Subject: Madison Smartt Bell and JDS
From: Tim O'Connor (tim@roughdraft.org)
Date: Sun Dec 17 2000 - 20:14:37 GMT
[warning: This is a longish post.]
I've been thinking lately, and reading, the fiction writer Madison Smartt Bell.
There is no connection in the tangible world between this
contemporary writer and J.D. Salinger, as far as I'm aware. They
occupy wholly different spheres of existence. Bell is most often
classified as a "Southern" [United States] writer; he appears in
public regularly, and publishes prodigiously. He also teaches
creative writing at Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland. His most
recent book was published in the last couple of months: MASTER OF THE
CROSSROADS. (He's one of my favorite contemporary writers, along
with Lorrie Moore and a handful of others I mention here from time to
time.)
I thought to write something here about him specifically because I
recently re-read his collection ZERO db AND OTHER STORIES. I had
been poking through CATCHER and reading Bell, more or less
concurrently, and some parallels came to mind. I highly recommend
Bell both for his stories (he has two collections) and his novels (he
has published ten), or even for the textbook he wrote, NARRATIVE
DESIGN, which is about the writing and structuring of short fiction.
Bell's protagonists are often nameless, or nearly so, and when they
are in cities (especially New York) they live in the seamy underside
of life, clinging to existence tenuously, scraping by, making do. Or
they drop off the proverbial map, in some cases very literally (for
instance, in the novel WAITING FOR THE END OF THE WORLD).
I recently read the story "The Structure and Meaning of Dormitory
Food Services" in the collection ZERO db, and was struck by how the
narrator is a close cousin of Holden Caulfield and an example of what
might have happened to Holden if Holden had not come from a
background of privilege and protection. The Bell narrator is a
student at Princeton who is an absolute misfit. He sits by himself
in the dining hall, and he befriends a fellow misfit who has a key to
get into many of the dining areas late at night, where they go
exploring.
In the Caulfield manner, the narrator gives us a crisp sketch of the
social striations of the seating areas in the main dining facility.
There are the places for refugees and people we might consider to be
complete losers. But there is also a place where old Stradlater
might exclusively eat, in a section called "Upper Eagle":
"Upper Eagle is really much more cheerful. Everyone is talking
brightly, and the noise is deafening. The young men tend to be
handsome and clean-cut, though a little tousled, naturally, since
they're college students. They have on khakis and Levi's and Brooks
Brothers shirts, all of which may show discreet signs of wear. On
the backs of their chairs you'll find tweed or down jackets, and you
may notice that some of the men are wearing horn-rimmed glasses.
Their women are either pretty or think they are, which is just as
good. It's a shame there're so few of them. Most of them are
mannishly dressed, but there are a few skirts here and there. The
ones who wear make-up try not to let it show. Everyone is flirting
like crazy and seems to be having a good time. They're a happy
bunch, and they also have table manners. If you recognize this group
as your natural element, and if it will receive and accept you, you
are fortunate blessed. Sit down and eat what the Lord has provided.
If not, read on."
The narrator explains, in his alienated (but endearing) way how after
he arrives he meets his two new roommates when school starts and they
are all new at Princeton:
"We indulged in a little strained conversation until it was
dinnertime. Then we put on our coats and walked up to [the dining
hall]. One of my roommates had on a gray tweed coat, and the other
was wearing a down jacket, although it was a warm evening. They went
straight to Upper Eagle. God knows how they knew."
The narrator doesn't stick with these roommates, and drifts off (as
so many characters do in this collection) to be a loner. Like
Holden, he loses interest gradually in everything, until he reaches
the point where he is kicked out of school on academic grounds, but
for some bureaucratic reason there is a snarl, and word never reaches
the dormitory people, so he is allowed to stay in his room. He just
stays in there, hour after hour, watching the play of the sunlight on
the walls as the days pass.
That's another fascinating parallel -- and difference -- between
Bell's characters and Holden: When they find places to live, these
are marginal homes, dangerous and empty and lost. (In one story, the
narrator thinks that it would be useful to have his apartment burgled
soon after he moves in, so that "the word would go out that I wasn't
worth breaking into even though I was white.") The characters drift
from job to job, or they live off tiny nest eggs, and they spend a
lot of time lying about, in what appear to be states of clinical
depression. Sometimes they wander their neighborhoods, which are
invariably crumbling and dangerous. Sometimes they ride the subway.
Sometimes they sign up for short-term jobs to get immediate infusions
of cash. Occasionally they get mixed up with the wrong people. Or,
also like Holden, they go out in lost nights of bars and dubious
social situations. In the story ironically entitled "I <heart> New
York," the narrator sees what he thinks is a mugging as he wanders
the night streets of the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and he reports
it to a pair of police officers in a patrol car. But this is not
Holden's New York. "We're gonna ride downtown," says one of the
police officers when he is told about the mugging. The narrator
asks, "You want me to wait here for you to come back?" "I wouldn't
do that if I were you" is the answer he gets. I love New York,
indeed.
Unlike Holden, Bell's characters don't have protective shields around
them, and, in most cases, no visible signs of family or of support.
They sell their possessions to pay the rent. They live in a world
where you have to bribe the superintendent to get even a crummy
apartment. They work jobs that require you to take lie detector
tests, and, like Holden, they are terrific liars. They are usually
terrible drunks, and maudlin, and become fixated on details, such as
does the narrator in the title story, "Zero db," who is a sound man
in the movie industry, and who is passing the time in a smoky New
York bar, listening to a couple of guys in the next booth who are
discussing a third party, not present, who is a leg-breaker for the
Mob. This thug, a kung-fu expert, is attacked by a dog that is
protecting a guy whose arms he has to break. To get to the victim,
he has to attack the dog first, and he ends up breaking the dog's
jaws, and he falls into a funk of depression, repeating to himself,
"I didn't wanna hurt the dog." It's a mantra picked up by the
narrator, who has fouled up his life with his girlfriend. He thinks
about the girlfriend and answers himself, "I didn't wanna hurt the
dog." Like Holden, he even gets onto a pay phone and calls the
girlfriend, but can't bring himself to talk to her.
I wouldn't go so far as to say that Bell is some kind of Salinger
clone (you'll be disappointed if you come to him looking for a
late-twentieth-century version of The Man From Cornish), but he
writes haunting and evocative fiction that demands your attention.
His pair of novels, WAITING FOR THE END OF THE WORLD and THE YEAR OF
SILENCE, fit together like a loose puzzle, and offer unforgettable
glimpses into the grisly side of life in New York City, especially in
my old neighborhood in Brooklyn. His novel STRAIGHT CUT is a
wonderful insider's look at the indie film industry, as well as a
first-rate thriller and a psychodrama. The novels ALL SOULS' RISING
and MASTER OF THE CROSSROADS are two volumes of a projected trilogy
about revolutionary Haiti.
If you're looking for some new talent to concentrate on during the
holiday season (when so many of us have a little extra time to read),
you might try dipping into a Madison Smartt Bell volume. I have a
pointer to his web site (and to a few other writing-related sites) at
http://www.roughdraft.org/ under the heading "Writers and Other
Creative Spirits."
I hope this might help turn one or two subscribers in the direction
of a new writer. In return, of course, I'd be curious to hear of
someone you cherish and might want to share with the rest of us.
Lurkers, unlurk yourselves!
Cheers and greetings to all you brave survey-responders....
--tim o'connor
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