Friday, September 29, 2017

The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare (1596)

A complex tale of law, love, and loyalty, of marriage, mercy, and money, of racism, religion, and revenge, of debt, destiny, and disguise.

Play Review: The Merchant of Venice is one of the most striking examples of "of its time" I've ever read; this is comedy? The play itself is quick, easy, and enjoyable. I read for plot, wondered what might happen next in the twists and turns -- it seemed almost like a novel. The more I read Shakespeare the easier he is to comprehend. I've become accustomed to his poetic, metaphorical language. Once again Shakespeare creates indelible female roles, Portia being one of his best: strong, intelligent, and riding to the rescue with her brilliant "quality of mercy" speech, saving all the men. But once again in Shakespeare we have a woman whose marriage is held hostage by her father, even after his death. Portia knows she's more clever than all her suitors, regretfully telling her future husband: "I was the lord/ of this fair mansion, master to my servants,/ Queen o'er myself," but now all that will be his. Jessica must also be an incredible role to play in its complexity, an actor deciding how to play being torn between two worlds ("what a heinous sin is it in me/ to be ashamed to be my father's child," described by her lover as "wise, fair, and true"). It's far from clear that Jessica will ever be accepted by the Christian world.

But I'm delaying the inevitable, the strongest role in the play, and the elephant in the review. When reading novels I understand the societal influences of its time, recognize what would be unacceptable today, and can enjoy the book despite elements I couldn't tolerate in a contemporary book. But The Merchant of Venice seems mean-spirited, even for 1596. I can make excuses: Shakespeare apparently never met a Jewish person (Jews being expelled from England in 1290); the prejudice against Jews was common and accepted; good Christians were not to charge interest on loans; Elizabethan Christians were obsessed with converting the Jews (as represented in the play -- two of three Jewish characters are converted); and Shylock is allowed to provide some part of his side of the story. But on balance the scale still tips to the wrong side. Antonio is presented as a paragon of virtue, but he hates Jews, calls Shylock a dog, disparages his religion, kicks him, spits in his face. Shylock says (without dispute) that Antonio "hath disgraced me ... laughed at my losses ... scorned my nation ... heated my enemies -- and what's his reason? I am a Jew." This is not how a "good" Christian treats a fellow human. Shylock notes that the Christians, being slave-owners, have unclean hands. To justify his revenge upon Antonio, Shylock makes his famous speech: "Hath not a Jew eyes ... if you prick us, do we not bleed ... if a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge ... the villainy you teach me I will execute." Which could be Malcolm X and Ta-Nehisi Coates talking about the chickens coming home to roost. For me, every time Shylock is referred to as "the Jew," with or without other epithets, it's like a small slap in the face. (Portia's suitors come in for additional arrows.) At the end Shylock is forced to convert to Christianity (as his daughter did voluntarily). He also loses half his property to Antonio. The punishment seems cruel, but he was willing to kill Antonio in forfeit of his debt. Death for a debt (even contractually) seems barbaric, but this dramatic choice by Shakespeare also has the despicable smell of blood libel in Shylock's demand for a pound of flesh, and subsequent denial of a drop of Christian blood. Although The Merchant of Venice was written in his time, we read Shakespeare in our time, and cannot simply ignore what we know, cutting out conscience, ethics, and morals like Shylock's pound of flesh. Of course Shakespeare wrote his plays in savage times, when the horror of bear-baiting was considered good entertainment. But being of our time we can also recognize what I believe is Shakespeare's gentle and generous portrayal of Antonio's unrequited love for Bassanio. The Merchant of Venice is a play I greatly enjoyed, despite, except for, what was inextricably, regretfully, painfully, of its time.  [4½★]

Wednesday, September 27, 2017

Return of Banned Book Week 2017


In our culture no books are formally banned. Most book "banning" today takes place in schools, where librarians, parents, and teachers try to wrestle with the gray area of which books are age appropriate for which children. But there still are those who would try, on their say so, to ban a book. One of the worst things a book reviewer can say is "do not read this book." But I hear book reviewers say this quite proudly. Often it's simply because they believe the book is unreadable, poorly written, the author did a bad job. But to say "do not read" is just too arrogant for me, too conceited, it's authoritarian and something like telling the book "you're fired!" Who wants to be that person? Don't be that person. Usually the reason is bad writing, but sometimes it's a review that sets off a tweetstorm because the book doesn't meet some vague and artificial standard of "cultural sensitivity." This is the new censorship, the new book banning. A book has a character who says racist things? Don't read it! The author is a racist! So I can't read Merchant of Venice (anti-semitism), Taming of the Shrew (misogyny), or Othello (racism). I may choose not to read them (I am going to read them), but certainly not on the word of someone else. What I read is my choice and I will decide for myself. I can't make any substantive comment on a book I haven't read. Neither should anyone else. As an aside, there are authors I feel I can't support, and make a point of only obtaining their books used or from a library. But that's because I don't want to put money in their pockets. And because I'm cheap.

