Authors, Fiction

Did Crime and Punishment Remake the Novel?

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Of course, Dostoevsky’s claim to have invented a new literary genre doesn’t solely rest on Crime and Punishment. Although it was published when he was 45, after so many books and setbacks, it marked a breakthrough, not a culmination. Its resemblance to Hamlet resides both in its details (fatherless ex-student, bookish sidekick, philosophy, mumbling, murder) and in its peculiar status, as an extraordinary achievement that also serves as the preparation for a trio of more ambitiously unsettling tragedies.

Various touches point towards Dostoevsky’s later novels: a reflection on the “holy fool” (The Idiot), a dream involving a city-wide disease (The Possessed), a smattering of theodicy (The Brothers Karamazov). It is not an insult to Crime and Punishment but a tribute to its author to say that his most famous book, the face he shows to the world, plays a more servile role within his body of work, something like a hinge, or border – a spin-off that doubles as a gateway drug to more exalted highs.

Leo Robson writes of the importance of Crime and Punishment to its author and the literary world, even those who disliked it. (via Prufrock News)

Uncategorized, Writing

Commitment (in two senses)

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Photo by Mikhail Vasilyev

I’m still keyed up about my sudden admittance to the ragged outskirts of the movie industry. For all I know, this translation experiment will be a failure, culminating in shame and derisive laughter. And yet it seems to be going pretty well so far. Which leads me to ponder, after the manner of a script doctor, where this plot line in my life started.

It was a summer in the 1970s. I’d recently graduated from college, though I was still living in an upstairs apartment on campus. The woman I had fallen in love with, more than any other before or since, had recently left the country. I had a strong feeling that I’d never see her again (I was almost right), and that I would be forever sad and alone (I nailed that one). So what was I to do with the shards of my hardly-begun life?

I resolved to do two things. I would write a novel, and I would learn Norwegian.

My true motive for writing the novel was (I’m pretty sure) to Show Her. I would be a great and famous literary figure, and she would kick herself for missing out on a good thing every time she saw me guesting on the Carson Show.

That didn’t work out very well. The novel would be finished – eventually – and it would be published, about 20 years later. But to date it has failed to make me a beloved cultural icon.

My motive for learning Norwegian, I think, was that I had a vague idea that someday I’d travel to Norway, where I’d meet a wonderful woman who’d be impressed that I spoke her language and make me forget my sorrows.

That hasn’t worked out very well either.

But I stuck with the plan, by gum. And now the two of them together have snagged me an interesting job.

At this point, I suppose, I should close with a hackneyed meditation on the importance of perseverance.

But that’s only one possible lesson. Another is a similarly hackneyed bromide: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.”

Fortunately, insanity is no handicap in the film industry.

Publishing

You Think You’re Unpublished Now?

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A thousand trees have been planted in the Nordmarka forest, near Oslo, Norway, as a work of art, literature, and hope in dystopian days. It’s being called a work of art, framtidsbiblioteket  or The Future Library; and I don’t doubt it’s beautiful even now. Trees have a way about them.

The trees are to meant grow for 100 years (starting in 2014) and then be cut for the paper to publish anthologies with manuscripts that will be written over that hundred-year period. Participating writers will surrender their original work to the project and allow it to go unpublished until 2114, preventing anyone from knowing how pretentious and unreadable it is until after their death. The writers who submit something in 2100 will be the ones under pressure, because they will have living readers to engage at the next virtual book signing. If their work flops, it will only be another weight to drag the whole project under water.

Who’s going to care to read back fifty years to see whether one of these works will hold their interest? Other writers possibly. More likely it will be publishers who read through these anthologies to find a gem they can exploit for themselves. “Frizzik Notweilder’s Ghosts at Noon Know the Heimlich, written seventy years ago and published in the framtidsbiblioteket anthologies, is the novel of the century, now available through Simon & Zondervan publishers.”

And Notweilder won’t know a thing about it.

Uncategorized, Writing

The Norwegian word for ‘translator’ is ‘oversetter’

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From time to time on this blog, thanks to Phil’s patience and longsuffering, I review movies and TV shows. Sometimes they’re foreign productions, often Scandinavian ones. One of my most frequent complaints about foreign films is the poor quality of the English translations.

