3~27~09 Pages: Re-Hash

"Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you."
- Elbert Hubbard

Well, in the last post, I talked about how Chang and Eng ended. I was so, well, affected by it profoundly that I decided to omit the other ending. As I mentioned in the earlier posts in my blog, the novel bounces back and forth between Chang and Eng's teenage years and married life. In the novel, as Chang descends into alcoholism in the latter sections, things are just picking up for the young Chang and Eng. They left their current promoter, the oppressive Mr. Hunter in order to meet P.T. Barnum, who I mentioned a couple of posts ago. With Barnum, they learned of his luxurious and often jolly life but decided that it was not for them and left him as well.
After rejecting both of the promoter's who had been jockeying for their attention they wandered New York and eventually asked a small theatre for lodging in return for their show. This marked the start of Chang and Eng's solo career (did you see what I did there?). At this point, they are about 18 and it's been 4 years since they arrived in America. They have realized that they may never go home by now ENg still hopes that one day he may be separateted from his brother.
It is now that a man named Dr. Lau shows up. He is Siamese, and he'd had a short encounter with the boys earlier in their lives. He suggested that he new a technique to separate the two using special Siamese medical techniques. It is one of the most climactic moments in the book when Eng is dreaming of all the strength and freedom he would have after being separated. The response comes:

"no,no,no-it would not kill you," the doctor said, but he stared so sadly at our band, holding it with the slightest tough, as if he did not realize his palm was still against it. He looked at Chang and me, going from face to face-he must have seen one hestitant expression and one overwhelmed by anticipation-and very softly, he said, "It would kill you."

Eng then asks him about his mother who he left inside in Siam. and he learns that she is dead. It is such a blow to Eng that he loses his spirit and retreats to books and introspection.

What is remarkable about these scenes is that they are one chapter away from Chang and Eng's last humiliating show. There were two, simultaneous (as simultaneous as you can be in a novel) climaxes. Eng learning that Chang will be with him always and their last battle. Though these two parts of their life were decades apart, having them be juxtaposed was incredible and made reading it wonderful.
A Glog
Another One

All in all, Chang and Eng was a fantastic novel, and I recommend that everybody read it. :)

3~20~2009 Pages: 241-319

'We were all basically alone/ and despite what all his studies had shown / What's mistaken for closeness / Was just a case for Mitosis'
-Andrew Bird, 'Imitosis'

The last section of Chang and Eng was a lot like what I suppose the ends of lives are like. It followed Chang and Eng through the Civil War to their deaths. Chang, who had developed a serious drinking problem, had become stunted, tired. His hair was thinner and he could barely go a day without retreating to the flask. Eng ages too, but his existence is not supplemented with drink. As the prospect of being with Adelaide grows more and more distant, Eng feels more and more and more empty. He knows that he and Sarah hate their marriage and knows their is nothing he can do about it. Each of Eng's children raise less fatherly pride in him. He feels as if his first child, Katherine who died at 14, is the only one who could come to understand him. As the page numbers in the corner of the book rise, Eng's feeling that he has failed as a father and a husband come to the forefront. It is a sad reflection of his retreat into his mind that has occurred as he has grown.

Eng's sadness becomes the reader's sadness, his shame our shame. His anger is our anger. At one point, Chang, now in his late fifties, is drunk and nearly out of consciousness. Adelaide and Eng help him into bed, and as they do Eng, partly affected by Chang's drunken stupor and partly by his own cloaked emotions, reaches out and kisses Adelaide. Initially she recoils, but then she goes along with him and they embrace, quietly and shamefully.

Eng and Adelaide never spoke about that moment again. A little while later, Chang and Eng awake to see their home in flames. They rouse everyone and escape the house and are able to rescue a few valuables. This is after the Civil War, so Chang and Eng's Confederate currency is now worthless. The two famous brothers are nearly broke. They devise a plan to go on one last tour. They work their way up from Wilkesboro to New York City. At least 20 years since they last saw it, New York has changed and become a 'taller, blacker place.' The crowds are as large as ever, but they are much crueler. Chang, drunken, and Eng, tired and empty, are reduced to crawling on all fours in front of a hissing, cursing crowd.

The emotional epicenter of this book is Chang and Eng's fight. After the humiliating and heartbreaking performance, Eng loses his head in anger swinging at Chang. They fight, but so accustomed to anticipating one another's movements, they flail at one another in a disharmonious mess until the circus promoter walks in aghast by the spectacle. Chang, before drifting off into sleep confesses he knew everything about Chang and Adelaide: 'You kill the home in your way, I light fire.'

It sounds like a cliche, bu the book does end like (I assume) a life does. It becomes more and more difficult to read. Each line is a labor to read because you feel like you're carrying a lifetime along with you. It gets slower and more sad until it curls up, and it's just you in the dark. admittedly, I need to chew on this longer, but I feel as if this book has made me grow in some imperceptible way. Like I've found something.

I did find something on the Internet for sure. Because it was rather difficult to understand the band, I found some pictures of Chang and Eng, this web page has advertisements for their show and an autopsy: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/conjoined/marvels.html

3~13~2009 Pages:155-240

"Don Quixote could never manage without his patient servant Sancho Panza."
-Nicholas Tucker

Well, First and Foremost, I apologize for the lapse of posting. Woo! Now that that's over with, I have been reading the third section of Chang and Eng and it is perhaps the most enjoyable and interesting section yet. It concentrates alternately on Eng's yearning for Love in his Marriage and for Adelaide and on Chang and Eng's first few shows and touring in New York and London.
In married life, you see the seeds of the schism between Adelaide and Sarah being sown during a few volatile exchanges between the two. In one of these instances, Adelaide implies that Sarah had an affair with a slave, instead of being raped by him like she told Eng. Though he has no way know these statements are true, Eng becomes infuriated with his wife and their relations become cold and curt. His affections become directed at Sarah's sister, Adelaide, but because he is always never more than 7 inches away from his brother they can never manifest.
The second focus is Chang and Eng's touring. It is here that Chang developes a reputation of being of being a showman and a joker and Eng is labeled an Imbecile. Chang, even though his english is pitiful, can make a crowd laugh, becomes a favorite with the critics. In one of their earlier shows, they are confronted by P.T. Barnum (that's right! He's the famous circus promoter!). He tries wo sow doubts in Chang and Eng's minds about their lifestyle so that they may abandon their current promoter and go to him.
In the last reading section, it was explained how Chang and Eng had intimate relations with their wives. I didn't blog about it on the last post for dramatic tension (also the post was getting really long and I didn't want for it to be a wall of text). The brothers talked over the problem of sex. This way, the other brother and his wife could create the illusion of being alone. Of course, this method is not without it's flaws. Eng starts interpret the times when Adelaide accidentally brushes hands with him assome sort of secret intimacy-- Scandelous!
In any event, the section wass wonderful. I promise that the next section's post will arrive in a more prompt manner.

3~5~2009 Pages:90-154

The Dream of the State is to be one, while the dream of the individual is to be two.

-Jean-Luc Goddard

Well, at this point I am nearly half-way through Chang and Eng, by Darin Straus. It’s quite a fantastic novel and has come along with some surprises. Because my last post didn’t actually address what has actually happened in the book, I suppose this one is going to have to. Obviously, the book revolves around Chang and Eng, their relationship to one another and the rest of the world brought on by their odd condition.
The brothers, although physically attached to one another, are quite different. Eng is the narrator of the tale. He doesn’t talk much and soon, in the eyes of others, becomes the more submissive for the two brothers. What we lacks in sociability he makes up for with introversion. He is well read and likes Shakespeare particularly. His character is full of self doubt and loathing of his condition. It is always Eng who wants to be separated when the topic comes up and regards his brother with disgust when he makes a fool of himself.
Chang is certainly the more comical and outgoing of the two. When Chang and Eng meet the Yates girls, who become their bride later in life, Chang is the one who begins courting one of the girls first and he needs to convince Eng to try to woo one of the sisters because Eng is convinced he could never marry a woman, let alone a white woman in the American South. Even though they are identical twins, t you can tell them apart because Eng is the taller of the two, on the left. To the left is a picture with arrows to help discern the two.
The novel is very well written, and even though the story is ‘told’ to you by the narrator (in s style similar to Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Actually) you feel like you are inside Eng’s head feeling what you are feeling. Not only that, Strauss’s writing is so good that while I was getting into Eng’s head, Eng was getting into mine. At about the time I reached the One hundredth page, I stopped reading because every few pages, I found myself looking up to make sure that there wasn’t anybody connect to me on my left. The feeling was unsettling and disturbing, but also fascinating. In order to write this post, I had to force myself to complete the reading section.
Within this section, their was one section that I think is particularly worth sharing to you. It is in Siam during Chang and Eng’s teenage years which they spent as entertainers in the King’s court. During this scene, The King of Siam has taken Chang and Eng along to a rendezvous with the Emperor of Cochin China. A hilarious dialogue ensues:
“Behold the Double-Boy!” Rama [the king of Siam] cried.

In a grave voice, the Emperor said:”Of course, we have several people I our Nation who are similarly united.”
“Is this so?”
“More than several, in face… We did not know you prized them, King Rama. If we had, we would have conveyed many double-boys from my kingdom to you as a gift.”
“When we pay our respects to your country, we shall see them at that time,” said Rama.
“…Yes. That will not be difficult to arrange” (88)

In any event, the next section proves to be promising. The section ended with Chang and Eng’s settling into married life with the Yates girls and the Siamese twins getting on a boat leading to America. Strauss has yet to explore how and why the sisters set up separate households or what the twin’s touring in the West was like.
And of course, for there is no hiding it from you any longer, the wonders of the Martial bed. \:)

2~26~09 Pages 1-89

All of Man's Unhappiness Stems From His Inability To Stay in a Room Alone

-Pascal

Good evening everyone. This is the first entry in what will become my ‘Chang and Eng Reading Diary.’ What that means is that my thoughts, reactions and notes about this fantastic novel will soon fill up this page. Chang and Eng, if you haven’t already guessed, is a historical fiction novel by Darin Strauss about the famous conjoined twins it is entitled after. The novel strikes a very, very careful balance between history and fiction. Strauss’s book is heavily researched, and all of the events that take place in the novel are real, though the exchanges and some of the names of minor characters are fabrications.
The book moves forward through time from two starting points, alternating between them each chapter. The first being when Chang and Eng Bunker arrive in Wilkesboro, North Carolina one winter in 1842; the second is their birth in Siam in 1811. The story is told in the perspective of Eng, the taller and quieter of the two brothers. Right from the beginning of the book, the differences between the brothers is severe and definite. Where his brother Chang is often more outgoing and louder, Eng is silent most of the time though when he does speak, he is far more eloquent.
The novel has some important places that it needs to go in order to keep in contact with the chronology of the Bunker’s lives. It needs to explore their experiences in the Americas and Europe, how they got there and how they courted and eventually married their wives (and of course, the big question, how did the make love to their wives?). Well, all shall be revealed later in the reading. All that I can say for sure is that it is quite an engrossing read.
Also, A reading schedule for each entry.

• 1-89 –Entry 1 (this one!)
• 90-154 –Entry 2
• 155-240 –Entry 3
• 241-321 –Entry 4

The final entry will be a look back on the book and a final review. Each section is approximately 80 pages.