Terri Brown-Davidson is a masterful writer. The crux of the narrative of “Marie, Marie, Hold On Tight” hinges on the uncompromising and out of control relationship between a mother and daughter. The potential darkness of mother love is brought to a whole new level by Marie’s mother–we fear her, we despise her and yet we yearn for her and love her in the same way Marie does. The book delivers a hopefulness one can only feel when a young girl learns that her survival is not only inevitable but necessary.
I believe a story as dark and challenging as “Marie, Marie, Hold On Tight” is one we don’t often get to see in today’s marketplace. As I read I was reminded of another unflinching masterpiece, Tillie Olsen‘s “Yonnondio: From the Thirties” and I was grateful that Terri Brown-Davidson was brave enough to write with such clarity of vision.
I’m not sure which version of “Cold Mountain” I liked less: the novel or the movie. Both seemed intent on manipulating me as a reader/viewer into feeling despair or something of the sort, while ultimately I felt bored and irritated that certain details (like how men and women might have actually responded to each other) were couched in too modern a way (you’ll note that this doesn’t bother me in other movies set in historical times but when a movie is this bad, it does).
I know people really liked this book and movie but I just don’t get it. Granted, Renée Zellweger gave a great performance (I tend to like her in everything, which kind of surprises me) but the rest of it was so weird. It felt more spaghetti western than anything, which would have been great had it been a spaghetti western but it wasn’t. I did love the cinematography (not that I’m educated on this stuff enough to talk about it) because I got a sense that the light was special. I couldn’t quite take myself away from it actually; the feeling it gave me was that this was another time. I loved that. The setting, also, was gorgeous.
The book, when I read it a few years ago, sort of bored me. I kept waiting to find out what was so great about it. I never did. What I did like about was how the main character (her name totally escapes me—but Nicole Kidman) was transformed by the Renée Zellweger character—unfortunately, that part is sort of glossed over in the movie. Suddenly Nicole Kidman can shoot like a marksman! Huzzah!
Now all of this got me thinking of a Civil War book I truly loved, which is Tony Horwitz’s Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War. Now here is a tale where all of the details are right—because it is, essentially, about all of the details. Tony Horwitz is a journalist and this book is about his time spent with the folks who (whenever they have a spare minute) recreate the civil war—right down to their underwear (or lack thereof). It is an absolutely fascinating must read. If you haven’t read it, do and then come back and tell me how much more you enjoyed it than Cold Mountain (just kidding, but seriously do read it!).
This is exactly the type of site that I could become obsessive over: YourSurgery.com. But I am going to resist temptation (and my hypochondria tendencies) and only spend a few minutes reading through the procedures because ultimately it’s kind of gross.
Wow. This month’s Word Riot has so much great stuff but I almost missed it because this week has been so crazy.
I would highly recommend checking out the following work by three brilliant women:
Tracks, by Katrina Denza
Shuffle Up (And Deal), by Susan DiPlacido
Wince, by Leigh Hughes
Mark Moskowitz’s touching documentary The Stone Reader
is not just for bibliophiles, it’s for anyone who has a lifelong love of knowledge. It’s for anyone who has been passionate about something in his youth and somehow lost that desire. And it is for anyone who has ever found that a dream realized sometimes falls short of expectations.
In his quest to find Dow Mossman, the authur of a then out of print book entitled The Stones of Summer, Moskowitz finds something he already had but hadn’t realized–and that is that,once it is written, the love of the word can exist almost more intensely for the reader than it does the writer. It’s as though they share it together. It is in itself an act of creation.
If you can see this movie, do. You will not be sorry.
No Marks is wonderful new fiction by Jordan Rosenfeld at The Pedestal Magazine.
Great stuff in Pindeldyboz from two extremely talented ladies:
A Shadow Rising, by Mary McCluskey
Ridiculous, by Miriam Kotzin
I’m devastated, depressed, and despondent. I’m sure John Kerry feels worse than I do right now, though: CNN.com – Kerry calls Bush to concede
myfanwy collins 