Tag Archives: Novels

Timothy Findley: The Wars (1977) Literature and War Readalong April 2013

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The Wars

Is it possible to write about WWI – including the trenches, the incapable high command, shell shock, gas attacks, rats, mud, facial wounds, the immense body count – and still be original and have something profound and thought-provoking to say? Before reading Timothy Findley’s  The Wars I might have said “possibly” but after finishing it, I have to say “definitely”. This novel proves that in the hands of a powerful writer anything can become extraordinary.

The Wars has an episodic structure but still tells a coherent story, exploring what happened one day, during WWI, when young Officer Robert Ross, broke the ranks, committing an act of total insubordination, shot another officer and freed dozens of horses. How did it come to this? The story is told in a circular way, starting with the end, withholding all the vital information, and then moving back to  the beginning, unfolding every step which led to that fatal day.

I said in my intro post that I was worried the book would contain a lot of animal suffering and it did but in an unusual way. The strength of Findley’s work is that he manages to show, just like Coetzee – another defender of animals – that, at the end of the day, animals and humans are equal. Both feel pain; their lives are precious and must be protected. Being alive is nothing short of a miracle.

This first quote is central in the book and illustrates perfectly what kind of person Robert Ross is

In another hole there was a rat that was alive but trapped because of the waterlogged condition of the earth that kept collapsing every time it tried to ascend the walls. Robert struck a match and caught the rat by the tail. It squealed as he lifted it over the edge and set it free. Robert wondered afterwards if setting the rat free had been a favour – but in the moment that he did it he was thinking: here is someone still alive. And the word alive was amazing.

The instances in which animals die at the hand of men who have gone crazy or are saved by compassionate men are numerous. Madness is an important topic in this novel. Not just in the sense of war is madness but because people lose their minds during battle or under attack. And often they take it out on weaker ones. Wounded Germans, prisoners or animals.

Many of the soldiers in the book question the decisions of their superiors

This – to Bates – was the greatest terror of the war: what you didn’t know of the men who told you what to do – where to go and when. What if they were mad – or stupid? What if their fear was greater than yours? Or what of they were brave and crazy – wanting and demanding bravery from you?

Life in the trenches is constant terror, trying to stay sane and attempting to survive.

Robert had only taken eight hours sleep in the last three days. He was living on chocolate bars and tea and generous portions of rum which he took from the supply wagons. His body was completely numb and his mind had shrunken to a small, protective shell in which he hoarded the barest essentials of reason.

The novel is divided in many short chapters which could be read separately but definitely work as a whole. This isn’t a collection of snapshots, it is a novel but this approach of unfolding the story in short chapters, which change point of view, narrative technique, tone and mood, make every part very powerful. Findley is probably one of the most assured writers I’ve read. This could have been difficult to read but most chapters contain strong and expressive scenes. There is far more show than tell in this book, which makes it accessible but also painful. Death, pain, loss and grief are described in a civilian setting and during war, and finally illustrate that love is all that counts. War is mad, inflicting pain is mad and treating people without respect is mad as well.

What came as a surprise were the many funny moments in this book. Rodwell is an officer who saved some injured animals after an attack

“Where did you find the hedgehog?” Robert asked.

“Under a hedge,” said Rodwell.

Everybody laughed.

“I suppose that means you found the bird in the sky,” said Devlin.

“Would that I had, Mister Devlin,” said Rodwell. “No sir – I found him with the hedgehog. They were crouched there side by side when I got them by putting out my hand to secure the toad. We were all there together, you see. It was a popular hedge just at that moment.”

There are many other funny moments. I was glad for those, otherwise the book would have been really dark.

The Wars is populated by likable characters which makes it a painful read. There are not many men or animals who survive in this book. It’s not too gruesome as wounds and pain are not dwelt on but it has many explicit moments which make it an equally beautiful, powerful and painful read.

Other reviews

Anna (Diary of an Eccentric)

Buried in Print

Danielle (A Work in Progress)

The review is also a contribution to The Canadian Book Challenge.

