I Married a Communist by Philip Roth

I Married a Communist is one of Philip Roth’s  “Zuckerman” novels. It is the seventh in the series. Over the last few years I have been working through this sequence and reading the books in order. I love these works.

I have immensely enjoyed everything that I have ever read by Roth. His writing contains multiple insights into people and the world. His wit, as well as his characters, are often hilarious. When he is tragic, it is devastatingly effective. The tendency is moving toward tragedy, and less lighthearted playfulness in the Zuckerman Series, as the books progress and the characters age. His writing style is easy to digest yet not simplistic. His structured plots are artfully interlaced with complex and thought provoking themes.

 Though a “Zuckerman” Book, Nathan Zuckerman is not the main character in I Married a Communist. Instead, he is more of a bystander influenced by the main players, as well as an interpreter of their actions. The protagonist here is Ira Ringold, an unsophisticated Newark tough, who goes off to fight World War II, and who becomes seduced with communist ideology. When Ira returns from the war, he eventually finds success as a radio actor and marries into upper crust American society. Ira is not a menace to America, he is no spy or saboteur, just an very overbearing and naive ideologue. Ira is eventually brought down less by McCarthyism, then by a terribly dysfunctional relationship with his wife and stepdaughter.

I Married a Communist follows the brilliant American Pastoral in the series.  American Pastoral was superb. It was one of the best twentieth century novels that I have read. I Married a Communist is not quite up to that level; it does not pack the same emotional punch and is not as esthetically satisfying.  Nonetheless, in my opinion this is still a really good, perhaps great novel. American Pastoral is just a tough act to follow.

The Zuckerman books are full of interesting themes. I will mention that some readers have found that these works become repetitive. Roth has come under criticism for this perceived redundancy. See the below link to a New York Times piece about Carmen Callil’s opinion on this and other issues. Callil contends, among several complaints, that Roth repeats himself. While in a way, Callil has a point, I ultimately do not agree with the conclusion.

Roth does tend to explore similar or even the same themes over and over again in the course of many books. In my opinion, in Roth’s case, this is not a flaw. Like the composer of a complex piece of classical music, who starts with a musical theme and repeats it in a variety of forms over the course of the entire work, Roth imaginatively and expertly looks at several aspects of the human condition from multitude of angles and points of view. He accomplishes this over a series of books. Like the composer who restates a chosen theme using different keys, emphasis. tempo, etc., Roth takes an idea, and applies it to various people and situations that may be too diverse to fit into one novel.

One of Roth’s most important reoccurring motifs is the concept of human identity, or the way in which a person and others thinks about “self”. Roth’s thinking about what it means for a person to have identity owes much, to both Shakespeare, who is often referenced directly and indirectly by Roth’s characters, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, particularly the  Great Gatsby’s conception of the American propensity to reinvent and shift identities.

How precisely does Roth explore identity? In I Married a Communist, the various characters try to establish their identities, slip in and out of identities, hide their identities, fake identities, and finally have invalid identities forced upon them by others. The later sub - theme; that of having a false identity forced upon you, fits in well with the era described here. Most of the narrative takes place of post World War II America, when a multitude of non - communists were falsely accused and identified as being communists. The way that Roth weaves together this complex lattice of character and identity, as the various personalities evolve and interact, is a wonder.

For instance, I Married a Communist’s character of Eve Frame is born and raised Jewish. As she becomes accepted in the White Anglo Protestant world of mid twentieth century upper class America, she hides, perhaps even from herself, her Jewish origins, and actually develops real feelings of anti – Semitism. Later she is indifferent to the fact that her husband is a dyed in the wool communist (not someone who is falsely accused, but the real thing). Later still, she changes her “self” again and poses as a right wing, flag waving, anti –communist patriot, but privately admits that this position is just an act. Eve’s shifting persona interacts with a variety of others, who also share the all too human trait of having shifting, false, and misinterpreted selves.

My advice for anyone wishing to delve into the Zuckerman books is not to start I Married a Communist since it is late in the series. As a “Completest”, I would start at the beginning with Ghost Writer. The first four novels can actually be found in one volume as Zuckerman Bound. If one definitely does not want to read all the books, American Pastoral can be read standalone (Nathan Zuckerman is not even the main character in this one either), and is well worth it.

I have two more books to go, The Human Stain, and Exit Ghost cannot wait to get to them!

