Easy Rider

 I understand the allure of ambient music.  I get why someone wants a song to just go on and on, to gradually surrender to the experience, to observe as the subconscious creates an arc that isn't really there.  I get the draw of minimalist music, of Philip Glass, of seeing how a theme evolves in the music and in the experience of the music over longer periods of time than might be strictly necessary.  And I suppose I see the point of "mood" pieces in general.  I know why some people don't mind that a movie or TV show or book doesn't quite work on a thematic or plot level, why it doesn't matter that Bret Easton Ellis or Ryan Murphy don't really care about "meaning" or "plot" or "logic".  I get it.

I just don't like it.

There are plenty of ways to create a mood.  It is my belief, fixed and outdated as it may be, that there is more to Art, Literature, and Cinema than just feelings.  I was fully prepared to dismiss this movie; with its protracted,  well-underscored, and scenic interludes; as a "mood piece".  Until, that is, the last quarter or so.  Jack Nicholson's brilliant semi-monologue about what freedom means and why people fear it is worth becoming an audition piece in and of itself.  The movie is not just a "mood piece"; it is a movie about mood--about the feeling of freedom, of letting go, of abandoning chains and fetters.  It becomes in that moment, more than a movie, it becomes metaliterature, the very highest form in my estimation.  

And then it regresses slightly.  Perhaps it is because I have no personal experience of the "mood" of that decade that it seems tone deaf to end the movie with a message about how oppressed straight cis white people with long hair are.  Maybe that group really does serve as an appropriate metaphor for prejudice in general.  All I know is that the movie is brilliant and innovative (actually getting high while filming?  Cutting edge.), but the generation that it seems to be speaking for has become the very thing the movie rails against.

Ramon Gómez de la Serna: Las Proximas Greguerías hasta 1200

 
1100.A, e, i, o, u: las cinco notas del piano humano.
The vowels are the five notes of the human piano.

1101.Hay un diálogo interior muy importante entre hígado y riñones; si le llevan bien, la cosa marcha.
There’s a very important internal conversation between the liver and the kidneys.  If they get along, things move right along.

1102.La lluvia acaba por olvido: pero, a veces, vuelve a acordarse, y vuelve a llover.
The rains ends up being forgotten, but sometimes it returns to remind you, and rains again.

1103.Cuando el martillo pierde la cabeza, los clavos se ríen.
When the hammer loses its head, the nails laugh.

1104.En el murmullo se cuecen las palabras.
In a murmur, the words boil

1105.Los peces no tienen cultura: no saben ni siquiera que existe la salsa mayonesa.
Fish have no culture.  They don’t even know that mayonnaise exists.

1106.El reloj de la torre está illuminado por lunas atrasadas.
The clock on the tower is illuminated for waning moons.

1107.Cuando suena el timbre nos sirve una copita de vino del Rin.
When the doorbell rings, it serves us a little glass of Rhine wine.

1108.El portero no la vio entrar, pero la vio salir. (Era la Muerte.)
The doorman of Death does not see the entrance, only the exit.

1109.La F de Felicidades debe ser firuleteada.
The F in “felicitations” needs to be ornamented.

1110.Con los variaciones del clima crujen los esqueletos de los muebles.
When the weather changes, the furniture’s bones creak.

1111.Un ser humano no es más que un portador de microbios, de más o menos microbios.
A human being is is nothing but a carrier of more or fewer microbes.

1112.Lee y piensa, que para no pensar tienes siglos.
Read and think.  You will have centuries to not do so.

1113.Las estatuas no vuelve la cabeza, porque saben que si la volviesen e convertirían en efímeros seres mortales.
Statues don’t turn their heads, because they know that if they did they would become mortal and ephemeral.

1114.Los días que la luna queda en el cielo del día es que, para secarse, quiere tomar un diurno baño del sol.
The moon sometimes rests in the midday sky to dry itself off and do a little sunbathing.

1115.Los egipcios siempre estaban en perfil.
Egyptians were always in profile.

