The Moon and Sixpence

W. Somerset Maugham

So far as I could make out, he painted with great difficulty, and in his unwillingness to accept help from anyone lost much time in finding out for himself the solution of technical problems which preceding generations had already worked out one by one. He was aiming at something, I knew not what, and perhaps he hardly knew himself; and I got again more strongly the impression of a man possessed. He did not seem quite sane. It seemed to me that he would not show his pictures because he was really not interested in them. He lived in a dream, and the reality meant nothing to him. I had the feeling that he worked on a canvas with all the force of his violent personality, oblivious of everything in his effort to get what he saw with the mind’s eye; and then, having finished, not the picture perhaps, for I had an idea that he seldom brought anything to completion, but the passion that fired him, he lost all care for it. He was never satisfied with what he had done: it seemed to him of no consequence compared with the vision that obsessed his mind.

Every once in a while I have the wonderful surprise of stumbling blindly upon some amazing author whose existence I had never even imagined. Such was the case with W. Somerset Maugham. I simply happened upon a small book by the title of The Moon and Sixpence which turned out to be the best book I've read this year.
As far as the book though, this novelette is a picture of the mythical painter Charles Strickland. From the outset, Maugham's dry wit and subtle surprises come to slap you in the face at the end of many a sentence. But it is not for the priceless wit which I find myself championing this book. Maugham also has an insight into the human soul, particularly the artist's soul which I have rarely seen paralleled. With this sort of philosophical tone, I entered into this book with the expectations of another Thomas Hardy society work, incredibly dry and pompous in its abstraction. But I found Maugham to be some darker, more experienced version of P. G. Wodehouse. Perhaps a conversation from the book would help to illumine this:

‘Hang it all, one can’t leave a woman without a bob’
‘Why not?’
‘How is she going to live?’
‘I’ve supported her for seventeen years. Why shouldn’t she support herself for a change?’
‘She can’t.’
‘Let her try.’”

This conversation comes almost directly after the first great movement in the book, in which the mild-mannered and entirely dull Strickland up and leaves his wife of seventeen years. What may come across as the callousness of the main character is never denied by the author although he gives you plenty of reasons to excuse it. Truthfully, Charles Strickland is still a mystery to me. As an artist he represents complete devotion in search of perfection but twinged with the ties of humanity which prevent him from ever attaining his aesthetic goals. Maugham depicts the world's battle against itself in this man, and his terrifyingly stoic death leaves a distaste in your mouth not likely to soon dissipate. Maugham raises the question of Beauty as opposed the human condition of being unable to recognize it. I don't know if the ending of this book will irritate you, but I imagine those less inclined to think while they read will find it a let down.

But while the character of Charles Strickland is impressive in its incongruity and mystery, it is my personal feeling that Dirk Stroeve is far more interesting. A man who is cast upon the wild ocean of life with no more than a feeling that he wants to like people and that he wants people to like him. He suffers the innumerable buffets of a cruel world, feeling their piercing pain and yet is incapable of shielding himself, not so much because he lack means, but because he cannot find it in his heart to be anything but so entirely bare before humanity. Dirk is the character of a man who has incredible insight but is blind to the rock he is about to stumble on; he is a man who has the mind capable of wrapping around all the intricacies and devilries of human society yet cannot get this into his reality. He is the pinnacle of tragic heroes because no one can see him as aught but an ass, he is the height of tragedy because his pain makes us laugh. He is the most depressing, sad, and pitiful of characters because he comes across as nothing short of a joke.

But while art is painted in many ways by Maugham, in the true testament of his understanding, his depiction of art transcends itself and steps into the broader world. From the battle in a man's heart between adventure and comfort to playing with the dynamic between writer and written about--between the man immersed in the world so much he lives great tales to be told my a man understanding of the world enough to relate these stories and this man. The interaction between Strickland and the narrator made me stop to think for a moment.

