Adam Bede

by George Eliot

"See the difference between the impression a man makes on you when you walk by his side in familiar talk, or look at him in his home, and the figure he makes when seen from a lofty historical level, or even in the eyes of a critical neighbor who thinks of him as an embodied system or opinion rather than as a man."  - George Eliot, Adam Bede



George Eliot's Adam Bede lives in the charming rustic countryside and adheres to a stoic version of the Puritan work ethic. His world is disrupted by both the classic temptation of Eros in the form of the too beautiful Hetty and the dissenting spiritual views of the Methodist preacher Dinah Morris.
The author controls the narrative and lectures the reader as the other characters, brother Seth, Arthur Donnithorne, the Poysers, and the Rector Irwine are intertwined in the the fates of young Hetty and Adam. The novel succeeds in conveying the bucolic charm of the place while almost convincing us of the inevitability of fate. Above all, the characters are interesting and believable. My favorite, the Rector Irwine is notable in his interest in the classics and his disdain of preaching. Hetty Sorrel, the narcissistic young girl is harder to believe or understand, but she certainly has the requisite beauty to catch the eye of the aristocratic young Arthur who lets his emotions hold sway over his reason (insufficiently developed to handle this battle). Rereading this early novel of Eliot suggests the potential that she would fulfill in her later work, particularly Middlemarch.

Adam Bede by George Eliot. Everyman's Library, New York, 1992 (1859)

The Great American Novel

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

“He smiled understandingly-much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles… It faced–or seemed to face–the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor.”

Set on the East Coast in the roaring 20′s, this novel is a classic -- some claim it is the great American novel or at least one of them (Huckleberry Finn and Moby-Dick have been included in this list). If not the best depiction of the American iconic story it is still a great read and it was with heightened anticipation of this that I recently reread this book. That Fitzgerald's novel is a great book is demonstrated by the many layers of meaning and myriad ways that you can interpret the story. One approach is to focus on crime and there is plenty of that to be found in the book including: murder, bootlegging, financial theft, adultery, speeding and fraud to mention many if not all. Another interesting way of looking at the novel is that the real character, Tom Buchanan, dislikable as he may be, triumphs over the fake character of Gatsby. Throughout the novel Gatsby seeks to be something he is not and when his false front crashes there is nothing left. No friends, no possessions, no life. My favorite moments of the book also have to include the sheer poetry of Fitzgerald's writing. This, the narration of Nick Carraway, and all the rest made it a book I enjoyed rereading as much as any in recent memory. From it we learn that often the wanting of something is better than actually having it. Furthermore, one true friend is worth infinitely more than a multitude of acquaintances.


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Flannery O'Connor


The writing style of Flannery O'Connor awakens the reader with its felicity. The author's imagination takes over from there and with Flannery the reader is in for a wild ride.
I have the collection, Flannery O'Connor : Collected Works : Wise Blood / A Good Man Is Hard to Find / The Violent Bear It Away / Everything that Rises Must Converge by Flannery O'Connor , in my library. Wise Blood, her first novel and the first work in this collection, is a gothic take on the world of southern itinerant preachers. Hazel Motes' Church without Christ is a bleakly humorous approach to the whole god/man situation and the psychology portrayal of Motes is worth studying through a rereading of this short work. I cannot remember another work that challenges the modernists view and raises questions in so many different ways. The sad lives of Leonora and Hazel come together in a haunting way following episodes in which Hazel, again and again is treated almost sadistically both by others and himself. The collections of short fiction underscore the ability of O'Connor to surprise and challenge the reader. I find myself returning to her work from time to time just to make sure that my previous readings were not a dream.

Warlock


Yes, this is a book (actually there have been several over the years) that, in spite of some redeeming features, I do not like and would not recommend (consider The Ox-Bow Incident by Bret Harte instead, if you must read a western). In this case, Warlock by Oakley Hall, is a book that I found uninteresting and repetitive in spite of being otherwise well written. Amazingly, it was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1958 when it was originally published.
I say amazingly although I have never been able to determine the basis for the Pulitzer judges' selections and I've found the winners (those that I have read) uneven in quality and readability. Warlock was, however, thought highly enough by the editors at the New York Review Books press to warrant a recent reprinting. And writers as noted as Robert Stone and Thomas Pynchon have sung its' praises.
The novel does have some redeeming features for this reader. As I noted it is well written with a readable style that helped me to persevere in my reading and it has one structural feature that I found appealing: inserted throughout an otherwise straightforward narrative are selections from the "Journals of Henry Holmes Goodpasture". This character and his journals add a personal note and interesting commentary on the events in Warlock. Oh, by the way it is a "western" with all the typical characters and events including a shootout at the (Acme) corral. There is little else I can say about this book other than now I can take pleasure in moving on to other summer reading.

