BookEnds

“If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.”

— “The Catcher in the Rye”, opening line

Today kicks off our staff read (or re-read) of “The Catcher in the Rye”, in honor of J.D. Salinger. We will be blogging along the way and invite everyone to join in the discussion.

Personally, I plan on curling up with my high school copy of “Catcher” and a nice cup of tea, losing myself once again in the adventures of Holden Caulfield. This will be my third time reading the book: I first discovered Holden the summer I was 15, and returned to the novel again in my sophomore English class. I loved the book then, and I’m almost certain I’ll love it now, though viewing the words through a filter of several years may shift my perspective slightly. What I remember enjoying most was Holden Caulfield’s voice, clear and resonant, conversational and jaded, honest and original. Throughout my initial reading, I could almost hear him echoing in my head, mixing with my own thoughts. I think this helped me to identify with him, as though we were sharing ideas through the secret medium of the novel — and, as with many of my favorite characters, I couldn’t help wishing that he was real, like another member of my sophomore English class.

I’m looking forward to meeting Holden again.

The elusive and beloved author of “The Catcher in the Rye”, “Franny and Zooey”, and “Nine Stories”, died Wednesday at his home in Cornish N.H., at the age of 91. The New York Times ran a detailed and fitting obituary.

Salinger is perhaps best known as the creator of one of the most caustic and endearing anti-heroes in all of literature, Holden Caulfield, though his meticulous depictions of the eccentric Glass family consumed both  a novel, “Franny and Zooey”, and several stories. He was a veteran of both the Battle of the Bulge and the Normandy landings in the Second World War, a good friend of famed New Yorker magazine editor William Shawn, a husband to two wives, and a father to two children. He was also a writer whose work has had enormous cultural repercussions; an author who, with one book and one character, captured and distilled adolescence for generations of readers. In 1953, two years after the publication of the bestselling “Catcher”, he retreated from New York to New Hampshire, where he lived in seclusion for the rest of his life.

It’s not for me to sum up or expound Salinger’s talent and contributions to the literary world  — nor, I think, would Salinger like it if I did. I have a feeling that he would despise the long-winded, grandly-gestured tributes dripping with high praise that will naturally (and rightfully) follow his passing. I can only speak of my reaction to his work, as someone who has adored both “Catcher” and “Franny and Zooey”, not only for their memorable characters, but for the style with which Salinger introduced them onto the page, giving them fresh, arresting voices of their own. Those stories have made me shriek with laughter — like the scene of Zooey Glass reprimanding his mother from behind a shower curtain — or fill with compassion; despite all his faults (or perhaps because of them), there were many times in reading “Catcher” that I wanted to hug Holden Caulfield.

There’s a post on The Guardian book blog that wonderfully sums up our dilemma about celebrating Salinger: with so little of his life in public, it’s hard to know just how to honor his death. Perhaps what he’d like best, and what we all ought to do, is to go back to his work: to read it again, and remember.

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January 25, 2010 marks the 251st birthday of the Scottish poet Robert Burns, author of “Auld Lang Syne” and “My luv’s like a red, red rose.” Each year, the anniversary is commemorated with the celebration of Burns Night, a traditional holiday in Scotland and the UK.  Burns Night festivities usually honor the bard of Scotland with a combination of food, song and poetry. The host will serve a dish of haggis with bagpipe music, a whisky toast, and the recitation of Burns’ famous “Address to a Haggis.” The dinner concludes with readings of his poetry and, of course, the singing of Auld Lang Syne.

Alas, for Americans wishing to honor the poet, Burns Night celebrations lack a wee bit of authenticity – haggis has been banned in the United States for over twenty years, due to health concerns about its contents. The dish, which mixes sheep innards with oatmeal and spices, will soon be legal here, thanks to the planned reversal of the longstanding ban by the U.S. department of agriculture, and ending the neccessity for smuggled or “bootleg” haggis, or indeed an apparently substandard version made with beef.

Nevertheless, even without haggis at present, we can still honor Robert Burns, for auld lang syne.

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” – George Orwell

Today marks the 60th anniversary of George Orwell’s death. He was born Eric Arthur Blair in Motihari, India, on June 25 1903, and died in London on January 21, 1950, at the age of forty-six. For the last three years of his life, he suffered from tuberculosis – a condition that was undoubtedly not helped by his habits of smoking and drinking, or the year he spent living on cold, wet Scottish island of Jura.

