Thoughts on “There There” by Tommy Orange

This was the latest selection for the book club to which I belong. It’s a novel written by a Native American author that explores what it is like to be a Native American living in an urban environment. The book is set in Oakland, and follows the paths of multiple characters leading up to a big pow wow.

For me, the strength of this book is in the way Orange uses different voices and narrative styles for each of the characters’ stories. He does manage to give each one a unique voice, which is tough to pull off well, especially with the number of threads and stories that are woven together into the larger tale.

The structure of this book reminds me of a Quentin Tarantino film. There are all these story lines that wind together, bringing the characters together in unexpected ways. Maybe a better analogy would be that the story resembles a Native American dream catcher, with all the stories knotted together; and yet somehow the nightmare is not caught, but slips through, a symbol of how the American Dream just doesn’t exist for so many people of indigenous cultures.

While the title of the book seems conciliatory, it is actually a reference to a Gertrude Stein quote, about how the lives and places we knew from our pasts are no longer there.

“Do you know what Gertrude Stein said about Oakland?” Rob says.

Dene shakes his head no but actually he knows, actually googled quotes about Oakland when researching for his project. He knows exactly what the guy is about to say.

“There is no there there,” he says in a kind of a whisper, with this goofy openmouthed smile Dene wants to punch. Dene wants to tell him he’d looked up the quote in its original context, in her Everybody’s Autobiography, and found that she was talking about how the place where she’d grown up in Oakland had changed so much, that so much development had happened there, that the there of her childhood, the there there, was gone, there was no there there anymore.

(pp. 38 – 39)

I think of the various times and places of my past, and those are just snapshots in time. They no longer exist. On a recent trip back to a city where I had lived for over 20 years, it was almost unrecognizable from what I remembered. There were shadows of what once was, almost like a distant echo that sparks a nostalgic memory, but the place itself is gone, changed beyond recognition. I can only imagine that this feeling must be magnified 100 fold for Native Americans, who were displaced and stripped of their homes.

The book is unsettling, and might be disturbing for some readers. But it is worth reading. We should not avoid reading about topics because they make us uncomfortable.

“Sonnet 36: Let me confess that we two must be twain” by William Shakespeare

Let me confess that we two must be twain,
Although our undivided loves are one:
So shall those blots that do with me remain,
Without thy help, by me be borne alone.
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a separable spite,
Which though it alter not love’s sole effect,
Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love’s delight.
I may not evermore acknowledge thee,
Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame,
Nor thou with public kindness honour me,
Unless thou take that honour from thy name:
But do not so; I love thee in such sort,
As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.

The essence of this poem is expressed in the first three words: Let me confess. The speaker is confessing that he has done something wrong, the result of which is the separation of the two lovers. This sentiment is echoed in line 10, where he mentions guilt and shame.

As this is another of the fair youth sonnets, where Shakespeare is expressing his love toward a young man, I am curious as to what it was that the speaker did which would have caused such a public disgrace that the two could no longer be seen together. I cannot find any hints in the text as to what might have happened. But the emotion is clear. There is regret on the part of the speaker for his part in the separation, a feeling that too many of us have experienced in our past failed relationships.

“Sonnet 35: No more be griev’d at that which thou hast done” by William Shakespeare

No more be griev’d at that which thou hast done:
Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud;
Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,
And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.
All men make faults, and even I in this,
Authorizing thy trespass with compare,
Myself corrupting, salving thy amiss,
Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are;
For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense—
Thy adverse party is thy advocate—
And ’gainst myself a lawful plea commence:
Such civil war is in my love and hate,
That I an accessary needs must be
To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me.

This is another of the Fair Youth sonnets. In this poem, the speaker is addressing a wrong which the young man committed against him. The sense that I get is that the speaker believes that the youth was not faithful, specifically from line 9 where he mentions “thy sensual fault.”

The most moving part of this poem, though, occurs in lines 11 and 12:

And ’gainst myself a lawful plea commence:
Such civil war is in my love and hate,

Here the speaker is expressing his inner conflict, which is such a human response to the pain of infidelity. On one hand, he is wracked with pain and anger, but on the other hand, his love and attachment is already prompting him to forgive. And it is this contrast, this inner struggle, which is the most powerful aspect of this poem.

“Sonnet 34: Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day” by William Shakespeare

Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day,
And make me travel forth without my cloak,
To let base clouds o’ertake me in my way,
Hiding thy bravery in their rotten smoke?
’Tis not enough that through the cloud thou break,
To dry the rain on my storm-beaten face,
For no man well of such a salve can speak
That heals the wound and cures not the disgrace:
Nor can thy shame give physic to my grief;
Though thou repent, yet I have still the loss:
The offender’s sorrow lends but weak relief
To him that bears the strong offence’s cross.
Ah, but those tears are pearl which thy love sheds,
And they are rich and ransom all ill deeds.

