1930s

Homage to Catalonia

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As promised, today I’m going to write about Homage to Catalonia. Perhaps I should start by acknowledging Obama and everything – but since I know less than nothing about the whole thing, I’ll just say that I was rather hoping he’d win (in an unfounded sort of way) and always imagined he would.

Right. To the Spanish Civil War. Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell was one of two works (the other being an Auden poem) which were chosen by our tutor to represent ‘Literature of the 1930s’. If I had to choose a decade about which I knew the most, I’d plump for the 1930s, but nothing like either of these texts. My knowledge centres around the novel, perhaps with a little drama thrown in – I’d hoped to do my presentation this week (I’m now doing Theatre and Revolution next week) and I’m quite glad I was too late. Interesting as I found Homage to Catalonia, I feel completely unqualified to present a paper on it.


For those who don’t know – and I’d like to point out that Our Vicar did know – Homage to Catalonia is non-fiction. It’s more or less autobiography, military autobiography if you will, of George Orwell’s experiences fighting in the Spanish Civil War. It’s one of those events which wasn’t taught much in school – it was wheeled in every now and then to explain certain reactions towards World War Two, but has been rather overshadowed by it. The only thing I knew about it, really, was that Julian Bell (Virginia Woolf’s nephew) died there, bombed whilst in an ambulance. So Orwell’s text really informed me, and what is more it was written in the six months after he returned to England. WW2 hadn’t started, and all the events were fresh in his mind.

Despite not being hugley interested in military history, I found Homage to Catalonia absolutely fascinating and incredibly engagingly written. My only experiences with Orwell before were, like a lot of people, 1984 and Animal Farm. Although they both have evident left-wing morals, I hadn’t realised quite how active Orwell had been for the left-wing cause – and the same great writing that he uses in these novels is transferred to discussing life ‘at the front’.

I say ‘at the front’. Some of it is, and he describes the unreality, frequent tedium, and unexpected priorities: ‘In trench warfare five things are important: firewood, food, tobacco candles and the enemy. In winter on the Saragossa front they were important in that order, with the enemy a bad last.’ After a spate there, he is back in Barcelona, once more faced with frustrating inactivity and boredom. And later he is shocked by the fact that the voluntary militia he joined, the POUM, is being used as a scapegoat by the government to blame for all ills – even while they are fighting for the cause.

Perhaps I should pin my colours to the mast. I am more or less a pacifist, probably through inclination as much as ideology; I find the concept of warfare sickening, and also find it unfathomable that Orwell cannot connect the danger, indignity and pain he experiences with that of the men on the other side of No Man’s Land. I recommend Homage to Catalonia – and I certainly recommend it – for Orwell’s exceptional writing and for interest, definitely not as a how-to manual or political treatise!

My copy is from the 1986 Complete Works – most editions after this have moved two chapters to be appendices, supposedly based on notes Orwell left – these are the two most overly political chapters, and what is left is more his personal experience. The tutor leading discussion was rather scandalised by this, but it makes the book much more captivating for me. And captivating it certainly is – if you’re intrigued to find out more about the Spanish Civil War, or if you are simply interested by the 1930s as a period, I think Homage to Catalonia would be an excellent starting point.

Brontes and Woolies

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I’ve been meaning to write a post about The Brontes Went To Woolworths by Rachel Ferguson for quite a long time, and somehow it never quite happened – perhaps it’s the prospect of having to write ‘Brontes’ so often, without the necessary accents. I know *how* to find them, but to do it everytime… it’s probably best just to pretend they don’t exist.

Anyway, it’s now been so long since I read the novel that I can’t remember all that much about it. What’s more, most of the blogosphere appear to have been read it this year – Danielle’s review; Lady Bug’s Books’; Cornflower’s; dovegreyreader’s. Sorry if I’ve missed some people out, and I’m sure I have, but those are the ones I could lay my hands on – in the unlikely event that anyone hasn’t heard about this book, I advise clicking on one those links for a proper summary of the book! Mine will be brief…

“How I loathe that kind of novel which is about a lot of sisters”, is how this novel about sisters begins. They’re all rather mad, and I can’t remember any of their names, but their important characteristic is that they create fantasy personalities, which cluster around them. Not their own personalities, nor other fantasy people – but rather they choose people (sometimes a doll, sometimes – centrally – a judge they’ve encountered only in the newspaper) and have conversations about and with these people. Which all becomes rather complicated when the judge in question becomes an acquaintance, and has to learn how to act the part he has already been given.

