Calypso by David Sedaris

Source of book: Borrowed from the Library

This was this month’s selection for our “Literary Lush” book club. One of the things I enjoy about this club is that I end up reading interesting books that I never would have discovered on my own. Although I was at least aware of David Sedaris, I had never read anything of his, and likely would not have picked up one of his books on my own. We had a great discussion about this book, I must say, as Sedaris writes thoughtfully on the complexities of family, mental illness, and life.

Sedaris’ books are officially classified as non-fiction - and they are largely autobiographical in nature. However, he does take some artistic and comedic license with things - he is a comedian and entertainer, not a historian. That said, as we lawyers are all too aware, memories are tricky things, and two participants in a conversation will often remember them differently. Since many of the stories involve conversations within the family, it would not surprise me at all if Sedaris’ accounts are roughly as “factual” as the average memory. 

The Sedaris family sounds rather...interesting. David was one of six siblings in a close(ish) Greek-American family. He and his siblings and his father still get together regularly, and stay in the same house for a week or two at a time. Honestly, there is no way in hell that happens ever again in my own family. (It’s a long story, but there are definitely broken relationships there.) The Sedarises are quirky, to say the least. Very quirky. And David is probably the craziest. (At least, since his humor is self-deprecating, he portrays himself as the craziest. And he may be right.) 

Calypso is in many ways, David’s attempt to deal with his sister Tiffany’s suicide. And also with his aging and increasingly non-functional father. These themes run through the book, and keep coming up as Sedaris tells his stories. The book shows a bit of a darker side to the family. His mother became increasingly alcoholic after the kids moved out, and her ability to hold the family together failed. When she died of cancer in her 60s, Sedaris’ dad descended deeper into his hoarding tendencies. But, the family still continued to get together as best they could. 

The book opens with a description of some of the trips the family took to the Outer Banks, followed by David’s decision to purchase an island home. All of these homes have cutesy names, so Sedaris and his siblings decide their house needs one too. The name they settle on, “Sea Section,” is, believe it or not, the least inappropriate of the options they consider. Dad is mortified. 

Although there are themes running through the stories, they are not truly connected in plot. They were mostly published elsewhere first - Sedaris writes regularly for The New Yorker and occasionally for other magazines and websites. The locations vary from rural England, where Sedaris lives with his partner, Hugh, to Japan, to various places in the United States where David puts on his show and sells his books. 

The England episodes are pretty funny. David is a bit OCD, and ends up a slave to his FitBit. This in turn leads to increasingly long walks where he picks up garbage. (And comments on how commonly he finds KFC and condoms…) Eventually, he has a garbage truck named after him. That’s not fiction or artistic license, by the way. That’s completely true. 

Also hilarious is the time he and his siblings shop at this ludicrously expensive and completely impractical clothing store in Tokyo. Among other things, David ends up buying a smock and culottes. 

Sedaris with one of his several (!) pairs of culottes.

The stories are often amusing, but also bittersweet. David and his siblings are still processing the suicide of a mentally ill sibling, and the descent of their father into right-wing nuttiness. (They forbid all radio and TV at the beach house, and dad nearly drives them crazy looking for his Fox News and Talk Radio fix.) 

There were some specific passages which stood out. One involved politics. David was born in New York, but when he was kid, the family moved to North Carolina, which was, shall we say, a rather different culture. (Because of the age differences of the kids, David doesn’t speak with a southern accent, but his younger siblings very much do.) Apparently, the Sedaris parents were out at a restaurant or bar when the news came that Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated. And the other patrons stood and clapped. The Sedaris parents were left wondering where they had moved to… It is thus ironic that David’s dad would later go down the racist rabbit hole of Tucker Carlson and Rush Limbaugh.   

I also liked Sedaris’ description of his experience being a short man. (He’s 5’5”, apparently, a bit shorter than I am.) 

I know that straight me sometimes have it hard when it comes to finding a girlfriend, but I thought that for people like myself - “pocket gays,” we’re sometimes called - it was no hindrance. In retrospect, I guess I wasn’t paying much attention. The Washington Post has a regular feature in which they send two people out on a date and then check in to see how it went. Recently the couple was gay. Both stood more than six feet and listed in their “Deal-Breakers” box “short men.” They did not, I noticed, exclude white supremacists or machine gun owners.

Yeah, that is a bit disturbing. I would certainly consider white supremacy to be a deal breaker were I on the dating market. 

Rather amusing was the section on crazy diets. 

As I grow older, I find that the people I know become crazy in one of two ways. The first is animal crazy - more specifically, dog crazy. They’re the ones who, when asked if they have children, are likely to answer, “A black Lab and a sheltie-beagle mix named Tuckahoe.” Then they add - they always add - “They were rescues!”

The second way people go crazy is with their diet. My brother, Paul, for instance, has all but given up solid food, and at age forty-six eats much the way he did when he was nine months old. 

I think Sedaris nails it with that one. Obviously, I know people who make dietary changes due to illness or other legitimate medical reasons. But there is definitely a kind of “mid-life crisis” that involves an obsession with diet - an increasingly restrictive diet. 

