A lot of novels begin in media res, and I have gotten quite comfortable with being confused for a number of pages, if not a number of chapters. When the confusion lasts longer than I would like, I sometimes read the forward or introduction if my edition comes with one. My edition of Henry Green's Loving comes with an introduction by John Updike, and I availed myself of it after stumbling through the first ten pages of the novel. I recharged my battery after reading that "Green, to me, is so good a writer, such a revealer of what English prose fiction can do in this century, that I can launch myself upon this piece of homage and introduction only by falling into some sort of imitation of that liberatingly ingenuous voice, that voice so full of other voices, its own interpolations amid the matchless dialogue twisted and tremulous with a precision that kept the softness of groping, of sensation, of living." Wow, that sounds good!
But I did not find it to be as exhilarating as Updike. It took me a quarter of the book to figure out who was who, and another quarter to feel comfortable with the cast of characters. Then I spent the last half trying to figure out why I was reading the book at all. The uniqueness of Green's voice was lost on me, but I did find his skill at dialogue most impressive. He had many scene transitions that were sharp and clever. And he had a few descriptions that were striking and poetic. But those moments of admiration were moments, disparate and free-floating, unanchored to any plot or theme that I could follow. Summaries of the novel focus on the division of the masters and their servants and on the characters raiding each others turf as the warring nations in Europe simultaneously war with each other, but to say that that is what this novel is about does not ring true for me. The servants gossiped and spied on each other, but nothing about it felt like it was echoing the fighting happening overseas for the characters.
In the end, it's Raunce's story above all others. He is promoted to Butler, falls in love with Edith, and in the end the two elope. There are some power struggles, but nothing is ever really on the line. There could not be said to be any hills or valleys in the story. It is telling that Green avoids any chapters, because chapters suggest a rhythm that I found the novel lacking. So in the end I feel like I didn't understand the novel at all. And my brief search through the interwebz did not shine any light on it. Here is a novelist admired by many, and a novel that has made it not only on this top-100 list but on several others as well. So I just want to understand why.
One of the things that I like about reading from a top-100 list is that I can assume that what I am reading is good or ground-breaking in its own way. When a book takes an odd turn or does something that I would never expect, I can assume that the author had a reason for doing so, that doing so is part of his or her very point. I don't expect all the novels to be gripping or to be great in every category (character, plot, pacing, writing, etc.), but I do expect each novel to be doing one of two things: Giving me a good yarn or saying something about the world we live in. The good yarn I can do without if the characters and world portrayed are vibrant and absorbing, which they are indeed in this novel. But I can't say that this novel is saying anything about anything.
So there it is. It's not the worst book I've read. It's not the lamest book I've read. It's not the most confusing book I've read. I just don't get it. So if anyone out there can enlighten me, please do!
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Lonely Hunters Make Good Company
In spite of my long silence, the search for smarts continues. I took some time to read Watership Down with my son and I have begun reading Dune aloud to Ann. It is one of her favorite books, but it is my first time reading it. In addition, I got lassoed into reading a free market economics book that is draining my soul.
But onward with the subject at hand: Carson McCullers's The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. We all have certain subject matters and writing styles that resonate with us on what feels like a primordial level, and McCullers and this novel do just that for me. Like Cannery Row and Winesburg, Ohio, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter takes a look at human suffering at its finest, at the efforts we make to reach out to the world around us, at the inevitable failure of those efforts. Every part of this novel was a joy to me. McCullers's writing is powerful in its straightforwardness and it manages to be wonderfully heartwrenching while steering clear of sentimental goop. Moreover, the writing never falls into self-congratulatory profundity even as it makes beautifully profound observations of human desires and interactions. The characters are vibrant and alive, seeming to exist beyond the borders of the page.
As Biff Brannon observes, the lonely creatures surrounding John Singer are able to cast their own image onto Singer due to his muteness. And as Singer observes, the three lonely hearts that seek him out are all obsessed with something they cannot get a hold of. McCullers makes it clear that Singer holds no special powers himself; in fact, he is equally obsessed with and equally able to write his own desires on Antonapoulos. Everyone is casting about to find a fellow soul that vibrates on the same frequency, and often we mistake our own eternal vibration for the like vibration of another.
All interactions in this novel miss their mark. Biff loves Mick, but she sees his attention as something malicious, her own guilty conscience turning his love into suspicion. Jake Blount and Dr. Copeland are fellow political activists who cannot trust themselves or others, who meet for one night of intense discussion only to fall apart and become more distant than ever. Singer's love for Antonapoulos is painful to watch since we know that that love is doomed from the first chapter. Each character has wonderful insights into those around them but is blind to his own motivations and doings. And it seems the more they stumble, the more lost they become. Mick's entrance into adulthood is of course the prime example of this. After her initiation into sexual adulthood, she withdraws not only from those around her, but from herself. She is no longer allowed into her own interior room. Her response is strikingly similar to Bubber's after shooting Baby in the face. Both have crossed a threshold after which childhood is lost, and with childhood, some understanding of ourselves and our own dreams.
Perhaps it is hope that the lonely heart hunts for, hope for a connection and for a world of possibilities. And when that hope dies, something dies in us. For Singer, that death is total. Without Antonapoulos, he has no reason to go on at all. For those who pinned their hopes on Singer, his death sends them into a spiral as well. Mick's estrangement from herself is complete, and Jake's groundedness is lost. We cannot see beyond ourselves. Worse yet, we cannot see within ourselves. Where does that leave us?
Biff seems to be the pivot point of the novel, insofar as he is left standing in the end. He is the only character rooted in the community. I suppose Copeland is certainly rooted, but his desires for a better world take him out and set him on the fringes, as does his skin. No, Biff is the only one settled and unmoving. He is as disconnected as the rest, but there is something resigned in him that allows him to keep soldiering on even as the world changes. His loneliness doesn't seem as painful, and I can't decide if that is an even sadder fate than that of the others.
I took so long to read this novel not because it was a difficult or slow read, but because I was eager for it not to end. I knew from the start that it was not going to end well, and I was in no rush for everything to unravel and slip away. The writing, the characters, the world--they were all too good to let go.
But onward with the subject at hand: Carson McCullers's The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. We all have certain subject matters and writing styles that resonate with us on what feels like a primordial level, and McCullers and this novel do just that for me. Like Cannery Row and Winesburg, Ohio, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter takes a look at human suffering at its finest, at the efforts we make to reach out to the world around us, at the inevitable failure of those efforts. Every part of this novel was a joy to me. McCullers's writing is powerful in its straightforwardness and it manages to be wonderfully heartwrenching while steering clear of sentimental goop. Moreover, the writing never falls into self-congratulatory profundity even as it makes beautifully profound observations of human desires and interactions. The characters are vibrant and alive, seeming to exist beyond the borders of the page.
As Biff Brannon observes, the lonely creatures surrounding John Singer are able to cast their own image onto Singer due to his muteness. And as Singer observes, the three lonely hearts that seek him out are all obsessed with something they cannot get a hold of. McCullers makes it clear that Singer holds no special powers himself; in fact, he is equally obsessed with and equally able to write his own desires on Antonapoulos. Everyone is casting about to find a fellow soul that vibrates on the same frequency, and often we mistake our own eternal vibration for the like vibration of another.
All interactions in this novel miss their mark. Biff loves Mick, but she sees his attention as something malicious, her own guilty conscience turning his love into suspicion. Jake Blount and Dr. Copeland are fellow political activists who cannot trust themselves or others, who meet for one night of intense discussion only to fall apart and become more distant than ever. Singer's love for Antonapoulos is painful to watch since we know that that love is doomed from the first chapter. Each character has wonderful insights into those around them but is blind to his own motivations and doings. And it seems the more they stumble, the more lost they become. Mick's entrance into adulthood is of course the prime example of this. After her initiation into sexual adulthood, she withdraws not only from those around her, but from herself. She is no longer allowed into her own interior room. Her response is strikingly similar to Bubber's after shooting Baby in the face. Both have crossed a threshold after which childhood is lost, and with childhood, some understanding of ourselves and our own dreams.
Perhaps it is hope that the lonely heart hunts for, hope for a connection and for a world of possibilities. And when that hope dies, something dies in us. For Singer, that death is total. Without Antonapoulos, he has no reason to go on at all. For those who pinned their hopes on Singer, his death sends them into a spiral as well. Mick's estrangement from herself is complete, and Jake's groundedness is lost. We cannot see beyond ourselves. Worse yet, we cannot see within ourselves. Where does that leave us?
Biff seems to be the pivot point of the novel, insofar as he is left standing in the end. He is the only character rooted in the community. I suppose Copeland is certainly rooted, but his desires for a better world take him out and set him on the fringes, as does his skin. No, Biff is the only one settled and unmoving. He is as disconnected as the rest, but there is something resigned in him that allows him to keep soldiering on even as the world changes. His loneliness doesn't seem as painful, and I can't decide if that is an even sadder fate than that of the others.
I took so long to read this novel not because it was a difficult or slow read, but because I was eager for it not to end. I knew from the start that it was not going to end well, and I was in no rush for everything to unravel and slip away. The writing, the characters, the world--they were all too good to let go.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Native Son Shines On
In Native Son, Bigger Thomas, a young black man, murders a teenage white girl, smothering her in her own bed, shoving her body into the family furnace, and cutting off her head so she can fit. Richard Wright does everything he can to make this experience difficult for his white readers. Mary Dalton, the murdered girl, is a young revolutionary who wants to help bring about a world of racial equality. Her mother and father hire Bigger knowing he's had a troubled past with the purpose of bettering him and his family. In addition, Bigger is something of a thug and a bully. When we meet him earlier, we see him intimidate and fight with his friends, turning fear into violence, masking his insecurities and worries by lashing out and humiliating others.
And in spite of stacking the deck against Bigger, Wright makes us feel for him, makes us understand him.
In 1940, the same year Native Son was published, Wright authored an essay entitled "How 'Bigger' was Born." In it, he talks about his motives for making Native Son difficult to react to emotionally:
"I had written a book of short stories which was published under the title of Uncle Tom's Children. When the reviews of that book began to appear, I realized that I had made an awfully naive mistake. I found that I had written a book which even bankers' daughters could read and weep over and feel good about. I swore to myself that if I ever wrote another book, no one would weep over it; that it would be so hard and deep that they would have to face it without the consolation of tears."
There is still one other passage in "How 'Bigger' was Born" that makes me truly appreciate how difficult it must have been for Wright to write this novel with Bigger at its center:
"I felt a mental censor--product of the fears which a negro feels from living in America--standing over me, draped in white, warning me not to write. This censor's warnings were translated into my own thought processes thus: 'What will white people think if I draw the picture of such a negro boy? Will they not at once say: "See, didn't we tell you all along that niggers are like that? Now, look, one of their own kind has come along and drawn the picture for us!"' I felt that if I drew the picture of Bigger truthfully, there would be many reactionary whites who would try to make of him something I did not intend. And yet, and this was what made it difficult, I knew that I could not write Bigger convincingly if I did not depict him as he was: that is, resentful toward whites, sullen, angry, ignorant, emotionally unstable, depressed and unaccountably elated at times, and unable even, because of his own lack of inner organization which American oppression has fostered in him, to unite with the members of his own race."
Bigger is why this book is so gripping. Don't get me wrong; the plot is incredibly well-crafted. By about page 50, I was thoroughly convinced that the Cohen Brothers needed to turn this book into a movie. While they have never really dealt with black America, I could see them treating the murder and Bigger's attempt to conceal the body with such skill. And the kidnapping idea? And the newspaper men gathered about the furnace? And the detective grilling Bigger in the cellar? So many scenes with such intensity, a single bad decision unfurling into a catastrophe. So, yes, the plot was top notch. But Wright's truly wonderful feat was how fully realized Bigger was, and how we are made to understand his impulses and desires whether we feel like him or not. Wright has done an incredible job.
The book on this reading list that I kept thinking about as I read Native Son was Dreiser's An American Tragedy. Both novels deal with the murder of a woman by a man who attempts to cover it up. In both novels the man is motivated by something uniquely "American" (at least as their authors' understand them). Both authors' took the basic story of the murder from current newspaper headlines. And both novels end with a lengthy trial scene and the state-sanctioned murder of the murderer. Dreiser's Clyde pre-plans his murder in an attempt to climb the social ladder by marrying a rich man's daughter. For Dreiser, this desire for wealth and social success is the thing that American society breeds in us. Wright's Bigger is the titular native son, a product of American Jim Crow culture. For as unpleasant as Bigger's character is, those unpleasantries are created by the restrictions and limitations that surround and press upon Bigger like the humid air of Chicago's Southside in Summer. He murders not by design, but by fear, a sudden impulse to survive. These are the origins of all Bigger's actions. Both authors use the trial to build sympathy for the murderer as the overzealous prosecutors attack them, trying to make their horrible crimes even more horrific. I would not be surprised to learn that Wright had Dreiser's novel rolling around in the back of his head.
Wright uses that last section to lay out the thesis of his book, and that portion of the book has been attacked as the weak link. I can understand that. After the gripping drama of the first two books, the pondering pace of the third section is something of a let down. But it feels like Wright is doing more than giving a defense of Bigger's actions. His lawyer's speech is a small portion of the section. Instead we watch as Bigger's actions are interpreted by the prosecutor and as crimes he didn't commit are laid upon him. And we watch as Bigger tries to find his place to live in this world. When he finally comes to peace in the last few pages, I don't know what to make of his lawyers reaction. Mr. Max seems scared of what Bigger says. Is he scared because Bigger's revelations are scary? Or is he scared for Bigger himself and his knowledge that he is on his way to the electric chair?
This entry is long enough, so I will not delve into the importance of communism in this novel, and while I suspect no one reading this (if anyone reads this) will care to join in, I leave that as an open question: Does communism hold the hope for a world of racial equality in this book? And I would also like to write a whole section on the role the newspapers play in shaping and skewing public opinion. Especially as it transforms the question of rape into a certainty. What role do newspapers play in oppression here?
If you haven't read this book, go out and read it now, even if I just spoiled half the novel's storyline. It is a wonderful read!
And in spite of stacking the deck against Bigger, Wright makes us feel for him, makes us understand him.
In 1940, the same year Native Son was published, Wright authored an essay entitled "How 'Bigger' was Born." In it, he talks about his motives for making Native Son difficult to react to emotionally:
"I had written a book of short stories which was published under the title of Uncle Tom's Children. When the reviews of that book began to appear, I realized that I had made an awfully naive mistake. I found that I had written a book which even bankers' daughters could read and weep over and feel good about. I swore to myself that if I ever wrote another book, no one would weep over it; that it would be so hard and deep that they would have to face it without the consolation of tears."
There is still one other passage in "How 'Bigger' was Born" that makes me truly appreciate how difficult it must have been for Wright to write this novel with Bigger at its center:
"I felt a mental censor--product of the fears which a negro feels from living in America--standing over me, draped in white, warning me not to write. This censor's warnings were translated into my own thought processes thus: 'What will white people think if I draw the picture of such a negro boy? Will they not at once say: "See, didn't we tell you all along that niggers are like that? Now, look, one of their own kind has come along and drawn the picture for us!"' I felt that if I drew the picture of Bigger truthfully, there would be many reactionary whites who would try to make of him something I did not intend. And yet, and this was what made it difficult, I knew that I could not write Bigger convincingly if I did not depict him as he was: that is, resentful toward whites, sullen, angry, ignorant, emotionally unstable, depressed and unaccountably elated at times, and unable even, because of his own lack of inner organization which American oppression has fostered in him, to unite with the members of his own race."
Bigger is why this book is so gripping. Don't get me wrong; the plot is incredibly well-crafted. By about page 50, I was thoroughly convinced that the Cohen Brothers needed to turn this book into a movie. While they have never really dealt with black America, I could see them treating the murder and Bigger's attempt to conceal the body with such skill. And the kidnapping idea? And the newspaper men gathered about the furnace? And the detective grilling Bigger in the cellar? So many scenes with such intensity, a single bad decision unfurling into a catastrophe. So, yes, the plot was top notch. But Wright's truly wonderful feat was how fully realized Bigger was, and how we are made to understand his impulses and desires whether we feel like him or not. Wright has done an incredible job.
The book on this reading list that I kept thinking about as I read Native Son was Dreiser's An American Tragedy. Both novels deal with the murder of a woman by a man who attempts to cover it up. In both novels the man is motivated by something uniquely "American" (at least as their authors' understand them). Both authors' took the basic story of the murder from current newspaper headlines. And both novels end with a lengthy trial scene and the state-sanctioned murder of the murderer. Dreiser's Clyde pre-plans his murder in an attempt to climb the social ladder by marrying a rich man's daughter. For Dreiser, this desire for wealth and social success is the thing that American society breeds in us. Wright's Bigger is the titular native son, a product of American Jim Crow culture. For as unpleasant as Bigger's character is, those unpleasantries are created by the restrictions and limitations that surround and press upon Bigger like the humid air of Chicago's Southside in Summer. He murders not by design, but by fear, a sudden impulse to survive. These are the origins of all Bigger's actions. Both authors use the trial to build sympathy for the murderer as the overzealous prosecutors attack them, trying to make their horrible crimes even more horrific. I would not be surprised to learn that Wright had Dreiser's novel rolling around in the back of his head.
Wright uses that last section to lay out the thesis of his book, and that portion of the book has been attacked as the weak link. I can understand that. After the gripping drama of the first two books, the pondering pace of the third section is something of a let down. But it feels like Wright is doing more than giving a defense of Bigger's actions. His lawyer's speech is a small portion of the section. Instead we watch as Bigger's actions are interpreted by the prosecutor and as crimes he didn't commit are laid upon him. And we watch as Bigger tries to find his place to live in this world. When he finally comes to peace in the last few pages, I don't know what to make of his lawyers reaction. Mr. Max seems scared of what Bigger says. Is he scared because Bigger's revelations are scary? Or is he scared for Bigger himself and his knowledge that he is on his way to the electric chair?
This entry is long enough, so I will not delve into the importance of communism in this novel, and while I suspect no one reading this (if anyone reads this) will care to join in, I leave that as an open question: Does communism hold the hope for a world of racial equality in this book? And I would also like to write a whole section on the role the newspapers play in shaping and skewing public opinion. Especially as it transforms the question of rape into a certainty. What role do newspapers play in oppression here?
If you haven't read this book, go out and read it now, even if I just spoiled half the novel's storyline. It is a wonderful read!
Sunday, August 14, 2011
A Milestone
We are officially a quarter of the way through the list of 100 novels! The books read so far are as follows:
1. A Passage to India (E.M. Forster)
2. An American Tragedy (Theodore Dreiser)
3. Mrs. Dalloway (Virginia Woolf)
4. The Great Gatsby (Scott Fitzgerald)
5. The Sun Also Rises (Ernest Hemingway)
6. Death Comes for the Archbishop (Willa Cather)
7. The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Thornton Wilder)
8. To the Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf)
9. Red Harvest (Dashiell Hammett)
10. The Sound and the Fury (William Faulkner)
11. Light in August (William Faulkner)
12. A Handful of Dust (Evelyn Waugh)
13. I, Claudius (Robert Graves)
14. Tropic of Cancer (Henry Miller)
15. Appointment in Samarra (John O'Hara)
16. Call It Sleep (Henry Roth)
17. Gone with the Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
18. Their Eyes Were Watching God (Zora Neale Hurston)
19. At Swim-Two-Birds (Flann O'Brien)
20. The Death of the Heart (Elizabeth Bowen)
21. The Big Sleep (Raymond Chandler)
22. The Day of the Locust (Nathanael West)
23. The Power and the Glory (Graham Greene)
24. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
25. The Man Who Loved Children (Christina Stead)
1. A Passage to India (E.M. Forster)
2. An American Tragedy (Theodore Dreiser)
3. Mrs. Dalloway (Virginia Woolf)
4. The Great Gatsby (Scott Fitzgerald)
5. The Sun Also Rises (Ernest Hemingway)
6. Death Comes for the Archbishop (Willa Cather)
7. The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Thornton Wilder)
8. To the Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf)
9. Red Harvest (Dashiell Hammett)
10. The Sound and the Fury (William Faulkner)
11. Light in August (William Faulkner)
12. A Handful of Dust (Evelyn Waugh)
13. I, Claudius (Robert Graves)
14. Tropic of Cancer (Henry Miller)
15. Appointment in Samarra (John O'Hara)
16. Call It Sleep (Henry Roth)
17. Gone with the Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
18. Their Eyes Were Watching God (Zora Neale Hurston)
19. At Swim-Two-Birds (Flann O'Brien)
20. The Death of the Heart (Elizabeth Bowen)
21. The Big Sleep (Raymond Chandler)
22. The Day of the Locust (Nathanael West)
23. The Power and the Glory (Graham Greene)
24. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
25. The Man Who Loved Children (Christina Stead)
The Man Who Had Mixed Feelings About The Man Who Loved Children
As always, this brief post contains spoilers, so if you plan on reading the book and want to be surprised by it, wait to read this.
But really, how many people are planning on reading this book? The title was vaguely familiar to me, and in spite of her having written over a dozen books, Christina Stead was entirely unknown to me. Add to that the odd looks I get from people when they see what I'm reading and their general statements that follow ("I should read more," "I haven't read for fun since high school," "Oh I don't read novels or fiction," etc.) and I think poor Ms. Stead has a slim chance of having her novel read much. And as I say in nearly every post here, that is one of the reasons I am glad to be doing this project: even if I personally wouldn't put a book in my own personal top 100 list, I am being exposed to works and ideas that I never would have otherwise, works and ideas that have made an impression on the world and culture both past and present.
And no, The Man Who Loved Children would not be in my personal top 100 list. The book is very long for its subject matter and the plot seems to tread water through the middle 200 pages or so as we witness the same fights, the same troubles, the same manipulations that are the daily bread of the Pollit family without building to anything, without that slow turning of the screw. At about page 350 (my edition has 527 pages), I began to despair that the book was one long character piece that would end exactly where it began and I would have wasted two weeks worth of reading. What was odd was that I felt like Stead was being very intelligent and that she knew what she wanted to accomplish even as I felt like the book was going nowhere. How is that possible? But indeed, the final 60 or so pages were dynamite and brought the story to a wonderful conclusion.
Part of the difficulty of the story is that you are not allowed to hold on to any characters comfortably. In some books, our heroes have faults, but we love them anyway. In fact, we love them because of their faults. Their faults make them human and in some way make them tolerable. Without those faults they would be too good and the story to saccharine. But in The Man Who Loved Children, I found myself loving and hating all of the main characters in nearly equal proportion, which makes it very hard to navigate. Henny Pollit is endearing in her cavalier approach to parenting, but she says such nasty things to the children that laughter becomes uncomfortable. Sam's childish view of the world is amusing and his genuine love of life makes him very likable, but his tyranny over his children by inserting himself in everything they do, his mean-spirited mockery of what he sees as their faults, his views on Eugenics and women that made the muscles in my neck grow taught--all these things made him despicable even as he was charming and likeable. This war between the two parents had no clear superior.
And even Louie, the oldest daughter, whose story I think this is, truly--even she is not someone you can simply cheer on. She is a wonderful character who combines Sam's imaginative reconstruction of the world and Henny's emotional mystery to be something entirely her own. She is the child we follow most, and she is the child around whom the climax pivots and sways. Stead does not feel any need to stay with Louie much and gladly goes trotting off to Singapore with Sam and to illicit lunch dates with Henny. She fleshes out these two forces with emotional distance and with love that made me suspect Stead was working through her own childhood. And Louie, in all her awkwardness, ugliness, ungainliness, is a beautiful child whose single goal is to survive this upbringing. In many ways, this novel could be retitled "The Artist as a Young Girl Trying to Survive Her Wack-A-Doo Home and Childhood."
