What Are We Reading? 12 April 2021

[scarletnoir]

Reen wrote: "Anna Livia Plurabelle to give her her original name ... (is) now obliged to hold herself up in some kind of boat pose yoga move. She's lovely I think and deserves a better pitch...

Maybe - though I have to agree (in part, at least) with the author of the blog you linked to, who wrote: "I have never liked this sculpture and the poor lady looks very uncomfortable with no support for her back."

It does look very uncomfortable! I would not presume to comment on the sculpture without seeing it 'in the flesh' (if that makes any sense).
I'm not much for late Joyce (the early stuff was good), but the Silk Road cafe sounds excellent - I must give it a try, if we ever get through this COVID stuff in one piece.

Was Joyce a total arsehole, as proposed in this piece?https://lithub.com/james-joyce-genius...

If so - it would explain a lot!

[Bill]

scarletnoir wrote: "Was Joyce a total arsehole, as proposed in this piece?"

I pretty much make the assumption that all authors are total arseholes, although I am aware that there are occasional exceptions (I'd like to name one here, but none come to mind at the moment). This is one of several reasons that the NY Times' "By the Book" question, "You’re organizing a literary dinner party. Which three writers, dead or alive, do you invite?" seems misguided to me.

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote: "Vietnam is the topic of my latest modern novel, well written in 1975... Should be an intense read...

If you want an intense read about Vietnam, I'd recommend 'Dispatches' by Michael Herr - from the Amazon pages: "Michael Herr went to Vietnam as a war correspondent for Esquire. He returned to tell the real story in all its hallucinatory madness and brutality, cutting to the quick of the conflict and its seductive, devastating impact on a generation of young men. His unflinching account is haunting in its violence, but even more so in its honesty."

In other words - it's very much an impressionistic work, not a detached and cold-blooded look at events and participants... you either enter into Herr's world and description of it, or you won't get much from the book.

Otherwise, an even earlier look at Vietnam (or the moral problems which can arise from imperialism) arises in Graham Greene's superb The Quiet American.

[scarletnoir]

Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Was Joyce a total arsehole, as proposed in this piece?"

I pretty much make the assumption that all authors are total arseholes... This is one of several reasons that the NY Times' "By the Book" question, "You’re organizing a literary dinner party. Which three writers, dead or alive, do you invite?" seems misguided to me."

Indeed.

They'd do better to have a question about: "Which three authors would you make a point of NOT inviting?"

[Lljones]

Bill wrote: "I'd like to name one here, but none come to mind at the moment..."

You're such a curmudgeon, Bill. I can think of a bazillion authors who don't appear to be arseholes - listing three I happened to be thinking of earlier today: Michael Chabon, George Saunders, Ann Patchett.

Saw an interview of Blake Bailey (Philip Roth's biographer) this morning. Now he might qualify as an arsehole, albeit a complicated one.

[CCCubbon]

My second Pfizer jab didn’t like me much and laid me low for a while but it did mean that I finished The Absolute Book that you are probably tired of hearing about.
I don’t know who would enjoy it, many would relish the literary allusions, a quiz within a story, some would like the sheer other world fantasy, some the adventures, some a utopian dream ( myself I think humans would end up quarrelling with perfection) but I am glad that I read the book, probably will need to reread sometime to truly gather it all to me.
I revelled in the saltwater crocodile as you would expect!

[AB76]

scarletnoir wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Vietnam is the topic of my latest modern novel, well written in 1975... Should be an intense read...

If you want an intense read about Vietnam, I'd recommend 'Dispatches' by Michael H..."

have read both scarlet but thanks for the tips and the superb "Matterhorn" by Karl Marlantes. Vietnam has been an interest of mine all my life(the period from French Indochina to 1975)

Herr was probably the best writer on the sheer horror of it all, Greene captures the slow slide of the decaying French empire into the american attempts at halting the communist movements in the east. ofc the americans learnt next to nothing from the French loss to the Vietnamese in 1954..