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/18/philip-roth-wins-man-booker-international-prize-in-disputed-decision/

The Human Stain - Philip Roth

**** Minor Spoilers contained here.  I give away the fate of the main characters.  I say that this is minor because it is revealed a little more than halfway through this book anyway. ***

The Human Stain is another Philip Roth book that I loved.  Once again, this is a story that is part of the Zuckerman series and, like the previous two entries, Zuckerman mostly narrates and interprets the tale. He is only a character of moderate importance in this book.

Roth and Zuckerman tell the story of Coleman Silk.  Silk is an African-American who grows up in New Jersey during the 1930’s and 1940’s.  Silk is a strong willed, brilliant student as well a talented boxer.  Encountering only occasional racism in his very early years, he is shocked by the hardcore ethnic bigotry that he confronts when he first attends college in Washington D.C. Intending to live life his way, Coleman, who is very light skinned and possesses many Caucasian features, simply decides to pass himself off as a white man.  After serving in World War II, Silk returns to civilian life and meets Steena Paulsson, who seems destined to become his wife. Coleman hides, or at least does not reveal, his ethnicity to Steena for several years.  When he finally surprises her with a visit to his family, providing her with no foreknowledge that they are African-American, Steena flees from Silk.  After this incident our protagonist cruelly severs ties with his family and completely takes on the identity of a Jewish-American.

Silk later marries another white woman and has children, but never reveals to his family his true past or ethnic background.  Professionally he becomes a Professor of Classic Literature and rises to the position of Dean of the fictional Athena College. As a dynamic reformer, he puts Athena on the academic map.  Along the way he makes numerous enemies as he eliminates the dead wood and non-working members of the faculty of the college.

In his seventies and upon retirement from the position of Dean, Silk decides to stay around and continue to teach a few undergraduate courses.  In an ironic twist of fate, one day while taking attendance in class he casually refers to a couple of students, who have never shown up to class and are just names on the attendance list, as “Spooks”.  It turns out that the students in question are African-Americans.  A firestorm erupts as Silk is accused of making a racist statement.  His friends abandon him as his enemies descend upon him and he later resigns in fury.  Afterward, he blames the ensuing death of his wife on the scandal.

The heart of the book concerns itself with events that occur several years after the above events.  Silk meets Nathan Zuckerman, whom he implores to write the story of his persecution. He also begins an affair with Faunia Farley, a woman less than half his age who has been abused throughout her life and who is apparently illiterate.  Members of the local community as well as Silk’s children condemn the relationship as inappropriate.  The lovers are hounded by Lester Farley, who is Fauna’s abusive and psychotic ex-husband, as well as by Professor Delphine Roux, a self-righteous professor at Athena College.  Lester Farley eventually murders both Coleman and Fauna. I am not really giving anything away, as the events of Coleman’s death are mentioned relatively early the novel, whose timeline is only partially linear.  Next, Zuckerman proceeds to piece together the story of Coleman’s life and demise.  The last months of Coleman’s life take place concurrently over the backdrop of the Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky scandal, which is referenced again and again.

The Human Stain is a work of great thematic and philosophic complexity.  Multiple strains of ideas run concurrently and are intertwined.  As is true of every other Roth novel that I have read, the issue of identity and its shifting permutations dominate the narrative.  The idea of an African-American taking on the ethnicity of a Jewish-American, and eventually being persecuted for being a racist, is prime material for these explorations.  Since I explored this multi–novel train of thinking in my commentary on Roth’s “I Married a Communist”, I will instead focus here on another related aspect of this novel, what Roth calls the “Ecstasy of Sanctimony”.

Roth takes humanity to task for our tendency to judge and attack individuals for personal behavior that is not really the business of the public, is ultimately trivial and sometimes accompanied by gross mistruths.

As mentioned earlier, the Clinton sex scandal and subsequent impeachment plays prominently in the words and thoughts of the book’s characters.  Pondering the events, Zuckerman points to the incongruity of the fanatical piety that many people were projecting over both Clinton’s and Silk’s liaisons, while paying minimal attention to a twentieth century world full of suffering, war, genocide and insane ideologies.  Zuckerman deplores this unsophisticated and small-minded tendency of certain Americans to obsess over such trivialities and ignore what is truly momentous in the world.  He compares such reactions to the Muslim extremists who supported the Fatwa by calling for the murder of Salmon Rushdie.  Roth ties such thinking to a strong anti – intellectualism and racism prevalent in America.  Many of the characters who express disgust with both Clinton’s and Silk’s sexual activities accompany the comments with anti–education, racist and anti–Semitic comments.

This is a train of reasoning that I must admit appeals to me.  I am often appalled by what seems to me the simplistic phony righteousness expressed by some of my fellow Americans.  I remember distinctly the discussions that I engaged in with self-described pious persons during the self same scandal.  One needs only to listen to the ridiculous and hateful rhetoric engaged by many of our current politicians and commentators speaking against access to birth control to understand what I mean.

Just when you think, however, that Roth is going to confine his point to the puritanical anti- intellectual thinking that a segment of America engages in, he throws us a curveball. He proceeds to aim his sights on the over intellectualized and often politically correct thinking left wing.

Professor Delphine Roux is the diametric opposite of the American anti-intellectual.  She is a young, attractive, stylish and sophisticated French woman descended from aristocracy who can be described as a super intellectual.  Educated in the finest French schools and possessing a brilliant mind, Roux has mastered the intricacies of complex literary theories that few of her colleagues even understand.  She has awed her peers and students with her cerebral prowess and engaging charisma.  She describes herself as living for books and for art.  At twenty- nine years of age she rises to become chairperson of the language and literature department at Athena College.

Roux is, however, emotionally immature and unstable.  She leads a hysterical sanctimonious attack against Silk, first for the innocent “Spooks” comment and later for what she incorrectly imagines to be an abusive and misogynic affair.  Even after Silk’s death she continues to pile on the slander.  Here, Roth presents us with self-righteous attacks from a different source altogether.  Like the assault on Clinton, real truth concerning private human weakness, is combined with outrageous lies that further smear the victim.

Though Roth clearly despises the excesses epitomized by Roux, from what I know of him, he is intellectually, socially and politely much closer to the intellectualized international literary left that is occupied by Roux.  To Roth’s credit, he has turned his literary glare close to home.

Faunia Farley is the true opposite of the reprehensible people who engage in the vicious moralizing.  She condemns no one.  In one passage, she seems to see that human imperfection, or “the Human Stain,” as all pervasive and simply accepts it as part of the world.  Later Zuckerman, writing in Silk’s voice (yes, perception and point of view get really complicated with Roth!) describes her,

 “She's not religious, she's not sanctimonious, she is not deformed by the fairy tale of purity, whatever other perversions may have disfigured her. She's not interested in judging—she's seen too much for all that shit.  “

Raped and abused all of her life, and in the end murdered, for me Faunia Farley is the noblest and most admirable person in this story.

This tale made me think about a book that I read a few months ago, Nancy Issenberg’s Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr . This work details the life of America’s third vice president, who Issenberg contends was the victim of outrageous lies and character distortions that continue to be perpetuated to this day.  My commentary on that book is here.

My thoughts here only represent a small fraction of what a reader will get out of this book. There is so much that I have not even mentioned.  Aside from a great story and characters, Roth weaves a tale that is a thinking person’s delight.  Since once again Zuckerman is only interpreting a story, a reader unfamiliar with the other works in the series can jump right in. This is a great work, though not quite as great as the incomparable American Pastoral.

I have one last Zuckerman book to go.  That is Exit Ghost.  I believe that the main narrative returns to Zuckerman’s life and, I fear sadly, his death.  I will get to that one soon and share my thoughts with everyone.

Exit Ghost by Philip Roth

I have completed all of Philip Roth’s Zuckerman books! Exit Ghost is the ninth entry in the series and as per Roth, the last. This work is a fine farewell to Nathan Zuckerman, Roth’s long running protagonist that some also consider his alter ego. As this novel wraps things up and involves connections with some of what has gone before, I would strongly recommend at least reading the first Zuckerman book, Ghost Writer and preferably the first four books which are collected under one volume, Zuckerman Bound, before attempting this one.

In 2004, after eleven years of self imposed exile in rural Massachusetts, Zuckerman has finally returned to the formally familiar New York City. At age seventy-one the fictional writer of fiction is falling apart both mentally and physically. He is both impotent as well as incontinent and is also beginning to show signs of mental decay, likely the result of Alzheimer’s disease.

Zuckerman encounters a host of both new and old characters.  He meets a thirtyish couple, Billy Davidoff and Jamie Logan. The married pair are struggling writers whose fear of a post 09/11 terrorist attack is counterbalanced by their strong ire and despair over the Bush administration and its policies. Zuckerman becomes smitten and somewhat obsessed with Jamie. However, the former womanizer is reduced to writing intellectualized romantic fantasies of an encounter with her in lieu of the real thing.

