Gaddis: Carpenter's Gothic

“What writing is all about is what happens on the page between the reader and the page . . . What I want is a collaboration, really, with the reader on the page where the reader is also making an effort, is putting something of himself into it in the way of understanding, in the way of helping to construct the fiction that I am giving him.”

William Gaddis, Albany, April 4, 1990

I determined to read William Gaddis’s Carpenter's Gothicafter reading Ben Marcus’s “Why Experimental Fiction Threatens to Destroy Publishing, Jonathan Franzen, and Life as We Know It” published October, 2005 in Harper’s Magazine. L. had pointed out the article over brunch at the Trident bookstore. The title was catchy and soon I was knee-deep in a literary battle of the minds: Marcus v. Franzen. The debate was new to me. I was a student of the Great Books and somehow missed out on battles of authors struggling to understand the nature of literature as art or artifice or both, or whatever.

Marcus spoke out in his article about the necessity of creating space for writers to work as artists and damn the readership. In other words, he argued that there is no right way to create literature. The problem is, of course, that there is one right way to get published in today’s fast-paced world where writers have to compete with video games and reality TV—write easy-to-read realistic narrative. Marcus says that if writers are reduced to work within a formula that sells, then literature is dead. Great painters—modernists at least—were not expected to please their audience. They innovated.

So too should writers be free to innovate, play with language, expect their readers to use their brain as a muscle. Marcus helpfully points out that the Wernicke's area--the "tufted bundle of flesh" tucked into left temporal lobe of the brain--is responsible for language comprehension. That's the part of the brain that we should grow, quite literally, when we exercise it with a variety textual gymnastics.

How do you feel about James Joyce’s Ulysses?

If you have never read it or hate it, then that proves that it is pretentious drivel that destroys literature by turning off readers who can not decipher the nonsense. On the other hand, if you see it as art—and good art at that—then Marcus says you are on the right track. Allow innovation. Expect readers to work.

Personally I cracked open Ulysses in a tiny cabin in the lush mountains of Transylvania. We had an outhouse. You had to pump water to brush your teeth. L. was writing his book; I was reading Ulysses. No TV or radio. Long mountain walks. (This is pre-ipod.). I had no distractions from the text. I also had no help with it either. I worked at it. I loved it. It drove me mad.

I admit, here today, I never read the last 100 pages. I just couldn’t do it.

Later I read the biography of Nora Bloom, Nora: The Real Life of Molly Bloom, which tells the life of Joyce's wife. I was immersed in it and consequently appreciated Joyce and his times in a clearer light. But still, I didn’t finish it (though I did read Portrait of an Artist with relish and a furrowed brow). I started Ulysses because it was touted as THE classic book to have under your literary belt. I admired it, but I did not finish it. Yet.

Yet, sucker that I am for claims to Great Book-ness, I eventually cleared my reader’s desk for Gaddis’ third novel, which is a measly 262 pages after his earlier tomes. I was surprised after the first several pages to find it strangely unstrange to me. It uses unmediated dialogue, yes. But "experimental"? Perhaps my reading of Jose Saramago’s Blindness strengthened me to face this reading task?

Frankly, my reader’s muscle was more exhausted by Saul Bellow’s The Adventures of Augie March. Gaddis’s style in this novel—which is dialogue and more dialogue—read to me almost like pure made for TV drama stagecraft, as if it bypassed my reader’s muscle altogether and hit home—curled up on the living room floor in front of the pulsing TV with canned laughter and all. This, I suppose, is the genius of his work. It allows the reader to use language to hear voices and see his house, seemingly without the author's mediation. It will take more work on my part as a reader to step outside of his house, and see what he is doing with the novel. This will take a lot of interpretive muscle.

Today I will post my initial comments and some quotes. I have already gathered various outside sources to help me gain a better perspective on Gaddis’s other novels and Carpenter’s Gothic in particular. I will post again after I have digested both the novel and the commentaries. If anyone has read CG, or other works by Gaddis, please share your comments with me!

Memorable Passages:

(Note: the dashes and elipses within each quotation are original to the work and do not indicate missing material)

“as long as something’s unfinished you feel alive it’s as though, I mean maybe it’s just being afraid nothing will happen. . .” (89)

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“You don’t leave the money to the kids you leave the kids to the money, two or three generations everybody’s crazy.” (98)

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“Now Christianity’s an American religion, that’s what he’s talking about isn’t?” (104)

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“—Keep an open mind your brains will fall out” (106)

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“—No, there’s a meanness. . .

—No no no, no it’s plain stupidity Mrs. Booth. There’s much more stupidity than there is malice in the world. . . “ (118)

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“—Or because we didn’t. No. . .his legs fallen wider for her fingertips twisting in a coil of hair —no, they all want to be writers. They think if something happened to them that it’s interesting because it happened to them, hearing about all the money that gets made writing anything cheap, anything sentimental and vulgar whether it’s a book or a song and they can’t wait to sell out.

—Oh. Do you think that? Her hand had come up now to the fork of his leg, opened, as though to weigh what it found there, —because I mean I don’t think so, I don’t think they sell out she said, her voice weighing the idea as though for the first time, —I mean these poor people writing all these bad books and these awful songs, and singing them? I think they’re doing the best they can. . . her hand closing there gently. –That’s what makes it so sad.

—Yes. . . he shifted almost stealthily, trying to rid himself of those trousers –you’re right aren’t you.

—And then when it doesn’t work. . . her grasp closed tighter on the sudden surge, —when they try and it doesn’t work. . .

