Let Me Tell You What I Mean

 Let Me Tell You What I Mean by Joan Didion is a collection of twelve essays, compiled during the middle three decades of her career, as well as a good Foreword by Hilton Als. It's a short, punchy read. You'll careen through reportage on war veterans, gambling addicts, business tycoons, and first ladies, not clearly understanding the connections but entertained by Didion's precise observations and perfect prose. If there is a dominant theme, it's the subject of writing itself. This surfaces in her few, but fascinating, personal essays. It's also expounded on in a thoughtful essay on Hemingway's posthumous publications. I wonder if a beginning writing class would benefit from this short book, both in its examples, and analysis, of excellent craft.

My favorite essay--one that I'll print off and make my students read--is the unambiguously titled "On Being Unchosen by the College of One's Choice." I can't recommend it enough, this seven-page flash of genius. Go and find it and read it right now. Written in 1968, it easily speaks to today's college bound, bemoaning the problems and offering succor to this anxious generation.

The Last of the Mohicans

 The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper is an adventure story that traffics in early-American frontier myths. Swashbuckling and melodramatic, the novel reminds me of Ivanhoe, written only seven years earlier. Both novels mourn dying empires, but choose to spend most of the story rescuing beautiful maidens and besting cartoonish villains. Set during the French and Indian War, The Last of the Mohicans is also shockingly violent for something written in 1826. Some scenes almost anticipate Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian in their brutality. As a reader in 2025, part of this makes me uneasy. I am sure that the depictions of American Indians require careful correction and scrutiny, but Cooper does make an honest effort. He takes time to describe several tribes, with their unique languages and customs. Several of the heroes are indigenous (as well as the antagonists). It all seems thoughtful, but I don't know enough about the tribes depicted, or colonial America, or the available resources when the book was written, to offer intelligent commentary on the historicity of the events and characters.

I do know that Cooper is one of the most influential writers in American literature, and this is his most illustrious work. Almost every modern use of the word "Hawkeye"--including the University of Iowa's mascot--comes from the nickname of Natty Bumppo, Cooper's protagonist. There was a popular film of The Last of the Mohicans released in 1992, which I watched for the first time after reading the novel. Both the film and the novel are entertaining and mildly ridiculous. In the novel, a pivotal situation is resolved when Hawkeye puts on a bear suit (!) and infiltrates an indigenous village, completely fooling the Huron tribe. In the film, a nineties-era love story--absent in the novel--is conjured out of nothing and smolders absurdly for long stretches. 

To me, the novel and the film are good summer escapes, and not much more. That said, there is a deep history behind both adventure stories. The French and Indian War, the novel's backdrop, was much more interesting to me than the plot and characters, and I'm motivated to learn more about that time and that place. It's rare that setting becomes the most important literary element in a novel, but that was my experience.