Four Quartets

        Four Quartets is a book of poetry by T. S. Eliot which was published in 1943. The four quartets are named after places: “Burnt Norton” (the original Norton manor, located in Gloucestershire, burned down in 1741), “East Coker” (a village in South Somerset, England), “The Dry Salvages” (“...a small group of rocks, with a beacon, off the N.E. Coast of Cape Ann, Massachusetts. Salvages is pronounced to rhyme with assuages,” as we are told in the introductory note to this section on page 20), and “Little Gidding” (a small village in Cambridgeshire, England with a Christian worship legacy). Each quartet has five parts (movements), beginning with a roman numeral. There is quite a bit of variation in form for these sections, shifting between rhyming and not-rhyming sections. There are long stanzas and short stanzas, long lines and short lines, alliteration, repetition, indentations (though few) and enjambments. Each line begins with a capital letter, and sentences are not always used. The language is fairly straightforward, though in the first movement of “East Coker,” there is a line that begins with “Whiche betokeneth.”

            Where Gary Snyder's work exemplifies everything I've learned in writing classes about poetry and fiction in general, Eliot deviates. Where Snyder uses gritty and precise language to paint a specific picture of an image, Eliot delves into the prophetic. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly moments of intense imagery, at times seemingly out of nowhere. The second part of “Burnt Norton” begins as such: “Garlic and sapphires in the mud / Clot the bedded axle-tree (4).” While this imagery does surprise and sounds incredible (it works), it is abstract and difficult to associate with an absolute and relate-able meaning. The text ambitiously spans topics from metaphysics and existentialism to the passing of time and the very concept of poetry. These vast topics are tackled matter-of-factly, with surprisingly-worded observations.

            I have heard warnings for beginning poets to avoid using the boring and clichéd words which are generally associated with love. You might say I've even been wary to attempt writing about topics in the arena of love, for fear of boring language. Eliot, however, is a master and has seemingly no qualms about tackling such topics wholly and confidently. And, apparently, poetically: “Love is most nearly itself / When here and now cease to matter (17).”

            I have to say that it took until almost the end of the book for me to come to terms with the fact that Eliot is allowed to make these statements in his poetry. I have become so accustomed to aspiring to read and write poems that are good because they speak of a moment, paint a picture, relay an experience through concrete imagery. Eliot sort of throws all that to the wind, injecting these moments of pure introspective genius and what could be considered, I suppose “life lessons” throughout. He defines things in an extremely attractive “x is ___” type of way, and this works because the way these lessons are conveyed is so carefully wrought and intricately portrayed.

            Some of my favorite “defining” moments are as follows:

§  “Only through time time is conquered (5).”

§  “Distracted from distraction by distraction (6)”        

§  “Or from which they turned their eyes. There is, it seems to us, / At best, only a limited value / In the knowledge derived from experience (13).”

§  “Risking enchantment. Do not let me hear / Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly, / Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession, / Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God. / The only wisdom we can hope to acquire / Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless (14).”

§  “Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought: / So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing (15).”

§  “You say I am repeating / Something I have said before. I shall say it again. / Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there, / To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not, / You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy. / In order to arrive at which you do not know / You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance. / In order to possess what you do not possess / You must go by the way of dispossession. / In order to arrive at what you are not / You must go through the way in which you are not. / And what you do not know is the only thing you know / And what you own is what you do not own / And where you are is where you are not (15).”

§  “Home is where one starts from. As we grow older / The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated / Of dead and living. Not the intense moment / Isolated, with no before and after, / But a lifetime burning in every moment / And not the lifetime of one man only / But of old stones that cannot be deciphered (17).”

§  “Time the destroyer is time the preserver, (24)”

§  “Midwinter spring is its own season (31)”

§  “Love is the unfamiliar Name / Behind the hands that wove / The intolerable shirt of flame / Which human power cannot remove. / We only live, only suspire / Consumed by either fire or fire (38).”

§  “What we call the beginning is often the end / And to make an end is to make a beginning (38).”

§  “Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern / Of timeless moments (38).”

§  “Desire itself is movement / Not in itself desirable; / Love is itself unmoving, / Only the cause and end of movement, / Timeless, and undesiring / Except in the aspect of time / Caught in the form of limitation / Between un-being and being (8).”

It is one thing to say that the book is only 39 pages long, but I think I could contemplate these last eight, short lines (not even a full stanza, let alone a movement or a quartet mind you) for a good 39 hours. These momentous statements are balanced with surprising images; as in the next seven lines: “Sudden in a shaft of sunlight / Even while the dust moves / There rises the hidden laughter / Of children in the foliage / Quick now, here, now, always— / Ridiculous the waste sad time / Stretching before and after (8).” Again, the meaning of these images is not necessarily available on the surface of the text. It's sort of like a puzzle to put together.

            I've done a little background research on Eliot and this book, and by all accounts it seems “Four Quartets” incorporates Eliot's religious inclinations; in some circles it is actually criticized for drawing too heavily on these views. Some daring soul who checked the book out of the library before me offered their summation of three out of four movements (for some unknown reason excluding “The Dry Salvages”) as well. For “Burnt Norton,” she (?) thinks that: “Life of word is continual death since contexts and usages change. In the pattern of a poem word's life preserved beyond its life in speech.” On “East Coker:” “Stresses craftsmanship of words. Poets inevitable defeat—outgrows his own idiom and rhythm.” The word theme is continued in her observation of “Little Gidding:” “Mysterious union of words in poetry—symbol of process by which past and future are woven together into meaning in our personal lives and in history.” My point is that there is no limit to the meaning one could find in this book; and in my opinion, that is the measure of great poetry. It is a universally powerful but specific experience; albeit one which may be read very differently by different people.

