Two Volcanoes

My reading topics have really come in pairs this year, like my last post, Two Mysteries. But the choice to read Volcano by Shusaku Endo and Krakatoa by Simon Winchester nearly back to back was a bit more deliberate. I thought it would be interesting to read one fiction and one nonfiction books ostensibly about the same topic.

I picked up Volcano because I had been so blown away (no pun intended) by Endo’s Silence last year.  Like Silence, Volcano is set on the southern island of Kyushu, but Volcano is set in contemporary times in the city of Kagoshima, which is right at the foot of the real-life volcano Sakurajima.

In Volcano, Sakurajima is called Akadaké, and it is a looming symbol of evil and wretchedness in the story. One of the main characters, Jinpei Suda, has spent his life working at the local weather bureau which overlooks Akadaké. He developed such an obsessive interest and knowledge of the volcano that he’s known as the “Demon of Akadaké.” He’s arrogantly confident about his knowledge of the volcano, asserting that it is dying and won’t erupt anymore. But Suda is a dilettante. His blindly follows the theories of a now-deceased scholar, dismisses contrary scientists, and ignores obvious signs of impending eruption when he visits the island. His whole life is so wrapped up in his work and the self-importance of his so-called expertise that he is blind to reality — the reality of the volcano’s dangers, the reality that he is not as widely respected as he believes, and the reality that he has failed to develop meaningful relationships with his colleagues or even his own family.

Just as Suda is about to retire, Father Sato, the young local priest, wants his expert assurance that the volcano is dying and won’t erupt anymore. Sato has used the church’s precious funds to buy a plot of land at the foot of Akadaké where he wants to open a spiritual retreat center. Of course, this would be a very poor idea if Akadaké were still active. Father Sato turns to the Demon for his “expert” opinion, and the Demon ignores all evidence to the contrary and reassures the priest. But as he is cast adrift in his retirement, he is consumed by guilt and loneliness.

The Western counterpart to Suda is the old priest  Father Durand. Father Durand is ill and near the end of his life. As he sits by his window looking out over the volcano, he recalls an earlier time when he was arrogantly confident in his religious beliefs and his feelings of superiority over how the Japanese live and follow Buddhist customs. At that time, a young female doctor came to him for help with her sickly, frail only child, but he was convinced that the only thing wrong with the boy was being indulged by the mother. He harshly scolded the doctor, and convinced her to let him put her son in Catholic mission boarding school. The child detested the school and Durand and eventually fell ill and died, devastating the mother. For all Durand’s religiosity and confidence, he has no answer for the boy’s mother as to why god let the boy die. Now, in old age, he is consumed by guilt:

But in his own case, whatever he tried in wanting to do God’s work had ended up ironically in disaster, in tragic consequences. Moreover, God was always silent. God did not answer his prayers. God was only trifling with Durand.

…’Go ahead and explode! Go ahead and explode!’ Durand was actually hoping that some day without warning the mountain would vomit its fire and smoke, retch with its lava, destroy everything — as he had destroyed it all with his own life.

Endo chases around his obsessive themes about the arrogance of Christianity while the great Akadaké/Sakurajima looms in judgement over the characters in the book. It was a powerful symbol to center the novel on.  I visited Kagoshima and drove around the perimeter of Sakurajima about 10 years ago. It’s beautiful and rather scary — the volcano regularly erupts and always has a thick plume of smoke drifting up from the crater. It feels crazy to drive around on it! I think it added to my enjoyment of the novel because I could really visualize this volcano.

Krakatoa by Simon Winchester is everything you ever wanted to know about the world’s biggest and baddest recorded volcanic explosion on August 27, 1883. Krakatoa island, situated in the strait between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia, blew itself out of the water and out of existence that day, but the effects of its demise were felt globally for years afterwards. Winchester explains the geologic history and chases down vague reports of earlier possible eruptions. He also explains the social, economic, and technological reasons why this particular explosion in 1883 was poised to be so widely observed and studied, and the impact the explosion had on the global economy, the scientific understanding of the proliferation of species, and even, possibly, the spread of Islam in Indonesia. And be warned: a new volcanic island, the restless Anak Krakatoa or Child of Krakatoa, has already been born from the waves in the same spot.