It is my belief that we dislike novels and movies most when they aren't the movies and novels that we want to see. Why did they do that?, we ask because the character we want to cheer on wouldn't do that. Why did they have that scene at all?, we ask because we would rather they tell the story that is in our head. Why did that character live while this one died?, we cry because it is not the way we would have done it. And I think that those reactions were the ones I was having when the book most unsettled me. I wanted Sam to have some sort of reckoning, some moment where he is forced to face reality and see his manipulations for what they were. Stead couldn't do that for me because that wasn't her purpose. Sam's selfishness and egocentrism is so complete that he cannot look outside himself but for fleeting moments before his ego rushes into the room and starts rearranging the furniture back the way it was. I wanted Henny to become something of a hero who caused Sam to have that reckoning, but Stead couldn't do that for me because Henny is every bit as broken as Sam, but in her own way. I wanted Louie to rise above the muck and make something good come from this chaos of her childhood, but Stead couldn't do that for me because Louis is a girl who grows from 11 to 15 in the course of the novel, filled with hormones and emotional scars from her two parents. The book is not a realistic novel, but there is an emotional realism that Stead is bound by and that emotional realism is the story she wants to tell whether I want her to or not.
My effort in all my posts for this project has been to meet the novelists and novels where they are, to read the books they have written, not find them faulty for not writing the books I thought they should have written. And when I finish any novel of this sort, I find the things that seem odd and start with the assumption that these things were not added and left in accidentally but that they were purposeful constructions of the novelist. As purposeful constructions, the novelist left them in for some purpose; the secret to appreciating the novel for what it is is to come to some understanding of these story outcroppings that at first glance mar the landscape. So if I seem too full of praise for these books, too generous with my criticism and analysis it is only because I give the books the benefit of my doubt.
So in the end, chewing on the scenes and picking the characters from my teeth, rolling them over my palate and savoring the different flavors, I find that I like the book and would recommend it to others. The writing is wonderful and the characters and world created are impressively complete. Actually, one of the main reason I would recommend it is so I can talk to someone about it to help me figure out what is going on here still more. So if any of you out there have read it and want to weigh in with your thoughts, I would greatly appreciate it.
But really, how many people are planning on reading this book? The title was vaguely familiar to me, and in spite of her having written over a dozen books, Christina Stead was entirely unknown to me. Add to that the odd looks I get from people when they see what I'm reading and their general statements that follow ("I should read more," "I haven't read for fun since high school," "Oh I don't read novels or fiction," etc.) and I think poor Ms. Stead has a slim chance of having her novel read much. And as I say in nearly every post here, that is one of the reasons I am glad to be doing this project: even if I personally wouldn't put a book in my own personal top 100 list, I am being exposed to works and ideas that I never would have otherwise, works and ideas that have made an impression on the world and culture both past and present.
And no, The Man Who Loved Children would not be in my personal top 100 list. The book is very long for its subject matter and the plot seems to tread water through the middle 200 pages or so as we witness the same fights, the same troubles, the same manipulations that are the daily bread of the Pollit family without building to anything, without that slow turning of the screw. At about page 350 (my edition has 527 pages), I began to despair that the book was one long character piece that would end exactly where it began and I would have wasted two weeks worth of reading. What was odd was that I felt like Stead was being very intelligent and that she knew what she wanted to accomplish even as I felt like the book was going nowhere. How is that possible? But indeed, the final 60 or so pages were dynamite and brought the story to a wonderful conclusion.
Part of the difficulty of the story is that you are not allowed to hold on to any characters comfortably. In some books, our heroes have faults, but we love them anyway. In fact, we love them because of their faults. Their faults make them human and in some way make them tolerable. Without those faults they would be too good and the story to saccharine. But in The Man Who Loved Children, I found myself loving and hating all of the main characters in nearly equal proportion, which makes it very hard to navigate. Henny Pollit is endearing in her cavalier approach to parenting, but she says such nasty things to the children that laughter becomes uncomfortable. Sam's childish view of the world is amusing and his genuine love of life makes him very likable, but his tyranny over his children by inserting himself in everything they do, his mean-spirited mockery of what he sees as their faults, his views on Eugenics and women that made the muscles in my neck grow taught--all these things made him despicable even as he was charming and likeable. This war between the two parents had no clear superior.
And even Louie, the oldest daughter, whose story I think this is, truly--even she is not someone you can simply cheer on. She is a wonderful character who combines Sam's imaginative reconstruction of the world and Henny's emotional mystery to be something entirely her own. She is the child we follow most, and she is the child around whom the climax pivots and sways. Stead does not feel any need to stay with Louie much and gladly goes trotting off to Singapore with Sam and to illicit lunch dates with Henny. She fleshes out these two forces with emotional distance and with love that made me suspect Stead was working through her own childhood. And Louie, in all her awkwardness, ugliness, ungainliness, is a beautiful child whose single goal is to survive this upbringing. In many ways, this novel could be retitled "The Artist as a Young Girl Trying to Survive Her Wack-A-Doo Home and Childhood."
It is my belief that we dislike novels and movies most when they aren't the movies and novels that we want to see. Why did they do that?, we ask because the character we want to cheer on wouldn't do that. Why did they have that scene at all?, we ask because we would rather they tell the story that is in our head. Why did that character live while this one died?, we cry because it is not the way we would have done it. And I think that those reactions were the ones I was having when the book most unsettled me. I wanted Sam to have some sort of reckoning, some moment where he is forced to face reality and see his manipulations for what they were. Stead couldn't do that for me because that wasn't her purpose. Sam's selfishness and egocentrism is so complete that he cannot look outside himself but for fleeting moments before his ego rushes into the room and starts rearranging the furniture back the way it was. I wanted Henny to become something of a hero who caused Sam to have that reckoning, but Stead couldn't do that for me because Henny is every bit as broken as Sam, but in her own way. I wanted Louie to rise above the muck and make something good come from this chaos of her childhood, but Stead couldn't do that for me because Louis is a girl who grows from 11 to 15 in the course of the novel, filled with hormones and emotional scars from her two parents. The book is not a realistic novel, but there is an emotional realism that Stead is bound by and that emotional realism is the story she wants to tell whether I want her to or not.
My effort in all my posts for this project has been to meet the novelists and novels where they are, to read the books they have written, not find them faulty for not writing the books I thought they should have written. And when I finish any novel of this sort, I find the things that seem odd and start with the assumption that these things were not added and left in accidentally but that they were purposeful constructions of the novelist. As purposeful constructions, the novelist left them in for some purpose; the secret to appreciating the novel for what it is is to come to some understanding of these story outcroppings that at first glance mar the landscape. So if I seem too full of praise for these books, too generous with my criticism and analysis it is only because I give the books the benefit of my doubt.
So in the end, chewing on the scenes and picking the characters from my teeth, rolling them over my palate and savoring the different flavors, I find that I like the book and would recommend it to others. The writing is wonderful and the characters and world created are impressively complete. Actually, one of the main reason I would recommend it is so I can talk to someone about it to help me figure out what is going on here still more. So if any of you out there have read it and want to weigh in with your thoughts, I would greatly appreciate it.
Monday, July 25, 2011
The Greatness of Grapes
The Grapes of Wrath is my favorite book of all time. It is everything that I look for in a story. I want a gripping story of characters I can see and feel. I want sentences and paragraphs I can sink my teeth into. I want a world so fully developed that every part of the story feels right at home. I want to walk away from the story satisfied in my mind, my heart, and my soul. The story of Tom Joad and his family does all that for me.
I was struck on this reading by the simplicity of the story. To trace the Joad's odyssey from beginning to end is to draw a direct line with only 15 or so dots. There are no complicated plot twists, no big reveals, and very few surprises, and yet the whole thing is riveting! The book does not slump or slow at any point for me, even when I know what is going to happen.
And to take that simple story and interlace it with the larger story of all the migrants surrounding the Joads was brilliantly done. The Joads and their trials always exist in a context that is as beautifully written as the main narrative.
It is sad that this book is wasted on high schoolers who are looking to avoid reading it in the first place. The book is taught, I think, for wonderful reasons: it's a classic, it's beautifully written, it allows students to learn about the dust bowl and the depression. But how can your typical high schooler appreciate the language, the dialogue, the details, its genre as a protest novel? I would say that it can't hurt to expose them to this book, except most of us walk around groaning at the title, at this piece of capital-L Literature precisely because it was forced on us. And what high schooler didn't get sick of talking about the turtle in chapter three?
For me, Grapes of Wrath is a perfect book, and I couldn't be happier that it made this list.
I was struck on this reading by the simplicity of the story. To trace the Joad's odyssey from beginning to end is to draw a direct line with only 15 or so dots. There are no complicated plot twists, no big reveals, and very few surprises, and yet the whole thing is riveting! The book does not slump or slow at any point for me, even when I know what is going to happen.
And to take that simple story and interlace it with the larger story of all the migrants surrounding the Joads was brilliantly done. The Joads and their trials always exist in a context that is as beautifully written as the main narrative.
It is sad that this book is wasted on high schoolers who are looking to avoid reading it in the first place. The book is taught, I think, for wonderful reasons: it's a classic, it's beautifully written, it allows students to learn about the dust bowl and the depression. But how can your typical high schooler appreciate the language, the dialogue, the details, its genre as a protest novel? I would say that it can't hurt to expose them to this book, except most of us walk around groaning at the title, at this piece of capital-L Literature precisely because it was forced on us. And what high schooler didn't get sick of talking about the turtle in chapter three?
For me, Grapes of Wrath is a perfect book, and I couldn't be happier that it made this list.
Monday, June 27, 2011
When Bad Men Do Good: Graham Greene's The Power and the Glory
Graham Greene is a name I have been familiar with for a long time, but until now, I have not read any of his books. One summer, on a long drive, I listened to a BBC radio play of his book Our Man in Havana, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. But The Power and The Glory is the first of his books that I have read. And according to all the little blurbs that come with my edition, it is his masterpiece.
I am not a religious man, and trials of religious people do not typically move me. There is no exception here for the unnamed priest at the center of The Power and The Glory. I can respect his struggles, and I understand his dilemma, but for the most part I was not moved by his inner religious turmoil. That said, however, I really enjoyed this book and really enjoyed the main character we follow around because even as the book is about the trials of a persecuted priest among persecuted people, it is the people and not the religion that Greene studies and discusses.
When I learned in the biographical sketch at the head of my edition that Greene converted to Catholicism when he was 26, I was very wary about what I was about to read. That knowledge acted like a lens, affecting the way I started into the book, the symbols and lessons I looked around for. That lens fell away as I got a quarter of the way into the book and simply enjoyed the story and the writing. Greene creates crisp, clear, and evocative sentences. He seemingly effortlessly creates a scene with deft description and characters come to life through their dialogue and interaction. I never found myself wanting the scenes to move faster or for the plot to develop quicker, nor did I wish to linger longer. It all moved so perfectly. And then, as I neared the end, as the whiskey priest neared the end of his journey, I suspiciously picked that lens back up and read on expecting one of two things. Either the priest was going to get his absolution and become an appropriate martyr, or he would be denied confession and die ingloriously.
Greene did something I didn't expect and he did it with great skill. The whiskey priest does indeed die without confession, without repenting of his own scenes AND he becomes a proper martyr, believably. There is nothing superhuman in the priest's fate. He does not find God's strength to face his execution. He does not transcend to some higher spiritual level in meeting his death, but it is that incredible humanity that makes his death meaningful. Unlike Christ, the priest is a man steeped in sin, but like Christ, he dies with the sins and confessions of everyone who called on him. He gave his life to hear the last confession, and he did it without seeming ridiculously pious. And his last word, overheard by the dentist, before the firing squad let loose, was "excuse." What a great and ambiguous word! Was he making an excuse for his own behavior, pleading for a stay of execution, or speaking to God as Christ upon the cross, asking him to "excuse" their murdering him, for they know not what they do? In this conclusion, Greene allows tragedy and hope to come together in a beautiful balance. He gives us the ending that the priest becomes a martyr but without it becoming a cheesy tale of morality. Greene gives it all to us, and you cannot ask for a better ending than that.
