I think the heading for this review is as good as it's gonna get as I am not really sure what to make of this one. I kind of liked it and kind of did not. I usually have a kind of defined opinion of the book I am reading. You feel when you read it if you are getting on with it or not. You get through some books easily, some take more attention and care when you read them and will make you slow down your reading speed but still... as a reader I tend to know when I like a book or not and with this one I am just not sure. I like some of it but not all... Let me elaborate.. but first....
#### SPOILER ALERT ####
Tales of Mystery & the Macabre - Elizabeth Gaskell
This is a collection of short stories (according to the blurb "a dark anthology) by this author. I have never read any of her other work so cannot compare it to that. I believe she is most famous for writing North and South and I ave heard some really good thins about that one so I will have to go and find that one too. But, back to the bundle at hand. The stories are said to be mysterious and/or macabre but I had to look pretty hard to find any of that in the tales in this volume. Yes - some of them have something marginally strange happen in them but they are not on the same scariness level of an MR James or Joseph Le Fanu. Not by a long shot!
As I said I am not sure what exactly ails these stories? Maybe nothing and perhaps I am just used to pacier and more concise ghost stories but at times there seems to be something lacking from these ones. Maybe it is pace, maybe it is that they are too elaborate or too well developed or end too suddenly with the anticipation of more to come and none that follows. Some of her writing is very touching and beautiful and you can tell that she is skilled in her art but... I don't know what they lack... let me go through them and see if I can clarify.
The Old Nurse's Story
This one is set up as and old nurse maid telling children the story of their mother's experiences when she was young. Apparently the mother was orphaned as a little girl and sent to live with her family in a big old house of which part was closed off. Everything seems to be okay except sometimes at night the nurse maid hears this music from an organ. Then one time the little girl is lost and when they find her she is curled up in the snow cold as ice. she survives but tells tales of a woman and another little girl that coaxed her away from the safety of the house. In the end we find out that this woman was the sister of the present resident the house and she was turned out by her own father (who is the guy playing the organ - well, that was a dead give away). The only ghostly hing that happens that we get a scene where the betrayal of the one daughter over the other is acted out. There is some booming noises and some shouting and fainting, someone dies and then that's that. Some of the dialogue is well written and the emotions that the characters have is really well presented. You feel for them but in the end, for me there is no real tension and no real scare. There are a few plots that intermingle and it all comes to a sudden end. It's almost as if she is trying to hard to put something else or extra in to try and make it work and for me it does not really come off. She had the story of the organ playing but then the girl has to wander off and the whole business of the daughter being cast out by the father is brought up as well. Either would have done for a ghost story but she throws them together and she really did not have to.
The Squire's Story
This one is even more of a let down. No ghosts, nothing even remotely scary or worrying, nothing to make you go "wow really?!" Basically, a stranger comes to a new town, charms everyone, obviously blinds them by his presence and manners and marries one of the best catches in town. Then he turns out not to be who says he is. The whole thing meanders a bit too much, does not get to the point and calls in all kinds of other side characters than the main ones to move the story along so it distracts you from the main story and the whole thing loses it focus slightly. It is very neatly rounded up in the last paragraph or so.. a bit too nicely and too quickly for my taste.
The Poor Clare
This one had me wondering the entire story why it was called what is was called. I kept thinking who is this Clare and when is she going to turn up. I'll put you out of your misery right now - they are actually a religious order who give away everything they have to help the poor and sick. They sacrifice what little they have so others may live.
This one is good but suffers from the meandering disease. It seems to start out as a family history but then turns out to be more about the woman servant and her daughter. They do not see eye to eye and the daughter goes off to build her own life. This does not go well but she does have a child. Before you find that out, however, you have to read your way through a story about a man being cursed and our narrator being sent to find heirs to a small fortune and falling in love on the way. Just as you are about to lose the will to live and wonder where this is going you find that the servant woman is the long lost grandmother of the girl or narrator has fallen in love with. Then we get another sub plot that sees out narrator go abroad, get caught up in a war, find the his love interest's father and the girl's Grandmother (the servant from the first story) who turns out to have turned to God for assistance in cleansing her soul so her granddaughter can be forgiven and lead a normal life with our narrator. The whole story could have been condensed and differently arranged to make it flow better. I kind of felt cheated that in the end it was all coming together like that. Not that you do not have any doubts that that is the way it will work out for Gaskell never introduces a character that does not serve a purpose somewhere along the line. Again the emotions described are put on the page very well. Gaskell knows how to evoke an interest in her characters and you really feel for the old Clare as she struggles to put right with love and service to God what the curse that was cast in a burst of fury.
