July 25, 2008
Looking forward
It may have been raining plenty of late, but it is still summer. We’re off on a cottage mini-break this weekend, for which we’re very lucky and excited, and life is never ever better than it is in July. However the following is a list of things for which I’m looking forward to autumn (and they must be good, to make me look past July). Surprise, surprise, they’re mainly bookish:
- Once by Rebecca Rosenblum (Biblioasis, September 15)
- Goldengrove by Francine Prose (Harper Collins Canada, September 3)
- The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toews (Knopf Canada, September 2)
- Alfred and Emily by Doris Lessing (Harper Collins Canada)
- Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Gift of Wings by M.H. Rubio (Doubleday Canada October)
- When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson (Bond Street Books, September 9)
- What It Feels Like For A Girl by Jennica Harper (Anvil Press, September 15)
- Promised Land by Dar Williams (September)
July 25, 2008
Fire in the Blood by Irène Némirovsky
Fire in the Blood by Irène Némirovsky is a funny little book. Although twisting in its plot, it is rather straightforward in its twists, and I thought I had it all figured out when I finished reading. I had its two main points summed up, but there was just one problem– that these two main points were entirely contradictory, and so I delved further into the text to try to solve this problem, and discovered there is a whole lot going on in this novel than what I’d first assumed.
My experience being quite analogous to the story, a similar theme to Suite Française— that rural tranquility can belie all variety of human drama, and that even in Arcadia, there be– in addition to death– murder in particular, and love, and lust, and secrets and lies.
Fire in the Blood is narrated by Silvio, structured as a notebook, as he observes the passage of time during the autumn of his life. The novel beginning upon his young niece Colette’s engagement, and he reflects upon her happiness, “the fire in her blood” that he remembers from his own youth. That seems so distant from him now, so much so that he supposes if he ever happened to meet his young self, he wouldn’t even recognize him. The past is past, and he is old, and, as his cousin remarks to him, “My god, if only one could know at twenty how simple life is…”
This is a novel quite obvious in its imagery, full of images of burning and fever, of fire and flame. This sort of energy similar to “the force that through the green fuse drives the flower”, I suppose, Silvio’s cousin remarking to him, “Ah, dear friend, when something happens in life, do you ever think about the moment that caused it, the seed from which it grew?… Imagine a field being sowed and all the promise that’s contained in a grain of wheat, all the future harvests…”
When Colette’s husband is murdered, however, and the points of a complicated love triangle become clear, notions of “promise” become dark and ominous. Raising questions of chance or destiny, what happens to our fire, how the past changes as it gets away, and that youth is eternal, always the same, that promise. Silvio asking, “But who would bother to sow his fields if he knew in advance what the harvest would bring?” but still we do, knowing full well what the end is.
This story’s simplicity is deceptive, and perhaps undermined by the fact of this book’s history. Némirovsky’s own story being well known, as well as the story of Suite Française and its remarkable discovery. Fire in the Blood has similar origins, part of it thought missing for years and only found quite recently among the author’s other papers. And it is clear to me that this novel wasn’t finished, wasn’t quite polished, for though the writing is strong (this partly due to translator Sandra Smith, of course), the novel’s structure is clunky and fragmented. Not to the point where the reading is compromised, but the effect is not that of the greatness that was so evident from Suite Française. This being wholly understandable within its context, and so the context becomes necessary, enhancing. This reader being grateful for the author still having sowed her seeds.
July 25, 2008
Oh, we do love love
Oh, we do love love here at Pickle Me This. The true kind, the dream-come-true kind. We love perfect couples and wonderful friends, and how exciting then, to get to celebrate all of this. Because my friend Paul, he of the years of steadfastness, the life-saving, the infinite goodness (and besides if it weren’t for him, I would never have met my husband) has asked the remarkable Hannah to marry him. And smart girl she is, she said yes. Hannah, who I adored from the second we met, and, selfishly, I must admit that I’m also excited because this means I get to be friends with her forever too. They are a perfect couple, so wonderful together and oh so happy. What a spectacular beginning now, and here’s to brilliant days ahead.
July 24, 2008
Of poetry and war crimes
What I’ve found fascinating about recently-captured Serbian war-criminal Radovan Karadžić was not his hair (which, incidentally, is quite remarkable both before and after) but rather the fact that, in addition to being guilty of crimes of genocide, he is a poet. That he is a poet surprised me, because I’d always supposed that literature in general and poetry in most particular would act as some sort of inoculating force against the decisiveness, the arrogance, narrow vision, and lack of empathy necessary for such a crime.
But perhaps I am naive, and you-know-who was a painter, etc., and surely there have been plenty of evil writers. Yes, definitely there have been some evil writers, by which I mean writers who thought, said, wrote some evil things, but unlike the poet/war-criminal, this doesn’t surprise me at all. For surely it is the writer’s role to think himself into places others can’t even fathom, and it’s natural that some might choose to stay there. But I do see a mild distinction between thinking and doing, the former abhorrent and the latter inexcusable.
It still surprises me that poet could do, a poet. Poets, I’d supposed, knowing better than the rest of us the careful constructs upon which ideas are built, of “just words” after all, and how those words and those ideas can’t be bent and twisted into anything, and that anything is everything, and that nothing can be sure. The difference of a line break, a comma; how fragile is simply everything, including life itself.
But perhaps I’ve overestimating this man, and all evidence suggests as much– the poems are terrible. I read the excerpts and reasoned that they must have been put through an online translator, or translated by a drunk illiterate baboon, but they are said to be as “bad in the original as they sound in the English version.” The lesson being that bad poets are prone to war crimes? But then I’m not so sure, because that kind of assumption is bound to tarnish the reputations of a lot of us.
