Night and Day. Woolf, Virginia. 1919. London: Grafton, 1987.
Why bother with Virginia Woolf? When one reads her one gets the impression that he has ventured into exalted territory—a domain in which every intricacy of the English language is exploited and celebrated. In short she is not for beginners and occupies a perch beyond which lies that radical branch of modernism that does not make literal sense, where cohesive thoughts and sentences are not taken for granted.
Yet despite these and other flaws (in addition to a voluptuous use of English a stubborn Metropolitan snobbery exponentially stronger than Woody Allen) she is worth a writer's time. I could say the same for readers but there are plenty of great writers who are easier to digest. Woolf is a writer's writer and if one is not too interested in the craft of expression then she may not be worth the effort.
But her prose is so damned good—so good that you wonder how anyone could write this well. Writers and aspiring writers can and should love her (or at least substitute envy for admiration).
Night and Day is not a novel to read for the plot. Typical love triangle. At the centre is Katherine Hilbery—rich, beautiful, noble, well-bred and yet flawed. Katherine does not know how to love and would prefer to entrench herself in calculus and astronomy. This despite the fact that she is of poetic nobility as the granddaughter of a fictional prototype of Lord Tennyson. Indeed Katherine is the perfect foil to the extraordinary character of her mother who is eerily similar to a hippie except she predates Woodstock by half a century. Katherine is no poetry junkie (despite her bloodline) and does not wax poetical about stepping on the hallowed ground upon which the Bard may have squatted as her mother does.
Perhaps the two do agree on one thing: don't marry a man unless you are in love with him. Katherine almost breaks this rule when she is engaged to Rodney, who by all accounts should be her perfect match. Rodney is an academic sort but he is not privileged enough to earn his bread solely by means of his Elizabethan monographs (though he licks his lips at the possibility once entered into the Hilbery fortune).
Katherine must hear his blatant poetic rendering of herself as the Muse even though it is rubbish and she can't believe it. Her noble resolve is finally broken (as is the engagement) not by means of a frank declaration that she does not share Rodney's love...at least, not originally. Katherine only becomes forthright after her apparent public ridicule of Rodney forces him to chastise her in a effort to justify the apparent emasculation. We are speaking of nothing particularly devastating (at least by today's standards). Apparently agreeing to take a walk and then standing one's partner up is enough to constitute ridicule according to Rodney. Despite his devotion to literature he is still attuned like a satellite to the public opinion of himself in elevated Chelsea circles. He seems to lack the poetic abandon and fearlessness towards scandal that is sometimes expected of those who write verse.
But Katherine is a woman of class and women of class eventually have to settle. She has not the unfettered quality of her friend Mary Datchet whose life is fueled by the passion for justice that is a necessary consequence (for those modern and enlightened) of Parliament's beastly avoidance of the suffrage issue. Woolf seems to suggest that Katherine is not a woman of ideals precisely because she has money. Or perhaps she is a woman of ideals except that her ideals are personally and purposefully dehumanized (mathematical figures; constellations in the sky). Perhaps it is a facile treatment of the sciences but Virginia Woolf probably never would have called herself as a scientist.
Anyway Katherine settles for Ralph Denham even though he shows similar attributes of the idealistic, fanatical, "head in the clouds" love that she rejects from Rodney. Katherine's social status towers over these two male friends of hers and to both of them she does not reciprocate their love. Yet in the end she chooses (or considers or settles upon) Ralph. Both men adore her and she ultimately rejects the respective angelic depictions of herself but there is a difference that draws her to Ralph.
It certainly helps that Ralph (unlike Rodney) does not fall for the youthful, exuberant Cassandra, dearest cousin of Katherine. Cassandra, due to her inexperience, lacks the cruelty of Katherine; she must learn how to ridicule a man as society has not endowed her with the foul seeds of that knowledge. Things don't end happily for Rodney but it is perhaps excusable that he falls for a relation of Katherine's. It is also excusable (and perfectly reasonable) that Katherine almost welcomes the news as a feasible (if controversial and scandalous) way of justifying the end of her engagement to her parents.
Yet it is scandal that marks the difference between these two intellectual young men—in particular Ralph's complete lack of fear toward it. He is perfectly alright with making a fool of himself by staring into the window of the Hilbery drawing room. So deep is his love (or infatuation or vision) that the poor man cannot help it.
The ending of this novel is beautiful in that there is a working agreement; a compromise between the two (dare we call them lovers?). It is majestically left unfinished as it should since the two of them must resolve the different visions of their relationship.
No doubt Katherine expresses the view of Woolf in that true knowledge of another person is impossible (even among lovers). She cannot believe that if she loves Ralph the way he loves her the world would suddenly change for the better (as Ralph believes). But she is willing to try to believe it and perhaps that's all that love is, or at least all that we can expect of it.
Monday, June 4, 2012
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
The Informers
The Informers. Ellis, Bret Easton. New York: Vintage, 1994.
Generally considered to be among the weakest of Ellis' works, The Informers is a victim of its own form as the author's only short story collection. In a way it qualifies as a novel since many of the characters from Ellis' universe reappear and interact. The problem is the utter anonymity of Ellis characters as well as the uniformity of their appearances. The latter is expressed strongly in American Psycho in which one of the running gags (or tropes) is how Patrick Bateman is unsure of the identity of the people that he sees at parties and clubs. In fact, Bateman himself is completely mistaken for a colleague by Paul Allen simply because both he and his doppelganger wear Armani suits and Oliver Peoples eyeglasses. Whether or not these two men have different personalities is inconsequential. Ellis is all about "surface, surface, surface" (to paraphrase the man himself).
Why doesn't this work in The Informers? Because the incredibly toneless narration robs the cast of any semblance of sympathy and cognizance to the reader. It's hard enough to stomach a dose of absolute nihilism in a novel with a coherent plot and a protagonist. The short story form makes Ellis' words even more unhitched from anything approaching morality, justice or decency. If you don't care about an Ellis protagonist; a Clay, Patrick Bateman or Victor Ward, then why would you care about a narrator who you only have twenty pages to get to know?
This problem is compounded by the necessarily Ellisean aspect of characters. Or to put it rhetorically (for those that have read the book): what is the difference between Tim and Graham? Besides the obvious connections to each character (parents, who they are fucking, etc.) there really is no difference. Both have the same personality, same interests, both are wealthy, hang out at the same places, even dress similar. Even in appearance Ellisland is uniform: blondness, tallness and attractiveness are ubiquitous. The only ethnic minorities in The Informers (besides some Hispanics used as scenery) are surfers.
