As Not Seen on TV!
by St. Clair Carr, literary editorReviewed in this article:
The Ambiguous Adventure, by Cheikh Hamidou Kane
Frasier, National Broadcasting Company (also seen on Global and in syndication)Hello, television watchers. Here at last is a book review specially written for YOU!
Now some of you may have trouble believing what I'm going to say next, but nevertheless it's true that books are better than television. First of all, books are cheap while television is expensive. For the cost of the average annual cable subscription you could buy 40 or 50 trade paperbacks a year.
Of course, you're not going to read that many serious books in a year (you tend, for one thing, to devote time to thinking about them, as well, so you don't have to be constantly shoving a book in front of your face the way you have to be constantly shoving TV programs there), so if you cancelled your cable subscription you could read like a king and still have lots of money left over to put in one of those fashionable RRSP things which will assure you of a comfortable and dignified retirement!
A book can be carried in pocket or purse, a television can be carried if you work out a lot. Even if you have a so-called portable TV, you can't take it with you and watch it on the subway.
If you decide you want to take a break from reading you just put your book down. If you want to take a break from television you have to invest in further expensive technology to record the program you're watching and play it back later.
And now, to drive the point home, I would like to compare an important book of the twentieth century to an important television show of the twentieth century. The book is The Ambiguous Adventure by Cheikh Hamidou Kane (published in 1961 and described on its title page as a story, although it could be considered a novel), while the television show is that perennial favourite, Frasier, starring Kelsey Grammer.
While Kane's book has been published in English under the title of The Ambiguous Adventure, the only copy I have is in the original French (in which language it is known, naturally enough, as l'Aventure ambiguë). My command of French is far from masterly, but I have diligently consulted my dictionary while reading this book and believe I have a reasonable understanding of it.
There is one similarity between The Ambiguous Adventure and Frasier – I've read The Ambiguous Adventure five times, and I've seen about five episodes of Frasier. However, that's about all I want to see of Frasier while I will be reading The Ambiguous Adventure again.
Both works also employ stock types for characters, but while The Ambiguous Adventure employs them as allegorical figures Frasier is simply a collection of stock comic turns. Frasier features a comic pretentious twit, a comic Englishwoman, a comic yuppie, a comic crotchety old guy, a comic disk jockey, and a comic dog. Mr Grammer is a fine actor but he is also a discerning judge of the intellectual effort required by a role. His performance is simply a competent display of standard shtick, chiefly prissy articulation and head tics.
Kane's use of types for characters may be why he chose to describe his work as a story rather than a novel. However, his types are carefully chosen to represent not stock comic turns but a range of stock philosophical, political, and social positions, both Western and Muslim. With his characters he is able to conduct a penetrating analysis of some of the most serious issues of the twentieth century. Frasier's characters are simply a means to fill the time between commercials with very broad humour.
The story of The Ambiguous Adventure is simple. Samba Diallo, eldest son of a leading Senegalese family (there's another difference from Frasier – The Ambiguous Adventure has both black and white characters), is enrolled in the European-style school system of Senegal so that his people may obtain the benefits of European technology. Eventually he goes to France for university but returns before finishing a degree. Along the way he talks to and argues with a lot of people, mainly about the advisability of what he's doing.
Kane originally planned to call the book Dieu n'est pas un parent, which can mean either "God is not a parent" or "God is not a relative." He argues that the relationship of human beings to God is different in Christian and Muslim cultures, and that this difference has led to differences in intellectual analysis, politics, and technology. Western culture is to a large extent based on the idea that God is our father, while in Islam (cheikh, by the way, is in West Africa a Muslim honorific) God is considered to be entirely beyond the trivial human realm. Kane's analysis has the additional benefit that it explains events since the book's publication – as belief in God has withered away in Europe and North America, belief in the divine Self has flourished.
To be fair I must admit that The Ambiguous Adventure is heavier going than Frasier. However that is why I remember what's in The Ambiguous Adventure and return to it periodically to sharpen my thinking and see if I've learned anything which helps me appreciate it better. Frasier I watch when I'm sick and befuddled and don't want to think because I'd just get confused.
So unless you're sick The Ambiguous Adventure is a better deal than Frasier, and books beat television hollow. The only benefit television offers is an easy way for corporate zombies to pass the time till they're tired enough to go to bed.
Viewers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your cable! And that sure as hell ain't much.
As Not Seen on TV! © John FitzGerald, 2000
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