Who hasn't heard this quote: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...? But have you read the rest of this first paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities?
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way--in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.
"So far like the present" always gets me going. This engages me in the past like little else. It makes me feel close to the people who lived in another time and place; it gives us in common our separate times. Chapter One of A Tale of Two Cities is Mr. Peabody's Way-Back Machine; it transports me back to Western Europe in 1775-1789, discharging me on the Road to Dover, completely prepared for Chapter Two and the rest of the book.
Possibly almost as many people are familiar with the last lines of the book: "It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known." So what is in between? In between these famous lines lies life, death, insanity, murder, treachery, grave robbing, revolution, love and hate: all the stuff of great literature.
If you have read past posts in this blog, you know that Laura's assessment of Jane Austen's Persuasion was short and sweet: "The greatest novel by the greatest English novelist of all time." Well said! I almost agree, I just can't be convinced that there is only one greatest novel, only one greatest novelist.
Pride and Prejudice remains my favorite of Austen's works, possibly because it was my introduction to the author and, after about 15 times through it, the characters are like close friends. It is a perfectly crafted novel, without the tragic sturm und drang of most great works of literature. It is in the handful of novels, along with War and Peace, Nicholas Nickleby, The Cider House Rules, and The Hours that I regret finishing each time I read them because the characters will not be a part of my life the next day.
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What do these guys have in common besides a mustache?
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| Marcel Proust |
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| Ram Dass |
Proust says it here:
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| The six volumes of Remembrance of Things Past in English translation |
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| Title page of Proust's work in original French |
Proust is my ultimate escape. When life is difficult and unpleasant, I can get lost in the extraordinary lyricism of Proust's exquisite prose. And after coming out of his sea of words back to a sometimes bleak reality, how can I fail to hear his message loud and clear? Proust, with his gift for memory and observation, can spend pages describing an incident with such beauty, clarity, and intensity that the reader feels as if time has stopped--that nothing exists except the moment in the story. All life is wrapped in the moment, and those who are lucky enough to experience this get a taste of the Eternal Now.
Ram Dass said it in four words:
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| Part of the cover of Ram Dass's 1968 book Remember, Be Here Now |
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| My old bumper sticker |
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You have probably seen the movie The Hours starring Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, and Nicole Kidman. But, although the movie follows the book very closely, if you have not read the book by Michael Cunningham you have missed part of the beauty of the story; it is 226 pages of resplendent poetic prose. Listen:
Clarissa crosses Eighth Street. She loves, helplessly, the dead television set abandoned on the
curb alongside a single white patent-leather pump. She loves the vendor's cart piled with broccoli
and peaches and mangoes, each labeled with an index card that offers a price amid abundances
of punctuation: "$1.49!!" "3 for ONE Dollar!?!" "50 Cents EA.!!!!!" Ahead, under the Arch, an old
and peaches and mangoes, each labeled with an index card that offers a price amid abundances
of punctuation: "$1.49!!" "3 for ONE Dollar!?!" "50 Cents EA.!!!!!" Ahead, under the Arch, an old
woman in a dark, neatly tailored dress appears to be singing, stationed precisely between the
twin statues of George Washington, as warrior and politician, both faces destroyed by weather.
It's the city's crush and heave that move you; its endless life. You know the story about Manhattan
as a wilderness purchased for strings of beads but you find it impossible not to believe that it has
always been a city; that if you dug beneath it you would find the ruins of another, older city, and then
another and another. Under the cement and grass of the park (she has crossed into the park now, where
the old woman throws back her head and sings) lay the bones of those buried in the potter's field that
was simply paved over, a hundred years ago, to make Washington Square. Clarissa walks over the bodies
of the dead as men whisper offers of drugs (not to her) and three black girls whiz past on roller skates and
the old woman sings, tunelessly, iiiiiiii. Clarissa is skittish and jubilant about her luck, her good shoes
the old woman sings, tunelessly, iiiiiiii. Clarissa is skittish and jubilant about her luck, her good shoes
(on sale at Barney's, but still); here after all is the sturdy squalor of the park, visible even under its coat of
grass and flowers; here are the drug dealers (would they kill you if it came to that?) and the lunatics, the
stunned and baffled, the people whose luck, if they ever had any, has run out. Still, she loves the world for
being rude and indestructible, and she knows other people must love it too, poor as well as rich, though no
one speaks specifically of the reasons. Why else do we struggle to go on living, no matter how compromised,
no matter how harmed? Even if we're further gone than Richard; even if we're fleshless, blazing with lesions,
shitting in the sheets; still, we want desperately to live. It has to do with all this, she thinks. Wheels buzzing
on concrete, the roil and shock of it; sheets of bright spray blowing from the fountain as young shirtless men toss
a Frisbee and vendors (from Peru, from Guatemala) send pungent, meaty smoke up from their quilted silver carts;
old men and women straining after the sun from their benches, speaking softly to each other, shaking their heads;
the bleat of car horns and the strum of guitars (that ragged group over there, three boys and a girl, could they
possibly be playing "Eight Miles High"?); leaves shimmering on the tress; a spotted dog chasing pigeons and a
passing radio playing "Always love you" as the woman in the dark dress stands under the arch singing iiiii.
grass and flowers; here are the drug dealers (would they kill you if it came to that?) and the lunatics, the
stunned and baffled, the people whose luck, if they ever had any, has run out. Still, she loves the world for
being rude and indestructible, and she knows other people must love it too, poor as well as rich, though no
one speaks specifically of the reasons. Why else do we struggle to go on living, no matter how compromised,
no matter how harmed? Even if we're further gone than Richard; even if we're fleshless, blazing with lesions,
shitting in the sheets; still, we want desperately to live. It has to do with all this, she thinks. Wheels buzzing
on concrete, the roil and shock of it; sheets of bright spray blowing from the fountain as young shirtless men toss
a Frisbee and vendors (from Peru, from Guatemala) send pungent, meaty smoke up from their quilted silver carts;
old men and women straining after the sun from their benches, speaking softly to each other, shaking their heads;
the bleat of car horns and the strum of guitars (that ragged group over there, three boys and a girl, could they
possibly be playing "Eight Miles High"?); leaves shimmering on the tress; a spotted dog chasing pigeons and a
passing radio playing "Always love you" as the woman in the dark dress stands under the arch singing iiiii.
Michael Cunningham handles his characters with care and gentleness. Their inner lives, as well as their life-altering events, come to us readers full of passion and profundity, reflected on our own experiences. The Hours is a truly beautiful book.
