Clicking on banner ads enables JWR to constantly improve
Jewish World Review July 3, 2000/30 Sivan, 5760

Suzanne Fields

Fields
JWR's Pundits
World Editorial
Cartoon Showcase

Mallard Fillmore

Michael Barone
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Don Feder
James Glassman
Suzanne Fields
Paul Greenberg
Bob Greene
Betsy Hart
Nat Hentoff
David Horowitz
Marianne Jennings
Michael Kelly
Mort Kondracke
Ch. Krauthammer
Lawrence Kudlow
Dr. Laura
John Leo
David Limbaugh
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Chris Matthews
Michael Medved
MUGGER
Kathleen Parker
Wes Pruden
Debbie Schlussel
Sam Schulman
Amity Shlaes
Roger Simon
Tony Snow
Thomas Sowell
Cal Thomas
Jonathan S. Tobin
Ben Wattenberg
George Will
Bruce Williams
Walter Williams
Mort Zuckerman

Consumer Reports


Independence Day with Norman Rockwell


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- 'TIS THE SEASON to unfurl the red, white and blue. Cornucopias runneth over with yellow corn, red tomatoes, and long green beans. Wicker baskets overflow with melons as plump as pigs, with berries in black, blue and red, juicy peaches, plums, cherries and figs. Fireflies tease a dark-rum night, scattering dots of color in the warm evening in prelude to high-tech fireworks that light up the sky with bombs bursting in air.

The Fourth of July is apple pie and summer cotton, Whitmanesque in acclaiming the word "democratic'' and pure Proust in its appeal to the remembrances of celebrations past. Not even the most ardent bureaucrat dares tamper with the date. The Fourth has escaped the Monday holiday syndrome that sacrifices history for long weekends.

The Fourth is the Fourth is the Fourth, as Gertrude Stein might have said. It's a chocolate, vanilla and strawberry ice cream kind of day, as American as Hagen and Dasz. It's artist is Norman Rockwell, quintessentially appealing to the common man, woman, and child of the small town, elevated by the commonplace in a country that continues to stretch the boundaries of egalitarianism and broaden a bounty beyond the dreams of avarice.

These thoughts (as purple as the mountain's majesty) are inspired by an exhibit entitled "Norman Rockwell Pictures for the American People'' that is touring the country and presently resides in the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington. What a bonus for this show to be in the capital, so close to the Mall when Americans from all over are here to watch the fireworks.

The American art world is finally reevaluating Norman Rockwell, appreciating his skill and subject matter so derided and dismissed as mere illustration by the elites and radicals when he was alive. His characters no longer evoke cornball sentimentalism, not even to the sophisticated critics. In fact, some critics now compare his work to that of the 19th century French satirist Honore Daumier, and to the two splendid 17th century Dutch painters, Jan Vermeer and Frans Hals. The final destination for the traveling show is the prestigious Guggenheim Museum in New York. Critics of yore are spinning over that one.

In Rockwell paintings we find America's Everyfamily, the hometown boy and girl, mother and father, grandmother and grandfather who built on the dream of our Founding Fathers. They are as individualized as universalized, with the fruits of the Declaration of Independence spilling into our daily lives.

When the Saturday Evening Post asked its readers in 1955 to pick the Norman Rockwell cover they liked the best, most chose "Saying Grace,'' a plain and homely grandmother and grandson are depicted saying a blessing before a meal in a restaurant as others watch with nonchalance. It's about faith and tolerance, the religious and secular coexistent in the landscape of everyday life.

The painting is free of an overt message -- you'll find no preaching here -- but it's an emblematic snapshot of continuity in a country where social mores are forever changing. Prayer is part of the mix. So is the gratitude for the bounty of the table.

Shuffleton's Barber Shop

My favorite Rockwell is "Shuffleton's Barber Shop.'' The details are painted with an exquisite virtuosity of perspective. The barber shop in the foreground of the painting is dark because it is closed, and a group of men have gathered together in a well-lighted barely visible back room where two men are tuning a violin and a clarinet. An easy and secure masculinity pervades the canvas, documenting a more innocent time when men gathered in fellowship after the day's work, the entrepreneurial spirit at leisure.

Norman Rockwell weaves a narrative for our Independence Day with both a big and little "i,'' idealism to the specifics of American realism. As a nation we've always celebrated the Fourth of July by combining patriotism with picnics, fireworks with fireflies, love of country with love of family, the commonplace in the context of community, the hope, joy, poignancy and promise that resides in every American moment.

