Soul Lessons from the Literary Classics
When Karen Swallow Prior and I identify as book nerds, we're delighted to claim the moniker. When we chat (usually online), she and I use the kind of literary shorthand common among former English majors. Say one of us is deriding a sloppy political argument. One of us might warn: "A little learning is a dangerous thing," to which the other might reply, "I love it when you talk Alexander Pope to me."
So when I read Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me (T. S. Poetry Press), Prior's new memoir that arranges key moments in her life around great works of literature, I felt like I was having a satisfying conversation with a longtime friend.
For the following conversation, Prior and I chose passages from three of the books explored in Booked as springboards for reflections: on the American Dream, on isolation, and on the gifts of ordinary life.
Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert (published 1856)
"I have come to love stories that move breathlessly along, that frighten one. I detest commonplace heroes and moderate feelings, as one finds them in nature."
Grant: As a prolific reader and writer, do you ever find ordinary life and people tiresome, as Madame Bovary does?
Prior: Madame Bovary cured me of romanticism. Truly. I did not realize until I read the novel that I was, like Emma, prone to mistaking art for life, an error that inevitably leads to disappointment in the day-to-day real world. That confusion—between art and life—is all around us.
By God's grace, I can't say I ever do tire of ordinary life and ordinary people. The things I find richest and most satisfying are things like a good book, funny friends, a clean home, work well done, happy dogs and chickens, and a content husband. And a book that took years to write finally complete.
What makes you breathless in your regular, ordinary life?
I run miles nearly every day. That makes me breathless, but not only in the obvious way. The beauty of the changing seasons, the deer and rabbits I encounter, the sunlight, the occasional snake or snappy dog, the feeling of my body working and my mind at ease—these make me breathless.
Has a work of art left you "breathless" recently?
The Tree of Life, a film released last year, left me in awe and in a spirit of worship every time I saw it.
Do women in our culture err on the side of fantasy, like Madame Bovary, or banality - perhaps like her husband, Charles? And what might the success of Fifty Shades of Grey have to do with this?
I've not read Fifty Shades of Grey, but from the reviews and reactions I've seen, it seems like it is just a 21st-century version of the Harlequin Romances: high on fantasy, low on real life. I think banality and fantasy are two sides of the same coin. Those seeking fantasy and not finding it will find banality in its place (as Emma Bovary did).
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Kate
To Kill a Mockingbird would be my first choice because of the way it deals with hypocrisy, racism, and the way we ought to treat other people.
Oun Kwon
'Fifty shades of gray' - not romance, but pornography for women's taste. Harry Potter - do people have time to read when thousands thousands of books and movie which we can not read and see all in our life span? Time is a Terrible Thing to wasTe on such Trivia like hairy poTTer.
Doreen Ashley
What about The Wizard of Oz series or Alice in Wonderland? I'll second non-fiction such as The Hiding Place, but I believe whatever additional literature we read, we should hold it up to the Light of God's Word. I enjoyed reading Prior's godly commentary on some the classics. Good lessons to be learned, hopefully not the hard way. Thank God He's forgiving, the Way, the Truth and the Life for us in Christ.
Doreen Ashley
I believe whatever additional literature we read, we should hold it up to the Light of God's Word. I enjoyed reading Prior's godly commentary on some the classics. Good lessons to be learned, hopefully not the hard way. Thank God He's forgiving, the Way, the Truth and the Life for us in Christ.
Doreen Ashley
I believe whatever additional literature we read, we should hold it up to the Light of God's Word. I enjoyed reading Prior's godly commentary on some the classics. Good lessons to be learned, hopefully not the hard way. Thank God He's forgiving, the Way, the Truth and the Life for us in Christ.
Nancy Lee
I keep returning to Jane Eyre, with its deeply redemptive themes . . . and also a play by Arthur Miller called All My Sons, for its tragic commentary on our responsibility to one another. I also love The Hiding Place, and have reread that quite a few times. And I second the nod to Gerard Manley Hopkins!
Halee Scott
Anna Karenina, Tolstoy A Horse and His Boy, Lewis Shakespeare's Sonnets, Shakespeare Dare I say it? Harry Potter.
kelli trujillo
The Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy by Sigrid Undset (trans. Tiina Nunnally) The Brothers Karamazov (Dostoevsky) War & Peace (Tolstoy) The works of Madeleine L'Engle And for a smashing good time, the (secretly theological/philosophical) murder mysteries of Dorothy Sayers I also echo the nods to Potok, Tolkein, Les Mis . . . And let's not forget the poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins . . . OK, I'll stop myself before I add dozens more.
DR-MRS HENRY SHEPHERD
Great post. I would also have to second Madame Bovary as an important book for me, but I wish I had read it when I was younger. I learned more from Middlemarch, which I read first, and has similar themes. The most compelling characters in Middlemarch are the talented, ambitious ones who have dreams of making their mark on the world or changing it for the better, but are thwarted for various reasons. The interesting part is the way the characters answer, or fail to answer, the question of how to live an 'ordinary,' good life that is full of purpose, after their illusions are shattered.
Tim
Nice interviewing, Jen, and great responding, Karen. A book that has shaped me is actually the six books contained in Tolkien's trilogy The Lord of the Rings, but especially when read in conjunction with The Hobbit. This is such a powerful statement of right and wrong, dark and light, ambiguous motives and shifting allegiances; in other words, the way people really are. Tim P.S. If anyone's interested, I reviewed Booked just yesterday: http://timfall.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/hooked-by-booked-literature-in-the-soul-of-me-a-review/
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