Food For Thought

Was just now munching some extremely tasty mashed potato, courtesy of the Missus, when I recalled the frequency with which I consumed potato pie and chips, from the chippy, as a kid. I don't think it occurred to anybody then what a gloriously unhealthy combination that was. Oh, for such innocence again.

New Words For Old

I was attending a workshop today on the fashionable notion of empathy which reminded me of a recent slip in the employment of the term I encountered. In Eleanor Catton's wonderful The Luminaries she has one of her characters ruminating over the word in an early chapter. (I forget the precise reference, but the term is definitely in the character's consciousness.) The problem is that the novel is set in 1866, but the word didn't come into the English language until the turn of the century - around 1905. When I noticed the (extremely minor) glitch I was struck by how incredibly difficult it is to maintain an authenticity of style in any kind of historical novel (and generally the style of this novel is a triumph, by the way) and also how so much of the vocabulary that we might think of as foundational to thought has only been adopted relatively recently. Indeed, it was only around the 1970s that 'empathy' became a widely used term.

Of course, it's possible that Catton's character might have had a thought something akin to that rendered in the novel through the use of the term, but I do wonder if anyone in 1865 could have thought the thought so crisply and effortlessly without the term that encapsulates it.

And I wonder whether the word itself as it commonly used is now changing its fundamental meaning. A lot of folk clearly mean something like 'compassionate sympathy' when they use it, which is an admirable quality. But it's not empathy in the 1905 sense.

Taxing Times

It suddenly occurred to me that I really must get my tax return done soon. In the old days an elaborate form would arrive early in the year and sit mournfully on my desk as a reminder of what needed to be done. Now everything is on-line - and actually easier - but it's kind of invisible so easier to forget. When you finally pay you get thanked for your contribution to nation building, which might seem slightly silly, but which I believe is worth taking seriously. I have no problem in accepting the moral obligation to pay taxes and it's good to know that in paying them I'm doing something to benefit this community.

Missing The Obvious

Despite having finished Infinite Jest, I can't quite get away from it. It isn't that I've been rereading any of the text, though I did peruse the opening segment immediately upon completion since chronologically this is, I think, the most advanced we get along the time-line of the events described, so it helps in terms of trying to figure out the ending in terms of the actual plot (or whatever resembles a plot.) No, what I've found myself looking at rather more than I expected to is the abundance of on-line commentary on the novel - well, bits of it. When I was reading the novel I avoided this material as I thought it would get in the way of my developing an authentic personal response, but since finishing Infinite Jest I've found what other people have to say about it is generally enlightening, though most of it tends to confirm impressions I'd already developed.

And sometimes I'm simply led to realize how blind I've been to aspects of the text I really should have immediately grasped - which is a great reminder to someone who teaches lit that it's perfectly okay for students to sometimes be obtuse to the point of the ridiculous. One simple thing in relation to Wallace's work: I'd never quite got the relationship of the two key settings involved - the tennis academy and the nearby halfway house for recovering addicts. I missed the obvious fact that they represent the two extremes of the world of the novel, athletic prowess/success as opposed to physical decrepitude/failure (with the academy at the top of the hill, naturally so.)

As soon as I read a comment neatly summing up this point, the novel suddenly became significantly different for me. What earlier had appeared arbitrary became integral, and I began to see this loose baggy monster as a Dickensian kind of work in other ways. Wallace, like Dickens, is attempting an analysis of the whole range of American society in an extraordinarily ambitious manner, and, like Dickens, convincingly connecting the threads between those struggling at the very bottom and those who see themselves as the movers and shakers operating within the upper reaches.

Completely Incomplete

I wasn't at all surprised to get to the final page of the main narrative of Infinite Jest only to find nothing like an end in the conventional sense. One reason for my lack of surprise was that in the hundred or so pages leading up to the non-ending I could see no sign of the narrative winding down in the manner one grows accustomed to, none of the usual signals of narrative exhaustion. Quite the opposite, in fact. A number of the segments in the concluding pages seemed to have the energy of new stories getting under way and stretching themselves out to measure possibilities and I found myself thoroughly enjoying these 'new' storylines. One example from many: the painfully sad and hilarious visit of Hal to the NA men's meeting in which he (and the reader) finds himself excruciatingly embarrassed by the regressively infantile behaviour on display is a brilliant, entirely unexpected contrast to the generally positive depiction of the AA meetings described from the point of view of Don Gately earlier in the novel. As stand-alone entertainment it succeeds but in no way furthers the dynamic of the text towards some kind of understanding of what it might take to beat the dreadful addictions under scrutiny. (Oh, and suddenly there's a wonderful couple of pages comprising a speech by one Mikey at an AA meeting which, again, just seems to 'happen' with no particular rhyme or reason, yet develops a gripping little narrative of its own that seems to stand somewhere between Hal's experience and those of Gately.)

After putting the novel to one side just now I went on-line for half-an-hour or so to see whether any commentary had been generated apropos the ending itself, or the novel in general. It turns out, hardly surprisingly, that the Web is awash with conjecture/complaint as to what Wallace thought he was doing. I think this in itself is testament to just how powerful his novel is. He creates a world that draws readers into it in an almost magnetic manner and it's clear that many relish allowing themselves to be drawn back.

