The Catcher in the Rye
discussion
The Most Overrated Books
Kallie:Interesting. Apparently sometimes (often? all the time?) Mohammed Mrabet didn't actually write his fiction down but simply told stories to Bowles who taped him and then later translated/transcribed those tapes to text.
At least that's what is suggested by a very cursory look at some of Mrabet's books on Goodreads.
Mark wrote: "Kallie:Interesting. Apparently sometimes (often? all the time?) Mohammed Mrabet didn't actually write his fiction down but simply told stories to Bowles who taped him and then later translated/tr..."
That's correct. I'd forgotten, since the voice is Mrabet's.
I hope there's someone besides me who found "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" pretentious and with an unlikable narrator from the first page.
Personally, I couldn't even finish "Madame Bovary"
Beth wrote: "Beth Chandler I hope there's someone besides me who . . . "I'll just bet there is.
Mark wrote: "Kallie:Interesting. Apparently sometimes (often? all the time?) Mohammed Mrabet didn't actually write his fiction down but simply told stories to Bowles who taped him and then later translated/tr..."
In fact, I don't remember if Mrabet (quite a character) spoke English that Bowles transcribed and edited . . . I will look into that.
Calamarsa wrote: "Personally, I couldn't even finish "Madame Bovary""No worries. It's my understanding that (view spoiler) even if you couldn't.
So far as Atlas Shrugged and Catcher in the Rye I really cannot agree. Maybe the others.
Beth wrote: "I hope there's someone besides me who found "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" pretentious and with an unlikable narrator from the first page."I'm with you, Beth. Couldn't finish the first chapter.
Anne Hawn wrote: "My selections would be (totally out of order) Plato's Republic , The way of all Flesh, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Hamlet, Macbeth, On Liberty , 1984 , Brave New World , Tom Jones , Vanity Fair , Edith Hamilton's Mythology , Julius Caesar Les Miserables ...."I created a book shelf for your recommended book list. Please tell me who wrote Tom Jones.
I have not read most of these so I am very excited to get your book list.
I would recommend
Anna Karenina because it talks about society being a human family or organism. He relates how relationships with each other and with work are interrelated (exploring the industrial revolution of farming and railroads and the impact this had on the quality of life.)
Hard Times Charles Dickens education book that influenced Tolstoy. He was for teaching thinking and experiences rather than "Core Education" or "facts, facts and nothing but the facts.
Bleak House The judicial system hasn't changed that much.
The Castle from someone who understood the labyrinth of the system...all systems, whether educational, medical or judicial.
Bambi predicts the exodus of the Jews by a Zionist. Banned by Hitler. I don't know if he predicted this exodus or was looking at the Russia. History may have just repeated it self. I think it is interesting that HIM mentioned in the book is also stands for His Imperial Majesty.
Anne I think that you may have picked your books with a certain theme in mind. I am not sure that mine match up to that expectation. I would love to hear why you picked the books you did.
I would put The Catcher in the Rye on the list but only if it was read with all the literary textures, not as a biography, but as a history of WW2.
My list would include THE TRIAL as well.
Henry Fielding wrote Tom Jones, another big book I need to complete before I die. Fielding is an 18th Century novelist, very funny...
Petergiaquinta wrote: "Henry Fielding wrote Tom Jones, another big book I need to complete before I die. Fielding is an 18th Century novelist, very funny..."I loved Tom Jones. Very funny indeed. And the film by Tony Richardson with Albert Finney did it justice. (It's best seen on a big wide screen.)
Kallie wrote: "to me, that is as important as seeing cultural commonalities. Part of the reason I read is to experience someone else's point of view. ..."This is why I think that Salinger named the book Out of Africa. She was sympathetic with the Africans. All war is colonization for resources. It is not about human freedoms but resources. But you can't get people passionate about that unless it is beer and food...or football right?
All war is colonization for resources. It is not about human freedoms but resources. That's an oversimplification. Those two, resources and freedom, are often linked together. Unless you're talking specifically about colonization, and the conflicts related directly to them, in which case I'd agree.
Michael wrote: "Beth wrote: "I hope there's someone besides me who found "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" pretentious and with an unlikable narrator from the first page."I'm with you, Beth. Couldn't finish the fir..."
I was in the same boat. I just didn't see the point.
