You Know Nothing, Word Play

I heard that Game of Thrones fans have a petition on Change.org asking for a re-write of the final episode, now that the juggernaut that is GOT has, at least for now, come to an end. I had a chance to watch the episode twice, and while I was prepared not to like it, honesty compels me to say that—know-nothing though I am—I thought it was rather impressive. Elegiac, tragic, bleak, shocking, solemn—all of those things, with happy endings few and far between. From my understanding of the show, events were leading rather inexorably toward something very much like what happened, though I was sorry that one of my favorite characters was among the casualties. Hasn’t GOT been doing this type of thing from the beginning, getting you to like people and then doing them in? When ruthless people jockey for power, people die—I believe it was Cersei who pointed that out.

However, the people calling for a rewrite could be on to something. As I understand it, people feel that some of the characters veered into unexpected directions that weren’t consistent with previous actions and that destruction of the Night King in Episode 3 this season threw a wrench into the logical unfolding of later events. I liked an article in which someone explained the problem in terms of the standard exposition/rising action/climax/denouement structure we all remember from school. The basic argument is that the climactic action came too early in the season and forced the last few episodes to produce a second climax when one should have been enough. Though I’m recalling that in The Lord of the Rings, there were several big battles before the final climax, I can’t argue with people who know GOT better than I do and say that all the big buildup was toward a confrontation with the Night King.

While this is purportedly the end of this iteration of the series, we all know of cases in which characters were killed and shows ended only to be resurrected later. I think I feel what a lot of viewers are feeling, which is how big a hole the killing off of so many major characters left in the program. It was as if half the oxygen had been sucked out of Westeros, leaving a huge vacuum. Grief feels that way, and I think a lot of viewers are likely in mourning over the loss of characters they’ve come to know over eight seasons. I was surprised at how sad the scene in which Tyrion finds Cersei and Jaime in the rubble of the Red Keep made me; I had never even seen GOT before the end of Season 7.

I disagree, however, with people who feel that Jaime’s actions in returning to his sister were inconsistent with the direction he’d been going in. I admired him for returning to King’s Landing and not abandoning his sister. As strange as their relationship was, it seemed to be a central fact in both of their lives. While he had been moving away from her (and might have continued to do so if he had lived), in the final push, blood was still thicker than water. From what I understand of Ser Jaime’s character, he never would have been able to live with himself afterward if he hadn’t been with his twin in the final crisis. I thought he behaved very honorably.

I also disagree with those who think that Brienne of Tarth acted out of character by crying when she and Jaime parted and then writing down his story in the final episode. What, can’t a girl be a knight and have feelings, too? Don’t you suppose she suspected it might be the last time she’d ever see him? Was there anyone in a better position to fill in his page after his death in the annals of the realm? Brienne had moved into a position of power on the Council by the end of the episode and was obviously going to be a key player in the future of Westeros — is she any less a knight for looking off into the distance occasionally and thinking about someone who isn’t there?

Having said all that, I confess, if I had written the final episode, I would have done it differently. I find the whole Daenerys/Jon Snow finale too thorny a problem and would leave that for someone else to rewrite if they could (to me, Daenerys did seem, if not mad, then increasingly ruthless and unlikely to change direction). I would have had someone come along after Tyrion left the ruins of the keep, find Jaime barely breathing, and then spirit him away to some secret place for healing. Well, what of it—wasn’t Jon Snow brought back from actual death? These things can be managed—it’s show business, after all. I would have had Jaime find his way back to Brienne in time for GOT II, and they would spend the rest of their lives trying to figure out how to be together, which might not be as simple as settling down together in a castle somewhere. Both seemed to me to be very independent, complicated people. There’s enough material there to fill a number of seasons just in that subplot alone.

Well, there you have it, and if anyone calls me, I’ll be glad to undertake that re-write—for a small fee. And by the way, three cheers for the survival of Tyrion, one of my other favorite characters. Watching him moving those chairs around so noisily in the Council Room gave me hope for the future. A little compulsiveness never hurt anybody.

Elegy for Lost Items

The big adventure I had this week was having my cell phone taken from my locker at work. This is a $10 phone, folks, not an expensive iPhone, but it did cause me the aggravation of having to deactivate my service, buy a new phone, set it up, reactivate my service, find out how to get a list of any phone calls that may have been placed to or from my phone while it was out of my hands, and stop by the police station at midnight to report the theft (a police report is required if you want to request your own phone records—not sure if this is a requirement if someone tries to get them through FISA).

It wasn’t the first time I missed something that I thought I’d left in my locker and will hopefully be the last—but you never know. I liked the other phone better, even though all it really did was make and accept phone calls, but they don’t produce it any more, so I had to accept an upgrade, which I did, more or less ungraciously. It does have several pleasant-sounding alarm tones to choose from; lets you turn Wi-Fi definitively off, so you don’t connect to the Internet without meaning to (admittedly a drawback on the other phone); and caused me to stroll through Target, where I fell in love with some decorative pitchers that I don’t need but enjoyed looking at.

I don’t know about you, but it strikes me as odd that someone would take a $10 phone. It reminds me of the time I was staying at Extended Stay in SoCal two years ago and someone stole my cell phone charger (a $7 item) out of a zipped compartment. I remember racing over to the closest Walmart to where I was working and buying one on my lunch hour, the one and only time I’ve seen Knott’s Berry Farm (which was in the vicinity). When I made a police report in that case, the officer seemed not to understand the fact that it wasn’t the value of the item that mattered but the fact that someone at the hotel had gone into my room and stolen it. This time, I did at least get the feeling that the officer frowned on the whole lack of security around the lockers—he asked if the store had security cameras.

Naturally, things like this put you in a bad mood. I don’t ever recall giving anyone permission to disrespect my personal space or the sanctity of my possessions, but people seem to have peculiar ideas about what they can get away with these days. We do still live in a country of laws, but you would never know it by either reading the news or listening to me recount the things that have happened to me in recent years. Prosecution is always an option, of course, but—gosh, what a drag. Still, you can’t let people get away with things because otherwise they have no incentive to stop.

I guess this post is about the unwanted and overweening presence of Hermes, the trickster, who has appeared and reappeared in various forms in my life and is one of the reasons why Hestia has such an appeal for me right now—Hestia being somewhat the opposite of Hermes. That’s probably why the sight of a simple pitcher could stop me in my tracks: an object purporting to be nothing but itself and hearkening to be filled with iced tea or lemonade and placed on a summer table with a vase of flowers. If I were a good Buddhist, I suppose I’d be thinking along the lines of, “The pitcher is already broken/Nothing is permanent,” but heck, I don’t even have the pitcher yet, so let me at least enjoy the idea of it whole and perfect and sitting on my table in my nonexistent house. I guess I’ll go ahead and post the picture, so you can see what I’m going on about (I have no place to put a pitcher right now, even if I bought it).

Enjoy the pitcher/picture, and if you happen to see the person who took either my charger or my cell phone, tell them I haven’t forgotten them. To everything there is a season (to quote both the Bible and the Byrds).

Worlds Collide

I know I’ve talked before about my love of HGTV but am not sure I mentioned how much I enjoy looking at not only regular homes but also tiny homes. While I suppose I’d rather live in a regular house in the long term, I can also imagine being happy in a tiny home, at least for a while. I know ya’ll have heard all about this movement, which has been fed by a widespread wish to downsize and simplify, and although some of those tiny homes can be quite pricey, living in one would certainly cut down on cleaning and maintenance. Dusting the furniture is infinitely more manageable in an oversized dollhouse than in a mansion, and washing the dishes is a breeze when you can’t have more than two plates on the table.

I have some experience with living in small spaces—from dorm rooms to a sleeping bag—and while I was horrified a few years ago at the thought of living in less than 200 square feet, I now find that laughable. Living in your car will definitely adjust your ideas of space, but even before that, I was intrigued by the idea of tiny houses purely from a design perspective. It’s the spatial equivalent of haiku: how do you get the most out of a small amount of space? How do you put in everything essential and nothing that isn’t and do it with style? You have to think through every square inch and carefully consider what you need and what you don’t. If you can make items do double duty or fold away when you’re not using them, so much the better. And you will almost certainly have to think creatively about how to accommodate ordinary tasks.

Because I work with appliances, I know that there are tiny washers and dryers that would remind you of the play kitchens you had as a child except that they actually work; you can even get a combo washer/dryer that does the work of both in a single machine. In fact, a lot of the tiny home kitchens, with their miniature sinks, quarter-size fridges, and built-in ovens, remind me of the exact toy kitchen that fascinated me as a child (I had one with a tiny sink that actually worked if you put water in the tray in back). You can also place a fully functioning bathroom in a space the size of a small shower stall, albeit what you have is basically a bathroom inside a shower. There is something about the idea of miniaturizing things that is intriguing in and of itself. (Ever noticed how difficult it is to walk by an elaborately furnished dollhouse without looking inside? It’s ourselves, writ small. Why is that so interesting?)

Beyond all that, I just find the thought of living in a tiny home cozy—I’ve never been one for big, drafty houses. Of course, I’m imagining doing all of this by myself. If you were to try to share a tiny home with a partner or a family, I’m sure the lack of space could become an irritation very, very quickly. I understand that many people who’ve attempted the tiny house experiment have found it didn’t work for them and ended up going back to more conventional housing. I imagine it’s usually the lack of privacy and personal space that does it.

All of this shows what a preoccupation with Hestia concerns I have right now, which is not at all surprising given the circumstances. I fantasize about houses all the time, how I would furnish them, what colors I would use, where I would plant the flowers. With all of the Game of Thrones ruckus going on, I thought it might be a good idea to turn my attention to something else for this week’s post, scaling down, as it were, from the big picture to the small, from the epic to the domestic. Sometimes these things get mixed up with each other: early this morning, I dreamed I had moved into a compact, modern apartment that had lofted sleeping spaces and then realized Jaime Lannister was my roommate. We were looking out the window together when I woke up, still in my car.

