Stone's Fall

Back in 2002, as the world was dealing with the aftermath of the September 11 attacks and there were rumors of retaliatory measures to be taken in Iraq and before news of Guantanamo hit the papers, I picked up a new novel by Iain Pears called The Dream of Scipio.

First the story.

I was familiar with Pears' work.  Readers will know that I love a good mystery series and Pears had, in the 1990's, written a series of mysteries involving an art dealer named Jonathan Argyll and a colleague who was a member of the Italian art theft squad.  They were fun, they were erudite and they were slightly more literary than the average mystery story .  Then in 2000 he had written his first "serious" novel, The Instance of the Fingerpost, a long novel told from multiple points of view set in the 1600's.  It was an unexpected success.  I read it but I don't remember much about it other than that it was long, must have taken a ton of research and it kept my attention.  So, when I picked up The Dream of Scipio I expected I might enjoy it.  I did not expect, however, to encounter a novel so suited to its times and so thought provoking.

A story involving three men living in three different periods (none of them the present time), The Dream of Scipio examined how otherwise good men responded, sometimes in bad ways, to the idea that civilization was falling apart and that there were people "out there" who were threatening a way of life.  It asked the reader to consider what "civilization" meant and whether it was reasonable to betray core values in the name of preserving civilization.  What, in the end, are you left with if you lose your soul or those most dear to you and yet save  "civilization"? 

As Pears said in a rare interview, the idea that there are barbarians at the gate can bring out the barbarian in otherwise civilized persons. It is not the outside barbarians who truly threaten a civilization. Civilizations crumble from within and only when they are weak enough can an outside force topple them. 

It seemed unlikely that Pears began to write a novel of the length and complexity of The Dream of Scipio after the September 11 attacks and manage to have it written, edited and published in just a few months, so I assumed he just had incredible good luck in choosing to write on this theme at exactly that time. 

But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Iain Pears has more than simple good luck and is, in fact, prescient.  How else do I explain that his new novel, Stone's Fall, is a novel about financial crises that arrives in the midst of the greatest financial crisis we have seen since the 1930's?

Stone's Fall is a long book (about 600 pages) and I couldn't put it down.  I had to force myself not to read too late into the evening because I wanted it to have my full attention.  The story begins in the 1950's in Paris at the funeral of an elderly woman.  One of the funeral goers is told that a mysterious package is to be sent to him that has been held by a firm of London solicitors since the 1940's.  It was to be delivered only upon the death of the woman. 

The man, Matthew Braddick, is a retired radio newsman and the first part of the novel is his recollection of the year 1909 when he, a young newspaper reporter, is asked to search for a missing person who may or may not be alive and the clues to whose existence lie in some papers that have mysteriously disappeared.  The second part of the novel is the contents of the mysterious package delivered to Braddick in Paris, a memoir of Henry Cort that takes place in the year 1890 when he was beginning his life as a spy in the service of the British Foreign Office.  The third part of the novel consists of the mysterious papers that Braddick was originally looking for in the first part.  It is a memoir of John Stone recounting the year 1867 when he was a youngish, wealthy man trying to figure out what to do with his life.  He will eventually become (we have learned in the other two sections) a fabulously wealthy and influential businessman who controls most of the defense industry in Britain and eventually is knighted, becoming Lord Ravenscliff.

The person who connects all of these stories is John Stone's wife Elizabeth, Lady Ravenscliff.  It is she who commissions Matthew Braddick to discover the missing person, a child of John Stone's who is named in his will.  She is a key person in the early career of Henry Cort and of course she marries John Stone.  But although she draws all three parts of the novel together it would be, I think, a mistake to think that this is a novel about Elizabeth.  This is a novel that is, in part, about the effect that Elizabeth had on these three men and on their obsession (in their different ways) with her and how that affected their lives.

It is also a novel about the incestuous relationship between finance, politics and industry: between war and commerce where a war can make millionaires and the lack of a war can threaten ruin for companies that make the means of engaging in war; between politicians who are investors in companies that also need their political support; about how a financial crisis in one bank can threaten to bring down the entire financial markets and, with them, governments and empires; about how a good idea or invention is not enough without the financial wherewithal and the organization to get it into production.   All of these relationships can bring great benefit but they can also bring destruction.

On a personal level it is about human relationships and how they can become commodities and business arrangements too:  sex as a way to support oneself whether as a simple whore or a courtesan; persons who are forced into family businesses; marriages that are partnerships and those that aren't; money as a weapon and a tool.

This novel has so many pieces that I'm going to have to read it again, perhaps when I go on vacation, to truly appreciate how Pears constructed it.   But on top of all the themes that he has woven into the novel, he also tells a story that keeps the pages turning.  Part of me didn't want to reach the end and part of me wanted to get there to find out "all the answers". 

If there was one weakness in the novel I think it is Elizabeth, who is also the novel's greatest strength.  Pears simultaneously made her fascinating enough that the reader is swept along, wanting to know more about her, while at the same time he constructed her mostly of archetypes.   This is somewhat similar to what he did in The Dream of Scipio in which the three women play important roles in the lives of the three male characters and yet are also "types".   The difference I think is that Scipio was written in the third person and that lent a certain authority to the descriptions of the women characters.  I didn't feel that I knew everything about them but I felt that they were real and that I understood enough.

Stone's Fall is written by three (very) unreliable male narrators who notice only what they want to notice about Elizabeth.  She cannot be completely real to the reader because she is not, I think, completely real to Braddick or Cort who narrate most of her story.  They are besotted the way men become besotted (and maybe she wanted it that way) and are unable to think of her in an objective way.

In general I think this is not a bad thing to do, but she is so central to the story told by Braddick and Cort  that I think a reader can make the mistake of thinking the novel is about her.  When it is not.  And I admit that I was, at first, a little taken aback by the end which may be thought to explain certain things about her but doesn't really.  I won't give it away, but my immediate reaction was to wonder if Pears simply wanted a sensationalized ending to draw the story to a close.  But after a few moments I realized that of course the ending fit in perfectly with the entire theme of the novel and that if a reader hadn't understood the theme prior to that ending, the reader was going to be hit over the head with it so he didn't miss it.

At least that's what I think Pears intended.  On the other hand, after I wrote the above I finally read some of the reviews that I had been avoiding (I like to do that on books that I know I'm going to read so as not to read any spoilers) and found that not a soul wrote about the major themes of the novel and they all focused on the story of Elizabeth.   I find that odd.  But when Scipio came out I also found that not a single reviewer that I read wrote about the themes of that novel either and all focused solely on plot.  So maybe I'm just an odd reader of books.

In any event, I heartily recommend Stone's Fall to those who are looking for a novel of substance and who want food for thought.  I will be feasting on this novel for months as I think about it.

The Bean Trees

I wish someone would have told me that Barbara Kingsolver was born in Kentucky.  I would have read one of her novels sooner.  It's not that I've never wanted to read any of her novels, it's just that I always put it off.  I thought they would be well written but dense and erudite and, well, east coast. 

But she was born in Kentucky.  And in The Bean Trees you can tell. 

"How do," one of her characters says in greeting to another character.   Exactly how my great-aunt Mary (who was born in rural Kentucky) would say it.  And other phrases that I could hear rolling off the tongue of my rural Kentucky bred kin.  And the odd combination that her characters have of loving the state and being perfectly ready to leave it behind.  Just like my own grandma.

Kingsolver left Kentucky behind and now lives part time in Appalachia and part time in Tucson.  Most of this novel is set in Tucson.  I wondered why the characters weren't constantly complaining about the heat - until I realized it was set mostly during winter when, apparently, Tucson is a paradise.  It made me want to visit.  In the winter.

Published in 1998 The Bean Trees is Kingsolver's first novel and it seems both very timely and out-of-date.  The main character, Marietta Greer has moved away from rural Kentucky, where girls her age are expected to get pregnant and get married (most of the time in that order).  She doesn't want a baby, she wants a new life.  So she leaves and changes her name to Taylor and decides to drive until her car breaks down. 

She ends up in Tucson with a baby, a child given to her by a stranger as she drives through the lands of the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma.   The little girl, whom Taylor christens Turtle, has been abused and Taylor doesn't know what to do except to keep her.   Needing a place to live she rents rooms from a woman whose husband has just left her.  The woman is also from Kentucky.  So, in a way, Kingsolver seems to say that no matter how far you travel you really can't leave your past behind or escape your future.

