Lee's mother Marguerite is the one who really gets the bad end of the deal in Libra. A single mother who was divorced twice, that was cheated on and then received not a penny of a settlement in one of the divorces even though the man she married was quite wealthy. She was then left to raise Lee on a minimum wage job that she has to work long hours at. She repeatedly is having to fight for her and Lee's livelihood, though she deserves so much better. Lee doesn't really help her out much either. All Lee does is skip school, ride the subways, and resent her and tell her things like "I am entitled to better."and "They're [Lee's brothers] in the service to get away from you." (DeLillo, 35) . Then after taking care of Lee, and working her ass off for him for years, he high tails it to Russia and gets married, without a word to his mother. Even when he gets back to the states, he avoids his mother for a while, then when he can't avoid her any longer he only begrudgingly agrees to allow her to visit himself, Marina, and her only grandchild June. Marguerite doesn't seem to be a particularity overbearing mother, or have an annoying personality, Lee just treats her badly because he can, much like he does with Marina.
When Lee is taken custody for the assassination of Kennedy, it has been a year since Marguerite has seen him and suddenly she is thrown into the chaos with Lee as reporters and F.B.I. agents hound her for information, as she tells Lee "I told them I didn't even know about the new grandchild. I had to endure a year of silence and now there is family news everyday on the radio." (DeLillo, 423). When Marguerite was telling all of this to the F.B.I. agents they kept saying to her "But you are the mother", which adds humiliation to the event because yes, she is the mother. She raised Lee, a murderer, an assassin. Not only that but she was so out of touch in his life, granted not of her accord, that she didn't even know about one of her own grandchildren being born, so now she has to answer to why her son turned out the way he did to the whole country.
When Lee is shot just days after Marguerite sees him for the first time in a year, she has to go through the pain of not only losing her son, but having his death broadcast and played over and over on television for the whole nation to see. She has to face preachers that turn her away because they don't want to pray over a murderer. Her son, the murderer. While Marguerite is at the funeral, she is pleading her case to a judge in her head, insisting that she wasn't a bad mother, and Lee wasn't a bad boy, rather that he was the victim of a plot his whole life.
I don't think Marguerite was a bad mother, she did what she could with what little she had and she obviously cared about Lee. Now all of a sudden, Lee is dead and was found guilty of killing the President of the United States, and she is left alone in the world to carry the burden of his crime.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Kudos, DeLillo
I don't know if I'm particularly "enjoying" the reading the novel, though time seems to crawl a little faster while I'm reading it now that the plot is nearing the actual assassination. Even so, my attention is not quite captured. Maybe it's purely a generational thing, but I just don't find the Kennedy assassination to be something worth obsessing over. I guess I've always just taken the facts at face value. Plus, we know a lot more facts about the assassination now than people did when it initially happened. However, after attempting to create my own historical short story, I have much more respect/appreciation for what DeLillo had to go through to write this book that I find so hard to read, especially since the internet wasn't mainstream until the 1990s so he had to do all of his research without all the information at his fingertips.
There is so much detail, and research that must've been done to provide that detail, which is pretty unmatched in the books we've read thus far (though perhaps somewhat in Ragtime). I can imagine there was also a lot of pressure on DeLillo since there were probably a lot of people who were Kennedy assassination junkies and would be scouring the book for errors, along with the general pressure to represent a historically significant event in America well. I think DeLillo really did a great job representing all the known information, and even adding some speculated information with the grassy knoll shooter, as unbiased and accurately as possible. We talked a bit in class about how Branch really represents DeLillo in the novel, showing how varied, random, and obscure much of the evidence and data was on the Kennedy assassination. I really like the image of Branch sitting in his paper-covered office and spending hours sifting through it all and trying to find what's important out of it, because I imagine DeLillo had a very similar experience. (I experienced a minute version of this while writing my own novella, though I never encountered any photographs of goat heads filled with gelatin.)
There is so much detail, and research that must've been done to provide that detail, which is pretty unmatched in the books we've read thus far (though perhaps somewhat in Ragtime). I can imagine there was also a lot of pressure on DeLillo since there were probably a lot of people who were Kennedy assassination junkies and would be scouring the book for errors, along with the general pressure to represent a historically significant event in America well. I think DeLillo really did a great job representing all the known information, and even adding some speculated information with the grassy knoll shooter, as unbiased and accurately as possible. We talked a bit in class about how Branch really represents DeLillo in the novel, showing how varied, random, and obscure much of the evidence and data was on the Kennedy assassination. I really like the image of Branch sitting in his paper-covered office and spending hours sifting through it all and trying to find what's important out of it, because I imagine DeLillo had a very similar experience. (I experienced a minute version of this while writing my own novella, though I never encountered any photographs of goat heads filled with gelatin.)
