Jewel is pretty well known in the US, I think - indeed, her first (and, to my mind, worst) album is one of the biggest sellers ever there - but she's not made much of a splash in the UK. I first heard her song 'Hands' in 2004, when my friend Hannah played it to me, and have loved it ever since. Enjoy!
Sunday, 19 August 2012
Friday, 17 August 2012
Very definitely Gone to Earth
 |
| From the 1950 film (photo source) |
When I do give up, it's usually because I think the writing is too bad, or (occasionally) too confusing. It's rarely related to subject matter or character - although if I started a gory crime novel, I'm sure I'd stop reading that pretty smartish.
But I've never given up on a novel quite so quickly as I did on Tuesday morning. Because I now have a 40 minute walk into work, I tend to read a book whilst I'm walking. (Yes, I'm that guy. Surprised?) And I was a page and half - yes, 1.5pp. - into Mary Webb's Gone To Earth before I concluded that I could not read any further.
I've read and re-read, and loved and re-loved, Stella Gibbons' Cold Comfort Farm, but I've not read any of the authors she was parodying. Well, I've read some Lawrence and Hardy, and they're on the peripheries of her satire, but I've steered clear of that peculiar vogue for rural novels which seized British literature in the early years of the 20th century. Here is the opening of Gone To Earth, with my thoughts interpolated:
Small, feckless [oh, wasn't that one of the cows in Cold Comfort Farm?] clouds were hurried across the vast untroubled sky [always cross out the adjectives first when editing, love] - shepherdless, futile, imponderable [oh... never mind.] - and were torn to fragments on the fangs of the mountains, so ending their ephemeral adventures with nothing of their fugitive existence left but a few tears. [oh sweet mercy.]
[So, what have we established? It was a cloudy day. Right-o.]
It was cold in the Callow [oh, sorry, we're not done with the weather - as you were] - a spinney of silver birches and larches that topped a round hill. A purple mist hinted of buds in the tree-tops, and a fainter purple haunted the vistas between the silver and brown boles. [Of course it did. Purple is a very haunting, hinting colour. Now, for the love of all that is pure, can we move on?]
Only the crudeness of youth was here as yet, and not its triumph [anyone else feel we're wandering into heavy-handed metaphor territory?] - only the sharp calyx-point, the pricking tip of the bud, like spears, and not the paten of the leaf, the chalice of the flower.
[Is there an editor in the world who wouldn't have rejected this novel by now?]
For as yet spring had no flight, no song, but went like a half-fledged bird, hopping tentatively through the undergrowth. [To summarise: it's early March.] The bright springing mercury that carpeted the open spaces had only just hung out its pale flowers, and honeysuckle leaves were still tongues of fire. [I think you've made your point, Mary.] Between the larch boles [oh good, more boles] and under the thickets of honeysuckle and blackberry came a tawny silent form, wearing with the calm dignity of woodland creatures a beauty of eye and limb [can one wear a beautiful eye?], a brilliance of tint, that few women could have worn without self-consciousness. Clear-eyed, lithe, it stood for a moment in the full sunlight - a year-old fox, round-headed and velvet-footed. Then it slid into the shadows. [A sentence without adjectives or adverbs! Mary, my dear, are you feeling quite yourself?] A shrill whistle came from the interior of the wood, and the fox bounded towards it.
"Where you bin? [oh, Heaven preserve us.] You'm stray and lose yourself, certain sure!" ["certain sure?" REALLY?] said a girl's voice [or, indeed, 'said a girl'], chidingly motherly. "And if you'm alost [oh no...], I'm alost; so come you whome. [no, 'whome' isn't a typo. In case you were wondering. I wish it were.] The sun's undering [I wonder if Mary Webb had ever spoken to someone from the countryside?], and there's bones for supper!" [YUM.]
[I finished off the dialogue spoken by the girl's voice, but - truth be told - it was at that 'You'm' that I made my decision not to read on. Isn't this simply everything appalling you ever thought the rural novel might be? Perhaps it gets better, perhaps I am doing Ms. Webb an injustice. I, for one, certainly shan't be finding out.]
