My Own RE:public – Page 24 – … of life, of literature … & MORE

The sum of their parts

“The Vanishing Half” by Brit Bennett.

Be its beginning in a matter of daring or of jest, by mistake or with deliberation, the act of passing, and in respect to racial identity, is not unique to the United States. But, with a relatively young history so defined by slavery and migration, it is the place that has long provided the most fertile ground from which to spring complex narratives of personhood – and to feed a hungry national imagination. And it is within this context, that Brit Bennett’s best-selling novel of last year The Vanishing Half finds its place.

“The Vanishing Half” pub. Random House (2020)

The title hints at where this novel may take the reader. Brit Bennett’s protagonists are the Vigne twins, Desiree and Stella. Twins are oft sought subjects in many branches of scientific research; for reasons that are as obvious as they are many. And most especially so should they be separated at birth; growing up under disparate socio-economic conditions, a nature versus nurture debate would be the consequence. However, as a fictional narrative device, twins with all their particular character attributes have been surprisingly neglected.

Bennett gifts us such a literary pair. Desiree and Stella, are not separated early in their lives, and so not the best fit for scientific experiment; in fact, they grow up together in small town Louisiana of the 1940s and 50s, intimately bound in one another’s shadow and shared experience, both bearing the trauma of witnessing as children the lynching of their father, wanting only to escape the cruel hand dealt to their mother. And, what a peculiar small town this Mallard is! Populated, and most deliberately so, by “coloured” folk determined to get less so as generations pass, and the home-town twins a shining example of do-it-yourself social engineering. A different sort of experiment. (I can’t help but wonder whether such a place as Mallard ever really existed, but it could be an imagined “coloured” – and uppity – version of Zora Neale Hurston’s Florida town of Eatonville in Their Eyes Were Watching God, which was inhabited and governed by Black people, and based on the real Eatonville that was the childhood home of Hurston. To digress: Now that is a novel I love, and must say something about sometime soon!)

Still together as teenagers, and on not much more than a whim, the girls flee their suffocating nest to the city of New Orleans. And, in search of what? Freedom, perhaps. Perhaps, not explicitly that for which their forbears had yearned for and fought for, but some how akin. As alike these light skinned pair physically, so different are they in temperament, but circumstances and chance then determine their fate – and that they will not share, for their ways now part. For the serious, reticent Stella it will mean leaving behind her very self; choosing instead a path paved with deceit, and for Desiree, in youth the so much more adventurous of the two, there will be only some years of adventure – ending badly, and back in Mallard. But both will bring forth a new generation; daughters who must make their own choices, but each burdened with those made by their mothers.

Every day is a day to remember…

…but maybe some more than others, and at least provides for an opportunity to link to a really nice and informative site dedicated to today’s birthday girl. Though, she seemed not to enjoy her birthday very much (with the exception of funny little gifts from Leonard) – too much did it remind of the passing years – and may not appreciate this reminder from her distant future – or on the other hand, perhaps delighted at being remembered still!

Happy 139th birthday, Virginia Woolf!

Blogging Woolf.org

And then there was light …

Amidst all the dark tidings from the world’s metropoles, some light at the end of the tunnel came with the New Year opening of the Moynihan Train Hall annexe to Penn Station in NYC.

Moynihan Train Hall, Opening Day 1st January 2021, by Garrett Ziegler, CC BY-SA 2.0

And this gives me the opportunity to speak to Michael Kimmelman’s verdict at The New York Times. (Kimmelman, their architecture critic whose opinions – for instance, on the perversion of “the classical” that I linked to from this post – and multi-media projects, like last year’s virtual walking tours of NYC, are always impressive.)

Firstly, Kimmelman lauds the very fact that, in these extraordinarily stressed times, such an immense public works project could be fulfilled – and within schedule and budget! And with plaudits for all those concerned – from the architects, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, and construction engineers, Schlaich Bergermann to Gov. Cuomo and all those in-between. Placed in the historical context of its original function as a general post office and mail sorting facility (later named the James A. Farley Building, and from the same firm of architects, McKim Mead and White, responsible for the old Pennsylvania Station opened a couple of years previously and demolished in 1963), beautifully described (and pictured) are the sky lights and trusses as ” […]aerial feats of sculptural engineering and parametric design.” And recognised are the tributes paid to the original Penn and Charles McKim in the arched windows inspired by the Baths of Caracella and the geometric, hanging clock, designed by Peter Pennoyer.

Original Pennsylvania Station 1910 (demolished 1963)

As a with all contemporary public projects, the realist Kimmelman acknowledges the role of commercial and retail influence, but is satisfied that, for the moment at least, these haven’t intruded excessively into the public space, and that the main hall has been designed with utilitarian motives and not capitalist; passenger service as the imperative. And that the space has been magnificently served by art installations courtesy of the Public Art Fund.

Happy Birthday, Mr. Barnes!

