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What Are We Reading? 8 February 2021
scarletnoir wrote: "Andy wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "I Am an Island by Tamsin CalidasThis was a really enoyable and completely compelling read that I can only add to the many a..."
great song!
Veufveuve wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Veufveuve wrote: "@AB76, have you read "A Grief Observed"?As to Ditlevsen, I'm waiting for the bookshops to reopen so I can buy Vol.3."
you dont wanna order it?"
No, I can wait. I ..."
its almost exactly a year since i read "Childhood", so looking foward to "Youth". i have never read a series right through in one go which was why i avoided buying the penguin triology edition, it would tempt me to read 2 and 3 together
not sure why FSG are now publishing the seperate paperbacks rather than penguin or maybe i picked up the US edition from amazon
I could almost smell the heat and scent of the Punjab as i read Khushwants Singh's novel "I Shall not hear the nightingale"(1959), the style is interesting, mixing cultural observations with the impact of WW2 on IndiaSher Singh, the main character, is a revolutionary, son of the local magistrate but filled with self doubt and anxiety over his role in the movement. Flitting from pride in speaking before a vast crowd of sikhs , to fear of his demanding wife in the marital bed.....set in Amritsar in 1942-3, i'm 60 pages in and loving it
I’m very pleased at last to have finished La Vie mode d'emploi by Georges Perec. But it’s taken me an awful long time. 660 small print Livre de Poche pages of ‘story’, 50 pages of index, 7 pages of chronology from 1833 to 1975 and an index of 107 stories contained within the book. I’m sure there are more than 107 in fact, but I’m not going back to count them.I started and stopped halfway through a year ago so restarted it again. I zoomed through to the point where I stopped before then it’s taken me weeks to get to the end. Why? It starts as quite a good idea – the history of the occupants of a Paris apartment block built in the 1870s. So far so good – Zola did something similar with Pot Bouille – but as you can see from 50 pages of index there are an awful lot of occupants taking over from one another and remodelling the interior (I actually printed off from the internet a plan of the inside with various names and chapter references, although there is one in the book, but it was easier to have it to hand).
But Perec doesn’t make it an easy read. He dots around in space and time so you have to keep reminding yourself who he’s talking about – you may have last read about them hundreds of pages back. He really loves describing interiors in GREAT detail. There might be twelve pictures on a wall so we get detailed descriptions of each of them. He just loves lists. There are chapters devoted to the stairways and lists of lost property found there over the years. There are lists of the contents of several owners’ ‘caves’.
Then there are the histories of the owners. Some of these (far too few) are interesting and touching and occasionally funny. Others are boring. A lot have little human interest. And running through it is the fantastic (fantasy that is) story of the life-long obsession of one of the occupants with making jigsaw puzzles, and what he then does with them.
I deliberately did no research on the book before I read it, though it was on my list as a ‘must read’ of 20th century literature. It’s an interesting and clever idea, and thank goodness I've finished it.
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When I Am Playing with My Cat, How Do I Know That She Is Not Playing with Me?: Montaigne and Being in Touch with Life
FrancesBurgundy wrote: "I’m very pleased at last to have finished La Vie mode d'emploi by Georges Perec. But it’s taken me an awful long time. 660 small print Livre de Poche pages of ‘story’, 50 pages of ind..."I enjoyed Perecs brief "An attempt at exhausting a place in paris" a few years back and i have my eye on "Ellis Island" which has just been re-published,
Machenbach wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Can't happen if the book is The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress, that's for sure. 😉"I've almost finished The Dressmaker which, like most Bainbridge book..."
Also hello to BMac, who I see is braving Poetry of the 'Nineties - the stench of rotting orchids must be overwhelming.
reply | flag *
Hi Machenbach, good to see you're one of the regulars that made it over to the ErsatzTLS. I've been reading Poetry of the 'Nineties off and on, in between other books, over the last several months. The last section was "The Hound of Heaven" and other religious poems, so not so much of the rotting orchids. But the next is entitled "Love and Death", which sounds more promising, at least from that perspective.
