May 18, 2013 Leave a Comment

Book Review: The Monsters

Title: The Monsters (Goodreads)
Author: Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler
Published: Back Bay Books, 2006
Pages: 400
Genre: Non Fiction
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

It was a dark and stormy night on the shores of Lake Geneva, 1816. You’ve heard the story before; Lord Byron challenges his friends to see who can come up with the best ghost story. Among the people include Percy Bysshe Shelley, his lover Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, Mary’s stepsister Claire Claremont and Byron’s physician, John William Polidori. Two novels were born that very night; Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s (née Godwin) Frankenstein and John William Polidori’s The Vampyre. The evening begat a curse, too. Within a few years of Frankenstein’s publication, nearly all of those involved met untimely deaths.

First of all I want to point out that authors of this book Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler don’t actually believe this was a curse. Well at least I hope they don’t, this is a little gimmick to help sell the book and I think they just wanted to explore the interesting fact that they did all die young. This book is purely a biography on Mary Shelley that focuses on the night in 1816 and the novel Frankenstein. I was hoping for something about struggling to write something as great as Frankenstein or how the novel has been destroyed by pop culture.

The book starts out with the life of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft, the famous philosopher and feminist parents of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. The two had very different personalities and they seemed like a very odd couple but I think they really complemented each other. Sure, they had their problems but nothing like their daughter.

This brings us to the bulk of the book, Mary Shelley and the young romantics. These were the original rock stars and their lives, no soap opera will ever come close to the drama and complexity as the real lives of the romantics. I picked up this book to learn about these poets after reading A Treacherous Likeness and I wanted to know more about them. This was a very accessible biography, which focuses primarily on Mary Shelley but it gives you a great insight into her life. I don’t pretend to fully understand the Romantics, they are way to complex but I feel I have a better knowledge into their lives.

My interest in the Romantics has gotten stronger thanks to The Monsters by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler. I have a few other books I plan to finish off in on the topic and I doubt I’ll stop there. I love the quotes and the referencing in this biography; I’ve often found that I wonder about the source of information in biographies that don’t reference so it was so handy to have that reference.

While this book does primary focus on Mary, it was nice to learn a little more of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, Claire Claremont and John William Polidori. I didn’t previously know the story of the original publication of The Vampyre; I found it fascinating and heart breaking for John William Polidori. It is always great to find new stories about these amazing talented people.

One thing I liked about this biography, especially after reading A Treacherous Likeness, is the fact that it didn’t try to sway the reader’s opinions; it stuck to facts and left it to the readers to make up their own mind. This was a refreshing change from the opinionated A Treacherous Likeness and I really enjoyed the experience of learning more about these poets. I’m sure there are better biographies on Mary Shelley out there but The Monsters is worth checking out as well.

My Rating: 3 and a Half Stars

Filed Under: 3.1/2 Stars, Back Bay Books, Dorothy & Thomas Hoobler, Non-Fiction Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 17, 2013 4 Comments

Rereading The Great Gatsby

Title: The Great Gatsby (Goodreads)
Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Published: Scribner, 1925
Pages: 180
Genre: Classic
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Nick Carraway moves in next door to the young and mysterious millionaire, Jay Gatsby. Nick is soon following the dramas of Gatsby’s quixotic passion for Daisy Buchanan. Often hailed as the “Great American Novel”, F Scott Fitzgerald’s magnum opus is a portrait of the Jazz Age and the great American dream.

We all know the story, we’ve either been forced to read it in school or we’ve seen the movie, I wanted to reread this in the lead up the terrifying new adaptation by Baz Luhrmann. I remember reading it when I first started become a serious reader and I thought I would look at what I originally wrote and try and dissect and expand on it now that I think I’ve improved in reading critically.

First of all “One of the most interesting aspects of The Great Gatsby is the Point of View”, while this has probably been covered many times by people I will just cover this off again. Carraway tells the story of a group of destructive personalities but first you have to understand Nick before trying to understand the others.