Warlock by Oakley Hall. New York Review Books, New York. 2006 (1958)

The Remains of the Day


I have just read this novel for the second time, having read it in the not so distant past of the mid-nineties shortly after it was published and won the Booker Prize for fiction.
My current reading confirms the reasonableness of that award and reminds me of the felicitous style demonstrated by Kazuo Ishiguro in writing this book. The music of the prose helped make bearable the oppressiveness of the past and the icy gravity of Stevens" approach to his work and his life (the two are interchangeable). Stevens is the narrator of the story and as a butler he demonstrates dedication to his craft that goes above and beyond "a life of service". The price he pays is an inability to relate to other humans with any sort of feeling that goes beyond the formality of his work environment. As is typical of truly good books you can tell a lot from the first page as to what will be important. Ironically, we find reference to both an "expedition" and "imagination" on the opening page; two things that Stevens has never experienced in his life of service. As the story is told looking back from a vantage point near the end of his life it has the flavor of nostalgia, but with that flavor the flatness of a life that is as plain and worn as the sleeve of Steven's butler jacket. While the prose style kept this reader turning the pages I wondered what Stevens new employer, an American named Farraday, saw in this worn out man. Perhaps he saw the humanity that Stevens himself never found.


The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. Alfred A. Knopf, New York. 1989.

Euthyphro


What is piety? We find Socrates in this dialogue under indictment and on his way to the trial. He meets a prophet, Euthyphro, who claims to know the nature of piety and plans to prosecute his father for murder of a slave.
The lines are drawn and we are presented with several definitions of piety as Euthyphro attempts to deal with Socrates' questioning. Do we get a definition that works? No, but we find the struggle itself is one that defines the dilemma of the limits of our knowledge, Humility and respect for these limits are the gifts bestowed to the attentive reader - Euthyphro leaves unbowed.



Five Dialogues: Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Meno, Phaedo by Plato. G. M. A. Grube, trans. Hackett Publishing, Indianapolis. 2002.

The Misanthrope



The spirit of Moliere was alive at the Theater on the Lake yesterday evening. Thanks to a lively and talented production of The Misanthrope by Greasy Joan and Co., we were treated to an evening of witty dialogue and outrageously over-the-top comedic performances.
All of which led to contagious laughter that erupted throughout the audience all night. First, credit must go to the genius of Moliere who, when presented with the requisite verve and thespian expertise, still inspires audiences more than three hundred years after his death. Secondly, and no less important the production depended on the direction of Libby Ford and the acting of the whole troupe, but especially the central couple of Kate Cares as Celimene and Kevin Cox (who recently has been performing in an outstanding production of Macbeth - what a breadth of acting skill he has!) as Alceste. The supporting cast was excellent also in moving the comedic action forward to ever greater heights. Of particular note was both the comic pacing and excellent diction of the entire cast in their presentation of the poetic English translation. The evening provided a welcome respite from some of heavier dramatic fare I have been attending in recent months.

Oedipal Cinema

Savage Grace
a film directed by Tom Kalin

"One of the uses of money is that it allows us not to live with the consequences of our mistakes." - Antony Baekeland
One of the current films at the Landmark Century Cinema is an adaptation of a true story titled Savage Grace. This is the story of the beautiful and charismatic Barbara Daly (played convincingly by Julianne Moore, whose performance in Far From Heaven was one of the best I have ever seen), who married above her class to Brooks Baekeland (searingly portrayed by Stephen Dillane), heir to the Bakelite plastics fortune.
The film, based on the book by Natalie Robins,  is narrated by Eddie Redmayne playing the role of their only child Antony; he is a failure in his father's eyes, and as he matures he develops gradually from a beautiful boy with doting mother to handsome young homosexual whose escapades do not receive his mother's approval. She attempts to cure him with disastrous consequences as he slowly slides into madness, a separate universe of his own making (interesting ironic touch in his use of 'backwards writing' in his journal modeled after Leonardo da Vinci). The film documents both the oedipal struggles of young Eddie alongside his father's weakness as a man incapable of handling what remained of the family fortune. Through it all Barbara seems on the edge balanced between both unfulfilled erotic and artistic dreams. The director, Tom Kalin, effectively portrays the world of the wealthy who manage to elegantly while away their life doing nothing. It is a thought provoking film for those who ponder the state of oedipal desires at the end of the twentieth century.

