At the end of the first quarter of 2025 I saw I was already seven books ahead of my modest goal of sixty books this year, largely due to reading a faiAt the end of the first quarter of 2025 I saw I was already seven books ahead of my modest goal of sixty books this year, largely due to reading a fair number of short works like novellas. Still, there was still the summer to go, with the intention of reading a number of chunksters a likely brake on rapid progress....more
Everard's Ride It’s Christmastide sometime in the middle of the 19th century, that twilight period between the winter solstice and the New Year wheEverard's Ride It’s Christmastide sometime in the middle of the 19th century, that twilight period between the winter solstice and the New Year when there might be strange visitations and the interface between worlds is thin enough to pass through.
And where else should one expect that interface to be thinnest than an island, a tump as it were surrounded by a moat, preferably with a seemingly ruined castle on it? Time and place are then set for something magical to happen.
And that’s what Diana Wynne Jones promised us in this novella penned early in her career: a visit to a kind of fairyland, a perilous realm where mortals should fear to tread. Though inklings of her later themes and literary motifs are already in evidence, this is not yet the glorious firework display of her later fantasies; still, I think there’s enough here that invites favourable comparisons with other work published in this genre in the 1960s.
Cecilia and Alex are the teenage children of Josiah Hornby, a well-to-do farmer with a holding somewhere on the eastern coast of England. Their neighbours, the Courcys, are minor gentry, and the youngsters feel condescended to by that family’s numerous offspring. However, canny Josiah has managed to purchase an island overlooked b the Hornby farm � perhaps somewhat akin to the causewayed Essex islands of Mersea or Osea � which happens to be crowned by the ruins of a castle; it also has a legend of death occurring whenever a ghostly Wild Rider appears galloping along the causeway.
Josiah is a cruel, demanding father to Alex and Cecilia and when circumstances with the Courcys get too fraught the pair pick their way along what can only be a fairy path through quicksands to the island. And it’s now, at this special time of year, that they discover that the castle is not ruined, that there are lands beyond the island, and that the people they meet in strange Renaissance garb regard them as Outsiders with a singular curse associated with them; and it’s now that Alex and Cecilia’s travails begin in earnest.
The 1960s saw an explosion of outstanding, innovative fantasy aimed at young readers, and though not published for nearly three decades, Jones’s novella when viewed retrospectively would have fitted comfortably with many of these. The children’s fantasies I’m most reminded of here are Tom’s Midnight Garden (1958) by Philippa Pearce and, before that, A Traveller in Time (1939) by Alison Uttley, as both of these involve unusual temporal slippages. But Everard’s Ride is very much a one-off and its own thing: it has a complex plot spread over four parts, full of antipathies, betrayals, confusion and deaths before we get to the main climax (when we discover what the title refers to). It would therefore be remiss of me to give even the baldest of synopses, so I will instead say a few words about what most struck me in this, my latest re-read.
First and most importantly, for all that Cecilia and Alex interact with flesh-and-blood humans, this is quite clearly a version of the folklore motif of the mortal human’s sojourn in fairyland. The fact that this princedom’s inhabitants regard the pair (and any other visitors) as Outsiders living in another era strongly supports this impression; meanwhile Outsiders view riders from the uninhabited island as ghostly apparitions, much as they would other denizens of the Otherworld.
Following on from this, it’s not hard to sense a major difference, almost a disconnect, with Jones’s later work. In Everard’s Ride people find it difficult if not downright impossible to accept anything supernatural or magical, whereas with fiction published from the early 1970s onwards magic is much more routinely accepted, especially by children, and even in some titles (like Charmed Life) it’s a given. Jones acknowledged this sea-change in her approach to writing, pointing to having children of her own and getting the chance to read all the children’s books which she’d been denied as a child, plus watching her own sons� reactions to having them read to them.
Finally, what came strongly to my attention this time was a motif that recurs a lot in Jones’s later work, namely the domineering father. A significant figure in titles such as The Ogre Downstairs, Time of the Ghost, and A Tale of Time City as well in the final works like The Game and Earwig and the Witch, the overbearing father figure here is Josiah Hornby: he stands somewhere between Conrad, the villain of the novella, and a wandering individual astride a donkey who is introduced as a seer. The author frequently drew attention to her own father Aneurin � distant, dismissive, and prone to fly into uncontrollable rages � and there’s little doubt that Alex and Cecilia when recipients of Josiah’s temper closely reflect the author’s childhood experiences.
There is so much to appreciate, from descriptions (such as “the powdery snow flew up under its hard crust in winking rainbows like a shower of ground diamonds�) to the masterful way sudden reversals of fortune drive the narrative forward and give it a sense of urgency � but I think I’ve said enough: each reader needs to appreciate this work for itself. Now if only some enterprising publisher would give Everard’s Ride its proper due and issue it as a standalone . . ....more
“Got the other twelve witches all chasing me. I’ll be back for her when I’ve shook them off. It may take years. Her name is Earwig.�
What child doesn’t
“Got the other twelve witches all chasing me. I’ll be back for her when I’ve shook them off. It may take years. Her name is Earwig.�
What child doesn’t at some stage fantasise about being an orphan, their parents unknown, or adopted into the family they’ve in fact been born into? Whatever drives these common fantasies the protagonist of this story, being an abandoned child in an orphanage, seems happy to play aspects of them to her advantage.
Unbeknown to her, though, her birth mother was a witch, and not only might this account for Earwig’s particularly persuasive powers but it will also have repercussions for the couple who adopt her.
This, the last book completed by Diana Wynne Jones and published just three months after her untimely death in 2011, is � despite its brevity � a summary of many of the themes her vast body of work dealt with and therefore, as we may see, a very fitting epilogue.
She was perfectly happy at St Morwald’s. This was because everyone, from Mrs Briggs the Matron to the newest and smallest children, did exactly what Earwig wanted.
And because of Earwig’s strength of character in getting her own way at the orphanage she’s in no hurry whatsoever to get adopted. So when a rather strange couple of individuals choose her she’s very unhappy, but also extremely fascinated: Bella Yaga is a witch and Mandrake a rather sinister magician.
However, instead of learning how to create spells as hoped she’s expected to be a skivvy for Bella, who only adopted her “because I need another pair of hands� for the housework and chores. Luckily she finds an accomplice in Thomas, the put-upon feline ‘familiar� needed for Bella’s witchcraft, and she sets about getting exactly what she wants out of the curious ménage.
