1001 Books #Update #BookList

 

My edition of the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die is a 2009 reprint by Harper Collins Australia with a Preface by Australian journalist and book lover, Jennifer Byrne. Back in February 2016, I spent one ghastly heatwave weekend, going through this book and compiling my read and to-be -read lists with the idea that I would constantly refer back to it and update it.

Guess what?

Neither of those things happened.

I'm not even sure what I hope will happen now, by revisiting both the read and TBR lists!

Except, I love lists.

I love the idea of ticking things off a list.

I love seeing that list of things completed and what is still to be accomplished.

It makes me feel organised and like I'm making progress.

Maybe that's the key word here - progress.

There has been a lot of standing still, treading water, waiting around, and biding my time this year. You all know why. Most of us are experiencing a similar thing.

I've always read several books at once, but since Covid, I have taken this habit to the extreme! As a result, I'm not getting that lovely, satisfied feeling one gets, when a good book is finished. I'm curiously delaying this pleasure, by waylaying it with that other glorious book pleasure of starting a new book!

Which is also making it hard for me to blog regularly as I have less book reviews in the wings. Therefore, a list.

On my current TBR pile I have these books from the list of 1001 to look forward to:

• Tale of the Genji
• The Princess of Cleves
• Oroonoko (ebook)
• Robinson Crusoe
• Moll Flanders
• Pamela
• Clarissa
• The Female Quixote (ebook)
• Candide (ebook)
• Dream of the Red Chamber
• Camilla (ebook)
• Rob Roy (ebook)
• Ivanhoe
• Last of the Mohicans (ebook)
• The Betrothed
• The Red and the Black
• Hunchback of Notre Dame
• Eugene Onegin (ebook)
• Le Pere Goriot
• Oliver Twist
• Lost Illusions (ebook)
• The Three Musketeers (ebook)
• The Scarlet Letter (ebook)
• Cranford
• Walden
• Adam Bede
• Fathers and Sons
• Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (can't believe I got through my childhood without reading this, but have seen many movie versions)
• Journey to the Centre of the Earth (ebook)
• Last Chronicle of Barset
• Therese Raquin
• Alice Through the Looking Glass
• Around the World in Eighty Days (ebook)
• L'Assommoir
• Treasure Island (ebook)
• Une Vie (ebook)
• The Death of Ivan Illyich
• Bel-Ami
• La Bete Humaine
• Picture of Dorian Gray
• The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
• Diary of a Nobody
• The Time Machine
• Dracula
• What Maisie Knew
• The War of the Worlds
• The Awakening
• Buddenbrooks
• The Hound of the Baskervilles
• Heart of Darkness
• The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge
• Death in Venice
• Kokoro
• The Good Soldier
• A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
• The Return of the Soldier
• Ulysses
• Siddharta
• Kristin Lavransdatter
• The Magic Mountain
• The Professor's House
• The Trial (ebook)
• Mrs Dalloway
• The Good Soldier Svejk
• To the Lighthouse
• Remembrance of Things Past
• Steppenwolf
• Some Prefer Nettles
• Parade's End
• Orlando
• Passing
• The Maltese Falcon (movie version only)
• The Waves
• The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
• Tender is the Night
• Independent People
• Nightwood
• Nausea (ebook)
• Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
• The Big Sleep (movie version only)
• Goodbye to Berlin
• The Outsider | Albert Camus
• Pippi Longstocking
• The Heat of the Day
• The Rebel
• Invisible Man
• The Tree of Man
• The Talented Mr Ripley
• Voss
• Cider with Rosie
• The Tin Drum
• The Golden Notebook
• A Clockwork Orange (movie only. Not sure I will ever, ever read it!)
• The Bell Jar
• The Graduate (movie only)
• Silence
• The Master and Margarita
• 2001: A Space Odyssey (the movie was enough)
• Slaughterhouse Five
• G
• The Siege of Krishnapur
• A Dance to the Music of Time
• Quartet in Autumn
• Delta of Venus
• The Beggars Maid
• The Singapore Grip
• The Virgin in the Garden
• The Name of the Rose
• On the Black Hill
• Waterland
• Flaubert's Parrot
• The Cider House Rules (movie only)
• Love in the Time of Cholera
• An Artist of the Floating World
• Beloved
• Regeneration (started many years ago, but never finished)
• The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
• A Fine Balance
• The Unconsoled
• The Life of Pi (movie only, found the book hard to get into)
• The Corrections (tedious, did not finish)
• Cloud Atlas
• The Master
• The Elegance of the Hedgehog
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist

I have now read all of these:

