A Short Adventure on a Fast Literary Journey

"He looked like Walter Abel". Photo Wikimedia, Public Domain.

Prefiguration of Lalo Cura by Roberto Bolaño

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I discovered this short story on the podcast The Joy of Serious Literature. It is not something I would usually read. But that is the point of listening to literary critics. To discover new things. 

But here, I have heard the commentary before I have read the piece. I usually prefer not to do this as it directs my thinking as I read. Like reading the novel after you have seen the movie. One keeps expecting the original to live up to the fidelity of critique. It doesn't make sense. 

Nevertheless, if I would never have read something otherwise, does it matter? I think the answer is no; literature provides life lessons we otherwise wouldn't or shouldn't want to, or couldn't, learn in real life without great harm. 

And that is what I have learnt from this experience, and continuing to do so can only add to my appreciation of literature and my exposure to different forms and cultures. Otherwise, I would never leave the harbour of my comfort zone. Ships are meant to be sailed. Comfort zones are meant to shelter one while resting between adventures. 

And there it is: a new adventure in literature from unexpected journeys. Surely this is an important way to learn. Why have I not discussed the short story? Read it. I have nothing more to say about such things.

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Spring time in Gunning

Spring time in Gunning; Photo by Michael de Percy.

The seasons in the Southern Tablelands region are governed by precision clockwork. The second day of spring and the sunlight explodes over the hill in its last minute glory, jolting me out of the chill. Standing in the same place five days before, the snow made me laugh and laugh for joy.

I grew up in tropical Far North Queensland, where the summer never ends. So the seasons are special to me now. The hearth in winter, the bare trees, and then the burst of life as spring stirs me back into existence.

Winter in Mareeba, Far North Queensland, July 2016. Photo by Michael de Percy.

Soon the winds will come, and I will wonder why I live here. Summer will burn me to a crisp. The winds will carry their blast furnace from the fiery west. The blinds on the verandah help create a vacuum that sucks the air out of my lungs in the long afternoons.

Cullerin Wind Farm, Summer 2017. Photo by Michael de Percy.

But then autumn will bring some of the loveliest weather I have known, and after the three-month ritual the winter shall return. Precision clockwork. In tune with the sun and the moon and the earth and my pets. In peace shall I rest with a good book in front of the fire.

But today, this second day, reminded me of the joy that is spring. And it is here!

Autumn 2017, Retford Park, Bowral. Photo by Michael de Percy.

Instead of Hemingway's iceberg, think Gabriel's peephole...

Steamers on the Magdalena River.  Photo: Clímaco Calderón (1852-1913), Wikimedia, Public Domain.

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

After powering through two books per week while on long service leave, back at work and teaching and applying for research grants and my literary luxury is thrown out with the bathwater. It has taken me six weeks to finish one book, and it deserved a more settled reading. Last night I realised there was less than half a page to go and I felt an overwhelming sadness and as I read the conclusion, I was at a loss. Can life and loving really be like that where it all turns out in the end? Or does the Disney gloss of undying love hide the protagonist's sinful deception sufficiently? To say I wasn't hooked would be a lie. There are so many things that Márquez puts into writing what people actually do but would die of embarrassment if they knew that others knew they knew. I found this enlightening because nobody else talks about such things. Of course, I am too embarrassed to talk about the things I mean, so it is better to leave one guessing. Márquez, at least, could always say that his work was fiction and he imagined such things, but I don't think so. He was 58 when this work was published. For once, I do not feel like I am behind the eight-ball. Not in terms of receiving the Nobel Prize, but in terms of living and loving and knowing. I have been listening to a podcast by Bryant Davis recently, entitled The Joy of Serious Literature. It is everything I ever wanted in a podcast. Something quirky, something different. So far, the podcast points to several non-traditional and non-white literary works that will certainly take me out of my comfort zone. Márquez certainly did that, but rather than freaking me out like Japanese adult manga might do, but there it is explicit, whereas Márquez drops thought grenades and leaves the reader to clean up the mess. When Florentino Ariza is resting in the brothel, I daresay the reader's imagination will be trying to see what is going on in the background. Rather than Hemingway's iceberg, think of Gabriel's peephole. But don't tell anyone. It's very powerful. And I do believe the conclusion left me with a Spanish version of saudade.

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