Book #79: Thank You for Smoking by Christopher Buckley
March 17, 2014
Smoking is bad for you. Duh.
That being said, I must confess that I am, myself, a smoker. A pack-a-day smoker, at that. I've been smoking regularly since I was 17. The thing that I miss most about Flagstaff, the town where I went to college, is all of the smokers. Between classes, walking down the street, on a break from a job...nobody batted an eye if you were smoking, and I made most of my best friends in college from just chatting it up while having a smoke. At my current university, I hardly see anyone light up, and I don't smoke while I'm on campus. As a teacher, I don't exactly announce my bad habit, since, you know, smoking is bad for you and I wouldn't want to encourage bad habits.
Now, this book that I am discussing was published 20 years ago (less than a decade before my very first cigarette). I know that things for smokers, publicly, have changed since then. In the book, they still have restaurants with smoking sections. Now, in most states, smoking is banned from all bars and restaurants; from any public place besides those that are designated at "smoke shops" (like a hookah bar). As Nick Naylor, the protagonist of the book suggested, the climate for tobacco has gotten worse. For all of the millions (nay, billions) of dollars that tobacco companies have spent trying to keep such measures from passing, they have been, for the most part, unsuccessful.
Nick Naylor never really acknowledges if he's really lying for the tobacco company. As a lobbyist, from the Academy of Tobacco Studies, he is supposed to paint tobacco in as positive a light as possible to the public. He's mainly on the defense, and at the beginning of the book, his job is in jeopardy. By the end of the book, due to some crazy events, he is now working for the anti-tobacco lobbyists. At that point, he does claim that he was telling "lies" for the ATS. But that's not exactly true, either, because now he's just lying for the other side of the argument.
Nick is pure Washington through and through. He is very slick, and is a master of reverse psychology. He claims that it is a lie when he tells people that he lobbies for tobacco because it's a "challenge," instead claiming that it's really for "the mortgage" (his ex-wife's, not his own). Is he really that greedy? As a guy living in a one-room place while making (at one point) $250,000 a year (in the early '90s!), he doesn't strike me as the materialistic sort. He appreciates nice things, but doesn't really strive to acquire them. He's really very simple: he does his job, he smokes cigarettes, he fucks women, and he hangs out with his buddies. His best friends are Polly, a lobbyist for the alcohol industry (who later becomes Nick's wife), and Bobby Jay, who represents a gun rights group (what, no friends from Big Oil?). They jokingly call themselves the Merchants of Death (MOD) Squad as they commiserate over their statuses as public enemies. I think that Nick takes smug satisfaction in his work, in being able to outwit his opponents in front of a live audience, or on national television, or whatever. The tide turned for him in tobacco, as I'll explain, and so now he's fighting with the other guys...a challenge in and of itself, but probably not such a big one (certainly not so hopeless), and one that will bring him just as much smugness and financial gratification as his previous one, and perhaps more security.
Okay, so as I noted, Nick's job is in real danger at the beginning of the book. His life is threatened when he appears on Larry King Live. This book had a jarring mix of real and fake celebrities (some real actors and politicians and talk show hosts mentioned, and just as many fake; why? Why not make them all fictional?) in this book. On the one hand, it definitely puts the reader into the '90s with the names being dropped, but on the other hand, I think that the descriptions of smoking in various public institutions do a good job of that on their own.
Anyway, Nick isn't concerned about the death threat, but his influential boss gets him some body guards. But Nick, smug bastard, plays a game of outrunning them in his car, and one day, he is kidnapped at gunpoint. The kidnappers, after putting a hood on him, proceed to stick him with nicotine patches...like 40, I think, which is, of course, very dangerous. Nick almost dies...he's supposed to. But some cops find him on the streets, delirious, and he does survive, though he is shaken...and he is unable to ever smoke again (it was his body's nicotine tolerance that saved his life, actually).
Now, the kidnapping doesn't turn Nick around in his career. He's still all in for defending tobacco; in fact, his ordeal of being kidnapped by supposed "anti-tobacco terrorists" gets a lot of good press for his side. He gets a raise, and starts making a deal with a Hollywood studio to have smoking placed prominently in a film featuring two popular (fictitious) stars. I suppose that all of this sneaky placement of tobacco is supposed to be shocking, and maybe when this book first came out, it was. I know that tobacco companies have gone to lengths to advertise their products in sneaky ways. They're not the only ones who do this, I assure you. So nothing about what Nick was doing in this book was particularly surprising, when it came to his job.
