Another anecdote: flashback to 2004, a session of the creative writing class already referenced in an earlier blog post, officiated by a talented, vaguely depressive, former hotshot with latin roots. I invited a friend of mine to class with me, since he was visiting that week for his spring break. We exchanged a couple notes and a couple conversational asides during the process of a critique of my story. Our activity does not go unnoticed. A week later we receive our "notes" for the class--a rambling "free write" about the creative writing process that our instructor hands out each week and which more often than not, is quite compelling. This time it is extra special for me because I am singled out as an asshole. The instructor tells me that there is nothing more rude than talking to someone else while you are receiving feedback on a story. He takes a few more potshots at my character that I can't recall, though those notes are saved somewhere in my forgotten academic archives. He then goes on to discuss the writing potential of most of the other students in the class, calling some "baby writers," and talking about my ego being huge, and who knows, maybe I might make it one day, but I wouldn't bank on it. He then talked about his own experience. These details I remember. Having a book of short stories published early in his career, becoming a critical darling, making a good deal of money, moving to Manhattan Beach and playing volleyball everyday. Then soon after, realizing that he would need a real job, and working on the runway directing airplanes at LAX. (In retrospect I have to say, not so bad a job--at least the commute was easy). A year and a half later, I wouldn't be friends with that companion that caused me to get in trouble anymore, and two years later I would ask that same instructor for a letter of recommendation for my MFA applications and never receive a reply. None of this has anything to do with One Hundred Years of Solitude except the aforementioned "latin roots." Once in his notes he had written about running through Central Park to pick up Octavio Paz for an honorary ceremony at Columbia University. He also wrote stories for the class for us to critique, which I found extremely endearing, acting as if he were one of us. For one of the stories he said he had written it in my style and another student's style whose name rhymed with mine. That was a great compliment. The second great compliment was the only real piece of advice that did not seem tinged with malice of any kind. He said, "Before you ever try to write anything serious, you have to read One Hundred Years of Solitude. I can't recommend it enough."
The summer of 2004, I went to South Carolina and tried to read it. I made it through about a hundred pages and then had to return it to the library, I think. Now, five years later, it has finally been completed. It took me about two months, minus the time to read One L, which was about a week, making it the longest period I have ever spent reading a single book since the inception of this blog--a troubling development. This includes behemoths like Underworld and The Magic Mountain. I will say first of all that the long time it took me to read this has been dictated by difficult outside circumstances (LSAT 1 test results, job search, LSAT 2 prep, job found, applications imminent, "nerves") and second of all that while I did not find this book to be the revelation that so many before me have called it, I do believe that anyone who cares about improving their literary knowledge should seek it out at some point in their lives and experience it.
Here is my main problem with the book: it is a family saga, and it is a very confusing one. I find it hard to believe that a reader will be able to get through the first two hundred pages without skimming across a few for boredom or tedium or pure confusion. That is why there is a family tree on the first page, for your reference. And while studying this single page may help understanding, it could also give away a few secrets and spoil some parts of the book, but it usually doesn't. My main problem with One Hundred Years of Solitude is that I have read Buddenbrooks, and I would still recommend that family saga over this family saga anyday. However, both are responsible for earning their authors the Nobel Prize. And they are separated by some 67 years, which would make one believe that this one is more modern, but, and this is almost laughable, even Buddenbrooks is more modern.
I felt like quitting for the first 250 pages of the roughly 450 pages this version contains. Most tedious of all was the discussion of the civil war in Macondo, and the differences between liberals and conservatives that made almost no sense to me at all. Also frustrating were the repetitions of the male characters' names Jose, Arcadio, and Aureliano (the latter in particular has 5 characters named that, plus 17 other minor characters) which made me feel like character development was sorely lacking. But there were great parts in the opening 250 pages--for example, the character of Melquiades--who remains present for practically the entire novel and is the true masterstroke of the work. This book introduced the literary term "magical realism," and true, I have not read anything else that approximates this blend of the fantastic and mundane, but then again, I have not read Cervantes, nor any other latin writers--embarrassing, but something I hope to remedy over the years. One exception--I have read some Borges--but Borges still strikes me as more trustworthy than Marquez.
And in two separate afterwords to my edition, it is mentioned in both that this book had its origins in Marquez's childhood, a large part of which he spent living with his grandparents. His grandmother's habit of telling true stories with the same facial expression as when telling completely made-up stories is the device he sought to mimic in the tone of this book--and after reading that, it's clear to me that he has achieved his goal perfectly. Still, it is difficult for me to select any passages for quotation in this post because I did not find any description, exchange, or explanation particularly beautiful. I do believe the last page or two merits quotation, but it would not be right to do that--the ending is the single best part of the book, in my opinion, and well worth the journey to get there.
So I will recommend One Hundred Years of Solitude with reservations. You will have to know that you are getting into a novel that appears to play by no rules, only to find that around page 300, there has always been a relatively clear and focused modus operandi, though one that eschews traditional narrative detail. Marquez does not get sentimental about his characters. They are exposed to myriad punishments and suffering. Many of them do embrace solitude, but none are totally divorced from the outside world.
The reservations that I have about recommending this novel are primarily cultural. This book will not meet the same expectations as a book like say, American Pastoral will. It may be a Nobel Prize winning work of literature, but it does not fall in line with the concept of a "great American novel." It may be a great "South American novel," but for a person such as myself, it is difficult to feel very close to the characters, or to be deeply moved by their story. So for me at least, the greatest value of this work is its imaginative quality. It is almost like Marquez is a crazy grandfather that tells fantastic bedtime stories. And indeed an enterprising parent might read a chapter to their children before bed, in spite of the racier segments, and achieve a connection to an earlier part of society that is increasingly disappearing--oral culture. Whatever mechanism is used for the enjoyment of this text, it will ultimately impress by virtue of its scope. But I do find it hard to believe that every single word could be treasured, and that a reader would not find a single part slow going.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
One L - Scott Turow
I've been thinking about law school for about three years now. This is finally the time that I'll apply to it. Each year has brought increasing seriousness to the pursuit. It hit its full realization when I applied for a $7.75/hour job at Barnes & Noble and saw an interesting book in the legal section called Lawyer Boy. I read some of that on Google Books and it is about going to DePaul in the early to mid 2000's. I would say it is pretty up-to-date and accurate, and probably a lot more applicable to the majority of applicants than One L. That said, anyone who is considering law school should read One L because apparently all of the pain the book describes is going to happen no matter where you end up.
One L takes place at Harvard Law School (HLS) in 1975 and 1976. It is a memoir by Scott Turow, who now lives in Wilmette, I believe, and works for a loop law firm. He is just about the greatest role model someone from the North Shore who wanted to be a writer and decided that it was too hard without a good back-up option so he decided to be a lawyer instead could have. He writes novels and he practices law, and he seems pretty successful at what he does. If I end up like him in thirty five years, I won't be upset with my accomplishments. However, he is not the greatest role model for two reasons:
1) He was teaching Creative Writing at Stanford before he started law school. If I were doing this, despite its undoubtedly lower pay, I would have stuck with it. Plus I'm assuming he got his MFA from Stanford. Something I tried to do but yeah I wouldn't even have bothered with Stanford and it didn't work out anyways.
2) He went to fucking Harvard.
So, one opens up One L and automatically takes a negative attitude towards its author. He is obviously one of the smartest people in the world, or at least one of the luckiest, but one could hardly claim that he didn't put in hard work to get there. Still, he does well on the LSAT (then scored on a scale of 800) and figures he could go to Harvard, so why not? (For someone that didn't score, oh, 175, it's automatically frustrating too).
Once he is into law school and done with all of the magnanimous introductions, however, the story becomes much more human and relatable. Oh wait, he is also already married and "old" at 26 (if I go, I will be starting at 27, and relentlessly single). He begins by describing his courses, professors, and classmates, and this is the majority of the "action" of the book. This is not a novel--this is a memoir--but the names have been changed. He kept what I have to say is a very detailed and impressive journal during the first year that is the basis of the book. His first classes are in Contracts (a year-long course), Civil Procedure (also year-long), Criminal Law (one term) and Torts (one term). Each of the professors--Perini, Morris, Mann (!), and Zechman--become major characters. So do his wife, Annette, his friends Stephen, Terry, and Aubrey, and Karen Sondergard who is always mentioned in conjunction with crying.
There is a fair amount of suicidal depression that occurs in the context of stress associated with first term exams and judging from what I have heard about present-day practices, it hasn't changed. It makes law school seem downright masochistic. And it may in fact be masochistic. But that doesn't change the fact that Turow is excited by the law and enamored with it. So basically, what this book accomplishes is a fair warning to anyone thinking about the major commitment that is three years of intense scrutiny, endless studying, and what basically amounts to public humiliation. If you still think you want to go after reading it, you have been warned. I personally still want to go. I'm not afraid of it. Especially since certain things seem to have changed in the last 33 years, and certain things would be unique to HLS and not other law schools.
I know that the admission process is insane enough as it is, and the first year is the most "intellectually traumatizing" experience one can have (as one friend described it to me). But One L does take a bit of the mystery out of the law school experience and gives one a better idea of what to expect. However, it is dated. Harvard costs $3,000 a year in 1975. Who knows what that equates to, inflation-wise, but still, thirteen times the price? Law school is one of the most ridiculously expensive things there is in this world (perhaps it is not as bad as a $10,000 bottle of wine). But salaries are also higher, thankfully:
"I was accustomed to teachers' salaries. At Stanford, in the English department, a full professor, well respected, after a lifetime of successful teaching and scholarship might have been earning $22,000. That is the starting salary for Harvard graduates at many firms in New York. (101)
"A poll taken during interview season and published in the law school newspaper showed that the 1Ls responding hoped for an average income of $28,000 in their twentieth year out of law school and a starting salary of $13,000." (102)
Turow does have some intriguing suggestions for law school reform, and the book mainly serves as a soapbox for exploring those incidents that merit consideration in changing certain policies or traditions. One of them that I found intriguing was the practice of grading exams blindly--that is, the student's name is replaced by an ID number while the professor grades them. First of all, I would say that basing a student's entire grade for a year-long course on a single exam is messed up as it is, but that is something that seems fairly established no matter where you look. But doing it blindly, without any consideration to a student's in-class accomplishments seems even more unfair:
"And there were also a number of people who'd demonstrated real insight into legal problems in class but who somehow had not done well on the exams. Ned Cauley was one. In a case like his, I was left wondering if the law school's system of blind grading--with a student's entire mark based on a test identified by a number and not by name--was worth it, or if it forced professors to ignore knowledge obviously relevant to their evaluations." (239)
Turow's most compelling single statement, however, concerns the practice of number-crunching law school applicants and law school students to the degree that the cycle becomes truly vicious, and one might say, unjust:
"But one thing nags which does not bear directly on me anymore, but is worth mention. Right now admissions at most American law schools are based on predictions of how well applicants will do in school, which is to say how high they will rank on exams. Those forecasts, based on statistical formulae that combine LSAT scores and college grades, are often quite accurate. But that amounts only to saying that American law schools admit people who will be good test-takers rather than good attorneys. Correlations between exam success and worthwhile achievements in the practice of law are speculative at best. Until that connection is better established, the narrow and arbitrary nature of exams will continue to dictate a narrow and arbitrary means of selection for training for the bar. And that is a peculiar state of affairs for a profession and an education which claim to concern themselves with rationality, with fairness." (199)
For moments like these, where Turow's rhetoric rises above to the level of a nearly profound articulateness, those in the field of legal education will benefit from a perusal of this text. But this post is probably an unnecessary prescription--it seems as if One L has attained pre-eminent status amongst law school hopefuls and pre-1Lers. But the depictions of classroom conduct by professors, as well as the competitive nature of the classmates (a necessary evil of the system, it seems) will remind the reader what it means to be a decent person in a sea of indecency. Even when Turow himself cracks and claims he doesn't give a damn about anybody else, he wants the advantage on the last exam, the reader may be inclined to agree with him. But not before he comes to his senses and realizes that he may be taking everything just a little too seriously (emphasis on little).
Maybe there are attendant memoirs about going to med school and going to business school and going to a PHD program and an MFA program, but if they are lacking, Turow's accomplishment can point the way for others. This book is occasionally dry, but so is the law, and anyone interested in reading it should be expecting that and so it is obviously forgivable. It's not the greatest book I've ever read, but I haven't read many suspense stories about going to school, and it is probably the best in that genre that I have noticed. But maybe I am just biased and self-serving.
One L takes place at Harvard Law School (HLS) in 1975 and 1976. It is a memoir by Scott Turow, who now lives in Wilmette, I believe, and works for a loop law firm. He is just about the greatest role model someone from the North Shore who wanted to be a writer and decided that it was too hard without a good back-up option so he decided to be a lawyer instead could have. He writes novels and he practices law, and he seems pretty successful at what he does. If I end up like him in thirty five years, I won't be upset with my accomplishments. However, he is not the greatest role model for two reasons:
1) He was teaching Creative Writing at Stanford before he started law school. If I were doing this, despite its undoubtedly lower pay, I would have stuck with it. Plus I'm assuming he got his MFA from Stanford. Something I tried to do but yeah I wouldn't even have bothered with Stanford and it didn't work out anyways.
2) He went to fucking Harvard.
So, one opens up One L and automatically takes a negative attitude towards its author. He is obviously one of the smartest people in the world, or at least one of the luckiest, but one could hardly claim that he didn't put in hard work to get there. Still, he does well on the LSAT (then scored on a scale of 800) and figures he could go to Harvard, so why not? (For someone that didn't score, oh, 175, it's automatically frustrating too).
Once he is into law school and done with all of the magnanimous introductions, however, the story becomes much more human and relatable. Oh wait, he is also already married and "old" at 26 (if I go, I will be starting at 27, and relentlessly single). He begins by describing his courses, professors, and classmates, and this is the majority of the "action" of the book. This is not a novel--this is a memoir--but the names have been changed. He kept what I have to say is a very detailed and impressive journal during the first year that is the basis of the book. His first classes are in Contracts (a year-long course), Civil Procedure (also year-long), Criminal Law (one term) and Torts (one term). Each of the professors--Perini, Morris, Mann (!), and Zechman--become major characters. So do his wife, Annette, his friends Stephen, Terry, and Aubrey, and Karen Sondergard who is always mentioned in conjunction with crying.
There is a fair amount of suicidal depression that occurs in the context of stress associated with first term exams and judging from what I have heard about present-day practices, it hasn't changed. It makes law school seem downright masochistic. And it may in fact be masochistic. But that doesn't change the fact that Turow is excited by the law and enamored with it. So basically, what this book accomplishes is a fair warning to anyone thinking about the major commitment that is three years of intense scrutiny, endless studying, and what basically amounts to public humiliation. If you still think you want to go after reading it, you have been warned. I personally still want to go. I'm not afraid of it. Especially since certain things seem to have changed in the last 33 years, and certain things would be unique to HLS and not other law schools.
I know that the admission process is insane enough as it is, and the first year is the most "intellectually traumatizing" experience one can have (as one friend described it to me). But One L does take a bit of the mystery out of the law school experience and gives one a better idea of what to expect. However, it is dated. Harvard costs $3,000 a year in 1975. Who knows what that equates to, inflation-wise, but still, thirteen times the price? Law school is one of the most ridiculously expensive things there is in this world (perhaps it is not as bad as a $10,000 bottle of wine). But salaries are also higher, thankfully:
"I was accustomed to teachers' salaries. At Stanford, in the English department, a full professor, well respected, after a lifetime of successful teaching and scholarship might have been earning $22,000. That is the starting salary for Harvard graduates at many firms in New York. (101)
"A poll taken during interview season and published in the law school newspaper showed that the 1Ls responding hoped for an average income of $28,000 in their twentieth year out of law school and a starting salary of $13,000." (102)
Turow does have some intriguing suggestions for law school reform, and the book mainly serves as a soapbox for exploring those incidents that merit consideration in changing certain policies or traditions. One of them that I found intriguing was the practice of grading exams blindly--that is, the student's name is replaced by an ID number while the professor grades them. First of all, I would say that basing a student's entire grade for a year-long course on a single exam is messed up as it is, but that is something that seems fairly established no matter where you look. But doing it blindly, without any consideration to a student's in-class accomplishments seems even more unfair:
"And there were also a number of people who'd demonstrated real insight into legal problems in class but who somehow had not done well on the exams. Ned Cauley was one. In a case like his, I was left wondering if the law school's system of blind grading--with a student's entire mark based on a test identified by a number and not by name--was worth it, or if it forced professors to ignore knowledge obviously relevant to their evaluations." (239)
Turow's most compelling single statement, however, concerns the practice of number-crunching law school applicants and law school students to the degree that the cycle becomes truly vicious, and one might say, unjust:
"But one thing nags which does not bear directly on me anymore, but is worth mention. Right now admissions at most American law schools are based on predictions of how well applicants will do in school, which is to say how high they will rank on exams. Those forecasts, based on statistical formulae that combine LSAT scores and college grades, are often quite accurate. But that amounts only to saying that American law schools admit people who will be good test-takers rather than good attorneys. Correlations between exam success and worthwhile achievements in the practice of law are speculative at best. Until that connection is better established, the narrow and arbitrary nature of exams will continue to dictate a narrow and arbitrary means of selection for training for the bar. And that is a peculiar state of affairs for a profession and an education which claim to concern themselves with rationality, with fairness." (199)
For moments like these, where Turow's rhetoric rises above to the level of a nearly profound articulateness, those in the field of legal education will benefit from a perusal of this text. But this post is probably an unnecessary prescription--it seems as if One L has attained pre-eminent status amongst law school hopefuls and pre-1Lers. But the depictions of classroom conduct by professors, as well as the competitive nature of the classmates (a necessary evil of the system, it seems) will remind the reader what it means to be a decent person in a sea of indecency. Even when Turow himself cracks and claims he doesn't give a damn about anybody else, he wants the advantage on the last exam, the reader may be inclined to agree with him. But not before he comes to his senses and realizes that he may be taking everything just a little too seriously (emphasis on little).
Maybe there are attendant memoirs about going to med school and going to business school and going to a PHD program and an MFA program, but if they are lacking, Turow's accomplishment can point the way for others. This book is occasionally dry, but so is the law, and anyone interested in reading it should be expecting that and so it is obviously forgivable. It's not the greatest book I've ever read, but I haven't read many suspense stories about going to school, and it is probably the best in that genre that I have noticed. But maybe I am just biased and self-serving.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Pitchfork Music Festival - 7/17/09, 7/18/09
I forgot to bring my camera with me this year, so I won't be able to include any pictures. This is the 4th Pitchfork Music Festival that I have attended ('05, '06, '07, and now '09)--I would have gone last year, which I think had the best line-up yet, but I was in L.A. I read in the Chicago Tribune this year that they had to scale back their ambitions for big name performers and go for more up-and-coming talent. But that has always been the case with this event. Lollapalooza has been occurring two weeks afterwards for the same period of the last 5 summers and while sometimes great bands play that other festival (last year had a similarly great best line-up ever) it is SO not worth it.
While Grant Park is THE outdoor space of Chicago and a badass place for a music festival, it is ultimately TOO BIG and so Union Park, where Pitchfork occurs, is a much more welcome respite. You do not have the whole of the skyline as your backdrop, but you do have the Willis Tower (!) in close view. Beer is cheaper by a dollar or two, I think. The food options are similar, but I still think Lolla is more expensive on that front too. The ticket price difference is frankly absurd. And the line-up this year is way lame. The only bands I would see would be Lou Reed and Deerhunter--and they play at the exact same time, so sorry, but I would see Lou Reed, but I feel like I would be crestfallen at the end of the set for missing that other band in their prime.
I didn't go last night to see Flaming Lips, and Sunday probably had the best line-up of any single day. And I don't have pictures but I will relay a short narrative to deliver my central thesis: the best moment of the summer has passed, unfortunately! (at least in this city).
Friday night I went in hoping to see Yo La Tengo, Jesus Lizard, and Built to Spill. I arrived, having purchased my tickets through will-call, and proceeded to wait for ONE HOUR outside the gates while Tortoise finished up and Yo La Tengo started. Their organization at the will call window was a total disaster and made me feel that I was in for a horrible weekend and that all the money I blew was going to be a total waste. Well, I got in, and was very grateful that it worked out, and I stood pretty close to the stage waiting for Jesus Lizard for about 45-50 minutes. I saw Yo La Tengo playing in the distance and they looked like they were tearing it up (though they didn't play "Too Late" which would have been on my request list).
One difference from this year was that there were no announcers or Thax Douglas reading poems before the sets would start, which I have to say was sort of fun in a way. But Jesus Lizard started, and they played "Puss" as their opening song, and David Yow immediately jumped into the crowd and sang the first words of the song while being held aloft, and I was in serious pain. I almost lost my glasses. It was without question the most violent show I have ever experienced. Their sound was excellent and David Yow proved that he is one of the best frontmen in all of rock, even during a reunion tour. Some of the other highlights were "Then Comes Dudley," "Boilermaker," "Gladiator," "Blue Shot," "Monkey Trick," and "Bloody Mary." I was surprised that there were about three or four songs I didn't recognize. I had to leave during their last song because I was so beaten up. Then they played a two-song encore, which I missed too. I needed to get a water, I was dehydrated. (Jesus Lizard will play the Metro around Thanksgiving and I hope to be there. I also hope not to die there, but something tells me the crowd-surfing will be more contained at the Metro.) It was a cool weekend (probably the coldest in the history of the event) but there was plenty of sweating anyways. Built to Spill played, and I watched them play "Liar" and "Stab" and decided that the place was way too crowded and it wasn't worth it for me to stay. Don't get me wrong--I love BtS but I have to admit that they can be a boring live band.
The next day was much more fun for me because I decided to drink. The first set I saw was Fucked Up, and this was almost as violent as the Jesus Lizard, but the crowd was not quite as crazy, probably because Fucked Up are a regular working band, though I am sure many would argue that each set was just as wild. This was the second best set of the weekend for me. They played about half songs from The Chemistry of Common Life and the other half from Hidden World, at least as it seemed to me. Pink Eyes was the Tim Harrington of this year. Ideally both of them could play back-to-back next year.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart were next, and I have not heard their record, and I only saw them from a distance, but I have to say, they were pretty cool! However, they sound EXACTLY like My Bloody Valentine. This is not a bad thing. However, it led me to theorize that, okay, they like MBV, I like MBV, we all love MBV--why not start a band that sounds just like MBV and then everyone will love us, and we can be the new MBV? That was what I feel went on in those band members' heads two years ago or whatever. Their male singer sounds just like Kevin Shields and their female singer sounds just like Blinda Butcher and their guitar sound recalls the Isn't Anything-era. Maybe Loveless is next? Regardless, I liked them. I'd get their album on the basis of the live show.
Ponytail were next, and I liked them alright, but not as much as Pains of Being Pure at Heart (as these were the only two I had never previously heard). They were like a combination of Yoko Ono, The Go! Team, and Deerhoof. They were interesting. I don't know if I'd go out and get their record. I think I would have liked them more if I was closer to the stage.
I waited around for Wavves next, and they were about twenty minutes late starting their set, which started to draw ire from the crowd, thinking that another meltdown might be in store for us. Half the people wanted there to be a meltdown actually. When he finally started, he played "Nervous Breakdown," which was wonderfully unexpected and awesome. Then he turned in what I have to say was a very solid performance. I really enjoyed their set. It wasn't a disappointment and hopefully he has redeemed himself and will prove the haters wrong.
I saw parts of MF Doom, but I had gotten more beer and a snack before. I saw about three songs by them. It was okay I guess. I just feel like hip-hop is a lot more predictable when it comes to the actual performance aspect than rock because you are not worrying about the band playing. You just have to remember your lyrics. Regardless, the Tribune said Doom had lip-synched his lines, and I couldn't tell if that was true, or if that was just hyperbole (one of the vocab words he tossed off near the end).
I saw part of Matt & Kim, by this point really drunk and getting free beer because a friend knew someone at one of the tents. (Another girl at the tent played drums for TV on the Radio and Spoon during live shows and I was like, oh my God that's the coolest thing in the world!) I compared them to Fiery Furnaces but they are nothing like them. My friend told me he threw "Widow City" out of his car window during his recent road trip and I was shocked and offended. Fiery Furnaces should play Pitchfork festival because a) they never played before, b) they are from Chicago, c) they rule. Matt & Kim have nothing on them, but they are interesting for being super happy people--I wish I could be like them!
Black Lips closed out what I saw (I missed the National, sorry)--and while I haven't heard their recent record, their last record, I just couldn't get into, sorry. "Cold Hands" and "O Katrina!" are O.K. as far as the best songs on the album, but happily, Black Lips are a good live band. I kept saying I didn't like them and they would only be redeemed if Bradford Cox came up as a special guest which I said had a 1% chance of happening--but overall, they sounded pretty good live. If I were closer, I'm sure I would have gotten really into it. But by that point the alcohol had turned me into a disinterested half-zombie, spewing bile about whatever crazed topic entered my mind.
Yo La Tengo: 8/10
Jesus Lizard : 9/10
Built to Spill: 6/10
Fucked Up: 9/10
Pains of Being Pure at Heart: 7/10
Ponytail: 6.5/10
Wavves: 8/10
MF Doom: 5/10
Matt & Kim: 5/10
Black Lips: 7/10
Regardless of my personal situation, which has deteriorated greatly from the excellent times of 2005 and 2007, this is still the best event in the city of Chicago. Period. Let the summer wind down, bring on the pain of winter, and start counting the days until they announce next year's line-up. Boycott Lollapalooza until they bring ticket prices down to, oh, $50 a day ($60 with service fees...).
While Grant Park is THE outdoor space of Chicago and a badass place for a music festival, it is ultimately TOO BIG and so Union Park, where Pitchfork occurs, is a much more welcome respite. You do not have the whole of the skyline as your backdrop, but you do have the Willis Tower (!) in close view. Beer is cheaper by a dollar or two, I think. The food options are similar, but I still think Lolla is more expensive on that front too. The ticket price difference is frankly absurd. And the line-up this year is way lame. The only bands I would see would be Lou Reed and Deerhunter--and they play at the exact same time, so sorry, but I would see Lou Reed, but I feel like I would be crestfallen at the end of the set for missing that other band in their prime.
I didn't go last night to see Flaming Lips, and Sunday probably had the best line-up of any single day. And I don't have pictures but I will relay a short narrative to deliver my central thesis: the best moment of the summer has passed, unfortunately! (at least in this city).
Friday night I went in hoping to see Yo La Tengo, Jesus Lizard, and Built to Spill. I arrived, having purchased my tickets through will-call, and proceeded to wait for ONE HOUR outside the gates while Tortoise finished up and Yo La Tengo started. Their organization at the will call window was a total disaster and made me feel that I was in for a horrible weekend and that all the money I blew was going to be a total waste. Well, I got in, and was very grateful that it worked out, and I stood pretty close to the stage waiting for Jesus Lizard for about 45-50 minutes. I saw Yo La Tengo playing in the distance and they looked like they were tearing it up (though they didn't play "Too Late" which would have been on my request list).
One difference from this year was that there were no announcers or Thax Douglas reading poems before the sets would start, which I have to say was sort of fun in a way. But Jesus Lizard started, and they played "Puss" as their opening song, and David Yow immediately jumped into the crowd and sang the first words of the song while being held aloft, and I was in serious pain. I almost lost my glasses. It was without question the most violent show I have ever experienced. Their sound was excellent and David Yow proved that he is one of the best frontmen in all of rock, even during a reunion tour. Some of the other highlights were "Then Comes Dudley," "Boilermaker," "Gladiator," "Blue Shot," "Monkey Trick," and "Bloody Mary." I was surprised that there were about three or four songs I didn't recognize. I had to leave during their last song because I was so beaten up. Then they played a two-song encore, which I missed too. I needed to get a water, I was dehydrated. (Jesus Lizard will play the Metro around Thanksgiving and I hope to be there. I also hope not to die there, but something tells me the crowd-surfing will be more contained at the Metro.) It was a cool weekend (probably the coldest in the history of the event) but there was plenty of sweating anyways. Built to Spill played, and I watched them play "Liar" and "Stab" and decided that the place was way too crowded and it wasn't worth it for me to stay. Don't get me wrong--I love BtS but I have to admit that they can be a boring live band.
The next day was much more fun for me because I decided to drink. The first set I saw was Fucked Up, and this was almost as violent as the Jesus Lizard, but the crowd was not quite as crazy, probably because Fucked Up are a regular working band, though I am sure many would argue that each set was just as wild. This was the second best set of the weekend for me. They played about half songs from The Chemistry of Common Life and the other half from Hidden World, at least as it seemed to me. Pink Eyes was the Tim Harrington of this year. Ideally both of them could play back-to-back next year.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart were next, and I have not heard their record, and I only saw them from a distance, but I have to say, they were pretty cool! However, they sound EXACTLY like My Bloody Valentine. This is not a bad thing. However, it led me to theorize that, okay, they like MBV, I like MBV, we all love MBV--why not start a band that sounds just like MBV and then everyone will love us, and we can be the new MBV? That was what I feel went on in those band members' heads two years ago or whatever. Their male singer sounds just like Kevin Shields and their female singer sounds just like Blinda Butcher and their guitar sound recalls the Isn't Anything-era. Maybe Loveless is next? Regardless, I liked them. I'd get their album on the basis of the live show.
Ponytail were next, and I liked them alright, but not as much as Pains of Being Pure at Heart (as these were the only two I had never previously heard). They were like a combination of Yoko Ono, The Go! Team, and Deerhoof. They were interesting. I don't know if I'd go out and get their record. I think I would have liked them more if I was closer to the stage.
I waited around for Wavves next, and they were about twenty minutes late starting their set, which started to draw ire from the crowd, thinking that another meltdown might be in store for us. Half the people wanted there to be a meltdown actually. When he finally started, he played "Nervous Breakdown," which was wonderfully unexpected and awesome. Then he turned in what I have to say was a very solid performance. I really enjoyed their set. It wasn't a disappointment and hopefully he has redeemed himself and will prove the haters wrong.
I saw parts of MF Doom, but I had gotten more beer and a snack before. I saw about three songs by them. It was okay I guess. I just feel like hip-hop is a lot more predictable when it comes to the actual performance aspect than rock because you are not worrying about the band playing. You just have to remember your lyrics. Regardless, the Tribune said Doom had lip-synched his lines, and I couldn't tell if that was true, or if that was just hyperbole (one of the vocab words he tossed off near the end).
I saw part of Matt & Kim, by this point really drunk and getting free beer because a friend knew someone at one of the tents. (Another girl at the tent played drums for TV on the Radio and Spoon during live shows and I was like, oh my God that's the coolest thing in the world!) I compared them to Fiery Furnaces but they are nothing like them. My friend told me he threw "Widow City" out of his car window during his recent road trip and I was shocked and offended. Fiery Furnaces should play Pitchfork festival because a) they never played before, b) they are from Chicago, c) they rule. Matt & Kim have nothing on them, but they are interesting for being super happy people--I wish I could be like them!
Black Lips closed out what I saw (I missed the National, sorry)--and while I haven't heard their recent record, their last record, I just couldn't get into, sorry. "Cold Hands" and "O Katrina!" are O.K. as far as the best songs on the album, but happily, Black Lips are a good live band. I kept saying I didn't like them and they would only be redeemed if Bradford Cox came up as a special guest which I said had a 1% chance of happening--but overall, they sounded pretty good live. If I were closer, I'm sure I would have gotten really into it. But by that point the alcohol had turned me into a disinterested half-zombie, spewing bile about whatever crazed topic entered my mind.
Yo La Tengo: 8/10
Jesus Lizard : 9/10
Built to Spill: 6/10
Fucked Up: 9/10
Pains of Being Pure at Heart: 7/10
Ponytail: 6.5/10
Wavves: 8/10
MF Doom: 5/10
Matt & Kim: 5/10
Black Lips: 7/10
Regardless of my personal situation, which has deteriorated greatly from the excellent times of 2005 and 2007, this is still the best event in the city of Chicago. Period. Let the summer wind down, bring on the pain of winter, and start counting the days until they announce next year's line-up. Boycott Lollapalooza until they bring ticket prices down to, oh, $50 a day ($60 with service fees...).
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Swann's Way - Marcel Proust (incomplete)
About a year ago, while reviewing Desolation Angels, I mentioned that I wanted to read Proust. Like Kerouac, Proust is one of the few major literary figures who made a career off of writing thinly-veiled autobiography and describing the experiences of his real life, rather than searching for the fantastic fictional scenario to elucidate and transmit an idea of complexity. Proust is also one of the most eccentric figures in modern literature--being pretty much a bonafide hermit who never really had a job and lived off his parents fortunes until he took his famous "cork-lined" room after the devastating death of his mother. In this room, he wrote all seven volumes of the almost 3,000 page "longest book of all time"--of which Swann's Way is volume 1. Proust is a major intellectual giant--it is clear--but his eccentricity also clearly shines through in his work, and that can make it a bit inaccessible for readers, which is the only explanation I have for the now-third (incomplete) in the title of this post.
Part of the reason I picked up this book was the new Yo La Tengo song where Ira Kaplan says he never read Proust because it seemed too long. Yeah, I pretty much felt it was time to give it a shot, and I tried, and I got through about sixty pages, and I want to move onto something by Garcia Marquez, a novel I tried to read about five years ago and stopped for reasons I can't recall. So there's a little sneak preview for you. But this next book is long too and will probably take me a couple weeks.
Here is my feeling on Swann's Way: in the introduction to my volume, Lydia Davis says something about why the text is difficult. Not only are there the famously long sentences, but there is also the indescribable detail inherent in them. At a lot of these details, the reader may be moved to say, "Who cares--get on with the story you colossal bore!" Davis points out that the reader must adjust to Proust's speed--slow down, as it were, be content to savor the static. And yes, I greatly admire Proust's ideology and concept behind his work. When I first heard about him, I thought it lied very close to the same aims I hoped to produce in my own work--the inexplicable singularity of a life, with all of its attendant idiosyncrasies, which thereby educates an audience more as to the total "meaning of existence." Lofty ambitions indeed, and I will say, after 60 pages, that I am sure Proust succeeds on his own philosophical level, but that 21st century American readers will find it extremely difficult to "dig."
That said, whenever my life becomes "more intellectual" and I'm "less stressed out"--I will return to Proust--and it won't take someone else convincing me that it's worthwhile like that previous (incomplete) post. Despite the long stretches of boredom, there appear sentences of unusual beauty, and these random moments, for me, make all of the tedium worthwhile:
"My great-aunt was so used to seeing Swann always as the same adolescent that she was surprised to find him suddenly not as young as the age she continued to attribute to him. And my family was also beginning to feel that in him this aging was abnormal, excessive, shameful, and more deserved by the unmarried, by all those for whom it seems that the great day that has no tomorrow is longer than for others, because for them it is empty and the moments in it add up from morning on without then being divided among children." (34)
And of course there is the famous petites madeleines passage that occurs at the end of the first section of this volume. It is highly quotable and spells out the raison d'etre of the work as a whole:
"....But at the very instant when the mouthful of tea mixed with cake crumbs touched my palate, I quivered, attentive to the extraordinary thing that was happening inside me. A delicious pleasure had invaded me, isolated me, without my having any notion as to its cause. It had immediately rendered the vicissitudes of life unimportant to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory, acting in the same way that love acts, by filling me with a precious essence: or rather this essence was not merely inside me, it was me. I had ceased to feel mediocre, contingent, mortal. Where could it have come to me from--this powerful joy? I sensed that it was connected to the taste of the tea and the cake, but that it went infinitely far beyond it, could not be of the same nature. Where did it come from? What did it mean? How could I grasp it? I drink a second mouthful, in which I find nothing more than in the first, a third that gives me a little less than the second. It is time for me to stop, the virtue of the drink seems to be diminishing. Clearly, the truth I am seeking is not in the drink, but in me. The drink has awoken it in me, but does not know this truth, and can do more than repeat indefinitely, with less and less force, this same testimony which I do not know how to interpret and which I want at least to be able to ask of it again and find again, intact, available to me, soon, for a decisive clarification...." (45)
Part of the reason I picked up this book was the new Yo La Tengo song where Ira Kaplan says he never read Proust because it seemed too long. Yeah, I pretty much felt it was time to give it a shot, and I tried, and I got through about sixty pages, and I want to move onto something by Garcia Marquez, a novel I tried to read about five years ago and stopped for reasons I can't recall. So there's a little sneak preview for you. But this next book is long too and will probably take me a couple weeks.
Here is my feeling on Swann's Way: in the introduction to my volume, Lydia Davis says something about why the text is difficult. Not only are there the famously long sentences, but there is also the indescribable detail inherent in them. At a lot of these details, the reader may be moved to say, "Who cares--get on with the story you colossal bore!" Davis points out that the reader must adjust to Proust's speed--slow down, as it were, be content to savor the static. And yes, I greatly admire Proust's ideology and concept behind his work. When I first heard about him, I thought it lied very close to the same aims I hoped to produce in my own work--the inexplicable singularity of a life, with all of its attendant idiosyncrasies, which thereby educates an audience more as to the total "meaning of existence." Lofty ambitions indeed, and I will say, after 60 pages, that I am sure Proust succeeds on his own philosophical level, but that 21st century American readers will find it extremely difficult to "dig."
That said, whenever my life becomes "more intellectual" and I'm "less stressed out"--I will return to Proust--and it won't take someone else convincing me that it's worthwhile like that previous (incomplete) post. Despite the long stretches of boredom, there appear sentences of unusual beauty, and these random moments, for me, make all of the tedium worthwhile:
"My great-aunt was so used to seeing Swann always as the same adolescent that she was surprised to find him suddenly not as young as the age she continued to attribute to him. And my family was also beginning to feel that in him this aging was abnormal, excessive, shameful, and more deserved by the unmarried, by all those for whom it seems that the great day that has no tomorrow is longer than for others, because for them it is empty and the moments in it add up from morning on without then being divided among children." (34)
And of course there is the famous petites madeleines passage that occurs at the end of the first section of this volume. It is highly quotable and spells out the raison d'etre of the work as a whole:
"....But at the very instant when the mouthful of tea mixed with cake crumbs touched my palate, I quivered, attentive to the extraordinary thing that was happening inside me. A delicious pleasure had invaded me, isolated me, without my having any notion as to its cause. It had immediately rendered the vicissitudes of life unimportant to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory, acting in the same way that love acts, by filling me with a precious essence: or rather this essence was not merely inside me, it was me. I had ceased to feel mediocre, contingent, mortal. Where could it have come to me from--this powerful joy? I sensed that it was connected to the taste of the tea and the cake, but that it went infinitely far beyond it, could not be of the same nature. Where did it come from? What did it mean? How could I grasp it? I drink a second mouthful, in which I find nothing more than in the first, a third that gives me a little less than the second. It is time for me to stop, the virtue of the drink seems to be diminishing. Clearly, the truth I am seeking is not in the drink, but in me. The drink has awoken it in me, but does not know this truth, and can do more than repeat indefinitely, with less and less force, this same testimony which I do not know how to interpret and which I want at least to be able to ask of it again and find again, intact, available to me, soon, for a decisive clarification...." (45)
Friday, June 26, 2009
The Hurt Locker - Dir. Katheryn Bigelow
It's been more than six years since I've been invited to experience any part of a film festival, but a week ago I had the pleasure of attending a few events in Nantucket as part of their 8th annual bash. I was not extremely active--I saw one film, and went to two events which included lots of free booze and hors d'oeuvres. I saw several celebrities and famous personalities act contrary to my prior conceptions. But it would be tedious to get into that discussion--I will only note that Brian Williams should quit his news anchor gig and become a stand-up comedian and a more than part-time indie rock blogger.
I do want to mention The Hurt Locker, the only movie I saw, almost exactly one week ago today from this post. It is directed by Katheryn Bigelow. I have never seen a movie by her before, though a few are mildly famous (Point Break, K-19: The Widowmaker), and now I will finally get around to seeing Strange Days. I did have the opportunity to tell her and I regret not doing so, but if I could go back a week in time, I would say to her: Strange Days had the coolest trailer I have ever seen in my life--the teaser trailer, that is, the one I saw in 1995. I haven't forgotten it, and I've watched it now, and I will post my first ever link to youtube on this blog in case you are interested, but I will just say, it made me want to be the person who edits trailers:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0zaqWQiXG8
Too bad I'm not so cool that I can post the actual picture of that video in the text.
Anyways, The Hurt Locker is more of an indie film than some of Bigelow's previous ventures, and I would give it three, or three and a half stars (three and a quarter) if I had to rate it. It's very long, and I fell asleep during it for about three or four minutes, but that's no reflection upon its overall quality.
I'll be honest--I haven't seen every movie about the current (over yet?) stint in Iraq--in fact, I haven't seen more than a couple of them--no Redacted, no Stop-Loss, no The Kingdom, no In the Valley of Elah (which was co-written by the screenwriter of this film), no The Lucky Ones--but I have seen Three Kings and I would say that this film does not quite measure up to that one--but that's a different war--bad joke, but I am trying to give a sense of relative greatness.
I would still venture the guess that The Hurt Locker trades less in overtly leftist prosyletization than its predecessors and is probably the best film about the nouveau war in Iraq. It is about the people that defuse bombs. And that is pretty much all it is about. When I read that description, I wasn't all that excited about it--I was more interested in seeing Cold Souls, or Serious Moonlight, or even Beeswax--but I am glad I saw this instead. The scenes of "bomb-teching," or whatever, are expertly directed, chilling in their realism, and are definitely one of the more original approaches to the "action sequence" that I have ever seen (in a way that Speed or Die Hard with a Vengeance turn these moments into blockbuster popcorn fare, The Hurt Locker is content to stay totally ordinary and mundane--the less stuff that blows up, the better--and the audience becomes more involved as a result).
The Transformers sequel just opened and is making more money than practically everything before it, but it has gotten some brutal reviews. The Hurt Locker is opening today and will probably be forgotten, languishing on DVD or random cable stations. Whatever the medium, I recommend you find a couple extra hours and experience this film. I don't think you will regret it. At the very least, this film should be Jeremy Renner's breakout performance. At best, you will leave shaken and with a new-found respect for those that give their lives for this country. It might even work well as a military recruitment video. If you are young and thinking about going out for service, this would be a good film to see, which is more than I could say for the others.
I do want to mention The Hurt Locker, the only movie I saw, almost exactly one week ago today from this post. It is directed by Katheryn Bigelow. I have never seen a movie by her before, though a few are mildly famous (Point Break, K-19: The Widowmaker), and now I will finally get around to seeing Strange Days. I did have the opportunity to tell her and I regret not doing so, but if I could go back a week in time, I would say to her: Strange Days had the coolest trailer I have ever seen in my life--the teaser trailer, that is, the one I saw in 1995. I haven't forgotten it, and I've watched it now, and I will post my first ever link to youtube on this blog in case you are interested, but I will just say, it made me want to be the person who edits trailers:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0zaqWQiXG8
Too bad I'm not so cool that I can post the actual picture of that video in the text.
Anyways, The Hurt Locker is more of an indie film than some of Bigelow's previous ventures, and I would give it three, or three and a half stars (three and a quarter) if I had to rate it. It's very long, and I fell asleep during it for about three or four minutes, but that's no reflection upon its overall quality.
I'll be honest--I haven't seen every movie about the current (over yet?) stint in Iraq--in fact, I haven't seen more than a couple of them--no Redacted, no Stop-Loss, no The Kingdom, no In the Valley of Elah (which was co-written by the screenwriter of this film), no The Lucky Ones--but I have seen Three Kings and I would say that this film does not quite measure up to that one--but that's a different war--bad joke, but I am trying to give a sense of relative greatness.