Friday, May 4, 2012
Librans
There is a lot of talk about scales and balance when David Ferrie talks about Libras and Oswald. David Ferrie is an interesting character on his own, a devout believer in, well, anything. Astrology is no exception, so when he learned that Oswald's birthday was October 18 he immediately recognized he was a Libra and decided he knew everything he needed to know about him. "He is well balanced, levelheaded, a sensible fellow respected by all. We have the negative Libran who is, let's say, somewhat unsteady and impulsive. Easily, easily, easily influenced. Poised to make the dangerous leap." (DeLillo, 315). It surprisingly describes what we've seen of Oswald thus far very well. We've seen him several times heavily influenced by Marxist ideals and Trotsky, and his immediate buy-into the communist utopia of Russia. His impulsiveness is also evident. Oswald doesn't really stop and think, things through weighing the pros and cons against one another. Once he gets an idea, he just runs with it full speed, like his General Walker assassination plot, and moving to Russia.
All of these aspects of a Libra, plus his naivete, sets up Oswald to be the perfect candidate in the CIA's plot to take a shot at the president. He can be manipulated to do anything and won't have he good sense to stop and think about what he's doing, the things that could go wrong, and the consequences. Especially since the consequences turn out to be more than Oswald bargained for.
All of these aspects of a Libra, plus his naivete, sets up Oswald to be the perfect candidate in the CIA's plot to take a shot at the president. He can be manipulated to do anything and won't have he good sense to stop and think about what he's doing, the things that could go wrong, and the consequences. Especially since the consequences turn out to be more than Oswald bargained for.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
This took a while....
The title of this most recent/rather late post both represents my thoughts on this post, though more importantly it pretty much sums up my views on reading Libra: it drags on forever. I don't think the reading sections themselves are super long, it's just very dense and detailed writing that can be very demanding if you want to go try to stay focused and retain all of the information. I find the sections that follow Oswald's life around to be moderately interesting; it's more the scenes with the C.I.A. agents that can be confusing to keep straight and dull hearing going through their monotonous dialogue and shenanigans. It seems like it takes twice as long to read the C.I.A. chapters than the ones about Oswald.
Before we started DeLillo, we had watched a film in history class about the whole JFK assassination by giving us pretty much a four day play by play of all the events before and after. In the movie there was so much speculation and mystery around Oswald that I didn't feel like it was concrete that it was completely confirmed that Oswald was the one who shot the president since he was completely denying it (which I realize many people deny committing crimes to get out of trouble, but perhaps I imagined more of a defiant revolutionary reaction to being caught) and there was the whole issue about the grassy knoll and multiple shots. I found it interesting that the DeLillo addresses the possibility of Oswald being set up by the C.I.A. pretty much right off the bat as he shows all the secret levels and clearances and plots that even the president doesn't know about it. The immediate shadow of a doubt that DeLillo gives Oswald made it easier to take Oswald as his own character in the story instead of being labeled throughout as a killer.
Before we started DeLillo, we had watched a film in history class about the whole JFK assassination by giving us pretty much a four day play by play of all the events before and after. In the movie there was so much speculation and mystery around Oswald that I didn't feel like it was concrete that it was completely confirmed that Oswald was the one who shot the president since he was completely denying it (which I realize many people deny committing crimes to get out of trouble, but perhaps I imagined more of a defiant revolutionary reaction to being caught) and there was the whole issue about the grassy knoll and multiple shots. I found it interesting that the DeLillo addresses the possibility of Oswald being set up by the C.I.A. pretty much right off the bat as he shows all the secret levels and clearances and plots that even the president doesn't know about it. The immediate shadow of a doubt that DeLillo gives Oswald made it easier to take Oswald as his own character in the story instead of being labeled throughout as a killer.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
A Not-So-Happy Ending
I'm a big fan of happy endings. It gives a sense of closure when the problem is resolved and you're happy with how things turn out in the book. I don't see the point in reading a book if the ending is just going to make me angry or annoyed. The ending is one of the most important parts of the book since it's probably what the reader is going to remember the most, so it has to be done well. Normally when I finish reading a book I like to be left with a satisfied feeling that I've gained something from all the time I spent reading it. That something was achieved in the book. That it wasn't a waste. When I finished reading Kindred I didn't really get that satisfied feeling. Probably because the ending wasn't a satisfying one at all. I was really enjoying the novel up until the last couple chapters. Well, I guess until the last section. Everything just started to fall apart once we found out Alice killed herself. You could pretty much tell from that point on in the novel things weren't going to pan out so well but you just had to endure it, and it just becomes like watching a train wreck in slow motion.