The surprising stuff comes from the truth about the kidnapping. Turns out it was Nick's boss and his office fuck, Nick's competitor Jeanette, who had staged the kidnapping...using a hit man who had also killed multiple people who were suing the tobacco companies, setting them on fire in their beds. This is pretty dramatic stuff. His boss had gone to great lengths (like, beyond anything that any group lobbying for a product would ever really do, I'd like to think) to create good press for tobacco. Ironically, Nick, who was the one swept up in the whole thing (and who ultimately went to prison for "faking" his kidnapping, for the good of tobacco, but had his boss killed by the very man who had attempted to kill him), had been all for telling what I consider to be the real truth about tobacco. It's not a safe product. It can cause health problems. It doesn't always. I had one great-grandfather who died of lung cancer, and a great-grandmother who smoked most of her life and lived to 92. I have a grandfather who has smoked for decades; he and his wife are both doing okay (any health problems he has are related to his age and a genetic disorder, not smoking). I don't think that it's a guarantee that I won't suffer any health issues from it, but for the time being, I am taking my chances. I like smoking.
What's weird is that Nick doesn't reflect all that much on his life as a smoker when he's forced to quit. A couple of times, he mentions missing it. It makes me think that he wasn't a real smoker; smoking is a vital part of my routine. I don't have a cigarette all day long while I'm working, but as soon as I'm off work and driving away, I light up. I look forward to it as the relaxing close to my day, listening to the radio as I get away from work. Since I've been living alone, my smoking has increased. I very much enjoy, but I do feel ashamed about it because there is such a social stigma surrounding it. I don't feel bad for doing it because it's "bad for me," but because of the opinions of other people. Shit. Smoking just isn't cool anymore. So in that sense, Buckley predicted what would come to pass, as his talented tobacco lobbyist switched sides.
Overall, I enjoyed this book. It didn't really offer me any insights into the tobacco industry. I always knew it was crooked, but not any more crooked than any other corporation, really. At one point, Nick points out how dangerous eating McDonald's is, and I said out loud, "Hell, yeah." And yet, they are definitely allowed to advertise to kids. So if tobacco has to be sneaky about advertising, that's just what they've been forced to do. I don't know why companies like Coca-Cola have to resort to that...
Monday, March 17, 2014
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Book #78: Mockingbird
Book #78: Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine
March 12, 2014
This particular book came out of nowhere. See, recently some of my stress has been alleviated by our facilitator (who is incredible with some of our most emotionally wrought students, so patient) coming on full-time on our campus. She's teaching all of the students in a life skills class, and the reading that she assigned was this particular novel. When she described it, I was fascinated. I snagged a copy and finished it off quickly tonight.
It's an interesting book, aimed at kids, of course. It's told from the perspective of Caitlin, a young girl with Asperger's (heehee, "assburgers"). She lives with her widower father; it's eventually revealed in the story that her mother died of cancer years before. I would have assumed that, having a child on the "spectrum" was what drove the mother away, so I found it interesting the way the author did it. I wonder if she had it in mind all along, or if she waffled, and finally went with what some might view as the cop-out. Anyway, it made me look at Harold, her father, just a little differently. Not necessarily in a bad way...I'm not real sure how to explain it.
Caitlin's narrative is laugh-out-loud funny at times. I'm someone who has felt awkward in social situations many a time, sometimes not sure how to read people, which is what Caitlin struggles with just about every second. Quite frankly, I feel torn about Mrs. Brook's approach to helping Caitlin. On the one hand, it seems like Caitlin, being as "high functioning" as she is (she's highly intelligent, just very much lacking in social graces and tact), shouldn't be bothered so much about her introverted ways. If prefers to be by herself, what of it? Who's it hurting? But on the other hand, the kid needs to function in this world, whether she likes it or not. Mrs. Brook obviously sees that Caitlin has potential, and won't allow something like her lack of people skills to stand in the way of an otherwise good future. And the connections that Caitlin begins to make with some of her schoolmates helps her to heal from her brother Devon's death.
