For Whom Does the Bell Toll?

Why, for you, dear reader! Yes, that's creepy, but it's true!

Seriously, though, this one was okay. It was my favorite Hemingway (and also my last; coincidence?), but that isn't really saying all that much. I was more of a Pilar fan than a Maria fan. I appreciated the ending. It was pretty compelling, and I do love a good story about the consequences of fascism and how violence warps us.

That said, what stood out for me the most was how annoying the Spanish was. There would be something literally like, que caballo! What a horse!, or no me gusta, I don't like it, and you'd think, why put the very easy, Spanish 101 Spanish throughout the story and follow it my an English translation? Is that really what all that French has been in these novels that I just skip because I am too lazy to Babel Fish it? Maybe I haven't been missing anything all these years! Truly, all you need is je detest John Tesh to get by.

Hey, Jude

Don't make it bad. Take a sad song, and make it better. Yes, pretty much the whole time I read Jude the Obscure, I had that song in my head. Oh, well. I have very conflicted feelings about Thomas Hardy (though I did like Tess of the D’Urbervilles, though it was triggering).

I was actually grooving with this one for awhile. It was moving along, and it was pretty interesting. Sue started out as a really interesting character, but by the end I pretty much hated her. Still, at first I was really enjoying the complexity of her relationship with Jude, and enjoying that they both had passions and intellectual lives that were their own. While some of the issues it explores are timeless/still relevant, it is very much of a specific historical moment, in terms of gender roles and divorce. It addresses a time of immense, albeit subtle/suppressed upheaval; well, I guess verge of upheaval.

The novel explores a number of issues, but the main guiding issue is the idea that "the word kills," referring to societal norms, law, values, and roles, as well as religion and religious believes. Sue particularly chafes under these words, but Jude is the one who ultimately is crushed. That said, near the end I really just wanted to knock Sue over the head.

Arabella is a bit of an interesting character as well. She would be interesting for a re-write from her perspective. I didn't exactly like her, but she is fascinating, and I think we're likely more sympathetic to her than Hardy's contemporaries were.

Fortunately, I did not have Meg Manning's challenge when I read The Sun Also Rises. Mind you, I'm not a Hemingway fan (you can tell I grabbed both of these while wondering in the library and picking books that were close together alphabetically speaking), and this didn't change my mind. But I found it overall painless, despite my lack of interest in bull fights. I was struck by how much time the characters spent drunk, and how understanding and relating to being drunk likely would make the book make more sense. Oh, well.

Pacing

Clearly, many factors impact how much someone enjoys a book. Everything from genre, literary style, plot, characters, etc. plays a role. However, I think that one factor typically gets overlooked: pacing of reading. Some of this, I'm sure, varies person to person, so the following thoughts likely really only apply to me. That said, the pace with which I read a book certainly shapes my perception of the book, at least to a certain extent.

Some books may be best if you can luxuriate in them, taking your time, savoring each page. I remember that there were parts of The Ground Beneath Her Feet where I just had to stop reading and relish the previous passage. On the flip side, I read The Joke in a few short, intense bursts over the course of one afternoon. Being so intensely in the moment with the book increased my enjoyment in that case.

I tend to read books in two ways, depending on whether I start it on a Sunday or Monday, or if I start it on a Tuesday. If I start it on S or M, I usually read it very quickly, generally in one day. If I start it during my work week, I might take the whole of the work week to finish it. In some cases it likely matters less, but regardless, it does impact my experience of the book. I'm reading The Sun Also Rises more slowly than To Have and Have Not, and it's much more enjoyable (it's also a better book, but still, for me I need some breathing room with Hemingway). In other cases, dragging out a book just makes it painful (say, The Corrections).

Regardless of how long it takes me to read a book, I'm always glad with the serial novels that I am not stuck waiting for the next installment. If I had to wait months for the next chapters of each and every Dickens' novel, I'd go crazy.