FrancesBurgundy wrote: "I’m very pleased at last to have finished La Vie mode d'emploi by Georges Perec. But it’s taken me an awful long time. 660 small print Livre de Poche pages of ‘story’, 50 pages of ind...And running through it is the fantastic (fantasy that is) story of the life-long obsession of one of the occupants with making jigsaw puzzles, and what he then does with them."
I thnk that is the key to the whole book: the "jigsaw puzzle" is not only a metaphor for Perec's novel and for art in general, but even for life itself, in the sense that "the meaning of life" is something we must construct for ourselves (or have constructed for us), as empty and arbitrary as that may seem, accustomed as we are to thinking of meaning as something transcendental.
Or so it seemed to me when I read the book a few years ago.
CCCubbon wrote: "Past Nobel winners. Can you really dismiss them all?I tried to pick out one or two from a decade as an example.
Rudyard Kipling 1907
WB Yeats 1923
GB Shaw 1925
John Galsworthy 1932
Pearl Buck 193..."
Let's put it like this: I have either read or seen performances of works by 14 out of these 20 writers.
I have enjoyed reading/viewing, or been made to think, by 5 of them. The other 9 either left me indifferent, or I actively disliked.
That seems about par for the Nobel course, probably. The Booker scores about the same - or worse!
Ok, so now I also finished the Chemistry book. Non-fiction, but not a "serious" book - more for friends of science than scientists.If I can compare Nguyen Kim's book with Bryson (not fair to both, one I read in German, the other in English, one deals with a theme she studied and became a doctor in, the other goes beyond what the author knew and he did some serious research to come up with it, one is only under 300 pages, the other over 500) despite its length I wished Bryson had written even more.
Why don't I ask for more from Nguyen Kim's book - she never promised a complete work, I am far more happy with her dealing only with a few aspects of Chemistry in our day to day lives. And she will write more books. Bryson has retired.
The body is entertaining, but I miss a little depth. I like the way Bryson writes - always have liked it. (Well, I did not read all of his books).
I also like the way Nguyen Kim writes - it is very much like her in her youtube channel, with the added charm that those complex chemical formulars are not lost in the next frame ... I want to read more of her, too.
My chemistry lessons at school were few and are entirely forgotten (2 years 78 to 80), so I am quite happy that this book re-acquaints me with this subject. It is NOT a school book on chemistry and reading this will not suddenly make me understand chemistry.
And The body? Well, my interest in medical and anatomical facts predates my chemistry interests, so I already knew quite a few of the facts (and some I learned from a French cartoon series, which I watched in translation: Il était une fois… la Vie "Es war einmal .. das Leben" or "Once upon a Time ... Life" also known as Micro Patrol) - but I certainly did not come out dumber out of this book.
All in all both books were time quite well spent. Which book to read next? Maybe something shorter? I still have two short Japanese novels lying around ...
Berkley wrote: "I thnk that is the key to the whole book: the "jigsaw puzzle" is not only a metaphor for Perec's novel and for art in general, but even for life itself, ..."I'm sure you're right and that did occur to me while reading it. And reading up about the book afterwards I see that all the moves between apartments are 'knight moves', which needless to say I didn't notice.
But clever as it may be I didn't feel much empathy with any of the characters (apart from Cyrille Altamont). Funnily enough (?) my post-reading researches brought up the fact that Bartlebooth's name was derived from Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener (which I'd wondered about) and Valery Larbaud's A. O. Barnabooth: His Diary. Now I haven't read the Barnabooth but I have read another Larbaud - Fermina Márquez.
And talking about names, I was amused by the names of other English characters (Bartlebooth is English) such as Lady Forthright, Lord Ashtray .... They sounded so right but so wrong!
FrancesBurgundy wrote: "I’m very pleased at last to have finished La Vie mode d'emploi by Georges Perec....It’s an interesting and clever idea, and thank goodness I've finished it.Haha! I do like your honesty. Somehow, I doubt that this book - even given my extreme Francophilia - will make an early appearance on my doorstep!
