Retrospective: 超時空要塞マクロス (Super Dimension Fortress MACROSS). Introduction.

Part One
Part Two.

Several years ago, I wrote this post, discussion the value of 超時空要塞マクロス(Choujikuu Yousai Makurosu = Super Dimension Fortress Macross) as a science-fiction drama.  If you've already read that post, please bear with me because I'm going to cover some similar ground.

My discussion of Macross inevitably begins with Robotech.  For many Generation X'ers who were children during the 1980s, including myself, our introduction to Japanese アニメ (anime = "animation") was through the various work of Carl Macek (who passed away in 2010).  Macek is either a hero or a villain depending on to whom you speak.  While Macek did a lot to bring アニメ to North America and other Anglophonic countries, this often required mash-ups, heavy editing, and sometimes even complete and total rewrites of entire series.  The most notorious (and, indeed, his first big) project was Robotech for Harmony Gold, which took three unrelated anime, 超時空要塞マクロス (Super Dimension Fortress Macross), 超時空騎団サザンクロス (Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross), and 機甲創世記モスピーダ (Genesis Climber Mospeada), combined them into three consecutive generations and changed names, dialogue, and even edited out certain scenes in order to make the show more palatable to an audience primarily composed of American and Canadian children (and possibly their parents).

Carl Macek

Interestingly enough, Robotech was not the only program to receive this treatment.  Captain Harlock and the Queen of a Thousand Years was a mash-up of two separate anime, 宇宙海賊キャプテンハーロック (Space Pirate Captain Harlock) and 新竹取物語 1000年女王 (Queen Millennia).  Both were taken from manga series written by 松本 零士 (Matsumoto Leiji), the genius behind 宇宙戦艦ヤマト (Space Battleship Yamato) and 銀河鉄道999 (Galaxy Express 999).  The reason for these mash-ups revolved around syndication regulations in the United States--in order to air a weekday television series, there needed to be at least 65 episodes (essentially a minimum-length run of five episodes per week over the course of thirteen weeks). マクロス (Macross) had 36 episodes, サザンクロス (Southern Cross) had 24, and モスピーダ (Mospeada) had 25.  Individually, they didn't have enough--combined they had 85 episodes, well above the minimum requirement for U.S. syndication.

The purpose behind the heavy editing was two-fold.  First, Macek had to rewrite names and dialogue enough to explain the progressive generations and put them into a narrative framework that would make sense.  Thus, for example, the Zor in サザンクロス (Southern Cross) were rewritten as the Robotech Masters, the overlords of the Zentraedi from マクロス (Macross).  In addition, dialogue and visual content had to be edited to make the show fit for children, since in the 1980s it was assumed that cartoons were strictly for kids.  Thus, dialogue that related to mature themes (such as sex or suicide) had to be sanitized for American child audiences.  The brief and occasional nudity also had to be excised.

What was shocking, however, to me as a kid, were the abundance of mature themes and ideas that persisted.  Characters died and the price of war was high.  There was a continuous narrative that flowed from episode-to-episode.  This was during a time when G.I. Joe and The Transformers were self-contained, independent stories and it mattered little if you missed a few episodes.  Robotech was the first show that I made certain I watched daily as a child.  If I missed episode 13 of G.I. Joe, I could still pick up and watch episode 14 the next day because Cobra Commander would be hatching a completely new and unrelated plan.  Missing an episode of Robotech meant that I missed out on character and plot development.

In addition, when a plane was shot down in Robotech, there wasn't always a parachute to let the censors know the pilot escaped.  People died, good and bad.  Robotech was about war and the cost of war.  Robotech challenged me far more than the other television cartoons that I viewed and it inspired me to a wider and more complex world of stories and storytelling.

I'm not writing this series of blog entries, however, to discuss Robotech.  I'm writing a retrospective that will analyze and review 超時空要塞マクロス (Super Dimension Fortress Macross).  To that end, I want to discuss first how Macross came about and then, in subsequent posts, explore the narrative elements and themes of the series.

Kawamori Shoji

The Genesis of Macross
Macross was the brainchild of 河森 正治 (Kawamori Shoji), an animator, designer, and conceptual artist who began working in the Japanese animation industry during the late 1970s.  His influence as a designer is extremely heavy--he's done designs for Matsumoto Leiji's Space Battleship Yamato and even had a hand in creating a number of Generation 1 Transformers.  If you've seen Eureka 7, the Patlabor movies, the Ghost in the Shell film, Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory, Outlaw Star, or Vision of Escaflowne, you've seen mechanical designs by Kawamori.  Kawamori got his big start working as an intern and assistant artist at スタジオぬえ (Studio Nue), which produced Matsumoto's Space Battleship Yamato in 1974.  Kawamori would eventually come to helm 1996's 天空のエスカフローネ (Vision of Escaflowne) at Studio Nue before branching off to create many science-fiction and fantasy anime that would come out during the new century, particularly 2001's 地球少女アルジュナ (Earth Maiden Arjuna), 2005's 創聖のアクエリオン (Genesis of Aquarion), and 2012's AKB∞48.  However, he always seems to return to the universe of Macross from time-to-time, revisiting it with Macross Plus, Macross 7, Macross Zero, and most recently, Macross Frontier.

Macross is a foray into what is known as the リアルロボット ("real robot") genre in Japan.  The basic idea of this genre centers on somewhat explainable scientific and technological advances that make possible the construction and piloting of giant robots.  The first true real robot series is usually considered to be Mobile Suit Gundam, and Kawamori’s Choujikuu Yousai Makurosu helped to better define the tropes and characteristics of the genre.  This genre is noteworthy for its departure from other giant robot shows like Voltron because the core concepts are more realistic, don’t rely upon gimmicks like “blazing swords” and “monsters of the week,” focus on weapons that are known to be technologically possible, don’t have special attacks that are activated by voice-command, and so on.

What first inspired Kawamori to create his own "real robot" series was the immense success of 機動戦士ガンダム (Mobile Suit Gundam) during the late 1970s.  Combined with his experience working on Space Battleship Yamato and the immense success such space-opera programs had, Kawamori drew up plans for a space-opera of his own.  This time, he would incorporate a great number of themes absent from those series.  He would use the backdrop of interstellar war to galvanize the action but the real drama would always be interpersonal.  Thus, Kawamori teamed up with Studio Nue colleague Kazutaka Miyatake for mech design and Artland’s Haruhiko Mikimoto for character design.  By 1982 the result was an epic story of the power of music and love amidst the tragedy of futuristic space-war.

In Part One, I will give a brief overview of the plot for 超時空要塞マクロス (Super Dimension Fortress Macross) and initiate discussion of its more salient themes as well as occasionally compare it to other popular "real robot" anime, especially Mobile Suit Gundam.

Book Review--THE JEWEL IN THE SKULL by Michael Moorcock

EDIT: I'd like to thank Taran of One Last Sketch for the link to this most excellent review of The History of the Runestaff. Check it out. It addresses some of the reasons why I was so disappointed by this book--mainly Moorcock wrote it as a potboiler in the space of three days. Basically, he wrote it to pay the bills while the bulk of his time was spent on more serious projects. Apparently the 1990s omnibus editions were corrected of inconsistencies and such, but still remain very disappointing.

