This year's Booker prizewinner, "The Luminaries", by Eleanor Catton, made history as being the longest yet, at 832 pages. It also made headlines because she is, at 28, the youngest author ever to win the prize.
It is indeed a weighty tome. I got it out of the library to preview, as one of the members of the book-group I have just joined was threatening, (others protested vehemently), to select it as book choice for her next turn.
Oh, the wordiness of it! At a creative writing group I've joined, we are told to "Show Not Tell". E. Catton persists in lengthy boring descriptions, both of the characters' external visage and their interior psychology. We are supposed to show the latter by dialogue. The former, as in Jane Austen, is supposed to be inferred by the reactions of others. Here's an example of the verbosity, not to say pomposity, of the language. (I've researched copyright, and a quote for illustrative purposes is all right if it is short in proportion to the length of the work as a whole. My selection fits that measure).
"Balfour's will was too strong to admit philosophy, unless it was of the soundest empirical sort; his liberality could make no sense of despair, which was to him as a fathomless shaft, possessed of depth but not of breadth, stifled in its isolation, navigable only by touch, and starved of any kind of any curiosity."
A further three sentences of about the same length and density, continue the paragraph, which basically adds zilch, tiddly squat, to my mental picture of Balfour. This is on page 32. You are supposed to carry on for another 800 pages. Life is too short.
Now compare a sentence from a book by Penelope Fitzgerald. A friend, anticipating the new biography of this author (by Hermione Lee if anyone is interested), lent me a book by PF. Fitzgerald won the Booker prize in 1979 with "Offshore". Amazon reviewers praise this winner for being brief, incisive, elegant, if a little too short. The book my friend passed on to me was called "The Bookshop", (a subject guaranteed to attract my interest). It was published in 1978 and made the Booker Prize final list. It is a short book, subtle and sharp.
"The Bookshop", elegantly written but leaving ultimately a very sad after-taste, is set in coastal Suffolk. A woman opens a bookshop. Here is a sample sentence. "She was held back by an urgent hand, and addressed by a man, not young, in a corduroy jacket, smiling as a toad does, because it has no other expression."
I have time to read another book by this author!
Showing posts with label Booker Prize. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Booker Prize. Show all posts
Monday, 9 December 2013
Wednesday, 2 October 2013
Tips on How to Read Wolf Hall
I don't know anyone who has finished "Wolf Hall". Most of my friends (as you would expect) are avid readers, but all of them say things like: " I couldn't follow it", or "You didn't know who was who, or who was speaking", or simply "I found it unreadable".
Finally, four years after publication (Wolf Hall won the Man Booker Prize in 2009), and three years after I bought and stashed away my hardback copy, it has at last reached the top of my "to-read" pile.
First tip - Read "Bring Up the Bodies" first. (Thanks are due for this tip to my young friend and ex-work-colleague who took a first in History, but still couldn't make it through WH). She said that BUTB is easier, and I certainly agree with her. I didn't have any problems with it and it eased me into the mind-set of the author's way of writing, and her intentions. Also, I was disappointed when it ended, and therefore actively looking forward to reading WH. Although WH comes first, of course, and BUTB follows on, both chronologically and in the author's order of writing.
Second tip- Watch "The White Queen" first, and read at least one of the four novels on which the series is based. You don't need to read all of them because they each take a different character's point of view of essentially the same events. Maybe not "The Lady of the Rivers", though, because that one is slightly earlier in time. The best two books in my opinion are "The Red Queen" and "The White Queen".
The reason for my second tip is as follows:
Philippa Gregory's historical novels are much, much easier to read than WH or BUTB, and you can easily get into the period via these novels. The period of course being the one immediately prior to the Tudors. In fact Henry VIII's father, Henry Tudor, is a major character in the Philippa Gregory series. You get to know him, and his extremely stubborn, single-minded and obsessive mother, Margaret Beaufort. Don't forget she was H8's grandmother on the Lancaster, (or Red) side. And they introduce you to his grandfather (on the York side, the white side of the Tudor Rose). This was Edward IV, and once you have met him, you see how much H8 took after him. Physically, both were very tall, very golden, very good-looking, very charming, and very athletic and strong - in their youth. Both put on weight, ran to fat, and became more self-centred and ruthless in middle age.
