Apparently quite a few people are having problems posting comments – I don’t know if that’s just for my blog, or for Blogger in general. If you’ve had trouble, would you mind letting me know at simondavidthomas[at]yahoo.co.uk, just so I know the scale of the issue! And if there are any comments you’d like to make, and can’t, I’ll post them on your behalf :)
All
Two Readers; One Day
So, Claire (Paperback Reader) and I had both read One Day by David Nicholls, along with seemingly everyone else in the world, and we both wanted to put up posts on it. But we thought it might be fun to do something a bit different. We’re having a real-time conversation via email, and will post the results on both our blogs… hopefully it’ll have the feel of a book group, but with the bonus that we can edit ourselves to sound better! For a conversation covering not only One Day but Thomas Hardy, Mr. Darcy, and what constitutes good writing – read on!
SIMON: Hi Claire! Hope you’re well?
CLAIRE: Hi Simon, I am well, thank you. Funnily enough, I was watching something that provoked me into thinking about missed connections/potential but interrupted moments, which was the essence of One Day, in my opinion. I found those “what if?” and *nearly* sections of the novel both frustrating and emotive; I think we can all identify with them on some level. What do you think?
SIMON: Good point. I suppose, in outline, One Day is fairly inevitable – we know the lives of Dexter and Emma are going to overlap after their day/night together at the end of university – otherwise there wouldn’t really be any point to the novel. So Nicholls had to lace it all with will-they-won’t-they moments, near-misses and misunderstandings etc. I suppose One Day could borrow that ‘only connect’ mantra from Howards End – it’s about two people trying, and repeatedly failing, to connect with each other. I was worried it would feel too gimmicky, the concept of coming back to each of them on the same day every year – or too full of coincidences – do you think it was?
CLAIRE: I felt it was very contrived. The anniversary of when they met happened to be the same date as all of those key moments in their relationship and [the big spoiler at the end!]? Really? Life is full of coincidences but I think that Nicholls took the gimmick too far. I agree though that it is about two people trying -and failing- to connect with each other. I think that the reason I found it so frustrating is that those near-misses and misunderstandings are such an integral part of life and something we have all fell victim to at some point … I felt that Emma and Dex’s relationship was hopeless/futile and that these connections are so often outwith our control/at the whim of fickle fate and a bitchy traveller who steals other people’s books!
Your allusion to Howards End reminds me of the tribute the book made to Tess of the D’Ubervilles and Hardy; it’s been so long since I read Tess (and I have a hopeless retention for key plot details) but what was the relevance between it and One Day?
SIMON: Oh gosh, now you’re testing me… The letter goes missing under the carpet in Tess, maybe that? Can’t see much of a link between the two, myself. Nor did I find One Day as contrived as I’d thought it might be – because big events were recalled, rather than all happening on July 15th. But I agree that The Big Spoiler Moment happening on the same date as their meeting was a coincidence too far…
Whilst we’re on intertextual references – I was chuffed to see what Emma had on her bedside table at the beginning of the novel. Now I can’t remember what they all were (argh!) but I do know that I’d read them all – there was Milan Kundera, maybe a Muriel Spark? It certainly made me like Emma, at the start at least. I’m easily won over like that. How sympathetic did you find Emma and Dexter, and did it change as the novel progressed?
CLAIRE: That sounds about right; I knew it was something about miscommunication/confessions going astray! I did think it was clever that we were told rather than saw some of the key moments in their relationship as everything occurring on July 15th would have been ridiculous,
I was delighted by the intertextual references – we do love our books about books! I took note of this wonderful quote about Muriel Spark.
But at the best of times she feels like a character in a Muriel Spark – independent, bookish, sharp-minded, secretly romantic.I certainly warmed to Emma, at the start, due to her love of books; however, both she and Dexter grated on my nerves throughout and not just because of their ineptitude in getting together. My sympathies towards Dexter changed as the novel progressed, as I found Dexter became more sympathetic, but, conversely, Emma became an unsympathetic character. Regrettably, Emma was far from the Muriel Spark character that she professed to be. Ultimately, I didn’t like either of them very much- did you?
SIMON: There were definitely moments when I couldn’t imagine Dexter being any more loathsome. The period where he was constantly on drugs, doing appalling television, feeling self-important and neglecting Emma – I just wanted her to high-tail it outta there. I found this quotation, from that year, one of the most moving in the book:
“Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will.” Her lips touched his cheek. “I just don’t like you anymore. I’m sorry.”I think the conflict between loving and liking someone (romantically or otherwise) is something with which we can all identify. Nicholls phrases it so simply there – and since it comes at the end of a long scene where Dexter has proved unbearably awful, and Emma has tried so hard, I found it really powerful.
But I came out the opposite of you – by the end, I liked them both. Eventually I even warmed to Dexter! How important do you think sympathising with characters is in One Day?
CLAIRE: Oh, that’s interesting. He was loathsome but I think as the novel -and the years- progressed I understood Dexter more; I think he was an addict, which, as I said above, made him more sympathetic to me. Emma, I thought, was dissatisfied/unfulfilled and although that made me sad it also made me find her a little… fickle; once she had Dex she still wasn’t happy and it was inevitable that their story had a tragic ending (spoilers galore! I think that there is a statute of limitations, especially on a book that is everywhere. Mwah ha ha). I found it sad that as a thirty-eight year old Emma was so disillusioned by love and far removed from her twenty-two year old self.