Oops, We're Getting a Little Ahead of Ourself

You know those days where you're like, wow, I am being so productive! I've done everything that I planned to do, and I still have time to spare before I have to be at that thing this evening.

But then you realize, oh shoot, I completely forget that I had to run to the bank and grocery store, that thing starts half an hour earlier than I thought it did, and I forgot that we sprang forward for daylight saving time, so I am actually running really, really behind!

That sort of happened to me with the list project. I was feeling really great. I've read quite a few books now, and I've been tackling some of the more difficult authors, genres, and texts. I've even been doing pretty well with tackling authors with many books on the list. I'm done with Austen (everything she wrote is on the list!) and Morrison. I only have three more Dickens to go, and he has ten on this list! And then, then I remembered that the other most common author on the list is J.M. Coetzee, who also has ten books on the list. Of which I have only read one, and I didn't like it.

So, working through his works (no pun intended) is my next major task. Le sigh.

I read Elizabeth Costello over the weekend (she actually appears, and annoys if you ask me, in the other book of his that I read). It's a very odd little book. It is essentially about various lectures/talks that she gives since she is a writer/lecturer, and the context surrounding those talks (and then her chat with St. Peter at the Pearly Gates, I kid you not). It's disjointed, intentionally, and very, very philosophical. One talk is all about vegetarianism and the question of what separates humans from animals (and if the answer is nothing significant or super meaningful, then is eating meat essentially murder), and one talk is all about the problem of evil and its relationship to literature. Or something like that. Truly, it's as fun as it sounds.

I also read To Have and Have Not, because Hemingway also appears on the list several times. Being a Bogart/Bacall fan, I have of course seen the movie many, many, many times. I also knew, also of course, that the book and movie have virtually nothing in common (for example, the movie is very good, the book, not so much; even Hemingway thought so). The best thing about the book is the title, which the movie took (along with the names of two characters and one seen, and really nothing else).

I've really got nothing to say about this book. I do wonder why it made it on the list, but mostly it made me want to watch the movie. That and Dark Passage. Not such a good movie, but I haven't seen it in a really long time. Or Key Largo. That's a good movie. I think I need to have a Bogart/Bacall fest sometime soon.

If You're Happy and You Know it Clap Your Hands

I have now finished the pantheon of Toni Morrison novels on the list. I’m actually rather sad. Bluest Eye, the first I read, is not a favorite, but from Beloved on (Song of Solomon, now Jazz, and to a lesser extent Sula), I have come to absolutely adore Toni Morrison.

Ultimately, I think most of her works are about love, not in a goopy, romance novel way AT ALL, but in all the rich complexity, all the ecstasy, all the pain, all the wonder, and all the hate of the many, many types of love (including self love and self hatred, and the justice that is what love looks like in public), and Jazz epitomizes that for me.

I have a weakness for novels that use other art forms to help structure their story (one of my two favorite books, God of Small Things, mirrors a Kathekali dance). I particularly like the solo improvisations in Jazz. Morrison is just masterful in the way that she uses jazz to enhance and maintain the force of the novel; it doesn’t feel even remotely artificial or gimmicky.

My favorite quote comes at the end (the last two paragraphs, essentially): I envy them their public love. I myself have only known it in secret, shared in secret and longed, aw longed to show it – to be able to say out loud what they have no need to say at all: That I have loved only you, surrendered my whole self reckless to you and nobody else. That I wanted you to love me back and show it to me. . . But I can’t say that aloud; I can’t tell anyone that I have been waiting for this all my life and that being chosen to wait is the reason I can. If I were able I'd say it. Say make me, remake me. You are free to do it and I am free to let you.

The declarative, linearity of Hemingway’s novel, Farewell to Arms, ways a strange experience after so many non-linear ones. I feel like I should have something to say about this. Hmm. It probably hurts that I’ve read several (yes, I am running behind; my bad). Let’s see. What happened in this novel.

