3 Quickies

Alcyone: "At the Feet of the Master"

This item, more of a booklet than a book, I received as a gift from the Denver Theosophical Society. I was intrigued by an advertisement on their website to the effect of "Always wanted special insight and awareness, but never figured out how to do it? Here we are!" Which I interpreted as "Come get special mental powers!" This is something I have wanted, of course, for a long time.

The answers offered in the group, and in this booklet, were not satisfying, but merely repeated what I already knew from reading The Buddha's work: "Have no desire for psychic powers; they will come when the master knows it is best for you to have them" (17). Rats. I already knew, of course, that there is no trick to enlightenment, and that it is a lot of hard work. How many times do I need to be told this?

Tom Stoppard: "The Dissolution of Dominic Boot" and "'M' is for Moon Among Other Things"

Yes, I really did read two Stoppard plays in one night, but volume two of his collected works is a collection of his radio dramas, not stage plays, and they are correspondingly shorter. I'm not sure if my confusion over the first would be cured by hearing it as it was performed, or just by a better understanding of the British Monetary system. Either way, I didn't get it. The second was more comprehendible, but the ten minutes or so was not long enough for the full Stoppardness of it to shine. It was amusing, but not really thought-provoking.

Ovid: Metamorphoses

One of my favorite things--and a sure fire mark of mind-blowing literature--is when the form of a book mirrors the function. by this measure, Metamorphoses should be the best book ever written. Within the scope of one book, Ovid flows seamlessly from one scene, one metamorphosis to another, stories taking place within stories within stories, and stories--sometimes roughly--altered to queue up the next in the series. The result is an endlessly flowing expression of Ovid's central idea, that all life is change and that nothing stays itself for long. This theme reaches a touching and convincing climax in the voice of Pythagoras :

Everything changes; nothing dies; the soul

Roams to and fro, now here, now there, and takes

what frame it will (XV.166-169)

Sadly, to my ears the book was no more inspiring than a summary of Bullfinch's Mythology. Even though Ovid is reputed to be the most witty, most agile of all the Latin writers ( though not necessarily the best), none of that came through in this translation. This is not the first bad experience I've had with the Oxford World Classics editions (see previous post on Beaumarchais). Even could I overlook the typos--and I cannot--I feel the thick and forced meter of the translation imply that the thickness of the language comes from the translation as well. It is suggested that I read the Ted Hughes version. I would have earlier balked, as I suspect that Hughes' ego would lead him to take liberties. Now that I have read a prosaic version, I welcome what will no doubt be a soggy one.

Interesting note on appellation: I was thoroughly surprised to meet Lucifer in book XI. I felt a thesis rising in my blood as thought about the connections that could be made to Hebrew Mythology, though as I thought about it, I wondered if the translator had inserted something unseemly. Research reveals that the name Lucifer does not appear in the Hebrew text of the Bible, and especially not as a reference to Satan. His first appearance in that capacity is in the Latin Vulgate, four centuries after Ovid. To sum up, Lucifer was the evening star in 400 years before he was Satan.

BTD: 34. Falling behind rather embarrassingly.

Two for the Show

Kurt Vonnegut: Cat's Cradle

Halfway through this book, I was ready to officially convert to Bokononism. All of the central tenets make a certain perverse sense, including and especially the paradoxical exhortation that Bokononism itself is foma (lies). Aside from being great fun to consider, it actually explains something that has intruiged me for years: why do certain people keep appearing in my life in wildly different contexts? Bokonon's answer: they are part of my Karass, meant to accomplish something jointly with me during our lives. Kelly Palmblad, even though we barely know each other, is clearly a member of my Karass, and probably Kim Templin as well.

By the end of the book, however, I feel that Vonnegut had emasculated my support for Bokononism. Others of his masterpieces, Slaughterhouse Five and Breakfast of Champions, to name a few, are hopelessly convoluted, but are framed as non-fiction in that they could conceivably have taken place in our own universe. This is not necessarily what makes them great, but it is what makes them wonderful; the reader walks away saying to him or herself, "I can picture this happening." Cat's Cradle, as it ends with the ersatz end of the world, does not evoke that response. As much as I wanted to be a Bokononist, by the end of the book it was impossible. Bokononism didn't exist in this universe.

This is neither a mistake or an accident on Vonnegut's part, of course. Even the epigraph should have preapred me for such a thing: "Nothing in this book is true." It evens serves to add a level to the allegorical religion: just like all other religions, it is fictional and ultimately disappointing. If the book had inspired a generation of nerds running around declaring themselves Bokononists, as I no doubt would have, they no doubt would have missed the point. I may do it anyway, just out of rebellion . . .

Francisco Jimenez: Breaking Through

I read this to see if it was suitable for my students, rather than for pleasure. I decided it would be a good choice for the classroom for a few reasons:

The Latino backdrop of the book would be familiar to them

The coming of age story matches their current path

The conflict with the Dad and friction with traditional values might be especially relevant

It's written at an appropriate and accessible level

I therefore proceeded to teach it to them, and found that they didn't agree with me at all. they especially hated the ending. In their minds, going to college was a dumb ending for the story, one they couldn't wrap their brains around. It didn't make sense to them at all that the protagonist would end up that way. They loved it, up until the last chapter. I see their point, not from a social perspective, but from a literary one. The end did feel a bit sudden and arbitrary somehow, even though it was clearly set up from very early in the book. Still, their reaction surprised me.