What I’m reading (May 2024)

Okay, I know I was skeptical about James Joyce the last time I did a reading update, but I kind of get why he’s so famous now. The Norton Anthology of English Literature I’m reading right now includes an excerpt from Ulysses but also a very accessible earlier story of his called “Araby”. Its images glimmer and its sentences carry me along a powerful current; the man clearly has a good command of language. The Norton Anthology explains part of his genius in Ulysses: “He may move, in the same paragraph and without any sign that he is making such a transition, from a description of a character’s action…to an evocation of the character’s mental response to that action. That response is always multiple: it derives partly from the character’s immediate situation and partly from the whole complex of attitudes created by a personal past history. To suggest this multiplicity, Joyce may vary his style, from the flippant to the serious or from a realistic description to a suggestive set of images that indicate what might be called the general tone of the character’s consciousness. Past and present mingle in the texture of the prose because they mingle in the texture of consciousness, and this mingling can be indicated by puns, by sudden breaks into a new kind of style or a new kind of subject matter, or by some other device for keeping the reader constantly in sight of the shifting, kaleidoscopic nature of human awareness.”

I also powered through the Virginia Woolf essay I was stuck on and MAN was it good. I was underlining and taking notes all over the place. Sometimes you just have to make yourself read the hard thing. It can reward you in the end!

I’m newly finished (aka I threw it down) with Meg Wolitzer’s The Interestings, so I can give you my immediate feelings: I hated it, and it wasn’t interesting. It deals with a group of friends who meet at an art camp for talented kids. I thought ideas like having to deal with the loss of a childhood dream or navigating the tension of friendship with people who are much more successful than you sounded intriguing, but the themes are buried beneath 1) way too much meaningless sex that doesn’t move the plot forward or help anyone grow, 2) endless, repetitive sections that rehash everything Wolitzer has already told us about the characters (and what makes them annoying in their own *special* ways), and 3) an unhelpful amount of telling us exactly what the characters think, feel, and are motivated by so that we can’t imagine a bit of it for ourselves. This is probably my last Meg Wolitzer book.

And then there’s Reading Genesis! Marilynne Robinson’s newest book is “a powerful consideration of the profound meanings and promise of God’s enduring covenant with humanity” with an iridescent cover. I think it’s going to be a more literary interpretation of the first book of the Bible, and while I’m sure this will pull out many facets of meaning that I haven’t considered before, I do want to read it cautiously. There have already been a few hints, 30 pages in, that Robinson may not consider the Bible to be a true story. But the writing is luminous, if laden and hyper-intelligent, so I’m excited to get further into it.

The possibilities of one’s own nature

“…Your problem is, you think everything has to mean something.”

That was one of my problems, I couldn’t deny it.

“Mortals”, Tobias Wolff

Tobias Wolff’s characters feel real. I have only recently started reading him and I find his writing so articulate, especially about people’s motivations and emotions.

I’ve just started reading his collection of short stories called The Night in Question and I was struck by this character named B.D. in “Casualty”. To be honest, stories about war bore me a bit, (or maybe it’s just that the trenches of World War I are not my ideal reading escape). I don’t really know how to identify with characters who are soldiers, how to get into their world — full of so much fear and violence but also so much routine and boredom. But I was captivated by B.D. He felt like a real person.

     B.D. wasn't brave. He knew that, as he knew other things about himself that he would not have believed a year ago. He would not have believed that he could walk past begging children and feel nothing. He would not have believed that he could become a frequenter of prostitutes. He would not have believed that he could become a whiner or a shirker. He had been forced to surrender certain pictures of himself that had once given him pride and a serene sense of entitlement to his existence, but the one picture he had not given up, and which had become essential to him, was the picture of himself as a man who would do anything for a friend.
     Anything meant anything. It could mean getting himself hurt or even killed. B.D. had some ideas as to how this might happen, acts of impulse like going after a wounded man, jumping on a grenade, other things he'd heard and read about, and in which he thought he recognized the possibilities of his own nature. But this was different.
     In fact, B.D. could see a big difference. It was one thing to do something in the heat of the moment, another to think about it, accept it in advance. 

