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. 

2025 Academy Award Nominees for Best Picture

 It's been a rough year in terms of trying to see them all, but almost there. It's a little easier because I started using Letterboxd and wrote reviews there (some of them are not very good, my apologies). For now I am just cutting and pasting them and maybe adding some light edits. Feel free to follow me there, and I would love to follow you as well.

Conclave

    A couple years ago, Women Talking was the surprise Best Picture nomination that almost everyone knew wasn't going to win. Now, we have Conclave, which could just as well be Men Talking. 

    It is based on a novel and it is not about the passing of John Paul II, as I initially and erroneously assumed. I also do not think it is meant to be a glimpse into the future, but an exploration of our present moment. 

    Some may take issue with the plot, or the pacing of the film, and that would be fair. Frankly it would seem that Conclave, part two, might be the much more interesting movie. 

    But this is a meditative film, more interested in exploring characters fulfilling their duties while tending to their own private crises of faith. It is anchored by two very strong performances by Ralph Fiennes and Stanley Tucci. John Lithgow is also good (though not given quite enough to do) in a supporting role. 

    The scenery and art direction and production design of the Vatican is flawless. The movie will probably make you want to go to Rome. And you should. When they reform the Catholic church the next time and decide to take a cue from from their counterparts in synagogues, all confirmed Catholics should get a birthright trip there. And the film will be screened in seminary schools everywhere. 

    Like Women Talking, it would also make an excellent play. I think it all turns out fine in the end, but there must be those that feel differently, and hearing why would likely be as illuminating as the film itself. One of its virtues is that it can lead to such conversations.

Emilia Perez

    This is Best Picture nominee this year that is getting the most hate. It does not deserve it, for the reasons it is getting it, but it is just O.K. I liked it better than I thought I would. But not that much.

    Some people have no idea what it is about but hate it just because it's a story about gender transitioning. It's not based off a true story, as far as I know, and there are definitely some moments that truly strain credulity. (The whole idea of not being open and honest with wife and kids is essentially the tragedy of the story.)

    Basically, it is "Transparent" the movie, the musical, transplanted to Mexico, with a hint of "Breaking Bad." The person that wants to be a woman is a cartel boss. He (she? There is some degree of dead-naming, and the movie is not so overly precious about trans foibles in ways that give the deplorables of our society ammunition for mockery--a good thing in my honest opinion because realistic--but probably a bad thing, too, according to activists, or at least my idea of some of them) achieves it and becomes Emilia Perez.

    The woman that helps find the doctor to do the surgery is Zoe Saldana, and her performance is rightfully lauded. She is the best part of the movie, unquestionably. I sort of hated the musical element of the movie, but of all the actors forced into semi-singing their lines, she does the best, keeping it both light and heavy at the appropriate times. Maybe it's just because she plays a lawyer, but I found her the most "lovable" and I think everyone else will feel the same (I didn't think it was that funny, except when she sang the pseudo-song---because that is what they are---that has the line about why she won't open her own firm).

    Selena Gomez is secondarily good, but she is tasked with the unenviable role of the abandoned wife and mother and the villainess (the part of the film that is totally misbegotten and icky). It's a shame because she shows she does appear to have "acting chops." Regardless it seems like a breakout film role (I hadn't really seen her in anything since her outrageous "adult debut" in Spring Breakers, a superior film in nearly every aspect) and she should rightfully get better roles. 

    She does the best she can, and I think this movie is interesting and engaging and could be compelling, but has a few missteps that made me care a bit less about the characters--except Zoe who holds the entire movie together, lending it the credibility to make it the record-breaking (or tying, with Titanic?) Oscar nominee it is. The fact that it did that is frankly ridiculous and so the Academy is to be blamed for unintentionally rolling back progress by elevating it, if that makes sense. 

    If it wins, it will be the worst winner since Crash, and actually, even more worse. Note that this isn't really a "woke" film and that people should actually watch it before assuming it is. Ironically the trans haters should love this movie, since it clearly depicts how terrible of an idea it was for Emilia. But they probably won't give it the time of day.

    It deserves 2, and I'm giving it 2.5 to be charitable to Zoe, and the boldness of the conceit. If not a musical, and if not a narcotics industry story, and if more realistic about the process of transitioning, it would be closer to best picture territory, or at least 4 stars on Letterboxd territory. This is not the film trans people deserve, and unfortunately comes at a time when they need the best representation they can get, because of all the idiots in our country saying horrible things that make me want to throw up. Kudos to Zoe and this performance should put her (and Gomez to an extent) into a higher category of projects, but I will be surprised if there is a lesser best picture nominee this year, on the whole.

The Substance

I don't think this deserves to win Best Picture, but I am glad it got nominated. It's a pretty inventive and original horror film, and probably the first distinct entry in the "body horror" genre to gain Academy recognition. I felt slightly underwhelmed, and maybe because it was overhyped. That said, I think it is better than Emilia Perez, but not quite as good as Conclave (I also gave Conclave 4 stars, however, and this was the most entertaining of the three, by far). 

Demi Moore should win best actress, in part because she "goes for it" in a way that I haven't seen anyone else this year apart from Amy Adams in Nightbitch, and in part for career recognition. Without her, this movie wouldn't be as big a deal. Her performance is vulnerable and beautiful. 

The issue I have is the satire and the one-dimensionality of the other characters. This is likely intentional but it made for a very unpleasant and disturbing narrative. There are not many roles apart from Moore, Qualley and Quaid. Quaid plays such a caricature, and while his manic energy and shamelessness are compelling, the hostility towards Moore is too extreme. This is a satire for sure but taking it a step or two closer to reality would have pushed it to 4.5 star territory. (Call it the Sorry to Bother You problem.)

It is regardless quite an achievement and Moore is justly lauded for her work. She has stepped away from the limelight over the past decade or two, and this is a stunning return. Perhaps the best thing is what it may inspire in the viewer: acceptance of our bodies. I think you will be very grateful that yours is "untouched" after watching. And maybe it will be an inspiration to feel more confident and take bigger swings, so to speak.

