Books I Should Have Already Read, Vol. 5

Punching in for another installment of the series....

Books I Should Have Already Read, Volume 5

Nickle and Dimed

By Barbara Ehrenreich

This is one of those "Ithaca" books that felt like everyone back there had read and discussed. Other examples of such books included Fast Food Nation; Eat, Pray, and Love; State of Denial; A People's History of the United States, and anything by Michael Pollan. What I am trying to say is that I heard a lot about this book and already understood the basic gist of it.

And the subject is one hell of a pitch. Barbara Ehrenreich decided (at the suggestion of her editor) to try and make it as a member of the working poor. She would leave her persona and profession behind to find housing and sustenance on $7 to $8 dollars an hour. She worked as a waitress in Key West, FL; a home cleaner in Maine; and a Wal-Mart store associate in Minneapolis, MN. There are other odd jobs in between (hotel maid, food service worker, etc.) and failed attempts for some others.

Ehrenreich's writing is strong and the narrative is compelling. She distills the ins and outs of job applications to their mind boggling details. As someone who has taken a slew of those Unicru Assessment Tests, (I can tell you that I "Strongly agree" that "It is infuriating when the court lets guilty criminals go free" and "Most people can be trusted.") it was wonderful to read how those tests are just filler. Instead of assessing your personality, the tests are meant to squeeze out your loyalty. And you are not even working for them yet! Would you get any job at all if you put anything but a big fat zero in the "How many dollars of company materials have you stolen in the past year?"

The book's central challenge isn't to any one employer, but the idea of the American Dream. The idea that if you work very hard you can have a piece of the pie and rise up from the bottom rung. This idea is core to our Master Narrative and Ehrenreich's questioning of it makes for a prickly book. Understandably, the book sends the Right into a fit. Ehrenreich does herself no favors when she plays right into the "liberal academic snob" that pundits love to hate. She is able to deduce that a household with books by John Grisham and Rush Limbaugh (Literature she describes as on the "low-end" of the literary spectrum) isn't filled with the brightest bulbs. She attends a church revival in Maine, in hopes of finding some entertainment in a small town, and finds it all quite silly. On the revival, "But Jesus makes his appearance here only as a corpses; the living man, the wine-guzzling vagrant and precocious socialist, is never once mentioned, nor anything he ever had to say. Christ crucified rules, and it may be that the true business of modern Christinaity is to crucify him again and again so that he can never get a word out of his mouth."

Yeeesh. Did I just stumble into Christopher Hitchen's God is Not Great? Cause that is one is still on my "to be read" pile. I am no fan of Limbaugh and an atheist, but did she really need to say those things? I understand that in a book about the poor, it might be wise to mention Jesus since he was all about helping the poor. He was poor himself. But, this is the only mention of him in the whole book! I would have prefered something like, "Hey, it would be great if Rick Warren and Pat Roberston really stumped for the poor and calm down a bit about this whole gay marriage bit."

People were having fun at that revival. It would not be my kind of fun, but they can go nuts. I find writing for free on a blog nobody reads plenty of fun! I am sure those folks would not. Did she met the people in that house and actually have a conversation with them? When I used to live in Ithaca, fellow progressive/left-leaning/hippie/whatever folks, would often judge me by the media I view. "My God, Garik! You watch prime time television!?"

"Hell, yeah! The Office is on and then we can watch Lost!"

Such arguments do the movement no favor. I have ranted about this before, so feel free to browse the archives. Please, browse the archives! PLEASE!!!

Ehrenreich makes some sharper observations when she turns the lens to the working poor's situation. If we expect the "lower class" to cook our fast food meals and stock our Big Box shelves then they need to drive out to the suburbs. Or they find housing in the suburbs. And once the wealthier class gets nervous about having those folks in their neighborhoods, they move further out and continue the cycle. I am new to my little Cleveland inner-ring suburb (Lakewood*), but I often hear how Section 8 housing has ruined it. Lakewood is a nice place to live if you end up cleaning houses in Bay Village or selling Halloween costumes in Rocky River. It is close enough to the outer suburbs and relatively cheap enough to live in.

She challenges assumptions that her jobs were "dumb" jobs filled by "dumb" people. She frames this in light of her academic experience and PhD. It was still hard to learn how to master the backpack vacuum cleaner and register! I understand her viewpoint, but nothing except experience on the actual machine itself will prepare you to handle it. I think what Ehrenreich was trying to do was portray herself as someone considered "smart" by society in "dumb" jobs. An honest analogy, but an awkward presentation that can come off as snobby.

Regardless, these are not dumb jobs. Every job and workplace has policies, politics, and a culture that you need to adjust to. When I am faced with a new register at a new job, I don't think back to my degree. I do that for my writing gigs. In this gig, I am begging the senior staff to walk me through the process.

She budgets down her earnings to demonstrate how difficult it is to get by on $7 an hour.This provides the greatest challenge to the American Dream of working hard and getting that house in the suburbs However, the book is filled with people that bust their ass everyday doing the repetitive work and still can not rise up. If something was supposed to happen, if something was supposed to "trickle-down," then why hasn't it yet?

All these discussions reveal a inherent conundrum in the book. Most of the debates around poverty, welfare, and the working poor are based on anecdotal evidence. Ehrenreich's book is a great read, but it only represent relatively isolated cases. Her writing is great and you feel for these people,but for every (insert name) she met, someone probably has the opposite example. My parents grew up damn poor and worked hard so that they could prepare me for all this blogging. Oh, and life too. Thanks to the efficiency of Puerto Rican social services, my grandmother (who was in her late sixties when she recently passed) collected WIC and the PR equivalent of food vouchers. I remember her once telling me to run down to the store and use the EBT card to buy groceries. In a moment that would make Ronald Regan** proud, I refused to use the card and instead paid for the groceries (I think it was some rice and Vienna sausages) with a twenty dollars I have saved up from my lunch money. It felt wrong to use that money when I knew we were not lacking. Of course, I also deduced that the cashier would wonder why a fifteen year old was whipping out a welfare EBT card. I got this one, granny. No jail time for me***.

So there are people that abuse the system. Go on the Cleveland.com message board to find supposed proof of these moochers. The rants you read up there are part of that anecdotal evidence. Personal responsibility is a big part of the equation. If you cannot afford something then it is simple economics that you should not buy or have it. Then again, such statements ignore the realities faced by some of the working poor. Hell, I am working poor. Not to dive too much into a sob story, but I have and still do work in similar jobs and situations. It would be great if I owned a car since I have actually been rejected from jobs for not having one. A car would open up a whole other side of town for me. Financing one would be risky, so I am left to sorting out jobs based on their criteria and proximity to a bus line. Ultimately, I am responsible for this, but it speaks well to Ehrenreichs comments on how it can be hard, almost impossible, to break out of poverty. Worse of are those workers that want to climb up and go to school, but have no time. A single working mother might dream of bettering herself, but cannot consider taking a break between her current job and her children.

She challenges the idea that poverty stems from joblessness. All her co-workers are (duh!) employed, but they often work two to three jobs, still struggling to make ends meet. She does not dwell much into her co-workers personal lives (Another quip I had with the book is that it presented everyone but Enhereich as utterly defeated. It seemed no one had hobbies except being a loser and dreaming about going to Dairy Queen), but it seems that most of their money gets spent on necessities. Again, their is plenty of anecdotal evidence that people can waste away their paychecks of vices and unnecessary luxury items. Then there is the argument of what are necessities. Is a car a necessity? Well, no, I guess, but don't we live in a car culture? Is Internet a necessity in today's world? My job searches would be render impotent if I stuck to newspaper classifieds. When does a specific food item become a luxury?

She does mention how all her co-workers either share an apartment house with roommates, friends, or families. Enhereich approaches every situation alone and that takes a bit of the bite out of her argument. Few people end up with absolutely no support groups like a friend to borrow some money from or family member's couch to crash on for a night. I read some critiques online that said this dismissed her entire thesis. I understand that it is rare to find people in such situations as Enhenreich, but this was an experiment and that was a variable she choose to control. Being as she mentions how all her co-workers double up on housing and job (One in Key West actually lives in a van down by the river!), I don't consider this a glaring flaw. She probably chose this condition, including an aversion to social help, particulalry religious charities, to concentrate the impact of her experience. Albeit, these are not conditions you should impose if you find yourself in a similar bind.

The book deserves to be widely read. I mean, it has already, but if there was a book I would have everyone read then it would be this one. It instantly creates discussion and debate because everyone makes (or tries to) make ends meet. The constant back and forth about the "working poor" even with anecdotal evidence demonstrates how it hits across all social spheres. A well off person might not necessarily care about the poor's condition, but they would have something to say about it. Nickle and Dimed obviously wants the reader to agree with Ehrenreich's conclusion that the working poor are screwed by the "owner class." At the very end she even mentions a sort of workers revolution where the poor will realize they are getting the Reganomics shuffle. I don't know if that will ever happen, but Ehrenreich chronicled and wrote about these experiences during the tail of end of the 90s and into the early part of this current decade. It is sobering to read this book in light of the recent mortgage crisis and sour economy. During her Key West sojourn, Ehrenreich mentions how the $5 a day for gas are really eating into her budget. Could it have been conceivable that we would hit a day when people making the same wages as Ehrenreich struggled with $4-a-gallon gas? What about everyone affected by the mortgage crisis? Getting back into the murky waters of anecdotal evidence, what do we say to families that tried to finance a house and had the rug pulled out from under them?

Regardless, the book offers an engaging read about an often forgotten sector of the economy. You can read it and be angry and the companies or the workers, but it will get your mind thinking and ideas churning. And if our economy moves towards a post-industrial one, dominated by innovation and service/hospitality, then you will see even more and more of these jobs in the headlines. There are some other issues with her analysis. She could have always returned to her regular life, if things got dicey. It would be an experimental failure, but security. Few people have such safety valves. But, the heart of the book remains solid. There are many obstacles to "making" it in America and the American Dream from the Master Narrative does not factor any of those. Some of these obstacles are personal and require that an individual prioritize what is important to them. Some of these are economic, racial, social, and gender based. Some can be cured with a quick "Suck it up an deal with it!" Others might need a "Hey, do you need some help?" Nickle and Dimed tells us that this is all very complex and that it deserves our attention.

Peace!

*In all actuality, I love living in Lakewood and do not see much to these arguments. Again, anecdotal evidence. Maybe I live in the "good" part of town. I find the mix of people and classes engaging when compared to the angry hippie echo chamber of Ithaca.
**Not that I was trying to impress him or anything. Ronald Regan gives me the willies!
***My grandma could fill up an entire series of blog posts. About a year before she passed, she got worried that the PR government, in a stunning act of doing something, would bust her for these welfare shenanigans. To make herself appear needy, she proposed sending my sister and I each a sum of some $10,000 to hide. You know, while things settled down and the tax man left. Yes, my grandmother wanted to turn me into an offshore tax shelter. And don't blame this on old age. She was nuttier than pistachio ice cream, but always lucid. The transaction never happened. This was great considering how I would need my own real tax shelter to explain that to the IRS.