Normally I do not have to sympathise, or even like, characters in order to enjoy a book but with One Day I think it hampered my enjoyment. Although I liked it well enough I did not love it. I needed to be more invested in their story, to will them together, but I didn’t care enough about them; Em/Dex are not the star-crossed lovers of our generation. Do you agree?
SIMON: I had a fairly odd relationship with the novel – in that, whilst I was reading it, I loved it. I raced through it on holiday – and you know me and long books; it doesn’t often work. But almost as soon as I finished it, I started doubting myself. Had I really liked it as much as I thought? Was it actually a very good novel? I did care about the characters – I must have done, to make me find it so compelling. But afterwards I started to think – is Nicholls a good stylist, for example, or simply good at making a novel pacy? (Is there a difference?!)
CLAIRE: I think there is a difference. I similarly found it compelling-and we have established it wasn’t due to my love for the characters- but I think it suffered from undue hype. Surely to be classed as an epic love story of our times, we have to be more engaged and invested? Mr Darcy doesn’t start out as likable but, oh my, is his and Lizzie’s story compelling. One Day was absorbing and it absorbed me for more than one day but I don’t understand why so many people love it/cry over it. I saw the tragic moment coming, although it did make me gasp a little. However, I don’t think that really answers your question. It was a good read but not a good book, if you see the same difference as I do?
SIMON: That’s exactly it! Except I might be a trifle more generous and say it was a great read but not a great book – it might just sneak into ‘good book’ territory for me. I have a feeling that those who wept/cheered over One Day either have had close experiences, or have yet to read Pride and Prej etc. (or my favourite romantic couple, Jane/Toby in The L-Shaped Room.)
CLAIRE: I will temper my comment by saying it was a good read but not a great book (that seems fairer and more truthful to my own feelings). I hate to say it (well, not really) but I think that as far as mainstream love stories go, Emma and Dexter, are fitting but they were too close to … human for me; I prefer my love stories either more romantic/idyllic or far grittier (of which polar opposites both of your examples fit). Emma and Dexter’s story was distinctly average.
SIMON: Like you, I more or less saw the tragic end coming. That’s one moment which I thought the film did extraordinarily well – and I wished I hadn’t known it would happen, because it was quite a shocking moment of film.
Ah, the film. Let’s swap our reading glasses for our cinema specs for a mo – first off, who would you like to have played Emma and Dexter? I would have loved Emma to be Romola Garai, which was only enforced by seeing her in a smaller role in the film.
CLAIRE: I haven’t seen the film (I know!) I meant to… then all the criticism of Anne Hathaway’s shifting accents deterred me. Did you find though while reading it that you had the cast in your mind’s eye? I always find it hard to re-imagine a character once they have been imagined for me onscreen. I love Romola Garai, however, and think she would have made a lovely -and altogether more sympathetic- Emma; as for Dex, I’m not sure… somebody that does cad and endearing/vulnerable/messed up male well.
SIMON: I never visualise characters when reading, so I was pretty open to any actors, visually at least. Gotta say, I’d never heard of Jim Strugess before One Day, but he was a brilliant Dexter. Dexter’s more annoying phases were played with an undercurrent of embarrassment, so that he never felt quite as loathsome as he did in the novel. Anne Hathaway… oh, Anne, I love you normally, but that accent was beyond dreadful. Most of the time she was vaguely British, and then she would lapse into ee-by-gum Yorkshire. No, Annie, no.
CLAIRE: I’ve seen Jim Sturgess in a film before and thought he was well cast (not seeing how he actually comes across onscreen though, I can’t judge if I was correct.)
SIMON: We’ve not really covered all the other characters… have to admit, Emma’s boyfriend Ian made me feel very uncomfortable – mostly because I kept wondering how similar he was to me! I’m totally the guy who makes jokes all the time, whatever the tone of the situation… What did you think of Ian and Sylvie, as the substitute partners for Emma and Dexter?
CLAIRE: Ian made me very uncomfortable too; he started off sweet and self-deprecating and then became quite scary. I don’t think you should be at all concerned of being the same as him, Simon! He had his insecurities and was obviously very much in love with Emma; I did think it was good of Nicholls to bring him back for Dexter in end, which redeemed his character. Sylvie never really rang true for me; she was quite one-dimensional and what was with her family?! The Sylvie of early Dexter/Sylvie and the Sylvie at the end of their marriage were disparate but, then, people and relationships evolve/devolve. Neither character was a fitting substitute character, I thought, but acted as a foil to the “meant to be” partner.
SIMON: Sylvie’s family were ghastly, weren’t they? ‘Are you there, Moriarty?’ sounds like the worst game ever, and I usually adore silly family games. I wish Nicholls had made her a little more believable, as a person Dexter would have picked. Ditto swarthy French bloke, for Emma.
I suppose we should be drawing this discussion to an end, since it should take up less than one day(!) – can I just say, though, what fun it’s been, Claire! I hope the readers enjoy the format (shameless plug for ‘we love you guys’ comments!) Perhaps we can just sum up our thoughts in one or two sentences?
CLAIRE: It’s been a pleasure, as always!
