By Alex Ness
May 8, 2022
The origins of this article came from answering emails, and one in particular, as the writer of an email asked me, What do you actually read for all you recommend and invite people to read, what do you read? Immediately I thought of defending myself, suggesting that I read everything I review, and that I am open about all I like. But then I realized that not everyone has read my work online since 2002. Not everyone has been able to read it now, or even long after it had been written, as various websites have died, others changed, and still more erased my presence, for good or ill. I do read anything I will write about and review, but I don't write reviews for everything I read. If I don't enjoy a book, I might finish it, but only as an exercise in hoping it turned out better than it had been. Most of the time, I have limited hours in my life, and to give attention to works I think suck or even are just mildly annoying, or bland, is a waste of my time and your reading eyes. I absolutely don't assume everyone's taste is the same, that my views are all correct, or that my views altogether matter.
I have spent a great deal of time in my life reading. In my youth it was for school, but also for pleasure. In my teens it was to feed a need of hope in a life that had to that point, very little. In my college years when I was serious about my education, I was constantly reading to learn all that I could. But in the moments of quiet with studies over or classes on break, I'd read as much as humanly possible. I read history and poetry, fiction, myths and legends, true crime and horror. I read a book listed below in the original French to understand it deeper. I tried reading one in the original German, but that did not help me understand it, in English or German, it was a journey to get to the depth of the work. By my early 30s I understood what it was that I thought, and who I was, and did so by the depth of my reading. No one I know can get through Grad School without learning how to quickly digest information, through reading, and for me, it taught me lessons to get more out of my reading than at any time before.
Authors presented in no alphabetical order or any order of preference.
Some people I know despise Hemingway's writing, as they see it as artless, sparse and uninspiring. Others I know despise the man, for being an emotionless bully. But for me, I know he used his life experiences in his art, so, I am not going to judge the man by the art, or art by the man, I have to take art as being art. And for me, with my thimble sized attention span, and vague focus, his economic use of language tells the story through emptiness and shadow as much as by character voice and actions. I think of the stories he tells, and ask, what isn't being said every bit as much as, what does the narrative voice tell me, and what does that mean to me. It isn't complex in terms of hidden meanings, but there is depth that isn't seen upon first look. Hemingway might have been a prick. He might have committed suicide and had issues. But his writings are like drinking water after being in the desert for a month.
Can I exist for the moment and the sake of existing? I went through college years thinking the concept of existentialism was silly. There is far more to live for, I thought, than this selfish way of thinking. It is true, existentialism could collide with religious outlooks, or those people who think your life is meant to be lived entirely for others. However, I came upon Camus at a time when I was going through my own existential crisis. Camus argued that rather than see the Titan Sisyphus who was condemned to push a rock up a hill, only to have his day's work lost, as it rolls down, as a tragic character, as one who was rather more. He said, in order to see the worth of the life of Sisyphus, we must see him happy with the labors he is allowed to do. That is, whatever the reward, life is captured best by living it in the moment you are in. His works are wide reaching and to some highly challenging. But his work the Plague is highly relevant today, the Stranger even more so. They both talk about alienation from others, how we see strangers as being dangerous, when in fact they might well be kind, or gentle. We separate ourselves from others, and we alienate ourselves, when we refuse to live for the moment. I've said it before, but Albert Camus may have saved my life. Because after repeated life failures, and the loss of my mother in 2012 and a good friend to suicide in 2014, I wanted to stop living and by whatever means available. When I reread Camus I saw the absurdity of my dilemma, and I refused to quit.
EZRA POUND
Ezra Pound's poetry and prose are stunning in their depth and excellence. I see myself in his characterizations, and his view of what a poet should be. I haven't a single percent of his talents or genius, so before you decide that I think I am his equal, you'd be wrong. His words move me deeply, on a level no other writer has ever reached. He is honest, clever, and able to get you to understand his point, by speaking to you on your level, without snobbery. But then he became wrapped up in his distaste for the wars of modern Europe and America, and saw their root cause as being bankers and elitist capitalists. He tried to use his public persona as a pulpit to preach against the power held by those with money. He did so while offending many, without use of hate. The more it seems he was not given a respect or agreement by those he aimed his words at, and he was not listened to, the more he drifted into hate. He chose to use the racist language about Jews and money, and he ended up moving to Mussolini's Italy. He tried to call out against the war, but once it started, he was marginalized, and his pulpit mostly lost. This genius was said to have gone insane, and when the war was over, he was held for a decade in a mental hospital for his crimes against America. Upon his release he returned to Italy, and eventually came to regret and renounce his racism. His poetry remains brilliant, and his insights into literary works and culture remain beyond equal in my reading experience. But the fact that I need to explain why I like him, to avoid being accused of being one who ignores his sins, demonstrates his controversial status in American culture, and literary circles.