Without going into anything controversial by claiming Nick Carraway was bisexual and in love with Jay Gatsby, let’s just say he idolised him. A Yale graduate, World War I veteran and relatively well off (inherited money), Carraway moves in next door to the charismatic and much talked about Jay Gatsby. But this leads to the question of just what is the relationship between Nick and Gatsby; is Jay using Carraway to get closer to Daisy? I think there friendship was real, Nick envied the person Jay was and he in return grew fond of Carraway.

“The book does a decent job at shedding light on the egotistical, desire driven tendencies of human nature.” While this is true I think to expand on this you really need to look at what F Scott Fitzgerald was trying to do with this book, and to do that we must first look at the colour scheme (weird I know). There are two primary colours that play an essential role in this book. Firstly, green, the light over the river on the East Egg dock. The representation of Gatsby’s hopes and dreams, the green light represents the American dream. This would be considered objectification, that Gatsby believes that his American dream is to have Daisy.

The other major colour in this book is Gold or Yellow, the symbol of wealth and beauty. I think Yellow and Gold play as much of a significant role as the green light. This is true American goal; wealth and beauty, to be able to live without a care in the world. This is what I think Fitzgerald was trying to show us; like I said in my original review of this novel, these people are egotistical and desire driven and I think the author wanted us to see that. The problem with a carefree life is the fact that you don’t care about anything other than yourself and you don’t realise just how destructive that can be.

“Carraway starts out starry eyed towards high society but slowly becomes more and more uncomfortable with the unrestrained materialism and lack of morality that comes with it.” I think that Carraway found himself sucked into high society and captivated by the presence of Gatsby. While in some respects he remains an outsider, he tries desperately to fit in and pursue the idea of the American Dream. The Great Gatsby tries to highlight the decline of this so called American dream, which originally was about discovery, uniqueness, and the pursuit of happiness but in the 1920s it seemed to decline and represent easy money and a social of leisure.

“F. Scott Fitzgerald paints a unique literary picture of the time and life style, with interesting, snooty and slightly annoying characters.” I will admit that I sigh every time I read this sentence. Why was I the type of person that wanted likeable characters? Just because I hate these people, doesn’t mean that the book isn’t great and that they don’t have anything significant to teach. These people are supposed to be unlikeable, Fitzgerald isn’t trying to show us how great high society is; he wants to point out the flaws and what he sees as the decline of the American dream.

“Everyone seems so self-absorbed and never think of each other; which helped drive the story beautifully.” We can probably argue if this really is the great American novel or even the great Jazz age novel. I know a lot of people hated this novel but I think there is so much this book can teach us and it’s less than 200 pages. F Scott Fitzgerald did a brilliant job of layering everything on top of each other that I feel the need to read this book again (already) just to see what I might pull out of it this time.

Someday I would like to do a post about motifs because there are so many recurring themes in the book, I think this would be a perfect novel to explore the idea of what a motif is. I read all the reviews from people that hate this book and I feel like I want to use that dreaded saying, “I don’t think you got what this book is trying to do”. But I hope this helps understand what this book really is about; while pointing out what you think I got wrong.

I reread this novel in anticipation of the new adaptation, which I’m scared about; I remember the old movie and think it failed to capture the true essence of this novel. This leads to two questions I want to ask the readers; “Is The Great Gatsby unfilmable?” and “Was Gatsby truly great?”.  I know my answers, so I’ll be interested to see what others think. I’m surprised how much fun I had dissecting my original thoughts and expanding on them.

My Rating: 4 and a Half Stars

Filed Under: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, 4.1/2 Stars, Classic, Fitzgerald, F. Scott, Modern Library 100 Best Novels, Scribner Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 16, 2013 4 Comments

Book Review: Guards! Guards!

Title: Guards! Guards! (Goodreads)
Author: Terry Pratchett
Published: Orion, 1998
Pages: 216
Genre: Fantasy
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

The Unique and Supreme Lodge of the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Night is a secret organisation that plans to overthrow the Patrician and install a king of their choosing; a puppet under the control of the Supreme Grand Master. Using a stolen magic book to summon a dragon on the people of Ankh-Morpork, the plan is to slay the dragon, rid the city of its tyranny and have their hero take the throne.

Guards! Guards! attempts to parody Hard-Boiled and Noir novels with elements of police procedurals but there is one thing that really doesn’t match this style. Guards! Guards! is writing in third person with an omniscient and reliable narrator, this really seems weird since the style of novel it is trying to parody is often first person and unreliable. I’m not sure if it is the fact that all Terry Pratchett novels are written in the same style but it really didn’t help me connect with the novel, let alone notice most of the parodies.

This is a simple quest plot, The Unique and Supreme Lodge of the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Night obviously want to take over the throne but there are a few other plotlines that are on a quest for power. Wonse (The secretary to the Patrician) had power; he could make commands and have them carried out and he quite enjoyed that. Now he has lost this power, he wants it back. The Patrician wishes to hold onto his power as the ruining king, ultimately his calm demeanour is what aids him through the tyranny.

One thing I thought was difficult about this book was the language; while this novel uses modern language there is a lot of in world slang that took a while to get used to. There was an incident where a character got intoxicated and the words started being misspelt for emphasises. This can be effective but you don’t find out this is due to his intoxication till you read through some of his gibberish. Sometimes the language can be effective like when Death speaks, he only uses capital letters and when the dragons are speaking they use italics. Overall it just took so much to get used to. If you are a reader of the Discworld series, this might not seem too difficult but for an outsider like me it really affected my enjoyment of this novel.

This novel wasn’t broken into chapters; it’s just three hundred plus pages of continuous story. I’m not really sure the reason behind this, but the only way the novel switches between the plot and subplot are paragraph breaks. I’m not saying it is necessarily a bad thing but when you want to put the book down, I think it makes it hard to find a decent stopping place.

I’ve been very vocal about my struggle to connect with fantasy novels; I discovered I do enjoy the urban fantasy/noir blends (The Dresden Files, Bobby Dollar series) so I thought maybe this would be similar. Sure this book was funny and some of the parodies worked really well but it missed any crime element to really work for me. To make a good fantasy/noir blended novel, I think it needs to be a lot darker, with some cynical elements; it doesn’t necessarily need a crime but a quest that will cause an inner struggle within the protagonist will help.

If someone has a suggestion for a decent fantasy novel with some noir elements to it, please let me know. Guards! Guards! is a very funny fantasy novel; this is the second Discworld novel I’ve read and while I did enjoy them, I felt like the both lacked something. I guess I much prefer darker stories; this is just light entertainment and sometimes you need that, but it’s not a series I plan to read in its entirety.

My Rating: 2 and a Half Stars

Filed Under: 2.1/2 Stars, Fantasy, Pratchett, Terry, Random House Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 15, 2013 2 Comments

Book Review: The Reader

Title: The Reader (Goodreads)
Author: Bernhard Schlink
Published: Orion, 1998
Pages: 216
Genre: Historical Fiction
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

The Reader tells the story of the teenage years of Michael Berg while recovering from hepatitis and his passionate affair with a mysterious woman twice his age. Later going on to study law and discovering that this woman was involved in the death march from Auschwitz. The book continues on through the war crimes trial and the relationship between the two after her imprisonment.

Bernhard Schlink was born in 1944 (one year before the war ending), studied law then became a professor of public law and the philosophy of law. His passion for reading comes from a teacher in his high school who encouraged his reading and discovery of literature. Later he discovers that this teacher was a member of the Gestapo and involved in some questionable practices. His first series of books featuring a sixty year old private investigator Gerhard Selb (Selb translates to Self) also had a questionable past during the war and his coming to terms with this. This is interesting since the books in the series are called; Self’s Punishment, Self’s Deception and Self’s Murder. Also he has a collection of essays called Vergangenheitsschuld which translates to Guilt about the Past, which leads you to believe that Bernhard Schlink has a fascination about the effect of World War II has on the next generation of Germans.

This is not a book about the Holocaust novel; while this historical event plays a role, this is rather a novel that gives you a lot of questions and problems to think through. Divided into three parts; the summer of love, the trial and imprisonment; The Reader explores three different scenarios as well as the notion of keeping secrets. At the start of the book Hannah comes across as Good Samaritan trying to help Michael who was throwing up in the street. Later he pursues her and she gets an impression that he is old enough to be out of school; he doesn’t correct her, thinking the papers he leaves behind was enough for her to know his true age but we later finds out she would never have looked at them. When she finds out, they are in bed together and he tells her that he is skipping classes to be with her. She throws him out and it’s not until very later in the book we discover just how important education is to her. Hannah is his first love, he is too young to fully understand the kind of relationship they are having, while Hannah remains guarded and tries to protect both her public and private shames.

