“Maps and Legends” by Michael Chabon
Were I to judge Michael Chabon’s Maps and Legends by its fabulous cover (one of the best of last year), I would guess it to be geeky, beautiful, layered and complex. In other words, generally pretty awesome. This book, like its cover, is pretty on the inside.
Given, I’m a geek who reads comic books, and a fan of Chabon’s writing; I’m predisposed to like this book. His Mysteries of Pittsburgh was a pivotal novel for me; it made me want to be a better reader, and seek out better books. I had an embarrassing moment with him at a signing a few years ago* that seemed only to cement my crush on him.
But enough about me. To the book.
Maps and Legends is Chabon’s first collection of essays. In it, he writes about subjects as varied as Sherlock Holmes, comic books, planned communities, children’s literature, and golems. He ties these disparate topics with a shared theme of blurred boundaries, most often between truth and lies, reality and imagination.
Because Trickster is looking to stir things up, to scramble the conventions, to undo history and received notions of what is art and what is not, to sing for his supper, to find and lose himself in the act of entertaining. Trickster haunts the boundary lines, the margins, the secret shelves between the sections in the bookstore. (p. 26)
Fond of subjunctive clauses, Chabon’s writing is challenging in an energizing way, spurring this reader on to further thought, related reading, and flights of fancy. I was reminded of the essays of dear, departed David Foster Wallace–erudite AND entertaining, though Chabon’s book has far fewer footnotes. I’m not sure the book would be as entertaining to non-geeks, but I found a great deal to appreciate.
*Another amusing (to me, at least) story from the signing. My friend and former bookshop co-worker Kate DiCamillo was there, too. Her book, Because of Winn Dixie had recently been released, and had not yet won the Newbery Honor award. Before Chabon’s reading, she saw a woman walk by holding Winn Dixie, and offered to sign it for her. The woman looked at Kate oddly, unsure if she was who she said she was, but handed over the book. Kate whipped out a pen, signed the book and handed it back. I wonder if the woman remembers the incident, and wonders at the encounter with the soon-to-be-well-known author.
January 12th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
How cool that you know Kate DiCamillo! Her book Great Joy is a new Christmas favorite of mine.