Reviews
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The Weed & the Winter Solstice is set in a particular time,
place and culture, but it is far from being mere local color. Jeb,
the protagonist, for example, can be taken as a personification of
modern man: uprooted, alienated from his native heath,
alienated, indeed, from the very ground of his being, estranged
from himself, yet helplessly bonded to mother earth. The
narrator, Mr. Byrd, in telling Jeb's story, is also telling the story
of himself, the the ultimate outsider.
In the limited first edition -- now a collector's item -- the
philosophical element was foremost, and the black and white
design by José Argülles on the dust jacket emphasized the
esoteric, the oracular elements in the tale. The cover design on
the second edition offers a more-readily accessible symbolism.
Reviewers of the limited first edition tended to see the novel
either as pop-culture entertainment or as a contribution to
serious literature. Here, for example, are
THREE POP-CULTURE REVIEWS:
l) The novel has all the elements of an absorbing thriller and
prime-time TV show. SMALL PRESS BOOK REVIEW
2) Whatever you want, whatever you may be looking for you'll
find in this one. THE BOOK WORLD
3) THE WEED & THE WINTER SOLSTICE provides something
missing in most fiction: an attention to characterization and the
details of psychological compromise and survival which lend
insight into a variety of rationales, motivations, and private
lives. THE BOOK WATCH
And here are
THREE LITERARY REVIEWS:
1) A welcome addition to the library of outstanding fiction, THE
WEED & THE WINTER SOLSTICE was featured and highly
recommended in our TV special publicizing some of the best
books available. THE MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW
2) A luminously dark tale of an for our times. José Argülles
3) Author Howard Cook presents several profound themes that
beg to be noticed and analyzed. Lovers of allegory will be in
heaven. WEST COAST REVIEW OF BOOKS
ON READING THE ALLEGORY
Allegory dramatizes phenomena that exist not in the objective
but in the subjective world. Behind the surface meaning there's
another meaning. Lovers of allegory will readily recognize in
Agatha the traditional earth mother figure, in Mr. Byrd the sky
god, and they will see man in the space age personified in the
little boy Space.
But we live in an age that knows the price of everything and the
value of nothing -- the daily news is reported in terms of
numbers and dollar marks -- and "lovers of allegory" are few and
far between. So we offer these notes for a generation less
familiar with values-oriented allegory than their forebears were.
Allegory communicates meanings over and beyond the literal by
encrypting meaning. The word "code" is sometimes used to
mean any kind of encryption. Mr. Byrd, the narrator in The
Weed & the Winter Solstice, insinuates meanings that cannot
be exhaustively expressed as syntax through image, symbol and
literary allusion. Allegory is in effect an extended metaphor; and
The Weed & the Winter Solstice, while not as allegorical as,
for example, Aesop's Fables, does take its place in the English
tradition of allegory, a tradition that reaches from Piers
Plowman (14c) to Animal Farm (20c).
The names of the major characters, for example, carry subtle
allegorical allusions. But the broadest philosophical implications
are encrypted in the iconic place names:
Little Lost Snow Bird
Penitentiary Hollow
Sleepy Ditch
Avernus
Little Lost Snow Bird, the name of a mountain, is geographically
the highest region, where the narrator, Mr. Byrd, the hihgly
cultivated observer-narrator lives. lives.
Avernus is geographically and symbolically at the lowest level.
Penitentiary Hollow, home of the land-based family, is
geographically and symbolically on a level between Avernus and
Little Lost Snow Bird.
Sleepy Ditch (where the school and the church are) is more
elevated than Avernus, and only slightly more elevated than
Penitentiary Hollow.
Readers who do not share the narrator's classical learning can
become so absorbed in his story that his broader philosophical
implications go unnoticed. But the iconic image from the front
cover of the paper-back edition ties in with some very familiar
symbols. 'Words divide: Pictures unite.'"
The picture of the marijuana bud will be quickly and easily
recognized; it connects with the first two words of the title: The
Weed.
Examined closely it also connects with the last twords of the
title: Winter Solstice. For the bud has the tapered shape of a
Christmas tree, our common and immediately recognizable
symbol of the solstice season. The white blooms, moreover, can
suggest lights on a Christmas tree. Tops of Christmas trees,
moreover, traditionally carry angels. At the top of the bud,
however, is an eye, and the outline of the bud, like the outline of
the Christmas tree, forms a pyramid.