[AB76]

CCCubbon wrote: "My second Pfizer jab didn’t like me much and laid me low for a while but it did mean that I finished The Absolute Book that you are probably tired of hearing about.
I don’t know who would enjoy it,..."

glad you are now protected CCC but a shame you had a bad reaction

[Bill]

Lljones wrote: "listing three I happened to be thinking of earlier today: Michael Chabon, George Saunders, Ann Patchett."

I know nothing about Patchett, except that she opened a bookstore (unless that was, in fact, another author), but I'd agree about Saunders and Chabon to the extent of what I know about them (and I had a brief internet exchange with the former). To be fair, I was trying to think of authors no longer among the living: it's often in the post-mortems that true colors are revealed, perhaps because at that point they are beyond exacting vengeance.

[Andy]

The Children of Dynmouth by William Trevor
Having worked with adolescents for more than 30 years it is fair to say that I've come across a few strange ones (just a few..). Such is the subject of Trevor's novel. I have always thought it difficult to write about that age group and portray it accurately, but Trevor does an excellent job here.
I prefer to see it as a sad story rather than one of horror, as I have seen it described. And as a splendidly accurate piece of historical fiction about the inhabitants of a small English seaside town.
The protagonist is 15 year old Timothy, more lonely than evil, at the local comprehensive, parentless in effect, with a seemingly predictable future at the town's sandpaper factory. But he dreams... of being a stand-up comedian and appearing on Opportunity Knocks with Hughie Green. He sees his chance for stardom initially at the town's Talent Show at the Easter Fete, performing an act based on the Brides in the Bath murders from 1915, which fascinates him, as do the town's funerals. He just needs a few props...
The wonder of this novel is that it broaches so many issues. What is to be done with Timothy, who ends up offending just about everyone in town? Trevor's slant is an optimistic one though, he sees a chance for redemption for the boy, and even a place in the community. And he probes deeper questions. In what may seem to outsiders an idyllic town, how could someone with Timothy's tragic background slip through the cracks. There is even an orphanage with perfectly happy children, that have in many cases been failed by parents, but it has missed Timothy, and the two 12 year old step-siblings home from their resepective private boarding schools for Easter holiday, also with absent parents, who Timothy tries in such a wrong way to befriend.
This is a sensitive and memorable novel of great compassion.

I was the same age as Timothy when this novel was published and indeed set, so the culture and habits of the day were thoroughly appreciated also.

[Bill]

Lljones wrote: "Saw an interview of Blake Bailey (Philip Roth's biographer) this morning. Now he might qualify as an arsehole, albeit a complicated one."

I’ve been reading all the reviews of the Roth biography and I’m probably getting enough of the guy through them that I won’t read the book – though I’m still curious about how Alfred Brendel came to know him. I’ll probably do an equivalent of a “Washington DC read” where I look up Brendel’s name in the index and stand in the bookstore or library and read the page(s) mentioning him (I’m assuming there won’t be that many).

[MK]

Paul wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Paul wrote: "AB76 wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "AB76 wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "AB76 wrote: "good news about second jab,looks like the under 40s may get a choice of jabs when the..."

2¢ here for the Pfizer team (and not just because that's what ended up in my arm)

https://www.reuters.com/article/healt...

Also about being open and accepting immigrants. Here in the States they often do those jobs we wouldn't touch. Without them we wouldn't have food on the table, etc.

[MK]

Pomfretian wrote: "Thanks MK for the info on the Cromer peregrines.

I've just had a search and there is a live webcam at www.cromerperegrineproject.co.uk"

Oh, dear. Would you like more links? Go to - https://hawkandowltrust.org/index.php

and check out the pull-down where you can see both the pair at Bath and Norwich (where I initially became hooked). Both are boringly quiet now, but the Trust says Norwich eggs should hatch the week of the 26th and Bath will follow later. That is where the fun (and addiction) really begins.

[Slawkenbergius]

Bill wrote: "Lljones wrote: "though I’m still curious about how Alfred Brendel came to know him. "

It was when Roth was living in England with Claire Bloom. He was friends with poet and critic Al Alvarez and through him met some of his neighbours, namely John Le Carré and Alfred Brendel.

[Tam]

scarletnoir wrote: "Reen wrote: "Anna Livia Plurabelle to give her her original name ... (is) now obliged to hold herself up in some kind of boat pose yoga move. She's lovely I think and deserves a better pitch...

