Bookshelf 3

Currently reading: The Bear by William Faulkner
-- Faulkner is great for reminding me, when my life is complicated, that even the most simple lives are unexpectedly complex and rich.
-- Also, for reminding me that it could always be worse--i.e., that it could involve corncobs or incest.

Currently reading: Yeats by Harold Bloom
-- Even though I am extraordinarily skeptical about Harold Bloom, I love Yeats. I'm hoping my love for Yeats will override my skepticism about Bloom.
-- Though I strongly disagree with Bloom's dismissal of Eliot, among other early-20th-century poets, I hope that the chapters dealing with Yeats' actual work will be stronger.
-- Not having a strong grounding in poetry, I'm not overly familiar with the lines of influence through the 19th and 20th centuries. Have to brush up on my Shelley and Blake.

Just finished: Paris 1919 by Margaret MacMillan
-- Remarkably comprehensive overview of how all the problems of the 19th century and all of the conflicts of the 20th century met in Paris for six months in 1919.
-- MacMillan not only addresses the better-known conflicts to arise out of the Conference (tension between Italy and France, self-determination in the Balkans, power struggles in the Middle East) but also turns an eye on the less-frequently noted conflicts in the East, particularly those between Japan and China which led to such disastrous consequences during WWII and whose effects reverberate today.

Just finished: The Untouchable by John Banville
-- Reminded me very strongly of Brideshead Revisited, with the exploration of the sexual relationships and eerie connections between a pair of siblings and an "outsider." Banville is much more straightforward in laying out parallels between Nick and Baby; I think the connection of Baby to androgyny does not operate to flesh out Baby's character, but rather serves only to highlight Vic's replacement of Nick with Baby. In a way, the androgyny is too blunt for my taste.
-- Some of the finest points of the novel occur when Vic readily admits how absurdly petty and cruel he is, only to turn around and claim all of those nasty character traits as a privilege of old age. Though Vic uses his old age and fall from grace as an excuse to inflict pain on his son, his daughter and his would-be biographer, his old age does not always evoke sympathy from the reader. We can only pity Vic when it turns out that for all of his spitefulness, for all of his so-called devotion to a cause, he has been an inconsequential figure his entire career. I'm not sure which is worse--Vic's betrayal by Nick, the love of his life, or Vic's discovery that, all along, he was both less clever and less important than he imagined. How did he feel, I wonder, when he discovered that he, who prided himself on being a wonderful spy, was all along so pitiably transparent?