I would still venture the guess that The Hurt Locker trades less in overtly leftist prosyletization than its predecessors and is probably the best film about the nouveau war in Iraq. It is about the people that defuse bombs. And that is pretty much all it is about. When I read that description, I wasn't all that excited about it--I was more interested in seeing Cold Souls, or Serious Moonlight, or even Beeswax--but I am glad I saw this instead. The scenes of "bomb-teching," or whatever, are expertly directed, chilling in their realism, and are definitely one of the more original approaches to the "action sequence" that I have ever seen (in a way that Speed or Die Hard with a Vengeance turn these moments into blockbuster popcorn fare, The Hurt Locker is content to stay totally ordinary and mundane--the less stuff that blows up, the better--and the audience becomes more involved as a result).
The Transformers sequel just opened and is making more money than practically everything before it, but it has gotten some brutal reviews. The Hurt Locker is opening today and will probably be forgotten, languishing on DVD or random cable stations. Whatever the medium, I recommend you find a couple extra hours and experience this film. I don't think you will regret it. At the very least, this film should be Jeremy Renner's breakout performance. At best, you will leave shaken and with a new-found respect for those that give their lives for this country. It might even work well as a military recruitment video. If you are young and thinking about going out for service, this would be a good film to see, which is more than I could say for the others.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Pygmy- Chuck Palahniuk (incomplete)
Happy 100 posts day! It's unfortunate that it must be so slight a review this time, but I could not fail to report about what happened with Pygmy, Chuck Palahniuk's most recent novel.
As some of you may be aware I have reviewed all of this author's books on this blog, owing the obsession to a bit of film rights success envy. Along with Bret Easton Ellis (and perhaps Cormac McCarthy, we might say) Palahniuk seems to attract filmmakers with his work at an above-average rate. I've liked a lot of Palahniuk's books (Choke is a much better book than film, and Rant is very original and may be made into a movie soon), but I could not get past the second chapter of Pygmy. Faced with carrying it around with me for two weeks and seeing what happened, or trying to take on Proust instead, this book went back into the return bin.
What's the problem with it? It's quite simple really. I feel like this is the true literary equivalent to Eli Cash's novel Wildcat, to those that have seen The Royal Tenenbaums. In the scene in that movie, the Charlie Rose-type journalist asks the author, "Wildcat. Not a success. Can you explain why?" And Owen Wilson replies, "Wildcat. It was written in an obscure vernacular. Wow, Wildcat. Pttcchhoowww. I gotta go." Now, in interviews, Palahniuk has been enthusiastic about the dialect that this novel is written in, and has said that it was kind of like writing poetry. And once one does read it for a while (I read it for about 30 pages), it is possible to get into a rhythm where it is more understandable.
While the 2nd chapter may be "hardcore," or whatever, it's hardly believable, and the satire is so extreme that it becomes almost total nonsense, and while I am sure there is a serious moral debate taking place under metaphorical auspices, it wasn't worth the effort for me. It's almost just like somebody was on a ton of drugs and decided to write the most fucked up thing they could think of and coat it in this dense verbiage of broken English -- that's what the first 3 chapters read like to me. There apparently is a fully realized story here--some young kid from the Middle East is passing himself off as an exchange student but is really part of a network of terrorists, and apparently he protects the boy in the family he is staying with in unlikely ways (say, by raping the bully that picks on him in the ass) and it seems predictable that he is falling in love with the girl in the family.
Sadly, the vernacular got to me, and the story struck me as being far too over the top for me to feel like I would get something out of this book. Perhaps this is a long overdue reaction about anti-American sentiment post 9/11, and while maybe later Palahniuk does some amazing things, the text just simply did not engage me. It challenged me, and frustrated me, and I do not feel it rewarded me for understanding what was happening, because it seemed like what was happening was just, I don't know, over my head. When somebody comes up to me and tells me that Pygmy is worth the effort, maybe I'll return to it. But until then, I will just say, better luck next time to Chuck. And I apologize for offering an incomplete review. If someone paid me to do this, I would have read the next two hundred pages.
As some of you may be aware I have reviewed all of this author's books on this blog, owing the obsession to a bit of film rights success envy. Along with Bret Easton Ellis (and perhaps Cormac McCarthy, we might say) Palahniuk seems to attract filmmakers with his work at an above-average rate. I've liked a lot of Palahniuk's books (Choke is a much better book than film, and Rant is very original and may be made into a movie soon), but I could not get past the second chapter of Pygmy. Faced with carrying it around with me for two weeks and seeing what happened, or trying to take on Proust instead, this book went back into the return bin.
What's the problem with it? It's quite simple really. I feel like this is the true literary equivalent to Eli Cash's novel Wildcat, to those that have seen The Royal Tenenbaums. In the scene in that movie, the Charlie Rose-type journalist asks the author, "Wildcat. Not a success. Can you explain why?" And Owen Wilson replies, "Wildcat. It was written in an obscure vernacular. Wow, Wildcat. Pttcchhoowww. I gotta go." Now, in interviews, Palahniuk has been enthusiastic about the dialect that this novel is written in, and has said that it was kind of like writing poetry. And once one does read it for a while (I read it for about 30 pages), it is possible to get into a rhythm where it is more understandable.
While the 2nd chapter may be "hardcore," or whatever, it's hardly believable, and the satire is so extreme that it becomes almost total nonsense, and while I am sure there is a serious moral debate taking place under metaphorical auspices, it wasn't worth the effort for me. It's almost just like somebody was on a ton of drugs and decided to write the most fucked up thing they could think of and coat it in this dense verbiage of broken English -- that's what the first 3 chapters read like to me. There apparently is a fully realized story here--some young kid from the Middle East is passing himself off as an exchange student but is really part of a network of terrorists, and apparently he protects the boy in the family he is staying with in unlikely ways (say, by raping the bully that picks on him in the ass) and it seems predictable that he is falling in love with the girl in the family.
Sadly, the vernacular got to me, and the story struck me as being far too over the top for me to feel like I would get something out of this book. Perhaps this is a long overdue reaction about anti-American sentiment post 9/11, and while maybe later Palahniuk does some amazing things, the text just simply did not engage me. It challenged me, and frustrated me, and I do not feel it rewarded me for understanding what was happening, because it seemed like what was happening was just, I don't know, over my head. When somebody comes up to me and tells me that Pygmy is worth the effort, maybe I'll return to it. But until then, I will just say, better luck next time to Chuck. And I apologize for offering an incomplete review. If someone paid me to do this, I would have read the next two hundred pages.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Death in Venice and Other Stories - Thomas Mann (Transl. David Luke)
The story is well-known to those of my friends that I unleash my artistic insecurities upon, for lack of better conversational material or to convince myself that my work is less dubious than it appears: the time is December 2006. The effort is an MFA application. The problem is a lack of confidence in any of my prior work for use as a writing sample. The solution is this volume, inspiration, and three or four stories written in a period of three or four weeks, now of questionable value. Two-and-a-half years later I still don't have an MFA.
Bought from a used bookstore on Clark St. in the summer of 2006 for $3.00, this collection of seven short stories has been perused two or three times since that initial encounter, spawned an interest in three long, great novels Buddenbrooks, The Magic Mountain, and Doctor Faustus, and appropriately earned the distinction of the 99th post on Flying Houses.
This collection will prove to be more difficult than any other review on this blog because of the quotability of far too many passages. Inevitably some great ones must be left out. There are seven stories, and while each deserves much attention, it will be clear that in this collection in particular, there is a definitive progression. I am not sure what other Mann story collections include. Perhaps four or five of these are included in most collections, and there are other stories of a different quality that deserve recognition--in particular "Mario and the Magician"--but I am convinced that if you have not read Mann and you need a place to start, this is the only way to go. Seven stories, around 260 pages, and almost perfect the whole way through.
"Little Herr Friedemann," published in 1897, begins the collection, and Mann's literary career on a hilarious and horrible note: "It was the nurse's fault." (3) The nurse has a problem with drinking, and so has dropped a baby which will now endure the rest of its life a hunchback. A breezy biography of the next thirty years of this person's life follows, including the one time he was afflicted with sexual desire, at age 16, and how he realized--"such experiences...obviously engrossing though they were for others, belonged like gymnastics and ball games to the category of things for which he was not suited." (5) The next fourteen years pass unperturbed until a new military commandant and his wife, Gerda, settle in the town and Herr Friedemann cannot help but be moved. The manner in which his attraction is evoked, nurtured, teased, and ultimately denied, is the element of the story that elevates it to a higher level. Also, it gives a taste of what is to come, since many of these stories share the same disconsolate themes.
"The Joker" comes next, and hardly anyone could fail to love a story that begins as such:
"The end of it all, the upshot of life--of my life--is the disgust with which it fills me. A worthy ending indeed! Disgust with it all, disgust with the whole business, this disgust that chokes me, goads me to frenzy and casts me down again into despair--sooner or later, no doubt, it will give me the necessary impetus to cut short the whole ridiculous, contemptible affair and clear out for good. True enough, I may well hold out for a month or two yet; maybe for another three or six months I shall carry on eating, sleeping and passing the time--in the same mechanical, calm and well-ordered fashion in which my life has outwardly gone by all this winter, contrasting so hideously with the vile process of my inner disintegration. One might almost suppose that a man's inner experiences become all the more violent and disturbing the more undisturbed and uncommitted and detached from the world his outward life is. There is no help for it: life has to be lived--and if one refuses to be a man of action and retires into the quiet of a hermit's solitude, even then the vicissitudes of existence will assault one inwardly, they will still be there to test one's character and to prove one a hero or a half-wit." (31)
This troubled character is unnamed and proceeds to tell his story in the first-person of how his parents died and how he was given an inheritance and how he traveled for three years and then settled and never really developed any serious occupation and then lived his days in quiet, contemplative leisure. Until, he happened to see a young woman in particular driving a horse carriage, and how he saw her again at a performance of Faust, and how he found out that she would be at a bazaar, selling wine from a booth (on this point the story could be construed as another version of Joyce's "Araby," except about ten times more depressing), and how there has always been a certain other gentleman caller close by, and how he finally comes upon the decisive moment at the bazaar, and, much like "Little Herr Friedemann," experiences horrible disappointment.
"The Road to the Churchyard" is story #3, and it concerns another alcoholic--this one a widower who cannot stand the fact that a boy (named Life) is riding his bicycle on a road leading to a churchyard instead of on the main road. This character, sporting the moniker Lobgott Piepsam, owns perhaps the most depressing history of any Mann character, in a sprightly and ironic kind of way:
"He was--in rather low spirits, is that it?...It is hard to explain these matters to happy people like yourselves...But yes, he had his little troubles, you know, he was rather badly done by. Alas, if the truth be told, his troubles were by no means little, but grievous in the highest degree--in fact, his condition could fairly be described as absolutely wretched.
To begin with, he drank. Well, we shall have occasion to refer to this again. Secondly, he was a widower and a bereaved father, forsaken by everyone; he had not a soul left on earth to whom he was dear. His wife, whose maiden name had been Lebzelt, had been snatched from him six months ago when she had borne him a child; it was their third child, and it had been born dead. The other two had also died, one of diphtheria, the other of nothing in particular, perhaps just a general deficiency. As if this were not enough, he had shortly afterward lost his job, he had been shamefully dismissed from his employment and livelihood, and this had been in consequence of the above-mentioned ruling passion, which was a passion stronger than Piepsam." (64-65)
Lobgott, who had been drinking before setting out to visit the graveyard, becomes so infuriated with the boy that it becomes the central plot of the story. To be sure, this is the greatest trifle in the collection, but a lighthearted comic one, with obviously very dark shades. Mann had just completed Buddenbrooks and had intended this story as a light afterthought. Story #4, "Gladius Dei" perhaps concerns itself with a pressing artistic controversy--censorship--but is definitely the second trifle in the collection. This should hardly be taken to mean that these stories should be skipped in reading--but perhaps if you are on your deathbed, and you have very little time, if you absolutely must...but they are the most variegated, they conform least to Mann's set of governing themes, and so may be of potentially greater interest.
This story concerns another unhappy protagonist, this one named Hieronymus, who is religious and lives in "resplendent" Munich. There is an art gallery in town displaying some rather immoral artwork in its front window. Hieronymus takes extreme issue with the proprietor of the gallery, in a way that almost mirrors Lobgott in the previous story in the sense that, the entire central arc of the story concerns the main character's (potentially) deranged invective against a "disrespectful" representative of common society:
"Art! they cry--pleasure! beauty! Wrap the world in a veil of beauty and set upon everything the noble imprint of style!...Enough of this infamy! Do you think gaudy colors can gloss over the misery of the world? Do you think loud orgies of luxurious good taste can drown the moans of the tortured earth? You are wrong, you shameless wretches! God is not mocked, and your insolent idolatry of the glistering surface of things is an abomination in His sight!...'Who are you,' you will answer, 'to be reviling Art?' You lie, I tell you; I am not reviling art! Art is not a cynical deception, a seductive stimulus to confirm and strengthen the lusts of the flesh! Art is the sacred torch that must shed its merciful light into all of life's terrible depths, into every shameful and sorrowful abyss; art is the divine flame that must set fire to the world, until the world with all its infamy and anguish burns and melts way in redeeming compassion!...Remove it, Herr Bluthenzweig, remove that famous painter's work from your window--indeed, you would do well to burn it with hot fire and scatter its ashes to the winds, yes, to all four winds!..." (87)
Once we arrive at "Tristan," we enter into the final trilogy of stories, and the proceedings are driven up a notch. After reading The Magic Mountain, it is clear that "Tristan" shares many similarities with that novel (despite being published 21 years earlier) in its central arc alone--the sanatorium romance. This time it is between Herr Spinnell and Gabriele Kloterjahn--a writer and a wife of a businessman. "Tristan" definitely marks a turning point in the collection towards heavier material. There is also the first WTF moment when Spinnell and Gabriele sit at the piano while she plays music from Tristan and Isolde and it turns into a kind of metaphysical narrative that is about the story of the opera, but really symbolic of the short story at hand, confusing enough that you will have no clue what is going on--markedly similar to the segment near the end of The Sorrows of Young Werther where Goethe goes off on the Ossian tangent towards a parallel aim--and one which enhances the mystery of the story. Near the end, Spinnell writes a letter to Gabriele's husband, and it begets the most satisfying moment in the piece. Also, Spinnell has horrible contempt for Gabriele and Herr Kloterjahn's infant son, which is hilarious. The passages to note are too numerous to mention. But the most touching for me at least remains the description of how husband and wife met:
"'Yes, all those years are a precious memory to me; especially the garden, our garden behind the house. It was terribly wild and overgrown, and the walls round it were crumbling and covered with moss; but that was just what gave it its great charm. It had a fountain in the middle, surrounded by a dense border of flag irises. In summer I used to sit there for hours with my friends. We would all sit on little garden chairs round the fountain.'
'What beauty!' said Herr Spinnell, raising his shoulders. 'You sat round it singing?'
"No, we were usually crocheting.'
'Ah, nevertheless...nevertheless...'
'Yes, we crocheted and gossiped, my six friends and I...'
'What beauty! Ah, dear me, how beautiful that is!' cried Herr Spinnel, with his face quite contorted.
'But what is so particularly beautiful about that, Herr Spinnell?'
'Oh, the fact that there were six young ladies besides yourself, the fact that you were not one of their number, but stood out amongst them like a queen...You were singled out from your six friends. A little gold crown, quite inconspicuous yet full of significance, gleamed in your hair...'
'Oh, what nonsense, there was no such crown...'
'Ah, but there was: it gleamed there in secret. I should have seen it, I should have seen it in your hair quite plainly, if I had been standing unnoticed among the bushes on one of those occasions...'" (108-109)
From there we proceed to "Tonio Kroger"--arguably Mann's greatest work, the one I believe Franz Kafka valued more highly than any other, generally regarded as his second greatest story. Here the prose noticeably becomes even more direct. I think it is fair to say that "Tonio Kroger" is the most autobiographical of all of Mann's stories in that it presents his artistic concerns under less of a veil than his other characters. The long middle portion--the salon between Tonio and his painter friend Lisaveta--is perhaps the greatest discussion of the "artist" as a type that I have ever read.
The story opens with a young Tonio and his friend Hans walking home from school. Tonio writes poetry and loves reading Schiller's Don Carlos; Hans loves riding horses and looking at picture books of them. Then it is clear that Tonio loves Hans, and Hans considers Tonio a friend, but not quite to the same extreme. And so Tonio suffers. Several years later, there is Ingeborg Holm, whom he longs for at a dance. He makes a mockery of himself at the dance by performing the female part of one, and the instructor points this out for everyone's entertainment, and then he goes and stands in front of a window, even though a shade is drawn and he cannot see out of it, and he waits and hopes for Inge to "put her hand on his shoulder and say: 'Come back and join us, don't be sad, I love you!' And he listened to the voices behind him, waiting in senseless excitement for her to come. But she did not come. Such things did not happen on earth." (148)
Later he enters into a career as a writer, and almost immediately, the 4th chapter showcases him now in his early 30s, delivering a near-monologue to Lisaveta for approximately ten pages, finally settling upon an element in the artist that is tantamount to all others:
"You see, Lisaveta, I harbor in my very soul a rooted suspicion of the artist as a type--I suspect him no less deeply, though in a more intellectual way, than every one of my honorable ancestors up there in that city of narrow streets would have suspected any sort of mountebank or performing adventurer who had strolled into his house. Listen to this. I know a banker, a middle-aged man of business, who has a talent for writing short stories. He exercises this talent in his spare time, and what he writes is often first class. Despite--I call it 'despite'--this admirable gift he is a man of not entirely blameless reputation: on the contrary he has already served quite a heavy prison sentence, and for good reason. In fact it was actually in jail that he first became aware of his talents, and his experiences as a prisoner are the basic theme in all his work. One might draw the rather fanciful conclusion from this that it is necessary to have been in some kind of house of correction if one is to become a writer. But can one help suspecting that in its roots and origins his artistic tendency had less to do with his experiences in jail than with what got him sent there? A banker who writes short stories: that's an oddity, isn't it? But a banker with no criminal record and no stain on his character who writes short stories--there's no such phenomenon...Yes, you may laugh, but I am half serious nevertheless. There's no problem on earth so tantalizing as the problem of what an artist is and what art does to human beings. Take the case of the most remarkable masterpiece of the most typical and therefore mightiest of all artists--take a morbid, profoundly equivocal work like Tristan and Isolde, and observe the effects of this work on a young, healthy listener of entirely normal sensibility. He will be filled with exultation, animation, warm, honest enthusiasm, perhaps even inspired to 'artistic' creative efforts of his own...Poor, decent dilettante! We artists have an inner life very different from what our 'warmhearted' admirers in their 'genuine enthusiasm' imagine. I have seen artists with women and young men crowding round them, applauding and idolizing them, artists about whom I knew the truth...The sources and side-effects and preconditions of artistic talent are something about which one constantly makes the most curious discoveries..." (158-159)
Later, Tonio travels, and is mistaken for a criminal in his hometown, where they have turned his family home into a public library. And then, in Elsinore, Tonio finds "Hans" and "Inge" at a dance at his hotel. This is a story whose greatness is not easily described--but for me, at least, its greatness lies in Tonio's articulations on the nature of art and the artist, along with the atypical, yet direct and confrontational views of love and romance that affect Tonio. Also of note in the story is Mann's use of leitmotif--the repetition of certain phrases--which imbues the story with a lyricism seldom found in prose--some of these phrases like "such things did not happen on earth" or "the girl who was always falling over" or "in it there is longing, and sad envy, and just a touch of contempt, and a whole world of innocent delight" or "And if it was the wrong way, then that was because for certain people no such thing as a right way exists" or the oft-quoted "After all, I wasn't born a gypsy in a green caravan"--some of these phrases comprise the final 1/3 of the story's near-perfection.
From there we proceed to the title story, generally viewed as Mann's most important contribution to the western literary canon. And a difficult one to write about. If you would like a fine distillation and something more involved, I would like to point you towards Andrew O'Hehir's astute and scholarly review http://dir.salon.com/story/books/review/2004/08/10/venice/index.htmlfrom roughly five years ago (of a different translation/edition/collection)--not two years after he served as my only professional mentor in the journalism trade when he presided over a couple meetings as technical advisor to our college newspaper arts section. I will not be able to focus my efforts as singularly on this story as O'Hehir, but I will make my best effort.
This story concerns Gustav von Aschenbach and a sudden whim that directs him on a vacation to Venice. After a couple preliminary oddities, in a cemetery and on a ship, he arrives in the title city and notices a particular Polish family, whose youngest member is a 14-year-old boy named Tadzio. Aschenbach is smitten with the boy, and the fixation becomes the central element of the story. Along the way, something else is amiss in Venice, and the authorities are trying to cover it up, and it is transparently suggested that the greater chaos at hand is reflective of Aschenbach's inner turmoil.
The story is generally regarded as "the" originator in the Queer genre of literature. For being written in 1912, it is very far ahead of its time. The subject matter is still very unsettling and it is hard for a reader to sympathize with Aschenbach, and still harder to denounce him. To add another layer of controversy to it, this may be regarded as Mann's second most autobiographical story, as it all apparently happened, while he was on vacation in Venice with his wife and brother, to a somewhat less severe degree, we can assume. He said he wanted to portray "the loss of an artist's dignity"--and in the end, this little infatuation proves to be the ultimate vehicle for that sentiment. Few would argue that the story cannot be deeply felt or that it lacks emotional power. In giving voice to a situation without literary precedent, under circumstances of the utmost disgrace, with both seriousness and irony, Mann created a very unlikely masterpiece indeed.
While Aschenbach does eventually lose all sense of moral decency and takes to following the Polish family around Venice, there are moments where he realizes the incompatability of his attraction with his respectable exterior, and attempts to self-reconcile:
"Nevertheless, there were moments at which he paused and half came to his senses. Where is this leading me! he would reflect in consternation at some moments. Where was it leading him! Like any man whose natural merits move him to take an aristocratic interest in his origins, Aschenbach habitually let the achievements and successes of his life remind him of his ancestors, for in imagination he could then feel sure of their approval, of their satisfaction, of the respect they could not have withheld. And he thought of them even here and now, entangled as he was in so impermissable an experience, involved in such exotic extravagances of feeling; he thought, with a sad smile, of their dignified austerity, their decent manliness of character. What would they say? But for that matter, what would they have said about his entire life, a life that had deviated from theirs to the point of degeneracy, this life of his in the compulsive service of art, this life about which he himself, adopting the civic values of his forefathers, had once let fall such mocking observations--and which nevertheless had essentially been so much like theirs! He too had served, he too had been a soldier and a warrior, like many of them: for art was a war, an exhausting struggle, it was hard these days to remain fit for it for long. A life of self-conquest and of defiant resolve, an astringent, steadfast and frugal life which he had turned into the symbol of that heroism so much in keeping with the times--surely he might call this manly, might call it courageous? And it seemed to him that the kind of love that had taken possession of him did, in a certain way, suit and befit such a life. Had it not been highly honored by the most valiant of peoples, indeed had he not read that in their cities it had flourished by inspiring valorous deeds? Numerous warrior-heroes of olden times had willingly borne its yoke, for there was no kind of abasement that could be reckoned as such if the god has imposed it; and actions that would have been castigated as signs of cowardice had their motives been different, such as falling to the ground in supplication, desperate pleas and slavish demeanor--these were accounted no disgrace to a lover, but rather won him still greater praise." (245-246)
For the time it was written, these are some revolutionary statements to be included in such a mainstream work. But moving just beyond the salacious element, the story is certainly Mann's most elegantly composed piece. It is precise, pure, and detailed to just the right degree. A feeling of mystery enhances the opening pages and the driving compulsion that pushes the story to its already-promised end render it a surprising page-turner. And there are still moments of overpowering emotion at which the reader cannot help but be moved, as after the time that Tadzio recognizes Aschenbach and smiles at him:
"He who had received this smile carried it quickly away with him like a fateful gift. He was so deeply shaken that he was forced to flee the lighted terrace and the front garden and hurry into the darkness of the park at the rear. Words struggled from his lips, strangely indignant and tender reproaches: 'You musn't smile like that! One musn't, do you hear, smile like that at anyone!' He sank down on one of the seats, deliriously breathing the nocturnal fragrance of the flowers and trees. And leaning back, his arms hanging down, overwhelmed, trembling, shuddering all over, he whispered the standing formula of the heart's desire--impossible here, absurd, depraved, ludicrous and sacred nevertheless, still worthy of honor even here: 'I love you!'" (241)
I am not sure the degree to which these stories shattered the conventions of their times--some of them are quite ordinary--but for me, this short story collection was a discovery of rare value. I feel that Mann is one of the first writers to experiment with so-called "transgressive fiction" in the modern sense of the term, and while he has legitimately cemented his place in the canon of German literature, proving himself worthy of the kind of respect only known to Goethe, few present day American readers will be familiar with his work. One should not forget that Mann himself became an American citizen in the 1950's and lived in California, and there is sometimes an American element that will appear in his stories that will make one proud with the kind of respect he shows this country and its citizens. Keeping all of this in mind, if it is your motive to review all of the classic works of literature created in this world before you die, please add this collection to your list. I do not think you will find the time wasted.
Bought from a used bookstore on Clark St. in the summer of 2006 for $3.00, this collection of seven short stories has been perused two or three times since that initial encounter, spawned an interest in three long, great novels Buddenbrooks, The Magic Mountain, and Doctor Faustus, and appropriately earned the distinction of the 99th post on Flying Houses.
This collection will prove to be more difficult than any other review on this blog because of the quotability of far too many passages. Inevitably some great ones must be left out. There are seven stories, and while each deserves much attention, it will be clear that in this collection in particular, there is a definitive progression. I am not sure what other Mann story collections include. Perhaps four or five of these are included in most collections, and there are other stories of a different quality that deserve recognition--in particular "Mario and the Magician"--but I am convinced that if you have not read Mann and you need a place to start, this is the only way to go. Seven stories, around 260 pages, and almost perfect the whole way through.
"Little Herr Friedemann," published in 1897, begins the collection, and Mann's literary career on a hilarious and horrible note: "It was the nurse's fault." (3) The nurse has a problem with drinking, and so has dropped a baby which will now endure the rest of its life a hunchback. A breezy biography of the next thirty years of this person's life follows, including the one time he was afflicted with sexual desire, at age 16, and how he realized--"such experiences...obviously engrossing though they were for others, belonged like gymnastics and ball games to the category of things for which he was not suited." (5) The next fourteen years pass unperturbed until a new military commandant and his wife, Gerda, settle in the town and Herr Friedemann cannot help but be moved. The manner in which his attraction is evoked, nurtured, teased, and ultimately denied, is the element of the story that elevates it to a higher level. Also, it gives a taste of what is to come, since many of these stories share the same disconsolate themes.
"The Joker" comes next, and hardly anyone could fail to love a story that begins as such:
"The end of it all, the upshot of life--of my life--is the disgust with which it fills me. A worthy ending indeed! Disgust with it all, disgust with the whole business, this disgust that chokes me, goads me to frenzy and casts me down again into despair--sooner or later, no doubt, it will give me the necessary impetus to cut short the whole ridiculous, contemptible affair and clear out for good. True enough, I may well hold out for a month or two yet; maybe for another three or six months I shall carry on eating, sleeping and passing the time--in the same mechanical, calm and well-ordered fashion in which my life has outwardly gone by all this winter, contrasting so hideously with the vile process of my inner disintegration. One might almost suppose that a man's inner experiences become all the more violent and disturbing the more undisturbed and uncommitted and detached from the world his outward life is. There is no help for it: life has to be lived--and if one refuses to be a man of action and retires into the quiet of a hermit's solitude, even then the vicissitudes of existence will assault one inwardly, they will still be there to test one's character and to prove one a hero or a half-wit." (31)
This troubled character is unnamed and proceeds to tell his story in the first-person of how his parents died and how he was given an inheritance and how he traveled for three years and then settled and never really developed any serious occupation and then lived his days in quiet, contemplative leisure. Until, he happened to see a young woman in particular driving a horse carriage, and how he saw her again at a performance of Faust, and how he found out that she would be at a bazaar, selling wine from a booth (on this point the story could be construed as another version of Joyce's "Araby," except about ten times more depressing), and how there has always been a certain other gentleman caller close by, and how he finally comes upon the decisive moment at the bazaar, and, much like "Little Herr Friedemann," experiences horrible disappointment.
"The Road to the Churchyard" is story #3, and it concerns another alcoholic--this one a widower who cannot stand the fact that a boy (named Life) is riding his bicycle on a road leading to a churchyard instead of on the main road. This character, sporting the moniker Lobgott Piepsam, owns perhaps the most depressing history of any Mann character, in a sprightly and ironic kind of way:
"He was--in rather low spirits, is that it?...It is hard to explain these matters to happy people like yourselves...But yes, he had his little troubles, you know, he was rather badly done by. Alas, if the truth be told, his troubles were by no means little, but grievous in the highest degree--in fact, his condition could fairly be described as absolutely wretched.
To begin with, he drank. Well, we shall have occasion to refer to this again. Secondly, he was a widower and a bereaved father, forsaken by everyone; he had not a soul left on earth to whom he was dear. His wife, whose maiden name had been Lebzelt, had been snatched from him six months ago when she had borne him a child; it was their third child, and it had been born dead. The other two had also died, one of diphtheria, the other of nothing in particular, perhaps just a general deficiency. As if this were not enough, he had shortly afterward lost his job, he had been shamefully dismissed from his employment and livelihood, and this had been in consequence of the above-mentioned ruling passion, which was a passion stronger than Piepsam." (64-65)
Lobgott, who had been drinking before setting out to visit the graveyard, becomes so infuriated with the boy that it becomes the central plot of the story. To be sure, this is the greatest trifle in the collection, but a lighthearted comic one, with obviously very dark shades. Mann had just completed Buddenbrooks and had intended this story as a light afterthought. Story #4, "Gladius Dei" perhaps concerns itself with a pressing artistic controversy--censorship--but is definitely the second trifle in the collection. This should hardly be taken to mean that these stories should be skipped in reading--but perhaps if you are on your deathbed, and you have very little time, if you absolutely must...but they are the most variegated, they conform least to Mann's set of governing themes, and so may be of potentially greater interest.
This story concerns another unhappy protagonist, this one named Hieronymus, who is religious and lives in "resplendent" Munich. There is an art gallery in town displaying some rather immoral artwork in its front window. Hieronymus takes extreme issue with the proprietor of the gallery, in a way that almost mirrors Lobgott in the previous story in the sense that, the entire central arc of the story concerns the main character's (potentially) deranged invective against a "disrespectful" representative of common society:
"Art! they cry--pleasure! beauty! Wrap the world in a veil of beauty and set upon everything the noble imprint of style!...Enough of this infamy! Do you think gaudy colors can gloss over the misery of the world? Do you think loud orgies of luxurious good taste can drown the moans of the tortured earth? You are wrong, you shameless wretches! God is not mocked, and your insolent idolatry of the glistering surface of things is an abomination in His sight!...'Who are you,' you will answer, 'to be reviling Art?' You lie, I tell you; I am not reviling art! Art is not a cynical deception, a seductive stimulus to confirm and strengthen the lusts of the flesh! Art is the sacred torch that must shed its merciful light into all of life's terrible depths, into every shameful and sorrowful abyss; art is the divine flame that must set fire to the world, until the world with all its infamy and anguish burns and melts way in redeeming compassion!...Remove it, Herr Bluthenzweig, remove that famous painter's work from your window--indeed, you would do well to burn it with hot fire and scatter its ashes to the winds, yes, to all four winds!..." (87)
Once we arrive at "Tristan," we enter into the final trilogy of stories, and the proceedings are driven up a notch. After reading The Magic Mountain, it is clear that "Tristan" shares many similarities with that novel (despite being published 21 years earlier) in its central arc alone--the sanatorium romance. This time it is between Herr Spinnell and Gabriele Kloterjahn--a writer and a wife of a businessman. "Tristan" definitely marks a turning point in the collection towards heavier material. There is also the first WTF moment when Spinnell and Gabriele sit at the piano while she plays music from Tristan and Isolde and it turns into a kind of metaphysical narrative that is about the story of the opera, but really symbolic of the short story at hand, confusing enough that you will have no clue what is going on--markedly similar to the segment near the end of The Sorrows of Young Werther where Goethe goes off on the Ossian tangent towards a parallel aim--and one which enhances the mystery of the story. Near the end, Spinnell writes a letter to Gabriele's husband, and it begets the most satisfying moment in the piece. Also, Spinnell has horrible contempt for Gabriele and Herr Kloterjahn's infant son, which is hilarious. The passages to note are too numerous to mention. But the most touching for me at least remains the description of how husband and wife met:
"'Yes, all those years are a precious memory to me; especially the garden, our garden behind the house. It was terribly wild and overgrown, and the walls round it were crumbling and covered with moss; but that was just what gave it its great charm. It had a fountain in the middle, surrounded by a dense border of flag irises. In summer I used to sit there for hours with my friends. We would all sit on little garden chairs round the fountain.'
'What beauty!' said Herr Spinnell, raising his shoulders. 'You sat round it singing?'
"No, we were usually crocheting.'
'Ah, nevertheless...nevertheless...'
'Yes, we crocheted and gossiped, my six friends and I...'
'What beauty! Ah, dear me, how beautiful that is!' cried Herr Spinnel, with his face quite contorted.
'But what is so particularly beautiful about that, Herr Spinnell?'
'Oh, the fact that there were six young ladies besides yourself, the fact that you were not one of their number, but stood out amongst them like a queen...You were singled out from your six friends. A little gold crown, quite inconspicuous yet full of significance, gleamed in your hair...'
'Oh, what nonsense, there was no such crown...'
'Ah, but there was: it gleamed there in secret. I should have seen it, I should have seen it in your hair quite plainly, if I had been standing unnoticed among the bushes on one of those occasions...'" (108-109)
From there we proceed to "Tonio Kroger"--arguably Mann's greatest work, the one I believe Franz Kafka valued more highly than any other, generally regarded as his second greatest story. Here the prose noticeably becomes even more direct. I think it is fair to say that "Tonio Kroger" is the most autobiographical of all of Mann's stories in that it presents his artistic concerns under less of a veil than his other characters. The long middle portion--the salon between Tonio and his painter friend Lisaveta--is perhaps the greatest discussion of the "artist" as a type that I have ever read.
The story opens with a young Tonio and his friend Hans walking home from school. Tonio writes poetry and loves reading Schiller's Don Carlos; Hans loves riding horses and looking at picture books of them. Then it is clear that Tonio loves Hans, and Hans considers Tonio a friend, but not quite to the same extreme. And so Tonio suffers. Several years later, there is Ingeborg Holm, whom he longs for at a dance. He makes a mockery of himself at the dance by performing the female part of one, and the instructor points this out for everyone's entertainment, and then he goes and stands in front of a window, even though a shade is drawn and he cannot see out of it, and he waits and hopes for Inge to "put her hand on his shoulder and say: 'Come back and join us, don't be sad, I love you!' And he listened to the voices behind him, waiting in senseless excitement for her to come. But she did not come. Such things did not happen on earth." (148)
Later he enters into a career as a writer, and almost immediately, the 4th chapter showcases him now in his early 30s, delivering a near-monologue to Lisaveta for approximately ten pages, finally settling upon an element in the artist that is tantamount to all others:
"You see, Lisaveta, I harbor in my very soul a rooted suspicion of the artist as a type--I suspect him no less deeply, though in a more intellectual way, than every one of my honorable ancestors up there in that city of narrow streets would have suspected any sort of mountebank or performing adventurer who had strolled into his house. Listen to this. I know a banker, a middle-aged man of business, who has a talent for writing short stories. He exercises this talent in his spare time, and what he writes is often first class. Despite--I call it 'despite'--this admirable gift he is a man of not entirely blameless reputation: on the contrary he has already served quite a heavy prison sentence, and for good reason. In fact it was actually in jail that he first became aware of his talents, and his experiences as a prisoner are the basic theme in all his work. One might draw the rather fanciful conclusion from this that it is necessary to have been in some kind of house of correction if one is to become a writer. But can one help suspecting that in its roots and origins his artistic tendency had less to do with his experiences in jail than with what got him sent there? A banker who writes short stories: that's an oddity, isn't it? But a banker with no criminal record and no stain on his character who writes short stories--there's no such phenomenon...Yes, you may laugh, but I am half serious nevertheless. There's no problem on earth so tantalizing as the problem of what an artist is and what art does to human beings. Take the case of the most remarkable masterpiece of the most typical and therefore mightiest of all artists--take a morbid, profoundly equivocal work like Tristan and Isolde, and observe the effects of this work on a young, healthy listener of entirely normal sensibility. He will be filled with exultation, animation, warm, honest enthusiasm, perhaps even inspired to 'artistic' creative efforts of his own...Poor, decent dilettante! We artists have an inner life very different from what our 'warmhearted' admirers in their 'genuine enthusiasm' imagine. I have seen artists with women and young men crowding round them, applauding and idolizing them, artists about whom I knew the truth...The sources and side-effects and preconditions of artistic talent are something about which one constantly makes the most curious discoveries..." (158-159)
Later, Tonio travels, and is mistaken for a criminal in his hometown, where they have turned his family home into a public library. And then, in Elsinore, Tonio finds "Hans" and "Inge" at a dance at his hotel. This is a story whose greatness is not easily described--but for me, at least, its greatness lies in Tonio's articulations on the nature of art and the artist, along with the atypical, yet direct and confrontational views of love and romance that affect Tonio. Also of note in the story is Mann's use of leitmotif--the repetition of certain phrases--which imbues the story with a lyricism seldom found in prose--some of these phrases like "such things did not happen on earth" or "the girl who was always falling over" or "in it there is longing, and sad envy, and just a touch of contempt, and a whole world of innocent delight" or "And if it was the wrong way, then that was because for certain people no such thing as a right way exists" or the oft-quoted "After all, I wasn't born a gypsy in a green caravan"--some of these phrases comprise the final 1/3 of the story's near-perfection.
From there we proceed to the title story, generally viewed as Mann's most important contribution to the western literary canon. And a difficult one to write about. If you would like a fine distillation and something more involved, I would like to point you towards Andrew O'Hehir's astute and scholarly review http://dir.salon.com/story/books/review/2004/08/10/venice/index.htmlfrom roughly five years ago (of a different translation/edition/collection)--not two years after he served as my only professional mentor in the journalism trade when he presided over a couple meetings as technical advisor to our college newspaper arts section. I will not be able to focus my efforts as singularly on this story as O'Hehir, but I will make my best effort.
This story concerns Gustav von Aschenbach and a sudden whim that directs him on a vacation to Venice. After a couple preliminary oddities, in a cemetery and on a ship, he arrives in the title city and notices a particular Polish family, whose youngest member is a 14-year-old boy named Tadzio. Aschenbach is smitten with the boy, and the fixation becomes the central element of the story. Along the way, something else is amiss in Venice, and the authorities are trying to cover it up, and it is transparently suggested that the greater chaos at hand is reflective of Aschenbach's inner turmoil.
The story is generally regarded as "the" originator in the Queer genre of literature. For being written in 1912, it is very far ahead of its time. The subject matter is still very unsettling and it is hard for a reader to sympathize with Aschenbach, and still harder to denounce him. To add another layer of controversy to it, this may be regarded as Mann's second most autobiographical story, as it all apparently happened, while he was on vacation in Venice with his wife and brother, to a somewhat less severe degree, we can assume. He said he wanted to portray "the loss of an artist's dignity"--and in the end, this little infatuation proves to be the ultimate vehicle for that sentiment. Few would argue that the story cannot be deeply felt or that it lacks emotional power. In giving voice to a situation without literary precedent, under circumstances of the utmost disgrace, with both seriousness and irony, Mann created a very unlikely masterpiece indeed.
While Aschenbach does eventually lose all sense of moral decency and takes to following the Polish family around Venice, there are moments where he realizes the incompatability of his attraction with his respectable exterior, and attempts to self-reconcile:
"Nevertheless, there were moments at which he paused and half came to his senses. Where is this leading me! he would reflect in consternation at some moments. Where was it leading him! Like any man whose natural merits move him to take an aristocratic interest in his origins, Aschenbach habitually let the achievements and successes of his life remind him of his ancestors, for in imagination he could then feel sure of their approval, of their satisfaction, of the respect they could not have withheld. And he thought of them even here and now, entangled as he was in so impermissable an experience, involved in such exotic extravagances of feeling; he thought, with a sad smile, of their dignified austerity, their decent manliness of character. What would they say? But for that matter, what would they have said about his entire life, a life that had deviated from theirs to the point of degeneracy, this life of his in the compulsive service of art, this life about which he himself, adopting the civic values of his forefathers, had once let fall such mocking observations--and which nevertheless had essentially been so much like theirs! He too had served, he too had been a soldier and a warrior, like many of them: for art was a war, an exhausting struggle, it was hard these days to remain fit for it for long. A life of self-conquest and of defiant resolve, an astringent, steadfast and frugal life which he had turned into the symbol of that heroism so much in keeping with the times--surely he might call this manly, might call it courageous? And it seemed to him that the kind of love that had taken possession of him did, in a certain way, suit and befit such a life. Had it not been highly honored by the most valiant of peoples, indeed had he not read that in their cities it had flourished by inspiring valorous deeds? Numerous warrior-heroes of olden times had willingly borne its yoke, for there was no kind of abasement that could be reckoned as such if the god has imposed it; and actions that would have been castigated as signs of cowardice had their motives been different, such as falling to the ground in supplication, desperate pleas and slavish demeanor--these were accounted no disgrace to a lover, but rather won him still greater praise." (245-246)
For the time it was written, these are some revolutionary statements to be included in such a mainstream work. But moving just beyond the salacious element, the story is certainly Mann's most elegantly composed piece. It is precise, pure, and detailed to just the right degree. A feeling of mystery enhances the opening pages and the driving compulsion that pushes the story to its already-promised end render it a surprising page-turner. And there are still moments of overpowering emotion at which the reader cannot help but be moved, as after the time that Tadzio recognizes Aschenbach and smiles at him:
"He who had received this smile carried it quickly away with him like a fateful gift. He was so deeply shaken that he was forced to flee the lighted terrace and the front garden and hurry into the darkness of the park at the rear. Words struggled from his lips, strangely indignant and tender reproaches: 'You musn't smile like that! One musn't, do you hear, smile like that at anyone!' He sank down on one of the seats, deliriously breathing the nocturnal fragrance of the flowers and trees. And leaning back, his arms hanging down, overwhelmed, trembling, shuddering all over, he whispered the standing formula of the heart's desire--impossible here, absurd, depraved, ludicrous and sacred nevertheless, still worthy of honor even here: 'I love you!'" (241)
I am not sure the degree to which these stories shattered the conventions of their times--some of them are quite ordinary--but for me, this short story collection was a discovery of rare value. I feel that Mann is one of the first writers to experiment with so-called "transgressive fiction" in the modern sense of the term, and while he has legitimately cemented his place in the canon of German literature, proving himself worthy of the kind of respect only known to Goethe, few present day American readers will be familiar with his work. One should not forget that Mann himself became an American citizen in the 1950's and lived in California, and there is sometimes an American element that will appear in his stories that will make one proud with the kind of respect he shows this country and its citizens. Keeping all of this in mind, if it is your motive to review all of the classic works of literature created in this world before you die, please add this collection to your list. I do not think you will find the time wasted.
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