Chapter 12: In Which I Admit that it’s Me and not the Books, and Further Realize that Wallowing Has Very Few Benefits

First time visiting? Start with the Prologue, then follow the Chapters in the Archives list on the right sidebar, going from oldest to newest.

I’m currently reading five different books and all of them are boring me to tears.

Okay, maybe not to tears. Maybe I just wrote that for effect, an intentional cliché, meant more to emphasize that I just don’t care all that much, that nothing seems all that interesting right now, so much so that I don’t even care if I slip into cliché, ending up with banal writing that just stands there, wallflower-like, waiting for someone to request a dance but knowing that no one will. Or perhaps it wasn’t for effect at all, but mere laziness, cliché not for cliché’s sake, but just to get through the paragraph.

It all just seems so….so…pointless….

In any case, if you’ve read this far and aren’t yet bored yourself, here’s the quick rundown:

Dragon’s Teeth is an Upton Sinclair novel that throws a few rich but basically two-dimensional characters into the early days of the Nazi era, apparently as a device to let us know how terribly awful it all was. Written before the end of the war, it has a hint of tension, the kind you might expect from a writer who isn’t really sure how it all turns out; but looking at it now, through the rear-view mirror—especially after so much has been written and documented—leaves one merely reading a not-very-engaging history text, only with yachts.

House Made of Dawn, by N. Scott Momaday is a breakthrough novel from a Native American writer, a Kiowa, written back when he was still an Indian, and well before his nation put up the website which prominently displays the “gushers of cash” available at their very modern casino, right alongside the picture of a nine-dollar quesadilla burger (with taco fries). Written in a style that combines thickly layered poetic prose with a fractured narrative, it’s one of those books with lots and lots of beautiful phrases, all insisting I read them over and over again in the hopes I’ll stumble upon just a hint of captured meaning. It reminds me of the first time I read Wallace Stevens’ Anecdote of a Jar. And the second time. And the third time.

Two short-story collections also contribute to my literary lethargy, the first by Katherine Anne Porter and the second by John Cheever. Neither author thrills me; the prose (though staying well right of purple) feels overtly weighty, as if it’s longing to slap me across the face to insure I pay it the proper attention. (I haven’t yet run across any yachts, but expect to, sooner or later.) Adding to my disinterest are the facts that both collections are quite long and that, at least in the case of the Cheever, the print is very very small and the pages very very large, something my middle-aged eyes rebel against.

And then, of course, there’s still Honey in the Horn, Gillian Flynn’s bane and the book that started all of this. I have to say that Honey isn’t bothering me quite so much these days. It still serves as a splendid soporific, but maybe—just maybe—it’s not the worst on the list….

All of these books reluctantly encourage a wandering mind; I’ll be right in the middle of some long passage about rich people arguing over fascism, or about how an albino’s hair looks when the albino dies, or about something a family member said to another family member in some story about family members, and I’ll realize that, while I’ve been intending to read, what I’ve in fact been doing is mentally balancing my checkbook, or wondering whether I remembered to check the date on the Greek yogurt I just bought at Hannafords, or wondering if I want to take a trip to Toadstool Books in Milford, perhaps to buy something interesting.

We’ve all had moments like this, of course, moments when our minds drift and we realize we’ve read a couple of paragraphs (or even a page or two), and don’t quite remember the gist. But this is different, deeper, and it’s happening with five books, all at the same time. This degree of random inattention has never happened to me before; I’ve certainly run across books that dull my brain, that make me wish I were doing anything else but reading them, but I’m a book lover, a bibliophile with online accounts at a dozen different used-book sites. If I don’t like a book I’ll put it down; there are many more to choose from, dozens and dozens of wonderful volumes I’ve picked up over the years but have yet to get around to. So this can’t be the books. It has to be me. It has to be.

So then: time for mirror-glancing, for reflection.

Things haven’t been all that great lately; recovery from my recent hand surgery has been slower than expected, and while I can type nearly as rapidly as ever (and play lead guitar about as poorly as ever), such activity requires periodic respites else the throbbing in my fingers sets me searching for medication. On top of that my back has decided to act up, and this only days before house guests are due to arrive, which has me wondering about when the vacuuming will get done. And on top of that, business has chosen just now to slow down, leaving me regularly (perhaps even obsessively) worrying about money, and reacting in patently absurd ways, like deciding to skip breakfast.

All of this is bringing me down a bit, or so I’ve been told. (At least one person has suggested that perhaps I should go off by myself for a few days, but I think that’s more for her benefit than mine.) The down, though, doesn’t seem all that extreme—and is certainly well short of clinical. My mood can lift easily, often by something as simple as hearing Katrina and the Waves doing Walking on Sunshine, or running across the “tiara” clip from Big Bang Theory.

Unfortunately, I’m forced to admit that I might secretly enjoy the now-and-again wallowing. It gives me a chance to pretend that I’ve got a very good reason for not doing anything productive like, say, writing. Or doing my physical therapy. Or marketing my business.  But then there’s the guilt that comes from wallowing myself into unproductivity, and that makes me wallow even more, which makes the desire to avoid doing anything meaningful even stronger, which makes me wallow more, and… well, you get the picture.

It’s difficult having a Mobius strip for a brain.

And sooner or later, since reading has always been my favorite escape, I find myself back in that leather armchair, next to that cherry end table with the stack of books on it. Except that I don’t particularly like that stack of books right now, mostly because I’ve been wallowing.

It will shift, though, and must, because I am, after all, obsessive. At some point the mental wanderings become too discordant for my little-o, little-c, little-d personality, and I’m forced to restore order. That means plans and schedules and checklists. It means small but real successes as those checklists fill out. And, of course, finishing those books and writing about them simply must be on those checklists. That’s who I am, after all. But maybe not just yet. I think, first, I’ll head to the bookstore. That always clears my head.

