Review: The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

   

The Great Gatsby

F. Scott Fitzgerald

1925

An Alexandrine Couplet About The East And West Egg Crowd

J. Gatsby loves Daisy – Daisy loves attention

Tom loves being an ass – Nick loves the West, I guess?

***Magical Bonus Couplet***

An Alexandrine Couplet About Nick’s Friends

They dance and drink champagne – they traipse around New York

dating the wrong people – and it ends tragically

So here’s the thing:  Everyone read this in high school, but it’s a really difficult book to teach.  Having taught it, I think it mostly loses readers in its insanely complex intro, which is really hard to get through.  Alienate a teenager in the first 10 pages and you can’t really expect them to give their full and complete attention to the next two hundred.  So it goes.

Regardless, of all the “classics” of American literature, this is 1 of the 2 best.  I’m not exaggerating – I’ve spent way too much time thinking all this through.  To Kill A Mockingbird is the other.  And here’re 2 reasons why:  1^st, Gatsby’s written about a very specific time and place, but it’s easily translatable to other times and places.  It’s as relevant now as it was then.  It’s both history and pop-culture (there’ll be more on this after some pictures of closets).  2^nd, it can be read as entertainment or in an educational setting.  But mostly, this book is flawless.  Every word is carefully chosen and perfectly applied.  Every line is pregnant with meaning.  Everything relates to everything.  There’s no wasted space, dialog, or description, and no accidents.  

It’s written like this closet

But it’s fun like this one

We could haggle if we needed.  It always bothered me how Nick forgot his birthday till halfway through the day, though I can defend it if put on the spot.  But 99.9% of this book is impossible to argue with.  If you don’t like it, that’s cool.  That’s a personal choice.  But you can’t say it’s bad. 

 Living in New York, I saw the lives of people so rich and careless.  And I, as a West Coaster, never entirely fit in there, was never truly accepted by New York, and eventually moved back.  Like Nick, most of my friends in New York weren’t New Yorkers.  Virtually everyone I knew had a great few years and moved again.  New York is filled with people from other places who hang out with people from where they’re from.  F. Scott wrote about it then, and it’s still like that.    

Also, the lifestyle of Gatsby and his world are all very real today in hip-hop culture.  People making it, occasionally in shady ways and occasionally in very honest ones, and then not knowing what to do with themselves.  They’re filthy rich but people who’ve been the 1% for 2 or 3 or 5 generations will never accept them.  They throw lavish parties, drink, dance.  The entire “roaring 20s” thing, with the sexy clothes, the flashy jewelry, the people going out, being part of a “scene,” being photographed, it’s all so like today.  Replace black and white news photos with TMZ, the gin with Cristal, and you’re right there. 

You don’t believe me?

Look at Drake’s backyard . . .

 . . . and Lil Wayne’s vodka add . . .

and tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about.

 

Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of F. Scott’s writing.  But the man didn’t waste any time.  This book paints such an accurate picture, so brilliantly, that it really is awe-inspiring from a writer’s point of view.  Watching Nick watch all these people and getting wrapped up in their stupid, inconsequential lives, and understanding that they’re still people with emotions, hopes, dreams, that they actually take themselves seriously, and having to figure out where to draw the line between sympathy and disgust.  Reading Gatsby is going through all that, but we mostly don’t think about it or even understand it, we just talk about the clothes they wear, the cars they drive, the physical details through which we pretend to know and understand them.  Remind you of the Kardashians?  Think about it. 

The book really is stunning. 

Also:  Yes, the eyes of T.J. Eckleburg are meant to be God.  Just stop arguing and accept it.

God. 

Review: Lord Of the Barnyard, by Tristan Egolf

Lord Of The Barnyard

Tristan Egolf

2000

An Alexandrine Couple About The Lessons Learned From Lord Of The Barnyard

                                 Don’t screw with geniuses – or any of their friends

                                 they can exact revenge – very creatively

The full title is Lord of the Barnyard: Killing The Fatted Calf And Arming The Aware In The Corn Belt.   That is a fucking ridiculous title.  But the book is truly amazing.  I don’t use the following term lightly (because I hate sounding like a pretentious kootie), but this book is a tour de force. 

