Twitter is Lame (With a Capital Tweet)

It's funny how a day unfolds. Yesterday morning I woke up with a plan. The plan unfolded reasonably well. Everything happened the way it was supposed to.

Then I had some down time.

Down time is not a bad thing, except when it leads to wasted time. So, at first I wasn't wasting time, since I was merely exploring the various avenues available on www.brucespringsteen.net, which happens to be one of the reasons the Internet is still around. Then I discovered the Boss had his own Twitter account. "Hmmm," I thought. "Maybe Twitter isn't as lame as I thought."

Since pretty much anything the Boss writes is profound and potentially life altering, I decided to check out the Boss's tweets (which, I know, sounds dirty). To my disappointment, http://twitter.com/springsteen offers little of true value, being nothing more than news updates and advertisements.

So much for working class wisdom in 140 characters or less.

Still, I became intrigued with Twitter. Although I am habitually long-winded, I liked the challenge in condensing my aimless musings down to something that could fit on the inside of a gum wrapper. After all, it worked great for the guy who came up with Bazooka Joe.

So, I set up a Twitter account.

Part of me was really excited about tweeting. I figured since no one reads my long blog posts anyway, shorter posts might attract more readers. A Low-Tech tweet might be my ticket to a loyal fan following.

I was wrong. As soon as I posted my first tweet, I expected to have at least twenty-five followers in fifteen minutes. No such luck. It has been at least an hour and a half since that first tweet, and I am yet to have one follower. Either my friends hate me, or they don't know I'm tweeting.

Gaining followers is not the only challenge Twitterers face, I've discovered. Despite what the makers of Laffy Taffy and fortune cookies might think, coming up with something funny or profound in 140 words is not as easy as it sounds. My first tweet was about reading Ovid on Sunday morning. My second tweet will be about how lame my first tweet was. My third tweet will probably be about taking a nap.

Chances are, my Twitter account won't survive a fortnight--or any kind of night, for that matter. Unless, of course, I get my twenty-five followers by Wednesday. Then it might last a month.

Tweet out.

http://twitter.com/lowtechworld

Recycling the Classics, or Magwitch and Hamlet Get a Make-Over

"Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us."--Ecclesiastes 1:10

The Preacher was right: there is nothing new under the sun.

For instance, I recently finished reading two contemporary novels that take their cues from the classics: Peter Carey's Jack Maggs (a loose retelling of Charles Dicken's Great Expectations) and David Wroblewski's The Story of Edgar Sawtelle (a modern re-envisioning of Shakespeare's Hamlet). Both novels stand on their own, independent of the works that inspired them, so readers don't need to bone up on Dickens and Shakespeare to appreciate them. Still, I had read Great Expectations and Hamlet before reading these novels, and I was surprised to learn how much my exposure to these "parent texts" affected my reading--and judgement.

Jack Maggs is a smartly veiled retelling of the life of Abel Magwitch, the secret benefactor in Great Expectations. Like Magwitch, Jack Maggs is a English convict from Australia who returns to England illegally in order to visit a young gentleman whom he financially supports. Able to locate the gentleman's home, but not the gentleman himself, Maggs finds work as the neighbor's footman. By means natural and (seemingly) supernatural, his dark past quickly comes to the attention of his new employer and his staff, who subsequently treat him with mixture of fear, contempt, wonder, and sympathy. He also becomes an object of interest for Tobias Oates, an up-and-coming novelist, who wants to turn Magg's life (or the life he imagines for Maggs) into a best-selling novel.

Jack Maggs works extremely well as a novel in conversation with another novel. Wisely, Peter Carey does not try rewrite Great Expectations; rather, he uses elements Dickens's novel as a springboard for the exploration of possibilities: What if Great Expectations had been Magwitch's story instead of Pip's? or What if Pip had been a completely selfish, despicable person? This exploration of possibilities, however, is not crucial to the success of the novel. As I mentioned earlier, a reader can appreciate Jack Maggs without having read Great Expectations.