July 24, 2008
Already Elsewhere
Taking offense to a recent article which termed fiction as distraction, and non-fiction as enlightenment, my friend K at The Pop Triad has some wonderful things to say:
“Fiction is a distraction, but all books are. Reading steals you from the sensory world around you and immerses you in the interior world of the pages in front of you. The temperature and sounds of the place where you sit to read, your seat itself, are irrelevant. You could be anywhere because you are already elsewhere.”
And she wonders if “it’s time to reconsider our collective mindset about the kinds of books that are distractingly enlightening and the kinds that are simply distracting.”
July 24, 2008
Abundant abundance
We’re entering that wonderful time of abundant abundance, and our aubergine/eggplants are blossoming purple. I didn’t even know that eggplants blossomed in purple, which is only one of the thousands of things I don’t about the food that I eat. As well, lots was blooming at the market today– we got blackberries, tomatoes, and cantaloupe in particular. And also purple dragon carrots, which are fabulous.
In other news concerning marvelous creation, may I please introduce you to our cousin site, Create Me This. It is the homegrown initiative of my talented husband, with a little help from me.
July 23, 2008
Birthday Haul
Due to bibliochaos in a variety of forms, I’ve not been able to show you the fine stack of books I received for my birthday last month. The top five a gift from my wonderful in-laws from across the sea where books are cheap, and so I’ve got Henry James’s Daisy Miller, An Experiment in Love by Hilary Mantel, and Penelope Lively’s Consequences before me. As well as two books I’ve read already but absolutely had to own– Rachel Cusk’s A Life’s Work and Ian McEwan’s Saturday. My friends Kate and Paul sent me Stalking the Wild Asparagus, in hopes that I’ll go foraging for muskrat and cattails. There is even a recipe for raccoon pie, but I’m not baking. My friend Paul and Hannah, his partner-in-goodness, gave me a copy of Red Wine on the Carpet by Mrs. Danvers (who is said to be a niece of the Mrs. Danvers). Nicola Barker’s Darkmans came from Bronwyn and Alex. The remarkable Rebecca Rosenblum blessed me with Forms of Devotion by Diane Schoemperlen, and finally the bottom three from my fantastic husband who always knows just what I need– Summer of My Amazing Luck by Miriam Toews, Garbo Laughs by Elizabeth Hay, and the breathtakingly marvelous This is San Francisco.
July 22, 2008
So much can slip on by
I’m now rereading Joan Didion’s Where I Was From, which is a very different book from the one I first encountered last May. Partly because I’ve visited California since then, and therefore have a more concrete image of what she describes. Which is not to say Didion’s descriptions are inadequate, but rather now I see something different. In addition, I just finished Sharon Butala’s The Garden of Eden, which has provided Didion’s consideration of California agriculture-culture with a context. I’ve also found that Joan Didion is always worth a trip back to, for she is so subtle that much can slip on by.
Good things on the web of late: I also thought Feist singing “One Two Three Four” on Sesame Street was truly lovely, and will link to Carl Wilson’s post about this because it contains some other vintage Sesame Street counting hits. My new favourite website is Fernham, by Woolf scholar Anne E. Fernald. Writer Margo Rabb’s struggles upon discovering she’d written a YA book, and Laurel Snyder understands.
July 20, 2008
50 Bonus Points
Scrabble in the park is the perfect activity for a sunny Saturday afternoon, but when sun suddenly turns into downpour, nothing could be more perfect than Scrabble indoors. In air conditioning, no less, at the wonderful home of the even more wonderful K, and this game was legend. I have never ever been more on fire, or, alternatively, I’ve never had such luck of letters, and my victory was certainly fixed when I used them all to spell out “neutrons”.
July 20, 2008
Skim by Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki
That a book has pictures, in my opinion, makes it no less a book, particularly if that book’s language still matters. If the images are enhancement and not just a flashy stand-in for story, and in Skim, a graphic novel with words by Mariko Tamaki and pictures by Jillian Tamaki, images are certainly the former. The images so vivid in their own right that they stand alone effectively when necessary, in individual panels or full page spreads, so perfectly conveying a moment– with expression, posture, that single perfect object standing in for a whole scene. Otherwise the language and images integrated– words stamped out in the snow, chalked on blackboard– in a perfect synchronicity.
But the language still matters– I was part of an audience that heard Mariko Tamaki reading from Skim on Monday evening, and rushed to buy the book between the sets. I almost fought someone for what I thought was the last one, but luckily they had another box. Reading from a comic book— I didn’t even know this was possible. Part of this is that Tamaki is a spectac performer, she did her work true justice. And the structure too– the voice bubble dialogue being terrible funny to listen to, but so much of Skim is written in a diary format, meat and substance as you like.
Skim is the story of Kim, called Skim because she isn’t, and she attends a private girls’ high school and it’s 1993. Always somewhat of a misfit, her isolation from her peers is only exacerbated after a local suicide when classmates establish the Girls Celebrate Life Club (“Teenage Suicide– Don’t Do It”). Skim is disgusted by feigned concern from girls who’ve spent years as her tormentors, and now they’re relishing the drama, discussing her in hushed tones– she wears a lot of black, says she’s a Wiccan, she can’t think of anything that makes her happy. And they don’t even know that she’s in love with her English teacher, Ms. Archer.
Skim is marketed as a children’s book, and will serve this demographic well, I think, assuring other misfits (nearly everyone) that they aren’t alone. Holding great appeal to older readers too, and not only because they’ll have it confirmed how incredibly lucky they are to be grown up, but also for such an engaging story, told with a great deal of insight and dark humour. Further, the acuity of its characterization, of Skim– that a comic book character could be bestowed with such a voice. Even in her most desperate moments, this girl’s company is a delight.
