Last night, as I watched the primaries of Texas and Ohio(and Vermont and Rhode Island)unfold, I finished Booth Tarkington's Alice Adams which won the Pulitzer prize in 1922. It didn't take me long to read when I actually sat down to it, maybe only 3 days. And, it was okay. I'm not saying it was the best book I've ever read(by a LONG SHOT), but it wasn't too terrible at all, a fairly fast read actually, and maybe I'm just coming down off of a high of finishing All the King's Men. Keren was a bit worried that Alice Adams would appear to be sexist. It's about a family in a small Midwestern town in which the wife is constantly nagging the husband to be better and make more money so that his family can have more nice things, and is constantly telling him how much of a failure he is because after all these years he hasn't done anything about bettering the welfare of his family. This is juxtaposed with Alice Adams, the title character of the book, but also the daughter in the family, trying to keep up with the rich girls she wants to be like and attract a rich eligible bachelor, in this case the highly-sought-after Mr. Russell. By pretending too much and, I guess the old-fashioned expression is "putting on airs,"(as well as saying QUITE often, "people may talk about me" and either asking if they have or downplaying it...it makes Mr. Russell nervous, this constant preoccupation of hers with wondering what others think about her) she doesn't give him the most accurate picture of herself, and when Mr. Russell is at lunch with his rich cousins and hears some trash-talking about her and her family, he becomes uneasy, thoughtful and especially after the climactic disastrous dinner her family has for him, he is permanently out of the picture.
In the midst of this, Alice's father decides to actually get off of his extremely sickly ass and DO something since his wife won't quit harping on him. He decides to open a glue factory by using a recipe that he shared with his very wealthy boss, but up until now had not been acted upon. He does it without his boss knowing and then the boss squashes him, like a bug. Though in this process, Mr.Adams stands up for himself and being the poor, forgotten man. It is a pathetic speech, but reminds us all of what it is like to be the underdog trying to compete with the extremely wealthy.
Alice, though the heroine, is rather annoying. I felt myself constantly wanting to scream BE YOURSELF!, but it is not even today uncommon for women to act a certain way to try to attract a man, or be popular or whatever. The most interesting character, who unfortunately becomes a major player in the family's downfall, is Alice's brother Walter. Now the book I don't find to be sexist at all, even from an historical standpoint. Women's roles were definitely different in 1922, but I don't think that this book contributes to that outlook, it just depicts it. There are still nagging, social-climbing wives out there and there always will be, there are always women who will pretend that they are something or someone else to make a man fall in love with them, especially if they feel that their chances are running out. But what is interesting is the depiction of Blacks in this book. Now, this book takes place in the Midwest, where there never was slavery. But here there is still a dichotomy between the blacks and whites, something that will continue until even the present day. Walter, Alice's brother, has fun with "the coloureds" and interacts with them, causing much consternation for his family members, especially Alice, who tells her Mr.Russell that her brother is writing a book on them so he must observe their habits. Also, the depiction of the maid they hire for the dinner and other black people that are onlookers to the families demise are not depicted very well, but you get the picture with Tarkington's writing that this isn't necessarily his opinion, rather the opinion of the people of the time. Which when you read the novel, you are more likely to believe.
I was surfing around on the Pulitzer prize website last night to see how they decide on the award given in that particular year(esp. since as the farther you go back you don't have any way of finding out what other novels the winners were up against)and there wasn't much information to be found in that respect. What was interesting was in the FAQs, there was this question:
23. Why in some years was there no award given in a particular category?
According to The Plan of Award "If in any year all the competitors in any category shall fall below the standard of excellence fixed by The Pulitzer Prize Board, the amount of such prize or prizes may be withheld."

Hmmm. What does this mean? I find it particularly hard to believe that out of the thousands of books published in any given year the committee can't figure on one that depicts American life well enough to give it an award. I hope that when I'm done with this project I will be able to interview or at least speak with some members of the committee to see how it all really works. Same with the Canadian side...though they didn't award far less times than the U.S. did. I just don't know. PPs-38, GGs-35.

I'm sitting here, listening to James Taylor sing "Country Road" in a public television concert, and it makes me think about my travel out West, a literal coast-to-coast journey along major highways and also small country roads. It was an awe-inspiring trip and I'll never forget it. This project too has been even thus far an amazing journey through Canadian and American literature, through the cities and small towns that make up these two great countries, discovering authors that I would have never ever known about otherwise and reading some of the "classics" that I probably should read at some point but haven't yet. I'm almost half-way through both lists(actually just about half-way on the Canadian side) and there's still so much more to go, but it's books like the last one I read, Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men that make me excited to keep going, to see what still lies ahead. I decided to read Warren's book because of the timeliness with all of the excitement swirling around the presidential election coming up in November. It's only a few days away from two big deciding states on the democratic side, Texas and Ohio's primaries and caucus. Robert Penn Warren's novel is supposed to be THE political novel of American literature, about a well-meaning attorney who at first is blindly led to the slaughter of politics in Louisiana and then, only a few years later, takes the gubernatorial election by storm and becomes the great, but as the years add on extremely corrupt, Governor Willie Stark. Stark's character is based upon Huey Long, a real-life famous governor of the same state. I have to admit, politics have always fascinated me, I voted in my first democratic primary (at the state level) only days after I turned 18, and have followed the road to the White House in these past months and will continue to follow it rapt. It is kind of sad that two of my new favorite shows are Charlie Rose and George Stephanopoulos. But, I eat that stuff up. So, I was looking forward to this book, though apprehensive too, because even though it had garnered great reviews, I have been deceived on that front before. Boy, was I pleased. This is probably(and I've already said this more than once this week)one of the best books I HAVE EVER READ. Not only am I talking at the enjoyability level, but also in terms of how well it is written. Warren was named as the first poet laureate of the United States and has won two Pulitzer prizes for books of poetry, being the only writer in the history of the prize to win in both categories. Michael Ondaatje(my author that I LOVE to hate) and also Margaret Atwood won Governor General's for poetry and the novel, but even though I haven't read Robert Penn Warren's poetry, I can surely say that this man writes a truly poetic novel. The descriptions are luscious and dripping with the sweat in Governor's house and the humidity of the Louisiana bayou. I clung to every word, aching to read more, and that's just because of his choice of words and phrases. The story too is complicated and rich, as complicated as all our lives are. The title of the work makes reference to the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty" in which after Humpty Dumpty falls, "all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again." This book is supposed to be about the rise and fall of Governor Willie Stark, but it is so much more than that. It is about the narrator himself, Stark's right-hand man Jack Burden and his life, as well as all of the people that he and Stark touch or destroy along the way. This book has echoes of F.Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby in which an unreliably biased(possibly experiencing homosexual desire and love)narrator depicts the rise and fall of a tycoon named Jay Gatsby. Warren blows Gatsby away. You see not only the rise and fall of Stark, but of all of his cronies and every one he touches, and come to realize that one's life is shaped so very much by the relationships that one has with other people; children can be borne out of relationships, but so also is experience born and depending on the kind of experiences one has is how one's life shifts and changes. Politics obviously plays a huge part in this book and shapes everyone surrounding Gov. Stark, and it made me think of the candidates that we have now...Obama, for example, still seems wide-eyed and not as calculating as I presume Hillary to be, but I know he's got his calculating side as well, and how far is he really from backroom deals and screwed up spending? I would like to think that he is above all that, but then you can look at Willie Stark and see how quickly one can run down a slippery slope...I also, for whatever reason, seem to have a penchant for books about the deep South and this book is so great for that, perhaps I like books about the South so much because it seems to have a dreamy quality to it. I've only been to Florida in terms of travelling to the South, which is full of magnolias and gardenias, azaleas, live oaks and cypress. Soon, though, in about a month, I will travel to North Carolina as well, and even though it will just be early spring, I'm hoping to enjoy some of the landscape. But, I digress. What I also really liked about the book is that EVERYONE is flawed. There is absolutely no perfect character in Warren's book, which is, of course just like in real life.:) I'm not sure why this book grabbed me so, I just have to put it on the list of top reads next to Faulkner, To Kill a Mockingbird and Gone with the Wind. Funny, all those books take place in the South as well...I've got a lot of favorite quotes from this book, and I hope by reading these you can see a little bit about how well Warren writes, though the brevity of them doesn't do him justice...
"That was why I had got into my car and headed west, because when you don't like it where you are you always go west. We have always gone west.[paragraph] That was why I drowned in West and relived my life like a home movie.[paragraph] That was why I came to like on a bed in a hotel in Long Beach, California, on the last coast amid the grandeurs of nature. For that is where you come, after you have crossed oceans and eaten stale biscuits while prisoned forty days and nights in a storm-tossed rat trap, after you have sweated in the greenery and heard the savage whoop, after you have built cabins and cities and bridged rivers, after you have lain with women and scattered children like millet seed in a high wind, after you have composed resonant documents, made noble speeches, and bathed your arms in blood to the elbows, after you have shaken with malaria in the marshes and in the icy wind across the high plains. That is where you come to lie alone on a bed in a hotel room in Long Beach, California.(464-465)

Also..."I dismissed the question finally. Perhaps the only answer, I thought then, was that by the time we understand the pattern we are in, the definition we are making for ourselves, it is too late to break out of the box. We can only live in terms of the definition, like the prisoner in the cage in which he cannot lie or stand or sit, hung up in justice to be viewed by the populace. Yet the definition we have made of ourselves is ourselves. To break out of it, we must make a new self. But how can the self make a new self when the selfness which it is, is the only substance from which the new self can be made? At least that was the way I argued the case back then (529).

