American fairytales

I have been almost non-existent on this blog for the last month, mainly because my reading has temporarily paused. Well, I'm reading plenty it's just that none of it is interesting enough to share (unless anyone wants to hear my thoughts on the UK's Companies Act 2006?). Yes, my final law exams start next week and my reading for pleasure has been subordinated to my reading for necessity. With work being more than a little hectic at the moment, I haven't even had any time to read through the blogs I regularly visit! I've been feeling quite deprived...but the prospect of just a couple of more weeks of slog before being free to read without guilt for the first time since I started working full time/studying part time four years ago is the light at the end of this particular tunnel. I shall soon be able to read not just books but all my favourite blogs (my unread posts on Bloglines are at a crazy level, though I have promised myself that I will read them all properly soon!).

In the meantime, it's time to catch up just a little on some of my pending reviews, starting with my Reading Dangerously April & May titles.


TRANSFORMATIONS by Anne Sexton
This collection of poetry is short but no less formidable for that. Sexton reimagines (transforms) 17 fairy tales originally told by the Brothers Grimm. Starting with The Gold Key (a rather obscure tale that I had to look up in my Grimm collection), Sexton introduces her role within the poems as that of a "middle-aged witch", with her face in a book and her mouth wide ready to tell a story or two. This poetic witch wants to make us remember what it was like to be read to as a child, to make us reimagine these fairy tales ourselves, to remind us that the sanitised, Disneyfied tales we tell our children today are at some distance from the strangeness and violence of Grimms' original tales.

I particularly enjoyed Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. As with all of the tales, Sexton includes an introductory verse framing the poetic retelling:

No matter what life you lead
the virgin is a lovely number:
cheeks as fragile as cigarette paper,
arms and legs made of Limoges,
lips like Vin Du Rhone,
rolling her china-blue doll eyes
open and shut.
Open to say,
Good Day Mama,
and shut for the thrust
of the unicorn.

I had forgotten quite how shocking this fairy tale is. The stepmother, still clinging to the glory of her youthful beauty, ordering the murder of her stepdaughter, and competitor, and setting out to do the job herself when she learns that the girl has survived to keep house for the seven dwarfs.

For me, Sexton succeeds in reminding me of the strangeness of fairy tale by conjuring the feeling of reading these tales for the first time. There are no simple happy ending heres, like Cinderella, and her prince living as "they say, happily ever after, like two dolls in a museum case never bothered by diapers or dust, never arguing over the timing of an egg, never telling the same story twice, never getting a middle-aged spread, their darling smiles pasted on for eternity."


OTHER VOICES, OTHER ROOMS by Truman Capote
Joel Knox, thirteen and still reeling from his mother's death, is despatched to live with his mysterious father in the crumbling mansion in Alabama where he now lives with his new wife. On arrival, the hero father he has imagined is nowhere to be found on, as his eccentric stepmother and her even more eccentric cousin Randolph, steer him deftly away from questions about his father.

I enjoyed aspects of this novel. Joel is believably on the cusp between childhood and adulthood, especially the way he still retreats into the childish imaginative world of his hero Mr Mystery when real life gets too painful. I liked the interaction with the astoundingly tom-boyish Idabel and the general Southern Gothic atmosphere (the sonambulent mansion, Miss Amy and her obsession with the past, the wonderfully named Jesus Fever) but I was left a little cold overall. I had realised almost instantly who the mysterious lady at the window was, and found the layers of backstory revealed in Randolph's rambling stories overlong.

Cat's Eye by Margaret Atwood

Most mothers worry when their daughters reach adolescence, but I was the opposite. I relaxed, I sighed with relief. Little girls are cute and small only to adults. To one another they are not cute. They are life-sized.
Cat's Eye, p118

Elaine Risley has returned to Toronto, the city of her birth, for the first retrospective of her artwork. As she wanders around present day Toronto she embarks on a parallel retrospective of her own, unleashing a flood of memories of her family, her first friends, her first lovers and her first steps in art. Elaine's narration moves fluidly between the Toronto of her present and the Toronto of her childhood, with this narrative structure serving as a reminder that the undercurrents of the past constantly move beneath the smooth surface of the present.

