A Work in Progress

The Mastery of Muriel Spark

I read The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark maybe eight or ten years ago.  I had little recollection of the story other than it was about a teacher who has a particular group of favorite students.  The novel was set in 1930s Edinburgh, and there was some significance of the Spanish Civil War and fascism to the story.  More than one Amazon reviewer has mentioned they believe this book would be lost on younger readers and one said on readers under the age of 40.  I don't entirely agree.  I do think that younger readers could appreciate Spark's work, but I can say that for myself I got much more out of the second reading than the first.  Perhaps this has something to do with life experience, but I did read it more carefully the second time and read some additional criticism after the fact as well. 

Despite the fact that The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is a slim 160 pages, she manages to tell a witty yet complex story.  Her novels can be read on more than one level.  There is indeed the story of a teacher and her particular group of favorite students, but there is also more than meets the eye to her stories as well.  Miss Jean Brodie from first appearances seems benign enough, but she turns out to be anything but.  Jean Brodie is a completely self absorbed character.  While she appears to want to impart knowledge into her students (or more the case "draw it out") really she wants to dictate to them what she believes to be important.  Maybe this is why she admired the fascists so much.  In the book she chooses six as her favorites--to be "the creme de la creme".  Really her choice is less decided upon by the characteristics of each girl and more upon the fact they come from families who won't question her methods.  From this group of girls one will eventually betray her.

I won't go into Spark's biography, but I do think it worth noting that in her mid-30s she converted to Catholicism.  She is quoted as saying "the reason I became a Catholic was because it explained me."  Prior to this she wrote only short stories, poetry and criticism.  After converting she began writing novels.  Religion seems to have played a great role in her work.  From the criticism I have read one of the big themes in her novels is "good vs. evil", and Dorothea Walker (Muriel Spark - Twayne's Author Series) even said "Brodie is a departure from explicit exploration of good and evil.  Miss Brodie is the embodiment of the demon become god."  I am not entirely sure I consider her a "demon become god", but she certainly was wrapped up in herself and quite manipulative of people and circumstances.  Maybe she was trying to play god.

I am not giving away many details here as I hate to spoil the book for anyone planning on reading it, and I daresay that my fellow Slaves of Golconda will perhaps be going into greater detail than I of the story itself.  I could literally write pages and pages on this book.  I had no idea that Spark was such an intricate writer.  Her style is different than the norm as well.  Early on she gives away who Jean Brodie's betrayer is.  She tends to jump back and forth in time giving you bits and pieces of information, and it is all slowly revealed to you.  It is all quite easy to understand, yet it is also very complicated as you ponder what her motivations are.  Sandy, her betrayer, is also a very complicated character and one of the more fleshed out characters next to Jean Brodie.

The Driver's Seat (possible spoilers in this section).

I chose The Driver's Seat as my "extra credit" reading.  It was a somewhat shocking and very dark book.  I am not sure it was the best choice for a second book to read compared to her other books.  Lise, a 30-ish single woman from a Northern country (I have read it is Sweden) goes on vacation to Italy.  You get the feeling that she is going looking for a man.  She is, but not exactly with the intentions you think.  Lise is one of the oddest characters I have met in literature.  Her behavior is erratic and unexplainable.  In a book by Judith Saxton called The Women of Muriel Spark  she describes Lise well:

"Nowhere in Muriel Spark's work is a character presented so remotely as Lise in The Driver's Seat.  Her behavior is never explained, merely described.  She has no clear intentions as far as the reader can make out.  Her feelings are never intimated; the reader can only make wild guesses at them, whilst trying to make sense of her erratic speeches and actions.  Her very inaccessibility is a disturbing yet compulsive feature of the narrative.  The style of the account is as bizarre as Lise herself; it is in the present tense, which emphasizes the narrator's detachment as each moment is carefully picked out without comment.  However, occasionally the tense leaps forward in the future, indicating a further alarming and inevitable dimension.  From the statements about what will happen the following day, it becomes clear that Lise will be murdered.  And it also becomes clear that she herself has all the time been wholly complicit in this event. "

Even after having read the book and criticism in addition, I still do not understand why she did what she did. I have read that this novel "confronts the problem of existence".  Lise seems to want not only to disappear, but she goes to extensive ends laying a trail of herself as well.  In the beginning of the novel she is described as living in an apartment where "everything is contrived to fold away into the dignity of unvarnished pinewood".  It is almost as if no one lives there.  Later when she is in the hotel she begins unpacking and hanging up her clothes, but then puts them back in the suitcase, once again as if not leaving a trace that she was there.  However she also seems to go to great lengths to make herself noticed.  She throws fits when buying clothes, talks loudly, makes scenes, leaves her passport in a cab.  She wants people to be able to piece together what has done or what was done to her.  Once again Spark gives away what is going to happen before it actually happens.  And while the story is playing out and she interacts with other characters and makes her necessary purchases you can just sense where all this is leading.  Even knowing the outcome I was still shocked at the end.

Muriel Spark was really an amazing author.  She manages to tell complex tales in such small amounts of space.  There are authors who can't tell a story with half the complexity in twice the amount of pages I think.  She is certainly an author deserving of more study!  I am looking farward to the discussion at the Metaxu Cafe and learning more about her other novels (which I hope to make my way through eventually).  Expect posts/comments from: Bookworm, Cam's Commentary, Kate's Book Blog (including visuals!), Necessary Acts of Devotion, Of Books and Bicycles, Pages Turned, So Many Books, and The Blog Jar.  Did I leave anyone out?  Let me know and I will add you.  It looks as though our group has been expanding, which makes for very interesting discussion!  One more little note--I have the film adaptation of the novel finally, which I hope to watch this weekend.  There is also one of The Driver's Seat which stars Elizabeth Taylor, which I am not sure I can get my hands on (and not sure I want to!).

The Reading Experience

I wish I could quote the entire essay by Adele Wiseman that I am reading, but I fear the publisher would frown upon that.  It is also about 30 pages, and that is way too much typing for me!  Much like when reading Nick Hornby's essays and I felt like he was inside my head....it is amazing how readers so often think alike!  Only Adele Wiseman says it so much better than I ever could!

"It seems pretty clear to me now that just as important as the specific books which affected me at particular times were the experiential impurities of the reading process, the mutual contamination of the lived life and the lived reading.  I have never been able to separate the act of reading from the acts of living.  Reading is experience.  I remember how it felt at different times, why I read what I read, what the reading meant to me, and what the books seemed to mean in relation to one another and to life.  I remember the circumstances, how I used the very act of reading, in different ways, as part of the inner politics of the conduct of my existence.  I avidly wanted to know, but I seldom read for intellectual information.  I had to feel what I was reading, know what I was feeling, feel my knowing.  I was never able to divorce myself from the emotional content of words and word combinations, the suggestions, the overtones, the balances, the ambiguities, the implications, the contradictions, as well as the direct, naked thrusts of meaning that drew blood of infinite varieties of comprehending protest, pain, and pleasure."

Memoirs of a Book Molesting Childhood, by Adele Wiseman

Edited: I intentionally posted something short and to the point tonight so I could work on my Slaves/Muriel Spark post for tomorrow.  Being the procrastinator I am, I have been reading blogs instead.  And now it is going on 10:00 p.m. and it is like homework all over again.  There is so much to think of with Spark's work, I don't even know where to begin.  Alas, in whatever form it takes, I will be posting on my two Muriel Spark reads tomorrow (at some point in the day anyway!).

More books I want to read...but where to find the time?

Do you aleady know about Book Sense?  If not you must go take a look at not only the June Picks but also at their Summer Paper Back Picks too.  I won't list all the titles I want here (there are too many).  Let's just suffice it to say, that my library requests list has just grown by a few titles.  I had put a stop to requesting library items (other than DVDs), as it got out of control.  I always have far too many library books than I have time to read them all.  But so much for self control.  No doubt they will all come in at once. 

Speaking of which (library books that is), this week's Newsweek reviewed Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise.  I started this book and was enjoying it before ILL books jumped ahead of the line.  Newsweek gave it a very good review.  As a matter of fact I have yet to read anything negative about it at all.  I am hoping to get back to it soon before it needs to go back to the library in July.  I have not forgotten about these books either.  Over the long  weekend I do hope to read Oroonoko by Aphra Behn.  It seems like the sort of book that is better read in one or two sittings rather than in fits and starts.  Although I want to start with the Behn book, I actually have several 18th novels in mind to read (see again this post) including the books as shown above.  These are the first part of two Amazon orders.  Okay, Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene is not 18th century (more like 100 years earlier), and I am not sure what exactly possessed me to buy it, but isn't it lovely?  I think the draw was the fact that Spenser wrote it in honor of Elizabeth I, and even though I haven't gotten around to reading any of the biographies I wanted to read, I am still in an Elizabeth I mood as the Elizabeth I exhibit begins at my public library today.  I plan on seeing it soon and hopefully going to the lecture series (first up this Saturday: "Wardrobes from Eleanor to Elizabeth").  I only hope that when I get around to reading it there is some sort of book that I can buy that will help me understand what I am reading!  Now the other two are recommendations from Dorothy who is very knowledgeable of this period of literature.  I couldn't decide between Pamela or Clarissa both by Samuel Richardson, so I got them both (more self control--okay--not).  And I have been enjoying Stefanie's posts as she makes her way through Clarissa.  How often do I say this?  I only wish I could read faster.

