Vanity Fair

I started reading Thackeray's Vanity Fair with low expectations - 19th century literature, whilst worthy, is rarely gripping or particularly interesting...a sweeping statement, I realise.

VF is a massive book (800 pages + footnotes in my edition), and was originally published chapter-by-chapter as installments in a weekly magazine. This makes it really readable, as each chapter is structured to hold attention and stimulate interest enough to make readers pick it up again the next week.

It is described by the author as a novel without a hero, and is immensely refreshing for this genre...the female characters are not good, meek, moral, waiting for their parents to set up the perfect match. Instead they act against parents and relations, set up their own marriages, and the real story starts after the wedding, rather than the wedding being the ultimate goal.

Thackeray's characterisation is brilliant - his aim is the satirisation of "polite" society, and he takes great joy in uncovering the unsavoury elements of behaviour. Gambling, financial dishonesty, the petty politics particularly within the female circles...hypocrisy, the way that people flock to associate with the "right sort", who just happen to have come into some money...it's all there. There are comeupances, love stories, redemptions. His central female characters are the perfect antidote to the view of 19th century society as portrayed by Austen - Becky Sharp could totally take on Elizabeth Bennett in a literary "Celebrity Death Match".

I also enjoyed the way that the narrator's tone was continuously faintly disapproving of the goings on with "Vanity Fair" (i.e. polite society), and equally scathing of minor indiscretions (taking slightly too much spirit and water) and major (causing the ruin of an old family retainer by failing to pay rent to the extent that his creditors foreclose), leaving the reader to make their own moral judgement.

There is a lot that I could write about this, but again I would be in danger of reproducing York Notes on the subject. It took me by surprise, and was an utterly gripping read, both in terms of the story, and the social commentary. Towards the end, a couple of chapters were a bit drifty, making me wonder whether he was ready to bring it to an end, but had to spin it out for a certain number of weeks, but that is pretty much the only criticism I have. It brings me to the conclusion that the flawed are much more interesting than the good - Amelia is basically good but the narrator makes no secret of his disdain for her as she is a bit of a wuss with no initiative! - and I have to be honest, that I often find this to be the case in real life too...

If you haven't read this, you should most definitely do so! I have a copy available on loan if anyone wants to borrow it...

37 left to go!

Mary Berry's Banoffee Traybake

This recipe is from "Cook Now, Eat Later" - I've just made it for the first time, and it has the double plus points of being really easy to make, and really really nice!

On the topic of books, I'm about 100 pages from the end of Vanity Fair so will write about that soon...the cake is a minor distraction for you while you wait.

So, you will need:

For the cake:

175g baking margarine or butter at room temperature

250g caster sugar

3 eggs, beaten

3 ripe bananas, mashed

350g self-raising flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

3 tablespoons milk

Toffee topping: a tin of Carnation caramel (normally used for banoffee pie). Alternatively, 50g butter, 50g light muscovado sugar and a 397g can sweetened condensed milk.

Line a 30 x 23 cm (12 x 9 inn) traybake tin or roasting tin with foil & grease well. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C, 350 F or Gas 4.

Measure the above ingredients into a bowl, and mix until smooth with an electric beater. Put into the tin, smooth the top, and bake for 40-45 mins until well risen & golden (in our oven this took about 38 mins, but it is a feisty oven). Cool in the tin.

If using the tin of caramel, tip into a bowl and beat to make it smooth, then spread over the cake.

If making the topping yourself, put the three topping ingredients into a saucepan and heat gently until the sugar has dissolved. Bring to the boil stirring continuously and simmer for a few minutes until smooth and starting to thicken. Take off the heat and cool slightly, pour over the cool cake. Spread out evenly with a small palette knife and allow to set on the cake before cutting into squares with a hot knife.

Enjoy. I love Mary Berry recipes because they always work and she doesn't really consider the concept of low fat...

Nineteen Eighty-Four

I don’t quite know why I hadn’t read this before. This is an immensely powerful tale, and felt familiar all the way through due to the extent that Orwell’s concepts have permeated into cultural terminology. I read it pretty much in one sitting, partly floating on a lilo in the pool (perhaps that would be a lying?), which gave an interesting juxtaposition to the dark & depressing world of 1984.

