Daily Book Excerpt: YA/Children’s books
Next book on the shelf is A House Like a Lotus
I can’t really describe how much this book meant to me when I first read it – I always think of it, in a way (even though it’s not) as a companion book to Ring of Endless Light. They have nothing to do with each other (although they do share some characters – mainly Zachary) – but to me, they are thematically similar – and – I found the reading of them to be an incredibly cathartic and healing thing. Hard to talk about them without making them sound like “message” books – or books meant to be uplifting. I don’t think they are. I think L’Engle knows the story she wants to tell, first of all – but underneath all of that, underneath the plot points – is the theme she wants to bring out. Like in The Arm of the Starfish
I read House Like a Lotus in the middle of a huge crisis in my life – one of the biggest, at that time. I read it my first year of college – after my senior year of high school had ended in a rather – sharply defined horrible crisis. I was left hurt, scared, and – I can only say scarred. I thought I’d never recover. And the reality was – it took me years to get over it, and I still go back and forth on what happened – and we all still have to deal with the ramifications of what went down back then. My friends will know of what I speak – I’m being vague, because – duh – I choose not to share the details. But anyway – this book came out at around that time, when I just … did not know how to go on. I was in college and supposed to be all excited about the new experience. But I was – dragging my shadow around in a circle (thanks, Sylvia Plath!!). This book is ALL ABOUT this kind of experience. I read it over and over again. I remember finishing it (the book made me cry – it still does) – and starting it again immediately. It was a deep healing drink. No easy answers. Eventually, when you get right down to it, you have to take responsibility for your own life. You have to admit: I need to heal myself. Otherwise – you let the situation victimize you. I was in need of healing. I could not get over it. This book helped me at least clarify the depths of the situation. It couldn’t be avoided. I couldn’t ignore what had gone down. I had to deal.
Here’s the plot, briefly:
Polly O’Keefe (daughter of Calvin O’Keefe and Meg Murry) is 17 years old. When the book opens, she is sitting at an outdoor cafe in Athens – writing in her journal. It’s a first-person narrative book – which is the first time we’ve been inside Polly’s head like that. So we know immediatley that something is wrong with Polly. She feels shell-shocked. She stares at her surroundings, but – she feels dead to them. There’s a pain in her. Her heart has been broken. We don’t know why. And we won’t for a while. The book unfolds slowly. (Uhm … like a lotus??)
Turns out – that Polly is on her way to the island of Cyprus to be a “girl Friday” at an international conference. And she ends up having an unexpected layover in Greece for a couple of days. Her uncle Sandy (uhm – member him? Sandy Murry??) was supposed to meet her there – he’s some kind of secret contractor with the US government – he travels the world – nobody knows what he really does – But anyway, he was supposed to meet her in Greece, spend a day or so with her, and then get her to Cyprus. He was going to be delayed – so Polly has a couple of days to kill by herself. She is so raw at this point that this unexpected delay from her beloved uncle feels like yet another betrayal. But she settles in to being by herself.
She promptly meets a glamorous guy named Zachary (uhm – we’ve met him before) – who pretty much picks her out of a crowd and pursues her. Polly is confused and put off and flattered – He turns on the charm. But Polly is not available – she’s too hurt, by whatever happened. Too damaged. Zachary senses this – and doesn’t push – but he definitely keeps pursuing her.
As this present-day story develops – we also go back to the beginnings of the story of whatever it was that so destroyed Polly. Back in South Carolina – where her family now lives – she was kind of an outsider at high school. Polly has lived abroad and on islands all her life (Calvin being a marine biologist) – she speaks a gazillion languages – she’s a weirdo. Her uncle Dennys (Sandy’s twin – ahem) is a neurologist – and he arranges an introduction between Polly and a woman named Max who lives nearby. Max is a patient of his – and he somehow thinks they would hit it off. Max is an older woman, she’s a painter – she lives in this amazing house (L’Engle describes it so well) … and … she and Polly do, indeed, hit it off – even with the age difference. Max becomes a kind of loving mentor to Polly. Polly blossoms. Max becomes the most important person in her life.
L’Engle has a lot to say here – about the dangers of idolizing those who mean the most to us.
It’s a fantastic book, everyone – again, I think it’s a shame, sometimes, that her books are relegated to the children’s section of bookstores – because – many of them don’t belong there. I mean, yes, 14 year olds can read them and love them … but does that mean it’s not serious literature? To an adult who isn’t into young adult fiction – a book like House Like a Lotus doesn’t read like “young adult fiction” – it reads like a damn good book, and that’s final.
Polly eventually gets to Osia Theola – the conference center on Cyprus – and a whole second section of the book begins: the people she meets … they’re all so vivid, so flawed and so real. YOu love them all. Polly works her ass off at the conference – and learns so much – just from being in the presence of all of these people, many of whom have had tragic things happen to them – many of them coming from war-torn countries. It’s not that Polly learns to trivialize her own hurt … it’s that during this experience she basically joins the human race, she joins the world of adults … where no one is exempt from being hurt, no one is excused, and also: no one is perfect. Children can think other people are perfect. But adults can’t get away with that for long. It’s hard to give up childish things. But that’s what happens for Polly, working at this conference.
