Ersatz TLS discussion
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Weekly TLS
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What are we reading? 3rd August 2021
Hushpuppy wrote: "The fact that, in Part II, the promiscuous behaviour of Antoinetta (or Bertha's, as it is alluded to in JE) is shown to be perhaps only the figment of (Rochester)'s imagination, fuelled by the envious gossips of the Cosway "cousin", and (Rochester)'s own progressive rejection of Antoinetta's sexual openness towards him, makes the narrative stronger in my view."I'm not sure what I think of the matter. In making the promiscuity purely a matter of suspicion based on unfounded accusations, Rhys renders (Rochester)'s behavior too irrational for me to accept on its own. I should say I have pretty much the same problem with Othello - his jump from suspicion to certainty never convinced me on the page or in the performances I've seen.
scarletnoir wrote: "Robert wrote: "Rendell's A Guilty Thing Surprised was a good book. My late wife was a fan of her Inspector Wexford books; she wrote psychological crime stories under both the Rendell and Vine names..."When I saw the Anglo-French movie "Swimming Pool" a few years ago, it struck me that this was a Rendell-type story. They're often told either from the viewpoint of the criminal, or someone emotionally close to the criminal.
Bill wrote: "I read Out of the Silent Planet this week, intrigued by Jake Morrissey’s description of the set-up. ...Speaking of missionaries converting the heathen, I was impressed that Lewis, in making his Mars a kind of unfallen world, was able to embody the evil and arrogance of colonization in his two human villains (there are no Martian villains) without at all having to deal with the closely related idea of missionaries and conversion, with which he would presumably be in sympathy: the Martians already subscribe to a universally accepted theology which maps unto the Christian worldview so closely as to make conversion superfluous."
And if I remember, the human villains were kind of secular humanists with a vengeance - they were all about the survival and expansion of the human race and other places, planets, and peoples were just there to be exploited in the pursuit of this glorious destiny.
I thought that was a bit disingenuous of Lewis: as if the dark side of western colonialism was never aided and abetted by the Christian "mission" to convert and "save" the indigenous peoples it encountered.
Berkley wrote: "And if I remember, the human villains were kind of secular humanists with a vengeance - they were all about the survival and expansion of the human race and other places, planets, and peoples were just there to be exploited in the pursuit of this glorious destiny."Lewis sort of divides the odious traits between the two characters: Weston, the scientist, expresses a single-minded pursuit of the survival and expansion of humankind at all costs while Devine, the financier, is interested only in exploiting natural resources, mainly Martian gold, and turning them into cash assets as quickly and easily as possible.
Bill wrote: "Lewis sort of divides the odious traits between the two characters: Weston, the scientist, expresses a single-minded pursuit of the survival and expansion of humankind at all costs while Devine, the financier, is interested only in exploiting natural resources, mainly Martian gold, and turning them into cash assets as quickly and easily as possible."Yeah, that's the thing: he seeks to associate rapacious capitalism and greed with science and secular humanism rather than with devout Christianity, completely standing historical reality on its head in order to serve his ideological agenda. To this end, he misrepresents science and humanism as a kind of misshapen religion itself, one that sets up Humanity as a false idol to be worshipped in the place of God.
Bill wrote: I'm not sure what I think of the matter. In making the promiscuity purely a matter of suspicion based on unfounded accusations, Rhys renders (Rochester)'s behavior too irrational for me to accept on its own. I should say I have pretty much the same problem with Othello - his jump from suspicion to certainty never convinced me on the page or in the performances I've seen.Morbid jealousy is also called "Othello Syndrome". At the extreme end of the spectrum it is a serious psychiatric disorder, evidenced by (paranoid) delusions, with a not inconsiderable risk of homicide.
Othello could be viewed as an early case study.
(Rochester) is almost certainly not on this spectrum, yet it is conceivable that he has a 'mild' form of morbid jealousy:
In cultures in which partners are treated as possessions, jealousy is often considered to be a normal part of sexual relationships and it may therefore be seen as an understandable (although undesirable) explanation for marital tension. Gender-role behaviour in which the male partner is dominant and the female submissive, in which there is a sense of sexual ownership, is generally tolerated. In highly conservative cultures, any evidence of autonomous or independent activity by a partner may be interpreted as evidence of infidelity and punished. Jealousy in this context may be used to justify violence towards a partner who is perceived as unfaithful.*
My interpretation was that (Rochester) wants to believe that Antoinette has had affairs because that allows him to despise her and then treat her accordingly.
