Cane

by Jean Toomer 1923

Cane is not really a novel by any measure, more a collection of poems and short stories that capture a certain sentiment about the rural south at the turn of the 20th century.  Cane is a short book, only about a hundred pages, but by no means light reading.  There are many stylistic elements, poetic and dramatic, fused together here.  The book is divided into three parts, with the short vignettes and little poems comprising the first two sections and a 35-page story as the third.  Toomer is considered part of the Harlem Rennaisance movement, although he is known only for this one book, and his style is unique and personal.

The poetry in Cane is beautiful and tragic.  Slave spirituals are a strong influence on the rhythm and repetition, and the subjects are one with the setting.  The cane in the fields and the Negro slaves working the land are "dark purple ripened plum[s], Squeezed and bursting in the pinewood air... Caroling softly souls of slavery."  There is an abundance of imagist transformation in these poems, between nature and bodies, and the language is vivid and rich.  But this is juxtaposed with the harsh conditions that the author has observed.  For example, here is a short and haunting poem in its entirety, Portrait in Georgia:

Hair—braided chestnut,
           coiled like a lyncher's rope,
Eyes—fagots,
Lips—old scars, or the first red blisters,
Breath—the last sweet scent of cane,
And her slim body, white as the ash
            of black flesh after flame.

Cane's greatest success, I think, lies in these poignant and painful images, a cri de coeur for the South, still reeling from a painful and deeply entrenched history that will not die.  Toomer expresses himself with a strong racial identity in Cane, though in reality his life was much more complicated.  He was born of mixed race, and only as a teenager became aware of the harsh cultural dichotomies that were constructed in American culture between Black and White.  He sought to transcend being pigeonholed as a 'Negro' voice in the arts, championing a new American race, disdaining the characterization of unique individuals by such limiting terms.  For all his vision, we know all too well today how elusive a 'post-racial' America is.  Toomer was never able to achieve his goal of recognition in a way that was not tied to his race, though his Romantic temprament is evident in some of the poems here, where he seeks peace with nature.  In the poem 'Beehive' he depicts a "black hive" with a flurry of activity, bees buzzing and passing, escaping, returning, while "I, a drone, Lying on my back... Getting drunk with silver honey, ...Wish that I might fly out past the moon And curl forever in some far-off farmyard flower."  The speaker doesn't exactly sound eager to be a part of his own racial community.

In the end, Toomer is a loner.  He feels acutely the pain of his subjects, but also his subjects are never fully human; they are at times objects or symbols and at others simply caricatures.  This is the greatest shortcoming of Cane on the whole.  Some of the stories can become tedious, and the characters blur into a miasma of figures struggling to maintain dignity and hope, beaten and bloodied, seeking joy. There are no truly memorable characters in this book, for all the sensitivity with which they are portrayed.


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Look Homeward, Angel

by Thomas Wolfe 1929

Wow, what a book.  Difficult?  Yes.  Rewarding? Yes.  Accessible?  Yes.

This book comes at the end (maybe a little later) of an era of heavily descriptive Realism and early Modernism.  Henry James and Edith Wharton and Theodore Dreiser were all well past their heyday, Ulysses by James Joyce had been published (and banned) seven years earlier, Lady Chatterly's Lover, by DH Lawrence, had been published (and banned) a year earlier, Hemmingway had published his first novel, and The Great Gatsby was a few years old.  It was the Jazz Age, and nineteenth century Realism was supplanted by exciting new writers who were breaking the shackles of the forms of the previous generation, a trend we've seen happen over and over again in the last few hundred years; the swinging of the cultural pendulum, a rich subject for much longer writings than this.

Consider Thomas Wolfe a little old-fashioned then for wanting to carry forward a European tradition to the American continent.  He saw infinite potential and newness in the Carolina hills, land untouched by the great writers of the past, where he could write without the shadows of giants hanging over him.  His story is largely autobiographical in the loosest sense, in that every setting and character lives and breathes as something known by the author.  He was in fact criticized as being a one-trick-pony, too autobiographical, limited in his subject matter, which he took great issue with.  He did not live long enough to publish much else to prove them wrong, but Look Homeward, Angel is a great gift to have left behind.

