Book Report: The Three Questions

42. Jon J. Muth, writer and illustrator, The Three Questions (2002) (1/14/19)

This story is based on a similarly titled piece by Leo Tolstoy, originally written to raise funds for the victims of an anti-Jewish pogrom in Kishniev. The three questions in each are

• When is the right time?
• Who are the right people?
• What is the most important thing to do?

Tolstoy's story involves a tsar who thinks that if he can find answers to these questions, he will never fail at anything. He summons advisors from all over, but each group gives him different responses to the three questions, none of which satisfies him. He decides to consult a hermit who is famous for his wisdom. When the tsar arrives at the hermit's hut, the man is digging in his garden but appears exhausted. The tsar offers to help. In the midst of the work, a wild-faced man comes running from the forest, clutching his bleeding stomach. The tsar takes him in and helps him, nursing him to back to health. It turns out, the man was an enemy of the tsar, sworn to kill him as vengeance for the death of the man's brother. But now he changes his tune and swears allegiance to the tsar, for his benevolence. When all that is wrapped up, the tsar turns to leave, saying he's sorry he didn't get answers to his questions. But, the hermit protests, of course you did!

Had you not taken pity on my weakness yesterday and dug these beds for me, instead of turning back alone, that fellow would have assaulted you, and you would have regretted not staying with me. Therefore, the most important time was when you were digging the beds; I was the most important man; and the most important pursuit was to do good to me. And later, when that man came running to us, the most important time was when you were taking care of him, for if you had not bound up his wounds, he would have died without having made peace with you; therefore he was the most important man, and what you did for him was the most important deed. Remember then: there is only one important time – Now. And it is important because it is the only time we have dominion over our selves; and the most important man is he with whom you are, for no one can  know whether or not he will ever have dealings with any other man; and the most important pursuit is to do good to him, since it is for that purpose alone that man was sent into this life.

In Muth's version, the tsar becomes a young boy, Nikolai; the advisors are a great blue heron, Sonya; a monkey, Gogol; and a borzoi dog, Pushkin. The hermit is a "turtle," Lev (actually a giant tortoise that, inexplicably, lives high up a mountain—but who's counting?). And the injured enemy becomes a gentle panda, injured in a storm, and her baby (neither bearing ill will toward a soul). There is still digging in the turtle's garden, and nursing back to health. And the lesson remains the same:

Remember then that there is only one important time, and that time is now. The most important one is always the one you are with. And the most important thing is to do good for the one who is standing at your side. For these, my dear boy, are the answer to what is most important in this world. That is why we are here.

What is really lovely about this book, as with so many picture books, is the art—in this case, exquisite watercolors.

Here is an interview with Jon J. Muth, about this book in part. In it, he says: "In the pictures I was probably influenced by Zen's 'nothing extra': showing what is essential, without decoration. Depicting nature as large and man as small is a feature of Asian painting and I realized later I had done that. I did these things unconsciously. Zen is a Buddhist way of sitting still and being present in the moment; a way of waking up to the fact that you are alive and connected to everything right now. The answers to the questions are all about that."

Book Report: The Principles of Uncertainty

41. Maira Kalman, The Principles of Uncertainty (2007) (1/10/19)

This book, an illustrated journal, started out as a monthly blog in the New York Times. It covers the year from May 2006 to April 2007, with such titles as "Sorry, the Rest Unknown," "Heaven on Earth," "Ich Habe Genug," and "The Impossibility of February."

The book is replete with Kalman's distinctive faux-naive gouache paintings, as well as embroidery and photography, all accompanied by seemingly stream-of-consciousness thoughts and wonderings about "what it all means." As she puts it on the cover fly leaf, "What is this book? What is anything? Who am I? Who are you? stop it forget it This is a year in my life profusely illustrated. Abounding with anguish, confusion, bits of wisdom, musings, meanderings, buckets of joie de vivre, and restful sojourns."

The book covers everything from (starting on page 1) the extinction of the dodo—followed immediately by the extinction of Spinoza and of Pavlov's dog—to elegant hats, people who have difficulty walking, sumptuous fruit platters, sinks, and obituaries. She describes heaven on earth as her aunt's kitchen in Tel Aviv, where they eat honey cake and talk about dead Russian writers. In August,

My sister and I go to Israel during the short, furious, the-world-is-doomed war [with Lebanon].
For a wedding.
Because you CANNOT postpone weddings in DARK Times—Especially in dark times.
Who knows when the light will come on again?
Are things Normal? I don't know.
Does life go on?
YES.

