NP: Shadow Country

[Bekah]

Yes,   I meant comparing Watson to Sutpen but also,  although  
Matthiessen doesn't quite come up to the Biblical level of Faulkner,   
there's something about the way he treats the dialogue and the dialect  
that's like a homage to Faulkner or something.   I know what you mean  
about comparing anyone to Faulkner because no one is at that level -  
still,  Matthiessen kind of rings of him without ever overdoing it -   
Matthiessen is true to himself first of all.      (He's written a lot  
of good stuff - check it out.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Matthiessen


  The first section of Shadow Country is about the death of Edgar  
Watson (a Thomas Sutpen-like character) at the hands of his neighbors  
as told through their voices along with those of his family and a few  
others.  They have lots to say about their memories of him and his  
life.    To me that was a lot like Miss Rosa and Mr. Compson telling   
Quentin all they did about Sutpen and that whole thing.   There's a  
first person,  stream of consciousness feel to it - but it's spoken  
with a gift for the dialect of the deep South.   Also,  Part 1 of  
Shadow Country is pretty circular - starting and ending with the same  
event and the rest of the book re-examines that event and what led up  
to it and what resulted from it.   AA does essentially the same thing  
- tells the story and retells it and circles it around.

Bekah


On Mar 17, 2010, at 7:42 AM, rich wrote:

> nothing can compare to the sheer density and baroque nature of the  
> language of Absalom Absalom admittedly. Watson you'll see is a  
> complex character, lots of distortions to his history by others.  
> Guess you could compare him to Thomas Sutpen a man who ultimately  
> destroys what he worked so hard to build up but I think PM's  
> strengths as a writer are a wonderful way of writing about nature  
> (which is not a surprise) but more importantly the skewed and  
> twisted nature of race relations, capital greed, and frontier spirit  
> in the 19th century in the US (which makes me really yearn to read  
> that John Sayles unpublished novel about America in the 1890's and  
> its involvement in the Philippines). You'll realize a growing  
> sympathy for anyone who works cutting sugar cane that's for sure
>
> On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 10:23 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>  
> wrote:
> Thanks for the tip.  I understand from reading the Publisher's Weekly
> review on Amazon that this is semi-fictional, based on the true story
> and associated legends re. Edgar J. Watson, a real plantation owner in
> the South Florida Everglades in the late 1800's, supposedly a mean SOB
> who murdered a slew of his many enemies over a long period of time.
>
> How is it redolent of Absolom, Absolom?  In my opinion comparing any
> writing to anything by Faulkner is setting up the former for failure.
> It's hard to think of anyone who can write with Faulkner's eloquent
> power.
>
> David Morris
>
> On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 10:12 PM, Bekah <bekah0176 at sbcglobal.net>  
> wrote:
> > Has anyone read this fine novel?   Shadow Country by Peter  
> Matthieson,  912 pages,  winner of the National Book Award 2008.    
> I'm devouring it -  redolent of Absolom, Absolom!
> >
> > Bekah
> > http://tinyurl.com/my-bloggish-thing
>

Bekah
http://tinyurl.com/my-bloggish-thing