What Are We Reading? 3 May 2021

[giveusaclue]

Fuzzywuzz wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Due to the horrid cold and wet weather here this morning, I made a coffee and walnut cake. Sometimes I can be really stupid and not read all the details in the..."

It will grow again!

[Lljones]

SydneyH wrote: "AB76 wrote: "The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis"

Thanks, that was one of the two Machenbach mentioned (where is that scoundrel?)."

I have it on good authority that he will return...soon? eventually? Likely with some unlikely story about his absence.

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote(144): However the anti-semitic situation in France had been inflamed by the Deryfus affair and it will be interesting to compare the french interviewees with the German ones

The Dreyfus..."

i think any work like Bahr's is based on journalistic discussion and enquiry rather than academic scrutiny. It offers a flavour, a sort of stew of comments and ideas, that invites discussion and argument rather than a precise study. I would have loved to have read it in the 1890s as a contemporary study

The Dreyfus affair may have occurred in 1894 but the currents and tensions were there in the preceding decades, through the work of Drumont and others

[AB76]

Lljones wrote: "SydneyH wrote: "AB76 wrote: "The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis"

Thanks, that was one of the two Machenbach mentioned (where is that scoundrel?)."

I have it on good authority that he will retu..."

he has been missed!

[AB76]

One book i'm reading but i havent commented on much is Father and Son by Edmund Gosse

This short autobiography covers the childhood of the author and his relationship with his biologist father, who was a member of the Plymouth Brethren. His mother dies early on, father and son move to the Devon coast and Gosse describes childhood and the semi-puritan Brethren movement with skill and intelligence and a perceptive insight into childhood and how it forms people into later life.

Written in 1907, it has been highly acclaimed ever since and alongside its father and son elements, there is the descriptions of coastal Devon and the Brethren who worship at the local chapel.

Gosse wrote many other books and was a friend of Thomas Hardy, he did not follow his father into the Brethren in adult life.

[Georg]

AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote(144): However the anti-semitic situation in France had been inflamed by the Deryfus affair and it will be interesting to compare the french interviewees with the German one..."

The Dreyfus affair didn't "occur" in 1894. It started in 1894 and it formally ended in 1906. It's reverberations around the globe were unprecedented.

[AB76]

The wonderful Hermann Bahr is also leading me to other great german works of literature via the footnotes supplied by Rixforf Editions

The problem is some of these are POD editions and look a bit "iffy"

The atmosphere of Imperial Berlin is well created in his prose, especially with the political situation of the time, it ties in well with the Retallack book on Imperial Germany

I look foward to the French interviews and also the views of Balfour, Dilke and Healy. I must also explore writings on antisemitism in Belgium and Holland when i get time. (I have a novel by a Belgian Jewish author Ida Simons on the pile)

[AB76]

scarletnoir wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I'm a huge fan of Graham Greene , i do find his catholic musing very interesting, likewise with Waugh."

I've only read two Greenes - The Heart of the Matter and..."

A Burnt Out Case is on my pile, do you think its up there with his best novels Scarlet?

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regarding Peter Carey's Theft: A Love Story, now less than 40 pages to go and probably would have finished reading it earlier today, except for family "meetings". It has drawn me in very successfully, and I can only speculate about the end, for now. Probably melancholy (suitable to the novel's many thrills and "supreme heights", https://poets.org/poem/sonnet-reversed), but we will see.

@Tam/jediperson, not sure, but I think you might like the following quote by painter "Butcher" Bones, who almost never seems shy of offering his opinions:

"I sought out the pre-war loonies, the futurists, the vorticists of whom it can at least be said that they were kind enough to write more than they painted." (p. 261).

I am also intrigued by the detailed description of a (fictional) painting with a Golem (as you, taking a great interest in ekphrasis). Literary Golems featured in an earlier (e?)TL&S discussion, if I remember correctly...

Need to find out how to insert spoilers here next... Help, please?

Edit:
Hushpuppy: Really late writing this, sorry, but I very much hope you are feeling well again?

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote(144): However the anti-semitic situation in France had been inflamed by the Deryfus affair and it will be interesting to compare the french interviewees with t..."

