Ersatz TLS discussion

Welcome to the new thread.

Literary mags again - Working through some back numbers I came upon a short article by Tim Parks in the TLS suggesting that the mysterious Elena Ferrante might in fact be a man. Some years ago we all read that an unsporting Italian journalist had unmasked the author as a well-known female translator, to whom the publisher of The Neapolitan Quartet had been sending very large cheques, She denied it. Now a deep computer analysis of stylistic attributes in 150 published novels has pointed to someone quite different, and one person only – her novelist husband. He denies it too. Does it matter, asks TP. All artists ventriloquize, himself included. A reviewer of one of his early novels, written in the first person as a female, convinced herself that Tim Parks must be the pseudonym for a woman.

Reading Clive James’ lengthy essay on Aldous Huxley in The Meaning of Recognition makes you want to read Huxley’s own essays, which CJ says are so brilliant it is “like being enrolled in the college of your dreams.” The collected edition runs to six volumes. I find I have one small set published as On the Margin which happily has the one I was hoping for. “When he talks about Chaucer,” says CJ, “he beats even Chesterton, and sends you running for the nearest copy of The Canterbury Tales.” Literary essays with thoughtful insights are great to read, but the ones I value the most are those that also get you enthused to read, or re-read, the original works.

Hi Russel, can you send me your amended version of your PFA experience again. I replied to you, but somehow duplicated my reply as well. In my attempt to remove the extra copy I managed to delete the whole thread!.. The way things are going this week it is 'par for the course' I think. Goodreads does not let you recover a deleted post, it seems

thanks Tam

RussellinVT wrote: "Welcome to the new thread.

Literary mags again - Working through some back numbers I came upon a short article by Tim Parks in the TLS suggesting that the mysterious Elena Ferrante might in fact b..."

i never got into Ferrante. Modern italian novels can be hit and miss for me, nothing i have read before 1980 has disappointed me but something stale entered the oeuvre post 1980, not sure what. Back in the 2000s, i had so many italian modern novels i dumped it was laughable, while i have read 25 or so from the 1890-1980 period with great enjoyment.

Tam wrote: "Hi Russel, can you send me your amended version of your PFA experience again..."

No problem. I just re-sent it.

AB76 wrote: "i never got into Ferrante. Modern italian novels can be hit and miss for me,.."

I’m in no position to judge myself, as Ferrante is the only really modern Italian writer I have read, outside crime. The novels were all relatively enjoyable, giving a great idea of life in the low-class quarters of Naples, and the ebbs and flows of a relationship between two young women. They were not especially remarkable for the style. The pace was often very unhurried. At times I kept reading only because I wanted to find out what happened. Even if they were written by a man I don’t think it means they are necessarily any the less authentic as a record of female experience. You can imagine them as a wife-husband collaboration, the wife inventing and relating the story and the husband writing it (in the mould of Pevear and Volokhonsky).

RussellinVT wrote: "Tam wrote: "Hi Russel, can you send me your amended version of your PFA experience again..."

No problem. I just re-sent it."

I have posted it on to the blog. Should be fine now. Thanks for the input... Here is hoping Wednesday goes well...

Tam wrote: "I have posted it on to the blog. Should be fine now..."

It all looks fine, and the space for posting a comment is obvious, which it wasn't before.

RussellinVT wrote: "Tam wrote: "I have posted it on to the blog. Should be fine now..."

It all looks fine, and the space for posting a comment is obvious, which it wasn't before."

Yay! onwards and upwards... or maybe a bit sideways, as well?...

Proust, prix Goncourt by Thierry Laget continued journalistic and entertaining, though by the end you feel you’ve read more than enough of the newspaper coverage. From the day of the announcement that the prize had gone to Proust, instead of Dorgelès’ humane, heroic war story Les Croix de bois, a torrent of abuse and ridicule cascaded over the jury and Proust himself. The most ruminative chapter was one taking each of the criticisms in turn and smoothly assembling what was said, pro and con. Not all the abuse was crude. (Some of it was reasoned and very witty!) One can imagine something similar if, today, the Booker Prize were awarded not to a well-written, heart-felt novel by a survivor of a third-world famine but given instead to a novel of sensibility written by a billionaire from West Palm Beach wondering which pair of loafers to wear to a cocktail party. The most telling comment from Laget was that what the critics seemed to object to most was that Proust’s work was from an outsider, in a style they didn’t recognise. Reading Dorgelès - who volunteered at the outbreak of the war and served throughout, first in the infantry, then in the air force, winning the Croix de guerre - the journalists found the tone and rhythm of their own articles, a poignant account mixing tragedy, adventure, movement, emotion, gaiety, truth, sincerity and humanity, everything one liked to find in a novel (and just the sort of WWI story for which Pierre Lemaitre won the prize in 2017). In Proust they experienced nothing but a mortal ennui. But a century of passionate readers has vindicated the jury.

