thisnewday

In the prologue to Steinbeck's 1954 novel Sweet Thursday, Mack is talking to Whitey No. 1 about what he likes in a book. In so doing, he's actually critiquing the novel in which his own character first appeared, Steinbeck's 1945 book, Cannery Row.

Which is totally as odd as it sounds, given that none of Steinbeck's characters, with the possible exception of Doc, are particularly literate. But perhaps, we might reason, this is another layer in the Steinbeck onion of suspended disbelief. Which was, in fact, my rationale for continuing to read beyond Sweet Thursday's opening page.

Anyway, Steinbeck proceeds to take Mack's suggestion about labeling chapters, an idea with whose rationale I totally agree. (Mack goes on to elaborate.) But then we get to Chapter 10, titled, "There's a Hole in Reality through which We Can Look If We Wish."

And, I dunno, he kind of loses me, albeit momentarily, while simultaneously disarming me of any particular expectations. Which, I suppose, might've been his purpose, but that's kind of a stretch.

The thing is, I found this to be a singularly entrancing chapter, the one in which Steinbeck introduces the character whose narrative voice infuses the movie version of Cannery Row with, I dunno, the natural and mystical wonder that the writer finds in coastal California and with which he proceeds to surround both his characters and his readers.

And I just think that such a moment would be better served--and the chapter better titled--with simply the name of that character, "The Seer..."

LPK
Dreamwidth
12.23.2018  

Sometime yesterday, I came to the realization that several of the projects that I've been working on in recent months are now at or near completion. At least in terms of where they're going for the foreseeable future.

With it came a sense of accomplishment, but there was also a pronounced feeling of what, relaxation? Which could be owing to a sense that whatever comes next will simply be a manifestation of things already in place. Still, odd for me, at least in recent months, and in that sense somewhat disquieting. A signal of what, exactly, existentially speaking?

Later, I did order a couple of books, which I'd been considering for a while, The Radium Girls, which the book club read last month, and Eleanor and Hick, which they're reading next month. And I've finally gotten well into Jay Parini's John Steinbeck, which I've literally been reading, minutes at a time, for months.

I think my problem with the Parini book has been that, although I've always loved literary bios, it's the story part of the writer's life, his or her interactions with other people, that has always interested me the most.

When I was an undergrad, I used to pride myself on understanding the philosophical roots of a writer's work. And with Steinbeck, there's quite a lot of that. He's not an intellectual, by any stretch, but more of an eclectic, self-educated thinker and theoretician. And I think that Parini does a credible job of sorting that out.

Unfortunately, I seem to have regressed to a point where I have the attention span and intellectual acuities of a 3rd or 4th grader, and the process is on-going. As for the book itself, and my selection of it, Parini has written a scholarly work which, figuratively speaking, fell off the shelf and into my lap at a used bookstore.

I'm pretty sure that it's mostly me, mostly about where I am in my life. Which has made it difficult to comprehend, to even want to understand, where Steinbeck was at various stages in his. But I'm also willing to consider the possibility that Parini has in fact written a monumentally boring book about another monumentally boorish and entitled male literary figure of the last century, LOL.

In any case, there's no final exam waiting at the end of this one, so I think I'll keep slogging along until the end of it. Or until the end of me. Maybe, just to be sure that I see this through, I should specify that it be cremated with me. You know, in case I'm finished with this effing life before I'm finished with this effing book.

In the meantime, Talulla's plastic drum set is waiting in the basement for the completion of promised repairs. She's a kid who likes banging on things, and she bangs on them hard. That's just how she rolls. And she's only recently turned three.

Which has led me to conclude that plastic is probably not the best material for this repair, so I'm using aluminum bar stock--which will probably outlast both the drums and the person who repaired them.

Anyway, if it's Destiny's Drumroll that I've been hearing, I'd better get to it.

Because Talulla is not the sort to be forgiving of promised tasks left incomplete. Regardless of the excuse...

LPK
Dreamwidth
6.12.2018