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The Wars was the fourth book in the Literature and War Readalong 2013. The next is the WWII novel All That I Am  by Australian writer Anna Funder . Discussion starts on Friday 31 May, 2013. Further information on the Literature and War Readalong, including the book blurbs can be found here.

Moroccan Literature and A Blogging Break

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Picture taken from www.trekearth.com

Picture of the Kashbah Aït Benhaddou taken from http://www.trekearth.com

This is just a quick post to let you know I’m taking a blogging break. I’m not sure for how long but I will certainly be back in time for the readalong at the end of the month.

Canetti

Some of you know that one of the reasons for the break is that I’m travelling to Morocco. To Marrakech to be precise. The first time I’ve been to Morocco was in part because of so many European and American writers like Paul Bowles, Elias Canetti, Esther Freud, who loved Morocco and especially Marrakech. The way they described the city made me think I would love it. At first I was disappointed as it was so different from what I had imagined but then I went back and saw the “real” Marrakech and fell in love. I wonder how it will be this time. This trip will be special as I’m travelling with someone who has been there before, someone who has never been there and someone who was born there. It will be interesting to see the city through so many different eyes. From Marrakech we will travel to Essaouira which is on the coast and stay there for a couple of days.

I’m looking forward to this trip as the temperature here is still around 6°C/42,8°F, while in Morocco it should be around 27°C/80,6°F.

a-street-in-marrakech-elizabeth-warnock-fernea-paperback-cover-art

Another reason why I wen to Marrakech for the first time was Elizabeth Fernea. While studying at the university I took a course on travel memoirs written by cultural anthropologists. One of the titles that made a huge impression was A Street in Marrakech. I’d love to read it again. It’s a fascinating account and a well-written book that captures the magic of living in another culture and the sorrow to leave it again.

The other day I thought it was appalling that I haven’t read any Moroccan writers other than Tahar Ben Jelloun. There are so many, however not all of them have been translated. To put myself in the mood for the trip I compiled a small list.

Tahar-Ben-Jelloun-Leaving-Tangier

Tahar Ben Jelloun – Leaving Tangier

Ben Jelloun is probably the most famous Moroccan writer. His books are short and lyrical. He has written a lot. Many of his books have been translated.

Laila Lalami

Laila Lalami Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits

Lalami is  new to me. Her books received much praise. She lives in the US and writes in English but was born in Morocco.

For-Bread-Alone

Mohamed Choukri – For Bread Alone

Mohamed Choukri’s autobiographical novel is a classic. It has been translated by Paul Bowles. It’s an account of poverty and hardship, written in powerful prose.

Dreams_Trespass

Fatima Mernissi – Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood

I bought this years ago but have still not read it. Mernissi writes in English. I’ve read other memoirs by women who grew up in a harem. They are worth reading as we discover a world we would otherwise never see.

mother-comes-age-driss-chraibi-paperback-cover-art

Driss Chraibi’s novel Mother Comes of Age is another classic which I’ve bought some time ago. It is said to be one of the most important Moroccan books.

I hope this post will tempt the one or the other to pick up a Moroccan writer in the future.

I know that some of you are curious to see what books people will read when travelling or on holidays. While I have a kindle I will not go anywhere without real books. These are the candidates I’m taking with me:

Asmara

I’ve already started Asmara et les causes perdues. Jean-Christophe Rufin has won the Prix Goncourt for his novel Rouge Brésil or Brazil Red. Unfortunately Asmara hasn’t been translated.

burning bright - ron rash

Ron Rash has been on my radar for a while. Before reading his novel The Cove I wanted to explore his shorter fiction. Burning Brigth has received some prestigious prizes.

Snapper

I just received Brian Kimberling’s first novel Snapper from Random House and since it sounds so good, I’m going to read this soon.

You certainly wonder why I’m not taking any of the Moroccan books. I’m weird that way, I keep those for when I’m back.

Take care everyone. I’ll be back in a couple of weeks.

