Books do furnish a room

The stories and essays of Mina Loy Mina Loy packed a lot into her life and to say it was colourful and interesting would be an understatement. She was involved with modernism, futurism, avant-garde; she wrote poetry, a novel, short stories, essays. Loy had friendships with Gertrude Stein and Djuna Barnes. Her disillusionment with futurism led to her writing a feminist manifesto in 1914. Her friendships ranged widely across Europe and the US and included Ezra Pound, William Carlos Williams, Man Ray, Marianne Moore to name but a few. She had a relationship with Arthur Cravan (a Dadaist poet-boxer (I’m not making this up) on the run from conscription). I recently discovered a novel about their relationship and his mysterious disappearance called Shadow Box by Antonia Logue. This collection is a really mixed bag. There are lots of fragments and parts of essays and stories. There is a score for a ballet (very bizarre), a couple of short plays (the unfinished The Sacred Prostitute which satirises the subjugation of women is very good), brief essays on Stein and Havelock Ellis, essays on censorship, the atom bomb, metaphysics and aesthetics to name but a few; and a whole collection of short stories. There is a good overview of Loy’s thinking over the years. The work from her modernist period is very good and her dissection of D H Lawrence is delicious (“the almost lyrical prose of Women in Love”). I found some of the more philosophical stuff a little tiresome and some of the later material does not have the punch of the early work. There is none of the poetry here, although Loy writes many of her short stories in a poetic way and she did write a novel which was published posthumously. This collection is a good introduction to Loy and the prose is excellent. 8 out of 10 Starting Afternoon of a Good Woman by Nina Bawden

Interim by Dorothy Richardson Interim is the fifth novel in Dorothy Richardson’s Pilgrimage series. Much of this instalment revolves around Miriam’s place of residence. Her landlady, Mrs Bailey has changed from running a lodgings to a boarding house. The difference being the provision of food for her boarders. This means social interaction and Miriam has to mix with her fellow inmates. They are a mixed bunch; several Canadian doctors in London to study for the summer, Mr Mendizabal (a Spaniard) and Miss Dear pops up again briefly. There is plenty of social interaction, but nothing really happens, which of course is one of the joys of Richardson. The author has time to explore relationships, interactions and Miriam’s interior life. Because movement is slow and the changes imperceptible, it is easy to miss how little Miriam has changed since the beginning of the series. Miriam is living an independent life and her challenging of the norms of society is a silent and gradual process. The challenge of keeping going such a detailed and comprehensive analysis and study of one character over such a series of work is quite an achievement, which makes it all the more surprising that Richardson isn’t rated alongside Joyce, Proust and the like. An interesting aside that is worth considering is the background setting of the novels. London was not just any city; it was the Imperial capital, the hub of Empire. It is easy to forget the impact of the empire on everyday life. Chyrssa Marinou’s article in the Richardson Journal looks at the traces of Imperial influence in her work using Edward Said’s notion of “unembarrassed cultural attention” to the empire. Metropolitan life contained all sorts of people who had travelled, been employed abroad or at home as a result of Empire. It pervaded much of metropolitan life at an almost subconscious level. Richardson uses Kipling three times in The Tunnel (Gunga Din, On the Road to Mandalay and the Ballad of East and West). We forget how much Kipling was part of the cultural landscape; Barrack Room Ballads was published in 1892 and reprinted over fifty times in the next thirty years. It isn’t immediately clear how Richardson/Miriam reacts to empire; the middle classes imbibed it from early childhood. In Interim Miriam has experience of meeting the Canadian doctors who stay at her boarding house. The descriptions of rooms and furniture also add extra weight to the imperceptible influence of empire (the picture of Queen Victoria with her Hindu servants). Richardson has managed to maintain her very high standards, continuing to make the point that women’s experience and work has validity. 8 out of 10 Starting the next in the series; Deadlock

Women are different by Flora Nwapa This is the second novel I have read by Flora Nwapa; she has a particular writing style, making her point by telling a story. This novel is about a group of Nigerian women who go to secondary school together from 1945; Dora, Agnes, Rose and to a lesser extent Comfort. They are pretty much contemporary with Nwapa and in telling their stories she also tells the story of Nigerian women through the end of the colonial period, to independence in 1960, civil war in 1967-1970 and into the 1970s. This is the story of struggle, falling in love, betrayal, loss, corruption, disillusion, hope and the sheer ordinariness of having to make a living. It is an insight into the lives of Nigerian women; this time Nwapa’s setting is not rural but urban and concerns women who have worked hard to gain an education. There is a dilemma because the education was in reality a western one and their main teacher was a white western woman there as a missionary. This creates an inner division and a tension with older traditions. Two of the women reflect towards the end of the book that perhaps their education did not prepare them for the lives they had lead. The role of the men in this novel is necessarily limited given the subject matter, but most of them are notable for betrayal, disappearing for months and years on end and being generally useless. The role of women in society and community is what Nwapa is really concerned with and how culture and tradition passes from one generation to another. The three women who have children discover these tensions for themselves as their mothers before them did. What Nwapa emphasizes most of all is the need for women to be economically independent, so that if their marriages or relationships go wrong they are not dependent. Contrast Rose and Comfort in the novel. Rose has followed the mores of the western education, she has not married despite several courtships, but has got her degree and has a very good job. Comfort on the other hand has determined not to get emotionally involved and has gone into relationships for money and not love, leaving when she needs to and living life to the full. Dora is forced into an arranged marriage to a husband who does not love her and Agnes marries her school sweetheart. When it comes to post-colonial nation building and recovery from the civil war Nwapa is pointing towards a society based on feminine/feminist approaches to community rather than the oppressive alternative. The women dissent from society’s norms at one level, but all are in one way or another focussed on the institution of marriage as a means to an end and as the appropriate way (ultimately) to relate to men. That is the starting place, but by the end of the novel you can see a change and one of the characters is able to say that marriage is not the only way. You can also see this attitude shifting in their children; Nwapa sees change occurring over generations and gradually. Nwapa creates strong female characters who are courageous, competent, hard-working and independent; they reject oppression and mistreatment in men. They seek men who will collaborate with them and not oppress them and all too often they do not find. Nwapa is a great novelist and so little read in the west. 9 out of 10 Starting Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age by Bohumil Hrabel

