“How can we not write satire? ” Juvenal asked in the second century CE.
That’s why I appreciate Mary McCarthy. I recently reread her brilliant novel Birds of America (1971), set in the 1960s in Rocky Port, Massachusetts, Paris, and Rome.
McCarthy aims her savage wit at American politics (the 1964 presidential election and the Vietnam War), the rise of “canned” culture, literally canned and frozen food, the creation of faux history in American small towns, and the growing mistrust of the American government in the U.S. and Europe.
The protagonist, Peter Levi, a birdwatcher and amateur philosopher, moves to Rocky Port with his mother after she separates from her second husband, a Berkeley professor. They had enjoyed a stay in Rocky Port a few years ago, but the small town is no longer idyllic: it has been infected by urban culture, the disappearance of fresh vegetables in stores, and the death of the Great Horned Owl at the nature preserve, which only Peter mourns.
But the changing American traditions, old and new, are most sharply illustrated by McCarthy’s descriptions of two Thanksgivings, one in Rocky Port, the other in Paris.
Thanksgiving in Rocky Port is the most fun, because Peter’s mother, who plays the harp and is a professional musician, organizes it. She resolves to make a tradtional Thanksgiving dinner using only ingredients available to the Pilgrims and indigenous Americans of the time.
And still she can’t find a bean pot! Peter wonders,”Can’t you use a casserole?” Fortunately, a neighbor provides one. And of course the unique traditional meal is scrumptious, and both family (Peter’s cynical aunt and joyful cousins), and friends (lonely Mrs. Curtis, who takes most of her meals at the Portuguese diner), enjoy the food and have fun.
And then there’s another Thanksgiving dinner in Paris, where Peter spends his junior year abroad. He is acquainted with a general attached to NATO, and his wife invites Peter to “partake of turkey ‘n’ trimmings” on Thanksgivlng. Naturally, the victuals at Thanksgiving in Paris are of the all-American kind, of the modern frozen tureky era, because the general’s Southern wife wants to be as American as possible.
But Peter is appalled when the general’s wife holds forth on Thanksgiving.
He observes,
“Then, at table, she actually explained the principle of Thanksgiving to the French. ‘It isn’t a social event, you see. It isn’t exactly a family event, either… It’s the day when we Americans – help me, Chuck – as we thank God for our blessings trying to gather under our roof some of our fellow countrymen who might be lonely….'”
Peter, a little tired of being a waif, can’t resist saying, “It’s just a harvest festival, isn’t it?”
And that’s the thing about Peter: he is philosophically prepared, from reading Kant and living with his radical mother, who gets arrested in Rocky Port for refusing to post a faux historical plaque on her house, to jeer at undercooked thought and oppose American imperialism.
McCarthy also mocks Peter’s American obsession with European toilets: In his rooming house in Paris, he is so disgusted by the filthy toilet that he rises early every morning to scrape the shit off the seat and walls. In Rome, he has to repeat the process. He had hoped for better. So it’s not only America: France and Italy are also full of shit. (No, I’m only pretending to parse the text. That’s not at all what Mccarthy means!)
McCarthy’s slings and outrageous arrows strike everything in sight, not just American smugness but French chauvinism and tourism in Italy. In the process she makes you laugh aloud, but she also reveals both affection and criticism of flawed American culture.
This is one of my favorite books.
