August 9, 2005
Beautiful Books
I am obsessed with the design of “Falling Cloudberries” by Tessa Kiros, perhaps the most beautiful book I’ve ever seen. You get a good image of the cover here. Wallpaper patterns are throughout the book and I just love them and I am thinking of using samples for the binding of my haiku book. Another nice book I’ve seen lately is Ticknor by Sheila Heti, to whom good book design must be old hat by now.
I am obsessed with Devil’s Lake, Lionel Shriver and Zoe Williams thinks living by yourself is selfish. It’s interesting to see the difference between Canadian and American coverage of the Devil’s Lake issue. Here, Margaret Wente lauds cars as symbols of freedom, in much the same way I did in an essay composed in Grade Ten history class, and declares that it will take way more than $1 a litre to make her give up her SUV. Good on you Margaret.
Finished George and Rue by George Elliott Clarke today. The language was astoundingly beautiful, though sometimes I felt I was wading through adjectives. My problem with it is that I knew the outcome from the outset, which naturally kept me from barrelling through in in search of a conclusion. But, I realised, that perhaps was the point of it all. Clarke writes of the Hamilton brothers that “as soon as the sun first shone on them. it’d been shining on their graves.” Their end had been as forecasted to themselves as it was to the reader, which is a pretty interesting bit to think upon. So, now reading The Ice Age which is by Margaret Drabble and so will prove to be Drabbley.
Fun stuff at McSweeneys.
Tomorrow, Pearson bound to pick up my Ma n’ Sis In Law.
July 31, 2005
I'm on the ride and I wanna get off
One of the reasons I can’t wait to move into my new apartment next month is to have all my books on my shelf again for the first time in nearly 3 and a half years. It will be wonderful to rediscover them all over again. There is a profile of Dorothy Parker in The Guardian this weekend. I had forgotten how fascinating she was and I can’t wait to read her stuff again. I feel the same about my many LM Montgomery books, which you don’t outgrow as you might think. I found a fun page here with lots of Anne info, including a quiz to discover what Montgomery character you are. Apparently I am Jane, but I would argue with that. Thuis website is bizarrely fantastic. Click to find snapshots of people o’gasming, but not in a doity way. A really powerful article here by Margaret Drabble, about her experiences writing The Red Queen and cultural appropriation. She asks how do we “only connect” (as Forster put it) with other cultures without stealing or invading. A fantastic article here on the dying voice of Hiroshima survivors. The article mentions the letters the city government of Hiroshima have written to every country since 1945 that has staged nuclear tests, and how the display of letters at the Hiroshima Peace museum has nearly run out of space. I’ve seen the exhibit, and to me it was the most symbolic and powerful image I was left with. The lessons learned from Hiroshima are not well-received these days, when they are needed more than ever.
It’s been a good weekend. We went shopping in Oshawa on Friday, yesterday I ventured back to Durham region and met friends in Whitby, and we had lunch at the world famous Hanc’s Fish and Chips and Chicken and Ribs. Such a various menu! I have been reading madly, newspapers, magazines and the wonderful Small Island, by Andrea Levy, which I will write about in more detail this week. I have now started “Case Histories” by Kate Atkinson, which comes with an endorsement by my husband and I am enjoying so far. Tonight we are going to Dusk til Dawn at the Mustang Drive-In!
July 18, 2005
Konstantin
I love Margaret Drabble. I am reading the afore mentioned “Gates of Ivory” and absolutely loving it. It’s the final book in “The Radiant Way” trilogy, which got me on my Drabble kick in the first place, though it concerns less the three women of the first two books than one of their friends, Stephen Cox, who is missing somewhere in Asia. In Thailand, he has met up with a young photographer called Konstantin Vassiliou who I realised was a character in “The Needle’s Eye”, which was published in 1972. “Gates of Ivory” was published two decades later. In the former, Konstantin was the son of the main character, maybe ten years old? And now he turns up again, grown up in the mid-eighties. There is no reason that had to have happened. Konstantin in “The Needle’s Eye” could have been a forgettable character, and that Margaret Drabble would choose to resurrect him is just fascinating. I look forward to finding out why she did as the story develops. Her characters frequently recur, but just in passing. I absolutely love that world.
July 14, 2005
It's not easy
Lionel Shriver’s strange column, volume two. She doubts Tony Blair’s ability to stand up to terrorists, in light of concessions made toward terrorists in Northern Ireland. It’s a complicated issue, and perhaps she draws parallels too quickly. I think when you have to live with people who harbour some legitimate grievences against you, compromise is necessary if you want to move out of the Dark Ages. In Italy, ignorant people engage in print warfare. It’s drawn parallels to this story, as Theo Van Gogh’s murderer goes on trial in Holland. There is no black and white anymore, no room for sweeping statements. Living together has become unbelievably complicated and requires an open mind.
I enjoyed “The Dialectic of Fat” from Ms. The article talks about the centrality of women’s weight to her identity, double standards, fat as a feminist issue and the new globalisation of eating disorders. I find it so interesting to look at the way Western media has affected women’s body images internationally. It’s sometimes difficult to strike a balance between these feminist fat acceptance ideas, and the fact they could be seen as excuses to be unhealthy. I think the former is more important. The article mentions the amount of time women spend at the gym these days, and how many of these women really are seeking health over thinness. It’s an absolute fixation for most women I know, regardless of what they actually weigh, and really there are so many more important things to worry about.
Found The Gates of Ivory by Margaret Drabble today in a used bookshop. It’s the final book of the Radiant Way trilogy, the first of which was absolutely brilliant and the second (A Natural Curiousity) which I enjoyed. I’ve never seen it used (or new- it’s out of print now) and the spine wasn’t even cracked. So now I have all the Drabbles except “The Red Queen” which isn’t in paperback yet anyway. And we saw Dr Barnardo’s Children tonight. It was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen, so moving and entertaining. It’s such an important story and was told in such an honest way. We also went to our wedding reception venue to check it out and it was lovely. Tomorrow we’re renting a sander to get ready to repaint some furniture for our new apartment and selecting flowers for the wedding, and perhaps going for a ride on our boat on Clear Lake.
June 28, 2005
Fire Risk
I signed up for my graduate courses! I am taking Virginia Woolf Essays and Short Fiction, Literature and the Environment, Theories of Modernist Canadian Fiction and Authors and their Institutions. They sound wonderful, and I read over the information about the program again, and I am so excited.
Now reading The Seven Sisters by my beloved Margaret Drabble, which takes place in Bronwyn’s neighbourhood (and Candida even goes to Bronwyn’s gym!). It’s wonderful. I found it in Brighton for £3.50 unmarked. My amazon bumper crop arrived this morning- four new wonderful books. And yesterday, I went to a charity shop to retrieve two books that had I had donated in a moment of weakness and bought them back. One even had my name in it. That was a bit strange. I am concerned about taking stock of my book collection once I get home. I have sent tons home over the past year, and there are hundred stored there already. We will have to cut down, and give away at least a third. I will give away all the books I own but don’t like but have on my shelf so I look clever. But then again, shouldn’t I own a copy of Ulysses just in case I one day want to read it?
The “I’ve been reading too much Heat magazine” problem continues. You can imagine what I initially thought when I read, Jordan bans Saddam novel.
June 24, 2005
The Official Happiest Day of the Year
How exciting! Today, which happens to be my birthday, is apparently the happiest day of the year. I knew that already, though we did forget about my birthday this morning for a good half hour, so caught up in the fact that it was our honeymoon. I really think everyone should go to Brighton for their honeymoon. We had the most amazing time. The weather was fantastic each day, I went swimming in the sea, there were all kinds of cafes and cool shops and I felt inspired by this vibrancy like I haven’t felt in ages. We wandered for hours. The find of the week was perhaps a book called “Tigers and other game”, published in 1928 and a how-to guide to tiger hunting in India. It’s priceless. I also found a used Drabble I hadn’t read yet, and we had cream tea today and yesterday at a place called The Mock Turtle, with delicious clotted cream etc. We drank far too much tea in general. On Wednesday by 4:00 we had drunk an entire bottle of champagne. We went on rides on the Palace Pier, and sat in deck chairs and had our photos taken in one of those scenes where you stick your head through a hole in a board (is there a name for that? probably). Our hotel overlooked the blue blue sea, and the pier. We sat in the garden at the Royal Pavillion and drank ice tea, we went to the movies, and sat on the beach last night when it was dark. And we had ice cream, and ate nearly all our meals at outdoor tables, and got slightly sunburnt noses and just had the most perfect amount of fun. And for my birthday, from my British family, I received red wellington boots and from my new husband, the book “EastEnders: 20 Years in the Square”. Tomorrow I will read the Saturday Guardian one more time, and next week back to The Globe.