Should we really be rooting for a feisty young girl determined to get her own way using every underhand method she can muster? Surely the reader should be expecting a compliant young miss to be the role model this seeming fable demands?
But no, for this is Diana Wynne Jones asserting her inner child, righting the wrongs of her own childhood when she was constantly told “You haven’t got it in you� when she expressed her ambition to be a writer. Earwig does have it in her to be mistress of her own fate and woe betide Bella the taskmaster and the Mandrake (who “mustn’t be disturbed� but very much is) if they set out to thwart her.
Earwig and the Witch feels as if the author, who often had ‘witchy� experiences visited on her, was expressing in fictional form the fulfilment of a childhood wish; so that while we may have fears for the headstrong young witch there’s no doubt that the reader will be rooting for her....more
Eric was nearly in tears. ‘But it said her face launched a thousand ships—� ‘That’s what you call metaphor,� said Rincewind. ‘Lying,� the sergeant explai
Eric was nearly in tears. ‘But it said her face launched a thousand ships—� ‘That’s what you call metaphor,� said Rincewind. ‘Lying,� the sergeant explained, kindly.
There is a literary trend for modern writers to take an old plot � it could be by Homer, Shakespeare, Dickens, Shelley, Austen or whoever, all are grist to the mill � and reprise it in a form attuned to contemporary tastes and expectations. Pratchett of course did this back in 1990 with Eric, his take on Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe, and early editions of his novella made this debt clear with 'Faust' crossed out and replaced by its assigned title.
But � this being Pratchett and his setting being the Discworld � can the reader really expect Eric to be merely a slavish rerun of the motif of selling your soul to the devil in return for three wishes! Perish the thought! Standing in for Mesphistophes and Faust are two of the most unlikely denizens of Discworld and, as is his wont, the author’s substitutes will discover that nothing can be taken for granted.
Also, given Pratchett’s penchant for holding a mirror up to Nature (in this case, the modern world), here we have a broad satire on the growing trend in the 1980s to mould every aspect of daily life to fit � however awkwardly or inappropriately � a soulless business template.
‘I want mastery of the kingdoms of the world, I want to meet the most beautiful woman who has ever lived, and I want to live for ever.� He gave Rincewind an encouraging look. ‘And I want a chest full of gold, too. Just to be going on with.�
Rincewind is a not entirely competent wizard on Discworld but apparently � as his name implies � is very good at sprinting away from trouble. However, he has now found himself in a magical bind, mistakenly conjured into a magic circle by an incompetent demonologist, Eric. Rincewind at first thinks Eric is a greedy old man, and Eric thinks Rincewind is a deeply disappointing demon who must do his bidding by granting him wishes. Both are wrong.
And both will need to be undeceived, and the sooner the better. In pursuit of riches, earthly kingdoms, the paragon of beauty and eternal life, Eric will have to learn that hard lesson � ‘Be careful what you wish for� � and Rincewind will frequently have to give a practical demonstration of how to run as fast as the wind to avoid a life cut short. Luckily there’s always the chance that Rincewind’s renowned Luggage may present itself as the cavalry that reputedly always arrives in the nick of time so as to extricate him and the hapless Eric from potential danger.
You will remember that in the Faust legend the good Doctor is usually carted off to Inferno. Hell � or, as we ought to call it, Pandemonium, from the multiplicity of devils residing there � is, to the general dismay of its denizens, being initiated into the requirements of good business practice by the Demon King, who has clearly been to some business school. Anyone from late 20th-century institutions such as schools may remember the drive to run them almost as industrial enterprises or factories, complete with mission statements, clearly formulated goals and aims, and carefully costed management plans. Such a, well, hellish overhaul seems to be going down like a lead balloon with all but Hell’s CEO, er, the Demon King.
Despite its brevity Eric fulfils all the requirements of a Discworld novel � parody, satiric commentary, literary legerdemain, footnotes (of course), even a walk-on part for Death. Throw in hints of the Odyssey, Aztec human sacrifices and trouble in Purgatory and the stage is set for Rincewind to show what he is and isn’t made of: as well as skill in running away he can, for example “shout ‘help!� in fourteen languages and scream for mercy in a further twelve�.
One can only hope that he and Eric are able to return back down the road to Hell which, according with tradition, is indeed here paved with Good Intentions....more
‘From now on, I must draw the danger towards me. As always, I am Your servant. Do with me what You will.� � Chapter 19. Suspicion. Betrayal. Paranoia. ‘From now on, I must draw the danger towards me. As always, I am Your servant. Do with me what You will.� � Chapter 19. Suspicion. Betrayal. Paranoia. When matters spin away and out of your control who can you trust? Friends, colleagues, or total strangers? Yourself, when your own actions, facial expressions or unguarded words may reveal what you must hide? Or, if you are religious, God?
We are in an unnamed Eastern bloc country in the late 1980s during the Cold War, at a moment in time when the Catholic Church and State have reached an understanding: if religion doesn’t stray into politics, the political apparatus won’t interfere in religious matters. But, worryingly, that won’t do for certain people, who are prepared to take matters into their own hands.
In a few days pilgrims will be making their way to a church ceremony to commemorate a couple of hundred Catholics who’d been martyred there two centuries before; and only now are whispers emerging of agitators planning to hijack the service to issue a clarion call for a strike and civil disobedience. But the first that Cardinal Stephen Bem becomes aware of the dangerous crossroads the country has arrived at is when there’s an attempt on his life.
In fact the narrative is bookended by two assassination attempts and the first, against Bem, dramatically occurs within a few paragraphs after the novel’s start. This is alarming enough but then, back in his Cardinal’s palace recovering from the shock, Bem is taken into what some ‘raincoats� � members of the Security Police � call protective custody and placed in a former agricultural college miles from the country’s capital. This is when he begins to have doubts about whom he can trust: are, for example, the ‘raincoats� actually the SP they claim to be?
We see all that’s played out from Bem’s viewpoint, so it’s not difficult to buy into his suspicions that not only perfect strangers may be agents promoting instability, even revolution, but also clergy and even close confidants and those within his staff. Whom can he call on for help as he goes on the run � parish priests, union leaders, even former school friends now in government? As for what the colour of blood represents it can be the shade of red that Cardinals wear, the revolutionary shade on the Red Flag, or the colour of priestly vestments worn to commemorate martyrs � or indeed all three.
