April 21, 2006
I'm number 1! I'm number 1!
As of today, I am the top google hit for both "Ben Munson" AND "Benjamin Munson."
Won't you help me celebrate this crowning achievement by leaving a comment? Indulge my out-of-control egotism.
Less than five weeks before Kevin and I move in together.
April 20, 2006
Desert Island Novels
On the eve of moving in with Kevin Burk (yup, we're taking the plunge--hold your breath), books are at the front of my mind. I suspect that this is because a fair chunk of the 1,300 square feet in our new apartment is going to be dedicated to storing all of our books. Seriously, books are one of the things that brought Kevin and me together. I shouldn't be complaining that we have so many. (I can, however, legitimately complain that I'm almost certainly going to bear the responsibility of putting together our new Ikea bookshelves.)
If I were stranded on a desert island and I could only have a handful of books with me, what would I choose? I'm glad you asked, because I've written a blog to answer just that question. I tried to make the task easier by considering only fiction books. I might write a nonfiction list sometime in the future.
Song of Solomon (Toni Morrison). With all due respect to Oprah and the folks who give out the Pulitzer, the genius of Toni Morrison is best seen in this book, not in Beloved. Sure, Beloved is a triumph of symbolism, and its story of the ghost of slavery being embodied in an actual ghost is both powerful and ribald. I only wish it rated higher on the readability scale. It's so baroque. On a visceral level, it is Song of Solomon that I go back to again and again. Its protagonist's quest to find his roots just resonates with me, and the book has perhaps the second-best last line of any book, ever.
Dancer from the Dance (Andrew Holleran). If you are gay and have not read this book, then I would like you to now bang your head on the wall in self-punishment. Is your forehead bloody yet? No? Then keep banging. This is the definitive portrait of gay life in the 1970s, told without the speculation and judgment that movies like The Boys in the Band and Cruising gave us. (It doesn't, unfortunately, have Al Pacino's awful dancing.) Read it, read it, read it.
Continental Drift (Russell Banks). I want my epitaph to read "extremely flawed, but consistently ambitious." The same could describe this book. It attempts to deconstruct the American dream by telling two parallel stories, one about a many moving from New Hampshire to Florida, and the other about a woman emigrating to Florida from Haiti. A number of scenes—including the climactic scene—go terribly awry, but the characters are uniformly engaging, and the book's flaws end up being more interesting than cringe-inducing. I wouldn't consider an eternity of desert-island loneliness without it.
Never Let Me Go (Kazuo Ishiguro). Oh baby, baby, never let me go. If I had to pick only one author to take to a desert island, I might choose Ishiguro. His six novels are so wonderfully subtle and understated that it's hard not to enjoy them. (Well, at least five of them are, and even though The Unconsoled was an uneven novel, it made a great movie as The Saddest Music in the World.) NLMG was an unexpected treat—his crowning achievement. The less said about the plot, the better. Sufficient to say, he took a plot that could have been nothing more than a string of clichés and made it high art.
Goodbye to Berlin (Christopher Isherwood). Wilkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome. Every desert island needs a set of short stories, and they don't get better than this. Forget that these are the stories that inspired Cabaret. Read them as a fascinating picture of life in German between the two World Wars.
Mildred Pierce (James M. Cain). Sure, snicker away at the stereotypically gay man and his love of the book that most people only know through its Joan Crawford-starring film adaptation. If that's the only way you know Mildred Pierce, then I feel sorry for you. The book is a sublime critique of sexism and classism. And you thought Veda was a witch in the movie? Brother, you don't know the half of it.
The House with a Clock in its Walls. (John Bellairs). I feel sorry for kids whose favorite childhood books are in the Harry Potter series. If you want a children's book that is so macabre that it would give Stephen King nightmares, then look no further. An awkward kid (who, I swear, is suppose to 'read' gay) actually raises the dead in an attempt to impress a bully. Then, his warlock uncle and witch neighbor (both of whom are single, which just gives the book even more of a GLB subtext) have to defend him. It's absolutely riveting, impeccably written, and very, very, very scary.
The Haunting of Hill House (Shirley Jackson). Another deliciously macabre choice. I particularly like this ghost story because it clearly is meant to take place in upstate New York. I can imagine places in the Southern Tier around Taylor and Corning where Hill House might be located.
Death Comes to the Archbishop (Willa Cather). I've heard people say that this story is a meditation about loneliness and the feeling of being overwhelmed by the world around you. Maybe that's true. I just like it because it describes parts of the old west that I really enjoy (Northern New Mexico). Its episodic structure makes it feel sort of like a Robert Altman film.
Mockingbird (Walter Tevis). I picked up this book as a bit of a curiosity. I wanted to read a book by Walter Tevis because I was, at the time, pretty good friends with his daughter Julia Tevis McGory. I picked it up in a bookstore in Chicago when Julie, Elaina Frieda and I were there for an ASA meeting in June '01. (If Julie or Elaina is reading this, that was the day we got lost because we were on the brown line instead of the red line.) This book has it all—its central section reads like a road movie. Better yet, it's a road movie with an android and a cat. Most importantly, though, this book has the best final line of any book, ever, period.
Suitable Substitutes: Jane Eyre, The Sheltering Sky, The Great Gatsby, Bastard out of Carolina
April 12, 2006
Vacation Photos
Alex Francis writes...
just thought I'd drop you a line to see how things are going (I'm sure you're busy, given the time of year). I... noticed that you have not updated your blog since February. I hope this is a sign that you are having so much fun in your life and/or such incredible productivity at work that you just haven't gotten around to it. But I do enjoy your blog and hope you eventually have a chance to get back to it.
Incredible productivity? Hardly. My work feels like it has come to a grinding halt.
I do, however, have pictures that I can post from Kevin and my trip to New Mexico and Colorado March 11-17.
Picture 1. We travel 1,000 miles and what do we do? Go looking for what-nots and old books. Isn't that what we usually do in Minneapolis? This picture was taken in Durango, Colorado.
Picture 2. It's nice to know that on a road in the middle of nowhere (about 20 miles south of Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico) there are still progressive people!
Picture 3. I think I look like a moron in this picture, but it's basically the only picture of the two of us together. We're at Bandelier National Monument.
Picture 4. Real Men sleep on king-sized brass beds with chenille bedspreads at the historic Strater hotel.
Picture 5. Kevin on a rock. Bandelier again.
Plenty of stories to tell, but no time to tell them. I hope the pictures suffice.