Wolff breaks a well-known writing rule (show, don’t tell) by telling us that his character isn’t brave. But it works because he’s not just trying to show us that B.D. isn’t brave; he’s going beyond that to show how this soldier has had to accept some hard facts about himself. B.D. has not lived up to the version of the man he always thought he was. The things he has done are shameful. But he stubbornly refuses to cross a certain line, refuses to see himself as a man who lets down his friends. (Yet even in this, he sees his cowardice. He’s willing to die for a friend in one way, but not in another; it feels arbitrary.)

The syntax — the rhythm and flow of the sentences — in these paragraphs is gorgeous. Look at the variation; there are no dead spots, no awkward pauses. It all flows. Take paragraph one, for example:

1. Short sentence (B.D. wasn't brave.)
2. Short sentence followed by a long phrase -- we're building to something. (He knew that, as he knew other things about himself that he would not have believed a year ago.)
3-5. A series of three sentences all starting with the same eight words -- "He would not have believed that he could...". These are examples from sentence #2.
6. A very long sentence. A summary (He had been forced to surrender certain pictures of himself that had once given him pride and a serene sense of entitlement to his existence) that moves on to a new revelation about the character (but the one picture he had not given up, and which had become essential to him, was the picture of himself as a man who would do anything for a friend). 

Wolff is doing one of my favorite things that good writing can do. The length and construction of his sentences is reflecting the meaning of the sentences themselves. “B.D. wasn’t brave” is a concise fact, so the sentence is concise. The last sentence is more complex, reflecting the complexity of B.D.’s character — he is both a disappointing man and one who aspires to be good.

As a side note, I find this sentence from the second paragraph so insightful: “B.D. had some ideas as to how this might happen, acts of impulse like going after a wounded man, jumping on a grenade, other things he’d heard and read about, and in which he thought he recognized the possibilities of his own nature.” How often do we do this same thing, evaluating ourselves by the possibilities for good that we see within? I struggle with this a lot. The default way that I see myself is solidly, morally good. I would not hesitate to say that I’m a good person. But eventually I will come across something in my own character — something buried just below the surface of my personality — that shocks me with its desperation, pride, or shame, and I realize that “good person” doesn’t even scratch the surface of who I am. How did Wolff capture all this in one sentence — in one phrase?

Here’s another masterfully written passage:

     Years later he told all this to the woman he lived with and would later marry, offering it to her as something important to know about him -- how this great friend of his, Ryan, had gotten hit, and how he'd run to be with him and found him gone....
     This story did not come easily to B.D. He hardly ever talked about the war except in generalities, and then in a grudging, edgy way. He didn't want to sound like other men when they got on the subject, pulling a long face or laughing it off, striking a pose. He did not want to imply that he'd done more than he had done, or to say, as he believed, that he hadn't done enough; that all he had done was stay alive. When he thought about those days, the life he'd led since -- working his way through school, starting a business, being a good friend to his friends, nursing his mother for three months while she died of cancer -- all this dropped away as if it were nothing, and he felt as he had felt then, weak, corrupt, and afraid. 
     So B.D. avoided the subject.
     Still, he knew that his silence had become its own kind of pose, and that was why he told his girlfriend about Ryan. He wanted to be truthful with her. What a surprise, then, to have it all come out sounding like a lie. He couldn't get it right, couldn't put across what he had felt. He used the wrong words, words that somehow rang false, in sentimental cadences. The details sounded artful. His voice was halting and grave, self-aware, phony.

I’m fascinated by the choices Wolff makes here. Why include that B.D. tells his story to “the woman he lived with and would later marry”? Why not say “his wife”? My guess is that Wolff is creating a sense of distance between B.D. and the other people in his life, people who cannot understand the things he encountered in the war. Saying that he “offer[ed] it to her as something important to know about him” (rather than “he told her”) and describing B.D.’s rendition of his past as a “pose” emphasizes the isolation of his experiences. B.D. is alone. He can’t describe it adequately to anyone.

