Modernism At Work With A Touch Of Romance

Yesterday I mentioned how modernism is informing my novel writing which made me think of another writer’s excellent blog set up as a fictional journal of a great character named Wall Grimm. As a warning I will say that the blog is R-rated for mature content (sometimes as I read it I’m thinking –Wall, too much information! But then it is supposed to be a private journal :)).

Wall Grimm has some issues. He’s in love with Emma, but he’s also in love with drugs and sex any way he can get it. He’s a complex and lovably screwed up character. I think I like Wall so much because he sums up what the last few generations of Americans have had to deal with—free sex, confused feminism and a feeling that just out of reach is a thing, a way of living that offers real beauty but seems impossible to get to. This sense that you can have it all and really, eventually get what you want without giving up self indulgent behavior is as old as time but  is promoted under modernism. This has nothing to do with being a prude. Sex is fun. But you can’t get Emma (the higher ideal, the satisfaction of true and abiding love) without terminating  more animalistic behaviors. But here’s the thing–without a “true” moral way, how can a young man with “natural” urges be expected to rise above (and even this hints at intolerance for what is low) instinct if society’s story is that love is just a social construct or a random evolutionary tendency that helps some survive?

Grimm fathers a child and when he offers to help raise her the mother shouts him down, insisting that she has full say. Why would a young guy bother being responsible even if that is his natural desire, one given to him by God or programmed into him by countless generations of humanity?

Now, Sage Doyle, the writer of Wall Grimm’s journal has never said that any of the above opinions or themes matter to him. This is just me showing my appreciation for a talented and thought-provoking writer who also happens to be a generous blogger.

Personally I want Grimm to end up with Emma, but you should make up your own mind by reading his blog.

http://wallgrimm.wordpress.com/emma/