And it’s all rather dizzying. But in a quite brilliant way. As reviews of Edward Carey’s Alva & Irva recently, and Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns a while ago (see the 50 Books…) demonstrate, I’m rather a fan of the quirky and surreal, and Rachel Ferguson dishes this up with abandon. So I can only add further endorsement to the recommendations others have already given – The Brontes Went To Woolworths is charming and zany and I can remember the feeling of reading it, even if all the other details escape me.

The other thing I can bring to the party is a different picture, since my copy is an old hardback. What an odd cover. More intriguing, Rachel Ferguson (known to many of us as author of Persephone Books title Alas, Poor Lady) is also ‘”Rachel” of Punch’ – hmm, wonder what she wrote there… might have to get a copy up in the Bodleian and have an investigation…

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.

Mapp and Lucia

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I can’t believe I’ve been blogging for over a year and not made mention of a series of books which I’m sure you all either do love or will love – the Mapp & Lucia series by EF Benson. I’ve recently had the pleasure of watching Elaine at Random Jottings succumb to Elizabeth and Emmeline, and it has set me off re-reading. I’ve only read the first four of the six, actually, and if you throw in Tom Holt’s well-respected sequels (in the style of EF Benson) then I have only got halfway. More news on Benson sequels very soon…


For those who don’t know, EF Benson wrote Queen Lucia in 1920, Miss Mapp in 1922, Lucia in London in 1927 – and by 1931 had the brilliant idea to bring his creations together in Mapp and Lucia. I haven’t read the final two books, as I say, but presume that the characters remain united enemies in them. Mapp and Lucia are not likeable characters, by any means – both with their varying pretensions and self-delusions, but both holding sway over their neighbourhood, there is inevitable friction and competition when they meet. And these characters, especially when they meet, are an absolute delight to read about. We laugh at them, we are fond of them, we realise how intimidating it would be to meet them in real life.


My dear friend Barbara-in-Ludlow introduced me to these books, back in 2004, very kindly lending me her beautiful Folio edition. These were returned when I went to university, and I bought up the Black Swan paperback editions. Very nice, even featured in my post about favourite book covers – but I did hanker for the beautiful Folio editions. When I was reading Barbara’s, I was so worried I’d get them dirty that I read them with custom-made brown-paper covers. What can people have thought I was reading… Anyway, I found this boxset secondhand in Oxford, and was utterly delighted. Annoyingly, I have to use my glasses to read them (never know why this is true of some books and not others – nothing to do with font size) but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.


Advance apologies to anyone who now must go out and buy this edition… but it’s worth it.

Going Postal

StuckinaBook All , 5 Comments

I’ve made cursory mention a few times about the postal book group I’m in – I send a book to someone, and receive a book from someone. Repeat every two months (always the same people), and at the end of 18 months or so, my book has been round a circle, and come back with comments from lots of people. Plus, I’ve had the chance to read and comment on a bunch of books, too.

A week or so ago I got my book back from the end of 2006, and was able to see what people thought – and so I thought I’d share the outcome with you all. I chose Ivy Compton-Burnett’s A House and Its Head. I chose it for a couple of reasons – first, I wanted an excuse to read another ICB after having really liked Mother and Son, and secondly, Ivy Compton-Burnett was sure to raise some reactions! She is very much a love-or-hate author (Our Vicar’s Wife hates her; I love her). I think the reason she causes such a divide is the play-like style of her novels i.e. they are almost completely dialogue. For me, this brings characters alive – and often dialogue is the site where authors can be the most amusing or their most poignant.


A House and Its Head follows the Edgeworth family, none of whom (except perhaps Nance) are particularly likeable – and some rather dramatic storylines, expressly the father’s unpopular remarriage. But it’s more about Ivy C-B’s writing style than the plot… so… what did the recipients of the book have to say?

“I C-B certainly has an individual style of writing. As I started reading I noticed that she would describe each character when they first appeared, in fair detail, incl. their age, and then just dialogues would follow. Actually this style didn’t bother me at all (at first I thought it might!) I found the novel quite austere and gloomy, nevertheless I enjoyed the experience of reading my first I C-B. I’m certain I would enjoy a second reading sometime & I’ll certainly sample some other I C-Bs.” – Angela

“I tried with it, I really did, Simon, but I must place myself in the ‘hate it’ category, which puts me in the same camp as your Mum. The style really grated on me – I found it difficult to follow the play-like dialogue, and the characters irritated me more than I can say. Yes, they are of their time, but so are the Provincial Lady’s, and I though hers – even the unpleasant people – were delightfully drawn.
Maybe it was the scene at the begiining when Duncan is cheerfully throwing a book he disapproves of INTO THE FIRE – and that is in a book published in 1935! I just could not forgive Ivy C-B for that.” – Rhona