The eye in the zenith of the pyramid is intended to call to mind
the universially recognized image on the Reverse side of the
Great Seal of the United States: an eye in a triangle in the
zenith of a pyramid.
Charles Thomas, who designed the Great Seal explained its
symbolism in these words: "A pyramid unfinished. In the zenith
an eye in a triangle, surrounded by a glory, proper." The eye of
the Great Seal symbolizes the all-seeing eye of Diety. Annuit
coeptis. He has smiled at our undertaking. The eye in the book-
cover image is meant to suggest "Byrd's eye view: the eye of
the narrator. Pun intended.
The images on the black and white dust jacket of the limited
first edition are from Earth Ascending by José Argülles, and are
more esoteric.
The allegorical features in both editions, however, are identical.
Subtle and cryptic meanings are conveyed to the discerning
reader by the novel's organic structure. The narrative is divided
into four parts symbolizing the four seasons, and each part is
named for one of the four major characters: child, mother,
father, and narrator.
The fictional world in which their story unfolds is like the
traditional Christian cosmos of three levels: earth, heaven and
hell. Earth is represented by Penitentiary Hollow, an
Appalachian cove devoted to a family-centered agrarian way of
life.
Little Lost Snow Bird, the mountain Mr. Byrd lives on, represents
the world of the spirit, intellect and high culture. His home is
located in Cloud County, while that of his arch enemy, Charlie
Jim Pesterfield, when not in prison, lives in Avernus County.
Avernus is also the name of the county seat of Avernus County
and represents hell. The name Avernus alludes to Virgil's
famous lines: "Facilis descensus Averni: noctes atque dies patet
atri ianua Ditis....“ Easy is the descent to Avernus: the doors
stand open night and day.
In the church at Sleepy Ditch, Old Pest, personification of
decadent Christianity, clashes with other characters associated in
various degrees with modernity.
Sound hopeless? Actually the ending is not pessimistic. For in
the course of the novel Jeb's son Charles has fathered a son, and
his name is Space. Astute lovers of allegory will know how to
connect the dots.
place and culture, but it is far from being mere local color. Jeb,
the protagonist, for example, can be taken as a personification of
modern man: uprooted, alienated from his native heath,
alienated, indeed, from the very ground of his being, estranged
from himself, yet helplessly bonded to mother earth. The
narrator, Mr. Byrd, in telling Jeb's story, is also telling the story
of himself, the the ultimate outsider.
In the limited first edition -- now a collector's item -- the
philosophical element was foremost, and the black and white
design by José Argülles on the dust jacket emphasized the
esoteric, the oracular elements in the tale. The cover design on
the second edition offers a more-readily accessible symbolism.
Reviewers of the limited first edition tended to see the novel
either as pop-culture entertainment or as a contribution to
serious literature. Here, for example, are
THREE POP-CULTURE REVIEWS:
l) The novel has all the elements of an absorbing thriller and
prime-time TV show. SMALL PRESS BOOK REVIEW
2) Whatever you want, whatever you may be looking for you'll
find in this one. THE BOOK WORLD
3) THE WEED & THE WINTER SOLSTICE provides something
missing in most fiction: an attention to characterization and the
details of psychological compromise and survival which lend
insight into a variety of rationales, motivations, and private
lives. THE BOOK WATCH
And here are
THREE LITERARY REVIEWS:
1) A welcome addition to the library of outstanding fiction, THE
WEED & THE WINTER SOLSTICE was featured and highly
recommended in our TV special publicizing some of the best
books available. THE MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW
2) A luminously dark tale of an for our times. José Argülles
3) Author Howard Cook presents several profound themes that
beg to be noticed and analyzed. Lovers of allegory will be in
heaven. WEST COAST REVIEW OF BOOKS
ON READING THE ALLEGORY
Allegory dramatizes phenomena that exist not in the objective
but in the subjective world. Behind the surface meaning there's
another meaning. Lovers of allegory will readily recognize in
Agatha the traditional earth mother figure, in Mr. Byrd the sky
god, and they will see man in the space age personified in the
little boy Space.
