This is a short novel about a woman who works at CROSS, which is the French navy鈥檚 rescue centre for the Channel. She took a call from a small boat thThis is a short novel about a woman who works at CROSS, which is the French navy鈥檚 rescue centre for the Channel. She took a call from a small boat that was sinking in the channel and her response is being judged in the aftermath of the deaths of 27 of the 29 people aboard.
It is a philosophical meditation on the migrant crisis and our reaction to it. It does much more effectively what Prophet Song failed to do. It confronts us with all the reasoning and language that revolves around migration and the humanity of our responses (and what we ask of those who have to deal with on a practical day to day basis.
It was written by a philosopher, which I think you can tell. It is repetitive, but that repetition is necessary. Repetition as emphasis.
I鈥檝e now read two of the International Booker Prize shortlist. This and Perfection. I鈥檇 put this above Perfection, just. But I may re-read Perfection once I鈥檝e read the rest of the shortlist....more
This is a collection of interviews with Philip K Dick, including the last one he undertook in 1982. They're an interesting read. I found myself wishinThis is a collection of interviews with Philip K Dick, including the last one he undertook in 1982. They're an interesting read. I found myself wishing I had Lawrence Sutin's book 'Divine Invasions: A Life of Philip K. Dick.' beside me to get straight into after I'd finished.
The interviews cover a lot of the later part of his career, including the period around the making of 'Bladerunner' and it is fascinating to get Dick's take on the various different screenplays and his satisfaction with the Ridley Scott version.
Dick is clearly well-educated and well-read in the self-taught sense. He dropped out of college. But he seemed to have read widely in philosophy, religion and science-fiction. Amongst other things. His theories of the world and the universe are interesting. And he's spot on with some of his early predictions. He said this in 1977:
Computers are becoming more and more like sensitive cogitation creatures, but at the same time human beings are become dehumanized.
And then there was this:
This is one of the biggest transformations we have seen in human life in our society is the diminution of the sphere of the private. That we must reasonably now all regard the fact that there are no secret and that nothing is private. Everything is public.
And this is decades before social media made us voluntarily offer up our private lives.
There's a lot in here about perceptions of reality and of what constitutes a human being. He quotes the two themes from 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep' for example and how the research he did for 'The Man in the High Castle' had led him to read diaries from Nazis and that he thought ...there is amongst us something that is bipedal, humanoid, morphologically identical to the human being but that is not human. It is not human to complain that starving children are keeping you awake.
This story reminded me of something I read in Clive James where he talks about German Civil Servants who worked beneath a Doctor's office where the Doctors were testing some drug on Jewish children that just killed lots of them. And James wonders what went through these peoples heads as every so often there was a thunk on the ceiling as another child's corpse hit the floor above. What kind of beings could they be?
There is also though the feeling that Dick's grip on reality - or our version of reality - is slipping. That he was mentally ill. That he was, perhaps, paranoid. He definitely believed a being took control of him in 1976. In the final interview he calls it Elijah, the prophet. And actually his discussion of that experience fits neatly with Bill Lundberg's experience in 'The Transfiguration of Timothy Archer' that I read recently. Except in that case Lundberg is sharing his mind with the dead Bishop Timothy Archer.
I found it a fascinating read and might have to see if I can get hold of a copy to annotate. I was reading a copy from Libby so my notes are all handwritten. Apparently this is part of a whole series of 'Last Interviews' with many different writers. Some of which I am interested in reading.
Recommended if you like Dick's work or, more broadly, how a creative mind works. Or doesn't. ...more
I normally write my reviews - for what they're worth - straight after I've finished the book. I want to get the thoughts down as soon as I'm done. BefI normally write my reviews - for what they're worth - straight after I've finished the book. I want to get the thoughts down as soon as I'm done. Before I forget. But I think I'm going to have to give this one some thought.
It's the first Philip K Dick novel I've read in a long time. Loosely part of a trilogy apparently. Dick finished it in 1982, but died before it was published. Weirdly it does feel like the kind of book that someone would write as they try and get their thoughts together on the nature of the world, even the universe, at the end of their life.
He pulls together different sources to tell the story of Bishop Timothy Archer from the point of view of his daughter-in-law, Angel. It comes with a bibliography. It is filled with quotes from the Bible, Virgil, from Yeats, from Donne, from Goethe. There's even poetry from Henry Vaughan. It deals with John Allegro's theory of Christ being a magic mushroom, which written like that makes it seem even madder than it actually might be.
It's not a science-fiction book, which you'd expect from Philip K Dick, but it does deal with themes on the nature of reality. Of how we know what we know. Angel towards the end says she coped with all her loss by becoming a machine, but she never really does.
I'm not sure if this is an incredibly profound book or the ramblings of a man who took too many drugs. I'm not sure if there's much difference between the two. Except this isn't rambling. It straightforwardly written, clear, and a little bit cynical. It's never clear whether we're supposed to side with Angel Archer's cynicism or with the possibilities that she refuses to accept.
Still I think I liked it a lot. And it is a reading list of its own.
O, and it makes me want to read more Philip K Dick....more
This is an autobiography made up of extracts from her diaries, her notebooks and letters she wrote over the course of her life. It could do with some This is an autobiography made up of extracts from her diaries, her notebooks and letters she wrote over the course of her life. It could do with some notes. Not a lot but occasional footnotes.
It is a fascinating read and you can see how much of her work was influenced either directly by her life or by the observations she made along the way. The series of men she fell in love with who never seem to have reciprocated her feelings (or for significant periods of time.) Her frustration at the period from the late-60s to late-70s when her style of writing went out of fashion - from a publishers point of view - and she lost confidence in herself - yes, Jonathan Cape Ltd (or whatever you're now called) I'm looking at you - is pretty sad(?) Sad might not be the right word. Frustrating? Annoying?
But like with some the writers mentioned in 'Jane Austen's Bookshelf' it is easy to see her disappearing from view completely if it hadn't been for that 1977 edition of the TLS when Philip Larkin and Lord David Cecil mentioned her in their choice of 'underappreciated 20th century writers.'
That led to her work coming back into 'fashion'. She was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1977 for Quartet in Autumn, which was her 'come back' novel. And I think she's been pretty much in print ever since. She's made it to Kindle, which is a temporary form of immortality (if there can be such a thing.)
There are nice insights into the literary world, into her reading, and just the life of a writer. I'd like to read a biography of her now - probably starting with 'The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym' by Paula Byrne....more
This is the fourth Barbara Pym novel I've read and once again I enjoyed it immensely. She is the wittiest of writers. She writes clear and clever prosThis is the fourth Barbara Pym novel I've read and once again I enjoyed it immensely. She is the wittiest of writers. She writes clear and clever prose. A little like Jean Rhys her stories play with similar themes, but they're always a joy.
This novel begins with a broken hearted Dulcie Mainwaring at an academic conference where she meets Viola and Dr Aylwin. Aylwin is a handsome academic writing a book on a minor 17th century poet. His wife has left him. From this seed a whole series of relationships and friendships emerge. Dulcie investigates Aylwin's life. Ostensibly out of curiosity.
So, she ends up meeting his mother, his wife, his mother-in-law, and his brother - a Vicar. Things happen. Nothing explosive, mostly. But things. Domestic. Small scale. But I find Pym's subtlety much more appealing than a let it all hang out emotional artillery barrage. Like I prefer British films of the 30s, 40s, and 50s where the suppression of emotion is much more moving than the more modern demonstrative kind. Perhaps I am just an old Englishman.
Most importantly Pym's books are witty. You can see why she is sometimes compared to Jane Austen. Jean Rhys can be witty too, but hers is a dark and sharp wit. The wit in the shadow of the gallows. Pym's wit is observational and most gentle. I enjoy it.
She's also drops in little literary references: quotes from Sir Thomas Wyatt, Proust, and others and her own book appears on someone's shelf, as does a character from a previous book. And I'm pretty she she insert herself briefly into the dining room of a hotel.
I can't recommend Pym's work enough. They're so much fun to read and her style is addictive....more
I really enjoyed this. It's three books in one. Or maybe two and a half. An exploration of the women writers who influenced Austen and why they've sliI really enjoyed this. It's three books in one. Or maybe two and a half. An exploration of the women writers who influenced Austen and why they've slid out the canon when their reputations were so high in the 18th/19th centuries. It's also about reading and rare book collecting. There's also an element of memoir in there.
The writers chosen are Austen herself, Frances Burney, Ann Radcliffe, Charlotte Lennox, Hannah More, Charlotte Smith, Elizabeth Inchbald, Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi, and Maria Edgeworth. Some of those names were more familiar to me than others. But probably ten years ago none of them would have been, which is a sign of how my reading has changed.
The other thing this book does is talk about how the 'canon' of literature changes. This is something I've been thinking about for a while. A canon is a useful tool to some degree. You can't read every book and having some guidance as to what might be the best things to read is helpful. But canons have a habit of being heavily influenced by the power dynamics of a society you live in and literary fashion. (Or snobbery.) A canon of influential books that doesn't, for example, include science-fiction and fantasy is limited. But what I took from this book is don't let 'canons' limit you. Go explore and make your own canon. Follow the trail from one favourite author back to another and, most importantly, make up your own mind. Don't let critics dictate to you.