RussellinVT wrote: "Proust, prix Goncourt by Thierry Laget continued journalistic and entertaining, though by the end you feel you’ve read more than enough of the newspaper coverage. From the day of the announcement t..."

interesting!

I am enjoying 'The Shadow of the Wind'The Shadow of the Wind By Carlos Ruiz Zafon by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. It has a Spanish version of a certain historical flavour of description that reminds me of C J Sansom, of 'Shardlake' fame, somehow. But Zafon is less prescriptive with his characters. I would say it is part 'gothic' fantasy, ghost story, richly descriptive of period atmosphere, and part political commentary, of the times. He has a lot of fun name-checking famous, authors and stories. A great deal of weaving of plot takes place, sometimes they feel like aimless digressions, but somehow he weaves them back in to the story.

He also draws his characters very well. I feel far more empathetic to his characters than I did to C J Sansom's whose portrayal of women, of those times I found very caricatured. So if you like layered stories and gothic tendencies looped into crime novels then I would tentatively recommend it. Though I'm only about a third of the way through so far, so early days. His books seem to be somewhat on the hefty side, so don't get it if you are looking for a quick read. I will leave any actual rating until I get to the end, of course... My favourite character is the 'Library of Forgotten Books' itself...

glad you like it....i didnt and found it dragged badly, the promise was rich but i never really enjoyed it

AB76 wrote: "glad you like it....i didnt and found it dragged badly, the promise was rich but i never really enjoyed it"

I do understand your reservation. I'm not a fan of really long books on the whole, and I can see why you think it dragged a bit, I had a few moments of ennui and then in a few pages time he threw something new into the mix, enough to keep me going, for now.

I am not a crime reader so I didn't expect to particularly relate to it. Also I have found Spanish writers, the few I have read so far, to be far to flowery in language terms, and so suppose that I felt a bit relieved that it wasn't as flowery as those were. I'm someone who likes the idea of Cervantes 'Don Quixote' but didn't actually like the reality of trying to read the actual book...

Tam wrote: "AB76 wrote: "glad you like it....i didnt and found it dragged badly, the promise was rich but i never really enjoyed it"

I do understand your reservation. I'm not a fan of really long books on the..."

On spanish literature in general i'm majorly positive and the flowery crap is mostly confined to the useless Javier Marias who sucks up way too much attention with his appalling drivel

Modern spanish writers like Llazanzares, Rivas and Cercas are superb, while its hard to find bad novels from 1890-1980. Marias has ruined many peoples idea of what Spanish literature could be.

Marias, like Tim Winton and China Mieville is one of those writers i used to go back to the well for one more time on my commute as a 20 something and find sleep was preferable to their dreadful prose! I loathe all three...

Hello everyone, I've not been here for a while, I've been trying not to have anything to do with Amazon or Besos, but hey, I've missed you all!
I'm currently reading The Woodcutter by Reginald Hill.

Thank you for the new thread.
Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection. Napoleon was right-- a static defense is a fatal thing. The Germans are waiting to be surrounded-- just as the Red Army was surrounded in Ukraine during the summer before. Stalin, furious-- and probably fearful-- of retreats, had commanded his armies to stand fast-- four armies surrounded by a German pincer movement. Two powerful panzer forces linked up east of Kiev, and the "kessel," as the Germans called the surrounded area, was brought to a boil.

By midwinter 1941-1942, with the German army stuck in the snow, Hitler told his own armies to stand fast. The German dictator had learned nothing from Stalin's example; his armies were pounded by Red troops who had served in Siberia, and were trained and equipped for fighting in an Asian winter.

