Posted by guillermo maynez
on 12/12/2011, 11:45:26, in reply to "Re: Omensetter's Luck by William H. Gass"
189.178.234.130
Lale: as I said in a previous comment, I was also about to give up on the book going through the Furberage, but I'm glad I stayed with it. The mad prose is the reflection of an insane mind, a wonderful penetration of that kind of soul...
--Previous Message--
: There are several reasons that I know that he is not
: respected or liked. People walk out on his sermons.
: He is treated with no deference in direct dialogue.
: He is described as one "who preaches at our
: church," pointedly not as "our
: preacher." At the end of the novel, the good
: people of Gilean get a new preacher, a "large
: ruddy man" whom they feel lucky to get.
:
: I think the difference is that Furber's madness is
: personal. He has no charisma. People aren't drawn to
: him. Living here in the South, I frequently hear
: people tell me that they visited a church and found
: the preacher hateful, or bigoted, or narrow, or
: whatever. I imagine they would not attend church at
: all if such a preacher were their only option.
:
: The "crazed maniacs" you're talking about,
: Lale, have charisma for their followers. (Heck,
: people used to tell me what a "nice guy"
: George W. Bush was, or they believed him to be. They
: found him charming and endearing and "would like
: to have a beer with him." I could never
: understand. I hated Reagan, too, but I understood his
: charisma.) Also, the madness and hatred of these
: preachers and candidates resonate with the hatred,
: narrowness, fear, and bigotry of the people who are
: drawn to them. Nobody shares Furber's madness.
:
: Lale, I guess I could summarize what happens in the
: rest of the novel, but I wish you'd give it another
: try, skipping the "80 pages." It is never
: anywhere near that hard again. The story is not much
: without the amazing style.
:
:
:
:
: --Previous Message--
: He is not held in the respect and regard that a
: preacher in that time and place could reasonably
: expect, because the townspeople of Gilean recognize
: his madness and spite and hold him in contempt.
:
: How did they recognize his madness and spite? Did they
: really hold him in contempt? Did they really not
: respect him? How can they be so smart? Did they have
: physical evidence of his madness and spite?
:
: Today there are many crazed maniac hateful preachers,
: some presidential candidates even but most people
: don;t seem to recognize their madness and hate.
:
: How did the town react to Henry's death. Who found
: him? Which pages are safe (from Furberage) to read?
:
: Lale
:
: