State of Wonder

One of my favorite books is Ann Patchett's Bel Canto, and so it was an easy decision to pick up her latest novel State of Wonder.  The story follows Dr. Marina Singh, a research scientist whose father grew up in India and mother in Minnesota, as she navigates through the Amazon.  Two of my favorite passages:

"Like her mother and all her mother's people before her, those inexhaustible blondes who staked their claims in verdant prairies, Marina was cut from Minnesota, the soil and the starry nights.  Instead of growing up inquisitive and restless, she had developed a profound desire to stay, as if her center of gravity was so low it connected her directly to this particular patch of earth."

"Her skin was all cream and light in comparison to her father's and very dark when she held her wrist against her mother's.  She had her father's round, black eyes and heavy lashes, his black hair and angular frame.  Seeing her father gave her the ability to see herself, the comfort of physical recognition after a life spent among her mother's people, all those translucent cousins who looked at her like she was a llama who had wandered into their holiday dinner.  The checkers in the grocery store, the children at school, the doctors and the bus drivers all asked her where she was from... Being the child of a white mother and foreign graduate-student father who took his doctoral degree but not his family back to his country of origin after he was finished had become the stuff of presidential history, but when Marina was growing up there was no example that could easily explain her situation."

Admission

After seeing the trailer for Tina Fey's new movie Admission, I picked up the novel.  I figured it made sense to read the book first, since the book is (nearly) always better than the film.*  Both the book and movie revolve around an admissions officer at Princeton.  Beyond that, though, I'm not sure how much they have in common:  the trailer suggests that the movie is a comedy whereas I found the book to be fairly depressing.

One common theme through the novel is how *difficult* it is to be an admissions officer at a top-ranked institution:  parsing through thousands of remarkable applicants who, at a certain point, are virtually indistinguishable.  After all, nearly every applicant has stellar grades, excels on standardized tests, participates in extracurricular activities, and volunteers.  And the pressure that comes with making those judgments, knowing that your decision as an admission officer will affect the applicant's next four years (if not the rest of their life.)

The novel also touches on the fact that, while high school students are plagued with insecurities, admission to an "elite" university doesn't necessarily assuage those fears:

"Inside every one of [the college] students, she understood now, was a person who didn't live up to his or her own expectations, a person too fat, too slow, whose hair wouldn't hold a curl, who had no gift for languages, who lacked the gene for math.  They were convinced they were not all they'd been cracked up to be:  the track star, the classicist, valedictorian, perennial leading lady, campus fixer, or teacher's favorite.  The driven ones… feared they weren't driven enough, and the slackers were sure they'd find out how deficient they were if they ever did apply themselves.  Up and down the corridors of the dormitories, behind each closed door, and whether the person within was davening over organic chemistry or drinking himself into a store, the Dartmouth she'd attended was populated by young people who were terrified of exposure."

While the impostor phenomenon isn't something new - and not necessarily sometimes that even goes away - I do think that it's particularly pronounced in college.  And, perhaps, your first year at a law firm. ;)

*  Notable exceptions:  Gone With the Wind, The Godfather.

The Best of 2012

Books! So many books! Fifteen trips and one new book club, and I’ve been reading even more than usual this year. Not everything was great, but, without commentary, my top three:

1.  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
2.  A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
3.  Bossypants by Tina Fey

I don't think it's a coincidence that all of them are by women: one of my resolutions for 2012 was to read more books by women, since last year I disproportionately read novels by men. I didn’t always like what I was reading, but it was interesting to see how my reading material affected what I was thinking about in, you know, life. 

 And with that, digital vacation for the next one week. Happy holidays!

How Should A Person Be?

Oh man.  I feel like I'm on a roll:  First "How To Be a Woman", then "Gone Girl", and now "How Should a Person Be?"  From the titles of the books alone, you might surmise I'm having a bit of an existential crisis.

But, in any event, I just finished the last:  Sheila Heti's "How Should A Person Be?"  Despite the accolades, I couldn't get into it.  Mostly, I found its the characters irritating.  (The book has been widely compared to Lena Dunham's Girls, which means that I should probably skip that too.)

Still, there were some great passages:

• Two painters, discussing what it means to have freedom to paint:  "Sholem was saying that freedom, for him, is having the technical facility to be able to execute whatever he wants, just whatever image he has in his mind.  But that's not freedom!  That's control, or power.  Whereas I think that Margaux understands freedom to be the freedom to take risks, the freedom to do something bad or to appear foolish.  Not to recognize that difference is a pretty big thing."

• "You remember the peur aeternus -- the eternal child -- Peter Pan -- the boy who never grows up, who never becomes a man?... Such people will suddenly tell you they have another plan, and they always do it the moment things start getting difficult.  But it's their everlasting switchings that's the dangerous thing, not what they choose... [W]hile others actually build a life in which things gain in meaning and significance, this is not true of the peur.  Such a person inevitably looks back on life as it nears its end with a feeling of emptiness and sadness, aware of what they have built:  nothing.  In their quest for a life without failure, suffering, or doubt, that is what they achieve:  a life empty of all those things that make a human life meaningful."

• "What is American cheese anyway?"  I heard one of them say.  Her friend replied, "I think it means it has a chemical in it."

Gone Girl

Courtesy of Hurricane Sandy, I found myself with a bit of free time and picked up Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl.  It. Was. Fantastic.  

While I desperately want to talk about the plot, I also don't want to risk spoiling it for anyone who hasn't gotten to it yet.  (Go out and read it already!)  

Instead, I'll focus on one of my favorite passages, told from the viewpoint of wife Amy:

"Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding... Men actually think this girl exists."

That's pretty much how I feel every time I happen to look at Maxim (shudder).  I started to look for links to prove the validity of that passage, but I got too grossed out.  (Thanks, Internet.)  Instead, I'll just point to today's article in Jezebel about the new "Good Girl Gina" meme making the rounds.  :-|

p.s.  As a total aside, I'm not sure what it says about me that I found myself relating to Amy.

How To Be A Woman

My latest read is Caitlin Moran's "How To Be A Feminist."  I enjoyed it, although I wouldn't say it was my favorite read of the year.  Unfortunately, the author has a propensity to TYPE IN ALL CAPS WHEN MAKING HER POINT, and nothing is more of a turn-off than the dreaded all caps.  (Well, perhaps some things are more of a turn off, but, you know.)

A friend called the book as "pop feminism", and I'd wager that's a pretty accurate description (see, e.g., the chapter on how Katie Price is harmful to women, whereas Lady Gaga is a symbol of empowerment).  And while I didn't think the book was particularly earth-shattering, I thought that Moran raised some interesting points.  For instance, when discussing clothing:

"Women are just supposed to be Good at Clothes, and to look down on those who aren't -- who screw up even one outfit, as evidenced by all those "Circle of Shame"/"What Was She Thinking?" spreads in every magazine and every tabloid newspaper every week.  Prominent female politicians are lambasted for a single pair of "wrong" shoes.  At its best -- and I love a nice frock -- fashion is a game.  But for women, it's a compulsory game, like netball."

I suppose that arguably -- especially in New York -- mores are changing, and men are also being judged by their attire.  Still, I think that the degree to which women are judged by their appearance, and expected to look a certain way, far outweighs the pressure felt by male counterparts.

Also entertaining:  Moran devotes a chapter to strip clubs and contrasts them to burlesque clubs, and argues that the former are objectionable whereas the latter are permissible.  Although she makes several points, she ends with:

"Do you know what the final rule of thumb is with strip clubs?  Gay men wouldn't be seen dead in Spearmint Rhino - but you can't move for them in a burlesque joint.  As a rule of thumb, you can always tell if a place is culturally healthy for women when the gays start rocking it."

Touche!

The Best Possible Light

I've been thinking a lot about interference in other people's decisions and when it's necessary to speak up.  After all, we're all adults, and people are entitled to make their own choices.

Still, it can be hard.  Harder, I think, when you're a parent and might see your (adult) child's actions as a reflection of your prior parenting decisions. One of my favorite passages on this point is in The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, when the narrator is dealing with the fact that her son has impregnated two women:

I turn and face him.
For a long time I see this man.
I see him and I think, I am the one who taught him to regard himself as a blessing.