~Amanda Pratt~

Snyder's "Turtle Island"

Turtle Island won Gary Snyder the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1975. The book is divided into four parts: “Manzanita,” “Magpie’s Song,” “For the Children,” and “Plain Talk.” Though this is a book of poetry, the last section is prose-y, covering the broader philosophical foundations from which the poems are driven. “Plain Talk” includes pieces like “Four Changes,” written “in response to an evident need for a few practical and visionary suggestions (91).” “Four Changes” explicates pressing environmental complexities associated with population, pollution, consumption, and transformation by breaking down each larger issue into sections titled The Condition (position, situation, and goal), and Action (social/political, the community, in our own heads).

The subject matter of the text works because it is entirely reflective of the deep ecology worldview and associated environmentalism taking hold during the time period in which the book was published. April 22, 1970 marked the first designation and celebration of Earth Day, a response to a public outcry regarding highly visible and immediate environmental problems. As per the introductory note, “Turtle Island” itself represents the continent of North America in Snyder’s writing.

Snyder relies heavily on the intrinsic value of nature as his inspiration. The underlying conflict in his writing seems to be the ways in which development of humanity compromises the natural world. “One Should Not Talk To A Skilled Hunter About What is Forbidden By The Buddha” begins: “A gray fox, female, nine pounds three ounces. / 39 5/8” long with tail.” Then in the beginning of the second stanza: “Stomach content: a whole ground squirrel well chewed / plus one lizard foot.” Flora and fauna show up in nearly every poem, oftentimes embodying themes which reflect the ‘circle of life’ and the ways in which we influence it. As is exemplified in this poem, we are often shown the beauty and complexities of nature through a somewhat-disturbing lens.

As far as the form and structure of Snyder’s poems go, there seems to be just about every type of experimentation possible going on. Caesura is used differently everywhere. Some poems end with little images or drawings; some have little symbols or roman numerals between sections (not stanzas). Some poems begin or end with a quote, or a dedication, or a date and location. Some poems are just a few lines and some are much longer. “The Dazzle” is center-justified. “Facts” is a literal list of facts numbered one through ten (for example: “6. General Motors is bigger than Holland.”). “Two Immortals” is written in paragraph form. “What Happened Here Before” is a literal geologic-scale timeline of Turtle Island, with sections labeled by numbers of years ago that these events happened: “-80,000,000- / sea-bed strata raised and folded, / granite far below.”

Repetition is used in varying contexts throughout the text. Though there is slant rhyme and playful rhyme sprinkled throughout the collection, the only poem that is fully committed to a rhyme scheme is “The Wild Mushroom.” This playful poem is a sort of tribute to fungus: “So here’s to the mushroom family / A far-flung friendly clan / For food, for fun, for poison / They are a help to man.” Overall, Snyder uses language that is plain but effective, and “Straight Creek—Great Burn” ends with the line: “end of poem.”

In the poem “Coyote Valley Spring,” there is a line that says: “white and solemn toloache flower”. I looked up this toloache plant and found a host of interesting and complex information about it. It is toxic and potentially fatal if ingested. It emits a foul odor similar to rancid peanut butter when crushed or bruised. Its flowers bloom at night. It was used by the Aztecs as a poultice for wounds. It was also used as an entheogen for hallucinations and rites of passage. It can be used as a pain reliever, but with great risk as there are wide variations in plant toxicity. I was looking for, perhaps, an image of this plant and an associated geography, and what I learned was flooring. There is so much meaning that can be taken from this one word and Snyder may have been drawing on all of this, or maybe none of it. I love this idea of a word being worth a thousand words, and am now inspired to incorporate vast yet specific words like this into my poetry. In contrast, Snyder uses the word “gnowledge” in “Spel Against Demons,” which as far as I can tell is a made up word.

-End of review-

~Amanda Pratt~

Linchpinism

 

           “Linchpin” is a professional development text written by Seth Godin and published in 2010 by Penguin Group. Godin is a best-selling author, but he can also be described as an entrepreneur, public speaker, and marketing guru. In this text, he sets out to teach readers about what he feels workers must become in the modern world: linchpins. The alternative to the linchpin is the cog, and readers are instructed to avoid being a cog at all costs. Stories of successful, ingenious go-getters are sprinkled throughout; Godin tells us anecdote after anecdote of these linchpins—from Darienne Page, receptionist to Barack Obama's White House, to Virgin Airlines founder Richard Branson. What qualities do these people share, making them linchpins? In one way or another, their services are indispensable.

            The text is broken down into an introduction, twelve chapters, and a summary. Each chapter is broken down into numerous subheadings, rarely more than a page long (about twenty-five per chapter), relating to the topic at hand. There are also several hand-drawn diagrams referred to in the text (e.g. a Venn diagram where the linchpin is found at the center of charm, talent and perseverance on page 43). Godin's tone is persuasive if not overbearing—certain terms and concepts are repeated over and over (e.g. linchpin, cog, shipping, make art, etc.). He employs a sort of no-nonsense, tough love approach to offer a wake-up call to those readers who have not yet seen the tell-tale signs of a changing world for themselves. Also, interestingly enough, Godin seems to set out to squash gender stereotypes in his writing. Instead of using “one,” “he,” or even “he or she” when referring to the subject of potential situations described, he almost exclusively uses the pronoun “she.”

            According to the Miriam-Webster dictionary, a linchpin is literally a locking pin inserted crosswise as through the end of the axle or shaft, and figuratively a person that serves to hold together parts or elements that exist or function as a unit. A cog, in contrast, is defined as a tooth on the rim of a wheel or gear and metaphorically as a subordinate but integral person or part. Godin sets out to translate these metaphors to the tenor of the American worker.

