A Eulogy for Tommy

The other day I found out my barber Tommy passed away.  Alberto, his friend and co-worker, had told me he was out the last six months on family leave taking care of his mother who was very sick.  The news of Tommy’s death saddened me; he was my barber for about 20 years.

           

Tommy worked at Astor Place Hairstylists in the village.  In the early 1980’s, I remember seeing long lines just to get in the place and thought only the rich and beautiful could get in, but the barbershop catered to everyone.  One day I walked in and an employee asked if I needed help.  I said I needed a haircut and he pointed to Tommy who was not busy at the time and that is how our relationship started.

           

I can’t say I knew Tommy well.  He was married, but didn’t he talk about his wife much.  At one point, we both owned Nissan Maximas and we talked about the quality of the brand name.  He was Italian and talked about how much he loved his country.  He was not as rabid a soccer fan as Alberto, but he enjoyed talking about World Cup matches.  Tommy rooted for the Italian team to win, but always rooted against the Brazilian team.  I never formally introduced myself, but that never stopped Tommy from calling me, “my friend.”

           

What I do know about Tommy, I gathered from observation over the years.  He was a devoted son to his mother.  Tommy took time off from work to take care of her.  At the time, I could tell by the look on his face that he was very concerned about her.  Sometimes I was afraid to ask about her because I did not want to intrude in his private pain.

           

Tommy was a devoted Catholic.  It was a coincidence that I went to Astor Place at the exact time the Vatican announced the death of Pope John Paul II.  Tommy was sitting in his chair with a rosary in his right hand, tears streaming down his face.  I stood by him as he grieved not wanting to interrupt this very personal moment.  He knew I was there, but I told him I was not in a hurry.  After the news report ended, I told him to take a break and that I’d wait for him.

           

It was that devotion to Pope John Paul II that led me to ask my sister to bring back a souvenir from the Pope’s beatification ceremony in May of this year.  Sadly, I never got the chance to give it to him.  He was already absent on leave.

           

He was a big fan of Julio Iglesias, and sometimes played his CD’s over the barbershop speakers.  Tommy knew a little Spanish.  He said he was able to learn Spanish because a lot of words were similar in Italian. 

           

One year, I was scrambling to finish my Christmas shopping, it might have been on Christmas Eve, I cannot remember exactly.  Tommy was on the checkout line.  He saw me as I made my way to the escalator, gave me a sly smile in recognition of our mutual procrastination.  We shook hands and wished each other a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

           

Christmas time was a special time for me because it gave me an opportunity to give Tommy a gratuity – once I was financially able.  One time I came in and Tommy was sitting in his chair reading the paper.  He saw me and got up right away.  I told him I was not there to get a haircut.  Instead, I was there to drop off his Christmas gratuity.  He was touched by the effort and the gesture.

           

Another time, I gave Tommy his Christmas tip, then gave a Christmas tip to Alberto.  Earlier in the year, Tommy was out on family leave taking care of his mother and Alberto was the substitute barber.  Alberto was moved by the gesture and Tommy said, “See how classy my customers are.”

           

I also took the time to write in Italian, “Thank you for your service, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.”  I’ve noticed that people are touched when you extend warm greetings in their native language.

           

I guess what I’ll miss the most is Tommy’s professionalism, his skill as a barber, his patience and his courtesy.  I will miss our conversations about current events and how he punctuated every comment with “fuggedaboutit.”

           

Alberto and I talked about Tommy.  He said it was hard and emotionally draining for him to tell all of Tommy’s loyal customers about his passing.  Alberto was saddened again having to tell me.  “Tommy said you were his best customer,” he said.  We hugged and I offered my sympathies on Tommy’s passing.  

Rest in peace my friend.  Può il dio benedire la vostra anima con felicità eterna.

Religion and Politics

Recently a dear friend asked me in an email about my spiritual beliefs, if I believed in God and Jesus Christ. In my reply, I said that I believe in God, Jesus is the Messiah and Mary gave birth to Jesus. Also, I believe in revelation, that God sent his message through the Holy Spirit/Archangel Gabriel to prophets. My friend then asked how I’m able to reconcile my radical political beliefs with my religious beliefs. From my perspective, religion and politics are not mutually exclusive.

In the United States, in our present time, I would be considered a radical, but in most parts of the world I would be considered an ordinary socialist. I believe in an activist government because there are problems the private sector cannot solve by itself.

Admittedly, I’m to the left of most liberals. Capitalism as a doctrine cannot govern society because the goal of modern capitalism is the accumulation of wealth. Conservative Republicans and Tea Party activists argue for lower taxes on millionaires and billionaires because lower taxes will lead to job growth, except that we have had low taxes for the top one percent for the last ten years and it has not resulted in job growth. Instead it’s led to hoarding cash. The private sector is sitting on two trillion dollars. The only thing lower taxes will do is increase wealth.

I believe capitalism equals exploitation. Society is at the mercy of profiteering and greed. We pay premiums into a private for profit health insurance industry that will use any excuse to deny medical coverage because paying a six-figure hospital bill will negatively impact profits.

We are at the mercy of pharmaceutical companies because the costs of life saving medications could bankrupt 95% of the people living in the United States.

Homelessness is a major problem in New York City for more than two decades. Why are people homeless? Because they cannot afford to pay rent. The market dictates the cost of renting an apartment and high rents exclude the middle class and the poor.

Public education is in danger of becoming extinct. A free education is perceived as a poor education and families are forced to pay tuition to private schools because the government does not invest resources into public schools. Want to see how important public schools are to politicians, just walk into a public school library and pull out a book at random. Chances are the book is older than you are.

Middle class families are faced with the challenge of feeding, educating and providing shelter for their children. They are one illness away from bankruptcy.

These are problems Americans choose to endure. In Europe, healthcare and education are affordable, but these political systems are socialized and socialism is considered evil in the United States.

As a political scientist, I perceive religious movements as political movements, religious figures as political activists and it’s through this perception that I can reconcile politics with religion.

Abraham is acknowledged in Judaism, Christianity and Islam as the first monotheist. We take for granted the revolutionary impact in the concept of one Creator.

Polytheistic societies are predisposed to being unequal. Multiple gods implies some members of society are stronger than others, or more privileged than others and in some extreme cases kings proclaim themselves to be deities, for example Pharaoh in Egypt and Caesar in Rome. The social structures of these unequal societies are static with an absence of social mobility. If you were born into the aristocracy, you will remain there. A child of a slave will remain a slave.[i]

Abraham lived in a polytheistic society. By proclaiming one God as the creator of the universe, he is also making the following statement: We are all equal in the eyes of the one true God. The King and the slave were equal in stature. Not only did Abraham challenge the notion of multiple gods, he affirmed his right to choose his own religious beliefs, challenged the tribe’s state religion, and introduced the concept of social mobility.[ii] The child of a peasant or a slave could aspire. Abraham was a threat to the structure of the society built around the concept polytheism.

Abraham was a political revolutionary because he was able to merge the theological concept of one God with the political aspirations of countless oppressed peoples throughout history: We are all equal. The slave master is not better than the slave. The hedge fund manager is not better than the sweatshop worker.

President Bush was mocked for naming Jesus as his favorite political philosopher during a Republican presidential debate. I thought it was unfair because I perceive Jesus to be a political figure, but Present Bush was unable to explain why he thought Jesus was a political philosopher. I think I can.

First, “Rome reserved crucifixion for two categories of people: those who challenged imperial rule (violently or nonviolently) and chronically defiant slaves… The two groups who were crucified had something in common: both rejected Roman imperial domination… [Crucifixion] was state torture and terrorism.”[iii]

From this passage, we can deduce Jesus was a political prisoner who was crucified to deter the masses from revolting against Roman imperialism.

Second, in Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians he writes, “We proclaim Christ crucified.” (1 Corinthians 1:23) To the people suffering under the oppression of Roman imperialism, this is a code meaning the Roman imperialists executed Jesus, but justice prevailed because God resurrected Jesus. Christ crucified became a message of hope.[iv]

If Jesus was executed as a political prisoner, then what was the nature of the political threat against Roman imperialism?

Romans lived under polytheistic doctrine. In fact, Caesar Augustus (31 BCE to 14 CE) was proclaimed, “Divine, Son of God, God, and God from God… Lord, Liberator, Redeemer and Savior of the World.”[v]

The Romans had a peculiar notion of peace. Peace on Earth could only be achieved through violence and victory over their opponents, or to paraphrase Mao, peace by the tip of a spear.

Jesus was born into a monotheistic faith (Judaism), but Jews were subjects of the Roman Empire. Jesus’ concept of peace was through nonviolence and justice. Here we have the first conflict with the Roman Empire who believed that violent conquest over their enemies and violence to maintain order will lead to peace. Jesus preached God is the ultimate authority; God commands us to live peacefully among ourselves and will dispense justice to those who disobey God’s commandments.[vi]

Jesus and the Roman Empire did not only disagree about methods of achieving peace. Jesus preached the oneness of God, the sole Creator. Just as with Abraham, Jesus presented an alternate religious doctrine that was contrary to the Roman theology, but the Romans considered Judaism to be a religion of a conquered people. It was not a threat.

But the concept of one God means we are all equal. Caesar Augustus was created by the same God that created Jewish peasants who were under the control of Roman imperialism.

Jesus’ concept of equality is best encapsulated in the Parable of the Great Feast. “A man prepared a great feast and sent out many invitations. 17When the banquet was ready, he sent his servant to tell the guests, ‘Come, the banquet is ready.’ 18But they all began making excuses. One said, ‘I have just bought a field and must inspect it. Please excuse me.’ 19Another said, ‘I have just bought five pairs of oxen, and I want to try them out. Please excuse me.’ 20Another said, ‘I now have a wife, so I can’t come.’

21“The servant returned and told his master what they had said. His master was furious and said, ‘Go quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and invite the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’ 22After the servant had done this, he reported, ‘There is still room for more.’ 23So his master said, ‘Go out into the country lanes and behind the hedges and urge anyone you find to come, so that the house will be full. 24For none of those I first invited will get even the smallest taste of my banquet.’”

There are two messages within this parable. The first is obvious to Christians. Many will be invited to the Kingdom of Heaven, but few will be admitted. The second is subtle, but more subversive.