*https://www.cambridge.org/core/journa...
I believe someone mentioned Anne Sebba’s Ethel Rosenberg biog? Looking forward to reading this. Her book about the lives of women in Paris during the 1940s, Les Parisiennes, is excellent. Will probably re-read at some point. Yeah, I know, repeating m’self.
Hushpuppy wrote: "Antoinetta is meant to be White Creole. "And so was Rhys herself; it's not so surprising she decided to explore the story from Bertha/Antoinette's point of view. And having to face the difficulties of a Caribbean woman settled in good ol' England.
What a stunner, eh?
Bill wrote: "MEPHISTOPHELES:
Mit vielen Namen glaubt man mich zu nennen--
Sind Briten hier? Sie reisen sonst so viel,
Schlachtfeldern nachzuspüren, Wasserfällen,
Gestürzten Mauern, klassisch dumpfen Stellen;
Das wäre hier für sie ein würdig Ziel.
Sie zeugten auch: Im alten Bühnenspiel
Sah man mich dort als old Iniquity.
Was this a German stereotype of the British?"
Ha, thanks for this Carl Spitzweg painting ("English(wo)men in the Campagna", c. 1835), which is exhibited in Alte Nationalgalerie Berlin. The tourists certainly don't look too interested...
https://smb.museum-digital.de/index.p...
Yep, this certainly was a stereotype: Well-moneyed, philistine English people touring the sights (as Mephistopheles says: "they travel a lot"), and seen, in their behaviour, as far different from the more cultured English cavaliers on tour. As Friedrich Theodor Vischer, author of a knowledgeable work on aesthetics, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedri..., in 1840, put it abrasively in a clunky rhyme in a private letter:
»Erträglich ist die Welt,
wo der Engländer nicht hinkommt mit seinem Geld«
(the world is bearable in these places which Englishmen, with all their money, can't reach)
Carl Spitzweg appears to have encountered "modern tourism", as the painting's description has it, in 1832 during a journey to Italy. Tourists always appear to be complaining about tourists - almost a timeless constant!
(All above info from text accompanying Spitzweg's painting.)
SPINX:
Wie kam man drauf? +
MEPHISTOPHELES:
Ich weiß es selbst nicht wie.
I like that, in this instance, Mephisto reveals himself as a traveller through time and places: He tells us that he played the vice figure (old iniquity) in older plays, and states that the English had witnessed this (at the time, of course).
My Faust commentary (by Albrecht Schöne), which I was curious enough to consult, indicates, as such plays featuring Old Iniquity, Nice Wanton, c. 1550 and King Darius, c. 1560.
Inspired by this, just looked through a volume of Goethe's drawings: Johann Wolfgang Goethe: Zeichnungen. No reading women (a couple are writing), nor reading men either, nor any English people (in fact, hardly any people except for single portraits of friends or lovers), but shadowy Walpurgisnights and various Harz impressions.
Sorry, about to be off, so just a brief comment on White Sargasso Sea. I reread it recently and I still think it is a very good novel, not least in its exoticism-revealing take on the sensuality of the landscape and of Antoinette herself: First alluring, then othered and crushed as far as possible. I also think it very plausible that Rochester, just because his wife obviously enjoys sex with him, thinks she can't control herself with others! In the logic of the narrative, it is he who demeans her by ascribing all sorts of behaviour to her. In order not to lose himself in these unfamiliar surroundings (these scenes where he himself is teetering as regards his sanity are rendered really well), he imposes his views on everything, not acknowledging that others might know better or might be better placed to judge.
Yes, Jane Eyre probably never reads the same afterwards for many, but I see WSS as a complementary story in its own right. Would recommend it as an example of intertextuality to anyone interested.