Paul Martin wrote: "All war is colonization for resources. It is not about human freedoms but resources. That's an oversimplification. Those two, resources and freedom, are often linked together. Unless you're talki..."
For example our civil war (America) was suppose to be about slavery but if you look close slavery was already going out of vogue in the south. In the documentary THE SECRETS OF OZ" he talks about what the war was really about. Only thing is they couldn't get soldiers to fight that war. So are other fictional wars. There designed then sold to the public, then revealed in history (sometimes as conspiracies, I.e. The Catcher in the Rye)
In the civil war the resource was land and human resource for the northern factories. Freeing them meant you didn't have to pay to take care of them.
You should put The Jungle by Upton Sinclair on your list.
Cosmic wrote: "This is why I think that Salinger named the book Out of Africa."Salinger? Isak Dinesen, right? I'm confused.
Freedom is just as limited as resources. I am free to jump off my roof if I want to, but this does not free me from breaking my back in the process.
And what do you have against beer? And are you male or female ... not that it matters at all. It's just that Anne referenced you as "her" and I had always thought you were a "him" for I don't know what reason.
I have no doubt that that is the case with The American Civil War, and many other wars, but I don't agree that it is the case in "all war". What did NATO gain my bombing Yugoslavia?
THE HITCHIKERS GUIDE TO THE GALXY IS SOOO OVERRATED
Paul Martin wrote: "All war is colonization for resources. It is not about human freedoms but resources. That's an oversimplification. Those two, resources and freedom, are often linked together. Unless you're talki..."
But it troubles me that some entities and individuals invested therein are making so much money through war these days and I don't see what freedom is being won that is worth the warfare and destruction. There also appears to be a lot culture-wrecking economic colonization. I hope someone can contradict this impression because thinking of the world that way is depressing.
Mark wrote: "Cosmic wrote: "This is why I think that Salinger named the book Out of Africa."Salinger? Isak Dinesen, right? I'm confused."
I think he/she/it means that Salinger mentioned it or name-dropped it, not wrote it
Kallie wrote: "I hope someone can contradict this impression because thinking of the world that way is depressing."I can't contradict it. The powerful prey upon the weak either to increase their own sense of personal pleasure and gain or because they're in some out of their mind allegiance to twisted, meaningless principles and causes.
Have a nice day.
Kallie wrote: But it troubles me that some entities and individuals invested therein are making so much money through war these daysOf course, someone will always profit. What I challenge is the idea that the ones who profit are always, as in every single time, the ones who cause the war. From Cosmics statement, I almost got the impression that he/she meant that it is theoretically impossible to have a war where increased resources isn't the primary goal (Sorry if I misunderstood, Cosmic).
and I don't see what freedom is being won that is worth the warfare and destruction.
Neither do I, but I guess it's a matter of perspective. What is a human life worth? (I'm sure these's a utilitarianist lurking this thread).
Paul Martin wrote: "and I don't see what freedom is being won that is worth the warfare and destruction."WW II? I realize the following sentence is the epitome of oversimplification, but didn't Hitler have to be stopped?
Mark wrote: "Paul Martin wrote: "and I don't see what freedom is being won that is worth the warfare and destruction."WW II? I realize the following sentence is the epitome of oversimplification, but didn't H..."
Nah, I agree. I can't imagine even the most hard-core pacifist argue that Nazi world domination would be preferable to the war.
But then, everything is more extreme in America(?), maybe you know one?
Paul Martin wrote: "But then, everything is more extreme in America(?), maybe you know one? "Well, there were plenty of dumbasses in America, just as there were in Britain, content to let the Nazis do their thing. Sadly, Charles Lindbergh was one of them, and he wasn't alone.
And I don't think Lindbergh was motivated by pacifism, unfortunately.
Lindbergh was an isolationist, not a pacifist. "America First" and all that stuff. Naive but not THAT naive, if you will.
Gary wrote: "Lindbergh was an isolationist, not a pacifist. "America First" and all that stuff. Naive but not THAT naive, if you will."Was that the last time American diplomacy and military action was motivated by isolationism (my understanding is we really dragged our feet getting into WW II) in any real way? Seems like after that, we were solidly "cops of the world" (as goes the Phil Ochs song) at most every given opportunity.
