Imaginary Museums (Polek)

https://www.clereviewofbooks.com/home/2021/5/25/rtw2bxd73f17vlbqdcv29u8g2vnbqu

Be Recorder (Smith)

I felt like I wove in and out of this book. There’d be a poem like “Self as Deep as Coma,” that really jumped off the page at me and then there’d be a handful that I found I really couldn’t enter.

Part 2, the long poem, “Be Recorder,” was definitely a mixed experience for me. This was one of my favorite parts of it –

https://poets.org/poem/be-recorder

In general, I was drawn to the individual poems, like “Entanglement.” “American Mythos” is an anthem and will be part of my work next time I teach American Literature.

Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy (Eire)

This is an elegantly written book. I liked Eire’s style immensely. I’ve been reading a lot of current issue books lately, so this one seemed to lack some urgency in comparison. Still, I was interested in Eire’s life before and after Fidel took over Cuba. It seemed like he was setting up for a sequel. This is largely the ‘before’ picture, with some indications of what the transition phase was like and a few glimpses of life once he and his brother were sent to the United States. Eire tells a good story, but without sufficient contrast, the narrative lacks some drama.

They Call Me Guero: A Border Kid’s Poems (Bowles)

I really wanted this to be poetry written by an actual border kid as an awkward adolescent, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Bowles does a reasonable job of imitating unexceptional middle school poetry, some of which is about being a border kid, but most of which is about an adolescent boy growing up with the love of his family, a few good friends and, eventually, the affections of a girl. There are a few poems that illuminate the plight of someone who lives in between (literally and metaphorically), though the insights are largely surface level – not suprising for a middle school voice, I suppose.

Since I don’t speak Spanish, I appreciated the glossary in the back and, in general, the way Bowles wove Spanish into his poetry.

Border Land, Border Water: A History of Construction on the US-Mexico Divide (Alvarez)

This was fascinating. Alvarez makes his main points clear. Construction on the divide has been a process of “compensatory building.” Each new project is meant to remedy the limits of previous ones when, in fact, it is the policies and not the infrastructure that is failing us. All of this building centers around a desire for control – control of water, of land, of the movement of people and goods. We continue here, as elsewhere, to think that nature is ours to subdue, and nature keeps teaching us lessons that we ignore while we build something new. We seek to promote the connectedness between the two countries when it serves commerece, but not humanity, and we keep thinking that just one more engineering project will do the trick.

Alvarez’s historical survey is clear and convincing as he examines the way that history (the Mexican Revolution, the Mexican-American War, the election of Nixon, etc.) has also intersected with the efforts of border builders. I love all of the images in the book and very much appreciated that they were not gathered into one collection of photographs inserted randomly into one section of the book. Instead, they are located where they are most immediately relevant. Good for the University of Texas Press for breaking a convention here.

Border & Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism (Walia)

As a round-up of how borders are used and abused in the service of many other things, notably capitalism, this serves as an excellent overview. A bit jargon-heavy at times, it still flows well enough to give you an understanding of who is seeking to control migration and mobility, how, and why. Walia has love for neither the neoliberals nor the liberal elite and instead envisions a borderless world. She makes a good case for it in principle. But in practice. . .

Parable of the Talents (Butler)

This is my third Butler novel, and I am waving the white flag. I think she has such profound ideas and vision, but she just struggles to create and sustain a narrative. This just became too expository and didactic to work as a novel. I read the prequel a while ago, so I can’t speak to its success as a sequel. I do admit that it was odd to have the 2020s discussed as if they were far in the future and a President who resembled our previous one. But the story itself is so labored that it was hard to be anything but glad when this one was over.

Concrete Rose (Thomas)

I have to admit that I’m worried about Angie Thomas. After a spectacular debut with The Hate U Give, she came out with what seemed to me a rather ordinary, On the Come Up. (Granted, I’m not the primary audience for these books.) Concrete Rose is a serviceable prequel to The Hate U Give, though I don’t think it stands on its own. I think you have to have read the later book to enjoy and ‘get’ this one. Characters, conflicts, and settings are introducted that are put to dramatic use in The Hate U Give.

I do not mean to suggest that all of Thomas’ novels have to have the currency and urgency of The Hate U Give, nor do they have to be issue oriented. There was just a driving momentum to that narrative that I found lacking in On the Come Up and inconsistent here. A subplot or two had some energy behind it, but overall, I think Thomas knew where she was headed and just wrote until she got there.

I think whatever comes next could well determine whether she retains her place as a leader in YA literature or drifts back into the pack with the rest of the all-too-often formulaic and sometimes condescending books.

Decolonizing Israel, Liberating Palestine: Zionism, Settler Colonialism, and the Case for One Democratic State (Halper)

I’ve been saying for a while now that we need new thinking and this, for me at least, represents new thinking (though Halper demonstrates that he’s far from the first).

It was hard medicine to read this. I found myself unable to argue with his diagnosis of Israel and its comparisons to apartheid South Africa. And he outlines his solution – not his alone, but he is careful not to claim to represent anyone else. His timeline is in generations which seems the bare minimum. He anticipates objections and address them. The plan here is complete and I can see his vision.

I just don’t know though.

Two things I would have liked him to take up.

1. The disproportionate impact that one act of violence can have in such a small place. He says, rightly I think, we cannot deny the Palestinians their right to resist, but what could be done to keep those who tentatively accept his political plan from abandoning it?
2. I wondered if the requirement for military service in Israel indoctrinates Israelis into always thinking of the military as part of any solution.

As a Jewish reader, this was a hard book to read at times, but I’m glad I did.

The Complete Stories (Lispector)

At over 600 pages, this was an epic undertaking. I have no problem with long books, but these were stories, often short and, at times, largely plot-less. Many are short character sketches more than anything else. Together, we get Lispector’s vision of the lives of Brazilians, particularly women, in the course of their everyday (often inner) experiences. As overwhelming as the size of the book sometimes seemed, I found these stories strangely addictive, as though the next one I read would be the one to unlock the key to understanding Lispector’s work. I admit that I know that her work was very popular, and I can’t see it. What is it, I wonder, about her work (her?) that appealed to the masses? I could see some of the stories resonating with female readers. Was that the extent of her popularity? I’m going to read another novel or two before I read her biography.