            For the last two hundred years, it was okay to be a cog. In fact, it was the American Dream to strive to be a brainless cog as a means to a nice house and a comfortable retirement. Godin goes so far as to say that certain elements of our society (namely the education system) were deliberately constructed to churn out this cog-type worker: “it's about overcoming a multigenerational conspiracy designed to sap your creativity and restlessness (2).”  Godin offers a long list of what modern schools are “teaching kids to do (with various levels of success).” On this list are things such as fit in, follow instructions, don't challenge authority, do the minimum amount required, be a generalist, and move on once you learn a topic. We are, in short, breeding mediocrity. Achieving average scores, in American schools (with already low standards), is a feat worthy of praise. Godin counters, saying that in order to address the needs of our society, we should actually only be teaching two things in our schools: to solve interesting problems, and to lead (45-47).

             In the current economic climate, factory jobs that have historically provided secure employment to innumerable cogs are disappearing at an unprecedented rate. Godin extends the definition of a factory outside of the conventional sense, to any organization “that has it figured out, a place where people go to do what they're told and earn a paycheck (40).” He gives examples of failed factories, such as print newspapers too busy following established industry protocol to see that radical adaptation is a must for survival. In order to achieve job security and be considered generally employable now, Godin ventures, the linchpins are the ones with the competitive edge. Godin systematically and almost redundantly emphasizes this point (“there are no longer any great jobs where someone else tells you precisely what to do [14].”), describing just how and why this dichotomy and shift occurred.

            Once Godin has established why the American Dream was the way it was, as well as how and why it is no longer viable, he spends the remainder of the text detailing elements of what he sees as the next necessary step: becoming the linchpin. He explains the exact characteristics of a linchpin: linchpins make art by giving gifts of emotional labor, and a great deal of time is spent on the topic of art. An artist is defined as a person “with a genius for finding a new answer, a new connection, or a new way of getting things done (8).”

             There are several elements of being a linchpin as defined by Godin that are personally intriguing to me. For one, he encourages that the purpose of starting is to finish, and regardless of relative readiness, one should “ship” on the ship date (103). Now, this concept makes me slightly uncomfortable, as my perfectionist self often has a hard time producing any kind of sub-par work. I can see the value in Godin's shipping policy though, because my ego nags me more often than I'd like to admit and as a result, in the absence of 100% quality work, too often 0% quality work gets shipped (aka nothing). To accomplish this shipping goal, another novel idea: do all editing at the beginning of a project. Later in the text, Godin adds another layer to this concept when he says that “we shouldn't bother doing it if all we're going to do is do it (197).” Put your all into everything you do, he seems to be saying, and when it still isn't good enough on ship day, get it out anyway.

            At the core, Godin teaches universal life lessons about passion—on page 190 he talks about how opportunities come after you're inspired and not vice versa. He's driving home an age-old adage: do what you love and you'll be happy (because you'll be doing art), but with a caveat—if you don't, you won't have job security anymore. However, it is difficult to conceptualize how realistic the linchpin business model is for a universal audience. It depends upon an us vs. them mentality—Godin isn't speaking to everyone. On page 202, he lists the linchpin's only, two, “elegant” options:

 

1.      Hire plenty of factory workers. Scale like crazy. Take advantage of the fact that most people want a map, most people are willing to work cheaply, most people want to be the factory. You win because you extract the value of their labor, the labor they're surrendering too cheaply.

2.      Find a boss who can't live without a linchpin. Find a boss who adequately values your scarcity and your contribution, who will reward you with freedom and respect. Do the work. Make a difference.

 

This brings up the ethics of being a linchpin. Unless you want to be managed, the act of being a linchpin is inherently dependent upon the continued exploitation of cogs. Throughout the text, over and over, we are told in various ways, “let someone else do cog job x—you're a linchpin.” So the logic is slightly flawed—Godin's premise rides on the fact that anyone can pick up this book and learn the tools of linchpinism. He convinces us that this is a necessary avenue to any kind of real or lasting future success. We are reassured and convinced that we are all capable of making art and becoming linchpins, but it is understood that not everyone will. It's like an exclusive club, and only suckers are cogs—but they are still necessary in society. And often a linchpin's success depends upon those cogs.

            All in all I did like the book, in that it uniquely underlines what is essential to living a fulfilled life—finding passion, love, and true enjoyment in what you do. In a way, readers are presented with a wonderful opportunity: as the security of the cog-til-retirement career path becomes less and less of a realistic option, we have no choice but to find this fulfillment  The problem, it would then seem, lies in the interim period. As it stands now, our schools are still effectively punishing artists and rewarding bureaucrats. If we were properly encouraging creativity in schools, we would be effectively nourishing individuals in tune with their passions and aware of what kind of art they excel at; we would be growing people capable of drawing their personal map to becoming a linchpin.

~ Amanda Pratt~

           

Magnum Opus

I reluctantly sat at my grandmother’s kitchen table as she feed me piping-hot chicken noodle soup and a piece of fresh rye bread. I was twelve years old and my world was very simple and easy. My existence revolved around me trying to fulfill all of my petty, self-centered desires. I would not take no for an answer. There was nothing that I went without. Suffering was foreign.

         “You know Collin, Nannie came over to the United States during the Russian Revolution. It was not easy for her to come into America. She needed to know someone in America. Thankfully she knew someone in Buffalo.”
     
         I blew on my soup and rolled my eyes at the story I had heard a multitude of times. The story that my grandmother held so close to her heart was so far from my realm of existence; I lived in America, the land of opportunity. I never knew what it was like to be denied something.

    “I know Grandma. You told me this story a million times. I remember. Uncle Max shot his finger off so he didn’t have to fight for the Russian Army. I know Grandma, horrible.”

I never understood the hardships, the pain and turmoil, but I also could not understand the beauty and pride that lays precedence in the hearts of the Russian people, until I attended Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poetry reading at the University at Buffalo on November 1st. When I received an invitation to attend the reading, I was not sure what his reading was going to entail: what themes were laden in his poems? Was he going to speak solely in Russian? I had never heard of Yevtushenko, so I was curious to see what his poetry was like. After conducting some of my own research, I discovered that Yevtushenko is an outspoken political activist, writer, poet, dramatist, and filmmaker who opposed many of the Soviet Union’s ideologies. His magnum opus, “Babi Yar,” discussed the Soviet Union’s down play of the horrific events that occurred in a Kiev ravine, in which 34,000 Jewish people lost their lives during the Holocaust. This poem inspired the noted Russian composer, Dmitri Shostakovich, to write his “Symphony No. 13.”

Before attending Yevtushenko’s reading, my fellow attendees and I met to discuss some of his poetry. The discussion turned to aesthetics, and how and why we gauge meaning and value from various forms of art.  We discussed the differences between mainstream and commercial art in comparison to “high-brow” literature and visual art. We talked about how certain forms of art make us work harder to contextualize and formulate an understanding of meaning, how if good art allows for its participant to create their own meaning. I was curious to see if Yevtushenko’s poetry fit on this spectrum.

       When we arrived at Lippes Concert Hall on UB’s North Campus, I realized I was surrounded by predominately Russian-speaking Americans. The lobby was full of people conversing in this immensely tonal, beautifully soft, consonant/vowel language. It was refreshing to hear individuals speaking their native tongue, not feeling obligated to conform to Western culture’s predominantly English-speaking standards. Inside the actual venue was incredible: the concert hall showcased a brass organ perched up high over the stage, looking out with its splendid symmetry and grandeur. It was overwhelming. The concert hall started to fill and I could not help but overhear all the Russian being spoken around me. It was almost as though the majority of the Russian-speaking population came out to acknowledge and remember their home country and traditions.
       
          When Yevtushenko graced the stage, he had a presence unlike anything I had experienced. He had passion- a fire in his eyes that was unparalleled to anything I had seen. It was like he had a memory of the past that was haunting him, and when he looked at the audience, you felt that emotion sitting in the pit of your stomach. The poet was also accompanied by three English students: Daniel J. Schweitzer, a Ph.D. candidate in American literature; Paige Melin, a senior English and French dual major; and Jennifer Johnson, a senior English and theatre and dance major. It was then that I learned that Yevtushenko’s reading was going to involve a diverse array of speakers, and would be recited in both English and Russian. The exchange of stanza reading in which one of the students recite a verse, and then Yevtushenko would recite the next stanza was incredibly interesting. Here you had an American college student who was doing their best to read Yevtushenko’s poetry with the poet sitting right next to them, potentially worrying that their reading would not do the poem’s emotive rhetoric justice.
         
        I think the readers did a good job striving to recite the poem with the proper emotion at the proper time. At times there was an immense contrast between reader’s tonality and reading style, but I felt that when a plethora of readers recite different parts of poem, there are going to be differences in projection.  It was also fascinating to hear certain stanzas in English and Russian, because while I got some context from the English speaking stanzas, when I was hearing the Russian verses I had to go solely off my imagination which was dictated by Yevtushenko’s tone, rhythm, and overall dramatic approach. This was not entirely the case for the vast majority of attendants, who were most likely bilingual speakers who understood both the English and the Russian. It is hard enough to gain an understanding of most poetry, let alone poetry read in a completely different language; through this, I came to the realization that language is everything when trying to understand another human being, and we often endure disconnect and misunderstanding because of languages inability to fully articulate a situation. For me, I was left, essentially to the status of an infant because I could only go by Yevtushenko’s tone to gain the meaning.
    
        When Yevtushenko did speak English, he was relatively inaudible and the language failed to stick in my brain. At times Yevtushenko was shrieking, and at other times he was quiet. I had to infer the truth of what I made an inference of what I thought the overall theme or mood of the poem was based solely off the reader’s emotion. My vulnerability and susceptibility to the language of the reader was very humbling and made me come to the conclusion at how vast the world really is, and how little I have seen or experienced.

        It was here that I remembered my grandmother, who constantly tried to help me understand a past that I never really connected to until I heard Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poetry. After the reading, I felt I had been transported to a different part of time and life that my grandmother was trying to get me to see. Language can transcend time and place, and it took a world-renowned poet to make me realize that power.


~Collin Schreiner~

 

 

 

The Hunger Games…feeding its readers a steady diet of violence, romance, and hardships.

                The namesake of The Hunger Games comes from an annual tradition, brought about by the government of Panem after they brutally put down a revolt by the citizens in its outlying districts 74 years ago.  The Hunger Games pits one male and one female teenager from each district, 24 in total, against each other in a battle of survival.  This, to show those districts that "The Capitol" is in charge.  The Capitol gets the best while the other districts get the rest.

                Why is this book so popular? Well, there are many relatable elements.  This is a Dystopian coming of age novel, where a 16 year old teenage girl faces a series of trials and tribulations and survives but sees others she cares about get injured and die, sometimes grotesquely.  A Dystopian novel which takes place in what's an alternate reality of America, where a small overprivileged majority rule over an underprivileged minority that is trampled underfoot.  Doesn't that sound like today's society?  Our lady protagonist is named Katniss Everdeen, the daughter of a late coal miner.  Our male protagonist is Peeta Mellark, the well-built young son of a baker.  Girls will swoon over the star-crossed teenage lovers and the strapping young lads.  Boys will swoon over that adventurous girl Katniss that's into guy things.   Be careful though, or she'll shoot you in the eye with her silver bow.   Yes, they'll also be into the weapons and violence.  Lastly, this includes a classic socioeconomic good versus evil struggle.  In other words, something for everyone. 