As mentioned above, no books in our society are actually banned. Any real limitation takes place at the publishing level where certain books simply don't get accepted for publication. But self-publishing is still available (see Joy of Cooking, The Martian, A Christmas Carol). So really this talk about "banning" is somewhat exaggerated. But only somewhat, as I see the hysteria of Banned Books Week as a bulwark against censorship yet to come. As recently as the 1960s efforts were made to actually ban books in the U.S. Other countries still have banned books. I see First Amendment warriors as pushing Banned Books Week with such enthusiasm to maintain a weapon for use against any future government effort to actually ban a book. Can we say, in times such as these, that it's impossible? So "thank you!" to those who stand on guard today, for that tomorrow when the book burnings start.  🐢

Monday, September 25, 2017

Banned Books Week 2017

Banning books seems futile. Stupid, in fact. Banning may well validate the ideas in a book by marking those ideas as important and meaningful enough to ban. Trying to silence a work may make the entity look weak and afraid. Or censorship may make the book seem like forbidden fruit such that readers are all the more eager to read this mysterious morsel. Perhaps condemning books brings attention to a book that otherwise might just fade away due to lack of interest. And banning may engage those people who disagree with a book's sentiments, but will defend to the death the right of those sentiments to be heard.

The most common books bans are for being age-inappropriate. These are partial bans that restrict a book from people of a certain age or at an individual school, when people can still obtain the book, just not quite as easily. While it's worthwhile debating such books and the gray areas they create, probably a majority of people would agree that some books should be kept from some children; in our society we try to protect children. At least from sex. Usually we keep "dirty" books from children, such as Catcher in the Rye. In the past, we've also tried to protect adults from literature that's a little too sexy. This has happened with notable literature such as Lady Chatterley's Lover, Ulysses, Lolita, A Farewell to Arms, and even a poem, Allen Ginsberg's Howl. Today it seems unlikely that much is censored from adults for being too sexual, but the church will try, because religious censorship is another huge force in the world of book banning. After obscenity (too much sex), the next big category for religious censorship is blasphemy such as The Satanic Verses, Candide, and (believe it or not) Carrie, The Da Vinci Code, and Animal Farm. Even Faulkner's As I Lay Dying was censored for questioning the existence of God. But I could've written that as "god." Given the theocracies that still exist in the world, there's an overlap between religious and political censorship (see above, The Satanic Verses). The biggest political book banners are dictatorships and other authoritarian regimes. That means books like Animal Farm, Dr. Zhivago, The Master and Margarita, and probably anything written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Yet even The Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf have been forbidden in democratic countries. While there are other categories, one last common reason relates to "lifestyle," such as novels portraying homosexuality, drug use, or promiscuity -- a bewildering combination. I'll make no suggested reading for Banned Books Week, because every week is banned books week.  🐢

Friday, September 22, 2017

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare (1595)

In city and in wood, four couples span the spectrum of love.

Play Review: A Midsummer's Night Dream is a play about love and the imagination, perhaps written by someone who was in love at the time. The various elements of the play echo the elements of love. There is fantasy and magic, passion and crudeness, jealousy and anger, beauty and confusion, comedy and tears. Lovers' quarrels and the games lovers' play, all are here. Who hasn't felt like an ass when struck with love? Even oafish but lovable Bottom, seemingly the last person to ever to fall in love, suddenly encounters the unexpected and doesn't quite know what to make of it. The play spans the spectrum of love (of the time) from the quiet, stable passion of Theseus and Hippolyta, to the spell-struck love of Titania and Bottom, to the comically and clumsily enacted love story of Pyramus and Thisbe (similar to Romeo & Juliet). There is also desire, not only the desire of the couples for each other, but the desire of the audience for the young lovers to succeed. (Well captured by the 1968 British adaptation of the play, with Judi Dench.)

The world of A Midsummer Night's Dream is divided into the sensible, civilized city and the wild, chaotic wood. The city is ruled by the restrained logic of its King, Theseus, and the wood by the untamed emotions of its rulers Oberon and Titania. In the city Egeus can make harsh demands under the law (he insists she marry a man other than the one she loves -- much like Juliet) and receive an orderly hearing (he accuses Lysander of having "bewitched" his daughter -- little does he know!). In the wood anything is possible and everything can happen, no rules, no limits. "Bewitched" is an understatement.

All the female roles are especially engaging, well rounded and individual, compelling and attractive: the Queen of the Amazons, strong, proud, and reserved; the Queen of the Fairies, strong, fanciful, but deceived; and two lovely girls whose only wish is to love and be loved. Helena and Hermia are best of friends become bitter rivals. The interplay between the four lovers is complex, both comic and heartbreaking. Hermia has two suitors though she loves only one (though Demetrius first loved Helena before Hermia, fickle as Romeo), then Helen has Hermia's two lovers, but believes neither. Helena is as irrationally (or youthfully) infatuated with Demetrius ("I am your spaniel ... to be used as you use your dog") as Demetrius is with Hermia (she says, "I give him curses, yet he gives me love," "The more I hate, the more he follows me"). Hermia boldly swears to meet her love, Lysander, "By all the vows that ever men have broke/ (In number more than ever women spoke)." Helena challenges social norms and Demetrius' gentility: "Fie ... Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex. We cannot fight for love as men may do. We should be wooed and were not made to woo." But at night in the wood, Hermia modestly tells Lysander, "For my sake, my dear,/ Lie further off yet. Do not lie so near." Egeus, Hermia's cruel father, is the only unredeemed character in the play, Theseus generally seeming fair and sensitive (for the times, I like how in the first scene he carefully left Lysander and Hermia alone to commiserate). Oberon is more mercurial, but not without his better moments; he's capable of wrong, but also does right. Lysander and Demetrius are ruled by their passions, enchanted and otherwise.

Throughout the lovers' play, there is the comic relief provided by Oberon's servant, the mischievous Puck (Robin Goodfellow), and by the rustic tradesmen awkwardly attempting to stage a romantic play for the Duke's wedding. And the faint reminders of Romeo and Juliet. But there's also the Duke's insight that "The lunatic, the lover, and the poet" all live solely in their imaginations. Imagination and love is the essence of A Midsummer Night's Dream, as it ends with a horde of wild fairies from the magic wood invading the Duke's palace to bless the happy couples.  [4½★]

Wednesday, September 20, 2017

FilmLit: Stranger than Fiction (2006)

Film Review: Stranger than Fiction is a fictional and fantastic account of an author meeting her novel's protagonist. Too clever for its own good? Nope. Just clever enough. The film begins with a voice-over, which we soon learn is the author writing her book, and simultaneously narrating the daily life of our hero, Harold Crick (Will Ferrell). Crick is a lonely IRS agent with such a minimal life that he seems to live his life only as if waiting to die. He begins to hear the voice describing all he does. We also see the author herself, Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson), struggling with a 10-year writer's block, helped by a quietly competent assistant (Queen Latifah) hired by the publisher. In each of Eiffel's books, the protagonist dies. To deal with the voice Crick futilely goes through therapy then ends up talking with a literature professor (Dustin Hoffman), who decides he has to determine whether Crick is in a comedy or tragedy to tell which author's book he's the subject. Simultaneously, Crick finds love. The film is full of gentle, subtle humor with touching moments that make this a rich, though quiet, emotional experience. Stranger than Fiction consists of the typical great-novel questions: life, death, love, time. It'll also change how you feel about getting flowers on a date. This is one of Will Ferrell's best roles, toned down, under control, and projecting just the right mix of bewilderment, pathos, and hesitant determination. Emma Thompson is brilliant portraying the desperation of an author with an endless case of writer's block. The cast also includes Maggie Gyllenhaal, Linda Hunt, Tom Hulce, and that guy from the Sonic commercials. This is a film about authors, books, inspiration. How many movies mention Italo Calvino, third-person omniscient, and dramatic irony? Stranger than Fiction is one of the films I was thinking of when I came up with the idea of FilmLit -- a movie about writing, and the struggles of writing. Literate, intelligent, romantic.  🐢

Monday, September 18, 2017

Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett (1952)

Two men talking while waiting on a road near a tree.

Play Review: Waiting for Godot is a play that the viewer is compelled to interpret. What does it mean? Who is Godot? Why do Vladimir and Estragon live as they do? What are Pozzo and Lucky's roles? Why does Pozzo go blind? Why is it so funny? Where does the symbolism begin, and end? Because everything is this play seems symbolic. Not a word is spoken or a boot removed that doesn't seem like a symbol of something. But what? Since this is known as an existentialist work, I suppose it's safe to say the play is about humanity's search for meaning, while at the same time we're scrutinizing the play for meaning. What could be more existentialist than that? But what if the viewers sit back, perhaps with cups of espresso, and just watch Waiting for Godot on its own terms, for our own enjoyment, just accept it for what it is, and don't try to probe it for meaning or allegory. That actually seems a little more existential to me. But I may be (to paraphrase Roxane Gay) a bad existentialist. Because I want to interpret this, it's fun: is Pozzo Capitalism incarnate and are the proletariat the ironically named Lucky? "Godot" sounds like "god-oh." Is he God? Is Godot an inversion of "doggo," meaning concealed or hidden? What if Godot is a woman? Is Godot actually Beckett (Godot has agents, "critic" is the worst insult of all, he does nothing (clearly an author), and has Gogo's and Didi's future in his hands)? A play of two men trying to find something to give them the impression they exist, trying to find ways to live a meaningless, pointless, purposeless, absurd existence. Trying to deal with nothing, waiting, repetition. They consider many methods, including suicide. They're Sisyphus split in two and dressed in music hall costumes. Nothing lasts, nothing is sustained, in the end nothing changes. Somehow they believe Godot will save them, but we know he'll never arrive. They want to do something while they have the chance (after all, it's not every day that they're needed). The whole play is an existential crisis on a minimalist set. While enjoyable on the page, viewing the Irish version on YT helped, too. In the end I think Waiting for Godot is a play the viewer can profitably analyze endlessly, or just sit back and simply enjoy for its comic absurdity. A work of genius.  [5★]

Saturday, September 16, 2017

The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1970)

A Colombian Navy sailor is swept overboard and drifts for 10 days on a raft.

Book Review:  The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor harks back to the days in 1955 when Gabriel Garcia Marquez was a staff reporter for a newspaper. He conducted 20 six-hour interviews with the nationally-famous "shipwrecked" sailor, which were then published by the newspaper in 14 non-fiction installments, written as a first person narration "by" the sailor. This book's extended (I mean extended) title is "... who drifted on a life raft for ten days without food or water, was proclaimed a national hero, kissed by beauty queens, made rich through publicity, and then spurned by the government and forgotten for all time." That sounds like GGM to me. The newspaper accounts were first published as a book in Spain in 1970 because, as Garcia Marquez writes, "the publishers are not so much interested in the merit of the story as in the name of the author, which, much to my sorrow, is also that of a fashionable writer." The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor does not sound much like the Marquez we know and love. Marquez had to write in the "voice" of the sailor to make it credible (as anyone who's ghosted term papers knows) to the newspaper-reading public. Imagine having Gabriel Garcia Marquez as your ghostwriter! Even so, there are a few scenes in which the reader may see Marquez peeking out: a visit by an old but friendly seagull; a close encounter with an enormous, yellow turtle; the story of the fakir; and the reception by the townspeople of Mulatos. The introduction written by Marquez in 1970, also gives a wonderful sense of the man, mentioning: "the U.S. Panama Canal Authority, which performs such functions as military control and other humanitarian deeds." The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor is not a novel, is not fiction, but does show Marquez as a writer and reporter. It's the exciting story of a resourceful, but in some ways just average, man, a sailor whose "heroism" consisted of not letting himself die. A good story in its own write.  [3½★]

Thursday, September 14, 2017

The Tragedy of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare (1599)

Lo, how the mighty are fallen.

Play Review: Julius Caesar has contributed several memorable phrases to our everyday speech and its namesake lent his name to a famous salad, but the play was not my cup of tea. Not that it was bad, of course, it's still Shakespeare after all. The play has a relatively simple structure, with a first rising action to the moment that the reader may guess, and then a second rising action to the conclusion of both the civil war and the play. Shakespeare apparently based his story on Plutarch (who we still read today), but felt free to change the facts to suit his needs in a fit of poetic license. One thing I did find significant about the play was that although the characters are historical figures, they're portrayed as actual people, seeming like real human beings. I find that an amazing skill in Shakespeare. Although there are some exciting plot points, the actual focus of the play is the depth of the characters, their scheming, their discussion. Julius Caesar, although owning the title role, is not the lead actor or hero of the play. Shakespeare tries to portray Caesar as arrogant and power hungry to make him unlikable. But as man who has conquered much of the known world, is immensely wealthy, and a leading citizen of Rome, Caesar does not appear all that arrogant. As someone who thrice rejected the crown, he does not appear all that power mad. He is also much beloved by some of the characters, which makes him not wholly unlikable. But he is not the hero of Julius Caesar, that role falls to Brutus, "the noblest Roman of them all." Although perhaps not a perfect paragon of nobility (he kills his friend, he lusts for glory), his essential ethics lead him to do what he thinks is right, but which leads to tragedy and disaster for him, Cassius, and the other conspirators. It's interesting, however, that both Cassius and Antony have scenes in which they imagine themselves as Brutus, though less noble and more devious. I miss that Shakespeare didn't give Brutus a brilliant speech in which his conscience debates whether to murder his good friend (he is described as Caesar's "angel") and mentor. Shakespeare doesn't dedicate his best language in Julius Caesar to Brutus' turmoil (being caught between his love for Caesar and his fear of Caesar's possible ambitions (see Act II, sc.1)). That falls to Portia, the wife of Brutus, who presents Brutus' anguish better than he does (reticent Roman that he is): "It will not let you eat, nor talk, nor sleep." She notes that the effect is so great that she "should not know you Brutus." In a historical play that seemingly might not have a strong female character, Shakespeare makes a solid effort to establish Portia as that strong female lead; she even wounds herself in the thigh to show her devotion to her husband. Portia ends up killing herself (off stage) horribly. Portia is balanced by Caesar's wife, Calphurnia. Both women attempt, unsuccessfully, to counsel their husbands, each falling to her knees in supplication. Cassius is wily and scheming, but wins little sympathy. Antony is clever, brave, and full of life, but somehow does not qualify as our hero. He does, however, give a masterful if manipulative speech: "Friends, Romans, countrymen ... ," which includes the masterful use of apophasis. Antony is called "a shrewd contriver" and said to be given to "wildness." Octavian, the future Emperor, is slight, a weak general of "cold demeanour," and his role is correspondingly small and unemotional. Perhaps Shakespeare did not want to turn his characters into cliches and stereotypes, but for me they weren't quite as memorable as they could have been. On the other hand, watching a performance made the play more convincing and helped greatly. At the end of Julius Caesar, we're left with an ethical conundrum: does the end justify the means, does the intent justify the act? Cassius, who murders Caesar from envy and greed is evil; Brutus who murders his great friend to avoid a king in Rome, is noble. Each reader gets to reach a conclusion, but since Shakespeare lived in a monarchy, I wonder how the Crown (Judi Dench, I believe) felt about that question.  [4★]

Tuesday, September 12, 2017

The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare (1597)

Beautiful youth, young love, parents, duels, melodrama, marriage, trouble, death.