M..."

Thanks for that Reen, I racked my brain, and I know that I saw the actual sculpture, but I could not call to mind what it actually looked like, other than being a bit 'mermaid' like, so to me it failed the 'test of time'. Still I think she will be happier in a nice park, and I agree that she looks very 'unsupported'!...

That picture of Oscar looks totally 'louche' which is possibly quite fitting in some ways, though personally I'm not a fan here either. Seems i'm quite hard to please, which is what him-indoors says quite often...

I do fancy afternoon tea, or a late lunch, in the 'silk' caff though and a peruse of the art exhibits nearby...

[Georg]

Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Was Joyce a total arsehole, as proposed in this piece?"

I pretty much make the assumption that all authors are total arseholes, although I am aware that there are occasional ex..."

An interesting view. The question is whether you can defend it when we leave the usual suspects/offenders out.

For starters I'd like to throw Jane Austen into the ring....

[Bill]

Slawkenbergius wrote: "It was when Roth was living in England with Claire Bloom. He was friends with poet and critic Al Alvarez and through him met some of his neighbours, namely John Le Carré and Alfred Brendel."

Thanks, that pretty much scratches that itch for me.

[Gpfr]

Georg
What about Unterleuten? Did you like it?

[Bill]

Georg wrote: "For starters I'd like to throw Jane Austen into the ring...."

My understanding is that Austen’s family burned most of her letters and censored others.

[giveusaclue]

Cabbie wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Rounders on steroids!..."

Oh, but rounders is so much more exciting, at least how we used to play it in Bolton."

Agreed, and it doesn't last as long. When I was a youngster we lived on a service road with a big area of grass between it and the main road, and we used to play rounders on there, it was in the 50s and there were a lot of us around (no pun intended) the same age.

[[deleted user]]

Paul wrote: "I finished up Pat Barker's Regeneration Trilogy with The Ghost Road, and it was just a phenomenal achievement ..."

I absolutely agree about Barker's brilliance, but I would also give a nod to the extraordinary real life figure of W.H.R. Rivers. An amazing life. And what Barker achieves there is to take the real life source and create a superb fictional narrative where you can't see the joins between the real and the invented.

[[deleted user]]

@Lass

I've been catching up on posts: damn right I disagree about Persuasion! I'll concede the 'autumnal tone' as described by one TLSer (don't know who) and some pleasing character studies, but that's as far as I'll go.

Edit: I forgot we could edit posts. I'll leave the original post as it stands, but just add that I didn't mean to bark at you about Persuasion out of the blue, Lass. In my head we were having the conversation already, which obviously wasn't much good in terms of what I actually wrote. Sorry.

[Fuzzywuzz]

scarletnoir wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: am I right in thinking that this is the one in which an artificially grown 'meat' called 'chicken little' is produced?"

Yep, that's the one. Took me some ..."

Ha, I'm showing my ignorance, yet again of terminology! Many years ago, there was a kids' film called 'Chicken Little' which I had watched many times with mini Fuzzywuzz when she was younger. Said chicken was named Chicken Little, well, because he was little and a chicken and predicted that 'The sky was falling'. I now appreciate the cleverness of the title. It was also very funny in places.

[Fuzzywuzz]

Fuzzywuzz wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: am I right in thinking that this is the one in which an artificially grown 'meat' called 'chicken little' is produced?"

Yep, that's th..."

Hmm, that last sentence should read 'The film was also funny in places'.

[Fuzzywuzz]

I'm delighted that it's Friday as this is my first full weekend off in 4 weeks. Not much reading done really due to lack of time and having the intellectual power of a banana.

In my part of the world, the shops are looking like they will re-open on the 30th April. I won't be joining in the tsunami of people initially, I'll maybe wait about a month or so. The only thing I really want to do is go to bookshops and cafes for coffee and reading time. I probably could do with some new clothes too, but that can wait.

I'm still reading Trunk Music by Michael Connelly. Hopefully I'll be onto something new before the end of the year...

[Georg]

Gpfr wrote: "Georg
What about Unterleuten? Did you like it?"