We take for granted the concept of sharing a meal with other people from different social strata, but during Jesus’ time nobleman ate with nobleman, peasants with peasants, slaves with salves, etc. In the parable, the man was willing to share his great feast with “the poor, the crippled, the blind, the lame” because they are all equal.[vii] This is a message the Romans could not accept. Jesus is crucified because he’s preaching subversive messages and in the Roman Empire the best way to maintain peace is through violent public executions with the goal of discouraging more subversion.

Religion and politics can cohabitate, but unfortunately religion is easily corrupted by charlatans and politics in the United States is disposed towards corruption. We, as a nation, are dangerously close to becoming an oligarchy, a 21^st century version of the United Fruit Company. Money equals speech and corporations have the same rights of individuals. Politicians have access to universal health care, but we are denied the same right. We claim to be a Christian nation, but we forget the basic rules of Christianity. We are all equal.

Revelation is much more than commandments to abide by, they’re ethics to live by and I believe every citizen should have access to affordable healthcare, a quality education, a job that provides wages to support a family, and government should protect us from bankruptcy.

If I'm a radical, it's because I try to follow in the footsteps of other radicals like Abraham and Jesus.

---

[i] Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, “What’s Right With Islam Is What’s Right With America,” HarperCollins, 2005, page 11.

[ii] Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, “What’s Right With Islam Is What’s Right With America,” HarperCollins, 2005, page 11.

[iii] Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, “The First Paul,” HarperCollins, 2009, page 131.

[iv] Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, “The First Paul,” HarperCollins, 2009, page 132.

[v] Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, “The First Paul,” HarperCollins, 2009, page 93.

[vi] Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, “The First Paul,” HarperCollins, 2009, page 121.

[vii] John Dominic Crossan, “Jesus A Revoluntionary Biography, HarperCollins, 1995, page 74.

Books: Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson

Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson is a strange novel on several levels. The first chapter starts out in a deliberate staccato style, but afterward the narrative is less constrained due to the impressionistic nature of the writing.

The novel is a first person narrative told from the point of view of Trond Sander, a 67-year-old Norwegian whose wife died in a car accident and a month later lost his sister to cancer. After living his adult life in the city, he retreats to the country, living secretly in seclusion, without a television and telephone, and alienated from his daughters and society. One night, he notices his neighbor, Lars, is looking for his dog and this chance encounter is the catalyst to Trond’s recollection of past relationships with his father, his best friend Jon and his mother, the neighbor Franz and living in Norway immediately after WWII. It appears Trond becomes annoyed with Lars because he feels the latter is interfering with his solitude.

Another strange aspect of the novel is Trond’s friendship with Jon. One day, they are out together on an adjacent farm riding horses. Afterwards, they climb a tree and Trond is fascinated by a bird’s nest, but Jon crushes the egg and destroys the nest. This sudden act of cruelty hurts and ends their friendship. Jon becomes distant and eventually, at least physically, disappears from the novel. He leaves home and becomes a sailor after a childhood tragedy. He left a loaded weapon within reach of his younger twin brothers and Lars accidentally kills Odd.

In an odd coincidence, his neighbor, Lars is Jon’s brother and Odd’s accidental killer.

Trond’s sexuality is emerging and he is infatuated with Jon’s mother. The situation becomes more complicated when Trond realizes his father is a rival for her affections and vice versa. In one scene, his father says, “What about someone your own age?” And as much affection Trond has for this woman, he never identifies her by name, only as Jon’s mother.

Trond’s father maintains a presence throughout the novel, but he the protagonist last saw him in 1948. His father was a courier/spy during the Nazi occupation of Norway. The war must have wounded him in a way that he could no longer live with his family and one day he left. Later on, he wrote his family a letter thanking them for wonderful memories; he was not coming back, left some money in a bank in Sweden and sent his “best wishes.”

In a sense, Trond is his father’s son. He also abandons his family. Ellen, his daughter, is forced to track him down because he left without saying goodbye, or even leaving a forwarding address.

There is a coldness that permeates throughout the novel, when Jon crushes the fragile egg I get a sense of how Trond feels, but not about Jon’s feelings and motivations because he never explained his actions. At first, I thought I was peeking into the mind of a budding sociopath and was disappointed when Jon disappeared. At least, I expected a conversation in which Trond scolded Jon for his behavior.

Furthermore, there was no sexual tension in the scenes with Jon’s mother. Trond did not appear to understand his feelings toward her. He describes what she is wearing, but not how she looks. I did not get an understanding into his attraction for her. In terms of teenage sexuality, he must have been a late bloomer because at that I age I was fully aware why I lusted after girls.

Another interesting aspect of the novel is the virtual absence of dialogue. The narrative is descriptive, there is a strong sense of time and place, especially when the protagonist is describing nature, but Trond is not simply describing sights and sounds; he’s also describing scent. For example, he just cut down a tree and is describing the scent of the fallen tree and he is transported back in time to a childhood memory. The author uses scent as an effective tool to triggers memories, and this is an efficient method of transitioning from the protagonist’s present to his past with the novel shifting seamlessly from present to past.

The most striking feature of the novel is how the author is able to describe the ordinary minutia of Trond’s life without it becoming ponderous, how he’s getting the chainsaw ready, cutting trees, collecting hay. The author’s successful because of the vivid descriptions. There is a strong sense of place.

There is a great line in the novel, “the past is a foreign country, that they do things differently there…” It symbolizes the spirit of the novel. An outsider would not understand Trond’s past because it was foreign to the outsider. You had to be there to understand how it shaped Trond’s present and maybe that is why I found Out Stealing Horses a little strange. I had to be there to understand.

No Country for Democrats

Alleged gunman Jared Lee Loughner, 22, a Tucson resident, shot Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D) once in the back of the head on Saturday as she was meeting with constituents outside a Safeway supermarket. It was Ms Giffords first town hall meeting after being sworn in to the 112th Congress.

Eyewitnesses said Mr. Loughner first shot the congresswoman, then opened fire killing six and injuring 14. Among those killed were federal judge John M. Roll, Christina Taylor Young, a 9 year old who was at the town hall as part of a class assignment, and Ms Giffords’ director of community outreach Gabriel Zimmerman, 30. The others who were killed were Dorothy Morris, 76; Dorwin Stoddard, 76; and Phyllis Schneck, 79.[i]

Reports from the crime scene indicate Mr. Loughner fired 30 shots from a Glock 19 automatic handgun that he legally purchased at Sportsman’s Warehouse located in Tucson, after Mr. Loughner passed a “federally required background check.”[ii]

Mr. Loughner is described as alienated, disturbed and prone to erratic outbursts when in class. Last October, he was suspended from college and was not allowed back until he produced a letter from a psychiatrist attesting to his mental fitness. He tried to join the military, but was rejected for reasons currently undisclosed. He has a criminal record, but the police are not releasing details.

Also, Mr. Loughner has a You Tube channel in which he posted several disparate thoughts involving the gold standard, the constitutionality of police and other rambling, disjointed antigovernment musings.

I read some of Mr. Loughner’s statements and they are completely undecipherable. His thought process is erratic. There is no logic or reason to them.

At a news conference, Pima County sheriff, Clarence W. Dupnik was visibly frustrated when he said the political discourse on radio and television may have played a secondary role in the crime. “When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous,” Sheriff Dupnik said. “And unfortunately, Arizona has become sort of the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry.”[iii]

Immediately, the hand wringing began. Politicians and the mainstream media espoused their collective guilt over the tragic incident. As usual, they framed the argument into two equal positions, the left and the right are equally at fault for the corrosive nature of our politics today.

Except that’s a false argument. If there ever was a time to point fingers in one direction, it is now because one side of the political spectrum is clearly at fault.

President Reagan demonized the word liberal until it became an political epithet. He also said government was not the solution to the problem, it was the problem.

The Republican Party sent its staffers and supporters to disrupt the ballot recount in Florida in 2000.

Vice President Cheney, among others, said terrorists were rooting for a Democratic presidential victory in 2004 and 2008.

During McCain presidential campaign rallies, people were yelling, “kill” when Obama’s name was mentioned.

Michelle Bachmann, on Hardball with Chris Matthews, said the media should investigate Democratic elective officials to expose their un-American activties.

Glenn Beck infamously said President Obama has a deep seated hatred of white people. Rush Limbaugh uses rape imagery to describe the president’s policies.

Tea Party and conservatives stormed and disrupted town hall meetings conducted by Democrats during the health care reform debate.

Gun enthusiasts, hardly bleeding heart liberals, defiantly flaunted their weapons at Tea Party rallies.

Sharon Angle, Tea Party and Republican candidate for Senate (Nevada), proposed “second amendment remedies” against the tyranical rule Senator Harry Reid.

A male Rand Paul supporter stomped on the face of a female Moveon.org activist as she was trying to get Mr. Paul's attention by waving a placard.

Newly sworn in congressman Allan West had nominated talk radio host Joyce Kaufman for the position of chief of staff, but she ultimately refused the position after she was criticized for saying, at a campaign rally, “If ballots don’t work, bullets will. I’ve never in my life thought the day would come that I would tell individual citizens that you are responsible for being the militia the Founding Fathers designed. They were very specific: you need to be prepared to fight tyranny.”[iv]

It is the Republican Party, aided and abetted by Fox News, that denounced President Obama’s policies with ad hominem attacks, such as he’s a communist, socialist, fascist and un-American.

In addition, the Republican Party refuses to denounce the Birther movement, a group that is convinced President Obama was not born in the United States. Combine that erroneous assumption with President Obama’s policies will destroy America, and you will create an extremely combustible political tinderbox.

Republicans, conservatives and Tea Party activists are in denial if they believe their words and deeds do not have consequences.

Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips condemned the shooting, but mentioned Ms Giffords is a liberal.[v]

Actually, she is conservative, but she does not pass the Tea Party/conservative purity test because she voted for the Obama health care reform bill.

Former Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin posted a map of the United States on her Facebook page with 20 crosshairs, each symbolizing a Democratic representative she wanted defeated. Afterwards, she posted, “Don’t retreat – Instead RELOAD!” on Twitter.[vi]

At the time, Ms Giffords said, “For example, we’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list, but the thing is, that the way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district. When people do that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action.”[vii]

But Rebecca Mansour, who works for Sarah-Pac, said, “There is nothing irresponsible about our graphic.”[viii]

House Speaker John Boehner said, about the attempted assassination of congresswoman Giffords, “an attack on one who serves is an attack on all who serve.”[ix]

But he is not completely innocent. Last year, he said congressman Steve Dreihaus “may be a dead man. He can’t go home to the west side of Cincinnati.”[x]

Mr. Dreihaus was in danger because he voted for President Obama’s health care reform bill.[xi]

Liberals or Democrats have not disrupted the political process in the United States. This is a lopsided fight. If it was a boxing match, the referee would have stopped the fight because the left is barely able to defend itself and fight back.

This is not a debate about honest, political disagreements. Political discourse is currently framed through the prism of false reality, the Republican Party is righteous and is America’s sole protector against the apolyptic evil manifested by the subversive, unpatriotic policies of the Democratic Party.

If the attempted assasination of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was politically motivated, then this is not a left-right problem. The fault lies solely in conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Using this divisive strategy, the Republicans captured the House of Representatives last November and are poised to win the Senate in 2012. I doubt the Republicans will become soft because, as Thomas Jefferson famously said, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

By the way, the context of Jefferson’s quote was misinformation could lead to lethargy, therefore liberty is at risk – our current state of political discourse. We are being mislead and misinformed by a political party and a news organization to the point where fact and reason have become the enemy and those who defend fact and reason are a threat to the United States.



[i] “Giffords Called Responsive After Attack,” Marc Lacey and David M. Herszenhorn, New York Times, January 9, 2011.
[ii] “Gun used in Tucson was purchased legally; Arizona laws among most lenient in nation,” James V. Grimaldi and Fredrick Kunkle, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[iii] “Arizona Sheriff Slams Media Vitriol,” Politico, January 8, 2011.
[iv] “Ballots or Bullets Radio Host Not Joining West Staff After All,” The Maddow Blog, November 11, 2010.
[v] “Bloodshed Puts New Focus on Vitriol in Politics,” Carl Hulse and Kate Zernike, New York Times, January 8, 2011.
[vi] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[vii] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[viii] “Sarah Palin crosshairs never intended to be gun sights, says aide,” Felicia Sonmez and Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[ix] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[x] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.
[xi] “John Boehner decries attacks in brief remarks,” Dan Eggen, Washington Post, January 9, 2011.

Books: The Emmigrants by WG Sebald

The Emigrants by W.G. Sebald is a first person narrative, that reads like a memoir, and told from the point of view of someone who appears to be the author, but it isn’t. There are a couple clues that lead me to conclude The Emigrants is entirely a work of fiction.

First, on page three, the narrator and Clara drove to Hingham. Clara appears to be the author’s wife. According to an online biography, Mr. Sebald’s wife is Ute and they were married in 1967.

Second, on page 29, the narrator moved from the village of W to the small town of S in December 1952. The online biography indicates the author was born in Wertach im Allgu, Germany in 1944, but his family moved to Sonthofen in 1948.

Therein lies the excellence of The Emigrants. It looks and feels like a memoir. The use of photos throughout the novel supports the belief that we are reading four mini biographies: a relative (Ambros Adelwarth), a former teacher (Paul Bereyter), and people he met on two separate journeys (Dr Henry Selwyn and Max Ferber). We are listening to life stories and looking through a photo album at the same time.

The author was born during the latter stages of World War II in Nazi Germany. The author’s father joined the German military in 1929, served in the Wehrmacht, and was a prisoner of war until 1947. Anti-Semitism hovers silently over The Emigrants.

The characters are fictional, but they occupied the real world and the consequences of Nazi rule and the Holocaust. Paul Bereyter is a prime example. Paul, probably, is based on the author’s father. He served six years in the German military, in “the motorized artillery, variously stationed in the Greater German homeland and in several countries that were occupied. He was in Poland, Belgium, France, the Balkans, Russia and the Mediterranean and doubtless saw more than any heart or eye can bear.” (Pages 55-56) The picture of a German soldier sticking his head of a car (page 55) makes the story more authentic.

Paul was one quarter Jewish, or as the Germans referred, three quarters Aryan and he served with others who were not pure Aryan.

In 1935, Paul met Helen Hollaender, an emigrant from Vienna who was visiting the small town identified as S. He was about to start a teaching position, but new German laws prevented him from taking the teaching post. The author does not specify the actual laws, or how the laws were applied to Paul, but our general understanding of history fills in the blanks. Paul was part Jewish and Jews were not allowed to teach in Nazi Germany and not providing the additional details did not lessen the impact of the narration. The lack of specific information strengthens the narrative because we know the history. There is no need for repetitiveness. We don’t have to be told he wants to a teacher, but cannot teach because he’s one quarter Jew.

Furthermore, Paul moved to Besancon to work as a house tutor. While he was away, in 1936, his father, Theodor Bereyter “died on Palm Sunday” because of heart failure, but the underlining reason for the heart attack was that Jewish families were the target of violent anti-Semitic attacks. His mother, Thekla, “fell into depression and died within a few weeks.” (Pages 53-54)

It’s interesting to note Paul had antipathy towards the Catholic Church (Page 36). This could be due to his father dying on Palm Sunday and he is unconsciously connecting his father’s death to Catholism. Also, the Catholic Church is authoritarian in structure, with the pope as the leader of this structure.

