September 3, 2006
Remember September
And so September, happy new year. A time for reflection of course, to remember those who enjoy doubting others’ impossible plans, and then to laugh at their lack of imagination, because we’re okay here, after a long time in limbo. The last year has proven that two people can live on nearly nothing, that there is a light at the end of the immigration tunnel (as long as one is patient), and that things do work out somehow, as long as it is happiness you’re aiming for. Which leads me back a few Septembers further, because it was four years ago this week that I ran away to England to seek my fortune (ie sanity). The most impossible plan of all, because I’d just endured a bit of a trauma, was completely depressed/deranged, I had no job prospects, nowhere to live and very little money. For three months I inhabited a gungy sx-infested backpackers hostel in the East Midlands, ran out of money and lived off Tesco value tuna, got into the data entry industry, and it sounds horribly sordid, but it was thrilling, and even more thrilling, I built a life there. It was in December of that year that I moved out of the hostel into a two-up-two-down terrace with a good friend, got promoted to a job that, I believe, is the foundation of any talent I possess as a writer, and then best of all, I met a wonderful British boy who saved my life, and who I married. I realize how incredibly lucky I have always been, but not all of this is luck. I will always love best the bits of life I made myself, on the backs of impossible plans.
~How could one stumble dully through its streets, or waste time sitting in a heap, staring at the wall? When there it lay, its old intensity restored, shining with invitation, all its shabby grime lost in perspective, imperceptible from this dizzy height, its connections clear, its pathways revealed. The city, the Kingdom. The aerial view~ Margaret Drabble, The Middle Ground
I am lucky that when bad things happen, I forget them after. I was reading journals recently that make that altogether evident, and I wondered exactly who had ever penned them? I get nostalgic, you know. I miss England often, as much as Stuart does. In order to supplant my homesickness, I’ve become obsessed with the blog transatlanticism, by a wonderful writer who also ran away to change her life and proved that it works, it really does. If all plans were possible, we’d stop ever being pleased.
I love India Knight. On what novels can teach us. Oooh! Controversy in Punctuation Land. The CanLit Atlas reviewed. On recurring characters. Must highlight a NYTimes wedding profile which features the line “The survival of the fish was a metaphor for the whole relationship.” Please note, said fish is now dead.
I just finished Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel. It was weird but really excellent, and I think I appreciated it a bit more having read Giving Up the Ghost. Now beginningWhen I Was Young and In My Prime, which I bought because it was pretty.
August 31, 2006
Spare Ribs
I have been quite busy lately, mainly trying to get the first draft of my thesis project completed by September 10. This goal is distinctly possible but requires maniacal devotion for the next week or so, and that is where I will be. But on top of that, we’re quite busy at work scrambling to finish our final project before the end of the summer, I am reading voraciously, there are final days of summer to be lived inside (though bad weather the last two weekends have scuppered some of those plans, and more of the same is promised for the long weekend), and Stuarts must be enjoyed. An end-o-summer night out with my co-workers yesterday, and Katie came over for an indoor picnic on Tuesday. She brought with her my bridesmaid dress, and it looked like I will have to have some ribs out if I ever intend to actually wear it.
The Great Summer Rereading Project ends today, with A Jest of God by Margaret Laurence, which is an incredible novel. I reread The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion before that. It’s been wonderful to revisit these books, and I will do a rereading project every summer now, though only for one month from now on, as I’ll have less to catch up on. Stay tuned for more thoughts on the rereading experience, as I reflect upon them. And then I start my new Hilary Mantel tomorrow!
Terrible news times two regarding The Murdermobile. First, after a year of living in my neighbourhood, I had never seen anybody driving this most sinister vehicle. It seemed to move between parking spaces between murders on its own accord, and that was fine with me. That was a legend. And then last week, I walked past it and saw a woman inside. She was dressed all in pink, and she was strapping her baby into a child’s seat on the passenger side, and I was gut-wrenchingly disappointed. Neither pink woman nor baby appeared particularly murderous, and they sort of disproved my thesis that the Murdermobile is self-propelled. Moreover, the Murdermobile is for sale, for about $3500. It’s described as a “vintage delivery van”. I don’t know about that. In any case, the dream is over, or at least the nightmare.
(Oh, the my new Drabble is pre-ordered. Sweet anticipation!)
August 27, 2006
Private Universe
Our weekend has been full of little things. Reading and writing of course, and Little Miss Sunshine (which was brilliant), the orientation for my new volunteer endeavour at Culturelink, I got quite a haircut (and not by Stuart), a birthday dinner for Carolyn (which was hilarious), followed by a going-away party for Steve (which was well attended by some of my favourite people), The Big Chill on our way home, fun at Pedestrian Sundays in Kensington, and an entire watermelon (devoured).
I reread a number of books last week. In particular, The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields. I first read this book in the early 1990s; my mom bought it for me once when I was sick in bed, and I have this pre-Pulitzer, small, hardcover edition that I am awfully fond of. It’s a great book- so prescient. It was 1993, and Shields was writing, “When we say a thing or event is real, never mind how suspect it sounds, we honour it. But when a thing is made up- regardless of how true and just it seems- we turn up our noses. That’s the age we live in. The documentary age. As if we can never, never get enough facts.” A bit eerie, when I think of now. I loved this book for its factualness, though, that such fact can come from fiction. For a similar reason that I loved Possession last week. These stories are so firmly planted, in place and time. The authors have created an entire universe to accommodate their people, and that universe is so very similar to mine. The Stone Diaries, with its lists, photographs, family tree and extensive documentation; it is uncanny in its reality. I bet it drives some people absolutely mad. I’m now reading The Middle Ground by Margaret Drabble. Drabble also does some fine universe building. She has invented places and people that continually pop up throughout her body of work. Characters turn up, twenty years on from when we last met them, and they’ve changed accordingly. Her world is such a terribly intricate web, of incredible connections which are far too connected to be really plausible in fiction, and that’s what makes that world seem so very real.
On the L Woolf bio. Here for how to read a novel. New Can-Lit! I loved the Michael Ignatieff feature in The Globe, solely on the basis of it being a good story.
August 18, 2006
Gluttony
Sometimes I know that systematic reading is just an excuse to be a book glutton. Don’t think I don’t know this. I love hotdogs more than anyone I know. I am a bit out of control; I’ve taken up reading whilst walking home from work, but I haven’t been hit by a car yet. Has actually been quite fascinating. I have no problem following the text and navigating myself through the world, and everybody gets out of my way. It adds five minutes onto my half hour walk, but the five minutes are well spent.
Margaret Drabble is just as bookishly gluttonous as I am however. I know this because I got my latest letter from Bronwyn today, and my text-based treat was Drabble’s essay “The Radiant Way and After”, from the 1999 anthology A Passion for Books by Dale Salwah. Containing such declarations as “I am unhappy unless I have a book about my person”, and such fears as being caught in a lift sans book. She goes on to write about not loving books themselves so much, and vandalizing them something terrible, how our early reading affects us, desperation for (any) books while abroad (the same desperation that led me once to read “The Assassination of Marilyn Monroe” in Salzburg). And how it’s not a passion for books she has as much as “a passion for print”. When she was in Japan, she wrote, being unable to read was akin to being deprived of a sense and she found it hard to function. She finishes, “I need print like an addict. I could live without it, perhaps. But I hope I never have to try.” And now why I love Bronwyn is evident.
Now rereading Franny and Zooey. I read Wonder When You’ll Miss Me by Amanda Davis yesterday, and really enjoyed it. I wasn’t expecting to, and didn’t at first. This book was an expansion of a short story I had already read, and I found it difficult to get past that. I sort of felt like I was trespassing. And the beginning of the book was awkward, disjointed. I knew that the main character would run away to join the circus, which I didn’t think would be particularly interesting. I feel the same way about books that take place at circuses that I do about books that take place a magical boarding schools in mystical lands, but this is where the combination of Davis’s extraordinary story-making, story-telling and writing skills proved enormously effective. This was an excellent book. It made circus sideshow performers absolutely human, and had plenty of pachydermic content, which is always important to me.
Books in the news: On that difficult second novel. I like the idea of book biographies, but then again, I would. The Geek hierarchy. Poetry workshop in The Guardian. Most these links stolen from Bookninja and Maud Newton. I’ve been busy. Now that Stuart has a job, I have to do housework again. Yawn.
We are going to the island this weekend!