Play Review: Romeo and Juliet, as a play, is doubly curst, uh, I mean cursed. First, the play is typically pushed on teenage students because it involves teenagers. And everyone knows that anything teens are forced to do in school is horrible. Students complain about: (1) the odd language; (2) that it's a play (not one of those epic novels); and (3) it's set in some bizarre time and place (no cell phones? no cars? not L.A.? not New York?). Second, paradoxically, the play is so immensely popular that it quickly becomes trendy to slag it off to show how brilliant the bloviating reviewer happens to be, and what a putz that overrated Billy Shakescene is. This despite that so much language from the play has entered our everyday language. But Romeo and Juliet is beautiful, intelligent, and worth valuable critical analysis, being astonishingly ahead of its time. Juliet rejects her parents' right to make her marriage choice, ignoring societal strictures and choosing to marry for love instead. This is much like any Jane Austen novel in which women are pushed to marry for their family's advantage, but instead daringly choose (or demand the right) to marry for love, and this a full 200 years before Austen. Romeo and Juliet has some of the most beautiful language ever written, the lovely sonnets magically propelling the story. For me, Juliet and Romeo's intertwining sonnet creates a metaphor for their love, communicating their love as some kind of celestial (and infinitely more clever) rom com montage. The first part of the play, despite constant and ominous foreshadowing, seems light, comedic. Romeo's swift fickleness from despairing over his love for the prim Rosaline to his rapid infatuation with lovely Juliet is comic (and Romeo is shown humanly flawed, no immaculate Adonis he). Mercutio with his ready wit and punning wordplay is matched by Romeo line for line. But all changes in Romeo and Juliet when Mercutio is slain. Although even as he dies he can pun and mock, from there the play moves toward its tragic conclusion. But there are lovely moments along the way. Juliet and Romeo debate whether evening is morn, or morning is eve, much as Katherine and Petruchio did in The Taming of the Shrew. Juliet, as a woman ("her means much less") is much the more daring of the two, her reputation, future, her life, family ties, all endangered by her actions. In a brilliant scene, she magnificently dissembles about her love for Romeo, appearing to agree with Lady Capulet, while never actually saying so. Her father proclaims his love and respect for his daughter, but when she refuses his unpalatable arranged marriage, Capulet becomes a raging monster, calling her "carrion" and a "curse." Facing her own father's cruelty, Juliet sees only one way out (those judging her by today's customs and practices are glibly ignoring four centuries of history). Her (and Romeo's) sturdy willingness to die makes me wonder if the crushing teen suicide rate today is at all similar to that of Shakespeare's time. The ending is also brilliant, and subject to many interpretations. Has Shakespeare anticipated the modern conflation of love and death ("our love become a funeral pyre")? Capulet says that death "deflowered" his daughter; Romeo states that death keeps Juliet "to be his paramour." Are the children a human sacrifice to end their families' blood feud? Is death the only way the two can be together? Have they been fatally punished for daring to flout society's rules? Or has Shakespeare created the audience's concern for the young lovers, brilliantly raised the audience's expectation that a rosy ending is still possible (despite the words of the Chorus in the Prologue), and then utterly and cruelly crushed that hope. Perhaps it was as portrayed in the film Shakespeare in Love with the audience's stunned silence at the end of the play. A conclusion to take the breath away.  [5★]

Thursday, September 7, 2017

The Secret History of Jane Eyre by John Pfordresher (2017)

How Charlotte Bronte's life influenced the writing of Jane Eyre.

Book Review: The Secret History of Jane Eyre is not quite as secret or dramatic as the cover blurb would have the reader believe. And don't be fooled, this is not a biography. Here Georgetown University English professor John Pfordresher attempts to find an intersection between events in Charlotte Bronte's life and in the text of her great novel, Jane Eyre (the book's extended title is "How Charlotte Bronte Wrote Her Masterpiece"). Having just completed a re-read of the novel less than two weeks ago, this title had to catch my eye. But the Secret History is not all that mysterious. No piece of Bronte's short life is too insubstantial to try to fit into the jigsaw puzzle that is Jane Eyre. There is a wealth of speculation in this book, there is "must have felt," so much "may" and "perhaps." At times these correlations seem simply coincidence, sometimes they seem to be a bit of a stretch, and at points life and novel fit neatly together. But trying to establish a novel as autobiography is always on uncertain ground. Similarities do not mean truth about the author, as surface correspondence may be all there is. Authors have to get their material somewhere: a writer may base a conversation in the Mars Bravo 4 space colony on one she overheard at Starbucks. As the author acknowledges, parts of Bronte's life were worse than the life she gave Jane Eyre. There are too many assertions with too little evidence. At the same time, Pfordresher deserves credit for his creativity, for thinking outside the box, for a careful reading, and sifting together the facts of Bronte's life and the text of her novel. For example, he's largely successful in his analysis of Bertha Rochester's place in the novel, even if far too eager to lay racial accusations. One point the author seemed to have missed is that Charlotte's brother Branwell is an obvious model for John Reed's (Jane's cousin) dissipation, just as is Hindley Earnshaw in Wuthering Heights. Pfordresher is also is a little too obsessed with the sex drives of people in the 19th Century, and seems too sure of his appraisal based on scant evidence. The novel's original title page read "Jane Eyre. An Autobiography. Edited by Currer Bell." The Secret History of Jane Eyre does its best to make the novel an autobiography of Charlotte Bronte, but there is not quite enough substance here. This book is for readers who are not only passionate about Jane Eyre (having read JE at least twice), but also need to know as much as possible about Charlotte Bronte (having read at least one of the actual biographies), wherever that Venn diagram overlaps. Being one of those in the overlap, I had to read this, but I'm not sure that you have to read it.  [3★]

Tuesday, September 5, 2017

They Feed They Lion by Philip Levine (1972)

The fifth book of poetry by working class poet Philip Levine, U.S. Poet Laureate, Pulitzer Prize winner, National Book Award winner.

