A Work in Progress

Teaser Tuesday: Founding Gardeners

There was a time (and maybe not even so long ago) when I might have said something like, 'who would have thought a book on gardening could be such a page turner', but I have been reading some really good nature/gardening books in the last year or so, so I'm not in the least surprised that Andrea Wulf's Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature and the Shaping of the American Nation is so interesting.  I'm a happy convert (and was just yesterday thinking that I need to pick up another book by Roger Deakin to read) to this sort of book.  Even better as this combines nature, gardening and history. 

After hearing the author speak I had a feeling the book would be good, and I am most certainly finding this to be the case each time I dip into it.  Stefanie and I decided to read the book in tandem.  She wrote about it last week, so I thought I would chime in and add to her enthusiasm.  Wulf paints such a vivid portrait of the four 'founding gardeners'--George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and James Madison (I have yet to get to Madison and his garden in my reading) that she really brings the men and their times alive.  As silly as this sounds reading about them makes me sort of tingly.  As much as I might criticize the state of contemporary politics, I think there is truly much to admire about our Founding Fathers and the work they did to create our government. 

But it's not really the political that Wulf writes about, peripherally of course since it is the early 1780s and America was in its infancy (Washington had yet to take Office), rather it's about the private.  Washington, Jefferson, and Adams were all earnest gardeners and they considered themselves farmers first and politicians second.  Even while readying for battle, Washington was writing home to Mount Vernon about planting.  After the Revolution ended and Jefferson and Adams were ministers to France and England, Jefferson was planning his own garden at Monticello who along with Adams spent time touring the most famous English gardens.  For Washington his gardens were truly revolutionary as he designed them using only native species.  He changed their orientation from east to west--looking inwards to the vastness of America rather than across the pond, which was a departure from traditional Colonial gardens.

I'm barely a third of the way in (lots of dog-earing and pencil marking going on in my copy) and I have pages of notes that I would love to share.  There is so much to take in, I am reading fairly slowly, and I tend to lose time when I open the book and start reading.  Some of the most fascinating passages are those that describe the men themselves, one of which I thought would be fun to share since it is so personal.  I hate to admit that what I knew about the men (their personal lives anyway) might not fill a page torn from a notebook, but I plan on following this book up with others about the period and the 'players' (wives includes--especially the wives), as now I want to learn more.  What I like most about Wulf's book is the sense of intimacy she creates when talking about these larger-than-life personas. 

This is a bit longish, but I think you might get a kick out of it if you have an image already in mind of Jefferson and Adams.

"As Adams and Jefferson walked together through the gardens, they made an odd pair.  Where Jefferson was tall and thin, almost gangly, Adams was shorter and rounder--reputedly they had once been compared to a candlestick and a cannonball.  At six feet two and a half inches, Jefferson towered about seven inches over the stout Adams, who had put on so much weight that his wide pitied the poor horse that had to carry him.  Jefferson's powdered hair and elegant Parisian clothes gave him the air of a polished diplomat.  He accentuated his sophistication with striped silk waistcoats, starched ruffles and cravats.  During their garden tour he even went to the hairdresser.  Adams preferred a plainer style.  At heart he was a farmer, and unlike the other ambassadors at the courts in Versailles and St. James's, who were swaddled in ribbons, wrapped in lace and decorated with expensive jewels, Adams wore sturdy broadcloth.  He proudly carried the aura of simple republican life and said that he had no drop of blood in his veins 'but what is American'." 

I had to chuckled over Abigail's comment.  For follow up reading (the proverbial one path leads to another, or one book leads to another in this case) I already have Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow (it won the Pulitzer) and Revolutionary Summer:The Birth of American Independence by Joseph J. Ellis.  If the Chernow wasn't so massive I would be tempted to dig into it right away.  As always reading suggestions (biographies especially) are most welcome.  There are so many books out there, and I am sure each has its own spin, I don't mind a little guidance in choosing books that are interesting, accurate and well written.  For now, though, I am happy to be in the garden with Washington, Jefferson, Adams and Madison!

Book Lust: New (and a few Used)

I am nothing if not tenacious.  When I really set my mind to something I sometimes surprise even myself by what I can accomplish.  I only wish this was the case with books.  I'm an easy sell when it comes to books--both borrowing and buying.  I often find myself feeling overwhelmed by them.  But does that stop me from accumulating them.  No, of course not.  You would think I would arrive at a point of satiation--at least when it comes to how many stacks seem to pop up in my house (like mushrooms on a soggy lawn), but not yet anyway.  Not that I am complaining per se.  I mean look at that lovely stack and the promise it holds for many hours of pleasant reading.  They mostly elicit contented sighs and wishes for more time to read them in.  Still, as slow as I go, it is always nice to have a good choice of reading material. 

It's been a while since I have shared my new discoveries.  I had to do some serious weeding of library books over the weekend, but I did keep a number of them back.  These are the highlights (if I shared all my new books this post might get a little too unwieldy and the sheer number might raise a few eyebrows).

Top to bottom:

I'm a great fan of Mary Wesley.  I went through a phase some years ago where I read everything by her I could get my hands on.  So when I came across Patrick Marham's biography of her Wild Mary: A Life of Mary Wesley, I had to snap it up.  The only problem is whether to just dive right in or go back and do a little rereading. Enough time has passed to ensure I have sufficiently forgotten most of the book plots.  The other 'problem' is that biographers often discuss the author's works, which makes me hesitate--thinking I should read/reread the works so the stories aren't 'ruined' for me.  Such a dilemma!

