She was the first thing I saw when I walked into the bookstore. Such a looker I damn near tripped over a stack of calf-high hardbacks set next to a s...more She was the first thing I saw when I walked into the bookstore. Such a looker I damn near tripped over a stack of calf-high hardbacks set next to a stand of morning papers. "I'm sorry," she said. "We're not quite open yet." "That's okay," I told her. "Neither are my eyes." I could tell right away I wasn't going to win any hosannas by being a smart-aleck. "I need a book," I continued by way of apology. "Something fun but dark. I'm looking at five hundred miles today, but I'm not in the mood for an epic. Noir, maybe. It takes a lot of plot to get through Tennessee." She went to the shelves and started looking at the books. I was looking at her looking at the books. I'm pretty sure I had the better view. "Try this." She handed me a trade paper---nothing flashy. Minimalist even. But I recognized it, and the title went down like a good steak. "You ever read it before?" "The Big Sleep? Sure. It's been twenty years, though. I don't remember much." "Literary hair of the dog," she nodded. "It should suit you. It's got a dead dirty books dealer, a nympho with a pistol, some scrape-ups, and a lot of snap-cracklin' wit. Maybe one or two too many jawbreakers, but there's no mush. My guess? You'll hit the FINIS before you make Cullman." Something caught my eye. Outside, three cruts piling out of a red pickup. I thought about the night before, the money at the casino one interstate exit up, the deal that didn't go down so straight. I looked at my scraped knuckles and licked the cut in my gums. I hoped I made it to Cullman. Hell, I hoped I could make it to a last page. "What about the sentences?" I asked. "What about them? You start with the big letter and follow the rest to the dot at the end. That's all you need to know about sentences, Jack." "I like mine short, but not stuttery. Any joe who speaks one-word ones is likely to get a smack upside the head from me. By the same token, I don't go for gabber.s Long, windy ones give me an ache. You know why? Because long sentences are a tough chew when you're sporting a busted rib or two." She saw the cruts outside. They hadn't spotted me, but I wasn't lucky enough to stay the invisible joe indefinitely. "You got a broken rib, do you?" She was watching the dufuses outside. "Not right now, but something tell me I will before I get to Chapter 2." An idea came to mind. "Hey, how about you give a dying man his wish and read me a paragraph or two of this Chandler guy?" She took the book back, not looking at it but looking at me, not a dab of fear in her eyes, but hard as a charcoal and twice as haughty. For a second I wondered what it would cost me for her and the book both, but what with the ride I was headed for, I didn't need any baggage. She opened the book and purred out the antepenultimate paragraph. You know the one: the one that explains the title. The big sleep. It had the kind of sentences a man could die for. With my luck, I probably would. "You better ring me up," I said. The cruts had spotted the bookstore and were headed for its door. They knew me too well. "I'll pay cash," I told her. "Because neither of us has time for credit." "If you ever get back to town, swing by. I stock noir like air. I'll hook you up." "Sure. If I make it back. Maybe then I can swallow a longer paragraph." I was on my way to head off the cruts when I nearly tripped again over the stack of hardbacks next to the morning papers. "You sell many of these?" I asked. "Not a one," she shrugged. I looked at my name on the book jacket. "Figures," I shrugged back. I set it back on the stack---gently, because tossing it would've been ungentlemanly---and I stepped outside to meet my fate. Damn if the little livro pusher didn't do me right. The Big Sleep turned out pretty durable, especially for a trade paper. Just ask the first crut who came at me. He crumpled the second he took its spine upside the temple.(less)
This book makes me embarrassed to be a man. The fact that it has sold 400,000 copies makes embarrassed to be a reader. That it's justified as bathroom...moreThis book makes me embarrassed to be a man. The fact that it has sold 400,000 copies makes embarrassed to be a reader. That it's justified as bathroom reading makes me embarrassed to own a toilet. To folks who happen to like it: hey, to each his own. My opinions are worth both sides of the two-ply they're printed on and nothing more. But as wussy as the words are, the whole premise---I'm an obnoxious alco-fuckaholic, but I know it, so the joke's not on me---lacks two things I'm sorta fond of: compassion and maturity.(less)
I owe Richard a big apology. I read Six Fang Marks back in September when we traded books and I've been as unprofessional as a comet-tailing hooker by...moreI owe Richard a big apology. I read Six Fang Marks back in September when we traded books and I've been as unprofessional as a comet-tailing hooker by not getting a review posted before now. I can only plead a busy life, which is a bullshit excuse because all I pretty much do is sit on my dimply ass all day reading books (okay, and grading papers, too). The reality is I needed time to digest this rollicking picaresque, which spans two continents, some graphic incontinence, at least two non-linear storylines, and a lot of comic mishaps and debiltating injuries. The forte is the style: it zooms more recklessly and disregardaciously than European traffic---and I mean that as a compliment. There's an attitude in the language that's loose, winky, and fun in its elbowing liveliness. The only word that comes to mind is verve. It's also a very male book, with a lot of boyish cock-woggling, which one expects from a coming-of-age story because, frankly, that's how we boys fumble our way to manhood: we cock-woggle. That's not to say that there's so much of what the French call le woggle du cock here that it will turn off distaff audiences (as witnessed by the many excellent comments here from GoodReaderettes). Then there's the structure, which is episodic, disconnected, flashing back and forth as it does between the sibling dependencies of two brothers and a journalist piecing together their story. I won't give away exactly how those tales are intertwined, but suffice it to say that it's sure to leave us Americans---literalists we are---scratching our heads, going, "Huh?" And that's a good thing: it's a reminder that not all stories need to be tidily told. I think what I liked best is how the novel drew me in wanting to find the connections in time and place between fragments and juxtapositions. It's no mean feat to construct a disjointed narrative that makes the reader want to joint it back together. That said, the book is also beyond smart in evoking the sentimentalities of brotherdom without getting too sentimental. In the end, all the indirection and uncertainty is a pretty neat metaphor for how circuitous the male syntax gets when trying to express something that should be as straightforward to parse as fraternal love.(less)
The big controversy in England over F1 chair Max Mosley's "Nazi sex orgy" (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/spor...) got me wondering what exactly is...moreThe big controversy in England over F1 chair Max Mosley's "Nazi sex orgy" (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/spor...) got me wondering what exactly is so erotic about dressing up like a jackbooted thug c. 1942 and going Adolf on some fraulein (or, in Mosley's case, having a fraulein go Ilsa on him). Perhaps, I pondered, there is something dull about good old democracy sex that I'm not aware of? So I found a copy of Frost's book and have been reading it in off moments.
