The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Picture of Dorian Gray is a novel written by Oscar Wilde, first published in 1891. It was his only novel, and it was brilliant. I finished it last week and have not stopped thinking about it since. It is a very complicated, philosophical work, which will be explained in a bit, but also extremely suspenseful. It's not a mystery book or a thriller, or an adventure, but it does manage to grab that cliff-hanger effect. I think that's the best thing about this book. It is so complex but manages to exce in every component of it. It's a nice, rich book. Then there are, of course, the characters.

The book follows the character Dorian Gray who as a very young man, has a master-portrait painted of him by his friend Basil Hallward. After meeting Lord Henry though, he becomes convinced of the utmost importance of beauty, and in a moment of passion, wishes that the portrait will grow old and carry the burden of his soul while he himself could forever remain young, beautiful and pure, at least in appearance. After the suicide of his first love Sybil Vane, he begins noticing the deterioration of the painting, hides it away, and from then on lives his life freely, following the epigrams thrown about by Lord Henry, eventually transforming from the purest of humans to the most grotesque, cold, and immoral. Unable to reclaim the value of goodness, decades later, he attempts to erase all evidence of his soul's dirt by destroying the panting, and thus unintentionally kills himself.

So there are not a whole lot of characters, but there are only three that are specifically explained in depth. Those are Dorian Gray, Lord Henry Wotton, and Basil Hallward. The other characters can all be split into either the members of the intellectual, polite society of which Dorian is a part of and the victims to Dorian's cruelty.

So Dorian Gray,though he is a very interesting character, is more of a reflection of the influence of others. He changes often though, which is interesting, and he also is interesting in that his past is kept very vague despite the great uniqueness of it. Dorian starts out very nice, pure, and polite. He is friends with Basil Hallward and is very happy being so. He sits for his paintings quietly, borrows his music to learn on piano, and is glowing with a great personal beauty. Then Lord Henry starts polluting his mind, and Dorian starts following Henry's liberal ways. After the portrait separates his soul from his body, he grows worse and worse. Why? The main belief of Henry's that Dorian adopts is that life is a collection of experiences, that experiences are but our own mistakes, and that the more experiences you have, the better. The final pushing point is the book that Henry gives Dorian. W'll get into that later too, but the book basically fascinates Dorian so much that he becomes poisoned by it.

The book is followed by a gap of several years. Dorian becomes obsessed with experiencing everything then, and this is easy for him because, being ever beautiful, he can get whatever he wants. So he starts changing, and people start noticing. He himself begins feeling very guilty, blaming the painting for killing him, calling the blessing a curse, and finally regretting that it all happened. There are two times in the book when he tries to actually fix himself up. The first time is when he cruelly breaks his engagement with Sybil. Upon returning home, he sees the first signs of change in the painting. On his own, he then decides to go back and marry her, since he now understands the wickedness of his actions and wishes to erase it from his soul. However, finding out that she killed herself, he feels extreme remorse for a moment, but then Henry steps in, convincing Dorian of the beautiful romance of her death, and washes away any want of reconciliation. This is what happens the second time too. The second time, Dorian is about to sleep with a girl that is in love with him, but decides to instead break his relations with her in order to spare her of his terrible influence. Oh, there's something interesting about Dorian. It is his transition from Basil to Henry and from positive to negative influence. That'll come later then.

Anyways, so both times, Henry convinces Dorian not to try to be good, but both times, Henry's convincing is helped along by the portrait. The second time, Dorian still continues to believe that he is getting better until he sees his painting and how he actually had turned worse, seeing that his good action, as Henry said, was but one of vanity, hypocrisy, and curiosity. Now these little moments are important because they are out of the norm. Dorian, like most of us, regrets our own action, but is too frightened to actually feel remorse, for remorse is to confront one's own conscience, and when you do that, then you feel thus obliged to do something about the faults. Doing something is actually very frightening, and Dorian is acutely frightened of his own conscience for the duration of the book, being his greatest downfall. So these moments are so brave when he wishes to make a change. However, though he wishes to make change, he doesn't. Notice that when he wishes to change, he is alone. He is only stopped from change when he is convinced to stop by Henry or other, other being his conscience in that second time. So Dorian, poor Dorian, manages to stay good, or wishing to be good, and most of all maintaining an understanding of what is good despite all his actions, and this is only when he is alone to contemplate over his sins. Then his sins are twisted by Henry, the futility of his goodness twisted by the damage of his soul, and I wonder whether without Henry he would have been a better person, and the answer is an obvious yes, for conscience catches us all, and seeing it is a gift if one can act freely to fix himself, but a death sentence if one is haunted by it, lacking the ability to act to change it on his own.

The other thing was his childhood. Rarely mentioned in the book, it is a wonderfully colorful, but also tragic. According to Henry, of course, tragedy is the most exquisitely interesting of things. It is wonderfully beautiful and romantic. Yet it is so little spoken of. It is like a very subtle subplot that had already concluded. Dorian’s mother was the daughter of a very respected and wealthy gentleman, Kelso. His mother, in love with a man beneath her class, she married him despite her father’s consent, and then did during childbirth. His father died soon after, and left to the care of his grandfather, Dorian suffered. Kelso despised Dorian for killing his daughter. What a story, right? That poor boy, he was kept in a single grimy room, alone, for years of quiet. This is the room where Dorian keeps his soul. I love these great juicy bits that are left out, like when he blackmails Alan to destroy Basil’s body, where you never find out what exactly he blackmails Alan with. Of course if you’re getting into the psychology of the character and all, you could start going on about childhood trauma and how it has affected his vision of the world, but honestly, more than anything, that lonely childhood worsened him less than preserved his youth to be one of only one terror, Kelso, while others of us could be subjected to many. Of course the isolation could also have made him more vulnerable to the influence of others. If only he learned that there are actually terrible people in the world, he may have been spared the influence of Lord Henry.

Well that’s enough of Dorian for now I think, and Henry is in many ways vastly more interesting. Henry is essentially Dorian after all, or rather the other way around. See we could do Basil and Henry in one I guess. Basil is the painter and he is a terribly good person aside from the fact that he is a bit creepy, but that’s not so bad at all in context. So according to Henry, the only time that Basil was eve interesting was when he explained his feelings regarding Dorian. Basil has an obsession with Dorian, at first at least. He becomes dependent on him for artistic inspiration, as though life has come into existence when Basil met Dorian and life certainly becomes dull when he leaves. Basil understood that beauty is not everything but that there was great value in it. He gained art out of Dorian’s beauty. If he painted him again after what Dorian had done, I’d think the painting would be quite terrible.

Anyways, Basil is the good. When Dorian is with him he is pure. Of course Basil is a bit of a jailer when it came to Dorian, the opposite of Henry. Henry says what all else are afraid to say. There’s a great quotation about this that I will write out in the end. Henry is anyways, a terrible influence to those around him. He says things that if you believe, can cause terrible harm. Bail says even Harry does not believe everything he says. That is the flaw of t hose in the aristocracy, that they are too brilliant, too persuasive, too secure, and to free for their own good, and most of all, to society’s good. But Dorian does believe him instead of Basil. That was a mistake. So Henry speaks well, in his low musical voice, and you’d have to wonder, what would the book be like told from his point of view. Honestly, I think it’d be terribly boring. Henry is a great character when told from Dorian’s point of view because Dorian is pretty fun. He’s a terrible person, Dorian. He ruins lives left and right. But he at least does something. Then you get these interjections by Henry of long speeches filled with philosophy. Very fun. But if the entire book was written like that, it’d be very tiring.

Not to say that Dorian’s narration is any less interesting because Dorian is very intelligent, and you could very clearly track how he grows more and more intelligent as he goes, saying his own philosophies at times, much like Harry. The thing is, though, Dorian actually has the chance to put these theories into practice. He is young and beautiful. Thus he can do anything he could possibly want. Harry is all talk. That is why he could be the spirit of evil and still be considered a gentleman. Dorian is far more active. Harry does have one very interesting moment near the end when he goes back a it on the marriage taboo. He gets divorced from a meaningless marriage to which he claimed he had no attachment. You’d think then that the divorce would not mean anything to him at all, and if anything, he’d be rejoicing. That is not the case though. He says that marriage is like a bad habit and that all habits are missed, especially the bad ones. This is Harry’s round-about way to say that he misses his wife. This is quite a sentimental moment for him, especially since Harry has a hidden fear for sentiment. Anyways, his sentiment for Dorian, at least, is apparent, despite the fact that he has corrupted the angel to become a terrible vision of what Harry fantasizes on. He never meant for it to get this bad. Harry, even, though he caused it, does not understand just how terrible Dorian had become, as shown in the same conversation when he says crime is for the lower classes as art is for the higher, in experiencing profound experiences. Dorian, he says, is not capable of crime, especially murder. How little Harry knows. There is that pause when he leaves when Harry seems like he’d say something. What is this? It is never revealed, again, a wonderful mystery to speculate upon, but it may very well have been something too concretely sentimental to be expressed by such a “cold cynic” as Harry (the quotations being for that it is more of a put-on appearance rather than a true personality.) Harry is one of the few characters that actually voice his curiosity over Dorian’s lasting youth. He voices it in this conversation too. When he leaves, I think, personally, that he was going to ask how he managed it, seriously. Then perhaps he decided that he’d rather not know. Perhaps he was afraid. Perhaps he thought it didn’t matter. Perhaps this was because the youth was a wonder that he did not want shattered. Perhaps this was because he feels guilty, for perhaps this theory of his, that beauty and youth are the only things worth having in life, was a flawed theory that he’d soon take back. Perhaps he had this deprived Dorian of the wonders of soul. Perhaps. It is impossible to know, which is the beauty of it.

So yes I think that’s good enough for characters, and so I’ll go on to some of the writing style stuff I guess. It’s changes gradually. The book isn’t all that long but it’s pretty long and during it, the writing gets a lot more intellectual, but along with that, the writing style changes with the subject that is being spoken of. For example, there is the philosophy stuff. There’s this chapter, Chapter 11. If you’re a plotline reader, as in one that just loves plot and not much else, this chapter is where you’d fall over. Nothing happens except for a bunch of years pass and he describes learning about a bunch of things like jewelry. It could get really boring, I understand, but I think it is absolutely wonderful He gets into this passage about waking up in the middle night and realizing things. He makes a bunch of allusions to different bits of knowledge that he had gained and it is special. It doesn’t come off as arrogant either. It comes off as sincerely excited as well as well-informed. Anyways, so the sentences here could get massive and the words longer, while in other moments of suspense, like when he wills Basil, the sentences get very short and the words simple.