While most people focus mostly on the relationship between the two, but there is so much more to look at in the novel. Years later Michael finds Hannah again in a trial and the reader is asked to consider two things; the nature of her guilt and the significance of her other secret (the one she is more ashamed of it). While she was never the ringleader of her charges and she was following orders, when it came to the damning report, she let the court believe she wrote it to continue to hide her illiteracy. This brings to the overall concept to the book; ignorance is not necessarily innocence. The pride to protect herself from people discovering of her illiteracy works against her though out the entire book. She gives up promotions and lands herself in prison all to protect this secret.

This leads into the third part; years later we find that Michael starts reading to Hannah once again. Sending cassettes both the reader and Hannah mistakenly get the impression that this is an act of affection and when Hannah eventually finds out,  we also find out just how cold he has been acting. I’m not sure if he was trying to gain back the power in their relationship or just the bitterness of his life doing it but we are led to believe he still cares about Hannah when all he really cares about is that summer fling when he was still a teenager.

The book wants you to recognise that you are the reader, and Hannah, in particular, wants you to realise just how blessed you are to be able to read this book. I remember there was a great movie adaptation of this book a while ago; while very meta to have a movie about reading, I’m surprised how well it came together. I didn’t remember much about this movie while I read this but it all come back to me as I discovered it in the book. It was a great feeling to remember as I read and not know what would happen next.

I really loved this book; there is that element of uncomfortableness with the relationship at the start, which really is something people can be afraid to talk about but with a book like this it can be scandalous.  There are also so many other interesting elements that I think are equally valuable; especially with the whole German shame towards what they did in World War II and the next generation having to deal with it. While the movie closely follows the book, it is still worth reading; I highly recommend it.

Book Review: 4 Stars

Filed Under: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, 4 Stars, Historical Fiction, Orion, Schlink, Bernhard Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 13, 2013 2 Comments

Supporting Your Favourite Authors

books4How do you support your favourite authors? I just listened to a great podcast of The Readers (my favourite bookish podcast, so check it out) about supporting authors and I thought I would add my thoughts as well. Sure, a lot of authors only want reviews and being a book blogger I get a lot of requests to read books and review them when really my blog is just a way to document my reading journey and talk about my favourite topic, books. I have a review policy which basically says, I’m happy to expect books but there is no guarantee that I’ll read them. If I do read a book, I will write something about it as it is part of documenting my journey but I do try to be constructive and say why the book didn’t work for me but I never go out of my way to be mean. Book reviews are a great way to share thoughts of a book and help support the author but there are so many other ways to do so now.

In a world of social media you can like them on Facebook or follow them on Twitter or if you are a fan of tumbleweeds you can try Google+ (most of my favourite authors are no longer living, so if I follow them that would be a little weird). I’ve had mixed experiences with authors on Twitter; some will just retweet every nice thing said about their book (I know one that will retweet everything, even the bad stuff) and sure that might be good in a way but these authors are not worth following. I follow some great authors that interact with their follows and it can be a great experience (sometimes if you end up not liking the book, they suddenly unfollow you). I had an interesting experience with an author who contacted me to thank me for reading and reviewing his book even though I didn’t like it and while I felt a little bad for not liking it after the thank you I now have more respect for this author for going out of his way to interact with his readers.

There are also book signings and bookish events, you can show your support for an author by going and hear them read or talk about their book. This is a good way to meet the author and get a book signed. I think you learn so much about an author by actually meeting them and see how they interact with the readers and they are also a lot of fun. I remember going to see an author and realised I was wearing a shirt that said “I’d rather be reading Dostoyevsky” and this particular author ended up signing my copy of the book with an apology for being neither Russian or dead, which was really amusing and makes that book that much more special (even though I wasn’t a huge fan of it).