The result is that when one reads this novel one often forgets just who is who. Unlike in Less than Zero (which is pretty close to this novel stylistically) there is no main narrative to hold together the plot and the reader's attention. Ellis has publicly stated that the film adaptation of this novel was the greatest of the four that have been done on his work and it's no wonder why. What the film is able to do is to lace together the independent stories (albeit at the expense of some others that are left out) in a way that is never really done in the novel since there is no sense of chronology. The result is that we know why Martin is not Graham and Graham not Martin. In the book the distinction is much less clear.
Ellis is not one to place particular attention toward development of character as his premise is that surface develops character far more than do thoughts or emotions. So much of Ellisland is about being the right type of person at the right types of places having access to the right types of debauchery and sex. Whether or not you happen to be eloquent, sympathetic or even coherent is far less important. There is no room for free thinkers in such a morally depraved view of the world. Though Ellis never makes this point clear in his work, his devotion to surface and its nihilistic consequences makes him a moralist, albeit a subtle one.
The Informers is imperfect as is often true of short story collections. But as a work it is decidedly in line with Ellis' literary experiment – if you create characters that have everything and can do anything, is there anything left to be said beyond the surface? Apparently not.
Generally considered to be among the weakest of Ellis' works, The Informers is a victim of its own form as the author's only short story collection. In a way it qualifies as a novel since many of the characters from Ellis' universe reappear and interact. The problem is the utter anonymity of Ellis characters as well as the uniformity of their appearances. The latter is expressed strongly in American Psycho in which one of the running gags (or tropes) is how Patrick Bateman is unsure of the identity of the people that he sees at parties and clubs. In fact, Bateman himself is completely mistaken for a colleague by Paul Allen simply because both he and his doppelganger wear Armani suits and Oliver Peoples eyeglasses. Whether or not these two men have different personalities is inconsequential. Ellis is all about "surface, surface, surface" (to paraphrase the man himself).
Why doesn't this work in The Informers? Because the incredibly toneless narration robs the cast of any semblance of sympathy and cognizance to the reader. It's hard enough to stomach a dose of absolute nihilism in a novel with a coherent plot and a protagonist. The short story form makes Ellis' words even more unhitched from anything approaching morality, justice or decency. If you don't care about an Ellis protagonist; a Clay, Patrick Bateman or Victor Ward, then why would you care about a narrator who you only have twenty pages to get to know?
This problem is compounded by the necessarily Ellisean aspect of characters. Or to put it rhetorically (for those that have read the book): what is the difference between Tim and Graham? Besides the obvious connections to each character (parents, who they are fucking, etc.) there really is no difference. Both have the same personality, same interests, both are wealthy, hang out at the same places, even dress similar. Even in appearance Ellisland is uniform: blondness, tallness and attractiveness are ubiquitous. The only ethnic minorities in The Informers (besides some Hispanics used as scenery) are surfers.
The result is that when one reads this novel one often forgets just who is who. Unlike in Less than Zero (which is pretty close to this novel stylistically) there is no main narrative to hold together the plot and the reader's attention. Ellis has publicly stated that the film adaptation of this novel was the greatest of the four that have been done on his work and it's no wonder why. What the film is able to do is to lace together the independent stories (albeit at the expense of some others that are left out) in a way that is never really done in the novel since there is no sense of chronology. The result is that we know why Martin is not Graham and Graham not Martin. In the book the distinction is much less clear.
Ellis is not one to place particular attention toward development of character as his premise is that surface develops character far more than do thoughts or emotions. So much of Ellisland is about being the right type of person at the right types of places having access to the right types of debauchery and sex. Whether or not you happen to be eloquent, sympathetic or even coherent is far less important. There is no room for free thinkers in such a morally depraved view of the world. Though Ellis never makes this point clear in his work, his devotion to surface and its nihilistic consequences makes him a moralist, albeit a subtle one.
The Informers is imperfect as is often true of short story collections. But as a work it is decidedly in line with Ellis' literary experiment – if you create characters that have everything and can do anything, is there anything left to be said beyond the surface? Apparently not.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Lunar Park
Lunar Park. Ellis, Bret Easton. New York: Vintage, 2005.
One could call this book a Bret Easton Ellis tribute novel which just happens to have been penned by Ellis himself. Lunar Park is kind of like a graduate thesis on Ellis and his work except that it is also a novel and an intriguing story in its own right.
The first part of the novel is a brisk first person account of Ellis rise to fame as a literary superstar who never really needed to grow up. He seems to have hit upon a niche spot in contemporary fiction and his signature style of moral blindness and harrowing depravity satisfies (or at least shocks) readers worldwide. In his creative process Ellis depends more and more on the drugs that fill his novels and his Syd Barrettesque behavior eventually contributes to his demise in that he fathers a child with a well-known actress with which he has a characteristically self destructive relationship. Fatherhood, to put it mildly, is not given much attention in the Ellis oeuvre (just read Glamorama or "In the Islands" from The Informers).
We must stop here for clarification: this is not an autobiography of Ellis (even though the first section basically is). In real life Ellis is bisexual and (so far as we know) has no children. Ellis in this way creates a kind of pellegrino Ellis who lives through the metaphysical hell of the plot but who is distinct from poeta Ellis. Dante shielded his readers from the mundane world of his wife and family whereas Ellis shares these themes in an attempt to make himself appear normal. It does not work on the one hand. Father Bret attempts to fit in with the upper class parents in the ubiquitous McManshion neighborhood in the northeast (not sunny SoCal). But the end result is that he's just the same type of guy as before except on a kind of liberal rehab regiment in which he can slip off from responsibility and do a line or two provided he can lie and keep a straight face.
Yet this honesty is refreshing because Ellis undertook a massive risk in making a fictional character of himself. This book could have been unbearably pretentious in the wrong hands. Ellis succeeds in poking fun at himself. For all the praise and scorn heaped on the man, he has published comparatively little (seven novels in twenty five years). Ellis wisely writes in a romantic subplot with a beautiful graduate student who is doing her masters thesis on his work as the pellegrino "teaches" a creative writing class and spends the rest of his time crafting his new work "Teenage Pussy". Her graduate advisor attempts to persuade her from studying literary trash in depth as if, below the nihilistic LA surface, there lies some nugget of truth or virtue.
Ellis is at a point in his life where money doesn't really matter all that much; he's already made a fortune since publishing Less than Zero while still in college (though he blew a lot of it rockstar style). Of more importance is learning how to deal with being a dad and with leaving behind the vestiges of his enfant terrible past life as a substance abuser. And then weird things begin to happen and pellegrino Ellis finds his home besieged by the demons of his past both real (his father) and imaginary (Patrick Bateman).