What really bothered me about the ending of the book was that it was Dana who had to take Rufus out. Like, really? We just spent the entire book watching her spend years of her life in 19th century helping Rufus and being a slave on his plantation and enduring all kinds of hardships and she's just going to stab him after all that? She could've just let Rufus commit suicide like he was going to anyway. At least that way his death would have seemed somewhat justified. Rufus would've gained a lot more of my favor if he had killed himself (kind of weird to say, but true) since then it would've seemed like Rufus was remorseful of his actions and that he had learned his lesson. Instead he just turns around and tries to rape Dana.
The fact that Dana lost an arm to her time traveling experience also bothered me. She had plenty of scars that she got from whippings and even Kevin has a scar on his forehead, isn't that enough of a physical reminder of what they experienced? I realize that Butler is trying to make a point about slavery and how it scars the individuals permanently, but regardless I don't like that Butler made it impossible for Dana to go back to normal life afterwards since she's now disabled. I don't really know why, but somehow that doesn't sit well with me.
What really bothered me about the ending of the book was that it was Dana who had to take Rufus out. Like, really? We just spent the entire book watching her spend years of her life in 19th century helping Rufus and being a slave on his plantation and enduring all kinds of hardships and she's just going to stab him after all that? She could've just let Rufus commit suicide like he was going to anyway. At least that way his death would have seemed somewhat justified. Rufus would've gained a lot more of my favor if he had killed himself (kind of weird to say, but true) since then it would've seemed like Rufus was remorseful of his actions and that he had learned his lesson. Instead he just turns around and tries to rape Dana.
The fact that Dana lost an arm to her time traveling experience also bothered me. She had plenty of scars that she got from whippings and even Kevin has a scar on his forehead, isn't that enough of a physical reminder of what they experienced? I realize that Butler is trying to make a point about slavery and how it scars the individuals permanently, but regardless I don't like that Butler made it impossible for Dana to go back to normal life afterwards since she's now disabled. I don't really know why, but somehow that doesn't sit well with me.
Friday, March 30, 2012
Rufe
It's very hard to say whether I like Rufus or not. When he was younger and more innocent I found myself liking him a lot. He seemed like an intelligent boy who had a silent strength about him who wasn't threatened by having Dana suddenly appear in his bedroom. He treated her with respect despite his upbringing which would give him no reason to respect Dana, even though she is his senior. Even his use of the n-word is arguably excused by his ignorance, though to his credit he does follow Dana's request to call them black people instead. One couldn't help but hope along with Dana that maybe Rufus will turn out different than his father.
When Dana says "And there was Rufus, swung from his father's indifference to his mother's sugary concern. I wondered whether he was too used to the contrast to find it dizzying." (Butler, 69) I couldn't help but see a similar comparison to Hitler's childhood. Apparently he too had a very strict and abusive father and an overbearing mother who smothered him with affection. I don't think because of the dynamic he has with his parents that Rufus will grow up as messed up as Hitler, but you can certainly see how swinging from being severely punished by his father to hugged and fed cake by his mother can be emotionally confusing.
Then flash forward ten years. We see Rufus getting beaten for trying to/succeeding in raping Alice, yet claiming to love her. But then we see him joking around with Nigel and appearing kinder and more humane than Tom Weylin was. The swings Rufus can go from are about as dizzying as his parents swings. However, Rufus still realizes that the culture he lives him allows him to do whatever he wants to black people with no repercussions, and he takes advantage of it when he gets desperate and feels he needs to that he will threaten Alice and even Dana. Of course, we as the reader may not agree that he actually "needs" to. It doesn't excuse his actions in the slightest, but you out someone in power in a culture like that and you can't be surprised if every now and then they use that power to their full advantage. It really makes you wonder if/how people we know would change if they were put in a culture like the antebellum south.
