You Dreamed of Empires - Alvaro Enrigue (2024)

After listening to several New York Times Book Review podcasts last year, I picked out this book for a friend, as it was noted by many as one of the highlights of the year in publishing. As a gift, it was a great success. My friend loved it. He may consider it one of his favorite books, period. After he finished, he insisted on my reading it too, and as is custom, a review on this blog follows. 

It is easy to describe the book. It is an historical novel, detailing events from roughly 500 years ago in what is now Mexico City, centering around a crucial encounter between Hernando Cortes and the Emperor Montezuma. It takes place in the course of a single day.

It is not as easy to say how I feel about it. At first blush, I would say I do not agree entirely with my friend (I would not put it in the Best Books category), but I can certainly understand why it has been lauded, and admit that my own knowledge of history and interest in this type of narrative puts me at an unfair bias. In any case, I will do my best to explain. 

I am tempted to copy the lyrics from the Neil Young song, "Cortez the Killer," as it rung in my ears throughout my reading. I am actually going to read them now. You may find them here 

And yes, Neil is not totally off here, but the song presents a rather one-sided take on the encounter, and is something of an anthem against colonialism. Montezuma is presented as a hero, Cortez as a destroyer. The story Enrigue depicts is far more nuanced. 

At a certain point near the very end, there is something of a "twist" that definitely tricked me, and belied my own lack of knowledge about this general period in world history. So now, I need to do some wikipedia research. Forgive me. 

And now, I believe, the twist here is a twist on history, and I'm trying to avoid spoilers, but my initial thoughts while reading were correct--the dream is the reality, and the reality depicted is perhaps Tarantino-esque, a la Inglorious Basterds or Once Upon a Time in Hollywood--an alternate conclusion that might have changed the course of history between these two nations. 

All that being said, the overarching impression was one of anti-climax. Arguably, the book opens with its climax, or at least its greatest intrigue. The book (and day) plays out towards another climax, which ends in rather tentative and odd psychedelic fashion, and is in keeping with one of the major themes of the novel. Maybe I am speaking so generically because I am dreading spelling out the names of these characters, but unfortunately it must be done. 

***

Enrigue does open the book with a letter to his editor, Natasha, which contains an explanation for the spelling and usage of various words deployed for both historical accuracy and readability. This was not particularly helpful and it might have been better had I flipped back to it for reference--but I think I got the gist of things, which Enrigue also anticipates in the letter. 

First of all, it's not Montezuma--it's Moctezuma. And I've overstated the complexity of things here, because there aren't many characters. Perhaps the lingo washed over me in such a way that up to 20% of text per page felt borderline nonsensical to me, but again I think I got the gist. 

Obviously the main characters are Cortes and Moctezuma, but this is definitely focused more on Moctezuma, and Moctezuma's wife (and sister! as the text highlights several times early on--in title only, symbolic and not incestuous), Atotoxtli. Beyond those 2, there is Tlilpotonqui, the mayor of Tenochtitlan, and some other incidental figures that may be in line to be emperor or mayor. 

On the Spanish side, Jazmin Caldera is arguably focused on just as much as Cortes, along with the translators Aguilar and Malinalli. Cortes is the captain, but Caldera is third in command. Alvarado is second in command, but only mentioned a few times--once while saying the Lord's Prayer and polishing his shoes with a grease made by rendering fat....in one of the most gut-wrenching chapters in the book, which I wanted to excerpt but my friend insisted was a spoiler.

It's not a spoiler to say this book is gross, and describes horrible smells somewhat often. It also describes the cuisine of Tenochtitlan in a rather charming way. The writing about food is great. There is also a lot of drug material in this book. These were arguably my favorite parts. 

The period detail here is peerless, and Enrigue's research is marvelous. In terms of historical novels, it's very difficult to put on a better clinic than this. In reading it, you will be transported back in time 500 years, and guided by Enrigue on all facets of daily life that feel unfamiliar and strange. This element of pitch-perfect historical accuracy probably accounts for the majority of its acclaim.  

***

Plot, briefly: Cortes and his crew have arrived in Tenochtitlan, and have been invited to the royal palace of Moctezuma, who remains unseen by them for the majority of the novel. The opening scene of the novel is instantly iconic, and is probably the part that most reviews would excerpt, as it gives a preview of the "sensory" experience in store for the reader. I would not say the rest of the novel is downhill from there, but that it is rather more concerned with backroom political intrigue than "action." The main action here is that Caldera is disgusted by the options and situation, and that Cortes does not care, and demands compliance:

"Cortes took a generous swallow of soup and bellowed his delight. He smiled at Princess Atotoxtli, seated next to him. With a pleasant expression still on his face but with his fists clenched on the linen cloth--his knuckles white with rage at Caldera's insubordination--he said quietly, almost in a singsong: Shut up and eat the soup, son of a bitch; we are the empress's guests. Caldera smiled. I can't, he replied; if only you knew what they smelled like, Hernan, this one here must have eaten mashed-up babies for breakfast. The captain general returned his smile and, as if commenting on the sweetness of the chocolate, said: You think you smell of roses? Shut up and eat, then vomit later all you want. Malinalli, the Nahua translator, raised her eyes from her plate. In Maya, she asked Aguilar, the Spanish translator, whether they should translate what Caldera and Cortes were saying for the benefit of the princess and the nobles and priests crowded around the table. He whispered in her ear, also in Maya, that he didn't think so, it was just conquistador chatter." (6-7)

It's unclear whether Cortes and Moctezuma are going to become allies (or conquered), and the potential result of their encounter is contemplated throughout the novel to the point that it becomes the actual main plot--what do they want from one another? At a certain point it becomes obvious: the Spanish have brought horses, "deer without antlers," and those might be very useful to Moctezuma, though his exposure to the creatures feels rather distant (Atototoxtli is the one that recognizes the advantages they provide). In fact, Moctezuma is distant the entire time, and it's soon clear that he is on magic mushrooms pretty constantly. 

Small note: just in revisiting this section of this first chapter, my understanding is much deeper the second time around, and so this book probably would probably benefit enormously from a total re-read. It's a strange setting filled with strange words and complicated feelings for most of the characters, but after generally processing how the events unfold, it seems to be more straightforward. 

***

I'm not sure if there's anything I can add here, beyond another excerpt. My feelings should be clear. I am only not putting it on the Best Books list because historical fiction generally does not make the list. It is not my favorite genre. I can certainly appreciate it, sometimes, and I know this should stand as a prototypical masterpiece of the genre. 

It certainly has a purpose, beyond straight non-fiction history. It allows us to go beyond the facts, as we are often told that history is written by the victors. It is good and useful to imagine an alternative history that might have been written if the defeated could provide their account. 

And it is also amusing to insert wild fantasy that breaks the 4th wall and crosses over into experimental literature. Such is the mystery of life, and Kurt Vonnegut would likely approve: 

"I love this room, said Moctezuma, you can't imagine how I miss being a priest. Where there were splotches of blood, he saw sprays of flowers. The withered fingers of the hands of great warriors sacrificed during the year's festivals swayed pleasingly like the branches of a small tree to the beat of some music he couldn't place, though in a possible future we would have recognized it. It was T. Rex's 'Monolith.'
The priest was also up to his ears in whatever he had taken to carry out his temple duties, so he bent his magic powers of hearing to the music and caught the sexy crooning of Marc Bolan. He smiled. That's good stuff, he said. Moctezuma swung his hips to the beat. It's nothing I've ever heard before, he replied, but I like it. He pulled his elbows in tight and shimmied, moving his head gravely from side to side, transfixed by pleasure. The priest, swaying his own ass to the beat--he was nearly eighty, but on mushrooms he was a jaguar--said, I was thinking about you, believe it or not; look at this. He carefully lifted the clay basin in which the blood of doves sacrificed that afternoon had yet to coagulate--their decapitated bodies sensually dancing to 'Monolith,' all around the priest and emperor--and showed him the image forming in it. It took Moctezuma a while to bring it into focus because it came from very far away. When it was finally sharp and clear, it made no sense to him: It was me writing this novel in a yard on Shelter Island. Uh, he said, strange, and he was seized by laughter. Is that what will happen if I wait for the new year, or if I don't wait? The priest shrugged. The calendar says you should wait, but the calendar has been wrong lately; let me ask the boss. Moving to the beat of the emperor's internal music, he walked to the giant sculpture of Huitzilopochtli that loomed over the place. His skull-embroidered cape swished like the train of a contented queen. As always, the god was covered with a veil." (176-177)

If one is traveling to Mexico City, one should read this book. Because it is just as much about the founding of that place as anything else. I think Enrigue also perceives something in the character of its people that is more ancient, and through this literary alchemy has created what must be one of the most beautiful statements about this city (and the country of Mexico) as there has been. I know at least that it will make me look at the city rather differently, whenever I am so lucky to return for more than a 6 hour layover, and hopefully less ill than I was when there 8.5 months ago. 

Finally, the world did not end in 2012, but to many of us perhaps, it was the beginning of the end. Those that want to believe in such supernatural prognostication should also find much here to appreciate. Maybe they will even discover the key to quelling global unrest, and better advise all those putting on suits of armor to go to battle against hot-fudge sundaes. 

