“Remorse—and notoriety—finally led me to Rand Barry” (212). John William has recently died and Neil felt the need to apologize to his parents (however, Mrs. Barry is insane, so he did not speak with her). Rand spoke with him after the news of the money came out and told him many things that John William had never felt the need to divulge to Neil. Rand claims that the entire burden of blame should be placed on his and his wife’s shoulders, but primarily his wife’s. She was an insane woman whose beliefs of how to raise the infant John William overtook Rand’s beliefs, because as she claimed that his job was to be the breadwinner, and she would take care of the infant at home. Her way of “taking care” of John William, as Rand told it, “Virginia believed…that you didn’t want to positively reinforce the negative behavior of crying by offering comfort” (217). John William was neglected, left alone to cry all night, but Rand couldn’t, and Virginia wouldn’t do anything about it. Rand describes the flaws in his wife’s plan, “you can’t mistreat an infant like that and afterward have a reasonable expectation that all will go right in adulthood” (217). This is one example of how John William was not cared for as a child, however even when he was cared for, his parents missed some things.
John William was described as a boy wonder, the young genius. He was so intelligent; he began the hobby of telescope making at age thirteen. This intelligence enthralled his father, who believed that this gift who soon be harbored into a great future for his son. However, this intelligence kept Rand and Virginia at their distance when he was a teen, leading to even more neglect and John William’s sense of not belonging in this world. “I didn’t see, and neither did Ginnie, how this might have what you would call a dark side” (241). A dark side, in the fact that John William’s interests began to veer sharply away from the educated path, preferring instead to continue on his own path, one that does not involve schooling in any way, because as he said at age fourteen, “The stuff they teach you at school is just so they can own you” (243). So, we can now see that the path that John William chose was chosen at a very young age, and it was surely influenced by the lack of love and respect that he was shown as a child. Without the guidance of a true maternal figure and the love they exhibit, he lacked the understanding that others can be forgiving and kind. The weakness that his father showed simply made him expect all men to be weak, and that was not what he wanted, he wanted to have the power to live on his own, so he simply left the “hamburger world” and went to live on his own, simply because of the neglect he had been shown as a child.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
The Other: Blog 5 3-15-09
We pick up the story with sacrifice, and the desired happy ending of so many stories. Alas, John William is not doing well. He is cranky, and running out of luck. An elk was killed near his cave, and when he came upon it, he decided to cook it, however, he only managed to save a fore and hindquarter. This meat was planned to last the entire winter, even though it was found before June. It didn’t last past July. The interesting part is what he does with the rest of the elk. “He’d rolled up its antlers, teeth, bladder, hooves, and sinew in its hide” (173). That may seem to be the obvious thing to do, but what if you had to do this with something else? Someone or something you weren’t planning on eating or using to make garments? John William’s demeanor became very defensive whenever Neil tried to communicate with him. Neil asked him to play chess, smoke dope, leave the cave, and meet a woman, but every time John William shot him down, saying that dope gave him nightmares, or leaving is crazier than staying and going crazy (175). John William began to lose everything he had wanted, from dope, the first commonality between Neil and himself, to chess, their two great minds working against each other to gain the upper hand, to his freedom. Living in the woods was great for him, he didn’t want to be in the “hamburger world”, but was he really outside this world? Neil constantly brought him items from general stores, and he didn’t turn them away, instead he welcomed them, but was too afraid, (self-conscious?) to go out and buy it for himself. John William was a narrow minded individual who wouldn’t rest until he had the life that he wanted, even if he didn’t know what life he wanted…
“John William died” (177). I didn’t like this book, but this section was so well written that I couldn’t put the book down. These three simple words; completely changed the dynamics of the novel. The comparison to the elk comes here when Neil “got up, reluctantly, and did what I thought I should do, which was to shove John William’s remains onto the mat and roll them up…he fit” (178). This was the saddest part, whether Mr. Guterson meant to compare the portaging of an elk’s remains to that of a human’s or not, I couldn’t avoid it. Not to be cynical, but wasn’t this what John William had wanted? He wanted to be alone in the wild, having to fend for himself. He always tried to send Neil away whenever he came by. I don’t know but, it seems almost fitting, that may be a horrible thing to say, but that is what came to mind when I read this part. Back in the present, Neil has moved on past his friend’s death, he took up a poem written by Han Shan, a Chinese poet that John William had loved reading.
