Heartbreaking Works of Nightmare and Utopia

Books reviewed:

Eggers, Dave. Zeitoun. McSweeney's Books, 2009. 351 pp.

Solnit, Rebecca. A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. Viking, 2009. 353 pp.

I don't know about you, but the majority of my focused reading (not including the daily paper, homeschooling my daughter, in line at the post office, waiting at a red light ["Alright, already, I heard the horn the first time]) takes place late at night, after the rest of the family is asleep, between about nine and one 0'clock, depending on my level of fatigue from the day. If the book just doesn't hold my attention (like Dickens' Little Dorritt, which I dutifully, but unsuccessfully, tried to read for one of my book groups), I'm out, the book swaying back and forth in my hands until it drops onto my chest and wakes me up. But give me a riveting story of outrageous injustice perpretrated against an honorable, innocent individual or community by representatives of banal, sadistic, Kafkaesque institutions, and it's like crystal meth for the soul (there's my franchise right there: Crystal Meth for the Cat-Lover's Soul, Crystal Meth for the NASCAR Soul, Crystal Meth for the Auto-Erotic Asphyxiation Lover's Soul, you get the idea).

The two books reviewed here provide exactly that, coming from very different but occasionally overlapping perspectives. Zeitoun is Dave Egger's account of one man's nightmarish experience in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Abdulrahman Zeitoun is a Syrian immigrant, successful painting and building contractor, devout Muslim and loving husband and father who refused to leave New Orleans as Katrina bore down on the city. After several days spent rescuing neighbors and strangers, staying in touch with his wife Kathy, feeding abandoned dogs and exploring the submerged city by canoe, he and some acquaintances are imprisoned (not formally arrested or charged, mind you) by local police and National Guard and accused of Taliban/Al Quaida membership because of unusual but completely innocent circumstances. He then disappears for several days into a legal system that is utterly dysfunctional on its best days, while his wife and family members frantically try to find out what happened to him. It's an unbelievably infuriating story, told skillfully by a master storyteller who seems determined lately to use his considerable talents and resources (as publisher and editor as well as writer) to draw attention to monumental injustices through the prism of highly personal narratives.

Rebecca Solnit, on the other hand, examines the historical dynamics embodied by both Zeitoun and his persecutors. Analyzing such historical phenomena as the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, a 1917 ammunition explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia, earthquakes in Managua (1972) and Mexico City (1985), and 9-11, Solnit makes the case that, mass media myths to the contrary, disaster tends to bring out not just the best, but downright utopian tendencies in most people, often resulting in far-reaching, long-term social change for the affected society (Nicaragua's Bautista regime and Mexico's PRI party being two of those whose fall Solnit connects directly to the aforementioned earthquakes). As institutions break down, individuals and communities are forced to pool resources and wisdom, and often discover that, despite the tragic hardships which result from the disaster, there is a meaning to their lives that wasn't present previously.

There are always countervaling forces, however, as New Orleanians are bitterly aware. The economic and political elites (at all levels, within and outside of the city), white-flight suburbanites, and police and military personnel are among those Solnit identifies as subsceptible to "elite panic," a condition which can render one incapable of the kind of critical thought necessary to discount rumors like those of babies being raped in the Superdome in the days following Hurricane Katrina: "Disaster sociologist Kathleen Tierney,... itemized its ingredients as 'fear of social disorder; fear of poor, minorities and immigrants; obsession with looting and property crime; willingness to resort to deadly force; and actions taken on the basis of rumor.' In other words, it is the few who behave badly and the many who rise to the occasion. And those few behave badly not because of facts but because of beliefs: they believe the rest of us are about to panic or become a mob or upend property relations, and in their fear they act out to prevent something that may only have existed in their imaginations. Thus the myth of malevolent disaster behavior becomes something of a self-fulfilling prophecy," (p.127).

One factor Solnit doesn't discuss is what seems to me the most obvious difference between Katrina and the other disasters cited. While an earthquake or tsunami or terrorist attack takes its victims by surprise, a potentially disastrous hurricane can be anticipated, in at least a meteorological manner, days before landfall. So while the populations of San Francisco and Managua and Mexico City (and now Port-au-Prince) were struck in their entirety (allowing for construction and location variations), those in New Orleans who bore the brunt of Katrina were mostly the poor, stuck in the city even if they would like to leave, or those, like Zeitoun, who chose to stay for various personal reasons. Does the shared direct experience of the former cities contribute to greater solidarity post-disaster? Are the class differences between those who stayed and those who left in New Orleans too entrenched to allow for the reform and revolution seen in other places? Will the historic connections between New Orleans and Haiti come into play in coming years?

