Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow
Publication date: 1974
Edition: Penguin Classics with introduction 2006 (Plume Books 1996)
Publisher: Penguin Classics
270 pages
Source: Toppings Books, Ely
Summary/Back of the book: "Welcome to America at the turn of the twentieth century, where the rhythms of ragtime set the beat. Harry Houdini astonishes audiences with feats of escape, J.P. Morgan dominates the financial world and Henry Ford manufactures cars by making men into machines. Emma Goldman preaches free love and feminism, while ex-chorus girl Evelyn Nesbitt inspires a mad millionaire to murder the architect Stanford White. In this extraordinary chronicle of an age, such real-life characters intermingle with three remarkable families, one black, one Jewish and one prosperous WASP, to create a dazzling literary mosaic that brings to life an era of dire poverty, fabulous wealth and incredible change."
There is a very definite rhythm to this book - which perhaps makes sense considering its title, and not being particularly familiar with the background to ragtime (the music) I went to look it up. Scott Joplin was the "king of ragtime", and he crops up in the book when Nathaniel Coalhouse plays two of his tunes - Wall Street Rag, then Maple Leaf, describing them as "Composed by the great Scott Joplin". Actually the first music that came up in my search was this - The Entertainer, which isn't mentioned in the book, but seems pretty apposite nevertheless - I thought oh of course... I could see the story as a silent movie, with this playing in the background. Anyway - ragtime is apparently a modification of the march ... with additional polyrhythms coming from African music ... The ultimate (and intended) effect on the listener is actually to accentuate the beat, thereby inducing the listener to move to the music." Scott Joplin ... called the effect "weird and intoxicating." He also used the term "swing" in describing how to play ragtime music: "Play slowly until you catch the swing...
I did indeed find the story rather like that - it's about America as the world of the "WASP", and about the "additional polyrhythms" that are the other peoples who have come to it (but, interestingly, not a mention of the native Americans who were there before). The beat carries on, on the one hand, in life itself - it doesn't matter whose life, they all go from beginning to end, birth through happenstance to death, but on the other hand, when you take each person or event as a singular instant in time, as something "ragged", out of step with the supposed basic beat, that's what catches our attention. And through all that I was drawn to read on and on, and to think about it all - I was moved. *g* The first line in the book is a quote from Joplin: Do not play this piece fast. It is never right to play Ragtime fast... - I suspect whole essays have been written on what Doctorow meant by that quote at the start, so I won't subject you to my version (*g*) but it's interesting to think about.
It's also written in a rather distant style, as by someone looking down on the world - and sometimes back through time and wisdom - which of course it was. It's set in the early 1900s America, but was written in the 1970s by an author who is described in the introduction as having lovingly researched" the period, so that the detail throughout is "so meticulous, vivid and full of awe that the energy and appetities [sic] of the country itself seem to shine through it. I find that interesting to think about too. On the one hand it's very grounded, via its detail, in the early 1900s, but on the other hand I do find it very much a book of the 1970s. Coalhouse seemed very much out of his time - not ever the "deferential Negro" that society wanted him to be, to the point that his direct action was much more in the style of the Black Panther party, and another of the main characters was Emma Goldman, where the focus seems to be more on her feminism than her anarchism (actually she almost seemed presented as motherly in some parts).
Actually women are treated interestingly - on the one hand there are certainly strong female characters, on the other hand much is made of, for example, Houdini's love for his mother but his wife and/or apparent affairs don't rate a mention at all. Pierpont Morgan's wives and daughters seem to be non-existent. Considering all the other detail, that does strike me as odd - presumably purposeful?
It's a book that made me go and look up most of the "real characters" out of resulting interest - that can't be bad either! The Harry K. Thaw/Evelyn Nesbitt/Stanford White story (true) reminded me of Baz Luhrmann's version of The Great Gatsby enough that I went to find out of the one was thought to be connected to the other (not that I can see). The real-life characters aren't all accurately drawn though - on purpose - and as a historian I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's not that things seem to have been taken away from them exactly, or made up about them completely, but maybe that's where I struggle. In taking historical characters and giving them motivations and thoughts they may not ever have had... well, what effect does that have? Morgan didn't seem to have been obsessed with Egypt, Houdini wasn't all alone except for his mother. Was von Papen ever in America, on the beach, with his wife? Well, yes he was in America - and expelled for suspected subversive activities and intrigue. Did Freud, Jung and Ferenczi go to the US together? Yes - but did Freud become disillusioned with it as quickly and personally as the book suggests? I'd have to do more in-depth research than wiki to find out... I might, but I'm sure most readers won't (there's only so many days in a life, after all... *g*) But again, it's making me think, in an interested, musing way - the book doesn't lecture to the reader, but you wind up more conscious of things, even though what I mainly did was enjoy the story.
Oh, Doctorow has been quoted as saying, about writing in general: First you invent something, then you find a corroborating source or lie. Hmmn... Oh, to the point that there's controversy about whether his appropriation of a situation from the novel Michael Kohlhaas (for Nat Coalhouse's character) by Heinrich von Kleist counts as literary adaptation or plagiarism... Doctorow has said it was "a quite deliberate homage".
And oh dear, I am going on, aren't I? Basically - I enjoyed reading it, it engaged my imagination and my brain, and I'd recommend it as a good read!
Edition: Penguin Classics with introduction 2006 (Plume Books 1996)
Publisher: Penguin Classics
270 pages
Source: Toppings Books, Ely
Summary/Back of the book: "Welcome to America at the turn of the twentieth century, where the rhythms of ragtime set the beat. Harry Houdini astonishes audiences with feats of escape, J.P. Morgan dominates the financial world and Henry Ford manufactures cars by making men into machines. Emma Goldman preaches free love and feminism, while ex-chorus girl Evelyn Nesbitt inspires a mad millionaire to murder the architect Stanford White. In this extraordinary chronicle of an age, such real-life characters intermingle with three remarkable families, one black, one Jewish and one prosperous WASP, to create a dazzling literary mosaic that brings to life an era of dire poverty, fabulous wealth and incredible change."
There is a very definite rhythm to this book - which perhaps makes sense considering its title, and not being particularly familiar with the background to ragtime (the music) I went to look it up. Scott Joplin was the "king of ragtime", and he crops up in the book when Nathaniel Coalhouse plays two of his tunes - Wall Street Rag, then Maple Leaf, describing them as "Composed by the great Scott Joplin". Actually the first music that came up in my search was this - The Entertainer, which isn't mentioned in the book, but seems pretty apposite nevertheless - I thought oh of course... I could see the story as a silent movie, with this playing in the background. Anyway - ragtime is apparently a modification of the march ... with additional polyrhythms coming from African music ... The ultimate (and intended) effect on the listener is actually to accentuate the beat, thereby inducing the listener to move to the music." Scott Joplin ... called the effect "weird and intoxicating." He also used the term "swing" in describing how to play ragtime music: "Play slowly until you catch the swing...
I did indeed find the story rather like that - it's about America as the world of the "WASP", and about the "additional polyrhythms" that are the other peoples who have come to it (but, interestingly, not a mention of the native Americans who were there before). The beat carries on, on the one hand, in life itself - it doesn't matter whose life, they all go from beginning to end, birth through happenstance to death, but on the other hand, when you take each person or event as a singular instant in time, as something "ragged", out of step with the supposed basic beat, that's what catches our attention. And through all that I was drawn to read on and on, and to think about it all - I was moved. *g* The first line in the book is a quote from Joplin: Do not play this piece fast. It is never right to play Ragtime fast... - I suspect whole essays have been written on what Doctorow meant by that quote at the start, so I won't subject you to my version (*g*) but it's interesting to think about.
It's also written in a rather distant style, as by someone looking down on the world - and sometimes back through time and wisdom - which of course it was. It's set in the early 1900s America, but was written in the 1970s by an author who is described in the introduction as having lovingly researched" the period, so that the detail throughout is "so meticulous, vivid and full of awe that the energy and appetities [sic] of the country itself seem to shine through it. I find that interesting to think about too. On the one hand it's very grounded, via its detail, in the early 1900s, but on the other hand I do find it very much a book of the 1970s. Coalhouse seemed very much out of his time - not ever the "deferential Negro" that society wanted him to be, to the point that his direct action was much more in the style of the Black Panther party, and another of the main characters was Emma Goldman, where the focus seems to be more on her feminism than her anarchism (actually she almost seemed presented as motherly in some parts).
Actually women are treated interestingly - on the one hand there are certainly strong female characters, on the other hand much is made of, for example, Houdini's love for his mother but his wife and/or apparent affairs don't rate a mention at all. Pierpont Morgan's wives and daughters seem to be non-existent. Considering all the other detail, that does strike me as odd - presumably purposeful?
It's a book that made me go and look up most of the "real characters" out of resulting interest - that can't be bad either! The Harry K. Thaw/Evelyn Nesbitt/Stanford White story (true) reminded me of Baz Luhrmann's version of The Great Gatsby enough that I went to find out of the one was thought to be connected to the other (not that I can see). The real-life characters aren't all accurately drawn though - on purpose - and as a historian I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's not that things seem to have been taken away from them exactly, or made up about them completely, but maybe that's where I struggle. In taking historical characters and giving them motivations and thoughts they may not ever have had... well, what effect does that have? Morgan didn't seem to have been obsessed with Egypt, Houdini wasn't all alone except for his mother. Was von Papen ever in America, on the beach, with his wife? Well, yes he was in America - and expelled for suspected subversive activities and intrigue. Did Freud, Jung and Ferenczi go to the US together? Yes - but did Freud become disillusioned with it as quickly and personally as the book suggests? I'd have to do more in-depth research than wiki to find out... I might, but I'm sure most readers won't (there's only so many days in a life, after all... *g*) But again, it's making me think, in an interested, musing way - the book doesn't lecture to the reader, but you wind up more conscious of things, even though what I mainly did was enjoy the story.
Oh, Doctorow has been quoted as saying, about writing in general: First you invent something, then you find a corroborating source or lie. Hmmn... Oh, to the point that there's controversy about whether his appropriation of a situation from the novel Michael Kohlhaas (for Nat Coalhouse's character) by Heinrich von Kleist counts as literary adaptation or plagiarism... Doctorow has said it was "a quite deliberate homage".
And oh dear, I am going on, aren't I? Basically - I enjoyed reading it, it engaged my imagination and my brain, and I'd recommend it as a good read!