The thing Greene explores throughout the novel and the priests travels is the difference between the man and the role he performs. The priest can be a bad man, a bad priest, and still do good. He can be the horrible example he fears he is and still bring God to people. There are no wicked characters in this book; and there are certainly no saints. But what the people are like on the inside, what motivates them and occupies their mind, are different from the effect they have on other people and the world around them. The lieutenant is a kind-hearted man who gives money to a struggling man and seeks to eliminate the church for what he sees as the good of the people, but he is ready to execute innocents to reach his goal. The fang-toothed mestizo is another great example of the person and the role being at odds.
Graham Greene is another author that I plan to return too when this experiment is over. I love his writing, his plotting, and his combination of intellect and intuition to create a riveting and rewarding story.
I am not a religious man, and trials of religious people do not typically move me. There is no exception here for the unnamed priest at the center of The Power and The Glory. I can respect his struggles, and I understand his dilemma, but for the most part I was not moved by his inner religious turmoil. That said, however, I really enjoyed this book and really enjoyed the main character we follow around because even as the book is about the trials of a persecuted priest among persecuted people, it is the people and not the religion that Greene studies and discusses.
When I learned in the biographical sketch at the head of my edition that Greene converted to Catholicism when he was 26, I was very wary about what I was about to read. That knowledge acted like a lens, affecting the way I started into the book, the symbols and lessons I looked around for. That lens fell away as I got a quarter of the way into the book and simply enjoyed the story and the writing. Greene creates crisp, clear, and evocative sentences. He seemingly effortlessly creates a scene with deft description and characters come to life through their dialogue and interaction. I never found myself wanting the scenes to move faster or for the plot to develop quicker, nor did I wish to linger longer. It all moved so perfectly. And then, as I neared the end, as the whiskey priest neared the end of his journey, I suspiciously picked that lens back up and read on expecting one of two things. Either the priest was going to get his absolution and become an appropriate martyr, or he would be denied confession and die ingloriously.
Greene did something I didn't expect and he did it with great skill. The whiskey priest does indeed die without confession, without repenting of his own scenes AND he becomes a proper martyr, believably. There is nothing superhuman in the priest's fate. He does not find God's strength to face his execution. He does not transcend to some higher spiritual level in meeting his death, but it is that incredible humanity that makes his death meaningful. Unlike Christ, the priest is a man steeped in sin, but like Christ, he dies with the sins and confessions of everyone who called on him. He gave his life to hear the last confession, and he did it without seeming ridiculously pious. And his last word, overheard by the dentist, before the firing squad let loose, was "excuse." What a great and ambiguous word! Was he making an excuse for his own behavior, pleading for a stay of execution, or speaking to God as Christ upon the cross, asking him to "excuse" their murdering him, for they know not what they do? In this conclusion, Greene allows tragedy and hope to come together in a beautiful balance. He gives us the ending that the priest becomes a martyr but without it becoming a cheesy tale of morality. Greene gives it all to us, and you cannot ask for a better ending than that.
The thing Greene explores throughout the novel and the priests travels is the difference between the man and the role he performs. The priest can be a bad man, a bad priest, and still do good. He can be the horrible example he fears he is and still bring God to people. There are no wicked characters in this book; and there are certainly no saints. But what the people are like on the inside, what motivates them and occupies their mind, are different from the effect they have on other people and the world around them. The lieutenant is a kind-hearted man who gives money to a struggling man and seeks to eliminate the church for what he sees as the good of the people, but he is ready to execute innocents to reach his goal. The fang-toothed mestizo is another great example of the person and the role being at odds.
Graham Greene is another author that I plan to return too when this experiment is over. I love his writing, his plotting, and his combination of intellect and intuition to create a riveting and rewarding story.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
The Day of the Locust
As always, my review/essay contains all kinds of spoilers, so if you want to read The Day of the Locust without having anything ruined for you, go read it first and then come back. And I highly recommend reading it. It is a rather short book but one that is wonderfully written and culturally weighty, I think.
Reading Nathanael West's Day of the Locust is exactly why I love this project. It is quite possible that without this reading quest I would never have discovered this incredible writer or this thoughtful novel.
Like many of my favorite novels, Day of the Locust places its characters in a particular cultural moment and the two are thoroughly intertwined. West is able to tell a compelling story and make a larger comment on American society without ever feeling pretentious or ridiculous. West does what Tod thinks painter Alessandro Magnasco would do with his subjects: "He would not satirize them as Hogarth or Dumier might, nor would he pity them. He would paint their fury with respect, appreciating its awful, anarchic power and aware that they had it in them to destroy civilization." Like Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Anderson, and others of his time, West keeps a neutral, distant tone that respects both the characters and the readers while showing us something deep in the ways of human beings.
In a lot of ways, this novel reminded me of The Great Gatsby; only, it's The Great Gatsby turned on its head. Nick Carraway and Tod Hackett are both observers of the drama surrounding them, and both are involved without actually creating any of the drama. Nick is a transplant in the east coast, moved to New York to be a part of the financial heart of the country. Tod is a transplant on the west coast, moved to L.A., to be a part of the entertainment heart of the country. Fitzgerald uses his novel to comment on the excesses of the culture and the role that finances and wealth play in that corruption. West uses his novel to comment on the excesses of the culture and the role that entertainment and movies play in that corruption. But where Fitzgerald takes us into the lives of those who are at the center of wealth and the cultural scene, West plays around the outskirts of the entertainment industry, with the extras, the vaudevillian actors, and all those hovering on the edges.
West is quite explicit in his cultural analysis at the end of the novel when the riot breaks out in Hollywood and Tod connects that riot to the painting he has been working on through the entirety of the novel, "The Burning of Los Angeles." The masses have been lulled into working and working so that they can buy some leisure time and partake in the American Dream, but when they actually get there, they see how hollow it all is and they become restless, bored:
Their boredom becomes more and more terrible. They realize that
they have been tricked and burn with resentment. Every day of
their lives they read the newspapers and went to the movies.
Both fed them on lynchings, murder, sex crimes, explosions, wrecks,
love nests, fires, miracles, revolutions, wars. This daily diet
made sophisticates of them. The sun is a joke. Oranges can't
titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough
to make taut their slack minds and bodies. They have been cheated
and betrayed. They have saved and saved for nothing.
Hackett notes that "all those poor devils . . . can only be stirred by the promise of miracles and then only to violence." And it's important to note that the riot is one of the middle class: "Tod could see very few people who looked tough, nor could he see any working me. The crowd was made up of the lower middle classes."
In some ways the riot at the end of the novel was jarring, because West had focused on individuals up to that point, not on masses of people. But what this technique does is cause you to reevaluate what you have read up to this point, to comb back through the novel and see the world hovering around the edges of Faye, Harry, Tod, Earle, Miguel, and Homer. And in doing so, we see that we have only been looking at a corner of West's canvas, picking out individual faces in a crowd. The ending is like a an epic pull-back of a camera in a movie, showing us the full landscape of destruction for the first time.
The whole is written upon the parts, however, I believe, and the individual characters echo the larger world of the novel. Faye, or instance, is like Hollywood and the dream that keeps everyone coming out and staying in L.A. It is obvious to everyone what she is. Tod sees right through her but wants her all the same. She is promiscuous, but he sees something innocent as well. She is not bright, but he sees that she has moments of self-awareness. Everyone flocks around her like those chasing the dream. Homer is the hard working lower middle class that saves and saves and is left only with boredom and disappointment. West consistently describes him as a poorly constructed automaton who is made up of disparate parts that don't talk to each other. His hands are alive and act by themselves, just like the crowd is made up of all these parts but act with one destructive force. And for as gentle and restrained as Homer is, one day that rock will strike him in the face and he will explode and destroy, beating adore without thought or mercy. His explosion of course mirrors the riot that sweeps Todd away.
What amazes me is that West does all this while simultaneously creating real characters and an absorbing story. This is not a political tract dressed up like a novel; this is a novel with a social conscience. And still more amazingly, West's critique feels like it could just have easily been made yesterday as over 70 years ago.
When this list is done (in five years?) I will definitely come back to read West's Miss Lonelyhearts, which is paired with The Day of the Locust in my edition. So wonderful!
Reading Nathanael West's Day of the Locust is exactly why I love this project. It is quite possible that without this reading quest I would never have discovered this incredible writer or this thoughtful novel.
Like many of my favorite novels, Day of the Locust places its characters in a particular cultural moment and the two are thoroughly intertwined. West is able to tell a compelling story and make a larger comment on American society without ever feeling pretentious or ridiculous. West does what Tod thinks painter Alessandro Magnasco would do with his subjects: "He would not satirize them as Hogarth or Dumier might, nor would he pity them. He would paint their fury with respect, appreciating its awful, anarchic power and aware that they had it in them to destroy civilization." Like Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Anderson, and others of his time, West keeps a neutral, distant tone that respects both the characters and the readers while showing us something deep in the ways of human beings.
In a lot of ways, this novel reminded me of The Great Gatsby; only, it's The Great Gatsby turned on its head. Nick Carraway and Tod Hackett are both observers of the drama surrounding them, and both are involved without actually creating any of the drama. Nick is a transplant in the east coast, moved to New York to be a part of the financial heart of the country. Tod is a transplant on the west coast, moved to L.A., to be a part of the entertainment heart of the country. Fitzgerald uses his novel to comment on the excesses of the culture and the role that finances and wealth play in that corruption. West uses his novel to comment on the excesses of the culture and the role that entertainment and movies play in that corruption. But where Fitzgerald takes us into the lives of those who are at the center of wealth and the cultural scene, West plays around the outskirts of the entertainment industry, with the extras, the vaudevillian actors, and all those hovering on the edges.
West is quite explicit in his cultural analysis at the end of the novel when the riot breaks out in Hollywood and Tod connects that riot to the painting he has been working on through the entirety of the novel, "The Burning of Los Angeles." The masses have been lulled into working and working so that they can buy some leisure time and partake in the American Dream, but when they actually get there, they see how hollow it all is and they become restless, bored:
Their boredom becomes more and more terrible. They realize that
they have been tricked and burn with resentment. Every day of
their lives they read the newspapers and went to the movies.
Both fed them on lynchings, murder, sex crimes, explosions, wrecks,
love nests, fires, miracles, revolutions, wars. This daily diet
made sophisticates of them. The sun is a joke. Oranges can't
titillate their jaded palates. Nothing can ever be violent enough
to make taut their slack minds and bodies. They have been cheated
and betrayed. They have saved and saved for nothing.
Hackett notes that "all those poor devils . . . can only be stirred by the promise of miracles and then only to violence." And it's important to note that the riot is one of the middle class: "Tod could see very few people who looked tough, nor could he see any working me. The crowd was made up of the lower middle classes."
In some ways the riot at the end of the novel was jarring, because West had focused on individuals up to that point, not on masses of people. But what this technique does is cause you to reevaluate what you have read up to this point, to comb back through the novel and see the world hovering around the edges of Faye, Harry, Tod, Earle, Miguel, and Homer. And in doing so, we see that we have only been looking at a corner of West's canvas, picking out individual faces in a crowd. The ending is like a an epic pull-back of a camera in a movie, showing us the full landscape of destruction for the first time.