Finally, as one who thinks the importance of popular culture is too easily discounted by most historians and political theorists, will the confluence of New Orleans' globally iconic musical culture and the Saints' victory in what is unarguably one of the most popular sports spectacles in the world have repercussions in the navigation of the post-Katrina political landscape? Time will tell if Who Dat Nation will truly become Utopia.

Zinn and the Art of Democracy Maintenance

Today has brought the unexpected news of the deaths of Howard Zinn, 87, and J.D. Salinger, 91. Neither death should be particularly surprising, given their ages, but, as very different quintessentially American icons of cultural and political upheaval, I think it is safe to say there is a true void in this country's soul that didn't exist a few days ago.



If I can leave a discussion of Salinger for later, I would like to concentrate on Zinn, the iconoclastic historian activist. Like Catch-22 author Joseph Heller and 1972 Democractic peace candidate for President George McGovern, he served on bombers during World War II (if Tom Brokaw wants to make his case just from these three, maybe we can talk greatest generation). Returning to his native Brooklyn, he worked in the shipyard before taking advantage of the G.I. Bill and starting college at 27 (I can't help contrasting Zinn's bio with the Keystone Conservatives facing federal charges after being accused of trying to tamper with Senator Mary Landrieu's phone system here in New Orleans. Probably seemed like a good idea at the frat house kegger.).

After earning his Ph.d. with a dissertation analyzing the congressional career of left-leaning Republican (no, it's not a misprint, my apologies for any computers whose hard drive is fried trying to process such a concept [but it's good practice for next week, when all those computers are going to have to process the Saints' victory in the Super Bowl. Who Dat!]) Fiorello LaGuardia, he settled into a teaching position at Spellman College, the historically Black women's institution in Atlanta, where his students included Alice Walker. He was fired from that position for his strong support of students' participation in the civil rights movement, and continued his academic career at Boston University.

Although Zinn was best known as an historian, with A People's History of the United States (now in at least its third edition) serving as an initial corrective to the conventional historical record for many. He was also very much directly involved in the tumult of the late 1960's. A diplomatic trip to North Vietnam with radical Catholic priest Dan Berrigan (there I go flouting the conventional wisdom again) resulted in the release of three American POW's in the midst of the Tet Offensive. And Daniel Ellsberg entrusted a copy of the secretly-copied Pentagon Papers (which showed a pattern of official deception on Vietnam policy stretching back to Truman) with Zinn, who (along with friend and colleague Noam Chomsky) edited and annotated it before its release to the New York Times in 1971. Alaska Senator Mike Gravel (a darkhorse candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008, despite a public record whose heroism dwarfed the others) then read it into the Congressional record in dramatic fashion, confirming for many the moral and constitutional disaster the war had become.

Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to see Howard Zinn live, though I came close. He spoke at Portland (Ore.) State University when we were living there, and my wife Sheila and I planned for attending. For some reason, we got a late start, and got there pretty close to the time it was scheduled to start. I didn't expect to have great seats, but expected the auditorium to accomodate what would certainly be a large crowd.

You have to remember that this was Portland, Oregon, where radical politics is both a way of life and a passionate spectator sport, and Zinn is right up there with with Chomsky, Naomi Klein, Ralph Nader, Gore Vidal, Cornel West, Slavoj Zizek and a handful of others in the stratosphere of living icons. However, Zinn's appearance was sponsored by the student history association, who apparently saw him in rather narrow academic terms, as a distinguished scholar of particular insight. So the hall they had reserved for the lecture was abysmally small, as they had drastically underestimated Zinn's appeal to the general public. So the doors were closed by the time we arrived (how many times has the fetus of the revolution been aborted in its conference room womb by that insidious, draconian representative of soul-destroying bureaucracy, the fire marshal?), with other stragglers engaged in passionate arguments with bewildered security personnel. It was just such a perfect microcosm of the age-old opportunity for deep democratic dialogue being stifled by ignorance and blind adherence to rules.

I don't remember what Sheila and I did instead, but that was pre-parenthood (not to mention pre-Netflix, Facebook, and blogspot), so we probably went out, spent our overflowing disposal income on a nice meal and drinks, and went home and made passionate love until dawn. Those were the days, weren't they?

