Month: January 2009

Orlando Blooms

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One of the re-reads I’ve already read this year (and there are four) is Orlando by Virginia Woolf. The reason I re-read it is because Orlando forms a significant aspect of my dissertation for this year. Nicola asked a while ago what my dissertation would be on – I’ll probably elaborate at greater length another time, while I’m writing it no doubt, but I’ll mention it briefly. It’s called The Middlebrow Fantasy and The Fantastic Middlebrow – looking at the idea of the middlebrow in the interwar years, the use of the term and ethos in fiction, criticism and public arena, and how porous the boundaries between highbrow and middlebrow are. From this, I want to look at novels which I shall call the ‘domestic fantastic’ – not out-and-out fantasies like Lord of the Rings, but novels with an element of fantasy within a domestic setting or scenario. I think this use of genre and other worlds and consciousness of boundaries (temporal, spatial, mental) is interesting in relation to the middlebrow debate – how these two ideas feed into one another. Was that at all clear? I think I need to practise saying it to myself a few times before I try to explain it to anybody in person…

Anyway, back to Orlando. This is THE highbrow domestic fantastic text, as far as I’m concerned – for those not familiar with it, the novel is a sort of faux biography of Vita Sackville-West, only in the person of Orlando, a man who lives for hundreds of years and turns into a woman halfway through. This was the third time I’d read the novel – the second was when writing about Woolf and clothing, so that was my main focus. This time I made copious notes whenever Woolf mentioned boundaries or fantasy or class – in fact, those notes are waiting in a pile to be typed up properly, which I might achieve tomorrow. The constant scribbling made this re-read more of a struggle than the previous times, but I still think Orlando is a wonderful novel. Like all Woolf’s writing, there is something about her writing which is lyrical without being pretentious; beautiful without distracting from the heart of the novel. And funny. People forget that Woolf can be amusing. I liked this section, when Orlando is being ‘entertained’ by supposedly witty society, which is governed only by the illusion of wit:

She was still under the illusion that she was listening to the most brilliant epigrams in the world, though, as a matter of fact, old General C. was only saying, at some length, how the gout had left his left leg and gone to his right, while Mr. L. interrupted when any proper name was mentioned, ‘R.? Oh! I know Billy R. as well as I know myself. S.? My dearest friend. T.? Stayed with him a fortnight in Yorkshire’ – which, such is the force of illusion, sounded like the wittiest repartee, the most searching comment upon human life.

Is Woolf gently mocking the image people had, and still have, of the Bloomsbury Group? Mayhap… rather a lot of Orlando is tongue-in-cheek, and all the more fun for it. I don’t know if I’d recommend this as the first Woolf novel to read, but, if you’ve got one or two under your belt, this would be a great one to go onto. (And I must put in a good word for the beautiful new Oxford Worlds’ Classics editions. Once I’ve fiddled with my camera I’ll show you the ones I’ve bought – their choice of cover painting, by Charles Haslewood Shannon, is an exceptionally good choice – looks very much like (s)he could be either man or woman.)

Traditionally, when I mention Woolf here, the comments go rather silent… I’d be intrigued – what are your opinions on old Ginny? And have you read anything by her? I know some of her most vehement opponents haven’t got as far as reading her work, and then there are some who love her diaries and letters but hate her fiction. And then, of course, there is poor Our Vicar who started listening to a radio production of The Waves and now looks physically pained whenever Virginia is mentioned…

Fourth of the fourth

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Sorry, I come back and then disappear again… I’ve just been away for a few days with the Oxford University Christian Union, spending time learning more about Jesus and how to follow Him, which has been exciting and challenging and rather nostalgia-inducing, as I first went on this trip four years ago, and met my two closest friends.

I’ll be back with some recently read books soon, but a little too sleepy today. I was hoping to do a meme which Overdue tagged me for – post the fourth photograph in the fourth folder of my photo album. Sadly, since my laptop died and I have a new one, there are no photos on here yet. Instead, as with all good plans, I’m going to go to Facebook – and post the fourth photo from my fourth album on there.


