Books Read and Reviewed 2008.2 (March-April)
Submitted by JohnnyW on Tue, 03/04/2008 - 03:12
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- 3/3/08: Howard Pyle/The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood (1883): Leave it to a Yankee Quaker to write the best-known version of the Robin Hood myth, one that emphasizes Robin's everyman identity and abhorrence of overbearing nobility. This novel, complete with Pyle's incredible illustrations, flies along with all the familiar tales of how Robin meets (and gets bested by) Little John, how he befriends Friar Tuck, and how he disguises himself to enter and win the sheriff's archery tournament. What's different here is that Robin is merely a yeoman (a freeman, rather than a disgraced noble) and Maid Marion is nowhere to be found (one brief mention).
- The tone, while carefree in some ways, also emphasizes that Robin and his merry men live in the present, feasting, sporting, and joking, because life will end soon enough. The narrator reminds us time and again that the merry men, once aged, would look back on the old days and sigh, and the constant emphasis on nature and the seasons is yet another reminder that we are part of nature's cycle--Robin may be depicted here in his summer, but his winter would come soon enough. An existential Robin Hood? Yes, but don't let that scare you off from a delightful read.
- 3/7/08: Jack London/Before Adam (1907): This is the grandaddy of prehistoric fiction, with a much tougher edge than later novels that cover similar territory, such as Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear. A young man realizes that the vivid, interlocking dreams that have terrified him since childhood are actually racial memories from a proto-human ape-like species that had advanced to living in caves, communicating with a few rudimentary words, and living in monogamous "marriages." In most ways however, it is still a world "red in tooth and claw"--will Big Tooth and Swift One survive the attacks of the still more advanced Fire People?
- London's attraction to Darwinism and to Nietzsche's emphasis on power are effectively showcased in a world in which species and individuals obey no rules other than the instincts to survive and pass on their genes. An interesting corollary to works like White Fang and The Call of the Wild.
- 3/11/08: Maria Edgeworth/The Absentee (1812): The back of the book assures me that Edgeworth "influenced writers as disparate as Scott, Thackery, and Turgenev." All apologies to those gentlemen, but they certainly must have had the chimerical ability to produce gold from lead, if The Absentee is truly representative of Edgeworth's work. The story held promise enough--the son of an Irish nobleman who had relocated his family to London years before and continued to live upon the income of his estate back home decides to travel incognito to the old country and find out what effect absentee ownership has had on the Irish people.
- Sadly, much of the novel bogs down in leaden, boring love plots and interminable dinner parties where the young man's mother affects an English accent to hide her Irish identity. A few chapters in the middle, where we get glimpses of the struggling farmers and workers who have lived on the estate lands for generations, are genuinely affecting and focused; otherwise, this is third-rate melodrama tarted up to look like social commentary. Also: check out the brutally anti-Semitic charcter of creditor Mordecai, a heartless Jew who makes Shylock look principled. What a mess.
- 3/13/08: Rafael Sabatini/Scaramouche (1921): I came to read this novel after stumbling across the 1952 swashbuckler film based on it, and I discovered a forgotten gem. Sabatini may have been the last great author of the golden age of the adventure novel, an era beginning with Stevenson, Haggard, and Kipling, and fading away by the Twenties. Andre-Louis, a provincial lawyer with no strong political views, turns vehemently against France's aristocracy when a haughty marquis trumps up a duel with his bumbling but egalitarian friend so he could run him through and silence his dangerous views. During the next few years, Andre-Louis becomes a revolutionary speechmaker, a clown in a traveling acting troupe, and an assistant to one of the greatest fencing masters in Paris. Eventually, as France erupts into chaos and the nobility becomes fair game, Andre-Louis has his chance for revenge...