Most of Elaine's early childhood in the late 30s and early 40s was isolated but for her older brother Stephen and her loving but remote parents. Her family led a nomadic life, traveling around the forests of northern Canada to allow her entomologist father to conduct field research. This rootless existence restricted Elaine's ability to form friendships; the Risley family were never in one place long enough for friendships to bloom. From what she gleans from magazines and other snatched glimpses, little girls are as exotic as unicorns, with their dresses and ribbons and pink cheeks. They are far removed from her life of canvas tents, camping stoves, insects and lakes. She instinctively understands boys, as Stephen and his games and casual physicality teach her all she needs to know. When she's 8 her life is transformed as her father finally accepts a professorship at the University of Toronto. The Risleys move to the suburbs, furniture and the trappings of a middle class family life come out of storage and Elaine finally has her chance to make friends of her own age. Unfortunately, as she falls under the spell of Cordelia, her best friend and eventually chief tormentor, it's clear that Elaine is woefully unprepared for the manipulation, hypocrisy and bullying that soon becomes her daily reality.

Atwood captures the torment and complexity of childhood so well. The quote above leapt out at me, as it's a distinction many adult writers fail to make. The writing is nuanced, so that Cordelia and her associates are not starkly bad - they have parents and problems and motivations of their own. Elaine's parents and the other adults are kept to the peripheries, in the way that adults actually are for children, yet they emerge as distinct characters. Elaine's mother is particularly well drawn, with her slight bohemian air and ambivalence about the stay at home life of the typical mother and her struggle with knowing that Elaine is suffering but not knowing how to help her.

Best of all, Atwood skillfully shows how childhood traumas percolate through adulthood. Elaine may have been a victim as a child, but she goes onto form unhealthy relationships where she has a lot more power to hurt. She emerges into a successful artist, producing some of her best art from her childhood pain. There is no simple tale of the good girl versus the bullies, instead Atwood explores themes of female relationships, mother/daughter relationsips, male/female relationships, memory and the experience of aging.

Revising my reading dangerously plans

I recently started The Divinersby Margaret Laurence, as part of my Year of Reading Dangerously. The "official" title for March is Cat's Eyeby Margaret Atwood, but I decided to push beyond my Atwood comfort zone with another Canadian author. Since I'd only discovered Margaret Laurence in January, when I started my adventures in blogging, it seemed appropriate to include one of my first blogosphere discoveries in my first reading challenge!

Laurence's novel The Stone Angel was featured as the February title over at the Slaves of Golconda (see here for Stefanie's thoughts). Following the Golconda discussion really whet my appetite for this author and the first pages of The Diviners, as Morag Gunn delves into the recesses of her early childhood memory, have not disappointed. But I've decided to set this book aside for the time being. This is totally out of character for me - I usually finish what I've started, even if I really dislike the book (see my thoughts on Then We Came to the End for the latest of example of my chronic inability to put down a book once I've started even if I'm not enjoying it!). I've decided I want to start with The Stone Angel and work through Laurence's work in a roughly chronological order. The Diviners will be enriched by reading at least some of the earlier novels and stories.

Since I read Cat's Eye in March anyway, I'm substituting that as my Dangerous book for March (my thoughts on Cat's Eye will be posted this weekend). I've ordered Transformations by Anne Sexton, my April title, and am looking forward to continuing this challenge.

Go Tell It On The Mountain by James Baldwin

This poor blog's been sadly neglected over the past week or so, as it's been a busy time chez moi...but I won't bore you with the intricacies of revision for my property law exam! Instead I'd like to share my thoughts on James Baldwin's stunning Go Tell It On The Mountain. Baldwin always struck me as a writer that's fallen out of fashion, with his popularity tapering away after his death in 1987. Despite his "modern classic" status, I wasn't ever particularly tempted to investigate his work for myself. But since African-American writing was the genre for February in the Year of Reading Dangerously challenge, I thought I'd give his debut novel a go. Mainly because I just loved the cover artwork (which, as you can see for yourself, is starkly gorgeous). And I am so so very glad I did.

