A Lengthy Proposition.... and Jane Eyre

Well, long time no post. My apologies, but I have been caught up in life so to speak! Last weekend was our first wedding anniversary and we were busy celebrating that - but for the bulk of my absence I blame the ABC that waited until the end of the year to put all the good TV shows on.....The Vicar of Dibley, Monarchy, Beau Brummel, The Wind in the Willows have all been calling my name, leaving less time for reading and blogging. And tonight one of my absolute favourites - the Edinburgh Military Tattoo is on at 8:30....I just hope we get home from church in time.

Anyway, I have read a few books in the last couple of weeks which I want to briefly comment on. I saw Debs at War by Anne De Courcy yonks ago in a bookshop in Leura in the Blue Mountains. I was very tempted to buy it then, but held off - finally succumbing and buying it off the Book Depository. I am glad I did, because I enjoyed it. It is part of my pledge to my husband to read more non-fiction.

De Courcy starts off looking at what growing up in a privileged household was like in the 1920s, then how the girls made their debut into polite society. Then she looks at the options of war work available to the young women....the land army, the waafs, the Fany's, the ATS and factory work. I agreed with the sentiment of the girls that joined the waafs because of their nice uniform. I could see myself doing the same......the land army and ATS would definitely be out because I hate to get dirty. I found Debs at War a valuable read because it has provided me with an historical background for the many novels I read that are set in WW2. I will be on the look out for more of De Courcy's writing in the future.

Another non-fiction read was John Waller's The Real Oliver Twist - Robert Blincoe: A Life that Illuminates a Violent Age. I have had a newspaper cutting about The Real Oliver Twist pinned to my pin-up board since it was reviewed in The Australian last year. Still, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed reading it. I am gradually coming to the conclusion that I enjoy reading history books as long as they are domestic or social in nature.

Robert Blincoe was an orphan abandoned to St Pancreas Workhouse in the late 1790s. In an effort to cut down the cost of maintaining all the children in the workhouse, its governors started apprenticing them to trades - chimney sweeps and factory work. At age 7, Robert was apprenticed to a cotton mill in the north of England (when the original one closed he was indentured to another close by) . There he was physically abused, malnourished and worked half to death in very dangerous conditions. At age 21, with virtually no skills and a body twisted and deformed from the hard labour and poor food he was sent out into the world. What makes Robert an unusual parish apprentice is that he succeeded to make something of himself - rising to be solidly middle class. Yet, he did not forget those less fortunate than himself. He championed the rights of the young children working in factories... lobbying for ten hour days and educational rights. And, he saw his son go to Cambridge and become an Anglican rector....not many parish apprentices achieved that!

Another read (a very quick one) was Gerald Durrell's Golden Bats and Pink Pigeons. This is about his adventures in Mauritius trying to capture endangered species including skinks and pink pigeons. Durrell, as always, writes in a fun, witty style which means you just rollick through enjoying the story. I managed to pick this up in St Vinnie's for 20c....so I am sure you could find a copy at a charity shop without a problem.

Finally......and I have saved the best for last! How could I not have read this before? I am in complete horror that we didn't have this as a set text in high school - at a girls' school too. I have just read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. I was inspired to read it because ABC was showing the film adaptation and I always like to read the book before I watch the film. It is just brilliant. I think Jane is a spunky, inspiring heroine. This is definitely going down as one of my favourite reads ever!

Well, that wraps up my reading reports here. I can start posting afresh in the new year. I will be taking a break for a week as we are off to the Blue Mountains to relax in a cottage for a week. We are taking our darling dogs with us....so that relaxing descriptor might not be the most accurate.

Anyhow, I want to take this opportunity to wish my readers a wonderful and blessed Christmas. Travel safely if you are going away and I hope to hear from you in the new year.

JESUS IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON!

All Passion Spent

I have finished reading All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West. I don't want to say too much here as I am keen to join in the discussion over on Cornflower on the 15th of December. The book is wonderful and I would encourage anyone who hasn't read it to scout out a copy. The plot is basic - 90 year old Lady Slane's husband dies and, for the first time in her life she decides to do exactly what she wants to do, and retires to a tiny house in Hampstead. She is surrounded by a cast of wonderful characters: her bossy and disaproving offspring, her French maid (Genoux), her landlord (Bucktrout) and an eccentric millionaire who loved her when she was young (Mr FitzGeorge). Oh, but the writing is beautiful and Sackville-West captures human frailty so well. One passage that appealed to me (probably because I often find myself in precisely this situation at work):

She had always taken an enormous amount of trouble to disguise her ignorance from Henry. In the end she had learnt to succeed quite well, and he would disburdern himself of his political perplexities wiithout the slightest suspicion that his wife had long since lost the basis of his argument. She was secretly and bitterly ashamed of her insufficiency. But what was to be done about it? She could not, no, she simply could not, remember why Mr. Asquith disliked Mr. Lloyd George, or what exactly were the aims of Labour, that new and alarming Party. The most that she could do was to conceal her ignorance, while she scrambled round frenziedly in her brain for some recollected scrap of associated information that would enable her to make some adequate reply.

