Alex Beam is a Globe columnist. His e-dress is beam@globe.com.
The end? It's only the beginning.
Have you noticed the relentless bass-ackwards direction of American society, striding boldly into yesteryear? The 2009 stock market has the same capital value as the United States of 1997. My house is now worth close to what it cost when we moved in. The Gross Domestic Product just shrank an astonishing 6 percent. Crab-like, we scuttle backward to the future.
It's not just the economy. There is a bizarre new trend in what passes for literature: reverse chronology. I recently read Paul Torday's novel "Bordeaux," which starts out with a bang. I was hesitating to buy the book, but a store employee assured me, "You'll really like the beginning; it's an unforgettable drunk scene." It was an unforgettable drunk scene. But it wasn't the beginning; it was the end.
That's right, "Bordeaux" proceeds back to front. We intrude on a beautiful and tragic love story just as it is - well, I don't want to spoil the end, I mean the beginning. Innovative idea, eh? Not really. Everybody's doing it.
The wonderful T.C. Boyle just published "The Women," about the love interests in the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright. You know in which direction I am going with this. "The backward-time structure is distracting and seems chiefly intended to allow the Taliesin murders (which occurred in 1914, relatively early in Wright's career) to serve as the novel's climax," the Los Angeles Times wrote.
Iain Pears's new novel, "Stone's Fall," has three main sections, proceeding from 1909 to 1890 to 1867. In addition, there are scenes set in 1953, 1943, and 1900. Reviewer M.A. Orthofer finds this "a slightly cumbersome framing device," adding that "the awkward, semi-backward way the answers are brought to the fore - feels too forced."
Literature isn't the only popular pastime moving stern-to-bow these days. The movie "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," based on an F. Scott Fitzgerald story, mined the possibilities of heartthrob Brad Pitt becoming ever-younger and more handsome. That seems unfair to the rest of us.
Every summer, of course, Hollywood fires up the Waybac machine for the annual visit to Tired Sequel Land. Rising, Lazarus-like, at your local multiplex: another "X-Men" ear-popper, more "Star Trek," more "Terminator." All three of these movies depict action that took place before the original plotlines; sequel-prequels, as it were.
I once took a yoga class where the teacher encouraged us to walk backward. I often retro-stride up hills, partly to enjoy the view, and partly to use the powerful muscles on the backs of my legs. I am surprised to learn that I am in the vanguard, or perhaps the rear, of an important trend.
Have you visited the website "Drawkcab Gninnur: Stifeneb"? Benefits of backward running, get it? Wife-and-husband team Janet Dufek and Barry Bates have been promoting backward locomotion for years. They argue that it improves overall balance, can help prevent injuries, and is a useful rehab tool.
Dufek, a biomechanist and an associate professor at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, allows that retro-walking is still an oddity here. "I saw some people walking backwards when I was in grad school," she says. "But after all, that was Eugene, Oregon. It's really big in Europe, especially the backwards running races."
Two of her students run a remarkable website, backward-running-backward.com. Not only is there information about the forthcoming world retro running championships in Stans, Switzerland, there are also videos of dozens of activities that can be performed in reverse: backward bicycling, backward bowling, backward skiing, and so on.
Forward running is yang, backward running is yin, the website asserts. It also includes this inspirational quotation: "More than words can, a backward motion of our bodies will provoke a fundamental questioning of our commonest attitudes and bring about the social change that the urgency and gravity of the problems of our day require."
Where will it all end? Believe me, this is just the beginnin