But when it comes down to it, the best way to support an author is just reading their books. Not necessarily buying their book, even going to the library (your local library needs support too) is a way to support the author (I believe they still getting royalties from library books). It’s not always about the royalties, sharing their creativity is important as well and in some cases what the authors value the most. If you love the book maybe go buy the book too, just to give them that extra support but remember to support your local indie bookstore whenever possible; they don’t always have the book you are looking for but if you don’t support them they may not be there for long.

So when it comes down to it, I personally feel the best way to support an author is to just read their books and maybe buy them (but never pirate them). A review helps to promote their book as well, but that really comes down to personal preference. Goodreads may not be perfect but I do trust my friends opinions of a book, rather than reading a stranger’s review. I would love to know any other ways we can help support the authors we love or any stories you would like to share that helped change your opinion of an author.

Filed Under: Literature Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 12, 2013 Leave a Comment

Book Review: The Last Good Kiss

Title: The Last Good Kiss (Goodreads)
Author: James Crumley
Published: Vintage, 1978
Pages: 244
Genre: Pulp
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

James Crumley’s private investigator CW Sughrue finds himself searching for a runaway young woman, missing for ten years. But this is not how it started out; he was hired by a woman to find her ex-husband, Abraham Trahearne before he drinks himself to death. A confrontation in the bar that results in Trahearne being injured in hospital puts Sughrue in a position to look for this missing woman.

This hard-boiled novel is told in a way I don’t think has been done enough in a pulp crime novel. A parallel narrative exploring the problematic relationship between Sughrue and the wandering alcoholic novelist, and the three femme fatales in Trahearne’s life, just to make things more complex. Apart from that, you have the usual elements that make up a hard-boiled novel; alcohol, money, love, sex, power and violence.

Somehow James Crumley has a refreshing voice for this genre; I’m not sure if it is just that I’ve not read enough hard-boiled novels set in the seventies or there is something else there. I would put Crumley somewhere between Raymond Chandler and Jim Thompson; he doesn’t have the plotting skills and wit that Chandler has but he isn’t as violent and philosophical as Thompson. The narrative, while in a first person point of view, manages to switch between making the reader feel like they are in the same room trying to piece this mystery together, and then all of a sudden you are inside CW Sughrue head reading all his thoughts, emotions and memories. This isn’t easy to do but Crumley does this so seamlessly that you don’t really notice it happening. This narrative, mixed with the cynicism and low regard to society is what I think makes this book so refreshing.

This novel deals a lot with sex; Sughrue’s personal integrity and professional ethics are corrupted by the sexual desire towards Catherine; a desire she uses to manipulate him. Trahearne hasn’t been able to be creative because of his sexual desire with Melinda and his attraction towards his mother. Then there is Betty Sue, who just has a sexual desire towards everyone in the book. It’s important to know at the core of this books portrayal of sexual desire is the cynical belief that such corruption is unavoidable and even inevitable.

The Last Good Kiss also deals with the idea of identity and trying to escape your past, but ultimately realising you can’t run. Betty Sue hides her true self between layers of masks and other identities; she is running from her sexually exploitative time in San Francisco but it all comes back in the end. Trahearne can’t escape his infidelities, alcoholism and his ex-wife’s fury. All of them fail to realise that the past defines the present. Their mistakes in the past do not have to define their future but helps them grow; this book just ends up being a twisted celebration of life’s obstacles shaping our personality.

Admittedly I found myself being bored in parts of this book and wanting to skim read, but I persevered and found some interesting elements that stopped this from being a generic crime novel. CW Sughrue, is an alcoholic ex-army officer turned private investigator and that dark past is what makes me want to keep reading the series, just to discover what he is running from.  The Last Good Kiss has been described as the most influential crime novel of the last 50 years, influencing people like Michael Connelly, George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane and even Neal Stephenson; that alone is an impressive reason to check this book out. While I think I prefer Jim Thompson for style and message, James Crumley is an author I plan to explore more of.

My Rating: 3 and a Half Stars

Filed Under: 3.1/2 Stars, Crumley, James, Pulp, Vintage Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 11, 2013 4 Comments

Book Review: Decline and Fall

Title: Decline and Fall (Goodreads)
Author: Evelyn Waugh
Published: Penguin, 1928
Pages: 216
Genre: Classic
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Paul Pennyfeather finds himself taking a job at a public school called Llanabba after being expelled from Oxford for indecent behaviour. He takes up some private tutoring to get close to the student’s mother, Margot Beste-Chetwynde. Their relationship forms and they are soon engaged; all the while Paul is still unaware that the main source of her income is a number of high class brothels in South America. Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall is a black comedy satirising British society in the 1920s.

This is my first Evelyn Waugh novel; why did I pick this over Brideshead Revisited? Simple answer is a friend loves this book and I thought I would see if I trust her taste in literature; since they are more of a genre reader. Decline and Fall gets its name from Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, a book that traces the trajectory of the Roman Empire, and Western civilisation as a whole. There are some who also attributes the title to Oswald Spengler’s The Decline of the West, a philosophical book that rejects the Euro-centric view of history. Both books are important to remember as both look at western civilisation and reject the idea that it is the be all and end all.

Decline and Fall satirises a world where the British social institutes (like schools) have lost their integrity and their authority. The church has lost its faith and the aristocracy have declined to the same level as the masses since the educational system teaches nothing worth learning. The situation is both humorous in its approach and also very dystopian. Waugh has a great deal of fun playing with this world but when you reflect on this book and take out all the comedy, it really is quite scary; sure I’m for equality in the social classes but the prediction of a failing education system is not something I look forward to.

There are two major literary techniques within this novel that I feel are worth looking at; first of all there is the humour which, while funny, leaves a lot to the reader’s imagination with the deadpan narrative of the newspaper reporter. For all I know the book really isn’t about the decline of education and society but the way this book is written has set my mind running in that direction, it could have filled in the blanks on its own. The second is the way this book parodies English literature within the book, from a reference to Shakespeare’s Othello to many more. A better English major than I could probably pull this book apart a lot better and tell you every single literary reference within the book.

This book confronts the reader with some difficult moral decisions all the while doing it in a tone that reminds me of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Monty Python. The general decay of society is the major theme throughout this book but you might not even pick up on this if you are only reading this for the humour. There are elements of both Horatian and Juvenalian satire within the book and I like the way Evelyn Waugh writes it so you can read in either form and still get some enjoyment from Decline and Fall.

After reading this novel, I’m keener than ever to check out Brideshead Revisited and some of his other works. This is not a perfect novel, I did find myself a little bored at times and even lost but Decline and Fall has some interesting ideas worth reading about. I can’t help but wonder if reading The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire or The Decline of the West might have a positive effect on this novel. I won’t say this is a great novel but I’m glad to have read and dissected Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall. 

Book Rating: 3 Stars

Filed Under: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, 3 Stars, Classic, Penguin, Waugh, Evelyn Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 10, 2013 2 Comments

Book Review: Main Street

Title: Main Street (Goodreads)
Author: Sinclair Lewis
Published: Modern Library, 1920
Pages: 448
Genre: Classic
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (free) (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Main Street; that primary street in every small town that is exactly the same, full of stores and guaranteed to run into people you know. Carol Kennicott finds herself moving to Gopher Prairie, Minnesota with her new husband. Carol is a liberal, free spirited city girl who finds herself appalled by the backwardness of this small country town. Her disdain for the town’s ugliness and smug conservatism compels her to change it.

I grew up in Gopher Prairie; well not exactly but when I was just starting high school I was moved from Sydney to a small mining town in North Queensland called Charters Towers, so I know what Carol was going through. Sure, it wasn’t the 1910’s but for someone that loves city life (even at a young age) this move was devastating. Main Street is a satirical novel by Sinclair Lewis about the pettiness, back-stabbing and hypocrites that make up a small town. I will admit that I had never heard of this book until I read Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald. Knocking This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald off the number one spot, Main Street became extremely popular becoming one of the major best sellers of its time. Naturally having read about the impact this book had on the Fitzgerald’s and the readers of the time, I looked this book up and immediately added it to my “to read” list.