And,
"This is not remarkable, for, as we know, reality is not a function of the event as the event, but of the relationship of that event to past, and future, events. We seem here to have a paradox: that the reality of an event, which is not real in itself, arises from other events which, likewise, in themselves are not real. But this only affirms what we must affirm: that direction is all. And only as we realize this do we live, for our own identity is dependent upon this principle" (578).

This too:
"So I went back down and stood in the garden among the black magnolia trees and the myrtles, and thought how by killing my father I had saved my mother's soul. Then I thought how maybe I had saved my father's soul, too. Both of them had found out what they needed to know to be saved. Then I thought how all knowledge that is worth anything is maybe paid for by blood. Maybe that is the only way you can tell that a certain piece of knowledge is worth anything: it has cost some blood" (647).

And finally, two quotes from the same page...The first "I tried to tell her how if you could not accept the past and its burden there was not future, for without one there cannot be the other, and how if you could accept the past you might hope for the future, for only out of the past can you make the future"(656). And, the beginning of the end, where Jack Burden(what's in a name after all? his is fitting since he has such a burden of a story to carry with him...)begins to wrap it up..."This has been the story of Willie Stark, but it is my story, too. For I have a story. It is the story of a man who lived in the world and to him the world looked one way for a long time and then it looked another and very different way. The change did not happen all at once. Many things happened, and that man did not know when he had any responsibility for them and when he did not..." (656).

We have no idea how even the minutest events will affect us until they turn us down the path on which we now walk. I could quote Robert Frost, but I think you get the point. This book is all about roads taken and not taken and the sometimes horrific consequences that ensue, all written in an extremely beautiful lyrical way. This is what American literature is all about and why we give out a prize like the one it won. I'm so glad I read it. PP-37, GG-35

One of the things that has been really great about this project is that I've discovered some authors that I probably wouldn't have otherwise, they are the unsung heroes, the forgotten ones. One of these is Gwethalyn Graham, the author of Earth and High Heaven which is the book that I finished this afternoon. Gwethalyn Graham is an amazing writer: one of the few women to win the Governor General, and one of the even fewer women to win it multiple times, first for the novel Swiss Sonata(GG in 1938)and then again for Earth in 1944. I read Swiss Sonata right when I started pursuing this project seriously and fell in love with her then, thankful that I had this projects to make discoveries like that one. I got Swiss Sonata through an interlibrary loan with the Seattle Public Library. The book came from Pomona, California. What a jewel of a novel. It takes place pre-WWII in a Swiss boarding school. This Swiss boarding school becomes the microcosm for what is going outside this 1930s version of Mean Girls. I wrote a review about it on Amazon.ca and here it is:

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

A rare and outstanding jewel, Mar 7 2006

By	Pastry chick (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews

Graham's novel was an amazing look at the world pre-WWII, written with such insight and foreshadowing as I have only seen in novels written post-war, when one has all the time in the world to have hindsight. Written in 1938 about 3 days during 1935, it turns a Swiss "finishing school" into a microcosm of pre-war Europe and abroad. Sometimes while reading, I couldn't see how the book pertained to a kind of Canadian experience, which I thought might be fitting as it was the 1938 winner of the Governor General, but I realized that it chronicles several human experiences, loneliness and loss among them, that make it universally worthy of any award presented to it. A must read for anyone who likes to think, but also enjoys good prose.

Earth and High Heaven is also a gem. Graham tackles a social unmentionable: the possible mixed marriage of a Jew and a Gentile. Interestingly, this book takes place DURING WWII, while Canadians and the rest of Europe were fighting against Hitler and Nazi Germany. At the heart of the novel are two people, Erica Drake and Marc Reiser. Erica is from a wealthy family who has seen their wealth slip a bit during the Depression, but they still cling to their WASPy status wholeheartedly(at least her parents do). Marc Reiser is a Canadian Jew, born to Austrian immigrant parents, who practices law in Montreal. Erica and Marc meet at a party at her parents' posh Westmount home, and you could pretty much say it was love at first sight. But, what ensues is a battle for that love as Erica's parents fight wholeheartedly against the relationship, because to them marrying a Jew is pretty much the worst thing in the world, at least they claim it will be for her, since her social status will diminish and after all, this man is only "using" her to get ahead. The love that Marc and Erica share grows despite all of this though, and even despite Marc misgivings that HE will ruin Erica's life with the prejudice she will face with a mixed marriage. Questions arise like "How would they raise their kids?" and the fact that Erica's father wouldn't be able to have his son-in-law come to his club(something that matters to him a great deal, to Erica not so much). What lies at the heart of this novel is prejudice and how blinding that prejudice in the face of stubbornness it can become. Erica's father is already not too pleased by his son's marriage to a Catholic French Canadian, this, especially given the fact that Erica is his favorite child is too much. It takes the second generation, both Marc's brother and Erica's sister to show parents some sense(though Marc's parents seem more amenable to the idea; Marc's mother's only worry is that when people are married for a long time they can fight and say things they wouldn't say to anyone else. She's afraid that Erica would throw Marc's being a Jew back at him). This, to an extent can be applied to any situation involving prejudices towards something someone doesn't or can't(because of lack of desire)understand. I know that when I began dating Keren, my mother got extremely worried. This is a woman for whom Christmas is a literal explosion all over her property every single year. The fact that I would possibly never celebrate Christmas again bothered her terribly. I still don't think she's completely over it, but at least she's willing to work with it and is not trying to prevent the relationship from continuing like Erica's father, especially, tries to do. Erica's father feels he knows what's best for her, but of course the only one that knows what's best for her is her, and he doesn't get it at all...Some phenomenal quotes come out of this book: "That human beings, regardless of their own merit, should take upon themselves the right to judge a whole group of men, women and children, arbitrarily assembled according to a largely meaningless set of definitions, was evil enough; that there should not even be a judgement, was intolerable" (Graham 32).
And in reference to Erica's father: "What he was saying was of no importance in itself, it had all been said before so many times, repeated parrot-like but with an air of acute perception and originality by one person after another, in one country after another, all the way down through history. After all, even Hitler was unable to think up anything really new on the subject of the Jews; he merely said what everybody else had been saying, only of course he said it louder and oftener, and put it a bit more strongly.[paragraph break] The importance lay, first, in the fact that it was Charles who was saying it, and second, in the fact that if he believed what he said, if he believed that even half of what he was saying applied to Marc, then, whether or not her father ultimately came round, it would make no real difference. He might put up with Marc, he might even endure him for her sake, but he would never like him. He would never even get near enough to Marc to find out whether he was likable or not. [paragraph break] (and MY FAVORITE PART RIGHT HERE) You might just as well try to see a man through a brick wall as try to see him through a mass of preconceived ideas" (149).
What I particularly loved was the foresight that Graham's characters had towards AMERICAN government. something that seems particularly fitting seeing as we are in an Election year moving towards FINALLY electing a new President. "'Do you think the people who are in a position to do all the talking really know?' asked Erica. [paragraph break] 'Maybe a few of them do, but all we seem to have got so far is a kind of mass consciousness of the way things are changing or ought to change, if we're really going to get anywhere after the war. At least the English masses seem to be getting the hang of things, and I guess we are too, though naturally not to the same extent yet, because we haven't taken anything like the beating they have. I don't know about the Americans, though I'd be willing to bet that when capitalism is a dead duck in the rest of the world, the Americans will be the last nation to admit it.' 'Why?' asked Erica. 'Because their attitude toward Government seems to be fundamentally different than ours. The further you get from unrestricted capitalism the more Government you have to have. So far as the war is concerned, for example, the Americans apparently get production in spite of their Government, half the time, and not because of it. It's their individual industrial geniuses who work the miracles, not Washington. They still believe in rugged individualism and don't believe in 'government interference,' so rugged individualism works and Government doesn't. Most of the Americans I know talk about their Government as though it was on one side of the fence and they were on the other. Good old-fashioned capitalism is the only economic system that suits that point of view'" (157-8). Hmmmm....
The novel gets its title, one discovers, from The Shropshire Lad by A.E. Houseman, which contains the lines 'Be still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle.../Earth and high heaven are fixed of old and founded strong.' That makes me think of today even, that in some regards things haven't changed, or at least not as much as we would like. My mother worried about me dating a Jew, but not as much as she worries about what our lives are like as being a lesbian couple. There is an entire part of the country(ultra-conservatives)that are afraid, much like Erica's parents in the novel are, of people who are different, and there are also a lot of people who claim to be enlightened, but when push comes to shove...
"When I was just a little girl" I wanted to be Jewish so bad. I thought it was cool, that it would make me different. This book made me think about how hard it must have been, to preserve one's faith and culture in the face of sooooo much adversity. One night while I was reading the book I asked Keren about whether sometimes it had been hard for her to be Jewish in this country. Her answer made me think. Have we really come that far as a nation, as a world? This impending election has raised a lot of those questions, since the democrats have either a white woman or a black man as possible nominees. How ready are we really, and are our preconceived notions like the wall that stretches across China, or like the one in the former East Berlin? GGs-35. PPs-36.

