A Room of One's Own

            Today, let’s talk about the big, bad Virginia Woolf.  Woolf graced the world with her presence in 1882 and graced the literary community with her first published work in 1990. She couldn’t vote, but she could certainly write. Much of her work touts the *radical* notion that women can do things well. The catch? Women’s limited resources inhibit their intellectual potential.

In A Room of One’s Own, Woolf argues that “a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction” (Woolf, 6). The extended essay comes from lectures she gave to women’s colleges in 1928. It explores the conditions required to produce a creative work and emphasizes the necessity of literal space and privacy, which women simply did not have at the time. She invents the fictional sister of Shakespeare—Judith. Judith might have the same skills and ambitions as her sibling, but because she has meals to cook, children to raise, and shelves to dust, she is forced to squash her imaginative spirit. William is over here whipping out sonnets on the regular, and all she can do is call him Bill behind his back to belittle him. She laments her wasted talent so much that she kills herself.

Of course, the gender dynamics of the sixteenth century differ from that of her own generation. In the early 1900s, there were some—though, not many—female writers. But even then, a woman had a pickaxe in her hand instead of a pen (Woolf, 80). Her writing served as a therapeutic exercise in which to (rightfully) bitch (however unconsciously) about her inferior position in society. She wasn’t creating art with unperturbed vigor; she was constantly grinding against a strong patriarchal current that guffawed at her attempts. To highlight the prevailing sexist mentality, Woolf smugly quotes a contemporaneous male preacher, who said, “‘A woman’s composing is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well, but you are surprised to find it done at all’” (Woolf, 56). Actually, sir, there are some that do it quite well: 

Woolf also observes the strange contradiction between the way females are depicted in literature (by male authors) and the way they’re considered in real life. Poets prattle on about the magic splendor of women. If that’s how men really feel, then it’s nonsensical that “the spirit of life and beauty [is left] in a kitchen chopping up suet” (Woolf, 45). A male chopping his own suet?! The horror. [What is suet, and is it the same as the System of a Down song "Chop Suey"?]

I find Woolf’s perspective particularly interesting because she has her own room and she has money—her aunt died and left her the big bucks. These opportunities provide her clarity of mind in such a drastic way that she can’t deny their importance. It’s nice when someone gets ahead in life and doesn’t forget about the little people. Even more curious is the fact that Virginia Woolf suffered from bipolar disorder, which contributed to her suicide by drowning. Might I point out the irony of The New Yorker’s recent article “The Bath: A Polemic”**, which was originally shared on Facebook with the caption “There’s a reason Virginia Woolf insisted on a room of one’s own, and not a bubble bath”? Perhaps there’s more than one reason why Woolf isn’t associated with bubble baths? Might I also point out that the article is pretty stupid/useless?

Drowning jokes aside, I think that this woman is excellent. She says things like “we burst out in scorn at the reprehensible poverty of our sex” and she lights a fire in my soul that’s grounded in tangible frustration (Woolf, 22). Her brilliance is timeless because she attacks the root of the problem: people who are at a disadvantage culturally and financially have physical and spiritual barriers that prevent them from entering a mental space that allows for pure creativity. Because this situation disproportionately affects women, where does that leave us? Her lectures culminate in an inspirational urge to move forward. She encourages listeners to write despite circumstance, but also strive to speak out against those circumstances and thereby incite social progress.

The essay is relatively short (my copy is 112 pages). I think that it should be mandatory reading in high school; understanding how populations are deprived is hugely essential to interacting with them in a non-douchey way. Additionally, Woolf knows how to slip humor into her writing, and I respect any author who can simultaneously speak about a serious subject with deference and interweave an appropriate light heartedness. Woolf’s impressive and sensitive dexterity make A Room of One’s Own four out of five humps. I’m docking her one hump because I don’t agree with everything she says. I appreciate that she starts a much-needed conversation about a subject that’s not easily definable—creative poverty—but I don’t necessarily think that it’s inextricably linked to financial poverty. I think that Woolf wrote what she wrote with an enlightened perspective of her time. That perspective can help us today as a launch pad, but I think that it’s imprudent to view it as the end-all-be-all feminist doctrine.

*Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own. New York: The Fountain Press, 1929. Print.

**Klein, Jessi. “The Bath: A Polemic." The New Yorker. Condé Nast, 23 May 2016. Web. 25 May 2016.

The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

                Think you know the story of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame* because you’ve seen the 1996 Walt Disney film? Think again. The film adaptation is basically skim milk, and this is how Nick Offerman feels about it...

                Truly, the watered-down Disney version barely resembles Victor Hugo’s original 1831 publication (although, it’s worth watching if you want to hear Demi Moore speak seductively for 90 minutes). The Disney classic is a musical drama in which the good, handsome man ends up with the good, beautiful girl. The Hugo creation is a Gothic depiction of love and its failure to prevail. It shares characters’ most vulnerable moments and asks what extremes will they go to in defense of their love? Of course, Hugo demonstrates all different kinds of “loves”. Some conflate love and lust, so their love is less exclusive and thus less consuming (Phoebus). Some develop a one-track love-mind, so they’re blinded to anything that contradicts their vision of their lover (Esmeralda). Some love is unreciprocated, and the unloved harbors a bitterness that bursts into rage (Claude Frollo). Some love is unremitting, and loyalty persists no matter the costs (Quasimodo). You get the picture—people love other people, and sometimes that works out, but most of the time it doesn’t.

                Plenty of nineteenth century tales discuss love, so what makes Hugo’s novel any different? Like his contemporary, Charles Dickens, Hugo writes stories that comment on the history of his birthplace—Paris, France. Hugo portrays the Norte Dame cathedral as a sanctuary for citizens and a large portion of the book is told from the physically heightened point of view of the building. His reasoning is less religious and more artistic; he laments that architecture is a dying art form and he hopes to remind Parisians that their buildings leave behind a historical imprint, defining who they are as a culture. Unfortunately (for me, at least) this means Hugo goes heavy on the structural description sauce. I’m not Hank from Breaking Bad—I care only so much about stones.

 Looking past Hugo’s lengthy architectural descriptions, I see a well crafted narrative with a disturbing ending. When you read “‘You must either die or belong to me! …Either the grave or my bed!’” you don’t exactly think *all’s well that ends well* (Hugo, 280). On the other hand, I am disappointed by the lack of character growth, and therefore the predictability of their actions. Quasimodo is an intriguing character; he’s a horrifically ugly, deaf orphan, who clings to the cathedral for refuge. He’s generally kindhearted, but he’s often misunderstood. This unique background and temperament allows for a vast array of narrative opportunities. In my opinion, Hugo puts him in a corner and then lazily confines him to that role. He’s ugly, and people remind him of that fact. He’s deaf, which understandably hampers interpersonal communication. He’s an orphan, so he’s desperately loyal to the man who lovingly takes him in. He adores the cathedral because the gargoyles don’t judge him. In the rare moments he deviates from expectations, his defiance becomes a footnote, overshadowed by other events. I feel that Hugo spread himself too thin; instead of having several main characters compete for the reader’s attention, I wish he had explored the depth of Quasimodo further.

Overall, his dramatic prose does not sufficiently sweep me away, and I think a more apt title would be The Hunchback of Notre-Lame. This work is not so unsatisfying that it’ll keep me from Les Misérables, but I don’t revere Hugo as much as I anticipated that I would. As such, I give the novel 2 out of 5 camel humps, and I’ll have to find my love story elsewhere. Don't get me wrong-- I love sad endings-- but I don't love numerous edificial barriers keeping me from getting there.

*Hugo, Victor. The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Trans. Lowell Bair. New York: Bantam Book, 1956. Print.

A Long Way Gone

            “I never thought that I would be alive to this day, much less that I would write a book”, Ishmael Beah shares at the end of A Long Way Gone (Beah, 219). Acknowledgement sections are typically stuffed with sappy thank-yous and generic nods to those who helped publish the piece; Ishmael is mostly thankful he’s alive to tell the tale.

The 2007 memoir chronicles Beah’s horrific experiences as a child soldier in the Sierra Leone civil war (1991-2002). As most civil wars go, the Sierra Leone one was complicated. Several different factions—namely the RUF (Revolutionary United Front), the SLA (Sierra Leone Army), & the AFRC (Armed Forces Revolutionary Council)—disagreed about how to run the country. Over 50,000 died as a result.

           

Ishmael in particular lost his village to the RUF. He wandered from village to village with a group of friends for many months, dodging attacks until they settled in a village guarded by the SLA. When RUF forces surrounded their haven, men of all ages were recruited to join in the fight, including thirteen-year-old Ishmael. The army brainwashed his impressionable mind through drug addiction and a “kill or be killed” mentality. Drug of choice? “Brown-brown”—a mixture of gunpowder and cocaine. Confusing your nostrils with your AK-47, classic.

I had a very physical reaction to the book. I read it while vacationing in Charleston. Charleston was so damn lovely, so I guess I had to get my masochistic fix somehow. There were times when I had to put it down, take a walk, and remind myself that there is some good in the world. I think about the civil war in Syria. Same story, different colors. It’s difficult to grasp how lucky we are and it’s a little sickening that we constantly tell ourselves we’ve earned everything that we have. I wonder when we’ll stop justifying indifference to war crimes by emphatically convincing ourselves that our country’s safety comes first. I think that we’ve heard “please put on your own oxygen mask before assisting others” too many times. We’re starting to suffocate from too much oxygen.

In his memoir, Ishmael constantly asks Why me? He watches his friends get blown to pieces. Why not him? “…Rebels had cut off the heads of some people’s family members and made them watch, burned entire villages along with their inhabitants, forced sons to have intercourse with their mothers, hacked newly born babies in half because they cried too much, cut open pregnant women’s stomachs, took the babies out, and killed them” (Beah, 108). Why not him? I think this is a question worth asking ourselves on a regular basis. It is humbling and honest, as we must continue to grapple with our existence despite not having all the answers.

Ishmael’s story has a happy ending, but his childhood is irrecoverable. I had a wonderful childhood full of oversized stuffed animals and trips to Chuck E. Cheese (shout out to that dank pizza), so it’s difficult to comprehend Ishmael’s pain. His impressive writing skills serve to bridge that gap. He transports the reader in time and place to a dark corner of the universe and he doesn’t hesitate to turn up the depravity notch.

My only complaint with the book is its distribution. It’s structured in such a way that leaves me wanting. From a storytelling perspective, I wish he had discussed his pre-war life in more depth. It’s natural for readers to appreciate what’s been taken away if we know more about what was there in the first place. I realize that makes me sound bloodthirsty, but I think with a heartbreaking book like this, anything that makes me feel less removed helps.

Inspired by Ishmael’s triumph over evil, I decided to further depress myself and watch Netflix’s Beasts of No Nation* (2015). The film is a fictional account of a child solider in an unnamed, war-ridden African country, but the story’s elements are almost identical to that of Ishmael’s. Watching the horrors of child soldiering aroused the same level of repulsion and distress as reading them – a testament to both the movie and Ishmael’s book in their effective no-holds-barred approach. Both give me a sinking, overwhelming feeling that there is so much wrong with the world, where would we even start? And then I think of Ishmael now, a gifted writer and a relentless advocate for human rights. His current existence proves that good can come from evil if we fight to find it. I think of Agu, the child from Beasts of No Nation, and I realize we should do everything in our power to help kids like him, if only for the purpose of creating a viral meme depicting Agu eating Ragu.

I give A Long Way Gone 4 out of 5 camel humps, docked one hump solely for the aforementioned story-structure reasons. I give Beasts of No Nation 5 out of 5 camel humps because it effectively addresses before, middle, and after. These are hugely important stories even if they’re difficult to swallow.

*Beah, Ishmael. A Long Way Gone. New York: Sarah Crichton Books, 2007. Print.

*Beasts of No Nation. Dir. Cary Joji Fukunaga. Perf. Idris Elba, Abraham Attah. Netflix, 2015. Netflix.