Books I Should Have Already Read, Vol 4

Just in time for the movie...

Books I Should Have Already Read, Volume 4

Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

Well, first off, I will defend considering graphic novels on equal footing as any "proper" novel. Reading six issues of your favorite monthly comic book wrapped into a trade paperback format is not reading a novel, but graphic novels are one shots designed with characterization, depth, and length in mind. Graphic novels have won Pulitzer Prizes and Time Magazine considers Watchmen one of the 100 Best of the English language. So, if my lowly opinion isn't enough (It isn't!?) then trust these respected institutions.

Considering that I discovered my inner comic book geek a scant two years ago it makes some sense that I missed Watchmen. However, the work is seminal and won a Hugo award, so it is not like I had failed to hear about it before I stepped into Comics for Collectors one June day.

I had read some of Moore's work before and appreciated the sense of detail and expansiveness to his graphic novels. I enjoyed the hell of out of Top 10 and it's police drama meets comic book world. It had so many injokes and references to other comic books that it really was a delight to read. In a world where everyone has super powers and/or is a super heroes it makes perfect sense for things to play out in comic book logic. So having the exterminator reset the timeline for your mouse infestation makes perfect sense even though you do not remember asking him to do so.

V for Vendetta was a great book even though it took me a few reads to wrap my head around it. I have yet to read From Hell and some of his single issue work, but there is still plenty of time.

But, how did I miss Watchmen for this long? Isn't it the best graphic novel of all time? Many believe so.

As I have mentioned before in these posts, it is difficult to write anything new about these works. I started reading comics in a post Watchmen world and the book's influence is apparent. I imagine reading Watchmen when it first came out and rereading the hell out of it because it just felt so real. Wouldn't it make sense that the government would try to crack down on masked vigilantes. If cities can now legislate what kind of oil a restaurant can use then why would they stand by and let some armor clad weirdo jump over roof tops? And Watchmen dares to answer all those "what if" questions like "What is Batman has to pee while chasing the mugger" or "What happens when Daredevil sleeps those two hours every night?" Well, people get hurt and crime keeps going on. Superheroes (Or "Masked Adventurers" as per the book's terminology) inspire fear in criminals, but they might also inspire fear in those they protect. Aren't these people human? Maybe they might mistake me for the perp and crack my back in half by accident? Regular cops did have some code to bind them.

Of course, there are numerous examples of this kind of realism or psychological depth in current comics. I read one analysis of Watchmen that said Moore had released a sort of four-ink genie that now equated gratuitous violence with real and real with good. Hey, Rorschach shoved someone into a refrigerator, so why shouldn't we do the same thing to Kyle Rayner's girlfriend? I think you can trace the umpteen times that Daredevil has been pushed way too far and has had to go way too violent to Watchmen. And where did all this raping in Identity Crisis come from? Well, not Watchmen per se, but I can see the point. Watchmen was wonderful because it broke from comics as a kitschy escape art for kids. Of course, some of those old stories were just lots of fun! Can't we have fun comics and "real" comics. I appreciate some nice realism, but sometimes I want to see a guy drop a battleship on the other guy.

However, this was not the effect Moore and Gibbons had in mind. The reason comics get any respect (albeit still minimum) is from seminal works like Watchmen. And, guess what, the book was both fun and real at the same time! Not for faint at heart, but it had some jokes, some punches, and some thinking to it. What is the real point of a superhero if all they do is fight the sickness of crime? If someone robs a store because they can't make the rent then should the hero try to smash the CEOs that terminated the robber's previous job? Or should the hero punish them both? One for robbing a man of his life and the other for robbing the 7-11 of one-hundred dollars. Why are these masked people better than me? Because they spent more time in the gym than I? Well I had to work! And, I look funny on the elliptical machine.

If you have not heard, there is a Watchmen movie coming out and upon first seeing the trailer I was thourughly confused. After reading the book, there is a spine tingling excitement in seeing the scenes play out now that I understand what is happening. I think they are definetly going for the fanboy approach here. It might be hard on those that are unfamiliar with the book. Spiderman and Batman have a ton of backstory, but in the end they are guys that punch the hell out of the others. The Watchmen do the same thing, but have all those neuroses that make you and me a delight to others.

I did not enjoy the story in 300, but appreciated the director's loyalty to the original comic's panels. If he does the same thing with Watchmen then it will be a movie to enjoy several times*. Just like the book.

Peace!

*Unfortunately Alan Moore has ben quite vocal in his disapproval of the film and his name is never to be seen on any of the credits. I only hope that the movie does well and introduces more people to comics and his work. Even if they came via the film.

Books I Should Have Alread Read, #3

The return! Of posts and and a previous column!

Books I Should Have Already Read #3


A Walk in the Woods
By Bill Bryson

Well, it is not a classic, but Bryson is a popular author with books about subjects ranging from hiking, popular science, etymology, and the UK. He is an honorary Officer of the British Empire and an university chancellor. Also, Robert Redford already secured the rights for the book and will make it into a movie sometime soon. Some serious credentials.

