Today I read the
next 100 pages of Camilla Läckberg’s The
Ice Princess. This is the section of the novel where Läckberg devotes the
most attention to the burgeoning relationship between Erica Falck and Patrik
Hedström, which means this is the section of the novel that reads most like a
romance rather than a mystery. While it’s true to say that the relationship
between Läckberg’s two protagonists does not contribute to the solution of the
mystery, it is anything but a distraction or minor plot point. Inasmuch as Läckberg’s
focus is the damage that people can inflict on each other, Erica and Patrik’s relationship
serves as an important counterweight to other aspects of the plot. Moreover, bringing
these two characters together serves as a reminder that Läckberg in some ways
divides the investigative activity in this novel between Erica and Patrik,
giving the novel a hybrid character—part amateur sleuth à la Miss Marple and
part police procedural. Perhaps it’s this hybridity that accounts for Läckberg’s
phenomenal popularity.
I also read the next
fifty pages of Alexander Cockburn’s A
Colossal Wreck: A Road Trip Through Political Scandal, Corruption, and American
Culture. Whatever else you want to say about Cockburn, one must acknowledge
that he has the ability to turn a phrase. When discussing the fact that after
the 1996 Presidential elections, “Large portions of the nation’s affairs are
now being run by three men from Alaska,” for example, Cockburn goes on to say
about one of them, Senator Ted Stevens, that he “really would drill through his
mother if he thought there was oil in substrates below her coffin.” It’s an
observation that is simultaneously outrageous and hilarious; a combination in
which Cockburn seems to specialize. It’s also in this section of the book that
Cockburn reproduces his well-known response to the ‘accusation’ that he is a
Marxist: “These days I’d say Marxish.” I’d be tempted to say that this ‘ish’
would be pounced on by vulgar Marxists as evidence of Cockburn’s contrarian
relationship to leftist principles were it not for the fact that ‘vulgar
Marxists’ do not exist, being nothing more than a straw target designed to
discredit Marxism in general. Instead, Cockburn’s use of ‘Marxish’ strikes me
as almost universally applicable to anyone (including myself) who has been
influenced by Marx. We are all ‘Marxish’ to the extent that we are committed to
adapting Marx’s work to whatever contemporary conjuncture we happens to find
ourselves occupying.
Ever since I
started watching ‘The Following,’ I’ve been struck by how similar it is to ‘24.’
Some of the similarities are quite banal: for example, like Kiefer Sutherland’s
Jack Bauer, Kevin Bacon’s Ryan Hardy is seemingly in constant motion,
undoubtedly sleep-deprived but still driven onward by a combination of duty and
desperation. And, of course, both shows have the same combination of a
qualified admiration of the power and resources of law enforcement along with a
fetishization of the individualistic renegade who is part of, but also
resistant to, their respective large organizations. But what they also share is
the use they make of the threat of terrorism to advance an ‘ends justify the
means’ argument with regards to torture. So, when Ryan Hardy captures one of
Joe Carroll’s cult members alive, he is allowed to torture him to extract
information. In this regard, it is striking that the members of Carroll’s cult
are described as both serial killers and terrorists. If ‘24’ is a definitively
post-9/11 show in its focus on terrorism rather than serial murder, ‘The
Following’ attempts to suture these two categories; the enemy within is also
the enemy without. Serial killers and terrorists are two sides of the same coin
and any means necessary are justified in the effort to hunt them down and kill
them.
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