3 Notorious Beat Books...

Three Beat Boys:

The Beat generation has received renewed interest as of late. This post will look at three of it's celebrated members:

Jack Kerouac in New York City.

Jack Kerouac (above), William Burroughs (bottom, left) and Allen Ginsberg (bottom, right) were the cornerstones of the Beat Generation. 

Kerouac was the poster-boy of this post-war American subculture. His seminal work On the Road, that will be reviewed above, embodied the spirit of the subculture. It is referred to as the 'Beat bible'. On the Road is heading for the big screen this summer, with Francis Ford Coppola as a producer.

 Burroughs, often referred to as the godfather of the beat generation, was the most innovative beat novelist, often experimenting with new styles and developing different genres. In his most celebrated work, Naked Lunch,  Burroughs employs the cut-up technique, something Burroughs created, improved and eventually perfected.

Allen Ginsberg was a 'jazz poet'. Some of his noticeable works are Howl, Kaddish and America. He was the most political beat, often striving for a more politically aware movement, rather than the arguably apolitical, even anti-political, position that characterized the Beat generation.

Post 9/11 US Fiction: Don DeLillo and Jonathan Safran Foer

Theodor Adorno once claimed that to write poetry after Auschwitz was barbaric. He later rescinded this ideal, claiming that ‘perennial suffering has as much right to expression as a tortured man has to scream’.  Adorno was concerned that attempts to artistically interpret or even condemn Auschwitz would be callous, and at the same time, success at such an attempt would be futile.

The same has inexorably been said about art (especially fiction) after 9/11. I have recently read two books that deal with 9/11 in very contrasting ways. The first was Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, and the second was Don DeLillo’s Falling Man. Foer’s attempt is different as it seemingly adopts 9/11 as a principal theme, and is excessively referential to the event. The plot is strange and simple, a boy named Oscar, who loses his father in the terrorist attacks on September 11^th 2001, finds a key left by his father and searches New York for whatever it may open, meeting a variety of people who have also suffered and thereby forming relationships built on their mutual anguish.

Oscar is overwhelmingly precocious and is increasingly unlikeable. Foer seems to ask the reader to forgive Oscar’s apparent arrogance and obnoxiousness due to his ever-present melancholy. However, I couldn’t look past how unlikeable he was; page by page I grew increasingly irritated by this 9 year old child. I think what I disliked most was how the author was perpetually referring all of Oskar’s exploits back to the horror of his father’s death, and unfortunately, this didn’t allow the story to expand, or Oskar to become more agreeable.

I think the main problem with Foer’s attempt was that it dealt with 9/11 head on; it appeared too romantic due to the sweet young boy who prevailed through his torment and overcame his fears and trepidations despite the horror of the event. It almost played on 9/11 as a certain way to capture it’s readers, and although this was seemingly a smart move (it sold many copies and was made into a truly awful feature film); in literary terms, the book is over romantic, glorified and ultimately dull.

DeLillo’s attempt is a far more accessible and likeable piece of literature. DeLillo is a more experienced writer and the theme of terrorism has appeared in his works before, especially Players and Mao II (Both excellent books). He has even been called prophetic as he eerily wrote in Players that ‘to Pammy the towers didn’t seem permanent’.

Falling Man begins in the towers, where he claims one can hear the ‘buckling rumble of the fall, this is the world now’. It follows the aftermath of the event, through the lives of a New York couple (Keith and Lianne) who rekindle a past romance. It looks at how their lives have been effected without the over romantic aspects that Foer uses, rather it is quite laconic and only deals with 9/11 intermittently, usually in the characters psychology or through the emotions inspired by a performance artist who hangs from buildings, representing the titular photograph that was famous after the attacks, the Falling Man. (Interestingly, this picture (above, left) also plays a rather significant part in Foer's novel)

By avoiding perpetual reference to 9/11, DeLillo is able to form a far stronger plot and develop more likeable characters that you are genuinely sympathetic towards. This is not to say I had no sympathy for Oskar, but rather he was far more enigmatic and therefore tougher to engage with, and was ultimately, and bear in mind these are fictional stories, tiresome.

I think perhaps what I took from reading these two books, was that in order to engage in such tragic events, the author must attempt to avoid permanent reference to the event, and while it can form the core of the story (in fact if this is part of the plot that would be almost inextricable), playing on the collective emotions that derive from such a horrific event can lead to a novel that is vapid, over-romantic and cheap.

DeLillo gets the balance just right, he deals with the event but also develops a story outside of it, a story in which the event is in the background, permanently installed in the mindset of his characters but not unavoidably driven by it. I would recommend Falling Man and most of DeLillo’s other works, he is an extremely talented contemporary writer, and one of the few that I would entrust to attempt the ostensibly insurmountable task of literature after September 11^th.