I think I mentioned that my library owns most of the Criterion Collection's films.  A recent acquisition was a set: David Lean Directs Noel Coward.  All the films in the set caught my eye, but I discovered that my library owns the script which is included in Three Plays (perhaps I should search out the scripts for all the movies in the set) which includes Blithe Spirit.  I thought it would be fun to read the script and then see the film.  And I have always been curious about Noel Coward--it sounds like he was quite a personality in his time. 

I've heard many good things about Lily King's Euphoria.  "From New England Book Award winner Lily King comes a breathtaking novel about three young anthropologists of the ‘30’s caught in a passionate love triangle that threatens their bonds, their careers, and, ultimately, their lives."  Has anyone read it?  Is it as good as they say?

Litlove recently had a good reading experience with Bittersweet by Miranda Beverly-Whittemore.  She compared it to Carol Goodman (another author whose books I have read nearly all of).  "Suspenseful and cinematic, Bittersweet exposes the gothic underbelly of an idyllic world of privilege and an outsider’s hunger to belong."

Sometimes I think books follow me about begging me to buy them (it's always the books' fault and never my own).  I always take pity on them and do so.  Is it good or bad when even books in the supermarket start sounding good?  Some of these are new books and a few recent finds when I stopped by my favorite used bookstore.

From top to bottom:

The Summer Girls by Mary Alice Monroe since there should be at least one beach book in every reader's pile come summertime. 

Aunt Dimity's Death by Nancy Atherton since I have long wanted to read the first Aunt Dimity book, it is called a charming read and it is one of the "100 Best Mysteries of the Century"!

Hugger-Mugger in the Louvre by Elliot Paul since it has one of the best titles I've come across in a long time, it's pulpy cover is priceless and it sounds like a fun read.

A Hank of Hair: An Exquisite Danse Macabre by Charlotte Jay since I need to read more Australian authors.  Bonus since it is a woman AND a mystery.  It sounds very creepy, too.

The Last Days of Il Duce by Domenic Stansberry since it was a finalist for both the Edgar Award and the Hammett Prize.  Mostly because it is set in San Francisco's North Beach, and I am likely to get no closer to my (well one of) favorite city than through the pages of a book this year.

Revolutionary Summer: The Birth of American Independence by Joseph J. Ellis since it was staring me in the face when food shopping last weekend.  And it is related to other reading I am doing at the moment (see below).

Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow since I am very much enjoying reading Andrea Wulf's book (and which I plan on telling you a little about this week).

I have to start at least one of these--I can't keep buying books (or bringing new ones home in any case) and then ignoring them.  It makes me feel like a bad hostess.  Part of the pleasure of new books is deciding which one to read first, don't you think?

Angela Carter's Fairy Tales, Part 2

It didn't dawn on me until after I had been reading that Angela Carter's Book of Fairy Tales that I wrote about last weekend was only compiled by her and that the actual fairy tales have been handed down over time by anonymous storytellers.  The impetus to (finally) pick up the book in the first place was to read her work, but I'll tell you about my weekend reading anyway (in a way I am reading her work since she selected these stories specifically, right).  If you want to read more about Angela Carter's work let me direct you to Caroline's posts here and here and you can check out a list of links to more posts about her work here.

This is a massive and varied compendium of tales and how does one choose what to read?  My normal method is to just begin at the beginning and work my way through, but as I know I will only be randomly dipping into this collection over time, I decided to start with the section "Good Girls and Where it Gets Them", which I was fully expecting to be a--it gets them nowhere good.  Fairy tales are so often dark and even violent, and it is only in the world of Disney that happily ever afters seem to be the norm, but maybe I haven't read enough to judge? 

My favorite so far is a Norwegian tale called "East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon".  What a good story and a satisfying one, too.  And I have heard that tag line without ever knowing the story behind it and now I do.  It begins:

"Once upon a time there was a poor husbandman who had so many children that he hadn't much of either food or clothing to give them.  Pretty children they all were, but the prettiest was the youngest daughter, who was so lovely there was no end to her loveliness."

I guess you would call this archetypal?  It's a recurring theme in stories.  Once upon a time . . . a beautiful child a family with too many children and not enough money to provide for them all.  I bet you can almost guess what is going to happen next?  Maybe not the specifics, but . . .

It's fall and outside is cold and blustery, the weather is rough and wild and cruelly dark.  The family sits around the fire, no doubt reflecting on what a nasty winter they have before them when there is a knock on the door.  It is a great white bear who asks the father to give up his youngest daughter.  In exchange he will give them so much wealth that they will never want for anything ever again.  The daughter says no outright but the father asks her to take a night and think it over and give her answer after a little reflection.

Well, this would solve all the family's problems so she agrees and goes off with the bear.  She sits upon his back and they journey for many days, a hard long journey and arrive at a castle--all gold and silver with many, many rooms.  She eats and then, so sleepy, asks to sleep.  Her bed is made up with silken pillows and gold fringe and it looks as though she will live in a luxurious home.  At night the bear comes to her, but in the form of a man.  The catch is she is not allowed to see him.  he comes in darkness and they spend the night together and he must leave before first light.  This goes on for a while.  As thrilling as his visits might be, she is lonely and bored during the day hours.  When he asks what will make her happy she says to go and visit her mother and father.

