The
cover of the novel depicts Diogenes of Sinope, the Greek
philosopher who allegedly carried around a lit lantern in broad
daylight, saying he was “looking for an honest man”. But the Diogenes
shown here is black, jauntily clad in pink shirt and white trousers.
The
reading was poorly attended and a couple of readers had not managed
to read the novel. Nevertheless with a bit of urging they too read
from passages others had selected.
Paul Beatty - ‘I wanted to be a psychologist. It taught me how to look underneath the rock’
There's
a lot of drollery and sheer extravagance in the use of language,
sprinkled plentifully with mother-fuckers, bitches and psychology
jargon. The characters are often denizens of the absurd: Hominy
Jenkins who volunteers as slave to the narrator (‘Me’) and calls
him Massa in the manner of a
pre-Reconstruction era slave; a punk pretender called Foy Cheshire
who lives by publishing the ideas of Me's father and heads the Dum
Dum Donut Intellectuals. And Marpessa the attractive bus-driver Me
yearns for, who seems unattainable.
Preeti
Me
goes about his life work of
a)
Re-creating the erased town of agrarian Dickens in LA County, the
largest and most diverse county in USA whose population of 10m is
larger than that of 42 states; and
b)
Re-segregating its society so people may regain a sense of community,
identity and self-worth.
Thommo
Miraculously
he succeeds in both ventures, and the rejuvenated Dickens scores
higher on measures of social and educational progress than it ever
had before. However, he runs foul of the Civil Rights Act and ends up
facing judgement in the Supreme Court of the United Staes, refighting
the ‘separate-but-equal’ battles of the 1960s.
KumKum & Joe
Though
Me wins Marpessa by novel's end, since the case is unresolved, there's scope for a even crazier sequel.
Almond Nougat
Here
we are at the end of the reading after consuming the sweet almond
nougat Hemjit brought along:
Joe, Thommo, Sunil, Preeti (back row) KumKum, Hemjit (sitting)
