April 27, 2007
California
My only problem with Joan Didion is that when I think about her too much, I start singing “Lydia the Tattooed Lady” with her name in place of Lydia’s. Otherwise I feel about Joan Didion something just short of worship, on the right side of sane. From that magical day four years ago when I first picked up Slouching Toward Bethlehem, I’ve had her voice in my head. I will reread her forever, but it thrills me that there is new reading still in the meantime.
All of this because I’ve just began Divisadero and I find myself in Didion’s California. And so how can I not read my new copy of Where I Was From next? I love the way one book suggests another.
I am concerned though, as Anna Karenina is lined up to be my May Classic and I have this terrible suspicion that I might not get to it….
April 27, 2007
Persephone Books
A recent reference by Maud Newton and another by dovergreyreader scribbles was enough to pique my interest in Persephone Books. Persephone Books are “revived” twentieth century novels, usually by women writers, and often now-forgotten texts. With their look they appear to be as branded as Penguins (a good thing), and absolutely lovely. And it perfectly breaks my heart that I don’t live in England, and nor will we be in London when we go in June so that I can pop into the shop and just pick up one, two, or ten. But then again I’ll get there someday, and it’s nice to know that such a lovely thing exists.
April 25, 2007
Encountering the great unread
“People shouldn’t worryabout disliking books widely accepted as great, or avoiding them for decades. They should wait for that stage when they are ready for the book, for it will come. I have read with such excess all my life that I could always use the excuse that I had another book on the go. I didn’t know this when I was young, but I would still have plenty of time to encounter the great unread.” -Heather Mallick, “Lessing is More”
April 24, 2007
It's hard to find good music
Indeed, I successfully defended my Masters Thesis yesterday, and came home to this beautiful bouquet sent by my family. Lucky I, and luckier still for this Saturday afternoon Stuart and I are going out to celebrate the end of school in the fashion I have chosen, and it is a very special fashion. I can’t wait to tell you all about it.
Linkylink:
-Find an update over at my hobby blog Now Doing! Posted are pictures of the blanket I knit this winter, and my current patchwork project.
-I was thrilled to find out that the marvelous Saffrina Welch has started a blog. Saff is a friend of Stu’s from uni, and when she and her boyfriend Ivan came to stay with us in December, we had a brilliant time. So it will be fun to see what she gets up to online.
-Bookwise, I was happy to see that Karen Connelly’s The Lizard Cage has been nominated for the Orange Award for New Writers. As I expressed when I read it last March, The Lizard Cage is an extraordinary novel, and deserves so much recognition.
-I’ve never read Barbara Pym, but I feel like I ought to after having read this wonderful feature on the Barbara Pym Society Conference.
-And on an unrelated note: Kirsten Dunst is credited with saying: “I was brought up on Guns ‘N Roses, the Les Miserables soundtrack and anything my mother listened to. But it’s much harder to find great music these days.” Bless.
Still reading Happenstance very happily, though copy errors make my eyes bleed. I also picked up the new Hart House Review today and it’s absolutely beautiful. The ever-accomplished Rebecca Rosenblum took a top prize for fiction. Congratulations RR! Some poetry as well by other creative writing comrades. What a bunch.
April 17, 2007
Short Orange
Announced: the Orange shortlist. And we will be cheering for Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie all the way.
April 15, 2007
We forgot my father-in-law
I love it when I’m reading and I can pinpoint the moment a book casts its spell. Suite Francaise took a little while, but at the end of page 112 when I gasped audibly with horror and surprise (laced with the slightest dash of amusement), I was hooked. I’ve just finished “Storm in June” now, and I am looking forward to the rest.
April 13, 2007
Smart books
I don’t know how to calculate the odds that going to my bookshelf and pulling down In the Skin of a Lion to check a reference on page 106 for the paper I am marking, I will open the book right to page 106 without thinking. In fact I don’t really want to know the odds, because I like the idea of some sort of a connection between my head, my hands and the text itself. This happens often at my library job where I go to retrieve a book, I know the general area, and then reading the call number I realize that my intended book is right where my hand already rests, or that it was the first book I looked at on the shelf. Sometimes books do know us better than we know ourselves.
However Rebecca Rosenblum is experiencing the opposite phenomenon today. Much concerned is she that her Jane Eyre has disappeared!
April 12, 2007
There she blows
Margaret Drabble writes with an omniscience that absolutely wows me. Rereading The Realms of Gold is like being strapped inside a rocket ship. Though the rocket permeates the depths of consciousness rather than outer space. It’s really quite a Woolfian book in many respects, which I didn’t notice when I read it first three years ago. It didn’t get a very good review in the NYTimes when it came out in 1975 though. Funny how much the criticism in that review is so similar to reviews of Drabble’s most recent book. Funny also that when I read bad reviews of Margaret Drabble’s work, I don’t ever necessarily disagree with them, but it never means I love her any less. In fact I think my love for Margaret Drabble may be unconditional. This, however, does not mean I intend to read her biography of Arnold Bennett ever.
Upcoming bookishness: Suite Francais, Kitchen, The Horseman’s Graves, and Open because The Calhoun says so.
Marking continues. 46 down. Yesterday’s treat was lunch with RR.
April 8, 2007
Woke up this morning feeling fine
Japan was in the news last week, mostly unfortunately through this murder which has been sensationalized by the red-tops in Britain. I appreciated measured responses to the hype here inThe Times. (Judging from reader comments, clearly not everyone appreciated the first article as much as I did. The venom it unleashed was sort of baffling, but then a lot of people don’t like to call racism by its name). More positively, Top Ten Books Set in Japan by Fiona Campbell who has just published Death of a Salaryman. (Incidentally, I’ve only read number 10 but plan to read Kitchen someday soon.)
Lionel Shriver happily reviews Nora Ephron. I want to read Julie Burchill’s book on Brighton. Rounding up responses to Didion on stage. This review makes me so excited to read the new McEwan. I love this: Sunday Morning Music.
Now rereading The Realms of Gold by Margaret Drabble, for kicks.
I’ve marked thirty essays, and as I’ve only done four and three today and yesterday, the weekend has contained some aspects of nice. Yesterday we partook in lattes over the paper in Kensington, and today we ate our delightful M&S Easter Treats from England. But otherwise, yes, not much has occurred. Life continues on hold. The notable event of the weekend continues to be that I brought a very large object into our home, oh and mustn’t forget the startling revelation (to the sound of Herman’s Hermits) that I dance like my dad.
April 7, 2007
Yolk
Busy week here at Pickle Me This. 23 essays down, and I am pretty deranged. Life is dullsville at the moment as marking is almost all. This Easter weekend will be a fairly lacklustre affair, unfortunately. And the weather is absolute garbage. Which I guess is not the worst seeing as I have to spend most of it indoors.
I went to see Lionel Shriver and Jacqueline Baker read on Wednesday. I am looking forward to reading Baker’s novel soon, and Lionel Shriver was so terribly nice and thoughtful toward those of us who approached her to get our books signed. She read with such authority, and I think she’s such a fascinating woman. She reported being interested in depictions of contentment, and how such portrayals are received as “boring”. She said she was going to making a point of reading us the “boring bits” of her novel that evening, and they were wonderful.