She meets a man from an island called Baki – his name is Omio – and they basically become kindred spirits. There’s something in him she needs, she senses it immediately. She is still cringing inside her shell – and through her friendship with kindly Omio – she starts to come out again. A bit chastened, perhaps – that’s what your first hurt will do to you … but she’s coming out again. Oh – and Zachary, true to form, tracks her down to Cyprus. Keeps calling her at the conference center … but she’s already in a new headspace … Zachary’s glamour and his pushing for sex and his cynical view of the world – is not for her. Even though, in a way, she likes him. But Omio is the one who ushers her into healing. (There’s a whole section in the beginning of the book about Epidaurus – and in an example of L’Engle’s weaving of two different levels through her book – the Epidaurus episode happens, Polly is unable to accept healing yet – it baffles her … but then there is Omio – at the end … who basically becomes an Epidaurus for her.)
I haven’t read this book in a while – it’s one of my favorites.
Here’s an excerpt from the second half of the book. Polly’s at the conference, getting to know everyone. Omio rising ….
Excerpt from A House Like a Lotus
Bashemath and Millie were drinking tea, sitting at the table. I hoped I didn’t look as though I’d been crying. Norine came toward me. “Where were you, Polly?” she accused. “That same young man phoned you again, and I couldn’t find you.”
Bashemath said, in her calm, deep voice, “She doesn’t have to tell you whenever she goes for a walk, Norine.”
“Well, you missed him once more,” Norine said to me.
“Is he going to call again?” I asked.
“He didn’t say.”
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted him to or not. This world of Osia Theola was a completely different world from Athens, and Zachary seemed alien to it. Still, I was glad he had called. I was glad he had sent flowers.
“Tea, Norine?” Millie asked. “Polly?”
“No, thank you,” Norine said. “I have work to do.”
“Do you need me?” I asked. “I’ve typed Bashemath’s stencil. Shall I run it off?”
“Not now, Polly. I’m going over some of my lectures.”
“Then I’d love some tea,” I said.
Norine trotted across the dusty compound to the office, and Bashemath got a mug, and Millie poured me tea from the large pot on the table.
Millie said, “There are some hot peppers by the dormitory building. I’ve picked a few, to add to the dinner tonight. This food is good, but not overly seasoned.”
Bashemath spoke, following her own train of thought. “Do not let Norine bother you with her sharp ways. She has a heart of gold.”
“She doesn’t bother me,” I replied. “And I’m here to work.”
“But not to be overworked.”
“Oh, I’m not, and I like work.”
Omio drained his mug. “We’re not likely to have another free afternoon. How about a swim? Or is it too hot?”
“Much too hot,” Bashemath said.
“I don’t swim. I’m afraid of crocodiles,” Millie said.
Omio laughed. “But this is Cyprus, not Cameroon.
“Nevertheless,” Millie said firmly, “no. Thank you.”
“I’d love a swim,” I said.
“Let’s meet under the fig sycamore.” Omio smiled at me.
He was there, waiting for me, and we started downhill. “Polly, forgive me.”
“For what?”
“I have given you, lo, a romantic picture of Baki. It is not only the Christians there who have done bad things. If the missionaries were not overly concerned, about whether or not the women covered themselves, it was because they were more concerned about the black magic, the witchcraft. Using hateful, hurting magic was as bad as beating a man and rubbing salt in the wounds. Worse. It could kill. We Bakians and the Christians were alike, some good people, turning the heart to love, others wicked, turning to greed and power.”
He was holding my hand, swinging it, as we walked. I said, “I guess everybody’s like that.” And then I asked, “Does your Laughing Christ always laugh?”
His hand squeezed mine. “It is said that in time of great disaster tears fall from his eyes. My great-grandfather is supposed to have seen him cry before a tidal wave which killed many of our people. I have seen only the laughter, and there have been bad things in Baki. But if I ever saw him cry, I think I would be very afraid.”
Did the statue on Max’s landing ever weep?
We left the houses of the village and moved quietly along the path protected by high walls of grasses plumed with pale fronds, bleached by the fierce sun. And then we came to a tiny pasture I hadn’t noticed the night before in the dark. In the pasture were the most beautiful little goats I’d ever seen, with soft, silky hair, and long, drooping ears. We stopped and admired them. They looked at us with great, startled eyes, then went back to grazing.
When we reached the place which Vee had tried to clear of stones, Omio sat down in the water and began to throw stones far up on the shore, to make the path wider. I joined him, throwing the rounded stones as far as possible.
“If we keep at this a little every day,” Omio said, “we will keep the path open. I think Vee has tender feet. She is a poet.”
That seemed rather a non sequitir, but I thought it likely that Vee did have tender feet, or she wouldn’t have bothered to move the stones. My cut foot was not that tough, either. I was glad of the path.
When we had finished throwing what Omio decided were enough stones, he said, “Last night you held back because of Vee, and that was nice of you. But I think you swim well. Let’s race.” And he splashed into the water and threw himself under a breaker.