Thursday, 16 August 2012
With The Hunted - Sylvia Townsend Warner
Do you ever wish a book had been published a bit earlier? I imagine a few people lamented that the first dictionary was issued just weeks after they'd struggled with spelling 'sincerely' at the end of a letter, or mourned that British Birds and How To Spot Them came out mere days after that flock of yellow-crested (or was it crested-yellow?) hornspippets descended.
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Well, I'm feeling that way about With The Hunted - the selected non-fiction writings of Sylvia Townsend Warner, recently published by Black Dog Books (their website here.) If it had come out earlier, it would have saved me a LOT of time scrabbling through enormous, dusty old journals, hunting out articles by Warner, photocopying interviews from books, etc. etc.... But, truth be told, I had great fun doing that. And now it is available for everyone to read! Thank you Black Dog Books for sending me a review copy.
With The Hunted really is a goldmine. I haven't read it all yet, but I've read enough to know that it is an astonishingly varied and fascinating companion to Warner's novels - indeed, I have something of a chequered relationship with Warner's novels, and might find the writings selected here more consistent.
It includes so much! Remember how much I enjoyed her pamphlet on Jane Austen? It's in With The Hunted! I greatly enjoyed an interview from Louise Morgan's 1931 volume Writers at Work, which enchantingly begins '"I wish," said Sylvia Townsend Warner, "that I could tell you I wrote standing on one leg. Then you'd have something really entertaining and original to say about me!"' It's included! Her speech on 'Women as Writers' which re-popularised Woolf's A Room of One's Own - it's there! Everything from an essay on her grandmother's experience of the countryside ('iniquities she had thought of as rare vestigial occurrences in crime-sheets persisted and were taken as a matter of course among these cottage homes of England') to her views on Daniel Defoe ('there are some books, as there are some personalities, which one can open anywhere and be sure of an interest. This, I knew, was one of them') is here in this exceptionally wide-ranging volume. 418 pages never contained such infinite variety.
And then there are all the beguiling essays and reviews that I have yet to read! The titles leap out to me. I want to read 'Are Parents Really Necessary?' immediately; I cannot imagine what could lie behind 'Not To Be Done in May.' And then there are pieces on Saki, Katherine Mansfield, Dickens, Edward Lear, Beatrix Potter - what riches!
Peter Tolhurst - the editor of With The Hunted - cannot be thanked enough. Not only will this book prove invaluable to future scholars of Sylvia Townsend Warner, who will not have the paper trail I had whilst writing my thesis chapter on Warner, but it is for anybody who has any interest in Warner's novels, or indeed in early twentieth-century literature. In this extensive collection we see Sylvia Townsend Warner as literati and as countrywoman, casting her eye over her contemporaries and Victorian literary greats, yet also the minutiae of everyday life and everyday concerns, with the same perception and humour.
Whether you love Warner or have never read her before, I think this is a wonderful resource to keep on the shelf, dip into, dip into, dip into - and marvel at.
.JPG)
Well, I'm feeling that way about With The Hunted - the selected non-fiction writings of Sylvia Townsend Warner, recently published by Black Dog Books (their website here.) If it had come out earlier, it would have saved me a LOT of time scrabbling through enormous, dusty old journals, hunting out articles by Warner, photocopying interviews from books, etc. etc.... But, truth be told, I had great fun doing that. And now it is available for everyone to read! Thank you Black Dog Books for sending me a review copy.With The Hunted really is a goldmine. I haven't read it all yet, but I've read enough to know that it is an astonishingly varied and fascinating companion to Warner's novels - indeed, I have something of a chequered relationship with Warner's novels, and might find the writings selected here more consistent.
It includes so much! Remember how much I enjoyed her pamphlet on Jane Austen? It's in With The Hunted! I greatly enjoyed an interview from Louise Morgan's 1931 volume Writers at Work, which enchantingly begins '"I wish," said Sylvia Townsend Warner, "that I could tell you I wrote standing on one leg. Then you'd have something really entertaining and original to say about me!"' It's included! Her speech on 'Women as Writers' which re-popularised Woolf's A Room of One's Own - it's there! Everything from an essay on her grandmother's experience of the countryside ('iniquities she had thought of as rare vestigial occurrences in crime-sheets persisted and were taken as a matter of course among these cottage homes of England') to her views on Daniel Defoe ('there are some books, as there are some personalities, which one can open anywhere and be sure of an interest. This, I knew, was one of them') is here in this exceptionally wide-ranging volume. 418 pages never contained such infinite variety.
