When I first heard
about Roger Grenier and his latest work, The
Palace of Books, I was certainly intrigued.
When I first looked at this book-length essay, I lost some of my
enthusiasm, but I began to read with my rule of fifty in the forefront of my
mind. As I neared that “line in the
text,” I began to understand Grenier’s ideas, so I accelerated onto the
end. Grenier has written a thoroughly
enjoyable analysis of literature for readers and writers. He organizes this essay – not by genre, time
period, author, or country – but by ideas.
He weaves a wonderful tapestry connecting various works dating back to
the ancient Greeks and Chinese all the way into the 20th century. He seems to effortlessly draw examples from
the library of his mind.
This slim volume will
appeal to anyone interested in reading and/or writing. He deftly connects quite a few dozen works of
literature, because they demonstrate the continuity of devices writers use to
accomplish or abandon their intentions in a particular work. Each chapter poses an idea then takes the
reader on a whirl-wind tour of authors who have tackled that problem, or, in
some cases, those unable to avoid the inevitable because of death, or worse
writer’s block.
My favorite chapter is
“Private Life.” Grenier introduces each
chapter of the essay with a question.
For example, “Is knowing the private life of an author important for
understanding his or work” (56). I have
always believed the answer to be yes, because the author’s life provides a
context for the work. It may or may not
help in the understanding, but at least it becomes a piece of the puzzle. Grenier seems more concerned with how much
weight a reader places on this information.
He writes, “As long as you have not asked yourself a certain number of
questions about an author and answered them satisfactorily, if only for your
private benefit and sotto voce, you cannot be sure of possessing him [or her]
entirely. And this is true, though these
questions may seem to be altogether foreign to the nature of his [or her]
writings” (56). So we agree, at least in
part.
Roger quotes
Chekhov’s Notebook, “How pleasant it
is to respect people! When I see books,
I am not concerned with how the authors loved or played cards; I only see their
marvelous works” (58). He then quotes
J.B. Pontalis, who “suggests with a touch of malice that Proust and Freud […]
don’t want their own private lives examined: if Proust’s perversion of
torturing rats was discovered” (59).
Sometimes this obsession with privacy can have tragic effects. I recall the destruction of an unfinished
novel and the diary of Emily Brontë by her sister Charlotte. What treasures have we lost? Should we Google J.B. Pontalis to find out
who he is? I did. He also quotes a mysterious person I could
not identify, known only as “Aragon,” who wrote, “My instinct, whenever I read,
is to look constantly for the author, and to find him, to imagine him writing, to listen to what he says, not what he tells; so in the end,
the usual distinctions among the literary genres – poetry, novel, philosophy,
maxims – all strike me as insignificant” (60).
I am with “young Aragon of 1922.”
Grenier adds, “One retreats into oneself in order to communicate better
with others” (61). If the book has a
flaw, it might be the lack of any reference to some of the more obscure writers
he mentions.
Finally, Grenier
writes, “If I were asked what a literary creation amounts, to, I would say that
it’s about choosing among past or present realities. Faced with a character or a story, you say to
yourself, ‘that one is for me, that one isn’t for me.’ By that I mean it does or doesn’t correspond
to my sensibility, my way of understanding life, and finally to an esthetic, to
a certain music that emanates from that esthetic. Memory obviously goes along with choosing and
doubtless has already made its own choice” (67). Amen.
For an interesting
tour of literature and a literary mind, I highly recommend The Palace of Books by Roger Grenier. 5 stars
--Chiron, 12/16/14
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