This album is from my last weeks at Oxford as an undergraduate, when the Christan Union climbed to the top of Magdalen Tower (up the staircase, not scaling the walls) to pray and sing and wish the CU leavers well on their way. Obviously I came back… Left to right in this photo are Sarah, Liz, Claire (with her best smile), Maja and Dave. In the distance are the dreaming spires of Oxford.

Do feel free to try this meme yourself!

Red Books

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It’s a shame that I haven’t got my camera working on this laptop yet, as the two books I’m writing about today look rather fetching together. Alternatively, they clash. Who’s to say – what’s certain is that they’re both red. One was a present for Christmas, non-subtly asked for by myself and given by OV and OVW; the other was a present to myself.

Decca: The Letters of Jessica Mitford was urged on my by those who rose to Decca’s defence while I read The Mitfords (my review here, and it subsequently came top of my books of 2008). Jessica was easily my least favourite of the Mitfords, not because of her politics but because of the extent to which she cut herself off from her family and was entirely hostile to Diana, especially. To my, probably idealistic, mind politics should never get in the way of family. But, prepared to be proved wrong, I have started Decca… and, yes, she is starting to win me over, mostly because she confesses that her most vitriolic moments re:Diana were ‘stuffy and self-righteous’ and ‘not very sisterly’. I’ve been moved by her husband’s death in a way which almost passed me by in The Mitfords, mostly because she exchanged relatively few letters with her sisters in this period. And perhaps Decca will be most useful for those who consider the Mitford sisters all hardened snobs – whatever ones opinion of Communism, Jessica’s work for the Civil Rights Movement is wholly admirable.

The second red book is… The Paris Review Interviews vol.3 – the third in the series after those mentioned here – though I am still working my way through these, I couldn’t pass on the opportunity to add this to my collection. The interviews I’ve read so far are insightful, in depth and really deliciously writerly. Volume 3 includes interviews with Harold Pinter, Evelyn Waugh, Ted Hughes, Martin Amis, Jean Rhys, Salman Rushde, Joyce Carol Oats, William Carlos Williams, Jan Morris, Chinua Achebe… every home should have one.

An old friend returns

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I was going to leave Col’s review of Northanger Abbey up as the latest post for longer, to encourage more people to read and comment, but I heard some news today which I couldn’t ignore…

This may be old news, I don’t know, but I only heard about it today. Granted my only voluntary access to news is The Week, an excellent weekly summary of all major newspapers, and perhaps an article on this will appear in due course. But I am being deliberately elliptical – the news I’m talking about is the new Winnie the Pooh book. If, like me, you hadn’t heard, Yahoo’s summary is as good as any.

Those of you who pop in here regularly may well know my love of all things AA Milne, be it his plays, novels, poetry, autobiography, pacifist leaflets, sketches, essays and, indeed, children’s books. The first two books read in 2009 were re-reads of Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner, and very wonderful they were too. He was the first author I got excited about in my post-teenage reading, and still very close to my heart – the news that the Pooh canon is to be extended is one I receive with very mixed feelings.

Shall I propose the argument for the prosecution? My main issue, actually, is not so much that the new book will be inferior – of course it will – but that it will be written for the Disney generations. Most people reading this will be in the Disney generations, as they started churning out their dross in 1961. Whoops, I lost my journalistic objectivity a little there, didn’t I? Like most, I enjoyed the Disney cartoons when I was tiny, but when I discovered EH Shepard’s utterly brilliant illustrations, I was outraged – the amount of character and expression he gives with a few tiny pencil lines is astonishing. Disney lost all this subtlety and went for insane Rabbits and hyperactive Tiggers and Gopher (*shudder*)… and made everyone American. I’ve nothing against Americans, of course, but Winnie-the-Pooh is English! Christopher Robin is English! By all means make Gopher American, since we don’t have them in England, and consequently not the Hundred Acre Wood…

Sorry, this has veered right off message. My problem is – who will illustrate these stories? Will someone imitate Shepard in the way that someone is imitating Milne? Heaven forefend Disney illustrations…

Secondly, where is the room for a sequel? The final chapter of The House at Pooh Corner, unutterably sad, ends thus:

“Promise you won’t forget about me, ever. Not even when I’m a hundred.” [said Christopher Robin]
Pooh thought for a little.
“How old shall I be then?”
“Ninety-nine.”
Pooh nodded.”I promise,” he said.
Still with his eyes on the world, Christopher Robin put out a hand and felt for Pooh’s paw.
“Pooh,” said Christopher Robin earnestly, “if I–if I’m not quite” he stopped and tried again –“. Pooh, whatever happens, you will understand, won’t you?”
“Understand what?”
“Oh, nothing.” He laughed and jumped to his feet. “Come on!”
“Where?” said Pooh.
“Anywhere,” said Christopher Robin.

So they went off together. But wherever they go, and whatever happens to them on the way, in that enchanted place on the top of the Forest a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.

How can they continue after that? Not possible, surely…

Well, I confidently predict that there will be a brief flurry of media attention, quite a few sales (including, let’s face it, me) and it will be quietly forgotten in three or four years’ time.

What do you think? Excited, horrified, or wholly indifferent?

The Carbon Copy

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My laptop has arrived! And, what’s more, it seems to be working. So I’m back regular blogging, but before I bring you up to speed on the things I’ve read this year, we still have to hear about The Carbon Copy (also know as Colin) and his favourite read of 2008 – and the whole family circle is complete! Despite having quite a different taste in books from me, I think you’ll find his choice rather at home here… over to Colin:

2008 may well have been the first year in which I read more non-fiction than fiction, and of those non-fiction books I read, William Hague’s biography of William Wilberforce stands out – this, unsurprisingly, as much a testament to the wonders of Wilberforce’s life as to Hague’s writing style.

Indeed, it is some time since I was blown away by a work of fiction – which is sad – and a number of the ‘classics’ have left me relatively unmoved. But there is always safe ground in Jane Austen, and I’m perpetually surprised by how few of her books I have read, especially considering there were only six to speak of. I pushed myself up to four this year, by reading Northanger Abbey.

If I can have a complaint about Austen, it’s that she doesn’t stray far from template: boy meets girl. Boy and girl face insurmountable boundaries. Boy and girl dance. Boy and girl marry. And I hope I’m not spoiling the story too much when I tell you that Northanger Abbey sticks pretty much to the script, with the same healthy doses of pleasant-looking baddies and unpleasant-looking goodies that you’ll find in any of Austen’s other novels. Well, with the possible exceptions of Persuasion and Mansfield Park, which I’ve yet to read.

But Northanger Abbey is marked out by being a satire on the gothic novel, with haunted bedrooms and mysterious doors scattered about the place. How pertinent a satire this is, I cannot really say – the gothic novel is not my bag – but I have to admit I could have done without it. Essentially, the satire is limited to a couple of rather heavy-handed chapters that the novel would flow rather better without.

The satire aside, this is an excellently observed love story of the quality you would expect from Austen. I believe some have criticised the Austen men as being slightly two-dimensional: if they have, they are wrong. There is nothing so admirable as an Austen hero, and I think I speak for the vast majority of men when I say that I would like to see something of myself in Mr Tilney. He is not especially complicated, but he is loving, thoughtful and honourable. Male or female, I defy anyone not to root for Tilney and Catherine to get together.

