(Apologies for the lateness. I had the flu.)
Have you heard there's a big new movie coming out?
I won't go into it too much, because if you have children, or a television, or you're one of the millions who loves the series, or you possess any of the senses, you probably know that The Hunger Games is opening at the end of the week.
Although I had nice things to say about it over the holidays, I'll refrain from discussing it in this Media Monday, lest you suffer from Hunger pangs. Or loss of appetite. Or maybe you don't care either way. This post will remain a Hunger-free Zone.
Still, it's nice to see a book get so much attention. As Young Adult Books Editor at Amazon, Jessica Schein said the other day, "There are books we all love, and books we can't put down, and then there are books that morph into cultural events." Well put, Jessica.
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The New York Times takes us to court in this Sunday's Book Review. A review of Dale Carpenter's Flagrant Conduct: The Story of Lawrence v. Texas tells us that "Dale Carpenter’s Flagrant Conduct is a stirring and richly detailed account of Lawrence v. Texas, the momentous 2003 decision that overturned Bowers." The reference is to "Bowers v. Hardwick," a 1986 Supreme Court decision that is largely seen as a key ruling against the privacy of homosexuals. Reviewer David Oshinsky writes that the book "tells the story through the eyes of the major players — the plaintiffs, arresting officers, attorneys, judges and prosecutors — most of whom were interviewed at length. The result is a book that turns conventional wisdom about Lawrence on its head. Indeed, the readers most likely to be surprised by Flagrant Conduct are those who think they already know the basic outlines of the case."
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Kevin Boyle calls Raymond Bonner's Anatomy of Injustice: A Murder Case Gone Wrong "mesmerizing," describing first the grizzly 1982 murder that sets up the case, then describing the man who was sentenced to death for the crime, eventually telling us that this capital case, like so many, "was shaped by the fearsome combination of race and class." For years, the case was in and out of court. "Then, in the summer of 1993, [the] file ended up in the hands of Diana Holt, a law student working as an intern for the South Carolina Death Penalty Resource Center. And the case’s trajectory suddenly changed." Boyle that we watch as Holt "peels back the prosecution’s omissions, manipulations and deceits,
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By: Matthew Cheney,
on 5/29/2010
Blog: The Mumpsimus (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Quotes, mashups, reviewers, John Leonard, John Clute, Add a tag
Hitting this parenthetical, I knew I was in the wonderful Land of Clute:
--Ajvaz has made it clear he does not want the reader to be reminded of Magic Realism in his work, that his texts do not valorize any hero bearer of sigils out of the swamp nor any origin tale at the heart of the delta of tales untold--Since the death of John Leonard, I've come to cherish Clute more than ever. I've always had an admiration for Clute -- for though my ability to embrace his ideas has often been tempered by my (quasi-irrational?) antipathy to taxonomy vs. his career of it, I love his rhythms and diction, and more than that, I love his willingness to follow the words into a realm more of sound than sense, something Shakespeare did now and then, and all the best poets, and John Leonard, too, who was nearly unique in offering that quality as a book reviewer.
Nearly unique. I think of Leonard and Clute as the Jazz Johns of Bookchat. I wish they'd had the chance to play a session together. Imagine what it might sound like--
The sky's falling and so's the yen. Suddenly the jaws of Story shut cleanly on him. And he realizes he's been holding his breath even on those occasions -- under a tent at Caramoor, once in a cathedral -- to which he's been invited as a designated partisan, after which he's guaranteed a standing ovation because, of course, he's followed by the Laureate, who reads from her novel-in-progress, which begins: "They shoot the white girl first."
Shouting, farting, swearing, grinding his intimates into stricken silence but also lifting them high, shitting himself so hard he blasts a hole in his own peritoneum, arguing, staggering from the ring of truths so great the world shouts God in his ear, he is a stunning creation, a histrion utterly real to the eye, a porridge of sensation who turns on a dime into icon. Old son, you're nicked. From sea to shining sea: long-distance loneliness ... Deer slayers, cow punchers, whaling captains and raft river rats ... Greedheads, gun nuts, and religious crazies ... Carpetbaggers, claims jumpers, con men, dead redskins, despised coolies, fugitive slaves, and No Irish Need Apply ... Land grabs, lynching bees, and Love Canals ... Lone Rangers, private eyes, serial killers, and cyberpunks. Not exactly the ideal social space for a radical Johnny Appleseed to plant his dream beans.
All in all, though, it is a structure into which a thousand tales could nestle, each nudzhing its niche, each transacting furiously. So superior are these sentences to the churlishness that passes for criticism elsewhere in our culture -- the exorcism, the vampire bite, the vanity production, the body-snatching and the sperm-sucking -- so generous and wise, that they seem to belong to an entirely different realm of discourse, where the liberal arts meet something like transubstantiation. It is the outside of the inside of the data of the dance. It is a shape for the knowing we're going to need.
By: Matthew Cheney,
on 3/6/2009
Blog: The Mumpsimus (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: critics, cathedral, tantrum, thug, John Leonard, qualms, libidinal, dialectic, splendid, linoleum, brood, moxie, Obituaries, Add a tag
In NYC recently, the Imperial City, they remembered John Leonard. Had there been any way to do it, I would have been there, even if I couldn't have gotten inside with all the literati; heck, I would've been happy just to stand in traffic for a bit and get the taxis honking in tribute. But no. I'll rely on reports. Such as this one from Charles Kaiser at CJR:
Family members, former colleagues, important writers, and intimate friends gathered yesterday to praise the critic John Leonard for his “love of the life of the mind,” his “incomparably informed generosity,” his reluctance to “pan books or movies or TV shows or children, except when absolutely necessary”—and his unlikely dependence on just ten words: “tantrum, cathedral, linoleum, moxie, thug, dialectic, splendid, brood, libidinal, and qualm.”It's a nice piece, and best of all, peppered with Leonard's own words. Here's what he once said about Fran Lebowitz:
To a base of Huck Finn, add some Lenny Bruce and Oscar Wilde and Alexis de Tocqueville, a dash of cab driver, an assortment of puns, minced jargon, and top it off with smarty-pants. Serve without whine. This is the New York style, and I for one am glad that it survives and prospers because otherwise we might as well grow moss in unsurprising Omaha."Obviously," Kaiser says, "he had spotted a kindred spirit."
The thing I admire about Clute's work most of all, which, admittedly, I don't always get (often not his fault but mine) or agree with, is his earnestness. He's really thought deeply about the works he reviews, cares about the ideas and craft embodied within, for better or worse, and is always honest in his assessment. I just dont see a lot of that from others.
Jeff Ford
I have this notion that when Clute doesn't know what to say, he just writes a parody of himself that's indistinguishable from his actual prose style. Just as often, though, I think he brings far more to the table than the original works he examines do. This was a great reminder to appreciate him while he's still doing his thing.
You've also made me miss John Leonard all over again. I went back to your eulogy of (can it be?) nearly two years ago and found myself doing the same thing I did at the time, corralling the spouse and reading his sentences aloud to her. I'd skip a mortgage payment if the Library of America put out a volume or two of his complete works.
there are so many taught that Clute's want to do. if he desire, he get it.
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