The whole is written upon the parts, however, I believe, and the individual characters echo the larger world of the novel. Faye, or instance, is like Hollywood and the dream that keeps everyone coming out and staying in L.A. It is obvious to everyone what she is. Tod sees right through her but wants her all the same. She is promiscuous, but he sees something innocent as well. She is not bright, but he sees that she has moments of self-awareness. Everyone flocks around her like those chasing the dream. Homer is the hard working lower middle class that saves and saves and is left only with boredom and disappointment. West consistently describes him as a poorly constructed automaton who is made up of disparate parts that don't talk to each other. His hands are alive and act by themselves, just like the crowd is made up of all these parts but act with one destructive force. And for as gentle and restrained as Homer is, one day that rock will strike him in the face and he will explode and destroy, beating adore without thought or mercy. His explosion of course mirrors the riot that sweeps Todd away.
What amazes me is that West does all this while simultaneously creating real characters and an absorbing story. This is not a political tract dressed up like a novel; this is a novel with a social conscience. And still more amazingly, West's critique feels like it could just have easily been made yesterday as over 70 years ago.
When this list is done (in five years?) I will definitely come back to read West's Miss Lonelyhearts, which is paired with The Day of the Locust in my edition. So wonderful!
Thursday, June 9, 2011
The Big Sleep
You would think that after you read Tropic of Cancer nothing could shock you. But shock is always contextual. An F-bomb amongst a crowd of profanities is barely noticed, whereas the same bomb dropped in a preschool classroom gets a lot more attention. In addition, Tropic of Cancer was not a massively popular book, but The Big Sleep was. I had seen the movie, and I didn't remember anything too racy, just a lot of sharp talk and cigarette smoke. But the book has plenty of pornography, nudity, drugs, sex, and adult behavior. I wasn't expecting it. And when one character responds to Marlowe by saying, "Go ------ yourself," that dash spoke louder than any paragraph in Henry Miller's work.
But that dash, how interesting! I have seen swear words in just about every book on the list. But this book, a book written for adults, refrains. It refrains not from the sentiment, but from the word itself. And for some reason, that decision captures the moral spirit of this book. The sentiment of adult seediness is all there, but there is a big dash hovering over it. That sentiment and that dash are both in the lead character and narrator, Philip Marlowe.
In my memory, Marlowe was a worldly guy, a ladies man, a tough guy whom nothing surprises. And my memory is pretty spot on. Except that he might as well have a halo over his head. He strikes me as a noir Rhett Butler, a guy who plays the scumbag, hangs with the scumbags, but in his heart is something else. Marlowe can talk the talk and solve the puzzles, read people and anticipate their next move, but there is nothing rotten at his center. He may drink more than is approved of today, but he is unaffected by his alcohol consumption. He can drive, fight, think on his feet and resist temptation no matter how much booze is sloshing around in his belly. Here is a guy who has the opportunity to sleep with a number of women and doesn't once. He doesn't even seem to feel the temptation. Not once does he need to take a cold shower.
Instead, the thing that he cares about is an old, dying man who in turn cares about the well-being of his daughter's missing husband. The women are femme fatales every one, but their dance is made on the periphery of the action, an action that works between men. And just so that you don't go thinking Marlowe and his fellows are gay, Chandler gives us real homosexuals to contrast with Marlowe's masculinity. When the young lover swings at Marlowe, he lets you know they are different, he and the gay fighter: "It was meant to be a hard [punch], but a pansy has no iron in his bones, whatever he looks like." Being gay makes you weak, and Marlowe is not weak. And he is not gay either. He isn't. So stop considering it. Just stop it.
No, he isn't gay; he is a catcher in the rye, only it's not children running through the rye. It's the old man. The big moral responsibility in Marlowe's adventure is to keep the old man from discovering how rotten his corrupted daughters are and that Regan has been shot and killed by one of them.
And this tenderness that Marlowe feels for Sternwood (yeah, that sounds like an erection), and Sternwood's tenderness for Regan are set up in opposition to all the other relationships in the novel. In this world, relationships are leverage, bargaining positions that can shift as the individual's needs shift. This is a novel of alliances, not love. Los Angeles is a corrupt place where cops can be bought, pornographers protected, murderers hidden and everyone can be betrayed. And Marlowe can navigate all these shark infested waters even as he holds his moral lamp above the waters. So like Mitchell, Chandler wants it both ways--a hard and gritty novel with sentimentality tucked into the harsh folds and slid into the sharp corners.
This is a famous novel not just because it is a great storyline, not just because it is representative of a whole genre, not just because it's an excellent mystery. This novel is also beautifully written. The overstated similes that seem to be the hallmark of private detective fiction are genuine and powerful in this novel. Hell, I found them to be downright poetic. For example, "So she giggled. Very cute. The giggles got louder and ran around the corners of the room like rats behind the wainscoting." That is everything a simile should be! Those giggles become a physical thing with a tangible character. Chandler does an incredible job describing his scenes with precision and color and his characters have voices you can hear, and not just because you've watched enough black-and-white movies to know the accent. The plot develops with mystery and inevitability and never gets muddled. This book is on the this list because Chandler is a superb writer.
If I had time I would love to compare The Big Sleep to Red Harvest. If there is anyone out there playing along, I would love to hear your own thoughts. Till then, I'll take my two fingers of scotch and get back to work under intermittent light of the neon sign outside my window.
But that dash, how interesting! I have seen swear words in just about every book on the list. But this book, a book written for adults, refrains. It refrains not from the sentiment, but from the word itself. And for some reason, that decision captures the moral spirit of this book. The sentiment of adult seediness is all there, but there is a big dash hovering over it. That sentiment and that dash are both in the lead character and narrator, Philip Marlowe.
In my memory, Marlowe was a worldly guy, a ladies man, a tough guy whom nothing surprises. And my memory is pretty spot on. Except that he might as well have a halo over his head. He strikes me as a noir Rhett Butler, a guy who plays the scumbag, hangs with the scumbags, but in his heart is something else. Marlowe can talk the talk and solve the puzzles, read people and anticipate their next move, but there is nothing rotten at his center. He may drink more than is approved of today, but he is unaffected by his alcohol consumption. He can drive, fight, think on his feet and resist temptation no matter how much booze is sloshing around in his belly. Here is a guy who has the opportunity to sleep with a number of women and doesn't once. He doesn't even seem to feel the temptation. Not once does he need to take a cold shower.
Instead, the thing that he cares about is an old, dying man who in turn cares about the well-being of his daughter's missing husband. The women are femme fatales every one, but their dance is made on the periphery of the action, an action that works between men. And just so that you don't go thinking Marlowe and his fellows are gay, Chandler gives us real homosexuals to contrast with Marlowe's masculinity. When the young lover swings at Marlowe, he lets you know they are different, he and the gay fighter: "It was meant to be a hard [punch], but a pansy has no iron in his bones, whatever he looks like." Being gay makes you weak, and Marlowe is not weak. And he is not gay either. He isn't. So stop considering it. Just stop it.
No, he isn't gay; he is a catcher in the rye, only it's not children running through the rye. It's the old man. The big moral responsibility in Marlowe's adventure is to keep the old man from discovering how rotten his corrupted daughters are and that Regan has been shot and killed by one of them.
And this tenderness that Marlowe feels for Sternwood (yeah, that sounds like an erection), and Sternwood's tenderness for Regan are set up in opposition to all the other relationships in the novel. In this world, relationships are leverage, bargaining positions that can shift as the individual's needs shift. This is a novel of alliances, not love. Los Angeles is a corrupt place where cops can be bought, pornographers protected, murderers hidden and everyone can be betrayed. And Marlowe can navigate all these shark infested waters even as he holds his moral lamp above the waters. So like Mitchell, Chandler wants it both ways--a hard and gritty novel with sentimentality tucked into the harsh folds and slid into the sharp corners.
This is a famous novel not just because it is a great storyline, not just because it is representative of a whole genre, not just because it's an excellent mystery. This novel is also beautifully written. The overstated similes that seem to be the hallmark of private detective fiction are genuine and powerful in this novel. Hell, I found them to be downright poetic. For example, "So she giggled. Very cute. The giggles got louder and ran around the corners of the room like rats behind the wainscoting." That is everything a simile should be! Those giggles become a physical thing with a tangible character. Chandler does an incredible job describing his scenes with precision and color and his characters have voices you can hear, and not just because you've watched enough black-and-white movies to know the accent. The plot develops with mystery and inevitability and never gets muddled. This book is on the this list because Chandler is a superb writer.
If I had time I would love to compare The Big Sleep to Red Harvest. If there is anyone out there playing along, I would love to hear your own thoughts. Till then, I'll take my two fingers of scotch and get back to work under intermittent light of the neon sign outside my window.
Monday, May 16, 2011
The Death of the Heart - Not a Laughing Matter
Elizabeth Bowen's The Death of the Heart is a quiet novel. Taking place largely in the upper-class home of Anna and Thomas Quayne, the story plays out like a novel of manners, with guests coming and going and people being rather polite to each other. Or at least they seem to be polite to each other, and it is in that seeming that Bowen's story finds its strength. This two-faced behavior is commonplace enough and shouldn't surprise anyone. But the lies told, the secrets kept, and secrets revealed in confidence take on new depth and import when seen through the eyes of Portia Quayne, the sixteen-year-old girl at the center of the novel.
Portia is above all an observer. The love child of an upper-class man who longs for his old life and a common woman forced to live an uprooted life by her shamed husband, Portia is the quintessential outsider. She grew up in hotels, traveling from one to another, watching the fellow guest come in and out of her life. After her father's death, Portia and her mother are an isolated pair with no ties. And when her mother passes, Portia goes to live with her father's son, Thomas, and his wife, Anna, in London.
Portia keeps her observations in a diary. At the opening of the novel, we learn that Anna, who does not care for her quiet guest, has found Portia's diary and read it through. Anna is upset that Portia is watching her and making notes. She does not complain about what Portia has said, and there is no evidence that Portia is mean spirited in her writings, but she feels violated on behalf of everyone who has been watched. Anna seems disproportionately upset by her discovery, and that is our first indication about Bowen's plan for this novel. There is power in observation and in the silent passing of judgment. Anna feels that Portia is laughing at her behind her back, and this practically unhinges Anna.
Characters throughout the novel are obsessed with being watched, being exposed, and being in the public eye. As long as you are the one laughing at others, feeling superior to others, you are in the position of power. But to be laughed seems to be a fate worse than death; at least it is an equal fate, as the very title of the novel suggests.
The titular heart is Portia's. The novel is a coming of age story for Portia, and her final entrance into adulthood is not love, or sex, or independence. The thing that hurtles her irreversibly into adulthood is having her heart broken by the betrayal of her boyfriend, Eddie. Eddie's betrayal is not that he loves another. While Portia is upset that Eddie held hands with Daphne in the movie theater, Portia accepts his odd explanation and moves on. In fact, Portia is maddeningly indifferent to Eddie's awful behavior, seemingly willing to tolerate any kind of mistreatment. But the one thing she cannot tolerate is the knowledge that Eddie knew that Anna read Portia's diary regularly, and that Anna knew that Eddie knew but Portia knew none of this. Eddie and Anna, in other words, had a secret and excluded Portia. "You have laughed at me. You've laughed at me with them," says Portia to Eddie, shattered. Later she tells Major Brutt, "It, it isn't all right there [at Anna's house] any more: we feel ashamed with each other. You see, she has read my diary and found something out. She does not like that, but she laughs about it with Eddie; they laugh about him an me."
This betrayal is worse than if Eddie and Anna had had an affair: "Oh, he's not her lover; it's something worse than that."
Meanwhile, at the Quayne house, politeness fall apart (even as they continue to act politely to each other) as Anna and St. Quentin reveal their subversive acts to each other.
This much more plot summary than I am usually comfortable with in these posts, but the meanings of the novel are woven so tightly into the plot that I have a hard time grabbing the individual threads. The novel was intense and driving even as nothing of any seeming import happened. All the characters' interactions with each other and themselves are ripe with subtext and potential energy on the brink of becoming kinetic. It is in the end a rather dark novel about relationships and the unavoidable power relations between all people, power that unbalances everything and makes a simple union an impossibility. I have seen many films try to tackle this same subject and have never found them satisfactory. The reason Bowen succeeds where others have failed, I think, lies in her ability to plunge into the hearts and minds of the characters and let us linger in the wet dark of their thoughts. We are the additional layer in this power relationship as we, as readers, sit in judgment, in the know. We are the ultimate diary readers, the ultimate observers. Will we laugh at these creatures and share a joke amongst ourselves at their expense?
