WWW Wednesday!

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It’s the first Wednesday of the month, so it’s time for WWW Wednesday, an idea I borrowed from David Chazan, The Chocolate Lady, who borrowed it from someone else. For this feature, I report

  • What I am reading now
  • What I just finished reading
  • What I intend to read next

This is something you can participate in, too, if you want, by leaving comments about what you’ve been reading or plan to read.

What I am reading now

I just finished my previous book, so I haven’t actually started An Episode at Toledo by Ann Bridge. I have liked the couple other books I have read by Bridge, but this one is apparently a part of a mystery series she wrote. I haven’t read any of the others, and I’m afraid I’m getting this one out of order, which I hate to do if I can avoid it. Anyway, I’m looking forward to starting it today.

What I just finished reading

I just read The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden for my Walter Scott Historical Prize project. It is set in the early 1960s in Utrecht, but the vestiges of the war are still in evidence. I don’t want to say too much about it here, because it goes somewhere surprising at the end. You’ll have to wait for my review!

What I am reading next

I sometimes forget what I said I was going to read next and read something else, but this time I think I’ll read the third book in Edna O’Brien’s Country Girls trilogy. It’s called Girls in Their Married Bliss, and I can’t help thinking that title might be meant ironically. I’ll find out!

Review 2586: The White Bear

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The newly released (today, I think) reprint of The White Bear by NYRB is actually two novellas, The White Bear and The Rearguard. I wasn’t familiar with Pontoppidan but find he was an early 20th century Danish Nobel laureate. Both of these novellas were published in the late 19th century.

In The White Bear, we meet Thorkild Müller, who as a young misfit was directed into the ministry because of a grant that offered a generous university stipend for a theological degree if the recipient was willing to minister in the frozen north for an unspecified period. Thorkild takes the stipend but fritters away his time at university, barely setting foot in the classroom.

But then because of the deaths of two ministers, he receives his summons, which he tries to avoid by flunking his exams. That doesn’t work, and he ends up in Greenland ministering to the Inuit.

There he is miserable until one summer when, instead of returning to a trading post as expected while the Inuit were leading their nomadic summer lives, he goes with them.

Much of the story is about what happens when, as an old man, he decides to return to Denmark.

I really loved this story. I have a fascination for books about cold and desolate climates, but what’s more important is that Thorkild is an unforgettable character—huge and covered with an unkempt white beard, boisterous, simple, yet not as simple as he seems.

The Rearguard is about Jørgen Hallager, in some ways a bit like Thorkild but in others, not. He is also a big boisterous man, a social realist painter who considers that artists who turn away from realism are traitors, who is loud in his condemnation of almost everyone that doesn’t believe what he does.

He has recently become engaged to Ursula Branth, the frail, gently reared daughter of a state counselor. He has become engaged to her in Rome, where they make a lengthy stay and eventually marry. Her father and Hallager dislike each other. He is trying to separate her from her friends and family because of his socialist principles, and her father is worried about her.

I found Hallager to be insufferable—so full of himself and sure of his ideas, belligerent with anyone who disagrees, and verbally abusive to his wife, trying to bring her to a mental place where he wants her. I didn’t understand some of the basis for his rants (not being up on 19th century Danish politics and art).

I liked Thorkild a lot better. Both of the novellas are wonderful character sketches, though.

I received this book from the publishers in exchange for a free and fair review.

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Review 2585: Literary Wives! The Constant Wife

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Today is another review for the Literary Wives blogging club, in which we discuss the depiction of wives in fiction. If you have read the book, please participate by leaving comments on any of our blogs.

We also welcome another member to our group! Becky Chapman is a new member from Australia. You can see her bio on my Literary Wives page. Welcome, Becky!

Be sure to read the reviews and comments of the other wives!

My Review

The Constant Wife is a play by Maugham, a social comedy that is reminiscent of one of Wilde’s. It is witty and reflects some interesting attitudes about marriage and faithfulness. It is set completely in Constance Middleton’s drawing room.

The play begins with the revelation that most of Constance’s friends and relatives think her husband John is being unfaithful with her best friend, Marie-Louise Durham. Constance’s sister Martha wants to tell her, but her mother, Mrs. Culver, does not. In any case, once the matter is hinted at, Constance refuses to hear and says she is sure John is faithful to her.

John and Marie-Louise are having an affair, though, and it turns out Constance knows. She has been maintaining the status quo, but when the truth comes out, it turns out she has some unusual ideas about marriage, especially for the time. At the same time, Bernard, a former suitor of Constance’s, returns from years in China.

The play is meant as a light diversion, I think, but its ending was probably considered pleasantly shocking at the time.

