I’ve only really read As She Crawled Across the Table, but I’ve always wanted to read more Jonathan Lethem, I found a copy of The Fortress of Solitude for cheap at Kent’s used bookstore, I had the perfect excuse to add one more thing to the pile of stuff we’ll have to package up when we move. The guilt has lead me to read it.
I’ve always enjoyed a book that grabbed me and pulled it through its plot, unwillingly, with a palpable sense of speed. The Fortress of Solitude shares some elements with the books that have done that in the past, but it pulls in the opposite direction. Instead of being forced along to see what happens, next, I’m drawn backwards to reappreciate some two page meditation on a terrible pop song or bit of childhood vernacular. It will a miracle if I ever finish it, reading this book may contain an infinite loop.
I can also see some of my own history here in this book, or at least the history I lived through. Lethem and the books protagonist are both five years older than I, and have a deeper understanding of racial complexity than I do. (Whitman MA only needs one well placed ‘e’ to properly represent the sort of people who live there.) But from the Son of Sam killings to black out, events are referenced from the perspective of a child that I remember from the perspective of a child. More importantly than all the large historical events, there are micro-historical events that fix coincendental moments in my life and in the narrative. Two points of space time define a space-like slice and that slice is defined by Marvel’s publication of Logan’s Run, and confusions about Steve Ditko (He can’t draw but still he’s compelling.) and Mad’s mass market paperbacks by AL Jaffe and company (as Lethem observes: “Sarcasm is something you practiced like Karate. Later concealing your mute fury when nobody fed you the opening lines”). I’ve spoken about Steve Ditko. My writing to blogs has been driven as much by the comic books and cheap science-fiction that inhabits my dreams as by anything, and it seems to be the same comic books and pulpy novels that drive Lethem’s novels.
I may have something more interesting to say about The Fortress of Solitude, but of course I have to finish reading it first and I may fall into a sef-referential loop in the meantime.
Addendum: The most obvious comparison to this book is The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, by Michael Chabon. The authors are of roughly the same generation and the source material has significant overlap. Though Chabon draws on an earlier generation of comics, Stan Lee appears as a minor character at one point. Chabon’s book is also a good contrast to Lethem’s in that it had a strong forward draw. Reading that book was like body surfing, I gave myself over to the wave and had no more perceived volition about where to go until my belly was on sand.
