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What Are We Reading? 23 Nov 2020
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Alwynne wrote: "REVIEW: 
The Sunlight Pilgrims Jenni Fagan
The world’s on the brink of something devastating possibly the dawning of a new ice age. Some..."
I’m with you. Enjoyed it, but not hugely.
The future it was set in is November 2020... spooky.. (published 2016)
If anyone’s keen for a Scottish Dystopian recommendation I’d shout for The Last of Us by Rob Ewing, also from 2016, on a remote island a pandemic has wiped out all adults, just the children remain, and they expect to be also doomed at puberty..
Its good fun.
Andy wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "REVIEW: The Sunlight Pilgrims Jenni Fagan
The world’s on the brink of something devastating possibly the dawning of a n..."
I seem to remember I picked up the Sunlight Pilgrims from the NTB longlist, maybe it was even shortlisted??
Mod
"
Nope, not NTB, but it was shortlisted on RSL Encore 2017.
Alwynne wrote: "AB76 (359)wrote: "Will begin reading some MR James today and this quote from a collection of essays by him at the end of the OUP edition is very much in tune with my thinking on literature:“…retic..."
Just read "Canon Alberic" and "The Mezzotint" and i agree about his mixing in his interests and studies, something i thought might bore me when i explored him a decade ago on a tv show
I also am in victorian-edwardian love in right now, occasional visits to the era and to find the novels and short stories that avoid the over hype but tell of the calm of suburbia mixed with a disquiet (Machen, De La Mare, Conan Doyle, James)
Alwynne wrote: "AB76 (397) wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "AB76 (359)wrote: "Will begin reading some MR James today and this quote from a collection of essays by him at the end of the OUP edition is very much in tune with..."MR James himelf thought very highly of Le Fanu, i think i read some Le Fanu about a decade ago but he is very much of the same time and genre
i have a long Benson gothic detective novel lined up "The Luck of the Vails" for sometime in the future.
Gladarvor (364) wrote: "@Reen and @Alwynne. Following your comments and the interview with Magnus Carlsen (https://www.theguardian.com/sport/mag...), I've watched the whole of The Queen's Gambit last weekend and o..."Good morning from the far side of the world! I've also been watching The Queen's Gambit and greatly enjoying it - still got a couple of episodes to go. The frock consciousness is off the scale, but so is everything else; acting, writing, directing. Perhaps because it is fiction I find myself preferring it to The Crown where one starts worrying about historical accuracy (though Victoria is worse).
Apparently Beth is loosely based on Bobby Fischer, who was brilliant but very strange.
Magrat wrote (#400): "I've also been watching The Queen's Gambit and greatly enjoying it - still got a couple of episodes to go. The frock consciousness is off the scale [in The Queen's Gambit], but so is everything else"& Alwynne wrote (#395): "Glad you liked it agree about the dress, and the scene where she's wearing a patterned dress against clashing wallpaper really stood out."
Good night @Magrat from this side of the world. You still have the last two episodes to go (lucky you), and you think the frock consciousness is off the scale? Prepare to implode! (Despite the absolutely amazing cast, I don't really have any intention of watching The Crown, including for the reasons of accuracy you mention...).
*Spoiler frock alert below* @Magrat in particular, I'd recommend not reading on, and not clicking on any of the two links I give below until you're done with the series. Not only does it list some of the dresses to come, but in what situation they play a role.
@Alwynne: the two dresses in Paris are actually heavily inspired by Pierre Cardin (all handmade by the team of the costume designer, Gabriele Binder). I thought I could also detect some Courrèges's influence and bingo, some of the standout outfits for me are reproductions of his tops and dresses. THE coat, the one she wears when she arrives in Russia, is actually a vintage Courrèges when he designed what we'd now call a capsule collection for an American brand called Samuel Robert (me neither).
And now, for the link, I've found a virtual exhibition, a collaboration between Netflix and the Brooklyn Museum, with the details of 14 of the outfits on The Queen's Gambit (The Crown is available too). If you click on this link https://www.thequeenandthecrown.com/d..., and go top right to the two horizontal lines, you can flick through the 14 options. Also this informative article in Vogue (love, love, love the top when she's on the phone). https://www.vogue.co.uk/arts-and-life...
And how could I forget her (Bulova) watch? I have terrible watch envy when I see hers.