And then there are all the beguiling essays and reviews that I have yet to read! The titles leap out to me. I want to read 'Are Parents Really Necessary?' immediately; I cannot imagine what could lie behind 'Not To Be Done in May.' And then there are pieces on Saki, Katherine Mansfield, Dickens, Edward Lear, Beatrix Potter - what riches!
Peter Tolhurst - the editor of With The Hunted - cannot be thanked enough. Not only will this book prove invaluable to future scholars of Sylvia Townsend Warner, who will not have the paper trail I had whilst writing my thesis chapter on Warner, but it is for anybody who has any interest in Warner's novels, or indeed in early twentieth-century literature. In this extensive collection we see Sylvia Townsend Warner as literati and as countrywoman, casting her eye over her contemporaries and Victorian literary greats, yet also the minutiae of everyday life and everyday concerns, with the same perception and humour.
Whether you love Warner or have never read her before, I think this is a wonderful resource to keep on the shelf, dip into, dip into, dip into - and marvel at.
Wednesday, 15 August 2012
Five From the Archive (no.6)
This week I wanted my Five From The Archive (where I revisit old reviews from my blog - it's been a while, so some of you might not know about it!) to be novels about families. Obviously that encompasses many, many novels - so I decided to be a little more specific, and insist that they have a relative of some sort in the title. Makes it more fun to pick them! Here are my five - as always, let me know which you'd suggest...
Five... Books about Family
1.) Sisters By A River (1947) by Barbara Comyns
In short: The surreal account of Barbara Comyns' childhood by the Avon in Warwickshire, paving the way for her later, equally surreal, novels.
From the review: "Tales of ugly dresses and bad haircuts are told in the same captivating, undemonstrative style as those of Grannie dying and Father throwing a beehive over Mother. If this motley assortment of remembrances were made-up... well, I don't think they could have been. Such a bizarre childhood, so of its time, and yet utterly fascinating."
2.) Travels With My Aunt (1969) by Graham Greene
In short: Meeting his Aunt Augusta at his mother's funeral, Henry is caught up in her bizarre (and often illegal) cavorting around the globe.
From the review: "But the characters have the same indomitable spirit, eccentric manner, and amusingly unpredictable speech. The success of Greene's novel, for me, is through character - through Augusta and Henry's conversations, where two wholly different characters meet and travel together."
3.) Parents and Children (1941) by Ivy Compton-Burnett
In short: A typically Ivy Compton-Burnett novel - sprawling family, endless brilliant dialogue, and occasional doses of rather surprising action.
From the review: "Life-changing events are encompassed by lengthy, facetious discussions - gently vicious and cruelly precise, always picking up on the things said by others. Calmness permeates even the most emotional responses, and ICB's writing is always astonishing in its use of dialogue."
4.) My Cousin Rachel (1951) by Daphne du Maurier
In short: Philip's cousin Ambrose goes to Italy, marries Rachel, and (er, spoiler) dies - leaving Philip, and the reader, in doubt regarding Rachel's culpability or innocence...
From the review: "The novel has a lot in common with Rebecca - and not just the setting. The same intrigue, power, and issues about what is left unspoken in relationships. [...] My Cousin Rachel is brilliantly successful in the sense that I have never left a novel so uncertain as to a character's guilt or lack of it - and either interpretation seems quite valid."
5.) Brother of the More Famous Jack (1982) by Barbara Trapido
In short: Katherine is an ingenuous 18 year old when she meets the Goldman family, but living alongside this enchanting (but bewildering) assortment of people - most of whose names begin with J - helps propel her into adulthood.
From the review: "Katherine herself it is difficult not to like, if only for this: 'I reverted, as I do in moments of crisis, to rereading Emma, with cotton wool in my ears.'"
Over to you!
