February 13, 2007
Self Portrait
We’re tired at our house, which is what happens when we both spend the night having dreams in which we are struggling to sleep. And so for today, in lieu of coherence, Pickle Me This brings you me waiting for the tub to fill. Turban-headed because if my Japanese life taught me anything, it was that a bath sans shower is foul. And I like this image because it incorporates four of my favourite things: books, baths, big mugs of tea and Stuart (for it is his robe after all). Happy All The Time was a splish-splash delight.
Today in the post was a letter from Bronwyn, with whom I’ve defied Laurie Colwin’s quote from Happy All The Time: “Friendship is not possible between two women one of whom is very well dressed”. (That said woman is Bronwyn and not me should be revelatory to nobody). And her note contained the news that she has subscribed me to the London Review of Books, which is sort of like having pennies rain from the sky. I’d say life must be mostly good, with friends like that.
And I think Lucky Beans is one of the prettiest blogs I’ve ever seen.
February 11, 2007
Culling Nothing
Wonderful! Some writers’ rooms (with photos!). This one is Hilary Mantel’s. Here for literary friendships, and rivalries. Calvin Trillin in conversation. The beginning of this article is something a lot of book collectors can related to, on pruning your shelves: “…the same thing happens with every potential discard: You start to read it. Four hours later, you wake up on the floor, having culled nothing.” This article pleased me– on being a good wife. Heather Mallick’s manifesto— it’s always amusing to read the comments of her irate (and apparently avid) readers.
February 11, 2007
Bliss
This weekend the sun came out and I had to leave the house because I’ve been living in pseudo-hibernation the last while and by Sunday evening I’m always crazy. Not this weekend however, as we’ve had a delightful time. We went to St. Lawrence Market yesterday for fruit and veg and had lunch there, and then hung about in a coffee shop reading the paper. Last night the Brown-Smiths came for dinner and we had a wonderful time, and I didn’t drink too much– just enough. Today we went for a walk down College Street and had coffee/tea at Golden Wheat. The house is clean, delicious leftover risotto in the fridge, and just enough ice cream to make a dessert. Bliss.
February 11, 2007
Cheating
I’m totally cheating because I’ve gone on a YA spree. I am justifying this by explaining that I am dealing with a young protagonist at the moment and so it’s good to have some exposure to that kind of voice, but the truth is that I love the Anastasia books. They are so clever. I went to the library yesterday to return one and brought home four more, as well as a couple of other young adult novels. And I say that I am cheating because I read one in an hour, and then mark it on my list of Books Read Since 2006 and now I’m at 199 and I don’t know if that’s quite right. Now reading Happy All the Time by Laurie Colwin. I love Laurie Colwin.
February 11, 2007
Epigraph
The streets of London have their map; but our passions are uncharted. What are you going to meet if you turn this corner? -Jacob’s Room
February 11, 2007
Project
Whenever someone came to visit us in Nottingham, we took their picture in front of the Robin Hood Statue. This was not only because there wasn’t much to do in Nottingham, but it was quickly an important ritual. Some shots are quite posed: me and my guests standing at attention (hello Erin, Claz, Mike, and all of ye who attended my 24th birthday celebration). We’ve got Stuart’s and my sisters in town, and even a shot of my Mom (though she’s standing a bit east of the statue; her visit occurred before tradition was cemented). Some great dramatic shots: Bardley launching his bow alongside, Rebecca swooning at RH’s skirts, and Britt being nailed in the skull. All in all, an excellent photographic exhibition (in which, it must be noted, the sun is never shining) and I’ve decided to arrange and frame some sort of a display that will deck our walls forever more. At the time I was unaware that I was creating an historic record, but then I suppose one never is.
February 8, 2007
At 57 Mount Pleasant Street
Bronwyn and I once had the pleasure (or terror) of seeing The Proclaimers live at the T in the Park festival in Scotland, and I must say I’ve never been part of a scarier crowd. We both very nearly cried, but then neither of us thrive in chaos at the best of time. We just thought that we like “500 Miles” sort of, and we could hum along with it, but the experience was like being at a ten-thousand-strong revival when you’re sort of not bothered about Jsus. It was a cultural thing, and I thought of it whilst reading this article about how the English just don’t “get” the point of those bespectacled boys. The Costa Book of the Year has been won, and it’s a book researched entirely in the British library which takes place in Northern Ontario. Ohhh! CanCon (sort of). On movie/book cover tie-ins. Irène Némirovsky. And last night I was lucky enough to attend Trudeau night at The Kama Reading Series which was lovely, except that Stephen Clarkson and Peter C. Newman never showed!
Today I’m starting Jacob’s Room for the first time.
February 8, 2007
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was absolutely stunning. If you read it, I promise you will like it. The story of Arthur Seaton, a factory worker in 1950s Nottingham with insatiable tastes for married women and liquor, and the smartest, deepest soul. Really a cracking story with humour, a marvelously rich and complex character, a reflection of a time, and oh the language. Concluding with “Well, it’s a good life and a good world, all said and done, if you don’t weaken, and if you know that the big wide world hasn’t heard from you yet, no, not by a long way, though it won’t be long now.” This is the most subtly delicate masculine book I’ve ever read.
And I read it because of this article from The Observer last month about Nottingham now versus then, and the idea of reading any book set in Nottingham really appealed to me because I used to live there and I miss it all the time. There is something about reading about a place where you’ve lived (I particularly remember feeling this whilst reading Russell Smith’s books when I was an undergrad). Even if the book is set fifty years before you set foot in that town, and the Raleigh Factory is gone now, and all the rough places are even rougher and even the nice places aint so nice anymore. I would posit that reading a book about a place you know well is a vastly different experience from reading a place you’ve never been, or a place that never was. They’re whole different species of reading, I think.
It was also interesting to read Saturday Night and Sunday Morning having just read No Longer at Ease and Things Fall Apart (which was published just a year after Sillitoe’s novel). And the relationship between Achebe’s postcolonial Nigeria and Sillitoe’s 1950s Industrial Midlands, which is just fascinating. And I thought this even before the African character Sam rolls into Nottingham and they reckon he’s so good at darts “as a legacy left over from throwing assegais”. Just these similar themes and emotions experienced by the protagonists, and the fact that a “Morris” automobile is a status symbol for Achebe’s Obi, and yet Sillitoe’s Arthur dismisses an ancient one as a step below a car.
It’s a brilliant book. I wanted to read it slow and well, just to see how the words worked. And I have been making an effort to read more books written by men, as I’ve been far too discriminatory in the past. I’ve enjoyed this broadening of my horizons. It was also nice to see that Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was one of the 1001 books I must read before I die. That list is a bit man-heavy, really, and lately I’ve been wracking up a score.
February 7, 2007
Voluble
“A literary portrait of marriage”, so says this profile of Calvin Trillin of About Alice (which I read in December). A different perspective on those streamlined classics. Margaret Atwood once again on arts funding cuts.
Just finishing No Longer at Ease.
My friend Sk8 proposed to her lovely boyfriend in the company of bison on Sunday, and he said yes. Hooray!
And finally, Sunday night I saw a penguin being eaten by a seal on David Attenborough, and I’ve been traumatized ever since.
February 6, 2007
From YA to Feldman
My favourite bookish link of the week is Lois Lowry’s blog. She has a website too. I loved her Anastasia books when I was young, and I am going to be rereading the first one in the near future. It occured to me yesterday that my first references to Freud, Gertrude Stein and Billie Holiday were courtesy of her. I’m glad she’s made a such a fine place for herself online. Another YA author I enjoyed who has done so is Marilyn Sachs, and looking through her bibliography brought back quite a few memories.
Speaking of ghosts of books past, I found Stump the Bookseller recently while searching for the book Me and Fat Glenda. My google query was “burgers” and “inez” (marvelous thing seach engines) and evidently someone had had a similar question because this book had appeared at Stump the Bookseller. Readers write in with bits they can remember of long-lost books, their queries are available for perusal, and you can fill in other readers’ gaps, or check out the “solved” section to bring back memories of your own. It’s quite cool.
Along the lines of YA, I’ve been inspired to read The Unreluctant Years: A Critical Approach to Children’s Literature by the most famous Toronto librarian of all, Lillian H. Smith. Recommended by the booklet “100 Memorable Books” which I picked at my local branch of the Toronto Public last week. And you should get one of those if you’re able. It’s a list of books recommended by TPL librarians as not necessarily the best or most important books, but books which have had an impact on their own lives. It’s a lovely booklet with great commentary and best of all, it’s free. Thank the TPL. I always do.
Further in Toronto things, check out Write Around Town, a new column by Ragdoll whose blog I enjoy. February is bursting with bookish business.
And finally, I think I’m starting a new feature here at Pickle Me This. This past month I’ve been banned from the internet Wednesday to Friday between 8:30 and 5:30. I’ve made my husband take the internet cable to work with him because I have the most incredible talent of whiling my time away on internet inanities. Last week’s was my high school’s ‘where are they now’ page, which provided an afternoon of fun to my BFs Britt and Jennie when I sent it their way. “This is a goldmine” quoth Britt. Oh Britt, it gets better. This week’s time-sucker was the best site on all the net, Corey Feldman’s homepage. This site is essential. If it weren’t for this site, we couldn’t have had this conversation tonight at dinner:
S- (talking about something I can’t remember) is very zen.
K- Corey Feldman’s son is called Zen.
S- Who’s Corey Feldman?
It seems they didn’t have him in England. But really folks, if it weren’t for Corey Feldman’s homepage, I could never have segued into the most important conversation my husband and I have ever had.