The author has, in Cardinal Bem, created an extremely sympathetic character, one whom we implicitly feel we could trust even if we don’t share his religious beliefs. He is a moderate in all senses of the word, and circumspect in his dealings, but you soon sense that in helping establish a working relationship with the communist authorities to allow freedom of worship he has not satisfied more radical elements in the Church. So, between Security Police, the army, a shadowy group called Christian Fighters and certain rogue elements Bem has to use all his wits to stand his ground while still negotiating dangerous paths.
In 1946 the author worked in Poland with the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, visiting Warsaw and Gdynia; decades later he clearly kept an interest in current events there, especially in terms of the friction between Catholicism and the government, and between the authorities and the unions, especially Solidarność (‘Solidarity�). It has been suggested that the protagonist here was inspired by the figure of Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński, a thorn in the flesh of the communist regime, but of course the story of Stephen Bem is not that of Stefan Wyszyński.
This is a satisfying novel in that it works on so many levels: it’s a suspenseful tale of cat and mouse but also a political thriller; it contrasts realpolitik with terrorism as a cynical denial of humanity; and it’s a portrait of an honest, upright churchman with a pastoral calling who finds himself forced at times to dissemble, a man who comes to realise how vulnerable each person is in the face of uncertainty, especially when he’s regarded as a kind of scapegoat.
One might think that its being shortlisted for the Booker Prize was merely because it reflected political events in the 1980s; in truth it’s just as relevant now when selfish individuals are engineering chaos to garner more resources and power for themselves....more
Much of Táin Bó Cúailnge � often called, simply, The Táin and anglicised as ‘The Cattle Raid of Cooley� � first began to appear in 12th-century manuscMuch of Táin Bó Cúailnge � often called, simply, The Táin and anglicised as ‘The Cattle Raid of Cooley� � first began to appear in 12th-century manuscripts in Old Irish, a form of Gaelic which flourished from the 7th to the 9th century CE. Thus the main action of this epic tale, part of the Ulster Cycle, predates the 600s and could refer to supposed events occurring a few centuries earlier, during Ireland’s Iron Age.
But this is no documentary history: much of the narrative is patently mythical, involving gods and demigods, impossible deeds and reported speech. Yet the action ranges across the four provinces of Ireland � Connacht, Leinster, Munster and Ulster � and much of the movement of individuals and armies can be traced on a map, giving the tales a semblance of true history.
Above all, this is a story of human emotions and actions on a grand scale � faithfulness, jealousy, compassion, ruthlessness, diplomacy, battle frenzy, boastfulness, vendetta and more � committed by larger than life individuals. We may not always understand or approve what they do but nevertheless it’s hard for the modern reader not to respond to the tragic consequences of dubious decisions made and rash acts carried out.
Note, I am no scholar of these texts, nor of Irish history; I can only report on my reactions on reading this translation and the editorial methods followed by Thomas Kinsella. I had previously read Rosemary Sutcliff’s 1963 novel The Hound of Ulster, a modern rendition of Ulster hero Cú Chulainn’s story, so the general outline of The Táin narrative was familiar to me; but its episodic nature, the inclusion of verse forms improvised by key characters, various toponymic excursions and the folkloric nature of many anecdotes all give a flavour of how the epic may have been narrated more than a modern iteration in novel form can.
And now you’ll be wondering if I’ll ever get on to what the epic is really about. In essence this is the story of how Queen Medb of Connacht, desperate for equality with her husband Ailill’s ownership of goods, covets the Bull owned by Ulster’s king Conchobar, and how when thwarted she raises an army drawn from the four provinces to take the Bull by force. But the Ulster warriors are laid low because cursed by the ‘pangs� (childbirth? periods?) and are thus initially unable to oppose her; into the breach steps young Sétanta � otherwise known as Cú Chulainn � to show off his extraordinary prowess and to almost singlehandedly defeat the best that Medb can throw against him.
But there is more to The Táin than an ancient Hibernian cattle raid, and it’s made more complex by what buttresses it and what might to our minds seem like superfluous excrescences: there are digressions, backstories, pauses for poetry, and explanations of how a natural feature got its name. These however all add to a Homeric doom-laden atmosphere; just like Achilles in The Iliad (whose story Cú Chulainn’s most resembles) the beardless youth is desperate for everlasting fame even if it means (as it undoubtedly will) a short but glorious life.
Though it makes me fearful of the film industry making a hash of The Táin I’m not the first to see in Cú Chulainn the archetypal superhero achieving superhuman feats against impossible odds; but his is a tragic end, slain by magical means after falling foul of Morrigan, the goddess whose advances he rejects and who appears in the form of the raven and perches on his shoulder in his final hour; surely Hollywood couldn’t mess up this ending? Unfortunately the complicated relationships, the folkloric duplication of deeds and the profound psychological portraits would probably defeat any studio that took on the project, though the whole might work well as a graphic novel series (and maybe even already has).
Kinsella’s translation tries to clarify the several medieval sources he uses while giving us a readable text � in fact, after the confusing patchwork of tales that form a preamble to the expedition itself the rest reads almost as a good novel should with the action drawing the reader along. His introduction and notes are supplemented by maps and hints on pronunciation, and the whole of this first edition is enlivened by Louis le Brocquy’s Rorschach-like ink blots that suggest the shapes of warriors, magical kine and, in one magnificent double page spread, armies in combat.
At the end of it all there can’t be many readers who aren’t both shaken and stirred by the intense actions they’ve witnessed, the extreme emotions � from generosity to wanton cruelty � vividly displayed, the imaginative touches like shapeshifting and Cú Chulainn’s body-morphing battle frenzy which we learn to almost take for granted. As a window onto the mindscape of the Irish Iron Age The Táin is a wondrous thing....more
“The Bell that is like y glwys yr angel ym mharadwys—the joy of the angels in Paradise—is returned; the Altar that is of a colour that no men can disc
“The Bell that is like y glwys yr angel ym mharadwys—the joy of the angels in Paradise—is returned; the Altar that is of a colour that no men can discern is returned, the Cup that came from Syon is returned, the ancient Offering is restored, the Three Saints have come back to the church of the tri sant, the Three Holy Fishermen are amongst us, and their net is full. Gogoniant, gogoniant—glory, glory!� � Chapter VII.