August 17, 2006
More Drabble Mania
For the first time ever, it appears that a Canadian book cover is far prettier than the UK edition. The above cover is from the UK Amazon site, and the one below from the McClelland and Stewart catalogue. How lucky then, to be on this side of the ocean.
August 7, 2006
the same, and leftover pie
The long long weekend has been spent with ease. I’ve read four books which has brought my total to 100. Also, soppy films, frisbee in the park, ice cream, Kensington afternoon, and we cooperatively baked a strawberry pie. I made the pastry and Stuart made the filling, and just as we were about to put it in the oven, Carolyn and Steve invited us over for a bbq, so we took the pie to their house and partook in a rooftop feast. It was wonderful. The pie was absolutely perfect and I was quite impressed with us. Today is more of the same, and leftover pie.
Germaine Greer on Brick Lane. Kate Atkinson has a new book out! Rogers loses millions due to misplaced comma. On why women read more novels than men do.*
My obsessive compulsive public library borrowing is interfering with my Great Summer Re-Reading Project. I just finished reading Circling the Drain by Amanda Davis. I’d read her Fat Ladies Floated in the Sky Like Balloons already, and I really loved this collection. Though, as it has been said, the parallels between the stories and Davis’s death were impossibly spooky at times. I do wonder sometimes, the extent to which we write our own lives.
As soon as the rereading project is done, I am going to read Laurie Colwin. Sometimes an author’s name just starts appearing so often, it must be taken as a sign from the universe. In a recent column, Heather Mallick mentioned having read one of her novels recently, and when I entered Margaret Drabble into the Literature Map, there was Laurie Colwin again. Until September, however.
In tacky billboard news, it would be fair to suspect that the turnout for “We Don’t Regret Our Abortions” would be way bigger than this crowd.
*Why I believe that novels are more effective than non-fiction to learn about the world (particularly in terms of current events): This is not a well-developed thought. There are gaps in my ideas here, particularly that I detest historical fiction, which makes no sense. (What a start!) I believe in novels for the same reason I disbelieve in the virtues of decisivesness, political alignment, and principles (except principles in theory- these are ok, and necessary). The world is complicated and stupid, and anyone who can sum up anything is leaving something out of the equation. I like novels for their hypothetical-ness, novels test out realities and one’s reaction to that reality. I feel that is a far more educative tool than a non-fiction book, which is primarily instructive and more obviously biased.
July 30, 2006
My fascinating self
The reason I haven’t finished a book in a few days is that I am reading three. I am reading Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry, which I am too distracted from at the moment. I am also reading In Fact: The Best of Creative NonFiction, which has some brilliant essays (ie “Shunned” by Meredith Hall, but also others I skip over. And finally, I am reading the newest PEN Anthology Writing Life, which is the anthology to end anthologies. I can’t quite put my finger on why.
I can’t decide why this book should be better than the disappointing anthology I read a few books back. I suppose the fact that the essays are good means something, though the others weren’t bad. The writers here have all achieved a measure of success, and they have learned something in the process that they care to impart (as opposed to “what I learned in the process of just being my fascinating self” which seemed to be the theme in that other book). So many writers here are fiction writers, and what they say has more to do with literature than their fascinating selves. Nobody is whining. Each of the essays has taken such a different approach and tone, and I’ve not yet encountered repetition. And perhaps the “writing life” is just something about which I am passionately curious, and so I will go forth in my reading more readily, enthusiastically, than I would with a book about the “expensive shoe life, and how I lost my bestest friend on the way.” Anyway, the PEN anthology comes so entirely recommended. (Plus there is an essay by Margaret Drabble!)
This weekend we ventured out into the North York Countryside, where Stuart acquired 28 mosquito bites and I got none. We were attending a dinner party at the home of the wonderful Natalie Bay, who had organized a feast for “Unagi Day”. I didn’t know there was an unagi day. It was definitely oishi. We had a lovely time. And then yesterday, we baked our cakeular ode and spent the afternoon under a tree in Trinity Bellwoods Park. Bliss, obviously. Today will be devoted to reading, writing, working on Pickle Me This’s newest publication, and cleaning our disgusting house.
July 9, 2006
The Radiant Way
I first read The Radiant Way nearly two years ago while we were living in Japan and moving house and I should have been packing but wasn’t, I was so absorbed. I note from the inside cover that this book (a ratty paperback that required taping up upon rereading) cost me just one hundred yen from the English Used Book Shop in Kobe. (Technically, this was not my first book by Margaret Drabble, as I’d read The Millstone in 2001 but I had not really liked it at the time, and had forgotten about it by then.) I think I only bought this book because I knew Drabble was AS Byatt’s sister and I had liked Possession. I had no premonition that The Radiant Way would create a Drabble devotee of me.
In my opinion, MD was at her peak around the time of The Radiant Way. The Middle Ground, which I believe preceded it, was also pretty fantastic, as was the Realms of Gold. (Oh don’t get me started, I never met a Drabble I didn’t like). Her early works are very interesting, but perhaps too fashionable, as forty years later, they’re quite dated- perhaps the reason The Millstone didn’t grab me first time around. By the late-1970s, MD was no less concerned with current events and society, but these issues become contextualized in a way that remains relevant. Her later books (since the mid-1990s) are more focused and deliberate and they’re great, but I do particularly love the sprawling nature of The Radiant Way, and her other such books. When Margaret Drabble was trying to write the world. Here, there be England I think- another reason The Millstone mightn’t have so appealed to me. There is particular Englishness about her works that I wouldn’t have understood before I lived there- what it means to be “suffering from a case of the Midlands” for example, which I remember from a book I cannot remember which.
And so I finished reading The Radiant Way this morning before I got out of bed. It did not read so differently from the first time, as I read it only two years ago, though I have since read the rest of the trilogy and so I got to be all omnipotent and know how things turned out. And having since read all of Margaret Drabble’s novels, it’s interesting to see her peculiarities that I wouldn’t have noted first time around. The Radiant Way is a wonderful book about ideas and history, and I am particularly fond of the narrative style. That Margaret Drabble has, through her works, created an entire universe and the ease with which she maneuvers her people within it is amazing. I also like that as readers, we are privy to the author’s view in a way that characters are not. That two characters who are complete strangers pass one another in the street, and nobody else knows it but we do. That characters from her other books keep popping up surprisingly. That the narrator doesn’t profess to make or know the story, just to tell it. To read as a writer, such a narrative is deeply humbling. Through the progression of Drabble’s work, it is clear that it takes ages and ages to get this good, but the thing is so few people ever get this good.
July 3, 2006
I think I cheated
I finished reading The Master and Margarita on Saturday. I read it last for my Soviet Cultural History class in 2001 and liked it then, but couldn’t much remember it after all this time. I loved it. The rich intertextuality and multitudinous levels of meaning were fascinating and the story was great. But it’s a very heavy book, in every sense. So upon finishing it, I decided to read Don’t You Want Me? by India Knight, which I’d received as a birthday gift. Now I had read My Life On a Plate by India Knight when I lived in England, and thought I’d read this second book too. Upon completion, I realized that I really hadn’t read it. Which I sort of knew all along I think, but after Bulgakov’s epic tale, I wanted a pink novel which a cartoon on the front. I hope that’s ok. Oh my, I read it in a day. A day in which I rolled around laughing hysterically at that little pink book. India Knight is one of my favourite newspaper columnists- deeply provocative, hilarious and well-argued, no matter how outlandish her claim. And she writes funny books. They’re not perfect novels, because as in her columns, Knight fills her books with asides and incidentallys, that don’t exactly carry a plot along. But because one likes India Knight, one is carried along. One is I. This book was absolutely brilliant for a summer’s day involving scrabble and wine on the porch. And I’m now reading The Radiant Way by Margaret Drabble, which is very exciting because this is the book that made me love her (only?) two years ago.
April 7, 2006
Because you asked
I have decided not to seek the Liberal leadership. Frankly, I could have run a very competitive campaign. I had a chance of winning, but for me, the end game is not about winning but about strengthening the party. I can best serve that purpose by remaining simply a knitting/bookish blogging graduate student with a passion for Margaret Drabble, a role that allows me to be more open in expressing my views. It is not because of my French, or because I do not belong to the Liberal Party. Mon francais etait le plus bonne que tu pense et mon Francais est un prioritee pour moi. And I’m not going anywhere. I’m not going away.
Thank you.
