The day after

For some reason I don't really want to think about too hard, I am not hung over today but Billy Collins, at some point (I think it was yesterday) read a poem called The Hangover which included the most poetic rendering of the children's pool game Marco Polo one could imagine. You should look it up, or better, find a recording of Billy reading it. It's entirely possible you will find such a recording in the near future on Littoral, The Key West Literary Seminar's entirely excellent blog. At least I hope so.

In the meantime I can now recite from memory the poem Bacon and Eggs by Howard Nemerov, like Billy a two-time Poet Laureate and apparently like Billy a funny guy, too. This is the entire text:

The chicken contributes

But the pig gives its all.

It's a good poem and it bore repeated recitation, along with Roy Blount, Jr.'s poem Oysters, of which I cannot recite the entire text though I do know the last lines:

I prefer my oysters fried

That way I know the oyster's died.

A sentiment with which I agree after reading The Big Oyster by Mark Kurlansky, in which he reports that if you have to shuck an oyster, it's alive (once it's dead, it relaxes the ligament holding the two sides of the shell together). I always liked them Florentine anyway, plus that way you don't have to worry about that pesky liver thing that can kill you.

All of which is to say, I learned a lot over the last 10 days and had a great time, too. It was cool to see New Yorker staff writer Adam Gopnik in action -- if you weren't at his keynote you'll just have to wait for the podcast because there's no way I could possibly describe it except as a cultural history of the concept of taste. My take-home from that talk: E Pluribus Unum, our national motto until 1956 when they replaced it with In God We Trust, came from a recipe. Pretty cool. (June 10 update: It's here! Download now for your auditory enlightenment!)

As usual, the Seminar makes me want to read almost every book by almost every writer who appeared, but this year's Seminar had the added effect of also making me want to eat almost everything described (except the human lung mucus from "Alive" -- thank you, Kate Christensen!) and cook almost everything, too. I had been wavering the entire time about buying American Food Writing, Molly O'Neill's anthology published by the Library of America. I knew we had it in the library collection but I also knew that you don't just check an anthology out of the library for two weeks and read it straight through; you dip in and out as the mood strikes you. The factor that put me over the edge yesterday was that it includes recipes, including James Beard's recipe for Beef Stroganoff, which seemed to come up multiple times. I might even attempt the damned thing.

Here, in no particular order except roughly chronological, are some of my highlights from the second session of the Seminar. Despite having a number of panelists (or seminarians, as Adam Gopnik suggested we call them) in common, it was very different -- but both were excellent.