Zuckerman also encounters for the first time in nearly fifty years, Amy Bellette. This is where an intimate connection is established with the first Zuckerman novel, The Ghost Writer. In that work, set in 1956, a young Zuckerman is invited to the  home of his literary idol E.I. Lonoff. During his visit Zuckerman witnesses the breakup of Lonoff’s marriage precipitated by an affair with Lonoff’s young protégée Amy. At this time Zuckerman is also erotically and intellectually drawn to Amy. In a plot twist related to Zuckerman’s ongoing theme of shifting identities, Zuckerman comes to believe in a strange fantasy that Amy is actually Ann Frank who has survived the Holocaust. Zuckerman does eventually come to realize that this belief is apocryphal.

In Exit Ghost we learn that following the events described in The Ghost Writer, Lonoff and Amy married. In the ensuing four years Lonoff, who had previously only penned short stories, was working on a novel. Progress on the book was cut short by his death. An aged Amy is now poverty stricken and declining due to a brain tumor.

Richard Kliman, a friend of Jamie, is badgering both Zuckerman and Amy as he is attempting to put together a biography of Lonoff that will highlight a supposed scandalous affair between the writer and his sister. Richard believes that the aborted novel was a fictionalized account of the incestuous relationship. Richard is aggressive and arrogant. Zuckerman is appalled by Richard’s ways but he does remind our protagonist of his own younger self. Both Zuckerman and Amy philosophically object to Richard’s digging for scandal as well as the entire concept of searching for real events and people when attempting to explain the work of a fiction writer. The ever-cagey Roth seems to provide evidence in support of both sides to this argument.

There are so many themes presented in this book that it is difficult to coherently summarize them all. The motifs also interact and intertwine with one another further defying systematic description. Of course there is Roth’s old standby of identity and people’s perception of it. In addition, there is the question of whether fiction is a mirror of reality and real people and events, verses being only a product of a writer’s imagination. There is also an exploration of the issues surrounding once young and vibrant people coping with physical and mental decline. There are serious ruminations on the philosophical ramifications on isolation and voluntary withdrawal from the world and its travails.

Roth also delves into the concept of an older person trying to connect and come to terms with both the past and the present. There are multiple references to Joseph Conrad’s “The Shadow Line”. I have not read that work, but a little research leads me to believe that it was concerned with related themes.

As if Roth did not have enough to cram in here, Exit Ghost is also very political, excoriating the American right wing. At one point Zuckerman describes George W. Bush as an “Imbecile King”.

Since this is the last that time that we are likely to visit Nathan Zuckerman I will try to focus on his character here as well as in the proceeding books. Though never a simplistic persona, Roth seems to be suggesting that there are two overriding aspects that defined Zuckerman’s life as well as his own perception of himself. First, his gift at writing great and meaningful fiction that is a reflection of the real world. Second, as we saw in previous books, he was an enormously promiscuous womanizer. Zuckerman had affair after affair, sometimes simultaneously with a vast assortment of women. The trysts were only interspaced with a string of short lived and unsuccessful marriages.

Eleven years prior to the events of Exit Ghost Zuckerman became impotent which put an end to his sexual and emotional escapades and was one of several factors that prompted his withdrawal and isolation from the world. As this novel proceeds, it is apparent to both Zuckerman and the reader that senility is closing in and that he is now also losing his ability to write.

Zuckerman is strongly attracted to Jamie who he knows that he cannot have for many reasons. I get the sense that he feels that in his younger days he would have found it easy to seduce this woman. Roth however throws out some hints that he may hold a distorted vision of his former powers. Once again we see some difference in perception of self verses reality.

Roth’s books often contain fictions within fictions. In what is likely to be his last creative piece, Zuckerman is writing a short play titled “He and She” about a flirtation between himself and Jamie. What makes this fiction interesting is that it is not completely off the wall, but it does vary from reality subtly. For Zuckerman, writing these variations and extrapolations on reality is a part of who he is and how he exists in the world. At one point he ruminates on the subject.

“But isn't one's pain quotient shocking enough without fictional amplification, without giving things an intensity that is ephemeral in life and sometimes even unseen? Not for some. For some very, very few that amplification, evolving uncertainly out of nothing, constitutes their only assurance, and the unlived, the surmise, fully drawn in print on paper, is the life whose meaning comes to matter most. “

Jamie’s character in “He and She” is different, but only a little different, from the real women. Again, the theme of perception verses reality rears its head as some aspects of the story are based upon false impressions that Zuckerman has drawn. Of course the people that I am referring to as “real” are fictional characters themselves in Exit Ghost. This confusion is clearly Roth playing with the idea of storytelling and identity again.

