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Bookclub: "Housekeeping"
Presented by Michael Dirda
Washington Post Book World Senior Editor
Thursday, Oct. 25, 2001; Noon EDT

Welcome to the online meeting of The Washington Post Book Club, a monthly program presented by the editors and writers of Washington Post Book World. Book World senior editor Michael Dirda will be leading the discussion on this month's selection, Marilynne Robinson's "Housekeeping".

"The background of the novel is this: Ruthie and Lucille's grandfather was among those killed when a train overshot the railroad bridge of the nearby lake and plunged into its deep waters. Their mother, one of his three daughters, eventually commits suicide by deliberately driving her car into that same lake. Their grandmother duly rears the little girls, until "after almost five years," one winter morning she "eschewed awakening." For a while, Ruthie and Lucille are then watched over by two wonderfully dotty spinsters, but eventually they come under the care of their aunt Sylvie, newly returned to the town of Fingerbone from mysterious travels." Read Dirda's review.

The transcript follows.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

Michael Dirda: Hi, Welcome to the Washington Post Book World Book Club's
discussion of Housekeeping, by Marilynne Robinson. As your techno-illiterate introducer and discussion leader had some problems logging on, we'll move right to the questions.

Washington, D.C.: Has Marilynne Robinson written other novels, and are they as good? I love the lyrical, evocative writing in "Housekeeping."

Michael Dirda: No, she hasn't brought out any other novels, but has written essays--there was a volume of these at least a decade back. I think many readers have wondered why a novelist so accomplished would seemingly abandon fiction and even writing altogether. But we can only hope that she's in fact hard at work at some great project that she will eventually share with us. STill, it's interesting how many of our most admired novels are one-shots (or essentially one shots): Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man; Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, etc.

Springfield, Va.: Is this Marilynne Robinson's only novel? If so, does her amazing use of language show up in her non-fiction book, "Mother Country"?

Michael Dirda: I don't really know Mother Country--I read one or two of the essays when they appeared and I remember them as political, even polemical.
As this is a discussion, let me open the floor to readers: Can anyone comment on Springfield's question?

Lenexa, Kan.: Mr. Dirda,

I first encountered Bernice's "green" or "blue" Ford sailing off Whiskey Rock cliff in Bill Forsyth's 1987 film on a business trip to Chicago--spent the rest of the week coaxing colleagues to see it. Rushed home to get the novel from the library.

Became an absolute favorite of mine and my son's. Love the sadness, the loneliness, the kindness--the older sister coaching the younger one: "We have to improve ourselves!...Starting right now!" The haunting mood and beauty of the writing.

QUESTIONS: When someone does something so nearly perfect that is seemingly autobiographical (Bobbie Gentry, Harper Lee, "Housekeeping"), it never bothers me if there is no attempt at a second. Your thoughts? Also, I've read her scholarly essay collection "The Death of Adam." Is she still at Iowa? Is she in the Writing Program or some other department? Thanks.

Michael Dirda: I think readers who respond to Robinson's novel share precisely your sentiments. Still, one can't help but wish there were other novels to go with this masterpiece. I do think of the example of William Gaddis, who published The Recognitions as a young man, then waited 20 years before bringing out J.R.
I don't think Robinson is at Iowa. Truth be known, except for the friend who urged me to read Housekeeping, I haven't heard anyone in literary circles talk about her in years. Yet the book remains a special one for almost anyone who reads it.

Silver Spring, Md.: Do you think the book is partially autobiographical? It is so intense and real in its feelings that it seems very personal and based on real experience, strange though that experience was.

Michael Dirda: Well, it sometimes happens that one-novel writers are actually writing displaced autobiography. So it's tempting to see Housekeeping that way. But I have no evidence that this is the case. And, having been trained years ago by New Critics, I wonder whether this matters in any significant way. A writer needs something about which he or she feels passionately to get started, but after that the logic of story usually controls the development of the narrative.

Manassas, Va.: Do you think the family's craziness began with the grandfather's death in the lake, or do you think it had even deeper roots?

