Carol Maso Lecture

On Wednesday April 11th, I attended Carol Maso’s lecture and presentation of her poems. Maso is a fiction author and has written six books. She has written poetry and a collection of poems named “Beauty is Compulsive.” Maso currently is an English teacher at Brown University and is additionally in the process of writing a book named Bay of Angels.
Maso discussed three main pieces of fiction, the first being “Mothering During Wartime.” This piece talked of a mother’s duties to her son during a period of war and the emotional range she encounters. Aside from that, she is talking about her desire to protect and interact with her child during the Iraq war. It demonstrates the maternal instinct of a woman who wants to protect her son from something as terrible as war. Using phrases like “a mother’s madness”, Maso conveys a situation she cannot relate to into a surprisingly realistic and relatable piece of poetry.
The next excerpt discussed was “Young H Saved From Infamy” and discussed Ava needing a bone marrow transplant which struck a personal chord with me, since my own mother underwent a bone marrow transplant. In this story, Ava has a hallucination, and describes a young man named “H” who is referred to as full of possibility. Upon discussing “H” as an artist and the relationship he has with his parents, we come to find out that “H” is actually Hitler as a young man. This excerpt exhibited the idea of deceptive irony, where you are lead purposefully to think one thing and discover something else entirely. This idea relates well to “Twelfth Night” by Shakespeare because the same situation is established. The idea of physical appearance being deceptive as Viola disguises herself as Cesario as well as the deception that her brother is dead both equate t the idea of deception discussed in this excerpt.
The final excerpt that was discussed was “Intercession of the Saints”, where Ava is on her deathbed and being read a book of saints by her husband. From this story, we are told of how saints are ever day people. Maso also alludes to the idea f faith being a pendulum, how you may waver in your faith but you are always brought back to God. After leaving, I also determined this analogy is appropriate because at the end of one’s life, when the pendulum slows down about to come to a stop, your faith is the strongest eventually coming to rest.
In terms of the Year of the City, this presentation was not considered a Year of the City lecture, but did hold some of the same ideas. Finding saints to be anywhere and in unlikely places is just a testament to the people that this city has to offer. The idea of disguises show that you cannot deem something by its outward appearance.