This book is an acquired taste and one could say the same about Ellis in general. Yet this novel is profoundly different from the rest of his work, and not merely because Ellis himself is the protagonist. Ellis deftly touches upon multiple themes and genres. Lunar Park is part memoir and part horror story but below the surface of this novel is the awesome power of family and its potential for destruction. Ellis never comes to terms with his falling out with his father (who seems like a real shithead but I suppose Ellis has to be a little biased) and he must rectify this in order to save his own relationship with his son. The deadpan moral depravity that Ellis so usefully provides in his earlier work is here morphed into a malevolent force which pays homage to the power of literature. I don't wish to give away the details any further than that, but one of the points of this novel is how dynamic the creation of the written word is.
Lunar Park is the closest we have to Bret Easton Ellis opening his mind for his fans. This book is so entrenched in the author himself that even the title is not explained as it's a kind of inside joke shared between father and son. Even if one doesn't care for Ellis complaining about his bitter relationship with his father (not all of us can drive off in a BMW and snort eight balls in the Hollywood Hills to escape our family problems), there are moments of brilliance here. Ellis is spot on in describing the new wave system of parenting in which children are a kind of commodity raised to fruition even if that means stunting their emotional growth with unnecessary medication. Depravity and malevolence are the bread and butter of this author and in Lunar Park he does not disappoint. But Ellis shows with this novel that he can branch out and show his emotional side and the last chapter of this novel is so touching that you wonder how the author of American Psycho could have written it.
One could call this book a Bret Easton Ellis tribute novel which just happens to have been penned by Ellis himself. Lunar Park is kind of like a graduate thesis on Ellis and his work except that it is also a novel and an intriguing story in its own right.
The first part of the novel is a brisk first person account of Ellis rise to fame as a literary superstar who never really needed to grow up. He seems to have hit upon a niche spot in contemporary fiction and his signature style of moral blindness and harrowing depravity satisfies (or at least shocks) readers worldwide. In his creative process Ellis depends more and more on the drugs that fill his novels and his Syd Barrettesque behavior eventually contributes to his demise in that he fathers a child with a well-known actress with which he has a characteristically self destructive relationship. Fatherhood, to put it mildly, is not given much attention in the Ellis oeuvre (just read Glamorama or "In the Islands" from The Informers).
We must stop here for clarification: this is not an autobiography of Ellis (even though the first section basically is). In real life Ellis is bisexual and (so far as we know) has no children. Ellis in this way creates a kind of pellegrino Ellis who lives through the metaphysical hell of the plot but who is distinct from poeta Ellis. Dante shielded his readers from the mundane world of his wife and family whereas Ellis shares these themes in an attempt to make himself appear normal. It does not work on the one hand. Father Bret attempts to fit in with the upper class parents in the ubiquitous McManshion neighborhood in the northeast (not sunny SoCal). But the end result is that he's just the same type of guy as before except on a kind of liberal rehab regiment in which he can slip off from responsibility and do a line or two provided he can lie and keep a straight face.
Yet this honesty is refreshing because Ellis undertook a massive risk in making a fictional character of himself. This book could have been unbearably pretentious in the wrong hands. Ellis succeeds in poking fun at himself. For all the praise and scorn heaped on the man, he has published comparatively little (seven novels in twenty five years). Ellis wisely writes in a romantic subplot with a beautiful graduate student who is doing her masters thesis on his work as the pellegrino "teaches" a creative writing class and spends the rest of his time crafting his new work "Teenage Pussy". Her graduate advisor attempts to persuade her from studying literary trash in depth as if, below the nihilistic LA surface, there lies some nugget of truth or virtue.
Ellis is at a point in his life where money doesn't really matter all that much; he's already made a fortune since publishing Less than Zero while still in college (though he blew a lot of it rockstar style). Of more importance is learning how to deal with being a dad and with leaving behind the vestiges of his enfant terrible past life as a substance abuser. And then weird things begin to happen and pellegrino Ellis finds his home besieged by the demons of his past both real (his father) and imaginary (Patrick Bateman).
This book is an acquired taste and one could say the same about Ellis in general. Yet this novel is profoundly different from the rest of his work, and not merely because Ellis himself is the protagonist. Ellis deftly touches upon multiple themes and genres. Lunar Park is part memoir and part horror story but below the surface of this novel is the awesome power of family and its potential for destruction. Ellis never comes to terms with his falling out with his father (who seems like a real shithead but I suppose Ellis has to be a little biased) and he must rectify this in order to save his own relationship with his son. The deadpan moral depravity that Ellis so usefully provides in his earlier work is here morphed into a malevolent force which pays homage to the power of literature. I don't wish to give away the details any further than that, but one of the points of this novel is how dynamic the creation of the written word is.
Lunar Park is the closest we have to Bret Easton Ellis opening his mind for his fans. This book is so entrenched in the author himself that even the title is not explained as it's a kind of inside joke shared between father and son. Even if one doesn't care for Ellis complaining about his bitter relationship with his father (not all of us can drive off in a BMW and snort eight balls in the Hollywood Hills to escape our family problems), there are moments of brilliance here. Ellis is spot on in describing the new wave system of parenting in which children are a kind of commodity raised to fruition even if that means stunting their emotional growth with unnecessary medication. Depravity and malevolence are the bread and butter of this author and in Lunar Park he does not disappoint. But Ellis shows with this novel that he can branch out and show his emotional side and the last chapter of this novel is so touching that you wonder how the author of American Psycho could have written it.
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
The Comedians
The Comedians. Greene, Graham. New York: Bantam, 1966.
My seventh Greene novel and, with two exceptions (The Human Factor and The Ministry of Fear), this one like the others does not take place in England. On the surface this novel is typical Greene. We have a world weary protagonist with hazy ties to Britain who lives in a moderately decrepit and unstable country in the tropics. That sentence can apply to both Our Man in Havana and The Heart of the Matter.
However the themes of these three books are distinct. HOTM is more so about the fatal consequences of being unable to distinguish between love and pity and how both concepts are embedded in Catholic doctrine. OMIH is lighter fare that concerns how the cold war can manifest itself as a farce. Both of these novels also dabble in the common theme of exposing the cruelty and oppression of the respective governments. But the incision is blunt. Greene has too much to say about Catholicism in HOTM. In OMIH (one of his “entertainment” class of novels) the intention is to provide humor. It is important to note that OMIH takes place about a year before Castro’s revolution so the criticism leveled toward the government refers to that of Fulgencio Batista. Overall though, Greene’s intention is not in castigating that regime, which led some readers (including Fidel Castro himself) to point out how Greene had essentially ignored the less than noble characteristics of Batista’s regime. Perhaps the proof is in the very disclaimer: OMIH is an entertainment, not a novel as far as Greene is concerned. Then again, so too is The Ministry of Fear, a novel so entrenched in espionage and government deception that it borders on frightening.