FRANZ KAFKA
In a world of precise measures and logical demands, Kafka stands as a writer who crafted works that were surreal, disturbing, but somehow, presents these maddening concepts, with a hyper realist approach to dialogue and inner thought. Some have called his work absurd, but they are not. They Are a form of existentialism, but from a much darker realm than Camus or that of Jean-Paul Sartre. They might be considered bizarre, or weird, but the idea involved is that whatever we experience, we have desires, we have fears, and we can well imagine them, but the world stands off in the distance, being real, concrete, known, and unemotional. In order to understand that world, one must live within it, and experience it. And by experiencing it, adds emotions to the bizarre thoughts, which makes for a powerful writing. Kafka was hopeful in his despair, and by showing the reader so many disturbing concepts, while being firmly standing on solid ground, there is a dynamism at work, where two opposing ideas act in ways to channel energy to the story. I think I might like Kafka's person more than his writing, but I like his writing more than I can say. It moves me.
YUKIO MISHIMA
Yukio Mishima wanted to be seen as hyper real example for the Japanese and Japanese males specifically, wrote about subjects that were new in ways, both to Japan and to the international world. He spoke about beauty as an objective definable concept. Despite believing in emotional honesty and right actions following such thought and feeling, he was an intellectual who seeded his works with knowledge being a concept that could be a quest worth having. In a book about a monk trainee and arsonist's actions who burned down a temple due to being unable to attain such beauty he offered knowledge as the answer to the questions asked. In this rash and extremely emotional tale, Mishima focused upon transformative knowledge rather than finding emotional understanding, or even redemption. Writers of his era often avoided Mishima's subject matter. He asked and considered questions of gender and orientation. His book Confessions of a Mask, is an account of being gay, but wearing a socially acceptable disguises. And, far from wanting to be seen as soft or emotional, he believed in redemptive violence, but he was completely aware of the need to couch in historically Japanese roles. He was a Japanese patriot and yet, not a xenophobe. He spoke English, had western clothing, and smoked American cigarettes. He wanted a Nobel prize for literature, and to be seen as Japan's greatest writer. But he also wanted to be perceived and judged the finest living writer, of the international world. I think but for his end of life and militant patriotic views, he was one of the best writers in history.
e.e. cummings
I have an affection for the work of e.e. cummings. I think his poetry is playful, wildly unique, and he deserves all of the praise he has received and the respect for his work it has garnered. He is the person who helped the most pay for the legal defense of Ezra Pound, and it helped achieve Pound's release, so, I appreciate his fidelity to other poets, regardless of their outlook. I enjoy his work very simply, visually, and when you invest the time, it pays in layers of meaning. Few poets achieve that.
EDGAR ALLAN POE
In grade school all the way to high school I pretty much thought Edgar Allan Poe was the poet I found the most rewarding and worth reading. I read Beowulf, Virgil and Homer and lots of other classical authors and works, and loved them, but I was limited in my exposure to poetry that spoke to me, in the way Poe did. While I had written my own poetry since being able to write, it was the weird and different worlds that Poe took me to in his poetry that entertained and moved me. There was a depth of thought in his work that exceeded the limits of the reflective poetry other poets wrote, that I had to read in various courses on English and Literature.
About Getting Reviews from Me
I
can be found on Facebook, Twitter or through email
Alexanderness63@gmail.com. I accept hard copies, so when you inquire at
any of these places, I'll follow through by telling you my street
address. I no longer have a post box, although I regret that. It was a
crushing defeat to no longer have a p.o. box, when I came to realize I
was getting so little product it made no sense to pay for the privilege
to not receive mail at both my home and at the post office. If you send
hard copies for review I will always review them, but if you prefer to
send pdf or ebooks to my email, I will review these at my discretion. I
don't share my pdf/ebooks, so you can avoid worry that I'd dispense them
for free to others.
MY LINKS:
My Poetry AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com
Published Work AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com/2007/01/My-Work.html
Amazon Page Amazon.com/author/AlexNess
Cthulhu Horror CthulhuDarkness.Blogspot.Com
Atlantis & Lost Worlds AlexNessLostWorlds.Blogspot.Com
All works and art remain the property of the owners/creators and nothing more than fair use is asserted.
No comments:
Post a Comment