(no subject)

I'm still reading The Centaur. I'm enjoying it, but progress is slow. Reading it is like wading through vast snowdrifts of prose--I'm trying to maintain forward motion, but I'm hip-deep in words. The writing is, for the most part, beautiful, but extremely dense. It's interesting that the last time I wrote about the book I made a rather flippant, off-hand comparison with Ulysses, because the more I think about it, the more similarities I notice. The Centaur is much shorter and Updike's style is not nearly as willfully obscure as Joyce's, but both books are based on Greek myths (Is the Odyssey a myth? Not exactly, but the word will serve my purpose.), both books use those myths to demonstrate the differences between our debauched modern age and the heroic age represented in the myths, both books feature an intelligent but isolated antihero, both books focus on the interior life of the characters, both books follow their protagonists through a fairly ordinary day in their lives (The Centaur has spanned two days so far, but that's close enough)... It seems to me that there are enough similarities that it couldn't possibly be incidental. Did Updike intend to write an American Ulysses? If that was his goal, it's certainly an ambitious one!

Noticing all of these similarities has had an interesting effect on my reading of the book. On the one hand, I feel that it has helped me get a better handle on what's going on in the book. On the other, I am somewhat afraid that I am allowing Ulysses to color my interpretation of The Centaur more than I should. A good example of this is the confusion I was having over the significance of the the myth of Chiron in the book. Last time I posted about the book, I couldn't figure out why the centaur appeared or what he had to do with the narrative. Now, however, I just say, "Oh, it's just like in Ulysses! The myth is there to highlight the disparities between the modern and classical worlds." This may very well be true, but it's also possible that Updike is trying to say something entirely different. The Centaur is its own book, after all, and I should allow it to be.

In other news, I went through a phase where I posted about interesting things I cooked, and I think I might revive that idea. I've been writing a lot about my reading and my writing, so I might as well include my third hobby. Anyhow, last night I made a great dish with orzo, zucchini, tomato, roasted peppers, and a bunch of other stuff. It was great, very summery and fresh. Plus, all the herbs I used were homegrown, so that was cool. I love being able to just go up onto the deck and cut some herbs, take them down to the kitchen, wash them and throw them in the pot.

In yet more news, I am not on a good pace to meet the deadline I have set for finishing the revision of the next chapter of my book. I'm having a hard time figuring out how to begin one particular scene, and it's really holding me up. Must get my act together!