But we live in an age that knows the price of everything and the
value of nothing -- the daily news is reported in terms of
numbers and dollar marks -- and "lovers of allegory" are few and
far between. So we offer these notes for a generation less
familiar with values-oriented allegory than their forebears were.
Allegory communicates meanings over and beyond the literal by
encrypting meaning. The word "code" is sometimes used to
mean any kind of encryption. Mr. Byrd, the narrator in The
Weed & the Winter Solstice, insinuates meanings that cannot
be exhaustively expressed as syntax through image, symbol and
literary allusion. Allegory is in effect an extended metaphor; and
The Weed & the Winter Solstice, while not as allegorical as,
for example, Aesop's Fables, does take its place in the English
tradition of allegory, a tradition that reaches from Piers
Plowman (14c) to Animal Farm (20c).
The names of the major characters, for example, carry subtle
allegorical allusions. But the broadest philosophical implications
are encrypted in the iconic place names:
Little Lost Snow Bird
Penitentiary Hollow
Sleepy Ditch
Avernus
Little Lost Snow Bird, the name of a mountain, is geographically
the highest region, where the narrator, Mr. Byrd, the hihgly
cultivated observer-narrator lives. lives.
Avernus is geographically and symbolically at the lowest level.
Penitentiary Hollow, home of the land-based family, is
geographically and symbolically on a level between Avernus and
Little Lost Snow Bird.
Sleepy Ditch (where the school and the church are) is more
elevated than Avernus, and only slightly more elevated than
Penitentiary Hollow.
Readers who do not share the narrator's classical learning can
become so absorbed in his story that his broader philosophical
implications go unnoticed. But the iconic image from the front
cover of the paper-back edition ties in with some very familiar
symbols. 'Words divide: Pictures unite.'"
The picture of the marijuana bud will be quickly and easily
recognized; it connects with the first two words of the title: The
Weed.
Examined closely it also connects with the last twords of the
title: Winter Solstice. For the bud has the tapered shape of a
Christmas tree, our common and immediately recognizable
symbol of the solstice season. The white blooms, moreover, can
suggest lights on a Christmas tree. Tops of Christmas trees,
moreover, traditionally carry angels. At the top of the bud,
however, is an eye, and the outline of the bud, like the outline of
the Christmas tree, forms a pyramid.
The eye in the zenith of the pyramid is intended to call to mind
the universially recognized image on the Reverse side of the
Great Seal of the United States: an eye in a triangle in the
zenith of a pyramid.
Charles Thomas, who designed the Great Seal explained its
symbolism in these words: "A pyramid unfinished. In the zenith
an eye in a triangle, surrounded by a glory, proper." The eye of
the Great Seal symbolizes the all-seeing eye of Diety. Annuit
coeptis. He has smiled at our undertaking. The eye in the book-
cover image is meant to suggest "Byrd's eye view: the eye of
the narrator. Pun intended.
The images on the black and white dust jacket of the limited
first edition are from Earth Ascending by José Argülles, and are
more esoteric.
The allegorical features in both editions, however, are identical.
Subtle and cryptic meanings are conveyed to the discerning
reader by the novel's organic structure. The narrative is divided
into four parts symbolizing the four seasons, and each part is
named for one of the four major characters: child, mother,
father, and narrator.
The fictional world in which their story unfolds is like the
traditional Christian cosmos of three levels: earth, heaven and
hell. Earth is represented by Penitentiary Hollow, an
Appalachian cove devoted to a family-centered agrarian way of
life.
Little Lost Snow Bird, the mountain Mr. Byrd lives on, represents
the world of the spirit, intellect and high culture. His home is
located in Cloud County, while that of his arch enemy, Charlie
Jim Pesterfield, when not in prison, lives in Avernus County.
Avernus is also the name of the county seat of Avernus County
and represents hell. The name Avernus alludes to Virgil's
famous lines: "Facilis descensus Averni: noctes atque dies patet
atri ianua Ditis....“ Easy is the descent to Avernus: the doors
stand open night and day.
In the church at Sleepy Ditch, Old Pest, personification of
decadent Christianity, clashes with other characters associated in
various degrees with modernity.
Sound hopeless? Actually the ending is not pessimistic. For in
the course of the novel Jeb's son Charles has fathered a son, and
his name is Space. Astute lovers of allegory will know how to
connect the dots.