1116.El barco entra la peluquería del puerto con la ilusión de que lo repinten.
The boat enters the hair salon of the port with the illusion that it will get repainted.

1117.Psicoanalista: sacacorchos del inconsciente.
Psychoanalyst: the corkscrew of the unconscious.

1118.Llamar al sigle XIX decimonono es hacerle más cursi.
To call the XIX century “nineteenth” is to make it even cornier. (the silliness of the word is lost in translation).

1119.Si todas las palabras fuesen como crac, chirriar y quiquiriquí, podría existir el lenguaje universal.
If every word was like “crack”, “screech” and “cock-a-doodle-doo”, there would be a universal language.

1120.Bajo el árbol no llueve mientras llueve, pero comienza a llover después que ha llovido.
Under the tree, it only begins to rain after the rain has stopped.

1121.Los grandes reflectores buscan a Dios.
Spotlights are searching for God.

1122.Lo primero que quiere ser un niño es contortionista.
The first thing a child wants to be is a contortionist.

1123.Así como el barco sufre la tentación de la sirena, el auto es perseguido por Dafne, diosa convertida en árbol, que le llama para que se estrelle contra su tronco.
Just as boats are beckoned by sirens, cars are called by Dafne, a goddess transformed into a tree, to wrap themselves around her trunk.

1124.Cuando comprendimos el engaño de la vida fue cuando descubrimos que las flores del gran ramo estaban sostenidas con alambres.
The moment we realize the deception of life is when we discover the hidden wires supporting grand bouquets.

1125.El ángel no mueve apenas las alas para volar.
Angel barely move their wings to fly.

1126.Bostezo: borrón del respirar.
A yawn: a smudge of breath.

1127.Los mástiles son los lápices con que el barco dibuja la travesía.
Masts are the pencils with which boats draw their voyage.

1128.En el poema del menú siempre están tachados los mejores versos.
In the poem of a menu, the best verses are always crossed out.

1129.Las palomas duermen en los aleros como pobres de pedir limosna en el quicio de un portal.
Doves sleep in the eaves like beggars asking for alms at the door.

1130.El ascensor está lleno se seriedad.
The elevator is filled with seriousness.

1131.Los hoteles de verano tienen que cobrar lo suyo, porque el mar es lo que abre más el apetito.
Summer hotels have to get paid because it is the ocean which whets the appetite.

1132.La luna se pone algunas noches el dije de una estrella que le dejó su abuela.
Sometimes the moon dons the locket of a star left to her by her grandmother.

1133.Una tienda de bicicletas es como un circo, y un circo es como una tienda de bicicletas.
A bicycle shop is like a circus, and vice versa.

1134.Al jardinero le horroriza el otoño porque se le descose todo el jardín.
Autumn horrifies the gardener because is unravels the entire garden.

1135.Eclipse: carambola celeste.
The eclipse is a celestial ricochet.

1136.Ser bailarina es lanzarse sin un solo mohín al agua fría y luminosa del escenario.
To be a ballerina is to jump into the icy waters of the stage without so much as a grimace.

1137.La única que guarda un secreto es la ceniza.
Only ashes can keep a secret.

1138.El sol es un Banco vitamínico que cierra los días nublados.
The sun is a vitamin bank that closes on cloudy days.

1139.En la oscura memoria de la planta siempre consta de qué color eran sus flores.
In the dark memory of the plant there is always the knowledge of what color its flowers are.

1140.La mano vieja se agarra a la vida como la plata de pájaro a la rama.
Old hands grab on to life like a bird’s claws on a branch.

1141.Al ver las tiendas de ortopedia se piensa que sus aparatos están hechos con restos de muñecos descuartizados.
Seeing the orthopedics store one wonders if its devices aren’t made from dismembered dolls.

1142.Los ciervos de los parques zoológicos no pueden olvidar el bosque porque reciben en sus arboladas antenas «la voz de la selva».
Deer in zoos cannot forget the forest because they receive “The Voice of the Jungle” on their wooden antennae.

1143.En los arcos enhebra su hilo la historia.
History threads its needle with arches.