Yes I did. I thought the end was flawed big time, but altogether it was so good that that would not keep me from recommending it.
The way she handled the characters and the intertwined story of Kron and Gombrowski alone was outstanding imo.

[[deleted user]]

Anne wrote: " @Lass

I've been catching up on posts: damn right I disagree about Persuasion! ..."

Oops. I also meant to say, Hello Lass and how are you? It's been a long time since we last spoke.

[Georg]

Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "For starters I'd like to throw Jane Austen into the ring...."

My understanding is that Austen’s family burned most of her letters and censored others."

That is my understanding also. But that won't help your all-authors-are-arseholes-argument, will it?

And while I'm at it: the next author I'd like to throw into the ring would be Toni Morrison.

[Bill]

Georg wrote: "That is my understanding also. But that won't help your all-authors-are-arseholes-argument, will it?"

You think that they destroyed Jane's letters because she was just too kind and considerate in them, eh?

I won't go author-by-author with you; as I said, there are exceptions. I don't tend to find authors' lives particularly illuminating, so there are many about whose lives I know nothing and prefer it that way.

I've also made a claim back in the Guardian days that you may want to disagree with: An author whose life is more interesting than their work is a failed author.

[Bill]

Georg wrote: "the next author I'd like to throw into the ring would be Toni Morrison."

Most of my literary-biographical knowledge is about male authors and it seems possible and perhaps likely that the arsehole-to-mensch ratio is considerably higher among them. Compared with females, they are certainly socialized in ways that are less inhibiting to letting their arsehole flags fly.

[Georg]

Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "That is my understanding also. But that won't help your all-authors-are-arseholes-argument, will it?"

You think that they destroyed Jane's letters because she was just too kind and c..."

No , I don't hope so. Just the opposite, indeed. I hope they destroyed her letters because they thought she was too "un-womanly", too radical for her time, too abrasive.

And yes, my first thought when I read your post was about female authors. I would be able to get a veritable party together, not only three,
Notwithstanding that: there would also be men. Charles Dickens and Mark Twain, to name but two. Many authors are full of themselves, but that doesn't automatically make them arseholes in my book. Just flawed. As we all are, more or less. I am not in the casting-stones business. I draw my personal line however where really nasty pieces of work (imo) are concerned, like Hamsun or Handke. Notwithstanding how great they might be as authors.

[SydneyH]

AB76 wrote: "deployed to Vietnam (3,000 New Zealanders too) ... Not much is known in the UK of the aussie involvement."

Culturally, we followed America's response to the war. Many in the public opposed the war and returning soldiers didn't receive a very warm welcome. On the other hand, Australia probably had a better idea what it was in for, having engaged in jungle warfare (against the Japanese in WW2) and in guerrilla warfare campaigns previously. Australians had jungle warfare training before deployment (using our own jungles). One major difference in America's deployment was that their soldiers had a 'tour of duty', in which the soldiers would be moved from place to place, while Australia's tended to be established in a single location. One of the benefits of this was that they could possibly engage more with the local Vietnamese and get them on-side than their American peers.

[Lass]

Anne wrote: "Paul wrote: "I finished up Pat Barker's Regeneration Trilogy with The Ghost Road, and it was just a phenomenal achievement ..."

I absolutely agree about Barker's brilliance, but I would also give ..."

Anne, Thought the Persuasion reference would get a response! Good to see you. More tomorrow. Am not yet organised in navigating this site. More tomorrow.

[Bill]

The conversation about arsehole writers has got me to reflecting on my very limited experience of reading literary biography. I’ve actually read more memoirs than biographies. I should say that I almost always read reviews of new literary biographies, from which I generally glean more than enough information to satisfy my curiosity.

I feel some kind of apologia is needed for those I have read.

