Glorious Portraits of Writers

I just returned from a short trip to Washington, DC. While I was there, I went to the National Portrait Gallery for the first time. What an amazing museum! First, the building is gorgeous and impressive, including the huge central courtyard with its lovely, lacy high dome, and the soaring, ornate “Great Hall.” There were some great special exhibits, including the controversial, wonderful “Hide/Seek” (about LGBT writers and artists) that has been in the news lately. But best of all were the hundreds of portraits -- paintings, sculptures, and photographs -- of writers, politicians, scientists, musicians, artists, activists, and more. I of course especially focused on portraits of writers. Naturally I had seen pictures of many of the novelists, poets, playwrights, and essayists before, but not these great original works of art, up close. I have to resist listing all of the writers’ portraits I saw, but let me mention a few: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, Mark Twain, Upton Sinclair, Allen Ginsberg, e. e. cummings, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Penn Warren, Eugene O’Neill, Frank O’Hara. But the portraits that drew me most were those of the women writers: Harriet Beecher Stowe, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Margaret Fuller, Joyce Carol Oates, Maxine Hong Kingston, Gwendolyn Brooks, Gertrude Stein, Djuna Barnes, Janet Flanner, Suzan-Lori Parks, and more. The strong, unique face of Louisa May Alcott is caught forever in a bronze bust. Edith Wharton is immortalized in a painting of her as a small girl. Marianne Moore is shown with her mother, with whom she lived and was close. There is something so striking and immediate about these faces. I couldn’t stop looking at them. Highly recommended.

I Know Someone Who Knows Someone

The theory of “six degrees of separation” postulates that each of us is connected with everyone else on earth; we are each only six steps, or six people, away from any other person. There has even been a play, later adapted into a movie, about this. I was recently thinking about how I am one degree – or maybe two, depending on how the theory is interpreted – away from several famous writers. Of course I know some quite well-known writers myself, mostly teaching at the same university I teach at (see my 11/28/10 post), and I believe that some of these are going to become even more well-known in the future. But here I am reflecting on some long-time, well-established writers that I read and admire, have never met, but feel a little connected to because they are relatives or friends of people I know. Four examples are as follows. Tobias Wolff is the close relative of someone who also teaches where I teach, and whom I have known for about three decades. Mona Simpson is a friend of someone else who works at my university. Bharati Mukherjee is a friend of one of my best friends from graduate school. And Maxine Hong Kingston is a friend of a member of my longtime reading group (which I wrote about here on 1/26/10). None of these friends tells indiscreet stories – or really any stories – about their famous friends. But, even though it isn’t at all logical, somehow these connections make me feel that I know the writers at least a little bit. Apparently I am as capable as the next person of being starstruck, and pleased at any tenuous connection with stars; it just happens that my idea of "stars" is famous writers!

"The Company They Kept"

In, of all places, the store Anthropologie, I stumbled across a lovely book called “The Company They Kept: Writers on Unforgettable Friendships” (New York Review Books, 2006), edited by Robert B. Silvers and Barbara Epstein. On the back book cover, a sort of extended subtitle calls the book’s contents “Twenty-seven memoirs of transforming personal and intellectual relationships among writers, poets, composers, and scientists from the pages of the New York Review of Books.” Just a few of these essays are “Stanley Kunitz on Theodore Roethke,” “Susan Sontag on Paul Goodman,” “Anna Akhmatova on Amedeo Modigliani,” “Saul Bellow on John Cheever,” “Maurice Grosser on Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas,” “Caroline Blackwood on Francis Bacon,” “Enrique Krauze on Octavio Paz,” “Larry McMurty on Ken Kesey,” and “Oliver Sacks on Francis Crick.” Three of the essay writers – Robert Lowell, Joseph Brodsky, and Mary McCarthy -- are also subjects of other writers’ essays; this “doubling” adds an intriguing perspective. The essays are short and personal, giving readers behind-the-scenes anecdotes and insights that in a few pages shed real light on these brilliant writers, artists, and scientists. They do not attempt to be comprehensive, but offer individual perspectives on their fellow intellectuals and artists. Also of great interest are the insights on the various friendships between the writers of these essays and their subjects; some of them knew each other for decades, and all had a special connection with each other. The essays are mostly warm and appreciative, but they don’t shy away from acknowledging weaknesses and difficulties as well. Reading these miniature memoirs feels like being privileged to be part of an intimate conversation among some of the greatest creative minds of the second half of the twentieth century.

A Gift of Haiku

My friend C., about whom I wrote on 2/16/10 as a great reader, with whom I have had almost 40 years of wonderful book conversations, and who kindly contributed two guest posts to this blog on 10/17/10 and 10/18/10, is, as the 10/18/10 post said, a great appreciator of Japanese literature, and especially of haiku. A few days ago I received in the mail a beautiful Christmas gift from her: “Haiku: An Anthology of Japanese Poems” (Shambhala, 2009), edited and translated by Stephen Addiss, Fumiko Yamamoto, and Akira Yamamoto. This is a lovely collection that can be read cover to cover or, better, dipped into, savored, and returned to often. It contains haiku by some of the most well known poets, such as Basho and Busan, as well as by many others. The physicality of the book itself adds to the pleasure of reading, with its small, easy-to-hold size, sturdy hardback solidity, beautifully illustrated front cover, well-spaced poems, and lovely black and white drawings throughout the book. It is a well-made art object (thank you, Shambhala Publications), worthy of the poems it contains. The editors provide a short, useful introduction and, at the end of the book, information about each of the poets and artists. But the heart of the book is, of course, the haiku themselves. Each poem is a small masterpiece: vivid, visual, evocative, philosophical, meditative, and moving. I have been reading slowly, struck by the beauty of each poem, and trying to absorb both their words and their meanings. Knowing how much these haiku have meant to my friend C. adds to my own appreciation of them. Thank you, C., for this perfect gift.

Austen, Again!

I was recently browsing for a novel to listen to in my car, and upon seeing a CD version of Karen Joy Fowler’s “The Jane Austen Book Club” (Putnam’s, 2004; recording by Listen & Live Audio, 2007), I decided to re-experience the novel in audio. I first read it when it came out six years ago, and enjoyed it; I enjoyed it again these past couple of weeks listening while driving. Readers know that I am interested in anything by, about, or connected to Austen. There are some good “offshoot” novels, and of course much good scholarship and other information, along with many unfortunate adaptations, sequels, prequels, mysteries, etc. that basically exploit Austen fans’ insatiable desire for “more Austen,” even ersatz Austen. I have read many of these, both the good and sometimes the bad ones. In the case of “The Jane Austen Book Club,” Fowler uses Austen’s work imaginatively, both offering tribute to Austen and showing how Austen’s work still connects with and illuminates people’s lives. The premise of the book is that a group of six characters, living in the Davis/Sacramento area of California, agrees to form a book club to read and discuss Austen’s six completed novels. The six meetings over six months provide the structure of the book, but there is also much interspersed information about each character’s background, history, and current happenings and concerns, as well as about how the characters interact with each other. The book does not purport to be scholarly, and the club members are not scholars; in fact, for some of them, this is the first time they have read Austen, or at least read all of Austen. At the club meetings and elsewhere, some perceptive comments are made and insights shared; there are some rather humorous and sometimes off-track comments as well. What the book portrays best is the jumble of human life and how readers’ enjoyment of and appreciation of literature mixes in naturally and sometimes unpredictably with their lives. This novel is especially delightful for Austen fans, but a prior knowledge of Austen’s work is not necessary in order to enjoy “The Jane Austen Book Club.”

Another Immigrant Story: "Quiet as They Come"

I thank my friend Sarah for recommending (in a comment on my 12/17/10 blog entry) the book “Quiet as They Come” (Ig Publishing, 2010), by Angie Chau. This collection of interconnected stories about members of an extended Vietnamese-American immigrant family and their friends takes place here in San Francisco, which of course adds to its interest for me. But its main strength is its powerful portrayal of the histories and current lives of these immigrants, many of whom –- often with great difficulty and in great danger -- left Vietnam during or after the “American War” (what those of us living in the U.S. then called “The Vietnam War,” the difference in labeling signifying a huge difference in perspective), some as “boat people” who saw and experienced horrifying events. In the U.S., the characters struggle to survive, to adapt, to fit in, yet to keep their own culture. There are of course, as there are with so many immigrants from various countries, tensions and problems between the older and younger generations; the older ones want to keep the old ways, and to protect their children, and the youth want to go out into the world, explore, rebel against their parents and the old ways, and collect experiences – all the things that almost all young people want to do. Chau is particularly good at depicting this generational divide. She is also good at showing a whole spectrum of characters and experiences, not just those that portray the difficulties of immigrant life; although the latter are of course very important to show, writing only about those would be unidimensional and would leave out the complex humanity and experiences of these characters. Some of the characters in these stories are beaten down and defeated; some are optimistic; some are feisty. All are beautifully and revealingly drawn. Many of the stories are heartbreaking. Yet there is hope as well. One of my favorite characters is Viet, who had a PhD in philosophy and a law degree in Vietnam, where he was a professor; in the United States he struggles to get and keep jobs with much less status and that do not at all recognize or utilize his intellectual and academic background. Yet despite hardships and setbacks, he retains his dignity. Then there is the energetic and somewhat free-spirited teenaged Sophia, finding her own way with verve despite some stumbles. Reading this book so soon after reading (and writing about here on 12/28/10) Gish Jen’s novel “World and Town,” with its Cambodian family as main characters, has reminded me yet again of the increasingly diverse mixture of immigrants that has complicated and enriched the texture of all of our lives in the United States today. I am grateful to authors such as Chau and Jen who bring us their careful, thoughtful, well-written, and engaging portrayals of these new participants in American life.

On this New Year's Day, 2011, I wish readers of this blog all the very best -- including much good reading -- for the coming year!

"Miss Kansas City"

Joan Frank, a San Francisco Bay Area resident, has written four works of fiction. (She has also written at least one book of nonfiction.) I wrote about three of them on 7/6/10 and 7/11/10. Now I have read the fourth one (the second one to be published), “Miss Kansas City” (University of Michigan Press, 2006); this novel won a literary prize from the University of Michigan. (I also feel a slight connection to the book through its publisher, which is the publisher of my most recent book as well, although my book is academic rather than fiction.) This novel shares some characteristics with Frank’s other three books of fiction (one novel and two short story collections): much of it takes place in the San Francisco area (of which Frank writes wonderful descriptions, including a lovely one of the swirling fog patterns just north of the Golden Gate Bridge, something which I see almost every day on my way to work); the main characters are mostly female; the characters tend to be damaged or at least bruised by life, as well as lonely; and the characters are often aimless and unsure of what to do next, and often don’t live up to their potential. In “Miss Kansas City,” a woman in her late twenties, Alex, has moved to the SF Bay Area and taken a respectable but dull job editing software manuals. She makes no friends, but gets involved with a successful married man, and in classic fashion, wants and dreams of much more from the relationship than he ever considers giving; this is obviously a situation with no happy ending possible. Other characters include Skip, the excessively good-looking receptionist at the company where Alex works, and Mort, Alex's nervous and repressed boss there. Both of these men are gay but closeted, at least at the company. Then there is Alex’s sister Maddie, who lives back east and is both supportive of and worried about Alex; she has her own problems at home with her husband. The sisters are forever affected by and bonded by their sad childhood experiences. An important theme in this novel is the tension between the human need for solitude and the equally human need for connection with others. Despite much sadness and depression all around, the ending of “Miss Kansas City” is, mercifully, cautiously positive.