There's also a lot in here about the inherent difficulties of being a woman writing in the 18th/19th century. The societal expectations and pressures. And the personal. Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi being in a loveless marriage whilst going through twelve pregnancies is just one example. It reminded me of how much Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley went through in her life too. Virginia Woolf pointed out the difficulties faced by women writers in 'A Room of One's Own'. This just drives that home.
Romney seems to get mildly irritated with the shadow of Samuel Johnson over a number of these writers. For example people suggested that the final part of 'The Female Quixote' had been written by Samuel Johnson and not by Charlotte Lennox. (An accusation often thrown at women writers - see Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and Frankenstein.) And Samuel Johnson's involvement with these women - which was (mostly) supportive and encouraging - seems to have been more interesting to academics than their own lives. That's not Johnson's fault. But occasionally you think Romney feels it is.
This has made me really think about my future reading plans. It also helped convince me, once again, that my theory that all literature is just one big book of books in conversation with each other isn't exactly wrong. ...more
This is a slim collection of Herrick's poetry originally published by Everyman in 1996. Herrick was a clergyman and Cavalier poet. He probably best knThis is a slim collection of Herrick's poetry originally published by Everyman in 1996. Herrick was a clergyman and Cavalier poet. He probably best known now for a single poem, 'To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time'. Indeed, he's probably famous just for the first verse of that single poem:
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old time is still a-flying, And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying.
That poem contains one theme that Herrick touches upon often - mortality and the need to enjoy life as much as possible in the short time we are here. The shortness of life is a constant refrain.
But Herrick's clergyhood - for want of a better word - doesn't stop him writing of love and lust. Indeed, that too is a regular theme of Cavalier poets. They admired wit - in the sense both of cleverness and humorousness - which is also reflected in this selection. Herrick, I suspect, was good company in the tavern over a flagon of sack.
Indeed two poems here - which I read in a Cavalier Poets collection - are odes to giving up sack and then going back to it again. They're funny as well as smart.
There's a handful of poems about the King or his children that to modern ears are ridiculously brown nosing and over the top. But then, as one can see from the present government of a nation across the Atlantic, Kings attract the fawning courtiers.
Is Herrick a great poet? Possibly not, but he is one of the good ones and a collection like this is worth the time it will take you to read it. Some of these poems I was familiar with from the Cavalier poets collection I mentioned before but most of them were new to me. ...more
If people know Catullus at all it is for his poems to his lover Lesbia. Love poems. But some of that love is pain. Such as LXXXV I hate and love. PerhIf people know Catullus at all it is for his poems to his lover Lesbia. Love poems. But some of that love is pain. Such as LXXXV I hate and love. Perhaps you're asking why I do that? I don't know, but I feel it happening, and am racked. Which reminded me of the beginning of Graham Greene's 'The End of the Affair' - This is a story of hate.
But this collection, which is all that we have of Catullus, contains other poems: wedding hymns, elegies, epigrams, abuse. He can kick at his enemies, unnamed though they often are. Did people know who he was talking about? His friends might have done - some of whom come in for a kicking of their own when the stray into his Lesbia's path.
They vary in length. They vary in subject matter. They vary in levels of abuse and swearing. He's not up to Juvenal's levels of length and breadth of vitriol, but he can make a good go of it. Here's the start of XCVII:
I thought (so help me Gods!) it made no difference Whether I smelt Aemilius' mouth or arsehole, One being no cleaner, the other no filthier.
On reading this I did find myself wishing my Latin was better than almost incompetent. This is Guy Lee's translation from 1997 and I feel sometimes it tried to hard to sound 'modern'. Some of it dropped with an unmusical clang. But the poems are clear and easy to understand, although I think with some of the longer ones more notes were required to explain references. I'd like to find a really thorough modern translation with copious notes.
I do like that this has both the original Latin and the English on opposing pages so if you want to have a go at translating you can. I tried a couple of times with the shorter ones but it became very clear why I got a U at Latin A-Level.
My second book from the International Booker List. I read Reservoir Bitches before the longlist was announced. What did I think?
Well, I enjoyed it. IMy second book from the International Booker List. I read Reservoir Bitches before the longlist was announced. What did I think?
