{"id":5893,"date":"2017-01-04T05:25:46","date_gmt":"2017-01-04T05:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/01\/04\/klavan-on-experience\/"},"modified":"2017-01-04T05:25:46","modified_gmt":"2017-01-04T05:25:46","slug":"klavan-on-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/01\/04\/klavan-on-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Klavan on Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am now on p. 118 of Andrew Klavan's memoir, The Great Good Thing: A Secular Jew Comes to Faith in Christ<\/em>. Thomas Nelson, 2016, 269 pp. As I reported<\/a> a few days ago when I was on p. 18, <\/span><\/p>\n

\n

If you are a tough-minded American Boomer like me on a religious\/spiritual quest you will probably be able to 'relate' very well to this book. A fortiori<\/em>, if you are Jewish.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The book gets better and better especially for those of us who are (i) 'true' Boomers and (ii) were influenced by the Zeitgeist<\/em> of the '60s.  I divide the Boomer cohort (1946-1964) into the 'true' Boomers and the 'shadow' Boomers.  You are one of the former if and only if you remember the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November of 1963.  Otherwise you are a 'shadow' boomer.  Klavan, born in 1954, is a 'true' Boomer.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Mike Gilleland, who is my age and few years older than Klavan, told me some years back that the '60s passed him by.  I would put it this way: many of those who came of age in<\/em> the '60s were not of<\/em> the '60s.  It is like a Christian's being in<\/em> the world but not of<\/em> it.  My point is that if you a 'true' Boomer of<\/em> and not merely in<\/em> the '60s, then Klavan's book is one you will want to read.<\/span><\/p>\n

We were experience-hungry.  We were in quest of the Real and thought that it could be found by a close grappling with the seedier and seamier sides of life. We took drugs, consorted with dead-end women, got drunk in flophouses with bums, worked dirty and dangerous jobs, left on 1200 mile trips with five dollars in the pocket returning with ten.  This is what got a lot of us into a lot of trouble. Klavan:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Experience! That's what made a writer great, I thought. Harsh, brutal, savage Experience — I would have done anything to get my hands on some. But where? There were nothing but lawns and homes and normal families around me as far as the eye could see.<\/span><\/p>\n

I didn't want to go to war. Those in the know had declared the Vietnam conflict corrupt and evil. [. . .]<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead I took jobs whenever I could — not jobs that would teach me something or contribute to my future or career. No, I took jobs that I hoped would get me nearer to the grit of things: Experience. I was a gas jockey, a warehouseman, a truck driver, a construction worker, a delivery boy to some of the dodgier areas of New York City. After seventeen years in grassy peace and comfort, I was hungry for anything that looked like cruel reality. <\/span><\/p>\n

What I wanted most, though, was to wander. Not to travel — to drift. [. . .] My romantic fantasies often involved a girl in some other town, not this town. A brief affair. A tearful goodbye. Then, babe, I've got to travel down  that lonesome, dusty road. (116-117)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

At this point Klavan might have referenced Dylan's Don't Think Twice<\/a> with its talk of long, lonesome roads and the lines:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

So long honey babe<\/span>
Where I'm bound, I cain't [sic] tell<\/span>
But goodbye is too good a word, babe<\/span>
So I'll just say fare thee well.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Robert Zimmerman, too, the middle-class Jewish son of a Hibbing, Minnesota appliance salesman. recoiled from the unreality of suburbia and hit the road, more or less.<\/span><\/p>\n

Summing this up: reading Klavan's book I am reading about myself.  <\/span><\/p>\n

\nRelated articles<\/legend>\n
\n
<\/a>Maverick Philosopher: Reading Now: Andrew Klavan, The Great Good Thing<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/a>Bernie Goetz, 30 Years Later<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/a>Zimmi Turns 74<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/a>Crime as Politics<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/a>Robert Paul Wolff on Netanyahu<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am now on p. 118 of Andrew Klavan's memoir, The Great Good Thing: A Secular Jew Comes to Faith in Christ. Thomas Nelson, 2016, 269 pp. As I reported a few days ago when I was on p. 18,  If you are a tough-minded American Boomer like me on a religious\/spiritual quest you will probably be … Continue reading “Klavan on Experience”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[92,40,203],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-autobiographical","category-literary-matters","category-questers-and-other-oddballs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5893"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5893\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}