He acquiesces, but there is a catch.  There is always a catch, isn't there?  The bear tells her she may visit, he will take her, but she must not go alone to her mother and talk about her life in the castle.  All conversations must be done in front of the whole family, no secrets revealed or it will bring bad luck on both of them.  Of course she says she wouldn't dare, but you do know what is going to happen, don't you?

Yes, she spills the proverbial beans and bad luck will be coming there way.  First, however, thanks to her mothers advice (maybe you might call it meddling?) she snuck a peek at the bear in his man's form.  She had hidden away a little tallow candle.  The thing was she only needed to be careful not to drop even a drop of the wax and he would never know.  Wax is dropped, he wakes up, but not before she sees him in all his beautiful glory.  The white bear is a handsome prince and she has fallen in love.  Only to have him wrested away from her now.  You see he had a terrible spell cast on him that made him into the bear and now he must marry (a rather unattractive) princess "with a nose three ells long".  It's not a happy prospect for the prince as you know he was enamored by the lovely young woman.  Instead he is whisked off in anticipation of this betrothal.

What can she do?  She's muddled it all.  She asks him where is he going, can she go, too?  No.  If she can seek him out, but the only information she has is that the princess's castle is east o' the sun and west o' the moon.  No one seems to know where that is exactly.  It's almost a quest that she goes on in search of the prince.  She encounters an old hag who lets her take her horse and gives her (the always symbolic) golden apple, and tells her to ride to the next neighbor who might be able to help her out.  Well, with each new hag she acquires a number of accouterments that will help her break the spell and get her prince.  I won't give away the ending but I had to chuckle that in order to break the spell, washing the wax out of the shirt was the trick to break the bad magic.  Hmm.  The woman for the prince is the woman who can get the cleanest shirt. 

For all that, this was a great story and I enjoyed reading it very much.  I do wish Angela carter had written about each and every fairy tale.  I can read my own meaning into it, but I would be pleased to hear her take on it all.  But as she said in the introduction each tale takes on new meaning with each teller and each reader since we each bring something new and different to it. 

I'll enjoy revisiting this book.  I was hoping to read some of Angela Carter's short stories (I pulled out my copy of Burning Your Boats: The Collected Short Stories) and have started reading (a rather longish) one called "The Snow Pavilion", but as my post has already gone to the lengthy side, (and I hate to rush my reading unnecessarily) I'll tell you about it next weekend.  I'll be back to my regular short story reading then and have some catching up to do with my New Yorker stories, too.

A Dutch Perspective: Beginnings

I wonder how much my choice to make The Netherlands my literary reading destination this summer was unconsciously influenced by my good friend Cath.  One of the beauties of blogging is making so many virtual friendships via A Work in Progress.  Cath left her first comment here way back in 2009 and we have been chatting and corresponding ever since.  Our reading tastes often overlap (as you'll soon read) and she has given me much insight into not only books but into questions on how to live a contented life.  How lovely that people an ocean apart and can find common ground showing how universal life and experiences really can be (just like reading books).

I thought it would be great fun to collaborate a bit on this project and as Cath is Dutch, how serendipitous is it that she can offer a unique perspective on Dutch literature and culture.  I can read about it and try and image and understand it, but she knows it intimately.  She kindly agreed to write a post to help kick things off and how appropriate that she chose as her topic "beginnings" as I am at my own literary beginning of sorts.  Cath is a great lover of poetry and nature and is a thoughtful and introspective reader and writer.

* * * * *

Without further ado, I'll hand the keyboard over to Cath now:

First Lines

All beginnings are hard.

This first line of Chaim Potok's novel 'In the Beginning' came back to me while thinking about my first blogpost ever.  I have written a series of columns in a magazine for a couple of years, but the idea of my writing travelling through the internet is new and somewhat daunting.  While being very grateful to Danielle for inviting me, Cath, a retired counselor from The Netherlands with a weakness for books, the first hours after her suggestion reached me were filled with the making up of a few 'what if' disaster scenarios.  Beginnings are hard.

Some beginnings are beautiful.

It was the egret, flyng out of the lemon grove, that started it.

In case you didn't recognise it; this is the first line of 'The Moon-Spinners.'  I don't remember what came first in my life, falling in love with Scotland as a vacation destiny or loving Mary Stewart's books.  She's the only author in my house with a shelf of her own in my bookcases.  'The Moon-Spinners' is my favorite.  Not because of the romantic suspense, mainly because she can evoke the sense of place so very well.

And then there are precious first lines.  Like the one this first blogpost is really about.  A few words written in a language long forgotten.  Even though you might not be able to decipher them - I will translate though - they are so special I think they deserve to be shared  here.

'...hebban olla vogala nestas hagunnan hinase hic enda thu wat unbidan we nu'

(All birds have built their nests except you and me, what do we expect now)

Words scribbled on the last page of a manuscript by a Benedictine West Flemish monk in a convent in Rochester, Great Britain.  The medieval Old Dutch is poetic, mysterious, longing and very, very old.  Dating back to 1100 it marks the beginning of Dutch literature in writing.  Before 'hebban' Dutch literature was preserved orally.

