Feeling nostalgic following the death of author John Jakes
By nature, I am not prone to nostalgia. In fact, it’s something of the opposite. I’m inherently suspicious of the pull of the past, and the idea that times of yore were simpler and therefore better.
But I will admit to some pangs of nostalgia upon learning of the recent passing of the author John Jakes at age 90.
The first thing that comes to mind when I think of John Jakes is an image of his book, “North and South,” published in 1982, and the first of an ultimate trilogy of historical melodramas set during the U.S. Civil War. In my mind’s eye, it’s sitting on the built-in bookshelves in my family’s living room, a trade paperback, inches thick, one of those copies that’s so thick the spine is creased and concave after having been read.
I do not recall any of the specifics of “North and South” other than it was the story of two families, one in the North, one in the South, each with a son who fought in the war for the respective sides. It’s a pot-boiling page-turner, perfect fodder for the television miniseries it would become.
Jakes was, by his own admission, not a great stylist and his plots were crafted for maximum heart-rending drama rather than logical soundness. The New York Times review of “North and South” declared that if a reader was hoping for “an insightful, revelatory vision of human events, ‘North and South’ will be a disappointment.”
But the same review declared, “If, however, one is looking for an entertaining, popularized and generally authentic dramatization of American history, without the weight of polemics on either side of the issues,” “North and South” would “meet (the reader’s) expectations.”
“North and South” was one of those grown-up books I read before I was a grown-up, where it felt like I was being let into some secret store of knowledge. I still wonder at that kid, so eager to know more that he’d gulp down an 800-page Civil War saga in his spare time.
There was a time when “North and South” was just about the sum total of what I knew about the U.S. Civil War. This was not a terrible thing for the times. I could’ve been entirely ignorant beyond the few days my middle school social studies class might’ve used to cover the events.
But that New York Times review from the time of the novel’s publishing also reveals the trap of nostalgia, of longing for a simpler time when it seemed like what you needed to know about a subject could be contained in a single volume.
I can only assume that the “polemic” being described was the debate over the origins of the Civil War, a debate that isn’t really a debate, as the overwhelming preponderance of evidence reveals that yes, it was a war over the desire for Southern states to continue the practice of slavery.
That this is called a “debate” and that it continues to draw oxygen in some quarters is a testament to a dominant culture that sometimes wants its stories to be satisfying melodrama, rather than complex reality.
I feel no need to apologize for my one-time enjoyment of Jakes’ series, nor should anyone else. The book is the book, and its pleasures are real and genuine. The 60-some novels Jakes published in his lifetime delivered a lot of readers a lot of pleasure.
But times change. I’m not 12-years-old anymore. I can handle the full truth about the reality of the U.S. Civil War.
Godspeed, John Jakes.