                As for my personal thoughts on this book, let's get down to it.  Before I read this book, I instinctively thought of this series as a reboot of Twilight, only without a pregnant vampire and werewolves.  But it's not.  When I read The Hunger Games, I'm not infuriated by thoughts of Rob Pattinson, a modern-day Casper the Ghost with fangs and an emo attitude.  I'm intrigued by a female protagonist who uses a combination of ingenuity, dexterity, and wit to outsmart her foes, which includes The Capitol; she's MacGyver with a braid.  I'm intrigued by the violence of the games, which relies on sheer brutality as much as it relies on the survival skills of the "Tributes".  Lastly, I'm intrigued by the technology at the disposal of The Capitol, controlling the climate controlled Hunger Games arena which is replete with weather controls, fireballs, and mutated wasps and dogs, just to name a few things.  Oh, and hoverplanes to pick up the dead tributes.  Nice touch. 

                I will say that I willingly read this book AND watched the movie, without a girlfriend forcing me to, either.   This book resonates in so many sectors of society that you can't help but pick it up and read… 

~Jason A. Wright~

A Politically Incorrect Love Story

          For this book autopsy, I have read a book by Canadian author Henry Makow called A Long Way to go for a Date.  The book is about the author's experiences traveling to the Philippines to meet a woman he's met through a correspondence service.  This story takes place in 1998, where dial-up ruled the Internet and cell phone technology was in its infancy.  He goes there as a late 40's man, there to meet a girl for marriage that's nearly half his age.  Do I have your attention yet?

          Having been to the Philippines many times and having travelled throughout Manila and several different provinces, I've seen a few of the areas that are discussed by Makow.  He describes life in rural provinces very well, with many Filipinos in those areas working long and hard hours for low pay just to support their families.

          Makow labels himself as a man scarred by Feminism and the expectations of Western women and he is unapologetic in wanting a woman who is submissive and who wants a more "traditional" household.  On the back of this book, it is described as an "ironic, politically incorrect diary of a quest for masculine identity".  It is most certainly filled with irony and politically incorrect language and situations.  Makow seems to be author who has indeed lost his "masculine identity" since his divorce.  Yes, he's divorced and has a son from his first marriage.

          As for the story itself, he decides to embark on a journey to find a second wife; this time, in the Philippines.  To say that Makow is culturally inept would be accurate.  He has a very hard time adjusting to Filipino culture and just refuses to accept some of the cultural norms of the Philippines.  In the long run, it's his loss.  He uses many humorous anecdotes in his ultimately unsuccessful efforts to appreciate Filipino culture.  Personally, I have a deep admiration for the Filipino people who have learned to live a simple life; a simple life that sometimes involves hard work for low pay.  This is something I could never do, I'll admit it.  The Philippines has a rich and deep culture, some of which can only be truly appreciated by born and raised Filipinos. 

          The story follows Makow as he meets Cecilia, his future bride, as well as her friends and family.  It follows his trials and tribulations in relating to her and arranging for their marriage.  It also shows why a late 40's man should never marry a woman who isn't even 20, no matter where he's from.  There's just an incredible difference in maturity.   Haven't you all heard of the half plus seven rule? A man should only consider dating a woman who is no younger than half his age plus seven years.  By that math, a 46 year old man shouldn't date someone younger than 30.  The age difference goes for both genders…immaturity at that age isn't gender-specific.  And if you're 18-21 now and think I'm a jerk for saying that, wait until you're 30 and take another look at that age group.

          Cecilia, in the beginning of this tale, is a beautiful and thoughtful woman.  Her parents are very hard working, particularly her father.  When she can't find the right words to tell Makow how she feels, she takes the time to write letters to him in English, many of which are reproduced in this story.  (Spoiler ahead, read on to last paragraph). However, as the story progresses, you will see that wedded bliss is not in the cards for her or Henry Makow.

          As a future husband, he doesn't have patience with Filipino culture nor does he have it with his future wife.  He doesn't sugarcoat things and speaks his mind plainly; whereas, in Filipino culture, some things are just better left unsaid or handled in private.  Some readers of this book might throw Makow under the bus and blame everything on him.  However, these readers apparently don't take into account the part of the book where Makow and Cecilia are trying to live a married life in Winnipeg where he resides.  His once submissive bride takes to talking to 100's of men on the Internet, goes into fits of rage for minor reasons, trashes the house, has him falsely jailed for domestic abuse (more than once), and even gets jealous of his teenage son from his 1st marriage.  I'm sorry, but no matter what he said or did previously, cut him some slack at that point.  He finally manages to divorce her after nearly two years of being with her.  Before the divorce is finalized, she flies to the US to meet up with a sailor stationed in San Diego, with Makow's blessings.  She marries him less than six months after the divorce became final. 

          Now, for some of my final thoughts.  I don't excuse Makow's behavior.  He had no business marrying someone less than half his age.  He clearly didn't respect or even understand a lot about Filipino culture.  His motives for going to the Philippines for a woman were grounded in a dislike for the attitudes of Western woman, which is also wrong.  In that regard, a man should marry a woman for who she is, not for the other women who are not.  I don't excuse Cecilia's behavior, either.  If she wanted to be with other men, she could have been the one to initiate the divorce, instead of making his life in Winnipeg a living hell.  Henry Makow isn't one of the more well-known authors out there; however, A Long Way to go for a Date is a good read, particularly for those that are more culturally well-rounded. 

-Jason A. Wright

         

If a tree falls...