Another Reason to Love Your Library

Interlibrary loan.  Those are the secret words.  Am I the only one who is truly addicted to interlibrary loan?  Practically (and I do stress practically as there are always a few odd books that manage to elude my grasp) any book is at my fingertips with this wonderful service.  Working in a university library I receive the added benefit of getting nearly all these books on loan for free.  So when Kate S. mentioned the essay by Adele Wiseman (an unknown author to me previously) called "Memoirs of a Book Molesting Childhood" and she quoted some wonderful passages, I knew I had to find a copy.  None to be had in the state of Nebraska, but Bates College in Maine has so kindly loaned me their copy (and I promise to take good care of it and return it on time!).  It is sad that "One of Canada's leading fiction writers" as Adele Wiseman is described on the book blurb is someone I have never heard of.  Who else don't I know about?  I might have named this post "Another Reason to Love Litblogs"--just think of all the other undiscovered (by me anyway) authors there are out there...and thanks to those bloggers who introduce them to us!

A Good Dose of Muriel Spark

I am getting a good dose of Muriel Spark this weekend.  Yesterday I finished The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and today I started Spark's very slim (a smallish book with just over 100 pages) The Driver's Seat.  Spark is an interesting author and I am looking forward to the discussion that will start on Friday.  If you are reading along or have read her works you are welcome to join in on the discussion over at the Metaxu Cafe.  I did read some reviews of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.  It was interesting the variety of things readers had to say about her.  I will save my opinion and thoughts until Friday.  Several readers thought this was a book that readers who are older and with more experience would appreciate more than younger readers.  I'll have to think on that one as this is my second time reading it.   I think The Driver's Seat is going to prove as creepy as the book description says.  There is a quote by Spark on the back of the book--"I aim to startle as well as please."  I do not doubt that.  The description goes on to say that this is her most unnerving novel.  I chose it because it was already on my bookshelf. I guess I am off to be startled now!

The Further Adventures of Maisie Dobbs

I love Maisie Dobbs.  If you are at all interested in mysteries I highly recommend this series.  I have followed her from the very first, when she appeared in Maisie Dobbs.  The series is written by Jacqueline Winspear.  Winspear is originally from Britain, but she now lives here in the U.S.  Her mysteries are set in post-WWI London.  And Maisie is an unusual sleuth.  Like so many other women of this period, she lost her fiance to the War.  She herself was a nurse in France.  When she returns to London she sets up her own practice as an investigator, but the twist is that she is also a psychologist.  Messenger of Truth is the fourth installment and I can't wait to get started on this book (I do need to finish my Muriel Spark books and maybe something else, but I hope to begin reading next week!).   I was approached by a marketing/publicity company to read and review this book.  I have done this on a couple of occasions before.  While I don't make it a habit of reviewing books on my blog like this (I know there are bloggers who do like to do so, but I would start to feel like all my reading was 'obligation' reading), there was no way I could pass up a new Maisie Dobbs book!  If the book appeals to me and I would likely read it anyway, I am open to reviewing it on my blog.  The book came in the mail today--yay.  (Edited: this book will be released August 22 by the way.  I was sent an advance reader's copy to read)

I also picked up the current issue of O-The Oprah Magazine.  Thanks to Lotus Reads and So Many Books for the heads up on this Summer Reading issue!  Stefanie you are right--too many perfume ads, and that reading room has too many expensive accoutrements!!  I have started on the article "How to Read a Hard Book".  This is good timing as I prepare to begin War and Peace.  The first part of the article discusses Moby Dick, and the author is a professor at Bard College.  I like what he says: 

"(But) Moby-Dick wasn't meant to be a rigorous, depleting experience, a triathalon for the housebound.  It was meant to be a stimulant to thought and feeling;  it was meant to make your mind a more interesting and enjoyable place.  So if the prospect of reading Moby-Dick makes you feel even a little but daunted, try to get as close to that earlier reading experience (a shadowy anticipation of strangeness, wildness, and sadness) you can.  Get an unannotated edition with no introduction and no essays in the back. Clear your mind of exectations and open it to chapter one.  Listen with nothing more than ordinary human curiosity to the voice that begins speaking to you.