This novella, first published in instalments by the London Evening News and then in booklet form by the Faith Press in 1915, was � back in the early 1970s � my favourite fiction by Arthur Machen because it felt like a heartfelt response to the legend of the Holy Grail.
Like C S Lewis � who in 1963 wrote that he was “not a good enough Grailologist (to coin a dreadful word)� � I have nevertheless dabbled enough in grail research to know there’s no simple answer to the question “What is the Holy Grail?� But I did at least recognise that Machen felt that as a symbol the grail spoke profoundly to him.
And as a symbol its inherent ambiguity also reflected his own position: in a country of nonconformist chapel-goers he was an Anglo-Catholic from Monmouthshire � then often seen as an English county though officially in Wales. Still, he retained a sense of hiraeth, a yearning or nostalgia for the land of his birth, even when self-exiled as both journalist and author in London. And that ambiguity suffuses The Great Return and, indeed, much of his writing.
“It is my opinion, then, that the Legend of the Grail as it may be collected from the various Romances, is the glorified version of early Celtic Sacramental Legends, which legends had been married to certain elements of pre-Christian myth and folk-lore.� � ‘The Secret of the Sangraal� (1925), essay by Arthur Machen.
The opening section, ‘The Rumour of the Marvellous�, sets the scene: the narrator, Machen himself, offers us a fine example of fictional reportage when he quotes a national newspaper clipping describing “remarkable occurrences� which are “supposed to have taken place during the recent Revival� in the West Wales coastal town of Llantrisant, though it reports “the lights have not been observed lately.�
What exactly does this brief notice allude to? German seaborne activity? The aurora borealis? ‘Odours of Paradise� supplies more details when the writer visits Llantrisant church in August 1915: there is a lingering smell of incense in the austere building, and Machen overhears a conversation on the town beach in which references to made to odd prayers being made in private homes. Further research, recounted in ‘A Secret in a Secret Place�, reveals individuals whose illuminated faces are “glowing with an ineffable joy�, ancient feuds which had been resolved without rancour, and reports of strangers in Llantrisant who were called “the Fishermen�.
‘The Ringing of the Bell� and ‘Olwen’s Dream� deepen the mystery of Llantrisant’s wonders, with people hearing sweet tolling of bells and the consumptive-stricken teen Olwen Phillips restored to life and health from the sound. And what of ‘The Rose of Fire� which, during the nine days or so of these strange happenings in June 1915, was either witnessed or hallucinated by a great many people? This was the “red light� on the sea seen by sailors which rushed towards the Chapel of St Teilo on the headland where, on the following Sunday in early June, the congregation were present at an unprecedented service, when three figures emerged from the sanctuary door:
These three were in dyed vesture, red as blood. One stood before two, looking to the west, and he rang the bell. And they say that all the birds of the wood, and all the waters of the sea, and all the leaves of the wood, and all the winds of the high rocks uttered their voices with the ringing of the bell.
The second held up the lost altar that they once called Sapphirus, which was like the changing of the sea and of the sky, and like the immixture of gold and silver.
And the third heaved up high over the altar a cup that was red with burning and the blood of the offering.
Machen the grailologist (who confesses he has “an appetite for these matters�) suspects that Olwen’s dream, and the unorthodox service in the church, and all that led up to it, points to just one outcome: the Mass of the Sangraal. And he gives us lots of antiquarian hints that the bell, portable altar and cup are still remembered in folk tradition � in Teilo’s bell, the altar described by William of Malmesbury, and the Tregaron or Nanteos cup.
Is it all pure fiction? Not quite, for more than a century later we can easily discern Machen’s inspirations. The medieval Book of Llandaf has this passage (here translated from the Latin by J Gwenogfryn Evans):
To Blessed Teilo, the Pontifex, was given not the least of the gifts, a Bell more famous than great, more precious than beautiful, for in sweetness of sound it seemed to excel every organ; it condemned the perjured, it healed the sick, and what is far more wonderful, it kept sounding every hour without being moved until, by the rash and constant handling of sinful men, it ceased from its sweet services.
The healing cup of Nanteos still exists, of course, but Machen deliberately confounds it with the Holy Grail variously described in medieval romances as a platter, a stone, or a chalice. Where else did Machen derive his ideas from? Was it from reports of blue lights seen over Pwllheli and the Dysynni Estuary in 1877? Or from reports of the preacher Mary Jones who formed the focus of a religious Revival movement at a chapel in Egryn, between Barmouth and Harlech in the early 1900s?
For around this time a huge “aurora arc of light� was reported, stretching from the mountains of Snowdonia into the Irish Sea, and this was followed by “lights� associated with Mary Jones, beginning in 1904 and reaching its zenith in 1905 as the religious Revival movement reached its peak.
Between 1903 and 1906 eight earthquakes were experienced in northwest Wales, associated with the Aber-Dinlle geological fault, and it’s faintly possible that associated phenomena such as ball lightning occurred because London journalists were soon sending back reports of balls of lights around the chapel and in the vicinity of Jones: these were described as strange lights “coming together with a loud clap� at Pensarn, Abergele, a “blood-red light a foot above the ground� near Egryn Chapel, “a ball of fire [with an] intense yellow brilliance� at Egryn Chapel and “light radiating a brilliant luminosity� over a road on the east-entrance to Barmouth.
It’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that Machen, who was otherwise suspicious of nonconformist fervour, took the phenomena witnessed at the Egryn Chapel Revival and conflated it with more mystical and ritualistic grail legends to create his ‘report� of strange happenings during the first full year of the Great War. But this conflation, I believe, is not what gives The Great Return its potency as a narrative: at a time when newspapers regularly included short fiction in their pages Machen’s episodic ‘reporting� of events at Llantrisant (seemingly only a train ride away from Pembroke) slowly builds up the sense of mystery before his ‘explanation� in a manner which must have thrilled regular readers reading each instalment side by side with the real news.
And what adds to the narrative potency are his descriptions, couched in almost biblical language, rendering the coast of Wales as a kind of Earthly Paradise:
A land that seemed to be in a holy, happy dream, a sea that changed all the while from olivine to emerald, from sapphire to amethyst, that washed in white foam at the bases of the firm, grey rocks, and about the huge crimson bastions that hid the western bays, and inlets of the waters; to this land I came, and to hollows that were purple and odorous with wild thyme, wonderful with many tiny, exquisite flowers.