Sedaris also scores a nice one with this description of Bible Belt passive-aggressiveness. 

Increasingly at Southern airports, instead of a “good-bye” or “thank-you,” cashiers are apt to say, “Have a blessed day.” This can make you feel like you’ve been sprayed against your will with God cologne. “Get it off me!” I always want to scream. “Quick, before I start wearing ties with short-sleeved shirts!”

I know, not everyone who says “have a blessed day” is intending to give a little religious middle finger to others. But that is the meaning of the saying, and why it originated. And the Southern Baptist deacon look is...accurate. 

Sedaris also hits on a pet peeve of mine, particularly when travelling through the [ahem] white and rural areas of our country. 

More often than not, your breakfast room will have a TV in it, tuned to a twenty-four-hour cable-news network. Sometimes, you see two TVs or more. At a place I stayed at in Kentucky one year, there were eight. After I ordered, the waitress went around with her remote and activated each one, making me think of a lamplighter, if lamps were instruments of torture rather than things that make it easier for you to see how old and tired-looking you’ve gotten. “People like it,” she said when I asked her if it was really necessary at six o’clock in the morning. 

You hear this a lot in America, especially when you’re complaining about televisions, or loud music, or, more common still, television and loud music together in the same room. “People like it.”

“Yes,” I always want to say, “but they’re the wrong people.” 

Preach it, David! While you are at it, how about mentioning the people who cannot seem to hike or sit on the beach or chill around the campfire without blaring some loud music. 

Quite fascinating was the chapter on how David came out as gay. Here are some excerpts. 

When my mother called me a queer, my face turned scarlet and I exploded. “Me? What are you talking about? Why would you even say a thing like that?”

Then I ran down to my room, which was spotless, everything just so, the Gustav Klimt posters on the walls, the cornflower-blue vase I’d bought with the money I earned babysitting. The veil had been lifted, and now I saw this for what it was: the lair of a blatant homosexual.

That would have been as good a time as any to say, “Yes, you’re right. Get me some help.” But I was still hoping that it might be a phase, that I’d wake up the next day and be normal. In the best of times, it seemed like such a short leap. I did fantasize about having a girlfriend - never the sex part, but the rest of it I had down. I knew what she’d look like and how she’d hold her long hair back from the flame when bending over a lit candle. I imagined us getting married the summer after I graduated from college, and then I imagined her drowning off the coast of North Carolina during one of my family’s vacations. Everyone needed to be there so they could see just how devastated I was. I could actually make myself cry picturing it: How I’d carry her out of the water, how my feet would sink into the sand owing to the extra weight. I’d try mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and keep trying until someone, my father most often, would pull me back, saying, “It’s too late, son. Can’t you see she’s gone?”

It seemed I wanted to marry just so I could be a widower. So profound would be my grief that I’d never look at another woman again. 

Not only is this hilarious, but it is a pretty good explanation for why telling gay folks to just suck it up and have a heterosexual marriage is not merely ludicrous, but profoundly damaging. I mean, David Sedaris seems pretty harmless, but I can’t imagine knowing your spouse fantasized about your death so he could eliminate the pressure to be heterosexual. Later, David puts his finger on a key dynamic. I think a lot of people, particularly of my parents’ generation and older, just wish they didn’t have to deal with the fact that LGBTQ people exist in our world. 

“I just don’t see why you have to rub everyone’s noses in it,” certain people would complain when I told them. Not that I wore it on T-shirts or anything. Rather, I’d just say “boyfriend” the way they said “wife” or “girlfriend” or “better half.” I insisted that it was no different, and in time, at least in the circles I ran in, it became no different. 

Times are definitely changing, though. My kids talk about same sex relationships, transgender people, non-binary people, and so on, with a natural ease that I have never known. It turns out that the “confusion” that we were warned would come about if our children saw gay or transgender people was really this: the kids would have no confusion at all, but the old folks would continue to lose their shit. And us Gen Xers kind of experience the whiplash of going between our parents’ and kids’ generations and having to code switch. A lot. 

There is another interesting episode in England that I want to mention. Sedaris befriends this fox, kind of going against a lot of his neighbors who consider them pests. He describes this interview on the subject thus:

“I know how much people love to save wildlife, but how would you feel if a fox killed your chickens or turkey?” someone named Pat Stokes asked. 

To this a man responded, “My chickens are cunts.”

I don’t know if this made him pro-fox or if he was just stating the facts. 

I definitely am on the “just stating the facts” side. Chickens are assholes. All of them. Every last one. They are horrid to each other, and as soon as the alpha gets made into soup, the next biggest chicken terrorizes the rest. I don’t like killing, and I could see feeling bad about eating other delicious animals. But I have never ONCE felt guilty for eating a chicken. Nasty, cruel, mean buggers, the whole lot. 

Speaking of assholes, I really felt with Sedaris the disorientation of the election of Trump, and the way that so many of my friends and family supported him - and his most evil, toxic policies. This exchange kind of sums it up: 

I join my family on Emerald Isle for Thanksgiving and have a great screaming fight with my Republican father, who yells at one point, “Donald Trump is not an asshole!” I find this funny, but at the same time surprising. Regardless of whether you voted for him, I thought the president-elect’s identity as a despicable human being was something we could all agree on. I mean, he pretty much ran on it. 

Exactly. I have heard this whole “Trump isn’t racist” bullshit from so many. But, he pretty much ran on it! That was always the whole point. That was his platform, those are his policies, and that’s who he is. And yes, if you support his racist policies, you are a racist. Own it. Just don’t try to claim that it is compatible with following Christ, because it isn’t. 

One of our book club members saw David Sedaris live a few years back, and she said he was hilarious. And also came hours before the show to talk and sign books - and stayed literally for hours afterward. If he comes this way again, I might have to go to a show. 

One final thought. One of the themes of our discussion of this book is how Sedaris walks a fine comedic line. On the one hand, he isn’t particularly politically correct (whatever that means these days), and he reveals some pretty personal stuff about his family. But, as one member pointed out, Sedaris is never mean. He isn’t cruel. He isn’t laughing at people or humiliating them. He does point out foibles - but he doesn’t make it personal. He does not wish to embarrass people, but humanize them. And a lot of his humor is self-deprecating. He is one of those comedians who doesn’t make you feel dirty for laughing along - or afterward. 

***

Just for fun, here is the list of books that our book club has read. At least the ones I have read too. Most of these were read for the club, but a few were ones I read previously - those posts pre-date the club discussion - and some I read afterward, because I missed the discussion. 

The Air You Breathe by Frances de Pontes Peebles

The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

There There by Tommy Orange

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng

Be Frank With Me by Julia Claiborne Johnson

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Educated by Tara Westover

Stiff by Mary Roach

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

The Marsh King’s Daughter by Karen Dionne

Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin

Never Mind by Edward St. Aubyn

All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders

Artemis by Andy Weir

Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov 

The Radium Girls by Kate Moore

A Taste for the Beautiful by Michael J. Ryan

Source of book: Borrowed from the library

In case it wasn’t obvious, I have been fascinated with science since I was a kid. This led to a lot of internal conflict between the militant Young Earth Creationism that was part of the Fundie homeschool culture I grew up in, and the obvious falsehoods that were necessary to believe for that viewpoint to work. My dad, at least, wasn’t committed to a young earth, so I felt that I had some freedom. As I got into my teens, I realized that I couldn’t believe in a timeline which didn’t match observed reality, and started a journey away from that. Eventually, in part because of my continued extensive reading on scientific topics, and in part because of my discovery of the rich tradition of non-literalist approaches to Genesis (dating back...before Christ, actually…), I came to peace with an acceptance of the truth of mainstream science. 

One of the fun things about accepting that there is overwhelming evidence in favor of evolution, even if we don’t have all the details (it’s amazing we have as much as we do, given the time scales), is being able to explore what we know and have learned even just in the last few decades about how life develops and changes. A great many things just make more sense that way, to be honest, including the wacky and often inefficient ways that traits work. 

A Taste for the Beautiful is about sexual beauty and attraction, and how it evolved in specific (and interesting) cases. The author is a researcher who has studied various animals - most pertinently, amphibians in Central America and their calls. (This forms a good bit of the book, which is a good thing.) 

The central idea of the book is that scientists often focus primarily on the males of the species they study, which means a focus on how the traits that attract females function and develop. In Ryan’s view, this misses a lot of the point, because beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Thus, it is more illuminating to examine why the beholder finds things beautiful - from there, it becomes somewhat more obvious how the “beautiful” trait evolved. 

Ryan takes a look at some basic ideas first. A central one to understanding life on Earth is that evolution and natural selection do not result in perfection. A trait need not be perfect to survive. It just has to be good enough. It is easy to see this in nature. Everything is a compromise. There is no such thing as a creature with endless endurance, high speed, and deadly reflexes. (If there was, it would likely devour everything else, then die of starvation…) Rather, you see creatures which have just enough fitness for their roles, enabling them to survive long enough to reproduce. 

I have heard this described elsewhere as the inherent “kludginess” of evolution. The human brain is a marvelous example of this. We actually do not have particularly “powerful” brains, if you think about it. A pocket sized calculator can do math far faster than we can, mechanical devices have better precision, and our memories...well, they are no great shakes. What human brains DO have, however, is a set of kludges - shortcuts - that enable us to think flexibly, think in analogies, and leverage our limited memory and processing speed in ways that solve the particular problems we encounter using what we have. It’s pretty impressive when you think about it. 

Everything in nature is like this, though. All vertebrates share a basic bone architecture, which is adapted for all kinds of locomotion, from swimming to flying to running to standing erect. If an engineer were to design a creature from the ground up, it is unlikely that it would look like anything currently in existence - let alone look strikingly similar despite widely different functions. 

