1 Nephi 4-6: The Wilderness

 As with post about utopias, I am posting excerpts from my Book of Mormon from the Nineteenth Century blog. 

I believe that readers can better understand and appreciate The Book of Mormon by examining it from the perspective of nineteenth-century readers. What questions were they asking? What religious problems concerned them? 

1 Nephi 4-6: The Wilderness

Nineteenth-century readers would have reacted positively to the idea of wilderness as freedom. This perspective is often applied only to white settlers in North America--and Manifest Destiny, articulated in 1845, was used to justify the practice of white settlers steadily moving west. However, lots and lots of people—including escaped ex-slaves—also moved west. Irish immigrants, Blacks, and displaced Native Americans occupied the fringes of society as well as a number of religious groups. 

It helps to realize that those “fringes”--what was labeled “the West”--kept moving. At one point in the 1800s, “the West” was western New York and Ohio. It then became the Mississippi River Valley and then what we now refer to as the Mid-West. (California became a self-described utopia and sophisticated “other” coast fairly early on—though it was also perceived as part of “the West.”) 

The Gold Rush, naturally, contributed to the idea that going to the West equaled a new start, but that metaphor impacted North American pioneering as early as the Mayflower (possibly earlier, if one goes back to the Vikings). It links to the Puritan idea of “exodus” from a corrupt society. Methodist preachers, circuit riders, were immensely popular in the nineteenth century while their stable, elite, (well) paid, stationary counterparts on the east coast were perceived as missing the plot. 

Consequently, nineteenth-century readers would have reacted positively to Lehi’s decision to move his family away from perceived urban corruption into a potentially dangerous wilderness. And the thread of violence that inhabits these chapters would have made more sense to nineteenth-century readers than it often does to modern readers. The “Wild” West was truly “Wild” in some cases and the attitude “better left alone to take care of themselves” from state and Federal governments (pre-Civil War) was prevalent. (I will return to this attitude later.) 

Although indigenous people and trackers and traders saw the wilderness as an approachable and useful setting, the mindset for many North American newcomers--when faced with so much risk--was more medieval than Enlightened, namely: 

One goes into the Wilderness and dies heroically (and/or becomes a hermit--see Saint Anthony--and dies sacrificially) or one goes into the Wilderness and fights off all contenders as part of a social order. 

The tensions here between freedom and organized leadership, pacifism and violence continue through The Book of Mormon. Nineteenth-century readers could relate. 

 

Izzy: Transformation through Maturity

Izzy, Willy-Nilly by Cynthia Voigt is a YA novel about a fifteen-year-old who loses her leg in a drunk driving accident that is not her fault.

Izzy or Isobel is a pleasant, "nice" (in her own words), somewhat proper (though not prim young woman. She gets average grades and has rather ordinary friends. She is pleasant and pretty and gets along with others. 

There is more to her than even she realizes. There's little doubt she would have grown up to be a thoughtful, nice woman with commonsense and grounded insights. 

The accident doesn't alter her personality. In fact, Voigt captures a truth here--which is that grand events (for good or bad) don't fundamentally change people's temperaments, which is why people who win the lottery end up bankrupt. If one is bad with money to begin with...

Likewise, studies have shown that people who undergo terrible trauma, such as losing a leg, often revert to a baseline within a year. 

Lost leg in shark attack.

The book takes place in the first 5 months after the accident. Izzy hasn't yet gotten the cast off her other leg. And she won't get her plastic leg until the stump has fully healed. The reader is introduced to Izzy while she is still undergoing the great upheaval in her life. 

She experiences change. She sees her erstwhile friends for the rather self-centered and shallow, limited people they are. She doesn't stop being friends with them; she simply moves on. She gains new, more honest friends. She expands her skills and interests (without suddenly becoming a prodigy at something). She doesn't lose her niceness or sense of propriety but she gets more real and stronger. And the bravery that she has always had comes out when she prevents a younger woman from making the same mistake she made.   

It is skilled writing, made more so by Izzy maturing into the woman she would have become. She admits that if she could go back, she could change what happened to her--but "the richness in me; there was so much more than before." 

She still gets sad. She is still nervous about the artificial leg. She still wishes that things could be different. She doesn't suddenly become all-knowing (just as she doesn't suddenly become a prodigy at an instrument or other talent). And she doesn't suddenly become a poster-child for a CAUSE. She adapts--and as she adapts, she matures. She adapts in the here and now.  