Taste in Music: Eating on Tour with Indie Musicians - Alex Bleeker and Luke Pyenson (2024)

Oeuvre rule: I'm only vaguely familiar with the band Real Estate, and Frankie Cosmos to an even lesser degree. I like Real Estate, but not as much as Sunny Day Real Estate, and they have rather different vibes. Real Estate is super chill, laid back, mellow and pleasant--not as overwrought (in a good way) and thunderous as Sunny Day. They are like the final wave from the heyday of indie rock from the 2000s (before all the bands got Spotified) and their first two albums were accordingly praised by Pitchfork. Frankie Cosmos seemed to come slightly later, though only by a couple years, and similarly does not "go for the jugular," so to speak, but again I'm hardly vaguely familiar with them. To be clear, I like what I've heard, and while I have revisited Real Estate a bit more in the course of reading this book, now I will need to do that with Frankie Cosmos in the course of writing this review. 

This is because the book is authored by a member from each of those two bands. It's not quite accurate to say that. The book is "curated" by these two musicians, and they must have edited a great deal of it themselves, but they only contribute an essay or two individually, and much of the work involved tapping connections to numerous bands and requesting their participation in the project. Beyond that, they wrote an introduction to the book, and introductions to each essay. They deserve praise in bringing this book to fruition, because there really doesn't seem to be anything else like it, but as might be expected in any book of essays collected from over a dozen musicians, the quality varies. 

***

Books of short stories or essays are always difficult to review. You don't want to give short shrift to certain contributors when they are all placed on equal footing. In this case, however, it's unrealistic to expect a review to mention every single essay (there are somewhere between 40 and 45). Many of them are very short--1 or 2 pages--and feel slightly "phoned in." Each musician/writer does consider the topic distinctly and tries to write meaningfully about it, but it feels like a creative writing class prompt, at times. 

You know what it really feels like? It feels like a big zine, the type I might have put out during college when I solicited contributions from friends, about 50% of which were musicians. It makes the book fun in a way, and it is not "amateurish" in its presentation, but yes, the content sometimes feels that way. Am I judging all the contributors that are under 40 slightly more harshly than maybe is warranted? Maybe, but I don't think so. Basically, this feels like a "coffee table book"--in terms of the photography in the book and its general appearance and production--and that's not a bad thing. 

Ultimately, the best parts of this book are the recommendations (Du Pain et des Idees in Paris for the greatest croissant, and L'As du Fallafel; Durumzade in Istanbul for durum--all of which come from Hermon Mehari ), which are also sometimes anticipated to be obsolete. I am thinking of "Sweet 16th and the Temporary Lives of Sandwiches and People" by Adam Schatz, a saxophonist for Japanese Breakfast. I can only presume that it is the most memorable essay (though I also think the closing "It's Not about the Pho" by Sebastian Modak is the most artful) because his co-worker wrote what is basically one of the greatest memoirs of the 21st century (at present), so Schatz really wanted to show up for this. Tour Food is also still an active website and may be a great resource for many people, and I will be checking it out shortly (nothing was included for Italy; it may be more US-centric). In any case, his essay topic is basically nostalgia:

"Until very recently, on North Sixteenth Street in East Nashville, Tennessee, there was a bakery right on the corner called Sweet 16th, run by a couple of New Englanders whop opened the spot in 2004. I ended up there for the first time seven years later, not because I heard it was amazing, but because it was a breakfast sandwich near me [what he usually types into his phone to find breakfast on tour]. I got the egg casserole on a biscuit sandwich, immediately translated as 'One to Go!' by owner Ellen Einstein at the counter, who shouted it back to the kitchen. A few minutes later it showed up wrapped in paper, the kind of hot that your smart brain knows you ought to count to one hundred before eating. But then your idiot hands shove it into your stupid mouth before you count to fifteen, because that's how good it looks." (116)

To be more precise, the book is about the odd "golden hour" period between Sound Check and Show Time when bands usually just have food delivered for their Rider, but sometimes venture out into the city to find something more unique and special. And also about the people along the way--the promoters and fans and organizers and record shop owners that also put bands up at their house and cook for them. I guess, if there is a definitive book for musicians on the topic of food and the concept of "family-style" dining, this is it. 

***

Some of the moments in these essays are quite beautiful and touching, so Bleeker and Pyenson occasionally strike gold:

"As the van rolled out of Budapest, I was overcome with memories of my baba that centered around food and eating: how she would hand-crimp her homemade pierogi with the tines of a fork; my dad, aunt, and grandparents, crowded around the kitchen table at my childhood home in Toronto, eating headcheese doused in vinegar (my cousins and I were nauseated by the smell); the year or so when Baba seemed to confuse different tomato sauces and served after-school snacks of pizza with a Tostitos base or tortilla chips with Ragu for dipping. In the backyard of that Toronto home, her vegetable garden bore bumper crops of tomatoes, cucumbers, sorrel, and herbs that were used for soups and pickling, or just picked off the vine and eaten over the sink in the middle of an August heat wave. I wept silently as I realized it was logistically and financially impossible to get back for the funeral. 'Don't worry too much,' my dad consoled me when we finally spoke on the phone. 'Baba would have been horrified that you'd skip a gig for her.'" (172, "Baba" by Steve Sladkowski)

The main introduction to the book lays out its mission statement like a thesis, and the blurby-intros are similar, but Bleeker's intro to Chapter 2, about Wellness on the Road, strikes a deeper chord of vulnerability:

"As long as I've been playing shows, people have been taking photos of me onstage, and as long as I can remember, I've struggled with my weight and with compulsive overeating. Back in 2001, future Real Estate bandmates and I started a Strokes cover band to perform at a friend's sweet sixteen. We all went to the thrift store to buy secondhand dress shirts and army jackets, doing our best to impersonate our skinny idols. The show was a resounding success, but when a photo of the band surfaced a week or so later, I spent a significant amount of time on MS Paint trying to crop and edit my belly out of it. This technique did not work." (104)

Obviously, these more melancholic moments are tinged with humor, and it is a very funny book at times:

"But because of the night-and-day difference between fast food in Japan and the US, I feel so comfortable eating at rest stops and konbinis. Not only is it delicious, but it's really cheap: It's a miraculous win-win. You're like, 'Oh my god, this was only five bucks! I got a great meal, I don't feel like shit, and I'm not gonna shit my brains out after this.' And if I do, there's a bidet at the 7-Eleven, the seat is heated, and it's singing to you." (214, "Rest Stop: Japan" by Sen Morimoto)

There is a heavy emphasis on rest stop culture, and what I gather is that they are much better in the U.K. and Japan than they are in the U.S. But the first of these "interludes" on rest stops includes a conversation with Mark Ibold and the author of a book that seems like a forebear to this one (Michael Stern and Eat Your Way Across the U.S.A.). The book came out before a certain Pavement tour, and the story of the "throwed roll" may or may not be an homage to the infamous rock throwing as depicted in Pavements: 

"I was trying to make eye contact with the people who worked there, and they were all busy doing things, but then there was a guy on the complete other end of the place [Lambert's] who kind of looked at me, and I waved to him. And when my hand went up in the air, he just threw this roll and it went straight into my palm. And I caught it from, I would say, at least fifty feet across the room....I remember looking into my hands, like, dumbfounded, and I was trying to tell my bandmates that a guy had just thrown this roll--I mean, nobody even saw it, it happened so quickly--and I was about to tell my bandmates that this had happened when another one came flying at us and hit our drummer right in the face!....And then everybody just starting cracking up, and somebody came over and gave us a table. I think they served everything in giant cast-iron pans, just, like, ridiculous portions with meat slopping over them, just gigantic, and I think once you sat down, for your rolls, they brought you these little tubs of....what's it called? It's not maple syrup....it's not honey....[MS: Sorghum, or molasses....] Sorghum, sorghum, yeah." (55)

Probably not because getting hit in the face with a roll by a restaurant worker is funnier than getting hit with a rock by a dumb festival-goer. 

I said there weren't many "famous" musicians in it, but that's not totally true---there is also Damon from Galaxie 500/Damon & Naomi, Chris Frantz from Talking Heads, Devendra Banhart, Kevin Morby, Geologist, Robin Pecknold, Sadie Dupuis and of course Bob Mould. I was familiar with all of them, and also Greta Kline though I had to be reminded she was the force behind Frankie Cosmos (and not a nepo-baby per se, but paranoid she might be). Her essay is rather amusing, as are all of the above. I am finding now that I want to say all sorts of things about this book. Like how there is an inordinate fascination with gas station food, and why I like Fleet Foxes more than I did before (I always liked them, to be clear) after Hunter Biden's appreciation for them became public knowledge. And Subway. Subway is mentioned at least three times in this book, maybe four--and each time it is basically almost the entire topic of the essay. I find most in common with Bob Mould on this point:

"It's not the same anymore, but thirty years ago Subway was great. It was consistent nationwide, and the bread was always baked fresh on-site. Yeah, the loaves were baked from pre-made rolls, but so are my favorite Hokkaido cheesecakes at te Westfield mall. It was high quality, it was cheap, and it was consistent. I think psychologically for me, when I'm on the road, consistency--any kind of consistency--is valuable. Every day is an iteration of the same motif, but things do change from town to town. Back then, you could count on Subway. We could all agree on it, it was fast, and we could eat it on the run. Sometimes when you're touring, those are the things that are most important." (108)

Having gone to Subway many, many times with a vegetarian resigned to Veggie Delights, Pecknold indicates that may or may not have been the right idea:

"My savior and my destroyer became the Subway 'Veggie Patty,' a gray-brown melange of unidentifiable vegetal ingredients, damp from the microwave. Mouthfeel of sieved paper pulp or marinated sponge. Flavor nonexistent to net negative; it was so powerfully antiflavor that it siphoned and destroyed the flavor of anything surrounding it. Just a volume of calories, a shape, a wet wallet of mashed peas and binding agent around which I'd pile lettuce, spinach, carrots, salt and pepper, and oil and vinegar, all encased in a sleeve of dubious bread." (183)

We learn that if you are a musician, and you can make it to the next level where you get an early afternoon billing at a festival, you must go to Osheaga Festival in Montreal--if only for the food. In fact this chapter made me want to try to be in a band again specifically so I could justify that (it doesn't seem the catering tent is available to festival go-ers--just bands--though I'm sure the food for everyone is better on the whole, too).