A Taste of Honey

Still exciting fifty years after its London debut in 1958, A Taste of Honey by Shelegh Delaney is a gritty realistic drama that must have truly been dynamite on the stage in the fifties. I still remember the stir created by the film adaptation of this drama touching on issues of premarital sex, interracial marriage and homosexuality that was released three years later. It was partly my memory of this film that encouraged me to explore the current production by Shattered Globe Theatre.
Centering on the tumultuous relationship of daughter and mother, Jo and Helen, the play chronicles the events of about a year in their lives. The production last night was excellent in spite of minor technical problems that, fortunately, did not detract from the fine acting. I particularly enjoyed the lead performances of Linda Reiter as Helen (I have fond memories of her past performances in Suddenly, Last Summer and Arcadia); Helen Sadler as Jo, who was convincing in her search for love; and Kevin Viol as Geof, whose character brought some touching tenderness into Jo's life. Shattered Globe's production at the Victory Gardens Greenhouse Theater is a worthy revival of this now classic drama from the fifties.

Protagoras


Seldom does Socrates meet his match when engaging in dialogue, but Protagoras is able to hold his own once he decides to engage Socrates rather than orate. This occurs following the encouragement of Alcibiades when they take up the question of virtue and its constituent parts (349b-354e).
When pressed by Socrates to admit that "the most confident are the most courageous" and thus that wisdom is courage, Protagoras makes a stand and reminds Socrates that "When I was asked if the courageous are confident, I agreed. I was not asked if the confident are courageous. If you had asked me that, I would have said, 'Not all of them.'" (350c) The typical word games that lead most of Socrates' interlocutors to their doom are not enough to trap Protagoras. Earlier in the dialogue Protagoras seems to view the event as a 'contest' and while Socrates does not share that view, it does seem that during this interchange it is a reasonable view that the participants are somewhat evenly matched.
Protagoras had previously briefly succeeded in persuading Socrates to engage in poetic interpretation (339a-349a). That attempt ended in a demonstration of the difficulties in determining the truth when the speaker (in this case the Poet) was not present. The return to the dialogue offered more success through engaging in the dialectical method. However, we still did not seem to be making much progress toward an answer to the question of whether virtue is teachable.


Protagoras by Plato. Stanley Lombardo & Karen Bell, trans. Hackett Publishing, Indianapolis. 1992.

Pudd'nhead Wilson

Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example. - Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar

Mark Twain wrote four books featuring the Mississippi River and based in part on his home town of Hannibal, Missouri. Among these is what some consider the greatest American novel, Huckleberry Finn; also Tom Sawyer and Life on the Mississippi; but the last and least read of the four is a comic gem, Pudd'nhead Wilson. Twain was always fascinated by themes of twin hood and exchanged identity. Earlier in his career he wrote a fantasy, The Prince and the Pauper, that was a favorite of mine in my youth and explores the theme of exchanged identity. But in 1894, twelve years after that novel and ten years after Huckleberry Finn, he returned to the Mississippi with publication of The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson and the Comedy of Those Extraordinary Twins. The book was published at a low point in his personal and business life as he succumbed to personal bankruptcy upon his return from a trip to Paris in that year having previously suffered a bout with pneumonia (in 1892) while his family was also ailing. The comic inspiration of Pudd'nhead Wilson betrays none of these travails but adds to the reputation of Twain the great American humorist.

Last night I enjoyed a dramatic adaptation of this novel produced by City Lit Theater. Terry McCabe and Brian Pastor, the Artistic and Managing Directors, respectively, of City Lit adapted the novel for the stage and Terry McCabe directed it. The performance was engaging especially in conveying the humor and wit of Twain's novel. I particularly enjoyed the Italian twins, played by Dan Howard and Craig J. Newman, who demonstrated timing and ability to create humorous moments that for brief moments literally 'stole the show'. The difficult central roles of Wilson and Tom (Kingsley Day and Ehren Fournier, respectively) were also handled extremely well. Overall it was a delightful evening of theater buoyed by the wit of Mark Twain and the production of City Lit Theater.