‘For there is no friend like a sister In calm or stormy weather…�
For shade you need light, else all will be utter darkness. So it proves for the villag
‘For there is no friend like a sister In calm or stormy weather…�
For shade you need light, else all will be utter darkness. So it proves for the village of Cwmcysgod, the name of which could be translated as ‘shady coombe or shadowy dale�. For dark deeds have occurred here, on which light will finally be shone years later; and it all begins with arson and a grass fire.
Set in the South Wales valleys, this novella is beautifully written despite its sombre themes � jealousy, agoraphobia, substance abuse, criminality and, distressingly, more � with the eye of its omniscient narrator roving over the thoughts and actions of key players through successive short chapters.
And, as is the way of the world, outcomes for those players are a mix of the fortunate and the unfortunate, though not always in the way they might deserve given how they’ve behaved.
Who is Rosalind Bone exactly? The sister of the rather plainer Mary Bone, she disappeared from Cwmcysgod in 1978 just after a pit disaster in which, along with a number of other men, their father died; it’s said she went off to model in London. But how does that explain why, in 2001, Mary refuses to leave her home, sending daughter Catrin out when things are needed? Also, why does she keep a photograph of Rosalind hidden in a kitchen drawer?
And Catrin, how is she coping? She has her sketch book, but no friends to speak of. She once used to be friends with Daniel Clements in primary school, but now he spends his time out of school with his ne’er-do-well brother Shane and his druggie friends, getting up to mischief and arson.
Then there’s old Mrs Williams at the village shop � now she’s a rum person, her � and creepy Dai Bevel who has an eye for very young pretty girls but is steadily dementing alone in his house, and the Witch who’s rumoured to live in the hillside woods overlooking Cwmcysgod, situated somewhere (we surmise) between the Taff and Rhymney valleys. How do all these individuals relate to or impact on each other, and what is the strain that comes from living in a community of gossips, among neighbours who are strangers, in families with secrets they won’t share?
The Unbroken Beauty of Rosalind Bone is a taut, intense novella which packs a lot in a few pages by excising all but essentials. As well as telling the lives of individuals, whose fates we really want to know about, it is a lament for scattered communities built on an industry which no longer exists, communities whose proud memories of past toil and disasters cannot efface the knowledge that an uncertain future, without hope and lacking direction, is what stretches out in front of them.
Ultimately, though, this is a tale about sisters, once close, then estranged. Can these female siblings ever find and support each other again? The author keeps us guessing.
“For there is no friend like a sister In calm or stormy weather; To cheer one on the tedious way, To fetch one if one goes astray, To lift one if one totters down, To strengthen whilst one stands.� � Christina Rossetti, ‘Goblin Market�.
What a school student thinks is the body of a sheep on a hillside in the Cambrian Mountains turns out to be nothing of the sort. Scant months after DeWhat a school student thinks is the body of a sheep on a hillside in the Cambrian Mountains turns out to be nothing of the sort. Scant months after Detective Sergeant Julie Kite transferred from Manchester to Mid Wales she finds herself investigating a second death in the Elan Valley.
But then the emaciated body of the supposed young man is confirmed by forensics as other than expected, with murder strongly suspected, and so Julie and her colleagues have a conundrum on their hands: what’s the victim’s identity, how did they get to such an isolated spot in the hills as summer gets into its stride, and if it’s indeed murder what was the motive?
Yet though this crime mystery sits firmly and squarely in the police procedural subgenre, Rather to be Pitied is so much more than a collection of clues for readers to pit their wits against. As with Remember No More, the author’s previous novel in the series, we continue to be invested in DS Kite’s life, wondering whether she and her partner will still manage the move from an English urban existence to Welsh rural life.
There are several strands here for the reader to keep tabs on. One relates to whether Julie continues to feel a fish out of water, with new colleagues, ‘unpronounceable� Welsh placenames and scattered communities. Next is the issue of Adam’s old flame back in Manchester and what connection, if any, she has with a break-in at the home of Julie’s parents. And third is the resentment of a detective constable who’s failed his sergeant’s exam against incomer Julie.
But foremost is the patient sleuthing required with not only identifying the body found near the ancient Monks Trod long distance route by the Elan Bridge but also with locating other persons of interest. Visits by Julie to Preston, Blackpool and Rhyader reveal that a number of people Mid Wales Police want to interview have each done a disappearing act: the partner of the deceased, one of the couple’s neighbours, the couple’s young child, and the husband of a B&B landlady in Rhyader. Getting answers to how they’re all connected will not be an overnight job.
This I found to be an absorbing read for several reasons. The author is good at making individuals on the page feel real: not just DS Kite herself but also her husband Adam, a supply teacher who happens to be on a health kick; there’s one of Julie’s old Manc colleagues but also her current boss DI Swift (who, we suspect, is physically not as well as he would have everyone believe); and there’s police pathologist Dr Kay Greenhalgh who, despite hailing from the ‘wrong� side of the Pennines, is the professional she may have the most respect for.
And then we have a strong sense of place: in this area of Central Wales, the heart of Powys and just over the border in Ceredigion, there are recognisable locations (Rhyader, Llandrindod Wells, Llanidloes, the Elan Valley reservoirs), impressively named villages (Pontrhydfendigaid), and the spartan beauty of the Cambrian Mountains. And though we know this is fiction � for there is no Mid Wales police force, just Dyfed Powys Police � it’s very easy to buy into Jan Newton’s Wales as being closely aligned to reality.
As for the crimes, for indeed there’s more than one, the author orchestrates them all very well; given the characters involved, some weak, some traumatised and some driven by an implacable force, it doesn’t strain credulity to accept the manner in which they were committed, either casually or brutally; but whether we will have pity for them is another matter.
So how is Julie adapting to life in Cymru? Pretty well, it seems; and though as yet there’s no sign of a third DS Kite Mystery appearing imminently I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that, like her creator, she has not only acclimatised but is now embedded in life there....more
The title really tells you all you need to know about this novella, really two related novelettes combined: it’s set largely in a Japanese used bookstThe title really tells you all you need to know about this novella, really two related novelettes combined: it’s set largely in a Japanese used bookstore in the first decade of the 21st century and involves the people who are connected to it. Takako the narrator is a young woman in her twenties, disappointed in love, jobless as a result, who is invited to stay in a room above the secondhand bookshop by the owner, her uncle Satoru Morisaki. He’s persuasive and, in the final analysis, what has she got to lose?
