scrawls.

scrawls

still cheaper than therapy*

31.10.05

Esterhazy

so i'm reading this new book, celestial harmonies. And originally it was going to be for the Mom only then i got it and sort of decided, well, it's very big and kind of heavy and has very small print, and it might be a better act of kindness to not give it to the mom. Amazon says it has eight hundred and sixty-four pages, which is more than harry potter had. so. i kept it instead of giving it to the mom. and i'm reading it, now, because even without having finished pynchon i didn't want to go in the bedroom (where the pynchon was) while the cable guy was here because the dogs were crated and they would have gone nuts with the barking, and really they were going mad enough already. After we gave them chewies. and i'm on, maybe, page fifteen. I'd maybe even give it twenty. One loses track. plus i read the introduction (which i never do, and i'm not entirely sure why i did, and it was a crumby introduction, so i'm sure i won't read another for quite a while - entirely too fawning, Oh mister esterhazy i love you i love you i love you and NOBODY CARES SHUT UP). so. And i'm wondering.

This is a hungarian author. it was published first in hungarian. and i'm wondering. does it read like the old folk tales from when i was a kid because it actually does and if it does, is that something deliberate on his part or does it just happen because he's hungarian? or does hungarian just have that distinct a sentence structure, or paragraph structure, or it was the same translator or it just comes through in the language? or does it just sound the same because they were hungarian and it's hungarian and something in my subconscious wants it to be the same? At what point does it so resemble my old books of folk tales? it could be anywhere, it could even be the subject matter. And the funny part is i think - i - this person, he - or in book one, anyway - and i'm flattering myself to think so. But he almost - or probably vice versa, that i almost sound like him, and is that real, or is that flattering myself, or do we just come out of some singular tradition? the hungarian school of thought? is there some particular way that We Are? and how is it so familiar to me, being only half anyway, and entirely removed by an ocean? what is it in my blood that is breathing this like drowning?

and can i substitute this for not having any grandparents left?

so, on page twenty or thereabouts, only i'm going back to pynchon now because the cable guys have left and i can finish him Finally (only i haven't read V yet, and besides, i'm neglecting Joyce, again) i'm loving it. and what kind of a snob am i, that i'm only reading these Huge Fucking Epic Novels? confession: i read Galapagos again two weeks ago. (Does it piss anyone else off that their mother read Slaugherhouse-5? that's Mine.) i was low, but not low enough for salinger.

and one almost has to wonder: do i want to ever read salinger again? can happy people read salinger? it couldn't work. one of those things. is that even allowed? and if i like salinger, as i remember it now, whether i want to read salinger again? because it couldn't possibly be the same. can a happy person read salinger and remain happy, and would i want to take the risk?

salinger wrote no Huge Fucking Epics. i'm safe. but. celestial harmonies. i think i am going to want to hear more about the Women. but i was expecting that. oh mister esterhazy ...

scrawled @ 03:45