Elizabeth Bowen: The Heat of the Day (1948) Literature and War Readalong March 2013

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The Heat of The Day

Elizabeth Bowen’s The Heat of the Day introduces us to London during WWII. The novel starts on a Sunday in 1942 and ends exactly two years later. London is a ghostly city. Many houses are but ruins, other’s are abandoned. People’s lives have changed, relationships are formed much more quickly but they end as abruptly too. Social differences become smaller, the society is less strict as a whole. Everything is perceived more intensely. The seasons, the hours of the day, the light. The beauty and spookiness of the time is captured in evocative passages like the one below.

Out of the mists of morning charred by the smoke from ruins each day rose to a height of unmisty glitter; between the last of sunset and first note of the siren the darkening glassy tenseness of evening was drawn fine. . . . The diversion of traffic out of blocked main thoroughfares into byways, the unstopping phantasmagoric streaming of lorries, buses, vans, drays, taxis past modest windows and quiet doorways set up an overpowering sense of London’s organic power–somewhere here was a source from which heavy motion boiled, surged and, not to be damned up, forced itself new channels.

The very soil of the city at this time seemed to generate more strength: in parks the outsize dahlias, velvet and wine, and the trees on which each vein in each yellow leaf stretched out perfect against the sun blazoned out the idea of the finest hour. Parks suddenly closed because of time-bombs–drifts of leaves in the empty deck chairs, birds afloat on the dazzlingly silent lakes–presented, between the railings which girt them, mirages of repose. All this was beheld each morning more light-headedly: sleeplessness disembodied the lookers-on.

In reality there were no holidays; few were free however light-headedly to wander. The night behind and the night to come met across every noon in an arch of strain. To work or think was to ache. In offices, factories, ministries, shops, kitchens the hot yellow sands of each afternoon ran out slowly; fatigue was the one reality. You dared not envisage sleep.

The main story centers on Stella, her lover Robert, her son Roderick and the intelligence agent Harrison. The side story involves two girls, Louie and Connie. It’s a peculiar story. Harrison visits Stella one night and tells her that Robert is a spy working for the Nazis. Harrison could protect him to some extent if Stella was willing to become his lover.

It’s hard to imagine what it would feel like to hear something like this about the man you love. Stella doubts it at first but Harrison has proof and after a few months she accepts it and confronts Robert.

I’m not exactly sure why Elizabeth Bowen chose this topic or why she chose to paint the portrait of a likable Nazi spy. I didn’t feel this was believable at all.

If you put the story aside and concentrate on other elements, you will find an excellent description of wartime London. I liked the many side stories far more than the main story as such. The female characters are all interesting. There is Stella who was perceived as a fallen woman as it was said she had walked out on her husband. Nettie, the wife of a distant Irish uncle lives in a home for mentally ill patients but is perfectly fine. Louie sleeps with various men, to feel closer to her husband who is stationed in India. The status of women has changed a lot at the time, the society is less rigid, many could finally break free,

Robert, although far less of a character than most women in this novel, is interesting because he symbolizes the wounded men who came back after Dunkirk, unfit for future service. Many of these men must have been very bitter. I’m not sure though that an experience like this would have pushed many to become Nazi spies.

All in all this was a disjointed reading experience. I liked the atmosphere and the mood, didn’t care for the story and often had the feeling Elizabeth Bowen cannot write novels. As much as I liked her shorter prose and could forgive her for many convoluted sentences, in this book she went too far. According to Glendinning’s biography, her editor changed many sentences and told her many times to work on them. It’s not that they are long – long sentences hardly bother you when you read German or French literature – but the structure is weird. Let me give you a few examples.

In the street below, not so much a step as the semi-stumble of someone after long standing shifting his position could be, for the fist time by her, heard.

Or her way to break up dialogue and add long complicated tags

“This is certainly,” she agreed, with the affability of extreme disdain, “rather a point.”

This one is hilarious

“Absolutely,” he said with fervour, “not! Though you know I do wish I knew what’s rattled you.”

