The Generator Speaks

Next train:

Farewell My Lovely - Raymond Chandler

(ain't all this holiday reading time grand?)

Seventh Son: Final Thoughts

First, the image to the right may or may not be a Pennsylvanian dutch hex sign designed to invoke strength and courage. Feelin' braver? The information on the linked site, as well as this wikipedia discussion of hexes seems to suggest that there is some controversy as to whether the art is meant to be thought of as talismanic or merely emblematic. *Semantic cough*

I've finished Seventh Son. I typically assign the books that I read a letter grade when I add them to my "books I've read list." I don't mean this to be in any way repesentative of, for instance, quality of prose, significance of work etc. - my letter grades reflect a purely subjective appreciation of the text. And Seventh Son received an A rating. What did I like so much?

First off, to continue the discussion of familiar stories below, I did my homework about Card (who still seems like a pretty swell guy), and found that he makes no bones about "loosely" basing events in the life of his character Alvin Maker on the biography of Joseph Smith Jr. I'm not sure how loosely the events are based, but no matter: I've decided that a compelling story is a compelling story. Religion, however, still makes a difference. I take for example the re-telling of current events: many novels or films are based on real-life events - and I admit, I often enjoy the dramatization. Where the water gets muddy is when the attempt is to dramatize a spiritually significant event. Though I believe (here we go again with cosmology and literature) in an absolute truth, I also believe in the subjective experience of that truth (sense?), and as such when I see someone else's interpretation of a spiritually significant event with which I feel familiar, I'm often left feeling "off" very quickly. Some of Mel's Passion anyone? Were there some jarring moments in Seventh Son as a result of this effect? Absolutely. But I found that they quickly passed, and didn't hinder my enjoyment of the text in the least. While reading, an obviously biographical event would pass and I would get that "be careful" feeling, and then Card would be just that, "careful." But then Card seems very conscious of the responsibilities and risks involved in the enterprise - I found this discussion from his personal website particularly interesting. Any non-LDS reader at this point is thinking "why all the fuss?" So I'll move along with one parting observation: LDS readers will have some fun in the text noticing some very specific points of "mormon" doctrine at work ("mormon" easter eggs, if you will) - for instance Rev. Thrower's attempt to shake hands with "the Visitor."

The themes dealt with by the novel were lovely. I finished the novel with a strong sense of the religious confusion present during the period. Card doesn't just describe the fact of religious upheaval, he takes time to examine the sources of contention through the faiths of his characters. So-called "black and white" thinking is rare, and the search for truth seems to be the paramount virtue. LDS cosmology is indeed present, though in unexpected forms. The discussion of chaos versus order (or "making and unmaking" in the language of the text) was particularly enjoyable for myself, as well as the interesting idea that the devil may well have been himself deceived... No, it was a novel with some great ideas therein. The story was compellingly written, and more than wondrous enough to merit its "fantasy" designation, although if you'd like to talk more about the difference between magic and miracle, we could get some wings. The fantasy elements were deliciously original - and I personally will look forward to further reading in this world of "knacks" and the above mentioned "hexes." The alternate history material, as well, was deeply satisfying. Knowing well how small changes can have vast consequences, I love playing my own "what if" games, and Card must have had fun transcribing his for the novel. Without spoiling too much I'll drop a small example: what if the Iroquis confederacy had been an independent signatory to early American documents and had been granted statehood? Heck, one more: what if Napoleon's feet in ancient time had walked on America's Green Mountains? I'll admit, most of this first novel in the Alvin the Maker series is spent on character development with some minor attention paid to Card's alternate history, but the set-up is tantalizingly arrayed, spurring genre fans to further reading.

For those who picked up some Blakean punning, did I mention that St. William makes an appearance? The placement of Blake on the American frontier is frankly bizarre, and I'm not sure how well it works for me, but a surprise reading of "The Garden of Love" is always welcome. I prefer to think of Taleswapper as an homage to Blake rather than the character transplanted - again, maybe here's a true story I think too good to be re-written.

My only gripe with the text might be the textbook cliff-hanger ending. I'm not sure how the novel stands on its own - a very few things felt resolved by the last page. I know I can't complain: Seventh Son works the way that most first books in an epic fantasy series work. We don't complain all that much when Boromir gets offed at the end of the Fellowship and Frodo and Sam strike out on their own. Neither do we think "and now I'll read something else." Having been introduced to some of the series' (I presume) major characters and the swellings of its grand conflict, I'll admit that I'm looking for my copy of the next in the series, Red Prophet, and not just because it's on my 2010 challenge list.

Spooky! This is the second time that I've been discussing the novel and had the Mose Allison version of "The Seventh Son" randomly play on my well-stocked iPod. Quick, someone start talking about something else so's we can ward the jinx...

