Plot Similarities: Thomas Hardy and Henry James

 About half way though Thomas Hardy's "Far From the Madding Crowd," I had a sudden thought: that the basic plot was remarkably similar to that of "The Portrait of a Lady," by Henry James.  Both revolve around attractive, independent women who have come into an unexpected, significant inheritance at an early age and who are pursued by three different men.  Both women make the wrong choice when it comes to marriage, but in the end, Hardy goes in one direction and James in another.

The similarities were so striking I thought: "I can't be the only one who thinks so," and, indeed, not.

An Internet search soon turned up a thesis on this very topic, written by a woman named Susan Shepeard in 1976 in partial fulfillment of a Master of Arts degree at William & Mary College in Williamsburg, Virginia.

"The striking similarities in theme, characterization and imagery go so far as to suggest that Hardy's earlier work might have influenced that of James," Ms Shepeard said, and, indeed, there is evidence to suggested that such could have been the case.  When "Far From" first appeared in 1874, it got a distinctly mixed review from James. whose "Portrait" was published in 1881. In other words, he was very familiar with Hardy's story prior to writing his own rather similar story. In addition,  the two men knew each other.

Shepeard's thesis doesn't attempt to resolve that particular controversy, focusing instead on how the two authors progressed from similar starting points to differing views on love and marriage. As such, I highly recommend her thesis to those interested in such ideas and/or the two authors.

One notable difference between the two works is their settings: very rural England in the case of Hardy and rather glittering European society in the case of James, a difference that initially serves to obscure their similarities. A young woman owning and running a farm (albeit on leased land) and, in the process, engaging in a lot of work, is enough to put Bathsheba on a pedestal in "Far From."  In contrast, Isabel, an American, needs the vast wealth she inherits to set her apart in the rather jaded European social milieu in which she finds herself and she has neither need for nor thought of employment.

Each woman is initially pursed by a man attracted to her before she came into wealth and both reject the advances. Both are also pursued by wealthy neighbors whose motives seem not dishonorable if less than ideal for women determined to be more independent than such liaisons would likely permit. And both eventually marry flawed individuals they seem to think they can help, only to be taken advantage of. 

In Hardy's case, certain circumstances serve to give Bathsheba an "out" and she then marries the man she apparently should have in the first place, an outcome Hardy justifies by offering readers a definition of the nature of true love. I wrote about that here.

In the case of James, "Portrait" ends with Isabel in such dreadful, unresolved circumstances that Irish author John Banville not long ago decided a sequel was needed. Banville's effort, "Mrs. Osmond" (Isabel's married name) was published in 2017. It is an interesting if less than totally satisfactory read.

Does it Really Matter Who Choreographs a Ballet?

 An interesting question that has arguably been around for a long time, but which has gained considerable currency lately, is: when it comes to a work of art, if it satisfies a viewer, does it matter who created it?

In other words, once launched, does a work of art (and similarly, a work of intellect) stand on it's own?

While I've written about this a number of times, the latest iteration comes from a comment made by the newly appointed artistic director of the National Ballet of Canada, a woman named Hope Muir.

According to an article in the  July 22, 2021 New York Times, she was an unexpected selection and as a result, Roslyn Sulcas, one of the paper's dance critics, asked her what kind of artistic vision she presented to the ballet company's search committee.

"There wasn't a vision statement as such," Muir replied. "They gave the candidates a three-year programming exercise that included various anchor ballets that you had to incorporate, as well as making sure there was representation of female choreographers, Canadian choreographers, and Black, Indigenous and people of color choreographers in each season."

In other words, just who choreographed a given ballet is to be a more important consideration for the National Ballet of Canada than the quality of the piece. An alternative approach would be, leaving aside the so-called anchor ballets, considering each piece on its merits without knowing the race, color, national identity, gender, sexual orientation, etc. of the choreographer and let the chips fall where they may.

Muir said she found the National Ballet of Canada's requirement fascinating and satisfying "because when you look at ballet repertory, you realize that most ballets are choreographed by white men." 

Well, let's think about those "anchor ballets," one or more of which must be present in every season -- ballets such as "Swan Lake," "The Nutcracker," "Sleeping Beauty," "Giselle" and so on and so forth. Why continue to mount such time-worn productions?  Well, they sell lots and lots of tickets since the public continues to love them. Choreographed by dead white males (a major target of "cancel culture" movements), they in effect subsidize the efforts of all the others.

The more I read about it, the less worried I am about "cancel culture" -- in the long run, at any rate. 

Ultimately, in the eyes of those members of the public that appreciate the arts, individual works will stand or fall on their aesthetic merits. White male choreography -- perish the thought -- will be with us for some time even if contemporary white male choreographers appear likely to find themselves far from "privileged" in the prevailing circumstances. Indeed, based on Ms Muir's comments, when it comes to the National Ballet of Canada, white male choreographers still alive and working can pretty much forget it.