Jamie, in “real” life, is confident about her physical attractiveness. However, her fictionalized persona is just a little more self assured and sexually confident then the actual  “real” woman. Zuckerman’s fictional Jamie is likely having an extramarital affair with Richard, where in reality Jamie seems to be faithful to her husband.

Finally in reality, Zuckerman attempts to seduce Jamie over the phone and induce her to visit his hotel room. He fails in his attempt. In his fictional account however, Zuckerman secedes in convincing her. As she is on her way to the liaison, the fictional Zuckerman, who is also impotent in the tale as well, flees the hotel and New York before she arrives, having lost his abilities both sexually and creatively. The fictional Zuckerman, and presumably the real Zuckerman, whose former powers have vanished, will return to isolation, probably until the end.

The story within the story, “He and She” says a lot about Zuckerman. As he alludes to, Zuckerman perceives his fictions as reflections and interpretations of the real world, pain included. He is still egotistical enough to believe that he can talk a women forty years his junior into an affair, but is facing the reality that he would be unable to perform in such a situation. With the loss of his mental faculties and his inability to think and write, he withdraws himself from the world that he once thrived in. He does so without sentimentality or even a strong sense of despair. Since Roth has effectively conveyed these feelings in other characters, I must assume that this is no oversight here.

Once again, I have barely touched upon the themes, philosophic ruminations and character studies found in this work. Exit Ghost is an extraordinary swan song for Zuckerman. Like real life, many of the story threads as well as themes are left unresolved. For fans of Roth and the series, this is very well done finale.


Emma at Book around the Corner has some really good commentary up on this book here.

I also have also written commentary on other Zuckerman books, The Human Stain and I Married a Communist.

Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth

Portnoy's Complaint by was written in 1969 and was the book that put Philip Roth on the map. The tale is told from the point of view of Alexander Portnoy in a stream of consciousness style of monologue directed at an unheard psychoanalyst. Portnoy is intelligent, self aware and highly literate. He is also neurotic, insecure, a narcissist, a sex-crazed womanizer and is very vulgar, especially in regards to bodily functions and masturbation. The novel alternates in time between the Portnoy’s childhood and adult adventures.

This is a brilliant character study. It hilariously plumbs the psychology and social interactions of Portnoy, who is alternately likable and unlikeable to the point of being reprehensible. The constant commentary is very often extremely crude and unfiltered. Portnoy views and describes sexuality as well as other biological functions in extremely uncouth terms.  In my opinion the sexuality is ribald and usually not erotic. Many readers will be offended while others may be simply disgusted.  Though I loved this book and found it often hilarious, and consider myself relatively thick skinned, the over the top diatribe was even a bit much for me at times. In addition, Portnoy can be a very unpleasant character. In real life, his self-absorption would be tediously annoying, and he treats women as sex objects, to name just a couple of his character flaws. On the other hand, I find his portrayal to be realistic. I have known people who speak and seem to think a lot like Portnoy.

Some have taken Roth to task about this work, as the characters often express sexist, racist and otherwise anti–social views. I find this angle of criticism unfounded. It seems relatively obvious that this work is not advocating these views. Though Portnoy has his virtues and at times is extremely insightful, when he behaves badly, the reader clearly does not laugh with him, but rather laughs at him.

There is a lot here. This novel is a fantastic and complex character study. There are so many avenues one can ponder. One of many things that this novel succeeds in being is an exploration, and perhaps a parody, of Freudianism. Roth often approaches this from a humorous angle.

The ideas of Sigmund Freud are brimming all over the narrative. Portnoy’s actions and thoughts are a torrent of Freudian concepts relating to guilt, the Id, ego and super-ego, castration anxiety, neurotic guilt, infantile sexual abuse, symbolism in dreams, etc. At certain points in the narrative, the protagonist even reads and obsesses over Freud. On one level, this work can be viewed as the fictional representation of how these influences play out in the real life of a person. 

For instance, Portnoy recalls a strong erotic attraction to his mother that is pure Freud.