Carol is the heroine of this novel; enthusiastic and with high hopes for her future, she finds herself in a town that expects her just to play the house wife. Her love of sociology and her degree in English literature appear to be useless to Carol in Gopher Prairie. She feels like an outsider and even when she tries to fit in by throwing a Chinese themed party (where the guests feel bewildered by the strangeness of it all) or joining the woman’s group, the culture shock leaves her unsatisfied. I had to laugh at the woman’s group when they gathered to discuss poetry, Carol felt excited and asked which poets they will discuss. Their reply was ‘all of them’ and she finds herself in a very generic conversation about poets. At the end of the meeting she enquires about other poets which were missed and how they could improve this discussion, in which they decide that one extra meeting devoted to poetry will cover everything.

“I do not admit that Main Street is as beautiful as it should be! I do not admit that dish-washing is enough to satisfy all women!”

Carol struggles to find her identity within this town, she thinks of herself as some sort of artist and intellectual but Gopher Prairie doesn’t appear to give her the stimulation she so desires. She sees the other woman in the town as lacking of intelligence, curiosity or even a personality and never feels like she will be satisfied with all the other women. Living in the small town slowed her path to self-discovery; I feel like in any other circumstance Carol would have discovered her true identity a lot sooner.

The people of Gopher Prairie have grown complacent and comfortable with the familiar. So when Carol tries to make a change, she is met with resistances; not just because she is a woman but also being an outsider. While she is trying to get involved and make the town a better place by proposing they revitalise city hall and turn it into a meeting centre for events and dances, the town is worried she might make young people aware of sexuality while they are still in high school. You have to chuckle at their backwards ideas, I don’t think I ever thought improving the town would ever lead to sexual corruption of the youth.

I really enjoyed this satirical novel; while people thinking this novel wasn’t funny did lead me to write a post about understanding satire, I did think this was humorous. I think this is just me relating to the backwardness of a small town like Gopher Prairie. Times have changed a lot since the 1910’s but in a small town it kind of feels like nothing has changed. Not necessarily an easy book to read, but I really did like the culture clash between the “wholesome” small town and an outsider.  Sinclair Lewis got it right when he wrote about just how difficult it is being an outsider in a town where everyone knows everyone.

My Rating: 4 Stars

Filed Under: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, 4 Stars, Classic, Lewis, Sinclair, Modern Library Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,
May 9, 2013 8 Comments

Gatsby and My Hate for Movie Tie-In Covers

gatsby

I had a little complaint about book covers changing a few days ago but now I feel the need to comment on something else cover related. Movie tie-in book covers are the worst thing out there, I know they help people recognise the book but they are just so ugly and should never be printed. The New York Times wrote an interesting article called Judging ‘Gatsby’ by Its Cover(s) in which they looked at the iconic Great Gatsby cover with the new movie cover.

Normally books go through different cover changes but when it comes to The Great Gatsby, the original cover is still the most recognised of all its covers. So when you see the movie tie-in cover it is a huge shock; do we really need a cover with Leonardo DiCaprio on it? The article is really interesting because it looks at how the original cover is out selling the movie tie-in and even an independent bookseller who refuses to sell the new cinematic edition. Saying “It’s just God-awful, ‘The Great Gatsby’ is a pillar of American literature, and people don’t want it messed with. We’re selling the classic cover and have no intention of selling the new one.”

There is even a little quote by Ernest Hemingway who called the original cover “garish” and wrote in his memoir A Moveable Feast that he was “embarrassed by the violence, bad taste and slippery look of it.” But that is probably a whole new blog post, maybe two (one to look at the complex relationship of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Hemingway).

I know I hate movie tie-in covers and go out of my way to avoid them at all cost. I know most people hate them, you can read The Week complain about them, even Books on the Nightstand had a conversation about them recently. But I want to know if there are any good movie-tie in covers out there and what you think about them?

Filed Under: Literature Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
May 8, 2013 Leave a Comment

Rereading Heart of Darkness

Title: Heart of Darkness (Goodreads)
Author: Joseph Conrad
Published: Oxford University Press, 1899
Pages: 225
Genre: Classic
My Copy: Paperback

Buy: Amazon, Book Depository, Kindle (free) (or visit your local Indie bookstore)

Heart of Darkness tells the tale of Charlie Marlow’s journey on an ivory transporter down an unknown river in the Congo. What he sees horrifies and perplexes him, calling into question the very basis of civilisation and human nature. The story follows this commercial agent and the object of his obsession, the notorious ivory-procurement agent Mr Kurtz. This novella has become an important piece in the western canon for its range of themes and scholarly values.