Corporal Hicks from Aliens is actually 

the 1st Google Image result for 

“Pretentious Kootie.”  

 Which is really unfair, 

considering Paul Reiser was in that movie.

Lord Of The Barnyard is nothing short of breathtaking.  The prose is clean, descriptive, and brutally honest.  The depiction of a small Kentucky town, the poultry industry, etc. will knock you down. 

The story itself is a 1st person narrative of a garbage man telling the story of his friend (and the protagonist) John Kaltenbrunner.  John is preternaturally, even mystically intelligent.  His brains are only matched by his bad luck and completely anti-social personality traits.

The early story concerns John’s terrible childhood in a farm community, his leaving and much later returning, and his becoming a garbage man.  Building to the climax, John, in an effort to give the people he works with the human dignity they deserve (and engender them some self-respect), leads a garbage strike.  Soon enough the town is crippled, businesses close, riots begin.  The garbage men go into hiding as the town, rotting under the putrid filth of its own trash, begins destroying itself.  Basically all-out white trash anarchy.  Can you think of a better Tuesday night?

“white trash anarchy” in a Google Image search 

brought up this Salvador Dali tattoo.  

 I’d rather have a Corporal Hicks tattoo.

I don’t want to give too much away.  Suffice to say there’s just enough believability in the settings and characters to keep the story grounded, just enough excitement and intrigue to keep it going, and just enough real world to make you wonder.  It’s clear you’re intended to think about what you would do without trash men, and about the way you see them.  But don’t think too hard – it’s more about awesome literature than social commentary.  Just buy this book and enjoy the Hell out of it.  It really was one of the best books written in 2000, and should have, in this humble narrator’s opinion, been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.

Why Moby Dick Is White

Moby Dick; or, The Whale (Yeah, that’s the book’s full name)

Herman Melville (Henceforth known as Herman)

1851

For what it’s worth, the movie Jaws is probably the best thing Herman ever wrote.

I had an American lit professor in college who told us a story.  In the 1950s, his first year teaching at Princeton, he met Albert Einstein at a cocktail party.  They were introduced, did the obligatory round of small talk, and went their ways.  My professor was understandably impressed. 

Late that night, home in bed with his wife, the phone rang.  It was Albert, apologetic about calling so late, but wondering if he could ask a question. 

“Okay, Albert” my professor said.  Imagine calling Albert Einstein just “Albert.”

According to the story, Albert Einstein said, “I’m a genius.  I’ve won the Nobel Prize.  But there’s this thing that’s always bothered me.  You teach literature, right?  – In Moby Dick, why is the whale white?”

It comes up again and again.  AP high school teacher and college professors go on and on.  Students write about it.  There are lots of answers.  The thing is, they’re all bullshit.  

She, like Ahab, searches for Moby Dick

Those teachers, professors, and students – they’re all just blowing smoke.  Here’s the real reason Moby is white:

He was an albino whale.

No really, that’s it. 

Wikipedia will tell you that “The symbolism of the White Whale is deliberately enigmatic, and its inscrutability is a deliberate challenge to the reader.” 

I’ll let you in on a secret:  Symbolism is never enigmatic or inscrutable.  If there’s a symbol written into a book, you’re supposed to get it.  When writers use symbolism, they do it to enrich their work.  They want you to understand.  What’s the point otherwise?  Any writer who is being “deliberately enigmatic” is fucking with you.  Most writers who come off that way, they’re just covering for a screw up in their work. 

So back to Moby:

Not this Moby, the other one

A marine biologist, if you happen to know one, will explain that nature occasionally produce albino whales.  Also, sperm whales (like Moby) are community animals who travel in pods, except the albino sperm whale is attacked and shunned by the pod and has to live alone.  He’s usually overly defensive and quick to attack because he’s so often attacked by other whales and because he can’t rely on the pod for defense.  So albino sperm whales used to attack boats.  It was just something that happened.