Scoop by Evelyn Waugh I’ve read little Waugh apart from Brideshead Revisited, which I loved; Waugh is writing there about the decline of the upper classes and writing about people he knew. This is a comic novel about Journalism and the newspaper industry and is a very effective satire. Lord Copper, the tyrannical and megalomaniac newspaper boss was said to be based on Lord Northcliffe, but was probably also part Beaverbrook and Hearst. The story is based on Waugh’s experiences working for the Daily Mail as a foreign correspondent covering Mussolini’s invasion of Abyssinia in 1935. Ethiopia is changed to the imaginary state of Ishmaelia. Lord Copper owner of the Daily Beast has learnt that something is going on in Ishmaelia. As his best correspondent has recently transferred to the Daily Brute, he is in need of a new one. A certain Mr John Boot, a writer, is recommended. As it happens William Boot writes an obscure countryside column for the paper. He is mistakenly called to London and given the job. Boot is sent to Ishmaelia with large amounts of useless luggage, where he meets lots of other journalists, including Americans and French. They look for communists and fascists and for the promised civil war. Of course little is going on so the journalists make it up. William has adventures, falls briefly in love. William also has his moment when something actually does happen. There is a good cast of supporting characters; many of whom are based on people Waugh knew. The character of William Boot is said to be loosely based on Bill Deedes who had been with Waugh covering the situation in Abyssinia. Deedes was 22 at the time and his newspaper had sent him out with a quarter of a ton of baggage. Deedes spent the next 65 years denying this! This is a funny and well written novel and was in the Observer list of the one hundred greatest novels of all time. The satire of the newspaper industry still has relevance today and is very pertinent. However there are problems for me with the whole. This was written in 1938 and one would expect with a robust writer like Waugh some issues with language. That is an understatement; Waugh is anti-Semitic and racist and his approach to other races is execrable. He was a clear believer in hierarchy and very misanthropic. Cyril Connolly referred to him as a permanent adolescent. Christopher Hitchens has argued that Waugh’s many faults, dislikes and contempt for other human beings makes his cruelty funny as a novelist and writer. I remain unconvinced and Orwell (who was an exact contemporary) made a more thoughtful comment in some notes for an unwritten essay on Waugh; Waugh was “almost as good a novelist as it is possible to be . . . while holding untenable opinions” Waugh’s satire of tabloid journalism and its complacent corruption is still prescient, but his attitudes and opinions are awful 6 out of 10 Starting Mr Norris Changes Trains by Christopher Isherwood

Thank you Tracey Larry's Party by Carol Shields This is the first novel by Carol Shields that I have read (I still need to read The Stone Diaries). It is set mainly in Canada and the protagonist is Larry Weller. We follow Larry from about 1976 when he is 26 until 1997. It is thematic and each chapter looks at a different aspect of Larry’s life, through his two marriages, being a father, work, sex and so on. Often we see events at a distance as significant events seem to take place between chapters. The last chapter rounds off the whole with a dinner party. Shields is writing a man’s life and looking at sections of that life over 20 years and doing a remarkably good job. Shields focuses a good deal on work, the way it can fulfil and its importance. Larry starts off working in a flower shop and moves on to become a maze designer (he got his passion for mazes from his first honeymoon in England, getting lost in Hampton Court Maze). Many of the minor characters are also defined by what they do and there is dignity in work. The whole novel is a little like the mazes that Larry designs with lots of paths and byways but pretty much ending up where you started. As Eliot said; “And the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time” There is a circularity about the whole It’s a good story with some interesting reflections on what it is like to be a man. I think Shields is subverting traditional notions of masculinity (some of which probably only exist in men’s minds) and positing multiple masculinities which are more fluid and ambivalent. Larry’s experience is one of anxiety combined with inadequacy. He is certainly not a “master of the universe”. Shields challenges the traditional male notions of aggression, rationality and control; these are dead ends in the maze. Shields is also playing with traditional modes of biography and identity in complex ways. There is a lost and found and doubling back sense that you would find in a maze. There is some repetition and you move from chapter to chapter, but there is a sense of building rather than repeating. One critic has described this as postmodern biographical fiction. Shields plays on a feeling of ordinariness and an unexpected social mobility (it is mostly rich people who want mazes). Larry wonders how he has moved so far from being the son of a working class craftsman. The move has disoriented him and there are tensions between the masculinities he was brought up with and the more middle class ones of his middle age. Usually biography and autobiography consolidate and reinforce the notion of self which has been developed by Western thought (read Western white male thought). Phyllis Rose has argued that biography is a tool by which the dominant society reinforces its values. Shields questions those values quite consciously by providing a protagonist who is unsure, a little muddled and unstable, not a subject of public acclaim. Nina van Gessel argues this is an essentially feminist type of biography. And on top of all that; Larry is rather likeable. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting The Modern Woman Revisited; Paris between the wars

Laughing Torso by Nina Hamnett Nina Hamnett wrote these memoirs in 1932 when she was 42. She was primarily a painter and a painter’s model and was part of the modernist movement; moving between Paris and London from about 1910 to 1925 (with several forays to the south of France and Brittany). She has also been described as avant-garde and bohemian. The memoirs are engaging, rather self-deprecating and frank. Hamnett also manages to be discreet at the same time, not naming some of those closest to her, or just using initials or nationalities. When published the memoirs received a great deal of publicity and caused some scandal. She (and her publishers) were sued by Aleister Crowley for some factual statements about his activities in Sicily. Crowley lost and then tried to bribe the publishers not to reprint the book. Hamnett lived life to the full during these years and shares some of the flavour of her life. She doesn’t focus a great deal on her private life; affairs with men and women and mixing with artists, musicians and writers on both sides of the channel. She focuses on her grown up life and sketches over her abusive father. This was written at about the same time as Gertrude Stein’s memoirs of the same period, The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas. Although both have a huge cast of characters, they are very different in that Hamnett is at the fringes of her own story whereas Stein is at the centre. The cast of characters are as you would expect and include Modigliani, Cocteau, Radiguet, Sickert, Nancy Cunard, various Sitwells, Roger Fry, Carrington, most of the Bloomsbury group and many more who were better known then than now. Nina Hamnett is an engaging narrator who has a great generosity of spirit and the circles she moves in are varied and interesting. She is often short of resources (that’s why she wrote the memoirs), but is resourceful. The sadness of her later life is foreshadowed a little, but her follow up memoirs are more difficult to find. If you are interested in London and Paris bohemian circles in this period this is a must read. 8 out of 10 Starting Women are Different by Flora Nwapa

Lady into Fox by David Garnett A very odd little novella. It was written by David Garnett, part of the Bloomsbury scene as a result of his affair with Duncan Grant. It was written in 1922 after they had broken up and was dedicated to Grant. It won the James Tait Black prize and the Hawthornden prize. The woodcuts in the original were by Garnett’s then wife Rachel. Later in life Garnett married Angelica Bell, daughter of Vanessa Bell. The story is a simple one; a fable or fairy tale. Richard Tebricks marries Silvia Fox and they are happy. One day whilst walking in the woods Mrs Tebricks turns into a fox. After the initial shock (on both sides!) Mr Tebricks continues to look after and care for his wife. He dismisses the servants and shoots the dogs and devotes his time to his wife. Initially little changes, his wife eats the same things, plays cards; he dresses her in altered clothes and it’s all very odd. Imperceptibly things begin to change. Mrs Tebricks becomes less comfortable with clothing, chases the ducks near the pond, her eating habits begin to change and she begins to look at their pet dove in a hungry way. All of these changes grieve Mr Tebricks who does not comprehend the growing desire to be wild, but he adapts. As time goes on, nature takes its course and the fox becomes feral and leaves the home. Mr Tebricks descends into depression, curses God and his fate and searches the countryside for his wife. His wife turns up at the door one day and leads him to an earth where she has cubs. He finds a new lease of life playing with the cubs for some months; despite inevitable jealousy about his wife having found a dog fox. Some time is also spent avoiding the local hunts and the ending is inevitable and tragic. The novella was written only seven years after Kafka’s Metamorphosis. It lends itself to many interpretations. It could be a paean to the enduring power of love; a fable with the moral being that if you love someone you must set them free; a controlled and rather straightjacketed masculinity trying to cope with a wilder untamed femininity; a tale about how convention can restrict and constrain; a warning about how relationships are never static and subject to change in one of the parties that might mean their destruction; don’t hold onto something when you know it is over. And so on. It may, of course, also be reflection on Garnett’s relationship with Duncan Grant. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting Scoop by Evelyn Waugh

