Subject: Reviews: GOJIRO & ADVENTURES IN UNHISTORY

From: Don Webb <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 1993 19:59:35 GMT

Review of Mark Jacobson's _Gojiro_ 
Reviewed by Don Webb (c) 1993.

When I was in college my American Lit instructor, a man who viewed
_Gravity's Rainbow_ as slightly more important than the discovery of fire,
announced one day, "No one knows what Pynchon will write next, but it's
rumored that he is watching all of the Japanese monster movies."  Well,
_Vineland_ came, and Godzilla left only a footprint.  If not for the
evidence of Mr. Jacobson's name, I would have assumed that this was indeed
the Pynchon work of rumor.  A decidedly lesser work than _GR_ (but then
_Vineland_ . . .), but linguistically and thematically a child of _GR_.

	"Gojiro recognized that goldplated pill, remembered the day, not so
	very many years before, when it rolled up onto the beach at Spandex
	Shore, one of several set inside an elaborate handworked snuffbox.
	Game for any drug, he was about to submit the pellets to his raging
	gastros when Komodo stopped him, pointing at the ornate funeral
	robes that had washed up along with the case."

Now those are Pynchon sentences.  The length.  The clauses.  The way they
sound when you read them aloud.  For me this epic of Gojiro, the Japanese
pronunciation of Godzilla, and Komodo creates two questions.  How do you
judge one man's quality in writing when you can only read them in terms of
another man's craft?  Secondly, what do I say to the world of letters -- is
this a good thing? -- to copy the masters until you develop your own style
-- or should I slyly condemn this flowing prose that I myself could not
(probably) master?  Before returning to these questions I'll made the
obvious commercial remark -- this book makes a great gift item for the
Pynchon lover on you list.  Well at least a so-so gift (better than
_Vineland_).  I'll add an obscure commercial remark -- the book judging from
the Godzilla synchronicity (I've seen 34 separate Godzilla items while
_Gojiro_ has lain in my "to be read" pile) will be a success in terms of
sales.  It will probably do the best of the Atlantic Monthly Press line.

Regardless of the morality (or even the accuracy) of judging one man's work
by another's success, I suspect that all new writers are read as though
their works are lesser products of whomever we've come to terms with.  Some
(like Mr. Jacobson) are simply easier to pigeonhole.  So if this were
Pynchon, I'd miss the subplots and set pieces.  The real difference between
Jacobson and Pynchon is that Gojiro moves toward self knowledge and his
discovery of himself as microcosm provides the salvation motif of the book
(unlike Slothrope's quest for knowledge of the other -- specifically his
Impolex-G penis -- which leads only to dissolution).  Gojiro is aided and
thwarted in this quest.  Reversals and ironies abound -- Gojiro, massive
monster, becomes a small skink, and scientists like Joseph Prometheus Brooks
become specimens for Gojiro to study.  Strange beams open atavistic
resurgence in Gojiro, and the number one path to self knowledge is making
movies.  Gojiro's quest for self knowledge does bring him into conflict with
the novel's various forms of evil, but beyond this, as Gojiro finds out who
he is -- there is an identification with the entire process of evolution.
Gojiro becomes one with the unfolding of life, which currently is menaced by
the planet's leading primate.  This is not as syrupy as it sounds --
Jacobson fights the rising tide of sweetness with Pynchonian elements:
drugs, pollution, techno-plots, and camp.  Jacobson also uses the "O" as a
symbol of return, like Pynchon's rainbow.  We find it everywhere from the
target marks on Komodo's chest to the spelling Gojiro rather than the more
common Gojira.  As a novel of ideas, _Gojiro_ is one of the best examples of
John Campbell's definition of science fiction as a literature of ideas.  It
is no surprise that Mr. Jacobson writes the ethics column for _Esquire_.
True to form the originality of the novel lies in ideas.  Gojiro faces the
dilemma that as a Monster, he can't quite cut it as a Hero.  The best he can
do is find himself -- integrate himself into the whole of life.  In this
knowledge he finds a oneness with Komodo, finding not only a species of
salvation for himself, but a promise of re-integration for us human saps as
well.

Now to the second question -- is this a good thing?  I put forward a
reserved yes.  For Mr. Jacobson to achieve his paean to life, a workable
style had to exist.  I realize that this speaks against the current call for
originality, but books do not need to be original in style.  Classical poets
always cast their works in the appropriate style and Pynchon-prose is the
appropriate mode for the current epic.  It moves between consensus reality
and stylized camp reality effortlessly.  It leaves the complicated goings-on
of the real world whenever a close-up focus is needed -- and best of all it
can just tell the reader what's going on or spice up the flow with a few
jokes.  The story of Gojiro and the pot holders will cheer anyone who, like
me, has too many family members practicing arts and crafts.  This is an
exemplary novel -- a writer writing in an existing style to achieve his
intent.  He handles the style well and has created a minor classic which
will be recognizable to all who are familiar with the "school."  Of such
things are bookshelves filled and hearts gladdened.

Review of Avram Davidson's _Adventures in Unhistory_
Reviewed by Don Webb (c) 1993
 
If America were to become a police state, there would be certain books
banned.  Most would be banned in accordance with their slants -- a right
wing state would ban the _Communist Manifesto_, left wingers might not have
much use for _Mein Kampf_.  But any totalitarian state would be well advised
to ban _Adventures in Unhistory_ for it is the kind of book that will make
the young dream dreams and start off on Quests.  This is the perfect book to
give people who are a little too sure about the world.
 
The book is a collection of fifteen essays by Avram Davidson on, as the
subtitle says, the factual foundations of several legends.  The topics are
wide ranging from mermaids to mandrakes, and mammoths to the theft of the
mulberry tree.  The sources of the essays seem to follow (for the most part)
the career of editor George H. Schithers, who bought my first pro story and
has other crimes to answer for, -- _Asimov's_ in the early 80's, then
_Amazing_, then _Amra_, then _Weird Tales_.  Davidson uses a light and
entertaining prose for presenting his scholarship, sort of like Mircea
Eliade done by Dave Barry.  But the light tone does not hide the two key
words here: scholarship and a sense of wonder.  This book is in some way the
opposite of a bad fantasy novel.  Instead of dragging out old stodgy
fictions of dwarves and elves and expecting you to be amazed, Mr. Davidson
shows real wonders and allow you to think about this universe that is_
stranger than we know.

Many of the essays are accompanied by bibliographies.  The range of works
cited in each is astonishing.  On the essay on the dragon among the fifteen
books included are Mircea Eliade's _The Forge and the Crucible_, Jacob
Grimm's _Teutonic Mythology_, and Philostratus' _Life of Apollonius of
Tyana_.  His magical curiosity has impelled him to research the topics with
love and care and time far out of proportion for the money paid for the
work.  This is a love affair between one man and the mysterious.  He senses
something's out there and has looked in the best new scholarship and the
older dust-covered volumes of curious and forgotten lore.  But most
important this is done in a critical spirit rather that the fuzzy way common
to writers on occult and pseudoscience topics.

This is a book of Runes, a Germanic/English term meaning literally a
"Mystery" or "secret".  Or if you would prefer the polysemy that Mr.
Davidson himself delights in: in Latin it would be a book of "Arcanum" and
in Egyptian "Seshetat."  Magically it signifies the internal or subjective
sense of the hidden, which is the driving force of all true becoming.  It is
the inner key to the power of curiosity without which Those who Know would
never have set out on their Quests.  Runes are thought to exist (though
hidden) both within the subjective universe, and in some "place" outside the
subjective universe.  Because of the obscure outer edge of hidden things,
the necessity of the development of objective foundations and of methods of
understanding of such foundations while exploring in the usually
all-too-murky world of the occult is essential.  In this Davidson has
succeeded, doing for popular readers what Mircea Eliade has done for the
specialist.  This book will be a seed for many a lifelong quest -- it shows
the method and the reward.  It would be the absolutely perfect High School
graduation gift.  The only other book that goes as well for High School
graduation would be Baltasar Gracian's _The Art of Worldly Wisdom_, but I
digress.

George Barr has provided a series of well-crafted illustrations, and Peter
S. Beagle, whom I normally find irritating, has given a good introduction to
who Avram Davidson is -- although I suspect that if you deal with a
bookstore that carries Owlswick works you probably already know.

A final note: Something a little scary happened the day I got the book.  I
had been discussing the Aeon of Horus and its successor with a member of the
O.T.O.  (I have several black magicians in my sphere of personal
acquaintance.)  The O.T.O. is a group dedicated to perpetuating the legacy
of Aleister Crowley.  My friend was talking about synchronicities being one
of the ways the god spoke to us.  I was dismissing the argument when the
U.P.S. (the U.P.S. is group dedicated to preserving the legacy of the Postal
System) truck pulled up and delivered the yellow wrapped book.  I told
Gordon that I _really, really_ wanted to review this book (because I knew
otherwise I would be buying it).  I unwrapped the book and Mary suggested
that I try bibliomancy.  So I opened the book after a remark about Crowley
-- sure enough to page 115 in the Crowley essay in which after some
delightful remarks about the Crowley-Yeats rivalry was the passage my thick
index finger rested on, describing the reception of the _Book of the Law_:

	_Aleister and Rose went to Cairo: and there on April 8, 1904, he had
	a vision, if that is what it was, which was to prove of immense
	effect: the "minister" of Horus, the ancient hawk-headed Egyptian
	god, appeared to him in the form of "a dark man about his own age
	with the face of a savage king." and, standing behind Crowley's left
	shoulder, dictated words which Crowley wrote, down:_ O blessed Beast
	and thou scarlet woman of his desire, Do what thou wilt shall be the
	whole of the Law. . . .

%A Mark Jacobson
%T Gojiro
%I Atlantic Monthly Press
%D 1991
%P 356
%O Cloth $22.95

%A Avram Davidson
%T Adventures in Unhistory
%I Owlswick Press, PO Box 8243, Philadelphia, PA 19101-8243
%D 1993
%P 305
%O Cloth $24.75

Biography: Don Webb is the author of _Uncle Ovid's Exercise Book_,
_Marchenland est abgebrannt_, and the soon-to-be released _The Seventh Day
and After_.  Don Webb has had fiction in recent numbers of _Future Sex_ and
_Interzone_.  He is a recognized authority on secret societies and an expert
in ceremonial magic and small group interaction.  He lives in Austin with
his beautiful wife Rosemary.
--
--Alan Wexelblat, Reality Hacker, Author, and Cyberspace Bard
Media Lab - Advanced Human Interface Group	[email-masked]
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You pathetic jugglers never lowered yourselves to developing the software.
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