Nazi Literature in the Americas

Read from Saturday, September 17th to Monday, September 19th.

Nazi Literature in the Americas, by Roberto Bolano.  This is an interesting collection of stories by one of my favorite authors.  Each short story is set up like an encyclopedia article about a fictitious right wing author living in the Americas during the past century.  Bolano gives a biography of each author, and a catalog and description of all their major work.  In this fictional world, the authors in each chapter sometimes interact with one another, and sometimes they interact with real-life characters as well.

It is fiction dressed up in a non-fiction format, which is very interesting.  And it is also misleading to say that all the authors are Nazis.  They are all right-leaning, and some fought for the Nazis or for Franco in Spain.  But some are just conspiracy theorists railing against the communist governments.  Their writing is all influenced by their political beliefs though, which is an overriding connection.  The genre of writing is different as well.  Some are novelists, some poets, some write crazy science fiction, and some write essays on philosophers.  One of my favorites was an author who wrote poetry in the sky using the smoke from a plane. 

An interesting, quick read by Bolano, something completely different from his massive 2666.  I enjoyed it, and felt a little empathy for some of these outrageous authors, which shows how good his writing can be.  The narrator sees things from an impartial omniscient third person, but Bolano throws in tender moments that offer tremendous insight into each character.  Three out of five stars.

Blood Meridian

Read from Tuesday, September 13th to Friday, September 16th.

Coming off of the violent student uprising in The Instructions, I took on Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, which many critics argue is his finest work.  I agree to an extent, but most of the book was very unsettling and disturbing, as it deals with an entirely different and almost incomprehensible level of violence.  In the familiar setting of the Border Trilogy, the action in this book takes place in 1849 and 1850.  Texas has become a state, and America just defeated Mexico, and savage Indians still roam the deserts of this region.  The scariest aspect of this book is that it is in fact meticulously researched and based on historical facts.

The story follows the unnamed Kid, a 14 year old Tennessean who runs away from home to Texas.  The narrative is in the third person, and we do not know the inner thoughts of the kid, and parts of the story do not follow him at all.  However, he is the main protagonist, and he gets in bar fights in various towns, until he is recruited by an ex-Captain for an expedition into Mexico to reclaim territory for the U.S.  That expedition, while traveling into Mexico, is attacked and brutally massacred by a band of Apache warriors.  The kid and few others survive, and he staggers around the desert until he is picked up and imprisoned by Mexican police (since he was part of an invading army).  In the prison, he befriends Toadvine, a fellow American, and Toadvine convinces the officials to release them because they are experienced Indian hunters.  The kid and Toadvine are released and join Captain Glanton's gang, who have been commissioned by the governor to hunt Apaches, and are paid based on the number of scalps they bring back.

Glanton is a brutal man, an ex-officer and outlaw from the U.S.  Also in the gang is the judge, Holden.  This incredibly interesting character eventually emerges as the antagonist, but not until the end.  The judge is a self-taught genius naturalist, and often described in mythical ways.  He is a giant, and hairless, and with an easy predilection for violence.  He is smart, and enjoys teaching the other riders about geology, astronomy and other subjects.  The gang follows the trail of the Indians across northern Mexico, and eventually slaughters an entire village in the night.  They collect dozens of scalps, and return as heroes to the city.  However, they soon wear out their welcome, by partying too hard and destroying things and hurting the townsfolk.  Back out on the trail, the gang has trouble finding Indians, so they kill peaceful Indians and even entire towns of Mexicans in order to increase their profit.  Of course, they become outlaws in Mexico, and the army is sent after them. 