“De l’Amour” – Stendhal sets out here his theory of the several stages of love and the two moments of “cristallisation”. Entertaining stories and musings fill nearly 500 pages in this Folio edition – the geography of love (Germany, Arabia, the USA, etc), the sweetness of life in 12th century Provence, pride in women, courage in women, and so on. Indispensable to read first the short Introduction which recounts Stendhal's unfructuous passion for Mme Dembowski, who eventually tells him to get lost. The supposed origin of the famous theory is given in a lively 12-page fragment, “Le Rameau de Salzburg”. A branch left in the waters of the salt mine and drawn out a month later is entirely encrusted with salt crystals. You see the sparkling diamonds and think not at all of the plain twig beneath.
PaleFires wrote: "Revolting piece in the NYT today, front page, Editor's Picks, which I have no idea how to link to my comment. I'm sure this isn't breaking news for many of us here, as it was for me.'Pedophile S..."
i had actually never head of this guy but the fact he he was written about his paedo activities and remains unconvicted is incredible, he clearly has no comprehension of his deviance and his crimes
PaleFires (406) wrote: "Revolting piece in the NYT today, front page, Editor's Picks, which I have no idea how to link to my comment. I'm sure this isn't breaking news for many of us here, as it was for me.'Pedophile S..."
So, surprise surprise, the powerful stick together and both promote and protect their own! Like we haven't already seen this in churches and governments. Painful consequences, like taxes, are for the little people.
PaleFires wrote: "Yeah, for sure, Justine, similar to the grimy business between Savile and the BBC. I particularly liked the contempt expressed for the putative 'purity' of the US! Delusional on so many levels."Or Savile and a certain female Prime Minister - who insisted on his receiving a knighthood against the warnings of those who'd vetted him...
The Ministry Of The FutureAurora
I am about to embark on reading Kim Stanley Robinsons book ‘The Ministry of the Future’, but this is really a review of an earlier book of his, ‘Aurora’. I very much enjoyed his ‘Mars’ trilogy, from many years ago. ‘Red Mars’, ‘Green Mars’ and ‘Blue Mars’, but have not got on with his other books that I have tried. “The Years of Rice and Salt’ remains unfinished. Perhaps he is too much of a ‘geologist’ for me. It seems that what happens to the physical planet over millennia has more on impact on his psyche then what happens to the humans upon it. I have trouble in investing emotionally into that kind of scale of ‘mattering’.
But to return to ‘Aurora’. A spaceship sets off, from an over-crowded and over-polluted Earth with the hope of finding a new and healthier planet to colonise, to save a small proportion of the human race. There are a tiny few of suitable identified planets. He describes the ship quite well, the living cosmos of a tiny habitable planet/spaceship in travelling space/time. It is many years-worth of living, and he does a pretty good job of describing the nature of the ship and the problems of living in a very constrained environment. But there is a weakness here in the plot, I fail to feel emotionally engaged in the characters that he is portraying over years-worth of ‘telling’. However, I have got to be quite fond of the ships computer who is co-ordinating it all. They reach a suitable planet and start to colonise the surface. It’s not much of a planet, it is pretty cold, with little in the way of weather but a great deal of water. I imagined a sort of permanent winter off the highlands of Scotland for everyone, and forever. Still its habitable. They are cautious so only a small proportion of the ship’s community are allowed down onto the surface, whilst the habitable superstructure is being built.
Alas an incident occurs where some of the crew fall into a muddy edge to the sea. In the process they stir up a long buried lethal pathogen. They are rescued but, the pathogen quickly begins to cause the death of all of those currently on the planet surface. One manages to escape from the planets surface in a tiny transporter ship, however there is a long debate, even though he has no symptoms of illness, as to whether he should be allowed back onto the mother ship. I am loath to go much further here, as to the plot, as I don’t want to spoil the book for future possible readers, but there are many trials still to come but finishing the book made me feel quite disconsolate, and I wondered whether it was Kim Stanley Robinsons intent, in writing the book, to somehow imply that rather than looking for an escape from the problems that humans have actually themselves caused, on their own ‘home’ planet, we should be putting all of our effort into solving those problems… “right here… right now”…, whilst we still can…
By the end of the book I was even fonder of the ships computer than I had been at the beginning. But that might say something more about me, than the actual book. It has interesting debates to be mulled over. I’m hoping for the same at least with The Ministry of the Future’. On past analysis of his writing I think this might be his version of what we can do to survive, if we stay put here, down on our own ‘Earth’ rather than jumping ship, and hoping for something better, elsewhere…
Hi, I haven't gone away, I just hate to navigate Goodreads on my phone and have not much time at home, lately that I do not spend on my cat, sleeping, chores ... and a few bits and bobs (or however that saying goes). I have read a few pages on in that 1938 novel I told you all about, about a young surveyor searching for the real Danube source. But the style is hard to stand ... not Nazi-kind of style then I'd just throw the book away. No, more very old-fashioned. It reads as if it was written some 40 years earlier ...