Problems with Utopias: Problem of Isolation

Over the next year or so, I will be posting now and again from my "sub-blogs." 

The post here is from the associated blog, Problems with Utopias.

* * *

It is typical of utopia novels/tracts to start with "I met a man who told me about..." similar to Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner."

More's Utopia, for instance, is described by a traveler, Raphael, who claims the place was already populated when a group of Romans and Egyptians arrived there in a shipwreck. The resulting perfection is a combination of those cultures. James Hilton's Shangri-la is described by one man to another man based on the first man's encounter with Conway (the Ronald Colman character in the 1937 movie). Shangri-la is in the mountains and only reached by Conway and his companions when their plane is hijacked. 

The implication is that these places exist within the real world but are difficult to reach. Only the occasional survivor or visitor will find a way to pass on the story. 

The problem is that in reality, stuff and people leak out. Why wouldn't Utopia's fisherman keep sailing? Why wouldn't Herland's citizens up and leave? George Mallory isn't the only one who wanted to climb a mountain because it was there.

In fairness, Gilman's women are infinitely practical, which is a welcome change from rampaging idealism, but human nature is not infinitely practical, male or female. Road trips and rituals like Rumspringa exist for a reason. Good grief, Gilman got a divorce and hauled herself and a child all the way across the country to California--why wouldn't her women do the same? For that matter, at age 25, I drove cross-country in a non-air-conditioned Dodge Colt (stick shift) in the summer with a cat by myself. I would never do that now! (People get more risk-adverse as they age.) 

Even during Japan's most extreme isolationist period, people still knew it was there and eventually showed up in a "here we are; what are you going to do now?" way. (And, yes, people did leave, even if they did so partly unintentionally. Courtesy of Eugene, see John Manjiro, "whose biography would barely be believable as fiction.")

In addition, one of the most fascinating revelations of archeological digs is how much people in the past got around. Goods from Asia show up in medieval England. Folks from England show up in the Mediterranean world.

Not to forget, during the nineteenth century, that time of no-holds-barred nationalism, the attempt by antiquarians to discover the "pure" past of a nation ended in failure. German fairy tales weren't German--for one, a lot of them were French. 

And so on.

Isolation is necessary to utopias. Mobile people undermine utopias since (1) restless people indicate that people care about more things than their immediate "needs" (sorry, Marx); (2) if mobile people can leave, other mobile people can arrive, and there goes the perfectly structured society. 

Star Trek tackled this problem in several ways (setting aside the utopian ideals of the show itself). TOS tackled it philosophically: How can you thrive if you are too happy? TNG tackled it, to my mind, somewhat more realistically. In "Masterpiece Society," the engineers on the planet are too excited about Enterprise technology to give it up. Now we see the cost of not being part of a space-faring community! No, thanks!

Welcome to human nature. 

All the Ms: Mallette to Mallone

Gloria Mallette: Distant Lover starts with a clearly characterized protagonist. Lots of family problems, so I didn’t keep going, but I did, I confess, skip to the end, and the end pleasantly surprised me! 

G.M. Malliet has written a number of mystery books. Death and the Alma Mater begins with a humorous account of college in-fighting in Cambridge over an alumni fundraising weekend. The tone reminded me of the Home Improvement episode where Tim Taylor–like Tim Allen–is awarded a degree by his alma mater. The woman who greets him at the ceremony makes it clear that he was selected for his potential construction-building contacts. Others at the college wanted to give the degree to "an award-winning poet--like he could help us raise a dime!" 

Allan Mallinson: A Regimental Affair takes place in the early 1800s and seems to be in the Hornblower tradition. It begins at the House Guards, which reminded me of one of my favorite books A Minor Inconvenience by Sarah Granger, which tackles romance and spying during the wars against Napoleon. 

Thomas Mallone: Fictionalized recountings of historical events are quite common. I’m not a huge fan–though I did read The Agony and the Ecstasy–since I would rather just read the history. That is, I enjoy stories set in history but stories about actual people and events seem to be better handled by documented non-fiction. 

Thomas Mallone wrote Watergate. I read the beginning and could see the attraction, the idea of being in on the action, a fly on the wall of a seminal event. I still didn’t continue…

Henry Wood: Not a Disguise to the Lover

One of the best episodes of Granada's Sherlock Holmes is "The Adventure of the Crooked Man." 

