Books And Tunes December 31st, 2019

I spent the end of December at London Christmas Markets, wandering briefly through New York, playing chess with my little brother, holding young children, and returning, finally, to the blissful warmth of Los Angeles. For those following along at home, this is not my end of year post, that comes tomorrow.

The Ruined Map by Kobo Abe – A detective tracks down a woman's husband, illuminates the limitations of identity, truth, and reality. Haruki Murakami very much read this book—if that sounds like a good thing to you, then you could do worse than give it a read. In fairness, it does seem to have come a rough half-century before the high point of esoteric pseudo-noir, in which style and mood are substituted for plot and narrative coherence, though frequent readers may recall that this is generally not my bag.

Monday Starts on Saturday by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky – An everyman coder finds himself working for the National Institute for the Technology of Witchcraft and Thaumaturgy in this early urban fantasy/satire of scientific existence. Even the lesser works of the Strugatsky Brothers are kind of interesting simply by virtue of showcasing a form of foreign genre fiction—I'm going to bet this was a big influence on the Night Watch series—but it's basically altogether lacking in plot or conflict, and apart from a few fun asides probably isn't worth the time.

Nobody Move by Denis Johnson – A gambling addicted crooner shoots a guy, gets involved with a femme fatale, in this swiftly moving, admirably realized comic noir. It's not bad! It's not amazing! It's OK! OK is what's between not bad and not amazing!

The Magician of Lublin by Isaac Bashevis Singer – A drunken, licentious stage magician struggles with the age old question of whether or not to sleep with a Shiksha. Well written line to line but taken altogether its a little bit half-baked.

Heat Wave by Penelope Lively—A woman watches her daughter's marriage collapse, remembers her own marriage doing the same, considers the eternal war between the sexes, makes her own contribution to the fight. Excellent. The writing and characterization are subtle but strong, and it's got a great sting. Good stuff.

A History of Warfare by John Keegan – While back in Baltimore over Christmas I broke out this classic of military theory, in which Keegan rebuts the Clausewitzian paradigm of war as a political activity, arguing instead that mass combat is best understood as an emanation of a particular culture and moment. Looking back in on it ten years after I read it last it pretty much stands up, and though I would quibble with a few of his examples I basically found the thesis compelling. Probably if you have any interest in this subject you've already read this book, but if not, maybe get on it.

The Recognitions by William Gaddis – Writing a review of Gaddis's 1000 page post-modernist ur-text – initially maligned by critics before ultimately going on to take a place in the modern canon – is a daunting prospect. William Gass, in the introduction, more or less accuses anyone not loving the book of being a philistine and probably an idiot. It is unquestionably a work of brilliance, an investigation of the nature of authenticity through the perspective of fraud in the world of high art. Apart from its linguistic complexity, Gaddis has a genius for a peculiar sort of world-building, in which themes and stylistic distinctions gradually accumulate to give weight to the whole. That said, and Mr. Gass's challenge not withstanding, I didn't particularly enjoy this book and probably wouldn't recommend it. Like a lot of writing of this sort the characterization is terribly flat, with characters operating more as stylistic flourishes than as fully rounded people. A lot of it amounts to an ill-tempered and ultimately exhausting skewering of the artistic and cultural elite, which, fair enough, who the fuck likes them assholes, but around the seventh parody of a Manhattan literary party one wanders if we haven't reached diminishing returns. In short, this is the sort of book which demands rereading but maybe doesn't actually warrant it, and while I admire Gaddis's intelligence I couldn't help but wish it was put to a less sterile end.

The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester – A space-wrecked savage seeks vengeance on those who wronged him. Pleasantly bizarre, with a focus on economic and cultural exploitation which would go on to influence a lot of 80's sci-fi writers, but it's kind of incoherently structured and the narrative basically didn't function that well for me.

The Epic of Gilgamesh – Mankind's first hero learns to hate death. How does one review a foundational text of human civilization? It was not good as the Illiad. I tell you, if I was writing cuneiform in 2500 BC, I'd have done a fuckton better job. Lotta repetition, man, lotta repetition.