Orwell is predominantly known for his fervently political work; in particular, “1984″ and “Animal Farm.” He admitted that most of his life’s writing was penned with political intent, “against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism.” I often wonder what Orwell would make of today’s world; how the likes of Google, Twitter and Facebook would feature into his bleak, Big Brother-dominated world of “1984″, or how he would react to the financial crisis and the ongoing debate over health care in this country. Doubtless, whatever his political opinions would be, he would have no hesitation in tackling them with his fiercely prolific typewriter.

Though we are generally more familiar with his novels, Orwell wrote an astonishing number of essays, with content that ranged from the political to the seemingly commonplace (on the best sort of English pub, or how to make a nice cup of tea – a subject close to my own heart). I’ve read many of his essays and am enamored of his clear prose and direct style; he begins the essay “England Your England“, written during the London Blitz in 1941, thus: “As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead, trying to kill me.” My favorite, though, is his candid “Why I Write.”

And so, here’s to George: fearless soldier, compassionate chronicler, brilliant writer.

It has to be one of the coolest literary rituals ever. And one particularly
fitting the honoree.

Every year, on Edgar Allan Poe’s birthday, a mysterious figure shows up in
the dark, early morning hours and leaves three roses and a half-full bottle
of cognac at the writer’s grave in Baltimore.

Poe fans come from far and wide to shiver in the cold and wait for the “Poe
Toaster” to arrive.

But this past Tuesday, Poe’s 201st birthday, the Toaster didn’t show for the
first time in at least 60 years. The disappointment had some Poe fanatics
ready to surrender to the pendulum.

Check out the AP story.

I’m sure there are other traditions like this. I’m aware of the annual
Bloomsday celebrations, although I’ve always been too chicken to try reading
“Ulysses”; and when I went to New Orleans several years ago, I had just
missed the “Stella!” shouting contest at the annual Tennessee Williams
festival. I also know that if ever in Key West, you have to go visit the
descendants of Hemingway’s six-toed cat.

But that’s about it as far as my knowledge of literary traditions is
concerned.

Anyone know any others?

Sherlock Holmes' sitting room in Baker St.

I finally went to see the new Sherlock Holmes adaptation with no small amount of trepidation. For years, Holmes and I have been very well acquainted and I was afraid my clear, well-defined image of a character I so loved would be muddled and abused by watching the film. I walked into the movie theater slightly nervous, and came out…pleasantly surprised.

There is no doubt that Robert Downey Jr. plays a very different Sherlock — one without the hawk-like nose, questionable drug addiction and cat-like cleanliness of appearance. I knew within the first fifteen seconds of the film that this was not my Sherlock, the vision of which is very meticulously imagined in my mind. Still, that didn’t mean I couldn’t enjoy Downey’s clever acting, or Jude Law’s surprisingly good turn as Watson, and the interesting banter between them, which I think was a bit limited and overshadowed by the looming heaviness of the action scenes. Downey was, as always, fascinating to watch, playing up Holmes’ eccentricity and lending his character a more whimsical air, which nicely counterbalanced Jude Law’s stolid but unstuffy Watson. I was also pleased to see that Law’s performance elevated Watson out of the dim and stodgy stereotype that has so plagued the poor fellow.

Despite the changes wrought in Sherlock by the film, I was surprised by the details that still rang true from the original stories. The deduction that a pocket watch with a scratched keyhole must belong to a drunken man was lifted straight from Conan Doyle’s pages, and the scene of Holmes engaging in bare-knuckle boxing had it’s roots in “The Sign of the Four”, in which Holmes greets a former boxing champ turned bodyguard with fond reminisces of their match against each other. There were even a few sprinklings of familiar Sherlock-isms; Downey lazes around his (uncharacteristically) sloppy Baker Street rooms and moans, “My mind rebels at stagnation.” Sadly, there were fewer lines in the script that allowed Downey to show the full extent of his character’s fierce intelligence, or the amusing mixture of arrogance and impatience with which Holmes often regards those of lesser intellectual powers.

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I picked up Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood this summer and slowly worked my way through most of it, only to leave it lying unattended by my bedside for months.