Yes, folks, there are times when morning comes a little too soon. The only thing to do then is to head over to the coffeehouse for hot tea, banana bread, and blogging. Which I have done.

Celebrating the Derby with Wordplay

Q. Wordplay, have you ever been to the Kentucky Derby?
A. Yes, once, a long time ago. It’s something like a right of passage in Kentucky to attend the Derby infield festivities, and I did it back in 1981. I haven’t felt the need to do it again.
Q. Why not?
A. Lots of mud, long lines to the bathrooms, long lines to get in, heavily inebriated people everywhere, not much to do except play cards and sit around. You have to go out of your way to get over to the fence and see the horses go by. That is pretty spectacular, but it doesn’t last long. Don’t get me wrong, everyone should do it once—it’s one of those “once in a lifetime” things. It’s nothing against horses (what beautiful creatures!)—I just didn’t like the infield experience.

Q. How does one act at the Derby?
A. Not sure there are many rules in the infield. However, most people try to be creative in their hat-wearing, whether they’re in the infield or the seats. Millinery creations span the full range from comical to haute couture and can be quite stunning, in several senses of the word. I believe people tend to plan their outfits around their hats, rather than the other way around. At least, that’s my perception. As far as the rules for the gentry (the folks sitting in the boxes and reserved seats), you’ll have to ask someone else.

Q. What does one eat on Derby Day?
A. There are certain Kentucky specialties you can expect to see on most tables—ham and biscuits, May Day pie, grits casseroles. A Kentucky specialty that originated at the Brown Hotel in Louisville is the Hot Brown, an open-faced sandwich with a Mornay sauce. There are many variations on making it, but as far as I know, the original recipe uses turkey and not ham, bacon, and some of the other things that are sometimes added. It’s delicious and has about a million calories.
Q. What’s a May Day pie?
A. There is controversy about the name “Derby Pie,” which is copyrighted by Kern’s Bakery. It’s often used as a generic reference to the pie that has become associated with the Kentucky Derby, so they had to find another name for it, and the one I’ve heard most often is May Day pie.
Q. What’s in it?
A. It’s like a transparent pie (a chess pie) with nuts and chocolate chips.

Q. What does one drink on Derby Day?
A. Mint juleps, no question. These are made with bourbon, ice, sugar, and mint. Ideally, you sip them from a julep cup sporting a sprig of mint; your goal is to sip in a sophisticated enough manner to keep the mint sprig from getting tangled up in your millinery couture.
Q. Do you personally like juleps?
A. No, I confess I don’t. I had one at the Derby that year and thought it tasted like something you’d put on your lawn to kill weeds. I don’t like the combination of mint and bourbon and would propose something that tastes better for an official drink if asked, something like a Kentucky Mule. But that’s never going to happen.
Q. Why not?
A. Tradition.
Q. “F@&#!* tradition.”
A. Have you been watching Game of Thrones?
Q. Yes.
A. Have you noticed how similar the GOT logo looks to this year’s Kentucky Derby logo?
Q. No, I admit that escaped my attention.
A. And (speaking as a mythologist) they both resemble the lyre of Orpheus. I just noticed this myself.  See?

Q. Yes, I do see.

Q. How do you pick a horse to bet on?
A. I’m not the best person to ask, but I’ll tell you my system. I pick a name I like and then check the odds. If it looks like a decent payoff if the horse wins, great. If it doesn’t, I might pick another name. This is especially true if no single name jumps out at me. Sometimes, I just fall in love with a name, like Smarty Jones, and go for it despite the odds. Of course, the last time I even went to a race was about 17 years ago, and the most I ever won was about $7. Usually, when I pick a horse, it’s just for the fun of it—I have no money on it.

Q. If I get invited to a Derby Party, what would an appropriate hostess gift be?
A. Well, I’ve been told I give good gifts, so I may be able to help you here. Useful gifts are always welcome, so why not take a hint from an official Kentucky Derby gifts website and consider something like these little hand soaps made with actual frankincense and myrrh? A Biblical theme will get you points with many hostesses here in the Bible Belt, but if your host or hostess doesn’t roll in that direction, you could take them a bottle of their favorite wine or perhaps an inexpensive kitchen gadget, like a cheese knife or a set of kitchen towels. By the way, here’s a picture of the soap.

Q. Oh, wow, you weren’t kidding.

Q. Is there any mythological reference connected to the Derby that I should be able to drop if I get invited to a cocktail party or someplace like that?
A. Well, there is the traditional Pegasus Parade in Louisville as part of the Derby festivities, and as you know, Pegasus was a winged horse in Greek mythology. A very nice image for the power of the horse.
Q. Pegasus, wow, that’s so cool! A horse with wings—like an angel, right?
A. Just remember: horses are real. Winged horses are not. Some people get confused about this.
Q. You mean . . . There aren’t any winged horses?
A. No. Sorry. But that hostess soap is real.

Dude Looks Like a Lady (Sorry, Aerosmith)

Did I hear somebody out there say, “Come on, Wordplay, show us some cultural mythological relevance by taking on Game of Thrones. No fair just sneaking by with a passing reference like you did last week. What’s your stand on the next ruler of Westeros?” I probably just imagined this, since it’s so rare for me to feel someone really wants to know what I think—but I’ll take you up on it anyway. It might interest you to know that I’ve been caught up in Game of Thrones myself lately, watching old clips and trying to figure out what happened in previous seasons when I wasn’t looking. Let me start out by disappointing you: I have no prediction vis-à-vis the Iron Throne. I have a few observations, though.

First, I’ll start with my lack of qualifications for doing this: I had never laid eyes on GOT before 2017, when I watched a few episodes and noticed how well done the show is. I hold to that: they should win awards for the opening credits alone, which are stunning. I missed all of the earlier seasons when precipitating events were happening and characters were maneuvering into place. Gotta say, not sorry I missed Joffrey Baratheon, Ramsay Bolton, and all the gory events of earlier seasons. As far as I know, the only episodes I saw were from Season Seven.

To wit: People were struggling across a frozen wasteland; there were battles with an unprepossessing fellow called the Night King; a queen named Daenerys killed a couple of fellows who refused to bend the knee by means of dragon’s breath; this same Daenerys got it on with a handsome fellow named Jon Snow; a dragon was killed; there was a good bit of screen time given to a family called Lannister, in which one guy was bonking his sister, and another family called Stark, which featured a scary little girl named Arya who assassinates people; and there was a spectacular breaching of a wall by means of what I believe was the dead dragon brought back to life by, I think, the Night King. Is that about right?

I got to see the opening episode of Season Eight but didn’t see last week’s episode. I could tell I’d gotten hooked by the fact that I spent so much time this week reading recaps of what happened on Episode 2 and watching retrospectives of previous seasons. GOT has a sprawling cast of personalities: there are many characters dead and gone from previous seasons who played a vital role in events that followed. I do not know the relationships of all these people to one another; I do not know the geography of Westeros, though I do know that Winterfell doesn’t look like a place where I’d want to hang my hat. Rather chilly, if you ask me, inhabitants and all. Oh, and there’s a good-looking guy named Rhaegar Targaryen who is Jon Snow’s real father (which everybody knows by now). But was he ever on the show or just seen in someone’s vision? Just one of many things I have no idea about.

I was occasionally struck by how much a character reminded me of someone I know, but that’s no big deal. It happens all the time. I’m not sure if the GOT creators are into drawing pointed parallels between events and characters on their show and events and people in real life—I believe that happens sometimes on television and in movies, but I’m not sure they’re doing it on GOT. I do find it amusing to entertain the possibility, though, and, of course, in the spirit of archetypal analysis, there are always parallels to be drawn, regardless of any premeditated intent on anyone’s part whatsoever. I’ve also become aware of the phenomenon of “fan theories,” in which the show’s fans propose explanations and outcomes that they believe fit the story’s arc to date. In that spirit, I am prepared to propose one of my own, which is this: Brienne of Tarth is really Donald Trump [and I have the photographic evidence to prove it].

I don’t really remember Ser Brienne from Season Seven: the Starks, Lannisters, and Targaryens were taking up too much oxygen, I guess, so if she was in there, she slipped past me. Brienne of Tarth was just knighted in the last episode by Jaime Lannister (the guy that bonks his sister), and based on what I’ve seen, I’m surprised no one thought of doing it before (knighting her, that is). This is a woman who is entirely credible as a warrior and is apparently well thought of by most people. She was once in a bathtub with Jaime, and I think the show is trying to imply there might be something between them, though as far as I know, there hasn’t been anything verifiable yet. (It was a big bathtub, so get your mind out the gutter, you weirdos.)

As to the Donald Trump connection, just look at this picture:

I took it from a satirical news piece by CNN’s Jeanne Moos on past presidential visits to Great Britain and was struck by the physical resemblance between President Trump and Ser Brienne. I might not have brought this up, except for the fact that I was reading some of the reactions from British officials about the president’s impending visit to their country and was actually, I must say, offended by the tone of some of their remarks. I told you a long time ago that I hoped President Trump meant to do good by running for office, despite appearances, and I am still hoping that might be true, despite having lost faith several times along the way. I’ve always believed he is smarter than many people think he is, and regardless of whether you like him or not, he is our president—the fact that this privileged son of wealth can talk to unemployed factory workers, good old boys and girls, and others outside the sanctioned arena of political correctness and People Like Us and gain their confidence ought, perhaps, to tell you something. If it doesn’t, it’s not my fault.