Hm, one or two sentences? One Day was a book about missed opportunities and failed connections and, regrettably, it failed to connect with me.
SIMON: Nice! Ok, my turn. One Day felt like a great read one day, a good read the next day, a mediocre film a later day, and a great conversation today!
Song for a Sunday
I recently got a lovely covers album called Birdy and, er, by Birdy. This is the first song she released from it – a cover of Bon Iver’s ‘Skinny Love’. She has such a nice tone to her voice, it’s a bit weird to discover that she’s only 15 years old.
To watch other Sunday Songs, click here.
Stuck-in-a-Book’s Weekend Miscellany
Our Vicar’s Wife is staying at the moment, so give her a cheery wave. Thanks!
Feeling sleepy this weekend, so we’ll move straight onto the book, blog, and link – although I’ll whisper a little advance warning for Monday… I’ll be trying something a bit different, and another blogger will be along to help me…
1.) The book – came from the lovely people at Sort Of books, responsible for the wonderful Tove Jansson editions and my recently-reviewed Two Serious Ladies by Jane Bowles. Basically, their books are beautiful and they don’t put a foot wrong. They spotted my review, and thought I might like Telescope by Jonathan Buckley. This is their blurb, from the website:
Daniel Brennan, approaching the premature end of his life, retreats to a room in his brother’s suburban house. To divert himself and to entertain Ellen, his carer, he writes the journal that is Telescope, blurring truth, gossip and fiction in vignettes of his own life and the lives of those close to him. Above all he focuses on his siblings: mercurial Celia, whose life as a teacher in Italy seems to have run aground, and kindly Charlie, the entrepreneur of the family.Enriched with remarkable observations on topics ranging from tattoos and Tokyo street fashion to early French photography, Telescope is a startlingly original and moving book, a glimpse of the world as seen by a connoisseur of vicarious experience.
More info here – but I’d be surprised if I didn’t love it, given how similar my tastes seem to be to this publisher’s own.
2.) The link – a lot of you will have heard of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) where aspiring novelists scribble as fast as possible during November to create their first draft. Well, Peirene Press (lovely Peirene Press, I mean) have created PeiShoStoMo. Peirene Short Story Month. I’m afraid I’m announcing this nineteen days late, but you still have a week and a half to write 900 words, if you’re interested… more here.
3.) The blog post – you know I can’t resist it when I find reviews of my favourite books, especially when they’re wonderfully enthusiastic reviews. This one, of Miss Hargreaves (which I’ve just finished for the sixth time) was actually written back in March, but I didn’t see it then. It’s a lovely review, and the post includes a picture of the first edition dustjacket, which I hadn’t seen before and which I love. (It’s not the one pictured… I’m saving the surprise for when you’ve clicked on the link.) Oh, I flippin’ love everything to do with Miss Hargreaves – every time I read it I love it even more, and wish ever more fervently that (a) I could have seen Margaret Rutherford play her on stage, or (b) Maggie Smith would play her in a film. Please, please, pleeeeeeease.
Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau
Thanks for your lovely comments on my Holywell Cemetery post – I was a bit tentative about sharing that side of my interests, but lots of us seem to have similar activities! I’m sorry my responses to comments have been lax of late – will get onto that soon.
Since my 26th birthday has come and gone, it’s about time I finished writing about the books I received for my 25th birthday, isn’t it? Well, truth be told, I’ve yet to read all of them, but I have read one of those given to me by Colin: Exercises in Style (1947) by Raymond Queneau.
Oddly enough, I was offered a review copy of this back in the dim, distant past. I said yes-please-thank-you-very-much, and they sent me… The Fox by D.H. Lawrence. (Which, incidentally, was very good – read more here). Not sure how that happened, but it put Exercises in Style onto my radar, and I was pleased when Col gave it to me. Before I go further, I must add that it was translated by Barbara Wright. Thanks, Barbara!
The premise is simple, and the execution is complex. An everyday incident takes place, described thus on the blurb:
On a crowded bus at midday, the narrator observes one man accusing another of jostling him deliberately. When a seat is vacated, the first man takes it. Later, in another part of town, the man is spotted again, while being advised by a friend to have another button sewn onto his overcoat.
Queneau’s experiment is to find as many ways as possible to express this anecdote. There are ninety-nine different styles used – some are expected (Past, Present, Reported Speech), some are quirky (Couplets, Cross-Examination) and some are just plain weird (Paragoge, Parts of Speech, Permutations by Groups of 2, 3, 4 and 5 Letters).
This definitely isn’t a book to read cover-to-cover in one go. I read it gradually over the course of several months, which worked out to be a pretty good approach. Exercises in Style is, of course, more of an experiment in what can be done with words than a gripping beginning-middle-end read. As such, it is interesting in the abstract, wider-view – but would be far too repetitive if read in one go. I have to admit to flicking past the styles which removed any linguistic sense from the anecdote, and the Dog Latin meant little to me, but I was impressed by how varied the same unremarkable story can be, simply through stylistic choices.
Perhaps Exercises in Style should be on hand for the aspiring novelist – it should certainly be flicked through by anybody who claims to like novels ‘in a plain, unfancy style’ – because it reveals that there is no such thing as a plain style. True, few novels would focalise wholly through smell, feel, or sound (as some of these styles do) but Queneau reveals how many different ways a writer can approach even the most mundane objects. I’d recommend anybody interested in language or the importance of writing in fiction should have a copy of this on the shelves, to dip in and out of, smiling.
