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Lit Out Loud: 11 Songs Inspired by Books

April 13, 2013

The Coachella Music and Arts Festival has moved into my neighborhood for the next two weeks. The lineup of great live music got me to thinking about how music relates to my other great love — books.

 

Of course all art feeds off each other. Visual artists are inspired by musicians who are inspired by writers who are inspired by painters and so on. It’s the human centipede of art. Everything is digested by someone else eventually. But I feel like the link between music and writing is particularly strong — I know many musicians who feed off ink and many writers who are fueled by song. So I compiled a few great songs inspired by books.

This is by no means a comprehensive list. There are about five gagillion songs inspired by the Bible, so I didn’t even go there. I know Mumford & Sons have a couple Steinbeck-inspired tunes, but frankly, listening to Mumford & Sons makes me tired. And there’s a Kate Bush song about “Wuthering Heights,” but I hate it.

This is just a sampler of the bookish tunes I do like. If I missed one of your favorites, let me know in the comments!

 

The Song: Ramble On • Led Zeppelin

The inspiration: Lord of the Rings • J.R.R. Tolkien

Oh, total LOTR nerds, those Led Zep guys. Give Robert Plant a wedgie the next time you see him.

 

The song: Sympathy for the Devil • The Rolling Stones

The inspiration: The Master and Margarita • Mikhail Bulgakov

Marianne Faithfull gave Mick Jagger a copy of the book as a gift. I haven’t read it yet, but the character of the devil in the novel is apparently quite sophisticated, “a man of wealth and taste.”

 

The song: Killing An Arab • the Cure

The inspiration: The Stranger • Albert Camus

This is an exact retelling of “The Stranger” in just over two minutes, like musical Cliffs Notes. You don’t even have to read the book now. Seriously. I read it.

 

The song: Don’t Stand So Close to Me • the Police

The inspiration: Lolita • Vladimir Nabokov

Ah, the song that inspired me to pick up Nabokov at an inappropriate age. Music: Inspiring sex, drugs and reading.

 

The song: White Rabbit • Jefferson Airplane

The inspiration: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass • Lewis Carroll

Remember what the dormouse said: Feed your head! (Although the dormouse didn’t really say that, so don’t put that in your next English class essay.)

 

The song: All Along the Watchtower • Bob Dylan (But I’m linking the Jimi version, because I like it better and this is my website.)

The inspiration: Frankenstein • Mary Shelley

This one is a bit of a stretch. But other people on the internet say it, so it must be true.

 

The song: Hey Jack Kerouac • 10,000 Maniacs

The inspiration: On the Road • Jack Kerouac

I’m baffled by why there aren’t more beat-inspired songs, since the writing of that era was incredibly ripe with rhythm, experimentation and vitality. Or do these songs exist and I just don’t know them yet?

 

The song: How Soon is Now • The Smiths

The inspiration: Middlemarch • George Eliot

The Smiths have other songs that reference a bunch of dead writers. But this is one of my favorite songs of all time with some of my favorite lyrics of all time.

“I am the son, and the heir, of a shyness that is criminally vulgar/I am the son and heir, of nothing in particular,” an adaptation of this line from Middlemarch, “To be born the son of a Middlemarch manufacturer, and inevitable heir to nothing in particular.”

 

The song: Sylvia Plath • Ryan Adams

The inspiration: The poetry of Sylvia Plath

Beautiful and sad, just like Sylvia Plath.

 

The song: 1984 by David Bowie

The inspiration: 1984 • George Orwell

Apparently David Bowie wrote an entire, never-produced rock opera based on “1984.” Can someone please bring this to life for me? What do I have to do to make this happen? I picture it as dystopian dinner theater. “I’ll have the tofu and Big Brother, please.”

 

Song: Shadrach • Beastie Boys

Inspired by: J.D. Salinger

Inspired by Salinger? Not really. But one of the greatest lines of all time is, “I’ve got more stories than J.D.’s got Salinger/ I hold the title, and you are the challenger.”

If you want a song that was truly inspired by Salinger, check out “Bananafishbones,” based on one of my favorite short stories, “A Perfect Day for Bananafish.” And then you can go ahead and read all of Salinger’s “Nine Stories,”  because it is a tremendous book.

Santa Barbara is DOOMED! (Or How Andrew McCarthy Revealed My Baggage)

April 10, 2013

Let me take you back in time, back before The Husband and I had health insurance.

The Husband was in terrible pain and needed an expensive root canal surgery, but our options were limited. We could drive to Mexico and look for a dentist in Tijuana. We could go to a dentist friend-of-a-friend in Santa Barbara, who was willing to do the work at a discounted rate. Or I could try my luck with an x-acto knife, a pair of pliers and a YouTube instructional video.