Mind Voyages Reading Challenge

As pointed out to me by Dave at Worlds Without End, there is a space race afoot! I'm a great lover of that genre that has nobly worn the name "Science Fiction," and at Mind Voyages the gauntlet has been dropped to really dig in to some of the classics, old and new, in 2010. So count me in! The list of books acceptable for the challenge is populated with Hugo and Nebula award winners and nominees - an artistic vein that has provided plenty of reading joy over the last 10 years since I initially set out to conquer "the list." I'm more than happy to fast-track a slough of books that I've been itching to get to. I'll finagle the random number generator book selection process so that every second selection will be from my challenge reading list.

My list of books to devour in 2010 is as follows:

The Yiddish Policeman's Union - Michael Chabon (2008 Hugo 2007 Nebula)
Rainbows End - Vernor Vinge (2007 Hugo)
Spin - Robert Charles Wilson (2006 Hugo)
The Doomsday Book - Connie Willis (1993 Hugo 1992 Nebula)
Blue Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson (1997 Hugo)
Paladin of Souls - Lois McMaster Bujold (2004 Hugo 2004 Nebula)
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick (1968 Nebula nominee)
Galactic Pot-Healer - Philip K. Dick (it's by Philip K. Dick!)
Perdido Street Station - China Mieville (2002 Hugo Nebula nominee)
The Years of Rice and Salt - Kim Stanley Robinson (2003 Locus 2003 Hugo nominee)
Blind Lake - Robert Charles Wilson (2004 Hugo nominee)
River of Gods - Ian McDonald (2005 Hugo nominee)
Red Prophet - Orson Scott Card (1989 Hugo Nominee)
Tea with the Black Dragon - R. A. MacAvoy (1983 Nebula nominee 1984 Hugo nominee)
The Integral Trees - Larry Niven (1984 Nebula nominee 1985 Hugo nominee)
The Claw of the Conciliator - Gene Wolfe (1981 Nebula nominee 1982 Hugo nominee)

For those keeping score, that's 16 titles in 12 months and taken together they qualify me for the "Jupiter Voyage" (meeting the requirements for the "Mars," "Venus," "Moon" and "Slingshot to Earth" voyages on the way - I decline the Mercury voyage on the basis of an already expressed loathing).

For those new to the genre, the list of Hugo and Nebula winners and nominees is well worth your time - I can't count the number of titles therein that I would heartily recommend. Anyone else up for the challenge? At least to the Moon and back?

Seventh Son: Revelation

Remember how I had mentioned that cosmological lens?

First - how did Orson Scott Card end up on my shelf? Card is a very well respected Science Fiction author, having won both the Hugo and Nebula awards, along with many others. His novel Ender's Game is considered a masterpiece of the genre and is one of the rarefied novels to have won the Hugo and Nebula simultaneously. Card is also a "devout and outspoken" mormon - a member of the LDS faith - of which faith I also consider myself to be a devout and outspoken member. Card is a popular personality in the genre having famously suggested once that budding SF authors first read through the catalogue of award winning SF novels in order to get a sense of the conversation...

So why have I put off reading him for so long? I have his classics on my shelf, as well as lesser known works, like Seventh Son, but even before the random number generator my reading never took me there. I had friends in university who talked about LDS theology present in Ender's Game, and for reasons that I don't fully understand I bumped the texts to the bottom of my "to read list." I tend to shy away from the large body of "Mormon Lit" and maybe I caught a scent, perhaps false, and unwittingly closed a door. I'm no snob, I just like my theology from the source, unfiltered as it were.

So here I began reading Seventh Son thinking - a magic-realist novel about folk magic in an alternate history frontier America, I am so in! And I am. But 70 pages into the text I have a distinct sense of deja vu.

The opening scenes of the text are crisp, exciting - I know I just said "exciting," but I still thought of Faulkner's As I Lay Dying (you'll know why if you've read both). I also thought of Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales, especially "The Maypole of Merry Mount" as I read further. As I continued to read, I reached a point at which a blurry sense of familiarity burst into clarity. The point in the text I'm thinking of is when 6 year old Alvin Jr. awakens to find a shining being standing at the foot of his bed that proceeds to provide the boy with a vision regarding his burgeoning supernatural abilities and his responsibility in the world. For those in the know, see if you've heard this story: a large family travelling further into the frontier to hack their homestead from the virgin forest gives birth to a child of destiny; said child shows signs of this special destiny early in life - he portentiously shares the name of his father and forefathers and is curious about the differences of relgious belief within his family and society; he recieves multiple visitations in one night from a being of light standing by his bed in the middle of the night wilst his siblings sleep; the powers of darkness continue to threaten his destruction, most prominently by the "powers of water;" he is able to heal by the laying on of hands; he receives a vision in which a stone is cut from a mountain and rolls to fill, or become, the whole earth; this young man, "a maker," is considered to be the second most important maker in the history of the world since the first Maker turned water to wine at Cana... Need I continue?

I should note that the Prophet Joseph Smith Jr.'s elder brother's name was actually Alvin. Also, this link provides a brief explanation on the commonly held mormon belief regarding watery menace.