Tuesday, 14 August 2012
The Lizzie Bennet Diaries
I think I might have been the last person to watch The Lizzie Bennet Diaries - I was certainly the last person in my nuclear family to do so - but perhaps some of you are new to electricity, and I was second last. Penultimate, if you will. And so I'll tell you about it.
I imagine a good 95% of people who stumble across my blog will have read Pride and Prejudice (got my eye on you, Simon S.), and a fairly high percentage will also have seen an adaptation of some variety. By my count, I've seen two films, one TV series, one Bollywood adaptation, and one play - and that's only the tip of the iceberg for what's out there. But The Lizzie Bennet Diaries is one of the most innovative 'takes' on Pride and Prejudice yet - it's done as a series of vlogs. (For those not in the know, 'vlog' is 'video blog', which - in turn - is 'video web log'. Phew.)
In videos that last about five minutes, 'Lizzie Bennet' (a graduate student) recounts her life to camera, mostly being annoyed by her overbearing mother, ambushed by her OTT sister Lydia, and agonising over the love life of her sister Jane. It's not just Lizzie - Jane and Lydia appear sometimes, alongside Charlotte Lu (her Asian-American best friend), Caroline Lee and (ahem) Bing Lee. No sign of William Darcy yet...
It's done rather brilliantly, and certainly all we Thomases are fans. It follows the novel pretty precisely, albeit with a modern spin on things. The arrival of the militia morphs into some visiting swimming teams; the entailment of the house becomes threats about having to sell the house because of the financial crisis; Mr. Collins is a businessman, and Catherine de Burgh is his financial backer... And the characters translate perfectly, especially Lydia. What else would she be but a self-indulgent popular cheerleader-type, enthusiastically high-fiving people all over the place?
My favourite moment so far? That Kitty is, in fact, a cat - and, as Lydia says, "Kitty follows me about everywhere."
Here's the first episode (if it embeds properly). If you want to watch more, click here. 37 instalments in, most of the novel is still ahead of us - long may it continue!
I imagine a good 95% of people who stumble across my blog will have read Pride and Prejudice (got my eye on you, Simon S.), and a fairly high percentage will also have seen an adaptation of some variety. By my count, I've seen two films, one TV series, one Bollywood adaptation, and one play - and that's only the tip of the iceberg for what's out there. But The Lizzie Bennet Diaries is one of the most innovative 'takes' on Pride and Prejudice yet - it's done as a series of vlogs. (For those not in the know, 'vlog' is 'video blog', which - in turn - is 'video web log'. Phew.)
In videos that last about five minutes, 'Lizzie Bennet' (a graduate student) recounts her life to camera, mostly being annoyed by her overbearing mother, ambushed by her OTT sister Lydia, and agonising over the love life of her sister Jane. It's not just Lizzie - Jane and Lydia appear sometimes, alongside Charlotte Lu (her Asian-American best friend), Caroline Lee and (ahem) Bing Lee. No sign of William Darcy yet...
It's done rather brilliantly, and certainly all we Thomases are fans. It follows the novel pretty precisely, albeit with a modern spin on things. The arrival of the militia morphs into some visiting swimming teams; the entailment of the house becomes threats about having to sell the house because of the financial crisis; Mr. Collins is a businessman, and Catherine de Burgh is his financial backer... And the characters translate perfectly, especially Lydia. What else would she be but a self-indulgent popular cheerleader-type, enthusiastically high-fiving people all over the place?
My favourite moment so far? That Kitty is, in fact, a cat - and, as Lydia says, "Kitty follows me about everywhere."
Here's the first episode (if it embeds properly). If you want to watch more, click here. 37 instalments in, most of the novel is still ahead of us - long may it continue!
Monday, 13 August 2012
A Bristolian Weekend
I've just come back from a lovely weekend with my brother - and, very to my surprise, and the surprise of everyone who heard me moaning for the past seven years, I actually got a little into the Olympics, and was genuinely chuffed when Mo won the running thingummy. Who'd have thought? It'll fade, no doubt.
More importantly, I also bought some books in Bristol... and here they are, taken (rather obviously) on my bed, I'm afraid:
(Clockwise, starting top left)
Two Worlds and Their Ways - Ivy Compton-Burnett
I do already have this; I bought it to offer as a giveaway when I read it. So, watch out for that!
