So I’ve gotten completely sideswiped from House of Mirth, and probably won’t get back to it for a bit. I hit a total deal on the Lemony Snicket A Series of Unfortunate Events books, and I’m downing them like candy. Delightfully unpleasant sour candy. They remind me of Roald Dahl’s books, but neither the peach nor the chocolate factory ever come into the picture. They sound like they’d be horribly depressing, but they’re really highly enjoyable, and very clever. I’m 5 books in, and ready to plow through the remaining 4.
I also finished Find Me by Rosie O’Donnell. I’ve been wanting to read it ever since I heard the storyline compared to The Night Listener by Armistad Maupin, a book I loved. I found it (Find Me) on clearance for $3, so hooray for the books on sale. I read it in about 2 hours, and was surprised by it even though I thought I knew the twist. It struck me how much we escape into fictions in our lives- Rosie was completely ready and willing to dive headfirst into the fiction someone else had created, and through that fiction, was able to see the truth of her own life. Interesting.
I’m now reading Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. Nafisi was a literature teacher in Iran, and this book is her account of a private class she held in her home for some of her most dedicated women students. They studied Western classics, most of which are banned in Iran. I’m only part way through, and I’m spellbound. The courage these women have, just to live their lives, is amazing. And it ties in perfectly with the themes from Life of Pi and Find Me- the intersection of life and fiction. Two of the passages that struck me the most:
“Do not, under any circumstances, belittle a work of fiction by trying to turn it into a carbon copy of real life; what we search for in fiction is not so much reality but the epiphany of truth.”
“In all great works of fiction, regardless of the grim reality they present, there is an affirmation of life against the transience of that life, an essential defiance. This affirmation lies in the way the author takes control of reality by retelling it in his own way, thus creating a new world.”
Those thoughts in relation to Life of Pi and Find Me are taking over my brain. I don’t know that I can voice them yet.
The other thing that struck me very powerfully is how much I take for granted. I can’t imagine not being able to read whatever I want, wear whatever I want, go where ever I want. I’m planning to take a lot away from this book.

Current Total:63
Just Finished: Find Me by Rpsie O’Donnell
Currently Reading: Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi
Next up: more Lemony Snicket!!

So I got distracted part way through House of Mirth by DV by Diana Vreeland coming in the mail. I’ve wanted to read it ever since I saw To Wong Foo, Thanks for everything, Julie Newmar. I can definitly see where reading it would change a young Vida’s life, and why you might be tempted to commit whole passages to memory. Her conversational, light tone is so accesible, and the vignettes she shares are sweet and charming. She seems simultaneously grateful for the blessings of her life and completely unaware that her experiences are in any way unusual. I’m only halfway through but loving it.
The connection between it and House of Mirth is so clear, the practice of making one’s self attractive to men. And she refers several times to geishas, which I thought was interesting seeing as I was just talking about them in my last post.
After this I’m going to search out a bio of Conde Nast, the creator of Vogue, House and Garden, and Vanity Fair. He sounds fascinating. And I’d like to read more about Hearst and Marion Davies, I’ve read her autobiography, The Times We Had, but I’d like to read more, and more about him.

I’ve just started House of Mirth by Edith Wharton. I remember starting it before, and I’m pretty sure I put it down because I sensed it was going to be depressing. I’m thinking the same thing about now, but I’m still reading because I really llke the character of Lily and I’d like to see what she does in different situations. I’m scared that bad things are going to happen to her, put she’s plucky and strong willed and hopefully she’ll come out ok. The thing that worries me is what a complete lack of control she has over her circumstances. She can influence them slightly, yes, but there is always someone with more power, more ability to wreck her life.
As I write that, I’m struck by the parallels to the conversations about zoos in Life of Pi. Lily is fine,as long as she stays within her cage, her routine. When she steps outside of that, she is in danger of all the stronger animals. They say many animals who have the chance to escape from zoos don’t- or if they do escape, they return. So far when Lily has stepped out she’s stepped back in and faced the repercussions… sorry, that train of thought just derailed.
The thing I’m finding interesting is the similarity between how women of the late 1800s were raised to act and geishas. Their entire purpose for being was to entertain men, and they were highly trained to do so.
More thoughts later when I’m farther in.