Words Without Borders: The World through the Eyes of Writers

It’s no secret that us English-speakers think very highly of ourselves. What’s less obvious is how that pomposity affects the dissemination of media. According to Words Without Borders, “50 percent of all the books in translation now published worldwide are translated from English, but only 6 percent are translated into English” (Schnee, Mason, and Felman, xi). I could not locate an updated statistic, but the prevailing sentiment holds that we think we’re BFDs, and we’re missing out on a wealth of literature as a result.

Words without Borders (WWB) is a magazine that bridges the gap by translating and publishing international literature. Words Without Borders: The World through the Eyes of Writers* is a particularly innovative anthology published by the organization in 2007. WWB asked 28 esteemed authors to choose their favorite short story or poem that had not seen the English light of day. Their choices were translated from a wide array of languages: Arabic, Chinese, Italian, and Spanish, to name a few.

I couldn’t help but agree with author Ariel Dorman, who felt disturbed that many stories remain “shipwrecked and without a translator” (Schnee, Mason, and Felman, 344). Nowadays, we are so bogged down by the politics of physical borders that we narrow-mindedly focus on one goal: what is pragmatic? I’m not saying throw rationality by the wayside, but wouldn’t it be more prudent to understand the cultures that we’re turning into numbers? To expand our perspective through knowledge and empathy? Literature is a resource in that regard. What better way to learn about a different world that to hear from someone immersed in it?

As you might expect in an anthology, some stories are better than others. One of my favorites is “Revulsion” originally written in Spanish by Horacio Castellanos Moya. It is the El Salvadorian version of The Catcher in the Rye and it appeals to all of my unintelligible angst. Another favorite is “The Scripture Read Backward” originally written in Bengali by Parashuram. It ironically inverts the India-Britain post-colonial power structure, lending India the upper hand.

After reading this story, my respect for translators skyrocketed. To be honest, I hadn’t put much thought into the process until then. A translator is tasked with capturing the language and the subtle meanings. They must retain the author’s nuances. Even something as straightforward as alliteration proves difficult. Furthermore, you must have a decent mastery of the culture and history behind the text you’re translating. Sukanta Chaudhuri, the translator of Parashuram’s work, had to have a working knowledge of what colonial dynamics were like in order to catch Parashuram’s idiosyncratic jabs at Britain.

Admittedly, there are stories in the collection that I’m not crazy about. One complaint I have is that the majority of the stories hint at oppression in some form. Of course, oppression happens in all nations, including our own; however, when you’re dealing with an anthology intent on increasing access to foreign works, and most of those works have a subjugation theme, you run the risk of associating foreign nations with subjugation—at the expense of other wonderful cultural happenings in that nation. Still, this is a small taste of the many works that WWB provides us and their mission to alter the one-way translation street is laudable overall.

As such, I give Words Without Borders: The World through the Eyes of Writers 4 out of 5 camel humps. The immense respect between authors is beautiful to witness. Writers we know and love, like José Saramago, go to bat for their beloved non-English works, and we listen to them and learn from them. Reading the collection made me feel like I’d cleansed my Westernized mind… and feel less guilty about forgetting all of the Spanish I learned in high school. To get that same feeling, I recommend you at least check out WWB’s site!

* Schnee, Mason, and Felman, eds. Words Without Borders: The World through the Eyes of Writers. New York: Anchor Books, 2007. Print.

*n.p. Words Without Borders, 2016. Web. 27 April 2016.

The Awakening

Let’s get one thing straight: the actions/thoughts of a character are distinguishable from the actions/thoughts of the author who created that character. Perhaps Freud would disagree, but I don’t believe that every writer necessarily gravitates towards stories populated by a bunch of mini-mes. Readers too hung up on Humbert Humbert’s perversion as an extension of Nabokov himself totally miss out on the incredible prose of Lolita. People have imaginations. Artists like to use them. 

