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What are we reading? 29/07/2024
Hello group I hope everyone is well? I haven't been around for a while as I've been suffering from fatigue which is a symptom of WM and was unable to concentrate on reading.I've picked up now though and have started to read Death at the Seaside by Francis Brody.
The last worthwhile book I read was Prophet Song which makes it's point very well that what happened to the perfectly normal Irish family depicted in the book is happening to families somewhere in the real world right now.
Bill, I'm afraid that I hated Moby Dick from start to finish .I liked your post though.:)
Greenfairy wrote: "Bill, I'm afraid that I hated Moby Dick from start to finish .I liked your post though.:)"The McSweeney's piece was posted by several people I follow on Bluesky. I don't know how many people laughed out loud like I did just from seeing the title, but despite it being many years since I last read Moby-Dick, for some reason I could instantly recall the ethnic makeup of the Pequod's harpoon crew.
Mod
In consequence I’ve been reading only when I could snatch ten minutes.
The Journal of Anaïs Nin has actually got better. It suddenly woke up when the scene shifted from Henry Miller to the psychoanalyst’s couch. Her clear-eyed view of the process itself, and her own vulnerabilities, make her much more sympathetic. She likes to analyse the analyst.
I’ve pushed on with Craig Brown’s Ma’am Darling. Princess Margaret continues very un-sympathetic. A sad tale of a discontented life. In the first half the only bit of surprising news is that she was enthralled by Richard Holmes’ biography of Coleridge.
I’ve enjoyed the opening chapters of To the Finland Station. I've realised that pretty much everything I ever knew about Vico and Michelet I learned from this book. Shorter sections on Renan and Taine were good value. On now to Anatole France, which I should be able to appreciate better than before, as I have read some of his books in recent years (a memoir of his life, a couple of the novels). The connection to Communism seems a bit distant, though you can see where Wilson is going – a new approach to history which is socially organic, not just a record of the deeds of great men.
Bill wrote: "but despite it being many years since I last read Moby-Dick, for some reason I could instantly recall the ethnic makeup of the Pequod's harpoon crew.)"I don't think it was an accident that Melville made them of various ethnic orgins, and mostly, IIRC, from various tribal or indigenous backgrounds around the world. They had the most dangerous job on the ship, one that required highly specialised skills and physical strength, dexterity, courage, etc. I think the average sailor wouldn't have been up to the job, the kind of skills needed were more likely to be found in men who came from culures in which those skills were still needed in everyday life.
I was reminded of the harpooners of Moby Dick in what may seem an odd way recently - when reading Ian Fleming's Moonraker, the third of the Bond series. It's the only one that takes place in England and there's an interesting passage in which it is stated "Bond knew there was something alien and un-English about him [Bond himself, that is]." and I immediately thought of Melville's harpooners. The parallels don't end there, of course, since like them Bond also has a highly dangerous job that requires special skills.
Berkley wrote: "I was reminded of the harpooners of Moby Dick in what may seem an odd way recently - when reading Ian Fleming's Moonraker"I don't think Fleming ever caused me to think of Melville, but your mention of Moonraker brings to mind a number of memories, especially Hugo Drax' wonderfully ambiguous speech at the launch of his rocket. I'm rather surprised about how much I recall from that novel: the opening bridge game, the personal grooming of Drax' assistants, and other details and plot points.
Berkley wrote: "I think the average sailor wouldn't have been up to the job, the kind of skills needed were more likely to be found in men who came from cultures in which those skills were still needed in everyday life."Yes, that point is one of the things that made the Mc Sweeney's piece so funny for me.
Bill wrote: "Berkley wrote: "I was reminded of the harpooners of Moby Dick in what may seem an odd way recently - when reading Ian Fleming's Moonraker"I don't think Fleming ever caused me to think of Melville, but your mention of Moonraker brings to mind a number of memories, especially Hugo Drax' wonderfully ambiguous speech at the launch of his rocket. I'm rather surprised about how much I recall from that novel: the opening bridge game, the personal grooming of Drax' assistants, and other details and plot points."