And since Christmas is coming I put my nose in recipe-collections online or offline to find cookies which are spectacular in taste with next to no effort and only the usual ingredients, you know, eggs, butter, sugar and if they are fancy nuts and spices ... Yes, I am completely aware that I am trying to square a circle there.
FranHunny (416) wrote: "Hi, I haven't gone away, I just hate to navigate Goodreads on my phone and have not much time at home, lately that I do not spend on my cat, sleeping, chores ... and a few bits and bobs (or however..."Hi there, Fran - I was about to send out a search party! I've decided that the best way to get used to Goodreads is just to keep using it. It will never work like the original TL&S, but I've learned that it is possible to read, follow, or skip over conversations as one is inclined. So please do keep taking part - and that goes for all the rest of you hiding in the bushes there! It's still a joy talking about books and chatting with one another.
PaleFires wrote: "Yikes, I had no idea he'd been knighted!"Savile was a feature of my childhood and i liked him as a kid, cos he seemed so zany and off the wall, i remember the "age of the train" adverts where he wore a suit and had short hair and he looked more normal than the tracksuits and a mullet look
little did i know he had access to every room in a hospital, spent hours in the morgue and had rings with the eyeballs of the dead in the middle. he really was a grotesque little man
Magrat wrote: "Bobby Fischer, who was brilliant but very strange"Indeed. He had of course psychological issues; the relationship with his mother was never simple (single parent, absorbed by her university studies and political activities), he was mostly left to himself, and that's why he became obsessed with chess. After reaching the top of chess stardom, and gradually enclosing himself in a world dominated by conspiracy theories and 'fake news', he turned into a rabid anti-Semite denying his own Jewish ancestry. There's a remarkable documentary about his life and career. His games are still the stuff of legend among devoted chess aficionados.
Two things I've come across this week that might be of interest:- I was exploring that amazing archive http://www.archive-arn.fr/ of rural and 'forgotten' France (prompted by this Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddes...). If you click in particular on the label 'pigeonniers' under AGRICULTURE, for those who have read Vargas's latest (Quand sort la recluse/This Poison Will Remain), you'll be able to imagine where the recluse was living...
- Galley Beggar have attempted to recreate the chili from the recipe in Ducks, Newburyport. Here it is, including a cameo by Sam's dog! https://twitter.com/GalleyBeggars/sta...
PaleFires (413) wrote: "Yikes, I had no idea he'd been knighted!"Yes, apparently Margaret Thatcher had been trying for years to make him a 'Sir' but the vetting committees kept saying 'no no no'. Finally, for her last honours list, she put her foot down. This may be why the Tories have made less fuss than they might have done about the BBC's handling of Savile.
Slawkenbergius wrote: "There's a remarkable documentary about [Bobby Fischer's] life and career. His games are still the stuff of legend among devoted chess aficionados."Fab, thanks a mil for the link V!
Justine wrote: "PaleFires (413) wrote: "Yikes, I had no idea he'd been knighted!"Yes, apparently Margaret Thatcher had been trying for years to make him a 'Sir' but the vetting committees kept saying 'no no no'...."
it beggars belief the number of crimes Savile committed...
Alwynne wrote: "Andy (387) wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "REVIEW: The Sunlight Pilgrims Jenni Fagan
The world’s on the brink of something devastating possibly..."
Thanks - it was on my extremely long tbr list - moved up a tier (in a good way..)
Alwynne wrote: "I hope it's more easily digestible than the book [Ducks, Newburyport], although if someone ever puts out an edition omitting 'the fact that' I may try again!"Oh, I should have said: I have not read it (yet). But I know some people here liked it very much, and some are still in the middle of reading it... From what I can hear, you may eventually get into the rhythm of her soliloquy and it then clicks and just flows, including 'the fact that'.
A trend I didn't see coming: two homes on my daily walk are displaying Yuletide Narwhals.
Hilary Mantel, Fludd. Fetherhoughton is a village on the North of England moors, a grim little place in the 1950s, whose incurious inhabitants, mainly Irish immigrants or their descendants, work in local factories and have no interest in or care for the surrounding landscape or larger world. They are, moreover, very scathing and unforgiving about any aberration, deviation, eccentricity or piece of originality, [and] so thoroughly against pretension that [they] also discriminated against ambition, even against literacy.
But there are certainly eccentrics among them, notably Father Angwin, pastor of St Thomas Aquinas church, where most villagers are parishioners. Usually inebriated, he believes he understands these people’s limitations and superstitions, and has judged ‘it dangerous to disabuse his flock of the notion that the Bible was a Protestant book.’ But along comes the Bishop, a man of modernizing – ?Protestantizing – ideas, and orders the removal of most of the statues from the church. He doesn’t understand the primitive – or, let’s be frank, pagan – local beliefs and instincts, far more powerful than any rationalism. Nevertheless, the statues are duly buried. And then Father Fludd appears in the night. Who or what is he? A curate sent by the Bishop to spy on the pastor? A ghost? A devil? An angel? An occultist? An imposter?
Hilary Mantel mixes just enough realism and light into the madness to assure that this concoction of the gothic, the comic and the send-up of a certain type of Catholicism provides a good story, well told. She shows a particular gift for mixing sacred and profane in her similes: Father Angwin becomes mesmerized by the church sanctuary lamp ‘winking redly at him like an alcoholic uncle’. Or there’s this scene in a Manchester hotel:
The foyer had a marmoreal chill. Behind a mahogany desk, curiously carved, proportioned like an altar, stood a sallow-faced personage, with the bloodless lips and sunken cheeks of a Vatican City intriguer; and he proffered them a great volume, like a chained Bible […] and then smiled a thin, wintry smile, like a martyr whose hangman has cracked a joke.
What with, additionally, the monstrous Mother Perpetua, the dutiful spinster Agnes Dempsey, the ambiguous tobacconist Mr McEvoy, and the desperate young Sister Philomena (naïve but intelligent), Fludd gives pleasure on many levels and, despite its dark, damp corners and anterooms, ultimately cheers and refreshes.
WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 consensus on welfare and public spending into the Thatcherite neo-liberal rule of the private sector and the individual.
However its never as clear cut as memory makes it, Thatcher remarks that a possible October 1978 election would have been "too early" for the Tories, while Labour cabinet members were aghast that PM James Callaghan hadnt called that election, as they felt they would have narrowly won
The unions are waiting for a large pay review and Callaghan is determined not to cave, he has steered Labour slightly to the right and has been cutting public sector spending for the last 18 months
Beyond the frontline of politics, many right-wing pressure groups and think-tanks are devising strategies for Tory campaigning, behind them are shadowy forces of the military right.
The saddest thing about 1978-79(which i am personally too young to remember) was that things were looking ok for sensible, pragmatic Jim Callaghan and Labour, the uneasy days of 1976-77 and the IMF loan issue had faded
Since 1979, its been 41 years of the neo-liberal "dream", in 1978, many might argue that James Callaghan had started the move from 1945-1975 politics, to the grimmer, more selfish future of Thatcher and the Tories..
My conclusion so far was that level of state spending from 1945-75 was vulnerable to the neo-liberal mantras, especially as old industries started to struggle with modernity, this doesnt mean neo-liberalism was right, it certainly wasnt but it tipped the dial....
PaleFires wrote: "Revolting piece in the NYT today, front page, Editor's Picks, which I have no idea how to link to my comment. I'm sure this isn't breaking news for many of us here, as it was for me."I have the paper edition, and I'll probably read the story later in the week; maybe I'll have comments at that time. For those interested here's a link to the story.. As far as I can see on Goodreads, no books by Gabriel Matzneff are available in English.
Alwynne wrote: "FranHunny (416) wrote: "Hi, I haven't gone away, I just hate to navigate Goodreads on my phone and have not much time at home, lately that I do not spend on my cat, sleeping, chores ... and a few b..."That recipe looks good, I have put on a word document and saved it in my evergrowing recipe folder.
Justine wrote: "Hilary Mantel, Fludd. Fetherhoughton is a village on the North of England moors, a grim little place in the 1950s, whose incurious inhabitants, mainly Irish immigrants or their descen..."You've sold it to me, thanks.
AB76 wrote: "WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 consensus on welfare ..."
I am old enough to remember the time. I think Callaghan's problem was that many folks were fed up of the unions bringing workers out on strike at the drop of a hat.
AB76 (434) wrote: "WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 consensus on welfare ..."
That was such an interesting period in the UK, and one I remember from the sharp observations of a newcomer trying to pick her way around the little landmines of a culture deceptively similar (on the surface) to her own. As I recall, unions were the constant rightwing bugbear that would be replaced, after the defeat of the miners in the mid-80s, by the EU. How many citizens today even know who the leaders of the main unions are? - but they were household names at the time. (As union leaders were a few decades earlier in the US.)
Justine wrote: "AB76 (434) wrote: "WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 co..."
I know the name of Len McCluskey who are reminds me of Shane McGowan of The Pogues I'm afraid. And the late Bob Crow of course.
PaleFires wrote: "Thanks for providing the link to the article, Bill. The grubby mess in French haute literary circles as well as the machinations of the Nobel lit committee shine a light on the greater transparency..."I just read the article. My favorite bit was:
Defenders of lifetime appointments argue that the holders develop expertise.
Christine Jordis, a longtime editor and professional reader at Gallimard and a Femina judge since 1996, rejected the suggestion that her work influenced her voting — saying instead that it gave her financial independence.
She dismissed critics of lifetime appointments, saying, “These are young people who believe in egalitarianism, who think anybody can read as well as anybody else.”
giveusaclue wrote: "AB76 wrote: "WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 consensu..."
the looming problem for the final 100 pages (i'm in Autumn 1978 right now), is exactly that, the meetings with the TUC are ahead and there is little chance they will listen to Callaghan, now the semi-pact labour governments had with the unions was over.
The author talked to an elderly Jack Jones,(the union "godfather" who favoured talk rather than action, a positive force), who retired in 1978 and Jones remarks that new faces were among the union top bods, who favoured action more than talk
Justine wrote: "AB76 (434) wrote: "WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT(Britain in the 1970s) by Andy Beckett is a superb study of nine years of turmoilTime and chance play their part in a slow transition from a post-WW2 co..."
I lament the passing of strong unions for the good they do but it did seem they had become rather too fixed on endless pay wrangling without perceiving how their various industries were fading. Jack Jones was the right kind of union leader, open to ideas and to discussion, when he retired in 1978, i think the unions lost their ace card.
Clearly Thatcher represented a growing swell of anti-union sentiment, fears of what happened in 1970-74 with the 3 day week and Ted Heath being too accomodating with the unions for the right wing tories. Without Jack Jones, it was confronation that won out.
Callaghan is much more of a character than they grey haired old man i would see in news reels, an intelligent, canny operator, watching him on an old youtube clip he is highly impressive but then any leader before 2007 looks good next to the modern dross of part-time politicians and ex-spads.
Gladarvor wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "I hope it's more easily digestible than the book [Ducks, Newburyport], although if someone ever puts out an edition omitting 'the fact that' I may try again!"Oh, I should have sai..."
It's OK once you realise 'the fact that' acts as punctuation. Mind you, I still have a long way to go...
Justine wrote: "Hilary Mantel, Fludd. Fetherhoughton is a village on the North of England moors, a grim little place in the 1950s, whose incurious inhabitants, mainly Irish immigrants or their descen..."Great review! One of the things I love about Mantel is her dark humour, present in every book to some degree, even the Wolf Hall saga, but front and centre in Beyond Black.
(to 446, Alwynne) Thatcher and the Sun:Yes, indeed. The Sun was for decades the largest selling newspaper in the world, with a strong working-class readership. It was also left-leaning until Murdoch bought it; then its politics shifted 180 degrees. Thatcher maintained very close ties with Murdoch; they worked together to sharpen and widen anti-union attitudes. I could say more, but it's late, and the issue was very complicated, as I saw myself from inside several different unions.
PaleFires (442) wrote: "Thanks for providing the link to the article, Bill... It makes me wonder what he had on Maggie." Have you seen the Louis Theroux docco in which he follows the creepy old monster around hoping for the mask to slip and it's like "I know that you know that I know"? Really weird stuff. Not being British I can't see what people saw in him in the first place. At least Rolf Harris's public persona was crunchy and wholesome.
Bill wrote: "A trend I didn't see coming: two homes on my daily walk are displaying Yuletide Narwhals."
That is magnificent.
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Kind of reminds me of
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Perhaps I had better not comment 🤣