Do we have a monk here pining for a beloved?  Probably not.  More likely the reason for his exclamation on paper was rather mundane.  He was trying his pen.  That's why scribbles like these are called probatio pennea.  What speaks to me is the poetic potential of the words.  Exactly these words made me start reading beginnings from other cultures like 'Gilgamesh' and 'Beowulf' and hopefully 'Edda' later this year.  How about your beginnings?

By CathvdL, 's-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands, June 13, 2014

* * * * *

Many thanks to Cath.  She found the perfect illustration (above) for this post, too, "Parchment Books" by Jan Mankes (1889-1920).  Hopefully Cath will be able to share more posts with us over the course of the summer and perhaps help explain or untangle questions that arise in my own reading about Dutch life, history and culture.  I'll be sharing more about my literary travels later next week.

Reading Notes: Reading The Netherlands

I wonder why it is that there are certain very famous literary heroines of whom I am quite fond that mostly elicit feelings of annoyance in many other readers?  I admit I tend to be (perhaps overly) sympathetic in my reading.  I wonder if it is a good thing to admit that maybe I am so sympathetic towards them as I find I have some of the same feelings or shortcomings (as the case may be) as they do.  Are you wondering who I am referring to?  Emma Bovary, Anna Karenina, Effi Briest, Edna Pontellier and now I can add to the list Eline Vere.  Of course let me clarify that just a bit by saying that I realize they are very flawed women and have many weaknesses.  How much is it a weakness of character rather than a failure of society, I wonder, though (each case/each heroine being unique)?  I guess that is up to each reader to decide.  Whatever their failings you have to admit they are certainly all very human.

I've been thinking of these questions as I read the Dutch classic Eline Vere by Louis Couperus.  The other heroines I mention come to mind as Eline Vere has been called the Dutch Madame Bovary.  I picked up this Couperus novel a few years back though it went back to the library essentially unread.  It wasn't the story, rather it was was a matter of timing and the fact that it is one hefty book coming in at just over 500 pages.  I should probably have given it a better chance then, however, as I am now finding it hard to set aside now.  Always a matter of timing, but maybe now is better than then anyway (all my 'Dutch' books are proving to be excellent reads so far).

I am only a third of the way in, so this is not a proper 'telling you all about the book' post, rather a teaser of what's catching my attention at the moment.  The story begins slowly and moves at a leisurely pace.  I think the subtitle is 'a Novel of The Hague'.  I still need to educate myself on both the author, Louis Couperus, and about the country, but I have read that The Hague, while not the capital is the seat of the country's government.  It is one of the larger cities, but I get the feeling that the story, which was published in 1889, refers to it in terms of it being a provincial city.  Maybe that refers more to society and its attitudes than culturally or geographically?

After the deaths of her parents, Eline (in her early twenties still) goes to live with her sister, brother-in-law and their son.  Betsy is the elder of the two and has married the man who Eline was walking out with.  She doesn't seem to hold it against Betsy and she gets on well with Henk still.  She thinks of him more as a brother figure now more than anything else.  She and Betsy often have a very strained relationship--bickering over small things, though they share a love for parties and social gatherings.  They are middle class well-off and dress well. 

Eline has the most divine room, almost an apartment-like setting in Betsy's home and she has an income of her own.  She has a reputation for being something of an heiress, so maybe a good catch in terms of wife material, but she has always turned down offers of marriage.  She loves beautiful things, elegant clothes, loves music and both sings and plays the piano.  But she is also given to fits of melancholy and nervousness.  You can sense about her a feeling of discontent and early on in the story she says if she had been born a man she would surely have made herself famous. 

What has made me sympathetic towards Eline is her feeling of unhappiness in her life.  Different situations don't mean I can't relate to that feeling that something important is missing.  Something else I shouldn't admit to.  She has had a crush on an opera singer.  She doesn't want to admit to it to her family, but she goes about collecting portraits of him that are sold in stores--even going so far once to buying several in one shop in Amsterdam knowing she will never go back and they will never see her again.  She carefully puts them into an album and pulls it out to look at and dream over creating these elaborate fantasies over a life with him--an artistic life singing and performing together.

She never goes back to the same shop twice and would never admit to any of this to her family.  But you know how these crushes go.  They are never realistic.  And eventually reality does rear its ugly head.  Eline has just gone to see her beloved Fabrice perform and sees him in an entirely different light.  He is nothing like her fantasy or even like his portraits.  He's old and maybe even a little crude looking.  There is nothing heroic about him and he even looks more like a tradesman than an artist.  So into the fire goes the pictures and she falls once again into a bout of melancholia.  (Okay, so I said I could often relate to these heroines since I have on occasion similar feelings or experiences?  The thing is, crazy as it might sound, I could almost picture myself doing something like that.  Maybe not creating an album of treasures like Eline, but I am sure my own imagination could easily run away with itself in just such a way . . . ).

To be in such a state is perhaps not the best circumstances to think of marrying, but that is the direction Eline's story is going.  Then again, maybe it is just the time?  Will she be like Emma Bovary and wish for that happy fantasy life rather than be fully planted in reality?  I'll let you know as Eline's story plays out over the next few hundred pages.  Although 'not a lot happens' in this story, there is still lots going on and a full cast of characters.  I'm finding it fascinating reading and don't even mind lugging it about with me each day back and forth on the bus.

I like Couperus's writing so much I have even started his shorter novel Inevitable and have one other book by him on my potential reading pile.  I'll tell you more about that book and the others I'm reading next time.  I am hoping to post once a week over the course of the next three months.  I have loads of good books on my reading pile, and you'll be hearing lots about them later. 

And I have a treat in store, my Dutch friend Cath has kindly agreed to guest post here.  She'll be writing about whatever strikes her fancy and will have a unique perspective on Dutch literature and culture.  She'll be here tomorrow and over the course of the summer, too, so please do stop back this weekend.  I know I am thoroughly enjoying my reading project and hope you will, too.

Wildfire at Midnight by Mary Stewart

Wouldn't Mary Stewart's books make wonderful movies?  Perhaps some of them have been filmed?  I've just finished reading Wildfire at Midnight, which was published in 1956, and as I have classic films on my mind, I imagine a movie adaptation along the lines of one of Alfred Hitchcock's from the 1950s.  You know that string of films he made with the likes of Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant, Grace Kelly and Kim Novak (to name only a few)?  Hollywood and its stars were truly elegant in those days.  The films have that warm, rosy technicolor glow to them.  They're wonderfully suspenseful, edge-of-your-seat stories with all those gorgeous settings and those utterly divine clothes.  The men are dashing and the women beautiful and there is almost always a hint of romance, but oh so restrained.  Yes, that's what I have in mind for a Mary Stewart film adaptation. 

Wildfire at Midnight would be a prime candidate for adapting to the big screen (or maybe not Hollywood fare these days?  Are Mary Stewart's books too sedate?--Not for me certainly).  It has everything you would want for a Hitchcockian script.  Lush, exotic setting?  Check--the Scottish Hebrides.  Imagine those craggy mountains with the waves crashing against the beach.  Atmosphere?  Definitely--the mist coming in, enveloping everything and everyone.  A perfect crime scene?  Yes--a hotel set in amongst the mountains where visitors come to get away from London and the larger world.  An interesting cast--most decidedly.  Our heroine is a young woman recently divorced and in need of getting away from the City.  Numbered amongst the other guests is a famous actress, two school teachers, several serious mountain climbers, and our heroine's ex-husband!  Fitting for that 1950s Hitchcock era?  Certainly--it happens to be the summer of the Queen's Coronation, 1953.  Perfect!  And our heroine is a model, so that Grace Kelly elegance is not hard to imagine at all.  And what about suspense?  Not one murder, but several with hints of the murderer still lurking about--likely one of the hotel's guests.

With not only a name like Gianetta but as the namesake of a famous-Beauty-in-her-day, "the lovely redheaded Gianetta Fox, who was once the rage of London" it's destiny that she's going to get herself into some kind of trouble.  While her great grandmother was on the disreputable side, Gianetta Brooke is the daughter of a country vicar.  A training course for mannequins lands her in a fashionable London design house where she causes something of a stir and catches the eye of the slightly older, dapper writer Nicholas Drury.  A mere nineteen is Gianetta and not half as savvy as she comes off as being.  At twenty-nine, Nicholas takes her "stammering schoolgirl rubbish" for coquetry and the two are married three months later.  And the three years that follow?  Best not to dwell on any of that.

So it is May and all of London is preparing for the Coronation.  The City is packed to suffocation and Gianetta is run-down and tired and wants nothing more than to get away from it all.  On her parents' suggestion she sets off for the picturesque and very remote Isle of Skye.  No crowds, no TV, just blissful quiet.  So what if it rains all the time, and she doesn't fish or climb.  Peace and quiet is enough of a draw.  Surely a young woman traveling alone is not unusual?  But her journey across the bay to the isle renders her some odd looks.  As it turns out there has been a murder not long ago of a local girl on one of the mountains.  Everyone seems to be tiptoeing around it, and it goes unmentioned initially.  She has problems of her own as shortly after her arrival she discovers Nicholas will soon be a guest, a return guest as a matter of fact.  He is doing research for a new book.  It takes Gianetta by surprise and sends her into a flutter, all the more so since she is still using her married name.  The last person she wants to run into is her ex-husband.

And then another murder is committed.  Another young woman.  And a third has gone missing.  Everyone is under suspicion except Gianetta, who wasn't at the hotel when the first girl was killed.  Nicholas, however, and all the other guests were.  The tension begins to ratchet up as the search not only for the missing girl begins, but for the killer, too.

Wildfire at Midnight is Mary Stewart's second book, and while it has all the trademark elements that make her stories so entertaining, it does feel somewhat different than her later books.  It's a fairly short read and could almost pass as a traditional mystery, though it has suspense and romance, too.  I loved it and surprisingly she had me guessing the killer's identity (and motivations) all the way until the end.  I've read a small handful of her novels now and I would be hard pressed to choose a favorite but this story might give the others a run for their money.  I've still got a small stack of unread Mary Stewart novels and I like to keep them in reserve for those moments when I need a little pleasant escapism.  And I still think her books would make great films.

Angela Carter's Fairy Tales, Part 1

Angela Carter was a prolific writer and dabbled in many literary arenas.  To say dabbled isn't really correct, though, as I think she was a true proficient in everything she touched on.  If there is someone I could wish for as a teacher, it would be Angela Carter (just reading her, though, is educational).  Over the weekend I set aside my regular short story reading routine in favor of Angela Carter's Book of Fairy Tales which she edited for Virago.  This luscious book (isn't the cover art beautiful?) is actually a reworking of two earlier editions that she was completing shortly before her death in 1992.

