London War Notes: Starting, intro.

[Tania]

This month we are reading London War Notes by Mollie Panter-Downes, a series of letters from the home front that she had published in the New Yorker.

I will be starting this one soon.

[Mela]

I had tried it, but I decided I was not in the mood. Still, those essays are good, worth reading, for all interested in the topic.

[I will try them some other time.]

[Susan]

I’m going to try reading one or two updates daily. This is such a busy month, and that will at least get me started. What I notice so far is the change in tone from Wilkie Collins’ melodrama to the cool tones of Mollie Panter-Downes!

[Gina]

I've been reading this one - I'm a little more than halfway through. It's a long one! I always love her writing.

[Tania]

I stalled with this one, it being such a busy month. I have picked it up again though, and hope to make better progress. I'm still only at the beginning of 1940, so the early days.

I just read the letter where she talks about extending the pheasant shooting season by a month or two in order to save the farmers crops, because too few had been shot during the season. I remember the huge numbers of pheasants around during lockdown because of all the shoots having been cancelled. There were huge numbers around in the spring, My garden was often full of them.

[Gina]

That is so interesting, Tania! I guess we don't have tons of pheasants in Minnesota - I think our Department of Natural Resources gets concerned if the number of deer gets too high!
I'm almost done with the book - there were definitely a lot of political details that went over my head. And I realized that we didn't learn anything about the African or Asian front in school...that was interesting to read about that!

[Susan]

I’m taking my time on this one so will be reading awhile. It’s fascinating to get this peek back in time with so many details. I recently read this blog post about WWII poster designs — in case anyone is interested, here’s the link: https://katedaviesdesigns.com/2024/12...