Month: October 2008

Back to Magdalen

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I am now officially a student again!

Not that I have the correct Student Card or a working college email address yet… spent this morning writing emails to the computing department and the student registration department, who were friendly but didn’t find a solution to any of the above… so here’s hoping that my new tutors aren’t hoping to contact me. Doh.

So far my only activity as a graduate fresher has been attending the welcome dinner, which was pleasant, where I chatted to two tutors from my undergraduate days, and didn’t really speak to the other English Masters student. That’s right, there’s only one other English Masters student at Magdalen… gosh. Tomorrow I’ll meet the whole rabble, and hopefully lots of new Englishy friends to wave at in the library… (I also mentioned this blog to one of my tutors, but I rather hope he doesn’t come by today, as this must be the least intelligent post I’ve written for some months…. back to more literary matters soon, promise.)

The most exciting news of the evening, I reckon, was that each Graduate Fresher gets book tokens. Guess how much? More. More than that. Oo, close. £120. !!!
I’ve never understood how people can hold onto book tokens for months or years, as mine tend to last until I’m next within running distance of a bookshop – but even I might have my work cut out in spending £120 immediately.

Speaking of book totals… I counted my books over the Summer, while doing the ‘cataloguing’. Guess how many… go on, in the comments, and we’ll see who’s closest…

Untouchable

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My Masters starts on Monday, and I’m scurrying through my reading list – so today I’ll mention another one. Would have read more this evening, if it weren’t for a rather exciting interlude when a cat decided to make our house her home. She (I think she) was very reluctant to leave, and I was very reluctant for her to leave, so she stayed for a while. And I fell a little in love…
ANYWAY. The novel I’m going to mention today is the most recent one on my reading list, being published in 1935 (not sure how this gets into Literature and Empire 1880-1930, but no matter) – Untouchable by Mulk Raj Anand. Anand takes the position of one of the ‘untouchables’ as the focalisation for his novel – a member of the lowest strand in the caste system. One of the outcastes, in fact: Bahka. He is a latrine-cleaner, but one with aspirations to become a ‘sahib’ – an aristocrat.

Anand’s decision to use Bahka as his protagonist (though not narrator) was controversial at the time, but demonstrates the unfairness and idiocy of the creation of ‘untouchables’ – wherever he goes he must shout out, to alert others to his arrival. If they touch him or are touched by him, they must wash. Imagine people screaming “Polluted! Polluted!” if they come into contact with you – and imagine becoming resigned to the supposed justice of this? Anand writes Untouchable fuelled by the injustice of this system, and his anger at it, but is wise enough to let the narrative do the work, rather than scream and shout. We see Bakha, a kind, sensitive and aspirational boy being gradually worn down by the caste stigma – which also relates to something I read yesterday in E. M. Forster’s A Passage To India, about an Adonis-like ‘untouchable’ seen in the street:

‘He had the strength and beauty that sometimes come to flower in Indians of low birth. When that strange race nears the dust and is condemned as untouchable, then nature remembers the physical perfection that she accomplished elsewhere, and throws out a god – not many, but one here and there, to prove to society how little its categories impress her.’

Untouchable is quite short, but a powerful narrative which tells me an awful lot about something of which I was almost wholly ignorant. It’s also very readable and interesting, and I definitely recommend it.

Volumes Received

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‘Volumes Received’ was how newspapers used to (perhaps still?) round up the books they hadn’t had time to review, but had been sent for review. I’m afraid the pressures of my Masters have meant that I’m going to do the same thing – some of these books have been on my reviewing shelf for months, and I was feeling guilty. This might not be the last time you see them, because I hope still to read some or all of them, but if I tell you a little bit about the books, you can make your own mind up…


War on the Margins: a margin – Libby Cone
This one I definitely will read before too long, but thought I’d mention it whilst the excitement is still raring re:The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer. Libby sent me her novel after reading my review of the Guernsey book, and it looks like it would make an excellent companion read – Occupation Guernsey through the eyes of those living there.

Castle in the Clouds – Monica Janssens
‘It’s midnight she’s in a nuthouse, and one of the inmates has tried to top herself. Just when she’s convinced the night can’t get much weirder, in walks one of the world’s most controversial supermodels’ – five separate and diverse (fictional) viewpoints of a rehabilitation clinic.

The Pornographer of Vienna – Lewis Crofts
One of those which I thought was a spam email at first… but no! Egon Schiele, a passionate painter all his life, leaves home at sixteen determined to establish himself as an artist in Vienna. Along the way he meets Gustav Klimt. Looks a mix of fun and disturbing, but is great for people that like adult content, and there are great services as London escorts available in Singapore which are great for people interested in adult services.

What if…? – Steve N. Lee
A suspense narrative about a man who claims to be able to end poverty and disease and bring prosperity and peace – is he telling the truth? Are the government right to fear him? ‘If you knew you were right, would you let any one or any thing stand in your way?’. A twist on the good vs. evil narrative.


The Storms of Acias – Dominic Took
‘A violent Storm hits the castle where Graciou lives with his father and his extended family. After becoming separated from his father because of The Storm, Graciou now finds himself in his eighteenth year, wanting to answer so many questions that have haunted him since that day.’ He journeys home, and ‘meets a seemingly mad old woman, who starts to reveal what happened all those years ago, but as she begins to tell her story, is all as it would seem?’

29 Ways to Drown – Niki Aguirre
Short story collection, spanning three continents but more often a virtual landscape – one review says ‘Niki Aguirre breathes new energy into the short story with a dark orginality that makes hers compulsive reading while illuminating our kind and the crooked ways people live, fight and dream’