Category Archives: American literature

February 4, 2015 · 10:15 pm

City of Light: ‘Allegory’ doesn’t mean what you think it does. Or what I think it does.

The thing about an allegory (like a metaphor) is that the comparison is made between two unexpected things (pigs and communist leaders; shadows on the wall and ideas). So when reading Lauren Belfer’s excellent City of Lights I struggled to figure out whether the novel was allegory or something else. A literary term that escapes me, but exists, I’m sure.

So tell me what this literary term is that I’ve missed out on. I’m looking for a term that describes when the fictional plot events/setting/character parallels a contemporary and real plot event/setting/character. Not parallels in an unexpected way, but parallels in a way you recognize the contemporary thing. You’d like an example? Sure.

So a bit to set this example up. The novel is a few things: historical fiction, murder mystery, romance, tragedy of manners. The plot goes something like this – it’s 1901, Buffalo is playing host to the pan-american exposition. Industrialists and engineers are developing hydroelectric power at Niagara Falls with all sorts of complications: union organizing and labour conditions; nature-preservationists and eco-terrorism (that the development of the Falls was protested on environmental grounds was an absolute revelation to me); public versus private ownership of resources. Our protagonist, Louise Barrett is headmistress of an exclusive all-girls school and passionate about the way education can transform individual women and reform society as a whole. She’s also afforded unusual social liberties because of her ‘spinster’ status; a status she’s had to assume for good reason (which I won’t spoil here) to do with gender-based violence and independence for women. A man gets murdered. The hydroelectric project gets complicated. The cast of characters and their secrets and lies thickens.

Right, so in this example Louise is talking to a reporter (masquerading as a photographer – because performativity and identity is also a big thing here), Franklin (who is also a potential love interest). Franklin explains his cynicism as to why he doesn’t think the industrialists care about the ordinary people when the choice is between the people and the extraction of a resource:

I served time in the Philippines, remember? I saw our fine and honorable American soldiers using the too-aptly named ‘water cure’ to exact confessions from prisoners; of course the prisoners weren’t ‘white’ so it didn’t matter. (135) He goes on… Electricity should be a public service, not a commodity sold to the highest bidder. The electricity created at Niagara belongs to the people. Not to the industrialists, not to the nature preservationists […] but to the people” (136). 

It parallels waterboarding, right? Electricity – throughout – parallels oil extraction with immediate gains prioritized over long term environmental damage. But it’s not an allegory because it is – in the fictional past – a recognizable reflection and deepening of our understanding of the present. Am I just describing a term called ‘the beauty and wonder of historical fiction’?

Anyway. I really loved this one. The murder mystery, while a driving plot point, wasn’t the focus of the text so much as Louise’s journey to understand her past and present. The historical details about Niagara and hydro development are genuinely fascinating. The socio-political-economic context that underpins the plot is as rich a character in its own right as any. Including the one moment Louise doubts her self-reliance and thinks how lovely it would be to rely on a man, she is a model of feminist independence. So yeah, please read the book and tell me what the term is that I’m looking for. Or maybe you don’t have to read the book because it’s so obvious. It’s probably alliteration. Kidding. (Am I?)

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November 22, 2014 · 6:51 pm

I am Pilgrim: Arrogant

Terry Hayes wants you to know he’s written screenplays. He really wants you to know that Nicole Kidman was in one of them. And that he’s kind of a big deal. How do I know this? Well, not just from the eight pages of acknowledgements (thanking, get this, his Norwegian editor ‘the first of many international publishers’ to pick up his book) and the author biography, but from his self-satisfied, falsely-modest, made-for-the-movies protagonist. Our polyonymous protagonist who on every page reminds the reader of what an exceptional spy he is (but oh-no, he really didn’t want this kind of responsibility and power), how materially privileged he is (but no really, he was adopted so he understands alienation and he never really wanted to be a billionaire anyway) how patriotic and brave he is (but seriously, the firefighters on 9/11 were the *real* heroes),  what a genius he is (no for real, he dropped out of Harvard medical school because it wasn’t meaningful enough) and how self-sacrificing he is (of course not, he’s just too dangerous for friends or permanence). Continue reading →

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August 10, 2014 · 5:06 pm

Six Books; Seven Days: The Vacation Edition

                                     If you asked my mum I spent the entire cottage week reading and avoiding conversations about weddings, houses and jobs. To be fair I *did* avoid those conversations, but I didn’t spend the *entire* week reading. I also played a lot of hearts, chess, ticket to ride and euchre; made dinner; paddled a canoe and cuddled my nephews (though the photographic evidence suggests I did a fair bit of this cuddling while also reading). 

I should probably blog each book individually, but instead I’ll give you the highlights reel. Thanks to those who made suggestions in advance of cottage week, most of the reads here are terrific and well worth seeking out. So, in the order that I read them (and so with descending memory of what they’re about):

The Cat’s Table – Michael Ondaatje

Basic Plot: Young boy sent on his own on a three week sea voyage; meets other kids; woven passages of how the boat trip does (and does not) influence his later life. Highlights: Ondaatje does so much well here – sweet slices of poetry, characterization, atmosphere and mood. It’s a novel that takes a “small” story (a slice of one man’s life; a trip) and makes it resonate with large themes and a wide audience. Gripes/Grievances: The climax didn’t feel sufficient, not an anti-climax, but a sort of “oh, that’s it?” and a wish that it was more. Overall: Beautifully written; not my favourite plot.

Salvage the Bones  – Jesmyn Ward

Basic Plot: Never a good sign that I had to flip through the book to remember what it was about. But then it all comes back: poor family in the lead up to Hurricane Katrina; the kids in the family are (on the surface) trying to raise pit-bull puppies (to sell; to fight) and trying to conceal a pregnancy; the father in the family tries to prepare the house/kids for the coming storm. Highlights: The scenes during the storm itself are gripping, tense and well written. Gripes/grievances: The plot reads a bit “out of time and place” in that its hard to imagine (though maybe this is the point?) this family existing. But they do and their suffering reads as real and poignant. Overall: I could have done with less time obsessing over the puppies. 

Tenth of December – George Saunders

Loathe as I am to admit it: this collection moved me. Like my experience of all short story collections, I struggle to recall exact plots of the stories (though the story of the experimental drug testing and the other about the human garden gnomes linger), the overall impression of the collection is fresh: fresh narrative voices, images, plots and characters. The whole thing reads like a genius writer from the future has arrived in our present to share how writing will be: imaginative, funny, poignant and challenging. I know I’m late to the bandwagon (and that I’m hardly credible when it comes to recommending short story collections): but go get this one. It’s really, really great.

The Good Lord Bird – James McBride 

Basic Plot: Henry Shackledford (Henrietta aka “Onion”) narrates his history disguised as a girl in the company of abolitionist John Brown as he (Brown) campaigns for the end of slavery. Highlights: I suppose it was getting a sense of this aspect of American history – the raid on Harpers Ferry contributing to the beginning of the Civil War. Gripes: I just didn’t like Henrietta/Henry. At all. I found the character to be annoying, so my patience with the plot stretched. On the plot it was ploddingly paced, overburdened with description and scenes that didn’t add to character. Hard to pinpoint larger thematic questions: just seemed to be a straight-up retelling of history. Overall: It’s rare that I don’t like something N. recommends, but this one fell a bit flat. Sorry, N.

