Yankee in a Red State

The ramblings of an expatriate New Yorker in the South ~ formerly known as The Kudzu Kronikles ~

Requiescat in pacem Norman Mailer

I discovered Norman Mailer's written work only recently.  I knew who he was, being a child of the sixties and seventies.  I was young but I had my finger on the pulse and Mailer's name came up often.  He spoke out against the war, one of the last generation of writers with enough balls to do so.

I had never read anything by Mailer, however, until I was a graduate student and taking a film class because I liked the way the professor thought.  (He still thinks, daily, and hopefully will for many more years.)  For our texts, we used the novels upon which the films were based and so I dutifully bought the books that were associated with that course number at the college bookstore.  Among them was The Executioner's Song, which, it turned out, was swapped for another text after the first day of classes, but I never returned the book.  I never read it either.  My first experience with Mailer is his final work, The Castle in the Forest, which was offered to me by Amazon.com in one of their incessant emails. It was inexpensive, however, if I pre-ordered the soon to be released paper bound version, so I indulged myself.  My reasons are twofold, however.  I was also aware that the English Department at my dear University that pays my salary had published the flagship edition of the Mailer Review, and so I knew I needed to find out, finally, why people enjoyed Mailer's work.

I have not finished The Castle in the Forest yet, as I plan to spend a lot of time on a train next week -- 24 hours each way -- and I plan to spend that time reading.  I am about 150 pages into it, however, and I had to put it down or I would have forgotten about grading papers and everything else like food and showers.  That's what happens when I read a GREAT novel.  I forget the world swirling about me and I am transported into the narrative, a silent watcher or the proverbial fly-on-the-wall.  Help meee!!

What I have discovered about Mailer, at least through this book,  is that he captures the imagination and holds it hostage, forcing one to see things one would rather not (the image of Hitler's father beating the family dog) but he does so without being lurid or over the top. His violence is bluntly matter-of-fact and narrated by a devil (not THE Devil with a capital d' he is referred to as "Maestro").  Suddenly the reader sees what Adolph Hitler, the impressionable toddler, sees.  Adolph witnesses control of a beloved beast through blows and intimidation and fear and it excites him.  He half reminds me of the character "Stewie" from the television cartoon Family Guy.  Since some episodes are seen from Stewie's point of view one can see how Stewie has the potential to grow up to be a little cartoon dictator.  But we're talking Norman Mailer, here, and not cartoon characters. I'm talking point of view.  In The Castle in the Forest, one reads about young Adolph Hitler from pre-conception.  These are the details of the incestuous forces that shaped a brilliant and passionately nationalistic yet perfectly sociopathic mind and this is the thing I am struggling with at the moment. i As a reader, and as a human alive in the twenty first century,  I have preconceived notions of Adolph Hitler.  One can dislike, even hate, the man, but how can one hate a child?  Mailer gives us the Maestro, of course.  The prime scapegoat for Hitler's evil.  Mephistopheles chose Adolph long before his conception in human terms.  This particular evil was conceived well before Herr Alois Hitler's ejaculation.

I have the rest of the book to read once I get through this next week of teaching and head on up north for the Thanksgiving celebration.  It will be my own little farewell to Mailer.

posted by: willothwisp at 17:05 | link | comments (1) |
literature, pop culture

A Hasty Decision ... Perhaps

Upon consulting with the director of graduate studies at the University, I am having serious second thoughts about pursuing my PhD.

She brought up some good points and some bad ones.  The good point being that I should do some real soul searching into the reasons why I want to pursue the doctorate.  The ones I listed in my blog post the other day are all bad reasons.  The bad point is that I cannot study what I want.  I have to choose something else because the professor I would be working with is already swamped with students and the market is glutted with people who specialize in contemporary literature.  My second choice would pit me against the same professor who guided me through the agonizing thesis process and if I thought THAT was torture, I can't begin to imagine what the dissertation would be like.

Then my chat friends weighed in on my dilemma.  Those who have either pursued the PhD or who are married to people who have, recounted tales of horror and stress unimaginable.  That made me realize that in order to devote sufficient time to the task, I would have to teach less, make less money (which is why I was seeking the higher degree in the first place - a bad reason by the way) and be generally miserable for the next five years.

What to do, what to do???

It makes no sense to involve myself in the study of something that I am not truly passionate about and if money is my object, I am pretty much out of luck.  I think I am earning about as much as I will ever earn - somewhere just above the poverty line and never enough to make the ends meet.  I need to teach high school if I want to make a decent living (and we all know teachers in Florida do not make decent livings).  The way things are looking at the University, I do not want to make a career ot of being an adjunct.  They just took away our sick days.  We truly are the migrant workers of the University world. We are not valued, but we are "treated humanely" according to one of our directors.  Yes, please put my bowl of food and water in the corner where I don't crap thank you.

Follow my bliss?  Joseph Campbell be damned.  My bliss doesn't pay.

What to do ...

posted by: willothwisp at 13:30 | link | comments |
the academe, dilemmas

Goodbye to Chat

I am going to have to give it up, folks.  My long reign as chat queen, that is.
I have spent the past ten years chatting with assorted folk from all over the world.  I have met quite a few of those with whom I have held nonstop electronic conversations, and have discovered that at least for me, ninety nine percent of the people are not ax murderers.
In fact, I have met people who have become my best friends.  Even better, we all chose to live in the same mega-florida-metropolitan area at about the same time so now electronic friendships have developed into real, human interaction types of friendships.
I have chatted with hippies and conservatives alike (they both have their good and bad points), and I have fallen prey to the lurid glow of online love affairs (my advice is don't go there).  I have traveled to "gatherings" in Chicago, Georgia, Indiana, Wisconsin, and I have hosted two gatherings of my own back in  New York . 



We always had fun,

and everyone generally behaved themselves although I missed the crazed, snowed-in-cabin-fever wedding party week when chat friends tied the knot. (She from Illinois, he from Sweden and yes, they met online.)  I even have a chat visitor now and again, as I feel confident in my people reading skills to know who is a nutcase and who is not.  Potential visitors take note: my couch is usually available to people who need a place to crash overnight but we have no extra beds so you have to stay in a hotel if you want to extend your stay and check out Busch Gardens.
But, and I say this with a sigh, I will have to give up most of my chatting soon because I have finally decided to commence work on my doctoral degree in English literature.  I decided this for a few reasons and believe me, if my MA was any indication of how the PhD will go, this was not a decision made without some serious thought.  First, I am going nowhere professionally with a Master's degree in English but I still want to write and work in the field so the only option left that will keep me from eating cat food in my waning years will be to get that PhD.  Yes, it is a mercenary reason.  No, it is not a noble decision.  It is supremely economic and based on selfish need for a roof over my head.  I can make more as a graduate assistant in the PhD program than I can as an adjunct.
Second, I really do miss studying and writing papers.  I am a glutton for punishment.
Third, I just want to collect one more tassel.  I have three.  I need to round out the set with four.
And who knows?  There are many universities in the area.  I might get a job with one of them and *gasp* head out on that tenure track but at my advanced age I kind of doubt it.
It will look good in a frame on my wall at the very least.
And people can call me "doctah."
w00t!
So goodbye to chat.  I will have to turn all my writing attention toward scholarly pursuits and not waste as much time avoiding academic work if I am going to succeed in this.  I may peek in from time to time but my chat friends will mostly find me here in this blog and read about my exploits in these personal essays.
Stay tuned.

posted by: willothwisp at 14:16 | link | comments (1) |
chat rooms

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