My seventh Greene novel and, with two exceptions (The Human Factor and The Ministry of Fear), this one like the others does not take place in England. On the surface this novel is typical Greene. We have a world weary protagonist with hazy ties to Britain who lives in a moderately decrepit and unstable country in the tropics. That sentence can apply to both Our Man in Havana and The Heart of the Matter.
However the themes of these three books are distinct. HOTM is more so about the fatal consequences of being unable to distinguish between love and pity and how both concepts are embedded in Catholic doctrine. OMIH is lighter fare that concerns how the cold war can manifest itself as a farce. Both of these novels also dabble in the common theme of exposing the cruelty and oppression of the respective governments. But the incision is blunt. Greene has too much to say about Catholicism in HOTM. In OMIH (one of his “entertainment” class of novels) the intention is to provide humor. It is important to note that OMIH takes place about a year before Castro’s revolution so the criticism leveled toward the government refers to that of Fulgencio Batista. Overall though, Greene’s intention is not in castigating that regime, which led some readers (including Fidel Castro himself) to point out how Greene had essentially ignored the less than noble characteristics of Batista’s regime. Perhaps the proof is in the very disclaimer: OMIH is an entertainment, not a novel as far as Greene is concerned. Then again, so too is The Ministry of Fear, a novel so entrenched in espionage and government deception that it borders on frightening.
The difference between those novels and The Comedians lies in the direct attack on the government of Duvalier. HOTM is more about moral corruption and how empathy can have tragic consequences. The government in that novel is colonial (the narrator Scobie is a British police officer in Sierra Leone), and necessarily unfair, but Graham Greene is not writing an expose on African governments and their internal problems. In The Comedians he is doing nothing short of that except this time the target is the Haitian government of “Papa Doc” Duvalier.
One of the main points of this novel is to suggest that the labels associated with government are only as flexible as their leaders allow them to be. Haiti is a country with a democratic government in this novel (I believe it still is today). Greene presents it as a dictatorship. Duvalier rules the country by fear. He’s a phantom in this novel. No one can see him because he encloses himself in the royal palace. His henchmen, the Tontons Macoute’, haunt the country and use intimidation and violence to keep the people in order. There seems to be no system of law and civilians are not allowed to bear arms.
The irony of all this is that, on paper, Haiti is a democratic country that is devoted to capitalism and opposed to totalitarianism. The reality is that almost no one seems to profit from this supposed free market economy. Almost everyone in Haiti (besides bureaucrats, foreigners and royal sycophants) is destitute and hungry. The Haitian government keeps presenting itself as a vital force in opposition to Cuba (which by 1966 is under Communist rule unlike in OMIH), which justifies American aid until it stops due to (it is implied) human rights violations. Haitian society is segregated; Haitians are allowed no voice of opposition toward the government and their thugs while foreigners can only hide in their respective embassies. Port-au-Prince is under curfew and electricity is cut off for half of the day. The implicit message here is that, bad as things may be in Cuba, they most certainly cannot be worse than in Haiti, regardless of the respective political ideologies of each nation. Greene seems to explain as much beautifully by means of Dr Magiot who claims to be "a supporter of Communism" in a country in which the idea of being Communist is basically illegal.
The back cover of my edition suggests that the three main characters in the novel (Brown, Smith and Jones) are secretly working together to overthrow Duvalier. This is entirely untrue. It is made evident throughout this novel that Duvalier and his troops hold all the cards. This book is more so about three foreigners and their experiences in Haiti. The end result is that one dies and the other two flee to the Dominican Republic; a destination simply dripping with irony since geographically that country is the other side of Haiti (or more accurately Hispaniola) but in actuality it is entirely different (read: tolerable, decent).
Of all the Greene novels that I have read so far, this one best shows Greene's remarkable imagination regarding character. Brown is the narrator, a man who seems an enigma and it's no wonder; even his name is in doubt. He was born in Monaco, that much is certain but who his parents are is harder to place. His mother's nationality is never revealed (since Brown himself does not know it) and even on her deathbed Brown's mother does not reveal whether her supposed royal name is a farce or not. The father is supposedly an Englishman named Brown but all knowledge about him stops there. Brown is raised by Jesuits after his mother essentially drops him off there and they, such morally bound men, keep him around until he skips school to gamble at Monte Carlo and they decide that it is time to emancipate him from his religious upbringing. What's really interesting about the way Greene describes Monte Carlo is the way in which it is a transitory place in which almost no one is actually from there. Brown is a man with little connections to Monaco, France or England even though he spends time in all three countries. His detachment from his homeland is almost American in its emptiness. Part of this is certainly due to his being essentially an orphan (even though he meets his mother again briefly before her death), but there is certainly a statement being made about Monaco by Greene. It's uncanny to read about a European city that seems to lack that sense of place that we so commonly expect of places founded centuries ago.
And then you have Smith the American idealist. Smith seems to be comedic relief in the beginning of the novel due to his obsession with vegetarianism and the belief that foregoing meat would somehow limit the viciousness of man if only more would adopt that practice. Yet despite his quirks Smith is truly "salt of the earth." He is miles ahead of his contemporaries in terms of civil rights and genuinely expects the best of mankind. No wonder then that Haiti ultimately disappoints him. His plan was originally to install a kind of vegetarian institute in the yet to be built city of Duvalierville. Brown sees the project as doomed from the start but the incredible patience of Smith (who once ran against Harry Truman as a kind of vegetarian political statement) eventually wavers and Haiti breaks his American optimism. In a way Smith is a stereotypical sort of American; no talent for foreign languages, always ready to preach and stick his nose in foreign affairs, firmly resolved in his belief that democracy causes a perfect union among peoples, etc. But there is little denying that he is as saintly as they come and Brown admits as such.
I have done this novel a disservice upon focusing on only two of its characters given that there is a large supporting cast and Greene, as is typical of great writers, makes them each memorable in some way. Funny, enlightening, and piercingly aware of the fierceness of totalitarianism and authority. Typical Graham Greene. Woe betide readers of this novel who believe in the "republic" of Haiti.