The book offers a great history on how sadomasochism became associated with fascism as opposed to, say, a parlimentary monarchy. As you might expect, it's all about power fetishes. The chapter on Lawrence is especially interesting given its focus on the giggle-in-your-shirtsleeve-titled Aaron's Rod---especially when up pops the name of British fasict leader Owen Mosley, who just happened to be ... Max Mosley's dad. (And who says the swastika doesn't fall far from the tree?). Equally interesting is the section on Hans Bellmer, who ambiguously photograped naked women---first dolls, then humans---in the shape of Nazi iconography. (See http://www.nachtkabarett.com/ihvh/img...) (Beatles fans: Bellmer was the inspiration for the famously suppressed "meat" cover of The Beatles Yesterday and Today LP cover.
Haven't had time to digest all of Frost, but the point seems to be that the valorization of kink-for-kink's sake subjugates us to the biological determinism of the sex act (i.e. innies and outies). No room for Platonic mutualism here. Oh well. I always thought democracy could accommodate more than the missionary position (Walt Whitman, pansexual, and a great lover of democracy), but maybe not in this day and age when grown men like Mosley (British, admittedly) dress up like Auschwitz prisoners to get their rocks off. Goodbye, humanism.(less)
I can still remember the edition of this that---somehow---I had in my room as a child. It was a hardback, dense type, the occasional woodcut, thin pag...moreI can still remember the edition of this that---somehow---I had in my room as a child. It was a hardback, dense type, the occasional woodcut, thin pages, tightly bound, and it smelled like it had been mouldering under somebody's bed since Martin Van Buren ass-ended to the presidency. Back then I couldn't for the life of me get past the first chapter. The syntax was so knotty (ie. Latinate) that I might have compared it to autoerotic asphyxiation if I'd known such a thing existed (autoeroticism, that is--not asphyxiation). In fact, I hope it doesn't expose my secret propensity for lace panties and Angora sweaters to say that at ten I much preferred Little Women. Yes, I loved Cooper's title bc I didn't know what the hell it meant, and I debated the pretension one might be susceptible to if made to tote the name 'Fenimore' through life. Decades later I can say that life for me boils down to a choice: some books you love because they are you writ in picas, and others you teach. This one falls into the later category.
Personal bullshit aside, there's so much here that's so historically important that LaMo as well call it in my neighborhood call it by necessity becomes worthy of reading time. For starters, landscape. The book is capacious, to use one of Cooper's marble-mouthed words. It conveys the scopic magnitude of the New World. The prowess of setting is particularly important when you realize that by the 1820s---a mere fifty years after the country's founding---nature was already a touchstone of nostalgia and Cooper was depicting us as having milked dry the natural resources of this fresh green breast of the new world. Second, the Native Americans. You don't read Cooper for the verysmellytude of ethnicity. Go see Dances with Wolves for that. (Better yet A Man Called Horse). But you do see in the ridiculously wooden me-likum-you-pale-face cigar-store depiction of Chingachgook and Uncas a sincere desire to elevate the NA warrior, Greek epic style, into a symbol of Lost America---again, poignant given that the Trail of Tears was taking place in this same era. Cooper thus helps make the Vanishing Indian a personfication of American guilt, a spokesman for the jeremiad. Finally, chicks, man: in Cora and Alice, you have here the prototypes for the Dark Lady and Light Lady that will play their sista act out in American fiction all the way through Pierre and The Blithedale Romance on up to every bad Sarah Jessica Parker/Rachel McAdams romantic purported comedy not starring Matthew McConaughey. Why divide feminity into innocent blondes and dirty brunettes? To quote the title of my least favorite Pink CD, must be Mizzacegenation, the anxiety that ravenheads have to be born out of those dalliances on the dark side that even British generals are prone to when the colored girls go do-da-do, doo, doo, dootey-dootey-doo, doo, doo, doo, etc. It's a literary obligation in the 19th century bc Cooper and his peers knew, deep down, that nobody short of Edgar or Johnny Winter was truly white enough.
Yes, at some point long about Book II, the formula of kidnap/rescue/ bring-a-tomahawk-to-a-gunfight gets tedious. And you are likely to throw the book across the room at the more silly assertions of Natty Bumppo and Chingy's ability to blend with the animals. The scene in which the latter, the father of the Mohicans' last, dresses up as a beaver (!!!!!!!!) to get the scoop on the alien tribe's war plans has to be the single hardest scene in American literature to teach without regressing to an eight year-old. It absolutely kills the seriousness of the book---at least until the glorious last chapter, when suddenly Cooper's marvelous ability to lament takes over, and you read a threnody for fallen America that ranks up there with the final paragraph of Gatsby.
So, enjoy, but be prepared to chew through the fat of preposterousness to the gristle of import. None of Cooper's other books save The Pioneers can really touch this one in terms of melancholy. And the melancholy of loss is what makes it great.(less)
This is the first selection in our 19th Cent American Novels class this semester (even though, technically, it's an 18th cen novel), so I'm rereading....moreThis is the first selection in our 19th Cent American Novels class this semester (even though, technically, it's an 18th cen novel), so I'm rereading. It'll be a challenge bc novels of this period are so different from ours---the horizon of expectations, shall we say, might as well exist in a whole other world. The key thing to getting into this book is understanding the social function of this genre: Charlotte Temple---a huge bestseller all the way up to the early 1900s---is a seduction novel a la Pamela and Clarissa, the latter of which really did explain it all ... seven volumes worth. As with these progenitors, CT is full of stock characters, including the soon-to-be devirginated damsel, the rakish ne'er-do-well, the disappointed parents, and the older fallen woman who fails to preserve her charge's cherry. Then there are the authorial intrusions, all of them so exclamatory (dare I say shrieky) you'd be forgiven if you thought you'd tuned into Dr. Laura. Those are prejudices we'll have to overcome. The books also served a feminist agenda: they taught young readers that they deserved companionate marriages, cautioned them against the many pitfalls of men (not the least of which is the saying of anything to get into a woman's petticoat), and critiqued the novel's own dangerous power to propogate unrealistic fantasies of romance (not sex, romance). On the positive side, CT is at least a bit more dramatically straightforward because, unlike The Coquette, it's not an epistolary novel, which are brutal to get students into. Additionally, this edition has an excellent introduction that links the book's drama to Rowson's experience as a playwright and within the tradition of American melodrama. Still, this one to me is better suited to study than to enjoyment, and that will be the big obstacle. Facing it, I've figured out a gambit for kick-starting the discussion: I'll be using Caitlin Flanagan's excellent assessment of the Twilight phenomenon (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200812...) to make a basic argument: Susanna Rowson was the Stephenie Meyer of her day--and I will mean it as a compliment.