Part One describes how, little by little, the previously listless and directionless Takako comes to discover a love of modern Japanese fiction, an affection for her idiosyncratic uncle, and the delights of the Tokyo district known as Jinbōchō Book Town. Here she meets and makes new friends, especially from what becomes her favourite café. As she tells us on the first page, ‘The Morisaki Bookshop is precious to me. It’s a place I know I know I’ll never forget.�
But there is a tinge of sadness. How does she feel about her former boyfriend who had suddenly announced he was getting married to someone else? And why is her uncle Satoru reluctant to talk about his former wife Momoko, who left him without warning five years previously? Will we ever know if there will be a resolution?
I thought this was a sweet story of two halves, the first describing how books and an eccentric relative saved Takako from feeling lost and rudderless, the second exploring her uncle’s history and the place filled by Momoko before she inexplicably upped sticks and left him. For both Takako and Satoru abandonment seems to be the theme here, and how it brings about the mixed and confusing feelings which arise after being left without prior warning.
For bibliophiles too there’s the additional draw of a novel which has the protagonist living in a room cocooned by piles of books above a well-stocked secondhand bookshop: can there be a more idyllic setting? And when one needs more than just books to comfort oneself, who could ask for more than being in a famous neighbourhood full of coffee shops and used bookstores where one could meet other literary-minded people and form new relationships?
But comfort is most needed when there is hurt, and no sooner does Takako find equanimity and purpose than Satoru is thrown into disarray. While there are some answers to account for his distress, Takako has to go on a “girls� trip� to gain a deeper understanding, and there will be at least two other relationships with which she will become closely acquainted.
Eric Ozawa’s translation feels workmanlike, suggesting a Japanese text that’s told factually with few literary frills. I’m sure for Japanese readers the litany of modern Japanese novels and their authors name-checked throughout the narrative will affect them more profoundly than it will a Western audience, but as a recommended reading list I guess it’s a good place to start for those like me interested in exploring the Japanese canon.
For readers simply wanting to know what happened next to Takako, her family and her newfound friends, it’s good to know More Days at the Morisaki Bookshop, originally published in 2011, was finally made available in an English translation in 2024. I wonder if there’s more about the worry that its predecessor hinted at, the existential threat all bookshops face from societal changes and shifts in leisure habits?...more
The Robinsons lived in Headstone, an industrial town about 150 miles north of London. There were five of them: father, mother and three children.
With
The Robinsons lived in Headstone, an industrial town about 150 miles north of London. There were five of them: father, mother and three children.
With this innocuous beginning the author of the famous Shoes sequence of children’s fiction initiated a quartet of books featuring a family bursting with talents in the performing arts who are joined by the children’s cousin Gemma, their maternal aunt’s daughter.
Less Swiss Family Robinson but not quite Von Trapp family, the Headstone Robinsons in their terraced house will seem a massive comedown for young Gemma Bow, star of TV serials and films; the eleven-year-old is virtually foisted onto the Robinsons when her mother Rowena gets a contract to work for a film studio in the States.
How will Gemma get on with her uncle and aunt � Philip and Alice � and what will siblings Ann, Lydia and Robin make of her? What exactly is distressing her about joining the local comprehensive school, and will her fears about this provincial town turning out really dull prove well founded?
As a talented child actor Gemma was in demand for various screen roles, just as her mother Rowena was. Cosseted by film and TV production staff, with a tame governess tutoring and chaperoning her, Gemma was doing well � much as Hayley Mills did in the early sixties in films like The Parent Trap and Pollyanna. That is, she was riding high until her mother was spotted starring in a British TV serial by Hollywood and lured across the Atlantic, and Gemma has to be left behind.
As well as feelings of abandonment and the fear of future media success now eluding her, Gemma has anxieties about being recognised and taunted for her apparent comedown � especially in Headstone, a name perhaps signifying the graveyard of her ambitions. And what a comedown for a star, to end up in a terraced house in a nondescript street after the luxuries of her previous lifestyle!
However, despite its title, Gemma is as much about the Robinson family as it is about the child star. The father Philip has had his own comedown, having to retire as a first violin in the town’s prestigious orchestra because of rheumatism, and mother Alice has taken a part-time job to help keep the wolf from the door. Meanwhile the children have budding talents seeking nurture � Ann who is an asset to any choir she is part of, Lydia with the promise of being a gifted dancer, and Robin who hopes to gain a choral scholarship to a music school.
This feelgood novel, superficially a Cinderella story, is made richer by all the main characters having some foibles mixed in with each individual’s forte: nobody is absolutely perfect (though Alice, the sister of self-centred Rowena, approaches this state) but all feel like rounded human beings, complete with their own lives. Still, our attention is ever drawn to Gemma � how solutions to disguise her true identity are found, how opportunities present themselves for her to shine without the baggage of fame, and how she has to screw up her fears and behave authentically instead of merely acting out roles.
How does Streatfeild make her characters more than just cut-out figures in a toy theatre? By doing what every author worth their salt does, investing a bit of themselves in their creations. For example, Gemma gets into trouble for clandestinely arranging for a school jotter to be passed around during lessons for students to continue a story about Launcelot Panther, a daring spy. To get her own back she finds it easy, “trained in the use of words and inflections, to bait the teachers with answers which sounded harmless but could also be read as rude.�
This act of rebellion was inspired by an incident which took place when Streatfeild attended Hastings and St. Leonard’s Ladies� College: here she’d produced a class magazine which was then banned by the headmistress, so young Noel’s response was to found the Little Grey Bows Society, the aim of which was to be rude to teachers. Is it mere coincidence that Gemma Bow, whose surname was the same as Hollywood legend Clara Bow (who’d died as recently as 1965), also happens to echo the name of the Little Grey Bows Society?¹
Will Gemma eventually find personal equanimity as well as legitimate outlets for her acting talents on the public stage? This is what one hopes for by the end of this novel, but this won’t be the end of the story for Gemma and her cousins: Gemma and Sisters was the first sequel, also published in 1968, followed in quick succession by two more, Gemma Alone and Good-Bye, Gemma the next year. One hopes they will be as charming and of their time as the first in the series. ___________________
¹ I drew the information about the Little Grey Bows Society from this online source: ...more
My cup runneth over. It went all down my trousers.