The nice thing though, as I said, is that he invokes suspense without having to resort to constant uses of ellipsis, italicized words or strong language. There are no recurring metaphors of dark alleys or bats or shivering winds or whatnot. Wilde simply describes what exactly is happening in a manner that is short and blunt to give off the general effect. As for suspense, Wilde does not blatantly play with the reader, as in he does not say something shocking and then abruptly end a chapter. There are many breathing moments and the language remains ever beautiful. The playing with the readers occurs with the gaps and unanswered questions but not with unrevealed information that is simply delayed for dramatic purposes. There is much dramatic irony, but there is little teasing, little manipulation, and little concession to the plot of the book. That is the most terrible crime for a writer, I think. I am most definitely wrong in saying that, and the law definitely has many clauses and exceptions, but in my opinion, the plot is ever secondary. Twists are treats as are exiting incidents and daunting climaxes. It is of the utmost importance to first have the characters right and then to write it well, without condescending to the level of textbook. This is precisely why I avoid mysteries and thrillers as much as possible. There could be wonderful thrillers, I think, as well as mysteries, but more often than not, they tend to disappoint me. This is because they focus very much on the plot, and their audience is made of plot readers, which is fine, but I am not one. So the author writes for plot readers, meaning the writing is kept as obvious as possible, with ambiguities existing only in the plot, and this done clearly so that the reader could think it as a clue that will surely matter soon, but a clue too little for the answer to be guessed through its use. This is what makes the readers try to guess, doing the “He’s the killer” kind of stuff. That’s fine, but honestly, it interests me very little. I just don’t care enough about who the killer is, but much rather why the characters in the book want to know who the killer is, how they must be reacting to the situation and how the writer represents the situation through subtle things such as symbolism through the landscape or the syntax used by the characters that shows their inner conflicts. You know why this is? Well, I think it’s because most humans tend to be very self-absorbed, and so they wouldn’t care so much about who the killer is as to how it will affect them, and this how is subjected to the past events that concerned the character personally as well as their natural personality and such. Anyways, this all boils down to whether you prefer the who’s, what’s, and when’s or the how’s and why’s. I’m mostly the how’s I guess. It all depends on people. So what mystery books do I actually like? Sherlock Holmes. That’s pretty much it. I don’t remember a smidge of mystery from those books though. All I remember, (and of these I remember all very well) are the descriptions of Holmes as a character, Watson’s personal thoughts, and their interactions. Holmes is one of the best-written characters ever, I believe. This is because of how much of an image the character puts on. He is very Henry, actually. Holmes is absolutely self-absorbed, and goes into his thoughts constantly, and is opinions, though his opinions often seem to be but a theory made of thoughts, and never his feelings. This is the true mystery, and you’d think they’d be revealed if he was the one narrating, but they aren’t. It’s maddening and makes you love him dearly, and in the few moments when actions portray feeling, for him, and Watson, being so sensitive, expands on it, I feel so extremely glad. You do fall in love with characters, and that by how they are written, and so mystery and thriller doesn’t work for me. You cannot love an event, only what it represents and who it involves. I will leave fantasy for another day. Now Dorian Gray. What a tangent. You see what I mean by humans are self-absorbed.

Well, what did I say I’ll speak about? Oh, right, influences and of the book within the book. The influences are great because it addresses the idea that none of us are our own person. We are very much sharing lives. We are very much a societal species. If we lived on our own, we’d be wonderful or terrible, for there are only wonderful and terrible people. It is just tat we wonderful people are influenced by the terrible and we terrible people are influenced by the wonderful and thus we get this nice mélange of a people in every person and so we end up much the same. So you can’t really negate racia and gender-based generalizations completely because who we are exposed to does make a difference, ad this effect grows exponentially. Then again there are computers, phones, and televisions now, so that theory will evolve very soon. We may all just become soon enough a person each made of all people, and so be all very much the same in personality, but that is for sci-fi. In this case, we are in the late 19th century, and I love it here because things are nice and personal. Dorian is exposed to nobody at first, and so is pure for he is naturally a wonderful person and grows only from his own wonder-filled self. Then he is exposed to basil and he becomes wonderful still for Basil is also a wonderful person, though he does get influenced by the artists’ love of beauty, and so grows slightly vain or his own looks. Then he is exposed to Henry. Basil understood the danger of being exposed to people in general. You don’t know who is going to start influencing him. We know Dorian is very vulnerable to influence for his isolation and also the general vulnerability that all good people share. Basil, knowing this, acts as Kelso did, but not strongly enough, for Henry emerges, a definitively terrible person. You could really tell what kind of a person someone is by how the people around him act. One that influences others to be good is the best of people. One that influences people to be bad is the worst. One that influences people to be bad while staying relatively good themselves is the cruelest of people. Influence matters so much because confession exists, and self-purification. Henry can confess his sins and be perhaps forgiven, but the damage is not done only to him, but also to Dorian, and for all the forgiveness that God can shed on Henry, none would go on Dorian. Pity only goes on Dorian, but influence is a poison. This will lead nicely to the book.

The book is Dorian’s poison. It speaks of experience, a French boy that as he grows, spends that time experiencing everything he possibly can. Dorian does the same. It is very apparent. The man in the book grows to be afraid of his own reflection. This is because, as with most men, his soul is written on his face. Dorian’s soul is separate from his face though. It is on a painting and that is his true reflection, a terrible, terrible curse to have. Anyways, Dorian reads this book and imitates it. The writing is intriguing, of course Henry gave it to him, and when you love something too much, you give that loved thing the liberty to ruin you. The book, Henry says, was not at fault, for as Oscar Wilde said, all art is quite useless. We are what we are and will be what we will be regardless of art. That is a lie, in my opinion, but as Wilde was part of the art nouveau movement, where art is done for only art’s sake, on surface and symbols, where going beyond it is done at the spectator’s peril, where art shows what it shows and words say what they say and mean what they mean, saying nothing more and noting less, you cannot know whether this absurd statement of humans being free from the influence of art, is meant to be taken seriously by Wilde or not. Nonetheless, Henry says so, and perhaps he is right. Perhaps, as Dorian does quite like Henry, he is trying to place the blame of his living death to the book rather than to his friend. The book does seem t have a rather jarring effect on him though.

Finally, so this book within the book; can it be this book itself? Can Dorian Gray be reading Dorian Gray? Well, obviously n, since the book’s description does not match this one exactly, but the nameless book may be representing a power that this book, The Picture of Dorian Gray, is representing as well. Can this book do to a reader what the unknown book did to Dorian? After all, in the end of the nameless book, the character feels regret for his past actions as does Dorian, negating the argument that since this book, The Picture, has a negative message towards a life of pleasure, no reader can ever be tempted to lead that life of corruption using Dorian Gray as a justification. Dorian leads the life of the nameless character despite the warning ending. So can Dorian Gray do something to one of us? Honestly, I do think so. Probably to neither me nor you, but possibly to some unstable Wilde worshipper. So is it then immoral to write a book that can have such an influence on people. Well, arguably, yes? Are the parts of the book that cause this negative influence essential for creating a good book? No. There are perfectly nice, G-rated books out there that are just as enjoyable as Dorian Gray. I mean, To Kill A Mockingbird is an amazing book, but who is ever going to go lead a life of crime because of reading it. So why let Dorian gray come to life? Why not let the entire world read of Scout and only Scout? Well, what shall I tell Wilde? You’re not allowed to write about this stuff? Well, they tried that, those 19th century guys, and it didn’t work. Why did it not work? Because it’s such an annoying thing to say. You can’t do that… What an annoying phrase, for everyone can do anything, and everyone is allowed to do anything, though some things ought not to be done anyways. That is up to that specific person though. Anyways, I do not think that writing The Picture of Dorian Gray is part of that group of things one oughtn’t do. It’s a wonderful book that will cause damage, but in this sense, the art nouveau is correct. Art is art, and this art is beautiful. Some guy told Mozart that his piece had too many notes. Mozart asked him which specific notes he should take out. Every note is there for a reason, and this reason may not be available in words, but it does exist. The Picture of Dorian Gray was released into a society that feared scandal. What society calls an immoral book is because it shows society’s shame though. Society doesn’t have to be ashamed of itself, but it shouldn’t suppress people of their own art for fear of what they may have t bear for the sake of art. And ah, the everlasting phrase, for the sake of art, as cliché as it is by now, still holds much meaning, no. It is essential for this book. This book is absolutely beautiful, with the most grotesque of events written with mastery. He is Edgar Allan Poe mixed with every French Poet of the 19th century. Wilde is a brave man.

As a last suggestion, if you love this book, I advise you, do not watch the movie. The 2009 one, that is. I watched it, and sure, it was fine to some extent as all movies are, but the alteration to the book is a bit offensive at times. For example, the portrait moves in the film. It makes hissing sounds too. I mean, what is that? Fantasy belongs with the extremes, and this portrait, if any more mystical than in the book, must go over to the fantasy, which is such a let-down when put with the sophistication of most the rest of it. Anyways, the only reason you’d watch the movie is if you’ve got a thing for Ben Barnes. He’s actually surprisingly adequate in the movie, as Dorian Gray. The most tragic thing is the screenplay really, no fault to the actors. Ben was a nice surprise, especially after that Narnia stuff. If you like Colin Firth, then definitely do not watch the movie. The role is a bit of a disappointment for such an amazing actor. Henry’s all wrong for the movie. The film could be good in a way in that it shows you just how bad the crimes that Dorian commits in the book are. Being that it is still in the 19th century, the censorship must have been crazy for publication, making Wilde suggest everything instead of actually saying it. Since we all like Dorian, we make his crimes seem like much less in our head. The movie does a good job at showing just how terrible he became. Actually, the movie pushes it a bit far.. He becomes worse than ever. He actually tried to kill Harry in the end. I mean, it’s like how most productions of Romeo and Juliet cut that part when Romeo kills Paris because it’s too saddening to see Romeo turn into a killer. This movie does the opposite. It gets Romeo, makes him kill Paris and then kill Friar Lawrence too while he’s at it. It’s very cruel in that sense. Anyways, so yes, avoid the movie. If you want to get a nice idea of what Dorian looks like, Ben Barnes doesn’t match the description at all, but he works great for it anyways, I think. It’s nice to have a concrete face when the face matters so much for the book. So yes, there’s worth in the movie, but very little, and you watch it at your own prevail. Beware.

Alright I just finished the quotations and realized this is way too good of a book to end a blog of it by talking about the movie. So one last thing, I promise. There are a whole lot of philosophies in the book, right? Well, as you’re reading it, if you’ve read absolutely any books in you life, you start to make connections. The more the better. So here are some books that share in philosophy. There’s Hedda Gabler with the idea of a beautiful death. There’s those million Shakespeare references made in the book, particularly to Hamlet and Ophelia within Hamlet. There’s Brave New World with the concept of pleasure. There’s the life f Arthur Rimbaud, the poet, who expressed the free and rash life of passion and sensation alone. There’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being with the idea of love being separated from physical acts of love, and the idea of human relation and lies to the conscience versus to others. There’s The Scarlet Letter with the pride in showing a recovery from sin. There’s the Tempest with Caliban’s ugliness. There’s The Catcher in the Rye with the idea of self-torture through a state of mind and the idea of cynicism and its effect emotionally. There’s A Separate Peace with the idea of the very importance of youth and the influence of people and the power of infatuation and beauty. There’s Sartorist with the idea of aristocracy and the change in viewing the real world. There’s connections all over my place. Get what I mean? Yeah, so I think we’ve sufficed.

Read folks, Read.

“There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all. The nineteenth century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass. The nineteenth century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.”

“Something seemed to tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life.”

“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things”

“We have lost the abstract sense of beauty.”

“Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know love’s tragedies.”

“Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth!”

“The new manner in art, the fresh mode of looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt In dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryad-like and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for her there had been waked that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was!”

“All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many time, and with joy.”

“A rose shook in her blood, and shadowed her cheeks.”

“I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real… I have grown sick of shadows.”

“There seemed to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured by romance.”

“And indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own life, written before he had lived it.”

“It was an almost cruel joy – and perhaps in every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, cruelty has it’s place – that he used to read the latter part of the book, with its really tragic, if somewhat over-emphasized, account of the sorrow and despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and in the world, he had most dearly valued.”

“As he looked back upon man moving through History, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been surrendered! And to such little purpose!”

“Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern.”

“There steals over us a terrible sense of the necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of joy having its bitterness, and the memories of pleasure their pain.”

“Yet one had ancestors in literature, as well as in one’s own race, nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. There were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole of history was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act and was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act and circumstance, but as his imagination had created it for him, as it had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt that he had known them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed across the stage of the world and made sin so marvelous and evil so full of subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had been his own.”

“There were moments when he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he could realize his conception of the beautiful.”

“You have had more to do with my life than you think.”

“The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and, as the mist thickened, he felt afraid.”

“I think I have had too many friends.”

“You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, there is no such thing as that. Art had no influence upon action. It annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.”

“There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to earth as well as to heaven.”

Animal Farm

Animal Farm by George Orwell was first published in 1945. I finished it this morning after two days of excited reading - it's a short book, I just read really slowly. The point is, it's a very exciting book, an easy read, straight-forward, and genius, of course, since it is pretty difficult to write a book about talking animals that is respected enough to be taught in all sadness to students all over the world. This can be greatly attributed to the historical factor of this book and how clearly it etches out the complexities of communism and dictatorship for all ages. So characters and history. Summary first.

So the animals of The Manor Farm rebel against Mr. Jones, their master, in a call to fight human oppression over animals. The rebellion succeeds, the farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the animals set up a communistic society. The pigs, however, begin acting as organizers for the farm, and throughout the rest of the book quickly gain more and more power through a careful regimentation of fear, pride, secrecy, speeches and special terminology. In the end, the farm is renamed the Manor Farm, the animals fail to distinguish the pigs from the humans, and oppression has again become very apparent in the farm.

The characters, of course, are great, especially because of how they represent different contributors to the development and failure of communism in Russia. Here's a list.

Napoleon (pig): Stalin
Snowball (pig): Trotsky/Lenin - scapegoat
Squealer (pig): Molotov
Boxer (horse): peasants
Major (pig): Marx
Nine Dogs: KGB
Mollie (horse): bourgeois
Mr. Jones (human): Tsar Nicholas II
Sheep: propaganda
Mr. Pilkington: The West
Moses: The Church
Other Animals: oppressed workers

So everyone plays a part though some more than others. The same thing about the animals aside from the pigs is that they don't recognize their own strength while the pigs over-exaggerate it. Each animal has it's own characteristic, for example the lazy cat that always turns the other way. Then there is my favorite character Benjamin. Benjamin doesn't specifically represent any one of the real contributors to the rise of Stalin, but he is part of the working class. Benjamin is the cynical character. He is introduced as cynical and sticks with it all the way through. The tragic thing is that Benjamin is probably the wisest character in the book, even more than the pigs. He doesn't act on anything though, and it really comes to bite at him when Boxer gets taken away. Boxer is the only animal that Benjamin is devoted to, and Benjamin cares for him. He alone knows that he is being sent to the knacker's (where they slaughter animals) instead of the doctor's, but only gets everyone's attention when it's too late. Benjamin grows more morose after this, maybe out of guilt. I guess i like Benjamin because he is philosophical. He answers questions in cryptic ways, saying things like "Donkeys live a long time. None of you has ever seen a dead donkey." So he sees the big picture. He sees the long term effects and motivations, though being the cynic, he has no motivations. Everything will always be full of suffering, according to him. He is most like the writer, I think, not Orwell, that is, but all writers. He is distanced, all-knowing and observant. He never acts though. It's all very tragic. He remembers everything. He starts old and ends older.


The book illustrates the rise of the USSR very broadly, bringing philosophy of government into, ironically, more realistic terms - after reading this book, you start seeing clearly the circular effects of government, the dictatorship, oppression, revolution, communism, democracy, corruption, republic, monarchy, dictatorship. Sure it's not a history text book, everything's in code, and you can never know the specificities of what happened in Russia, but you do get a feel for it like you might miss in a text book. It's really most helpful when you know the basics of what happened in real life. History is like the greatest and most complex novel ever written, and if you've read that, Animal Farm is like reading another take on it, so when the milk disappears the first time, the readers ought to think that this is the beginning of the rise of Stalin instead of being oblivious like the animals. Of course if you hadn't heard of Stalin and all of it before, you could read it as a perfectly natural story, and unlike a text book, this story does not speak much in retrospect, so it actually is like it is happening then and there, so though I cannot experience what it is like reading Animal Farm first, I'd imagine it'd seem like more of a surprise and less like a tragedy. It is like being in Clover's (a horse) perspective as opposed to Benjamin's. I was in Benjamin's because Benjamin, arguably, knew what was going to happen, and saw everything that was happening with a broad eye. He saw things coldly, as though they were inevitable. That is the bleakest way to read it; pity is inflicted when events of a tragedy are seen in retrospect. Inevitability is one of the most bleakest of concepts, anyways.

The story does make a point of stressing inevitability. It comes slowly. That's the great thing. There are these Seven Commandments that the animals came up with right after their rebellion. The pigs come up with them and write them on the wall with everyone's agreement, and slowly through the book, these commandments are broken. They are altered too. For example, one of the rules is no drinking alcohol. Then the pigs drink and like it. They actually end up making a brewery; it's a really absurd book. So then the animals notice that the words "in excess" are added to the commandment "No Animal shall drink alcohol." The same sort of thing happens to all the commandments through the book, along with many other shows of the rise of Napoleon, or Stalin. The animals are oblivious to it too. It's really tragic. There's the manipulation of memories going on, there's talk about mysterious documents that prove things and science, there's the poetry and music composed to promote Napoleon, and there's the violence. Orwell writes in a way that is so straight-forward that the things he is saying seem obvious. The obvious quality then contributes to the inevitability of the pattern of the story, of the impossibility of communism and inequality of beings.

The foreshadowing, for example, is really plain and obvious. When Napoleon takes the puppies away, every reader could tell that they're going to come back violent and loyal to Napoleon.The way that the birth and disappearance are described so abruptly makes it clear that they were mentioned for a reason, so they mus come back to make a difference. There's a part where the pigs go out with whips to supervise, near the end. This is after the animals see the pigs walking on their hind legs. The walking on the hind legs really makes you gasp. It's the most shocking part of the book and disgustingly strange. After this, nothing can be shocking, and the animals seem to feel the same way. They are not shocked when the whips come out. It seems inevitable to have the strange occur, the wrong to be said as a right, and for cruelty to be done without opposition.

When the farm is renamed the Manor Farm, Napoleon makes the toast with the men and Clover sees the pigs and men as the same, that is inevitable as well. The toast contradicted absolutely everything that Major had said in the very beginning, as Stalin had contradicted every one of Marx's peaceful teachings. Napoleon speaks of common interests with man, the end of comradeship, prosperity from cooperation with men, and a blatant inequality between animals. Napoleon has to be making a point to use Major's exact words in negation, or else Orwell is just writing so that the irony is neat and clearly tragic. Orwell makes everything very clear. The circle had closed, and there is a very dark feeling that goes around, not so much in sympathy for the animals for there has been the entire book for that, or disgust at the pigs and human for there had been time for that too. The dark feeling is that of how what had been expected actually happened. It's not that either, actually. It's that which we feared would happen, we dreaded, finally came and nobody did anything to avoid it. There's an eeriness when you spend an entire book thinking of the ending which you already know and you finally reach it. Such cannot be felt from reading a history text book. These are not facts, these are philosophies and emotions, such that can be received only broadly, and even better, fictitiously, symbolically. That is the reason for repeating history through a story about barnyard animals. To get a basic idea across.

Finally, you have to question what is to come next. Does Clover see that the pigs are evil? Of course, but will she be able to rouse a rebellion? It cannot be led y the pigs as the last one was, so who next? The dogs? Will they make it worse? Or do we believe Benjamin when he says that no matter what happens, suffering will be present? Even if that is true, is that reason enough to stand aside and watch? Put a peasant in power and see how good the world will be. I think that was from A Farewell To Arms. Or some part of it. The book is not a call against communism, for it was good while it lasted. It is not a call against much at all, for it all seems inevitable, and so cannot be helped. It is a call against cynicism though, I think. So do something. Once you step back a bit, and the story starts clearing up, you start to notice that Benjamin may have been the final antagonist. It seems like the pigs or the humans at first, but when you consider the inevitability of it, it comes down to the one that let it happen. The story is of cycles, of dictatorship, revolution, communism, corruption, dictatorship, and soon enough, revolution will reignite. It leaves you with a cold feeling. The bleakness of inevitability is similar, I think, to the fear of nonexistence. What is so scary about not existing? Nothing but the fact that nothing will ever happen again, you will just be gone, an idea that is impossible to understand. It's terrifying. Inevitability is the same way. When you have no way to change things, no way for things to fail, there is no way to succeed, or even lose. You don't feel happiness, and if you're in sadness, then only you could make yourself snap out of it because nothing is changing. It's very terrible. It is like nothing happening ever again.

This is what makes the chill that covers the ending of this book, so similar to the beginning. When the cycle ends and a new one begins, you realize what routine this world is trapped in, and how every act of rebellion, even at realizing this, could be but another phase in the larger fabric of compliance muffling actual movement. You need absolute awareness to be able to make a difference. You need to know what is to happen and then do something. Benjamin could have done this. He saw more than the rest, and as he began the book old, he ends that way too, more wise than ever. He alone remembers what it was like before the rebellion. He alone knows how things were, are, and will be if they are left to the inevitable. Then why not do something? If he did something, would it make a difference? Is it just another thread for the fabric? Maybe, maybe not, but in terms of dignity, faith, and hope, it does make a difference. Benjamin is old and with guilt. Boxer is dead. Conscience does make cowards of us all, no? Benjamin is a coward, or is evil in his despair. He cannot take blame for the oppression of his comrades, but he was a bystander. Bystanders can change history.This book is a satire on communism, a bite at totalitarianism, but more than anything, a mockery of the inevitability of humanity, (after all, this book is not in the slightest, about animals - it is about us humans and our actions) and a fight against cynicism, the cold and those who live long lives for the act of breathing.

Read folks, read.

"And remember, comrades, your resolution must never falter. No argument must lead you astray. Never listen when they tell you that Man and the animals have a common interest, that the prosperity of the one is the prosperity of the others. It is all lies. Man serves the interests of no creature except himself. And among us animals let there be perfect unity , perfect comradeship in the struggle. All men are enemies. All animals are comrades."

"As soon as they were weened Napoleon took them away from their mothers, saying that he would make himself responsible for their education.He took them up into a loft which could only be reached by a ladder from the harness-room, and there kept them in such seclusion that the rest of the farm should forget their existence."