While being hunted by both Indians and the Mexican army, Glanton's gang manages to make it across Mexico and into Arizona.  They brutally take over a ferry crossing on the Yuma River, and rob settlers trying to cross.  This operation lasts for a few months, until the local Yuma Indians surprise attack, and kill most of the gang.  The kid, Toadvine, the judge, and an ex-priest escape, but the judge turns on the kid, by trying to get the lone gun off him.  The kid is hunted by the judge all the way to San Diego, where the kid is imprisoned.  After confessing everything to the authorities, he is released.  Many decades pass, where the kid wanders around the American West, going from odd job to job, never able to shake the memory of the judge.  Finally, in 1878 in Texas, the kid runs into the judge in a saloon.  The judge claims that violence is everywhere, and it is what man was made to do.  The judge claims he can never die, since he is able to master violence, he is able to control the world.  The kid resists, but in the end the judge finds him in an outhouse.  It is unclear if the kid is murdered, only that other patrons gasp and are speechless when coming upon the outhouse.  The judge is finally seen dancing on the stage, claiming he can never die.

The ending is definitely open-ended for interpretation, (some suggest rape and then murder).  However, the one theme of violence is ever-present, to the point where it is mindless and dull.  It loses shock value, and the only point in the book where someone is astounded by an act of violence is the final scene in the outhouse.  It is also interesting to view the evolution of a gang of criminals.  At the onset, these guys were just hired soldiers, but the power they possessed allowed them to run wild and become greedy, finally becoming an (almost) unstoppable force of evil.  We do not get into the head of the kid, but we can see from his actions that he never initiates violence, only follows along with the others.  He is one of the only ones that shows any weakness or humanity, depending on your point of view.  Highly recommended, but not for the faint of heart.  I also heard a rumor that James Franco was interested in a movie adaptation, which sounds amazing.  Four and a half out of five stars.

The Instructions

Read from Monday, September 5th to Tuesday, September 13th.

In a little over a week, I finished The Instructions, by Adam Levin.  1030 pages chronicling  four days in the life of Gurion ben-Judah Maccabee. It is hard to know where to start with this one.  So much action, dialogue, and philosophical opining is packed into those four days, and in spite of the weight of the book, it was very difficult to put down.  The best place to start is with the protagonist himself, Gurion.  He is ten years old, and in his fourth school, Aptakisic Middle School outside Chicago.  He is incredibly brilliant, a self-described 'scholar' of the Jewish faith.  Other kids and some teachers are naturally attracted to him, they become his followers and fellow scholars.  However, he has been kicked out of other schools due to violence, and inciting other students to violence, through building 'penny guns.'  Throughout the book, Gurion considers he might be the Jewish Messiah, which influences his actions later in the story.  The Instructions is Gurion's story told by Gurion himself, and it is his scripture, written in 2013 while he is in hiding, but the events take place in November 2006.

In Aptakisic, Gurion is placed in the Cage, a special classroom where kids are kept in cubicles, locked in, and not allowed to talk or ask questions.  They are caged off from the rest of the student population because of their violent tendencies.  This system, and the administrators in it, are referred to as The Arrangement.  There is the cage monitor, Victor Botha; the perverted gym teacher, Ron Desormie; Principal Brodsky; the popular basketball team, led by Captain Bam Slokum; the Main Hall Shovers, a basketball fan club (characterized by their stylish scarves) that behaves more like English hooligans; and finally Boystar, a huge new pop star that all the girls go crazy for.  In the Cage, Gurion befriends Benji Nakamook, the best fighter in the school, but also a confirmed arsonist and pyschopath, Vincie Portite, as well as Main Man Scott Mookus and many of the others, as they look to him for protection.  On the first day of the book, after a fight in the locker room, Gurion meets and falls madly in love with Eliza June Watermark, and they begin a relationship the next day in detention.  

In the cage that first day, Gurion says, in response to a question from one of his peers, "We must be on the Side of Damage."  Almost immediately, other cage students start vandalizing the school with We Damage We (putting We on the side of Damage).  Gradually, Gurion realizes that he is the leader of the Side of Damage, a movement among the cage students, and more and more students from the school at large, against the Arrangement.  They start organized protests and non-violent simultaneous acts in order to provoke Victor Botha.  The story starts on a Tuesday, and leads up to a pep-rally on Friday for the basketball team, in which Boystar is going to perform and shoot a music video, along with Scott Mookus, who is mentally handicapped.