A Complete Unknown

Of the 4 nominees, I've seen so far, this was better than The Substance, Conclave and Emilia Perez. I almost want to give it 5 stars but stopping just short because (a) it's Oscar bait and (b) it's a bit cliched and while it definitely explains why "going electric" was so controversial, I just have a hard time believing the reaction was as harsh as it was (I don't doubt he had things thrown at him, but the audience really must have been a bunch of cranks not interested in change).

Without looking at the Best Actor nominees, Chalamet has to be a strong contender. For some reason I feel like The Brutalist has Adrien Brody in that category and think he may edge it out, but I have a hard time imagining the performance will actually be better. What Chalamet does is perhaps not as impressive as what Cate Blanchett did in Tár, but it is very close. Arguably more impressive because Bob Dylan is very real. Frankly, he's better than Austin Butler was as Elvis, or Rami Malek was as Freddy Mercury, and this is a better film than either (still haven't seen Rocketman but willing to bet this is better, too). He is about as good as Joaquin Phoenix was in Walk the Line. 

Edward Norton is also great, as are the two female leads. Mostly, however, it is Chalamet playing and singing the songs that makes it really special. I've always liked him, but am now astounded by his talent. I've never really gotten into Dylan, but this also serves as a great primer into his catalog--it's like a collection of greatest hits, lovingly interpreted. Despite my limited knowledge of his song catalog, many of these were familiar. 

In short, I was surprised by how much I liked it, and how moving I found it (the scenes with Woody Guthrie may have led to some involuntary tears). 

Side note: the potential for a monologue joke about--I'm Still Here (Best Picture/Best International Feature nominee)/I'm Not There (previous Bob Dylan movie by Todd Haynes--where highlight was also Cate Blanchett)/I'm Still Here (Joaquin Phoenix movie)/Joker: Folie a Deux (no 2nd nomination for Phoenix)/Walk the Line (and Phoenix not appearing as Johnny Cash here, though the actor in this did a great job)/Phoenix leaving new Todd Haynes movie production--could be truly epic and wish I could submit something. But it's more of an oddly tangled web of movie titles and connections than a punchline. 

Suffice to say, Chalamet does about as well as he can here, compared to Malek doing Mercury, Phoenix doing Cash, or Foxx doing Ray. If he doesn't win, it'll be because of Brody, but also because there wasn't an addiction subplot.

Dune: Part Two

Dune 2 is perfectly passable, and a great demonstration of technical effects. It's not groundbreaking like Star Wars or Jurassic Park or Forrest Gump or Avatar or Titanic or whatever, but it should win the category. 

Beyond that, it's part of a trilogy (in a way--there is one more coming, I think) which gives it the Lord of the Rings problem or the Avatar problem. LOTR won for film #3, and I think Dune is totally on par with those (though not quite the first Stars Wars movies, on par with the best of the next 6--and I feel like when David Lynch adapted it, the "space opera" element could have made it feel like a ripoff cash grab--but we know that is far from the case now). I don't think Dune 2 will win, and I expect Dune: Messiah to be every bit as good as the first two (this one is just as good as the first, and probably better), but I don't think it will win best picture unless 2026 is a weak year for movies. Frankly, I'd be a bit shocked.

Nor should this win this year just because Chalamet's other film about Bob Dylan is a more obvious choice, which I also felt was better than this. In that film, he proved that he truly has a singular talent and dedication to the craft on the level of some of the other great actors of our time (Cate Blanchett, Joaquin Phoenix, etc.). Here, he proves he is fully capable of anchoring a movie as an action star. To be sure, he has plenty of help, and the cast seems even more star-studded than the first. But this was weirder (the water of life sequences) and a better development of the story. 

However, I still don't quite understand what I saw, and would need to watch both films again to better assess. I also regret not seeing it on the big screen. Like the next Avatar, even though I am not that excited for either, I will make a point to see each in the theater. Whatever the case, it's a great achievment and, from what I'm told, an adaptation par excellence of the original books, a fitting tribute to the author Frank Herbert, and a true realization of his vision.

Anora

I want to give this 5 stars bad. But something holds me back. Maybe I'm just fishing for a criticism, and maybe it's out of jealousy. Because there's nothing terribly impossible about making a movie like this, even if Sean Baker's film budget has leveled up.

In short, he fully delivers on the promise that critics always saw in his work. This is a great movie from beginning to end, and my favorite so far of the nominees (6 down, 4 to go).

It's totally original despite being a familiar trope. It's hilarious and beautiful and sad. It's very *adult* and even though it only gets an R rating, it is the least family-friendly in the group (The Substance is right behind it). That's the only thing that makes me think it may not win, but it reminded me of an "edgy" film like Pulp Fiction getting nominated and though that did not win, it would not be surprising if this did. It's totally fun and entertaining, but has kind of a strange ending. A bit disturbing. Maybe that's the 1/2 star knock. It felt like it was part of a different movie. But I guess it makes sense, and ends on a rather melancholy and moving note. I do not think the right actor was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but the recognition is deserving as well. I watched it twice and while it didn't blow my mind as much the second time, there was a definite reason to revisit at least once. This film has a ton of heat and people are saying Sean Baker will edge out Brady Corbet. I have a hard time saying it will win Best Picture for sure (see next review), but I think if one is playing the odds and doesn't care about personal integrity of taste, money would be on it. 

The Brutalist 

It's hard to say whether The Brutalist is better than Anora or A Complete Unknown--I've given each of them 4.5 stars. Each of them flirted with 5 stars. It's fair to say that this is the most elegantly constructed of the three. 

It's one of the longest movies I've ever seen, and that will likely be the case for many. Perhaps Killers of the Flower Moon was slightly longer. Seeing it in the theater with the "director-approved" intermission was a special experience and I am glad I did not opt for the convenience of streaming. 

This is a beautiful film in nearly every respect. The acting is superb. The script is ambitious and tight--for such a long movie, there are few wasted words. The opening sequence is immediately iconic, with a voiceover of a letter, quoting Goethe, "None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.” No epigraph could better represent the entire thrust of the picture. This serves as its thesis.