History seems to have validated our decision to drop our isolationism in the case of WW II. Seems we should have done it sooner. But then we were drunk with involvement from then on in.
Petergiaquinta wrote: Well, there were plenty of dumbasses in America, just as there were in Britain, content to let the Nazis do their thing.Yes, I suppose many people in many countries thought the same at the time (not to mention the more extreme ones, like Hamsun. Seriously, the eulogy he wrote for Hitler is just...sad), but I was talking more about present-day. Can a person of average education and intelligence, in 2014, argue that, say, America was wrong to enter the war, knowing what we now know?
Mark wrote: "Was that the last time American diplomacy and military action was motivated by isolationism (my understanding is we really dragged our feet getting into WW II) in any real way? Seems like after that, we were solidly "cops of the world" (as goes the Phil Ochs song) at most every given opportunity."I'd say so. At least, the last time it really had a meaningful political influence. There were comments from LBJ about not sending American boys to do a job that Vietnamese boys should be doing (or words to that effect) but that was largely meaningless. I don't think he hesitated much at all.
Nowadays, we do get the Paul boys occasionally spouting what amounts to an isolationist stance, but they couch it in different vocabulary, and I don't think those aspects of their politics are really taken all that seriously even by their supporters.
Paul Martin wrote: "Can a person of average education and intelligence, in 2014, argue that, say, America was wrong to enter the war, knowing what we now know?"I don't think a lot of people would make that argument for WW2. Some folks, however, do argue about WW1. I just saw this article a couple of weeks back, and was surprised by the views expressed:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014...
Ferguson is an... interesting fellow, but he's not the only person who make comparable arguments.
For your reading entertainment (maybe), here is a cut and paste of something I posted to my Facebook account this past Sunday. It shows that I was raised by hippies and didn't, like David Brooks, grow up to take opposite views as a result of the experience. I make a point about an isolationist view in our current political climate toward the end:I have spent some quiet time today contemplating the anniversary of the Kent State University shootings 44 years ago today. At the height of the Vietnam war, the elderly, moneyed elite men who were our "leaders" agreed to conscript young men (younger, in some cases, than my son is today) into the military and ship them overseas to fight in a war that made sense how?
Many of these young men were bodily, mentally and spiritually maimed. Or,
In numbers that our "leaders" refused to accurately report, were killed and then shipped home in flag-draped boxes. And when young people at home started taking to the streets to express their notion that this seemed like a raw deal, the foot soldiers of domestic law and order often busted heads. Forty four years ago today, some of those exemplars of domestic law and order fired 67 rounds into a crowd of young people on Kent State's campus, wounding nine people and killing four people. One of the horrors of history is that people are reduced to symbols and numbers. Two who were killed, Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller, had been involved in the protest the Ohio National Guardsmen were reacting to. The two other students killed, Sandra Scheuer and William Knox Schroeder, were just walking to their next class. Hell, Schroeder was even in the ROTC program.
Stop and think about the whole thing for a bit.
I guess I'll fully disclose my hippie raising when I say it all reminds me of the line that I think Grace Slick sang somewhere or other, "you've got children dying for you, that don't sound like freedom to me." I can't remember the song. I'll bet Harry can.
I have never in my life known that kind of shit (unless you count my vague awareness of it when I was seven years old). But I don't believe for a second that I enjoyed a youth free from such harrowing events because all those young men who came home maimed or in a flag draped box suffered to protect my freedoms.
I mean absolutely no disrespect to anyone who served or still serves in America's military or who has friends, family or loved ones who do. Nor do I think that the American military is an unnecessary or homogeneously evil institution. But does anyone today seriously think that if we had minimized our military involvement in Vietnam that part or all of the United States of America would have fallen to the kind totalitarian despotism that masqueraded as "Communism" at that time?
Now if you've decided you're on "America Number One!"/Go Team Red State as part of your personal identity, you may already be sharpening up your biting retorts without thinking much about what I've said. I've been there, although for the other team. Speaking of which, and to be fair and balanced, if your personal identity is "Rachel Maddow for President!"/Go Team Blue State, you might be getting ready to post a fist-pump comment of agreement. I welcome both, in addition to any thoughtful comments.