A further crucial similarity is that Edward IV, controversially, married an English commoner, for love. And even more interestingly, that particular woman refused to be his mistress, and held out for marriage or nothing. And another similarity is that the existence of a "pre-contract" or earlier marriage (which happened before the one universally recognised), later emerged as a reason why the public marriage was declared legally invalid. And when it did emerge, the children of the public marriage were declared to be bastards. And someone else took the throne on that presumption. (The infamous Richard III, but I am not going there).
So all that sets the scene, and gives a background for the character and behaviour of H8, and the background of civil unrest and war which explains the ruthlessness of the Tudors in executing anyone who set up as a rival claimant to the throne. The history of the "Wars of the Roses" and the "Princes in the Tower" also explain the Tudors' absolute obsession with the production of adult male heirs.
Third tip - Read and study the family trees which are laid out at the beginning of WH, and insert pencilled notes about the characters based on what you have learned from the study of the "Wars of the Roses" period. Keep a bookmark in the family trees page, and refer to it as often as needed.
Fourth tip - Have some history books to hand. My recommendations are as follows:
"The House of Tudor" by Alison Plowden. This gives an excellent overview of each of the Tudor monarchs as they follow on from the Plantagenets, and has further helpful family trees.
"The Six Wives of Henry VIII" by Antonia Fraser. The really excellent and meticulous fact-gathering of this work help you to navigate through the politics both national, international and religious. You can use the index to help you sort out the many Thomas's appearing in WH. You can look up the differences between Thomas Wolsey, Thomas Cranmer (both churchmen) and Thomas Cromwell, (linked to both, and the central persona of WH and BUTB).
In a similar vein, the last of the Plantagenets are confusingly called "The Poles", (descended from George Duke of Clarence, he who drowned in the butt of Malmesy wine), and the "de la Poles" (descended from a sister of Edward IV, also sister to Clarence and Richard III). You can look these names up in the history books to clarify who is who, and amend the family trees with further information.
Antonia Fraser's chapters on Anne Boleyn herself recount many of the events described in Wolf Hall, in the same order, so you can go there for verification of what is going on. And lastly, perhaps most importantly, Antonia Fraser gives impeccable reference notes, and lists her sources exhaustively. So, for example, you learn that Wriothesley, an irritating minor character in WH and BUTB, has a cousin who is the author of a "Chronicle of England" and hence a source. Likewise, the rather shadowy minor character George Cavendish, Wolsey's servant, turns out to have written a biography of Wolsey which is heavily used by AF as a source document. This is heaven for a person who likes checking things. Novels, of course, don't have an index!
Fifth tip - don't read it as a page-turner - it isn't. Take your time. Savour the language, and the historic detail, which you will recognise from the history books. Enjoy the "inside" knowledge which you are gleaning, ostensibly from the mind of the person there at the time, Thomas Cromwell, but in fact from works of history and the benefit of hindsight. Enjoy this god-like feeling of both knowing what is going to happen next, and having an imaginative insight into the thoughts and feelings of those present at the scene. This is where Hilary Mantel really excels. Her imagination recreates scenes with such realism, but simultaneously with such emotion and feeling - the latter qualities of course are completely absent from sixteenth century historical records. It is this skill which, I think, is what makes people feel sad when they have finished the book, and thirst for more.
As I did after finishing "Bring up the Bodies".
Finally, four years after publication (Wolf Hall won the Man Booker Prize in 2009), and three years after I bought and stashed away my hardback copy, it has at last reached the top of my "to-read" pile.
First tip - Read "Bring Up the Bodies" first. (Thanks are due for this tip to my young friend and ex-work-colleague who took a first in History, but still couldn't make it through WH). She said that BUTB is easier, and I certainly agree with her. I didn't have any problems with it and it eased me into the mind-set of the author's way of writing, and her intentions. Also, I was disappointed when it ended, and therefore actively looking forward to reading WH. Although WH comes first, of course, and BUTB follows on, both chronologically and in the author's order of writing.
Second tip- Watch "The White Queen" first, and read at least one of the four novels on which the series is based. You don't need to read all of them because they each take a different character's point of view of essentially the same events. Maybe not "The Lady of the Rivers", though, because that one is slightly earlier in time. The best two books in my opinion are "The Red Queen" and "The White Queen".
The reason for my second tip is as follows:
Philippa Gregory's historical novels are much, much easier to read than WH or BUTB, and you can easily get into the period via these novels. The period of course being the one immediately prior to the Tudors. In fact Henry VIII's father, Henry Tudor, is a major character in the Philippa Gregory series. You get to know him, and his extremely stubborn, single-minded and obsessive mother, Margaret Beaufort. Don't forget she was H8's grandmother on the Lancaster, (or Red) side. And they introduce you to his grandfather (on the York side, the white side of the Tudor Rose). This was Edward IV, and once you have met him, you see how much H8 took after him. Physically, both were very tall, very golden, very good-looking, very charming, and very athletic and strong - in their youth. Both put on weight, ran to fat, and became more self-centred and ruthless in middle age.
A further crucial similarity is that Edward IV, controversially, married an English commoner, for love. And even more interestingly, that particular woman refused to be his mistress, and held out for marriage or nothing. And another similarity is that the existence of a "pre-contract" or earlier marriage (which happened before the one universally recognised), later emerged as a reason why the public marriage was declared legally invalid. And when it did emerge, the children of the public marriage were declared to be bastards. And someone else took the throne on that presumption. (The infamous Richard III, but I am not going there).
So all that sets the scene, and gives a background for the character and behaviour of H8, and the background of civil unrest and war which explains the ruthlessness of the Tudors in executing anyone who set up as a rival claimant to the throne. The history of the "Wars of the Roses" and the "Princes in the Tower" also explain the Tudors' absolute obsession with the production of adult male heirs.
Third tip - Read and study the family trees which are laid out at the beginning of WH, and insert pencilled notes about the characters based on what you have learned from the study of the "Wars of the Roses" period. Keep a bookmark in the family trees page, and refer to it as often as needed.
Fourth tip - Have some history books to hand. My recommendations are as follows:
"The House of Tudor" by Alison Plowden. This gives an excellent overview of each of the Tudor monarchs as they follow on from the Plantagenets, and has further helpful family trees.
"The Six Wives of Henry VIII" by Antonia Fraser. The really excellent and meticulous fact-gathering of this work help you to navigate through the politics both national, international and religious. You can use the index to help you sort out the many Thomas's appearing in WH. You can look up the differences between Thomas Wolsey, Thomas Cranmer (both churchmen) and Thomas Cromwell, (linked to both, and the central persona of WH and BUTB).
In a similar vein, the last of the Plantagenets are confusingly called "The Poles", (descended from George Duke of Clarence, he who drowned in the butt of Malmesy wine), and the "de la Poles" (descended from a sister of Edward IV, also sister to Clarence and Richard III). You can look these names up in the history books to clarify who is who, and amend the family trees with further information.
Antonia Fraser's chapters on Anne Boleyn herself recount many of the events described in Wolf Hall, in the same order, so you can go there for verification of what is going on. And lastly, perhaps most importantly, Antonia Fraser gives impeccable reference notes, and lists her sources exhaustively. So, for example, you learn that Wriothesley, an irritating minor character in WH and BUTB, has a cousin who is the author of a "Chronicle of England" and hence a source. Likewise, the rather shadowy minor character George Cavendish, Wolsey's servant, turns out to have written a biography of Wolsey which is heavily used by AF as a source document. This is heaven for a person who likes checking things. Novels, of course, don't have an index!
Fifth tip - don't read it as a page-turner - it isn't. Take your time. Savour the language, and the historic detail, which you will recognise from the history books. Enjoy the "inside" knowledge which you are gleaning, ostensibly from the mind of the person there at the time, Thomas Cromwell, but in fact from works of history and the benefit of hindsight. Enjoy this god-like feeling of both knowing what is going to happen next, and having an imaginative insight into the thoughts and feelings of those present at the scene. This is where Hilary Mantel really excels. Her imagination recreates scenes with such realism, but simultaneously with such emotion and feeling - the latter qualities of course are completely absent from sixteenth century historical records. It is this skill which, I think, is what makes people feel sad when they have finished the book, and thirst for more.
As I did after finishing "Bring up the Bodies".
Tuesday, 23 October 2012
Electronic Equipment Seduces Me, but I Resist
I've commented before on the strange dissimilarity between myself and a very old friend (32 years and counting), concerning her dislike of second hand books. Second hand books are one of the greatest joys of my life. She already has a Kindle (150 books on it waiting to be read, when I saw her last week), and has now bought an I-pad. I asked her what she was going to use if for, and she didn't know. You can read books on an Ipad, as well as play games and do emails. She already has equipment to do all that, and I have to conclude that it was the aesthetic beauty of the I-pad which she could not resist. I thought the same myself, whilst waiting in PC World recently for the stock department to cough up a result for a new laptop I was considering purchasing. I was drawn to the display of Ipads, and picked one up. It was lovely to hold, lovely to look at, and the clarity of the graphics was just so brilliant. I was terribly tempted, but had to keep telling myself, "You cannot run Microsoft Office on this equipment, and the whole reason I wish to buy a new laptop is so that I can run the full suite of Office equipment and send documents electronically with ease to others using the same programmes."
The possibibility of reading books on an I-Pad was not a factor at all in my thinking. I love the feel of old books, I love the colour of old paper, and the distinctive character of different type faces. The physical weight of a real book tells you something about the contents. After Hilary Mantel won the Booker prize a second time last week, I retrieved from my bookcase my copy of her first win, "Wolf Hall". It's a hardback, which cost £1 in a charity shop. About eighteen months ago, charity shops were flooded out with copies of "Wolf Hall", presumably because people had found it to be unreadable, after being given copies for Christmas. The heavy, solemn dimensions give a preview of what the book will be like to read - not light or frothy.
At the present time, I am reading a copy of "A Pair of Blue Eyes", by Thomas Hardy. My copy, sourced in the excellent "Oxfam" Bookshop in Guildford, was printed in 1895. It is not a "First Edition" (the book was published in 1873), but a first "new" edition of the version printed by the American publisher, Osgood, McIlvaine.
Well over 100 years old, the spine is weak, and bits of old brown paper drop out of the binding when I prop it up in my book stand to read over meals.
The paper is yellow, the margins wide, the cut edges of the paper uneven, and the typeface small, hard to read without my reading glasses.
Wishing to find out more about the book, I went to the local library and took out a modern edition, "The Oxford World's Classics" version. This gives two maps of Wessex, a preface, an Introduction, a Note on the Text, a reading list, other historical notes, and an Appendix.
This is a pristine paperback, with a colour picture on the cover, and only one borrower has taken it out before me. It is printed in the Oxford Classics typeface, exactly the same as that used in its companion, "Jude the Obscure", also in my library pile.
The book smells of nothing, and gives out no atmosphere. I have read all the introductions and notes, but not the text (even though it differs slightly from the earlier, as TH revised it frequently during his lifetime, and this version has taken into account revisions later than 1895).
It does not stimulate my imagination. Reading the yellowing pages of the older book conjures up a time when women wore long skirts, had no vote and little chance of any education, and had to rely on marriage for a chance to leave the family home. Ladies, in particular, had to be shy, modest, able to play the piano and ride a horse, and had to have a spotless and unkissed past in order to impress a gentleman suitor. It is easy to connect with that long ago time when the book connects you with it. The new book, a uniform edition, has no such effect.
I do feel that a Kindle would have an even more dampening effect on my imagination.
Not long ago, on one of my now frequent visits to the library, an assistant approached me and tried to interest me in attending a lecture by Miriam Margolyes on electronic books. This lecture was free, and apparently designed to stimulate interest.
I was shocked, and told her I had no intention of moving over to electronic. This being in the actual library, I was rather worried that in ten years time there will be no books left on the shelves.
More encouraging was a small book I saw recently in the shop in the British Library. It was by former Booker Winner Julian Barnes, and was a hymn of praise in favour of real books, and particularly of second hand ones. I vowed to continue building up my stocks!
The possibibility of reading books on an I-Pad was not a factor at all in my thinking. I love the feel of old books, I love the colour of old paper, and the distinctive character of different type faces. The physical weight of a real book tells you something about the contents. After Hilary Mantel won the Booker prize a second time last week, I retrieved from my bookcase my copy of her first win, "Wolf Hall". It's a hardback, which cost £1 in a charity shop. About eighteen months ago, charity shops were flooded out with copies of "Wolf Hall", presumably because people had found it to be unreadable, after being given copies for Christmas. The heavy, solemn dimensions give a preview of what the book will be like to read - not light or frothy.
At the present time, I am reading a copy of "A Pair of Blue Eyes", by Thomas Hardy. My copy, sourced in the excellent "Oxfam" Bookshop in Guildford, was printed in 1895. It is not a "First Edition" (the book was published in 1873), but a first "new" edition of the version printed by the American publisher, Osgood, McIlvaine.
Well over 100 years old, the spine is weak, and bits of old brown paper drop out of the binding when I prop it up in my book stand to read over meals.
The paper is yellow, the margins wide, the cut edges of the paper uneven, and the typeface small, hard to read without my reading glasses.
Wishing to find out more about the book, I went to the local library and took out a modern edition, "The Oxford World's Classics" version. This gives two maps of Wessex, a preface, an Introduction, a Note on the Text, a reading list, other historical notes, and an Appendix.
This is a pristine paperback, with a colour picture on the cover, and only one borrower has taken it out before me. It is printed in the Oxford Classics typeface, exactly the same as that used in its companion, "Jude the Obscure", also in my library pile.
The book smells of nothing, and gives out no atmosphere. I have read all the introductions and notes, but not the text (even though it differs slightly from the earlier, as TH revised it frequently during his lifetime, and this version has taken into account revisions later than 1895).
It does not stimulate my imagination. Reading the yellowing pages of the older book conjures up a time when women wore long skirts, had no vote and little chance of any education, and had to rely on marriage for a chance to leave the family home. Ladies, in particular, had to be shy, modest, able to play the piano and ride a horse, and had to have a spotless and unkissed past in order to impress a gentleman suitor. It is easy to connect with that long ago time when the book connects you with it. The new book, a uniform edition, has no such effect.
I do feel that a Kindle would have an even more dampening effect on my imagination.
Not long ago, on one of my now frequent visits to the library, an assistant approached me and tried to interest me in attending a lecture by Miriam Margolyes on electronic books. This lecture was free, and apparently designed to stimulate interest.
I was shocked, and told her I had no intention of moving over to electronic. This being in the actual library, I was rather worried that in ten years time there will be no books left on the shelves.
More encouraging was a small book I saw recently in the shop in the British Library. It was by former Booker Winner Julian Barnes, and was a hymn of praise in favour of real books, and particularly of second hand ones. I vowed to continue building up my stocks!
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