- 3/18/08: Jules Verne/Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864): I enjoyed this novel, but I'm not entirely sure why--it never really got that exciting, and the moments of tension were never that engaging. Somehow, these were not fatal flaws; the expedition of Dr. Lidenbrock, his nephew Axel, and their Icelandic guide Hans to follow the tracks of Renaissance explorer Arne Saknussemm down a dormant volcano and to the center of our globe settles for charming rather than enthralling. My wish is that Verne would have spent more time on the primeval world preserved miles beneath the earth's surface--acres of bizrre skeletons, thirty-foot tall mushrooms, pitched battles between sea monsters, and even a glimpse of a twelve-foot tall human beg for more exploration. I remind myself that Verne was a pioneer, and that it is unfair to judge him harshly for not pushing his ideas farther, when he practically created science-fiction on his own. Lower your expectations a bit, and you'll be content.
- 3/23/08: Baroness Orczy/The Scarlet Pimpernel (1905): As if you couldn't tell by the "Baroness" part of the author's name, she comes down squarely on the side of France's aristocracy in the bloody, chaotic aftermath of the French Revolution. Orczy ignores the especially brutal oppression of the French people that led to the revolution, instead assuring us that, as far as the executed went, their "only sin was their aristocratic name." For a more balanced view, read Rafael Sabatini's Scaramouche, which depicts the abuses of the aristocracy while also condemning the savagery of those who took their place by 1792. There's also a little matter of Orczy's grotesque anti-Semitism towards the end of her book.
- All that said, The Scarlet Pimpernel is a remarkably enjoyable novel. A love story dressed up with wartime politics, this story of Lady Blakeney, her torn loyalties, and her eventual attempt to help the elusive Pimpernel won me over with its balance of sincere emotions and thrilling intrigues and escapes.
- 3/26/08: Anna Sewell/Black Beauty (1877): The Victorian period saw a dramatic rise in the middle class and in the leisure time that this new class had to spend on themselves and their causes. Childhood became more important to the middle class and so the first flowering of children's books, a genre that has prospered up until our own time. One of the great Victorian children's novels is Black Beauty, which illustrated the virtues of obedience and cheerfulness, while also bringing the issue of animal abuse into the public eye.
- Black Beauty is a truly affecting, first-person (horse?) account from a noble stallion who gets passed from owner to owner and who takes on all sorts of jobs common to horses at the time. Cloying sentiment is non-existent, as the tragic stories of fellow horses such as Ginger and Captain are told soberly. Interestingly, Sewell implies that we are to our animals as God is to us--they do not understand our ways and reasons (see the early discussion on hunting), but it is right for them to accept that we are wiser and to obey us as cheerfully as possible. A plea for compassion and mercy.
- 3/29/08: Trevanian/The Loo Sanction (1973): I enjoy a good spy novel now and then, but I'm not an obsessive fan of spy fiction. As I read The Loo Sanction, I felt that this was truly a novel for those who devour everything in the genre. The novel's not bad--far from it--but neither is it exceptional. The plot of the nefarious Mr. Strange to secretly record the perverse sexual acts of Britain's most powerful people (apparently they're all consumed by their perversions) and to use these tapes for blackmail is clever enough, but many of the sexual elements are absurd rather than envelope-pushing, and Dr. Hemlock's "art" lectures, meant to parody academic jargon and pretense, fall flat. All in all, a fast read, but don't expect the spectacular.
- 3/31/08: Tennessee Williams/The Glass Menagerie (1944): Wow. A powerful play that explores the often destructive dynamics between people who love each other. Laura Wingfield is easily the most compelling figure; her fragile spirit is symbolized by the tiny and fragile glass animals she collects and treasures. When Tom accidenly breaks some while arguing with their mother, or when Jim breaks her favorite, the unicorn, while dancing, we see that truly, Laura is not made for this world and has only hurt and loneliness to look forward to. Or does she? When I finished reading the play, I hurt for Laura and her bleak future, but the next day I began to wonder if there was some room for hope--did Jim's visit, his straight-forward words about her crippling (no pun intended) problems, and his kiss and dance with her leave the door open for her tentative steps towards the world outside and possible happiness? In all likelihood no, but the chance is at least there...