Lljones wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "Beryl won't let me down. No way. Nuh-uh. Can't happen...."Can't happen if the book is The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress, that's for sure. 😉"
Now, if it had been "The Girl in the Polka-Dot Bikini", you might have got my attention!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICkWj...
Bill wrote: "Wondering, too, whether the anti-Nobel sentiment extends to the work of laureate Bob Dylan."Yes, as far as I am concerned.
Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of commitment to and I'm very happy with this outcome.
Veufveuve wrote: "Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of com..."Hell yes you're allowed to brag. That's phenomenal news, congratulations!
Veufveuve wrote: "Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of com..."Great news Veuf, academic arm is just as big an accomplishment!
The Council of Egypt by Leonardo SciasciaThis is a novella, just over 130 pages (in my German translation), set in Palermo in the 1780s.
It starts with an Arabian manuscript that had gathered dust in the library of a monastery...
It tells the story of Giuseppe Vella, a lowly chaplain of the Maltese order, who supports his meagre income listening to peoples dreams and translating them into numbers to enter into the lottery.
It tells the story of a bold, cunning forger whose imagination knows no bounds. A man with foresight, a man who, as it turns out, never loses control, Giuseppe Vella. A man who grabs the opportunity offered to him by fate, or chance, to forge his own destiny.
(according to Sciascias German translator, Arianna Giachi, almost everything in the book, all persons, all events are historically authentic. Sciascia didn't even change the names of the main protagonists)
But there is much more to it than the "action": history, past and present, the old order of a quasi-feudal society, power and politics, revolutionary ideas....
If there were a contest how much you can pack into such a short book I think this would stand a good chance to be among the winners.
And it is well written. Some passages, towards the end, are very moving. When you are close to tears after the hero of the subplot has been sentenced to death you get this (I paraphrase):
'Don Francesco Barlotta. the Duke of San Giuseppe, expected him already to comfort him in his last hours. And he was the right man for it, because after 24 hours in his company you'd even view death as a welcome salvation'
I've hardly ever used the "look inside" function on amazon. You'll find an introduction and the first 3 chapters to read there:
The Council of Egypt
The Green Man by Kingsley Amis
It’s difficult to read this without Maurice Allington, the incompetent landlord of The Green Man, conjuring up images of Basil Fawlty.
It’s a rare thing, a ghost story disguised as a bawdy comedy.
The Green Man was reputedly haunted, many years ago. Something Allington taunts his guests with, as he initially dismisses his strange visions, at first at night, and then in the daylight also. It is only when his father dies after a fright, and the visions increase, that he starts to investigate the possibilities that some sort of dark magic is haunting his pub.
The fun is largely at the unreliable narrator’s (Maurice) expense. He makes a ridiculous attempt to get his friend’s wife into bed with him and his wife, but the women, happy to play along, know him too well.
Slapstick humour, a quirky old inn, a cat called Victor Hugo, ghosts causing mayhem; all blend together for a very satisfying concoction.
Congratulations, Veufveuve. In an epic mood, I tried to come up with an Aenid parody, “Academic arms and the man I sing …”, and something about exile from Penn’s Woods and conquering a Danish realm, but the muse (even such a low-rent one as I’m generally allowed) and I seem not on speaking terms at present.
Veufveuve wrote: "Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of com..."I've put my 'non-native-English-speaker' hat on and under its tutelage I feel confident to issue my verdict:
this is not a brag, it is an achievement!
Congratulations!
Veufveuve wrote (#131): "Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph)."Wonderful news Vv, bloody well done! Keep us posted on its progress.
Unrelated, but how's your wife feeling like now? Hope things have settled a bit. (Did you follow who I am btw - I've changed name and avatar recently?)
Machenbach wrote (#140): "I just found out that one of my dog walkers is a published novelist"Ah! Do they read their novel to the dogs? I hadn't looked at their instagram for a while, and omg, that pic of Iggy and Lola is just everything. That sheer happiness!🤗
Andy wrote: "The Green Man by Kingsley AmisIt’s difficult to read this without Maurice Allington, the incompetent landlord of The Green Man, conjuri..."
i still havent read anything by Kingsley Amis, which means he must be the only 1950s major english author i havent read. Not sure why as his novels are all very appealing from 1950s till his death
As a rebellious teen i was put off him by the veneration he was afforded in the early 1990s. I tend to like my authors a bit maligned and misunderstood.....
AB76 wrote (#144): " I tend to like my authors a bit maligned and misunderstood....."Well, luckily for you, that's exactly what he is now! (Maligned, that is, not sure about misunderstood.)
Machenbach wrote(139)."Every book should start like that."
Couldn't agree more.
Provided that all then come up with a story to match Sciascia's.
Veufveuve wrote: "Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of com..."Congratulations vv, very well done. I've only ever seen short articles of mine in print... though they gave he a slight frisson of pride, I have never felt the heft of a whole, self-generated, book...
Hushpuppy wrote: "AB76 wrote (#144): " I tend to like my authors a bit maligned and misunderstood....."Well, luckily for you, that's exactly what he is now! (Maligned, that is, not sure about misunderstood.)"
yes, good point. i dont think any authors can surivive the "maligned" label anymore, if they were beloved for 200 years, the woke brigade gets them
i guess a few authors deserved to be maligned from early on, Herr Hitler for example but "Mein Kampf" must have had some critical praise before WW2, i must research its reception before it became a "must have" aka a "You must have" in german households from 1933-1945
Veufveuve – Fantastic. With news like that you shouldn’t leave it at a little modest bragging. You are entitled to boast, vaunt, swagger and be altogether prideful.
@ VeufveuveFor quotes - begin <> with an i between then at the end the same but with /i between.
Max (Outrage) wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker [51]wrote: Maybe it comes a s no surprise that many people are enormously fond of the books they first learnt reading with. So, do you remember the reading primers you had..."
Haha, we are the same age and I too can remember Janet and John and also Peter and Jane. Wow, that brings back memories of holding a piece of folded tissue paper (dark red I think) under each line to help keep my place. Then, of course, I moved on to Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books
Veufveuve wrote: "I've just been offered a book contract"Wonderful! Congratulations.
Veufveuve wrote: Am I allowed a brag? I've just been offered a book contract - by Bloomsbury no less (albeit, the academic arm, and an edited volume rather than a monograph). It's a project that I feel a lot of commitment to and I'm very happy with this outcome."Brilliant news Veufveuve - you just have to deliver now, no pressure 😀
AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i hope mentioning henry james didnt start all this for you? like mentioning "the scottish play" for thesps"Ha, no, it predates that. In fact, I have b..."
I tend not to report on here about ‘stinkers’, just occasionally.
They’re on my GR page. If they’re that bad I won’t write any review either.. unless they have offended me.
But still, not many.
My average score for a review is quite high also. I think that’s because of all my years as a teacher. As a GCSE assessor we were always told that a very good school pupil was worth 100%, excellent above that. So give more 100%s.
It won’t surprise you that, for example, Tom, has an average well below me.
scarletnoir wrote: "Andy wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "I Am an Island by Tamsin CalidasThis was a really enoyable and completely compelling read that I can only add to the many a..."
I think it undoubtedly is, but hadn’t realised. Thanks for pointing that out.
Initially I thought it was a poor title, but on finishing the book, it works well.
AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "The Green Man by Kingsley AmisIt’s difficult to read this without Maurice Allington, the incompetent landlord of The Green..."
This is a nice easy read if you ever need that...
Georg wrote: "The Council of Egypt by Leonardo SciasciaThis is a novella, just over 130 pages (in my German translation), set in Palermo in the 1780s.
It starts with an Arabian manuscript that had gathered du..."
Thanks for this Georg. I’ll go for it. Not long finished To Each His Own, which was okay, nothing special. This sounds more interesting.
Veufveuve wrote: "Am I allowed a brag? "Congratulations! Well done!
giveusaclue {152} Then, of course, I moved on to Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books
Of course! So did I - and I'd completely forgotten! And you've shocked me into remembering other story books before that - Orange book, Green Book? I have the titles wrong , but I can remember some of the stories. They weren't very good, but the Famous Five and Secret Seven were.
Then Biggles and then Science Fiction and up, up and away!
Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "yes, good point. i dont think any authors can surivive the "maligned" label anymore, if they were beloved for 200 years, the woke brigade gets them"The paradox of blokes like Amis (a..."
good points
i need to explore some Pym, i have noticed positive reviews in here....you have reminded me....
Andy wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i hope mentioning henry james didnt start all this for you? like mentioning "the scottish play" for thesps"Ha, no, it predates that. In f..."
i agree, i tend to let the stinkers sink without trace rather than lambast them too much but since i've been on TLS and Ersatz TLs (Summr 2018), i've mercifully been spared the stinkers..
i still havent got into the GoodReads reviews, i tend to just rate and save, its nice to look back on what you have read in a grid of nice shiny covers but i havent abandoned my trusty old spreadsheets quite yet!
Andy wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Andy wrote: "The Green Man by Kingsley AmisIt’s difficult to read this without Maurice Allington, the incompetent landlord..."
i will make a note of that, i must read an Amis Snr soon....
Max (Outrage) wrote: "giveusaclue {152} Then, of course, I moved on to Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books
Of course! So did I - and I'd completely forgotten! And you've shocked me into remembering other ..."
Biggles, Algie and Ginger!! I progressed onto them (despite being female) but never got into science fiction.
After a bit of hesitation, finishing Monteverdi and the End of the Renaissance and enjoying it a great deal, I decided to read Monteverdi’s older contemporary and occasional source of texts for musical setting, Torquato Tasso, in two different translations Jerusalem Delivered and The Liberation of Jerusalem.
Machenbach wrote (#165): "I also recall Milly Molly Mandy, Orlando the Marmalade Cat and a few others. I never really liked Blyton though, so the next step I can recall is Richard Scarry's books and Le Petit Nicolas, then the Biggles books."Nice incursion of a French book series! For me it was also peppered with Anglo-Saxon books: Oui-oui (Noddy), a fair amount of Alphonse Daudet and Comtesse de Segur, then mainly the Alice (Nancy Drew), and less successfully Le club des 5 (Famous Five). The Nancy Drew reminds me of a conversation on TLS a few of us had on the subject of Carolyn Keene.
Machenbach wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Max (Outrage) wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker [51]wrote: Maybe it comes a s no surprise that many people are enormously fond of the books they first learnt reading with. So, d..."
Milly Molly Mandy lived in a cottage with gingham curtains in her bedroom, if I remember, and I always wanted a bedroom just like hers.
Machenbach wrote (#171): "Hushpuppy wrote: "Nice incursion of a French book series!"I should clarify that it was in translation."
Oh yes, that much was obvious! For me too, the English-language books were all in French of course. Edit: As for Daudet, I think I've read Les lettres de mon moulin, Les contes du lundi, Le petit chose and Tartarin de Tarascon. Not that I remember any of it, mind! Henry James, eh? Proves I know nothing of the man, apart from the sole book I've read of him (Turn of the Screw).
(#169): "Actually I think the love is a little lopsided as other videos seem to show her jumping at Iggy's face a lot, which he doesn't like."
Darn, are you telling me that a still picture can lie?
The problem with being a biggish dog is that the smaller dogs always wanna leap on your face for some reason."
Or else: 1, 2, 3!!!
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This was a really enoyable and completely compelling read that I can only add to the many accolades it h..."
Is the title a reference to the Paul Simon song, which ends:
"I am a rock. I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain.
And an island never cries."?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKlSV...