Stranger Will (28 page)

What do I mean by that?

There can come a point where the magnetism of the internal conflict of a central character can be abandoned or toned down for “the reveal” the exposition of the superficialities of the plot (“whodunit”, as they say, taking center stage) a delicate tension can be lost which to me is always a shame.

Returning to Chinatown, a piece exemplary of what I consider a flaw in some branches of noir, a piece in which the unveiling of who-did-what-to-who-and-why-and-when demolishes the connection to the world, takes the intimacy of the shared experience and makes it remote, only observed, no longer “lived” (even only vicariously). Because of Chinatown, of the letdown I feel every time I get wrapped in its spell and its spell for me falls limp, I always dread when it seems we’re going to learn of a “dark secret” or “a cover up” or any of the conventions, it gets my guard up.

And Ross plays in the tropes, as though cognizant of precedent as something essential. This was evident to me from early on, inseminated in the prose, the clip—and it reinforced my reading it through my own stance on genre.

Indealized world

To return to my idealized world of books existing somehow outside of precedent or pre-suggestion (from the reader ’s point- of-view), I found myself asking “What would
Stranger Will
have been, how would I have read it if my history could be set aside— and moreover, how would Ross have written it without his?”

This sat in my thoughts well through the center action of the novel, it must be admitted—indeed I think I read a more razor pointed suspense (or at least tension) in whether or not the novel-as-an-example-of-type was going to lose cohesion, drift from what I abstractly prefer from a noir, become unglued from the character, unroll into a litany of consequences and imports and moralistic dot-to-dot than read as vicarious exploration (or even earnest investigation) of theme and tenet.

A problem—hyper consciousness on my part, involved wholly in “what I’m thinking” rather than “engaging the page straight”, something I often deride others for.

I wondered throughout
Stranger Will
if I actually could access a book-devoid-of-genre, if I came onto a novel about a man considering the philosophical, ethical considerations present in Ross’ narrative (not an essay, mind you, a novel about the ideas) but without the recognizable landmarks, without the conscious adherence and veneration of them, would it lead to any different a headspace for me-put differently, did I need to make it noir to make it something else?

Because thinking about what I was thinking about reading Stranger Will
, that is what it boils down to—I was positing adherence to the fundamental truth of genre-having-flaws, yet not positing any alternative (flawless) model to use as litmus test to get any idea of what I am even driving at with such consider- ations.

Further, and somewhat embarrassingly, I seem to be suggesting that genre is actually elevated by “abandoning out of itself ” rather than following through. A thought I do not really like.

Appreciation

How do I approach a novel I know I identify as genre-built without having reconciled my feelings of genre—and connected to this, is an appreciation for genre necessary to an appreciation of literary-built-from-said genre?

More troubling to me (pointedly so, as
Stranger Will
seemed to me—aggravated by continually having to leave my reading of it and return—to be embroiling itself in what I consider genre flaws but certainly not “writing flaws”) is that I couldn’t come up with an answer to the question “Is it necessary for me to disavow a piece’s connection to genre in order to settle my thoughts on it- how far should I remove myself from suggested artistic intent and personal reader preference?”

Elements

I’ve at length discussed with colleagues and written elsewhere of how Dostoyevsky’s
Crime and Punishment
is a novel heavily influ- ential on me (beloved, in fact) but at the same time one I know I reduce down to particular elements—I may have blasphemously even said that every other sentence in it could be removed to no detriment. It is this self-chosen reduction I identify as “the novel” and this reduction I so adore.

And certainly it is endless rhetorical round about to ask myself “If the novel in fact had been written ‘as this reduction’ would it have impacted me?” or to suggest that perhaps the presence of what I may consider excess (the elements I can freely strip away) is necessary to my adherent love of the elements which imprinted.

But it’s also something that as I focus more and more on what I do when I read becomes essential to make concrete, to bring down from the ether.

The interesting intersection between
Crime and Punishment
(as I view it) and
Stranger Will
(as I viewed it while reading) was that with the former, I reduced a more genre identifiable version from a dwarfing literary whole, while with the latter I excised what I respond to as a taut, literary investigation from out of an overwhelmingly blunt genre mechanism.

I’ve no idea what I make of that, but I know it’s what happened.

Suspicion

Perhaps there is something in a work I encounter which leads to this paring down—whatever is in greater measure I instinctively remove, as my heart suspicion of all things artistic is that “the meat” of them is an unconscious germ which blossoms an infection of prose around it.

The germ in
Stranger Will
is the titular character—the suspense, the tension, the mire is his internalized reassignment of himself, it is there I find my fascination, my focus.

Ross designs a world of keenly-rendered grotesque for a man who feels a goblin to navigate—so much so that I felt these grotesques (built of convention though uniquely rendered) were almost, as literature, purposeful fantasia, were machinations built so specifically to play into Will’s internal deterioration yet refusal to totally discorporate, as though the novel (if I were to sum it up with some artful turn) was “a tangible man confronting a genre” a man, wholly human, encountering a rendering of a world that could never reconcile itself to him because its very nature is one built of contrivance and represen- tative apparition.

A fine novel that would be.

But, as with my pulling apart
Crime and Punishment
, is it also appropriate of me to think “A fine novel it is?”

Absolute meta

Much literature (not only contemporary, but there is a large swing of it in the contemporary literature I discuss in this series) seems to be overtly aware of itself as literature, though in no way titling so far as to become absolute meta. And as I read (not to say it was to a point that distracted, not to a point of failing to appre- ciate the prose for its own nuance and direction) I really felt conscious of the novel as written, couldn’t shut myself of the fact that (to me) it seemed evident how aware Ross was of the act of each word.

I am quick to add I see nothing wrong with this, do not for a moment think “a book should keep a reader unaware of the fact it’s a book”—indeed largely I think this is nonsense. Much as with cinema, I think a crucial part to the immersion as a viewer is an awareness of the physicality of the camera, I think a novel (or any piece of writing) gains nothing by reverting to a place of pure escapism, positing a tale meant to distract from the act of reading. There may even be something to the loss of equilibrium when considering genre-identity, a kind of impossible to reconcile back-and-forth between artist and realized art that draws me as a reader into my all too precise concerns of reaction, lets the creation touch something actual in me even as it proves itself increasingly ethereal with every attempt to get in closer.

Absoluteness

Ross’ novel, much more than anything, is a reminder to me of art’s ability to disquiet the concreteness of my status of Observer by so underhandedly reminding me that the concrete absoluteness, the identity I need to inflict on something before I can voyeur is something perhaps an endless figment, nothing that can ever be made real enough to truly observe.

Appendix C

“I absolutely could not write
Stranger Will
today, with a kid”: An Interview with Caleb J. Ross

Originally published at NOÖ Journal, July 5, 2011

Caleb J. Ross: Human remains removal felt like the perfect vehicle for William’s [the “Will” of
Stranger Will
] moral conflict. A metaphorical disgust of human life can too easily—for me anyway—come across as trite and nihilistic, while incorporating a literal disgust with human life allows some elasticity with the metaphor. And when working this balance for 188 pages, elasticity is necessary.

I can’t deny the simple morbid fascination of human remains removal, though. Just the job title alone—profession human remains removal specialist—evokes the kind of imagery that I strive for with everything I write. I love a visceral reaction. And not necessarily by way of blood and guts. The grotesque—as in an ordinary story twisted just enough to jar the reader—can elicit a gut reaction often even more so than blood. Flannery O’Conner ’s “Good Country People,” for example sticks with me more than most things; the idea of a traveling bible salesman stealing a girl’s wooden leg simply can’t be forgotten. And neither can, I hope, the idea of a man scrubbing away the stains left by dead bodies.

The messenger pigeons offer a rare combination of curiosity, antiquity, and possible psychopathy. I grew up in a small town. When leaving via a north/south highway on the west end of town there was a small house with a giant animal cage blocking the entire eastern façade. I never saw who lived there, only the pigeons. The image of this house, more metal wire than brick, stuck with me. It was only a matter of time before I used it somewhere.

Together, the commentary on death allowed by the human remains removal and the tenuous human connection allowed by the messenger pigeons created such amazing opportunity to explore universally appreciated aspects of the human condition but through a unique lens. Even saying that—“the human condition”—feels too kitchen sink domestic drama to me; I have to dirty it a bit with a few blood splatters.

I spent a lot of time trying to outwit Mrs. Rose. I wanted her to be a fluid symbol, something indefinable in much the same way that William is indefinable. Is she good? Does her philosophy make any logical sense at all? Does she have her own arc that crosses, and at times, matches, William’s arc? On all counts, possibly. But ultimately, I had to tone down the intellectualizing and accept that Mrs. Rose really isn’t any greater than a typical comic book villain.

As much as I like to claim my work is “literary,” (though not kitchen sink domestic, right?) and as much as I generally refuse to be confined to mainstream descriptors like hero and villain, I simply cannot with
Stranger Will
. Once I accepted those designations, the book’s theme was allowed to foster, and with it my ability to erase my own ethical concerns from the page. This means that Mrs. Rose was allowed to be evil. She was allowed to be crazy, which allowed me to focus on William and how he shapes the novel’s theme.

The simple answer, from which a much longer diatribe may sprout, is that I absolutely could not write
Stranger Will
today, with a kid.

I started the first drafts of the book during my sophomore year of college. I wasn’t thinking at all about kids at the time. But I was thinking. A lot. About everything. I wish I could capture that head-space again; everything meant something to me in college. Every leaf, every sound, every lecture, every textbook. It’s like I was on drugs, 24/7. I am glad I was able to pair that ceaseless pondering with plenty of time to write. What came of that time was the first draft of the novel, a lengthy, unnecessarily angst-driven pile of crap. Years later, with Zoloft, I approached the novel with a more level head, and came away with a much, much better novel. My advice to writers, I suppose, is write your novel when you feel like shit; edit when you feel great.

Some passages I read now, as a father, and shudder. There’s a part in
Stranger Will
where a boy, eight years old I think, is learning to read. He sounds out the words on a note that was meant for his mother, a note that basically outlines how she plans to kill the boy. The boy is so excited that he knows how to read, but has no idea what the words really mean. Damn that scene.

I don’t know that my understanding, in terms of how I approach fatherhood in my writing, has changed much. I write the father figure often, and usually as a reluctant authority figure. That will probably stay the same.

Stranger Will
is, I believe, the only piece I’ve written—
definitely of such length—from the perspective of the reluctant authority. Usually in my writing the father pops in for a few scenes as a device to highlight certain aspects of the main character, and then he drops away.

If anything changes because of my own fatherhood I may begin treating the father figure with a bit more care. I understand the role in a way I never have before (side note: I grew up without a father, only me, my mother, and my two sisters). The father will always be a presence in my stories, and perhaps now just a more informed presence.

I’d say, “Wow, you got to the last page. It must not have sucked too much.”

I think my son will react to my work in the same way he might react to any story; I don’t think the thematic weight will affect him. He loves stories, he loves books, and I think the separation of author from author ’s work will be a natural concept to him.