Still, the novel works best as a novel about novels. Aside from Maggs, the most important character in Jack Maggs is the novelist Tobias Oates, whose fictional life mirrors the life of young Charles Dickens. Through Oates's attempts to fictionalize Maggs's life, Carey is able to underscore the artificiality of narrative and the act of literary creation, which helps to explain the novel's anti-climax. Likewise, Maggs's violent resistance to Oates's desire to confine the unpredictability of life into the predictability of narrative convention lends further support to the idea that this novel is a critique of its own form.

If Jack Maggs is a lesson on how to borrow from the classics, then David Wroblewski's The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is a lesson on how not to borrow from them.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is about a mute boy and the crisis he undergoes when his uncle murders his dad, shacks up with his mom, and tries to take over the family's dog-breeding business. If the plot sounds familiar, then you've probably read William Shakespeare's Hamlet or seen the movie Strange Brew. Consequently, reading The Story of Edgar Sawtelle often feels like you're listening to a mediocre cover of Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone".

To be fair, Edgar Sawtelle is not a bad novel. For the most part, it is an interesting and entertaining read; its characters are well-rendered, especially those of Edgar and his mother, and the prose never bores or annoys the way the prose of, say, Louise Ehrdrich bores and annoys. Still, the novel gets too close to its source at times, making the plot predictable. I often found myself betting on what would happen next in the novel and hitting the jackpot every time.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is at its best when it isn't trying to be Hamlet. Unfortunately, it is rarely at its best.

Ultimately, the major difference between Jack Maggs and The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is devotion. Jack Maggs consciously borrows from Great Expectations, but it doesn't need Great Expectations. In a sense, Carey's use of Dickens is strategic, not devotional; by re-imagining an influential classic novel, he reevaluates the classic or traditional form exhibited in that novel (and novels like it). Wroblewski, on the other hand, is too devoted to his source story to accomplish anything similar with his re-imagining of Hamlet. The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, therefore, adds nothing new to our understanding of Hamlet, Shakespeare, or tragedy.

In my opinion, you ought to stick with Hamlet. While there are no new things under the sun, there are some things that manage to shed new light. Jack Maggs is such a thing. The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, on the other hand, is not. When it comes to shedding light, if fact, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is about as bright as a glowbug.

The Loveland Castle--A Triumph of the Independent Spirit

People who are really into medieval stuff are weird. For example, when I was in college, there was a campus medieval club that would set up a canvas tent outside of the building where I worked an early-morning custodial job. Around this tent, they placed two or three guards to keep watch over their collection of wooden swords and home-made chain-mail (you know, just in case anyone wanted to steal them). One morning, maybe to raise my twelfth century street cred, I told one of them that I had an interest in medieval literature. The thane looked at me with a ye olde twinkle in his ye olde eye, and said, "Then you are a friend."

The sincerity of his words were moving, but I still thought it was a weird thing to say.

I've kept an eye out for medievalists since then. They are generally easy to spot, mostly because they are the only ones in the neighborhood who dress like Robin Hood. They like to do medieval things, like lay siege to a dog house or storm a mailbox. Also, they are the only people you know with names like "Ulf" or "Hrothgar" or "Erowen."

It is easy to poke fun at these people. Outsiders interpret their behavior as a strange attempt to escape the modern world. I don't know if that is the case, but I wouldn't put it past either Ulf or Hrothgar. Anyone who would lay siege to a dog house is escaping something.

Still, I think there much that we--the outsiders, the modernists--could learn from these medievalists.

Take Sir Harry Andrews, for instance. Harry Andrews was a committed medievalist. He spent the last fifty years of his life building a medieval-ish castle (christened "Chateau Laroche," but best known locally as the "Loveland Castle") along the Little Miami River in Loveland, Ohio.

Why did Sir Harry do it?

Good question. During my recent visit to the Loveland Castle, the man who took my admission fee ($3.00 a person) explained that Harry built the castle because his loyal knights (who were actually members of his Boy Scout troop) needed one.

Fair enough, I thought. At least he didn't do it to impress girls.

* * *

Although I grew up only a town away from Sir Harry's Chateau Laroche, I never got around to visiting it until this week. My expectations were high; I had heard and read a lot of good things about the castle. On their official website, for example, Sir Harry's knights, the Knights of the Golden Trail (KOGT), describe it (and themselves) in these terms:

"Chateau Laroche was built as an expression and reminder of the simple strength and rugged grandeur of the mighty men who lived when Knighthood was in flower.

"It was their knightly zeal for honor, valor and manly purity that lifted mankind out of the moral midnight of the dark ages and started it towards the gray dawn of human hope.

"Present human decadence proves a need for similar action. Already the ancient organization of Knights have been re-activated to save society.

"Any man of high ideas who wishes to help save civilization is invited to become a member of the Knights of the Golden Trail, whose only vows are the Ten Commandments.

"Chateau Laroche is the World headquarters of this organization, started in 1927."

Wow! Who wouldn't, on the "simple strength and rugged grandeur" of that description, expect anything but the best from the world headquarters of a society that "wishes to save civilization" from "present human decadence"? Personally, I was so inspired by those words that I nearly forsook the modern world and changed my name to Unferth.

Good thing I'm not a drinking man.

What can be said about Sir Harry's magnum opus? The exterior of the castle is impressive, especially when you consider that Sir Harry did it all with his two knightly hands. And, to their credit, the KOGT have done a nice job keeping Sir Harry's castle grounds courtly and colorful. I mean, if I were throwing a medieval-themed wedding (or even a medieval-themed Tupperware party), I would throw it there. As castles along the Little Miami go, it's one of the more picturesque.

Still, inside the castle is a different story. While the KOGT are big on saving civilization, they are not big on dusting. Walking through the castle, I felt like I was taking a tour of the home of Pig Pen, Charlie Brown's perpetually dusty friend. Everything--Sir Harry's framed photographs, swords, and suits of armor--was covered with the stuff. I think I even saw where some medieval smart aleck had taken a finger to the dust and written the words "WASH ME" in both Celtic and Old English.

Don't get me wrong: the Loveland Castle is worth the three dollar admissions fee--even with the dust that hasn't moved a millimeter since 1985.

You see, Sir Harry's Chateau Laroche is a monument to the Independent Spirit. To the rest of us, Sir Harry and every other hard core medievalist seem like they're three motes shy of a drawbridge, but they don't seem to care. They are who they are, chain mail and all. They seize that independent spirit with a gauntlet of steel.

It takes a lot of courage to be a dork in this world. It takes even more courage to be a dork with a big dream. Sir Harry had a big dusty dream, and he made it a reality. That's more than most people can say.

Dusting Off an Old Poem

I was digging through some of my old poetry and I found this strange piece of work. I'm not sure if I would call it good. I might call it okay. I would definitely call it weird. Some might call it a little gross.

I remember writing it late one night. Sarah and I were still living in Provo. Connor was probably just a baby. We lived on the bottom floor of an apartment building next to a laundromat, so we always had people walking past our living room window. Apparently, on the night I wrote this poem I let my imagination run wild.

I can tell that I wrote it at a time when I was still taking myself seriously as a poet. It has that sound to it. I also wrote it at a time when I was trying to write longer poems, which explains its wordiness.

Anyway, enjoy.

On Hearing Someone Sing Outside My Window

If I were alone and somewhere else—
in a cabin, maybe, in the secluded forests
of central Alaska—the soft singing
I just heard outside my window would be
disconcerting, if not scary.

I have seen enough movies to know
isolation provides the perfect setting for madmen
and murderers to play mind games on hapless
campers before finally finishing them off
with a sharp ax or kitchen knife.

If that were the case—if I were alone
in the woods with only the four walls of a cabin
to separate me from a suspicious song—
my imagination, which usually trampolines
to the grizzliest conclusions, would get the better
of me. In the initial fear of those first notes,
my body would shiver; salty drops
of sweat would run down the sides of my ribs
like earthworms, drenching the armpits
of my flannel shirt. My breathing, of course, would be
as labored as a freight train wheezing through the night,
my heartbeat like an alarm clock without a snooze
button. Even my toes, which are always so calm,
would panic and scramble for sanctuary.

After this rebellion of my senses is
quelled, I would barricade the door and windows
with my furniture, turning my rough-hewn
tables and chairs on their sides, pushing them
against anything that would allow access
to my rustic domain. Only then, with the cabin secure,
would I listen again for the eerie song of the stranger,
placing my ear, perhaps, to a drinking glass
against the wall. If I’m lucky, I would hear nothing,
the maniac singer having moved on to a cabin more worthy
of his art, one full of teenagers on spring break.
If I’m not so lucky—which is usually
how these things go for me—I would hear
the stranger’s song still outside my window
rise to a hideous crescendo, followed by a murderous,
calculating silence.

But I am not in a cabin in central Alaska.
I live in an apartment beside a Laundromat
where the procrastinators of the day go to wash
their clothes at night. The stranger, no doubt,
is some musically-inclined college student
who returned home from a good day with her books
only to discover, with some chagrin, that she had
no clean clothes for tomorrow—
hardly a maniacal ax murderer poised to hack away
my door, slice through the craftsmanship
of my barricade, and spill my blood on a grand scale
with plenty of splatter for the horrified investigators.

Swine Flu Blues

A little humor for these perilous times...

Swine Flu Blues

My nose ran like a faucet,
So now I’m on the news.
My friends won’t dare to look my way.
I’ve got the Swine Flu Blues.

It started out as allergies,
Then turned into a cold,
And then I heard about this Flu
And placed my life on hold.

I bought a blue mask, just in case;
Flu meds I had to steal.
I looked around for kosher pork
To fix a pork-less meal.

I shunned my friends from Mexico,
Unlearned the Spanish tongue.
I plan to boycott Taco Bell
Before this song is sung.

So, as my heath care bills amass,
The doctors claim I’m fine.
But I know best: I’ll soon be gone.
These Swine Flue Blues are mine.

A Great Closing Sentence

"We live in a world of transgressions and selfishness, and no pictures that represent us otherwise can be true, though, happily, for human nature, gleamings of that pure spirit in whose likeness man has been fashioned are to be seen, relieving its deformities, and mitigating if not excusing its crimes."

--James Fenimore Cooper, The Deerslayer

Mormonism and a Magical America: a Review of Orson Scott Card's Red Prophet

On 7 November 1811, on a hill near the Wabash and Tippecanoe rivers, Native American forces under the Shawnee prophet Tenskwatawa attacked American forces under William Henry Harrison. In the aftermath of the attack, which later became known as the Battle of Tippecanoe, 30 to 50 of Tenskwatawa's warriors lay dead on the field, and William Henry Harrison became an American hero.

Tippecanoe, however, plays out differently in Orson Scott Card's Red Prophet, a fantasy novel set in a "magical America that might have been." In Red Prophet, the battle is an outright massacre, and Card's telling of it owes as much to the Book of Mormon as it does to any American history book. Readers who are familiar with Alma 24, for example, will readily recognize Card's inspiration for the the group of pacifist Shawnee, led by the Prophet, who allow themselves to be massacred rather than take up arms against their attackers. Other Mormonism-inspired elements surface in the novel; most obviously, the life of Alvin Maker, the story's main character, seems at times inspired by the life of Joseph Smith, while the characters Tenska-Tawa and Taleswapper seem loosely based on the Angel Moroni.

In less creative hands, these Mormon elements might come off as either heavy-handed or corny--like an Osmond Brothers' concept album or a lame Halestorm comedy. Card, however, knows where and how much to borrow from Mormonism. So, while Mormon readers will understand certain aspects of Red Prophet differently than non-Mormon readers, non-Mormon readers will not likely feel like they're missing out on something crucial. Nor will they feel like they're being fed Mormon doctrine subliminally.

One downside of Red Prophet (for me, at least) is that it's the second volume of Card's "Tales of Alvin Maker" series, which means it's not a stand-alone novel. So, the first third of the novel is basically a retelling of Seventh Son, the first volume of the series, while the last third of the novel reads like a prelude for the third volume. What is more, the novel is dialogue heavy (in the bad sense), which is true of all of Orson Scott Card's novels. Still, Red Prophet has a great story to tell. Card's characters--both likable and detestable--are interesting, as are his descriptions of the Tippecanoe massacre and Alvin's spiritual experiences. Overall, I'd recommend the novel--and its predessesor, Seventh Son--to any fan of fantasy or historical fiction.