• Don Quixote (once will be more than enough with this one)
• The Sorrows of Young Werther (ugh! hard work. Read during my pre-blogging days)
• Dangerous Liaisons (book & movie several times)
• Sense and Sensibility (book & movie oodles of times)
• Pride and Prejudice (lost count of how many rereads I've had. No movie or tv series has even come close to capturing this story to date imo)
• Mansfield Park (book only)
• Emma (book & movie)
• Frankenstein
• Eugenie Grandet
• The Count of Monte Cristo (book & old tv movie starring Richard Chamberlain)
• Jane Eyre (numerous rereads & movies)
• Vanity Fair (didn't finish the book, but watched the 1998 BBC production instead)
• Wuthering Heights (ugh! Probably should reread)
• The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
• David Copperfield (probably my favourite Dickens to date)
• Moby-Dick (I am now one of those Moby-Dick fanatics)
• Bleak House
• North and South (great readalong book that introduced me to Gaskell)
• Madame Bovary (another ugh! Not sure I finished it either. Read during my pre-blogging days)
• The Woman in White (book and the old B&W movie)
• The Mill on the Floss (read a long time ago - can't remember much about it)
• Les Miserables (my first year-long chapter-a-day readalong book)
• The Moonstone (the book that turned me onto Wilkie Collins many moons ago)
• Little Women (numerous rereads and viewings)
• War and Peace (rereading this year a chapter-a-day)
• Middlemarch (read so long ago & I feel it's due for a reread sooner rather than later)
• Far From the Madding Crowd
• Anna Karenina
• Nana
• Portrait of a Lady (book & movie)
• Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (surprised myself by how much I enjoyed this book)
• Germinal (my favourite Zola to date)
• The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (underwhelmed)
• Tess of the D'Urbervilles (makes me angry every time I read it)
• Jude the Obscure
• The Wings of the Dove (movie and book)
• The Ambassadors (watched the tv series way back when)
• The House of Mirth
• The Forsyte Saga (books and BBC series)
• A Room With a View (numerous reads and viewings of the Ivory Merchant movie)
• Howards End (movie and book)
• Ethan Frome
• Sons and Lovers (made to read this at school! Scarred me for life!)
• The Thirty Nine Steps (book & movie, both a long time ago)
• The Home and the World
• Women in Love (made to read this at school!)
• The Age of Innocence (several times, book and movie)
• A Passage to India (movie and book)
• The Great Gatsby (movie and book)
• The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (read during my Agatha Christie binge in Yr 7-8)
• Lady Chatterley's Lover (all the various versions of it plus a live outdoor performance)
• Cold Comfort Farm (didn't see what all the fuss was about)
• Brave New World (a favourite of Mr Books that he made me read 30 yrs ago)
• Testament of Youth (love, love, love)
• Gone With the Wind (relationship status: complicated)
• Out of Africa (underwhelmed. The movie was better)
• The Hobbit (just the book. Tried to watch the first movie but just couldn't)
• Their Eyes Were Watching God (thank you to the Classics Club for introducing this booka nd author to me)
• Of Mice and Men (book and movies)
• Rebecca (preferred My Cousin Rachel)
• The Grapes of Wrath (underwhelmed)
• The Little Prince
• Animal Farm
• Brideshead Revisited (three times plus numerous viewings of the BBC series)
• If This is a Man
• The Plague
• 1984 (book and theatre production)
• Love in a Cold Climate
• A Town Like Alice (book and TV series)
• The End of the Affair (book & movie)
• Day of the Triffids (book and m0vie)
• Excellent Women
• The Story of O
• Under the Net
• Lord of the Flies (ugh!)
• The Quiet American (twice plus movie)
• The Lord of the Rings (book and movies)
• Doctor Zhivago (book & movie, of course!)
• The Midwich Cuckoos
• The Leopard
• Breakfast at Tiffany's (movie, of course, and book)
• To Kill a Mockingbird (several rereads & movie)
• Catch 22 (don't get me started!)
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
• One Hundred Years of Solitude (twice)
• The Godfather (movie and book)
• The French Lieutenant's Woman (book & movie several times)
• I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
• Surfacing (read during my Atwood phase in the mid 90's but I remember very little about this one)
• The Summer Book (interesting)
• The Commandant (loved, a lot)
• The Shining (book & movie)
• The Sea, The Sea
• Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ( a hoot)
• If on a Winter's Night a Traveller
• Midnight's Children (an all-time favourite)
• Schindler's Ark (book & movie)
• The Color Purple (movie then book, sans the 'u' both times!)
• If Not Now, When?
• The Unbearable Lightness of Being
• The Handmaid's Tale
• Perfume (loved in a perverse kind of way. If you've read the book, you'll understand this comment)
• Contact (book & movie)
• The Drowned and the Saved
• The New York Trilogy (not sure if I will ever be brave enough to read this again)
• Kitchen
• Oscar and Lucinda (all I can remember is the glass church floating down the Bellinger River)
• Like Water For Chocolate (book & movie several times)
• The Remains of the Day (movie & book)
• Wild Swans
• Smilla's Feeling for Snow (book & movie)
• Written on the Body
• The English Patient (movie & book)
• Possessing the Secret of Joy
• The Secret History
• Remembering Babylon
• A Suitable Boy (quite possibly my all-time favourite book ever, although it will need a reread to confirm this status)
• The Shipping News (book & movie)
• Felicia's Journey
• Captain Corelli's Mandolin
• The Reader
• Alias Grace (my favourite Atwood to date)
• Fugitive Pieces
• The God of Small Things
• Enduring Love
• The Hours (movie & book)
• Atonement (book & movie)
• Kafka on the Shore (read in Japan :-)
• The Namesake
• What I Loved
• Suite Francaise
• The Inheritance of Loss
• The Gathering

I have now read 133 of 1001 books!

In 2016 I had read 120, or 12%.

I am making progress, even if it is only 1% in four years!

Other editions of the 1001 series (as kindly compiled here) include even more books that I have read:

• Never Let Me Go (underwhelmed)
• Saturday
• The Children's Book (loved a lot)
• The Gathering (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• What I Loved (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• The Curious Incident of the Dog at Night-Time
• The Blind Assassin
• Amsterdam
• Memoirs of a Geisha (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• The Robber Bride
• The Heather Blazing (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• Possession
• Cat's Eye
• The Passion
• The Child in Time (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
• The World According to Garp (movie and book)
• The Nice and the Good (read in the past four years & new to the list) 
• Chocky
• Vile Bodies (ugh!)
• Summer
• Where Angels Fear to Tread
• Lord Jim (movie and book)
• Northanger Abbey (book and TV series)
• Persuasion (book and movies)

Now we're up to the interactive part.

Which books on my TBR list should I prioritise?

Convince me!

Musings of a Very Idle Reader

One of the reasons I love readalongs is how they help me to get through a challenging book. They keep me focused and give my reading a purpose. The support of my fellow readalongers is an integral part of the process. But sadly, none of this is helping me get through Don Quixote.

It reminds me of my attempts to read Catch-22. The humour is amusing and clever to start with, but by the the half way mark (if not before), it just becomes tedious in it's repetitiveness. So many of my good friends LOVE Catch-22 and so many of my blogger friends LOVE Don Quixote along with a large number of authors that I respect and admire. What have I missed with both of these books?

I like to think that I'm an intelligent person, who is reasonably well-read and not afraid to tackle some of the heftier books when the mood strikes. So I saw the satire and the cleverness in both books, I appreciated the intentions of the authors, I enjoyed some of the set pieces and the themes but, ultimately, they didn't move me, engage me or entertain me. They left me scratching my head in bemusement.

With Don Quixote, I kept waiting for something different to happen, for some growth or insight. It never happened - well it certainly didn't happen in Part One.

I had heard that Part Two was a better read, with all sorts of exciting 'pre-post-modern metafiction', so imagine my disappointment when I quickly discovered that it was more of the same, but with parody...and more even poems!

The whole time I was reading DQ, I kept seeing and hearing The Cisco Kid and Pancho - the characters from a 1950's TV show that I watched in reruns during my 70's childhood. Every time Quixote said Sancho's name I heard Cisco's famous "ohhhh Paaaaaancho" in my head instead!

Just like the TV western, Don Quixote is episodic and full of copious amounts of frame stories...not my favourite form of literature. Perhaps I should have read one chapter a week, spinning each episode out with an anticipatory break in between?