I followed. I have learned that it is not a good idea for a girl to beat a man in a race, even though I think that’s stupid. However, I did not have to hold back with Omio. It was all I could do to keep up with him.
“How do you come to swim so well?” he asked while we were splashing into shore. The sun was low on the horizon; evening came early to Cyprus; and the sky was flushed with a lovely light.
“I’ve lived on islands most of my life. We swim a lot.”
Omio took my hand, and we walked on up the beach. “You are promised?” he asked.
“What?”
“You have a boyfriend? A special one?”
“No.”
“In Baki, by your age, a woman is at least promised.”
“In my country I’m considered too young. At least my parents would certainly think so.”
Omio swung my hand. “It’s time we went home.” He gave me his shining smile. “It’s home, isn’t it?”
Yes. Already the monastery was home.
After the evening meal, with the dark closing in, Krhis said that we would stay in the cloister for the staff meeting instead of going to the upper room. He had each of the staff members talk a little bit about what they planned to do. Bashemath expected to have everything ready for a book fair, posters and all, by the first weekend. Millie hoped they’d be telling their own stories. Frank talked about the hope for small presses, and then, at his urging, Millie sang for us, and then Norine suggested that Omio do one of the Bakian dances.
Without embarrassment, Omio stood up and stripped off his T-shirt, kicked off his sandals. Then he moved into a dance which started with his entire body undulating in slow rhythm. Then the tempo accelerated until Krhis began to clap, joined by Frank, then Millie and Norine. Then Omio squatted low to the ground, with one leg, then the other, stretching out, somewhat like Russian Cossack dances, but much more quickly, incredibly quickly, and then he rose, rose, until he was leaping high into the air, fingers stretching him taller, higher …
Then the clapping began to come more slowly, winding him down. He was glistening with sweat, breathing in short, panting gasps, and the clapping changed from being an accompaniment to the dance, to applause.
“Lo, now we must sing Saranam.” His voice was breathless, and he looked to Millie, who started singing.
In the midst of foes I cry to thee,
From the ends of earth, wherever I may be,
My strength in helplessness, O answer me,
Saranam, saranam, saranam.Make my heart to grow as great as thine,
So through my hurt your love may shine,
My love be yours, your love be mine,
Saraname, saranam, saranam.
“What does it mean, ‘saranam’?” I asked.
“Refuge,” Norine said.
“God’s richest blessing,” Millie added.
Krhis said, “There is no English equivalent.”
Frank laughed. “There doesn’t need to be. Saranam says it all, loving, giving, caring.”
Omio said, “I think it is like a Bakian word which means that love does not judge.”
Vee added, “Love is not love which alters which it alteration finds.”
“What’s that?” Bashemath asked.
“Shakespeare, from one of the sonnets.”
“Shakespeare?” Millie asked.
“Sonnets?” asked Bashemath.
Suddenly I realized that things I’d taken for granted, as part of my background, were unknown to people of other cultures.
“Shakespeare is probably our greatest writer in the English language,” Vee said, “and the sonnet is a form of poetry. I’ll talk about it in one of the workshops. I even hope to have people writing sonnets.”
Another thing I realized was how little I knew about Vee. I knew from her poems and novels that she had loved, and passionately. Because of Norine I knew she had an insane husband. There were a few chinks my imagination could fill in, but I realized something else that evening. I realized I was too young to understand much that had happened in the lives of these people who had quickly become my friends.
We finished the lemonade, which was tart and lovely, and Krhis sent us off to bed. I walked across the compound with Omio and Vee.
“Too late for a swim,” she said. “Ah, well, we’ll make time tomorrow.”
“Too bad Frank can’t come with us,” I said.
Vee nodded. “He does swim at home, in a pool. He misses it.”
“Lo, he is a kind man, is Frank,” Omio said.
“Yes,” Vee agreed. “I wonder if someone who has never suffered, known loss and pain, is capable of true kindness?”
Omio took my hand. “We find much true kindness here in Osia Theola.”
I think L’Engle’s books come off as fundamentally “uplifting” without being “message” books because her worldview is fundamentally a positive, life-affirming one.
In one of her essays (dang, I forget which one) she talked about looking into the chaos of this world and seeing meaning (I think she used the word “cosmos”)…seeing harmony, that something beautiful could ultimately be sorted out from the apparent chaos. And she said one of the problems she had with some writers and artists “of today” is that they seemed only interested in reproducing the chaos, not in trying to show that it can be transformed…
I’ve read a few of the Austin books but never in order (I could never find a list that seemd to give them in more or less “chronological to the story arc” order). I should pull them out and read (or reread) them following the order you’re listing.
They are very satisfying reads and a good antidote for all the unsettling and/or life-denying stuff we hear on the news these days…
ricki – Oh, man, totally – I read her books and -they are certainly not lightweight, but they reflect her worldview – that there is a pattern, and that we, as humans, can actually figure out how we fit into that pattern. I just love her books – because they seem so HUMAN to me.
House Like a Lotus is terrific – and Ring of Endless Light, too – those are my favorites of hers.