Pudd'nhead Wilson

Mark Twain (1835-1910)

A very strange and interesting book. I've read most of Twain's novels and this one is different. Pudd'nhead Wilson is Twain's most in depth examination of slavery. Huckleberry Finn is of course more recognized and popular, but to truly get a handle of Twain's feelings on slavery you have to read this book. Pudd'nhead is not just about slavery, however. Twain opens by describing the process of writing the book. He was in Florence and he invoked the muse of Dante and his beloved Beatrice. Twain also goes to great lengths to assure the reader of his authority and the veracity of the legal scenes.
Each chapter is headed by a an entry from Wilson's almanac. These are funny, ironic and clever, typical Twain. The story has many characters, but this is the plot in a nutshell: Wilson is a smart lawyer who is new in town. He is annoyed by a dog barking and jokes that if he owned half the dog he would kill his half. The dull town people don't get the turn of phrase and they dub him "Pudd'nhead". The name sticks for the next 24 years. Although he is the title character, Wilson hovers on the outskirts of the narrative until the end. The novel focuses on Roxana, an enslaved woman who is 1/16 African American. She has a child named Chambers at the precise time that her mistress has a child named Tom Driscoll.
Roxy is fearful that her child could be sold so she switches the nearly identical children at 8 months. Tom (nee Chambers) grows up to be a total jerk, blowing money and stealing to make up for his gambling habit. Chambers, (nee Tom) is a humble, good guy who takes crap from Tom all the time, and it's all the worse because he is Tom's slave. Tom's white father dies and he moves in with his uncle, a leading citizen. Roxy returns from working on a steamboat after 8 years and extorts money from the abusive Tome, threatening to tell the truth. Eventually, after lots of intrigue and plot twists, Tom goes ahead and murders his uncle to steal money. Two Italians who happen to be traveling through town get blamed because of a bloodstained knife. Wilson defends the unfortuate duo, but can't crack the case. He then goes and looks at his fingerprint collection (nice hobby) and is able to reveal the truth in a riveting courtroom scene. He proves Tom's guilt and restores Chambers to his rightful spot. Twain's conclusion once again details the writing of the book.
Twain's attitude to slavery is tough to pin down. Certainly slaves aren't mentally inferior, Roxy outmaneuvers all the other characters in the story. After Tom finds out that he is Roxy's son he often claims that it's the "nigger" in him that causes him to act poorly. That's more of Tom being an ass than Twain's feelings.
There are two things that jump out when reading Pudd'nhead. First, Twain goes into great depth to reveal the illogical shifts in social status that mere perception can cause. The real Tom is screwed over because people believe his mother was a slave. And clearly Twain is skewering the ridiculous notion of "blood" when he points out that Roxy is 1/16th black, making Chambers 1/32nd black. Good natured Tom is kept in the lowest class while dumbass Chambers is given chance after chance to behave because of social perception about status and race. Yet, at the end when the truth is revealed in court, no one has any problem switching their perception and elevating Tom and enslaving Chambers.
The second point is the strength of Roxy. She is the backbone of the story. She is a mixed bag of a character, making her much more real than some of the caricaturistic individuals in Pudd'nhead. She brilliantly switches her child to save him from being sold. She uses all her tools: beauty, guilt trips and guile, to keep herself free and afloat later in the story. She masterfully plays bad Tom to her advantage.

Rating 8/10: I'm a big Twain fan and I enjoyed this book. It is not typical Twain though. There is a darkly atmosphere in Pudd'nhead. The evils of slavery are more insipid here than in Huck although this work isn't as well executed. It seemed like Twain had a lot of good, profound ideas, but he tries desperately to pack everything together. The Italian twins are interesting, but they aren't well developed characters. Also, Pudd'nhead himself is a really interesting character, he would have been an ideal character to show us what small town life on the Missouri was like, but his potential isn't realized. Still a fascinating book.

(The image is a poster from The Acting Company's 2002 season, pretty sweet if you ask me.)

War and Peace

Leo Tolstoy 1828-1910

Probably the scariest looking author in the classics list, just imagine waking up to see this guy standing over your bed. Fortunately he's as good a writer as he is scary. This is one long book, well over 60 hours of audio. But it doesn't seem that bad once you get a hold on the characters and their situations. A good character guide that doesn't give away any key plot points would be invaluable. The story evolves within the Napoleonic Wars in Russia from 1804-1813. The main character include: Nicolai, Petya, Natasha, Sonya, the Bolkonskis, Andrei, Marie, Count Bezuhov, Pierre, Kuragin, Anatole, Helen, Napoleon, Kutezov, Dolohov, Platon Karataev, Ana Mehalovna, Boris and many, many more. The book follows the travails and joys of these people through (surprise) times of war and peace.
Society is a battlefield in this novel. Marriages, friendships and feuds are forged in parlors and at parties. There is simply too much to give an accurate plot summary, so I'll just relate a few things. Pierre Bezuhov is easily my favorite character. Sort of an innocent soul that that is thrown from his moorings when he sees any cruelty. He inherits a huge fortune but he spends the entire novel trying to find peace. Through a rotten marriage, an ill-fated attempt on Napoleon's life, a journey into Freemasonry, a POW stint, and a new marriage to the equally sensitive Natasha Rostov, he eventually ends up with a rather elegant world view: God is everywhere, a living, breathing part of it all.
Some things to remember about War and Peace:
-Tolstoy's ideas about history: it isn't determined by great men or popular groundswells, but a bit of both, and also an unseen source.
-Anatole's sleazy seduction of Natasha.
-Tolstoy's bitingly funny observations on people's social habits and actions.
-Petya's innocence. The young man wants to be a soldier and his last scene is touching.
-The idea that Russia was saved by its superior spirit rather than logic or military planning.
-The very human portrait of Napoleon.
-Prince Vasili's societal maneuvering.
-The execution scene in occupied Moscow.
-The French invasion of Moscow and the burning of the city.
-The randomness and pure chance of wars and battles. Andrei endorses this idea.
-The small, but important role of slaves.
-Fat, old, one-eyed Kutezov, who saved Russia.
-Tolstoy's ability to zero in on a very diverse (at least ideologically so) group of characters.

Rating: 10/10: An absolute epic. I'm going to have to figure out how Tolstoy was able to write something so intricate. The characters are engaging and the backdrop of a vast war for Russia's existence makes for exciting reading despite the book's massive length.

Cousin Bette

Honere de Balzac 1799-1850

France in the 1840s was a pretty crazy place. Parisians walking in two spheres, the respectable world and that of the courtesans. Balzac contrasts these worlds masterfully as reason/passion and duty/pleasure in his 1846 work Cousin Bette. The characters in the book are alternately enticed and smashed by this system.
It all begins with the title character, Cousin Bette Fisher. She is the old maid/black sheep of a peasant family. Her sister, Adeline, married the rich and powerful Baron Hulot. Cousin Bette kind of hangs around the periphery of this new high class life, not being as good looking or charming as her sister. Consequently, she is taken for granted and stepped on for her entire life. Bette snaps when her niece, the seemingly naive and innocent Hortense, steals her "lover" Wenseslas. Bette vows revenge against the family. She teams with the enchantingly beautiful Valerie Marneffe. They work together to tempt the easily temptable Baron Hulot. The Baron is kind of a good natured philanderer who can't keep his hands off of the young girls. Hulot fritters away his money and eventually puts his family into ruin. His wife, Adeline, never challenged her husband's infidelity, instead she worshiped him and accepted his extracurricular activities.
The shenanigans eventually engulf many more people. The most pathetic is the Baroness. She's still beautiful at 50, but she let's Hulot trample her. In contrast her daughter, Hortense, refuses to accept Wenseslas's dalliances with Valerie Marneffe. Neither strategy seems to effect the actions of either man, but at least Hortense has some backbone.
Eventually all the backstabbing and revenge catches up with the main characters. Madame Marneffe is poisoned by her Brazilian lover, Bette dies, the Baron is restored to his honorable position thanks to the diligence of his son, but he is soon discovered messing with a plain country maid. This final insult kills Adeline Hulot.
As evil as Bette's vengeful machinations are, they couldn't have been successful without the utter faithlessness of the men and the conniving of her niece. Hortense takes Wenseslas, the only good thing in Bette's life. Courtesans in Cousin Bette are sirens capable of ruining marriages and causing the shift of thousand and thousands of Francs. Men cannot resist these charming females, so different from regular women. It's the rare woman who has the qualities of wife and courtesan, they don't get cheated on.

Quotes: "Parents may hinder their children's marriage, but children cannot interfere with the insane acts of their parents in their second childhood."

Rating: 7/10: An interesting picture of Paris in this era. The book is, at times, confusing. There are many different characters, some thrown in for only a scene or two. There is also a lot of financial finagling that bogs things down a bit. That being said this is a very realistic look at upper class life in a revenge story.