The irony of all this is that, on paper, Haiti is a democratic country that is devoted to capitalism and opposed to totalitarianism. The reality is that almost no one seems to profit from this supposed free market economy. Almost everyone in Haiti (besides bureaucrats, foreigners and royal sycophants) is destitute and hungry. The Haitian government keeps presenting itself as a vital force in opposition to Cuba (which by 1966 is under Communist rule unlike in OMIH), which justifies American aid until it stops due to (it is implied) human rights violations. Haitian society is segregated; Haitians are allowed no voice of opposition toward the government and their thugs while foreigners can only hide in their respective embassies. Port-au-Prince is under curfew and electricity is cut off for half of the day. The implicit message here is that, bad as things may be in Cuba, they most certainly cannot be worse than in Haiti, regardless of the respective political ideologies of each nation. Greene seems to explain as much beautifully by means of Dr Magiot who claims to be "a supporter of Communism" in a country in which the idea of being Communist is basically illegal.
The back cover of my edition suggests that the three main characters in the novel (Brown, Smith and Jones) are secretly working together to overthrow Duvalier. This is entirely untrue. It is made evident throughout this novel that Duvalier and his troops hold all the cards. This book is more so about three foreigners and their experiences in Haiti. The end result is that one dies and the other two flee to the Dominican Republic; a destination simply dripping with irony since geographically that country is the other side of Haiti (or more accurately Hispaniola) but in actuality it is entirely different (read: tolerable, decent).
Of all the Greene novels that I have read so far, this one best shows Greene's remarkable imagination regarding character. Brown is the narrator, a man who seems an enigma and it's no wonder; even his name is in doubt. He was born in Monaco, that much is certain but who his parents are is harder to place. His mother's nationality is never revealed (since Brown himself does not know it) and even on her deathbed Brown's mother does not reveal whether her supposed royal name is a farce or not. The father is supposedly an Englishman named Brown but all knowledge about him stops there. Brown is raised by Jesuits after his mother essentially drops him off there and they, such morally bound men, keep him around until he skips school to gamble at Monte Carlo and they decide that it is time to emancipate him from his religious upbringing. What's really interesting about the way Greene describes Monte Carlo is the way in which it is a transitory place in which almost no one is actually from there. Brown is a man with little connections to Monaco, France or England even though he spends time in all three countries. His detachment from his homeland is almost American in its emptiness. Part of this is certainly due to his being essentially an orphan (even though he meets his mother again briefly before her death), but there is certainly a statement being made about Monaco by Greene. It's uncanny to read about a European city that seems to lack that sense of place that we so commonly expect of places founded centuries ago.
And then you have Smith the American idealist. Smith seems to be comedic relief in the beginning of the novel due to his obsession with vegetarianism and the belief that foregoing meat would somehow limit the viciousness of man if only more would adopt that practice. Yet despite his quirks Smith is truly "salt of the earth." He is miles ahead of his contemporaries in terms of civil rights and genuinely expects the best of mankind. No wonder then that Haiti ultimately disappoints him. His plan was originally to install a kind of vegetarian institute in the yet to be built city of Duvalierville. Brown sees the project as doomed from the start but the incredible patience of Smith (who once ran against Harry Truman as a kind of vegetarian political statement) eventually wavers and Haiti breaks his American optimism. In a way Smith is a stereotypical sort of American; no talent for foreign languages, always ready to preach and stick his nose in foreign affairs, firmly resolved in his belief that democracy causes a perfect union among peoples, etc. But there is little denying that he is as saintly as they come and Brown admits as such.
I have done this novel a disservice upon focusing on only two of its characters given that there is a large supporting cast and Greene, as is typical of great writers, makes them each memorable in some way. Funny, enlightening, and piercingly aware of the fierceness of totalitarianism and authority. Typical Graham Greene. Woe betide readers of this novel who believe in the "republic" of Haiti.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Brideshead Revisited
Brideshead Revisited. Waugh, Evelyn. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1945.
This is one of those books that I had been wanting to read for a long time. I have a particular interest in upper-class British (a)morality. I've read another of Waugh's novels called A Handful of Dust (which I will eventually review here) and didn't like it all that much but this one is much less satirical and focuses on a English landowning family who just happen to be Catholic.
The novel begins with a obtuse description of military exercises in the countryside. The narrator Charles Ryder comes across an essentially deserted mansion and with much melancholy (which he hides from his subordinates) begins the tale of his acquaintance with the Marchmain family. This book is composed of two parts. The first covers Charles relationship with Sebastian while the latter concerns Charles' successes as a painter and his ill-fated love affair with Sebastian's sister Julia.
Looking back on this novel I am reminded of that football saying; "a match of two halves." The favored team plays terribly in the first half. The manager berates them during the interval and lo and behold the chumps become heroes in the second half as everyone plays to their potential in a showing of teamwork and collective brotherhood. Yes, Brideshead Revisited is like that, except unlike in the football archetype the stinker is the second half.
The beginning of this novel is captivating. I have yet to come across such an enchanting view of undergraduate life at Oxford. So often in British literature the Oxbridge reference is just a code word for class; an inevitable afterthought that a gentleman studies there. Waugh went to Oxford and he does an excellent job of depicting the intellectual cliques among the student body as well as the bacchanalia of which modern readers are perhaps more familiar when reminiscing about university.
Charles becomes friends with the utterly enchanting and painstakingly handsome Sebastian Flyte (not Marchmain, the names in this novel are really confusing). There's a kind of cool ambient feeling as you follow them along throughout Europe getting drunk and hanging out. Less obvious is a homosexual attraction that (due to the time the novel was written) never quite passes from subtle to obvious but is nevertheless undoubtedly there, fueled by Sebastian's developing alcoholism. Also worth nothing about the first part of this novel is the delightful variety of Charles and Sebastian's mutual acquaintances, including the outrageous Anthony Blanche, an unabashed Latin American quasi British homosexual whose piercing analysis of the Marchmain family at first glance seems ridiculous but actually ends up being absolutely spot on.
And then we come to the primary family of the story (given far more attention than Charles' withdrawn father and cousin, the haughty man-about-town Oxford gent Jasper): the Marchmains. You will recall that the Marchmains are Catholic and indeed so devout is their faith that the parents are separated but not divorced given the stigma attached to a violation of the sanctity of marriage. Instead of the dreadful divorce Lord Marchmain lives in Venice with his mistress and he lets Lady Teresa Marchmain and their four children stay in Brideshead (the magisterial, labyrinthine family mansion). Lord Marchmain's conversion to Catholicism and eventual hatred of his wife (with a little post WWI trauma thrown in) explain why a man would live a thousand miles away from his family. Indeed, England is simply too small a place for Lord Marchmain. He needs a continent of space to be away from his estranged wife. This may be absolutely mad behavior but please observe what I call Catholic...shall we say...eccentricity. Regardless of what the reader may think of Lord Marchmain as a character, you have to admit that he chose the mysterious way to end a marriage.