I recall being annoyed at the one head nurse, thinking Keira Knightley should play the female lead if they do another movie version anytime soon, liking the fact that it ends tragically, and wanting to go to Italy. That’s really it. This is pretty terrible. I should remember more. I mean, I remember the main theme (the tragic nonsensical nature of war, individual tragedy/human suffering in the context of this suffering of humanity), but I’m not sure death in childbirth (which sort of isn’t necessarily all that connected to war) is the best way to show that. But hey, that could just be me.

Books vs. Movies

Serious Spoiler Alert for The Big Sleep, Casino Royale, and Rebecca.

Conventional wisdom suggests that the book is superior to the film adaptation. While I agree this is typically the case (cough The Black Cauldron cough), there are certainly exceptions (To Have and Have Not, undoubtedly, but personally I enjoy the HP films more than the books). I’m not interested in cases where there isn’t one version that is clearly better, but where the different versions have different strengths. Many of the list books have film adaptations. Unfortunately, the films I’ve seen and the books I’ve read do not match up too well, but here are some thoughts.

The Big Sleep.
If I had to choose one over the other, the film would win. Bogart and Bacall absolutely sizzle in this one. There a spark that To Have and Have Not has over Big Sleep, and a depth to their relationship in Key Largo, but their chemistry in Big Sleep is in a class by itself. My main complaint about the book is, of course, that they don’t have as much of a relationship. Vivian and Phil are not a couple at all, really. Mona Mars even gets one of the best scenes, thus eliminating the scene when Phil tells Vivian that he didn’t know they still made them that good (and oh, Bacall, they don’t now; it’s sad). Mona is even the woman Phil is thinking about at the end. It’s just wrong. But, the book did help clear up all of my confusion about why Geiger did what he did and why Mr. Sternwood hired Marlow in the first place; what can I say, I’m a bit slow when it comes to noir. Vivian, Carmen, and Phil also have a more interesting dynamic in the book, since Carmen doesn’t have to be redeemed at all. She’s a much darker character, and I like it that way. My favorite scene in the book is missing in the movie (and wouldn’t work in the movie while still keeping my favorite movie scene, so I guess I have to live with that), and it shows Carmen at her rawest. It’s positively terrifying. So, there are definite tradeoffs. I really do not understand, though, why they don’t have Vivian married to Sean in the movie like she is in the book (though his name is Rusty in that). Don’t get that change at all.

Casino Royale.
Again, movie wins hands down. Vesper is just an infinitely more awesome character in the movie. Vesper and Bond therefore have a much more interesting, and I would argue believable, relationship. Vesper in the book is almost your average Bond girl and she doesn’t do anything for me, really. That being said, SMERSH is works much better as the villain in the book; the Russian set up makes much more sense. I also like that Vesper commits suicide in the book. Finally, I think Baccarat is more fun than Poker. So, no contest, but the book is worth checking out and does have some things I like better than the film. It probably goes without saying, but I’m talking about the Daniel Craig film; I’ve never seen the first one.

Rebecca
I’ve always had a soft spot for Joan Fontaine. However, the book wins out for me with this one. The lead works better if you are in her head; she comes off as awfully simpering in the movie; in the book, she’s at least marginally interesting. The real reason the book is superior, in my opinion at least, though, is that the death of Rebecca makes so much more sense than in the film. It’s supremely ridiculous in the movie: “I was upset, and then she just kind of died.” Really, movie? Really? In the book, he’s a murderer! It’s awesome. Whether it’s the movie or the book, though, Rebecca kind of bugs. I am obviously not cut out to be a gothic heroine. “Thanks for telling me that’s not how Mrs. de Winter used to do things; I’ll just file that away in the completely irrelevant column. I am curious, though: what time of day did she write up help-wanted ads? I think I’m in the market for a new housekeeper.”

There are several that I should probably see the movie version, since the movie is almost more famous than the book (Dr. Zhivago, The French Lieutenant’s Woman, American Psycho, The Cider House Rules, The English Patient). We’ll see. I’m particularly interested in seeing the first two, since I don’t understand how they could work as films without messing with important aspects of the novels.