Henry James, the Mature Master

Bought Sheldon Novick's Henry James, the Mature Master yesterday at Capitol Hill Books. Read the introduction on the homeward train. Ran into this comment on past perceptions of James: "He was vaguely thought to have had ample independent means and so to have been able to write self-indulgent works that never found a wide audience." Having been reading Joyce and Beckett and their biographies over the past couple years, such a sentiment jumps out at me as a contrast to the starving artist that Joyce became and Beckett identified with, however falsely. James, Joyce, and Beckett were all literary artists whose works were never popular outside literary circles. Does the production of all three fall into the category of "self-indulgent works"? Is all art self-indulgent as a matter of course? If a genuine work of art blossoms into popularity, in the grossest sense, is that ever by design on the part of the artist? Or always a matter of luck?

Love

All spouses who, after many years, have grown to love each other in fathomless ways, actually, all of them, love the same person, the same everyman that dwells hidden beneath all the layers of individual personality, identity, history.

Theodore Zeldin

I've just begun Zeldin's An Intimate History of Humanity. He writes well enough: simple sentences and simple diction; doesn't hide indecision behind a lot of fluff. I like the meditations. They remind me a bit of Annie Dillard. And the seriousness of the themes (work=slavery; conversation between the sexes; loneliness) brings Thomas Nagel to mind. My only complaints revolve around lack of depth and direction -- the meditations seems to peter out rather than conclude.

Francis S. Collins

Having gotten through Sam Harris, Daniel Dennent, and Richard Dawkins, I thought I'd give the other side a look. I picked up Huston Smith's Why Religion Matters and put it down after only a chapter or two: entirely too ignorant of science to be meaningful. I've just put down Francis Collins's The Language of God. Though I got as far as chapter four, I really ended all meaningful interaction with the book on page 67 where I read the following:

The big Bang cries out for a divine explanation. It forces the conclusion that nature had a defined beginning. I cannot see how nature could have created itself. Only a supernatural force that is outside of space and time could have done that.

Coming from the head of the genome project, the absurd logic here defies all understanding! All this and, by extension, the rest of the book, really says is this: I can't understanding X, Y, or Z, so I guess there must be a God! Needless to say, I won't waste anymore time with Collins.

The Rambler

Yes, so I've gotten through three of Johnson's Rambler essays. As I was reading this afternoon on the train, I was reminded of Thomas Nagel, an odd association but apt from the standpoint of a writer's gut-level embrace and finely wrought examination of his subject matter. And I thought, too, of Emerson, but with quite a contrary analysis. I've never understood Emerson's popularity as an essayist except that his sentences are emminently quotable. But that was Emerson's whole reason for being, to be quotable...but never mind the lack of sense behind his aphoristic constructions. The difference between Johnson (who must have been one of Emerson's templates) and Emerson is that whereas Johnson uses language (and disciplined rhetoric) to express his ideas, Emerson uses language to form his ideas ... a dicey proposition at best.

Toronto

Scene from our Embassy Hilton room--






Hard to believe this is a color photo but it does give a good idea of how really bleak the weather was while we were there.

Note: Never do this again. Paul and I drove on Friday to Toronto. Instead of the 8 1/2 hour trip promised by Google Maps, we spent 13 1/2 hours battling icy roads, snow, and, bad as the previous two obstacles combined, Toronto traffic. The funeral of Paul's Aunt Anne was on Saturday. Paul & I met cousin Ken and friend (Ann) for breakfast at our hotel, the Embassy Hilton in Markham. The funeral was held in an Anglican church a couple of towns distant. Reverend Paul read the Gospel -- and read it very well. Afterwards, petite sandwiches in the parish hall with lots of people while the family went to the cemetery. A first cousin of Paul's, Marguerite, talked Paul's ear off while Denise and Mark (friends of Ken's who had visited us with Ken a few months ago) talked my ear off. Afterwards, we went to cousin Christine's for some welcome rye-on-the-rocks, a light dinner, much chatter, and many photos with the family of three sisters and two bothers...minus Ken, who had another engagement.

Drove back on Sunday. This time, about 12 1/2 hours. Complicated by the same obstacles as the trip up, plus, halfway back, Paul suddenly manifested a little stomach flu. Needless to say, we toured the restrooms in every rest stop from Pittsburgh to Frederick.

Samuel Johnson

As I write this, I am listening via the internet to the classical station at DR Netradio, out of Denmark. It is the best classical station I've ever listened to.

In other matters, I finally found my Everyman Library edition of Johnson's Rambler essays. I've been wanting to read these because, having finished Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson a couple months ago, and wanting more biographical detail (Boswell is unparallelled on Johnson's "character" but short on events) my evening read lately has been Bates's Samuel Johnson, a paragon of the biographical genre, rightly praised by Dirda as one of the best written biographies in the English language. In any case, I've reached the part in which Bates is discussing Johnson's moral writings and praising the Rambler essays as the masterpiece of the form. So, I'd like to put Bates aside for a few evenings and go directly to Johnson.

I know full well that this is a dangerous strategy. A few months ago, I left off in the middle of Hans Kung's memoirs in order to read his published dissertation on Karl Barth's theology of justification. Reaching the middle of that work, fascinating though it was, I left off to "quickly" get though Dennett's Breaking the spell, and have not gotten back to it. The same thing happened with Kierkegaard. I started reading the new biography biography by Joakim Garff, broke off to peruse Either/Or before Garff left the topic, got into the middle of it, and then got distracted with...who knows what? Maybe Kung.

So you can see, there is a pattern here...and not a healthy one. There was lately an essay in the NYT by a popular writer who wrote about the fact that he reads dozens of books simultaneously. That's me.