It's not as easy as it sounds.  Most Americans have been trained to revere the 'classics' and to think that the right way to read such books is to seek out their cleverly hidden meanings.  It can be surprisingly difficult to come to Moby-Dick with the kind of idle, flexible  interest that you bring to most of the other things you read.  But the secret to Moby-Dick is that there is no secret. Everything that matters is on the surface."

I think I am exactly the sort of person trying to find those "cleverly hidden meanings."  I probably avoided the "classics" for so long thinking I wouldn't be able to figure them out.  Of course no more, I am willing now to tackle (just about) anything.  Anyway, I am looking forward to reading all the other articles pertaining to books and reading.  Maybe I will find a few new titles to add to my list!

A Literary Family

Partially by chance and partially on purpose, I have accumulated a little stack of works by and about Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley.  I have been following the posts on Book World about Mary Wollstonecraft as well as chatting with a coworker who has read some of her works as well.  Add this to my recent interest in reading more (okay something) by 18th century authors, and how could I pass up these books?  I have started reading Claire Tomalin's The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft (for which she won the Whitbread Prize for first book).  I like the idea of working towards reading an author's work by first reading about the author.  I think this might be the first time I have done so.  I plan on reading A Vindication of the Rights of Woman after the biography.  There is also fictional account of Mary Wollstonecraft (that I forgot to add to the pile, but which I own) called Vindication by Frances Sherwood.  These are the books  I have chosen on purpose.  By chance I found The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein on the new book cart at work.  This is a biography of Mary Shelley and an account of her writing Frankenstein.  I have never read Frankenstein, but this would be the perfect time as a follow up.  I like how books can fit together like this, and you can get not only a sense of authors and their families but of the social times as well.

Translation, Please?

Do you think it matters which translation of a foreign novel you read?  Honestly I hadn't thought of this aspect of reading Tolstoy's War and Peace or any other novel translated into English for that matter.  I was all set to dig into my Modern Library edition when I started reading this post and particularly this post!  The translator for the ML edition is Constance Garnett, and apparently (quoting Amanda A. from her post--who read this in The New Yorker):

"Garnett translated over 70 volumes of Russian literature. She translated with rapidity and is known to have skipped words she was unfamiliar with and to also have grammatical and idiomatic errors and, at times, her writing would be unsmooth and lack polish. Nabokov was said to have loathed Garnett’s translations. In the article, Nabokov is quoted as calling Garnett’s Anna Karenina 'a complete disaster' and he also states that Americans were turned off by the Great Russian novels because they were 'reading Constance Garnett' rather than Tolstoy or Chekov."

Eeek.  Now what do I do?  My library has two other editions--translated by Rosemary Edmonds and Louise and Aylmer Maude.  A new translation by Anthony Briggs was published last year.  It is a pricey hardcover, and as I recently placed a couple of book orders there is no way I can afford this right now--despite all the five star reviews that Amazon readers have given it.  It is coming out in the fall in paper, but of course I am ready to read this now.  I guess it might boil down to getting a feel for how each version reads:

Garnett:

"Well, Prince, Genoa and Lucca are now no more than private estates of the Bonaparte family.  No, I warn you, that if you do not tell me we are at war, if you again allow yourself to palliate all the infamies and atrocities of this Antichrist (upon my word, I believe he is) I don't know you in the future, you are no longer my friend, no longer my faithful slave, as you say.  There, how do you do, how do you do?  I see I am scaring you, sit down and talk to me."

Edmonds:

"Eh Bien, mon prince, so Genoa and Lucca are now no more than private estates of the Bonaparte family.  No, I warn you--if you are not telling me that this means war, if you again allow yourself to condone all the infamies and atrocities perpetrated by the Antichrist (upon my word I believe he is the Antichrist), I don't know you in future.  You will no longer be a friend of mine, or my 'faithful slave', as you call yourself!  But how do you do, how do you do?  I see I'm scaring you. Sit down and talk to me."

