Cocktails with George and Martha by Philip Gefter

 

"Never again. It is like having an elephant sit on your chest for two hours."

    - My mom, remembering seeing the 1966 film Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? 

"It is still the truest rendering of love in marriage that I know. Call me a romantic."

    - From the preface, Cocktails with George and Martha

Ever since we learned about the custom of exchanging roses and books for San Jordi's Day on April 23rd (thanks, Helen Oyeyemi!), my partner and I have been dedicated observers. This year I received Cocktails with George and Martha: Movies, Marriage, and the Making of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? I don't think this had anything to do with how many martinis I drink, but it could be related. 

I love Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and could watch it just about any night. Like the author Philip Gefter, I find it a story about love in marriage, albeit through a scathing, harrowing perspective. From the beginning, Albee's dialogue crackles and Taylor is electric herself as the acerbic Martha. Burton transforms himself into the brilliant, embittered George and they ricochet off each other through the course of a drunken, vicious afterparty. George Segal and Sandy Dennis are perfect as the unwitting guests who fall prey to George and Martha's games. 

It was fascinating to learn about the behind-the-scenes of the movie. Gefter starts with a biography of playwright Edward Albee and describes the controversy that boiled around his play. Up until then, most marriages portrayed on tv were fairly conflict-free with delineated gender roles. Serious arguments, if there were any, would be conducted behind a closed door (off-screen). The dynamics between George and Martha, not to mention their antics, were condemned by some critics as obscene. That said, it was a sensation and touched on something in the zeitgeist.

Gefter links Martha's frustration ("She's discontent") with Betty Friedan's "problem that has no name" from her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique. Women were increasingly "discontent" with their lot and Albee unleashed onto the world a character who expressed all her frustration, resentment, and disappointment with terrifying articulation. Though it arose out of a particular era, Virginia Woolf remains a vital and vicious portrait of a marriage. It is about a specific, dysfunctional marriage, but it's also, ultimately, about marriage in general, and how frightening it is to live a truly examined life, bereft of illusions. 

The making of Virginia Woolf is laden with absolutely fascinating characters: Albee and his almost supernatural intelligence and wit, successful at such a young age; the obscenely glamorous Elizabeth Taylor and powerhouse husband Richard Burton, whose fame (infamy?) as a couple drove so many of the choices that were made about the movie; careful, introspective, insecure, and ultimately daring producer Ernest Lehman; and finally, perhaps the real star of the book, auteur Mike Nichols, whose work on Virginia Woolf seems to say to create a masterpiece you may need to be uncompromising, manipulative, and alienating. 

Into the Light by Mark Oshiro

A book told with a non-linear style and a sprinkle of a split perspective, Mark Oshiro delivers a story about belonging, community, home, and trust. It heavily utilizes themes of religion, neglect, abuse, and rejection, using the foster care system as a tool to convey them.

Manny is a Latino boy who's been living on his own for a long time. He's learned the rules of how to survive alone on the streets, but everything changes when he sees a television news program of a dead body found in Idyllwild, the secluded community where his sister lives. Eli lives in this very same community, strictly abiding by its rules and doctrines, but recent changes, events, and doubts form a crack in the neatly built foundation of his life. As the two boys' lives collide, we learn lessons of what family and community really mean. 

I enjoyed this book very much because of the writing style, in addition to the non-linear story telling. There's always a sense of suspense and you really get a feeling for how deeply impacted the characters were (are) affected by the world around them. One thing I learned after reading this book though:

Love will always find you regardless of who you are or where you go.

Check it out if you're interested!

- Leo H.

Ivy Lodge: A Memoir of Translation and Discovery by Linda Murphy Marshall

This book tells a story about a rather emotionally haunted house in Kirkwood, Missouri.

"Abraham Lincoln's comment that a house divided against itself cannot stand rang true in our home" the author wrote. She explains this both architecturally and psychodynamically. The Civil War era house in an upper class neighborhood that she grew up in looks beautiful and graceful from the outside, but rooms and spaces are awkwardly laid out within. On each floor, some rooms were left unfinished and empty. The same could be said of her family.

This is Marshall's account of growing up in that unusual house, and of the effects of her highly accomplished parents' neglect of both the house and their children.

The author grew up to become a language translator stemming in part from her constant efforts as a child to understand her parents' frequently cryptic and sometimes cruel ways of responding to their children's needs for emotional nurturance, safety and sometimes even critical medical care.

Marshall's retrospective translations of life in that house and family show how people can appear to have every economic, social and educational advantage while living disconnected, emotionally starved lives. The kindest thing I can think to say of her socially prominent, Washington University educated parents (long deceased) is that they weren't into parenting. That's putting it mildly.

Kudos to this woman for overcoming much of the childhood cruelty and neglect she experienced in the house called Ivy Lodge.

Reviewed by Marianne W

A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders

 

If you're in a reading slump, may I suggest George Saunders' A Swim in a Pond in the Rain? 

Adapted from his lectures to Syracuse MFA writing students, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain uses the writing of Tolstoy, Chekov, Gogol, and Turgenev to explore what makes short stories work and how reading can, possibly, make us better people.

Saunders begins by introducing these stories as resistance literature:

The resistance in the stories is quiet, at a slant, and comes from perhaps the most radical idea of all: that every human being is worthy of attention and that the origins of every good and evil capability of the universe may be found by observing a single, even very humble, person and the turnings of his or her mind. 

Throughout, we are asked to sympathize with characters seemingly very different from us, separated by time, nationality, sex, social stratum—but alike in deeper ways. A good author can connect us to these characters. The more you understand a character, the easier it is to extend grace towards her. If it works in fiction, can it also work with our passive-aggressive sister-in-law? One hopes. (That comment about the potato salad was really too much).

Each story is paired with two essays by Saunders full of his wit and insight. I wondered sometimes if I would have enjoyed the story on its own without his commentary. Always, I looked forward to reading what he had to say. Each story had something to teach us about writing and reading.

It was like learning how to read again. How generous Saunders was to share these essays with us! With a library card, we get to experience what it's like to be his students.

As a bonus, Saunders provides a few writing exercises. Even if you aren't a writer, I would encourage you to give them a try, if for no other reason than to deepen your appreciation for good writing. If you did, let us know what the experience was like by commenting below or stopping by the circ desk! 

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

    Chuck Tingle brings us a (very) different piece of art than what he’s made before. Handling themes of faith vs. intellect, religion vs science, and the ability to achieve a balance, this book brings us a suspenseful and chilling story of literally fighting your demons. 

    

    The book follows autistic high schooler and devout Christian, Rose Darling, as she suddenly begins to see strange figures following her. Rose’s day-to-day life and the mindset she has built around it are dictated by the doctrines and devotion that her neighborhood has towards religion. The book explores the idea that one can be devoted in different ways, and that one’s interests do not get in the way of one’s faith. 

  

    I enjoyed the book and it was pretty engaging. It wasn’t as scary as I thought it was going to be, but it did still have some pretty cool horror elements. The climax was really cool too, but I’ll let you experience that yourself!