Knife Thrower's Sonata

The Knife Thrower’s Sonata

“Hemingway did his work, and he’ll last. Any biographer who gives him less than this, granting the chaos of his public and personal life, might just as well as write the biography of an anonymous grocer, or a wooly mammoth. Hemingway, the writer – he’s still the hero of the story, however it unfolds.” Raymond Carver

My mother taught me: never leave the house without a book. You might get stuck in a line out there. The waiting room of a dentist’s office. Freeway. Runway. I left for Europe with a bag of heavy books, which included: “The New Yorker Book of Food and Drink;” with fine essays by Joseph Mitchell and A.J. Leibling. Also books about two Raymonds: Chandler and Carver. The Chandler bio by Hinney, and the new Raymond Carver bio by Carol Skelenicka. Chandler was a maestro of hard-boiled detective literature – and Carver brought suburban noir-realism to the American short story. Both writers mastered American lingo, character and the backwater emotional landscapes of the Promised Land. Both men pretty much drank themselves into the graves. Writers. Sagas of two Americans who traversed the nether land of fame and publishing world. Critics – Hollywood – fortune – loss – redemption. Marriage ups and downs. Drink. The carny wheel spins round: Drunk. Sober. Drying Out. Off the wagon. Under the wagon. They wrote their way through all of it. Chandler (after he was dead of course) was slagged by some fellow writers, including popular novelist Joyce Carol Oates – who declared Chandler and his detective Marlowe: “racist and misogynist.” Oh, Christ, please. New York critics deemed Carver’s work dreary and depressing. Welcome to the world of high brow, arch-political correctness and snobbery. Look out, folks; here comes the “new fiction!” The children of Joyce Carol Oates. Boring me to tears. But ah, Chandler and Carver…it’s a reminder of the work; then the later criticism of Hemingway –Hem’s work may seem dated to some; overly macho to others; out of date and style. But much of it will last because it was made with an artist’s honesty and passion; an accurate ear, a proven B.S. detector; and a whittled character that is lacking in much of today’s fiction. Style. But, oh mama, the morally-toned snobs love to kick the old lions when they’re down or dead. Ah, the hyenas and knife throwers…enough!...some final words from Chandler:

“Apparently Hemingway was very sick when he wrote the book (“Across the River and Into The Trees”) and he put down in a rather cursory way how that made him feel…I suppose those primping second guessers who call themselves critics think he shouldn’t have written the book at all. Most men wouldn’t have…that’s the difference between a champ and a knife thrower, the champ may have lost his stuff temporarily or permanently, he can’t be sure. But when he can no longer throw the high hard one, he throws his heart instead. He throws something. He doesn’t just walk off the mound and weep.”