And in Iceland, it may not be best to go for haute-cuisine:

"The first course arrived, and I swear I thought someone was playing a practical joke on us. It was a quarter-sized piece of burnt chicken skin with a tendril of dried moss or lichen on it. Second course: one single wild carrot and two flakes of sea salt. Third course (twenty minutes later), everyone's hunger now manifesting as manic smiles and raised eyebrows: a tiny fermented quail egg on a bed of hay. Fourth course, and we're all losing it in the damp basement, silent and sectioned off with a red curtain, blond-haired servers dancing in and out of sight: a tiny mushroom cap with compost-tasting muck stuffed inside. Sixth course: one single drop of cream the size of a dime on a slate slab." (65, Flora and Fauna by Meg Duffy). [She later goes for a couple hot dogs and maybe that does not sound very appetizing but if you are in Iceland, I would recommend them just as I would in Chicago, because they are different and unique.] 

There's probably more I could say about this book, but I think that's probably enough. I think in writing this, I realized that the quality is generally higher than not. 

Some of us idolize the lifestyle of the touring musician because it's an incredibly difficult thing for regular people to make their way around the world and see all there is to see--travel is one of the key defining "interests" or "hobbies" of regular people. "I want to travel," they say. Meanwhile many of us working stiffs get 2 weeks out of the year to squeeze everything we can into it. You really need to be strategic, and patient, if you are aware of all that is out there, and want to see as much of it as you can. Of course, the downside to this for musicians is that they don't have the the time to properly explore (this is what I also here from regular working people that travel for work, which I've always been envious of but maybe not so much as before). If there is any "message" to this book, it is to explore whenever you are able, absolutely--and to even prioritize that exploration, rather than submitting to the grueling city-per-day schedule that international touring sometimes demands. As I recall, Shellac did not really tour the U.S. much at all. They would go to Europe once a year for Primavera, and then play wherever they wanted to go on a vacation. That to me is obviously the ideal arrangement, but not everyone is so blessed to have that option. 

And musicians may not alway be blessed to have a generous per diem, and though tours are not likely to make a stop at Burlington (local musicians are more prevalent in the back room there, though I believe it's not unheard of to have people in from out of town), if they do, as long as I am in this apartment, I will humbly offer a place to stay and my own "basic" recommendations in the surrounding area. Because now I know just how meaningful that can be, and the types of lifelong connections of the most beautiful sort that can be created through this act of generosity. I think reading this book will cause others to act accordingly. 

James - Percival Everett (2024)

James won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award last year. I can hardly call myself an authority on whether it was deserved, but it certainly feels like it. I'm getting ahead of myself.

Oeuvre rule: I was unfamiliar with Percival Everett until American Fiction was nominated for Best Picture, and I began trying to see all nominees each year. I would have watched that regardless, and it's certainly on the cusp of greatness and worthwhile. It was based on Everett's novel from more than 20 years earlier, Erasure, and Everett has published a lot more. He has basically been as prolific as Philip Roth. So it feels as though he is finally having his "moment," after getting a big-screen adaptation and then dominating the literary landscape with this novel, which cannot be denied. Few books in recent years have been more celebrated than this.

The first thing I'll say is that I have never read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and while it is not necessary to have done that to appreciate this, it probably would enhance enjoyment. The closest referent I can think for this is Foe, which I believe I've mentioned before on this blog (in the review of Disgrace), along with the circumstances of reading it (in Paris, at University of Nanterre, in an English-language class). That is J.M. Coetzee's re-imagining of Robinson Crusoe, except told from the perspective of a woman that told her story to the author Daniel Defoe, who hijacked the narrative. There is no such literary trickery involving Mark Twain in this, and it is simply another version of Huck Finn told from the perspective of the runaway slave Jim, here known as James and revealed to be putting on an act that also seems to have a reverse-referent in the recent film Sorry to Bother You. It is odd to say that, but does feel like Sorry to Bother You is in fact a big influence on this, as is the experience of having American Fiction adapted. I'd be rather surprised if James does not get optioned. If anything, it may rekindle interest in Twain's work too, and it is never a bad thing to have people in 2025 stretching their perspective to try to appreciate something from the early 1880's. It made me want to read it more, at least. But for now, the Cliffs Notes will have to suffice. 

***

I reviewed those previously and from what I can gather, some of the episodes in this novel are taken straight from the source material (notably, a scene with a house that has been ripped from its foundation by a storm and is in the river, where Jim sees something that he doesn't tell Huck until later). Also, the episodes with the King and the Duke. And some of the characters on the periphery of James may play a larger role in the source material (Tom Sawyer, for example, is barely a factor here, mentioned at a few random moments, acknowledged as Huck's best friend, but they do not appear to share as deep an emotional bond as he does with Jim). For a fair stretch of the novel, the two are separated, and reunited during a duel scene involving some jealousy between older "young adult" characters that probably looms larger in the source material.  This is neither here nor there, but is to say, it made me want to read the original more, and there are few better aims in literature than to turn people onto the classics that are almost 150 years old (and sometimes much older) by reinvigorating them with a fresh perspective. 

It feels like it was a long time coming, for Jim. Even though I hadn't read the book, I was familiar with the character, and that he represented something about the American South. Perhaps Jim Crow had some connection. But no, Jim Crow was a character created for a minstrel show nearly 50 years before Huck Finn was published, which both that novel and James also depict in an extended episode (one of the several songs performed is about him). This is another reason James is great, for those that have read both books. I am not sure but I am reasonably confident that the depiction of minstrel shows in 1880 and 2025 are quite different. And those minstrel shows were created while slavery was still very much a thing. While James/Huck Finn takes place some 20 years prior to 1880, with rumblings of the Civil War also percolating at various points (Huck wants to fight for the Union), the two novels are not about the American South. They are about the Midwest, and the odd boundaries in play in Missouri and Illinois as slavery is abolished or simply against the law in certain areas and not others, very close to one another. 

Thus, as far as historical novels go, not only for true American history, but also for the history of American literature, this pinpoints a crucial moment. For all of the horrible things this country has been put through over the past hundreds of years, one can at least admire the artists that have exemplified its greatest qualities, and laid groundwork for a humanistic progressivism. 

It's not really a safe time in American to make that claim, that the history of our country is steeped in genocide, class subjugation and white supremacy.  Most recently, it was decreed that the Smithsonian will be getting a makeover to wipe its "wokeness" away. We live in the greatest country of the world, and we are no worse than any other country. Every other country is racist too, and hates people that are not from there originally, too. This is what those in power want us to believe, and this is what their sycophants preach ad nauseum to the point that the lie becomes the truth, for very many people to the point that it shifts a political tide. 

So this is additionally why James is such an important novel, and got so much of the love that it rightfully deserves--and the backlash against it as well (somewhat limited as it is) further underscores the urgency of its "message," or what I understand it to be. We've undergone massive waves of panic in "post-racial" America from absolutely being ashamed of racism and doing everything we can to acknowledge how we have been and what we have learned and how we can do better as a people, to now being validated in feeling that stereotypical views of non-whites are actually the true picture of reality, and not the "whitewashing" that "libtards" have shoved down the throats of Real Americans. It's been a horrifying thing to witness, and the only comfort we may take is that there really are just a lot of bots on X that spew hate that the algorithm promotes and the problem is not as bad "on the ground" as it seems on the Internet. Yet unfortunately, dozens of mentally ill people with guns kill hundreds of innocent people every year, and such incidents are flashpoints for opposing viewpoints on gun control laws and family values. There are plenty of reasonable conservative people that recognize the propaganda being utilized by MAGA and disavow it, and the debate between those that have not yet totally gone off the deep end and the more compassionate amongst us is what can still drive our country towards Real Greatness, and provide a glimmer of hope for the future. Debates with MAGA "conservatives" are, unfortunately, often given to straw man arguments that devolve into name-calling and line-drawing. Because if they've been duped and are being told they've been duped, they throw it back on the other side, and claim the other side is the one projecting. We get nowhere except hating each other more. There probably would be a civil war if there was not too much other shit going on around the world that people had to argue about, but sadly it appears that will always be the case now until we all destroy one another in a mass act of stupidity. 

The world has become impossibly complex, and yet still, smaller and smaller minded. It is good to have a book like James that goes back into the past and offers up a simple story, a parable of sorts, to remind us of the prior state of affairs in this country, and to help us recognize the parts that have been bubbling up ever more often since 2016, and really, post-Covid 19 (because I think most everyone acknowledges Trump 2016-2020 as not nearly as bad as Trump 2024-?). We are REGRESSING as a country and it is absolutely terrifying and artists are more important than ever in their role of moving the culture towards greater enlightenment.