Speaking of whom, Catherine Morland, despite being no one’s idea of a heroine, manages the peculiar Austen trick of being an all-round nice girl without making you want to vomit, and without being ‘feisty’ (urgh). The supporting cast could generally be plucked from other novels (Mrs Allen owes something to Mrs Bennet, Mr Tilney Sr is not unlike Mr Woodhouse, you could be forgiven for confusing Isabella with Mrs Elton, and so on) but the characters are strong nonetheless.

All in all, I have not been shaken in the idea that Austen’s novels are rather formulaic; however, when you’ve practically invented the formula and do it better than anyone else can, I say stick to the formula.

Our Vicar and Our Vicar’s Wife

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Apologies for silence of late – with my laptop firmly dead and buried, I have to wait until I’m in Magdalen to update my blog, or inconvenience some member of my household. As promised, Our Vicar’s Wife and Our Vicar have written about their favourite books of 2008, just to prove that I’m not the only member of the family who has been known to be stuck in a book. The Carbon Copy promises one will follow…

Do comment and make them feel loved, won’t you?
I’ll kick off with Our Vicar’s Wife, because she went for brevity – but we can’t blame her, as she is currently in bed and Not Very Well.

The Guernesey Literary and Potato-peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Schaffer.This was a perfect summer read – in a summer that, weather-wise, was far from perfect. It was, by turns, amusing, poignant, enthralling, nerve-wracking, delightful and painfully tragic. The subject was neatly wrapped in a perfect post-war scenario which rode well with the time and place. The epistolary style helped one romp through the book in leaps and bounds, picking it up and laying it aside easily as other activites dictated. Sadly there will be no more, but this is a book to which it will be a joy to return. A summer read – but maybe a winter re-read? OVW

And now for Our Vicar:

I’m not sure that anyone on Mastermind has ever chosen “Somerset Cricket 1970 to 2000”. If they did then essential reading would come from three books I have read this year. Ian Botham is among the best known cricketers of all time, Marcus Trescothick has had quite an impact on Somerset and England cricket over the past decade, and Peter Roebuck isn’t a name that many outside of the Somerset Supporters club would probably have heard of. (I do slightly malign a man who scored around 25,000 runs for the county).

As a child I would travel with a friend on the bus to the County Ground at Taunton, the 201 from North Petherton cost, I believe, 8d for a child. I made my first visit their in 35 years earlier this year – and saw the above mentioned Trescothick score 150+. When we moved to my home county 3 years ago I reread Roebuck’s history of Somerset Cricket. That book only went up to the mid 70s, so having seen the county at play again I thought I would catch up with the story.

Prior to 1975 Somerset had never won any trophy or championship, Botham and Roebuck contributed to a successful decade. Trescothick has been at the forefront of a recent resurgence in the county’s fortunes.

Roebuck gives the best insight into what life is like as a county player – and has a clearer assessment of his contemporaries and a feel for both cricket life and the politics involved. Botham’s writing, predictably, focuses on Botham. Mainly on his achievements and occasionally on his weaknesses, the former are lauded, the later briefly regretted but, in his terms, usually justified. He doesn’t speak well of others, particularly Roebuck, “he was aloof and distant when his team needed encouragement… he didn’t lead by example, he wasn’t good enough for that”. Roebuck is more generous in his assessment of Botham.

Trescothick’s book is essentially about the breakdowns he has experienced (essentially, and very simply, a fear of being abroad). It is disappointing that despite confessing to having had the book written by a “ghost” he isn’t able to convey any real sense of what it means to be a major international sportsman.

I confess that this is a fairly specialist selection – many of Stuck-in-a-book readers may not have a clue how cricket is played, let alone the nuances of the Duckworth-Lewis system used to decide who has won a game that has started but not finished. Nevertheless it has been interesting to assess the judgments made by three of Somerset’s greatest exponents of the game in recent years – and, if I remember rightly, I have a copy somewhere of Viv Richard’s account of the same period.

Head On – Ian Botham: The Autobiography by Ian Botham
Coming Back To Me: The Autobiography by Marcus Trescothick