Ochikubo Monogatari

The Heian period monogatari Ochikubo Monogatari is fascinating to read when one considers the more famous Tale of Genji was likely composed only a few decades later. While both share some stylistic features, such as the common insertion of poetry into the text, and a setting among Heian-period aristocrats and their retainers, Ochikubo Monogatari is rooted in an archetypal Cinderella story. The Tale of Lady Ochikubo is also far shorter than its more famous successor, and character development is rather weak, making it somewhat more akin to Taketori Monogatari. Indeed, Ochikubo suffers nobly the abuses of her step-mother, her loyal servant intercedes and ensures her relationship with a lord develops, and she becomes a wealthy and important woman through her husband, a favorite of the Emperor. There are no psychologically complex characters, unless one counts Ochikubo's husband or her servant, Akogi. Oddly, the only translation of this tale is the dated Wilfrid Whitehouse one, but it manages to capture the time and feel of a Japan from over 1000 years ago. 

Despite its flaws, Ochikubo Monogatari is an important work in the development of the novel and prose fiction for Japanese literature. In a sense, it prepares one for the more extensive and complex Genji Monogatari with its numerous characters (mostly named based on their title) and its realism, as there is no magic or supernatural phenomena here. Unfortunately, once our Ochikubo marries someone of higher rank in the imperial court, much of the text is spent on her husband's various acts of revenge and humiliation to the step-mother and her children. The noble-hearted Ochikubo rejects this, and eventually her husband makes amends with her family (even helping them rise to higher positions in the court). While some of the anecdotes of vengeance are rather amusing and entertaining (particularly, and disturbingly, the use of a horse-faced man as a substitute husband for the half-sister of Ochikubo), the plot does not really go anywhere until the inevitable peace. 

Like most Cinderella narratives, the inevitable happy ending occurs and the horrid step-mother seems to have learned a valuable lesson. As it is likely rooted oral or folk traditions, the main moral imparted by the conclusion of the novel seems to be a call for step-mothers to cherish their step-daughters. Ochikubo herself, through her devotion to her abusive step-mother and neglectful father, is pure, devoted to filial piety, and will ensure good karma through her actions. Indeed, even before her inevitable escape from the clutches of her parents, she was a stoic and devoted worker, sewing fine robes and dresses for her step-mother. The overall tone of the tale is a conservative one, even if its critiques the treatment of step-daughters. It also seems to favor monogamy over polygamy or the various forms of infidelity practiced by so many Heian males. For these reasons, one wonders if the anonymous author of this monogatari was a woman upset by the various intrigues and affairs of men who cheat on their wives while allowing them to mistreat innocent children. 

Les Thazar

Fernand Hibbert's Les Thazar is an endlessly entertaining social satire of the Port-au-prince upper classes. Written over a century ago, it depicts the long-lost Haiti Thomas of our forebears, focusing on the corrupt and venal upper-classes in the capital. The Thazar family, once rich, have lost their fortune. Madame Thazar pushes for the marriage of her daughter, Cecile, to a wealthy German so the family can maintain their status and rank in Port-au-Prince society. In order to accomplish this, the materialistic wife  is willing to sacrifice anything and everything to keep up appearances and ensure her two children will not descend the social ladder. Needless to say, the Thazar home in Turgeau also attracts a number of suitors for the hand of Cecile (as well as family friends, mostly from the Haitians of their social rank), providing the narrator an excuse to satirize various types of the Haitian bourgeoisie and corrupt politicians. This is very much a dialogue-driven narrative, with a tragic conclusion to its satirical content. One cannot help but wonder if Haitian elites a century ago had such dim hopes for Haiti then, what are they thinking today?

Foreigners, particularly Germans and French, also provide cannon fodder for the satire as their outsider view of Haiti provides great comedic relief. Ravet, for instance, has the most difficult experience trying to get his landlord, Madame Thazar, to fix his leaky roof. During his long discourse with Madame Thazar, we learn about his disobedient domestic, who is also a part-time tailor, and the various ways in which life in Haiti is upside down. Or, for that matter, the constant questions from Cresson, who is following Ravet around Port-au-Prince on the streetcar one day. In the end, Ravet agrees to pay for the repairs to the roof, but it is another instance of Haiti as a an aberrant place to the foreign mind. The question of race is often part of this, with Haitians speaking of news of lynchings in the US, Booker T. Washington (perhaps a message of vocational schools and practicality for the Haitian educational system, instead of effete and useless bourgeois like those in the novel?), the Anglo-Boer war in South Africa and British imperialism's positive impact on the "natives") and a naturalized Haitian who renounces citizenship, Alphonse Laubepin. Alphonse Laubepin, who is presumably of mixed racial origins from the French Antilles, refuses to see himself as one of the black race, and is constantly reminded of his racial origins by Cresson. This amusing episode is likely an allusion to the pattern of some mixed-race immigrants of the French Antilles refusing to take Haitian citizenship and using their status as French subjects for additional privileges in Haiti.  Of course, the iniquitous color question also rears its ugly head among Haitians themselves, a "political" issue which shapes how the bourgeois characters relate to each other and their non-elite compatriots in matters of love, class, language, and culture. 

Impressively, Hibbert transports the reader to the Port-au-Prince of the early 20th century. The German commercial and financial dominance of Haiti was palpable, and foreigners were protected from the excesses and corruption of the Haitian government better than Haitian citizens. Unsurprisingly, Madame Thazar prefers to marry her daughter to the German Schlieden than any Haitian suitor, reasoning that they will be unable to look after her material interests with the utmost security. Lamertume, a darker-hued Haitian "nephew" of Monsieur Thazar, is ambitious but utterly lacking in honor, wealth, and merit, so he is quickly rejected. Lionel Brion, who descends from a great family and was educated in France, also wishes to marry her, but is similarly rejected for not being wealthy. The "bourgeois" of Haiti are, in short, vain, corrupt, materialistic, and concerned only for themselves or their primal instincts. And, while Madame Thazar, Titus Baudouin, Cresson, Madame Apice, and a plethora of the characters in the novel exemplify all the aforementioned flaws, counter-examples such as Lionel Brion and Dr. Remo prove the exception to the rule. Unfortunately, in Haiti mediocrity and corruption reign supreme, so exceptional men of the upper-classes, who would and could transform and place Haiti on the path to progress, are unable to achieve their goals or find happiness. Lionel Brion never recovers from his love and loss of Cecile, Delhi has isolated himself at Mariani with a lower-class woman he abuses as his lover and servant. 

Perhaps like the case of Romulus, another novel by Hibbert but set in Miragoane during the "disturbances" of 1883, Hibbert was driven by exploring the theme of the frustrated bourgeois reformers, whose hopes are dashed by Haitian reality. Trevier or the proponents of Bazelais, in that novel, and Brion, in Les Thazar, are both ruined by their experiences, seemingly common to anyone who endeavors to go against the grain of materialism and mediocrity. Hibbert appears to infuse both novels with a pervasive pessimism as the Haitian bourgeois male has proven himself unable to save Haiti or those who should be theirs (their families, and wives). Another contemporary writer of Hibbert's, Justin Lherisson, also explored this theme even more humorously in La Famille Des Pitite Caille, where the rise and fall of a bourgeois family demonstrates the vacuity, corruption and  avarice of the bourgeois paterfamilias. It would take another generation before Haitian writers would look to the masses, with Jacques Roumain being part of that transition through the peasant novel. Perhaps not coincidentally, Roumain married the daughter of Hibbert, and it took Roumain's generation to begin the shift from the elite-focus of Hibbert. 

Tale of the Bamboo Cutter

After reading a translation of Tale of the Bamboo Cutter by Donald Keene, one is surprised by claims that this is an early work of science fiction. Sure, the supernatural being of beauty is from the Moon who returns to her celestial home through a flying chariot, but there are very few elements of science fiction in the text. If anything, it is more akin to fantastic fairy tale with elements of humor. Indeed, it was hard not to think of Lucian here, whose satirical work also included fantastic accounts of a war between the people of the Sun and the Moon. Lucian, on the other hand, made war in space a key part of the plot. Here, in the case of this Japanese narrative, the reader receives descriptions of people of the Moon as ageless, living in bliss, and to have a Palace, connoting a kingdom or empire. We never learn the nature of Kaguya's sin which led to her being sent to our planet, so the reason for this mysterious being's presence is left a mystery.

Much of the text's appeal can be found in its humor. Indeed, the impossible tasks Kaguyahime assigns to her suitors and the attempts by the men to achieve said tasks are very amusing as they involve various acts of subterfuge, wonder,  adventure at sea (and a dragon) and exoticism (invocations of India and China). Indeed, how can one not laugh at the plight of the man who grabbed bird feces, thinking it was the charm of the swallow? Or the man whose jeweled branch was the work of artisans he did not pay? Another sense of wonder in the tale lies is due to Kaguya's rejection of social conventions by refusing to marry, leading to her even rejecting the Emperor. Beauty as unattainable seems to be a key theme of the stale. Since specific individuals of the Heian court are named, perhaps it was also intended to be a satire of sorts. Nonetheless, it lacks the over the top satirical feel of Lucian's "science fiction" story and is more rooted in the fairy tale.

Hysmine and Hysminias

A medieval writer hailing from an elite Constantinople family wrote an erotically charged romance directly inspired by ancient Greek romances preceding him by several centuries. Perhaps most closely based on Achilles Tatius's Leucippe and Clitophon, Eumathios Makrembolites manages to write with perhaps even more ekphrasis than his influences and far more sexually-charged prose. For, Hysmine and Hysminias, despite hailing from the pen of a Christian writer of the Eastern Roman Empire, is far more erotic and, in some passages, pornographic, than anything from Achilles Tatius or the other extant romances. Nonetheless, it makes up for this NSFW quality by featuring far less of the action-packed adventures and exotic travails than Leucippe and Clitophon, with the action of the story taking place mostly in Eurykomis, Aulikomis, Artykomis and Daphnepolis, four unspecified cities linked to various gods (Zeus, Artemis, Apollo) and some hazardous journeys at sea (including the appearance of "Ethiopian" pirates who are presumably the Byzantine equivalent to the dark-skinned Egyptian Nile Delta bandits of Achilles Tatius) . 

Indeed, nearly half of the text is occupied by the initial flirtations and devoted love of Hysmine and Hysminias, with the latter a herald to Hysmine's town for a Zeus festival. Initially unaffected by the arrows of Eros, he falls head over heels for Hysmine after a very lengthy time studied a garden wall painting of the god of love. Eros, or Cupid, is depicted as an emperor to whom all beings fall in tribute, and the use of ekphrasis by Makrembolites serves the plot very effectively and visually. The paintings on the garden wall, their symbolism, and the erotic dreams of Hysminias are all visually rich passages showing the powers of dreams. By the time the two lovers finally elope and plan to sail to Syria, one is glad the action of the story has finally progressed. Separated at sea by Poseidon, the two are separated as Hysmine is sacrificed for the god's appeasement. Left on shore due to his lamentations and grief, Hysminias is kidnapped by black pirates (again, likely inspired by the ancient Egyptian bandits or, perhaps, black pirates who had served with Arab armies in attacks on the Byzantine Empire?) who present an example of the dichotomy of barbarians and Greeks. It is not due to their skin color that they are savage, but their brute nature and non-Greek customs. For what it is worth, these black pirates don't rape their virgin captives, but end up becoming slaves themselves in a raid by the army of Daphnepolis.

Meanwhile, Hysmine is miraculously saved by a dolphin and Eros himself, who carries her to shore. Somehow, Hysmine was taken by the same ship of pirates herself but did not see Hyminias on their trireme. Both eventually end up as slaves who use the subterfuge of appearing to be siblings to resume some of their physical affection. Then, miraculously during the sacrifice at the altar of Apollo, the two are reunited with their parents, demand their freedom from slavery, and marry happily. Like the Greek romances, there is a lot of unexplained and random good fortune to match their misery, but not nearly enough exotic adventures. Moreover, Kratisthenes, the loyal cousin who counseled Hysminias and helped prepare for the doomed elopement to Syria, is not reunited with the family. One cannot help but feel the ancient Greek romances would have included loyal relatives in the triumphal marriage and faily reunion. Further, besides Syria and the dark-skinned pirates, there are no series of travails across the Mediterranean world or Middle East (which may reflect the decreased size of the empire by the time of Makrembolites). The black pirates represent the non-Greek world, but none are given a voice in the narrative besides their debauchery and looting. 

Despite its flaws and shortcomings when compared to the romances which predate it by 800 years, Hysmine and Hysminias remains a fascinating work of a Christian imagination set in the pagan Greek world. It's far more sexual and descriptive of the physical embraces of the hero and heroine, but still puts the ultimate value on virginity before marriage. As a story of the heroine rejecting the approved suitor of her parents for her true love, it stands as a romance urging free love, to a degree. In some respects it also brings to mind Daphnis and Chloe in the initially awkward and clumsy flirtations of the characters learning love for the first time. Yet is in in its dream sequences and examples of ekphrasis where its combination of realistic sexual relationships and pre-Christian gods that show the genius of Makrembolites in building the narrative's world as it is and how it should be. One must read the other contemporary Byzantine romances to further contextualize how Hysmine and Hysminias imagines the pre-Christian past, but one cannot help but feel this is unique in the annals of the genre. 

Tales of the Ten Princes

Reading so much prose fiction from the ancient Greek world and the Roman Empire has pushed me to the east, to enjoy fiction from India and other parts of Asia. While it is not a novel, Dandin's Tales of the Ten Princes uses the frame story of Rajahavana reuniting with his fellow allies as they plan to defeat the king who unseated Rajahamsa, his father. As each prince (descendants of other kings or royal ministers to Rajavahana's father) reunites with Rajavahana, they regale him (and the reader) with their various exploits, ruses, adventures, battles, and supernatural encounters across the Indian subcontinent. 

Not surprisingly, like the various inset tales in Apuleius's The Golden Ass other works of fiction from the Greco-Roman world, many of Dandin's tales here revolve around magic, banditry, trickery, love at first sight, forest tribes, court intrigue, courtesans, proper conduct (or lackthereof), and merchants (there are allusions to Chinese silk, and even Greek sailors and merchants) with access to great wealth and exotic goods. Moreover, Kama, the Indian Eros or Cupid, is constantly invoked and present in the text, much as in the Greek romances. Indeed, various references to Hindu sacred texts, Jains, Buddhists, ascetics, and the pantheon of gods makes it clear that a proper understanding of this text requires a deep immersion into Indian history, epics, and religion. Similarly, one requires such a background to understand many of the allusions in the Greek romances, but the Western reader will already possess some of the requisite background knowledge.

Since most of the princes engage in various forms of immoral conduct or trickery, including sleeping with a married woman in one case, to gain their kingdom, the narrative seems to gain much of its humor and traction from the contradiction between proper ethics and the reality of lived experience. These characters are far less noble than the lovers of Greek romances, but one cannot help but admire and enjoy their misdeeds and adventures. Unfortunately, some of the tales repeat the same types of ruses and the convoluted stories within stories within another story structure can lead to confusion. Perhaps fewer princes and more attention on Rajavahana would have created a more compelling central thread, as in the case of Lucius in The Golden Ass. Nontheless, it is an engaging work that takes the reader on a journey across the various social classes, castes, kingdoms, and beliefs of India in the 7th century, and perhaps an Eastern variant of the picaresque tales of Western fiction. 

A Princess of Mars

One can enjoy A Princess of Mars as a very clever and entertaining science fiction novel from over a century ago. John Carter of Virginia descends from the Southern planter aristocracy and, through an unexplained phenomena in a cave in the Arizona desert after the Civil War, finds himself transported to Mars. While he was able to escape Apaches after his skin in Arizona, he finds spectacular obstacles on Mars among a variety of creatures and races. Intelligent life on Mars is now reduced to the "red" composite race of advanced beings living under monarchs in vast cities and domains on the decaying red planet. 

The green men, more alien and warlike, bring to mind the Apaches and other Native Americans John Carter encountered on Earth, although one would think the "red-skinned" humans on mars would be more reminiscent of them. For an adventure story based on the to-be-expected conventions of its genre and time, John Carter falls in love with a Martian princess of Helium, Dejah Thoris. They must survive a number of obstacles, ordeals, battles, and separations before all ends well as two inevitably marry. Through an eventual alliance with one of the more noble leaders of the "savage" Tharks, John Carter succeeds. Needless to say, the novel ends on a cliffhanger which, presumably, hooked more readers to engage the sequel.

In spite of its predictable storyline, A Princess of Mars introduces some very interesting lore and themes of ancient civilizations of Mars. The advanced forebears of the present humans were able to construct vast cities with plazas, amphitheaters, and their descendants retain some of this advanced technology. Powered through different rays of sunlight, they create a livable atmosphere on Mars while developing aerial navies and other gadgets, weapons, and amenities. While the "red" Martians are aware of humans on Earth, they lack spaceships to contact the human-like beings on the various planets in the solar system. Moreover, perhaps due to the racial theories of the era in which the novel appeared, Edgar Rice Burroughs attributes the advanced ancient civilization on Mars to a white-skinned race, who have disappeared after several generations of race-mixing among the yellow, black, and white Martians. Burroughs has woven into the narrative some popular notions of miscegenation and decline, which the white Southern gentleman of Virginia will presumably "correct" by his time and relationship with Dejah Thoris. 

Yet, despite the possibility of Social Darwinism and the nearly feudal politics in which Carter, who descends from Virginia pioneers and planter stock himself, promotes, cross-racial relationships and possibilities for alliance lead to a promising future. Through an alliance with Tars Tarkas of the green men, the "savage" and most war-like of the Martian races, Carter is able to subdue the Zodanga. And Carter himself is hopelessly in love with a red-skinned woman of Mars, and finds nobility in her people and their culture. Without reading the sequel novels, one can say there is an ambiguous embrace of the new that may differ from the subsequent books. 

Farscape

Farscape, another science fiction show canceled before its time, has been my guilty pleasure for the last two months. There's something so alluring and Australian about this show which, after the the initial bewilderment, continues to attract viewers. I attempted to watch Farscape a year ago, but could not get past the jarring beginning in the premiere. However, if you stick with it, you'll find yourself hopelessly attached to John Crichton and the crew of Moya. Instead of taking place in a distant future, the story is set during our era and features an American astronaut who, like the viewers, is thrust into a strange galaxy with a variety of alien life-forms and conflicts. Along the way, a series of adventures (often episode of the week, but later on more epic story arcs) will entertain and challenge viewers.

The show's lore, characters, humor, creativity, depth, and sense of wonder never fails to deliver, even during the mediocre episodes or the substandard miniseries (which, one must admit, had to wrap up a story that was meant to have a full final season). I cannot recall the last time I watched a science fiction show which could be so action-packed, morally ambiguous, and adventurous all at once. The show endeavors to explore the possibility and ethics of war and power, xenophobia and contact between Earth and the aliens Crichton encounters, and how a group of escaped prisoners befriend and love one another. It is fantastic, swashbuckling, wondrous, and, in some cases, anthropological as Crichton and company explore the Uncharted Territories. Who wouldn't love a show with tight leather costumes,  puppets, living spaceships, corrupt Sebacean Peacekeepers, neural clones, wormholes, bounty hunters, heists (the Shadow Depository episodes being among my personal favorites), and a show irreverent enough to poke fun at its own lore ("Zhaan did a unity thing")?

Of course, Farscape has its shortcomings. The aforementioned miniseries felt rushed, was inconsistent with some of the previous character relationships, and, due to its nature, could not tell the full story envisioned by the writers. Details of the Scarrans, Rygel's return to Hyneria, Chiana's brother and the resistance to the forces of conformity to the Nebari, or the possible Earth-origins of Sebaceans (oops, spoilers) are unexplored, and replacements for Zhaan never felt like full-fledged characters. And don't get me started on Stark, one of the zaniest characters to ever appear in science fiction television. Jool and Sikozu, compared to him, or even Noranti, were lovable additions to Moya's crew. But in spite of, or perhaps because of its flaws, its Australian cast and crew, and its sense of wonder made for an excellent science fiction program. There will never be anything quite like it, but one hopes for a continuation of it or its wacky universe