Temporal Reviews: The Master

The Master is Colm Toibin's Booker finalist about four years in the life of American ex-patriate novelist Henry James leading up to the turn of the 20th century.

Much has been made about the queering of Henry James....my people now claim James as "one of us." Toibin's novel, however, does not necessarily advance that reading. Clearly James is a lover of men, yet he can never bring himself to form full relationships with them. One of the interesting ways that Toibin explores this is to juxtapose James's crushes on men with the gossip surrounding Oscar Wilde in fin de siecle London, including his trials and subsequent imprisonment. In Toibin's estimation, James would have taken to heart the punishment that befell Wilde, which would therefore have discouraged any foray he would have made with other men.

Toibin also explores James's relationships with women. A recurring theme in the novel (and, apparently in James's life), were his relationships with infirm, independent young women who met untimely fates. James's attraction to these women is never really explained. It suggests that he is attracted to their independent spirits, which he lacks, but empathizes with their illness...perhaps reminiscent of his own illness with respect to his unwillingness to engage in romantic relationships.

The Master is not biography - it is a novelization of the life a real life person. Toibin has been widely remarked to channel James in his style. In my view, he has crafted a novel of sublime subtelty, circling around the interior life of an artist without ever touching down in the secret places the artist can't admit to himself.

Temporal Reviews: Let Nothing You Dismay

As a breezy Christmas story, Mark O'Donnell's Let Nothing You Dismay is a harmless confection. I enjoyed this book well enough, but like an inocuous Christmas cookie, not a lot to write home about.

Temporal Reviews: Their Eyes Were Watching God

Zora Neale Hurston's masterpiece is a novel I have read at several different points in my life, each time taking away something different. Each time, however, I am struck by the power and majesty of her prose. The words she uses....the images she creates are captivating. Janie Crawford's life, as incredulous as it might be, is always compelling.

Temporal Reviews: Mansfield Park

Jane Austen's Mansfield Park is more Dickensian than her other novels. Our herione, Fanny Price, is treated abyssmally by her adoptive family, especially her horrible Aunt Mrs Norris. But, being an Austen herione, she is plucky and lives to have all her dreams of marriage come true. My only complaint is with how horribly pious and self-righteous Fanny is. The other characters are alive with complexities....Fanny, however, is portrayed as saintly.

Temporal Reviews: A Prayer for Owen Meany

This complex novel is assuredly Irving's masterpiece. A Prayer for Owen Meany is about the short life of the short Owen Meany. Owen is presented as an oddly Messianic character who believed he was an instrument of the Lord. Whether or not he was an "instrument" is probably less important than that he thought he was.

This novel is also the story of Johnny Wheelwright, WASPish friend of Owen's who has come to worship Owen after Owen's death. This novel is almost equally Johnny's story, in the same way that The Great Gatsby could be said to be about Nick Carraway as much as it is about Jay Gatsby. We see Johnny as not much more than a cipher throughout his life - always living life as the acolyte of Owen Meany.

That Johnny might or might not be a "latent homosexual" is really irrelevant. His experience of knowing and loving Owen Meany has left him unable (or perhaps unwilling) to form human connections in adulthood. Johnny flees the US for Canada, even though Owen had already made Johnny un-draftable. This is really a metaphor for Johnny's flight from human relationships. His self-imposed exile in Canada is truly a lonely one. He keeps himself isolated by his single-minded fanaticism with which he studies American politics. While Owen's life might have made him a Christian, Owen's friendship and love have left him utterly alone in the world.

An interesting juxtaposition in Irving's novel is the comparison of the government's activities in Vietnam with the Iran-Contra scandal. This has a certain amount of relevance today, with respect to the government's prosecution of the war in Iraq. Vietnam was a watershed moment in 20th Centrury American history - the point in time when American's lost faith in their government. Johnny has also lost faith in relationships, it seems.

Temporal Reviews: Everything is Illuminated

Everything is Illuminated was the "it" book a couple years ago. The debut novel of Jonathan Safran Foer caused quite a literary stir, mostly because the format of the story was new, specifically, the narrative voice of Alex, the "translator" whose English is horrible. The structure of the novel is very creative - a mix of the present day narrative by Alex in the form of letters, and the historical story of Trachimbrod as written (apparently) by the character named Jonathan Safran Foer. I frankly found the use of Alex's poor English to be very gimmicky....it stopped being fresh after about 10 pages. The same effect could have been had without the gimmick.

Temporal Reviews: Memoirs of a Geisha

I can't comment on whether or not Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha accurately reflects a geisha's life and customs in Kyoto in the years prior to WWII, but it is an engrossing book. Poor Chiyo's life was horrible - but she also seemed to make wrong turns at every decision point.

As kind to her as Mameha was, Hatsumomo was evil. The depth of evil in Hatsumomo's character is a little reminiscent of a silent film villain. Also, the relationship between Chiyo and the Chairman is vaguely pedophiliac, or else I've watched too many reruns of SVU.

In all, an engaging novel.

Temporal Reviews: Old School

Tobias Wolff's first novel, Old School, is of the boys school genre. This novel is about plagarism in advance of artistic goals. The students are all focused on receiving an audience with a famous writer, including Frost, Rand, and Hemingway. The descriptions of these authors is, alone, worth reading the book. What is most delicious is how each author chooses the winning student by completely mis-reading his text.

As a former English major, this is one of the funniest parts of the book. It calls to mind the sad I was caught grossly mis-reading a Dickinson poem in my AmLit class in college. I suggested that "I felt a funeral in my brain" might have been about a headache. To which the teacher responded, "Yes, it does sound like an Excedrin commercial." Oh the humanity! It's nice to see that, at least in Wolff's world, Frost and Rand don't fare much better.

Temporal Reviews: Mother Night

I grabbed Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut after being told this was the novel that I am in one of those ridiculous "which ____ are you?" web-tests. Here is what being Mother Night says about me:

Nobody knows what to believe about you, and you know least of all. You spent most of your time convinced that the ends justify the means, but your means were, well, downright mean! And the end is nigh. Meanwhile all you want is to travel back in time, if not to change, then to just delight in the way it used to be. You are who you pretend to be. Oh yes, you're the great pretender.

Now, while this description might fit me, Mother Night is not really a book you'd want to be modeled after....to think I was thisclose to being Gatsby!!??!!?

Temporal Reviews: Enduring Love

Ian McEwan's Enduring Love is the strange story of a balloon ride gone wrong, and then the stalking that happens after the fact. As always, McEwan's prose is elegant. This style fits the thriller atmosphere of the story rather well, although the sense of impending violence and drama never seems to gain much steam.

Temporal Variations: The World According to Garp

John Irving's The World According to Garp is quite an excellent novel. To the extent Irving purloined his own life and work in the novel is not so interesting to me - that is more the work of graduate students in literature. Since I'm reading for pleasure these days, I was able to enjoy pure escapism in this "biography" of the writer TS Garp.

There is so much to think about in this book: the artist's life, feminism, fidelity/monogamy in relationships, mortality, lust, conventionality, and so on. Any of these topics could be explored in great depth. There is a certain amount of 70s in the handling of many of the issues, particularly in terms of the sexuality and thoughts about feminism. However, this does not make the book dated. Rather, Irving's book is remarkably well-preserved, even to the extent that it includes a transgendered character, when that is still a taboo phenomenon today.

Garp is a wonderful book - rich enough to warrant several re-readings. This is the kind of book that will evoke different responses at each reading. Highly recommended.

Temporal Reviews: The Swimming-Pool Library

The Swimming-Pool Library is British author Alan Hollinghurt's first novel. He has achieved more fame this year due to his winning the Booker. I very much like Hollinghurst's prose style...it's very elegant, yet still passionate. There is also a rawness to the experiences Hollinghurst describes.

In this novel, we are introduced to William Beckwith, an effete aristocrat who leads a rather meaningless life, having random sex and only engaging in aesthetic pursuits and studies when the mood strikes. Through chance, he is introduced to Lord Nantwich, who entreats our young Beckwith to sort through his old journals and write a biography.

We learn about Nantwich's life in Africa during colonization, but Nantwich, a notorious homosexual, left behind only vaguely coded diaries and journal entries. The facts of gay life in the early 20th century, in which Beckwith would be most interested, are only suggested by the diaries.

Unfortunately, there is a "twist" at the end. This twist did not, for this reader, provide the payoff that Hollinghurst clearly intended. Not enough to not recommend the book, but it did distract.

Temporal Reviews: Becoming a Man

Becoming a Man is the National Book Award winning memoir by Paul Monette, and was a landmark text in the literature associated with HIV. This book was, in many ways, the "little book that could," beating out such non-fiction heavyweights as David McCullough for the NBA.

Monette is a fascinating character - shortly after reading this memoir, I saw the documentary about Monette's life. I have always enjoyed his novels...Taking Care of Mrs Carroll, The Longshot, and Halfway Home. This memoir is not only brilliantly written, it is well-suffused with the authors thoughts about being gay, suffering with HIV, and the experience of being "other."

When Monette passed away, literature lost a bright light.

Temporal Reviews: Lives of the Circus Animals

Lives of the Circus Animals is the Lambda Literary Award winning novel by Christopher Bram. I have enjoyed several of Bram's novels, including Father of Frankenstein and Gossip. This novel is reminiscent of an Altman film- a patchwork of characters interrelated, as observed in shifting first person narration and told across seven eventful days in New York.

The novel mostly centers around theatre folk - people whose lives are lived on stage, in some form or another. Several of the characters are actors (to varying levels of success), there is a writer, a critic, and crazed family members.

A great read - Bram is an excellent writer, and this book is enjoyable from first to last.

Temporal Reviews: Testosterone

James Robert Baker's Testosterone is an ok book. I read it thinking I would make it to the film version at the Phoenix Gay Film Fest. The novel was disappointing...very uneven. I can't in good faith recommend it.

Temporal Reviews: Dave Brandstetter Mysteries

So I read some cheesy Dave Brandstetter mysteries by the late Joseph Hansen. I read the first three books in the series: Fadeout, Death Claims, and Troublemaker.

These stories were ground breaking for the time, as they were really among the first of their genre (gay mysteries). In all, they're a little dated, but campy fun. I was drawn to them because of the insurance connection (Dave is an insurance adjuster). These books are good, but the period is a little precious. I am secretly looking forward to reading the rest of them.

Temporal Reviews: Little Children

Tom Perrotta's Little Children is surely one of the best books of last year. The author of Election and Joe College turns his sights on suburban America...specifically the dream of the perfect American family (pre-dating the Desperate Housewives).

The novel concerns the lives of suburbanites: "Prom King" Todd, who spends the novel rebelling against the expectations thrust upon him by his wife to be a responsible adult man; Sarah, the erstwhile bisexual documentary filmmaker who is terrified of her daughter and the traditional turn her life has taken; Richard, her husband consumed by an internet porn fueled fantasy life; and Ronald, the convicted child molester whose release into the community seems to hover over the characters in the novel.

Since I'm doing a dump of books I've read in the past nine months, I won't go into details. But this novel is a must-read. Excellent work.

Temporal Reviews: Toilet

Toilet, of Tom Woolley, is a disturbing little book. Kind of along the lines of Dennis Cooper or JT LeRoy, but much more readable. To be frank, I don't remember much about it (read it a while ago while in the pit for Cosi Fan Tutte), which probably speaks to its relative effect on me (net net - not too much)

Temporal Reviews: What Was She Thinking? (Notes on a Scandal)

Zoe Heller's bitingly funny "What Was She Thinking?" was short-listed for the Booker Prize - quite rightly so. This is a delicious novel...very subversive. On the surface, it is an account of an all too American phenomenon: teacher seduces underage student. Similar to the Mary Kay LeTourneau incident, the teacher involved is female, and the student is male.

The real story, though, is all about the narration. The novel is narrated by the sexpot teacher's "friend," a spinster teacher who has "be-friended" her, and is attempting to write her story ostensibly to stand up for her character, but we learn much more about the narrator.

The narrator is a cleverly disguised, rather closeted lesbian. She has a habit of taking young female teachers under her wing, in a rather Jamesian ploy of mentoring...really it's a sexless, lustless crush. Barbara Covett's attention, always smothering, is always eventually rejected by the young women.

Reading first person narrative from the POV of a narrator so lacking in self-awareness can be used to evoke pathos, as in Ishiguro's "The Remains of the Day," or to evoke black comedy, as in Vonnegut's "Mother Night." Heller's approach is to head for the black comedy. The extent to which the narrator has built up elaborate explorations in order to avoid dealing with her own sexual identity is quite humorous - especially as she attempts to dissect and analyze the sexuality of her "dear friend" Sheba Hart.

Highly recommended

Temporal Reviews: Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason

I read this book thinking I'd want to see the movie. Unfortunately, the book put me right off. There were moments of broad humor, but mostly, the charm of the original book is sorely lacking in this sequel. Bridget in the original found herself in funny situations, or helped make them worse. The kinds of situations most of us could find ourselves in.

In this sequel - a Thai prison?? Please. This was just an ok read. I'd save time and just re-read the original if ever in the mood to wallow in my singleness. Hurrah for the Singletons! But sucks to this sequel.

Temporal Reviews: Primary Colors

I read this book, penned by "Anonymous" (aka Joe Klein currently of Time Magazine) when I went through 90s nostalgia after the election. I wanted to harken back to happier times....Clintons in the White House, Kurt Cobain was still alive, flannel shirts - in, goatees - in, etc. Good times.

This book is a roman a clef about the Clinton presidential campaign. It's quite a page turner, although not really great literature. It's hard to read a book like this and not think that all of the stories are true. I'm not one who expects my leaders to be perfect people. I don't believe something like infidelity in a relationship means that someone will therefore be a bad leader (or even a bad person).

I would much rather have a president that lies about his sex life than a president that lies about issues of national security. That issue makes Primary Colors a quaint trifle in these days of "yellow cake uranium" and "greated as liberators with flowers in the street" and "compassionate conservative" etc etc. I'd take a randy president who likes blow jobs and day of the week over a president that likes to blow things up.

An ok read, but more for nostaligia than anything.