Outside of school, Gurion writes scripture and argues with his parents.  His strong willed mom, an ex-Israeli super soldier, and his dad, an infamous lawyer who defends the free-speech rights of Nazis, which conflicts Gurion.  He initiates contact with all his former friends at the schools he used to attend, and gets them to march on Aptakisic on Friday in order to hear his Scripture.  Originally, Gurion planned to just sneak out of school and speak with his former classmates, but on the morning of the pep-rally, Botha held them in the cage, and rescinded on his promise to allow them to attend.  This was the breaking point, and Gurion called the Side of Damage into action.  Here the violence starts becoming quite brutal.  The students beat Botha into unconsciousness and steal his keys.  They break out of the cage, and arm themselves with penny guns, which are made from soda bottles and balloons, and can shoot pennies and bolts.  They attack the pep-rally while Boystar is performing, and a bloody battle ensues.

The Side of Damage attacks the basketball players, the school administrators, and the Shovers.  Other students in the audience join in the carnage, and many people on both sides get bloodied up.  Each of the Side of Damage has a personal vendetta against other people, and they pursue their own fights.  Gurion is attacked by Ron Desormie, but a well-placed shot from Eliza hits his carotid artery, and he is killed.  Eventually, the students take over the gym, and lock down the school.  Boystar is held hostage, and a police standoff ensues outside the school.  The Side of Damage, along with other 'Israelites' and Jewish ex-Shovers, try to buy time before the hundreds of 'Scholars' arrive.  At this point, this becomes a major news story, and the ex-Shovers get nervous and start an uprising against the Side.  Benji Nakamook is brutally beaten to death, but Gurion and the Scholars manage to quell the rebellion.  In their final move, Gurion and the Side and the Scholars march out of the school and through the police line, all the way to the shores of the lake.  There, Gurion gives his Scripture, and then the Miracle happens.  The water of the lake parts like it did for Moses, and the Scholars start walking through it.  Gurion hesitates though, and he claims that he will not run away, but will instead stay.  The scholars return and the lake returns to normal. 

The rest of Gurion's life is told by him only through various speculation.  He is hiding out in Israel under protection of the Mossad, who believe him to be a Messiah.  His devoted followers teach his word throughout the world, but he is still waiting for his moment to start a general uprising, but in what form it will take remains unknown. 

This was a wild trip of a book, and it was very unique in many aspects.  There are many diagrams drawn by Gurion that explain set ups of rooms and the final battle.  Gurion includes email exchanges and other homework assignments and essays that he completed that help to explain past incidents and the development of his mind.  And the language is also wholly unique.  There are many words the kids use in the dialogue, like suck as a noun, bancer, dentist, and many of the nicknames that take a while to get used to, but in the end you really feel like you can speak their language. 

The book raises many interesting questions.  Gurion believes himself to be the Messiah and leader of the Israelites, which alienates many of his Christian and non-Jewish friends at Aptakisic.  But while Gurion is very intelligent and just, (he vehemently protects his friends and the picked-on), he is also incredibly prone to violence.  Perhaps that is because of the injustice in his Cage program, but it seems he lashes out to an extreme degree.  Which makes the reader conflicted:  At one point you identify with Gurion and cheer for him, but while he is brutally punching in the face of another kid.  The school is obviously a fictionalized world, but while some characters are extremely well-developed, others seem to be stereotypical (the Jennys and Ashleys, Shovers, Band Kids).

The novel is incredibly grand and intelligent, and I flew through it.  It was also very funny in many parts, while dark in others.  Gurion is one of the most intriguing characters in literature, and he made me want to follow him into battle at times.  Four and a half out of five stars.

Memories of my Melancholy Whores

Read from Saturday, September 3rd to Monday, September 5th.

Memories of My Melancholy Whores, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.  In this short novella, his most recent work, Marquez tells the simple story of a man who, on his 90th birthday, falls in love with a young, fourteen year old virgin, Delgadina.  The man, a lifelong reporter, has been with hundreds of prostitutes over the course of his long life, and he has never fallen in love.  An average man, he sticks with the newspaper out of loyalty.