I just finished reading Life of Pi by Yann Martel, and my mind is spinning as I try to process it all. It’s a beautiful, challenging book and I don’t know that there’s any one right interpretation. But this is mine for this reading of it.
Pi is a sweet little boy who goes through a horrible ordeal. He tells the story of what happened, and his telling of the story is how he takes something gruesome and gives it meaning. (Reminiscent of Big Fish and Don Juan DeMarco in terms of how we use stories to portray emotion and depth of experience.) To believe his account takes a leap of faith, a belief in the unusual, but his story contains allegory and metaphor for life. It functions as the stories of religion- it’s a narrative deeper in its application and meaning.
What that meaning is is difficult to express on first reading. I sense a connection between Pi’s experience on the boat to Hindu concepts, although there are also parallels to Christian stories (Noah, Job, Daniel and the Lion’s Den). The island he finds is perhaps a comment on the Muslim experience, but as his own faith transcends religions, so do his allegories run together. The main vision I see in it is one of a cycle of life – a blissful pre-existence of learning and growth; a seperation from that to earth life, full of struggles, trial, and application of those things learned earlier; then a returning to a that previous existence where, if faith and a proper perspective have been applied during trials, progression can be made. If the trials had the opposite effect, of dragging down and causing to lose hope, then growth won’t have happened.
I have no idea if that makes any sense, but the book is beautiful despite its gruesomeness at times.
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I just read an interview with Yann Martel, and it backs up my thoughts on the redemptive power of stories, the choice we have about how we view reality. He’s an interesting man.
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Addtional thoughts from a couple days later when my mind is still naturally wandering back to this book (while trying not to include anything that will be a spoiler)-
Pi and Richard Parker on the boat = the spiritual vs. the physical
Violence of the animals on the boat= connection between all life- what violence do we accept? ( I don’t quite know how to express this)
Pi’s realization that Richard Parker is on the boat, in relation to revelations made later, is one of the most powerful moments in any book, ever. I keep returning to it again and again in my mind.
Current Count: 56
Just Finished: Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Next up: The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

Over the last days I finished Codex by Lev Grossman, the first two Harry Potter books, and Pal Joey by John O’Hara. I want to start Life of Pi by Yann Martel, but need to write about Codex so I can fully concentrate on Pi. I’d delayed writing about it as I was trying to sort my thoughts out. There will be spoilers in here, so beware if you want to read the book later.

Codex is the story of Edward, a young, highpowered Wall Street mover and shaker. He’s getting transferred to England, and has two weeks off for the first time in years. With nothing to do, he takes up the offer of some clients of the firm to organize their library, and what starts out as just something to pass time becomes obsessive as a search begins for an old manuscript which may or may not exist. As he does this, he also gets sucked into a video game that starts to resemble his search.

The back of the book describes it as a cerebral thriller, but there was less suspense than a feeling of vague confusion. That sounds bad- let me explain. The video game, MOMUS, that our hero plays, has him in a realistic if slightly surreal looking world, with something to accomplish but no idea what it is or how to do it. He gets sucked in further and further as he tries to figure out what he’s doing there. In real life, his search for the codex is the same. He knows he’s looking for it, but really has no idea why or how to go about it, and the world of academia that he finds himself in is also oddly surreal. As we read, its the same feeling. There’s not a feeling of danger so much as putting together oddly shaped pieces of a puzzle.

One of the main themes of the book is the purpose of fiction. Early on Margaret explains that the manuscript can’t exist because no one wrote escapist fiction back then, and when they started to do so it confused people- they couldn’t tell reality from the visions in the books. Later, the reason for the writing of the fiction of the codex is revealed, and it’s all for the purpose of escape from a reality too depressing to face. For Edward, the search and the video game become an escape from a life where he’s lost his vision. The story contained in the codex (as told to him by Margaret), and the narrative of the video game all start mixing and melding with his own reality until he can’t tell what is real. And for good reason, as his own reality starts to reflect the themes of the codex.

The narrative in the codex is circular, the knight of the story begins searching for the Holy Grail and then for the Rose Chapel, and along his way sees many of the same people mulitple times, and repeats a number of experiences. Edward also circles through his experiences, with events in the video game repeating events in real life. He begins his story looking for his Holy Grail- more fame and fortune. He gets sidetracked by the Rose Chapel- the codex, and the vague promise of peace of mind it seems to hold. And at the end, one could argue he’s circled back around to the beginning.

Those are my thoughts for now- now I can move on to Life of Pi. I don’t have much to comment on the Harry Potter front- this read through was a reread, and again they’re very enjoyable. I’m impressed by the level of subtle foreshadowing that occurs- now that I’ve read all the books published so far, I can see how she’s set up clues and tie ins for everything thats happened so far. It’s impressive.

Pal Joey was interesting, I picked it up because Bob Fosse was in the stage version, and it was $2. It’s set in Chicago and expresses a clear sense of place, which tied in nicely to what I’d read in The Devil in the White City. The book contained both the original novella and the libretto of the musical, and it was interesting to see how they differed. The novella is a series of letters, and the libretto obviously has dialogue- but there were thematic and narrative differences as well, most likely done to streamline the story. The story- especially the ending of the musical, was quite reminiscent of Sweet Charity, and it’s interesting that Bob Fosse was involved in both.

Current Count: 55
Just Finished: Pal Joey by John O’Hara
Next Up: Life of Pi by Yann Martel

I just finished The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson. It’s about the architect who masterminded the Chicago World’s Fair, and the serial killer who used the fair to lure his victims. More than being about these two men though, it really captures the feel of Chicago in the late 1800s. I’m now fascinated by the onset of the modern city- how things progressed. It also covered the prevailing thoughts on landscaping, architecture, city planning- I have so much I need to read now!
The Chicago World’s Fair was monumentally complex and intricate for a 6 month stint, it’s amazing how much was accomplished. They basically worked for 3 years to build an attraction that would exist for 6 months and then come down. The dedication and work that went into it in the name of civic pride would never happen today. And the results of the fair are fascinating- apparently Walt Disney’s father worked on what pretty much became its own city by the lake, and you can see the comparisons to Walt’s own construction. Frank Baum also said that Oz had roots in the buildings of the fair.
The personalities of the two men discussed in the book were also fascinating, I’d like to read more about Holmes (the serial killer)-he appears to have been a criminal mastermind. Obviously totally psychotic, he was so methodical- he reminds me of the Joker- killing for killings sake in a completely rational irrational way. At least the Joker looks crazy.
Anyway, now I want to go to Chicago, and I have to go visit Balboa Park again now that I have more context for the concept of a World’s Fair- all the buildings there were built originally for a World’s Fair with the plan that they would come down, but afterwards they actually fitted the buildings to be permanent.

Current total: 51
Just finished: The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
Next up: I think Codex by Lev Grossman, but I might binge on all the Harry Potter books

So I finally finished The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The Mitford girls were such a unique group of people, and the way they each got involved in the political movements of their time was almost too perfect- they could have come from a young adult historical fiction novel. “Six sisters grow up in the English countryside, only to be torn apart when war comes. One will run away from home to become a communist, one will marry the wanna-be Fascist ruler of England, and one will become friends with one of the most despised men in history.”
I was interested while reading this book by the reality of life in the time before WW2- why people thought fascism might work, why people turned to communism, and how the two groups played off each other. Most interesting was how people believed the reports of atrocities being commited in other countries to be communist or fascist propoganda against the other group, which allowed them to disregard problems they did not want to face.