Read since last post:

• None 

Currently reading:

• House Made of Dawn, N. Scott Momaday (1969)
• Dragon’s Teeth, Upton Sinclair (1943)
• Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter, Katherine Anne Porter (1966)
• The Stories of John Cheever, John Cheever (1979)
• Honey in the Horn, Harold L. Davis (1936)

Count: Still 46 read, 41 to go.

Chapter 11: In Which I Feel Overwhelmed and Impotent, and Wonder at the Falsity of Glory

First time visiting? Start with the Prologue, then follow the Chapters in the Archives list on the right sidebar, going from oldest to newest. 

Our fascination with war is downright exhausting.  

I’ve now read roughly half of all the books on the list of Pulitzer fiction awardees and the number that deal with war—whether directly or indirectly—betrays our fascination. Just recently I’ve read Tales of the South Pacific (WWII), The Caine Mutiny (WWII), The Killer Angels (Civil), The Confessions of Nat Turner (Pre-Civil, but clearly connected), A Bell for Adano (WWII), A Fable (WWI, though I thought it was WWII until I checked Wikipedia), and the half-million-word Gone With the Wind (Civil). Still to come is the equally lengthy Andersonville (Civil), along with probably a few others which hide their subject matter behind more cryptic titles. 

A thread that runs through them all, a thread that tapestries a mythical history, is the one that weaves the idea that there is glory in war, that there is always a cause, The Cause, worth fighting for. In the stories of the Civil War there are endless numbers of characters that act as the Tarletons, Stuart and Brent, did, childishly eager to don the grey in the hopes of participating in the adrenalin-filled adventures of fife and drum, bayonet and rifle. Never once did they think that flesh bleeds, that horses scream. 

Neither came home: that was the result of their quests for glory. 

There has always been this myth: it crosses religious, geo-political, cultural, and racial boundaries. There is always someone, somewhere who trots out the Idea of glory, the idea that this time it’s different, that this time there is a greater, more glorious, purpose. It is a devil’s whisper in the ear of those easily persuaded, those whose egoism and nationalistic tendencies need only the slightest push. 

But don’t misunderstand me: there are reasons for war, true justifications. There is genocide. Self-defense. Truly evil individuals creating truly evil states. But never—never—is there glory in it. And never—never—is glory a reason. 

And yet it is. Look to the ancient Greeks and Spartans, the Visigoths, the Mongols, the Crusaders, the Samurai. Look to the English and the Scottish and the Welsh. Look to the French and the Germans and the Russians. 

Look to the Iranians and the Israelis and the Iraqis and the Syrians. Look to Al-Qaeda and to ISIS.

Everywhere you look: the myth of glory. And we write about it and propel the myth ever forward; even within those corners of art where the horrors of war are so well displayed—Guernica, Catch—22, Platoon—still there is that misguided, subtle sense that somewhere, beneath the blood and the limbs and the hunger and the agony there is, just a bit, just a touch, of heroism, of righteousness, of glory. 

Reality begets fiction begets belief begets a new reality, and as long as war parades this myth of glory, there will be an ample supply of soldiers willing to be blown to bits. 

But who are these storytellers? Who convinces the thousands upon thousands upon thousands that the myth is true? It isn’t just history unwinding, self-propelled, that takes so many there—it is a technique, a strategy—of those who benefit (and there are always those who benefit) from war.

They are those who long not for glory, but for other, more material goods. For control. For wealth. Look to those who promise and see what they do, where they are. Look to the recent leaders of theocratic states (including, it often seems these days, our own). Look to the military-industrial complex. It’s not hard to find…. 

And why is it so easy? Why are so many led so fervently down such suicidal paths in that eternal quest for glory? The answer to this question, sadly, remains more stubbornly elusive. Perhaps it’s because we avoid hard truths and swallow easy lies. Perhaps it’s because we behave commonly and consistently without thought to the unintended consequences that come from the ways we treat the conquered—think Treaty of Versailles and Reconstruction. And perhaps it’s because we think in the short-term, about ourselves and (maybe) our children, but never their children, or their children’s children.

And we are fragile souls; glory feeds both our sense of self-worth and our need to connect. When we are faced with the ails of our world—with poverty and anomie and a vision of others that are superficially different than we are—our sense of self becomes supremely important (as does our need to connect with others who share that same sense), a way for us to value our time on earth. And so we are led to a place where that can happen, a place of seeming nobility where we can partake in fellowship and perhaps rise heroically or, if not, at least attempt our own place in history by creating a reason for remembrance. And we are led by those who don’t partake of any of that, who use others for those baser purposes: money, or power, or money and power. 

The calls now are as loud as ever. The Ukraine, Gaza, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and more all require new (or renewed) intervention (according to some), and the call for such intervention relies on the need for pride, the call for glory, the myth of the American Savior. There are voices enough shouting that message. And they will continue to do so until we stop believing what they tell us, stop needing so aggressively, until we take just a moment to look at them and ask: Why? 

This is no conspiracy theory, no poorly plotted warning against an ethereal them. This is a request that we question, ponder, analyze—and then question again—anyone who propels the myth forward, who rides it, steed-like, across our apocryphal plain of emotional resonance. Because as long as we don’t, they will. 

Read since last post: 

• Gilead, Marilynne Robinson (2005)
• Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell (1937)
• Years of Grace, Margaret Ayer Barnes (1931)

 

Currently reading: 

• Dragon’s Teeth, Upton Sinclair (1943)
• Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter, Katherine Anne Porter (1966)
• The Stories of John Cheever, John Cheever (1979)
• Honey in the Horn, Harold L. Davis (1936)

Count: 46 read, 41 to go.