| Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell |
[Nov. 29th, 2009|01:52 pm] |
I recently stated that Mary Doria Russell's two-part novel The Sparrow and Children of God was perhaps my favorite novel of all time (certainly all year); well Thread of Grace is certainly a showcase to her fantastic writing capabilities, but I must admit it falls far short of the deft plotline delivered in her earlier novels. My greatest difficulty in reading Thread of Grace was that her "main" character (it is a multi-character storyline) has the exact same voice as Sandoz from her earlier books. They are the same voice in new vestments, and thus it was difficult for me to really accept Renzo as an independent character. However, without the taint of her previous novels, this one is clear and delicious.
Having lived in Ferrara for nearly a year, I am haunted by the ghetto devoid of Jews, and the plaques listing all the ebrei shipped off from the city, never to return. I lived in the exception, and Russell's book woke me to the rule: The Italians died for and protected their Jews, the assimilation was not broken in most parts of the country. Ferrara was a strongly fascist city during the war (there was an infamous slaughter in the streets where two dozen "reds" were killed as a warning. The authorities saw to it that the Ferrarese would have to step over the bodies to get to school and work.) While such atrocity continues in other cities, it more often confirmed the Italian decision to harbor and save the Jews than to give them up.
Russell also (and this is another reason why I do, in fact, love her) paints a clear-eyed portrait of the Catholic-Jewish relationship unique to Italy. They are two old religions in an old country, joined by their tradition and wisdom. There is intermarriage and little exhortation towards conversion, yet the two religions remain devout and strong. These relationships are wonderfully described, and the sheltering of refugees does leave the reader with hope.
But what I am most struck by is Russell's demands on forgiveness. In Thread of Grace the question of forgiveness looms in the face of genocide: can a priest forgive a man who has killed tens of thousands? Can a captive forgive the gleeful cruelty of a staunch Nazi? Can God forgive those who grow too weary to continue on, and forfeit their own lives? Russell lets her characters bloom and die, more often cut short than simply giving in to "the good night". She does not save any of her characters, nor play favorites, though she does allow them grace at times. In this, Russell is literally acting God, playing out life as she imagines God may. There is pity and patience in the author's voice, but rarely condemnation.
The attitude of Russell's characters reminded me of Il giardino dei Finzi-Contini in that they all are prematurely dead, and none of them expect to escape to the other end of the war. They only live out the days and do what must be done, but there is never a thought to future. They have moss in their mouths. It is a stark and beautiful novel, and it attempts to present humanity rather than explain it. This is what people have done, and what they told themselves when they did it. Right and wrong are blurred and contentious. Russell is very good at reminding the reader that Judgement should ultimately be left to God, for it is far too great a burden and responsibility for us short-sighted mortals. |
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| The End of the Affair - Graham Greene |
[Nov. 16th, 2009|11:13 pm] |
This book was a true pleasure to read. I had just finished Cat's Cradle and so I was initially wary of the narrator (again, a first person narrative of a writer). However, halfway through the novel a new voice arrives in the form of a diary, and the first person changes to apostrophe, and feminine at that. Greene's writing did not strike me until this moment. His narrator seemed an extension of himself (much like Vonnegut), but when this altogether new voice arrives and brings such power to the novel, I was awestruck. He perfectly captured the female voice, whatever that may be. And the fervency and vocabulary are so different that I often forgot the two voices were of the same author! There are many fine pieces of art which fail to differentiate in voices, such as Aaron Sorkin's shows, all of which have the same glib and breathless dialogue. I am not condemning Sorkin's shows (I love them!), but Greene's talent in introducing whole and independent characters is simply marvelous.
As for the plot, it is one that at first I wish I had written myself. I say at first because it is a theme I have long dwelt upon, but as Greene unfolded his novel I quickly became humbled by the author's strengths and turns. Turns which I never would have dared. He is careful not to wrap anything up, make any clear statements, or dip into lecture. Greene did not moralize, though I am sure he must have had strong feelings regarding his characters. He seemed more intent on portraying reality and letting the reader fall to conclusion, and I admire that restraint.
The End of the Affair thankfully begins with the affair over, saving the reader some time. However, much of the past makes appearances and so the chronology jumps a bit. This is not really a task, though I would have liked to see Greene try the novel subsisting on vague memories rather than chronology knots. Nevertheless, the narrator begins the novel in a frame and says he is writing about hatred. Greene's theme, then, becomes the blur between love and hate when people are stirred to passion. In addition to this he adds the layer of confusing love/hate in terms of God in addition to romance. This turn interested me greatly: as the main characters battle with their romantic emotions they realize their own confusion in faith, and oscillate violently between the poles of love and hate. More often, they recognize that even hatred implies God's existence and so they try lose all faith, for that would hurt God most.
The revenge passions, poisoned love, and ecstasy of the characters makes the whole novel thrilling, and the complexity Greene adds to his characters prevents it from merely being a gothic romance set in WWII England. Greene's setting is gothic, but his characters are modern: they are skeptical and world-weary. The juxtaposition allows God' entrance, where He can appeal to both the passionate and the cynical. Greene merges mysticism and erudition, he presents the ways in which we find God, and the difficulty in truly denying Him. Greene also manages to present the harsh and salvific tone of Catholicism in a sympathetic light. Greene, like Mary Doria Russell, manages to portray the harsh piety and the raw spirituality of Catholicism, much different from Protestantism. The truly grand thing about Greene, however, is that he does not let his own faith overrun the novel--or at least he does not reach any conclusions about faith.