I loved basically everything about the movie and I only don't give it 5 stars because of something that would be a spoiler that I do not care to describe. It is undoubtedly the climax of the film and it's hard to explain but generally feels like something of a cop-out to me. After such a grand production of art on the highest level, it is reduced to a plot device to manufacture drama and resolution. This is probably the point, and even if I think it could have made a Bigger Statement, the epilogue redeems it to a degree, and further illuminates the depth of the film.

I am not confident that it will win Best Picture, at all. At least two of the others stretch towards its heights, but ultimately do not reach them. In good conscience, I should pick what I truly believe is the best, though I may lose the family ballot contest. There are still three left for me to see, and it will be a tall order for any of them to eclipse this.

Nickel Boys

jackknorps’s review published on Letterboxd:

This is a "searing drama" that was probably the slowest of the Best Picture nominees, which is saying something when The Brutalist is included in that group. That said, sometimes the best movies are those that put one in a somnambulant state, where sadness and melancholy feel comfortable, and drifting off does not feel unpleasant.

That's not to say Nickel Boys is boring--it just moves slowly and doesn't fully reveal itself until the end, and the way the twist is teased out is masterful. There are also numerous moments that stretch towards greater cinematic heights, and are extremely moving. I almost want to use the adjective "Terence Malickian." 

This is a true story and definitely the hardest watch of the BP group. Of course, The Brutalist is about a Holocaust survivor. Yet the reformatory school depicted here is not dissimilar to a concentration camp in the Jim Crow era-South, particularly shocking since the main events take place in mid-1960s. 

Point-of-View is emphasized in this movie in a way I haven't seen in many others. This works sometimes and other times feels limiting. It has a point. I think this is one of the nominees that would improve on subsequent viewings, but it is difficult to want to subject oneself to the misery of the proceedings. 

Generally speaking, this is a film comprised of powerful moments and scenes (the grandmother is fantastic, and the friendship between Turner and Elwood is beautiful), but it feels very sketchy and vague, perhaps necessarily since it has a PG-13 rating and does not go for the graphic jugular, so to speak (most of the horrifying abuse is kept offscreen or hinted at). For example, I needed to look up on Wikipedia why the "climax" of the film has to happen, but I pretty much got it. 

In the end, this could be another example of a Black Lives Matter story--though just saying that may trigger some people and want to dismiss it as propaganda. But after The Underground Railroad and this, it's quite clear that Colson Whitehead is responsible for some of the most powerful work over the last two decades. It's not propaganda, we just tend to forget about these stories (Whitehead became aware of the school in 2014, and it had been closed in 2011 after 110 years). There is probably going to be a movie about similar "schools" for indigenous children in Canada in the coming years. These horrifying stories are fortunately things of the past, but of course, in our present day and age, with a good portion of the population succumbing to DL bigotry, it sadly bears repeating. I'm not giving it 5 or even 4.5 stars, though it probably deserves that. I am just judging off how engaged I was, and maybe many others will want to look away too, but that doesn't make it any less powerful or important. The same cannot be said for many of the other nominees, which are trifling in comparison. Depictions of joy in this film are few and far between, which is to be expected. It is probably better than Sleepers, but it is probably not as good as The Shawshank Redemption, though it definitely has vibes of the latter. Some people still consider that one of the greatest films ever, and anyone that does should see this, too.

I'm Still Here

This is a good example of a movie that I wouldn't have seen if it was only lumped into the Best International Feature category. As such, it sits with Emilia Perez in both that category and Best Picture, and this is, in fact, the better picture of the two. I won't be totally surprised if EP wins Best International due to its number of nominations but I'm picking Zoe and look at Killers of the Flower Moon last year--even the best film can get totally shut out.

This is about Brazil in 1970. I dont know where the term "disappeared" emerged, but this would stand as the film par excellence that mines that concept and really shows the impact it can have on loved ones. Fernanda Torres puts on an unbelievable performance, again stacking the Best Actress category with at least 3 strongly deserving contenders. It's a beautiful film in so many ways and will probably make you cry. It's the hardest watch in the category besides Nickel Boys (The Substance is a tough watch for different reasons, and so is The Brutalist).

I went into it knowing as little as possible and recommend that if you also know almost nothing, that you keep it that way and see it. It's absolutely worth watching and a triumph not only for the filmmakers but the family at the center--this is just about the most beautiful tribute that could be made.

Wicked

Wicked is the origin story for the Wicked Witch of the West, whose name is apparently Elphaba. She is born with green skin and has a disabled younger sister in a wheelchair (Nessarose). They both end up at Shiz, which basically feels like Hogwarts, and she mets Galinda there. They have a goat for a professor. She also had a nanny named Dulcibear, who is a talking bear.

At first, this was my problem with the movie. It seemed fairly traditional and recognizable in comparison to the original, except for the talking animals. This is a prequel, however, and the yellow brick road has not even been laid yet. The Wizard of Oz was always kind of a dark movie in spite of being family-friendly. This definitely retains that element. There is a conspiracy to get rid of all of the talking animals. This actually has a rather complicated plot that I can't fully recall. But by the end we meet the Wizard and see how the monkeys at the Emerald Palace sprout wings and Elphaba gets her hat and broomstick. I won't spoil why she is summoned or what happens there.

I don't think this is a movie one watches for the story. This is a musical, and it is all about the songs and emotion behind them. Both Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande deserve their nominations. They probably could not have done a better job in casting. This is an adorable movie in a lot of places. Ariana basically takes pains to look as adorable as possible in every single shot. 

I just don't really know what I saw. I know Galinda becomes Glinda, but I am wondering what happened to the Wicked Witch of the East. Perhaps she was referenced, but I may have missed it. If not, it is a missed opportunity. But this is a 2.5 hour Part One as it is. (Maybe in Part Two, Nessarose will become her?)

We only see hints at who Elphaba will become. She is essentially a good person, and various things happen to her that make her wicked. I would imagine Part Two would be a bit more fun as that develops. 