Not that it isn’t a gripping tale. The non-fiction, which details the murder of a family of four in rural Kansas, often has the same appeal as a good horror flick. Before the bloody deed is done, it’s easy to get wrapped up in the suspense: the only question is how the victims, Mr. Clutter and his family, will be snuffed out.

My problem came after Kansas detectives bag Perry Smith and Dick Hickock, Mr. Clutter’s twisted assailants. Perhaps my disinterest can be blamed on having seen Philip Seymour Hoffman’s brilliant turn as the author in the 2005 film Capote. Unfortunately, I know how this story is going to end.

That aside, I’ve got a bigger bone to pick with Capote, and it has to do with good old-fashioned journalism. Capote’s claim to fame was his ability to conjure vivid, true-to-life scenes from actual events. The author himself called In Cold Blood a “nonfiction novel,” and laid claim to its total veracity.

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Haworth parsonage, the Brontës' home in Yorkshire, England

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.” – Jane Eyre

Despite the holiday rush, I have unofficially allotted this month as the time to catch up on all the books I think I’ve read, should have read, or never properly read. All the Dickenses I’ve missed, all the Narnia Chronicles I never got around to (which is most of them), all the James Joyce stories that I’ve always been too intimidated to try (Joyce still scares me, just a bit). In the last week, though, thanks to a five-dollar sale on classics at Borders, I have finally conquered the literary demon that has so rancorously pricked my guilt for the last decade or so. I have fallen, perhaps ten years too late, for “Jane Eyre.”

My relationship with the Brontë classic was, for many years, slightly troubled. I blame in part the preponderance of miscast film adaptations (a tradition that I worry may continue in the new, forthcoming movie of “Jane Eyre”). Jane seemed to me meek and uninteresting, while Mr. Rochester never seemed to exude much romantic appeal (such is the danger of watching the films before reading the book). I felt a certain amount of posthumous sibling rivalry simmering from the ghosts of Haworth parsonage; as I had eagerly devoured both Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights” and Anne Brontë’s “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall”, it troubled me that Charlotte alone was neglected.

Last week, however, I finally decided to brush away all this literary baggage and give poor Miss Eyre another chance. About a hundred pages into the story, the knotty, doubting clouds scattered at last and the uncertainty with which I had so often regarded this book cleared for good.

Charlotte Brontë

To say that I enjoyed reading “Jane Eyre” is a gross understatement — I fell in love with it, as deeply and wholeheartedly as it is possible to fall in love with a fictional world. How could I have so misjudged a book? The submissive, colorless Jane I remembered was swept away by a new vision of a strong, capable heroine with an unshakable sense of herself. This was a woman who resisted the controlling desires of not one, but two masterful men, who listened deeply to her heart but would not be ruled by it. She had the moral and personal strength to reject the prospect of happiness because it would have required a sacrifice of her most fundamental principles — not as a martyr, but simply as someone who would not undermine herself for any prize. Jane was courageous, even when wracked with fear, sensible, even when faced with the senseless, and fiercely intelligent, even when the contemporaneous view of women condemned her to ignorance. She is the role model of role models; I can only imagine the generations of young women that she has inspired in her wake, and am proud to finally join their ranks.

And then, Mr. Rochester: words cannot possibly express how mistakenly I judged the Byronic hero of “Jane Eyre.” In my feeble defense, I can only plead that I was never properly introduced to him, and thus decided on a weak and baseless knowledge that, in the canon of Great British Males, he was vastly inferior to, say, Mr. Darcy. But — without attempting to compare those two estimable literary gentlemen — I concede my former opinion of Edward Fairfax Rochester. He is neither sweet nor handsome – often described as an “ugly man” — and is often brutal in both temper and teasing.  He spars intellectually with Jane, calls her a sprite and an imp who has “bewitched” him, and even toys cruelly with her affections by cavorting about with a beautiful heiress. He is by no means a perfect hero, with flawed judgment and dark demons, both emotional and corporeal. And yet, he is completely irresistible, to both Jane and the reader, perhaps because his love for the former redeems his less admirable qualities. While he growls to the rest of the world, he beams with Mediterranean warmth in the presence of his “Janet.” He is able to speak words of adoration that, on the lips of any other character, would smack of sentimental corniness. When he utters his offer to Jane to be his “second self, and best earthly companion” — in short, an equal in both mind and spirit — what else can the reader do but melt?

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