“The jury was out for a long time, as they say, but in the end, I’ll be adding my name to the ‘love’ camp. At first I was struck by the claustrophobia-inducing atmosphere – a house full of not particularly likeable people who have nowehre to go and nothing useful to do and so submit to the tyranny of its head. Ass to this the ever watchful and oh-so well-meaning neighbours, prepared to gossip about the slightest irregularity. But despite – or because of – it all, the book is hilarious. I kept waiting for each and every one of Dulcia’s appearances – inwardly cringing, of course, but unable to suppress a giggle.” – Susan

“For quite the first 100 pages this book irritated me beyond belief, but I decided that I had to stick with it and get it finished. Then it just ‘grew’ on me – I can’t say I loved it. I found it very hard going, but I was intrigued by the characters. [The rest of this comment has too many spoilers!] – Barbara

And a few people either didn’t have time or gave up!
Make of those responses what you will… I was quite pleased with them. And hopefully it’s convinced some of you to dip a toe into Ivy Compton-Burnett territory… if only because you have the back-out of solidarity if you hate it.

More Cold Comfort Farm

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I’m just back from a very enjoyable meet-up in London with some bookish people, more on that in the near future. Today, I just couldn’t leave you mystified as to my opinions concerning Ms. Gibbons and her Farm of Cold Comfort. So interesting to read the views of others before I throw my own out there, must try that again some time.

And what an interesting disparity there is amongst you! Some love; some loathe; some fairly indifferent. Well, it’s time to nail my colours to the mast – I love, love, love Cold Comfort Farm and think it’s in the top ten funniest books I’ve ever read. Quite a bold statement to make, and knowing that lots of you have already read it, I probaly have to justify my position… I’ll do my best. But I think humour in a book is the most difficult thing to define, encapsulate or explain. Why do I find something funny? Goodness knows. And trying to work out why something is funny kills the humour. Oh well. I’ll do my best…

I read Cold Comfort Farm in January 2004, and re-read it last week for Book Group – what had been enjoyed at 18 was delighted in at 22. Perhaps my pleasure will go up in four-yearly increments, leaving me in delirium by the time I’m 98. What made the most difference, I think, is that I have read some Lawrence, some Hardy, some interwar psychoanalytical novels in the interrim. For Cold Comfort Farm is pastiche on every page – mostly, apparently, of Mary Webb, whom I have not read – and not a word is intended to be taken seriously.

Ironically, Cold Comfort Farm is both pastiche and wholly unlike any other book in the world. It couldn’t be. Flora Poste, the chic London ‘heroine’, finds herself orphaned and decides to live with a relative. She tries several, including the Starkadders of Cold Comfort Farm, albeit reluctantly: ‘ “because highly sexed young men living on farms are always called Seth or Reuben, and it would be such a nuisance. And my cousin’s name, remember, is Judith. That in itself is most ominous. Her husband is almost certain to be called Amos; and if he is, it will be a typical farm, and you know what they are like.” ‘ It is this sense that Flora is walking into a cliche – which is evident even if one has never touched a rural novel of the type being satirised – which characterises the whole situation, and the rest of the novel. She breezes into Cold Comfort Farm, and encounters every type of absurd, farcical and outlandish character imaginable. And I loved every one of ’em.

90 year old Adam, who cares only for his cows Feckless, Aimless, Graceless and Pointless; over-sexed Seth who is perpetually undoing shirt buttons and believes women only want “yer blood and yer breath”; Mr. Mybug who sees Flora’s revulsion towards him as ‘inhibitions’ and claims Branwell Bronte wrote Wuthering Heights; preacher Amos who doesn’t plan his sermons but “I allus knows ’twill be summat about burnin’…”; most famously Aunt Ada Doom, confined to her room, who once “saw something nasty in the woodshed”. And a host of others, all of whom are keen to impress on Flora that “there have always been Starkadders at Cold Comfort”.

In response to Angela’s comment yesterday, I do think the characters are supposed to be cartoonish – or absurd, anyway. It is the clash of their melodramatic sayings and Flora’s unflustered sense which gave me the moments of greatest mirth. For example, this exchange between Flora and Cousin Judith:

…
Judith had sunk into a reverie.
‘Curtains?’ she asked, vacantly, lifting her magnificent head. ‘Child, child, it is many years since such trifles broke across the web of my solitude.’
‘I’m sure it is; but do you think I might have them washed, all the same?’

