1. It's been thirty+ years now since Rita Hennessy (RIP) and I team taught courses in English composition and philosophy.
Those heady days of working with Rita came back to me as I spent most of the day today reading (and finishing) Jess Walter's detective novel, Over Tumbled Graves.
Back then, the introductory philosophy courses were divided into three offerings. In the fall, the focus was on ethics; in winter, epistemology; in spring, metaphysics.
In the ethics course, we explored how we humans arrive at our understanding of right and wrong; the epistemology course focused on the nature of knowledge and how we arrive at what we think we know; the metaphysics course focused on the nature of reality, with special emphasis on the visible and invisible.
Reading Over Tumbled Graves was like being back in those philosophy classrooms again. Detective work -- and detective novels -- are all about what's ethical and unethical in crime investigation and how far detectives are willing to push ethical boundaries and rub up against unethical deeds.
Detective work is also about what the detectives regard as reliable knowledge and how they arrive at it. Are the senses reliable? Is profiling? Do the past practices of serial killers help in the search for a killer who is currently active? Can detectives call into question their own assumptions about knowledge they think they have? What is the impact of arrogance and stubbornness on the thinking processes of detectives? How do these very human qualities impede their search for knowledge and limit their willingness to consider a variety of approaches to figuring things out?
And, lastly, is what appears to be real, actually real? How about if what appears to be real isn't? Are the detectives open to this possibility? To what degree are they confined to a sense of their own certainty about what's real and is that "certainty" actually impeding their investigation, not moving them closer to solving the crimes?
Jess Walter explored these sorts of philosophical questions thoroughly, through his story telling, in a very practical manner, demonstrating how questions of ethics, epistemology, and metaphysics are not merely to be puzzled over in college courses, but are at the core, yes, of the work detectives do, but also at the core of how you and I conduct and muddle our way through our everyday lives.
2. What I'm about to write might be a little off the wall, but here goes: to me, the stretch of dive bars, adult bookstores, Chinese restaurants, sketchy convenience and liquor stores on East Sprague Ave. and the ongoing illicit prostitution and drug dealing in this neighborhood become a central character in this novel. It's as if this neighborhood has a mind and a will of its own that it imposes upon those people who frequent this stretch and upon those who would try to change it, try to eradicate the crime. This stretch of street pushes back, resists, seduces, traps, deceives, even mocks not only those who would try to change it and those who try to escape, but those whose habits and ventures keep the crime alive.
3. I was so absorbed in Over Tumbled Graves today that almost all I did was read -- very similar to the way I spent my days with Ruby Ridge and All the Light We Cannot See. I didn't cook today. Instead, for both lunch and dinner I stretched the salad I made for family dinner by adding more rice and adding chopped lettuce to it and further dressing it with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
When I do this, when I spend whole days reading and not leaving the house, not doing anything else except some writing and puzzle solving, I have to push back voices in my head that nag at me to get out of the chair or off the bed and get things done. I did take good care of Gibbs and Copper today. I did keep the kitchen uncluttered. I might have snuck something else productive into my day. The truth is, though, when I get enthralled by books*, all I really want to do is read, enjoy the solitude of it, and feel the pleasure of stimulation and appreciation -- the stimulation of ideas and insights and the pleasure reading books written beautifully gives me.
*the same is true for movies -- if only I could do both at the same time......
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