CT Blue

With some trepidation, I am about to venture beyond the political pastures to which I have largely confined myself, and venture into literary criticism. I am, after all, as well suited for punditry in the former area as I am in the latter. I leave it to the reader to decide the degree of suitedness.

But I stray.

The occasion for this foray is the fact that I am at present “reading” two early American literary classics. I put the term “reading” in quotes, for I am actually listening to one as I trundle my weary body back and forth to work, while I am truly reading the other in the old fashioned bound paper form that will soon be going the way of the dinosaur.

Lest you think that the spoken word book is at a disadvantage going into the comparison, I urge you to think again, for the opposite is true. In the hands of a good reader, a spoken book is more entertaining to the auditor and, at least in my own experience, sticks in the head longer than one that is merely “read”. Alas, the book in question is sufficient to drive any reader to distraction; we can only hope that the individual tasked with this audio performance was paid double for his time, for time must have stretched while he read it.

The books in question are these: The Last of the Mohicans, by James Fenimore Cooper, and A History of New York, by Washington Irving. I chose the first since it seemed to flow naturally from the last book I read in the car- Mayflower, by Nathaniel Philbrick. They are both about Indians, after all. I am reading Irving’s book as a prelude to another book, Knickerbocker, The Myth Behind New York, by Elizabeth Bradley. If you are like 99% of the people in this country, you won’t see the connection, but indeed it is there, for the imaginary narrator of Irving’s imaginary history is none other than Diedrich Knickerbocker, the source from which all other Knickerbockers have flowed.

The Last of the Mohicans is still read, while A History of New York lies mouldering on all shelves but mine. I am not going to try to explain that phenomenon; I will confine myself to posing the question: Why?

I’m sure there are Twain fans out there who are urging caution. That noble writer has already destroyed Cooper for all time, in prose so funny that he cannot be outdone. But have we learned from the Master? No!

We must cut Cooper some slack. Consider his origins as the son of a real estate developer. Nonetheless, we cannot, we must not, let his crimes against humanity and the reading public go unpunished.

The Last of the Mohicans is basically a pre-telling of the Dudley Do-Right stories, with an Indian cast in the role of Snidely Whiplash, and with an extra Nell Fenwick thrown in. The girls keep getting captured by this evil Indian and are just as often rescued just as the train is approaching just as the scalping knife is about to descend, each time by the fearless Natty Bumpo and his faithful Indian companions. Bumpo, by the way, seems as uninterested in the fairer sex as does his descendant, Dudley.

Let us pause to acknowledge the hopeless task of the audiobook reader, who manfully struggles through prose which would consider itself blessed to be called merely turgid. Here I must quote the great Hartford transplant. Recall his incredible ear for dialect. Is it any wonder that among the literary sins he would find most condemnable would be dialog that is inherently unbelievable. According to Twain (speaking of Cooper):

[W]hen the personages of a tale deal in conversation, the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject at hand, and be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people cannot think of anything more to say.

Needless to say, Cooper disdains such petty considerations. Consider this language, chosen more or less at random, that he puts into the mouth of the unschooled frontiersman, Natty Bumpo, as that valiant hero prepares to march once again to the rescue of the damsels:

Uncas is right! it would not be the act of men to leave such harmless things to their fate, even though it breaks up the harboring place forever. If you would save these tender blossoms from the fangs of the worst of sarpents, gentleman, you have neither time to lose nor resolution to throw away”! (Emphasis added, gagging noise to be supplied by the reader)

Read it out loud for the full effect, if you can. Now, consider again, the fate of the hapless audiobook reader, who has fourteen hours of this stuff to recite.

Now, consider the neglected Irving. A little on the long side for modern taste, considering our short attentions spans. But entirely readable, written in real English, and extremely funny. Why, Irving would have been a great blogger. He even provides links (known as footnotes in those bygone days) to support his facts, and where a good link is lacking, he makes one up, just like so many modern day pundits. Here we glimpse, as through a glass darkly, the very beginnings of the undying Boston/New York sports rivalries as he recounts the story of the (from Knickerbocker’s deluded vantage point) crafty Yankees driving the Dutch back to New Amsterdam from their outpost at what is now Hartford. To this day, Hartford is on the dividing line between the land of the just (Red Sox nation) and the Dark Side. It’s educational too. Did you know they once grew onions in Wethersfield?

Google tells me that there is no audiobook of The History of New York, though it’s dollars to donuts that it would be a better listen than Cooper, and a far more humane task to inflict on a no doubt underpaid reader.

I now arrive at the end of my peroration (that’s a word Cooper must surely have loved, and would without a pang of conscience have put in poor Natty’s mouth), seeking a fitting conclusion as desperately as Natty and Uncas kept seeking Cora and Alice. Alas, it seems unlikely I’ll pull off a dramatic rescue of either my point or Washington Irving’s book sales. I can only say, in conclusion, that the fact that Cooper’s stuff is still in print is yet more proof that there is no justice in the world, that talent does not win out in the end. In short, life isn’t fair.

Postscript: I will, by the way, keep with Natty, Uncas, Cora and Alice to the bitter end. I am a stubborn person, and will not give up until those simpering maidens have been safely stowed, the evil Indian vanquished, and the faithful Uncas goes down in history as the last in his noble line. Yes, I already know how it ends, since when I was a mere lad I read the far more entertaining and better written Classic’s Comics edition.