And that’s it.  It’s no deep symbolism and only a mystery because lit professors often think that inventing an answer is better than finding an answer.  But originally, Herman wanted to tell the story of obsessed Captain Ahab, and Herman needed an antagonist, something that Ahab could be obsessed with, something that Ahab was pitted against in a fight to the death.  A giant albino whale works because it would have attacked Ahab’s whaling boat, and Ahab could spend his life chasing it.  It’s not symbolism, it’s story telling.  Plain and simple.  

Einstein should have been talking to lit professors.

 

So there you have it folks: generations of literary mystery demystified.  If you or someone you know is reading Moby Dick, you or they can pull out that trump card.  Meanwhile, Herman is laughing in his grave.

Spoiler Alert: The whale dies.

Review: The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas

The Three Musketeers 
(That’s Les Trois Mousquetaires in the French)

Alexandre Dumas

1844

Ummm . . . Who’s that 4^th guy?

Alexandrine Couplet About The Three Musketeers

                                                  Hot-headed country guy – moves to the capital,

                                                  makes friends, fights some duels – turns into a badass.

 

This is a classic of French literature, and honestly, I kinda have to give it up to French Literature.  It seldom got bogged down in details like Brit Lit did, and as much as I love the Russian classics for being so intensely cerebral and internal (see my future post on Crime and Punishment) the French classics are always prepared to break their own boredom with a quick quip (respect the alliteration), a good sword fight, or a night of heavy drinking.  

Essentially, classic French writers are okay with movies like this. 

Existentialists came later and screwed everything up.

  

The point is: The Three Musketeers is spectacular.  It has everything.  Action, intrigue, spies, politics, class issues, sword fights, love, sex, betrayal, brilliant characters, humor, moustaches.  No really, lots of moustaches.  Musketeer Headquarters is like the most hipster bar in the most hipster area near you.  They make fun of d’Artagnan because he can’t grow one.  Porthos’s bristles when he’s angry.  They curl them.  Really.  Reading The Three Musketeers is like watching an old western, only it makes you smarter.

This guy is Captain Of The Musketeers.

The book runs the gambit from arguments about appropriate clothing to the reasons countries go to war.  The scene where the musketeers and d'Artagnan fight the four English gentlemen in such an honorable fashion juxtaposes brilliantly with the scenes where the French and British armies kill each other for such a terrible reason.  With the eight fighters, they had a fair argument, a fair fight, and they walked away trusted friends.  The war – a big part of the background and setting for this book – is essentially a drunken brawl over who should own Anne of Austria.  She’s married to the French king but the Duke Of Buckingham has a crush on her.  He provokes a war with France so that, a few years and thousands upon thousands of lives later, he’ll be able to arrange the peace treaty, which means he’ll get to travel to Paris and be in the same room as her.  As the French would say, “That’s love, no?”  And I would answer: “NO!  That’s not love, it’s CRAZZZY!”  But hey, it makes for a great book, I guess?    

--Yes, I just said that Alexandre Dumas wrote the whole book, and fashioned an entire, real life war, on the theory that when the Duke Of Buckingham told his friends “I can get any woman I want” he really, really meant it.  Either that or Dumas had been cribbing plot lines from the Iliad.  Now I’m not saying Dumas stole the Anne of Austria/war plot from Helen of Troy/The Trojan War, I’m just saying you can point that out next time you need to sound smart at a lit themed cocktail party. 