For the most part, the men and women of 1899 begged to differ. When Kate Chopin published The Awakening*, people simply could not deal.  A book about a woman, Edna Pontellier, who *awakens* to the notion that she is no one’s possession—not her husband’s, not her children’s, not even her lover’s? God forbid. A book about a woman who realizes her own humanity and acknowledges that sometimes being a human means feeling a little capricious? Thanks, but no thanks. Her Victorian peers could not get past Chopin’s explosion of gender norms, so they shunned both Chopin and her book.

So, what about readers in this day and age, over a hundred years later? They’re certainly less shocked by female infidelity, but some are still not that impressed. Complaints I’ve heard usually revolve around the fact that Edna isn’t unlikable because she values her independence; she’s unlikeable because she values her independence over everything else. Edna is a mother of two when she experiences her psychological rebirth and she’s fairly candid as to how she sees herself in relation to them. She says, “I would give up the nonessential; I would give my money, I would give my life for my children; but I wouldn’t give myself” (Chopin, 62). She doesn’t hate her kids. Rather, she becomes conscious of the fact that motherhood is only a portion of her identity. The veil of blind contentment is lifted and her socially appropriated role can no longer contain her expanded identity. 

I understand that Edna does not react to her awakening in a totally reasonable, moral way. But would we really expect her to—in a time still twenty years shy of women being able to vote? Her emotions have been tempered and her opinions have been ignored for so long that they are bound to erupt in the opposite direction.  She might come across as immature and selfish but up to that point she has lived her life in a completely selfless way, sacrificing her own desires and needs—her essential self-- for her husband and children. Maybe cut her a little bit of slack?

I never thought of Edna as an asshole, but I did think Kerouac was one. I watched him gallivant around in On the Road, encouraging and enabling his friend Dean to eschew his responsibilities as a father. Maybe Edna’s decision to start doing whatever she wanted to do, even if it wasn’t beneficial to her children, is easier for me to digest because she’s a fictional character. Edna is a symbol for the liberation of women and an important milestone in feminist writing; Dean Moriarity is an actual man (Neal Cassady) who in real-life treated his kids and his (many) women in atrocious ways. Maybe I justify Edna but not Jack and his gang because Kerouac’s writing skills disappointed me whereas Chopin strung beautiful sentences together like it ain’t no thang. One of my favorite sentences in all of literature belongs to her and speaks of Edna—“He could see plainly that she was not herself. That is, he could not see that she was become herself and daily casting aside that fictitious self which we assume like a garment with which to appear before the world” (Chopin, 75). What an absolutely beautiful way of portraying Mr. Pontellier’s limited perspective and Edna’s multilayered, enlivening persona.

 Indeed, Chopin’s novel is ahead of her time in content and in scope. Her use of the sea as a symbol of Edna’s endless possibilities is effective. It also adds to the novel’s sensual undercurrent, if you will. Describing Edna, she says, “the very passions themselves were aroused within her soul, swaying it, lashing it, as the waves daily beat upon her splendid body” (Chopin, 34). Chopin is not overtly sexual, rather she seamlessly intertwines sensuality in her work, as when she writes, “…the same glance which had penetrated to the sleeping places of her soul and awakened them” (Chopin, 131).

                Overall, I think that The Awakening is a significant book for men and women alike and it deserves 5 out of 5 camel humps. When you read it, ask yourself how you feel about Edna. Are you inspired by her renewed sense of wonder or are you put off by how she redefines the concept of a caregiver? Should she have to attend to others if she’s not allowed to attend to herself? These questions are ultimately moral dilemmas that are relevant to today’s society as well. Consider how your response to Edna might reflect your own expectations of women and how those expectations shape the social-equality landscape today.

*Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. New York: Bantam Books, 1899. Print.

Fight Club

            The first rule of reading this book blog is that you tell everyone you know about it. The second rule of reading this book blog is that you tell everyone you know about it.