Well, I enjoyed it. I didn't love it. It's the story of a couple of 'expats' from an unnamed southern European country who had moved to Berlin to work and how the city changes as time and gentrification start to bite. It could be about almost any European city. Some of it definitely sounds familiar to someone who lives in London, although I missed out on my drugs, clubs and galleries era. I was more of a pub type of person.
I thought it was well-written and drily funny. I also felt Lantronico was exorcising some of his own experiences. This is apparently his fourth book, but the first to be be translated into English. There's not much extremity in it. The prose feels clear and direct. Almost unemotional. Like a review of a life for some kind of social media website.
It's only about 100 pages long, which makes it a quick read.
Three stars. I did highlight a lot though, which suggests it'll be a book I'll come back to. ...more
I liked it, but I started to feel a little frustrated by it's inability to end. The writing is excellent and Sophie Hughes has done an excellent job tI liked it, but I started to feel a little frustrated by it's inability to end. The writing is excellent and Sophie Hughes has done an excellent job translating (as far as I, a monoligual Brit, can tell.)
At its centre seems to be an allogorical story of the impact that Pinochet's rule had on Chile and Chileans. On their language, on their memory, and on their relationships. That a country can, as a whole, suffer from PTSD.
Not much else to add. This is the second of her books I've read, after Clean. I felt a little similar about that. Perhaps she isn't a writer for me to love, just to like. I admire the writing, but I just can't love these books. ...more
"Don't remember them as old or frail; remember them as they were! Determined men, sometimes frightened, but fighting as best they could for their cou "Don't remember them as old or frail; remember them as they were! Determined men, sometimes frightened, but fighting as best they could for their country and a cause they believed in...I still believe that, amid all the other cross-currents of twentienth-century politics, the Second World War was a war against fascism."
Peter Hart's story of the 16th Durham Light Infantry (DLI) is told through interviews with the men of that regiment recorded by the Imperial War Museum. Hart's text in between statements from the men forms a superstructure of historical writing that holds it all together.
The book covers the training and then their introduction to action. They fight in North Africa, in Italy, and in Greece. Each battle sees casualties and deaths. In the aftermath the battalion is re-built and goes again. The more I read about the war in Italy the more I think that it has been forgotten. It was a bloody, brutal series of battles.
Hart's interviews also show that this constant feeding into the mixer did break men. Everyone seems to have a reservoir of courage that is eventually drained. You can be saved by time out of the line or even a wound but eventually it runs out for almost everyone. And the ridge after ridge battles of the Italian campaign, often in terrible weather, seem to have been particularly draining.
The book does a great job of making the ups and downs of the whole thing real. I don't think there's ever a good place to serve in a war. There's a great moment where a radio operator, Ronald Elliot (I think) is put inside a tank to help co-ordinate communication between infantry and tanks when he realises that being in a tank isn't quite as comfortable as he thought, for example. But the infantry seems to be amongst the hardest.
The stories make it clear how shattering artillery and mortar barrages could be on the nerves or how the waiting to go into action was often worse than being in action when you didn't have time to think.
I'd recommend this as a book for anyone interested in WW2 and what it was really like on the front line. It's easy I think from the cynical 21st century to find WW2 somewhat mythical or to equivicate about what the Allies did versus what their enemies did, but fundamentally this is the story of the good guys. At its most simplistic. ...more
Ian Fleming lived a remarkable life and lived it well, but seems to have also never been entirely happy. Unfortunate to have a domineering, snobbish mIan Fleming lived a remarkable life and lived it well, but seems to have also never been entirely happy. Unfortunate to have a domineering, snobbish mother and a father who died in the First World War and became the dreaded example for his sons. He was also the second son who, for a long time, lived in the shadow of his eldest brother, Peter. Then whilst he had many affairs he was never able to find the right one to marry: his mother drove him away from the first, the second was killed by bombs in World War Two and the one he did marry seemed to have been the worst choice in terms of personality.
He was a spy working for Naval Intelligence during World War Two. A job that probably saved him from becoming a wastral posh boy. The truth about his role will never been genuinely known and accusations have been thrown around of Fleming being pretty unimportant, but Shakespeare does a good job - in the absence of sources - to piece together his role and significence both during and after the war both in the UK and US.
Then when the success of James Bond erupted and the fame he had wanted arrived it quickly turned - in his own words - to 'ashes'. He died at 56. The book draws all the threads of the things that might have contributed to his death together: the law suit against McClory, his marriage etc. But fundamentally smoking 70 cigarettes a day is going to get you somewhere along the line. Not to mention the alcohol.