William Faulker’s “Dry September” as a Possible Opera

           The opera takes place one exceptionally hot afternoon and evening in a small town named Jefferson in the American south just after WWI, perhaps around 1920 during the Jim Crow era of strict racial segregation.  A rumor is sweeping town that a Black man has done something transgressive to a local white woman, but no details have been forthcoming.

Principal characters:

           Minnie Cooper (soprano), an unmarried woman about 39, who lives with her ailing mother and a problematic aunt. She’s “on the slim side of ordinary,” frequently goes into town wearing new, voile dresses and tries to represent herself as younger and more desirable than she actually is, asking the children of friends she knew in school to call her “cousin” rather than “auntie.” That’s been the case for several years now, after she had a four-year relationship with a widowed bank clerk about 15 years older than she was. The affair, her first such relationship, ended when he left for Memphis without her and although he returns to Jefferson every Christmas, he has had no interest whatsoever in seeing any more of Minnie.

           Will Mayes (tenor or baritone), an attractive Black man, probably in his late thirties or early forties, who works as a night watchman at an ice-making plant outside of town. Little else is known about him in Faulkner’s story, but in the opera, he recently did an odd job for Minnie.

           Hawkshaw (tenor or baritone), a middle-aged white man who works as a barber with two or three other barbers in a shop in Jefferson. He claims to know both Minnie and Will and insists that if a negro was involved in the rumored incident, it couldn’t have been Mayes. He urges restraint until the facts are known.

            McLendon (bass), a man in his 30s who led troops in WWI and was decorated for his service. He is insistent that whether the rumor is true or not, the untouchable status of white womanhood, and thus of the prevailing order of society, must be maintained whether the facts are clear or not. He questions anyone who would believe a Black man before a white woman. Carrying a pistol, he declares himself the man to lead a mission of retribution and urges others to join him

 Prelude (in front of the curtain)

             There are brief scuffling noises of an indeterminate nature off stage left and Minnie, somewhat disheveled, appears. She starts to run across the stage, but suddenly pauses, quickly glances about, and then briefly checking her attire, tugging a shoulder strap or sleeve down a bit more. She then resumes running in an agitated state. She seems to be saying something, but nothing comprehensible.

 Scene One (a barbershop in town, late on a hot Saturday afternoon)

             The curtain rises on an animated discussion among a group of men – three barbers, a couple of customers in the chairs plus various other men awaiting their turns or just hanging about. Hawkshaw’s chair is downstage and he is shaving a client, evidently a traveling salesman known as a “drummer” passing through town. Prominent among the others is a poorly spoken, hulking youth called Butch.

During the discussion, which is mainly if not entirely sung, Hawkshaw, seemingly out of the blue, declares that if anything did happen, and he doubts it did, that Will Mayes was most definitely not the culprit. He repeatedly says he knows Mayes and that Mayes is “a good nigger.” Hawkshaw’s client accuses him of being “a hell of a whiteman” and the youth accuses him of being “a nigger lover.”

 Another man attempts to quiet the youth, who had lept to his feet. But the salesman backs Buck up, declaring “if there ain’t any white men in this town, you can count on me even if I’m a stranger.”

The man who first attempted to quiet Butch says there is plenty of time to look into things. But the stranger insists there can’t be anything that excuses a nigger for molesting a white woman. He accuses the man of being from somewhere up North and the man responds by saying he was born and raised in Jefferson.

During the course of the discussion, Hawkshaw says he also knows Minnie and implies she’s too much of a spinster to attract the attentions of a man.   Another man asks her age and Hawshaw says she’s about 40. No one says anything more about her.

The youth fulminates, struggling without success to explain his thoughts. (He’s clearly threatened if Blacks are allowed to advance.)

Suddenly a door bangs and there stands McLendon, heavy set, wearing an open white shirt, and a felt hat. “Well,” he sings,” are you going to sit there and let a black son rape a white woman on the streets of Jefferson?”

“That’s what I been telling them,” sings Butch, cursing and fulminating in a ever-more agitated fashion.

­Aria:  McLendon sings an aria in which he mentions his citation for valor in the recent war, says he is ready to lead an immediate mission of retribution and calls on others to join. During the course of this, he advances themes associated with what are known as “the lost cause” of the Confederacy and the Southern way of life, centering on the inviolable nature of fragile, vulnerable women. Such women, the symbol and essence of a superior culture, must be protected at all cost. Blacks, who must keep their place, can’t be allowed to think otherwise. It’s a slippery slope and any perceived transgressions must be nipped in the bud.

 "But did it really happen?” one of those present asks.

 "Happen? What the hell difference does it make? Are you going to let the black sons get away with it until one really does it?" McLendon says as he demand of the group: “Who’s with me?”

Butch jumps up eagerly and several others follow more reluctantly.  McLendon whirls around to head out, the butt of a pistol visible in his back pocket. Hawshaw hesitates for a while, looking at the other two barbers who have remained at their chairs.  Then suddenly, tossing down a towel, he heads after the group.