 The Silence of the Trees by Valya Dudycz Lupescu promised to draw me into the mysticism of gypsy magic and fortunetellers. Rather it drew me into a story about a woman named Nadya Lysenko who ran away from her home country of Ukraine to Chicago, which holds its own Ukraine village; during the aftermath of World War II. The back cover spoke of a gypsy's prophecy and it led me to believe that this would be yet another fictional tale written for pure entertainment and that literary amnesia that sometimes takes over with unmemorable tales. Instead Nadya made me feel the havoc that the beginning of World War II brought on so many people and made it personal. Her tale of her first love made me think of my own and I felt her pain so easily. The tale quickly brought me to a modern time of Urban Chicago. By chapter four I was reading the thoughts of a 70 year old Nadya, remembering her youth. I liked the fact that this novel was not written in chronological order. The fact that the first three chapters were written from the perspective of a sixteen year old Nadya made the narrator trustworthy to provide the basis of the story. While the flashback tactic used through the rest of the novel provided mature insight into Nadya's past and present. Having worked so hard to hide the pain and questionable adventures Nadya has become the identity she made for herself to be someone she thought her children, grandchildren and grand-grandchildren wanted her to be. However, the traditions and spirits of her past combined with the spiritual influences of her present enable her to slowly peel the layers of paint from the concrete wall of her past. Becoming who she used to be allowed her to finally become who she truly was. This novel not only left me anxious to read the next passage but in tears for the adversity that had to be fought throughout. More importantly, it left me nostalgic for my own country, for folklore and for tradition. Because we are nothing without our past.



~Timea Kernacova~

 

Could you ever be a Hangman?

The Hangman’s Daughter by Oliver Potzsch takes place in Germany, 1659.  The tale of the hangman is one of a man who has come to accept his life work as death.  Potzsch put much work and research into the details of a hangman’s job and the time and the outcome are scattered throughout the novel, but it is not the details of death that will keep you turning the pages.  Every character is developed meaningfully and continuously at every turn and the mystery grows deeper as the hangman works to save the life of woman who is deemed a witch by the town’s people.  Every character twists throughout the novel and often this they are twisting in the opposite manner than the plot is twisting, which makes for intriguing read.  Those who crave the rational will turn the pages as reason strings them along and those who crave the magical will turn the pages as they are all filled magic.  Although the novel is set a very long time ago the reader cannot help but be pulled into the plot and question life as they know it in the modern world.  ~Amy Widman~

                                     

A Howler Monkey and a Donkey

        I had the opportunity to read the latest offering by Yann Martel, the author of Life of Pi.  His latest book, entitled Beatrice and Virgil, involves a popular author, whose name is Henry.  To start this short novel, Henry had spent five years working on his latest book.  It was a different perspective on The Holocaust: Holocaust fiction.  He realized so much factual and historical non-fiction was written about The Holocaust, and he wanted to write a fictional take on it.  After submitting the initial offering to his publishers, he was flown to London. He thought his latest efforts would be praised.  They weren't.  

         He was flown to London to meet a firing squad.  Henry is told that his latest book would be a "flip-flop"; it lacked focus and drive, and would have a hard time selling.  Henry is devastated and moves away with his wife Sarah.  He continued to receive letters from people all over the world, praising his first book, asking questions, and telling him what certain parts of his book meant to them and how it helped them through rough times.  It kept him going.  He then received part of a play in the mail…the play is entitled Beatrice and Virgil.  The writer wanted help from Henry regarding how to make his play work.  The play is about a howler monkey and a donkey…and they are just talking.  The play was written by none other than a very serious-minded and elderly taxidermist. 

                The book proceeds along a projected path.  Throughout the book, I thought that the big payoff would be Henry finding inspiration to rewrite his Holocaust novel for his publishers.  It didn't quite turn out to be that way, but if you want to know the dénouement of this book, you'll have to read it for yourself.  I finished reading this novel, sleepily reading through pages on a Saturday morning, content that the story would end along the path I projected it would.  But it didn't…when Henry has his moment of realization, I was wide awake, and eagerly finished reading.  Pick it up…you won't be disappointed.

~Jason A. Wright~

Tell the Truth

            Eat Pray Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia is a memoir written by Elizabeth Gilbert, published in 2007 by Penguin Books. As a #1 New York Times Bestseller, it has been read by millions of people. Elizabeth Gilbert has worked as a journalist for GQ, New York Times Magazine, and Spin; she has published many different books and collections of stories; she has won many awards for writing. The movie Coyote Ugly was based on one of the articles she wrote for GQ about her experiences bartending on the Lower East side of Manhattan, and Eat Pray Love is the basis for the 'major motion picture' with the same name starring Julia Roberts.

            Eat Pray Love chronicles Gilbert's year of traveling and self-discovery following a harsh divorce. It is broken up into an introduction (called Introduction or How This Book Works or The 109^th Bead), the main text, and a Final Recognition and Reassurance section. As the introduction explains, the main text of the memoir is divided into three books: Book One: Italy or “Say It Like You Eat It” or 36 Tales About the Pursuit of Pleasure; Book Two: India or “Congratulations to Meet You” or 36 Tales About the Pursuit of Devotion; and Book Three: Indonesia or “Even in My Underpants, I Feel Different” or 36 Tales About the Pursuit of Balance. The introduction also explains why there are three parts in the book (each with three names), and why there are 108 (109 including the introduction) tales in the memoir: “...the number 108 is held to be most auspicious, a perfect three-digit multiple of three, its components adding up to nine, which is three threes. And three, of course, is the number representing supreme balance, as anyone who has ever studied either the Holy Trinity or a simple barstool can plainly see. (1)” 

            Japa malas, she explains, are the traditional strings of beads worn by ancient yogis which have—you guessed it, 108 beads in the necklace, with one extra hanging off as a pendant (the 109^th bead). Each bead represents one repetition of one's mantra, and according to Gilbert, when one's fingers reach this 'extra' bead, “...you are meant to pause from your absorption in meditation and thank your teachers. (2)” So, she starts here, with thanks, before she tells her story. She also includes a disclaimer in the introduction about which names have been changed and which ones have not, and why. Not mentioned in the text but ironic nonetheless is the fact that the entire book runs 334 pages long (333 plus one for thanks). Not unlike Gilbert’s prose, the organization of the text is meaningful. It is well-structured and symbolic of the themes of the story, while offering Gilbert's unique perspective of three distinctly different cultures' methods of survival in a linear, diary-esque, mixed tense format.

            Due to the book's extreme success, and the widespread exposure of its movie portrayal, there has been much controversy in the media about Eat Pray Love and by association, about Elizabeth Gilbert. Jan Moir of Daily Mail sums the criticism up well, claiming the book is an insult to women with real problems. According to Moir, “Elizabeth did not really take a year out to find herself following divorce and depression. She took a year out to write a book about finding herself, and there is an enormous emotional difference between those two experiences.” Moir's point is trifold: since Gilbert's publisher had assigned her to write the book and in fact Gilbert had already been paid for it before embarking on her journey, it should not be considered a brave, groundbreaking piece; Gilbert's life really wasn't that bad in the first place to warrant such a trek; and even though Gilbert's year of discovery is characterized by a vow of celibacy, the story is basically just a “long, smug, search for a boyfriend. (www.dailymail.co.uk)”

            Though Gilbert may appear to be more 'lucky' or 'privileged' than the rest of us that suffer from problems similar to the ones she chronicles, her ‘luck’ in being paid to write this book (and in turn, embark on this spiritual quest) is only a result of the hard work she has done writing and the obvious talent she possesses. Her words are worthwhile, her insight profound, her fortune is fleeting (she loses everything she's worked her entire life for in divorce), and she is a good person who is genuinely trying to find peace in her heart. The story isn't meant to be a happily ever after, but rather a telling of her very personal discovery process along the road to her version of 'happy.'

Everyone's truth is different; and there is a quote from Sheryl Louise Moller before the introduction that serves as a testament to Gilbert's dedication to her personal version of truth: “Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth.” The story's worth lies not in serving as a catchall 'how to' guide for happiness, but rather as a telling of an altogether common predicament ('I've worked hard to get everything I thought I wanted, and now I'm miserable.') dealt with in a very uncommon (and arguably unrealistic to most) fashion. Gilbert portrays her quest for pleasure, devotion, and balance between the two extremes through excellent creative nonfiction skills: constant mixing of information with ‘the mind at work’; a well-balanced mix of scene, summary, and reflection; storytelling (literally telling 108 stories); assayer; recursiveness; compelling and likable voice; and extremely vivid sensory details. And above all, as CNF’s ultimate goal is to convey emotional truth (which is by nature, extremely subjective) Gilbert's memoir is a consistently honest account of the emotional truth her unique set of circumstances has created in her. 

            On page 35, Gilbert clearly states that her publisher is funding her trip: “...I can actually afford to do this because of a staggering personal miracle: in advance, my publisher has purchased the book I shall write about my travels.” So, we see, she is not at all trying to hide this fact from her audience; this fact does not cheapen the story—it is a part of her story. Later, while in Italy, she emphasizes her 'luckiness', when considering all she has given up in this unconventional pursuit of contentment (the promise of children, a nuclear family): “I'm lucky that at least I have my writing...So now I have started living my own life. Imperfect and clumsy as it may look, it is resembling me now, thoroughly. (95)”

            In Italy, Gilbert's main agenda is to pleasure-seek. She does this largely through food and drink, and her descriptions of food are vivid and often surprising. Of Bologna (the city): “The mushrooms here are like big thick sexy tongues, and the prosciutto drapes over pizzas like a fine lace veil draping over a fancy lady's hat. (98)” While in Italy, she begins to tackle depression, a tender, abstract subject which she manages to illustrate almost as beautifully as the food:

            When you're lost in those woods, it sometimes takes you a while to realize that you are lost. For        the longest time, you can convince yourself that you've just wandered a few feet off the path,     that you'll find your way back to the trailhead any moment now. Then night falls again and    again, and you still have no idea where you are, and it's time to admit that you have bewildered   yourself so far off the path that you don't even know from which direction the sun rises        anymore. (48)

            Gilbert mixes facts and information in throughout, saying of Syracuse: “Plato thought it would be the ideal location for a utopian experiment where perhaps 'by some divine fate' rulers might become philosophers, and philosophers might become rulers. Historians say that rhetoric was invented in Syracuse, and also (and this is just a minor thing) plot. (113)” It is clear she has educated herself on the places she travels to, and the facts don't come off in a mundane way, as her voice and sense of irony are so strong.

            As her time in India comes to an end, Gilbert questions the boundaries of pleasure-seeking, displaying the ‘mind at work’ and assayer: “...is it so awful to travel through time with no greater ambition than to find the next lovely meal? ...Or to nap in a garden, in a patch of sunlight, in the middle of the day, right next to your favorite fountain? And then to do it again the next day? (113)” Gilbert is directly involving the reader by asking these open-ended questions, while at the same time adding depth to her humanity—like most people, she has many more questions than answers. She recursively comes to this same question over and over again throughout the last story in this section, and after detailing the war-fraught and corrupt Italian history, comes to this conclusion-resembling realization: “Because the world is so corrupted, misspoken, unstable, exaggerated and unfair, one should trust only what one can experience with one's own senses, and this makes the senses stronger in Italy than anywhere in Europe. To devote yourself to the creation and enjoyment of beauty, then, can be a serious business...(114-115)” Trying to justify her relative existence through this constant evaluation of self in the context of learned facts about the world she finds herself in further emphasizes the fact that Gilbert is genuinely searching for truth. 