- 4/5/08: Max Brooks/World War Z (2006): Zombie literature certainly doesn't have the tradition or breadth of zombie films, but World War Z, coupled with Stephen King's recent Cell, signals a fertile period for "novels of the undead," comparable to the zombie movies that have proliferated since the turn of the millenium. World War Z is a sturdy book, effectively using the form of oral history to tell the story of a bloody and prolonged world war against an army of mindless, reanimated corpses infected with some sort of lethal virus. But while Brooks has clearly thought out all the details and ramifications of not only a zombie infestation but the rebuilding of society after their defeat, the novel wears out its welcome. Part of the problem lies in its weak characterization--when presenting transcripts of various leaders, soldiers, survivors, etc., letting these people speak for themselves, the voices should be distinctive. Instead, I lost track of who speakers were when Brooks reprints more of their words later because, apart from certain instances of slang, all his "voices" sound monotonously similar. Science-fiction often has this same disconnect between clever ideas and bland characterization, but it usually doesn't distract me the way it does with World War Z.
- 4/7/08: Len Deighton/Berlin Game (1983): Deighton seems to be out of favor at the moment--go to your local big bookstore and you'll see loads of Ludlum, LeCarré, and Fleming, but nary a Deighton novel. And that's a shame, for if Berlin Game is any indication, he can hold his own with any of the other warhorses of spy fiction's golden age. Part of the problem may lie in the fact that Deighton downplays the world-weary cynicism of Fleming and LeCarré in favor of the more low-key, bureaucratic aspects of espionage while still injecting tension and an intricate, compelling knowledge of Berlin. Bond may be suave, Bourne may never stand still, but Bernard Samson seems like one of us, with his stresses, fears, disappointments, and ultimate goodness.
- 4/9/08: Len Deighton/Mexico Set (1985): The second volume of Deighton's "Game, Set, Match" trilogy contnues strongly in the vein of the first, as everyspy Bernard Samson finds himself under suspicion since his wife, Fiona, has now defected to the KGB, and he is charged with enticing one of the top East German agents to come over to MI-6. What I find so impressive about both Berlin Game and Mexico Set is the way Deighton enthralls the reader with middle-aged agents simply talking to and about one another; both books really only have one action sequence each, and neither is longer than a few pages. Despite this, the tension and gamesmanship of espionage are never downplayed, partly due to the constant chess matches between agencies and the no-man's-land settings of places like Berlin and Mexico City.
- 4/12/08: Georges Bataille/Story of the Eye (1928): A pornographic novel that is anything but erotic, Bataille's 1928 work draws on surrealism and psychoanalytic associations both to disturb and to create fascinating connections. Bataille consistently stresses the fundamental similarities of testicles, eggs, and eyes, usually mixing them with fluids, penetrations, and filth.
- Story of the Eye follows the "adventures" of Simone and the unnamed narrator, two teens who initiate each other into not just sexuality but immediately bizarre, and escalatingly transgressive, sexuality. The last two chapters, which depict an astoundingly blasphemous desecration of a confessional, a priest, and the eucharist and chalice, is the most overtly shocking scene in the book, but I found the previous episode, at the bullfights, much more disturbing, as we see Simone become increasingly aroused by the enraged bulls' constant goring of the decoy mares in the ring, ripping their bellies open and leaving the stricken horses to run about the ring dragging their entrails.
- Fortunately this work is less than 100 pages; it is difficult enough to read what is there. I certainly didn't enjoy reading Story of the Eye, but I also can't escape a conviction that Bataille truly created a work of art with this book.
- 4/15/08: Len Deighton/London Match (1985): The last volume of Deighton's "Game, Set, Match" trilogy falls short of the quality of the previous books, but not too far. Bernard Samson is still dealing with the emotional and professional fallout from his wife Fiona's defection to the Soviets, and with his growing suspicions about the KGB defector Erich Stinnes. The intermingling of national and romantic infidelity provides a thoughtful subtext here. Not a mile-a-minute thriller, but an emotionally resonant and compelling one, a fitting conclusion to the trilogy.
- 4/19/08: H. Rider Haggard/Heart of the World (1895): With King Solomon's Mines, Allan Quatermain, and She, Haggard hit an early peak with his popular formula of taking a brave Englishman, adding exotic locales, native women, and glorious riches, and then capping it all off with an explosive climax (the Englishman being the hero, of course). Perhaps because he followed this formula, more or less, for the rest of his career with the zeal of a religious convert, his reputation has suffered much more than those of his fellow Victorian adventure novelists Robert Louis Stevenson and H. G. Wells.
- Heart of the World illustrates Haggard's decline as well as any of his works; published in 1895, a decade or more after his first successes, Heart fulfills all of the expectations, with a promising twist--instead of the African settings that his novels are so famous for, Haggard places this one in the New World, embarking his two protagonists, an Englishman (brave, naturally) and a noble Indian (loyal and sacrificing, of course) on a quest to find a hidden and still thriving Mayan-type city in Central America. The story is lively enough at first, if rote, and the introduction of the princess Maya is welcome, but soon the novel overstays its welcome, with the extended section set in the ancient city stretching on for what only seemed an eternity (I checked my watch). One interesting note: the noble Indian, Don Ignatio, early on is betrayed by a woman, and he becomes an unrepentant misogynist; every woman in the book is, at worst, treacherous, or, at best, conniving. Judging by characters such as the protagonist of She, I can't help but wonder if Ignatio is a mouthpiece for Haggard's views on women.
- 4/21/08: Leo Tolstoy/The Cossacks (1863): An absolute masterpiece by Tolstoy, and a less intimidating work than the later, monstrously long novels he is better known for. Dmitri Olenin is a young man who has ruined himself through gambling and scandalous love affairs, so he buys a commission in the Russian army and gets sent to the the Caucasus, where troops simultaneously protect the Cossack minority and seek to subdue the Chechens and other groups on Russia's imperialist frontier. Despite being written on the other side of the continent, The Cossacks shares a worldview with British and French literature dealing with imperialist regions. Olenin sees both the Chechens and the Cossacks as less civilized and simpler, but he also comes to see the Cossack way of life as preferable--he believes that culture has numbed Russians to the true joys of life and that the Cossacks, who farm, hunt, drink great quantities of homemade wine, fight skirmishes with enemies, and love with passion, live in the present and therefore more fully. Much of the book deals with Olenin's desire to marry a local girl and to befriend the young men of the village--in short, to become a Cossack. But how to become "simple" when you've already been "civilized"? He believes that he can understand Marianka, a young beauty, but that she can't understand him because of her simplicity--does this create an unbridgable rift between them, or is this duality even valid? Subtle, emotional, and thoughtful.
- 4/25/08: Leo Tolstoy/Hadji Murad (1912): Published posthumously, Hadji Murad in some ways is a fascinating bookend to The Cossacks, one of Tolstoy's early novels. Both are set in the Caucasus, Russia's imperial frontier and home to various ethnic groups hostile to Russian rule. But while The Cossacks takes the view of a young, naive Russian officer living among ethnic Russian settlers, Hadji Murad tells the story of a Chechen rebel leader caught between fellow Chechens who want to kill him in a power struggle and the Russian colonizers whom he hates but who can help him regain his former power. Tolstoy explores issues of honor, understanding, compassion, and loyalty, but above all he is interested in death, and what he has to say about it is not comforting. Whether it is a young Russian soldier shot in the gut by a sniper's bullet and mourned by his parents back home, or a Chechen boy whose only crime is to live in a village razed by a Russian patrol, life is fleetingly enjoyable but death constantly lurks out of sight. Murad's honorable, fantastic life contrasts with his degrading, unpoetic end, underlining Tolstoy's conception of human existence.
Cloned From:
For awhile I've been frustrated by the idea that after I read a book, it begins to fade from memory. This is an attempt to keep a sort of reading log, but with impressions as well as titles.