Roof Beam Reader
Adam Burgess
Review: The Little Prince by Antoine de St. Exupery
This is the first book to ever make me wish I spoke French. Extraordinarily beautiful and imaginative. I read the book in one sitting, and look forward to picking it up again, or to sharing it with friends. It was truly wonderful and wondrous – I have far too much to say about it, but far too few words.
>Review: Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence
>Fast-paced, powerful, and engaging story about one of the trials of the century. Based on a true story, Inherit the Wind
Review: Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
It’s hard to describe what James Baldwin has done with Giovanni’s Room
Review: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Diaz
Junot Diaz has provided an immense contribution to contemporary American literature with this novel. He, somewhat perplexingly, incorporates Dominican folklore, American culture, and comic-book fantasy into one seamless, powerful work of fiction. The narrator is a simultaneous throwback to the historic story-telling cultures (Latin, native American, Greek, Irish, etc.) but is also a nod to the American pop-culture “Watcher” narration of comic books and graphic novels; an explainer of mysteries, an omnipotent and omniscient master of the histories of every character, minor or major, this “Watcher” also plays a role in the story itself, which would be strange in more traditional story-telling models (i.e. Homer’s “chorus”) but is in keeping perfectly with some of the more popular American versions, such as the namesake “Watcher” from the Fantastic 4 storyline. Interestingly, one need not be a lover of comic books, or even familiar with them, to appreciate the deep, rich, and painful history of the Dominican Republic being presented in this book. I for one had no knowledge of the terrors – both ancient and recent – faced by the Dominican people. Diaz rails on about kleptocracies, corruption, Trujillo, Hitler, Castro, etc. He portrays America, not as a savior, but as an escape place. Someplace “less bad” but which is not invulnerable to the assaults of the Domincan gangsters. This depiction of the U.S. is relatively new and refreshing – a loss for the Utopian hopefuls (first placed under attack by the likes of Fitzgerald, Barthes, and West) but a valid and honest gain for the literary canon. The annotations are both brilliant and hilarious; the story is engaging, fast-pace, and vastly encompassing. Perhaps the most interesting and appreciated nuance of this novel, for me, is that the title character, Oscar Wao
Review: Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie
I am fascinated with Native American/Indian literature and cultural history. In this collection of short stories, Alexie does a wonderful job of expressing the pain of the Native past, and the hopelessness of its future, in an unique way. I did find it difficult to stay interested, though, in that the stories were simultaneously connected and disjointed. Most of the characters were present throughout the collection, and each of the stories had something different to tell about life and experiences on the reservation, in the bars, in the HUD home shambles and, perhaps most importantly, on the basketball court. Still, the inability to tell a straight and direct story is perhaps the real dilemma which Alexie is attempting to express. All the characters’ stories are exaggerated – created for the illusions of comfort, power, home, and even health. We find similar methods in the old Irish folk tales and even early American Folklore (i.e. Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, etc.); however, there is something more honest about the Native tales – the magical realism isn’t intended to be believable, yet still manages to be so, somehow. Perhaps because, though the stories themselves are doubtful, the words and thoughts (the spoken and unspoken) express so much – and the heartache, the disaster that was Native American eradication and displacement, cannot possibly be told within the confines of typical “white man” narration. I’m interested to read more Alexie, after this collection. Though it wasn’t my favorite read, it was surely worth the time.
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