The Books of the States: California (55 electoral votes; Guest: Sean Wilsey)

Throughout this whole process, the great state of California has loomed enormous. 55 electoral votes? Are you kidding? Well, on one hand, as the person who has to cut and paste a URL into this post for every book on the list, 55 still seems like a lot. But as someone who has now sat down to look through possible California books, 55 seems like nothing. 55? You could get to 55 with good hardboiled detective novels from California alone, or with books on Hollywood alone--sometimes it seems like there are 55 important books solely about water rights in LA County. California might be the land of beautiful weather and moving pictures, but somebody has to be staying inside and writing--and not just screenplays.

It's a big job, and I was very happy to hand most of it off to a local (or former local), who has been thinking geographically for quite a while now: Sean Wilsey, one of the editors of State by State, who grew up in San Francisco, as any reader of his bestselling memoir, Oh the Glory of It All, knows. He lives in New York now, with his wife, Daphne Beal (who covered our previous state, Wisconsin, earlier this week) but as you can hear in our interview earlier this year, there's no mistaking his mellow (and stoked!) Northern California vibe. Speaking of mellow, Sean has concocted a definitive (and only somewhat flawed) dichotomy to represent the Golden State, which I will let him introduce below.

And speaking of dichotomies, this state turned out to be too big for just one person. Sean's list runs to 30 books, so I'll add some more below: I should stick to 25 to make things clean and tidy, but I know I'm going to blow way past that. As it happens, Sean's list is understandably heavy on the Bay Area, while I happen to know SoCal (or at least its books) a little better, so our two halves will match the geographical division in this state-that-could-be-a-country. (One thing we agree on, though: the deliriously wonderful McTeague, certainly one of the weirdest (and therefore among the best) books in the American canon.) I'm even more sure than usual that many, many worthy titles will get left out, so please make your own additions to the nominees (or your criticisms of ours) in the comments below.

Here's Sean's half, starting with his introductory note:

Here's a motley-looking list of books that would not have been written if California did not exist. It's a list full of omissions. Most notably absent is the work John Steinbeck--but I have never much cared for the man. I've listed these chronologically, starting with American literature's greatest account of a beer-drinking dentist, McTeague, set in San Francisco at the end of the 19th century. Also, in search of an organizing principle, I have decided to contend there are two modes of being if you're a Californian: You're always nice, but within the framework of niceness you can either be mellow or stoked. I have categorized these books along those lines. And some of them manage to be both stoked and mellow. Here goes:

• McTeague by Frank Norris: Beer. Dentistry. Stolidity. Mellow.
• The Earth Shook, the Sky Burned by William Bronson: In 1906 San Francisco was destroyed and the inhabitants were STOKED! A history of this disaster/party, full of astonishing pictures.
• The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett: This may be noir, but, in my opinion, it is also stoked. Sample sentence: "He looked rather pleasantly like a blond satan."
• The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler: Southern California noir is, not surprisingly, mellow. (And stylishly shallow.)
• Day of the Locust by Nathanael West: Pretty much a wrist slitter. Neither mellow nor stoked--sure proof that my theory is baloney. But then West was not a Californian*.
• Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion: Here's Joan Didion at her most cutting and brilliant. Kinda mellow, too. This was the '60s.
• The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe: Probably the best thing anybody's ever written about California. Here's a sample from the opening paragraph, which finds Wolfe is in the back of a pickup with some Merry Pranksters: "Out the back of the truck the city of San Francisco is bouncing down the hill, all those endless stagers of bay windows, slums with a view, bouncing and streaming down the hill. One after another, electric signs with neon martini glasses lit up on them, the San Francisco symbol of 'bar'--thousands of neon-magenta martini glasses bouncing and streaming down the hill, and beneath them hundreds, thousands of people wheeling around to look at this freaking crazed truck we're in, their white faces erupting from their lapels like marshmallows--streaming and bouncing down the hill--and God knows they've got plenty to look at." Stoked!!!!!!!

• The Great American Jackpot by Herbert Gold: Herb Gold is a great writer, a long time San Franciscan, and a very funny man. This is maybe not his best book, but it covers all the essential '60s satirical terrain. Check him out. Stoked!
• The Intruders by Pat Montandon: A bit of nepotism here, since my mom wrote this book. It is a classic. And in true California style, it has been optioned for the big screen. How does she feel about this? Stoked!
• Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin (Tales of the City, More Tales of the City, Further Tales of the City, Babycakes, Significant Others, Sure of You, Michael Tolliver Lives): Taken as a whole the seven-book Tales series is the best thing anyone has ever written about San Francisco. I want to live in these books. Pure pleasure. Wodehousian situations. Radical yet comfy. Goofball. Madcap. Stoked! Mellow.
• The Rainbow Stories by William T. Vollmann: Beautiful ... grimy ... sad ... thrilling. S&M!
• Vineland by Thomas Pynchon. In case you are one of those people who thinks Reagan was a great president, this will remind you that he was, in fact, OFTEN ridiculous, and so was his America (and especially his California--AND EXTRA ESPECIALLY IF YOU WERE A TEENAGER). Stoked!
• Homeboy by Seth Morgan: Why is this even on the list? Because I got a cheap thrill reading his overheated accounts of the seedy stretch of Broadway where I used to wander as a teenager. But, actually, reader, don't read this! It's a terrible book.
• Already Dead by Denis Johnson: Very funny opening chapter. Pure Northern California. A less antic version of Vineland. Stoked-n-Mellow....
• Cold New World by William Finnegan: Heartbreaking. Deep. Finnegan transcends my reductive categorization completely. I admire him more than most any other nonfiction writer. Also, look up his long article on surfing in San Francisco, "Playing Doc's Games." Redefines the city. S&M!
• The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman: Again, this transcends my contrived categories. It's just beautiful and tragic, and a look at a different California, the California of doctors and immigrants.
• A Child's Life and Diary of a Teenage Girl by Phoebe Gloeckner: These are raw and painful cartoon accounts of a terrible youth. Nuanced. Sad. X-rated. Or worse, really, than x-rated. Stoked in the end, Stoned throughout. Gloeckner is one of the finest cartoonists from California, or anywhere else.
• A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers: This is rapturous, stoked CA at its peak. It also, of course, breaks your heart. He's a Californian, even though he's from Illinois! S&M.
• Chez Panisse Vegetables by Alice Waters: Mellow. Delicious. We can teach you how to eat in California.
• A Good Night Walk by Elisha Cooper: One of my favorite children's books. With perfect calming cadences and drawings of Berkeley make me lament the day I ever moved to New York. Mellow.
• The Discomfort Zone by Jonathan Franzen: Mostly a Midwestern tale, there are some vivid moments of bird watching in the Golden State that, though brief, are luminous in their depiction of the state's natural beauty.
• Born Standing Up by Steve Martin: One of the best memoirs I've ever read, and one of the most Californian. Considering that the book describes a riotous standup career, it is surprisingly mellow.
• Valley Boy by Tom Perkins: A plainspoken memoir about Silicon Valley and big new money--I found it fascinating. Stoked!

* nor were/are a lot of these writers, of course.

And here are my additions, with great thanks to two local sources: my sister in Silver Lake and her well-read, Orange County-bred boyfriend. I'm going for volume and speed here, so I'll offer them mostly without comment (most don't need any). And maybe it's the East Coaster in me, but I can't fathom Sean's S/M polarity enough to make my own calls here:

• The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, Mildred Pierce, and Selected Stories by James M. Cain: I was torn: Postman or Double Indemnity? This Modern Library omnibus solves my problem.
• The Galton Case by Ross MacDonald: The currently neglected member of the hardboiled Holy Trinity (see Hammett and Chandler above).
• If He Hollers Let Him Go by Chester Himes: The hardboiled classics just keep coming.
• The Grifters by Jim Thompson: More coming from him when we get to Oklahoma. Am I getting carried away with the hardboiled stuff? Hard not to.
• The Black Dahlia by James Ellroy: Many to choose from here; hard to leave off his creepily intense memoir, My Dark Places.
• Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley. And Michael Connelly, and Robert Crais...
• Ask the Dust by John Fante
• Post Office by Charles Bukowski
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck: Despite Mr. Wilsey's expressed wishes above.
• Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
• Warlock by Oakley Hall
• Thieves' Market by A.I. Bezzerides: Alex (my sister's boyfriend) reports: "a great late 40s trucking novel that goes all over CA... A.I. also was the screenwriter for Kiss Me Deadly."
• Nature Writings by John Muir
• The Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin
• Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner
• Hunger of Memory by Richard Rodriguez
• The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
• Children of Light by Robert Stone
• California: A History by Kevin Starr: A new single-volume version of the seven-volume state saga by the dean of California historians
• Southern California: Island on the Land by Carey McWilliams
• City of Quartz by Mike Davis
• Locas by Jaime Hernandez and Palomar by Gilbert Hernandez: Which of Los Bros do you prefer? (I'll vote for Jaime.)
• The Complete Peanuts: 1969-1970 by Charles M. Schulz: I don't know if one of his earlier collections will make the Minnesota list Matt Weiland is putting together for Monday (it should!), but by this point (with the introduction of Woodstock), Schulz was fully assimilated to the West Coast.
• Ghost World by Daniel Clowes: You could put together a list of 55 CA comics... I'd love to add R. Crumb, but I'm not sure which book to choose.
• Always Running by Luis J. Rodriguez
• Weetzie Bat by Francesca Lia Block
• Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing That One Sees by Lawrence Weschler: His classic book on California artist Robert Irwin--wish there were room for Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder too.
• Every Building on the Sunset Strip by Ed Ruscha: Tough to find this limited edition even on Amazon--and if you could find it you couldn't afford it.
• The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston
• What Makes Sammy Run? by Budd Schulberg
• Adventures with D.W. Griffith by Karl Brown: As it happens, I've read a bunch on the early movie era, and this is my favorite, a charming and insightful memoir of being one of Griffith's cameramen.
• Final Cut by Steven Bach: The classic busted-blockbuster tale.
• 5001 Nights at the Movies by Pauline Kael: A West Coast bohemian who made it big back east.
• Zeroville by Steve Erickson
• I'll Let You Go by Bruce Wagner

and finally

• Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi
• Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard

--Tom

• See all of our state posts
• Read our introduction to The Books of the States: 50 States, 538 Books
• Read our interview with State by State editors Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey

P.S. I have to include the photograph I saw on The Elegant Variation this week of Sean making a high-powered stop on his State by State book tour:

Worth noting in its own right, but also, as readers of Oh the Glory of It All will recall, hardly the first time he's made such a rarefied summit:

Comments

[Elinor on November 22, 2008 at 10:45 AM]

Robert Stone! I forgot about him. DOG SOLDIERS makes a pretty complete California tour (north to south, via Vietnam) and is worth consideration...

[on November 22, 2008 at 02:37 PM]

No Philip K. Dick.

Tsk tsk.

[on November 22, 2008 at 04:30 PM]

Less Than Zero, The Last Tycoon, The Dharma Bums

[Brad Thomas Parsons on November 22, 2008 at 10:52 PM]

Sean & Tom, bravo compiling the monumental CA list. But no BEE? I'm going to go ahead and assume that "Less Than Zero" was your 56h pick. --BTP

[Dean Anderson on November 23, 2008 at 04:46 AM]

Steinbeck should dominate the first picks, and anyone who tries to leave him off is clearly not qualified to help compose the list. Pitiful!

[helena on November 23, 2008 at 08:41 AM]

Upton Sinclair's California writings and his life here? Fascinating stuff, as presented in, "Land of Orange Groves and Jails: Upton's Sinclair's California," edited by L. Coodley(Heyday, 2004).

[aging lit major on November 23, 2008 at 05:29 PM]

Okay. You are talking about the state where I and at least one or two generations of my family were born. If I read this too fast and missed seeing that you got the following, then moi faux pas, but there were some essentials missing. Several more of Steinbeck, of course, like Cannery Row. Jack London: Martin Eden and The Valley of the Moon; John Fante, Ask the Dust; Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye; Dashiell Hammett, The Maltese Falcon; Didion's Where I Came From (which I think of as Where WE Came From); the underappreciated and out of print Literary San Francisco by Lawrence Ferlinghetti; Jack Kerouac's novel The Dharma Bums and the nonfictional Lonesome Traveler; Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions or All New People, or even Bird By Bird; Selected Poems by Robinson Jeffers; Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club; Leonard Michaels' The Men's Club; Cyra McFadden's The Serial; John Muir's The Mountains of California; Vincent Bugliosi's Helter Skelter; William Saroyan's My Name is Aram; Nathaneal West's Day of the Locust; Robert Louis Stevenson's Silverado . . . and a few I haven't read, like Po Bronson's earlier books, and Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon. Then there's Dr. Seuss, of course, poet Gary Snyder, Yee's Silent Traveler in San Francisco, Dennis Smith's San Francisco is Burning . . . . . Just for starters. Glad to see Alice Waters included, but where food is concerned, what about native MFK Fisher? And wasn't Dave Eggers Staggering Genius already credited to Illinois? I'll be quiet now . . . .

[Tom on November 23, 2008 at 09:48 PM]

That's what I'm taking about, folks: thanks for all the further nominations. Keep 'em coming! California can definitely bring it, book-wise. We did have a few of your favorites covered, A.L.M., but many we didn't--I tell you, 55 is just not enough. Big apologies about no P.K.D.--that's a mistake. And B.T.P., sorry no B.E.E.--I must admit I've always been on the McInerney side of that one...

[Ericka on November 24, 2008 at 09:30 AM]

What about Louis L'Amour? He wrote several books that involved California as the central setting and its inhabitants that should certainly be included.

[KristiC on November 25, 2008 at 10:07 PM]

Wow, this is a great list. But what about Kate Braverman--probably Palm Latitudes, though there are several you could choose from. And don't forget Golden Days by Carolyn See, which hugely freaked me out back in the 90s when I thought nuclear holocaust was the worst thing that could ever happen. God, I miss those days. Bravo on the Alice Waters, though my personal pick would be the Chez Panisse Menu Cookbook. And I agree with Aging Lit Major that one of Anne Lamott's lovely early novels, probably All New People, belongs on the list.

[KristiC on November 25, 2008 at 10:08 PM]

Wow, this is a great list. But what about Kate Braverman--probably Palm Latitudes, though there are several you could choose from. And don't forget Golden Days by Carolyn See, which hugely freaked me out back in the 90s when I thought nuclear holocaust was the worst thing that could ever happen. God, I miss those days. Bravo on the Alice Waters, though my personal pick would be the Chez Panisse Menu Cookbook. And I agree with Aging Lit Major that one of Anne Lamott's lovely early novels, probably All New People, belongs on the list.