"The manuscript of the second collection lay on her bed.  'I'm just finishing this off for the girls' she said.  Her loyalty to us was boundless.  When we first heard she was ill, we told her not to worry, we had published The Virago Book of Fairy Tales, that was enough.  But no, Angela claimed it was just the project for an ailing writer to pursue.  And so she worked on the book until a few weeks before her death." (Lennie Goodings, Virago).

After her death Virago grouped the fairy tales she had collected under the headings she had chosen and used the introduction used in the first collection.  Reading that alone was so interesting and informative I thought I would share a bit of what I learned here today, although there was so much to take in I'm not even sure where to begin.

Maybe it's best to start with a definition?  Carter writes that while this is a collection of fairy tales you won't find any fairies within the pages of this collection.  ". . . the term 'fairy tale' is a figure of speech and we use it loosely, to describe the great mass of infinitely various narrative that was, once upon a time and still is, sometimes, passed on and disseminated by word of mouth--stories without known originators that can be remade again and again by every person who tells them, the perennially refreshed entertainment of the poor."  Since fairy tales have for most of human history been spoken and not read the act of writing them down changes them at the same time it preserves them.  They are anonymous and genderless (we might know the name of the person who ultimately wrote it down but never the person who made it up in the first place).  The stories we have today are bits and pieces of stories that came before. 

Carter refers to these storytellers as female since in the European tradition it is usually a woman telling the stories--

". . . 'Mother Goose' in English, 'Ma Mère l'Oie' in French, an old woman sitting by the fireside, spinning--literally 'spinning a yarn' . . . "

I love plays on words and had not thought of a woman literally spinning yarn, and 'the spinning of a yarn' (or telling of a tale).  Another play on words, or the meaning behind the phrase for which I had not given much thought--the word 'tale' being synonymous for 'lie' or 'falsehood' and not just also meaning a story. 

"'The tale is over; I can't lie any more'--thus do Russian narrators conclude their stories."

No worries, though, the story may be made up of lies, but the storyteller isn't setting out to deceive rather to entertain.  Carter notes that while the fairy tales are "dedicated to the pleasure principle", there is always more than meets the eye (and isn't that almost always the truth in literature--more there swimming beneath the surface).  The collection Angela Carter has put together is meant for pleasure and each has only one thing in common--they all center on a female protagonist.  She might be clever, brave, silly, good, cruel, sinister or unfortunate but she is always center stage and larger than life.  She didn't put the collection together to show we women are all the same underneath it all (she didn't believe that anyway).  Carter never has a problem with offering a critical eye on any topic, does she?

(I knew I was going to like this collection, and what Carter writes below elicited a 'knowing' chuckle out of me).

"Considering that numerically, women have always existed in this world in at least as great numbers as men and bear at least in equal part in the transmission of oral culture, they occupy center stage less often than you might think."

Actually I know that to be true . . . at least in other aspects of literature.

The fairy tales (and there are more than a hundred in thirteen different categories) come from all over the world and exist in many different versions (and I like the idea that the person telling the tale can change the meaning so subtly--or maybe not so subtly--just because they are telling it--just as the listener brings her own experience to the storytelling, too), but Carter has not tinkered with any of them and tried to choose tales that had not been 'improved upon' by their collectors or which have been 'rendered literary'.  The only shortcoming she notes is that she confined the material to that which was available in English (knowing her shortcomings as a linguist--though I think she would have done a most impressive job nonetheless).

I've barely skimmed the surface of what she says when it comes to fairy tales, their history and meaning.  If you like fairy tales, or short stories, I think this will be a good collection to read from as well as a good one to own.  If you were here now and were interested I think I would just press the book into you hands and tell you to sit and read the intro, too.  But now comes the fun part, the main attraction.  Which section to read first?  Should I read randomly or an entire section or start at the first story and go from there?  I think whatever path I choose to follow I am in for a treat.

"The fairy tale is user-friendly; it always comes with an answer to that question ['What happened then?'].  The fairy tale has needed to be user-friendly in order to survive.  It survives today because it has transformed itself into a medium of gossip, anecdote, rumor; it remains hand-crafted, even in a period when television disseminates the mythologies of advanced industrialized countries throughout the world, wherever there are TV sets and the just to make them flicker."

Oh, I do love a good story, and it doesn't matter who first told it.  I'll be back later in the week to share a few of the stories I'll be reading in the coming days.  I have had this collection on my pile for a while now, always looking at it longingly, so thanks to Caroline for giving me a good reason to pick it up now and start reading.

A Monday Miscellanea

Sometimes I like to go back to my 'reading notes' posts (must get better at using tags more consistently . . . ) and like to see which books I actually finished, which still sit only partially read or have been abandoned and what reading plans seem to have fallen by the wayside.  But I digress (I was only looking for a picture to loot from a former post to use here). 