She shares with us some of her collections: of empty boxes, of sponges from around the world, of postcards from the Hotel Celeste in Tunisia, of whistles, candies, and suitcases. Her November entry begins,

We could speak about the meaning of life vis-à-vis non-consequential/deontological theories, apodictic transformation schemata, the incoherence of exemplification, metaphysical realism, Cartesian interactive dualism, revised non reductive dualism, postmodernist grammatology and dicey dichotomies. But we would still be left with Nietzsche's preposterous mustache which instills great anguish and skepticism in the brain, which leads (as it did in his case) to utter madness. I suggest we go to Paris instead.

And we do! Delightfully! There are superlative tassels, desserts, and pink beds, as well as a bit of malaise prompted by a nightmare. But it is soon overcome by a visit to the Luxembourg Gardens and some pinky pink paté.

January, "Completely," consists largely of photographs of individuals walking on streets, all taken from behind. I found this chapter especially beguiling, in part because I identify with the subject matter (I don't like taking photos of people—but from behind? sure!), but also because it made me think about her process, how much of her painting must rely on photos either that she takes or that she collects. It gives a clue to her roving, all-noticing eye.

 

Here is an interview with Kalman, "What's in Your Toolbox," that gives insight into her process—or her mind—or both.
Here's a blog post on how she combines gouache with ink lettering.
Here's an interview discussing how she stays creative.
Here is her daily routine (she starts by reading the obituaries).
And here's an interview about her writing.

Here are a few more examples of her eye, wit, and whimsy:

Also, the final chapter of The Principles of Uncertainty is still online.

Book Report: Math Curse

40. Jon Scieszka, with illustrations by Lane Smith, Math Curse (1995) (1/10/19)

I got around to working on the garage today—the half with boxes of books—and at the bottom of a box full of natural history guides and essay collections I found three larger-format books, all of which I will now proceed to review. The first that I (re)read was Math Curse. What a delight!

It concerns a child whose math teacher, Mrs. Fibonacci, says one Monday, "YOU KNOW, you can think of almost everything as a math problem...." Turn the page and, perhaps inevitably: On Tuesday I started having problems. They kick off first thing:

I wake up at 7:15. It takes me 10 minutes to get dressed, 15 minutes to eat my breakfast, and 1 minute to brush my teeth.
SUDDENLY, it's a problem:
1. If my bus leaves at 8:00, will I make it on time?
2. How many minutes in 1 hour?
3. How many teeth in 1 mouth?

Getting dressed proves to be a math problem ("How many shirts would I have if I threw away that awful plaid shirt?" is one pointed question). Breakfast is such a problem that the child ends up going hungry, overwhelmed by the number of cereal flakes in a bowl.

The whole morning is one problem after another.
There are 24 kids in my class.
I just know someone is going to bring in cupcakes to share.

Lunch presents a fraction problem by way of pizza. Social studies becomes a problem about measuring the 4,000 km long Mississippi River—using 1 cm long M&Ms. English is a word problem. Even Art turns into a connect-the-ancient-Mayan-numerals problem. "Math is just a total problem," and at the end of the day—someone remembers that they brought cupcakes! Twenty-four of them, for twenty-four students—but how to share them with Mrs. Fibonacci without some gnarly fractions entering in? Our hero finds a way, fortunately.

Dinner brings no relief, and then there are the nightmares:

I dream I'm trapped in a room with no doors and no windows. The room is covered with a lifetime of problems. I have only one piece of chalk. How do I get out? I'M ABOUT to give up and die, when the answer to my problem comes to me. Fractions. I break the chalk in half. Then I put the two halves together. One half plus one half equals one whole.
     I put the hole on the wall and jump out.
     I'M FREE.

The next morning, the original problem about getting dressed and catching the bus is a breeze! No problem! The math curse is broken!

Oh but wait. In science class, Mr. Newton says, "YOU KNOW, you can think of almost everything as a science experiment..."

The math problems alternate between real and silly. The art alternates between fairly simple and frenetic. There is so much to look at in the illustrations. This book is simply a whole lot of fun.

Here is an interview with the illustrator, Lane Smith (not about this book specifically, but it's interesting anyway).

And here are a few of the spreads (the final one being what is quoted above):

Book Report: The Tomten

39. Astrid Lindberg, from a poem by Viktor Rydberg, with illustrations by Harald Wibert, The Tomten (1960) (1/8/19)

A while back there was a discussion on FB about favorite children's books, and a friend mentioned The Tomten by Astrid Lindberg. I had never heard of it. So of course I ordered it: it's someone's favorite!

It's a sweet story about a little gnome who wanders around a snow-covered farm one night, talking to the inhabitants in tomten language (a "silent little language" that everyone but adult humans can understand) about how spring will soon be on its way. He visits the cows, the horse Dobbin, the sheep and their lambs, the chickens, the dog Caro, and even the humans (the children, if they were to awake, would be able to understand him—but they sleep on). At the end of his rounds he returns to his corner of the barn, and the cat, leaving behind only "a line of tiny footprints in the snow."

