Friday, October 22, 2004

Literature is part of the flow of life. We don’t exist in some simple ‘factual’ way. We exist in virtual worlds made of stories we constantly tell ourselves. It’s made of master stories told by master storytellers or by whole communities, and contains in coded form the experience of our race. It’s a well of resource at which we can drink.

Writer-critic Yap Kun Bek

Monday, September 20, 2004

"Oryx and Crake", by Margaret Atwood

This book impresses me so much that I am writing about it whilst I am only ¾ of the way through. For anyone who’s watched a bit of Star Trek, or read Iain M Bank’s Science Fiction, you may have been lulled into a false sense of hope and security… that humans will go from strength to strength, that eventually, everyone will have a luxurious standard of living, unlimited by resources, and that we’ll only have clever gadgets and quirks of humanity – or even that of another extra-terrestrials! – to keep us amused.

Margaret Attwood will have you thinking again. This book has more in common with the films “Bladerunner” and “12 Monkeys”. What will happen in the future is still guesswork, but you can tell the author of this novel has spent many hours thinking deeply about humanity and what is going on with technological developments now, and extrapolated these to a frighteningly plausible scenario. I haven’t found any faults in the detail yet – the science isn’t so far out from what it is now that it is unbelievable.

This book has plenty of food for thought… What happens when biological research is allowed to go on unchecked and unhindered by ethics in the profit-driven private sector? When the earth’s resources become limited, how would we react? Will governments or companies play large roles in future societies? What about law and order? Will humans be able to keep up with their own advancements enough to cope with the new boundaries they push? What will teenage boys in the future do to amuse themselves? How many generations does it take to make a species extinct? What are people prepared to ignore in order to have a comfortable life? What balance should we be striving for? Once society becomes fragmented into so many groups, are people capable of pulling together in any way????

This book has many ideas that will stay with you, possibly keep you awake thinking about them. Some “sensitive types” may find this book a bit dismaying at first. Being the type that wants to believe in the goodness of people (within limits!), I was sad that the picture of future society had few if any redeeming features. But then, had the book been written in any other way, it would have had less of an impact. Hopefully I’ll be able to turn this around into an inspiration somehow.

The book is written exceedingly well, and draws you in from the start. At first you are acquainted with an old man on a tropical island, wracked with guilt about something that has happened, possibly surrounded by some indigenous peoples, and using words from their language. Then gradually, by oscillating between the “now” and the “past” in the book, you piece together what has happened. Not a new mode of book writing by any judgement, but the author has artfully used this style to keep you suspended to the end. Despite jumping between past and present, you never feel as if you are left hanging on half the story, as the two are interwoven so well by the narrator. You soon find out that the man is not on a tropical island – he’s in what used to be a city, and civilisation has been ruined somehow.

How? Well it's not nuclear war in this story at least, but go read it and find out. One to add to the compulsory (over 18) reading list.

Monday, June 07, 2004

The Mating Season by P.G. Wodehouse

This is one of Wodehouse's series of stories involving Bertram Wooster and his butler Jeeves, set in 1920's & 30's England. Wooster is the "more money than sense" yuppie bachelor, living in Mayfair, and Jeeves is more like a personal consultant, who is constantly getting Wooster out of scrapes, and smoothing over hangovers with his morning concoctions.

These books are a very good read for their sense of humour, and probably good to keep on the go while you read other books. They are written in Antique, upper-class English "She then went on to say that indeed, he was the lodestar of her life too...etc", which is delightful when the author is painting a character or situation in a humorous way - I wish I could be so subtle when being catty!! The story and characters are described with such articulacy that you can vividly imagine the story being played out in a huge country manor in rural England. The narrator of the book, Mr Wooster, is not necessarily the voice of reason - he is capable of self mockery, and always looks to Jeeves (his butler) for advice on how to handle tricky situations involving disagreeable Aunts, bratty teenage cousins visiting for the week, or the latest off-rails romance requiring deft steering in the right direction.

I suppose for me, the "take home" messages from reading this book were: that 1930's upperclass English had lots of time on their hands; but, like Jane Austen and Shakespeare before him, PG Wodehouse is brilliant at describing the human character and relationships with all their frailty, vanity, and silliness. You could take out the English gentry and replace it with any modern-day person with power and money who thinks they should be treated or perceived with a certain amount of respect, and write about people scurrying about trying to meet the approval of their superiors or peers, and people trying get away with things whilst maintaining the reputation they consider most suitable for themselves...

Saturday, May 08, 2004

Sugar Street by Naguib Mahfouz


Well, this is the first book I've read of this guy's - quite a prolific (Nobel Prize for Literature winning) author who started writing back in 1928. This one came out in the original Arabic in '57 and was only translated 10 years ago.

To be honest I actually started reading this book to avoid another book I was a few chapters into that started to annoy me.

So far it's a look at a big Egyptian family with all its tangled history, hopes and heartache. Funny though. Not cheap laughs funny, but wry, generous. There is the aging patriach, the doting matriach who has had her edge worn by the heartache of her daughters, the bespectacled son still living at home who teaches by day and immerses himself in classical philosophy and revolutionary politics by night, the various sister in laws, servants, friends of the families; you get the picture.

It will be interesting to see whether the unfoldings of everyday life are the main point of the book or whether it becomes more political, whether the brother finally gets laid, whether I will have to remember the names of lots of political movements that will make my brain hurt and whether any of the gender politics will shit me.

So far it has been a lyrical, warm, ironic tone that I am enjoying. Reminds me of Dostoevsky a bit; featuring privileged, educated young men pondering their fates as intellectuals and moral beings in politically charged times, lots of dialogue and characters that you can almost smell.

If only I had a bath to read it in!

"For truth was a beloved as flirtatious, inaccessible, and coquettish as any human sweetheart. It stirred up doubts and jealousy, awakening a violent desire in people to posses it and to merge with it. Like a human lover, it seemed prone to whims, passions, and disguises. Frequently it appeared cunning, deceitful, harsh, and proud."

Monday, May 03, 2004

In the Half-light by Anthony Lawrence.


I think I've got a bit of a thing for first-time novelists. (But maybe its a fear of committment). This is a book I recently picked up at the local second hand bookshop. (Right opposite the local cocktail bar - I love my area).
Its by an Aussie writer who's apparently had some poetry published but I'd never herad of him. The jacket says he was born in Tamworth, NSW and is an award-winning poet. And in good first-novel style the protaganist is born in a "country town, high in the New Englad Tablelands of New South Wales". The book tells the story of a boy growing into a man, and living with schitzophrenia. But the condition is woven into the tale and delusionsal episodes become lucid and rich prose, that is teetering on the edge of being poety. At times it become almost just a stream of metaphors and images, but manages to get back to thte narrative just in time before you're lost as a reader. I really enjoyed it. The story had sad and melancholgy moments but it felt real, and it showed a life that was a bit complicated and not just a simple story arc*.

* Term learnt from the BTVS script book.

How's that, miss list convenor? :-)

Sunday, May 02, 2004

Ok kids this is a virtual book club for all those time-poor lit-geeks and word lovers. Save yourself from actual book club stranger danger! Avoid having to commit time to yet another Tuesday night hobby! Try some transcontinental discourse!

Yes, dust off the cravat and brew yourself a macchiato. Review away. Quote till your nose bleeds. Drop names 'like they drop e's in Surry Hills'*.

Let the games begin!

*the Herd's words not mine. See?? Quoting is good safe fun for all the family.

NB Yes I am lonely.