The winter of 1942-1943, when Junger made his trip to the Caucasus, was even worse.

" Cauldron battles produce a frame of mind unknown in earlier wars from our history. Inertia sets in when we are about to hit rock bottom."

[Junger doesn't mention another event of that winter; with the German Sixth Army surrounded in Stalingrad, Hitler sent a message to General Paulus, promoting him to Field Marshal, and at the same time reminding him that no German Field Marshal had ever surrendered on the battlefield. Paulus accepted the promotion. And then surrendered.]

Junger's fascination with epigrams. He and other holders of the Blue Max, the highest German medal, have their annual gathering, laying a wreath at the tomb of Frederick the Great. He quotes Napoleon's General Murat: "I wear medals so that people will shoot at me." Junger: "I have only to reverse this sentiment in order to comprehend "my own situation."

He quotes a French author: "I wear a suit of armor forged completely of errors."

His fascination with his own dreams, which he often remembers clearly, continues.

Some other reading: I looked up a list of books whose copyright has expired. US copyright has ended for creative works registered in 1929. I note that Hammett's noir novel Red Harvest is on the list. Poking around at the Auburn Library, I found "Classic American Crime Fiction of the 1920s," a huge anthology (hard to lift) with five complete novels plus annotations. The margins contain definitions of 20s slang, and photographs of places and makes of autos mentioned in the books.

Of course, Red Harvest was included. Now that I've finished it, I'm tempted to read the next entry, W.R. Burnett's "Little Caesar." After all, why waste the energy spent lugging the book upstairs?

Robert wrote: "Thank you for the new thread.
Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection. Napoleon was right-- a static defense is a fatal thing. The Germans are waiting to be surrounded-- just as the Red Army..."

glad to see you are still enjoying the magnificent Junger diaries, its striking how so many of the officers he engages with in the Causcasas section were to die before the end of the war, the eastern front was a brutal place to fight

It still baffles me how an army like the German one, steeped in logistical skill, could leave such a large army in Stalingrad with almost no basic winter clothing. I know they reached the city at the end of the long hot russian summers but to not plan for siege or the fact they might face 2 or 3 winters, is incredible. I havent re-explored the wehrmacht side yet, my luftwaffe diary reading was brilliant on the situation after 1942, where despite destroying so many soviet planes, the soviets were at parity in months and then the luftwaffe was playing catch up. supply for stalingrad was never easy and aerial superiority around STalingrad was long gone

interesting you mention "Red Harvest", its on my list as it is set in Montana, where my Raban and Doig readings have left me with a clear picture of that state and especially the situation where the Pinkertons were involved in actions for companies. I am going to order it now

Interesting TLS article on the new David Hare play being performed in London, with Ralph Fiennes as the great Victorian actor Sir Henry Irving

I wasnt aware that Irving was from a working class background and he now joins Elgar and Hardy as great examples of great Victorians from modest backgrounds. Elgar was from a modest Warwickshire family and Catholic, which didnt help him and Hardy was of modest Wiltshire stock. Irving was also from the western UK, Somerset.

The wiki page for Irving also mentions "The Diary of a Nobody" a novel i still havent read, so i will put that right and read it after the Stow novel. Its possibly the longest late victorian "must read" for me, that i still havent read

La Légende de Mélusine turned out to be surprisingly long, at 250+ pages. It was written by a clerk, Jean d’Arras, in the employ of the Duc de Berry. Completing it in 1393, he seems to have used certain ancient sources that are now unidentifiable. Some elements may be drawn from Herodotus and Horace.

It tells the story of how in the land of Poitou the young knight Raimondin meets the mysterious and beautiful lady Mélusine, coming upon her at the Fountain of Thirst. He immediately asks her to marry him, and she agrees after he gives his solemn promise never seek to observe her on a Saturday. This promise observed, he will rise to the heights of riches and honour.

She then counsels him to travel to Brittany to recover a lost inheritance, and in the meantime she builds for him the splendid fortress of Lusignan. Raimondin for his part succeeds in every venture. So for a time things go swimmingly, with much jousting and feasting and the occasional punitive raid or a battle with a giant.

But then Raimondin is provoked by a malicious rumour that Mélusine spends her Saturdays fornicating. He peeps into the bath-house and discovers that on this day of the week her lower body is transformed into that of a serpent “as fat as a barrel of herrings”. From that moment all is lost.

This colourful tale, which pre-dates Le Mprte d’Arthur by 70 years, is recounted in the grand style of courtly romance. The clarity of the story-telling reminds one of the classic fairy tales. Nor does it lack the brutality that is so startling in Perrault. The copy from the library had a lot of lovely original 15th century woodcuts (if not quite as charming as the ones Tam posted). What a pleasure to read, and how strange that it is not better known in the anglo-saxon world.

Greenfairy wrote: "Hello everyone, I've not been here for a while, I've been trying not to have anything to do with Amazon or Besos, but hey, I've missed you all!
I'm currently reading The Woodcutter by Reginald Hill."

It looks good - will ask the library to find it for me.

RussellinVT wrote: "La Légende de Mélusine turned out to be surprisingly long, at 250+ pages. It was written by a clerk, Jean d’Arras, in the employ of the Duc de Berry. Completing it in 1393, he seems to have used ce..."

Both Jean d'Arras and Guillaume de Machaut, (of the Garden fame) https://i.postimg.cc/N0p0zTPq/Machaut... both worked for Jean, Duc de Berry at roughly the same time, I am sure that there is some cross over there somewhere

Oddest book find ever?

Well until now it was finding a Tillich book in a beautiful old Salisbury church, for £1, about a decade ago

Today, a new odd find, i popped out in the welcome pouring rain(using an umbrella, wow...thats a change), to pick up some sourdough bread and the weekend FT. Was walking down one of the streets where i live and noticed another tedious eatery, taking the place of a liberal club and spotted "A Students Diary 1956" by Lazlo Beke lying among other hardbacks in the window, as you get in some gastro pubs.

Got home, it was £83 on amazon but £7.99 on ebay....sorted. I think we all know what a diary of 1956 by a Hungarian student may be about but i'd never heard of it before

Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the reason for his visit. It was not to fight – he visits positions near the front line, makes observations on the grim state of equipment and morale, and then moves on. A relatively junior officer, he meets with generals and commanders, who show him their maps. There is no mention of any report he must make, whether written or oral, just this journal, which could not be shown to anyone, so close does it come to criticism of the conduct of the war at the highest level, and a condemnation of atrocities. As the front collapses, after the capitulation at Stalingrad, he learns to confine his views to platitudes when speaking with an officer of “the other party”.

As you say, he does have an ear for a good epigram. I keep trying to identify what it is that makes his writing so special. It seems inadequate to say it’s apt and cultured and expressive. His paragraphs somehow possess a rhythmic balance. To put it in a sub-Jungerian way, it’s as if there were no such thing as poetry, and all poets were obliged to express themselves in prose.

RussellinVT wrote: "Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the reason for his visit. It was not to fight – he vi..."

i think the translators deserve major credit too for delivering a complex 400 page work as well as they have done. His novel On The Marble Cliffs would be relevant for you and Robert to read , he refers to it many times in the diary and uses the term "charnal houses" for concentration camps which comes from the novel. Its very short, lyrical and dark, a kind of fantasy with barbs,written in 1939

I agree about the mystery of his reasons for going to the Caucasas, i would imagine as a mid 40 something military man, he would have known these top officers socially inbetween the wars, so may have got an intro on his name alone, i suspect. While Junger wasnt a "junker" , he would have fouight in WW1 alongside many, who by 1939 would be Colonels or above if they survived and i'm sure the connections were maintained from 1919-39

An excellent Joyce Carol Oates review of a new book about serial killers and environmental p[ollution called Murderland

Partly about a Washington State company based in Tacoma that polluted the whole region for decades, owed by the Guggenheims, it also links in many of the serial killers in the area to possible brain damage due to lead and arsenic inhalation. The author of the book grew up in the Tacoma area.

I'm not a fan of true crime, its a truly odd sub-genre which seems to fascinate female audiences (i have never worked out why, Oates suggests its because in the true crime world, people are caught and sentenced, unlike so much other crime against women). Ted Bundy is referred to throughout and other killers i didnt know but the most interesting part was the possible role lead poisoning plays for all of us and how significant it may be a few generations down the line.