I see a lot of my GR friends are currently reading this, so I'll be interested to see what they think of it. I understand the importance of this one--...moreI see a lot of my GR friends are currently reading this, so I'll be interested to see what they think of it. I understand the importance of this one--free speech, yo---but honestly, I wasn't blown away. I prefer Ginny Woolf, in fact. Part of it is that Lawrence is too damn Freudian for me. And all the stuff about women needing civilization fucked out of them by virile treetrimmers seems a little misogynistic. I know the historical context out of which Lawrence is writing, what with industrialization and war sapping the natural semen-spewing strength of all us who can grow hair on chests (trust me, I value all three of mine; they're insured by Lloyd's of London). Still, that only dates LLCoolLady more for me.
Finally there's the sex. Shocking in its day, but 80 years later, it has all the poetry of your average Penthouse Forum entry. Seriously, dudes, don't name your peen. Especially don't name it John Thomas. It makes your reader think of The Waltons (i.e. John Boy, portrayed by Richard Thomas). And if you feel the need to write about anal, try not to justify it saying you're ridding your lady of "shame, which is fear: the deep organic shame, the old, old physical fear which crouches in the bodily roots of us, and can only be chased away by the sensual fire, at last it was roused up and routed by the phallic hunt of the man.” In my (admittedly limited) experience, chicks don't go for that ole "phallic hunt" line.
In the end (no pun intended), I think this book is most interesting to read alongside the history of 1920s’ and 30s' sexology. To wit, a line from Theodoor van de Velde's Ideal Marriage, one of the most popular (and controversial) sex manuals of the era: “What both man and woman, driven by obscure primitive urges, wish to feel in the sexual act ... is the essential force of maleness, which expresses itself in a sort of violent and absolute possession of the woman. And so both of them can and do exult in a certain degree of male aggression and dominance—whether actual or apparent—which proclaims this essential force.” Like I said, a tough sell these days.
Still, looking forward to seeing other folks' reviews. Get on the stick, RA (not literally, of course).(less)
In retrospect this may not have been the ideal book to read immediately on the heels of Shade of the Raintree: The Life and Death of Ross Lockridge, J...moreIn retrospect this may not have been the ideal book to read immediately on the heels of Shade of the Raintree: The Life and Death of Ross Lockridge, Jr. Long about page 300 I found myself wondering if there was ever such a thing as a happy biography of a writer, one that doesn't go gonads-deep into ego, depression, bitterness, etc etc. Of course, there's no drama in being well-adjusted (or so I'm told). I was struck reading this life story alongside a new article in Poets and Writers that basically laments the absence of Keith Richardsonian excess among writers of the post-McInerney/Ellis generation. Why do we glamorize the wreckage? Is there not a method of creativity that can be seen as positive, invigorating, enlivening? Or are we so accustomed to the trainwreck that the smooth operator seems mechanical? I guess we'll wait for the recently announced Updike bio to answer those questions.
None of these concerns should detract from Bailey's well-researched and written bio of Richard Yates, who twenty years after his death is finally enjoying the acclaim that he spent his last thirty years bitterly resenting he'd been denied. Yates remains a fascinating if somewhat repellant character if only bc the slow march to oblivion that basically occupied him from 1961 when Revolutionary Road first appeared to his death in 1992 (in Alabama no less) would seem to preclude any writing at all. And yet Yates was productive, with sterling successes such as The Easter Parade and competent if not epochal stuff like Young Hearts Crying. Unlike a lot of bios, Bailey does talk about the art, so in between descriptions of alcoholic seizures, emphysematic hacking, nuthouse stays, and endless cocklobbing (debilitated in later years by the impotence inflicted by the aforeskinmentioned), there are fine descriptions of the priestly revising and exactitude for which Yates lovers love him. In the end, what comes through is how emotionally stunted men of RY's generation were---a thesis one could glean from Eleven Kinds of Loneliness, of course, but nevertheless sad and frustrating. That said, it's also clear that Yates was a devoted if distant father, and the best quotes of the book come from his two oldest daughters, who talk honestly about their struggles. (One daughter, Monica, dated Larry David, which is how Yates came to be depicted as Alton Bennes on Seinfeld). There's also testimony aplenty here about how inspiring a teacher Yates was, which is good to see.
In the hands of someone who cared less about his subject, the life of RY could've been sensationalized. Then again, the ideal for this audience won't be the Kitty Kelley sort. They'll be fans of RR and Eleven Kinds, and they'll probably read this shuddering at how capricious literary reputation is and how cruel not the Bitch Goddess of Success but her mythology is to our authors.
I recently read this for an encyclopedia entry I was writing on post-2000 coming-of-age novels, so my assessment, I fear, isn't really fair. On the on...moreI recently read this for an encyclopedia entry I was writing on post-2000 coming-of-age novels, so my assessment, I fear, isn't really fair. On the one hand, I think Sittenfeld is a very talented writer, but on the other, I kept wanting to say GTFU (you know, grow the *#^$ up), which seems very, very ungenerous of me. In the end, I can appreciate what attracted people to this book, making it a surprise success. That doesn't mean the book sticks with me or changed my life in any drastic way---and isn't that what we crave from a novel? I guess the lesson I learned from writing the entry is that WAY too many of us authors (if I may call myself that) go the C-of-Age route early in life. If we're lucky, we mature to recognize that adolescence isn't the be-all, end-all of our lives---despite what the culture tells us about clinging to youth. I want adult books, and I want to say to Curtis, please, please, after THE MAN OF MY DREAMS (the follow up to PREP), take a risk, look beyond your own experience, imagine someone who's not a 16-28 year old girl/woman struggling with place/parental affection/identity, and write me a magnum opus about---oh, I don't know---exploited sugar cane workers in South Florida.
