Newberry Library Book Fair

I went yesterday and can barely bear to speak of it. It was the first day I was available to go, and the fair runs from Thursday to Sunday (with a preview night for rich people on Wednesday night)... I can't go on: I didn't find a single book.

Native Son, Richard Wright

"Native Son" was, by far, the best book I've read this summer. It is a masterpiece of American drama that, tragically, I found as much application to contemporary Chicago (and the rest of the United States) as I would have found in the decade of its authorship, the 1940s. I connected deeply with Bigger Thomas' oppression and the oppression of Blacks and Communists in the era "Native Son" took place, in part because of the parallel oppression gay Americans face today. Among other things, this novel is a critique of blame and the notion of collective guilt, and the way different racial, ethnic, and political groups view one another.

I never thought I'd find myself including what is essentially a political novel (Richard Wright was a staunch member of the Communist party in Chicago, and the book's themes and characters surely reflect that fact) among one of my favorite books. However, since finishing "Native Son" nearly two weeks ago, Bigger has not left my mind. His story tapped into a quiet anger I didn't know I had, infused me with deep guilt at having implicitly taken part in the oppression of others, gave me a better understanding of Black America today, and allowed me to compare experiences of oppression across communities.

I can't do the best job I'd like at describing how thought-provoking and startling "Native Son" was for me, but I hope that it is included more often on required reading lists--not just for African-American-focused courses or political science courses, but for American literature and history as well.

A Natural History of the Senses, Diane Ackerman

Many know Diane Ackerman for her most recent novel, The Zookeeper's Wife. While I haven't read the latter, A Natural History of the Senses urged me to investigate. My second nonfiction selection of the summer, Ackerman's book lives up to the promise of its title--and more. Getting dry only near page 250 of its 300-plus pages, the rhythm picks up shortly thereafter, leaving the reader with a sense of accomplishment at having absorbed so many interesting tidbits of information on the five senses, and at having, in a sense (pun entirely intended), recharged: For after completing A Natural History of the Senses, I was made aware of the wonder of my functioning body for perhaps the first time. Since I'm not as aware of trends in recent nonfiction as I'd like to be, I can't be sure, but from what I've read in the Tribune and heard from friends, it would seem that Ackerman's book ranks with some of the best of those pop-science books (a la "Bonk," "Freakonomics," etc.) that have graced the bestseller lists in the last few decades. I'd definitely recommend A Natural History of the Senses to anyone looking to beef up on interesting party facts. (Why do you think I read it? Girls always chase after those witty intellectuals.)

• Orphaned calves are wrapped in the skins of stillborns so that the mother of the stillborn will nurse the orphan--if she can't smell that the calf is her own, she won't nurse it.
• Those with smell disorders also find their sex drives lowered and have problems with their long-term memory.
• Touch is ten times stronger than verbal or emotional contact.
• In medieval times, a knight wore a lock of his lady's pubic hair into battle.
• Women often have colder hands and feet than men because when temperatures lower, the body automatically sends blood to protect her reproductive organs from freezing.
• Potato chips were invented in Saratoga Springs in the late 1800s.
• Those who crave carbohydrates are attempting to raise their levels of serotonin, as do those who suffer from seasonal affective disorder; ingredients in most carbohydrates have been tested and results show them to increase personal contentment.
• Humans can talk for exactly the same reason they can choke so easily: their larynx lies lower in their throat than the larynx of any other mammal.
• One's perception of color can be effected by emotions and memories associated with the color.

These were just a few of the surprisingly interesting things Ackerman dug up to include in her book; if you find any of them as intriguing as I do, I'd suggest checking it out.

Confessions

While on the subject of books that I've crossed off of the List incomplete, I figure I might as well confess: I have abandoned more than a couple books this summer. Guilty as charged: They are classics of great literature; how can I expect to be a decent reader or writer when I can't even get through ----?; I've got to give them a fair shot... I'll admit that I didn't get past page 50 in any of these books, but I've got to be frank--I wasn't enjoying them. So I figured I'd just set them free and move on. Maybe they are the kind of books I will appreciate when I'm older. After all, if I'm stowing Proust for my over-the-hill years, why not save a few more?

Abandoned books:
The Golden Notebook, Doris Lessing
The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers
The Jungle, Upton Sinclair

Didion, Woolf, and Baldwin: Exempted excerpts

"I have sometimes dreamt, at least, that when the Day of Judgment dawns and the great conquerors and lawyers and statesmen come to receive their rewards--their crowns, their laurels, their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble--the Almighty will turn to Peter and will say, not without a certain envy when He sees us coming with our books under our arms, "'Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading.' " -Virginia Woolf, "How Should One Read a Book?" (245)

I realized that I've been meaning to read three collections of essays, Joan Didion's The White Album, Virginia Woolf's The Second Common Reader, and James Baldwin's Notes of a Native Son just in order to read, respectively, "The White Album," "How Should One Read a Book?", and the title essay of Baldwin's collection. I know that someday I would like to read these books in their entirety, but because of the ambition of my reading list, I'd like to bench these three collections, having read the essays I was most excited for. It's probably a mortal sin to not finish these magnificent, heralded books (The New York Times called Woolf "as nearly perfect as Heaven grants it to a critic to be" upon the 1932 publication of The Second Common Reader), but I'm confident I will come back to them soon. For now, consider them enjoyed, appreciated, and checked off the List. (Postscript: After reading and loving Native Son, I may have to get my own copy of Notes of a Native Son; I feel like I could connect to Baldwin's essays deeply right now.)

"We tell ourselves stories in order to live. The princess is caged in the consulate. The man with the candy will lead the children into the sea. The naked woman on the ledge outside the window on the sixteenth floor is a victim of accidie, or the naked woman is an exhibitionist, and it would be 'interesting' to know which. ...We look for the sermon in the suicide, for the social or moral lesson in the murder of five. We interpret what we see, select the most workable of the multiple choices. We live entirely, especially if we are writers, by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images, by the 'ideas' with which we have learned to freeze the shifting phantasmagoria which is our actual experience." -Joan Didion, "The White Album" (11)

Woops

I got more books.

The Second Amendment:

• A Natural History of the Senses, nonfiction by Diane Ackerman (Barnes & Noble; I know, I know)
• Housekeeping, Marilynne Robinson
• Drown, Junot Diaz's short story collection
• Speaking with the Angel, original stories by the likes of Dave Eggers and Zadie Smith, edited by Nick Hornby (cheep-cheep at the Brown Elephant)
• Snow, Orhan Pamuk
• A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry ("A whole quartah?! Gee, thaaanks, mistah!")
• An unblemished, hardcover copy of The History of Love
• A vintage hardcover copy of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, an old favorite (for $1!)
• Maps and Legends, Michael Chabon (a gift from my pops)

I also found a pristine copy of In Cold Blood for the brother, and my girlfriend got Middlesex for $1.50. Not too shabby, Howard Brown, not too shabby.

I'm going up to Wisconsin with the Kenealys and plan to conquer more than a few books out in the hammock with a root beer. I've been slowed up by my recent crafting obsession, visits from faraway lovers, and assigned readings for my class at the Newberry--this week: two short stories by James T. Farrell, but I hope my week away will get me back on the (not too) straight and narrow.

Fun Home, Alison Bechdel

Sometimes a magical thing will happen to me: I'll pick up a book and read the first few pages and suddenly, somehow, find myself finishing it within hours. This happened with "Fun Home," a graphic novel described by the author/illustrator as a "family tragicomic." A general explication of the lesbian Bechdel's relationship with her closeted father, the novel proved to be a deep, feelinged probing of the heretofore exhausted subject of father-daughter relationships--something I couldn't have expected from a graphic novel. It's a quick read, but one that will stick in your head for days or weeks afterward. An excerpt is below:

Half-Price Books

No, the title of this post wasn't just meant to lure you in. I forgot to write about the first two bookstores I've stopped in as part of the Chicagoland bookstore exploration I mentioned here. I have yet to make a journey into a neighborhood like Lincoln or Hyde Park (that is, a neighborhoos with bookstores at every intersection), but I hope to before the month is up. For now:

1. Half-Price Books, Records, and Magazines
14 Countryside Plaza
Countryside, IL
(708) 579-1770

My family and I drove out to Half-Price Books a couple of weeks ago after my mom and I stumbled upon it on an earlier pilgrimage to JoAnn's Fabrics. It's well-worth the drive (although they have five locations in the greater Chicagoland), because sprawling suburbia allows for the store to have a massive inventory. They buy books whenever they're open, but beware: I only got $4.50 for a stack of unread paperbacks and I ended up spending almost $30.00. They ainno stoops at Half-Price, but all their books are in excellent condition. I left the store with a hardcover copy of "Martin and John" (Dale Peck), a hardcover Modern Library first-edition of Richard Wright's "Native Son" (only $4.95!), "How to Be Alone" (Jonathan Franzen), a $2.00 copy of Ian McEwan's "Saturday," and a like-new edition of "The Polysyllabic Spree"--how fitting!

2. A.C. McClurg Bookstore
at the Newberry Library
60 W. Walton
Chicago, IL
(312) 255-3520

I've been taking that class at the Newberry for four weeks now, and it wasn't until I had shown up an hour early for class yesterday evening that I finally had the opportunity to browse through the McClurg Bookstore. I wasn't aware of their lofted second floor, and was glad to spend nearly the entire hour up there in the quiet space. What McClurg lacks in its amount of literary fiction (I'd say only 1/10th of their inventory), it makes up for in selection--and they're always willing to place an order for you. I found the environment--a library--to be especially pleasing. Few spoke above a whisper, and there weren't any pesky employees looking over my shoulder. I'd recommend a visit to the Newberry any day, but be sure to stop by the Bookstore when you do.