Reading Rainbow

For those who are interested, here is a rundown of the things I have been reading since I last updated my reading log (June 2007).

Mere Anarchy
Woody Allen
June 2007
Fiction

When I was 13, back in the Pleistocene Epoch, I found a copy of Woody Allen's Without Feathers (a collection of New Yorker articles) in my parents' basement and it was the funniest thing I had ever read in my life. Granted, at 13, there wasn't a whole lot to compare it to, but even now, many many years later (I did reread it) it still is the funniest book ever written. I then found its predecessor, Getting Even and it was also side-splittingly hilarious. Then I bought Side Effects when it came out circa. 1982 and, also, extremely funny. This trilogy of books would inform my own writing and humor style (a high school friend described it at the time as "hit and run humor"). So imagine my disappointment when I picked up Woody Allen's first collection of prose in more than 20 years—and it was utterly unfunny. At least at first. The last several pieces retain the old Allen style and had me on the floor, but the bulk of this admittedly slim volume seemed to be written in an overblown pseudo-literary-cum-hard-boiled style that reads like Raymond Chandler trying to emulate William F. Buckley. Or vice versa.

Children of Men
P.D. James
June 2007
Fiction

I bought/read this because the Film Forum was showing the film adaptation, and while I liked the book, I utterly loathed the movie—maybe because I had read the book first. In the book (as in the movie), the premise is that for whatever reason, the human race has been unable to reproduce itself and the last generation to be born has reached adulthood (the media carry reports of the last known child born). As a result, civilization is on the decline. And there the similarities between the book and movie end. In the book, a mild-mannered British college professor is approached by a young woman who is trying to get an audience with the professor's cousin, who, as it turns out, is the Warden of England. He falls in with her band of revolutionaries, one of whom happens to be pregnant... I thought the book was well-written and fast-paced, with the kind of genteel style one would expect from the 800-year-old P.D. James (who usually writes mysteries). The movie was one long streak of violence and unpleasant characters who are all the opposite of their corresponding characters in the book.

Fellow Travelers
Thomas Mallon
June 2007
Fiction

I read Mallon's Dewey Defeats Truman (bought just for the title alone, really) back in the 90s and it was OK. I came across Mallon's new book in the NYT Book Review and it sounded vaguely interesting, so I picked it up. It was good, but kind of a yawn. It is the story of two gay lovers who work for the government during the McCarthy years, with all the societal and political implications that entails. Mallon is a good writer and the end was rather touching, but overall it was kind of a struggle to get through.

A Home at the End of the World
Michael Cunningham
August 2007
Fiction

Recommended by a friend of mine, this was by Michael Cunningham, who wrote the Pulitzer-winning The Hours. It is the story of a unique family—Jonathan, his childhood friend Bobby, and his adult friend Clare. Jonathan is gay and lives in NYC as an adult with Clare, who is about 10 years older than he. Bobby comes to visit and moves in with them—then falls into bed with Clare and gets her pregnant, and the three of them decide to become a family and move to the country. It's an OK book, and Cunningham is a very good and lyrical writer, but the characters all really annoyed me after a while (typical baby boomers—self obsessed and whining). Maybe The Hours is better. I don’t think I’ll find out.

Inside Out
Nick Mason
August 2007
Non-Fiction

Steven H. had this on hand when I visited him in London last August, and I just couldn’t not read it. Nick Mason was (is?) the drummer for Pink Floyd, and has the distinction of being the older bandmember who has been in every phase of the group, from the early Syd Barrett days, to the heyday in the 1970s, to the short-lived post-Wall Final Cut era, to the revived post-Roger Waters era. So it's basically a history of the band, from its tentative early days, to the wild 60s London era, to the recording and aftermath of Dark Side of the Moon, The Wall, the internecine fighting, and ending with the band's reunion at Live 8 a couple years ago. Probably not for anyone other than a hardcore Pink Floyd fan, but a good read. Mason (or his ghostwriter) has a wry, witty style. Not a lot of wholly new information, but enlightening in certain respects anyway. Definitely not a "tell-all" book and is very very short on lurid details. (I expect with Pink Floyd there weren't all that many—as Roger Waters pointed out in the commentary track for The Wall movie, all the "groupie" scenes were entirely fictional as, he seems sad to relate, Pink Floyd were never quite the groupie magnets that other bands were. That's almost hard to believe...)