Another novel I am glad to have read. I feel like I have read an original thing here, a thing that others have tried to imitate many times and failed.
Portia is above all an observer. The love child of an upper-class man who longs for his old life and a common woman forced to live an uprooted life by her shamed husband, Portia is the quintessential outsider. She grew up in hotels, traveling from one to another, watching the fellow guest come in and out of her life. After her father's death, Portia and her mother are an isolated pair with no ties. And when her mother passes, Portia goes to live with her father's son, Thomas, and his wife, Anna, in London.
Portia keeps her observations in a diary. At the opening of the novel, we learn that Anna, who does not care for her quiet guest, has found Portia's diary and read it through. Anna is upset that Portia is watching her and making notes. She does not complain about what Portia has said, and there is no evidence that Portia is mean spirited in her writings, but she feels violated on behalf of everyone who has been watched. Anna seems disproportionately upset by her discovery, and that is our first indication about Bowen's plan for this novel. There is power in observation and in the silent passing of judgment. Anna feels that Portia is laughing at her behind her back, and this practically unhinges Anna.
Characters throughout the novel are obsessed with being watched, being exposed, and being in the public eye. As long as you are the one laughing at others, feeling superior to others, you are in the position of power. But to be laughed seems to be a fate worse than death; at least it is an equal fate, as the very title of the novel suggests.
The titular heart is Portia's. The novel is a coming of age story for Portia, and her final entrance into adulthood is not love, or sex, or independence. The thing that hurtles her irreversibly into adulthood is having her heart broken by the betrayal of her boyfriend, Eddie. Eddie's betrayal is not that he loves another. While Portia is upset that Eddie held hands with Daphne in the movie theater, Portia accepts his odd explanation and moves on. In fact, Portia is maddeningly indifferent to Eddie's awful behavior, seemingly willing to tolerate any kind of mistreatment. But the one thing she cannot tolerate is the knowledge that Eddie knew that Anna read Portia's diary regularly, and that Anna knew that Eddie knew but Portia knew none of this. Eddie and Anna, in other words, had a secret and excluded Portia. "You have laughed at me. You've laughed at me with them," says Portia to Eddie, shattered. Later she tells Major Brutt, "It, it isn't all right there [at Anna's house] any more: we feel ashamed with each other. You see, she has read my diary and found something out. She does not like that, but she laughs about it with Eddie; they laugh about him an me."
This betrayal is worse than if Eddie and Anna had had an affair: "Oh, he's not her lover; it's something worse than that."
Meanwhile, at the Quayne house, politeness fall apart (even as they continue to act politely to each other) as Anna and St. Quentin reveal their subversive acts to each other.
This much more plot summary than I am usually comfortable with in these posts, but the meanings of the novel are woven so tightly into the plot that I have a hard time grabbing the individual threads. The novel was intense and driving even as nothing of any seeming import happened. All the characters' interactions with each other and themselves are ripe with subtext and potential energy on the brink of becoming kinetic. It is in the end a rather dark novel about relationships and the unavoidable power relations between all people, power that unbalances everything and makes a simple union an impossibility. I have seen many films try to tackle this same subject and have never found them satisfactory. The reason Bowen succeeds where others have failed, I think, lies in her ability to plunge into the hearts and minds of the characters and let us linger in the wet dark of their thoughts. We are the additional layer in this power relationship as we, as readers, sit in judgment, in the know. We are the ultimate diary readers, the ultimate observers. Will we laugh at these creatures and share a joke amongst ourselves at their expense?
Another novel I am glad to have read. I feel like I have read an original thing here, a thing that others have tried to imitate many times and failed.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Swimming through At Swim-Two-Birds
At Swim-Two-Birds is one hell of a trip. It is unlike anything I have read before, and most certainly unlike anything else on this list so far.
Flann O'Brien is one of the several noms de plume of Brian O'Nolan, an Irish contemporary of James Joyce. Written at the height of High Modernism, At Swim-Two-Birds is convoluted and non-linear, encasing stories within stories and levels upon levels. But this must be one of the most tongue-in-cheek modernist novels written. There were many times when I laughed out loud (LOL!) at the ludicrous storylines. One of the characters, for example, Finn MacCool is a hero of Irish legend who likes to tell stories, recite poetry, and engage in hyperbole. Early in the novel, Finn relates what a man must do to be a part of Finn's gang. Near the end of a list of impossible abilities, Finn adds:
"One thousand rams he must sequester about his trunks with no offense to the men of Erin, or he is unknown to Finn. He must swiftly milk a fat cow and carry milk-pail and cow for twenty years in the seat of his drawers. When pursued in a chariot by the men of Erin he must dismount, place horse and chariot in the slack of his seat and hide behind his spear, the same being stuck upright in Erin. Unless he accomplishes these feats, he is not wanted of Finn. But if he do them all and be skillful, he is of Finn's people."
O'Nolan delights time and time again in the absurdities of the happenings in this novel. The structure alone is absurd. O'Nolan has a fictitious author, O'Brien, write a novel of a fictitious narrator, unnamed, who writes a fictitious book about a fictitious author, Trellis, who writes his own stories and keeps his own fictitious characters locked up in his house. Trellis's character Finn tells a lengthy story of his own about a man called Sweeney. Trellis rapes one of those fictitious characters who then gives birth to a son, fully grown, who meets up with Trellis's other characters to write a piece of revenge fiction about Trellis. Who is the author and who is the authored becomes intertwined and in some ways inseparable.
The highest frame of the story, that of the narrator and his encounters with his college friends and his confrontations with his uncle seems rather trivial, since it seemed to me merely a way to get out the stories about Trellis and his characters. There is not much of a plot as far as the narrator goes. He is a lazy man who spends most of his time in bed writing his stories. He leaves his room to share his stories and to be needled by his uncle, whom the narrator detests, to study harder and be a good student. I was surprised therefore when I came to the end of the novel and found myself combing through the story with this tension between the narrator and his uncle as my guide.
See, this is a novel obsessed with the act of writing and creating. And as the story of Trellis and his characters brings to the fore, "author" is intimately tied to the word "authority." He who writes claims a power and an authority over that which he writes. But that authority is tenuous at best. The characters have full lives beyond the boundaries of the novel. Like actors, they play the part directed by the author, but when business hours are over, they drug the author and have free reign of the house. In that piece of revenge fiction, the characters bring a lawsuit against Trellis for misusing and abusing them.
Trellis is an interesting combination of the narrator and the uncle. Like the narrator, Trellis spends all his time in bed, but like the uncle, he wields his authority bluntly. And when the uncle demonstrates fairness at the conclusion of the novel, the narrator seems to reconceive Trellis's cruel fate, letting him off the hook, but simultaneously freeing the characters by burning Trellis's manuscript.
That's why I see this novel as the portrait of the artist as an awkward young man. The author is part rebel (against society and the authoritative forces around him) but he is the very essence of authority and a creator of society (within the boundaries of the novel) itself. How does the self-aware young author reconcile these internal contradiction? With great absurdity and humor according to O'Brien. And a lot of bloodshed and pain too, for the characters express this struggle in the young artist with their own contradictory natures. Specifically, there is a great amount of gentility to the characters and their exchanges with each other (at every level of the story (stories)), but they are simultaneously vicious, devising levels of punishment through which few readers could experience any kind of uncomplicated joy.
This novel confounded my original attempts to make any sense of it, and somewhere around page 20, I just let go and let the current sweep me away, laughing as I went. And whether or not you struggle with the whats and wherefores of the novel, you are in for a good time if you have a keen sense for the absurd.
Flann O'Brien is one of the several noms de plume of Brian O'Nolan, an Irish contemporary of James Joyce. Written at the height of High Modernism, At Swim-Two-Birds is convoluted and non-linear, encasing stories within stories and levels upon levels. But this must be one of the most tongue-in-cheek modernist novels written. There were many times when I laughed out loud (LOL!) at the ludicrous storylines. One of the characters, for example, Finn MacCool is a hero of Irish legend who likes to tell stories, recite poetry, and engage in hyperbole. Early in the novel, Finn relates what a man must do to be a part of Finn's gang. Near the end of a list of impossible abilities, Finn adds:
"One thousand rams he must sequester about his trunks with no offense to the men of Erin, or he is unknown to Finn. He must swiftly milk a fat cow and carry milk-pail and cow for twenty years in the seat of his drawers. When pursued in a chariot by the men of Erin he must dismount, place horse and chariot in the slack of his seat and hide behind his spear, the same being stuck upright in Erin. Unless he accomplishes these feats, he is not wanted of Finn. But if he do them all and be skillful, he is of Finn's people."
O'Nolan delights time and time again in the absurdities of the happenings in this novel. The structure alone is absurd. O'Nolan has a fictitious author, O'Brien, write a novel of a fictitious narrator, unnamed, who writes a fictitious book about a fictitious author, Trellis, who writes his own stories and keeps his own fictitious characters locked up in his house. Trellis's character Finn tells a lengthy story of his own about a man called Sweeney. Trellis rapes one of those fictitious characters who then gives birth to a son, fully grown, who meets up with Trellis's other characters to write a piece of revenge fiction about Trellis. Who is the author and who is the authored becomes intertwined and in some ways inseparable.
The highest frame of the story, that of the narrator and his encounters with his college friends and his confrontations with his uncle seems rather trivial, since it seemed to me merely a way to get out the stories about Trellis and his characters. There is not much of a plot as far as the narrator goes. He is a lazy man who spends most of his time in bed writing his stories. He leaves his room to share his stories and to be needled by his uncle, whom the narrator detests, to study harder and be a good student. I was surprised therefore when I came to the end of the novel and found myself combing through the story with this tension between the narrator and his uncle as my guide.
See, this is a novel obsessed with the act of writing and creating. And as the story of Trellis and his characters brings to the fore, "author" is intimately tied to the word "authority." He who writes claims a power and an authority over that which he writes. But that authority is tenuous at best. The characters have full lives beyond the boundaries of the novel. Like actors, they play the part directed by the author, but when business hours are over, they drug the author and have free reign of the house. In that piece of revenge fiction, the characters bring a lawsuit against Trellis for misusing and abusing them.
Trellis is an interesting combination of the narrator and the uncle. Like the narrator, Trellis spends all his time in bed, but like the uncle, he wields his authority bluntly. And when the uncle demonstrates fairness at the conclusion of the novel, the narrator seems to reconceive Trellis's cruel fate, letting him off the hook, but simultaneously freeing the characters by burning Trellis's manuscript.
That's why I see this novel as the portrait of the artist as an awkward young man. The author is part rebel (against society and the authoritative forces around him) but he is the very essence of authority and a creator of society (within the boundaries of the novel) itself. How does the self-aware young author reconcile these internal contradiction? With great absurdity and humor according to O'Brien. And a lot of bloodshed and pain too, for the characters express this struggle in the young artist with their own contradictory natures. Specifically, there is a great amount of gentility to the characters and their exchanges with each other (at every level of the story (stories)), but they are simultaneously vicious, devising levels of punishment through which few readers could experience any kind of uncomplicated joy.
This novel confounded my original attempts to make any sense of it, and somewhere around page 20, I just let go and let the current sweep me away, laughing as I went. And whether or not you struggle with the whats and wherefores of the novel, you are in for a good time if you have a keen sense for the absurd.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Their Eyes Were Watching God
Their Eyes Were Watching God is for me a purely pleasurable reading experience. I find Hurston's poetic prose meaningful, profound, and weighty without ever being pompous or overwritten. Hurston is a folklorist by trade and a collector of tales. I read a good deal of Of Mules and Men a while back and see in this novel the same love of how people communicate with one another, how stories and ribbing games are more than just ways to pass the time; they are the very root of who we are and how we connect.