Biography:

• Charles Fort (my interest in the paranormal made me very interested in Fort).
• Alexander Wolcott (a personality more than a writer).
• Charles Schulz (well reviewed, and I liked the fact that it was illustrated with comic strips, but I wouldn’t recommend it).
• Anthony Burgess (a favorite writer I couldn’t get enough of).
• Philip K. Dick (reviews didn’t tell me nearly enough, so I had to read the book).
• John O’ Hara (hometown guy).
• Samuel Johnson (Boswell – its reputation as a literary classic)
• Arthur Conan Doyle (another favorite author).
• James Joyce (Ellmann – later on, I did not make it very far in his Wilde book; again a favorite author).
• Samuel Beckett (way back when I was in Book-of-the-Month club. I had read Waiting for Godot years before in high school, but since reading this biography have never read anything by Beckett)

Memoir or autobiography (a few more of these):

• Tom Grimes
• Jack London
• Bill Bryson
• Harvey Pekar
• Michael Dirda
• Robert Bloch
• Anthony Burgess
• Anthony Powell
• Fredric Pohl (I believe surnames of these last two have the same pronunciation)
• Mark Twain
• Anthony Trollope
• George Orwell

I note that coincidentally both lists have one SF writer and one writer of comics.

[Tam]

Georg wrote: "Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "That is my understanding also. But that won't help your all-authors-are-arseholes-argument, will it?"

You think that they destroyed Jane's letters because she was just t..."

Thought you might be interested in this Georg https://www.ekphrastic.net/ekphrastic... Though I have no idea what 'Ekphastic' means, but there are some very nice poems here seemingly linked to Franz Marc's 'blue' horses.

I have the book of the postcards that Marc sent to poet 'Prince Jusuf (Else Lasker-Schüler)... I must try and find it as its been a few years since I last noticed it!.... (sigh) Tam

[Bill]

Georg wrote: "I would be able to get a veritable party together, not only three,
Notwithstanding that: there would also be men. Charles Dickens and Mark Twain, to name but two. Many authors are full of themselves, but that doesn't automatically make them arseholes in my book."

Perhaps we have different standards for an arsehole designation – I picked up @scarletnoir’s term and ran with it though I didn’t have much of a problem with it; we have so many in the US it’s a generally applicable term, at least in its American incarnation. For instance, after spending some time at a gathering with someone who’s “full of himself” as you put it, on the way home I’d be very likely to turn to my wife and sigh, “What an asshole!” Not my idea of a desirable dinner companion; but then, if I could come up with three names, there’s no way they would possibly want to attend a party with me, so it’s better if they just write the books and I occasionally deign to read them.

As I’ve often said, my ideal for an author’s personal behavior is Thomas Pynchon, who writes terrific books and otherwise stays completely out of sight and largely incommunicado.

Leaving the a-hole epithet aside, if I turn to the Yiddish terms I used in my review of Michael Chabon (which @Lljones’ mention of him inspired me to look up), on the mensch vs. momzer scale, most authors, as with most people, probably tend to fall in between, but certainly it’s the momzers that leave the big impression behind them.

[Hushpuppy]

Bill wrote: "I’ve actually read more memoirs than biographies. "

Ok, hands up, I don't usually read non-fiction, and as such have only read the one biography of a writer I think (A Man of Parts, on H.G. Wells), so my record is as skewed as yours, but come on Swelter, of 22 (auto)biographies, not a single woman...?

[Hushpuppy]

Anne wrote: " @Lass

I've been catching up on posts: damn right I disagree about Persuasion! I'll concede the 'autumnal tone' as described by one TLSer (don't know who) and some pleasing character studies, but that's as far as I'll go."

Still hurts after all these years (well, ok, just about two)! (I still find it really hard to come across inter's name in previous threads and conversations...)

Oh, I've now found another, older post of yours... I do fall in that category, knowing nothing of Austen or what people of literary taste deem to be her best (I actually have to confess to never having even heard of Persuasion before coming to the UK), and that's still my favourite I think. I'm due a re-read of P&P so I'll test this soon enough!

[Tam]

Hushpuppy wrote: "Bill wrote: "I’ve actually read more memoirs than biographies. "

Ok, hands up, I don't usually read non-fiction, and as such have only read the one biography of a writer I think (A Man of Parts, o..."

Now, for the one biography that you have read, 'A Man of Parts' it is the only other one of the two biographies that I have ever read, and given up on. I couldn't take the personal assumptions that he was continually making about what, according to David Lodge, was going on in H G Wells mind. There is no way to tell what people, who have been long deceased, were thinking at the time. So many assumptions, way too far to my mind!... Shame, as I quite enjoyed most of his earlier books.