How to write about it though? Is there anything which hasn’t been written about it? Published in 1949, it takes some of the aspects of the communist regime (I think!) and extends them to create a world where independent thought and action are forbidden, where the past is constantly rewritten, and where the regime demands doublethink – truly believing that which is not true, to the extent that one has forgotten it is not true, whilst also understanding that it is not true. It is truly compelling.

Winston Smith struggles to live within this world – as he works in the Ministry of Truth, rewriting history, he is constantly faced with proof of the regime’s control and amendment of the truth, and so starts to break out. He starts with a small rebellion (writing a diary) which eventually builds up to full involvement in anti-regime activity. Even from the start he believes that discovery and punishment is inevitable, and rebels because he cannot do anything else, rather than because he believes he will achieve anything.

I don’t want to give away the ending – if you haven’t read it, read it. I can’t really find much to comment on without writing a poor excuse for an A-level essay, other than how much of writing since then has drawn on this, popular TV concepts (Room 101 and of course Big Brother) have come from this, and it really does deserve its reputation as one of the best English novels of the twentieth century.

The Five People You Meet In Heaven

This book is one of the more modern ones on the list (published in 2003) and I remember, when it came out, picking it up in bookshops lots of times but never quite being interested enough to read it.

It is an interesting, light read. I like the central concept – that heaven starts as a place where your life is explained to you by five people who had an influence in changing your life, although this may be unknown to you. It avoids borrowing too heavily from Dickens’ ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, in that Eddie is in conversation with the five people, being told a story, but is not taken back to observe particular events. The narrative device adds interest to what is essentially a slim story of a disappointed life.

However, I don’t know whether I was in the right frame of mind when I read it, or whether I’ve become hardened and cynical as, I have to say, rather than being emotionally stirred by Eddie’s reconciliation to his father’s treatment of him and reunion with his wife, I found it all a little simplistic. I am fortunate enough to have not been treated badly by a parent (or anyone else to a significant extent), but felt that Eddie’s acceptance of the reason for his father’s treatment, just on the basis of understanding why (rather than receiving an apology etc) would frustrate readers who have themselves been treated badly...I read into it an implication that anything can be forgiven as long as it’s understood which doesn’t always ring true. Perhaps this is where the supernatural element of being in heaven comes into it but still...not convinced.

It is nicely written, paints a vivid picture, and is very readable – so I would recommend it – but it didn’t convince me. Perhaps because the idea of an afterlife that just consists of spending time explaining life on earth just isn’t enough!

The Great Gatsby

After Lord of the Rings, I wanted to read something that I could potentially relate to a bit more - something about people. So I took advice from the mother-in-law, and went for The Great Gatsby. In addition to being about people, it is short, and as soon as I started it I realised I had in fact read it before - easy win!

TGG is set in 1920s high society in America. The eponymous (I love that word) Gatsby is a mysterious figure who hosts party after party in his beachside mansion, surrounding himself with people whilst remaining personally aloof. No-one really knows where he has come from, or why he constantly opens his home to others whilst not seeming interested in involving himself with them.

Re-reading this novel reminded me that on first reading, I thought it was rubbish. I thought the characterisation was shallow, the resolution too swift, and the work in general too quickly over for it to truly deserve the accolades it received. I think I've changed my mind. It still left me with the impression that the characterisation is shallow - although the novel is written in the first person, Nick is actually fairly peripheral to events and we don't really learn much about him - his own little "love story" is understated, a side line, and doesn't really go anywhere. Where the other characters are seemingly keeping mistresses etc, and very little detail is given about more physical relationships, we see in great detail Nick's decision to move his relationship with Jordan Baker "to the next level"...putting his arm round her shoulders.

So, with the narrator being a little peripheral, narrative distance is then maintained - where Nick is not party to an event, we may hear about it retrospectively, but only hear an event from the character's point of view if they later choose to talk about it. This has the effect of making the novel as a whole feel quite distanced, and as a reader I felt very much that I was an external observer rather than drawn into the situation.