Clearly I'm reading a story that I've heard a different version of before. But should this matter? I've heard hundreds of versions of the Ring of the Nibelungen, the Arthurian legend, even Cinderella - and enjoyed many! Stories in literature surface and resurface, are re-interpreted and refurbished - witness Heinlein's classic Stranger in a Strange Land (disclosure: I loathe this novel). But does it make a difference to me if the story being retold is one that I consider profoundly sacred? And so it all comes back to the lens. Were I not LDS and reading this novel, I don't doubt that my reaction would be very different. Sorry, can't change that. I'm an unabashed proponent of Reader theory in this case. I'm enjoying the story, and this is far from a re-write of Joseph Smith - History. But I can't help noticing the similarities to a story that for me carries deep spiritual significance. And I ain't talkin' about the Hawthorne. But then, wasn't it me that just read Inferno? Apropos, no?

The Generator Speaks

Next train:

Seventh Son - Orson Scott Card

Inferno: Cocytus

I have passed through the center of Cocytus...

This time reading Inferno I got so involved with the Dante's journey... I eagerly followed Virgil, awaiting the spectacle of each new division of Hell. When I finished the canticle late last evening, I couldn't help but feel the relief of the poet as they stood again 'neath the heavenly cars. I'm not sure if this had to do with the translation that I was reading (American poet John Ciardi's in yes, yes the Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces), which I should not was crisp, accessible, and lovely in terms of the attention devoted to meter and rhyme. It has been a long time since I have been so enveloped by verse, pushing on as I would a "page-turner" novel. Should I even write how satisfying the journey was?

Dante's Inferno is certainly what Norton proclaims it to be, and as such, my couple of pennies here couldn't begin to do justice to the depth of conversation that could be had around this text. Also, being primarily an explication of personal theology, I find the work difficult to converse about without referencing my own: opinions about this text, I would think, cannot help but be first altered by the lens of one's own cosmology. My disclaimers aside, I found a few things specifically interesting to me.

First, the poem features Dante as himself (or, the autobiographical self, which is to say the mythic self), who throughout the journey is keeping mental notes on the poem he will write once this trip is through. Dante the traveler throughout his descent expresses deep sympathy for the damned - he weeps at their stories, and were it not for his deep belief in Divine Justice, we wonder whether he doesn't question a hellish sentence or two. But wait: isn't it Dante the poet that has, in effect, invented this appalling, if not awesome and majestic walking tour? So what does Dante really think? On one level, he has devised a meticulous system of punishment for the damned, and on another, he mourns its harshness?

As someone that does happen to believe in the idea of sin, and that all of our actions are associated with material and metaphysical consequences, the symbolic punishments for sin are profound. As someone who has difficulty with the idea of eternal damnation, well, there's that lens again... Whatever your cosmology, I think that Dante's song is masterfully sung.

Beautiful moments in the Inferno? There were many, even if they tend to be monstrously beautiful. The vast valley of the evil counsellors: infinite fireflies flickering in the dark; and the burning plain of the violent against God and Nature; the sad, stately light of the noble pagans in limbo encroached upon all sides by eternal night... Ah, that's lovely verse.

I'm recognizing that the blog medium limits what I might like to say about a text - I can't say a fraction of what I've thought. I deeply enjoyed my return to the Inferno - I'm certaily curious about Purgatory and Paradiso.

As a last note, will someone please gift me Barlowe's Inferno - an artist that distinguished himself by science fiction and fantasy art's interpretation of Dante's descent. Here's the link to Barlowe's own website. It's also available through any old big, jungly, online retailer.

Inferno

Not that I typically read 14th century Italian poetry. I like the idea of it, but have read little - and by a little, I mean the pieces of Inferno that I read in English 201, the night before it was to be discussed in class.

I'll come out with this shocking fact right away: I use a random number generator to decide what book I should read next. I love to read, and I read as much as I can. Which may or may not seem like a lot. I do have a day job... I've been hooked since grade school. And I don't think I'm snooty about it. Just because I mention grade school doesn't mean that I consider myself well-read. I just enjoy text.

From which stock does my random generator choose? From my own of course. I have laid up a store of some books - hunted from book-sales, used paper stores, glossy big box stores (as little as possible). What do I look for? As if I even understand why I pick up what I pick up: award list books, books by authors that I've liked, books by authors that I think I should like, books that I've heard are important, books that seem exotic, books from places that seem exotic... How do you choose books? I get lost in these places. And so, you might ask, why a random number generator? Because my shelves swell and swell, and left to myself faced with this feast I would starve for choice. Or get stuck in a rut. So, my random number generator selects the next book to read in what has become something of a ritualistic occurrence, and I ready myself for the trip...

At the most recent changing of trains, I was directed to Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, specifically the first division, which happens to be Inferno, and after 10 years, I'm back again reading 14th century Italian poetry (translated into 20th century English, of course) and have found myself pleasantly enthralled. No discussion in class tomorrow, no short essay questions. Just me and Dante and Virgil, and the nightmarish path downwards. I'm in the midst of the Seventh Circle of Hell at the moment, on the burning plain of the Second Round. Have you been there? I mean as a tourist, of course.