I try hard not to judge works out of their time, but although the script is undoubtedly witty, it reflects some attitudes that made me wince. Here’s one that seemed so strange it was funny. I’m not sure what early 20th century British people of a certain class thought feminism was, but in an early speech Mrs. Culver says she told a friend whose husband was unfaithful that it was her fault because she wasn’t attractive enough. (Ouch! But that idea was still around when I was growing up.) What made me laugh, although I don’t think it was meant to be funny, was that Constance in response asks her if she’s not “what they call a feminist.” Maybe it was meant to be funny. Hmm.

What does this book say about wives or about the experience of being a wife?

I think a discussion of this topic probably involves spoilers, which I try to avoid. But here goes.

This play comments in several ways about marriage and fidelity. First, there is the idea that it’s okay and expected for a man to cheat, expressed by Mrs. Culver. The corollary to that is that it is not okay for the wife. Martha does not agree. She thinks both should be faithful. Constance’s attitudes are more complex.

At first, Constance wants to maintain the status quo of her marriage by ignoring the situation. Then when she is forced to acknowledge her husband’s infidelity, she does and says some surprising things. She is very matter of fact about it and expresses the idea that they were lucky because they both fell out of love at the same time. John, more conventionally, affects to love her still.

Constance has been offered a place with a successful decorating business by her friend Barbara, which she originally turned down. Now, she decides to take it, eventually explaining that John’s rights over her have to do with him supporting her, so she wants to be independent. And a year later, there is more to come.

I’m not sure whether Maugham was making serious points about marriage and the relationships between the sexes or just trying to shock and be funny. The upshot of the play is what’s good for the goose is good for the gander—or the other way around.

There are still lots of implicit messages in the play:

  • That women are still property, based on their being supported by men. And Constance discounts running a house and caring for children as if it were nothing
  • That once love has calmed, marriage is basically a financial arrangement
  • That women are more interesting when they’re unobtainable than when they are present and faithful

These are the women’s attitudes, mind you (although I keep reminding myself that this play is written by a man). John isn’t that much heard from, except his cowardly request for Constance to break up with Marie-Louise for him and his conventional assertions that he still loves Constance.

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Review 2584: Walk the Blue Fields

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Walk the Blue Fields is a collection of short stories by Claire Keegan that I think was published earlier than another collection I read. It contains seven stories, one of which I already read.

In “The Parting Gift,” a girl is leaving home for the first time, headed to New York. She is leaving an unhappy life with dark secrets, but she wishes for some indication of affection.

In “Walk the Blue Fields,” a priest presides at a wedding and goes through his daily business. But the bride was a girl he loved.

Brady’s behavior has caused a split with his wife in “Dark Horses.” Still, he tries to believe she will come back.

In “The Forester’s Daughter,” Deegan cares more for the lands and his old house than he does for his family. Before he married, he talked about the house to Martha as if it were a castle, but it is dark, crumbling, and damp. She considers leaving but stays, even after he does an unforgivable thing to her daughter—gives away her dog for money.

“The Long and Painful Death” is the story I read before, about a writer whose stay in a revered writer’s home is interrupted by an unwelcome visitor.

“Surrender” is about an IRA man, a sergeant, a man who other men fear. He receives a letter from his girlfriend calling it off because of his delays in marrying her.

“Night of Quicken Trees” starts out realistically enough, about an older woman who has inherited a cottage on the west coast of Ireland from her cousin, a priest. She is entirely alone, and her story is a sad one, but then it slowly becomes a mythic one.

I liked most of these stories very much. Keegan is a fluid writer. Her stories are spare without being bone bare. You never quite know where they are going.

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Review 2583: The Magician’s Assistant

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Sabine was very much in love with her husband, Parsifal, when he died unexpectedly. A handsome, affectionate, and charismatic man, he was also gay. For Sabine, it was love at first sight, which he hired her as his magician’s assistant.

Sabine lived with Parsifal and his lover Phan before Phan died from AIDS. Parsifal was also diagnosed with AIDS (this was the 90s when it was a death sentence), but he died unexpectedly of a brain aneurysm. Sabine is devastated and finds it hard to get out of bed. Phan was wealthy, so she is alone in a large house with Rabbit.

Although Parsifal had told her he was from Connecticut and had no family, Sabine has a shock coming. He does indeed have a family, a mother and two sisters in Nebraska, and his real name is Guy Fetters. She learns from his lawyer that Parsifal has been sending them money and left them some in his will. Sabine hypothesizes reasons why she has never heard of them but decides to call Mrs. Fetters. Eventually, she agrees to take her and her daughter around a visit of L. A. Sabine’s parents think she should have nothing to do with them.

Sabine likes Dot Fetters and her youngest daughter, Bertie. She begins learning new things about Parsifal. When they are leaving to go home, she agrees to visit them and attend Bertie’s upcoming wedding.