While I would still recommend to read The Heat of the Day for many different elements, I’m not so keen on reading another of her novels soon unless someone tells me there is one in which the sentences are not as contorted. For the time being I’ll stick to the short stories.

Other reviews

Anna (Diary of an Eccentric)

Lizzy (Lizzy’s Literary Life)

TBM (50 Year Project)

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The Heat of the Day was the third book in the Literature and War Readalong 2013. The next is the WWI novel The Wars by Canadian writer Timothy Findley. Discussion starts on April 29, 2013. Further information on the Literature and War Readalong, including the book blurbs can be found here.

Geling Yan: The Flowers of War – Jingling Shisan Chai (2006) Literature and War Readalong February 2013

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The Flowers of War

Geling Yan’s novel  The Flowers of War – Jingling Chisan Chai is set in Nanking in 1937 during The Rape of Nanking or The Nanking Massacre, when the city was occupied by Japanese troops. The story which is inspired by true events takes place in the compound of an American church. Father Engelmann hides a group of school girls and when some prostitutes from the nearby brothels climb over the wall, he hides those as well. Later, three Chinese soldiers, two of which are badly wounded will also come and seek refuge. Their presence endangers the others greatly.

The Rape of Nanking is one of those horrific events which are hard to imagine and I was very curious to see how the author would handle this. I must say she’s written an amazingly powerful and beautiful book which gives us a good impression of what has happened without dragging the reader down too much. Still, especially due to the very sad ending, we never doubt for one minute how atrocious this must have been, notably for women.

Having a group of beautiful and very seductive prostitutes hide in the compound also leads to comical moments. The girls are still very young and pious and hate “those women” with a vengeance. The prostitutes on the other hand love to provoke and shock the priests and the girls.

In the beginning of the novel nobody expects that the Japanese occupation will turn into such a nightmare and Father Engelmann frequently says that he knows the Japanese to be very polite and expects that they will stay civilized and follow the Geneva Convention. When rumours of rapes and executions are spread he learns that he was wrong.

Because the church is neutral territory, Engelmann lives under the assumption that they are all safe inside of the compound. Safe but hungry because there is hardly any food left in Nanking. However Engelmann is wrong and the end of the story is harrowing. The Japanese don’t only enter the compound because they are looking for food but also because they are looking for women. It is known that the Japanese took female prisoners and used them as so-called “comfort women” and turned them into prostitutes or rather sex slaves.

I didn’t expect to love this book so much but I did. Geling Yan tried to show that war brings out the worst in people but also the best. It explores different moral choices and questions what is really good and what is bad. In the end, the prostitutes who are seen as bad, are the ones who prove to be capable of the greatest kindness and compassion.

The characters are very well-developed. We learn the back story of almost all of the characters and truly care for them by the end. There are numerous moments in which two people are listening and caring for each other and manage to share true beauty despite of the mayhem that is raging outside.

It occurred to Fabio that he might stop drinking if he had someone to tell his troubles to. A listening face like hers was intoxicating enough.

I thought this was one of the most subtle books on war I’ve read so far. It’s written in a very simple, straightforward and engaging way and tells a story of beauty, humour, sacrifice, compassion and hope without ever letting us forget the horrors or minimizing them. The biggest strength were the many characters which came alive in a few sentences.

When I choose a book for the readalong I tend to focus on the war aspect but ultimately The Flowers of War has a lot to say about the precarious condition of women.  The stories of the prostitutes are heartbreaking. It’s also well shown how conditioning makes other women, in this case the girls, hate them because of their trade. They are treated like the scum of the earth although they are good-hearted and kind and in most cases had no other choice. Many come from poor families and have been sold to brothels at a very young age.

One of the core messages of the book is captured in this quote in which Father Engelmann speaks to one of the Chinese soldiers who hides in the compound

“God used him to give me inspiration. He wanted me to save myself by saving others. God wants people to help each other especially when they are injured or weak. I hope you will trust in God. It is God you should trust, not weapons, when you are powerless to control your fate, as you are now.”

I’m looking forward to read what others thought of this novel. I liked it a great deal.

Other reviews

Book

Anna – Diary of an Eccentric

Danielle – A Work in Progress

JoV’s Book Pyramid

Movie

The Flowers of War – Novia (Polychrome Interest)

Book and Movie

Kevin (The War Movie Buff)

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The Flowers of War was the second book in the Literature and War Readalong 2013. The next is The Heat of the Day by Irish writer Elizabeth Bowen. Discussion starts on Thursday 28 March, 2013. Further information on the Literature and War Readalong, including the book blurbs can be found here.

Elizabeth Bowen and Irish Short Story Week

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Elizabeth Bowen Collected Stories

I just wanted to let you know that Mel’s Irish Short Story Week is upcoming in March. Because it was such a success in the last couple of years the week has been extended to a whole month and therefore runs from March 1 until March 31 2013.

I discovered some great new writers like Órfhlaith Foyle and Kevin Barry last year, but I also rediscovered old favourites like Elizabeth Bowen. I read a few of her short stories and had sworn I would read more. This year I’m planning on reading several of her stories contained in the Collected Stories which seems to be a great collection.

To stay in line with this month’s theme my Literature and War Readalong, which takes place at the end of the month, also features a book by Elizabeth Bowen – The Heat of the Day.

Because I loved the stories I read last year so much I also got her book Love’s Civil War which contains letters and diary entries and Victoria Glendinning’s biography which was recommended by Mel u. I might start the one or the other or even both.

For more details and Irish reading suggestions please visit Mel u at The Reading Life.

Orfhlaith Foyle

Hjalmar Söderberg: Doctor Glas – Doktor Glas (1905) A Swedish Classic

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doctorglas

The haunting tale of Doctor Glas takes place in Stockholm during the closing years of the 1800s. The doctor, a troubled and compassionate man, relates the strange story of the Reverend Gregorius and his pretty wife. Gregorius, an elderly and offensive pastor, has endangered her physical and mental health. She consults Doctor Glas, who for the first time violates the ethics of his profession and uses a highly unorthodox method of helping her. But when the wife takes a lover, and Doctor Glas becomes emotionally attached to her, an intolerable situation develops. The uxorious pastor dies, poisoned. The aftermath of his death and the doctor’s unforeseen reactions to it bring the story to a chilling, horrifying close. Originally published in 1905, Doctor Glas is a novel of extraordinary immediacy and frankness. Its concerns – sexual incompatibility, abortion, euthanasia – together with its psychological insights, make it a remarkably modern work.

I’m so glad I’ve discovered this book on Danielle’s blog (here) not too long ago. I haven’t read a lot of Swedish literature. I’m familiar with some names, like Strindberg, Lindgren, Lagerlöf, and Lars Gustafsson but I hadn’t heard of Söderberg. I tend to read books from Scandinavia in German and Söderberg’s novel Doctor Glas wasn’t available in Germany anymore. It has just been republished for the first time last year following the success of another Swedish writer, Kerstin Ekman, who wrote a book called Tagebuch eines Mörders (Diary of a murderer) in which she tells the fictitious story of how Doctor Glas told Söderberg about the planned murder. Her novel led to the rediscovery of Söderberg’s controversial book. It was considered to be very scandalous when it came out. That’s not surprising as some of the topics (abortion, euthanasia) still lead to heated discussions.

Doctor Glas has been compared to Zola’s Thérèse Raquin and Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. I would add Schnitzler to these two as there is clearly another dimension to this story which seems influenced by depth psychology.

Doctor Glas is written in form of a fictitious diary. The diary is kept by the doctor himself. The book is set during one hot summer, in Stockholm towards the end of the 19th Century, and tells the story of a murder.

Doctor Glas is a loner and a very sensitive man who is filled with disgust by anything all too human. He’s in his thirties and has never had a relationship or any physical contact with a woman. It’s not that he never felt attracted but he thinks too much about it and it starts to look absurd and revolting to him. The summer during which the story begins, is hot and sweltering. Couples meet in the dark in the cemetery below his window. He can hear and sense them, and after a while he cannot shut himself off anymore.

The elderly Pastor Gregorious is a man who more than any other fills Glas with disgust. He looks revolting and has an obnoxious character. Imagining him with his young and beautiful wife is awful for Glas, all the more so as he is secretly in love with her. One day she comes to see Glas and asks him for help. She wants him to tell her husband that he cannot have sex with her as she suffers from an illness. She then tells Glas that he forces her and even rapes her when she is not willing. This shocks Glas so much that even though he knows she loves someone else, he decides to free her one way or the other.

The story line circling around the planned murder reminded me a lot of the above mentioned books by Zola and Dostoevsky but the way the inner life of Glas is rendered, the descriptions of the weather and the nature, his thoughts, emotions and dreams seem influenced by depth psychology and reminded me of Schnitzler. It’s this aspect that made me love the novel. But there is another dimension. The book covers a lot of themes. Adultery, abortion, free love, marriage, euthanasia, murder, guilt. It’s almost endless and highly fascinating. What I found the most interesting are the thoughts on love, marriage and sexuality which made this a very modern novel. This reminded me of another Swedish author, Carl Jonas Love Almqvist whose much earlier novel Sara Videbeck and the Chapel (1839) is equally ahead of its time. It’s the story of a young woman who doesn’t believe in marriage and thinks that a relationship suffers if people are too close and live together. The very same spirit can be found in Doctor Glas only the story is bleak, as Doctor Glas, unlike Sara, is a very troubled mind.

I wrote in the beginning that the novel is set in Stockholm. Stockholm is much more than just a setting, it’s one of the topics of the book. Glas hates the country and loves the city and many of his entries describe the beauty of Stockholm. The initial descriptions of his diary entries always capture a special sight, the blue moon over the cemetery, a walk through the city, a famous building.

Doctor Glas is a rich, multi-layered book which has not only put me in the mood to read more Swedish authors but to finally visit Stockholm. If you like books which take a look into the darkest corners of troubled minds, this is for you. I loved it.

Charles Dickens: Great Expectations (1861)

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In Great Expectations the orphan Pip tells the story of his life. He tells us how, after having lost his parents as a small child, he was brought up “by hand” by his mean and quarrelsome sister who hit him and her husband. How his sister’s husband Joe and Biddy the teacher were the only kind people in his life. How he met a convict and helped him. How he was invited to the excentric and melancholy Miss Havisham to play at her house. How he saw the wonderous house for the first time and met the beautiful Estella who would be the love of his life. How being introduced to Miss Havisham and Estella made him long for another life and feel ashamed of his own. How finally he was made rich and hoping for great expectations from an unknown benefactor. And how in the end things turned out in a very different way.

Great Expectations offered everything I expected from Dickens and so much more. The only thing I could criticize is that it was predictable and that there were a lot of coincidences which didn’t seem all that realistic but who cares. There is so much in this novel to like that I can easily forget its flaws. The characters were, as was to be expected, quirky and over-the top, much more caricatures than portraits, but drawn which such a wonderful imagination that I loved each one of them.

I also liked the atmosphere, how with a few words, a few sentences he captures a mood, a season, the weather, a location, a house, a street. All his descriptions are highly evocative and one sees every little detail.

There were many uncanny, witty and captivating scenes and I would have a hard time picking favorites. I liked all the chapters at Miss Havisham’s house. The sorrow and grief which had made the time stand still in that place and entrapped its owner for eternity, gave the book a very gothic feel.

But I also loved all the scenes including Mr Jagger’s clerk Wemmick and his father. They made me chuckle very often. They are such an endearing couple.

To do this book justice and write properly about it, I would need more time which I don’t have. Maybe I will return to it next year and write something a bit more detailed.

For now I would just like to say, I loved it for many reasons but what stood out the most is that Dickens comes across as a writer with a huge heart who can even  make many of his villains endearing.

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