Maude:

"Well, Prince, so Genoa and Lucca are now just family estates of the
Buonapartes. But I warn you, if you don't tell me that this means war,
if you still try to defend the infamies and horrors perpetrated by
that Antichrist--I really believe he is Antichrist--I will have
nothing more to do with you and you are no longer my friend, no longer
my 'faithful slave,' as you call yourself! But how do you do? I see
I have frightened you--sit down and tell me all the news."

And even though I can't afford it...Briggs:

"Well, Prince, Genoa and Lucca are now nothing more than estates taken over by the Buonaparte family. No, I give you fair warning. If you won't say this means war, if you will allow yourself to condone all the ghastly atrocities perpetrated by that Antichrist - yes, that's what I think he is - I shall disown you. You're no friend of mine - not the "faithful slave" you claim to be... . But how are you? How are you keeping? I can see I'm intimidating you. Do sit down and talk to me."

Essentially they all say the same thing--it is just a matter of word choice.  Some choices might just be a bit more clunky than others.  I am leaning towards the Maude translation (though I also really like the way the Briggs reads), but I will have to see what translation others in the group are reading.  There are other translations as well--but the first three I quoted are the easiest for me to get my hands on.  Now every time I choose to read a foreign author I will be worried about which translation to choose... 

First Impressions, or the joy of starting a new book

As I have finished Sixty Lights by Gail Jones, it is time to move on to other books that have been sitting on my nightstand.  The end of the month is quickly approaching (note: Slaves of Golconda posts due), so The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark was the first to go into the bookbag this morning.  I read this slim novel years ago, but I think it is quite worthy of a reread now.  It is amazing how much you forget.  Reading this book again I see how much I little I have remembered of the story!

"The boys, as they talked to the girls from Marcia Blaine School, stood on the far side of their bicycles holding the handlebars, which established a protective fence  of bicycles between the sexes, and the impression that at any moment the boys were likely to be away."

I have been impatient to crack open The Observations by Jane Harris, so it went into the bookbag next (yes, I do drag more than one book around with me--at least when I go to work--remember I have two bus rides, and a lunch break that must be covered!).  From the little I have read, I think I am going to like this one very much.  I do admit, however, that some of the British slang might be beyond me.  I have been able to figure out most by the context.  For example, "oxters"? "a quick skelly"? "gob was I"?  And here I thought we spoke the same language.  I do like when I get a sense of place, though, and you certainly get the idea of this being a very different time and place! 

"I had reason to leave Glasgow, this would have been about three four years ago, and I had been on the Great Road about five hours when I seen a track to the left and a sign that said 'Castle Haivers'.  Now there's a coincidence I thought to myself, because here was I on my way across Scratchland to have a look at the Edinburgh castle and perhaps get a job there and who knows marry a young nobleman or prince.  I was only 15 with a head full of sugar and I had a notion to work in a grand establishment."

Should I just jump right into Oroonoko by Aphra Behn, or do I read the introduction first?  This is always a problem with me.  I want to know background, but I hate to know too much about the narrative before I begin reading. I like the surprise element when I am discovering a new author or book.  Editors can be very bad sometimes about giving away important details, so I tend to wait until after I have read the book and then go back and read the introduction.  My library had the Norton Critical Edition, so there is an abundance of material to study on the text.  In any case, I think this will require careful reading.

"I do not pretend, in giving you the History of this Royal Slave, to entertain my Reader with the Adventures of a feign'd Hero, whose Life and Fortunes Fancy may manage at the Poet's Pleasure; nor in relating the Truth, design to adorn it with any Accidents, but such as arriv'd in earnest to him: And it shall come simply into the World, recommended by its own proper merits, and natural Intrigues; there being enough of Reality to support it, and to render it diverting, without the Addition of Invention."

Finally, sitting on the top of my nightstand pile is Dominic Smith's The Mercury Visions of Louis Daguerre.  I want to read this as a sort of follow up to Sixty Lights, as they both are set at about the same period and each deals in some way with the beginnings of photography.  I really love books that incorporate photography in some way--as odd as that may sound.