Flora’s tidy dismissal of the rural histrionics would be callous and arrogant in real life, but real life is not something which impinges on Cold Comfort Farm. Self-confidence propels Flora through solving all the Starkadder dilemmas, even the domineering matriach Ada Doom, whose only defence tactics are thwacking people with Cowkeepers’ Weekly Bulletin and Milk Producers’ Guide.

I find Cold Comfort Farm a hilarious romp from beginning to end, as well as an example of brilliantly measured and controlled writing, but I can quite see it’s a novel which is either hit or miss. Those who haven’t read it, do give it a go – if, after 40 pages, you don’t love it then you never will. If you do, you always will.

My Husband, The Poet

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Number 19 in the 50 Books You Must Read But May Not Have Heard About is a double-whammy. Actually, since the 1930s these books haven’t been published separately, as far as I’m aware, so hopefully I shan’t be done for false advertising or anything.

Step forward, Helen Thomas. No, not my aunt (though I do have a very nice aunt of that name) but rather the widow of poet Edward Thomas. Y’know, the ‘Adelstrop’ one. After Edward was killed in the First World War, she wrote As It Was, an autobiographical (though pseudonymical) portrait of their courtship and marriage, up to the birth of their first child. She wrote it cathartically, and was only approached with the idea of publishing a while later (1926). This she did, and followed it a few years later with World Without End (1931), which started where As It Was left off, and continued until David (Edward) leaves for war.

What beautiful books! Helen’s writing is the very opposite of pretension – but she is a natural born storyteller. She raises a family, moves through several small house, joins and leaves communities. Very little that I can see or analyse why she is so good, but these books lilt along with bathos and pathos and every sort of -thos. The final paragraph had my crying:

A thick mist hung everywhere, and there was no sound except, far away in the valley, a train shunting. I stood at the gate watching him go; he turned back to wave until the mist and the hill hid him. I heard his old call coming up to me: ‘Coo-ee!’ he called. ‘Coo-ee!’ I answered, keeping my voice strong to call again. Again through the muffled air came his ‘Coo-ee’. And again went my answer like an echo. ‘Coo-ee’ came fainter next time with the hill between us, but my ‘Coo-ee’ went out of my lungs strong to pierce to him as he strode away from me. ‘Coo-ee!’ So faint now, it might be only my own call flung back from the thick air and muffling snow. I put my hands up to my mouth to make a trumpet, but no sound came. Panic seized me, and I ran through the mist and the snow to the top of the hill, and stood there a moment dumbly, with straining eyes and ears. There was nothing but the mist and the snow and the silence of death.
Then with leaden feet which stumbled in a sudden darkness that overwhelmed me I groped my way back to the empty house.

Wow.

Throughout Helen’s writing, Edward/David doesn’t come off as the best husband, but what saturates these books is Helen’s passionate, loyal and unshaking love for him – the sort of love which would seem a bit far-fetched in fiction, but is obviously true here. Such simple books, but will move you a huge amount, I guarantee it.

I thought they’d gone out of print, but managed to find a new edition called Under Storm’s Wing, which has the two novels alongside some photographs, letters and memoirs. Haven’t looked at the letters and memoirs yet, but I await them with pleasure. They can only add to the touching honesty with which Helen Thomas has written simple, beautiful, affecting works.

All Passion Spent

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I don’t know if any of you joined in on Cornflower’s first ever Book Group read, All Passion Spent, but here’s the link if you wanted to follow the animated conversation. Lots of strong opinions and lots of people contributing – can’t quite match the fun and furore of a real live book group, but comes a close second.

You may remember that I got All Passion Spent as my Secret Santa present – and I Woolfed it down. Yes, I know Woolf didn’t write the novel , but there wasn’t a great deal of punning potential in ‘Sackville-West’… unless some sort of badinage on ‘string-vest’…

I was a little surprised that not everyone loved the novel, but I must assure you that it is brilliant. I had 22 contenders for my top ten books (well, I read a great deal more than that, but there were 22 on my shortlist) and All Passion Spent came in about twelfth. It’s the tale of Lady Slane, a widow who decides to buck her troublesome family (which does include, however, the rather lovely dreamer Ethel) and live alone for the first time in her life. She quietly moves to a house she first saw thirty years previously, refuses to see her grandchildren and great-grandchildren (though, again, in a quiet and calm way) and reminisces about her childhood, courtship, and marriage. In many ways the old-woman-seeking-dependence plot is like The Stone Angel, which I wrote about here, but where Hagar was undeniably selfish and bitter, Lady Slane is dignified, sensible and kind throughout.

A background of great, slightly eccentric, characters such as Mr. Bucktrout and FitzGeorge complete this witty, calming, beautiful novel. Above all, the writing is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful – each sentence is constructed with care and humanity. Would make excellent Boxing Day reading.

How Withering

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A while ago I mentioned that I was reading a play called The Brontes. As always, that has an accent which I haven’t the motivation to locate. It’s a 1933 play by Alfred Sangster, whomever he may be – the only info I can find is on imdb, here, which tells me that he was an actor as well as a playwright.

It’s just as well.

I don’t own many books of whose provenance I am unaware, but The Brontes is one. Apparently I paid £2.99 for it, and it used to belong to Margaret Cousins, but besides this I know nothing. Not quite sure what made me pick it up and read it a few weeks ago, except curiosity – sometimes I feel in the mood for a play, and this was one of those times. Plays aren’t read much anymore – obviously their primary medium is the theatre, but I’d encourage you to take sit in an armchair with one sometime, and see how that suits. Or just read Ivy Compton-Burnett, which is much the same thing.

Fictional books about authors are a funny thing. I’ve not read many… in fact, racking my brains, I can only think of one other that I’ve read – The Hours. Well, where Michael Cunningham presented a biographical novel in a clever, three-tiered narrative with many a subtle nuance, Sangster has contributed nothing to the Bronte story which one couldn’t gain from reading the blurb on Elizabeth Gaskell’s book on Charlotte et al. Whilst we’re on that, I blame Gaskell’s biography for the lasting, and wholly unsubstantiated, view that Anne was a weak writer – for my money, and this is controversial, Agnes Grey is better than Jane Eyre. There, I’ve said it.

If you’re still reading, I’ll carry on. Sangster does all the usual tricks – Patrick is a stern bully of a father; Bramwell is a destructive drunk whenever he appears; Emily is mysterious and melancholy; Anne is timid; Charlotte… well, the stage directions are thus – “She is eager and interested, small of stature, almost bird-like in movement, and might be called insignificant if it were not for the large, dark eyes below the fine brow, for ever questioning – seeking – “. From this point on, whether pondering existential matters, or asking for a cup of tea, Charlotte is perpetually ‘seeking…’ in an endless ellipsis. Basically, take all the cliches about the Brontes you’ve ever heard, jumble them along with some 1930s jargon (can you really imagine Emily saying “I can’t. I’m all wrong. All jumbled up inside…”) and that’s what Sangster produced. It’s very entertaining.

So what do you think about fictional-books-about-authors? And are there any good ones to recommend? Or bad ones to avoid? Need they be factual?

As EM Delafield wrote, in advice to anyone considering becoming an author:
1) You will, at some point, be expected to write something about the Brontes.
2) There is nothing new to say.

Adaptation

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Yesterday I watched Mrs. Miniver on DVD. Somewhere in the back of my mind I’d known that a successful film adaptation had been made, but that’s about the extent of my knowledge on the topic. Having read Jan Struther’s novel – more a series of vignettes – and loved it, I was intrigued by the prospect of a film version, especially since I’m discovering an affinity with older films. Harder to track down than older books, but worth the investigation.

So. Mrs. Miniver the book – many, very short snapshots of upper-middle-class domesticity in the late 1930s. Humour and kindliness soak through every page, real Salt of the Earth stuff, but vastly enjoyable too. Quite Diary of a Provincial Ladyesque, and if there’s anyone reading this blog who still hasn’t read DoaPL, then sign off straight away and get yourself to abebooks.com. Mrs. Miniver the film… same characters, more or less, but more German parachuters thrusting guns around. In fact, I couldn’t think of anything except the characters, and Mr. M’s new car, which was in the novel – what was a carefree picture of domestic life became a vehicle for war propaganda. That sounds like I hated the film, which is not the case at all – I thought it excellently acted, often emotional, and an amusing look at the way villages live. Yes, the world is at war, but that won’t stop the annual Flower and Produce Show from taking place. I attended one of these only the other day, in the village adjacent to my own in Somerset. In the film, the competition over roses was given almost equal weight as the war, and more than such trivialities as Dunkirk. And that must have been the way wartime was experienced by many people.

The most striking thing about Mrs. Miniver is that it was in cinemas in 1942. The outcome of the war was not known, was far from certain. In fact, many credit the film with helping convince the American public that becoming an Allied force was a good idea.

So, great good, great film. They just don’t have much in common. I’ve probably rambled about adaptation before, so I shan’t again, but I do think that I can best appreciate both book and adaptation when they are so disparate as to make comparison farcical. I threw in today’s sketch because it would be a perfect, controversy-free adaptation – after all, nobody’s read the book.