Years earlier, Nancy DeVoy fell in love with Henry Wood. A fellow officer, James Barclay, was jealous of the relationship since he wanted Nancy for himself. He arranged for Henry to fall into enemy hands, a move that Nancy--who becomes his wife--later characterizes as resembling David's treatment of his general Uriah. 

Henry survives torture and mutilation and finds his way back to England. Thirty years have passed, but he encounters Nancy who recognizes him. He then confronts her husband who dies from the shock. Holmes's investigation doesn't uncover a murder but does clear Nancy of suspicious in her husband's death. 

I find it entirely believable that Nancy would recognize her past fiancee, despite the passage of time and physical damage. 

Whether or not a wife/fiancee would recognize her lover from years earlier is a question I've discussed with my mother since we both love mysteries, and mysteries often use such disguises, such as in Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile. My mother believes that it depends entirely on the people involved. (After all, I'm not sure David McCallum ever changed!)

The wife in Death on the Nile, for instance, is rather self-absorbed. It's a little odd that she wouldn't recognize the man she married over twenty years earlier but the novel's set-up and the character's personality prepares readers for that possibility. In Henry Wood's case, on the other hand, he could still retain the voice, speech patterns, and underlying facial bones of the man he once was, especially since--unlike the husband in Death on the Niles--he isn't attempting to hide himself. 

In this rather romantic tale (and Arthur Conan Doyle was a romantic!), the disguise is not from the lover but from the detectives. And the disguise is one that Conan Doyle and Christie relied on: people's assumptions about what they are going to see. 

It takes Holmes to see past the "crooked man" who uses magician tricks to entertain soldiers to the young soldier of the past, to connect that man to the man with whom Nancy fell in love.

Nancy never suffers a doubt.   

Elementary Moment of Chivalry

One of the things I love about Sherlock on Elementary is how he never quite loses his British respect for protocol and hierarchy. Sure, he is brash and often off-kilter. Sure, he is a recovering drug addict. Sure, he breaks barriers and upsets people.

But at a fundamental level, he is respectful of forms. (The ability to challenge the status quo and still respect the queen is...very British.) 

So when the King of Bohemia visits, he demonstrates courtesy and even executes a little bow. 

This innate courtesy extends to all types of people, including the sex doll in "The Uncanny Valley of the Dolls." Unlike the others who scoff and sigh and roll their eyes at having to question the sex doll ("I guess her AI wasn't ready for a police interrogation," the creator says apologetically), Sherlock answers all her questions directly and kindly, no matter how loaded her questions are with salacious content. When she asks, "Do you want to fool around?" he responds without pause or loaded innuendo, "No, not right now." 

He perceives her entirely as a machine (as his joke on Marcus later demonstrates) yet he treats her as human and deserving of gentle respect. 

What a guy!  

Major Houlihan: Great Well-Rounded Female Character

I mention earlier on Votaries that Major Frank Burns had more potential than the writers allowed for. 

Apparently, Loretta Swit objected to her character's ongoing affair with Frank. (Maybe Swit did; maybe she didn't--what gets reported isn't always accurate).  

In any case, I've always considered Major Houlihan one of the great female characters of the 1970s. She doesn't spout off the correct-sounding stuff. She is a full character with layers. And I never had any trouble understanding why the seemingly tough and ambitious Houlihan would have an affair with Frank. 

First, she likely isn't as interested in marriage as she thinks she should be--she is a product of her time period, and a woman in the military is still an outlier. She sees friends getting married and settling down and having kids. She would hate that life, but a part of her thinks she is supposed to love it--until an actual marriage fails her. 

Second, a person can be savvy and hard-headed in one area yet a fool with romance. She marries a jerk--in fact, she acknowledges at one point that Frank was better than her cheating husband, Lt. Colonel Penobscott, who was entirely shallow and fell short of Frank's devotion.

Third, she isn't stupid--the obvious person for her to hook up with his Hawkeye...and they would kill each other in a fortnight (as the episode when they sleep together proves). Hawkeye is too cynical. He is also, work-wise, her mirror. She doesn't need a mirror, and Hawkeye isn't comfortable with one (as the episode with a female surgeon proves). 

Fourth, Houlihan has enough self-knowledge to understand herself regarding Frank. To him, she states, "You were military issue. I got you with my mess kit and khaki girdle."