Medieval Women by Eileen Power This would have been Eileen Power’s magnum opus had she lived to complete it. Sadly she died of heart failure at only 51 in 1940. She had been working on a book about medieval women for many years; on the way writing about the wool trade, nunneries and medieval people. Here we have her notes and part finished work on women, put together after her death. Eileen Power herself is an interesting character, going to Girton College Cambridge on a scholarship and an early supporter of the suffragettes. She taught at Cambridge and the LSE, pushing to include women’s history in the curriculum and to modernise the teaching of medieval and economic and social history. After the First World War Power won a prestigious travel scholarship (the first woman to do so). Not without some opposition. Power wrote of her interview with Sir Cooper Perry, the Vice Chancellor of London University; “Sir Cooper Perry obviously did not take women’s work very seriously (or perhaps it was me he didn’t take seriously!) One of his obiter dicta was “I have often been amused by women historians; so many of the springs of human action must be hidden from them.” He also suggested that I might defeat the objects of the trust (sic) by subsequently committing matrimony, so I suppose he keeps his wife in purdah: anyway these silly remarks would not be made to male candidates.” Nevertheless Power got the scholarship and spent time travelling in China and India. She saw the aftermath of the Amritsar massacre, met Ghandi and attended the Nagpur Congress. Power also mixed in bohemian and intellectual circles in London. She was a member of the well-known Gargoyle Club, but resigned because when she was showing Paul Robeson around London, he was refused admittance. Power was a good historian with a wide range of interests who opened a window on the lives of medieval women. This work has chapters on nunneries, education, noblewomen, working women and the medieval conception of women. There is a great deal to learn from this book and Power explodes some of the myths about medieval women, examining the two main sources of ideas about women; the Church and the Aristocracy. She acknowledges that it is very difficult to gain significant information about the lives of the labouring poor; but Power was one of the early pioneers using paleology and detailed court and church records to glean small amounts of information. There is interesting reflection on the cult of Mary and the ideas surrounding courtly love. The ideas relating to priories and nunneries being spaces for women are interesting. More interesting was the information about Christine de Pizan (1364-1430), a writer. She was married at 14, had three children and was a widow at 25. She had to support her family (including her mother) and did it by writing. She entered into controversies with male writers about the role of women and wrote books in defence of women and advising women. Simone de Beauvoir commented that de Pizan’s work is “the first time we see a woman take up her pen in defence of her sex". She also collaborated with other women. Power brings to light parts of history previously overlooked. 8 out of 10 Starting The Love Child by Edith Olivier

W h o r e s for Gloria by William T Vollman This is my first Vollman; an easy way in I thought because it is short. I should have known better because it raises all sorts of issues and defies neat classification. The novel is a series of vignettes and short chapters. The main protagonist is Jimmy, who is a Vietnam veteran; middle-aged and living in a flophouse, surviving on his regular cheque and spending much time drinking in bars. It is set in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. Jimmy is obsessed with Gloria, who seems to be an idealised woman (possibly a prostitute, or maybe not) who he may or may not have known in his past. He pays a variety of prostitutes; some for sex, others for stories, sad and happy. He starts to build a composite picture of Gloria from stories, memories and individual character traits and physical attributes of the women he meets. He even asks for a lock of hair. Gloria is usually almost within reach for Jimmy, but just beyond what he can conceive and bring to reality. Vollman has done his research, at the back of the book is a glossary of terms (necessary) and he interviewed many prostitutes in the Tenderloin area as part of his research. There are notes on these interviews at the back of the book and these make the book more powerful being authentic voices. There is also a price list for the period 1985-88. We follow Jimmy in his encounters with prostitutes, some of whom are transvestites and transgender. Other characters include the barmaids in various bars, a number of pimps and Code Six, Jimmy’s Vietnam buddy who is even worse off than Jimmy, living in an alley. This is not a novel in the same genre as American Psycho et al; the difference being that Vollman clearly has great compassion for those who inhabit the world he draws. John Rechy has drawn a comparison with Don Quixote with Gloria as Dulcinea and in an odd sort of way I can understand that. This is the first of a trilogy and it has been noted that Vollman does seem to focus on prostitution quite a lot. When asked about this he makes a point about it being an intersection between love, sex and money and contends that in terms of our materialistic society prostitutes do openly what the rest of society do covertly and so by looking at them we see ourselves more sharply. This is in a way a love story; the language is very strong and the descriptions vivid. The women who work as prostitutes are portrayed with understanding and warmth. It is never really clear whether Gloria is real and in some ways Jimmy is also a composite of one of the denizens of the area. It could be a ghost story. It is all the more powerful because of the knowledge that many of the stories Vollman uses are real. Vollman clearly has a strong moral sense. The pimps, although as lost as everyone else, are using the structure and agency society gives them to control the women; backed up of course by physical violence. It is moving and harrowing and very bleak. Vollman leaves open a lot of questions about gender relations and how men and women negotiate relationships. But he does leave the reader with some explanation; “For we must all build our worlds around us, bravely or dreamily, as long as we can shelter ourselves from the rain, walling ourselves in gorgeously” 9 out of 10 Starting Lady into Fox by David Garnett

The Tunnel by Dorothy Richardson This is the fourth in Dorothy Richardson’s Pilgrimage series. Coincidentally I am reading another book of the same title by William Gass. This one stands well in comparison and this series gets better and better. We continue to follow the protagonist Miriam as she becomes more independent. As ever the plot is irrelevant and mostly absent and we see life through Miriam’s eyes. By now Miriam is 21; she has taken a job as a dental assistant with Dr Hancock, a family friend. She also goes into lodgings with Mrs Bailey and makes some new women friends, Jan and Mag and also the consumptive Miss Dear. Miriam also begins to move in more interesting circles with Hypo Wilson and his friends. Hypo Wilson is a very thinly disguised H G Wells (Richardson knew him well). Miriam also falls in love with the bicycle and there are some good descriptions of discovering the freedom that cycling can bring. Interestingly reviews from Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf were mixed and both made criticisms about structure and order, although the lack of structure didn’t really bother me. Richardson illustrates the new phenomenon of the single working woman; Miriam hasn’t lived in the family home until marriage, but has set out on her own and relies on her own resources. Miriam increasingly comes across as an independent thinker; rejecting religion, reading modern texts and not feeling the need to have a man in her life. She opts for an independent creative space despite the problems that raises for herself and others. Miriam is beginning to fall between the world she was brought up in with its traditional expectations of marriage and domesticity and the world of work. Miriam quite consciously is on a journey of rejecting marriage and motherhood in favour of writing and her own space and company. Miriam becomes more sceptical about men. Her experience with Dr Hancock is illustrative. They seem to have shared interests and attend lectures together and are friendly and informal. Friends of Dr Hancock point out that the relationship might be misinterpreted and he withdraws and becomes very formal. Miriam has a very amusing rant about men and the male gender. As her thoughts move and coalesce she begins to ask a basic question about the role of men and masculinity. What is also very interesting are the details of everyday life; little descriptive passages that make the novel much more interesting. The bike ride passage is wonderfully written and amusing. Miriam herself grows more interesting and by this time the reader is becoming more attached to her; it’s a great series. 9 out of 10 Starting the fifth book in the series, Interim.

