A Room With A View, by E. M. Forster

This is my second time reading this since high school--prompted by a recent viewing of the 1980's film adaptation with Helena Bonham Carter.  I like Howards End even better, but A Room with a View is very fun read too.  It's a romantic comedy about Lucy Honeychurch, an upper middle class, rather sheltered young lady, who goes on a tour of Italy with her proper spinster Aunt Charlotte, and who has her horizons widened, and not just by the art and architecture.  She meets a variety of different people, not the least of which are two very different young men:  George Emerson, a passionate young railway clerk, beneath her in class, but to whom her thoughts keep reverting despite herself, and Cecil Vyse, a wealthy aesthete who would make a respectable husband for a girl of her station.  Which will she choose? 

E.M. Forster has a talent for showing the state of mind of his characters by subtle details in their behavior or reactions, with nothing overplayed or forced such that everything seems natural yet significant.

Howards End, by E. M. Forster

This is a re-read for me, prompted after watching the Emma Thompson/Anthony Hopkins movie based on it.  Howards End is the name of an old country house in England that is the childhood home of Ruth Wilcox, to whose family it has belonged for generations.  She has a deep love for her family home and land, and the traditions of the village where she was born.  It makes her something of the odd woman out in her family, since her husband, a wealthy industrialist, and adult children are all very modern and practical in their tastes and outlook on life.  They befriend the Schlegels, upper middle class intellectuals who value education and cultural pursuits, and who have formed a friendship with Leonard Bast, a lower class clerk who aspires to become more intellectually and culturally learned.  The book is about how these three groups of people interact with each other, and who will end up inheriting Howards End (which could be thought of as a symbol for England in general) after Ruth Wilcox's death. 

The book is enjoyable and can be read on several different levels.  The movie is very well done too, and quite close to the original storyline.

Mr. Reginald Peacock's Day, by Katherine Mansfield

Amusing story about a typical day in the life of a man (a singing teacher) who has a quite high opinion of himself. He condescends to tolerate the foibles and shortcomings of those around him, of course not recognizing that he has any of his own.

A Shropshire Lad, by A. E. Housman

Evocative collection of poems on various themes such as youth, love, early death, the beauty of nature, looking back on one's life, and the passage of time. Some are joyful and even comic, but most have a melancholy atmosphere. The rhythm and rhyme of the words are so natural, nothing forced. 

I found it a very enjoyable read. The haunting quote from poem #35, On the idle hill of summer at the beginning of Winston Churchill's account of World War I, introduced me to this book. 

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, by Samuel Coleridge

This poem is impressive in how the wording and the meter are so evocative that the scenes described by the Mariner seem real. It's the story of gratuitous evil: the Mariner kills, for no good reason, a beautiful Albatross who seems to be a benevolent presence around his ship. The horrific events that follow are like a supernatural retribution for his idle deed.

The poem is even better listened to than read. Check out Richard Burton's rendition available on YouTube. It's great!

A Train of Powder, by Rebecca West

A group I belong to was doing a challenge throughout the month of October to read books by or about people or places in Ireland.  Since Rebecca West, the journalist, travel writer, and novelist was part Irish and she was born in Kerry, this was one of the books I read for it.  As is probably obvious from the cover art, <i>A Train of Powder</i> is a collection of six articles she wrote while covering various criminal trials.  They read more like short stories than like magazine articles because the author really develops the characters, their background, the circumstances of the crimes, and also her own thoughts on the situations.

Three of the articles make up a series called <i> Greenhouse with Cyclamens</i>, where she relates her thoughts during the closing sessions of the Nuremberg Trials and the rebuilding of Germany, including her observations of the personalities of top Nazi leaders like Goering and Hess as they sat in the dock, differences between German and American/British law, growing tensions between the Soviet Union and the other three Allies who shared control of Germany, leading up to the Soviets’ attempt to isolate Berlin from the West and the resulting Berlin Airlift, and the nascent West German government’s insistence on a free market economy despite pressure from the occupying Allies to adopt a more statist model.

 <i>Opera in Greenville</i> is about a lynching in Greenville, South Carolina in 1947.  A mob of about 30 people, mostly cabdrivers, convinced the prison warden to hand over a young black man named Willie Earle, in jail on suspicion of having killed the disabled white cabdriver who was driving him home.  After some days of no results from the local police, the FBI was called in to find the perpetrators.  West does a good job of sketching out what life was like in 1940’s Greenville and situating the crime in a society undergoing a transition in its attitudes towards race relations and vigilante justice.  

<i>Mr. Setty and Mr. Hume</i> is about a 1949 London murder case.   A man who enjoys hunting on weekends goes out in his boat to the marshlands at the mouth of the Thames hoping to bag some duck.  Instead, he comes across a bag full of a more grisly type of meat.  The remains turn out to be those of Mr. Setty, a shady businessman and member of a well-to-do immigrant family.  Mr. Hume is the ex-R.A.F. pilot with a checkered past charged with the murder and disposal of the body.

<i>A Better Mousetrap</i> is the story of an espionage case involving a young British radio telegraph operator employed at the Diplomatic Wireless Service suspected of passing information to a high official in the Soviet embassy.

Sad Cypress, by Agatha Christie

I was motivated to read this book after watching the very well done BBC adaptation as part of their Hercule Poirot TV series with David Suchet (who will always be the definitive Hercule Poirot to me!).  One of my favorite episodes so far, although they did change a few things to make the story more dramatic and to give Poirot a bigger role to play.

Basically, here we have a love triangle:  Elinor and her fiance Roddy, young sophisticated Londoners with expectations from a wealthy invalid aunt, who so far in their lives have not had much to worry about, and Mary Gerrard, a childhood friend, the daughter of their aunt's gardener, who reenters their lives as a very attractive young woman after finishing her education in Germany.  Roddy falls in love with Mary, and shortly after their aunt's death, Mary turns up dead and Elinor is accused of poisoning her out of jealousy.  As in the film, it's presented as a courtroom drama, with Elinor in the dock, and flashbacks to tell the reader what happened.  The solution to the puzzle is not what you'd expect, and it was an enjoyable quick read.  Classic Agatha Christie.

The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde

This is one of those books that I always had the impression of having read, but had not, until now.  The reason is that movies have been based on it and allusions to it are made in many other books, movies, and articles.  My favorite film version is the 1945 one with Hurd Hatfield as Dorian, George Sanders as Lord Henry, and Angela Lansbury as Sibyl Vane.  I watched it lots of times on as a child and Lansbury's song <i>Goodbye, Little Yellow Bird</i> was a favorite.  And no, it's not in the book!

Oscar Wilde was a great storyteller, and <i>Dorian Gray</i> is a morality tale.  Dorian starts out as a very handsome innocent young man who sits for a portrait for his artist friend Basil Hallward while urbane, sophisticated, cynical Lord Henry whiles away the time chatting and introducing subtly corrupting ideas into Dorian's head.  Such ideas and his continued friendship with Lord Henry ultimately lead Dorian into a life of hidden vice.  Meanwhile, Dorian discovers that by some miracle, he has become mysteriously identified with his portrait.  It begins to show signs of each vicious deed he commits, while he remains physically unchanged to the point where he does not even age.  The portrait, which might have helped moderate Dorian's lifestyle by serving as a visible conscience, actually helps to accelerate his corruption because it detaches him from the physical consequences of his vices.  The problem is that the physical consequences of vice are not the only ones: there is the damage to his reputation, damage to other people's lives, and also damage to his own soul.

I think Wilde may have meant this story to criticize how society places too high a priority on appearance and not enough on substance, and also to show how a growing discrepancy between appearance and substance becomes impossible to keep up in the end.

Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney

I found Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf to be quite easy to read.  The story was fast paced and his wording somehow had a terse, majestic style that really helped me to visualize the events in my head.  This edition has the original Old Anglo Saxon English text on the left page and the translation on the right, and I did think that since I know English and have some knowledge of German, I would be able to read some of the original, but picking out an occasional word or phrase here and there was all I could manage.

Beowulf is set in a time of small kingdoms that alternately carried out wars of conquest or raids, and formed alliances with one another. Christianity had been well established, but it was still new.  The atmosphere kind of reminded me of Sigrid Undset's [book:Gunnar's Daughter|6226] that I read some months ago.  Beowulf is a warrior of noble birth who lands with a small army to help the Danish king get rid of the monster Grendel who has been terrorizing the people by carrying out nighttime raids and killing people in gruesome, X-rated ways. Basically, it's the story of his achievements as the protector of the people and teaches the lesson of courage, self sacrifice, and resolve in the face of evil.  Let's just say this guy is no vacillating Hamlet, forever deliberating on what to do.

Perelandra, by C.S. Lewis

In <i>Out of the Silent Planet</i>, C.S. Lewis speculated on what visiting a different world (on Mars) might be like, particularly an older, more established, and less corrupt one than our own.  This second novel of the space trilogy is C.S. Lewis's idea of what the Genesis story might be like if God chose to create a newer world of living creatures, including persons, on the planet Venus.  It is also a speculation of how human beings, with our own sad experience, might help them avoid our mistakes.  Lewis's talent for creating believable characters, creatures, and fantasy environments is just as good and as absorbing here as in the <i>The Chronicles of Narnia</i>.  As with the first book the main themes of the novel are of course the struggle between good and evil and the great privilege and responsibility of free will.  Already looking forward to reading the third book in the trilogy.

