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The Novel
Cluster Headache One - 2012
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Discussion - Week One - The Novel - Part 1, pp. 1 - 106
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I'm loving the dense descriptions Michener has written. In one sense, these density of these descriptions mirrors what some are finding fault with in Yoder's work. I wonder if Michener meant to create that parallel style?
I had to concentrate on the fact that this book was published in 1991, because many elements of it seemed dated. That said, I really enjoyed the descriptions of Yoder's Pennsylvania Dutch neighbors, their ways of speaking and living, and the food that they served him. There are similarities between Michener and Yoder, but there are also significant differences. Michener's writing career was launched with a Pulitzer prize while Yoder worked hard to develop his reputation and his readers.
Mod
One of the more common criticisms of Michener's writing is the dense detail of the first 100 pages of his big books. This section gives him a chance to present his opinions on the value of that kind of writing by incorporating it into Yoder's story. Later in The Novel, the topic comes up again for debate.
One of the things I like about The Novel is that it is an effectively disguised essay on Michener's opinions/observations of the writing craft. He creates likeable characters who in the course of the story present easily understood ideas about writing and publishing - the reclusive, true to his beliefs writer and his loving, rice pudding-making wife; the stickball-playing, blue collar editor; the young Mennonite critic who discovers his sexuality; and the aging do-gooder heiress raising her genius grandson. He wraps it all with a murder mystery and a happy ending, asking the reader to think deeply on why they should know the difference between good and bad writing and do their part to keep the flame burning. This is why Michener made so much money - he always delivered a good story to his readers.
This isn't my cup of tea. I'm experiencing it like I did the high school textbooks in my U.S. History class, which was more boring than my accounting and finance classes in college. I persevered in my schoolwork because I knew it was important to my education, but engaging? No. But I recognize this is a well written book and an excellent source to understand the respectable world of the publishing houses of the 20th century, and maybe earlier. I once read an introduction to Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward Angel which described the process to bring that book to print, and it is remarkably similar in tone to 'The Writer'.I come from an urban, blue-collar district in a big Western city from a home similar to Archie Bunker in the TV show All in the Family. I love museums, Art and books, but this life of the Connecticut intellectual has always been like watching grass grow. It seems awfully sterile, centered on a 'Home and Gardens Magazine' ready home, with figurines and cracked wooden furniture from the 1800's, along with long drives past picturesque barns and wooden bridges, with a lot of hiring of locals for maintenance and authenticity, between trips to New York City and Washington D.C. It seemed from these books I've read by writers living in old farmhouses in Connecticut, they all have this same flavor. To me, it's as foreign as a Chinese farming village, but far more dull and slow, even pretentious, perhaps.
I'll keep reading, though.
Mod
Later in the book there's a murder mystery (committed in a blue-collar idiom) that you'll probably like.
The first section is about a safe, storybook (read "dull") life of a safe, storybook-type writer. He isn't an Eastern intellectual, but a common man of immigrant farming stock. He did have have the fortune to write a book that became a best-seller, and so became wealthy after the fact and as a result of hard work and sacrifice on the part of him and his wife. His farmhouse is actually that - a farm house - and not a contrived magazine version, so I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. Are your comments a kind of class warfare approach? Can you expand your ideas in a way specific to the book? Maybe cite a few lines that rubbed you the wrong way?
I'm finding the character of the critic (Streibert) highly pretentious, but that's the character, not the novel itself. Michener was fairly accurate in his creation of this character as I have experienced such Eastern intellectuals. I also find Streibert sad in his affectations and pretentions. But the rest of the novel I haven't found to be that way. April, I wonder if you could explain further your thoughts.
Mod
One thing I like about Streibert is how Michener starts his story arc as an innocent country boy who later grows into his intellectual, pretentious persona.
I like good writing about places and find descriptions of regional food interesting. I also spend some time in central Pennsylvania when I was in elementary school -- I remember going to some of the local farms to buy apples and eat in restaurants in farmhouse kitchens. I still love milk based clam chowder with butter, paprika and parsley floating on the top and apple pie topped with a slice of sharp cheddar cheese -- my favorite things to order. Although all of Michener's characters ended up at with enough money to be comfortable financially, most of them did not start out with money and he took the time to outline the different paths each one took from their hard working, not very intellectual origins to the intellectual and influential positions they later held. In fact, the ones who start out with money, seem to be the least happy.
I'm very sure Yoder is living the life of a type of Eastern intellectual from the description in this chapter. I went back and skimmed it. There are quite a few books where the characters live like this, and some play it straight unaware of the stereotype they are fulfilling, and quite a few books have been written which parody it. The Yoders' roots make their choice of lifestyle legitimate, but they are still living in the stereotype, as Michener set them up. I'm half through 'The Critic' and Michener has so far created very stereotypical characters for each literary business category, interesting as they are.As far as class warfare, you got me there. At home, I'm a homebody who reads, knits and watches TV, with occasional walking for exercise. But growing up poor, abused and no child abuse laws or women's shelters, with the church's only response being pray and obey, yeah, I'm radicalized. In my 20's I had the choice of marriage or being a secretary, or maybe college to be a nurse. I couldn't even buy a car by myself, and I was not allowed to have a credit card despite savings and a job. Yeah, I burn, honey, in a knee-jerk second. : )
I've learned in debate, you need to be rational and reasoned. But my gut tells me that even millionaires who earned their money the hard way don't need 20 mansions or 100 automobiles and should be taxed. Some poor deserve their fate due to irresponsible behavior, but we could afford to provide them housing and minimum medical care, since the very wealthy rarely pay any taxes, and if they paid their fair share.....but now you know what my gut reaction will always be.
Ahem.
I like to think, though, I can reason. Many many many books don't hesitate to include class related issues. Michener certainly is yanking those chains, too, in this book, but without any authorial comment beyond making everybody as normal in their character's role as possible. No villains here.
To me, the Yoders are of a type that when I meet, I want to be polite, talk about the nice figurines and ask what kind of furniture polish they use. Inside, I'd be thinking this kind of life would bore me out of my mind. I don't cook, I have no kids, I'm a crappy housekeeper. My furniture is marginally better than the plastic motel mismatched variety I grew up with - today it matches and came from a store. I wear jeans and T-shirts every day. This is all by choice. My family is fundamentalist -I'm an athiest. Out West we are more casual about everything. Even the intellectuals. The Yoders are the type of people who if coloring in a coloring book, would be fearful of drawing outside the lines or using purple for the grass instead of green. They make me grind my teeth, quietly. I try to be polite.
I hope it's ok if I argue or react from my liberal left gut. I don't REALLY froth from the mouth too much.
James Michener had a decades-long career as a successful writer. Like his fictitious character, Lukas Yoder, Michener made millions of dollars for himself and his publishers, however, the similarity between their careers ends there.
Much like William Faulkner, Lukas Yoder created a fictional geography based on his own life experience. Where Faulkner had his Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, Yoder has his Grenzler Region in the Pennsylvania Dutch Country. And much like Faulkner, Yoder’s first novels met with little popular success.
The story begins with Yoder at the end of his career, finally finished with what he and his reading public believe will be the final novel of his “Grenzler Octet” – a bittersweet moment for a writer who has devoted his life to his vision. We are taken through the pre-internet process of editing, publicity, working with fans, the media and the personal support network of a successful novelist. Supporters, rivals, and business interests pull Yoder’s energy in many directions as we follow the incubation and “birth” of a finished best-selling novel.