In the Labyrinth

The Novels of Mythic and Perilous Travel Across Borders

"Traveling is brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things: air, sleep, dreams, sea, the sky - all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.”  --Cesare Pavese

Here are two of my favorite novels that I have reviewed over the last ten years that, in many ways, embody the sensibilities of Pavese's brilliant observation:

 

Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera is a unique and haunting work. Makina is given a note from her mother to take to an older brother who has disappeared into the North. Along the way, Makina encounters ambiguous helpers: a thug who mysteriously owes her mother, the trading of favors with a coyote, the strangers who pull her along the road, the rivers and mountain passes, and then the cities themselves, full of mazes, flags, and shops until she arrives at a place to discover her brother, changed utterly.  

 

 

 

Pedro Paramo, by Juan Rulfo, opens with spare, compelling prose, like a darkly lived fairy tale, hinting at the ghostly journey to come in an altered landscape. In late August, Juan travels to Comala, a hot and dry town; a popular myth is that "when people die and go to hell, they return for a blanket." Juan is greeted by Eduviges Dyada, an old friend of his mother's, and quickly learns that Pedro Páramo, the father he is seeking, is long dead. But the conversation takes an odd turn, as Eduviges tells Juan that his mother had told her just that day to expect him. When Juan tells her his mother is dead, Eduviges shrugs and responds, "So that was why her voice was so weak."

 

 

 

The Spine of a Novel That Tends to the Eternal

“Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things: air, sleep, dreams, sea, the sky - all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.”  --Cesare Pavese

The above is one of my favorite quotes as it seems to suggest to me not only the physical journey but the deeper emotional well of any good narrative of self-discovery. It's the foundation or backbone on which so many wonderful novels I have read over the years seem to rest. I am drawn to them because such a structure is how I tend to think when constructing the shape of a story or novel; our separation from the familiar, our trust in strangers, the off-balance, the journeying, the transformations and the leaning into all things eternal.

Here is a short list of my favorite novels that I have reviewed over the years that I feel in many ways embody the sensibilities of Pavese's brilliant observation:

 

 

Pedro Paramo by Mexican author Juan Rulfo' opens with spare, compelling prose, like a darkly lived fairy tale, hinting at the ghostly journey to come in an altered landscape. In late August, Juan traveled to Comala, a hot and dry town. The popular myth has it that "when people die and go to hell, they return for a blanket." Juan is greeted by Eduviges Dyada, an old friend of his mother's, and quickly learns that Pedro Páramo, the father he is seeking, is long dead. But the conversation takes an odd turn, as Eduviges tells Juan that his mother had told her just that day to expect him. When Juan tells his mother is dead, Eduviges merely shrugs and responds, "So that was why her voice was so weak." Read more > >

 

 

 

 

 Thaliad by Marly Youmans, both novelist and poet, composes her story in free verse reminiscent of heroic epics (a sort of Homer meets Gerald Manley Hopkins). Thaliad recounts the aftermath of a fiery apocalypse and the perilous journey of a band of children led by a girl whose prophetic visions are guiding them. They seek a mystical a sanctuary on the edge of a lake where, even as children, they must confront the challenges of re-creating a world illuminated by hope and love. In this stunning narrative the eternal is always close at hand in both violent and transfigurative  powers.  Read more >>

 

 

 

 

The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obrecht is an astonishing novel, set in what was once Yugoslavia over the course of WWI, WWII, and the recent wars that resulted in its dissection into new territories. War forms an continuous backdrop throughout the novel, often as a distant but deeply felt anxiety and sometimes exploding on the community. Travelling is a hazard as boundaries shift with the conflicts and "our city," or "our fields" abruptly become someone else's property. Identities shift too as the long married wife whose origin, faith, or language suddenly mark her as an enemy to the new state. Nadia, the novel's protagonist, is a young pediatrician who sets out on a perilous journey, crossing newly minted borders to understand the reasons for her beloved grandfather's strange disappearance and his death alone in a remote village. Read more > >

Shank's Mare: Hoofing It Down the Tokaido Road

I love "road books" -- novels whose plot mostly rests on a pair or a troupe of travelers making their way down some famous road. Adventures abound, stories are shared, and the journey becomes more important than the final destination. One of my favorites, which I have picked up again after many years, is the early 19th century novel, Hizakurige , by Ikku Jippensha. The title, a word for "journeying by foot," has been translated into the English version: Shank's Mare -- our wonderful expression of the same. The book is now sadly out of print, but it appears that used copies of the book are available at an affordable price at Amazon. I have linked the title and the book cover to the listing on Amazon. 

