Review: The Liar by Martin A. Hansen

The Liar [1950] – ★★★★1/2

You say the most important thing as indirectly as possible in your story, and that is how you truly capture the attention and interest of your reader. In this classic novel by Danish author Martin A. Hansen (1909-1955), our narrator is schoolmaster Johannes Vig (Lye) living on one very small Danish island of Sandø  – “a molehill in the sea”, and we all become “Nathanael”, an imaginary addressee of the schoolmaster’s sporadic diary-entries. While teasing and taunting his reader, Johannes details the natural beauty of the island and comments on its most illustrious inhabitants and their relationships. Local beauty Annemari wants to break off from her long-term beau Olaf, who is now away from the island. Olaf has been involved in a tragic boat incident some years previously, where one man died, and is apparently not the same anymore. Meanwhile one engineer Harry takes Olaf’s place in Annemari’s life, but the situation appears complex as Olaf’s return is imminent. As the novel so insidiously progresses, the question becomes: what is the place or role of our narrator, mysterious Johannes Vig, in all these happenings? Is his narrative reliable?, and if not, can we differentiate truth from fiction? While evoking the best of the epistolary literary tradition, notably George Bernanos’s The Diary of a Country Priest and Hjalmar Soderberg’s Doctor Glas, Hansen penned an existential novel about the gradual finding of meaning in the fleetness of life, and coming to terms with the passage of time in a remote place where time has stood still.

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Review: Antidote to Venom by Freeman Wills Crofts

Antidote to Venom [1938] – ★★★★

“…of the Good in you I can speak, but not of the Evil. For what is Evil but not Good tortured by its own hunger and thirst? When Good is hungry, it seeks food, even in dark caves, and when it thirsts, it drinks even of dead waters” (The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran).

There are few murder-mysteries out there that have truly unique settings, and since this Golden Age detective mystery is set in a zoo, it certainly appeals just on the basis of its intriguing set-up. Irish author Freeman Wills Crofts (1879-1957)’s story is about Birmington Zoo Director George Surridge, whose life starts to slowly unravel right under his nose: he and his wife grow increasingly indifferent towards each other, he has recently forced to fire one of his zoo guards for misconduct, and now he has to deal with the most astonishing mystery: the disappearance of a poisonous snake from his zoo. That’s not all: following the snake’s disappearance, a man is found dead – presumably, from that snake’s bite. But, nothing is as it seems. Inspector Joseph French starts investigating and comes up with the most ingenious solution that would explain a whole sequence of odd events in George Surridge’s life. Antidote to Venom is one thrilling mystery read from one of the most esteemed Golden Age crime authors.

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Hiroshige: Favourite Woodblock Prints

One Hundred Famous Views of Edo [1856-1858] is a popular, highly influential series of ukiyo-e prints of Edo (now Tokyo)’s environs produced by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858). They offer views of Edo’s landscapes, temples, bridges, tea-houses, busy streets and people, often during seasonal festivities. They showcased unique for that time perspectives and offered unexpected insights, such as the interplay between the concrete and the abstract, the eternal and the mundane. The prints are not only masterworks, but also now a vivid throwback to Japan’s historic past with its long-gone traditions. Below are 15 of my favourite prints from this magnificent collection.

Bamboo Quay by Kyōbashi Bridge
Plum Orchard in Kamada
Yatsumi Bridge

Bamboo Quay by Kyōbashi Bridge is one of Hiroshige’s nocturnal masterpieces in One Hundred Famous Views of Edo that shows the Kyōbashi river and its bridge being traversed by pilgrims. In the background, one can see drying bamboo rods of the bamboo quay. The painting probably influenced James McNeill Whistler in his artwork Nocturne in Blue & Gold: Old Battersea Bridge.

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10 Women Authors From Latin America To Read

Happy International Women’s Day! Today, 8th of March, the world celebrates women, as well as their contributions, so I thought I would focus on women authors, highlighting the achievements of women authors from Latin America in particular. The list below presents 10 female authors (in no particular order) from Latin America worth reading.

I. Maria Luisa Bombal

María Luisa Bombal (1910-1980) was born in Chile, and gained prominence in her late twenties with books The House of Mist (La última niebla) and The Shrouded Woman (La amortajada). She also later published collections of short stories. Much of her work is focused on surrealist and feminist themes, as well as emotions and longing. I consider Bombal one of the most underappreciated female authors. She was once championed by Jorge Luis Borges, and some claim her book The House of Mist influenced Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca (see also my review of her short story The Tree).

II. Clarice Lispector

“No it is not easy to write. It is as hard as breaking rocks. Sparks and splinters fly like shattered steel.” (Clarice Lispector)

Clarice Lispector (1920-1977) is definitely one of my favourite authors of all time. She was a writer from Brazil (born in Ukraine) with a penetrating writing style, and the ability to unravel the hidden and capture the unsaid. The Hour of the Star, Near to the Wild Heart and A Breath of Life are books of incredible originality, insight and nuance.

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Ogura Ryūson: View of Yushima

Scene at Yushima, View Over Rooftops of Houses by Moonlight
[1880-1890] by Ogura Ryūson

This is painting Scene at Yushima by 19th century Japanese artist Ogura Ryūson. I do not know exactly why, but I fell in love with it the moment I saw it. There is something eerie and mysterious about it, and this feeling has probably something to do with Ogura’s effective shadowing, and the fact that the two male figures standing on an elevation are presented with their backs to us, facing the Moon.

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10 Best Short Stories I Read in 2023

Last year was a great year of reading short stories for me, and below are ten best short stories I read in 2023. I have to confess that I never used to read short stories, preferring lengthy novels and huge tomes of “substance” over short stories, but all this changed a couple of years ago when I discovered some great gems in this genre and my enthusiasm for short fiction has since only deepened. In 2023, I was particularly impressed by stories of James Baldwin, Anton Chekhov and Edith Wharton.

I. Sonny’s Blues [1957] by James Baldwin – ★★★★★

Baldwin’s Go Tell It On The Mountain was one of the last year’s novel highlights for me, but I also found this story by the author equally compelling. It tells of two brothers: our unnamed narrator, a conservative teacher, and his younger brother – free-spirited musician Sonny. The setting is the 1950s Harlem, and the unnamed narrator has just discovered that Sonny was arrested on drug charges. It is incredible how much power, emotion and thought Baldwin could compress into one single short story. Sonny’s Blues is about taking a nostalgic look at one’s life choices, dealing with loss, regret and the inescapability of one’s home environment, and copying with life dreams slipping away daily. It is also about the healing, transcendental power of music. Sonny’s Blues is not only the best short story I read in 2023, but one of the best I have ever read.

II. The House with the Mezzanine [1896] by Anton Chekhov – ★★★★★

This evocative, immersive story tells of a travelling landscape painter who, while staying at a friend’s house, gets acquainted with two sisters living in a neighbouring estate (the house with the mezzanine). One sister, strict and practical Lydia, works as a teacher and is engaged in her community’s political affairs, while the younger one, Zhenya, spends her time reading and day-dreaming. Our artist’s disagreement with Lydia’s world-view has long-term consequences when he realises that he has fallen in love with Zhenya. There are many themes that can be glimpsed in Chekhov’s delicate story, and one of them is spiritual, lofty ambitions, views and dreams clashing with daily realities and practicalities.

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Shōtei Takahashi: Night & Winter Scenery

From the end of the last year I have been actively into Ukiyo-e (a genre of Japanese panting), and would like to share some of my recent discoveries. Shōtei (Hiroaki) Takahashi (1871-1945) is considered to be one of the most prominent artists of the Shin-hanga (new prints) movement, which flourished in the early 20th century Japan and aimed to revitalise the traditional 17-19th century ukiyo-e art. Shōtei was raised in an adoptive family and was once an apprentice to his uncle, Matsumoto Fuko, who taught him Japanese-style painting. As a young man, he also worked for the Imperial Household Department of Foreign Affairs, and later for the Okura Shoten and Maeba Shoten publishing, as well as for the well-known Shin-hanga publisher Shōzaburō Watanabe, where he produced original designs. Below are some of his paintings showcasing the mysteries and wonders of the night, and winter season.

Snow On Ayase River by Shōtei Takahashi
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Review: Dandelions by Yasunari Kawabata 

Dandelions [1964/2017] – ★★★★

“Dandelions cover the banks of Ikuta River. They are an expression of the town’s character – Ikuta is like springtime, when the dandelions bloom. Three hundred and ninety four of its thirty five thousand residents are over eighty years old…Only one thing seems out of place in this town: the madhouse” [Kawabata/Emmerich, Penguin Classics, 1964/72/2019: 3].

These lines begin Yasunari Kawabata’s novel which is about a young woman, Ineko Kizaki, who suffers from a strange, rare illness called somagnosia (fictitious) – the inability to see the body of another person. Ineko is in the Ikuta mental institution, and much of the novel is the conversation that Ineko’s mother and Ineko’s lover Kuno have on the way from the clinic after visiting Ineko. They both try to decipher the strange illness plaguing their loved one, but even the best Japanese doctors cannot help them, and the only conclusion reached is that maybe Ineko’s illness may somehow be connected with her seeing a traumatic event involving her father when she was young. Kawabata’s last book is gentle and restrained, but hides penetrating insights into the matters of the heart and mind for a reader willing to read between the lines.

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7 Best Books I Read in 2023

I would like to wish all my followers a very Happy New Year! ✨ – let the year 2024 bring only joy, happiness and the fulfilment of all your wishes! Below is my list of 7 best books I read in 2023 (the best books I tend to read happen to be classics, and I am excluding non-fiction, graphic novels and short story collections).

I. My Ántonia [1918]

by Willa Cather – ★★★★★

This touching coming-of-age story by Willa Cather (Death Comes for the Archbishop, A Lost Lady) centres on Jim Burden’s friendship with one immigrant girl, free-spirited Ántonia Shimerda in Nebraska. Cather’s elegant prose simply enchants, and Jim’s distinctive voice is unforgettable, with each chapter brimming with soulfulness as it tells of immigrants’ hardships and sacrifices made through the years. It is a deeply nostalgic look at a life passed, as well as a sweeping expose of rural life in the late 19th and early 20th century America.

II. Go Tell It On The Mountain [1953]

by James Baldwin – ★★★★★

James Baldwin’s debut is a staggering book that focuses largely on John Grimes, step-son of the minister at the Pentecostal church in Harlem. John tries to make sense of his upbringing, environment and above all – all the expectations placed on him by others. This is a multi-dimensional and at times multi-perspective novel which also reveals issues of sexuality, racism and attempts at fitting in while remaining true to oneself. Baldwin’s prose cuts like a knife and yet remains touchingly lyrical throughout as the story recounts the accumulated heartbreak.

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10 Novels By Contemporary Authors To Read If You Like Dickens

The novels of Charles Dickens are characterised by gripping plots, complex characters, and wondrous descriptions. But, what are some of the contemporary authors who also tried approaching their books in a Dickensian mode? Below are ten great books by contemporary authors who were either directly inspired by Dickens, imitating his plot structure or tone, or wrote their books having a truly Dickensian ambition.

The Luminaries [2013] by Eleanor Catton – In this highly ambitious, sophisticated, atmospheric and beautifully-written novel, Catton presents through an astrological chart mysterious events, including a disappearance and a possible murder, happening in Hokitika, New Zealand in the 19th century. Even Dickens himself never thought of doing something that eccentric with a book structure.

A Fine Balance [1995] by Rohinton Mistry – This book spins a powerful, heart-wrenching tale of four individuals whose lives intersect in the time of political and social upheaval in India in the 1970s. Recalling Dickens can feel almost an understatement to what Mistry really tried to achieve in this 600-page epic.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell [2004] by Susanna Clarke – “Dickens meets Harry Potter” is the best way to describe this ambitious alternative history fantasy that is about friendship between two very different magicians living in the 19th century England. Dickensian through and through, especially in its structure, characterisation, and language, it is probably the best fantasy novel I have ever read.

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A Trip to London’s Anthropological Museum 

I have recently visited the Horniman Museum & Gardens in Forest Hill, London. This is a museum established in 1901 and dedicated to anthropology and natural history. It is situated in a quiet, leafy area of London, and also boasts extensive gardens and an aquarium. Below are my highlights from this trip, with some excursions-snippets into topics and themes I found the most interesting.

  • The World Gallery section of the museum is probably the most jaw-dropping, presenting various cultures through different elaborate displays of artefacts. I was drawn to learning about the cultures of people living in the Himalayan mountains, Africa, and North and South America. For example, it was interesting for me to find out more about the Wai-wai and Tuareg people. The Wai-wai are indigenous people of Guyana and northern Brazil. They nurture their children to become “real human beings” by sharing food, time and love. For them, “a real human is someone balanced, calm and beautiful, and knowledgeable about the world”.
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Graphic Novels: Onward Towards Our Noble Death, & Trashed

Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths [1991] by Shigeru Mizuki – ★★★★1/2

The most astonishing and touching aspect of this graphic novel is that it is based on Shigeru Mizuki’s own experience of being a soldier in the Imperial Japanese Army during the World War II, an event that affected him deeply, haunting him incessantly throughout his life and influencing his pacifist views.