—Yes that’s the, when they, that’s worse yes. . . his thumb tugging down at a beltloop with the haste he’d drawn the trouserleg on —that’s the, isn’t it that’s the worst yes, failing at something that wasn’t worth doing in the first place that’s the. . .(158 – 159)

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“—every time I’d look up, see him out there every time I looked up pretending he’s doing something worth doing look at him, ten dead leaves in his damned dustpan he’s still trying to prove he was put here for some purpose?” (167)

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“I mean when you think that those grasshoppers probably all just know the same thing but I mean with all these people, with all these millions and millions of people everyplace that no one knows what anyone else knows?” (168)

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“We’ve got the questions and they’ve got the answers” (184)

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“The greatest source of anger is fear, the greatest source of hatred is anger and the greatest source of all of it is this mindless revealed religion anywhere you look, Sikhs killing Hindus, Hindus killing Moslems, Druse killing Maronites, Jews killing Arabs, Arabs killing Christians and Christians killing each other maybe that’s they one hope we’ve got.” (185 – 186)

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“nice line between the truth and what really happens” (191)

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“That’s not what I, I mean it’s like you’ve got this real secret self hidden someplace you don’t want anybody to get near it, you don’t even want them to know about it like you’re afraid if some superior person shows up he’ll wipe you out so you protect it by these inferior types they’re the only ones you’ll let near you because they don’t even know it’s there.” (194)

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“—I’ll tell you why yes, because why people lie is, because when people stop lying you know they’ve stopped caring.” (226)

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McCandless describing the house:

“—a patchwork of conceits, borrowings, deceptions, the inside’s a hodgepodge of good intentions like one last ridiculous effort at something worth doing even on this small scale, because it’s stood there, hasn’t it, foolish inventions and all it’s stood here for ninety years. . .” (227 – 228)

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“—Have you ever seen the sunrise here? and as though she’d answered she hadn’t, as though she’d answered at all —especially in winter. You’ll see it in winter, it’s moved south where the river’s its widest and it comes up so fast, it’s as if it just wanted to prove the day, get it established so it can loiter through the rest of it, spend the first damned half of your life complicating things in that eagerness to take on everything and straighten all of it out and the second half cleaning up the mess you’ve made of the first, that’s what they won’t understand. Finally realize you can’t leave things better than you found them the best you can do is try not to leave them any worse but they won’t forgive you” (230)

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“All the discipline, obedience all the missionary zeal put a gun or a Bible in hands like that and they’re just as deadly” (235)

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"—All your gentle, your hands on my breasts on my throat everywhere, all of you filling me till there was nothing else till I was, till I wasn't I didn't exist but I was all that existed just, raised up exalted yes, exalted yes that was the rapture and that sweet gentle, and your hands, your wise hands, meeting the Lord in the clouds all these sad stupid, these poor sad studid people if that's the best they can do? their dumb sentimental hopes you despise like their books and their music and they think is the rapture if that's the best they can do? hanging that gold star in the window if, to prove that he didn't die for nothing? Because I, because I'll never be called Bibbs again. . . He stood there holding the empty cup as though looking for a place to set it down, for some refuge: shewas looking straight at him, and then —I think I loved you when I knew I’d never see you again, she said, looking at him.” (245)

Decadent Eating and Reading

It was a Thanksgiving to remember. . .especially in the past few days as my pants grow tighter through the hips and sweatpants tempt me as a viable fashion statement. The invention of elastic waistbands may be the doom of us all.

We headed up to the shore early on Thursday afternoon to join friends for Thanksgiving dinner. Although snow was forecast, it was sunny despite the chill. Near three o'clock we set off for a short hike along the coastline and scaled impressive granite rocks along the cold shore. A bit of exercise to prime the gut for the feast, so to speak.

Cheese--at least six varieties from France and Portugal and Vermont--with fresh white crusted bread and olives took the edge off after the walk. Then, just for fun, we had a round of freshly sautéed shrimp. This was followed by a round of mussels--prepared Belgium style. I should note that two cooks vied for our affections. One dish followed by another, just for fun, to see which cook could garner our praises.

While we waited for various things to simmer, D. (the ten-year-old and the only one there under the age of twenty five) got us going in a fiercely competitive card game: Spoons. The Cuban soon declared that there should be a punishment for whoever loses three times. He claimed that card games in Cuba always have punishments. We were game. M., the world class scientist, soon had to succumb to his punishment: sitting on the floor, he propped himself on his hands and feet and had to use his raised bum to trace the numbers 0 - 9. This was the Cuban's idea. It was genius and absolutely hilarious. I'm sure it burned some calories too--which is always good between courses.

A thick and steaming vegetable soup course was served at the table. Before the soup we had been milling around, eating at the kitchen island and enjoying the sunset through the wide expanse of windows.

Then a small salmon course with vegetables. Just for fun. It was sumptuous. I know we are supposed to eat more salmon--it has various healthy attributes, but this course felt too decadent to be healthy.

Finally we arrived at the main course: pheasants cooked in cream sauce with endives and a side of mashed potatoes. L. was in charge of the mashing. It was quite a sight to see M. and L. busy with their kitchen tools and mystified by the blown fuse. It was my first taste of pheasant and endives. The pheasant was quite mild, moist and decidedly ungamish. The endives were slightly bitter, but just to my liking.

Then we took a break. We sipped wine and rested near the crackling fire.

Finally we dug into sweet potato/pumpkin pie, pecan pie, and at least three other homemade desserts. It was over the top, to say the least.

We stayed up until at least one a.m. enjoying chatter and wine and the toasty fire. Finally, exhausted and heavy with food and sleep we headed off to our bedrooms. Luckily the house was built for a big extended family to vacation and so we all got a comfy beds with views to the ocean to wake to in the morning.

I paired my indulgent eating with a guilty reading pleasure: The Rule of Fourby Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason. It is a Dan Brownish thriller, but easy going. I admit that I gave up even my daily dose of news in order to indulge in this one--taking breaks only for necessary naps. I also enjoyed finishing Dai Sijie's Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, which my book club read for November. Both of these little jewels will be set forth in Boston soon as part of Bookcrossing.com.

