Recent reading

[luzula]

My reading has been slow lately, because so much energy goes into writing. Anyway, I now have two books to write up!

Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner (1926)
A friend asked for beta-reading help, so I reread this. My hat is off to her for writing fic for this--I would be far too intimidated, I think! Partly this is because of the style, which sort of comes at me sideways, with surprising turns of phrase, but also because of the setting. Well, all right, I could write autumn woods, but there are all sorts of cultural references in this book which I do not get. Despite this, I enjoy it a lot, especially the latter half--partly for the writing style and partly because of the story of a woman gaining her independence in a surprising way (selling her soul to the Devil, though the Devil isn't exactly like you expect him to be).

The Bull Calves by Naomi Mitchison (1947)
Half a year of research for writing Flight of the Heron fic has set me up very well for making the most out of this book, which is also set in mid-18th century Scotland. I have read it before, and enjoyed it then, too, but I did find it extremely dense, and sort of like being thrown into the sort of SF/F brick where you have to figure out the elaborate worldbuilding. And now I get it! When the characters discuss politics, I understand all their references to people and current events, and the whole fabric of society and setting feels familiar enough to me that I can really appreciate what Mitchison does with it.

The main character is a middle-aged woman (Kirstie Haldane), and the main (already established) relationship is her marriage with William Macintosh, who she came to after a pretty bad first husband. The whole book is set during a few days, when the Haldane family is gathered (actually Mitchison's ancestors), and shows the complex family relationships and how they are affected by the '45, which was only a year ago, and by various secrets that come to light, and by the relationship between the Highlands and Lowlands. There's a warmth in the book which is really lovely, and I just love the second-chance relationship between middle-aged characters. I really appreciate the style, too, which has a lot of Scots words and phrases, but the spelling is like standard English spelling.

There's also a long section of historical notes, which of course I lapped up eagerly. I wonder if some of those books she refers to are available somehow, hmm. Anyway, the notes are full of very interesting facts, but also full of Mitchison's rambling opinions on the Union, Scots and Gaelic language, methods of preserving vegetables, Jacobitism, religion, agriculture, Jungian psychology, etc etc. The notes are very obviously written at a particular point in time (the 1940's), but she also owns this, and wonders what future readers will think. The whole book extremely recommended if you think you'd have any interest in it. I am ridiculously satisfied that I have a first edition of it. *clutches it to chest*

Comments

[regshoe]

Aww, the more I hear about The Bull Calves the more I look forward to it! That idea of setting a book in the aftermath of a big historical upheaval rather than during it is an interesting one that I'm sure Mitchison can do a lot with—as is a middle-aged 'second chance' romance.

the notes are full of very interesting facts, but also full of Mitchison's rambling opinions on the Union, Scots and Gaelic language, methods of preserving vegetables, Jacobitism, religion, agriculture, Jungian psychology, etc etc.

That sounds like a very good and worthy notes section indeed :D

The cultural references and setting in Lolly Willowes are interesting—in some ways the turn-of-the-century London middle-class family home setting is very familiar to me, because so many classic British children's books (as well as adult books) are set in that background, but this book turns it on its head, as it were, and shows what evil that whole society does to someone who can't live the way she's supposed to within it. It was certainly refreshing!

[luzula]

Looking forward to your thoughts on it when you finally get hold of it!

On Lolly Willowes: I mean, I do get the general sense of it as a turn-of-the-century London middle-class family home setting, so it's not like it confused me or anything. I suppose I was just reading it through the lens of potential fic writing, and seeing how difficult it would have been for me to write.

[regshoe]

Oh, yeah—I mean, not that picking up a new historical period and learning loads about it isn't possible as a fic writer, you know, but definitely something as casually dense with the cultural references as Lolly Willowes is is a bit intimidating. There have been plenty of books I feel the same way about.

[jesse_the_k]

Now you're a proper middle-aged reader -- you can enjoy the autumnal warmth of the second-chance love; you can compare your own reading to your writing and research and rereading.

My father used to say that the best part of middle age was rereading and getting things in a whole new way.

[luzula]

Oh, that's very true. ♥