I'm proposing a book about David O McKay for June. It is longish, and I'm about halfway through. The 1st sixty or so pages alone would serve as enough fodder for book club conversation and are on google:
David O McKay and the Rise Of Modern Mormonism .
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
My Life as a Traitor: Two last thoughts?
So I went into Traitor expecting something like a cross between Elie Wiesel’s Night and The Kite Runner. Needless to say, Traitor did not live up to my expectations. Most of the time, I felt like I was reading the diary of a whining teenage girl who thinks she knows everything about the world because she’s read a lot of books.
I believe I read somewhere that she wrote the text (or translated it herself) in English, so maybe that’s the problem. I wonder if the story would be better in Farsi. (Although, it has occurred to me that maybe the best way to portray the experience of isolation in a prison is to bore the reader to death with stream of conscious. Given that the background chapters are so much more interesting, I wonder if she’s aware that she’s doing this.)
But, as evidenced by the fact that I finished it (and actually finished it rather quickly), it was still an interesting read. For instance, the portrayal of post-revolutionary Iran during the war with Iraq was new to me. For some reason, I think my mind had just lumped everything that occurred after the revolution into a big black hole.
At any rate, I’ve pushed off writing this for so long that I can’t remember all that I wanted to say. Perhaps that’s just as well, since this way I can ensure that what I’m only commenting on my lasting impressions from the book.
Here are the two lasting impressions that come to mind:
1) Like several of you, I couldn’t help but think “thirty days?” Are you serious? And as the story progressed, I found myself annoyed, frustrated, and embarrassed by how “weak” Zarah seemed. However, I couldn’t discount the fact that to Zarah, at least, this was suffering.
And then it occurred to me—this isn’t a story about torture or injustice. This is a story about being a woman. To a man, to Zarah’s male friends, for instance, 30 days in an Iranian prison wouldn’t mean that much. To really appreciate Zarah’s suffering, however, we have to be inside the mind of a female. And perhaps even more specifically, we have to be inside of the mind of an Iranian female.
The shaved hair, the possibility of permanent facial scarring, the isolation, the feelings of helplessness. I’m not saying I’d like to go through any of that, but to understand how terrifying these experiences are to Zarah, I think I would need to be female. More importantly, the prison is largely symbolic of a more general suffering. Her whole world is a prison. The clothes. The lifestyle. The rules. What scares Zarah most is the thought of the whole universe collapsing in on her until there is nothing left of her.
This brings me to a tangent. Yes, perhaps Zarah’s ideals lacks a certain “morality.” But is she really culpable in this lack of morality? The fact is, she hasn’t had the freedom to openly make the kind of choices she would like to make. So in her thoughts and dreams, she tries to obtain as much “freedom” as possible. The more radical the thought, the greater freedom she’s “obtained” in thinking it. And when a rare opportunity to express her freedom on the outside crops up, she takes it, to prove to herself that she has some degree of individuality. I wonder if, with more “freedom” on the outside, she might have more of an opportunity to develop a sense of morality that we Mormons would better approve of on the inside.
2) Why does Zarah seek to universalize her experience? I wish I had the book so I could draw some direct quotes here, but she qualifies too many of her statements with something like “like all men” or “no different than any other culture” or “as they always do.” She does this especially often with reference to people she dislikes: men, people in positions of power, and complicit women. It makes me distrust her as a narrator. Sure, there may be some similarities between Southern wives at a church social in Georgia and the complicit, completely-covered wives of Iranian business men at a party, but really, what does she know about Georgia? Or Nazi Germany? The more she tried to generalize her experiences, the more I distrusted her. The whole point of her narrative is that her experiences have a uniqueness to them, and I think she does a great disservice to Iranian women when she tries to dismiss that uniqueness.
Anyway, I’m done with East of Eden as well. I’ll save those comments for another day. Right now, I’m busy buying and fixing up a house, hopefully in time for the baby next month.
I believe I read somewhere that she wrote the text (or translated it herself) in English, so maybe that’s the problem. I wonder if the story would be better in Farsi. (Although, it has occurred to me that maybe the best way to portray the experience of isolation in a prison is to bore the reader to death with stream of conscious. Given that the background chapters are so much more interesting, I wonder if she’s aware that she’s doing this.)
But, as evidenced by the fact that I finished it (and actually finished it rather quickly), it was still an interesting read. For instance, the portrayal of post-revolutionary Iran during the war with Iraq was new to me. For some reason, I think my mind had just lumped everything that occurred after the revolution into a big black hole.
At any rate, I’ve pushed off writing this for so long that I can’t remember all that I wanted to say. Perhaps that’s just as well, since this way I can ensure that what I’m only commenting on my lasting impressions from the book.
Here are the two lasting impressions that come to mind:
1) Like several of you, I couldn’t help but think “thirty days?” Are you serious? And as the story progressed, I found myself annoyed, frustrated, and embarrassed by how “weak” Zarah seemed. However, I couldn’t discount the fact that to Zarah, at least, this was suffering.
And then it occurred to me—this isn’t a story about torture or injustice. This is a story about being a woman. To a man, to Zarah’s male friends, for instance, 30 days in an Iranian prison wouldn’t mean that much. To really appreciate Zarah’s suffering, however, we have to be inside the mind of a female. And perhaps even more specifically, we have to be inside of the mind of an Iranian female.
The shaved hair, the possibility of permanent facial scarring, the isolation, the feelings of helplessness. I’m not saying I’d like to go through any of that, but to understand how terrifying these experiences are to Zarah, I think I would need to be female. More importantly, the prison is largely symbolic of a more general suffering. Her whole world is a prison. The clothes. The lifestyle. The rules. What scares Zarah most is the thought of the whole universe collapsing in on her until there is nothing left of her.
This brings me to a tangent. Yes, perhaps Zarah’s ideals lacks a certain “morality.” But is she really culpable in this lack of morality? The fact is, she hasn’t had the freedom to openly make the kind of choices she would like to make. So in her thoughts and dreams, she tries to obtain as much “freedom” as possible. The more radical the thought, the greater freedom she’s “obtained” in thinking it. And when a rare opportunity to express her freedom on the outside crops up, she takes it, to prove to herself that she has some degree of individuality. I wonder if, with more “freedom” on the outside, she might have more of an opportunity to develop a sense of morality that we Mormons would better approve of on the inside.
2) Why does Zarah seek to universalize her experience? I wish I had the book so I could draw some direct quotes here, but she qualifies too many of her statements with something like “like all men” or “no different than any other culture” or “as they always do.” She does this especially often with reference to people she dislikes: men, people in positions of power, and complicit women. It makes me distrust her as a narrator. Sure, there may be some similarities between Southern wives at a church social in Georgia and the complicit, completely-covered wives of Iranian business men at a party, but really, what does she know about Georgia? Or Nazi Germany? The more she tried to generalize her experiences, the more I distrusted her. The whole point of her narrative is that her experiences have a uniqueness to them, and I think she does a great disservice to Iranian women when she tries to dismiss that uniqueness.
Anyway, I’m done with East of Eden as well. I’ll save those comments for another day. Right now, I’m busy buying and fixing up a house, hopefully in time for the baby next month.
Introducing Ivy Sophia Jones
Ivy Sophia Jones was born this morning at 6:45. Weighing a healthy 9 lbs. 3 oz., she's the largest of our children so far. These are pictures of friends and family meeting her for the first time today at the hospital.
Next challenge: squeezing three car seats in the back bench of a mid-sized sedan.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Me: He-Man or Pillsbury Doughboy?
It was better than I expected, though I was a little underwhelmed by her experience in prison. I might be softer than I think and break as Zarah did, but I honestly feel that I could endure the torture she describes. I could defy them if they handed me personal physical or psychological torture, but if those same threats were directed toward family or friends, I would fold much more quickly.
For me, the best parts of the book were her memories of life if Iran. It seems very culturally colorful. These parts of the book reminded me of a movie I saw a while back called "Children of Heaven." I don't remember if I saw it at the BYU International Cinema, but it is a fantastic movie that opened my eyes to Iranian culture. The country and the people are not full of conspiracy and hatred as some might have us believe.
I thought the ending was good. It seemed artsy, like the ending of a foreign film.
Well, that's it for this book.
I finished East of Eden. Can't wait to discuss it. Maybe I'll rent the movie to tide me over.
For me, the best parts of the book were her memories of life if Iran. It seems very culturally colorful. These parts of the book reminded me of a movie I saw a while back called "Children of Heaven." I don't remember if I saw it at the BYU International Cinema, but it is a fantastic movie that opened my eyes to Iranian culture. The country and the people are not full of conspiracy and hatred as some might have us believe.
I thought the ending was good. It seemed artsy, like the ending of a foreign film.
Well, that's it for this book.
I finished East of Eden. Can't wait to discuss it. Maybe I'll rent the movie to tide me over.
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