Consequently, I wouldn't pair Frank with Houlihan in the long run. I would have them become good friends who can confide in each other. But Frank is looking for a wife--and, as stated above, Houlihan isn't necessarily looking for a husband, even if she thinks she is.   

The above analysis is based on the character--what she does, what she says, how she says it. The complexity and strength is there!  

Fantastic character! And excellently acted!  

All the Ms: Malerman to Mallery

Josh Malerman: A House at the Bottom of a Lake I picked up because I loved the title. I’m fascinated by water and places under water. The book is about the relationship between Amelia and James, starting with the first date. 

Aanchal Malhotra: The Book of Everlasting Things is a saga of a young man and a forbidden love. I know that from reading the dust jacket. The first chapter is about the young man’s ability to smell perfume. The chapter is very well-written. 

Tania Malik: Three Bargains is a saga tale set in contemporary India. Overall, like the book by Malhotra, it seems to embrace life, even if sadness is part of the equation.  

Ally Malinenko: Sometimes during this project, I feel like every writer in a group of books I got out of the library is writing on the same subject. It likely says more about the human tendency to find patterns than about every author in the Mal range being interested in the same thing. With this post, there are several books about houses!

Malinkenko's Appearing House starts with Jae, who is recovering from cancer. The first chapter sets an interesting premise

“She’d read the books. The stories were always the same. Kid got sick; everyone felt bad; kid taught everyone to love in a deeper, more meaningful way; kid died; everyone remembered the kid as a hero…She’d never read about a kid who’d Gone Through What She Had and lived. They didn’t write stories about those kids.” 

Susan Mallery: Susan Mallery has her own shelf at the Portland Public Library. The books are what I call “world” romances—that is, in Three Sisters–which also begins with a house!--the story is as much about the neighborhood and the job and the friends of the main character, who meets two other women who have romances of their own, as about the romances. Not my cup of tea but the first chapter was more engaging than other romances I’ve read in the Ms.

Buddy Shows: Librarians versus Leverage

Generally speaking, I appreciate a show where the main characters aren't fighting or breaking up every two seconds. 

And yet, I find The Librarians more unbelievable in the buddy-buddy aspect than Leverage. 

Christian Kane is a member of both. Yet why is Leverage--which relies (in a life versus death, jail versus not-jail way) on the main characters liking each other--a better show than The Librarians--which also relies on the main characters liking each other. 

I think the primary reason is that Leverage, like Bones, allows the characters to (1) be idiosyncratic--strange in their individual ways; (2) have different types of relationships with each other. 

The Librarians uses idiosyncratic characters, but there is a constant need within the script to reaffirm the group's togetherness--which often means treating the idiosyncrasies as entirely positive and understandable. 

In Leverage, Eliot continues to be irritated by Hardison's techno-babble (even when he is willing to die for him). And Parker never stops being very Parker-ish. Likewise, in Bones, everyone acknowledges that Bones is going to do things in Bones's way. 

The Librarians are constantly proclaiming their affection for each other (it does get worse in later seasons). The result is a kind of flattening effect. They are all equal all the time in all the same ways about everything because they are all completely supportive all the time in all the same ways about everything, including (weirdly enough) betrayal of the group. It's rather like Star Trek ships: in the next episode, no matter how much damage the ship got, it's back to pristine condition.

I rather like Star Trek. I don't think the solution is, necessarily, to go the Battlestar Galatica route. But--some actual personality traits and opinions and fears should survive the weekly break!  

In Leverage and in Bones, the characters' ability to work together is considered far more important than what they say to each other in the final scenes. In the meantime, the individual relationships hugely differ. Parker dates Hardison. Eliot relates to Parker on the job because they think the same; he treats Nat very much as a leader, even when he criticizes him. On Bones, Angela is Bones's best friend; Booth is her lover and her husband; everyone else, one gathers, is some form of subordinate, which doesn't mean she doesn't care for them. 

I do find it notable that Christian Kane--even with Angel--seems to be drawn to roles where he acts alongside a group.  

A-Z Character Transformations: Little Nikita

My current A-Z List looks at characters in terms of disguises and transformations. I am going by character name. For "G," I chose Grant, Jeff or Nikita in Little Nikita. 

I am reposting my review of the movie. I originally posted in under "Like it Anyway" for artworks that I admire despite critics--and sometimes the general public--labeling them "bad." 