No.3 - Lady Kitty Vincent
I was rather surprised to find this, since I thought nobody else read Lady Kitty Vincent. I rather enjoyed her books last year, and have kept an eye out ever since, but this one doesn't seem to be available at all on Amazon or Abebooks. Worth £2.49 of my money!
The Bottle Factory Outing - Beryl Bainbridge
Spurred on by Beryl Bainbridge Reading Week!
A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
I laughed my way through this brilliant tour de force, but didn't have my own copy - and it's definitely one I'll re-read.
The West Pier - Patrick Hamilton
I've still only read one Hamilton novel, but it was one of the best novels I've ever read, so I'm happy to add to the Hamiltons on my shelf. I don't think I'd even heard of this one.
Herland - Charlotte Perkins Gilman
I've been meaning to read this Amazonian utopia (dystopia?) for years, and was glad to stumble across a copy. And I had a nice chat with the bookshop owner (who, on a previous visit, had told me that he loved Persephone Books) - he, entertainingly, told me that he'd once painted his bedroom yellow after reading The Yellow Wallpaper. A brilliant novella, yes, but not one which would lead me to re-decorate in yellow...
Brighton Rock - Graham Greene
My book group is doing this next month...
The Persimmon Tree and other stories - Marjorie Barnard
I don't know anything at all about this, but the blurb sounded intriguing. And I'm not a person who leaves VMCs untroubled on a bookshelf...
So, there we go! It's always great to spend time with my brother, and even better when he traipses after me around bookshops. He even bought three books himself. Perhaps he'll let you know what they were in the comments...
As always - thoughts? Have you read any, etc. etc.? I'd love to know.
More importantly, I also bought some books in Bristol... and here they are, taken (rather obviously) on my bed, I'm afraid:
(Clockwise, starting top left)
Two Worlds and Their Ways - Ivy Compton-Burnett
I do already have this; I bought it to offer as a giveaway when I read it. So, watch out for that!
No.3 - Lady Kitty Vincent
I was rather surprised to find this, since I thought nobody else read Lady Kitty Vincent. I rather enjoyed her books last year, and have kept an eye out ever since, but this one doesn't seem to be available at all on Amazon or Abebooks. Worth £2.49 of my money!
The Bottle Factory Outing - Beryl Bainbridge
Spurred on by Beryl Bainbridge Reading Week!
A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
I laughed my way through this brilliant tour de force, but didn't have my own copy - and it's definitely one I'll re-read.
The West Pier - Patrick Hamilton
I've still only read one Hamilton novel, but it was one of the best novels I've ever read, so I'm happy to add to the Hamiltons on my shelf. I don't think I'd even heard of this one.
Herland - Charlotte Perkins Gilman
I've been meaning to read this Amazonian utopia (dystopia?) for years, and was glad to stumble across a copy. And I had a nice chat with the bookshop owner (who, on a previous visit, had told me that he loved Persephone Books) - he, entertainingly, told me that he'd once painted his bedroom yellow after reading The Yellow Wallpaper. A brilliant novella, yes, but not one which would lead me to re-decorate in yellow...
Brighton Rock - Graham Greene
My book group is doing this next month...
The Persimmon Tree and other stories - Marjorie Barnard
I don't know anything at all about this, but the blurb sounded intriguing. And I'm not a person who leaves VMCs untroubled on a bookshelf...
So, there we go! It's always great to spend time with my brother, and even better when he traipses after me around bookshops. He even bought three books himself. Perhaps he'll let you know what they were in the comments...
As always - thoughts? Have you read any, etc. etc.? I'd love to know.
Sunday, 12 August 2012
Song for a Sunday
When you see this, I'll be in Bristol with Colin - he might be talking to me, or he might be watching the Olympics - I hope you're all having lovely weekends too!
Goldfrapp are (I think) best known for up-tempo, disco-type songs (are they?) but this track, A&E, is wonderfully calming and very appropriate for a Sunday Song. Enjoy!
Goldfrapp are (I think) best known for up-tempo, disco-type songs (are they?) but this track, A&E, is wonderfully calming and very appropriate for a Sunday Song. Enjoy!
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