RussellinVT wrote: "Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the reason for his visit. It was not to fight – he vi..."

What's even more puzzling is that the Germans had shortages of winter uniforms and equipment in the winter of 1941-42. That they fell into the same trap in the winter of 1942-1943 is astounding.

Junger wasn't an aristocrat by birth, but as a member of the Order of the Por Le Merit (Blue Max), which he belonged to for his remarkable service in World War One, was a high social order of its own. This might explain his rubbing shoulders with senior officers and aristocrats. The social order that Junger and his friends hoped for in the late 1920s was rather like Imperial Germany-- without the Hohenzollerns or a democratically chosen parliament.

Robert wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the reason for his visit. It was ..."

good point about the blue max and Jungers politics, as for the uniform shortages, i wonder if anyone has explored this in depth?

Of course the veneer of German organisation is maybe over-hyped in WW2, their best operations were the ones involving fast moving "blitzkreig" with healthy dosings of luck. Once sucked into Russia's gaping maw, they were always likely to face the attractional agony of facing much larger enemy forces and the nightmare logistics of advancing 500 miles into a void and having 500 more to go and again...plus having a lowly austrian corporal deciding on tactical options...LOL

AB76 wrote: "Robert wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the reason for his visit ..."

good point about the blue max and Jungers politics, as for the uniform shortages, i wonder if anyone has explored this in depth?..."

The role of logistics in WWII has to be the subject of many studies in staff colleges. I’m not sure I’ve seen much on it in the popular histories that I mostly go for. Even in Richard Overy’s Why The Allies Won it receives only intermittent attention. He is excellent on the disastrous decline of German tank superiority on the eastern front, but even here the focus is more on manpower and production rather than deployment. No mention at all that I can find of winter uniforms.

Of the eleven stories in The Distracted Preacher and Other Tales by Thomas Hardy only two ended happily, the rest in misery or death. The best were the lead story (about smugglers), The Son’s Veto (about a vicar with no charity in his heart) and On The Western Circuit (about a London barrister and a country girl). One or two of the others were rather weak. But on the whole it was a worthwhile read.

I read Jude The Obscure recently and was surprised to find how sometimes Hardy’s style fell into preciousness. The editor of this book has a spot-on comment:

“Those aspects of Hardy’s writing which most often irritate or repel – the syntactical mannerisms and convolutions, the archaisms and insensitively placed abstract or learned references – are largely absent from the stories.”

RussellinVT wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Robert wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "Robert wrote: "Junger in the Caucasus on a tour of inspection...."

Just finished that section myself. One curious thing is that we never learn the r..."

There probably was a gremlin in the works here, some Nazi bigwig who had never fought a fair fight maybe feeling winter uniforms were a luxury. I'd understand that on the western front in Dec....a good greatcoat and thermals would be sufficient but spending an entire Russian winter exposed, fighting and hungry wearing the feldgrau must have been agonising.

Some quick googling shows the amazing range of gear needed in winter conditions, the right kind of coat, boots, hats etc. It may be a factor that in reality the Germans were supplied with the wrong kind of winter clothing, again suited to the robust and cold German winter climate but not the much longer and much colder Russian one.

So winter gear was available but not the right quality or variety for the russian winter

I have finished reading 'The Shadow of the Wind' by Carlos Ruiz Zafron. I can only give it a modest 3, I think, though I was entertained somewhat, I didn't believe in the fundamental basic premise, that a father could so alienate himself from his daughters welfare, to her ultimate detriment. I don't want to spoil any of the plot details, for those that might want to read it. I did enjoy a lot of the characterisation but I think that gothic novels are not really for me.

The only one that I can think of, that I did enjoy, was Mary Shelly's 'Frankenstein'. Otherwise I seem to have a fundamental disbelief in the construction of such narratives. It is not really a ghost story, but does seem to be about how history can haunt people for all kinds of reasons, which I do agree can often happen, but I found the responses of the various characters just a bit OTT, on the whole. That is ramping up the drama, to the cost of the overall story arc, at least to me. The sproglets partner had read it, but she probably read it in Catalan, and reported back that she quite enjoyed it, but it was a bit too flowery for her tastes. I did not find it so, but I am interested in the implication that translations to another language can change the whole feel of a novel. Do foreign publishers give instructions such as dial down the 'floweriness' of the language, to suit the new foreign readers, when commissioning a translation?

