Musée des Beaux Arts W.H. Auden
About suffering they were never wrong,
Musée National Picasso Paris Janet Kelley
About strangeness, he was never wrong,
The lovely Ms. L.-H chose the phenomenally successful Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (published 1995) as her inaugural book club selection. I finished it yesterday while I was on the bus, oddly. It is quite unsatisfying to finish a novel while lurching along breathing in the odors of strangers. But I digress.
Ms. L.-H is the group’s newbie and chose one of her dearest favorites to share with us. In our Book Club the custom is that one member hosts at her home and whips up a scrumptious meal to get our literary cogs turning, while another member leads the discussion about the book of her choice. If you host, you don't have to fuss with prepping a discussion (actually we rarely need any grease for our booky-talk hinges). Everyone gets to proffer their book selections; and we take turns preparing our homes and dinner tables. The sharing of books and our culinary talents (or experiments, in my case) works for our group.
I should clarify, for the record, that I am actually not attending Book Club this year. You see, Book Club is in South Bend, Indiana. I am in Boston, Massachusetts. While I would love to find a grant that supports my desire to travel for Book Club, it hasn’t happened. Apparently, Oprah just hasn’t read my letter stipulating my wildest dream and why she should make it come true. I understand; Oprah is quite busy. All those needy kids in Africa—I bet she reads their precious little letters first. Alas. Did I just digress, again?
Yes, Ms. L-H, it is true that I had to deal with a bit of personal reluctance before I dove into Wicked. I am a Kansas girl, born and bred on the tales of the plucky young Dorothy. Yes, I owned a Cairn Terrier—the exact same breed as darling Toto. My Toto was named: Haley’s Comet (check your astrology charts and you can do a complicated story problem to figure out my age when I welcomed little Haley into our Kansas acreage.) Little Haley went the way of the car accident and we buried her on a gentle hill near the road. But you didn’t log in to read dead-dog stories.
My point is this: I grew up with the Munchkins and the Wicked Witch of the West. I am sure many readers are drawn to the tale precisely because of their great familiarity with and love for the characters and its fantasy. I was hesitant, however, to jump into a long novel about a story that I already “knew” and LOVED.
But I love Ms. L-H too. It was a terrible triangle: me, the Wicked Witch of my childhood and my passionate devotion to Book Club. I gave in. And. . .I am glad that I did. I am glad to have been goaded into reading a fantasy.
I have to say, honestly, that I did really get into the Wicked Witch. I think Maguire did a convincing job creating a fully realized character for her. She was the star of my reading. The discussion of EVIL, on the other hand, just got annoying. Don’t get me wrong, I love EVIL (really, I studied it in college. no really.), but here I felt it was a bit forced.
I wanted adventure, intrigue. I wanted to feel delight. I wanted to empathize with the witch. I didn’t want to think about the nature of evil or her “baptism” at the end. She died. End of story. She was not baptized. I know, I know that I should/could think more deeply about the ideas in the novel. But I don’t want to. I want to read this one for pleasure. Don’t make me think. I love Maguire when he lets me gallop along in his fantasy land. I love him not so much when he tries to get too deep.
Recommendation: Yes, read it. It is a perfect bedside/planeride read. Here are some of the little jewels you will delight in down the yellow brick road. . .
Memorable Lines
(page numbers taken from paperback edition)
"He meant this, and for such intensity she had fallen in love with him; but she hated him for it too, of course." (9)
"She reasoned that because she was beautiful she was significant, though she what she signified, and to whom, was not clear to her yet." (65)
"The broad, offensive panoply of life and Life, seamlessly intertwined." (75)
"Walk softly but marry a big prick." (161)
"I do not listen when anyone uses the word immoral," said the Wizard. "In the young it is ridiculous, in the old it is sententious and reactionary and an early sign of apoplexy. In the middle-aged, who love and fear the idea of moral life the most, it is hypocritical." (175)
"When the times are a crucible, when the air is full of crisis," she said, "those who are the most themselves are the victims." (238)
"Poets are just as responsible for empire building as any other professional hacks." (320)
"Maybe the definition of home is the place where you are never forgiven, so you may always belong there, bound by guilt. And maybe the cost of belonging is worth it." (377)
gawp (67; 167)
Function: intransitive verb
Etymology: English dialect gawp to yawn, gape, from obsolete galp, from Middle English
etiolate (108) A perfect way to describe a blanched green witch!