It appears I’ll now be in a position to do something about that problem.

Briefly stated, I responded a couple days ago to an inquiry in a Facebook group, asking for people with Norwegian translation skills and writing abilities. I figured I might as well take a shot, and today I have an agreement to work as a freelancer with Meteoritt (Meteorite), an Oslo-based company that does translation, closed captions, and subtitles for film and television productions.

They’ve got me working on a very interesting project right now – but I can’t tell you what it is. There’s a non-disclosure agreement, for reasons that make sense once you get involved. When the project is released, I’ll be able to tell you I worked on it.

Some of you may be asking (as I asked myself) “What will that mean for your novel-writing?”

Well, in the short run, it will make it difficult.

But in a few months, if things go as I expect, my day job situation is likely to change. At that time I’ll probably be in a position to spend more time on the novel.

Maybe all this won’t work out. Maybe I’ll find the company incompatible, or the work too challenging. But if it prospers, it could set me up for my old age in a very agreeable manner.

I’m very happy about this.

Non-fiction

The Thing Under the Bed is Depression

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In seasons like this, the straight truth is my best help. One truth my doctor told me early on was that this depression would probably find me after I had been home for a few weeks. And here it is, like a train pulling into the station right on time.

http://russ-ramsey.com/monster-in-the-dark-a-chapter-about-depression/

Fiction, Reviews

‘Last Orders,’ by Caimh McDonnell

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Last Orders

Phil’s ideas were a lot like children: they could be wonderful or a nightmare, but regardless, you couldn’t leave them on their own for very long, or bad things would happen.

Caimh McDonnell is definitely having us on. The third book of his “Dublin Trilogy” proved to be a prequel, and it’s this fourth book (which makes it a tetralogy at this stage) that finally wraps the story up. Sort of. A note at the end informs us that a further sequel is coming.

Ah well, it’s all fun. In Last Orders, a couple old bodies are dug up in the course of a construction project, and we know (if we recall the prequel) that the bodies belong to two guys one of our heroes, old Bunny McGarry, killed 18 years ago. All in a good cause, of course. They were killers (even though one of them was an FBI agent), and he was saving a good woman’s life.

But now the specter of discovery hangs over Bunny, who has never entirely recovered from the tortures he suffered in the second book. Retired from the police force, he’s supposed to be part of the detective agency started by his friends Paul and Brigit, but his heart isn’t in it. Mostly he whiles away his time drinking and making a spectacle of himself in public.

Meanwhile Paul has become obsessed with a duel of practical jokes between his agency and a rival agency. This leads to somebody actually getting injured, leading to a lawsuit and the impending death of the agency, unless a way can be found to discredit the plaintiff. Also the course of true love is not running smooth between him and Brigit.

Last Orders is essentially a serious story, told in a hilarious way. Lots of laughs all through, along with some genuinely poignant moments. Cautions for language and immature themes. I loved it.

Fiction, Reviews

‘The Dead Daughter,’ by Thomas Fincham

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The Dead Daughter

Possibly the worst book title I’ve ever seen. Thomas Fincham’s The Dead Daughter isn’t as bad as its name, but it’s no masterpiece.

Kyla Gardener was the daughter of a wealthy couple in the (fictional, I think) city of Milton. When her mother Sharon finds her dead, strangled and stabbed, suspicion falls on her father, Paul. The marriage is struggling, and he’s been sleeping in the guest house. The burglar alarm had been turned off. The murder knife was found in his car, and a smear of her blood was found on his shirt. He himself had been drinking and has no memory of the night at all.

But private eye Lee Callahan has information for the police – Paul had hired him to follow Sharon as part of his divorce defense. She was gone that night, not at home as she claimed, and it was she who turned off the burglar alarm. That’s enough to get Paul out on bail, and Lee takes it on himself – out of pure generosity – to try to balance the one-sided investigation the police are running. What he discovers will be shocking.

The thing that kept me reading The Dead Daughter was that the story itself wasn’t bad. Lee Callahan is interesting and sympathetic as a character. But the writing was… unfortunate. Amateur. First draft stuff.

