Recent Reads, Thoughts, Films, Art
Just a quick summary of things I've been reading, thinking about, or enjoying in art.
Books:
The Post Office Girl by Stefan Zweig - Post-war Austria. A presumably mid-twenties girl who works in a small village post office is plucked by her aunt and invited to join the aunt's trip to the Austrian alps, so she's momentarily afforded the high life. She's abruptly cast off by her benefactors and left to return to her life as it was before--BUT she finds herself changed. As one of the many critics of capitalism, I enjoyed the way Zweig laid bare the emotional, psychological, and spiritual deprivation that is irrevocably intertwined with financial precarity. I saw a bit of my younger self in the protagonists, when they pinched pennies to sit in Viennese cafes on one of their rare free days. Apparently, this novel inspired Wes Anderson's Grand Budapest Hotel.
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck - I read this during our trip to California over the July 4th holiday. I was never assigned it in school and never read it before. It's as moving as it is brief. I'm continually amazed at Steinbeck's capacity for world-building and scene-making with his rather plain, almost subdued writing style. Through the novella I was constantly waiting for the "other shoe to drop".
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin - My second Baldwin novel after reading Go Tell It on the Mountain last year. David, the protagonist, falls in with Giovanni & Co. in Paris, France in the 1950s. He keeps asking his father for money and he mentions Hella (who is traveling in Spain for much of the novel) offhandedly at the beginning. Throughout David's relationship with Giovanni, he resists Giovanni's characterizations of him as an American, which I found to be an interesting undercurrent. This struggle is brought to a head in one of their later conversations:
"I can see you, many years from now, coming through our village in the ugly, fat, American motor car you will surely have by then and looking at me and looking at all of us and tasting our wine and shitting on us with those empty smiles Americans wear everywhere and which you wear all the time and driving off with a great roar of the motors and a great sound of tires and telling all the other Americans you meet that they must come and see our village because it is so picturesque."
David wasn't only faced with society's expectations on him as a man, but he also struggled with others' expectations because of his Americanness.
Films:
The Straight Story (David Lynch) - This film came across our path in Criterion's "Odysseys" collection (think: The Odyssey, The Darjeeling Limited). This is decidedly not a very Lynch-ian film. The main character, Alvin Straight, is only getting older and in one of the first scenes of the film shown on the floor after he had a fall and couldn't stand up again. His daughter, with whom he lives, informs him that his brother had a stroke and is in recovery. Unable to drive, Alvin decides to hitch a small trailer to his tractor and begins a months-long trek to see his brother in Mount Zion, WI. It was so touching watching this man, who is increasingly aware of his own infirmity, insist on wielding his own agency in one of the remaining ways he's able. We will not go out silently into the night! The dialogue was quality, and I thoroughly enjoyed the scene in the bar where he talked about his lowest moments in the war with another veteran. This film beautifully unfolds in a heartfelt portrait of what it means to age, to be human, and to connect with both strangers and family alike.
Art:
Hilbert Museum of Art (Orange, CA) - One of the most extensive collections of California scene paintings. This is an unassuming gallery on the Chapman University campus; I left feeling drunk with this longing to create art that depicts the California I know.
California Dreamin, Dennis Ziemienski
The Audience, Ernie Barnes Jr.
c.1968
Oasis - Beady Nevada (The Eastern Entrance to Death Valley, Maynard Dixon
Undated
Addison Gallery of Art (Andover, MA) - The first floor of this museum had a vast collection of twentieth century American artwork--exactly the kind that me and Z most appreciate. Charles Sheeler, early in his career, was an artist in residence at the Addison, so we got to see some of his lesser-known works and studies.
Ballardvale, Charles Sheeler
1946
Freight Cars, Gloucester, Edward Hopper
1928
Manhattan Bridge Loop, Edward Hopper
1928
Railroad Train, Edward Hopper
1908
D Train, Richard Estes
1988
I loved the D Train for obvious reasons. What a view!