1144.Gallo: jefe de fábrica de la huevería.
Rooster: the foreman of the eggery.

1145.Clavando clavos se nota que unos nos quieren y son dóciles y otros nos odian y son rebeldes.
When we play the claves, we notice who likes us and are placid, and who hates us and are unruly.

1146.Comer salchichón es poner tacones al hambre.
Eating salchicha puts high heels on the appetite.

1147.Hay violín de naranjada y violín de limón.
There are violins that are as sweet as oranges, and those that are s tart as lemons.

1148.Dijo un dislate de muchos quilates.
I say 24 karat absurdities.

1149.Los carros de mudanza son tan grandotes porque trasladan los muebles al destino--toda la fuerza del sino--de los que se mudan.
Moving vans are so big because they transfer furniture to the destiny--all the power of fate--of those who are moving.

1150.Si vivir no fuese morir, ¡qué hermosa sería vivir!
If living were not simply to die, how beautiful it would be!

1151.La palmera aplaude al viento con sus grandes manos verdes.
The plam applauds the wind with its huge green hands.

1152.El puente está hecho de XXX que son la incógnita de si se caerá o no al pasar el tren.
The bridge is made from the XXX that are the mystery of whether it will collapse or not under the passing train.

1153.Tomó tan en serio eso de «ahogar las penas» que se tiró al río.
He took “Drowning his sorrows” so seriously that he threw himself into the river.

1154.El tranvía tiene momentos en que parece pasar por sitios de gran oleaje.
The streetcar sometimes seems to pass through places like surfing a giant wave.

1155.Los acordeones tienen el pelo ondulado.
Accordions have wavy hair.

1156.Raja de sandía: luna de sangre.
The split in a watermelon is a blood moon.

1157.Las sardinas son las cucharistas de plata del mar.
Sardines are the teaspoons in the sea’s silver service.

1158.Frívola es la que se hace una blusa con un pañuelo.
Frivolity is wearing a blouse with a scarf.

1159.Lo que más gusta a la escalera de mano es que se caiga el martillo desde su altura.
The thing a stepladder likes best is when a hammer falls from its top rung.

1160.Los nietos destiñen a los abuelos.
Grandchildren are destined to become grandparents.

1161.El primer beso es un robo.
The first kiss is theft.

1162.El camarero que se olvida de abrir la botella, es un hijo de Tántalo.
The waiter who forgets to open the bottle of wine is a child of Tantalus.

1163.Las venas son los riachuelos que van a dar a la mar que es el morir.
The veins are streams which lead to the sea of death.

1164.El piano siempre está vestido de etiqueta.
The piano is always dressed properly.

1165.El defecto de las enciclopedias es que padecen de apendicitis.
The problem with encyclopedias is that they suffer from appendicits.

1166.En el fondo del automóvil se celebra la confesión del paisaje.
Underneath the car, the landscape is giving its confession. (Or in the background of?)

1167.Tememos estar mucho tiempo mirando a la luna, por si nos hace una radiografía.
We fear spending too much time looking at the moon, as if it were giving us an x-ray.

El violín armoniza el llanto do los niños.
The violin harmonizes with the crying of infants.

1168.Las flores que no huelen son flores mudas.
Flower that don’t have a scent are mute.

1169.El que descascarillase la luna buen descacsarillador sería.
He who could husk the moon would be skilled indeed.

1170.El raudo segundero inquieta el pausado caminar de las manillas de las horas, que exclaman: «¡Qué niño éste!»
The swift second hand interrupts the rest of the hour hand, who exclaims, “What a brat!”

1171.Víctor Hugo nació para estatua.
Victor Hugo was born as a statue.

1172.Lo más terrible del atropello es que el grito lo da el freno mientras enmudece la víctima.
The worst thing about an accident is that the screams of the brakes drown out the victim.

1173.Los cangrejos bailan la jota en el fondo del mar.
Crabs dance the Jota on the sea bed.