He chose the Santa Barbara route.

We were new Californians then, and it was our first visit to Santa Barbara. What little we knew about the place was culled from a new TV show called “Psych” and a soap opera from the ’80s.

 

The dentist was nice, and I was impressed that he opened his office on his day off to do this favor. His practice had one of those forcefully cheerful names, like Dr. Happy Smile Goodtime Dentist O’ Fun!, so I expected to have a great time. Maybe even get a free pink toothbrush.

My husband settled into the dentist’s chair, and I settled into the waiting room with a stack of books and whatever electronic gadget provided entertainment in 2006. A Tamagotchi, maybe? I don’t remember.

The dentist popped his head out of his office.

“Hey, this is going to take a while,” he said. “Maybe five, six hours. Why don’t you go get a cup of coffee or browse around? I’d hate for you to be stuck here that long.”

He gave me directions to State Street, just a couple blocks away, which is lined with boutique stores, galleries and cafes. Then he said he’d call in a few hours with an update. I put my things in my car, then headed to State Street.

Back then, The Husband was The Fiancé, and we were still in the planning stages of our wedding. So when I passed by a bookstore with a large window display of glossy wedding magazines, it was like having my clothes snagged on a thorny bush. I got stuck, and I couldn’t seem to walk away.

Before I knew it, I was in a coffee shop binging on newly purchased bridal magazines, making crazy lists and planning all kinds of shit with tulle. The lunch crowd came and went, but I remained, reading in-depth articles about how to give good face in my wedding photos and 40 reasons to love an illusion-neckline dress.

I had just reached the end of a quiz (Was I an elegant bride? Or a glamorous bride? Dear God, tell me!), when I glanced at my watch.

 

Five hours had passed. I still hadn’t received a phone call from the dentist.

Maybe I should call him, I thought. So I rummaged in my purse for my phone. No phone. I looked all over the coffee shop, back the bookstore, inside every store I visited. No phone. And then, in a jolt of panic, I ran as fast I could to the dentist.

The Husband was sitting on the concrete stairs outside the dentist’s office, cradling his jaw with his hand. He was in tears.

All he said was, “I called you.” And then he nearly fainted.

Here’s what happened: After I left the dentist’s office, the dentist realized my husband’s tooth was too far gone to salvage with a root canal. So he pulled it. The Husband was done and out of the chair within a half hour. The dentist, working on his day off, packed up and left. And my poor boo had been sitting outside for more than five hours, holding his achy jaw, with an unfilled prescription for painkillers in his pocket.

I helped him to the car, where my phone was sitting with the rest of my things. I had 27 missed phone calls, all from my husband. The voicemails covered the entire spectrum from “Hey, I got done early. Come pick me up” to “What the hell? Are you ignoring me? The engagement is off!” to “Are you OK? I’m so worried about you.”

The guilt! Oh, the deep, miserable guilt. This one incident is why I scooped the cat litter for YEARS without complaint.

Now, seven years later, it was time to revisit this beautiful city and make the past right. And so for our anniversary, I planned a trip to Santa Barbara.

 

Through Airbnb I booked a one-bedroom apartment in a leafy neighborhood near State Street. It sounded perfect — a dog-friendly place that boasted a full kitchen, wifi, off-street parking, all kinds of great stuff.

Almost immediately, things went a little awry. The owner of the apartment texted me to say there had been a death in her family, so she didn’t have a chance to clean the place. Also she left her car was in the carport, so we would have to park on the street. I completely understand how the sudden death of a relative can turn everything upside-down, and I truly felt sympathy for this woman, so I cut her a lot of slack. However, I didn’t like that she asked us to lie to her neighbors about who we were and what we were doing there, since she was illegally subletting her apartment.

Later, parked on the street instead of inside the carport, we found a neon-green parking ticket tucked under our windshield wiper.

The next day, in an effort to try something new, The Husband and I took a painting class together and created two lovely pieces of art. We didn’t yet know that just two days later, my husband would drop my painting and shred the canvas.

Then our dog became ill. This involved hours of walking in circles around the pretty, leafy neighborhood, wiping runny poo off the sidewalk.

On one such walk, my husband and I stumbled onto the office of Dr. Happy Smile Goodtime Dentist O’ Fun. The Husband held my hand and gazed at the concrete steps. “Remember when the dentist pulled my tooth and you abandoned me for more than five hours while I was in pain?”

“YES.”

And then our dog defecated on the steps.

Honestly, I wouldn’t say it was a bad vacation. I’ve known people who had bad vacations, and this wasn’t even close. But I will say that this lovely seaside town has a tiny raincloud above it, and it’s addressed only to me. All the things that would pass by uneventfully elsewhere seem to get bumpy for me in Santa Barbara.

