The Royal Game – Stefan Zweig (German) 

In the slim edition I have this novella is the first of three. Most of Game is told in a monologue by a man who, while imprisoned, becomes obsessed with chess. He begins playing games in his mind, in which he is both black and white; a kind of split personality develops. But how many times can you go over the psychological effects of isolation? (In this case the monologue lasts for twenty-seven pages.) When freed he’s on a ship bound for Buenos Aires, and a match between him and a grandmaster takes place. Another problem arises: how do you make a game of chess interesting? Zweig concentrates on the differing personalities of the two players. A fair try. But if this novel had been longer than seventy-one pages, I probably would have bailed out. I think the problem lies in a stagnant plot. Maybe, with a more open and lively subject matter, Zweig would fare better. That said, his stilted manner of writing doesn’t invite further reading.

F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Life in Letters

And what a miserable life it was. It started out well: when he was twenty-four This Side of Paradise was published (it was an immediate success) and two weeks later he married Zelda. He suddenly had plenty of money, and he and Zelda embarked on a whirlwind of extravagant living. But things turned sour pretty quickly. Fitzgerald’s next two novels sold poorly (including The Great Gatsby), and he relied on short stories – many of them hack work – for an income. The relationship with Zelda deteriorated: her emotional instability grew worse, his drinking grew worse (apparently he was a mean, destructive drunk). His health also grew worse (besides the effects of alcoholism, he had TB and heart problems). Zelda began an existence in and out of mental hospitals. Their one child would grow up in boarding schools. In Hollywood – he spent time there working (with little success) on scripts – Scott had a relationship with Sheila Graham, but that was sabotaged by his drinking. His reputation as a serious writer tanked, and he died from a heart attack at age forty-four; eight years later Zelda would die in a fire at Highland Hospital. These two mismatched people, who shouldn’t have met one another – much less married – are buried together in the same plot. This bio I’ve provided is more interesting then the book. Never, in a collection of letters, have I done so much skimming (or, in this case, skipping pages). Maybe a third of the book is taken up by the subject of his writing – either the creation of the novels or the financial side – and this is just plain boring. Not helping matters, FSF was a compulsive type; he would be so thorough in a discussion (even numbering his points) that he wore me out. And, since he didn’t write when he was drunk, that side of him doesn’t emerge (though he often apologized in letters for his behavior). Still, I formed some impressions of the man. He had his good points – some very good. He helped many writers get noticed (including Hemingway), and, when he had money, he lent it to those in need. Despite the fact that he wrote vindictive letters to Zelda at one point in his life, he always felt concern for her. He cared intensely about his writing, yet, to make money, he did work that he knew had no literary value; he did it not so he could live in luxury but to pay for his daughter’s schooling and for Zelda’s treatment (both expensive). Though he was an absentee father, he wrote long letters to Scottie (too long!) in which he instructed her on life. The last letter in the book is one written to her six days before his death, and I’ll end this review with a quote from it: “For the rest I am still in bed – this time the result of twenty five years of cigarettes. You have got two beautiful bad examples of parents. Just do everything we didn’t do and you will be perfectly safe. But be sweet to your mother at Xmas . . .”

Selected Letters of William Faulkner

There are problems with this collection similar to the ones found in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s. Why do editors think that a reader (who’s not a scholar) is interested in detailed descriptions of the creation of novels? Even more questionable are the many pages devoted to contracts, advances, etc. – shop talk. Take those two elements away and this book shrinks by at least half. And it does, in actuality, shrink – I skipped all that stuff. As for the rest, there was not much of interest for enquiring minds. Though Faulkner writes clearly and simply – there’s none of the dense convolutions of his fiction – he was reticent about personal matters. Added to that, the editor, Joseph Blotner, states that he showed respect for Faulkner’s desire for privacy by omitting “some intimate passages.” Well, if that’s his compunction – to show respect by shielding his subject – maybe he and Faulkner’s daughter (who collaborated on this book) should never have embarked on the project. Because intimate passages are what readers want. Prominent in these letters are concerns about money. One of the leading novelists of the twentieth century – in his late forties, with almost all his major works behind him – was often broke; in one letter to his agent he writes that he “did not have $15.00 to pay electricity bill.” He, like FSF, had to reluctantly turn to Hollywood and script writing to keep the lights on. As for personal matters, some do leak out, and conclusions can be reached by evaluating omissions. There are no affectionate letters to his wife, but a few that show dissatisfaction with family life; in one he states that “I am either not brave enough or not scoundrel enough to take my hat and walk out.” His drinking problem emerges – he did a lot of falling off horses in his later years. He carried on a correspondence with – and helped, which was unusual for him – a young writer named Joan Williams (was she pretty?). In the letters to her he dispenses a lot of talk about the “anguish of the artist.” What else? He has almost nothing to say about his fellow writers. He could be funny. I guess that’s about it.

Since I was suspicious about the relationship with Ms. Williams, I did a little research. She and Faulkner – who was thirty years older than her – indeed had an affair. She even wrote a fictionalized account of it. And Mr. Blotner wrote a biography about Faulkner in which he delves into the “intimate” matters he excluded from the letters. I guess the time had arrived for tell-alls. Faulkner would not be happy; he constantly stated that he wanted to be remembered only in his books. But lack of privacy is the price one pays for fame. All he can do now is turn in his grave.

My Mother’s House/Sido - Colette (French)

Colette wrote these books when she was in her seventies. She looks back at her provincial childhood, and most particularly at her mother. It was a happy childhood, and her mother was a unique person who stirs strong feelings of love and admiration in Colette. These feelings are evoked beautifully in My Mother’s House (by far the stronger of the two books). It’s composed of vignettes that don’t tell a story; they aren’t even chronological. They simply capture moments. Notable is her mother’s embracing of all life – plants, insects, animals, people. She’s able to truly see and appreciate, and we see and appreciate how special her gift is. The descriptions of nature are deeply felt and matter to the story. In the background there’s the shadow of loss. The city was calling to Colette; she will leave the world where she experienced pure happiness. But this is merely suggested in a few sentences; what the author is doing is celebrating a life and a time. In the preface she writes “I have come late to this task. But where could I find a better one for my last?”

Snow Country - Yasunari Kawabata (Japanese)

In this novel about love and sex (in their darker aspects) Kawabata concentrates on his main character’s thoughts – to the exclusion of much else. Though the short sentences impart an open, airy feel, reading this is a claustrophobic experience; one is caged in a gloomy and brooding mind. The book lacks a valid ending; there’s no justification for the inconclusive way in which Kawabata drops matters. A big disappointment from the author of The Sound of the Mountain. 

Go Down, Moses - William Faulkner

Faulkner and I have officially parted company. I hold three of his novels in high esteem – Light in August, The Sound and the Fury and Sanctuary – but I won’t be attempting Absalom, Absalom or anything else by him. “Was” (and why would a story have such a title?) is, with its clothes off, merely a juvenile comedy that falls flat. I had to take its clothes off because Faulkner buries the characters, their situations and the setting in bombast. He works at an intensity level that’s set far too high, and his convoluted prose creates a density that’s almost impenetrable. After abandoning “Was” I turned to “The Bear.” Better, if you place primary value on atmospherics. But that aspect hinders any momentum in the plot, and the slow going had me constantly looking to see how much I had left to read (and it was always more than I hoped for). I finally decided that life is too short to bother with a self-indulgent author who turned what should be pleasurable into a task. With relief and no regrets I put the book aside.

Lanterns and Lances - James Thurber

This was Thurber’s last book. He was in his sixties, almost completely blind (he writes of composing sentences in his mind, so he must have dictated them to someone), and, as he states in one of the pieces, he was a victim of “decreasing inventiveness.” It also seems (from references he makes) that he was drinking a lot. The effects of these factors are evident. The prose is nice, and some of the essays and miscellany are mildly humorous, but there’s a meandering quality, an aimless puttering around. Thurber muses at great length about words, and I can’t believe that many readers would find this of interest. But for me these weaknesses elicited sympathy rather than censure. Thurber was trying to write when there was almost nothing left in the tank. One high spot is “The Wings of Henry James.” Thurber gives his personal responses to James’s work, and in doing so he ranges far and wide. Erudite but not scholarly, this is one of the few literary essay that can be described as entertaining. His review of the stage version of “My Fair Lady” is also outstanding, and I was glad that he got so much pleasure from the show.

You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town - Zoe Wicomb

These interconnected autobiographical stories begin when Frieda is a child in South Africa and end when she’s a young woman living in England, soon to have a book published (the one we’re reading). None of the stories have England as a setting, so only her formative years in Cape Town are covered. Race plays a major role because Frieda, who is “mixed,” is growing up during the time of apartheid. In a prose that’s dense and inventive (though not daunting), we get Frieda’s observations of herself, the people she interacts with (mainly family), and the place where she lives. As she matures she acquires an array of negative emotions (anger, obstinacy, etc.). We all have our flaws and demons, and honesty is laudable; still, a groundwork of understanding must be established to create empathy with the reader. It was the waywardness of some of Frieda’s actions that I found hard to accept. I wouldn’t have wanted her to be sugarcoated, but Wicomb seems determined not to win the reader over in this portrayal. I wondered what kind of person the adult Frieda turned out to be; maybe Wicomb’s defiant attitude answers that question.

The Track of the Cat - Walter Van Tilburg Clark

Clark explores big themes in this novel. The cat (not the one that’s killed at the end, but the mythical “black painter”) is a symbol of evil. Evil cannot be killed. It takes many forms. It’s in the implacable blood lust of all predators. It’s in nature’s brutal indifference for life. Most importantly, it’s present in the human heart. A withdrawal from the world (which the almost-saintly Arthur does) or passionate love (as Harold and Gwen have) can possibly counteract it. But, overall, this is a dark novel. The explosive tensions in the snowbound ranch house are the equivalent of savagery; with words people tear at one another. In Part Three, when Curt goes to hunt down the cat, human evil is pitted against animal evil. The description of the hunt is nature writing at its best, for it conveys a powerful sense of the forbidding environment that Curt is struggling to survive in. The novel is unusual in its structure and tone. There’s the early death of a person who seems to be the main character. Interspersed in the narrative are italicized dream sequences that portend the future. An undercurrent of spirituality is present – not in a religious sense, but as if a spirit world exists (one that the old Indian, Sam Joe, knows how to interpret). In the midst of much darkness, a pure light is cast by the love between Harold and Gwen. All these elements work, as does the moving and enigmatic ending. *

The Unvanquished - William Faulkner

I was mildly engaged with the characters and plot, so I made it halfway through this book. Seems the author was also mildly engaged, for this is watered-down Faulkner. For the most part he writes clearly (he published all but the last chapter in popular magazines), and he makes an attempt at humor, particular with the “nigger” boy, Ringo. So he wrote this to appeal to the general public. Though there’s one long riff of prose that’s full-blown Faulkner – a convoluted cascade of words, many of them obscure – and I thought: What bad writing! The scene is supposed to be descriptive, but it describes nothing. It comes off like a parody of Faulkner. But sometimes he’s a parody of himself without trying to be. Was he a genius? Yes, in some of his work, but his genius bordered precariously close to the ridiculous.