Stradling Two Worlds

 I am currently reading three books. One is by Thomas Mann's son Klaus written in the early 1940s. He traces the early years of his life in that illustrious German family and the descent of his country into Nazi barbarism. The second is an anthology of short stories which Adele and I read over the phone. We've discovered some gems including works by Tim O'Brien, Joyce Carol Oates, Charles Baxter and Lorrie Moore.

The third is a new autofiction by Ben Lerner entitled Transcriptions. His novella reminds me how those of us over fifty straddle two cultures. The analog world of straight-ahead sequential movies and fiction. I didn't even have a telephone til I was thirteen. (None were available during WWII). We talked to each without rushing to recover forgotten names and we walked away with unanswered wonder. More personal, less performative.

Contrasted with this is the virtual universe of mobile phones, Zoom meetings, Facetime, instant images and breaking news. We have learned to live with simultaneity, fluent in a gestalt of surfaces. No, I don't want to see a photo of your french toast.

Lerner creates situations in which technology fails, and the character has to revert to his elemental senses such as listening and taking time in our rush to nowhere.

Short pieces of fiction tend to concentrate on a single moment as a way of penetrating the subject. Reading aloud adds a new dimension, lifting characters off the page into a new life as we assume their voices.

To a certain extent, Hitler was a product of that newfangled technology in the 1930s called radio. While he ranted with fury, mesmerizing his flock, FDR also utilized radio, delivering his fireside chats which often drew an audience of over sixty million. The medium lent itself to opposite messages, but it was the force that moved millions.

Our would-be dictator has mastered social media with his midnight rambles, hogwash and decrees as if his delusions crossed the blood-brain barrier to this new bamboozled reality. Every morning the world waits with held breath for his latest blabbering; and that is the name of the game.

I read Klaus Mann's autobiography to gain insight into the degradation of two proud cultures. The parallels are clear. The lesson learned is the fragility of the human spirit particularly in periods of epochal changes. The two worlds I straddle not only mark changes in sensibility due to technology but also challenge us to stay centered during these years of infamy, breathing the foul air of indecency and lust for power.