Henry Frickin' James

As an English major, I had no guilt about skipping over the works of Henry James. I tried to read The Bostonians and settled on the movie for an exam back in he late 80s, and more than a few critics write that James was an acquired taste.

So it's odd to report that I have read Daisy Miller and Washington Square and have my sites set on The Wings of the Dove. To bone up on my James -- you said bone up -- I have been reading Colm Toibin's The Master, the recent novel about James living in Europe around 1896. It's a fine novel once you realize there is absolutely no action. Zilch. Instead, you get to see an artist search for his stories and attempt to live his cloistered, stuffy life.

I only wish it came with hyperlinks. Toibin goes through James' life and offers episodes where real life inspires novels and stories. Thank to the Barnes & Noble introduction to Daisy Miller and Wings, I have a decent sense of his life and literary output but it would be great if I could click on a word, a name or a passage and be able to read where this fits in the writer's life and cannon. That would be neat.

One enterprising editor/publisher should release an annotated copy of this novel with information on James and his works. Think of it like the director's commentary on a DVD.

The Wings of the Dove, on deck after The Master.

Raunch Dressing, Not on the Side

The review of Ariel Levy's Female Chauvinist Pigs in today's NY Times Book Review triggered some thoughts. Levy expands her New York Magazine article on the rise of Girls Gone Wild, magazines like Maxim and Stuff, and porn stars appearing everywhere outside their movies on regular shows and music videos as if it were normal. Well, according to Levy, it is normal: America has been pornified.

Jennifer Egans' review mentions one omission of the book's argument and might have missed another. Egan says Levy spends scant time on Madonna, who turned sex into self-empowerment ever since 1984. That's sad. Because the singer/video star has done a lot to move the ball down to the end-zone. No one exploits me but me, was her mantra. (Or is that womantra?) Also, I wonder if the young's acceptance of this lite porn stems from the shrill, humor-free days of the late 80s and 90s when people were politically correct to a fault.

I took three feminist courses at SUNY New Paltz in 1988-89, and these were deadly serious areas unless you were mocking men. So far, so shrill. After the Anita Hill hearings, lawyers and human resource consultants entered the fray. Telling a woman she looked nice in a sweater could be a litigious offence and the days of humor were over. I sat in on my share of HR seminars on how to be a sensitive co-worker and managers. Thank goodness the Internet boom rolled around so we could concentrate on making money.

Egan's review does not mention the feminist left's melding with the Christian right in its views on pornography. Even though both sides have different views on modern women -- kitchen vs. the board room -- they could both easily hate Hugh Hefner, Howard Stern, and even Victoria's Secret. Like the flimsy bras in the pages of those monthly catalog, something had to give.

The so-called third wave of feminists hated Christian prudes and the smelly feminists of yore. Howard Stern was a free-speech liberator, Hugh Hefner made sure his Playmates were treated well, and a whole raft of magazines from London came in with bad jokes and pics of models and actresses in bra and panties. Where was the victimization? Jenna Jamison looked healthy, drug-free and all-American to most people.

The Man Show debutted and rose in the ratings around the time that America read The Starr Report and expressed shock and acceptance. Bill Clinton looked like a serial humper from Day One and besides, the economy was roaring. Why jinx it? The Man Show was fighting against the notion that being a guy had been a bad thing for more than a decade. Pictures of cleavage, bodily function jokes and reviews of beer seemed almost elevating back then. It was.

There is a downside, though. I like my subscription to Stuff and one day would like to write captions for those magazines, but why is it so hard to find clothes for my daughter that doesn't like the laundry pile from a Vietnamese brothel? Does my listening to Stern and Opie and Anthony's antics mean that my daughter has to dress like a hooker?

Parenting Chronicles - Volume XII Chapter XXXVII

Driving back from my nephew's party on Long Island, Nora complained that she had to go the bathroom. She was whining and in deep distress that she might wet her pajamas and car seat. We were on the Sprain Book parkway, probably the darkest busy road in lower New York - no lights but the full moon. Again she said she had to go and bad. It was going to be a disaster.

I spotted some lights behind some black trees and got off. Couldn't name the town but there was a gas station nearby. We ran in and asked for the bathroom key.

We have no key, the attendant said. "I asked the owner four times and he won't drive the key over."

We left for McDonalds, which was down the road from the gas station. I backed into the guard rail that protects the pump and made sure I didn't hit a Lexus or that gas was puring out of the stall.

Nora was crying and moaning.

But when we pulled into the McDonalds' parking lot, she started to giggle. "I have to tell you guys something," she said between laughs.

Regina knew the answer but I was already unbuckling my seat belt.

"I PEED my car seat!" she squealed and out came peals of laughter.

I got out to check the back of the minivan -- perfectly fine in the parking lot light.

Back in the car, the two boys are asleep and Regina and Nora are laughing at her accident.

We drove home and she relieved herself like a racehorse outside the car door. More giggles.

Good times.

Falconer

Before leaving for Lake George, I looked for a book to take with me. It had to be slim, smart and I didn't mind if it was something I had already read. I brought John Cheever's Falconer, which is supposed to be his great novel. That's not much of a stretch because he will always be known as a short story writer thanks to his epsiodic novels. All in all, Falconer was good, if strange. It definitely probably read better when it came out in the mid-70s and if I remember the glowing reviews, it might have been over-praised for two reasons: Cheever had finally quit the sauce and delivered a full-length novel that didn't read like a collection of short stories. It was compelling and it was always nice to be in the hands of a writer who knows what they're doing. The scene where Farrugt realizes that he has beaten his drug habit without even realizing it -- the prison medical team had been feeding him a placebo -- was wonderful and quiet in this loud rambunctious novel.

Lake George, Late Summer

After two weeks of humid weather, high temps and some awful news from New Orleans and Mississippi, it's great to be back at Lake George with the family and Regina's sister, her two nephews and one girlfriend. The weather has been amazing and we spent the day switching between the pool and then to the lake and then back to the pool again.

This morning, Regina took Nora and Timmy to the local pancake house while I watched Matthew swim in the pool. While he was wading in the whirlpool, a plane flew overhead at around 150 feet. Then a helicopter flew along the lake at seagull altitude. If that weren't entertaining enough, I saw an Indian with full headgear and war paint in a canoe by the motel's dock. He lifted his musket and BOOM fired into the air. The ducks in the water didn't seem to like the entertainment. The Indian then chatted with a few people on the dock before paddling off.

Tonight we played miniature golf. Nora and I both had a hole in one -- the triumph of luck over skill!

Speaking of skill, both Nora and Matthew can doggy paddle like champs. It's been a good summer.