I just cannot help thinking that the story would have been better if it would not have kept going from her to there and then back to somewhere else and someone else.
Lois the Witch
An orphan girl gets sent to live with her family in the newly settled colonies of America. always an outcast she gets unjustly accused of being a witch and hanged.
Again the story meanders a bit too much -the girl has an amorous cousin to deal with and a jealous cousin as well. she is not loved by her new family and never really fits in. She remains an outcast and you really feel that in the writing, in how the girl speaks and acts. Again, Gaskell writes about the human emotion very well. She gets you to feel sorry for this little innocent girls that is pushed into a strange world that she does not know or understand with no-one to protect her, staying with people that really do not want her there and she is having to cope with her emotions on her own. The final part of the story where she is in jail is really hear wrenching and emotional. But.. also again, the story could have been condensed down to just dealing with the girl, her story, her emotions, the accusations against her and how she deals with them. I think it would have been more powerful then. Not sure what the mysterious or macabre element in this story is but hey.. let's not quibble over details.
The Doom of the Griffiths
At the risk of sounding like a broken record... the intro in this story is way too long. Gaskell could have gotten to the point a lot sooner. The point being that a curse was placed on a family that the son would kill his father and in the end that is sort of what happens. But it does not transpire before we get the tale of three generations of fathers raising their sons to be spoilt brats and not learning from it. Just as you think one is going to be able to escape the prophesy tragedy hits and people die. Nothing scary, strange in this one and not a ghost in sight.
The Ghost in the Garden Room
There is actually a ghost in this one. It is mentioned in the introduction of the story and it is the ghost that tells our narrator the story we are about to read... although by the time you get to the end of it you tend to have forgotten there was ever a ghost in it.
A couple marry late in life, have one son whom they spoil and indulge a bit. He gets to go to school and later on to London to go into business. He comes home to see if his father will give him some money to buy into a business, which the father (rightly) refuses. we by this time know the boy is a cad and a bit of a bad boy. When he does not get his way he "disappears" and the parents left behind are wondering what could have happened to their golden boy.
Years onwards the house of the old coupe gets robbed and he is one of the robbers, they get a fright and their boy gets away.
There is a court case, they have to testify against theirson and this part is very moving and well written. Once more Gaskell shows her skill at portraying the human emotion and you wish the old couple were just left alone to deal with their grief of discovering their own son tried to do them wrong. There is the subplot of the "love interest" of the son. A cousin comes to stay with them as a child and becomes sort of betrothed to him. However, he treats her badly, she sees through him and ends up dedicating her life to the boys parents, her uncle and aunt.
The Grey Woman
She is grey because she stayed inside a lot because she was afraid to go out in case her mad, villainous first husband was still out there looking for her.
A group of tourists on holiday are given shelter by a miller who has an interesting portrait on his wall. The story of at woman is told here. The story is basically said to be a set of letters a woman writes to her daughter to explain why she was so shocked at meeting her daughter's choice for a husband (though I admit I had to go back a few pages to see why the name was so important... still not really sure I get it?!).
It is a tragic story of a woman married to a man who turns out to be a hoodlum and a killer. She ends up relying on her maid to disguise them to be able to escape her husbands clutches but she manages in the end. She does not like going outside from fear of being discovered and this is why she looks the way she does. It does end well in a way as the woman's first husband is caught, she marries again and has a loving husband but she never does leave the house very often.
This one meanders a bit less, seems better organised but the disguise of the whole thing being put together from letters is not really necessary. It would have stood up on it's own without this narrative device.
Curious, if true
Man fall asleep plodding through a forest in the dark and dreams of going to a party in some weird castle. Well what do you expect?! the gag is that the characters in the story are well known fairy tale characters gone haywire.
Cute descriptions of the different characters but this one kind of left me with a "is that all there is to it?". Yet it's shortness gives it more punch and direction so good in that respect.
Disappearances
Does what you expect it to do. Tells you about some "mysterious" disappearances.
It seems to be more a catalogue of anecdotes thrown together, disguised as being potentially interesting tales and the promise of more. Maybe she should have used some of these mini plots and developed them into more substantial short stories? This last one did not do it for me.
Oh goodie.. that was the last one.. good!
All in all I struggled with this one. Gaskell has a very nice writing style and I could not really say I was bored by her writing. I was disappointed by her stories as they seemed to me to lack purpose. At times she seems to keep inventing another twist and turn in her stories to "make it more interesting or the reader" but in that she loses focus and the story just meanders off into a different direction. You do get pulled back to the main character and the main point but a times I have sort of had enough by then and just want to get to the end of it to see how it will finish. At times it is almost as if she is trying to write an epic 500 page novel but then tries to pull it back in into a short story as she realises that this is the name of the game she is playing. As I have said, she is excellent at writing about the human emotion and getting you to feel the character's plight, sorrow and grief (and there is plenty to go round) and this is why I like in the stories however a a reader she did not engage me enough in the plot and story line to really pull me in hook, line and sinker.
