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Book Talk, Part 2

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First Things First Before I address more of that distant past rattling in my brain, I want to write about four books I’ve read since Tom and I returned from our road trip in early June. Three of these books, and tangentially, the fourth, fit in with my general topics of book banning and individual rights. In the order I read them, the books are: The Bassett Women, by Grace McClure; This America of Ours: Bernard and Avis DeVoto and the Forgotten Fight to Save the Wild by Nate Schweber;  The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride; and The Door of No Return by Kwame Alexander.

four books

Note: I wrote the above paragraph over a week ago and then I lost my train of thought. In part that was just my usual mix of avoidance, inertia, and letting ideas percolate slowly through my mind. Also, though, we had our parrot friend Phoenix visiting last week, we’ve had friends over for dinners, I’ve worked in the native plant nursery and weeding invasive plants in Hillside Park, I’ve done my high intensity interval trainings, I’ve read too many political articles, and we’ve had–just when I thought a mild and lovely September here was a fading dream–it appeared.  I am making myself sit here at the computer until Tom makes dinner. After I straighten up the kitchen, I am out the door before it  gets dark. I will be back at the desk tomorrow morning, hoping my thoughts and words are ready.

Phoenix (photo by William Terrill)

Huron sachem butterfly in the condo garden

I’m Back and now I need to understand why I wanted to tell you about these books. I have been thinking about each of these four books, but how do I pull them together with a conclusion about the interplay between control and freedom? I think going back to the texts will help me understand.

The Bassett Women (copyright 1985 ) In May I bought this book at the Quarry Visitor Center in Dinosaur National Monument. Since early childhood I have loved books about nature and history and I have gravitated toward reading about indigenous peoples, the immigrants who came to this country, and the enslaved people who were brought here unwillingly. When I first visited the American West in 1970, I was beguiled by all the stories I heard, and that has not changed. These last three decades, I have also especially sought out memoirs and accounts of  women in the West. When I say, “sought out,” I mean sought out in a desultory fashion. I am no scholar here; just a quirky reader. When I came home from the West this June, I read The Bassett Women right away. I enjoyed reading this history of Ann and Josie Bassett and other pioneers, ranchers, and outlaws (such as Butch Cassidy) in Brown’s Park in Northwestern Colorado. However, the composition teacher/editor in me didn’t think the writing was as clear as I wished, nor was the historical account as fastidious as it should have been. Still, the book will find a place on my bookshelf and I will continue to think about the women and men trying to survive in a challenging, if beautiful, environment.*

bookshelf

This America of Ours: Bernard and Avis DeVoto and the Forgotten Fight to Save the Wild (copyright 2022). I am searching for modifiers to describe how much I like this excellent book. I am almost giddy. When I am reading a nonfiction book, I like an index, a substantial bibliography, and many footnotes. This America of Ours has 33 pages (small font) of footnotes! In this book I read that historian and writer Bernard DeVoto was born in Ogden, Utah; Tom lived in Ogden when he was young. Bernard fell in love and married Avis from Michigan; I’m from Michigan. Bernard and Avis loved road trips through the West just as Tom and I do. Avis and Julia Child became close friends–bonding, at least partly, through food. Tom and I have loved cooking recipes from Julia Child’s cookbooks. More seriously, Bernard and Avis cared about preserving the land, the people, and the overall environment of the American West. This meant speaking up for forest rangers, small ranchers, and others who cared about the land. This meant speaking up against backroom political deals, and the anti-Constitution, anti-egalitarian, anti-immigrant schemes of Senator Pat McCarran (Nevada) and Senator Joe McCarthy (Wisconsin) who were in league with FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. I need to stop myself from going on too much longer–just two more things. Author Nate Schweber follows the trail of attorney Roy Cohn from his early years working with the nefarious McCarran and McCarthy and identifies links to his protege, Donald J. Trump. On a happier note: I learned there is a DeVoto Memorial Cedar Grove off U.S. Highway 12 near Lolo Pass in eastern Idaho. Turns out, Tom and I have driven this road twice, the first time in 2015 and then again in 2018. Along this road in the Nez Perce–Clearwater National Forest we found the rivers, the forests, the rocks, and the sky moving and beautiful beyond words. We didn’t know about this memorial of ancient western red cedars. If Tom and I ever find ourselves on another western road trip, we won’t miss it again.

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store (copyright 2023) I had read James McBride’s The Good Lord Bird a few years ago. I liked it and continued to think about it since. A month or so ago, when I saw The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store on display at a local bookstore, I wanted to read it. I say this as a person who tries to limit my reading of beautiful but difficult books–I can only take so much pain and brilliance. I was happy I took this chance. I’ve never been to Pottstown, Pennsylvania, but all my life I have traveled through Pennsylvania. Some of my earliest travel memories are of queasiness on the mountains and in the valleys of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Tom and I have traveled through fog on steep and twisty back roads through damp forests in Pennsylvania. Now, I want to find the fictional Pottstown of McBride’s world in The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. I want to go to Chicken Hill and see Malachi, “The Greatest Dancer in the World” and, perhaps, a magician. I want to see the kindness of Moshe and Chona. I want to feel the strength and uprightness of Nate and Addie, Paper, Miggy, and so many others. I want to hang out with Fatty and Big Soap. This book–full of the Depression, antisemitism, racism, sexism, poverty, and abuse–was an exhilarating read and it gives me hope for the country and the world. The book is also full of music, humor, hijinks, mystery, and love. I agree with the New York Times review by Danez Smith that, “The book is a murder mystery locked inside a Great American Novel.” If you like to read novels and are not afraid of pain and brilliance, this book may be for you.