I enjoyed the brief glimpses into life in rural Spain and watching the very first odd-couple literary pairing in action. But I failed to find much humour - there was ridiculousness and absurdity and some slap-stick, but nothing to laugh out loud about. Don Quixote was sad and mad, and Sancho ignorant and trusting, not figures I could poke fun at, or find it amusing to see others do so.

So reluctantly, and with some regret, I abandon the readalong and leave Don Quixote and Sancho to continue riding around the Spanish countryside in search of adventures and injustices to right. According to Goodreads, I made it to the 52% mark, which I think is giving it a fair go, in anyone's books!

Over the years, a number of authors have adapted elements of Don Quixote into their own work. These include Madame Bovary, The Idiot, The New York Trilogy and The Moor's Last Sigh. I attempted but did not like or finish Madame Bovary but I was sucked into Auster's mad, sad world in The New York Trilogy. I even read somewhere that Che Guevera modelled himself on the bumbling, grandiose idealistic knight as well!

Rushdie obviously loves it so much, he's having a second go at a Quixotic story. His new novel, due to published in September, is an even more obvious nod to his favourite novel, than the previous.

 The Jonathan Cape blurb says:

 Quichotte, an ageing travelling salesman obsessed with TV, is on a quest for love. Unfortunately, his daily diet of reality TV, sitcoms, films, soaps, comedies and dramas has distorted his ability to separate fantasy from reality. He wishes an imaginary son into existence, while obsessively writing love letters to a celebrity he knows only through his screen. Quuihotte's story is narrated by Brother, a mediocre spy novelist in the midst of a mid-life crisis, triggered in part by a fall-out with his Sister. As the stories of Brother and Quichotte ingeniously intertwine, Salmon Rushdie takes us ona wild, picaresque journey through a world on the edge of moral and spiritual collapse.

While The Bookseller, 8th March 2019, reveals that,

Quichotte tells the story of an ageing travelling salesman who falls in love with a TV star and sets off to drive across America on a quest to prove himself worthy of her hand. “Quichotte’stragicomic tale is one of a deranged time, and deals, along the way, with father–son relationships, sibling quarrels, racism, the opioid crisis, cyber-spies, and the end of the world.”

Rushdie has previously spoken of his enthusiasm for Cervantes’ Don Quixote, which was published in two parts in 1605 and 1615. 

In January 2018 he told the Guardian of his re-reading of the text: “On the one hand, the characters of Quixote and Sancho Panza are as beautifully realised as I remember them, and the idea of a man determinedly seeing the world according to his own vision, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, feels strikingly contemporary. 

“On the other hand, how many more times are the Knight of the Dolorous Countenance and Sancho going to get beaten up and left in pain in various roadside ditches? The ‘greatest novel ever written’ – I voted for it myself once – turns out to be just a little bit repetitive. To make the reading easier, I’m breaking it up and reading other books by other authors after every couple of hundred pages of Cervantes.”

I was rather thrilled to read, that even though Rushdie voted this the best book of all time, he still considers it repetitive and difficult to read. Sadly, even though I unknowingly used Rushdie's approach of reading Quixote by reading other books in between, it only served to make me feel more and more reluctant to pick it up this monotonous tome each time.

Honoré Daumier

It's not to late for you though.

If my miserable failure should inspire you or goad you into trying for yourself, please visit Nick's blog for details around the chapter-a-day readalong or Silvia's blog to enjoy the company of someone who could read Don Quixote every year and never get tired of it.

My earlier, more hopeful, Quixote posts.
Musings of an Idle Reader
Marcela

I'll leave Don Quixote and Cervantes now, with little regret. My curiosity to experience the first modern novel remains unmet, or at least, unsatisfied.

Catching clouds would have been more amusing.

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

The End!

How on earth do I sum up in mere words such a magnificent, majestic, momentous story?! Les Miserables is a story full of pathos, compassion, extravagance and just a few flaws. Fortunately these flaws of logic and historical truth don't get in the way of Hugo's grander themes about love, redemption and sacrifice.

I struggled to accept Hugo's premise for the forward march of humankind with the promise of inevitable Progress towards some greater point. This belief, that all progress and evolution is good, was common among many writers, politicians and thinkers of the time, a belief which still infects many people today. However his ideas about the positive outcomes for universal education, suffrage and abolishing slavery felt spot on and admirable.

In his Introduction to my Penguin edition of the book, Norman Denny, explains that although

he was masterly in the construction of his novel, (Hugo) had little or no regard for the discipline of novel-writing. He was wholly unrestrained and unsparing of his reader. He had to say everything and more than everything; he was incapable of leaving anything out.

Which is a shame, because some basic editing would have made an easier journey of it, for this new-to-the-story reader in particular. I powered through the Waterloo diversion and enjoyed Valjean and Cosette's sojourn in the convent, but the soppy love story between Marius and Cosette and then the barricades nearly did me in!

The student uprising, with their youthful idealism, the creation of the barricades, the endless pontificating, the senseless waste of life that just kept going on, and on, and on, chapter after chapter. So much detail and importance assigned to a little remembered, little known footnote in history.

Although, perhaps that was Hugo's point.

All our lives are filled with moments significant and important to us, but of little consequence to future historians. Smaller moments within bigger historic periods, like the French Revolution and Empire, get swallowed up by time. Only the events that allow historians to draw a narrative line that suits their agenda get included (and we all have an agenda when it comes to creating the story of our lives, even historians).

It was only after finishing the book, that I went back and read the Introductions in all three books. In the Rose edition, Adam Thirwell has written a very thoughtful piece about Hugo's intentions for this epic book. He notes that,

What is relevant?....How can you know what fact will emerge, and destroy you?....We all live our lives so blissful in our ignorance of an infinity which could invade us at any moment....The true story is chance.

Hugo said that the poet's duty was to elevate political events to the dignity of historical events....he was interested in transforming politics into history, and rewriting history so that it included the unknown, the ignored, the forgotten....to show how far history is fiction.

Donougher also noted that Hugo believed that 'classicists wanted art to improve and idealise reality, while he insisted it should 'paint life', with its confusion of the good, the bad and the absurd.'

Hugo himself was a romantic, a liberal, a poet. He used his fame to promote his political views. He wrote a story that, according to David Bellos (The Novel of the Century) showed that 'moral progress is possible for all, in every social sphere' without reassuring us with a 'tale of the triumph of good over evil, but a demonstration of how hard it is to be good.'

Throughout the year I read/referred to three different translations of Les Miserables - the Denny, the Rose and the Donougher. I started the year with the Denny, so that ended up being the main one I stayed with the whole time. I developed a strong affection for it and the lovely hardcover design by Coralie Bickford-Smith. I really enjoyed his language choices. I found it easy to read and it flowed well. But Denny did edit and make changes to Hugo's work - he also put two whole chapters into an appendix at the back.

The other two versions became my comparison reads when I had the time or inclination.

I can safely say that the Rose version will not be staying with me beyond this readalong. I disliked many of the word choices she made, especially the modern colloquial that jarred within the pages of a book so obviously set within a specific time.

I really liked the Donougher though, when my copy finally arrived in February. The deckled edges tickled my fancy every time I picked it up and the soft cover book was much easier to travel with (for weekends away).

Next time I read Les Mis, this will be the version I will read the whole way through.

At various times throughout the year, I would get fixated on translation choices. I found this fabulous summary of ALL the Les Mis translations by R. Plunket from Scotland on his VERY extensive review about the book here.

Below are his abridged comments, from that review, about the various translations:

Now onto the translation. First a little bit of translation history. American Charles Wilbour was the first to translate the novel and his version was published by Carleton in 1862 just months after the novel was published in Brussels. The fact that Wilbour, at the age of just twenty nine, completed the translation so quickly is astounding. The translation is very close to Hugo's French and is highly regarded.... An abridged version of Wilbour's translation was released in the UK by Catto & Windus in 1874. The unabridged version was finally released in the country in 1890. 

The only downsides of Wilbour's translation are that it contained no footnotes and French verse parts were not translated. This was rectified in 1987 by an updated translation by Lee Fahnestock and Norman MacAfee, released by Signet. The vocabulary is more modern so the translation will appear more readable to someone who finds 19th Century texts difficult. This is the most common paperback version in the USA and has the musical logo on the cover. It is unabridged like the original Wilbour, has full place names instead of dashes (so you get Digne instead of D-, this was a revision Hugo himself made to the text in 1881) and French verse parts are translated into English in footnotes. 

Sir Frederic Charles Lascelles Wraxall's translation was the first to be released in the UK and appeared in 1862, just before the release of the last volume of Wilbour's translation in America. Wraxall's translation was the only one to pay copyright to the publishers. It was advertised as the most "literal" translation. It is abridged as it deliberately misses chapters and books (Wraxall gives his reasons for this in the preface). The text was even further abridged from the fourth edition onwards. The omitted parts were translated in the USA by J Blamire for the 1886 Deluxe Edition by Routledge and this same text was used for the 1938 Heritage Press release with illustrations from Lynn Ward. Little Brown also supplemented the Wraxall text in 1887. Later reprints by various publishers, such as Allison & Co, supplemented the text using Wilbour. Even with the supplementations, the Wraxall version is still very poorly regarded. Hugo himself even voiced his disapproval. 

The Wraxall translation was also heavily plagarised by others. The translation by William Walton et al. (actually a pseudonym of John Thomson of the Philadelphia Free Library), released in 1892 by the publisher G Barrie, borrows heavily from Wraxall.
Isobel F Hapgood's translation first appeared in 1887 and was published by Thomas Crowell. Hapgood's translation was generally very well regarded at the time, although some of the language used has become outdated. Hapgood's main defect is that she misses out the Cambronne section. This omission was restored by a handful of publishers in the early Twentieth Century including John Wannamaker, Dumont and Century Co. Crowell continued to publish a copyright version without the supplementation so it is clear that Hapgood did not approve of such additions.... 

The early years of the post war era was mainly filled with adaptations and abridgments of Wilbour's text (a famous abridgment by James K Robinson reduced Wilbour's text to under 400 pages). 

Norman Denny was the first person to offer a new translation in the Twentieth Century. This is the most common version available in the UK, released in 1976 by Folio Press (with bizarre illustrations) and by Penguin as a paperback in 1980. Highly readable but Denny takes great liberties with Hugo's text and a lot of material is omitted. Two sections are moved to the end of the book as appendixes. Penguin continues to print this but thankfully they have now released this superior translation by Christine Donougher. 

Finally in 2008 an unabridged translation by Julie Rose was released by The Modern Library in the US and Vintage in the UK. The main criticism of this translation is that the vocabulary is very modern and at times feels awkward. For instance Rose uses the term "slimy spook" to describe Javert in one section. I have never heard this term before and I cannot imagine it being a good translation of the French term Mouchard. I do respect Rose for translating such a difficult text. Her translation just didn't click with me. 

So now we come to the new translation by Christine Donougher. So why is this translation superior to the others? It is complete and unabridged, unlike Denny, Wraxall and Hapgood. It doesn't feel like the language has been dumbed down, unlike Rose. It has excellent notes and footnotes, unlike Wilbour and the updated versions of his text. The text flows well. I would say the closest translation to Donougher in terms of style is probably Hapgood. It is certainly as readable as say Denny.... 

In summary Christine Donougher's translation of Les Misérables is the best version available in English and I would advise all fans of the novel to buy it. Well done to Penguin for publishing this splendid edition.

Finally, a big thank you to Nick for keeping us on track and motivated (especially via twitter) all year. Slow reading my way through this monumental story was a magic way to do it, even if I didn't manage to maintain the schedule the whole year.

Final posts by host & some of the participants:

Nick's Les Mis wrap-up post

Lory @The Emerald City

Louise @A Strong Belief in Wicker

(please let me know below if I've missed your final post, so that I can add it in.)

My Les Mis posts throughout the year:

September Slow Reading Update

The Battle of Waterloo the Victor Hugo Way

Finally Facing My Waterloo

Birthday Check In

Week 2 Catch Up

Translations

Week 1 First Impressions

#lesmisreadalong

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

I've loved Japanese literature for many years now, but since visiting Japan earlier this year, my fascination and interest has exploded! Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto popped up on several lists as a great contemporary example of Japanese literature.

Kitchen is a slim book containing two stories - Kitchen and Moonlight Shadow - both deal with death, grief, mothering and healing. Kitchen is the longer of the two and I was enchanted from page one. The language is deceptively simple and at times I worried that it was too simple. I wasn't sure if this was a translation issue or part of Yoshimoto's urban grunge charm. Except that somehow, very quickly, with no fuss or bother, Mikage's tragic tale crept into my heart and stayed. 

Yoshimoto has created two beautiful, tender tale about loss and how to move forward from it. Her writing is suffused with innocence and warmth. Although her characters experience discontent and confusion, loneliness and urban angst, ultimately there is hope and love. 

In her Preface, Yoshimoto says,

Growth and the overcoming of obstacles are inscribed on a person's soul. If I have become any better at fighting my daily battles, be they violent or quiet, I know it is only thanks to my many friends and acquaintances.