When Dana says "And there was Rufus, swung from his father's indifference to his mother's sugary concern. I wondered whether he was too used to the contrast to find it dizzying." (Butler, 69) I couldn't help but see a similar comparison to Hitler's childhood. Apparently he too had a very strict and abusive father and an overbearing mother who smothered him with affection. I don't think because of the dynamic he has with his parents that Rufus will grow up as messed up as Hitler, but you can certainly see how swinging from being severely punished by his father to hugged and fed cake by his mother can be emotionally confusing.
Then flash forward ten years. We see Rufus getting beaten for trying to/succeeding in raping Alice, yet claiming to love her. But then we see him joking around with Nigel and appearing kinder and more humane than Tom Weylin was. The swings Rufus can go from are about as dizzying as his parents swings. However, Rufus still realizes that the culture he lives him allows him to do whatever he wants to black people with no repercussions, and he takes advantage of it when he gets desperate and feels he needs to that he will threaten Alice and even Dana. Of course, we as the reader may not agree that he actually "needs" to. It doesn't excuse his actions in the slightest, but you out someone in power in a culture like that and you can't be surprised if every now and then they use that power to their full advantage. It really makes you wonder if/how people we know would change if they were put in a culture like the antebellum south.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Kindred Initial Reaction
I am thoroughly enjoying Kindred thus far. As much as I love Vonnegut's writing, it's a nice change to read something a little more grounded. Though time travel is also thrown in this novel, this time it's more believable and has more merit since it's a self proclaimed science fiction book, and I completely trust the sanity of the characters of this novel. With Billy Pilgrim, everything's happening more or less in his head and even in the book people, like his daughter, think he's crazy. I also find this book easier to relate to since not only is Dana a young female, but the book was actually written in the late 1970s when Butler was in her thirties so her writing style is more what I'm used to from just reading "young adult" books I suppose you could call them.
One thing I thought was particularly interesting in Kindred is how long it takes for us to learn that Kevin is white. I suppose his super light eyes may have been a tip off (since I don't know many non-white people with eyes that aren't brown), and that scene where he asks Dana "Do I really look like that patroller?" since, obviously the patroller is white. It's not until 50-some pages in, through the story of how Dana and Kevin met, that we get a sense of what Kevin looks like, including the fact that he's white. I also think it's interesting that once we learn that Kevin's white, we aren't likely to forget it so quickly; especially once he is transported back to Maryland with Dana. Once he's in Maryland, his and Dana's relationship is completely transformed. He has to pretend to be Dana's master in order to protect her and that must be a really hard dynamic to take on, especially for Dana. We don't really see any tension at all between Dana and Kevin when they're in L.A., but once they're back in 1815 Maryland, that's all that matters to the people there so there's the constant reminder that Kevin is a white man and Dana is a black woman. It really doesn't help anything that Kevin's story involves buying Dana and pretending like he's going to free her when really he's "planning" on selling her in Louisiana and is just sleeping with her now because he can. Having to play that scenario out would be really demeaning since Kevin is her husband.
All in all, Kindred looks like it's going to be a really good read. It'll be interesting to see how this time-traveling experience changes (if it does) Kevin and Dana's relationship.
One thing I thought was particularly interesting in Kindred is how long it takes for us to learn that Kevin is white. I suppose his super light eyes may have been a tip off (since I don't know many non-white people with eyes that aren't brown), and that scene where he asks Dana "Do I really look like that patroller?" since, obviously the patroller is white. It's not until 50-some pages in, through the story of how Dana and Kevin met, that we get a sense of what Kevin looks like, including the fact that he's white. I also think it's interesting that once we learn that Kevin's white, we aren't likely to forget it so quickly; especially once he is transported back to Maryland with Dana. Once he's in Maryland, his and Dana's relationship is completely transformed. He has to pretend to be Dana's master in order to protect her and that must be a really hard dynamic to take on, especially for Dana. We don't really see any tension at all between Dana and Kevin when they're in L.A., but once they're back in 1815 Maryland, that's all that matters to the people there so there's the constant reminder that Kevin is a white man and Dana is a black woman. It really doesn't help anything that Kevin's story involves buying Dana and pretending like he's going to free her when really he's "planning" on selling her in Louisiana and is just sleeping with her now because he can. Having to play that scenario out would be really demeaning since Kevin is her husband.
All in all, Kindred looks like it's going to be a really good read. It'll be interesting to see how this time-traveling experience changes (if it does) Kevin and Dana's relationship.
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