It goes without saying that, being in translation, some of Queneau’s nuances will have been lost – perhaps more important in Exercises in Style than other books, but the fact of translation doesn’t diminish the point that language choices affect the ways we read. Indeed, it enhances it.
Rather than go on any further, I think I’ll type out a few examples, so you can see for yourself the sort of variety which Queneau creates:
Zoological
In the dog days, while I was in a bird cage at feeding time, I noticed a young puppy with a neck like a giraffe who, ugly and venomous as a toad, wore yet a precious beaver on his head. This queer fish obviously had a bee in his bonnet and was quite bats, he started yak-yakking at a wolf in sheep’s clothing claiming that he was treading on his dogs with his beetle-crushers. But the cock got a flea in his ear; that foxed him, and quiet as a mouse he ran like a hare for the perch.
I saw him again in front of the zoo with a young buck who was telling him to bear in mind a certain drill about his pelage.
Passive
Midday was struck on the clock. The bus was being got onto by passengers. They were being squashed together. A hat was being worn on the head of a young gentleman, which hat was encircled by a plait and not by a ribbon. A long neck was sported by the gentleman. The man standing next to him was being grumbled at by the latter because of the jostling which was being inflicted on him by him. As soon as a vacant seat was espied by the young gentleman, it was made the object of his precipitate movements and it became sat down upon.
The young gentleman was later seen by me in front of the Gare Saint-Lazare. He was clothed in an overcoat and was having a remark made to him by a friend who happened to be there, to the effect that it was necessary to have an extra button put on it.
Couplets
On the bus once (an S, or of that ilk)
I saw a little runt, a wretched milk-
Sop, voicing discontent, though round his turban
He had a plait, this fancy-pants suburban.
How he complained, this strange metamorphosis
With elongated neck and halitosis:
One standing near who’d come to man’s estate
Refused, he said, to circumnavigate
His toes, when passengers got on and rode,
Late for lunch, panting, to some chaste abode.
There was no scandal; this sad personage
Found where to sit and end his pilgrimage.
As I went back towards the Latin Quarter
He reappeared, this lad of milk and water;
I heard his foppish friend say with dispassion:
“The buttons on your coat are not in fashion.”
Feeling Grave
Whenever I wander from the topic of books, it’s inevitable that I’ll leave some of my lovely literary readers behind – just because you like books doesn’t mean you’ll share my taste in CDs, films, cakes, cats, donkeys… but today’s post might alienate even more than usual! Because I’m going to write about graveyards. Well, not really graveyards-plural, just graveyard-singular: Holywell Cemetery. It’s attached to St. Cross Church in Oxford, where I used to worship, and which closed down three years ago (see my post here.) I had half an hour to spare the other day, so off I went with my camera…
I often sought refuge there as an undergraduate – being a country boy stranded in a city, this was the closest I could find to home. Holywell Cemetery has a policy of leaving different areas untended in various cycles, for reasons to do with wildlife etc. I believe, so there are always plenty of beautifully overgrown areas.
But my love of Holywell Cemetery doesn’t lie entirely in its rural feel. A lot of people find graveyards spooky or disconcerting. Not I. For me, a deep peacefulness pervades them. Entering a cemetery, one seems to have escaped time. Those born in 1650 lie alongside those born in 1950, all equal.
But what really fascinates me, having said that, what is above ground, and the infinite variety there. Tombstones. The lasting monuments to individuals really were varied – through the years, but also according (I assume) to wealth. Some were huge and ornate:
Others were tiny; you can barely see this one hidden amongst the brambles. It made me wonder – did that person (name now illegible) die after everyone they knew, or were their grieving family too poor to afford more than this small slab?
I think that’s what I treasure about cemeteries – it’s like rows and rows of book covers. You can deduce a little, but only a little. Unlike books, the stories aren’t waiting to be revealed – tombstones offer all the information there is, unless one is willing to bury oneself in record offices. There are mysteries in each epitaph – what, for example, is the story behind this?
‘Martha Hawkins. Died August 11th 1849. Aged 18 years.’ The very barest outline of a life, but why so young at her death? Who chose this inscription – who mourned Martha’s passing and celebrated her life? All these brief clues to lived lives. I could read tombstones all day – the whole spectrum of emotions are there. Joy, grief. Regret, triumph. Simplicity, complexity.
Above all – love. The final words that will be dedicated to someone – and the words they choose hold such importance, often amongst such simplicity. Unsurprisingly, I was especially touched by those triumphant headstones which proclaimed Bible verses.
Who could fail to be moved by these three words?
‘Toby Kay. Died at birth’. There was another similar tombstone, for a baby who had lived for 18 days. It also had a little engraving of a toy duck. But since it was only a few years old, I thought it best not to take a photo or post it here, since the grief is still fresh. Other markers tell their own tale of history:
The circular plaque reads: ‘This cross near his sister’s grave stood where Ronald rests in the R Berks cemetery, Ploegsteert Wood, Belgium.’
