The Orchid Thief
Or, if you want to be technical, I actually envision a blending of three plausible reasons for his “Adaptation” inspiration: (1) the line in the movie about Susan Orlean’s book, “The Orchid Thief”, being an impossible basis for a straight movie adaptation is 100% true, (2) Charlie Kaufman is one seriously freaky-minded individual and (3) Sir Kaufman just went with the first thought which popped into his head upon rustling himself awake from one of the numerous times he dozed off reading another of Orlean’s long-winded Florida back story history lessons.
I gotta tell you, I come away from “The Orchid Thief” conflicted. Not about South Florida. Not about flowers. And certainly not about the honest-to-God whackjobs who love their orchids just a little too much. OK, way too much, nothing little about it actually. No, mine is a more personal conflict. I wanted to enjoy this book, I really did. I honestly don’t want to be the typical guy who needs his literary interest held tight by the clearly defined villains of, say, a Grisham thriller or the wild antics of Stephen King’s latest psych-out. I dearly wished nothing more here than to enjoy the intellectual benefit of both the author’s distanced insight as well as her lavishly researched historical facts on subjects ranging from the Seminole warrior Osceola, aristocratic class wars of early orchid hunting and early Floridian swamp land sales schemes, which truly provide the meat of this tale, begun ostensibly as an examination of the court case involving one John Laroche and three Seminole Indians arrested for stealing wild orchids. Unfortunately, I just couldn’t do it. More often than not, I had to slap myself back to consciousness as the book meandered unevenly through the sordid, multi-layered backdrop to the crazed denizens who populate the Florida orchid community.
The initial trust invested in Susan Orlean as the storyteller is funded mainly by a common understanding she finds the people she meets during her two-year odyssey among the Florida orchid collectors to be as nutty as they appear. I felt a sense of betrayal as a subtle breakdown of this separation began to display itself through her growing fascination, bordering on obsession, with the object at the very heart of the tale – the Ghost Orchid. Yet baring witness to the journey taken by our storyteller only confirms the inherent seductive qualities of this orchid “addiction”, a term routinely uttered among many of the collectors themselves.
My biggest disappointment, however, is reserved for the underdeveloped focus on the titular “Orchid Thief” himself, John Laroche. Here is a character too fascinating to be invented, with Orlean at the outset sprinkling just enough from his massively overflowing bag of personality quirks, both good and bad, to draw in the reader – yet in the end it wasn’t enough. I wanted more about the orchid thief from “The Orchid Thief”, to be quite honest. Although, I come away richer for the experience with a much deeper understanding of the extensive orchid world, the plight of the Seminole tribes of Florida and a general belief that just about anyone has a fascinating history when provided the opportunity to drill down, I still couldn’t flip pages fast enough when the topic on said pages didn’t involve Laroche. Take for instance his boast about supposedly finding the only gem grade fossil pearl in existence. By the time he explains his true life-affirming reasons for believing in this fact, the need to challenge his boast is replaced by an appreciation for his passion.
Sure, there’s no question, I’ll be the life of the next cocktail party within the garden circuit in which my newfound understanding of the invincibility of the melaleuca tree and its seedling death gasp or the botanical advantages of pollination by pseudoantagonism versus pseudocopulation are properly appreciated. Nevertheless, I would gladly give up this wealth of knowledge in return for more Laroche.