The novel is hilarious, bawdy, and outrageous as it follows the misadventures of two lower-class workers on a trip (ala shank's mare) along the great Tokaido Road between the capital city of Edo and the temple-filled Kyoto. Yaji and Kita manage to embroil themselves in all kinds of lusty and disreputable doings as they rest at inns and way stations along their way. They are not alone, of course -- for the road is peopled with tradesmen, samurai, "lively dancing girls," itinerant actors, and scheming matrons -- all who are grist for the pair's irrepressible appetite for trouble. Who knew travel could be such an endless source of fun, trickery, one-night stands, good food, bad booze, and, in general, absurd observations about life from two brash, madcap punsters looking for a good time?

In the illustration below, Kita and Yaji have stopped at Hokwo Temple to ogle at a huge statue of Rushana in a sitting position. After making a few inappropriate comments about the August figure ("And he's got whayoumaycallems as big a badger"), the pair discover that pilgrims are engaging in a fun game with the substantial beams used to support the roof. They squeeze themselves through cut openings near the bottom of the beams. Kita has no trouble -- but when the plumper Yaji wriggles in, he discovers he is pretty stuck. What follows is a fast, comical dialog with every country pilgrim making outlandish and perilous suggestions for getting Yaji free.

The author Ikku Jippensha wrote the novel first as a serial, and it was wildly popular throughout Japan in the early 19th century. Later, the whole series was published as a book that included excellent illustrations -- some of which (like the one above)have been reproduced in the English edition published by Tuttle and translated very ably by Thomas Satchell (which is saying a lot as the puns themselves are a translator's nightmare -- look for the beneficial notes in the back.)

For travelers' convenience, the Tokaido Road was serviced by 53 well-known "way stations" where one could find inns, food, and animal shelter. The well-known Ukiyoe printmaker Hiroshige, created around 55 separate prints of the 53 stations, which are a fantastic visual record of the stations along the road. They are gorgeous -- some depicting the stations in winter, others in spring, some bustling with travelers, others more remote with only horses quietly grazing. I have included a selection below, but happily, you can see all of Hiroshige's Tokido Stations here. The photograph of the Tokaido Road above was taken in 1865 by Felice Beato.

Salman Rushdie: The Enchantress of Florence

It's hard to imagine a more wonderful and sumptuous novel than Salman Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence. The novel moves between the opulent settings of the Mughal Empire at its zenith and the brash, upstart world of the Italian Renaissance in that most quarrelsome city of Florence. After an arduous journey, Niccolò Vespucci, a young roguish traveler arrives in India, at the court of the Mughal emperor Abdul-Fath Jalaluddin Muhammad with an impossible tale -- that he, blond hair and all, is the descendant of a lost Mughal princess and he has arrived to make himself known as the uncle to the emperor.

After having pronounced such a blasphemous claim, Niccolò is aware that his survival depends on his consummate skill as a storyteller. And over the days and months that follow, Niccolò slowly unravels the interwoven tales of friendships, secret family histories, and perilous journeys, while the Emperor, snagged and entranced by his guest, reflects as well on the mirror image of the tales in his own family, his own journeys and his own life.

And what tales they are! Feverish, like the painter who falls so deeply in love with his subject that he paints himself permanently into the corner of a canvas; sensual, as the dream of an imaginary Queen that acquires substance and life; heroic and violent, like the boy Nino Argalia who goes to sea, is captured by the Turks and becomes commander of the formidable Janissaries. Here too is a young Machiavelli learning the lessons that a Prince must know to survive, the secret history of Qara Köz, a girl of dark eyes and occult powers who knows how to protect herself; an intimate servant who lives as a mirror to reflect her mistress, and another woman enchanted to hold the secret memories of her master at the expense of remembering anything about herself. Cultures collide as characters invent and reinvent themselves on new landscapes, from west to east and east to west. And throughout the novel, the Emperor and Niccolò and others reflect and argue on politics, religion, war, and women.  

It is a splendid novel -- one that will send you to the library with its generous bibliography at the back of the book to delve more deeply into its rich historical and literary resources.

Review By Colleen Mondor of "The Reverend's Wife."