Anyway, on with the review... .

I'd like to start out with a few quotes:

Théoden King of the Mark had reached the road from the Gate to the River, and he turned towards the City that was now less than a mile distant. He slackened his speed a little, seeking new foes, and his knights came about him, and Dernhelm was with them. Ahead nearer the walls Elfhelm's men were among the siege-engines, hewing, slaying, driving their foes into the fire-pits. Well nigh all the northern half of the Pelennor was overrun, and there camps were blazing, orcs were flying towards the River like herds before the hunters; and the Rohirrim went hither and thither at their will. But they had not yet overthrown the siege, nor won the Gate. Many foes stood before it, and on the further half of the plain were other hosts still unfought. Southward beyond the road lay the main force of the Haradrim, and there their horsemen were gathered about the standard of their chieftain. And he looked out, and in the growing light he saw the banner of the king, and that it was far ahead of the battle with few men about it. Then he was filled with a red wrath and shouted aloud, and displaying his standard, black serpent upon scarlet, he came against the white horse and the green with a great press of men; and the drawing of the scimitars of the Southrons was like a glimmer of stars.

Then Théoden was aware of him, and would not wait for his onset, but crying to Snowmane he charged headlong to greet him. Great was the clash of their meeting. But the white fury of the North-men burned the hotter, and more skilled was their knighthood with long spears and bitter. Fewer were they but they clove through the Southrons like a fire-bolt in a forest. Right through the press drove Théoden Thengel's son, and his spear was shivered as he threw down their chieftain. Out swept his sword, and he spurred to the standard, hewed staff and bearer; and the black serpent foundered. Then all that was left unslain of their cavalry turned and fled far away. --J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

How about another quote?

And then, as the horde writhed and coiled upon itself, Amalric's lancers, having cut through a cordon of horsemen encountered in the outer valley, swept around the extremity of the western ridge and smote the host in a steel-tipped wedge, splitting it asunder. His attack carried all the dazing demoralization of a surprise on the rear. Thinking themselves flanked by a superior force and frenzied at the fear of being cut off from the desert, swarms of nomads broke and stampeded, working havoc in the ranks of their more steadfast comrades. These staggered and the horsemen rode through them. Up on the ridges the desert fighters wavered, and the hillmen fell on them with renewed fury, driving them down the slopes. --Robert E. Howard, "The Black Colossus"

And for comparison, this final quote:

From the remaining ranks of infantry, arrows flew thickly toward them and flame-lances sent searing fire. Count Brass' archers retaliated, and his flame-lancers also returned the attack. Arrows clattered on their armour. Several men fell. Others were struck down by the flame-lances. Through the chaos of fire and flying arrows, the infantry of Granbretan steadily advanced, in spite of depleted numbers. They paused when they came to the swampy ground, choked as it was with the bodies of their horses, and their officers furiously urged them on. --Michael Moorcock, The Jewel in the Skull

One can see a vast difference between the first two and the last quote, both in temperament and quality of prose. I would expect much more from the man who would later pen the essay "Epic Pooh," blasting Tolkien for the "sentimental, slightly distanced, often wistful, a trifle retrospective" prose that "contains little wit and much whimsy."

Tolkien's description of the Battle of Pelennor Fields and Howard's description of the battle at the Escarpment are both written extremely well. Tolkien's description eschews the sleepy quality that Moorcock describes as reminding him of A.A. Milne:

There is an element of conspiratorial persuasion in his tone that a suspicious child can detect early in life. Let's all be cosy, it seems to say (children's books are, after all, written by conservative adults anxious to maintain an unreal attitude to childhood); let's forget about our troubles and go to sleep. At which I would find myself stirring to a sitting position in my little bed and responding with uncivilized bad taste. --Michael Moorcock, "Epic Pooh"

True, Moorcock provides quotes to compare portions of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings to back up his argument. But Tolkien does not maintain a consistent voice throughout the novels. Indeed, he alters his voice depending on the circumstances and the Battle of Pelennor Fields reads more like Beowulf or The Iliad than Winnie-the-Pooh. Granted, Moorcock deals with these shifts and injects a good deal of politics into his assessment of Tolkien's supposed anti-industrialism and anti-democratic romanticism.

But this review isn't about "Epic Pooh." If you want to read a full rebuttal to Moorcock's essay, check out "Knocking Some Stuffing Out of Moorcock's 'Epic Pooh'" by Brian Murphy of the Silver Key. It's about The Jewel in the Skull and how I was profoundly disappointed by this book by the man who wrote "Epic Pooh."

Now, I've read Elric of Melniboné and remember enjoying it. However, I wasn't quite so profoundly moved or invigorated as I was by Tolkien's or Howard's prose. Indeed, the prose in The Jewel in the Skull is so weak that I had difficulty making it all the way through the book. I was profoundly disappointed by this work. Indeed, this book is weak in more than simply prose, but also in characterization and plot.

Firstly, let's discuss characterization. The main character, Dorian Hawkmoon, isn't introduced until fifty pages into the novel. This isn't bad in-and-of itself, however Moorcock fails to utilize it effectively by building a very compelling opening. Dorian could be easily played by Keanu Reeves as he's almost completely bereft of emotion for much of the middle of the novel. Granted, Moorcock was trying to use his strange emotionlessness as a vehicle, but he handles it so poorly that it fails completely. Our protagonist is absolutely unsympathetic and the reader is utterly incapable of identifying with him. Therefore, we don't really care if he lives, dies, wins, or loses.

The villains are cardboard cutouts, especially Baron Meliadus. The Dark Empire of Granbretan, which is uniting the continent of post-apocalyptic Europe, is evil... and engages in wanton slaughter and rapine of conquered territories... and that's about it. Oh, and it has an immortal god-emperor. Wow.

Moorcock establishes Baron Meliadus' villainy so clumsily that it comes off almost as a laughable parody of Robin Hood-type heels like the Sheriff of Nottingham. Of course he's going to try to abscond with the princess! Of course he's going to wound the aptly-named warrior-poet Bowgentle with villainous swordplay. Of course he's going to betray Count Brass' honorable hospitality. Of course he's going to swear vengeance and rant over every defeat like Skeletor, Cobra Commander, or Megatron.

Count Brass is likewise such an archetype of the honorable warrior-knight that he, also, becomes a laughable stereotype. Moorcock introduces him and develops his character but in so doing makes Count Brass so predictable and noble that he comes off as a flat caricature and not a character.

The plot is not much better, although it does have its moments. At least the opening sets the stage for the later conflict correctly enough. The Dark Empire wants the Kamarg--a portion of what used to be southern France--either with Count Brass' vassalage or through outright conquest. Count Brass, being honorable to a fault, refuses to become politically involved and thus cannot support Granbretan, although he feels that the unification of Europe under one banner and the ending of all the incessant warring (of which he's a renowned hero) would be a Good Thing, even if Granbretan is at the helm. This makes very little sense--he wants to see Europe unified, doesn't want to get involved, and yet is the ruler of a state that is a part of Europe and must eventually be incorporated into any unified whole. The entire time I'm reading, I feel that Count Brass is Lawful Stupid--noble and honorable at the expense of any real rationality. At least Ned Stark wasn't stupid--his honor and nobility got him a pretty rotten result, nevertheless.

Baron Meliadus, in comparison, behaves Retarded Evil. You'd think a Dark Empire ambassador would be much more subtle, but no, that would actually be interesting. Instead, Baron Meliadus tries to steal Count Brass' daughter and kill his best friends when Count Brass proves himself too stupid to live. He doesn't spend time scouting out the defenses or planting a spy network or finding ways to sabotage the forces of the Kamarg.

Enter Dorian Hawkmoon, a lord whose state was conquered by the Dark Empire of Granbretan and is now a prisoner. The defeat robbed him of his emotions and has left him a cold automaton who just doesn't give a damn. When Meliadus makes a deal with him ("sabotage the Kamarg and we'll give you your state back"), Dorian basically says, "meh."

Then comes the eponymous MacGuffin--a plot vehicle that is so weak and positively stupid that I nearly put the book in the trash. The black jewel implanted into Hawkwood's forehead is basically a magical camera that is connected to a machine in London that shows only what is in front of Dorian and provides no sound. The sorcerers of Granbretan assure Hawkwood that if he betrays them, the jewel will basically fry his brain. It's the tool they're going to use to blackmail him and ensure his loyalty. But it has immensely profound weaknesses. So, in the end, instead of Lawful Evil, the leaders of the Dark Empire of Granbretan has demonstrated how they, like their Baron Meliadus, are entirely Retarded Evil.

At least Count Brass and his friends aren't so stupid as to not see through Granbretan's ploy. They use their own technomagic to prevent the stone from frying Dorians brain, but it will only last a little while--the only place Dorian can go to get the jewel removed without killing him is somewhere out in Persia. But the armies of Granbretan are marching for the Kamarg. Now that Hawkmoon has met Count Brass' stereotypically hot daughter, he's starting to get his emotions back, but the presence of the jewel makes him feel hopeless enough that he refuses to allow himself to fall in love (although she has, predictably, fallen head-over-heels for him).

By this point, I want to bang my head against a wall.

The rest of the story consists of a couple of rather better chapters describing guerrilla raids on the Granbretan forces and a decent set-piece battle before descending into Hawkmoon's journey toward Persia, his gaining of a companion, and a very uninspired arrival in a Persian kingdom and his participation in a battle. I say "descend" because the rest of the book is just as uninspired as the beginning.

The problems with the plot are not the actual contents but in how they are handled by Moorcock. Coupled with his lackluster prose (which I will address below), Moorcock's storytelling is simply lacking. Other authors have written equally derivative works but did so with style and/or panache that Moorcock, as of 1967, did not seem to possess. Every opportunity he had to make the story more interesting he did not seize. As a result, the book reads like a dull attempt at parody. If parody it was, then Moorcock failed at this as well because there is no wit whatsoever in his writing. There are no moments where we realize that he's presenting these events to us tongue-in-cheek. It simply plays out dully, uninspired.

The prose simply serves to drive this point home:

Sparks scattered into the darkness of the hall as the two big men dueled, the broadswords rising and falling, swinging this way and that, every stroke parried with masterly skill. Sweat covered both faces as the swords swung; both chests heaved with the exertion as they fenced back and forth across the hall.

George Orwell said it best when comparing pulp boxing stories by British authors to those of American authors in "Boys' Weeklies:"

Notice how much more knowledgeable the American extracts sound. They are written for devotees of the prize-ring, the others are not.

An honest comparison of this to any combat scene by Robert E. Howard demonstrates this. The American writer wants the reader to experience the combat. I could also compare it to Zelazny's description of combat, which benefits heavily from his excessive knowledge of fencing. Moorcock's description is vague and frankly blasé. Obviously, Moorcock doesn't know anything about sword-fighting, but he doesn't even attempt to guess. Tolkien's description of combat is much more energetic for all his dreamy let's-all-go-to-sleep prose.

Moorcock also is guilty of the tell-not-show sin.

A conflict was beginning to develop in Hawkmoon's breast--perhaps a conflict between humanity and the lack of it, perhaps a conflict between conscience and the lack of conscience, if such conflicts were possible.

If such conflicts were possible? You tell us, you're the author! This is just clumsy writing, but it continues.

Whatever the exact nature of the conflict, there was no doubt that Hawkmoon's character was changing for a second time. It was not the character he had had on the battlefield at Köln, nor the strange apathetic mood into which he had fallen since the battle, but a new character altogether, as if Hawkmoon were being born again in a thoroughly different mold.

One of the advantages of writing a novel is the author can actually develop these changes through showing how the character behaves and actually describing a bit of their thought processes and feelings. George R.R. Martin does this very well with many of his characters, especially ones like Arya, Jon Snow, and Jaime Lannister. Moorcock is writing one of the very, very short SF novels that proliferated the discount bookracks of convenience stores (like my own antiquated DAW Books copy pictured below) and the like during the mid-twentieth century, so he has to deal with page limitations. However, I don't feel that is a legitimate excuse, especially since these problems are rife throughout the narrative and detract from the interest factor.

I could provide more examples of the disappointing writing, but I'll refrain. Suffice it to say, for the most part, The Jewel in the Skull reads like a rough draft or perhaps an extended summary of a story that could have really benefited from some greater detail and less derivative narration.

I don't know if I'm going to read any more of The History of the Runestaff, the four-volume series of which this novel was the first. Indeed, this makes me want to go back and reread Elric of Melniboné to see if it suffers from the same weaknesses in narration, characterization, and prose.

As I said, this book was a disappointment. I was very interested in reading it but when I finally did, it most certainly did not live up to expectations, especially considering the vocal criticisms its author leveled against other, noteworthy and accomplished, authors. There's a kernel of a good and exciting story here. However, in this volume at least, Moorcock doesn't deliver.

The Jewel in the Skull by Michael Moorcock Style: C
Substance: C-
Overall: C-

Book Review -- HARRY POTTER SERIES by J.K. Rowling

It took about three months' worth of reading, between classes and settling in after my return from Korea, to finish the Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling. Unfortunately, I never got around to buying the British versions when I was in Korea, and especially regret not having done so. While in Korea, I sat in a bookstore for a few minutes doing side-by-side comparisons of the two texts and finding that Scholastic had heavily edited the American versions (more about this later).

J.K. Rowling's story of rags-to-riches is quite well known. Published on June 30, 1997, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone had sold up to 300,000 copies in the UK by March, 1999. It was an instant success as a children's novel and was rapidly acquired by Scholastic Corporation, who strong-armed Rowling into changing the name to Sorcerer's Stone because they thought American children wouldn't want to read a book with the word "philosopher" in the title (more on this later). We all know how the tale grew to become a phenomenon complete with films and accompanying books about Harry Potter's world. Rowling has become an incredibly rich billionaire.