Currently I am reading William Gaddis' Carpenter's Gothic (which turns out to be less strange than I had hoped). My night table book is Exodus by Leon Uris. I am also reading one story a day or so from The Scribner Anthology of Contemporary Short Fiction and I have just checked out from the Boston Public Library a copy of The Working Poor by David K. Shipler.

In between reading and eating, we also took time over the long holiday weekend to visit the important new exhibit at the Boston Museum of Science: Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination. It was too crowded and the lighting could have been handled more effectively BUT we loved it. Do you know how they made Luke's spacecraft hover? I do! After nearly three hours building robots and learning about magnetic trains, we headed off to the North End to find a cozy Italian restaurant with plates of pasta and then a cafe for plates of pastry. I know, all that on top of the feast I already described. . . today, it is back to the gym!

Oh! And just for posterity's sake. . .and future torte buying. . check out The Empire Torte and the special "reserve torte." Talk about decadence.

Happy Thanksgiving Eve!

For a Turkey Day ha-ha click on my link in the sidebar to McSweenys and read "Butterball Help-Line Help-Line" by Alysia Gray Painter. (You may have to scroll down to get to it AND story will be changed shortly after T-Day.)

We are headed up to the shore for salmon followed by pheasant with Belgium endives. Not to worry: I already picked up a sweet potato/pumpkin pie and a pecan tart to make sure my traditional food quota is satisfied.

I hope you all have a delectable feast! Write me and tell me about it....how lumpy is your gravy?

Make me salivate with your description....

Saul Bellow: Augie March

Saul Bellow's third novel, The Adventures of Augie March, involved commitment as a reader. I believed there would be a payoff, and sure enough the odyssey of Augie, the first person narrator, sucked me in somewhere around page 300 and took me along for the ride. I did have to study it--in the sense that I had to read it a chapter or two at a time, sitting at the dining room table (in other words, not in bed), with good lighting and a pen in my hand. Below is a summation of the book provided by Penguin Readers Guides:

THE ADVENTURES OF AUGIE MARCH
by Saul Bellow

The Adventures of Augie March burst on the postwar literary scene with the exuberance of a great American author finding his true voice. The most freewheeling of Bellow's heroes, Augie paints a fresh, gritty, comic view of the American landscape and poses anew the perennial questions: How do you reconcile freedom and love? How do you simultaneously find liberty and home in a chaotic world?

Bellow was already a well-known author when he began writing his third novel, but his early works, Dangling Man and The Victim, are very different books, written in a constrained, naturalistic form that he ultimately rejected as too limiting. Their central characters, introspective intellectuals trapped in claustrophobic circumstances, are reminiscent of Kafka's narrators. "I was afraid to let myself go," Bellow says of these works. He discarded the drafts of two additional novels because he felt they, too, were too bleak. Tired of the "solemnity of complaint," the plaintive tone he heard in the novels of his contemporaries and in his own first books, Bellow turned to his boyhood home in Chicago for inspiration.

The change proved immensely liberating and gave rise to the colorful cast of Augie March: Grandma Lausch, Einhorn, Five Properties, Dingbat, and many others, all of whom were rooted in the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Bellow's youth. Augie, a poor but spirited boy growing up in Chicago during the Depression, leaves his mother and disabled younger brother to find his way in the world. He enters a wild succession of occupations— dog groomer, saddle soap salesman, smuggler, shoplifter, boxing coach—guided by an equally fantastic array of mentors. Each of these "recruiters" attempts to determine Augie's lot in life, but whenever he is at risk of being taken by a person or profession, he slips away to a new misadventure, equal parts joiner and escapist. Not until his affair with Thea Fenchel does Augie begin to realize that love and independence are irreconcilable.

In one sense Augie is a characteristic Bellow hero, a young man with an ironic sense of the world, wary of taking direct action but certain that he belongs to a greater destiny. Like Bellow's other central characters, he is intent on finding a "good enough fate" eager to write his own part on life's stage yet stubbornly resistant to the limits imposed by any scripted role. But he is also dramatically different from the brooding thinkers of Bellow's early works. Augie is playful, subversive, adventurous, and ever optimistic. He is a new American Adam, innocently poised for a future full of promise in a land full of possibilities. No profession, no lover, no commitment can capture him. He risks his job as a book thief because he can't resist the desire to keep and read the books he has stolen. Although this very adaptability, this lack of firm obligations makes him hard to characterize or define, his first-person narrative conveys a compelling vision of American freedom, a fresh spirit of irresistible charm.

While Augie's character remains protean, the world he inhabits is painted with magnificent detail and texture. Infused with the vivid, hyperbolic Yiddish of his childhood, Bellow's narrative revels in the melodramatic people and language of 1920s Chicago. As Bellow said:

"The most ordinary Yiddish conversation is full of the grandest historical, mythological, and religious allusions. The Creation, the fall, the flood, Egypt, Alexander, Titus, Napoleon, the Rothschilds, the Sages, and the Laws may get into the discussion of an egg, a clothes-line, or a pair of pants."

The language of Augie March is likewise rife with heroic allusions, casting a mythic glow on Augie's smallest move. Augie's thoughts about his job as a labor organizer invoke John the Baptist, Stonewall Jackson, the Tower of Babel, and Ghandi's India in quick succession. Yet the extravagant metaphors sound uncalculated, falling as easily on the ear as a street-corner conversation. "The great pleasure of the book was that it came easily," Bellow said in an interview. "All I had to do was be there with buckets to catch it. That's why the form is loose."

Praise for Bellow's ebullient new style was enthusiastic, if not unanimous, and he won the National Book Award in 1953. Augie March was compared to Ulysses and described as "a howlingly American book." Supporters and critics alike recognized in him a powerful voice, a vision of America that could not be ignored. The book brought "a new sense of laughter," wrote Alfred Kazin. "In Augie, Bellow . . . discovered himself equal to the excitement of the American experience, he shook himself all over and let himself go."

Ultimately Augie's vision finds a tamer, more mature expression in Herzog, Bellow's masterwork. But Augie March holds a unique place for its rev- olutionary joy and exuberance. This rollicking tale of modern-day heroism is not only a portrait of determination and survival, but also a keenly observed drama of one man's "refusal to lead a disappointed life."

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memorable quotes:

“I am an American, Chicago born—Chicago, that somber city—and go at things as I have taught myself, free-style, and will make the record in my own way: first to knock, first admitted; sometimes an innocent knock, sometimes a not so innocent. But a man’s character is his fate, says Heraclitus, and in the end there isn’t any way to disguise the nature of the knocks by acoustical work on the door or gloving knuckles.” (Opening Paragraph)

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“God may save all, but human rescue is only for a few.” (152)

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“He believed she was already in love with him.” (200)

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“Talk will lead people on until they convince their minds of things they can’t feel true.” (209)

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“She gave me enough silence in which to take it back, looking at me.” (252)

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“Well, given time, we all catch up with legends, more or less.” (333)

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“The whole mystery of life is in the specific data.” (434)

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“Anything that just adds information that you can’t use is plain dangerous.” (455)

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“You pay for what you want, not always what you get. That’s what a price means. Otherwise where’s the price?” (465)

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“But love is adultery, he said, and expresses change.” (483)

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“Why do you have to think that the thing that kills you is the thing that you stand for? Because you are the author of your death. What is the weapon? The nails and hammer of your character. What is the cross? Your own bones on which you gradually weaken. And the husband or wife gets to do the deed. ‘Kind spouse, you will make me my fate,’ they might as well say, and tell them and show them how. The fish wills water, and the birds will air, and you and me our dominant idea.”

“Can you say what is your dominant idea, Mr. Mintouchian?”

He answered readily. “Secrets. Society makes us have some, of course. The brotherhood of man wants to let us out of them by the power of confession. But I must beget secrets. I will be known by secrets at my death. . . .

Complications, lies, lies and lies! he said. . . .Mind you, I’m a great admirer of our species. I stand in awe of the genius of the race. But a large part of this genius is devoted to lying and seeming what you are not. We love when this man Ulysses comes back in disguise for his revenge. But suppose he forgot what he came back for and just sat around day in, day out in the disguise. This happens to many a frail spirit who forgets what the disguises are for, doesn’t understand complexity, or how to return to simplicity. From telling different things to everyone, forgets what the case is originally and what he wants himself. How rare is simple thought and pureheartedness! Even a moment of pureheartedness I bow to, down to the ground. That’s why I think well of you when you tell me you’re in love. . . ."

“You will understand, Mr. Mintouchian, if I tell you that I have always tried to become what I am. But it’s a frightening thing. Because what if what I am by nature isn’t good enough? . . . I suppose I better, anyway, give in and be it. I will never force the hand of fate to create a better Augie March, nor change the time to an age of gold.”

“That’s exactly right. You must take your chance on what you are. And you can’t sit still. I know this double poser, that if you make a move you may lose but if you sit still you will decay. But what will you lose? You will not invent better than God or nature or turn yourself into the man who lacks no gift or development before you make the move. This is not given to us.” (484-485)

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“I said when I started to make the record that I would be plain and heed the knocks as they came, and also that a man’s character was his fate. Well, then it is obvious that this fate, or what he settles for, is also his character. And since I never have had any place of rest, it should follow that I have trouble being still, and furthermore my hope is based upon getting to be still so that the axial lines can be found. When striving stops, the truth comes as a gift—bounty, harmony, love and so forth. Maybe I can’t take these very things I want.” (514)

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“Look at me, going everywhere! Why, I am a sort of Columbus of those near-at-hand and believe you can come to them in this immediate terra incognita that spreads out in every gaze. I may well flop at this line of endeavor. Columbus too thought he was a flop, probably, when they sent him back in chains. Which didn’t prove there was no America.” (536)

words:

balk, ward, goad, shill, gyp, gypped, gyp·ping, envenomed (with fear), embittered, bid, pacify, gorp (to eat a snack of high-energy food) , procure, lag, repudiate, debilitate, glom, arouse, stymie, pepper, stupefy (stupefaction), clung, blundered, sauntered, swell, hauled, hustled, harrowed, intercept, procure, gallop, interpose


toploftiness, persiflage (frivolous, bantering talk), ripple-assed luxury, fustiness (rigidly old-fashioned or reactionary) , avidity (keen eagerness), supernumerary (exceeding what is necessary, required or desired), rapaciousness (living on prey, voraciousness), assignation (tryst), axial lines, effrontery, guff (nonsense), confiteor ( from Middle English, literally I confess), jitney (slang for nickel)


wan (sickly, pallid, languid) , nonplussed , sullen, parricide faces, fiery, pale-fire concentration, sardonic (disdainfully humorous), temerarious (marked by temerity), indignant, negligible, gilt (gold covered), marvelous, verdigris (green, blueish deposit on copper, bronze or brass), restive (stubbornly resisting control, balky; marked by impatience, fidgety) , licentious (lacking legal/moral—esp. sexual restraint), empyrean (sublime), pellucid (reflecting light evenly / easy to understand)

my book shelf:

I will return my copy of Augie March to the Boston Public Library this afternoon along with my recently finished copies of Hatchet by Gary Paulsen and Runaway by Alice Munro.

Fish in the City, On the Shore

So a Kansan, a Transylvanian, a Belgium, a Portuguese, an Oklahoman and a Russian meet in a North end Oyster Bar. Much wine, much conversation, a few high fives, much-much laughter and a waitress who kicked us out—very politely of course after all that muchness. Four of them continue the conversation at an Italian cafe over limoncello and grappa. . .