What I Saw

Not what I saw, but the wonderful selection of essays by Joseph Roth collected as What I Saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-1933. In this selection of "reports" by the novelist and journalist Joseph Roth, best known for his masterpiece The Radetzky March, we are presented with a picture of the Weimar Republic through the eyes of one of the finest writers of the twentieth century. Roth was a young foreign correspondent for various newspapers, only twenty-six years old, when the earliest of these pieces was written. During the period he would also write some of the novels that have brought him posthumous fame.

The reports in this selection chronicle the underside of Berlin including Jewish immigrants, criminals and others. There are 34 pieces organized by topics such as Displaced Persons, Bourgeoisie and Bohemians, Berlin's Pleasure Industry and Look Back in Anger. In the essay "The Kurfurstendamm" he writes, "In the evening I walk along the Kurferstendamm. I slink along the walls like a dog. I am on my own, but I have a certain sense that destiny has me on a leash. . . . And so the Kurfurstendamm stretches out endlessly day and night. Also, it's being renovated. These two facts need to be emphasized, because of the way it's continually ceding particles of its true self to its designated cultural-historical role."

It is the essay of the last section, "The Auto-da-Fe of the Mind" that resonates in my memory looking back on my reading of this book. Let me quote:
"Let me say it loud and clear: The European mind is capitulating. It is capitulating out of weakness, out of sloth, out of apathy, out of lack of imagination . . . Now, as the smoke of our burned books rises into the sky, we German writers of Jewish descent must acknowledge above all that we have been defeated."

The essays in this book ring loud and clear over the decades and they bring home to the twenty-first century a sense of the life and decay of the era witnessed by Joseph Roth.


What I Saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-1933 by Joseph Roth. Michael Hofmann, trans. W. W. Norton & Company, New York. 2003 (1996)

Erich Wolfgang Korngold

Today is the birth anniversary of Erich Wolfgang Korngold who was born in Czechoslovakia 111 years ago on this day. He was an amazing composer with a Piano Trio and Sonata for Violin and Piano completed by age 15. He would go on to compose operas, lieder, a Symphony, and concertos for both Piano and Violin. His opus 2 Sonata for Piano was championed by Artur Schnabel. He began composing for Hollywood at the request of Max Reinhardt in 1934 and in 1938 moved permanently due to the political changes in his homeland. His music was from the beginning the epitome of high romanticism and his film scores were some of the greatest for films like Anthony Adverse, The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Prince and the Pauper, The Sea Hawk, and Deception. He won two academy awards for his scores but in the late forties returned to "classical" music with the creation of such works as his Violin Concerto (premiered by Jascha Heifetz) and the Symphony in F#. I find Korngold's music invigorating in its intense harmonies and vigorous melodies.

Bookworks

One of my favorite pastimes is browsing in used bookstores and, sometimes (often) buying good books. One of the best bookstores I have found is Bookworks on North Clark Street in Chicago (near Wrigley Field). The owners, Bob and Ronda, both friendly and knowledgeable, are welcoming to all. I've been going there for longer than I can remember and have fond memories of buying and selling (when I can part with a book) books over the years. Their offerings are of uniformly high quality especially for readers interested in good literature and I am seldom disappointed since I usually find something on my list. If they do not have the specific book for which I am looking there are always more fine alternate choices than my budget can afford. This time of the year they annually offer their books at sale prices making them even more attractive. In the past I've taken my sister and her husband (also book lovers) to visit Bookworks when they are in Chicago and recommend it to my friends when they are looking for a good book. I can only conclude with the recommendation that all book lovers should visit Bookworks and partake of the fine wine of literature they offer.

Protagoras


Continuing my reading of Protagoras I find myself questioning the nature of the dialogue itself. Is it a work of art? If the answer is yes, then does that effect the roles of the "performers"? After meeting Protagoras and engaging in some introductory discussion we are presented with a story and his argument that "virtue is teachable" in the form of a long speech by Protagoras (320d-328d). This is followed by questions from Socrates. Interestingly, Socrates praises Protagoras' oratorical skills, but finds "one small obstacle" to the complete explication of the understanding of the "practice by which the good become good". Needless to say, this small obstacle becomes a major difficulty in going forward in the dialogue, when several paragraphs later Protagoras becomes frustrated with Socrates and refuses to limit the length of his answers in the "verbal contest" that is underway. This raises a further question in that the two performers have different agendas. Protagoras is interested in winning "the contest" while Socrates seems to be attempting to demonstrate the possibility (or impossibility) of teaching virtue or the good. This difference provides for real drama constituting a work of art. Some of the onlookers join the discussion providing suggestions and support for either side, while demonstrating their own respective characters.