On his 90th birthday, he asks the local madam for a virgin, and that is no easy task for her.  She finds Delgadina though, a young factory worker looking to help out her family.  On that first night, she is given drugs to make her sleep, and the man simply watches her while she sleeps.  He falls quickly and madly in love for the first time in his life, and he constructs an elaborate relationship out of those many nights they spend in the exact same fashion.  He reads to her while she sleeps, he gently caresses her, he imagines her in his house and out on the street.  She is everything to him that he can imagine, and then he imagines the worst.  He flies into a jealous rage when she and the madam disappear for a few weeks after a murder at the brothel.  He believes she is out with other men, but finally they return, and are reunited, for Delgadina has grown in love with the old man as well.

Marquez uses the relationship with the young girl as a chance for the man to reflect upon his own life.  All the mistakes he made, the women he had been with (all of them he had to pay in one way or another), and the nature of old age in general.  It is a quick story, without too much plot development, and unfortunately not much character development either.  The old man is often left unexplained and flat.  It was a light, quick read, but not one of my favorites by Marquez.  Three out of five stars.

Norwegian Wood

Read from Tuesday, August 30th to Saturday, September 3rd.

Norwegian Wood, by Haruki Murakami came highly recommended, and it did not disappoint.   This book was a huge success in Japan when it was originally published in 1987, much to Murakami's dismay apparently.  He was one of the authors featured in The Secret Miracle, and there are a few other books of his that I am going to check out soon.

The story takes place in 1969 in Japan, but it is told as a memoir from the present-day voice of Toru Watanabe, remembering his college days and the loves of his life at the time.  It is a sad book, with moments of passion and humor, but mostly it is a self-reflection, always haunted by the spectre of death.  In high school, Toru was best friends with Kizuki, who was in a relationship with Naoko, who had been his girlfriend since practically when they were born.  Toru was happy to be third wheel, and things seemed great, until Kizuki killed himself on his 17th birthday.  This death had a profound impact on both Toru and Naoko.  A year later, in college, the story picks up, and Toru and Naoko begin a friendship characterized by their long walks around the city.  The story is set against the backdrop of student demonstrations in the 1960's, and it is interesting to see what things were like during that decade around the world, not just in America.  However, the protests don't factor into the plot that much.  Anyways, Toru realizes he loves the emotionally fragile Naoko, and on her 20th birthday, they sleep together.  However, Naoko is too unstable for this, and afterwards she leaves school and checks into a sanatorium out in the country. 

While Naoko's response is to dive deeper into herself, Toru seeks solace in one-night stands, influenced by his friend Nagasawa.  He is a quiet, average, uninterested student, but when connected with Nagasawa, Toru seeks to lose himself in sex.  Finally, Naoko contacts him through a letter, and explains where she is, and how fragile she is, and how she would like him to visit.  Toru visits the sanatorium, (while reading Mann's The Magic Mountain, soon to come!), and learns more about Naoko.  Her sister committed suicide as well, and combined with Kizuki, it was all too much for her.  Naoko's roommate is Reiko, an older musician, who broke down many years ago when confronted with accusations about her sexuality.  Reiko tries to help the relationship between Toru and Naoko, and advises Toru to take it very slow in order to let her heal.

Back in Tokyo though, Toru meets Midori, a fellow student, who is very outgoing and spontaneous.  She helps run a family bookstore, although her father is sick with a tumor, and he dies shortly after the two meet.  Midori has a boyfriend, but after hanging out with Toru, she leaves him.  Toru, meanwhile, is torn between the two women.  He loves Midori, but cannot get over Naoko.  He visits her again at the sanatorium, but she has apparently gotten worse mentally.  Naoko cuts off their communication through letters, because she is unable to write.  Toru consults with Reiko about what to do, and she advises him to go after Midori, while he has a chance for happiness.  However, by ignoring Midori, he is losing his chance day by day.