You know what I think? I think if today's "leaders" brought back conscription (i.e. the draft) and said it was time for our Johnnies (maybe even our Joanies) to go to the next "over there, over there" to die for their oil, and their hedge funds and their diversified profit margins, the red team and the blue team might finally start to agree on something. Maybe not. Not sure.
I guess you might say, 2 + 2 is on my mind this Sunday.
http://youtu.be/487t88pz-2Y
Gary wrote: Ferguson is an... interesting fellow, but he's not the only person who make comparable arguments. Ah, yes, I remember him. Might be something in it, who knows?
Interesting though it might be, he seems to thrive on provocation.
Mark wrote: "For your reading entertainment (maybe), here is a cut and paste of something I posted to my Facebook account this past Sunday. It shows that I was raised by hippies and didn't, like David Brooks, g..."+1 Fist-pump comment.
Paul Martin wrote: "he seems to thrive on provocation."Could not have said it better myself. Hooray. And thanks for the fist pump comment, btw.
I think Niall Ferguson is whip smart and well read. He had a limited series on PBS (they probably bought it from or co-produced it with the BBC) and I saw some of it and mean to go back to it.
But welcome to the basic reality that the surplus of information created by the digital age has ushered in: it's an attention economy.
Because before we spend our time with or our money on something or someone, that thing or that one must grab our attention! Attention first and then all else (particularly money) flows from that. And it is not easy to get our attention because we are cocooned in a dizzying surfeit of stimuli that is distraction wrapped within a distraction wrapped within a diversion that pulled us away from the meme of the moment in the first place. How to best grab our attention? Say something that shocks or that goes against conventional thought and wisdom or that immediately gets under our skin emotionally (I can't believe that bastard said that! Wait until he reads this comment I'm typing fast as a rabid bunny with fangs on his blog, damnit!).
This is what I intuitively suspect Niall Ferguson is guilty of to some degree. I am the first to agree that a lot of reasonable positions go against the grain of so-called conventional thought, but that's different somehow from pumping up that dimension of your ideas because you know it's going to mean lots of page visits, big book deals, media attention, opportunities to have pictures of you taken where you look suave and ready for the ladies, etc.
There are other examples of this phenomenon that have riled me up, but I cannot think of them right now (besides obvious and unimaginative ass hats such as Bill O'Reilly).
Paul Martin wrote: "Ah, yes, I remember him. Might be something in it, who knows?Interesting though it might be, he seems to thrive on provocation."
He's definitely making a career of it. He gets on TV more than the chairman of the Fed... no small accomplishment for an academic. I'd say he's the Harold Bloom of macroeconomics. (Not a compliment IMO.)
Mark wrote: "For your reading entertainment (maybe), here is a cut and paste of something I posted to my Facebook account this past Sunday. It shows that I was raised by hippies and didn't, like David Brooks, g..."Thanks for the song, and the reminder of this day in history. There are some really powerful current anti-war songs out there also. I was 12 so I only remember my parents being horrified. My husband was 18 and he remembers exactly where he was and what he was doing when it happened. Every time we, as a country, have gone to war since then I think maybe this time it won't be as horrible, we will be in and out of it in no time; because I want to believe it. But I don't and I am sick of crying every time I learn of another casualty or horrible injury that tears apart families and our vets. For what.
Cosmic wrote: "Paul Martin wrote: "All war is colonization for resources. It is not about human freedoms but resources. That's an oversimplification. Those two, resources and freedom, are often linked together...."
Why didn´t any slaveholders free their slaves if as you say, "they wouldn´t have to pay them"?
You seem to be confused between three groups of people-northern industrialists, southern plantation owners(owners of slaves), and the slaves themselves.
Geoffrey wrote: "You seem to be confused between three groups ..."Actually, I would settle for just ending the sentence before the word "between." I am intrigued by Cosmic's posts but when I decide to hunker down and read them closely, a lot of times some of the points or the overall point trying to be made eludes me.
That's NO attack, mind you. I want to understand what you're trying to express, Cosmic, but it just gets a little bit fuzzy for me a lot of the time.
MarkRight. Between would be the wrong preposition.
Cosmic wrote: "Kallie wrote: "to me, that is as important as seeing cultural commonalities. Part of the reason I read is to experience someone else's point of view. ..."This is why I think that Salinger named t..."
Salinger did not write OUT OF AFRICA. Isak Dinesen did.