Sebastian's alcoholism drives this story along. It is alcohol that allows him to engage in homosexual behavior with Charles but it is also alcoholism that causes him to sever ties with pretty much everything in his life; Oxford (he is "sent down"), his family and friends. Remarkably, the homosexual element in this novel is never really detected by anyone in the Marchmain family. The most marked reference to it comes from Lord Marchmain's mistress Cara. Sebastian's childishness aides his growing dependency on alcohol. Like many similar sorts of characters from rich families, Sebastian is spoiled rotten and may not have an intellectual bone in his body, to put it mildly. But that doesn't really matter according to Anthony Blanche and Charles because both admit that Sebastian's charm is unyielding and dependable. No one who meets him can possibly hate him. So predictably enough, through the use of liquor, Sebastian comes to be unhappy himself and destroys his life.
This novel was written back when alcoholism had to be necessarily hushed about (even when the problem itself is obvious), most especially since the Marchmains are rich and aristocratic. Lady Marchmain enlists the help of Charles in trying to curb her son's drinking but Charles can only roll over and put up a smidgen of resistance toward his best friend. Charles and Sebastian have a kind of "us against the world" mentality, which certainly suggests that the homosexual affair they have is not some innocent fleeting attraction that goes away. Rather than deal with sending her son to Lindsay Lohan style rehab (as the rich do today), Lady Marchmain decides to send him on a trip to the Middle East with her puppet, the Oxford don Samgrass. This ends up being a tremendous error in judgment on Teresa's part since Sebastian keeps giving Samgrass the slip and the latter is really a sychophant who only agrees to look after Sebastian in order to further his personal ambitions and ingratiate himself to Oxford's elite.
The end result is that Sebastian absconds from Samgrass' care and filches his travelling companion's money. At this point both Charles and Sebastian have dropped out of school and the former is working as an artist in Paris. Lady Marchmain, in a sort of authoritative Sisterly sort of way, does not blame Charles for her son's alcoholism but cannot condone the latter's lack of resistance toward Sebastian's petulant "I do what I want" attitude. And so, in a dramatic and foreboding scene Charles is "banished" from Brideshead and he can't help but feel that this is a certain turning point in his life; this shutting out from the splendor of magical Brideshead and its quirky inhabitants.
And so that's the end of the novel...Ha! No it's only the end of the first part! Yet you can see that this novel could have ended right then and there. No. It drags on. And instead of concerning itself with the burgeoning youthfulness of Sebastian and Charles, we instead hear about the egotism and (dare I say it?) boredom of Charles' life. Perhaps not the best terms for describing an artist, but it is time that I editorialize: I do not like post-Sebastian Charles all that much.
His love for Sebastian's sister Julia struck me as a symptom of a midlife crisis. While he acknowledges Julia's beauty when he meets her earlier on in the novel there just does not seem to be any attraction between them until it all of a sudden springs up when they happen to be on the same ship. Charles acknowledges that Sebastian was the harbinger for his love for Julia but that seems like baloney to me. It's one thing to never forget a first love, but there seems to be a conscious effort on the part of Charles to forget about Sebastian now that he's chosen to live like an outcast in Morocco. I just don't buy the way in which Charles simply transfers his love for Sebastian to Julia. It strikes me as egotistical and pathetic.
The novel seems to drag on toward the end. Charles and Julia have to dissolve their respective marriages. It's not that hard a task for Charles as he dislikes his wife and their relationship has no passion. Charles seems to have no affection toward his children either which is kind of weird.
I don't want to give away the ending which is not really all that good anyway. Like I said; a match of two halves. Waugh is still capable of a brilliant phrase so I won't call this novel a complete waste of time.
This is one of those books that I had been wanting to read for a long time. I have a particular interest in upper-class British (a)morality. I've read another of Waugh's novels called A Handful of Dust (which I will eventually review here) and didn't like it all that much but this one is much less satirical and focuses on a English landowning family who just happen to be Catholic.
The novel begins with a obtuse description of military exercises in the countryside. The narrator Charles Ryder comes across an essentially deserted mansion and with much melancholy (which he hides from his subordinates) begins the tale of his acquaintance with the Marchmain family. This book is composed of two parts. The first covers Charles relationship with Sebastian while the latter concerns Charles' successes as a painter and his ill-fated love affair with Sebastian's sister Julia.
Looking back on this novel I am reminded of that football saying; "a match of two halves." The favored team plays terribly in the first half. The manager berates them during the interval and lo and behold the chumps become heroes in the second half as everyone plays to their potential in a showing of teamwork and collective brotherhood. Yes, Brideshead Revisited is like that, except unlike in the football archetype the stinker is the second half.
The beginning of this novel is captivating. I have yet to come across such an enchanting view of undergraduate life at Oxford. So often in British literature the Oxbridge reference is just a code word for class; an inevitable afterthought that a gentleman studies there. Waugh went to Oxford and he does an excellent job of depicting the intellectual cliques among the student body as well as the bacchanalia of which modern readers are perhaps more familiar when reminiscing about university.
Charles becomes friends with the utterly enchanting and painstakingly handsome Sebastian Flyte (not Marchmain, the names in this novel are really confusing). There's a kind of cool ambient feeling as you follow them along throughout Europe getting drunk and hanging out. Less obvious is a homosexual attraction that (due to the time the novel was written) never quite passes from subtle to obvious but is nevertheless undoubtedly there, fueled by Sebastian's developing alcoholism. Also worth nothing about the first part of this novel is the delightful variety of Charles and Sebastian's mutual acquaintances, including the outrageous Anthony Blanche, an unabashed Latin American quasi British homosexual whose piercing analysis of the Marchmain family at first glance seems ridiculous but actually ends up being absolutely spot on.
And then we come to the primary family of the story (given far more attention than Charles' withdrawn father and cousin, the haughty man-about-town Oxford gent Jasper): the Marchmains. You will recall that the Marchmains are Catholic and indeed so devout is their faith that the parents are separated but not divorced given the stigma attached to a violation of the sanctity of marriage. Instead of the dreadful divorce Lord Marchmain lives in Venice with his mistress and he lets Lady Teresa Marchmain and their four children stay in Brideshead (the magisterial, labyrinthine family mansion). Lord Marchmain's conversion to Catholicism and eventual hatred of his wife (with a little post WWI trauma thrown in) explain why a man would live a thousand miles away from his family. Indeed, England is simply too small a place for Lord Marchmain. He needs a continent of space to be away from his estranged wife. This may be absolutely mad behavior but please observe what I call Catholic...shall we say...eccentricity. Regardless of what the reader may think of Lord Marchmain as a character, you have to admit that he chose the mysterious way to end a marriage.