I agree its a bit suspect that Bill seems to think that women aren't that interesting to read about, so I will personally recommend to him, the only other biography that I have ever read, and finished, which is 'The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft' by Claire Tomalin, which I thoroughly enjoyed.... Who knows... maybe his wife does all the 'heavy lifting' of reading about 'women's lives'... just to get the 'hormones' balanced, a bit, around the household?

[Hushpuppy]

Tam wrote: "Still I think she will be happier in a nice park, and I agree that she looks very 'unsupported'!..."

Agree with you and scarlet, she [Anna Livia] looks terribly uncomfortable, like she's in the middle of doing some punishing gym exercise (her head seems to me also out of proportion....?). Anyway, I'm not sure Reen has mentioned the alternative name given to poor Molly as well; that'd be The Tart with The Cart.

[Bill]

I am reader who reads the endnotes, in the case in Robert Schumann: Herald of a "new Poetic Age". Doing so I learned how many times a week Robert and Clara had sex (I did not need to know that), but also came across this interesting pair of mutual impressions:

Schumann: Wagner possesses an enormous gift of gab, crammed full of overwhelming thoughts; one can’t listen to him for long.

Wagner: [Schumann is] a highly gifted musician, but an impossible human being. When I came to Dresden from Paris, I visited Schumann, told him of my Parisian experiences, spoke of the musical situation in France and Germany, and spoke of literature and politics – but he remained as good as silent for almost an hour. Certainly one can’t conduct a conversation alone! An impossible human being!

[Hushpuppy]

Tam wrote: " just to get the 'hormones' balanced, a bit, around the household?"

😊. And for the balance around (e)TLS, I suspect @(goodyorkshire)lass can come to the rescue!

(I actually didn't mind the poetic licence that Lodge took, but then again, perhaps this just gets to show that I have more taste for fiction than reality, in writing at least!)

[Bill]

Hushpuppy wrote: "of 22 (auto)biographies, not a single woman...?"

Since I included Michael Dirda's book, I probably should have included Maureen Corrigan's memoir Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading: Finding and Losing Myself in Books, but I didn't have that tagged as "biography" in Goodreads.

Most of those biographies were read years ago, at a time when I read very few women authors. For one woman I did read back then, Ivy Compton-Burnett, I also bought a biography - but, as with Ellmann's Oscar Wilde, I never got past scenes of youth and young adulthood. I still have the Compton-Burnett bio and it's one of a trio of unread literary biographies on my shelves, all of which are women: the others are Mary McCarthy and James Tiptree Jr.. Otherwise, I have generally avoided picking up works in the genre, so to tell the truth, I don't know if I will ever read those three.

I also have Alison Bechdel's memoir, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic.

[Bill]

Tam wrote: "its a bit suspect that Bill seems to think that women aren't that interesting to read about"

I recently read a review of Wollstonecraft: Philosophy, Passion, and Politics in NYRB, and that kind of article is about the level of literary biography I want to read. I think my time would be better spent reading her actual writings, as I suspect is true of just about any author.

The only lives I really want to read about at book length are those of composers and they are pretty much exclusively men, so sue me. Though I have and would read more about Cosima Wagner, Alma Mahler, and Clara Schumann, as well as female musical performers, though performers in general are a rather distant secondary interest after composers and their music.

[Lass]

I’m pretty sure I recently recommended Claire Tomalin’s “The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft”? An outstanding biography of this remarkable woman.

[AB76]

SydneyH wrote: "AB76 wrote: "deployed to Vietnam (3,000 New Zealanders too) ... Not much is known in the UK of the aussie involvement."

Culturally, we followed America's response to the war. Many in the public op..."

good point re the training in similar terrains and the experience of the WW2 battles in New Guinea and other Pacific locations

i worked with an aussie vietnam vet briefly long ago, he brought in colour photos from 1969-71, they were haunting. one was a young guy aged 19 heading out from Sydney, the last photo was him aged 22, a veteran and he looked older, tired and stunned...