Basically, I need to see it again to better assess, because I didn't understand what was happening most of the time. A few of the songs are great, and visually it is quite stunning. It felt somewhat hollow to me is all. But it made me think about the original and wonder why the Witch wanted those red slippers in the first place. Maybe I have just never been paying attention. I think the original does actually make sense, however, and this mostly confused me. Regardless, the entire closing sequence is fantastic and it justifies its many nominations on the basis of being a spectacle like there hasn't been in years. It's probably the most popular musical of all time now, and the movie will only deepen its legacy.

The Secret History - Donna Tartt (1992)

I hadn't been aware of Donna Tartt prior to hearing about the The Goldfinch and giving it a read. That was about 11 years ago. I enjoyed that book, and knew she had a small oeuvre--just two others, and one of which was seen as a towering achievement. I'm not sure why it took me so long to get to this. A word should be said about my sister and my mom. 

Now, my sister actually was an English major in college, and perhaps notably at University of New Hampshire. That's not Vermont, but think it could be seen as a "sister state" of sorts. I have always appreciated her taste in literature. Few others match up as directly with what we feel a book should do to be great. 

Both of us perhaps get this from our Mom who is a very heavy reader, though often given to underplaying her taste. By that I mean, she will give me a mass paperback and acknowledge that it is kind of trashy but still amusing, and it could be a decent "guilty pleasure." Last year when my second niece was born, she flew out to be with my sister, and I noticed she had brought back The Secret History with her. This, after returning from an earlier visit with To Paradise, which came just as I had finished A Little Life--and while I meant to borrow that one after too, I think I needed a breather. 

This was, however, serendipitous. For some reason with The Secret History, I had always been meaning to check it out but I kept forgetting about it. So I asked if I could borrow and she said when she was done, which was soon after. She said that it might make her seem basic or of having "less refined" tastes, but it might be the the best book she ever read, or close to being her favorite book. Of course, I had to prioritize it, pushing it ahead of several others that I had gotten for Christmas last year. I started it on the way back from Sweden and finished it in Mexico. That is the crawl my reading has slowed to, and generally just on vacation. In any case, both of them had read The Goldfinch and enjoyed it (ironically, my sister had the same experience as me with the film adaptation--we both forgot we watched it--and perhaps that is due to Tartt not having creative control). I think all 3 of us will want to check out The Little Friend next, which is what another friend actually considers her best, though acknowledges that as a minority position. 

Another irony--a date once asked which books were my favorite and when I volleyed the question after just saying Molly lately--got the answer of The Secret History, which I felt was a "sign" since I had just started it. That was not to be, but was also informed I should listen to the audiobook, which is available on YouTube, just so I could hear Donna Tartt do Bunny's voice. Apologies if this long preamble on Tartt and family and friend connections is of little interest--I just feel she is one of the few "real ones" left, and if she ever delivers a a follow-up to The Goldfinch, it will be a "genuine literary event." 

I've tried listening to the "Once Upon a Time....at Bennington College" podcast again (after consulting it for The Shards) and will need to dig in again shortly. Suffice to say, Tartt did not agree to be interviewed for the podcast, which is another mark of a true artist. Granted, giving interviews does not make one less of an artist, but refusal to do interviews lends a deeper air of mystery to a work, as well as the author's intent. They don't want to tell you how you are supposed to feel.

***

This book does not bury the lede. On the very first page, we know Bunny has been killed, and the only mystery of the book is the perspective from which its narrator recounts the events of that year at Hampden College in Vermont. It may be ten years later, or perhaps twenty. This is not a hard book to read, and though it is 550+ pages, and though technically I had it on the back-burner for about 4 months, it's a relatively quick read. There is a lot of dialogue. 

The book is dedicated to Bret Easton Ellis and you can see the influence of Less Than Zero on it. There may even be characters that appear in both of their works. (Or perhaps not--the podcast is more content to uncover the real life inspirations for the characters.) These are like two sides of the same coin---except this one is almost 3 times as long. It may be more "Dickensian," but I think that adjective is better applied to The Goldfinch. 

However, Less Than Zero is....about what, exactly? It is somewhat plotless, and that is what makes it good too, but it is vaguely about a group of three friends and one that eventually devolves into prostitution and drug addiction--though it is really more about a "vibe." By contrast, The Secret History definitely carries something of a similar vibe---except the characters are dorks. 

They're dorks! In Less Than Zero, while they may not be the most popular people in their cliques, they are at least cool and hip, and when their more gentle or "embarrassing" emotions come into play, that is when it reveals its greater humanity and depth. The main characters in The Secret History are weirdos, nerds, and scholars of arcane academia (studying ancient Greek language). But yes, they do drink a lot and smoke a lot of cigarettes and do cocaine and smoke weed (though less often than others). I'm not suggesting that doing drugs makes you cool--but it does not seem to comport with my own human experience, that these types of students freely engage in these types of vices. This is not an ordinary situation and so it does not feel terribly off in any way, which is a testament to Tartt, who injects realism into a horribly fucked up situation gone wrong. 

She does what she did in The Goldfinch--which is to write about a certain subject so well that it makes the reader care more about it. In that book, it was antique dealing. In this book, it is the study of classics, in their original ancient form. 

This is where I note that it is not a perfect book and arguably does not deserve to be on the Best Books list--but if Goldfinch is on it, then so should be this. IMO, it is better than The Goldfinch, precisely because it is so strange, and it is done in such an arch way, and does not tie a little bow on the story.

Ultimately, it does turn into an absurdist thriller, and it feels somewhat less special as it goes along, but that didn't make me put it down. I think the key factor that makes it a special book is mining the emotion that comes out of the act, and demonstrating understanding on the nature of guilt, and what we choose to feel guilty about, or what it is be guilty in a more philosophical sense. 

*

This is perhaps what makes it a Great Book, or a Nearly Great Book. It feels like there may be a somewhat messy quality to it--imperfect, which is par for the course for a first novel. And yet Tartt took much longer to develop a debut than Ellis. Enough with the comparisons, they have rather different trajectories. Suffice to say, this would make for a much better film than The Goldfinch, and probably a better film than could have been made of anything in either oeuvre.