Back to those comments, though—I guess it was just the tone of indignant horror, the blaming of the president for all bad things that are happening in our country, that very British attitude of superiority from the Undisputed Arbiters of All Things Proper that got my American back up. How dare you talk about our president that way, you lily-livered pustules on the back of a rotten whoreson bag of wind. (Is that Shakespearean enough, do you think?) I mean, God Bless English Literature, but if that’s all you have to stand on, it has, after all, been a long time since Shakespeare. Hell, it’s even been a long time since Keats. It’s been a long time since Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Been a long time since Agatha Christie.

I suspect our president is up to anything the British might want to throw at him, so I’ll be looking forward to his visit with interest. I guess the accompanying question is, what will happen to the noble Ser Brienne of Tarth on GOT? Some of the fan theories have it that she will not survive the impending battle, so I guess the thing to do is to keep your eyes on her. I confess I hope to see her survive and thrive, though not, perhaps, to end up on the throne. That’s not a burden I would wish on anybody.

Now that I’ve totally upset the apple cart, I guess the next thing you’ll want to know is whether I personally identify with any of the characters on GOT. I will say that I’ve seen myself in several different characters and situations (remember, we’re good Hillmanians here, so we strive to be mindful that all of us play a variety of different roles day in and day out). However, there is one character I relate to more than the rest. Don’t worry, adoring public, I can hear you saying, “OK, smarty-pants writer, who is it?” Well, I’d rather not tell you—and I don’t think you’re going to be able to guess. And that’s all for this week.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter to all. This is an abbreviated post due to the fact that I worked all day and am a bit tired. Also, I don’t really have a topic. Everyone is talking about Game of Thrones, and by a fluke, I caught the Season Eight premiere last Sunday. I previously blogged about my impressions after catching a few episodes of Season Seven, but I didn’t even realize the show was on hiatus last year, so that shows you how much I know about Game of Thrones. I do like the dragons, though.

Equal Time for Apollo

After I read my post from last week, something occurred to me: I didn’t bring Apollo into my archetypal discussion of Sherlock Holmes. For some people, he might seem like more of a natural match for the archetype of the Great Detective, with his devotion to science, music, and other pursuits. He didn’t even occur to me while I was writing the post, though I admit Mr. Holmes has attributes in common with him. I should at least have brought him up and said why Mr. Holmes seemed to me more like Athena than Apollo, so I’ll do that now. There are really several reasons.

First, I think of Apollo as trailing clouds of glory, making grand entrances, and otherwise creating a grand spectacle. He’s good at a number of different things and rather a proud god, sure of his appeal to nymphs and mortals alike. As the god of light, he’s always shining, and I can’t help but think of him in his most natural guise as possessing enviable golden curls that are constantly glinting and gleaming. In other words, you really can’t miss him—a room is almost too big to contain him. Mr. Holmes, on the other hand, is more of an indoor person, most at home talking things over with Watson in his rooms in Baker Street. Although you could say that he “sheds light” on the facts of his cases, it is more as if he points out to people things that they have seen for themselves but failed to understand. He does have a large store of knowledge about chemistry and other sciences, but aside from that, he’s uncannily observant.

I think of Mr. Holmes as more professor-like than the grandiose Apollo, as someone who uses his brain to the full. For that reason, he seems closer to Athena, who sprang from her father’s head and whose attribute is the owl. (Apollo seems more eagle-like.) Besides that, Mr. Holmes is no skirt-chaser, being very abstemious in that regard—more like Athena, Apollo’s chaste sister. In many ways, he seems not to care that much for his body and physical well-being. There is a darkness that clings to his character, a kind of counterbalance to his logical brilliance and devotion to scientific methods. He has an opium addiction that sometimes sinks him very deep into darkness, giving him more in common with Morpheus, the god of sleep and dreams, than with shining Apollo.

And yes, I know that both Apollo and Sherlock Holmes play stringed instruments, but Orpheus also played the lyre, and his melancholy seems much more in synch with Mr. Holmes than Apollo’s blazing virtuosity (I don’t object to blazing virtuosity; I’m only trying to draw a distinction between styles). I assume Apollo rarely does anything without the accompaniment of crescendos and thundering chords, those Fabio locks all a-tumble, as he overwhelms some poor Greek on the battlefield or chases a fleeing girl who couldn’t care less about his perfect pitch. His is more the grand style of Bach or Handel than the lyricism of Orpheus. I think of Mr. Holmes, generally, as playing for himself rather than with intent to impress.

Lastly, I was thinking about Mr. Holmes’s faculty with disguises, which reveals a tricksterish quality that he occasionally employs to good effect on cases. This sly, shape-shifting ability to change his coloration is at odds with Apollo’s proud, clear lines. In another context, I compared Apollo with an airline pilot, a role in which you expect clear-headedness, precision, and perhaps a certain amount of bravado, but most of all, decisiveness—you don’t want your pilot playing tricks on you or doing something unexpected. Many of the gods (including Apollo) had the ability to disguise themselves and play tricks when they wanted to, but Hermes is known for his quicksilver quality. Mr. Holmes, like Hermes, seems not only to make use of disguises for his own purposes but also to enjoy tricking people.

All of this is really to say that Mr. Holmes, like all of us, is an amalgam of different qualities, with perhaps one or two dominating. He’s not above showing off. And for those of you who think I’m being too hard on Apollo—who does, after all, have gifts of his own and sometimes plays an important, positive role in human affairs—I admit that there is something in what you say. My blog, however, is currently represented by an image of Apollo chasing a distressed nymph, so it’s probably a good idea to point out that all the gods have both light and dark aspects. I do think other qualities predominate in the character of Sherlock Holmes, though he takes much of his scientific brilliance from dazzling Apollo. But not the curly hair.

Essay on Panache

Last week, I wrote about the plethora of Sherlock Holmes stories currently flooding the bookshelves (and there are many others besides the ones I wrote about). I didn’t get to say everything I wanted to, though, about the appeal of the detective’s character. Although Mr. Holmes does represent an archetype, it’s not enough just to say that. I wonder, in fact, if he doesn’t represent the appearance of a new archetype that arose with the development of science, technology, and other aspects of modernity. I remember having a conversation with someone about whether new archetypes ever appear. I believe they do, in response to changing conditions. Maybe Sherlock Holmes is an instance of an archetypal character that appeared in response to the times and couldn’t have appeared sooner.

I was taught that the multiplicity of gods in the Greek and Roman pantheons represents various conditions and forces that affect all aspects of human life. In other words, there should be a god for every occasion. Sherlock Holmes probably has the most in common with Athena (or Minerva), but it’s not an exact match. Athena, who sprang from the head of her father, is the goddess of wisdom, but she is also a warrior goddess and often appears in the capacity of aiding or advising her favorites in matters of war and strategy. Holmes is a logician who combines finely honed powers of observation with an ability to draw conclusions from the evidence, which is perhaps not quite the same thing as wisdom, Athena-style. He solves puzzles and unravels mysteries, something the Greek gods were not necessarily wont to do, being more expert at creating mysteries and expecting mortals to accept things as they were.

There’s a chapter in my book on the nature of the labyrinth in the literature of the 19th century, and I discuss the detective novels that appeared at that period. I wrote at length about Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White and about the way the plot of that novel resembles a labyrinth in which the characters are caught and out of which they escape only by following the threads that have ensnared them. They get very little assistance from anyone else and have to be their own detectives. The mood of the novel is somber, and although they succeed in rescuing a loved one, they prevail in spite of a largely uncaring world. Their triumph, however, is very real. Unlike the Greek story of Orpheus and Eurydice, The Woman in White features a return from the underworld. The protagonists barely escape the labyrinth, but escape they do—their determination and detective work carry the day.

Sherlock Holmes is the professional embodiment of these characteristics. Doing what comes naturally to him, he makes a science of solving mysteries for other people. In his time, scientific inventiveness and technological advances were rapidly changing ways of life that had been settled, in some cases, for centuries. Much was gained, but much that had seemed certain, like Christianity and man’s place in the universe, didn’t seem as rock solid as it had been. I always think of Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach” as the expression of this sense of the loss of certitude: one lover exhorts the other to remain true in the face of a growing feeling that nothing—not the institutions of society nor the universe itself—offers security in an atmosphere of gathering darkness.

Behold, then, the entrance of Sherlock Holmes upon this somewhat chilling scene. While it may be true that the modern world really has “neither joy, nor love, nor light/nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain,” damn it, Sherlock Holmes is on the case, and you can bet he’ll give satisfaction, let the forces of darkness do what they will. He represents the triumph of mind over matter, and while I would agree that it’s quite possible to take the ascent of thought too far (in separating ourselves from nature, for instance, when we are always and ever a part of it, merely), Mr. Holmes does something the Greek heroes were rarely able to do, and that is to snatch people back from the edge of a precipice the Fates have prepared for them, and to do it without turning a whisker. Not only is he preternaturally effective, he also has style. I think style is vastly underrated.

By the way, I am not arguing that God is dead, or never lived, or that life has no meaning. I never said that. (Personally, I believe in God, by whatever name you call him/her.) I’m only describing the conditions in the 19th century in which people had reason to question a lot of what had been accepted as gospel for a long time. It’s necessary, in my opinion, to do this, to question things you’ve been told, but it can be quite uncomfortable. I don’t think the appearance of the archetype of the Great Detective means that man is in charge of all he surveys; it is more, perhaps, that he is taking his destiny into his own hands and fighting back against the joylessness, darkness, and pain that have, after all, been with humankind from the beginning and that religions were designed, in some measure, to deal with. Rather than opposing or replacing God, Sherlock Holmes rises to meet him, you might say, which is perhaps what God intended all along.

Wither Baker Street?

If I remember right, my first reading of Sherlock Holmes occurred in the summer after my first year of college. I’ve read and re-read several incarnations of the detective’s exploits over the years and have also enjoyed nearly all of the filmed versions I’ve seen. If we aren’t currently experiencing a Sherlock Holmes revival, we’re at least experiencing the proof that he never really goes out of style. Authors as diverse as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (writing with Anna Waterhouse) and Anthony Horowitz have created their own versions of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson in recent years, approaching the characters from various angles that add something new to the material while remaining faithful to the original in spirit.

