There's a very good chance that no one in here remembers who I am, but on the other hand, I haven't contributed much to this thread and I still haven't picked up a Discworld novel so it's not as if I'm anyone of consequence. Besides, like I said in my last post here, college is eating up all of my time so I really don't post here that often. The last time I posted must have been over a month ago. And even though no one reads my posts anyways, I figured I'd at least say something about the last two books I've read just so I might have something to look back on if, say, in the future I were called upon to discuss a piece of literature that I hadn't read in some time. But to be sure, remember when I said that I wouldn't be reviewing textbooks? Well, I'm kind of going against that. No, I'm not going to review "Final Cut Pro HD". I'm going to talk about the first nonfiction book I've read since that Kinsey bio I read last year: "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer.
So, has anyone here ever had one of those courses that you really couldn't figure out the purpose of? Like, no matter what you did in that class, it was never actually benefiting you in any way? Well, I thought that Film 101 would be more helpful than it is, but so far, the only purpose of my Film Crafts course that I can see is just to have another class to heap just a little more work on us. Which would be where "Into Thin Air" comes in. All the instructors in my class have this analogy about filmmaking being a lot like climbing a mountain, so naturally, they just had to get us to read a personal account of the disastrous 1996 Everest season in order to demonstrate, and I quote, 'good and bad team or leadership behavior'. I can see the point of it, really. I just think there are better ways we could have spent our time. However, I must admit that the book was a very pleasant change of pace after having to read so many manuals and screenplays. Krakauer is a very readable author as well, and truth be told, I believe that this was my first foray into narrative nonfiction, and I enjoyed myself immensely. One of the reasons I enjoyed this piece of writing so much was mostly because, as this was a personal account, Krakauer didn't decide to simply pummel us with fact after fact after fact. While still remaining objective, he treats each of his team members fairly, criticizing only their decisions and never the person. For example, during the 1996 Everest season in which twelve climbers died, an Anatoli Boukreev decided to descend from the summit hours ahead of his teammates despite the fact that he was serving as a guide. Krakauer calls Boukreev's decision into question, which of course, he should. But just a few pages after that, Krakauer acknowledges Boukreev's later attempts to find a group of missing climbers, writing that "[i]t was an incredible display of strength and courage, but he was unable to find any of the missing climbers." (p. 222). Krakauer also writes with a sense of honesty, even willingly bringing up his own mistakes and his own contributions to the tragedy: "[M]y utter failure to consider that Andy might have been in serious trouble -- was a lapse that's likely to haunt me for the rest of my life." (p. 196). There are many more examples to prove those two points, but for the sake of brevity, I'll move on. The last thing that really got me came near the end, as Krakauer describes going back home to all the things he used to take for granted. "[E]ating breakfast with [his] wife, watching the sun go down over Puget Sound, being able to get up in the middle of the night and walk barefoot to a warm bathroom" (p. 282), all reminded me of how, at one point or another, death reaffirms life and how profoundly certain events can change a person. But I had never really left the comforts of my own home here at sea level British Columbia. Yet, as I read that line, I suddenly understood, in some small way, what Krakauer and his teammates had been through, carried forward by only their sheer determination and will. I can tell you right now that I will never climb a mountain. But for the 333 pages of this book, I got a sense of what it might be like. And so, even if you're not really into nonfiction, I still recommend this book for that very reason.
The second book I've read since my last post, I'm still not sure counts. Because, well, it's a play. In any case, Tom Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" is actually in town at the moment but I was too late in getting tickets, so I'm settling for reading it. Now, everyone compares this play to Samuel Beckett's "Waiting For Godot" but what most people don't realize is that "Waiting For Godot" is all about existentialism whereas "Rosencrantz" is more about determinism. "Rosencrantz" also belongs to a very exclusive type of theatre known as 'metatheatre'; essentially, 'theatre about theatre'. Much like the 1976 film, Network, the characters eventually become vaguely aware that they are actually in a film/play. In the middle of Act One, Rosencrantz loudly proclaims, "I feel like a spectator -- an appalling business. The only thing that makes it bearable is the irrational belief that somebody interesting will come on in a minute." (p. 41). And no one does until the end of the scene. But metatheatre aside for now, the theme of "R&G" is the illusion of free will. Aside from the slapstick absurdist elements of the play, "R&G" is actually extremely dark. After all, if free will doesn't exist and we all know what happens to Ros and Guil at the end, where does that leave us? At the end of Act Two, Ros and Guil are about to get on a boat to escort Hamlet to England. We all know what really awaits them, but Ros sees this as an opportunity to be free at last and makes a point of saying so to Guil. At which point Guil replies, "I don't know. It's the same sky." (p. 95). Act Three gets even darker, with the Player denouncing life as being a "gamble, at terrible odds" (p. 115), until finally, Ros and Guil meet their end and Guil reflects on it in his final chilling monologue: "There must have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said -- no. But somehow we missed it." (p. 125). Strange that one of the funniest plays of all time is also one of the darkest. Acts One and Two, by the way, are hysterical. Watch for the game of questions and how they try to trap Hamlet. I'm still livid at the fact that I missed the live production.
![The Book Club]()