The story is incredibly well-known so there's no reason to discuss it. Essentially, Rowling's story is not at all original but that is not a criticism. It's long been mused that between Shakespeare, the Bible, and Homer, every possible story has already been told. However, Harry Potter achieves an incredible resonance with it's readers. Rowling was able to take Thomas Hughes' Tom Brown's Schooldays, an 1857 novel about a private boarding school in England, add such fantasy elements as magic and antiquity, and marry it to the Campbellian heroic journey.

Her brilliance in such a combination cannot be understated. Tom Brown's Schooldays had been extremely successful and spawned an entire genre of schoolboy stories during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Its great appeal was due to the interest of poor boys who couldn't afford to attend boarding schools and their curiosity of what such a life is like. It also appealed to former such academy students reminiscing about their times there. Such a setting made it easy for Rowling to incorporate the elements of a typical bildungsroman. To increase the appeal and make the story much more dynamic than the typical school novel, Rowling added the idea that the school in her story (Hogwarts) specifically existed to educate children and adolescents who displayed innate magical talents and prepare them to live in a hidden society of wizards and witches. The Campbellian monomyth provided a tremendous cultural resonance to her stories.

The influence of the monomyth cannot be understated. Written well, a story that incorporates the monomyth can evoke a powerful emotional response in the reader. Written poorly, such a story devolves into formula and cliche, much like Terry Brooks' The Sword of Shannara.

Rowling's prose evolves as her protagonist and audience age. In the first two books, her writing style isn't very impressive. Indeed, if she had stopped at Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, I'd not have any qualms agreeing with Harold Bloom's assessment of the books (more on that later). At several points, she felt the need to recap previous events, concepts, and setting material in the form of tedious info-dumps as the series progressed. This is jarring to her narrative rhythm and honestly unnecessary. To her credit, Rowling reduces these to a few stray sentences in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and virtually does away with them altogether in The Half-Blood Prince and The Deathly Hallows. She never achieves a poetic or moving style of prose but I feel that had she attempted as much, her work would have been tastelessly turgid instead of straightforward and event-driven.

The characterization of Harry Potter and his friends is incredible. Rowling's characters feel like real people (with a few exceptions). The character dynamics between Hermione, Ron, and Harry are incredible. Many of the characters are spectacularly well-developed and fully realized on the page. Through their dialogue they take life and express their personalities. Very few of the major characters feel flat (and those that do are mostly villains, which does, admittedly, weaken her narrative, but I digress...) and their interactions are excellently enjoyable. It is difficult not to feel amusement and affection for Fred and George Weasley, for example.

Equally well-realized is the wizarding world, complete with its own lore, legends, entertainment, music, and culture. Rowling's world grows as the books progress and she reveals more and more of the land of enchantment which comes to be just as imaginative and dynamic as Carol's Wonderland or Baum's Oz and despite Bloom's criticisms (see below), much more self-sustaining. What irked me, however, was the complete independence the wizarding world experienced from the Muggle world in contrast to how events in the wizarding world would effect the Muggle world (Sirius Black's escape and the return of Voldemort, for example). Also, I found the helplessness of the Muggle world in the face of wizardly conflicts a plot hole (especially since the wizards went into hiding in the 17th century because of Muggle persecutions against magic-users). Rowling does a lot of wand-waving (heh, heh) to separate the Muggle and wizard worlds so much, often resorting (quite literally) to "a wizard did it" to deal with any potential for the isolation of the wizarding world being breached by the Muggle one.

Harold Bloom's infamous criticisms of Rowling's achievement are well known and discussed throughout the blogosphere. Just google "Harry Potter and Harold Bloom" and you'll be hit with a plethora of blog entries and magazine articles on Bloom's scathing criticism.

Bloom's primary points of contention?

• The books are bereft of imaginative vision.
• Rowling's setting and the action therein have nothing to do with reality, which he sees as completely contradictory to the "realism" of Tom Brown's Schooldays.
  
• Rowling's dichotomy of wizard vs. Muggle is offensive, especially when the Muggles are abusive, dull, and close-minded.
  
• Sex and sexuality is all but nonexistent.

However, Bloom's conclusion is quite revealing.

And yet I feel a discomfort with the Harry Potter mania, and I hope that my discontent is not merely a highbrow snobbery, or a nostalgia for a more literate fantasy to beguile (shall we say) intelligent children of all ages. Can more than 35 million book buyers, and their offspring, be wrong? yes, they have been, and will continue to be for as long as they persevere with Potter.

A vast concourse of inadequate works, for adults and for children, crams the dustbins of the ages. At a time when public judgment is no better and no worse than what is proclaimed by the ideological cheerleaders who have so destroyed humanistic study, anything goes.

The review was published in July, 2000, in The Wall Street Journal, almost at the same time as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire hit American bookstores and Harry had to deal with death and sexuality for the first time. Indeed, Bloom should have waited until the series was complete before he leveled his infamous criticisms against it. It does read as highbrow snobbery, as he frequently compares the novels to The Wind in the Willows and The Wizard of Oz as exemplars of imaginative children's literature.

Rowling's writing style and imagination matures as her protagonist--something that Bloom misses. Bloom characterizes himself as a guardian of the great books of the past. Indeed, I agree that the Western canon needs defending in this post-modern era and that many of the books Bloom holds in highest esteem deserve to be read and appreciated, I still feel that his attack on Rowling is endemic of the ivory-tower isolation of the academics from the masses and is a result of intellectual elitism.

The evidence is written all across the last novel. Harry Potter is faced with the realities of Dumbledore, his late guide and adviser, as a human with human failings and frailties of the heart. Harry is faced with making extremely difficult choices that result in the survival or demise of friends, teachers, and students. There is moral ambiguity in his decisions and although he inevitably triumphs, Rowling wisely glosses over the reconstruction and gives us a small glimpse into the lives of the characters and their children decades hence. The brevity of the epilogue leaves the aftermath vague and ambiguous, leading the reader to ask, "Was it worth it? Did everything go back to normal? How could it after such tragic events?" (The weakness of omitting the aftermath means we never see how many of the characters cope with loss and tragedy. It is impossible that the characters have all been able to return to their normal lives and I would have very much like to have seen how George Weasley dealt with his very tragic loss).

Similarly, the wizard attitude toward Muggles is never described as correct throughout her novels. With the exception of the Dursleys, Muggles are rarely encountered in the novels but it is evident that the Dursleys are not to be considered the model on which one should judge. The visceral reaction of the reader to the wizards' and witches' patronizing and (oftentimes inadvertent) bigotry toward Muggles (indeed, even the name sounds pejorative) should evoke a certain distaste in the reader. This is never a situation that Rowling addresses and is, necessarily, left up to the reader to wrestle. Though I do not believe Rowling did this purposely, that she did it is still a strength and not a narrative weakness. Indeed, she even intensifies this question through the revelations of Albus Dumbledore's friendship with Grindelwald.