But much as I enjoyed the novel I think it's time for me to create a distance between us. You can have too much of a good thing. Though I must say, I'm keen to read some of Wallace's essays and shorter fiction.

Thoroughly Musical

I've been playing quite a bit of Van Der Graaf Generator lately, especially stuff from the mid-seventies, after the first hiatus involving the classic Hammill/Banton/Jaxon/Evans line-up. Acquiring a copy of Still Life has been the stimulus behind my exploration of this period - and, of course, it's always good to listen to Godbluff (which is probably my favourite VDGG album, though the competition is strong.) By the end of the week I'd developed major and welcome ear-worms, in the form of segments of Pilgrims, La Rossa and Childhood's End - quite a good way to get through a day at work, by the by.

It's astonishing to me that the band actually dropped out of sight for me back in the '70s. What was I thinking? Isn't it obvious that just as instrumentalists three of the four have to be seen as operating at the peak of achievement in rock music? Indeed, I suspect if forced to name my all time favourite drummer it might well be Guy Evans, who just can't do wrong. He swings when he needs to, can get down dirty and funky, and has an impeccable sense of the dramatic.

I suppose I'd lost faith - foolishly - in the kind of writer and performer Peter Hammill embodies, and since he's at the centre of everything the band does, despite being the most limited of the players, that affects all possible responses. Yes, he's not just over-the-top but sailing miles above the planet. But once you see him in the tradition he really belongs to I think what he's doing can be seen as down to earth in its gloriously flamboyant way. He isn't a rock singer at all; he's the star performer in a Musical, but he gets to play all the parts. And these are not rock songs: they are extended arias in the operatic sense.

I suspect it's the way that groups like VDGG drew upon ways of making music outside the straightforward rock'n'roll, jazz, blues tradition that defines the much-abused notion of progressive rock. I don't know what accident of history made that a distinctly English phenomenon, but in retrospect it's so obvious now that it was - possibly with its roots in The Beatles themselves.

Not Entirely Infinite

I'm beginning to think I might actually finish reading David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest quite soon, being in sight of the last hundred pages. I have absolutely no idea how it's going to end - an excellent thing in itself. I suspect there won't be an ending in anything like the conventional sense; it's just going to somehow stop.

I'll be glad when it's over, as I'll be free to move on to some briefer fiction; but I'll be equally sad when it's over as each time I pick it up I know I'll be rewarded in some way, but that way is deeply unpredictable. Also I'll miss the frequent shocks attendant upon having my face rubbed into realities I'd rather avoid, thank you very much.

For the first three hundred pages or so, I seemed unable to stifle my awareness that Wallace had chosen to eliminate his own map (to adopt some of the terminology of his text) and found my reading frequently cross-referencing that sad reality. But in recent days I've just found myself surrendering to the novel without giving any real thought as to its underlying vision of things. It seems strange to be reading a text with such clear philosophical implications innocent of all thought, but there it is.

No Illusions

Got back to the gym this evening for the first time in over a week. Thought I'd do well, given the fact I've had to rest, but found myself struggling and was glad to finish my stint. All a bit pathetic really.

After a day or two spent thinking about the amazing capacity of humanity for deceiving itself in a whole variety of ways, it was refreshing to be put in a position in which there's no escaping the fundamental truth of the inadequacy of one's own body. It brought back memories of the honest wretchedness of hitting the 'wall' back when I did the Singapore Marathon in 1990 (I think.) Any illusions I had about possessing some kind of mental strength and capacity for endurance were dispelled a long time ago, I can tell you.

Getting Away

Felt a bit overwhelmed by it all early in the day but deftly escaped into the wonderful world of William Carlos Williams via a lovely picture book for children about his life and writing entitled A River of Words for a good (and I mean a good) twenty minutes around noon, and all was well again. The book's from the same team that created the splendid volume on Roget, the one that Karen gave me for a birthday present last year, and it's just as good, which is really saying something. In making the great American poet accessible to kids it succeeds in reminding even a fanboy like myself of exactly what makes Williams so special as a writer: the simple things he showed us that weren't so simple after all.

Having made my escape so successfully it struck me later in the day just how important the 'escapist' nature of great literature is to me. Now serious readers of Lit with a capital L don't really like this to be said as it seems to make the literary enterprise that bit less serious. But I've no doubt that it's the escape route provided by books that lies at the heart of their attraction, for the likes of this reader anyway. And I reckon there's a double kind of escape involved. You get away from this world being given access to other worlds. And you escape, if just for a short while, the confines of your own consciousness for the wilds and wisdoms of someone else's.

Better than a power nap.

Blank Spaces

Driving back to this Far Place yesterday, with little else to pay attention to on the highway, I noticed just how many advertising billboards there are lining it now, a surprising number of which are entirely blank - I'd guess at least 10% and possibly more. I used to think the blank ones were patiently waiting for their ads to be pasted, but I now suspect there's a considerable over-supply of such space and many will remain blank. I say this because the metal surfaces of quite a number are obviously corroded despite looking as if they've never actually had anything pasted on them. In fact quite a few are in a state of semi-collapse.

So we're cleverly managing to ruin whatever view there is off the highway not just by posting garish advertisements, but by posting exactly nothing on the pointlessly ugly, and most likely unnecessary, structures we've intruded upon whatever landscape there is.

Am I the only person in the world who never buys anything as a result of looking at advertisements? Because, as far as I know, I never do.