My addiction is pretty plain and simple. It is books. It always has been, likely always will be. For that, if anything, is illustrative of some consistency in my life. I am enamoured with writing, how authors compose sentence structure and arguments. I marvel more so at the pre-20th century writers where conviction and prose matter most even if their words, in sum, amounted to only a hill of beans. Very dry, pruned beans at times. And yet, I wonder at how they do it.
My addiction, and there is no other way to explain it, leads me to buy and read books about books. Their history as an object, their evolution, their impact on culture and society. For this books are written about. But I also found a niche of fiction; of booksellers' unwittingly caught in a web of intrigue and danger. And this is harder to find. Yes, there are exceptions. There are a few authors who have capitalized on this genre, if it's meagre size qualifies as a "genre", and who have likely made some good coin on it. Paul Robertson, however, won't be one of them. According to their Deeds is a cardboard, thinly put together tale of a bookstore owner who discovers a few items in a book that lead him to discover and offer forgiveness to a blackmailers list and the soul of the blackmailer. For this to work the characters are in need of some depth beyond simple dialogue, in need of fleshing out, in need of forgiveness by the reader. And Paul Robertson sadly fails.
There was potential. A thread of flashback scenes between the saintly protagonist and the spider laying his web of deceit. Here they meet, unwittingly of one, across an aged chess board, the dichotomy of good and evil, in game, and in words. Philosophers are argued, their lives summed up, their worth measured and weighed. Here was Robertson's potential to explore and develop a heartful plot. Here, across a chess board, life and lives could have been explored. Instead, we endure the booksellers pun-ish nature with a past that would have been punishingly heavy if were allowed to unfold.
And instead, my craving moves on. Pleading forgiveness for my bookish sins (and there have been a few), now myself even wary of the absurdity of wanting to read everything I can. Something I couldn't say at a bibliophile anonymous meeting a few years ago. I have other titles to go to. And there certainly are other literary fictions in want of a reader. And I would certainly recommend others to avoid this one. Another sin awaits behind another dust jacket.
No. 0848
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Sunday, June 14, 2009
"Almost There" and "Are You Somebody" by Nuala O'Faolain
The O'Faolain books are wonderful diversion from the heady stuff in life. But only for a moment.
"Are You Somebody", her first autobiography, is a summation of who she was. A middle aged Irish woman, writer for the Irish Times among others, at the rim of celebrity status, as a writer only can. The title, "Are You Somebody" speaks to that position; on the rim of public awareness. Her life, from family and onwards, was trying for sure. Abandoned in spirit, anyways, by her father, a small "c" celebrity in his own right, and by a mother whose attachment to her was always suspect. Her savior in all this strict anti-woman Catholicism was her reading. "The most useful thing I brought out of my childhood was confidence in reading."
Breaking through the Irish stereotypes and maleness of 60s and 70s culture was no small feat. She explored the culture of writing and the arts with the uncertainty of belonging; of knowing that at any one moment, this was her life. One of her mentors, a historian Raphael Samuel, "was a pioneer of the interdisciplinary approach. He believed that anyone who had done a specialist degree had been trained in incuriousity about everything else. He believed in starting again, from ignorance. I was rich in ignorance" O'Faolain writes. "I count it as one of the great lucky things in my life...".
It is probably this complete lack of hubris that make O'Faolain interesting. If you Google her name you will inevitably come across some radio interviews she did. And the sense of wonder, humor, and the purpose of literature is beguiling. Her second autobiography, "Almost There" is more of the present journey to where she wants to be. "Middle age is the least talked about of all the seasons of life, and yet it seems to me the most exacting. It is adolescence come again at the other side of adulthood - the matching bookend - in its uneasiness of identity, its physical surprises and the strength it takes to handle it." The book is less literary and more personal. Excluding the numerous and numerous times pointing to her first autobiographical volume "Almost There" is about finding place; of having a bit of breathing room; and the societal clumsiness of not being wed or having (or wanting) children. "It has been shouted at us for so long that we're second rate if we're not in a pair with someone else, that we've come to deeply believe it."
The two books are as much a cathartic experience for O'Faolain as anything else, the "needing to shed ballast for the rest of the journey", as she put it. And likely so as most writers of self and fiction, and artist do. And yet, the purpose or hook for reading any one of these books might be suspect. Maybe there is no "hook". I would suppose if you were a young male with a preoccupied here-and-now view of life there would be no experience enjoyed in reading these. If you're middle-age (man or women), a woman of youth or experience, or cross both gender boundaries and are literary minded, then, the O'Faolain autobiographical volumes should be consumed.
#0844 and #0846
"Are You Somebody", her first autobiography, is a summation of who she was. A middle aged Irish woman, writer for the Irish Times among others, at the rim of celebrity status, as a writer only can. The title, "Are You Somebody" speaks to that position; on the rim of public awareness. Her life, from family and onwards, was trying for sure. Abandoned in spirit, anyways, by her father, a small "c" celebrity in his own right, and by a mother whose attachment to her was always suspect. Her savior in all this strict anti-woman Catholicism was her reading. "The most useful thing I brought out of my childhood was confidence in reading."
Breaking through the Irish stereotypes and maleness of 60s and 70s culture was no small feat. She explored the culture of writing and the arts with the uncertainty of belonging; of knowing that at any one moment, this was her life. One of her mentors, a historian Raphael Samuel, "was a pioneer of the interdisciplinary approach. He believed that anyone who had done a specialist degree had been trained in incuriousity about everything else. He believed in starting again, from ignorance. I was rich in ignorance" O'Faolain writes. "I count it as one of the great lucky things in my life...".
It is probably this complete lack of hubris that make O'Faolain interesting. If you Google her name you will inevitably come across some radio interviews she did. And the sense of wonder, humor, and the purpose of literature is beguiling. Her second autobiography, "Almost There" is more of the present journey to where she wants to be. "Middle age is the least talked about of all the seasons of life, and yet it seems to me the most exacting. It is adolescence come again at the other side of adulthood - the matching bookend - in its uneasiness of identity, its physical surprises and the strength it takes to handle it." The book is less literary and more personal. Excluding the numerous and numerous times pointing to her first autobiographical volume "Almost There" is about finding place; of having a bit of breathing room; and the societal clumsiness of not being wed or having (or wanting) children. "It has been shouted at us for so long that we're second rate if we're not in a pair with someone else, that we've come to deeply believe it."
The two books are as much a cathartic experience for O'Faolain as anything else, the "needing to shed ballast for the rest of the journey", as she put it. And likely so as most writers of self and fiction, and artist do. And yet, the purpose or hook for reading any one of these books might be suspect. Maybe there is no "hook". I would suppose if you were a young male with a preoccupied here-and-now view of life there would be no experience enjoyed in reading these. If you're middle-age (man or women), a woman of youth or experience, or cross both gender boundaries and are literary minded, then, the O'Faolain autobiographical volumes should be consumed.
#0844 and #0846
Monday, June 8, 2009
"Darwin's Sacred Cause. How a Hatred of Slavery Shaped Darwin's Views on Human Evolution"
The tandem of Adrian Desmond and James Moore have a lengthy history in deciphering the inner depths of archives, libraries, museums, and literature. Both have contributed with numerous books and journal articles to the workings of science and culture, specifically that one exists in the other. Their latest challenge is no different. "Darwin's Sacred Cause" is also, however, a significant challenge.
The premise is that evolution, particularly human evolution, as Darwin would come to understand it and contribute to, was in part do to his own misgivings of slavery, both in England, but also in America. "We aren't out to prove the uncorrupted purity of Darwin's corpus" they write, "...or indeed deify his corpse." "The real problem" they argue "is that no one understands Darwin's core project, ...No one has appreciated the source of that moral fire that fuelled his strange, out-of-character obsession with human origins."
Thankfully, Darwin provided much of the original material for this project as one of the most notorious note-takers of the 19th century; the authors reviewed over 15,000 letters, plus all the drafts of publications to be, as well as those of his close family. And it is here where it all begins. His family, and later the in-laws, many of whom were abolitionists in their own right, provided an atmosphere of the unity of all men and women. Emma (nee Wedgewood) was a singular force in Darwin's life and with religious piety helped center Darwin (but let's not forget, many of the arguments for the plurality of human origins comes from the same good book).
Much of the evolution of Darwin's abolitionist nature, from boy-hood, through the discomforting trials aboard the Beagle voyage, at times seeing humanity shredded, to his more reclusive days can be documented. The problem the authors face, however, is the certainty of the early influences on Darwin. Too often Desmond and Moore bridge suppositions with 'must haves' and 'likely's". Yet "Sacred Cause" is a thorough going of the relationship between British and American rationality and irrationality. Though racism was an integral part of both countries (the Brits through trade, the Americans, through labor), the sensibility, at least on paper, was born earlier across the pond than on American soil. And on this soil, the challenger to abolitionism (and evolution by natural selection, but more so sexual selection), whose "long arm unsettled Darwin", was in many ways headed by the renowned Harvard zoologist Louis Agassiz. And it is this interplay that is the most interested for much of the American 19th century racism rest equally so on the 'science of the day.'
"Darwin's Sacred Cause" is a wonderful tour of 19th century science and how two countries, one emerging, the other at the peak of its colonial game, began to intertwine. That alone is worth reading. How much did Darwin's abolitionism influence his views? The authors show time and again the Darwin spared the public with his views on the unity of humans until he was sufficiently armed with evidence and a mechanism. And the problem is that Darwin, even amongst his thousands of correspondence, never is sufficiently clear. And the problem with 15,000 pieces of authored paper is that it only fuels the need for more. More questions for the few answers.
#0845
The premise is that evolution, particularly human evolution, as Darwin would come to understand it and contribute to, was in part do to his own misgivings of slavery, both in England, but also in America. "We aren't out to prove the uncorrupted purity of Darwin's corpus" they write, "...or indeed deify his corpse." "The real problem" they argue "is that no one understands Darwin's core project, ...No one has appreciated the source of that moral fire that fuelled his strange, out-of-character obsession with human origins."
Thankfully, Darwin provided much of the original material for this project as one of the most notorious note-takers of the 19th century; the authors reviewed over 15,000 letters, plus all the drafts of publications to be, as well as those of his close family. And it is here where it all begins. His family, and later the in-laws, many of whom were abolitionists in their own right, provided an atmosphere of the unity of all men and women. Emma (nee Wedgewood) was a singular force in Darwin's life and with religious piety helped center Darwin (but let's not forget, many of the arguments for the plurality of human origins comes from the same good book).
Much of the evolution of Darwin's abolitionist nature, from boy-hood, through the discomforting trials aboard the Beagle voyage, at times seeing humanity shredded, to his more reclusive days can be documented. The problem the authors face, however, is the certainty of the early influences on Darwin. Too often Desmond and Moore bridge suppositions with 'must haves' and 'likely's". Yet "Sacred Cause" is a thorough going of the relationship between British and American rationality and irrationality. Though racism was an integral part of both countries (the Brits through trade, the Americans, through labor), the sensibility, at least on paper, was born earlier across the pond than on American soil. And on this soil, the challenger to abolitionism (and evolution by natural selection, but more so sexual selection), whose "long arm unsettled Darwin", was in many ways headed by the renowned Harvard zoologist Louis Agassiz. And it is this interplay that is the most interested for much of the American 19th century racism rest equally so on the 'science of the day.'
"Darwin's Sacred Cause" is a wonderful tour of 19th century science and how two countries, one emerging, the other at the peak of its colonial game, began to intertwine. That alone is worth reading. How much did Darwin's abolitionism influence his views? The authors show time and again the Darwin spared the public with his views on the unity of humans until he was sufficiently armed with evidence and a mechanism. And the problem is that Darwin, even amongst his thousands of correspondence, never is sufficiently clear. And the problem with 15,000 pieces of authored paper is that it only fuels the need for more. More questions for the few answers.
#0845
Sunday, June 7, 2009
"Against All Gods" by A. C. Grayling
For those of you who are familiar with this line of discussion A. C. Grayling's "Against All Gods, Six Polemics on Religion and an Essay on Kindness", a slim volume, should sit nicely beside Richard Dawkins "The God Delusion" and anything by Christopher Hitchens.
Grayling's premise and passion is obvious. That any form of religion is a special interest group, nothing more, just the same as a rotary club, or another; and that as a religion, belief in the supernatural is "...the negation of thought". Don't get him wrong. Even though those that are religious are given, without thought special status, it doesn't mean they deserve disrespect. It just means that "[i]t is time to demand of believers that they take their personal choices and preferences in these non-rational and too often dangerous matters into the private sphere, ...". And that [e]veryone is free to believe what they want, providing they do not bother (or coerce, or kill) others; but no one is entitled to claim privileges merely on the grounds that they are votaries of one or another of the world's religions."
One has to consider the specific words here; "providing they do not bother (or coerce, or kill) others." Grayling argues that coercion begins young, long before "mature" minds prevail. This is similar to Dawkins line of thinking.
"Against All Gods" is not strictly an anti-religion polemic. It is a statement of an even more stronger root. That if the supernatural is lifted (a category of all religions according to Grayling) a stronger unifying force can blossom. A humanitarian approach. For it is in this view that "we can have a proper discussion about the ethical principles of mutual concern, imaginative sympathy and courageous tolerance on which the chances for individual and social flourishing rest. We need to meet one another as human individuals...in a pubic domain hospitable to us all..." (p. 38).
Grayling makes many strong points but it comes down to this. Who am I to judge? And with the power invested in me by the evolutionary line that I come from, riddled with chance and circumstance, I have, in this 21st century, Youtube, hyped up sensationalism, the ability to finally turn the off the tube, or not read this book. Or, one can dare to read something outside their comfort zone.
#0847
Grayling's premise and passion is obvious. That any form of religion is a special interest group, nothing more, just the same as a rotary club, or another; and that as a religion, belief in the supernatural is "...the negation of thought". Don't get him wrong. Even though those that are religious are given, without thought special status, it doesn't mean they deserve disrespect. It just means that "[i]t is time to demand of believers that they take their personal choices and preferences in these non-rational and too often dangerous matters into the private sphere, ...". And that [e]veryone is free to believe what they want, providing they do not bother (or coerce, or kill) others; but no one is entitled to claim privileges merely on the grounds that they are votaries of one or another of the world's religions."
One has to consider the specific words here; "providing they do not bother (or coerce, or kill) others." Grayling argues that coercion begins young, long before "mature" minds prevail. This is similar to Dawkins line of thinking.
"Against All Gods" is not strictly an anti-religion polemic. It is a statement of an even more stronger root. That if the supernatural is lifted (a category of all religions according to Grayling) a stronger unifying force can blossom. A humanitarian approach. For it is in this view that "we can have a proper discussion about the ethical principles of mutual concern, imaginative sympathy and courageous tolerance on which the chances for individual and social flourishing rest. We need to meet one another as human individuals...in a pubic domain hospitable to us all..." (p. 38).
Grayling makes many strong points but it comes down to this. Who am I to judge? And with the power invested in me by the evolutionary line that I come from, riddled with chance and circumstance, I have, in this 21st century, Youtube, hyped up sensationalism, the ability to finally turn the off the tube, or not read this book. Or, one can dare to read something outside their comfort zone.
#0847
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