Finally, Toru gets a letter from Reiko saying that Naoko killed herself.  She hung herself in the forest near the sanatorium.  He is completely devastated, and spends a month wandering homeless around Japan being depressed.  When he does return to Tokyo, Reiko gets in touch with him, and tells him she is leaving the sanatorium to visit him.  When she arrives, they have an impromptu funeral for Naoko, singing songs late into the night, and finally they sleep together.  It is done in the sense of two friends celebrating the memory of a third, and the night convinces Toru to go after Midori while he still has a chance.  He calls her, and she answers, but the rest is left to the reader's imagination since that is the end.

The title of the book refers to the Beatles' song of the same name.  It is a favorite of Naoko's, and she says it makes her feel as if she is lost in a deep forest, which is significant since that is how she seems to live life, and it is where she took hers.  There was a movie made about the book last year in Japan, and I've seen a trailer.  The book has also caused a lot of controversy lately, as it has been banned at many schools because some parents have complained about the sexuality.  The only criticism I would have is through the translation.  Some of the phrases, while maybe remaining true, do not sound good in English.  They are chunky and awkward, and you can tell it is from Japan.  But other than that, I liked the book a lot.  It is easy to read, and the imagery and language is beautiful.  There are many memorable lines of dialogue as well.  It is a terrible tragedy, but there is hope in the end.  Four out of five stars.

Pale Fire

Read from Monday, August 22nd to Tuesday, August 30th.

Pale Fire, by Vladimir Nabokov is one of the most unique novels I have ever read. The plot structure is completely genre-defying. The story revolves around two characters, the poet John Shade and the ex-king Charles Kinbote, although the ending of the novel leaves you wondering what actually happened, whether or not it was the figment of one of the other's imagination.

Charles and John are neighbors and professors at an Appalachian college. Charles idolizes Shade, a well-respected poet, to the point of creepiness and stalking. Charles is, in actuality, the disposed former king of Zembla, a fictional northern European country, and he loves discussing all the majestic beauty that was his country, and his daring escape from the palace, over the mountains and across the ocean by boat to America. In early July, Shade begins work on his most ambitious work, a 999 line poem called Pale Fire. Charles mistakenly believes it is an ode to Zembla, but in reality it is about his youth, his daughter's suicide, and his own search for meaning in life after death. He finishes the last line of the poem on the day he dies,in late July. The poem then falls into Kinbote's hands to be the editor and publisher.

The novel is set up into three parts. The first is an introduction by Kinbote, giving some of the background, and the second is the 999 line poem in its entirety. The third part, and the bulk of the novel, is the commentary that Kinbote gives on many of the lines in the poem. This commentary varied from a simple explanation of a term or animal, to a lengthy discussion on his family history in Zembla, to the revolution of the communists, to his escape to America. Finally, there is the story of Gradus, a bumbling and inept assassin sent from the communists in Zembla in order to kill the former king. This story, which Kinbote so desperately wanted to tell, is what he really thinks Shade's poem is about subliminally.

The image of Gradus as death advances throughout the commentary to the very end, which we know already is the end of Shade's life. Finally, in the commentary on the last line and the 1000th line, which was also the first, (I was the shadow of the waxwing slain), Gradus meets the two men on the step of Kinbote's house. Mistakenly, Gradus murders Shade, and is sent to a mental institution. Kinbote then proceeds to posthumously publish Pale FIre, along with his extensive commentary.

The ending and set-up of the entire poem/novel leaves things open for the readers. Some maintain that Shade created the character of Kinbote, and others say the opposite. Some think that Kinbote was mentally insane himself, and that Zembla was just his illusion and fantasy, and Gradus really was an escaped mental patient who intended to kill Shade, who looked like a judge.

This book took me a few days to get into, and it was a slow start, but once I got going, I finished quickly. I really enjoyed the structure, and it definitely left me thinking after the ending. Four out of five stars.

World War Z

Read from Thursday, August 18th to Sunday, August 21st.

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, by Max Brooks.  This was a really original, creative zombie novel that I enjoyed immensely.  And I am excited to learn that it is being made into a legitimate movie starring Brad Pitt, coming out in 2012.  Although it is not the kind of literary fiction I tend to read, this book was exciting, and very thought-provoking, especially about the end of the world and what kind of survival tactics you, or your country would take.  It had an international focus, as well as an American one (so you could get that nationalistic pride going.  USA! USA!).