"Only Clover remained, and Benjamin, who lay down at Boxer's side, and, without speaking, kept the flies off him with his long tail."

"There was nothing there now except a single Commandment. It ran: ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS. After that it did not seem strange when next day the pigs who were supervising the work of the farm all carried whips in their trotters."

A Farewell To Arms

I finished this book last week. Honestly a masterpiece. A Farewell to Arms was written by Ernest Hemingway, first published in 1929. That's 11 years after WWI for the history brains out there. And math brains to some extent... Hemingway was thirty when he wrote this by the way. Born 1899. Just made the 19th century. Yeah! Good for him. Thirty... Jeez that's young. What a genius. Right, well, characters.

Speaking of characters, tangent: here's a fun character for an anecdote. I was alright until the end, and then I finished and closed the cover, and no kidding, I was bawling my eyes out. I just couldn't stop crying. I really scared my entire family, they thought I was having a heart attack or something, but then I managed to choke out the words on maybe my sixth attempt: It was such a good book! needless to say they were all exasperated and left immediately. I cry easily with books and films, but this was sobbing. I don't want to be a spoiler, but the ending's pretty depressing. But you could expect that from most war books, and anyways, it was more the entire book than the ending that had me crying; you know, when you close that cover and then someone asks you, "Are you finished?" and then that just does it; the entire book flashes through your mind and you see the intricacies and the painstaking weaving that goes through Hemingway's deceptively plain writing, and you see how the characters have developed, and developed together along with the war and with Italy, and with the back cover staring at you in old yellow kindness, you just have to start crying, and then it doesn't stop. And then you write a blog.

Right, well basically, it's a WWI book and a love story split into five books. The first has Lieutenant Fredric Henry on the Italian Front. He meets Catherine when his friend Rinaldi makes him play wingman, and then he eventually gets injured in the leg and he goes to a hospital. Book Two is in the hospital where Catherine gets to taking care of him, they fall madly in love, Catherine gets pregnant, and eventually Henry has to go back to the front. Then in Book Three, Henry goes back to the front and the Italians begin their massive retreat. The officers begin being shot, so Henry runs away. In Book Four, Henry has to lay low since he technically deserted, and so finally Henry meets up with Catherine and they eventually run away to Switzerland together when the war police come to arrest Henry. In Book Five, Henry and Catherine live quite happily in Switzerland until Catherine eventually has her baby but it was a miscarriage and she dies from two hemorrhages soon after.

So characters! Characters are the most important aspect of a book. Had to say it. It's really Fredric Henry and Catherine Barkley. Henry is the narrator and he is wonderful. Same with Catherine. The thing is though, Hemmingway is known for having rough, straight-forward writing, meaning even though it is written in first person, it doesn’t get all that intimate, and writing styles never get all that complicated. There are moments near the end, of course, when you really dive into the character Henry with internal monologues, or rather ramblings, scattered all over the place. And there are moments in the beginning when he gets drunk and the writing style changes dramatically, but that’s for a bit later. So anyways, since it’s rough and straight-forward, you have to base most everything about a character on his action or his speech. There is a lot of dialog in this book though. That’d be interesting to touch at later.

But, I did just now think of something to point out about Henry. There are a bunch of unanswered questions about him. That’s probably because Henry is such a Hemmingway, being all strong and controlled, rarely letting go of control. So the unanswered questions are things like why he really joined the Italian Army. You get stuff like he already was there, and he already knew Italian, and America didn’t enter until much later anyways, but you’d think there’d be an additional reason to him wanting to go to war in the first place, especially since it’s WWI, where there’s very little meaning in war, at least morally. Later on he said he joined because he was stupid, but that really doesn’t suffice either. Considering how he changes through the book and how at the beginning he seems like an all right person but not entirely present, you could get the sense that maybe there was something missing or hurting that drove him to the war. That’s just a conjecture though. Just throwing it out there; these things are always interesting: how much you know of a character’s past, as in before the book started, even in the past tense; there’s always some chronological order, even in absurdist novels, which this is definitely not. You could place significance to it and then draw a bunch of conclusions from it, like once you’re in war, or once you’re in love, the past is no longer you’re past and you are a new person with a second life, of new hopes for the love and new darkness for the latter, or something like that. Nice and rich, huh? But yeah, these messages are always possible, and might even be true, at some points of the book at least, but they rarely have enough evidence to be decided as the sole purpose of the book.

There is interest in how he changes. In the beginning, Henry is somewhat of a bore, really. He is just at the front, but not even, stuck more in politics and the duty of keeping order; he’s an ambulance driver, for crying out loud; definitely not the typical war novel hero. There’s more interested in the other characters, like Rinaldi and the priest. They’d be nice to talk of too. But anyways, Henry changes dramatically by the end of the book, with love and with war. Henry’s all cool with Catherine in the beginning, but as he gets more and more infatuated with her, you get to see him acting more interestingly. Well, we hear him, I suppose then, rather than watch him since the actions because of love are pretty straight-forward granted they now have an initiative that Henry somewhat missed before, being Henry does anything Catherine asks and does anything for her sake. For example, concerning speech, we see him speaking very romantically and illogically such as when Cat and he talk about how they can think of themselves as married. It’s very cute actually, something you wouldn’t picture Henry ever saying in the beginning, or as a matter of fact, Hemingway writing, but then again it is written in a very Hemingway fashion: quotations following quotations with nothing more said.

Then there is the war that changes him, naturally. He learns how awful it is, and there’s that great gap from the war made by Book Two, and the war just evolves so quickly; it’s really like a character of its own. He manages to switch back onto war mode in Book Three, but you start to see him really losing control around the desertion scene. He seems some Germans and the guys and him just assume their lives are now lost, but they keep going and one of them dies shot by some frightened Italians that just shoot at anything by now. So they keep going and meet two other people, and so Henry, being a Tenente (lieutenant), takes charge. But then the two run off and Henry goes off and shoots at them, killing one, with no remorse of course. It’s a pretty frightening scene, if you really think about it. This is a change action-wise. He is a very mild person all around, Henry. This one time a person in the bunk on top of him starts bleeding down on him with a hemorrhage, and Henry just stays there very calmly, and when the guy dies, he says it strongly and directly. But then we see a desertion and he goes ahead shooting, wanting to kill. He goes back to normal after that though, and stays that way, acting in accordance, morally, refusing to steal from deserted houses, only taking what he needs: food. It’s actually quite frightening how Henry acts so normally throughout Book Three. Book Two ends with Catherine and Henry being separated by the war, and her being pregnant, you’d expect Henry to be broken in the war; you’d expect it to be impossible for Henry to get back to survival war mode, but it seems not. He snaps right back, with stuffing brush under tires and keeping clear of thoughts of Catherine. Then the retreat comes and the shooting of the Officers. One of his men already surrendered to the Austrians, and Henry took that alright, though he may have shot him if he had the chance, and he goes off seeing other Tenentes get shot, and so he jumps into a river and gets away after being shot at a lot. Then he’s on a train, and you finally see it. I guess I ought to just write at least this bit straight out from the book. It’s a turning point. Strong Henry breaks a bit, though still together physically; it is but in mentality, war mentality that he falls. All this terrible stuff that he let pass with the calmest of demeanors seems to have been piling up, and there it is on the train, let loose for once. Of course it happened on a train. It always happens on a train, alone, sitting, with country passing before unseeing eyes, with that window right there for you to gaze out of with glassy eyes, and the sound of the machine around you, taking you away with the monotonous hums; that is where you get to breaking. Actually, lets talk a bit more of this breaking first.

It starts when he hits the river, and that is shown by the opening up of the narration, or rather, Henry’s thoughts, to the more abstract, with philosophizing that does not match the directness of the typical Henry and typical Hemingway. Hemingway actually gives to the romantic at the end of the book, not too much, but he does, and it’s a great middle-ground. Here’s a bit after e reaches land. “I had done half the retreat on foot and swum part of the Tagliamento with his knee. It was his knee all right. The other knee was mine. Doctors did things to you and then it was not your body any more. The head was mine and the inside of the belly. It was hungry in there. I could feel it run over on itself. The head was mine, but not to use, not to think with; only to remember and not too much remember.” Poetic, huh. Then thoughts of Catherine finally break in at this end of Book Three. We discover the reason for her absence in Henry’s thoughts: he had been restricting it due to that he “knew I would get crazy if I thought about her when I was not sure yet I would see her” It’s structures SO well! It’s amazing, isn’t it? Literally, I can’t breathe when I’m reading it, or right now in writing it. I’m not breathing. It’s so amazing. I can’t get over it. The structure is to die for. I would die for it actually. It’s a masterpiece. It’s so amazing. Haha, I just took a deep breath because I started feeling dizzy. It’s so amazing. Hemingway, he makes you question why he’s not thinking about Catherine all through Book Three, and he makes you question how Henry could possibly be so calm about all of it, and how he could possibly be coping, and had he forgotten about Catherine? No, of course he hadn’t. But why isn’t he thinking about her? Maybe he is, but Hemingway isn’t recording it down. Why not? Maybe Henry doesn’t let himself think about her. Maybe. And then this part comes, after himself deserting and everything falling to pieces, the Italians shooting their own people, and this happens, and it’s amazing, how it is finally revealed and we know things are changing because it does, even though it is just a thought, we all know things are going to change, and Henry’s thoughts change, finally breaking loose after such a long freeze, and IT’S SO AMAZING! Wow, okay, moving on.

After thoughts of Catherine, comes this: “You did not love the floor of a flat-car nor guns with canvas jackets and the smell of vaselined metal or a canvas that rain leaked through, although it is very fine under a canvas and pleasant with guns; but you loved someone else whom now you knew was not even to be pretended there; you seeing now very clearly and coldly – not so coldly as clearly and emptily. You saw emptily, lying on your stomach, having been present when one army moved back and another came forward. You had lost your cars and your men as a floorwalker loses the stock of his department in a fire. There was, however no insurance. You were out of it now. You had no more obligation. If they shot floorwalkers after a fire in the department store because they spoke with an accent they had always had, then certainly the floorwalkers would not be expected to return when the store opened again for business. They might seek other employment; if there was any other employment and the police did not get them. Anger washed away in the river along with any obligation.” Tangent: I just walked away and hugged my entire family because it’s structured, SO WELL! Right, well, let’s talk about these last two enormous quotations. Great, so the first one about the knee, you see he’s starting to open up a bit, to think more and Hemingway to write more. Henry always thinks about how long a certain hunk of cheese would last him, and where Britain is on the front. That’s because he has to. Now he’s deserted, and he thinks about other things, having been through the river. You get a lot more of this later on, for example, his brain rant on whisky later on. Tangent: Consider whether Henry is an alcoholic or not.

Alright, well, he thinks of his body and his knee, and starts coming up with these accepted truths about doctors and knees, and it’s all very interesting, extremely, you could write a novel about a fixed knee, but in the circumstances, what’s vital is that he says it. Henry gets very metaphorical. He probably is always talking about a bigger picture when his mind is loose like this, but the thing with big pictures is that they mean so much less when you use the big words. Henry lets it be quiet, and Hemingway lets the readers figure it out for themselves. The knee is Henry separating himself from the war, I suppose. It’s him feeling different, foreign, like he doesn’t belong to this body, this body that is a Tenente, that is being shot at, that is in WWI, and idiot’s war, and that is wearing this coat of stars away from his girl, his life, and his sense. This is one of those meanings like I talked about before though. It could be said but not completely proven. So many more of these generalizations could be made off the knee. This is just mine. What is also wonderful about the first quotation is that bit about hunger. It pops up a lot more, but I just didn’t include them for the sake of conciseness (how ironic is that?) This hunger flows through Book Three, but mostly I this part. A soldier’s life is his food. That’s a fact. You’ve got more chance of living if you’re not hungry, obviously, and a soldier’s life depends arguably more on his food than his skill, at least in this war. It’s also a simple thing. All animals whine when they are hungry. Babies cry when they are hungry. It’s nice and simple. It breaks through complexity too. Henry is hungry and as philosophical as he gets, he still feels hungry. Hunger also is covered by excitement. You don’t think about food when you’re being shot at, for example. Henry can now think about food. The excitement is gone, and what’s left is desolation. There’s a nice exaggeration for you all, but I think it’s true. Henry’s too tough to admit it though. Also, in war, you don’t complain about hunger until you’re starving. Henry is starving, but he’s not in war anymore, so it doesn’t matter anyhow. He doesn’t realize it for a while after, but he is no longer concerned with the war. He is separate.

Quotation #2: genius, metaphorical, grand, and clear. Genius on the part of Hemingway, of course, though Henry too. I don’t know how much I have the right to feel proud of Hemingway, but I am so proud of him for writing in the “you”. Henry is obviously talking about himself, but the you also extends this truth to everybody, which is so great of Henry with his humility that is everlasting, but also so useful in showing how overwhelming all this can be. You don’t complain in the army. There’s a nice cliché for you. But sometimes, you have to, and then there comes the need to feel just how hurt, tired, and broken you are, which is very difficult to do when it is true. Thus Henry thinks in the “you” to protect himself and through the metaphor of the floorwalker. A floorwalker is a senior employee of a large store who assists customers and supervises salespeople by the way, if anyone was confused. Courtesy of Google Dictionary, great place. So floorwalker’s a pretty random and insignificant thing to compare yourself to. There’s that humility again. Not that there’s anything wrong with being a floorwalker, it’s just no knight or rock star. But yes. Henry is now a floorwalker that had a fire at his store, which speaks in an accent, which gets shot for it, and then is irked about getting asked to work again. From the beginning of the quote you have the “you”, and Henry describes the canvas jackets and guns, which is obviously him, and the lying on stomach. The detail is there for a reason, clearly, and that is to show that is now, in this very specific state, that this realization occurs, that he is done with the war. He doesn’t say it yet, but that’s what it is, and the canvas doesn’t matter much, nor the stomach, but it matters in saying that it is now, not the last few hours or days, but now. The “someone else” is Catherine, and he just talked about her before, and talked about loving floors, and you get to see how Henry’s drifted into this topic. It’s very neatly done. Then you get the clearly and coldly, or rather clearly and emptily. The dash is significant in pointing out the difference between coldly and emptily. Coldly in this sense means cynically, without feeling, clearly and just the truth, though you can feel emotions that lack warmth, I suppose, being icy vehemence or something, though I do admit vehemence could be burning, but cold seems so much scarier. Emptily means without feeling too. So what’s the difference? It is the connotations to them; that’s why I said cynically, since that has a negative connotation too. When a person sees a fact coldly and cynically, people feel a bit scared of them or harsh towards them, as though they are uncaring or course in not sympathizing. People would look at emptily with sympathy though, because it’s saddening to see a person without the capability of feeling. There’s another difference. Emptiness implies that something had emptied them, and coldly is more like growing cold, which, again, I admit is saddening too, so this argument is rather wishy-washy, but in context, I suppose Henry has been emptied rather than cooled. He is exhausted of power to cope, or lie to himself to see calmness in the destruction and corruption before him. Right, so Henry is empty, in missing his love and missing his shop and beliefs. He has been let down by the Italians, seeing them acting inhumane, senselessly and cowardly. It’s all very overwhelming see, so you get the “you” and the metaphor. Now you get that he could either come out of his emptiness and feel anger, or depression, or strength to lie and thus return to the army somehow to finish off the war, or freedom from the culprit, or he could stay in the emptiness, like Paul from All Quiet on the Western Front or Gene from A Separate Peace. Paul died after reaching this disillusioned emptiness. Gene lived fifteen years until he finally got out of emptiness to absolve himself for putting himself in it and feel finally a freedom from obligation. That’s what Henry does. “Anger washed away in the river along with any obligation.” Very A Separate Peace, actually, because of the river thing. Anyways, yes, Henry does absolve the enemy, war, by letting go of his anger, and he thus washes his hands of war and moves on to the other half of this book: love. War lost, it’s love.

So then we go on like this for a bit and you get to our third quote. You’ll get why I’m going on about A Separate Peace now. He goes to Milan and has some of that Hemingway dialog with back and forth quotations lacking in any narration to couple it with thought. Well, without the negative connotation of lacking, of course; it works very well for the emptiness. There’s a chapter of that, and then he gets on a train to Stresa. Yes, finally the train. Catherine’s in Stresa, that’s why he’s going. He feels strange in civilian clothes, very All Quiet on the Western Front, and then goes: “They smelled of tobacco and as I sat in the compartment and looked out the window the new hat felt vey new and the clothes very old. I myself felt as sad as the wet Lombard country that was outside through the window. There were some aviators in the compartment who did not think much of me. They avoided looking at me and were very scornful of a civilian my age. I did not feel insulted. In the old days I would have insulted them and picked a fight. They got off at Gallarate and I was glad to be alone. I had the paper but I did not read it because I did not want to read about the war. I was going to forget the war. I had made a separate peace. I felt damned lonely and was glad when the train got to Stresa.” See it? Yeah, it’s awesome.

So first there’s that thing about the clothes, and you do feel the roughness of Hemingway that I stress so much again. It’s all very blunt and he never goes into what something might mean. He just writes it. For example, he speaks of the window and then the new clothes as though they are supposed to be related. They are, but you have to ask yourself the question, and then interpret to get the connection, and of course, there is no right answer. I think the window has more to do with allowing his mind to loosen up and widen, since he sees the country passing with nothing to grab onto but for the truth of how large the world is, and he gets to feeling himself more than his reactions to the war or to love, and he then floats on to the idea of clothes. See windows are very good in literature, especially in these situations, because in these situations, characters rarely concentrate on what is actually outside a window, or if they do, the window never fails to add more meaning to what they see. In this case, he sees the Lombard country, but the train has a passing quickly and the mirror has it distant, away and outside. The window is a barrier, like a mirror; you could see yourself across it, in the wet Lombard country, but it is still only a reflection, a suggestion instead of a victory. I don’t know if any of that made sense by the way. Sorry, but most of what I say doesn’t make sense, as long as what I’m saying interests me, that is.

Anyways, we have the window mentioned again along with the sadness, which is so wonderfully put, considering he straight out says he’s sad instead of letting it be expressed by some extended metaphor or whatnot. He also says he’s “sad” instead of depressed, or disillusioned, or dismal, or despondent, or doleful, or any other pretty d-word. He is sad. That’s when you know you’re really sad. When you actually say sad instead of coloring it up, since the d-words are more descriptive and tell more and are nice for specificity, but they own too much soundness for sadness. When you’re any d-word really, you don’t say the d-word, you just say sad. The aviators serve for some nice irony and lets you sympathize for Henry a bit, but then he says he doesn’t feel insulted, which makes you sympathize for him even more, him being so empty and all. Then you have him thinking about his past self, giving an idea of aged weariness to Henry, even though he’s really young. He’s somewhat of a burnout now, I suppose, which is again, very sad; he’s a veteran made out of a youth. Like Gene. Then there’s the paper, which is followed by a “did not”, a “because”, another “did not”, and then “the war”. The structure here is so wonderful since I do see a great significance in the word “because”, especially sandwiched between two did not’s and even more when it follows a completely separate sentence about aviators. It’s so choppy see, since first of all it’s stuck in right after the aviators without any soft transition. Then there’s the did not’s which are each so choppy too because the words are so simple that you’d expect some great writer to avoid them, and here Hemingway goes using them twice each. Then there’s the “because” which is the choppiest you could get. I mean, “because” makes any sentence sounds like a middle-school thesis statement, something straight out of the sixth grade highlighted in green with red pen all over it (which is not a good thing.) Combining it all, you get this nice insane bluntness that brings across how plainly he feels the need to avoid the war. This is just how he thinks now, I suppose, Henry. No beauty, no fluidity, no decoration, just words next to words that make sense.

Then there’s the separate peace. He finally admits that he wants to forget the war, that he is tired of it and that wants to escape. This does make you question why exactly he has the paper. Henry always has the paper. It’s like a habit. The separate peace is love, as cheesy as it sounds. Peace is separate from the war. It is stolen from a time of unrest. But it’s taken selfishly, and he admits this on the train, and then he feels damned lonely and is glad when the train got to Stresa. Why feel lonely if you’re heading towards love? Well, you cannot underestimate the affect that being a Tenente has on you. Henry was a good Tenente and he took the war seriously. It took him thus very long to give up on the war; he shoots his deserters for Christ’s sake, and he’s not even Italian! Henry always has the paper, he cares about the war; he has pride and honor. Then he himself deserts and he has to admit that the war has cheated him, which is sound, but still difficult, after being such a soldier. There is a good to war: comrades. Rinaldi was good to him, as well as Piani and the priest and many others. He had the Italians, and now he has no one but Catherine. He deserted. Of course he has others, but at this moment, after the aviators and giving up on the war, this may be how he feels, and on a train, when you admit these things and feel these things, there is nothing to feel or think but these, nowhere to turn but to the window, and nothing to do but to think and feel. So he is glad when he reaches Stresa, not only because Catherine is there, but also because he escapes the train and these thoughts. Sanity often comes over truth, after all, in war, especially. A Separate Peace, what a nice phrase, huh. This is breaking. He loses his war and goes into a deepness foreign to him. Catherine mends him though, but losing Catherine makes him break where he ought to have been stronger. He falls into his emotions, which he had kept at bay for the length of the book. It is Catherine that ultimately gets killed though. She was too good to be broken with anything less.

There is a great quote for this breaking though, but this blog is now 4955 words, and now more, so I think I will leave that to your interpretation below. Let me just say that it serves as a basic summary for A Separate Peace. By the way, I think you all should read both the books back to back and then read them again. You have to reread a book to really appreciate it, and these two deserve to be appreciated. So I said I’d talk about Catherine, Rinaldi, the priest, writing style, and monologues huh. Well, I think a lot of that has been covered, and Henry took enough words as it is. What can I say? The characters are the most important aspect of a book, or character in this case. I could write about this much for both Catherine and Rinaldi too. They are both great characters, Rinaldi especially. He is a sweet man, open and close and jokey, though he has moments when he darkens, becoming forced to dabble in the truths of war and tragedy. I’ll put in a quote for him. The syphilis thing is genius. Rinaldi drops out of the book around halfway through, but Henry thinks of him once in a while, mentioning Rinaldi and how he may have gotten syphilis. It’s one of those extreme subplots, one you never see in action, just thought of. It holds much power by influencing the main character so much, and in not knowing exactly what happens, it adds to the realism, I suppose, since you get to see how some characters might feel by being lost in the first person, just like the rest of us. Monologues, inner monologues, are terribly gripping in this book. I’ll include some. It’s terrible, really, how honestly saddening it is. People never act nor speak as honestly as they feel, and sometimes they think almost just as honestly, and Henry gets there eventually. It resembles how he thinks when he’s drunk in the beginning, but since those days, Henry experiences a lot of traumatic things, and he gets to admitting things then, and eventually, it’s terrible, really. But it’s lovely, how terrible it is, grand; hence the crying I mentioned in the beginning. Not so funny now, is it. I’d like to write as simply as Hemingway some day. You’d need a masterpiece of a plot to pull it off though.

