A Beautiful Day in Haarlem

 

Last weekend a friend (whom I haven't seen a long time) suggested let's go somewhere out of town and we ended up in Haarlem - it is a prettiest little gem of the city relatively close to Amsterdam and easy to reach even with a public transport (we went with a car). I have always loved Haarlem, its much smaller and quieter than Amsterdam + it has less tourists and less pressure from international party crowd, truly a beautiful little historical town with old architecture and some brilliant museums, in fact if I am correct, the very first museum in the country is here, a famous Teylers Museum which this time we did not visit.

It also happened that it was a weekend of "Open Monumentendag" which is basically similar to "Open Museum" concept, but it happens trough the day - so we went to Frans Hals Museum which I always loved, the 17th century building used to be an orphanage (and old people's home) so one can still see the dining room where children used to eat and there are some spectacular portraits of sour-faced old ladies who were administrators back in the day. No one was smiling on those old paintings, probably they thought this was a serious matter and smiling was perhaps seen as too frivolous, who knows. Tons of beautiful art, many by enigmatic Frans Hals himself, who painted his own face on a group portrait of the St. George Civic Guard - this is how we know what he looked like. I was very intrigued by paintings from two female Dutch artists: 17th century Judith Leyster (her signature is in the corner of the painting) and 1928 portrait of lady in a black hat by Charley Toorop that I really, really liked. 

But the biggest surprise was the museum in the same street - Verwey Museum that one could easily miss, if not for "Open Monumentendag" so we went inside and it was delightful. It is even older building and it has a beautiful collection about Haarlem itself (and its famous citizens), including local painter Kees Verwey - the museum is named after him, as he left his whole collection to Haarlem. There was also interesting exhibition about what artistic studio looks like (mainly eccentric and chaotic, as expected), art by his wife Jeanne Tilbusscher and a very nice part about Haarlem - for me this was such a nice surprise that I decided right there and than to visit again soon.

We also had a very nice lunch (just in time to avoid rain) in a beautiful local Indonesian place Café Samabe where we had excellent little "Rice table" for two: this is usually a selection of choice Indonesian dishes, generally served as a group meal but this one was for only two of us and it was perfect. Afterwards the rain had stopped and we could still wander a little about the town and enjoy some more coffee in the sun - it was a lovely day and I was enjoying it very much. 

"Rage" by Stephen King (writing as Richard Bachman) (1977)

 

This was a solid Stephen King psychological thriller but what is perhaps even more interesting is the story behind it - just as his career was started to getting steam, King was advised to keep his publishing to a minimum, as not to overwhelm the market. Apparently books are selling better if the authors make it looks somewhat more exclusive and rarified - too many titles by the same writer in one year just don't work.

"I was aware, eight years ago, that the production of my fiction was out of control. I'm also aware that publishers are reluctant to publish more than one or two books a year, and I've always been three or four books ahead. I've been feeling the frustration of having this stuff pile up for a long time."

So right after phenomenal success of "Carrie", 'Salem's Lot" and "The Shining", there came "Rage" advertised without much fanfare as written by a brand new writer Richard Bachman. No one suspected, though if you are familiar with King's writing, its very clear that this is exactly his style and his way of psychological manipulation - it took a few more Richard Bachman books until eight years later, the success of latest Bachman novel "Thinner" eventually spurred a ordinary salesperson in a bookshop Steve Brown to check publisher's records at the Library of Congress - Brown was simply blown away with similarities in styles between King and this Bachman guy. Afterwards, King himself contacted Brown and allowed to be interviewed, explaining that his next novel titled "Misery" was originally planned to be published under Bachman name. He even gleefully noted how critics praised "Thinner" and claimed "This is what Stephen King would write like if Stephen King could really write." 

Personally I perfectly understand why Brown made a connection because everything about "Rage" is a typical Stephen King, specially the way the story builds up to show the real danger is hiding under the faces of ordinary everyday people (in this case students in a high school). The story itself was shocking and disturbing back in 1977 - school shooting - in fact, King himself eventually started to dislike the way his novel depicts US social climate and after school shootings became more and more part of news circle in his homeland, he instructed his publishers to pull the novel completely out of print. It still can be found online and in second hand shops, but it is not printed anymore. 

It is also the first Stephen King novel that does not use any supernatural elements - where previously  there was telepathy, vampires and ghosts, in this novel the evil is pure human. The main character is high school student Charlie Decker who turns on his fellow students and teachers because he is filled with rage (in this case towards his father, but basically the whole world) - he keeps the whole class as hostages and things take unexpected turn as hostages became violent towards one of them. Because the novel deals with psychotic and disturbing subject, it is not something I see myself returning again, I simply might prefer King dealing with demons.