***

Some window into the language of the novel is appropriate, as the performance of "slave speak" is one of its key defining features. That is, when James drops the ruse of Jim--either as a slip-up or intentionally, to shock and frighten--the novel reaches its critical moments of suspense. Relatively early on, we learn of James's literary designs. After being bitten by a rattlesnake, shortly after they have run away, he lays down to rest and has dreams of a kind:

"I was in Judge Thatcher's library, a place where I had spent many afternoons while he was out at work or hunting ducks. I could see books in front of me. I had read them secretly, but this time, in this fever dream, I was able to read without fear of being discovered. I had wondered every time I sneaked in there what white people would do to a slave who had taught other slaves to read? What would they do to a slave who knew what a hypotenuse was, what irony meant, how retribution was spelled? I was burning up with fever, fading in and out of consciousness, focusing and refocusing on Huck's face.

Francois-Marie Arouet de Voltaire put a fat stick into the fire. His delicate fingers held the wood for what seemed like too long a time. 
'I'm afraid there's no more wood,' I said. 'Which is fine, because I am hot enough. Too hot.' 
He reached in again and moved some charred pieces around. He looked at his blackened fingertips. 'I'm like you,' he said.

'How is that?'

He wiped his hands on his pants, left smudges. 'You shouldn't be a slave,' Voltaire said, sighing. He sat beside me, moved to feel my forehead with the back of his hand and then thought better. 'Like Montesquieu, I think we are all equal, regardless of color, language or habit.'

'You do, do you?' I asked.

'However, you must realize that climate and geography can be significant factors in determining human development. It's not that your features make you unequal, it's that they are signs of biological differences, things that have helped you survive in those hot, desolate places. It's those factors that stop you from achieving the more perfect human form found in Europe.'

'Is that right?' 

'The African can be easily trained in the ways of the European, of course. He can come to be more than he naturally is, to learn those manners and skills that will allow him to become equal.'
'Yes?'
'That is what equality is, Jim. It's the capacity for becoming equal. The same way a black man in Martinique can learn French and so become French, he can also acquire the skills of equality and become equal. But I repeat myself.'......

'How do you explain slavery? Why are my people subjected to it, treated with such cruelty?'

Voltaire shrugged. 

'Let me try this,' I said. 'You have a notion, like Raynal, of natural liberties, and we all have them by virtue of our being human. But when those liberties are put under societal and cultural pressure, they become civil liberties, and those are contingent on hierarchy and situation. Am I close?'
Voltaire was scribbling on paper. 'That was good, that was good. Say all of that again.'" (48-50)

This is one of the more blatant entreaties to post-Covid racism (we might say post-George Floyd, but we conflate those periods), and gives heed towards those armchair intellectuals that justify despicable views on the basis of rather dubious anthropological precepts. That is a mouthful but maybe you know what I am talking about. We look back on Voltaire and think of him as one of the great humanists in history, a philosopher that also wrote amusing novels and is responsible for many famous epigrams, and it is true that many such Europeans in the Enlightenment Era couched white supremacy in this mix of science and philosophy--which on the one hand, acknowledges basic humanity, and on the other, mass-generalizes any entire continent of people that can be "trained." We don't need to start going down the list of famous thinkers from that era. 

(Rousseau is the one that comes to mind, and he is referenced elsewhere in this text, and "On the Origin of the Nature of Inequality" is, in my opinion, a great text. I am also sure if we learn more about the lives of such thinkers, we may see that they hold other beliefs that are not as great, but I prefer to leave such investigations for another day and take the text at face value--that is, a depiction of Savage Man, pre-civilization, not a depiction of "savages" in undeveloped nations that exist adjacent to a "more civilized" brand of people that find glory in conquest. As man created more structures to make life less harsh and untenable, so too did machinations of inequality enter into the picture.)

Suffice to say, there is a philosophical element to this novel that additionally puts it into a higher echelon, on an issue that sadly continues to be evergreen, even if I thought in say, oh the 1990s, that such lessons had already been learned by all (or at least in Chicago, and thankfully, we have not lost our collective minds in 2025--though I am sure down by say, oh Cairo, IL, we may find views only slightly advanced from the 1880's, though it's a ghost town now, and has a ghastly history). 

Here too, Kierkegaard is invoked, then just five years deceased, and perhaps his work had yet to be translated into English, but there does appear to be some limited awareness of him at the time:

"'Kin you ax for more wishes?'

'You know, that was what I said, but it seems you cain't have but three. What would you wish fer?'

Entertaining such discussions in character was exhausting, but I had thought about such a thing many times before and, just like a story I'd read in the judge's library, I could see that anything I thought was good could entail some bad consequences. For example, living forever would mean you'd have to watch everybody you loved die. The question I played with, but certainly couldn't share with Huck, was what would Kierkegaard wish for. 'I dunno, Huck. I reckon I'd be scared to wish fer anything.' 

'Think about it.'

'I reckon the genie be white. I ain't got no need to wish for sumptin' dat ain't gone happen. Good story or no.'

Huck let that sink in, then he looked at the sky. I kin tell you what I'd wish fer. First, I'd wish fer some adventure.' He smiled big. He looked at me. 'Then I'd wish dat you was free like me.'

'Thank ya.'

''Course. Well, I'd wish all slaves was free.'

I nodded.

'Don't every man got a right to be free?' Huck asked.

'Ain't no such things as rights,' I said.

'What say?'

'I ain't said nuffin.'" (71-72)

In any case you have a distillation of the modus operandi of the novel in this exchange, a fairy tale within the heavier philosophical context of free will and self-determination. James does ultimately pursue that path, and the novel also works on this second level as an allegory of sorts. Even after we get what we wish for, the very notion of wishing for anything begins to appear problematic, as it unleashes other consequences which necessitate further wishes. And yet, this is not about making peace with one's fate, but rising above it and achieving what was thought impossible through sheer persistence and belief in personal destiny.  

Apart from that, there are just several touching moments, such as this:

"Big Mike slapped a small hand on my shoulder. 'Help me take down this here tent,' he said.

Everyone worked to collect their things, large and small. Emmett stopped for a second and looked at me. He said something that confused me. Confused me because I wasn't quite sure what it meant. Confused me because I had never heard anything like it before. He said, 'I'm sorry.'

I had been about to help take down the tent, but this white man's apology screwed me to the ground." (179)

There seems to be a derogation of the apology in our time, a belief in the strength of never apologizing, seen as a sign of weakness of one's own character and rationalistic behavior. In truth, the inability to apologize--driven, no doubt, by the hordes that decry them as never being good enough--is another key factor in the devolution of society. We can all feel safe and secure in the knowledge that what we are doing is right, we can deny the cruelty and pretend that it never happened, or that it was deserved, and we cannot bring ourselves to forgive others, even when they ask for it, because everyone is hopelessly flawed and will never truly change for the better. Emmett is not a "white savior" in this novel, but just slightly less evil than others, "buying" Jim but telling him that he has actually hired him as a performer and that he will be paid and later freed as an indentured servant of sorts. While this does turn into something of a fantasy, the depth of this very small gesture felt rather moving (particularly if the reader is used to never hearing apologies in their own life, as may be the case for many now, even if the context is wholly different). 

Ultimately, this is a simple story with rather complicated angles that reflect on history and how we have advanced in certain regards and yet not in others. For hundreds of years, basic humanity was conveniently ignored, until we finally grappled with it, and tried to take accountability for the cruelties inflicted, undo them to the extent we could, progressing all the way up to the point of issuing reparations--until the counter-narratives and backlash drove political organizing in the opposite direction, back towards cruelty, denial of basic humanity, unwillingness to understand where people came from and where they want to go and why. The novel symbolizes how far we have come, and how far we still have to go, and the constant obstacles that are wedged throughout the path. At the very end, like Voltaire said, we must tend to our garden, and James does have something of a happier ending along the lines of that notion. We cannot change how others think of us. We can only exist among them, chameleon-like, and forge our own paths, finding that freedom within ourselves, driving us towards a destiny that only we define, and not one decreed by those in power. This type of freedom--to be left alone, to be respected as a human being, rather than labeled or boxed-in by stereotypes--should be seen as a natural right. When we are not so lucky to have that, fighting for it is a good and noble cause. 

Still, we shouldn't have to fight for basic human decency, and once those in power recognize the obvious results of this paradigm--that violence borne out of race-based thinking only begets further violence--we may finally set forward on a path towards greater peace for all, and true greatness. 

The Amplified Come as You Are: the Story of Nirvana - Michael Azerrad (2023)

I seem to recall reading Come as You Are in 2002. Possibly 2003. In either case, before Our Band Could Be Your Life, which has been referenced across at least a dozen posts on this blog over the past 17 years. Is this better than that? Hard to say. They are very different items. It is quite clear however, that this is the far more personal of the two. OBCBYL is like a seminar with a syllabus, a gloss that can either lead towards deeper investigation, or casual indifference. While Azerrad has done other work, it is hard to say anything else comes close to these complicated, entertaining, uneven and yet ultimately canonical texts. 

OBCBYL is the follow-up to Come as You Are, coming about 8 years later, and the band at issue looms large throughout, even as they post-date the proceedings. The prologue is essentially about them, and the Mudhoney and Beat Happening chapters might as well be, too. As with the Sonic Youth one and Dinosaur Jr. one, for other reasons not connected to their homebase. Fortunately they were not on SST, though they wanted to be, badly. There are twinges of both Husker Du and the Replacements—the shambolic outrageous excess flanking the sensitive songwriter potentially destined for stardom, or superstardom; the unquestionably punk three-piece that openly nurtures its pop instincts. The guitar master that might actually have been their drummer; the impossibly arch and artsy noise rock band that said it was OK to be on a major label if you retained your control over the finished product. The blue-collar/white-collar dichotomy of the Pacific Northwest scene, an unmistakable “sound” and an adjacent circle of insider-tastemakers intoxicated by the freedom to play unprofessionally and actually without any semblance of skill or knowledge at all. And the purity tests inherent in the identity of unwitting (and generous) figureheads, and those unafraid to lambast anyone that does not accord with their impeccably defined aesthetic. Or the band that actually opened up for them at the end, and that they saw themselves turning into a poppier version of, in the unwritten chapter of their career cut too short. One can only strain to find a connection to Mission of Burma, and yet Bob Weston separates them by just two or three degrees.

Basically, if I read Come as You Are before OBCBYL, I don’t remember much about Azerrad in the context of the former. And yet here I say this the more personal of the two. Really, I can’t recall the experience clearly, I just can’t. I remember liking it, thinking it was really good. But then I also remember reading the Everett True biography of the band and considering that possibly superior.

 ***

I would be writing a review of Nirvana: the Biography (and in googling re-discovered a third volume, Heavier Than Heaven, which was also really good) here, or else there would already be a review of that book over the past several years if it hadn't been taken from me.

I hesitate to detail the story surrounding that, as it is rather vulgar in certain regards--suffice to say, I met someone, and I asked her to pick out something on my iPod to listen to and she picked Mudhoney and I was kind of surprised by that and went off on them a bit and then obviously pivoted to Nirvana and the 656-page book about them that she needed to read. For some reason that I still don't understand, I was blocked and ghosted, and hurt. I did the pathetic thing, and googled her, and found her on LinkedIn, and messaged her on LinkedIn saying it was fine if she didn't want to see me again, but it wasn't right to take my book. I would really appreciate if she returned it, just left it on my doorstep. That didn't happen but I hope she read and enjoyed it. (Later, I am almost positive that 4 years later she randomly sat next to me on the bus home from Riot Fest, recognized me after a moment or two, and got off the bus early and waited for the next one.)

In any case, the Everett True biography is very good. And I would say it was difficult to say which of the three was the best. I can't recall much about Heavier Than Heaven at all to be honest, except that it was worthwhile, and all I can remember about True's Nirvana is that he is totally BFF with Courtney Love. It didn't make it any less revealing but it is just the prism to see it through. And while there's a prism for this too, it's fair to say this now "Amplified" version is the most comprehensive and meaningful history of the band in print. 

***

It was actually Weird Al that introduced me to the band. I saw the video for "Smells like Nirvana" before the one for "Smells Like Teen Spirit," but not by long. I had heard vaguely about them, but I was about 8 years old, and my world revolved more around video games than music. My older siblings liked them well enough, but not obsessively. One or two out of the three had Nevermind.  It's possible one more of them saw Nirvana live, but all I really hear about are early shows by Pearl Jam and Smashing Pumpkins, or the last Grateful Dead show before Jerry Garcia died (at Soldier Field).

Ironically enough, there is a short section here that contrasts the two icons:

"Despite Kurt's disparaging Grateful Dead T-shirt, he actually had a lot in common with the Dead's leader Jerry Garcia. Like Kurt, Garcia resisted all the attention and power that came with being the figurehead of a really huge, culturally resonant band. 'I did a lot of things to sabotage it,' Garcia said in an interview clip in the Grateful Dead documentary Long Strange Trip. 'You don't want to be the king, you know?'" (477)

The comparison is longer than that, but this is going to be a long review, as you can already tell. We will need to limit the excerpts.

It will be hard, because that is a good example of what makes this book special and why it came into being. Kurt died in 1994 and while Azerrad did write an additional chapter after his death for a later printing, he did not revisit it for a long time. 

(If you want to know how he spent the years following the publication of this book--which was enormously commercially successful--you will need to read it. Suffice to say, Azerrad's oeuvre is limited, and besides this and OBCBYL, he only co-authored another item reviewed on this blog, the Bob Mould memoir, which has a lot in common with this too, mainly in the way the subjects allow themselves to be totally vulnerable and unguarded. That may not actually be the case for Kurt. It appears he wanted to make himself seem more fucked up than he really was, or at least to take more extreme positions for public posturing to be seen as authentically punk. So when he said, for example, that he might be bisexual, it was probably just to throw his homophobic fans through a loop. At another point he says he'll kill himself if Azerrad includes his list of top 50 albums in the book, which Courtney had apparently scolded him over also, basically for trying to look cool with the list.)

Azerrad only has one other book as far as I am aware, and it looks like a humorous item on rock criticism and writing about music. I would read it if I wrote more about music on this blog, but I know I am terrible at that. For a time I thought I would be a better music critic than film critic, but experience has shown that I should have stuck with my original critical interests (probably not books but oh well). I still may read it, because he's definitely a figurehead in his own way, and I respect the limited oeuvre, only putting something out if it is truly worth doing. 

At the time, however, this was "commissioned" by Courtney Love and Kurt, motivated by a desire to retain custody of their daughter and show they were not dangerous drug addicts that were incapable of raising a healthy child. (What's surprising about the original is how openly Kurt talks about using heroin, and at which specific flashpoints; I can't believe he wasn't more upset at Azerrad for some of the things printed, but he did apparently read the entire thing and give his blessing.) 

The Amplified Come as You Are was then released in late 2023, and it justifies its existence on the nearly 30 years of history since Kurt left this world. The original text is here, in bold, and Azerrad's commentary follows in regular print. I do think this book might have "read better" with footnotes, but it's a minor quibble. The book is also repetitive (anytime a reference to suicide or self-harm in the original occurs, Azerrad's following present-day commentary will mention that it is hard to read, and he will scold himself for not recognizing warning signs; yet in this way too, the book is valuable in depicting how we might better support our loved ones that may be struggling with depression or other mental health challenges) and occasionally clunky (I will need to explain that later), and I was going to give it 4 stars on Goodreads because it really is not perfect (and neither was OBCBYL, upon revisitation). However, it is 609 pages long and there is simply so much here that it becomes an overwhelming emotional experience that washes over the reader. It's not perfect but it gets 5 stars for its audacity. It's as epic a story as can be told about any band, or person for that matter.

***

I almost feel like I should leave it at that. I'm not sure if this is better than True's Nirvana, but my sense is that previously, this was on par with that and Heavier Than Heaven; now, this is the definitive one, but perhaps a bit unwieldy if not having read the original. Still I think anyone reading Lolita generally understands that The Annotated Lolita is the superior read, and a similar logic applies here. I will say that the "2023 content" is not as sharply-edited, but this seems by design. Azerrad takes pains to acknowledge all the points where he was "dissembling" for the benefit of his subjects. 

Perhaps the key to this book are the surviving members of the band, who have both gone on to interesting careers and induction in the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame, complete with live performances with Joan Jett, Kim Gordon, Lorde and St. Vincent filling in (all women, which Kurt would have liked I think, though see also Post Malone more recently). Grohl obviously continued his world domination, and also experienced deja vu tragedy, and his own personal drama, but he took the gravitas that came with being the Nirvana drummer and ran with it straight to the bank. God knows whether he has more money than Courtney Love (the book acknowledges the majority of publishing credit went to Kurt, and thus her by inheritance), but I have to think that is the case. Despite the Foo Fighters being elder statesmen at this point, they remain surprisingly popular, with younger generations discovering Nirvana and loving the them as the next best thing. (I did finally seem them live last year, after having been a fan for about 25, and Grohl justified the headliner status.) Courtney has not fared nearly so well, though Hole did put out one more very good album in 1998 (perhaps the moment Hole and Foo Fighters stood on equal ground), and she did turn in a few memorable cinematic performances. Some people think she killed him; this is crazy, but sure, being in a volatile relationship can take a mental toll on a person, too. She did not get along with them for a long time, but they have supposedly buried the hatchet, which feels kind of sweet to me. (Again, they've all written their own memoirs; she needs to do that, too.)

While Azerrad may have "sugar-coated" Kurt in the original, here this may be the case for Novoselic, at least in discussion of his politics. There is no need to offend a friend, though I have to believe that Azerrad is not completely aligned in the same beliefs. In any case, Novoselic is praised, and while there are suggestions of his political engagement, Azerrad does not dissect them, and perhaps for good reason. At the end of the day, not all of us believe exactly the same things, but loving and taking care of one another can't be criticized, and that is all Krist seemed to do in the context of this story. It is absolutely true that he was essential to the band and everything it became, and there is no way it would exist without him. So he did already do great things with his life. And maybe he will be a rogue agent. Maybe he will style himself as a libertarian and "fuck things up from the inside" the way Nirvana wanted to with their major label and popular music more generally. I have to doubt anyone will believe he could be trusted. Though "In Bloom" may be directed at such types, they do not comprise the majority of the Nirvana fanbase, and while they are enormously popular, Novoselic would have had a better chance in say, 2016. I'm not aware if he is actually "anti-woke" (and I don't care to dissect that here, either; I'd prefer to believe he is still a fundamentally decent dude, and from what I understand his platforms are not nearly as inhuman as MAGA), but if anything is clear, Nirvana was "woke AF," though Kurt also would not believe in cancel culture. Really, there is probably no better book that could answer the question of WWKD than this. Anyone that is inspired to make art they feel passionate about will find a barometer for authenticity here.