“Award-winning author of The Snowman� it says on the cover, but it could easily have added Father Ch
My cup runneth over. It went all down my trousers.
“Award-winning author of The Snowman� it says on the cover, but it could easily have added Father Christmas (1973), Fungus the Bogeyman (1977) and a few other Raymond Briggs titles which have delighted children of all ages.
But his graphic novels, distinctive and idiosyncratically British, have also included the more serious Ethel & Ernest (1998, loosely based on his parents� lives) and the dark and pessimistic When the Wind Blows (1982) in which Everyman and Everywoman Jim and Hilda Bloggs try to survive a nuclear attack launched by the Soviet Union.
What then is Notes from the Sofa? Touted as “his first book in a decade� it started life as a compilation of short pieces he wrote for 'The Oldie' magazine, enlarged two years later with additional material to 189 selected pieces newly illustrated in his familiar style. In keeping with the magazine’s editorial stance these occasionally have ‘grumpy old man� vibes, but there is more to them than mere curmudgeon.
Old age is another country; we do things differently here. � ‘Digitalis.�
Look, what can I say about this that isn’t vacuous and obvious? In this series of sketches Briggs comes across as a funny man � or at least someone to whom funny things happen � but he’s also serious at times, self-deprecating, and generally filled with what he calls ‘oldie angst�. Much of it is looking back to an age long gone (he was born in 1934, surviving to reach 88) so, for example, we have his experiences of being evacuated to the primitive cottage of a pair of aunts during World War 2, with reminiscences about the Cycling Touring Club towards the end of the war, then deferment from National Service long after the war and so fortunately missing combat in the Korean War.
But there are also humorous episodes aplenty: imitating David Hockney’s Yorkshire vowels in a restaurant without realising the Great Man was sitting behind him; hearing about how easy it was to get a private telephone landline in 60s America, unlike in the UK, and thus nearly becoming a free market Tory overnight; forming a bond with a random chicken that adopts him; keeping a wedge in his man-bag to stop café tables wobbling �
And then, the thoughts of Raymond (as his grandkids are encouraged call him) gradually progress from a gentle perspective of ironic nostalgia to one expressing full-blown perplexity: explaining pre-decimal coinage to uncomprehending school kids is one thing, realising that once customary practices like drink-driving used to be acceptable is altogether another. “What are we doing today that in twenty years time we will look back upon with disbelief, even disgust?� he observes with some wonder, while considering junk food, obesity and the cost to the nation.
But mostly he oscillates between the man shouting at the clouds in the middle of the high street to a modern Diogenes in his barrel philosophising on the ways of the world:
Dinner parties. God spare us. Did we ever do them, once upon a time? Yes, we did. Why? Did we really enjoy them? Or was it just a habit, an obligation, almost a duty? � ‘Socialising: why make a meal out of it?�
This is a book to dip into. Or maybe to read from cover to cover, but only three articles at a time every day (it would take you just over two months, or sixty-three days, this way). It’s something to keep by your bedside, perhaps, or for the guest room (if you still entertain visitors), or the shelf in the spare loo � though I don’t really recommend this last unhygienic practice.
Better still, leave it in your will to your grandchildren, great-nephews or great-nieces, as an insight into what obsessed an older generation, or as a dire warning of what’s yet to come for them....more
The language and content of Occidental fairytales varies according to the age in which they’re told: in ancient times they were closer to the myths thThe language and content of Occidental fairytales varies according to the age in which they’re told: in ancient times they were closer to the myths they overlapped, with divinities interacting with female warriors in chariots and shapeshifting magicians; in the medieval period there were knights in armour, damsels in distress and castles with beetling battlements.
And in the modern period tales of faërie and wonder and enchantment draw from these rich sources while adding contemporary touches, introducing the kinds of anachronistic details just as their antecedents always did.
So it is with Peter Beagle’s The Last Unicorn: here we have mythical beasts and a magician, a king and a prince, wastelands and a castle, but also one of the Pleiades out of Greek tradition, and snatches of songs and mentions of artefacts from our own recent history. On paper it shouldn’t work but yet it does, as all good fairytales should.
We begin with a unicorn existing outside of time, wandering in woodland, suddenly aware that she may be the last of her kind and then embarking on a quest to discover if the others still exist. This initiates a series of seemingly random episodes: she is captured by Mommy Fortuna who runs a travelling sideshow, and caged near Celaeno, a dangerous harpy; we see her on the run with an incompetent magician called Schmendrick (Yiddish for a fool); they encounter a band of merry outlaws in the greenwood and escape with Molly Grue; their ultimate destination is a wasteland dominated by the cursed castle of King Haggard, approached via the village of Hagsgate, all menaced by the nightmare known as the Red Bull.
It’s easy to feel disoriented with such a wandering plot, but yet also engaged by how this ragtag group of individuals find the resources to cope with the threats they encounter. And then who exactly is the villager Drinn, how is Prince Lír related to King Haggard, where does the Lady Amalthea come into the story, and is the unicorn really the last of its kind?
There’s so much that bit by bit impressed me, from the gradual coalescing of seemingly disparate episodes into the faint promise of a quest being achieved to the personal dilemmas facing individuals which leads to them doubting themselves. There were also passages full of wit and wisdom, and paragraphs of alliterative descriptions, and for the reader the satisfaction of learning of transformations attained and of mysteries resolved � though not always the way one expects.
Though I loved the sly but knowing way Beagle played with fantasy tropes � magic and mayhem, dragons and unicorns, damsels and knights, castles and caverns � my focus was fully on the characters. I relished the melancholy of Lady Amalthea (who shares a name with Zeus’s foster mother, seen as a nymph who sustained him with goat’s milk or even as the goat itself) somehow combined with the sadness of the unicorn who worries about being the last one ever while she muses on eternity and immortality. The haphazard nature of Schmendrick’s magic suggests the perennial figure of the itinerant Fool, but there’s an underestimated power within him, dormant most of the time, which has yet to show its full potential:
“Now I knew you for a unicorn when I first saw you, and I know that I am your friend. Yet you take me for a clown, or a clod, or a betrayer, and so I must be if you see me so.� � Chapter III.