“Der Mann in roten Rock” [Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 2021]

As the years proceed, birthday greetings – given and received – become almost perfunctory, and especially so when they are between peoples unknown; a ritualistic give and take encouraged by the echo of an omnipresent media. But, an interview with Julian Barnes in the Süddeutsche Zeitung (on the publication in German of The Man in the Red Coat), alerted me to his approaching seventy-fifth birthday; and that it falls on this 19th January day. Much more than just an admired romancier and essayiste; a very favourite person who had the right words to share with me when I most needed them. So, here, I simply remember that; and to no-one in particular, I say: Happy Birthday, Mr. Barnes!

Caste awry

Adam Shatz talks with Hazel Carby, January 12th 2021

This podcast is an accompanying conversation to Hazel Carby’s essay in the current London Review of Books (Vol. 43 No. 2 · 21 January 2021) on Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents; published to acclaim last year. Carby’s argument, like all those that go against the grain, is provocative. Interesting, is that the critique comes from a wider, global perspective of race and the historical complexities of the greater Black diaspora; and ironic, in that it is precisely with this broader brush that Wilkerson claims to make her case in her comparisons with the Indian caste system and Nazi Germany. But, Carby argues, Wilkerson is in fact bound by, and limited by, national constraints (be they inherited or learned), and constructs her “origin” story accordingly; one that depends on a (United States of) American exceptionalism.
Carby does make at least one very persuasive argument; in that I am persuaded to add Wilkerson’s book to my reading list! Beyond that, only a reading will tell.
(I often wonder about the considerations that lead to a book title change; why and to what end – aesthetic, linguistic, marketing. In the LRB review above, “Caste: …” is (mistakenly?) subtitled as in the US, but in the UK it seems to actually have been published as Caste: The Lies that Divide Us.)

January 17 2021: As I intimated above, prior to hearing this podcast, only positive takes on Wilkerson’s book had come my way, but a newsletter that I receive regularly from Jamelle Bouie (which always has something interesting to read, think about – and sometimes to eat!) has just suggested this review by Charisse Burden-Stelly in the Boston Review, in which, similarly to Hazel Carby, she considers “caste” to be an inadequate, even misleading, terminology under which to talk about race in the United States. Their critiques may differ in emphasis, but both reviewers dismiss this (imported) system as too rigid in structure and too dependent upon popular acceptance to lend itself to the complex interplay of politics, class and resistance in a volatile, changing social construct such as that which has evolved – continues to evolve – in the U.S.

When words matter

We are witnessing the beginning of the end of a fantastically failed presidency; the state of the society that facilitated it, and which is to be left in its wake, is yet to unfold and reveal itself, let alone to be told.

Here, in this space, I have been very disciplined in my restraint, and (mostly) suffered and seethed in silence; words are not all that matter, but sometimes really are there to be said…

As things would have it, the events of the last weeks, culminating in yesterday’s mayhem, have coincided with my immersion in Barack Obama’s memoir covering his first years in office. And as my reading, too, approaches its end, it does so leaving me much informed, much reminded of things worth remembering, sometimes irritated, and very often touched by beautifully rendered human moments – full of warmth, humour, regret.

Obama makes the intricacies of finance and health reform and the complications of composing and passing of legislation eminently readable. (Though, and especially in terms of finance reform, I was sometimes overwhelmed with initialisms and acronyms – for legislation, programs, committees, etc.) International relations and foreign and defence policy concerns are usually presented with a brief historical discourse that places the matter at hand in context – for instance, I particularly liked his preludes to discussions on Saudi Arabia (on his visit there) or to Iran (when the nuclear capabilities issue came to the fore). What I liked somewhat less was Obama’s tendency to see fit to describe the physical attributes of others. I mean, we know what Vladimir Putin (“…a wrestler’s build…”) and Benjamin Netanyahu (“…built like a line backer…”) look like. And, perhaps the “high-fiving”, “firing-ups”, “freaking outs” and the like, irritate a little the non-American ear. On the other hand, I “know” Barack Obama well enough to recognise such colloquialisms as genuinely being an aspect of his way of expression, and authenticity in voice is surely what one wants from a testimony such as this.

When did I last think of this. The catastrophe of Deepwater Horizon seems such a long time ago, and affecting a coastal region I once passed through even longer ago, but deserves not to be easily forgot: as an event in and of itself, but beyond that, what it has to say about the world’s insatiable consumption of fossil fuel. And, Obama tells us that little Sasha came into the bathroom one morning whilst he was shaving and enquired: “Did you plug the hole yet, Daddy?”; a tone Obama sets throughout – of seriousness and reflection blended with glimpses into the intimate family life that was being lived, parallel to, and sometimes intersecting with, the job at hand. There are any number of snippets of repartee with Mrs. Obama and their daughters and interactions with his staff and others, of observations and afterthoughts, which reflect a wonderful mix of wit and intelligence, and a basic goodness that is rarer than we would like to imagine.