Since my last blog, I've read two more winners...Home Truths by Mavis Gallant and Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. I feel slightly bad, because I didn't do any writing about Home Truths. I thought it was easily one of, if not the the best, short story collections I have EVER read. But, even though each story was very well crafted and highly enjoyable, I didn't find any of the stories to be particularly memorable. This is not to detract at all from Gallant's writing ability at all, though. Her collection of short stories, though shorter than Katherine Anne Porter's, was so much better.:) Gallant explores what it means to be "Canadian"...Her depiction of Canadians is not always good, she sometimes demonstrates them as close-minded, but others as explorers of their world. Perhaps this is to show that just like in the US, despite sometimes international thought depicting us differently, it takes all kinds of Canadians to make, well, Canada.
The book I finished early this morning is Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. It was 945 pages long, and at first, I was like "this book is FUCKING long." But, especially in the last 300 pages, it became quite amazing. Larry McMurtry is one of the most successful American writers, not only because he has published a crazy amount of books, but also because he has had those books turned into screenplays(Terms of Endearment, etc.)and also written several screenplays of his own, including the screenplay for Brokeback Mountain(adapted from E. Annie Proulx, short story). Lonesome Dove is also about cowboys, lots and lots of them, though absolutely NONE of them are gay, unfortunately. 945 pages and NO ONE IS GAY? Come on! Women too are scarce in the novel, only a handful show up of any real note and less than 5 women would be considered main characters(probably really only 2, Clara and Lorena). That was also disappointing, but then I had to really think about what the West was like...
I will completely, and totally, readily admit that the West has been a fascination of mine since I was probably about 7 years old, when I first read Little House in the Big Woods and all the books that followed. I have, for at least the past twenty years, scoured libraries and bookstores for anything about the West and pioneers, mostly women and pioneering, which is pretty rare. Willa Cather whom I adore(especially since she was a lesbian) talked about establishing the Midwest and living and working the land, but she always used male protagonists(arguably because then she could write more freely about the love for a woman). Cather's only Pulitzer prize winner also has a male protagonist. But, anyway, I've always thought the West and travelling the West was pretty interesting, though I always focused much more on the pioneer aspect and less on the cowboy aspect. There are quite a few books, interestingly enough, in the Pulitzer list, that are about establishing the West, which makes sense because the Pulitzer is supposed to be about the American Experience, a huge part of which of course is the never-again paralleled Westward Expansion. I will have many more books to read about the West and hard farming lives in the Midwest, which is great! Why didn't I have to read this stuff in school? Why are all the early books pushed aside and put away? I can't wait to read almost all of them, especially women writers writing about prairie experiences.
Back to Lonesome Dove. When the book opens, we are thrust into the small town of Lonesome Dove, Texas, with Augustus McCrae and Woodrow F. Call and all the other characters who will forever stay in my memory. The novel follows these two mean as they lead thousands of cattle north to Montana, loves lost and gained and also all the peripheral stories of other people and how the world is such a truly small place. My favorite character, besides Augustus(Gus) McCrae, is Clara Allen, who is Gus's long lost love, from twenty years prior. She only figures in the book in memory, until around the last few hundred pages, when the cattle trip stops by her house in Ogallala, Nebraska. Then, her life without Gus is revealed and when he comes to visit, he brings Lorena, the whore that he rescued from Indians(up until that point the only real female character in the novel). She winds up living with Clara through the duration of the novel, helping to raise Clara's two children as well as the baby son of a young sheriff who is half-heartedly searching for Jake Spoon, a cowboy that Gus has known for years, who is on the run from the law and spent quite a long time with Lorena, who is on the trail to Montana because of him. See what I mean? In the novel of Lonesome Dove, it's truly a small small world.
It is fortunate that for the most part all of McMurtry's female characters(what few there are)are quite strong-minded survivors. That makes me appreciate them so much, despite the presence of them. However, I have to remind myself that the West certainly had a limited female population anyway and what women survived HAD to be strong in body AND spirit. Even Louisa, a woman farmer that Roscoe(July Johnson the sheriff tracking Jake Spoon's deputy sheriff)encounters on his way west is a hard-working, takes no prisoners, kind of woman, a fact that surprises Roscoe greatly. I wonder what I would have done if that opportunity had been available to me back then. Would I have gone and taken my chances with the men? It was appalling to see how limiting the career options for women were. You were either a schoolteacher, married or a whore. How would I, if I was as I am now, a lesbian, have handled myself and would I have taken advantage of my desire to see the West and explore, or would I have stayed East and NOT risked my life. It was crazy enough to move out here on my own now, over one hundred years later with the amenities such as car and cell phones. I'm not sure what I would have done back then. My dream would have been(especially when I was single)to open a restaurant in a town and cook for the men who would have loved homecooked meals, but I'm not sure whether there was a real possibility of me then being raped or forced to marry. I'm sure I wouldn't have been allowed to be single for too long. And then, where would I meet other women and/or have had exposure to books and education? As one found out while reading Lonesome Dove, when Clara talks about how long it takes for her to get her magazines that she sends away for, and one discovers how illiterate the men were, it would have been hard for a big reader like me. However, the description of the landscape on the way north from Texas to Montana made me want to get in the car and do a long-distance drive right away and see Wyoming again, not to mention the land I haven't seen, Montana, which to all accounts is supposed to be absolutely stunning. There is so much to write about with a 900+ page novel, but this has already been super long. I can say, it is like the Gone With the Wind of the West. Perhaps that will give you a better idea...:) Pulitzer prize-35, GGs-34.

Divisadero and The Road. What do they have in common? A few things. They were both written by men who are extremely famous writers with many accolades to their credit. They both are populated by stark dialogue and overall sparse prose. And, they both won an award in 2007. Divisadero by Michael Ondaatje(MY FAVORITE! NOT!) won this year's Governor General award, and The Road by Cormac McCarthy won this year's Pulitzer Prize. Both books also held their share of surprises. But, even though Ondaatje's book won later in the year(November), I want to talk about him first, since I owe a blog about him(my blog about Anil's Ghost was unfortunately lost by blogger in a combination with firefox) to the blog.
Michael Ondaatje. I am not a big fan. I've been thinking lately about why that is. Perhaps it's because he's one of the only Canadian writers that Americans are familiar with and that makes me just a little bit bitter because there are so many other fabulous Canadian writers out there. Also, I know that he and Margaret Atwood are always linked together as the "Margaret Ondaatje" phenomenon(at least her name comes first)and yet though I think she is both a better novelist AND poet, he always seems to clean up at the big awards. I don't like the feeling that I get when I open an Ondaatje book(and I feel I can be a pretty good judge of this, I've read 4 of his novels and two books of poetry)I feel like I should be basking in this overwhelming sense of AWE. I feel like when I open the book this voice speaks to me that says "YOU ARE READING A MICHAEL ONDAATJE NOVEL, WRITTEN BY ONE OF THE GREATEST CANADIAN WRITERS, NO, WORLD WRITERS, EVER. JUST TRY AND UNDERSTAND WHAT WILL BE THE MOST AWE-INSPIRING READING EXPERIENCE YOU HAVE EVER HAD. YOU ARE NOT MEANT TO UNDERSTAND, BECAUSE CLEARLY YOU ARE NOT MICHAEL ONDAATJE, THE GREATEST WRITER, EVER." A book, no matter in what esteem I hold it in, is still a book. I don't want anyone, especially an author, making me feel like a book is going to be a certain way before I even get past page 5. Let ME read it and see what I think. That being said, I am, to an extent, a fan of Ondaatje's poetry. The Collected Works of Billy the Kid is still one of my favorite poetry books, because I love the combination of words and use of found poetry, as well as Ondaatje's pursuit of the outlaw theme that runs rampant through Canadian literature. However, with his novels, I've had a little bit different experience. Though the books are interesting enough at the time, I have never found one to be particularly memorable. Ironically, I CAN remember what was going on in my life whenever I read one of his books, and that WAS memorable, so perhaps that is why his books don't cling to me as much. The English Patient I read the summer I had major jaw surgery. I was so doped up it was hard for me to focus on anything, and Ondaatje's elongated prose poem style of writing, not to mention the fact that the main character was also heavily medicated, made the book a challenge to follow at times. I thought it was an interesting read, but wasn't compelled to read any more of his novels. In the Skin of a Lion I read because of someone, which is what made that memorable. I met a guy, through a friend at school, and began dating him. The reason I was dating him was because I found out that my two best friends had fallen in love, and I was supremely jealous and freaked out because I wasn't sure that I was gay(I knew I was, but I was still in denial)and I wanted to prove that I wasn't. In the Skin of a Lion was one of his favorite books. I bought it because of him and read it much later(the relationship was extremely short-lived for a few reasons). I don't remember much about that book either except that it involves a bridge and immigrants. Out of the 4 Ondaatje books I've read, it's also the one that hasn't won a Governor General. Anil's Ghost I read this past summer(2007). It wasn't as terrible as I'd heard it to be, but it wasn't that great either. It doesn't help that I was depressed much of that time because Keren was in NZ and I was lonely and work was super stressful. I spent much of my free time watching Gilmore Girls episodes and any book that I read kind of got the shaft in terms of my attention commitment level. I just felt a major MEH when I read it, perhaps it's some anticlimactic reflex from the build-up of reading an ONDAATJE(can't you just hear some deep announcer voice saying his name and the room vibrating?)novel. So, since my experiences with his novels have not been super great, you can only imagine my chagrin when he won this year for Divisadero, his latest novel. Chagrin doesn't begin to describe it. I was PISSED. First of all, I was looking forward to the announcement, like counting down the days, of who would be the winner of this year's GG award for fiction. I was also crossing my fingers because I didn't want him to win. Not only because I was tired of reading Michael Ondaatje novels, but also because there were quite a few new novelists(Heather O'Neill for example)who I wanted to win to spread the wealth and bring in some new blood. The day of the announcement I was SOOOO excited and then subsequently SOOOOO disappointed. I had a gloomy face for a few days and if anyone asked why, they were sorry, because I told them. So, I put a hold on it at the library(it was extremely popular) so that it would be a long time before I would read it....Someone at the library must hate me because I got it only a few weeks later. Kate thinks it's because everyone who was on the list found out how shitty it was and took their names off the list. Ha. Well, I read it, started and finished it on my trip back to Seattle from Vermont, when I visited my parents this year for a birthday surprise for my mom. Yet again, even though I just finished the book a little over a week ago, the trip is memorable, the book is not so much. I remember liking it while reading it, surprisingly, but not being overly drawn to any of the characters. Ondaatje's writing style is so, poetic, which I do admire, and the book was short, which was helpful. I finished it going, what was the point of that? The first part was about three people(even four if you include the father)and their interconnected lives and how the past continues to haunt them, the part about the writer in France, that one of the protagonists is studying, I'm not sure where exactly that fits in, and especially since the book ends with that writer's point of view and just seems to stop, I felt like I was left hanging. I flipped back through the book for clues, and the one that I found was perhaps in reference to the choice of title....It's a thought line of a character, but it could be interpreted as straight from the author's mouth: "This is where I learned that sometimes we enter art to hide within it. It is where we can go to save ourselves, where a third-person voice protects us. Just as there is, in the real landscape of Paris in Les Miserables, that small fictional street Victor Hugo provides for Jean Valjean to slip into, in which to hide from his pursuers. What was that fictional street's name? I no longer remember. I come from Divisadero Street. Divisadero, from the Spanish word for 'division,' the street that at one time was the dividing line between San Francisco and the fields of the Presidio. Or it might derive from the word divisar, meaning 'to gaze at something from a distance.' (There is a 'height' nearby called El Divisadero.) Thus a point from which you can look far into the distance. [paragraph break] It is what I do with my work, I suppose. I look into the distance for those I have lost, so that I see them everywhere. Even here, in Demu, where Lucien Segura existed, where I 'transcribe a substitution/like the accidental folds of a scarf.'" (142-143) He's a beautiful writer, don't get me wrong, but perhaps, now reading the quote that I chose over again, the reason why I'm not is biggest fan is because I feel he DOES create that distance, and it separates me as the reader from the book with a wall of either inability to understand, or not enough to depth in character to make me want to.