I certainly know that my mother loves oysters on the half shell. I have some vague memory of tasting one myself, but I can't nail down when or where that might have been. Friday night I ate oysters. Unless someone can remind me of another occasion, I will mark my 31st birthday as an oyster first.

Frankly, the little opaque quivering masses have always slightly frightened me. But as the restaurant was a surprise as well as our guests who had valiantly held our table in the tiny, packed place, I was caught up in the moment. The waitress came by and asked for our oyster order. Yes, I admit, as the Kansan, I was not aware that one could choose from an extensive variety of oysters. I explained that this was my first time and the waitress kindly suggested a flight of four varieties recommended for the beginner.

The first one I swallowed (on the advice of the Russian) after holding it on my tongue--briny, slimy and altogether reminiscent of olives. The second one I chewed (per the advice of the Portuguese) and I have to admit the sweetness came through when my teeth sliced through the the soft flesh. A good beginning.

My birthday wish for seafood was well satisfied this weekend: oysters, followed by red snapper and the next day, up on the shore, mussels (home cooked Belgium style) and lobsters! We had theater tickets for a show at 8 p.m. on Saturday, but once out on coast and in awe of the sunset, we decided that food and friends trump theater tickets. So we offered the tickets to friends back in the city and got to be there to witness our dinner crawl first.

A fine seafood weekend. Not to mention a memorable 31st!

Read more about our little restaurant...the Neptune.

World's Shortest Stories

This morning I am treating myself to some fun little writing exercises, namely I have finally sat down and tried my hand at a 55 word short story ala Steve Moss' s The World's Shortest Stories. Ms. M. told me about this idea--short, short stories or sometimes called nanofiction--last year or the year before. I have had Moss's little book on my shelf for quite a while. Today, my last day of being 30 years-old, seemed like a good time to try my hand.

I prepared my morning coffee and reread the rules for the game in the back of the book. I won't bore you with an account of all the rules, basically the story must be 55 words (or less, but why less?) excluding the title, which can only be up to 7 words. Numbers (42, for example) count as a word. It has to be a story: characters, conflict and resolution (not to mention setting).

You must have a clear focus, a sharp idea. Once I got my first little story going, I quickly had over 100 words--yikes! Then I whittled and carved and threw articles out the door until I ended up with something that delighted me. Beware: I literally just penned this short, short story this very morning and so it is very rawish:

Poet Wields Metaphor

“Honey, where is the extra salt?” he implored from his study.

“Kitchen, second shelf,” she mumbled and ratcheted up the TV’s sound.

“Butcher knife—the good one?”

“Bottom drawer, inside the leather box, but what on earth for?”

“Salt and a razor edge: the stuff of poetry, my love. I’ll just open your mind, finally.”

by J.K.Kelley

This first attempt was such a good time that I wrote two more, but with less zing I think:

Wifely Duties

“Mrs. Wiggenstein, it’s about your husband.”

“Come in, and let’s talk inside. Tea?”

Too late she regretted her neighborly impulse. The Mrs. hustled her through the door and shoved her down the basement steps.

This one worried Mrs. Wiggenstein. Reginald had forgotten to fix that broken step, it seemed. She must increase his medication again.

by J.K.Kelley

And finally this last one seems pretty bad, but here goes:

Spare Some Change, Mister?

Two goddesses patrolled Newbury Street, swiveling their hips toward likely suitors.

One goddess slapped a young man. He cried out, but she left him there, a sniveling mess.

The other goddess smirked. “Tightfisted, couldn’t spare a few coins. Boys mistake confusion for suffering.”

They continued to beg down the street, one mortal at a time.

by J.K.Kelley

Here a few I have copied from Moss's book (he is the editor) to give you an idea of his collection:

Bedtime Story

"Careful, honey, it's loaded, "he said, re-entering the bedroom.

Her back rested against the headboard.

"This for your wife?"

"No. Too chancy. I'm hiring a professional."

"How about me?"

He smirked. "Cute. But who'd be dumb enough to hire a lady hit man?"

She wet her lips, sighting along the barrel.

"Your wife."

by Jeffrey Whitmore

Guitar

He'll never hold me as he holds that guitar. Hasn't touched me that way in years.

I'll get inside the guitar, to be in his arms again.

She spent all day, sacrificing shape, voice, everything but desire to be held. Finally inside, mute, invisible, she waited.

"Honey, I'm home! I bought a new guitar! Honey...?"

by John M. Daniel

I Want to Report An Accident

"Celia, it's all your fault. You'll find my bloated body in the pool. Farewell. Umberto."

She stumbled out, the note in her fist, and saw me, floating face down, like a giant fly marooned in Jell-O.

When she leapt to rescue me, and remembered she couldn't swim, I got out.

--Convict 338412

by Tom Ford

The Ordeal

She hated them! All of them! Their masks hid not their glee, as their groping hands held her down--for him.

The pain and the blood were unbearable. Still, he persisted, forcing her.

Her screams only encouraged him. She knew not to deliver meant certain death.

Finally, satisfied, he said, "It's a boy."

by Tom McGrane

Lecture: Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad

Last night L. and I attended a reading by Margaret Atwood. I first read her novel, Cat's Eye at the suggestion of my book club. I quickly followed up with The Handmaid's Tale and then The Blind Assassin. These three books are just the tip of an impressive iceberg—she has many novels, books of poetry, essays and children’s literature as well.

The event was organized by Newtonville Books and held at the New Art Center, both in Newton. The venue was sold out, but it was an intimate space with about one hundred folding white plastic chairs in front of a raised stage. A heavy navy curtain hung at the rear of the stage and tiny white holiday lights adorned the arch. Hardwood floors tripled the excited chatter in the room.

I had dashed off to Newton a few weeks ago after an email update from the bookstore announced the event. Tickets were not available online or by phone. Rather they requested a visit to the bookstore and the purchase of her new book, The Penelopiad, and a surcharge to cover our entrance fee. The twenty minute drive took me nearly an hour and a half—due to faulty directions I swear! The bookstore, which has an enormous presence online and through its weekly author readings, is a relatively unassuming and cozy place. Since I had scouted the route, our trip there last night was in due time.

I had strong-armed L. to arrive quite early. I hate to be in a rush and I did not want to arrive late or even slightly harried to the event. The cocktail hour began at 6:30, and we arrived closer to 7:00. The reading began promptly at 7:30 and lasted almost exactly one hour, including the question-and-answer session.

The audience was mostly women, but there was a smattering of men and all ages were represented, though the average attendee was over thirty, well-healed and artfully coiffed. There were a few stunning crones who were given a helping hand and moved through the crowds on their own (well-deserved) red carpet.

After a brief welcome by Eric Phelps, director of the New Art Center, and by Betty from the Bookstore, Atwood took the stage. She wore a wide-collared coral button-down shirt beneath a black shawl with simple black pants. Her fringe of silver curls framed her face. She appeared elegant, but unpretentious when her cutting wit began to sizzle across the podium as she discussed the content and the genesis of her latest work.

In Homer’s Odyssey Odysseus' faithful wife Penelope does a lot of weeping, weaving and waiting. Atwood set out to retell the myth through two narrators: Penelope herself and the Twelve Maids, who are hanged upon Odysseus’ return to Ithaca. Atwood noted that Homer’s work (or work that has been attributed to Homer) is an epic poem that draws on some, but not all, of the oral myths of his time. In fact, there are stories and more information about Penelope in other ancient sources that didn’t make it into the Odyssey. Atwood made use of these.

For example, in the Odyssey Penelope weeps often and is famously chaste. Other sources reveal that she had one lover or perhaps made lovers of all one hundred suitors. It is also learned that Penelope’s father was Icarus, who tried to drown her when she was a child, and her mother a Naiad—a water nymph. Thus Penelope weeps because she is half-naiad, not necessarily because she pines so deeply for her long-lost Odysseus. Also revealed is that Helen of Troy is Penelope’s cousin, which creates all kinds of family tension between the beautiful Helen and the clever (but less pretty, damn it) Penelope.

The mythological sources do attest that both Odysseus and Penelope were renowned liars, that famous guile. The sources all agree that Odysseus had short legs. Thus he needed his guile even to win Penelope, whose hand in marriage was given to the winner of a foot race. Odysseus had actually tried to win Helen’s hand first, and when he lost he made a deal with Helen’s new husband (or her father?) that he would help him win Penelope by cheating at the foot race. He had to cheat due to those famously short legs. Perhaps he put a drug in the other runners’ wine. Penelope used her guile to either hold off the suitors or to keep them secret as her lovers. She also outwitted them with her ploy to weave a death-shroud and she set up the contest of the bow at the end. Finally she even tested Odysseus at the end with the secret of their marriage bed. Atwood takes these details and uses them to paint a more complete picture of clever Penelope.

Atwood read from the novel, a hilarious section in which Penelope and Helen meet in the underworld as Helen is about to take a bath. The entire novel is narrated from the afterlife, by the way, where Helen of course does not have a body that needs bathing. But she bathes to afford a glimpse of beauty to the hordes of men who follow her every ethereal move.

It was a short reading but very lively as Atwood took up the coy voice of Helen and the witty responses of Penelope as she read.

Atwood then took questions. I will try to tease out some of her responses here, as she really came to life with clever replies that the audience heartily loved.

She was asked about the genesis of this work. She told us that she was at a book fair in Edinborough and was having breakfast with a young publisher who set forth his plan for a series of re-told myths. He laid out his ambitious plans before she had had her coffee. She agreed to do one in his proposed series--having no idea what she was going to write—a bad idea, she noted. All the writers in the series would receive the same page allotment, a rather small number (which was attractive), as well as the same fee, a “paltry sum,” she laughed. But, as she said, “It was Help a Young Publisher Day,” and so she gave herself, reluctantly it seemed, to the task.

As a North American writer, she first attempted to re-tell a myth of her region. She found this impossible after several false starts. Finally the deadline loomed and she fumbled around and hit upon the Odyssey. She commented that while Penelope had never gotten much press in the modern world, since she read the Odyssey in school at age fifteen she had always been disturbed by the hanging twelve maids. “So much of writing,” she said, “is unfinished business.”

An audience member asked Atwood to talk about her own reading pleasures. Atwood was quick to say that she will read anything—even airline magazines or the back of the cereal box. She buys magazines in airports—news, science and commented that she had read two interesting pieces in Gentlemen’s Quarterly. She admitted to reading the equivalent of Harlequin romances to check out how things are changing—years ago the women were allowed to be governesses, nurses or art restorers. Men weren’t allowed to say much—just look sufficiently brawny. Now the women get to be doctors and lawyers and the men get complete sentences! She mentioned that she likes to read Stephen King, comic books and advertisements—although today’s advertisements have fewer words and more images.

She told a quirky little anecdote about reading an advertisement for the old Old Dutch cleanser (I’m not familiar with it myself, but here is a link with some images--none of which seem to be the one she described) when she was young—maybe five years old. There was a Dutch maid who had a broom to scare away the dust in one hand and in the other a can of the cleanser. But on the can in her hand there was the exact same picture of a maid with a broom in her hand and can of the cleanser. She noticed the infinite regression and wondered at it—what it meant for the poor maid, and perhaps for all women. The costumes for the women in “The Handmaid’s Tale” were inspired by that ad, except that she made them red.

She was then asked about how she started to write science fiction. She discussed her childhood growing up in the 1940’s in the golden age of “Flash Gordon” and coming of age with Ray Bradbury as her influences. She also quipped that science fiction “is where theology went after Milton.” It is where we set forth our ideas of how the world should or could be organized and governed. She noted that humans, Hitler, for example lay out their plans for the future well in advance, but that he was not believed. She cautioned belief when we read of diabolical plans that may seem like science fiction at the time.