"When the vision came, he was in the bathtub.  After a decade of using mercury vapors to cure his photographic images, Louis Daguerre's mind had faltered--a pewter plate left too long in the sun.  But during his final lucid minutes on this cold evening of 1846, he felt a strange calm.  Outside, a light snow was falling and a vaporous blue dusk seemed to be rising out of the Seine.  The squatters had set fire to the barrens behind the Left Bank and the air was full of smoke.  Louis reclined in warm water perfumed with lemon skins, a tonic he believed to be good for his skin and nerves.  The wind gusted under the eaves.  He placed a hand against the adjacent window and from the bath, perched high in his rooftop belvedere, he felt the night pressing in against him.  His head was partially submerged and he heard the metallic click of the tenant's pipes below.  It was a message; he was sure of it.  The world was full of messages."

I know I have too many books on the go, but truly I can't help myself.  What do you do when they all sound so good and you simply can't put them down?

Filling in the Gaps

Lately there has been much discussion at  Of Books and Bicycles about 18th century literature.  As I am familiar primarily with 20th and some 19th (I seem to be reading more novels in this period at the moment) century literature, my interest has been (once again) piqued by this discussion.  I know in the past I have read some books by 18th century authors (I read Gulliver's Travels as well as a few other works by Swift in high school--surely there must be other things?), but I can't think of anything in the recent past that I have read, which was written in this time period. 

I have also been thinking of what I read and how I read (yes, I am a somewhat obssessive person at times, I admit...and lately on this topic) since I have been blogging.  Blogging about books has changed how I approach them to a certain degree.  While I will always read whatever sounds appealing to me and read books for pleasure, I do want to try and fill in the many gaps I have in my "reading education"--not sure really what to call it.  I wonder why or how I made it so far without, for example, ever having read Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird (which I finally did this year).  Last year I finally read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights by the Bronte Sisters.  These are wonderful books--there is a reason why they have endured so long in their popularity.  I have an idea of what I am missing now, which is why I have been so interested in "the classics" in the past couple of years.  I even found this timeline of English Literature (it is quite basic and many famous works have been left off, but just seeing the various periods helps me put things a bit more in perspective).

What this all boils down to is I have added a few more books to my TBR pile.  Thanks to Dorothy for her recommendations on good 18th century novels.  I want to start with Oroonoko by Aphra Behn.  Behn lived quite an interesting life.  Aside from the fact she earned her keep as a writer (considered the first woman to do so), she led a most interesting life (she was even a spy for Charles II).  Just by chance, when I was looking for essays in the lit section of my library, I came across two early American novels The Power of Sympathy and The Coquette by William Hill Brown and Hannah Webster Foster.  These are written in the epistolary form, which appears to be quite common for this period.  I also found in my own stacks, Susanna Rowson's Charlotte Temple, which per the book description was America's first "bona fide bestseller".  While Oroonoko was published in 1688, the three American novels are from later in the 1700s.  I am curious if all writing of this period is essentially morality tales.  Certainly the descriptions for the American novels makes them sound as though they are (thinking of those Puritans--perhaps it shouldn't be surprising).  Anyway, more adventures in reading...

Edited: I meant to mention in this post that it is interesting also to see the influence of a particular author on another author's work.  I am currently reading (and greatly enjoying) The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins.  One of the narrators, a servant in the household from which the Moonstone is stolen, finds Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe to be the most exceptional book he has ever read:

"I am not superstitious; I have read a heap of books in my time; I am a scholar in my own way. Though turned seventy, I possess an active memory, and legs to correspond. You are not to take it, if you please, as the saying of an ignorant man, when I express my opinion that such a book as ROBINSON CRUSOE never was written, and never will be written again. I have tried that book for years—generally in combination with a pipe of tobacco—and I have found it my friend in need in all the necessities of this mortal life. When my spirits are bad—ROBINSON CRUSOE. When I want advice—ROBINSON CRUSOE. In past times when my wife plagued me; in present times when I have had a drop too much—ROBINSON CRUSOE. I have worn out six stout ROBINSON CRUSOES with hard work in my service. On my lady's last birthday she gave me a seventh. I took a drop too much on the strength of it; and ROBINSON CRUSOE put me right again. Price four shillings and sixpence, bound in blue, with a picture into the bargain."

The editor of this edition of The Moonstone has gone into great deal discussing the many themes found in this book.  I am saving the introduction for after the novel, so I am looking forward to seeing how it all ties together.  I did glance at some of the Amazon reviews of this book, and I wonder if some of the negative ones have to do with applying 21st sensibilities to a book written in the 19th century?  And it would have been 18th century authors and works that Collins might be responding to or formed by.  I think it can be very helpful to know the context that a book was written in.  And I wonder if this may have an effect on the pleasure or dislike of a book?