Part of the story involves Taylor's decision to help smuggle a couple from Guatamala out of Arizona.  The plight of undocumented aliens is very timely but I couldn't help but think that it is unlikely that Taylor would have been able to so easily have smuggled them out of Arizona in this day and age.  That's why I felt that the novel was out-of-date.  The militarization of immigration had not yet occurred when this novel was written.

What Kingsolver does best in this novel is give the reader a sense of what it is like to not belong and the intense desire to belong and feel safe.   This novel is filled with characters who are "other".   Taylor of course is new to Tucson but she never really felt she fit in with the people in Kentucky. Her new roommate Lou Ann Ruiz is also a newcomer to Tucson and must decide if she wants to stay in Tucson or follow her ex-husband on the rodeo circuit. Estevan and Esperenza are immigrants whose lives would be in danger if they were deported to Guatamala. 

This is also very much a novel about women and how they deal with situations that they find themselves in.  It includes how they deal with their children.  Lou Ann has a son, Esperenza had a daughter that was taken from her and Taylor has Turtle who the state is threatening to take from her.   It is also about how women can support one another and help make each others' lives better.

I picked this novel up at my local bookstore because it was on a shelf marked "summer reading list".  The books were on the summer reading list of the next door girls' high school and this was on the sophomore reading list.  I figured if sophomores were reading it, I should too. 

The week I read it I was riding public transportation to work for the first time in 20 years and it was a joy to have something good to read during the commute and not only at lunch.  I would read it on the light rail train in the morning and evening.  This was the first novel I've read in a long time that I would count the minutes until I could get back to it.  And I was sorry when I was finished.

Salome

I went to see Opera Theatre of St. Louis' production of Salome with some trepidation.  The prior week I had seen La Boheme, expecting to be enchanted, and ended up leaving early.  I had never seen an entire production of Salome.  (I had seen a dress rehearsal of a production in DC back in the late 1970's.) I knew I didn't care for the music of Richard Strauss as much as I love Puccini and the religious story wasn't really of interest to me.  On the other hand, the folks at OTSL constantly amaze me so I knew it was possible that I would end up loving it.

And I did.

Salome was, in my opinion, one of the best operas that OTSL has ever produced.  And what a surprise that is.  It is a difficult opera.  Strauss' music requires a soprano in the role of Salome who has a strong legitimate voice and yet the role is that of a teenager mesmerized by her own sexuality and the erotic feelings she is having.  It is difficult to find a soprano who can sing the part who also looks the part. 

Enter Kelly Kaduce.  I can't say enough about her performance.  I had seen her before and enjoyed her.  She gave a beautiful performance as Cio-Cio San in Madame Butterfly.  She gave a riveting interpretation of Anna in Colin Graham's last production, Anna Karenina.  In 2006 she starred in the production of Jane Eyre.   But her performance as Salome took things to a different level.

First, of course, she sounded gorgeous.  I'm not sure she has a big enough voice to do Salome on the great stages of the world, she probably should stick with Puccini and some of the modern operas. But her voice was perfect for the confines of The Loretto Hilton Theater where OTSL performs.  Second, she is small enough and lithe enough to be a believable teenager.   Those two traits combined might have been enough to make this an excellent performance.  But, it turns out she can also dance.   Or, at least, dance well enough to do a very believable Dance of the Seven Veils. 

In the end though, what made this a stellar evening was the fact that she is a singer who can act.  From the moment she took the stage through the last mesmerizing twenty minutes as she made love to the severed head of John the Baptist she grabbed the spotlight and never let go.  She acted the hell out of a difficult role.  Salome is on stage for almost the entire length of this two hour opera that runs without an intermission.  During a long period in the middle she is on stage but has nothing to sing while her mother and step-father sing over her.  Kaduce was never out-of-character.

It is a difficult monstrous character to play.  And in the end Kaduce made Salome the monster she was and yet ... maybe if Salome had a different mother ... or maybe if Salome hadn't had a lecherous stepfather ... or maybe if Salome hadn't been born with all the power of a princess ... maybe, maybe, maybe .. she might have been different.  Kaduce layered the character the way a dramatic actress might and in a way that few opera singers are capable of doing. 

The rest of the cast was fabulous.  Maria T. Zifchak, as Salome's horrible mother, was especially good and her diction was perfect (I vividly remember her as the witch in Hansel and Gretel, she just has the perfect voice for evil).  Michael Hayes played a very nuanced Herod.  Gregory Dahl as the John the Baptist character was more earthy than I had imagined the role being.  The set worked perfectly.  The severed head with the blood dripping slowly from it was appropriately gruesome. The direction was superb.  The director, Sean Curran, is also a choreographer and it showed.  Not just in The Dance of the Seven Veils but in the way that key actions were timed to the music. 

Finally, and maybe most importantly, Stephen Lord in the orchestra pit was, as always, a joy to watch.  He controlled the orchestra and the production with a gentle but sure hand, as usual.     

Click through to watch OTSL's trailer for Salome to see what I mean.  (I like this portion of OTSL's website but I wish OTSL would allow the trailers to be embedded so that they could be shared easily on facebook and on blogs). There is also a longer documentary for those who are interested which, among other things, shows how they made the head and got the blood to drip out.

One final thought.  I never realized before that Salome, written by the German composer Richard Strauss, is based on a French language play by, of all people, Oscar Wilde.  If he truly imagined the blood soaked Salome with her tongue down the throat of John the Baptist's severed head, he's a more complex playwright than I ever realized.

There are two more performances of Salome before the season ends.  I'm tempted to go again.

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to everyone out there who is a dad.  Since this is "musical" weekend, and since my sister and I went to the Circus last night, I'm posting this for my own dad.  

Come and Meet those Dancing Feet

42nd Street was really good.  If I sound surprised it's because MUNY productions for the last 15 years have mostly been mediocre.  But this was a good show with lots of good dancing.

Considering that the temperature was in the high 90's with a heat index of 108 and when the show ended after 10:30 the temperature was still in the upper 80's, that's saying a lot. And the rain held off, the drops didn't start falling until the drive home.  Which is good because this wasn't Singing in the Rain.  Which has been on my mind all night because of comments on my earlier thread.

So here's a brief scene in honor of Andi:

Tap Your Troubles Away

It has been a tough week for a variety of reasons.  But the weekend is almost here.  I'm starting the weekend by going to see 42nd Street at the MUNY.  Tap dancing always puts me in a better mood.

Here's two of the greatest tap dancers ever:  Fred Astaire and Eleanor Powell.

How to Kindle a Love of Books

Last week one of my colleagues, a man more than 20 years older than me, came into my office and said "You're young.  I need someone young." 

Since I turned 49 on my last birthday I was flattered.  But when he told me that he needed advice on a graduation gift for his grandson who was leaving college and entering law school, a gift of "some useful new technology" as he put it, I told him that we needed someone younger.  So we walked down the hall to talk to someone who graduated from law school in the last five years.

What we ended up discussing was whether a Kindle would be a good gift.  He didn't know what a Kindle was, but when we explained it he was intrigued.  We all agreed that it might be a wonderful gift for a law student.  The case books for classes probably wouldn't be sold digitally but  if other types of books that a student might need were available digitally, it would be worth the price:  law dictionaries, etc.  He was going to look into it.

I've avoided getting a Kindle.  I like reading "real" books - paper and ink books.  But I can see the benefit of them.  My sister, who travels regularly for her job, has a Kindle and loves it.  She always has something to read wherever she is.  And it is much easier to carry around her Kindle than it is to bring 10 books with her.

Digitalization of most books is coming and will be here before we know it.  And in general I think that's a good thing.  In the same way that digitalization of music and television shows that I can buy online is a good thing.  I don't think it will kill publishing but it will change it. 

Last month Clive Thompson, in Wired Magazine wrote about the digital revolution in reading. His main thesis: Taking [books] digital will unlock their real hidden value: the readers. He made an interesting observation:

You're far more likely to hear about a book if a friend has highlighted a couple brilliant sentences in a Facebook update—and if you hear about it, you're far more likely to buy it in print. Yes, in print: The few authors who have experimented with giving away digital copies (mostly in sci-fi) have found that they end up selling more print copies, because their books are discovered by more people.

Maybe.  Or maybe they won't buy it in print but they will buy it in a digital format that is easy to read, such as the Kindle format. 

I'm considering seriously considering getting a Kindle.  But I'm not in a hurry to make a decision.