On Getting Caught Up in "Just Kids"

Reading "Just Kids" (HarperCollins, 2010), by the great singer, performer, writer and artist Patti Smith, about her life and work during the 60s, 70s, and 80s, was mesmerizing for me. Why? Because I lived through that era. Because although I was a middle-class girl living a mostly conventional life, I tasted some of the adventures and pleasures of that era, and loved the music and art of the time. Because the milieu of art, jazz, rock, literature, and alternative cultures was something we all swam in at the time, if mostly vicariously. Because it all seemed impossibly romantic and creative. Because I listened to Patti Smith's music over and over again, and over the years have often heard the amazing lines from her "Horses" album in my head. Because I bought the "Horses" CD recently, although I have a very old copy of the album in a box in our garage. Because when I played the CD a couple of months ago, it brought so many memories back. Because it was fascinating although sometimes very sad to learn more about the exciting, scary, sometimes homeless and poverty-stricken, but always creative, early years of Smith and her soulmate and companion, the artist/photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. Because it was touching to learn more of all they were to each other, and of how loyal and inspiring they were to each other. Because she writes so tenderly about him. Because she writes so well. And again, because she evokes an amazing era.

Where Do Writers Write?

Most readers are curious about writers' writing habits, including where they write. In recent (2/4/11 and 2/6/11) Writer's Almanac entries, there were notes about two unusual writing location habits. First, Robert Coover once spent a month alone in a primitive cabin on a "remote Canadian island," just reading and writing. I think everyone who writes, and especially those who have been fortunate to go on writing retreats of various types, fantasizes about this kind of opportunity for complete, uninterrupted focus on one's writing. Whether most people could actually do something like Coover did is another question. Second, Eric Partridge went to and wrote at the same desk in the British Library every single day for 50 years. There is something admirable and appealing about such pure, focused, lifelong discipline.

"Pictures of You"

“Pictures of You” (Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2011), by Caroline Leavitt, starts out with -- literally –- a bang. A car crash in the fog has one fleeing wife accidentally hitting and killing another. The surviving woman is devastated, as are the dead woman’s husband and son. Despite this dramatic start, the novel proceeds in fits and starts, and –- dare I say it –- drags for most of the book. It picks up a bit at the end, but never manages to be as compelling as its premise promises. There is a lot of mystery about things that turn out to be not all that mysterious. All the characters seem immobilized, and although the reader sympathizes with them, it is hard to feel very involved with them. The character of April, the woman who dies, is so contradictory, with no bridge between the two sides of her character, that she is almost unbelievable as a character. The most interesting and touching character is Sam, April’s nine year old son; Sam gradually grows to love Isabelle, the woman who survives, first as an “angel” and then as a sort of surrogate mother, but this does not work out. There is a lovely coda to the book, a sort of belated reward to the reader who has made it to the end of the novel, but by that time, it is a matter of too little, too late.

"In India"

On 1/17/11 I wrote about going to the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibit at SFMOMA and how impressed and moved I was by the array of this artist's photographs representing so many years in so many places around the world. Before I left the museum, I bought one of the photographer's books, "In India" (Thames & Hudson, 1987), in the museum bookstore. Ever since, I have been poring over these amazing 105 black and white photographs taken in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s. They are both beautifully composed and carefully observant of people; almost always, the focus is people. Some are famous (e.g., Gandhi); some are maharajas; most are "ordinary" people on the streets, in shops, washing clothes in the river, studying classical dance, fishing, and much more. As some of you know, I spent much of my childhood in India, during the 1950s and 1960s, so these photographs are particularly evocative for me, especially those taken in the south of India, where we lived; the names Hyderabad and Madurai bring back specific memories of visits and events there. I know I will continue to look at these photographs again and again. The book includes a foreword by the famed film director Satyajit Ray, as well as an introduction by Yves Vequand. For anyone interested in India or simply in beautiful, perceptive photography of human beings in all their variety, I highly recommend this book.

"Villages"

I have been reading the late John Updike's books on and off for years, although more the books of his early and middle writing years than of his later years. However, I just finished listening to the CD of his 2004 novel, "Villages" (Random House; Books on Tape), read by Edward Herrmann, and I enjoyed it very much. Updike's prose is just so good! And listening to a novel on CD forces me to slow down and savor the language. (Sometimes I tend to read too fast). There is also something endearing about Updike, and his main characters (surrogates?), that is hard to resist. This novel is the life story of Owen Mackenzie, who is 70 at the end of the novel; the novel thus encompasses the period from the 1930s to the early 21st century. As Owen's career was in technology, we see the changes wrought during that time period, especially related to computers. But the more essential themes are twofold. First, as the title indicates, Owen organizes his life and world view through the lens of the three "villages" he has lived in: his childhood home in a small town in Pennsylvania; his adult life in Middle Falls, Connecticut, where most of his career took place, and where he raised a family; and his retirement locale with his second wife Julia in Haskells Crossing, Massachusetts. Owen enjoys the feeling of being part of a community; he feels connected, noticed, and cherished in each of these "villages." The second main theme is his lifelong fascination with, love for, and entanglements with women. He loves sex and is often unfaithful to his adored first wife; his sexual encounters and affairs are a major part of the story. But what comes across about this theme is Owen's intense and almost humble appreciation and even awe of women, their strengths, their individuality, and of course their bodies, which he describes in loving detail. These descriptions, curiously, do not come across as erotic as much as loving, amazed, and grateful. Again, this is rather endearing. I will say, though, that by the end of the novel, I was a little tired of the endless and minutely detailed descriptions of the women he was involved with, and of the particulars of their physical characteristics.

Problems Commenting on This Blog?

Dear readers,
Some readers have told me that they are unable to comment on this blog. Mostly people who are "followers" (becoming a follower is easy!) have been able to comment, but not always. I am checking into this, as much as I can with my rather limited technological adeptness, but in the meanwhile, you are always very welcome to comment directly to me by email; I very much appreciate and enjoy hearing from you about the blog and its topics. My email address is: vandricks@usfca.edu. That address is also listed in my profile on the blog. Thanks for reading the blog!
Stephanie

"Yarn: Remembering the Way Home"

I read Kyoko Mori's memoir, "The Dream of Water," and her book of essays, "Polite Lies," some years ago. Mori has also published three novels; I have not read those. I have just finished reading her new memoir, "Yarn: Remembering the Way Home" (GemmaMedia, 2010). In this book, Mori recapitulates and continues the story of her mother's suicide in Japan, her own moving to the United States for college and eventually becoming a professor of English, and her unusual marriage that is amicable but wobbly, and eventually ends in divorce. While she lives and teaches in the smallish town of Green Bay, Wisconsin, she feels like an outsider, yet gradually finds connections through meeting fellow knitters, weavers, and spinners. Her deep engagement with learning about and practicing these crafts with ever-increasing skill and art (and no small investment of time and money in materials, classes, a studio, and more) provides her with a community, as well as a way of making sense of her life. She remembers her late mother's sewing, and feels connected to her through her own creations of sweaters, mittens, shawls, and more. Although her mother's depression and death, and her stepmother's cruelty, cast a long, deep shadow continuing into Mori's adult life, she is eventually able through sheer will to make a productive and even happy life for herself. What stands out to me in this memoir is, first, the constant tension between Mori's need for connection and her need for solitude, and, second, how hard she has had to work to achieve a reasonable portion of peace and happiness. I don't personally knit or sew or weave, but in this book, Mori makes me understand how those arts can be creative, satisfying, and even a lifeline at times.