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): -lat·ed; -lat·ing
Etymology: French étioler
1 : to bleach and alter the natural development of (a green plant) by excluding sunlight
2 a : to make pale b : to deprive of natural vigor : make feeble
voluble as in volubly weeping (142)
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle French or Latin; Middle French, from Latin volubilis, from volvere to roll; akin to Old English wealwian to roll, Greek eilyein to roll, wrap
1 : easily rolling or turning : ROTATING
2 : characterized by ready or rapid speech : GLIB, FLUENT
synonym see TALKATIVE
glower used as glowery (161) to describe the weather
Function: noun
: a sullen brooding look of annoyance or anger
splenetic (171)
Function: adjective
Etymology: Late Latin spleneticus, from Latin splen spleen
1 archaic : given to melancholy
2 : marked by bad temper, malevolence, or spite
sententious (175)
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, full of meaning, from Latin sententiosus, from sententia sentence, maxim
1 a : given to or abounding in aphoristic expression b : given to or abounding in excessive moralizing
2 : terse, aphoristic, or moralistic in expression : PITHY,
camels in glittering caparisons (236)
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French caparaçon, from Old Spanish caparazón
1 a : an ornamental covering for a horse b : decorative trappings and harness
2 : rich clothing : ADORNMENT
parlous (361)
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, alteration of perilous
1 obsolete : dangerously shrewd or cunning
2 : full of danger or risk : HAZARDOUS
I read Annie Proulx’s 1997 short story Brokeback Mountain this past Fall in the Scribner’s Anthology of short fiction. It is a powerful story and the film adaptation directed by Ang Lee, as I found out last night, is well done. The only other work by Proulx (rhymes with “true”) that I had read previouisly was The Shipping News (1993) which I found in an English language used bookstore in
I had intended to see Brokeback Mountain ever since it arrived in theaters, but just didn't seem to find the time. Then yesterday an occasion presented itself: The Coolridge Corner Theatre was screening the film in partnership with the Boston Psychoanalytical Society. As the Boston Globe blurb put it: "This year's buzz movie, "Brokeback Mountain," has a cast of characters who could use some one-on-one time with a licensed psychologist. The movie contains loads of denial, passive-aggressive behavior, alcohol abuse and phobias." The event was part of a series called "Off the Couch" and occurs every first Tuesday of the month.
After the film the majority of the audience stayed for an open discussion of the film and a consideration of the issues from a psychoanalytical perspective. It was a lively discussion. I was fully aware that this kind of gathering of minds is a rare thing in my usual neck of the woods. The gentleman seated in front of me was happy to confess that this was his third viewing, he had read the short story and the screenplay, and he listened incessantly to the soundtrack. When I asked him later if he was a film buff or an English professor, he said no. He had simply been swept away by the tragic tale. Another woman pointed out that this is the first film to use the predicament of the two men as the crux of the story while staying clear of identity issues, which I thought was a good point. Their predicament is true love that society thwarts. Romeo and Juliet cast as Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist.
It is a tragic story. Not one single character in the entire story gets want they want out of life, except the young daughter at the end of the story. The price for her happiness is almost too much to bear. I will not say any more about the plot or the characters! It is a finely drawn tragedy and the actors do an exceptional job. See it.