My next book lined up to read is Samantha Harvey's 'Orbital' from the free 'church library' offerings!... It is quite a few years since I have actually read a Booker prize winning novel, I think. The last one was 'Bring Up The Bodies', by Hilary Mantel. I failed to complete 'Lincoln in the Bardo'... and so it goes...

Tam wrote: "I have finished reading 'The Shadow of the Wind' by Carlos Ruiz Zafron. I can only give it a modest 3, I think, though I was entertained somewhat, I didn't believe in the fundamental basic premise,..."

Orbital is on my pile...mainly due to discussions here and on the G....i should be reading it soon.

Tam wrote: "...I did enjoy a lot of the characterisation but I think that gothic novels are not really for me.

The only one that I can think of, that I did enjoy, was Mary Shelly's 'Frankenstein'. ,..."

I just read the story of Frankenstein in a section of Richard Holmes’ The Age of Wonder. He places it in the context of a heated argument over Vitalism, in which two leading medical authorities of the time, one an established professor, the other his upstart young collaborator, disputed in public whether there was in our physiology some additional (God-given) vital fluid or whether there was nothing beyond our (evolved) organs. The Romantic poets followed it all, and Mary Shelley may have attended one of the lectures. When the Creature is laid out on Frankenstein’s operating table and is galvanized and opens one eye, it recalls what happened in a lugubrious experiment by the sinister Italian Aldini trying to revive an English murderer’s corpse with an electrical charge, shortly after his hanging. Holmes makes the point that a similar major issue, the origin of consciousness, remains wholly unresolved today. Victor Frankenstein from Ingolstadt seems to have been a composite portrait based largely on a physiologist named Ritter who was one of the circle around Novalis in Jena, another group I’ve enjoyed exploring. The Creature of course is entirely her own invention. I found him pitiable and rather tragic, not at all the monster of the movies.

RussellinVT wrote: "Tam wrote: "...I did enjoy a lot of the characterisation but I think that gothic novels are not really for me.

The only one that I can think of, that I did enjoy, was Mary Shelly's 'Frankenstein'...."

Yes. The sadness and the tragedy was my overwhelming impression from reading it. Pathos even, and it must be well over 40 years since I last read it. I wonder how Frankensteins 'monster' would have been received if Frankenstein had managed to revive a handsome and attractive cadaver? And of course the main part of the story is that the creator rejects his creation, which is a variation of the parental rejection of the child, which it has in common with "The Shadow of the Wind'...

AB76 wrote: "An excellent Joyce Carol Oates review of a new book about serial killers and environmental p[ollution called Murderland

Partly about a Washington State company based in Tacoma that polluted the w..."

We used to call that smokestack and its output The Tacoma Aroma. Hard to believe that the smell created serial killers. Sometimes several such monsters will appear in a region-- like the German serial killers described in Lustmord, who appeared in Germany in the 1920s.

Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "An excellent Joyce Carol Oates review of a new book about serial killers and environmental p[ollution called Murderland

Partly about a Washington State company based in Tacoma that po..."

i love that(Tacoma Aroma), i dont know much about the Pacific NW industries, i read a crime thriller set in Portland called Hard Rain Falling which was great and some Ken Kesey, plus Japanese american novels.

I imagined Tacoma as a kind of sleepy burb, that article educated me no end!

I agree that the premise it may create serial killers is rather flimsy in some ways but then nobody really seems to analyze the impact of industrial pollution on people in an organised manner, relating to brain function etc

My suspicion is that pollution acts slowly and lingers, impacting people in their 50s and 60s, more than youngish folk like Bundy

Francos Crypt by Jeremy Treglown(2014) is almost exactly the kind of cultural history i love to read, detailed, conversational but also delving into the cultural roots of a period in history and the lesser known creative fringes of so called "dead" periods

"Dead" periods for me would be Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy or Francoist Spain, where the ideologies deny creative freedom and expression in art, literature and society. But as i edge ever close to 50, i realise there are so many nuances within these periods of history, where in fact the process was a vivid and as dynamic as before and after these destructive epochs(peacetime of course not WW2 or the Spanish Civil War, where times were different)

