That Just Happened!

Schoemperlen, Diane.  Forms of Devotion.  HarperCollins Publishers Ltd. (1998).

…Forms of Devotion contains eleven stories, each one a brilliant interplay of words and images. The illustrations, selected by Schoemperlen and depicting almost every subject imaginable, are wood engravings and line drawings from the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In some cases, she was inspired to write the story after studying the illustrations; in other cases, she wrote the story first, then chose or constructed the pictures to accompany it. The result is a playful, sometimes surreal and often mysterious juxtaposition of a historical fascination with anatomy and classical themes with the author’s contemporary exploration of everyday people, places and things.

Each story is a creative delight, perfectly formed and rich in mischievous wit, irony and multi-layered meaning. The title story, “Forms of Devotion,” is a wonderful literary cataloguing of the traits and qualities of the faithful, those who “sail off to work, perfect confident that they will indeed get there: on time, intact. It does not occur to them that they could just as well be broadsided by a Coca-Cola delivery truck running the red light at the corner of Johnson and Main.” “Five Small Rooms” is an intriguing, spectral journey into the narrator’s imagination, with the reader left wondering, “Is it madness or a murder mystery?” In “How Deep is the River,” the author offers an innovative, completely compelling take on the ubiquitous high school math problem that begins “Train A and Train B are traveling toward the same bridge from opposite directions…”

Quite different in form, yet alike in their ability to entertain and provoke, the stories in Forms of Devotion show once again that Diane Schoemperlen’s voice is as intriguing, fresh and electric as ever.

HarperCollins.ca

I guess people will say anything when they have to sell a book.  Much like the book Bear,  this description doesn’t accurately portray what’s inside.  I did not understand how each of these stories was “rich in mischievous wit, irony and multi-layered meaning”.  I found myself reading this just because I have to as part of my personal Governor General Literary Awards Challenge.  I hardly ever abandon a book and I have only done so a few times in my life, but this is one that I would have put down after the first 30 pages.  Each story was hardly interesting and superfluous in its descriptive words.  The only redeeming story was “Count Your Blessings (A Fairy Tale)”.  It explores the feelings of inadequacy women sometimes have, even when living the “perfect life”.  Why women feel that they are not doing enough, not challenged enough, not contributing enough, not loving enough, not loved enough, not listened to enough…why it’s sometimes just. not. enough.   That story really resonated with me and it called to mind Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique. 

Other than that story, this book was painful to get through.  It took a lot of will-power and multiple attempts to finally finish it.  Her stories were written in such a way that I could not relate to the story lines, characters (of which there are few), or ideas presented.  When I first read the publisher’s description I read the last sentence as “…intriguing, fresh and eclectic  as ever,” and I couldn’t agree more.  When I re-read it I realized it said “electric” and they lost me again.

I gave this one “eh” because there was one story I liked and the illustrations she chose accompanied the stories well.  That’s about all I can say about that.

Engel, Marian.  Bear.  McLelland and Stewart. (1976)

After five years buried like a mole amid the decaying maps and manuscripts of an historical institute, Lou is given a welcome field assignment: to catalogue a nineteenth-century library, improbably located in an octagonal house on a remote island in northern Ontario. Eager to reconstruct the estate’s curious history, she is unprepared for her discovery that the island has one other inhabitant: a bear.

Lou’s imagination is soon overtaken by the estate’s historical occupants, whose fascination with bear lore becomes her own. Irresistibly, Lou is led along a path of emotional and sexual self-discovery, as she explores the limits of her own animal nature through her bizarre and healing relationship with the bear.

A daring and compelling novel, Marian Engel’s Bear won the Governor General’s Award for 1976

From the Publisher

 I was with the Publishers until the second paragraph.  I wouldn’t necessarily say that they accurately capture what the book is about.  In one word, it is about: Bestiality.  Yeah.  Lou’s relationship with the bear is a sexual one.  I understand that the author was probably going more for exploring Lou’s sexual awakening and her mental fragility as a single woman.  Perhaps, given the time, I will even stretch to say that the author was commenting on the sexual awakening happening in society.  The Seventies was definitely a time of excess, but this kind of free love may be more appropriate to pair with the mind-bending psychotics of the Sixties.   So really…I got nothing.  Reading this book was disturbing and, I felt, shocking for the sake of being shocking. 

I did a bit of research on this book and the author.  Although it is stated by many that Engel was a prolific writer, I cannot find a single thing beyond the plot summary.  What does it all mean?  What does her relationship symbolize?  Why did I read a book about a woman doing “it” with a bear?  *sigh*  The answers are not to be found.

Themes are self-discovery, relationships, sexuality.

Richler, Mordecai.  St. Urbain’s Horseman. McClelland & Stewart. (2001).

St. Urbain’s Horseman is a complex, moving, and wonderfully comic evocation of a generation consumed with guilt – guilt at not joining every battle, at not healing every wound. Thirty-seven-year-old Jake Hersh is a film director of modest success, a faithful husband, and a man in disgrace. His alter ego is his cousin Joey, a legend in their childhood neighbourhood in Montreal. Nazi-hunter, adventurer, and hero of the Spanish Civil War, Joey is the avenging horseman of Jake’s impotent dreams. When Jake becomes embroiled in a scandalous trial in London, England, he puts his own unadventurous life on trial as well, finding it desperately wanting as he steadfastly longs for the Horseman’s glorious return. Irreverent, deeply felt, as scathing in its critique of social mores as it is uproariously funny, St. Urbain’s Horsemanconfirms Mordecai Richler’s reputation as a pre-eminent observer of the hypocrisies and absurdities of modern life.

From the Publisher

I don’t get it. I mean, I get that it was about class distinction, religious persecution, personal crisis and family relationships, but other than the overriding themes, I just. Don’t. Get. It.  So, Jake Hersh is on trial for perversions and he basically goes back through his life and the major events that led up to him being in this position.  It took me three tries to actually read the dang thing and two weeks to complete it.  I even took it with me for an hour on the treadmill and I barely made a dent.  Granted, this is a long book, but he has lived a long life, so I guess there was a lot leading up to the trial. 

Oh heck, I know I am trying to look for meaning where there is some, but I can’t seem to find it.  His character wasn’t necessarily relatable, or likeable.  I couldn’t get on his side at all.  Really I read this book because I had to for my Governor General Award Challenge.

This is my rating, but I would be willing to reconsider if someone could explain this stupid book to me.  What am I missing?  I have a feeling I should be more enthusiastic about it than I am.  It has been made into an award winning movie and a miniseries on CBC television, so someone gets it and should be able to explain it to me, dang it!