The Road by Cormac McCarthy, on the other hand, can be considered one of my SURPRISE!s of 2008(even though 2008 is still very young). The premise of the book did not interest me at all. It's about a man and son traveling west in the post-apocalyptic US. I can't think of anything in that description that would make me put the book on my must-read list. I am so glad I did. The book's prose is stark, dialogue sparse against the page, but the relationship between father and son is so compelling possibly because there is nothing else to focus on for them but survival(survival for their physical but also relationship health). These two men are working so hard to get to the West Coast, why, it is never really explained, but one hopes/assumes that it is in the desire to find something better...The road they travel is full of possibilities for scariness and threat of death but still they persevere. What is interesting to note too is that the son still has, even though this is the only kind of world in which he has lived, a sense of looking out for the good guys and helping people along the way...he still maintains some sort of innocent samaritan-ness. It is he who has to convince the father to help out the few that they do along the way and who thinks constantly about the ones that they choose not to help, wondering where they ended up. The father, though possessed with his own pre-apocalypse memories has such amazing love for his son, despite the fact that he is a jaded adult who for his own survival must focus exclusively on his and his son's life. The only thing I didn't like about the book is that the world is so bleak and hopeless in so many ways, that I had terrible nightmares at night over the three nights or so that I read it. I could only contribute it to the book because the horrific landscape always figured in somehow. It is totally a worthwhile read, though, it really made me think about how I would respond in a situation like that, what would I do, where would I go. You have no way of knowing if anyone else you know is alive or dead, there is absolutely no way to communicate, the entire US is full of blackened, burnt landscape and long-abandoned homes. In reading the novel, you assume that things have been like this for quite awhile due to the character's comments. Remember that movie 28 Days? It's kind of like that except imagine that the world has now calmed down a little and now you're just left in the wreckage, the open, empty wreckage. Like Ondaatje's book the prose was extremely sparse, but it made sense given the landscape and the character's situation. It actually drew me to them much more. I couldn't put it down. I'm actually happy this won, because maybe people will read it and it will encourage them to think. Isn't that what the Pulitzer is is all about? I could have bought this at a store in Port Gamble on my birthday this year(first edition hardcover)but I didn't. Too bad. But, I guess I have enough books as it is. GG's-33, PP's-34.

It's a new year, a new look at the Pulitzers and Governor Generals.  I realize, as I did towards the end of last year(wow, that's a weird thing to say), that I still have a long ways to go, and like everyone who has their New Year's resolutions, I too, have mine.  I think the plan has always been to complete these lists as soon as I could; this morning I woke up and decided to try to complete them before I turn 30.  That's only about 2 1/2 more years to go.  And, if I want to write a book about all of this as an experiential review/memoir, I'd like to do that sooner rather than later as well...Mmm...Since I last wrote in this blog, I've read 2 Pulitzer Prize winners: Katherine Anne Porter's Collected Stories back in the middle of December, and Bernard Malamud's The Fixer.  Malamud's book I finished just yesterday now, my mom's birthday.  

  Katherine Anne Porter's book is interesting in the sense that it took me almost 5 months to finally finish.  I started it back when Keren went to New Zealand.  But, I was lonely and distracted from so much work, that I couldn't get through the around 500 page book.  I put it down and resolved to read it another time.  I finally picked it up again around Thanksgiving and just persevered through it.  I ended up not hating it as much as I did in the beginning, but I'm still not totally sold on the book.  I did however, like the story "Noon Wine" a lot, it was engaging and the characters(a husband and wife, their hired man and an encounter with an outsider)were absolutely fascinating.  That was a story I couldn't put down.  The rest of the stories were interesting, but not gripping.  I think that so far the short story collections that are my favorites are The Roaring Girl and The Interpreter of Maladies.  But, I read it, I've now been exposed to another author that I wouldn't have normally read, since I no longer take classes in English literature, and I have another book off the list.  This book also is important to note because it and A Jest of God won in the same year, 1966.  There were only 3 times in the entire history of both awards that two women won in the same year(PP and GG).  It's also a book that I picked up while Chris and I were on our two day nine movie marathon that we had for his birthday almost two years ago.  It's one of the many books I've picked up in this quest that until now had gathered a bit of dust on my shelf.  

  Bernard Malamud's The Fixer was a much different experience.  I started reading The Fixer when I was waiting for blood work at Swedish Hospital in Ballard, after a physical, way back in October.  But, I didn't really feel like reading it then.  It has languished on my shelf all this time, until I picked up again last week.  It was due at the Seattle Public Library back in early December.  I may have amassed the most amount of overdue fines yet for this particular book, but I didn't want to give it up, postponing the reading of something that was in my grasp for so long.  So of course literally I will have to pay the price.:)  It was a great book.  I was really surprised, because the premise was not something that I thought I was going to enjoy.  It's about a Jewish man who is wrongfully accused of murder during the last few years of Tsar Nicholas II's reign when anti-semitism was rampant and disgustingly tortuous and frightening.  Yakov Bok spends the nearly the entire book in jail, awaiting his INDICTMENT, which takes forever to come.  It's a HELLISH purgatory, waiting, wondering, losing his mind, but never ever does he deny his innocence, regardless of what is put before him in the form of tortures or promises of release if he confesses.  This book made me sick to my stomach and very proud.  I was sick because of all the horrible things that Yakov has to face, but proud because he continues to stay his ground and never waver.  Yakov's thoughts are what take prominence in this book and there were some very amazing quotes:  "Nobody can burn an idea even if they burn the man" (61).  "'There's something cursed, it seems to me, about a country where men have owned men as property.  The stink of that corruption never escapes the soul, and it is the stink of future evil'" (172).  I find this quote to be particularly interesting because not only was slavery commonplace in Russia before the Emancipation of the Serfs, but of course slavery plays a HUGELY prominent role in US history.  This quote to me seems extremely prophetic for our future as well.  The only difference in the case of the US vs. Russia is the color of the persecuted's skin.  The final quote makes reference to Jews, which in this particular novel is very salient, but I think applies more generally to all who are in some state of persecution or discrimination.  "Why? Because no Jew was innocent in a corrupt state, the most visible sign of its corruption its fear and hatred of those it persecuted.  Ostrovsky had reminded him that there was much more wrong with Russian than its anti-Semitism.  Those who persecute the innocent were themselves never free" (315).  This book is about humans and human rights.  I agree with the writer of the introduction, it makes you want to DO something about all of the injustice in the world, and interestingly enough, the novel, even though at times it seems so terribly bleak, offers hope for some of the members of humankind.  This is one of the books that makes me glad I do this project.  I'm glad that it is the first winner of the new year that I have read.  I was so moved by it that I told my mother(I'm home in Vermont now for my mom's birthday, I surprised her:))about it, and she's expressed a desire to read it.:)  We'll see.  It's not exactly a light read, but a very rewarding one.  PPs-33, GGs-31.