Sebastian's alcoholism drives this story along. It is alcohol that allows him to engage in homosexual behavior with Charles but it is also alcoholism that causes him to sever ties with pretty much everything in his life; Oxford (he is "sent down"), his family and friends. Remarkably, the homosexual element in this novel is never really detected by anyone in the Marchmain family. The most marked reference to it comes from Lord Marchmain's mistress Cara. Sebastian's childishness aides his growing dependency on alcohol. Like many similar sorts of characters from rich families, Sebastian is spoiled rotten and may not have an intellectual bone in his body, to put it mildly. But that doesn't really matter according to Anthony Blanche and Charles because both admit that Sebastian's charm is unyielding and dependable. No one who meets him can possibly hate him. So predictably enough, through the use of liquor, Sebastian comes to be unhappy himself and destroys his life.
This novel was written back when alcoholism had to be necessarily hushed about (even when the problem itself is obvious), most especially since the Marchmains are rich and aristocratic. Lady Marchmain enlists the help of Charles in trying to curb her son's drinking but Charles can only roll over and put up a smidgen of resistance toward his best friend. Charles and Sebastian have a kind of "us against the world" mentality, which certainly suggests that the homosexual affair they have is not some innocent fleeting attraction that goes away. Rather than deal with sending her son to Lindsay Lohan style rehab (as the rich do today), Lady Marchmain decides to send him on a trip to the Middle East with her puppet, the Oxford don Samgrass. This ends up being a tremendous error in judgment on Teresa's part since Sebastian keeps giving Samgrass the slip and the latter is really a sychophant who only agrees to look after Sebastian in order to further his personal ambitions and ingratiate himself to Oxford's elite.
The end result is that Sebastian absconds from Samgrass' care and filches his travelling companion's money. At this point both Charles and Sebastian have dropped out of school and the former is working as an artist in Paris. Lady Marchmain, in a sort of authoritative Sisterly sort of way, does not blame Charles for her son's alcoholism but cannot condone the latter's lack of resistance toward Sebastian's petulant "I do what I want" attitude. And so, in a dramatic and foreboding scene Charles is "banished" from Brideshead and he can't help but feel that this is a certain turning point in his life; this shutting out from the splendor of magical Brideshead and its quirky inhabitants.
And so that's the end of the novel...Ha! No it's only the end of the first part! Yet you can see that this novel could have ended right then and there. No. It drags on. And instead of concerning itself with the burgeoning youthfulness of Sebastian and Charles, we instead hear about the egotism and (dare I say it?) boredom of Charles' life. Perhaps not the best terms for describing an artist, but it is time that I editorialize: I do not like post-Sebastian Charles all that much.
His love for Sebastian's sister Julia struck me as a symptom of a midlife crisis. While he acknowledges Julia's beauty when he meets her earlier on in the novel there just does not seem to be any attraction between them until it all of a sudden springs up when they happen to be on the same ship. Charles acknowledges that Sebastian was the harbinger for his love for Julia but that seems like baloney to me. It's one thing to never forget a first love, but there seems to be a conscious effort on the part of Charles to forget about Sebastian now that he's chosen to live like an outcast in Morocco. I just don't buy the way in which Charles simply transfers his love for Sebastian to Julia. It strikes me as egotistical and pathetic.
The novel seems to drag on toward the end. Charles and Julia have to dissolve their respective marriages. It's not that hard a task for Charles as he dislikes his wife and their relationship has no passion. Charles seems to have no affection toward his children either which is kind of weird.
I don't want to give away the ending which is not really all that good anyway. Like I said; a match of two halves. Waugh is still capable of a brilliant phrase so I won't call this novel a complete waste of time.
Monday, March 26, 2012
Atonement
Atonement. McEwan, Ian. New York: Anchor Books, 2001.
This book had a lot to live up to when I began reading it. I saw the very loyal film adaptation a few months ago and the preceding reviews of this novel affirm that McEwan will be part of the classical canon for years to come. I don't necessarily disagree with that opinion. Yet the film, good as it is, takes away quite a bit of the excitement found in the crucial scenes of the novel. In some cases, the book even disappoints in comparison with the film. For example, the death of one of the characters in a Underground station during the war is mentioned in an almost offhand way in the novel while the film depicts the scene in slow motion.
But I am getting ahead of myself. I do not intend to write about how the movie and book differ because — with the inevitable exceptions — they really do not all that much. This is a story about a young girl and aspiring writer who is presented with the opportunity of fashioning her own world dramatically just as in her stories, which she takes. However, the consequences of this fashioning are tragic and unyielding. I do not wish to go into further detail about the plot for risk of spoiling it for any potential readers out there.
The attention to detail here is extraordinary. You can tell quite easily that McEwan is very familiar with Virginia Woolf. The experience of reality; of multiple realities is much at work here. I mean this particularly in the vase scene by the fountain. There are three different accounts of this scene and none of them are "correct." Each contain bits of the observers themselves. Cecilia wants Robbie to love her and therefore entices him into an emotional response by stripping. Robbie wants Cecilia and later fantasizes about her near naked figure. Then there's Briony who is convinced that Robbie has some sort of malignant sexual force that her sister cannot resist. Who is right about this episode? Who is most "realistic"? There is no answer because this is a case of multiple realities. The scene by the fountain is singular because of this and it is one of the precursors to Briony's wrongful accusation.
This is a love story, but it is also a story about how cold those closest to us can be. The only love is shown between Robbie and Cecilia. The consequences of the narrator Briony's action completely divide the family just as the war does. Briony is incapable of love as she has no backbone (her own words). She is still damaged by her terrible mistake and basically hides behind it. The film treats this well if I remember correctly, as Briony (played by the most beautiful woman in the world Romola Garai) remains bashful when discussing potential suitors with her fellow nurse friend. In the novel she fails to return the gaze of the two male nurses (or perhaps doctors I forget) who pass her on the street. Leon seems almost sexless in the early part of the novel even if he ends up marrying in old age (I don't recall exactly). Jack is furthermore distant from his wife and family, with an almost American devotion to his work (which is at least serious on a national defense scale). The relationship between Paul Marshall and Lola is too tainted to be considered loving and at any case McEwan only briefly brings them back to the narrative during the wedding. We never really see if they are happy together or not. Their marriage seems more so a confirmation of their respective guilt than any consensual agreement. Robbie's father leaves home when he is a small child, a further example of a familial love that does not play out. Robbie and Cecilia's love is hardly singular in a general sense (there were probably millions of similar letters passing across the Channel during those days). But within this novel the relationship is singular because they seem to be the only characters who can and do fall in love.