I came across Mr. Abdul-Jabbar’s Mycroft Holmes two years ago and recently read the follow-up novel, Mycroft and Sherlock. The authors make Sherlock’s older brother, Mycroft, the main character, with the emerging detective (introduced as a teenager in this series) playing a co-starring role; there are also endearing new characters, such as Mycroft’s friend Cyrus Douglas, a merchant and philanthropist. While still within familiar territory, these stories reveal new aspects of Sherlock’s character by not only portraying him as a younger and more vulnerable brother but also by depicting him in relationships with characters other than Dr. Watson. The third novel in this series, Mycroft and Sherlock: The Empty Birdcage, will be released this fall and is already on my reading list.

Bonnie MacBird’s novels, Unquiet Spirits and Art in the Blood, are close in atmosphere and tone to the original Arthur Conan Doyle stories. Unquiet Spirits, in particular, with its Scottish setting, well-developed characters, and bizarre set of plot circumstances, is an impressive and uncanny evocation of the Holmesian universe; Art in the Blood weaves a series of disparate plot threads together in a tale of murder and a stolen artifact that stretches from London to Paris and the Northwest of Britain. I’m looking forward to reading Miss MacBird’s third novel in the series, The Devil’s Due, which is due to be released later this year.

Theodora Goss’s “Monstrous Gentlewomen” novels, while focused on a set of female characters, include Holmes and Watson as friends of the Athena Club. With their light-hearted tone (despite some underlying seriousness), her books go the furthest in placing a new twist on the characters of the two men, depicting both as more romantic characters than they are in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s originals. In Miss Goss’s hands, the well-intentioned protection offered by Holmes and Watson to a group of young females clashes with the determination of the young women to fend for themselves, sometimes to comic effect. And I don’t know how to break this to you, lest you think the universe is playing tricks on us with synchronicity (maybe it is), but Miss Goss also is releasing a third novel in her series this fall, The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl. My reading list is growing—maybe yours is, too.

And then there is Anthony Horowitz’s The House of Silk, which has Holmes and Watson investigating a mysterious and terrifying series of events to uncover the scandalous truth behind the titular house, whose true nature is concealed until nearly the end. I read this book almost two years ago, when I had just arrived in L.A. and had neither a dime to my name or a library card, so that I had to keep returning to the library to read it. In fact, I started reading it in one L.A. County Library and ended up finishing it in the library of another town. Though steeped in sadness (a widowed Dr. Watson is recalling the events of an earlier time when Holmes was still alive), the book is a page turner. Like the other Sherlock Holmes authors named here, Mr. Horowitz has created a series; his Moriarty was published in 2014.

So what is the import, Dr. Watson, of all this Holmesiness? Why are all these great minds thinking in the same direction? I think it’s quite simply the appeal of a great archetypal character. No matter the circumstances, Holmes always keeps his head and always gets his man. In a world of confusion, pain, sorrow, and injustice, his powers of deduction inevitably lead him to the truth in the end. He is a person in whom you can place confidence—no considerations make him waver from his search for facts. His world is not so very different from ours, so it’s no wonder that Conan Doyle’s readers have refused to let the great detective die, even in the 21st century. We could all use someone like that in our lives.

How It Came to Be

I usually try to post a little background on my fiction, but last week’s post was done in a few hours before I went to work, and I was still making small edits two days later. Suffice it to say that it started with a wish to pay tribute to Salt Lake City and a seed planted in my mind when I was last there about the nexus of the physical and spiritual in that particular place. I also wanted to write about a type of character I hadn’t really explored before (who was decidedly unspiritual), so I came up with the wedding guest. I’ve known people like him before, but he isn’t based on any one person.

I have actually taken the train into Salt Lake City twice (and it does indeed arrive around 11 p.m., though I believe it sometimes runs late). The experience that gave me the idea for “Salt,” though, was really the overnight visit I made about two years ago. It would be hard to get any idea of the character of the place just by passing through on the train and not wandering around at length. I drove into Salt Lake City one summer evening on the way to somewhere else, walked around, and saw some of the same sights the wedding guest saw—though, alas, no angels. I could imagine seeing them, though, and that was the germ of the story.

If you’re wondering where the salt came from and why it’s in the character’s pocket, you probably read very little mythology and fantasy. It’s a trope that you bring back a souvenir of some kind from an experience like this, and in this case, in particular, I had the sense that without tangible evidence, this boy might later talk himself out of believing that he’d had a very unusual time of it in Salt Lake City. If he’d been to the stars, it might have been stardust; if he’d been to fairyland, it might have been a gem from the fairy king’s mine.

Well, Watson, you know (or should know) my methods by now and should realize that I don’t write this blog for literal-minded readers. Anyone would think some of you had never been to school the way you carry on. Personally, I don’t like to have everything spelled out to me as if I cannot appreciate a story for myself, so I’ll say no more, just in case someone out there actually liked it and resists the notion of having everything explained to death. It’s good sometimes to sit with something and ponder it, but don’t expect it to suddenly reveal an underlying “this equals that” equation. If you do, you’ll never find what you’re looking for, at least not in this blog.

Salt

(A Short Story)

It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.

“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”—Samuel Taylor Coleridge

It hadn’t been a bad wedding, which meant, of course, that there’d been plenty of beer at the reception. So much so that he now had a headache and was fuzzy on some aspects of the latter part of the night before. Now that he’d been accepted to law school, he was going to have to cut down on his partying. Sometimes, when your future was at stake, you just had to step up to the plate and take one for the team. He’d heard that once you made partner, you could pretty much do as you pleased, and since he was planning to be the youngest partner ever at a major East Coast law firm, he thought he could sacrifice present comfort for later bounty.

Right now, though, he felt like he’d been scoured dry from the inside out and that something was trying to crawl out from behind his eyes. Being on a train didn’t help . . . That rocking motion was enough to upset your tenuous hold on an already delicate stomach if it didn’t split your head in two first.

He was holding said head up with one hand, elbow propped on the tiny tray that popped up from a hidden slot somewhere beside his seat. He’d trapped his hand in the crevice trying to pull the damn thing up earlier and had had to call the porter, an irritating Colored man who had looked at him with disfavor before removing his imprisoned hand, with much more force than was strictly necessary, and setting the tray in place with a crisp, judgmental snap. He was considering having his father write to the president of Amtrak with a complaint against the fellow, especially since his hand was now an unbecoming shade of purple and black due—he was certain—to the mistreatment he’d received. His father had been college roommates with the Amtrak president, which was the whole reason he was riding for free. He was now weighing whether the satisfaction he’d derive from getting the porter into trouble was worth possibly jeopardizing future free rides. Perhaps it wasn’t worth all the questions that were bound to be asked. People were always trying to make mountains out of molehills.

Now, as the train pulled into Salt Lake City with a juddering sound that morphed into a drawn-out screech and then an ugly shudder that shook the whole train, our wedding guest, shocked out of his reverie by this latest unwelcome development, looked out the window. He was unable to see beyond the unaccountably bright lights of the station, but a few minutes later, there was a rap at the door of his compartment, followed in a moment by the appearance of the irritating porter, who informed him of a mechanical problem that would necessitate a delay of some hours. Indeed, he went on to say, it would likely be mid-morning before the train would be on its way again, and the passenger might want to consider a hotel for the remainder of the evening. Amtrak had arrangements with a hotel in the vicinity of downtown that was within walking distance—or perhaps a cab would be better?

The wedding guest waved away the porter, who seemed to be hovering. What did he want now, a tip? The nerve of some people knew no bounds. He stumbled to his feet, bumbling down the corridor of the train car in the porter’s wake. The distance from the top step to the station platform looked, to the wedding guest, to be a half mile at least, and he was wondering how he could possibly be expected to negotiate such a distance when he felt, or thought he felt, a firm hand on his arm, guiding him and propelling him forward and down, so that he found himself standing, alone, next to the train car, now silent except for a low-pitched hum and a ticking sound. The air seemed to be full of fog, but he discerned the outline of the station and headed inside, noticing, even in his compromised state, the gleam of marble and brass and the golden warmth of the light, though the place seemed to be deserted. He wondered briefly where the other passengers might have gone and concluded that perhaps he had been the last one to be notified and the last one to disembark. Typical, wasn’t it? The black hands of the station clock read ten minutes past eleven.

He was nearly out the door when a sound behind him made him turn. He saw that the lobby wasn’t deserted after all, but it was only a gray-haired cleaning woman, broom in hand, tidying up near the station’s coffee shop. She seemed to wearing some type of bulky coat that bunched up around her shoulders and hung awkwardly to near her ankles, an odd fashion choice even to the eyes of a heavily hungover college student. She paid no attention to him, going on about her task, but when he glanced back over his shoulder before pushing through the door, he saw the bunched material rise and unfold into what appeared to be a pair of wings. Oh hell, no way, man!

Trying to process what he had just seen, the young man had no sooner stepped outside when something flew at his head, flapping furiously. Backing into the wall, holding his wrecked head in his hands, he looked up, trying to see what had attacked him. It was a large seagull, sailing off down the street. Nervously, the student set off in the opposite direction, hoping the gull was not planning a return attack and unsure of how he would defend himself if that should occur. He realized that he had now forgotten the name of the hotel the porter had mentioned but thought that if he just kept walking he might see it and recognize it. He did not want to go back to the station for fear of encountering either the gull or the strange cleaning woman or both.