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "scarletnoir: I have started with Intrigue à Giverny, but I had to interrupt reading it on the train yesterday"To my surprise, I noticed in bed last night that my (French) wife was reading that book - I was not aware that she had bought it. So far, she rates it as OK but no more - she's not that impressed. We'll see if it improves (in her opinion)!
Bill wrote: "If a male writer's creation of a horrid and emotionally abusive female character (let's say Stoner's wife Edith) can justify claims of misogyny, why shouldn't the creation of a similarly cruel and abusive male character whose point of view is presented without the least hint of authorial sympathy give rise to suspicions of misandry?"I'm not going to argue the second half of this point, as I don't think the first half stands up.
As you know, I hate 'Stoner' with a passion - not the wife (who I feel is clearly portrayed as having mental health issues), but Stoner himself, for his weakness in failing to protect his daughter.
It's not a misogynist book, or portrayal: it portrays a sick woman, and a weak man.
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Sorry, about to be off, so just a brief comment on White Sargasso Sea. I reread it recently and I still think it is a very good novel, not least in its exoticism-revealing take on the sensuality of..."In a very roundabout way WSS reminded me of Klaus Theweleit's
A brilliant examination of how thoroughly screwed up many men 100+ years ago were about women and sex, one of the most thought provoking and influential books I read as a young feminist (though the second volume was a bit of a let down, tbh).
scarletnoir wrote: "It's not a misogynist book, or portrayal: it portrays a sick woman, and a weak man."Not only my take on it:
Charles J. Shields, who has also written biographies of Harper Lee and Kurt Vonnegut, has done a valorous job with Williams in The Man Who Wrote the Perfect Novel . But he cannot disguise what’s at the heart of Stoner and what seems to have been at the heart of its author: misogyny, and mediocrity. A recollection of Williams: “He was one of those who felt…that the world is closing in on them, with all these ‘women and minorities’…[taking] the place that they were raised to think is rightfully theirs.”
Georg wrote: "My interpretation was that (Rochester) wants to believe that Antoinette has had affairs because that allows him to despise her and then treat her accordingly."It's an awful long time since I read WSS, but this rings a bell - this was probably the way I read it, too. I do recall that my sympathies were entirely with Antoinette (despite being male...). I do lack context, though, having never read 'Jane Eyre'...
scarletnoir wrote: "I do recall that my sympathies were entirely with Antoinette"As the book is written, there is almost no way the reader can avoid this.
Slawkenbergius wrote: "Hushpuppy wrote: "Antoinetta is meant to be White Creole. "And so was Rhys herself; it's not so surprising she decided to explore the story from Bertha/Antoinette's point of view. And having to f..."
always found that photo very attractive, a beautiful woman
Lass wrote: "I believe someone mentioned Anne Sebba’s Ethel Rosenberg biog? Looking forward to reading this. Her book about the lives of women in Paris during the 1940s, Les Parisiennes, is excellent. Will prob..."Les Parisiennes is on my list...next after the Shah of Iran book possibly
scarletnoir wrote: "As you know, I hate 'Stoner' with a passion - not the wife (who I feel is clearly portrayed as having mental health issues), but Stoner himself, for his weakness in failing to protect his daughter."I find it interesting that, in your statements about Edith in Stoner, and @Georg’s about (Rochester) in Wide Sargasso Sea, you both treat them as autonomous beings, as if their actions and conditions are those of a real person, suggesting in both cases that for you the author’s presentation of them has achieved a level of verisimilitude that allows them to be considered in this way.
The problem for me with both these characters is that they never come close to achieving that kind of life: they remain exactly the sort of figure the author requires them to be to act as foils for the protagonist. I should note that I do think both Stoner and Antoinette achieve this level of autonomy to some degree: this is why I can feel sympathetic to the latter. In the case of Stoner, though, I think that the autonomy is almost involuntary on the part of the author; I think Williams wants Stoner to be sympathetic, but so closely identifies with his protagonist that he doesn’t realize that the character as shown is something of a shit, to say the least.
Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "I do recall that my sympathies were entirely with Antoinette"As the book is written, there is almost no way the reader can avoid this."
Indeed.