1174.Si al león le diesen de comer en la selva como en un jaula, dejaría de ser feroz para convertirse en un pensador.
If they gave the lion meat in the jungle as they do in the zoo, he would become a philosopher.

1175.Lo primero que necesita un director de jazz es un sastre que haga muy bien las espaldas.
The first thing a jazz director needs is a tailor who specializes in backs.

1176.Rollo do pianola, música «braille» para pianos ciegos.
The player piano roll is braille for blind pianos.

1177.Sólo el sol puede dar vacaciones a las nubes.
Only the sun can give the coulds vacation time.

1178.Pajaritos en la música: mejor están bien fritos.
The birds that are included in music sometimes are better off fried.

1179.Todos los pájaros son mancos.
Every bird is a one-armed man.

1180.La miope huele todo con los ojos.
A nearsighted person smells everything with their eyes.

1181.El ronquido es la sierra del sueño.
The snore is the saw of sleep.

1182.Hay árboles que dan gritos verdes.
There are trees that scream in green.

1183.La prisa es hermana del olvidar las llaves.
A rush is the sister of forgetting one’s keys.

1184.La rana se tira al agua como si quisiera suicidarse.
The frog jumps into the water as though he wanted to commit suicide.

1185.Los pingüinos en la playa parecen estar desolados porque se les has ido al barco.
The penguins on the beach seem sad because they have missed their boat.

1186.La luna: vacuna del noche.
The moon is the vaccine of the night.

1187.La pintura al pastel se hace con polen de flores.
Pastel painting is done with flower pollen.

1188.El león está siempre a medio afeitar.
The lion is always in the middle of a shave.

1189.Metía tal escándalo con su calva que se enteraba todo el mundo que había llegado.
He made such a fuss with his bald head that everyone who had come knew about it.

1190.El frío reparte prospectos de peletería.
The cold handed out pamphlets for a furrier.

1191.La bufanda nos hace pájaros pechugones.
The muffler turns us into puffy-chested birds.

1192.Prefiero las puertas que aconsejan: «Empujad», que las que aconsejan «Tirad».
I prefer the dors that say “push” to those that say “pull”.

1193.Cuando enloquece al violinista es cuando el arco toca en frenéticas XXXX el violín.
When the violinist really gets going is when they are drawing frantic Xs on the violin.

1194.El gallo se sacude las alas como si sacudiese un paraguas mojado.
The rooster puts away his wings like a wet umbrella.

1195.El hipopótamo hace vide de baúl.
The hippo lives the life of a steamer trunk.

1196.Los juglares de la jungla son los monos.
Monkeys are the jugglers of the jungle.

1197.El caballo siempre coloca con coquetería una u otra pezuña.
The horse is always placing one hoof or another coquettishly.

1198.Hay gabardinas que convierten en paquete postal al que las lleva.
Trenchcoats turn you into a postal package when you wear them.

1199.Motocicleta: cabra loca.
Motorcycle: crazy goat.

1200.El chófer del ómnibus está en el pulmón de acero, y mira por el espejo a los que llegan.
The bus driver is living in an iron lung, and can only look as his passengers through a mirror.

Zaretta Hammond: Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

 When I describe the process I am undergoing to renew my teaching license, the response invariably includes some form of the phrase, "It's like they don't want people to become teachers."  This a natural response to the poorly thought out, meaningless, and copious work that is part of the process.  The current step I am tackling (the penultimate in a series of a dozen or so) is filled with outdated materials, broken links, false or inaccurate content, and--perhaps most inexcusable of all--boldly featured misspellings.  It would be hilarious that one of the required tasks is titled "Compentency 2" if it were not so tragic.  I just finished submitting around 100 pages of reports, each section of which was returned with a perfect score within 20 minutes of submission.  The odds of the evaluator having even perused the work are self-evident.  And these 100 pages represented merely a third of a single step in the process.  I almost gave up and began looking for jobs as a copy editor.

But.

Buried in the casserole of incompentence [sic] was an interview with the author of this book who was so clear, knowledgeable, and visionary that I simply had to order her book and add it to my goals for the coming school year.  She pointedly avoids specifics, focusing on principles that underlie culturally responsive pedagogy, rather than quick additions to ornament a fossilized practice, so it is not as simple as most would hope--rightly so.  The mindset she prescribes reinforces that of Christopher Emdin: that viewing students' home culture as a deficit is insulting and harmful, in the same way that so called "Native-American Schools" were to their students.  To approach education of marginalized students as a project in "fixing" fixing them not only is wrong on ethical and moral levels, but it simply doesn't work, and the achievement gap's persistence is evidence.

The culture in which a child was raised is not a deficit or an obstacle.  It is an asset which can be leveraged into real learning--provided the teacher is secure and insightful enough to step outside of her or his preconceptions about "success" and "achievement".  The quote Hammond offers from Ralph Ellison sums it up: "If you can show me how I can cling to that which is real to me, while teaching me a way into the larger society, then and only then will I drop my defenses and hostility. . . ".

Ibrahim

 1: Already a fascinating qualifier: that those reading this may only be led out of darkness by the permission of their own Rabb, a vague referent that I am inclined to agree with Hulusi in interpreting as "the higher self".

 2,3: Standard admonition against the unbelievers.  They are specifically chided for making what is simple appear complicated.

4: The but . . . why?  Because he is the Aziz and the Hakim, and we can't understand his ways?  Pretty fruitless reasoning, that.

5-8: and related is the question "why this 'testing' through suffering?  what end does it serve?" 

9-12: A whole lost, alternate history lurks here, the people of Aad and Thamud, who received their own prophets and whose messages could probably sustain their own book.

13-15:  The distinction between Hulusi's interpretation of "Rabb" and the traditional one blurs here, and it is possible that drawing a distinction is pointless anyway.

16-17: Culturally fitting that the ultimate punishment is thirst.

18-22: It certainly seems like the only requirement for escaping the tortures of hell is to not deny Allah.  Indeed, as far as rules and regulations go, the entire Quran is startlingly non-prescripitive.  The characterization of Satan here is spot on too.

23: And the reward is also aquatic.

24-26:Hulusi's liberties here are really unsupportable.  All seven of the other renderings I'm referencing are true to the word بِإِذْنِ, and translate it "will" or "permission".   Hulusi can't help himself from squeezing the inscrutable Sufi interpretation "based on the suitability of its Name composition" out of it.

27-30: "Have fun in hell!" is an unexpected bit of comedy.

 31-34: Really all that has ever been required of followers is a spirit of submission, salat, and prayer.  Pretty reasonable if you ask me, especially considering the benefits outlined here.

35-39: We finally get to the eponymous character of this book, and he seems to be referring to Lot in his pleas.

40-41: Here ends the portion that has anything to do with Ibrahim.  All he asks is that people be generous and that Allah be merciful.

42-52: The entire book is a warning, and Hulusi naturally metaphorizes all of it in quite a pleasing and resonant way.  Your Rabb is clear.   The rasuls have been given you.  Allah is consistent. However you respond to them in this life is exactly what you will experience in the next.

 

 

TJ Klune: The House in the Cerulean Sea

 A rare pleasure read, to pass the long empty hours of Summer, and it was a true pleasure.  I could have wished that my sister didn't introduce the book to me in quite such detail as she gave it to me, and had simply said, "Read this. Trust me."  Even without the joy of discovery, however, I was thoroughly captivated and read it in a matter of days. Part of this was due to the ultimate shallowness of the book. One would be hard pressed to find any deep or new ideas in it.  There was no need to set it down and think about it.  The speed with which I devoured it was also due to the vivid and original world it held: each of the characters was clear and able to form an emotional connection with the reader through skillful characterization and original observation.  

With one exception.

The main character, Linus Baker, seemed almost purposefully underdeveloped.   As exceptional as every other character in the book was, Baker seemed to have nothing in particular to recommend him as protagonist.  A schlubby factotum was an interesting choice for the reader's entry point into this world, and one can only assume one of two things: that it was purposeful, so that he could emerge like a Papageno at the end with a message that even schlubby factotums can find love, or because this is how the author saw himself.  Just an average man with a gift for detail, and a little bit of bravery lurking under the surface.  Either way, the "everyman" choice is not new, and presumably warranted, but it makes the love story feel unearned.  Arthur constantly says how wonderful the main character is, as though we needed convincing--and we do.  We still do.

David Foster Wallace: Consider the Lobster

 Did I black out and write this without my own knowledge?  Am I David Foster Wallace?  His writing and thinking feel so familiar, his tone so exactly my own, that I remain curious whether this I am a brain in a jar and wrote this book for my own amusement--perhaps even to wake me from my slumber and give a hint as to the mature of reality.  Never, and I include the very act of learning to read, have I had to look up so many English words in the dictionary.  What a scamp.  It's exactly the sort of precision and mischief that I would commit.  Swivet.  Gonfalon.  Benthic.  All so useful, and so obscure that he had to know what he was doing.  And his tone, my god, his tone.  Am I insane, or is it my own?  Making a mockery of academia by co-opting its forms for an irreverent and covertly florid purpose?  Footnotes to footnotes to footnotes, so vanishingly small that I literally had to find my monocle to read them (a fact that I'm sure delights his spirit)? Even his ideas match my own:  the hand-wringing over the reality of meat, the singular take on abortion, the disdain for both prescriptive and descriptive linguistics, all things I could easily have written insofar as they are my very thoughts.  

    It is to be wished that his writing were not so cripplingly straight, or that this book was not primarily on topics that he did not choose, and was assigned to cover.  It is even more to be wished that people like us didn't so often Robin Williams ourselves at the end. 

Jean-Paul Sartre: Existentialism and Human Emotions

 The more I read of Sartre, the clearer he becomes, in several ways.  The first, perhaps most significant, is that it's not that serious or complicated at root.  One tries to parse every word, making sense of and extrapolating each turn of phrase, but as it turns out that, while Sartre's thinking may be sophisticated, his writing is not.  Where he seems to be trying to explain the inexplicable, desperately trying to clarify for the reader something that is beyond words, he is in actuality trying to  work through and adorn a very simple idea in his own mind, and is just as confused as the reader.  I owe a great deal of my own personal beliefs and philosophy to existentialist thought, but I must say that in this case he seems to have overextended himself, gone under his own gas, and gilded the lily.  The truth of existentialism is universal, but here he tries to make it specific and to lay it into a practical purpose: that of psychoanalysis.  There are a couple of flaws with this mercifully brief project;  for one thing, the nature of existential reality is such that it is impossible for it to be prescriptive; if reality and experience have no inherent meaning, then it is awfully silly to use the same tools that have revealed that fact to try and reveal the whys and hows of behavior, to give meaning to what is without meaning.  For another thing, it would be absurd from a purely existentialist point of view to try and make generalizations about human experience, insofar as it is impossible to know the experience of another, let alone of all.  This is most sorely revealed when Sartre addresses the promising question of "The Hole" (84).  This is at first glance a sobriquet for "The Void" which is so crucial to existentialism, but no.  He means literal, physical holes: mouths, sockets, and vaginas.  He observes that people like to fill holes, and assumes it is because they are representations of the larger Void at the heart of the self.  by his reasoning, it is purely for this reason that children put their fingers in their mouths, and men enjoy putting their penises in . . . honestly anything.  If one didn't know better, one would think that he had never actually had sex, for there is a stronger urge at play that that of filling holes: that of having orgasms and feeling physical pleasure.  It is this sort of detachment from the realities of human experience that make it seem as if Sartre were a god trying to communicate to mortals, but in reality he is simply a man who had a great idea, and spent the rest of his life trying to make it work.

Dario Fo: We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay! and other plays

 If one believes in coincidences, which I find it more satisfying not to, it is worth noticing that all three books I've finally gotten around to writing about on this ostensibly patriotic day are, each in its own way, rebukes of America.  Fo's comedic assault on Reaganism specifically is no less-- and perhaps is more--relevant as an assault on the even more theatrical politics of today.  It is layered, however, with such masterful humor and deep philosophical underpinnings that it reads as good-natured ribbing, which is the key to the success of any insult. Something is no doubt lost in reading the plays, though they stand up to scrutiny admirably, and are rather easy to envision, thanks to the extensive explanation provided by the editor, Ron Jenkins.  This explanation is especially credible because it comes from a personal relationship with the writer and his collaborator Franca Rame.  She is so inextricable from these texts that she really should be credited as a co-author, much as Jeanne-Claude is given equal billing with Christoff. Try as one might, however, it is simply impossible to capture on the page elements of physical comedy, visual acuity, and theatrical instinct that are so clearly fundamental to the works.  It is the opposite of a work which is given life by its staging, but has nothing to offer on its own.  Such works belong to the director rather than the author (I'm looking at you, Lloyd-Webber).  Rame and Fo's work is rather so vivid and profound on its own that any staging other than their own would have very big shoes to fill indeed.

Jeanne Wakatsuki and James D. Houston: Farewell to Manzanar

My personal biases are such that when my purpose in reading a book colors my approach to it.  When I am reading something for work, which is to say in order to teach it in the classroom, I see it primarily through that lens and analyze it accordingly.  When I am reading something I perceive to be canonical, I tend to approach it more broadly and philosophically.  There are surprises and course-corrections in each case.  Sometimes a presumably fluffy book turns out to be deeply literate and resilient to that sort of scrutiny, as in the case of The Hunger Games.  Sometimes the opposite is true, as documented here more times that I care to go back and count. A dilemma arises when a book is both potential classroom material and, if not canonical, at least "important" in the canonical discourse.  This was the case, for example, with Rosa Parks' My Story, and it is the case with the work under consideration now. As in the former case, it turns out to disappoint on literary levels, though to retain its significance.  Perhaps it is a function of non-writers having something that needs to be said. Perhaps it is more a byproduct of what constitutes "should" in the literary and cultural mind.  At any rate, Manzanar left this read feeling unsatisfied, and this teacher feeling well-equipped.

Langston Hughes: The Ways of White Folks

    It is often said of certain books that you do not read them; they read you--or at least they read you back.  I have myself had and documented here that experience, most notable when reading the books of Dick or Vonnegut. When I say this, I mean "read" in the sense of observe in detail and provide results of that observation, as if by a medical device. The experience of being thus read by a book or an author is generally unnerving, and in the best cases is revelatory.  The realization that someone with whom you have never had contact, and is likely long dead, sees you and displays your own characteristics publicly is the proverbial lightning in a bottle that is one of the most magical things about literature.  

    Hughes does that in this volume.  He reads me in the sense of seeing right through me and recording what he sees.  But he also reads me--and presumably any other eponymous white folk--in another sense, that of NYC ball culture.  To read someone in this sense is not to objectively notice details about them, but to take those details to their most exaggerated and unflattering ends.  Hughes here reads me "for filth," as the saying goes.  He highlights and exposes the reality of my interactions with any melanated person, and more to the point, their interactions with me.  I am comfortable saying that I am anti-racist, both in belief and in action, though no more free from bias and generalization than any other human.  The startling and eminently supportable thesis of this book, however, is that the overriding variable in my interactions with others is out of my control: my whiteness.  Even more terrifying, the thoroughly plausible examples given support the idea that this same whiteness is universally negative in its effect.  My humanity, ethics, morals, etc. may counterbalance that effect to some extent, but they cannot erase it.

    What does one do with this information?  It makes the task of being a "good white person" somewhat irrelevant, doesn't it?  At the very least it humbles one, and gives the lie to anything resembling self-congratulation.  Furthermore, doesn't the same thing apply to other ways in which I am rewarded by the kyriarchy--maleness, cisness, etc.?  It is manifestly untenable to draw the conclusion that I should distance myself from marginalized groups for their own welfare.  Nonetheless, it gives rise to caution, and an honest look at my own motives, actions, and ultimately the effect of my existence.