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The Enchanted April
“Enchanting” and its close cousin “charming” are apt words for Elizabeth von Arnim’s novel The Enchanted April. It’s an outwardly unassuming meditation on how one’s surroundings can change one’s mind, and gives a fair amount of early (1922) insight into British attitudes towards the rigidity of society, as well as to the ameliorative effects both of […]
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The Turtle Diary
Last week I read Russell Hoban’s The Turtle Diary (1975) which I quite liked. It’s an understated study of loneliness and a search for meaning in London in the 1970s, and many of its concerns remain of unwelcome relevance to today’s Londoners, however drastically the city has changed in the past four decades. The novel’s […]
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CivilWarLand in Bad Decline
I first came across George Saunders in a New York Times piece on his new novel, and due to its high praise, I proposed his first book, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline (1996), to my book club a few months ago. I read it in two days, and even though many of the stories are a […]
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The Untouchable
This week I finished John Banville’s The Untouchable, a moving chronicle of longing, reminiscence, and sadness. It is a book about memory and about the act of remembering, too personal to really be called a history, despite the fact that it’s based on real people and events. Memory for Banville is much sadder than it is […]
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Sons and Lovers
D.H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers (1913) is a sort of bridge between two centuries of literature. Its length, breadth, and the length of time it narrates make it a close relative of the Victorian novel. However its concern with themes of sexual frustration, alienation, and meaninglessness place it thoroughly in the twentieth century. If it’s […]
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Hangover Square
I saw the 1945 film adaptation of Hangover Square long before I knew it was based on a 1941 novel of the same name by Patrick Hamilton. I’ve just finished reading the novel for my book club, and from what I remember of the film it’s quite a loose adaptation. The novel starts off a […]