I remember reading this book a few years back and while I thought it was an interesting book, I never really grasped it completely (and I’m not sure if I ever will) but for comparison to what I know now and then, check out my review here. To begin with we need to gain an understanding of Joseph Conrad’s life because there are a lot of life experiences in this book. Born Josef Teodor Konrad Walecz Korzeniowski in Russian-ruled Poland in 1857; this part of Poland is now part of Ukraine. Both parents were political activists and as a result of their participation in the Polish independence movement they were exiled to Northern Russia in 1863. At sixteen he dropped out of school to work on a French merchant ship, sailing the West Indies as an apprentice. Later he joined a British ship where he served as a merchant for ten years, during this time he gained the rank of captain and became a naturalized British citizen. During a trip in 1890 sailing through the Belgian Congo and Congo River he got really sick and had to retire from sailing and focused his energy on writing. This means Joseph Conrad must have grown up speaking Polish and Russian, learning French at some point and then English. Although he often struggled to write in his adopted language, he is now considered one of the greatest prose stylists in English literature.

There are many themes explored in this book, so much so that I think I would need to keep reading this book again and again to discover them. Though major themes include slavery (the effect the British had on Africa) as well the author’s problems with Colonialism and Imperialism. There are a few other themes I would much prefer exploring. First of all, the idea of alienation; both Conrad and Marlow are both outsiders. The entire novel questions what alienation and loneliness can do to a person over an extended period of time, especially since they are in hostile environments. Even the doctor warns Marlow prior to his departure of changes to his personality that may be produced by a long stay in another country.  Prolonged solitude seems to have damaging effects on the sailors, which leads me into another major theme; insanity. In the case of Kurtz, the loneliness lead to literal madness, while others like Marlow’s predecessor, Captain Fresleven was described as a gentle soul that transformed into a violent one.

There are other themes I really would love to talk about but for the sake of keeping this review a decent length I will just highlight them. Heart of Darkness also looks at the way Belgium is exploiting the Congo, order verse disorder, duty verse responsibility, doubt verse ambiguity, race verse racism and finally violence and cruelty. All these, plus many more, are reasons why this book has been studied. It is a very difficult book to explore, I found myself rereading passages trying to get more out of it. I know at one point near the start of reading this I thought I would never get enough meaning out of this book but eventually it opened up to me.

There are a lot of symbols within the book as well, beginning with the title and the setting; Heart of Darkness deep in the heart of the Congo, the centre of the deep dark Africa. Even the fact that the entire story is told in the late afternoon as the sun sets is a motif of Africa. There are a lot more in this novel but I want to quickly talk about the movie adaptation Apocalypse Now. Sure there are some similarities but not enough to really consider the movie to be based on this novella. There are more similarities with Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner in the way the book starts out, also with Bram Stokers’ Dracula with the suspension between life and death. So how are they the similar, since one is set in the Congo and the other during the Vietnam War? The very basic answer would be that both look at the deterioration of humanity as a result of conflict, one via imperialism and one by war.

I would love to talk about the narrative and how there are two narrators, Marlow and someone anonymous. And how all the scenes on the Nellie are obviously an introductory and critique to the story that it doesn’t go away after the intro. Marlow’s narrative is often interrupted by this unnamed narrator as they listen to the story as a way for Conrad to tell the reader to notice different themes. There are also the proses in the book, poetic and while difficult, you can get swept away and not really notice just what Conrad is trying to do. So many things I want to talk about but I have to cut this review short.

Heart of Darkness is a really complex book but if you take the time to break it apart and explore the text critically, you’ll find there is so much to appreciate. It’s like a fine meal, it can be enjoyed without any thought, but if you take the time to see how each element complements each other you end up enjoying the novella a whole lot more. It all comes together with a sense of satisfaction that while you might not know everything Joseph Conrad was trying to say, you know enough for the book to have real value.

My Rating: 4 Stars

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Filed Under: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, 4 Stars, Classic, Conrad, Joseph, Oxford University Press Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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