The novel entertains the pious, the reluctant, the hateful, and the grieving. All these reactions to God have a place in the characters, and they are all played out against each other. How we personify God is also prominent in the literature. This led me to thinking about how our relationships with God begin, and how impossible it is to compare one relationship to another. When I think about how quiet, earnest and bold my love for God is, it humbles and satisfies me. I am awed by how other people have met God, and how little I still know about Him even though I feel so close to Him. I think, "When will I feel the wrath of God? The jealousy? The sweet cruelty?" and I know that time will come, and it just hasn't happened yet. It is not yet in my way to learn these aspects of God.
However, in the relationship of the lover and the wife, they are pulled together through passionate love and hate, and so it is through that context that God appears. I have grown to understand God better through my romantic relationship with Jethro, and I can see that parallel play out in The End of the Affair. Most of all, I just love how Greene doesn't make it simple, doesn't let the audience off the hook, and really brings his people to life. Regardless of faith, God becomes a very real and immediate question to be answered. One must believe or not. |
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| The Garden of The Finzi-Continis |
[Oct. 28th, 2009|10:02 pm] |
Note: Children of God was such a powerful and filling book that it will take time to digest, plus I must unwind my thoughts through discussion and this may take some time. Suffice to say, it is a dark complement to perhaps my favorite book of all time and certainly my best book of the year.
Now, onto Giorgio Bassani's famous novel. What's that you say? Giorgio who? Finzi what? Come now, surely you've at least seen the Oscar-winning film by prized director Vittorio De Sica! What? Not that either? Oh. Well the story is set in the handsome Renaissance town of Ferrara...--I said "Ferrara"... No, they do not make cars there. Damn it! I studied there for nine months! I have pictures go look it up! It is a tiny Italian town with cobble stones, a castle with a moat, and a huge duomo!
Ahem. Back to the novel. This is historical fiction, and everything in it is true except for the characters. I lived on the streets of the novel, and I lived in the Jewish ghetto. The story is set in the 1930s during the implementation of the Racial Laws, and the main character is basically Bassani (really, there is no difference between the character and author) yet he writes of a fictional Micol Finzi-Contini. I have mentioned this book once before in reference to the John Green trilogy, and I maintain that comparison. Micol would be very much a friend of Margo Roth Spiegelmen, and were the prose of the novel less desultory I would readily recommend it to the fine Mr. Green. In The Garden the main characters are Jewish, but utterly assimilated into Italian society. It is the Finzi-Continis, an extremely wealthy and mysterious family, that imposes it's own severance from Ferrara, from society, and from the other Jews. This family lives in a mythical, vast compound outside Ferrara's walls, and after years of secrecy the family open their gates to surrounding Jews who have been kicked out of country clubs.
What begins as a philanthropic offer of tennis evolves into a beleagured romance between the author and Micol, and the novel works itself into a lugubrious epitome of impotence. If there is anything this novel is about, it is impotence. Giorgio is a tragic hero, suffering Hamlet's own flaws. Micol is strange and real, mythical and believable. She transcends Bassani's writing and moves the entirety of the novel. Ferrara is a ghetto, a prison for these Jews. As the laws descend there are fewer options for the young Jews, they lose their jobs, their education, their marriages. Eventually they are only waiting, and they know not for what. Bassani alludes to the eventual Holocaust of the Ferrarese Jews, but only in the beginning and end of his framework narration. The rest of the novel is a picture of Micol.
Micol Finzi-Contini died in a concentration camp and her body is somewhere in Europe. The family mausoleum, garish and expensive, is empty save for her poor brother who died of consumption just before Mussolini shipped his Jews to Germany. Bassani himself escaped the fate of the camps, but was a political prisoner in Italy. However, he takes great care to keep as much of the Holocaust out of the Finizi-Contini garden as possible. It is remarkable, really. But there is a darkness to the tone of the novel, for the garden is not a safe-haven but a desperate cling to the past, much like all the characters of the novel itself.
This is a book of the dead. While all the characters in it are lively and vociferous, there is a constant reminder that now they are all dead, and in a way "have always been dead". This is a comment made of the Etruscans, who died so long ago that it seems they were never really alive. The Ferrarese Jewish youth of the 30s, deprived of any futures, sat awaiting the end of the war when they might finally begin work, school, families. Instead, they were put on trains and taken to Daschau, Auschwitz. I remember the famous Ferrarese fog; it has the capacity to turn a vivacious city into a cemetery worthy of a Hollywood set. Everything turns monochrome and there is a chilling dampness that leaves the taste of dirt always in your mouth.
Despite the slowness and the frustration of this novel, it is beautiful and I love it. Emily Dickenson's poem I died for Beauty is translated into Italian by Bassani in the novel, and the final lyric illustrates the two dead conversing until moss fills their mouths and covers their names. All the actors in this novel are dead and conversing, Bassani manages to keep them all slightly ghoulish. His own character, the narrator, is so distant and quiet as to be only a spectator, only a guide to the underworld.