I once asked Andrew McCarthy — yes, THAT Andrew McCarthy, the teenage heartthrob-turned-travel writer — how he writes about a location in which something bad happens to him or a place where he doesn’t feel a personal connection.

 

He said, “I’ve realized that when I don’t feel a connection to a place, it says more about me than it does about the place. It’s rarely ever about the place at all. It’s about what you brought there.”

It means I brought a lot of baggage to Santa Barbara.

Or perhaps, like my husband’s tooth, I’m rotting from the inside out, and Santa Barbara is simply exposing the decay. Who knows?

Either way, it’s a nice enough place that I don’t mind trying to love it again and again.

There’s always next anniversary.

 

She’s a good dog: In defense of broken animals

February 11, 2013

A woman stopped me in my neighborhood as I was walking my dog. She pulled a bag of organic dog treats from her purse.

“Can doggie have a tweat?” she said in a high-pitched baby voice. She began to kneel by my dog.

“Um, sure,” I said. Then I launched into my prepared spiel: “Yes, my dog can have a treat. But don’t be offended if she doesn’t take it. She was born blind and deaf, so she gets a little nervous around people she doesn’t know.”

The woman stopped, stood up, put the treats back in her handbag.

“Well,” she said. “A dog like that should’ve been put to sleep. Put it out of its misery.”

I wanted to say, “You should’ve been put to sleep,” but I bit my tongue out of decency. Instead I said, “She’s a good dog,” and walked away.

 

That woman’s response was uncommon. Usually strangers act as though I’ve been feeding lepers in Calcutta. “That’s so good of you,” they say. “It’s very noble of you to take that on. She’s very lucky.”

But that’s not exactly what happened. I did not seek out a special-needs dog. This wasn’t an act of charity.

What happened was this: I was a newspaper reporter, covering a story at a local animal shelter. All of the small dogs at this shelter lived in the office, where I was conducting my interview. One of the dogs wiggled around my feet. She was long and weird-looking and moved too fast. I took a picture of the dog with my phone, and it turned out like a blurry thumbprint.

It was kind of like falling in love. There was a spark, a moment. When I couldn’t stop thinking about the dog two days later, I returned to the shelter.

That’s when a shelter worker told me the dog was deaf. “She’s broken,” he said.

I went home again and considered if I could raise a dog that couldn’t hear, couldn’t respond, would never know the sound of my voice. I discussed this with my then-boyfriend. Together we decided we could do it.

When I showed up to sign the adoption papers, I discovered the dog was blind too. Her left eye was misshapen and clear blue. Her right eye was clouded and brown. Both of them pointed in different directions, like a cartoon animal that’s been hit in the head with a frying pan. She was really broken. But by then I was too far gone to say no.

 

We brought the dog home and named her Lemon, like a bad used car. The cat hissed at her. She bumped into a lot of furniture. We suffered through long training days and many sleepless nights.

Now, four years later, Lemon has grown into exactly what I told the lady on the street — a good dog. She is an integral part of our family, and I don’t know if I ever want an unbroken animal companion again.

 

On behalf of Lemon, and all the other Lemons out there, here is why you should consider adopting a less-than-perfect shelter animal.

1. Broken animals have a different kind of intelligence. Lemon has keen instincts. She is a quick judge of character. And she plays the hell out of fetch, even though it’s more like hide and seek. I simply spray her toys with vanilla scent first, and Lemon can sniff out any tennis ball, rope twist or soft stuffed gorilla.

2. Broken animals are brave. My dog can find her way through a maze of furniture, hop on and off the bed and negotiate hiking trails — all with her eyes shut. Every day she teaches me something more about living fearlessly.

3. Broken animals are well-behaved. Lemon does not bark at the mailman. She does not notice when the doorbell rings. She is quiet in hotels. She doesn’t even glance at the dogs we pass on the street.

4. Broken animals are especially snuggly. Lemon loves fiercely and unconditionally. She doesn’t know me as the person who saved her; she only knows me as her family.

5. Broken animals improve your life. I am richer for having this dog as a companion.

 

Of course, adopting a broken dog also comes with some drawbacks:

1. Idiots approach you on the street and say your dog should be put to sleep.

 

 

Favorite minute of 2012

December 28, 2012

It’s difficult to take a bad photo of Venice’s Grand Canal, but I certainly tried.

Exhibit A: Grey sky. No dominant point of interest. Big-ass crane in the distance.

 

Exhibit B: More grey sky. More big-ass crane. Plus gondolier butt.

 

And then … the sun slipped out to say hello.

 

Suddenly the whole city was picturesque!