            Sound familiar? I know that it’s Fight Club* and we’re not supposed to discuss it, but this is a group hell-bent on defying the rules so I think they’ll honor an exception. If you’ve been living in a hole and haven’t read Chuck Palahniuk’s debut novel or seen David Fincher’s 1999 film, here’s a brief rundown for you without giving anything major away:

A run-of-the-mill man (unnamed narrator--Edward Norton) encounters a charismatic man (Tyler Durden--Brad Pitt) who offers him a new perspective on life. Both men are caught in a love triangle with an unstable, adventurous woman (Marla Singer--Helena Bonham Carter).  The unnamed man feels dissatisfied despite the fact that he’s accumulated a near-perfect furniture set in his apartment. And don’t even get him started on his refrigerator! He’s “collected shelves full of different mustards, some stone-ground, some English pub style. There were fourteen different flavors of fat-free salad dressing, and seven kinds of capers” (Palahniuk, 45). But he’s treading water. He’s experiencing life in such a dull, zombified way that he actually craves death as an event that would liberate him. Tyler swoops in just in time as his deliverance. He doesn’t come bearing Buddha’s recommendation to strip yourself of your possessions and discard your mustard collection in order to reach nirvana. Instead, he insists on total anarchy. Destroy everything in the current system and rebuild! Society has devolved such that everyone is a slave to their job and their bank accounts just so that they can make a bunch of money to buy shit that they don’t need. Maybe the only way to truly feel alive is to take back our own dominance and dignity by emancipating ourselves from the institutions that control us and abolishing the rulebooks of our generation.

So, Tyler gives the narrator a new set of rules in the form of Fight Club. Men come together, rip off their shirts, and beat the living daylights out of each other. A microcosm for how Tyler thinks we should be reacting to our present fates and a chance to taste the sweetness of death so that the fighter might really live. When Fight Club stops fully scratching the morbid fascination itch, he ups the salvation ante with Project Mayhem—an organization designed to wreak havoc on the world. He states, “the goal [is] to teach each man in the project that he [has] the power to control history” (Palahniuk, 122).

Project Mayhem geeks me out. Members tag cars with “Drunk Drivers Against Mothers” bumper stickers (Palahniuk, 144). Tyler leaves the following note: “I have passed an amount of urine into at least one of your many elegant fragrances” next to a table holding a hundred perfume bottles that belong to some rich prick (Palahniuk, 82). And indeed, the novel and the film are very funny, even while brutally preoccupied with mortality. After all, it’s a satirical work and Palahniuk is as comically inventive as he is candidly dark. What started out as just a seven-page short story unfurled into a two hundred-page masterpiece that leaves you laughing, angry, disturbed, and depressed.

Fight Club takes the sentiments of Office Space and hands them to a deranged insomniac. We’re somewhat accustomed to the representation of this kind of daring and disastrous defiance of conventions in film today, but audiences were less prepared back in 1999. Many reviewers balked at the film, which rarely deviates from the text and more often than not uses direct quotes. The impassioned, polarized responses matched the intensity of the message in the film, with some viewers concerned by its potential promotion of violence. But the enormous cultural impact eventually overshadowed the film’s box-office disappointment. It’s a cult classic that struck a nerve with many Americans steeped in consumerism and frustration.

I watched the movie prior to reading the book. When I first saw it, I loved it because I was 18—I didn’t know anything about anything and Fight Club posed some edgy questions that appealed to my desire to be *different*. I had zero reason to feel deeply dissatisfied with the current order, but I admired the film because it was raw, in-your-face, and incredibly entertaining. I still think those things, but now I appreciate the satire. The book and the movie are so similar in execution that they’re practically inseparable in my mind. They both provoke an urgency to confront an important issue: you are definitely going to die, so how are you going to live? Not to mention the impeccable casting. Edward Norton perfectly resembles the punk ass bitch you imagine the narrator to be, Brad Pitt is an obvious idealized version of manhood and strength, and Helena Bonham Carter is, as always, believable in her quirky sensuality. In fact, Palahniuk insists that the novel is a romance.

I’m sure that the book + film are upsetting to some, but if life isn’t always rainbows and Chili’s, then our media shouldn’t be either. I respect Chuck Palahniuk for not backing down at all in the narrator’s quest to control his own life and redefine the concepts of completeness and perfection. It doesn’t hurt that there’s a disturbing twist and a constant thread of dark comedy. As such, Fight Club (the novel and the movie) each receive 5 out of 5 camel humps.