Then again, who am I to ask such a thing of an author?(less)
**spoiler alert** OK, kids, as long promised, having just finished Outlander---and already having had the Mrs. snatch it from me to reread (she read i...more**spoiler alert** OK, kids, as long promised, having just finished Outlander---and already having had the Mrs. snatch it from me to reread (she read it years ago)---here is my long-promised review.
I'm giving it 3 1/2 stars (UPDATE: Already I'm being forced to point out that that is 1/2 more than RA gave it! OK: NEW UPDATE: J has convinced me that 3 stars is too lukewarm, so I'm kicking up to 4 because--well, I'm a people pleaser. And I have no problem saying I "really" liked it as opposed to just "liked it"). I enjoyed it a lot---I won't say far more than I thought I would because I really tried to go into it without preconceptions. Honestly, genre is meaningless---romance, historical romance ... these categories build more prejudices than they do expectations, and, at the end of the day, they're simply categories for folks at Barnes and Nobles to arrange shelves. Literary fiction is every bit as formulaic as we tend to accuse these more "popular" forms of being---if you don't believe me, read eighty consecutive coming-of-age novels like I had to last year.
So, that said: I found Claire a great character. The action was fun, and many of the twists and turns---from the arsenic poisoning and the witch interlude to the various encounters with Lord Randall---were lively and dramatic. The dialogue has a lot of wit to it, and I can see why the ladies swoon over Jamie. As with all time travel literature, there is the great every-small-action-changes-the-future irrevocably theme. I thought the ending was quite beautiful, too. I also got a kick out of being reminded that my first name---kirk---means church in Scottish. (Too bad my last name is German for "of the Poison Mind").
There were a few things I didn't like. For starters, the book is too long. I mean, for the love of Franklin H. Roosevelt, I've had marriages that didn't last 850 pages, so if you're going this epic you really need a tight canvas. I personally found the last section that introduces Jamie's sister Jenny a bit slow-going. After a while, the sex scenes also started to blur together (sort of like they did in my thirties). Two other sexual issues also got me thinking: there is a mild strain of homophobia here. I was grateful when the foppish Duke was introduced that the author didn't go Braveheart and have a mincer in a kilt---quite happily she avoided that. Then (MAJOR SPOILER ALERT) when Jamie turns out to have been boofed by Lord Randall while in prison ... hmmm ... I don't know. We have to be careful when it comes to same-sex stuff being used as an index of perfidity; it just plays into too many agendas. I also was a bit odded out by the submission/domination theme in some of Jamie and Claire's more athletic tumbles---especially when he spanks her derriere black and blue and then ramrods her with the --- well, see for yourself. It would be an interesting discussion indeed to talk about the sexual dynamics. Not sure we could do it on GR without getting silly, though---which is okay. We live for silly!
Oh, and the problems some had with the religious conversation toward the end ... that didn't bother me at all. It seemed to fit Claire's character as far as I was concerned.
In the end, those are minor quibbles. My main point here is that many people love this book, but I think from my conversations, they're sometimes embarrassed a bit bc it's romance or bc it's a time-travel book. To which I say: there are many many "literary" time-travel love stories that aren't this interesting, entertaining, or consistently readable. That makes this a good book!!!! I can totally see why readers like Outlander and the ensuing series: the book is fun, sexy, historically smart and interesting, vivid and has really dynamic characters who speak great dialogue. It certainly doesn't perpetuate the stereotypes that come to mind when people mention the words "romance fiction." I appreciate RA's challenge to read the book with him, and to all the GR friends---J, Kim, Kelly---who not only encouraged us but really seemed interested by our "manly" [sic] reactions.
Now I must go yassle me lasse. Just please God, don't leave me saying Je suis prematuro.(less)
For such a short book it sure took me a long time to get around to this, but I wanted to knock it out in one sitting. Wilson's approach is essentially...moreFor such a short book it sure took me a long time to get around to this, but I wanted to knock it out in one sitting. Wilson's approach is essentially an effort to explain the benefits of Romantic melancholy to a "don't worry, be happy" world. It's a daunting task given that Americans in particular prefer the cheery optimism of the manifest destiny soul to the sublime darkness of the introverted soul. While I generally liked the book, I found some of the points and examples came and went a little too quickly for my taste---references to Springsteen, John Lennon, Joni Mitchell, etc., fly left and right without much elaboration, as if no one would dare quibble with Wilson's interpretations of their work. Maybe that's the best compliment I can give Against Happiness: while I agreed with much of what's said here---especially the interpretations of Keats---the debater in me wanted a bit more on the other side. Yes, Melville was about as dark a dude as American letters ever produced, but he also understood that it's a thin line between melancholy and monomania (i.e. Captain Ahab). Then again, considering the up-with-people audience he's aiming to persuade, Wilson probably didn't feel his could introduce those ambiguities into his argument for fear of undermining its assertiveness. Still, a highly worthy read. (less)
This is visually a sumptuous book. It includes a beautiful portrait of my late great-grandmother who was 115 at the time and an interview with my uncl...moreThis is visually a sumptuous book. It includes a beautiful portrait of my late great-grandmother who was 115 at the time and an interview with my uncle who talks about his memories of her. Unfortunately, Amazon doesn't yet invite you to peek into its pages, so I can't point you to the pic, and since it's copyrighted, I can't reproduce it either. But I can say that Paul Mobley's photos capture the sheer age that farming tills into the human body---even in the faces of the children you see the wear and tear of work. This would be a five-star for me if not for the text. The interviews are great, but as the subtitle suggests, the publishers couldn't avoid the heartland meme, which sentimentalizes rural America. These people are not the salt of the earth because that is a cliche. They are the earth, and as Walt Whitman says, they bequeath themselves to the dirt to grow from the grass they love. If you want to know them, look under your boot soles. Barring that, thumb through this.(less)
I like to think of this as the Metal Machine Music of American literature. It's a crazy, baffling, totally alienating renunciation of readers of the 1...moreI like to think of this as the Metal Machine Music of American literature. It's a crazy, baffling, totally alienating renunciation of readers of the 19th-century popular marketplace that mixes filial bile, Gothic satire, philosophical essay, and tantalizing hints of impropriety (threesome!) with some of the most gorgeous prose ever to not make a lick of sense. In other words, if you thought Moby-Dick was a digressive mindbender, this "kraken" as HM called it (the kraken being a sea beast even scarier than the Dick) is way more challenging. So incomprehensible was the narrative that one reviewer's headline declared "Herman Meville Crazy." That's my second favorite succinct review right after a certain somebodylicious on GR said "[Yours Truly:] is Fucked in the Head." (I'm not, just for the record). If I'd been alive back in 1852 my review would have read in its entirely: "Methinks Herman Melville Has Been Smokin Too Much Kraken."