John Grimes is going to be a preacher when he grows up. He's going to preach at the Temple of the Fire Baptized, just like his father Gabriel. Everyone says so and everyone's been saying so for so long that even John himself believes it now. The novel opens on the morning of his fourteenth birthday, the first morning he begins to realise the enormity of his looming future. He's still not saved, not like the living saints in his storefront church, so how can an unsaved sinner like him find a future saving sinners as a preacher man? His emerging sexuality and his changing body add to his guilt and fear. But his biggest sin is his hatred of his authoritarian and distant father. He's nursed this hatred so long that it's part of him, part of his future, and his struggle with this hatred in the eyes of God is the biggest part of his spiritual journey.

This is an intense novel, grappling with the role of religion in early 20th century African-American culture at a time the blues and jazz explosion were expressing African-American life in new ways. The first and last chapters are largely from John's perspective, while the three longer chapters are from the perspective of his paternal Aunt Florence, his father and his mother Elizabeth. While the action unfolds only over the course of less than 24 hours, this tight structure allows Baldwin to swoop over decades and geography. His older characters move from the South to the North, following lovers or seeking a new life away from the grinding physical poverty of the South. His spare, almost clipped, style adds to the repression and poverty of post-emancipation life in the South. One character, Deborah, was violently gang-raped as a teenager by a group of white men, while lynchings are in the background as the white bloodsport. But the fabled North is not much better, with black women still toiling as cleaners for whites and black boys too afraid to go into the New York Public Library, as it's too imposing, too intimidating, too white, even for an intelligent boy like John Grimes. John is not a likeable character, he's dutiful but resentful, at times self-pitying (will anyone remember his birthday?) and isolated from the rest of his family. But the family secrets revealed (to the reader, not necessarily to all the other characters) show how he's a product of his history and environment. It's compelling stuff

This accomplished debut was just what I needed after finishing another debut (Joshua Ferris' debut Then We Came To The End - more on this later). I'm now planning to read more Baldwin, to make up for all the years when I thought he wasn't worth the effort!

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray

The novel opens with Rebecca Sharp and Amelia Sedley leaving Miss Pinkerton’s Academy for Young Ladies. Amelia is the kindest of souls, with her tearful promises to write to her numerous bosom school friends, while Becky is determined to overcome her humble birth. The stately Miss Pinkerton deems Becky too lowly to receive the copy of Dr Johnson’s dictionary presented to all young ladies on their graduation from her establishment. When a copy is smuggled to her, Becky doesn’t want it and throws it out of the carriage taking the two girls away, much to Amelia’s genteel horror!

Amelia is headed back to her father’s house in Russell Square, to await marriage to her long-term beau George Osborne. Becky stays with the Sedleys en route to a position as governess at Sir Pitt Crawley’s country house Queens Crawley. While at Russell Square, Becky sets about wooing Amelia’s brother Joseph (an hilariously self-centred dandy). Luckily for the reader, Becky doesn’t ensnare Jos Sedley, allowing her to continue on her journey to scale the social heights by heading to Queen Crawley.

I don’t want to reveal too much of the plot. It was originally serialised so Thackeray used lots of tricks to keep the reader hooked. There’s a wide range of characters from right across the social spectrum, from humble servants to aristocrats (and even occasional glimpses of the King). There are secret marriages. There are scheming relations vying with each other for their maiden aunt’s sizeable fortune. There is a bankruptcy. People flee to Paris to avoid their debtors. Waterloo carries most of the sizeable cast of characters to Brussels.

I’ve been meaning to read Vanity Fair for years, and I was very curious to know what I’d make of Becky Sharp. She’s one of those characters with a life of its own (and I’ve not even seen any of the screen adaptations of the book!). She’s certainly the brains of the operation, skilfully handling not just the men but most of the women too. She contrasts brilliantly with the rather insipid Amelia, to the point where at times I wished for less Amelia and more Becky. She also shows how frustrating life was for women, who were effectively powerless and reliant on fathers, brothers, husbands and patrons to survive.

