Joseph Sciuto's Blog: A Curious View: A Compilation of Short Stories by Joseph Sciuto, page 10

“THE MOON AND SIXPENCE,” BY W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM

I have been a big fan of W. Somerset Maugham for a very long time and I have especially loved, “The Painted Veil, Cakes and Ale, The Razor’s Edge, Theatre (one of the best books I have read about the theater) and Of Human Bondage.”

If one can get through the first 5 pages of Mr. Maugham’s, “The Moon and Sixpence,” one is in for a slow, tedious, inspiring, thoughtful, philosophical journey about art and the artist… complete with obnoxious characters, at times beautifully written, and at other times meandering that nearly drove me crazy (especially since my edition came in at 164 pages).

The story is supposedly based on the life of Paul Gauguin, and if Mr. Gauguin was anything like the main character Charles Strickland, who leaves his wife and two children and moves to Paris without giving a second thought about their welfare, to become a painter, an artist, I am glad I never got to meet either Mr. Gauguin or his possible double Mr. Strickland.

MARY DORIA RUSSELL’S, “THE WOMEN OF THE COPPER COUNTRY.

Mary Doria Russell’s, “The Women of the Copper Country,” might not be the literary gem that I felt her previous three books I have read were but it is real close.

On the cover page of the edition of the book I have there is a short blurb from Kirkus Reviews that reads, “Historical fiction that feels uncomfortably relevant today.”

The copper strike that takes place in Ms. Russell’s book goes all the way back to 1913 in Calumet, Michigan where at least one miner was killed a week for the meager salary of about one dollar a day for twelve hours of work.

Since then the labor laws have changed quite a bit, and the big companies of yesteryears might have changed names but the big companies of today still practice many of the same practices. They are more interested in their stock holders than their workers and the best way to get what you want is to buy off our less than holy politicians. The late Senator John McCain, the last republican I had any respect for, said, “it’s getting to the point that the only people who are going to have a vote in this country are the rich.” Well, I hate to disagree with Senator McCain but the rich people, the big companies, have controlled the vote for hundreds of years in our lovely country but it is getting worse which seems almost impossible but true nevertheless.

Ms. Russell’s book thoroughly explores the many aspects of a big company and their control over workers, fear of stock holders, and politicians doing what many do best and that’s taking the contributions and turning the other way.

Her heroes, in contrast to many depictions of union disputes, is mostly the women (wives) of Calumet, Michigan who go to bat against the Copper Company that employs most of the men of the town and whose unfair and deadly practices their husbands’ are subject to for such meager salaries.

Ms. Russell’s characters are simply fantastic, her writing sublime, and one could easily read this 300 page book in one or two sittings it moves so quickly. I strongly, strongly recommend.

“THE SPARROW,” BY MARY DORIA RUSSELL.

 “Was Cain’s sacrifice to God not good enough? Why did he reject it?” Father Emilio Sandoz asked of his fellow companions as they explore the distant plant of Rakhat, a few light years away from earth, and orbits around three suns.

Mary Doria Russell’s “The Sparrow,” is like a 360 degree turn from the two previous novels I have read by this amazing author. The one thing it has in common is its brilliance.

I’ve read where other reviewers have compared it to the works of H.G. Wells and Ray Bradbury and I can definitely see the similarities but I will take it a step further and say that Ms. Russell’s novel goes to a place where few authors have been successful. She makes inquiries into the very ‘essence’ of religion…of Christianity, Judaism, and God’s place in the universe. She joins that elite group of authors, Yeats, Joyce, T.S. Elliot, Dostoevsky, and Graham, who have had the courage to question the dogmas, principles and tenets of religions.

I would be amiss if I did not say that this novel might not be for everyone. It leaves you pondering questions that could be quite disturbing and unnerving.

For me, I have pondered many of these questions for nearly my entire life, but Ms. Russell’s novel is a compelling example of a writer who not only creates great characters and tells wonderful stories but is willing to examine the human condition in all its complexities, despite the uneasiness it might engender.

ALICE HOFFMAN’S. “INCANTATION.”

Alice Hoffman’s, ‘Incantation,’ has no real, practicing magic in it, but it is magical all the same. It takes place in a village in Spain called Encaleflora at the turn of the 1500 century. At the beginning of that noble crusade called “The Spanish Inquisition.”

The story is told by the youngest child, Estrella, who for most of her first sixteen years of life has been living a lie that she doesn’t know about. Like many families in the village her family for the last one hundred years have called themselves Catholic while maintaining many Jewish traditions. Becoming Catholic was a survival mechanism for many Jews and Muslims.