Bill wrote: "The problem for me with both these characters is that they never come close to achieving that kind of life: they remain exactly the sort of figure the author requires them to be to act as foils for the protagonist. I should note that I do think both Stoner and Antoinette achieve this level of autonomy to some degree: this is why I can feel sympathetic to the latter. In the case of Stoner, though, I think that the autonomy is almost involuntary on the part of the author; I think Williams wants Stoner to be sympathetic, but so closely identifies with his protagonist that he doesn’t realize that the character as shown is something of a shit, to say the least."I won't comment on Rochester in WSS as it's too long ago, and have only a vague memory of my reaction to the narrative...
As for 'Stoner', if as you say Williams intended him to be a sympathetic character, the full incompetence of his ability as a writer is summed up right there. He was a coward, and failed to protect his child. A thoroughly repulsive individual. The wife may have been less 'fleshed out', but none of the characters totally come to life as far as I can see. A book that deserves to be (re-) consigned to the dustbin of history.
Bill wrote: "...he cannot disguise what’s at the heart of Stoner and what seems to have been at the heart of its author: misogyny, and mediocrity."I would not doubt that Williams was a mediocrity, and am happy concede that he was a misogynist. The book, though, doesn't focus on that aspect (IMO), though it certainly demonstrates Stoner's mediocrity in spades. Are we to assume that the character was Williams's 'alter ego'? It sounds like it, from what you say.
I'm just surprised that anyone saw this as a book worth 'rescuing'.
AB76 wrote: "MK wrote: "Yesterday I checked out the annual August book sale at a neighborhood church. I managed to find 6 paperbacks including the second Tony Hillerman - Jim Chee mystery, [book:A Thief of Time..."I wish. The closest thrift store to me is in an old, large, drug store chain. It's not a place that comes close to a 'high street'. I've not been successful there and parking is at a premium.
Back when one could cross oceans, I liked to walk down village/small town high streets, stop in at the British Heart shop or the 'Save the animals' shop, walk to the back and check out the small book selection.
My equivalent here used to be 'Friends of the Library' as some have a little shelving set aside just inside the library (and will put out everything they get which I prefer) and periodic book sales which I hope to see again one day.
Unfortunately, I found during my tenure as a volunteer at Seattle Public Library that most items over 5 years old had to be pretty special to avoid being tossed in the 11¢ per pound bin that goes to resellers like thrift books and better world books.
Unlike everyone else, I like old stuff!
As 'reading' is one of the subjects on which this group comments in all its variations, I thought that a few passages from Tu montreras ma tête au peuple might be of interest.Each chapter of the book deals with one individual guillotined during the French Revolution; one victim was the brilliant scientist Antoine Lavoisier - clearly an avid reader, if the book is to be believed:
Car depuis on lui avait ôté sa liberté, le plus grand esprit français du siècle dernier passait son temps à lire, et semblait résigné à continuer ainsi jusqu'à ce qu'on lui ôtât la vie...
Alors que croyez-vous qu'il fît sur la sinistre charrette? Le plus souvent, les condamnés criaient, pleuraient, priaient, haranguaient le peuple ou le maudissaient. Le plus grand esprit français du siècle dernier ? Il lisait...
Devant l'échafaud, le plus grand esprit français du siècle dernier continua a lire jusqu'à ce que son nom fût appelé. Alors, il sortit de sa poche une signet, le plaça à la page où il avait arrêté sa lecture et, sans prononcer une seule parole, posa sa tête sur le billot.
Voilà, Monsieur, comment on meurt avec élégance.
(For since they had removed his liberty, the greatest French mind of the last century spent his time reading, and appeared resigned to continue thus until they removed his life...
So what do you think he did on the sinister tumbrel? Most often, the condemned cried, wept, prayed, harangued the people or cursed them. The greatest French mind of the last century? He read...
Before the scaffold, the greatest French mind of the last century continued to read until his name was called. Then, he took a bookmark from his pocket, placed it at the page where he had stopped reading and, without a word, placed his head on the block.
That, Sir, is how you die with elegance.) - My loose translation.
Those who have not studied science may find his contribution interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antoine...