I am deeply touched and unnerved by this book. Bassani writes tragically, as though the sweeping death of the Holocaust has irrevocably murdered all his friends, and even in memory he cannot recall them ever being alive. There is a true horror to this novel, though it is slow and hidden. The book acts as a grave for Micol, and it does its purpose well. But it is a grave, and all the characters have moss on their lips. |
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| Premature Ejaculation: FAVORITE BOOK EVER |
[Oct. 10th, 2009|10:47 pm] |
Okay, I am using the term in the older sense, that of an unsolicited and often loud comment. Yeah, I remember being a little bewildered by how much ejaculating and love-making went on in those Bronte books. Scintillating sisters!!
But the Brontes are not the subject of this (premature) post. Mary Doria Russell is. And (oh my God) she is wounding me with her beauty. I am only halfway through the sequel to The Sparrow and I am already determining that Children of God is the second half of what I will now refer to as "my favorite novel". The Sparrow does not stand on its own. It is provoking and intense, hilarious and abrupt, but it leaves the reader hungry, unsatisfied, and almost maddened. It is not a cliffhanger, but it is a clipped ending--so much more infuriating!
Children of God picks up seamlessly, acting as the second volume to a two-part work, rather than a follow-up to a concluded story. I am choking on my attempts to swallow this novel whole. It is studded with vignettes and emotions that cause me to physically drop the book and pause just to digest what is happening. This novel is a religious experience, and it further cements my firmness in God and my decision to follow Him through my life. The ethical implications and the perfect humanness of the characters is withering. I want to read the novel just to get through the anticipation of it all, and then chunk it up into parts and analyze each over time. I want to savor this story over the length of a year. I want to bring forth this ten-year-old book as if it were a revelation.
There is a single instance, a short quartet of a chapter, where old men, priests with years behind them, witness God. There is a saintly presence, the unnerving utterance of prophecy, and an ambiguous miracle. None of it is startling, but it is clear that the air has changed and God is making Himself present. And these men, the men of God, shrink from Him. Russell invokes the countless lines in the Torah and the new Testament of men trembling before God, terrified of His Truth and His Presence.
These sorts of moments, these terrifying and painful glimpses of Faith (a faith so beautiful it burns and cripples) is heavy. It is not something I recommend to those who are casual or blithe in faith, but only to those willing to submit their ideology to fire. I am one who churns over a book in a few hours, and I find myself laying this book aside just so I may breathe. Yet I turn back to it, longing, and ready to be bruised again by its lovely brutality. |
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| Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger |
[Oct. 8th, 2009|08:25 am] |
To be honest, I had to read reviews of the ending of Her Fearful Symmetry to make any sense of it. There remain some details that still puzzle me, though Robert’s actions are less incongruous and less abrupt. My problem was, I didn’t really think of the cemetery as a character until I finished the book. In truth, the novel is a love story (a gothic, morbid, beautiful love story) among various characters. It is a classic tale of unrequited love. Obsession with the cemetery, love unrequited via death, the breaking of a life-long kinship between shared souls (twins, in this case), and the ownership we feel over people, things, and history.
It is a fantastic novel. For those of you who haven’t read The Time Traveler’s Wife I suggest you do, but these two novels are entirely unrelated with wholly exceptional endings. In Time Traveler’s the ending is romantic, rearing out of the depths of hopelessness (much, I believe, like the conclusion of Wuthering Heights) however, Symmetry gives in to the chaos, the darkness and the horror. This is not morbid or cynical, only darkly romantic (much like an Edward Gorey picture), it is a careful and fine balance of the tragic and the mystical.
I doubt Niffenegger intended to give pause to her Christian readers by setting up a situation where a soul is listless and chained to an apartment. It is by no means a novel idea, but it does bother a reader who’s ideas of the afterlife are definitive and not so grey or bleary. There is no point, no trial, and no consequence after death, says Niffenegger. She takes a line similar to atheist Philip Pullman, where the only “heavenly” outcome of death could be joining sentience with nature (mingling conscious particles of the dead with particles of air, earth and water). But even this seems theistic, in my opinon. To declare that sentience is all, and that even consciousness cannot be undone by death, is that not inherently religious? It is the Buddhists who send themselves blissfully into annhiliation, a concept retained as horrific in Western theology and apparently still in atheology (is that a term?)
Symmetry is a haunting and enchanting ghost story, pulling the reader into its cold depths. I am disturbed, but not unpleasantly. The resurrection of the story encourages me to read Beloved which I, sadly, have been remiss to do. In it, the Christian idealization of life after death is distorted and horrific, amounting to little more than a cruel and sentient zombie. My mother is fascinated by ghost stories, and I share her interest to a lesser extent. For those seeking a good ghost story and a perfect October read, I recommend Symmetry. Especially if you can be content with unsettling endings and ghoulish grotesquery. |
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| JESUITS IN SPACE! |
[Oct. 1st, 2009|08:48 pm] |
I couldn't help myself. No matter how serious, beautiful, and sharp this novel may be, it is about Jesuits in space and I simply can't stop laughing whenever I think about it! I think it is the mark of a truly courageous and brilliant author to manufacture a seemingly hilarious and crude plot into a poignant piece of literature (it is why Zelazny* is one of my favorite authors). Perhaps Mary Doria Russell's plot is not as goofy as some of Zelazny's, and to quote her it is even "predictable" that Jesuits should shoot themselves into space.
An anthropologist and a linguist, Russell has never written a novel before The Sparrow, but rather more often wrote and published articles in journals. Russell extrapolates from history in a very reasonable way: Jesuits lead the Age of Discovery; if faced with sentient life on another planet, wouldn't the Catholic Church wish to learn more about it? They wouldn't be restricted financially, that is certain.
And so begins the most brilliant and acidic novel I've read this year. In the first chapters you meet the duality (I am a huge fan of chronological mess, ie: Catch-22, The Astronaut's Wife etc): Before the mission, and after. Jesuit priest Emilio Sandoz is the main character of the novel, and the soul survivor of the mission. And he is horribly maimed, broken, and severed from God. As we see his laughing, loving soul juxtaposed to the shattered and sardonic creature he has become, the reader is increasingly drawn into the story-- what could have done this? How did this happen?
I was going to wait to write about this novel since there is a sequel and I wanted to include them together, but the sequel is not readily available so I must make do. I am struck by the greatest residue of the novel. The piece that cycles through my mind day in and day out is the complexity of interpreting God's hand concerning a situation: good, or bad? Would it be erroneous to say "deus vult" to all things that occur? God wills destruction, chaos, rape, infanticide, cruelty? "Wills" is the wrong word for it implies that He condones it. But Russell struggles with those who praise God for good and condemn Man for evil, in a clear and decisive line. I agree to this, though not to Russell's extent.
Russell points out the value of agnosticism, but I, myself, am confused by her implications. Russell states that we are all agnostics for we cannot understand God. If agnosticism is "We can know nothing about whether there is or is not a God" and gnosticism is "All can be known and understood" then Christianity should be the median, pointing out that we can hold onto our stories, the parables, and the brief and "real" history of God inserting Himself into time; but that while we may know the benevolence of God we cannot comprehend Him, we cannot equal our mind to His purpose.
But she is also right. Our capacity to judge a situation as "good" or "bad" is faulty, mainly by our own mortality. Only through omniscience, through seeing the reaction through to the end, can we make a judgment. Many of us have had experiences that felt good or right at the time, but which we later came to regret; or the opposite, a horrible situation which turns itself toward the good. Our judgment is faulty, but God's is not. By trying to apply our own reasoning, limited by time, space and our own experience, we fail to gel our concept of the world with God's. It gives me solace to know that there are parts of life beyond my understanding, but that I can still reach towards God and ask Him to teach me.
I do not recommend this novel to those who are just beginning a journey of faith, faith of any kind. It uncovers the hard love of God, the struggle of belief, and the war within ourselves. It would be distressing and unnerving to beginners, but I think that those who have begun to fashion their lives to include God will understand and relate to the depth and pain of such Love. This novel has been a spiritual guide for me, most importantly because I can question some of it; whereas were I only curious about faith and had no foundations I would be horrified and confused through most of it.
I will do a more complete review upon reading Children of God next week.
*Zelazny wrote a short story, which I will reproduce here later, called Stainless Steel Leech which is terribly beautiful. The plot is absurd, and sounds coarse whenever explained, which makes it all the more miraculous that Zelazny could produce such a lovely work. |
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| The John Green trilogy |
[Sep. 27th, 2009|02:32 pm] |
Now, I understand that Green is not writing a trilogy and is specifically adverse to any sort of sequels/prequels excluding an idea (and I think a rather good one) to have a sequel to an imaginary novel. Nevertheless, I argue that Green's novels share a connectedness beyond their author. Green, like many find novelists I enjoy (including Dostoevsky) appears to be drawing something from himself, something specific. He may have successfully articulated this concept in his most recent novel, but each of his novels have been striving to make the same expression.
Writing is an act of therapy, and it often builds itself well beyond the immediate control of the author. Green has something he wants to say, in Looking for Alaska he bundled it into the complex and beautiful character of Alaska, seen through others. This, however brilliant, was not enough and thus Green articulated his point through the very different characters of An Abundance of Katherines, and finally, and I would argue most successfully, he found Margo Roth Spiegleman and her tragic detective Quentin. These two people exist outside of Green, and I believe he has been seeking them for years.
What is it, you may ask, that he is trying to say? Well, I will give my opinion, but from here on out are ( spoilers )
Green picks up a new thread in Paper Towns which I expect him to chase as doggedly and masterfully as he did that of "Self vs Other": the truth of fiction. It is a prevalent and interesting debate in literature, and I find it most appropriate in War novels; but Green teases the reader of Paper Towns. The imaginary becomes tangible, paper towns support life, our masks influence our decisions, Margo steps off the page. While he seems to have written Paper Towns primarily to address the issue of materializing fiction, I think Margo was more concerned in unbinding herself from preconception and overwhelmed his intentions. I look forward to seeing him unravel his own thoughts onto the page in search of the perfect story to explain True Fiction. I think that Green writes more for himself than his audience (for one, because he cannot adequately conceptualize such a large body beyond himself, for another because he treats the reader with such familiarity, respect and eagerness). He draws out his own conclusions through stories, and he just so happens to tell these stories remarkably well and in such a way that other people enjoy them and grasp his own ideas.
So while I may never know John Green as anything more than a wide-eyed character on a screen or a subtle Young Adult author, I may at least have the intimacy of learning his concepts, his views, and his suppositions. And I believe that sharing our ideas, our perceptions and our hopes lends itself sympathy. If I can but make one of my ideas understood, then I am satisfied that those people do, in fact, know me.
**Editor's note**
I understand I did not insert my over-arching application of the trilogy to my understanding of God, so I will briefly summarize here: We cannot know each other, not truly. We are often failing at even understanding ourselves, yet with all these mistakes and masks, there is a consistent preception that there is a true self capable of being known. That person can only be taken in as a whole, including all thoughts and actions of a lifetime, and most of the time we are unconcious of ourselves, which leaves only God to really understand us. And God understands every single one of us. If, then, we have the common pivot of a omniscient and intimate God, we should not be discouraged by the impossible task of understanding another person. Through God, through that great commonality, we can approach each other sideways and grasp at the pieces given. I offer my ideas, another may offer art. God connects us like Whitman's thin roots of grass. We cannot be conceptualized in life, but in God we may be understood fully. |
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| Crime and Punishment Part II: the understanding |
[Sep. 20th, 2009|02:44 pm] |
Crime and Punishment left me thinking about a dualism that has bothered me for some years. The classic duality of body and soul, worldly and godly. This is a human problem, it is the war between the discrete and the ambiguous. Raskolnikov is, like many of us, attracted to the idea that all things are quantifiable and potentially understandable. That through reason we may explain everything. This is quite the opposite of Kurt Vonnegut who sighs that nothing is knowable, and that reason is futile. I would argue against both of these concepts, but back to the book.
So Raskolnikov abandons his system of values instilled by Russian Christianity, for he finds these inexplicable and therefore unnecessary (one might compare this to a disdain for superstition or "gut feelings"). Working on a wholly logical plane, he determines that he may benefit society through a pardonable murder. He reasons with himself and is sure of the logic of his argument. He even clings to this logic through his eventual confession and imprisonment, and it is only through conversion and knowing Christ that he accepts his logic to be faulty.
There are many reasons why his logic was wrong, and these can be argued on philosophical, economic, or psychological levels (Raskolnikov was a bit of a nutso); but my main argument against the sole worship of all things reasonable is this: reason remains subjective. Logic, though it emulates mathematics, and reason are not concrete. They can only work when all factors are accounted for--and as any psychologist will tell you, there are too many extraneous variables that we are unable to see ahead of time. Unless we are omniscient, our capacity to take into account all variables is impossible. We can be reasonable and we can be logical, but we must accept that this, too, is fallible.
Raskolnikov does not take himself into account, does not guess at the psychological repercussions of murder. He guesses that if great men such as Napoleon can have the blood of thousands on their hands and still control countries that a single murder should matter little (at least to any great man, which Raskolnikov believes himself to be). When Raskolnikov confesses and is shipped to Siberia for his imprisonment, he still contends that his logical blunder, the err in his reasoning, was leaving the door open (allowing the sister Lizaveta to walk in, and necessitating her murder as well). It is only on the penultimate page that he finally realizes all his logic was faulty, and that no amount of reason can super cede the virtue of life.
Raskolnikov clings to the quantifiable and the worldly because it can be controlled (or gives such an appearance at least), and I find myself doing the same. It is easy to want everything to be reasonable, but Dostoevsky wants the reader to appreciate the inexplicable and the mystical. Raskolnikov's conversion is mystical, and the greater concepts behind morality are beyond our knowledge. We must accept the things we cannot know, and this ambiguity frightens us.
Sophia is unable to explain her faith, she is not succinct or clever, and has nothing but feeling. Yet her feeling unbinds Raskolnikov, her faith undermines his reason, and she leads him to the most irrational and ambiguous of all situations: love. ( A mathematical attempt to understand Love) Love is the very fabric of God, and proves His superiority to our intellect; we cannot comprehend Him, though we can continue to seek a greater knowledge of Him. |
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| Crime and Punishment Part I: the summary |
[Sep. 19th, 2009|01:49 pm] |
I summarize this book for those who have read it, for even in reading it, it is difficult to comprehend fully.
As I wrote earlier, I had only the epilogue left of Crime and Punishment and I read it with much anticipatory dread. The book has had a profoundly physical affect on me, just as it did the first time I read it. I find myself somewhat feverish and manic, much like the main character. It is exhausting, thrilling, and profound. It took all my strength not to tear through the end, but instead to consider each sentence, waiting for the accursed turn. It came less than 2 pages from the end. Up until that point, Dostoevsky remained faithful to his craft. Then, inexplicably, he made an incongruous turn and abruptly ended the 550 page novel. I was flustered.
( Spoilers )
Dostoevsky was a conservative Christian with a strong belief in mysticism. I attribute his abrupt "deus ex machina" ending to his mysticism, in which the spirit may completely overwhelm our bodies and establish an otherwise inexplicable enlightenment. As a Christian, I am most interested in seeing the conversion, seeing how Raskolnikov, a previously proclaimed Christian, suddenly realizes God in a personal and terrifying intimacy. Perhaps my only critique is that I never meet the Raskolnikov I would like, but must only imagine him--and that Dostoevsky has given me little with which to imagine this new character. |
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| Wheeee!!! |
[Sep. 17th, 2009|07:06 pm] |
So I just finished Crime and Punishment for the second time, and by finish I mean "finish" because I have yet to read the ... *sigh* epilogue (read with tone of loathing). I love the book, and you will certainly hear more on this in my next post, but the epilogue is a big smelly load of crap. Nevertheless, it must be read. I used to know the Greek literary word for the human drive for closure, but that word applies here!
In the meantime, I wanted to give update: I have job. It is a temp job, and it was only supposed to last until Friday but now they love me and want me a little longer. I will milk it for all it's worth, and I am fully convinced that this is God's doing. It may be another month before I get work, it may be this job will keep me for months, all is in the air! I only know that I am happy now, and grateful for the foot in the door.
Now for a google meme. In it, I type my name followed by a specific verb and see what comes up. Here we go
1. Aubrey needs to stop fighting progress and continue her move forward. I am looking forward to her first porn for Vivid Entertainment!
2. Aubrey looks like a Warner Brothers cartoon hillbilly, or a more hirsute version of Sir Richard Francis Burton if you prefer
3. Aubrey says Dog "Prefers" to Be Dyed
4. Aubrey wants reinstatement in the navy more than anything else
5. Aubrey does hereby recognize within the framework of the governmental organization of the City of Aubrey an independent body
6. Aubrey hates Communists like the devil hates holy water
7. Aubrey asks where she is, what town is she in. The nurse tells her she will get the doctor. As the nurse leaves Aubrey notices that her hand is missing.
8. Aubrey likes raptors
9. Aubrey eats dog and cat food then barfs :]
10. Aubrey wears A DRESS SHORT ENOUGH TO SEE HER CERVIX
11. Aubrey was arrested for assaulting her roommate. She put coffee in my teacup and called during hockey games, so basically she was asking for it.
12. Aubrey loves his car, now its a convertable (sic). What was that? Now its a scooter. Hoop and stick, Oh well. He isn't happy today, Now its raining on him
So I guess there is a famous pop star/ porn star/ rapper/ I have no idea named Aubrey who is a dirty, dirty, crazy character. Well, I do like raptors.
Oh, uh so I tag you. It doesn't matter if you don't know me, I know about 3 people who maybe sometimes read this blog and I think I have to tag upwards of 8 so YOU ARE TAGGED |
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| Cat's Cradle |
[Sep. 13th, 2009|01:11 pm] |
This is a reluctant post, for I must admit I still cannot get my head around much of Cat's Cradle. I isolated the spoiler to an lj cut so you can choose to skip it if you like.
This book spoke out to me, and it challenged me and used a tone and 'humor' I am altogether unfamiliar with. It was like getting pwned in debate class, where you had your own ideas and arguments, but then someone comes in with a new logic and you cannot formulate any sort of response. You have been weakened by their very formation of thought. It is so outside yourself, so foreign, yet not in a necessarily bad or even unsettling way.
Cat's Cradle had gotten me thinking about healing. War, no matter how many times people say it, is a great incomprehensible evil. At times, I begin to doubt the existence of an entity titled Satan, a purely malevolent being somehow within and outside of God (I imagine this looks somewhat like a Venn Diagram). But when I think about the casual cruelty of massive groups of people engaged in war, I begin to surmise that there must be an underlying evil guiding along such orchestrated carnage. People are responsible, I do not dispute that, but can I credit us to the breadth and scope of our destruction? When a single human reaches out and saves another, I know God is present and breathing upon those two; is it not the same in the inverse?
I think of authors who have tried to heal their war wounds, Vonnegut among them. Some appear more successful, like Joseph Heller whose sense of humor remained intact (until you take in Catch-22 as a whole, then the grotesque and violent emerge, revealing how crippled Heller remains). Some, like Primo Levi , can never escape. Not with all the beauty of their prose or tears of their readers can they transcend what war did to them. I do retain hope, nonetheless, that God can heal us; or at the very least He can close the wounds, soothe the memory, but leave the wicked scars on our mortal bodies. We are subject to our mortal world, and while that can be catastrophic, it is still worthwhile and occasionally awe-some.
Vonnegut uses fiction to produce truth; a technique I first read in Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried** but which surely must be attributed to earlier writers such as Vonnegut. Dystopic fiction is the (somewhat exaggerated) logical end to an upset world. It is only a minor fictitious event that Vonnegut adds; so minuscule as to barely merit the label of science fiction. Everything is the same, except for a molecule of water. The development of this microscopic droplet is a direct result of the same brain that conceived the atomic bomb: a brain preoccupied with tinkering, creating for the sake of novelty, and knowledge. There is nothing beyond this, no empathy or curiosity concerning the results of his inventions. This is Vonnegut's God brought to gross negligence; a direct depiction of God in the book is that of an inventor who's toys seek meaning where there was none intended. But surely, an apathetic God is a malevolent God.
As the world rushes to its nadir--though not outright annihilation--a bombastic and sarcastic religion is uncovered. In it, the lies are expressed outright as lies and the "purpose" is to create a tension between good and evil that is interesting enough to distract the followers from their pointless and monotonous lives. Bokonism must share some Vonnegut ideology, though how much of it I cannot guess. It is here, in the atheistic depiction of religion, that I falter. This is no fault of Vonnegut but it is my own, for only in the past few years have I begun to conceptualize complex anti-heroes, protagonists who are not meant to be exemplary or appealing, or even sympathetic. This anti-hero is different from, for example, Raskolnikov who, although pretentious and murderous remains sympathetic and endearing; or the main character of A Clockwork Orange who manages to pull us through a morality play set in carnage. No, these figures (among whom I include Holden Caulfield, thanks to John Green's insistence) are simply not heroic in any sense. They are petty and myopic. They do not transcend their transgressions or achieve a new level of consciousness, they simply live out life and deal with its consequences.
( Here I list the spoiler, but in summation, Vonnegut undermines a traditional literary triumph with a scene of horrific and complacent self-annihilation. The seeming message is that evil is casual and sometimes without point or reason. )
But I am fundamentally in opposition to this viewpoint. While, perhaps, we cannot conceive of the reason or deduce a lesson, I do not go so far as to admit there is none. Life, as a great and intricate story, does not tie itself up neatly every generation or so, but often leaves loose and fraying ends to be woven in later. And because I believe in the essentially benevolent and omnipresent aspects of God, and because He walked under our mortal skin and was subjected to this very life, I must protest against all concepts of God as an aloof tinkerer, an accidental inventor with no concern or investment in his creation. It is my belief that the good and the love in this world is so powerful and so strong it grossly outweighs any evil or chaos we instill in this creation. The followers of the Nerdfighter project should understand what I mean, as should anyone who has loved, lost, and come around to thankfulness for the memory of that love. It is when, despite the ease with which we may cut each other down, turn against our God, or plaugue our own planet, we give pause to do the opposite; it is when we turn without coercion to God and we whisper "I love you". These are the moments that outweigh our evils, and these are the small eternities that provide the masonry for heaven. That is the purpose.
**I was blessed, in my own ignorant way, in seeing O'Brien speak at my old college. I did not fully appreciate it then, but he revealed his fiction/truth technique in a straightforward and easy speech. His, daughter, to whom the book is dedicated and who acts as the innocent conscious foiling his memories of Vietnam, does not exist. |
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| While I let Cat's Cradle creep up on me... |
[Sep. 10th, 2009|08:17 pm] |
I have recently finished Cat's Cradle and I am so disturbed and interested that I simply cannot form an account as of yet. I am therefore reading a little about Vonnegut, re-skimming the novel, and then I will return. Until then, I have a personal post.
Please, whatever your current job, do not quit. It could be a terrible, humiliating career, but do not lend yourself to the ranks of the unemployed. We have enough as it is, and let me tell you: it is so much worse than you can comprehend. |
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| The wizard returns... AS A CHRISTIAN BOOK BLOG! |
[Sep. 6th, 2009|06:05 pm] |
Now, thanks to the ambiguity of our grammatical system in terms of adjectives, you may think I am going to blog critiques of Christian Books or Books written by Christians or Books written for Christian Book Groups. No.
Some of the books may fall into that category, but really I am just going to blog about the books I've been reading and point out how my faith wrestles or digests the novel. I've been unemployed for a little while and recently I have become sick (a present from the fiance) so I have had a LOT of time on my hands to read. Since coming to Chicago I have read these books:
At the Back of the North Wind; The Tao of Pooh ; Catch-22; Pride and Prejudice and Zombies; Small Gods; Looking for Alaska; Eleven on top; and Coraline. Between PP&Z and Small Gods I began re-reading Crime and Punishment but as that novel happens to give me fevers (for real) I had to stop until I felt better. Since I am still sick, I've begun Cat's Cradle and hope to be better when it is done so that I might finally get back into the haunted mind of Raskolnikov, one of my favorite literary characters. I will do a one-line review of the majority of the books and then start the REAL BLOG. Today will mainly be dedicated to Small Gods by Terry Pratchett.
At the Back of the North Wind Was a tedious, overly moralistic bed-time story that was better done by Dostoevesky in The Idiot with an adult audience.
The Tao of Pooh Began as an interesting introduction to Taoism and homage to Pooh Bear's wisdom, but quickly deteriorated into a diatribe against intellectuals and scholars of any sort.
Catch-22 One of my favorites, I re-read this for the third time and was still surprised how Heller mixes the hilarity of Theatre of the Absurd so well with the poignancy satire, producing a chilling and artistic critique of human warfare.
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Could have been a good book had the author liked or even respected Jane Austen (I will delve further into this here**, as I feel very strongly.)
Looking for Alaska Was another one of those Young Adult novels that takes teens seriously and remains rewarding for those who have long left high school, or even, like me, have only poor memories of those four years; I will keep reading Green.
Eleven on Top Is another satisfying box of doughnuts, a sugary snack devoid of any nutrients but wickedly satisfying as a comforting sugar-binge. Yumm...
Coraline Was a fine read, although I now want to see some of the graphic novel, and I agree with my friend that it is better to read the book before seeing the movie.
AND NOW... Small Gods from the novels of ( Discworld )
**About Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Now, I suppose Austen is mistaken for a chick-writer, albeit one from two centuries ago, and thus she suffers a dearth among male readers. One of those readers appears to be Seth Grahame-Smith; I am sure he read the novel, but I doubt he read it willingly or with any interest at all. PP&Z is written by the puerile mind who, while scanning Austen's prose thinks to himself, "Insert zombie here." and while that is entertaining for the bored reader, it does not make good literature. Now, I am not saying that Austen and zombies are an impossible combination, I actually think they could be done rather well, I am just saying Grahame-Smith did not do it. There is a third ghost writer who manages to put Grahame-Smith's puerile intentions into Austen-esque prose, often to the detriment of a lame joke about balls. But Grahame-Smith as an author can still be heard clearly, and he thinks Austen is a dumb chick who only cares about dresses, finding a husband, and how much money said husband earns.
Actually, Austen is criticizing her own society which reduces women to such cares and concerns. Austen's heroines are not interested in marriages or husbands, but rather are interested in education and independence, with marriage reserved for romance rather than financial stability. However, Austen is not criticizing the silly women who concern themselves only with the attentions of men, but criticizing the men in power who have formed a society where woman's only freedom is her choice of husband--and sometimes not even then. Imagine Elizabeth Bennett's attempts to be an independently minded and strong-willed woman in a world where young women should only care about dresses--now throw in zombies. Surely Austen's point is made all the more clear and the arguments for "ladylike qualities" are all the worse in context of a zombie attack. However, Grahame-Smith did not angle his novel in this favor, but saved his literary talent for descriptions of disembowlment and heart-eating. It could have been good, it just wasn't. |
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| Bliss |
[Aug. 6th, 2009|09:52 pm] |
I've indeed been eating something called "Bliss", a sort of dark chocolate lovingly created by Dove (wait--is Dove chocolate and Dove shampoo the same company? Because I feel a collaboration coming on!) but besides my melty-dark lovings, I have encountered bliss in various other forms.
Through the haze of sweat, dirt, moving chaos and general frustration I have glimpsed beauty. In Connecticut I had a persistent sense of displacement, of not being where I should. In a book I recently read, a character undergoing an identity crisis remarks on how satisfying it must be to exist as the lid of a can: always knowing where you fit and what you are meant to do. Where he stumbles is that the inanimate is unaware of its own fortune, and therefor cannot experience satisfaction. I am the animate lid, and I am screwed tightly to the jar marked Chicago.
The windy city greeted us with open arms, promptly breaking Jethro's umbrella by bending it at a 90 degree angle and turning the top inside-out. Our neighbors have been generous with their garbage, throwing away choice items like wooden chairs, welcome mats, and folding tables. And the neighborhood must have been planning our arrival for some time--all the gardens are in full glory. Rockets of ivy shoot into the sky, and next door grows something akin to a kentucky coffee bean tree but with much longer, greener beans. A small welcome committee has formed and greets us intermittently. I've met the maintenance man who is also a painter, the local dog walker who is really a documentary film maker, his dog Lulu who is perhaps the sweetest explosion of fur I've ever seen, and Jethro and I waved to the Buddhist monks who were sipping tea outside their monastery. Today a 75-year-old Japanese woman and long-time Chicago resident decided to tell us her life's story, accompanied with photos.
Much has gone wrong. But so much has gone right that I cannot but feel contentment and joy. Plus, I am still high from a video I found on a site called Cute Overload in which a kitty entertains its owner during a move. This cat is so kindly and loveable that I will post the site here
Enjoy! |
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| Listen and read |
[Jul. 28th, 2009|07:55 pm] |
So I decided to post some music and then, inspired by the fiance, I looked up some mad libs... INTERNET STYLE! I will give you the link and let you pick something out. I forgot how much fun mad libs can be! Here is my Rock Star story:
I'm at a new school. Its name is “The Aubrazilla School for Rock Stars.” The courses here are rockalicious!
My first assignment is to learn to play the synthesizer and sing like a rock star. To be a good rock star, I'm supposed to scram around a lot, to bungle across the stage, and to enlarge at the audience. I did not act like that at my old school, so I think I'll have to work on it for a while; this will be interesting homework.
My second assignment is to learn to have an entourage, which is a group of people that always seems to follow around a rock star. I have a lot of friends, but for this assignment I suddenly have Couple gillion people following me around, telling me how fierce I am, how they really like my girdle, and how I am the most frustrating person ever. I can't be sure, but I think they are just saying that.
My final assignment is to put on a rock concert. I have to arrive in a(n) segway and walk the beige carpet, past all the crunking fans with cameras flashing in my face. Then, when I get inside, my entourage will be there and I will glorify with them to the stage. Next, I'll perform eight songs, all while barhopping across the stage, singing, and furchliching at the audience. This will be the toughest final exam I've ever had, and the one I'll never forget! |
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| One last video |
[Jul. 20th, 2009|01:48 pm] |
Okay I know it is a kitsch show run by the zeitgeist, but one thing I inherited from my mother is the urge to watch (or perform) dance. It's too bad that so many dance movies have plots as compelling as porn. I love dance, and contemporary dance (although sometimes it borders on the pretentious and weird) is one of my favorites. Anyway, although weeks have passed I keep remembering this one number, and so I shall share it with you. |
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| Video! |
[Jul. 7th, 2009|11:31 pm] |
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If you have ever listened to my playlist (a link is located at the heading of my blog) you have probably heard the Fiona Apple Song Not About Love. I am not a huge Fiona Apple fan, she is a terse poet and a little too dark for me (not playfully so, but morbidly dark). I am starting to turn around, though, since this song. For one, it is written beautifully and I actually like it very much from the lyrics to the use of instruments and the timing. You should listen to the song. If you already have listened to the song and have the same sobering feeling about it as I do, then you should click on my provided link and see the video. I promise, it is not what you were expecting. |
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| ? |
[Jun. 9th, 2009|09:53 pm] |
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You don't know how many times I have saved this blog's integrity by hitting the delete function. Ah well. Let's wait a little longer for real inspiration to strike. |
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