In terms of my current list, one reason I chose Grant, Jeff is that the character doesn't transform into a radically different person when he learns his parents are "sleeper" agents. He is shocked. But he doesn't turn into a spy or run away. He is the boy of loving parents. He remains the boy of loving parents. 

*** 

Every few years, I check out Little Nikita with River Phoenix and Sidney Poitier. The movie has a 52-54% rating on both IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes. (It has a higher rating on Amazon, which is not unusual since Amazon ratings are often by folks renting the movie through Prime; if they are going to rent it, they already have a reason.)

In truth, the plot makes absolutely no sense. It is the ultimate McGuffin. The rogue agent, Scuba, is killing off sleeper agents supposedly to embarrass the Soviet Union (I guess), yet makes zero effort to contact any news agencies. Also, once the sleeper agents are dead, who is there left to embarrass the Soviets? If the Soviets are trying to protect their agents, why do they use the last agents to pay Scuba? Why don't they just ship them back to Moscow? And if the payment is to capture Scuba, wouldn't Scuba guess? And why are the Soviets so impressively bad at capturing and/or eliminating this guy? 

In the end, though, I don't care. Sure, I think a few tweaks to the script would have made it more sensible. But ultimately, again, I don't care. Phoenix's Nikita character falls into a category that I will address in a future A-Z List [A-Z List 11] since I enjoy character journeys so much. He is a character in disguise, only he doesn't know he is in disguise. That part of the movie is exceptionally well-done with excellent pacing. 

And pacing is an important element of film. The movie isn't fast. It isn't slow. It is, rather, inexorable. The inevitable unveiling--the movement from one understanding of one's self to another--is what matters. 

Consequently, the exchanges between Nikita and the adult characters--his father, mother, Sidney Poitier--carry the film. Even Richard Bradford and River Phoenix in the final scenes (however nonsensical in terms of plot) are enough to keep the viewers' attention. 

Word Choice Moment: Psych's Stanchions

One of the most amusing aspects of script-writing is how often writers appear to be talking to each other. They have characters make comments that are more about writing than about the plot--and not entirely the kind of thing those characters would say to each other. 

Though not entirely not--Danny's point about "forte" (that it doesn't have to be pronounced "for-tay") is a little random but does emphasize the fact that Danny is more erudite than he often behaves. 

Gus and Shawn of Psych often make comments about word choices. One of my favorites is when they comment on "stanchions"--as in "Oh, that is what they are called!"  

 

Historical Disillusionment

Repost from 2005 with edits.

***

"There may have been more than three Wise Men!"

In terms of things to get disillusioned by, history facts have never been high on my list. There is a teaching approach in which instructors "surprise" their students with "what you think you know!" versus "what is really true!" enlightenment. 

When the instructor is part of that process (I learned something so interesting when I was researching...), I don't mind. 

But when the approach is a form of "debunking," it simply makes me tired.

So-called "debunking" frankly seems rather streamlined. The better type of instructor isn't going to say, "Everything you thought you knew is false!" because, well, actually, it might not be. (I've become quite fond of Great Courses lately because the instructors are summarizing others' research as well as their own, and they often try to be objective about what people have believed on a topic over the years.) 

Another problem with the "debunking" approach is an issue that I encountered in books by an author I usually enjoy--the author commented in passing, "He wasn't most people's idea of an Asian man." 

She then proceeded to describe the character in accordance with several Asian characters I've encountered in manga and on Viki.

Likewise, in my master's program, instructors would say things like, "Well, this is most people's image of..." as in, "This is most people's image of the West." 

I can never figure out who these people are. I always thought the West was a big, scary desert that the Mormons irrigated (part of it, anyway). I never assumed that prostitutes had hearts of gold or that mining wasn't incredibly dangerous or that people didn't get disillusioned and heartachy and downright lonely. Along the same lines, I never assumed that the Puritans were one monolithic group of believers or that New Englanders were devoid of racism in the 19th century. But I am given that information as if it will surprise me.

I like to learn about stuff, but in order to learn I don't feel it is first necessary to believe (1) there is a monolithic version of history out there that my current instructors will replace with ANOTHER monolithic version; (2) that I'm making all kinds of erroneous assumptions about stuff all the time about everything. 

Both points assume that education's purpose is not to expand but to override. 

Take the initial quote. I grew up with the classic Christmas story.About the time I hit teenagehood, I encountered, "There could have been more than three Wise Men!" statement with a kind of wink, wink, nudge, nudge implication: We have insight! Aren't people doofusi for not knowing what we know?