This story is an absorbing and touching one. Sabine learns to deal with her grief and finds out more about Parsifal. His family hears stories from her about their exotic-seeming life. The truth about why he left Nebraska is a difficult one, but Dot Fetters has regretted not trying to find him.

I love this novel. I thought I had read it before when I picked it up for A Century of Books, but it was unfamiliar. Patchett knows a lot about human nature.

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Review 2582: #ReadingAusten25! Mansfield Park

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I decided to reread all of Austen for Reading Austen 25, even the books I had already reviewed. That said, I looked at my original review of Mansfield Park and thought it was still valid, so I thought I’d write about something else—the modern perception of Fanny Price.

The Introduction to my Folio Society edition by Richard Church asserts that the novel was written as a “self-disciplinary work imposed by Jane to exorcise grief and rebellion” after a promising courtship was cut off by the death of the suitor. Church himself rates Mansfield Park either 2nd or 3rd of Austen’s books, depending on where you put Emma (with Pride and Prejudice first).

A brief glance at Goodreads, however, tells me exactly what I expected to see—that of the six books counted as Austen’s oeuvre, (Sanditon isn’t usually included) Mansfield Park is the lowest rated. I suspect that’s because of Fanny Price, who is not at all a modern heroine. In fact, a few years ago someone made an “updated” movie that depicted Fanny as more of an Elizabeth Bennett- or Emma Woodhouse-like character, full of wit and energy. That movie missed the point. We have to view Fanny with early 19-century eyes, not 21st-century ones.

First of all, think how Fanny was raised. She is brought from her poor family to a wealthy one when she is only 10. She probably already has a retiring and timid disposition. Then for seven years she is treated with no regard for her feelings or wants except from her cousin Edmund. In fact, she is purposefully meant to feel the difference between herself and her cousins and is largely treated as a hanger-on, especially by horrible Mrs. Norris. In fact, it’s shocking to me that such a close relation is so treated, but we’re looking at money and class distinctions that may have been common in families. Think of Jane Eyre in exactly the same position.

But more difficult for the modern mind to deal with are the principles she’s been brought up with. To us, some of the distinctions that Fanny makes seem finicky, to say the least. (Others, like her reaction to Mary Crawford’s remark about the fate of Edmund’s very sick older brother, are not.) But to most of the early 19th century population, at least among the middle class or well-born (excepting, probably, the fashionable), they were not. As far as Henry and Mary Crawford are concerned, they have revealed too much of themselves, Henry in his dalliances with both the Bertram sisters and Mary in her remarks.

Fanny is growing up in this novel, learning to become herself. Much of her improvement comes from being able to develop a sense of self-worth after Sir Bertram returns from his travels and is happy to see her, and Lady Bertram discovers how useful and comforting she is, and different characters suddenly turn to her for advice. She may have learned her principles from Sir Bertram and Edmund, but by the middle of the novel, she is the one who recognizes principled behavior and speech, as Edmund becomes more in love with Mary Crawford and not only makes excuses for Mary’s remarks but is convinced to break his own principles.

Of course, the ultimate behavior of the Crawfords shows that Fanny was right all along, but before that, when Crawford decides he’s in love with her, she has the difficult task of sticking to her principles when everyone else disagrees with her. She may be gentle and retiring, but she resists all pressure. Think how much more difficult that would be for a person of her nature than for Emma or Elizabeth.

This has been rather a wandering post, but I hope that readers will look at Fanny differently.

Soon, we’ll be reading a book with a heroine much more like Fanny than the others, in Persuasion.

Oh, and I just have to say one more thing about the book in general. Edmund takes orders and has a parish, and then we never see him paying any attention to his job. He doesn’t stay in his parish; we don’t see him working on sermons. It’s like he’s completely forgotten about his work. I don’t think I ever noticed that before. There might be something about that which I don’t understand, though.

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Review 2581: Murder at Gulls Nest

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I messed up a bit with this book. What happened was that as soon as I heard about it, I pre-ordered it because I love Jess Kidd’s books. Then a few months later, although I am no longer active on NetGalley, I received an email from a publicist asking if I would like a review copy. I answered, as I have for other books, that I would love to if I could get a paperback rather than an ebook.

As usual when I make this request, I got no reply, so I dismissed it from my mind. Then, when I received a copy quite a bit later, I assumed it was my pre-order, not even noticing that it was a review copy. I put it at the top of my pile, which I have been ignoring while I try to finish A Century of Books (now complete!). I apologize to that publicist, because I have missed the dates. It wasn’t until my pre-order arrived that I realized my mistake, but then I read it immediately. So, here’s my review—better late than never.