For the most part the remaining questions had to do with her work as a writer. One young woman writer asked her for advice for an aspiring novelist. Atwood replied with a question, “To what does the young novelist aspire?” After a round of laughter, the young woman (not me, by the way!) said that she aspired to publication. Atwood did have some practical wisdom:
1) write the novel;
2) get an agent that loves you and understands your work (rather than a “big name”);
3) you are own your own; and, somewhat kindly,
4) good luck.

Another aspiring writer, I assume, asked her about her writer’s habits. Atwood said that she had always admired those who had a routine. She couldn’t handle it. She writes when she writes, in bursts, but not at a regular time each day. In the beginning, she would have long panic attacks and then end up at a movie after having written nothing. Now she has managed to compress her panic attacks into five minutes of sheer terror and then she gets on with the writing. She used to be a night time writer, but switched to writing in the day when she was caring for her daughter. One thing she knows for sure, if she would have waited for a routine, she never would have written a thing. I liked this last bit of advice. I have tried to discipline myself to have a set writing time in the mornings and feel terrible when I can't make it happen---perhaps I shouldn’t be so rigid with my practice after all. Perhaps.

When asked which of her many, many works is her favorite, she launched into a very funny comparison of a parent having to choose which of their children they love the best. Impossible to do—they each have their own gifts—and fatal because the others would certainly hear about it.

One of the last questions asked if she was working on something new. “Yes I am. Will I tell you? No.” She laughed at her emphatic response, but explained that she never talks about her new works. If she talks about them, she doesn’t write them.

A round of warm applause closed the Q & A and then the small mass that we were tried to arrange ourselves in an orderly fashion—we had been encouraged twice by the director to be civilized. He must have had experience with the bookie enthusiast crowds—things got a bit tense as people jostled for places in line to have Atwood sign precious copies of her new book or treasured well-worn classics. Luckily we all settled down and decorum reigned.

As I have written before, having an author sign my book always makes me uncomfortable. First of all, it is a strange kind of autograph seeking, which I find a bizarre custom, a slightly repellant longing. Then there is the impossibility of saying anything of consequence to the author who is churning out his or her signature. The whole thing is a bit sticky and stomach-churning for me. Getting so close and personal, but not really having a real encounter seems so sad. A bit. Is that just me? But she was as gracious as could be and I thanked her at least four times (I had three books signed). I am proud to say, I did not blather at all. Just smiled and glowed and tried not to stall the line.

I had briefed L. about Atwood herself and her newest book. I think he enjoyed the evening—the art, the sold out venue, Atwood’s aura and her wit. It was good to have his company. As we headed back to the car, the November air was chilly and suddenly we realized we were hungry. We had eaten a rushed dinner in order to make it on time, but after the excitement had ebbed we needed ice-cream calories. We contemplated stopping to buy a carton of Ben & Jerry’s. Right then we passed the huge glass windows of Cabot's Ice Cream & Restaurant filled with a lively crowd. We had never heard of the place, but it was clearly a beacon in the night. The sundae we shared was enough for four people—we couldn’t even finish it all! There is something singular about dipping your spoon into a mess of ice-cream, syrups and whipped cream—knowing there is more in your dish than you could possibly ingest, but the pleasure of trying is sweet indeed.

Party on the Beach, Vegetarian Hamburgers, and The Penelopiad

Friday afternoon we piled into the car and took off for a party up north, past Salem, on the coast. It was an hour drive that took us almost two hours due to the "scenic" route and a mad dash into a Dunkin' Donuts for a bathroom break and doughnut holes (bathroom for customers only....).

The view was fantastic and the house a writer's retreat--huge windows, a crackling fire, etc. etc. We stayed on the shore until the sun set, then moved inside for more food, more wine and lots more conversation--I think we covered the riots in Paris all the way to the love/sex paradox. I'm not sure that conclusions were reached. But we did imbibe to our hearts content and talk until we nearly pulled a muscle in our jaws. I laughed until my sides ached. It was a delicious night.

The next morning, I awoke with a headache. Not a hangover, mind you, more like too much good food and crazy talk had gone straight to my head and lodged there. Coffee was all that was needed to clear my synapses for another day. I should note, for the record, that the first words uttered by moi that Saturday morning are as follows: "Honey, I am a vegetarian." And I mean it. For years, roughly since the time I met a certain Hungarian, I have been a non-practicing vegetarian. I believe in it--philosophically, emotionally, even intellectually. Yet I had also been swayed by the kill-the-pig and eat all of it--snout to tail, approach of the Eastern European variety.

At the shore party, however, I fell into conversation with a certain Iranian, who had provided a lavish vegetarian spread from a local Indian restaurant. Somehow bullfighting had arisen as a topic of conversation and he had expressed his disdain, disgust and general repulsion. I jumped into the fray at that point and contributed that I had seen a bull fight in Madrid and, in fact, was surprised by my reaction, which was as follows: At least there was a pretense of respect for the animal. Man is going to kill and eat it. Bullfighting is honest about that AND they profess to eat snout-to-tail as well. Here in the States we pretend that the pink-in-plastic that we serve up with a garlic rub or a delicate white wine reduction is something other than meat. It arrives in the grocery store bloodless and ready for our tidy kitchens and hungry tables.

I could go on to support why I believe in abstaining from meat, but alas I shall save the philosophy. Perhaps I will develop my apology in a later blog; surely I will need one ready at hand for the inevitable questions.

In short, as of Saturday, I am a vegetarian who eats dairy, eggs and fish.