However, I think this narrative device does convey a sense of the shallowness of 20s high society - all about being seen at the best party, with the best people, even if you don't like them. (Is it any different today in "high society", or the "Hello" world??!) Relationships were more formal, and distant, and it is entirely possible to spend evening after evening at parties with the same people, and not really come to know them. Understanding this has made me revise my opinion of the novel, and agree that it is brilliantly crafted, although I still find the distance frustrating. It is typical of "the Great American Novel" - On the Road had a similar sense of manic progression from place to place and party to party without really engaging with the people, and perhaps that's why I didn't like it...not sure I'm willing to read that again to check though!

The hypocrisies in relationships are uncovered well, and the ending is very neat and tidy for Tom and Daisy - although again, because of the style in which Fitzgerald writes, there is very little feeling attached to the events. The lack of consequence for their actions is frustrating...I won't say more about this in case I spoil it for any prospective readers. However, I think it is safe to say, without spoiling, that the novel is an interesting study of double (triple??) standards within a marriage, and that my identification with, and sympathy for, characters shifted throughout as events unfolded in what is essentially, a tale of obsession & love gone a bit wrong - the depiction of a period is the greater achievement here, rather than the story itself. I think - I'm happy to be disagreed with!

I recently read "Tender is the night", one of F Scott Fitzgerald's less prominent works, and I liked it much better...if you liked Gatsby, read it; if you didn't like Gatsby, read it anyway and you might like it better!

Lord of the Rings #4

Well, I am delighted to say that I have finished Lord of the Rings - all 3 books, or indeed 6 books as I read them.

I'm not sure whether reading the three one after the other (without reading something else in the meantime) was the best way to do it - by the end of book 3, I was a bit bored of the whole orc/war/good/evil thing, but having said that, they hang together so much more as one big story, rather than three individual episodes.

So, some thoughts. As I think I've mentioned before, it took me a while to get over my Lord of the Rings prejudice, and admit that I was interested, and I have, overall, thoroughly enjoyed my reading experience. The world is convincing and well-constructed, the storyline moves along at a good pace, and there is a huge variety of character, events, and place. Essentially, I guess I'm saying that it is very well and compellingly written.

However, I'm continuing to discover how much my reading is driven by caring about the characters, and it seems that I only extend this to human beings!! I was very much involved in LOTR until the point that Frodo successfully destroys the ring (presuming that since everyone in the world other than me has seen the films, this won't be a spoiler for anyone else), and the compulsion that the story held was very much wanting to know whether they were successful in their mission. Once the ring had been destroyed, in my mind, mission accomplished, and I then struggled to finish the rest of the book, because I'd pretty much forgotten that the hobbits would need to get home again...I didn't mind whether they had a happy resolution to the story as I viewed them very much as vehicles for the Ring, rather than beings with a right to an ending themselves. This may be a reflection on the way I read - generally described as charging through to get to the end rather than pausing to absorb the detail. It also may be a positive reflection on Tolkien in that the strongest character in the trilogy is the ring itself, and everybody else is a means to an end.

One thing that I became slightly weary of by the end is the way that significance/fate is attached to almost every event - nothing just happened because it happened, it was all part of the grand plan. After the ring is destroyed and the darkness lifts, there are two weddings. These felt like a slightly superfluous attempt to bring human interest into the story, and they were written in such a way as to indicate that Tolkien felt he ought to include them but wasn't particularly interested. So, rather than there being a gradual development of any sort of romantic feeling, both relationships seemed to arise almost out of nowhere, but to be portrayed as the fulfilment of something that was meant to happen. I suppose it is possible to read something into it about the lifting of the darkness of the Dark Lord's influence, allowing love & positive relationships to flourish, but I can't help feeling that I'm reading more than was intended into it! I don't feel that I've described that very well, but read it and you will see what I mean.

I don't know if it was necessarily intended, but I couldn't help but notice some parallels to religious concepts in there - I'm not in any way suggesting that this is an extended metaphor like the Chronicles of Narnia, but the sense of spiritual oppression brought by the darkness/black riders/ring, and the impression that so many events were predestined had a strong religious flavour to it.

An 8 hour drive from Devon today is clouding both my memory of the books and my ability to type so I will leave it there. Onto something with people in it next, I think!