Here are American dreams rather than the American Dream. The dog underfoot, the adolescent anxious for her future, the black child nervously on her way into a white school, groaning gossips and wailing babies, homecomings and shortcomings, the awesome concealed in the ordinary -- fleeting moments preserved for future reflection. On the Fourth of July, we're all thankful for an amazing grace.



Up

06/29/00: Here comes 'something old'
06/26/00: Waiting too long for the baby
06/22/00: Good teachers, curious students and oxymorons
06/19/00: Wanted: Some ants for Gore's pants
06/15/00: Like father, like daughter
06/12/00: Culture wars and conservative warriors
06/08/00: Return of the housewife
06/05/00: Hillary and Al -- playing against type
05/31/00: The sexual revolution confronts the SUV
05/25/00: Waiting for the movie
05/22/00: Pistol packin' mamas
05/18/00: Journalists and the 'new time' religion
05/15/00: There's nothing like a (military) dame
05/11/00: 'The Human Stain' on campus
05/09/00: We've come a long way, Betty Friedan
05/04/00: From George Washington to Mansa Masu
05/01/00: Gore's ruthless doublespeak
04/28/00: Doing it Castro's way
04/24/00: Women's studies beget narrow minds
04/17/00: The slippery slope of anti-Semitism
04/13/00: A villain larger than life
04/10/00: When mourning becomes an economic tragedy
04/03/00: The last permissible bigotry
03/30/00: Seeking the political Oscar
03/23/00: The gaying of America
03/20/00: Pointy-eared quadrupeds on campus
03/16/00: The shocking art of the establishment
03/13/00: Sawdust on the campaign trail
03/10/00: Campaign rhetoric of manhood
03/06/00: The Amphetamine of the People
03/02/00: Elegy for Amadou
02/29/00: With only a million, what's a poor girl to do?
02/24/00: The changing politics of change
02/16/00: Tip from Hillary: 'Let 'em eat eggs'
02/10/00: No seances with Eleanor
02/07/00: Campaigning like our founding fathers
02/03/00: When neo-Nazis have short memories
01/31/00: George W. -- 'Ladies man' and 'man's man'
01/27/00: Dead white males and live white politicians
01/25/00: Smarting over presidential smarts
01/21/00: A post-modern song for `The Sopranos'
01/19/00: When personality is a long-distance plus
01/13/00: French lessons in amour --- and marriage
01/10/00: Reaching for the Big Golden Apple
01/07/00: Liddy Dole as the face of feminism
01/04/00: Hillary: From victim to victor
12/30/99: 'Dream catchers' for the millennium
12/27/99: In search of a candidate with strength and eloquence
12/21/99: The president as First Lady
12/16/99: Columbine with blurred hindsight
12/09/99: Homeless deserve discriminating attention
12/07/99: Casual censors and deadly know-nothings
12/02/99: Why mom didn't make general: A reality tale
11/30/99: Potholes on the road to the Promised Land
11/25/99: A feast for the spirit and the stomach
11/23/99: Fathers need to say 'I (can) do'
11/18/99: Adventures of a conservative pundit
11/15/99: Traveling with Jefferson on the information highway
11/11/99: Wanted: 'Foliage of forbiddinness' for the oval office
11/09/99: Eggs, art and rotten commerce
11/05/99: Al Gore, 'Alpha Male'. Bow wow.
11/01/99: Gay love
10/28/99: Lose one Dole, lose two
10/26/99: Rebels with a violent cause
10/21/99: Reforming parents, reforming schools
10/19/99: The male mystique -- he shops
10/13/99:The campaign of the Teletubbies
10/08/99: Money is in the eye of the art dealer
10/01/99: Lincoln's 'Almost Chosen People'
09/29/99: Introducing Bill and Hillary Bickerson
09/27/99: Must we wait for the next massacre?
09/24/99: Miss America meets Miss'd America
09/21/99: Princeton's 'professor death'
09/16/99: The Cisneros lesson
09/13/99: No clemency for personal politics
09/08/99: M-M-M is for manhood
08/30/99: Blocking the schoolhouse door
08/27/99: No kick from cocaine
08/23/99: Movies don't kill people
08/19/99: A rude awakening
08/16/99: Dubyah and that 'language' thing
08/09/99: Chauvinist sows -- oink oink

©1999, Suzanne Fields. Distributed by Los Angeles Times Syndicate