He Died With His Eyes Open
Derek Raymond
August 2007
Fiction

Steven H. loaned this to me, and I read it largely on the flight back from England. It is a modern British noir supposedly in the style of Raymond Chandler or, more properly, James M. Cain. The nameless detective is an antihero in the best noir tradition—out for truth and justice but is given to his own dark vices. he takes of the cause of man who was beaten to death and dumped on the street, leaving behind a lengthy set of cassette tapes that comprise a kind of audio diary. Mr. Nameless gets a bit too involved in his life while doggedly trying to find out who offed him. Well-written, and certainly shows the dark, seedy side of London. Parts of the plot go a bit off the rails, but it is quite compelling. I'm not sure I would read anything else by Raymond, but this one wasn't bad.

The Penultimate Truth
Philip K. Dick
August 2007
Fiction

Another great Philip K. Dick dystopian future. In this one, most of humanity lives in underground "ant tanks," manufacturing robots (called "leadies") who are supposed to be fighting a war that is being fought on the surface. What most of the people don't know is that the war has been over for years, and the leadies are actually being manufactured as household servants for the private demesnes of those who rule the earth, including Stanford Brose, an old, largely synthetic person who is in charge of everything (he reminds me of Dick Cheney). The purported leader, Talbot Yancy, doesn’t really exist, and is instead a robot that simply repeats the speeches that are programmed into it. (No comment.) When one of the underground tankers secretly makes it to the surface, he finds out what has really been going on, and finds himself embroiled in a plot to free the tankers. Or is that the plot? This seems to me one of the most fleshed out of Dick's novels, and despite the basic premise (which is not an unfamiliar one in the annals of sci-fi), it does go in unanticipated directions. And like good sci-fi, it asks probing questions: what is truth? Is the truth always the best policy? What is a leader? What qualities make up a leader? What makes a good leader vs. a bad leader? Are despots are benevolent leaders driven by the same things? And so on. This has to be one of my new favorites of Dick's.

The Pickwick Papers
Charles Dickens
September–October 2007
Fiction

After visiting Charles Dickens' house in London, I was motivated to embark on a reading of his entire oeuvre, starting with his first novel, The Pickwick Papers. Serialized in 1836-7, it relates the adventures of Samuel Pickwick and several of his friends as they travel about the British countryside and get involved in a variety of misadventures, including a run-in with fast-talking rogue Alfred Jingle, a pair of newspaper editors supporting opposing political parties, and various romantic assignations. It's basically a comic novel, with Dickens' social commentary a bit more broad and slapstick than it would become later in his career. One of Dickens' favorite books was Don Quixote, and Pickwick was designed as a modern (well, Victorian anyway) Quixote, and when he finds his Sancho Panza (Sam Weller) things really take off. A Three's Company-like misunderstanding finds Pickwick sued by his housekeeper for reneging on a purported promise to marry her, and the resulting courtroom scene is a laugh riot. A very funny book, and one which deservedly made Dickens' reputation. There was a BBC adaptation of it which is good, bit they seemed to have forgotten that they were making a comedy.

Diaries 1969–1979
Michael Palin
October 2007
Non-Fiction

Michael Palin, of course, was one of the Monty Python troupe, and had kept a daily diary since 1969. Enlightening, and one comes away from this with an immense liking for Palin. He seems like one of the most genuinely nice people in show business. One also gets a good warts-and-all look at the other Pythons (they all had tremendous respect for each other, even when they occasionally drove each other crazy). Probably could have been edited down even more than it was, but still a good read for us Python-o-philes.

Oliver Twist
Charles Dickens
November 2007
Fiction

Dickens' second novel and his first "real" novel is a well-known story of the hapless orphan Oliver Twist and his escape from a provincial workhouse, his flight to London, and his falling in with a band of criminals (Fagin, The Artful Dodger, the evil Bill Sykes, etc.). Not bad, but if it has any weaknesses (and these were common ones with Dickens) it's that a) his title character is boring and doesn't really do anything, and b) the title character only prospers as a result of a kind of deus ex machina, or the random encounter with an altruistic soul. As always with Dickens, though, the ancillary characters (especially the villains) are the most colorful, although I did like Mr. Grimwig, a crotchety old crank whose favorite refrain was "I'll eat my own head if it's so." A very fast read; but Dickens would get better.

