Back in Orange

To the sir/madame who snatched my poor laptop over two weeks ago: Booooooo.

Fortunately, thanks to my wonderful insurance company, I am back in business with a new clementine-colored little guy!

Things that have happened during the interim: "Last Year at Marienbad" showed up in "Melancholia" and made me think of Dostoevsky, I finally triumphed in my search for a copy of Franzen's "The Corrections," and I'm just getting back to "Dead Souls" by Gogol. More coming soon on those top two items.

So happy to be up and running again!

Literally, Oh My God!

Man, what cave have I been hiding in the past couple years? I cannot believe that Ken Follett's "Pillars of the Earth" didn't make it into my book pile until just now. Wow. And it was EPIC! Good triumphs over evil, God defeats Satan! I think I was on the verge of straining an eye muscle towards the end. It reminded me of the times when I read Harry Potter books in a weekend and "The Shining" in two days (the latter mostly because I was too scared to leave my recliner). And similar to Harry Potter, I thought it was a fantastic story even though the writing itself was basic. Follett can stitch a story like a quilt, but Cormac McCarthy he is not. That being said, "Pillars" is miles and miles above Dan Brown's DaVinci shenanigans and don't even get me started on the Twilight series.

I enjoyed this book so much that I'm going to avoid reading Follett again for a while; I'm afraid his other work won't be as exhilarating. This was a fun and easy break, and as soon as I catch my breath I'll be ready to get back to thinking.

Up next: It's autumn, it's getting cooler, so back to the Russians at last! "Dead Souls" by Gogol

A Few Relevant Reflections

Coincidentally, I was searching for a copy of Camus' "Reflections on the Guillotine" (bizarrely not available online) as the whole Troy Davis execution brouhaha was occurring in Georgia.

Camus does present several excellent arguments against the death penalty, but there were a few points that I think spoke more to the guillotine specifically, and not so much lethal injection. And the argument for prohibition was off-putting.

Some things that were thought-provoking:

"None among us is authorized to despair of a single man ... But pronouncing the definitive judgment before his death, decreeing the closing of accounts when the creditor is still alive, is no man's right."

"According to M. Grand, the lowest of criminals when faced with execution withdraws into himself. 'He repents and his preparation for death is thereby facilitated. The Church has saved one of its members and fulfilled its divine mission. This is why it has always accepted the death penalty, not only as a means of self-defense, but as a powerful means of salvation.'"

Interesting POV on the last quote (though whatever happened to 'Thou shalt not kill'?). I suppose peace of mind and acceptance of death, innocent or guilty, would have a lot to do with strength of faith -- i.e., judgment in the afterlife is what truly matters. Rare to find that nowadays.

"For there to be equivalence, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date at which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months."

Personally, I don't think I could seek the death penalty against someone. I think life in prison, and the total absence of freedom for the rest of your days, is more punishing. But, I can accept that others do feel the need for "justice," and society happens to allow this.

The two things that bug me about the Troy Davis episode: 1) he died still proclaiming his innocence -- which to me means he was, because why lie when you're at the end of your life? and 2) the police officer's family made some comment to the effect of 'why is everyone acting like he's the victim? we're the victims!' -- BOTH families are victims.

Camus' Notebooks & More Greece

I picked up Albert Camus' Notebooks: 1951-59 at the sad closing sale of my local Borders, and thought it would be like the Kerouac-Ginsberg letters that I read last summer. Not so. The letters were much more interesting, and while Camus has some excellent moments ("The Hague") it's more of a collection of notes and ideas than an insightful diary.

Before I read the Notebooks, I had also happened to read Susan Sontag's critical essay on the first collection of his notebooks (think these were from the late 30s?), so I went back to see if anything rang true for me. She notes that it's very "anti-autobiographical"; not really any mention of events or other people -- SO TRUE. And of course in true Sontag fashion she points out that, "solitariness is the indispensable metaphor of the modern writer's consciousness." In other words, the writer is always alone.

From Camus, p.65:

It is alone that one must decide if he loves, and it is all alone that one must respond to the incalculable consequences of true love ... He is afraid of himself and for himself. He wants to spare himself, refusing then his condition.

For the most part in the diaries, it seems like he's trying to escape things -- his work, possibly the boredom of his marriage, politicians ... p.47:

The tragedy is not that we are alone, but that we cannot be. At times I would give anything in the world to no longer be connected by anything to this universe of men. But I am a part of this universe, and the most courageous thing to do is to accept it and the tragedy at the same time.

I think that quote relates to what Sontag describes as Camus' "leaping of the abyss of nihilism." To be honest, I really need to brush up on this whole nihilism thing and especially the ol' oft-mentioned Nietzsche. Like Zorba, Camus mentions this a bunch of time. Along with Greece. What the heck is it with optimistic quasi-nihilists writing about Greece?! ("For the first time I watch a land that I love disappearing with the painful feeling that perhaps I will never see it again before dying," p.155)

Other tidbits of interest that I starred & picked out:

- Joanna of Castile
- Sontag told me to go read Camus' "Reflections on the Guillotine," so there's a detour
- wrote more about Countess Tolstoy than Leo (should I put her diary on my reading list?)
- had a lifelong desire to write a combo of Faust and Don Juan, on the nature of love I guess

Bottom line: Mildly interesting but not impressive.

Next up: "Pillars of the Earth" ... I should also note that I read "A Decade of Hope" in the interim and was pleased with its tastefulness and wide representation. In addition, I was trying to nab "Freedom" by Jonathan Franzen from the public library and the online catalogue told me it was finally available after months and months of all copies checked out. I walk over to the library, wander around in squeaky sneakers for half an hour because the fiction section is under construction and I CANNOT FIND THE BOOKS. I finally find a small segment of new fiction moved out in the hallway and there is a book-sized gap where 'Franzen' should be. Really? Really. I got "A Decade of Hope" instead and felt self-conscious about just getting a book about 9/11, so I almost got "Pillars of the Earth" before realizing that I was not realistically going to read a 900+ page book in two weeks. My coworker kindly lent me a battered copy.

Going Greek

Last weekend I finished with "Zorba the Greek" by Nikos Kazantzakis and I've been waiting for a good air-conditioned moment to finally post. So first, my initial thoughts: well-written, thought-provoking, but Zorba is kind of maniacal and it got really irritating that the narrator was always running around shouting "Zorba! Zorba!". I wonder if my particular translated edition wasn't the best.

Philosophically, Zorba's another modernist novel and focuses especially on existentialism -- your existence precedes your "essence," which you create for yourself (i.e. make your own life). A great essay on this is Sartre's "Existentialism is a Humanism." While this whole concept can be construed as an atheistic and pessimistic worldview, I think it's pretty optimistic. Sartre says:

Man is nothing else but what he purposes, he exists only in so far as he realizes himself, he is therefore nothing else but the sum of his actions, nothing else but what his life is.

Thus, it follows that the hero of an existentialist work should be a brave non-conformist that makes the most of his life ... "Zorba!" This is one (and IMHO the best) solution to the modernist quandary of How Do I Deal With My Life. Kazantzakis' views are summed up nicely in Peter Bien's Why Read Kazantzakis in the Twenty-first Century. Apparently they show the influence of Nietzsche and Bergson -- neither of whom I've read, so I'll just stop there and come back when I'm more informed.

Kazantzakis is decidedly not an atheist but neither is he overly religious. As reflected in "Zorba" he "believed in a not all-powerful deity that struggles together with humanity and that needs humanity in order to stay alive" (Anti-Nihilism in the Thought of Nikos Kazantzakis, Galanopoulos). Somewhat related side note: I had no idea this was the same guy who wrote "The Last Temptation of Christ."

As to the actual book, this is my favorite description: "popular with educated readers of discriminating literary taste ... terrifyingly intellectual" (Life Span Development in Kazantzakis' Zorba the Greek, Elsman). I wouldn't call it terrifying or intellectual, or even that you need to have some sort of trained bookworm palate to enjoy the book. Can I better appreciate the novel now that I realize the underlying philosophy? Yup. Would I have also enjoyed it on surface-value alone? Probably.

The same article above points out that "Zorba" is fairly autobiographical; Kazantzakis operated a lignite mine with George Zorba, a friend of 27 years, before parting ways with him. Interesting.

Quotes that I want to comment on or just generally connected with:

"Woe betide the woman who could sleep with a man and who did not do so!" (p.106)
... Oh Zorba, thanks for making me feel better about my weekends.

"If you take a magnifying-glass and look at your drinking water ... You'll see the worms and you won't drink. You won't drink and you'll curl up with thirst." (p.117)

"I have always been consumed with one desire: to touch and see as much as possible of the earth and the sea before I die." (p.139)
... I feel the same way. Because really, going back to Sartre, then in a way you've made your life as much as you possibly could.

"I let the brakes off when I get to the most dangerous slopes. The life of man is a road with steep rises and dips. All sensible people use their brakes." (p.146)
... Basically this is why sometimes Zorba came across as being psychotic.

And, in light of my current endeavors, one of the most important lines from the narrator:

"All the problems I was trying to solve point by point in my solitude and glued to my chair, this man had solved up in the pure air of the mountains with his sword." (p.127)

Bottom line: Not to say that reading is useless, but sometimes you just gotta live it to understand.

Most memorable moment:

When I am dead write to him and tell him that right until the very last minute I was in full possession of my senses and was thinking of him. And tell him that whatever I have done, I have no regrets. Tell him I hope he is well and that it's about time he showed a bit of sense.