Geoffrey wrote: "Salinger did not write OUT OF AFRICA. Isak Dinesen did..."I meant that he put the title in the book The Catcher in the Rye. Holden says that he would like to be friends with Isak Dinesen, but not Somerset Maugham (a spy for the British Secret Service) the wrote Of Human Bondage
Sorry for the confusion.
Geoffrey wrote: "MarkRight. Between would be the wrong preposition."
Actually, I didn't mean it would be the wrong preposition (although I see your point, "among" would be correct). I meant that it would be enough to say to Cosmic: You seem to be confused/FULL STOP, period.
It's a case of either Cosmic being confused or the way Cosmic is articulating Cosmic's points confusing me.
In other words, it might just be me.
Geoffrey wrote: "hy didn´t any slaveholders free their slaves if as you say, "they wouldn´t have to pay them"?You seem to be confused between three groups of people-northern industrialists, southern plantation owners(owners of slaves), and the slaves themselves. ..."
The American Civil War was started over tariffs.
"Because manufactured goods were not produced in the South, they had to either be imported or shipped down from the North. Either way, a large expense, be it shipping fees or the federal tariff, was added to the price of manufactured goods only for Southerners. Because importation was often cheaper than shipping from the North, the South paid most of the federal tariffs.
Much of the tariff revenue collected from Southern consumers was used to build railroads and canals in the North. Between 1830 and 1850, 30,000 miles of track was laid. At its best, these tracks benefited the North. Much of it had no economic effect at all. Many of the schemes to lay track were simply a way to get government subsidies. Fraud and corruption were rampant.
With most of the tariff revenue collected in the South and then spent in the North, the South rightly felt exploited. At the time, 90% of the federal government's annual revenue came from these taxes on imports."
"Many Americans do not understand this fact. A non-slave-owning Southern merchant angered over yet another proposed tariff act does not make a compelling scene in a movie. However, that would be closer to the original cause of the Civil War than any scene of slaves."
"Slavery was actually on the wane. Slaves visiting England were free according to the courts in 1569. France, Russia, Spain and Portugal had outlawed slavery. Slavery had been abolished everywhere in the British Empire 27 years earlier thanks to William Wilberforce. In the United States, the transport of slaves had been outlawed 53 years earlier by Thomas Jefferson in the Act Prohibiting the Importation of Slaves (1807) and the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act in England (1807). Slavery was a dying and repugnant institution.
"The rewritten history of the Civil War began with Lincoln as a brilliant political tactic to rally public opinion. The issue of slavery provided sentimental leverage, whereas oppressing the South with hurtful tariffs did not. Outrage against the greater evil of slavery served to mask the economic harm the North was doing to the South."
Toward the end of the war, Lincoln made the conflict primarily about the continuation of slavery. By doing so, he successfully silenced the debate about economic issues and states' rights . The main grievance of the Southern states was tariffs. Although slavery was a factor at the outset of the Civil War, it was not the sole or even primary cause.
"The Tariff of 1828, called the Tariff of Abominations in the South, was the worst exploitation. It passed Congress 105 to 94 but lost among Southern congressmen 50 to 3. The South argued that favoring some industries over others was unconstitutional."
"The South did not secede primarily because of slavery. In Lincoln's First Inaugural Address he promised he had no intention to change slavery in the South. He argued it would be unconstitutional for him to do so. But he promised he would invade any state that failed to collect tariffs in order to enforce them. It was received from Baltimore to Charleston as a declaration of war on the South."
http://www.emarotta.com/protective-ta...
Go ahead and accuse me of writing a wall of text but I cannot write better than this article has presented the facts.
Here comes the exploit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpetba...
Colonization doesn't have to be one nation "A" taking over another nation "B". It doesn't have to even be indigenous people being exploited. It doesn't always have to take place as overtly as it was in the South. It could be done like it was in The Jungle one person at a time becoming a wag slave.
Maybe I am not sticking with the most exact interpretation of colonization, but instead I am taking expanded liberties in using it to describe exploitation of any people or persons by banks or industry or government for the benefit of a few. Who do the wars benefit? Who wanted the tariffs on the South? The north. And after the war who benefited from occupying the south? The northern carpet bangers. It was like we were two different nations...this a civil war.
Excellent post, Cosmic. It is rare for anyone to discuss the US Civil War in a rational way. This war was fought just in time for the federal government to seize a lot of power before the arrival of mechanized agriculture would have made slavery obsolete. The English Civil War is actually far more interesting.
Naw, I don' think so...Cosmic's latest offering is not an "excellent post," nor is this a "rational" way to discuss the Civil War. I am not a historian, but then neither is David John Marotta, the author of the article that Cosmic is linking to. He is a conservative wealth management guru for right-wing fat cats, and he works out of Charlottesville. Google up Marotta and the first thing you'll find is a bunch of links to a splash he made on the Interwebs last year encouraging us all to stock up on guns and ammunition for the impending apocalypse. Do some more deeper reading on the Internet and you'll find some interesting people embracing him and his ideas.
In fact, before you do that, go over to the left on the website that Cosmic has linked to and you'll find something that almost strikes me as humorous post-modernist meta-whatever, but it's not. It's serious. The third link from the bottom on the left is Marotta musing on Charles Dickens' The Christmas Carol in a series of essays encouraging greed and and blaming the poor for being poor. Scrooge himself couldn't have done a better job. Go to the last link there for an idea of what Marotta is really all about: "Why Is Bob Cratchit So Poor?" This would be funny if it weren't so scary and morally repugnant:
"At first glance, this story fills us with pity for the Cratchit family, always struggling to make ends meet...Bob Cratchit is a spendthrift, or a shopaholic...As a typical spendthrift, Bob was probably raised in poverty...For Bob Cratchit, living within a budget and saving money would be like setting out to deprive yourself and suffer...The Crachit family is clearly living beyond their means...If Scrooge was shown the starving children of Ignorance and Want, Bob Cratchit would be shown the starving children of Addiction and Entitlement."
It goes on and on, and it really is upsetting.
Be careful about the Internet and about the person posting information under the guise of a "rational" argument. Of course there were economic underpinnings to the Civil War. But this dismissal of the role of slavery is abhorrent. And no, Holly, the "arrival of mechanized agriculture would" NOT "have made slavery obsolete" in the South. It merely would have changed the face of slavery.
Reject Cosmic's post and look closely at the forces of wealth behind that article linked to there...this is dangerous stuff, and if you spend some time at the Marotta website, you will see where this argument comes from.
Cosmic wrote: "Geoffrey wrote: "hy didn´t any slaveholders free their slaves if as you say, "they wouldn´t have to pay them"?You seem to be confused between three groups of people-northern industrialists, south..."
Well, the article may be well written, but why should you or any of us consider the principle of a wealth management firm in Charlottesville, Virginia who has a penchant for writing articles about American history (lacking second and third source academic confirmation of his assertions) to be accurate or reputable?
It probably wouldn't take me all that long to find an eloquently written article somewhere online that demonstrates the WW II holocaust never happened. That doesn't make it true.
I am sure that a variety of factors went in to the American civil war. And I've read (from reputable sources) that it wasn't as simple as abolitionist North against slavery South. Plenty of people in the North didn't give a damn about freeing slaves, they disagreed with secession ... and so forth. But I don't know that it's accurate to say "slavery was on the wane" in America just because other country's had outlawed it. Isn't it possible that the plantation owner class had dug in and politically, on this issue, they were going to stand behind their belief in the institution?
You shouldn't accept everything you read online at face value without considering the source. I'm sure there are some guys running wealth management firms below the Mason-Dixon who would also tell you, "besides, slavery--a little bit of it in the right and prudent hands--wasn't all that bad!" And how do you know that those sort of evil thoughts aren't beneath the surface of the wealth management article writing dude from whom you quote?
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I started The Sheltering Sky and then abandoned it when something shinier caught my eye. But I mean ..."
The Sheltering Sky was Bowles' first, and to me most compelling as ex-pat noir (ditto with Up Above the World, set in Central America). He rarely returned to the States and lived in Algiers until he died, meanwhile immersing himself in Moroccan culture and writing more from that perspective as a result. He promoted Mrabet, a close friend, and another Moroccan artist whose name I don't recall. Burroughs hung out with him there. And he was married to Jane Bowles, whose fiction is strange and wonderful. Oh, and he was also a composer and traveled throughout Morocco collecting tribal music, his reason for traveling there, to begin with.