Life of Wry

Spent a good part of today cramming. I, as I usually do, left myself just a few hours to read an entire book in order to be conversant during a book group discussion of said book.

Honestly. This is precisely why I have declined every invitation to join a book group. And then I acquiesced and joined this one, since it has a focus on social justice books and we make a point of choosing books written by authors across a diversity of perspectives and life experiences. It’s been going for maybe a year and a half (two years, perhaps?) and I can probably say I’ve managed to complete about half of the books. Not a great record.

Today’s was no exception… I got about a third of the way through it before 3:00pm rolled around. But wow… what a wonderful read. Hurston is an exceptionally gifted writer, very poetic. So far, most of it’s dialogue that is written in a super colloquial manner, and takes a bit of decoding, but I’m just loving it. (An example: “‘Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have, baby, it’s protection. Ah ain’t gittin’ old, honey. Ah’m done ole. One mornin’ soon, now, de angel wid de sword is gointuh stop by here. De day and de hour is hid from me, but it won’t be long. Ah ast de Lawd when you was uh infant in mah arms to let me stay here till you got grown.”)

Here is a passage from a bit of non-dialogue that knocked my socks off. Main character, Janie, maybe 16, feels trapped in a loveless marriage and finds herself drawn to this pear tree, under which she lies for hours.

She was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was a marriage! She had been summoned to behold a revelation. Then Janie felt a pain remorseless sweet that left her limp and languid. 

I hope I will find the time — soon — to finish this book. About fifty books wait in the wings.

You think I’m kidding?

This does not include the piles on the coffee table and a few end tables.

Acquiring books is a wee sickness of mine. It’d be okay if I read them…