A couple years ago, during a poetry reading at my alma mater, I read this poem by Louise Glück, an important contemporary female poet whom I have mixed feelings about. I liked the poem a lot, but I was a little worried I might be the only one. However, the reading was a smashing success, and a lot of people praised my choice of poem. Even though it's a poem that takes place during the summer, it's really about the lost chances of a late autumn day such as this, so I thought it would be appropriate for this week.
Midsummer, by Louise Glück
On nights like this we used to swim in the quarry,
the boys making up games requiring them to tear off the girls' clothes
and the girls cooperating, because they had new bodies since last summer
and they wanted to exhibit them, the brave ones
leaping off the high rocks - bodies crowding the water.
The nights were humid, still. The stone was cool and wet,
marble for graveyards, for buildings that we never saw,
building in cities far away.
On cloudy days, you were blind. Those nights the rocks were dangerous,
but in another way it was all dangerous, that was what we were after.
The summer started. Then the boys and girls began to pair off
but always there were a few left at the end - sometimes they'd keep watch,
sometimes they'd pretend to go off with each other like the rest,
but what could they do there, in the woods? No one wanted to be them.
But they'd show up anyway, as though some night their luck would change,
fate would be a different fate.
At the beginning and at the end, though, we were all together.
After the evening chores, after the smaller children were in bed,
then we were free. Nobody said anything, but we knew the nights we'd meet
and the nights we wouldn't. Once or twice, at the end of the summer,
we could see a baby was going to come out of all that kissing.
And for those two, it was terrible, as terrible as being alone.
The game was over. We'd sit on the rock smoking cigarettes,
worrying about the ones who weren't there.
And then finally walk home through the fields,
because there was always work the next day.
And the next day, we were kids again, sitting on the front steps in the morning,
eating a peach. Just that, but it seemed an honor to have a mouth.
And then going to work, which meant helping out in the fields.
One boy worked for an old lady, building shelves.
The house was very old, maybe built when the mountain was built.
And then the day faded. We were dreaming, waiting for night.
Standing at the front door at twilight, watching the shadows lengthen.
And a voice in the kitchen was always complaining about the heat,
wanting the heat to break.
Then the heat broke, the night was clear.
And you thought of the boy or girl you'd be meeting later.
And you thought of walking into the woods and lying down,
practicing all those things you were learning in the water.
And though sometimes you couldn't see the person you were with,
there was no substitute for that person.
The summer night glowed; in the field, fireflies were glinting.
And for those who understood such things, the stars were sending messages:
You will leave the village where you were born
and in another country you'll become very rich, very powerful,
but always you will mourn something you left behind, even though you can't say what it was,
and eventually you will return to seek it.
Note: Today is the birthday of one of my favorite contemporary novelists, Anne Tyler. I wrote about my love for Tyler's underappreciated Saint Maybe a couple weeks ago. Once again, I urge you to check out the book. It's quite wonderful.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Birthday Musings and Some Notes
Well, today I turn 23, which is exciting I guess. Truth is, I don't put much stock in the importance of my own birthday anymore, although I am always happy to celebrate it with friends and family. My birthday also gives me time to reflect on all the great reading I did the year before. And the age of 22 was a great year of reading. I encountered two of the best books I have ever read: War and Peace and Gilead, and I explored the poetry of Philip Larkin and W.H. Auden. Overall, it was a successful reading age. To celebrate, I am including another passage from Gilead, even though you've heard about the book a million times here before. I can't help it; it's genius.
From Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson:
I saw a bubble float past my window, fat and wobbly and ripening toward that dragonfly blue they turn just before they burst. So I looked down at the yard and there you were, you and your mother, blowing bubbles at the cat, such a barrage of them that the poor beast was beside herself at the glut of opportunity. She was actually leaping into the air, our insouciant Soapy! Some of the bubbles drifted up through the branches, even above the trees. You two were too intent on the cat to see the celestial consequences of your worldly endeavors. They were very lovely. Your mother is wearing her blue dress and you are wearing your red shirt and you were kneeling on the ground together with Soapy between and that effulgence of bubbles rising, and so much laughter. Ah, this life, this world.