I was most impressed by Molly, the most human of the players here and who is neither a magical being nor somehow deluded like the outlaw leader, or Prince Lír, or even the unsympathetic King Haggard. But our focus I guess must be on our unnamed mythical beast, filled with a doom-laden sense of malaise in her wood. How would each one of us feel if we feared there were no other human beings left or, if there were, worried where they had disappeared to? Were the rumours of a Red Bull and of the forbidding castle of King Haggard somehow related? And could the unicorn manage a cross-country trek to discover the truth, alone and unprotected?
The Last Unicorn was not quite what I expected but, by the end, it quite charmed and impressed me: the pseudo-medieval language is meant both ironically and sincerely, and the bits of doggerel verse that punctuate the prose occasionally reflect simple but profound truths, as in this rhyming couplet concealed in one of Schmendrick’s little speeches:
“We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream.� —Chapter III.
Like the mythical beast itself, a symbol of innocence, purity, hope and the extraordinary, The Last Unicorn doesn’t fail to fulfil its promise of otherness....more
Who’s this, creeping through the deepest part of a great forest, “so dim between the trees that it was as though twilight had already fallen�? Why, itWho’s this, creeping through the deepest part of a great forest, “so dim between the trees that it was as though twilight had already fallen�? Why, it’s Moomintroll and his mother, Moominmamma.
And why are they venturing through this strange wilderness with its glowing giant flowers, fearful of whom they might meet? They are searching for Moominpapa, whose wanderlust has taken him off to who knows where; and they are anxiously looking for a place where a house may be situated and where they may spend the winter hibernating.
For it is already August, and time is passing.
This, the very first of the Moomin tales –though not appearing in translation (here by David McDuff) until 2012 � introduces us to some of the core creatures in the series � Moomintroll of course but also his parents, the small animal later named Sniff, and the curious hattifatteners. We’re also given some hints as to the history of moomins, especially those whose natural habitat is around and in the stoves in human houses.
For this is the story of a quest to find security and shelter by a cosy fire by braving the dangers represented by dark forests, raging seas, floods and fearful beasts. Family, friendship and a generous spirit hugely matter in a world where external threat is ever present; in her introduction the author describes how this fairytale was conceived in 1939 � in the first months of the war � but not completed and published until the end was in sight, in 1945.
But this is no mere allegory, if allegory it is (and we may doubt that) for her mood had directed her towards writing a fairytale, though without the clichés usually associated with that genre. She focused instead on what she identified as “my angry signature character from the cartoons� which she’d drawn for the Finnish satirical magazine Garm and whom she now called Moomintroll; no longer angry, this troll figure with a big snout played the principal role in what was to become, initially at least, a child-centred series.
She acknowledges here the influence of Jules Verne’s In Search of the Castaways (or, as it first appeared in France, Les Enfants du capitaine Grant) with certain elements from Collodi’s Pinocchio, but the resulting narrative � faintly reminiscent of the Winnie the Pooh stories � has a darker, more melancholy strain than Milne’s offerings for all its apparent whimsy. So, even if Moomintroll’s new friend resembles Pooh bear’s piglet in looks and disposition, the search for a missing father and a home with a hearth is like nothing to be found in the Hundred Acre Wood: the threat from a giant serpent like Jörmungandr in the Midgard of Nordic myth, the ambiguous nature of the old gentleman in his Cockayne-like land of sweets, and the initially terrifying figures of the Hemulem and marabou stork strongly suggest that the world is a dangerous place for the innocent.
To balance these perils are unexpected delights like the flower fairy Tulippa, the boy in the glass tower, the cat and her litter of kittens, and of course Sniff (as he will later become known).
The undoubted delights of this book are the illustrations: the muted tones of the colour plates, some rendered as sepia, run counter to the notion that children only respond to images in dayglo colours, and the line drawings accentuate how harmless the Moomins are � even if it’s disconcerting to see mouths below what are evidently their noses instead of the snouts we now expect. It’s glorious too to see that Moominmamma’s handbag, furnished with a pair of spare socks, is already in evidence!
However, by the standards of the later entries in the series this is a very slight tale, which is why it’s usually labelled as a title only for completists. Nevertheless I’m pleased to have finally read it so I could appreciate the ideals of patience, kindness, perseverance and friendship that appear right from the very start, and to note the anxieties that characterise the psychologies of these creatures. I’ve long since learnt not to underestimate Jansson’s ability to celebrate humanity in the form of marshmallow hippopotami and their fellow creatures....more
But not so Sarah! Not so Sal! She was a most uncultured girl Who didn’t care a pinch of snuff For any literary stuff And gave the classics all a miss. Obse
But not so Sarah! Not so Sal! She was a most uncultured girl Who didn’t care a pinch of snuff For any literary stuff And gave the classics all a miss. Observe the consequence of this! � ‘Sarah Byng.�
Though nothing irks more than a fib will, Strike me down were I to quibble Or seek to start a heated quarrel Through damning stories with a Moral. And yet here’s Belloc (first name Hilaire) Belching Morals into still air; I, whose instinct’s first to curse, Am charmed by each improving verse.
His tales for children urge due caution Lest hard lessons should be learnt: You might prove the lion’s portion; Telling lies might get you burnt. Just in case you thought it funny, Slamming doors could be your death; Throwing stones could lose you money; Eating string can stop your breath.
Cease to be like Tom or Peter, Even Jim or wild Rebecca, Or Matilda (little cheater! Lying only served to wreck her). Unlike proud Godolphin Horne (Who lost his wealth, though manor-born) Charles Augustus Fortescue Got richer just by acting true.
Yet �
Blithe illiterate, Sarah Byng, Refusing to read anything, Believed in her “instinctive guess That liter-a-ture breeds distress�. Who knows that she may yet prove right, That printed matter just brings woes? Best avoid distress and fright: Heed not Mr Belloc’s prose!
I jest!
For you may sadly lose Menageries of funny creatures: Animals you may find in zoos Equipped with strangely silly features. Here are also Lords and Ladies, Each one equally a beast; Some are only fit for Hades; Many, thankfully, deceased.
Mr Belloc's wise, all-seeing: Couplets, quatrains are his gift. Animal or Human Being? He will give them all short shrift. You may think his rhyming verse Somewhat prejudiced � or worse, But, when all is said and done, One can’t deny it’s � mostly! � fun....more
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