Defending Jacob  – William Landy

It’s probably a rule that you can’t go to the cottage without reading at least one pulp mystery novel. And so I did. I intended to read the first in the series by Mo Hayder (on the suggestion of A.), but couldn’t get a copy from the library (I’m now halfway through a copy – stay tuned!), so settled for this one brought to the cottage by mum. Basic Plot: District Attorney’s son is the prime suspect in the murder of another teenager. DA has to defend his son. Highlights: Pages turned quickly. Gripes: The ending  – promised by the front cover to “chill and thrill” was… disappointing. Not that I saw it coming (surprise!) but that it wasn’t a satisfying outcome to the moral questions the plot tried to ask (a much, much better answer to these questions can be found in the brilliant *We Need to Talk About Kevin*). Overall: I’m enjoying the Mo Hayder so much more. But if you’re stuck on a plane, or holding a sleeping nephew, it does make the time go by quickly.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane – Neil Gaiman

I love the way Neil Gaiman writes about the importance of reading and libraries. I love the idea of loving Neil Gaiman. And I did like The Ocean at the End of the Lane well enough because I love reading about other people who forget all of the things that they ought to remember. But I just don’t *swoon* the way others seem to over this book. Anyway, Basic Plot: boy returns to childhood home and remembers magical/fantastical experience when  otherwordly things wreak havoc, saved by neighbour girl, has remembered/forgotten the experience before. Highlights: I have a terrible memory; it’s comforting to be reminded that our memories alone can be tricked with, played with and held in other places by other people. Gripes: Slow getting going. I worried about the kitten. 

 

So there it is. The cottage week is done for 2014. I’m now returned to conversations on weddings, houses and jobs. Routines of work, play and reading in the bath with wine. I’m still very open to book suggestions – though be warned that the next six weeks rival that time I moved across the country, started a new job, ran a marathon and co-chaired a conference all at once. So send me gentle reading suggestions. Or free books. Or hugs. 

 

 

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July 6, 2014 · 5:09 pm

Look at Me: Conceptually rich; Practically dull

We’re fat, we’re image obsessed and we hate ourselves. The irony at the heart of Jennifer Egan’s Look at Me is that we’re all so busy looking at ourselves and imagining other people looking at us that no one is properly seeing anyone. Obsessions with image and identity collapse under the surfaces, glosses, mirrors and refractions that reveal nothing but continued obfuscation. Impermeable even to – or especially to – themselves, the characters in Egan’s novel complete Odyessian searches (complete with siren calls and tortured transformations) for a core sense of self that might anchor their choices and relationships. 

Central to the plot is the New York fashion model Charlotte’s experience of radical physical transformation: after a car accident, her face is reconstructed to such a degree she goes unrecognized by her friends, coworkers, lovers and family. In this way Charlotte enacts the fantasy of beginning again, the chance to re-form an identity without the cumbersome logistics of fleeing to a far off island or buying a fancy car. What she discovers – as do the supporting characters who experience their own sorts of attempts at beginning again and reforming past selves (both in the sense of forming anew and correcting for poor behaviour) – is that without exteriority, the recognition of others, the self-itself collapses: to be unrecognized is to cease to be. In place of “I think therefore I am,” Look at Me posits: “I’m seen, therefore I am.”

While there’s a conceptually rich idea here the pace of the novel and the complexity of the characters and their interaction fall under the weight of the premise. Too busy insisting that the reader “get” this message, the novel misses opportunities to look at many possible layers of spectacle. There are passing nods to the way gender and class shape the way we are viewed, and a fuller exploration of racial politics in the character of Z. Z, we learn, is a would-be terrorist on a mission to destroy the image-obsessed America and who carries out his mission by trying on identities as one tries on bathing suits: not effortlessly or enjoyably, but with a sense of purpose (note the book was written pre-9/11). Yet these treatments feel – perhaps appropriately – cursory and surface, throw-away lines rather than meaningful dialogue. 

Which is not to say it’s an arduous slog. Egan writes genius sentences of arresting beauty (I suppose there’s another irony to be found in the lushness of writing that demands the reader stop and re-read (look again) at the marvel of its beauty) and there is enough interest in how the wayward characters will all meet in climactic wonder. Interest, too, in the prescience of Egan who seemed to anticipate both 9/11 and Facebook in one masterful rendering.

All the same it was decidedly not the perfection of A Visit From the Goon Squad, but it is certainly a great book to teach about performativity and metaphor. And the advantageous of a good moisturizing regime. And the perils of binge drinking. And strangers. Except for Egan, we’re all strangers: most particularly to ourselves.

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