But William Dobbin was a revelation for me. I wasn’t expecting him at all, and he was undoubtedly the beating heart of the novel. He physically unappealing, being lanky and squeaky voiced, but his heart is good and he’s a true friend. His emotional depth compensates for the weaknesses in other characters. The contrast between William Osborne and George Osborne counter balances the contracts between Becky and Amelia perfectly.

John Carey, who introduced this novel (or wrote the afterword in my case, as I obeyed his exhortation to only read his introduction after reading the entire novel!) in the Penguin Classics edition I read made some interesting comparisons with War & Peace. I hadn’t known of Thackeray’s influence on Tolstoy and since War & Peace is also a challenge read for me this year I’m looking forward to seeing how it compares.

Reading dangerous (and chunky) books

Wandering through the litblogosphere is bringing out my inner explorer...stumbling across an insightful and quirky blog is like discovering a new land. I'm reading about new authors, or new books by authors I've already read. It's invigorating, and exciting. My mental reading list is growing ever longer.

My other great discovery has been reading challenges. There are some utterly wonderful reading challenges out there (I'm thinking of things like the outmoded authors challenge I saw on Books of My Numberless Dreams). Most challenges would be too challenging for me, as I'm not a big one for lists, preferring to read where the mood takes me. But then I came across the year of reading dangerously challenge. It grabbed my attention. Such an idea, reading outside my personal comfort zone. And not too prescriptive either, providing a recommended list of titles, with the option to mix & match as I choose. Which suits me perfectly!

Here's the recommended list of titles:
- January: Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens (English classic)
- February: The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison (African American)
- March: Cat's Eye, by Margaret Atwood (Atwood for Atwood's sake)
- April: Transformations, by Anne Sexton (Poetry)
- May: Other Voices, Other Rooms, by Truman Capote (Southern US)
- June: Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov (Russian)
- July: The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier (adolescent)
- August: Maus I and II, by Art Spiegelman (Graphic Novel, Pulitzer winner)
- September: The Secret Lives of People in Love, by Simon Van Booy (Independent)
- October: The Human Stain, by Philip Roth (Contemporary/Jewish)
- November: A Month of Classic Short Stories, Various - watch for a list
- December: The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck (Dusty)


But, since I've read some of these, and since Atwood is one of my favourite authors (so not exactly dangerous!), I've decided to tweak it slightly. Instead, here are my dangerous reads:
- January: Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray - This has been on my shelf, making me feel guilty, for about three years.
- February: Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
- March: The Diviners by Margaret Laurence - this Canadian Margaret is brand new to me.
- April: Transformations, by Anne Sexton (Poetry)
- May: Other Voices, Other Rooms, by Truman Capote
- June: Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov (Russian) - this will be re-reading, as I love Nabokov but don't read him now as much as I used to.
- July: The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier (adolescent) - I didn't like adolescent novels when I was an adolescent so this is quite "dangerous" for me.
- August: Maus I and II, by Art Spiegelman - I've never really gotten into graphic novels
- September: The Secret Lives of People in Love, by Simon Van Booy
- October: The Human Stain, by Philip Roth
- November: A Month of Classic Short Stories
- December: The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck (Dusty) - I've read a lot of Steinbeck, but not this one.

So with these twelve books to look forward to, I thought I'd sign up for another challenge - the Chunkster Challenge. Again, this isn't too prescriptive, as it's just four books, of over 450 pages, over the course of the year. Even better, cross over with other challenges is allowed so my Vanity Fair counts for this. But I really want to read War and Peace, and to re-read Ulysses, so this challenge appeals. My chunky books for 2008 are:

- Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray (809 pages)
- War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (a whopping 1358 pages)
- Donne: The Reformed Soul by John Stubbs (474 pages) - I'm very glad this qualified as this has been in my stack a while
- Ulysses by James Joyce (732 pages) - The 1922 edition

It should be an interesting and satisfying year I hope!