Blonde: A Novel

Author - Joyce Carol Oates ... [Goo?] [Posters]

This Paperback Book item from Harper Perennial was reviewed on 24-Oct-2008.

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1) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. Ambivalent because that´s how the book left me. Maybe confused, certainly affected. I had not read Joyce Carol Oates before and have always been curious what attracted her fans.

"Blonde" has a certain 21st century Virginia Woolf style. But, whereas Virginia Woolf was more poetic in her prose, and wrote in a dreamier, drawn-out style, Joyce Carol Oates tends to shout when she writes, seeming to be concerned that the reader might not understand her point.

A fictionalized biography allows the author to paint her own impression, highlighting what she thinks would have been the important events/memories of the subject´s life. The author can give weight to five or six events that most likely defined and affected the subject, rather than writing a similarly thick book that gives equal weight to all events in a subject´s life.

I have mixed emotions about the graphic sex; it was necessary to paint the impression that Joyce Carol Oates intended to portray, but it runs the risk of Hollywood producing a movie that focuses on that one aspect. Virginia Woolf´s Bloomsbury Group agreed to talk frankly about all issues, including sex, particularly homosexuality, and it would be interesting to see her review on this book, if she were still alive.

Henry Miller and Anais Nin were much more graphic; they were much more pre-occupied with physical sex in much of their writings.

Joyce Carol Oates was not pre-occupied with physical sex, but had she omitted these details, one might think that she was afraid to "go there." Some readers will not be able to get beyond the images of the graphic sex; most readers will find Marilyn´s psyche much more robust than Hollywood tended to portray it.

For me, Marilyn´s concern for her mother and the sweet things she did for her mother tells me much more about Marilyn than anything else.

By the way, Marilyn Monroe would not have had time for this kind of fiction; she was reading Doestovsky and Darwin´s "Origin of the Species" which even I find difficult, and biology/chemistry were my majors in college. Pop/contemporary literature would not have kept her interest.¤

2) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. I saw the movie and it was horrible. Marilyn Monroe was a real person who does not settle for abuse. The author is a woman who has no respect and is incorporating her own sex life in the book. As a English Literature major I can tell she is suffering from a lack of sex. But I know that there are good writers out there who write Marilyn out of love and respect and do their homework.¤

3) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. When I first picked up the book (hardcover), the size of it almost made me put it down...738 pages! Yikes! Who has the time? In this day and age of quick gratification (and getting to the point), this one had better be good! So, I read it, and (yawn) I read some more. It was hard to keep my eyes opened in the beginning. The paragraphs were all very long, with mishmash of dialogues. Never the one to give up (especially with such an interesting character as Marilyn Monroe!), I hang in there. And I´m glad I did. Once I got used to Ms. Oates´s writing style, I was able to follow her writing. Considering this is a novel and not a documentary, I read it as such...fictional story of non-fictional character. I didn´t liked the ending, however, where Ms. Oates finished the book with a repeat of an earlier anecdote. I can honestly say that in the end, I enjoyed reading this book and, if I had the time, I´d re-read it again since I skimmed good part of the beginning.

For those people who follow Monroe´s life, I´d recommend Ted Jordan´s "Norma Jean, My Secret Life with Marilyn Monroe". Jordan was one of many, MANY Monroe´s lovers. In this autobiography, he included pictures - i.e. Marilyn´s first wedding in 1942, pictures of Norma Jean before she became the fabulous Marilyn Monroe, and the pictures Jordan took. This book was very easy to read and you get to know who actually influenced Monroe´s sexy persona.¤

4) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. This novel by Oates includes many of Oates´s strengths as a writer; and, who is not interested in Marilyn Monroe? All in all, it is one of Oates´s most interesting novels from a research viewpoint and she tries to get into Marilyn´s head and fill in the details - albeit fictional. I thought that she failed to do so. She spent a lot of time on the small sexual details. Do we really want to know "how" the head of a studio had sex with her, and what position they were in, etc., etc.... and you can fill in the details yourself or read the book for much graphic detail. And, remember it is part fictional so it is part guess work by Oates. Less is sometimes better in literature. In short, it is a bit over the top.

Joyce Carol Oates was born in 1938 in upstate New York State and is a distinguished Professor of Humanities at Princeton. She gained fame with her first novel With Shuddering Fall in 1964. Now four decades later, she is the author of scores of novels, many short stories, essays, plays, and poetry. The present novel from is somewhere near the end of the chronological order of her body of work and we see the polished prose of an experienced writer.

I have read a number of her works from different time periods in her career and set up a Guide to Joyce Carol Oates Listmania list. Compared to her early novels, this is a straight-forward and almost a "light" read. It contains some drama but there are a few intense scenes, but less than in some other works. The novel has a good story structure and easy prose, and the reader is spared the "too much prose" found in some early works such as The Assassins. The read is mostly compelling.

Oates is known for her emotional and dramatic stories, often with women or even poor women such as students or teachers caught up in stressful situations, and often set in her native upstate New York (Niagara River - Syracuse - Erie,PA. triangle). Actually, some of her best work is found in her 10 to 20 page short stories, which are often dramatic, sometimes very intense, and many involve off-beat characters, and they include rapes, murders, and people with serious mental health issues, etc. People who have not read her collections of short stories should take a look at those.

The present novel is a departure in location but not in spirit. Marilyn Monroe was a stressed young woman with a mentally ill mother. She had to make many sacrifices to follow her acting career. Oates gives a good step by step view of her teenage years, her first days as a model, and the career that followed, along with her marriages.

This is a relatively compelling read, but very graphic, and some will be turned off by the details of Marilyn´s sex life. Again, as in other works, she mixes in the tawdry a little too much. Overall I did not like it. I still prefer You Must Remember This and We Were The Mulvaneys. Both are better works.

Neutral recommendations: 4 stars.
¤

5) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. Don´t believe the hype! Although widely panned, this book is superb. Less a meditation on Monroe herself, the book´s real success is as a feminist critique of Hollywood. By focusing on the idea of Monroe the legend, it calls into question the entire Western project of deification and celebrity. It also works as a kalidescopic ride in and out of a multitude of literary styles and narrative voices, often operating as a brilliant piece of metafiction.¤

6) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. In her most ambitious work to date, Joyce Carol Oates boldly reimagines the inner, poetic, and spiritual life of Norma Jeane Baker -- the child, the woman, the fated celebrity and idolized blonde the world came to know as Marilyn Monroe. In a voice startlingly intimate and rich, Norma Jeane tells her own story of an emblematic American artist -- intensely conflicted and driven -- who had lost her way. A powerful portrait of Hollywood´s myth and an extraordinary woman´s heartbreaking reality, Blonde is a sweeping epic that pays tribute to the elusive magic and devastation behind the creation of the great twentieth-century American star.¤

7) Paperback Book Blonde: A Novel by Harper Perennial. Penzler Pick, April 2000: It is surprising and shocking to realize that Joyce Carol Oates, one of the great writers living today, has never made The New York Times bestseller list (at least not in recent memory). Far less talented (and less famous) authors have made it while she, in all likelihood not caring much, has been shut out. That could easily change with her new novel, Blonde, which may be the masterpiece of a staggeringly distinguished career.

This 700-plus-page tome is based on the life of (you guessed it) Marilyn Monroe. In fictional form, with names changed (husband Joe DiMaggio is referred to as "The Ex-Athlete," Arthur Miller as "The Playwright," John F. Kennedy as "The President," for example), this may be the most accurate and compelling portrait of this beautiful and complex woman that one is ever likely to read.

But why discuss it on the mystery page, you might well be asking yourself. It was the author´s intent to structure the book as a mystery, and of course she succeeds, as she seems to succeed at everything she attempts in the world of letters. And there is a murder, apparently arranged by a secret government bureau (FBI? CIA?), although that could be the victim´s hallucination. Of course, it could also be both real and hallucinated (remember, even paranoids have enemies).

If you like biographies, you´ll like Blonde. If you like novels, you´ll like Blonde. If you like mysteries, you´ll like Blonde. And if you fear that more than 700 pages by one of the greatest of living literary lions might be tough slogging, here´s a little excerpt from the chapter titled "The President´s Pimp:"

Sure he was a pimp.

But not just any pimp. Not him!

He was a pimp par excellence. A pimp nonpareil. A pimp sui generis. A pimp with a wardrobe, and a pimp with style. A pimp with a classy Brit accent. Posterity would honor him as the President´s Pimp.

A man of pride and stature: the President´s Pimp.

At Rancho Mirage in Palm Springs in March 1962 there was the President poking him in the ribs with a low whistle. "That blonde. That´s Marilyn Monroe?"

He told the President yes it was. Monroe, a friend of his. Luscious, eh? But a little crazy.

Thoughtfully, the President asked, "Have I dated her yet?"

Nothing inaccessible about Joyce Carol Oates, especially in this most readable and relentlessly fascinating study of the lovely woman with whom the whole country was at least a little in love. --Otto Penzler¤

Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 21-Nov-2008, 006093493X9780060934934, 050-3X0-370-420-650-920-ABB-1WB-8

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