Tangent: The thing to remember is that it’s a great war novel and a great love novel but all around, it’s just another guy’s life, Henry’s. I say these things, I know, about war, laws and truths, like I know all about it, but honestly, I’m a seventeen year old girl that’s pretty well-to-do, and I’ve never been remotely near a war, and I really know nothing real about it. I don’t and I admit that, and so I hope I could absolve myself of at least some of the hypocrisy in my writing this and other things. I guess it’s a bit awful when I say I love war novels, war poetry, war art, and war movies, but it’s true since I do. I suppose if I actually was on the war, I wouldn’t so much. But then I go off thinking that I’d finally able to understand this stuff, but that’s so cold now, so utilitarian. So I guess I’m not a hypocrite in the sense that I admit my ignorance, but I am an idiot in that this all intrigues me so much, and not as an anti-war message, but as art. The emotion, the psychological effects, and the irony and tragedy that results from war is why I read, watch, write. You know what, I just don’t understand, I know, but I also know that that’s no reason for me to ever love reading any less, or writing. I may not know anything of war, but I have known my fare share of sadness. As for love, I guess I know even less, but concerning books, love for them, that is, and writing, I know the world. Let’s just hope I’m alright at it.

“’There is nothing as bad as war. We in the auto-ambulance cannot even realize at all how bad it is. When people realize how bad it is they cannot do anything to stop it because they go crazy. There are some people who never realize. There are people who are afraid of their officers. It is with them that war is made. ‘
‘I know it is bad but we must finish it.’
‘It doesn’t finish. There is no finish to a war.’”

“’We won’t quarrel, baby. I love you too much. But don’t be a fool.’
‘No. I’ll be wise like you.’
‘Don’t be angry, baby. Laugh. Take a drink. I must go, really.’
‘You’re a good old boy.’
‘No you see. Underneath we are the same. We are war brothers.’”

“He goes to the American hospital, I tell you, Rinaldi said. To the beautiful nurses. Not the nurses with beards of the field hospital. Yes, yes, said the major, I know he goes to the American hospital. I don’t mind their beards, I said. If any man wants to raise a beard, let him. Why don’t you raise a beard, Signor Maggiore? It could not go in a gas-mask. Yes, it could. Anything can go in a gas-mask. I’ve vomited in a gas-mask. Don’t be so loud, baby, Rinaldi said.”

“’You’re not really afraid of the rain are you?’
‘Not when I’m with you.’
‘Why are you afraid of it?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Tell me.’
‘Don’t make me.’
‘Tell me.’
‘No.’
‘Tell me.’
‘All right. I’m afraid of the rain because sometimes I see me dead in it.’
‘No.’
‘And sometimes I see you dead in it.’
‘That’s more likely.’
‘No it’s not, darling. Because I can keep you safe. I know I can. But nobody can help themselves.’

“’If anything comes between us we’re gone and then they have us.’
‘They die of course.’
‘But only once.’
‘I don’t know. Who said that?’
‘The coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one?’
‘Of course. Who said that?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘He was probably a coward,’ she said. ‘He knew a great deal about cowards but nothing about the brave. The brave dies perhaps two thousand deaths id he’s intelligent. He simply doesn’t mention them.’
‘I don’t know. It’s hard to see inside the head of the brave.’”

“’I am the snake. I am the snake of reason.’
‘You’re getting It mixed. The apple was reason.’
‘No, it was the snake.’ He was more cheerful.
‘You are better when you don’t think so deeply,’ I said.
‘I love you, baby,’ he said. ‘You puncture me when I become a great Italian thinker. But I know many things I can’t say. I know more than you.’
‘Yes. You do.’
‘But you will have a better time. Even with remorse you will have a better time.’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Oh yes. That is true. Already I am only happy when am working.’ He looked at the floor again.
‘You’ll get over that.’
‘No. I only like two other things; one is bad for my work and the other is over in half an hour or fifteen minutes. Sometimes less.’
‘Sometimes a good deal less.’
‘Perhaps I have improved, baby. You do not know. But there are only the two things and my work.’
‘You’ll get other things.’
‘No. e never get anything. We are born with all we have and we never learn. We never get anything new. We all start complete.’”

“’No, no,’ said Rinaldi. ‘You can’t do it. You can’t do it. I say you can’t do it. You’re dry and empty and there’s nothing else. There’s nothing else I tell you. Not a damned thing. I know, when I stop working.’”

“’Something may happen.’ I said. ‘But it will happen only to us. If they felt the way we do, it would be all right. But they have beaten us. They feel another way.’
‘Many of the soldiers have always felt this way. It is not because they were beaten.’
‘They were beaten to start with. They were beaten when they took then from their farms and put them in the army. That is why the peasant has wisdom, because he is defeated from the start. Put him in power and see how wise he is.’
He did not say anything. He was thinking.
‘Now I am depressed myself,’ I said. ‘That’s why I never think about these things. I never think and yet when I begin to talk I say things I have found out in my mind without thinking.’
‘I had hoped for something.’
‘Defeat?’
‘No. Something more.’
‘There isn’t anything more. Except victory. It may be worse.’
‘I hoped for a long time for victory.’
‘Me too.’
‘Now I don’t know.
‘It has to be one or the other.’
‘I don’t believe in victory anymore.’
‘I don’t. But I don’t believe in defeat. Though it may be better.’
‘What do you believe in?’
‘In sleep,’ I said. He stood up.”

“If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.”

“’What do you think of the war really?’ I asked.
‘I think it is stupid.’
‘Who will win it?’
‘Italy.’
‘Why?’
‘They are a young nation.’
‘Do younger nations always win wars.’
‘They are apt to for a time.’
‘Then what happen?’
‘They become older nations.’
‘You said you were not wise.’
‘Dear boy, that is not wisdom. That is cynicism.’”

“’I’m not brave anymore, darling. I’m all broken. They’ve broken me. I know it now.’
‘Everybody is that way.’
‘But it’s awful. They just jeep it up till they break you.’”

“Everything was gone inside of me. I did not think. I could not think. I knew she was going to die and I prayed that she would not. Don’t let her die. Oh, God, please don’t let her die. I’ll do anything for you if you won’t let her die. Please, please, please, dear God, don’t let her die. Dear God, don’t let her die. Please, please, please, please dear God, don’t let her die. God, please make her not die. I’ll do anything you say if you don’t let her die. You took the baby but don’t let her die – that was all right but don’t let her die. Please, please, dear God, don’t let her die.”

Read folks, Read

Dubliners

Dubliners is a collection of short stories written by James Joyce published in 1914. I finished it this morning with "Grace" (I read them out of order.) Collections are always great since they always have some continuity and such a continuity stringing through apparently separate works serves well for such an objective as portraying the message for such a book titled "Dubliners". Continuity resides in alcoholism, Catholicism, Irish politics, music and epiphanies. K let's go.

So Joyce has often been called the greatest writer of the 20th century. I've only read this so far. His most famous work is "Ulysses", though "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" is very well-acclaimed as well. I plan to read them in the future, but as of now, "Dubliners" has already convinced me that Joyce is an absolute genius. On a side note, I've always had a thing about the name James, a good thing, so yeah, that's another plus. Anyways, what makes him so good? Well, we'll do characters, though that's a bit more difficult with a collection of short stories, and then writing style, which again may be tough, but then we'll open it up to the themes of the stories mentioned above. Those are the key interesting points, I think.

Despite the last paragraph making me sound like I might concede at this point, guess what. It's still true. The characters are the most important aspect of a book, or story now, I guess. I'll concede that. Congratulations. Well, so each story focuses on one specific character with the exception of "The Boarding House" in which there are presumably three main characters. For the most part though, there is one. This is significant in that most of the stories are in third person. The first three are in first person, and also incidentally, all take the voice of a young boy, but the rest are third, and the rest older too. The narrator follows the life of a character for a day or a few, and though separating once in a while, sticks mainly to that character and dictates the thoughts of the character often, sometimes explicitly with words like "She remembered" but often without saying it and only implying it by the reminiscent position the character is in (Evelin looking out the window, very still) and the personal way in which the sentences are written (using exclamation points and posing questions.) So we get a character for each story. New paragraph.

The characters all tend to be very flawed. They are either controlling like Mrs. Kearney, timid like Little Chandler, bitter like Mr. Duffy, naive like the boy in Araby, lost like Farrington, small like Gabriel, or alcoholic like most everyone else. There's a huge array of different people and different insecurities. They all act quite painfully stupid quite often, though they really can't be blamed for it. If you narrate any of our lives, we'd probably seem pretty stupid. Why is this. Dramatic irony. There it is. When one acts like an idiot, one usually does not know why exactly one is doing such a thing, and when an observer knows this, one seems in such a way when one is really only acting in a very forgivable, human ignorance. For example, there's Evelin, who we see standing up impulsively and screaming internally as she clings to iron railings at docks, and the first to escape this house she is trapped at and the second to stay. She seems very keen on going when she stands and keen on staying when she clings, and so we see that Evelin, you are acting like an idiot. Why not be cruel to her and say straight out that she is an idiot? Well, because her mommy died and her daddy beats her and Frank loves her and she is only nineteen. Of course she's confused and of course she has all the right to be, and of course, then she'll act like this. Then she turns all passive and unresponsive. This is an epiphany, here, showing her that she has no choice whether to stay or to go, so it doesn't matter what she wants or what she decides, because in the end, she's staying. So, there is one example of a character and the complexity of her. We see her develop. We see her thoughts and her feelings and confusions and past, and we see how she turns out. The thing is that it is only from this one event that we see her. We will address this later.

So Evelin had her debut, sympathy and epiphany, and so do the other characters. The main ones at least. My favorite was Chandler because of how genuinely confused he gets and how genuinely well Joyce portrays both his thoughts about Dublin and his life, and what we should see of Dublin and his life, and how this affects what we think of Chandler and his mentality. He's pretty screwy, to tell you the truth. So we have that, and we have sub-characters. Yay! So there are a lot of characters. A lot! And they all live in Dublin, so they do seem to overlap. They might nit actually, but you could definitely interpret it that way, with the priest that died in The Sisters and Araby being the same person and such. There are also character names that repeat, like Holohan. Then there is the fact that the chronology of the stories influences the characters too, like the girl in "Araby" and Evelin that follows right afterwards. The list of characters grow as you go on through the book. In the first one, "The Sisters", you have the sisters (aunts), the boy, the dead priest, the uncle and Old Cotter. You could list them, that's the point. In the end, "The Dead", has so many characters it gets a bit ridiculous to call it a short story. See most of these characters are not so very significant anyways, like Miss Daly and Miss Power. Oh, Miss Power may be a connectionn to Mr. Power from "Grace", don't you think? And "Grace" is right before "The Dead". Well, too bad Miss Power is not so very significant. Darn, that'd've (get the Cather in the Rye connection?) been a cool connection. Well, looks like this blog may turn out to be even longer than "A Doll's House." So let's wrap up characters. You're in first and third person but you almost always focus on a single character rather intimately and you see how they grow away from their flaws to a final self-realization, usually. This growth though, is not always all that great of a thing. Sometimes they degenerate, like Farrington beating his kid, though that may happen quite often, or Joe drinking a lot, or Lenehan going through with meeting Corley to finish their master plan of screwing over that poor slavey girl. Note: If you are a weeper and if you don't like being a weeper, avoid this book; it's totally depressing.

So writing styles. We talked about voice a bit, like how you get really close sometimes. You keep your distance from sub-characters often, as the main character also keeps his distance in understanding, and all this always serves a purpose, like when we keep very close to Gabriel but far from Gretta, and this makes Gabriel every annoyed because he has no idea what's going on in her head. So closeness and farness always there. Good. There are gaps. Gaps!! Don't we all love gaps? Yes. That's the answer. yes we do because I LOVE gaps. They're so telling, which is so nice and ironic. Anyways, we have the dotty line quite often in the stories, especially the later ones. For example, in "Grace" we have a gap between the conversation and the church scene. This is probably just because the rest of the conversation after getting Tom to go and the days until the journey and the journey there are probably pretty uninteresting. There are more meaningful gaps though. Like when there's one after Farrington loses the second arm wrestle and before he is shown on the corner on his way home. Here we see that during this time he must have degenerated into a n awful state, and I'm sure it would have been interesting to see how he would then have departed from the bar, but we don't see, and maybe that's to create this next effect.

After the pause in "Counterparts", Farrington is referred to at first as "A very sullen-faced man" rather than "Farrington". Joyce does this often. He uses these round-about descriptions for characters rather than names. Often, Farrington becomes simply "the man" and sometimes "a man" like this time. This creates a distance and also lets the reader start over with the character, especially if it is at the beginning after the gap. See this pat at home in "Counterparts" could work in itself apart from the story before and still function well. This is very much attributed to this "a man" because this lets us start over and learn from then on the situation and the character without relying too much on the past. It is characteristic of the stories thus; to end with little dependency on the majority of the book. For example,if you simply read "The Dead" without analyzing it very critically, it becomes quite difficult to see any connection between the party in the beginning and middle and practically all the book, and the ending action of the wife's story and the snow and thoughts. Of course there is a connection. If the previous day had not been so, Gabriel may not have thought so profoundly, but having experienced the different lives and thoughts of Dublin, he does, and he thinks of Aunt Julia, aging for inevitable death but singing her heart out all the while. Such delicate, subtle idea are what will get you that legitimate enjoyment. Much of the story is for scene setting too. You get very accurate ideas of what the surroundings are like and how the characters feel about them and so how the characters are feeling when whatever traumatic thing happens to them. We have "The Encounter" for example, where you have most the story describing how these kids go on a ferry and play cowboys and indians and wait for a kid that doesn't come and a bunch of stuff like that. Then there's this encounter that happens all of a sudden, which is significant in itself, since meeting a pedophile is always a significant moment in a child's life, but also significant all the more because of it's contrasting with the scene set before of innocent peaceful youthful happiness. So Joyce has build-ups and final brief boom finales. Also, he leaves us hanging often with ambiguous phrases, such as at the end of "Araby" when the kid looks out into darkness, or the end of "A Little Cloud" when Chandler tears up in the darkness. There's a lot of dark and light that goes on, by the way. Side-note. A very good theme that you could probably talk for years about.

Anyways, alcoholism. It comes out all over; I mean, it's Dublin after all. Joyce is very critical of Dublin, and all these things fit. He was very critical of all people though but being it Ireland and being him possible bitter over the fact that the Irish had allowed themselves to create this image of drunkenness upon themselves, it's particularly Ireland, Dublin. There are actually points when the characters themselves don't even like Dublin. There's Mr. Duffy in "A Painful Case" when he lives outside Dublin just to avoid it, and there's "A Little Cloud" when Gallaher, talking about how great the rest of the world is, gets Chandler to start despising Dublin for holding him back. Chandler actually says you have to get out of Dublin if you want success before meeting up with Gallaher, so even before Gallaher, he's already thinking about outside Dublin. There's a whole thing abut foreign countries in this too, the fantasy of London and all. We'll get into it with politics. Anyways, alcoholism is particularly noticeable in "Grace", "Counterparts", "Clay", and "A Painful Case" I suppose since there are specific and important characters in each that are suffering from alcoholism. There's an interesting connection between "Clay" and "A Painful Case" since they are next to each other and "Clay" is about how a woman Maria works at a rehab for fallen alcoholic women, and in "A Painful Case" Mrs. Sinico falls to alcoholism. Alcoholism just tends to be associated with men, so it's interesting to see both these characters dealing with it concerning women. Also, in "A Painful Case" it is debatable that Mrs. Sinico committed suicide, so it might be some connection to the respect we should give Maria for giving such help to women like Mrs. Sinico who really need it. In "Grace", the main character is an alcoholic and suffers because of it, and his friends try to help him with Catholicism later. Will discuss. In "Counterparts", the issue is again alcoholism and how Farrington turns violent because of it. Then there's not really not alcoholism but just casual alcohol in all "After the Race", "Two Gallants", "A Little Cloud", "Ivy Day in the Committee Room", and "The Dead". In the first three, the drinking has negative connotations. "After the Race" is about partying all night after all, and "Two Gallants" about swindlers, though this may be deeper because Lenehan may be hiding his own sensitivities and so may be drinking as a distraction, and "A Little Cloud" with Little Chandler being practically forced to drink by Mr. Bad-Influence. Those all portray non-alcoholics though, and we see that alcohol is present in everyday life for most everyone. "Ivy Day" and "The Dead" are lighter about alcohol. In "Ivy Day", for example, they all drink but nobody gets raging drunk, it's just something you do when you're with a bunch of friends. Same with "The Dead". It's a party after all. There is Freddy Malins who is a drunk, but he doesn't seem all that abrasive either, just happier and more confident. These characters are significant because often, Joyce seems to begin implying that alcohol is always awful, but that's just because so many characters are aggressive drunks, frightening. However, many people can drink with control and if they get drunk, it may just be funny. Those people are always fun. Nevertheless, we often see alcohol, and often alcohol acts as a symbol in many of the books. In "A Little Cloud", Little Chandler progressively drinks more, and these intervals are done in one sentence indentations. So you could easily track how his alcohol intake coincides with his growing resentment of Gallaher and his own life. It acts across books as symbols too, like in "Clay" when naively Maria sits next to the old man, but when she describes the smell of alcohol about him, the reader can suspect something bad happening because across the previous stories, we've already had drunks who did terrible things. So yes, alcohol is very useful.

Catholicism. Catholicism and Ireland. Catholicism and Ireland written by a Jesuit-school guy. Wow. Right, so of course Joyce is being critical again, going on about how the Dubliners are too obsessed with their religion, or how they are too frightened of other religions, or how the religion in general is ridiculous. Now personally, I don’t agree since I’m Catholic, but Joyce makes quite the good argument and good points. The first story, “The Sisters”, is very religious and it starts us off with a priest dying and all the pressure of this. I’d like to concentrate on this story for a bit. So the dead priest’s name is James Flynn (hint hint James Joyce) and the kid that’s the first person before is pretty Joycian, I think, since he was all quiet and contemplative and sensitive but blind all the way through. But the voice stops being close to the kid half-way through, and that’s when the priest emerges. Twist! Anyways, that has nothing to do with religion. It’s just interesting. What has to do with religion is that the priest dies and the priest sort of goes insane before dying and this insanity is caused by the fact that he couldn’t handle being a priest, since it’s a lot more pressure than you could really conceive. He ends up chuckling alone in a dark confessional box. It’s creepy, so you could see how this could be critical in the sense that priesthood drove him crazy. And then there’s stuff like in “Grace”, how the guys discuss religion for hours making a bunch of mistakes and yet claiming to be Catholic, and then going to the confessional retreat where the priest rambles about some excerpt that is impossible to understand that he probably doesn’t either. The religion conversation is done over drinks, casually, and you think they cannot possibly be serious. They might be, but the thing is that they are convinced they could do absolutely anything because all they have to do afterwards is go to confession and then they’re good to go. This is a key issue between Protestants and Catholics, this idea of confession, the loophole, and so Joyce may be criticizing this of the church too. These two stories are the most religious of the stories, and the other ones mostly consist of sinful people. This story is called Dubliners, so is it suggesting that Dublin, a Catholic city, is filled with sinners, and so most people are sinners, and not just sinners but actual sinners, wife-beating, child-beating, alcoholic, spiteful sinners? Maybe. The hopeful part of it though, is that most of the stories end with the sinner realizing or working to realize what he has done or is doing, and in these two very religious story, there is much hope. The majority of the main characters in Dubliners are solitary, misunderstood, and sad characters. Nobody tries to help them and nobody they know really can. For example, Little Chandler in “A Little Cloud” has an issue about being timid and so missing out on life, or rather taking his life for granted by resenting a perfectly fine life. His confidants are Gallaher, a friend from eight years ago who is adventurous, self-absorbed, and so opposite of Chandler that he couldn’t possibly understand him and who rejects Chandler’s invitation straight off, his wife who is part of the timidity by causing him to be some intimidated that he can’t read to her, and his baby. So there’s no one to help him, and so he has to wallow in his self-pity, cling to fantasies, be turned to Gallaher’s bad influence, and finally yell at his baby before he finally realizes his misunderstanding. If only there was someone to just talk to the poor guy, right? Well, there are in “The Sisters” and “Grace”, thank God. It’s religious, and the only two religious stories are filled with legitimately good people. Sure Tome Kernan drinks, but he loves his wife and is loved by her, has good friends, and says “I’m very much obliged to you” in a slurred voice, but slurred and said is better than not. And sure Old Cotter in “The Sisters” is a bitter old man that talks smack about dead guys, but it’s not like he’s all bad, and the story focuses on the good old priest, the good little child, and the mourning sisters that comfort each other. It’s nice. And “Grace” ends in a church with misunderstandings, but it’s not like their paying lip-service. They are there to heal and to be peaceful, and that’s all religion is, really, and they’ve pulled it off, those drunkards. It’s all around nice; the boys helping Tom and the priest helping all of them just by being a priest and coming to talk to them. Whether what he says is legitimate doesn’t matter all that much then. In the end of “The Dead” you get this final, well-rounded, all-Irish epiphany with snow and the living and the dead and the whole bucket, and during this realization, Gabriel is described as being in that place of the dead, meaning, there must be some kind of afterlife. And it is very peaceful. Joyce likes religion after all, maybe not so much how obsessed people get over it or how immature it is in practice at times, but there is hope to be found in it, and peace, and niceness. People are better for being religious, that is.

Irish politics now. How controversial that is. Well, pretty much it’s the nationalists and everyone else. You get politics most in “Ivy Day in the Committee Room”, which is a great story, by the way, though it may be a bit difficult to keep up with it. It sort of makes you feel nationalistic. This is actually another one of the stories filled with legitimately good people. They’re not politicians, they promote one, but they all are definitively nationalist aside from Crofton, who was conservative, but had to switch when the party withdrew. So basically, I’ll just explain this story and that’ll do politics, and maybe we’ll talk about West Britons accusation in “The Dead.” Actually, let’s do that now. Basically, in “The Dead”, Gabriel writes in a British newspaper and he isn’t very troubled by this himself because he thinks literature trumps politics, which is true, but Mrs. Ivors, the patriotic type, accuses him for being a West Briton, who are people that think Ireland ought to still be part of Britain, hence the name. Of course she probably doesn’t think that, but she probably still does have an issue with him writing for the English. She leaves after this and says she’s cool and all, but as readers we’re all thinking she might still be irked and all about the West Brit. Anyways, so stuff like this crops up all over the book, little interactions concerning the government, little controversies, but Ivy Day is the big one.

It’s called Ivy Day, first of all, which is the day in Ireland that they celebrate the memory of Charles Parnell, the idolized nationalist Irish politician. People pin ivies on their shirts on that day, as Mr. Hynes does. He was my favorite character, mostly because there’s another gap concerning hi. So anyways, summary: there are two guys, O’Connor and Old Jack, who are hanging out in a committee room and then people keep coming in, all canvassers for Tierney, the politician who’s supposed to be paying them but isn’t, and they all drink and talk and eventually they get Hynes to read his poem about Parnell and they all applaud and sit in graceful and proud memory. So there are a bunch of characters and this is one of my favorite stories because it is so interesting how these voices mesh and these ideas bounce around. They mostly all discuss the coming of King Edward and whether it is right to give him a reception and all. Mr. Hynes pints out that Parnell would never allow a reception. O’Conner thinks it’s fine. Old Jack doesn’t really take place, concerning mostly with the subject of child-rearing in the beginning and gazing off into the fire in silence (I LOVE when that happens in literature! Fires and windows and landscapes and trains, gazing in general at anything) and then coming back to mostly answer and agree to people. Hynes I love because he seems to be a legitimately good guy, assuring them they’ll get paid, laughing, modestly standing up for the working man with gentle reason, calling O’Connor Mat, being called Joe, wearing the ivy, calling him King Eddie, saying ‘bye ‘bye, getting embarrassed in reading, walking slowly, being accused and writing awesome poetry. There’s a point when Hynes leaves which is very interesting in that nobody says anything except for O’Connor who only suddenly says ‘Bye Joe” and Joyce actually wrote it out. Very interesting. People must all have something in their minds or it might be characterizing a distance we see around Hynes. Then Henchy calls him a spy for Colgan, the other politician. It’s very strange, really, and saddening, because obviously, I think he’s a decent skin too. Anyways, it says something about Henchy and also how blazé they are about there being a spy around. Mr. Henchy comes after Hynes. He always rubs his hands. He says ‘No money, boys’ first, which I love too. I love anything that shows how close any people are, and these guys are clearly great friends, calling each other boys, first names, obsessing over the same things, turning up in the same spot and sharing drinks all around without a thought with the old man being referred to as both Jack and the ‘old man’ among young men, lovely lovely. I just love when any closeness occurs, especially in a book like Dubliners, it’ very endearing and reassuring. Anyways, Henchy quotes people a lot in a ranting, mocking way, but is not superior or intelligent enough to do great harm; it’s just friendly conversational complaining. He talks about votes a lot. Anyways, after Joe leaves, in their discussion about him being a spy, I get to liking O’Connor because he thinks he’s a decent chap because of his writing, and I get to wondering about Jack since he agrees with Henchy, which is pretty free of him. Henchy though is the worst and goes on about he doesn’t trust smart guys and says goes on a rant on Mr. Sirr, whoever that ism and how he’d sell his country for four pence. Then a priest, Father Keon, comes for a bit in a rally random way, and says he was looking for Mr. Fanning, turns around and leaves, saying a lot of No’s concerning coming in and being accompanied out. Mr. Henchy, John, seems a pretty decent guy then, and then they talk about whether the priest is actually a priest or not. They say he’s a black sheep, meaning he works for himself without any institution he’s connected to, and then they drop it when Mat says he thought the priest was their drinks they ordered. They talk about how to get their drinks then, and the kid comes with the drinks, and the kid gets a corkscrew, they drink, and the kid, 17, drinks too and leaves. Then Henchy calls Crofton, another canvasser, the Conservative, useless in getting boats, and then fat Crofton and thin Lyon come in. They give them bottles Henchy pops the cork off of by heating them by the fire (allowing sound effects) and then they finally start talking about the King. Crofton is revealed as a guy that doesn’t speak much because he thinks he’s above the others. They talk of Parnell and his memory and the King and all with different levels of nationalism and reason. O’Connor is totally for Parnell, while Lyon is a bit doubtful on how great Parnell really was and Henchy thinks the King’s alright. Crofton says shortly he respects Parnell for being a gentleman. Then Hynes comes in slowly. Slowly! Great stuff this story, this Hynes. Henchy puts a bottle for him by the fire and O’Connor and him get all excited about Hynes’ poem, which he doesn’t really remember (he’s so humble) and then remembers and reads out after a massive pause. We get the whole poem, which is really good. It’s followed by silence, applause, and then the Pok! of Hynes’ bottle which he ignores as they sit in that silence that follows glorious greatness. We get O’Connor’s praise, then Henchy’s asking for Crofton’s and then “Crofton said that it was a very fine piece of writing.” It ends with Crofton. So politics, we see is as casual as alcohol, as religion, as family, as friends. Politics are wonderful in these situations. It’s their reason to be together, really. They aren’t politicians, they’re buds. You got how overly excited I got over the characters. They’re great, that’s why. Sure the politics matter, but amid child-rearing, “spies” and black sheep. Crofton and Hynes matter, the Conservative and the spy. Does the Conservative not speak because he feels separate, because of his conservatism along with his education? Does Hynes leave because he feels separate, because of his “spying” or accusation of spying as well as his education? Joyce is definitely as always, ambiguous, but no doubt, this story ends beautifully.

As for music, Joyce is a mastermind, and he shows it in “The Dead” and “A Mother” as well as in “Clay” and “Eveline”. “The Dead” is about a middle-class musical society, and “A Mother” about Mrs. Kearney’s daughter Kathleen in a concert. In both there are needless musical references, showing how much he knows, but of course, how he uses it is what is important. In “A Mother” Joyce shows the difficulties of the music business since nobody goes to the concerts, ad then there is the corruption of music and performance by people like Mrs. Kearney who sacrifice music for making points and making money. It’s really sad, and you do feel bad for Kathleen. Mrs. Kearney’s the type of person that could make a first-class pianist learn to hate the instrument just by bossing you around too much. “The Dead” is about people who are absolutely obsessed with music, but kind of seem snobby at times because of it, but then again, that’s probably because the reader just isn’t so keen about music as the characters. The characters are very good, of course, at what they do. There’s Aunt Julia, for one, with her amazing song. There are times when music seems misunderstood too though, like when Gabriel can’t find the melody in Mary Anne’s piano piece and people leave during it, while the song very well might have been impressionist, where there is no clear cut folksy melody but only a river of sound. There’s also when Freddie that’s about the amazing tenor who’s a black man and people doubt it because he’s black, which is totally shallow and makes you question how much these characters care purely for music or for the prestige and formality that comes with it. Hmm. Then again they might just not like black voices. Maybe. Anyways, there is then the interesting connection between music and memories, like with Gretta in “The Dead”, Eveline and the organ in “Eveline”, and Joe and the song in “Clay”. They all are pulled by that music to some emotional memory, and they all are very much affected by it in some significant way concerning the plot of the story. In Eveline it reminds her of her mother’s death, Joe of his gentle childhood, and Gretta of her dead first love. So music is a great transition for plots. It’s intimate, sensitive and coincidental.

So concerning epiphanies, honestly, I think we’ve already covered it after 5164 words. The thing to remember is that nobody said these epiphanies were right or that they’re going to stick. For example, the last and most significant epiphany, the one by Gabriel in “The Dead” says that we all are equal, the dead and the living and all of Ireland, and we are all part of something greater. This may be true and is very much implied so by Joyce by just the sheer beauty of the writing and the sleepy transcendent state that the character thought this in. However, Gabriel is sleepy, and when you’re sleepy, your mind is free and you may do these things, but when you wake, you hardly ever remember. Epiphanies are profound and they are emotional, and this emotion is profound and so difficult to reach. So, will any of these epiphanies stick? I hope so, but there’s no saying. There are moments in our lives though when we are smarter and more wonderful people than we could ever have expected of ourselves, and so there is always that comfort that there is something within us - even though we may only understand it or realize it in vague and fleeting moments of passionate emotion, and maybe even in total depression - that we could take pride in for pointing at us as individuals of significance and beauty. So we will forget, or at least never be so honest as in those moments, but we could trust it to be there and that is how man was created in the image of God and how time has passed since then.

“I drew the blankets over my head and tried to think of Christmas.” –The Sisters

“A spirit of unruliness diffused itself among us and, under its influence, differences of culture and constitution were waived.” – An Encounter

“The cold air above us was the colour of ever-changing violet and towards it the lamps of the street lifted their feeble lanterns. The cold air stung us and we played till our bodies glowed. Our shouts echoed in the silent streets” - Araby

“It was hard work – a hard life – but now that she was about to leave it she did not find it a wholly undesirable life.” - Eveline

“Then an impromptu square dance, the men devising original figures. What merriment!” – After the Race

“The grey warm evening of August had descended upon the city and a mild warm air, a memory of summer, circulated in the streets.” – Two Gallants

“She had been made awkward by her not wishing to receive the news in too cavalier a fashion or to seem to have connived and Polly had been made awkward not merely because allusions of that kind always made her awkward but also because she did not wish to be thought that in her wise innocence she had divined the intention behind her mother’s tolerance.” – The Boarding House

“They seemed to him a band of tramps, huddled together along the river-banks, their old coats covered with dust and soot, stupefied by the panorama of sunset and waiting for the first chill of the night to bid them arise, shake themselves and begone.” – A Little Cloud

“Darkness, accompanied by a thick fog, was gaining upon the dusk of February and the lamps in Eustace Street had been lit.” – Counterparts

“And Maria laughed again until the tip of her nose nearly met the tip of her chin” – Clay

“He had an odd autobiographical habit which led him to compose in his mind from time to time a short sentence about himself containing a subject in the third person and a predicate in the past tense.” – A Painful Case

“Mr. Hynes came in slowly.” – Ivy Day in the Committee Room

“He was extremely nervous and extremely jealous of other tenors and he covered his nervous jealousy with an ebullient friendliness.” – A Mother

“Two gentlemen who were in the lavatory at the time tried to lift him up: but he was quite helpless.” – Grace

“A few taps on the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again.” – The Dead

Read folks, Read.