Possibly one of my favorite nonfiction genres is this kind of study of natural phenomenon and its  social, scientific, technological, artistic, economic, historical and whatever-else impact. Krakatoa was on my TBR for about 5 years. I am so glad I finally read it!

Volcano
Copyright 1959
personal copy
4/5

Krakatoa
Copyright 2003
personal copy
4/5

 

 

Pulitzer 2011: A Visit from the Good Squad

I’m going to find this book tough to review because — dare I confess? — I really couldn’t follow parts of it. It starts off with a great scene — Sasha’s on another bad first date and heads into the women’s room for some recharging. She spies a green wallet sticking out of a bag, while its owner is busy in the stall. Sasha’s a kleptomaniac, and she’s been working with a therapist to understand why stealing gives her such a rush of pleasure. But the opportunity the unattended wallet presents to give her a rush of relief from her boring date is just too perfect a chance to pass by.  So she nabs it. This first chapter nabbed me, too, even if I did have to wonder — who the hell leaves their bag outside the stall while using a public bathroom?

Stories of sadness: Olive Kitteridge

There was a certain point in Olive Kitteridge when I was mentally adding it to my best-books-ever list. While it’s still a contender, it’s not quite lingering with me in the way those books do. But I don’t want to give the impression that Olive Kitteridge (henceforth OK) is disappointing or lacking in some way. It’s really brilliant, but also unrelentingly sad.

OK has an interesting construction. Is it a novel or a collection of short stories? Each chapter is a unique stand-alone story, but all the stories are about people in the same small Maine town. Olive herself appears in every story, but sometimes only as a mention. Other times, she is the main character of the chapter/story. To me the book reads more like a novel mainly because the stories begin in the past, but move forward in time. Also, there is progression and change in the characters, including Olive herself.

The first story introduces Olive through a story about her husband, Henry, and his unrequited love for one of his employees. By the end of the book, we have learned from various stories that Henry has had a stroke and has been left completely incapacitated in nursing home. Finally, in another story we learn that he has passed away. The book is a bit like being privy to all the best (and saddest) small town gossip.

Foreign Affairs

Do certain decades have a unique writing style? Certainly most readers have a sense of writing that feels dated in some way — like the demanding vocabulary (by contemporary standards) and expository narrator you might find a Victorian novel. Or writing that uses language that is highly charged for today’s reader, e.g., use of the n-word in Huckleberry Finn or The Big Sky.

Alison Lurie’s writing in Foreign Affairs immediately slipped me into a late-70s, early-80s frame of mind. Her style is smooth and the pages slip by effortlessly. A bit like soft rock, novel-style. Pleasant, with a resonating groove under the surface. Easy, like Sunday morning.

A Gentleman in Moscow

I finished A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles about an hour before the clock struck midnight 2017, so it feels like a “back there” book. But I just want to write a few lines on it, because something about that story stays with me weeks later: the kindness of strangers who become friends.

If you’ve read anything about it, you’ll know that the story is about a Russian count, Alexander Rostov, who is sentenced to “hotel arrest” following the Russian revolution. As an aristocrat, he is lucky to be left alive and living in Russia. But if he leaves the hotel where he lives, he is told by the authorities that he will be shot. So he stays put in the hotel for more than 30 years.  Still, an amazing number of things happen in his life, and those events and their trajectory make up the very enjoyable story.

Two Slaps

It’s taken me about two weeks to figure out how to write about A God in Ruins, Kate Atkinson’s follow-up novel to Life After Life. I finished A God in Ruins the same night I watched the finale to the long-running TV series The Good Wife. If you’re a Good Wife fan, you’ll likely have a strong opinion about how the series ended with a resounding and literal slap in the face. Later that same night I lay in bed eagerly finishing A God in Ruins, looking so forward to a satisfying conclusion to another story and cast of characters that I was now two books familiar with. When I came to the ending….oh, I was surprised! And felt like I’d received a literary slap — two slaps in one night!

Time Reading Program: Memento Mori

Cover art by Tomi Ungerer.

I can’t believe this book has not been made into a film. I could visualize the introduction of the characters in the first few chapters as  a series of movie scenes. As one character meets another, we get a small vignette that illustrates each one’s personality, and then he/she bumps into the next character and a new vignette. Soon each characters eccentricity or uniqueness is revealed and the stage is set for the story to unfold. It’s a brilliant and cinematic opening.