The story takes the form of an oral history; a series of interviews with survivors of the decade-long Zombie War, that the humans ultimately won.  The interviewer, Max, works for the UN, but they ignored most of his interviews for their official report, wanting only facts and figures.  But Max wanted to portray the emotional, human aspect of the war, so he put it into a book.  Each interview lasts a few pages, and they are arranged mostly chronologically, so the whole story of the war is told through each person's perspective.  They range from low-level soldiers, to spies, to housewives, to the leaders of countries.

The outbreak started in China, where a boy went swimming down to the bottom of a lake created by a new damn, and he was bitten.  He infected some of his fellow villagers.  This story was told by the first doctor on the scene.  China sent in government troops in order to contain the spread of the virus, and they manufactured a war with Taiwan in order to hide the outbreak from the rest of the world.  However, the virus does spread of course, through black market organ trafficking and infected human refugees smuggled out of the country.  This story was told through one of the smugglers, and one of the doctors performing a heart transplant in Brazil.

The rest of the world, while hearing reports of the virus, refuses to believe it is a threat, and the U.S. government downplays the situation.  A ruthless businessman made a vaccine that he sold to most of the American public, but it worked only against rabies, and not against the Zombie virus.  He tells his story from his ice-fortress in Antarctica.   Finally, after an outbreak in South Africa, the world came to grips with its problem, and that began a period called "The Great Panic."  Millions of people ran, most of them north to colder climates, because Zombies froze in winter.  The U.S. government sent the army to Yonkers, NY in order to crush the zombie horde, but the army was routed instead.  They used old, Cold War tactics, used up all their ammo quickly, and did not anticipate the unending relentlessness of their enemy.

Around the world, other countries struggled as well.  Iceland became completely infected, Israel was the only country to completely self-quarantine, and Iran and Pakistan destroyed each with nukes over a refugee dispute.  India safely retreated behind the Himalayas, while Russia ruthlessly gassed their own population in order to identify the zombies among them.  This was the darkest period for humanity, and the mass migrations and confusion provided easy fodder for the zombies.  Finally, a plan was developed in South Africa in order to control the spread.  It was the Redecker plan, and it was named after the controversial founder, originally intended as a plan for the whites should the blacks take over the country.  Essentially, important survivors needed to make it to a safe zone in the country, one that could be easily defended using natural barriers.  Other groups would need to act as a diversion for the zombie horde, and that would pretty much be a suicide mission.  But it was the only hope for the country.

The U.S. created their own safe zone west of the Rockies, and many parts of the East were left abandoned by the army.  It was important that the safe zone be clean, and could be defended long enough for the war machine economy to get back up and running.  For years this stalemate lasted around the world, while everyone regrouped.  Finally, the U.S. president made an inspiring speech to the rest of the world leaders that humans needed to go on the offensive, and not just wait it out.  It would be important not only physically, but also psychologically.  This part of the story was told from the point of view of one of the new soldiers trained to fight the zombies.  The army redeveloped their fighting techniques: pacing their shooting, and only at the head; taking turns on the front line; and forming a complete line from north to south, and eliminating everything in its path.  The first battle in New Mexico was described by the soldier, as they shot for days at the enemy horde, and created a wall of zombie corpses hundreds of feet high.  Slowly but surely, the country was reclaimed.  There were some human pockets of resistance that had to be retaken, and zombies still had to be completely eradicated, especially from the sea floor, where they sometimes emerged onto beaches.  However, life was able to return to a sense of normalcy, even though the vast majority of the human population had been eliminated (the most populous city was Llhasa, Tibet) and the economy had to be rebuilt from scratch (the economic powerhouse is now Cuba).

It was a fun, and interesting thought exercise.  I really enjoyed the strategy aspect of the novel; the troop movements, what countries did and how they reacted, where the pockets of resistance were based out of.    It was great that it had an international focus.  Each perspective was a small story in itself, so the plot had to be pieced together disjointedly, but all in all, it worked out well.  I am excited to see the movie.  Four out of five stars.