The emotional part of the story comes from the fact that it takes place right after a school shooting. Caitlin's brother Devon, your all-American good kid, a baseball player and a Boy Scout (Life, planning for Eagle already at the age of 13), and sweet to his sister. They have a strong bond; Caitlin frequently recalls how Devon used to help her in social situations, keeping her calm and helping her do the "right" things. When Devon is shot by a classmate in the heart, he leaves behind a distraught father (crying in the shower; I couldn't help imaging David Cross wearing cut-offs and sobbing in the tub), a confused sister, and a shocked community. Caitlin, after finishing the chest that Devon had started as part of his Eagle Scout project, with her father, has a realization that her brother will never get to do all of the things that he loved, ever again. This is the first time she is able to identify her feelings about her brother's death; prior to that, it had been in the form of tantrums, not something their family has never dealt with before.
Caitlin becomes friends with a first grader named Michael, whose mother, a teacher at Devon's school, was also killed in the shooting. The little boy, who doesn't notice all that much that Caitlin is "different," bonds with both her and Josh, a boy in Caitlin's grade whose cousin was a shooter (he was killed by the police). In this small community, Josh and his family bear the burden of his cousin's guilt, and Josh lashes out at his classmates, and is only nice to young Michael. Josh is an interesting character; I couldn't help thinking a bit of Eva from We Need to Talk about Kevin as he yelled at the kids on the playground to stop blaming him for the shooting. Poor kid.
The author leaves some hope for Caitlin at the end of the book, that she'll find some place in the social life of middle school. I hope she does, at least enough that she doesn't feel alone, but I hope she doesn't change. She's an amazing artist, and she's so literal, it's hysterical. There are some people in her life who show some appreciation for the person that she really is; Mrs. Brook is one of them, though she is the one pushing her to be more social.
Oh, the title. It is a reference to To Kill a Mockingbird; the title actually made me think of that book right away, naturally. See, the widower father (Caitlin even compares her father to Atticus at one point), the guiding older brother and the brazen little sister. Devon had even called Caitlin 'Scout,' and whenever she feels overwhelmed or upset, she goes to hide in his room, in her "hidey hole," and she can look at where her brother had carved her nickname into the bottom of his drawer. I thought that this book was rather poignant, and would definitely be powerful for its intended audience. I'm very glad that I read it, since all of my students are. I hope to participate in some of the discussion with them!
March 12, 2014
This particular book came out of nowhere. See, recently some of my stress has been alleviated by our facilitator (who is incredible with some of our most emotionally wrought students, so patient) coming on full-time on our campus. She's teaching all of the students in a life skills class, and the reading that she assigned was this particular novel. When she described it, I was fascinated. I snagged a copy and finished it off quickly tonight.
It's an interesting book, aimed at kids, of course. It's told from the perspective of Caitlin, a young girl with Asperger's (heehee, "assburgers"). She lives with her widower father; it's eventually revealed in the story that her mother died of cancer years before. I would have assumed that, having a child on the "spectrum" was what drove the mother away, so I found it interesting the way the author did it. I wonder if she had it in mind all along, or if she waffled, and finally went with what some might view as the cop-out. Anyway, it made me look at Harold, her father, just a little differently. Not necessarily in a bad way...I'm not real sure how to explain it.
Caitlin's narrative is laugh-out-loud funny at times. I'm someone who has felt awkward in social situations many a time, sometimes not sure how to read people, which is what Caitlin struggles with just about every second. Quite frankly, I feel torn about Mrs. Brook's approach to helping Caitlin. On the one hand, it seems like Caitlin, being as "high functioning" as she is (she's highly intelligent, just very much lacking in social graces and tact), shouldn't be bothered so much about her introverted ways. If prefers to be by herself, what of it? Who's it hurting? But on the other hand, the kid needs to function in this world, whether she likes it or not. Mrs. Brook obviously sees that Caitlin has potential, and won't allow something like her lack of people skills to stand in the way of an otherwise good future. And the connections that Caitlin begins to make with some of her schoolmates helps her to heal from her brother Devon's death.