“While I crayon a picture for her, she showers— and now in the sunshine of her bedroom, she is dressing to take me downtown. She sits on the edge of the bed in her padded bra and her girdle, rolling on her stockings and chattering away. Who is Mommy’s good little boy? Who is the best little boy a mommy ever had? Who does Mommy love more than anything in the whole wide world? I am absolutely punchy with delight, and meanwhile follow in their tight, slow, agonizingly delicious journey up her legs the transparent stockings that give her flesh a hue of stirring dimensions. I sidle close enough to smell the bath powder on her throat— also to appreciate better the elastic intricacies of the dangling straps to which the stockings will presently be hooked.”

In similar Freudian fashion, he describes his murderous rage at his father. 

“I would have only to leap across the dinner dishes, my fingers aimed at his windpipe, for him instantaneously to sink  down beneath the table with his tongue hanging out.”

Lest we be too quick to label this novel as the uncritical acceptance of these ideas, there seems to be something else going on here. The references to the theories of Freud can be found on almost every page. They involve all kinds of over the top and ludicrous thoughts and situations. Less of a serious depiction of these concepts, at times this book is closer to parody.

At one point, the protagonist himself wonders if all these connections, explanations and childhood associations are worth so much time and angst and even if they are real or not,

“Whew! Have I got grievances! Do I harbor hatreds I didn’t even know were there! Is it the process, Doctor, or is it what we call “the material”? All I do is complain, the repugnance seems bottomless, and I’m beginning to wonder if maybe enough isn’t enough. I hear myself indulging in the kind of ritualized bellyaching that is just what gives psychoanalytic patients such a bad name with the general public. Could I really have detested this childhood and resented these poor parents of mine to the same degree then as I seem to now, looking backward upon what I was from the vantage point of what I am— and am not? Is this truth I’m delivering up…..”

So is this story a satiric exploration of Freudian ideology from the point of view of a neurotic character? Or, instead, is it a savage critique of the theories and the impact that these ideas have had upon society? I think that it may be a little bit of both. The ideas of Freud have had an enormous impact upon our culture and are important to understand. When applied to a character as Roth does here, they create a fascinating case study.  At the same time they have been employed in all kinds of, what seems to me, ridiculous interpretations of human behavior. Thus, I believe one can analyze these ideas while, in some ways, also mock them. It seems that this is exactly what Roth is doing in this work.

This is a very funny and lively character study. There is a lot more here then the musings about the Freudian thought system. Many of Roth’s favorite themes appear here including his ubiquitous examinations of human identity. As usual, I have only scratched the surface. This book is not, however, for the faint of heart. As mentioned above, it is exceedingly raunchy. In addition, those looking for a completely likeable main character will not be happy with the narcissistic, womanizing Alexander Portnoy. However, those who can deal with these raw elements may find this is a thoughtful, engaging and hilarious novel.

For those with further interest in Roth:

My commentary on I Married a Communist is here.

My Commentary on The Human Stain is here.

My Commentary on Exit Ghost is here.

Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

Sense and Sensibility was Jane Austen’s first published novel.  It is the story of the Dashwood family. Like other novels written by the famous author, the plot centers on the romantic entanglements and marriage prospects of the book’s characters. 

Elinor is the oldest Dashwood daughter and is the central character in the book. She is levelheaded and thoughtful. Her younger sister, Marianne, is more impulsive and more apt to show strong emotion. The girls’ mother, Mrs. Dashwood, can be described as an older but slightly more empathetic and wiser version of Marianne. 

Early on, Elinor and a young bachelor named Edward Ferrars seem to be drawn to one another. Likewise, Marianne and John Willoughby are apparently attracted to each other and close to engagement. 

The usual themes of faulty perception are strong in this work. Initially, Elinor believes that Edward is wooing her. She later learns that he is secretly engaged to another young woman, Lucy Steele. Likewise, Marianne believes that Willoughby is in love with her. However, the young man shocks her when he suddenly turns cold and it is announced that he is engaged to someone else. In the end, it is revealed that both of these situations played out very differently from what the sisters supposed them to be at various parts of the narrative. 

The balance of the plot is driven by these relationships and by misconceptions getting sorted out. The reality of the events and feelings, as opposed to the false perception of them, are revealed in detail. 

At one point Elinor observes,

"I have frequently detected myself in such kind of mistakes," said Elinor, "in a total misapprehension of character in some point or other: fancying people so much more gay or grave, or ingenious or stupid than they really are, and I can hardly tell why or in what the deception originated. Sometimes one is guided by what they say of themselves, and very frequently by what other people say of them, without giving oneself time to deliberate and judge."  