Here is the original Swedish poem on which Lindberg's book is based, with a translation.

I especially enjoyed this story for its illustrations, which remind me fondly of my sister-in-law's home place and her brother's farm: it's all so Norwegian. (Well, okay, this tomten is actually Swedish, but I'm familiar with Norwegian farms, and they're quite similar.) Here are the few I could find online:

Curiously, I am unable to learn anything from the Swedish Wikipedia page on Astrid Lindgren (who also wrote the Pippi Longstocking books, one of which my Norwegian language partner and I are currently tackling) about the original Tomten book. She wrote a heckuva lot of books and won a heckuva lot of awards, though, I'll say that.

A tomte is the Swedish version of a Danish or Norwegian nisse, a mythological creature associated with the winter solstice. He was once believed to be the "soul" of the first inhabitant of the farm, the one who cleared the tomt (house lot).

As Lindberg writes of this one, "He is an old, old tomten who has seen the snow of many hundreds of winters. No one knows when he came to the farm. No one has ever seen him, but they know he is there. Sometimes when they wake up they see the prints of his feet in the snow. But no one has seen the Tomten."

Thanks to Andrew for the recommendation. I love knowing there are tomtens out there, watching over things.

Book Report: Dead Water

38. Ann Cleeves, Dead Water (2013) (1/8/19)

I had finished Cleeves's Shetland mysteries a while back—or so I thought.* I recall the fourth of the series being disappointing, ending as it did with the (unnecessary, to my mind) offing of Inspector Jimmy Perez's fiancée. I figured Cleeves did that in order to send Jimmy into such a funk that he'd never want to do murder investigations again and she could escape his broodiness, turn to her new sleuth, Vera.

So imagine my surprise the other day when an avid-reader friend on FB mentioned Cleeves's newest Jimmy Perez mystery. I immediately dashed to the library, and yes, the first of a new quartet was in!

This one takes off six months after the fiancée's death. Jimmy is in a funk, but he's lured back into another complicated mystery that embraces Shetlanders and incomers ("soothmoothers," as they're called), big petroleum and alternative energy, old betrayals and new beginnings, love and jealousy—and always the beautiful Shetland landscape. There is a whole cavalcade of characters that keeps the red herrings swimming furiously by. In the end, I was surprised by the killer, and moderately convinced of his culpability.

(One teeny detail that Cleeves slipped up on: she mentions that the first victim's camera was found in the office of a press officer he'd spoken with earlier in the day. But the book opens with him shooting photographs immediately before he was killed. Tsk tsk.)

Nothing about the writing stands out: it's serviceable. The book is plot-driven. Quite satisfying.

Didn't I say not too long ago that I'd be going off mysteries for a while? I'm saying so again. At least this one had me guessing right to the—very abrupt—end. And yeah, I'm glad to see Jimmy back in the game. I hope he finds love again (there are strong hints that he will). I'll finish the next three over time. There's no rush.

*5/19/21: In fact, I was wrong about that: I had only read the first book of the first tetralogy. So yes, I skipped the second and third books—which is very unlike me. I like to read series in order. But Goodreads reminds me that I needed an airplane read, and the fourth Shetland book was there in the airport bookshop, so . . . my fate was sealed. I doubt I'll go back and read those two. As far as I'm concerned, Fran is dead and Jimmy Perez is trying to work his way back into life. No sense seeing the two of them in love, knowing what's about to happen.

Book Report: The Devoted

37. Blair Hurley, The Devoted (2018) (1/4/19)

This book is about a spiritual journey—sort of—and it's a coming-of-age story—also sort of, since the protagonist, Nicole, is thirtysomething when we meet her. She may not be young, but she's certainly confused enough.

The narrative begins in the present, as Bostonian Nicole seeks to escape her Zen "master," who remains nameless—and who for years has mixed sex in his private chambers and psychological domination in with his spiritual teachings. Nicole's brother has found Nicole an apartment in New York, and she's considering a change. On Christmas Eve, while mulling things over at a church service, she meets a recent divorcé, Sean. They grow close, but she decides to move to New York anyway. There, very quickly, she is contacted by a young woman, Jocelyn, who exhorts her to tell her story. Which she does, though she's never told anyone all of it before. She also dabbles in teaching Zen on her own, to a gaggle of variously motivated women seeking solace—until the Master reappears and begins exerting control over her again from afar.

