Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau Joseph Wood Krutch 298pp.

Joseph Wood Krutch’s Henry David Thoreau is a tight, well-written biography of one of my heroes. Krutch follows Thoreau’s life in a carefully considered way, providing biographical information to fill out the author’s own autobiographical oeuvre. At times, Krutch’s writing gets a little bogged down in considering small details from Thoreau’s life and speculating on them to an unreasonable degree, but he salvages his text into an informative and eminently readable volume.

One of the difficult aspects of writing about Thoreau’s life is that his own books are such up-front biographies. Krutch doesn’t do much to overcome this, in essence this book is simply a volume explaining the little bits of Thoreau’s life not discussed in his own writing. We learn meager bits of his childhood, the vaguest hints of a love life, and most interestingly, Thoreau’s pseudo-career as a businessman after Walden pond.

A businessman?

Yes, I was shocked to learn, and this is possibly the aspect in which I am most indebted to Krutch; that after leaving Walden pond, Thoreau made his living somewhat less by working as a surveyor, but rather became increasingly entangled in the family’s pencil-manufacturing business.

Thoreau still managed to keep his own naturalist concerns in play during the later years of his life, working on filling his notebooks with observations about the world around him, but Krutch makes his finest point of analysis on the manner of Thoreau’s writing in the book’s final chapter. Walden was more or less written six years before Thoreau began working on publishing it. All of Thoreau’s great writing took a very long time to filter through his life and experience before he could talk about it and make it into the treasure it became. By the end of his life, it is not unreasonable to look at much of Thoreau’s work in his journals and loose paper and speculate on the great pieces lying dormant, ready to spring forth if only he’d had just a few more years.

Would I recommend Henry David Thoreau? To the lover of Thoreau, yes. Otherwise, no.

Score: 3.8/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? No.

-Mr. Cheddar

The Essential Emerson

The Essential Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson 847pp.

Reading Ralph Waldo Emerson is a joy, his work is carefully considered and comes roaring out of history with a vengeance. The Essential Emerson is a mammoth book, compiling the entirety of Emerson’s writing into one massive volume. (N.B. It is possible that there are other essays by Emerson outside of this collection, but for the life of me, I cannot find them.) The collection begins with Emerson’s collections of essays and addresses in which he explains the Transcendentalist approach to life. From there he moves into a series of essays about the English and poems. The book wraps up with a small collection of biographical addresses about people Emerson knew and respected. Because this volume contains such a wide variety of Emerson’s work, I’ll divide this review into three sections, then talk about the book as a whole.

Emerson is at his strongest when he talks about philosophy and its role in the lives of individual men, be they real men-Plato or Napolean-or the vague philosophical man at the core of his essays. Nature, in this vein, is one of the strongest sections of the entire collection. It is refreshing to read the exuberance in Emerson’s writing. Much of life feels like drudgery, it is easy to become trapped in the day-to-day reality of living and working. The Transcendentalists, Emerson especially, shift their focus entirely and look beyond this world to a meaning and purpose lurking just behind the experiences in this life.

The poetry in this volume is, at best, uninspired. Emerson’s verse feels like an attempt to bridge out from the essays he is so talented at writing into a form he has not studied, but I know this isn’t the case. Rather, Emerson wrote his poetry in the closing years of the Romantic era, and the style has not aged well.

The low point of the volume, however, is when Emerson broadens his scope from writing about an individual in his essays to discussing the traits of the English. This essay is a long, dry, zest-less generalization of a population that Emerson only knew from reading and a season-long visit to the country. I understand how, in the context of the times, this long essay-delivered as a series of lectures-could have been very worthwhile to his audience. Thinking about it nicely, I’ll leave my discussion of this section with: it didn’t end well.

Plowing through the entirety of Emerson’s works is not an experience I would recommend. Emerson’s writing is enjoyable and refreshing, but it is at its best in small doses. I think that it is not accidental that Emerson reaches his peak in the form of the essay. When you read a single essay of his at a time, there is enough space and time to let the thought sink in and really enjoy it. By contrast, when you soak up 800 pages of Emerson in preparation for a trip to Concord, Massachusetts; the result is less than pleasurable.

Would I recommend The Essential Emerson? Yes, but in doses not to exceed three essays per day.

Score: 4.3/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? Yes.

-Mr. Cheddar

The Last Temptation of Christ

The Last Temptation of Christ Nikos Kazantzakis 506pp.

Nikos Kazantzakis’ marvelous novel, The Last Temptation of Christ is a lengthy exploration of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. Rather than portraying the life of Jesus with slavish accuracy to the gospels, Kazantzakis decides to explore Jesus’ life through a more realist, personal perspective, focusing to such an extreme extent on Jesus’ humanity that he makes the gospels seem solely focused on the divine nature of the man.

The Last Temptation of Christ was a treat to read. This book makes other novels look like races to the finish line by comparison. Every scene in this novel is drawn out and just feels like it is taking its time in a way that no other book I’ve read recently has done. Even books like 1Q84, which certainly took their time in resolving the story feel rushed in comparison to this. Despite this creakingly slow pace, The Last Temptation of Christ manages to keep the reader engaged in the story, truly pulling you into the suffering of Jesus.

Kazantzakis’ focus on Jesus’ suffering is, beyond a doubt, the strongest aspect of The Last Temptation of Christ. At no point do we see Jesus portrayed as a single-minded, fired-up preacher bent on following his course to save the world. Rather, Kazantzakis shows Jesus as a human, constantly plagued by doubts and false starts. Every time he begins to know which path he is to take, rather that of the zealot reformer, advocating military revolution against the Romans, or that of the peaceful preacher, showing the way to the kingdom of heaven through teaching, Jesus is uncertain which way to go, questioning himself through a book-length exploration of mortal agony.

Interestingly, the disciples are portrayed completely differently than in the gospels. Judas is the closest disciple, traveling with Jesus from the beginning of his ministry. On the other hand, Matthew and the other disciples are portrayed as, at best, being at cross purposes with Jesus during his ministry. Kazantzakis gives an origin story to the gospels, as an angel whispers into Matthew’s ear every night, compelling him to write down the gospels according to a story which does not quite match the facts of Jesus’ life. In one of my favorite scenes from the novel, Jesus confronts Matthew about the contents of the books, and Matthew can only blubber excuses about the angel’s instructions.

I enjoyed The Last Temptation of Christ quite a lot, it is a wonderful chance to see an author taking a daring risk retelling a story so dear to so many people in a manner so different than any done before it. Furthermore, by focusing on the internal moral struggle of Jesus, rather than treating him as a settled question from the beginning, Kazantzakis is able to portray the life of Christ as having a very direct relevance to the life of any reader of the novel.

Would I recommend The Last Temptation of Christ? Yes

Score: 4.5/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? Yes.

-Mr. Cheddar

Site News

Hello, everyone.

We're about three months into this project and a little more than 10% finished with the reading, which is honestly really exciting to me. So far, I've knocked off the Harry Potter series, as well as sundry other books scattered around the library. The number of books I'm still looking at is a little daunting at times, but I know that I'm going to be able to make it through them.

A little site news:
Last week I took a trip to Rhode Island and spent one day tracking down Lovecraft sites in Providence, as well as a day trip up to Concord to see Thoreau and Emerson sites. In the near future, I'll post an essay about each trip, the sites I saw, and the feeling of standing at the grave of one of the writers who has had a greater influence on me than possibly any other person in human history.

Halloween is coming up! October 31st will be a spooky Halloween review binge, I'm looking at at least three reviews for that day, possibly more.

Finally, November is going to be a very exciting month for Mr. Cheddar reviews. I'll be doing the first of two planned Beat Generation marathons. More details to follow.

-Mr. Cheddar

A Gringo Like Me

A Gringo Like Me Jennifer L. Knox 79pp.

Jennifer L. Knox’s first book of poetry, A Gringo Like Me is a hot, hot, hot-ass book. As I went through this collection it immediately became clear to me the humor and surrealism which so entranced me in The Mystery of the Hidden Driveway has been a part of Knox’s writing from the beginning. Knox will throw you for a loop sometimes, her poetry is always shocking, even after reading it several times, but you’ll be hard pressed to find a better poet writing today.

The poetry in A Gringo Like Me is surprising, not just in imagery, but in tone and language. Knox has no interest for the lofty mountain peaks and brightly colored flower blossoms. Hers is a world of chicken buckets and battery operated Shih Tzus. But when Knox turns her poetic eye to these visions, the language she plays with is breathtaking. This breathtaking skill with language isn’t all that Knox has to bring to the table-Knox’s poetry is bursting with little lines that underscore a joking sexual tension.

“Plus, they’re the only race/ able to sex baby chickens.”

Much like The Mystery of the Hidden Driveway, Knox works through multiple modes of poetry in this collection. Most notable among her deviations from her usual form of verse are the short scripts. The absurdist plays shout out Knox’s trademark humor to perfection. These plays further some of the deconstructive work Knox is doing with her poems, taking apart the notion of a play and subjecting an imaginary audience to watching these productions. This shifting of focus was possibly my favorite aspect of the book. At first, I read the plays simply as scripts themselves, giving a little thought what a production might look like. On returning to them, I began to envision how an audience would react to seeing these plays performed. That shift of focus, that surprising image, that immediate placement in the experience of another human being, that is poetry and was the high point of A Gringo Like Me.

A Gringo Like Me is a very good book of poetry, Knox’s work has been one of the high points for me in doing these reviews. Her verse is well-done, clearly the product of a talented writer. If I were trying to introduce someone to contemporary poetry, Knox’s work, and especially A Gringo Like Me is one of the first places I would turn.

Would I recommend A Gringo Like Me? Yes.

Score: 4.3/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? Yes.

-Mr. Cheddar

Paul VI

Paul VI Alden Hatch 279pp.

Alden Hatch’s biography of the late pope, Paul VI is a nice tracing of the course of a man’s journey through the Catholic Church, up through his role as pope. The biography begins, conventionally enough, with Giovanni Battista’s birth and boyhood in the Italian Alps. From there, Hatch follows the young priest through his career and life working in and around the Vatican. Interestingly, the biography does not hit its high point in or around Battista’s election to the papacy, personally, that section felt rather dull (On further reflection, perhaps this shouldn’t surprise me, since the event itself is shrouded in a veil of extreme secrecy.) Rather, Paul VI is at its most interesting by far when it discusses Pope Paul VI’s management of the second Vatican Council. Hatch uses this as the final scene with which to end his biography.

Hatch’s writing is conversational to a fault, every element from Paul’s life feels like you’re listening to someone describing the life of a very close friend. It would have been easy, in this manner of book, to slip into a sort of bland devotional writing, but Hatch tactfully avoids this pitfall. Additionally, while I personally would have liked Hatch to at least dip his toes into the turbulent theological waters of the discussions at the council, I think that by taking a route around them, his book worked much more effectively.

Paul VI was a good book. Hatch’s style was relaxed and comfortable, lending itself to a very skillfully executed biography. The only complaint that I could make against it, and I’m stretching a bit here, is that it felt a little too easy and simple; but I enjoyed the book tremendously anyway. 

Would I recommend Paul VI? I’m not certain on this one. It was a good book, to be certain, but I think that its appeal is going to be limited to a somewhat niche audience. I suppose that if you’re interested in the history of the papacy, this is the book for you.

Score: 3.7/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? No.

-Mr. Cheddar

A River Runs Through It

A River Runs Through It Norman Maclean 219pp.

Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It is a touching collection of short stories, all wrapped entirely around relationships between people and nature. These three stories all come from Maclean’s experiences in Montana during the first part of the 20^th century, reaffirming over and over again the clear virtue of closeness to the land. Maclean’s style is reminiscent of Thoreau, though it is much more heavily fictionalized. Happily, Maclean lets much of his philosophizing sit in the background of the text, choosing instead to extol the glories of actions, imperfections of life, and beauty of nature through his characters actions.

In the title story,  Maclean explores the relationship between himself and his brother during the last summer before his brother died. This story opens with a lengthy description of the pseudo-religious nature of fishing which he and his family practiced, then wanders through the season’s fishing shared between the Maclean brothers and the narrator’s brother-in-law. Fishing is explored as a symbol alongside the moral nature of each of the characters. The Maclean brothers, while not entirely upright men, are good and devoted fishermen who work by the incredibly demanding skill of fly-fishing. The brother-in-law, by contrast, is a layabout, portrayed without any manly virtues and fishes by the despicable technique of bait-fishing.

As the story progresses, Maclean attempts to help his brother straighten out the rougher parts of his life, but his attempts are rebuffed in a stiff, cold way. By the end of the story, which follows obsessively lengthy fishing trips, the two brothers have drawn closer together than they were as children and it seems as though this fishing therapy could straighten things out. But in a beautiful use of understatement, on the last page of the story Maclean simply reveals the brother’s death.

Maclean’s writing is beautiful, there’s honestly no other way to talk about it. Rarely, if ever, have I read an author who so well works the love of nature into his prose that the reader is fully transported into the stream and forest alongside the woodsmen and fishermen. I must make a brief acknowledgement that this over-pouring of love leads to one of the weaker aspects of the book. At points in the stories, Maclean makes such wide deviations from his narrative into lengthy passages about the landscape his characters inhabit and their history with the land that it makes the stories difficult to follow. This is shoddy worldbuilding, and it is surprising to find in the work of such an obviously talented writer.

At any rate, the stories in this volume are entertaining and touching, well-written to the point of excellence. I enjoyed A River Runs Through It tremendously and think that any reader would do the same. Perhaps the stories could have used a little tightening up in places, but their deviations and wandering, meandering pace lend an undeniable weight to the emotional punch at the end of the stories.

Would I recommend A River Runs Through It? Yes.

Score: 4.0/5

Would I keep this on my bookshelf? No.

-Mr. Cheddar