After midnight in Salt Lake City on a summer night, the streets were quiet but by no means, as he soon discovered, empty. He was vaguely surprised: wasn’t this place full of strictly religious people? Mormons or something? Shouldn’t they be at home, slumbering peacefully, or praying? And yet here and there he saw forms: walking, huddling in small groups, lounging. He’d say one thing for these Mormons, or whatever they were, they were quiet, even when they were out late. He heard not a whisper from any of them, which probably indicated, now that he thought of it, some kind of religious restriction. Maybe it was a vow of silence. After walking a short distance he realized that, unlike him, they were not coatless in the summer night but appeared to be wearing the same type of cape he’d seen on the cleaning woman in the station. Which could only mean—wait . . .

But he was right, wasn’t he? On looking as closely as his bloodshot eyes would allow, he realized that everyone he saw was endowed not with a cape but with a large pair of truly magnificent wings. Struggling to process this latest revelation, he was suddenly struck by a happy thought. It was obviously some kind of a celebration, like Mardi Gras. That was it! Shaking his head at the fright he had suffered a moment ago, he started to relax. If it was a party, he was all for it, and though a little while ago, he’d been considering total abstinence until the day he made partner, he now thought that perhaps just one more might have a beneficial effect on his splitting head and settle his stomach into the bargain. The hair of the dog, as it were.

His wobbling footsteps newly revitalized with purpose, he set off down the street, looking for an open bar. From time to time (for they were by no means boisterous), he saw people in angel costumes, taking selfies, riding the escalator in the town center mall, playing in the fountain, talking on cell phones, strolling hand-in-hand in the grounds of the great temple. There were angels in cars, angels on bicycles, angels in the crosswalks. No one spoke to him, but he was okay with that, he really was. Now that he knew just where he was, he was willing to get into the spirit of it. He’d heard that Mormons were a little stand-offish, anyway. No worries, man—let them party in their way, and he’d party in his.

In the event, though, he never located the party. After wandering for a couple of hours without finding much of anything open, only those infernal angels gliding around, he sat on a bench against a wall and fell asleep. He woke up with a gleam of sun striking his face, and when he squinted toward the source, the gleam disappeared behind a cloud. It was a foggy morning. He’d heard there were mountains around Salt Lake City, but he was inclined to think he’d heard wrong, because all he could see was mist. Thoroughly stiff now, he managed to haul himself upright. If only he could remember the direction of the station.

After nearly an hour of walking, during which he encountered not a soul, he realized that he was back on the street on which he had been surprised by the seagull, and yes, there was the station, half a mile ahead and on his left. He moved toward it nervously, scanning the air for any lurking seagulls, without, however, encountering any. Entering the station lobby, he saw that the time was not quite 7 a.m. He saw no one, passing through to the waiting room for his platform, likewise deserted. Relieved to find that the train was just where he’d left it, resting outside on its track, he sat down to wait, dozing off now and then. He woke for a final time when a bustle of activity revealed a returning coterie of fellow passengers, some of whom looked at him curiously, all presumably better off than he was for a few hours sleep in the hotel he had never found, damn them. They could keep their stupid looks to themselves.

Climbing back onto the train, with a mouth that felt like the desert floor and a hollow feeling in his head, he was greeted by the porter, who looked as crisp in his uniform as if he’d spent the night on a bed of down and silken sheets. He thought he detected a humorous gleam in the fellow’s eye, though his demeanor otherwise was solemnly professional. Damn the man, he’d report him for two cents just for his insolence. But the porter merely handed him a bottle of water and politely ushered him into his compartment. Once he was gone, the student slumped into his rather stale-smelling seat, wondering how he would get through the rest of the day and how long it would now take them to get home.

As he leaned against the window, something hard bit into his hip. Reaching into his pants pocket, he felt something cool and smooth, with jagged points and a bit of crumbly material adhered to it. He tried to pull it out, but it was stuck fast, as if it had been glued on; staring at it blankly, he wondered what it was and how it had come to be there. It looked like a crystal of some kind. On impulse, he put a finger to his mouth to taste what he had touched: salt.

Lark Metaphysics

I don’t know if this happens to you, but I sometimes get a lift without knowing why. That is, I sort of know why, in the sense of being able to describe the circumstance and its effect on me, though I may not know exactly why that particular thing affects me as it does. Last night, after dinner (and a good dinner, too, not consisting of a sandwich or fast food), I was driving to Starbucks. We’d had heavy rain earlier, the pavements were wet, and scraps of gray clouds were racing across a stormy sky. There was a kind of pearly light, for all that the weather was gloomy, which probably came from the reflections off all those wet surfaces. The sky looked manic and wild, as it often does here after a spring rain, and that was the key, I guess: I was suddenly looking at a spring sky rather than a winter sky. There was a feeling of cleanness, as if the rain had washed away not only the remnants of snow, but something more.

It had snowed just the day before, and the roads were so slippery then that I was afraid of an accident on the way to work. Now, suddenly, it was the moment that happens every year—though never in the same way or on the same day—when you suddenly feel things poised to change. The scurrying clouds, the tension in the air that comes with a thunderstorm, the difference in the light—all contributed to a feeling of movement and rebounding life. I could feel my spirits rising simply in response to that sky. I learned the importance of appreciating beauty where you find it a long time ago, but over the last year, I’ve become even more grateful for transcendent moments like this.

When you live in your car, you appreciate sitting under a solid roof and looking out at the rain from a dry place, as I did later in the evening at Starbucks. There were many times last summer when I had to sit up in the car until midnight before it was cool enough to go to sleep, but I was still enchanted by the sight of falling stars—and remembered to make a wish, you’d better believe it—during a meteor shower (for about two seconds, I imagined I was camping, but I couldn’t sustain it). I enjoyed the “nightlife” on whatever street I happened to be parked on: one night, it could be coyotes, the next night, it might be a prowling cat or a pair of opossums. I enjoyed looking at sunrises and the golden-leafed roof created by the autumn trees on one street. Most of the time, car camping is pretty miserable, so those fleeting moments of beauty stand out all the more. When you get a chance to try it, you’ll see what I mean.

This morning, the feeling of well-being persisted. I’m not normally a churchgoer, but I was stopped at a light and noticed a small red-brick church on the corner that I’d passed many times. In the mild sunshine (seemingly brighter and purer than it had been the day before), that little church looked so emblematic of Sunday morning that I wanted to write a story about it. It’s been a while since I had that Sunday morning feeling that’s an amalgam of peacefulness, restfulness, and a sensation of things having been freshly washed, but it was quite pleasant. You don’t have to be religious to appreciate that feeling.

There is a song from the musical Carousel that was sung at high school graduations when I was in school and may be still, for all I know. Rodgers’ and Hammerstein’s “You’ll Never Walk Alone” has the lines: “At the end of a storm is a golden sky / And the sweet silver song of a lark.” I often think of the lark’s song when the sky clears after a storm, though I’ve never heard it. Last night, I could almost hear it. It was like that moment in The Polar Express when the hero boy rings the Christmas bell and senses he’s about to hear it for the first time. I’m not saying that there is any relation at all between this feeling and anything that’s about to happen: I’m only stating that I felt it and was glad I felt it.

Hey, Rodgers and Hammerstein? Songs of a lark? Hero boys and Christmas bells? I get it that it’s not hip and if you happen to be, say, a millennial, this is all hopelessly maudlin. (Maudlin itself being another old-fashioned word.) But if you ever find yourself suddenly on the edge of a dark wood after an extended sojourn within, you may remember reading this and have a different outlook. I’m not saying it’s certain, mind you. But it could happen.

I’m gonna have to say I think the good dinner had something to do with it, too, all those greens and that tilapia starting to course through my system. And then there was the vegan coconut pie . . . But that’s a different story entirely.

The Return of Wordplay

The way this blog post came about is as follows: I was doing something I’d never done, which was to play with Siri on my iPad. I was asking it things like “Show me a picture of Sam Neill” and “Play me the theme music from The Illusionist.” Then I graduated to facetious searches like “What’s the price of tea in China?” and “What is most Americans’ opinion of the CIA?” The first facetious search brought me an explanation of the derivation and meaning of the expression rather than an actual price (shoot, and there I was hoping to fool Siri into giving me a literal answer). The second facetious question brought back the following article: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/oct/10/the-science-of-spying-how-the-cia-secretly-recruits-academics.

What started as playing around turned into something else as I read this article and thought about some of my experiences in academia, which include attending conferences. It also took me back to my reading of Ian McEwan’s novel Sweet Tooth, an eye-opening look at the methods used by British intelligence to recruit an unsuspecting writer to their ranks. The scariest thing about all of this is the deviousness of the methods used, which included a plant whose job was to subtly (very subtly) encourage the writer to express the type of views the spy agency wanted. His “handler” ended up falling in love with him, which didn’t prevent her from doing her job. Just imagine, you’re tooling along, doing your own thing (you think), when you find out that not only are you being used by the powers that be but that your lover, the closest person to you, is spying on you (while loving you at the same time, or so she says).

It so happens that I was also reading Theodora Goss’s novel, European Travels for the Monstrous Gentlewoman, which got me to thinking about the CIA in the first place. In this novel, a group of young women who have been victimized by the scientific experiments of such men as Drs. Moreau, Rappaccini, and Frankenstein end up banding together to fight the scientific society that has sponsored this research in the past and threatens to do so again. I started to stop reading the novel because I couldn’t tell where the author was going with such characters as Lucinda Van Helsing, who requires blood to feed (well, don’t look so squeamish—it doesn’t have to be human blood) and Count Dracula (and he’s one of the good guys). In this age of coded messages, fake news, and double entendres, one sometimes fears even to blink lest someone across the room mistake it as signal for God knows what. (It really is that bad. I take this opportunity to tell you in no uncertain terms that what I wear or what I eat or the way I walk has nothing to do with you.)

Maybe I’m wrong: maybe all the intelligence agencies, even the FBI, use these same methods. I can’t say that I can distinguish the methods of one agency from another, or even the methods of other countries’ spies from ours. I suspect a lot of them work in much the same way. My point is how horrifying I find all of this stuff. I can see subterfuge probably has its uses when you’re fighting crime, but it has no business intruding on the lives of private citizens. And yet, so much of what I read in this article seemed unsettlingly familiar to me.

How many times have I gone somewhere and had people talk to me as if they already knew me, dropping some small fact that they should have had no way of knowing? How often have I noticed someone sitting near me behaving erratically, with exaggerated movements or unnecessarily loud conversation as if everything depended on their getting my attention? How many years did I live in fear and discomfort due to the strange actions of my neighbors, who rode roughshod over my right to privacy and seemed not to recognize boundaries (up to and including a locked door)? How many times have I come out into a parking lot at night to face bright lights trained directly on my car? How many times have I noticed strangers lurking nearby? How many times have I been in fear of my life? How much has the quality of my life gone down over the last ten years? (Drastically—the normal life I remember from the past is as a distant dream.) How much time have I lost, how many things have I missed doing, how many people have I missed seeing, as a result of the way in which my life seems to have been hijacked with no explanation.

I’ll tell you what I have been doing: working at Home Depot and living in my car. Yes, I suppose I am a bit overqualified, but one thing I like about it is that I am dealing with tangible, verifiable objects. If someone is looking for a cabinet, I can point them in the right direction; I know where the shims are; I can explain the difference between an agitator and an impeller in a washing machine. When people ask me about these things, I answer them. The problem is I often feel that the conversation I’m having with them is not the same one they’re having, or think they’re having, with me. If you’re planning to come to Home Depot, let me save you some time: I sell appliances there, and that is ALL I do. I have no knowledge of any state secrets or any inside information on any crime investigations that may be or may have been ongoing. I have heard some strange rumors about things that may have occurred at my former place of employment, or more accurately, rumors of rumors. I have no actual knowledge and don’t want any; if you have information, take it to the authorities (of which I am not one).

I have not volunteered to work undercover, for any agency. I have not gone underground to write an investigative piece. I am not participating in a sting. I am not a candidate for the witness protection program, having witnessed nothing but a lot of B.S. and unconscionable behavior from people who seem certain they’re doing nothing wrong. I’m not planning on disappearing. I’m not insane (though it’s a miracle I’m not). I’m not getting married. I’m not looking to start a new life under a different name. I’m a writer and quite fond of my own name. I take experiences and use my imagination on them. I would object to having my work used, if I knew that was happening.

I’m looking to hold whoever is responsible for this mess to account and possibly to break their nose as well (the two goals not being mutually exclusive). My advice is not to act as if you know me if you don’t, not to pretend to be acting on my behalf, and not to call yourself my friend if you’re not. I have a long memory, and I don’t forget things.

I did finish Miss Goss’s book, and once I thought I saw where she was going with it, I approved. I believe her point about the need for personal autonomy and the importance of self-determination in one’s own life is a very salient one, though I winced at many points in the novel (a vampire is a vampire, people, no matter how nice his house is). Many of the characters are endearing, “freakish” though they may be. I suppose their state can be taken as a metaphor for many things, including the right to be different. I myself am an INFP, which means I’m used to being misunderstood. I used to think it was a tragedy, but I’m now inclined to think it a great blessing, as are perhaps one or two other of my other personal characteristics. People always think they have you figured out: they never do.

If My Boyfriend Was a State, He’d Be Texas

I realize I have missed writing my column for the last two weeks. Quite frankly, I have been dealing with the vagaries of not having a home, which involved traveling out of town and trying to figure out why things never seem to go the way I want them to and, in fact, go in the exact opposite direction every time. I’ve been the recipient of kindnesses as well as the receiver of some astoundingly unhelpful bad advice falling under the category of “With friends like these . . .” I got so disgusted with Lexington that I nearly lit out for California, traveled through Native American lands, visited friends in Texas, and decided I just couldn’t risk going through what I went through in California last summer again. I’m here in Lexington for now, may have landed a part-time job, and am hoping to get another one. Now, if you think it’s easy to keep producing a top quality blog week after week under conditions of homelessness and bankruptcy, I’ll be glad to let you try it. Otherwise, you’re getting no more from me. I will give you a freebie, though, before leaving you to your own devices. Your assignment is to read the Bhagavad Gita, if you haven’t done so already, without whining. Then, the next time you see me, I want you to tell me why you think I wanted you to read it. Then I’ll tell you the right answer.

By the way, the above title is not an indicator of any plan to move to Texas but merely an assertion based on my general impressions of that great state, the spirit of which even politicians and greedy bastards have not been able to kill. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, this part of the conversation is not for you.

Get Your Butt Out of the Bardo and Come on Down

While driving around Lexington and environs lately, I’ve been fascinated by glimpses of streets and neighborhoods I don’t know well. I’ve been charmed by the number of small businesses and cafes popping up on North Limestone (NoLi, in the new local parlance, and aren’t we fancy these days?) and by views of numerous old houses with good bones that dot the city in offbeat locales. I admit to viewing any purportedly positive developments here with suspicion since I’m not a fan of the local government and have found life here challenging, to say the least, in recent years. Places, things, and people that used to seem simple no longer do, but still, I somehow manage to enjoy my old pastime of driving around neighborhoods and imagining if I could live in them. Since I moved from my old Nicholasville Road address, I’m constantly seeing Lexington from new angles.

I often ask myself: Do I see myself here? Or here? Or there? What about that street? I have a lingering fondness for the Arboretum (how can you not love such a beautiful place), but I balk at the idea of resettling in the neighborhood. I sometimes feel that I shouldn’t even be in Kentucky at all, having been cheated of my plan to live in California. When I see something about Los Angeles in the news or on TV, I feel something tugging at me. I like Kentucky, but it’s not what it used to be (was it ever?). I had hoped that a new job and a chance to experience another city, an idea long cherished before being acted on, would either cure me of the desire for change or show me that I was right all along. How anticlimactic to end up back in Lexington last August! (Though it was no doubt the wisest thing to do under the circumstances.)

I don’t believe all the people who keep talking to me about the changing workforce and economic conditions that have forced many people away from their intended careers. I always was an employer’s dream and still am. I deplore many of the current economic trends but do not think that accounts for what has happened to me. I was asked recently about my plans, and I was taken aback, since few of the plans that I have made recently, no matter how well thought out and prepared for, went the way they should have. But since I’m on the topic, I’ll just say this: If I could do whatever I want to do, I would be back in California with a plan to stay for at least a few years. I could always come back to Kentucky (or go somewhere else) if it didn’t take, and maybe by that time the bad influences here would have cleared out sufficiently to make life enjoyable again. Or perhaps I’d never want to come back here to live. I never got a chance to find out, but the question is still active.

There’s a good chance I wouldn’t even be working as a librarian if I could do whatever I wanted. I’ll always be a writer first and foremost, and it’s a shame I haven’t been able to make a living out of it since I left the newspaper years ago—though perhaps that will change. Here’s how I see myself in my ideal scenario: I’m continuing to write, but I’m making actual money from it. I’m teaching literature and writing, and I’m talking to people about my academic interests: mythology, culture, the written word, books, and information literacy. I’d love to travel like I used to. I’d like to study film and perhaps Irish and Welsh mythology (maybe now is the time to specialize). If I had the money, I’d like to live in California for most of the year, maybe coming back to Kentucky to teach a class in the summer, since summers are my favorite season here. I’d spend May traveling in Europe, doing research and eating pastries and chocolate. In September, I’d go back to California to work, write, and study. If I did come back to Kentucky in the summer, I might teach at U of L instead of UK. (Sorry, Lexington, but sometimes a change of pace is good; I’ve met my share of obnoxious undergraduates and law students here [and actually, people of all ages] so why on earth would I want to rinse and repeat if I didn’t have to?)

This is all pie in the sky right now. I’m staying with a friend in circumstances far from ideal and trying to figure out how to keep from losing my furniture, currently but-not-for-long safely in storage, and my bank account, currently empty. The thought of bringing everything back here, even if I could, roils my stomach. Since someone asked me, I thought I’d outline what I’d REALLY be doing if I weren’t stuck in the bardo. And it could still happen . . . you just never know, do you? Things can change in the blink of an eye, and I’ve seen it myself.

Rest assured that any changes in circumstance will be reported faithfully in this column, but right now, I don’t know when that will be. People are talking to me about moving into Section 8 housing like I’m supposed to be excited about it (sorry, I’m not, no more than I was a year ago). In the meantime, I try to maintain a positive attitude, and even though it’s not always easy, it’s perhaps not as difficult as it ought to be. You have no idea how hard it is to rattle me these days.

Reader’s Guide to a Headlong Flight

After years of studying the writings of others, I now have the experience of sending my own out into the ether. I know now that some of the questions I was used to asking about other writers’ influences and inspirations are, in my case, relatively easy to answer, while others are not. The question of what I might have been thinking about when I wrote last week’s blog post, “The Illustrated St. Agnes Eve,” goes back as far as my first reading in the early 1980s of John Keats’s famous poem on that same subject, although the entire answer isn’t that simple. I think it was a dream I had several years ago—recounted in a 2014 post called “Madeline’s Casement”—that first gave me the idea of writing a modern version of the Keats romance, loosely based on the superstitions surrounding St. Agnes Eve. But there is more to it than that.

I know I came up with the idea of setting my version in a modern urban skyscraper instead of a medieval castle sometime after having the dream, and I’ve been thinking about it for at least a couple of years. My original conception included the dinner party and the nightmarish escape of two people down the stairwell and out into the snowstorm; at some point, the little boy in the lobby appeared and wouldn’t let go of me, even though there is no character like him in Keats’s poem. I played around with the idea of both main characters arriving as guests at the same time, but I eventually decided that my first instinct to make the female character, at least, a long-term inhabitant  (or guest) was necessary to the story. She has been trapped in the place for some time, which creates a pent-up energy to escape that wouldn’t be there for someone newly arrived. Ralph is a catalyst to the action but doesn’t “belong” to the scene in the same way Estelle does; he instantly recognizes the danger, though, and joins forces with her.

There’s a certain vagueness in the way the tower is presented that’s not accidental: it seems at the same time to be an office tower and a place in which people live. It encompasses the lives of many people and not just a single family. Estelle knows that she has a long history with the place but that it has fallen under an evil influence that baffles and troubles her; it is as if, she, too, is under a spell whose power is partly broken by the arrival of Ralph, an outsider. The other inhabitants of the tower are either unaware of or untroubled by the peculiar miasma that enshrouds the building but is almost invisible.

In my story, Estelle dreams not of her future husband, as per tradition, but of her fellow dinner guests, a dream that encapsulates her feelings about the surreal atmosphere of the proceedings. I was inspired to put animal heads on the dinner guests by an exhibit of animal portraits I happened to catch from a bus window while visiting San Francisco some years ago. I still don’t fully understand why that exhibit affected me so strongly, although part of it must be the peculiar intelligence with which the artist had imbued his subjects. There was something almost human in their gazes, at least to my mind. I got the horses’ heads from an actual dream of my own in which statues of horses came to life, and I must have been thinking of Egyptian mythology when I put dogs’ heads on the rest of the guests.

My story is not a traditional romance in the way of Madeline and Porphyro, who run away to be together, but more of an instant attraction that becomes the vehicle for an escape from danger. Perhaps it will blossom later, but the immediate need is to get the hell out of Dodge. Estelle has the knowledge and the will (and a flashlight, modeled on one that I actually own); Ralph has the clear view of someone newly arrived on the scene and is more certain of the way out. He is a sort of “Virgil” to Estelle’s “Dante,” and the extended vertical escape is in some ways more reminiscent of The Inferno than of Keats’s romance. I have long been captivated by the Dantean geography that begins in a dark wood and ends in a climb out of hell to a view of the familiar night sky: “E quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle” (“and so we emerged, to see—once more—the stars”) [Mandelbaum translation, Inf. 34.139]. It was from this line that I derived Estelle’s name, after considering several others with celestial connotations. Ralph’s name is a derivative that is probably a bit more obscure but may be a story for another time.

Estelle’s “suite” is loosely based on my memory of the rooms in my “Madeline’s Casement” dream, although none of the other particulars of that dream have made their way into this story. It was more the feeling and the tone of the dream, rather than its details, that survive here. When I started typing, my caps lock feature came on accidentally, which gave me the idea of playing a bit with the typeface in a manner reminiscent of John Barth in “Lost in the Funhouse.” I also had Franz Kafka’s “The Hunter Gracchus” in mind both for its existentialism and its brevity. The main rule I had in mind while writing the story was to keep things simple and not over-complicate matters.

So if this isn’t a romance, what is it? That seems like a good question to leave up to readers. To me, it’s a short story of epic proportions, but that’s probably just because it has so much personal resonance, deriving in part from dreams and in part from other poems that have loomed so large in my imagination—and maybe in no small part from the time in which we live. The illustration is from the Tarot of Marseille, which bears no real relation to superstitions surrounding the Eve of St. Agnes but that came to my mind as representing the urgency of an escape (or a fall) from a high place. It is probably both. These Tarot images are not only in the public domain but have the advantage of carrying an archetypal energy that suits the movement of the story.

The Illustrated St. Agnes Eve

(A Short Story)

It’s a dinner party, but she isn’t sure how she came to be there. It seems to have been going on forever, as if she had strayed into the Mad Hatter’s tea party and is unaccountably unable to find her way to daylight EVER AGAIN. Much nonsense is spoken by various guests, and little sense, BUT SHE SUSPECTS A METHOD TO THE MADNESS. What that may be, though, she does not know.

The dining table resembles a conference table, around which the guests are assembled. Does she live here? Was she invited? The answers to these questions are vague, though she has the sense that what was once a familiar place has suffered a sea-change, becoming nearly unrecognizable. It’s difficult to say what’s different, but the atmosphere is no longer welcoming. The house is cold, and a mist seems ever to creep from the corners, hanging in the air like a gray film that impedes clear sight. No one else seems bothered. They all speak loudly, some with high-pitched voices, and they all seem to know just what they are about, though no doubt some of them, at least, are wrong (confidence not always being commensurate with correctness). She once lived here, she thinks, but she walked through an invisible door one day and came out the other side to a place where everything had shifted an infinitesimal degree. That has made, as the poet said, all the difference.

She is on the 52nd floor of the mansion, that she knows. The dining room is in the center of the building and has no windows. Her bedroom is dark, with expensive tapestry hangings and heavy wooden furniture, but she can see the road below. Her car, looking like a Matchbox toy, is parked on the other side of the street, next to a greensward filled with leafless trees. If she could find her way down, she could leave, but she can never remember where the door is, and any time she asks about it, it is as if no one can hear her.

“Kindly point me to the nearest exit,” she might say. “Please pass the salt,” responds her neighbor. “Do you think it will rain tomorrow?”

(Of course it will rain. It rains nearly every day. Not to be unkind, but you know, that’s a really stupid question.)

Tonight, though, she sees a face that she may or may not have seen before. He sits at the other end of the table and may have been there for a while. She isn’t sure. He looks a little out of place among the company. HERE’S WHY: his face is stern and lined, but his eyes look alive. He does not look as if he is dreaming, like the other guests. He looks as if he is aware of himself and everything around him.

Here is a brief description of the company: a woman in an evening gown wearing a tiara tilted at a rakish angle; a suave gentleman with highly brilliantined dark hair, parted in the middle; a pale woman in black with red lips and scarlet nails who speaks in cultured tones and drinks champagne from a tea cup; a dandy with magnetic eyes and a foppish air; a soft-spoken, dark-skinned man who sports brightly colored ties and smells of expensive cologne; a drunken priest who may actually be an archbishop; a plastic surgeon with the whitest smile imaginable and beautifully manicured hands; a fast-talking man with a huge appetite who talks incessantly of real estate; a government man with big ears, a black suit, and a black tie who cracks his knuckles occasionally. And of course, herself, and the man with the lined face, who wears dark pants, a white shirt, and a leather jacket. Without moving a muscle, he is instantly more masculine than the other seven men combined. How does that work?

She would not mind talking to him, but he is several seats away from her. The evening passes in a blur.

That night, in her room, she looks out upon a world consisting entirely of a swirling snowstorm. (When it doesn’t rain, it usually snows. Fog is also a possibility in these parts.) The wind whistles around the corners of the building, occasionally rising in force to a near-shriek and then subsiding. It has been winter for as long as seven years now, she is nearly certain. The moon is a pale luminescence barely visible through the storm. She gets into bed and dreams.

Here is what she dreams of: her fellow dinner guests! (Proof positive that that St. Agnes superstition stuff doesn’t work.) One has the head of a wolf; another, the head of an owl. Still another bears the face of a tiger, and the next one, a gorilla. The rest are an assortment of horses and dogs heads. Huh? She does not see the man with the lines in his face and has a feeling (in the dream) that he has never really been there. It’s a sad thought. But she’s only dreaming.

Suddenly, she is awake. Just like that. Her eyes are open, and she is looking at the ceiling, a wilderness of tracery in an old-fashioned room. She gets up. I have to get dressed, she is thinking. She knows with a certainty that she should. She goes into the fussy, well-appointed bathroom and washes her face, even applying lipstick. She goes back to her room and puts on the clothes she had left out for the next day, noticing that her bag is already packed. I seem to have already decided to leave, she thinks. Then she remembers: the bag has been packed for a long time.

There is a knock; when she answers, the man with the lined face is standing in the hallway.

“I want to get out of here,” she says, without preamble. “My bag is packed, but I can’t find the door. It’s like ‘The Hotel California’ with inferior weather.”

“I know where the door is,” he says, “but my cell phone doesn’t work here, and I can’t imagine getting a taxi in this storm.”

“I have a car,” she says. “But how did you get here?”

“I was invited. But I only arrived yesterday.”

“There’s something wrong here, but I’m not sure what it is. I’ve been trying to understand it.”

“I agree with you,” he says. “Is there an elevator?”

“Yes, but it doesn’t work.”

“Then the stairs it is. Shall we go?”

She picks up her bag. They TIP-TOE DOWN THE HALL. At the end of a long corridor, they turn right into a small alcove in which a heavy door is set. At that exact moment, the dim light in the ornamental sconce next to the door goes out. Standing there in darkness, she says, “Wait, I have a flashlight.” There is a noise of fumbling. Then a whirring, mechanical sound. Then there is a small light. She is holding a pink plastic flashlight shaped like a pig. “I have to crank the battery to charge it up,” she explains. “I’m surprised it still works.”

He winks at her and pushes the door, which opens into a concrete stairwell with a metal railing painted blue. The door closes softly behind them, and they listen for a moment. All is silent. NOTHING IS STIRRING, or so it seems.

“I have a feeling,” he says to her, “that it’ll get worse before it gets better.”

“Probably,” she says. “But the only way out is down. We may as well start.”

So they tread lightly down the stairs, guided by the tiny light of the plastic torch. There are no floor numbers on the landings, but sometimes there are noises—cries, whispers, shouts, explosions; sometimes there are snatches of music, sometimes there is a rumbling in the walls, as if they are just outside a theater with an action feature playing at top volume. She feels that to open most of these doors would be to risk heartbreak, even the ones that are ominously silent, so they press steadily on, placing their feet cautiously. It seems to take hours. She is beginning to wonder if the staircase goes all the way to the center of the earth when they come to a place where there are no more stairs. He pushes the door open, and they are faced with a grand marble lobby with a ticking clock, a checkerboard floor, and mullioned panes on either side of a massive front door. The expanse of the lobby seems endless, as if they are contemplating crossing the prairie instead of an entrance hall. They hear the wind howling faintly beyond the building’s heavy walls.