So, it is then, that every other day, I have been reading the former President’s account, and every other day waking up to, or retiring of an evening with, the reality of this perversely “other” presidency, or the closing act of absurd theatre – or both. And, wondering where the line is to be drawn, if in fact a line can be drawn, between performance and all its component parts. Is Trump playing a role? Or is he the role? And for all those who enabled – who set the scene, supported from the wings, propped up – does the show go on with a new cast? And, when Trump exits the stage (or be dragged from it!) in a few days time, what will be his legacy, or more precisely, what extent the wreckage he leaves behind? Surely, there will neither be the traditional memoir nor Presidential library – a historian’s nightmare in years to come; explaining this era without the defining subject’s testimony.

Words matter. What is said and written matters. Words inspire and words incite. The 44th and 45th Presidents of the United States have proved that; each casting long shadows that could not be more different. And the 46th? Mediocrity incarnate one could reasonably suggest, uninspired. Perhaps. But, a Biden presidency will at least offer some respite, and with good will (and some luck) allow in its warmer shadow a new generation of political leadership to form.

Some Literary Reminder(s) for the New Year

The Guardian, 2021 in books, 3 January, 2021

I bookmark this page at The Guardian every year, and always find it a worthwhile guide to what is coming up, and when. And not just books, also the dates of literary events and anniversaries. The following is a list of some of the new works that interest me for one reason or another.

A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders (Bloomsbury)
Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America by Eddie S Glaude Jr (Chatto & Windus).
The Mysterious Correspondent by Marcel Proust, translated by Charlotte Mandell (Oneworld)
Under a White Sky by Elizabeth Kolbert (Bodley Head)
Everybody by Olivia Laing (Picador)
Letters to Camondo by Edmund de Waal (Chatto & Windus)
The Wife of Willesden by Zadie Smith (Hamish Hamilton)
Home in the World by Amartya Sen (Allen Lane)
The Magician by Colm Tóibín (Viking)
Oh, William! by Elizabeth Strout (Viking)
Greek Myths by Charlotte Higgins (Jonathan Cape)
HG Wells by Claire Tomalin (Viking)
Silent Catastrophes: Essays on Literature by WG Sebald (Hamish Hamilton)

There is no need to say that the Books section of The New York Times always has plenty to offer – by week, month and year, and just about everything else – but this international selection (mostly in translation) for the year to come is worth perusing. Here, for various reasons, and by those known and not, the following (just some amongst many) particularly interest me:

An Apprenticeship, or The Book of Pleasures by Clarice Lispector, trans. from the Portuguese by Stefan Tobler (New Directions)
Aristophanes: Four Plays trans. by Aaron Poochigian (Liveright)
The Art of Losing by Alice Zeniter, trans. from the French by Frank Wynne (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Cleopatra by Alberto Angela, trans. from the French by Katherine Gregor (HarperVia)
The Copenhagen Trilogy by Tov Ditlevsen, trans. from the Danish by Tiina Nunnally and Michael Favala Goldman
First Person Singular by Haruki Murakami, trans. from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel (Knopf)
The Impudent Ones by Marguerite Duras, trans. from the French by Kelsey L. Haskett (The New Press)
In the Company of Men by Véronique Tadjo (Other Press)
Painting Time by Maylis de Kerangal, trans. from the French by Jessica Moore (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

At year’s end, and in retrospect, I don’t ever seem to get as far as time and circumstance should allow for, but …!

Anyway, while in retrospect mode, here is The New York Times “10 Best of 2020”; of which, I have read only Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell and, still bringing to an end, Barack Obama’s presidential memoir. I appreciate being reminded of, on the fictional front, Homeland Elegies and The Vanishing Half, and non-fiction works pertaining to war, Shakespeare and schizophrenia that I had totally missed. (Though, Margaret MacMillan’s “War” may well be related to her 2018 Reith Lecture series.) One could, of course, go a step further (which I haven’t!) and be tormented further by their “100 Notable of 2020”.

At odyssey’s end …

At odyssey’s end,
what is to be said?
What is to be sung,
when all's said and done?
 
When great wars fought
have long been won -
in ancient lands lost
awaiting to be found?
Or upon the high seas 
that time has forgot?
 
Where human hearts beat
to the drum of the gods;
playing their game loud,
and in joyful discord?
Or to be told by another
or many more in song?
 
What is to be said?
What is to be sung -
alone or in chorus
for heroes long dead?


- Anne Dromache January 1st 2021

My reading of Homer’s The Odyssey was never meant to take a whole year! But when I conceived the project at the end of 2019, such a verflixtes year I did not even imagine! In my defence, then – the distractions have been many!

Anyway, it is just in the nick of time, that I have reached an end. (Though a lot of very clever people would insist that a reading of Homer never really ends.) My reflections along the way are collected here. What you don’t see, are the videos of my readings of each book – done to encourage the “reading out aloud” that Emily Wilson suggested. And, conscientiously having done so, I would most definitely agree.

Awaited now, is Wilson’s new translation of the Iliad – for which I think we must be patient.