Note: Sorry my posts have been more erratic lately; they may stay that way for awhile. My new job currently has me on a six-day work week, and I will be extremely busy with graduate school applications for the next month or so. I will always post a Poem of the Week, and I will update you all on anything I read or recommend. For example, you will soon hear about Pete Dexter's new novel, Spooner, which I am set to finish in the next 24 hours. It's been a fantastic read so far. Otherwise, I will try to update as often as possible and stay on schedule as time allows. Thanks for being understanding! Happy Reading, everyone!
From Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson:
I saw a bubble float past my window, fat and wobbly and ripening toward that dragonfly blue they turn just before they burst. So I looked down at the yard and there you were, you and your mother, blowing bubbles at the cat, such a barrage of them that the poor beast was beside herself at the glut of opportunity. She was actually leaping into the air, our insouciant Soapy! Some of the bubbles drifted up through the branches, even above the trees. You two were too intent on the cat to see the celestial consequences of your worldly endeavors. They were very lovely. Your mother is wearing her blue dress and you are wearing your red shirt and you were kneeling on the ground together with Soapy between and that effulgence of bubbles rising, and so much laughter. Ah, this life, this world.
Note: Sorry my posts have been more erratic lately; they may stay that way for awhile. My new job currently has me on a six-day work week, and I will be extremely busy with graduate school applications for the next month or so. I will always post a Poem of the Week, and I will update you all on anything I read or recommend. For example, you will soon hear about Pete Dexter's new novel, Spooner, which I am set to finish in the next 24 hours. It's been a fantastic read so far. Otherwise, I will try to update as often as possible and stay on schedule as time allows. Thanks for being understanding! Happy Reading, everyone!
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Poem of the Week: "Talking in Bed," by Philip Larkin
When I am looking for a good poem, or rather a poem to love and squeeze the life out of, I tend to make the decision based on the ending. If I read the final few lines of a poem and it feels like someone has punched me in the gut, I know I've found a winner. Good endings do many things at once: they end with an image or idea that's memorable, they tie together everything that has come before, and they leave you thinking deeper and wanting more. One of the best end-liners of all time is Philip Larkin. I have mentioned Philip Larkin on here a couple times already, and I apologize if I sound like a broken record, but he is just so incredible. His rhyme and meter manages to be complex and simple at the same time, and he buries nuggets of philosophy in images of common, even mundane, tasks and descriptions.
So, here we have "Talking in Bed," my single most-favorite Larkin poem in a long list of favorite Larkin poems (and quite possibly my second favorite poem of all time in all of poetry). It's deceptively simple, and yet so beautiful and sad and honest. And those last two lines: Killer gut-punchers. Enjoy!
Talking in Bed, by Philip Larkin
Talking in bed ought to be easiest,
Lying together there goes back so far,
An emblem of two people being honest.
Yet more and more time passes silently.
Outside, the wind's incomplete unrest
Builds and disperses clouds about the sky,
And dark towns heap up on the horizon.
None of this cares for us. Nothing shows why
At this unique distance from isolation
It becomes still more difficult to find
Words at once true and kind,
Or not untrue and not unkind.
So, here we have "Talking in Bed," my single most-favorite Larkin poem in a long list of favorite Larkin poems (and quite possibly my second favorite poem of all time in all of poetry). It's deceptively simple, and yet so beautiful and sad and honest. And those last two lines: Killer gut-punchers. Enjoy!
Talking in Bed, by Philip Larkin
Talking in bed ought to be easiest,
Lying together there goes back so far,
An emblem of two people being honest.
Yet more and more time passes silently.
Outside, the wind's incomplete unrest
Builds and disperses clouds about the sky,
And dark towns heap up on the horizon.
None of this cares for us. Nothing shows why
At this unique distance from isolation
It becomes still more difficult to find
Words at once true and kind,
Or not untrue and not unkind.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Favorite Passages: The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
My list of literary crushes from Tuesday is lacking a few noticeable entries. After all, when you read as much as I do, such a list could easily be pages long. But one of the more noteworthy absences was Holden Caulfield, the easily-identifiable hero of J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. When I first read this novel at the age of fourteen, I both loved and hated Holden. He was a little annoying, what with his constant use of the word "phoney" and his recklessness. But in him, I also found a damaged fellow teenager who just needed a confidante. And of course, I wanted to be that confidante.