Not to be outsmarted, The Inquisition, with the help of informers uncover these imposters and burn them alive. (Apparently, none of them read the Sermon on the Mount) nor were conscious of the fact that Jesus (the Christian messiah) was Jewish himself.

Like most tragic, despicable crimes against humanity the enforces try to wipe out all existence of the conquered…destroying books, letters, etc.

In one telling reminder Estrella tells her daughters and sons:

Remember what I’ve told you
Remember me

“DOC,” BY MARY DORIA RUSSELL.

If it wasn’t for the fact that the previous novel I read, “A Thread of Grace, ” by Mary Doria Russell was the best novel I read this year, it would have been “Doc,” by Mary Doria Russell. So “Doc,” is the second best novel I have read.

The two above books are, in my opinion, literary achievements. I put them in that rarified atmosphere reserved for writers like Toni Morrison, Early Truman Capote, and Don DeLillo.

For those who might not like westerners, I can assure you that “Doc,” is so much.

5+++++ Highly, Highly recommend.

“JACQUELINE BOUVIER KENNEDY ONASSIS: THE UNTOLD STORY,” BY BARBARA LEAMING.

One of the saddest statistics that have come to light during our misguided adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan is that suicides among returning veterans of these two wars is far greater than the number of service members killed in combat.

The keeping of statistics on returning veterans who have committed suicide after fighting for their country is a relatively new thing…so we have have no statistics of suicides among veterans after returning from Vietnam, Korea, World War 2, etc…

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) wasn’t considered a psychological disorder until the early 1980’s.

Ms. Leaming’s, “Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis: The Untold Story,” is a fascinating analysis of Mrs. Kennedy’s behavior after the assassination of her husband, President Kennedy, in Dallas on November of 1963. Relying on interviews, first hand accounts of her sudden mood changes, and her behavior for most of life after the death of the President, Mrs Leaming’s makes a convincing, yet very sad case, that she suffered from PTSD for most of her life and up until her death at the age of sixty-four.

Her marriage to Mr. Onassis, which many saw as a gold digger going after a rich, older man’s immense wealth, is explained in a way which contradicts the notion that Mrs. Kennedy was a gold digger. First, Mrs. Kennedy was quite wealthy and secondly, she had a number of extremely rich, younger men who had previously proposed to her. What these younger rich men didn’t have was their own island like Mr. Onassis. One of the signs of PTSD is one’s desire to be alone, to be in areas that are viewed as safe and Mrs. Kennedy throughout her life after the assassination desired safety and being left alone or among people and situations that she deemed safe.

If one had told me that I would be reading a biography on Mrs. Kennedy, just six months ago, I would have said that is highly unlikely. Not that I have anything against Mrs. Kennedy but because I have read so many books about the Kennedys’ that I didn’t think I needed to know more about her than I already knew.

What changed my mind was two books I have recently read that were not about her, but where she loomed large in such a positive, intelligent, and caring way that I felt I needed to know more about this fascinating, often misunderstood, American icon.

“THE CHRISTMAS KID,” BY PETE HAMILL.

What does a writer do? Answer: He reads. By reading one picks up, consciously or unconsciously, a style, one enhances ones’ vocabulary, and one truly finds out if he/she really wants to be writer. What makes a successful writer? Answer: Knowledge of your subject and characters and your ability to write HONESTLY. The above assessment was told to me by a famous writer, professor, and war hero and I have related this wisdom to everyone who has ever asked me about writing.

Mr. Hamill knows the subject of ‘Brooklyn’ during the 1940’s, 50’s, and 60’s as well as any writer I have read, and his love for this famous borough of New York City in undeniable. He has written about this borough in a number of wonderful books which I highly recommend, “Snow in August,” and one of my favorite books ever, “North River.”

“The Christmas Kid: And Other Brooklyn Stories,” is a series of nearly thirty short stories, brilliantly constructed, all about Brooklyn and its many characters and unique features during the time that he grew up there and which, sadly exist fifty-years later, only in his memories and his enchanting books and stories that will hopefully live on forever.

Mr. Hamill passed away in 2020. As a kid growing up in the Bronx, I used to read his column in the New York newspapers. He was then, and now in death the “Quintessential New Yorker.” His writing possesses all the qualities that I write about in the first paragraph and this collection of short stories is simply another reminder of how important it is to know and love the subject you are writing about and to honestly portray that to the reader. I highly recommend.

“A THREAD OF GRACE,” BY MARY DORIA RUSSELL.

There is something so beautiful about this novel, and that statement alone might seem like a contradiction because this book is about the German occupation of Italy, 1943-1945, after the Italians surrendered to the allies.

To be sure, it is not the humanity that the Germans showed toward the Italians, even though I am quite sure there was a trifling of the German population that was appalled by Hitler’s behavior and the way millions of his minions carried out some of the most deplorable behavior known to mankind.