I also did some cooking during the week. I made MommyCoddle's granola recipe. The second time I have done so. It is just delicious. I like having it with greek yoghurt and fresh berries. It makes a great start to the day.

As I mentioned in my last post, we have decorated the house for Christmas. I thought I would share a picture of our Christmas tree.




















And, because we finally got a picture of our dogs TOGETHER (very difficult) I will share that too. Abby is the one on my lap and Monty is seated in front - looking a little stunned!

Well, I am off to have lunch and then indulge in a lazy afternoon with my latest read Debs at War by Anne De Courcy. I am about half way through and it is brilliant (my kind of history book). But, more on that later.

Weekend Ramblings

We had a brilliant weekend here, though not much reading got done. We had a theatrical bonanza on Saturday. First we went to see the Sydney Symphony perform the film music of John Williams. The first half of the programme featured music from, inter alia, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, Jurrasic Park and E.T.. I loved the violin solo from Schindler's List, and now I really want to see the movie. The second half was solely music from the Star Wars films.

Then in the evening we went to see the Australian Ballet perform The Nutcracker. The Australian Ballet has purchased the rights to the coreography, sets and costumes from the Birmingham Royal Ballet. I absolutely loved the ballet, and if the whole season wasn't sold out would be going to see it again. The costumes were amazing, and the sets sumptuous. And, of course, the dancing brilliant. I might be biased (as she is a fellow West Australian), but I thought Madeline Eastoe as the Sugar Plum Fairy was amazing!

We also got into the festive spirit and put up our Christmas tree, nativity scene and christmas candles. I love Christmas!! I know that you technically are supposed to put up the tree on Christmas Eve and take it down on Epiphany, but 12 days of decorations aren't enough for me; so I favour putting it up at the start of Advent!

I have finished reading the final Maisie Dobbs - Messenger of Truth by Jacqueline Winspear. As I have come to expect it was a good read. Maisie investigates the murder of artist Nick Bassington-Hope - well known for painting provocative scenes of real people.

I am now reading All Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West for Cornflower's book group. I am about half way through and it is brilliant! Can't wait to join the forum to discuss it.

An Open Book...

And, finally, though I know that three postings in one night are a little excessive, but I do like to be on top of my read books pile! Anyway, I haven’t posted in over a week so I am in deficit overall! I have just finished An Open Book – the autobiography of Monica Dickens. If you have visited this blog before then you probably know that I love Monica’s writing. This is written in the same easy style. It traces her life from her parent’s home in London, to school at St Paul’s, her time as a Cook General, wartime service as a Nurse and in factory work, a five year period where she lived alone in the country, and finally her marriage and new life in America with her US navy husband, Roy.

Monica’s family seem to feature the same cast of eccentric characters as inhabit her books. Consequently, I found this a really quick, enjoyable read. There were lots of references to her work, providing context as to why she had written about a particular setting, or a particular theme. I kept yelping while I read because she would tell a story and I would be sure I knew in which book it appeared! And, as an interesting aside, she wrote One Pair of Hands in the space of three weeks. How’s that for speed writing.

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont

I saw Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont last year when it came out in the cinemas. The first thing that appealed to me about the film was its title – I went to school in a suburb called Claremont! Anyway, I found the film just delightful and, when I discovered the book of the same name, I was keen to read it. Fast forward a year, and my copy arrives from Book Depository. I dived straight in.

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont was written by Elizabeth Taylor. (oh, and I note another of her books has been made into a film and is showing now – Angel ). Mrs Palfrey moves to a hotel in London – The Claremont – when her husband dies. At the hotel are a number of other long term elderly residents. The outlook from hotel is bleak, the quality of the company questionable and the food is awful – there does not seem to be much for Mrs Palfrey to look forward to. That is, until she takes a tumble outside the door of Ludo’s basement flat. Ludo is an aspiring writer who becomes her surrogate grandson; invited to meals at the Claremont and doted on. The relationship is cemented to such an extent that, Mrs Palfrey having introduced Ludo to the other Claremont residents as her grandson, when Mrs Palfrey’s real grandson visits the Claremont the other residents turf him out as an impostor!

The book is just beautiful; sad in parts, but poignantly happy in others. Elizabeth Taylor is an exquisite writer and I definitely plan to read more of her work. Still, the novel left me thinking about what old age means when you are alone and I was reminded of a quote from the 1960s film The Trouble with Angels which stared Haley Mills. After visiting an old people’s home at Christmas the young Haley Mill’s character says to Mother Superior “I want to die young, and very, very wealthy”. Well I don’t want to die young, but I am not sure being the last one standing is all that desirable either!

Hester's Story

My Mum bought me Hester’s Story by Adele Geras when we went to a recent trash and treasure in a nearby village. She thought I would enjoy it because it is about a ballet dancer; and I do ballet. My enforced absence from my blog over the last week and a bit has actually been because of ballet – as I was very busy in the lead up to my ballet school’s concert. Hester’s story oscillates between two time periods: Hester’s youth in the 1930s/1940s and the mid 1980s. Hester (real name Estelle) was born in France where her mother, a ballet dancer, died giving birth to her. Her Father despised her, blaming her for her mother’s death. She did, however, have a very treasured relationship with her Grandmother – who raised her.

At age 6 her Father sends her to live in England with her Mother’s cousin, who has a daughter of a similar age. She is very unhappy there, until a strange Russian woman moves into an old house on the village edge. It turns out that the woman is ballet teacher and, after discovering Hester’s innate talent, commits to teaching her free of charge. Eventually, when she is 14 Madame Olga gets Hester a placement at a London ballet company, where she rises to be a principal. Her achievements are compromised when she begins an affair with a married patron of the ballet company and falls pregnant.

Fast forward to the 1980s and Hester is now retired and running an annual ballet festival (in Madame Olga’s old house). Each Christmas one choreographer is invited to come and stage a work. This year it is Hugo Carradine and his company. He is involved with Claudia, his prima ballerina; though their relationship is fraught. Actually, Claudia is a singularly nasty piece of work and behaves appallingly towards her daughter – who has accompanied her. It soon becomes clear that the past and present are very strongly intertwined. And there I must stop or I will give away the ending!

The Short Life & Long Times of Mrs Beeton

I have wanted to read The Short Life and Long Times of Mrs Beeton for quite a while. For some reason Mrs Beeton has always been an historical characterthat appealed to me. So, when I spotted a virtually untouched copy of thebook by Kathryn Hughes in the window of a second hand bookshop, I just hadto snap it up. I do not normally read historical non-fiction; and I am muchslower at reading it than I am at novel reading - save, Lady Chatterley's Lover where the dense writing took me an age to plough through. Anyhow,to the book...

Isabel Mayson married Sam Beeton in 1857 He gave her syphilis on their honeymoon - how generous! Sam had worked in publishing since he was a young teenager and, by the time of his marriage, was publishing a number of magazines including the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine. Soon after their marriage, Isabel became an active contributor to the magazine editing the cooking and fashion sections. Isabel suffered a seriesof miscarriages and lost her first little boy at only a few months of age (all symptoms of the syphilis from which she was, unknowingly, suffering). It was around this time that Sam suggested (perhaps as a distraction) that Isabel compile a book of household hints. Compile is the right word here because the book was copied either verbatim or with very loose paraphrasing from existing references. Occasionally, passing acknowledgement was given to the information's original source but, for the most part, Isabel's resources went unacknowledged. Originally the book was published in parts and it was only after Isabel's death at the age of 28 (in childbirth) that it was published as a complete volume.

One of the recurring themes in the book was class. Isabel Beeton's grandparents came from working class backgrounds. By the time Isabelwas born her grandparents and hence parents had made it solidly into thelower middle class. Her father died when Isabel was only 5 and her mother remarried - Mr Dorling, a man who was up-and-coming in the racing world. Mr Dorling's skill in managing the Epsom racetrack brought the family considerable wealth and improved their social status to such an extent that they became 'upper middle class'. Isabel's grandmother had worked in the family business, but her mother did not (a mark of her class). In marrying Sam and, by necessity,working in his business Isabel was perceived by her family to have slipped in social standing. But, Kathryn Hughes points out that it was precisely this 'slip' that allowed Isabel to use her talents in writing and finance (she was the money manager for Sam's business).

Interestingly, given its lasting fame, Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management was not an instant hit. Indeed, when Sam became bankrupt and had to sell off his titles in the late 1860s he seems not to have placed any value on Mrs Beeton's book. It was only about 20 years after it was written, and a number of appendages later, that the book began to be as recognised as it is today.