Michael Dirda: What could those deeper roots be? Something genetic? Obviously, all three of the grandfather's daughters are slightly disturbed--a religious zealot, a suicide, and a homeless wanderer. And that trait is passed on to Ruthie and even her sister. In one reading, you can view Lucille as the novel's heroine, having somehow escaped the lure of visionary isolation and found a relatively normal life. At least as far as we know. But then, the imagined glimpse of Lucille in Boston suggests that she may not have escaped the family's fate at all.

Callao, Va.: What other books has this author written and would you recommend them as well?

Michael Dirda: No other fiction; two books of essays. I only know this single novel. I'd guess that the essays are, at least, interesting and well written, but no one has ever told me that they possessed anything like the power of the novel. But then nonfiction almost never matches fiction in sublimity and power. Certainly I'd pick up either Robinson essay collection the next time I saw one.

Springfield, Va.: Like Lenexa, I, too, came to the book through Forsyth's film. Had I read the book first, though, I might have considered it "unfilmable" . Yet the film manages to convey many of the essential moods and emotions present in the book. Have you seen the film, and, if so, what do you think of it?

Michael Dirda: I'm sorry to say that I've not seen the film, but then, except under certain special conditions, I almost never watch tv or rent movies. I read Robinson's novel because a friend, whose taste I admire, berated me for not reading enough fiction by women. I babbled that I had read a good many women authors, but clearly she was right. So I asked "Well, what do you recommend?" And she suggested Housekeeping. As for all of you out there in bookdiscussion land, the novel simply overwhelmed me with its strangeness, odd humor (don't you love the exchanges between the two elderly aunts?), beautiful language, transcendental vision, and peculiar "happy" ending. It strikes me as one of those perfect short novels--like, say, The Dead or Noon Wine or Benito Cereno or Notes from Underground or First Love.

Bethesda, Md.: How does the ending of the novel reinforce its message?

Michael Dirda: What? The novel has a message? The ending does suggest that Lucille is more like her sister than she realizes--or that Ruthie somehow imagines that she is. One feels the tension that keeps Lucille "normal."

Lenexa, Kans.: Thanks for nice response. It's probably "Bobby" Gentry. Anyway, two favorites from the beautiful writing:

At the bottom of Fingerbone lake: "Imagine my grandfather reclined how many years in his Pullman berth, regarding the morning through a small blue window."

On the way to grandmother's: "Bernice's car smelled dusty, like an old sofa... she stopped and bought us hot-fudge sundaes... We sat at a hot green metal table...sticky, loud black flies with rainbows in their wings fed on the pools of drying ice cream."

I've read McCarthy and Millhauser. Look forward to trying Russell Hoban. Thanks.

Michael Dirda: THanks. ONe can turn to almost any page and find comparably beautiful sentences. But the one I quoted in my little write-up--about is probably my favorite: "For to wish for a hand one one's hair is all but to feel it. So whatever we may lose, very craving gives it back to us again. Though we dream and hardly know it, longing, like an angel, fosters us, smooths our hair, and brings us wild strawberries." Gorgeous, but I don't know if it is quite true.

Augusta, Ga.: I am an avid reader but had never heard of Robinson until Housekeeping was the book club selection. Why so long before the public got to know her? Excellent choice.

Michael Dirda: Housekeeping was much accliamed when it first appeared, and the movie of the novel has earned at least some critical renown among cinephiles. But in America literary reputation must be fed with further books--and these Robinson never supplied (the essay collections apart). So, gradually, she has been forgotten, though her book is periodicaly reissued in paperback. I suspect that Housekeeping will last--in my view, it is certainly among the 20 or 30 best American novels of the past 20 years.

Texas: Oh my goodness! I don't usually see a film and wonder if it was based on a book! "Housekeeping" was a wonderful film and Christine Lahti did a marvelous job in her protrayal of the eccentric aunt. Just last weekend, my granddaughter mentioned that she wanted something new to read; I think we'll read this together. Thank you! - Nani

Michael Dirda: thanks

Silver Spring, Md.: This is a statement rather than question. About whether author has written another novel, my old paperback version says she has written two novels, Housekeeping and Mother Country.

Michael Dirda: Hmm. Does anyone know if this is right? As I've said, I've never read Mother Country, but presumed it was nonfiction. If it is a novel, has anyone read it? I've related how I came to read Housekeeping, and have to presume that if Mother Country is a novel it must be somehow less good: no one seems to talk about it. But then, of course, it might be a neglected masterpiece, an even greater victim of the fickleness of literary reputation.

Washington, D.C.: Do you think that Lucille's turning away from Sylvie and Ruthie is well described? My one frustration with the book is that I never really understood why she did that. Perhaps that reflects Ruthie's lack of understanding of her sister's motivation?

Michael Dirda: It struck me that Lucille simply develops as anyh normal girl might, that the pulls of adolescence--conformity, clohtes, boys--are sufficient to take her away from the strange world of Sylvie and her sister. From another viewpoint, Lucille's soul is somehow more vulgar than that of the ecstatic souls of Ruthie and Sylvie.

Washington, D.C.: I'm related by marriage to Robinson. She's still in Iowa, teaching creative writing at the University, FYI.

Michael Dirda: Thanks. Glad to hear it. Can you add anything more? Is she working on a new novel?

Springfield, Va.: That passage in the book reminded me of Emily Dickinson's "Success is counted sweetest/by those who ne'er succeed..."

Please elaborate on the "curiously 'happy' ending". What do you find happy (or semi-happy) about it?

Michael Dirda: No one dies. Ruthie and Sylvie feel happy. Of course, one could regard Sylvie as a kind of psychological abuser, a kind of Erl Queen, who has spirited a child away into a peregrine life on the road.

Manassas, Va.: I, too, first encountered Housekeeping through the movie, and found it beautiful and haunting, but never went looking for the book. Thanks for choosing the book for the book club; as good as the movie is, the book is even better, because of the beautiful language and the many images the words invoke.

Michael Dirda: thanks. I guess we all should go see the movie.

Lenexa, Kan.: The cover of "The Death of Adam" does make a case for "in the tradition of nineteenth-century novelists who turned to the essay, Robinson." Her essays are very scholarly and relevant to the present: "Puritans and Prigs" e.g. At one point she writes: "To borrow a question from Genet, what would happen if someone started laughing?" I hope I haven't misrepresented her here.

Michael Dirda: thanks

Augusta, Ga.: Where can I find a list of the twenty or thirty American novels you consider the best over the last twenty years, Housekeeping being one?

Michael Dirda: A few years back, for the 25th anniversary of Book world, I wrote a long piece on the past 25 years of AMerican fiction. I discuss what then seemed the most significant AMerican novels of that period. I would suppose it's archived somewhere. When I bring out a companion volume to my essay collection Readings, I'd probably reprint that piece. But here are a few other favorites to whet your appetite: Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker; James Salter's A Sport and a Pastime; Annie Proulx's Accordion Crimes; John Crowley's Little, Big; Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian; Thomas Pynchon's Mason & Dixon.

Springfield, Va.: Mother Country appears to be nonfiction, and a reviewer at an online bookstore says:

"In a life time of reading one may come across a book or two written with both great passion and linguistic craft. Marilynne Robinson's Mother Country is one such work. These two hundred thirty odd pages bristle and glisten with insight, logic, and control of the Mother tongue mustered in a searing indictment of the British state plutonium reprocessing business at Sellafield. The details and extent of Britain's mindless pollution of the natural environment will shock most readers. First, however, all but the Philistine will be stunned by Ms. Robinson's art, wisdom, depth of feeling, and mastery of English prose. Among a few books I unreservedly recommend."

Michael Dirda: Yes, that matches what I vaguely remembered. The earlier comment threw me--perhaps the publisher made a mistake. Thanks for helping out.

Bethesda, Md.: For us, "Housekeeping" was an extraordinary journey into the throes of a dysfunctional family, one that had been this way over several generations. It raised many questions of relationships, life styles, and twisted thinking. There is no question concerning the consummate skill of Ms. Robinson. Can you tell us whether this book came about because of some similar (it could hardly be exactly the same) life experiences that she had? Why did the author avoid any closure to the story, leaving us only with ruminations of the departers (Sylvie and Ruthie) about who might be in the house, what happened to Lucille, and this endless speculation on various outcomes?

Michael Dirda: This is a perplexing issue. Certainly the family is unusual, even crazy, but Ruthie and Sylvie don't see themselves in quite that way. Should we apply the test of normality to a visionary experience or the discovery of an almost religious vocation? I don't think so. A person who falls in love may seem crazy to the world--why would a man, say, leave his perfectly fine family for some other woman? But to him, he might feel that his conventional existence was death-in-life and that here was a chance for something richer, more exhilarating and altogether fulfilling? Is he wrong? Or is he deluded? And even if he is "deluded," if his love affair brings him happiness, might he not be making the right choice for him? So Ruthie and Sylvie may seem like homeless wanderers, and yet within their lives are rich and wonder-filled.

Washington, D.C.: Thanks for the discussion and for the motivation to read Housekeeping for a third time. You mention it's among the best recent novels, and one that's often overlooked. Can you recommend others?
Thanks.

Michael Dirda: See earlier answer.

Washington, D.C.: Do you think that Lucille's turning away from Sylvie and Ruthie is well described? My one frustration with the book is that I never really understood why she did that. Perhaps that reflects Ruthie's lack of understanding of her sister's motivation?

Michael Dirda: I do think it well done--as I've said in an earlier posting. But then everything in the novel is convincingly told. I suppose one has to decide, as a reader, just how one wishes to regard Ruthie and Sylvie. Isn't there a Blake aphorism that goes something like "if a man were to go far enough in his madness, he would become wise"?

Silver Spring, Md.: Near the end of the book, Ruth writes: "I believe it was the crossing of the bridge that changed me finally." Can you elaborate on what you think that means.

I've been in and out of the chat because of things going on here, so excuse if this repeats earlier questions/remarks, but I'd like you ask you what you think the overarching theme and idea of this book is. I think it's mainly about loss and loneliness -- and being different, too.

Michael Dirda: Yes, we haven't talked much about the book's evocation of loneliness. But it's a strange kind of loneliness--akin to the joyful solitude of an ascetic rather than depression. ONe could readily see Housekeeping as part of an American exploration of isolatoes: Walden, Bartleby the Scrivener, Miss Lonelyhearts might be other examples.

Silver Spring, Md.: Actually, a comment. I disagree with your assessment of the ending. If Sylvie won out over Lucille, I think Ruthie's lost out. I've known some people like Sylvie in real life. Although Robinson's writing might make it seem beautiful and happy, the reality is that it isn't.

Michael Dirda: I'm sure the reality isn't. But does one judge fiction against the standard of reality? Or against the inner integrity of the work itself? Those are larger questions that we can't take up now. But I obviously believe that fiction has, at best, a tangential relationship to reality. Art is its own thing.

Spring Valley, Calif.: Michael, I must miss the discussion, alas. I did want to ask you about one thing I found curious. Why would a young girl be made to memorize Emily Dickinson's "I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died"?

Michael Dirda: Well, speaking of isolatoes, Emily DIckinson would certainly fit right into the family, wouldn't she?

Fairfax, Va.: There's a wonderful two-page scene in chapter 2 about a pack of unruly dogs frolicking around the girls on the lake ice and the walk home. A theme that recurs (no pun intended) later. Is the author using this "wild" as a symbol of life, freedom, or a mirror to the girls' condition?

Michael Dirda: I'd guess that all three of your suggestions are appropriate interpretations. Certainly, the working out of patterns is essential to any art.
But, sigh, I see that we've already exceeded our time together--and I have my regular book discussion in 40 minutes. If anyone wants to continue talking about Housekeeping, check out Dirda on Books at 2 and we can keep going. Otherwise, let me thank you all for reading Robinson's wonderful books and sharing some of your thoughts with me and the other members of the club who might be following this discussion. I would urge new readers to surrender to Housekeeping as an esthetic experience rather than try to analyze it as a document about dysfunctional families or a work of displaced autobiography. And let us all hope that one of these days Robinson gives us another novel even half as good.
Till next time, keep reading!

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