The brilliant mathematician Lagrange commented as follows: Lavoisier's importance to science was expressed by Lagrange who lamented the beheading by saying: "Il ne leur a fallu qu'un moment pour faire tomber cette tête, et cent années peut-être ne suffiront pas pour en reproduire une semblable." ("It took them only an instant to cut off this head, and one hundred years might not suffice to reproduce its like.") - Wikipedia
(This chapter meant more to me than the previous one on the politician Danton, though I wondered why the author missed the chance to use this effectively repeated and chilling phrase from the end of that section as his title: "Clic! Clack! Boum!")
MK wrote: "AB76 wrote: "MK wrote: "Yesterday I checked out the annual August book sale at a neighborhood church. I managed to find 6 paperbacks including the second Tony Hillerman - Jim Chee mystery, [book:A ..."i hope you get to cross oceans soon MK and immerse yourself in high street and heart shops!
my local oxfam has two branches since 2018, one for general stuff, the other is a dedicated and almost waterstones size second hand bookshop with an LP section too. Its brilliant
The Fall of Heaven: The Pahlavis and the Final Days of Imperial Iran is a dizzying and intricate study of the last years of the Pahlavi dynasty in Iran.Like my favourite history books, it is impossible to read quickly, it deserves study, reflection and constant referring to the internet to seek out characters long lost in the sands of time, from the remarkable era of Imperial Iran.
I'm in the gruelling last 100 pages now, where 1978 is forensically analysed, with the riots and unrest from the followers of the deeply cynical, janus-faced Ayatollah Khomeini and the weak, dithering of the Carter administration in the face of weekly insurrection.
I wasnt aware of how many times the Shah was offered chances to eliminate Khomeini but turned them all down. In 1963, he had a chance to bump him off or imprison him but declined, in 1978 firstly Grand Ayatollah Shariatmadari(a moderate marja) offered to declare a fatwa against Khomeini, again the shah declined and then later in 1978 Saddan Hussein offered to bump Khomeini off(Khomeini was in exile in Iraq ), again the Shah declined.
For me the Shah seems to have been surrounded by a klepto cabinet of shady fools on the make, a fairly loyal and competent army and a moderate Shia clerical support base but in 1978 his weak and careless mismanagement of all three sections of his entourage led to continous problems and bad decisions.
Elements of the bureaucracy seemed to compete for favour with the leader ike the Nazi era Germans did. Messages of sensible analysis were quietly parked so as not to favour a Prime Minister or Defence Minister, decisions were delayed and then not re-visited. What a mess.....
scarletnoir wrote: "I'm just surprised that anyone saw this as a book worth 'rescuing'."It's generally thought that the French had something to do with it.
But whatever the reason for its initially subdued reception, Stoner has certainly hit a vein now. Its resuscitation began in earnest in 2006 when the New York Review of Books (NYRB) bought the US rights to the novel, which had been languishing for nearly fifty years. Although reissued in the UK by Random House’s Vintage Classics in 2003, it was the NYRB Classics edition that saw the novel attract high-profile endorsements like those from Ellis, McEwan and Hanks.I know that booksellers do recommend the novel, and, in fact, most readers do like it, and a sizeable number are fairly extreme in their praise of it.
But it was when bestselling French novelist Anna Gavalda translated it into French in 2012 that Europe began to go crazy for Stoner . The European marketing for Stoner was overseen by Oscar van Gelderen at Lebowski Publishers, whose inventive approach to the marketing of the book has a lot to do with its sudden success there. Knowing it would be a challenge to make a novel by a relatively unknown mid-century author a bestseller in 2013, especially with no author to help promote it, Gelderen had to eschew traditional marketing strategies. Determined to push the readership for Stoner beyond the existing market for ‘classics’, Gelderen avoided the term. Instead, he turned to social media to start a conversation about the book, and sold the idea of the book directly to booksellers. This approach turned out to be more successful than he could have possibly imagined.
Not to mention critics
Not since Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance have I read a book as moving as Stoner. Written by John Williams, it was published in 1965 and sank without attracting much critical notice at the time. Only in recent years has it surged in popularity thanks to fervent advocacy by the French writer Anna Gavalda and the news that it is being turned into a film starring Casey Affleck. Since then, the novel has sold phenomenally well all over the world, riding on a wave of fulsome endorsements from a slew of famous writers. What can explain its sudden bestseller status?I have to admit to finding the praise fascinating. As someone who didn't like the novel and thought its flaws obvious, I feel the need to try to get some handle on its present reputation (though feminist critics are chopping away at that to some extent) and why readers love it.
Let me begin by saying that Stoner is literally unputdownable, if I allow myself liberal use of a cliché. The book is in the tradition of university or academic stories, popularly known as “campus” novels, similar to works by Malcolm Bradbury and David Lodge, or Mary McCarthy’s The Groves of Academe, Phillip Roth’s The Human Stain and The Dying Animal and JM Coetzee’s Disgrace. However, unlike Bradbury’s and Lodge’s books that focus on academic exchanges and tend to satirise academic life, Stoner is deeply serious.
People who revere the life of the mind generally love Stoner. Those invested in academia love Stoner. People who believe in a divide between high art and low art and consider themselves above the latter love Stoner. The book excuses all kinds of bad behavior in the name of a pure and holy love for literature, and thus it draws toward its sterile bosom all manner of writers and readers and teachers invested equally in solipsism and books.
Our society pre-empts literally too much of the space. For instance, it is impossible in the Eastern United States to pitch a tent and camp for the night without registering with the National Parks Service and its list of regulations. You cannot go off somewhere for a sexual bout without paying rent. Almost any stone that a kid picks up and any target he throws it at, is property. People hygienically adopt a permissive attitude toward boisterousness and hyperkinesis of children, and meantime we design efficient minimum housing. Under modern urban conditions, it is impossible for an old woman to be a harmless lunatic, as was commonplace in country places; she would hurt herself, get lost among strangers, disrupt traffic, stop the subway. She must be institutionalized. If you roam the street late at night doing nothing, and looking for something to do, the cop who is protecting you and everybody else doesn’t want you to be going nowhere and having nothing to do; and you ask him, Does he have any suggestions? (120)
AB76 wrote: "MK wrote: "AB76 wrote: "MK wrote: "Yesterday I checked out the annual August book sale at a neighborhood church. I managed to find 6 paperbacks including the second Tony Hillerman - Jim Chee myster..."How close to London or Norwich are you?
PS - I do stop in at Waterstones Gower St. I can sometimes pick up something there.
Someone - I know, I know but I never remember names - asked about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood which I got from the Library.Well, it is going back today unfinished because I quickly got bored. Lots of (to me) minutia about films, actors, foreign films. The last film I saw was in Holland Park - Oranges and Sunshine - in probably 2010! I am not a movie person, but, if you are a movie person, it may be right up your alley.
MK wrote: "I am not a movie person"If it wasn't an interest in movies, I'm curious what made you pick up the Tarantino book.
Georg wrote: "Hushpuppy wrote: "Bill wrote: "By its nature, Wide Sargasso Sea forces the reader into some degree of metafictional thinking."Thanks Swelter. I've followed the whole conversation ..."
Women not enjoying sex? The author (and audience) of The Country Wife would have laughed... sexual passion, and the odd forms it contorts its subjects into, was the whole premise of the play.
Mod
Where did you find this map, Swelter?
Bill wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "I'm just surprised that anyone saw this as a book worth 'rescuing'."It's generally thought that the French had something to do with it.But whatever the reason for its initiall..."
Interesting.
I, for one, did not find the book 'unputdownable' - indeed, I found it so repulsive that I didn't finish it.
There's no accounting for taste, as they say. Baffling, though.
Lljones wrote: "Bill wrote: ""Where did you find this map, Swelter?"
It's interesting... it misses out Dylan Thomas's 'Llareggub' ('bugger all' spelt backwards), but is that because it's fictional, or unsuitable for children? The inclusion of Enid Blyton, Black Beauty etc. may incline us to think it was for youngsters, until we notice DH Lawrence, Philip Larkin etc.
Who was the intended audience?
Morning everyone.My youngest grandchild visited yesterday, another bookworm, and she told me that she likes horror stories. This is a genre I know little about and I want to send a couple of books as she returns to Uni, please can anyone recommend any authors. She told me not Stephen King.
