A Different Kind of Gospel

The so called lost years of Jesus’ life are the subject of Christopher Moore’s hilarious novel, Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal (437 pages, $13.95). Everyone knows the story of Jesus even if you don’t believe in him, but really we only know the birth story, preaching after thirty, and the crucifixion. So what happened in between? Christopher Moore attempts to give his own version of events, and the result is that Christ knew kung fu. No, really.

Ok, before I get into the plot and whatnot, I would like to point out that Mr. Moore does not actually think that the son of God knew martial arts. It’s a story. I found it in the fiction section, so put away your torches my darling readers. Those are for emergency use only.

The story opens with the angel Raziel being sent to earth to raise Levi who is called Biff, Christ’s best friend, and to put the poor guy to work writing a new gospel. Biff relates the history of his friendship with Joshua, a.k.a Jesus, beginning with the day the two met when they were six. Mr. Moore applies a human perspective to Joshua that makes him relatable, but that does not take away from his ultimate role on earth. Yes, Joshua’s birth is foretold by an angel, and yes, he is the son of God, but that does not mean he is born knowing how to be the Messiah. Actually, Joshua spends thirty years and three hundred pages trying to figure out how to save mankind. Mr. Moore paints a picture of a man full of humor and light, someone endeavoring to understand sin without participating, someone who loved the entire human race without exception, and someone put on earth with the seemingly impossible task of saving our sorry selves. That’s Jesus for you. And that’s where Biff comes in.

Joshua decides that in order to figure out how to become the Savior, he must leave to find the three wise men present at his birth, Balthasar, Gaspar, and Melchior. Biff, of course, goes with him. To Biff’s way of thinking, no one in their right mind would allow the Messiah, an innocent, to wander the known world by himself. Biff also comes in handy as Joshua attempts to understand sin without partaking. After all, how can he expect to preach against something he cannot comprehend? Many prostitutes later, Biff is hooked on sin, and Joshua continues to fulfill his destiny. Joshua and Biff travel from Nazareth to Kabul, from Kabul to China, and from China to India to visit the three wise men; each learning very different things in the same environment. Biff aquires skills such as poison-making, kung fu, and the Kama Sutra, while Joshua learns yoga, the Divine Spark, and Enlightenment. The journey itself is funny and touching, and not just because of who Biff is touching. Not funny, I know, but, like Joshua meeting the Untouchables in India, I am unable to talk about metaphorical touching with a straight face. You try it: say “heartwarming”, “self-discovery”, or “finding yourself” without feeling like a tool. It can’t be done, so Mr. Moore has artfully written a book on the aforementioned topics without actually saying any of them. Thank you.

While Biff adds his own brand of humor to the story, he is also the reader’s all-access pass to the Messiah. It is Biff’s perspective that furthers Joshua’s human side. Biff loves Joshua not just because he is the Messiah, but because he is also Biff’s best friend. Biff knows very well that if he chose to, he could aspire to Joshua’s level but that he has no hope of being the kind of person that Joshua is. Talk about living in someone else’s shadow. Even the woman Biff loves, Mary Magdalene, only loves Biff because she cannot have Joshua. If Jesus were around today, I doubt anything would be different in that particular area. Ideally, we should all strive to achieve the kind of perfection Jesus possessed. Realistically, we all know we can never achieve that kind of perfection, no matter how hard we try. The fact that being a Christian (or a good person in general) means a life of strife and struggle that offers no hope of reaching that ultimate level is depressing. The fact that we still choose to struggle is the definitive act of hopefulness. Lamb reminds us that knowing our own limitations should never stop us from trying to overcome them.