Maugham is worth whatever time you spend on him, but I recommend the Moon and Sixpence as an interesting story in itself, not to mention an excellent question into art and beauty. 9/10

The Battle of the Books

Jonathan Swift

Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it. But if it should happen otherwise, the danger is not great; and I have learned from long experience never to apprehend mischief from those understandings I have been able to provoke; for anger and fury, though they add strength to the sinews of the body, yet are found to relax those of the mind, and to render all its efforts feeble and impotent.

Swift deserves credit alone for the title piece of this work: “A Full and True Account of the Battle fought last Friday Between the Ancient and the Modern Books in St. James Library.” The little bit about being fought last Friday is wonderful, especially since Swift faithfully preserves a epic style in his narration reminiscent of Homer and Virgil. Not only does he mercilessly rake those people he considers his ideological enemies over the coals, but he also quite a few telling points in man’s continual struggle with a belief in progress and evidence to the contrary.

The Battle of the Books is the closest thing I have yet read to a fair and unbiased conversation about ancient and modern thought—and by fair and unbiased I do of course mean blatantly on the side of the Ancients. He paints his contemporaries and those whom he sees as trying to place themselves above those titans of ancient thought as utter buffoons lacking manners, intelligence, beauty, and common sense. Overall a very damning approach to them and theirs. 6/10

Gulliver's Travels

Johnathan Swift

He hoped, when we returned to England I would oblige the world by putting it in paper, and making it public. My answer was, that I thought we were already overstocked with books of traveler: that nothing could now pass which was not extraordinary, wherein I doubted some authors less consulted truth than their own vanity or interest, or the diversion of ignorant readers. That my story could contain little besides common events, without those ornamental descriptions of strange plants, trees, birds, and other animals, or of the barbarous customs and idolatry of savage people, with which most writers abound. However I thanked him for his good opinion and promised to take the matter into my thoughts.

While there certainly are many, many satirists of note in this world, I have as yet not encountered any with as much wit and insight as Swift. Not only does he cut apart his contemporaries and their times with the most innocent of tones, but he further places the whole of the human race on the dissecting table and does not cease until our exalted vision of ourselves lies in tiny little pieces, only worth so much dog meat. While this may sound a bit harsh to you, I assure you, I'm not conveying the half of the criticism Swift levees on the human race so breezily in his Gulliver's Travels. But I also wonder if Swift didn't trap himself, perhaps like Mark Twain, into a narrow world of only being known as a satirist. I have seen many different works of Swift and they all have this same innocence which belies a deeper, darker and more knowing fury attacking the stupidity of humanity. While he is a wonderful writer in this vein and perhaps in others, and no doubt is brilliant, after Gulliver I felt I needed a goodly break before I returned to his sort of style.
I would be tempted to describe satire as a sort of addiction, a drug which draws you in and while you quickly become disgusted with it, you simply cannot stop. But beyond these sorts of morbid views of satire and whatnot, Gulliver's actual story is quite interesting. Swift never wastes times putting Gulliver alone in a strange and artfully constructed world. Usually it only takes him a few pages to go from peaceful family life to shipwrecked in a world of giants. The various peoples and cultures he meets with along his wanderings are all unique and interesting in their own right, besides their satirical value. If anything would be helpful though before you start to read this one, get a brief history of the political situation in which Swift was writing. I have a feeling this would make the entire story much more meaningful. 8/10

The True Story of Ah Q

Lu Hsun

This time he did not feel particularly irritated. He supposed that in this world it was the fate of everybody at some time to be dragged in and out of prison, and to have to draw circles on paper; it was only because his circle had not been round that he felt there was a stain on his reputation. Presently, however he regained composure by thinking, "Only idiots can make perfect circles." And with this thought he fell asleep.

But he did not really faint. Although he felt frightened some of the time, the rest of the time he was quite calm. It seemed to him that in this world probably it was the fate of everybody at some time to have his head cut off.

The True Story of Ah Q holds more meaning in its few pages than many novels of longer length. Not only is the character one of the better mixes between allegory and reality I have come across, but from what I know of the political situation in China at the turn of the century, it seems Ah Q is also a very cutting satire. Lu Hsun works his way into the story through the use of a very frank introduction so subtly that you miss the point at which the story begins and his voice fades out. And throughout the entire tale, his voice can be heard sneaking in and vanishing again, leaving the very curious sound of Ah Q's muddled conception of reality.
However you take the political elements of the story, there is no denying that Ah Q is also a fitting portrayal of some of the more disreputable elements of human nature. The life Ah Q lives in his mind as opposed to his life which is reality, remind me of certain tendencies in my own life to spend a little mental power and beautifying an otherwise ugly outlook. Ah Q carries this to a whole new level though, retreating to such a deep level of mental remodeling of reality, that he can go to his own death feeling things really aren't quite as bad as they actually are.
I must admit, I am scared by how much I find Ah Q's dellussional habits to be not so bad a way to live. While this may have been written for a turn of the century Chinese audience, Ah Q has just as many implications for an American. Given the small size of the book, I would say this would be one of the more efficient reads you have. 8/10

Riddley Walker

Russell Hoban

He said, 'Wel no I dint make it up you cant make up nothing in your head no moren you can make up what you see. You know what I mean may be what you see aint all ways there so you cud reach out and touch it but its there some kynd of way and it come from some where. That place Hagmans Il I use to wunner about it every time we come by it til finely that story come in to my head. That story cudnt come out of no where cud it so it musve coe out of some where. Parbly it ben in that place only the idear of it come to me there. That dont make no odds. That storys jus what ever it is and thats what storys are.'

The cover of the edition I read had the quote "Attempts the impossible...and achieves it" on it, but I would only agree if the impossible is getting such a ambiguously composed book published. Sometimes an author makes the decision to be adventurous, this is the case with Riddley Walker. Unfortunately the story does not have any of the adventurousness of its author. The entire tale, related in the first person, is composed in some phonetic dialect which is not always as clear as it could be. Indeed it took me some time to figure out that it was set in a post-apocalyptic world and not the distant past. While Hoban's choice to use such a unorthodox style gives the entire book a sense of mystery, it's not the kind of mystery which keeps a reader turning pages--it's the type which makes the reader through up his hands in disgust and leave off reading the book all-together. While it seems at times that Hoban was reaching for some life in his narrative, some mystery and a very colloquial feeling, he is no James Joyce. At least the incomprehensibility of Finnigan's Wake had some real brilliance behind it. Not so for Riddley Walker.
While I must admit the reason I picked out Riddley Walker rather than any other book was that it was written with such a unique voice. But the problem was that this unique voice got in the way of the plot. I still am not sure about quite a few points in the book. I will say that it was a very pleasant feeling to understand things and realize the many witty allusions as I went along. But I don't think I realized near as many of these are there were in the book. If you choose to read Riddley Walker expect to get a good mental workout and leave the scene with a whole bunch of questions (mostly about unnecessary things, but they will plague you all the same). 4/10

The Mill on the Floss

By George Eliot

It is astonishing what a different result one gets by changing the metaphor! Once call the brain an intellectual stomach, and one's ingenious conception of the classics and geometry as ploughs and harrows seems to settle nothing. But then it is open to some one else to follow great authorities, and call the mind a sheet of white paper or a mirror, in which case one's knowledge of the digestive process becomes quite irrelevant. It was doubtless an ingenious idea to call the camel the ship of the desert, but it would hardly lead one far in training that useful beast. O Aristotle! if you had had the advantage of being "the freshest modern" instead of the greatest ancient, would you not have mingled your praise of metaphorical speech, as a sign of high intelligence, with a lamentation that intelligence so rarely shows itself in speech without metaphor,–that we can so seldom declare what a thing is, except by saying it is something else?

I have read few books with such insight into the ludicrous workings of this inflated thing we call society. George Eliot has one of the most deft hands at sarcasm which I have yet felt at work. Talk about smooth and subtle criticisms, she exposes the many faults of 19th century British society to the open glare of a modern reader. I would also commend her superb characters. Most notably is the amazing Maggie Tulliver, I do not know if i have ever encountered such a vivid and real and interesting character. It is something more then her constant indecision and torment of being drawn between things she does not understand in the world. Maggie transcends into the realm of depicting how incredibly difficult it is to get along in this world. Her difficulties are not merely the difficulties of social life, not merely those of love, but they are the difficulties of self. Her inner struggle with desires is one of the most vivid depictions of the contortions a human soul will go through merely because it cannot be other than itself.
As far as the plot of the book goes, Eliot's ending was disappointing, almost as if she backed herself into a corner and had no tricks left with which to escape. But flaws are always bound to creep into one's tale, and her ending is not unnatural, only more abrupt than perhaps it should have been. The story of the Tulliver family though is a grand one, if it is tragic. And the various twisted manifestations of society as represented in St. Oggs are scary to the mind of a modern reader--only because we have our own different ways of quietly murdering our societal foes. Not to take the pulpit, of course--Eliot achieves that more beautifully than I could. 7/10

Master of the World

Jules Verne

I refuse absolutely and definitely the sums offered for my invention, for with it I control the world. There is no force within the reach of humanity able to resist me. Whatever injury anyone attempts, I will return a hundredfold. Realize this: You can accomplish nothing against me; I can accomplish anything against you.

This novel, one of the last Verne wrote, unfortunately does not live up to his normal standard. Perhaps because the Hollywood shrunken pupil of today simply is too flooded with light to catch the nuances of a work from the early 20th century. It was difficult to find Verne's invention (a machine which was submarine, airplane and car, and could attain the whopping speed of 150 miles per hour) as frightening. Even given the state of technology near 1900, his premise that such a machine could control the world was simply preposterous.
Another aspect of this story which made me sad was its similarities to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. You have once nice but now disillusioned inventor rampaging about with a powerful machine powered by electricity. You have a detective or researcher of sorts searching to discover the mysteries of this machine, eventually being brought on board said machine by mere chance, and of course an ending which leaves everything unexplained. There are more similarities, but continuing on along these lines would merely make me sad.
Master of the World did have its moments, but unfortunately these were sparse. Among the more notable parts of the book are Verne's numerous quips about America. I could never quite tell if he had misunderstood this country and its people or was providing witty and scathing sarcastic commentary on them. But, if in the 1900s America was considered an exotic location and Lake Eerie the perfect setting for a wild adventure, things in this land must surely have changed. 5/10

Dreams of Red Mansions

Xueqin Cao

This book is so horrible it would ruin the state of the blog to put any piece of it up.

While Dreams of Red Mansions may be a timeless Chinese classic, there must have been quite a bit that got mauled in the translation. Truly, I should have guessed as much when my translation was begun with quotations from Chairman Mao (in bold print no less). But the folly of this work is much deeper than the choice of preface.
Not only would I liken it to a cheap American soap opera, but I would even go so far as to say those steady fans of soap operas would gag on this one. But I don't blame anyone for the wasted hours of my life which this book has so greedily consumed; I brought it upon my own foolish self. People gave me adequate hints all along the way (i.e. a book about incest). Unfortunately these hints were so colorful in nature I assumed them all to be jokes. They were not.
Dreams of Red Mansions tells the story of a family (extended beyond all realistic connections to include a huge group of people with three or four different surnames) and its twisted inter-relations. The only high points of the book were the chapters narrated by a rock. These actually were witty and since one of them began the whole travesty, tricked me into reading on. The names of places and spirits are also quite entertaining, but one can only take so much of the Garden of Liquid Inimitable Purity and the Jade of Abstract Spiritual Confusion. These are only a few samples of the simpler sort, the real things were often much more convoluted. One name actually consumed an entire paragraph much to the chagrin of the plot. So the point is: unless you plan on reading it in the original Chinese, don't come anywhere near this atrocity. 2/10