Here's the problem with The Catcher in the Rye. It's a book that can only mean something to you if you read it at the perfect time - say, when you're an uncertain, bookish fourteen-year-old with a love for tragic, sad boys. Unfortunately, the book has not worn well as I've gotten older and more mature. I still like to read it - it's too full of my own youthful anxieties and troubles to discount - but it's lost a lot of its early luster. Holden's voice can grate on the nerves after awhile, and it's easy as an adult to pick apart his overly-simplified arguments. But there are occasionally breathless and beautiful passages that make the book worth every reading. I've probably read the book five or six times in the last nine years, and certain lines or paragraphs still bring me to my knees. I am most moved by the passages in which Holden tries to deal with the death of his younger brother Allie from years earlier. These are raw and terrible emotions, and Salinger does a great job letting Holden unfold them on his own instead of inserting his writerly intuitions of making everything mean something bigger. When Holden begs Allie for help in crossing a street, for example, it's impossible as a passionate reader not to get caught up in the moment and nearly weep for both these lost boys.
Which brings me to my passage of the week. In this scene, Holden is writing an assigned composition for one of his schoolmates, Stradlater. Instead of doing the assignment as asked, Holden instead decides to write about Allie's death. It's a sad, clear passage so steeped in denial and anger and pain that the Reader Who Enjoys Tragedy in me could not resist it.
From The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
The thing was, I couldn't think of a room or a house or anything to describe the way Stradlater said he had to have. I'm not too crazy about describing rooms and houses anyway. So what I did, I wrote about my brother Allie's baseball mitt. It was a very descriptive subject. It really was. My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder's mitt. He was left-handed. The thing that was descriptive about it, though, was that he had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. He's dead now. He got leukemia and died when were up in Maine, on July 18, 1946. You'd have liked him. He was two years younger than I was, but he was about fifty times as intelligent. He was terrifically intelligent. His teachers were always writing letters to my mother, telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. And they weren't just shooting the crap. They really meant it. But it wasn't just that he was the most intelligent member in the family. He was also the nicest, in lots of ways. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did, and he had very red hair. I'll tell you what kind of red hair he had. I started playing golf when I was only ten years old. I remember once, the summer I was around twelve, teeing off and all, and having a hunch that all of a sudden, I'd see Allie. So I did, and sure enough, he was sitting on his bike outside the fence - there was this fence that went all around the course - and he was sitting there, about a hundred and fifty yards behind me, watching me tee off. That's the kind of red hair he had. God, he was nice kid, though. He used to laugh so hard at something he thought of at the dinner table that he just about fell off his chair. I was only thirteen and they were going to have me psychoanalyzed and all, because I broke all the windows in the garage. I don't blame them. I really don't. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it. I even tried to break all the windows on the station wagon we had that summer, but my hand couldn't do it. It was a very stupid thing to do, I'll admit, but I hardly didn't even know I was doing it, and you didn't know Allie. My hand still hurts me once in a while, when it rains and all, and I can't make a real fist any more - not a tight one, I mean - but outside of that I don't care much. I mean I'm not going to be a goddam surgeon or violinist or anything anyway.
Here's the problem with The Catcher in the Rye. It's a book that can only mean something to you if you read it at the perfect time - say, when you're an uncertain, bookish fourteen-year-old with a love for tragic, sad boys. Unfortunately, the book has not worn well as I've gotten older and more mature. I still like to read it - it's too full of my own youthful anxieties and troubles to discount - but it's lost a lot of its early luster. Holden's voice can grate on the nerves after awhile, and it's easy as an adult to pick apart his overly-simplified arguments. But there are occasionally breathless and beautiful passages that make the book worth every reading. I've probably read the book five or six times in the last nine years, and certain lines or paragraphs still bring me to my knees. I am most moved by the passages in which Holden tries to deal with the death of his younger brother Allie from years earlier. These are raw and terrible emotions, and Salinger does a great job letting Holden unfold them on his own instead of inserting his writerly intuitions of making everything mean something bigger. When Holden begs Allie for help in crossing a street, for example, it's impossible as a passionate reader not to get caught up in the moment and nearly weep for both these lost boys.
Which brings me to my passage of the week. In this scene, Holden is writing an assigned composition for one of his schoolmates, Stradlater. Instead of doing the assignment as asked, Holden instead decides to write about Allie's death. It's a sad, clear passage so steeped in denial and anger and pain that the Reader Who Enjoys Tragedy in me could not resist it.
From The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
The thing was, I couldn't think of a room or a house or anything to describe the way Stradlater said he had to have. I'm not too crazy about describing rooms and houses anyway. So what I did, I wrote about my brother Allie's baseball mitt. It was a very descriptive subject. It really was. My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder's mitt. He was left-handed. The thing that was descriptive about it, though, was that he had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. He's dead now. He got leukemia and died when were up in Maine, on July 18, 1946. You'd have liked him. He was two years younger than I was, but he was about fifty times as intelligent. He was terrifically intelligent. His teachers were always writing letters to my mother, telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. And they weren't just shooting the crap. They really meant it. But it wasn't just that he was the most intelligent member in the family. He was also the nicest, in lots of ways. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did, and he had very red hair. I'll tell you what kind of red hair he had. I started playing golf when I was only ten years old. I remember once, the summer I was around twelve, teeing off and all, and having a hunch that all of a sudden, I'd see Allie. So I did, and sure enough, he was sitting on his bike outside the fence - there was this fence that went all around the course - and he was sitting there, about a hundred and fifty yards behind me, watching me tee off. That's the kind of red hair he had. God, he was nice kid, though. He used to laugh so hard at something he thought of at the dinner table that he just about fell off his chair. I was only thirteen and they were going to have me psychoanalyzed and all, because I broke all the windows in the garage. I don't blame them. I really don't. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it. I even tried to break all the windows on the station wagon we had that summer, but my hand couldn't do it. It was a very stupid thing to do, I'll admit, but I hardly didn't even know I was doing it, and you didn't know Allie. My hand still hurts me once in a while, when it rains and all, and I can't make a real fist any more - not a tight one, I mean - but outside of that I don't care much. I mean I'm not going to be a goddam surgeon or violinist or anything anyway.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
What Real Boys Never Live Up To: Beth's Top Ten Most Fervent Literary Crushes
One of the best things about my new job - besides the nice discount on books and the occasional free latte - is that it once again puts me in the land of the living. When I was job-hunting, I spent most of my time alone with only two fighting cats for company. But finally, I am once again taking part in proper social interaction. Of course, this means I am once again thrown in the middle of men I find attractive but unattainable (and occasionally, attractive but unfortunately-mannered). I am prone to the occasional infatuation, but nothing quite lives up to the crushes I develop towards literary characters. It might be unhealthy, but I can't help but constantly fall in love with these wonderful creations. I hope as I present my all-time favorite literary loves, you will spend some time thinking of your own. And who knows? Maybe you have a top-ten list, too...
Top Ten Literary Character Crushes
1. Jax Thibodeaux (from Pigs in Heaven, by Barbara Kingsolver): When I first read Pigs in Heaven about seven or so years ago, I fell head over heels in love with this man, protagonist Taylor Greer's live-in boyfriend. This sensitive rock musician adores his girfriend, writes songs with the aid of Taylor's adopted daughter, and grieves for the many things he has lost. Jax is funny, self-deprecating (well, to be honest, he actually has low self-esteem), and seemingly talented. More importantly, he wants nothing more from life than to be near the ones he loves. It sounds corny, but Kingsolver makes him as imperfect as the rest of us. And I don't know why, but I love the cracks in Jax's character as much as I love the flashes of perfection.
2. Kerry Holiday (from This Side of Paradise, by F. Scott Fitzgerald): You might remember this name from my Fitzgerald-related list a few weeks ago. For some reason, I often collect doomed characters as literary crushes, and Kerry is the prototype. From the beginning, it's easy to desire his friendship and attention, with his strong sense of humor and easy-going attitude. Plus, he's as luckless in love as a certain book-obsessed blog writer, so he gets double points. But then, less than halfway through the book, we find out he dies in World War I. And really, I should have known all along from the moment I decided I liked him.
3. Prince Andrei Bolkonsky (from War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy): I admit it seems a little strange to develop a crush on a character from one of the longest and most serious literary achievements the world has ever known. But in the literature class I took last fall where we studied War and Peace, the professor asked the girls in the class (for the purpose of comparing Tolstoy's constructions of different characters) if we found Prince Andrei - handsome, intelligent, restless, and doomed - attractive, we were all quiet for a moment. Then suddenly, one by one, we began nodding our heads and fumbling our words. The professor just smiled; point made.
