Dirda on Books – Transcript Michael Dirda Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, October 27, 1999

Michael Dirda The Washington Post

Following is a transcript of the discussion.

Washington, D.C.: The November issue of "Writer's Digest" has the results of a survey the magazine did on the best writers of the century. Five hundred people responded to the survey, and the top ten writers chosen were John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, Eugene O'Neill, T.S. Elliot, Willa Cather, Robert Frost, James Baldwin, Eudora Welty, and E.B. White -- in that order.

Do you agree or disagree with those choices? Who isn't there who would be on YOUR list?

Michael Dirda: Welcome to Dirda on Books. By now, most of you know the drill, so we'll move right on to the questions.

Best writers of the century? Clearly the list means best American writers. Personally I would put Eliot, Faulkner and Hemingway at the top, probably in that order. E.B. White wouldn't make the cut at all--if I wanted a major nonfiction writer, New Yorker variety, I'd pick Joseph Mitchell. Not on the list? The first name that comes to mind is Wallace Stevens, along with Auden and Vladimir Nabokov (they both became American citizens) and Ezra Pound. I'd also consider Elizabeth Bishop, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and Ralph Ellison.

Arlington, VA: My son is taking his wife to England for the first time. What are the books he should read to prepare himself besides Shakespeare and Dickens?

Michael Dirda: Robin Winks has a terrific guide book called An American's Guide to Britain--it tells you about the literary associations of various tourist spots and sites. Winks also possesses a sprightly style. I suspect it's out of print now, but libraries and used bookstores might have a copy.

Philadelphia, PA: Michael, thank you for your review of Steven Millhauser's Enchanted Night. I've been enthusiastic about his work for many years now. Have you read his lesser known works Portrait of a Romantic and From the Realm of Morpheus? Romantic is one of the most beautifully written books I've read. It is an evocative story of adolescence which manages to create a dreamlike atmosphere and yet remain anchored in the everyday world. Morpheus is pure fantasy. Sometimes it's a bit too self-indulgent -as I would also say about the last sections of Martin Dressler-, but has some interesting and beautiful passages. I think most readers would be fascinated with his description of the library which contains books written by fictional writers -including Edwin Mullhouse's Cartoons-.

Michael Dirda: I reviewed--front page--In the Realm of Morpheus--it's a marvelous Arabian Nights book of wonders. In my view a dazzling work of ventriloquism in multiple voices. I'm told that it was heavily cut before being published--a pity. I've actually written about Millhauser quite a bit, having also reviewed The Barnum Museum and Little Kingdoms, and profiled him a little after he won the Pulitzer for Martin Dressler. I can take a lot of self-indulgence when the prose is as wistfully brilliant and gorgeous as Millhauser's.

Madison WI: How 'bout that Booker prize, hm?

Michael Dirda: Who won? I know nothing down here in Florida, scarcely seeing the newspaper. Or is this a generic question?

Working Title Writer: Michael,
Two people in my writing-book group want to have us read one of the Harry Potter books as our next selection. I'm a bit skeptical about this -tried to swap it with a Chronicle of Narnia.- What's your opinion on Potter for "Grown Ups"?

Michael Dirda: They're a lot of fun. You'll enjoy them. And I'd start with the first: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. But if you want to read a truly great contemporary children's series, go for Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass and The Subtle Knife. His readers eagerly await the final volume of this amazing trilogy. Renaissance over-reachers, the sexiest witch in modern fiction, and a plot that hinges on war in heaven--what could be better? Oh, yes: armored bears. And Lyra Belacqua is a great heroine, a model for girls.

DC: How do you decide which books to write about in your column? I'm sure you see many more than you can deal with. I don't remember ever seeing you pan a book, except maybe by comparison or faint praise. Why is that?

Michael Dirda: Since I work at Book World I can pick and choose what I write about. For the most part, I figure on spending my time on good books; if I start a novel or work of nonfiction and it doesn't work for me, I'll usually try another. But I do pan works occasionally: I wrote scathing reviews of Judith Krantz's Dazzle, Daniel Boorstin's The Creators and the forthcoming Lo's Diary. The first two books, and for all I know the third as well, were best sellers anyhow. So much for the power of the press.

Also, I think of reviewing as my ongoing education, so I often choose books on subjects I want to know more about. People say that I'm a polymath; I'm not sure about that. But I AM a would-be polymath.

washingtonpost.com: In follow-up to Philadelphia, PA's question on Steven Millhauser, here is an excerpt from Millhauser's "The Knife Thrower and Other Stories" from washingtonpost.com's Books and Reading section.

DC: Good afternoon Mr. Dirda,

Hemingway? Why, in your opinion, is he so highly rated? This is a serious question. The Elkins, Coovers, Thomas Bergers, Barthelmes, Barths, Bellows, Updikes of the world can write circles around him in terms of language, themes, plots, narratives, pacing..... I usually agree with you, but I find reading Hemingway almost as excruciating as reading his literary heir, Raymond Carver. What do you see as his strengths?

Michael Dirda: Hemingway was the most influential American writer of the century. He created a voice that virtually all later writers have had to confront, in one way or another. His early stories and The Sun Also Rises are imperishable masterpieces. That he became a parody of himself is just one more American tragedy, like Fitzgerald's early death and Ellison's failure to move on after Invisible Man. But I love all the writers you list too: I worry, though, that Stanley Elkin may be forgotten or that Thomas Berger's weaker books will make people neglect Little Big Man, Killing Time and his other wonderful books.

Sci-Fi Girl, VA: Michael --

I remember back at the beginning of the semester you mentioned that you wanted to get through A Dance to the Music of Time. I read the first volume of the Chicago edition, and found it beautifully written, but detached. I was wondering how you were getting along with it, if at all. -I know, not Sci-fi, but hey, gotta read outside the lines!

Michael Dirda: Haven't even cracked the first volume. Doesn't look good right now. I live in a dreamworld in which I imagine I will be able to read about 10 times more than I actually can, given my life, schedule and obligations.

Columbia, MD: I am currently so engrossed in a book that I hardly have time to read your column. It's called Tortured Soul, The Life of Michael Erhart. It's non-fiction and follows the life of a mildly retarded man with a severe speech impediment that eventually realizes extraordinary talents as a dancer. Can you recommend any other "feel-good" books about the handicapped beating the odds?

Michael Dirda: Hmm. Do you know Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human? Its first section is about an idiot who realizes he has extraordinary powers. The obverse to the feel-good story is the classic feel-bad story: Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes. A brilliant account of how a retarded man acquires, then loses, super-intelligence. There are lots of books about people with handicaps, but I tend to avoid these, being all too easily broken up by tales of undeserved affliction.

Crofton, MD: I thoroughly enjoyed the non-fiction story of Pushkin's death, by Miss Vitale, Pushkin's Button. One of the tricks of a good writer is to make you care about the historical event as much as he-she does. Do you know of any other books she has written?

Michael Dirda: That's the only one in English; she's done some scholarly editing of Pushkin in Italian. I enjoyed the book a lot too, as my review indicated, though Vitale can gush and overwrite. There are similar books though to hers: Charles Nicholl's marvelous book on the death of Christopher Marlowe, The Reckoning; and A.J.A. Symons' classic The Quest for Corvo, about a tortured, bizarre 1890s figure, gay, Catholic and mad, named Frederick Rolphe, known as Baron Corvo for his most famous book, Hadrian the Seventh.

Tarrytown, FL: Could you please recommend one or a few good essayists on art, specifically on painting -no specific period or movement required-? Someone who uses his-her discourse language well, but is also concerned with the literary quality of the prose.

Michael Dirda: Among the classics: Ruskin--one of the great masters of English prose. Kenneth Clark has a good volume of selections: Rusking Today. Also, Walter Pater and John Addington Symonds on Renaissance painting.

Among contemporaries: Kenneth Clark (The Nude and a dozen other titles) and Michael Levey (try his two little books, Early Renaissance and Later Renaissance) both write excellent prose and know art as well as anybody ever has.

Waldorf, MD: Thanks very much for this most credible book recommendation service you provide. Have just finished Riddley Walker, my first introduction to Hoban. I loved it, and will be filled with its echoes for a while. When I read Hoban's afterwords about his inspiration and the book's evolution it seemed to reflect the story itself, how words and ideas evolve and how the imagination is so much about listening, building and linking ideas, and assigning meaning. Although I have quite a tidy pile of books to read, I'm curious if Hoban's other work is as imaginative and intriguing. I seem to recall some of the titles on the fly leaf as ones you've recommended as children's books? Can you recommend one to read next?

Michael Dirda: Of the children's books I'd look for The Mouse and His Child--it's a chapter book, with deep philosophical elements (one chapter parodies Beckett). The other kids books are brilliant, but are truly intended for children: I love How Tom Beat Captain Najork and His Hired Sportsmen and The Mole Family Christmas. Hoban's other novels for adults are distinctive and strange, though not as powerful as Riddley: Try The Lion of Jachin Boaz and Boaz Jachin (about the relationship between a father and a son) Kleinzeit (about death) and Turtle Diary (made into a film with Glenda Jackson, a love story about freeing sea turtles from the London Zoo).

Clifton, VA: The 1999 Booker Prize goes to J.M. Coetzee for his novel Disgrace. This will be the second time he has won, what do you think of this work? How does it compare to the other selected books?

Michael Dirda: I very much admired his novel on Dostoevsky, The Master of Petersburg. I reviewed the Michael Frayn and found it didn't work for me--seemed too contrived, without the pleasure of utter artificiality; also, it seemed like a play that hadn't quite worked. But I love Frayn's earlier novels, especially, The Tin Men. Don't know the other books on the short list.

Rockville, MD: I was glad to see you steer someone to Theodore Sturgeon. I loved his work all through my high school and college years, and think it's a shame that he's fading away, and has been since well before his death.

A great story about handicaps that turns everyone else's on their heads is Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Are you familiar with it? If so, what do you think of it?

Michael Dirda: Of course, Harrison Bergeron--it's a wonderful story about a future which enforces absolute equality by making the graceful wear weights and the beautiful don masks. It's about what happens when two people break free.

Charlottesville, VA: In order to tear my 9-year-old daughter away from Harry Potter, I've begun--on your recommendation--reading her Phillip Pullman's The Golden Compass and I will follow with The Subtle Knife. They're a trilogy, right? What's the third volume? I also have been pressing us to read Gulliver's Travels together, since I'm a big Swift fan. I picked it up a few weeks ago to refresh my memory of it and almost couldn't put it down--the prose is so clear and compelling. Why haven't I heard Gulliver mentioned much as another book for the "Potter-trained" young reader?

Michael Dirda: Gulliver can be hard slogging for some young kids--at least if read as Swift wrote it, and not in a simplified kiddie version. The last two books are probably too complex for most kids--in fact, they're pretty mind-boggling even for adults. I love Swift: I bought the standard edition of The Tale of a Tub for my middle son on the day he was born.

Sarasota, FL: Just a bit too curious, I'm afraid--in what part of Florida do you live?

Michael Dirda: I'm in Orlando for the fall semester, teaching at the University of Central Florida. In January I'll be back in Washington.

College Park, MD: Your description of being in Florida makes it sound as if you were stranded in the middle of the Pacific. Are you really that isolated at the University of Central Florida?

Michael Dirda: Didn't mean to make it sound that way. I quite like it here, in fact. My sense of being stranded came from being away from my books--I'm used to being able to retrieve favorite authors and titles when I want them. here I can't quite do that.

WDC: I read The Golden Compass this weekend - you've been plugging it for such a long time - and it really sucked me in to the story. But I prefer Tolkien's books, because the world he created seems much more real: you have a sense that there is -or could be- a whole history and mythology behind the adventures he describes. What do you think?

Michael Dirda: Well,there is a whole history and mythology behind The Lord of the Rings, and Tolkien wrote it: There must be a half dozen supplemental volumes now, detailing the history of Middle Earth. Most, if not all, are edited by Christopher Tolkien. They look unreadable to me--bits of myth, linguistic stuff, too much poetry--unless one is an utterly fanatical Tolkien fan.

DC: Regarding the person who said he was reading Tortured Soul, the Life of Michael Erhart: There is no such book. This person is infiltrating every online chat and asking embarrassing questions -yesterday is was about anal leakage in the food chat!- pretending to be Michael Erhart or Paul Inella. This person obviously is playing a cruel joke on these two people and I find it tasteless. Whoever you are, please grow up - you have the sense of humor of a 12-year-old.

Michael Dirda: So it goes: Life on the Internet.

Bishop's Fish: Way to go on recognizing Elizabeth Bishop. Many people forget her or dismiss her. Shame on them. Rah Rah Rah for you!

Michael Dirda: Thanks.

Washington, DC: I know you're a Nabokov fan and, for the most part, so am I. But I've been made increasingly uncomfortable by the tactics of Nabokov's family -especially son Dimitri-, to control the writer's "legacy." I see it as overbearing and unworthy of the spirit of art. Your thoughts?

Michael Dirda: I agree with your assessment of Dimitri. He seems to have his father's flaws without the compensating genius--though it must have been hard to have been the son of such parents as VN and Vera.

Manassas, VA: Dear Mr. Dirda,

First of all, your Readings column has debauched me from my sloth every Sunday morning for the past 12 years or so. I am very grateful to you for introducing me to many voices I may not otherwise have heard -Bashford, Millhauser, etc.-. I am curious as to your thoughts about another American author, overly obscure and, I think, undeservedly so: Alexander Theroux. I do not see much written of him anywhere. Along with Don DeLillo, I find him one of our most important and interesting contemporary novelists -particularly for pleasure of the language-. The novels - and a collection of poetry, have just returned to print in the last couple of years. Darconville's Cat, for example, is, among other things, a labyrinth of arcane learning -and vocabulary- and cosmic paranoia - reminding me Frederick Rolfe -who as Corvo-Crabbe seems a model for Alaric Darconville-Alexander Theroux-, Ferdinand Ossendowski or Umberto Eco. And like Rolfe, an acknowledged influence, his flights of invective are, if not breath-takingly elegant, sharply taloned -and not strictly confined to the vellum of literature-. Even his children's books, long out of print, are strange, Grimmish, linguistically voluptuous things -e.g.: The Great Wheadle Tragedy-. Apologies for being all over the place - at work and rushed. Best, Malcolm.

Michael Dirda: Terrific summary of Theroux's qualities as a writer. I admire his gifts too--Darconville's Cat is amazing--that tour of the West Virginia backwoods, the portrait of the girls in the college dormitory. My friend Steve Moore once said he wanted to be buried with his copy of Darconville. I've written a bit about Theroux--chiefly a review of The Primary Colors and short notices of the The Lollypop Trollops--and always look forward to his books. I hear he's writing a third "color" book on black and white. He's not as well known as he should be--of how many innovative and disturbing writers might this be said--in part because he is a pricklish character. Sometimes he seems a little too much like Baron Corvo for his own good.

Rockville, MD: Quick, Halloween is coming...name your best ever, guaranteed to scare the bejeebees out of you, scary story-book ever.

Michael Dirda: The scariest story is Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper, followed by M.R. James's Casting the Runes and Algernon Blackwood's The Wendigo and Robert Aickman's very strange, The Stains. For little kids, you should look for James Stevenson's picture book, That Terrible Halloween Night.

Reston, VA: Mr. Dirda: The Lord of the Rings is one of my favorite fantasy works. Since there's been an "explosion" in fantasy literature - have you found anything which can even come close to Tolkien's masterpiece?

Michael Dirda: Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy--very different, but the only fantasy trilogy on the same level as Tolkien. Smaller, but wonderful, are Jack Vance's stories in The Dying Earth, The Eyes of the Overworld, and Cugel Saga.

Washington, DC: Mike: Two responses to last week's chat and a comment. My suggestion for best major Henry James novel for the reader new to James would be Portrait of a Lady. Much more accessible than The Ambassadors, while still showing James in his major phase. James's short stories make great reading too.

Regarding the question about those Time-Life paperbacks: they have no collectible value at all. They are most noteworthy for the cheap glue used in them, which causes the bindings to break apart, and the sharp edges of the covers which inflict nasty paper cuts.

Third comment: you have often praised Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker, but I have found the book virtually unreadable due to the "invented" language in which it is written. Burgess did a much better job in that respect with Clockwork Orange. I'd be interested in what your other on-line readers say about the book.

Michael Dirda: Good comments. Portrait is probably a better starting place than Ambassadors. I did mention that the Time Life books tend to break apart when read. I agree they have little monetary value, but they look good massed on a shelf. I disagree about Riddley--the book isn't as hard as it looks, and there is a distinct pleasure in working your way through its language. But I revere Burgess too--especially Nothing Like the Sun (his Shakespeare novel) and Enderby (his novels about a poet's life).

Well, we're out of time, folks. Sorry if I didn't get to your question. Until next Wednesday at this same time, keep reading!

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