2009 Wrapup (About Time, Huh?)

Like just about all of you out there, I'm sure, I have been very preoccupied with the situation in Haiti, particularly given the shameful role the United States government and military has played over the years in that country. I was even motivated by the ignorant musings of New York Times columnist David Brooks to write a letter to the editor of the Times-Picayune. They are considering it for publication, but, to be fair, many of my points were made more effectively by Tracy Kidder, author of Mountains Beyond Mountains, in a column published just yesterday. So I'll give it a couple of more days, and probably publish my letter here, with some additional clarification.

But while I've got you all here (both of you here? Anyone? Hello?), I would like to present, in all its glory, the final, expanded 2009 Greater New Orleans Market Bestseller List, followed by some intriguing statistical analysis. Those of you who have been following this blog regularly know that Kurt Vonnegut had a commanding lead for much of the year, only to have Walker Percy catch him late in the year. Well, the irrepressible Indianapolite (Indianapolian?) finally did prevail. The final tally:

1. Kurt Vonnegut
2. Walker Percy
3. Ray Bradbury
4. Aldous Huxley
5. Albert Camus
6. Robert Heinlein
7. (tie) Hermann Hesse
7. (tie) George Orwell
7. (tie) Ayn Rand
10. (tie) James Lee Burke
10. (tie) James Joyce
10. (tie) Henry Miller
10. (tie) J.D. Salinger
10. (tie) Star Trek
15. Edgar Rice Burroughs
16. (tie) Joseph Campell
16. (tie) William Faulkner
16. (tie) Ken Kesey
19. (tie) George Carlin
19. (tie) Philip K. Dick
19. (tie) Henry David Thoreau
19. (tie) John Kennedy Toole
19. (tie) Tennessee Williams
24. (tie) Edward Abbey
24. (tie) Joan Didion
24. (tie) Bob Dylan
24. (tie) Ernest Gaines
24. (tie) Jack Kerouac
24. (tie) Sylvia Plath
24. (tie) Eric Schlosser
24. (tie) John Steinbeck
24. (tie) Alan Watts

It's important to remember that this is the best, most precise instrument we have in these uncertain times for determining the most popular writers among the greater New Orleans reading public. Now let's crunch some numbers:

Percentage of primarily fiction writers: 72%
Percentage of non-American natives: 22%
Percentage of British writers: 9%
Percentage of non-British Europeans: 9%
Percentage of non-Americans/Europeans: 3%
Percentage of Louisiana writers: 16%
Percentage of Southern writers: 19%
Percentage of women writers: 9%
Percentage of African-American writers: 3%

Just a little food for thought. And remember, if you want your voice heard in 2010, you've got to come out to the open-air markets that contribute so much to our city's vibrant, independent commerce: the Freret Market (first Saturday of each month), Broad Flea (second Saturday), and Elysian Fleas (third Saturday). Ayn Rand and Walter Moseley are the early leaders. Feel the excitement. Be the excitement.

For those of you who prefer online commerce, many new volumes have been added to the inventory of Deep South Samizdat Books (amazon.com/shops/deepsouthsamizdatbooks). You can find titles by Albert Camus, Charles Darwin, Octavio Paz, Bill Moyers and Ira Levin, as well as biography of hard-boiled pulp master Jim Thompson. Of course, you can always reach me at mpbookfreak@hotmail.com if you want to bypass the behemoth. Until next time.

Bio of a Player

Robert Altman: The Oral Biography
by Mitchell Zuckoff
Alfred A. Knopf, 2009

As any discerning film buff knows, the 1970s were a Golden Age for American cinema, with classic works spilling out from auteurs like Scorcese (Mean Streets, Taxi Driver), Coppola (Godfather and Godfather II, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now), Hal Ashby (Harold and Maude, The Last Detail, Being There) and Roman Polanski (Chinatown). Of course, any such list would be criminally incomplete without the inclusion of Robert Altman, whose turbulent, fiercely independent, multi-phased career included such highlights as M*A*S*H* (released in 1970), Nashville, The Player and Short Cuts, and included television (Bonanza, Combat), the pioneering cable miniseries Tanner 88, and A Prairie Home Companion, released just before his death at 81.