Papua Guinea (New Britain), 1943. One unit of the Japanese Imperial Army finds itself cornered by the enemy, rapidly succumbing to starvation, dengue fever and hopelessness. On top of it all, the soldiers receive beatings and bullying from their superiors, and their brutal disciplinary regime is informed by one misguided chain of command and the army’s inflexible hierarchy. “New recruits are like tatami mats, the more you beat them, the better they are” – seems to be army commander’s credo. We see the perspective of one rookie soldier who is thrown in at the deep end into the new environment, and is forced to adapt quickly to the most absurdist directions from his superiors regarding the war, including orders to perform “noble suicides”. This tale of one doomed regiment is very simply drawn, including the characters, but most of the backgrounds are very detailed, perhaps further underlying the Japanese militarism’s idea of the inconsequential nature of individual lives, especially vis-à-vis the Emperor and the sense of “honour”.

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Review: Lies and Sorcery by Elsa Morante

Lies and Sorcery [1948/2023] – ★★★★

“Look in my face; my name is Might-have been;/I am also call’d No-more, Too-late, Farewell;/Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell/Cast up thy Life’s foam-fretted feet between;/…“The House of Life: A Superscription by Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

The first lines of this famous poem by Dante Gabriel Rossetti may be best in capturing the rich and sensuous spirit of Elsa Morante’s debut – novel Lies & Sorcery, first published in Italian in 1948. It is a highly ambitious coming-of-age/multi-generational family saga at the core of which are such themes as love and abandonment, romantic longing and self-deception, parental attachment that verges on obsessive devotion and the ultimate disillusionment. The main, larger-than-life characters are shy Anna, capricious Edoardo, downtrodden Francesco and voluptuous Rosaria, while Anna’s parents Cesira and Teodoro also figure in this story. The narrative is from Anna’s daughter Elisa, who, in her confessional tone, weaves a story-tapestry on which her relatives are forced to repeat the same mistakes from one generation to the next due to their inability to learn, adapt and make peace with the past. The result is ambitions gone astray, opportunities squandered, and life and love being constantly replaced by unreachable dreams, illusions and elaborate fantasies.

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Review: The Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel by Boris & Arkady Strugatsky

The Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel [1970] – ★★★★

Boris and Arkady Strugatsky were brothers known for their philosophical sci-fi (Roadside Picnic, Hard to be a God, Noon, etc.), some of which were also later adapted into well-known films, but The Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel can be said to be a rather unusual entry in their bibliography. It is a “locked-room” detective mystery and reads like one – we see Inspector Glebsky arriving into one small hotel in a secluded European valley at the peak of the winter season, and, there, encountering a rather unusual group of residents: a magician, a rich and eccentric businessman, and a self-proclaimed famous physicist, among others. Strange things start to happen in this hotel, and Inspector Glebsky is soon forced to abandon his holiday plans to begin his investigation into a crime which no guest residing in the hotel could have possibly committed. A wintery read through and through, The Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel is a page-turner of a novel that rethinks traditional detective tropes as it provides entertainment full of intrigues.

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Schubert: Der Erlkönig

I would like to wish all my followers a very Happy Halloween! 🎃 and what Halloween is without a scary ghost story? Der Erlkönig (The Erl-King) is a 1782 spooky poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, which was set to music by Franz Schubert in 1815. The story has roots in a Scandinavian folktale, and below is its soundtrack taken from “Schubert Year by Year” (Stone Records), with the film created by Jeremy Hamway-Bidgood.

October 2023 Wrap-Up: From The Murder to The Blind

The Murder [1895] by Anton Chekhov – ★★★★1/2

This short atmospheric story by Anton Chekhov tells of the relationship between two brothers torn by suspicions about money, pride and religious fanaticism. Matvey is an ex-factory worker who struggles with his health and is forced to live at the inn run by his brother, merchant Yakov and his family. In the midst of one snowy winter, the family feels particularly claustrophobic in their house, and in no time Yakov and Matvey’s discord comes to its climax. This is a vivid tale of the price of faith, and a thorny path to it, a story of the ultimate crime and the ultimate punishment.

Alien Hearts [1890] by Guy de Maupassant – ★★★★

Guy de Maupassant’s last novel is “a delicate study of falling in love, enjoying its bliss and then being tortured by love’s poisonous darts. Subtle in its contours, but bold in its themes, this tale of being at cross-purposes with one’s beloved must be one of Maupassant’s finest literary achievement.” – see full review.

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Review: Alien Hearts by Guy de Maupassant

Alien Hearts [1890] – ★★★★

Known primarily for his short stories, French author Guy de Maupassant (1850 – 1893) nonetheless wrote some novels, and Alien Hearts (Notre Coeur) became his last. This is one unexpectedly riveting foray into matters of the heart, centring on two people – “talented and astute, but lazy” André Mariolle and beautiful and charming, but proud Madame de Burne – who become romantically involved. Since both are intelligent, witty, rich and free, the question is: what can possibly go wrong when these two start their union? It turns out – much, since people do not exist in a vacuum, and love without self-interest and vanity is rare, apparently and at least in the highest echelons of the Parisian society frequented by Mariolle and de Burne. Maupassant’s short novel is a delicate study of falling in love, enjoying its bliss and then being tortured by love’s poisonous darts. Subtle in its contours, but bold in its themes, this tale of being at cross-purposes with one’s beloved must be one of Maupassant’s finest literary achievement.

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The Legend of the Baker of Eeklo

Halloween is the perfect time to explore world art that disturbs and horrifies. Bosch, Caravaggio, Goya, and Beksiński are some of the artists known for their eerie and disturbing creative visions, which at times fall into the “memento mori” and “vanitas” art categories. In the similar vein, below is one of the surviving copies of a lost painting titled The Legend of the Baker of Eeklo by Flemish artists Jan van Wechelen (c. 1530 – 1570) and Cornelis van Dalem (1535 – 1573).

The Legend of the Baker of Eeklo (c. 1570-80) after Jan van Wechelen and Cornelis van Dalem
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10 Eye-Opening Books About the Death Penalty

Today, 10th October 2023, is the 21st World Day Against the Death Penalty, and it is thus a perfect opportunity to talk about some insightful books that shed light on the death penalty, its usage, history and justification (some 53 countries in the world still retain capital punishment). Below are 10 books, both fiction and non-fiction, that open one’s eyes to the issue and the debate, including from historical, socio-economic, moral, psychological and personal perspectives.

I. The Enchanted [2014] by Rene Denfeld

This is a staggering, hard-hitting debut about a death row inmate who tries to cope with his inhumane, claustrophobic prison conditions, authority corruption and his predicament by imagining fantastical things. He sits and observes, seeing hope and love flourishing in the most unlikely of places. Denfeld’s economical prose leaves a powerful impression, and the book brims with purpose and conviction. This is an engaging story that sheds light on the state of the death row and the human condition characterised by longing for redemption. A criminal never exists in a vacuum, removed from all the past, upbringing, and socio-economic and psychological conditions, and, yet, the criminal justice always treats them as though they were. This controversial book is described as “dark”, and it is, but there is also a strange burning light somewhere there too. It is worth reading this novel just to find and savour it.

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Review: The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier

The House on the Strand [1969] – ★★★★

“If  you get bitten by the past…whether you’re historian, or an archaeologist, or even a surveyor, it’s like a fever in the blood; you never rest until you’ve solved the problem before you” [du Maurier, Victor Gollancz/Virago, 1969: 229].

The House on the Strand is a time-travel novel, but because at the helm is none other than author Daphne du Maurier, it is far from being one’s usual, run-of-the-mill sci-fi fantasy. The premise is intriguing: Dick Young is a forty-something married man working in publishing who decides to spend his holidays at the house of his friend, Professor of Biophysics Magnus Lane. The house, Kilmarth, is in beautiful Cornwall, overlooking the sea, and Dick is awaiting the arrival of his wife Vita and his two stepsons from the US. Meanwhile, Magnus asks Dick to ingest his most recent research discovery: a potion that apparently transports a person to…the past. Dick should be thinking about his family, his new career option and his holiday, but instead, taking this drug, he becomes addicted to a different reality opening to him, to past events that happened in Cornwall in the 14th century and that involve political intrigues, adultery and a possible murder. But how safe is this potion drug that Dick is taking? And what could be the consequences of stepping into another world and gaining its secret knowledge?

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Mini-Reviews: Bernhard’s Woodcutters, & Coetzee’s Life & Times of Michael K

Woodcutters [1984] by Thomas Bernhard – ★★★★

In this unusual, but pretty much in line with Bernhard’s style, story, our narrator does not know how exactly he ended up where he is now – in a wing chair at the apartment of one aristocratic married couple, the Auersbergers. The last time he was there, some thirty years previously, he was still in love with everything that the Auersbergers represented, everything artistic. Now, however, some thirty years on, he again finds himself in their house as their “old friend”, but now despises everything about his hosts. The reason he is there in the first place is that he stumbled upon the rich couple on the street, and the death of their mutual friend Joana, brought them all to the same funeral. Now that he accepted their dinner invitation and sits in his comfy wing chair, his mind goes back to the past, as he tries to recall where he met the Auersbergers and Joana, a country girl, who once aspired to be an actress or a ballerina, but whose only claim to fame was her eventual marriage to celebrated tapestry weaver Fritz, who then left her.

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Nobel Laureates for Literature: My Stats & Preferences

To follow up from my post on the Booker & Pulitzer Fiction Prize winners, I have decided to do a similar discussion post, but this time focusing on the Nobel Laureates for Literature, providing below my stats and winner preferences (I read roughly 42 Nobel winners out of some 119). The Nobel Committee has at times been accused of being political in its nominations and awards, and it is also important to bear in mind that such renowned authors as Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, James Joyce, Marcel Proust and Vladimir Nabokov never, as preposterously as it may sound, actually won this prize. Nevertheless, I applaud the recent trend to recognise the achievements of women in literature (as Olga Tokarczuk and Annie Ernaux were awarded the prize in 2018 and 2022 respectively).

Nobel laureates:

who are my FAVORITE authors:

Thomas Mann, 1929:

“principally for his great novel, Buddenbrooks, which has won steadily increased recognition as one of the classic works of contemporary literature”.

José Saramago, 1997:

“who with parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony continually enables us once again to apprehend an elusory reality“.

Orhan Pamuk, 2006:

“who in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures”.

Albert Camus, 1957:

“for his important literary production, which with clear-sighted earnestness illuminates the problems of the human conscience in our times“.

Kenzaburō Ōe, 1994:

“who with poetic force creates an imagined world, where life and myth condense to form a disconcerting picture of the human predicament today“.

Albert Camus
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Sinéad O’Connor (1966 – 2023)

It is with great sadness that I write that Irish singer Sinéad O’Connor has passed away. Supremely talented with a divine voice, Sinéad achieved fame in the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially with her album I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got (1990), and song Nothing Compares 2 U, but she was also a passionate advocate for a variety of causes, speaking out against child abuse, racism (for example, see her performing her own song Black Boys On Mopeds), and in support of human and women’s rights. In her singing career, she always remained honest to herself and her beliefs first, touching millions with her determination and conviction to draw attention to important causes. Below is Irish ballad song Foggy Dew about the Easter Rising of 1916, which Sinéad sang for The Chieftains’ album (film depicted – Loach’s The Wind that Shakes the Barley). A beautiful, brave soul, RIP.

Shin Kyung-Sook’s “Violets”: Both Tender & Unflinching

Violets [2001/22] – ★★★★

There is a Chinese proverb that states “a child’s life is like a piece of paper on which every person leaves a mark”. Acclaimed South Korean author Shin Kyung-Sook may agree with this statement, seeing that her sixth novel titled Violets (2001), translated from the Korean by Anton Hur in 2022, is all about a girl who is determined to overcome her traumatic childhood experiences while trying to find her calling in the buzzing capital of the country – Seoul. San is first introduced to us as a little girl born into a poverty-stricken family with one wayward father and not-so-very-responsible mother, and San’s only ray of sunshine seems to be another girl her age named Namae. It is the 1970s, and the two girls spend their time together, bonding over their respective families’ poverty and inadequacies, until one incident puts an unbridgeable distance between the girls. Then, we follow San, who is already aged twenty-two, as she seeks a job in Seoul, presumably in the 1980s, and, after unsuccessful applications to various publishing houses, lands the job of a flower seller.

It is in this, at first unenviable, position of a “flower girl” that shy San starts discovering things about herself and others, first making a connection with the mute shop-keeper and then friends with strong-willed and bold co-worker Su-ae. However, what was planted in childhood is bound to shoot up in adolescence and adulthood. San may be attempting to find fulfilment in her new job and friendship with Su-ae, but her painful past, her persistent isolation and her growing inward despair, may just get the better of her. San’s uncertain condition and need for attachment culminate in her obsessive love for one magazine photographer and then in further trauma as her search for comfort and understanding leads to some thoughtless and erratic actions. Shin’s tender, dream-like narrative puts our heroine in juxtaposition to the elements of her brash immediate environment, including the misogynistic attitude towards women, the competitive job market of the 1980s’ Seoul and the lonely disillusionment of “big city” dreams. The message is clear – San represents those ordinary, anonymous women in society, whose pitiful circumstances and trauma were systematically shut down and ignored[1]. The novel in our hands ensures that their voices are heard and remembered.

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La Fête Nationale Française: Tribute to French Chanson

A version of La Marseillaise (the national anthem of France) by Georges Thill

Today, 14 July, is la Fête Nationale or Bastille Day in France, and, thus, a perfect time celebrate French culture. I thought I would do something different and have decided to pay tribute to the “French chanson” or popular French songs, and apart from those singers presented below, other notable “usual suspects” in this category are Yves Montand, Charles Aznavour, Serge Gainsbourg, Joe Dassin and Marc Lavoine.