Animal Farm, by George Orwell

This is a very witty, readable little fable that illustrates the historical pattern that often plays out before, during, and after revolutions that promise utopian results. Somehow human, or in this case, animal, nature gets in the way, and what often happens is that the new government displays the same vices as the old.  The moral of the story is that we don't live in the Garden of Eden anymore and it's futile to hope that those kinds of perfect conditions can be realized here on earth.  The only sensible attitude to take towards those who promise paradise is distrust.

The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis

I read this entire series over and over again as a child and teenager.  I still have my original set of books and it's in sorry shape; they've been read so many times!  C.S. Lewis has a great talent for storytelling and building worlds and characters that seem real.  I always looked forward to losing myself in those stories.  It's hard to name a favorite among the books, but if I had to it probably would be a tie between The Magician's Nephew and The Last Battle.

Out of the Silent Planet, by C. S. Lewis

I am not much of a science fiction person, so I did not think I would like this book.  But C.S. Lewis is one of my favorite writers, so I gave it a go.  And I'm glad I did.  As in <i>The Chronicles of Narnia</i>, Lewis creates a very convincing world and characters--one I could lose myself in.  Setting the story in another planet with different life forms and different ways of life offers plenty of opportunity to examine ideas and attitudes that are taken for granted today, but that are actually disordered and unnatural.

Already looking forward to <i>Perelandra</i>,  the next in the series.

The Abolition of Man, by C.S. Lewis

In these three brief essays, C.S. Lewis takes up the issue of moral relativism, how our view of what is considered rational and objectively true has narrowed significantly in modern times, and how that affects our outlook on morality, culture, art, etc.  He makes the point that children can be accustomed to this narrow view quite early in life before they can be aware of what is being done to them and the result is an adult with an impoverished moral imagination.

Let Dons Delight, by Msgr. Ronald Knox

The premise of this book is very interesting, as it traces the conversations that take place in one Oxford common room over centuries, at intervals of 50 years each, starting with the year 1588, the just before war with Spain and the Armada, and ending in 1938, when World War II is approaching. The reader (along with the narrator) gets to hear what questions and ideas are being debated in the university during each time and compare them with those in other times. Prominent among the subjects are questions of church and state, the relationship between them, Catholic vs. Protestant ideas, university politics, the changing role of the university, and, of course, occasional jabs at its rival, Cambridge.

The (fictional) Oxford college where the book is set is humorously named after Simon Magus, a Biblical figure who converted to Christianity, not because he believed its teachings, but because he wanted to acquire the ability to perform miracles. He thought the Apostles would confer this power upon him if he offered them money. Simony is named for him and he was known as the first heretic.

You do have to be familiar with the events of English history from 1588-1938 to get the most out of this book. Chapters set during times I knew something about (like 1588 and the victory over the Spanish Armada, the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the loss of the American colonies) were the ones I enjoyed the most.  The ones set during times I knew less about, like the early 1700's, I could not appreciate as much.

Heart of Darkness and The Secret Sharer, by Joseph Conrad

These are two very dark novellas in seafaring, colonial settings. Joseph Conrad excels in evoking an atmosphere and creating realistic characters and situations.

Heart of Darkness is a story told by a seaman named Marlowe to his shipmates about an eventful voyage he took down an African river many years ago to an isolated trading post belonging to the company he worked for. Mr. Kurtz, the man in charge of the post is their most productive agent by far but there is something mysterious about the man's methods the company doesn't like and they want to remove him. Marlowe comes to a slow realization of what those methods are as the voyage progresses and is shocked at how a seemingly normal, civilized man could descend to such depths. There is little direct interaction with Kurtz in the story; we get to know him mainly by what others think and say about him and by Marlowe's observations of the trading post and its surroundings.

Secret Sharer, on the other hand, is set in the Far East. The narrator is a young captain brought in at the last minute to replace the skipper of a ship whose crew has worked as a team for a long time. As he's the only newcomer on board and this is his first command he feels ill at ease with the crew. He soon gets a friend with whom to share his predicament in the shape of a fugitive officer from another ship who is in trouble for having killed a man during an emergency. He decides to help the fugitive by hiding him on board even from his own crew until there is a chance to escape. The captain's solidarity with the fugitive is even greater than that with his crew, and the satisfaction of secretly and successfully helping this man escape is what ultimately gives him the confidence to hold his own as captain.

Return of the Native, by Thomas Hardy

I read this book years ago, then decided to re-read it after seeing the 1990's movie with Catherine Zeta Jones as Eustacia Vye.  I don't know why it didn't make a stronger impression on me the first time I read it.