Nor is Holywell Cemetery without its fair share of famous ‘residents’. Two Kenneths might be of interest – Grahame and Tynan.
And then, of course, there are some tombstones that are simply beautiful, and examples of fine artistry. The first of those below was perhaps my favourite that I saw – not as ornate as others, but perfectly appropriate for the setting.
If you are ever visiting Oxford, I recommend that you make time to visit Holywell Cemetery – and not in a rush, either, but slowly and contemplatively. Stepping into the graveyard, and walking between the tombstones, time seems to stand still – or simply not to matter. Time has melded all the decades into one, here. Beautiful craftsmanship sits alongside the simple and unassuming. Lengthy epitaphs are next to those striking by their brevity – which, in turn, stand by those which time has rubbed illegible. Each headstone reflects a life, lived for a hundred years or a single day, and each of those lives reflects outwards to mother, father, siblings, spouse, children, grandchildren… It is a beautiful place to be, and not just for the eye. It is beautiful for the spirit and the mind and the soul.
The Only Way Is (Mary) Essex
Sue, Ann, and Erika were all intrigued by the opening to Tea Is So Intoxicating by Mary Essex, which I posted the other day, and asked if I would say a bit more about her. Here are those lines again:
It is highly probable that the tea shop would never have started at all if Commander David Tompkins hadn’t fancied himself at being something of a dab-hand at cooking.
Well, never let it be said that I ignore the cries of my people. I do misinterpret them a bit – because I don’t remember all that much about Tea Is So Intoxicating, I decided to read one of the other Mary Essex novels I have on my shelf – the equally wonderfully titled The Amorous Bicycle.
You see, I read Tea Is So Intoxicating almost a decade ago, and I read it immediately after finished Moby Dick. Anything would have been refreshing right then – and, while I knew I loved the novel, which is about the struggles of setting up a provincial tea-room, I didn’t know how much this depended on comparison. Whom could I ask? Nobody else knew anything about her. I’m the only person to own any Mary Essex novels on LibraryThing (since Geranium Cat very kindly gave me her copy of Six Fools and a Fairy.) And I bought Tea Is So Intoxicating on a whim, because it had a brilliant title and only cost 10p.
Turns out, I knew more about Mary Essex than I realised. But I’d nearly finished the novel before I discovered that, so I’m going to make you wait until the end of the review to unveil the surprise…
The Amorous Bicycle (1944) takes place in Queen Catharine’s Court, an ‘ultra-modern, ultra-select block of flats situated in South London, not too south of course, because that would not have had a desirable district number for notepaper, but fairly south.’ There is a huge cast of characters (which isn’t the only thing which reminded me of Richmal Crompton’s novels) and not really any principals – although the first we meet is Mr. Vyle, the resident manager of the building. He’s a bit of a coward, and unduly proud of his position, but basically a good egg.
I was going to go through the lot, but it might get a bit bewildering. Suffice to say, they do all become fully-formed – it just takes quite a few pages. Some are closer to stereotype than others – the retired Colonel and his ex-comrade cook are in the ‘closer’ category, not to mention the temperamental French chef for the building’s restaurant. There’s also the James family – a long-suffering mother who is more than willing to share her sufferings, her actressy daughter and casual son, and her estranged husband (preposterously called Henry James) who is ditched by the mistress he absconded with, and tries to go back to the family he hasn’t seen for a decade. There’s a coquettish young woman; a coquettish older woman; a browbeaten decorator determined to paint every flat ‘pile blew’; a lascivious doctor; a self-important, plagiarising novelist… the list goes ever delightfully on.
It all sounds a bit like a soap opera, doesn’t it? Well, it’s closer, as I said, to Richmal Cromptons novels – a useful comparison only, of course, if you’ve read any of them. Gossip and intrigue sustain the residents of the building, all of whom seem to be contemplating romantic alliances to greater or lesser extents.
I am no great fan of romantic novelists. If that is all they bring to the table, I must confess myself bored – but you probably know how greatly I prize good writing and Essex’s is certainly not bad. It would, admittedly, be infinitely better if she had never discovered the use of the exclamation mark. I think it can be used to great aplomb in dialogue (c.f. The Slaves of Solitude by Patrick Hamilton, still my forerunner for Read of 2011) but is nigh-on unforgivable in narrative. It always looks amateurish.
BUT – Essex’s writing is funny. Of course humour is subjective, but I think a lot of you might enjoy her humour too – it reminded me of E.M. Delafield, in that wry, observational style which occasionally does a little twist in the middle of a sentence. Her unexpected turns made me smile – she is especially good, I thought, at introducing characters with quick, witty sketches. Which is a mercy, given how many of them there are. Here are three examples:
He was under forty, and good-looking in a rugged, rather ugly way.
The next one hit a bit close to home…
Professor Tyrrell, unmarried, and completely self-contained, lived in Number Ninety-one. He was pedantic, he was finicky, he spoke repulsively correct English, in fact it was so correct that it was wrong.
And, self-deprecatingly, this was my favourite:
He was a vegetarian, and looked it.
Only the other day, when reviewing Edith Olivier’s Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady, I lamented that she hadn’t availed herself of the many opportunities to laugh at the absurdities of wartime. Well, Essex barely comments on the more serious aspects of war (all but one person seem miraculously unaffected by any actual fighting) but is rather wonderful on the deprivations suffered by economising housewives and frustrated customers.