They have just stepped into the hall when they see that they are not alone. A young boy, shivering, looks up at them from the shadow of the grand staircase that sweeps up to a mezzanine. He is about eight years old.

“Can you take me home?” he says. “Please, I want to go home.”

“Where is your mother?” she asks. “She wouldn’t want you to go with strangers, you know.” (But she sure wouldn’t want you here, either.)

“She isn’t here,” he says, insistently. “Please. She lives in Brooklyn. I know she’s wondering where I am, but I can’t get to her. I can tell you how to get there.”

The man looks at her. He is deferring to her, since she is the driver.

“Yes,” she says. “We’ll take you home. Though it would be better if your mother came to pick you up.”

“She could never find her way here,” says the little boy. (Which may be true.)

There is a lull in the storm, and it is as if the building is listening. The three of them hurry across a marble floor so highly polished that it is almost like a skating rink, and the big front door seems miles away, and someone is sure to stop them, but no—they scramble across the expanse, the door opens, and they are out in the storm, disappearing into it the moment they leave the threshold. On the other side of the street, her car is buried in snow, but they knock the worst of it off. She puts her key in the ignition, and the car starts, a reassuringly normal sound in the Stygian darkness. As they scrape the ice off the windshield and the boy climbs into the backseat, the man says to her:

“We haven’t been properly introduced—my name is Ralph.”

And she says, “I’m Estelle. I’m glad to meet you. Now let’s go.”

Then they get into the car and drive away, the mansion disappearing behind them like a mirage in the storm. They find a good indie rock station, and life instantly gets a lot better. (This version does not record what happened to the old beadsman or Madeline’s nurse, since they are not in this story. We presume the hare hopped off to a warm fireside.) OK?

Watching People Multitask at the Oscars

Sunday night I watched the Academy Awards, despite not having seen any of the nominated films. In years past, I found the Oscars occasionally entertaining but mostly annoying (and often embarrassing). I often wondered why the Oscars came off in such a clunky fashion when they’re meant to celebrate the movie industry—shouldn’t the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, of all people, be able to pull off a polished awards show? In the end, though, I guess some people are more comfortable than others in front of live audiences, and some people do better than others at reading jokes they didn’t write. Sometimes, I watched with the sound turned off so I didn’t have to listen to people limp through lame jokes and look ill-at-ease. All I really wanted was to see who was there, what they were wearing, and who would win the big honors.

Now I look back at those days with longing. This year’s awards show was groomed till it barely had a hair out of place—everything seemed to have been calibrated to within a millionth of an inch, but any sense of fun or spontaneity appeared (to me) to be lacking. I longed for someone to fumble their lines and appear to be something other than an automaton or a walking billboard. Don’t get me wrong: I still enjoyed seeing who was there and admiring the gowns, which, if anything, are distinctly more tasteful than they used to be. My problem is that instead of movie stars being movie stars, everyone seems to be busy representing something. I’ve got no problems with people speaking up about issues that are important to them, especially when they affect the movie industry, but I mainly watch the Oscars to be entertained, and I thought everybody else did too (but maybe not).

There are probably just as many fine people in the film industry as there are anywhere else, and I feel that most of them are well-intentioned, but that doesn’t mean their opinions about the state of the world today are any better informed than anyone else’s. I feel that most of the media and entertainment outlets today are the source of misinformation that at its worst is no better than propaganda and that some of the people propagating it may not even be aware of what they’re doing. They are passing along information or putting out ideas that they may or may not have formed in good faith but that in any case go beyond the purpose of entertainment and/or the creation of art.

I had this discussion with someone the other night. Plainly stated, I feel that any artist, no matter what his medium, is only responsible for doing the best artistic work he or she is capable of. I don’t think all entertainment rises to the level of “art,” and that’s perfectly OK. Some people aspire only to entertain but occasionally rise to the level of art because they transcend the limits of the ordinary. Sometimes art has a “message,” but not always. Sometimes, you’re just looking at what happens when someone sets out to create something, and whether it “means” anything or not is an open question.

There’s a poem I first read in graduate school in the form of a note of apology from someone who ate plums someone else had left in the refrigerator. It reads very much like a note you might actually leave for someone in such a circumstance, except for the cadence of the language and the placement of the words in lines. So what does it mean? In my opinion, it doesn’t so much “mean” anything other than to reveal that by looking at ordinary things in a certain way, you can transform them into art—or maybe the art is already there and all you’re doing is cutting away the extraneous material to reveal what’s already present. I’m not an art theoretician, but I can see it working either way.

What I do know is that art is one thing and advertising is something else (not that advertising can’t have great artistic merit, because it can). What’s different is the underlying purpose of art versus advertising. Art exists for its own sake, though it may also delight you, horrify you, or make you think. Advertising is an attempt to sell you something, and propaganda is a particularly sneaky form of it. My wish is that people would just go back to what it is they are good at doing and leave off the propaganda. I think propaganda has long had a place in popular culture, so it’s really nothing new, but its uses have been especially egregious in recent years. How about if we left advertising to ad people, news to news people, entertainment to entertainment people, and art to artists? My feeling is that everyone is so busy multitasking that news, entertainment, literature, and many other things have been muddied so that you no longer know what you’re looking at. Occasionally, an authentic voice breaks through the fog, if it can manage to make itself heard in the din, but we’re living in a very noisy world.

I’m not against movies (or books) with messages. What I’m against is propaganda masquerading as entertainment and news, and people running around saying things when they don’t know what they’re talking about. Rather than asking for “more matter with less art,” like Hamlet’s mother, I think what I’d really like to see, at least from Hollywood, is more art and less matter. Then it might be fun to go to the movies again (if I could afford it). What Sunday night’s Academy Awards really needed, in my opinion, was for Cher to show up in one of her trademark over-the-top outfits and throw everybody on their ear, as in days of old. On the other hand, if more journalists were out there actually doing their jobs, perhaps people in Hollywood wouldn’t feel as if they had to do it for them, which I suspect is what happens on occasion. So maybe it’s really the journalists I have a beef with, and not the movie people (or at least, not all of them).

Don’t mind me. I get cranky when I’m in the bardo for years at a time. But could somebody see about getting Cher back into the loop for next year’s show? Or at least the girl with the swan outfit?

The Glamorous Life

This past week, I finished reading Therese Anne Fowler’s Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald, a fictionalization of the lives of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, as well as Fitzgerald’s Tender Is the Night, his own novel based on actual events from the couple’s life together. It was a similar experience to my reading a couple of years ago of The Paris Wife and The Sun Also Rises (the former a novel about Ernest Hemingway’s first wife and the latter Hemingway’s fictionalized account loosely based on the marriage). I’m not sure I have anything more profound to say about it than the fact that, 1.) yes, your perspective of events really does shift depending on the point of view of the person telling the story; 2.) being a world-famous literary figure ain’t all it’s cracked up to be; 3.) marriage sounds like a pretty tough bargain even for (and maybe especially for) the rich and famous; and 4.) those people sure did drink a lot.

I felt rather sorry for Zelda as I was reading Z; she is portrayed as a woman with talents and aspirations of her own who languishes in the shadow of her husband’s literary fame, loving and resenting him at the same time. I don’t know how closely this hews to the actual truth of the matter, but one can sympathize with the fictionalized Zelda’s concern about preserving her own identity. Mr. Fitzgerald comes off rather badly, appearing to be insecure to the point of jeopardizing his wife’s mental health for the sake of maintaining his hold over her. Mr. Hemingway is also portrayed unsympathetically in this telling as a friend to the couple who is really a friend to neither.

But here’s the thing: in both The Sun Also Rises and Tender Is the Night, I was awed by the artistry that enabled each author to use painful (one presumes) personal events as the raw materials of a great work of literature. It seemed to me that, regardless of how closely the events of the novels matched reality or how self-centered or egotistical each author may (or may not) have been in real life, both writers became selfless in the process of writing. Both Mr. Fitzgerald and Mr. Hemingway “disappeared” inside their works, which seemed not so much self-referential as the result of a transmutation of lived experiences into art. In other words, I didn’t see either novel as an attempt at self-justification; both of them are tragedies that transcend the personal to reach the level of the universal.

Aside from that, of course, are the personal reactions of the authors’ acquaintances who may have seen themselves reflected in the novels and been hurt or dismayed by what they saw there. As I read The Sun Also Rises, I wondered how the first Mrs. Hemingway might have felt about her husband’s alter-ego, Jake, being portrayed as impotent and whether or not she took that personally. I also wondered whether Mrs. Fitzgerald would have resented the way in which her struggle with mental illness was incorporated into the events of Tender Is the Night, in which the wife becomes, in part, the instrument of her husband’s undoing. Finding oneself transformed into a literary character, no matter how celebrated, isn’t necessarily a cause for celebration. I’m not sure I would take too well to it myself.

Those of us reading the novels of Mr. Fitzgerald and Mr. Hemingway at a distance may not be aware of the interplay between real life and imagined events that may have been a cause of joy or sorrow for the participants, but we can imagine the discomfort of finding oneself in the spotlight as a result of proximity to famous writers. So does the creation of a great work of art justify offending someone or possibly invading his or her privacy? It’s a real question but not one that’s easily answered. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t envy the Fitzgeralds, the Hemingways, or those within their orbit. Glamorous, well-traveled, and well-connected they may have been, but their lives did not seem particularly happy to me. It’s certainly possible to live both a creative life and a happy one, but I don’t look to these folks as examples of that. A life with less glitter and more happiness seems to me infinitely preferable.