[Georg]

Bill wrote(186): "Georg wrote: "I would be able to get a veritable party together, not only three,
Notwithstanding that: there would also be men. Charles Dickens and Mark Twain, to name but two. Many authors are ful..."

My problem wasn't the-a-word in the first place, it was the all [authors]-word.
So unlike you to make sweeping generalisations.

Personally I might call an arrogant puffed-up-like-a-bullfrog-by-his-success author an arse. But to really qualify for that epithet they need to be arses towards their nearest and dearest as well.

So no place at my table for Goethe or Thomas Mann. Not only because they fulfill the criteria, they would probably also bore me to death ;-)

Unlike you I find I am sometimes more intersted in the person of an author (or artist) than in their work (e.g. Robert Walser), and often equally interested (e.g. Dickens and Twain).

What I don't understand: why are you so interested in the lives of composers and so uninterested in the lives of writers? (thanks for your Wagner/Schumann vignette, btw, that made me smile).

And many thanks for the Chabon review link. Over the years I have all but given up on contemporary American writers, particularly the male, white, middle-aged, middle class ones (yes, I stand by my prejudices!)
But I will definitely give that a go. Not least for the Yiddish element.

[AB76]

The Hungry Grass by Richard Power must be one of the greatest lost Irish classics, written in 1969

I'm enveloped by the world of rural County Wicklow in the 1960s, the world of a dying parish priest and his complicated relationship with his family and his flock

Its early spring descriptions of cold winds but burning sun, as Father Conroy reviews aspects of his failed life as a man of the cloth. He visits eccentric parishioners (one who keeps a pet Ram in her kitchen, another who despite leaving school at 14 applies to a role as a professor at Nottingham University, asking Conroy for a reference)

Menace and charm and balanced with nostalgia, regret and humour, the farmers are the heart of his diocese, a hard drinking,godless lot, who run the place. Conroy remembers a lost brother, time spent in England, the activities of his aged Uncle in the Black and tan wars.

..his housekeeper reads Dostoyevsky by the stove and his fellow priests are below his intellectual level. All of them but his young curate, Farrell, who baulks at Conroys attitude towards the church

I am enjoying cross referencing the 1961 irish census of Wicklow with the novel. It seems the catholic priest graduation numbers were already falling from 1961, Wicklow was overwhelmingly Catholic with small pockets of high Protestant populations. (Greystones to this day is a protestant minority town).

[Georg]

Tam wrote(185): "Georg wrote: "Bill wrote: "Georg wrote: "That is my understanding also. But that won't help your all-authors-are-arseholes-argument, will it?"

You think that they destroyed Jane's letters because ..."

Thank you Tam. I really enjoyed that. Had to look up "ekphrastic", never heard that word before.

That was an interesting friendship between Marc and Lasker-Schüler. By all accounts she was somewhat highly-strung and maybe a bit overpowering.

I sometimes wonder what happened to the painting.

The poem by Ed Gold is, I think, heavily influenced by Derek Jarman's Chroma.

I'll watch out for your new version of your Marc article. Not sure how something very good could be bettered though :-)

[Reen]

Hushpuppy wrote: "Tam wrote: "Still I think she will be happier in a nice park, and I agree that she looks very 'unsupported'!..."

Agree with you and scarlet, she [Anna Livia] looks terribly uncomfortable, like she..."

I avoided mentioning Molly's other moniker out of delicacy, ha.

As per my boat pose comment, Anna Livia does appear quite uncomfortable but is propped up by a support that may not be visible in the photos above. Anyway, I'm pretty sure she can't feel the discomfort. As for her head being out of proportion, one can only assume that was the scultpor's intent and it seems fitting as she is meant to symbolise the River Liffey, which I'm sure you know.

Tam, I'm not a big fan of the Wilde statue either but it does capture his loucheness well.

And, Scarlet, although I didn't know him personally (!), I get that impression. I don't know if it was here or elsewhere I referred to his ambitions as a singer, which predated his writing. He had a good tenor voice by all accounts, being pipped at the post of an all-Ireland feis by Count John McCormack from whom he got singing lessons.

You might be amused by some of this...
http://peterchrisp.blogspot.com/2018/...