Editor’s Note: The Sun’s Reader at Large, a.k.a. David Goodman, dedicates his leisure to reading voraciously and eclectically about politics, government, society, culture and literature. Every two weeks or so, the Sun will post for your pleasure and edification the Reader’s digest (pun intended) of some of the best and most thought-provoking articles, books and podcasts that Goodman has recently enjoyed. Please note that the italicized text is quoted and that some of the linked articles may be in publications that impose a pay wall. Neither the Sierra County Sun nor the Reader at Large endorses all the views expressed in the featured books and articles.
LITERATURE
First, a postscript to my mention in my Sept. 16 column about my high expectations for Colson Whitehead’s new novel “Harlem Shuffle,” which I had then just begun to listen to. My high expectations were fulfilled. The novel, which takes place in Harlem in the early 1960s, tells a captivating story of a man’s life and struggles to survive economically and morally, and it captures a rich and complex time and place. It abounds with memorable characters, and in the Audible version, the reader Dion Graham impressively creates a distinctive voice for each of them.
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As I have mentioned before in this column, I am a fan of the podcast Backlisted, almost every episode of which prompts me to read a book I had not known of, often by an author I had not known of. A recent episode focused on the novel “Elizabeth Costello” by the South African Nobel Laureate J.M. Coetzee. Though I had read and admired his novels “Disgrace” and “Waiting for Barbarians,” I had not known of “Elizabeth Costello.” Coetzee wrote it in 2003, but many of its themes remain intensely timely. As the Backlisted hosts state, it is a “novel that politely asks the reader to consider, amongst other matters, animal rights, the power of faith and the limits of fiction itself.” I would add the decline of academic discourse to that list. Though Coetzee uses the novel for some heady discussions of topics of interest to him (especially cruelty to animals), he also creates a vivid portrait of the title character, herself a novelist.
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I had already been inclined to read the new novel “The Magician” by Colm Tóibín, and the New Yorker’s publication in its September 20 issue of D.T. Max’s piece, “How Colm Tóibín Burrowed Inside Thomas Mann’s Head,” clinched it. Tóibín had first won me over with his novel “The Master,” based on the life of Henry James, and I loved the play based on his “The Testament of Mary” and the movie based on his “Brooklyn.” My reverence for Thomas Mann goes back to my college years, so I was eager to see Tóibín do with Mann’s life in “The Magician” what he had done with James’s in “The Master.” I have only begun reading it, but I am already enjoying it greatly.
POLITICS AND SOCIETY
Angela Merkel and Germany
Throughout her sixteen years as Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel has been the world leader for whom I have had the highest regard; often, the drop to second-place choice has been huge. As she prepares to leave office, several articles have sought to summarize her career and her legacy. These were two of the better ones I read:
New York Times (NYT) (9/13/21) : “Angela Merkel Was Underestimated, and It Became Her Superpower” by Serge Schemann
Her real legacy is the evidence that effective politics need not mean shedding humanity or steadfastness, and that being underestimated may be the true key to political longevity.
NYT (9/25/21): “Affluent, Anxious and Almost Normal: A Journey Through Merkel’s Germany by Katrin Bennhold
As Chancellor Angela Merkel prepares to leave office after 16 years, her country is among the richest in the world. A broad and contented middle class is one facet of Ms. Merkel’s Germany that has been central to her longevity and her ability to deliver on a core promise of stability. But her impact has been far greater. To travel the country she leaves behind is to see it profoundly transformed.
Our Constitutional Crisis
Washington Post (9/23/31): “Our Constitutional Crisis is Already Here” by Robert Kagan
Suspicion of and hostility toward the federal government; racial hatred and fear; a concern that modern, secular society undermines religion and traditional morality; economic anxiety in an age of rapid technological change; class tensions, with subtle condescension on one side and resentment on the other; distrust of the broader world, especially Europe, and its insidious influence in subverting American freedom—such views and attitudes have been part of the fabric of U.S. politics since the anti-Federalists, the Whiskey Rebellion and Thomas Jefferson. The Democratic Party was the home of white supremacists until they jumped to George Wallace in 1968 and later to the Republicans. Liberals and Democrats in particular need to distinguish between their ongoing battle with Republican policies and the challenge posed by Trump and his followers. One can be fought through the processes of the constitutional system; the other is an assault on the Constitution itself.
The Environment and Decluttering
As I approach my seventieth birthday next year, my impulse to get rid of accumulated stuff grows stronger. Apparently, the pandemic heightened that impulse in many others. In the article “Pandemic Decluttering” (NYT, 10/8/21), author Joanne Kaufman writes:
Covid sent the nation into lockdown. Stuck within their own four walls, people began pondering such existential questions as “Why do I have seven Pyrex loaf pans?” and “What are the odds that I’ll ever get into those size 2 jeans again?” Like Ms. Meredith [a declutterer described in the article], they frequently found relief, if not necessarily answers, in a Swedish death cleanse, perhaps more to the point, in a bored-to-death cleanse. But for many, decluttering was a practical necessity. Suddenly, home was no longer simply haven and shelter. It was also an office (sometimes multiple offices), a school, perhaps even a gym, requiring extra equipment and furniture—requiring a rethinking and reapportioning of space. To accommodate those changes something had to give, and a lot had to go.
For those like me who had been unfamiliar with the concept, the article “What Is Swedish Death Cleaning?” by Ashley Knierem (The Spruce, 12/18/20) explains: “Swedish death cleaning is a method of organizing and decluttering your home before you die to
lessen the burden of your loved ones after you’ve passed.”
Decluttering generally makes me feel virtuous, but a recent article by Susan Shain in the Mic Check newsletter, “Decluttering is bad for the planet. Here’s how to do it sustainably” (8/19/21) gave me a helpful reminder that the ways in which we declutter may be more or less harmful to the environment, and it provides some useful suggestions for better approaches.
Picture your neighborhood garbage truck. Got it in your mind? Now picture 29,000 of them, lined up end to end, stretching from Sacramento to San Jose, California. Then, finally, picture all those trucks, brimming with trash and dumping it all in a landfill, every single day. In the United States, that’s not hyperbole; it’s reality. Every year, we send nearly 150 million tons of waste to the landfill—an amount equal to roughly 2.5 pounds of trash per person, per day. In 2018, that included 9 million tons of clothing and shoes, 9.6 million tons of furniture, and 1.6 million tons of small appliances. That’s bad news for the planet, considering landfills account for 12% of global emissions of methane, a dangerous greenhouse gas responsible for at least a quarter of today’s global warming.