The Door of No Return (copyright 2022) About two weeks ago, needing to calm down after finishing The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store, I made a beeline for the middle grades** shelf of the Friends of the Library store at Central Library, Arlington Public Library, three blocks from my home.  I read many middle grade books. I do that because many are very well written, because middle grade books are usually good for a couple of sittings, and because, even when things are tough for the characters, some optimism pokes through. On the library shelf I found The Door of No Return. I  read this 398 page book in several sittings, but it didn’t calm me down. This  brave book in verse tells the story of Kofi an eleven-year-old Asante boy in 1860 (in what is now Ghana). The verse structure brings an immediacy to the narrative and, complex and gripping as the plot is, I  think it is  generally accessible to middle grade readers and old women alike. I just found out a sequel, Black Star, will be available by the end of this month. I am going to get on the library waiting list for it.

Conclusion I took you wandering with me through these books because I couldn’t let them go–even if they took me off the straight(er) and more narrow path of my exposition of book banning and individual freedoms. That’s how it is for me with words (and music and nature). There are however, some resonances between these four books and my overall concerns with books and an open and egalitarian society.

*Long before the Bassett family arrived in Brown’s Park there is the underlying history of the indigenous peoples who originally lived there. More on this topic in Book Talk, Part 3, forthcoming.

** Middle grades books are often considered to be for 8- to 12-year old readers. As far as I can tell, though, this designation is somewhat flexible. The majority of the Newbery Medal and Newbery Honor books are within in this category. So far, I have read approximately 145 Newbery winners.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Book Talk, Part 1

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In November 2023, I mentioned that I had been working on an article about book banning that I wanted to post during Banned Books Week 2023. I also wrote that, “I am still planning to complete that article, but I need to ruminate a bit more before I finish.” I have taken more than “a bit” of time, as 2024’s Banned Books Week is next month! Although I have thought about book banning and censorship through these many months, I am still having trouble focusing on my topic. Actually, I think–as a lifelong reader and proponent of the First Amendment–that seems reasonable. Figuring out our society’s rights and responsibilities is an important and complex task.

I think what complicates the First Amendment and censorship issues for me is that in real life things are complicated.  I have read (and continue to read), loved, talked about, written about, and taught many books that are currently on some censored lists (e.g., Lord of The Flies, To Kill A Mockingbird, Animal Farm, The Handmaid’s Tale, Beloved, Of Mice and Men, and many others). I also believe, though, that not every book is appropriate for every person–at a certain time, a certain age, or, sometimes, ever. However, I think that that choice resides with the individual (or, in the case of young children, a caring and responsible parent or surrogate), not some self-important group of parochial culture police. Right now, this minute, I am still pained by the memory of a Readers Digest article I read as a young teenager about the Communist Chinese depredations in Tibet in the 1950s. I read that article close to 60 years ago and I am not over it yet.  However, as much as I wish I had come across that article when I was older, I am confident that it helped form my world view, which empathizes with others, acknowledges and respects diversity, and seeks equity and inclusion for all humans.

Concerning the First Amendment, I have supported freedom of expression throughout my life. I am proud to have annoyed teachers and employers throughout my life standing up for my and others’ rights to speak freely. Even though I was a shy person, I got an early start on speaking up. In first grade, the teacher had we children cutting out little strands of (apparently male) figures holding hands for “brotherhood week.”  I asked the teacher (something like) is there a “sisterhood week?” The teacher laughed at my question.

I have always understood, though, that  there are some limits on speech, such as the cliche about yelling “fire” in a crowded movie. Or, in this decade’s prime example, inciting violence at the U.S. Capitol.

To make this large and (to me) somewhat troublesome topic more approachable, I am going to break it down into a few smaller articles. I am not sure yet whether my comments will follow chronological order. I may revert to my early penchant for stream of consciousness writing.  Note: This began when I was introduced to the technique when I read Thomas Wolfe’s Look Homeward, Angel: A Story of the Buried Life  when I was 16.

Milford, Michigan, 1960s From kindergarten through graduate school, I have had my share of uninspired, ill-prepared, and, occasionally, bad teachers. I have also had many excellent teachers. Even better for me, several of these were English teachers, and English was my favorite subject.  What I really need to do here is thank my good teachers. Thinking about ongoing efforts to control what teachers are allowed to teach in public schools, I have lately thought of my eighth grade literature teacher, Mr. Dennis. I can’t remember all the books we read in his class. I do remember we read Anne Frank: A Diary of a Young Girl, Hiroshima, and  Journey to the Center of the Earth. We also probably read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and possibly Animal Farm  and at least a couple others. The reason I can’t remember for sure is that I was reading so many paperbacks on my own back then (from a small paperback bookstore available before school in an anteroom of the office). For example, I am not sure I picked up PT 109: John F. Kennedy in World War II or whether we read it for a class.

As I have been thinking about Mr. Dennis, other good teachers, and my home, school, and community upbringing, three ideas came to mind. First, with some few exceptions, such as people who may have had learning challenges, we students knew how to read. Second, even though my school–Milford Junior High School–was no hotbed of liberality, the teachers, the school administration, and our families seemed to think we were able to learn about serious, even terrible, matters such as the Holocaust and the bombing of Hiroshima, Third, those same teachers, administrators, and parents liked us to read. We had the aforementioned in-school bookstore, an easily accessible school library (not too big), and an easily accessible public library (not too big) only blocks away. In that one small junior high that I attended, I took three years of English, and  one year each of literature, speech, and journalism. No wonder I have so many words coming out of me. Thank you teachers for helping me learn about the world that was bigger than my small Midwestern town of Milford, Michigan.

PT 109: John F. Kennedy in World War II, circa 1963

Part 2 to come soon