5 iconic covers for parts of Remembrance of Things Past through various Publishers

Marcel Proust – Swann’s Way (Part One of Remembrance of Things Past)

Marcel Proust’s masterpiece Remembrance of Things Past, or In Search of Lost Time, is renowned for both its size (3500 pages) and it’s seemingly effortless prose. I began part one, entitled Swann’s Way, this week with very little information about the author, and indeed the novel itself, and was pleasantly surprised from the first page. The vocabulary is exquisite and the prose itself is perhaps the most diligent and fastidious I have ever encountered, in the sense that it is difficult but ever-so rewarding.

Within the first one hundred pages the reader is encapsulated and in awe with the novel. The ‘episode of the Madeleine’, a sequence that I read unaware of its salient notoriety, was quite frankly astonishing. So astonishing in fact, that upon reading these two or three pages, I had made several notes, destroyed the page with ink, and quickly told one or two interested literary partisans about this rather brief passage.

This may seem slightly hyperbolic, but it really is marvellous. And while I am evidently drawing particular attention to these few pages, I certainly have no criticisms of the rest of the book, as it follows, more or less, in the same fashion.

What is so wonderful about the book is that the plot is noticeably ordinary. There is little action, very few likeable characters and the technique of ‘involuntary memory’ which is employed, doesn’t offer the reader intense emotion or collective tragedy, but this in itself is irrelevant. In fact, all this stands as a testament to the beauty of Proust’s work. From an outside perspective, to describe what the book is about, all 500 pages of this first part, would surely defer readers, as very little actually happens, but this certainly should not be the case. Proust is a superb author, and the mildness and vapidity of the text actually complements the brilliant writing.  It is slow, and at times difficult, but all this serves to highlight the sheer virtuosity of Proust’s work.It is exceptionally colourful and descriptive, and for such a seemingly ordinary storyline it has a way of truly encapsulating its readership.

This book is quite distinctive. If anything, it reminds me slightly of Nikolai Gogol’s Dead Souls, the comparison being that Gogol’s plot was seemingly ordinary yet still truly captivating, only Proust’s work is missing the element of intrigue that was so evident in Gogol’s magnum opus. These comparisons are small, Proust's work is undoubtedly unique.

After 500 pretty laborious pages, I have bought the second part of this 7 part classic, and quite look forward to reading it in due course. I would advise anyone to read this book; it is, quite simply, remarkable.

Literature Adaptations

Hollywood producers are increasingly adapting works of literature. Producing films from literature can be a way of bringing some of the best stories ever told into the visual world, and while they can be riveting upon fruition, I think there are some book adaptations that ratify the wide-spread contention that some books are quite simply unadaptable.

For example, two books that I quite adore, Kerouac's On the Road and Don DeLillo's Cosmopolis, premiered at Cannes film festival over the last week on the big screen. Both these films were done by rather artistic, creative and esteemed directors, giving them every chance of success. However, these are books that I would deem unadaptable, and are certainly not meant for an adaptation that veers towards entertaining the inevitable demographics which, unfortunately, they will ultimately seek.

Both films have a twilight star in main roles, and both have been, according to early reviews, and their trailers, diluted to suit a wide reaching audience. If both films are not successful, as early reviews also indicate, I believe it is not because of shortcomings in their scripts or failure from the reputable directors and writers who took part in these projects, but rather due to the fact that certain books are simply not meant for the big screen. They can't be diluted or glamorized because this in itself defeats their point.

When I heard these two books were becoming films I was slightly bemused, I am not against the idea of adapting classic or contemporary works of literature, my problem is that certain novels shouldn't be adapted (including the aforementioned two), and it seems these films may very well amplify my contention. 

5 Iconic Book Covers

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is renowned for being a book that combines philosophy and literature, and one that is supposed to create an exciting read whilst  enlightening it’s audience. The problem is that the abovementioned elements of this notoriously well-received and somehow 'best-selling' novel do not succeed.

The philosophical aspects of the novel are elementary, and while it borrows from some well known philosophers, such as Kant and Hume, it’s overall ‘thesis’ is underwhelming and falls short. The notion of a classic vs romantic view of the world, and the negation of technology, seems to differ only slightly from other philosophical theories while attempting to stand on its own. It fails to be either revelatory or substantial. Consequently, Robert Pirsig isn't, nor ever will be, considered a philosopher in the same class as some of those mentioned in this book.

In terms of its literary achievement, it lacks the quality to captivate its audience, it is a slow and lacklustre read, and it seems conflicted in what it is trying to accomplish. The best parts of the book are about his relationship with his son, and these are too infrequent and when they do arrive Pirsig, once again, veers off into the world of philosophy and creates a story that is difficult to follow.

Furthermore, the book is noticeably narcissistic and seems like an attempt to celebrate the authors own intellectual superiority. This makes the novel tedious at times, and a reader may well be inclined to raise his eyebrows above the page at the self-indulgent biographical narrator who seems stubborn and ultimately bland.

I wouldn’t advise this book to anyone. especially anyone who either loves literature or has a penchant for philosophy. In trying to combine the two he fails at both respectively. All this could be forgiven if the book was entertaining, but it is a difficult, slow and evidently monotonous read that fails to encapsulate, enlighten or even slightly engross its readers.