Both these stories are testimony to this belief. Friendship acts as a band aid for heartbreak. Being connected and making room for others in your life is what gets you through the tough days. For Yoshimoto's characters, this connection often occurred around the rituals of food, eating and tea drinking.

A dream-like almost mystical element imbued her work as well. Both stories have a dash of magic realism or other-worldliness, that I found to be appealing in a very Japanese way. The emotion is subtle and subdued and the cast of characters quirky and eccentric in a 1980's version of Harajuku style. I suspect that this particular version of Japanese gender fluidity might meet with some raised eyebrows by current Western thinking, however it felt culturally and historically appropriate to my burgeoning knowledge of Japanese society.

Yoshimoto said that her two main themes are 'the exhaustion of young Japanese in contemporary Japan' and 'the way in which terrible experiences shape a person’s life'.

I'm not really sure that I spotted the exhaustion of which she speaks, but there was certainly an ennui and disconnect with the more traditional values of Japanese society.

I decided to not include any quotes in this post, because when I tried, they didn't work out of context.

If you enjoy minimalist, zen-like Japanese literature, then I think this will work for you. But if Murakami, Yoko Ogawa, Hiro Arikawa or Takashi Hiraide are not your thing, they stay away from the Kitchen!

In 1987 Yoshimoto won the 6th Kaien Newcomers' Literary Prize for Kitchen. In 1988 the novel was nominated for the Mishima Yukio Prize and in 1999 it received the 39th Recommendation by the Minister of Education for Best Newcomer Artist. In 1988 she also won the 16th Izumi Kyōka Prize for Literature for the novella Moonlight Shadow, which is included in most editions of Kitchen.

First published in 1988 and translated into English by Megan Backus in 1993.

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

Reading Frankenstein for the first time was a curious thing. We all think we know the story. At least, I thought I did. I was expecting a slock-horror story full of scary, lurking, creeping monster moments with lots of people screaming and fleeing his terrible claws. I didn't get this.

I also hadn't appreciated that it would be an example of Romantic era thinking. I'm not a huge fan of romanticism, described by wikipedia as,

an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate period from 1800 to 1850. Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical. It was partly a reaction to the Industrial Revolution, Rationalism and Classicism of the Enlightenment. 

I'm all for exploring character emotion and psychology, but I often feel that Romantic writers are out of touch with own their times and their story often suffers for it's lack of reality. Frankenstein was certainly a curious and unexpected mix of nostalgia, scientific advancement, individualism and gothic melodrama.

I didn't expect that the monster would learn to talk in the same cultured tones as the narrator. I didn't expect all the murder scenes to be off-page. I didn't expect that Dr Frankenstein would be so self-absorbed and so unaware and so thoughtless. His utter lack of responsibility or understanding about his role in the monsters maturation, right to the very end, was astounding.

Shelley obviously had a lot to say about absent parents in this story. I'm finding the bio on both her and her mother by Charlotte Gordon fascinating and revealing...thoughts and review to come later though.

Like Shelley, the monster just wanted to be loved and to belong. Dr Frankenstein and the wider society denied him that opportunity. His reaction can, therefore, be seen as a normal response to such an all-encompassing rejection. Except that these actions then meant that he would forever be on the outside of the regular society he desired to be in. Just like Shelley herself, perhaps?

Dr Frankenstein meddled with science without thinking through the consequences. He was after personal glory rather than thinking about the betterment of society as a whole. The individualism admired by the Romantics has negative consequences when viewed through the prism of the larger community. One man's selfish actions can have ongoing and tragic effects on the people around him.

Dr Frankenstein and his monster were two tragic cases of misunderstanding, miscommunication and lack of personal responsibility. The reader is given more than enough detail to understand how both got to the point that they got to, but you're also left with a sense of frustration by their inability to walk in the others shoes. They might follow and track each other all around Europe, but it's a physical journey not a journey of discovery or enlightenment.

I did enjoy my #Frankenfest reading experience, but it wasn't what I expected. It felt quite juvenile and self-indulgent and certainly not the horror story I was anticipating. I'm now more inclined to agree with Gremaine Greer's opinion that I noted in my Preface post (link below). Frankenstein is not a great novel, but it was a fun October read for the Classics Club #ccdare.

As noted in previous posts, I'm noticing lots of bookish references to grief and loss, that reflects my own personal journey right now. Frankenstein revealed this,

'but is it not the duty of survivors, that we refrain from augmenting their unhappiness by an appearance of immoderate grief? It is also a duty owed to yourself; for excessive sorrow prevents improvement or enjoyment, or even the discharge of daily usefulness, without which no man is fit for society.'

My Frankenstein - Preface post

Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelley

by Charlotte Gordon

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

I like to think that I have taken my 'what to read whilst travelling' choices to an inspired level of brilliance, but I really outdid myself with our recent trip to Japan. Reading Murakami in Japan now feels like the ONLY place to read Murakami!

Not only does the usual Murakami weirdness make sense when you're actually in Japan, but you also realise just how important the environment is to Murakami and his characters. His descriptions of the trees, forests, waterways and urban spaces are everywhere as you move around the country. As are the crows.

In this case, the boy named crow is a mentor to our young protagonist, Kafka Tamura, perhaps an alter ego, a Japanese Jiminy Cricket. Whatever crow is or isn't, right from word one, Murakami is flagging that symbolism, mythology and psychology will be our prime concerns in Kafka on the Shore.

In Japanese mythology, crows are seen as a sign of 'divine intervention in human affairs' (wikipedia). Western mythology tends to associate the crow with bad news or as a harbinger of death. They're selfish, spread gossip and neglect their young. And they're everywhere in Japan. They sit on telegraph wires, fence posts and roof tops. You often wake up to their cawing, even in the city.

Cats are the other creatures that dominant not only Murakami stories, but many Japanese stories, yet curiously I didn't see one single cat in three weeks, let alone a talking cat! The opposite of the crow, cats are creatures of good luck, although still often associated with death and hauntings.

Silence, I discover is something you can actually hear.

There is no denying that Murakami is on very intimate terms with kooky.

If the talking cats weren't enough, a cameo appearance by Johnny Walker and Colonel Sanders of KFC fame might tip you over the edge. A reference to the (fictional) Picnic at Hanging Rock as an example of another group loss of consciousness event caught my eye. Did Murakami know that it was an urban myth? Is that what he was implying about his own story? The sense of mystery and other-worldliness was certainly a shared atmosphere between the two stories.

I was also amazed by truck drivers who suddenly became classic music afficiandos, quiet librarians who turned out to be sex fiends and sex workers who quoted philosophers. What's not to love? The kookiness gets under my skin and into my head. Just like what happened to me with his previous books.