I also love how Wolff explains why B.D. avoids talking about the war. My own grandpa, who fought in the Korean War, was hesitant to tell war stories; it seems to be a common response for some veterans (and maybe for that generation as a whole. In my mom’s words, “You acted like it didn’t happen. Nobody talked about anything.”). B.D.’s failure to describe what it was like is an interpretation of that silence. Perhaps this failure to describe was Wolff’s experience, as well; he served in the US Army from 1964 to 1968, during the Vietnam War.

The two passages I selected are only a couple of pages apart. In such a short space, Wolff has revealed the soul of his character; B.D. practically breathes. He’s afraid, conflicted, self-aware, ashamed, striving for nobility, laboring to be unique among men, to be better and more real. But despite living a full life after he comes home, B.D. defines himself by who he was in the war. You, the reader, feel the tragedy and the truth of that; you see echoes of yourself in him. You recognize the possibilities of your own nature.

Authorial control

In one of my English classes in college, while discussing what John Milton might have meant in a certain passage of “Paradise Lost”, a question came up about the difference between what a writer intends and what the audience actually comes away with. How much control does an author actually have over a text? Is it their job to make their point as clear as possible, making it the writer’s fault if a reader misinterprets something? Or is it, due to the different backgrounds, educations, biases, experiences, and personalities of readers, completely out of the author’s hands?

At the time I remember feeling very strongly that the way the author intends something to be read is how it should be read; it is their responsibility to make things clear. I went so far as to wonder whether an author can be considered “good” based on how clearly they communicate their meanings. The reader’s responsibility, then, is to try to decipher a piece of writing for an author’s motivation. The problem with that, as we quickly discovered in the Milton class, is that even within a pretty homogenous handful of college students, there will be twelve different opinions on what that motivation is.

As I look back on it, I’m pretty sure my strong feelings were linked to my ego. I loathe being misunderstood. The thought of exposing my work, which was meant to say one specific thing, to a sea of faceless readers who might read it and come away with the opposite thing made me feel queasy. As soon as I let go of the work, I thought, I’ll be unable to defend it, unable to explain what I really meant. And the book or poem or whatever it was would just float out there indefinitely, proclaiming something I never wanted to say.

So I buckled down on my opinion that the author has a strong say in how their writing is understood. I determined to become such a good writer and be so clear that no one would ever second guess my intentions; there had to be a way to do that, right? Maybe I could write epilogues or introductions that spelled it out: THIS IS WHAT MY BOOK IS ABOUT.

There really isn’t a lot of support for this position amongst established writers. I feel like they’re basically saying, “If you have any experience at all, you know this isn’t true.”

Joseph Heller even credits his audience with knowing more about his work than he does:

INTERVIEWER: Does the reaction to your work often surprise you?

HELLER: Constantly. And I rely on it. I really don’t know what I’m doing until people read what I’ve written and give me their reactions….I really don’t think authors know too much about the effect of what they’re doing.

INTERVIEWER: Doesn’t that bother you…that the author (you) has such a tentative grip…?

HELLER: No. It’s one of the things that makes it interesting.

The Paris Review, The Art of Fiction No. 51

So my position has changed since college. It’s just not realistic to think that you can always control the way people read what you write. As undesireable as it is, I will be misunderstood from time to time. But does that always have to be a bad thing? In the parts of my life that are not related to writing, isn’t being misunderstood helpful? Doesn’t it push me to communicate better, to work on relationships, to hone my language and attune my ears to the needs of others?

I even think there is a kind of beauty in letting go of control of your own work. There may be people who misinterpret your meaning or misread your intentions for it, but there also may be people who see things you didn’t see. Maybe someone can pick up on something you didn’t intentionally do that reveals something new about your work. Maybe there are connections in your story that unify it and make it cohesive that your subconscious put there, and it takes a certain reader to point it out. 

The closest I have personally been able to come to a definition of art is “something made that communicates.” Your art is being art when it starts a conversation between you and a reader. Your art is legitimate when someone misinterprets it. Your art succeeds when it makes someone feel something, negative or positive. Your art is real when someone responds to it, and I don’t think the response has to be the response you were going for to count.