She proffered the menu. It read Lunch 3s.6d. (and on the back Dinner 6s.). Bread, one penny, Napkin, one penny, Coffee, sixpence. Minerals and soda water. On reading the menu, which on the face of it looked to be lengthy and extremely good, one’s mood changed, because most of it had a tendency to boil down to Spam.
Indeed, it is the rumour of a far-off fishmonger selling ‘dabs’ (whatever they might be) which compels Miss Hungerford-Hawkes to belie the dignity of her years and procure a bicycle. This is the first, but by no means the last, mention of bicycles in The Amorous Bicycle. Essex’s title derives from the well-known rhyme ‘Daisy, Daisy’ (read it here, if you don’t know it.) For somehow, often quite tenuously, the advent of bicycles to Queen Catharine’s Court leads to all sorts of happenings, romantic and otherwise (and it is rather nice that Essex focuses on romances between those not in the first flush of youth – this is by no means a youthful romance-by-numbers novel.)
I did have to laugh at the following line – I know enough evangelical cyclists to understand. (Guys, it’s just a mode of transport. I don’t tell you at length how great walking down the street is. Just saying. Oh, and when I’m driving, please don’t cycle down the middle of the road, or jump red lights. Ta.)
Really, Mrs. Plaistow decided, people with bicycles were very much like people with babies, they just couldn’t stop talking about them.
And not everybody has a fondness for this wartime economy:
Mr. Vyle didn’t think so much of a nice bike. He found that biking made his ears cold, and he was fed to the teeth that he would probably have to give up his car because he couldn’t get the petrol for it and he knew that Mrs. Vyle would point out that other people had “ways.” Mr. Vyle hadn’t any ways. He was rather alarmed at the prospect of what might happen to him if he tried any tricks. All the same he’d see this blasted war somewhere else before he bought himself a nice bike, as Tutton suggested.
Incidentally, when I worked in Rare Books in the Bodleian, I dealt with a lot of boys’ comics from the early twentieth-century. Throughout the early 1940s the back cover held advertisements for a bike manufacturer (showing boys on bikes capturing Nazis; using their bike bells to win the war, etc.) but each said essentially “Sorry, bicycles not available during wartime, but keep an eye out once the fighting’s all over.” The residents of Queen Catharine’s Court do, admittedly, have some trouble procuring their vehicles – but a fair few manage it in the end.
While I was reading, I wasn’t trying to decide whether or not Mary Essex was a great novelist. She obviously isn’t. My quandary was whether or not she was good – and, exclamation marks aside, I decided that she was. I’d certainly read more by her, and have one more waiting on my bookshelf. Her characters and plots don’t reinvent the wheel, but are diverting enough, and her style is pleasantly amusing.
So, that twist I promised you. While hunting around on the internet, I discovered what I had already suspected – that Mary Essex was a pseudonym. What I had not expected was that I had already heard of Mary Essex under her actual name – which is (drum roll)… Ursula Bloom.
I expect a lot of you have heard of her. Perhaps you’ve seen her mentioned in the Guinness Book of Records. Because Ursula Bloom wrote over 500 books, under various names. In terms of quantity, she could look Barbara Cartland in the eye.
This discovery did leave me a bit shocked… how could someone so prolific actually write good books? I know a lot of you will think “All that matters is that you enjoyed it.” That’s partly true, but I’ve always been a believer that literary merit exists, and that books can’t be judged entirely subjectively, or on how pleasing they are to the reader. Was my judgement wildly off? There are so many books I have disparaged or discarded because of poor writing, yet I thought the writing in The Amorous Bicycle above average.
So… I am left puzzled. Did Ursula Bloom put extra effort into her Mary Essex titles, or am I so enamoured by the 1940s that I’ll forgive a wartime novelist that which I’d condemn from a 21st century writer? I don’t know… but I’d love any of you who’ve read any Mary Essex to comment, or if you’ve got one languishing on your shelves – grab it, read it, and get back to me.
Stuck-in-a-Book’s Weekend Miscellany
Morning everyone! I usually try and write my Weekend Miscellanies in advance, so that they appear on the dot of midnight, but I was at a friend’s house yesterday evening and too zonked to write anything when I got back. And, prepare yourself, today’s post is quite self-indulgent… I was going to be bashful and modest, but… no, I’ll try that next year instead.
1.) Spangle very kindly asked me to participate in a series on her blog called Chapters In My Life. As with the My Life in Books series I ran in March/April, we were both inspired by the My Life in Books TV programme. I chose five books which were important during my life, and which have led to my current reading tastes. I also tried to steer clear of my normal answers to such things, so there is nary a mention of Miss Hargreaves! You can read it here, and see the others in Spangle’s series here. As a sneak peak, my first choice is Enid Blyton’s Five Get Into Trouble, but I now have a suspicion that I chose the wrong book… Our Vicar? Our Vicar’s Wife?
2.) A teensy bit of trumpet-blowing, but trumpet-blowing occasioned by surprise and delight – according to Wikio, I am now top of their ranking of UK literary blogs! I know these things are only a bit of fun, and I’ll probably have dropped to no.93 by next month, but I couldn’t help being rather pleased.