The dialogue is rejoined as new rules are agreed upon for continuing. The questions remain both whether progress toward determining the possibility of teaching the good and whether the audience will continue to revel in the challenge of the debate. One wonders also what Socrates young friend, Hippocrates, is learning from the artistic performance.


Protagoras by Plato. Stanley Lombardo & Karen Bell, trans. Hackett Publishing, Indianapolis. 1992.

The Good Soldier


An impressionistic masterpiece? A tragedy or a comedy? This novel, published in 1915, from the pen of Ford Madox Ford is unique enough to have been described by its critics as all of the preceding and more. Subtitled "A Tale of Passion", it is unique both in my experience and within the author's total work. The story is narrated by an American, John Dowell, who invites the reader to sit down with him beside the fire of his study to listen to the "saddest story" he has ever known. The story, set during the decade preceding the Great War, while sad for some of the participants is truly sad only in the ironic sense of the word. The characters are not particularly likable or sympathetic. Considering that, it is counter intuitive, but the reader is spurred on to read the novel by the precision and the beauty of the prose and the intrigue within the story. The narrative unfolds in a mosaic-like way with a traversal of the narrator's memory back and forth over the nine year period that is covered. When complete, the tale is ended perfectly much as it begins. The result is a beautiful small novel that ranks high in this reader's experience.


The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion by Ford Madox Ford. Everyman's Library, New York. 1991 (1915).

Quiet as the Dew

Emily Dickinson


She went as quiet as the dew
From a familiar flower.
Not like the dew did she return
At the accustomed hour….

It seems appropriate on the anniversary of Emily Dickinson’s funeral, held on this day in 1886, that I devote some brief comments in her memory. Having lived more than fifty-five years with hundreds of poems to her name, many on the subject of death, her life ended. The funeral went according to her wishes: a robe of white flannel, only a few of her closest friends and family attending the home service, the white casket taken by six of the family's Irish men servants out the back door, through the barn and across the fields to the family plot. At the service, Thomas Wentworth Higginson read one of Dickinson’s favorite poems, Emily Brontë’s "No Coward Soul is Mine"; sister Vinnie put a bunch of violets, two heliotropes and a pink orchid in the casket, for Emily "to take to Judge Lord." The famous "Called Back" epitaph on Dickinson’s second, current tombstone was chosen by niece Martha Dickinson Bianchi; Dickinson had enjoyed Hugh Conway’s popular novel Called Back, published a few years earlier, and she had used the phrase in her last letter. A writer to the end, we now continue to enjoy her poetic immortality.

And another ...


There is no frigate like a bookTo take us lands away,Nor any coursers like a pageOf prancing poetry.his traverse may the poorest take
without oppress of toll;How frugal is the chariotThat bears a human soul!

Philosophical Thoughts

Pensees

by Pascal






It is difficult to decide what to say upon reading The Pensees of Blaise Pascal. The fragments, some resembling aphorisms with a few extending to several pages of prose, were left disorganized and unedited at Pascal's death.
Readers have pondered over The Pensees (literally thoughts) ever since trying to interpret them and discern some semblance of a world view from them. In my reading I also tried to comprehend the fragmentary comments and found the views of Monsieur Pascal, to the extent that I understand them, to be foreign to my own views of life. For Pascal the human condition is wretched with man's reason a frail thing on which life ultimately cannot depend. The overwhelming importance of such concepts as immortality and original sin imbue his world view with a supernatural and other-worldly outlook that is difficult to reconcile with reality. Perhaps his personal physical ailments were the source of his view that man in general shared his hatred of the human body.
Of the many thinkers who have contemplated Pascal over the years since his Pensees were left to us in 1670, Voltaire expresses thoughts close to my own when he says, "Nature does not make us unhappy all the time. Pascal always speaks like a sick man who wants the entire world to suffer."(Philosophical Letters, "Twenty-fifth Letter, On Mr. Pascal's Pensees"). For Pascal unhappiness is our lot, the corruption of the body is complete and irredeemable, self esteem is to be abhorred, god's thoughts are impenetrable and yet, we would be better off if we accept the wager that he does exist. Well I, for one, neither accept Mr. Pascal's worldview nor his wager. I look forward to continued wonder at the mysteries of existence and I celebrate the continuing progress that, weak as we may be, we humans produce with our reason.


Pensees and other writings by Blaise Pascal. Oxford University Press, New York. 1995.

The Grass is Singing


While the title of Doris Lessing's early novel, published in 1950, sounds rather lyrical the story is anything but that. This is the story of Mary and Richard Turner, who farm the land in South Africa in the forties when apartheid is the rule. Mary is an intelligent woman who makes a a fateful choice in Richard for her husband. Living with Richard, who is ineffectual and unsuited to the life of farming, soon leads Mary to depression. She grows progressively bitter and takes her frustration out on the black servants that help run the farm. In spite of the darkness of the story, a tragedy that verges close to melodrama, the writing of the author in her first novel is lucid and imaginative. Lessing plumbs the psychology of Mary's depression and her marriage with Richard effectively, building suspense all the while even though the reader knows the outcome from the first page. It is the prose of Doris Lessing and the clarity of the structure of her novel that makes this one of the best first novels that I have ever read.


The Grass is Singing by Doris Lessing. Perennial Classic by HarperCollins, New York. 2000 (1950)

Shakespeare

Chicago is fortunate to have many fine theater companies. Last night I attended a production of Macbeth by one of those companies, Greasy Joan and Co. Their production of Macbeth, directed by Julieane Ehre, was performed in contemporary dress with a simple but effective stage representing "a fantastical world of 'the future'". The emphasis was on the growth of tyrannical power, and as the evening wore on and the murders accumulated the power of Macbeth seemed to increase, that is until the denouement when he and his power collapse quickly with the suicide of Lady Macbeth and his death. While the acting of the leads was effective, all of the parts of the play did not seem to cohere. The emphasis on the tyranny and brute force overshadowed the impact of the psychological forces at work, while the omnipresent spirits/witches were difficult to reconcile with the futuristic setting of the tale. In spite of this there were some impressive moments of theater, especially the scene with Banquo's ghost that effectively opened the second part of the performance. Overall it was an engaging evening of theater with a somewhat flawed performance of one of the greatest tragedies in the repertoire.

Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Performed by Greasy Joan & Co.

Waiting for the Barbarians


A visionary novel by J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians is challenging with a lucid style and deceptive simplicity. It is an allegory of a place that seems familiar yet cannot be identified with any specificity. The protagonist, known as the Magistrate of the local outpost of the Empire, tells a story of the Barbarians poised on the edge of the Empire waiting. The story suggests conflict, yet there are no battle scenes. The Empire seems as amorphous as the threat from the Barbarians. There are even moments that seem Kafkaesque in their sheer surrealness.
The primary details of the story center on the relationship between the Magistrate and a young blind girl, a barbarian who begs for her survival. The Magistrate takes her in and the relationship that develops between them mirrors the growing dissatisfaction of the Magistrate with the Empire. He eventually takes action that will have significant consequences for his life, leading to lessons about freedom, justice, and the meaning of life within the Empire. The climax of the novel is powerful in the sense that principles are powerful in the lives of humans. The allegory is effective and the story is masterful. It is not surprising that Coetzee won the Booker Prize for this novel.


Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee. Penguin Books, New York. 1999 (1980)

Opera and the Morbidity of Music

In spite of the title of this retrospective collection of essays, Opera and the Morbidity of Music by Joseph Kerman, the author presents a forceful and eloquent argument that opera and classical music in general is neither morbid nor moribund. He is successful through nuanced and informed writing and the use of a structure in which a group of musical themes is highlighted much like those of a Bach fugue. Kerman quotes Charles Rosen, " It is never the theme that is the central interest but the way the theme is embedded in the polyphonic structure" (p. 81). Thus the essays take on this aspect of music and in doing so become more than their individual essayist parts. There is an ebb and flow to the collection that charmed this reader with references to musical memories and suggestions for future listening and reading. The breadth of the essays spans centuries of music and multiplicities of musical form while frequently narrowing the focus to specific composers. Over the course of thirty essays covering both the familiar (Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Wagner) and the unfamiliar (Byrd, Monteverdi and program notes), the life of music is reviewed from baroque to the present. The whole is lively and intelligent, both informative and accessible for the general reader.

Opera and the Morbidity of Music by Joseph Kerman. New York Review Books, 2008.