The emotional part of the story comes from the fact that it takes place right after a school shooting. Caitlin's brother Devon, your all-American good kid, a baseball player and a Boy Scout (Life, planning for Eagle already at the age of 13), and sweet to his sister. They have a strong bond; Caitlin frequently recalls how Devon used to help her in social situations, keeping her calm and helping her do the "right" things. When Devon is shot by a classmate in the heart, he leaves behind a distraught father (crying in the shower; I couldn't help imaging David Cross wearing cut-offs and sobbing in the tub), a confused sister, and a shocked community. Caitlin, after finishing the chest that Devon had started as part of his Eagle Scout project, with her father, has a realization that her brother will never get to do all of the things that he loved, ever again. This is the first time she is able to identify her feelings about her brother's death; prior to that, it had been in the form of tantrums, not something their family has never dealt with before.
Caitlin becomes friends with a first grader named Michael, whose mother, a teacher at Devon's school, was also killed in the shooting. The little boy, who doesn't notice all that much that Caitlin is "different," bonds with both her and Josh, a boy in Caitlin's grade whose cousin was a shooter (he was killed by the police). In this small community, Josh and his family bear the burden of his cousin's guilt, and Josh lashes out at his classmates, and is only nice to young Michael. Josh is an interesting character; I couldn't help thinking a bit of Eva from We Need to Talk about Kevin as he yelled at the kids on the playground to stop blaming him for the shooting. Poor kid.
The author leaves some hope for Caitlin at the end of the book, that she'll find some place in the social life of middle school. I hope she does, at least enough that she doesn't feel alone, but I hope she doesn't change. She's an amazing artist, and she's so literal, it's hysterical. There are some people in her life who show some appreciation for the person that she really is; Mrs. Brook is one of them, though she is the one pushing her to be more social.
Oh, the title. It is a reference to To Kill a Mockingbird; the title actually made me think of that book right away, naturally. See, the widower father (Caitlin even compares her father to Atticus at one point), the guiding older brother and the brazen little sister. Devon had even called Caitlin 'Scout,' and whenever she feels overwhelmed or upset, she goes to hide in his room, in her "hidey hole," and she can look at where her brother had carved her nickname into the bottom of his drawer. I thought that this book was rather poignant, and would definitely be powerful for its intended audience. I'm very glad that I read it, since all of my students are. I hope to participate in some of the discussion with them!
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Book #77: Don Quixote
Book #77: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (translated by John Ormsby)
March 11, 2014
I am thrilled that I can finally say that I have read Don Quixote. It's a lengthy book, and so I was hesitate to start it, especially when I've been so busy lately. But I recently decided that my full-time teaching position has put me in a financially advantageous situation, at least enough so that I could finally feel comfortable quitting my other part-time job. A tutoring job; while I'll miss some of the people I work with, and some of the interactions with the kids, the disadvantages of working there have recently come to outweigh the advantages, especially since they don't pay that great and I'm making okay money now. So that will free up some time for reading, and maybe having a social life at some point.
Anyway, with my busy schedule it took me a little while to get into Don Quixote (the full title is The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha), but over the last couple of weeks I've taken my own good advice and have been reading when I might instead have been watching TV. And even the few times that I flipped the TV on and checked the channels, none of the reruns and shit looked nearly as good to me as reading more of the book. I absolutely loved it; I don't tend to gush on these blog posts, but I think Don Quixote may be one of my new favorite books of all time.
Most people are familiar with this story, because it's such an old book. Cervantes was around in the very early 1600s, just after the time of Shakespeare. Much of the first part of the book, and some of the second, reminded me of Shakespeare's comedies, with the coincidences and the "happy endings." See, in the first part of the book, the knight-errant Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza (one of the best, best, very best characters in literature of all time) found themselves mixed up in a lot of people's business. Their travels and their encounters with other people allowed them to more or less accidentally leading these people to resolving their issues. So even though Don Quixote is a joke as a knight (the most famous scene, of him fighting the windmills that he fancies to be giants, happens within the first few chapters), he brings more happiness than trouble ('and that not a little') to the people that he meets, in his bumbling way.
Cervantes published this book in two volumes, of course, about ten years apart. The first one, which ended with Don Quixote being tricked into going home in a cage by his well-meaning friends, was, I take it, a smashing success. Cervantes created a pretend author for both volumes, a "Moor" (African) named Cide Hamete Benengeli, acting as if he himself were merely the translator for the story. In the second part, when Don Quixote and Sancho set out again for more adventures (their third and last "sally," having taken two separate trips in the first part), their fame has spread due to Benengeli's fictitious (but of course, Cervantes's very real) Part One. Then, in the last quarter of the story, there's frequent mention of a "fake" second volume, not written by Benengeli but someone else, and Don Quixote and others frequently criticize it as being a fake; a young damsel who plays a trick on Don Quixote even tells him that she saw devils tearing it to pieces in hell. I began to wonder if someone had really had the audacity (even in an age where copyright laws did not exist) to steal Cervantes's characters, and produce a cheap knockoff sequel in the style of a straight-to-video, unnecessary sequel to a blockbuster hit. But when I checked Google after finishing the book today, I saw that this was so! And Cervantes even calls the other guy out by name. He works this fake book into the story, and it steers the plot in some ways, which I found very interesting. Real life critics have written off the fake Part Two as being awful, unfit to stand next to Part One. And Part Two was even better.
I don't want to say too much here, so I'll just add a bit more here about Sancho and then leave off, in hopes that anyone who reads this who has never read Don Quixote will go and pick it up (I don't think John Ormby's translation is bad at all, but I've heard that some newer versions are great as well) and read it for themselves. Even just one little adventure or mishap at a time; this book would be absolutely appropriate to enjoy over a long stretch, just enjoying in intervals.
Sancho is a brilliant character, and I felt like he was easier to connect with than crazy yet intelligent Don Quixote. Don't get me wrong, I love Don Quixote; Cervantes has me convinced that he was, indeed, a kind gentleman; not only that, I admire how he goes after what he wants. I read that over the centuries, different popular views of the novel have been taken. I'm of the view that in some ways, Don Quixote did have the right idea. People played tricks on him and made him look like a fool, to be sure, but none of that touched him...he was perfectly content to be a crazy knight. But Sancho is very human. He is not just the portly sidekick; he has a mind for his base needs first (his food and his sleep, of course), but who doesn't? He's practical in many ways, even though he does follow along with Don Quixote's delusions (though he pretty much knows that his master is crazy...it was debated, at least a couple of times in the book, if this did not make Sancho crazier than Don Quixote himself). But Sancho wasn't crazy, just loyal. Greedy, sure, but when his desires to be a governor, a man of power, were fulfilled (even in pretend, not that he knew this), he realized that power isn't such a great thing, after all. He also proved his practicality and shrewdness, much to everyone's surprise. Cervantes clearly loved Sancho, to make him the one who, in the end, learned the most (he was especially clever in fooling Don Quixote, on only a couple of occasions and only in their own best interests). Don Quixote's ending is sad, but I won't get into it here. I love this book. Everyone should read it. The end.
P.S. Okay, I lied a bit. I read over the above post and thought, well, no, that's not the end. I do want to make a couple of comments about the gender and racial issues of this book. Not to criticize or downplay the value of it; if anything, it stands as a piece of history, and reflects the cultural attitudes of Cervantes, and perhaps many people in Spain at the time. See, I don't know much about Spanish history, about it's involvement with the Middle East and Africa and all that. I know that Spain had the best sailors in the world; there are some details in the book about the use of 'galley slaves,' and apparently Cervantes himself served time as one. Sounds miserable...it's crazy to think that a man could go from such an awful situation, to having written one of the greatest novels of all time. Indeed, Part Two is called the "first modern novel" by some.
Okay, but the issues that I want to address are these. First off, all of the women in the book who are "good" or whatever are always beautiful. Like, drop dead gorgeous. Every last one of them...unless, of course, Cervantes just really, really liked women. But damn, a woman has to be beautiful in order to be worth anything? I was tempted to say, well, fuck you, Cervantes. But that's not quite it. It's more like, wow, history has not been kind to my gender. But in Part Two, there are some women who are a little more than pretty faces, like the young woman who mistakenly shot her boyfriend and killed him when she was tricked into thinking he was cheating on her. Or Altisidora, the young damsel living in the duchess's house (another interesting character, but crazy herself, along with her husband), who tricked Don Quixote into thinking that she'd loved him, and that his unkindness to her had killed her. I mean, besides describing the "good" women as being beautiful, and deserving of the happy endings that they receive, I didn't find Cervantes to be overly sexist...I mean, not for someone living in the early 17th century.
Also, the same gender arguments could be made in regards to Shakespeare's work; I don't wonder much if Cervantes was inspired by him. Also, the same arguments about race. Cervantes, in some parts of the story, describes the decrees that expelled 'Moriscos" (black people in Spain). This had been done between as Cervantes was writing Part Two, so of course it was a contemporary issue. Cervantes, overall, seems to praise the decree, but through the character Ricote, expresses that converts should be permitted to stay, and that perhaps the Inquisition has been overzealous in that respect. Cervantes even makes his fake author, Benengeli, a Muslim. So I'd say again, that for a Catholic living in Spain the early 17th century, Cervantes was fairly moderate in his political views. That's progressive, I guess?
So again, this did not lessen my enjoyment of the book any more than the oppression of females in Victorian England doesn't hinder me from enjoying Jane Austen's works. It's helped to give me a bit of a perspective of Spanish history, if anything, and on the stereotypes of women present in even the greatest of works in history (and today, of course). And I do close this post by saying, long live Don Quixote and long live Sancho Panza.
March 11, 2014
I am thrilled that I can finally say that I have read Don Quixote. It's a lengthy book, and so I was hesitate to start it, especially when I've been so busy lately. But I recently decided that my full-time teaching position has put me in a financially advantageous situation, at least enough so that I could finally feel comfortable quitting my other part-time job. A tutoring job; while I'll miss some of the people I work with, and some of the interactions with the kids, the disadvantages of working there have recently come to outweigh the advantages, especially since they don't pay that great and I'm making okay money now. So that will free up some time for reading, and maybe having a social life at some point.
Anyway, with my busy schedule it took me a little while to get into Don Quixote (the full title is The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha), but over the last couple of weeks I've taken my own good advice and have been reading when I might instead have been watching TV. And even the few times that I flipped the TV on and checked the channels, none of the reruns and shit looked nearly as good to me as reading more of the book. I absolutely loved it; I don't tend to gush on these blog posts, but I think Don Quixote may be one of my new favorite books of all time.
Most people are familiar with this story, because it's such an old book. Cervantes was around in the very early 1600s, just after the time of Shakespeare. Much of the first part of the book, and some of the second, reminded me of Shakespeare's comedies, with the coincidences and the "happy endings." See, in the first part of the book, the knight-errant Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza (one of the best, best, very best characters in literature of all time) found themselves mixed up in a lot of people's business. Their travels and their encounters with other people allowed them to more or less accidentally leading these people to resolving their issues. So even though Don Quixote is a joke as a knight (the most famous scene, of him fighting the windmills that he fancies to be giants, happens within the first few chapters), he brings more happiness than trouble ('and that not a little') to the people that he meets, in his bumbling way.
Cervantes published this book in two volumes, of course, about ten years apart. The first one, which ended with Don Quixote being tricked into going home in a cage by his well-meaning friends, was, I take it, a smashing success. Cervantes created a pretend author for both volumes, a "Moor" (African) named Cide Hamete Benengeli, acting as if he himself were merely the translator for the story. In the second part, when Don Quixote and Sancho set out again for more adventures (their third and last "sally," having taken two separate trips in the first part), their fame has spread due to Benengeli's fictitious (but of course, Cervantes's very real) Part One. Then, in the last quarter of the story, there's frequent mention of a "fake" second volume, not written by Benengeli but someone else, and Don Quixote and others frequently criticize it as being a fake; a young damsel who plays a trick on Don Quixote even tells him that she saw devils tearing it to pieces in hell. I began to wonder if someone had really had the audacity (even in an age where copyright laws did not exist) to steal Cervantes's characters, and produce a cheap knockoff sequel in the style of a straight-to-video, unnecessary sequel to a blockbuster hit. But when I checked Google after finishing the book today, I saw that this was so! And Cervantes even calls the other guy out by name. He works this fake book into the story, and it steers the plot in some ways, which I found very interesting. Real life critics have written off the fake Part Two as being awful, unfit to stand next to Part One. And Part Two was even better.
I don't want to say too much here, so I'll just add a bit more here about Sancho and then leave off, in hopes that anyone who reads this who has never read Don Quixote will go and pick it up (I don't think John Ormby's translation is bad at all, but I've heard that some newer versions are great as well) and read it for themselves. Even just one little adventure or mishap at a time; this book would be absolutely appropriate to enjoy over a long stretch, just enjoying in intervals.
Sancho is a brilliant character, and I felt like he was easier to connect with than crazy yet intelligent Don Quixote. Don't get me wrong, I love Don Quixote; Cervantes has me convinced that he was, indeed, a kind gentleman; not only that, I admire how he goes after what he wants. I read that over the centuries, different popular views of the novel have been taken. I'm of the view that in some ways, Don Quixote did have the right idea. People played tricks on him and made him look like a fool, to be sure, but none of that touched him...he was perfectly content to be a crazy knight. But Sancho is very human. He is not just the portly sidekick; he has a mind for his base needs first (his food and his sleep, of course), but who doesn't? He's practical in many ways, even though he does follow along with Don Quixote's delusions (though he pretty much knows that his master is crazy...it was debated, at least a couple of times in the book, if this did not make Sancho crazier than Don Quixote himself). But Sancho wasn't crazy, just loyal. Greedy, sure, but when his desires to be a governor, a man of power, were fulfilled (even in pretend, not that he knew this), he realized that power isn't such a great thing, after all. He also proved his practicality and shrewdness, much to everyone's surprise. Cervantes clearly loved Sancho, to make him the one who, in the end, learned the most (he was especially clever in fooling Don Quixote, on only a couple of occasions and only in their own best interests). Don Quixote's ending is sad, but I won't get into it here. I love this book. Everyone should read it. The end.
P.S. Okay, I lied a bit. I read over the above post and thought, well, no, that's not the end. I do want to make a couple of comments about the gender and racial issues of this book. Not to criticize or downplay the value of it; if anything, it stands as a piece of history, and reflects the cultural attitudes of Cervantes, and perhaps many people in Spain at the time. See, I don't know much about Spanish history, about it's involvement with the Middle East and Africa and all that. I know that Spain had the best sailors in the world; there are some details in the book about the use of 'galley slaves,' and apparently Cervantes himself served time as one. Sounds miserable...it's crazy to think that a man could go from such an awful situation, to having written one of the greatest novels of all time. Indeed, Part Two is called the "first modern novel" by some.
Okay, but the issues that I want to address are these. First off, all of the women in the book who are "good" or whatever are always beautiful. Like, drop dead gorgeous. Every last one of them...unless, of course, Cervantes just really, really liked women. But damn, a woman has to be beautiful in order to be worth anything? I was tempted to say, well, fuck you, Cervantes. But that's not quite it. It's more like, wow, history has not been kind to my gender. But in Part Two, there are some women who are a little more than pretty faces, like the young woman who mistakenly shot her boyfriend and killed him when she was tricked into thinking he was cheating on her. Or Altisidora, the young damsel living in the duchess's house (another interesting character, but crazy herself, along with her husband), who tricked Don Quixote into thinking that she'd loved him, and that his unkindness to her had killed her. I mean, besides describing the "good" women as being beautiful, and deserving of the happy endings that they receive, I didn't find Cervantes to be overly sexist...I mean, not for someone living in the early 17th century.
Also, the same gender arguments could be made in regards to Shakespeare's work; I don't wonder much if Cervantes was inspired by him. Also, the same arguments about race. Cervantes, in some parts of the story, describes the decrees that expelled 'Moriscos" (black people in Spain). This had been done between as Cervantes was writing Part Two, so of course it was a contemporary issue. Cervantes, overall, seems to praise the decree, but through the character Ricote, expresses that converts should be permitted to stay, and that perhaps the Inquisition has been overzealous in that respect. Cervantes even makes his fake author, Benengeli, a Muslim. So I'd say again, that for a Catholic living in Spain the early 17th century, Cervantes was fairly moderate in his political views. That's progressive, I guess?
So again, this did not lessen my enjoyment of the book any more than the oppression of females in Victorian England doesn't hinder me from enjoying Jane Austen's works. It's helped to give me a bit of a perspective of Spanish history, if anything, and on the stereotypes of women present in even the greatest of works in history (and today, of course). And I do close this post by saying, long live Don Quixote and long live Sancho Panza.
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