Reading post: March

In March I planned to focus on "classics," loosely defined, that at some point in the past I said I'd like to read. "Classics" are often long books, so I figured I wouldn't read very many this month, but it turned out that length wasn't the problem. I just had all these other things to read, like book after book about autism and a very long biography of Dwight David Eisenhower, and the book for the book group. My "brief reviews" book this month was long too. It's fine! It's all good. I can read classics some other time.

Books I said I'd like to read (Classics)

Passing by Nella Larsen (1929). In 2020, I read Larsen's first novel, Quicksand, and noted,

Larsen is better known for her second novel, Passing, but that was checked out at the library (I might read it later). 

Passing is short, only about 120 pages, and very tightly organized. I didn't enjoy the book, but I was fascinated by the subject, the question of "passing" as white, back in the days of Jim Crow and the one-drop rule. The main character, Irene, who occasionally tries to pass, is forced to think deeply about the subject when she meets an old friend, Clare, who is married to a white racist and thus passing 100% of the time, but still wants to hang out with Black people, including possibly Irene's husband. It is a thought-provoking book.

Pierre or The Ambiguities by Herman Melville (1852). In 2019, I read Moby-Dick, inspired in part by Jill Lepore's article on Melville in the New Yorker. In that article she also discusses Pierre, which I had never heard of, so I made a note that I'd like to read it. Hmm. The edition I got from the library is truncated -- it's an attempt to recreate Melville's original version, before he tacked on some extra stuff to appease his dubious publishers. But that means it's not the Pierre that other people have read. Probably doesn't matter. This edition also has wonderful illustrations by Maurice Sendak, so that's a plus. 

Anyway, Pierre is one of the weirder books I have ever read. Moby-Dick is actually not hard to read, but Pierre is -- I think intentionally -- written in this florid, confusing style that was just so hard to get through. The story itself is nuts. Pierre, 19 years old and engaged to be married to blonde Lucy, meets a dark young woman, Isabel, who claims to be his half-sister (from an illicit affair his father had before marrying his mother). Pierre, who has a weird, vaguely incestuous relationship with his widowed mother -- he calls her "sister" -- doesn't want to destroy his father's reputation by acknowledging Isabel, but he wants to take care of her. So he comes up with a crazy scheme: pretend that he has married Isabel (his sister -- maybe -- but no one else knows that) and then run away with her. He breaks up with Lucy, his mother disowns him, his cousin pretends not to know him, his mother dies and leaves the estate to the cousin. Lucy, who still loves Pierre, comes to live with him and Isabel, and her mother disowns her. And then they all die (sorry for the spoiler -- was anyone actually going to read this?). Completely nuts. Well, I've read it. It's done.

Books from the New Yorker's "Briefly Noted" reviews

The Life and Times of Hannah Crafts: The True Story of The Bondwoman's Narrative by Gregg A. Hecimovich (2023). No one really knows who wrote The Bondwoman's Narrative (the oldest known novel written by an American Black woman), but Hecimovich makes a good case for Hannah Crafts. In part the book is fascinating -- the research that he and others did is just wild. But I found his descriptions of the men who owned her to be boring and hard to follow. I kept thinking, you shouldn't have written this chapter like this, you should have done XYZ differently. A family tree would have helped. So it's a mixed bag, but in general pretty darn amazing. I will now have to read The Bondwoman's Narrative.

Other reading

Your Child is Not Broken: Parent Your Neurodivergent Child Without Losing Your Marbles by Heidi Mavir (2023). My third book about autism, and I liked it a lot. The author's son was not diagnosed until he was 14 and started experiencing autism burnout. The author is herself also autistic, diagnosed late in life, and the second half of the book is more about her, which I was less interested in. Also, she's in England, and things seem different there. She had a lot of horror stories about how parents of neurodivergent kids are treated. I learned a lot from this book, especially the first few chapters, and I liked her attitude. I started to think that perhaps I haven't done everything wrong with Teen B, perhaps I've even done some things right. What a thought.

Uniquely Human: A Different Way of Seeing Autism by Barry M. Prizant with Tom Fields-Meyer (2015). My fourth book about autism and it was great. Everyone with an autistic kid should read this. I may even buy the updated edition from 2022. As far as I can tell, there are two possible approaches to autism: behaviorally modify the heck out of kids until they act more normal OR let them be themselves and work to understand what makes them happy and less stressed. The first approach (ABA) is very popular these days, but Prizant follows the second approach, which appeals to me (it may be possible to do some of both). Really good book. Rocket Boy read it too, after I finished it.

Eisenhower in War and Peace by Jean Edward Smith (2012). I am so close to the end of my presidential biography project! Eisenhower was elected in 1952, serving until 1960, when I was born. My parents were Adlai Stevenson supporters, so I grew up thinking there was nothing to like about Ike. In fact, I think he was a pretty good president (based on this book), although he made some very bad decisions, causing the current mess in Iran and destabilizing Guatemala. I was also uncomfortable about his romantic history, his affair with Kay Summersby and his relationship with his rather trivial wife Mamie. I was planning to read just this one book about Ike, but now I'm thinking I might read Kay's tell-all book, Past Forgetting. I'll see.

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell (2020). The book group book. I was really interested in reading this book about Shakespeare's son who died at age 11, possibly of bubonic plague (but we don't know). It's mainly about his mother, Anne/Agnes Hathaway, an interesting decision since nothing much is known about her. So O'Farrell makes up all kinds of stuff, turning her into almost a Mary Sue. Then Hamnet dies and Agnes becomes more human. I don't know. I found the book disappointing. I was hoping for something like Penelope Fitzgerald's The Blue Flower, which is my idea of a perfect work of historical fiction. This isn't that. I'd like to see the movie, though. Wonder what the book group will think of the book.

NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity by Steve Silberman (2015). My fifth book about autism. It's 477 pages long, but I started reading it on the 25th and finished it on the 27th. It's fascinating. The author is a journalist, not a clinician, and it's not a book about how to deal with autism -- although there are lots of horror stories about what NOT to do. It's a history book, all about how autism was first recognized, the ways in which it has been misunderstood, the different approaches to treating it, all the controversies, and where we are now -- or were, in 2015. Supposedly there's an updated version of this book too, and I think I should buy it. A very useful, helpful reference.