Over boeken, literaire reflecties en het web van literatuur, door Niek de Greef. Werner Herzog, Paul Theroux, V.S. Naipaul en meer. Nederlandse en Engelstalige boeken.

This Boy’s Life — Tobias Wolff review: coming of age with DiCaprio and De Niro

Tobias Wolff - This Boy's Life book cover

This Boy’s Life is a memoir written by short-story writer Tobias Wolff. I stumbled upon a recommendation for the book somewhere, though I can’t recall the precise source, and was intrigued enough to purchase it.

A boy in the late 1950s United States lives alone with his mother after her divorce. They frequently move from place to place, with his mother consistently drawn to problematic men. Then, after settling in a boarding house at the edge of poverty, she meets Dwight. After moving in with Dwight, Jack discovers that Dwight epitomizes the toxic men to whom his mother is inexplicably attracted. He is a manipulative, deceitful, downright stupid, and self-serving alcoholic who despises Jack. Dwight exploits the boy, forcing him to work and stealing his hard-earned money. Despite being shaped by this harsh environment, Jack retains a moral compass and a sense of decency.

Tobias Wolff portret
Tobias Wolff

Even when not burdened by Dwight’s demands, Jack struggles. One afternoon, he gambles away the $100 he had painstakingly saved. He also manages to get himself expelled from school, further complicating his tumultuous youth.

Eventually, several pivotal events unfold. Jack’s father appears and helps extract him from Dwight’s toxic influence. Jack is admitted to a boarding school and the narrative gains speed. During his final year, he is expelled and subsequently decides to join the army.

This coming-of-age story resembles Charles Bukowski’s semi-autobiographical “Ham on Rye,” though it doesn’t quite reach the same literary depth. The narrative echoes themes from other contemporary novels about fractured families, such as John Green’s “Looking for Alaska,” Barbara Kingsolver’s “Demon Copperhead,” and Gabrielle Zevin’s “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.”

The book was adapted into a 1993 film starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro as Dwight. Though I haven’t seen the movie, De Niro’s reputation for portraying intense, complex characters suggests a compelling interpretation of the villainous Dwight.

I have never seen this before in a Wikipedia entry:

Home media
This Boy’s Life was released on VHS September 1, 1993; LaserDisc in November 1993;[12] and on DVD May 13, 2003.[13]

Surprising Facts from ‘Uncommon Knowledge’ by The Economist

Uncommon Knowledge published by The Economist, edited by Tom Standage

I wrote earlier that I love rare facts. Uncommon Knowledge is published by The Economist, edited by Tom Standage, editor by The Economist.

The book consists of short essays of no more than two pages, each zooming in on an unexpected fact. The essays are well written and mostly indeed surprising. For example:

Swaziland is actually called Eswatini; it was renamed in 2018 (the name is eSwatini according to the book, but it is generally spelled Eswatini today).

Carrots are white. Orange carrots originate from the Dutch town of Hoorn and may have been grown out of a gesture of support for William of Orange.

Why most refugees do not live in camps: because camps are miserable places. Even when aid is more accessible in camps, refugees prefer an uncertain life in cities because they have more opportunities to do things. Conclusion by The Economist: let refugees out of camps; let them work.

China loans pandas to other countries as a political tool.

Why do people eat more chicken nowadays? It is cheaper, and breading them is so efficient. Chickens are so big nowadays that they can’t get on top of each other anymore to mate. I also talked about this after reading Jonathan Foer’s book Eating Animals (Dieren eten). (Yes, I eat vegetarian.)

Expensive weddings yield higher chances of divorce.

Import tariffs do more harm to the economy than good. (The book was written during Trump’s first presidency).
In 2018, the WHO published a list of deadly viruses, including the placeholder’ Disease X’, an undetermined disease that could cause an international epidemic.

The US has, next to Brazil, one of the highest deaths caused by firearms per capita in the world. Two-thirds of these deaths in the US are suicides. So, I would say you could very well conclude that the NRA in the US is a lobby organization promoting suicides. You never hear a pro-life organization about these approximately 26000 deaths per year.

Islamic zina laws inhibit illicit sexual relationships. This often applies to the victim of rape as well. That is a horror even worsened by the primitive punishments of whipping and stoning. A complete nightmare for women.

Turkey puts most journalists in prison of all countries in the world. (And is still contemplating the introduction of zina laws).

An interesting book that gives a different view on many topics.

Non-conformance: Sayaka Murata in Wired

Sayaka Murata
Sayaka Murata

I read this interesting article in Wired about Sayaka Murata, author of, among other things, ‘Convenience Store Woman’ (Buurtsupermens in Dutch) and ‘Earthlings.’ She is a fascinating writer.

Murata critically examines societal norms around work, conformity, and marginalization in Japanese society. ‘Convenience Store Woman‘ and ‘Earthlings‘ explore characters who struggle to fit into conventional social expectations, offering dark, satirical perspectives on identity and alienation.

Figuranten – Arnon Grunberg

Ik vond een tijdje geleden al Figuranten van Arnon Grunberg, op Terschelling bij de leuke tweedehands boekwinkel De Boekenboer op Terschelling.

De eigenaresse is zelf een schrijfster, lees ik in het krantje uit 2022 dat is uitgegeven ter ere van het 25 jarig bestaan van De Boekenboer. Ze is de dochter van de oorspronkelijke oprichter van de tweedehands boekwinkel en ze schrijft lokale detectives.

Ik lees dat ze Kluun een slechte schrijver vindt. Goed zo.

Leuk om Figuranten een keer te herlezen, dacht ik, maar het bleek dat ik het nog nooit had gelezen (of ik moet wel lijden aan zeer zwaar geheugenverlies).

Figuranten is een krankzinnig leuk boek, bijna net zo goed als De Joodse Messias. Drie adolescenten, Broccoli, Ewald en Elvira, proberen hun grootste plannen te realiseren in het Amsterdam van de jaren negentig. Maar er komt natuurlijk geen drol van terecht. Ewald kiest voor nachtmerrie van elke adolescent: hij wordt een geldwolf.

Ik ga het verhaal hier niet natuurlijk niet hervertellen. Het eindigt een beetje in mineur. Zo voel ik het in ieder geval. Zo’n boek waarbij het aan het eind toch allemaal mis gaat. Maar daar is dan weer helemaal niks mis mee.

Earthlings – Sayaka Murata

Earthlings by Sayaka Murata is a wonderfully weird book. Sayaka Murata wrote Convenience Store Woman, which I wrote about a few days ago. Earthlings is another book about people who can not or do not want to fit in.

Natsuki, about ten years old, has declared herself a fairy. Her cuddly Pyuut is from the magic police from another planet and has given Natsuki hate magic. Cousin Yuu is her lover. He is a space creature abandoned by a spaceship in the mountains. They fall in love and “marry” as kids can.

At home, Natsuki is insecure; she is mentally and somewhat physically abused. She wants to belong to “the Factory,” where people produce new people. Therefore, she blames herself for her problems and takes tutoring, but then is mistreated again by the teacher. To protect herself, she has built her magic world. Natsuki grows up in a protected cocoon, controlled by her family.

To escape the pressures of the Factory, she marries a man who, like her, wants to escape society. They have a marriage of convenience to deceive the outside world. They live in this construction for some time, but in the end, their secret is discovered by the people of the Factory – her mother and sister, and they are forced to choose a normal life.

The story degenerates into a gruesome hallucination of Natsuki, her husband, and her cousin Yuu. Earthlings is a grim and socially critical book, written at once humorously and strangely lighthearted.