***

Does this add anything to the cultural conversation around Nirvana? Time alone has done that. I knew Nirvana songs, the basics, but it wasn't until 2001 or 2002 that I fully immersed myself in In Utero and Incesticide and Bleach and the "deep cuts" off Nevermind. And I kind of wanted to get that smiley face Nirvana shirt, but they weren't as ubiquitous. It kind of felt "cool" to like Nirvana then because everyone was kind of burnt out on hearing about them, but no one had really acknowledged the depth of their catalog. The cultural phenomenon of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and Nevermind was the story. Not how fucked up a thing it was to put In Utero out as the follow-up, or the total insanity of stuff like "Milk It" and "Tourette's," or the weirdness of "Hairspray Queen" or heaviness of "Aero-Zeppelin" or thinking about how much better Nevermind would have been with "Aneurysm" on it. No, the only thing that came was "You Know You're Right," which sure, was extremely exciting, and then the With the Lights Out box set. And we've gotten the 20 year and 30 year anniversary editions of the albums with many extra live tracks, and as the years go on the stature of the band grows, and now those smiley face Nirvana t-shirts are everywhere all the time. Nirvana is basically up there with the Beatles now, even as I think many people consider their music kind of simple and not that interesting. I think it was recently announced that Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, now in their early-to-mid 80s, are going to do a Beatles reunion tour. When Krist and Dave to do that, with Post Malone or someone else, would I go? Probably but only if they were going to play the same type of weird show that Nirvana would have played, sabotaging the commercial aspect. Which feels sort of doubtful. At least we still have Pavement doing something wild and creative with their legacy.

***

Because Kim and Thurston are divorced and Sonic Youth is no more, and Fugazi has been on hiatus for 23 years, and Steve Albini is gone, and so is Grant Hart and for some reason Calvin Johnson has not even hinted that a Beat Happening reunion might be kind of cool--time reduces us all to nothing, and what we leave behind is all there will be. Black Flag vaguely sticks around in a kind of twisted variation that does not live up to its legacy, Mission of Burma pulled off a brilliant 2nd act to its career, Bob Mould continues to record and tour relentlessly, the Replacements played a few shows 12 years ago but don't seem interested at all in doing any more, and the Butthole Surfers did a similar thing. Dinosaur Jr and Mudhoney are sort of the last ones left standing. For that alone, they should be seen at every opportunity. 

"Smells like Teen Spirit" will continue to get played on the radio every single day, and "In Bloom," "About a Girl," "Lithium," "Come as You Are," "Heart-Shaped Box," "All Apologies," "Dumb," and even "Polly," will also get tons of airplay for as long as radio exists (half a dozen other songs will pop up on occasion, too). About half of those are really good songs, but the vast majority of Nirvana's catalog will never be fully appreciated except by those that dive deeper. It's a worthwhile thing to explore. And the whole history is a good story, too. It really is straight out of a novel. Kurt probably understood that, and wanted to make it seem that way, too. 

***

Azerrad did write another chapter after Cobain's death for an earlier 2nd edition of the book, and here too, he adds another chapter ("A Dark Constellation"), beyond his constant notes throughout the text. I forgot about this "epilogue" chapter ("A Sad Little Sensitive Unappreciative Pisces-Jesus Man") until I came to it, and I reflected all along how the ending of the book might be great, because it would really tell the story of the next thirty years. 

It doesn't do that. There is one chapter that starts off with something like, "The last time I saw Kurt alive...." which was released as a teaser excerpt ahead of publication. It's a great piece of writing but it wasn't "new" to me. I think that only comprises about half of that chapter, however.

The main thing I recall is Azerrad's vague references to his "nemesis," which is kind of hilarious but also horrible. This is apparently a person in the Nirvana management camp, possibly at Gold Mountain or the record label DGC, that obtained an advance copy of Come as You Are and flipped out, and didn't like Azerrad being friends with the band. Later this person heartlessly blocks Azerrad from the invite list for the memorial service. I think Azerrad lays it out in a way where you could figure out who he's talking about:

"I felt like an idiot for doing those interviews--well, far beyond an idiot since I was brutally beating myself up for it and still am to this day. But I also thought that the punishment was almost pathologically cruel--everyone knew that Kurt and I had become friends. I'll never know for sure who made sure I wasn't invited to the memorial, but I have a pretty good idea: my nemesis, the same person I had to hide the Physicians' Desk Reference from a year and a half earlier." (568)

I'm not going to do that sleuthing. There are other fascinating "editorial" incidents, like the aforementioned Top 50 Albums list ("If it goes in the [book] then I might as well blow my head off, OK? It's something I may have to explain later but it's caused a lot of problems in my household [emphasis mine] and it's ree-fucking-diculous, I can't believe it. So whatever you do, don't print it, OK? Thanks." (578))

Again, the book is worth a read for many, many reasons, and it's a tough book to read for the underlying psychological torment that it mines, but it is also incredibly amusing and hilarious at times, generally whenever Courtney is mentioned:

"Over the phone, Kurt later confessed to me that the reason why he was so upset about that list was because Courtney was chastising him for including too many hipster indie bands and ignoring the uncool bands that had been so formative for him in Aberdeen: no Queen, the Cars, Black Sabbath, Cheap Trick, AC/DC, Kiss, Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, all bands he had loved and that had an undeniable impact on this music Nirvana made. The list was revisionist image-making intended to burnish his indie cred. And Courtney called him out on it." (578)

Of course Steve Albini's comments are included profusely, and he did not think Courtney had a positive impact on the band:

"When I got back home to New York, Courtney called me, incensed. Kurt had told her that Steve Albini had called her a 'psycho hose-beast.' So I gave her the courtesy of a rebuttal. That's how I got her snappy riposte about Albini only preferring women who were 'from the East Coast, played the cello,' and so on. (I assume that was her description of whoever Albini was actually seeing at the time.) The next day, I received some flowers via messenger, accompanied by a little card apparently written in the hand of an older lady to who Courtney had dictated the following message:

                                             We love you Michael--you mensch
                                                       Courtney & Bean
                                                       p.s. from Courtney: fuck Steve up the ass

I love how Courtney made it clear the foulmouthed part wasn't from Frances. (592)

Love her or hate her, like Krist, Nirvana would not have become what it did without her. Maybe that was not for the best. Maybe they would have faded into semi-obscurity, like the Melvins or Meat Puppets or Mudhoney, and maybe even still be playing today (unlikely as it seemed Kurt wanted to collaborate with Mark Lanegan and Michael Stipe, though of course also after Courtney's influence had been exerted). If you watch The Year Punk Broke, that is pretty much around the time they met and started dating, right when Nevermind was about to blow up in the Fall of 1991. So she really only impacted In Utero, but look, it's fair to say In Utero is their best, even if Nevermind plays like a Greatest Hits album with basically zero filler. Maybe Nevermind has better songs, but the production of In Utero is peerless. I never saw Nirvana live, of course, I only see live performances and get a sense of how they sounded differently from studio recordings. Albini always wanted to capture the "live sound" and he did that with Nirvana on this album--and they were such a tight live band--so to me, it captures what made them great and special. 

"So what does Albini think of In Utero? 'I like it far more than I thought I was going to,' he allows. 'I like this record way more than I've ever liked a Nirvana record. I find myself listening to it of my own free will, occasionally.' 
'I think it's a far better record than they could have made under any other circumstances,' Albini continues. 'Is it one of my top ten favorite albums of all time" No. Is it in my top one hundred albums? Maybe.'

This is actually fairly high praise from Steve Albini. He's heard a lot, likes little of it, and can tell you exactly why, in the most acerbic and persuasive terms." (515-516)

Of course, Albini would pass away less than 6 months after this hit print. I recently followed Michael Azerrad on X. Sometimes he only gets 1 or 2 likes on his tweets. This makes me feel better as a person who generally gets zero. It's a dumpster fire, it's a horrible place, a marketplace of ideas for bigots and morons, but it is occasionally an intriguing window into the depths of human stupidity and evil people in general. But I also love Cubs twitter, and material on music is generally positive. As with Azerrad, a solid follow. Last year, Nirvana tweeted about Albini, unveiling a letter he wrote proposing to record In Utero for them (https://x.com/michaelazerrad/status/1788599002167927032). Azerrad did not take pains to express his appreciation to quite the extent I did, but he said pretty much everything in two posts and far less words. 

You have to appreciate what he did. I do think there is a "trilogy" of high-quality Nirvana books and this is now the best of them. I'm not sure how many books have been written on the Beatles or the Rolling Stones or Led Zeppelin (though Hammer of the Gods has been waiting in the wings for a couple years now), but I would imagine more, and none of them as important as this. 

Oh sure, John Lennon is probably more important than Kurt Cobain. The Beatles were short-lived, but Nirvana was even shorter-lived. Lennon lived another dozen or so years (weird to think about 1968 to 1980 and how different those seemed, but that came before I achieved consciousness so what do I know) and released critically-acclaimed solo work and still inspired rabid fandom. He didn't take his own life, someone else did, it's one of those deaths of the 20th century that looms large, not quite on the level of JFK or MLK or RFK, but just a step below--arguably, however, more important, because you chose whether or not to listen to the Beatles and him. I am not a big enough fan to write intelligently on the topic. I like them, but mostly just their crazy stuff. 

Suffice to say, we clearly know who else died the same day, and by his own hand, and of course also a bandmate of Pat Smear (put Smear on the list with C. Love for "must write memoirs," as the only person who can one-up Dave Grohl). Kurt knew, obviously, and Bobby Pyn died even younger, with the shortest-lived band of them all. I've written about them before, and in fact find much of their output unlistenable, but do enjoy a handful of songs and deeply respect the thought that went into the lyrics because it's such a contrast; they were brash and unprofessional, barely knew how to play (though Smear did), and yet had these very intellectual lyrics that are difficult to hear. Of course Belinda Carlisle also drummed for them briefly and went onto her own fame. Their influence remains. They are still one of the most punk bands ever. 

You couldn't say the same for Nirvana, because they got famous (for a similar reason that it's hard to accept Green Day or Blink 182 as punk--they're "pop punk" and no one should pretend otherwise, even if their hearts appear to be in the right place). And that frustration is at the heart of this book and Kurt's mentality in the second-half of their career as they blow up. And that is also what made them so special, to have a star that rejects the spotlight.

Nowadays, you don't have the luxury to do that, most of the time. Those artists are an increasingly rare breed in this attention-deficit-influencer culture. Comedians post crowd-work on Tik-Tok. Actors generally have to take any work they can get. Writers toil helplessly and pray for Substack subscribers. Podcasts become ubiquitous and pray the same way over Patreon. Bands don't even use Bandcamp as much anymore. Spotify pays them pennies for thousands of streams. You have to tour to make money. I'm sure Taylor Swift made plenty of money before she re-recorded her own songs to own her catalog, and major label artists are probably doing just fine--but no one is making their label $50 million, the way Nirvana did (ok maybe Beyonce, maybe a couple others). Even though Krist and Dave made a lot less than Kurt because of publishing credits, they still basically got rich (if not rich, at least comfortable in the knowledge they no longer needed day jobs). Now that can sap creativity, and Azerrad does acknowledge that many In Utero songs were not actually written during the "downtime" in 1992 between tours, but in my opinion, it's their best work, because there is truly extreme pathos in it. 

In short, 30 years later, it still sounds fresh, it's still relevant, and arguably even more relevant than it was back then. No one called Kurt a psychic (in the same way that, say, Mark E. Smith was sometimes considered) but the themes of Nirvana's music are evergreen, if not everlasting. The bigots have come back out in full-force. No one thought being "PC" was cool, but can you imagine a movie coming out titled, "Woke University?" People mocked the term "PC" but they inherently understood it made sense not to use such hateful and dehumanizing language. I've never, ever, ever, felt that "woke" was a good word, for grammatical reasons, and it's an easier target for backlash. It's remarkable that antipathy to the term has literally destroyed the entire world. 

It's so sad, how things have devolved, but we have to take heart that the worst examples of hate are on X and generally espoused by entities that mask themselves in anonymity. It's cowardly, and the vast majority of real people in the world and not nearly so evil. Those voices are amplified in the interest of monetization. They need to get people riled up to make money. 

Punk has always riled people up, but it has never been about money. At best, it has been about existentialism, self-actualization, and living an authentic and principled life where all one needs is "enough." Ian Mackaye may have a fortune of his own, but no one begrudges him that. (It is fair, however, to begrudge him for not bestowing the gift that is Fugazi back on the world that needs them more than ever.)

I'm not sure what else I can say about this book, or if there are any other parts worth mentioning. But you already know if you want to read it or not. You probably did before reading this stupid review. If you didn't however, and don't listen to Nirvana, I would encourage you to give them (and this) a chance. Just like I read Sontag before diving into her oeuvre, this would serve as a similarly-excellent primer. There is a good chance you will learn something new from it. 

***

I guess I mentioned something about "clunkiness," and to end this review in a clunky way, have to follow through. Basically there's a line in OBCBYL about Husker Du's Flip Your Wig and the songs being hit singles in a world where battery acid flows through rivers (paraphrasing) that a friend of mine always found pretentious and risible (warmly, of course--we did actually see Azerrad play drums in King of France once). There are a few such moments here as well:

"The main riff is indeed pretty meat-and-potatoes but that bone-simple ascending vocal/guitar line redeems everything. In effect, Kurt devised a hook that clinches the song. Kurt was a Public Enemy fan--maybe he borrowed that hook from the squealing, upward saxophone glissando in PE's "Rebel Without a Pause."
It was ingenious of Albini to remove all the reverb on the vocal and add distortion as Kurt screams 'go away'--it suddenly sounds like he's imprisoned in a small closet full of coats and blankets, just horrific." (524-525)

I prefer to admire the imagery, because that kind of is exactly how "Scentless Apprentice" sounds. And now I kind of have to hear the Public Enemy song. Azerrad can identify the songs that Nirvana was ripping off with the best of them. He's an encyclopedia and a national treasure in his own right. Kurt did not live long enough to write a memoir but this self-mythologizing and painfully honest read is the closest thing we will ever get to that. His journals are out there, but that's a coffee table book and a cash grab; this is how he wanted people to see him. As the back cover of the book blurbs, he considered it "the best rock book I've ever read." For many other people too, it will be up there. 

The MANIAC - Benjamin Labatut (2023)

This book was published about 17 months ago and I received it as a Christmas gift about 15 months ago. It was from my friend David, who previously gifted me Aliss at the Fire. That book was quite short and took me 71 days to read and I did not get it. This ended up taking me about 420 days to read and I loved it. 

Technically I didn't start reading it until about January 16 this year, so it actually took about 50 days. And it was slow going at the beginning. David did not gift me with Solenoid, but he suggested we both read and review it, and I had taken it with me to Mexico in 2023. I got about 100 pages into it and while slow, seemed to be building towards something potentially great. We ultimately abandoned the dueling review idea, perhaps because this was too hard for me after seeing Jon Fosse win the Nobel Prize for Literature and not properly loving Aliss. Thus on my second trip to Mexico, a little less than 2 years later, I brought The MANIAC and had early misgivings. Because this isn't a traditional book. 

At first blush, I feel driven to compare it to Paul Auster's New York Trilogy (a review from the early days!) and Lisa Halliday's Asymmetry (a "short form" review, 10 years after the former and 6 years ago now, which did it no justice whatsoever, despite the 8/10 rating). This is merely due to the structure of the book. These are all "tripartite novels." They flow together by different degrees. This is my favorite of the three, and the other two are quite good. 

The other obvious referent here is Oppenheimer. And while I don't want to spoil what's going on in this novel, or the unsettling reading experience it offers, that feels impossible to avoid. I simply could not tell which parts of the story were real, and I did not look up anything about it online, and when it was ultimately disclosed, it felt like the last revelation after many others in the preceding pages. Perhaps I can try to hide the ball. 

***

This is a book about mathematics. Because I have led a foolish life, I have always considered mathematics to be boring. I did not understand anyone that wanted to be a math major unless they wanted to go into engineering or computer science or programming. I was quite good at math, but I stopped after high school, and did not take any coursework that included it until Corporate Finance. All of that math was done over MS Excel, so it was not even supposed to be difficult, but after getting straight A's in high school math, I got a C+ in that. Still, I can appreciate the elegance of the formulas, proofs, solutions, and profound applications inherent in the discipline. Even if you do not, this book still has the capacity to instill such admiration. 

This focuses on three distinct characters in each of its three parts: Paul Ehrenfest, John von Neumann, and Lee Sedol. The middle part is further broken up into three parts itself, and as the centerpiece to the book, it is probably the strongest section. It is when the book hits its stride and begins to make more sense to the reader. 

[It's worth noting, perhaps, that I just did the annual Oscars write-up, and this year was aided by Letterboxd. I have also been doing Goodreads for a couple years now. Each requires rating on a scale of 5 stars. I prefer 4 stars for movies, and I had gotten used to giving basically everything 4 stars on Goodreads. 5 star ratings are reserved for books I would deem Best Books reviewed on this blog. In any case, Letterboxd allows for 1/2 star ratings. Goodreads should as well. I would give this 4.5 stars. Ultimately, this is rounded up to 5 stars (Grade: A), and now will be included in the Best Books category.]

 It goes beyond 4 star territory because of this elegant structure, which is disorienting at first and perfectly appropriate in the end. The second part of this book could be seen as "experimental fiction," and the very best sort of it. This originality sets it apart. 

***

Chapter 1, or Book One, is titled "PAUL or The Discovery of the Irrational." It is 23 pages long and sketches out the final days of a pioneering physicist that end in tragedy (the lede is not buried, the horrible fate is blankly stated in the opening paragraph). This is not a bad short story, but it left me wondering where else the novel could go, and if it might return to this character's earlier life and depict in finer detail what led to his madness. 

Instead, it jumps to something completely different, and yet not totally dissimilar--Chapter 2, or Book Two, "JOHN or The Mad Dreams of Reason." It introduces itself in ostentatious fashion, in terms of literary fiction. A few pages with nothing but a few words on each ("He was the smartest human being of the 20th century," (33); "An alien among us," (35)), followed by the announcement that we have entered Part I: "The Limits of Logic." 

