Notes from the Scriptorium

What do Walt Whitman and James Joyce have in common? Well, they share the dubious distinction of being literary giants I hate. I was looking forward to Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass,” too. I couldn’t find it over here in Riyadh, so I bummed a copy off a professor. Unfortunately, Whitman wasted my time by insisting on glorifying shoulderblades and describing how he rolled around in a field of New Hampshire foliage, or something. Hey Walt, get a crackpipe. Some pop-tarts. Something. And as for that f*ckface Joyce, let me just say this: if you ever get to the point where you’re contemplating suicide, I advise that you keep at least 129.6 cubic yards between yourself and “Ulysses.” And yes, I realize that cubic yards are units of volume, not distance, so shut the hell up.

I apologize for that Ike Turner moment, dear reader. You know I love you, honest. It just irks me, nay, vexes me, to remember Whitman and Joyce. And don’t even get me started on Ezra Pound. Ezra Pound is a bitch. The good news is that reading isn’t always a pain in the sphincter. As per Fluxland’s request, I’ve compiled a list of Tariq’s Top Ten Books. They’re not necessarily in order. And let me give a nod to the works that just missed making the cut: Philip Roth’s “The Human Stain,” “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding, Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” and “Palace Walk” by Naguib Mahfouz. And remember, if the following books evoke in you the same venom I feel torwards Joyce and Whitman, it doesn’t mean you’re dumb. It just means I’m smarter than you. Now, without further ado:

1- “The Brothers Karamazov” by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

This is probably my favorite novel. It’s dark and distrubing, but funny as hell too. There’s a chapter titled “Delirium” which is, to use the proper academic term, awesome. People always think “Crime and Punishment” is Dostoevsky’s masterpiece. Well, I read “Crime and Punishment”, and it is a masterpiece. This, however, is THE masterpiece.

Note: Anyone who wants to read ANY Russian translations, whether it’s Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Turgenev, or anyone else, do yourself a favor and get the Richard Pevear/Larissa Volokhonsky translations. They’re head and shoulders above the rest. Don’t be fooled if someone recommends Constance Garnett.

2- “Breakfast of Champions” by Kurt Vonnegut.

This is not usually regarded as Vonnegut’s best work. That honor is traditionally reserved for “Slaughterhouse 5″. But this is my favorite. It’s just so damn funny. Evidently, Vonnegut breaks the cardinal rule for playas: He gets high on his own supply.

3- “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman” by Laurence Sterne.

I have no evidence of this, but I’m convinced that there could have been no Vonnegut without Sterne. He wrote this in the 18th century, when people were writing boring epistolary novels. That would be like if the Wu-Tang Clan built a time machine, went back to 1629, bumrushed the Globe theater, pushed the wigged pansies reciting Beowulf off stage, and broke into a stirring rendition of “Protect Ya Neck”.

This is the literary equivalent of a wild goose chase. There is no point to the novel. Tristram is trying to write his life story, but keeps getting distracted by other stuff. It contains weird things, such as:

- The deed of some piece of land in French.

- The text of a baptism in Latin.

- Random drawings.

- A black page to commemorate the death of a character. The death and black page occur around page 30.

- Page 271 being followed by page 283, with Tristram apologizing for the poor quality of the missing pages. He says they were so bad he just had to tear them out.

In conclusion, if Vonnegut gets high on his own supply, then Sterne has a weed garden on the balcony.

4- Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust.

It only took the first page to leave me awestruck. Proust has this way of awakening nostalgia in the reader that is unprecedented. There’s a bittersweet quality to Proust, because his writing is beautiful, with its winding sentences and startling imagery, and yet you find yourself feeling a tinge of sadness because you’re longing for some memory or other. The funny thing is when you realize that those memories are not your own.

5- The Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley.

Malcolm is the only man on this list I actually love. I don’t love his writing, I love him. He’s my favorite person of the past century, bar none. If I ever get to heaven, I’d like to kiss his forehead. And the thing is, as monumental as his work as a civil rights leader was, that’s not why I love him. As you read his life, you’ll find that Malcolm always invests so much in an idea, and yet, when he discovers that it is flawed, he simply discards said idea. For Malcolm, his interests never matter. It’s always about doing what’s right, regardless of what he has to lose. And that concept alone is more than any athlete, entertainer or author has ever given me. At the end of the excellent Spike Lee film of his life, Ossie Davis says that Malcolm was “our living, breathing manhood.” That’s a nice sentiment, but I look at him in a different way: Malcolm is Integrity personified. So, even though I’m not Black, I claim my share of the man.

6- Anything by Noam Chomsky.

In this age where The Daily Show with Jon Stewart has become the most reliable source of news, reading Chomsky should be compulsory. I mean, CNN? Really? Chomsky shows you what’s what in the world today using a calm, measured approach. He relies not on inflamed rhetoric but on his tireless research and voracious reading. And in his spare time, Chomsky also revolutionalized the study of linguistics. But I generally read him for his political works.

7- The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.

Gibran tells the story of a fictional Prophet who is about to leave Orphalese and go back home. The people of Orphalese, sad to see him go, beg him to give each of them one last lesson. The book is basically the “prophet’s” observations on topics such as love, friendship, work, marriage, children, pleasure, sickness…etc. To quote amazon.com: ” [Gibran's] words have a power and lucidity that in another era would surely have provoked the description “divinely inspired” . Plus, Holly has read it, so how difficult can it be to get through?

8- Cities of Salt by Abdelrahman Munif.

This guy is a literary giant who, like Rodney Dangerfield, doesn’t get enough respect. Munif examines the discovery of oil in Saudi Arabia (although the country remains unnamed) and subsequent American presence. But the topical relevance is not the reason I love this book. Rather, Munif has a unique gift for illustrating how people communicate through oblique dialogue, gestures and facial expressions. This is what Graham Greene had to say about Cities of Salt:

“An Arab novel–and an excellent one at that. It opens up new vistas to the imagination.”
True dat.

9- Catch 22 by Joseph Heller.

I initially forgot to include this on my list, which is absurd. Speaking of which, if you want to read a hilarious novel about the absurdities inherent in almost all human institutions, this is your book. A soldier drafted into the American army can go home if they are insane. However, there is a catch: if you want to go home, then that proves that you’re not insane. Nuff said.

10- Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad.

Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now! is based on this book, although Conrad’s novella is set in the Congo and not Vietnam. The first time I read it, I HATED it. I was reading it wrong. I was flipping through it quickly (that’s how you should read Dostoevsky, incidentally) . I was looking for plot. I missed the point. You have to read at a leisurely pace, soaking up the language and the imagery. You could say this lies at the intersection between the novel and poetry, and it’s truly astounding how Conrad captures the dichotomy that drives the human heart. He effectively shows how racism manifests itself not only in a social setting, but on a psychological level.

As you can probably tell from my list, novels are my main interest. I’m not really a poetry guy, but I thought I’d include a bonus poetry section, just for sh*ts and giggles. Here are some poems I like:

- “To His Coy Mistress” by Andrew Marvell.

- “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks is a very short poem with rapid-fire, almost rap-like verses. Of course, no rap verse is as good as these.

- “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” captures self-loathing in remarkable fashion.

- Langston Hughes always manages to dissect the complexties of race very well.

- “The Painter” by John Ashberry is a sestina. For those of you who don’t know what a sestina is, it’s the most difficult form of poetry to write in. There are no rhymes, only six end-words, and you have to…Instead of getting too immersed in the technical aspects of sestinas, let me just say this: Imagine if someone thrusted a protractor in your unsuspecting hands and demanded that you produce a delicious omelette using only that instrument and your scrotum. That seemingly impossible task pales in comparison to writing a sestina that doesn’t read like a J.A. Adande column. Which is why “The Painter” is so awesome.

But my absolute favorite has to be e.e. cummings. Instead of talking about him, I’ll let “the boys i mean are not refined” speak for itself:

the boys i mean are not refined

they go with girls who buck and bite

they do not give a fuck for luck

they hump them thirteen times a night

one hangs a hat upon her tit

one carves a cross on her behind

they do not give a shit for wit

the boys i mean are not refined

they come with girls who bite and buck

who cannot read and cannot write

who laugh like they would fall apart

and masturbate with dynamite

the boys i mean are not refined

they cannot chat of that and this

they do not give a fart for art

they kill like you would take a piss

they speak whatever’s on their mind

they do whatever’s in their pants

the boys i mean are not refined

they shake the mountains when they dance