I am once again having problems connecting with the internet at home.  My internet service provider (which shall remain nameless) seems to think that all the world's troubles will be solved by sending out a new modem.  Why do they ignore their customer's concerns and opinions?  I now have my original modem (which I think is working just fine) along with two new modems (when the first one arrived and didn't solve the problem they said it must be defective and sent another new one).  I have less than a month now to return those extra modems before being charged for them.  See, I had this problem last fall and the issue was not with my modem (they had me buy a new one back then, too . . . ), rather there was a problem with one of those transformer boxes that sits outside in the neighborhood (I think the cables or infrastructure in my part of town is old and shoddy).  I suspect the problem is the same (but hey, why listen to the customer?) and they simply don't want to have to send a technician out to my house to fix the problem right away.  So, two new modems and multiple phone calls and many, many, many hours of lost internet connections later, they are finally sending out a technician to help diagnose/fix the problem.  My internet connection has been sporadic at best, but this weekend was nonexistent.  I have (needless to say) been extremely frustrated.

So, there was no short story post this weekend and now my posting schedule this week will be uncertain depending on whether I can connect to the internet.  I have been dipping into a collection of fairy tales edited by Angela Carter for the Angela Carter Reading Week.  The introduction alone is worth its own post (which is what I had planned for yesterday).  So, fingers crossed I can share my fairy tale reading with you soon.

I finished Mary Stewart's Wildfire at Midnight yesterday.  When I heard she passed away I immediately reached for one of her books.  She's always so reliably good, and I hope to write about the book later this week, too.

It's not a bad thing to turn off the computer now and again (I'm all for it really), but I want it to be on my own terms and according to my own schedule (scary how much I rely these days on being able to connect to the internet--and not just for blogging purposes).  I have been watching more movies since I often can't get online.  My library has almost the entire set of Criterion Collection films and I really should make better use of the collection.  Of late I have watched Following (really brilliant, I thought), Shallow Grave (very noir, but so unbearably suspenseful I couldn't finish it--I had seen it before actually and knew what was coming . . .), Foreign Correspondent (Hitchcock is pretty much my favorite director and I would love to watch all his films in the order he made them--maybe another little summer project?) which also happens to be set in part in Amsterdam, and Sunday Bloody Sunday (also brilliant--love Glenda Jackson and must look up more of her films).

I also spent time with my Reading the Netherlands books over the weekend--not sure if it is timing or just good books, but I am thoroughly enjoying this project!

As always many thanks for all the comments and as soon as I am back online I will reply to them and hopefully get caught up on emails, too.

Hope to be back soon, and until then, happy reading everyone.

How the Heather Looks, Joan Bodger

Joan Bodger's How the Heather Looks: A Joyous Journey to the British Sources of Children's Books is a charming read!  I wrote about it briefly back in March and wanted to make sure I mention it once again before it all fades too much from memory.  The copy I read was not mine and has since been sent on its way (though I temporarily have a library copy that also needs to go back), but it's a book I think I might have to add to my own personal collection.  Books about books are always a treat, don't you think?  And this one reminded me a lot of Christina Hardyment's Heidi's Alp: One Family's Search for Storybook Europe. I read it last year and it would make a great pairing with the Bodger. 

Each book covers slightly different terrain, though both concern families of bibliophiles who go out in search of places they encountered in treasured works of literature--in both cases children's literature.  Had I planned things properly I would have read along with the Bodger family's adventures--C.S. Lewis in Narnia country and a little King Arthur when they went in search of Camelot, Wind in the Willows when they went looking for the world of Rat and Mole to name just a few possibilties.  Each book is as much about the family's experiences traveling and a bit about family dynamics thrown in as about the literary destination.  Each, however, has its own unique spin with only a tiny bit of crossover.  The Hardyments, a British family, made their literary pilgrimage to storybook Europe in the mid-1980s whereas the Bodgers traveled from the US on the elegant Cunard Line in the 1950s direct to England and their focus was on British children's classics.

It's easy to appreciate these travels (a reverse armchair travel almost . . . read the book first and then if you're lucky go see the real place), though once again this is another eye opener in terms of seeing those gaping holes in my own youthful literary education.  The Bodger parents were both half English and had traveled to England as children.  As their own children arrived and grew they introduced them to all the British classics they themselves had loved--from Caldecott's picture books to typical and well known nursery rhymes, A.A. Milne's Pooh, Miss Potter's world and on to R.L. Stevenson and beyond.  It might have helped that John Bodger was a reference librarian.  If only every child could be so lucky as their Ian and Lucy.

"I suppose that an American's approach to English literature must always be oblique.  We share a language but not a landscape.  In order to understand the English classics as adults, we must build up a sort of visual vocabulary from books we read as children.  Children's literature is, in some ways more important to us than it is to the English child.  I contend that a child brought up on the nursery rhymes and Jacobs' English Fairy Tales can better understand Shakespeare; that a child who has pored over Beatrix Potter can better respond to Wordsworth.  Of course it is best if one can find for himself a bank where the wild thyme grows, or discover daffodils growing wild.  Failing that, the American child must feed the 'inward eye' with the images in the books he reads when young so that he can enter a larger realm when he is older.  I am sure I enjoyed Bronte novels more for having read The Secret Garden first.  As I stood on those Moors, looking out over that wind-swept landscape I realized that it was Mrs. Burnett who taught me what 'wuthering' meant long before I ever got around to reading Wuthering Heights.  Epiphany comes at the moment of recognition."

I envy people those childhoods.  It sounds so idyllic to me, to be so steeped in 'classic' literature as a child.  Some of us didn't have the benefit of guided reading and were simply left to our own devices, though I think I have not turned out so very badly.  My reading history will always be spotty, but I know I will likely appreciate those books all the more reading it now than I was likely to as a small child.  Having such a different reading background than the Bodgers, however, in no way lessened my pleasure of reading about their literary adventures.  Despite not having read many of the works I was still familiar enough for it to not all be completely new to me.

