The Yearling, A Review

I was never much of a reader. My parents weren’t highly educated. Mom made it to eighth grade and Dad through high school, and then they met, had six kids and no money. Reading was low on their priority list. It doesn’t explain my lack of reading completely though, because one of my sisters reads like a madwoman. I guess I never had much interest, plus, I’m a slow and deliberate reader and can’t seem to sit for long periods at a time What I did read as an adolescent was teen romance magazines. Oh, the drama, the longing, the love … it was all I needed - on a single page. But, whole books? Unlikely. And the classics? Never.

The Yearling, by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, was my assigned precursor for what is now termed Young Adult Literature and it took me three solid days - all of Labor Day weekend minus a movie here and a breakfast there - to get through it. Difficult? yes, but worth it. The Yearling was a long, luxurious meander through a year in the backwoods of Florida in the early 1900’s. Thematically a coming-of-age book, Ms. Rawlings skillfully intertwined setting and character development to give us a glimpse into the rough and laborious entanglement between the natural world and the Baxter family. Respectful encounters as well as intense struggles with the earth and its animals allowed the reader an intimate view of the rambunctious, animal-loving protagonist, Jody, and his kind-hearted (what we would now call) naturalist father, Penny.

There wasn’t an overarching plot per se, and so, for me at least, there was not a strong drive to read on for most of the book. It was more like a series of plots, popcorn plots, little arcs of drama as Jody and Penny would go on a hunt for large or small game, or deal with severe weather or an animal intruder, or even just go off together to haul water for the family. Conflicts came up within his family, with other families- like the family of brutes nearby who lacked the spirit and knowledge of Penny, or within Jody himself as he wrestled with his own conscience, a common theme in young adult literature. But, these issues were usually resolved within a page or two.

However, these experiences built on one another to form a foundation for a final, more intense, set of conflicts/plot found in the last few chapters. It was here that the drive to read on picked up. One minor plot was a feud between two of Jody’s older friends over, naturally, a girl. Jody had to repeatedly decide with whom to place his allegiance until one started the other's house afire. This brought both the best and the worst in human nature into clear focus for Jody. The major plot (which was a little long in coming, in my opinion) peaked when his adopted and beloved fawn, Flag, had to be killed to prevent him from eating any more of the food on the family farm than he already had. This was a great challenge for Jody and it was magnified, another common theme in young adult literature, by the fact that he blamed it on his parents, who, in Jody’s mind, couldn’t possibly know what was right, let alone understand his perspective. So, of course, he had to run away, during which time he faced discomfort and danger.After he cried and starved out his grief over the loss of Flag, who he actually had to shoot after his mother’s poor aim only wounded the animal, he realized how much he missed his home and loved his parents. He returned with a clearer understanding of the meaning of, and a willingness to take on, a more grown-up role in the family. If this wasn’t a precursor, I’d suggest it was all just a little too, well, cliché.

The language and use of dialogue was my favorite part of the book. Ms. Rawlings used specific and accurate dialect and historically interesting words, both of which helped to develop both the setting and the characters. For example, Jody had spent all day building a pen to house Flag, his new fawn, so Flag wouldn’t continue to eat the growing potatoes. Flag jumped out of it as soon as he was placed there and Jody started to cry. Penny said, “Don’t git in a swivet* boy. We’ll work this out, one way or t’other. Now the ‘taters is near about the only thing he’ll bother, do you keep him outen the house. They’d ought to be under kiver anyway. Now you just take down that tipply-tumbly pen, and build a coop to kiver the ‘taters.” (*A swivet is a flustered or agitated state.)

Ms. Rawlings made delightful and abundant use of metaphor, most of which referred to how nature can represent the common relationships and situations in life. About half way through the book, Jody finds his fawn, Flag, and he’s surprised that Flag had stayed put after his mother had been killed. Jody said to Penny, “Pa, he wa’n’t skeert o’ me. He were layin’ up right where his mammy had made his bed.” Penny responded by saying, “The does learns ‘em that, time they’re borned. You kin step on a fawn, times, they lay so still.” I think this can be interpreted as part of the human condition, one Jody discovers by the end of the book, that none of us, ultimately, stray very far (at least, emotionally) from where (how) we were raised.

The Yearling was first published in 1938 toward the end of a lengthy economic depression in this country. It’s not surprising then, that the author held in high regard a poor family who made way in the world solely on the land. And the role of women could be appreciated in the historical perspective as well -- primarily good or bad -- wife and mother or “one of them leetle chipperdales”. While not originally from the rural woods of Florida it is clear that once Ms. Rawlings moved there she studied in detail the local people and culture in order to bring it so alive in her writing. She won the Pulitzer Prize for the Yearling in 1939.

As for me, I’m grateful to have one of the classics under my belt. The slow pace, use of metaphor, and detailed description of place will all be useful for my own writing. And I will not soon forget the back woods life in Florida or the wonderful characters, especially Jody with his new grasp of animal and human nature and (maybe even more so) his patient and loving father, Penny. I enjoyed this so much, not in the reading of it necessarily, but in the having read it, that I find myself looking forward to reading other “classic” books of young adult literature. Huck Fin, here I come.

"Persepolis- the Story of a Childhood" by Marjane Satrapi

Persepolis was a gripping memoir of Marjane Satrapi, an Iranian girl who grew up during a time when her country was undergoing both severe internal unrest due to the Islamic Revolution and frightening external attacks from Iraq. As a parallel process to this, Marjane was experiencing her own internal, adolescent unrest in addition to attacks from her teachers (or other extremists) and periodic bombs of bad news about her friends or relatives.

The book was written from the point of view of Marjane as a precocious ten-(to fourteen)-year-old. Her voice, one of the most appealing things about this book, was trustworthy, easy to relate to. It helped me get to know more about Iranian history, culture and politics from an understandable, if not unbiased, perspective.

The use of comic book form was innovative. At first, it seemed to me to be an inappropriate structure to describe a life awash in suffering and loss. As I read on I saw that it mimicked the fact that Marjane and her family witnessed horrors I can only begin to imagine, then went on to shop and gossip and have parties. As one must, I suppose. By the end I felt that the form was perfect for the content.

The opening chapter, “The Veil,” was easily accessible and told us right away where the book was heading. It introduced us to Marjane, the child, with her innocent way of both accepting and rejecting the foolishness of the adults around her. The ending was abrupt but powerful. It left us yearning for more, and so, in retrospect, was a great marketing strategy for her sequel.

Of all the memoirs I have read so far, this one has moved me the most. In general I turn my head away from all but my few chosen battles/conflicts, feeling on some level that I am too sensitive, that I let things bother me too much, better to ignore it. But this memoir broke through that, I was able to enter the life of Marjane and her family, at a time in history when I had only been peripherally attending to newspaper or newscaster accounts of the world. Certainly, I remember words like: “scud missiles,” “hostages,” and “the Shaw,” but, in truth I had absolutely no context from which to comprehend their true meaning. I am grateful to Marjane’s writing for my new understanding.

Reponse to “Another Bullshit Night in Suck City” by Nick Flynn

While writing about his deeply personal experience, Nick Flynn focused a sharp light on one of our society’s failings in “Another Bullshit Night in Suck City”. He peppered his book with short vignettes of the lives of the downtrodden, which helped to illuminate, at least for this reader, the impact of our cultural neglect and/or misunderstanding of both the causes and consequences homelessness. He showed us in great detail the potential harm that can come from addiction, mental illness, poverty, or generational/parental incompetence, especially when they overlap as they often do.

Through honest reflection Nick Flynn allowed us to accompany him on his transformative journey. Throughout the book he maintained respect for human dignity, even when the characters’ own self-dignity appeared to have vaporized. The book included humor, which was difficult given the intensity and sadness of much of the material, and irony. In addition, there were some very tender scenes, which really gave the book its heart.

The book has a nice balance of lyric and narrative style. There was an eloquence of language throughout the prose, but there was one chapter in particular that stood out: “Same Again” p 221 was quite powerful. This is one I would use (with permission, of course) in my teaching about addiction for my family medicine trainees. But I was also drawn to find out what happened next to Nick and his father, as well as to see where their new and tenderhearted relationship would take them. For me, it was this narrative arc and the narrow narrative distance - the intimacy with which he dealt with his subject matter - that was most compelling. In many cases it felt as if he were writing, and we were observing, life’s very moments as he lived them. An example was the moment he videotaped his finger as he pushed the bell that would ring up in his father’s Section 8 apartment.

Each chapter stood, if not alone, on its own merit. There was much ‘experimentation’ with chapter styles, which I enjoyed, especially the italicized comments that popped into the prose, most of which were quotes from his father. I was less interested with the chapters done in play format; these left me a bit confused and didn’t add much to my understanding of plot or the characters.

The overarching metaphor of the lifeboat was woven into the stories in various ways beginning with his grandfather’s legacy of having invented one. In addition, Nick lived in isolation on a boat for many of his difficult years. There were many variations on saving one another in the book, for example: Jonathan thought his book would save him, Nick and his buddies worked to save the hopeless and sometime helpless men in and out of the shelter, and finally, and perhaps the theme of the book - would/could Nick be a lifeboat for his father?

The most interesting part of the book for me was that Nick and his father seemed to be living parallel lives. Each struggled with the push and pull, away from / then towards one another, (mostly push). Each struggled with relationships, addiction, and the love and loss of Jody. Both spiraled down. In fact, part of the appeal of the book was to find out how low they might go, and whether or not they could, or would, be able to climb back out.

I loved the final chapter; it captured this character, his father, very well. This was something Nick had to piece together and build for himself year after year (and for us chapter by chapter) - his father was at once grandiose, narcissistic, funny, addicted, demented, irritating, unpredictable, and … incredible. And, thanks to the clarity and honesty of his writing, credible.

Ultimately, it seems, Nick accepted who his parents were, and weren’t. What his life was, and wasn’t. This, along with some formal- and self-education and recovery from addiction, allowed him to transform his life into one he could, and would, enjoy living.

Response to Miss New York Has Everything by Lori Jakiela

With wit and keen observational skills, Lori Jakiela’s “Miss New York Has Everything” shows us the life of a girl growing up in small-town Pennsylvania, always wishing, as her father did, that things could be different. The chapters are loaded with personal reflection. The voice is strong and steady, and seems genuine even given the exaggeration that is suspected in some scenes. The primary energy seems to be lyrical, though, by the end, an arc of a story - her life interwoven with her father’s - emerges.

Lori Jakiela uses humor in much the same way as Sheryl St Germain uses raw truths and metaphor, each page is dripping with it. Other things come to light underneath it. And one turns the page because of it.

As I read this book I appreciated some stylistic choices Lori made. She frequently used one sentence paragraphs such as: “My father in death was suddenly popular”, “I blame Marlo Thomas” or “And then there was fitting day.” And she sprinkled in quick one-liners as well: “What did I know?” “What could I say?” or, my favorite, “Well then.” In addition she used dialog in interested ways, sometimes three simple lines carried so much information or tone or scene. Other times one line of dialog was followed by back-story, or even new story, for a whole paragraph before the response. In fact, on page 242, she carried on for over 2 pages (until p244) before giving us the follow-up part of the dialog.

The opening, while not exactly a road sign, set us up to understand what followed. I loved the closing - finding her way home from the air by looking through the airplane window at the line of traffic below, taillights specifically, on Grand Central. That was perfect.

The characterization of her father was very well done. The cursing and gestures helped as well as the consistency throughout the book. She felt no need to make him perfect just because he died, or just because it turned out she loved him … a lot. And I don’t much like repetition in a book but I smiled each time I read “those bastards” or “cockroaches, all of ‘em.” In the end I felt her compassion for this sometimes-unlovable man.

While I enjoyed the writing for the most part, I did wish for more plot or pull forward. I confess if it weren’t homework I may have put it down for good by about the chapter “My Life in Translation”. Early in the chapter she finally gave words to what I thought was obvious, (and perhaps the theme of the book): she and her father were looking for happiness somewhere in the future (“off the next exit ramp”). But by the middle of that chapter I was tiring of delving into riff after riff. I was yearning for more depth or action, I think.

Ultimately though, I was glad I kept at it, because the honesty and tenderness used to describe her father’s last year made it worth it. I would welcome more detail on her transition from lonesome-future-planner to wife and mother. Did she continue to skip like a stone? Or did she settle within herself enough to simply be in the moments life offers? I think she insinuated the latter, but I wondered: why not show us some of that?

This book didn’t really “crack my frozen sea” as Kafka might say, but I know a man very similar to her father, and I know I will pass this book along to his daughter, who is, ironically, also an ex-flight attendant. I will do this not only because of the hilarious flight attendant stories, but also because of the insight Lori Jakiela showed us as she internalized the meaning of her father’s life, (and her own, perhaps) including his inability to realize his dreams, even as he was living them.