When Ryan applied this basic idea to that of sexual beauty, he found that the eye (or nose or ear) of the beholder didn’t respond to sexual attraction in a sui generis way - it didn’t require unique traits used solely for sexual response. Rather, the pathways tended to be already used for something else - more basic stuff like finding food or avoiding being eaten. 

A great example of this is something most of us never think about: why do we universally, across cultures, as far back as history records, use the color red as a signal to stop, and green as a signal to go? (It’s crazy but true - this didn’t originate with the industrial revolution - it goes back to prehistoric times.) Ryan notes that most animals have vision that is either monochromatic, or a dichromatic version of color. (In that case, one could tell the difference between red and violet, but not see a significant difference between, say, green and yellow.) Humans, however, along with many of their primate relatives, have trichromate color - which allows a full rainbow experience. (At least in the visible color range - other animals vary in the wavelengths they see.) The ability to distinguish quickly and easily between green and red turns out to be hugely important to many primates. Why? Well, leaves are green...and fruit is red or yellow. Hey, that makes sense! We speed past the trees, but the fruit catches our eye. (Not in this book, but in other sources I have read, is the observation that animals that eat fruit in the New World and in Oceania don’t tend to have this, in large part because native fruits are more likely to be green, and thus the ability to see red isn’t as important.) 

From this ability to see color, humans found they were able to do other things. Humans (rather uniquely among animals), express emotion through blushing, to give one example. 

Color is just one, though. Ryan looks at pattern, which is pretty interesting. Cats are highly sensitive to patterns, particularly certain shapes and edges. This helps them avoid falling off things. But it also means that they have some...interesting reflexes. Hence the “cats and cucumbers” videos. I presume that oblong fruits remind cats of snakes, at least at first glance, and the reflex takes over before they think. For what it’s worth, our cat doesn’t care. But certain noises or motions can occasionally spook her - and she has a solid four foot vertical leap when startled. 

 

Starting from this framework, Ryan makes a case that the specifics of sexual beauty don’t come out of the blue, but utilize traits already present. The ear is already sensitive to a frequency that aids in hearing predators, so that frequency is used in frog calls. Patterns that already mean food or danger can be repurposed as attractiveness. 

This is kind of the central theme of the book, but it is far more detailed and varied than just that. Ryan spends a chapter each on sight, sound, and smell; and looks at the downsides of beauty - it can also attract predators, or make a creature less fit in some other way. It is, so to speak, a fight between reproduction and survival, with plenty of tradeoffs. Also quite fascinating was the chapter on how preferences can be fickle, and often change rapidly. 

Throughout, the book is well supported by research (much of which was done by the author), and avoids going beyond what can be seen from the results. Like all good science writers, Ryan is realistic about what we can and cannot know, and what we do and do not know. He doesn’t try to make a case he cannot adequately support by evidence. 

I think, however, that he does shed an interesting light on the evolutionary specifics of how traits develop. This book makes a good companion book to Sex on Six Legs, which more specifically looks at insects, but without the depth of information on the evolutionary details.   

A Taste for the Beautiful strikes a good balance between detail and readability, and is both fascinating and informative. Ryan clearly loves his topic, and makes it come alive.

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate

Source of book: Audiobook from the library.

This book is part of out not-particularly-systematic exploration of the Newbery Award winners and honor books. The One and Only Ivan won the award in 2013. 

 The One and Only Ivan is very loosely based on a true story. At the core is the real life of Ivan, a gorilla who spent 27 years of his life living in a small cage in a mall in Tacoma Washington, but eventually was sent to a zoo after an extended protest by animal rights activists. Other than those facts, however, the story is completely fictional - a point the author makes clear in the afterword.

The book itself is a bit of a downer - it is told from the point of view of Ivan, who is generally easygoing and sanguine about his life. However, it is clear that his situation is not ideal - and it is deeply uncomfortable for the other animals that live in the mall. The older elephant, Stella, has memories of before she was captured, and the new baby elephant, Ruby, is given abusive and exhausting show training. The comic relief is Bob, the sarcastic stray dog, who is content to be feral and steal food.

The book does have a number of good qualities. First, the writing is simple but evocative. Since Ivan is the narrator, the prose is intended to be the sort of thoughts he would have. Thus, he doesn’t understand all of how technology or humans work - but he is intelligent (as he was in real life), and philosophical.

The story is told in what is essentially a series of vignettes, which differ greatly in length. They are headed by simple one or two word titles, and can be as short as a sentence or as long as a dozen paragraphs. (I am guessing a bit here, as it was an audiobook and I couldn’t literally count paragraphs - but you can make a good approximation.)

Because of Ivan’s laid back personality, he tends to underplay the neglect that the animals suffer. This, of course, increases the impact. I am glad my kids have a reasonable tolerance for tough themes, because the depiction of animal abuse and neglect is pretty hard to hear or read.

The book does have a happy ending, such as it is. Ivan clearly was not going to be able to be returned to the wild - even after being around his own kind for years at the zoo, he was never going to be a wild gorilla. But the circumstances at modern zoos is a far cry from the past, and thus the ending is as good as one could expect.