Another intriguing aspect of this novel is the way that the war is depicted. We see no German soldiers. The carnage in Northern France that Robbie witnesses is mostly done through airborne attacks. The British army seem more angry with the hopelessly inept RAF than with the Axis powers. McEwan does a good job of showing the physical discomforts of war. I don't mean sword wounds or rifle shots. Blisters. Shells obliterating human targets; people literally vanquished. Thirst. The sense of everything being completely outside of the limits of reason or control. It's not the tired and pat expectation that Nazi evil must be overcome. There are more tangible thoughts on the minds of McEwan's soldiers; more direct sources of pain than foreign aggressors.
So why is this important you ask? I feel as if American accounts of the war tend to be unlike this. The emphasis is on key victories, rather like you see in textbooks. Certainly Americans are capable of showing the "lighter" sides of war as McEwan does for example when Robbie and Nettle must capture a gypsy woman's pig in exchange for water. It is the home front that really makes the difference. With the exception of Pearl Harbor (itself rather an exception since it was a military base), the war did not directly touch American lives in the same way. Of course it was a difficult time in America too, but in Britain it seemed as if everything had been upended. Gothic houses like that of the Tallises house London refugees. Women who may not have any inclination toward medicine decide to become nurses. The war and the allegation of rape unalterably destroy all the innocence of the blazing hot summer day in 1935 that forms the first part of the novel.
The film took away a bit of the magic of this novel but it was still a pleasurable read.
This book had a lot to live up to when I began reading it. I saw the very loyal film adaptation a few months ago and the preceding reviews of this novel affirm that McEwan will be part of the classical canon for years to come. I don't necessarily disagree with that opinion. Yet the film, good as it is, takes away quite a bit of the excitement found in the crucial scenes of the novel. In some cases, the book even disappoints in comparison with the film. For example, the death of one of the characters in a Underground station during the war is mentioned in an almost offhand way in the novel while the film depicts the scene in slow motion.
But I am getting ahead of myself. I do not intend to write about how the movie and book differ because — with the inevitable exceptions — they really do not all that much. This is a story about a young girl and aspiring writer who is presented with the opportunity of fashioning her own world dramatically just as in her stories, which she takes. However, the consequences of this fashioning are tragic and unyielding. I do not wish to go into further detail about the plot for risk of spoiling it for any potential readers out there.
The attention to detail here is extraordinary. You can tell quite easily that McEwan is very familiar with Virginia Woolf. The experience of reality; of multiple realities is much at work here. I mean this particularly in the vase scene by the fountain. There are three different accounts of this scene and none of them are "correct." Each contain bits of the observers themselves. Cecilia wants Robbie to love her and therefore entices him into an emotional response by stripping. Robbie wants Cecilia and later fantasizes about her near naked figure. Then there's Briony who is convinced that Robbie has some sort of malignant sexual force that her sister cannot resist. Who is right about this episode? Who is most "realistic"? There is no answer because this is a case of multiple realities. The scene by the fountain is singular because of this and it is one of the precursors to Briony's wrongful accusation.
This is a love story, but it is also a story about how cold those closest to us can be. The only love is shown between Robbie and Cecilia. The consequences of the narrator Briony's action completely divide the family just as the war does. Briony is incapable of love as she has no backbone (her own words). She is still damaged by her terrible mistake and basically hides behind it. The film treats this well if I remember correctly, as Briony (played by the most beautiful woman in the world Romola Garai) remains bashful when discussing potential suitors with her fellow nurse friend. In the novel she fails to return the gaze of the two male nurses (or perhaps doctors I forget) who pass her on the street. Leon seems almost sexless in the early part of the novel even if he ends up marrying in old age (I don't recall exactly). Jack is furthermore distant from his wife and family, with an almost American devotion to his work (which is at least serious on a national defense scale). The relationship between Paul Marshall and Lola is too tainted to be considered loving and at any case McEwan only briefly brings them back to the narrative during the wedding. We never really see if they are happy together or not. Their marriage seems more so a confirmation of their respective guilt than any consensual agreement. Robbie's father leaves home when he is a small child, a further example of a familial love that does not play out. Robbie and Cecilia's love is hardly singular in a general sense (there were probably millions of similar letters passing across the Channel during those days). But within this novel the relationship is singular because they seem to be the only characters who can and do fall in love.
Another intriguing aspect of this novel is the way that the war is depicted. We see no German soldiers. The carnage in Northern France that Robbie witnesses is mostly done through airborne attacks. The British army seem more angry with the hopelessly inept RAF than with the Axis powers. McEwan does a good job of showing the physical discomforts of war. I don't mean sword wounds or rifle shots. Blisters. Shells obliterating human targets; people literally vanquished. Thirst. The sense of everything being completely outside of the limits of reason or control. It's not the tired and pat expectation that Nazi evil must be overcome. There are more tangible thoughts on the minds of McEwan's soldiers; more direct sources of pain than foreign aggressors.
So why is this important you ask? I feel as if American accounts of the war tend to be unlike this. The emphasis is on key victories, rather like you see in textbooks. Certainly Americans are capable of showing the "lighter" sides of war as McEwan does for example when Robbie and Nettle must capture a gypsy woman's pig in exchange for water. It is the home front that really makes the difference. With the exception of Pearl Harbor (itself rather an exception since it was a military base), the war did not directly touch American lives in the same way. Of course it was a difficult time in America too, but in Britain it seemed as if everything had been upended. Gothic houses like that of the Tallises house London refugees. Women who may not have any inclination toward medicine decide to become nurses. The war and the allegation of rape unalterably destroy all the innocence of the blazing hot summer day in 1935 that forms the first part of the novel.
The film took away a bit of the magic of this novel but it was still a pleasurable read.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Welcome
Given that I am at times wholeheartedly aghast at how alienating the world is thanks to technology, the sudden decision to create this blog springs from the aforementioned verb. I write this as I feel myself alienated. I graduated from university a year ago and since then I am still getting used to the fact that I no longer am compelled to discuss literature in my daily life. In fact I rarely discuss it as no one feels like listening (or so I imagine).
The purpose of this blog is for me to get down my thoughts about the dozen or so books that I have read in the last year. I will try my best to restrict myself to literature and not stray into aspects of my private life (as there are enough Twitter egoists out there). I don't have much to say for myself as a person on this blog, but as a reader I hope that there is too little room for me to record my thoughts in each entry. Maybe I will include some of my own writing, maybe not.
The purpose of this blog is for me to get down my thoughts about the dozen or so books that I have read in the last year. I will try my best to restrict myself to literature and not stray into aspects of my private life (as there are enough Twitter egoists out there). I don't have much to say for myself as a person on this blog, but as a reader I hope that there is too little room for me to record my thoughts in each entry. Maybe I will include some of my own writing, maybe not.
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