Although written back in 2009 when the Datlow/Windling anthology Black Swan, White Raven was first published, I only recently and quite by accident discovered that Colleen Mondor gave my short story, "The Reverend's Wife"  a rather nice review -- which even though lately discovered, has made me very happy this morning. 

"Right off the bat, there are several standouts in Black Swan including Midori Snyder's very sexy take on a Sudanese tale, translated to a rural American setting, "The Reverend's Wife." (If ever a story said "fairy tales for adults," it's this one.) Tackling the nature of marital fidelity while also spinning on what it means to be a good wife, Snyder has a lot of fun here with a slight trickster take on woman having the upper hand but using their power for the sake of saving their marriages (well, okay and having some fun too). It's the sense of fun and humor that really makes this story succeed and that the gender roles are reversed to a certain degree. It's certainly bawdy in the best use of the word and also carries a sense of coyote and raven tales in how the women get one over their husbands (to everyone's benefit)"

 And just for fun, here's the opening paragraph: 

"It was funny the way it turned out. Hard in fact to feel any shame about it at all. No matter the fire and brimstone and God-avenging, hitting the Good Book hard enough to make sin jump up into your mouth and begin to testify. Me, I don't need to testify. God knows me. Instead, I just stay quiet and get to thinking how God has a mighty good sense of humor and doesn't mind a little sinning now and again. That is, of course, if no one gets hurt and all parties wind up happy. I guess you could say Violet Thomas and I wound up pretty happy women. And our dear husbands, though they learned a thing or two about women, were never the wiser for it. "

Folklore and Three Generations of War

There is something so extraordinary about Tea Obreht's exquisite novel, The Tiger's Wife, set in what was once Yugoslavia over the course of WWI, WWII, and the recent wars that resulted in its dissection into new territories. War forms an continuous backdrop throughout the novel, often as a distant but deeply felt anxiety and sometimes exploding on the community. Boundaries shift with conflict and "our city," or "our fields" abruptly become someone else's property. Identities shift too as the long married wife whose origin, faith, or language suddenly mark her as an enemy to the new state.

Against the constant threat of violence, the characters struggle to retain their humanity, their customs, and their hopes for a future. Some succeed -- though success here is measured more by how well one clings to a belief in human dignity and family. Some fail and become swallowed in fairy-tale fashion by the monsters of the day.

Nadia, the novel's protagonist, is a young pediatrician who sets out on a perilous journey, crossing newly minted borders to understand the reasons for her beloved grandfather's strange disappearance and death alone in a remote village. She also searches for the origin of the "tiger's wife," a story that has haunted her grandfather since childhood. In addition to Nadia's journey, the novel crisscrosses the country with multiple tales of other characters, weaving together a complex narrative of an ethnically diverse country.

The novel also includes the use of local folktales and iconic figures -- especially the Deathless Man who reappears to the grandfather throughout the novel. And though the Deathless Man is a harbinger of death, he is oddly gentile, almost kind when compared to the random brutality of the wars. The tiger's wife, a terrified mute girl, is given strength by her unlikely friendship with a tiger who has become a refugee from a bombed out zoo. A band of poor villagers and their ailing children travel to a coastal vineyard to dig for the remains of compatriot, hastily stashed in a suitcase and buried during the last conflagration because they believe they can never be healthy until they properly honor their dead and bring him home.

Obrecht's writing is elegant -- spare but filled with surprising beauty and precision when describing the landscape whether the mythic woods, decaying villages, or the eeriness of an elephant appearing on a city street during a night of bombing. But I would have to say that among the most powerful passages for me (and there are many here!) is this one, a reflection by the grandfather of the price of continuous war. It describes so many places in our world today and is the spine on which Nadia's and all the characters' stories are built:

"But now, in the country's last hour it was clear to him, as it was to me, that the cease-fire had provided the delusion of normalcy, but never peace. When your fight has purpose -- to free you from something, to interfere on the behalf of an innocent--it has a hope of finality. When the fight is about unraveling -- when it is about your name, the places to which your blood is anchored, the attachment of your name to some landmark or event -- there is nothing but hate, and the long, slow progression of people who feed on it and are fed it, meticulously, by the ones who come before them. Then the fight is endless, and comes in waves and waves, but always retains its capacity to surprise those who hope against it."

For a more detailed review of this novel, I recommend Lisa Schillinger's "A Mythic Novel of the Balkan Wars" in the NYT Book Review.

The Skin and Blood of Art: Atwood and Lorca

 

 

 

I am in a frenzy, following up from a the previous post on the art of Katherine Ace. We were writing about the surface of art in painting and oral narrative performance of well known fairy tales contrasted with the subtext of evocative imagery -- the tension between the encounters of the real and the fantastic -- experienced emotionally in the work. Story, like paintings, move across a calm surface from beginning to end, in an enclosed world of art. But within those boundaries, we are challenged by the emotions, more often deeply felt rather than understood, that are churned up by the metaphorical images.

As a writer, who began in academia studying oral narrative performance and stories, I was captivated first by the emotionally charged subtexts (and which of course I was required by the dictates of the class to eventually articulate into rationalized systems of information. The "this signifies that" format.) And yet, I felt more like the Xhosa story teller who when asked to explain the meaning of an image in the story she had just finished performing, responded, "To answer that, I will have to tell you the story again." And when I was writing my masters thesis (the first one) on African Oral Narratives,  I wound up writing a novel instead, preferring to feel and to show rather than to explain and to tell. And I had to wait twenty years until I could finally acquire a Masters Degree in the exact opposite corner of my psyche, Modern Literary Theory. But I have never strayed far from that first education, and the hardest part for me in writing any story, is the need to first feel the turbulence beneath the surface, to feel it rise hump-backed from the deep, filling me with excitement and seasickness all at once.

Mo Crow offered this yesterday to the conversation from Margaret Atwood's "The Page" (Murder in the Dark Coach, 1983):

"5. The question about the page is; what is beneath it? It seems to have two dimensions, you can pick it up and turn it over and the back is the same as the front. Nothing , you say, disappointed.
But you're looking in the wrong place, you were looking on the back instead of beneath. Beneath the page is another story. Beneath the page is everything that has ever happened, most of which you would rather not hear about.
The page is not a pool but a skin, a skin is there to hold in and it can feel you touching it. Did you really think it would just lie there and do nothing?
Touch the page at your peril: it is you who are blank and innocent, not the page. Nevertheless you want to know, nothing will stop you. You touch the page, it's as if you've drawn a knife across it, the page has been hurt now, a sinuous wound opens up, a thin incision. Darkness wells through."

And there it was, under the skin, fleshed to the bone of writing. And it sent me rushing for my copy of Federico Garcia Lorca's luminous and poetic Deep Song and Other Prose, and I couldn't decide between the essay on the duendes or on deep song, so here are moments from both offerings:

In "Deep Song," Lorca is contrasting what he considers the superficial flamenco songs of his day with the more ancient, mysterious, and mystical "deep song" that lingers in the Gypsy "siguiriya," which he describes thus:

"The Gypsy siguiriya begins with a terrible scream that divides the landscape into ideal hemispheres. It is the scream of dead generations, a poignant elegy for the lost centuries, the pathetic evocation of love under other moons and other winds...the melodic phrase begins to pry open the mystery of the tones and remove the precious stone of the sob, a resonant tear in the river of the voice. No Andalusian can help but shudder on hearing that scream."

And this from the essay "Play and Theory of Duendes" which defies direct translation but in his essay is described as a force more powerful than the angel who gives lights, and the muse who gives form. It is a force that surges up from the earth, through the soles, into the body, and it strips away anything that is not authentic emotion. Here is the description he gives of a performance of famous Andalusian singer, Pastora Pavón Cruz, known also as La Niña de los Peines:

"As though crazy, torn like a medieval weeper, La Niña de los Peines got to her feet, tossed off a big glass of firewater and began to sing with a scorched throat, without voice, without breath or color, but with duende. She was able to kill all the scaffolding of the song and leave the way for a furious, enslaving duende, friend of sand winds, who made the listeners rip their clothes...La Niña de los Peines had to tear her voice because she knew she had an exquisite audience, one which demanded not forms but the marrow of forms, pure music with a body so lean it could stay in the air. She had to rob herself of skill and security, send away her muse and become helpless, that her duende might come and deign to fight hand and hand with her. And how she sang! Her voice was no longer playing, it was a jet of blood worthy of her pain and her sincerity, and it opened like a ten-fingered hand around the nailed but stormy feet of a Christ by Juan de Juni. "

And so I move from skin, to bone, to blood. Each time I sit down to write, it is a dare to touch the page, to open the incision; to send away the muse and the angel and invite my duende to force me to write from the soles up.

Art: "The Jungle" by Cuban Surrealist Wilfred Lam.