How about a brief synopsis then, after laying it on thick with the theory and biography?  All right.

Our protagonist is Eugene Gant, but our story begins with his father, who goes mostly by just 'Gant,' as a boy.  Gant wanders around from Pennsylvania and eventually settles in the North Carolina hills, where most of the story takes place.  Gant is, I think, the most compelling and fascinating character in the book, and my favorite.  He is a tragically flawed man, a wild drunk at times (he has his 'sprees'), and a self-pitying blowhard much of the other time.  His wife Eliza is a savvy real estate trader, rich and frugal, a Scrooge of sorts.  Their antagonistic relationship is not only entertaining, with Gant's denouncement of property and oaths of vitriol, but rich and idiosyncratic.  They more or less get along somehow through the book.

The moment we are introduced to Eugene is demonstrative of the book's style: there is a detailed account of his first sensations and memories as a toddler, followed by his learning to rea, evoking the myth of Prometheus, for all its flashes of fiery importance.  What saves this book from being a real snooze however is the vivid and poetic impact of these passages.  Let's skip ahead to when Eugene is a teenager, and first gets drunk.  He's tried a few sips before, but this is his first real drink.  His family goes out to Christmas shop after he has his taste:

" "Son," said Eliza gravely... "I don't want you ever to acquire a taste for it."...

" "No," said Gant.  "It'll ruin you quicker than anything in the world, if you do."...

[Eugene has the drink, his family leaves]

"What he had drunk beat pleasantly through his veins in warm pulses, bathing the tips of ragged nerves, giving to him a feeling of power and tranquility he had never known.  Presently, he went to the pantry where the liquor was stored.  He took a water tumbler and filled it experimentally with equal portions of whiskey, gin, and rum.  Then, seating himself at the kitchen table, he began to drink the mixture slowly.

"The terrible draught smote him with the speed and power of a man's fist.  He was made instantly drunken, and he knew instantly why men drank.  It was, he knew, one of the greatest moments in his life—he lay, greedily wathing the mastery of the grape over his virgin flesh, like a girl for the first time in the embrace of her lover.  And suddenly, he knew how completely he was his father's son—how completely, and with what added power and exquisite refinement of sensation, was he Gantian.  He exulted in the great length of his limbs and his body, through which the mighty liquor could better work its wizardry.  In all the earth there was no other like him, no other fitted to be so sublimely and magnificently drunken.  It was greater than all the music he had ever heard; it was as great as the highest poetry.  Why had he never been told?  Why had no one ever written adequately about it?  Why, when it was possible to buy a god in a bottle, and drink him off, and become a god oneself, were men not forever drunken?"

And poor Eugene, a once promising, if eccentric, boy anointed by his parents as the savior of the family, the smart one, the lawyer, the politician, governer, president! starts his slide.

It's not as simple as all that of course, but what's important in remembering this novel is the verisimilitude of the characters and their emotions.  Eugene's story is certainly compelling, and a whole hell of a lot happens to him on the 500+ pages of this book.  The image of Gant that I am left with is mythological, he is a Titan, a relic, but one who cannot die, cursed and diseased from the start but outliving all around him.   A beautiful and grotesque image.

You can probably tell I liked this book, and found it rather invigorating, but there are some negatives.  At times the loquacious style does wear at the reader's patience, especially when dwelling on ancillary characters.  You'll have to not mind frequent trips to the dictionary for words like alexin, phthisic, frome, guerdon, gabular, ptotic, flivver, esymplastic, oh my.  I could go on, but, well, you get the idea.  This book is enjoyable today because despite its anachronisms in style and vocabulary, it shines as a crystalline vision of the Gant family, so ambitious that no detail is spared, nothing lost.  A Great American Novel.

Next up is Cane, by Jean Toomer, and also coming soon: the best albums of 2013

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