The maverick director is the subject of a recently-published "oral biography," a form uniquely suited to a subject who inspired such intense loyalty among colleagues. More so than maybe any modern director, Altman assembled a loose ensemble company of distinctive character actors, many of whom worked on several movies with Altman, usually performing their seminal roles with him: Rene Auberjonois, Keith Carradine, Bud Cort, Shelley Duvall, Michael Murphy, Lily Tomlin. All speak reverently of their time with Altman, whose reputation was as an enthusiastic ringmaster who encouraged improvisation and collaboration among his fellow artists, even those who other talented directors (such as Sam Peckinpaugh, in a contrast drawn by Altman protege' and television director Reza Badiyi) would bully in order to achieve their grand vision. Auberjonois, who is unfortunately probably best remembered for his role as the insufferable governor's aide in the mediocre Soap spinoff Benson (God, I know I've completely lost anyone under about 35 reading this), sums it up when talking his experience filming Brewster McCloud, a whcked-out movie starring Bud Cort as a teenage boy living clandestinely in the Houston Astrodome who has a dream of flying (and yes, it's a real movie, that's the kind of thing they did in the 70's):
It's a rare thing to get into a situation where you truly feel like a collaborator with the
director. He was so brilliant at knowing how it was all going to come together. He was so flex-
ible, and in my life the great directors I've worked with are always directors who know exact-
ly what they want but will change on a dime when they see what the actor brings to it. They
are supremely confident that they know what they want, but at the same time open to know-
ing what might be better. That's what Bob was (p. 204).

Although Altman embodied the independence that today's young directors go to the same handful of film schools and festivals to cultivate, he also got electrifying performances from many of the biggest stars of his day, some of whom appreciated his style more than others. Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland complained to the studio behind Altman's back about his lack of deference to their star power on the set of M*A*S*H*, while Warren Beatty chafed at his lack of control on McCabe and Mrs. Miller. But Robin Williams was born to play Popeye, and I think it can be argued that Tim Robbins took his craft to new levels with his collaborations with Altman.

The reader gets a detailed look at Altman's personal life, as well. Although he was married several times and a, frankly, neglectful father and stepfather many times over, there is little or no bitterness on the part of family members interviewed for the book (again, a contrast could be drawn with Sam Peckinpaugh, whose daughter I met briefly one time). His sons worked in the movie business in various capacities, including the amusing story of Michael Altman, at the age of 14, writing the lyrics of the song "Suicide is Painless," for M*A*S*H*. For those of you familiar only with the t.v. show, it may come as a surprise that there are actual lyrics. But Michael's arrangement gave him 50 percent of the royalties for the song. So the movie's a hit (probably the biggest of Altman's career), and there are those royalties. It's adapted for television, kept as the theme song, sans lyrics. The show is a hit, runs for 12 or 13 years, goes into syndication:
Anyway, after the series came out, I got another check for, like, twenty-six bucks. And
then the second check was like a hundred thirty dollars. And I'm going, "Oh, this is nice." And
And the next check was like tweny-six thousand dollars. And then it started, the whole thing
started with the royalties. I think I ended up making close to two million dollars. And Bob had
gotten paid seventy-five thousand dollars to direct the movie and no points, right? And it
made Fox Studios what it is, right? It was their biggest hit ever, you know. Then the tv show
and stuff like that. And Bob's just been livid about that for years (p. 179).

So there's the career of a maverick in a nutshell. His biggest box-office hit and first critical splash is associated in most people's minds with a t.v. series, and his then-teenage son ends up making more money off of it than he does. Read all about it, and then give Netflix the heads up, because I think a lot of us will be readjusting our queues afterwards. Let's see, I think I'll start with McCabe and Mrs. Miller, haven't seen that in years. But I've never seen Quintet, or Popeye, for that matter. And maybe I should give Images another chance. Gosford Park, oh and Kansas City was so good,.....

Down the Stretch, and Percy leads Vonnegut by a nose, with Bradbury and Huxley closing in!

We are now eight days away from Christmas (as I am reminded several times a day by my nine-year-old daughter, and those of you in the Greater New Orleans area have one more opportunity to buy directly from Deep South Samizdat Books, at the expanded Elysian Fleas market, at 527 Elysian Fields, on the corner of Chartres St. While Elysian Fleas typically takes place on the third Saturday of the month, you will have two opportunities this weekend, Saturday and Sunday, from 11-5. And, as the Saints will be taking on the Dallas Cowboys (otherwise known as the personification of evil) Saturday night, there will be no Sunday conflict with the game. But what about the weather, you say? It's a lot of trouble building bookshelves into the walls of an ark, you say. I hear you, but the forecast is for sunny skies, with a high of 53 Saturday and a balmy 60 on Sunday.