This book escaped me all throughout college where many fellow environmental studies students praised its narrative of the Appalachian Trail. I have discovered that those that love hiking only like one thing second to that and that is reading about it. OK, well, they are individuals so one hiker might really like pistachio flavored ice cream as his second choice and another always gives Maine Coon cats her second place medal. I have never really sensed a real desire to talk about hikes from the hikers. While you are on a trail, the fact that the only controlled variables in the whole hike are that strip of earth and whatever you have strapped to your back make for some serious, "Well, you just had to be there" moments. Except for really wacky moments like losing your pants while trying to ford a creek or being chased by bees in the shape of a fist! Or, just regular bees. Equally terrifying. They always want to take you there, however. Then you won't need to listen or read! Hikers are a friendly lot and, in my experience, always want to bring more appreciation to their trails.

And by hikers, I mean hikers. The kind of people that have actually taken their Nalgene bottles outside of the office. Or, a person who doesn't even own a Nalgene since the clunky plastic seems to pedestrian. Maybe that bright purple bottle will attract a bear, rookie! You ever thought of that!? These folks sleep in their sleeping bags for fun, laying them over an old comforter situated on the porch. Their boots are lost to the reverse gravity of their feet pounding the earth and not eaten away by the whorls of winter salt.These folks have wardrobes full of natural hues. Hunter greens, tans, granite, sage, and mahogany brown. But these colors, on these folks, are not drab. The energy of their stride and the adventure make everything come alive until you realize why should you hike in anything else. Certainly not something purple, because it might attract bears! And not in blue jeans, at least according to Bryson's research.

A UK resident in my previous book club tried to get us to read Bill Bryson's Notes from a Small Island once and I wonder if A Walk in the Woods would have shown up here any earlier if we had chosen his suggestion. Better late then never because I appreciate Bryson's honest voice and snarky wit. I have no idea if any of the cartoony events he mentions actually happened in the exact circumstances in the book, but I came to trust Bryson in the early chapters. He does an immense amount of research on the (roughly 2,100) mile long trail, but never feels overbearing or depressingly authoritative. If you read these posts and realize that my voice switches from observation to exposition (see above) then you probably realize that I am a big fan of "wonder." Bryson never loses that wonder, framing the trail and the journey, in the path's scale. Until I read the book, I never understood exactly what the trail was. I had ex-girlfriends, classmates, co-workers, and colleagues tell me about the desire to walk it from Maine to Georgia (or vice versa), but what the hell was it. I was always trying to impress these people (or at least get along with them) so I never really asked. But, Bryson, paints a trail that is meticulously maintained and well traveled, albeit rarely completed. When your local municipality has a 500 foot road with potholes able to disable a tank (I am looking at you Ithaca!), an unbroken trail of 2,100 miles maintained by an alliance of the unlikely (volunteers, state officials, entrepreneurs, federal officials, etc.) can restore your faith in humanity. Bryson and all his fellow trail writer/advocates portray a national treasure, the kind of narrative that has saved the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil development. I will probably never hike the trail, but I ma glad to know that it is there and that others can enjoy it.

The book features a particularly fresh point of view. Bryson likes to hike, but he also loves cheeseburgers and can't help but feel laughed at while purchasing his supplies at the outdoor store. His hiking partner (Stephen Katz) wheezes and whines throughout the climb and tosses supplies because they were too heavy on his back. While trail veterans might roll their eyes at such unfit people hiking the trail, Bryson and Katz democratize the trail for all of us whose hardest hike ever was the steepest incline possible on the gym's elliptical machines. Before reading the book, I knew it was humorous, but I still expected a serious anti-establishment tone to it. Something along the lines Edward Abbey or Bill McKibben, where hikers can find themselves in wilderness and lose all the absurdities of "modern living." Such works spoke to the people I mentioned before and I imagined Bryson doing the same, except with some MST3k wit and not Abbey's crabbiness.

Instead, Bryson makes the trail a physical and metaphorical through line for the eastern seaboard. The segment in Northern Georgia brings up the necessary Deliverance reference and how such stereotypes have harmed the region's image. A side trip through Pennsylvania mentions Centralia, PA; an abandoned town siting on top of a continuous old mine fire.


Of course, it is odd to find a hotel on top of Mount Washington and that you can drive your car all the way up one of the highest peaks in the continental US. My limited experience with hiking is in the El Yunque rain forest back home where you can walk up to the highest (publicly accessible) point on a 3,526 feet tall. It is an easy hike, with the only hazards being the poorly marked signs dating back from the 70's and slightly washed out ridges near the top forcing you to hop the length of a little bit less than a yardstick. But even here there are roads, where, if you made it pass the rangers, drive up to a concrete shack built for some communication towers. It feels phony there and more so on the Appalachian Trail. There is a sobering statistic where Brysion says, "Ever twnty minutes on the Appalachian Trail. Katz and I walked farther than the average American walks in a week." Maybe that has changed since the book came out in 1998 ( most of the trip happened in 1996), but it reamins powerful. There are asides on the death of the small trails towns to multinational chains and the commercialization of the trail. All these asides come across as mournful and not vindictive, something I have seen in such hiking literature. Shouldn't we be blowing up the bridges, Mr. Bryson?

Bryson portrays fellow travelers in cartoony tones. Selfish day hikers that actually dress like they are out for a safari and an irritating latch-on that had the annoying tendency to pinch her nose and blow, in an effort to clear her head. Apparently she honked all the way along the trail and when the guys ditched her, later feeling bad, are able to identify her by asking fellow passerbys if they had heard the honking girl. And they meet those people that your parents warned you about when telling you never to accept rides from strangers along with enough local color to make ten PBS specials!

Bryson appreciates the trail and venerates it, but never takes it beyond what it actually is. The trail is nature, not magical, and packs dangers for those ill prepared. He reflects on the fears created by the nine murders in the trails and how these are isolated cases, ill compared to the potential for twisting your ankle or dying of hypothermia. Bryson and Katz only walk abot 870 miles of the trail by the time they quit. The took a cab along part of the Virginia section, following a road that runs parallel to the trail. In Pennsylvania, Bryson goes it alone and has to rely on his chair, hiking to the next checkpoint and then hiking back to previous one where his car was parked. He then drives up to the new start, doubling back on himself in a snail's paced hike through the Keystone State.

When Bryson and Katz quit, I found their epilogues wholesome. While a "crunchy" hiker might sneer at their lack of devotion (Katz is excited to watch X-Files that first night after calling it quits. My hero!), Bryson mentions how 870 miles is still a whole hell of a lot. From New York to Chicago he says and that few people ever complete a true, non-stop, one season hike. He ends with more respect for the trail and the "cubic" woods that surround it. More respects for the comforts he has at home and the love of his family. "Yes and no," is how the boys described their feelings at the end and if that means finding the middle ground, then more people should read this book.

Peace!

Books I Should Have Already Read #3

I'll find you somewhere. Show you how much I care...

Books I Should Have Already Read #3

ROSEMARY'S BABY

By Ira Levin

And, no, I have not seen the 1968 movie. So we can count this as sort of a "Movies I Should Have Already Seen" as well. An early Christmas gift for all of you loyal blog readers!

*** SPOILER ALERT***

Part of me wishes I had lived in the late 60's and through the 70's. I'm very happy in my post-Boomer, Generation Y bracket, but it seemed like a big heyday for horror. You would not tell at first glance, but I actually enjoy a good horror movie. Imagine young Garik wearing a smiley face t-shirt going to see Jaws, Alien, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Carrie, The Exorcist, The Omen, Dawn of the Dead, as they premiered? Without the need for caveats like "Well, you need to understand, that was really scary when it premiered..." Just old-fashioned creepiness and desire to hang out with your mom for comfort. "Nothing is wrong, mom! I just want to hang out on the terrace with you for six hours!" I like for horror movies to get under your skin and not just startle me. I'm looking at you The Ring and The Sixth Sense! I get startled when Carson Rabbit jumps out of his cage too quickly!

Chuck Palahniuk thanked Ira Levin*, author of Rosemary's Baby, in a chapter to his non-ficiton book, Stranger Than Fiction. Portrayed as a letter to Levin, Palahniuk thanks Levin for his work and how it approached national issues. The essay is also a treat to Palahniuk's fans, particularly those with dreams of becoming writers themselves. I am comforted to know that Palahniuk has heroes and writers he admires as much as his legions, myself included, do. Take it away Mr. Palahniuk....

"In Rosemary's Baby...the battle is over a woman's right to control her own body. The right to good health care. And to the right to choose an abortion. She's controlled by her religion, by her husband, by her male best fried, by her male obstetrician."

Maybe it's the thirty years between then and now, but all these 70's horror stories always seem to counter some societal trend. Dawn of the Dead attacks consumerism while The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is supposed to reflect the horrors of the Vietnam war. I hope that in thirty years, the films and books I loved are looked at in such an academic light.

More Mr. Palahniuk....

"You showed women exactly how not to be. What not to do. Do not just sit around your apartment sewing cushions...Take some responsibility. If you get date raped by the Devil, don't think twice about terminating that pregnancy. And, yes, it's silly. The Devil..."

Palahniuk then refers to some of the crazy shit that happens in Rosemary's rape scene. Jacqueline Onassis is there. So is the Pope John Paul the Second. People making love in suits of leather armor. However, Levin hides the message in what is supposed to be entertainment. Its horror. Its supposed to be freaky and weird, not necessarily thought provoking. Messages are nothing new in horror or the plain weird. Plains Indians have the "White Buffalo Woman" story, the Bogey Man scared kids straight way before Sallie Jesse Raphael and most ghost stories have some sort of warning. Be nice to folks, because, if not, they come back and haunt your ass.

As you can tell, others can better explain the messages in Rosemary's Baby. I appreciated how creepy the whole book proved. Having a girl get raped by the devil opens up some enticing imagery. A little beast comes out screaming from the drain! Rosemary opens the bathroom door and sees dead bodies stacked upon each other! Everyone's mother sucks cocks in hell! Instead we get a nice everyday creepiness where the apartment we liked is suddenly terrifying. Everyone understands the idea of a nosy neighbor. Why the hell are they so nosy anyway?! What do they want from me.!? If you think about something long enough, it begins to feel unfamiliar. This is the opposite of deja vu--jamais vu. You can do it at home! Devil-free!

Pick a word. Any word! I am going to choose "orange."

Say the word over and over again. Try to pick at it's etymology. Where did this word come from? When we say it in conversation, the word makes sense. But why does it make sense. Why do the letters 0-r-a-n-g-e describe anything? It feels weird, no? And the unfamiliar can be fascinating or terrifying, if not both. There lies the appeal of Rosemary's Baby and Levin's writing.

The final moments left me a bit unsettled. Rosemary falling in love with her little devil baby. Oh, you're claws aren't so bad! Your yellow with black eyes aren't so bad! I am going to put you in your little black carriage and push you around! WEE! Acolytes scream out "All hail Andrew!" It's a kitschy baby shower...FROM HELL! Where the Adams Family and Munsters were funny, Rosemary is perverse. Levin also has some sick touches here and there. Not to spoil all the fun, but I wanted to share my favorite.

After giving birth, Rosemary believes that her baby is dead. The cult took it away and trapped her in bed. She still produced breast milk which she need to drain by pressing a crude pump (really just a cup with some tubing) against her breasts. She hands them off to cult members in scenes like this...

"And more often than not, the pump and cup were brought to her a few minutes after the cring began; and the crying stopped a few minutes after her milk was taken away.

'What do you do with it' she asked Laura-Louise one morning, giving her back the pump and the cup and six ounces of milk.

'Why throw it away, of course, Laura-Louise said, and went out."

Cold!

Laura-Loiuse then goes on to use Rosemary's breast milk cup to dump a dirty spoon.

COLDER!

Thank you, Mr. Levin

Peace!

*Ira Levin recently passed away and in reading his obituaries I learned that he only wrote seven novels and about nine plays. Most have become stage or screen icons like Rosemary's Baby, The Stepford Wives, and The Boys from Brazil. Amazing, but wish he could have written more for us later comers.

Books I Should Have Already Read, #2

I am back after another long hiatus. I did spend a lot of time watching Transformers, but its the usual excuses for why I have ignored the blog.

And to return, here is the long awaited second installment of a blog series that premiered earlier in the year.

Books I Should Have Already Read #2

Watership Down

Damn, I loved this book. And not just because it is about rabbits! Rabbits that sing songs and tell animal myths to each other! Rabbits that survive against countless enemies, including themselves. Rabbits with names like Cowslip, Bigwig, and Blackberry! OH MY NO!

I am not going to deny that the sheer amount of bunnies in this book didn't make me heart get twitterpatted. I adore rabbits, mostly because, like everyone, I can conjure up instant images of them. However, living in PR, I had not bunnies to chase around or even look at. We had lizards. Lots and lots of lizards. Anoles are just not that evocative. The first time I saw an Eastern Cottontail rabbit pop out of the forsythia bushes on the Ithaca College campus, I freaked! Here is a reenactment. Just this tall awkward guy squatting over some grass and clapping his hands saying....

BUNNNY! EEEEE! YAY!

I think someone might have called Campus Safety upon seeing me. But, I got away. Quick as a bunny!

I don't know much about writing. Have you read what I post here? And I know even less about writing children's literature, but I can see the classics when they come across.

Watership Down never, ever talks down to its audience. For a book compiled from bedtime stories Richard Adams told his daughters, it never loses it edge, which is weird since it is book about rabbits-the iconic prey animal.

Imagine being one of his daughters and seeing this wonderful gift your father gave you. If your parents ever had some goofy character they threw around in stories and yarns then imagine Chambon* or El Culebron** becoming this modern classic. And then they made a movie. And an animated series. And they referenced it Donnie Darko, Lost, Gundam, and Wallace & Gromit. That George Lucas considered it one of his inspirations for the uber-mythology of Star Wars. That there are over 300 editions and it have never been out of print! Yeah, awesome! Thanks, dad!

People that are not into fictional universes often ask why would someone get so wrapped up in fake people and events like with Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, Doctor Who, or The Rocky Horror Picture show. There are as many answers as their are cult-classics and geek fests, but I always appreciate the amount of effort put into creating these fake universes. Great ones reflect our own real world and they should always invite another visit, whether it be through tons of crazy stuff happening in the background (ex., The Simpsons) or the mythology in Watership Down. Adams actually researched rabbits, discovering that wild bunnies live in a quasi-caste system with some dominant males ruling warrens. That the cutesy animals are actually vicious little fighters that can tear each other apart when fighting over food or mates. And that the bucolic imagery of rabbits living happily in the fields is false. Everything kills them.

The book portrays a group of English rabbits (The only rabbits in the world to actually live underground) that listen to the prophecy of one pipsqueak named Fiver. The group flees their home because Fiver feels it will be soon destroyed and then travel across the English countryside looking to establish a new colony. Realizing they are all guys (Do'h!), they try to find some female rabbits to populate the new home. Hilarity does not ensue. But we do get adventure, heroism, tragedy, and action!

Adams gives the rabbits the standard commando team breakdown. Of course, this probably wasn't as cliched back then, but you got: the tough one (Bigwig), the smart one (Blackberry), the leader (Hazel), the first lieutenant (Silver), the annoying one (Fiver), etc. He throws in a villain (General Woundwort) and disastrous uncontrollable events like dog attacks and farmers. He creates a dichotomy between domestic and wild rabbits. The band tries to free some domesticated females from the farm and, in a funny exchange, begin to fantasize about the dolled-up domesticated females with their ears that hang down or fluffy Angora fur! The rabbits have a language called Lapine which consists of a sort Hawaiian/Celtic, onomatopoeic jumble of letters. "Hrududu" means any man-made vehicle, "Silflay' for eating out in the open, and "Hlessi" for a rogue wandering rabbit. A true triumph the imagination.