Favorite scenes: 

Where d'Artagnan walks in on Aramis with the superior of the Jesuits and the Curate of Montdidier.  The 3 argue on and on (sometimes in Latin) about Aramis’s thesis to join the order (should it be dogmatic and didactic, or ideal?  – THE PRESSURE!).  They try to involve d’Artagnan, but he doesn’t understand Latin, isn’t a big church-goer, and anyway he tends to let his sword do his thinking for him . . . if you know what I mean.  He’s increasingly bewildered and frustrated with his friend’s religiousness and the yammering of the three intellectuals.  Trust me, this is hilarious when Dumas does it.  But only if the translator knows what they’re doing, so watch out for that.

Also, I love the part where the four are required to procure all the horses, weapons, and equipment they’ll need to go to war against England, but all of them are dead broke.  Athos’s plan:  To lie down on a couch in his apartment and not move until a horse, weapons, and equipment fitting his needs and station arrive at his door.  He doesn’t care where they come from, as long as he doesn’t have to stop drinking or go outside.  I have friends like that.

Look, I’m not saying it’s the easiest book to read.  It’s long.  There're some parts where the king and Richelieu go on and on.  Some of the translations are certainly better than others.  And it was originally serialized, so there’s always going to be some issues with that.  But overall, it’s incredible, fun, exciting, full of great characters (and there are a lot of them.  Really, dozens.), and well worth the read. 

Why is d'Artagnan swinging a chicken?  Is he actually swinging his cock around?  Are they rushing to dinner?  Isn’t that Mousqueton’s job?  (Okay, if you remember the part where Mousqueton is poaching for Porthos while he’s squatting in the countryside hotel, that joke was hilarious!)  I’m telling ya, great characters.

All For 1, And For Each A Blimp!  Great job here, Hollywood.  This is exactly what Dumas had in mind.

. . . Okay, he probably would have been pretty entertained.

 

See, I warned you that staying under 350 words would be an issue for me.

An Outside Perspective On Ayn Rand; Or, Today’s Comic From XKCD

One of my future blogs will be on the novels of Ayn Rand.  Long story short: I’ve read all four, all the way through.  No small task.  One of my goals in life is to read the longest books ever written.  I read them, so you don’t have to.  Anyway, I’ll get to that crazy bitch one day.  In the meantime, today’s XKCD comic pretty much says it all.  I recommend following the link and checking the mouse over – it’s the best part.

Special Thanks to Randall Munroe and XKCD.

http://xkcd.com/1049/

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.5 License

Review: Bohemian Paris: Picasso, Modigliani, Matisse, And The Birth Of Modern Art, by Dan Franck

Bohemian Paris: Picasso, Modigliani, Matisse, And The Birth Of Modern Art

Dan Franck

1998

Translated from French to English in 2001 by Cynthia Hope Liebow

The artists in this book would not call this a “modernist” painting of their home.

The would call it crap.

Alexandrine Couplet about the Book Bohemian Paris 

Stumbling and drinking - artists wander Paris

creating some great art - and also some bad art.

After realizing we had shockingly similar art interests, a girl I was madly in love with at the time gave me her copy of this book.  I started reading it because I wanted to get laid needed a new book that day.  I finished it because it’s honestly the best non-fic book about art I’ve ever read.  I’ve made a habit of recommending it to others, and am currently reading it for the 2^nd time.  It’s about the painters in Paris between 1900 and 1950 or so, mostly foreigners (Picasso, his friends, and their ilk), and their struggles with life, with bills, galleries, woman, each other, their environment, and the art world.  It’s told in a very anecdotal style that gives a window into the lives of these people, paints a beautiful picture (ahem – pun intended) of the places they lived (mostly Montparnasse and Montmartre – you know, where Amelie’s from), and how and why they created the art they created.  It’s full of history and insight, but also  romance, hardship, action, duels, scams, and all those other things we should spend more time reading about that are seldom in non-fic.  At the very least, it's an excellently researched and excellently narrated book.  

Sacrebleu!

I’d recommend it to anyone interested in art, even if these aren’t your favorite painters.  At the very least, you’ll understand better what they were attempting to do and why.  And if you meet a girl with an interest in art, give her your old dog-eared copy.  I hope it works better for you than it did for me.