“It is easier to be bewitched by Haruki Murakami's fiction than to figure out how he accomplishes the bewitchment. His novels -- in America, the best known is probably ''The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle'' -- lack the usual devices of suspense. His narrators tend to be a bit passive, and the stakes in many of his shaggy-dog plots remain obscure. Yet the undercurrent is nearly irresistible, and readers emerge several hundred pages later as if from a trance, convinced they've made contact with something significant, if not entirely sure what that something is. Murakami's latest, ''Kafka on the Shore,'' is no exception, although it is a departure for this Japanese novelist in other ways.” --Laura Miller (see link below)
“I fumble around in the bushes, but all I touch are branches, hard and twisted like the hearts of bullied little animals.” (65)
“Works that have a certain imperfection to them have an appeal for that very reason—or at least they appeal to certain types of people.” (102)
“Kafka, in everybody’s life there’s a point of no return. And in a very few cases, a point where you can’t go forward anymore. And when we reach that point, all we can do is quietly accept the fact. That’s how we survive.” (148)
“I happen to like the strange ones,” the driver said. “People who look normal and live a normal life—they’re the ones you have to watch out for.” (174)
“A life without revelation is no life at all. What you need to do is move from reason that observes to reason that acts. That’s what’s critical. Do you have any idea what I’m talking about, you gold-plated whale of a dunce?” (255)
“We’re not metaphors.”
“I know,” I say. “But metaphors help eliminate what separates you and me.”
A faint smile comes to her as she looks up at me. “That’s the oddest pickup line I’ve ever heard.” (273)
“Anyone who falls in love is searching for the missing pieces of themselves. So anyone who’s in love gets sad when they think of their lover. It’s like stepping back inside a room you have fond memories of, one you haven’t seen in a long time. It’s just a natural feeling. You’re not the person who discovered that feeling, so don’t go trying to patent it, okay?” (276)
“Having an object that symbolizes freedom might make a person happier than actually getting the freedom it represents.” (292)
“The strength I’m looking for isn’t the kind where you win or lose. I’m not after a wall that’ll repel power coming from outside. What I want is the kind of strength to be able to absorb that outside power, to stand up to it. The strength to quietly endure things—unfairness, misfortune, sadness, mistakes, misunderstandings.” (293)
“I feel like I’m exactly where I belong. When I’m with Mr. Nakata I can’t be bothered with all this Who am I? stuff. Maybe this is going overboard, but I bet Buddha’s followers and Jesus’ apostles felt the same way.” (301)
“That’s what love’s all about, Kafka. You’re the one having those wonderful feelings, but you have to go it alone as you wander through the dark. Your mind and body have to bear it all. All by yourself.” (335)
“That’s right. a reciprocal metaphor. Things outside you are projections of what’s inside you, and what’s inside you is a projection of what’s outside. So when you step into the labyrinth outside you, at the same time you’re stepping into the labyrinth inside. Most definitely a risky business.” (326)
“Without those peak experiences our lives would be pretty dull and flat. Berlioz put it this way: A life without once reading Hamlet is like a life spent in a coal mine.” (352)
“The music that had been playing in my head vanished, leaving behind some faint white noise like a taut white sheet on a huge bed. I touch that sheet, tracing it with my fingertips. The white goes on forever.” (369)
“. . .the forest tries to threaten me. Blowing a chill breath on my neck, stinging like needles with a thousand eyes.” (370)
“Every one of us is losing something precious to us,” he says after the phone stops ringing. “Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That’s part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads—at least that’s where I imagine it—there’s a little room where we store those memories. A room like the stacks in this library. And to understand the workings of our own heart we have to keep on making new reference cards. We have to dust things off every once in a while, let in fresh air, change the water in the flower vases. In other words, you’ll live forever in your own private library.” (432)
Useful Links
Official Haruki Murakami website (worth a click!)
"Book of the Times: Adrift in a Universe in Flux Like Some Big FedEx Box” New York Times Review by Janet Maslin
“Crossing Over” New York Times Book Review by Laura Miller
“Subconscious Tunnels” New Yorker Review by John Updike