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Mini-Reviews: Steinbeck’s To a God Unknown, & Ariyoshi’s The Twilight Years

To a God Unknown [1933] by John Steinbeck – ★★★1/2

John Steinbeck’s third novel follows Joseph Wayne, who leaves his family in Vermont and makes for sunny California in hope of obtaining cheap land there. Taken by the “pioneer fever”, he desires nothing more than some acres of land to call his own, and soon, his three brothers back home, animal-loving Thomas, religious Burton and wayward Benjamin follow suit, establishing a big inter-connected farm in their new place – the valley of Nuestra Señora. Wayne makes friends with Mexican Juanito, who helps him build his house, and even woos local school-teacher Elisabeth McGreggor. The combination of Joseph’s obsessive veneration of one large tree (a symbol of promise and renewal), problems with his alcoholic brother Benjamin and then fears about some uncharacteristic weather conditions slowly sets the scene for tragedies to come.

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10 Great Coming-of-Age Novels

I think that summer is the perfect time to read coming-of-age novels (my past summers on this blog were all about such books as The Interestings, Golden Child, Fruit of the Drunken Tree, and Arturo’s Island), and below is my personal list of ten great coming-of-age novels (a Bildungsroman). Summer is usually linked to childhood and growing up (at least in my mind): the sense of freedom after school is over, grass picnics and summer camps. Charles Dickens (David Copperfield), Mark Twain (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer), J. D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye), and Louisa May Alcott (Little Women) are just a few of the authors I used to read who all wrote about the pains of growing up and finding oneself in the world, capturing that curious transition between the magical world of childhood and the “harsh” world of adults, that is full of responsibilities. The list below includes my other old favourites and more-or-less-recently-discovered modern classics.

I. The Little Friend [2002]

by Donna Tartt

The focus of this evocative novel by Donna Tartt is twelve-year-old Harriet Dufresnes living in Mississippi who becomes obsessed with tracking down the murderer of her brother Robin twelve years prior. Her passion for justice leads her on the progressively dangerous journey of confronting the town’s criminals and the people she believes are responsible for her brother’s death. Tartt fuses the southern mystery with the wonder and investigative adventures of childhood tainted by trauma and thrown in at the deep end.

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Review: The Toilers of the Sea by Victor Hugo

The Toilers of the Sea [1866] – ★★★★1/2

A novel of quiet, unassuming and yet extraordinary beauty, as well as a moving tribute to the sea and its people.

“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,/ There is a rapture on the lonely shore,/ There is society where none intrudes,/By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:/I love not Man the less, but Nature more…” (Lord Byron). Reading this almost forgotten novel by Victor Hugo reminded me of this verse by Lord Byron which celebrates the nature’s hold on man like no human society can match. In The Toilers of the Sea, Victor Hugo pays a beautiful tribute to the Channel Islands archipelago, where he spent some 15 years in exile. His story is set in Guernsey, the second largest island of the archipelago, and, there, a small, rather superstitious community prides itself on having businessman Mess Lethierry, a pillar of the society, his beautiful niece Déruchette and Lethierry’s steamship Durande. When one skilful, but disliked seaman Gilliatt falls in love with Déruchette, his love seems hopeless, but when ship Durande suffers an unprecedented trouble in waters, Gilliatt may finally have a glimmer of hope in winning Déruchette’s hand. This tale of a shipwreck and betrayals is Victor Hugo’s less dynamic novel, but where it lacks in narrative vigour, it certainly makes up for in awe-inspiring nature descriptions and memorable characters, instilling a sense of wonder for the Channel Islands and its inhabitants.

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The Croatian Freethinker

On the Edge of Reason re-issue is newly out from New Directions

What classic story first comes to your mind when you think of a satire on the hypocrisy of the bourgeoisie or ruling majority? George Orwell’s Animal Farm? J. B. Priestley’s An Inspector Calls? Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People? Charles Dickens’s Little Dorrit? Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth? French literature has a long tradition of such stories, so, perhaps, some story by Molière, Honoré de Balzac, Émile Zola, or Guy de Maupassant? The choice is numerous, but, whatever it is, chances are it would not be Miroslav Krleža’s novel On the Edge of Reason (1938). And, yet – it should be. This novel by one of the greatest Croatian writers of the twentieth century should be on everyone’s lips when evoking stories about the challenge to that prevailing social order that curbs individual freedoms and rights, leading to injustice.

Prolific and versatile author Miroslav Krleža (1893 – 1981), who wrote novels, essays, poems, plays and short stories, was aptly placed to tackle the theme. His stark criticism of the ruling elite’s egoism, greed and the perpetration of social injustice in his fiction is the reflection of his country’s turbulent political history and his own innate desire to challenge the status quo. While being an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army, Krleža once unsuccessfully deflected to the Serbian Army, and his embittered experience as a soldier on the frontlines during the World War I culminated in his powerful anti-war writings, including a short story collection titled Croatian God Mars (1922). After the World War I, Krleža emerged as a talented writer promoting socialism, and because of his leftist views, his books, publications and left-wing magazine Plamen had been banned in the inter-war period. In 1939, Krleža was expelled from the country’s Communist Party as his opinions on art contrasted with the social realist principles, and this further cemented his independent, “anti-establishment” public image.

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10 Great Novels About Misunderstood Intellectuals or Misfits

Some of the world’s most powerful stories concern a scenario whereby a single, often eccentric, lonely or misunderstood, individual is pinned against a society that is often too uncaring, rigid or self-interested to accommodate or acknowledge their unique spirit, character or life outlook. These fictional characters often find themselves at sea with numerous societal expectations, rules or people around them, striving for understanding and meaning, while also perhaps battling prejudice. The list below comprises novels, both contemporary and classic, about such characters who are all trying to understand how they fit into this thing called Life, and why their outlook or personality appears so different from that of others. The surprising conclusion from the list below is that many of these stories are semi-autobiographical, dictated by the authors’ own real-life experiences.

Pnin (1957) by Vladimir Nabokov

One eccentric émigré professor finds himself increasingly out of depth in his own classroom and his new country of residence – this is the premise of Vladimir Nabokov’s witty novella, which he wrote relying on his own experience of teaching Russian literature at Cornell University in the 1950s. In an episodic fashion, the story presents the character of Professor Timofey Pavlovich Pnin in various situations as he tries to navigate the academic life of one university in the United States – Waindell College (a fictitious establishment). Professor Pnin confronts a language barrier, culture clash, and painful memories from his past as he tries to make sense of the increasingly-confusing-to-him life around him. Pnin might not have achieved its mainstream popularity the way Nabokov’s novel Lolita (1957) had, but it is still as sharp-witted and as brilliantly told. Nabokov’s observational powers in fiction were second to one, and they are on full display here, in this bitter-sweet story about trying to fit into a new environment.

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Kakuzō Okakura: The Book of Tea

Kakuzō Okakura (1863 – 1913) was a Japanese scholar and art critic who defended core Japanese ideals, traditions and customs in the era of Meiji Restoration Reform. His major written work titled The Book of Tea [1906] distils the meaning and finer elements of the Japanese tea ceremony (“…the whole ideal of Teaism is a result of the Zen conception of greatness in the smallest incidents of life…”), but the book is not only about the tea ritual, and there are many insights offered in the book on life and death, Zen Buddhism, art, aesthetics, drama, and architecture, among other topics. Below are just a few quotes from this thought-provoking essay-book.

On the nature of art:

“In religion the Future is behind us. In art the Present is the eternal...”

“...art is of value only to the extent that it speaks to us. It might be a universal language if we ourselves were universal in our sympathies. Our finite nature, the power of tradition and conventionality, as well as our hereditary instincts, restrict the scope of our capacity for artistic enjoyment. Our very individuality establishes in one sense a limit to our understanding, and our aesthetic personality seeks its own affinities in the creations of the past. It is true that with cultivation our sense of art appreciation broadens, and we become able to enjoy many hitherto unrecognised expressions of beauty. But, after all, we see only our image in the universe, – our particular idiosyncrasies dictate the mode of our perception. The tea masters collected only objects which fell strictly within the measure of their individual appreciation“.

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Review: Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee

Waiting for the Barbarians [1980] – ★★★★

What does J. M. Coetzee’s third book Waiting for the Barbarians have in common with Dino Buzzati’s novel The Tartar Steppe (1940)? Arguably, much more than their shared source of inspiration – C.P. Cavafy’s poem titled Waiting for the Barbarians (1904), whose first two lines go like this: “What is it that we are waiting for, gathered in the square?/The Barbarians are supposed to arrive today.” The ironic poem tells of the idleness and passivity of authorities who wait for the realisation of their grandiose expectations – the coming of the Barbarians. While Buzzati’s book primarily focuses on the self-imposed inertia and what it may mean to an individual spirit, similar to Mann’s novel The Magic Mountain, Coetzee book emphasises the ignorance of a blood-thirsty, ruthless power out of touch with reality and the way of life of its own people, but adamant to prove itself in the face of any, however slight and imaginary, hint of an external threat.

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The Booker & Pulitzer Fiction Prize Winners: My Stats, Likes & Dislikes

This month two books were awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction – Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead and Hernan Diaz’s Trust. This got me thinking about this award and the book awards in general. Though I do not actively follow the Booker or Pulitzer awards, I have decided to find out how many books I read that won these prestigious prizes and what I thought about them. My results below (two separate columns for each award) show that I have only read a tiny fraction of the actual winners (14 Pulitzer for Fiction and 13 Booker prize winners), but from these I did enjoy and agree on the merits of many. The Booker Prize is awarded for “the best sustained work of fiction written in English and published in the UK and Ireland“, and I guess from the winners, that the (unusual) plot structure and the beauty of language are quite important with regards to this prize. The Pulitzer Prize is awarded for “for distinguished fiction published during the year by an American author, preferably dealing with American life“, so possibly, the power of the message/theme would be as important as the writing.

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Top 10 History Non-Fiction I Read

From all non-fiction out there, I often find history non-fiction the most interesting and, actually, the best written (historians can write!). This is a list of ten history non-fiction books that I wholly recommend, and, yes, my list does gravitate towards medieval history and the history of medicine. I am also excluding autobiographical memoirs, and this list is in no particular order.

I. History of Madness [1961/2009] by Michel Foucault 

“Men are so necessarily mad, that not being mad would constitute another form of madness” (Blaise Pascal). I have read a number of books on the history of psychiatry, but this one is still the one. It is an ambitious, monumental work of eminent French philosopher Michel Foucault (1926 – 1984), and in it, he examines the changing meaning, perception and treatment of “madness” through the centuries, commenting on many cultural, societal, scientific and political transformations.

II. Killers of the Flower Moon [2017] by David Grann

This entry cannot be more timely – Martin Scorsese’s film based on this book is currently debuting at the Cannes Film Festival 2023. This is the story of the brutal murders of the Osage people in Oklahoma in the 1920s after oil deposits were found on their land. Corruption and deception are rife, but can an independent police force untangle the web of deception and cover-ups, and ensure justice? This is an entrancing read that will haunt you for days. My first book by David Grann was The Lost City of Z [2009], which I also highly recommend.

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Review: Medicine & Society in Later Medieval England by Carole Rawcliffe

Medicine & Society in Later Medieval England [1995] – ★★★★

“Magic was…an integral component of medieval medicine”, tells us historian Carole Rawcliffe in this book on the state of medicine in later medieval England. And, not only magic. Religion, astrology and even art were all tied up in the practice of medicine in the Middle Ages, and this non-fiction sheds much light on how the medieval society in England viewed illness, and its diagnosis and treatment. What was the difference between the medieval professions of physician, surgeon, apothecary and barber? Why the state of medicine in England at that time lagged behind other European countries? What was the general attitude towards women connected to the practice of medicine? And, what methods were used when no proper methods of anaesthesia and sanitation were yet available to the medical personnel? Relying much on the contemporary accounts, Rawcliffe proves to be an expert guide on these questions and many more, and her book is a scholarly, but also highly readable, journey into England’s medieval past.

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10 Books of Summer

Cathy at 746 Books is hosting the 20 Books of Summer challenge yet again, and since I have seen this challenge around, but never participated before, I have decided to give it a go. The challenge involves reading and reviewing a certain amount of books from 1 June to 1 September 2023, and there are options go for 15 or even 10 books (instead of 20). Since this is my first time participating, I am going for the modest goal of 10 books, and below is my provisional, fiction-only, list of selected-for-this-challenge books.

I. The Other by Thomas Tryon

II. Trust by Hernan Diaz

III. Fraud by Anita Brookner

IV. The Golovlyov Family by Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin

V. Foster by Claire Keegan (may swap)

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The Fountain of Youth: Dream of Eternal Life

People have always been preoccupied with the question of how to live longer, retain their youthful looks for the longest possible time and reverse time that always marches forward. The idea that there could be a place in the world that would miraculously enable people to stop, reverse time and have their youth back might have been very appealing. Thus, similar to the legends surrounding the Elixir of Life and the Philosopher’s Stone, the Fountain of Youth is said to be a spring that restores youth to people who either bath in it or drink from it. Alexander the Great allegedly searched for it, and some waters’ cleansing and healing properties must have contributed much to the myth’s enduring popularity. Naturally, therefore, the idea also stirred many artists’ imagination, and below are four depictions of the Fountain of Youth that idealises the image of the mythical place that can grant the impossible.

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Review: The Films of Michael Powell & The Archers by Scott Salwolke

The Films of Michael Powell and The Archers [1997] – ★★★1/2

A good, introductory book on The Archers’ craft, and how the times in which the directors worked impacted their cinematic masterworks.

“In my films, images are everything” (Michael Powell).

The Red Shoes (1948), The Life & Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), Black Narcissus (1947), A Matter of Life & Death (1946) – these are some of the greatest films ever produced, but how did one unlikely duo of British film-makers, Michael Powell (1905-1990) and Emeric Pressburger (1902-1988), better known as The Archers, manage to achieve such level of cinematic mastery, while also working in a tricky political and economic situation, and more amazingly, without the support from Hollywood? In his bibliographical non-fiction, Scott Salwolke may not be unveiling all the keys to the mysteries of The Archers’ craft, but he certainly provides a fascinating historical background to many of their cinematic masterworks, focusing on the film-makers’ influencers and revealing how their films emerged to be so different from those of their contemporaries.

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Review: An Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter by César Aira

An Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter [2000/06] – ★★★★

A curious novella which is part travelogue, part biography, part historical fiction, part meditation on art, and part tribute to the beauty of Argentinian landscape.

What a landscape artist would be capable of doing for the love of art? Can they be capable of risking their life? What is human life in comparison to the eternity which is art?, they may ask. In today’s world of extravagant selfies, some taken in exotic locations and maybe even under relatively dangerous conditions, this short novella by Argentinian fiction writer César Aira may even feel ironically relevant again. Aira takes the real story of German landscape artist Johann Moritz Rugendas (1802 – 1858) and re-imagines one of the episodes from his life when Rugendas travelled as a documentary painter across tropical jungles and mountainous scenery of South America. César Aira’s 90 page-book surprises with its simplicity, humour and insights into the craft of an artist.

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7 Short Stories with a Twist Ending

We usually want our stories to be impressive and memorable, and, given this, there is nothing like a story with a twist ending. Below are 7 short stories with unexpected or “twist” endings where the author may seem to lead their readers in one direction, only for them to realise later that they have ended up in a completely different place.

I. The Lottery [1948] by Shirley Jackson

In this story, a local community holds an annual “lottery” procedure whereby its residents draw pieces of paper from a black box. There is only one “winning” ticket amidst more than three hundred. Jackson maintains the uncertainty and suspense well, and her readers will not even realise what they are in for until it is too late.

II. The Last Leaf [1907] by O. Henry

O. Henry was not only the master of short stories, but also of surprising endings. The Last Leaf is one of his stories with the most unexpected of endings that tells of artists Sue and Johnsy and their friendship with neighbour Behrman. The twist ending is as unexpected as it is deeply moving.

III. The Story of an Hour [1894] by Kate Chopin

In this short tale, a woman receives sad news that her husband is killed in a railroad accident. However, very soon, the woman’s reaction to the news takes an unexpected turn, with the story culminating in one twist ending. Chopin weaved an evocative, progressively disturbing tale that is also less than some eighteen small paragraphs’ long.

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Philip Evergood: Fat of the Land

“Pharaoh said to Joseph, ‘Tell your brothers, ‘Do as follows: Load your animals and return to the land of Canaan. Then bring your father and your families and return to me. I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat from the fat of the land” (The Book of Genesis, Ch. 45 (verses 17-18)).

In this 1940 painting, whose title Fat of the Land is taken the Book of Genesis, we are shown the dividing line (road) that separates two farms or very different lives in America. On the one hand and to the right, we see green pastures, electric power lines and big comfortable houses, and on the other and to our left, we see a different human life, characterised by want and poverty, with broken houses and barren land. The two lives are so near each other that they seem to be the closest of neighbours, and yet, one probably chooses to completely ignore the other. Despite the seemingly joyous colour palette, the painting still manages to unsettle as we start paying attention to the art’s details: the orderly line of trees and the cattle feeding on one side of the painting are contrasted with the disorder and the family of four thin African-American individuals standing helpless on the other side of the divide. The two neighbours share their common humanity and the same blue skies over their heads, but their life experience is very different. Separated by the “colour”/ status line, that could not have been more pronounced, one side can do nothing but stare blankly as the other one “devours” the promised-to-newcomers “fat of the land”.

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Top 20 Novels From Women Authors I Reviewed

It is the International Women’s Day today (8th March), and I am celebrating this event by showcasing an incredible talent of female authors. I am listing 20 fiction books from 20 amazing women that received top marks on my website. This list is in no particular order and, thus, I am not numbering it.

Edith Wharton – The House of Mirth

Olga Tokarczuk – Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

Eileen Chang – Half a Lifelong Romance

Patricia Highsmith – Edith’s Diary

Anita Brookner – Hotel du Lac

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Manga: Opus, The Strange Tale of Panorama Island, & The Solitary Gourmet

I. Opus [1995/96] by Satoshi Kon – ★★★★

I am a huge admirer of Japanese director Satoshi Kon (1963-2010). In his animations Perfect Blue [1997], Millennium Actress [2001] and Paprika [2006], he created worlds that fuse reality and fantasy, playing with such concepts as memory, identity and perception. Opus is his manga work that was released before his first animated debut, and it also mixes up reality and make-believe to a curious effect. In this story, Chikara Nagai is a manga artist who is creating a manga series titled Resonance. One of his characters is special agent Satoko who has telepathic powers and who is set to bring down the leader of a mysterious cult known only as the Masque, who, in turn, has a goal to “brainwash” the Earth’s population. Nagai draws the ending to his manga instalment, but then realises that one of his characters does not want to submit to his sad fate, as Nagai’s real-life and fantasy worlds collide. This is a tale of a creator who “lives and breathes” his work, and, in consequence, is becoming lost in his own creation (similar to A-ha’s music video Take on Me), but the focus is also the characters, who all start to experience an existential crisis.

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Remembering Lucio Dalla: Caruso (1986)

Lucio Dalla (4 March 1943 – 1 March 2012) was an Italian singer-songwriter, musician and actor. He debuted at the Cantagiro music festival in 1965, and released over 40 albums in his lifetime. His song Caruso (1986) was dedicated to Italian opera tenor Enrico Caruso, and echoes some of the events in Caruso’s life, including his success in America and his death in Naples. It tells of a man (a romanticised version of Caruso) who meets a young woman just before his death and falls in love with her. In the song, he is declaring his love for her, looking into her eyes, while knowing his end is near. The version below is sung by the great Luciano Pavarotti.

February 2023 Wrap-Up: From The Facemaker to The Trees

The Facemaker [2022] by Lindsey Fitzharris – ★★★★★

In this non-fiction, Lindsey Fitzharris (The Butchering Art [2017]) spotlights the achievements made by New Zealand-born, Cambridge-educated and golf-loving surgeon Harold Gillies (1882- 1960), who was one of the prominent contributors to the advances made in plastic maxillofacial surgery during the World War I. Facial disfigurement, the “rudest blow that war can deal”, often causes “loss of identity”, psychological damage, and social exclusion, and Gillies was one of the pioneers of reconstructive facial surgery who recognised the transformative, multi-disciplinary nature of this field, as well as the need for slow, step-by-step procedures to achieve successful results. Fitzharris writes with much passion and clarity, thrusting her reader into the midst of all the events, while providing an overview of the state of medicine at that time. Non-fiction has never felt as engaging or as exciting to read, and we are provided with many first-hand accounts, as well as with fascinating details regarding the brutalities of the battle-field and the stoic life on hospital wards. The overall result is one eye-opening and moving book about an important topic that deserved more attention, and one unsung hero in need of greater recognition.

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The Feast of Belshazzar: 5 Paintings

The paintings below tell a story from the Book of Daniel, Old Testament that concerns the Feast of Belshazzar. The topic is the final evening of the Babylon empire. Rather than preparing for war with threatening Persians, who are probably already gathering outside the city of Babylon, Belshazzar, referred to as the “son” of King Nebuchadnezzar, is seen spending his time at a feast – his crowning celebration. Belshazzar did not seem to learn the lesson of humility from King Nebuchadnezzar, and failed to honour God. So, during this merry time, an inscription “by the hand of God” appears on the wall. No one from Belshazzar’s entourage is able to decipher it, until prophet Daniel is send for and is able to decipher. The mysterious inscription reads:”mene, mene, tekel, upharsin“, which is interpreted by Daniel to mean: “God has numbered the days of your kingdom and brought it to an end. You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting. Your kingdom is given to the Medes and Persians.”

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“Plant Horror”: 3 Classic Short Stories about “Monster” Orchids

“There are such queer things about orchids…such possibilities of surprises” (H. G. Wells).

There is something about plant horror that stirs imagination like few other things, and evidence of this is the success of such astonishingly-premised books and films as The Day of the Triffids [1951], Invasion of the Body Snatchers [1956] and Annihilation [2014]. Orchids, in particular, have gathered quite a dark reputation over the decades, and academics like to link this reputation to orchids symbolising (the dark sides of) female sexuality. Also, just as there once was “tulipomania” in Holland in the 17th century, there was also once “orchidmania” in the 19th century, with the orchid becoming an obsession among botanists and travellers alike. Naturally, the more exotic the orchid was, the more it was sought after.

Below are three classic short stories that focus on “monster” orchids, and the interesting thing is that each of the stories below are connected through the “chain of inspiration”: Arthur C. Clarke’s story was inspired by H. G. Wells’s one, and Clarke and Collier’s stories provided inspiration for the horror-comedy films Little Shop of Horrors [1960] and [1986]. Two other books on a similar topic on my TBR list are Plants in Science Fiction: Speculative Vegetation by Katherine E. Bishop (ed.), and Plants That Kill: A Natural History of the World’s Most Poisonous Plants by Elisabeth A. Dauncey.

Orchids and Hummingbird by Martin Johnson Heade (1819 – 1904)
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Review: A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk

A Strangeness in My Mind [2014/15] – ★★★★

“Street vendors are the songbirds of the streets, they are the life and soul of Istanbul” [Orhan Pamuk/Ekin Oklap, Faber & Faber, 2014/15: 33].  

Shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize 2016, A Strangeness in My Mind tells the story of Mevlut Karataş, a street-seller in Istanbul. From his childhood in a poor village to his children’s marriages, we are taken on the literary journey of his life, introduced to his uneasy relationship with his cousins Korkut and Süleyman, his stoic friendship with rebellious Ferhat, and, more importantly, to his marriage with Rayiha, which occurred under rather peculiar circumstances. The main aim of Pamuk in this book seems to capture a life and a way of life through the years, showing the daily happiness and struggles or ordinary people living in Istanbul, while demonstrating the changes that Istanbul has undergone through time, including its socio-economic and political situation, expansion and modernisation. Translated from the Turkish by Ekin Oklap, A Strangeness in My Mind is closer to an overlong “docu-fiction” and over-indulgent bibliographical non-fiction and, in truth, is a bit far from that exciting literary novel that would make the reader hungrily turning the pages or would impart to them some true insight or reveal some Pamukian complexity. However, where the book truly shines is in a loving, nostalgic and painstaking reveal of the life of a street-seller, a profession that is rapidly dying in large cities. Pamuk’s emphasis on the mysteries and intricacies of this moribund craft, together with his touching tribute to Istanbul of the past, is to what makes this novel so compelling – ultimately.

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Top 10 Dickens’s Opening Lines

Some believe that there are few things which are more important in a novel than its opening line, especially since it sets the tone for the rest of a book. Charles Dickens excelled in crafting a memorable opening line, and I especially appreciate those of his creations that have humour/irony in them, which contrast things or introduce curious facts. Below are my ranked personal favourites.

I. A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”

II. Dombey and Son: “Dombey sat in the corner of the darkened room in the great arm-chair by the bedside, and Son lay tucked up warm in a little basket bedstead, carefully disposed on a low settee immediately in front of the fire and close to it, as if his constitution were analogous to that of a muffin, and it was essential to toast him brown while he was very new.”

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Kats-Chernin: Unsent Love Letters

Elena Kats-Chernin (1957-) is a Soviet-born Australian composer and pianist, and in this piece, she evokes Erik Satie‘s melodies to produce a melancholy composition of her own on the theme of unsent love letters since, after Satie’s death, a stack of unsent love letters was found in his apartment in Paris. The composition is part of Kats-Chernin’s album Meditations on Erik Satie (2017), and she is also best known for scoring the ballet Wild Swans (2003).

10 Great Novels About Unrequited Love

I. The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo

“Love is like a tree: it grows by itself, roots itself deeply in our being and continues to flourish over a heart in ruin. The inexplicable fact is that the blinder it is, the more tenacious it is. It is never stronger than when it is completely unreasonable” [Hugo, Signet Classics, 1831/2001: 313].

Unrequited love seems to be the main theme of this novel by Victor Hugo since each character’s action in this story is driven by their love (or lust), and that includes beautiful gypsy Esmeralda’s blind love for Captain Phoebus, and, of course, bell-ringer Quasimodo’s selfless and hopeless love for Esmeralda. This atmospheric masterpiece set in medieval Paris dramatizes the conflict of secret fears and desires experienced by such characters as Esmeralda, Captain Phoebus and Quasimodo, but also strict disciplinarian Archdeacon Claude Frollo and poet Gringoire.

II. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

“...I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be” [Dickens, Penguin Classics, 1860/1996: 268].

Great Expectations is a fine novel about tragic consequences of misbelief and obsessive love, though one is probably right to remain sceptical about the ending. Pip is an orphaned boy who is chosen by a rich woman Miss Havisham to visit her mysterious house for certain tasks. There, he falls in love with proud and aloof girl Estella, and his once chance encounter with two convicted felons on the run comes to haunt him as the years roll by.

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The Italia Reading Challenge – Completed!

I have completed the Italia Reading Challenge, which was a challenge for me to read books by Italian authors throughout the year 2022. I would like to thank Emma from Book Around the Corner for contributing to this challenge and the first two books in the selection above are her review contributions. The challenge covered such diverse genres as literary fiction (Pavese), historical fiction (Bassani), play (Pirandello), non-fiction (Angela), short story (Buzzati) and memoir/poetry (Dante), as well as authors born in such diverse regions of Italy as Sardinia (Pulixi), Veneto (Buzzati), Piedmont (Pavese), Lazio (Rome) (Morante), Tuscany (Florence) (Dante), Varese (Fo), and Sicily (Pirandello).

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Review: The Garden of the Finzi-Continis by Giorgio Bassani

The Garden of the Finzi-Continis [1962/2005] – ★★★★

“Nothing I know matters more / than what never happened.” John Burnside

This Italian classic tells the story of the prominent and aristocratic Finzi-Contini family in the Italian city of Ferrara in the 1920-30s through the eyes of a boy and then a man hopelessly in love with this family’s beautiful daughter Micòl. Our narrator’s family and that of Micòl could not be more apart on a societal standing, but they are both Jewish, and our narrator is soon admitted to Micòl’s entourage, making friends not only with Micòl, but also with her brother Alberto. A well-kept tennis court in the garden of the Finzi-Contini becomes the central point of the young people’s existence, and also, as it turns out, a sort of a safe haven, as anti-Semitic forces are tightening their grip on Italy on the eve of the World War II. Unbeknown to all, the ground is already set for the ultimate tragedy. This sensitive novel does not have the clearest of narratives, but it is still a touching coming-of-age story of lost love and opportunities, where emotions of first-love and tender friendship learn to co-exist with such feelings as pride and shame.

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Visualizing Spheres & Branches of Knowledge: “The Book of Circles”, & “The Book of Trees”

I. The Book of Circles [2017] by Manuel Lima – ★★★★

This illustrated non-fiction is all about the human presentation of knowledge through circles. The author states how natural it is for humans to try to classify and systematise all sorts of knowledge, and the circle serves as a perfect vehicle for doing so because it is a perfect geometrical figure standing for the Sun, among other things, and representing a multitude of other concepts, including movement, unity, wholeness, perfection and infinity. Being a shape that is omnipresent in nature, the circle may also be attracting our attention because of our innate evolutionary tendency to seek out human faces/eyes.

A large chunk of this book is devoted to showing various circles being used to illustrate and explain all sorts of concepts and progressions, from the presentations of the solar system, scientific theorems and alchemical tables to city maps, world economics and online engagements. There are things in this book which I never thought have been or could have been analysed using a circle, including the “Lineage of Sin in the Bible” (2009) by Anna Filipova and the changing colour of Lego sets (2015) by David Eaton.

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Review: Catastrophe & Other Stories by Dino Buzzati

Catastrophe & Other Stories [1965] – ★★★★

This short story collection is from one of the most inventive minds of Italy – writer and poet Dino Buzzati (1906 – 1972). I liked this collection more than the one I read last year – Buzzati’s The Siren: A Selection of Short Stories. In Catastrophe & Other Stories, there are twenty stories overall, but I am reviewing only five below. Though this collection is a bit of a mixed bag, it is definitely worth a read, especially for those into absurdist, existentialist or Kafkaesque fiction.

I. Seven Floors – ★★★★★

This is the best story in the collection, in my opinion. In it, one Giuseppe Corte enters one unusual sanatorium and desperately wants to remain on its top floor – the seventh, but circumstances are not in his favour. Why such a desire? It so happens that this medical establishment is designed in such a way that its top floors are reserved for mild cases, and the further down you go, the more serious cases you encounter until eventually you hit floor one where the hopeless dying “convalesce”. One hero is soon torn by a dilemma: he does not want to be a serious medical case, but the lower floors also have better medical equipment and more knowledgeable doctors and nurses. What does one do? Seven Floors is a fine example of a purely Kafkaesque terror, and the story can also be viewed as a satire on illness, diagnosis, hypochondria, and medical establishment.

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10 Best Books I Read in 2022

The year 2022 was a good reading year for me, but not brilliant. As you can see from my list below, I am no longer reading new releases because, well – they disappoint me (for example, Orhan Pamuk and Hanya Yanagihara, who are among my favourite authors, released their new books this year – Nights of Plague and To Paradise respectively, but, unfortunately, I ended up disliking both, and the same thing happened with Kazuo Ishiguro’s “relatively weak” book last year). So, below are ten best books I read in 2022. This list is in no particular order (click on the book titles to see the full reviews), and I am excluding non-fiction, poetry, plays and short stories (otherwise the list would have been much longer).

I. The Magic Mountain [1924/27]

by Thomas Mann – ★★★★★

“Time drowns in the unmeasured monotony of space. Where uniformity reigns, movement from point to point is no longer movement; and where movement is no longer movement, there is no time” [Mann/Woods, 1924/27: 312].

When Hans Castorp checked into one luxurious international sanatorium high up in the Swiss Alps for just a few weeks, he never imagined that he would stay there for years, contemplating the most unfathomable questions, including the meaning of life and death. This masterpiece of a novel from the Nobel Laureate Thomas Mann is an astute philosophical examination of many things, among which are human spirit, time, knowledge, an institution and the nature of illness.

II. How Green Was My Valley [1939]

by Richard Llewellyn – ★★★★★

“The quiet troubling of the river, and the clean, washed stones, and the green all about, and the trees trying to drown their shadows, and the mountain going up and up behind, there is beautiful it was” [Llewellyn, Penguin Books, 1939/2001: 42].

This book is undoubtedly my most “heart-felt” read of 2022. This is a poetic, nostalgic exploration of the life of one coal-mining community in Wales during the late Victorian era through the eyes of Hew Morgan, an intelligent boy in one large, close-knit family. The changes that he observes being made to the place and people he loves pain him as they also open his eyes to the machinations of the cruel world. Llewellyn wrote a touching tribute to a place and a way of life that are forever gone.

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Review: The Masquerade by Mikhail Lermontov

The Masquerade [1835] – ★★★★1/2

The Masquerade is Lermontov’s four act-play written in verse and set in the 1830s St. Petersburg. This very Shakespearean drama centres on Yevgeny Arbenin, once an immoral gambler and womaniser without scruples, but now it seems a decent man respected by society, especially since his marriage to a kind and beautiful young woman Nina. One day, however, Arbenin’s desire to rescue a man from financial disaster at a gambling table, malicious rumours, as well as his wife losing a bracelet during a masquerade ball set in motion a series of events that culminate in an unthinkable tragedy, as Arbenin’s jealous predisposition and his propensity to seek revenge overpower common sense, love and basic human considerations.

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Recent Reading: Short Stories from O. Henry, Friedrich Dürrenmatt, & Tobias Wolff

I. The Last Leaf [1907] by O. Henry – ★★★★★

“The lonesomest thing in all the world is a soul when it is making ready to go on its mysterious, far journey“. Two female artists Sue and Johnsy rent a studio in Greenwich, New York when Johnsy gets pneumonia and becomes bed-ridden. As she stays in her bed, she starts obsessing over an ivy growing outside their house and says to Sue that she would be counting its fallen leaves and when the last leaf falls, so would she “fall”, i.e. die. Incidentally, the ivy has always been associated with fidelity, devotion, friendship, affection and everlasting life, and Johnsy’s strange prophecy is somehow becoming convincing as any seriously ill person is always listened to carefully, as though they already possess otherworldly knowledge, being so close to the “other side”. O. Henry uses a number of literary devices to bring this story to a satisfactory climax, and the ending is powerful and tear-jerking.

II. The Tunnel [1952] by Friedrich Dürrenmatt – ★★★★★

“Each of his activities seemed a pretext designed to achieve order behind the façade of routine pursuits”. A twenty-four year old student makes his usual morning commute on a busy train when he decides to pay attention to “a little tunnel” that the train passes through. It is the first time he does so, but, to his surprise (given the speed of the train he took), the tunnel does not end, and there is no light at the end of the tunnel, either. As the student sits and wonders, his thoughts start to linger on his own mental well-being, as well as on the “pointless” preoccupations of the passengers around him.

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St. Cecilia: The Saint Patron of Music

Saint Cecilia [1896] by John Melhuish Strudwick

Today (22 November) is the feast of St. Cecilia. Saint Cecilia (200 – 222 AD) was a Roman virgin martyr, who became the patroness of music and musicians. Legend has it that Cecilia was a gifted musician from childhood and composed hymns of such beauty that angels came down from heaven to listen to her. She vowed to preserve her virginity to an Angel of God. However, she was married against her will to a pagan nobleman named Valerian (Valerius), and then told her husband to respect her vow. Valerian told her that he would only do so if he saw the Angel himself. Cecilia promised to him that he could if the Church baptised him. He was baptised, and then saw the Angel talking to Cecilia. She, her husband and her husband’s brother were all subsequently martyred for their experiences. Saint Cecilia’s final resting place is in Santa Cecilia Church in Trastevere in Rome, and the first celebration of the Day of St. Cecilia took place in Évreux, Normandy in 1570.

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10 Non-Fiction Books I’ve Recently Added to My TBR

November is the “Non-Fiction Reading” month, and I have compiled this list of non-fiction titles I am looking forward to reading in a near future.

Going to Church in Medieval England [2021] by Nicholas Orme

I am interested in the history of religion and knowing how prominent the Church was in the lives of people in the Middle Ages, this book will undoubtedly be a very insightful read. It aims to show how churches in England “came into existence, who staffed them, and how their buildings were used, [explaining] who went to church, who did not attend, [and] how people behaved there.” The book explains how the calendar and Church activities existed in unison, and demystifies the English Reformation of the sixteenth century.

The Facemaker: One Surgeon’s Battle to Mend the Disfigured Soldiers of World War I [2022] by Lindsey Fitzharris

Fitzharris’s debut book The Butchering Art [2017] was an unputdownable history non-fiction that told of British surgeon Joseph Lister and the transformation of Victorian medicine. In this new non-fiction, the author presents the story of one visionary surgeon who rebuilt the faces of the First World War’s injured soldiers, making first contributions to the field plastic surgery. The focus of this account is otolaryngologist Harold Gillies from New Zealand, who is considered to be the father of modern plastic surgery.

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Review: Hogenberg & Braun’s Cities of the World by Stephan Füssel (ed.)

Cities of the World by Frans Hogenberg and Georg Braun

Cities of the World [1617/2015] – ★★★★1/2

“Travelling – it gives you home in thousand strange places, then leaves you a stranger in your own land” (Ibn Battuta (1303 – 1377), a Berber Maghrebi scholar and explorer, who “travelled more than any other explorer in pre-modern history”, covering some 117.000 km over a 30 year-long journey).

This Taschen edition encyclopaedic book compiles engravings and original texts with commentaries from the Civitates orbis terrarum, a collection of town maps produced between 1572 and 1617 by Frans Hogenberg, a Flemish engraver, and Georg Braun, a German Catholic cleric, among other contributors. The book is often referred to as “the most important cartographic work of sixteenth-century Europe”, and includes town plans, bird’s-eye views of cities and stunning landscape illustrations of various cities’ domestic activities. Since these date from the sixteenth century and come from European authors, the book naturally talks predominantly about the cities of Europe (though it does include such cities as Constantinople (Istanbul), Cairo, Alexandria, Jerusalem, Cuzco and Mexico City, too), and retains its original title – Cities of the World. Below are just snippets from this fascinating illustrated book that spans some 750 pages and covers more than 450 cities.

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Review: Laura by Vera Caspary

Book Cover of Novel Laura by Vera Caspary

Laura [1943] – ★★★★★

“To solve the puzzle of [Laura’s death], [one] must first resolve the mystery of Laura’s life” [Vera Caspary, Houghton Mifflin/Vintage: 1942/2012: 16].

A beautiful and still aspiring socialite Laura Hunt is found murdered in her apartment in New York City. She allegedly opened the door to her murderer. A veteran detective Mark McPherson starts to investigate this tricky case, but soon finds out that few things make sense in Laura’s murder. Worse still, McPherson finds himself falling under the charms of Laura’s personality and her world as a number of possible murder suspects emerge, including Laura’s low-paid fiancé Shelby Carpenter and Laura’s friend, eccentric columnist Waldo Lydecker. It soon turns out that Shelby is a possible insurance beneficiary upon Laura’s death, and, then, someone also buys Laura’s portrait that hung on her apartment wall …could it have been the murderer? Clues are scattered throughout this clever mystery-noir, which also has a twist “to die for”.

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Review: Fryderyk Chopin by Alan Walker

Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times [2018] – ★★★1/2

A comprehensive biography of Chopin, though also a tad over-written and insensitive.

This book on Polish composer Fryderyk Chopin is the culmination of a ten years’ research project. Fryderyk or Frédéric Chopin is considered to be the greatest composer of the Romantic period, and this biography details his life from his early education and success in native Poland to his move and conquest of Paris through salon appearances, concerts and published works. Much in this book is about Chopin’s long-term relationship with female French novelist George Sand, but Chopin’s musical masterpieces, technique and piano theories are also dissected. Walker employs an engaging story-format to tell us about Chopin, a composer who was also largely self-taught and perpetually ill, providing invaluable insights into Chopin’s relationships with others. And, this well-researched book would have been a “must-read” biography if not for the fact that it is also over-written, with the author making some insensitive faux pas as he proceeds with his over-zealous narration.

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“Impossible Tasks” in Folklore: Wondrous Tradition Spanning Continents

“When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and the female one and the same, so that the male not be male nor the female; and when you fashion eyes in the place of an eye, and a hand in place of a hand, and a foot in place of a foot, and a likeness in place of a likeness; then will you enter the Kingdom” (Jesus Christ, Gospel of Thomas).

In many folklore traditions, mythologies and fairy-tales around the world, characters have to overcome or endure certain trials as a penance, to prove their worth (to marry a princess, for example), break a curse or claim their ultimate prize. These trials may be extremely hard (The Labours of Hercules) or even impossible to overcome or solve. At one end, there are riddles to be guessed, such as the famous riddle of the Sphinx from the Greek mythology (“What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, three legs in the evening, and no legs at night?”) or the puzzles in the stories of Persian poet Nizami, which also found their way to Puccini’s opera Turandot, but another extreme is a truly impossible task set to frighten and confuse characters or heroes. These paradoxical, “undoable” commands often have a wondrous effect.

King Heimer and Aslaug [1856] by Johan August Malmström
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Tetsuya Ishida: Art That Disturbs and Awakens to Reality

Tetsuya Ishida (1973 – 2005) was a Japanese artist known for his surreal paintings of the modern life in Japan. Tetsuya Ishida’s art speaks powerfully about the negative aspects of Japanese society, including over-work, social pressures and the erosion of individuality. His paintings are trying to show the human cost of capitalism and economic prosperity, society’s indifference, people’s isolation, alienation, uncertainty, anxiety and hopelessness, as well as the negative effects of consumerism in our industrialised societies overall.

Much of Tetsuya Ishida’s art should be understood in its context. In the 1990s, Japan experienced the economic crisis, recession and stagnation, with many people being laid off, and the “Lost Generation” was created. These were the people who missed their chance in the job market through no fault of their own. Normally, Japanese graduates have only one year’ opening to apply for jobs in companies, and many young people lost their opportunities when, in their graduation year, Japanese companies did not offer graduate positions (because of the need to cut costs). Of course, in the coming years, when Japan’s economy had improved, companies preferred most recent graduates to these “left-over” young people who then struggled to find employment, with some surviving by doing menial work. Some of these people also became what became known as hikikomori (“shut-in” adults living in their family home and not participating in any social life), facing much stigma. Tetsuya Ishida was, in fact, one of those “Lost Generation” people who experienced the 1990s’ hardship and discrimination first-hand.

Recalled
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Review: Talking Music by William Duckworth

Talking Music: Conversations with John Cage, Philip Glass, Laurie Anderson, & Five Generations of American Experimental Composers [1995] – ★★★★

A “must-read” for any music fan interested in the nature of music, its experimental forms and its boundaries.

Experimental music is defined as “any music that pushes existing boundaries and genre definitions“. Though the term originated in the 1950s, the US of the 1960s saw certain music artists emerging that can be said to be loosely associated with the “experimental music” movement. This book by American composer and educator William Duckworth compiles the author’s interviews with experimental composers and performers from the US, including John Cage, Philip Glass, Lou Harrison, Conlon Nancarrow, Meredith Monk and Laurie Anderson. The interviews shed light on the artists’ backgrounds, major works and inspirations, and many of the interviews are frank, interesting and inspirational.

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Review: Shell-Shock by Anthony Babington

Shell-Shock: A History of the Changing Attitudes to War Neurosis [1997] – ★★★★

“…They broke his body and his mind/And yet They made him live,/And They asked more of My Mother’s Son/Than any man could give...” (from Rudyard Kipling’s poem The Mother’s Son).

“…Men who went out to battle, grim and glad;/ Children, with eyes that hate you, broken and mad…” (Siegfried Sassoon, October 1917).

This is an insightful book about the history of “shell-shock”, a type of post-traumatic stress disorder suffered by soldiers after a prolonged combat. Anthony Babington is neither a medical professional nor strictly a trained historian, but his book still provides a thought-provoking overview of one very misunderstood illness. From wars described by Herodotus (484-425 BC) to the Gulf War of 1990/91, the account touches on every major war conflict to explain how “shell-shock” and combat stress were perceived and treated through history.

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7 Unputdownable Books Written from Multiple “First-Person” Perspectives

Below are seven books written from a multiple “first-person” perspective. More often than not, this perspective is employed when a narrative concerns some unusual or psychologically complex situation whereby it would be interesting for the reader to find out the reactions of more than one person to some event unfolding. Such a perspective can offer a valuable insight, and the use of unreliable narrators may heighten the intrigue.

I. The Beguiled/A Painted Devil [1966] by Thomas P. Cullinan

This historical fiction has more psychological depth than first meets the eye. It tells the story of a teacher and pupils at a girls’ school during the Civil War, who take in one injured soldier they spotted lying near their school. The author handles his multiple “first-person” perspectives brilliantly, showing the different personalities of the girls, as their self-interests and private desires start to collide with the concern for the soldier’s well-being. Sofia Coppola’s 2017 adaptation of this book missed the subtle points of Cullinan’s novel.

II. The Last House on Needless Street [2021] by Catriona Ward

This horror book’s multiple narrators are designed to unsettle the reader. First, there is heavy-drinking Ted, who lives in the last house on Needless Street. Then, there is his daughter Lauren, who is not allowed outside, and, lastly, comes the family’s religion-minded cat Olivia. It is an exciting, disturbing book that focuses on one missing girl, and filled with secrets and unreliable narrators.

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Frank Churchill: “Someday My Prince Will Come” (from Snow White)

Frank Churchill (20 October 1901 – 14 May 1942) was an American composer known for his years’ long partnership with Walt Disney. He provided scores for Disney’s animations Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, Dumbo, Bambi, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (posthumously) and Peter Pan (posthumously and not included), not to mention scoring many uncredited short animations. Churchill’s song Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? for animation The Three Little Pigs achieved an unexpected commercial success.

Churchill’s Someday My Prince Will Come is a beautiful, catchy tune full of hope and longing for a better future. It has many melancholic, “heart-breaking” notes, but the overall impression is one of endless reverie, of a desire that tomorrow brings a better day. Churchill’s contribution, including his musical pieces Heigh Ho and Whistle While You Work, helped make The Snow White the world’s first great animation.

Frank Churchill was an immensely talented musician, but also a sensitive soul. He took his own life on 14 May 1942 at the age of just 40. Though at the time of his death he was involved in a dispute with Disney over his Bambi pieces, the cause was most probably depression after the deaths of Churchill’s two closest friends. However, his music lives on, still uplifting and touching millions around the globe.

10 Novels That Explore Identity

“At what precise moment…does an individual cease to be the person he…believes himself to be?…If [both] arms are gone, I say: myself and my two arms…If they had to take out my stomach, my liver, my kidneys – I could still say: myself and my organs. But, if they cut off my head, what could I say then? Myself and my body, or myself and my head? [The Tenant, Topor/Price, Black Spring Press, 1966: 58].

There are so many great books that grapple with the issue of identity, from classic sci-fi – Wells’s The Invisible Man [1897] and Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? [1968] to fun foreign-language choices, including Japrisot’s Trap for Cinderella [1962]. Below are 10 books that discuss the issue of identity in a narrative context. For the purposes of this list, I define “identity” in terms of being a purely existential matter, rather than one based on any national, cultural, racial or gender identification. This list is also in no particular order, and I have taken care not to include books which I mentioned in my two previous, similar-themed lists “Double Trouble”: 7 Books That Focus on Identical Twins and “Mirror Image”: 7 Books That Focus on Doppelgängers/Doubles.

I. The Late Mattia Pascal

This 1904 novel by Novel Laureate Luigi Pirandello (Six Characters in Search of an Author) tells the story of a man who sees his chance to start life anew when he finds out that he was mistakenly pronounced dead. However, his prospects turn out to be not as promising as they appear on the first glance. The book is ironic and philosophical, and, for a similar theme, see also Balzac’s novella Colonel Chabert about a man searching for his past identity.

II. The Tenant

The Tenant is a 1964 French-language book (translation is available) by Roland Topor about a man renting an apartment in Paris. The man soon notices strange behaviour of his neighbours and starts to suspect the worst concerning the near-death of the previous occupant of the apartment. This is a very good psychological horror story that emphasises the loss of identity and apartment claustrophobia. It was also made into a 1976 film.

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Poems of Mourning

Poems of Mourning [1998] by Peter Washington (ed.) – ★★★★1/2

This is an impressive collection of poems that concern loss and mourning from the Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets series. I found most of them absolutely beautiful, coming from such poets as Emily Dickinson, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Alfred Tennyson, Robert Frost, Thomas Hardy, and Christina Rossetti. Some of them are fairly well-known, such as Bishop’s One Art, Dickinson’s Because I Could Not Stop for Death, Hopkins’s Spring and Fall, and Auden’s Funeral Blues, while others are more obscure, including those that commemorate animals. The other great thing about this collection is that it makes an effort to present poets from around the world, so there are poems from François Villon, Abu Al-Ala Al-Ma’arri, Fyodor Tyutchev, Czeclaw Milosz, and Primo Levi. For similar books, see also my post The Poetry of Thomas Hardy, as well as my mini-review of Japanese Death Poems.

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The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico

The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico [1959/97] – ★★★★

“The Aztecs…thought the strangers were Quetzalcoatl, and other gods returning from over the sea, while the Spaniards, despite their amazement at the splendours of Tenochtitlan, considered the Aztecs barbarians and thought only of seizing their riches and of forcing them to become Christians and Spanish subjects” (León-Portilla/Kemp, Beacon Press, 1959/97: xxxiii).

On 22 April 1519, Spaniard Don Hernán Cortés landed in Mexico, and on 13 August 1521, the Aztecs, one of the greatest civilisations of South America, fell. The Aztecs, a nation possessing an intricate culture and complex political organisation, were destroyed and plundered beyond all recognition. In this book, Mexican anthropologist Miguel León-Portilla aims to show the invasion of Mexico by the Spaniards in 1519 from the point of view of the native Aztecs. The non-fiction, translated from the Spanish by Lysander Kemp, compiles a number of first-hand account writings from indigenous people, giving the voice to the victims of this unprecedented encounter between two very distinct military powers and cultures.

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September 2022 Wrap-Up: From How Green Was My Valley to An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

How Green Was My Valley [1939] by Richard Llewellyn – ★★★★★

“Beautiful were the days that are gone, and O, for them to be back. The mountain was green, and proud with a good covering of oak and ash, and washing his feet in a streaming river clear as the eyes of God” [Richard Llewellyn, Penguin Books, 1939/2001: 153].

This absorbing story is told through the perspective of a small boy and then young man living in a close-knit mining community in Wales during the reign of Queen Victoria. Huw Morgan grows up in changing times and in a family of many other children and plenty of role models. The Morgan family experiences both good and bad times, enduring their daily struggles with their coal employers and the rise of labour unions, but still finds happiness of living so united, peacefully abiding by the laws of the Church and being surrounded by the primordial beauty of nature. Huw makes enemies and friends, both in school and in a wider community, and finds out about friendship, duty, shame, guilt and justice, as well as, later, the value of honest work, and torments and confusion of first love. Permeated with much emotion and with that quiet, poetic and resolute conviction, How Green Was My Value is a heart-felt, bitter-sweet and nostalgic literary masterpiece, a one-of-kind homage to the innocence lost and to Wales that is no more.

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10 Fascinating Books about Circuses & Carnivals

For me, autumn is associated with circuses and carnivals, maybe because Halloween is approaching and I think of country fairs, masks, costumes, etc. Thus, I am presenting ten books, in no particular order and both fiction and non-fiction, that revolve around circuses or carnivals.

I. Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham

Nightmare Alley is a fast-paced pulp noir that tells a journey of ambitious and street-smart Stanton Carlisle, working as a mentalist, through all the dark sides of one second-rate carnival show. The structure of this book is dictated by a Tarot deck, and the novel has now been adapted twice – as a 1947 film noir starring Tyrone Power and as a 2021 film directed by Guillermo del Toro.

II. The Circus Fire: A True Story of An American Tragedy by Stewart O’Nan

This book is about the 6 July 1944 circus fire disaster that occurred in Hartford, Connecticut, when a big top of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus caught fire in the middle of a performance with some 7000 people inside. At least 167 people died and another 700 were injured, and this book, filled with maps and photographs, painstakingly sets down all the circumstances leading up to the tragedy, including previous fires and circus arrangements, before talking about acts of heroism on the day and the aftermath, when the injured had to deal with PTSD.

Continue reading “10 Fascinating Books about Circuses & Carnivals” →

The “Multiple Perspectives” Art of David Wilkie

Sir David Wilkie (18 November 1785 – 1 June 1841) was a Scottish artist of genre paintings, who also painted historical events and portraits, and was sometimes known as the “people’s painter”, presumably for some of his paintings that depict the lower-class or the middle class fallen on hard times. He was the godfather of author Wilkie Collins (The Woman in White). Wilkie’s paintings are characterised by liveliness, detail, and different or multiple perspectives shown by a number of characters in one painting. Below are four of his paintings, though his best-known one is probably The Chelsea Pensioners Reading the Waterloo Dispatch [1816].

The Blind Fiddler [1806]

In this painting, where Wilkie pays close attention to details, a blind fiddler and his family (a wife, presumably, a lace-maker, an older boy and a baby) come to a country family home to provide entertainment. There is a lot going on in this painting, with each character having a different reaction to the music. The two small children of the family, presumably small trader’s family, seem to be interested in the music, while the baby is being entertained by the older man, probably his father. The small trader family’s son imitates the fiddler by playing on the bellows. Wilkie undoubtedly wanted to contrast the small trader with the poor fiddler, hence our attention is drawn to the colour red of the fiddler’s hat and the houseowner’s waistcoat.

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Review: The Ladies’ Paradise by Émile Zola

The Ladies’ Paradise [1883/1995] – ★★★★1/2

In this French classic translated by Brian Nelson, Denise Baudu, a young woman from the Valognes countryside, arrives to Paris with her two younger brothers, orphaned and destitute, looking to get employment at her uncle Mr Baudu’s small drapery shop. However, the moment Denise arrives, she becomes entranced by The Ladies’ Paradise, a magnificent shopping establishment that entices its customers with its extravagant window displays, personalised service, constant sales and affordable luxury. Since Mr Baudu’s small shop is on the brink of bankruptcy and Denise has to feed and clothe her two brothers, she feels she has no choice but to attempt working at this glittering shopping monstrosity that has already devoured many small businesses in the area, shutting them down. The proprietor of The Ladies’ Paradise is “brilliant” and ruthless Octave Mouret, an enigmatic figure, whose money-making schemes are already revolutionising the city’s shopping space. Can Denise, with her innocence and simplicity, navigate this complex, often immoral, commercial world so that she and her brothers survive? Zola masterfully and perceptively captures the changing Paris of the 1850-1860s that starts undergoing drastic urban transformations and changes in customer trends, seeing the rise of the “temples to Fashion’s madness for spending”, that are huge department stores.

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A Trip to Venice II: Literary Highlights

Following from my previous post where I talked about Venice’s cultural highlights, below is the overview of my literary exploration of Venice.

I. Studium Bookshop

This stylish bookshop, not far from St Mark’s Square, exceeded my expectations. It is packed with beautiful fiction and non-fiction books on many subjects, from travel guides and children’s fiction to Italian cook-books and illustrated marvels on Japanese art. There are also sections devoted to English, French and Spanish books, and the staff is very friendly. It is here that I bought my now-much-cherished Spanish-language edition of Italian classic The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni, and, as you can see from the photographs below, I was very impressed by this bookstore’s Corto Maltese section. Corto Maltese is a series of comic books by Hugo Pratt that talks about adventures of sailor Corto Maltese in the first and second decade of the twentieth century. One of those is titled Corto Maltese: Fable of Venice, and people also recommended to me the book The Secret Venice of Corto Maltese: Fantastic and Hidden Itineraries.

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A Trip to Venice I: Cultural Highlights

“Venice is like eating an entire box of chocolate liqueurs in one go.” Truman Capote

This August I went to Venice and Venetian Riviera for my holidays, and below I am sharing some of the cultural highlights from my trip.

I. Piazza San Marco

I started my excursion with the Piazza San Marco, probably the world’s most famous town square, bordered by the Doge’s Palace and Basilica San Marco. The tall bell tower is the Campanile, constructed in 1912, since the original collapsed in 1902. The famous Café Florian (which some say is the most expensive café in the world) can also be found on this square, once being a host to a diverse literary clientele, including Stendhal, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Thomas Moore, Charles Dickens and Henry James.

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Review: The Sea and Poison by Shūsaku Endō

The Sea and Poison [1958/92] – ★★★★

“The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything” (Albert Einstein).

“Go where the pain is” (Anne Rice).

Japan, the last months of the World War II. The city of Fukuoka, nestling in the Hakata Bay, has been experiencing air raids for quite some time, and its hospital finds itself stretched to the limits as its never-ending line of mostly dying patients is always at the door, riddled with many diseases, worsened by hunger and despair. But one day is no ordinary day for this hospital. Unbeknown to many, the Second Surgery is preparing for a secret vivisection operation on American soldiers taken prisoners by the Japanese, and the goal is to test the limits of air and saline that can be injected into humans before they die. Those who are involved in the operation are not some evil monsters or serial killers on the loose, though. They are some of the most respected people in the institution, as well as their dedicated supporting medical personnel. Through the perspectives of two interns – sensitive Suguro and cynical Toda, as well as haunted-by-traumatic-past Nurse Ueda, Endō shows us how easily the unimaginable can unfold when conditions are led by war-time nihilism and actions are prompted by apathy, despair, helplessness and self-interest. Based on a true story (see this article), Shūsaku Endō’s book is as intense as it is disturbing, but at its core is still a touching message to always preserve the spirit of humanity and compassion even in the most highly-pressured and hopeless environments.

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Japanese ASMR: Garden & Onsen

I feel like sharing today some of my favourite Japanese ASMR videos. I am sure at least one of them I first saw on Content Catnip, an amazing website dedicated to quirky, curious aspects related to all things travel, history, music, art, spirituality, natural world and much more.

I love the sound of gentle rain, and this view to a Japanese garden is very cosy. Traditional Japanese stone lanterns, a Buddha statue and cutlery for brewing ocha are a magical combination (creator Cosmic Resort).

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Allegories in Art II: Hope, True Love & Charity

I. Hope [1886] by George Frederic Watts

This painting depicts Hope, sitting crouched and blind-folded on a globe, trying to obtain a melody through the only string left in her lyre. It is a very powerful, though melancholy, depiction of the never-dying feeling. Hope clings desperately to something, anything, refusing to give up even when odds are clearly stacked against a person. As long as Hope hears a melody through the lyre, there can never be complete hopelessness.

The muted dark colours surrounding Hope makes the depiction even sadder, and the blind-fold and the globe further emphasise Hope’s helplessness, loneliness and isolation. There is a lone star above her head, twinkling, but it is hardly perceived. However, it is there, and Hope manages to distil and hear a melody through her instrument, meaning that not all is lost.

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Allegories in Art I: The Passage of Time

I. A Dance to the Music of Time [c. 1638-40] by Nicolas Poussin

This colourful painting shows four differently-dressed figures who dance to “the Music of Time”, with Time represented by an old man with wings playing a lyre. The figures’ hands are inter-locked and they are supposed to be in a perpetual motion, symbolising the cycle of life. They dance near a pillar topped by a double-faced Janus, the god of beginnings, transitions and endings. One of his heads is facing the future, while the other is facing the past. On the right, a putto holds an hourglass, while on the left, a putto is carelessly blowing bubbles, further alluding to the transience of human life. The painting scene takes place in the morning since Aurora, the goddess of dawn, leads the way for Apollo’s chariot through the sky. In turn, Apollo holds in his hands the Zodiac ring, and the Horae, the goddess of the seasons, conclude the procession.

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Review: How Do You Live? by Genzaburo Yoshino

How Do You Live? [1937/82/2021] – ★★★★★

Often compared to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince [1943], How Do You Live? is an unforgettable book with a heart and a soul.

This story focuses on naturally inquisitive high-school student Junichi Honda (nicknamed “Copper”) and his three friends: quiet Mizutani, outspoken Kitami and kind Uragawa. With his uncle acting as a guide, Copper learns important life lessons and discovers things that would enable him to become a better human being in future. We are shown little episodes in Copper’s life as the boy starts to understand the importance of friendship, kindness, thankfulness and acceptance, and the wrongs of bullying, cowardice and discrimination.

In an often typical Japanese literary style, there is hardly any “action” narrative in Yoshino’s book. Rather, the main “action” takes place inside Copper as he finds himself at “moral crossroads” in his life, forced to make decisions, and matures, learning certain things in life which can only be understood through experience. One such life lesson concerns the importance of humility and the need to be thankful for small things in one’s life. Copper’s uncle explains to our hero how there is a general human tendency to view oneself at the very centre of the world. This view is mistaken. We are all people who think, feel and dream, and are all connected to each other in a multitude of different ways, even if we do not see this directly. Only by thinking “globally” and from the point of view of other people, can we understand this life’s true nature, as well as become better human beings, making a positive impact on this world. Everything is inter-connected in nature and society, and no matter how small a thing or a person is, or how small their actions, its/their impact can still be felt on others/environment.

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Camille Saint-Saëns: Samson and Delilah (Bacchanale)

in 1877, French composer Camille Saint-Saëns (Danse Macabre) wrote opera Samson and Delilah to a French libretto by Ferdinand Lemaire and based on a biblical tale. Bacchanale is a musical piece from that opera where Delilah leads a provocative dance to taunt Samson.

Six Degrees of Separation – from Ruth Ozeki’s The Book of Form and Emptiness to Bruce Chatwin’s The Songlines

Six Degrees of Separation is a monthly book meme first created by Annabel Smith & Emma Chapman, and now continued by Kate at booksaremyfavouriteandbest. The aim is create a chain of six books stemming from one designated book. That designated book is announced monthly, and the books can be linked in various ways.

This month’s chain starts with Ruth Ozeki’s most recent book The Book of Form and Emptiness, which I have not yet read, but the synopsis tells me that this is a book that features “a large public library” at some point, and this brings me to Edith Wharton’s classic novella Summer. This book is about Charity Royall, a seventeen-year old girl who was once adopted by a prominent lawyer in a small town of North Dormer. She lands a coveted role of a librarian at her local library and there meets a promising architect and potential suitor Lucius Harney. Edith Wharton won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1921, becoming the first woman to do so, and 100 years on, Louise Erdrich also did so for her novel The Night Watchman, which won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize. This rather personal-to-the-author novel is set in the 1950s and follows the lives of North Dakota’s Native American population – the Chippewa tribe. The story focuses on a US Senator’s attempt to undo the protection enjoyed by the native tribe through the so-called Termination Bill.

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Review: Am I Dreaming? by James Kingsland

Am I Dreaming? The New Science of Consciousness and How Altered States Reboot the Brain [2019] – ★★★

From lucid dreaming and hallucinations to hypnotism and various effects of LSD and DMT, science journalist James Kingsland takes the reader on a journey explaining the altered states of consciousness and the present state of knowledge in this field, making his case that inducing altered states of consciousness is beneficial, and much can be gained by experimenting with psychoactive substances. Am I Dreaming? is an unnecessarily chaotic book, but if you are prepared to sift through the author’s more obvious statements on consciousness and his not-always-so-clear scientific explanations, there is some insight gained as the author talks about more recent studies and people’s first-hand experiences.

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10 Books to Read to Understand Japan

I. In Praise of Shadows [1933] by Junichiro Tanizaki

This persuasive essay by Japanese author Jun’ichirō Tanizaki illuminates the darkest corners of cultural and aesthetic Japan, explaining the country’s traditional preference for imperfection. Tanizaki says that there is an eerie beauty to be distilled from things that at first seem “dark”, “small” or “imperfect” (such as special charm emanating from lacquerware illuminated by candles). Those who are open to experience the imperfect and not afraid to crouch in the dark, will find that special delight. It now appears to me that Tanizaki might have also been influenced by the writings of Yoshida Kenkō, a Buddhist monk.

II. Another Kyoto [2016] by Alex Kerr & Kathy Arlyn Sokol 

In this book, Alex Kerr and Kathy Sokol capture and explain the nuances of the Japanese culture by focusing on seemingly mundane objects of the Japanese society, such as walls, gates, tatami mats and screens, opening to us a whole new way of perceiving these attributes of the Japanese culture. In Kerr and Sokol’s book, Kyoto never felt as intimate nor its most distinguishing features better explained.

III. The Japanese: A History in Twenty Lives [2020] by Christopher Harding

I thought this was an exciting read, presenting Japanese history through the lives of twenty distinguished citizens, from mythical Princess Himiko (“Shaman Queen”), who lived in the year 200, to Empress Owada Masako (1963-), an intelligent, well-educated woman, but once a very unlikely contender to the title. It is possible that Harding based his book on Gen Itasaka’s 100 Japanese (People) You Should Know, and those who want to read a more linear history of Japan, can pick up Andrew Gordon’s A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present [2019].

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Plays from Dürrenmatt, Levin & Friel: The Visit, Veronica’s Room & Dancing at Lughnasa

I. The Visit [1956] by Friedrich Dürrenmatt – ★★★★★

“A story is not finished, until it has taken the worst turn” (Friedrich Dürrenmatt).

“…feeling[s] for humanity…is cut for the purse of an ordinary millionaire; with financial resources like mine, [one] can afford a new world order” [Claire Zachanassian in Dürrenmatt’s The Visit, Grove Press, 1956/94: 67].

Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921 – 1990) was a Swiss author and dramatist, and his play The Visit is considered one of his best works. The play is set in a small, poverty-stricken town of no importance Guellen. Its forgotten-by-everyone people can barely make their ends meet, and it is to this scene comes Claire Zachanassian, an elderly multi-millionairess who owns Armenian Oil and Western Railways, among other things. Guellen is her home town, and she brought with her for this visit an unbelievably large amount of money, as well as her husband, her future husband, her sedan-bearers, who are actually convicted gangsters, a panther and…a coffin, because…”she may need it”. It seems that everyone in town reckons that Claire would want to become a much needed benefactor to the town and its desperate community. However, the millionairess makes one shocking proposition: she wants justice for money, and the matter has something to do with her past and with her childhood sweetheart, Alfred Ill, now the town’s most esteemed citizen.

Continue reading “Plays from Dürrenmatt, Levin & Friel: The Visit, Veronica’s Room & Dancing at Lughnasa” →

A Spot of South America on the Isle of Wight

I enjoyed so much my time on the Isle of Wight last year (see my post – A Trip to the Isle of Wight) that I decided to return this summer as well. Alongside penguins and pandas, llamas and alpacas are my favourite animals, so I visited the West Wight Alpacas and Llamas farm situated near the quiet village of Wellow on the Isle of Wight. This is a large farm that was started in 2010 by a husband and wife team, and now provides a great day out for all the family. They offer a variety of farm activities, from feeding various farm animals to short walks and long treks with llamas and alpacas.

Llamas and alpacas originate in South America, and at least the former has been domesticated for thousands of years, primarily in the central Andes. In their book Llamas of South America, Conklin and Bjorklund say that “the llamas were domesticated over two thousand years before the coming of the Incas”, and since the Incas of Peru had no writing system to speak of, or iron, it was probably due to the llama that they were able to build such a great empire since the llama provided them with food, wool and means to transport bulky items.

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The Art of Tivadar Csontváry Kosztka

Tivadar Csontváry Kosztka (1853 – 1919) was a Hungarian painter working in the expressionist style and being part of the twentieth century’s avant-garde movement. A pharmacist by profession, he had a vision that he would become a renowned painter when he was already close to thirty and after that vowed to stop at nothing “to fulfil his destiny”. However, Kosztka was not popular with his contemporaries and achieved most of his recognition only after his death, with his paintings now forming part of Hungary’s national treasure. Below are three of his distinctive paintings, with each having at least one curious aspect.

I. Old Fisherman [1902]

This seemingly straightforward at first glance painting shows an old fisherman with a cane with a coastline in the background. To the left of the man, one can see the serene sea and what looks like the signs of a village, while to the right, the sea is more volatile and a number of factories are seen, emitting pollution in the air. However, this is a painting with “a twist”. Art critics were quickly to spot that if you take a mirror and place it on the left-hand side of the painting (mirroring the fisherman’s face), it will show the benevolent man in a prayer, standing for goodness (God), but if you take a mirror and place it on the right-hand side (mirroring the fisherman’s face), it will show Devil himself (as the illustrations below demonstrate). Csontvary Kosztka seems to have wanted to underline the humanity’s dual nature – it harbours the seeds of both good and evil.

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Review: The Faithful Executioner by Joel F. Harrington

The Faithful Executioner: Life and Death, Honour and Shame in the Turbulent Sixteenth Century [2013] – ★★★1/2

“A technically proficient and reliable executioner was himself the very embodiment of the sword of justice in action – swift, unwavering, deadly, but never appearing susceptible to arbitrary or gratuitous cruelty” [Harrington, Farrar, Straus and Giroux Publications, 2013: 67].

This book is a biography of Franz Schmidt (1555-1634), a public executioner who lived in what is now Germany in the Renaissance period. He kept a diary for the majority of his professional life, which lasted some forty-five years and included the execution of at least three hundred and sixty one people. Harrington traces Schmidt’s life, from his apprenticeship to him becoming a master of his craft, a healer, a family man and, finally, “an honourable member of society”, grounding his research in Schmidt’s dairy. After gaining technical skills, Schmidt travelled several years across the country, performing executions for a fee (as was customary), and though associating with a dishonourable profession, always tried to challenge the social stigma and strived to be part of the honourable society, taking pains to avoid associating with the world of immorality, including gambling, drinking and fighting. Harrington’s non-fiction is not for the squeamish and the biography presented is a bit misguided, but those who are interested in the history of criminal punishment will find much here to consider at length.

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Review: Arturo’s Island by Elsa Morante

Arturo’s Island [1957/2019] – ★★★★

This coming-of-age story won the 1957 Strega Prize, Italy’s most prestigious literary award, but this review is of a newer translation by Ann Goldstein. The book tells of a fourteen-year-old boy Arturo Gerace living in Procida, Bay of Naples, Italy some time before the World War II. Growing up without his mother and with often absent father Wilhelm Gerace, Arturo is still happy to spend his days without rules or schedules running wild around the island, imagining being an adult and embarking on some sea adventure that would bring him eternal glory. That is until his father, whom Arturo idolises, brings home his new sixteen-year-old bride Nunziata. From that point on, Arturo’s world will never be the same and the shift in the household’s dynamics means that Arturo can finally confront his deepest subconscious traumas with a chance to experience both the joys and sorrows of secret love. Morante’s tale is deceptively simple, and is more psychological than first assumed. It evokes all the delights of childhood wonder and the longings of adolescence, the feelings of endless summers and the atmosphere of mysterious, isolated lands surrounded by aquamarine seas.

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June 2022 Wrap-Up: From La Vita Nuova to The Siren

La Vita Nuova [1294/2021] by Dante Alighieri – ★★★★★

“Here is a deity stronger than I; who, coming, shall rule over me”. Translated by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, La Vita Nuova is Dante’s early work dedicated to his beloved Beatrice, a noblewoman. Part autobiographical narrative and part poetry, the book is about this Italian poet’s joy and anguish as he worships Beatrice and her image, dedicating poem after poem to her, and his narrative is filled with tenderness, wonder, and visions and premonitions of all kinds. Being purely platonic and much idealised, this is no ordinary love, especially since Dante allegedly met Beatrice only twice in his life (the first time when both of them were children). So, some in his immediate entourage expressed their scepticism about this otherworldly love of his: “To what end lovest thou this lady, seeing that thou canst not support her presence?” However, Dante had an answer. “Love governs [his] Soul”. In this work at least, Dante’s love is obsessive and transformative, but also pure and unselfish, and does not depend on his beloved being near or reciprocating, though the torment of not seeing her and then seeing her pass to the “otherworld” of Angels is too much to bear (“The look she hath when she a little smiles/Cannot be said, nor hidden in the thought; ‘Tis such a new and gracious miracle” [Dante/Rossetti, Pan Macmillan, 1294/2021: 47]). This is Dante’s soul-crying, soul-searching work; a powerful, moving evocation.

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Review: The City and the Mountains by Eça de Queiróz

The City and the Mountains [1901/2008] – ★★★★★

“…and in life, only the soul matters” [Eça de Queiroz/Costa, Dedalus, 1901/2008: 174].

Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa, The City and the Mountains is de Queiroz’s much later novel about the life of Portuguese nobleman Jacinto de Tormes, as told from the perspective of his best friend Zé Fernandes. The novel starts in Paris, France (the City) and ends in Tormes, Portugal (the Mountains), presenting a vivid contrast between the busy, money and technology-driven Parisian lifestyle, on the one hand, and the quiet, simple, filled with natural beauty, mode of life in the countryside, on the other. As important as this duality is also the psychology of Jacinto de Tormes, a man of great means and even bigger opportunities. However, it turns out that it is not so easy to figure out the purpose of a thing called Life and the quest for ultimate knowledge may not lie in the most obvious of places. Thus, this charming book on duality and human transformation is many things: a delicate city satire, a study of fin de siècle societal eccentricities, a heart-warming presentation of lifelong friendship, and, finally, a lyrical tribute to the beauty of Portuguese countryside.

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Recent History Non-Fiction Reads: The Electric Chair, & Empireland

I. The Electric Chair: An Unnatural American History [1999/2009] by Craig Brandon – ★★★★

This book is on the history of one of “the elephants in the room” in the US – death penalty by electrocution. It talks in depth about the case of William Kemmler, a vegetable peddler from Buffalo, who became the first person to be executed by electric chair in America on 6 August 1890. Previously, Kemmler was convicted of murdering his common law wife Tillie Ziegler. It is this man, or rather his death, that became a pawn in the complex business and political game of inventors, investors, entrepreneurs and politicians, at the centre of which was the so-called “current war” waged by Edison (a proponent of the direct current (DC)) and Westinghouse (a proponent of the alternative current (AC)), both eager to prove that only their patented electricity was the way forward for American society, both for domestic and penal purposes.

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10 Novels I’ve Recently Added to My TBR

I. The Bell [1958] by Iris Murdoch

It is said that this “funny and sad novel is about religion, the fight between good and evil and the terrible accidents of human frailty.” The Bell should be right up my alley because I love stories that focus on small communities and morality. The synopsis reads: “A lay community of thoroughly mixed-up people is encamped outside Imber Abbey…A new bell, legendary symbol of religion and magic, is rediscovered“. At the same time, it appears that a number of characters also decide to either confront their partners or change their relationships status.

II. The Iliac Crest [2002/17] by Cristina Rivera Garza

Sometimes I am up for something subversive and unusual. The Iliac Crest is by Mexican author Cristina Rivera Garza who decided to explore the concepts of gender and identity, presenting in her story two women who come to an unnamed narrator’s house and start their questioning. “The increasingly frantic protagonist fails to defend his supposed masculinity and eventually finds himself in a sanatorium.” The novel has been called “haunting” and “otherworldly”, and I am sure there are many surprises along the way.

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Puccini’s Opera: Turandot

Turandot [1926]

Opera Turandot is set in Beijing, China and tells the story of proud Princess Turandot and unknown Prince Calaf. Turandot is a haughty Princess who wants to take revenge for a crime once committed against one woman in her ancestry line by condemning young princes from afar to their deaths. To achieve this aim, Turandot demands that every man that wants to marry her has to solve her three riddles. Whoever solves her three puzzles will become her husband, but if that person is unable to solve them – he will be executed. However, despite very probable deadly consequences of this trial-riddle imposed by the Princess, there is no shortage of young men willing to risk their lives since Turandot is very beautiful. Then, comes Calaf, a Prince travelling with his father Timur and a slave-girl Liu, and he will stop at nothing until he completes the challenge and wins the hand of Turandot. Turandot is an opera of extravagant displays, great passions and narrative contrasts and extremes. Puccini’s music diffuses Asian tones and makes use of powerful choirs, providing a kaleidoscopic musical experience, with the heart-wrenching final-act aria “Nessun dorma” rightly deserving its place among the finest operatic arias ever.

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Dreaming in Art: 5 Fantastical Paintings

The mystery of dreams and dreaming has been fascinating artists since ancient times. Many famous artists (from Hieronymus Bosch, Francisco de Goya and William Blake to Gustav Klimt, René Magritte and Salvador Dalí) had tried to give life and form on canvas to the wondrous and bewildering nature of dreams. Whether taking folklore, mythology or biblical scenes as their main themes, artists’ greatest challenge was to enable the easy differentiation in the painting between the waking and the dreaming lives of their subjects. Below is just a snippet of this fascinating art tradition.

I. The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of/Dreams [1858] by John Anster Fitzgerald 

John Anster Fitzgerald (1819 – 1906) was a British painter of the Victoria era known for producing detailed, colourful artwork depicting various mythological figures: fairies, ghouls, demons, and also effects of drug-consumption. Dreams is just one of his paintings that depicts a young girl sleeping and seeing dreams. Those dreams “materialise” around her in this piece, showing various mischievous spirits playing musical instruments at the foot of the girl’s bed, while the more benevolent ones dance in the painting’s background, encircling the girl’s most pleasant dream of forming a couple with a (real or imagined) man she loves. The girl’s chic dress is probably also a part of her dream, and the red drapery around the girl’s bed work almost as stage curtains further emphasising the effect of an ongoing performance.

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Recent Reading: Short Stories

I. Xingu [1900] by Edith Wharton – ★★★★★

In this story, one intellectual reading club is led by one Mrs. Ballinger and composed of a number of ladies of distinction, i.e. “huntresses of erudition”, “who pursue Culture in bands, as though it were dangerous to meet alone”. Mrs. Ballinger is the epitome of proper behaviour, but is also described as having a “mind [like an] hotel where facts came and went like transient lodgers, without leaving their address behind, and frequently without paying for their board”. Mrs. Roby is the newest addition to this elite club who gained her entry by way of one gentleman’s recommendation. However, she does not seem to fit and does and says the wrong things. That is, until Mrs. Ballinger and the other ladies invite a respected female author Osric Dane to talk about her latest book and that “inadequate” Mrs. Roby asks Ms. Dane to comment on one supposed book titled “Xingu”. The uttering of that word “Xingu” is that Alice in Wonderland’s Unbirthday Party moment in this story which precedes changing power dynamics and the quiet, or maybe not so quiet, disintegration of the club’s supposed erudition.

Edith Wharton (The House of Mirth [1905]) could always be counted on to produce a fine satire of the upper-class. The haughtiness and self-absorption of the club, that focuses too much on what is “right” and “proper”, means that the ladies lose sight of the very culture and intellectual endeavours they are supposed to be pursing. They are necessarily restricted by the very “fine” social parameters within which they operate, and the goal to pursue culture and serious literature, which does require a level of open-mindedness, sits at odds with the club’s inflexible and discriminatory practices. Xingu must be among Wharton’s best short stories, being both caustically amusing and delightfully sarcastic.

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