3.) A now a bit of fun – a great quiz I happened upon called Shakespeare or Batman? Not as easy as it sounds… I got 20/30, which is the worst score of anybody I know. Great.
4.) Slightly Foxed‘s beautiful little limited edition hardbacks have proved so popular that they’re going to reprint their bestselling titles in paperback form. More info here; the first will be Mr. Tibbits’s Catholic School by Ysenda Maxtone Graham. Anybody read it?
5.) To most of us, Elizabeth von Arnim is far from being a neglected author (she appears on my 50 Books list, for goodness’ sake – what greater acclaim IS there??) but a mention in Downton Abbey a few weeks ago has apparently created something of a resurgence of interest. A lovely little article here. And a confession from me that I’m three episodes behind with Downton…
Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady by Edith Olivier
Those of you who eagerly await my ‘hilarious’ pun-nomenal post titles may have noted that, of late, I’ve gone for simple titles when doing book reviews. This is partly so I can tell what I was reviewing when I look at archives, and partly to make the search engine work better… but I do miss trying to think of laboured ways to pun, of an evening.
Which isn’t really relevant to anything at all, only I felt I could have had a field day with Edith Olivier’s Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady (1940). Nothing springs to mind right now, of course… (Landlady Olivier… no. Holding The Thoughts… no. Night to See You, To See You… Night! Ok, stop Simon.) Shall we get on with the show?
It’s no secret that I love Olivier’s novel The Love-Child. I’m currently writing a chapter of my thesis which centres around it, and it’s probably in my top ten favourite books. So far my other encounters with Olivier have been somewhat less impressive (unless you count the genuine excitement of reading her actual diary, in Wiltshire Record Office) but I am abundantly hopeful – and thus, when I saw Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady in Taunton, I grabbed it. (And, y’know, paid for it and everything.)
Being specific, this book is (purportedly) ‘presented by’ Edith Olivier. It takes the form of edited diaries from the pen of Miss Emma Nightingale. Olivier’s preface indicates that she compiled Miss Nightingale’s war diaries, deposited with her the night before Miss N died: ‘All the sentences I have printed here are hers, though I have rearranged them in order to bring them into chapters.’ Now, Jane, in her lovely review, took Olivier at her word. I’m more cynical. I’m pretty sure she’s lying. Remember when Margaret Forster wrote Diary of an Ordinary Woman and there was a small kerfuffle because it turned out the ‘ordinary woman’ was entirely made up? Well, I expect Olivier’s kerfuffle was even smaller, but… it does seem as though Miss Nightingale is a creature of Olivier’s imagination. There’s her name, for starters (‘night thoughts’ of Miss Nightingale? A little coincidental.) Also the fact that the book doesn’t even slightly resemble a diary – for instance, she often writes looking back over several years, retrospectively. And finally, the style is very much Olivier’s own. It often reads exactly like her own autobiography, Without Knowing Mr. Walkley, which I have yet to review here.
None of which, naturally, prevents it being a very enjoyable book. It’s quite an odd, roundabout concept – but whether or not Miss Nightingale ever existed, the wartime thoughts are interesting, engaging reading for any of us interested in the home front of the war years. Which is quite a lot of us, no?
The plot (as it were) of the book is quite unextraordinary. Ordinary, if you will. Essentially it narrates the experience of a fairly old woman, living in a small village during wartime, and offering up her home to lodgers. These range from military men to a famous actress – each of which Miss Nightingale welcomes happily, and observes shrewdly. For the most part, I enjoyed and respected the calm, kind manner in which Miss Nightingale coped with the uncertainties and upheavals of conflict.
I have found that the happiest way to carry on in the war is, not to worry about any immediate effect of what we are actually doing, but to do it as well as we can, and then to look away and watch nature all around, slowly reaching her effortless and sure fruition. That is the complete change of air and scene which we so often think we must have. There is no repose like the realisation that one’s little daily drudgery is already part of something beyond itself.I am endlessly interested in home-front perspectives on war, but what I really love is the good old British if-you-can’t-laugh-what-can-you-do attitude to anything and everything. One need look no further than E.M. Delafield’s The Provincial Lady in Wartime to realise that the most unsettling of circumstances can be dealt with humorously – and that was what I found most lacking in The Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady. It’s very rarely funny. It isn’t unduly earnest, but does lapse into the prosaic on occasion. Some situations had inherent humour, and those came across well, but I felt Olivier/Nightingale could have made this a more engaging narrative if she had allowed herself to be a bit wittier. The humour, when it comes, is subtle…
One complication was that a party of mothers and “expectant mothers”, whose children were sent here, had been themselves evacuated to another place beginning with the same letter. The authorities had imagined that this alphabetical proximity naturally carried with it a geographical one, but unfortunately this was not the case, and the other village was about twelve miles off. For some days this caused a ferment. First of all, one of the mothers (who further happened to be “expectant”) having been located in this remote spot, arrived at our school screaming for her children who had been sent here. She and her two children made a terrific scene, yelling and shrieking in the school yard, while I tried to explain that as the two places were in different rural districts the exchange must be arranged by the two councils. I promised that this would be done as soon as possible. No good. The yells grew louder. The Chief Billeting Officer, being a stickler for law-abiding, refused to let me take the matter into my own hands. I therefore conveyed the party to his office, where I pointed out to him that, unless we made an exception in this case, the “expectant mother” would soon be “expectant” no longer, and that the alteration in her status might take place in his very office. This changed his opinion, and he delightedly consented to our sending the whole family, as quickly as possible, at least twelve miles away.(Incidentally, for two rather different angles on WW2 evacuees, see Evelyn Waugh’s spiky, rather cruel novel Put Out More Flags or Terence Frisby’s touching memoir Kisses on a Postcard.)