The Dreyfus Affair is something i have always been fascinated by and its slow burning impact across decades, with the investigation into Dreyfus occurring in 1894

The french brand of antisemitism with a strong catholic theme was to become even more dangerous and disconcerting by the time of Vichy, with men like Xavier Vallet becoming "Commissioner-General for Jewish Questions" and the complicity of the regime in the deportations to the east

[Lljones]

Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Need to find out how to insert spoilers here next... Help, please?..."

Type < spoiler > at the beginning of the text you want to hide and < /spoiler > at the end. (Remove the spaces between the carets).

[AB76]

if anyone hasnt seen this, i recommend watching this 25 min vid about a female resistant in Nazi occupied france and her trip to Nordhausen where her brother died

https://aeon.co/videos/a-french-resis...

[AB76]

The girl who smiled at Auschwitz, a france 24 article on a young french prisoner and her smile when being photographed as she entered the camp. I had never seen this image before...


https://webdoc.france24.com/smile-aus...

[Lljones]

Happy Mother's day to all who mother!

[AB76]

Lljones wrote: "Happy Mother's day to all who mother!"

i actually visited my mother today(though mothers day is march in the UK), was nice to see her. Its been a year of sporadic or no visits but my parents have been ok through the pandemic and are "double jabbed" now. they are only a few miles away but during the worst of the lockdowns, there was no physical contact.

Mum was delighted i got my hair cut.....she wasnt keen on my covid locks.....

[Tam]

Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regarding Peter Carey's [book:Theft:..."

I have little time for the Vorticists, especially Wyndham Lewis. I have some sympathy with his enemies, not that I would ever do something like that, but they got so annoyed by him that they hung him upside down from a lamp post, around the time that he set up his 'alternative' art school... by his shoe laces I think!...

I quite like some of the 'Camden group' of around that time but really I prefer the likes of Paul Nash. I read at least one copy of 'BLAST', and it wasn't 'a blast' to me. A lot of their paintings were destroyed rather than the fact that they were 'too busy' to paint much... so the quote is a little misleading, though quite funny...

[MK]

Phew! I have finished listening to , all 35 parts of it. I now hope that C J Sansom is in recovery mode and is writing the next Shardlake historical mystery.

In the meantime I was late starting my monthly allotment of venturing into 1144 with Cadfael. (During our stay-at-home time, I manage to complete acquisition of Ellis Peters' series. To try to make sure I didn't run out before the pandemic ended, I rationed myself to reading one each month. (Also good because I find I lose out when bingeing on a series.))

I am so enjoying . I think it is by far the best one yet. Ellis Peters was certainly a devious and resourceful writer.

[AB76]

Tam wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regarding [author:P..."

i'm intrigued by Lewis and love Paul Nash and also Nevinson.

I read "The Revenge of Love" by Lewis and enjoyed it

[Tam]

AB76 wrote: "Tam wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regardi..."

Nevinson is an excellent painter. I went to see the art held in the Imperial War Museum, quite a few years ago (surely its days are numbered as to going under that title?) and saw what I thought would be a huge painting by him of a WW-I scene, from the amount of atmospheric detail in it, but in reality it is tiny!... The amount of sexism, of that group, and those times, is quite shocking, at least to women like me, so there is a lot that is rather hard to appreciate...

[Lass]

Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regarding Peter Carey's [book:Theft:..."

Re the Dreyfus affair, I can recommend Michael Rosen’s “ The Disappearance of Emile Zola. Love, Literature and The Dreyfus Case” about his subsequent life in Upper Norwood.

[giveusaclue]

MK wrote: "Phew! I have finished listening to , all 35 parts of it. I now hope that C J Sansom is in recovery mode and is writing the next Shardlake historical mystery.

In the me..."

Tombland was the only one of the series that I couldn't finish. Left thinking editing out of about 300 pages would have improved things!

You may like these:

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/k/be...

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/p/s-...

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/m/ed...

[AB76]

Lass wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Lljones wrote # 152: "I have it on good authority that he will return...soon?"
That would be great, thanks! Missing his contributions here, too.

Regarding [author:P..."

thanks lass, Zola was a key part of defending Dreyfus with his pen in J'Accuse and that sounds a very interesting book...