Mr. Moore also throws in little modern tidbits throughout Lamb, perhaps to make you stop and think. For instance, in China, Biff comes up with natural selection. My favorite, however, is the idea that the medium warps the message. Personally, I follow a pretty typical pattern: I was raised a Christian until I bailed out at sixteen. Now I have a hard time separating God from organized religion. I don’t often have the desire to go to church, mostly because, from my experience, the other churchgoers have identical smiles plastered on their faces like zombies. It’s creepy. I want religion without the creepiness. Just by saying that the medium bungles the message, Mr. Moore is able to find the words that I have been looking for to describe why organized religion repels me. Priests and kings have had two thousand years to distort Christ’s message, which is a heck of a head start. Not that Christopher Moore is saying that he is God’s mouthpiece or anything. Personally, I think Lamb just tries to remind people of a few good ideas: love each other, and be nice. Love should be the basis for all our interactions with other people. Also, Jesus dying for your sins means that it hurt. It was not like ordering coffee. That last comment was meant for those that believe, of course. To all those that don’t, Jesus was a nice guy who probably would have liked you anyway. Seriously, though, the Romans crucified a lot of people, and, as far as painful ways to die go, this one takes the cake.

In terms of how the story ends, and I cannot call this a spoiler, Joshua’s death is painful to read. The Bible relates his teachings and brief moments of his life, but Mr. Moore gives his readers a person, as much as the son of God can be considered a person. Readers of Lamb have almost four hundred pages to connect with Joshua before he is killed, which is four hundred pages of seeing Joshua’s personality and his love for humanity. His death is senseless, and Mr. Moore does an excellent job of making the loss of such a life feel real. Forget watching passion plays, just read Lamb.


Next Week: Tales of Desire by Tennessee Williams

Disappointing Demon

After reading a novel, have you ever turned to the back cover, read the rave reviews from reputable sources, and thought to yourself, “What were they reading?” I tried my best, I struggled through the book, analyzed my own reactions for fear of being too quick to judge another writer’s hard work, I even delayed my review by a day to allow the book time to marinate, all to no avail. I hate to write the sentence, but I did not like John Gardner’s Grendel (152 pages, $8.00). Don’t get me wrong, I picked the book up because I loved the concept of a story written from the perspective of Beowulf’s Grendel. I just did not like what I saw.

In terms of the protagonist, I found him to be too whiny to be relatable, and too senselessly violent to be sympathetic. I understand the idea that Grendel struggled with his identity--trying to come to terms with his given purpose--but Gardner’s execution of this resulted in an obnoxious character. Grendel, as a monster, does wrestle with his identity. He wonders what purpose he serves, and beats his fists at the universe for want of a direction. He is obsessed with humans, and Hrothgar in particular, right from the beginning, but cannot interact with them. Instead, he watches them progress from scattered hunters, to warring tribes, to warring tribes with better technology. He both envies and hates these humans, and his feelings of confusion lead him to visit a dragon. The dragon has the advantage of being able to see all time, and Grendel comes to him in hopes that the dragon will be able to give him answers. After a rather long-winded conversation, Grendel learns that his purpose is to drive the humans. Through his violence against Hrothgar’s people, Grendel reminds them of their mortality, and, in a way, stimulates their progress. Grendel bemoans this fact at first, and then embraces it with quite a lot of bone-crunching enthusiasm. His internal struggle becomes a war against Hrothgar and his people. Looking just at the themes, if the book were not so graphically violent, I would say that this would make a good addition to high school reading lists.

I think the graphic violence is where I start to disconnect from the novel. I suppose I should rephrase that. It’s not that graphic violence is present, it’s that there is so much senseless violence. For example, Grendel spots a mountain goat making its way toward Grendel’s territory. The goat obviously poses no threat. Huge monster with claws and teeth generally beats tiny mountain goat, horns or no horns. Grendel, completely aware of this, decides to stone the goat to death. He enjoys it, despite the fact that the poor goat keeps trying to struggle up the mountain no matter how severely injured he is, and Grendel takes his time killing something that could never hope to harm him. He doesn’t even eat the goat like he normally would. Now, I get it. The goat struggling up the mountain no matter how hard Grendel beats him represents the way the humans recover no matter how much Grendel raids the village. Grendel stoning the goat also comes after Mr. Gardner’s depiction of one of Grendel’s raids against Hrothgar’s people in which hero after hero attacked the beast despite the rising body count. Grendel’s need for violence and enjoyment of violence is ever present in the novel. Writing about a monster means displaying his brutality, but I was never one who could stomach brutality. For what it is, Mr. Gardner has done well, but I simply could not enjoy the novel.

On a side note, Mr. Gardner’s portrayal of Hrothgar’s people is an interesting illustration of a zero-sum game. In other words, a success for one tribe means a loss for another. At least, that is the way the humans view the situation. Hrothgar’s systematic conquering of the surrounding tribes is motivated on the surface by a desire to create solidarity and stop wars. Of course, the real aim is to keep enemies close. No tribe outside of Hrothgar’s is allowed any kind of success. Tribes bring various offerings so that the advantage of resources is all on Hrothgar’s side. Hrothgar attempts to maintain absolute control to ensure the survival of his own tribe. Despite the fact that the tribes are supposed to be allies, Hrothgar is murderously suspicious of any tribe that has resources he does not possess. The zero-sum game is a concept we can see in action every day. In foreign affairs, a country gaining control of a certain resource translates as a loss for other nations. Immigration translates as loss of labor for natives. In sports, we either win or we lose. It's Us versus Them. Mr. Gardner shows how the zero-sum game mentality limits Hrothgar’s tribe. They are consumed with paranoia and envy. Hrothgar cannot enjoy his success or prosperity because he must keep an eye on his allies.

I see literature as serving two functions: to entertain and to instruct. For me, Mr. Gardner’s book falls entirely in the latter category. As much as I love exploring ideas, I don’t think I will reread this one.

A Little Night Music

I would like to introduce (or reintroduce, as the case may be) readers to the best science fiction writer I have ever encountered: Ray Bradbury. You may remember him as the author of works such as Something Wicked This Way Comes, The Illustrated Man, Fahrenheit 451, and, my personal favorite, The Martian Chronicles. If not, I pity you, wonder what you have spent your time reading, and I might even look at you as though you had just offered to read me a few pages from Danielle Steel’s latest “novel”. I would then rap you on the head with a rolled up newspaper, and confine you to the “naughty corner”. But I digress.

A few weeks ago, I picked up a Ray Bradbury novel I never knew existed, and I have been hoarding it on my shelf until this week as though it were the last Snicker’s bar. It is called The Halloween Tree (145 pages, $5.50), and it is a book intended for young adults. I did not know this when I picked it up. First of all, I did not know Bradbury ever wrote anything for young adults. Second, I got it out of the science fiction section. The books for teenagers are on the other side of the store together with the Twilight paraphernalia, which I sprint past with haste lest sparkly vampires attempt to make me read any of the series. Again, I digress.

The point is, none of you should immediately run to your local bookstore (as you do after reading any of my reviews, right?) to buy a copy of The Halloween Tree, and then curse me for writing a review of a novel for adolescents. No cursing is needed because Bradbury is a brilliant writer with universal appeal. He is a writer that seems to completely immerse himself in his words; he plays with them as if utilizing them effectively was the easiest thing in the world. He is a master at weaving exquisite sentences that employ every sense without being crowded or pretentious, and you will never regret reading one of his works.

In The Halloween Tree, eight boys set out on Halloween night to save their friend, who has been kidnapped. The boys must travel through time to retrieve their friend with the help of Moundshroud, a tall, evil-looking man living in the neighborhood haunted house who promises them “No treats…Only- trick!” (21). The boys visit the time of the ancient Egyptians, the druids, the Romans, and on and on searching for their friend, Pipkin. In every time, they see traditions, rituals, and myths built around death. Bradbury explores traditions from other cultures and times to get to the heart of Halloween as it exists today. In the process of doing so, he introduces death as an all-powerful source of religion and culture. It's not a new storyline, but what is? Bradbury takes it apart and makes it new like a pro.

I particularly enjoyed the presentation of death as a beginning, not an end. The ancient Egyptians, for example, buried their dead with everything he or she could possibly need in the afterlife. The concept of an afterlife in itself implies a new beginning; we shed the material in favor of the spiritual. We don't know for sure whether or not the afterlife exists, and, unfortunately, it's one of those things that you just don't know until you get there. Even then, it's not like you can come back and reassure the rest of us. Bradbury notes how much of faith is due to the omnipresence of death, and I must confess that I had never thought of it quite that way before. I think it might be something we are all vaguely aware of, but Bradbury takes the idea and uses The Halloween Tree as a frame. He does so without judgement; he merely places it before his readers for their own perusal, and moves on. How to judge something like that about ourselves? Is it really wrong that some of our core beliefs involve death?Or was Novalis right in his Hymns to the Night when he said that our obsession with death limits our own lives? According to Bradbury, striving to be more self-aware and to understand our motivations is enough. It might have to be.

Finding Life in Death

This week’s book is Victor Lodato’s Mathilda Savitch (292 pages, $14.00); the story of a girl coming of age a year after her sister’s death. Not knowing what I wanted to review this week, I picked up the book at random and, as always, read the first page. This is my ritual when it comes to finding a new book to read. If a book fails to pull me (an avid reader) in after page one, then it is unlikely to keep my attention for the next few hundred pages. Lodato's direct style of writing caught my attention with the first sentence: "I want to be awful". It was wonderful. Lodato warns his readers right off the bat what they are getting into: a character that has made the conscious decision to be bad.

The story is told from the point of view of Mathilda: an angry teenager whose sister was pushed in front of a train the year before. Now Mathilda causes trouble for her family out of anger, grief, and a desire to be noticed. Initially, it is difficult to look this character full in the face because the trouble she causes makes the reader feel ashamed of her and sorry for her all at once. For example, she puts on her sister's best dress on the anniversary of her death in the hopes that her parents might actually have to talk about her sister. Yes, it is ill-advised to do so, but what better way to get someone's attention? In the end, for better or for worse, for all her anger and irrational acts, she is impossible not to love. Lodato creates a beautiful and heartbreaking voice for Mathilda, which ends up being infinitely preferable to an omniscient narrative voice.

I was particularly interested in Mathilda's description of entities she calls "the watchers". They are not God with a capital g, and Mathilda does not say that they have any kind of divine power. The mere fact that they are referred to as "the watchers" and not "those inclined to action" states their function. They seem to be the souls of the universe, or perhaps the energy of the universe, but I think Mathilda would prefer them to be souls. When she does something she thinks is particularly daring, she says that she can feel "the watchers" perk up and take notice of her. I see it as someone who feels abandoned trying to establish a connection. She wants these "watchers" to watch her, and feels stronger when she believes they are paying attention. Do we not do the same thing with God? I applaud Lodato for choosing not to overtly bring God into his book. Not that I have an objection to God, but, in terms of writing, it is an easy out. Better to create something the character, in this case, a teenager with little to no knowledge of religion, would relate to. I would also like to point out that Mathilda is much more comfortable with her "watchers" than with anything the rest of the human race has come up with so far. At one point in the novel, Mathilda goes to a church to pray to Jesus, and meets a nun. While the nun has only the best of intentions, Mathilda cannot ask the questions that she wants to ask, and is woefully disappointed by this religious encounter. Church is where one would expect her to go for comfort, but it isn't for her. Instead, she has created her own comfort, free of other human influence, and I can't say I object. Grief is personal, and so is religion. The best we can do is find what works for us.

In terms of how different people deal with grief, I was also interested in Lodato's portrayal of Mathilda's parents. Her mother is closed and unstable, while her father puts on a calm face and goes through the motions of the day. Neither of them really talk to Mathilda. Not to say they never speak to her, but they don't talk about anything important. Mostly, they seem to be trying to shelter Mathilda and themselves at the same time, but it creates an oppressive household. Mathilda wants her parents to talk to her about her sister, but they are stuck in limbo between living and grieving. There are other factors attributing to her loneliness, but this is the big one. Her parents do not know how to help Mathilda with her grief because they are stuck in it themselves. I felt sorry for them, and for Mathilda. How to be a parent to one child when the other is dead? How to manage your own grief and hers as well? It is too much, and so Mathilda is neglected.

Alone, she finds her one path back to peace: finding her sister's murderer. I won't spoil this journey for you, but I will say that it's a good one. I will also say that Mathilda, through her grief, grows more in one day than most of us do in five years. If you do read this book, I would also recommend that you go do something cheerful afterward. Lodato, through Mathilda Savitch, expresses a loneliness and anger that is palpable.