Born in Denver in 1909, John Fante became one of the first Italian-American writers to make a significant breakthrough. His novels and short stories garnered praise from critics and successful authors. He collaborated on screenplays to help cover expenses. I just finished his most famous novel,
Ask the Dust, published in 1938. Set in L.A., only 165 pages, it is an episodic portrait of an artist as a young man, Fante's alter-ego Arturo Bandini, the protagonist of several of his novels. I found the writing uneven, at times beautiful, at times unpolished. The focus of much of the narrative is the young man's relationship with a Mexican-American waitress who loves a man who rejects her, as she spurns Bandini. Fante perfectly captures the frustration of a 20-year-old whose sexuality conflicts with his Catholic upbringing, with which I empathized, as I did with the unrequited love. Bandini frequently lashes out verbally, cruelly, but demonstrates compassion and kindness just as often. Again, I was there myself. The novel's best sequence is the description of a devastating earthquake that ravages Long Beach. There are several rich metaphors along the way. Here's one: "Her hair spilled over the pillow like a bottle of overturned ink." There are, of course, existential musings: "... The desert was always there, a patient white animal, waiting for men to die, for civilizations to flicker and pass into the darkness. Then men seemed brave to me, and I was proud to be numbered among them. All the evil of the world seemed not evil at all, but inevitable and good and part of that endless struggle to keep the desert down." Clearly, this is a work that would appeal largely to artists, especially writers. 246 readers at Amazon have rated
Ask the Dust, forging to a consensus of 4.3 on a scale of five, too high in my opinion. Yet it continues to be read, ranked at last check among all fiction at 53,000+, remarkable given its original publication date and the fact that there are at least 13 million titles available at Jeff Bezos' behemoth. Three of Fante's novels have been adapted to the big and small screen. Acclaimed director Robert Towne wrote the screenplay and filmed
Ask the Dust in 2006. It stars Colin Farrell and Salma Hayek. I've added it to my Netflix list. Towne has said it is the best novel ever written about L.A.. He was instrumental in getting the square outside the Central Library, which Fante frequented, named after the author. Fante passed away from complications of diabetes 1983 at 74. Italian-Americans seeking cultural references would be disappointed by the book. There are hardly any. Here's a pic of the author:
I was familiar with the use of Fauxchohantas to describe Elizabeth Warren. Talk radio's Mark Simone offered another gem yesterday - Lie- awatha. Speaking of liars, Jonathan Podhoretz devotes his op-ed piece in today's
NY Post to Nancy Pelosi's misbegotten defense of Congressman John Conyers, claiming it inadvertently helps Roy Moore. Here's an excerpt: "... served a ridiculous 52 years in the House of Representatives, a record that suggests he is less a captain of the ship of state than he is a barnacle permanently attached to its hull." Kudos, sir. And in the same vein - down goes another liberal icon - Matt Lauer. Remember how pleased the left was by the lawsuits vs. Roger Ailes and Bill O'Reilly? It's been downhill for them ever since. Who's next?
Here's a disguise
Star Wars icon Mark Hamill uses to avoid autographer seekers. The photo ran in today's Post:
My thanks to the sweet elderly woman who bought two books in Russian, and to the gentleman who did a three-for-three swap of them, and to the the guy who returned to purchase three more vinyl albums, two by Dean Martin and one by Dale Evans, the latter of which had never been opened.
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