My brief thoughts on the sisters, in no particular order:

Unity: I actually admire Unity for her integrity, although her embracing of Nazism boggles my mind. I can understand that she thought fascism would fix her country, at that point they didn’t know the atrocities being commited in the name of fascism in other countries, just the reform that was happening. I can also understand that she admired Hitler in an obsessive way and in doing so explained away his less than lovable characteristics; from the information in this book I don’t think she saw his bad side. He was like a superstar who she was able to get close to through sheer willpower, and it sounds like he was comfortable and casual around her. It’s the anti-Semitism and that part that I don’t get, obviously.

Decca: I’m really conflicted about Decca. She’s the sister I most expected to love- she was a communist and good friends with Maya Angelou- but from what I read in this book, I can’t stand her. She held grudges for epic amounts of time, transfered guilt to family members for things they weren’t responsible for (blaming Diana for Esmond’s death), jumped to conclusions about Diana in jail without trying to find out the truth, and I just can’t wrap my head around her statement that sisters are the trials in life, when SHE made them into that. She injected politics into situations where they didn’t belong and then couldn’t understand when people got mad. I need to read her autobography to get her side, but I’m just not up to it right now, she just bugs me.

Diana: I need to read more about Diana to form a complete opinion. Contrary to other people who revile her, most of what I read about her just made me sad. I don’t believe that she understood why she was in jail, I think she felt she and her husband were trying to do good for England. And as for being truthful and unremorseful about what happened, why they were fascists and what they thought of Hitler- someone’s got to explain it so it won’t happen again. I can see her perspective, what happened happened, and they believed in it at the time. She found Hitler charming when she visited him socially; thats a valuable thing to know about him.

Nancy: I really like Nancy. She’s interesting but also sad. She was never anyone’s great love, but she deserved to be. At the same time, she was a meany-pants, and I don’t know if she understood that she hurt people. It broke my heart to read the line from her father regarding the way she portrayed him in her books, “This just shows how horrible I must have been without knowing it”. NO! Poor sweet man.

Pam: I love Pam, her sweetness and ability to love despite the fact that various members of the family were on non-speakers.

Debo: I like Debo very much as well, but I don’t have anything to say about her at the moment.

and even though she’s not a sister,
Syndey: It makes me sad to think that she lived her life feeling that she hadn’t done right by her kids, but she did everything she could. I really like her.

Overall I loved the book and am very interested in learning not only more about the sisters, but about the whole time period, and how fascism got started in Europe.

I also read Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh because it’s been sitting unread on my shelf and it’s about one of the Mitford sisters. I’m sure I’ll burn in some level of literary hell for saying this, but I just didn’t get it. I mean, I understood it, but I don’t get what the big deal is. Waugh is supposed to be this great wit, and I just don’t see it. Parts of it were quite amusing, but I just didn’t love it. It’s the first Waugh I’ve read, so maybe I just started with the wrong one.

I’m listening to Don’t Know Much About American History on my computer at work. The further I get through it the more I think it’s intended for Jr. high level kids, but it’s informative and I’m getting a complete picture of US history that I’ve never had. Tying in with the Mitford book, I’m understanding much more why the wars happened and how they impacted the world.

I got the soundtrack to the Broadway revival of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and even though it’s not a book, there are some musical/narrative elements I want to write about, and it’s my blog so I can if I want to.
Musicals are one of my favorite narrative forms for the same reason I love comics- by adding an element to the words (visuals or music) you can add to the impact of those words. I love Richard O’Brien’s original libretto for Rocky Horror. His melodies are gorgeous, and I think he was able to subtly define his characters through the way they sing. Unfortunately, I don’t think the people who revived the show noticed that. They seem to have made changes just to make them- to differenciate their show from the original, and in the process I think it lost intended meaning. (They made amazing changes to the orchestration which I love, what I’m talking about are changes to the melodies sung by characters.)

For example:
In the original, Susan Sarandon’s Janet sang in a high, awkward register. While slightly irritating, this had the effect of making her sound hysterical and emotional. In the revival they lowered Janet’s register across the board, completely negating those traits in the music. It also lessens the effect when, finally freed of inhibition, she opens up and sings out in Rose Tint My World, since she’s been sing that way the whole time.
Likewise, Columbia’s parts were high pitched and sqeaky, adding to her image of a naive girl swept up in decadence she didn’t understand. Her register is also lowered and desqueaked in the revival, so she just sounds like a rocker girl.
The changes in Sweet Transvestite, however, are the biggest loss. In the original, the strict cadence of the opening lines: “How’d you do I/ see you’ve met my/ faithful handyman./ He’s just a /little brought down, because/ when you knocked/ he thought you were the candyman”, is hypnotizing in its beat-punctuated rhyme, circling around Brad and Janet and the listener. The revivalists, in their attempt to differenciate their Dr. Frank-N-Furter from Tim Curry’s, seem to totally miss the fact that the lines rhyme. Their Frank delivers the lines conversationally: “How do you do/ I see you’ve met my/ faithful/ handyman/ he’s just a little brought down because/ when you knocked/ he thought you were the/ candyman.” Aarg.

Not all of the changes are bad. While those listed above felt arbitrary, I believe a number of changes were made to accomodate the voices of the actors. Raul Esparza and Daphne Rubin-Vega who play Riff Raff and Magenta are incredible, and I believe the changes made to their songs allow them to fully channel their characters. (On a slight tangent, both Esparza and Rubin-Zuniga have been in Jonathan Larson musicals: Johnny in Tick,Tick…Boom and Mimi in Rent. They’re on the soundtracks, and I highly reccomend both. Stunning music and narrative. And music as narrative.)
I love Richard O’Brien as Riff Raff, but Raul Esparza takes Riff Raff to new levels. In the original, Riff Raff’s voice- while odd- had a whine to it which hinted at his discontent at being in a servile position. Ezparza’s voice is raw and powerful, changing Riff Raff from put-upon servant to someone who you realize at the end has actually been in control the entire time. I think this happened less for character reasons than the fact that it might be impossible to reign in Esparza’s voice, and it would have been a waste if they had. His voice is shiver-inducingly perfect.
I think the changes with Magenta were made for similar reasons; Magenta of the original was a lusty alto, while Rubin-Zuniga is a feline soprano ( I don’t know- thats the best way I can describe it. Something about it reminds me of a cat.) Changes would have to be made to accomodate that, and to allow her to wail her way through the songs, which she does gorgeously. She keeps the breathiness of the original Magenta, but is able to keep her voice raw at the same time.
In addition to those two, a very successful element is the cross-dressing casting of Lea DeLaria as Eddie/ Dr.Scott. Meatloaf had a high register for a guy, and DeLaria has a low register for a woman, so it balances out quite well. DeLaria has such amazing control of her powerful voice that she succeeds in sounding exactly like a saxaphone during Hot Patootie, which underscores Eddie’s identity as pure rock and roll.
The songs that work the best are the ones they changed the least (not including changes made for Esparza and Rubin-Zuniga)- Time Warp, There’s A Light, Hot Patootie, Superheroes- with the exception of Dammit Janet where they changed the kinda boring original backup singing to something quite clever.

Despite how this analysis probably sounds, I really do like this soundtrack; as I stated above, the changes to the orchestration are amazing, and overall it’s really enjoyable. I’m not complaining that they changed things, just that they changed things that I think served a purpose, and they did it without fulfilling another purpose. I just wanted to look at what happened to it narratively as a result of those changes. Why am I apologizing? Buy it, it’s good.

Current total:50
Just Finished: Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh
Currently Reading: The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson