Summer of Books: Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Ah the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo this summer's Harry Potter, but with "dark subject matter." I think I am quoting the evening news on this. I wasn't going to read it simply because it is popular, and I have an aversion to most popular things at first. But after seeing the book on the news I decided maybe I should read it.

I am not going to write what the book is about too much, it is an International Best-Seller. Read the NYT review for goodness sake. But for people who were wondering, I thought that for a mystery novel, it was pretty good. A more intense, articulate, social commentary, type of mystery, crime novel. It is well thought-out, although, admittedly I guessed the ending. Well, not all of it. It is well-written and at almost six hundred pages, there's a lot of pretty good writing to read. It isn't a fast-mover, but it gets page-turnery as it moves along.

My favorite this is that the main anti/protagonist, Lisbeth Salander, well, she kicks ass. And she sleeps with women. At least she slept with one woman briefly in the first book, but does not consider herself bi-sexual as media outlets have portrayed her.

If you are not a big thriller, mystery, best-sellery, type person, then this will probably not be your cup of tea.

I did not find it too horrifying or graphic? Not really. But I watch Dexter, and Bones, and Law and Order, and have read a bunch of pretty cheesy mystery novels, with content that is more haunting. I hear that the series gets darker, and I have purchased the second book, and having read the preface/first chapter from the end of GWtDT it appears a bit creepier. But as a friend told me, "Kathryn, you are de-sensitized." So don't take my word on the creepy/dark factor.

Being and Vibration

So I recently finished reading Being and Vibration by Joseph Rael for my week-long workshop at Naropa with Julie Patton.

It was an amazing week and I should have written about it more at the time. Julie asked us to try and not write with our computers at all during the week and I have to say it was very liberating to not be tied to a machine. Of course here I am back to it. But at the time of the workshop the way I took my notes was through writing letters to two friends, sharing parts of my experience. I am tying to carry over this practice as much as possible by not tying myself down to computers, my cell phone, etc. It is summer time, not time to be in connection with everyone, because, it is the only time I get to connect with myself. THE WHOLE PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK READING, REVIEWING PROCESS.

Back to the book. I cannot say I understand. The combination of metaphysics, sound, tone, vibration, energy is not something I usually jive with on such an explicit level. For instance, Rael, a man of Ute (as combined with other American Indian) heritage, offers a variety of ways to chant various words both in solo and group meditation settings. He describes ways of focusing on vowel sounds, i.e. "PEACE" becomes "peeeez" stretching the "ee" sound for purposes of sound meditation. This is not necessarily a new idea for those people who practice various forms of sound meditation, including the "Om" at the end of yoga practice. Rael relates much of sound vibration to a sort of transcendent form of being, the medicine wheel, and directionaiy (NSEW) and identifications with directions.

I thought this was crazy and didn't get it. Just kind of blasted through reading it. Until I met Julie, who is a poet. Some might call her a sound poet, meaning she makes poetry through sounds, not always human language, but language none-the-less. But she calls herself a poet, and I respect her process of self-identification. She is this amazingly beautiful black woman, with huge greying dreds, and a penchant for being with nature, observing, and knowing how to survive without monetary gain. Pretty impressive. We spent one workshop observing a blue heron, and then blindfolded, translating the sounds we heard in the natural setting of the Boulder Creek into sounds humans can make. One person took dictation while the other person made noises (not words necessarily) creating a soundscape. The next day we read these "sound poems" out loud to dogs. Seems strange right? But dogs respond to sounds. Not words. Even those dogs that are very well trained are responding to various forms of vibrational patterns that words make coming out of a human's mouth. Often to train a dog it requires more then simply saying a word. It requires saying it in a certain way, raising or lowering pitch, tone, speed. That is what dogs respond to.

So why are humans so out of touch with these vibrations? Because we have been socialized that talking with animals (as many of us do as children) is something only crazy people do. As both Rael and Julie say we have lost our ability to listen often relying on sight as a primary sensing skill. If you think about it humans can see many things at once and even notice the amount of things they are seeing, while only able to focus on one sound at a time. This is of course not true for all humans, there are always cultural factors playing a role into one's ability to do anything as well as ability. Those who are blind often have very keen other senses out of necessity.

The point however, is that if we think of communication as vibration, we hear a lot more, and open ourselves up to the possibilities of communication in a new form of language, one not limited to words. And I LOVE words. But I am open to experiencing beyond the word too. And I am also a person who usually says we cannot exist outside of language and I believe that, but maybe we need to be more open to what language is and work on erasing the hierarchy of human language, not only the language of dominance (white, masculinist, heterosexist, upper class) languaging over those of "others," but also the hierarchy of human language over language of animals, nature, etc. Not unproblematic, or uncomplicated, but I am open to being in conversation with this idea. I may not get Rael on his own, but I get Julie's translation of him and the practical use of his book for performers who work with vibration and silence to create meaningful performances.

Rebecca Brown: Excerpts from a Family Medical Dictionary

My latest read took me to Rebecca Brown's, Excerpts from a Family Medical Dictionary an amazing book about a woman, the author's care-taking of her mother after she is diagnosed with cancer until her death. One thing about this book: You know how it is going to end. What I will say without giving it away too much, is that despite knowing the ending, it concludes itself in a beautiful and poetic way. In many ways I am jealous of the author's/character's ability to be so matter-of-fact about the dying process and to complete the anointing process.

The book is split into sections/chapters divided by different terms that the author follows with a narrative/explanation of her mother going through the experiences of these terms. A couple of my favorite sections are "Twilight Sleep," which Brown describes as anesthetized space where one is not put "completely under" as a patient may need to be awake during a surgery. My other favorite scene, "hydrotherapy," gives a lovely glimpse into how the history translates into the present of the narrative. It reminds me of my mother and how we only had a bath tub until I was in middle school, reading in the bathtub a favorite pastime for her as well.

I love this book because it is not a survivor story. It is a story about profound loss, not coated with roses and daydreams. While it is a representation of her story, it is also my story, I read my dealings with death into the narrative. I locate my white lesbian body within the body of Brown, also a white lesbian. And although she is writing about her mother's ordeal with cancer, I see my stepfather and my great-grandmother-two more stories about not overcoming disease. It is not a progress story, they are not progress stories.

And that is most of all where I find myself, straddling a line of coping with death and falling apart. Recently I have been attempting to write through the death of loved ones...to share an excerpt of this process:

My great grandmother and step-father died the same day a year apart exactly. August 27. I pretend this day does not exist, cross it off calendars with black permanent pen. I was asked to both write and deliver eulogies at both funerals, the last pieces of significance for me. I didn’t want to unveil anything else, afraid of being haunted by memories. It is recommended I create an alter, acquire a marigold skull, light candles, burn incense, work through loss. I wonder what doing all of this in combination with writing could reveal? A divinatory moment about profound loss I suppose.

I have been thinking a lot about witnessing the death of the other and not witnessing one’s own death. Laying in bed, encouraging last breaths, holding bruised hands, it is hard to separate myself from the isolation of death. Death of language. I witness the demise of the other, am forced into writing and performing it in various ways, simultaneously feeling as though I am staging my mortality. In writing life I always feel I am writing death, writing without witnessing the ultimate mystery.

Reading the work of Brown I am inspired to continue to work through the death of the other, being a good seer in the world, and trying to bear witness to what I can of my own death.

Summer of Books: The Pink Institution

In light of my creative writing class and my overall need to feel human again (see PhD Culture for a brief overview of my life the past three years, although the intensity has increased within the last year, the first year of my actual PhD program) I am going to be reviewing books. Actual fiction books, some old, new, experimental, academic (maybe). In doing this I hope to revive my "soul" a little.

This also comes in light of some news that I have some sort of disc issues/boney growth in my back that may require surgery, but definitely will require taking it easy (thus, no hiking for awhile). Just until they figure out what is up and a long-term plan. So frustrating as I was just starting to feel better. In attempt to keep writing I am challenging myself to keep reading.

The first book I read was The Pink Institution by Selah Saterstrom

Saterstrom was my creative writing professor this past quarter and I find it to be important to know people's work, especially when working with them. So I bought this book in an attempt to be more familiar with creative work and the folks producing it.

I find this to be a fabulous book, not solely because I know her. Saterstrom's use of language paints a horrifying multi-generational tale of relationships between white women in the South and their relationships with men. In many ways it is a tale of epistemology and ways of the body knowing. How do white women and girls learn to deal with abuse, alcoholism, sexuality, and pass this knowledge on to their daughters? How do the women's bodies within the narrative learn to negotiate complicated and problematic relationships and historical legacies?

Saterstrom's syntax is revelatory of the ghosts that live in and between language. The gaps between words in the first section demonstrates the haunting of language, what is not said/written leaves a rich subtext that is as prolific as the words that grace the page. My greatest love, as with most great books, is no immediate or satisfactory resolution, except to read it again.

It is short yet complex, written in the style of vignettes for multiple sections, that start to unravel the density of the narrative, which is never completely undone or made transparent. This forces the reader to actively engage in the text not idle through it as mindless entertainment.

I am immediately drawn into the section when the narrator "I" becomes present, not because I am concerned with it being the author but because it allows me a place to enter the text. What parts of this "I" story are my own similar, yet different narrative. As a woman who has been alive as a part of a 4-5 female generation family myself what are family and personal stories we circulate, which ones do we keep hidden? Whether the text is semi-autobiographical or not isn't the point (although context is always important), the meaning drawn out is important.

The narrative is one of those stories that needs to be told, heard.