At one point in the novel, when Janie is disillusioned by Joe's desire to keep her "proper" and "respectable," Janie reflects upon where her life went wrong. She says, and I can't find the passage now, so I am quoting from memory, that in the course of her first two marriages "she went out in search of people" but has only found "things." Like Janie, this novel goes out in search of people, and that is precisely what it brings back to us, characters and world fully developed and rich. In many ways, the novel reminds me of Grapes of Wrath, in that Hurston shares Steinbeck's love of the poetry of common speech. Steinbeck's novel has of course at its roots a political concern, and while Hurston touches upon racism and Southern social politics, they are merely peripheral, an undeniable element that surrounds the characters but never touches their souls.
And this is an amazing and modern love story that I find very uplifting. Their is no meaningless poetry is Tea Cakes wooing of Janie. He lets her experience life by involving her in all his doings. And he involves her because he wants to share all his experiences with her, not because he wants to be some guiding principle in her life. Playing checkers, fishing at midnight, working in the muck of the glades, they are true partners and lovers with whom I can whole-heartedly identify.
And this romantic relationship makes the book wholly unique to me. In a romance, the writer must always find a way to keep the lovers apart, to create tension with misunderstanding, jealousy, and ill-timed meetings, but Hurston does away with that. Instead, she creates her climax when one lover is out of his mind, sick with a disease he contracted while rescuing his love; our hero must shoot her own hero in self defense, a horrible and painful fate made all the more horrible because of their true love and friendship.
This was my second time reading this novel, and I would readily read it again.
At one point in the novel, when Janie is disillusioned by Joe's desire to keep her "proper" and "respectable," Janie reflects upon where her life went wrong. She says, and I can't find the passage now, so I am quoting from memory, that in the course of her first two marriages "she went out in search of people" but has only found "things." Like Janie, this novel goes out in search of people, and that is precisely what it brings back to us, characters and world fully developed and rich. In many ways, the novel reminds me of Grapes of Wrath, in that Hurston shares Steinbeck's love of the poetry of common speech. Steinbeck's novel has of course at its roots a political concern, and while Hurston touches upon racism and Southern social politics, they are merely peripheral, an undeniable element that surrounds the characters but never touches their souls.
And this is an amazing and modern love story that I find very uplifting. Their is no meaningless poetry is Tea Cakes wooing of Janie. He lets her experience life by involving her in all his doings. And he involves her because he wants to share all his experiences with her, not because he wants to be some guiding principle in her life. Playing checkers, fishing at midnight, working in the muck of the glades, they are true partners and lovers with whom I can whole-heartedly identify.
And this romantic relationship makes the book wholly unique to me. In a romance, the writer must always find a way to keep the lovers apart, to create tension with misunderstanding, jealousy, and ill-timed meetings, but Hurston does away with that. Instead, she creates her climax when one lover is out of his mind, sick with a disease he contracted while rescuing his love; our hero must shoot her own hero in self defense, a horrible and painful fate made all the more horrible because of their true love and friendship.
This was my second time reading this novel, and I would readily read it again.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Gone with the Wind - Part 3
In my last two posts, I talked about how ambitious and how successful Mitchell is with her epic tale. As a feat of storytelling, Gone with the Wind is amazing. The characters are vivid and consistent. The main characters are rich and wonderful. The story never sags for long, which is hard to do in a short story, let alone in a book of this magnitude. Each section is interesting and rewarding so that you are never left pining for an older section; you happily move on and let the characters go on their way, happy to follow.
Moreover, Mitchell has incredible timing, bringing each twist and turn together to build up to something amazing. Having Melly's child arrive as Atlanta is under siege is fantastic. The rug is constantly pulled out beneath our heroes at just the right time.
As a feat of storytelling, I loved this book.
Politically, I hated this book.
As I touched upon in my last post, the South is romanticized beyond repair. The two burrs in my saddle are not surprisingly the issues of gender and race.
The book seems obsessed with what is masculine and what isn't. Every male character fails the test of masculinity except one. Every one of them is either effeminate ("He's nervous and timid and well meaning, and I don't know of any more damning qualities a man can have.") or boyish. Only Rhett is strong enough to man-handle Scarlett, to bend her to his will, to forcefully kiss her. As we are told repeatedly, "He was a man, and no matter what he did, she could never forget it." Near the end of the book, when Rhett is drunken and confronting Scarlett, he insists on his marital rights and carries her up the stairs. But instead of rape, we find the best sex of Scarlett's life. Once he kisses her roughly and controllingly, Scarlett melts away and gets what she's been needing the whole novel. Because of his uncontainable manhood, Rhett could even get away with knowing french fashions, which on any other man would be "rank effeminacy."
It's not that Mitchell insists on all women acting like women and all men acting like men. But what she does is romanticize the roles and social structures that bind them. The men may not know more, but the women should let them feel like they do. The tension in the book comes from Scarlett and Melanie and Ellen basically having to take care of all the men around them. But this seems to be a result more of the necessity of the times than a comment about any real social equity. And while we pity Ashley and his like-troubled southern men, we are left with something of disgust at their failures. Rhett is a shining example of what they could be and what they have failed to be.
And I do not have to say much about the politics of race here. Mitchell mocks Uncle Tom's Cabin because every northerner thinks that all slaves are brutalized when really they are treated more like family than slaves. But even Uncle Tom's Cabin shows some slave owners who are not brutal. There is nothing bad about slavery in Mitchell's book. In fact, we meet many blacks who having tasted freedom really just want to go back to their masters. And most disturbingly, we are supposed to share Rhett's outrage that he could be jailed for killing a black man who was "uppity" with a white woman. The Klan in Gone with the Wind never has been and never will be a terrorist organization; they are merely respectable southern gentlemen who are given no other recourse to righting the wrongs done against their womenfolk.
Mitchell's defense of southern social structures made parts of the book very difficult. There were many passages that made me feel dirty just to be reading them, and when I read those passages, I wanted to hide the book when someone walked by so they would not know I was reading this racist shit lest they think I endorsed it. And sadly, I cannot say I wholly enjoyed reading or thinking about the novel because of these passages.
I am very interested to see what the movie does with the politics of the novel, to see what extent they are left intact and to what extent they are washed over to emphasize the romance story.
Moreover, Mitchell has incredible timing, bringing each twist and turn together to build up to something amazing. Having Melly's child arrive as Atlanta is under siege is fantastic. The rug is constantly pulled out beneath our heroes at just the right time.
As a feat of storytelling, I loved this book.
Politically, I hated this book.
As I touched upon in my last post, the South is romanticized beyond repair. The two burrs in my saddle are not surprisingly the issues of gender and race.
The book seems obsessed with what is masculine and what isn't. Every male character fails the test of masculinity except one. Every one of them is either effeminate ("He's nervous and timid and well meaning, and I don't know of any more damning qualities a man can have.") or boyish. Only Rhett is strong enough to man-handle Scarlett, to bend her to his will, to forcefully kiss her. As we are told repeatedly, "He was a man, and no matter what he did, she could never forget it." Near the end of the book, when Rhett is drunken and confronting Scarlett, he insists on his marital rights and carries her up the stairs. But instead of rape, we find the best sex of Scarlett's life. Once he kisses her roughly and controllingly, Scarlett melts away and gets what she's been needing the whole novel. Because of his uncontainable manhood, Rhett could even get away with knowing french fashions, which on any other man would be "rank effeminacy."
It's not that Mitchell insists on all women acting like women and all men acting like men. But what she does is romanticize the roles and social structures that bind them. The men may not know more, but the women should let them feel like they do. The tension in the book comes from Scarlett and Melanie and Ellen basically having to take care of all the men around them. But this seems to be a result more of the necessity of the times than a comment about any real social equity. And while we pity Ashley and his like-troubled southern men, we are left with something of disgust at their failures. Rhett is a shining example of what they could be and what they have failed to be.
And I do not have to say much about the politics of race here. Mitchell mocks Uncle Tom's Cabin because every northerner thinks that all slaves are brutalized when really they are treated more like family than slaves. But even Uncle Tom's Cabin shows some slave owners who are not brutal. There is nothing bad about slavery in Mitchell's book. In fact, we meet many blacks who having tasted freedom really just want to go back to their masters. And most disturbingly, we are supposed to share Rhett's outrage that he could be jailed for killing a black man who was "uppity" with a white woman. The Klan in Gone with the Wind never has been and never will be a terrorist organization; they are merely respectable southern gentlemen who are given no other recourse to righting the wrongs done against their womenfolk.
Mitchell's defense of southern social structures made parts of the book very difficult. There were many passages that made me feel dirty just to be reading them, and when I read those passages, I wanted to hide the book when someone walked by so they would not know I was reading this racist shit lest they think I endorsed it. And sadly, I cannot say I wholly enjoyed reading or thinking about the novel because of these passages.
I am very interested to see what the movie does with the politics of the novel, to see what extent they are left intact and to what extent they are washed over to emphasize the romance story.
Gone with the Wind - Part 2
In my last post I reflected on the greediness of Gone with the Wind and Margaret Mitchell's desire to have it all. That greediness is reflected also in her depiction of the South.
Why is Scarlett so nasty and selfish? Why is the heroine of our book someone we not only love but love to hate? Scarlett believes herself superior to just about everyone except maybe her mother and Ashley. She will step over anyone to get the thing she thinks she wants. She is areligious bordering on atheistic. And unlike modern novels or movies, the story is not one of progress. Scarlett doesn't end the novel a changed woman, regretting her character flaws. Scarlett is Scarlett throughout.
This was my first time reading the novel (and I have yet to see the movie too) and I was surprised at how this most-loved book had a rather wicked protagonist. In any other book, I would have expected the main character to be a sluicing together of Scarlett and Melanie, or Scarlanie. Scarlanie would have Scarlett's determination and strong-headedness. Scarlanie would have Melanie's faith and devotion, her dedication to her friends. Why would Mitchell take this tack?
I believe it has to do with this being a Southern book. Mitchell has stated that Scarlett is like Atlanta during the reconstruction, an odd mixture of the old South and the new South. But she is really only part of the old South in her roots and ties. The old South is found in Melanie and Ashley, the Tarletons, and everything that Tara represents. Scarlett loves these things, but she is not like these things.
By letting us follow hard and ruthless Scarlett, Mitchell avoids a cloyingly sweet novel about the romantic South, while at the same time indulging endlessly in the romantic South. In fact, Scarlett's hardness only makes the old South all that much more romantic. There is no criticism of any of the social structures that propped up the old south. Sexism? No, chivalry. Racism? No, family. There is not one mistreated slave or one cruel master; those things are northern myths. The Klan? They are needed to protect our women from uppity blacks egged on by the carpetbaggers, a necessity created by the North.
It really all comes together in Rhett Butler. You may think that you love his rascally and irreverent ways. Okay, you do, but you can enjoy them because at root he is a southern gentleman who always knows the truth before him. He may deal with the northerners and make friends with ne'er-do-wells, but he knows the score. His charm is all southern, and whenever the chips are down, he acts just like the Old Guard. His southern gentriness is like his love for Scarlett; something that he hides but really the thing that defines him.
So through these characters and this world, Mitchell gets to present the most romantic image of the South possible without seeming to write a novel that pines for the past. Now that is brilliant writing. We get a modern tale with modern players AND the nostalgic romanticized backdrop for them to act out their tale.
Didn't I say she was greedy? But again, you can be greedy as long as you can pull it off. And Mitchell most certainly pulls it off.
Why is Scarlett so nasty and selfish? Why is the heroine of our book someone we not only love but love to hate? Scarlett believes herself superior to just about everyone except maybe her mother and Ashley. She will step over anyone to get the thing she thinks she wants. She is areligious bordering on atheistic. And unlike modern novels or movies, the story is not one of progress. Scarlett doesn't end the novel a changed woman, regretting her character flaws. Scarlett is Scarlett throughout.
This was my first time reading the novel (and I have yet to see the movie too) and I was surprised at how this most-loved book had a rather wicked protagonist. In any other book, I would have expected the main character to be a sluicing together of Scarlett and Melanie, or Scarlanie. Scarlanie would have Scarlett's determination and strong-headedness. Scarlanie would have Melanie's faith and devotion, her dedication to her friends. Why would Mitchell take this tack?
I believe it has to do with this being a Southern book. Mitchell has stated that Scarlett is like Atlanta during the reconstruction, an odd mixture of the old South and the new South. But she is really only part of the old South in her roots and ties. The old South is found in Melanie and Ashley, the Tarletons, and everything that Tara represents. Scarlett loves these things, but she is not like these things.
By letting us follow hard and ruthless Scarlett, Mitchell avoids a cloyingly sweet novel about the romantic South, while at the same time indulging endlessly in the romantic South. In fact, Scarlett's hardness only makes the old South all that much more romantic. There is no criticism of any of the social structures that propped up the old south. Sexism? No, chivalry. Racism? No, family. There is not one mistreated slave or one cruel master; those things are northern myths. The Klan? They are needed to protect our women from uppity blacks egged on by the carpetbaggers, a necessity created by the North.
It really all comes together in Rhett Butler. You may think that you love his rascally and irreverent ways. Okay, you do, but you can enjoy them because at root he is a southern gentleman who always knows the truth before him. He may deal with the northerners and make friends with ne'er-do-wells, but he knows the score. His charm is all southern, and whenever the chips are down, he acts just like the Old Guard. His southern gentriness is like his love for Scarlett; something that he hides but really the thing that defines him.
So through these characters and this world, Mitchell gets to present the most romantic image of the South possible without seeming to write a novel that pines for the past. Now that is brilliant writing. We get a modern tale with modern players AND the nostalgic romanticized backdrop for them to act out their tale.
Didn't I say she was greedy? But again, you can be greedy as long as you can pull it off. And Mitchell most certainly pulls it off.
Gone with the Wind - Part 1
My version of Gone with the Wind is 1450 pages long. Lord knows the book is long enough and complex enough to warrant quite a bit of blogging. I don't know how much energy I'll have, so I decided to create several smaller entries rather than one big one.
Now I don't know Margaret Mitchell personally, you may be surprised to learn, but I do know this: she is greedy. Or at least, Gone with the Wind is the greediest novel I have ever read. Mitchell has decided to put everything into one book. Everything.
Gone with the Wind is a novel of manners. The first part of the book plays like an Austen novel as we follow the young, wealthy, and beautiful folks of the County. There are proper ways to behave, proper things to say, proper reactions to have--and Scarlett follows none of them. The novel is more appropriately a novel of manners turned on its head. Scarlett is no Pamela; she is the opposite, using all her energy just to pass as decent and not give her inner demons away.
Gone with the Wind is an apocalyptic tale. Once Atlanta is in flames, the novel resembles The Road, or The Walking Dead, or The Road Warrior. How will Scarlett and her band of dependents survive? From whence will they get their next meal? Oh thank god she found a calving cow! Oh thank god she shot that nasty Yankee in the face and took his good horse!
Gone with the Wind is a buddy story. Like the novel of manners, however, this buddy story is turned upside down, since one of the buddies loathes the other. For all of Scarlett's continual whining about Melanie, Melanie is by her side the whole of the novel. She's there with the saber when the vile Yankee needs a good Dick Cheneying. She's there to support her every step of the way. Scarlett doesn't know she's in a buddy story; she thinks hers is a love triangle story.
Gone with the Wind is an Horatio Algers story. With a little gumption and honesty, the American Dream is open to everyone. Once the apocalypse has subsided and Scarlett marries Frank, her story is one of the search for the American Dream. Only instead of having honesty and spunk be at her back, it is pure selfishness and fear that gets her to get Frank's shop in shape and to buy two lumber mills and employ a ruthless Irish overseer to beat the prisoner labor force. She get to live her American Dream, but of course, it will turn out to be a nightmare in the end.
Gone with the Wind is a romance. Love overlooked, love thwarted, love barred, love denied--this book has it all.
Gone with the Wind is the greediest book I've ever read. It wants it all. It wants to be every story it can be, even if it has to run over a thousand pages long to get there. Perhaps Mitchell knew she would only write one novel, so she crammed six or seven into the one book for good measure.
The amazing thing is that she pulls it all together and makes it all work as a unified whole. It is dazzling in its ability to be all these things and be such a good and solid story the whole way through.
Now I don't know Margaret Mitchell personally, you may be surprised to learn, but I do know this: she is greedy. Or at least, Gone with the Wind is the greediest novel I have ever read. Mitchell has decided to put everything into one book. Everything.
Gone with the Wind is a novel of manners. The first part of the book plays like an Austen novel as we follow the young, wealthy, and beautiful folks of the County. There are proper ways to behave, proper things to say, proper reactions to have--and Scarlett follows none of them. The novel is more appropriately a novel of manners turned on its head. Scarlett is no Pamela; she is the opposite, using all her energy just to pass as decent and not give her inner demons away.
Gone with the Wind is an apocalyptic tale. Once Atlanta is in flames, the novel resembles The Road, or The Walking Dead, or The Road Warrior. How will Scarlett and her band of dependents survive? From whence will they get their next meal? Oh thank god she found a calving cow! Oh thank god she shot that nasty Yankee in the face and took his good horse!
Gone with the Wind is a buddy story. Like the novel of manners, however, this buddy story is turned upside down, since one of the buddies loathes the other. For all of Scarlett's continual whining about Melanie, Melanie is by her side the whole of the novel. She's there with the saber when the vile Yankee needs a good Dick Cheneying. She's there to support her every step of the way. Scarlett doesn't know she's in a buddy story; she thinks hers is a love triangle story.
Gone with the Wind is an Horatio Algers story. With a little gumption and honesty, the American Dream is open to everyone. Once the apocalypse has subsided and Scarlett marries Frank, her story is one of the search for the American Dream. Only instead of having honesty and spunk be at her back, it is pure selfishness and fear that gets her to get Frank's shop in shape and to buy two lumber mills and employ a ruthless Irish overseer to beat the prisoner labor force. She get to live her American Dream, but of course, it will turn out to be a nightmare in the end.
Gone with the Wind is a romance. Love overlooked, love thwarted, love barred, love denied--this book has it all.
Gone with the Wind is the greediest book I've ever read. It wants it all. It wants to be every story it can be, even if it has to run over a thousand pages long to get there. Perhaps Mitchell knew she would only write one novel, so she crammed six or seven into the one book for good measure.
The amazing thing is that she pulls it all together and makes it all work as a unified whole. It is dazzling in its ability to be all these things and be such a good and solid story the whole way through.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Call It Wonderful
I have enjoyed almost every book that I have read for this project. Some books I had read before and were excited to re-read. Some books I had heard of before and always wanted to read. Some books were brand new to me. Call It Sleep falls into this last category. I had never heard of Call It Sleep, and I had never heard of Henry Roth. And the experience I had reading this book is exactly the experience I was seeking when Ann and I started this project. It is a wonderful, striking, compelling, beautifully written work of fiction that has been rolling around in the recesses of my mind since I began it a few weeks ago.
As Ann has undergone her journey as a novelist over the past couple of years, I have had the opportunity to reflect on what I love most in the books I read and in the writing I enjoy. The one thing I keep telling Ann that she does to perfection is to be profound without being pompous, to be meaningful without being heavy-handed, to be rich without being baroque. A real piece of art strikes you intellectually and emotionally while at the same time just being interesting and compelling. Henry Roth does what Ann does so well and creates real art here.
The story of David Schearl simultaneously feels like an extended character piece (what Alfred Kazin calls The Portrait of an Artist as a Child) and a plot-driven story about David’s world. The plot is mortar-tight, but you never see it coming. At times the story feels like it wanders and introduces characters because they interest David. It is not until later that the pieces click into place and come into focus as the foundation they always were. That is a very difficult feat to create in any story.
The symbolism and meaning that infuses the novel was at first off-putting for me. The meaning of the Cellar as a place of dark human/animal desires and sexuality is so Freudian, that while I read the first section of the novel I thought to myself, “Oh, this is why the book was so popular in the 60s, the height of Freudian interpretations in literature.” The Oedipal issues that David has with Dad, his relationship with his mother, the dark underpinnings of sexuality, can all be packaged up and dismissed, were it not for Roth’s deeper characterization. David’s relationship with his mother is more than some Freudian desire; there is a real relationship here, complex and touching. David’s problems with his Dad isn’t just a war over Mother, it is a struggle with a man who suffers from paranoia and other personal problems. Albert is both frightening and pathetic, a terror and a struggling immigrant. Roth lets these larger structures and systems fall like a cloak over the characters, scenes, and situations, but he keeps everything alive by having the characters move and tussle beneath the cloak, struggle and strive to resist any such reduction.
Kazin’s comparison of Call It Sleep to Joyce’s Portrait of an Artist seems very fitting to me. This is high literature like Joyce’s work, only Roth manages to achieve Joyce’s level of profundity while still allowing the plot and character’s motives to be simple and comprehensible. The only point of confusion for me is the penultimate chapter, when David burns himself on the third rail. But because this is the ultimate climax and David’s at a fevered pitch, it all seems fitting. I do not mind the confusion, and I feel like I could parse it out and untangle the connection between David’s search for the pure light that once made him unafraid and confident and the grownup inhabitants of the Lower East Side discussing sex from an adult perspective not seen in the book up to this point.
It is a joy to get the highs with the lows in this amazing novel.
As Ann has undergone her journey as a novelist over the past couple of years, I have had the opportunity to reflect on what I love most in the books I read and in the writing I enjoy. The one thing I keep telling Ann that she does to perfection is to be profound without being pompous, to be meaningful without being heavy-handed, to be rich without being baroque. A real piece of art strikes you intellectually and emotionally while at the same time just being interesting and compelling. Henry Roth does what Ann does so well and creates real art here.
The story of David Schearl simultaneously feels like an extended character piece (what Alfred Kazin calls The Portrait of an Artist as a Child) and a plot-driven story about David’s world. The plot is mortar-tight, but you never see it coming. At times the story feels like it wanders and introduces characters because they interest David. It is not until later that the pieces click into place and come into focus as the foundation they always were. That is a very difficult feat to create in any story.
The symbolism and meaning that infuses the novel was at first off-putting for me. The meaning of the Cellar as a place of dark human/animal desires and sexuality is so Freudian, that while I read the first section of the novel I thought to myself, “Oh, this is why the book was so popular in the 60s, the height of Freudian interpretations in literature.” The Oedipal issues that David has with Dad, his relationship with his mother, the dark underpinnings of sexuality, can all be packaged up and dismissed, were it not for Roth’s deeper characterization. David’s relationship with his mother is more than some Freudian desire; there is a real relationship here, complex and touching. David’s problems with his Dad isn’t just a war over Mother, it is a struggle with a man who suffers from paranoia and other personal problems. Albert is both frightening and pathetic, a terror and a struggling immigrant. Roth lets these larger structures and systems fall like a cloak over the characters, scenes, and situations, but he keeps everything alive by having the characters move and tussle beneath the cloak, struggle and strive to resist any such reduction.
Kazin’s comparison of Call It Sleep to Joyce’s Portrait of an Artist seems very fitting to me. This is high literature like Joyce’s work, only Roth manages to achieve Joyce’s level of profundity while still allowing the plot and character’s motives to be simple and comprehensible. The only point of confusion for me is the penultimate chapter, when David burns himself on the third rail. But because this is the ultimate climax and David’s at a fevered pitch, it all seems fitting. I do not mind the confusion, and I feel like I could parse it out and untangle the connection between David’s search for the pure light that once made him unafraid and confident and the grownup inhabitants of the Lower East Side discussing sex from an adult perspective not seen in the book up to this point.
It is a joy to get the highs with the lows in this amazing novel.
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