Watership Down has a certain darkness to it, showing that nature, while adorable, is vicious. The rabbits believe in a sort of rabbit Robin Hood named El-ahrairah (Yeah, I can't say it either) who defied the Creator (Firth) and brought doom upon all rabbits In a take on the Judeo-Christian original sin concept, El-ahrairah's insubordination destroyed the equality of all creatures. Firth gave all the other animals unique attributes to better hunt and kill rabbits.

"For Firth has give the fox and the weasel cunning hearts and sharp teeth, and to the cat he has given silent feet and eyes that can see in the dark..."

Other children's literature would dismiss the sheer suffering of rabbits. We would know that the fox and weasel eat them, but our band will never say such things. It will be like Finding Nemo where the sharks are bumbling fools! Yay! Adams does not dismiss any of this. He does have Firth give the rabbits great speed and intelligence, but still hands them the shaft.

"All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, cunning, prince with the swift warning."

I love the message and it sums up why I wish I had read this book as a kid. Kids will be "Sweet rabbits on adventures!" But as adults we can come back to this intelligent read and be soothed by the rabbit's travels, whether how saddening. So no matter who your enemies are (Foxes, bill collectors, rampaging robots, the landlord, your boss, Republicans, etc.), take a lesson from the rabbits and keep fighting because it will only enrage them more and, hey, you might even make it. Adams is not the first to write down such a philosophy. During the Spanish Civil War, author and bane of my existence during Spanish AP literature class, Miguel De Unamuno told a Nationalist leader, "You will win, but you will not convince." That same spirit lead the US civil rights era. I am sure everyone has heard or read the famous quote "It is better to die on your feet then live on your knees," which is often attributed to Emiliano Zapata. "The people united will never be divided," is a close second behind "Fur coat and cowboy hats aren't immune to tear gas!" when it comes to my favorite protest chants. However, Adams is the first time I have ever heard those words and been actually moved. It is one thing to get angry or challenged, but the rabbits pluck and determination just made me feel good.

I don't do the book justice. I get all lackadaisical when talking about things that I truly enjoyed. I am right now reading a phenomenal biography on Charles Schulz that I will share on the blog soon, and already I am struggling with the words. I hope you read the book or even check out the old 70's animated movie, which is up on You Tube. I have no idea who reads this blog, but if some random parent stumbles across this, maybe looking for the Transformers DVD or something, I hope that you get your kids to read this book. Some of said that the violence and darkness in it (especially the movie) are too much for kids***. We spend a lot of time as a society trying to hide ourselves from the ugliness in the world. Nothing makes me sadder or angrier then when someone says, "I don't watch the news because it is just so depressing." or "I don't get involved in politics." AAARRRGGGGHHH! It is so easy to dismiss things, instead of trying to understand and challenge them. The rabbits could have easily laid down and waited to be eaten by one of "the thousand." Instead they fought, challenging the role that the creator itself gave them. The book's biggest achievement is demonstrating that courage, compassion, and cunning exist in creatures most, incorrectly, view as cute and dumb.

PEACE!

*What my nephew calls his imaginary friend. I think it's supposed to be French. "Chambon, I am with zee Freeeencch Reziztanze!

**Some imaginary wrestle my mom would call herself when we played fight. It means the big snake, which is getting a bit to Oedipal for me.

*** Don't worry! The story has a marvelously happy ending! No joke, a bit realistic since even the pluckiest wild rabbit dies of old age at four years, but happy nonetheless!

Movies I Should Have Already Seen Vol 3. Issue 1

I PROMISE that this will be the last time I bring back this column from the bowels of deletion. Get those collector's guides ready because it all starts here...again.

However, before I get to the reboot, here is a quick summary of the previous Movies I Should Have Already seen that were lost to the digital abyss.

The Silence of the Lambs

30-second recap: Jodie Foster is not hot. Stop trying to make her hot damnit! Why are there so many sheriff's deputies in West Virginia? And what was the big deal with the moth? An excuse to get the entomologists fawning over Jodie Foster who is NOT HOT!!

Saving Private Ryan
30-second recap: Has Nathan Filion in it! SHINY!

Final Destination

30-second recap: I learned that you don't fuck with death. He's a "mac-daddy."

The Godfather

30-second recap: Yes, I know I should have seen it a while ago. Sorry. Eh, what can I say? It's The Godfather! Damn Leslie Neilsen for ruining it for me with his wacky antics.

I still think Goodfellas was much better.

Donnie Darko

30-second recap: Expected a mind fuck, but instead got my mind groped by the highschool lacrosse team. Frank the Rabbit is insanely creepy. The Chucky of the current generation. Always nice to see Jena Malone, Jake Gyllenhall, and Patrick Swayze...as a pedophile.

Now, with that behind us, I present....

MOVIES I SHOULD HAVE ALREADY SEEN! (THE FINAL RE-LAUNCH!)

The Descent

Alright, this movie, isn't that old. However, much like the Saw franchise it is well-hyped as the future of horror. The difference between the two is that unlike the Saw franchise The Descent is truly scary. You need to understand that I am not a very touch hombre. I startle really easy so even the screeching cats and albino boys of your average J-horror make me scrambling up the walls. But those are just startles. The Descent scares. Remember how you never wanted to go back into the bathtub after seeing Jaws? The Descent does that same thing, but for caves, which you should really stay away from in the first place unless you are A) A spelunker B) Accompanied by a spelunker or C) Batman. Just saying.