*Palahniuk, Chuck. Fight Club. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1996. Print.

Exile and the Kingdom

                Guys, Viggo Mortensen has gray hair now. While I’m still under the distinct impression that all celebrities drink youth-retaining elixir, I have witnessed with my own eyes the aging of Viggo since LOTR. Why was I checking out Viggo’s silver fox locks and how is this remotely relevant to my blog? This past Monday, Viggo kicked off a month long event in NYC—Camus: A Stranger in the City. On that exact day seventy years ago, Camus made his first and only trip to America, lecturing and promoting the English translation of his French novel, The Stranger. Vigo gave a *dramatic reading* of Camus’ speech in the Miller Theatre at Columbia University. The lecture was wonderful and considering the theatre was on the shabby side, not much has changed between 3/28/1946 and now. I just learned about the business term “vig” (lol), so to cement my understanding of the word, I’ll use it in a sentence: I would have paid several Vig-go Mortensens to see Camus deliver the speech himself. Also,

            In honor of the event, I decided to read one of Camus’ last works—Exile and the Kingdom*-- a collection of six short stories that epitomize Camus’ own sense of exile at the time. It was published in 1957, right in the middle of the Algerian War that ultimately granted Algeria independence from France. Camus, born in French Algeria, was deeply affected by the war, evidenced in his correspondence with Jean-Paul Sartre. He felt conflicted between his fellow Frenchmen and the natives of the land he was born and raised in. This struggle, compounded by his grappling with absurdist philosophy, left him confusedly searching for meaning and identity in a meaningless world. Note: you can learn more about Camus’ absurdism here.

            The characters in his short stories are also attempting to find their place in a world that is so indifferent to their sufferings.

• “The Adulterous Woman” portrays a woman frustrated with the banality of her life who seeks to expand her existence beyond that of “wife to her husband”. I love how Camus respects women as thinking entities. I mean, no duh, but this was the 50’s after all.
• “The Renegade” focuses on a missionary who has lost hope in the ability for good to triumph over evil. He learns this in such a brutal way that as a reader, I’m forced to question the reign of goodness myself. Absurdism is considered “amoral”, so it leaves plenty of room for discussion as to the role of non-mainstream moralities (i.e. rejecting moral absolutism). The perspective was a tad disorienting, and I think that it takes a few reads to fully appreciate this one.
• "The Silent Man” reiterates that the world is full of inequalities—there is a vast spectrum of economical, social, and cultural experiences. And we all end up in the same place: the ground. What better way to spend your day than read about how your life is largely outside of your control  and you try to make the most of it but then you die #amirite?
• “The Guest” depicts a choice that humans have: we can find freedom in imprisonment by recognizing our absurd fate and trudging onward nevertheless.
• “The Artist at Work” gives us a kind man who grows weary under the pressures of his community. Creating art gives meaning to his life, but is his focus on art mutually exclusive with his obligations to his friends and family? This is my favorite of the bunch, as the main character, Jonas, is quite likeable and relatable.
• “The Growing Stone” reminds me of Heart of Darkness in its unflinching portrayal of alleged savagery. An educated man is exposed to poverty in Africa, which leads him to rethink Christian traditions as the standard for worship.

      Taken overall, each story describes characters who feel like outsiders. They are coming to terms with truths that abandon them in a world (both physical and metaphysical) that is different from what they’re accustomed to. They remain in their struggles rather than rise above them—and that’s a difficult pill to swallow. They must find meaning and identity on an individual basis. They are “among the most acute representations of a world without God, of the nature of human condition without transcendental meaning” (Camus, xv). This is what they’re stuck with, now how are they going to deal with it?

      I’m a sucker for philosophical fiction and a big fan of Camus himself, but I don’t think it’s his very, very best, so I award the collection 4 out of 5 camel humps. In my opinion, Camus’ prose is never gratuitous, but I didn’t appreciate the parallels he made through description of landscape as much as I would have liked. Be forewarned that you definitely have to understand Camus’ philosophy and his historical experiences to really get something from this book. It’s excellent for book club discussions because there’s always another hidden layer and a deeper meaning—and I’m still just scratching at the surface.

*Camus, Albert. Exile and the Kingdom. Trans. Carol Cosman. New York: Vintage Books, 2007. Print.

Tenth of December

I thought that Amarillo, Texas was the armpit of America…until I discovered that it spit out George Saunders. Saunders is the short story guy. His works have appeared in The New Yorker, GQ, The Guardian, McSweeney’s, and various other reputable publications. Most notably, he penned an essay for the “Cultivating Thought” series at Chipotle. Who cares about E. Coli when you can feed your brain?

Tenth of December* is a collection of short stories by Saunders. I’ve never intentionally avoided the short-story format, but I typically go for a full-blown novel. Why? Absolutely no good reason. My exposure to books growing up consisted of lengthy-ish literature, so I simply continued in that trajectory. Shout out to Nancy Drew and Junie B. Jones.

After this book, I’m born again. A well-done short story is my new favorite way to start the day. The time investment is minimal, but the payoff is enormous. Sometimes what an author wants to say doesn’t require hundreds of pages to convey. In just a few pages, Saunders forces you to care about the characters and feel some resolution about where they end up. 

A collection of short stories is even better. Don’t like one of them? Move on to the next. With Saunders, no skipping is necessary. Here’s a brief description of each piece in Tenth of December. Rather than inform you of the plot, I’ve summarized what Saunders is getting at to give you a taste of the themes he lays his King Midas hands on:

Victory Lap: A gump highschooler does something surprisingly heroic. But was his heroism trumped by another’s?

Sticks: A father uses a strange, unconventional medium to express his unstable emotions. Is he successfully communicating with anyone?

Puppy: Two women are leading their lives and managing their households in the best way that they know how. When their worlds collide, judgment and misunderstanding lead to an unfortunate consequence involving a puppy.

Escape from Spiderhead (YASSS so good): Because of a grave mistake, a man is forced to become the puppet of a scientific experiment that blurs the lines between good and evil. To atone for his wrongdoing, he ends up making the ultimate sacrifice.

Exhortation: The boss of a mysterious company (the work is never explicitly conveyed to the reader) implores his staff to approach their work more positively by focusing on the end result rather than the unpleasantness of the task itself. The memorandum is disturbingly upbeat with a menacing undertone.

Al Roosten: An unsuccessful middle-aged man has a wounded pride. He envisions confronting the source of his pain and reinventing himself accordingly, but the bravery never extends from the confines of his imagination.

The Semplica Girl Diaries (YASSS so good): A middle-class father justifies a morally questionable social norm because it brings happiness to the people he loves most: his family. Ironically, his youngest child is the one to resist the trend and challenge his decision. Role reversal---an age-old question is posed to the parent:

Is something okay just because everyone is doing it?

Home: A court-martialed marine returns home to a dysfunctional family. He struggles to figure out how he fits in the life he left behind.

My Chivalric Fiasco: A man unintentionally witnesses an unlawful interaction between coworkers. Is standing up for the victim “right” even if the victim doesn’t want him to?

Tenth of December: A dying man thinks he has “the end” all figured out…until an ill-prepared little boy messes it all up. 

         Still unconvinced that Saunders is worth reading? I’m not the only one impressed by his abilities. Time dubbed him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2013. Saunders himself has great faith in what fiction can do for the world and how he can affect people through his work. He says, “What I really think good writing does: It enlivens that part of us that actually believes we are in the world, right now, and that being here somehow matters. It reawakens the reader to the fact and the value of her own existence” (Saunders, 259). Truly, I feel those vibes in his writing. I love that he emphasizes the uniqueness and the idiosyncrasies of his characters, painting them as individuals just like us with feelings not too far from our own. I give Tenth of December 5 out of 5 camel humps. This collection is such an easily digestible form of literature that it’d be a shame not to check it out yourself.

*Saunders, George. Tenth of December. New York: Random House, 2013. Print.