It’s the 1950s. Nora Breen, looking disheveled, arrives in a seaside town in winter. She is a middle-aged ex-nun who has renounced her vows, and she has arrived because her friend Frieda, sent from the monastery for her health, has stopped writing. That is unlike Frieda, and Nora is worried about her.

Nora has taken a room at Gulls Nest, a sad rooming house, where she finds she is to occupy Frieda’s room. She learns that Frieda just disappeared one evening, no one apparently being surprised by it.

The occupants of the house are a mixed crew. Helena Wills, a widow, is the owner, but she spends almost all her time in bed and lets Irene Rawlings, the grim housekeeper who has lots of rules, run it. Helena also has a young daughter Dinah, who is all but feral. As she arrives, Nora watches a young couple from afar, Teddy and Stella Atkins, and notices them appearing to quarrel. She also sees another lodger, Karel Ježek, stomp on Teddy’s hat. Other lodgers are Bill Carter, an ex-Navy cook who works as a bartender, and Professor Poppy, an old Punch and Judy puppeteer who is rumored to be an aristocrat.

Although Nora goes immediately to the police, Inspector Rideout thinks there’s nothing unusual about someone who was living at Gulls Nest disappearing without warning. Nora has decided not to reveal to anyone else her friendship with Frieda, hoping she will learn more if no one is aware of it. However, she is feeling frustrated when Teddy is found dead in Poppy’s workshop behind the house, poisoned with cyanide in his coffee. Teddy often had coffee with Poppy before work. Inspector Rideout is thinking suicide, but Stella says not. She has just told him she is pregnant. So, did Teddy commit suicide or was he murdered? If he was murdered, was he the intended victim or was Poppy? Finally, is Teddy’s death related to Frieda’s disappearance?

Like Kidd’s other books, this one has some eccentric characters, although it is perhaps not as unexpected as her others. Still, it has some likable characters and some twists, as Nora begins to blossom out into this new world. A secret about the relationship between two characters was one I guessed fairly quickly, but I was unable to figure out a motive for what turns out to be not just one murder.

Fun stuff!

I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and fair review.

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If I Gave the Award

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Having read all of the shortlisted books for the 2022 Booker Prize, I see that it is time for my feature in which I decide whether the judges got it right. For this year the choice is difficult for me because I didn’t like many of the books.

As I sometimes do, I’ll start with the book I liked least. That is Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo. Bulawayo’s intent was to explain events in the recent history of Zimbabwe, but her choice to make the characters animals did nothing for me. In fact, it made the characters flat. I also had little tolerance for all the religious and political speeches, and the book’s repetition. I did not finish this book after reading more than half of it.

There was something strange to me also about the approach Percival Everett takes with The Trees. This novel is about the lynching of Black people that took place for centuries in the American South and in particular, the murder of Emmett Till. However, Everett makes it a mystery about some grotesque murders and creates Southern white characters who are almost caricatures of themselves. On reflection, for such a serious subject it seems to indicate an odd sense of humor.

The winner for this year was The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, about a dead man who is trying to reveal photographs he has taken of the Sri Lankan civil war. I was very interested in the history of Sri Lanka, which is not a country I know about, but I didn’t enjoy his depiction of a grotesque afterlife. (The book reminded me a bit of the afterlife depicted in George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo, although I found that book ultimately more touching.)

Alan Garner’s Treacle Walker is a fantasy novella about a boy left alone in an unusual world. It was interesting and imaginative, a fast read that resembled a fairy tale, but it didn’t do much for me.

I always like a book by Elizabeth Strout because of the writing and the gentleness with which she treats her characters. However, Oh, William!, about Lucy Barton’s ex-husband and his family secrets, seemed slight to me when compared to some of the other books.

The book I enjoyed most for its writing and its theme was Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan, about the Magdalen laundries. Keegan is another excellent writer. I guess I’ll pick it for its beautiful, pared-down prose.

Review 2580: Treacle Walker

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I read Treacle Walker for my Booker Prize project. It is an unusual novella that reads a bit like a fairy tale or myth.

Joseph Cappock is a young boy with a lazy eye who wears an eye patch and lives by himself. One day a rag and bone man named Treacle Walker comes to the door, and Joseph trades a pair of used pajamas and a bone for his choice of one thing in a box. He chooses a jar. Treacle Walker also gives him a stone.

When he leaves, Treacle Walker tells him to clean his front step with the stone. The stone turns the dirty step white.

Joseph finds that he sees different things with his good eye than he sees with his bad eye. One day he sees the characters in one of his favorite comic books climb out of a cel and disappear through a mirror in his room. Using the stone, Joseph finds he can go through the mirror himself.

This is an imaginative novel told in some kind of vernacular. I wasn’t always sure what was going on, but the telling was enjoyable.

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