A hermit’s hear it heavy
He mourns the passing years
He looks for roots and mushrooms
He seeks eternal life in vain (186).
While, John William was not looking for eternal life, he was surely looking for a better life; one that he hoped would lead to true happiness.
This happiness may never have been achieved but Neil certainly came close when he found out as the title of chapter 7 says, he was the “nineteenth-richest person in Washington State”. In the spring of this year a report came out in the Seattle Times saying that there were human remains in Olympic National Park and that there was evidence of long-term habitation and potential foul play (199). When Neil was eventually identified as a friend of the deceased, an attorney, Mark Sides, called him up and had Neil come down to his office where he announced the good news, “as we speak, you and I, you’re the nineteenth-richest person in Washington State. Give or take you net worth is four hundred forty million dollars” (205). Turns out that John William had left all he owned to Neil, 440 million dollars worth. I can’t quite tell you if this section focuses on positives or negatives, per se. Would you rather lose your best friend, who lived in the middle of the woods as a hermit and gain 440 million dollars? Or, keep your friend who didn’t seem to want you around, except when you brought him stuff he could use, and thus insult you for being too caught up in the hamburger world. That’s a choice that really cannot be made; it has to be made for you, just like it was for Neil.
“John William died” (177). I didn’t like this book, but this section was so well written that I couldn’t put the book down. These three simple words; completely changed the dynamics of the novel. The comparison to the elk comes here when Neil “got up, reluctantly, and did what I thought I should do, which was to shove John William’s remains onto the mat and roll them up…he fit” (178). This was the saddest part, whether Mr. Guterson meant to compare the portaging of an elk’s remains to that of a human’s or not, I couldn’t avoid it. Not to be cynical, but wasn’t this what John William had wanted? He wanted to be alone in the wild, having to fend for himself. He always tried to send Neil away whenever he came by. I don’t know but, it seems almost fitting, that may be a horrible thing to say, but that is what came to mind when I read this part. Back in the present, Neil has moved on past his friend’s death, he took up a poem written by Han Shan, a Chinese poet that John William had loved reading.
A hermit’s hear it heavy
He mourns the passing years
He looks for roots and mushrooms
He seeks eternal life in vain (186).
While, John William was not looking for eternal life, he was surely looking for a better life; one that he hoped would lead to true happiness.
This happiness may never have been achieved but Neil certainly came close when he found out as the title of chapter 7 says, he was the “nineteenth-richest person in Washington State”. In the spring of this year a report came out in the Seattle Times saying that there were human remains in Olympic National Park and that there was evidence of long-term habitation and potential foul play (199). When Neil was eventually identified as a friend of the deceased, an attorney, Mark Sides, called him up and had Neil come down to his office where he announced the good news, “as we speak, you and I, you’re the nineteenth-richest person in Washington State. Give or take you net worth is four hundred forty million dollars” (205). Turns out that John William had left all he owned to Neil, 440 million dollars worth. I can’t quite tell you if this section focuses on positives or negatives, per se. Would you rather lose your best friend, who lived in the middle of the woods as a hermit and gain 440 million dollars? Or, keep your friend who didn’t seem to want you around, except when you brought him stuff he could use, and thus insult you for being too caught up in the hamburger world. That’s a choice that really cannot be made; it has to be made for you, just like it was for Neil.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
The Other: Blog 4 03-10-09
John William recently became the heir to an entire fortune, and because of his age, he received his inheritance from his mother, that is the entire fortune seeing that he is her only son. So, as is to be expected, John William ahs no need for this money, so he gets rid of it the best way he can.