Holt began to pace the room like he normally did. He was like a bull who wanted to let off steam.

It was a family secret, one they did not want the public to find out about.

Author Fincham, according to his bio, has written quite a few novels. Apparently he hasn’t learned a thing about writing all through the process. If he’d put some work in on that front, I think he’d be a good novelist.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Going Underground,’ by Michael Leese

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Going Underground

I’ve often suspected that I’m somewhere on the lower end of the autism spectrum. Whether I am or not, I’ve always found autism an intriguing subject. So I purchased Going Underground, by Michael Leese, a novel with an autistic hero. It didn’t grab me, though I finished it. I’m really at a loss to say why I didn’t like it better.

The story begins with the murder of a prominent genealogist by his trusted secretary. Then a beloved philanthropist’s body is found, dismembered, in a cellar. Scotland Yard Detective Inspector Brian Hooley is sent to investigate the second case, and he brings along his favored assistant, Jonathan Roper. Jonathan has a bad reputation at the Yard because he nearly blew an important arrest before his recent suspension. But Hooley believes in him. Jonathan is autistic, and his social cluelessness makes him unpopular with other detectives. But he has amazing abilities to observe and process information. He justifies Hooley’s trust when he quickly locates hidden evidence no one else would have found. The evidence leads them to a genetic research company, where (they eventually learn) genuinely evil experiments are being carried on behind the respectable façade.

I can identify no failure in the writing in this book (except for a lamentable tendency to close individual paragraphs within extended monologues with quotation marks, which could be the fault of an editor converting the text to American punctuation). But somehow the characters never came alive for me. Maybe I’m not as comfortable with the portrayal of autism as I thought I was.

Anyway, I can’t enthusiastically recommend Going Underground, but I have no real objections to make either. Cautions for mature themes.

Uncategorized

‘Lost Conquest” documentary

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Here is a link to a recent documentary (a little over an hour) about Viking enthusiasm in Minnesota, concentrating on the Kensington Rune Stone. I am not in it; I was in the throes of graduate school when it was made. But several friends and acquaintances of mine are featured. I missed the Midwest Viking Festival this past summer, but hope to make it again this year. See it here.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Death Unholy,’ by Phillip Strang

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Death Unholy

Sometimes you can see what an author’s going for, but he just doesn’t have the skills to deliver. That’s my judgment on Phillip Strang’s Death Unholy.

It’s become almost compulsory in British police procedurals, perhaps due to the Inspector Morse model: Team a crusty old detective with a young rookie detective. Nowadays it almost has to be a female rookie. And that’s exactly what we have in Death Unholy. Keith Tremayne is an aging cop, approaching retirement, in Salisbury. His subordinate is Clare Yarwood, a suitably attractive young detective.

One day they get a truly bizarre case – apparently spontaneous human combustion. An old man – or rather his ashes, plus his legs – is found very dead in an easy chair. Such cases are generally explained by dropped cigarettes and a smoldering effect, but this fellow didn’t smoke.

As Tremayne and Yarwood inquire into the man’s circle of acquaintances, further people start disappearing or dying by violence. Eventually their attention is drawn to a nearby village, historically isolated, where the Anglican priest lives in fear for his soul, and ancient pagan rituals continue to be practiced – and they seem to be effective.

Death Unholy just didn’t come together for me. The classic grumpy English detectives, like Morse, are usually softened by some unexpected outside interest (often music) that humanizes them. Tremayne, we’re told, has nothing beside his job in his life other than betting on horses and drinking. He’s a bore, and utterly predictable. Dialogue in a novel is supposed to reveal the characters to the reader, through observation of how people relate. Author Strang here gives us the dialogue and then informs us what it means. A big surprise near the end was obvious to me a mile off, and another smaller surprise at the very end made no sense to me based on how the character had been established.

Death Unholy starts as a police procedural, then blindsides the reader by turning into a supernatural thriller. I have an idea that author Strang may have beliefs that I approve of, but I don’t think he made them work for him in this book.

Cautions for mature themes.

Book Reviews, Creative Culture