Saturday night, one day into my change of life, a group of people visited with a former high school friend of L's. Guess where we took them to dinner: Mr. Bartley's, Boston's famous hamburger joint for more than forty years. I had my veggie burger and felt good about it. So did my gut the next morning when L. was still complaining about all the food.

Sunday was quiet--lots of reading and stay at home out of the rain time.

I finished Margaret Atwood's newest book. It is called The Penelopiad and retells Homer's Odyssey through Penelope's eyes. It is a delightful read, but I have some questions. I will reserve comments until after we hear Atwood read and discuss her work this coming Thursday.

Carol Mulroney, The Last Word

I know that I should probably leave the entire "Carol Mulroney" play topic alone. But there is another episode. After I fired off my missive about the review I found off-kilter, the Globe emailed me back and wanted to publish my letter. I revised the letter and made it more newspaper friendly, but this did make it longer. Below you will see my revised letter, and then after you will see what was actually published in the Boston Globe. It is an interesting look at the exchange of ideas in the our daily news and the power of editing....

My Letter to the Boston Globe:

Ms. Kennedy's review (October 28, 2005) of Stephen Belber's "Carol Mulroney," in its world premier by the Huntington Theatre Company, described the play as having a "hollow core where its heart ought to be." Having seen the play myself before I read her review, I was shocked to read her take on it. It would be a pity if you stayed away from this production based on this one review.

I found the play's raw, yet poetic language effective. We watch as Carol, the main character, slowly moves toward the edge of the roof where she seeks solace from a noisy interior life. It is clear that she will end her life; the other characters must circle around this sad truth and try to reconcile their lives to it. I also recently saw Tom Stoppard's play, "The Real Thing," (also by the Huntington Theatre Company) and it helps to draw a comparison between the two in terms of language use.

When I left the Stoppard play, my cerebral g spot was in a tizzy from all the clever language and multi-layered meanings. I felt smart because I get some of his allusions and excited to better educate myself to understand more of his allusions next time. Belber's language, on the other hand, made me feel deeply alive. Lines that border on being fantastical evoked for me true emotion, namely the sadness of missed opportunity and denial. For example, the self-justifying histrionics of the self-deluded father and especially the soliloquy by the grieving best friend, which entails her sacrificing her deepest sexual self in search for salvation (her affair with Carol's husband was partly to blame for her death). I left the Belber play and walked out into the cool evening air knowing that I am human. And, unlike Carol Mulroney, still alive.

True, my brain didn't sizzle the same as when I am post-Stoppard, but my heart did. After a Stoppard play, you have little to discuss. You feel that you need to see the text, underline the clever bits and discuss it in a Socratic Seminar to uncover its meanings. After Belber, my boyfriend and I sat in a nearby cafe and happily hashed out the characters and the ways they interacted and how it related to our own lives.

Yes, I thought there were weak moments in the play, but it was hardly the failure presented in the Globe's review. This is a play that my generation can really get. We make jokes at the "wrong time." We have grown up with "The Vagina Monologues" and we respond to the raw language it reclaimed. Belber is a fresh new voice who was trying to write about "someone with a sort of inexplicable sadness." What is sad about the play is that one review in the Globe might prevent Belber from an audience who can appreciate his work.

J.K.Kelley
Boston

What was published in the Sunday Arts & Entertainment Section,

November 6, 2005:

Louise Kennedy's review of Stephen Belber's "Carol Mulroney," described it as having a "hollow core where its heart ought to be." ("Up on the Roof," Weekend, Oct. 28). I found the play's raw, yet poetic language effective. I thought there were weak moments in the play, but it was hardly the failure presented in the review. This is a play that my generation can really get. Belber is a fresh new voice who was trying to write about "someone with a sort of inexplicable sadness." What is sad is that one review might prevent Belber from [getting] an audience who can appreciate his work.

J.K.Kelley
Boston

My Book Shelf

I may not be going to Harvard, but I am certainly getting an education here in Boston. I have a full slate of things to read and places to visit, not to mention martinis to drink and miles to go on my treadmill.

Partly to impose some order on my self-assigned curriculum, here is an account of what I am reading:

I slog through Saul Bellows' Augie March, which I have just re-checked out AGAIN from the library. Finally, I have had a break-through chapter and think that I will, perhaps, make it to the end. Good stuff. Just dense, dense, dense. Coming-of-age is hard work.

I will return to the library The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman--I have to be tough and make some choices....

I finished Ryan White: My Own Story and can check that off my list of Young Adult writing. A good story. The account of his friendship with Michael Jackson is a bit eerie, I have to say.

I also finished Typical American by Gish Jen, which I found compelling, and can return it as well and check it off the Indiana Recommended Reading list.

I need to read and finish Margaret Atwood’s newest book because I will go see her next week on Thursday, November 10th! So I will focus on that as my "light" reading. Let the Atwood countdown begin.....

But what I want to seriously read is from so-called experimental fiction. I recently read an article in Harper's by Ben Marcus called "Why Experimental Fiction Threatens to Destroy Publishing, Jonathan Franzen, and Life as We Know It." You must bow down to that title, at least. While I am spinning from the debate--I have jumped into literary fisticuffs for the first time, really--I am mostly happy that his article has excited me about nonnarrative fiction. Now I just have to figure out what that means. Marcus has turned me on, in several senses of that phrase, to an entirely new set of authors and I can't wait to dig in and see where they take me. . . I think I will dare to start with William Gaddis's Carpenter's Gothic.

I also checked out from the 'brare Alice Munro's collection of stories, Runaway.

Not to mention that I am reading about two stories a week from the O. Henry Prize collection for my fiction writing class at Emerson--which is a wonderful class made up of delightful minds.

And not to mention that I finally read a few stories from John Cheever.

I can't believe I have the audacity to write short fiction in the shadows of such great work. I am undaunted! My plan: immerse myself in fiction, especially short and experimental fiction, and then wait for an explosion--either of my brain or my imagination.