The note inside [the abandoned camper] said, BARGAIN BASEMENT LOVERS: PLEASE COME GET MY CAR. THANKS—SIMON MAGUS…we came to the road end, and, sure enough, there was John William’s Impala, under the trees…we found…seven hundred of what some of my students call Benjamins: that is seven hundred one-hundred-dollar bills. There was also a note…reading, KEEP THE MONEY BUT TAKE THE CAR TO SAN DIEGO & LEAVE IT THERE (133-134).
John William managed to turn over the money and the car to Neil and Jamie in the form of a treasure hunt. He gave the money away because he has no reason for keeping it seeing that he was going to live the rest of his life in the woods. But the treasure hunt seemed to have meaning. John William was constantly pestering Neil about not having found a real place in the world, how teaching wasn’t for him, and that he needed to find his own road. The treasure hunt seemed to signify someone searching for something, but they don’t know what it is. Exactly how John William felt about Neil, and sometimes how Neil felt about himself. John William’s resilience to the modern lifestyle continues when Neil asks, “What makes [this lifestyle in the woods] better than seventy thousand bucks...you could have this and the money” but John William replies, “No, you can’t. Money ruins things” (138).
Even though Neil felt as though his friend had lost his mind, he kept visiting him, to keep him company. They also played a lot of chess, the primary game of strategy that the world has known for over four hundred years. John William had always been the better player, so in order not to embarrass himself; Neil read up on chess strategies and focused primarily on the art of sacrifice. When they finished a certain 3-day 21-game tournament, the conversation read, “‘You’ve got it dialed in.’ [said John William] ‘What’s that?’ ‘Sacrifice.’ [John William replied]” (152). Once again, the simple act of sacrifice in the game of chess has a greater meaning. Sacrifice was something that John William had readily accepted throughout his life, from letting go of the material world, to letting go of seventy thousand dollars. However, Neil is now learning that he doesn’t have to have everything, and he is beginning to accept John William’s point of view when he tells Jamie, “Nope” in response to her question “Are you ratting him out?” (153). He is giving up some of his “valuable” time that he has with Jamie, and that he needs to study for school, to spend with his friend that he had, at one time, dismissed as crazy. Sacrifice is the primary topic in this section, and we see that sacrifice can be used to feint one’s true intentions, and it can also be the path that leads to the happy ending, I hope…
The note inside [the abandoned camper] said, BARGAIN BASEMENT LOVERS: PLEASE COME GET MY CAR. THANKS—SIMON MAGUS…we came to the road end, and, sure enough, there was John William’s Impala, under the trees…we found…seven hundred of what some of my students call Benjamins: that is seven hundred one-hundred-dollar bills. There was also a note…reading, KEEP THE MONEY BUT TAKE THE CAR TO SAN DIEGO & LEAVE IT THERE (133-134).
John William managed to turn over the money and the car to Neil and Jamie in the form of a treasure hunt. He gave the money away because he has no reason for keeping it seeing that he was going to live the rest of his life in the woods. But the treasure hunt seemed to have meaning. John William was constantly pestering Neil about not having found a real place in the world, how teaching wasn’t for him, and that he needed to find his own road. The treasure hunt seemed to signify someone searching for something, but they don’t know what it is. Exactly how John William felt about Neil, and sometimes how Neil felt about himself. John William’s resilience to the modern lifestyle continues when Neil asks, “What makes [this lifestyle in the woods] better than seventy thousand bucks...you could have this and the money” but John William replies, “No, you can’t. Money ruins things” (138).
Even though Neil felt as though his friend had lost his mind, he kept visiting him, to keep him company. They also played a lot of chess, the primary game of strategy that the world has known for over four hundred years. John William had always been the better player, so in order not to embarrass himself; Neil read up on chess strategies and focused primarily on the art of sacrifice. When they finished a certain 3-day 21-game tournament, the conversation read, “‘You’ve got it dialed in.’ [said John William] ‘What’s that?’ ‘Sacrifice.’ [John William replied]” (152). Once again, the simple act of sacrifice in the game of chess has a greater meaning. Sacrifice was something that John William had readily accepted throughout his life, from letting go of the material world, to letting go of seventy thousand dollars. However, Neil is now learning that he doesn’t have to have everything, and he is beginning to accept John William’s point of view when he tells Jamie, “Nope” in response to her question “Are you ratting him out?” (153). He is giving up some of his “valuable” time that he has with Jamie, and that he needs to study for school, to spend with his friend that he had, at one time, dismissed as crazy. Sacrifice is the primary topic in this section, and we see that sacrifice can be used to feint one’s true intentions, and it can also be the path that leads to the happy ending, I hope…
Monday, March 9, 2009
The Other: Blog 3 3-03-09
I would like to start out by saying that this book has gotten better. It has not exceeded expectations, nor as it even met them, but I definitely overreacted in my last post, so I’m sorry. Now…
Cindy’s story ends within the first few pages, and she believes that she could put her story together with Neil’s to create a great film. However, she is left out of the next few chapters, which focus primarily on John William’s transformation into the hermit of the Hoh. Neil returned home from Europe, in the early 70’s, and to his surprise he had received a postcard that read,
COUNTRYMAN—
AT BADEN-BADEN THROUGH 9/4 THEN GOIN’
TO GET EJUKATID.
GET OUT HERE BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE.
BLOOD,
SIMON MAGUS (87).
Neil spent many days working on what John William meant by this letter, eventually he just gave up and decided to concentrate his efforts on getting in touch with Jamie. One day, after he had been with Jamie for many other days before, the paper made an announcement of the death of the “heiress to a considerable fortune, Dorothy Best Worthington” (94). Mrs. Worthington was the grandmother of John William, who now was the heir to the family fortune, behind his mother, Mrs. Worthington’s daughter. John William, the man who was to become a forest-dweller was now one of the richest people in Seattle. For whatever reason, 9/4 came and went without Neil noticing, and John William remained true to his word, he went to Reed College to get an education. However, only four months later, John William had quit school and bought an acre of land on the Hoh.
Neil went to visit John William on his land by the Hoh, and they, of course, smoked some dope and got completely wasted, while they hiked to the site of their blood pact. When they arrived at the site, “John William announced that he was excavating a ‘cliff dwelling.’” (114). Neil helped John William with the excavation whenever he visited, however he began to dislike the work, claiming that the simile “Like striking stone” meant to be getting nowhere, which is exactly how he felt about this project. As usual, John William was upset with Neil because he was wasting his time with the crap he was taught in school, how it was apparently utterly useless. The line that John William had written down about six months ago, resonated in his head during his class lecture, and he realized that he had, many times, thought of “striking out on a new path…COUNTRYMAN—GET OUT HERE BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE. There was more to that than I realized” (117).
Cindy’s story ends within the first few pages, and she believes that she could put her story together with Neil’s to create a great film. However, she is left out of the next few chapters, which focus primarily on John William’s transformation into the hermit of the Hoh. Neil returned home from Europe, in the early 70’s, and to his surprise he had received a postcard that read,
COUNTRYMAN—
AT BADEN-BADEN THROUGH 9/4 THEN GOIN’
TO GET EJUKATID.
GET OUT HERE BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE.
BLOOD,
SIMON MAGUS (87).
Neil spent many days working on what John William meant by this letter, eventually he just gave up and decided to concentrate his efforts on getting in touch with Jamie. One day, after he had been with Jamie for many other days before, the paper made an announcement of the death of the “heiress to a considerable fortune, Dorothy Best Worthington” (94). Mrs. Worthington was the grandmother of John William, who now was the heir to the family fortune, behind his mother, Mrs. Worthington’s daughter. John William, the man who was to become a forest-dweller was now one of the richest people in Seattle. For whatever reason, 9/4 came and went without Neil noticing, and John William remained true to his word, he went to Reed College to get an education. However, only four months later, John William had quit school and bought an acre of land on the Hoh.