I wish I could post screenshots as the film relies on claustrophobia to build up the tension. The landscapes of the Appalachians also increase the deadly foreshadowing. The film actually slams the foreshadowing right against your face. A shot of the cabin in the night with two torches at each end of the porch screams The Amytiville Horror? The misty woodlands do what the Blair Witch Project wanted to do and much like Alien it solves the problem of why the protagonists don't just leave the damn monster infested/cursed/haunted place by sticking them in a cave.

The movie gets pretty grisly and with the main characters being all female I have seen some folks throw around the term "mysoginistic." I don't think the movie is anti-women as none of the girls are stereotypes. They are all athletic women who know what they are doing, just like any group of friends that shares a common hobby. Get me and four other comic book guys together and you won't have a tough guy, crazy guy, loner, hero's best friend, and gentel guy. That's a Gundam team. Instead you would just get five guys who, if quipping about the latest issue of Civil War Frontline 10 was a martial art, could cut a path out of any cave!

I will try to keep the spoilers light. I think the movie relied a bit too much on startle scenes at times. It had use going from the moment they first went down those narrow crevices that link the caverns. It had use when that girl had to cross the chasm with nothing but upper-body strentgh and some caribiners. The monster were neat, but lost everything once we saw them. They were just slimy orcs rejected from The Lord of the Rings movies.

I am not a horror-movie buff or expert, but I believe horror movies should do one of two things at the end:

1) They should make you truly happy. The survivors should have won your heart and come out of the thing alive because they kick ass. They deserved to live. We get a happy ending because sometimes, when we have enough heart and strength, we can get those happy endings. I am looking at you Alien and Jaws. You too Cube! But just Cube! None of those sequels!

or

2) It should enrage you. You should get out of the seat and say, "No! Fuck! Not like this!" Then the movie needs to grab the guys jetpack and ram itself kamikaze style into the ending while screaming, "LIKE THIS!"
If you got that reference then I hope you smiled or screamed out a "BENDIS!!!!" that would make Dave Campbell proud. If you didn't get it then I promise not to nerd it up anymore.

Anyway...horror movies can also try to enrage you and betray what you expected. Seen Carrie? Yeah like that! Seen Final Destination? I have! And, no, it's not like that.


The Descent gives you both. I will try to make this as spoiler free as possible but you have been warned!

***SPOLIERS LIE AHEAD***

The Descent gives you two beautiful moments of salvation that just melt your heart while waiting to scream "HOORAY!". Weird to say that the most uplifting scene I have seen in a while has come from a horror movie where there is a fight in a pool of blood, but, there, I said it. Then it takes that away from you and turns the thumbscrews until the guy that made it is laughing at you! Laughing hard! Never have I been so enraged at the ending of a fictional movie.

Finally, The Descent is good because it must have looked so stupid on paper. Six hot British girls go spelunking in the hills of West Virginia where they fight blind, albino slime creatures? It worked. Go figure.

Peace!

Books I Should Have Already Read #1

Here it is! Here is some snark to follow those books that I should have already read. Those books in our collective cultural medium. Those books we reference in casual conversations. Those books that become crappy movies. Books like...

Books I Should Have Already Read #1

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

As I went to the Baldwin School of PR it makes perfect sense that I did not get this book assigned in high school. Like any other good high school, Baldwin disdains actual thought in favor of compliance, but they have the private school dollars to make it happen!

I had seen the classic 1966 movie in college and was surprised to see the movie mostly follow the book's plot.

Oh, a quick aside, since most of books that will be reviewed as a part of this series are classics, please keep in mind that there are people who have done much better studies/reviews of these books. Don't expect English papers here.

I am always surprised that any book that somehow deals with the future is automatically labeled science fiction. There is very little sci-fi stuff here, particularly when we read it 50-plus years past its publication. Wouldn't have academia realized by now that Bradbury's focus was the issue itself and not the presence of "robotic bank tellers" (ATMs) and interactive television (I guess you can put TIVO here).

The book is pretty low on physical description, which I often find weird when describing a future world. However, other classic dystopia novels (ex. 1984, Brave New World) also follow the same succinct descriptions. Bradbury does whip out the prose when he talks about sensations and experiences, particularly the destruction of books by fire. Even in this future land, everything is very non-technical, with most of the the high-tech devices bearing animal names. There is a eerie scene at the beginning of the book where a stomach pump is described in purely animal ways (i.e. the snake that sucks the green poison out of you).

Montag (the protagonist) doesn't really come off the page, but he does change as a character. He goes from complete book burning fireman to book lover. Considering the brevity of the book I think his change of colors came a little too quick, but he did meet some alluring characters. Also, as books were prohibited then their allure intensified. Maybe he had just held off too much.

I don't think we read this book because it is vivid or run. We read it because its message has only gotten stronger. A character in the book mentions how the ban on books began with just a few edits here and there. If a vocal minority (I'm looking at you family values people) just snip out a book or two then why not just ban the whole thing? School districts ban The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn because one of the lead characters in it is called "Nigger Jim." Of course, it doesn't matter that Huck cares for Jim and considers him an equal traveling companion. We kill the whole thing for one issue. Bradbury has a nice afterword (in my edition, which is not the same as the one pictured above) in the book where he talks about this very same thing. He refers to people trying to censure his writing by saying, "All you umpires, back to the bleachers. Referees, hit the shower. It's my game. I pitch, I hit, I catch. I run the bases. At sunset I've won or lost. At sunrise, I'm out again, giving it the old try."

Ray Bradbury is sick tight!

Peace!