Their journey was a little bit detective work, as much advice as they could glean from good sources (libraries!) and just luck and perseverance.  They went in search of the places they had (literally) read about in the stories they loved, which may or may not have ever really existed.  In some cases it was mostly in the imagination of the author with perhaps some landscape detail to provide inspiration.  On occasion the people who lived so close to these literary locales hadn't much clue to their significance (and isn't that almost always the case when you see something every day of your life).  And sometimes it just all came together--the imaginary world of the book and the real world around them.

"We heard someone shouting at us and looked up to see Ian standing knee-deep in heather.  The whole mountainside, as far as the eye could see, was steeped in bronze and purple.  'Hey!' he shouted, 'Now I know how the heather looks'!"

It didn't matter that my reading life hasn't been the same as the Bodgers, as I loved the book nonetheless.  But I know that moment of epiphany and I know what it is to truly love a well-told story.

Off to the Netherlands, or Summer Reading

Why settle for a staycation when I can go somewhere far away and new to me, a place I have long been curious about and a place I think I would like very much culturally, socially and geographically?  Armchair travel via books has much to recommend itself.  I thought of returning to Italy or maybe spending more time at the seaside.  Then I thought perhaps traveling to as many big European cities as I could squeeze in over the course of the summer months would be fun, but it might be exhausting, too.  Not long ago I picked up Eline Vere by Louis Couperus and as I have been enjoying it so much thought why not spend more time in the Netherlands?  I've read so little Dutch literature and surely it is time to rectify that!

So I am packing my suitcases, am changing dollars for guilders (okay, I know it's Euros now, but guilders sounds so much more exotic) and have my ticket in hand--if only 'virtually'.  Of course traveling through the pages of a book means I won't have to worry about spending too much money (except maybe on books!), or schlepping my luggage from place to place or endure lengthy flights.  So . .  . I won't get to sample any new foods, or get to hear Dutch spoken, but I can visit all sorts of neighborhoods in lots of different cities and even travel to different time periods.  I might meet up with a few unsavory characters along the way, but I won't have to worry about ever feeling unsafe.  If my reading is as varied as I hope it will be I might just get a sense of what life is like in this beautiful country.

I am busy assembling books to (potentially) read.  Of course the pile is far larger than I know I will manage to read over the course of the next three months, but variety is good, library books can go back read or unread, and anything newly acquired will be happily received in my own personal library to read now or later.  I thought I might have a hard time finding books translated from Dutch, but as you can see below I'm finding quite a few new authors and new books to explore.

I plan on traveling through as many cities/regions of The Netherlands as I can--novels, nonfiction, memoirs, short stories, mysteries and crime stories--whatever catches my fancy.  I am hoping to post once a week from now through the end of August.  I might even arrange a guest post or two from a Dutch friend.  I'm not entirely sure what form my posts will take--likely I'll just share whatever happens to be in hand that I am reading.  The postcard above was compliments of a fellow Postcrosser (and I have a fair few more of them to share, too).  It's summer so things will be pretty laid back here and my plans will be very loose and follow whatever my mood demands.

I have already started my reading.  I am thoroughly enjoying Eline Vere--so much so that I have found a few of Louis Couperus' other books and his 1900 novel, Inevitable, has joined Eline on my reading pile.  (How handy to be able to finally find an early novel to fill a slot for my Century of Books, too).  International crime novels are very popular these days, so I have found a number of them with a Dutch setting.  At the moment I am reading a collection of short stories by Janwillem ven de Wetering called The Amsterdam Cops: Collected Stories and on my work ipad I have A.C. Baantjer's The Somber Nude.

More books to choose from later, in no particular order (but grouped according to genre):

Classics:
Eline Vere, Inevitable and Ecstasy by Louis Couperus

Nonfiction:

Amsterdam and An Island in Time: The Biography of a Village by Geert Mak
Etty Hillesum: An Interrupted Life, the Diaries, 1941-1943 and Letters from Westerbork

Novels:

The Anatomy Lesson by Nina Siegal
Madame Verona Comes Down the Hill by Dimitri Verhulst
Villa des Roses by Willem Elsschot
On the Water by H.M. van den Brink
The Storm: A Novel by Margriet de Moor
The Good Thief's Guide to Amsterdam by Chris Ewan
After You've Gone by Jeffrey Lent
History of a Pleasure Seeker by Richard Mason
The Apothecary's House by Adrian Mathews
Amsterdam Stories by Nescio

Mysteries and Crime Novels:

The Amsterdam Cops: Collected Stories, Outsider in Amsterdam, and Tumbleweed by Janwillem van de Wetering
Close-Up and Rendezvous by Esther Verhoef
The Dinner Club by Saskia Noort
Shadow Sister by Simone van der Vlugt
Shooting in the Dark by Carolyn Hougan
Dekok and the Somber Nude by A.C. Baantjer

I've fudged a little on my list of books as not all are by Dutch authors, some simply have Dutch settings and some books by Dutch authors are not set in The Netherlands.  But they all appeal in one way or another.  I am still waiting for a few titles to arrive in the mail.  And as always, is there something good I am missing?  Suggestions always welcome.