Title: Tales of Mystery & the Macabre
Author: Elizabeth Gaskell
305 pages
Wordsworth Editions
ISBN 978-1-84022-095-7
I have to confess that I have bought one book in the meantime as well so I think we are even on the book count but let's check....
Books bought: 1
Books to be read: 74
and...
Books read: 1
Books to be read: 73
Yep... still quite a few to go.
On to reading The Day of the Jackal. It's proving good so far.
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Progressing nicely.....
Okay... so the year is only 52 weeks and not 53... it's not gonna make a lot of difference on the grand scale of things and in the amount of time it is going to take me to read all my books. But I guess we must correctly represent the scale of the current status of my book supply and the time it will take me to read them!
Okay... so I bought another book... just the one though. The guy said that if I returned it to him before 17 Sept I would get £1 back on it. I almost wanted to laugh at him and ask him where the camera was but he was serious. Trust me, there is no way this book is ever going to find it's way back to his book stall! I never give a book back once it is mine!
The reading of my present book is going well but at present I am being somewhat delayed in my reading efforts by this little thing called the World Cup. I am still finding the odd hour here and there to read some so it will get finished eventually.
Books bought: 1
Books to be read: 73
Okay... so I bought another book... just the one though. The guy said that if I returned it to him before 17 Sept I would get £1 back on it. I almost wanted to laugh at him and ask him where the camera was but he was serious. Trust me, there is no way this book is ever going to find it's way back to his book stall! I never give a book back once it is mine!
The reading of my present book is going well but at present I am being somewhat delayed in my reading efforts by this little thing called the World Cup. I am still finding the odd hour here and there to read some so it will get finished eventually.
Books bought: 1
Books to be read: 73
Sunday, 6 June 2010
Literary Day in London
Went to London yesterday for a little wander, trip down the bookshop and some sushi. In the process also decided to have a look round the Dickens Museum which was in the area we were wondering around. And very good it was too. Not too big but interesting, nice to look round a house where Dickens lived and wrote some of his books. An added bonus was the coffee shop which had one of the nicest strawberry cakes I have had in ages! It was a little suntrap, courtyard garden at the back of a normal looking London house but it was great to have a sit and ponder life... and chat to B my friend who was my travel buddy on the trip.
Then off to the bookshop. Hidden away in the basement of the Brunswick centre lives Skoob. It's a great little place to have a look around. They have a wide selection of books, lots of penguin books old and new (only strange that one of them had an old, original price sticker on it of £2.99 and the sale price was actually £3.50?!).... anyway, you know where this is going. A wise man once said "Nowhere is the human nature as weak as in the book shop" and how right he was! I succumbed to three. Only three though.. that's not too bad. London prices kept me from splashing out more. Sometimes when you go to the charity shops here you can pick books up for as little as £1 or even less but the one I got I have not seen down here so that's why they went home with me. One of them is a Ghost story one and the other two are biographies - Raymond Chandler and Agatha Christie. They will be read in due course.
Calculations show that if I read a book every two week I will have finished reading my 70 odd books in about.... ehm.. hang on, 70 books, two weeks er book (about), 140 weeks, divide by 53 weeks of the year= 2.69 years. Then of course there are times when you read less or take a little reading break so I guess we'll call it even at 3 years... right, so it will take me 3 years to read the ones I have now.... well.... mmmm, I'm off to read some more.
Books bought: 3
Books to be read: 72
Then off to the bookshop. Hidden away in the basement of the Brunswick centre lives Skoob. It's a great little place to have a look around. They have a wide selection of books, lots of penguin books old and new (only strange that one of them had an old, original price sticker on it of £2.99 and the sale price was actually £3.50?!).... anyway, you know where this is going. A wise man once said "Nowhere is the human nature as weak as in the book shop" and how right he was! I succumbed to three. Only three though.. that's not too bad. London prices kept me from splashing out more. Sometimes when you go to the charity shops here you can pick books up for as little as £1 or even less but the one I got I have not seen down here so that's why they went home with me. One of them is a Ghost story one and the other two are biographies - Raymond Chandler and Agatha Christie. They will be read in due course.
Calculations show that if I read a book every two week I will have finished reading my 70 odd books in about.... ehm.. hang on, 70 books, two weeks er book (about), 140 weeks, divide by 53 weeks of the year= 2.69 years. Then of course there are times when you read less or take a little reading break so I guess we'll call it even at 3 years... right, so it will take me 3 years to read the ones I have now.... well.... mmmm, I'm off to read some more.
Books bought: 3
Books to be read: 72
Thursday, 3 June 2010
What shall we play today?
This time round I have stepped out of my normal sphere and gone for something completely different. I had read part of this book years ago when I did my "Introduction to Teaching" course but decided it would be worth going back to it to give it a bit more attention.
I will not be putting up spoilers for this one as there is no real plot to reveal so am going to dive right in!
Games people play - Eric Berne, M.D.
The subtitle for this one sort of gives you a better idea of what the book is about: The Psychology of Human Relationships. Don't fret it's not a book that is filled with a deep and meaningful babbling analysis of the human race and the relationships humans have developed with one another.
The way I see it it basically boils down to this: people have a need to interact with one another and there is a certain structure to how this happens. This is itself should come as no surprise to any human being but what I like about how Berne approaches the subject is the way he analyses these relationships and structures.
According to Berne each individual has three ego states: Parent, Adult and Child. In short "Everyone carries his parents around inside of him, ... Everyone has an adult, ... Everyone carries a little boy or girl inside him.". The Child has the qualities of intuition, creativity and spontaneous drive en enjoyment of life. The Adult in each of us is busy with processing data and computing probabilities so we can deal effectively with the outside world (how far away i that car and is it okay for me to cross the road?). Our Parent allows us to be effective parents and takes care of routine matters in our lives (things get done because that's the way things are done). So what?!... I hear you say. Well... when we interact with one another we can do this on any of these three levels sometimes this works sometimes it does not. A question can provoke different reactions in different people. Both the person who asks the question as well as the person that responds will react from a certain perspective (Adult, Parent or Child).
To the normal Adult question: Do you know where my cuff links are?
The Adult response would be: On the desk
The Child response would be: Why don't you keep track of your own things? You're not a child any more.
The first respondent sees the question for what it is - a request for information on the location of the cuff links and responds from his adult state of mind by saying where the cuff links are. The second respondent see the question as an example of the questioner's incompetence to take care of his own stuff and the response implies that it is not the first time this has happened. It implies criticism of the behaviour and the finger of blame is firmly being pointed, like a parent criticising a child. Basically, as long as people react on the same level with one another then there are no issues. As soon as people switch roles in their responses problems arise and doors start slamming. People may say something at one level but the underlying motive of the question/remark is totally different. Example: Flirtation is not what it seems.
Person A says: Come and see the barn
B replies: I've loved barns ever since I was a little girl
See... innocent enough as two statements about barns, however, what they are really saying is:
A: wanna go and have some fun in the barn?
B: I'd love to go and have some fun with you in the barn!
When people play the Games that Berne mentions this is exactly what happens. People have conversations but there is always an ulterior motive in their question or behaviour, people do not play fair! The Games consist of a certain series of interactions, responses and behaviours
and can be divided into various categories, most of them are sort of self explanatory and easily recognisable.
Life Games
Alcoholic
Debtor
Kick Me
Now I've got you you son of a bitch
Marital Games
Corner
Courtroom
Frigid Woman
Harried
If it weren't for you
Look how hard I've tried
Sweetheart
Party Games
Ain't it awful
Blemish
Schlemiel
Why don't you - Yes but
Sexual Games
Let's you and him fight
Perversion
Rapo
The stocking game
Uproar
Underworld Games
Cops and robbers
How do you get out of here
Let's pull a fast one on Joey
Consulting Room Games
Greenhouse
I'm only trying to help you
Indigence
Peasant
Psychiatry
Stupid
Wooden Leg
Most people will know (or have played) at least one of these games without me even going into any big explanations of them. Anyone will recognise these games as having been played with them at one point of time or another... and that is the great thing about this book. It seems a very simple premise to look at the roles that people give themselves and sees if there is any structure to how people interact in these roles.
I am not going to go into all the games and all the roles here as that would take up way too much space. Let me just say that when you read through the games, look at the people around you (your colleagues, friends and family) you will see more clearly how you interact with them and they interact with you. You might be able to see how some interesting relationships have developed over the years and what your role is in them. Depending on how you feel about being in that role there is always the option to go and change your role but beware that this will impact the other people involved in your game(s) as well!
Needless to say people do not continuously play games and not all people play games to the same extent or degree but it is still fascinating to see how much familiarity there is in many of them and it makes you stop and think on how the human mind works. It made me think about how I interact with some people and how people around me work and interact with me.
A wise man once said "Knowledge is power" and knowledge about yourself is always a good thing.
Title: Games People Play
Author: Eric Berne M.D.
164 pages
Penguin Books
ISBN nr 978-0-14-002768-6
Books bought: 0
Books to be read: 69
I will not be putting up spoilers for this one as there is no real plot to reveal so am going to dive right in!
Games people play - Eric Berne, M.D.
The subtitle for this one sort of gives you a better idea of what the book is about: The Psychology of Human Relationships. Don't fret it's not a book that is filled with a deep and meaningful babbling analysis of the human race and the relationships humans have developed with one another.
The way I see it it basically boils down to this: people have a need to interact with one another and there is a certain structure to how this happens. This is itself should come as no surprise to any human being but what I like about how Berne approaches the subject is the way he analyses these relationships and structures.
According to Berne each individual has three ego states: Parent, Adult and Child. In short "Everyone carries his parents around inside of him, ... Everyone has an adult, ... Everyone carries a little boy or girl inside him.". The Child has the qualities of intuition, creativity and spontaneous drive en enjoyment of life. The Adult in each of us is busy with processing data and computing probabilities so we can deal effectively with the outside world (how far away i that car and is it okay for me to cross the road?). Our Parent allows us to be effective parents and takes care of routine matters in our lives (things get done because that's the way things are done). So what?!... I hear you say. Well... when we interact with one another we can do this on any of these three levels sometimes this works sometimes it does not. A question can provoke different reactions in different people. Both the person who asks the question as well as the person that responds will react from a certain perspective (Adult, Parent or Child).
To the normal Adult question: Do you know where my cuff links are?
The Adult response would be: On the desk
The Child response would be: Why don't you keep track of your own things? You're not a child any more.
The first respondent sees the question for what it is - a request for information on the location of the cuff links and responds from his adult state of mind by saying where the cuff links are. The second respondent see the question as an example of the questioner's incompetence to take care of his own stuff and the response implies that it is not the first time this has happened. It implies criticism of the behaviour and the finger of blame is firmly being pointed, like a parent criticising a child. Basically, as long as people react on the same level with one another then there are no issues. As soon as people switch roles in their responses problems arise and doors start slamming. People may say something at one level but the underlying motive of the question/remark is totally different. Example: Flirtation is not what it seems.
Person A says: Come and see the barn
B replies: I've loved barns ever since I was a little girl
See... innocent enough as two statements about barns, however, what they are really saying is:
A: wanna go and have some fun in the barn?
B: I'd love to go and have some fun with you in the barn!
When people play the Games that Berne mentions this is exactly what happens. People have conversations but there is always an ulterior motive in their question or behaviour, people do not play fair! The Games consist of a certain series of interactions, responses and behaviours
and can be divided into various categories, most of them are sort of self explanatory and easily recognisable.
Life Games
Alcoholic
Debtor
Kick Me
Now I've got you you son of a bitch
Marital Games
Corner
Courtroom
Frigid Woman
Harried
If it weren't for you
Look how hard I've tried
Sweetheart
Party Games
Ain't it awful
Blemish
Schlemiel
Why don't you - Yes but
Sexual Games
Let's you and him fight
Perversion
Rapo
The stocking game
Uproar
Underworld Games
Cops and robbers
How do you get out of here
Let's pull a fast one on Joey
Consulting Room Games
Greenhouse
I'm only trying to help you
Indigence
Peasant
Psychiatry
Stupid
Wooden Leg
Most people will know (or have played) at least one of these games without me even going into any big explanations of them. Anyone will recognise these games as having been played with them at one point of time or another... and that is the great thing about this book. It seems a very simple premise to look at the roles that people give themselves and sees if there is any structure to how people interact in these roles.
I am not going to go into all the games and all the roles here as that would take up way too much space. Let me just say that when you read through the games, look at the people around you (your colleagues, friends and family) you will see more clearly how you interact with them and they interact with you. You might be able to see how some interesting relationships have developed over the years and what your role is in them. Depending on how you feel about being in that role there is always the option to go and change your role but beware that this will impact the other people involved in your game(s) as well!
Needless to say people do not continuously play games and not all people play games to the same extent or degree but it is still fascinating to see how much familiarity there is in many of them and it makes you stop and think on how the human mind works. It made me think about how I interact with some people and how people around me work and interact with me.
A wise man once said "Knowledge is power" and knowledge about yourself is always a good thing.
Title: Games People Play
Author: Eric Berne M.D.
164 pages
Penguin Books
ISBN nr 978-0-14-002768-6
Books bought: 0
Books to be read: 69
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