Scene Two (a deserted property, ice plant visible in the background, a bit later in the afternoon as dusk is just starting to fall.  A black man stands alone, thinking about things.)

 Aria: Will Mayes sings an aria about what it is like to be a Black man in the Jim Crow era. Among other things, he sings about the difficulty of getting an education and finding decent work (he’s about to start his shift as a night watchman). He sings of doing odd jobs for whites, most recently for Millie Cooper and her mother who needed porch steps repaired, grateful that they at least paid him promptly. He sings about wanting to get married and have a child, but also that he’s hesitant to bring anyone else into the world as he experiences it. But he ends on a hopeful note.

The men led by McLendon suddenly arrive, surprising Mayes who asks what they want.

“What is it captains?” Mayes sings, adding “I ain’t done nothing.” He looks at the men, mentioning some names, but not that of Hawkshaw who has claimed to know him.

“Get him into the car,” McLendon demands.

A brief scuffle ensues, during which at one point, Mayes lashes out, randomly hitting Hawkshaw in the mouth, who hits him back.  But he’s rapidly subdued and the men haul him off-stage toward the car (headlights can be seen shining).

 Hawkshaw at first starts to follow, then declares he isn’t going.  They leave him behind.

 Aria: Hawkshaw sings of the hopeless state of things and his own inability to effectively act on what he thinks is right. Society doesn’t have to be this way, but what can change it? What can one man do?

As Hawshaw is finishing his aria, a single shot rings out in the distance, off-stage – far enough away to be somewhat muffled, but still audible.

 Scene 3 (Minnie’s house. She is wearing a robe and bathing out of a tub on the floor. Her aunt is helping her while her mother sits nearby. She’s in an odd mood, a bit distracted, it seems, reminiscing about the past.)

 Aria:  Minnie (with her aunt and/or mother occasionally joining in) reviews her past life: how pretty she was as a girl, how things were going well until other kids started saying rude things about her behind her back (you didn’t understand our station, her aunt or mother sings. We’re proud people who can take care of ourselves even after your father died, but those others don’t think we’re as good as they are. Some families have been here a long time, some even owned slaves.) Minnie continues, singing about her friends pairing up, getting married, having children. They started getting their children to call Minnie “aunty.”  Then the bank clerk with the new car came along (Minnie brightens up) and started “courting her.” (that’s not how the town people saw it, her aunt reminds her. It was like adultery in their eyes).  Minnie bristles. His wife had died, he was a widower. I was still young and pretty, she insists, and he showed me off as we drove around in his car – the first in town.  I was ever so proper in my motoring bonnet and veil. (But he tired of you, picked up and moved to Memphis just like that, the aunt or mother sings). Comes back every Christmas, but not to see you. You’ve got nothing left but the whiskey he taught you to drink).  Minnie’s mood darkens and she starts to sing a different song, but there is a knock on the door.

Two of Minnie’s women friends arrive and the mother and aunt leave the room.

They tell Minnie they are so sorry about what happened and ask her if she feels well enough to go out.  She nods and asks if they can hand her first her underwear and then her new, pink voile dress, all of which is laid out near by.

“When you have had time to get over the shock, you must tell us what happened. What he said and what he did; everything,” one of her friends sings.

Aria:  (Minnie sings as she puts on her sheer underclothes and then her new pink voile dress). I’m not sure what I can tell you because I’m not sure just who he was. I was out back, in a laid back chair in the shade of the two big trees. It was so hot I felt faint and my eyes were closed. I think I was almost sleeping when I felt it like a dream – a hand on my breast. Just every so lightly, you know, that I didn’t move at first. But I awakened and tried to cry out as I rose up, but nothing came out.  The hand was gone and at first I was scared to turn around, but I did and no one was there.  I heard some movement, but couldn’t see anything because of the trees. (She shudders and stops in mid phrase).

"It's alright, Minnie," one of her friends assures her.

 “So he didn’t ….?

 “ … rape me? I …I … I …”

 “McLendon says he deserves to pay if he even thought about it.”

 “McLendon?”

 Minnie for some reason starts to laugh, tries to control it, but can’t. Her friends look confused, then worried.

Aria resumes: Minnie sings in what sounds like a confused state – phrases, then laughter, then phrases – something about men, what they want, what a woman pays, the bank clerk, children, she will show them – more laughter, more confusion – she did what she needed to do. And as she passed through town in her pink voile dress in the wake of the rumor, even lounging young men followed with their eyes. So Faulkner tells readers. So Minnie sings in feverish triumph.

 Minnie’s friends try to calm her.

 “I heard McLendon and some men have gone after Will Mayes,” says one.

 “Will Mayes?”

 “Well, he was at your place, doing some work for you, wasn’t he?”

 Minnie sits up, puts her hand up to her mouth, but can’t stop a hysterical laugh that rapidly turns into screams.

 “Go fetch a doctor” one friend says to another as Minnie’s mother and aunt reappear.

 Aria resumes: Minnie’s hysteria results in her “mad scene” aria along the lines of Lucia’s, or even better (in my humble opinion) the “mad scene” aria sung by Electra in “Idomeneo.” The society of which she is a victim has sacrificed an innocent on its behalf using her plight as an excuse for atrocity. Madness is a salvation.

[What’s going on here?  Minnie, increasingly sexually frustrated after having been abandoned by the bank clerk, a man to whom she sacrificed her reputation as well as perhaps other things, and upon realizing she is reaching the end of the line in such matters at only age about 40, loses her senses and commits a desperate act.

 She invented an incident to make society still see her as a desirable woman without considering the possible consequences. Learning what has transpired, she realizes she has in all probability just killed Will Mayes.

 The desperation of an abandoned woman, in the tradition of Medea, Dido and a host of other, is a  trope, if you will, most recently extensively mined by Elena Ferrante, author of  "The Days of Abandonment" and four novels known as "The Neopolitan Quartet." Abandonment is a major subject for her, Ferrante makes clear in series of interviews.

Minnie, in her days of abandonment, began drinking whiskey supplied by a clerk at a soda fountain, and continued to go out into town in her new voile dresses, insisting that the children of her friends call her “cousin” rather than ”aunty” to reinforce the notion she is still young and potentially desirable.  But it was no use. “Lounging men did not even follow her with their eyes anymore.”

Based on what Ferrante, if no one else, tells us about abandoned women, Minnie’s resentments were thus continuing to build along with, one can fairly assume, her sexual frustrations. Surely her four-year relationship with the bank clerk, given his background, age and likely desires, was not devoid of intimacy.

On the day in question, on the single afternoon and evening during which the story takes place, readers, though the narrator’s eyes, are allowed to see Minnie late in the day, feverish (presumably as a result of the rumored incident) and having trouble dressing while three seemingly sympathetic, but also salaciously curious, female friends await her story.

“While she was still dressing her friends called for her and sat while she donned her sheerest underthings and stockings and new voile dress.” Her friends told her (the narrator relates) that when she got over the shock, she was to tell them everything – “what he said and did.” Who was “he?”

In the eyes of a John McLendon, a WWI veteran who commanded troops and was cited for valor, any Black male would do. “What the hell difference does it make?” he asks when Hawkshaw suggests the sheriff investigate the rumored incident to discover who, if anyone, is to blame. “Are you going to let the black sons get away with it until one really does it?” (my emphasis), McLendon says.

But again back to Minnie: eventually she sallies forth, escorted through the town to a film by her friends, “fragile in her fresh dress” – pink in color readers eventually learn thanks to one observer.

And rather than the apparent lynching, about which readers are told nothing, what happened to Minnie is described in some detail. She wanted to break out laughing and hoped the film would help the laughter under control “so it would not waste away so fast and so soon.” She clearly wants to enjoy something she has apparently pulled off, but to no avail. Her friends hear her, take her home in a taxi “where they removed her pink voile and sheer underthings and stockings.”  They put her to bed and as her laughter, increasingly hysterical, turns to screams, send for a doctor, but since it was a Saturday evening, one couldn’t easily be found.

An abandoned woman, one might argue, is a force of nature. While Dido limited the destruction by killing herself with a sword Aneas, her lover and the founder of Rome, had left her as a souvenir, Medea murdered her own sons by Jason, who abandoned her, as well as various others.

“Can one continue to live if one loses love?” Ferrante asks in an essay contained in her book of miscellany called Frantumaglia. “It seems like a pretty much discredited subject; in reality it’s the question most crudely posed by female existence. The loss of love is a failure; it causes an absence of sense.” [my emphasis]]

 Scene 4 (About midnight, at Mclendon’s neat new, but very small house)

 Mclendon returns home and discovers his wife sitting up, waiting for him. He demands to know why, telling her he has repeatedly told her not to.

 Aria:  McLendon’s wife sings “what kind of a man have you become since you went away to the war?  I still want you, but I don’t know you anymore. Within you there is no longer love, but hatred.”

When she has finished, McLendon slaps her and pushes her half over the chair where she remains, sobbing.

McLendon walks over to a screened-in window and gazes vacantly outward, removing his shirt, which he uses to wipe down his sweat-coved body. The butt of a gun is visible in his rear pocket.

Curtain

 

 

 

 

"A, S, D, F" Is a Text That Flows From Childhood Sex Abuse

I hesitate to call "A, S, D, F," a recent New Yorker fiction offering, a story since it isn't much of one. Instead, let's just call it a text, which is how a contemporary literary academic would refer it to it in any event. It's a text not so much about childhood sex abuse as it is a text that derives from such abuse.

In a nutshell, it's about a man who is going nowhere in life, which, come to think about it, characterizes a lot of New Yorker fiction these days. Also, like most current New Yorker offerings, this piece is promotional in nature, It's taken from a book of short stories by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh called "American Estrangement" scheduled to be published in August 2021.  My guess is that in return for printing this, the publisher, W.W. Norton & Co., gave it to the New Yorker free of  charge and made the author available for the usual interview as well. As a subscriber, I can't help wondering if a subscription price discount might be in order.

The protagonist of the piece seems to have one notable talent: he can type 70 words a minute on a manual typewriter with commendable if not total accuracy and as such seems to be of value to his employer, the owner of what amounts to a vanity art gallery in Aspen. Colorado. From that comes the title -- the first four keys upon which the fingers of one's left hand typically rest as one gets ready to type.

Touch typing is muscle or body memory and unlike mental memory, is arguably never forgotten. In this case, the body memory of typing is an allegory for the body memory of childhood sex abuse, which also apparently can't be forgotten even if suppressed. I use the word "apparently" only because I did not experience any such abuse myself and thus hesitate to say anything definitive about it.

Well down into the text, readers are told, more of less in passing, that when the unnamed protagonist was a child, his mother once left him with  neighbor and something happened. "No name, no face, no address. In other words, nothing actionable. I assume the doctor would say the memory has intentionally been buried."  

But clearly, not entirely.

In the New Yorker author interview, one learns that Mr. Sayrafiezadehthe himself was sexually abused as a child and is still attempting to come to terms with it -- in part at least by crafting this particular text. It apparently wasn't easy because according to the author, "A, S, D, F" went through about 20 drafts before emerging in its current form. As such, does it ultimately make a lot more sense to the author than it will to most readers?  I wouldn't be surprised if that were the case.

But then there is a familiar trope at the end: the protagonist, clearly submissive in nature, meets a woman of the other persuasion. Are they right for each other?  Not even the author knows, readers of the interview learn.

In Defense of Donald Byrd's Recent Offering for PNB

 It feels a little strange for me to come to the defense of Donald Byrd, a nationally known ballet and dance choreographer based here in Seattle whose work I have tried to like in years past without much success.

But I did enjoy a recent piece he did for Pacific Northwest Ballet called "And the sky is not cloudy all day" that was dismissed for a couple of reasons by Brian Sibert in an April 2, 2021 review published in the New York Times. 

I wasn't originally going to write about this, but PNB recently announced that one upside of its 2020/2021 all-digital season was that the programming attracted ticket purchasers in over 30 foreign countries as well as in all 50 U.S. states.  As a result, the company's forthcoming season will continue to be offered digitally at the same time PNB resumes performances before live audiences.

"And the sky is not cloudy all day" are well-known lyrics from a song called "Home on the Range" that was most famously sung by Roy Rodgers, known as king of the cowboys.  Byrd, recalling his boyhood dreams of being a cowboy, said he choreographed the piece to Aaron Copeland-sounding music by John Adams by way of nostalgia.

Danced by six men dressed in cowboy attire right down to their boots, the piece "presents a picture of something that existed only in my boyhood imagination," Byrd explained in the program notes. "It is like the 'dream ballet' in a Broadway musical. It steps out of time and reality to present a vision free of harshness, where the bloody narrative of the massacre of the Native people is not there."

Sibert, in his review, beat up on the piece for two reasons. First, he called it "not much of an idea" that came across as sluggish and sloppy "compounded by the way boots blunt ballet footwork."  In contrast, I found Byrd's choreography for men in boots surprisingly convincing from a balletic point of view. 

Secondly, Sibert, who is white, raked Byrd, who is Black, over the coals for being insufficiently woke, calling the ballet disappointing from a choreographer "who can usually be counted on for a strong point of view, especially on matters of history and race."

Seattle performing arts companies, especially in the wake of Black Lives Matter and the George Floyd atrocity, have been falling all over themselves to both include more people of color in their programming and to be more attentive to various long-standing grievances of American minorities. In that context, Byrd's choice of subject matter may have come as a bit of a shock to PNB artistic director Peter Boal who felt compelled to put the following in his program notes to "And the sky is not cloudy ...":

"Tragically the dream of one group resulted in the conquest and genocide of another. As we grapple with our failures as a nation of many people -- some privileged and included, and some persecuted and excluded -- we also look for strands of hope, inspiration, and even dreams." (The boldface emphasis there is that of Mr. Boal.)

While art over the ages has from time to time had a sociopolitical focus, that has not always been the case and it need not be always the case at present. Aesthetics, which has to do with beauty and good taste, has long been the principle domain of art and there is no reason individual works of art can't continue to reside therein. Because Byrd has choreographed one particular dance that is fundamentally aesthetic in nature does not at all mean that he is insufficiently attuned to social justice concerns. 

Once released, a work of art can stand on it's own terms, can make it's own statement, independent of prevailing social currents. "And the sky is not cloudy .,," is in no respect flawed because it apparently fails to take into consideration conquest, genocide, privilege, exclusion, etc. etc.

One can criticize it on other grounds and despite the fact I liked the piece, it could have been better. In my obviously insufficiently woke opinion, Bryd came up a bit short not on grounds of Political Correctness, but rather because he fell short on character development.  His cowboys needed to get beyond being just "a type."

Early in the pandemic, I watched a video offered by the American Ballet Theater in which former ABT soloist Sascha Radetsky taught his wife, former ABT principal dancer Stella Abrera, how to dance one of the three sailors in Jerome Robbins iconic ballet "Fancy Free," choreography that Robbins also used for the Broadway Musical "On the Town."  Both are about the antics of girl-chasing sailors on a very brief shore leave in New York city.

While Robbins' characters were most definitely "a type," he was careful through a host of often small variations in choreography to make sure they came across as three distinct individuals as well,

That's where Byrd came up short, but there is no reason he can't improve his piece for future performances -- if there are any. I think it has great possibilities.

The Literature of Olivia Rodrigo's "Sour" & Elena Ferrante

This is another post in which I look at the lyrics of popular songs from a literary point of view. It deals with a recent, very popular album called “Sour,” written and sung by Olivia Rodrigo, that consists of a number of closely linked songs akin to the chapters of a book.

The point of view is first person singular and genre is essentially “chic lit,” the topics being mainly those that would resonate with women in the teenage to Young Adult age spectrum. Despite certain shortcomings, I think it is a very commendable effort and perhaps even more so if one listens to the music, which I didn’t.

The topic is all too familiar: a girl has lost her boyfriend to another girl and in that context, it is interesting to compare it to the approaches taken by both Taylor Swift, who dealt with a similar  situation by way of three songs on her recent “Folklore” album, and with Elena Ferrante, author of a number of books, most famously four novels known as the Neapolitan Quartet.

Let's take Ferrante first because Rodrigo's effort is all about a young woman who has been abandoned by her boyfriend and that is a recurring theme throughout Ferrante's writing. Indeed, one of her novels is entitled "The Days of Abandonment" and asked whether it was feminist in nature, Ferrante replied:

"Yes, because it's sustained by the female reaction to abandonment, from Medea and Dido on. No, because it doesn't aim at telling what is the theoretically and practically correct reaction of the contemporary woman faced with the loss of the beloved man nor does it brand male behaviors as vile."

That's a comment one should keep firmly in mind when considering "Sour."

Shifting gears, Taylor Swift, who Rodrigo has said she greatly admires, tried to get to the heart of her breakup story by looking at what happened through the differing points of view of the three protagonists whereas Rodrigo sticks to just that of the abandoned woman. But in my view, Swift failed to take good advantage of her technique.

Both Swift and Rodrigo seem to have difficulty fleshing out the character of a man and that's one of the reasons their lyrics are chic-lit in nature. In both instances, their men are one-dimensional – akin to cardboard cutouts -- and it’s hard to see why the women who lost them found them attractive in the first place. They are simply foils for the expression of female emotions ranging from love to hate plus much in between, which is probably nothing new when it comes to songwriting. But as literature, it can be a major shortcoming.

In any event, “Sour,” like a good opera, opens in media res with our 17-year-old songwriter heroine – why not call her Olivia? -- proclaiming insecurity and wallowing in self-pity.

“I’m not cool and I’m not smart and I can’t even parallel park,” she moans, declaring her ego to be in such a crushed state that she wishes she could disappear.

 Life is brutal thanks to a traitor -- a boyfriend who has just left her for another girl. She’s a loser (this will be of considerable significance in due course) and that’s tough apart from lost love, or perhaps lost late adolescent infatuation. In short, she's been abandoned and as a result, is left feeling both highly vulnerable and in her view, justifiably angry.

The young man’s departure was apparently not all that unexpected. As the story proceeds, it becomes increasingly clear that he meant a lot more to Olivia than she did to him, but Olivia has trouble believing that and accepting the idea that what a person says can easily be situational as opposed to valid for all time.

A major reason she can’t accept what has happened is because she consistently failed to be true to herself throughout the relationship.

“I kept quiet so I could keep you,” she says. Winning is apparently what it was all about.

While her boyfriend was clearly no great prize -- “loved you at your worst, but that didn’t matter” -- she wasn’t either.

The young man in question has taken up with an older girl (even a couple of years can seem significant when one is 17) who is more sophisticated and more comfortable in her own skin than is our heroine.

“She’s everything I’m insecure about,” Olivia bleats.

And to make matters worse, the new girl – no need to give her a name because she’s essentially a trope – has blonde hair. Life is unfair, Olivia eventually comes to understand -- to her credit.

As a budding teenage songwriter, Olivia finds comfort in the power and validity of music. As such she can’t believe her former boyfriend can actually get along without her because of what he said in a certain song he wrote. Surely a song is where truth lies.

But with such thoughts predictably going nowhere, Olivia turns to more prosaic matters, revolving around a teenage rite of passage – a driver’s license.

Despite her inability to parallel park, she somehow managed to get one just the previous week. This was at the urging of her boyfriend who had wanted her to be able to drive over to his place as opposed to him having to spend time picking her up.

“I know we weren’t perfect,” she admits, which is undoubtedly an understatement.

Moving on is necessary, but not easy. At times, Olivia feels she is taking 1 step forward only to then take not just the usual two, but 3 steps back.

Much of this has to do with her acquiesce to subservient status in a relationship within which she felt “pretty” or “fun” only if her boyfriend told her such was the case.

“I hate that I gave you power over that kind of stuff,” she complains, without much justification. After all, as she says, she was the one who set things up in that fashion.

But then the story gets murky as self-abasement rears its ugly head.

Maybe, she says, she found it exciting to never really know how her boyfriend was going to treat her next: love her, want her, hate her, walk her to her door, send her home crying?

“The roller coaster is all I’ve ever had,” she tells us, the word “ever” suggesting her recent failed relationship may be just the proverbial tip of an iceberg.

In fact, Olivia may well be in therapy (she has told us nothing about her background) and perhaps that’s how she was able to find a therapist for her boyfriend, who she sees as having  benefitted from such help – far more than she herself has, it appears.  Olivia still believes she has to make herself into someone she isn’t.

Her former boyfriend is looking happy and healthy since he left her and is even a better man for his current girl. He has purchased a new car and his career is taking off, leaving her crying on her bathroom floor, his apathy salt in her wounds.

Good 4 u she thinks (tweets?), with sarcasm rather more hopeful than genuine.

Then Olivia steers off in a different direction. Perhaps it was fortunate her boyfriend dumped her, she decides to believe, depicting him as damaged goods. His new relationship isn’t so great. Rather, (pardon Olivia’s French) it’s déjà vu.

While the blonde boasts to her friends the young man is “unique,” Olivia sees his prevailing behavior (which she seems to know a lot about), as just a replay of the things he did with her.

Like trading jackets, or recycling jokes Olivia told him, or enjoying a particular Billy Joel song with his new girl, like they did.

“When are you going to tell her we did that, too?”

To his credit – although perhaps unfortunately for others – the young man remains true to himself, a characteristic Olivia finds infuriating.

While he made no concessions, she eviscerated her true self in an effort to become the person she thought he wanted. This, by the way, could be straight out of "Days of Abandonment" and Ferrante's depiction of her heroine, Olga.

Rodrigo's heroine wore makeup because she thought her boyfriend liked the Prom Queen look. She learned how he wanted his coffee and memorized his favorite songs. She read his self-help books so he would think she was smart.

“All I ever wanted was to be enough for you.” (Such was the case with respect to Olga as well.)

But the remake didn’t work (Olivia failed to become "exciting") and is left feeling “I just want myself back.”

Time goes by – it’s now a month later – and Olivia is somewhat more reconciled to the loss of  “all the sunlight of our past.”

The young man’s current girl friend is sweet and pretty and apparently also able to bring out the better in him, but perhaps to an insufficient degree. Olivia believes he is lying to her as well.

She can't give up the notion she and the young man had really been happy together before it all unraveled and, with a certain degree of noblesse oblige, even expresses hope he’s happy with the new girl, as long as he isn’t happier. In other words, Olivia still isn’t willing to admit defeat. She was the real thing; he just hasn’t figured it out. She isn't a loser!

But wait a minute: there's at least one more possibility. Perhaps society is to blame. What a concept!

Girls are pushed into presenting themselves with perfect bodies and white teeth and there they all are, out on social media, looking too good to be true.

Olivia, fixated with having failed to measure up, wants to throw away the phone upon which she views the competition – Instagram or wherever.

“I know their beauty is not my lack, but it feels like that weight is on my back.” 

She so desperately wants to be like such girls: happier, prettier, jealously, jealously. This is straight out of Edvard Munch. Olivia would fit right into "The Frieze of Life."

Well, those thoughts, too, are unproductive so it’s time for yet another tack. How about a notion of complicity?

Dumping her was her boyfriend’s favorite crime, she decides, but what if she was his accomplice? Only one person’s heart was broken, but “four hands bloody.” Knowing full well what he was capable of, she told lies and defended him to others “just so I could call you mine.”

That pretty much brings us to the end of the story, except that, like a good, old-fashioned tale, it has a moral to it.

Olivia has become a better person as a result of her misfortune in the sense that she is now able to see less fortunate members of society – a somewhat dorky boy she once knew and a lonely girl struggling to get away from dreadful parents – in a new light.

The aren’t the losers she probably once thought they were when she was riding high. They simply were unlucky – they got a bad deal of the cards of life when they were born as she herself did if for a girl, looks, and especially blonde hair, are pretty much everything.

She hopes the boy somehow converted his lousy hand into a royal flush and she decides the girl is commendably courageous in her attempt to “unlearn all their hatred.”

Nothing is forever, nothing is as good as it once might have appeared, and every door is hard to close. Those are Olivia’s closing thoughts as she realizes her setback was nothing special, nothing out of the ordinary in the grand sweep of things. She’s learned the value of empathy and compassion. A life worth living is not “all about me.”

Her teenage Dream was just that and her boyfriend’s behavior was not all that bad.

“We don’t talk much, but I just gotta say. I miss you and I hope you’re ok.”

Like Ferrante, Rodrigo does not ultimately brand male behavior as vile.

The ending saves it and as a result, I'd give this one a B+.

About Whether Works of Art & Intellect Stand on Their Own

 A topic I have written about in the past is:

Should a work of art or intellect stand on its own after it has been released to the public, or is its worth subject to reevaluation because society at some point takes a different view of the merits of its  creator?

The most obvious recent example of this on-going controversy was a decision by the publisher WW Norton to take Blake Bailey's massive biography of author Philip Roth out of print shortly after it was released because Bailey was then publicly accused of sexual assault or harassment by various women in earlier years. 

Before the accusations became public, the high-profile book received generally positive reviews in major publications, suggesting that readers interested in Roth (never a favorite author of mine despite his stature) would be well-served by Bailey's efforts.  That is presumably still the case. No one, before the accusations surfaced, seems to have said: "this book is flawed; it reads like it was written from the perspective of a sex offender and as a result, lacks credibility (or whatever)."

Technically, of course, Bailey is not a sex offender having not been tried and convicted of such an offense. But he stands accused and in the prevailing Me Too climate, that's enough. As a result, Baily's work of intellect has gone from praiseworthy to toxic, or so it seems.

Alternatively, I suppose one could view Norton's reasoning as: while the contents of the book are still valid, neither Bailey nor Norton deserve to collect any money from it because of Bailey's alleged past behavior. The publisher released its rights to the book, saying anyone else could publish it, and said it would donate an amount equal to the author's advance to  organizations that fight against sexual assault or harassment and make efforts to protect survivors.

I mention this in part because of a somewhat related curiosity. The New York Times just ran one of its "five minutes of music" features in the online edition.  This time around, a group of luminaries selected brief samples of their favorite Classical choral music so as to help expose interested readers to that genre.

One of them, Leila Adu-Gilmore,  a New Zealand performer/composer of Ghanaian descent, with a doctorate in music composition from Princeton, said: "As a woman of color and a composer, I struggle with the Classical period. Widely thought of as the height of Western European culture, this was a time full of violent colonization and slavery." 

In other words, the works of, say, Mozart can't be enjoyed on their own musical merits. One cannot consider anything written by a white European who lived in a time of colonization and slavery to be enjoyable or beautiful. If you like Mozart, that presumably means you approve of violent colonization and slavery.

So, instead, Ms. Adu-Gilmore chose an excerpt from a piece written by a woman born in 1098, which she said predates the age of violent colonization and slavery. The woman in question was a Christian nun and mystic named Hildegard of Bingen and her composition is of merit because by linking nature and the divine, it connects us as humans through time, Ms Adu-Gilmore said.

In response, in the comment section of the NYT feature, a person identified as Jeff from Toronto had the following to say:

"No surprise Adu-Gilmore didn't pick anything by Beethoven, who spent many years working on an opera about the struggle for freedom of a political prisoner. Why the racial stereotypes? And gender stereotypes -- there's no evidence that the racial attitudes of Hildegard of Bingen were any different from those of the men of her time, but Adu-Gilmore gives her a pass because she was female. OK, she says it's because Hildegard "predates" the colonial era and slavery, but so what, she still benefited from serfdom. As if that has any relevance to her music."

Further, here is a comment from JM, of the Northeast section of the U.S.:

"I was disturbed when I read the introduction by Leila Adu-Gilmore. I am a practicing musician and I have seen first hand how it is becoming increasingly fashionable to dismiss the works of "dead white European men" as one of my colleagues put it. Adu-Gilmore struggles with the Classical period because it "was a time full of violent colonization and slavery." She then points out that Hildegard predates all of that misery. She conveniently forgets that there was a thriving slave trade during the Middle Ages, and Hildegard was a member of the Catholic Church at a time when forced conversion, torture and religious military conquest was not unheard of. Should we all have issues with medieval music? That seems to be what Adu-Gilmore is saying. If we start rejecting our music solely based on the social or political environment in which it was written, there will be nothing left to listen to. No musical era is without abhorrent political events. The comment by Adu-Gilmore is musically irresponsible and sets a dangerous precedent."

So what do you think: should a work of art or intellect stand on its own terms, or should its worth be measured by the moral status of its creator or the by the moral status of the society in which it was created?

What will Ms Adu-Gilmore think about that piece of choral music if records surface that show Hildegard, in her role of head nun of an abbey, took advantage of her young charges in certain, inappropriate ways?  Will that be, as the saying goes, "the day the music died?"