So, I'm not sure how I feel about war novels. I don't think that I've read a war novel, other than Gone with the Wind that I've ever actually LOVED. I think, though, that war books by men are not particularly my scene. I get bored, I get distracted, mostly with all the writing about maneuvers and planes and boats and weapons. Maybe I'm just a total girl, but that part is just so dry to me, my eyes and mind both tend to wander. The one thing I do like about war books are the people and their experiences. I remember when I was younger(maybe late high school early college) I read Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy. In case you haven't read it (which you probably haven't, since who would read Tom Clancy who wasn't a male war vet?) it's about World War III between Russia and the United States. THE ENTIRE BOOK is about planes AND bombs AND ships AND MANEUVERS. BOOOOORRRRIINNNGGG. But, one of the side plots of the book is this story line about two American soldiers in Iceland who have rescued an Icelandic woman who was raped and spend the rest of the book trying to get back to safety with her. In between all of the war crap, I kept hoping that they would get back to the small group in Iceland. That's a bit how I felt about James Michener's Tales of the South Pacific, Pulitzer prize winner in 1948. First of all, I was a bit skeptical because all of Michener's books, though bestsellers, are gi-freakin-normous, and I've been told, are full of DESCRIPTION. I wasn't sure about this one, since it was less than 400 pages and his first book, I was hoping he hadn't gotten long winded...yet. Well, overall I think I enjoyed it. What is interesting to note here, too, is the musical South Pacific was supposedly based on the book. Funny, but when I think "Inspiration for a musical," this book does NOT come to mind. However, when I think "book most likely to be made into a television series/movie like MASH", this book DOES come to mind. The characters in this book are what make it great. Michener can write great characters, I'll give him that. I also liked the fact that the stories were interconnected, so some of your favorite characters come back again and again, viewed through a different narrator's eyes. Being on the front lines of a battlefield is something that I hope I never have to experience, but I think Michener, who himself was a veteran of the 2nd World War(the war which the book is about), gave an accurate picture not only of the men while in battle(though ironically for me that was the boring part), but of the longing, for home, women and for action on the warfront, and then all the activities that ensued. I had a lot of stories that I really loved, "Passion" was probably my favorite, though. It's about a doctor who is trying to write a letter to his wife about how he's feeling playing his part in the war, and also how he feels about her. He's having a really hard time doing it, when he's interrupted by someone who wants a second opinion on how to censor a Navy mechanic's letter. When he reads the letter, he is overcome by the passion that this man conveys to his wife, in such explicit detail. Then, he reads another letter, that of the person who wanted the second opinion. He's been cheating on his wife the whole time he's been in the South Pacific, but he uses a mundane outing in a boat in an extremely elaborate form(basically creates a nonexistent battle)to show his love for his wife. These men both make the doctor rethink the proprieties that bind him and he ends up writing a much more "from the heart" letter. It's great, and reminds me of one of my favorite songs, a song from The Civil War soundtrack, called Ashokan Farewell. In one of the versions of the song, a soldier, dead after the first battle of Bull Run, writes the most powerful, loving letter to his wife, not knowing if it would be the last one he would ever pen. It almost makes me cry every time. Another story that's amazing is "Fo' Dolla'" about a Lt. Joe Cable and his love for the daughter of a foul-mouthed female Tonkinese street hustler, who will sell anything to the GIs and often scream at them in the inappropriate language they themselves taught her, if they don't buy from her. Her daughter is sweet, beautiful and intelligent, but the relationship between her and the Lieutenant is doomed because he cannot bring himself to marry outside of his race...There definitely were a lot of boring stories, too, but I was definitely surprised that I wasn't groaning the whole time. The other thing that was cool about this book was that even though it's a Reader's Digest version, it is the original complete text AND has beautiful color illustrations. AND I picked up at Jean's church book sale for only two dollars Canadian(which is now like $6 US!)! Well, as Queen says "Another one bites the dust." It's a tie: 31-31. I still have a helluva ways to go.

The other night I couldn't get to sleep for a few minutes, not because I was stressed about work(which I am), or money, or anything like that, but because I feel like I've made relatively slow progress on this project thus far. Yesterday, I finished The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, by Oscar Hijuelos(winner of the PP in 1990), but I've decided that even though I've read 47 books this year, only 20 have been Pulitzer Prize or Governor General winners. That means I've got a lot of ground to make up before January 1. There are two more months left in the year, let's see how much further I can get. Mambo Kings brings my total thus far up to 30 Pulitzer Prize winners, 31 Governor General winners. Today I was trying to pick out what I want to read next and I have a TON of the prize-winning books at home on my shelf, not to mention one more from the public library that I'm sitting on(The Fixer by Bernard Malamud), so I have no excuses due to lack of access or anything. I've been working actively on this project for a little over a year and a half and sometimes it's depressing. I still have quite a ways to go. But, I suppose I also have to look at how far I've come. I've read more of these lists than certainly anyone else I know, and that's a pretty decent accomplishment, as well as the fact that this WILL be relatively impressive when it is all said and done. Well, enough of the personal pep talk. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos was a conundrum of a book for me. I think, overall, that I enjoyed it, it was a great read, but I'm not sure I would recommend it to anyone that I know, certainly not any of the female readers. Mambo is about two brothers who play Cuban dance music in the mid-20th century, how they come to the U.S., their lives that ensue and also all the memory that they left behind. It is told for the most part through the eyes of the older of the two brothers, Cesar(Nestor, the younger also has his story told at various flashback-style points)who is a complete and total chauvinist, very driven by his penis. It was unbelievable the amount of raw, rough, male-driven sex that was described in this novel. At first it made me somewhat uncomfortable, and even a bit queasy, and this is coming from the girl who was reading dirty books at the age of 15!!! I think what bothered me the most was that the sex was so much about domination and showing how much of a man this guy was and how good he was at getting women to do what he wanted, whether they wanted to or not(emphasis on the last part). What makes this book good, though and also complex, is that the character is human. He has partied too hard in his heyday and is now in a somewhat humiliating decline. So, as the reader, you are disgusted by him at times, but you also pity him. Oftentimes in the book you are reminded of the fact that this man is reliving his own life story, while having one last boozefest in a hotel room that was a favorite place for him to stay with his lady friends when he was successful. A room that, like its occupant, has seen better days. Cesar Castillo is the poster child for poor planning for retirement. He would strut his stuff on the dance floor in front of an orchestra crooning Latin love songs, drinking too much, womanizing too much, and now is dying with a few albums to his credit, but no money, a job as a super, and failing bodily organs. He outlives his brother Nestor by at least a few decades. Nestor's soul died of a broken heart long before his body did, and he would use violent sex with his wife to replace the void in his heart of the woman who left him long ago in Cuba. I've talked about this before in postings, but these men show, yet again, how we all carry around so much historical baggage regarding our lives/memories. For them, it's not just an accessory, it's a truck. The women in the novel, the few that are actually discussed, are shown to be strong in a backhanded sort of way, for they are the ones who witness the downfall of their men and make the decision to leave to save themselves or they, in the case of Nestor's widow, wait until the appropriate time to fulfill their needs. What is also quite fascinating here is how the men in the novel use the women as a crutch to fill whatever is missing in their lives, almost frantically holding onto them, claiming value through them, all the time(esp. in the case of Cesar)claiming to be men who can do what they want with "their women." Despite all of the characters shortcomings, though, the book was enjoyable, a glimpse into a era and lifestyle of which I know so little. the life of dance halls, fast feet and Latin music. Also, the really cool thing was that Nestor and Cesar's big life moment was when they went on the I Love Lucy show after meeting Desi Arnaz while out performing one night. Their 15 minutes of fame immortalized them forever on the television and made one song of theirs "Beautiful Maria of My Soul" at least somewhat famous, captivating their neighbors and the Latin community while tying them forever to probably the most famous Cuban after Castro. This book was turned into a movie AND ALSO a musical. I kept trying to think how they had made it into a musical(Hijuelos, the author, wrote the libretto, I believe)for the book is intensely complex(and long! like 448 pages!), but I suppose I would have to travel to NY to find that out. I think that the next book that I read(I'm pretty sure I've decided to read James Michener's Tales of the South Pacific), was ALSO a musical, the basis for South Pacific. It's a novel that is a collection of interconnected short stories that take place in where else? the South Pacific, during WW2. I'm tired of writing, I'm going to watch Biggest Loser.:) PPs-30, GGs 31.

A few hours ago, I finished Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. Talk about a novel that has built up for me over the years, and NOT in a good way. Everyone that I've ever talked to about it that has actually read it, has told me it is the most boring, anti-climactic piece of shit on the planet. Well, to tell the truth, it wasn't that bad. Thankfully it was only 93 pages, and this edition had pictures! Now, if I had had to put up with hundreds of pages of it(which believe me, with this project I've already had my fair share of boring and I'm sure there's plenty more where that came from), then I might be whistling a different tune, but it was a pretty quick read, and an easy way to move myself up into 29 Pulitzers(I have two more Pulitzers from the library that are waiting for me, so yet again, we'll be tied on the lists pretty soon). I'm not a huge fan of Hemingway. I guess I just don't see why he's SOOO GREAT. I mean, really, they even gave him a Nobel Prize for his "contribution to literature." His style is so simplistic, which I guess works for some(obviously not me), which makes it easy to read, but I don't find him very engaging at all. Even A Moveable Feast which I read in the hopes of having a great food memoir combined with narratives about Gertrude Stein and her lover Alice B. Toklas was a bit disappointing. There are some great descriptions of Paris, but I find Hemingway to be extremely, well, MALE, and not something easy to relate to for me. I suppose it doesn't help that Hemingway is one of an ex-roommate of mine's favorite authors, so every time I read him(which thankfully isn't often)I'm reminded of her. I find a lot of hopelessness in Hemingway's characters, including the title character in The Old Man, or hope that is extinguished in some way. In the case of The Old Man and the Sea, this guy is trying to bring in this mammoth of a fish, the Moby Dick of marlins, overcoming physical impediments due to his age, only to lose his prize to sharks at the very end(I'm not spoiling it, who out of the three people that read this blog is ACTUALLY GOING TO READ THIS BOOK, especially when I just gave you the jist), hauling into the Cuban coast a skeleton of the majestic fish, I guess a metaphor in itself for the old man himself, who was at one time a strong able-bodied fisherman. I spent most of, if not all of the book looking for some kind of a deeper meaning, because there HAD to be more to the novel than just a guy on a boat fishing. Which of course there is, it is an elongated metaphor for life struggle and the hopelessness in that(I don't believe it, but remember, Hemingway did end his own life). I don't have much more to say about Hemingway except for that now, I don't have to read anything else by him unless I want to.:) GG's 31, PP's 29.

About 7 years ago(June 19th 2000), I read Margaret Laurence for the first time. I can tell you exactly what I was doing, where I was reading it, how I felt. I felt extremely overwhelmed, I remember that. I was taking 3 summer school classes at the same time, a feat I had only managed to accomplish because I begged and pleaded with the powers that be, so that I could finish simultaneous bachelor's quicker than had been anticipated. I was having an internal struggle that I told very few people about, if anyone...I was worried about the future and struggles I would have to go through to get all of my coursework done. I was extremely depressed, at that time I was very very thin, the thinnest I've ever been, school stressed me out, my family stressed me out...I was staying in Montreal the whole summer in order to get away from them, my sister was on a downward spiral, and I was caught in the middle. I was trying to figure out my sexuality, even then, scared of what all of it might mean. I remember going to see a doctor because I was so depressed and I couldn't even talk to her, just looking at her I burst into tears. I was put on antidepressants for the first time that summer. My one solace, as it has always been, was reading. I used to have a spot, right in front of the Arts building, on top of a slab of concrete that I absolutely loved because it was so warm...I would lie on my back and read for a couple of hours before I would go home and do my homework. I read The Fire-Dwellers that summer. It was not the most uplifting novel, but I did like it quite a bit. Laurence is one of those great writers who no one knows about in the United States, highly feminist, writing about what women in the sixties and seventies really felt like, putting their internal thoughts and feelings on the page for all to see. It's been a while since I read her(7 years!!!), but she's been on my list, not only because The Diviners is one of Kate's favorite books, but also because, of course, Margaret Laurence is one of the few women to win the Governor General, and she won it twice, for The Diviners and A Jest of God. A Jest of God is what I just finished this afternoon. I was a bit excited because it was supposed to have a theme of homosexuality in it, and of course it does a bit. Rachel, the main character, has a friend(if you could call it that, Rachel doesn't really have any friends in the small town that she lives in, she is very much apart in terms of how she interacts with people)Calla, who comes onto her at the beginning(very risque for 1966!)and who Rachel, uncomfortable, distances herself from for the rest of the novel, until the end, when she needs to turn to someone, and they are able to resolve things as best as they can be. Rachel is 34 years old, lives with her ailing mother, who is quite overbearing in a very passive aggressive kind of way, and has never had sex or really a boyfriend to speak of. She is in danger of being a spinster(has all the qualifications, esp. being a TEACHER as was almost stereotypical, unfortunately at that time)until she meets Nick, a man who has returned to his aging parents for the summer. She has repeated sexual encounters with him, but, it seems, mostly because she wants to feel close to someone, not necessarily because the sex is actually any good. The one thing Laurence writes VERY WELL is loneliness. I was a bit afraid to read it now given the fact that I've been a bit lonely lately, but it was very well written, a great first novel. But, what is it with loneliness and MANITOBA? That's all I'm going to say about that. This book was turned into a movie, directed by Paul Newman, starring Joanne Woodward, called Rachel, Rachel. Wondering what that would be like, perhaps a rental at some point. I felt a bit of flashback coming on when I read this book though, back to the times when I read that first Laurence. Therefore, I read it quickly to be done with it. It wasn't really necessary, it was still a good book and didn't affect me as deeply as the previous book I read did(Jodi Picoult's The Tenth Circle), about how rape affected a family, but the slight paranoia in the character's internal monologue sometimes was a bit disturbing, because I sometimes think that way and wonder what I would be like at 34 if I had been single forever. The book actually reminded me quite a bit of Clara Callan, Richard B. Wright's GG winner, with the single spinster having intercourse for the first time, getting pregnant, etc. That book also had homosexuality themes...and some pretty open sex scenes. What is it with Canadians writing openly about sex? I mean it's great, but so different from the U.S., which of course is so Puritanical...The next book I'm going to read is The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter. This is for a few reasons, one because it won the Pulitzer and I'm trying to keep things balanced, two it's written by a woman which is also good because I want to keep reading women's work, but the thing that's really interesting is that 1966, the year that A Jest of God won is also the year that The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter won the Pulitzer. Only 2 other times in the combined histories of the awards did two women win in the same year. The first time was 1937, when Laura G. Salverson and Margaret Mitchell won, for The Dark Weaver and Gone With the Wind, respectively. Both books I've already read, both large-scale epics. The second time was 1966, and the third time was in 1985, the year that The Handmaid's Tale and Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie won. There were quite a few male-female combos and a TON of male-male combos, but since women make up only about a third of the winners of the prizes(and in Canada quite a few of the women were multiple award winners, like Gabrielle Roy(won twice), the aforementioned Laurence(won twice), Alice Munro(three time winner)...so the actual number of women who won is smaller(not to mention the US award has been around since 1918)...I'm rambling. Time to call it quits. Team Leader dinner was tonight, I talked about the books some, always feel kind of impressive and also like a big dork too, but of course the latter is something I'm quite used to...:) GGs-27, Pulitzers-27.

So, I finally finished Independence Day by Richard Ford. And no, it very much unfortunately has NOTHING TO DO with the Will Smith movie of the same title. I think I'm done with Ford's novels for a while(until, perhaps I'm fifty and have more to relate to him about). Richard Ford wrote a trilogy starting with The Sportswriter. The second book in the trilogy is Independence Day and it is the one that won the Pulitzer in 1996. I was worried about starting this 451 page tome right before Keren left and then, of course began, her trip in New Zealand. Why? Because The Sportswriter was highly depressing and I read it during that rough patch that we hit back at the end of April. I was anticipating that Independence Day would be more of the same, and I was unfortunately correct. It was, like before, good writing, but I don't really have anything in common with a divorced middle-aged white man living in New Jersey. The third book just came out this spring, but I'm not thinking it's going to be anywhere near the top of my list. I don't think I really have anything more to say...I kept waiting and waiting for something really interesting to happen, but perhaps that was the point of the novel. Frank Bascombe's son has a tragedy towards the end of the novel and it still doesn't create too many waves in his mind except perhaps to further his dreaminess and introspectiveness. I'll be off the lists for a couple of books I think, until I blast through one more library book, a lesbian romance novel and probably a Jodi Picoult novel from an employee of mine. Not to mention the fact that I need to start reading the new Michael Chabon book so that Gina and I can talk about it!!!!
GGs-26, PPs-27.

Suffice it to say, I read a lot of books, we all know this to be a fact. The past 5 monthes or so(almost 6 I guess), I've read approximately 21(my book list isn't currently on me)novels. This project has forced me to read a lot too, and I definitely have had my fair share of surprises when it comes to how I like certain of the novels I've encountered. However, this year, I've faced a lot of "meh, that was oh-kay"s, and nothing that really made me say "THIS IS WHY I FUCKING READ!!!!" Well, I think I've found my FAVORITE BOOK OF 2007 thus far. It's March by Geraldine Brooks. Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer prize, I had it via the hold list through the Seattle Public Library. I was reading it purely because it won an award, not necessarily because it held any super important interest to me, though it does have an interesting premise. In Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, the March girls and their mother struggle to to stay strong and support themselves while their father is absent in the Civil War. Brooks' novel takes threads from Alcott's novel and weaves them into an entirely different story, the imagined one of the March girls' father as he is away from his loved ones. I've read so many books lately with male protagonists, I wasn't that eager to read yet another one. But, Brooks' prose is astonishing, and the character of Mr. March is so fascinatingly human, I found myself holding my breath because I was too enraptured to let it go. We are introduced to a slightly soul shattered Captain March, after one of his fellow soldiers drowns while they are trying to, together, escape the enemy, it is only a beginning of the atrocities of war that he is forced to witness throughout the course of the work. We then begin to learn about Mr. March's stance on slavery and his ideals and how they brought him into the war, his self-described failings leading him to take part in this confused national conflict so as to almost make up for what he has lost. What he realizes of course, in the course of the novel, is that despite all of one person's efforts, s/he is only one person and is thus gravely limited. And, while coming to terms with this, he is constantly plagued by memory AND a great deal of guilt. Brooks' main character is a man, but a very sensitive one, a vegetarian(almost entirely vegan actually, which at this time period must have been at the very least EXTREMELY difficult and not necessarily healthy) at pretty much all levels because he does not believe in the harming of animals at all, that everything that is a product of them, whether it be flesh, milk or even wool is the property of the animal from whence it came. That was impressive. The character himself has flaws, though; in an effort to protect his very outspoken and feminist(yay!) wife, he tries to curb her outbursts, and is upset when she does not appear to be the model wife and lady, even when those outbursts and passionate embraces of the issues were what drew him to her in the first place. And, Mr. March's head is so wrapped up in his books and so far up in the clouds that when he finally has to encounter reality it is so very painful to read about. Brooks' prose depicts such atrocities of slavery and war that make them real, sickeningly so, but worth it to remind us not only how far we have come, but how much further we need to go. What was definitely disheartening but of course at the time probably all too true, was Brooks' depiction of the Union soldiers...March expected them all to believe in the emancipation of the slaves as much as he did, but when he encounters as much prejudice and lack of assistance with his cause as he did in antebellum South, it is a harsh wake-up call not only to him but to the reader as well. History books tend to romanticize the Civil War, making the North to be the good guys who could do no wrong, who were fighting for what was right. The truth is far different. Images in the novel swirled in my imagination as I tried to sleep this whole(fittingly)Memorial Day weekend, images that I would love to forget, but need to remember. The other thing that I found kind of fun about this book, is that much of March's memory refers back to his home life in Concord, Mass. Emily, Chris and I went there last summer as part of our National Park rendezvous. It was amazing to see the landscape come alive through my own memory. One of the national parks (Minuteman) bordered the Alcott's property. I found out at the end of the novel, that the author(as described in the afterword) based the character of Mr. March on Louisa May Alcott's father, Bronson Alcott, so to have seen the town of Concord and the lands surrounding Alcott's property became a relevant part of my book project without me even knowing it at the time. I'm sure this coincidence will happen again and again as I visit more national parks and read more Pulitzer prize winners, since the Pulitzer is an award given to a book that depicts an "American experience." And Marmee, who in Louisa May's book is depicted as this perfect self-sacrificing mother is not so in Brooks' light...she too is all too human. Yes! There is also much discussed of how time can change a relationship and how a desire not to hurt that whom you truly love can also unfortunately sometimes create distance. All of this crammed into a 280 page novel. Maybe now you'll have a glimpse as to why I was so impressed. I love books that make me think, but also make me cry out for characters, become worried, and so emotionally attached to the work that I am felt drained at the end. That is a great literary experience. Before I went to bed last night I thought hard about the book and what it meant, how it portrayed things etc. It reminded me of a quote that I love by Abraham Lincoln. He said "If you look for the bad in mankind, expecting to find it, you surely will." That unfortunately is too hopeful even for a great leader. Brooks' novel reminded me of the truly bitter truth that evil is everywhere, you don't even have to go looking. Something that Mr. March learns as well. It is a hard lesson his wife learns as well, especially when she sees her ruined(emotionally and physically) husband in the hospital. A quote that I loved from the book comes from Marmee after she has seen her husband again for the first time in almost a year. "But I said none of this a year ago, when it might have mattered. It was easy then to convince one's conscience that the war would be over in ninety days, as the president said; to reason that the price paid in blood would justify the great good we were so sure we would obtain. To lift the heel of cruel oppression from the necks of the suffering! Ninety days of war seemed a fair payment. What a corrupt accounting it was. I still believe that removing the stain of slavery is worth some suffering--but whose? If our forefathers make the world awry, must our children be the ones who pay to right it? (Brooks 210)" My other favorite quote comes from the black woman from March's past who he has quite the obsession with. He meets up with her before he is reunited with his family, claiming that he can't go home because he is so ashamed of all the wrongs that have been committed as a result of some poor choices on his part. She in turn tells him of things that have befallen because of choices she made and how she too has "experience with a conscience that flays [her] alive, every waking day". She says to him "I do not ask your absolution, I simply ask you to see that there is only one thing to do when we fall, and that is to get up, and go on with the life that is set in front of us, and try to do the good of which our hands are capable for the people who come in our way. That, at least, has been my path" (Brooks 268). Mr. Lincoln, I say you can't help the bad in mankind, but you can try with your measly two hands to assuage whatever wounds with a small measure of kindness. READ THIS BOOK. IT'S WONDERFUL, and VERY DESERVING OF THE PRIZE. THANK GOD. Pulitzers-26, GGs-26.

So, I haven't had the time to write for a while, sadly enough...I've been behind in my reading, busy with the new job, Keren's bday, a wedding(yay!)and the thus necessary trip to Victoria. But in only about a week, I finished two books, both wonderful, both needed to be read for the project that this blog is dedicated to...I finished Richard Ford's The Sportswriter last week and today(only a few minutes ago actually) I finished Peter Behrens' The Law of Dreams. I realized last night, while at the tail end of Behrens' book(the 2006 winner of the Governor General), it's been a really long time since I've read a book by a woman (in 8 books as a matter of fact)! Though, the next one I read(pretty sure it will be March by Geraldine Brooks, the Pulitzer winner in 2006). The Sportswriter is the first in a trilogy by Richard Ford, the second book was the one that won the Pulitzer...I had to read The Sportswriter first, of course to know what the second one would be all about...Ford is an amazing writer, even about a topic that I wasn't sure I would be into...Middle-aged male angst, dreaminess, restlessness. What I thought at the time, though, and still do(though I have yet to read the second book), is that Ford's main character, Frank Bascombe, is like a male version of me in so many aspects...His dreaminess, lost in thought constantly, people watcher, impromptu person to whom one feels compelled to confess(a neighbor confesses his gay affair and then kills himself, directing his only correspondence to the outside world to Frank, though that kind of blows the end). Frank is constantly in self-reflection, self-meditation(ironically or not, similar to the character of Fergus in Behrens' novel), and his outlook, inspired mostly by his sheer loneliness(also something that Fergus shares) reminds me so much of my own thoughts...In both novels, I found so many human truths, put into words either through the thoughts or spoken words of the characters via the authors' tones. There was so much in Ford's book that was marvelous, though the last page was what was fabulous(and I'm excited to read the 2nd book, too)..."I walked out of the condos onto the flat lithesome beach this morning, and took a walk in my swimming trunks and no shirt on. And I thought that one natural effect of life is to cover you in a thin layer of...what? A film? A residue or skin of all the things you've done and been and said and erred at? I'm not sure. But you are under it, and for a long time, and only rarely do you know it, except that for some unexpected reason or opportunity you come out--for an hour or even for a moment--and you suddenly feel pretty good. And in that magical instant you realize how long it's been since you felt just that way. Have you been ill, you ask. Is life itself an illness or a syndrome? Who knows? We've all felt that way, I'm confident, since there's no way that I could feel what hundreds of millions of other citizens haven't. [paragraph break] Only suddenly, then, you are out of it--that film, that skin of life--as when you were a kid. And you think: this must've been the way it was once in my life, though you didn't know it then, and don't really even remember it--a feeling of wind on your cheeks and your arms, of being released, let loose, of being the light-floater. And since that is not how it has been for a long time, you want, this time, to make it last, this glistening one moment, this cool air, this new living, so that you can preserve a feeling of it, inasmuch as when it comes again it may just be too late. You may just be too old. And in truth, of course, this may be the last time that you will ever feel this way again(Ford 374-5)." And Behrens' book, oh my freakin' God, what a surprising joy, even though it was rough and full of a sad life that was a struggle for everyone...it's about one character in particular, Fergus, and his journey from the potato famine-stricken Ireland, to the bush of Canada, and of all the people he meets in between...Very much an Irish Odyssey. Behrens' book is compared to Ondaatje's work, which may be true due to a feeling of somewhat epic sweeping, but it's better than that, a more direct clear narrative. And, I'm not a big fan of Ondaatje...There is so much about horses, too, and their mistreatment, and I think too, that Behrens is drawing a parallel between the horse, wild, mistreated by society, looking for some kind of kindness, and Fergus himself, a boy who never lived in a room, only a shabbily built cabin on top of an Irish farmer's mountain(also, the horses that died so terribly in the building of English railways, reminded me with their human-like characteristics of Faulkner's horses in As I Lay Dying). It was great, and also full of good quotes, since the author, through the protagonist's thoughts, is constantly plagued by the thought of dreams and not being able to escape the past, or the dead...Two quotes I loved..."Stories always started this way, suddenly, and set within a strange world. Patience is required, to let the stories unroll. This is how people explain their lives" (Behrens 289). This was how I felt the book was, a bit slow to get started, but it unrolled into a vast experience, spanning 4 countries, two continents...And the last quote..."Is courage just the awareness that gestures, journeys, lives have intrinsic shape, and must, one way or another, be completed? That there is a path to be followed, literally to the death? Awareness is harsh but better than being unaware, never sensing a path. Better than a life of stunts, false starts, dead ends. Better than the irredeemable ugliness of the halfhearted. Better than feeling there is no shape to anything--there is. The world knows itself" (Behrens 356). This novel actually reminded me a bit of A Fine Balance in its sweeping nature, but dare I say it? I liked this just as well, maybe a tad better? Not as long, and I've always had a weird penchant for Irish literature...A story of how a man's journey leads him to Canada, not unlike so many others, I think...:) PPs-25, GGs-26.

Steven Millhauser's Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer is the book that I just finished...besides seeing it on my long list of books to read, I first heard about it from the book snob at the independent bookstore on top of Queen Anne Hill. She said to me, when I told her I was doing this project(a project that offers me at least a small bit of pride), "Well, there are some great books on the list but a ton of terrible ones. Have you gotten to Martin Dressler yet?" What's interesting, is that I read another book on recommendation of hers The Winter Queen, a boring tome, the time which it took to read it being a week of reading time that I WILL NEVER GET BACK. So, why I thought she might be right with Dressler I have no idea. So, the book didn't suck. It was actually pretty interesting or at least engaging enough for me to blow through it pretty quickly. However, it wasn't really that memorable. It was kind of like eating white bread with butter, it tastes pretty good but it isn't that flavorful. Martin Dressler, the title character builds an empire in New York City, based on his dreams, but makes a fair share of mistakes along the way, showing his humanness. His wife is a mentally ill self-centered bee-yotch, he should have married the less attractive but far more intelligent sister...He has higher expectations for the hotel-occupying public than what actually occurs. But, we all make mistakes, right? I probably won't forget what I thought about Martin Dressler for a long time because of what that woman said to me and the context of our conversation, but otherwise, it would totally have gone into the pile of novels that I read and then file in the back of the rolodex of my brain...Now we're all tied up: Pulitzers 25, GGs 25...:)

So, this is the quote(it's really really long), that I loved from The Hours(finding it also particularly relevant to me) and I wanted to document it before I returned the book..."Yes, Clarissa thinks, it's time for the day to be over. We throw our parties; we abandon our families to live alone in Canada; we struggle to write books that do not change the world, despite our gifts and our unstinting efforts, our most extravagant hopes. We live our lives, do whatever we do, and then we sleep--it's as simple and ordinary as that. A few jump out of windows or drown themselves or take pills; more die by accident; and most of us, the vast majority, are slowly devoured by some disease or, if we're very fortunate, by time itself. There's just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we've ever imagined, though everyone but children(and perhaps even they) knows these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. Still, we cherish the city, the morning; we hope, more than anything, for more.[paragraph break] Heaven only knows why we love it so" (Cunningham 225-226). This quote is from the second to last and last page of the book. It's not my favorite book, by far, but it's pretty amazing.:)

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? I'm not really, though I do admit to not caring for her writing too much. I was wondering how I would like The Hours, because it focuses around Virginia Woolf and promised to be similar in writing style as Woolf's novels. I've read A Room of One's Own, Jacob's Room, and Mrs. Dalloway, the book upon which The Hours was based, and Virginia is not really my style. But after reading The Hours, I don't know why...I can't really figure it out. I felt like Cunningham's Virginia was a woman I could very easily relate to, as were the other women in the book. I feel often, like Virginia, that I'm outside of my body, looking in on my own life, exploring my own grief, frustrations, and the internal voices that speak to me almost as if I am a bystander. That sounds super odd, I guess, but I do feel that way at times. Also, the preoccupation with death of both the Laura Brown character and Virginia, how the suicidal thoughts were described reminded me of my years in college where I battled depression. I wanted to check into a hotel room(remember my Veronica entry?) much like Laura Brown did for those few hours, to escape, for certainly at that time, which was before I came to terms with what I wanted to do and my homosexuality, I was constantly feeling like I was losing touch with reality, like I wasn't a part of my own present. The Hours was a fabulous book, giving me hope for the Pulitzer prize system, a book about characters who are homosexual, male and female, living lives as openly gay, as well as the characters who are trying to sort out their own budding sexualities. The Canadians have done it, not only having a book with openly gay characters in it, but also being on the whole less conservative about what they chose to give the GG to, so, even though the American awards tend to be more conservative AND this was a book about lesbians written by a man, at least it's still A HOPE. His style is so cinematic in span, I do admit that I wonder what the movie would be like, especially since in the beginning Clarissa sees a woman that she thinks is a movie star that could be Meryl Streep, when I know that in the movie Clarissa's character is played by Meryl Streep. How ironic.:) There's a quote at the end about the bittersweet-ness of life, but I don't have the book on me while I'm typing this, so I can't add it until possibly later. However, it's all good, I guess.:) What I must say is it's really nice to have 45 minute lunch breaks(even though at times they feel a bit forced) because I can get A LOT of reading done.:) I feel like I've read so many books by men lately, but that's not really the case I guess, I just checked, it's only been 4 in a row. When I get up to 10 books in a row, then I'll have to go back to reading the ladies. Not like I'm lacking in books by them either. Pulitzers 24, GGs 25.

So, I just finished Philip Roth's American Pastoral. Hmmm...when I think of "pastoral," I think of Beethoven's 6th symphony, pretty cute cupids flying around, hearts and flowers(yay Fantasia!), of peaceful things like trickling streams...That, of course is the irony of Roth's title...his character Seymour "Swede" Levov is living the peaceful American life: he is a blond-haired Jew, who has fulfilled his bargain in the American dream; he was a sports star in high school, went to college and did very well, inherited his father's business, ran it successfully, married Miss New Jersey(who albeit it is a Catholic) and had a beautiful baby girl. Unfortunately, this bouncing baby girl grew up to build a bomb at the age of 16 and blow up the local post office/convenience store, killing the local doctor. Then the girl disappears, going underground to avoid capture by the FBI...The book is mainly about Swede and his inability to deal with the loss of his daughter and the following destruction of his marriage and his sanity. He is filled with a great deal of hindsight, all the what ifs...it reminds me a lot of my parents, especially my mom, who always seems to propose those kinds of questions, though unlike the Swede who carries out the dialogue internally, my mother asks these questions directly of me, the culprit...You see, it is I who now carries the much tossed around crown of being the black sheep of the family...my sister used to wear it proudly, causing a rift in the family not unlike what will happen to California if we get that really huge earthquake that the scientists are promising...but now that she's cleaned herself up and become the upstanding heterosexual "Jenny from the block" so to speak, it's my job to be the black sheep...my mother is constantly full of the what ifs: What if I had done this differently? Would you be straight? What if I had done that differently? Would you be a lawyer? How annoying is that? Also, she seems to be ignoring who I am and only focusing on the "what should have been." Seymour Levov does much of the same, for over 400 pages. What he seems to not get, even by the end, is the fact that so much of our lives and the ones that touch our own, is completely out of our control, especially when it comes to raising children. We are at the mercy of what we give birth to, it is unfortunately not the other way around. And, giving birth to children is the ultimate Russian roulette...This book portrays an interesting snapshot of America during the Vietnam war and how people may or may not have reacted and how divided the country was. Merry(Levov's daughter) acts before she is legal on her beliefs and protests the war, like many did at the time, in all kinds of different ways. Okay, enough of the plot summary...Philip Roth has written a lot of books(this is his 22nd book), and obviously someone out there likes him, because he's been published...I've heard through the grapevine that his early books include a lot of scenes of male masturbation, so he's never really been high on my list of people to read(because you know how men turn me on;)), and now that I've read American Pastoral, I think I'm okay with not reading any of his others(unless they come highly recommended). The biggest problem with was that to me it seemed like a really good idea for a book that could have been written way better. It dragged on A LOT. It got better by the end, and I can't say I hated it, because I really liked some of the parallels to Milton(the section headings, and the fact that Levov is so figuratively blind to the world around him, much like Milton was literally blind), but I mean, really...The first section is told from the point of view of an unreliable, biased(stars in his eyes) kind of narrator who "imagines" this man's life after he finds out about the terrorist daughter and then proceeds to write a "novel" about it. It took to long to get to the "novel" part. The other thing I was thinking about constantly was how would I react to this book if I was a boy? Would I like it any better? I'm finding that I like books written by men less than books written by women...Overall, I would like to think that I'm pretty even across the board in terms of favorites by both sexes, but lately I've been reading my fair share of books by men and have not really been feeling it. I think if I was a father, maybe with this novel I would have more to relate to(or at the very least a middle-aged male, of which I'm neither of course). My favorite part of the book oddly enough was when, in a flashback, Levov's then to-be wife and his father get into a discussion of religion and how a grandchild will be raised...it's super funny because it's all done negotiation style...and the grandfather to-be insists that his grandchild is not going to "EAT JESUS" over and over again. This, unfortunately came towards the end of the book. So, final verdict on American Pastoral? Meh...Perhaps I'll do better with The Hours. GG's 25, Pulitzers 23...