READIN

Saturday, August 5th, 2006

🦋 Southern authors

At last year's Unfogged meetup, I arrived carrying a copy of Flannery O'Connor's collected short novels -- I had been reading The Violent Bear It Away that morning, and I gave the book to John Emerson, since I had a couple of other copies of the same material. By a weird coincidence, yesterday morning I started reading Carson McCullers' Collected Stories, so I had it in hand when I arrived at the Unfogged meetup. I came away with the book still in hand though -- fortunate since it is looking like a great read.

I'm a bit pissed at The Gingerman (bar where the meetup was held), or at myself (for not divining that Gingerman would not allow children in) or something. My meetup experience only lasted until 6:00, when Ellen and Sylvia showed, at which point the weirdly hovering waitress informed us they had a over-21-only policy. So I only got to chat with Jackmormon and with Teofilo, too bad. We went over to the Pierrepont-Morgan library, where there is currently an excellent show of Rembrandt's drawings. I was very taken with his "Monk in the Cornfield", which could almost have been drawn by R. Crumb. Dropped by The Gingerman briefly on the way home, where I had a nice chat with LB and Becks, and got to meet Adam Ash.

posted afternoon of August 5th, 2006: Respond
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Thursday, August third, 2006

🦋 The Last Chapter, the First Chapter

So Bookslut (in the person of Maureen McClarnon) thinks The Keep would be a better book without the final chapter. And I can sort of see where Ms. McClarnon is coming from -- the end of Chapter 15 would make an excellent book ending. And 16 takes the book off in a new direction. But, well, I like the new direction. I've been wanting throughout the first 15 chapters to learn more about Holly. I'm glad 16 is in there.

On the train this evening I took a look back at Chapter 1 and was shocked all over again, at what a beautiful piece of writing this is. The structure of the whole book is contained in the first chapter, in amazingly compact miniature. Ray's first intrusion into the narrative -- wow! Also -- I looked through the book and realized that there really is not a lot of space devoted to Ray's story; it stands out in an exaggerated way, in my memory of the book.

posted evening of August third, 2006: Respond
➳ More posts about The Keep

I finished The Keep this morning on the way in to work; and let me just say: wow. What a perfectly crafted book this is. I want very much to read more by Egan -- I am going to lean on Ellen about finding her copy of Look at Me. And hope she writes more novels soon.

posted morning of August third, 2006: Respond
➳ More posts about Jennifer Egan

Wednesday, August second, 2006

I am ripping my way through The Keep -- it is utterly mesmerizing reading. Danny's paranoia and half-hearted fight against same has me nodding in sympathy; I'm anxious to find out what links his story up with Ray his author's.

posted evening of August second, 2006: Respond

A note on The Keep: I very strongly identify with Danny's relationship to the telephone/internet -- the bit where he gets his satellite hook-up working and listens to his voicemail, with a combined feeling of "wow messages for me!" and "oh god, this again" resonated for me. Also I think Danny would be right at home in the comments at Unfogged. (Indeed I am tentatively identifying him with coolest-guy-I-know Joe D., although the resemblance is admittedly inexact.) (And speaking of people I know in the story: Ray's cellmate talks exactly in Bill's voice. Not skinny like Bill but.)

posted morning of August second, 2006: Respond

Tuesday, August first, 2006

Tristram is born, maimed and misnamed; and I am lapping the reading group. So let's leave him to his own devices a little while, when A White Bear puts up her Volume II post I will return there. In the meantime: this weekend I read a book review that interested me very strongly. So today, when Jennifer Egan's The Keep was published, I went by Coliseum Books and picked it up. (I believe it is the second book I have ever bought on the day of its publication, the other one was Mason & Dixon.)

Started the book on the way home and am being blown away by it. Funny, this is the second book I've read recently in which the protagonist is just my age. (The other was Absurdistan.) This is giving me a funny sense of generational presence that I have not felt before. (Note -- Shteyngart is indeed my coeval; Egan is a couple of years older than I.)

Ellen read Egan's Look at Me previously, and doesn't remember much about it except that she loved it, and thinks she has it around the house.

posted evening of August first, 2006: Respond
➳ More posts about Tristram Shandy

Friday, July 28th, 2006

This is exciting: Gary Shteyngart has an op-ed in today's Times.

posted morning of July 28th, 2006: Respond

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

So I found the last hundred pages or so of Bleak House really unsatisfying. The quality which I think had really drawn me in about the rest of the book -- which was the airy, meandering way of storytelling, the tangential ramblings along the various paths of the story which led seemingly by accident to the revelation of some connection, somehow furthering the plot -- disappeared and was replaced by a driving, all-too-visible narrative structure. The last really affecting moment in the story, for me, was the discovery of Lady Dedlock's body. -- And even by then it had lost a lot of what I was reading for.

But the two things which really put me off about the ending were Mr. Jarndyce's bequeathing of Esther unto Allan -- which just took the inhuman quality of their relationship about three steps too far for me -- and the final chapter, in which Esther sounds like a sanctimonious prig.

I liked the resolution of the court case a lot; but the discovery of a new will among Krook's papers really added nothing, really seemed like a lame excuse for a little extra suspense at the end.

posted afternoon of July 23rd, 2006: Respond
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Friday, July 21st, 2006

I realized this morning, why I have such a strong visual picture of Lady Dedlock -- she is the only character in Bleak House who I really feel like I can see her face, or at least for whom the image of her face remains constant. This morning (oddly at the moment when Esther beheld her dead) I figured out the face I am seeing is Margaret Dumont's! And I think she would be a well-cast in the role of Lady Dedlock. Great! Groucho can be John Jarndyce and Chico will shine as George Rouncewell; and Harpo I can see in no other role than that of Dr. Woodcourt. It would be a beautiful movie.

Update: Also, Zeppo as Richard Carstone.

posted morning of July 21st, 2006: Respond
➳ More posts about Charles Dickens

Thursday, July 20th, 2006

At the party last night, Roy reminded me of my initial aim in starting this blog (and this website in general), which was to write about the books I am reading. Well, and, right now I am reading one that I'm finding just lovely, very moving, to wit Dickens' Bleak House.

It is hardly the perfect book I suppose -- I find myself thinking as I read it that there are too many lucky coincidences -- and I think I will notice even more such when I reread it and have the various threads of narrative more firmly in mind. I think that is the principal failing of the story. But with disbelief suspended, what a lovely story it is! The poetry of Dickens' language and the acerbity of his wit make for a world I can spend all day thinking about.

Also: I think the story is very sentimental in places; but it is sentimental in such a way that I respond emotionally, which I am finding pretty unusual. I felt a tear in my eye when Jo was dying -- when I was talking with LizardBreath last night she said she didn't really respond to that, Jo was just the poor orphan who dies, rather than a fully human character; and I could see what she meant, sort of -- but it worked on me. So whatever.

Next up: A White Bear is going to be conducting a discussion of Tristram Shandy. So I will read it! I started to back in 1999, it was the very first book written about on this web site. So here I am full circle! Nice.

posted evening of July 20th, 2006: Respond

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