The greatest weakness is the unsympathetic character of Voldemort. Although Rowling describes the difficulties and rejections he experienced as a child, Tom Riddle's development into an irredeemable villain is rather one-note. His inability to love is not only his greatest weakness as a villain, it's also his greatest weakness as a character. Voldemort is less human than Darth Vader, who despite being more machine than man still rescued his son from death. Despite being a common trope in fantasy, the monolithic villain that is so evil as to be inhuman and incapable of love or compassion is not nearly as interesting as a villain that has purposely rejected, submerged, and killed those emotions deliberately due to some pain or suffering in his past. Voldemort is not a tragic villain, he's simply a villain. Similarly, nearly every Slytherin character is petty, scheming, and hateful (I was very disappointed that no Slytherin characters besides Slughorn opted to fight Voldemort and the Death Eaters during the Battle of Hogwarts).

Another weakness in the narrative is the over-morality of the good guys. They never resort to use of the Killing Curse and never deliberately kill any of their opponents. Since such an action will result in breaking a person's soul apart, it is considered highly reprehensible. However, since the wizard community of Britain finds itself in a civil war, the prolific use of the Killing Curse by the forces of evil results in a growing disparity between them and the forces of good as the latter's numbers are reduced through attrition. Ultimately, Voldemort's hate and villainy are self-defeating and Harry triumphs without actually killing Voldemort. While there are many other examples of Harry struggling with pain and suffering, there is never a point where he is forced to kill in order to survive. He never experiences the pain and suffering that Simon experiences in Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn as he is forced to fight and kill in order to save the people and ideals that he loves. Though in the setting the good characters are spared such existential suffering and dilemmas that typical war veterans have to wrestle with due to their exemplary conduct (not descending to the use of the Killing Curse), it doesn't make for a complex, compelling, and interesting narrative.

In the end, the books are still for children. Rowling skirts such issues as good guys killing or sex and sexuality in order to keep the books "suitable" for her audience. I don't begrudge her decision. She includes a great many other complex issues and ideas in her books that young readers must consider. By the later volumes, she refuses to "write down" to her audience. Through excellent characterization and a well-paced narrative progression, she keeps her readers' attention.

Rowling has definitely accomplished something. Are these books classics of literature? Bloom says no. I say yes. The Harry Potter series is not simply a flash-in-the-pan. Discerning readers who find the Twilight series to be utter garbage still consider the Harry Potter Series to be a fantastic work of epic fiction and adventure. I've read many works of literature, like Bloom, but unlike Bloom I believe that Rowling overcomes her shortcomings as a writer and the weaknesses of many of her narrative choices to write an increasingly complex and dynamic story. No, it is not the equal of Don Quixote, Hamlet, or even The Lord of the Rings. It's rife with flaws, plot holes, inconsistencies, and characterization issues (specifically among the villains of the story). Yet Rowling's achievement is still worthwhile and I'd argue that it is just as worth reading as The Wizard of Oz.

As a final note, I'd like to discuss Scholastic Corporation's editing choices in "translating" the British dialect to standard American idiom. This is quite galling and struck me as very disparaging toward American children. Granted, many of the terms would be a bit confusing, but instead of a translation, incorporating a short glossary at the back might have been a bit more respectful to the intelligences of the readers. Similarly, the opinion that American children would find a novel with "philosopher" in its title unappealing (as opposed to British children, who had no such problems) displays the innately low opinion that Scholastic Corporation has of American schoolchildren. Considering that Scholastic is a corporation that produces schoolbooks (indeed, its very name is, in this case, ironic), this begs a great many questions about American education and the people and companies we allow to teach our children.

The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling
Style A
Substance B
Overall B+

Book Review -- THE WHITE-LUCK WARRIOR by R. Scott Bakker

"Death came swirling down."

This oft-repeated phrase that Bakker likes to flog during epic battle scenes describes a lot of what happens in The White-Luck Warrior. After more than a month away from keyboard, I return with this latest installment of R. Scott Bakker's The Second Apocalypse epic cycle. The previous trilogy, The Prince of Nothing, I've reviewed here and here, and the first novel of his ongoing The Aspect-Emperor trilogy is reviewed here.

Bakker's novel is an excellent second act, in a trilogy which is, itself, the second act of a larger cycle. True to the three-act structure, the main characters--Esmenet, Achamian, Mimara, and Sorweel--find themselves in ever worsening situations. All attempts to take action are met with disaster. Esmenet watches as control of the New Empire starts slipping from her grasp. Achamian's journey to Sauglish turns into a deathmarch through wilderness with decimated, untrustworthy, and companions that appear to be gradually losing their sanity. Sorweel finds himself a pawn caught between the goddess Yatwer and the Aspect-Emperor himself as he marches through sranc-infested plains towards the Great Ordeal's objective. And in the midst of all of this, Yatwer's chose, the White-Luck Warrior, strides--a man for whom necessity and circumstance are inexplicably merged.

Bakker's writing is quite cinematic. It's easy to imagine the great, dusty vistas of the Istyuli Plains stretching out in widescreen, with hundreds of thousands of armed and armored warriors, flapping banners of a thousand colors, marching across the camera's view, reminiscent of films like Spartacus, Lawrence of Arabia, or The Ten Commandments. You can imagine it being directed by Stanley Kubrick or Cecil B. DeMille with a cast of thousands. The climax of the book is extremely exciting, and easily lives up to the dramatic and terrifying end of The Judging Eye. Achamian and Cleric are an impressive combination and sparks seem to leap from the pages in which they interact (pun not intended--wait until you reach the end and you'll see what I mean). The bitter and ambiguous ending awaiting Achamian invokes (at least in me) the ending of Planet of the Apes, where Achamian discovers something that we, the audience, have known (or at least suspected) all along.

I don't have a great deal new to say about Bakker's style, philosophy, or grasp of history. I've said much already about how this world appears to be a thought-experiment for philosophical, religious, and gender-related issues. Both Mimara and Esmenet show immense strength of character and will. The abuses they'd suffered at the hands of men has not made them hateful or bitter, but something much different. They're survivors and Bakker demonstrates their determination not to succumb through their flexibility and ingenuity. Granted, neither character is perfect, but they're no more flawed (and in some cases, they're less so) than any of the male characters, such as Achamian and Sorweel.

One of the biggest criticisms that many readers have with Bakker is that his characters are almost universally unlikeable. To this, I must disagree. Bakker's characters are far more realistic than many of their other fantasy companions. His grasp of psychology helps him create characters that actually breathe and exude humanness. Their flaws, sufferings, idiosyncrasies are all believable and make them far more real than the over-romanticized two-dimensional heroes and heroines of many a fantasy novel. Indeed, perhaps the most obvious proof of Bakker's literary achievement is the ambiguity of Kellhus' role in this entire series. Is he noble and altruistic in his mission to destroy the Consult and the remaining Inchoroi? Is he truly a power-maddened megalomaniac? Is he something else? Bakker leaves this open for interpretation and if you ask different readers, they'll all give you different answers for what ultimately drives Anasûrimbor Kellhus. He's a different character to each reader, so much so that I believe readers are finding pieces of themselves in Kellhus every time they consider him.