Shakespeare's biography tells Fleming's story neatly. He also, in the final chapter, rounds of the tragic story of Fleming's son Casper. There are a lot of gaps and a lot of missing information. There's a lot of gossip and tittle-tattle. His life is connected deeply to the Establishment as you would expect from an old Etonian of his time and class. He knows people everywhere. Even before you get to World War Two there are stories and stories. Names drop with a satisfying clang on almost every page.
Yet in the end what do we know of Ian Fleming? It is easier to see him as a cad. The man Boris Johnson wishes he could be. What I think Shakespeare does in this biography though, intentionally I assume, is centre Fleming's war time service in his story. He follows Plomer's comments at Fleming's Memorial Service in asking us to see Fleming's role in war the thing he should perhaps be remembered for. He won't be. It'll always be as the posh, caddish, creator of James Bond that he'll be remembered as. But Shakespeare does a good job of trying to rectify that a little.
Firstly I should admit to knowing Jamie and Leslie and being mentioned in the acknowledgements. You can therefore take the review as you like.
The besFirstly I should admit to knowing Jamie and Leslie and being mentioned in the acknowledgements. You can therefore take the review as you like.
The best thing about The Black Archive, which is basically a book on a single Doctor Who story that deals with some aspect of that stories creation or content. The format is loose enough that the authors can approach a story from whatever point of view piques there interest. That makes for a series that usually brings something new and interesting to the analysis of a Doctor Who story.
Jamie and Leslie have focused on two main aspects of the story - it's relationship to Dickens' original novella and Christmas in general and the ethics at the heart of the stories. It is interesting that we rarely question the Doctor's ethics despite them sometimes appearing to be both hypocritical and holier than though. I've found this particularly with new Doctor Who but I remember questioning how the Doctor - in Creature from the Pit - is happy to hand over a planet to a man who, shortly before, was second in command to the main villain and a murderer.
This book is well researched, as one would expect. Although my minor quibble is it could have done with more sources for the ethics section. But then perhaps I'm being harsh. It isn't supposed to be a philosophical thesis.
Finishing this reminded me that I really do need to read more Black Archives. You learn a lot from them sometimes....more
Mexico is a monster that devours women. Mexico is a desert of pulverized bone. Mexico is a graveyard full of pink crosses."
This collection of short Mexico is a monster that devours women. Mexico is a desert of pulverized bone. Mexico is a graveyard full of pink crosses."
This collection of short stories, thirteen in all, is a story of women of different classes, different lives and the constant threat of male violence. It's a tale of both survival and of loss. Some of the stories connect together as we hear from different characters from an initial story. Some of them edge towards horror or ghost stories, but I think the real world is always more terrifying than any horror story I've ever read.
The writing is excellent. The last story 'La Huesera' seems to be the culmination of the themes of the whole book, it is the most angry and, it seems to me, the most personal. I don't know whether it tells of an actual experience of Dahlia de la Cerda's life, but statistically she's likely to have known a woman murdered by a man in Mexico.
I should stop here and say that Mexico might have its problems but violence against women is an epidemic everywhere. It happens in small ways and large ways. Every year in Parliament we hear a long list of women murdered by men in the UK read out by Jess Phillips. A woman Elon Musk attacked for no good reason apart from ketamine junkiness and misogyny.
Some of the stories have a redemptive quality. Vengeance is taken. But most of them don't. It's a tough read, but it is definitely worth it. Julia Sanches/Heather Cleary translation is great. I can't tell you if it is accurate. I speak no Spanish but I think you can tell if a translations doesn't catch the vibe of the original. This one catches it.
So begins Woodworm by Layla Mart铆nez. This is a short novel. About a grand-daughter, her grand-mother, their hoI walked in and the house pounced on me
So begins Woodworm by Layla Mart铆nez. This is a short novel. About a grand-daughter, her grand-mother, their house and their family. It's a horror story, but I think it is both a personal horror story and a political horror story.
The ghosts of the dead and angels haunt this house, but there's also the ghosts and angels that haunt Spain since the Civil War. There's a lot of stories of the missing here. People who were taken away from their families and 'disappeared'. It's also the story of violence against women: "...but shitty men will come down on you all the same." And the violence of capitalism and poverty.
It reminded me a little of The Hacienda by Isabel Canas, with similar themes around a haunted house being a symbol for something bigger and broader than even family.
The story is told by the grand-daughter and grand-mother in alternate chapters. The grand-mother warning us that her grand-daughter lies. Each has a distinctive voice and take on their situation.
You can see the ending coming I think. Not necessarily the specifics of it, but you know what's happened before it is confirmed, which doesn't spoil things because the book is obviously leading you in that direction.
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