Tonight I’m seeing the Broadway revival of Ragtime—which is Andrew’s all-time favorite musical, by the way—and in preparation, I’m reading E. L. Doctorow’s novel. (Can I finish the last 80 pages between the end of work and the start of the show? We’ll see!)
Lord have mercy, this book is great. I know it came out in 1975, but it’s new to me, and I’m flush with discovery. Are Doctorow’s other novels this excellent?
In case you don’t know it, Ragtime is a work of historical fiction about the start of the twentieth century in America. It tackles race, religion, class, art, and the American identity, and it hangs those themes on a story about families whose lives collide.
Since I haven’t finished reading, I don’t want to write a review, but I had to share this passage, which opens chapter twenty seven. It’s one of the best things I’ve read in ages…
Spring, spring! Like a mad magician flinging silks and covered rags from his trunk, the earth produced the yellow and white crocus, the fox grape, the forsythia flowering on its stalks, the blades of iris, the apple tree blossoms of pink and white and green, the heavy lilac and the daffodil. Grandfather stood in the yard and gave a standing ovation. A breeze came up and blew from the maples a shower of spermatozoic soft-headed green buds. They caught in his sparse gray hair. He shook his head with delight, feeling a wreath had been bestowed. A joyful spasm took hold of him and he stuck his leg out in an old man’s jig, lost his balance, and slid on the heel of his shoe into a sitting position. In this manner he cracked his pelvis and entered a period of declining health from which he would not recover. But the spring was joyful and even in pain he wore a smile. Everywhere the sap rose and the birds sang.
First, this paragraph gives you delicious images like the earth as a mad magician and green buds falling on a man’s head like a wreath. Then in activates those images by describing Grandfather’s Dionysian response. There’s a wild, pulsing life in the old man, a “joyful spasm,” that makes this pastoral scene much more than pleasant.
And then we learn this ecstasy destroys him. Death blows through the backyard like a chill wind.
When I started this paragraph, I had no idea this is where it would take me, and that sums up my experience of Ragtime.
I love the paragraph’s final twist, too: You might think the presence of death would quell Grandfather’s passion, but it doesn’t. His smile in the face of death—I imagine something feral in it—complicates the scene even more. You can die in life and live in death; one doesn’t cancel the other. Oh, and besides? The sap and the birds keep going. There’s a life outside the human experience that takes no notice of our joy and our jigs and our broken bones.
All that in one paragraph. Lord have mercy, this book is great.
13 responses so far ↓
1 ferretrick // Nov 19, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Apparently I’m just in a negative mood today, but that paragraph seems really overwritten to me. I’ll admit that I’m not familiar with Doctorow’s work; maybe it works better in the overall novel.
2 Doug // Nov 19, 2009 at 1:50 pm
It’s one of my all-time favorite shows, and one of my all-time favorite novels. And it’s not even Doctorow’s best.
3 Mark Blankenship // Nov 19, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Ooh! Which would you say is his best? I’m already itching to read more.
4 Robert Scott // Nov 19, 2009 at 2:06 pm
It was a great book. I read it so long ago I don’t remember the plot but I remember I loved it and a quote he made to an interviewer about the book.
But this note is about the movie you kinda slammed today. I have not read the book. I will. I have not seen the movie and I will. Lighten up. Some times joy happens for no damn reason understandable. Embrace the mystery while you’re looking for things to fix in the world.
Cordial regards,
Bob
5 Mark Blankenship // Nov 19, 2009 at 2:07 pm
Hi Bob… Which movie are you talking about, exactly? The last movie I wrote about was “Precious,” and I really liked it.
6 Kelly Anne // Nov 19, 2009 at 2:51 pm
I was lucky enough to see this show on Broadway and be in a production of it at a local theatre – what a wonderful show. I hope you enjoy the production – I’ve heard some good things about it.
The book is … very interesting. It sometimes leans on the side of overwritten, but as a whole it works. It’s hard to describe. I know some people that utterly hated it, but I enjoyed it when I read it.
7 Doug // Nov 19, 2009 at 6:12 pm
Book of Daniel might be my favorite. Loon Lake and Billy Bathgate are both v. good as well. (Too bad Bathgate and Ragtime both made for abhorrent adaptations.)
Enjoy the show. It’s great!
8 Laura Mc. // Nov 19, 2009 at 8:28 pm
Yeah, isn’t the no-dialogue thing cool?
I have a dirty secret, which is I rarely read for pleasure.. but I loved this book!! I should read his other stuff at some point.
The musical was wonderful. Saw originating actress for Emma Golman. Name escapes me at the moment, but she made me cry during “He Wanted to Say.” One of you will know her. She’s some fabulous diva who eats people like me for breakfast.
9 Laura Mc. // Nov 19, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Goldman, rather. Googled name: Judy Kaye
10 Stef // Nov 20, 2009 at 10:52 am
I’ll add a second for Book of Daniel ….
11 Seth Christenfeld // Nov 20, 2009 at 11:26 am
Just stay away from The Waterworks, which is terrible. (As opposed to waterworks, which is what Ragtime has a tendency to bring out.)
12 Michael // Nov 20, 2009 at 2:19 pm
I have some mixed feelings about the musical–the Forbidden Broadway parody was dead-on–but it has great things going for it; the novel, on the other hand, is one of a kind–extravagant, madly inclusive, risky, occasionally over-the-top (and hard to reduce to the stage without revealing some schematic clunkiness) . . . glad for your enjoyment, Mark.
13 Doug // Nov 20, 2009 at 10:19 pm
I think Judy Kaye was the original Emma, no? She won a Tony as Carlotta in Phantom, and kicked ass in Souvenir.
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