There are multiple characters that are shown to be of weak personality. In particular, the Dashwood sisters’ half brother, John, initially intends to act altruistically towards his family, who are in financial straits. However, he shows moral vacuity when he is easily persuaded not to assist his sisters by his malicious wife, Fanny.

As this was Austin’s earliest published novel, some of the characters seem to be a little less nuanced than in her later books. For instance, the money and status obsessed John and Fanny Dashwood have few redeeming characteristics and are a bit less complex than other Austen creations.

As I alluded to above, the themes of this novel will be familiar to folks who have read other Austen works. Obviously, the plot and characters, which center on young women and their romantic interactions, are common to other Austen books. 

Though this is the first published novel from the author, I have read several other Austen books before this one. The question arises, if the underlying meaning is not all that different for the other books and the plot and characters also seem to meet a template, is it worth reading an author like Austen over the course of more than two or so books?

My conclusion is that reading multiple Austen books is a very worthwhile thing to do.  I raised a similar question in regards to the novels of Philip Roth. In this post, I compared the tendency of Roth to use of similar motifs to a musical work that explored multiple variations on a musical theme. Likewise, though Austen’s messages may be similar between books, by illustrating them in different ways, she adds to the impact and nuance. A writer as skilled as Austen adds intellectual and aesthetic weight to subjects and themes by examining them from different angles. When combined, her brilliant writing as well as well crafted plots and characters, these novels reach the sublime despite the commonalities. 

This classic is a must read for Austen fans. As I am beginning to see the value of reading certain authors’ works in chronological order, this would be a great first read for an Austen neophyte. The benefit of seeing how Austen’s ideas and writing developed over time should be enlightening to a reader.  Like other works by Austen, this book manages to be entertaining as well as very meaningful. 

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz was written in 2007. It won the Pulitzer prize for fiction and numerous other awards. It is included in several lists of best books of the 21st century. At least one list rated it as the best.

I loved this book but it may not appeal to some readers as it is full of references to both popular and obscure science fiction and related genres. In addition to these references, there are major connections to Frank Herbert’s Dune, JRR Tolkien’s Lord of The Rings and the comic book series The Watchman. I have read both the Herbert and Tolkien books. I read the Wikipedia entry on The Watchman to help me with this book.

Much of the narrative covers the life of Oscar de León. Oscar is a young Dominican man growing up and going to college in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. These parts of the book also concern themselves with Oscar’s sister, Lola, and her boyfriend, Yunior. Some chapters cover Oscar’s mother, Beli, growing up in the Dominican Republic in the 1960s, and still others cover his grandfather, Abelard, a doctor in the Dominican Republic during the 1940s and 1950s. 

Oscar is a social outcast who is obsessed with science fiction, fantasy and other speculative books, film and television. Oscar has a terrible time adjusting to society. The depiction of him is detailed, complex and believable. At one point, his school years are described, 

“High school was Don Bosco Tech, and since Don Bosco Tech was an urban all-boys Catholic school packed to the strakes with a couple hundred insecure hyperactive adolescents, it was, for a fat sci-fi–reading nerd like Oscar, a source of endless anguish. For Oscar, high school was the equivalent of a medieval spectacle, like being put in the stocks and forced to endure the peltings and outrages of a mob of deranged half-wits, an experience from which he supposed he should have emerged a better person, but that’s not really what happened—and if there were any lessons to be gleaned from the ordeal of those years he never quite figured out what they were. He walked into school every day like the fat lonely nerdy kid he was, and all he could think about was the day of his manumission, when he would at last be set free from its unending horror”

There is a lot more to Oscar. He experiences love, rejection, terrible bouts of depression, and he sometimes acts surprisingly. He philosophizes a great deal and develops a lot as a character. His family members and friends, especially Lola and Yunior, are also very complex and believable. 

The parts of the book that focus on Oscar’s grandfather, Abelard, are tragic. Rafael Trujillo was the real-life dictator of the Dominican Republic during Abelard’s time. As per the book and some other sources that I have read, he was more brutal and controlling than the average dictator. According to this novel, among his outrages was the fact that he had a habit of personally raping young girls throughout the Dominican Republic. In an effort to protect his daughter from Trujillo, Abelard brings destruction to himself and to his family. 

The chapters that describe Beli’s adolescence in the 1960s paint the picture of a rebellious but naive young girl whose affair with a government operative draws the wrath of the powerful man’s wife. Beli is beaten and terrorized by the police and thus forced to flee to America.