There is something very modern about how Hardy uses the landscape of Egdon Heath.  He creates visions of large, primitive hills, with silhouettes of figures emerging from and disappearing into them as if they were growths produced from of the heath itself and were fated to merge back into it (ashes to ashes, dust to dust).  It made me think of a huge lava lamp (I know that's weird, but read the book and you'll see what I mean). The imagery reinforces the idea that human beings are futile, short-lived creatures.  The events that seem all important to us make no lasting impression on the world.  The vibrant character and beauty of Eustacia and her strong desire to escape from the heath make little impression in the long term and she never does escape.  Clym, who already did escape to Paris in the past, feels himself pulled back and decides to move back to the heath for good.  The heath seems to have an irresistible gravitational pull on all those who live there.

The reddleman Diggory Venn is the character most closely associated with the heath, and his redness and propensity to just appear and disappear at will into the landscape makes him an almost spectral figure, as if he were the spirit of the heath itself.  He is the wisest and best informed of the characters, and is the only one who doesn't have anything tragic happen to him.

Throughout the novel appears the theme of ancient, rural traditions coming up against new, urban ideas that in the end make little progress against the old ways.

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson

I read the book after watching the excellent 1941 Spencer Tracy movie based on it and was surprised (although maybe I shouldn't have been) at the liberties Hollywood took with the text.  Neither the barmaid Ivy (Ingrid Bergman) nor Dr. Jekyll's fiancée Beatrice (Lana Turner) are in the book and they are major roles in the movie!

Instead, the book focuses on the observations of Dr. Jekyll's friends and servants about his mysterious and strangely repellent friend Mr. Hyde who is seen visiting his office frequently and at odd hours.  He does not seem like the type of person the morally upright and influential Dr. Jekyll would normally associate with, so there is a lot of speculation about him.  In the end, Dr. Jekyll confesses the truth in a letter to one of his friends.

I see the story as a lesson of what can happen when a person decides to give himself permission to occasionally indulge in something evil.  He thinks he is in control as he only gives in now and then, and he can keep it in a separate watertight compartment from the rest of his life.  But the indulgence becomes a habit and soon it controls him and takes over.

Keep The Aspidistra Flying, by George Orwell

This was an Orwell book I'd never heard of until recently when I watched the 1990's movie based on it called <i>A Merry War</i> starring Richard E. Grant and Helena Bonham Carter.  The movie is very close to the book.  To start with I didn't even know what an aspidistra was.  It sounds kind of futuristic like Orwell's better known books, but it's just a houseplant, and a very common, very respectable, very hardy one at that, such that it becomes a symbol of middle class respectability in the story.

I found Gordon Comstock, the hero (or shall we say, anti-hero) quite tiresome, but enjoyed the book nonetheless.  Somehow he was a lot less tiresome when R.E. Grant was playing him onscreen.  Anyway, he's a copywriter for an ad agency with literary aspirations who manages to get a small collection of poetry published.  Buoyed up by this small success, he decides to quit his day job and become a full time writer.  Since he can't support himself writing, he has to take another day job as a clerk at a bookseller's that pays less than the old one.  Why not just keep the copywriting job since he has to have a job anyway?  Because he has declared a one-man war on money and wants to be as independent of it as possible.  So he wants a job, but it has to be a dead-end job.  Meanwhile he finds that having less money actually leads to his becoming more preoccupied with money than before, and he does less writing than before.  Money becomes an obsession. He hates it, the people who have it, and the things he can't do for lack of it more and more.  Finally, he is forced out of this vicious circle when he gets his (very patient) girlfriend Rosemary pregnant and has to solve some real life problems.

It's a very entertaining story about growing up and facing the real world.  The title alludes to how middle class respectability wins out in the end as Gordon and Rosemary start their married life together with their own aspidistra in the window.

The Heart of the Matter, by Graham Greene

I could not put down this novel about Scobie, a British police officer in a West African town.  He is married to a delicate woman who is so disappointed with the life they are living such that she is always ill.  His position is not  prestigious enough to give her the social status that she desires; he does not get the promotion that would have made him police commissioner, plus, there's not much of a social scene in that town anyway.  To send her on a trip to South Africa to improve her health, he has to compromise himself morally by borrowing money from a local lender under conditions that might cause his superiors to suspect him of accepting favors; then after his wife leaves he meets another frail young woman widowed during a rescue operation and enters into an affair with her.

Greene explores Scobie's increasing desperation as he tries to stay clean as a cop, tries not to betray any the obligations he has taken on to his wife and mistress, and reconciling all the resulting deceit to his relationship with God.  In the end it is God he decides to betray. His duplicity results in the violent death of his servant; he falls prey to despair and commits suicide, despite his conscience urging him to seek forgiveness from God and the people involved instead.  This is a story about how pride, even in the humble guise of just trying to appear reliable to other people, really is the greatest sin, because it causes us to deny that we really do need help and second (and third and fourth) chances from God and other people in order to finally get our act together.

Greene has a talent for scene setting, characterization, and psychological insight.  His characters are very believable (some of them exasperating!)  and you can lose yourself in the story.