In terms of plot, I must say that this book surpasses The Judging Eye. There were several points where I thought I could see what was coming but had guessed slightly wrong just enough to be surprised. It's incredible watching Bakker develop his characters. They grow, adapt, and change throughout the book. The challenges and difficulties they face, many of which are beyond their control or exacerbated by their actions, force them to evolve. Here Bakker's grasp of psychology shines through brilliantly as it had in The Warrior-Prophet and The Thousandfold Thought. Indeed, Esmenet gradually learns some of the most rudimentary techniques of the Dûnyain simply through the lessons she's had from her husband. She gradually comes to perceive the things that move the souls of those around her. Kelmomas' meddling comes to bite him quite severely, and for the first time his brilliance and conniving is met with dire consequences.

As usual, Bakker's worldbuilding is superb and consistent with his ideas and philosophical musings. History is a leash that all the characters wear about their necks, and Bakker's world is steeped in history and ruin. Having studied ancient civilizations myself, I've seen videos and photographs of places like Mycenae, Tiryns, Ephesus, Rome, Athens, and more. As Kellhus' Great Ordeal marches through the ruined north and Achamian makes his way to Sauglish, I find Bakker describing the sorts of worn and half-buried cities and fortresses about which I'd read and studied in college and grad school. Bakker's descriptions of these places are excellent and evoke the sense of unfathomable age and lost splendor that must accompany such ancient ruins.

Ragged patches of sunshine waved across the forest floor. Birdsong chirped and chattered through the canopy, light and inexhaustible. Here and there sections of wall rose from mounds like teeth from earthen gums. Layers of stonework ribbed the ravines they crossed. Blocks and fragments of every description stumped the ground. They passed a free-standing triumphal, the first thing Achamian clearly recognized from his Dreams: the Murussar, the symbolic bastion that marked the entrance to Sauglish's outlander quarter. Stripped of its inscriptions and engravings, it towered into the canopy, stone blackened, chapped with white lichens, shelved with moss. He need only blink to see the crowds bustling about its marble base: their garb ancient, their arms and armour bronze--men culled from all nations, from wild Aörsi to distant Kyraneas.

At this point, there isn't much analysis I can do since the trilogy is unfinished. Most of the analysis I've done already for The Prince of Nothing is quite similar to what I'm seeing in this series, although Bakker is doing some new things with it. However, I don't want to give anything about the story away, except to say that the ending is just as much an homage to Tolkien's The Hobbit as the climax of The Judging Eye was to The Fellowship of the Ring's Moria segments.

All told, The White-Luck Warrior is a fantastic installment in an already amazing series of novels. The philosophy is broadened only a little but the psychological character exploration and evolution is solid and the plot is absorbing.

The White-Luck Warrior by R. Scott Bakker
Style B+
Substance A
Overall A-

Book Review -- THE THIN MAN by Dashiell Hammett

A thick web of lies and deceit. Bullet-riddled corpses. Mobsters knocking on one's door, packing heat. Police suspicion. A fortune in cash and bonds. Dope fiends and morphine addiction. Hysterical women and cunning femme-fatales.

Dashiell Hammett's The Thin Man delivers, but not with the intense excitement and high-stakes of some of his other work, like The Maltese Falcon. (This, however, should come as no surprise, once the reader realizes that it was first published in 1934 as a serial in women's magazine Redbook--yes, that Redbook.) Although many of the female characters are conniving, treacherous, and often downright stupid and hysterical, Hammett provides a female character that is clever, trustworthy, and supportive of the main character--Nora Charles. This is a sharp divorce from the typical misogyny that runs through much of hardboiled detective tales. Indeed, the film version of The Thin Man is distinctively not very much film noir, and is actually quite lighthearted.

Greek American Nick Charles (an Ellis Island immigration officer changed the name from Charalambides), his wife Nora, and their schnauzer Asta, are in New York celebrating Christmas and New Years away from their company in San Francisco. Nick had once been a private detective before he joined Nora and went into business. Nora's keenly interested in Nick's past as a detective, and when one of his former clients turns up missing while the secretary is dead with four bullets in her, she gets her chance to experience a bit of the romance and adventure Nick used to inhabit. The couple was famously portrayed in 1934's film version of the novel by William Powell and Myrna Loy (notice below the dog is not a schnauzer), and in five subsequent films and a TV series that ultimately had nothing to do with Dashiell Hammett's books except the title.


The women actually make this book, and it is not surprising since the novel was written for (and serialized in) a women's magazine. Dorothy Wynant is a young airhead prone to hysteria and gratuitous overreaction. Her mother Mimi (ex-wife to the missing client) is vengeful, conniving, manipulative, and very much used to getting her way. Together, they do not provide a very positive portrait of women. However, Nora Charles, Nick's wife, is actually very much different from they, and are likely the primary character the female audience is supposed to identify with (despite the fact that the novel is written in first person from Nick's perspective).

Nora is problematic in that she's not an incredibly deep or incredible character. She's there, she's very prominent, and she has a very strong personality, but her weakness is that despite her strength, she's ill-defined. She's actually quite generic. She's smart--she helps Nick a few times by observing things that completely escaped his notice, teases him for being a lousy detective on occasion, and comes up with a list of suspects an motives. But her smarts aren't sharp. Of course, she lacks the experience that Nick has, and willingly takes a back-seat when he is doing his detective work. But in the end, she's just a glorified secretary. She doesn't play a pivotal role in Nick's solving of the crime. She's simply a pillar that holds him up. Nora complements him quite well, and they work very well together as a team. However, she doesn't really bring any special skills or abilities with her that Nick lacks save those traits a woman naturally has.

The book, however, is part of its time-period. I can honestly forgive its treatment of Nora. It isn't really chauvinistic, since Nora is definitely portrayed as a person of strength, resourcefulness, intelligence, and capability. One gets the impression that her and Nick are very much equal partners in both their business and their marriage. But the centerpiece of the book is not the business or the marriage--it is the mystery, and that's where Nick dominates the narrative and Nora recedes. She's still there, but she's a pace or two behind Nick. This isn't surprising. A powerful and dominant female detective would have been just as implausible to a 1930s housewife as it would have been to her husband.

The mystery itself is pretty convoluted. Hammett keeps the reader guessing through the immense web of deception that all of the women (except Nora) weave throughout the novel--including the deceptions of the deceased secretary (it seems that every female in the novel is a born liar).

"The chief thing," I advised them, "is not to let her tire you out. When you catch her in a lie, she admits it and gives you another lie to take its place and, when you catch her in that one, she admits it and gives you still another, and so on. Most people--even women--get discouraged after you've caught them in the third or fourth straight lie and fall back on either the truth or silence, but not Mimi. She keeps trying and you've got to be carefull or you'll find yourself believing her, not because she seems to be telling the truth, but simply because you're tired of disbelieving her."

Nick's character handles it with the adeptness, cynicism, and sarcasm of any early 20th-century gumshoe. His dialogue is dry and witty, and although he was played by William Powell in the 1934 film (and subsequent movie series), I couldn't help but imagine Nick as Humphrey Bogart.

The prose is nothing to write home about. Hammett writes in this clear, matter-of-fact style, but sometimes he lets some dry wit slip from his pen.

Morelli hit the fat man in his fat belly, as hard as he could without getting up. Studsy, suddenly on his feet, leaned over Morelli and smashed a big fist into the fat man's face. I noticed, foolishly, that he still led with his right. Hunchbacked Pete came up behind the fat man and banged his empty tray down with full force on the fat man's head. The fat man fell back, upsetting three people and a table. Both bar-tenders were with us by then. One of them hit the fat man with a blackjack as he tried to get up, knocking him forward on his hands and knees, the other put a hand down inside the fat man's collar in back, twisting the collar to choke him. With Morelli's help they got the fat man to his feet and hustled him out.

In case you didn't notice, the fat man is fat. That's an example of how Hammett's arid humor emerges through deadpan prose. You have to be paying attention to catch it, but when you do, it's hard not to cock a smirk in amusement.

The Thin Man was Hammett's final novel. I've only read 1930's The Maltese Falcon and found it to be far darker, cynical, and despairing of human nature than The Thin Man. The latter novel is much more uplifting and the tone is overall hopeful. Nick and Nora Charles are never really in any serious danger of being accused, arrested, or separated. The dramatic tension increases only slightly when the police briefly suspect Nick. There's not much truly at stake throughout the novel for Nick and Nora, with the exception of their vacation plans. As a result, the tension throughout the novel is really sustained through simple curiosity and Nick's natural desire to clean up a mess (which occasionally wars with his desire to simply go back to San Francisco and not be bothered).

With so little at stake, its not surprising that, although a delightful little mystery, I find it has less in common with Hammett's earlier The Maltese Falcon or Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, and more in common with one of Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple stories. It's not a bad novel, but it certainly doesn't pack the nihilistic punch that a hardboiled noir mystery would. And here I reveal my bias--far and away, I prefer the sort of fiction that punches me in the gut. I enjoyed The Thin Man, but there was never any point in the book where I sat up and felt like Hammett was really nailing something about human nature or the human condition like he did with the end of The Maltese Falcon, where Spade tells O'Shaughnessy that he can't trust her and sends her off to prison. I guess my bias is toward the more painful and negative aspects of the human condition. I don't recall ever reading great literature and noticing a recurring theme of happiness and good times.

The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett
Style B
Substance B-
Overall B-

Book Review -- BLOOD MERIDIAN, OR THE EVENING REDNESS IN THE WEST by Cormac McCarthy

I've been wanting to review this novel for months, but haven't been able to get quite around to it. However, this is a book that screams to be read, and is perhaps one of the greatest novels of the 20th century.

There are a number of other reviews of the novel, one by Goodreads, another by The New Canon, a further one by Bibliolotry, and Harold Bloom analyzed the depth of the work in his How to Read and Why. There is almost too much for me to review here, but I'm going to give it my best try.

Also, I'd suggest one look up Blood Meridian's wikipedia entry, although I'd skip the "Plot Summary" segment as it's full of spoilers. And if one's already read both, there's a fascinating article comparing Blood Meridian and another McCarthy novel, The Road at LibraryThing.

People love to hate this book. Why? It is difficult. Possibly the most difficult book you might ever read, barring Tolstoy or The Bible. Its returns are far from obvious. It has been described as an orgy of violence on an epic scale. The book appears to revel in nihilism on the frontier between the United States and Mexico in the mid-19th century. The language is thorough, thick, and difficult to decipher.

But my God, is it beautiful. I only wish I could write in such a profound manner. I find myself desiring it more and more to revisit specific passages just for the dense eloquence of the prose. McCarthy can describe a scene in such a manner that will startle the astute reader.

What is true of one man, said the judge, is true of many. The people who once lived here are called the Anasazi. The old ones. They quit these parts, routed by drought or disease or by wandering bands of marauders, quit these parts ages since and of them there is no memory. They are rumors and ghosts in this land and they are much revered. The tools, the art, the building- these things stand in judgment on the latter races. Yet there is nothing for them to grapple with. The old ones are gone like phantoms and the savages wander these canyons to the sound of ancient laughter. In their crude huts they crouch in darkness and listen to the fear seeping out of the rock. All progressions from a higher to a lower order are marked by ruins and mystery and a residue of nameless rage. So. Here are the dead fathers. Their spirit is entombed in the stone. It lies upon the land with the same weight and the same ubiquity. For whoever makes a shelter of reeds and hides has joined his spirit to the common destiny of creatures and he will subside back into the primal mud with scarcely a cry. But who builds in stone seeks to alter the structure of the universe and so it was with these masons however primitive their works may seem to us.

This is a fantastic example of how McCarthy can wield the English language like a featherweight scalpel and generate an atmosphere of mysticism and darkness, of times long forgotten and lost. My own copy is dogeared at several points where the prose was so evocative, lovely, and profound that I found myself skipping back to those parts simply to read them again. One particular paragraph, perhaps 3/4 of the way toward the end, the characters contemplate the moon, and describe various theories concerning celestial phenomena. McCarthy does not simply report their words, but summarizes it in an almost mythical language that left my jaw dangling open in amazement.

By and by the judge rose and moved away on some obscure mission and after a while someone asked the expriest if it were true that at one time there had been two moons in the sky and the expriest eyed the false moon above them and said that it may well have been so. But certainly the wise high God in his dismay at the proliferation of lunacy on this earth must have wetted a thumb and leaned down out of the abyss and pinched it hissing into extinction. And could he find some alter means by which the birds could mend their paths in the darkness he might have done with this one too.

An earlier passage involved the character known as Judge Holden vindicating the reputation of a specific "black Jackson," a negroid character, by invoking everything from the Bible to Darwin and even giving hints at postmodern and racial theories to come. McCarthy renders this passage in an incredibly stirring manner, perhaps channeling the spirit of the Judge himself, his charm, eloquence, and genius, through his pen. His command of the English language is beyond description.

That dark vexed face. [The judge] studied it and he drew the sergeant forward the better for him to observe and then he began a laborious introduction in spanish. He sketched for the sergeant a problematic career of the man [the negro, Jackson] before them, his hands drafting with a marvelous dexterity the shapes of what varied paths conspired here in the ultimate authority of the extant--as he told them--like strings drawn together through the eye of a ring. He adduced for their consideration references to the children of Ham, the lost tribes of Israelites, certain passages from the Greek poets, anthropological speculations as to the propogation of the races in their dispersion and isolation through the agency of geological cataclysm and an assessment of racial traits with respect to climatic and geological influences. The sergeant listened to this and more with great attention and when the judge was done he stepped forward and held out his hand.

Jackson ignored him. He looked the judge.

What did you tell him, Holden?

The story follows the career of the Kid, a nameless protagonist who is a cynical stereotype of a Western antihero in the vein of Clint Eastwood's nameless protagonist in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. But instead of being a weakness, it is a strength. The Kid is an empty, vacuous person because he is meant to embody the reader. He is a both spectator and participant in the rampant violence, rapine, brutality, and slaughter that his gang of lawless scalp-hunters engage in.

We don't truly read the book to follow the actions and behavior of the Kid. We find ourselves reading it for one person and one person only: JUDGE HOLDEN. The Kid exists for us to live through vicariously, a mute and helpless witness to the profundity that is the Judge. This is somewhat supported by the use of the second-person at the opening of the book, describing The Kid's origins:

Night of your birth. Thirty-three. The Leonids they were called. God how the stars did fall. I looked for blackness, holes in the heavens. The Dipper stove.

The Judge might be human, but then again he might be something more. The man is a merciless killer, enormous, pale, hairless, a mutant perhaps. And brilliant. Whether or not he is an official judge is not important--the fact that, functionally, he passes judgment and sentence upon everything he comes across is far more significant. In his own words, things in this world exist with his consent. Those that do not, he destroys pitilessly. Life, to him, is cheap. But he is a brilliant man, steeped in all manner of lore, whether scientific, mathematical, historical, theological, or philosophical. But his knowledge makes him an implacable enemy. He is inevitable as the tide--when he has chosen to kill, nothing can stop him. And it might be possible that he is incapable of being killed.

The relationship between the Kid and the Judge is a fascinating one. The Judge is very much aware of the Kid, and as time passes and the Kid gradually comes to reject the brutality of his existence, the Judge and he become antagonists. The Judge exists to both uplift and subjugate those who surround him. He is not the leader of Glanton's gang, and indeed, is more of a vizier or a chaplain. His knowledge and wisdom paradoxically seeks to enlighten his fellow men, while simultaneously his wickedness and cruelty exists only to utilize them as he best sees fit. Though Glanton leads, he serves the Judge's purposes. The Judge embodies the horrific reality of the modern age--he is evidence that knowledge and wisdom do not demand that humanity become merciful and just. The Judge exists in a world where morals and ethics are man-made creations, and he is free to accept or reject them at will. Whether or not other humans consciously exist is not of his concern. From his perspective, he is the center of the universe, just as all of us perceive ourselves as the cosmic navel. The Judge differs from us by embracing that perception consciously, all the while aware that he is truly not the universe's center but caring little, because reality is what he makes it. Nietzschean philosophy and Existentialism coalesce within a character as viciously manipulative as Shakespeare's Iago (from Othello), as aloof and mocking as Edward (from King Lear), as brilliantly perceptive and reflective as Hamlet, and as strangely sympathetic as Milton's Satan (from Paradise Lost). Through Judge Holden, McCarthy has done the impossible--he has created a character that is as dynamic, moving, and indeed terrifying as Shakespeare's greatest.

The violence in the book has been labeled both "gratuitous" and "meaningless." I'd have to disagree. Yes, the book is full of massacre, slaughter, and murder. But it is certainly not meaningless. It is certainly not a plot vehicle, as violence usually becomes in many novels. Violence serves no purpose other than to be violence. But that's where its meaning is revealed. The violence is not symbolic of anything (except perhaps itself), but it is most certainly an integral part of the human condition. Glanton's gang exists in a Hobbesian nightmare world where might makes right and the weak suffer. Glanton's gang are always aware that there might be a stronger group of killers over the next hill. They do not exist in a vacuum. They are brutal and paranoid. One cannot help but imagine periods throughout history, from the Vietnam War to the Crusades and even further back when life might have been just as cheap. Indeed, Mexico is a feudal state throughout the novel, existing in an incredibly primitive and medieval world that is hundreds of years and thousands of miles removed from the "civilized" world of the cities to the north and east. The lawlessness of the frontier, the absence of borders, and the ease with which the strong may crush and ravage the helpless is reminiscent of a reality that we, in our quiet, comfortable, conformist, and consumerist lives are loath to remember existed for most of human existence, and indeed persists up unto this very day in parts of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, not to mention sub-Saharan Africa. The marauding horsemen that pound over the hills to slaughter the inhabitants of a small town in order to present the scalps to their own Mexican provincial governor (and claim they were Apache) are no different from the Mongol, Cimmerian, Hunnic, or Viking raiders that massacred unarmed noncombatants and warriors alike.

The violence is reality. A reality that people do not like to think about, but they should, and indeed they must. Those who do not appreciate this book for the inexplicable beauty of the language and the graphic horrors of human suffering and cruelty committed and experienced by the characters do not appreciate the comfort and safety in which they live their current bougeois existences.

This is an important book. It is not a celebration of the Mexican, Native American, or U.S. American spirits. It does not paint anyone as suffering from injustice or oppression except the townsfolk, who are often far from innocent themselves. Indeed, everyone is a predator, prey, or a scavenger, on some level, in the socially Darwinian universe that McCarthy crafts so eloquently. This book has no flaws that I could hope to even begin to reveal. If the prose is too dense for the reader, it is no fault of the book, but rather the reader who is not yet capable of reaching the text. If I had attempted to read this book ten years ago, I would never have made it past the third chapter. I had to spend several years reading voraciously and experiencing literature beyond the confines of post-Tolkien fantasy writers. At my current state, I can read the book and even a year later, I cannot help but sit back and ponder its profundity.

One of my close friends in graduate school, and an English Literature student, wrote to me about Blood Meridian. He said:

Blood Meridian is, IMO, the latest in the line of the great American novels, fully a descendant of Moby-Dick, Last of the Mohicans, As I Lay Dying, and Invisible Man. Moreover, it taps into the support/disavowal of colonialism binary that greats like Haggard and Conrad made their careers with. The violence is spectacular and repugnant, the characters loathsome and fascinating; Judge Holden is more creature than man, a concept made reality; in his words, he is the prima donna of a violent dance. He is both the culmination and argument against the logic that painted the Age of Reason, his words chilling to the bone:

“The judge placed his hands on the ground. he looked at his inquisitor. This is my claim, he said. And yet everywhere upon it are pockets of autonomous life. Autonomous. In order for it to be mine nothing must be permitted to occur upon it save by my dispensation.”

In a sense, he's the Great Scientist and the West is his laboratory.

Fascinating. My friend goes on to say:

Another element of the book that I found particularly satisfying was the tone of the narrative; the prose style is unparalleled but, more than that, there was a cinematic quality that felt like it was lifted straight out of a western film. When McCarthy talks of the Kid's initial traveling out West, you get a sense of great motion, rather Conan-like, where he journeys through strange towns, encountering even stranger people. When McCarthy speaks of the Kid fighting men from many different lands and feeling ill at ease among their strange languages, you get this wonderful sense of exoticism, of the sort of back room activities that you could sense in Casablanca or Raiders of the Lost Ark. Moreover, his descriptions of the landscape and the Glanton gang progress through it serves as a perfect prose companion to the sort of traveling scenes you would see in a Ford or Sergio Leone film.

I know we've talked about English, especially as it relates to Orwellian notions of its usage, and I feel that McCarthy's prose style is definitively American. It's bizarre, long winded, Neo-Biblical, lyrical at times. Absolutely amazing.

Definitively American is absolutely right. The weight of the Biblical is heavy on McCarthy's prose, and hearkens back to the importance of faith to the Puritan settlers and the elevation of the Bible as American legendarium.

McCarthy's done something amazing with this book. It is probably one of the most important pieces of American literature in the 20th century. I daresay, it's better than Crime and Punishment.

Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthy
Style A+
Substance A+
Overall A++