Setting: Knoxville, TN
Period: 1915
Published: 1956
A ponderous novel taking place over only a couple of days (mostly)with vivid and exacting descriptions of the characters' reactions to a death in the family. The person who dies is Jay Follett(at age 36 in a car accident) husband of Mary, father of Rufus and Catherine, ages 6 and 4. Central to the plot are also Aunt Hannah Lynch(Mary's Aunt), Uncle Andrew, Joel and Catherine (Mary's parents), Ralph (Jay's brother), Walter Starr (family friend)and the minister Jackson (who refused to say the entire burial rites because Jay was not baptized). The contrasts are: children vs adult point of view; religion vs atheism; different ways that people respond to grief - ie: Rufus going to show off with the group of boys talking about his father's death - the day before the funeral. Mary retiring to her bedroom after being plied with alcohol. Extended family is close by - her parents, brother, and Aunt are within walking distance. A different time and place.
The details are sometimes enough to be maddening but then Agee pulls it together in the end - for ex: the description of Rufus being teased by older boys in the neighborhood, going back again and again for further humiliation is juxtaposed to the day after his father died when he is the center of attention with the boys because it was his father that was in the newspaper.
Interesting when I did some research and found that there are many autobiographical elements in the book - Agee was six when his father died and he went by his middle name as a child, Rufus.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
Starting with "A"
I got through the first couple of rows of the "A"'s until I got snagged by a couple:
Chinua Achebe, "Things Fall Apart" and James Agee, "A Death in the Family". I read Achebe's slim now set in Nigeria about the beginning of the time of colonization and missionary work in a few nights. I felt like I was sitting next a camp fire and someone was telling stories. There was rhythm, repitiion, and cadence - that made a beautiful melody about the life and culture of some villages in Nigeria before their introduction to the white man and his ways. Okonkwo, the protagonist, is a strong, proud, stubborn and ultimatley flawed leader of his village who spends his whole life trying to be someone different than his father. His father was weak, lazy and a debtor who earned no titles or status in the village throughout his lifetime. Okonkwo tries too hard to be seen as fearless and strong. This becomes a weakness and a liability as he tries to hide his feelings and vulnerabilities, ending up in him participating in killing a child from another village who, after living with him for 3 yrs he had loved as a son. This also marked the time that his son became alienated from him, blaming him for his friend's death.
It was sad to read about the arrogance of the missionaries and white people and how this had an effect on tribal culture. Ultimately this resulted in K feeling such despair over the changes in his village that he took his own life and had to be buried by strangers rather than by clansmen.
Africa mystifies me. Someday I would like to visit, especially South Africa. The description of the land, the wild animals, the plains, lakes, rivers and mountains sound beautiful and also frightening. It seems so teeming with life, dangerous life - poisonous snakes, ferocious animals, different cultures - so foreign to what I have experienced in my life.
Chinua Achebe, "Things Fall Apart" and James Agee, "A Death in the Family". I read Achebe's slim now set in Nigeria about the beginning of the time of colonization and missionary work in a few nights. I felt like I was sitting next a camp fire and someone was telling stories. There was rhythm, repitiion, and cadence - that made a beautiful melody about the life and culture of some villages in Nigeria before their introduction to the white man and his ways. Okonkwo, the protagonist, is a strong, proud, stubborn and ultimatley flawed leader of his village who spends his whole life trying to be someone different than his father. His father was weak, lazy and a debtor who earned no titles or status in the village throughout his lifetime. Okonkwo tries too hard to be seen as fearless and strong. This becomes a weakness and a liability as he tries to hide his feelings and vulnerabilities, ending up in him participating in killing a child from another village who, after living with him for 3 yrs he had loved as a son. This also marked the time that his son became alienated from him, blaming him for his friend's death.
It was sad to read about the arrogance of the missionaries and white people and how this had an effect on tribal culture. Ultimately this resulted in K feeling such despair over the changes in his village that he took his own life and had to be buried by strangers rather than by clansmen.
Africa mystifies me. Someday I would like to visit, especially South Africa. The description of the land, the wild animals, the plains, lakes, rivers and mountains sound beautiful and also frightening. It seems so teeming with life, dangerous life - poisonous snakes, ferocious animals, different cultures - so foreign to what I have experienced in my life.
The Reason
Many years ago in a galaxy far away I had the fantasy-wish of reading every book in the public library in my home town of Lexington, Massachusetts. I am more selective now. There are only certain books I want to read and a certain number of years I have left to read them. So I'm beginning at the beginning of the alphabet and perusing the shelves for those books that call to be read. Many will not make the cut (an X through mysteries, romances, nonfiction, scientific journals, philosophy, foreign languages, you get the idea). It will be only through the fiction section and it must be well written, considered a classic (at least in some circles)and appeal on a personal level. I've always been an advid reader but this will be a bit different - a reaction to those books which I've heard about, read about, and other books have been compared to throughout my life. I'm afraid that means I will finally have to read Faulkner. I may cheat and read some old fav's along the way. We'll see where time and the wind in my sails takes me.
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