MARILYNNE ROBINSON AND BARACK OBAMA

As I may have mentioned before, I sometimes read more than one book at a time. On second thought, who remembers what I may have mentioned before on my blog? Since I post seldom and irregularly now, I probably have very few readers. Along with books, I read magazines and newspapers. My present reading includes four books, one of which is a book of essays by Marilynne Robinson, a favorite novelist of mine. Robinson writes beautifully, but her writing is dense with meaning and demands attention. Every word counts, so don't expect a quick read.

I've read and enjoyed all four of her novels, a couple more than once. The titles are Housekeeping, Gilead, Home, and Lila. I fell in love with the character Jack in Home. He's flawed and causes hurt to people who love him, but I sense an innate goodness and sweetness in Jack that is, sadly, all too often overcome by the flaws in his character.

My friend Susan sent me two collections of Robinson's essays, most of which originated as lectures at universities. The titles are The Givenness of Things and What Are We Doing Here? Both collections are excellent. The latter collection includes an essay on Barack Obama and his time in office that was first published in The Nation.

The essay on Obama is brilliant and insightful and holds a place as the best writing on the former president that I have read to date. Below is an excerpt from the essay on Obama. You can read the entire essay at the link above.

I have had a singular relationship with President Obama. I cannot imagine a greater honor than his having called me his friend, but if I call our relationship more than meaningful acquaintance, I might suggest a degree of personal familiarity that I cannot claim. We have had conversations. His expressed interest in my work has had a marked effect on my career, very marked in Europe because he is held in such high regard there. The association of his name with mine abroad has let me see him as he is seen where the miasmas of polemic do not obscure him: as a gracious, good, and brilliant man. There, he is a vindication of American democracy, while here, every means has been tried to deny the public the consequences of having chosen him.

A NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION

Since, I'm already on record, at least on Facebook, as one who does not make New Year's resolutions, I go on record now with a change of mind. Thanks to Tim Chesterton, for inspiring me to start a list of books read in 2015. Why haven't I done this before now? I hope I remember to keep the list current.

I have now finished rereading Marilynne Robinson’s Home for the third time. Late last year, I’d read Robinson’s newest novel, Lila, which includes a number of the same characters as her two previous works of fiction, so I wanted to check back with my friends. All three of her 21st century novels, the two mentioned above and Gilead, are masterworks, or so I believe. If there is a finer writer of fiction in this century, I don’t know who it would be.

I was only a few chapters into Lila when I knew I would read the book again. There is so much to savor in Robinson's exquisite writing, that it's impossible to fully appreciate her work in one reading...or two or three, for that matter. Jack Boughton, as portrayed in Home, is one of the great tragic characters in 21st century fiction, and Glory, Jack's sister, and their father, the Reverend Robert Boughton, follow close behind, not quite so tragic as Jack, though all too human and real and weighted with sadness. In testament to Robinson, all her principal characters come alive to me and seem like people I know.

Robinson's books are beautiful, but I would not say they are happy books....more like life with ups and downs...and more downs. I come away sad, but not without hope, and lifted out of present depressing realities. As a Facebook friend said, her writing always allows for the possibility of redemption for her characters.  The depth of Robinson's religious sensibility is quite evident in her writing, but she never preaches.  Even now, on the third time around for Home, I find myself going back to reread certain shining passages. I'll reread Gilead next, and then back again to Lila.  Note that all Robinson's titles are a single word.

I could probably make a list for 2014 without too much difficulty, but maybe it's better to make a new start.

Notes On A Lovely Book

Glory had often reflected on the fact that Boughtons looked very much like one another. Hope was the acknowledged beauty of the family, which is to say the Boughton nose and the Boughton brow were less pronounced in her case. All the rest of them male and female, were, their mother said, handsome. They all passed from cherubic infancy to unremarkable childhood to gangling youth to that adult state of Boughtonhood their mother soothed or praised with talk of character and distinction, Hope being the one exception. So adolescence was a matter of watching unremarkable features drift off axis very slightly, of watching the nose knuckle just a little and the jaw go just a little bit out of square. So Glory's face had transformed itself in its inevitable turn. She remembered her alarm.

From Home, a novel, by Marilynne Robinson. When I began to read the book, I anticipated a pleasurable experience, because I'd read Gilead, by Robinson, a beautifully written story, with characters so alive that they become people whom you care about in the course of reading the book and even afterward. Characters in Gilead reappear in Home. On Bishop Alan's Blog, he and I discussed Gilead in his comments, and he said, "I thought Gilead was one of the most beautiful novels I've ever read — clear simple and profound..." I agree, and I'd say the same about Home. The girls in the family are named Glory, Hope, Faith, and Grace. If I remember correctly, the Reverend Boughton considered Charity for one of the girls, but his wife drew the line.

Home is the story of two siblings, of eight, who return to the family home in a small town in Iowa, where their father, a retired minister, who is old and ill, still lives. One, Glory, goes to help her father after a period of adversity in her own life, and her brother, Jack, returns out of desperation. It's a story of faith, of father, daughter, and son, with all the accompanying missteps, doubts, and hesitations. Biblical references and quotes abound, but not in a beat-you-over-the-head manner. They appear naturally, in the course of conversations, en passant. Many of the references are permeated with irony as Jack, the black sheep of the family, speaks them.

About Glory:

For her, church was an airy white room with tall windows looking out on God's good world, with God's good sunlight pouring in through those windows and falling across the pulpit where her father stood, straight and strong, parsing the broken heart of humankind and praising the loving heart of Christ. That was church.

The church could be a description of my church, except that the sunlight does not fall across the pulpit.

A conversation between Glory and Jack:

"...You're worried about seeing Ames tonight at dinner."
"Yes, well, it seems I've done as much as one man could do to make the experience embarrassing."
"Nonsense. Really. If he did see you on the street, what of it?"
"Good point, Glory. Perspective. Just what is called for here. Would he have noticed my discomfort with myself from that distance? Well, so what? A law-abiding citizen has a perfect right to feel wretched on a public sidewalk, on a Sabbath morning. Even to pause as he does so. Near a church, too. There's poetry in it, of a sort."

The father is a giant of a man, shrunken by age and illness, but still a force in the lives of his children. Jack, the black sheep of the family, is one of the most endearing and heartbreaking fictional characters that I've come across in quite a while. He lingers with me and, I suspect, he will continue with me for a long time.

There's no way that I can do justice to the book with my words. I was moved to tears more than once by the story but also by the beauty of the prose. I'd go back to read the lovely words again, and I'd weep. I urge you to read it and see for yourself. And then, if you haven't read Gilead, go read it, too. I get no commission from sales.

UPDATE: Listen to or read about the NPR interview with Marilynne Robinson.