Just as important as the holiday shopping, this weekend should be the last opportunity to cast your vote in the Greater New Orleans Market Bestseller List. To recap, I have been keeping meticulous records for all of 2009, tabulating sales for all of the markets I have participated in, and periodically publishing the results and providing you, the reader, with a cross-section of the literary preferences of the New Orleans community, arrived at through the democratic act of supporting your favorite local guerrilla bookseller. Here, then, is the expanded list, for your perusal:

1. Walker Percy
2. Kurt Vonnegut
3. (tie) Ray Bradbury
3. (tie) Aldlous Huxley
5. (tie) Hermann Hesse
5. (tie) George Orwell
7. (tie) Albert Camus
7. (tie) Henry Miller
9. (tie) Edgar Rice Burroughs
9. (tie) James Joyce
9. (tie) J.D. Salinger
9. (tie) Star Trek
13. (tie) James Lee Burke
13. (tie) Joseph Campbell
13. (tie) Robert Heinlein
13. (tie) Ayn Rand

I'll leave it for future graduate students to draw conclusions based on that data ("The Marketgoer: Literary Consumption and Identity in post-Katrina New Orleans"). But I can guarantee that multiple volumes by each of the above authors will be available, so there is still room for movement within the list. And, sometime after the first of the year, the final list for 2009 will be published, amid great fanfare.

Until next time, my friends, take care of yourselves and each other. Merry Christmas, war is over if you want it, and all the rest--Parker

The High Man in the Rent-Controlled Castle, Part Two

Chase plays the role of the tragic-stricken fiancee at soirees around Manhattan, apparently the only acting gig he's had in quite some time. Unfortunately, he can't actually remember Janice very well, and falls into an awkward relationship with Oona. Abneg, meanwhile, is seemingly at war with the natural world, as a mating pair of eagles nest just outside of his apartment, at the same time as he is the city's point person on eliminating the escaped tiger haunting the streets of the borough.

Ah, yes, the tiger. It's difficult to discuss it too much without revealing key plot twists, but it is my assertion that the tiger represents gentrification, configured as an actual (or at least a perceived) force of nature, unpredictable, undomesticated, irrational, unable to be tamed by Abneg. Obviously, no city administration will embrace gentrification as such, with its racist and classist stigmas, its profane and arbitrary destruction in the name of profit, its synthetic-fibered welcome mat leading the moneychangers into the temple, but if a force of nature comes along, say an earthquake, or tsunami, or perhaps.... a hurricane, if you will, then, and only then, maybe it's just best for all parties if cosmetically-damaged but structurally sound public hospitals or public housing units are demolished to make way for new, more fiscally sound projects. Forces of nature are funny that way, aren't they?

Perkus Tooth, the soul of Chronic City, is among the many Manhattanites affected by the tiger, and Lethem's obvious affection for him warrants further inspection and speculation. He is a representative of a completely different force of nature, a species of which I am particularly fascinated. The pop vernacular would identify him as a cultural critic, operating in the "postmodern" cultural/media environment. I put the adjective in parentheses only because of the loaded term's ubiquity, but I think it's appropriate given my interpretation. I would argue that the era of postmodernism (perhaps even an epoch, to give it a little geological heft) is one in which the most vital artifacts of popular culture project self-conscious artistry without losing authentic populist coarseness, while the most vital creations of fine art project a grounded populist coarseness without sacrificing self-conscious artistry (think Jasper Johns' Flag and Jimi Hendrix's "Star-Spangled Banner"). And while continents of forests have been felled to produce theses and dissertations and academic journals devoted to the sterile, heads-of-pins theorizing of lesser intellects (I can already feel the comments section filling with the words pot, kettle and black), a few first-rate minds - among them Susan Sontag, Greil Marcus, Cornel West, Lawrence Weschler, Greg Tate, Dave Hickey - have reached the status of what I would call cultural alchemists, squeezing and distilling the post-God scriptures of fine art and popular culture into something truly illuminating, and doing so with style, passion and - gasp! - genuine lucidity.