My reaction was, Sure, yeah, whatever, neat. Maybe growing up in the home that I did, I got used to hearing history discussed from multiple angles. As it is, the idea that there is more to a story, that a story and reality may not match up completely never surprised me. Not because I think people are big, fat liars. Just...Why would I get upset? History is confusing and complicated with lots of stuff happening at the same time; people's memories are bad enough with what happened last week, let alone what happened 1000 years ago. 

Subsequently, I've never faulted teachers for giving me the simplistic version of an event. Whenever I do any kind of research, I go to the kid's section first and read the "simple" version anyway. Got to have something to build on! I can understand people being a bit more upset that they got the "Caucasian-only" version, but since I'm Caucasian, again I've just figured: got to start somewhere! 

But then, it never occurred to me that I should believe everything I was told. Even in high school. It never occurred to me that there wasn't more to come. 

Behind the arguments against the simplistic version seems to be the idea that the simplistic version will KEEP another version from people. But in a country with libraries in nearly every town, not trying to expand one's knowledge is a choice, no matter who is speaking and no matter their ideology, especially since, sometimes, shutting down the "wrong" version results not in the "right" version but in...nothing.  

Better Walt Disney's fairy tales than no fairy tales. 

All the Ms: Malane to Malerich

Donna Malane: My Brother’s Keeper starts with a private investigator accepting a request to find a daughter from the mother who tried to kill her. Not my cup of tea. But–wow! 

Sally Malcolm: Rebel: An Outlawed Story is a M/M love story at the time of the American Revolution. I enjoyed it, though I thought the internal conflict for one of the characters was resolved too quickly.

Torrey Maldonado: What Lane? is a kids’ book about boys in sixth grade. They have a range of backgrounds and race. The book contains a lot of dialog on the topic of racism. I kind of sighed at first. I get tired of books that raise complex topics but don’t dive into that complexity. And books that present information without the main character even questioning that  information--as if human beings are robots. I questioned just about everything as a teen, including the sacred cows of my own culture, and I was not a particularly rebellious teen. In fact, I wasn’t rebelling at all. I was just thinking for myself. (And it never occurred to me that adults were automatically right since so many of them seemed kind of fatuous. Again, not rebelling! Simply, what I prayed about to God was my business, no one else’s, and it never occurred to me that my brain belonged to anyone else in terms of how I should think.) 

Back to the book: In terms of writing, I was impressed that the author focuses the topic by making it about relationships: the main character Stephen’s relationship to other kids in his class. It’s a story, not a lecture, which is something to applaud. 

C.S. Malerich: The Factory Witches of Lowell is about factory girls striking in Lowell. Witchcraft is involved. From what I could quickly surmise, the book is technically fantasy, which I thought unfortunate since I don’t doubt that strikers in that time period did, some of them, believe in witchcraft (the New England Vampire Panic lasted through the 1890s). I might have found factory girls who believe in a variety of stuff somewhat more interesting than factory girls practicing spells. 

Brother Fidelis: A Transformation in Trouble

*Spoilers*

Ellis Peters' An Excellent Mystery provides a female in disguise. Godfrid Marescot becomes betrothed to a young girl, Julian Cruce, before he leaves on Crusades. He behaves honorably but is severely and specifically wounded in the area of the groin. Subsequently, he breaks off his betrothal to the now-nineteen-year-old young woman and enters a Benedictine monastery. He adopts the name Humilis. 

Julian Cruce considers herself still betrothed (a not unlikely belief since betrothals had considerably more legal weight at the time). She enlists the aid of a servant to help her sell some jewels, change her guise, and enter the monastery as Brother Fidelis. She adopts muteness and becomes Humilis's companion. He is inevitably going to die and she helps him through those final days. 

The story is finely told. As with many of the Cadfael books, Peters ties the events into part of the civil war raging in England, specifically the attacks on the city of Winchester and destruction of nearby religious houses. 

And story is also infinitely touching and deeply romantic. Julian Cruce's disguise does not fundamentally alter her character, except to bind her more closely to her chosen spouse. 

What I appreciate with The Excellent Mystery is Peters' acknowledgement that the un-transformation must be handled in such a way to prevent dishonor and disgrace to all parties. 

There's no "but people mustn't react that way! how dare they! the good people--like Hugh and Cadfael--don't, so all the other good people won't either!" 

