Book Review - Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
Published by: Picador USA
Publication Date: September 19th, 2000
Format: Paperback, 639 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy
In 1939 Europe isn't safe if you're Jewish. Josef Kavalier lives in Prague but is unable to use the travel visa his parents obtained for him due to the ever changing policies of the Nazi Party. "Joe" was studying escapology and his teacher, Bernard Kornblum, has a plan. To smuggle Joe out with the Golem of Prague, a prize the Reich desperately wants. Concealed in the coffin Joe eventually makes his way to New York City and his cousin Sammy Klayman. Joe's one mission on reaching New York City is to find a way to get his family to join him. This requires money. Upon learning of Joe's artistic abilities as well as his knowledge of escapology, Sammy comes up with a plan that he pitches to his boss, Joe and Sam, under the moniker Kavalier and Clay, are going to write a comic, The Escapist. The Escapist will fight Fascism and punch Hitler in his ugly mug and laugh in the face of Germans with his Golden Key that lets him escape any bonds. But the creators of the comics, while decently paid, often didn't get the monetary rewards or fame they deserved. Even when the comic makes the leap to radio. The cousins grow frustrated. Joe has his family to rescue and a girl he's fallen for, while Sam has literary ambitions and is coming to grips with his sexuality, awakened due to the voice actor who plays the Escapist. These aspects of themselves and their desires play out in the worst way possible. Joe's family dies. Even his younger brother, Thomas, whom he had managed to get out of Europe. Thomas's boat, The Ark of Miriam, was bombed by a German U-boat and he now lies dead on the ocean floor. Meanwhile Sam is involved in a police raid on a getaway with several other homosexuals. He is violently assaulted and raped by FBI agents. When he finally makes his way back to New York City he finds that Joe is gone, he's enlisted in the Navy, and his girl, Rosa, is pregnant. Sam's trauma after his assault makes him sublimate his homosexuality and he wants to live a "normal" life. A nice nuclear family in the suburbs with a white picket fence. Which is what he offers Rosa. They can marry and raise little Tommy as their own. Only they will know the truth. That is until one day when Joe finally returns to their lives. Will Kavalier and Clay reunite or will all their lives once again implode?
I have repeatedly tried to embrace Michael Chabon and I just can't. There's no doubt he has immense talent as seen in his stunning prose. I just don't like what the prose are about or how they're structured. And I really think that it's not just his writing I dislike, I dislike him as a person. But it hasn't evolved to the hate I hold for his microdosing wife. So yes, applaud his use of obscure and verbose language, which, coming from Columbia University leads to Pulitzers, but coming from me, is a backhanded compliment. You shouldn't need a dictionary to read a book. And the thing is, I really tired with this book. I really really did because it's one of my friend's favorite books and to just have to say it wasn't for me left my stomach completely tied up in knots. Seriously, the stomach acid produced was extraordinary. I had to see my doctor. But this mix of magical realism and historical fiction with a weird Lovecraftian sidequest just didn't work for me. Though what it really came down to is Jack Kirby. It would not be hyperbolic to say that comics as we know them would not exist without Jack Kirby. Kirby, with the occasional assist from Stan Lee, co-created some of the most famous superheroes that now make up the MCU, from Captain America to Thor to the X-Men. With Joe Simon he created the single most famous comic book cover of all time; Captain America punching Hitler. That cover was published in March of 1941, nine months before the United States finally entered WWII. And for many it felt like the call to arms it was. But also a shocking statement from an unexpected source, a Jewish comic book artist. Kirby died in 1994 and tragically his later years were spent fighting Marvel to exert control over properties he had created. A struggle that his children continued. Marvel wanted to consign Kirby to history while Stan Lee "hijacked" Kirby's legacy to embolden his own and become "the man." The only way to sum up Kirby's legacy is that he was done wrong by. Therefore I have major issues with this book. I know that in his afterword Michael Chabon states that he wants "to acknowledge the deep debt I owe in this and everything else I've ever written to the work of the late Jack Kirby, the King of Comics." So, you were so in his debt that you did what everyone else had done before and hijacked his life to create your fictional story!?! You had other artists creating his Captain America cover when real comic book artists appear in this book. You could defend Chabon by saying that his characters are an admixture of several real life comic book artists... And yet he singles out Kirby. Chabon, I don't care who or what you are but you done wrong by Kirby and therefore you done wrong by be.
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