The dialogue between characters ranges from funny to profound to heart breaking. The parts that take place in the later twentieth century contain a fair amount of Spanglish as well as a lot of profanity. 

Most, but not all, of the chapters are told in first person by Yunior, who is a multifaceted and nuanced character in his own right. Diaz has included his character in other books and stories that I have not read. Yunior also seems to be interested in science fiction/fantasy and comic books, so he fills the entire narrative with such references as well as references to some classic literature. Other chapters are narrated by Lola. There are also a lot of footnotes where the author chimes in about both the real world and the fictional story. 

There is something odd going on throughout the book. This peculiarity seems to be similar to magical realism. However, the magical realism in this book seems different from any other novels that I have read that incorporated the technique. This oddness seems to dig into the way that the author sees some basic human truths about violence, despair, gender, colonialism and more.

Early on it is mentioned by the narrator that Oscar’s family has a curse hanging over it. We learn in the book that in Dominican culture, this kind of curse is known as Fukú. The narrator, usually Yunior, takes a mostly ambivalent attitude as to whether he believes in the curse or not. However, at one point, he makes the case for it as he points out that throughout the years, the de León’s have had terrible fortune that seems to go beyond mere coincidence. This bad luck has led to terrible violence and death. Luckily there is a counterforce in that throughout the narrative, characters, especially the women, seem to use a kind of white magic. Some of them have a power of their own. This positive force is called zafa in the book, and according to Yunior, it is part of Dominican culture. 

Diaz takes this even further in a very unusual way. As mentioned earlier, the book is packed with references to science fiction, fantasy, comic books etc. The characters that exist in the 1940s and 1950s seem to be familiar with Frank Herbert’s novel Dune as they make several references to it, even though Dune was written in 1965. Furthermore, Oscar’s aunt La Inca and other women in the book seem to have zafa-related powers that are strongly connected the powers that some female characters had in Herbert’s book. With these important references to Dune, I might recommend that a reader try that book before reading this one. 

There is more. After the story of Abelard is related, an alternate version of events is told. In this version, Abelard is writing a book that exposed Trujillo as a nonhuman, evil creature from another world. When the dictator discovered Abelard’s plans to publish his expose, a curse was put on the entire de León family. 

In an hour of darkest peril, Beli believes that she was helped by a talking mongoose that was a messenger from God. Though the reader is not sure if this is a figment of imagination or not, years later, Oscar is helped by the same mongoose when he is near death. Both Beli in her time and Oscar encounter a malevolent faceless man. Thus, there seems to be a mystical conflict going on between the forces of violence and chaos and the forces of nonviolence and benevolence. As I mentioned above, there is a strong connection between these benevolent forces and the feminine powers. Perhaps the author seems to be saying that it is women who play the predominate role in opposing violence and chaos in the world.

I read just a little bit online about the symbolism behind fukú, and the consensus is that it relates to colonialism. I agree that there are indications in the narrative that this is the case. However, I think that it is also representing something more universal, that is, the propensity for people to be violent and cruel. 

As I alluded to earlier, I read a few reviews and a little commentary on this book. Some have suggested that all the references to Dominican-American culture might lead those unfamiliar with that culture to be confused or at least to miss a lot in this book. I did not find this to be the case. The parts of this novel that take place in Patterson, New Jersey actually reminded me a lot of Philip Roth’s accounts of growing up in Jewish communities of New Jersey decades earlier. However, I think that those who are unfamiliar with science fiction/fantasy/comic book culture will miss a lot in this book. As per above, these references are all over the novel. In addition to the Dune connections, the dark forces and light forces in this book are connected in an important way to both The Lord of The Rings as well as to The Watchman. Growing up around the same time as Oscar and being a fan of science fiction and having ties to its “community” helped me to understand and relate to a lot of what is going on here. 

The government of the Dominican Republic is shown to be brutal and it perpetuates a great deal of cruelty and violence aimed at the de Leóns and others. Some readers might find these parts of the book disturbing. 

I immensely enjoyed this book. With that, I think that someone unfamiliar or uninterested in science fiction/fantasy culture might miss out on a lot and become bored. Thus, the book may not be universally admired. There is also a fair amount of disturbing brutality in this novel. However, the plot is compelling, and the characters are interesting and complex. It also offers an interesting look at Dominican-American culture as well as Dominican culture and history. It is full of odd things that contain a lot of underlying meaning. The right reader will find this a very worthy book. Some may also love it.