It just feels somewhat out of left field when Richard casually mentions that he was doing coke the other night, or that he got stoned all throughout middle school. It does not seem to fit with this character that the first 50 pages of the novel treats so earnestly. This is just a quibble, however. 

Probably somewhere around page 100, the novel reveals itself to be about this small circle of oddball students studying under an iconoclastic professor. These characters are indelible, even if they sometimes feel rote. That is, Henry, Francis, Charles, Camilla and Bunny. They carry a certain air about them that Richard finds highly attractive. They are clearly smarter than anyone else at the school, it seems. He soon joins them in their archaic curricula, and they welcome him as one of their own. 

If there's any "messy" quality to the book, it is the way Julian looms so large over the first 1/3 of the novel, and then all but disappears (there are some spoilers that I will avoid). Regardless, his last couple scenes in the novel are masterfully written. 

Much of it, however, is dashed off dialogue, "candy" for the reader, and I am not one to complain about that, but I did find a few moments to be missteps. I think the ending resolutions all make sense and work to the degree they can, but some of the moments along the way feel like necessary filler, and sometimes purely for shock value. 

Of course there are flaws to be found in everything. Even if Tartt did not write a masterpiece, she did write a masterful debut, and one that hasn't lost its appeal for over 30 years now.  

***

"Historicity does not ensure relevance " -Claude Fredericks

This is apparently a saying that Fredericks, the inspiration for Julian Morrow, had in the classes he taught, at least one of which included Donna Tartt. I need not rehash the entirety of the podcast referenced above--but taking a small moment here to acknowledge, it is a great podcast. Now it has supplemented two different reviews on this blog (The Shards being the other--and to get an idea of ranking and quality, I felt The Shards was pretty much as good as The Goldfinch, and it's lack of wider notice is likely due to Ellis's idiosyncrasies--but each is perhaps one step below The Secret History). Ellis is willing to talk to Anolik (the podcast creator), but Tartt is not. Ellis has his own podcast and multiple movies have been made of his books (The Shards will have its own series, I believe), and he sometimes makes bombastic posts on social media. Credit him with staying power, even if his relevance is perhaps 5% of what it was 35 years ago. Tartt knows it is better to exist in the shadows. Not unlike Goethe, who toiled over Faust for years in secret, despite being a god in Germany, Tartt may be polishing up her late era masterpiece, due in about 2040. We can look at her in awe. She's like the Fiona Apple of literature, except taking 2 or 3 times as long between projects, and more reclusive. Perhaps Thomas Pynchon is the better comp here. But he has been more prolific (is he, now that Kundera has passed on, the last of the greatest living writers, along with fellow-recluse-but-not-to-the-same-degree Don DeLillo? I'm not sure and I haven't really "gotten" his work but his influence has not abated.).

Tartt is not an iconoclastic artist in the same realm of Pynchon or DeLillo (or Salinger, another recluse with an even smaller oeuvre in terms of page numbers). White Noise is very accessible, and funny, but I think Tartt is much more accessible than either. Why The Secret History has not been made into a movie is a total mystery to me. It would make a great one. People still talk about it all the time. Regardless, there isn't anyone else like her. And this podcast is a great exploration of the mystery that surrounds her. She was likely upset by the investigatory nature of it. Because it does pull back the veil on this book in particular. It's quite fair to say, Tartt put a lot of herself into the main character and narrator (and though the podcast doesn't harp on it, I think she puts a lot of herself into Camilla as well). Apparently Tartt put Ellis in as Cloke Rayburn. Unfortunately, Brix Smith is difficult to identify. 

It's just worth listening to because I don't think there has been another period like this for any group of artists since the Beats or the "lost generation" of expatriates in Paris in the 20's. I think a lot of us--in 2001, and still in 2025, I would imagine--that go to college wanting to be artists and writers want to believe that we and our friends are all going to be famous and great. There's something beautiful about this aspect of believing in oneself, and that these friendships lend one another power. Yet for many of us, it is a dream that is forsaken in the favor of practicality. We need to survive, so we go to law school, because we believe others when they tell us we are not good, or it is enormously difficult to make anyone else interested in our work. But back in the 80's, before the internet and the instant, global visibility of everything including criticism, we could dream a little more and believe we were special. 

And so many of these Bennington students did just that, and this podcast is excellent for examining and understanding the reasons why. Brix Smith is just a lark here, since she did not become a literary icon, but arguably led as fantastic a life. No one could have imagined what her life would become, but obviously, for personal reasons, being a huge fan of the music she made with the band she joined--to say nothing of the fact that fate found her at the Metro in Chicago, in the days surrounding my very birth--her presence in this world is the final proof that this class was indeed special. Greatness emerged around everyone. I lament that I was not more aware of this facet to Bennington in 2000 (I was more aware of the Chris McCandless connection to Emory, spurring that particular rejected application), and instead chose to apply to similarly-sized Hampshire. And while NYU was probably the right choice for artists at the time, for many of us, and I have to think tens of thousands of others, the dream of art died after college. It took about five extra years to wither for me, and it still burns somewhere inside, but now instead, we admire those that were able to do something great and do what they love and live well enough off it to know that was their fate, that was their destiny, that was their calling, that was what they were meant to do in this life. Dreams at least can go on forever.

***

I haven't excerpted anything here yet, and this review is becoming too long, too precious for its own good, but at least one passage or snippet is necessary to illustrate the inimitable quality of Tartt's writing, this facility with language that is (deceptively) simple and precise and engaging and poetic, all at the same time. As noted, however, the book is very dialogue-heavy:

"'And it's a temptation for any intelligent person, and especially for perfectionists such as the ancients and ourselves, to try to murder the primitive, emotive, appetitive self. But that is a mistake.'

'Why?' said Francis, leaning slightly forward.

Julian arched an eyebrow; his long, wise nose gave his profile a forward tilt, like an Estruscan in a bas-relief. 'Because it is dangerous to ignore the existence of the irrational. The more cultivated a person is, the more intelligent, the more repressed, then the more he needs some method of channeling the primitive impulses he's worked so hard to subdue. Otherwise those powerful old forces will mass and strengthen until they are violent enough to break free, more violent for the delay, often strong enough to sweep the will away entirely. For a warning of what happens in the absence of such a pressure valve, we have the example of the Romans. The emperors. Think, for example, of Tiberius, the ugly stepson, trying to live up to the command of his stepfather Augustus. Think of the tremendous, impossible strain he must have undergone, following in the footsteps of a savior, a god. The people hated him. No matter how hard he tried he was never good enough, could never be rid of the hateful self, and finally the floodgates broke. He was swept away on his perversions and he died, old and mad, lost in the pleasure gardens of Capri: not even happy there, as one might hope, but miserable. Before he died he wrote a letter home to the Senate. "May all the Gods and Goddesses visit me with more utter destruction than I feel I am daily suffering." Think of those who came after him. Caligula, Nero.'

He paused. 'The Roman genius, and perhaps the Roman flaw,' he said, 'was an obsession with order. One sees it in their architecture, their literature, their laws--this fierce denial of darkness, unreason, chaos.' He laughed. 'Easy to see why the Romans, usually so tolerant of foreign religions, persecuted the Christians mercilessly--how absurd to think a common criminal had risen from the dead, how appalling that his followers celebrated him by drinking his blood. The illogic of it frightened them and they did everything they could to crush it. In fact, I think the reason they took such drastic steps was because they were not only frightened but also terribly attracted to it. Pragmatists are often strangely superstitious. For all their logic, who lived in more abject terror of the supernatural than the Romans?'

'The Greeks were different. They had a passion for order and symmetry, much like the Romans, but they knew how foolish it was to deny the unseen world, the old gods. Emotion, darkness, barbarism.' He looked at the ceiling for a moment, his face almost troubled. 'Do you remember what we were speaking of earlier, of how bloody, terrible things are sometimes the most beautiful?' he said. 'It's a very Greek idea, and a very profound one. Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it. And what could be more terrifying and beautiful, to souls like the Greeks or our own, than to lose control completely? To throw off the chains of being for an instant, to shatter the accident of our mortal selves? Euripedes speaks of the Maenads: head thrown back, throat to the stars, "more like deer than human being." To be absolutely free! One is quite capable, of course, of working out these destructive passions in more vulgar and less efficient ways. But how glorious to release them in a single burst! To sing, to scream, to dance barefoot in the woods in the dead of night, with no more awareness of mortality than an animal! These are powerful mysteries. The bellowing of bulls. Springs of honey bubbling from the ground. If we are strong enough in our souls we can rip away the veil and look that naked, terrible beauty right in the face; let God consume us, devour us, unstring our bones. Then spit us out reborn.' 

We were all leaning forward, motionless. My mouth had fallen open; I was aware of every breath I took.

'And that, to me, is the terrible seduction of the Dionysiac ritual. Hard for us to imagine. That fire of pure being.'" 
 --------------- (40-42)

The line break there is worth noting. There are 8 chapters, a Prologue and an Epilogue, in nearly 560 pages. Sometimes books with very long chapters can be a slog, but there are probably hundreds of line breaks here, and this coupled with the heavy dialogue and propulsive narrative makes for a page-turner and relatively quick read. 

That's about all I can say. It's not a perfect book, but it's a very good one, and while there may be other ones like it, I haven't seen them. The Little Friend will have to be added to the reading list. One hopes it will not take another ten years to remember to read it. By that time, who knows, we may have Tartt's true magnum opus. Because while The Secret History has remained popular and widely read and acclaimed for over thirty years, she is still out there somewhere, toiling in the shadows, and her greatest work may be yet to come. And maybe sooner than we think. 

Rebel Girl - Kathleen Hanna (2024)

Summarizing my entire prior familiarity with Kathleen Hanna as the "oeuvre rule" intro may overwhelm the reader, but I feel like this is a special book and it merits a special review. 

I hadn't really heard the term Riot Grrl until my junior or senior year of high school, i.e. late 90's. This was from a male friend that observed broad cultural trends from an academic distance, and may or may not have identified as a feminist. If I'd heard of Bikini Kill before then, it was likely a passing reference that didn't leave any impression. At the time, Hanna was recording the first Le Tigre album, and I was deep into Smashing Pumpkins, Radiohead, Rage Against the Machine and Beastie Boys. That would all change in a year or two.

Basically, there was one friend that represented and symbolized all things Bikini Kill and Kathleen Hanna to me. In 2004, Le Tigre played a $5 NYU show at Irving Plaza. She wanted to get a better view, so I told her to get onto my shoulders, and I quickly collapsed and nearly killed us both. I was weaker than I assumed. Another friend had burnt me a copy of the first Le Tigre album on CD-R, and so I was familiar with a few of their songs, but not most as it was the tour for This Island, what would end up being their last album.

This friend and I are now estranged, and perhaps my understanding of feminism and violence against women has finally evolved (or started to, at least, hopefully); my own complicity in perpetuating the status quo, with desultory "support" while maintaining what was essentially a misogynistic outlook is now apparent (some women were cool to me, but many were not). Years later, what I showed signs of being would get a name: incel. And it was because of such feelings that I assumed the problem was with them and not something within myself. It took a while to admit to myself who I really was, and it came too late, and I miss this friend terribly, and I message every time I go back to New York, and they are ignored, and I see what she posts on Instagram, and I am bowled over by all she has accomplished and achieved over the past 12 years, living up to the vision of her future career in near-perfect execution. What's clear now is that she was smarter and more emotionally mature and a more complete person 20 years ago than I even hint towards becoming at present, today. 

I am always trying to do better in the face of these past failures, and it is in this context that I read Rebel Girl, often reflecting on that friendship and my regret over screwing things up, wanting so badly to make amends and yet unable to repair whatever damage had been done. This is a side benefit of the book. Beyond being an amusing personal history with amazing insight into the Pacific Northwest indie scene in the early 90's, it is an emotional journey that the reader takes with Hanna, and inevitably instills self-reflection. I think reading this book can make someone into a better person. Not that it entirely did that for me, but it may have helped set a better trajectory. 