Paul’s nightmare worsens when he finds out Helen and her mother were deported “in one of those special trains that left Vienna, at dawn, probably to Theresienstadt in the first instance.” (Pages 49-50)

We don’t have to be told what the “special train” was. We already know Jews were transported to concentration camps via trains. Theresienstadt may not have any meaningful connotation in America, but mention it in Germany and a German and a Jew will understand immediately.

Paul went back to the teaching profession after the war, but his methods were unconventional. He does not follow the curriculum to the letter. This can be interpreted as Paul’s lack of trust in the German government, in the 1950’s. He participated in war crimes as a German citizen on behalf of the German government. Paul rebelled and decided he was not going to let the German Government dictate how he was going to teach. Paul believes he knows what’s in the best interest of his students, not the government.

Paul committed suicide by lying down on a railroad track (Page 27). The choice he made on how he killed himself is very revealing. As a child, he was fascinated by trains (Page 62), but trains played a major role in the Holocaust. The Nazis destroyed that sense of innocence. Perhaps he sought symmetry in death.

Paul shares two characteristics with Dr Henry Selwyn. Both committed suicide. Dr Selwyn choice was a self-inflicted gunshot to the head. Second, Paul and Dr Selwyn cultivated neglected gardens (Paul, page 57 and Selwyn, page 7). This can be interpreted as the characters serving some sort of penance, on earth, for their sins in Germany.

Dr Selwyn’s problem is that he changed his name from Hersch to Henry and Seweryn to Selwyn (Page 20). He changed his name because he wanted to hide his identity, even from his wife, who stopped speaking to him once she found out his true identity, although he is in denial. “I still don’t know for sure what made us drift apart, the money or revealing the secret of my secret origins, or simply a decline in love.” (Page 21)

The author does not need to elaborate on Dr Selwyn’s concealment of his ethic background. Europe had an anti-Semitic streak predating WWII and Jews were forced to change their names in order to integrate into society. Furthermore, marrying a Jew was considered scandalous and shameful.

Dr Selwyn mentions he cannot sell anything, except his soul, and his “only companions” are plants and animals because he doesn’t have to explain himself to them (Page 21). Dr Selwyn is implying he sold his soul, by changing his name and forgetting who he was, in order to integrate.

There is an interesting connection between Dr Selwyn, Ambros Adelwarth, and Max Ferber and that is the appearance of a butterfly net, or reference to butterflies. The narrator saw Dr Selwyn wearing “knee-length shorts, with a shoulder bag and butterfly net.” (Page 15)

Aunt Fini mentioned she saw “a middle-aged man appeared, holding a white net on a pole (page 104). Ambrose missed his last shock therapy session, before dying, and the reason he gave was, “It must have slipped my mind whist I was waiting for the butterfly man.” (Page 115)

In the Ferber chapter, there is a reference “to a boy of about ten who had been chasing butterflies.” (Page 213)

Butterfly nets have been used, in comedies, as a prop to catch people who are mentally ill. There was a thought that made me connect three of the four stories and that is the descent to madness. Dr Selwyn, Ambrose and Ferber have painful memories; due their experiences living in Europe from WWI to WWII and those memories are so painful that these characters not only physically emigrated, but mentally as well. In the case of Ambrose, he missed Cosmo Solomon so much; he chose to have his mind wiped clean through electro shock therapy.

Ferber was a hermit, like Dr Selwyn, but the former was due to claustrophobia, while the latter was due to shame.

Germany is like these four characters. Selwyn and Ferber became hermits and in a sense are afraid to confront reality. Ambrose wiped out his memories because he could not bear to live with them. Paul found closure with his memories when he lied down on the railroad track. Germans, who lived through WWII, want to suppress the memories of the Holocaust because they are too painful. Germans born after WWII find the atrocities inconceivable. But suppression of painful memories can lead to madness, as in the case of Selwyn, Ambrose and Ferber. Not only did they emigrate to other countries. They emigrated from their sanity.

Books: Contempt by Alberto Moravia

“Contempt,” by Alberto Moravia, is an appropriate title because the main character, Ricardo Molteni, is a contemptible human being. He is brutish, arrogant, narcissistic, yet insecure.

Molteni is an aspiring dramatist who is forced, from his perspective, to write movie screenplays in order maintain a lifestyle that would satisfy his wife Emilia who, in his estimation, “was… what is called a born housewife.” She is from a poor family and used to work as a typist. Molteni believes he rescued her from a potential life of deprivation.

Contempt is a first person narrative in which the protagonist is obsessed with the belief that his wife does not love him. Molteni notices slight changes in Emilia’s behavior, for example she wants to sleep in another room because Molteni likes sleeping with the blinds open and he snores, but Molteni does not believe her. To him, these are signs she is falling out of love with him.

Molteni’s petulance over not being loved is manifested in violent behavior. He pulls her hair, chokes Emilia and twists her fingers when they’re in a restaurant. After the hair-pulling scene, he badgers Emilia into having sex. She reluctantly agrees, but just lies in bed. Molteni then compares her passivity to “an inexpert prostitute.”

Emilia is not the only person Molteni regards as inferior. Battista is an Italian movie producer who physically resembles an ape; “with very broad shoulders, a long body, and short legs… his hair… came down rather low in the middle; thick eyebrows… small eyes; a short, broad nose and a large but lipless mouth… and slightly protruding… His hands were short and thick and covered with black hair.”

To Molteni, Battista’s taste in movies is vulgar. The producer is only interested in churning out blockbuster, action movies.

Battista is not the only character that is compared with a lower life form. Luisa Pasetti looked at her husband “like an affectionate dog with its master.”

His co-screenwriter, Pasetti, does not escape Molteni’s disrespect, who the latter thought was mediocre and was unbelievably psychologically obtuse, “a man without imagination and without nerves, but conscious of his limitations and fundamentally modest.”

Molteni’s scorn for the film industry is further illustrated by his perception that the screenwriter is powerless compared to the director and producer of a film. Also, the screenwriter is “forced to work with people he does not care for, people who are his inferiors in culture and breeding, who irritate him by features of character or behavior that are offensive to him.” Molteni is talking in general, but he is really projecting his own feelings about the film industry.

That is why he can’t stand working with Rheingold, the prospective director of Homer’s Odyssey. Molteni makes the mistake of underestimating the director because he judged him on his appearance. Rheingold had “a broad smile, like a half moon, showing two rows of very regular and altogether too white teeth which I at once imagined, I don’t know why, to be false.” Half moon could be interpreted as half-wit and false teeth could be interpreted as Rheingold being a pseudo-intellectual.

But Rheingold is his intellectual equal. He is not content with directing a common action movie. With Molteni’s help, Rheingold wants to make an intellectually stimulating movie, right under the nose of Battista, the producer. Rheingold challenges Molteni, “you’re intelligent and you must use your brain. Try to use it.”

Molteni is mad at Battista because his interpretation of Homer’s Odyssey is vulgar, and he is mad at Rheingold because his interpretation is a form of vandalism, adding an unnecessary 20th century psychological perspective to a timeless classic.

Contempt was written in 1954. In fact the original title was “A Ghost at Noon.” It’s interesting how a novel from 1954, about the constant struggle between film as art and commercialism, reflects current movie trends. Producers want to make money with action movies. Directors want to tell important stories. Sometimes, it feels like there is no middle ground, an artistic movie that makes a lot of money. Although, Molteni would feel more alienated today, writing movie adaptations of old television shows and sequels of mediocre movies.

Underneath the narrative is Molteni’s incredible insecurity. He is the civilized man working with primitives who do not appreciate him, but is terrified of the idea of not being loved. Self-adoration is not enough to sustain him. He needs somebody else to worship him because that would make selling out, writing screenplays for inferior people, more tolerable.

The constant need for verbal adulation from Emilia is irritating. She is right when she said, “you’re not a man, you don’t behave like a man.” Molteni acts like a spoiled child. Towards the end, Emilia is acting more like Molteni’s mommy than his wife.

Molteni is listening to his wife making dinner preparations. After she’s finished, he timidly pokes his head through the door. He wants to talk to her. “Go wait in the living room… I’m not finished with Agnesina yet… I’ll be there in a minute.” This is a role reversal with the physically abused wife taking firm control of the relationship from her abuser merely by admitting that she does not love him anymore and more importantly does not respect him.

Molteni pushed Emilia, with his constant doubts, into despising him, but it was Molteni’s contempt for everyone that left him isolated and alone.

Books: A Sport and a Pastime by James Salter

“A Sport and a Pastime is a first person narrative. The writing style is staccato, but there is a surreal quality to the writing that was distinct from “The Road.” Cormac McCarthy’s writing added a layer of sparseness to his narrative, but James Salter’s writing gave the impression that the situations he was describing were part of a dream. For example, “Perhaps it will snow. I glanced at the sky. Heavy as wet rags. France is herself only in the winter, her naked self, without manners.”[i]

I enjoy and prefer the staccato style of writing. It sounds like music to me because there is a rhythm to this style. The short sentences follow a beat, then there is a break and the writing pattern changes and the author riffs with a seamless longer sentence and then returns to the familiar beat. For example, “Over the crown of the western hills we sail beneath a brilliant sky of clouds shot through with sunlight and begin the descent to town, the road cutting back and forth in deep, blind turns.”[ii] This sentence is quite different from the methodical, staccato style James Salter mostly uses in the novel

“A Sport and a Pastime reminds me of Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises.” Americans are traveling through Europe, sharing experiences, endless parties, savoring European cuisine and lots of alcohol consumption, except that the former is a lot more sexually explicit than the latter.

The narrator appears to be obsessed with sex. It was evident, to me, that there were sexual overtones to even the most mundane descriptions, such as, “At last, with a little grunt, we begin to move. There’s a groaning of metal, the sharp slam of doors. A pleasant jolting over switches.”[iii]

The narrator gives a clue about the content of the story. “None of this is true. I’ve said Autun, but it could easily have been Auxerre. I’m sure you’ll come to realize that. I am only putting down details which entered me… It’s a story of things that never existed although even the faintest doubt of that, the smallest possibility, plunges everything into darkness. I only want whoever reads this to be as resigned as I am.”[iv]

Phillip Dean is a real person. The narrator met him at a dinner party. Dean is with Isabel, a forty-year-old woman. I got the impression Dean was a gigolo, or at least the “boy toy” of a very rich woman. She doesn’t know Dean. He is less than as an acquaintance. Dean was her escort to the party, but she barely remembers his name. He is an object to be desired. She brought him to the dinner party more as a trophy, “You’re the best looking thing in this room.” [v]

During dinner, at a restaurant, Dean tells the narrator that he dropped out of Yale. It wasn’t because he found college to be overwhelming. On the contrary, he is very intelligent, but Yale did not challenge his intellect. “He took an anthropology final when he hadn’t taken the course… His paper was so brilliant the professor fell in love with him.”[vi]

The Yale professor wasn’t the only person to fall for Dean. The narrator develops a man-crush over Dean. “If I had been an underclassman he would have become my hero, the rebel who, if I only had the courage, I might have also become. Instead I did everything properly.”[vii]

Soon, the narrator begins his obsession with Dean. “I am a little jealous of what he might do… I imagine him on a journey to the south of France in the spring. I’m not certain who’s with him. I know he isn’t alone… Perhaps she is the young whore he met in Paris he found so easy to get along with…”[viii]

Anne-Marie Costallat enters the narrator’s fantasy world. She is eighteen and beautiful. She is also the whore he fantasized Dean with. Cristina is gossiping. During the conversation she asks “the town whore?” Billy asks whom the “whore” is marrying, and Cristina says, “Oh, some student. I don’t know. I’ve never seen him.”[ix]

It appears the narrator obsesses over Dean and Anne-Marie. The sex acts he describes are detailed and passionate, “She is so wet by the time he has the pillows under her gleaming stomach that he goes right into her in one long, delicious move. They begin slowly. When he is close to coming he pulls his prick out and lets it cool. Then he starts again, guiding it with one hand, feeding it in like a line. She begins to roll her hips, to cry out. It’s like ministering to a lunatic.”[x]

The last sentence is a clue indicating the narrator is fantasizing about Dean and Anne-Marie. Men do not embellish their descriptions of sex that way, at least I don’t. This is a mind that has run amok. He is looking for language that fits his imagination.

“Feeding it in like a line” is the type of thing a guy would say to his male friends. A guy would not say, “She is pinioned on the bed, her arms trapped beneath her, her legs forced wide. Her eyes are close. The radio is playing Sucu Sucu. The world has stopped. Oceans still as photographs. Galaxies floating down. Her cunt tastes sweet as fruit.”[xi]

The novel hints the narrator is a voyeur. “Some things, as I say, I saw, some discovered, and some dreamed, and I can no longer differentiate between them.”[xii] Voyeurism would indicate the narrator’s obsession with Dean and Anne-Marie “plunged him into darkness.” It’s not enough to imagine the couple having sex. He has to witness it to see if the reality is equal to the fantasy.

There are other clues indicating the narrator is obsessed with the couple. “We walk along together for a way and then, at a corner, part. I can follow them without thinking.”[xiii]

I believe the narrator is in denial about his feelings for Dean. He describes a scene involving Dean and writes, “Of course it never happens. I have invented it all…”[xiv]

Also, “I am not telling the truth about Dean, I am inventing him. I am creating him out of my own inadequacies, you must always remember that.”[xv]

I detected the narrator is embarrassed over his obsession with Dean and Anne-Marie. During a conversation with Cristina, she wonders why he spent the winter in France. “You’re embarrassing me… It’s not that interesting to talk about.” Cristina continues her line of questioning and believes the narrator is in love. He denies it. “I’m ashamed of it, but I don’t.”[xvi]

“A Sport and a Pastime” is the tale of a man’s obsession with another man’s life and sexual potency. The narrator is unhappy with his life and fantasizes about another couple to make up for his own inadequacies. The fantasy also involves seducing the “town whore” and removing her from her trade and taking her to different hotels in France where the sex is not bartered for money.

He envies Dean’s sexual potency, his ability to summon and maintain an erection, “He has a hard-on he is sure will never disappear.”[xvii]

Anne-Marie is not the central focus of the obsession. The narrator wants to be Dean, young, handsome, adventurous, rebellious and sexually potent. The narrator is in denial over his obsession with another man because the obsession “plunges everything into darkness.”


[i] Chapter 8, page 44.
[ii] Chapter 6, page 35.
[iii] Chapter 1, page 4.
[iv] Chapter 2, page 11.
[v] Chapter 3, page 19.
[vi] Chapter 5, page 34.
[vii] Chapter 5, page 33.
[viii] Chapter 7, page 40.
[ix] Chapter 26, page 134.
[x] Chapter 19, page 103.
[xi] Chapter 11, page 64.
[xii] Chapter 9, page 51-52.
[xiii] Chapter 23, page 120.
[xiv] Chapter 21, page 111.
[xv] Chapter 13, page 79.
[xvi] Chapter 26, page 133.
[xvii] Chapter 9, page 55.