Neil went to visit John William on his land by the Hoh, and they, of course, smoked some dope and got completely wasted, while they hiked to the site of their blood pact. When they arrived at the site, “John William announced that he was excavating a ‘cliff dwelling.’” (114). Neil helped John William with the excavation whenever he visited, however he began to dislike the work, claiming that the simile “Like striking stone” meant to be getting nowhere, which is exactly how he felt about this project. As usual, John William was upset with Neil because he was wasting his time with the crap he was taught in school, how it was apparently utterly useless. The line that John William had written down about six months ago, resonated in his head during his class lecture, and he realized that he had, many times, thought of “striking out on a new path…COUNTRYMAN—GET OUT HERE BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE. There was more to that than I realized” (117).
Sunday, March 1, 2009
The Other: Blog 2 3-01-09
(No comments on first paragraph please) This book is the weirdest of weird books. It has surpassed all levels of weirdness. There are no words that can describe how weird this book is. I pretty much hate this book.
(Ok, now that that’s over with, comments only on this part of the blog thank you.)
This part of the book is written primarily about love, along with the dumb luck that allowed the two main characters to come across it. Before either of them came across the loves of their lives, they were still doing the stoned hiking adventures. However, John William decided that he wanted to do some hiking on his own, to hike to the seaside in Oregon, all by himself. So, Neil (with the $5,000 he inherited from his father) bought himself a plane ticket to Amsterdam. He took himself on a tour of Europe using primarily trains for transportation, however, he couldn’t get away from what he had been feeling for many years back in Seattle, “…my romantic spells were curtailed by the sight of garbage near the rails, or by a wandering dog raising a leg at the corner of a building. I just didn’t have the psychic wherewithal to incorporate these images into my affect for living; I let them dispirit me” (46). Neil Countryman was back to the depths of despair looking for a way to get out. However, his downtrodden spirit came up sooner rather than later. In August of whatever year it happened to be, he was on the side of a trail, when two young women came by carrying on a conversation in American English. Erin and Jamie were sisters who, through a long story ended up traveling through Italy together. They traveled together primarily because the sisters had a map and Neil didn’t. However, eventually Neil came across a new reason for sticking with these two. As Erin put it one night in a hotel in San Vigilio, she told Jamie, “ ‘You and Neil can just sit here without me and, I don’t know, fall in love.’ ” (58). Erin couldn’t have said it any better, because, what do you know, thirty-two years later, they were sitting together in their house watching a forgettable movie, reminiscing about the first time they met.
However, John William’s love story is talked about much differently. An article was run in the present-day Seattle Times about Neil’s relationship, as “the hermit’s only friend”, in reference to John William. After this article was printed, Neil received a call from Cindy Saperstein, who was John William’s girlfriend as a freshman at Reed. She was hoping that, from Neil’s stories and her own, they could come up with a screenplay. She then talks to Neil for eight pages about her relationship with John William, which I could only imagine to be a bit odd, considering the amount of detail she explained. The first time they met, they were at the school dance, and without even telling Cindy his name, he proposed to her, which I found to be weird, and she accepted, which was even weirder. He was apparently a different kind of guy; compared to the other men Cindy had tried to go out with. He had some quirks for example, Cindy explained, “John William, when he got done kissing, he turned around and split” (66). She felt more comfortable around him, which once again seemed odd, because John William, the first time he goes walking with Neil, did suggest that they jump from a cliff on a mountain. He didn’t really seem to be in to life. She seemed to believe that her story was a “tale of bizarreness”, and when Neil asked what she meant, she told him “I never felt urged, is the way I’d put it, to do something against my will, okay? And for a guy, that’s bizarreness” (69). Cindy was convinced that these their stories could put together a great movie, so she continued on about everything between them including a time when John William asked a question that seemed a little bit more like what he had been throughout the book up until this story of Cindy’s. He asked Cindy, all those years ago if she would kill herself, “Could you do that” he asked, “Because I’m looking for somebody who can do that” (72). She went along with the idea (and presumably with John William for a while longer until breaking his heart, because she is married to another man), but alas, the second section ends there. So, while these chapters focused primarily on the love that John William and Neil shared with other women, the two stories could not have been any different, or told any differently, or told for any different of reasons.