1Q84 is still roaming around in my head, Colourless Tsukuru less so, but it's still a memorable book experience.

Things outside you are projections of what's inside you, and what's inside you is a projection of what's outside you. So when you step into the labyrinth outside you, at the same time your stepping into the labyrinth inside. 

One of the really enjoyable aspects to reading Murakami in Japan is the place names. Suddenly they really mean something. Most of the action in Kafka takes place in Takamatsu on the island of Shikoku. 

We didn't get to Shikiko with this visit, but we did see one of the huge bridges, from a distance, that joins Shikoko to Honshu and we spent some time at the station that is the interchange for the JR line that goes to Takamatsu. Seeing the name of the city featured in my book up in lights suddenly grounded this surreal story into reality.

This is only my fourth Murakami (see my Author Challenge tab for details) so I'm not sure I can safely name all his common themes and ideas, but there are a few that I've clocked. Going into the woods/fear of getting lost, weird sex, talking creatures, dreams, random jazz references, loneliness and silence. And for me, the reader, there is an over-riding sense of bewilderment (WTF was that about?) as well as an overwhelming sense of wanting more (whatever it was a think I like it!) 

I'm caught between one void and another. I have no idea what's right, what's wrong. I don't even know what I want anymore. I'm standing alone in the middle of a horrific sandstorm. I can't move, and can't even see my fingertips.

Murakami doesn't wrap his stories up with a neat, tidy bow or resolve many of the story lines. This should be totally frustrating...and it is, but somehow you love being kept in the dark and confused at the same time. Perhaps it's the likeable characters? Or perhaps it's the not so subtle way he plays with your head? Or perhaps it is the hope that the next book he writes will bring you one step closer to understanding this maddening man and his ability to suck you into his world. 

Every one of us is losing something precious to us....Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That's part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads - at least that's how I imagine it - there's a little room where we store those memories.

Image source

Murakami likes to do the whole books in books thing. Kafka's backlist was an obvious start -The Castle, The Trial, Metamorphosis and In the Penal Colony in this case. But he also referenced The Arabian Nights, the complete works of Natsume Soseki, a book about the trial of Adolf Eichmann (I can only assume it was Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem), Electra by Sophocles, The Tale of the Genji and 'The Chrysanthemum Pledge' in Tales of Moonlight and Rain by Ueda Akinari.

So many tangents, so many connections, which one should I tackle next?

Under the Net by Iris Murdoch

Hmmmmm, Under the Net by Iris Murdoch...where do I start?

Perhaps I should start with my expectations.

I expected an English-style comedy of errors featuring a bumbling, gentleman layabout.

I'm reading the Random Vintage classic version, so the back cover tells me that,

Jake, clever and lazy, makes a living out of writing translations and sponging off his friends. When he is kicked out of his latest lodgings he embarks on a series of fantastic and hilarious adventures around London involving movie stars, majestic philosophers, bookies, singers and a celebrity hound called the Marvelous Mister Mars.

In my mind I pictured Mr Bean, racing madcap around London, bouncing from one person, idea and purpose to the next. Or perhaps purposelessness would be a better term for what Mr Bean does and what I expected from Jake. I fully expected to see a Christmas turkey on Jake's head at some point!

Jake is a particularly English character. He tied himself up in knots of anxiety about his friendships and possible betrayals and all the social niceties that keep the (English) world ticking over. It was exhausting watching him move from one chaotic experience to the next without pause or reflection. Until he had time to pause, then her reflected and reflected and reflected until you could barely recognise the initial problem any longer! And like Jake, you could barely recognise the real person he he was thinking about any longer. Do we ever get to really know the people around us? That's a good question and one that Jake grappled with constantly with little success.

I did struggle around the halfway point to keep going with this story. Jake was annoying me with his bumbling, madcap antics, in pretty much the same way Mr Bean annoys me by the end of an episode. It was getting too ridiculous and silly and pointless!

So I did something I don't normally do.
I read some reviews by other participants of the #IMReadalong and on Goodreads.
They convinced me to persist.

I found myself chuckling about the ridiculous escapade on the fire escape, that quickly led to the bizarre madcap (that word again!) kidnapping of Mister Mars and the eventual fall of Rome!

But what was the point of it all?

I kept on.

And I'm glad I did.

One must just blunder on. Truth lies in blundering on.

So we blunder on to the lovely, poignant passage in Paris with Jake chasing his dream of Anna and his work at the hospital back in London where Murdoch finally begins to draw all the loose strings together. The final meeting with Hugo that gives Jake (and us the reader) all sorts of ah-ha moments and understandings were worth the long wait.

What is urgent is not urgent forever but only ephemerally. 
All work and all love, the search for wealth and fame, the search for truth, life itself, are made up of moments which pass and become nothing.

Liz's review for Under the Net.

Round Up post by Liz with links to other reviews.

It has taken me two weeks to read this book which gives Under the Net the dubious honour of being my first book finished and reviewed for 2018. But now I get to experience for myself, Jake's emotions as he began Jean Pierre's award winning book,

Starting a novel is opening a door on a misty landscape; you can still see very little but you can smell the earth and feel the wind blowing.

Flight From the Enchanter
#IMreadalong

The Commandant by Jessica Anderson

The Commandant came recommended to me in a roundabout fashion. Earlier on in the year, I attended an 'Honouring the Author' event at the State Library, NSW. The author in question was Jessica Anderson.

Anderson won the Miles Franklin Prize twice (in 1978 & 1980), but not for The Commandant.

By the end of the honouring event, though, I was convinced that The Commandant was the book for me to start my Jessica Anderson journey with (and not one of her two more contemporary award winning books). Historical fiction based on real life events and people will always win me over.

The Commandant is based on Captain Patrick Logan, the man in charge of the Moreton Bay convict settlement on the present day site of Brisbane.

Moreton Bay Settlement 1835

He was a cruel task master, feared by all the convicts.

But the story is told mostly from the point of view of his young (fictional) sister-in-law, Frances, recently arrived from Ireland.

In some ways, this story could be seen as a simple drawing room story about two sisters, but of course, the outside world intrudes regularly on their domestic dramas. There is a strong message about the role of women in the early years of colonisation and how they coped with the isolation, the lack of modern amenities and the constant fear of the unknown. Frances is told by one of the other women,

'Whatever course you take,' she said, half-shutting her eyes, 'no doubt in ten years or so you will arrive at the state of the most of us - simply of making do with what one has. Surprisingly enough -' she opened surprised eyes - 'it is an art in which one may progress. I thought I knew all about making do with what one had, but now I find I can do more with it than I dreamed.'

Anderson's deceptively straightforward plot also hides many viewpoints and tensions.

We see the doubt and confusion that the soldiers and their wives feel about Logan's actions. The young doctors, who have to tend the battered backs of the recently whipped convicts, have another story to tell. The threat of a highly publicised court case in Sydney to deal with the rumours of Logan's cruelty bubble away underneath the surface, only to rear up every time a ship arrives with mail. The menace of the convicts, who far outnumber the soldiers, is felt throughout the story. How the convicts view the settlers and how they, in turn, view the convicts is a tension that Anderson plays with deftly. 

Underlying all this, though, is another viewpoint. The local Aboriginal population are spoken of and seen fleetingly by our main characters. They know they are being watched, rumours and myths are rampant. Yet the reader can also see this little settlement, barely clinging onto the land around the Brisbane River, through the eyes of the Aboriginals, wondering who on earth where these strange people with their stone walls and inappropriate clothing and guns. 

Image source

Even further away, are the Sydney based journalists and intelligentsia who are driving social change and asking questions about reform, mercy and justice for the convicts. Frances represents this new world order while her brother-in-law represents the old world order of duty, a firm hand and punishment. Logan is understandably confused and even, hurt, by the possibility of change. Anderson portrays his loneliness and brooding behaviour in a sympathetic light, thanks to the tender, loving concern he evokes in his young wife (a woman with a lisp not unlike the one that Anderson, herself battled with all her life).

It is not just Logan's right to rule that is called into question here. Anderson also leads us to see how tenuous and uncertain these early settlements actually were. A so-called civilisation perched on the edge of wilderness, halfway round the world, for the spurious idea of containing the poor and dispossessed of England, was always going to be fraught with danger. Most of the poor and dispossessed ended up on the wrong side of the law as a result of the Industrial Revolution. So many of the convicts were shipped off to Australia for one single offence, often stealing food or clothes. The colony of Australia became the dumping ground for a problem the English didn't want to face. Instead of dealing with the problem of a growing divide between the haves and have-nots at home, they shipped as many of the have-nots off to the other side of the world to basically fend for themselves.

Image source

Anderson's story brings to vivid life this period of history. There are fabulous, meaty characters, shifting points of view and a pervading sense of mercy. Logan's demise is deliberately left as confused and murky as the official reports of the time. Anderson doesn't try to give us the answers that weren't available to her characters at the time.

The story ends, as it began, with Frances on board a ship, musing about her fate. The innocence and conviction of her beginning has been tempered by experience and sympathy.

I'm so grateful to Text Publishing for bringing such tremendous Australian stories back into print. I hope they never go out of print again.

#AusReadingMonth
#Australian Women Writers challenge

The Return of the King, Book VI by J R R Tolkien

Book VI in The Return of the King brings us back to the perilous journey of Sam and Frodo.
Sam now has possession of the ring and Frodo is missing.

Tolkien provides the reader with a quick catch up that feels natural and part of the drama (not the obvious recap that so many authors clumsily employ). He also lets us know what the time frame is in reference to what's going on for Merry, Pippin and Aragorn. This helps us and creates panic at the same time. Sam and Frodo still have so far to go to succeed in their mission, yet their friends are about to go into one of the biggest battles of all time!

The power of the ring, even on hobbits, is clearly described here. We also see why hobbits were the perfect choice to bear the burden of the ring on this quest. Their humility and simple tastes over-ruled or kept at bay the desire for power, dominance and the large-scale delusions of grandeur that the ring encouraged.

Yet, the ring, still does exercise a power over Frodo, so that, some might say, that Frodo actually fails in his mission to destroy the ring. When he is standing on the edge of the fires at the Mountain of Doom, he cannot cast the ring aside.

Mount Doom - Alan Lee

But kindness, goodness and pity save the day in the end. Frodo's patient acceptance of Gollum throughout the journey now has a own role to play. The power of the ring may have been too much for Frodo in the end, but it completely overwhelmed and subsumed Gollum. His desire and greed made him reckless, whilst Frodo's inherent goodness set up the situation that makes the right result, the result for good, prevail.

Tolkien himself, talks about this in several of his letters. Many of his readers found this failure to be a problem or a concern.

no 192 to Amy Ronald 27 July 1956

I have just had another letter regarding the failure of Frodo. Very few seem even to have observed it. But following the logic of the plot, it was clearly inevitable, as an event. And surely it is a more significant and real event than a mere 'fairy-story' ending in which the hero is indomitable? It is possible for the good, even the saintly, to be subjected to a power of evil which is too great for them to overcome – in themselves. In this case the cause (not the 'hero') was triumphant, because by the exercise of pity, mercy, and forgiveness of injury, a situation was produced in which all was redressed and disaster averted....

Frodo deserved all honour because he spent every drop of his power of will and body, and that was just sufficient to bring him to the destined point, and no further. Few others, possibly no others of his time, would have got so far. The Other Power then took over: the Writer of the Story (by which I do not mean myself), 'that one ever-present Person who is never absent and never named' (as one critic has said).

246 Mrs Eileen Elgar (drafts) Sept 1963

I do not think that Frodo's was a moral failure. At the last moment the pressure of the Ring would reach its maximum – impossible, I should have said, for any one to resist, certainly after long possession, months of increasing torment, and when starved and exhausted. Frodo had done what he could and spent himself completely (as an instrument of Providence) and had produced a situation in which the object of his quest could be achieved. His humility (with which he began) and his sufferings were justly rewarded by the highest honour; and his exercise of patience and mercy towards Gollum gained him Mercy: his failure was redressed.

 211 to Rhona Beare 14 Oct 1958

But I might say that if the tale is 'about' anything (other than itself), it is not as seems widely supposed about 'power'. Power-seeking is only the motive-power that sets events going, and is relatively unimportant, I think. It is mainly concerned with Death, and Immortality; and the 'escapes': serial longevity, and hoarding memory.

Part of my reread of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings was to compare them against my memory as well as with the movies. I couldn't make myself watch The Hobbit movies. The first one was so ghastly (when I watched it when it first came out), that I couldn't do the other two in the movie trilogy or re-watch the first this time around.

However re-watching The Lord of the Rings has been enjoyable and fascinating. We have an extended blu-ray version that divides each of the three movies into two full-length movies. I remember loving the first movie, but feeling more ambivalent about the other two.

Now I know why.

The first movie follows the action of the book fairly closely (with some notable omissions), but the second and third movie veer off in different directions and changes the story by adding extra scenes and killing off people that survive in the book.

The big one, of course is Saruman.

Which completely changes the end of the Book VI when Frodo, Sam, Merry & Pippin finally make their way back to The Shire.

Scouring of the Shire - Alan Lee

The return to The Shire is full of peril and change for our four fearless hobbits. Gates block their way and tall chimneys mar the view. Trees have been pulled down and hobbit-holes have been destroyed to make way for ugly timber structures.

Saruman and Wormtongue have made their way to The Shire, where his malice lingers,

You made me laugh, you hobbit-lordlings, riding along with all those great people, so secure and so pleased with your little selves. You thought you had done very well out of it all, and could now just amble back and have a nice quiet time in the country. Saruman's home could be all wrecked, and he could be turned out, but no one could touch yours. 

I had forgotten there was a final battle - the Battle of Bywater, 1419 - where Captain's Meriadoc and Peregrin came into their own. And that Frodo and Sam enjoy a whole year in the Shire together, rebuilding, replanting and bringing their world back to order before Frodo goes off with the Elves.

Frodo's prediction of Sam's life in The Shire was a lovely way to finish their time together,

you are my heir: all that I had and might have had I leave to you. And also you have Rose, and Elanor; and Frodo-lad will come, and Rosie-lass, and Merry, and Goldilocks, and Pippin; and perhaps more that I cannot see. Your hands and your wits will be needed everywhere. You will be the Mayor, of course, as long as you want to be, and the most famous gardener in history; and you will read things out of the Red Book, and keep alive the memory of the age that is gone, so that people will remember the Great Danger and so love their beloved land all the more.

Peace, hope and prosperity have overthrown the dark days of evil. The world has changed, things have moved on, but it's okay...as long as we learn the lessons that history has to teach us.

Grey Havens by Alan Lee

Well, that's it! After seven months and about 1500 pages, we have come to the end of our journey through Middle Earth.

Thank you to those who stayed with me to the very end, and those who shared but a part of the journey with me. All your comments and support and have been HUGELY appreciated and enjoyed.

I hope you found the readalong as rewarding as I did.

Appendix A - F (about 100 pages) remain unread in my edition. I have never been able to make myself read through these (my HLOTR fandom has yet to fall over into fanatic!) but I'm keeping my options (and the linky below) open for another month, to see what might happen.

I also have Tolkien's letters to finish.

If you've just stumbled onto this (re)readalong and would like to leave your review link or simply comment on our journey, please feel free to join in.

But for now,

dear friends, on the shores of the Sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are evil.

#HLOTRreadalong2017 

- Masterpost

- The Hobbit readalong

The Fellowship of the Ring 

-Welcome to Book

- The Prologue

- Halfway post - Book one 

- TFOTR - Book two

The Two Towers

- Welcome to Book

- Review

The Return of the King

Book V

Book VI

Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote

I hadn't realised that Truman Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's was a novella - only 100 pages in my sweet little pink Popular Penguin. Not that I'm complaining. Brief is good for me right now.

This particular edition also contained three more short stories by Capote - House of Flowers, A Diamond Guitar and A Christmas Memory.

There's probably not much more I can say about the actual story of Breakfast at Tiffany's that hasn't already been said. Yes, the book is different to the movie. Capote clearly tells us that Holly has 'boy's hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blonde and yellow', yet it is impossible to read this story now without Audrey Hepburn in mind.

The book is seedier, grittier and less romantic than the movie. But in both, Holly comes across as being extremely young and naive (she loves Wuthering Heights after all - the ultimate symbol of young, naive passion). She's looking for love and belonging in all the wrong places. She allows herself to become a kept woman and keeps everyone at arm's length, even the cat.

She's described as being a phony (although a 'real phony. She believes all this crap she believes') and a liar. I'd like to say she was at least true to herself, but that was the part she hadn't worked out yet. She was still searching; trying on different parts; hoping, wishing, longing for something more or something different.

You call yourself a free spirit, a "wild thing," and you're terrified somebody's gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it's not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.

You're left hoping, that Holly will one day, like the cat, stop running and find a home where she feels that she belongs.

The other three stories are much slighter and quite different in tone and subject matter. I guess you could say that they represent a good cross-section of Capote's writing style, except the sum total of my knowledge about Capote's work is now contained in these four stories. So what would I know!

House of Flowers is set in Haiti featuring a young girl, Ottilie, who has found her way into prostitution. Like Holly, she longs to know what love is and to feel a sense of belonging. For Ottilie this means returning to the Mountains of her childhood and facing the hostility of an older, dying woman. The story seems to be about the battle for power between the two women, with the younger coming off the ultimate winner. Her old life is quickly forgotten as the age-old juggle/struggle for power begins with her new husband.

By the time I had got to the end of A Diamond Guitar, I realised that love and belonging were major themes for Capote. I also found a sense of nostalgia and yearning prevalent in all of his pieces. This one is a prison story - not one of those harsh, cruel prison stories full of depraved beings, on both sides of the wire - but one that focused on friendship, longing and memory with maybe just a hint of gay love.

The final story, A Christmas Memory, is apparently an American classic, but one I have never heard of before. A quick google revealed that there was an autobiographical element to the story, which made it more interesting and enlightening. Capote's writing was obviously his way of searching for the love and belonging that was missing from his childhood. This reminded me that the only thing I had known about Capote before reading these stories was his childhood friendship with Harper Lee. Apparently Sook, the elderly cousin that featured in his Christmas stories, was befriended by Capote during this same time.

I love how books can find connections with other books purely by chance. I'm currently reading Lincoln in the Bardo. Capote's descriptions of Sook made me smile,

Her face is remarkable – not unlike Lincoln's, craggy like that, and tinted by sun and wind.

It gave me an instant affection for her.

I'm not sure if other countries produced pink popular penguins, but in 2013 Penguin Australia teamed with the McGrath Foundation to help raise money for Breast Care Nurses in communities all around Australia.

Glenn McGrath was a prominent Australian cricketer a number of years ago. His wife Jane sadly died of breast cancer in 2008. She was only 42. They started the McGrath Foundation together in 2005. Currently 117 Breast Care Nurses have been placed in various communities around Australia.

The Pink Popular Penguins

• Alphabet Sisters by Monica McInerney

• Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote

• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

• Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

• Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Suskind

• The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald

• A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf

• Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford

• Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

• Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

• A Spy in the House of Love by Anais Nin.

This is my seventh completed book & review for #20BooksofWinter. 

I've half read two others on the list. 

There is a grandness in my ability to fail reading challenges!