Now, Lethem likes to play with some of the characters in this novel, dropping obvious clues as to who they were based on. The billionaire mayor is an obvious stand-in for Michael Bloomberg, while a city arts bureaucrat has an awful lot of Art Garfunkel in him. Whether fortunately or not, I heard a recent radio interview with Lethem in which he revealed that much of Perkus Tooth's character and idiosyncracies were those of his friend Paul Nelson, a largely-forgotten music writer, editor and (briefly) music business insider whose advocacy was crucial in the careers of Bob Dylan, Rod Stewart and the New York Dolls, among others. That shot my theory out of the water, but I nevertheless feel compelled to share it, given the possibility of the cosmic unconsciousness working in its mysterious ways.

I intentionally used the term cultural alchemist because it so befit one of my favorite characters, and my nomination for one of the unsung American heroes of the 20th century, Harry Smith (Har-ry Smith, Per-kus Tooth, you see?). Smith was born to practicing occultists in Portland, Oregon, in 1923, and his story was that his father gave him a blacksmith's set when he was young and told him to turn lead into gold, the eternal alchemical project. He grew up to become a pioneering experimental filmmaker and musicologist, collecting the records that became the milestone Anthology of American Folk Music, inspiring the folk revivalists of the 1950's and early 60's - Dylan, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Dave Van Ronk, the New Lost City Ramblers and so many others - without either the academic credentials or paternalism of Alan Lomax. Smith's stated goal was to the country through the recognition of the cultural contributions of poor black and white musicians. And, given the prominence and further evolution of such music through the course of the Civil Rights Movement and the revolutions of the 1960's, one could make the argument that such an alchemical transformation was achieved.

Of course, Smith was also known for his raging alcoholism and mercurial personality, alienating numerous friends and associates over the years before his death in 1991 (I had the pleasure of hearing him lecture in 1990 at the Naropa Institute, where the seemingly infinitely patient Allen Ginsberg arranged his appointment as Shaman in Residence). I don't know of any contacts Lethem may have had with Smith, but many of their obsessions would seem to dovetail fairly symmetrically.

Jonathan Lethem's Chronic City is a provocative novel of the highest order, the kind you were always hoping to find in musty old used bookstores in the pre-Amazon days, when such tomes were talked about on land line telephones or maybe written about in letters from friends on the coast, when the gratification of personal discovery might be delayed for months or even years from first notice. It is fiercely, passionately relevant.

The High Man in the Rent-Controlled Castle, Part One

Note: I have been writing this around the Thanksgiving holiday, so concentrated writing time has been fleeting. Given that, I have decided to publish this review in two parts. Sorry for the abrupt end of Part One, but I will get back to it just as soon as possible--Michael Parker

As a reader, a bookseller and, much more modestly, a writer, I can't imagine a better place to be (given realistic budgetary constraints) than New Orleans at this time. A lively independent bookselling scene, fantastic writers young and old exploring the possibilities of the novel, the poem, the memoir, investigative journalism, cultural history. Engaged universities nurturing young writers, bringing in established names. A recent and ongoing reminder of that good fortune is the book group organized by the inimitable, the ineffable, the indefatigible, the fierely independent bookseller of Tchoupitoulas St., Maggie McKeown, proprietor of the boldly-named McKeown's Books and Difficult Music (mckeownsbooks.com). At our most recent meeting, we discussed The Man in the High Castle, the 1962 classic by Philip K. Dick, whose fevered imagination gave us Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (adapted as the Future Noir Blade Runner), the short story "The Minority Report" (which inspired the 2002 movie of the same name that made household names out of formerly obscure director Stephen Spielberg [previously best known for Duel and 1941] and actor Tom Cruise [Taps and All the Right Moves]), among many, many others.



The Man in the High Castle showcases many of Dick's iconic, recurring themes - the tenuousness of identity, whether individual or collective; the fragility of concensus reality; the malleability of consciousness, with all the attendant epiphanies and pitfalls; the potential commodification of the deepest of emotional and spiritual commitments - within the framework of a highly inventive representative of the alternate-history subgenre of science fiction. Dick's scenario has the Axis Powers winning World War II, with the typically Dickian twist of a writer living in Wyoming (which is part of a vaguely identified autonomous zone between the Japanese-occupied West Coast and the German-ruled eastern United States [I'm getting a mental picture of the Risk board about this time])publishing a novel which posits the absurd notion of the Allies, led by U.S. President Rexford Tugwell (real-life Undersecretary of Agriculture under FDR, if indeed you're comfortable describing our consensus history as "real" life [maybe Joe Biden wasn't committing a gaffe after all when he referred to FDR's t.v. appearances, hmmmm?]).



The discussion flowed as freely as the red wine, with the round table in the front room of Maggie's bookstore providing Algonquinesque inspiration. Quantum theory, a demonstration of the I Ching, the power dynamics of colonial oppression turned inside out through the medium of science fiction and sold at drugstores and bus stations throughout early-1960's America, seeping into minds that wouldn't be exposed to Allen Ginsberg or Frantz Fanon for several years yet, if ever. All were touched on,... except maybe the part about Ginsberg or Fanon, I kinda thought about that later.



There was a palpable sense of personal relief at the end of the book club meeting, as I knew I would finally be able to start Jonathan Lethem's newest novel, Chronic City, when I got home. Outside of some short pieces in the New Yorker, two of which I would discover were excerpts from this book, I had not gotten around to Lethem, a hardback of Fortress of Solitude taunting me along with the other unread books on our shelves (incidentally, I have finally gotten around to reading Michael Chabon and Robert Stone recently, so I'm not slacking completely).



To get back to Philip K. Dick briefly, I would argue that he was a speculative fiction force of nature, defying the s-f geekocracy's obsessive need for categorization (is he a junior partner of the Golden Age, member emeritus of the New Wave, prophetic grandfather of the Cyberpunks?). That said, does he have a natural heir today?



I would propose two. Californian Tim Powers was a friend of Dick's whose novels reflect many of the same passionate ambiguities about personal and historical identity, utilizing real people and historical situations as jumping-off points for simply remarkable imaginative journeys. Declare recasts 20th century Middle East geopolitics as a battle between Great Powers of occultic and mythic might as well as political and military. And Three Days to Never conflates Einstein, Charlie Chaplin, the Mossad and a Dan Brown-style secret society into a story of a father and daughter on the run because they unknowingly possess components to a time machine developed by the scientist and the silent film star (believe me, he keeps all the balls in the air).



Jonathan Lethem is the other writer, one who, like Kurt Vonnegut many years ago, has graduated from his early pigeonholing as a science fiction writer to a place at the table with the literary grownups (forgive any stains from my dripping irony [the working title for my first foray into adult cinema, by the way, look for it on vhs and laser disc soon]), and Chronic City is a masterpiece. The classic Dick themes are all here (the working title for the sequel to Dripping Irony, by the way), and he makes the mature choice to jettison any s-f elements....oh, except for the International Space Station plagued by low-orbiting Chinese mines, the highly unusual meteorological and zoological phenomena plaguing Manhattan, and a mindbending virtual reality subplot worthy of Neal Stephenson, whenever he gets back from the 18th century.



Lethem's novel focusses on four friends/associates/co-conspirators (relationships and alliances shift through the course of the book), with the island of Manhattan and its ongoing survival as a unifying theme throughout. Given Lethem's obvious obsession with American popular culture (sign me up for that support group), it is hard not make associations with Seinfeld, although it doesn't hold up beyond the superficial symmetry of three men and a woman, all self-absorbed Manhattanites.



Cultural critic and onetime Rolling Stone contributor Perkus Tooth is the sun in this particular galaxy, smoking high-grade marijuana and poring over books, cd's and videos in his rabbit warren of an apartment, far removed from his days as the Thomas Paine of the Punk-era New York, plastering philosophical "broadsides" on construction site walls with the aid of Oona Lazlo ("Had Perkus spilled a pot of coffee on his tiles and the coffee sprung to life as a woman an instant before I opened the door, it would have explained her perfectly," [pg. 44]), now a cynical professional ghostwriter. Richard Abneg is a former squatter who now uses his fading street credibility in the service of the billionaire mayor of New York.



Our sometime narrator, and the most recently drawn into Perkus' orbit, is Chase Insteadman, an urbane former child star who is now best known as the fiancee of an astronaut aboard the doomed space station, Janice Turnbull, whose letters to Chase have transfixed the city (perhaps the country and world as well, if there were some indication of such a world beyond Manhattan). This subplot of doomed love and space-age trench warfare is tantalizing, not least because there is never a mention of any terrestrial conflict with China that would lead to the mine field the Americans and Russian cosmonauts face (perhaps a nasty floreclosure fight?).