*

The memoir starts where most do, in childhood, and as might be guessed, it was not great. She has one slightly older sister and parents that fight all the time and eventually get divorced. Unfortunately her dad was a total creep, and this is probably the first "negative influence" that gave rise to her perspective: many men simply had no self-awareness, and her father could hardly have done a worse job as a "protector." As she noted in her interview on WTF, there was not sexual abuse per se, but there was verbal abuse, psychological abuse, physical abuse, and it was usually inappropriate sexually, or mind-boggling in its cruelty (not only towards his daughters, but also their dog):

"My dad was installing sprinkler systems in Gresham when he got the news he'd been elected the head of his union, Local 669. His new office was in DC, so we moved across the country just before I started elementary school, to a tiny suburb called Calverton, Maryland. We were unpacking our boxes when our dog, Holly, shat on the living room rug. My father dragged Holly over to the poop and rubbed her face in it, screaming, 'Look what you did! Look what you did! Well, you won't do it again, will you!?'" (8)

It is in that living room, at Christmastime, when Hanna first sings "Away in a Manger" to herself, loudly, that she finds her r'aison d'etre: 

"Hearing my voice bouncing back at me was like watching light refracting off a mirror. A mirror I could finally see my whole self in. If there were words my body could've said, they would've been, 'Right now is perfect. Right now, nothing bad is happening.'...
Eventually I graduated to the bay window for my solo performances. I imagined I was looking out at an audience instead of an empty street. Singing was like figuring out I could make a rainbow appear on the wall just by staring at it. And because of that I always had a place I could return to when things got bad." (8-9)

*

We need not re-hash the memoirs by Kim Gordon, Carrie Brownstein, Patti Smith, Thurston Moore, Bob Mould (or Come as You Are, which I got a year ago and which will hopefully be up here relatively early in 2025), and we shouldn't forget Dean Wareham or Brix Smith, either. But they are all good-to-great, and I keep saying the latest I've read is the best one (i.e. saying Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl is better than Girl in a Band, in certain respects). This time is no different. Rebel Girl is probably better than them all with the exception of Just Kids, which should probably be enshrined as a Penguin Classic (more deserving than Morrissey's Autobiography, no doubt). 

What makes it the best of them all is Hanna's willingness to be vulnerable. Not that the others above did not do the same (well, one of them did not even try), but Hanna is willing to equivocate and debate with herself, really digging down into the nuance of situations where others more neatly summarize. It may not be much longer than them, but it is 322 pages, and the chapters are notably short--similar to Kim Gordon's (who figures heavily in this book as well as a major role model)--but even more extreme. There is even a chapter that rivals the iconic coin-pusher chapter from Tom Scharpling's memoir in terms of absurd hilarity (ironically titled, "Big Tom").  

Maybe it is not the best example, but one that struck me early on was her explanation of why she ran away from her mother's house, after her parents were divorced (unthinkably, she moves in her with her father despite knowing it is a terrible idea). It does not feel like the most rational or serious reason, but her willingness to be totally real and explain why she was in a bad place with her mom at the time is what sets this book apart:

"I'd gone on a long walk with her when I was visiting her in Portland and brought up the gun incident with my dad. At first she was defensive and asked why I was beating a dead horse, until I reminded her that we had literally NEVER talked about it. After a few minutes, we each shared our experience of that night, and I came to understand why she'd asked my sister and me to talk my dad down. The conversation ended with my mom telling me that she had one wish, she'd go back in time and protect me from my dad. 
When we got back to her duplex, Randy [her mom's boyfriend] and I watched TV while my mom cooked dinner. Something on TV made Randy uncomfortable and he went off on a bizarre homophobic rant. When I asked him to stop, he just kept going.
Earlier that weekend I'd been hanging out with my friend Gene Barnes, an older hippie writer I'd met in Olympia. He was living in Portland making zines and doing activism. He told me he'd agreed to go on a Carnival-type cruise with his elderly parents and was starting to regret the decision. He'd promised himself he would tell them he was gay on the trip--which seemed extra stressful to me, but he told me he needed to do it ASAP. He had recently been diagnosed with HIV and didn't want his parents to find out he was gay in the hospital. So I helped Gene, a strong, self-possessed, hero-like figure, role-play how to come out to his parents. It was heartbreaking, though we laughed a lot too. And now I was sitting on my mom's couch, watching Randy flounce around the room mocking gay men for being 'too flamboyant.' 
I started crying as I begged Randy to just please stop talking. I know my mom heard me, because she popped her head around the corner. I looked at her with a tearstained face, waiting for her to tell him to knock it off, but she turned away. This was the woman who'd told me, an hour earlier, that she wished she could go back in time and protect me. How about you protect me NOW? I thought. After yelling at both of them, I left, vowing never to return." (72-73)

Even though I may not think one man's homophobic stupidity in the late 1980s is a serious reason to question her mother's love, it is clear that her mother was still deferential to thoughtless men that hurt her daughters, even on a seemingly-unrelated issue, and that attention to detail--no matter how potentially embarrassing--is a testament to its greatness. Later Randy evolves in his attitudes and she repairs her relationship with her mother, and it is one of the more endearing moments in a series of them towards the end of the book, when all of the crazy instability of the first 40 years of Hannah's life finally begins to coalesce into something safe, loving, stable and nurturing. 

*

There is a crucial moment in the book that more clearly than any other exemplifies its singularity. Basically, this is personal drama involving Kurt Cobain as a supporting character in a scene. (Later, Courtney Love is similarly invoked as she often is in memoirs listed above, and in a rather negative light--which further begs Love to write her own memoir--which clearly, despite however anyone may feel about her, could be truly epic.) 

This is basically the moment where Hanna determines to better control her drinking. It is difficult to excerpt and I am wary of spoiling anything at all here, but it really feels like the defining moment and centerpiece of the book. 