Poetry Review: They Feed They Lion is a powerful and passionate book of poetry, and contains Phil Levine's best poem. That poem is the title poem, written in light of the 1968 riots in his home town of Detroit. To a relentless beat "They Feed The Lion" speaks of the oppressed, the raging, the dispossessed, the beaten, and in just five verses says all that needs to be said about all those populations. The thing to do here would be to quote the entire poem, or for you to find it on the internet and read it -- read it aloud -- or find Levine himself reading it on YouTube. But I'll just quote some bits here:

   Out of burlap sacks ...
   Out of the acids of rage ...
   They Lion grow.

   Of industrial barns, out of rain, out of bus ride ...
   Mothers hardening like pounded stumps ...
 
   From "Bow Down" come "Rise Up," ...
   The grained arm that pulls the hands ...
   They Lion grow.

A poem still contemporary today, that addresses issues as specific as the BLM movement to the widespread anger in every industrial city of America.

They Feed They Lion also contains my favorite Levine poem, "Salami." The poem begins with the vivid description of an old Spanish woman making salami at her kitchen table:

   And if a tooth of stink thistle
   pulls blood from the round
   blue marbled hand
   all the better ...

The poem goes on to describe a Spanish stone cutter asking the Virgin for blessings, and his grown but childlike daughter, "lost in the wind, or lost/ in the mind." The poem ends with the poet, with his own terrors and his own small son's breaths

  going and coming, and each
  bore its prayer for me,
  the true and earthy prayer
  of salami.

I don't know how any poet could find so much story to tell, and so much philosophy to unravel, in such a humble poem and such a humble subject.

This is just a taste of They Feed They Lion. There are other great poems such as "Coming Home," one of Levine's series of Angel poems "Angel Butcher," "Breath," "Detroit Grease Shop Poem." The poems in this book cover Levine's usual subjects: work, memory, Detroit, workers, family. He was never a star, he didn't get publicity, demand attention, act eccentric; he just worked hard and kept on working, teaching many grateful students along the way. A blue collar poet. This may be Levine's best book, or maybe not, but it certainly contains some of his best poems. If you haven't read the poems in They Feed They Lion, you haven't read what you need to read by Philip Levine. [5★]

Friday, September 1, 2017

If the River was Whiskey by T. C. Boyle (1989)

A collection of 16 stories by the author of The Tortilla Curtain, The Road to Wellville, and World's End.

Book Review: If the River was Whiskey is T.C. Boyle's third collection of short stories and my introduction to his writing. What a fine introduction it was! Boyle's writing is supple, engaging, energetic, rich, and about seven more adjectives, all of them good. Among the stories he brings in humor (lots of it), the bizarre (that too), tragedy, social commentary, satire, and even, as if ashamed to admit it, a touching concern for his characters. The cast of characters is wonderfully diverse: a restaurateur, a germophobic lover, a burglar alarm saleswoman, a widow and a bored housewife, the Devil, and the residents of an Alaskan bar, among way too many more. There's no pattern here, no repetition, no templates being used: Boyle's writing is individual and brilliant; I know no one to compare him to except, perhaps, his contemporary the too little known William Kotzwinkle. The subject matter of the stories in If the River was Whiskey is almost beyond description, whatever I say won't be enough; these are archetypal stories. A modern-day version of Kafka's hunger artist, a young man with a dangerous fixation on bees, a Faust story, an Irish miracle, a metaphorical polar bear club, and, may I say it? "Urk!" (Yes, you'll have to read the book to understand that one, but if you have a taste for the bizarre you'll be glad you did.) Is it a perfect collection? Well, about 3½ of the stories are flawed, slight, or average. An interesting effect is that the topicality of some of the stories has not worn well. What was common knowledge in the Eighties only lasted five years or so and has long been forgotten, weakening a tale or two. The "half" is given for an excellent story that crashed and burned in the last paragraph; endings are vital for a short story. If the River was Whiskey is a book you should read, an excellent antidote to a reading slump or to change your perception of the world. T.C. Boyle is a first-rate writer; read him just for the fun of it all.  [4★]