• "The key to writing is to take the mental task and turn it into a physical task." -- Adam Gopnik, during a panel that compared cooking and writing
• "One advantage pro cooks have over pro writers is they get to yell at people." -- Gopnik again
• "It's a really dangerous moment when you sate the desire in a piece. I always feel like I've lost the reader and it's time to do the dishes." -- Molly O'Neill
• "Obsession is required" in cooking and writing -- Michael Ruhlman. Also, he notes, an immense capacity for repetition, aka practice
• Kate Christensen said she always notices a novel's "prandial plot" and "I hate novels that have no food in them."
• "Our relationship to food is revealing of our characters in the way that nothing else is." -- Christensen again
• On the page, "food isn't a metaphor. It's a thing in itself that explodes in the verbal part of your brain." -- Christensen a third time
• Take This Job and Shove It is "a ditty disappointed in itself" -- from Kevin Young's poem "On Being The Only Black Man At A Johnny Paycheck Concert"
• "Food is what distinguishes us as human beings, cooked food." -- Michael Ruhlman
• "If my peaches are successful, they are no longer mine." -- David Mas Masumoto, organic peach farmer and essayist
• "When you grow thousands of peaches, you don't bother sucking on the pit." -- Mas again
• "Without me, you would never have seen the poem 'Nebraskans eat their weiners.' " -- Mark Kurlansky, discussing "The Food of a Younger Land," the collection of WPA food writing from 1940
• "Locavore is a movement today. It was a way of life then. You had no choice." -- Kurlansky again
• The reason French food culture is so much better than English food culture is red wine, according to Adam Gopnik. "I don't think a beer and whiskey culture will ever have quite that same relationship to its food as a red wine culture."
• Gopnik recommends "The Feasts of Autolycus: The Diary of A Greedy Woman," published in 1900 by Elizabeth Robbins Pennell, saying that "a woman writing about her right to be greedy is writing about her right be sexy, to have sex."
• "Catullus would have loved Facebook. He would have been on there all the time." -- Billy Collins
• "Sometimes you write a poem because you don't want eating alone one night in Pittsburgh to come to nothing." -- Collins again, discussing his poem "The Fish."
• "Fat is good!" -- the refrain Michael Ruhlman had the entire auditorium calling out. "Salt and fat are two of my great passions."
• "Food is about generosity, not about withholding." -- Ruhlman again
• It turns out a buckeye is, in addition to being some kind of hard little nut, a delicious candy made with peanut butter surrounded by chocolate, a big favorite in Ohio. I had no idea.
• In a discussion of, er, food porn, we learned that magazine and cookbook editors demand the "hero shot" of food that presents it at its most, er, appetizing. Ahem.
• "Always pick the thing that is not a chain is one way to save the world." -- Elizabeth Berg, from her story "The Day I Ate Whatever I Wanted"
• Favorite recipe: Buy two boxes of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese. Make one box of macaroni, use both envelopes of cheese. -- Berg again, from the same story
• "The whole history of America was of gobbling up the continent." -- Mark Kurlansky
• "We don't eat money." -- An Icelander telling Mark Kurlansky why they eat haddock, not cod
• "I have never followed a recipe in my life. I read them and I'm inspired by them but then I just go do what I was going to do anyway." -- Molly O'Neill
• "We think of recipes as instruction manuals but recipes are sheet music." -- Michael Ruhlman
• "There are several generations of people now who think recipes know more than they do." -- Molly O'Neill
• "My overarching goal is to have more people cook for themselves because I think life is better that way. The world is better that way." -- Michael Ruhlman
• Judith Jones is "absolutely the last of the great cookbook editors. Everybody else is just trying to make the sucker fit on the page." -- Molly O'Neill
• The first line of the first edition of The Joy of Cooking: "Stand facing the stove."
• "A great meal in China has themes; it has a narrative arc." -- Nicole Mones
• "Where else can you win an international cookbook medal for a novel that doesn't contain any recipes?" Mones again
• "My childhood was not defined by the grand meals my mother cooked. It was defined by trips to Waffle House with my father." -- John T. Edge
• Recommended reading from Edge: Southern Fried Plus Six by William Price Fox
• And I'll give Billy Collins the last word: "I'm surprised more people don't read poetry. It's so short."

You can (sort of) go home again

I was one of those Narnia kids. I read the books over and over (I was a big re-reader; I also read the Little House series and many others multiple times) -- though I eventually limited myself to once a year, perhaps fearing the effects of over-exposure. I think some of my love for Narnia was in reaction to the Tolkien dominance I felt in the house -- my older sister and cousins were all hard-core Tolkien devotees and those books were big and, in the hardcover boxed set we owned, rather forbidding. Narnia, on the other hand, was welcoming and manageable. And it was mine. My adoration for Narnia did not lead me far into the fantasy genre, or Christianity -- brought up with little exposure to religion, I managed to miss the obvious parallels in the tales until they were pointed out to me later and even then I just accepted them as part of this particular story and not something that was supposed to apply to my life. Eventually I grew up and during adolescence transferred my affections to books intended for adults, like Jane Eyre and the works of Jane Austen. I did read The Lord of the Rings, once, and enjoyed it but never felt the fierce connection to that world that I had to Narnia. I always wondered how Narnia would feel to me as an adult -- especially once my friends started having kids and the kids grew old enough to read the Chronicles or have them read to them. I both envied them and worried that they might have the childhood magic erased. Like pretty much everyone else on the planet, I was drawn back to kid lit by the Harry Potter series and I felt a little reconnected, in a strange way, in reading (and being entranced by) Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, even while understanding it could not, in many ways, be more opposed to Lewis' work. I read and loved The Magicians, Lev Grossman's novel that was widely described as Harry Potter with sex and drugs but obviously owes a lot more to a childhood obsession with Narnia.

So when the movie version of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe came out I got a copy of the book and re-read it and, as I had feared, it felt strangely flat. I was sorry I had done it. Narnia was lost to me -- I still fondly remembered loving the books so intensely, but I felt a little like the characters in the books who, once they reach a certain age, are told they cannot return.

But Narnia, and C.S. Lewis, just will not go away. About a year ago, unexpectedly, one campus of my alma mater was sold off and to become the new home of the start-up C.S. Lewis College. And the movies keep coming, too, most recently the third installment, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. (In a slightly related side note, I am glad to see the movies are appearing in what I believe is the correct sequence, which was the order of publication and the order that my paperback boxed set back in the '70s, rather than the series order now espoused by the Chronicles' publishers, which conforms to the internal chronology of Narnia but makes less sense to me.)

A couple weeks ago I was shelving books in the Children's Room at the library -- always a dangerous occupation -- and came across a copy of Dawn Treader with the familar '70s paperback cover, glued onto one of those hard buckram library bindings. I opened it up and read a few lines and to my own surprise felt drawn in. So I checked it out and brought it home. (If any of my bosses is reading this, I swear don't do a lot of reading while I'm supposed to be shelving books. Really.) I read it and enjoyed it, even while recognizing Lewis' crankiness toward co-education and practical knowledge was a little, well, cranky. But it was also kind of funny. I thought I just might give some other Chronicles a try. I also came across Laura Miller's recent essay in the Wall Street Journal about how the approach of the Narnia films differs significantly from the source material, especially in their emphasis on FAMILY VALUES.

That led me to pull of the shelf a book I have owned since it was published, Miller's The Magician's Book. It's subtitled "A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia" and Miller, who was one of the founders of Salon, is my favorite literary critic so I knew the chances were pretty good I was going to like it. And I did, though I also did not want to read too far until I had re-read the rest of the Chronicles.

On the day after Christmas, disaster struck. Our beloved dog died of liver failure. She was only 3 1/2 and my husband and I are one of those childless couples who are  devoted to our dog beyond all reason. Plus, she was an outrageously lovable dog, as many of our friends can attest. And it came as a huge shock. So I was in a state. I needed comfort, familiarity, and distraction. At some point, late in the day (I think; those first couple days are actually a little fuzzy), I reached for Narnia. I think it was Prince Caspian, since I decided I needed to return to the correct order and had already gotten the next few books out of the library. And it was a relief -- a tale that offered an escape without challenging my brain. It had been long enough that I had forgotten the details of the story so reading was interesting but as I went along I recognized and remembered the characters and plot points as old friends.

In the week since, I have blown through the rest of the Chronicles and finished Miller's book and yes, it is as excellent as I had expected it to be, both in its appreciation for Lewis' achievement and its clear-eyed view of his flaws. I was a bit shocked in reading The Horse and His Boy to come across the nasty descriptions of the clearly Arab-inspired villainous Calormenes with their turbans and scimitars and swarthy skin and nasty smells of onion and garlic -- not like those virtuous, fair-haired, upstanding (and odorless) Narnians! And of course I thought, oh no, how much of that did I absorb as a kid? Though as Miller points out, for many of us, if Lewis intended the Chronicles as religious treatises we didn't take them that way -- so perhaps the ethnic prejudice also rolled off. She also spends quite a bit of time discussing the differences in approaches and attitudes between Lewis and Tolkien, who were famously friends in Oxford, and the literary sources and inspirations for their respective creations.

So thanks, Narnia -- which means thanks, C.S. Lewis. Even if you didn't succeed in making me a believer as a kid and even if I am disturbed and offended by some of your attitudes as an adult, I appreciate the experience of immersion in literature that you provided for me back then -- and the welcome distraction this week. I'll continue to think fondly of the books, mostly, even if they are also now irrevocably associated with Andy Samberg and Chris Parnell's brilliant Lazy Sunday video (which pops into my head every time I check out one of the Narnia DVDs at the library, usually for someone who's about 8 years old). And thanks, especially, Laura Miller for an intelligent and interesting assessment of Lewis and the power those books in particular and literature in general can have for kids, and for writing about books in an appreciative accessible way for regular people, wresting criticism and literature back from the academics who seem to want to dissect it if not kill it for what reason I don't know. It's like they don't even like books.

By the way, if Narnia is not or never was your cup of tea, a fantasy series for kids that held up even better in a lot of ways -- no religious message or ugly stereotyping! -- was Lloyd Alexander's excellent Chronicles of Prydain. I re-read those a year or two ago and now recommend them wherever I go. And if you are ever in a time of crisis and need literary distraction, I strongly recommend Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series, which starts with The Eyre Affair. The first time I read that book I bounced off it but I tried again in my annus horribilis 0f 2005, a year in which I was editor of the local paper, we were coping with relentless successive hurricanes that culminated with Wilma and both my husband and I went through major medical crises. Those books were exactly the right level of distraction and entertainment without taxing my already overtaxed brain and I am eternally grateful to them. And wish Fforde would return to that series already.

It's that time of year

I'm a sucker for those year-end best books lists. Sometimes they make me mad; often they make me feel like I need to broaden my reading horizons. I decided to come up with my own best-of-the-year list and conducted a highly unscientific poll among readers of my acquaintance. Here are the results (in my poll, it doesn't have to be a book published this year; just read this year): My best reads of the year came down to one work of fiction and one work of nonfiction. The novel was Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, winner of last year's Man Booker. I had a feeling I'd love it -- I had read and greatly admired Mantel's historical novel about the French Revolution, A Place of Greater Safety, and I am of course, obsessed with all things Tudor. So when I heard she'd written a novel about Thomas Cromwell, I figured she had written it just for me.

The work of nonfiction is Cleopatra, the new biography by Stacy Schiff. If you think you know the facts about this woman's remarkable life, think again. Schiff does a wonderful job rescuing Cleopatra from the millenium-long trashing of her reputation, conducted by men who 1) never knew her and 2) had very strong motives to portray her as an evil seductress. A great read even if you're not all that into ancient Roman or Egyptian history.

Here are the results from my unscientific sampling:

Connie, newspaper books editor: "The best book I read all year was Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom.' Yes, I know it is popular to bash this book, or say there were too many white people in it, or that it was "unrealistic" or that the characters were unlikable (what, you want to read about boring people???) But I loved it unreservedly. I could not put it down, and I loved every minute I was reading it. And aside from being funny and insightful and brilliant, it also reflects my entirely cynical worldview: we are hopelessly doomed, not just as a species, but from ever doing anything truly selfless!

"My second favorite was Jennifer Egan's 'A Visit from the Goon Squad,' which is ostensibly about the shifting music industry but really about a lot more. Clever, funny and hopefully not TOO prescient..."

Arlo, poet and literary seminar media director: "I also liked Egan's "A Visit from the Goon Squad," a novel-in-stories filled with brilliant off-to-the-side-insights into relationships between friends and lovers and clear-headed commentary on the time we're living in. The PowerPoint chapter is a special treat. 

"I finally finished Richard Ford's masterful Frank Bascombe trilogy-- I'd been putting off 'The Lay of the Land' ever since it came out however many years back because I didn't want to live in a world without more Bascombe to look forward to. It's probably the sloppiest of the the three ("The Sportswriter" and "Independence Day" are the others), but I couldn't be sure that didn't make it the best.

Oh, and Charlie Smith's 'Three Delays' just plain knocked me down."

Bob, bookbinder and bookstore manager: "Orhan Pamuk's Museum of Innocence."

My mom: "The book I'm reading right now is easily my best of the year: Daniel Patrick Moynihan: a Portrait in Letters of an American Visionary, by Steven R. Weisman, published in 2010.

"You should read it to understand a lot of things about America in the 20th century.  Moynihan had a unique perspective and personal history. The Senate  is a much poorer place without him (and Teddy)."

A check-outable feast

There's just a month to go before the next Key West Literary Seminar and just in time, we at the Key West Library have received a shipment of books by writers appearing at the Seminar. This year's subject is The Hungry Muse: Food in Literature and the offerings are indeed appetizing. (It's not, by the way, the much-feared "cookbook seminar" and it's not just straight-up food writing, either -- our panelists will include novelists and poets and historians as well as some of the finest food writers in the nation.) We already had a bunch of books by these writers in our collection but the new ones are most welcome, including Eating by Jason Epstein, Ratio by Michael Ruhlman and At Home with Madhur Jaffrey. Jaffrey, by the way, will be at both sessions, as will be Calvin Trillin, Roy Blount, Jr., and Billy Collins. If you're interested in attending, there are still spots left in the second session -- and if you're in Key West, don't forget the Sunday afternoon panels and readings are always free and open to the public. Bon appetit!

And if you're wondering what's up with the slide show below -- well, I'm not much of a cook, to be honest. Given a couple free hours I will invariably spend my time reading instead of shopping for and preparing food. But these are some recent culinary creations of mine worth note -- the Swedish family recipe cake I made for our Stieg Larsson Book Bites session at the library, two pies I made for Thanksgiving (the inevitable pumpkin and the always popular apple-cranberry-raisin from the Fanny Farmer Cookbook), a batch of liebkuchen from another family recipe (and my favorite Christmas treat of the many, many kinds of cookies my grandmother used to make every year) and a cocktail, a Pisco guava punch prepared at the long-distance direction of Embury Cocktails impresario and New York Times-certified cocktail expert Jason Rowan. And all of them turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself. Recipes available on request.

[slideshow]

Near and far

Today's Miami Herald has my review of Bill Bryson's new book, At Home. It's an extremely entertaining read and informative, too. It's not a history as scholars would see it, but a review of various areas of private life in the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain and America. The book is organized as a tour of Bryson's home in Norfolk, England (thus, the title), and each room serves as a reason to muse about the history of the room and the functions it serves. Though Bryson does venture pretty far afield, it never seems boring or irrelevant.

There were tons of fun facts I couldn't fit into the review. Here, for your cocktail party fodder needs, are a few (but you should still read the book -- this doesn't begin to capture the depth and variety of good stuff within):

* George III ordered a palace at Kew -- that was half built -- made entirely of cast iron except for doors and floorboards "a design that would have given it all the charm and comfort of a cooking pot," Bryson writes. It was pulled down by the king's successor. But I would have liked to have seen it.

* "The Quechuan language in Peru still has a thousand words for different types or conditions of potatoes."

* The Europeans introduced many diseases that came close to wiping out Native American populations -- but they received one in return: syphilis.

* "For a century or so, no table of distinction was without its epergne, but why it was called an epergne no one remotely knows. The word doesn't exist in French. It just seems to have popped into being from nowhere."

* The name Boston Tea Party wasn't applied to the pre-Revolutionary rebellion until 1834.

* Franklin Delano Roosevelt's grandfather made the family fortune in the opium trade.

* Thomas Edison dreamed of filling the world with homes made of concrete.

* At the 1876 Centennial Exhibition most visitors were "far more impressed by an electric pen invented by Thomas Edison" than Alexander Graham Bell's new invention: the telephone.

* In 1726 gynecological medicine was so ridiculous that Mary Toft, an illiterate rabbit breeder from Surrey, "managed to convince medical authorities, including two physicians to the royal household, that she was giving birth to a series of rabbits."

* In the late 19th century people were so afraid of being buried alive that an Association for Prevention of Premature Burial was formed in Britain in 1899, and a corresponding group in America the next year.

* Buttons were so popular when introduced that they were applied all over clothes, even where they don't keep anything closed -- which is why suit jackets, to this day, have a row of buttons down near the cuff. "They have always been purely decorative and have never had a purpose, yet three hundred and fifty years on we continue to attach them as if they are the most earnest necessity."