(Ok, now that that’s over with, comments only on this part of the blog thank you.)
This part of the book is written primarily about love, along with the dumb luck that allowed the two main characters to come across it. Before either of them came across the loves of their lives, they were still doing the stoned hiking adventures. However, John William decided that he wanted to do some hiking on his own, to hike to the seaside in Oregon, all by himself. So, Neil (with the $5,000 he inherited from his father) bought himself a plane ticket to Amsterdam. He took himself on a tour of Europe using primarily trains for transportation, however, he couldn’t get away from what he had been feeling for many years back in Seattle, “…my romantic spells were curtailed by the sight of garbage near the rails, or by a wandering dog raising a leg at the corner of a building. I just didn’t have the psychic wherewithal to incorporate these images into my affect for living; I let them dispirit me” (46). Neil Countryman was back to the depths of despair looking for a way to get out. However, his downtrodden spirit came up sooner rather than later. In August of whatever year it happened to be, he was on the side of a trail, when two young women came by carrying on a conversation in American English. Erin and Jamie were sisters who, through a long story ended up traveling through Italy together. They traveled together primarily because the sisters had a map and Neil didn’t. However, eventually Neil came across a new reason for sticking with these two. As Erin put it one night in a hotel in San Vigilio, she told Jamie, “ ‘You and Neil can just sit here without me and, I don’t know, fall in love.’ ” (58). Erin couldn’t have said it any better, because, what do you know, thirty-two years later, they were sitting together in their house watching a forgettable movie, reminiscing about the first time they met.
However, John William’s love story is talked about much differently. An article was run in the present-day Seattle Times about Neil’s relationship, as “the hermit’s only friend”, in reference to John William. After this article was printed, Neil received a call from Cindy Saperstein, who was John William’s girlfriend as a freshman at Reed. She was hoping that, from Neil’s stories and her own, they could come up with a screenplay. She then talks to Neil for eight pages about her relationship with John William, which I could only imagine to be a bit odd, considering the amount of detail she explained. The first time they met, they were at the school dance, and without even telling Cindy his name, he proposed to her, which I found to be weird, and she accepted, which was even weirder. He was apparently a different kind of guy; compared to the other men Cindy had tried to go out with. He had some quirks for example, Cindy explained, “John William, when he got done kissing, he turned around and split” (66). She felt more comfortable around him, which once again seemed odd, because John William, the first time he goes walking with Neil, did suggest that they jump from a cliff on a mountain. He didn’t really seem to be in to life. She seemed to believe that her story was a “tale of bizarreness”, and when Neil asked what she meant, she told him “I never felt urged, is the way I’d put it, to do something against my will, okay? And for a guy, that’s bizarreness” (69). Cindy was convinced that these their stories could put together a great movie, so she continued on about everything between them including a time when John William asked a question that seemed a little bit more like what he had been throughout the book up until this story of Cindy’s. He asked Cindy, all those years ago if she would kill herself, “Could you do that” he asked, “Because I’m looking for somebody who can do that” (72). She went along with the idea (and presumably with John William for a while longer until breaking his heart, because she is married to another man), but alas, the second section ends there. So, while these chapters focused primarily on the love that John William and Neil shared with other women, the two stories could not have been any different, or told any differently, or told for any different of reasons.
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