CCCubbon wrote: "Morning everyone.My youngest grandchild visited yesterday, another bookworm, and she told me that she likes horror stories. This is a genre I know little about and I want to send a couple of books..."
Arthur Machen is literary and original, though she might not like the Edwardian styles, HP Lovecraft and Algernon Blackwood are other talents. I'm not so good on modern horror as you would expect CCC
The Enid Blyton hardback copy was duly delivered to Barbara (aged 83), at the day centre last week. Her first comment was "how much do i owe you?". "Nothing" i repliedShe was delighted with the book and told me even seeing the cover reminded her of reading Blyton in the back bedroom of her childhood home in the mid 1940s, the smell of privet hedge and the sounds of summer
I will be seeing her on Tuesday when the day centre opens(its 3 days a week right now) and hopefully she is enjoying the read.
Mod
After WSS I went for some light fare. My first book by Harlan Coben, who was recommended alongside Michael Connelly somewhere.
A man whose wife had been murdered 8 years ago gets messages with clues nobody but his wife could come up with. But her body had been identified by her father and her uncle....
This is the first time in my life I have abandoned a "thriller" about 60% in.
There are no "characters" in this book. All the protagonistst are, at best, vague sketches of stereotypes. Every single one of them, dead or alive, about as interesting as a stale piece of toast.
The "plot" so far has been so incoherent, meandering, implausible and tedious that I am not even tempted to jump to the end for the solution.
The writing style is fittingly dull, though with some ambitious attempts at originality. So, at least I got some peerless similes out of it:
"The realisation hit him like a piano that had been dropped from the third floor" .
"The big bags under her eyes made her look like a porter".
.....
A reminder to everyone that this thread will stay open until next Monday, 16th August.
Happy reading, all.
Happy reading, all.
AB76 wrote: "The Enid Blyton hardback copy was duly delivered to Barbara (aged 83), at the day centre last week. Her first comment was "how much do i owe you?". "Nothing" i repliedShe was delighted with the b..."
Good... maybe you should ask her if she also likes Richmal Crompton's 'Just William' books - I read and enjoyed a lot of Blyton as a kid, but could not envisage re-visiting them now... whereas I suspect William would still be good for a few laughs!
Lljones wrote: "Another hot spell looms...some say we're looking at 105 F, others say 108 F. Here we go again."Oh dear... I never understood the American habit of installing air conditioners, until spending an August in NYC without air-con... we don't need it in the UK, usually.
Bill wrote: " it surged in popularity thanks to fervent advocacy by the French writer Anna Gavalda"Such lavish praise by La Gavalda has got to be the best counter-endorsement possible this side of the Atlantic.
scarletnoir wrote: "AB76 wrote: "The Enid Blyton hardback copy was duly delivered to Barbara (aged 83), at the day centre last week. Her first comment was "how much do i owe you?". "Nothing" i repliedShe was delight..."
i am planning to re-read some Blyton, my eldest neice (7) is devouring the Blyton books and loves them, what a writer she was
Lljones wrote: "Another hot spell looms...some say we're looking at 105 F, others say 108 F. Here we go again."Oh no, the third heatwave of summer 2021 isnt it?
those wildfires in north cali look bad, town called Greenville was wiped off the map
Lljones wrote: "Bill wrote: ""Where did you find this map, Swelter?"
You can read all about it here. I find the omission of Scotland simply unforgivable.
Anne wrote: "A reminder to everyone that this thread will stay open until next Monday, 16th August.Happy reading, all."
Thanks Anne.
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Thanks Swelter. I've followed the whole conversation on WSS and JE with..."
I also think that sex was quite imortant. She enjoyed it, their sexual relationship was good, to start with. But what would a man of his time and background think of a woman who didn't "lie back and think of England"? Wouldn't he be scared? After all, it took another 130+ years or so before it was generally 'accepted' that women had a libido and acted accordingly. And even now it is not so uncommon to find a "madonna versus whore" subtext in newspaper articles, books, films...
As for her colour I am not sure either.. From what I understood she was either white or mixed-race looking white (?)