 

Two gondoliers joined the slow flow of traffic. I pretended they were in a fight, stripey shirt vs. stripey shirt.

 

But then they became friends and floated along together.

 

And as my boat slipped underneath a bridge, the city was everything I ever imagined.  Pastel buildings. Sherbet skies. Voluptuous, shimmery streets. A masterpiece of engineering and nerve, inspiring generations of poets and painters.

 

Then, just as quick as it began …

 

The moment disappeared.

 

I had many good minutes in Venice — and many great minutes throughout 2012 — but that one was perfection.

 

Favorite books of 2012

December 26, 2012
Overall, this has been a great year for reading, right? I read so many good books in 2012, I had trouble paring them down for this list. (Sorry, Gone Girl. But you made so many other lists!)

I love that I have the luxury of reading again. When I worked for newspapers, it was a challenge to even read one book a month. I think I just got so full on words while I was at work — I was surrounded by websites, magazines, newspapers, Twitter feeds, etc. — the last thing I wanted to do was pick up a book when I got home.

Now that I am in grad school, though, I am required to read, and I relish every second of it. When I tuck myself on the couch for a few hours to consume a book, it feels like the biggest scam in the world. Turn off the phone! Tell the husband to be quiet! I’m doing my schoolwork! I only wish I would have gone back to school years ago.

Anyway, these were my favorite books this year. Keep in mind that not all of these books were published in 2012 — they were just books I happened to enjoy this year.

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand — I resisted reading this for a long time, probably because my dad recommended it. But sometimes dear ol’ dad knows what he’s talking about.

This is the true story of a Southern California long distance runner who became an Olympian, then joined the military during World War II. That’s when this book starts to sound like fiction. Every time you think this guy’s story can’t get worse, it does. He and two of his crewmates survive a plane crash into the Pacific … and then they live on a life raft for 47 days … and then passing planes shoot and deflate the raft … and then they are captured by the Japanese. And it only gets worse from there. (I’m not spoiling anything, by the way. All of that happens in the introduction.)

Do they make people this tough anymore?

Treasure Island!!! by Sara Levine — No, not the swashbuckling classic. This is the story of a misguided 25-year-old woman who becomes obsessed with “Treasure Island” and uses it as a self-help book. It’s completely ridiculous, and the protagonist is completely unlikeable, but it’s completely funny.

And look — Sara Levine was a guest at my MFA program residency recently, and she signed my copy. (You’ll just have to read the book if you want to know what she means by “Steer the boat, girlfriend!”)

Columbine by Dave Cullen — I am downright awed by Cullen’s research. Yeah, I was a journalist for 13 years, but I’m not worthy enough to hold Cullen’s notebook. His work is amazing, and this is an important book. After the shooting in Newtown, it feels even more deeply profound.

Damascus by Joshua Mohr — A story about a San Francisco bar and its regulars — the misfits, the losers and the people who just want to be loved.

The Book of Jonas by Stephen Dau — A novel about a young Muslim boy who is saved by U.S. troops after his village is destroyed during an American military attack. The story is told in little patchwork pieces, sewn together into a meditation on the nature of trauma, memory and guilt. It’s a really beautiful and thoughtful book that poses many unanswerable questions. I read this many months ago, and I still think about it all the time.

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt — Two words: Cowboy hitmen.

Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven by Susan Jane Gilman — Travel memoir is probably my favorite genre, and this is a good one. The author and a friend backpacked through China in 1986, just after the country opened for tourists. It’s an interesting look at a nation in transition. But it’s also a bizarre and funny story about choosing the wrong travel companion.

Wild by Cheryl Strayed — This is a story of a woman, a trail and learning to put one foot in front of the other after grief, regret and mistakes. It took me a long time to read this book, not because it was difficult or too long, but because so many of the passages were too beautiful to consume at once.

Also, I am a firm believer that hiking long distances can make your life better. See?

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor — This is a young adult fantasy novel about an angel and a demon who fall in love. It sounds Twilight-y, but it’s really not. Taylor’s writing is stunning, and she invented a truly unique world with a brave, young female protagonist.

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter — I loved everything about this book. Walter created complex and flawed characters, and their stories intersect in the most bizarre, wonderful ways.

His descriptions of Cinque Terre were so vivid that when I was in Italy, I made a detour just to see the place for myself. It was worth it.

Shameless plug: If you’re in the Coachella Valley area, Jess Walter will be doing a reading/talk at my work! He’ll be at UCR Palm Desert at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 20 — and I can’t even begin to explain how excited I am about that. If you hear someone in the back of the room, shrieking as if she’s at a New Kids on the Block concert? That’ll be me. The event is free, but space is limited. RSVP here.