The famous Margaret MacMillan is going back to Oxford. This article is an interesting profile. More interesting though is the fact that 2001/2 were her turnaround years that put her on the road to grand success. And that’s the year she taught Mike and I. Little known fact there.
June 8, 2005
book learnin'
I do envy those who came of age in the 1970s, which was a golden age of young adult fiction and produced works as Forever by Judy Blume, profiled here. Her books were just beginning to be dated by the time I got to them (“Are You There God It’s me Margaret” and her sanitary napkin belts??!!) but even still today, certain elements of them are timeless and the best part is that she wrote books for boys and girls, young children and teenagers. I think many liberal adults today would give credit for their thinking to the quality YA fiction they read in adolescence, which went to great lengths to break down stereotypes and challenge societal norms. Judy Blume explains, “The 70s was a much more open decade in America,” she says. “Forever was used in several school programmes then, helping to spur discussions of sexual responsibility. This would never happen today.” Apparently, however, at the time of its release Margaret Drabble gave “Forever” a negative review!
Canadian teachers are to begin covering the Asian experience in World War Two with much more emphasis, inspired by a trip to China and learning of Japanese atrocities committed there. This is a positive thing, as my Asian education was practically nil for most of my history classes. The same could be said of every continent save Europe really. Before I lived in Asia, I wasn’t even particularly bothered about that. It was a serious case of “us and them” and I believed, however unconsciously, that “their” history was more or less incidental to my own. (I don’t profess to be in the majority with this limited way of thinking but still, I couldn’t have been the only one). History must be taught with a far more global perspective, and teach students the fascinating ways in which an incident in one country echoes around the world. The lines of experience, looping around the globe give one a sense of responsibility for the world around them and a real sense of connectedness. I realise history is very big and two years of high school history classes are minute, but perhaps the mandatory courses should be extended another year. I hope a sense of balance is attempted in the new lessons though. There is more to 20th century Asian history than Nanking.
June 2, 2005
In the ghetto
My first response to reports like this is always anger. While women read literary-fiction by men and women both, men don’t really do the same, though as this article notes now at least they pretend to dabble in authoresses. I get uppity at such imbalances. However. My favourite book, of one of my many favourites, is Unless by Carol Shields. I think this book handles the state of being a woman and becoming a woman with such a poignant acuity, but I don’t think my boyfriend could appreciate this. He is one of the most brilliant people I know, but the storyline couldn’t hold him and he’d only be reading it out of acquiescence to me, and that doesn’t make him a bad person or a poor reader. I understand that, and I think he is not such an exception among men (in this area only of course). The same goes for my beloved Margarets Drabble and (some) Atwood. He did like Oryx and Crake- case in point. It’s a mixture of style and substance that separates the kind of books he loves from the sort I do. I think he could read them, and even admit their brilliance but that wouldn’t be fun for him, and then what’s the point of that really? There are many books that we do read together, and books that I recommend to him, knowing they have a certain Stuartness about them. Juniper Tree Burning was one of those books, about a woman and so plot-driven and furiously paced that he would have devoured it, even as so much of the story was about various states of womanness etc. A.S. Byatt bristles at “ghettoization”. I think that quality literary fiction is a ghettoised genre unto itself these days. Also, as good citizens/readers (which are often one and the same), all of us have an obligation to read important additions to the canon by men and women. But the fact is that most men are not going to pick women’s fiction up at leisure, and this is why recognition from institutions such as the Orange Prize really is important, to help get these books into the public eye.
In summation, I guess it would be good if Stuart loved “Unless”, but I understand why he doesn’t. And a man not loving a book doesn’t make it any less good.
A remaining question would be, why then are women able to read book by writers of either gender? Perhaps, is masculinity a more universal, less specialised condition, that even women can relate to to some extent? Perhaps, dare I say, there are not books being written about the state of being a man in the same volume as those about women? Or maybe there are, and I just haven’t read them, and therefore things are balanced afterall. Is there a masculine counter to “Unless” and it’s ilk? Please leave recommended titles as a comment if you think so.