The audiobook was narrated by Adam Grupper, a veteran of screen and stage. His baritone fit the gorilla perfectly, yet he was able to capture the other voices well - even the female ones. His other audiobooks appear to be mostly Tom Clancy and political non-fiction. I’d love to see him do more kids’ fiction, as this one was quite good.

The Call of the Wild by Jack London

Source of book: Audiobook from the library (but I own this too.)

As part of our quest to visit the western National Parks, we take a longer camping or road trip each year. To get me through the miles, particularly when I am towing our trailer, we listen to audiobooks. I try to keep a good balance between kids books, and classics.

Earlier this year, a friend brought a book of “campfire stories” along, and had me read them on cool evenings around the campfire. One of those was Jack London’s “To Build a Fire,” a classic of the implacability of nature to man’s folly. Having read that, I decided it was probably a good time to listen to London’s best known work, The Call of the Wild. 

London was perhaps the best known of the naturalist writers of the early 20th Century. His novels and stories portray a highly Darwinistic view of nature, devoid of sympathy, governed by survival of the fittest, and ruled by instinct. London was not wrong about this. Nature is cruel. Well, not “cruel” in the moral sense. As London also noted, mankind is the only creature that kills and hurts for fun. In fact, this is one of the great contrasts in London’s writing. Nature is Darwinistic. Mankind is capable of a difference, both good and bad. Mankind engages in senseless cruelty. Mankind fails or refuses to acknowledge the laws of nature, and finds himself dead as a result. But mankind is also capable of genuine love and goodness.

All of the above is on full display in The Call of the Wild.

The basic story is pretty simple. Buck, a large and magnificent dog of mixed heritage, is stolen from his owner in the Santa Clara Valley, and sold north to work as a sled dog in the Yukon, during the gold rush. London knew this area pretty well, having prospected a bit himself. Buck first works for a government dispatcher running mail between outposts. He defeats the current lead dog, and becomes the leader. After that, he works for a different official carrying heavy loads. However, a season of running wears him out, and he is sold along with the rest of the team near the end of the season. Unfortunately, he is purchased by a naive couple and her brother who set out for the Yukon to look for gold. Overweight, underprepared, and too late in the season, they set out, only to reach utter disaster at the hands of relentless Nature. Fortunately for Buck, he is taken in by John Thornton, who shows him the first real love he has had in a long time. After a few memorable episodes, Buck finds himself growing wilder with time, and reverting to his roots as a wolf. When Thornton and his partners are slaughtered by Native Americans, Buck’s last tie to civilization is broken, and he becomes fully wild.

I read this book (and its companion, White Fang - which we didn’t get to on this trip) back in my teens. I suspect a lot of people did experience it at that age, either as as school assignment or just because it is one of the books you read in your teens. In any case, I read White Fang first, which gave me a different perspective on the two books. In some ways, The Call of the Wild seemed to be a lesser book. It was shorter, and the “growing wild” idea didn’t appeal much to me at the time.

Rereading it, though, by itself, I think I appreciate better what London was trying to do. The short length actually means London wrote concisely, and created a perfectly balanced and tautly written tale. I was struck this time by the parallel structure, the sense of direction in the narrative, and way that every detail matters.

I like long books just fine. I mean, Anthony Trollope and Henry James, right? But there is something to be said for disciplined writing of shorter narratives too. I have always loved short stories for this reason.

Last time I read this, I think I missed the way the incidents are parallels throughout. The opening theft and the final wilding after the massacre. The powerlessness of the beginning with the newfound power at the end. The contrast of the dispatchers and their innate knowledge of the rhythms of nature, and the arrogant prospectors who are broken by nature. The cruelty of the man in the red sweater who breaks Buck to servitude, and the kindness of Thornton, who, while he keeps Buck from going completely feral, also aids the transition by his own closeness to nature. The middle episode of running heavy loads transitions from Buck’s rising action to leadership to his increasing break with civilization. There is a lot of craft in the plotting and writing.

Other observations: I had forgotten how violent this book is. More accurately, I had forgotten how violent the humans are in this book. I recalled the animal violence well enough. Eat or be eaten, kill or be killed. The law of nature and all. But, perhaps because I remembered the violence better in White Fang, I forgot how much there is in The Call of the Wild. London seems to envision a good portion of humanity as animalistic at best, and brutal at worst. There are times when I agree with him. Not always, but sometimes. And more these days in the era of Trump.

Secondly, and this was no surprise, London is a bit racist. Not much of a surprise for 1903, of course. And also not a surprise for someone of that era who was strongly Darwinist. But this is a complex issue when it comes to London, as it is for Mark Twain, another person progressive for his era, yet with glaring blind spots. Both tended to view Native Americans as lesser - and London wrote a rather xenophobic diatribe on the peril of Chinese immigration. (This wasn’t that long after the Chinese Exclusion Act. The thing with London is that he was self-aware that racism itself has no rational basis, and noted that he suspected that his fears about China might turn out to be as silly as other “race fantasies.” Furthermore, like Twain, he wrote stories that humanized minorities more than his predecessors and contemporaries. Also complicating things was the fact that London believed strongly in determinism: that is, that environment determines behavior. He thus believed that poverty caused crime, for example, and that abused children grow up to be abusers. Because of this, he advocated for socialism, on the grounds that good outcomes required equal starting points, a point that later Civil Rights Activists would adopt as their own.

I find Jack London to be best in small doses. The brutally naturalistic viewpoint can be a bit overwhelming at times, and you kind of want to see some decent humans after a while. Although, to be honest, they can be in short supply in literature - and sometimes in real life too. But London does make you think. He is certainly an antidote to the sort of nature-worshipping story that views animals as if they were fuzzy little humans, and not living according to Nature’s laws. Never forget that that snuggly, purry cat you love will heartlessly slaughter and eat rodents and birds. I find nature to be beautiful, but it is also deadly and cruel if one fails to respect it. Perhaps London’s most unique contribution to the literature, then, is to write animals that think like animals. Buck isn’t just a human who can’t really talk. Rather, he acts according to instinct, according to nature, and according to his circumstances. And yet, he is a sympathetic and nuanced character; and one of the finest animal characters in literature.

In re-reading this, with the kids, I was reminded that London was an excellent writer, whether or not you agree with his philosophy or not.

***

A side note: I am (as regular readers will know), an avid hiker. The kids and I put on about 120 miles or so a year together, and I often get more than that in. One of the things that stuck with me from reading Jack London was that nature can be unpredictable - so always leave a margin for error and the unexpected, and hike prepared. Thus, we always hike with snacks, a first aid kit, and windbreakers. I have assisted other, less prepared hikers numerous times. Be prepared, be safe, stay alive.

Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson

Source of book: Audiobook from the library

This is another book that I loved as a kid and wanted to share with my own kids. My youngest daughter loves rabbits (and Hello Kitty), so this book seemed like a natural choice that she might enjoy.

Rabbit Hill was written in 1945, in the waning days of World War II, and it is clearly a product of that atmosphere. The Allies would have face the task of rebuilding Europe after the catastrophe and figuring out what to do with the formerly isolated Japan. In addition, the armed forces were integrating (finally), and the Civil Rights Movement was gaining steam. To that end, Robert Lawson wrote an animal tale that faced the fears and hopes for the future.

The house on the hill has been vacant for years, and before that, the tenants let everything go to seed. No garden, no lawn, the fields neglected. The animal residents of the hill have suffered hard times.

But now, there are new folks coming! Who will these new folks be? Will they be cruel hunters? Will they be animal lovers? Will it be a time of plenty, or of fear of death?

The characters are memorable and charming as I remembered them. Little Georgie the rabbit is the main protagonist. He is a bit cocky and distractible - befitting his age - but he is athletic and strong, enjoying his speed and youth. His mother is a chronic worrier, while his father is a “Southern Gentleman,” always speaking in highfalutin’ language and boring everyone with his tales of how much better everything was in the Bluegrass Country. Uncle Analdus, who Georgie is sent to fetch, is a cantankerous and hot-headed old man, but he has a lot of knowledge which may prove useful to new challenges. There are other animals too: Willie the field mouse, who is the spy for the rest (because he can climb the rain barrell and see in the window of the house); Mole, fiercely loyal to his friend Willie; and the hilarious Phewie the skunk, connoisseur of garbage. (The kids laughed most at Phewie’s lines.)

When the New Folks arrive, there is uncertainty as to how things will play out. They seem nice, but they have a cat. They are planning a large garden, but will they be willing to share with the animals? Many signs point toward them being benevolent, but when Georgie is injured by a car and taken in by the Folks, conspiracy theories tear apart the harmony of the hill. In the end, however, it is St. Francis of Assisi who wins out, and Lawson shows a vision of cooperation and harmony.

The audiobook version we listened to was narrated by Barbara Caruso, who did a fine enough job. The only problem was a certain amount of scratching and skipping on the CD, due to hard wear. That is always a risk with children’s audiobooks, we have found.

I am glad that we own this book, though, because part of the charm can be found in Lawson’s illustrations. (He worked as an illustrator for other authors as well.)

Just one note, however. It is strongly implied (although not stated) that the Folks’ cook and housekeeper is African American. In the original version, the illustrations of her tend toward a caricature. In editions published since 1970, these are omitted, which is just as well. Sulphronia is a minor character - and positively portrayed - so the offensive pictures distract rather than enhance.

It was nice to revisit this book, and the optimism that it contains. Perhaps we will never see harmony on this level worldwide, but the 70 years since have been good to Lawson’s hope. After centuries of fighting, Western Europe has had an extended run of peace. Japan has become an ally. It is a testament to those who worked so hard in the aftermath of the war to sow peace rather than hatred. Lawson’s choice of St. Francis of Assisi is thus doubly appropriate. He is the patron saint of animals - and his love for them during his lifetime is rightfully legendary. But he also was and is the bringer of peace.