The story Nicole tells Jocelyn goes back to her youth in Boston, where she was raised Catholic by a kind father and a depressive mother who finds extreme comfort in the Church. This takes place just as the sex abuse scandals are hitting and churches are closing. Nicole finds herself not just drifting, but sailing full-speed away from Catholicism and from her mother. She begins flirting with Buddhism while still in high school, then hits the road with two boys on a quest to join a monastery in Colorado. They drift; they grift; eventually, just as they are about to reach their goal, there's a blizzardy accident and one of the boys dies. She is brought home. Her father becomes ill and dies. She finds the Peaceful Healing Zen Center and spends ten years there, becoming the Master's "favorite student."

This is a first novel, and it felt like one: a little ragged, a little uneven—despite the glowing accolades by such luminaries as Joyce Carol Oates and Chang-Rae Lee (both call it "beautifully written") and Anita Shreve ("Hurley is a gorgeous writer"). There were lovely passages to be sure, but the whole package made me wonder if she had an editor. (She did, a "deeply insightful" one whom she credits in the acknowledgments.) There were some hefty metaphors, such as a never-ending soap-caked glob of hair that she pulls from her shower drain, which represents the past ten years, going back to when she was twenty-two, full of desire to be "the Master's for this life and all the next lives." Or bonsai trees cultivated by the Master, discovered by Nicole's brother: "He could appreciate the aesthetic pleasure of these delicate things. Beside them was spread an array of tools—wire cutters, snub-nosed pliers. And now he could see the technique behind the artistry: black wires spiraled tightly about the slender fingerling trunks, embracing them cruelly." Bonsai trees as Zen students. Or vice versa. There are multiple, detailed descriptions of the many (many) odds-and-ends—knickknacks, antiques, pieces of furniture—that Sean, a bit of a lost soul, collects. And there are occasional small but jarring inconsistencies (in one paragraph, Sean tells Nicole, "My wife . . . was so eager to get to California that she . . . left me all the furniture"; then two paragraphs down he says, "My wife took a lot of furniture." What? Which was it?) Characterizations were often uneven, motivations incomplete, certain actions unlikely.

All that said, Nicole's clumsy questing for some sort of spiritual foundation and meaning—well, it was fine. I guess I believe that she found her own path in the end, or at least was on the way there. The most satisfying passages did evoke the beauty of practice and devotion. "Sometimes meditation was like following a bouncing ball down a flight of stairs. . . . It floated her down levels of thought, leading her toward something silent and immovable at the core of her." When she attends an Easter service to appease her unforgiving mother, "She could see a mosaic of human faces, all of them familiar in their still poses. Of course they wanted the same things she did . . . the promise that sadness was not the inherent state of their lives, that the axle of the world turned on secret wells of joy."

I especially enjoyed a section where Nicole explains her personal experience of the Noble Eightfold Path (right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right effort, right livelihood, right mindfulness, right concentration) over a certain summer and fall, all narrated in the second person. Under Right Speech she avers, "We must learn how to love so that the beloved feels free." Perhaps, then, the journey of this book is Nicole's finding of both real love and freedom.

I'd give the book three stars on GoodReads because of its unevenness. I'm not sure I'd recommend it to most of my friends. But I'm not entirely sorry I took the time to read it, either.

Book Report: The Forest

36. Riccardo Bozzi, with illustrations by Violeta Lópiz and Valerio Vidali, translated from the Italian by Debbie Bibo, The Forest (2018) (1/3/19)

I learned about this book on Maria Popova's Brain Pickings as well. She quotes the biologist David George Haskell: "The forest is not a collection of entities [but] a place entirely made from strands of relationship." Bozzi's The Forest, she writes, embraces this "relational, existential mesmerism" of forests, artistically, emotionally, spiritually.

I was intrigued by the poetry of her description, and by the illustrations she featured. Despite the introduction, however, I was unprepared for the sumptuousness of this beautiful and unique volume, both physically—from the vellum-wrapped cover to the full-page embossed faces, the colorful, organic illustrations to the die-cut holes inviting the reader to look more closely—and philosophically.

The story is simple yet mysterious: We are presented, in spare words, with "an enormous, ancient forest, that has not yet been fully explored." Facing these words is the first embossed face, of a baby boy, whose eyes allow a glimpse of feathery green beyond. The words and colors lure us onward, into a grove of young pine trees, and there is another baby, this time a girl. As the stiff pages unfold—sometimes out into gatefolds, like hidden treasures—we venture deeper into the forest with these two. We meet fellow travelers, explorers who carry packs, kneel to gaze into watery pools, climb rocks, dance around fires. "Some choose to help each other out, while others prefer to push on alone." The babies become young children, then adolescents, then adults. These explorers leave traces of themselves along the way, and all eventually encounter a steep, difficult climb, with a sheer ravine at the end. The final spreads are ethereal, consisting of a lot of blank white, disappearing lines of embossing, and then new hints of color, as everything comes full circle.

Here are a few of the spreads: