Classic Literature and Breasts: Thoughts on 1Q84

Warning: Potential spoilers for things in the first four chapters.


I'm feeling really frustrated right now.  I'm currently reading 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami, and while I was totally expecting to love it, the more I'm reflecting on the book (I'm only 45 pages in!) the more I'm uncertain whether I want to try and finish or not.  I actually am finding the plot pretty intriguing, but I've got a lot of niggling feelings that everything the book is hinting at, is going to happen.

I'm four chapters in, and breasts have been discussed at length SEVEN times already.  Guys, that's averaging a couple paragraphs about breasts every few pages.  That's twice as many breasts as characters.  That's more breasts than character development or plot.   20% of what I have read so far is breasts.  I feel like I have this problem any time I read "literary" books.  It's like to be taken seriously, books have to fantasize women.  I don't have a problem with sexy times, but I like there to be a purpose to it.  I understand that part of adult fiction is bringing in more sex, which makes sense as it's a big part of culture for better or worse.  What doesn't make sense is jamming in seemingly random scenes or focus on parts of the body with no point in furthering plot or character development.  I don't want to be reading about a character walking down a flight of steps and then suddenly boom three page long lesbian fantasy scene!  (But of course the character isn't a lesbian or bi, she just has copious amounts of lady sex.)  What does that have to do with anything?  If that information is important, it could be summed up very quickly, or perhaps less graphically.  It's jarring to suddenly feel like I'm in the middle of a literotica when just a paragraph earlier, it was about a character walking down the stairs.  And I guess...it still wouldn't bother me if it felt real and not like something someone wishes were real.  Maybe that's why I prefer my YA sex scenes - they're not romantic or mysterious or just clear male fantasy.  They're honest.  They're awkward and fun, and if there's a focus on breasts outside of sex, it's usually funny or pertinent to the character/plot.   Not an ode to women's breasts that goes on and on comparing their different shapes and sizes or imagining what their nipple color is.

I don't know why I am so frustrated by this, because even to myself I sound a bit like a crazy person.  It's hard to really articulate why it bothers me so much, and what about it feels so clearly like a male fantasy vs any other book I've read with sex in it, regardless of the audience type. Maybe I'm feeling jarred as YA authors are primarily female, so I'm not sure when the last time I read a book by a male author was. (Edit: Not that long ago. I've read at least two books authored by a man in the past month, and they were both very fun) And it's not that I'm bothered by there being sex scenes - a couple weeks ago I read entirely romance novels for pete's sake!

Some of it comes from the fact that the book is starting with an older male character (30) ogling a 17 year old female character, and an even older man who has pictures of her (we don't know how he got them).  This is quickly feeling like it's going to get really icky.  I also don't have any patience for authors dismissing people as "not lesbian or bi" - when they have actual relationships with both genders.  According to reviews, the female character has relationships with older men AND women (once again, super hot young girl into older men - creep factor), and there continues to be random, pornographic sections that add nothing to the plot or character development.  And there appears to be large portions of the book about the characters doing nothing at all.  This is not sounding promising to me.

On the one hand, I usually finish books.  It's what I do.  And I feel like for me to be able to legitimately criticize the books out of my own opinions and not reciting others opinions, I have to finish the book.  But on the other hand, when I read reviews that confirm all my worries I've formed in the first 45 pages of the book, it seems clear I'm going to hate this...and it's almost 950 pages.  I'm not sure if I'm going to finish it, but as of this moment I'm feeling very angry and contrary, which almost certainly won't lead to any good reading of anything else.  So we'll see. I might finish this book out of sheer perverseness.

Mao's Last Dancer - Li Cunxin

Summary                                    

From Goodreads:  

From a desperately poor village in northeast China, at age eleven, Li Cunxin was chosen by Madame Mao's cultural delegates to be taken from his rural home and brought to Beijing, where he would study ballet. In 1979, the young dancer arrived in Texas as part of a cultural exchange, only to fall in love with America-and with an American woman. Two years later, through a series of events worthy of the most exciting cloak-and-dagger fiction, he defected to the United States, where he quickly became known as one of the greatest ballet dancers in the world. This is his story, told in his own inimitable voice.

Thoughts 

I had originally seen the movie based on this book when it came out a couple years ago (watch it - it will be well worth your while.  Not only is the story great - which we'll get to here - but the script and acting were very good and the dancing was phenomenal) and have been waiting anxiously to get my hands on the book, which I was FINALLY able to do a couple months ago.  Let me preface this by saying I don't read nonfiction normally.  I avoid it at all costs - I will read the occasional memoir or biography, but I can count the number of both genres combined on one hand.

Cunxin's insight into communist China as well as into the art of dance makes for an absolutely compelling read.  You start with a little background about his family before he was born and the opening bit of the book is devoted to his childhood before he was introduced into dance at the age of eleven.  The poverty he describes is beyond imagination.  Most first-world citizens will not be able to even come close to picturing the poverty that much of China (and much of the world even today) lived in.  Cunxin grows up in a small village.  He shared a tiny house with seven brothers, his parents, and grandmother.  There is no heat, and China reaches frigid temperatures much of the year.  School is devoted to teaching Mao's ideals (this is set a few years before Mao dies), meat is a luxury.  Even reading his descriptions and seeing some of the photos, it is literally beyond the realms of my imagination to dream up a situation as poor as his family was for generations.  At age 11 he is chosen to attend the Beijing Dance Academy, where he endured grueling 16-hour days.  Imagine everything you've heard about how challenging the dancers' lives are in New York or England or Australia.  Now imagine being 11 years-old, being physically stretched beyond your body's capabilities so that some student's are forever disabled.  These students are sent home in disgrace. Imagine being in an environment when one day your teacher is a renowned professor, then the next moment he is branded a traitor against Chairman Mao and forced into physical labor or prison.

Cunxin is finally able to escape this environment when he invited to work with the Houston Ballet Company.  When he comes to America he discovers that everything he has been taught in China about the outside world is a lie.  The rest of the book is devoted to his escape from China, dealing with the aftermath of a huge culture change as well as consequences for himself and for his family.  For almost a decade Cunxin didn't even know if his family had been murdered because of his defection.

I thought this story was amazing - to read how hard a person can push themselves to succeed and to see how far a human can come - it's really just mind boggling.  This isn't a work of fiction.  These things actually happened to real people, many of whom are still alive.  This story is only set a little over 30 years ago.  The writing is so descriptive, and the way everything is described is so foreign to everything I have experienced in life.  It is an absolute delight to read how Cunxin describes the world.  Even if you are not into nonfiction (like me) I highly recommend you read this book just so you can understand even a little of what goes on in some countries.   I would also recommend you watch the movie, which is a beautiful work of art.  It doesn't even matter which order you do either - they are both amazing stories.

Recommended

                           
Red Scarf Girl Review                     I Was A Dancer Review