In fact, Cadfael does an excellent job at the end of the book summing up the "case" he had to solve: 

"There'll be no scandal, no aspersions cast on either Hyde or Shrewsbury, no legatine muck-raking, no ballad-makers running off dirty rhymes about monks and their women, and hawking them round the markets, no bishops bearing down on us with damning visitations, no carping white monks fulminating about the laxity and lechery of the Benedictines...And no foul blight clinging round that poor girl's name and blackening her for life. Thank God!"

I love how Peters retains Cadfael's personality. He doesn't want anyone's "social media" commentary--not the gossips, not the self-righteous tut-tutters. 

Cadfael solves the problem by taking advantage of an unexpected storm. It's a powerful example of how disguise and transformation can entail wit and sacrifice. If Brother Fidelis's transformation was a difficult matter to bring about, it needed to be a difficult matter to undo. Luckily, Brother Cadfael is there to help out!   

Perry Mason versus Ben Matlock

I quite like Andy Griffith, and I enjoy a number of Matlock episodes. However, the courtroom scenes make me wince. 

Perry Mason (1957-1966) episodes are often not as engaging. But the courtroom scenes are far more credible and can even get quite interesting. And I don't wince. Here's why:

1. Perry Mason's courtroom scenes are usually preliminary hearings to determine whether a trial will occur. 

Rules about what jurors can hear/know are complex. Just about everything during Matlock's jury trials is frankly inadmissible and inappropriate. It simply wouldn't be allowed to occur in real life.  

Preliminary hearings allow for more flexibility. The judge makes the ultimate decision. 

2. Objections in Perry Mason are part of the drama. 

In Matlock, the objections are mostly opportunities for the main character to chew the scenery. I suppose they are stuck in for the sake of verisimilitude, but they feel almost random, shoe-horned-in. The objection occurs because it is time in the script to issue the objection.

In Perry Mason, on the other hand, the objections and legal arguments are part of the drama. In "The Case of the Larcenous Lady," for instance, Mason objects to testimony as hearsay. The judge agrees and states that the prosecutor must produce the witness who is being quoted. When the prosecutor later tries to close his case without following up with the promised witness, the judge insists that the hearing cannot end until the witness is produced. The objection is part of the story. 

3. Perry Mason is respectful of the legal process. 

Both Matlock and Mason show respect to judges. Matlock is more likely to protest and arguably that behavior is part of his charm--or at least his personality: he's a more bumptious John McEnroe. 

Mason is never disrespectful. 

Both Matlock and Mason are on good terms with the police. 

However, unlike Matlock, Mason doesn't do his investigation in the courtroom (which behavior is utterly inappropriate anyway). That is, Mason rarely questions factual testimony. He almost never questions doctors, for example. He focuses on eliciting already existing evidence from witness testimony. So while Matlock--however dramatically--will reconstruct the crime of a blind man based on a piece of paper that he found with a blood spot...

Mason will ask the police to bring all the shoes they found to court. He doesn't dismiss Lieutenant Tragg's analysis of the shoe prints. He uses the experts' deductions to back up his case. The evidence is already there, and he works through the police to bring that evidence to the court's attention. 

Now, granted, both Matlock and Mason's careers lead one to think, "Why are the prosecutors bothering? If these lawyers are involved, their clients must be innocent!" 

But with Matlock, I often enjoy the investigation but not the court scenes. With Mason, I often find the court scenes quite fascinating.    

A-Z Characters Who Could Transform: Major Frank Burns Deserved a Better Ending

Larry Linville left MASH when he (correctly) judged that his character, Major Frank Burns, was never going to expand beyond his role as the jerk/butt of jokes. 

I think the writers failed Burns (and Larry Linville). They replaced him with the complex-from-the-start Winchester but truth is, like Howard from Big Bang Theory, Burns had the potential to progress beyond his less palatable behavior. He just needed better writers. 

From the beginning, Linville gave the character a degree of self-knowledge as well as wistfulness at others' irritation. That is, Linville allowed that Burns might be teachable or trainable. 

Here's what I think could have happened:

Frank's wife back home divorces him (she has learned about Houlihan). Frank goes off the deep end when Houlihan gets married to another cheater (another Frank but more shallow). So far, these events follow the show (more or less). 

Unlike in the show, he stays with the 4077. A woman surgeon visits. Frank falls for her 100%. (My personal assessment is that Frank's personality requires a non-abstract relationship for him to improve.) 

Unlike Houlihan, this fellow surgeon not only likes Frank: she knows how to handle him. She demands that he live up to a certain standard. She then leaves, but they stay in contact through letters. Frank goes back to his old ways sometimes. He rises above them other times. 

In other words, Frank becomes very much like Howard and like Eustace from The Silver Chair. A guy whose "better self" is in process. 

I enjoyed David Ogden Stiers' Winchester. But I don't think the problem was that the show required a different character. I think the problem was the writers didn't know how to write themselves out of the useful-for-one-purpose hole they put Frank in.  

Stop the Christie Murder: Save Ross

*Spoilers*

Generally speaking, the extra murders that Christie throws into her books don't bother me. The victims are usually fairly unpleasant people anyway. 

However, the killing of Ross in Lord Edgware Dies or Thirteen at Dinner has always struck me as particularly gratuitous. 

It works. In fact, the entire novel is psychologically on-target. It uses several classic Christie tropes: assumptions about what people expect to see; a supposedly stupid character who turns out to be quite cunning; the role of vanity in a killer's make-up. In some ways, the book and its several films remind me of To Die For, in which romance takes a back seat to how each character covets the limelight. 

The killing of Ross--a friendly if wistful actor in the book; a friendly playwright in at least one of the films--is believable based on the wilful, almost random personality of the killer. And I suppose it is to Christie's credit that she killed off her extras (rather than wounding them or putting them into comas). 

But...still...

I think my detectives could easily prevent the death by keeping their eyes on the two main suspects. The book is sneaky because it trades on viewers' assumptions but the killer's identity is more or less a given. Like Cards on the Table, only so many people could be the murderer (Christie often expanded the pool of suspects with red herrings and a plethora of motives: everyone actually might be the murderer! but only one story holds together entirely). 

The above approach of keeping one's eye on the most likely bad guy is the approach that Alleyn should have taken in Singing in the Shrouds, one of those novels where Marsh traded intelligent, boring, bureaucratic "lock them all up until we check alibis" procedure for a splashy, melodramatic ending.

She was a playwright!  

C.S. Lewis's Great Flawed Character: Edmund

C.S. Lewis's Edmund has come up on several A-Z lists. Here he is again to represent a character who transforms. 

In her essay about Edmund, "King Edmund the Cute: Anatomy of a Girlhood Crush," Diane Peterfreund explains why Edmund is her favorite of the Narnian heroes. He's mine too, and I agree with Peterfreund's analysis. She points out that Edmund qualifies as a bad boy, but what makes him appealing is that he is a reformed bad boy: a bad boy who uses his bad boy past to gain insight into himself and others. 

Peterfreund points out, "Edmund...seemed [to me] to have pulled it together. He may have been somewhat graver than Peter, but he was still a cheerful guy, overall." In other words, he isn't a brooder.

Totally!

In terms of writing, Lewis's success with Edmund is three-fold:

1. Edmund's "fall" is very human. 

He isn't a sociopath. He is a normal human with normal resentment. He does betray his family--and that reality is not glossed over or excused by Lewis--but not for Big Bad, Larger-than-Life reasons. He isn't plotting to overthrow the universe. More Spike than Angel, his "fall" is human, rooted in day-to-day behavior (Lewis makes the point that Edmund has been away at a horrible school and has picked up horrible snide habits, again without excusing Edmund). Edmund's salvation is also very human. For instance--

2. Edmund retains his personality.

Edmund repents and recovers. And he gains a reputation of being wise with the ability to make level-headed judgments/assessments. 

He doesn't lose what makes him Edmund, however. In Voyage of the Dawn Treader, when talking to Eustace, he says, "You were only an ass, but I was a traitor." The tone is perfect. Edmund isn't apologetic. He isn't sappy. He isn't whining. He is matter-of-fact and even slightly sardonic. 

And it is notable that Eustace tells his story to Edmund first. Edmund has a practical nature that tackles problems in a practical fashion. The cousins have one characteristic in common.

3. Edmund's repentance or restoration is something he takes seriously. 

He doesn't dwell on his mistakes but he does use them. In Prince Caspian, when the siblings are lost, Edmund takes Lucy's side on where they should go next, precisely because he once let her down.

In sum, Edmund isn't just a bad-boy-reformed. He is a consistent and believable character who has turned his life around. Lewis accomplishes this feat through entirely non-dramatic characterization.