*

It is the story of the night of the graffiti--her and Cobain get spray paint to graffiti "GOD IS GAY" in giant letters (his) and "FAKE ABORTION CLINIC" (hers) on a new building for an organization that purported to give "pregnancy help" and instead would talk women out of getting an abortion by scaring them. They are very drunk and with Dave Grohl later go back to her apartment building. There is an odd configuration on her roof where she is able to walk across it and to the window of her friend that lives in the same building, who has daffodils growing on the roof. Kurt picks the daffodils and brings them to her, and then she realizes they are from his and instead of saying it was wrong to uproot them, chooses to brag about how she is just friends with the guy because he cooks for her and she has him wrapped around her finger, etc., trying to sound cool. Later her friend says he heard everything through an open window, and Hanna determines that she has a drinking problem and needs to get it under control.

This is the chapter "Benjamin Franklin's Glasses" and it was probably the hardest part of the book for her to write, along with its antecedent, "Friendship and Other Natural Disasters" (followed by "Throwing in the Towel" and finally "Reject All American"). It is not my place to re-hash trauma or spoil the complex drama that is masterfully teased out in the text--suffice to say, it is the most powerful moment in the book, and one of its purest examples of courageous vulnerability. It seems to be the defining trauma of her life, and the way she writes about it from these various contexts and angles across time only further deepens its impact. 

In short, we often hear about how 66% or 75% or 80% of women have been sexually assaulted and/or raped. If "Me Too" did anything, it showed that the number is actually closer to 100%, particularly if you include any situation where such assault was escaped. I have to believe that the world is safer for women in 2024 than it was in 1994, but I know, it is still far, far from safe--and it is getting worse again. We might think that Rebel Girl would have had its moment in 2018, but we need it more in 2024 than ever. Don't go on X and look at any post about how men and women are supposed to act unless you want to know what I mean. I hate this stupidity and ignorance, and I will push this book on everyone, because it's only when we really fully inhabit someone else's experience of the world that we can begin to understand the sources from which all of the anger and frustration flow.

*

There is not much more I could say to convince you it is worth reading--you will either know and care about Bikini Kill, or not, but if you have nothing more than a passing interest in the music scene in the early 1990s, you will find something to value here. This is because Hanna's writing is so engaging that (like the currently pending item by Donna Tartt), she could write about pretty much anything and make it seem interesting to the reader, even if they never considered it interesting before. 

Yet it is personal to me, in the way the book ends (not unlike Morrissey's autobiography either, totally). She doesn't mention playing Riot Fest with The Julie Ruin in 2016, but I went with that same friend from high school, the first one that acknowledged Bikini Kill as a cultural entity unto itself, and we rolled some rather large joints and snuck them in and lit one up as Julie Ruin began. 

If you haven't seen Hanna live, you must if you ever get the chance, because she is one of the iconic performers of our time, and the banter is fantastic. She looked out at the crowd after the first song and made a couple comments. I don't remember what she said exactly, maybe, "Someone rolled up some scooby-doobie dos,"--while clearly looking directly at us. In that moment, we felt seen. Not in the best way, but not in the worst way, either. In any case, that moment was easily more memorable than the rest of the set, which obviously was very good too, one of the highlights that year in a very good line-up.

*

I went back to Riot Fest in 2017 and maybe I skipped 2018, I can't recall--but in 2019 Bikini Kill re-united and they headlined Riot Fest and I had to go. A friend had procured a certain item for us that she ensured was safe to take, and I popped it before Patti Smith's set, which kicked in sharply and made for one of the most beautiful concert experiences of my entire life, as Patti is clearly a national treasure and imbued with an energy that is truly profound and spiritually nourishing. 

After taking such ecstasy in that performance, I moved towards Bikini Kill's stage (I think the Raconteurs were playing and I camped out an hour ahead of time at the neighboring stage), and I moved close to the front. Of course I wanted to be as close as possible. People started to go nuts as they prepared to take the stage. Early on, perhaps in the first or second song, I was taking a video, and there happened to be some ruckus that seemed like kind of an incredible WTF moment to have on an Instagram story, so I captured some of it, before one of the women nearby noticed and said, "Don't fucking take any fucking video!" and I became rather embarrassed and deleted it. 

At a certain point, a song or two later, Hanna spoke about the rallying cry for which they became known--"girls to the front." And she mentioned that she always used to say that, because it was necessary, but now she realizes, it leaves out a certain contingent of gender expression. She did, however, gently suggest that the men near the front look around to see if they were in front of any women that could not get a good view, and maybe consider stepping back. A song or two later I did that and watched the last half of the set near the sound-booth. 

Hanna writes about this same moment near the end of Rebel Girl:

"'I just want to say that we're a feminist band and we're headlining a festival!' I yelled into the crowd. As people cheered, I stood there silently, feeling proud and awkward at the same time. It didn't scare me, because our shows had always been sprinkled with the awkward. The goal had never been to be perfect; it had always been about asking questions and leaving space for the audience to see parts of themselves flash by. 
And then the 'Girl to the front!' chanted started.
In the nineties I misgendered a butch lesbian at a Bikini Kill show and asked her to go to the back. I met her years later and she told me what I'd done. I apologized profusely and she laughed it off, but it still broke my heart, and it stayed with me. 'Girls to the front' may have served a purpose when we were a tiny band playing tiny clubs, but it was outdated. And while I knew 'girls' included trans women, I guess they might not feel safe pushing to the front, where TERF-y cis women might hassle them. And what about trans men, nonbinary folks, and BIPOC men? I didn't want to tell them to go stand in the back.
I took a breath as the chant got louder, and I asked the cisgender white guys to look around and think about how much space they were taking up. I asked them to think about how unwelcome some people usually felt at shows. I asked them to make space. And then I said, 'Oh, sorry, is this the same thing Slayer said yesterday?'" (315-316)

Not everyone gets to read a book that reflects back a reality as you experienced it, in that space and in that moment, and that also makes you think about all the choices and circumstances of your life up until that point, and so this book may mean more to me than you--but anyone that has any kind of personal connection to Kathleen Hanna or the music she has made will undoubtedly find several moments that cut deep in a similar way. She made something beautiful with her life, and turned her dream into a reality, and anyone that accomplishes such a task and is generous enough to write a book about it deserves praise. Hanna implicitly is saying in this book (and like many of the other memoirs referenced above), "You can do this, too," and giving the reader that confidence to move forward and boldly make their life into something beautiful, too, is a gift like none other.

Grade: A