By this point, at page 47, after a good 21 pages of non-standard prose, or at least non-standard layout, we have Eugene Wigner's entry, "Only he was fully awake," which shifts the third-person perspective of Chapter/Book One to first person. After a couple dozen pages of Chapter/Book Two, the reader should find their footing and be able to enjoy the novel for what it is. At least for the next 220 pages. 

I am sure plenty of other novels have done it, but my mind first floats to The Rules of Attraction as a similar example of literary technique. Or perhaps various oral histories, whether true or fictional. It is not as risky a proposition as 2nd-person narrative, and while it is technically first-person, it has a 3rd-person veneer to it, since the speakers or contributors are not writing about themselves, but someone important that they knew. Perhaps the layout of the book is more experimental than this shifting of perspective, but whatever the case, despite the less immediately dramatic subject matter of Chapter/Book One, it is more engaging. 

The literary flourishes on the nature of mathematics and technology make this book particularly brilliant, and this is what sets it apart. We don't often equate art with science or math, but those separate wings of "useful" and "useless" study are beautifully harmonized in the text. There are many such passages here that could be excerpted, to the point that, by the end of the book, it almost gets repetitive. This is why I would rate it 4.5 stars rather than 5, if I could.

It is probably not a spoiler to say that this is likely the Great Novel about the Formation of Artificial Intelligence:

"Jansci thought that if our species was to survive the twentieth century, we needed to fill the void left by the departure of the gods, and the one and only candidate that could achieve this strange, esoteric transformation was technology; our ever-expanding technical knowledge was the only thing that separated us from our forefathers, since in morals, philosophy, and general thought, we were no better (indeed, we were much, much worse) than the Greeks, the Vedic people, or the small nomadic tribes that still clung to nature as the sole granter of grace and the true measure of existence. We had stagnated in every other sense. We were stunted in all arts except for one, techne, where our wisdom had become so profound and dangerous that it would have made the Titans that terrorized the Earth cower in fear, and the ancient lords of the woods seem as puny as sprites and as quaint as pixies. Their world was gone. So now science and technology would have to provide us with a higher version of ourselves, an image of what we could become. Civilization had progressed to a point where the affairs of our species could no longer be entrusted safely to our own hands; we needed something other, something more. In the long run, for us to have the slimmest chance, we had to find some way of reaching beyond us, looking past the limits of our logic, language, and thought, to find solutions to the many problems that we would undoubtedly face as our dominion spread over the entire planet, and, soon enough, much farther still, all the way to the stars." (222) 

This is not the greatest excerpt I could have found, but it will have to do. It should at least illustrate the quality of the prose. I had not heard of Benjamin Labatut prior to reading this, but he is only a few years older than me. This appears to be his 2nd novel, and from what I can tell, it falls along similar lines to his first, in terms of genre. I do not see how this could not eclipse the quality of its predecessor. It reaches for heights that some of the most profound literature in the history of our world can sometimes attain. It's far from perfect, and I did find the very end to be "basic," but by that I mean the book's final lines. 

***

Chapter/Book 3, "LEE or The Delusions of Artificial Intelligence," is 84 pages long and jumps forward into very recent history. And the game of Go.

Now. I have not played Go. I have never seen a board. No one has challenged me to it. My familiarity with the game is limited to a couple references in A Beautiful Mind, which yes, could also be seen as an "influence" (since the release of Oppenheimer post-dated this)--if mental illness drove the plot of The MANIAC. As such, it does not, though PAUL and JOHN certainly feature mental illness as a major factor in their work. If it is not already clear, MANIAC works on two levels--both the name of the computer that John creates, and as an adjective for his being. And Paul's, too. But not exactly Lee's.

To be sure, there is mental illness in LEE, but it does not arise out of the tireless pursuit of technological breakthroughs--just the disappointment of defeat, the humbling of no longer being considered the best. At Go.

It's not a bad ending to the book at all, but the A.I. is arguably more developed than Lee as a character. The chapter is named for Lee, but it may just as well be named for AlphaGo. 

If anything, this ending is most interesting for its depiction of the Go tournament Lee plays against AlphaGo, for Americans and others unfamiliar with the grasp this game has in China, Japan and Korea. It is probably still a bit of a "sub-feature" of the region, and one does not imagine it being played as often as chess, but I am sure I would be more familiar if fate had dropped me there rather than here in the Midwest. People here in my milieu were raised on Michael Jordan, and if you go anywhere in the world, he is still synonymous with the area. Of course, I only mention that because winning is all that mattered to him, and winning is all that matters to Lee. These are people that retire when they know they cannot continue to win every single time.  

There is a certain pride that comes with the greatest of all time being from your area, and Lee is a similar type of hero to South Korea. I do not want to spoil what happens in his match with AlphaGo. Suffice to say, AlphaGo is the apotheosis of Paul's and John's work. Chat GPT feels like a rudimentary form of A.I. in comparison, yet we are in a time when this is developing rapidly. In a year or two, it will likely be even more ubiquitous, and though many of us are assured that our jobs are not in jeopardy, we fear we cannot rely on such present understandings. 

The prospect of technology changing our lives (and possibly taking them over) is at the heart of this novel. It is important to maintain our essential humanity, which at least Paul and John seem to deride. They suffer accordingly in their personal lives for doing so. And there is the adage that on our death beds we won't wish we worked more, we will wish we spent more time with our families, and that is here, too. That may be an overly simplistic view of what this novel is meant to communicate, but nobody suggests we should aspire towards an artificial consciousness that discards our humanity. That may, however, just become another inevitable step down the line.   

***

A Dizzying Dive into the Abyss: The MANIAC Review

The MANIAC by Benjamin Labatut is not a book you read—it’s a book you survive. It’s like trying to catch lightning in a bottle while standing in the middle of a thunderstorm. From the very first page, Labatut drags you into a world of intellectual frenzy, where the boundaries between madness and genius blur in an all-consuming tango. The subject matter? The terrifying, thrilling, and often unfathomable evolution of artificial intelligence. The execution? Equal parts brilliant and bewildering.

Labatut’s storytelling—blending historical figures, philosophical musings, and speculative fiction—creates a narrative web so tightly wound that you almost feel like you're losing your grip on reality. There’s no comforting sense of control here. The MANIAC is like being thrown into the chaotic, unpredictable heart of a scientific revolution, where the very nature of what it means to be human is under siege. You’re given no roadmap to navigate, no map of the terrain—you’re simply told to follow the intellectual avalanche as it barrels down at you.

The book’s central figure, the MANIAC himself, is not a single person but a representation of the very forces driving humanity toward an unknown future. In these pages, you’ll encounter the eerie brilliance of minds like John von Neumann, Alan Turing, and others—titans whose discoveries laid the groundwork for our current technological landscape. But instead of portraying these intellectuals as mere historical figures, Labatut imbues them with a sense of manic obsession, as though the great minds of science are all teetering on the edge of madness, their inventions pushing them toward an abyss they cannot comprehend.

And then there's the unsettling question that pulses at the heart of the novel: What happens when we no longer understand the machines we create? Labatut doesn’t answer this question directly; instead, he drags you into the labyrinth of ideas that lead toward it, until you’re left unsure whether you should marvel at the brilliance of these innovations or tremble at the abyss they seem to be opening up. The narrative is less about clear answers and more about exploring the terrifying unknowns, the dizzying potential of artificial intelligence, and the human minds behind the algorithms.

Labatut’s prose is feverish, often elliptical, oscillating between clear, crystalline insights and maddening complexity. He writes as though he’s in a race against time, throwing ideas at you with such speed and intensity that you’re left gasping for air. And yet, amid the frenetic pace, there are moments of haunting clarity—fleeting glimpses of beauty amid the chaos—that make you pause and reconsider everything you thought you knew about technology, humanity, and consciousness.

The themes here are as vast and overwhelming as the subject itself. Artificial intelligence isn’t just a tool—it’s a force that forces us to confront the limits of our knowledge, our understanding, and even our humanity. It’s a reminder that we are, at times, as much at the mercy of our creations as they are at ours. As the book careens toward its final chapters, the sense of creeping dread becomes palpable. We’re all trapped in a race we may never fully understand, following a path that could lead to transcendence—or to a kind of self-destruction. Or, perhaps, to something even more unfathomable.

The MANIAC is not for those seeking a tidy, conventional narrative. This isn’t a story that progresses neatly; instead, it’s an experience, a visceral assault on the senses and intellect, a book that demands to be reckoned with. There are no comforting conclusions or neatly tied-up plot threads. Instead, you’re left with questions, feelings, and ideas that swirl in your head long after the final page is turned.

In the end, The MANIAC feels less like a book and more like a mind-altering journey—one that offers no clear destination, but leaves you irrevocably changed. It’s a disorienting, beautiful, and profoundly unsettling meditation on the intersection of human genius and the machines we create, and it’s a must-read for anyone daring enough to peer into the abyss of artificial intelligence.

*

Is what I do worthwhile? It's certainly never been necessary. There is no financial reward. The world has never needed me, but it needs me even less than before. We go on out of duty to others, to delay suffering, to forestall the pain of loss, to do what we can to provide comfort amidst the brutishness of the world.