While this poem is one of the “fair youth” sonnets, and is about some sin committed against the speaker by a person that he loves, for me, it has a more universal meaning.

I interpret this poem as a reflection on expectations. As humans, we cannot help but project about our future, and have expectations based upon those projections, whether we expect good or bad things to happen. It is rare, though, that our expectations are met. We are either painfully disappointed, or pleasantly surprised. In this poem, the speaker has strong expectations, symbolized by the promise of “a beauteous day,” but then the clouds of reality and disillusion set in, blotting out his fantasy. It is a feeling I suspect we can all relate to. I know I certainly can. Expectations usually lead to disappointment. I try to avoid them as best I can.

Thanks for sharing in my musings, and have a blessed day.

“Sonnet 33: Full many a glorious morning have I seen” by William Shakespeare

Painting by Albert Bierstadt

Full many a glorious morning have I seen
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye,
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride
With ugly rack on his celestial face,
And from the forlorn world his visage hide,
Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace:
Even so my sun one early morn did shine
With all-triumphant splendor on my brow;
But, out, alack! he was but one hour mine,
The region cloud hath mask’d him from me now.
Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth;
Suns of the world may stain when heaven’s sun staineth.

It was a gorgeous morning when I read this sonnet, and the image of the morning sun illuminating the world with gold resonated with me. Dawn and dusk are my two favorite times of the day, that threshold period when everything appears to transition. Carlos Castaneda claimed that these were times of heightened mystical power. I believe that.

In this poem, Shakespeare uses the sun as a metaphor for the fair youth, who is the light of his life. There is a definite play on words, sun symbolizing son, representing the young man. When the youth is with him, Shakespeare’s world is transformed, and everything is gilded in gold.

The image of the sun in the golden dawn is contrasted by the gloom when the sun is hidden by clouds. This symbolizes the time when the fair youth is absent from Shakespeare’s view. At these times, a shadow is cast upon the landscape of Shakespeare’s world. The warmth and brilliance are gone, replaced by a dull coldness. None of the other “suns” can replace his one source of light. They are all insipid in comparison.

This is a wonderfully visual sonnet that expresses that deep love that is so difficult to convey through words. I hope you found this poem as beautiful and inspiring as I did. Cheers and blessings.

“Sonnet 32: If thou survive my well-contented day” by William Shakespeare

If thou survive my well-contented day,
When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover,
And shalt by fortune once more re-survey
These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover,
Compare them with the bettering of the time,
And though they be outstripped by every pen,
Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme,
Exceeded by the height of happier men.
O, then vouchsafe me but this loving thought:
“Had my friend’s Muse grown with this growing age,
A dearer birth than this his love had brought,
To march in ranks of better equipage:
But since he died, and poets better prove,
Theirs for their style I’ll read, his for his love.”

This sonnet is fairly straight-forward and does not require a lot of analysis. It is another in the fair youth series, where Shakespeare professes his love to the young man.

In this poem, Shakespeare contemplates the fact that he will likely die before the youth, leaving behind nothing but his poems. Here Shakespeare entreats the youth not to judge the poems solely on the merit and quality of the penmanship, which he humbly claims is not as good as his contemporaries, but instead to judge the poems based upon the love for the youth which is conveyed through the words. For me, this is what makes Shakespeare’s sonnets great—their ability to express emotion in such a way that the reader cannot help but feel the love and passion that the writer felt when crafting his lines.

As always, thank you for taking the time to share in my musings.

“Sonnet 31: Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts” by William Shakespeare

Painting of Henry Wriothesley

Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts,
Which I by lacking have supposed dead,
And there reigns love, and all love’s loving parts,
And all those friends which I thought buried.
How many a holy and obsequious tear
Hath dear religious love stol’n from mine eye,
As interest of the dead, which now appear
But things remov’d that hidden in thee lie!
Thou art the grave where buried love doth live,
Hung with the trophies of my lovers gone,
Who all their parts of me to thee did give;
That due of many now is thine alone:
Their images I lov’d I view in thee,
And thou, all they, hast all the all of me.

This poem is one of the “fair youth” sonnets in which Shakespeare expresses that the young man is the culmination of all the loves which Shakespeare had before. But I also sense that, prior to meeting the fair youth, Shakespeare had given up on love, which he “supposed dead.” It is a normal emotion, that when we are suffering from a failed relationship, that we can no longer see the possibility of experiencing love again. But then that feeling is rekindled through our next lover, and it is that feeling that Shakespeare conveys in this sonnet.

This poem also reminds me of a recent conversation I had about failed relationships. Someone close to me had just broken up with her boyfriend, and was feeling sad about it. What I said was that failed relationships are learning experiences that lead you to a deeper understanding of yourself and will ultimately lead you to the right relationship. It is through practice in intimate relationships that we learn what it is that we truly need in a partner, as well as how to be a good partner ourselves. That is what Shakespeare is hinting at here in this sonnet. The relationships in his past that failed ultimately each taught him something about himself and the type of individual he desires. He then notices those qualities in the fair youth, whose “bosom is endeared with all hearts” of Shakespeare’s past loves.

“Sonnet 30: When to the sessions of sweet silent thought” by William Shakespeare

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time’s waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unus’d to flow,
For precious friends hid in death’s dateless night,
And weep afresh love’s long since cancell’d woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish’d sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o’er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restor’d and sorrows end.

This poem is one of the “fair youth” sonnets. It essentially contrasts the emotional states associated with focusing on the past as opposed to the present.

The beginning of the sonnet is filled with the alliterative “s” sound, emulating the sound of a sigh, which is actually mentioned in the third line. The speaker is lost in thought about the past, obsessed with wasted time, failed endeavors, and lost loves. There is also a sense of mortality, as the person remembers the deaths of his friends and presumably contemplates his own. The focus on the past becomes so intense, that he is actually renewing and reliving his pain and loss. This is something I feel we have all experienced, at least I know for sure that I have. In my quiet times, it is easy for me to replay old tapes of the past and imagine what might have been, to mourn missed opportunities and lost friendships. This is exactly the feeling that Shakespeare is conveying in this poem.

But the last couplet provides a stark contrast to the prevailing mood of the sonnet. Here his focus shifts from the past to his current relationship with the fair youth, and you get the sense that the speaker is immediately able to let go of the past and appreciate what is truly important: the connection with people here and now.

We have a very limited time in our lives, and to waste that precious time obsessing about the past is a tragedy. To quote Ram Dass, we need to “Be Here Now.” We cannot change the past, and the future is uncertain. All we have is this moment. Take advantage of it and enjoy your connection with your friends and loved ones.

Thoughts on “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace – Part 6

Let the call go forth, to pretty much any nation we might feel like calling, that the past has been torched by a new and millennial generation of Americans…

(p. 381)

I’ve thought about this quote a lot since I read it. And while I agree with the essence of this statement, I am not sure whether this torching of the past is a good thing or a bad thing.

On one hand, I agree that we need to break from the social mores of the past if we are to evolve as a global society and face the challenges ahead. As such, I am all for torching the antiquated ideologies to which we cling that no longer serve the better interests of our world. If we live in the past, we will never be able to successfully move into the future. We must, of necessity, break free from the chains of our past in order to move forward.

But here’s the rub…

I have observed a tendency among some millennials to use this as a justification for apathy. Since all candidates are part of the political machine and you are basically voting for the lesser of two evils, then why bother voting at all. It is better to completely reject the corrupt and antiquated system. But is it? And what I find most unsettling is the backlash against the social change that millenials represent. Personally, I feel that much of the right-wing radicalism and fundamentalist fervor is a response to the threat that the “old guard” feels when confronted by a generation that clearly rejects their way of thinking and their set of values. When I see angry people demanding that we “take back our country,” I must ask from whom do they wish to take it back. It seems logical that they want to take it back from the “new and millennial generation.”

I sense that we are on the cusp of a major shift in humanity, but I have no clue what direction that shift will take. I see humanity collectively standing on a tightrope, teetering, and it is not clear whether we will fall to the left or the right. But inevitably, we will fall, one way or the other.

These are interesting times, that much is certain.

“My Heart Leaps Up When I Behold” by William Wordsworth

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So it was when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

This is a poem about how our experiences as children affect who we become as adults. Wordsworth begins by expressing his joy and excitement upon seeing a rainbow. He then states that he had the same feelings as a child, as an adult, and that he expects the same feelings when he gets old. He essentially establishes a connection between his past, present, and future. He also strongly asserts that when he reaches the point where he is no longer enthralled by the sight of a rainbow, which is a symbol for the beauty of Nature, then it is time for him to die.

When Wordsworth writes “The Child is father of the Man;” he is stating that his reverence for Nature is something that he learned as a child. His thoughts and feelings that he had as a child are what created the man he became. Likewise, those childhood impressions would continue to influence his life as he enters old age.

For Wordsworth, all his days are “bound each to each.” There is a natural connection between who he was, who he is, and who he will become, and it all grows from the seeds of wonder that were planted within him as a child.