Nicholas Nickleby
Charles Dickens
November 2007
Fiction

Dickens' third novel corrects some of the faults of Oliver Twist (Nicholas is a bit more proactive). Orphaned in his late teens, the titular Nicholas is sent off by his evil, miserly uncle Ralph to be an assistant to the vicious Yorkshire schoolmaster Wackford Squeers (Dickens was great with names). He eventually beats the crap out of Squeers after seeing Squeers flog an innocent simple-minded student (the depiction of Yorkshire schools was based on an actual tour of them Dickens undertook) and joins the Crummles acting troupe, who are the most virtuous characters in the book. The plot is convoluted, but I really enjoyed this one much more than Oliver Twist, even if Nicholas' "rescue" by the Cheeryble Brothers is a bit far-fetched (talk about deus ex machina!). It also has some of Dickens' best comic characters.

The Old Curiosity Shop
Charles Dickens
November 2007
Fiction

Little Nell lives with her grandfather, who owns The Old Curiosity Shop. Unfortunately, his gambling debts have led him to borrow money from the usurer Daniel Quilp, an evil dwarf. Quilp finds out and buys the store out from under the grandfather. Nell then realizes that their only hope is to flee the city under cover of night, and much of the novel involves them fleeing to the north of England, with Qulip hot on their trail. As fond as I may be of evil dwarves, this was not my favorite, and Nell got on my nerves more than she probably should have, and all I wanted to do was beat the grandfather with a large, blunt object. Still, it does have some good moments; I like the character of Richard Swiveler, who speaks almost entirely in song lyrics. He is introduced as a bit of a buffoon, but Dickens rethought his role and he ends up being the hero of the book! Good, but not great.

Barnaby Rudge
Charles Dickens
December 2007
Fiction

One of Dickens' most overlooked books, and one of his least successful, I thought it was terrific. It is an historical novel, set against the backdrop of the 1780 Gordon riots (Protestants were up in arms about Parliament relaxing their persecution of Catholics, which culminated in a series of riots that burned down much of London). The "hero" of the book is the simple-minded Barnaby Rudge, who lives with his mother and his pet raven, Grip (based on Dickens' own pet raven, and said to have been the inspiration for the Poe poem). The book starts with a decades old murder mystery, and soon the characters are drawn into the band of rioters. The point of the book is that the people responsible for the most destruction have little actual grasp of the issues at hand; they are just illiterate buffoons who like to get drunk and destroy things. Funny how things never change. The scenes of the riot themselves are grippingly written (so to speak), and kept me reading late into the night. I loved this one.

Martin Chuzzlewit
Charles Dickens
January 2008
Fiction

That said, my favorite Dickens novel thus far has to be Martin Chuzzlewit. It has a great cast of characters, a compelling plot, and some of Dickens' best social satire. This was the novel that was written after Dickens visited America for the first time, which disappointed him immensely, and young Martin's journey to America only to be immediately taken in by a real estate scam gives Dickens to send up his American cousins as he did his native countrymen. By turns laugh-out-loud funny and bitterly tragic, this is a great one.

Dombey and Son
Charles Dickens
February 2008
Fiction

Paul Dombey is an extremely wealthy and successful businessman who, at the novel's start, finally has a son who can live up to the business' name. (Dombey's daughter Florence is cruelly dismissed by her father, as she is "a base coin that couldn’t be invested.") However, his son doesn't exactly live up to his expectations. Another great novel--I can't decide if I liked this one more or only slightly less than Martin Chuzzlewit. Another great cast of ancillary characters, including the hook-handed seaman Captain Cuttle, Mr. Carker and all his teeth, Mr. Toots who is incapable of getting anyone’s name right, the blowhard Major Bagstock, and many others. The ending is a trifle deus ex machiny and Dombey's turnaround is much too facile, but this one was still enjoyable from beginning to end.

It is at this point that I am exactly halfway through Dickens' oeuvre, and now it's time to cleanse the palate for the second half of his career...