The beauty that runs throughout this book is the humanity that exists between the Italian Catholics and the Italian Jews (and other Jews who escaped over the Alps and into northern Italy). The Germans, true to form and not wanting to disappoint the Führer, continued their genocidal policies in Italy like they did everywhere they went…even when it cost them battlefield loses such as in the Ukraine.

The Italian Catholics and Jews formed ‘cells,’ among themselves in the northern towns of Italy to fight the Germans, to survive until the allies finally defeated the Nazis. Rabbis gowned the vestments of priests, Jewish women wore the garments of Catholic nuns and taught in Catholic schools, Jewish mothers housed and fed the Italian partisans fighting the Germans and Communists. Jewish children and adults were given Italian last names and forged identifications.

Religion did not divide these two groups. In a very real sense, it provided cover and safety. It is the humanity that both these groups showed toward one another that is so absolutely beautiful about this book. It is their cohesive humanity and their fight against real evil that gave this reader real hope for the future of all mankind.

This is the best novel I have read this year. It is based on actual events and whereas this book is a real page turner, with a vast variety of great characters, I purposely read it slowly because this is a work of art by Ms. Russell that deserves careful analysis and attention to all details.

ANNE APPLEBAUM’S, “RED FAMINE.”

5+++
Before the United States entered World War 2, a reporter went up to Senator Harry Truman and asked what he thought about the Nazis attacking the Russians. His response was, “If we see that Germany is winning we ought to help Russia and if Russia is winning we ought to help Germany, and that way let them kill as many as possible, although I don’t want to see Hitler victorious under any circumstances.”

I have pondered this question and answer for most of my adult life and I have usually arrived at the hypnosis, that if Hitler and his group of madman did conquer Russia they would have killed Stalin and eliminated his group of madmen. Then the allies, at a great cost of human life, would have defeated Germany, occupied Russia, and there would never have been a Soviet Empire, or as President Reagan so aptly called it “The evil empire.”

Back in the early to mid-eighties when I was living in Los Angeles many of my friends thought that President Reagan would most certainly start World War 3. That he was the worse possible thing that could ever happen to America which is saying a lot since President Nixon and LBJ had not been out of office that long.

I disagreed with many of President Reagan’s foreign and domestic policies, but when it came to the Soviet Union I was one-hundred percent in agreement. Many of my friends were rich, spoiled, children, and unlike poor little me from the Bronx, they had been to Russian occupied countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary and they thought they were wonderful, not much different than the U.S. Of course, they never travelled outside of the capitals or to the parts of the capitals that the governments of these countries steered travelers away from…concerned for their safety.

I on the other hand, had the good fortune to have professors who searched for the truth, and not illusions. Who went against the popular myths about the Soviet Union and opened my eyes to the atrocities carried out by Stalin and members of the communist party, and the ones that were the most horrifying to me were the inhuman, brutal, premeditated, conscious policy of forcing Ukrainian peasants off their land and into collective farms and as a result creating a catastrophic famine from 1931-1933 that killed 4 million Ukrainians and another one million Russians, Polish, and Germans who lived in different parts of Russia.

Anne Applebaum’s, “Red Famine,” is the best book I have ever read about the Red Famine of 1931-1933 and explicitly states that the 4 million Ukrainians who perished were not accidental victims of poor policy but the deliberate wish of Stalin and the communist to kill them and to wipe out the entire Ukrainian culture, language, and history.

Warning: This book is graphic as it should be, exceptionally researched, lucid, and very, very powerful.

LYNNE OLSON’S, “EMPRESS OF THE NILE.”

Lynne Olson is my favorite World War 2 historian and there are quite a few reasons for that but the most important to me is her ability to take a little known historical fact or person and expand outward at a pace that never confuses the reader and greatly expands one’s knowledge. Whether that person is the US ambassador to Britain after Joe Kennedy quits the post in her novel “Citizens of London,” or the Polish pilots who helped save Britain from the Nazis in her novel, “A Question of Honor.” In her other four novels on World War 2 she follows the same constructive and lucid style.

In her latest book, “Empress Of The Nile,” the style continues and we are introduced to the fascinating, strong-will, five foot, French archaeologist Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt whose persistence, against the greatest of odds, saves the ancient temples of Egypt…with quite of bit of help from Jackie Kennedy, President Kennedy’s often misunderstood, highly educated wife.

Ms. Desroches-Noblecourt’s heroics shed a major light on the importance of history, culture, and art in the shaping and understanding the world we currently live in and, just as importantly, if we truly want to understand the present we need to study the past…even when that past is four thousand years old.

A simply fascinating book from one of the great historians of our time.