I hadn't been planning to re-read the Bond series anytime soon but have ended up doing the first four within the last two or three years as part of a more general exploration of post-war spy-thrillers and detective novels. My intention had been to concentrate on things I hadn't read before but I decided to read the first Bond as well for comparison and then of course got hooked and went ahead with the next few as well.
Moonraker, which I didn't recall as a particular favourite, has now become so after this reading. The unusual-for-the-series English setting, the insights into the Bond character, including but not limited to the one mentioned above (I'll have to see if I can dig out the exact quote later), and the ending (not only that Bond doesn't get the girl but how that scene plays out), all lend it a special interest.
Bill wrote: "Berkley wrote: "I think the average sailor wouldn't have been up to the job, the kind of skills needed were more likely to be found in men who came from cultures in which those skills were still needed."Yes, that point is one of the things that made the Mc Sweeney's piece so funny for me."
Though not given much "screen time" they are some of the most striking and charismatic figures in the novel, or so it seemed to me when I read it.
Greenfairy wrote: "Hello group I hope everyone is well? I haven't been around for a while as I've been suffering from fatigue which is a symptom of WM and was unable to concentrate on reading.I've picked up now tho..."
Glad to hear you are feeling better.
Bill wrote: "Berkley wrote: "I was reminded of the harpooners of Moby Dick in what may seem an odd way recently - when reading Ian Fleming's Moonraker"I don't think Fleming ever caused me to think of Melville..."
Moby Dick remains TBR
i only know the film of Moonraker, when i was a kid we had 70% of the film on VHS, so got used to missing the first 20 mins or so but i enjjoyed the space romp
Mod
I've picked up now tho..."
Glad to hear you are feeling better...."
I second that, Greenfairy.
I hope you're enjoying the Brody, I like her books.
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Me too, to both.
I put off reading Moby Dick until a few years ago, when I decided it was time to try and borrowed it from the library.
I have expunged just about everything about it from my memory, except that my reluctance was justified. (I mean that for me personally, not as a criticism of the book!)
My first dip into the crime novels by Ely North. Another series set in Whitby!
Decent enough, would have given it 3 and a half stars if I could. I'm a bit sparing with 4*s. Two girls from a local school are abducted from Saltwick Bay. A widower who texts his recently murdered wife every night, and suddenly gets a text back giving him clues to the abduction!
Bit of an oddity but ok
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I enjoy Nicci French's crime novels and have just read the latest: Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?.A disappearance and a death 30 years ago, 2 families, arson and murder 30 years on and a determined detective who finally finds the truth.
I also like the books Nicci Gerrard writes alone (ie not with Sean French).
Gpfr wrote: " I enjoy Nicci French's crime novels and have just read the latest: Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter?.A disappearance and a ..."
I may have tried one a few years ago, and will have to have another look
I have read many of you commenting on Gilgamesh on here. What version do folks recommend?Totally off topic, but currently watching the women's vault final at the Olympics and am in complete awe.
Gpfr wrote: "I put off reading Moby Dick until a few years ago, when I decided it was time to try and borrowed it from the library.I have expunged just about everything about it from my memory, except that my reluctance was justified. (I mean that for me personally, not as a criticism of the book!)."
I was sort of primed on Moby Dick from childhood. I had two versions adapted for children, the first a Golden Stamp Book which seeded and still supplies my internal pictures of the characters:
As a sophomore in high school I read an abridged version (eliminating some of the middle chapters, after the Pequod has set sail, on cetology and other digressions, pages that act on some readers like garlic on vampires) which retained enough of the original to give me an idea of its religious and philosophical concerns. Finally, the summer after graduating HS, I read the whole thing unabridged.
I believe it was the following summer that I read Ulysses, and since then those two novels have remained my favorites, yardsticks that almost all other fiction falls short of to a greater or lesser extent.
I looked back at the NY Times' 1915 "Best Novels in English" survey of writers to verify my recollection: Moby-Dick did not receive a single vote (nor did anything else by Melville). Perhaps it required the experience of modernism for readers to become aware of the novel's qualities.
