Books I Read December 31st, 2020

Excuse the delayed post, I've spent the last few weeks making food and then eating that food. The weather is lovely here in LA, and despite having no space left in our hospitals and the generally apocalyptic tenor of the times I manage to muddle along. Hope that you can say the same.

Down Second Avenue by Es'kia Mphahlele – Autobiographical vignettes from an early luminary of African letters. I found the early bits, detailing the author's childhood in rural South Africa (and later in a Pretorian suburb), his familial customs and struggles, to be particularly engaging, but then, 'vivid recollections of youth from people outside of my cultural milieu' is one of my favored sub-genres.

The BFG by Roald Dahl – Reading for a project. Actually quite charming, despite the endless far jokes. Dahl has a gift for funny language which is one of (the?) main asset for a writer of children's books.

All About H. Hatterr by G.V. Desani – A series of comic misadventures/religious commentary relayed by an Anglo-Malay neer-do-well in vivid and hysterical bazaar English. Even the bits that made no sense at all to me were fun to read.

My Uncle Oswald by Roald Dahl – Snippets from the ostensible journal of the author's uncle, a modern day Casanova. Absolute unmitigated trash. Just horrible. Genuinely one of the worst things I've ever read. Not erotic, resolutely unfunny, the entire plot consisting of a single joke stretched out interminably; that it is also misogynistic and racist is the least of its sins. Avoid.

By Night Under the Stone Bridge by Leo Perutz – Linked vignettes from the Prague of Rudolf II, who reigned over a vibrant and cosmopolitan city soon to be destroyed in a riot of religious violence. Really excellent. Perutz was the last generation of the Dual Monarchy, and uses the plight of the Prague Jews (and the horrors of the 30 year war) to evoke the tragic violence which destroyed the Central Europe of his youth. Worth your time.

The Odyssey (T.E. Lawrence Translation) – Re-reading this for who knows how many times I was struck by the grand emotion of the players. The idea of masculinity at this point in Greek society owes nothing to the sobriety of Socrates or the Stoics—everyone is always wiping away a tear, or running over and hugging people and whatnot. It's also really Bro-y – there's some monster fighting here and there but more of the narrative is like, “Joe, my dear friend, oh I missed you so let's exchange tripods and cry about our dead friends.' Also, this was the first time I'd read the Lawrence translation and it's just complete fucking garbage, all of the poetry and weight of the language is lost.

Ulysses by James Joyce – When I first read this some six or seven years ago while backpacking around somewhere or other I remember feeling that I understood about 30% of it and also that it was my new favorite book. In contrast to other competing works of genius (St. Petersburg, Confidence Man, The Recognitions) Joyce's novel seems a perfect fractal, so infused with spirit that to unlock a corner of it is to offer some access to the enormous bounty beyond. Coming back to it years later I was pleased to feel that certain sections I had found impenetrable proved, like Molly herself, more willing to yield to my attentions, and that fundamentally my opinion (commonly held but still) that this is the foremost work of English letters remains intact. The fecund beauty of the thing, the fabulous stir of the language (which is such a joy to read even when you can barely grasp the content), but most of all the fundamental sense of optimism which underlies the work, its affirmation of the glory and beauty of human existence – 'yes I said yes I will Yes.'

Indeed. Happy New Year.