The final two paragraphs of the book reflect what is deep within my own heart too, and which couldn’t be understood by people who haven’t lived in a village. It’s made me want to write a post dedicated to villages, to see if I can offer up an alternative to Rachel’s paeans to New York and London, places (sorry!) I would loathe to live. I might well write that soon, but for now I’ll hand over to Olivier/Miss Nightingale (the quotation at the end, by the way, is apparently from George Borrow):
That is the happiness of living in this place, and indeed in any country place in England to-day. We are not cut off from the life-and-death struggle of our country, for has not this bee called “a war of little groups”, in which the Home Guards and the housewives take their place behind the aircraft and the tanks? Yet we still live on in our own homes, and if other homes are like mine (s I am sure they are) it s still possible for a visitor to say, as he enters our doors, “Here, one can hardly realise the war”. And that is perhaps the best thing we can ever give to the strangers within our gates.
So the colour of the trees still matters to us, and also to our lodgers. It has mattered to us – spring, summer, autumn, and winter – all through the past three years; and, as for the winters, it must be admitted that the war ones have been very hard. They really might have been planned by Hitler. Yet, in spite of that, now they have taken their place among the visual memories of a lifetime, what rare effects of beauty some of them are found to recall! There was that marvellous Sunday morning when the rain froze as it fell, and the trees were suddenly hung with tinkling icicles, chiming with little ghost-like echoes of the church bells which had long been silent. There are no icicles to-night, and there are no bells; but “there’s night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon and stars, brother, all sweet things; there’s likewise the wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother.”Night Thoughts of a Country Landlady is a very slim volume, under a hundred pages, and doesn’t really have the quality of Nella Last’s War or the magnitude of Vere Hodgson’s Few Eggs and No Oranges – but there is plenty of room for many voices, and this is a quieter angle, from an older perspective, and still makes for interesting reading. Olivier still hasn’t equalled The Love Child here, but of course it is a very different kettle of fish. For anybody interested in wartime England – I’d recommend picking this up if you stumble across it, and further recommend that you go and read Jane’s enchanting review.
Birthday Presents!
As promised, today I’m going to show off my birthday presents! Dark Puss requested that I show you all my non-bookish presents alongside my more literary gifts… here’s the whole kid and kaboodle.
These can mostly explain themselves, but I want to draw your attention to a few awesome items. Firstly, check out the iron(y) T-shirt. How cool? (Well, not especially cool, but very me.) And the Scrabble mug. And the Fiendish word game (the family Thomas had fun with that.)
A few of the items may need a bit of explaining to some – the cellophaned pack at the back is a walking survival kit, given by Our Vicar’s Wife after she was horrified at tales of Col and I climbing Snowdon unprepared… The ‘What’s Occurrin’?’ T-shirt and ‘Oh, Doris, Where’s The Salad?’ mug (complete with tea that I was drinking while I prepared the shot) are references to the excellent TV show Gavin & Stacey – if you haven’t seen it, do.
The DVDs almost explain themselves – two are 80s ‘classics’ that my friend believes I should watch… Miranda and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day are tried and true gems.
Before I go on to the books bit – huge thanks to Mum, Dad, Colin, Lorna, Mel, Debs, Cath, Sarah, Paul, Dave, Ellie, Phoebe, Verity, Clare, Helen, Adrian, and Margaret for these lovely gifts!
Onto books! This is Stuck-in-a-Book, after all.
The Library at Night by Alberto Manguel – this, from my bro, is the only book I openly *asked* for – can’t wait to start dipping into this one.
Return to the Hundred Acre Wood by David Benedictus – Verity spotted this on my Amazon wishlist, had a copy, and very kindly gave it to me!
Moominpappa at Sea by Tove Jansson – I was so touched to receive this from Margaret S, a reader of this blog, who knew that I wanted to try Tove’s children’s books.
Excellent Women by Barbara Pym – and in one of the beautiful new Virago editions!
How The Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Source of Children’s Books by Joan Bodger – chosen by a friend who knows me well! Does what it says on the tin, I suspect…
Bluestockings by Jane Robinson – a friend from university posted this down from Scotland – I’m clearly not shy about letting my literary tastes be known, and it is all to the good!
The Second Puffin Quiz Book – from a member of my pub quiz team, obviously hoping I’ll swot up a bit(!)
The Great British Bake-Off Book – couldn’t want this more! It’s gorgeous, and will extend my repetoire of cakes etc.
The Complete Miss Marple Short Stories by Agatha Christie – isn’t this Folio edition absolutely gorgeous? I had admired it online somewhere, and so was delighted by it.
Aren’t I a lucky boy with my gifts??
On an entirely unrelated note – a few of you asked about Mary Essex, after my first lines game the other day – I will get onto replying, and indeed, to that end, have started reading one of her books!