What are the Rights of Man and the Liberties of the World but Loose-Fish? What all men’s minds and opinions but Loose-Fish? What is the principle of religious belief in them but a Loose-Fish? What to the ostentatious smuggling verbalists are the thoughts of thinkers but Loose-Fish? What is the great globe itself but a Loose-Fish? And what are you, reader, but a Loose-Fish and a Fast-Fish, too?
Mod
I have expunged just about everything about it from my memory, ex..."
I believe it was the following summer that I read Ulysses, and since then those two novels have remained my favorites..."
Ah, now Ulysses, that's a different kettle of fish :)
I can share your admiration there!
Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its now an acceptable discussion for everyone, a warning sign of how issues are drawn out of the shadows in this wayReading about Petain and Vichy, one can see the "other" being formed, the immigrant. Interesting FT weekend magazine article of the "whitening" of the liberation parades through Paris in 1944. The Yanks wanted as few colonial troops in the french parade forces as possible, the Brits agreed but the article finds a young man from the Gabon( a Monsieur Dukcson) who is prominent as De Gaulle strides through the city, his arm in a sling. The sad postscript was he died from his injuries sustained in the fighting for Paris a few days later.
AB76 wrote: "Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its now an acceptable discussion for everyone, a warning..."AB Have you read 'Nada' by Carmen Laforet? Set in 1940's Barcelona? Though I think she was from the Canaries originally so possibly does not fully qualify as a Catalonian writer?
My latest book was a 21st century novel that won the Booker prize but was nevertheless not on one of the “Best 100 Books of the 21st Century” lists recently discussed here.The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson has three main characters, who form a circle of friends, Julian Treslove and Sam Finkler, middle aged men who were schoolmates, and Libor Sevcik, a 90 year old Czech, a former teacher of the two, who moved to England as a refugee from Communism. Libor and Finkler are both Jewish and both recently widowed, which makes Treslove, Gentile and chronically single, doubly the odd man out in this trio.
Early on in the book, Treslove decides, on evidence that is either flimsy or nonexistent, that he may well be Jewish too. The plot of the novel, such as it is, largely concerns Treslove’s pursuit of a Jewish identity, a half-hearted pursuit, like everything Julian has undertaken in his life. Other plot threads concern Libor’s inability to come to terms with his bereavement and Finkler’s thorny relationship with Judaism. Much is made of the conflict among diaspora Jews, both with other Jews and within themselves, between their identification as Jews and the existence and actions of the state of Israel.
Right after finishing this book, I read a quote from Ludwig Börne in The New Yorker that might well have served as an epigraph for this novel: “Some reproach me with being a Jew, others pardon me, still others praise me for it. But all are thinking about it.” Books concerned with antisemitism are, alas, unlikely ever to seem irrelevant, but read now, The Finkler Question seemed particularly au courant, which leads me to a question for the group.
Were Israeli actions against Gaza a particularly prominent news story during the period 2006-2009?
The novel was published in 2010, but the frequent mentions of Gaza and bitter condemnation of Israel’s actions there could easily lead me to believe, in the absence of a copyright date, that the novel was written and set in 2024. I do recall reading stories about Hamas rocket launches into Israel and that country’s military responses, but before Oct 7, most stories about the Israel-Palestinian conflict that I recall had to do with Jewish settlers in the occupied territories. The West Bank is mentioned occasionally in Finkler, but far less than the conflict in Gaza. Perhaps Gaza was a bigger story in the British press than here in the US?
Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its now an acceptable discussion for everyo..."i bought it but never read it about 15 years ago oddly....im not sure it was written in Catalan though
AB76 wrote: "Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its now an acceptable discussio..."Yeah that's what I thought. It's set in Barcelona. It comes recommended by Daria, sprogs partner, who does speak good Catalan but she is not that enamoured of Catalan literature on the whole, it seems. She was part of a bookclub for books written in Catalan for two years, to improve her Catalan I think, she said all the other members of the bookclub were in their 70's, so maybe, she, being a modern woman, that the choice of books, for an older demographic, was not to her taste. She did like this one though...
Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its now an accepta..."my pro-catalan stance is a huge about face. on a visit to Barca in 2006 i was sceptical about all things catalan and the focus on the language, including when they tried that wildcat referendum about 10 years ago
but slowly i started to appreciate the beauty of the language without speaking a word, its delicate merging of french and spanish, with a sound and phrasing that intrigues. That led to a series of catalan novels i read and has richly rewarded me.
Sadly we are stripped of much demographic information on it as a spoken language during the 1939-1975 Franco regime. These novels i have read all suggest a catalan speaking majority but some research i did suggested this may be more reflective of middle class and intellectual circles writing in Catalan, where mostly Castilian Spanish and Catalan vied to be spoken in Catalonia.
AB76 wrote: "Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Sad scenes on the streets of our cities here in the UK, 4-5 years of constant normalisation of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the Tories means its no..."As far as I can see your more recent conclusion is pretty accurate. A rubber bullet missed me by about 6 inches at one of the major flash points on the day of demonstration. The Spanish police were trying to confiscate the ballots from one of the more, symbolically important polling stations https://i.postimg.cc/sD0T3w2r/IMG-278.... One member of the demonstrating crowd, near to me, lost an eye to a rubber bullet. I suppose I deserved it as we, the sprog, partner and me were just curious, and were living or staying nearby. I did meet some curious people afterwards, from as far away as Belgium who were part of a successionist nationalist movement
in Belgium. There were all kinds of foreign actors working the streets that day (for foreign media outlets). I do think the Spanish government vastly over reacted, they could have pretty much ignored it, as there was nothing legal about the referenda. Political point scoring can be a very symbolic event it seems...
I should add, that as far as I know, no rubber bullets were fired directly at the demonstrators. All the injuries were caused by ricochets from them firing, high up, at the walls of the buildings on either side of the street, in order to get the refuseniks, seated on the ground, to move, so that they could get the confiscated ballot papers out. Symbolic shooting can have some quite life changing effects... it seems.
This is in case there are any fans of Matisse out there. On Monday night, on BBC 4, there is a documentary called 'Becoming Matisse' on at 11 PM. It's a good documentary to me. One of the presenters is his grandaughter, or is it great-grandaughter? who very charmingly fills in bits of the family history. There is also 'Art of France' on at 8PM, on the same channel, where Andrew Graham Dixon holds forth on the development of 'Impressionism'.
The Forties by Edmund Wilson is an interesting but quite scattergun collection of his journals from that periodThe editor makes clear that the gathering process for the scribblings and notes means the collection is patchy and it shows in some of the shorter sections
But i've reached 1945 and his observations in Italy and then London are fascinating. He visits Naples, Rome and Milan and finds a sad resignation over the defeated nation of Italy, he talks with Santayana, Alvaro, Silone, Moravia and also a strange collection of aristos i had never heard of. The London vignette is slightly odd, he details the rather disgusting state of his hotel near Green Park, visits a prostitute and seems to have dalliances with various english girls (though seems to have avoided any time with italian prosititutes)
Any opinions on Ronald Frame? I saw one of his books the other day and was thinking of giving him a try.
Mod
I'm reading a book called Les chemins intimes. Ten writers have written about their childhood, where they're from, or other memories. One of them, who made me think at once of you, is François-Henri Désérable.
His essay concerns the first covid lockdown which for him coincided with a writer's retreat in la maison Julien-Gracq. While there he got a letter, forwarded by his publisher, from a woman named Camille. The handwriting led him to suppose that Camille was elderly. The letter was about his latest book, Un certain M. Piekielny. The writer gave her address and phone number. Désérable intended to write to her, but finished by phoning, and discovered that Camille was not the old lady he had imagined ...
If anyone wants something not too taxing to read in French, I recommend this, the texts are short and it's very pleasant.
https://www.autrement.com/les-chemins...
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There's one of his called Merlewood in The Oxford Book of Scottish Stories, and I thought it was outstanding. It was the first of his I had come across, so if you find others to recommend I would definitely be interested to hear.
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I'm reading a book called Les chemins intimes. Ten writers have written about their childhood, where they're from, or other memories..."
I'm interested! Sounds like a good way in to contemporary French writers, where I feel very much adrift.
It also reminds me of a collection of short pieces called My Country Childhood, all first published in Country Living magazine. Mostly by writers, but others too. Enchanting.
Off to the Big Shitty tommorow, visit to the V+A and a curry with friendsSadly one friend may not be able to make it as he works for a london local authority and they are drawing up plans to try and limit the damage of right wing attacks on migrant hostels where he works,mobs are planning to attack and try and burn down a few of them. Posts sent out on email to get to London for 8pm and attack! Very sad
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I'm reading a book called Les chemins intimes. Ten writers have written about their childhood, where they're f..."
I'm interested! "
I thought you might like this :)
Okey-doke, did anybody have Walz in the Veep betting pool?
The Missouri candidate who loves reading so much, she recreates scenes from favorite books.
Shown here: Fahrenheit 451.
my friend had to leave the lunch even earlier as the right wing thugs want to target refugee hostels that have grenfell like cladding, so they can set light to them quicker, he is expecting a long, fraught eveningam disgusted with these people..interesting that fahrenheit 451 is mentioned on thread.....
Mod
No, but I do quite like what I’m reading about him - a geography teacher, football coach, 24 year volunteer in the National Guard, married 30+ years, two children, not a single investment in stocks or bonds, not even a house any more (sold when they moved into the Governor’s mansion), just their two teacher pensions, life insurance, and a college saving plan. He sounds a very regular, stable guy. But… no word yet on his reading preferences.
looks like the anti-racist protests have stopped a lot of the trouble forecast for tonight...phew..,
Logger24 wrote: "But… no word yet on his reading preferences."He is a self-proclaimed sci-fi fantasy guy when it comes to books. “I just finished reading the four-book series Mortal Engines. I read a lot of these young adult ones, because I do it with my kids. I was reading that one with Gus,” he said in 2019. “And then I just finished one I would not suggest reading because it is terrifying: Command and Control. It traces the history of America’s nuclear arsenal.”
https://www.politico.com/news/magazin...
In addition, he doesn't seem interested in dictating anyone's reading preferences:
Earlier this year, in honor of Reading Month, Governor Walz placed a Free Little Library at the Minnesota state capitol. The gesture, produced in cahoots with the Little Free Library organization and Minnesota public librarians, was a pointed response to the hundreds of attempted book bans that have been running roughshod over America’s stacks.
And better yet? The governor’s little, free symbol foreshadowed a big, free policy change. In May, Walz signed a Minnesota law “banning K-12 schools, colleges, and public libraries from complying with [book] removal requests… based solely on the viewpoint, content, message, idea, or opinion conveyed.” The act meaningfully protects LGBTQ+ books from the crosshairs of conservative censors.
While unveiling the Little Free Library, Walz affirmed his commitment to free reading. “In Minnesota, we are focused on investing in education, our future, and children and families across the state. We’re not in the business of taking books away from kids and schools and we certainly don’t believe in banning books that tell our history,” he told reporters.
https://lithub.com/this-veep-likes-bo...
Logger24 wrote: "Paul wrote: "Okey-doke, did anybody have Walz in the Veep betting pool?"No, but I do quite like what I’m reading about him - a geography teacher, football coach, 24 year volunteer in the National..."
me neither, i'd never heard of him but then i dont follow the state governor stakes much, so i'd taken my eye off someone coming from that area if it wasnt Shapiro.
i like the look of him and just pray he can help Kamala and take them over the line. Its crazy when you think in the last 14 years, the deadly old party has only had 4 in power but all the changes they have managed, the retrogressive ones and control of the SC, make them look like the dominant party
Logger24 wrote: "Paul wrote: "Okey-doke, did anybody have Walz in the Veep betting pool?"No, but I do quite like what I’m reading about him - a geography teacher, football coach, 24 year volunteer in the National..."
He sounds like a 'regular guy' to me, coming from 'across the pond', and so I am hopeful that his new role will help to take the USA to a more hopeful future, for all... and most importantly, I think that there is not a lot in his background, as far as we know at the moment, that he can be attacked over?
Tam wrote: "Logger24 wrote: "Paul wrote: "Okey-doke, did anybody have Walz in the Veep betting pool?"No, but I do quite like what I’m reading about him - a geography teacher, football coach, 24 year voluntee..."
he should wipe the floor with JD Vance in the VP debates, although Vance did write a book. anyone read it? was it a good book or not?
Walz was interviewed by Ezra Klein last week. In answer to a standard Klein closing question, he recommended 3 books:The Most Secret Memory of Men
Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety
The Razor’s Edge
Mod
Thanks for all the info, Bill. The range of his three recommendations is quite impressive.
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It was cheering to see the photos of the crowds that came out.
Gpfr wrote: "AB76 wrote: "looks like the anti-racist protests have stopped a lot of the trouble forecast for tonight...phew..,"It was cheering to see the photos of the crowds that came out."
exactly, the first positive news in 7-8 days since the southport stabbings, its a very tricky period for the new government and i've never seen anything like this for the right wing pundits and politicians to feed off. there is still the same tropes swirling about, "two tier policing" and the false panic about muslim men roaming our cities attacking people.
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I realise that I didn't write any more about Harlem Shuffle after finishing it.
I suppose that overall I was rather underwhelmed. I won't say that I got no pleasure from reading it, but I don't think I'll read the 2nd book about Ray Carney, the protagonist who seems at first to be only crooked in very minor ways, but turns out to be much less of an upstanding furniture dealer and much more of a crook than we originally think.
I liked the depiction of early 1960s Harlem.
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Books mentioned in this topic
The Finkler Question (other topics)Reading Genesis (other topics)
Devil's Contract: The History of the Faustian Bargain (other topics)
Faust (other topics)
The Nearest Thing to Life (other topics)
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Mary McCarthy (other topics)Ivy Compton-Burnett (other topics)
Ivy Compton-Burnett (other topics)
Ivy Compton-Burnett (other topics)
Penelope Lively (other topics)
Jackson covers the trial of arch-traitor Marshal Petain at the end of WW2, July 1945, its a story of a trial and its characters from jurors, to judge, witnesses and the accused. Petain,a decorated Marshal of France, was quick to settle with Hitler in 1940 and create a strange regressive Catholic petty state which became known as "Vichy". The trial looks at the four years of Vichy and the guilt of the 90yr old veteran as the head of the Vichy serpent.
It feels sordid at times, when one is reminded outside the cold legalese of the french court, that this was a criminal state, involved in organised murder and forced labour. The Nazi's basically used Vichy as a sub-contractor to cheaply deliver the jews of France to the death camps and bleed France dry of manpower and booty. Petain liked saying he was the "shield" of France but this old man was letting any kind of violence, sadism and cruelty run riot under his watch.
In the courtroom, he says very little, occasional asides typical of a cynical cunning old man and once or twice getting rather shirty. From the Northern France, many saw him as a cunning peasent at heart, a womaniser, famed for his piercing blue eyes. He never wanted his age to feature in the trial and became quite upset when his defence counsel dallied on his 90yrs of age at the summing up. (i found some old video of him walking in 1944 and i can say he had the gait and posture of a 50yo, indeed the medical reports said he was excellennt physical condition for a man of his age but forgetful mentally)
I am now reaching the sentencing, so will report back on the ins and outs of that. I am also keen to try and see the Petain of WW1 in all this. A man who was only i think the sixth Marshal of France, a hero of Verdun and a war that was sacred to the people of France as an example of its considerable sacrifices. I struggle to see this as i never lived those times, instead he seems like a cynical, bored and rather unpleasent chancer, who dropped people quickly if he needed to.
Jackson tells of an anecdote when he was studying a map of France with German officers present. a fly landed on the map and Petain squashed it declaring " i have just killed a bosche(German)". Apparently the atmosphere was icy after that! He always seems to talk positively of the defeat of Germany and the Allied victory but one wonders what his private views were now his criminal, pro-Catholic puppet state was no more!
Hopefully the G will publish this post over there too..