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light;

where there is sadness, joy.

O, Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood as to understand;

to be loved as to love;

For it is in giving that we receive;

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life.

Reading with my Kids: The Jungle Books by Rudyard Kipling

Source of book: I own both Jungle Books

As regular followers of this blog recall, I participate in an online book club, hosted by my friend Carrie at readingtoknow.com. This is our second year, and we are focusing on classics - an even mix of adult and children’s books. This month’s selection was the The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. Although only the first book was officially selected, I and others decided to read both books..

My first experience of The Jungle Book came as a small child, when my mother read “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” to us. With all the good sound effects.

I believe this was before I had even seen the Disney movie based on the stories. (Yes, back in the dark ages when I was a kid, Disney movies were re-released in the theaters occasionally, but were difficult to find - even as video rentals - otherwise. Now, Disney has realized that immense sums of money can be made off of their back library.)

I later read through both books a couple of times. This time, I decided to read them to the kids.

The books were a little bit of a stretch for my two youngest, but the older kids thoroughly enjoyed them.

Kaa in particular was popular with my snake-loving older son. He was laughing uproariously during the scene in “Kaa’s Hunting” when Kaa paralyzes the chattering monkeys.

Kaa glided out into the center of the terrace and brought his jaws together with a ringing snap that drew all the monkey’s eyes upon him.

“The moon sets,” he said. “Is there yet light to see?”

From the walls came a moan like the wind in the tree-tops: “We see, O Kaa.”

“Good. Begins now the Dance - the Dance of the Hunger of Kaa. Sit still and watch.”

He turned twice or thrice in a big circle, weaving his head from right to left. Then he began making loops and figures of eight with his body, and soft, oozy triangles that melted into squares and five-sided figures, and coiled mounds, never resting, never hurrying, and never stopping his low, humming song. It grew darker and darker, till at last the dragging, shifting coils disappeared, but they could hear the rustle of the scales.

In the Disney cartoon, Kaa’s hypnotic powers are used against Mowgli, of course, rather than the monkeys; but they took inspiration from the book. (See below.)

In general, those expecting Kipling’s original to resemble the cartoon will be disappointed. Kipling isn't generally known for being a humorist. There are moments here and there, but in general one is more likely to find excitement and earnest adventure than comic relief. This isn’t a bad thing. Kipling writes a good short story, and his novels are also fun - particularly for boys. (I’ll particularly recommend Captains Courageous and Kim for children. Puck of Pook’s Hill for high schoolers - an underrated book.)

Also, the books are roughly half “Mowgli” stories, and half other, unrelated stories. Some of the stand-alone stories are set in India, while others are set in the Arctic - which seems a bit funny for a “jungle” book, but there you are. With the exception of “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi,” I think the Mowgli stories are stronger than the others.

An Adjutant Bird, which features in “The Undertakers.”

Because I think it is a really cool bird.

Ones I particularly like are “Letting in the Jungle,” “Her Majesty’s Servants,” and “The King’s Ankus.” I appreciated “Red Dog” more than I did when I was young, and was rather surprised that the kids liked it. It is pretty darn scary, and has more death in it than most of the others. That whole scene with the bees, though. That is one well written and paced, tension filled tour-de-force. Perhaps too dark for Disney, but that seems made for the movies.

The kids, though, adored the unforgettable mongoose. I think I did the sound effects pretty well. Maybe as well as my mom. Maybe. The kids liked them well enough. Again, filled with suspense and danger - and some pretty good trash talking too.

I will have to complain just a little, though, about having to explain Colonialism to the kids. I didn’t pay that much attention when I was little to the constant use of the term “white man.” Kipling is well known, of course, for his Colonialist attitudes. He was even a bit controversial in his own day. Still, it felt weird the way that “white man” stood in for “English.” He used that term too, but often, the color was enough to denote all the glory of the British Empire. Likewise, he tends to use his opportunities to contrast the civilized English with the “savage” ways of the Indians. He’s not entirely wrong. I could write quite a bit on India’s ongoing and longstanding problems with class and gender. (From the Caste system, which still classifies some as “untouchable” to the custom of “Suttee” and the modern gang rapes which make headlines. Also, for a compelling account of the transition from British rule to self government, I highly recommend Nirad Choudhury’s second autobiography, Thy Hand, Great Anarch. Hands down one of the best non-fiction works I have read in the last five years.)

Still, it seems a bit gratuitous in the context of the stories. (I particularly dislike “The White Seal” - in which it is the white seal that leads his darker brethren to paradise, because they lack the ability to look beyond their day-to-day life to the possibilities of establishing a civilization.)

I’ll also complain about the fact that in “Quiquern” - and, come to think of it - the only females who get names are the mothers. It is Kotuko and “the girl,” even though she is a key part of the adventure. Couldn’t she at least get a name?

On the other hand, Kipling does create imaginative renderings of his animal characters. (One of the reasons I like “Her Majesty’s Servants” is the way he translates the animal characteristics into personalities and dialogue. You really can imagine each animal talking that way. Likewise, in the advice and illustrations Baloo and Bagheera and Kaa give fit with their natural characteristics. Here is some of “The Outsong,” the poem of the final words given to Mowgli as he leaves the jungle.

Kaa:

Anger is the egg of Fear--

Only lidless eyes are clear.

Cobra-poison none may leech.

Even so with Cobra-speech.

Open talk shall call to thee

Strength, whose mate is Courtesy.

Send no lunge beyond thy length;

Lend no rotten bough thy strength.

Gauge thy gape with buck or goat,

Lest thine eye should choke thy throat,

After gorging, wouldst thou sleep?

Look thy den is hid and deep,

Lest a wrong, by thee forgot,

Draw thy killer to the spot.

East and West and North and South,

Wash thy hide and close thy mouth.

(Pit and rift and blue pool-brim,

Middle-Jungle follow him!)

Wood and Water, Wind and Tree,

Jungle-Favour go with thee!

In fact, the poems are an underrated facet of this book. Kipling was a skilled poet, and his best poems are memorable. As with the stories, some have aged poorly, but ones like “If,” his paean to stoical self control and dedication to principle are still relevant today.

The Jungle Books are imaginative and original, and do make a good read-aloud selection for older kids. Like Tom Sawyer, they also can spark a bit of a discussion about race and privilege; and also the importance of separating out the messages from the excellent writing. Because Kipling really does write very well. A little critical thinking can tease out the thrill of the story and the excellent ideas of honor, loyalty, truth, and disregard for the false promises of wealth from the cultural dross.

And really, go read your kid “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi” today. Rikk-tikk-tikki-tikki-tchk!

Note on Sterling Holloway:

Kaa has always been my favorite character from the Disney movie. (My mom’s too. She talked about him before we got to see the movie in its theater re-release.) Here is the key scene:

I love how Kipling’s vision of the coils which are ever changing in shape are rendered in the animation.

The character is voiced by Sterling Holloway, who is probably my favorite voice actor of the era. (Yeah, even beating out Mel Blanc by a hair. Maybe. I’m on the fence.)

In addition to Kaa (and his counterpart, Sir Hiss from Robin Hood), Holloway also voiced the grownup Flower in Bambi, the original Winnie-the-Pooh, Roquefort in The Aristocats, and the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland. That’s a pretty unforgettable bunch. And they will always sound like Sterling Holloway in my head.

Note on “The White Man’s Burden”:

Probably this poem caused more problems for Kipling’s reputation than any of his other works. (Indeed, this poem brought the phrase into the lexicon.) He wrote it as an encouragement to Theodore Roosevelt to colonize the Philippines. There is one school of thought that says that he intended it more ironically than it appears on its face. However, the bulk of Kipling’s work would tend to support the idea that he meant it exactly as it reads: fully in favor of the White Man’s duty to dominate the world.

Opinions differ on whether American involvement in the Philippines was predominantly negative or positive, of course; particularly in light of the prior Spanish colonization. History is messy in any case, and the “what ifs” can never truly be answered. Regardless, the poem is pretty striking in its arrogance. Read it for yourself and make up your own mind.

Take up the White Man's burden--

Send forth the best ye breed--

Go bind your sons to exile

To serve your captives' need;

To wait in heavy harness,

On fluttered folk and wild--

Your new-caught, sullen peoples,

Half-devil and half-child.

Take up the White Man's burden--

In patience to abide,

To veil the threat of terror

And check the show of pride;

By open speech and simple,

An hundred times made plain

To seek another's profit,

And work another's gain.

Take up the White Man's burden--

The savage wars of peace--

Fill full the mouth of Famine

And bid the sickness cease;

And when your goal is nearest

The end for others sought,

Watch sloth and heathen Folly

Bring all your hopes to nought.

Take up the White Man's burden--

No tawdry rule of kings,

But toil of serf and sweeper--

The tale of common things.

The ports ye shall not enter,

The roads ye shall not tread,

Go mark them with your living,

And mark them with your dead.

Take up the White Man's burden--

And reap his old reward:

The blame of those ye better,

The hate of those ye guard--

The cry of hosts ye humour

(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--

"Why brought he us from bondage,

Our loved Egyptian night?"

Take up the White Man's burden--

Ye dare not stoop to less--

Nor call too loud on Freedom

To cloke your weariness;

By all ye cry or whisper,

By all ye leave or do,

The silent, sullen peoples

Shall weigh your gods and you.

Take up the White Man's burden--

Have done with childish days--

The lightly proferred laurel,

The easy, ungrudged praise.

Comes now, to search your manhood

Through all the thankless years

Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,

The judgment of your peers!

Note on “If”:

I can’t leave a review of Kipling on a sour note. I really do love reading his works, both prose and poetry. I loved “If” the first time I read it, and still think that we would do well to impress its thoughts on our sons - and our daughters too.

IF you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;

If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!