            Gilbert stays in her Guru's Ashram in India, setting out to explore truth from the opposite side of the spectrum than she did in pleasure-soaked Italy—the art of happiness via devotion from a Yogic standpoint: “The Yogic path is about disentangling the built-in glitches of the human condition, which I'm going to over-simply define here as the heartbreaking inability to sustain contentment. (122)” Gilbert's descriptions of the people she meets at the Ashram are especially memorable, of a teenage Indian boy: “He dressed the way the computer-interested boys in my junior high school used to dress for band concerts—dark trousers, and an ironed white button-down shirt that was far too big for him, his thin, stemlike neck sticking out of the opening like a single daisy popping out of a giant flowerpot. (127)”

            Gilbert is also extremely skilled at portraying characters through dialogue, which she most notably does with Richard from Texas, the reformed junkie/alcoholic turned Yogi and best friend whom she meets in the Ashram. Of his initial skepticism toward the Guru, Richard says, “'I thought the Ashram was the weirdest thing I ever saw, and I was wondering where the room was where you have to give 'em all your money and turn over the deed to your house and car, but that never did happen...(139)”

            Throughout all three books of the main text but most notably in India as she struggles with meditation, Gilbert transcribes conversations she has with herself, interweaving them into her stories as literal passages of her mind at work. For anyone who has tried to meditate with any sincerity or has just simply taken a moment to recognize the absolutely random path a thought can take, it is easy to relate to these often humorous interactions Gilbert has with herself. When introducing these segments, she is sure to use qualifying language (we obviously do not always remember exactly, word for word, what happens in the dialogue of our minds): “...the conversations between me and my mind during meditation generally go something like this: (134)”

            With all this devotion and no worldly pleasure, Gilbert reveals her weakness in that she is continuing to dwell on the man she dated after separating from her husband: “It's all I can do not to jump out of this bed and call him from India in the middle of the night and just—I don't know what—just hang up on him, probably. Or beg him to love me again. Or read him such a ferocious indictment on all his character flaws. (147)” She is continuing to struggle; she certainly is not painting a picture of herself as a woman with all the answers, or of someone who is being rational (which of course, is very human). She is mad at herself for not being able to exorcise this from her thoughts, and thus it is ever the more consuming.

            Gilbert grapples with the blurry boundary between free will and fate in the context of achieving a higher meditative state, and after much persistence, she does achieve a state of transcendental meditation. She demystifies it, saying it was not euphoric, but: “It was just obvious. Like when you've been looking at an optical illusion for a long time straining your eyes to decode the trick, and suddenly your cognizance shifts and there—now you can clearly see it!—the two vases are actually two faces.” Gilbert has a way, as seen here, of lassoing almost hopelessly abstract concepts and synthesizing them into words that allow her readers a basis of comparison.

            The last leg of Gilbert's journey is spent in Bali, where she strives to take the things she's learned about pleasure and devotion and incorporate them into one solitary and balanced way of being. Bali itself is given distinct character traits through Gilbert's descriptions of its geography, history, and culture: “It has been estimated that a typical Balinese woman spends one-third of her waking hours either preparing for a ceremony, participating in a ceremony or cleaning up after a ceremony. (226)” It is obvious that the life of a Manhattan-based, accomplished journalist (and for that matter, many of Gilbert's readers) is very different than the life of a Balinese woman.

            While in Bali, Gilbert meets a man named Felipe for whom she eventually breaks her vow of celibacy. She is not meditating anywhere near as much as she was in India, and after Felipe becomes her lover, she stops her daily ritual of spending her mornings with Ketut Liyer, her medicine man friend and the main reason she came to Bali. She tells us this not because she is proud of it, but because it is true: “I'm losing days here, disappearing under his sheets, under his hands. I like the feeling of not knowing what the date is. My nice organized schedule has been blown away by the breeze. (295)” She is unapologetic and honest about how fully she loses her time to this man, and it is clear to the reader by this point that she has gained much sense of self to allow herself enjoyment in love after a year and a half of celibacy. Gilbert's ever-expanding and extremely open mind allows for the possibility of breaking her own rules, and the book does end with her 'finding a boyfriend.' Because that is what truly happened to her at the end of her journey.

            So, is Eat Pray Love a valid search for “Everything”, even though the book itself was an assignment; a job, essentially? Absolutely. Gilbert's impressive handle of language combined with her ability to relate to essentially human experiences is hugely valid. No, she hasn't been oppressed or held hostage like too many women have been across the globe, but everything is relative, and she speaks to the many women who do struggle with the same types of things she does. She is honest with her readers about the circumstances leading up to the creation of this memoir, and there is no doubt she deserved this opportunity to find herself through the one thing that did work for her while her personal life was in shambles: writing. Sure there are people worse off than her, but the “little” things (divorce, depression, imbalance) she is seeking solace from are huge obstacles for millions of people's lives. A refusal to conform to society in favor of soul-searching around the world—even if experimental, even if being compensated for it—when documented as Gilbert does, holds much worth for many people regardless of any other factors. She is telling a story; a true story. Maybe it's because Gilbert's life isn't terribly 'hard' in relation to many that she is able to dwell on trivial things such as 'divorce' and 'being truly happy in life'. It doesn't mean that her story is uninteresting or offensive. Maybe so many women relate because they, too, are that magical combination of 'privileged' and 'miserable'. 

~Amanda Pratt~