On Beauty by Zadie Smith I find myself liking Zadie Smith more and more. The blurb about this wasn’t immediately promising; another novel about a middle-aged academic having an affair resulting in a family and personal crisis. However, there is much more going on. Smith herself has acknowledged that it is an Homage to Howard’s End. The author creates a multitude of voices, all interesting in their own right. It is set in a fictional American university town, Wellington (a thinly disguised Harvard). The novel revolves around the Belsey family; Howard, the white male academic described earlier, his African-American wife Kiki and their three children, Zora, Levi and Jerome. Howard is a left wing (ish) liberal and he has an academic rival, Monty Kipps, a Trinidadian who is rather right wing (whilst writing this I am suddenly reminded of Naipaul who is Trinidadian and was a fan of Thatcher; but the resemblance ends there). Monty’s wife Carlene and Kiki become friends and the two families become entwined in a number of ways. The Belsey children are really well drawn. Smith captures the right level of warmth, hope, youthful verve and irritatingness for three teenage children. There is a warmth and humanity to all the characters, even Howard and Monty, both hypocrites. The university and academia types are brilliant and capture the machinations of academic life; thankfully there isn’t too much of them and usually the children take centre stage. Smith satirises everyone on all sides of the cultural divides we all inhabit; but without losing the warmth mentioned above. The politics of race and gender are handled here with great humour and Smith maintains a serious moral compass and shows the importance of connections in human relationships. There are some genuinely funny moments; Howard’s reaction to the glee club and his relating of it to his wife for example. There are also moments of great perception; Howard simply does not seem to understand the reactions to his infidelity. As for the second infidelity; it is breath-taking in its timing and inappropriateness. His family around him understand him all too well and let him know. This is a good comic novel, which has great humanity and is a seriously good read. 9 out of 10 Starting Larry's Party by Carol Shields

The Vet's Daughter by Barbara Comyns I think Barbara Comyns is something of a neglected genius, her novels are rather odd and this is the second one I have read. The Juniper Tree was based on a fairy tale and wove magic realism into social comment and the macabre. This novel is written from the point of view of Alice Rowlands, daughter of a Vet living in South London. Her father is brutal and cruel to Alice and her mother. Following her mother’s death he brings a rather brash girlfriend into the house. Alice is effectively a servant. She has few friends but is courted by Henry Peebles (known as Blinkers), who is kind to her. Alice moves to the coast to become housekeeper to Blinkers’ mother. Here she has a brief flirtation with a sailor. Strange things start to happen to Alice; she has to return to London and the oddness continues. To say more would give things away. This isn’t a ghost story; much earlier (written in 1959) it still has an element of magic realism, but could also be described as suburban gothic. Being set at a vets there are also plenty of animals and a rather creepy vivisectionist who visits to collect puppies. Comyns came up with the idea for this novel from a dream she had whilst staying in a cottage owned by Kim Philby (a friend of her husband’s). In the early 1930s she had been part of the bohemian scene in London, mixi ng with Dylan Thomas, Augustus John and others. Comyns is a unique writer; some of the grotesque are almost comic and many of the tragic scenes also have a comic element. Although there is fary tale and enchantment here; the theme is really concerning an evil; the treatment of Edwardian daughters and wives going on behind respectable front doors. Alice’s mother is entirely trapped with not a hope of escape and she withers away before Alice’s eyes. Alice is a tragic figure, innocent in a predatory world. The writing is clear and precise and the descriptions are excellent. Her characters are well drawn; even the monstrous ones, like Alice’s father are all too human. There are some unusual and deft touches; the undertaker arriving to measure Alice’s mother for her coffin whilst she is still alive. The pet monkey sitting in the fireplace wringing its hands, the rug which is the skin of a great dane. Watch out for a replay of the Passion story at the end with Alice as an innocent Christ figure and her father as the evil deity refusing to let the cup pass from her; it’s quite striking. I do wonder why Comyns isn’t better known. This is a sharp and very unusual analysis of the place of women in society and of violence against women, told in an original way. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting Medieval Women by Eileen Power

Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf: A very close conspiracy This is a very interesting book about Vanessa Bell and Virginia Woolf; it isn’t a joint biography. Dunn is looking at their relationship with and influence on each other over the years the rivalry and competitiveness as well as love and support. The relationship was certainly complex and as Dunn points out, symbiotic. This relationship was at the centre of Bloomsbury and to understand the whole Bloomsbury phenomenon you have to look at Vanessa and Virginia. The book is very informative and Dunn has accessed the mountains of letters and correspondence that surround the sisters. There are of course many lines of thought and areas of consideration and Dunn follows up some of them better than others. Dunn does consider Virginia’s sexual abuse at the hands of George Duckworth (her step-brother) and its effects over the years. There is some analysis, but I do wonder whether given the depth and intensity of Virginia’s depression, Dunn has underestimated its effect. She seems to think that the abuse certainly affected Virginia’s sexuality and sexual relations, but there seems to be too little connection made with the rest of life. Others have made this criticism as well and I think this could have been examined and interpreted in a wider way. Throughout the book Vanessa is portrayed as someone who is centred on maternal virtue and sexual fulfilment, especially in the 1910s and 20s; whilst Virginia is seen as the embodiment of the intellectual life. Dunn argues they each had these areas and when the other seemed to be encroaching on their own particular area, tensions ensued. This seemed to me to be an over-simplification. Dunn does explain and illustrate well the artist/writer relationship that the sisters had. Woolf’s writing style has been described as ekphrastic (the weaving in of descriptions of art or artwork which then becomes part of work of literature) and this works in tension with Bell’s visual aesthetic. The work of the Hogarth Press and Vanessa’s illustration of Virginia’s work is well outlined. Dunn does draw the portraits of those surrounding the sisters very well and there is quite a procession over the years. The importance of Duncan Grant to Vanessa and Virginia’s relationships with women like Vita Sackville-West are all explored. On the whole the book is interesting and there are lots of lines of thought to follow for those interested in Woolf and Bloomsbury. There are flaws (in my opinion), but it is interesting and informative. 7 out of 10 Starting The Stories and Essays of Mina Loy

Living, Loving and Lying Awake at Night by Sindiwe Magona “My great hope for African women is that one day they will come into their own. That is why I chose to write” Sindiwe Magona Sindiwe Magona started her writing career in her late 40s. In an interview she says that in the late 1980s she realised there were very few black women writers in South Africa (she counted 5 at the time) and she recalls being angry that other people were writing about what she and her people were going through. She decided that she must bear witness. You can find the interview in the Feminist Africa journal issue 13 (2009). This is a powerful collection of short stories which illustrate the experience of black women under the apartheid regime. They are written with strength and humour, but they have a very sharp edge and depict hope and tragedy in equal measure. Some are bleak and heart-breaking. There is a great (but controlled) ferocity in the anger at the injustice being described. The first group of stories are about a group of maids who work in domestic service in the homes of white South Africans. It reminded me a little of The Help, but much more powerful. Each of the group of maids speaks and imparts some of the particular habits of their own “Medem”. This is clearly written from experience, as Magona worked in domestic service when she was young. The rest of the stories are more diverse, but are all centred on Cape Town. Magone writes her characters really well, making it easier to highlight the systematic brutality of apartheid without having to put the political arguments into their mouths. This is well illustrated by the last story about the abolition of the pass laws (which occurred a little before the fall of the regime), when a family who are celebrating are pulled up by the mother of the family who tells a story which illustrates that the pass laws are merely a symptom; the roots of the injustice still exist. Magone is also very good at portraying children. She also tackles the issue of the abuse of women and how deep-rooted it is; a point she emphasizes in the interview I mentioned earlier. “The abuse of women is linked to our broken-ness, our de-basedness. I don’t know why we thought that just because we could vote in 1994, the de-basedness would vanish. The psychological wounding of racism and of the accompanying sexism will take a long time to heal. But we have to begin that journey.” When you read a great deal it takes something special to take your breath away and to shock (not in a negative way), but a couple of these stories are truly harrowing. This is a great collection of stories that deserve to be read and to be better known. 9 and a half out of 10 Starting W h o r e s for Gloria by William T Vollmann ( I had to spell out the title like that because I kept getting the first word changed to "ladies of the night"!! Very strange and not the title of the book)

Coming up for Air by George Orwell One of Orwell’s less well known novels; it is a rather bleak comic novel written and set in 1938/1939. It is a well written novel about nostalgia, the lower middle classes, relationships between men and women and middle age. Orwell is primarily a political writer and as he said himself, “Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism.” Given works like 1984 and Animal Farm, it isn’t surprising that this one can be forgotten. Coming up for Air is narrated by George Bowling; a man living in the suburbs with a wife and two children, in his late 40s and in an unexciting but stable white collar job. Orwell has always created his male leads with a strong sense of inadequate masculinity; some self-awareness, many and obvious faults. In terms of plot, at the beginning of the book George is bemoaning his lot, his wife, job and life. We then have the nostalgia where he recalls his childhood pre 1914 in the Edwardian era in a town called Lower Binfield. Later in the book George takes some holiday and without telling his wife goes back to Lower Binfield after a gap of 25 years to search for his past, which, of course, has disappeared. Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be. Some people have found George Bowling endearing; he isn’t. Orwell draws his caricature sharply. He is human, not a grotesque. But consider the point where George is laid on his bed and considering how women let themselves go after marriage; conning men to get to the altar and then suddenly rushing into middle age and dowdiness. This is from a man who is 45, fat, has false teeth and bad skin and wears vulgar clothes. Orwell is laying on the irony with a trowel. Late in the book George sees an old girlfriend from nearly 30 years previously. She has changed greatly and he barely recognises her (he inwardly reflects that she has aged badly without making the jump that she has not recognised him). George does have moments of clarity when he almost grasps how ridiculous he is, but not quite. The female characters are not well drawn and are feminine stereotypes, although Orwell does capture the monotony of suburban life. Usually Orwell’s female characters are more rounded (Julia in 1984), but the focus here is firmly on George Bowling and he certainly perceives the women around him in two-dimensional ways. Orwell is also satirising suburbia, he describes the road on which Bowling lives as a “line of semi-detached torture chambers”. Although Bowling dislikes his lot, he accepts it reluctantly, despite his brief foray into his past. Ever in the background is the threat of war; by this time war with Hitler was seen as inevitable and there is a sense of impending doom. George is aware that a good deal of what is around him will be destroyed, as the 1914-1918 war swept away the world of his childhood. Orwell also lets his own political feelings slip in occasionally and his description of a New Left Book Club meeting is very well drawn. It is a good read and has a deep vein of humour in the face of coming destruction. Not Orwell at his best, but certainly a different aspect of his work. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting Laughing Torso by Nina Hamnett

Starting The Albatross by Susan Hill A brief novella and four short stories from Susan Hill in her pre Woman in Black days. They all have an edge to them and are quite chilling and a little Gothic. They certainly are not cheerful. They are all, in one way or another about loneliness and isolation. Two of the stories, The Elephant Man and Friends of Miss Reece concern children, both about small boys. The Elephant Man concerns a small boy’s attempts to please his distant nanny, who was a Dublin Protestant who believed in the integrity of Unionism and the fact that all the worlds ills could be laid at the feet of men. Friends of Miss Reece concerns another small boy who often stays with his aunt who runs a nursing home. Miss Reece is a resident who the boy feels particularly attached to. He watches the ministrations of a particularly cruel nurse and observes the life and death of the residents as seen through the eyes of a child. Cockles and Mussels is set in an English seaside town with a rather genteel north bay and a somewhat racier south bay. It is clearly Scarborough, Hill’s home town. Avis Parson, a lonely spinster, lives in a genteel and fading guest house. She dreams of a trip out to the south bay to see more life. The guest house cook, Mrs O’Rourke, meanwhile goes out on the town most nights. The moral of this tale; beware of dodgy seafood!! Somerville concerns a man living alone in retirement in a rather splendid house in the country. He first sees the house as a small boy through its gates and decides he will one day buy it. After a successful career and planning retirement he sees the house is for sale and buys it; returning to it for the first time since childhood the day he moves in. He lives entirely alone. When a letter arrives (not a bill) he does not open it, remembering a previous letter many years ago which told him of the death of a friend. Into his life comes a young woman who is pregnant and has a grandmother who is dying in a local hospital. Somerville begins to realise how selfish and “wicked” it is to enjoy being alone as much as he does. What does he have to do to expiate for his selfishness. The novella, The Albatross is also set in a seaside town; this time it is clearly Aldeburgh. This being the case you cannot avoid Benjamin Britten and the whole thing is clearly loosely based on Peter Grimes. Duncan is 18 and lives with his mother. He knows nothing about his past or his father because his mother refuses to tell him. Duncan has a learning disability. His mother tells him he is useless and orders him around all the time. He has clearly been bullied at school and most of his contemporaries treat him with contempt or as a bit of a joke. He has a job at the big house, working in the gardens, where his boss does treat him with some respect. As does Ted Flint, a local fisherman, who tries to persuade Duncan to go out in the boats. A stormy night, a lifeboat disaster and an act of kindness leaves Duncan feeling he can now act for himself; what does he choose to do. Five interesting stories, a little slight, but looking at human isolation. They are very English and as you would expect form Hill, atmospheric. The novella was too formulaic for me, too predictable a rope to attach to the main character. However they read easily and it was fun spotting locations. 7 out of 10 Starting The Vet's Daughter by Barbara Comyns

Thank you Willoyd Margrave of the Marshes by John Peel and Sheila Ravenscroft John Peel is something of a national treasure in Britain and in the world popular music for his unceasing promotion of new music and unknown artists. Peel (real name John Ravenscroft) was a DJ for many years; in the US in the early 60s and then on pirate radio and finally the BBC form the late 60s until his death in 2004. Peel always promoted the odd, obscure and aspiring. He famously championed punk rock on his show after hearing the Ramones and was the first BBC DJ to do so. He was also a champion of reggae, hip-hop, garage, grime; the list is endless. He worked for the World Service and went on trips around the world where he picked up local music to promote on his shows. The list of bands that Peel supported and assisted to fame is enormous and impressive from Pink Floyd in the 60s to White Stripes in the early 2000s. He was a great supporter of live music and toured endlessly all over the country. I remember him from my university days turning up and playing stuff that you would not normally find on the radio. In later years he also had a radio programme on Radio 4 called Home Truths which was not musical at all. It gave a platform to ordinary people to talk about all sorts of aspects of their lives; funny, eccentric, poignant. Peel (despite his reservations) was a great interviewer and knew how to put people at their ease. This is part autobiography and part biography as Peel died before he finished it and it was completed by his wife Sheila. Peel’s part (by far the best part of the book) ends whilst he is in America and before his first marriage. The book does feel disjointed and the second part is rambling and overlong. Peel is very honest about his early years He was sent to public school (Shrewsbury) and describes (with the self-deprecating humour he is known for) the horrors he and others underwent. The sexual abuse of younger boys by older boys was routine and institutionalised and in Peel’s case went as far as him being raped by an older boy. There has been a good deal of soul-searching about the various child abuse scandals in Britain recently. The origins and history must be partially linked to what we have put our children through in times past; linked, of course to the nature of male sexuality. I must admit that Peel was a hero of mine; these days I don’t do heroes as everyone has feet of clay, as we all do. That brings me to the issues I have been skirting around. Peel married his first wife when she was 15 (he reportedly said he was misled about her age). He married in Texas and so the marriage was legal, Peel was ten years older. Peel also reports that because he was from Liverpool, when the Beatles broke in America he suddenly became very attractive to local teenagers. I know that in the 60s there was a much more lax attitudes to boundaries, but some of the stories and reports I have problems with. I know Peel married again and settled down to become a national treasure. It leaves me with questions about redemption; how do you atone for past misdeeds; what about the victims. It is a pity that Peel did not live long enough to answer some of these questions himself. All in all this feels like a very unsatisfactory review partly because I don’t have the answers. All I do know is that parts of this left a nasty taste and in some ways I wish I hadn’t read it. 6 out of 10 Starting Living, Loving and Lying Awake at Night by Sindiwe Magona

Honeycomb by Dorothy Richardson This is the third of the Pilgrimage novels. Miriam changes place of work again and becomes a governess for the Corrie family. In contrast to work is her family situation. Her two sisters marry and there are weddings to be endured. There is also the deteriorating mental health of her mother and this does closely reflect Richardson’s experiences with her own mother. It is worth recalling that Richardson was staying with her mother when her mother committed suicide (Richardson had gone out for a walk at the time). This must have had a profound effect and no doubt the working out of this will follow in later novels (the death takes place at the end of the novel). The description here is oblique, but very powerful; random impressions from Miriam, but no description of the death. Her mother’s state of mind is illustrated by this passage; “It is too late” said Mrs Henderson with clear quiet bitterness, “God has deserted me.” They walked on, tiny figures in a world of huge grey stone. “He will not let me sleep … he does not care.” Miriam is clearly out of her depth and her sheer inarticulateness in the face of her mother’s misery is a great piece of writing. Richardson is reflecting many years after her own mother’s death and has clearly read Freud and I think there is a classic description of repression of trauma at the end. I felt that Richardson was now getting into her stride in this third outing. The stream of consciousness sections were more prominent, especially later in the book and there were more gaps in the narrative. Miriam is clearly beginning to reject marriage as an option, having seen her sisters marry and clearly finds men very predictable and boring. The descriptions of life at the Corrie’s are interesting. There is a wonderful and brief vignette when Mrs Corrie and her friends are clearly fascinated by a scandal in London (the Oscar Wilde trial), but will not let the rest of the household into the secret, nor let them see the papers. Miriam finds something of an ally in the house in Mr Corrie, a rather dry and ironic lawyer who recognises Miriam’s sharp mind. Proust’s masterpiece (and it is a masterpiece) is still at the centre of the literary canon. There is also a great fuss at the moment about Knausgaard’s My Struggle (or My Saga, or Min Camp) novels which describe the minutiae of daily life in detail. He is the current literary darling. Yet it seems to me that women have been writing novels like this for decades. Richardson is a case in point. She is little known outside academic circles and died virtually unknown. They even got her name on her headstone wrong. Her middle name was Miller and on her headstone it says Miriam (I am assuming this was an error, but given that her heroine in Pilgrimage is Miriam, it may be rather an apt one.) This is turning into a brilliant series. Starting The Tunnel by Dorothy Richardson

The Waves by Virginia Woolf This is a wonderful novel; Woolf herself referred to it as a play-poem. Often when I’m thinking about a review I will read what others have written, do a bit of research about the context or author. In this case, that approach is not really possible because there is a whole industry around Woolf and her novels and people spend academic lifetimes on all this! Woolf said she was writing to a rhythm and not to a plot and the novel is a series of interludes and episodes revolving around six characters Susan, Jinny, Rhoda, Bernard, Louis and Neville. There is also Percival who does not feature in the novel, but is a focus for the others and whose early death in India has a significant effect on the others. Each character speaks over nine parallel episodes from childhood to late middle age. The wave metaphor appears and reappears and gives structure. Woolf tends to base her characters on people she knew and The Waves is no exception. Susan is Woolf’s sister Vanessa; Louis is most likely part Leonard Woolf and part T S Eliot; Neville is Lytton Strachey and possibly part Duncan Grant; Bernard creates some disagreement amongst critics who are split between Desmond McCarthy and E M Forster; Jinny is clearly part Woolf herself (Jinny was her father’s nickname for her), but also may be Kitty Maxse or Mary Hutchinson); Rhoda is also partly based on Woolf herself. The elusive and charismatic Percival around whom the group revolves is probably based on Thoby Stephen, Virginia’s brother, around whose memory the Bloomsbury group formed. Of course, this being Woolf, there are other views and some have argued that each of the voices/characters are actually part of Woolf herself and she is holding them in tension throughout, examining different parts of herself. She is certainly looking at the collective aspects of identity and the way the boundaries of identity merge and coalesce with that of the wider world. I think Woolf is in some ways thinking in a more musical or even symphonic way; as though each character were a different musical instrument, all combining to produce a greater whole. This fluidity and movement is also reflected in the descriptions of the waves, which are italicised and separate the nine parts of the novel. The sections relating to the waves cover one day, which is the whole lifetime of the characters. Percival represents solidity and reliability. The sort of certainty that the Empire, the upper middle classes and the Victorian and Edwardian era represented. It is no coincidence that Percival goes to India. His death represents the whole edifice crumbling and the innate uncertainty of life itself. It may represent Woolf’s feelings about the loss of her brother, her own distress at the abuse she endured at the hands of her step-brother, the cataclysm of the war, her own mental illness; nothing is sure. There have been critics who have argued that Woolf is being over mystical and visionary; but close reading does indicate that Woolf is making some political points as well; this is not far in time from A Room of One’s Own. She mocks the all-male public school system, particularly as it produces figures like Percival and is critiquing colonialism at the same time. The Waves is also Woolf’s reflection on the inexorable nature of death as Bernard sums up the whole thing in the closing pages. The end reminded me of Don Quixote astride Rocinante tilting at a windmill; the windmill being death. We all fling ourselves against “unvanquished and unyielding” Death; Woolf eventually chose how rather than wait for it. In “A Sketch of the Past” Woolf said “that the whole world is a work of art; that we are parts of the work of art … we are the words; we are the music; we are the thing itself.” In The Waves Woolf expresses these ideas in her play-poem in a beautiful and lyrical novel laden with images and reflections that dazzle, stretch the mind and ask difficult questions. I loved this; as broad in scope as the sea and intensely personal; written with great craft and style. 9 and a half out of 10 Starting The Margrave of the Marshes by John Peel

The Ghostly Lover by Elizabeth Hardwick I have read reviews of Hardwick’s last novel (Sleepless Nights) and these have been positive. So when I saw this one in my favourite book repository for a couple of quid, I couldn’t resist. This is Hardwick’s first novel, published in 1945 and is a coming of age tale. The story of Marian who is sixteen at the start of the novel and living in Kentucky at the time of the depression. The story switches between Kentucky and New York. Marian lives with her grandmother and brother. Her parents move around and are too disorganised and irresponsible to look after children. Marian meets Bruce a 26 year old divorcee and a relationship develops. Marian goes to college in New York and then returns to look after her grandmother during her final illness. The novel ends with Marian returning to New York. The novel is introspective, with Marian being a rather critical narrator and the focus is very much on her. The ghostly lover of the title is Bruce, who appears in the first couple of chapters, but is pretty much absent from then on, although he pays for her year at college. There is something of a Southern Gothic feel to parts of it and Marian’s grandmother at times reminded me of Miss Havisham (Great Expectations), especially during her final illness. An interesting vignette portraying a dementing illness. The minor character studies are very sharp and telling. The men are mostly absent (or hopeless) and Hardwick clearly identifies freedom as being alone (untrammelled by family or lovers). Race relations in the South are tangentially addressed and Marian asks questions about her own attitudes; particularly in relation to the family cleaner, Hattie. It is a first novel and Hardwick herself looked back on it with a little ambivalence. There is little in the way of plot, but the novel drifts along well and Marian is an interesting narrator and not so easy to second guess. I enjoyed this. 7 and a half out of 10 Starting On Beauty by Zadie Smith

A Visit to Don Otavio by Sybille Bedford One of the great travelogues and in Bruce Chatwin’s opinion “the greatest travel book of the twentieth century”. It helps a great deal that Bedford can write well and has a gift for observation and description. Living from 1911 to 2006, Bedford had a long and colourful life and is not appreciated as a writer as she should be. Bedford had escaped from France in 1940 and spent the war in the US. After the war she decided that before returning to Europe she would travel for a while in Mexico. She went with a travelling companion referred to as E throughout. E was in fact Esther Mary Arthur (at that point married to the grandson of the US president Chester Arthur). Bedford and Arthur were having a love affair at the time. As Chatwin says in his introduction, they approached their adventure “without an itinerary, without preconceptions, and with their senses wide open”. That propensity to go with the flow makes for an entertaining read. As I mentioned, Bedford has great descriptive powers, this is about a bus journey; “A well-grown sow lies heaving in the aisle. My neighbor has a live turkey hen on her lap and the bird simply cannot help it, she must partly sit on my lap, too. This is very hot. Also she keeps fluffing out her surprisingly harsh feathers. From time to time, probably to ease her own discomfort, the bird stands up. Supported on six pointed claws, one set of them on my knee, she digs her weight into us and shakes herself. Dust and lice emerge. On my other side, in the aisle, stands a little boy with a rod on which dangles a dead, though no doubt freshly caught, fish. With every lurch of the conveyance, and it is all lurches, the fish, moist but not cool, touches my arm and sometimes my averted cheek.” The book moves between pure travelogue, descriptions of Mexico’s bloody history (from Cortes to the nineteenth and twentieth century dictators), detailed descriptions of food and meals (always a plus), the vicissitudes of travel, he varying quality of hotels and of course, Don Otavio and his extended family and servants. Bedford, in an interview late in her life described it thus; “It is a travel book written by a novelist. I wanted to get across the extraordinary beauty of Mexico, the allegro quality of its climate, with the underlying panic and violence inherited from a long and bloody history.” Don Otavio is a slightly down at heel aristocratic type with a colourful family and some interesting neighbours who are similarly middle class with a smattering of those escaping Europe. Bedford has a sharp wit and excellent sense of humour. It does have to be noted that the travelers were middle class as were most of the people they stayed with and the lives of ordinary people are at a distance. That may have been inevitable, but there are many good vignettes and descriptions of customs and tradition (especially relating to the Catholic Church). All in all and excellent read by a very good writer. 8 out of 10 Starting Coming up for Air by George Orwell

The Purple Violet of Oshaantu by Neshani Andrews I noticed this in the feed of a friend and here we are. This is a first novel and the author is Namibian. It is set in the village of Oshaantu in a rural area of Namibia and is told by Mee Ali about her neighbour and friend Kauna. They are both women whose husbands work away in the mines whilst they look after the homestead and work the land. The two women have contrasting husbands. Mee Ali’s husband (Michael) treats her well and does not abuse or beat her, but Kauna’s husband (Shange) is very violent and abusive; he also keeps mistresses and stays with them. One day he returns home and dies very suddenly. The story is told in part flashback, part present. The novel revolves around the preparation for the funeral. It is a story of friendship between two women, but it is also an examination of the power of patriarchy. Patriarchy partly built on indigenous culture and traditional practices and partly on colonial Christianity and its firm view of the place of women. Kauna decides she is not going to follow traditional mourning, she is not going to weep and she is not going to give a widow’s speech at the funeral saying how wonderful he was. It’s a good story, powerfully written which challenges the traditional place of women and the expectation that men can do what they wish as women are property. The novel is realistic about the struggle and about the fact that many women accept their roles, as Kauna did when her husband was alive. Andreas however does subvert the role of victim into which women are placed, by creating a community of women and supportive friendships and in characters like Mukfiddleala, an older woman who shames Shange in front of his friends. Andreas explores the themes of women’s agency and victimhood in the context of her novel; challenging traditional values and imposed colonial ones at the same time. Interestingly the one male character known not to beat and abuse his wife (Michael), is regarded as weak and controlled by his wife as a result. Even he does not challenge tradition and does not criticise the men who do beat their wives. The tensions between traditional culture and the modern world are explored. The whole is full of tenderness and humour and is well worth looking out. Sadly this is Neshani Andreas’s only novel; I liked this one enough to look for more only to discover she died within the last couple of years. 8 out of 10 Starting The Albatross by Susan Hill

Briar Rose by Robert Coover This is a sophisticated, post-modern and very adult take on the old fairy tale Sleeping Beauty. Coover plays with and subverts the genre, but the question that occurs to me is; does he go far enough and why only in one direction? The tale is retold many times with numerous variations on the theme. Coover has in fact amalgamated Perrault’s Sleeping Beauty in the Wood and the Grimm’s Little Briar Rose. The cast of the good fairy, an evil old crone, a sleeping princess and rescuing prince are all present. Coover gives us access to the thought processes (and dreams) of all those involved. The good fairy and old crone are two parts of the same whole. The princess and the prince are also more nuanced, both questioning their roles. The happy ever after myths are exposed as false. The vignettes where there is a possibility of a happy ever after have one or both parties thinking “Is this it?” Everyone questions their roles. The prince wonders whether he really is the one and if he is up to the job. The good and bad sides of the fairy battle with each other. The princess struggles with a lack of memory and how she got there and with whether she is briar or rose, whether she is waiting silently for her prey (An interesting take on the idea of the woman being passive, beautiful and evil can be found in Andrea Dworkin’s Woman Hating). In all of the outcomes explored the princess never finds a happy or fulfilling ending; sometimes the prince does. Coover doesn’t play with the gender roles. The prince attempts to rescue and the princess waits. There are times when the prince wants the princess to act “Don’t just lie there! Get up! Come help!” It is the area of sex and sexuality that is most problematic. The princess is raped as she sleeps fairly routinely by her father, her father’s knights, a group of the castle’s peasants, bear (and is then bitten by the bear’s mate), by the prince (of course the prince is married and his wife takes her revenge by killing and cooking the princess, feeding her to her husband) and there is even a sexual assault by a monkey. Sexuality is implicit in this tale and I have no problems with that, but all the sexual scenes have a strong element of violence in them (implicit or (more often) explicit). This reminds me of two feminist critiques of fairy tales; Brownmiller saying that fairy tales trained women to be rape victims and the idea that humiliation and powerlessness are central to the female role in these stories. I would have thought that playing with the genre would have involved more sexual variety and switching of roles. By staying with the concept of the female as the penetrated victim (even though the prince is not a heroic figure) is Coover missing a trick or is he trying to do something else? This is a sophisticated and clever novella and the cutting back and forth between the prince and princess works well. The varying motives of the prince and the focus on duty with an element of dumb stupidity is also very effective. There is also a motif of eternally frustrated youth; never fulfilled, always seeking. Youth is caught by vermin and decay. That leaves me with my dilemma in relation to the violent nature of the sexual interactions. Coover is a clever writer and, of course, he may be trying to highlight this particular aspect of the fairy tale genre by highlighting the problem in a sharp and obvious way. The action is repetitive and maybe Coover is showing how dull the genre can be. And yet I can’t help wondering whether the result is just to emphasize the princess’s (women’s) victim status. What would be wrong with adding a bit of playfulness, variety (or even tenderness)? That might have stretched the boundaries even more. I wonder if I’ve missed the point, but the unremitting rape and there being no move away from the woman as a victim (or prey) and both the prince and princess being trapped in their roles was a point I got very early on. I didn’t go anywhere else. Is it me? 6 out of 10 Starting The Purple Violet of Oshaantu by Neshani Andrews

Backwater by Dorothy Richardson Book two of Dorothy Richardson’s epic thirteen volume Pilgrimage. In this novel Miriam is back in London teaching at a small school for girls run by the Misses Perne. It is important to remember that Miriam is still in her teenage years at this point; she is not a qualified teacher. Miriam’s life is still very much a typical life that a young middle class Victorian woman would have experienced. She goes to parties and dances, spends some time at the seaside, goes boating and even has a toboggan ride. She mixes with eligible young men. Miriam finds a cure for her isolation in the reading of sensational novels, which she hides and reads in secret. One of these is Ouida, a rather unconventional English Victorian novelist (Maria Louise Rame). There are accounts of Ouida when she lived at the Langham Hotel in the 1860s of her writing in bed by candlelight, curtains drawn and with lots of purple flowers. She held soirees whose members included Wilde, Swinburne, Browning, Collins and Millais. She wrote over 40 novels and Miriam discovers her and the descriptions of her initial purchases done rather guiltily are amusing. What makes the novel interesting is the filtering through Miriam. She can be irritating (what teenager isn’t) and at times there are assumptions relating to race and class which do not sit easily; but on the whole she is engaging and her questioning of conventions is always interesting. There are some interesting reflections on Englishness and sentimentality and as usual Miriam questions religion. It has been noted that the Pilgrimage novels are an account of the slow move from the Victorian era to the modern age and Richardson seems to have a good grasp of character development which makes the progression interesting. An interesting aside I found is an article called The Urban Observer by Deborah Longworth (you’ll find it in the Camden Town Group section on the Tate website) which examines the tradition of London observers, especially through the medium of the artist-flanuer. She pays particular attention to female observers with an interesting section on Richardson’s Pilgrimage; one of the sections she focuses on is the omnibus ride in this novel where Miriam reflects on the monotony of the London landscape. There is an extensive quote; “They lumbered at last round a corner and out into a wide thoroughfare, drawing up outside a newly-built public-house. Above it rose row upon row of upper windows sunk in masses of ornamental terra-cotta-coloured plaster. Branch roads, laid with tram-lines led off in every direction. Miriam’s eyes followed a dull blue tram with a grubby white-painted seatless roof jingling busily off up a roadway where short trees stood all the way along in the small dim gardens of little grey houses ... The little shock sent her mind feeling out along the road they had just left. She considered its unbroken length, its shops, its treelessness. The wide thoroughfare, up which they now began to rumble, repeated it on a larger scale. The pavements were wide causeways reached from the roadway by stone steps, three deep. The people passing along them were unlike any she knew. There were no ladies, no gentleman, no girls or young men such as she knew. They were all alike. They were ... She could find no word for the strange impression they made. It coloured the whole of the district through which they had come” The horror of the suburbs is eventually replaced by London proper (for Miriam) Regent Street and Piccadilly. It’s a fascinating picture of a particular time and place. 8 and a half out of 10 Starting Honeycomb; novel three of the series.

Thank you Willoyd; yes they are the same Stevie Davies(I'm now a fan, she writes very well). A Woman Unknown by Lucia Graves Whilst reading about the First World War last year, Robert Graves inevitably crossed my path. I discovered that one of his daughters, Lucia, was also a writer and a translator. So, knowing very little about her, I ordered this on a whim and I am very glad I did. This is an autobiographical work, but told in an interesting way. The first two thirds of the chapters pick out a particular woman in Lucia’s early life and focuses on her and does so very effectively. Graves was brought up on the island of Majorca, where her father and mother moved in 1946, after the war. Lucia consequently learnt English, Spanish and Catalan, which she has used to great effect in later life as a translator. Graves also writes about her own mother, who was Robert Graves’s second wife and 19 years his junior; she devoted herself to him and her family so he could write. Lucia describes her as “standing back to make room for others”. Graves grew up during the Franco regime and at a time when the Catholic Church was powerful and influential. She recalls the nuns who taught her and the pressure put on her to become a Catholic (her parents were firmly agnostic and she was the only non-Catholic in the school); particularly the fact that she had not been baptised which meant that if she died she would burn in eternal fire. She was reminded of this regularly. One priest even went as far as to say that she ought to be baptised without telling her parents. We meet a series of colourful and inspiring women, the local midwife (Blanca, a remarkable woman who married in a civil ceremony during the Republic, which meant that under Franco her marriage was not recognised), a prima ballerina, numerous villagers and Graves also tells a few historical tales about Catalan history and culture. The shadow of Franco looms large though and negative effects the regime had on the role of women; "Over the years I saw them fight to become the individuals they'd have been had they not been submitted to that prudish upbringing, long repression and clipping of their wings. Unlike their mothers, who had a memory of the Republican days when women were encouraged to fight for equality, Spanish women of my generation had no memory of freedom." Graves outlines the struggles and makes them real with the vignettes of the women she knew. Graves also says some interesting times about her father. These are asides and tend to relate to how she experienced him; as a child and later as an adult when she translated his works into Spanish. Robert Graves had spent much time studying classical mythology. He had concluded that in preclassical times in Europe there was a matriarchal system in place. This, he believed was replaced by the Greek patriarchal system, which was still in place and was the cause of most of our problems. Male logical and scientific thinking had taken over from female instinctive system, changing the world from the way it was meant to be. Interesting theory which I wouldn’t have expected from Robert Graves. Lucia Graves says her father’s theories helped her to move towards the feminist movement of the 1960s. Graves writes in a lucid and poetic style drawing together the links between memory and emotion. She has the ability to view Spain in a particular way; both as an insider and outsider. Beautifully written and moving and a fascinating insight into the lives of women in Franco’s Spain. 9 out of 10 Starting Briar Rose by Robert Coover.