A few slobservations: there's controversy over which edition to read. I bow to Hershel Parker, but I prefer this edition to his, which does away with some of the more digressive allegorizing on authorship. Also, there was an interesting film version of this about 10 years ago called Pola X starring the late Guillame Depardieu. Check it out, but only as an adjunct to the experience of the prose. That the French think this book is better than Moby-Dick is its own endorsement. I also wish some indie band would call itself "Plotinus Plinlimmon" after the batshit philosopher behind "Chronometricals and Horologicals," the treatise on moral relativism that ignites Pierre's rebellion from conventional mores. Plotinus Plinlimmon is at least as good a band name as Duran Duran (or Steely Dan---sorry, Jackie Blue). Finally, the ending---spoiler alert---has always reminded of Lucy and Ethel's famous sitcom performance of Shakespeare. And I say that with a straightface. It's a humdinger that's so over the top you seriously do wonder if the entire book was a hoax. That it wasn't makes for great pathos.(less)
I tried to snag a free copy of this last weekend, but the Wiley sales rep at the trade show I was at obviously saw through my disguise of mature, gray...moreI tried to snag a free copy of this last weekend, but the Wiley sales rep at the trade show I was at obviously saw through my disguise of mature, gray-haired reflection and took me for the slobbering girl-rock fanboy I am. Not even proclaiming my eternal love for Juliana's 1992 classic Hey Babe could melt the woman's heart. So I sent over the Sig-O to strike up a little sisterly empathy and, lo and behold, the book came to her place yesterday courtesy of the mail.
I spent the night reading the first 50 pages. Interesting rock bio, especially since JH gets into the nitty-gritty of drink-ticket distribution, crappy bar sound systems, and the prospect of randomly making out with mowhawked male fans. I would have read more but I was suddenly distracted trying to reach my barber to see how soon he could get me in for a temple shaving. More to follow.
UPDATE (10/12/08): Finished it yesterday. Much better than the usual rock memoir. The narrative is structured around Hatfield's increasing disillusionment with live performances during a humblingly small tour with her sometime band Some Girls. There is a lot of behind-the-scenes glimpses of how weird it must indeed be in one's late 30s to perform for $1000-1500 a night in stinky clubs with bad PAs. There are flashbacks to Hatfield's early 90s glory days, when she knew she was not destined to be a radio friendly unit shifter. The ambivalence toward celebrity is refreshing, and the insights into the writing of much-loved songs---"Ugly," "My Sister," "Spin the Bottle," and my personal fave, "Nirvana"---is interesting. I didn't necessarily buy the happy ending that after a year without writing a song JH's creativity exploded and she recorded her best album yet---2008's How to Walk Away. In fact, I smelled a bit of a tie-in. The CD is good, but not better than Hey Babe, which is probably her best and freshest (as I suspect she herself would admit). The most interesting chapter here is the one on her lost album, God's Foot, inspired by a line from Moby-Dick. (I knew there was a reason I love JH).
JH confirms a couple of rumors while denying others: yes, she was a virgin still in the Hey Babe era. No, she didn't fuck Evan Dando (who cares?). Yes, she did (does?) suffer from anorexia.
Interesting side note: This is Wiley's second high profile bid in the music-books business after Don Felder's bio this past spring. Props to a publisher known more for reference and academic stuff for getting into rock books.(less)
This is a powerful, compelling story of a writer who committed suicide two months after the blockbuster novel he'd slaved over for seven years was pub...moreThis is a powerful, compelling story of a writer who committed suicide two months after the blockbuster novel he'd slaved over for seven years was published---and only days before the book was announced as No. 1 on the bestseller lists. That this bio comes from the author's second oldest son---only five at the time of his father's death in 1948---makes the story more profound. In fact, what makes the life of Ross Lockridge so readable is the son's search for his lost father and the decades-long grieving process that he obviously underwent. It's refreshing to read a child's memory of a dead parent that isn't full of filial anger and rage---Lockridge makes an effort to empathize with all of the characters here, especially his mother, b. 1914, who was still living at the time the book was originally published in 1994. This is certainly a WAYYYY better book than ROSS AND TOM, the 1973 bio that drew parallels between RLJ and Tom Hegget, the author of MISTER ROBERTS, who also died young in the thick of literary success (though under very different circumstances).
Two sections of the book deserve special mention. The first is the author's careful reading of RAINTREE COUNTY, his father's 1000 page opus. Anybody attempting to get into this whopper (as I plan to this spring) needs these chapters as a blueprint to not get lost in the whirlpool of characters and symbols.
Even more important are the questions of suicide and the tendency to glamorize the artistic process. It's refreshing here, despite the frequent use of Freud to explain RLJ's struggles, that no single answer is provided. His publishers did not kill him. Heredity did not kill him. Art did not crucify him. Interestingly, LL explores a theme that I think all writers need to be wary of---the grandiosity of creating art. There are no more painful parts of this book than RLJ's verbose letters to his editors and publishers who were trying to trim RC from 1946-8 to make it more readable. The ego unleashed in those pages is embarrassing---as LL fully admits. (They're also the reason, he suggests, that Tom Leggett is so negative toward his father in ROSS AND TOM). But LL wonders whether this grandiosity (he scrupulously avoids using the word "manic") isn't a pitfall any artist must avoid in having the simple audacity to try to write. It's a worthwhile question given the self-absorption and self-importance that so many authors seem to exude. In a curious way, this book becomes a reassessment of Romantic theories of genius that LL, a Romantic scholar, has no doubt spent a lifetime studying.
I have to admit to having gotten a little RLJ obsessed this past month. This book has a lot to do with it. Even if some of the stretches of family history aren't so compelling, and the apprentice years are overly long, the story of one man's crack-up is handled so wisely that one doesn't feel the wear of 500 pages.
A sidenote: one senses some controversy unacknowledged in the book. The website of LL's older brother, Ernest (also a novelist), reprints some correspondence to LL that takes issue with some of the themes of this bio and suggests a bit of sibling rivalry that boils down to a single verb: "wrotten," which, in describing the books EL has written over his career, is interpreted as a pun on "rotten." Go HERE. The exchange (only EL's side, anyway) in no way undermines SHADE; it's simply an interesting sidenote. (less)
A blast and a half of a great political novel. This book struck me as a kind of Good as Gold transplanted out of the Jewish northeast and into the goo...moreA blast and a half of a great political novel. This book struck me as a kind of Good as Gold transplanted out of the Jewish northeast and into the good-old-boy South, or maybe an All the King's Men ditching the High Modernist seriousness for contemporary absurdism; at either rate, it harkens back to those great 70s novels---Vonnegut's Jailbird, maybe, or Updike's The Coup (which nobody but moi seems to like). In other words, The Millionaires is raucous in all the post-Watergate wily ways we've come to expect dirty politics to be---without getting too farcical. There's gambling, whoring, backstabbing, and sundry other types of machinations. There's also a lot of ingenuity in the narrative staging: every few chapters, Majors writes in screenplay style, which adds a swooping, cinematic feel to his treatment of the Tennessee wilds. Majors is a rougish writer, but always smart and perceptive---his characters are never goobers and toejam pickers, but always complex in their comedy. A great big read at 400+ pages.(less)
Another book read for my coming-of-age encyclopedia entry. It's pretty clear this book won the Booker Prize because the Brits felt like flipping the b...moreAnother book read for my coming-of-age encyclopedia entry. It's pretty clear this book won the Booker Prize because the Brits felt like flipping the bird to America. It's as if they said, "This is what we think you're capable of, you warmongering sons of *&$#^." (Remember 2003: The Year We Went to War. The Year Everybody Across the Atlantic Started Hating Us).
There is really nothing here to recommend. Take something topical (school shootings), add an all-too-obvious critique of contemporary society (the media demeans us), add a plethora of cartoon characters (the attention whore of a love interest, who celebrates here boyfriend's imminent execution by posing for Penthouse---natch!), throw in a bunch of supposedly "hip" slang, mix with a motif involving dookie. What do you get?
Whenever a friend/Roman/lover/countryman/debtor/student/ jackass bar brawler tells me that Hemingway lost it after THE SUN ALSO RISES or (being generou...moreWhenever a friend/Roman/lover/countryman/debtor/student/ jackass bar brawler tells me that Hemingway lost it after THE SUN ALSO RISES or (being generous) A FAREWELL TO ARMS, I say: read this book. There are moments of vile approbation. It saddens me infinitely to hear EH bang on Gertrude and Scott, and some of the dialogue is transparently punchdrunk. But when I want to read a book by someone who lost his shit and knew he lost it spectularly, this be the one. There are few passages more self-recriminating in lit than the moment at the end of this one in which EH, lameting his affair with Pauline Pfeiffer, says that he would rather have died than love anyone else than his first wife, Hadley. This is Hemingway kicking his own ass, and thus, a lesson to us all.(less)
Good friends of mine, Dan and Sandy Kendall (whose brother used to be married to my aunt) recommended this short, epistolary romance to me. I read it...moreGood friends of mine, Dan and Sandy Kendall (whose brother used to be married to my aunt) recommended this short, epistolary romance to me. I read it in one sitting---it's that quick (clocking in at 95 pages) and, yes, that lovely. It's a nostalgic book, reminding one of a time when the thought of love and friendship blossoming over talk of the Collected Works of Walter Savage Landor didn't seem precious. The basic premise is that a New York bibliophile strikes up a relationship with the staff at London's Marks & Co. The American author, Helene Hanff, is a lively and fun correspondent; its fun to watch her tease the more stiff-upper-lip (because he's British) Frank Doel. A fun, sweet, simple read.(less)
It's not easy to write a biography of someone whose middle name might as well have been Ambivalence. Wineapple's bio is the more entertaining of moder...moreIt's not easy to write a biography of someone whose middle name might as well have been Ambivalence. Wineapple's bio is the more entertaining of modern bios because she really emphasizes this peculiar aspect of both his persona and his appeal. A notorious fence-sitter, NH professed indifference to abolition, feminism, politics, and just about every other concern of the real world, claiming the artist must reside in the imaginary. In reality, he wasn't above pressing the flesh, calling in chits, and playing the victim to secure political appointments. The readings of his novels and stories are especially insightful here; nobody should teach The Scarlet Letter without consulting this for background, especially those who presume that the book has been "ruining literacy since 1850" (to cite a thread topic somewhere around here). I wish she'd been kinder to The Blithedale Romance, which is certainly the most modern of Hawthorne's novels in sensibility. Extra points for the clever opening: instead of picturing Hawthorne himself on his deathbed, or at the moment of his firing from the Custom House in 1849, we are introduced to his son, Julian, caretaker of his father's reputation, being tried for fraud. It makes for a nifty way to introduce the theme of Maule's curse.(less)
Sure, I'm biased given that I was lucky enough to show up in this issue, but the May 2008 MiPOesias is a gourmand's delight. The basic idea was to inv...moreSure, I'm biased given that I was lucky enough to show up in this issue, but the May 2008 MiPOesias is a gourmand's delight. The basic idea was to invite poets to offer not only their best poetry but their favorite recipes as well, and the result is sumptuous: Grace Cavalieri's oyster pie accompanied by a poem about Anna Nicole Smith's hometown; Geoffrey Gatza's ancho chile rub with works referencing Magritte and Blake; the one-named Mia with dirty pork stew and poems about broken promises and national dis-ease; Douglas Kearney with baked yams and carnal hungers. Excellent stuff as well from Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Peter Davis, and Jane Wong---I especially like Aimee's poem about a town called "Why, Arizona."
The connections flew fast and furious as I read; Derek Motion's "Pearl Jam" made me realize how the cover pic of Danny Jackson-Pierce looks like the cover of Rearview, while inside he looks like Jack White (only Danny writes better). (Kudos to Danny's wife Ashley for the great photos; plus a sweet pic of Derek and his daughter playing piano together). I loved the other pics of poets at home---who knew artists were so happy and had such clean houses? I'm calling a maid service asap. The illustrations nicely demystify the poetry and remind us that writers have lives outside of their work and actually (sometimes) are known to crack smiles.
There's a great essay by Kemel Zaldivar about the evaporating art of close reading, and several clever book reviews. Also Ada Limon's series of poems about female singers she admires, including my personal goddess Emmylou Harris. Speaking of goddesses, how lucky am I to have my mug next to Ada's on the contributor's page? Well, anyway... I digress.
Congrats to Didi for another noteworthy installment. This is indie publishing at its best---fast, fun, unpretentious, unsnobby, but still serious, professional and (most of all) useful. (less)
I doubt this book would have anything of the modest cult reputation it briefly enjoyed if it weren't for the myth of JT LeRoy that lent it some very d...moreI doubt this book would have anything of the modest cult reputation it briefly enjoyed if it weren't for the myth of JT LeRoy that lent it some very dubious "authenticity." It's not that there isn't a compelling story here: mother/son dependency, sexual exploitation, transgendering---hey, it could have been something amazing had the author had any concern whatsoever for the writing and not in manufacturing a "legend" of a life story. But now that LeRoy has been debunked as a fraud, the attention this book received demands some accountability: why is the literary establishment so obsessed with "discovering" savants? Is its fixation with chic degredation really an act of compassion and social justice (save the lot lizards!) or just literary voyeurism? Why the belief that only people who've really lived that degredation can write about it? And why the hell would a real writer care about hanging out with Courtney Love, anyway? Even before LeReoy was "exposed" as Laura Albert it was pretty clear that it was never about the craft of writing, for there wasn't a bit of art to the book. As with so many things today, it was all about starfucking.(less)
So I pulled this out yesterday trapped at home in a rainstorm and reread it. I haven't seen the movie, but I did read the recent Men's Journal article...moreSo I pulled this out yesterday trapped at home in a rainstorm and reread it. I haven't seen the movie, but I did read the recent Men's Journal article that questions the Alexander Supertramp cult. How readers feel about Chris McCandless and his vagabonding tends to divide into three groups: 1) People either revere him as a self-made Thoreau, an "aesthetic adventurer" as he refers to himself (ascetic, too); 2) a rather silly, naive child who starved to death unnecessarily, hurting his family in the process; or 3) people who have mixed feelings about him. I guess I'm in the latter.
There's no doubt that the journey Alex S. undertook in 90/92 is powerfully appealing; it's also a young person's journey and is thus rife with a lot of the selfishness and solipsism of that age. One weird thing is that as I read the dates in CMcC's diary I started pulling out my old dayplanners to see what was going on that same spring/summer of 92. Turns out that on the probably day of AS's death that August 18 I was on my own rite-of-initiation quest in the U.P. of Michigan. Only I had my five-year old son with me. None of that really means anything to anybody but me, but it helped me understand what folks born in the 60s were looking for as they faced their adulthood.
Ultimately, I think the appeal of Into the Wild is Krakaeur's point of view---the way he allows his own unabashed admiration for that journey mingle with his awareness of CMcC's all-too-obvious youth. It's also an impressive piece of reporting, with the author having done an enviable job of recreating two years of travels. In the end I had a few questions I couldn't get past, some of which are resurfacing bc of the movie: 1. Is there a monomanical edge to this type of personality? JK actually uses the word once (and CMcC refers to himself as an Ahab figure) but seems unwilling to consider the psychological aspects of his character beyond cursory mentions of his strong will and fierce independence. 2. Why haven't more of the photos from that journey surfaced? I've only found four, two of which were on the back of the original book jacket and one, the most harrowing, of CMcC with his goodbye note as he prepared to lie down to die. I haven't checked out the new movie tie-in edition, but I haven't heard anything about a new afterword. 3. As I reread this, I couldn't help but think of that other Gen X cult figure, Cobain, especially when JK discusses (all too briefly, I felt) his tensions with his father. I'm convinced that a great story remaining to be told is how Gen X'ers have struggled to grow up after the heyday of the early 90s.(less)
A roman a clef by the nineteenth-century Erma Bombeck. "Fanny Fern" aka Sara Willis Parton (no relation to Dolly) was an acerbic columnist from 1851-1...moreA roman a clef by the nineteenth-century Erma Bombeck. "Fanny Fern" aka Sara Willis Parton (no relation to Dolly) was an acerbic columnist from 1851-1872 and at one point America's highest paid newspaper contributor. In retrospect, it's easy to see why her writing would prove popular: she is one of the few nineteenth-cen women whose style tended more toward the sarcastic than the pious, and she was all about calling dudes in cravats out on their hypocrises---especially her brother, Nathaniel Parker Willis, who if he'd been born 150 years later would've been Simon on The Real Housewives of New York. Ruth Hall is FF's barely fictionalized account of her rise to fame. It was controversial in its time because it was seen as ungracious for a lady to take revenge in print on the family that had shanked her and her kids after the death of her first husband. If you're reading formalistically, you're likely to be disappointed: for all the addy-tude, the chapters are short and often fringed in sentimental apostrophes and exclamation points. It is notable for being one of the few novels of the day not to submit to the marriage plot---something even Alcott in Little Womenz couldn't avoid. Yet the real interest here is the biographical background. Even in its day the book was a bestsmeller because folks were curious about who FF really was---and some schmuck she barbeques in the book outed her shortly after its publication, promptly doubling sales. Perhaps what's really interesting is the background FF leave out: her disastrous second marriage---forced on her by her family---is not part of Ruth's journey (although it is fictionalized in Fanny Ford, FF's second novel). FF left the louche and toiled into semi-poverty until she found her metier. The rest is history, and this book, for all its historical importance, sometimes errs on the side of bragging about it too much. There are interpolated fan letters that get mocked (a proto-Casey Kasem request that FF dedicate a column to a reader's dead dog Fido) and some protests-too-much blather about FF not pretending to be literature. So it's a mixed bag. Many in the class loved it ... way better than Moibus Dickus. But that's okay. It ain't like Melville needs us.(less)
Very handsomely designed publication. Emma Trellis did a great job bringing together a diverse group of voices---her own, Rich Villar, Mia Leonin, and...moreVery handsomely designed publication. Emma Trellis did a great job bringing together a diverse group of voices---her own, Rich Villar, Mia Leonin, and Virgil Suarez, whose time at LSU ended just about when I washed up there. And yes, I was flattered to be asked to write a review of Oscar Hijuelos. How Menendez Publishing manages to produces so much good stuff is a mystery, but it's great to see an indie thrive so creatively.(less)
Reading this book I was reminded of Joe Queenan's Red Lobster, White Trash, and the Blue Lagoon (1999), an unfunny book of tossed-off "humor" pieces a...moreReading this book I was reminded of Joe Queenan's Red Lobster, White Trash, and the Blue Lagoon (1999), an unfunny book of tossed-off "humor" pieces about the irrevocable cheesiness of American culture. In an essay called "Slouching toward Red Lobster" (see what I mean by "unfunny"?), Queenan describes the chain as a place for people who think they're too good for Roy Roger's. That about sums up his point: I'm better than other people, and I get to write a book about it!
What I loved about LAST NIGHT AT THE LOBSTER is that forces people who revert to that reactionary snark to rethink their condescension toward the service industry. O'Nan finds poetry in the routine of check-lists and machinery, in the effort to treat customers more kindly than they treat waitresses and servers, in the effort to not give into despair but find some pride in work. The story and style are deceptively simply, and it's easy if we read too fast to miss the emotional subtext. In effect, O'Nan walks a tightrope here---he doesn't veer toward melodrama or sentimentality but a kind of fanfare for the common man. The most dramatic moment comes when Manny ponders stealing the giant stuffed fish as a momento of all his time at the restaurant. For some folks, that may seem too miniature to command attention, but to me it's indicative of the thousand little daily ethical challenges we face that make us a moral people. Simply put, a beautiful little book.(less)
It's almost a chore to get past the praise excerpted in the first few pages of this debut story collection from 2003. Much better to simply turn to th...moreIt's almost a chore to get past the praise excerpted in the first few pages of this debut story collection from 2003. Much better to simply turn to the stories themselves and make your own judgments. These are certainly accomplished short fictions, literary in the sense that their plots are asymmetical in interesting ways, many ending with codas that introduce ambiguity instead of wrapping up the drama. The subject is the African-American experience, of course, of all varieties: children, teenagers, fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, churchgoers, past and present. One of the intriguing themes is the black awareness of how racism damps down empathetic impulses; in "Brownies," for example, a troop of Af-Am girls make fun of mildly retarded "Caucasions" after hearing the latter utter the N word. In the title story, a self-destructive Yale student shuts herself off from a potential ally/friend with whom she has something in common (the death of a mother), leading to a devastating moment of indifference that ruins their connection. My one criticism is that there are maybe 1-2 too many coming of age stories---I found myself more interested in "Every Tongue Shall Confess" and even the Japan-set "Geese" than the New Yorker published "The Ant of the Self," which strikes me as a fairly conventional "our parents are doomed to fail us" story if not for its Million Man March backdrop. And "Speaking in Tongues" demonstrates the dangers of loose plotting: a long picaresque about a 14-year-old searching for her mother among the shadier streets of Atlanta goes nowhere fast. That said, the prose is immaculate. It will be interesting to see what Packer does in her long-awaited novel The Thousands, out next year.(less)
I met Erik here on GoodReads and we've had a lot of nice conversations, some of them about books, some of them about Cornhuskers. Those with canny eye...moreI met Erik here on GoodReads and we've had a lot of nice conversations, some of them about books, some of them about Cornhuskers. Those with canny eyes will notice that he was generous enough to give an enthusiastic review to one of my books, so I need to be upfront and preface my comments here with a statement: I do not logroll. Nuff said.
The pleasure of reading A Mother's Tale lies in the suspense. The back book jacket promises "one of the most astonishing endings in recent fiction," so inevitably readers begin from Paragraph 1 trying to predict what will constitute said astonishment. This can be a burden for a novel to carry, for some smarty-pants readers will inevitably say "I saw it coming all along," regardless of whether or not they did. In all honesty, I didn't see the ending coming, and forty years of reading have given me a pretty intuitive eye for the Big Wrap-Up Coming Down the Road. I was certainly guessing---wrongly---thanks to what strike me as some clever red herrings. (Or maybe I've just taught for too long and sniff for foreshadowings). So I invite other readers to test the book out for this. My guess is you won't predict the ending either.
A second danger of writing a narrative that promises a wallop at the end is that character becomes subordinate to the pushing through of plot. That's not the case here. In fact, the plot unfolds through the voices of the characters, which are offered in multiple first-person perspectives a la As I Lay Dying. (Erik will claim The Sound and the Fury as his inspiration, but A Mother's Tale names each after after the character telling it, just like Dying). There are a trio of characters here: a daughter, a mother, and a mysterious man discovered in their yard. Each voice is distinct, lyrical, and rhythmic. I especially appreciated how the voice of Jimmy (the daughter) avoided the twin perils of writing as a rural teenager: there are no faux hillbillyisms (dialect) of the Huck Finn variety, nor are there what I call "anointed-adolescentisms" in which a "touched" young person offers saint-like insight into hypocrises we adults are too corrupt to appreciate. Instead, the voice is delightfully shorn of attitude and naifdom and therefore feels authentic. I also loved the chapter that details Jimmy's mother's background---it reveals the mystery of just who Jimmy's father is and, in retrospect, explains the ending.
And now a paragraph to really show I'm not logrolling: If I were forced to mention a few things I might object to---just to prove my objectivity---I would say some of the motifs associated the rural setting are maybe too familiar. I myself would have avoided any mention of strippers, Jesus, and clotheslines. Then again, those things are woven deep in the fabric of country life, and to take them out is a little like taking the I out of Indiana (or the ask out of Nebraska). They're part of the idiom.
In short, a well-constructed novel, compelling in characterization, and deft in the way it teases the reader into partaking of the suspense. Highly recommended. (less)
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