[SydneyH]

AB76 wrote: "A Burnt Out Case is on my pile, do you think its up there with his best novels Scarlet?"

I enjoyed A Burnt Out Case. @LL recommended it to me back when I was looking for novels set in tropical locations.

[Tam]

SydneyH wrote: "AB76 wrote: "A Burnt Out Case is on my pile, do you think its up there with his best novels Scarlet?"

I enjoyed A Burnt Out Case. @LL recommended it to me back when I was looking for novels set in..."

I second a recommendation for 'A burnt out case'. It is an interesting examination as to what kind of undercurrents of motivation can actually be underpinning the trajectory of what an individual might choose to do, and also why, and under what conditions, they might actually decide to do it... or not...

[Lljones]

SydneyH wrote: "I enjoyed A Burnt Out Case. @LL recommended it to me back when I was looking for novels set in tropical locations..."

Ha! I remember those days when you were building that reading list - seems like 20 years ago! Did I ever convince you to try Ann Patchett's State of Wonder?

[scarletnoir]

Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Philippe Delerm's
The Small Pleasures Of Life
was enjoyable to the very last chapter. ...Many thanks to AuroraBorealis, who I am not sure is reading here, for the recommendation."

I was not aware that the original recommendation came from AB - I must get around to that one in the next few months. Thanks.

Not read Carey... perhaps I should give him a try, too.

[scarletnoir]

Lass wrote: "Re-“The Diggers”, sadly, I believe it has yet to re-open...

I see that you must be our Scottish (Edinburgh based?) expert! I was fascinated on my first visit to see the (to me) unusual method of serving the beer under mains water pressure, but according to Wikipedia "Water pumps, powered by mains water pressure, were the traditional means of dispensing draught beer in Scotland but this method is discontinued."

Can this be true? A crying shame, if so.

[scarletnoir]

Lljones wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I'm a huge fan of Graham Greene , i do find his catholic musing very interesting, likewise with Waugh."

I've only read two Greenes - The Heart of the Matter and..."

Like yourself, I have read very many Greenes (possibly all the novels), and enjoyed most of them... as for screenplays, I'd guess his best known is for the magnificent and highly rated "The Third Man", starring Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten... and who can ever forget that zither music, once heard?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thi...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oEsW...

[scarletnoir]

Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Gravediggers is a great name for a pub, I'm guessing a bit of a joke given the antics of Burke and Hare."

I once saw a production of Dylan Thomas's play The Doctor and the Devils at the Edinburgh festival (circa 1963) and enjoyed its black humour... it was apparently turned into an unsuccessful film, where judging from the reviews the humour was left out!

(As Lass has explained, the pub's nickname comes from its position opposite a cemetery - presumably, it was a watering hole for those 'diggers'.)

[scarletnoir]

Lljones wrote: "MK wrote: "And then there is this - http://www.prestonsingletary.com/blog..."

Stunning. I'll have to try and visit before I leave Seattle."

That is a beautiful crow 'sculpture' - I guess that the design is based on native American designs from the north-west, as it closely resembles the red/black crow designs on sweat shirts we bought on a visit to Vancouver...

(Apologies to all for posting so many consecutive comments... my brain is at its best early morning, and deteriorates throughout the day - a bit like life, really!)

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote: "A Burnt Out Case is on my pile, do you think its up there with his best novels Scarlet?"

It lives in my memory as being in the top 3 of his books, IMO - of course, I read it in the 1960s, and so I can't say with any certainty if my assessment would be the same if I re-read it today!

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote: "The girl who smiled at Auschwitz, a france 24 article on a young french prisoner and her smile when being photographed as she entered the camp. I had never seen this image before...


https://webdo..."

Thanks for that - my wife is from Brittany, and so we know the area very well...

[scarletnoir]

Lljones wrote: "Happy Mother's day to all who mother!"

It's interesting that Mother's day is on different dates in different countries... the UK and France, for example.
(My own mother will soon be 99, with any luck, and still lives on her own, but I provide some daily support...)

[Cabbie]

scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Slawkenbergius wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I'm a huge fan of Graham Greene , i do find his catholic musing very interesting, likewise with Waugh."

I've only read two Greenes - The Heart o..."

Greene is one of my all time favourites. I discovered him as a teenager, when one of his short stories was in a collection I had to study: The Destroyers had a profound effect. I read many of his books in my late teens to early 20s and at the time enjoyed most the ones that seemed to pit Catholicism against Communism: Monsignor Quixote, The Power and the Glory. Recently I've started to read them all again, in chronological order, and have discovered the earlier ones written in the 1930s. It was particularly interesting to read his travelogue of Mexico The Lawless Roads followed by the book it inspired, The Power and the Glory - you could clearly see the influences of what had been a horrendous journey.

[SydneyH]

Lljones wrote: "Did I ever convince you to try Ann Patchett's State of Wonder?"

State of Wonder is still on my list of longer titles, and the length is probably what has prevented me from getting to it (as with Denis Johnson's Tree of Smoke and a couple of others). Technically, I'm still looking for books set in jungles and tropical islands.

[SydneyH]

Lljones wrote: "Did I ever convince you to try Ann Patchett's State of Wonder?"

On second thoughts, that isn't so long after all. I might pick it up sometime soon, it could be what I need right now.

[AB76]

thanks for the A Burnt Out Case", recommendations peeps, i will make that my next Greene i think

[AB76]

scarletnoir wrote: "AB76 wrote: "The girl who smiled at Auschwitz, a france 24 article on a young french prisoner and her smile when being photographed as she entered the camp. I had never seen this image before...


..."

the bravery of that girl at 17, smiling in the face of horror, the attachment to the Lorraine cross and her refusal to quietly accept the occupation....

[Lass]

scarletnoir wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Philippe Delerm's
The Small Pleasures Of Life
was enjoyable to the very last chapter. ...."

I should check about “The Diggers”. I could be wrong, it may have re-opened. I made the assumption that the recent closures may have “Done for it”. Hope not. As you gather….I don’t get out much!

[Lass]

giveusaclue wrote: "MK wrote: "Phew! I have finished listening to , all 35 parts of it. I now hope that C J Sansom is in recovery mode and is writing the next Shardlake historical mystery...."

@Ab76. I had a vague knowledge about the Dreyfus affair, but my interest was kindled when I read the Zola chapter in Graham Robb’s excellent Parisians. Robert Harris’s An Officer and a Spy followed that a few years later. Then I had the pleasure of seeing Michael Rosen at the Ed Bookfest where he spoke about the case, and his book. It’s interesting where the reading pathways reading can lead.

[AB76]

Lass wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "MK wrote: "Phew! I have finished listening to , all 35 parts of it. I now hope that C J Sansom is in recovery mode and is writing the next Shardlake..."

thanks lass and i agree, so many topics i have been interested in can lead me into new books, authors and opinions

The Dreyfus affair was a tragedy, for a modern but troubled French state, still smarting from the defeats of 1870-71 .The French birth rate was significantly lower than Imperial Germany in that 1870-1900 era, leaving what had been the most populous nation in western Europe stagnating for a long time. (France didnt recover demographically until the post-WW2 period)

Dreyfus was a scapegoat in anti-Semitic circles amid the anti-German mood of resentment over the lost regions (Alsace-Lorraine). Dreyfus was born in Mulhausen, Alsace, which the Germans had occupied after the Franco Prussian War of 1870-71

[AB76]

Part of my background reading on French Algeria is the entire census of 1954, completed just before the war began

In french(no translation), it is a very detailed and comprehensive study of the last year of peace in "Algerie Francaise"......

[MK]

giveusaclue wrote: "MK wrote: "Phew! I have finished listening to , all 35 parts of it. I now hope that C J Sansom is in recovery mode and is writing the next Shardlake historical mystery...."

Thanks, I think I have the first of the Edward Marston books sitting in a booksellers basket waiting for a sale. (I don't buy from Amazon if I can avoid it.)

I know that Tombland is awfully long, but it must have been difficult to be historically accurate and not be. Of course the fact that Norwich is one of my 'must' visits when I come to England has absolutely nothing to do with it.😉

And good news - I have just put a library hold on the first Crowner John book.

Oh dear, I am in trouble! I just counted the audio books I have downloaded from the library - 20! We won't even talk about the book books I have on my shelves from two different library systems. It's a curse.