4. Dan Needham (from A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving): Dan is a lot like Jax in the simple fact that he's a bit of a cliched nice guy. He loves his almost-stepson, narrator John Wheelwright, as if he were his own, and he always stands up for people who need help. Plus, he has red hair and is a bit of a nerd - never a bad thing in my book. So while Dan may not be the most exciting literary creation of all time, he's certainly one of the most decent and loving.
5. Captain Frederick Wentworth (from Persuasion, by Jane Austen): Okay, have you seen the letter Captain Wentworth wrote to his beloved Anne Elliot while only sitting a few feet away from her? Wentworth makes me ask, "Darcy Who?" Check and Mate.
6. Atticus Finch (from How to Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee): That's right. I have a crush on Atticus Finch. He's the most respectable man who probably ever graced a page. I don't care if he's older or too interested in doing what's right to be up for much dating. He represents everything that is good in humanity, and that's what makes him crush-able.
7. Gottfried Lenz (from Three Comrades, by Erich Maria Remarque): Another doomed figure, which seems to be Remarque's specialty. I've actually carried a torch for quite a few Remarque characters, as they often are so full of grief and shock that they bring out all my dumb instincts to hug and make cookies and repair holes of humanity in the wake of World War I. Lenz, however, is never less than charming: funny, intelligent, a lover of poetry and beer. He's a goodtime guy haunted by memories of war, and when he gets caught up in the post-WWI political movements (Lenz is anti-Hitler; he seems to be more of a communist), you know it can only turn out badly.
8. Mason "Mace" McCormick (from Tex, by S.E. Hinton): In my Hinton post from a couple weeks ago, I mentioned that I often fell for her super-responsible older brother types. Mason is probably my all-time favorite Hinton creation. He's torn between taking care of his younger brother and getting the hell out of his home time, possibly through a college basketball scholarship. He worries so much he even develops an ulcer. But Hinton refuses to make Mason particularly sympathetic. His temper often gets the best of him (his first real scene in the book involves him beating the shit out of his little brother, the titular narrator), and he's so serious sometimes that he never looks twice at a girl or a painting or even a movie. But the final few chapters of the book reveal a complex teenager who simultaneously wants nothing more than to take care of his brother and himself at the same time.
9. Scripps (from History Boys, by Alan Bennett): I love History Boys. It's about damaged people doing often horrible things based on what they believe. In one scene, as the teachers and students talk about the Holocaust, several characters voice that it's a situation so far beyond factual comprehension that talking about it in terms of historical "interest" is grotesque. And the play works this out on a much smaller level, with both idealism and cynicism raging war against each other. It ends up as a war that no one wins. And stuck in the middle is amiable, God-fearing, "nice" Scripps. It's hard not to feel bad for a guy who sees everything but is pretty much too weak-willed to keep anything from happening. At the end, when we learn that he might never get to be the kind of writer he wants to be, it feels even sadder than it should. So why do I have a crush on him? I have no idea, but that never stops me when I read the play, watch the theater version, or see the movie.
10. Peter Hatcher (from Superfudge and other books, by Judy Blume): Peter Hatcher was my very first literary crush, way back when I was seven years old. For those of you who don't know, Superfudge was the "book that changed my life." It cemented my love for reading, and when I read it the first time, I knew I wanted to be a writer when I grew up. I wanted to share stories with people who would love them as much as I loved that book. I over-identified with Peter when I was a kid. I thought I had an annoying brother, and so did he. He was smart but largely normal, which I thought I was. We would have been good friends had we known each other. And now, weird as it may seem, I often wonder what he'd be like now. After all, now we'd both be mature adults making our way in the world without our siblings under foot. Hmmm...I wonder if he's single...
Top Ten Literary Character Crushes
1. Jax Thibodeaux (from Pigs in Heaven, by Barbara Kingsolver): When I first read Pigs in Heaven about seven or so years ago, I fell head over heels in love with this man, protagonist Taylor Greer's live-in boyfriend. This sensitive rock musician adores his girfriend, writes songs with the aid of Taylor's adopted daughter, and grieves for the many things he has lost. Jax is funny, self-deprecating (well, to be honest, he actually has low self-esteem), and seemingly talented. More importantly, he wants nothing more from life than to be near the ones he loves. It sounds corny, but Kingsolver makes him as imperfect as the rest of us. And I don't know why, but I love the cracks in Jax's character as much as I love the flashes of perfection.
2. Kerry Holiday (from This Side of Paradise, by F. Scott Fitzgerald): You might remember this name from my Fitzgerald-related list a few weeks ago. For some reason, I often collect doomed characters as literary crushes, and Kerry is the prototype. From the beginning, it's easy to desire his friendship and attention, with his strong sense of humor and easy-going attitude. Plus, he's as luckless in love as a certain book-obsessed blog writer, so he gets double points. But then, less than halfway through the book, we find out he dies in World War I. And really, I should have known all along from the moment I decided I liked him.
3. Prince Andrei Bolkonsky (from War and Peace, by Leo Tolstoy): I admit it seems a little strange to develop a crush on a character from one of the longest and most serious literary achievements the world has ever known. But in the literature class I took last fall where we studied War and Peace, the professor asked the girls in the class (for the purpose of comparing Tolstoy's constructions of different characters) if we found Prince Andrei - handsome, intelligent, restless, and doomed - attractive, we were all quiet for a moment. Then suddenly, one by one, we began nodding our heads and fumbling our words. The professor just smiled; point made.
4. Dan Needham (from A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving): Dan is a lot like Jax in the simple fact that he's a bit of a cliched nice guy. He loves his almost-stepson, narrator John Wheelwright, as if he were his own, and he always stands up for people who need help. Plus, he has red hair and is a bit of a nerd - never a bad thing in my book. So while Dan may not be the most exciting literary creation of all time, he's certainly one of the most decent and loving.
5. Captain Frederick Wentworth (from Persuasion, by Jane Austen): Okay, have you seen the letter Captain Wentworth wrote to his beloved Anne Elliot while only sitting a few feet away from her? Wentworth makes me ask, "Darcy Who?" Check and Mate.
6. Atticus Finch (from How to Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee): That's right. I have a crush on Atticus Finch. He's the most respectable man who probably ever graced a page. I don't care if he's older or too interested in doing what's right to be up for much dating. He represents everything that is good in humanity, and that's what makes him crush-able.
7. Gottfried Lenz (from Three Comrades, by Erich Maria Remarque): Another doomed figure, which seems to be Remarque's specialty. I've actually carried a torch for quite a few Remarque characters, as they often are so full of grief and shock that they bring out all my dumb instincts to hug and make cookies and repair holes of humanity in the wake of World War I. Lenz, however, is never less than charming: funny, intelligent, a lover of poetry and beer. He's a goodtime guy haunted by memories of war, and when he gets caught up in the post-WWI political movements (Lenz is anti-Hitler; he seems to be more of a communist), you know it can only turn out badly.
8. Mason "Mace" McCormick (from Tex, by S.E. Hinton): In my Hinton post from a couple weeks ago, I mentioned that I often fell for her super-responsible older brother types. Mason is probably my all-time favorite Hinton creation. He's torn between taking care of his younger brother and getting the hell out of his home time, possibly through a college basketball scholarship. He worries so much he even develops an ulcer. But Hinton refuses to make Mason particularly sympathetic. His temper often gets the best of him (his first real scene in the book involves him beating the shit out of his little brother, the titular narrator), and he's so serious sometimes that he never looks twice at a girl or a painting or even a movie. But the final few chapters of the book reveal a complex teenager who simultaneously wants nothing more than to take care of his brother and himself at the same time.
9. Scripps (from History Boys, by Alan Bennett): I love History Boys. It's about damaged people doing often horrible things based on what they believe. In one scene, as the teachers and students talk about the Holocaust, several characters voice that it's a situation so far beyond factual comprehension that talking about it in terms of historical "interest" is grotesque. And the play works this out on a much smaller level, with both idealism and cynicism raging war against each other. It ends up as a war that no one wins. And stuck in the middle is amiable, God-fearing, "nice" Scripps. It's hard not to feel bad for a guy who sees everything but is pretty much too weak-willed to keep anything from happening. At the end, when we learn that he might never get to be the kind of writer he wants to be, it feels even sadder than it should. So why do I have a crush on him? I have no idea, but that never stops me when I read the play, watch the theater version, or see the movie.
10. Peter Hatcher (from Superfudge and other books, by Judy Blume): Peter Hatcher was my very first literary crush, way back when I was seven years old. For those of you who don't know, Superfudge was the "book that changed my life." It cemented my love for reading, and when I read it the first time, I knew I wanted to be a writer when I grew up. I wanted to share stories with people who would love them as much as I loved that book. I over-identified with Peter when I was a kid. I thought I had an annoying brother, and so did he. He was smart but largely normal, which I thought I was. We would have been good friends had we known each other. And now, weird as it may seem, I often wonder what he'd be like now. After all, now we'd both be mature adults making our way in the world without our siblings under foot. Hmmm...I wonder if he's single...
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Poem of the Week: "Saint Judas," by James Wright
I didn't pick this Poem of the Week for any particular reason other than the fact that I just really, really like it. I love it. It holds one of my favorite literary passages of all time in the last three lines. Plus, it's a sonnet - my favorite (although admittedly cliched) poetic form. It's a beautiful little poem about guilt and redemption, and James Wright presents Judas's story with so little fuss that it feels like a minor miracle. I hope you like this poem even half as much as I do.
Saint Judas, by James Wright
When I went out to kill myself, I caught
A pack of hoodlums beating up a man.
Running to spare his suffering, I forgot
My name, my number, how my day began,
How soldiers milled around the garden stone
And sang amusing songs; how all that day
Their javelins measured crowds; how I alone
Bargained the proper coins, and slipped away.
Banished from heaven, I found this victim beaten,
Stripped, kneed, and left to cry. Dropping my rope
Aside, I ran, ignored the uniforms:
Then I remembered bread my flesh had eaten,
The kiss that ate my flesh. Flayed without hope,
I held the man for nothing in my arms.
Saint Judas, by James Wright
When I went out to kill myself, I caught
A pack of hoodlums beating up a man.
Running to spare his suffering, I forgot
My name, my number, how my day began,
How soldiers milled around the garden stone
And sang amusing songs; how all that day
Their javelins measured crowds; how I alone
Bargained the proper coins, and slipped away.
Banished from heaven, I found this victim beaten,
Stripped, kneed, and left to cry. Dropping my rope
Aside, I ran, ignored the uniforms:
Then I remembered bread my flesh had eaten,
The kiss that ate my flesh. Flayed without hope,
I held the man for nothing in my arms.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
The Reading Week in Review: Second Chances, Good and Bad
The theme of my reading week came down to two words: Second Chances. One is meant in the positive, with Richard Hugo's poems about redemption and looking back on life. The other kind of second chance holds terrifying possibilities in Stephen King's Pet Sematary. They were two very different reads, but in the end they both dealt with trying to make a bad thing right again.
I finished King's novel at the beginning of the week, and I liked it better than I expected. I really respect Stephen King for his love for the craft of writing and for the way he champions other writers and artists. However, I often find his work a little heavy-handed and self-indulgent. Pet Sematary definitely had its moments of awkward writing, and it didn't particularly scare me. But what I enjoyed about the book wasn't the horror plot or the mood. I enjoyed it for the very mature and terrifying way it handled raw grief. From the very beginning, the book is dripping with forthcoming doom, but that didn't keep me from being completely shaken up by what happens about half-way through.
[SPOILER ALERT AHEAD!] After the main character, Louis Creed, loses his toddler son, I couldn't help but feel every possible stab of grief and horror he and his family encountered. The grief is so profound in this part of the book that it made for a really hard reading experience. When the "horror" aspect of the book began at this half-way point, what made it so scary wasn't the bringing back of the dead or the possible wendigo that haunts the woods. What made it scary was how realistic it was that a man in Louis Creed's position might choose to do what he does in attempting to resurrect his dead child. After finishing the book, I had to admit that had I been in the protagonist's position, I might have very well done the exact same thing. How could you not be tempted to end your own grief and the horrible, thick sadness of your family by bringing back what was lost? So although Pet Sematary in and of itself left me a little cold (I much prefer King's Salem's Lot, which is much scarier and slightly better written), I had to give King a big round of applause for the way he dealt with a very real, fresh emotion that even "literary" writers sometimes shy away from.
The other book I read this week was Richard Hugo's 1980 collection of poetry, White Center. I really like Hugo, which isn't a surprise considering he was a student of Theodore Roethke and a close friend of James Wright, two of my favorite poets. At the time these poems were written, Hugo was a recovering alcoholic who dealt with serious bouts of depression and struggled to re-enter himself into family life. Hugo probably writes the most wonderful descriptions of nature that I have read in poetry. His work is very deft; the man does not waste space on lots of adjectives. His poems are full of short, even choppy, sentences, and the emotional pull is always simmering below the surface. Occasionally, a short line of confession will appear as if by magic and change the entire way you read the poem.
My favorite two poems in the collection are "Second Chances" and "White Center." "White Center" deals with returning to a home that is no longer your own. As the speaker (presumably, Hugo himself) wanders his childhood haunts, he sees himself both everywhere and nowhere in it. It's a really cool piece, and it has one of my all time favorite poetic opening statements: "Town or poem, I don't care how it looks." Meanwhile, "Second Chances" talks about Hugo's newfound, surprising happiness after having been in ruin for so long. But not all is as it seems, as the poet confesses he's still tempted by the old life, and even now, he doesn't feel quite right in his skin. The poem ends with a really cool image in which Hugo uses a children's game called "ghost" to show his discomfort: "a game where, according to the rules, you take / another child's name in your mind but pretend / you're still you while others guess your new name." It's a beautiful, haunting image that goes along well with a strong collection of poetry.
Coming up: I just bought Pete Dexter's brand-spanking-new novel, Spooner, and I'm excited to start it. My new bookstore job has the oh-so-wonderful perk of discounts, so I'm once again buying hardcovers and poetry books!
I finished King's novel at the beginning of the week, and I liked it better than I expected. I really respect Stephen King for his love for the craft of writing and for the way he champions other writers and artists. However, I often find his work a little heavy-handed and self-indulgent. Pet Sematary definitely had its moments of awkward writing, and it didn't particularly scare me. But what I enjoyed about the book wasn't the horror plot or the mood. I enjoyed it for the very mature and terrifying way it handled raw grief. From the very beginning, the book is dripping with forthcoming doom, but that didn't keep me from being completely shaken up by what happens about half-way through.
[SPOILER ALERT AHEAD!] After the main character, Louis Creed, loses his toddler son, I couldn't help but feel every possible stab of grief and horror he and his family encountered. The grief is so profound in this part of the book that it made for a really hard reading experience. When the "horror" aspect of the book began at this half-way point, what made it so scary wasn't the bringing back of the dead or the possible wendigo that haunts the woods. What made it scary was how realistic it was that a man in Louis Creed's position might choose to do what he does in attempting to resurrect his dead child. After finishing the book, I had to admit that had I been in the protagonist's position, I might have very well done the exact same thing. How could you not be tempted to end your own grief and the horrible, thick sadness of your family by bringing back what was lost? So although Pet Sematary in and of itself left me a little cold (I much prefer King's Salem's Lot, which is much scarier and slightly better written), I had to give King a big round of applause for the way he dealt with a very real, fresh emotion that even "literary" writers sometimes shy away from.
The other book I read this week was Richard Hugo's 1980 collection of poetry, White Center. I really like Hugo, which isn't a surprise considering he was a student of Theodore Roethke and a close friend of James Wright, two of my favorite poets. At the time these poems were written, Hugo was a recovering alcoholic who dealt with serious bouts of depression and struggled to re-enter himself into family life. Hugo probably writes the most wonderful descriptions of nature that I have read in poetry. His work is very deft; the man does not waste space on lots of adjectives. His poems are full of short, even choppy, sentences, and the emotional pull is always simmering below the surface. Occasionally, a short line of confession will appear as if by magic and change the entire way you read the poem.
My favorite two poems in the collection are "Second Chances" and "White Center." "White Center" deals with returning to a home that is no longer your own. As the speaker (presumably, Hugo himself) wanders his childhood haunts, he sees himself both everywhere and nowhere in it. It's a really cool piece, and it has one of my all time favorite poetic opening statements: "Town or poem, I don't care how it looks." Meanwhile, "Second Chances" talks about Hugo's newfound, surprising happiness after having been in ruin for so long. But not all is as it seems, as the poet confesses he's still tempted by the old life, and even now, he doesn't feel quite right in his skin. The poem ends with a really cool image in which Hugo uses a children's game called "ghost" to show his discomfort: "a game where, according to the rules, you take / another child's name in your mind but pretend / you're still you while others guess your new name." It's a beautiful, haunting image that goes along well with a strong collection of poetry.
Coming up: I just bought Pete Dexter's brand-spanking-new novel, Spooner, and I'm excited to start it. My new bookstore job has the oh-so-wonderful perk of discounts, so I'm once again buying hardcovers and poetry books!
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