Treglown has opened my eyes to the world of Francoist Spain and the fact that much art and literature did flourish in the 35 years between 1940 and 1975. Clearly it was not a free society and that vindictive repression marked a traumatised spain in the 1940s and 1950s but he has introduced to the work of artists like Tapies, Millares and Suara, my own exploration before the literature chapter has found recently translated novels from the 1950s and 1960s too

Why this kind of history fascinates me so much is that it combines art,literature and politics, without the familiar patterns of popular history. I read a great book on France from 1936-46 which was very similar and one about Italy from 1937-1947. What those two books managed was the often overlooked contunuity between the two regimes, one free, one not. With Treglowns book its a focus on Francoist Spain only but he manages the same depth and questioning as trhe other two

I am about halfway through Samantha Harvey's 'Orbital' so far. I find it a mixed bag really. Some bits are quite poetic, and other bits are really quite dull. None of the characters are well developed, so it feels a bit flat, and quite repetitive. To me, given the international nature of the missions the author could have written in more of a story by having the various astronauts discuss political/nationalist issues between themselves.

I found myself pondering, given the history of the 'space race', between the US and Russia, that this history seems to have such minimal acknowledgment in the book. But I do know now exactly how many underpants are allowed for each individual on a mission and so I am thinking that so far she has rather neglected the 'smells' of the space laboratory world!...

I cant remember if I put up this article on Earnst Jünger's fictional imaginations, so here it is for those interested as I was quite taken by the similarities of him imagining something that pre-figured, somewhat, the much more recent development of AI. 'Ernst Jünger’s Narratives of Complicity' by Alex Ross https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...

AB76 wrote: "Francos Crypt by Jeremy Treglown(2014) is almost exactly the kind of cultural history i love to read, detailed, conversational but also delving into the cultural roots of a period in history and th..."

I can recommend The Spirit of the Beehive, an excellent Spanish film about childhood set in the aftermath of the Civil War, made during Franco's reign.

Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Francos Crypt by Jeremy Treglown(2014) is almost exactly the kind of cultural history i love to read, detailed, conversational but also delving into the cultural roots of a period in h..."

thanks for that Robert, i am certainly finding a lot of culture that maybe hasnt been discussed or written about outside Spain. i'm still puzzled how i missed this book 11 years ago, unless i thought in haste, that the meagre offerings of the period were not worth reading about or just propaganda. In reality, i would say it was actually a richer period of novels, films and art, my list is expanding and i'm so glad i'm reading it.

Literature is the next chapter, the first major spanish writer of the period i read was Camile Jose Cela, about 15 years ago and i'm glad i have found so many more. (i have read Pla, Rodoreda, Bonet and Sales in last 7 years(all Catalan) and have Santos and Delibes on order right now.

AB76 wrote: "Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "An excellent Joyce Carol Oates review of a new book about serial killers and environmental p[ollution called Murderland

Partly about a Washington State company based in..."

My sister started as a Tacoma journalist and was active in Pierce County politics for years. During the 1970s, she found that the closest match to Tacoma was Oakland, California. The cities had the same weak mayors, similar crime rates, and even the same pollutants. Oakland had drug gangs warring with each other, but not prominent serial killers.
A friend of hers once put out her hand as we were driving through Tacoma, like a conquistador toward the Pacific: "This is downtown Tacoma! Isn't it gross?"

Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Robert wrote: "AB76 wrote: "An excellent Joyce Carol Oates review of a new book about serial killers and environmental p[ollution called Murderland

Partly about a Washington State com..."

Hardly the Californian dream in Oakland then lol!

were these places as liberal as they are now, back then, the classic west coast-east coast democratic voting majority?

Tam wrote: "I cant remember if I put up this article on Earnst Jünger's fictional imaginations, so here it is for those interested as I was quite taken by the similarities of him imagining something that pre-figured, somewhat, the much more recent development of AI. 'Ernst Jünger’s Narratives of Complicity' by Alex Ross https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...."

This looks interesting, thanks. Initially the link would allow me to read only the opening paragraph, but now I seem to have the whole piece.

L’exil et le royaume – Albert Camus

One hardly thinks of Camus as a short story writer, and indeed several of these six nouvelles read more like descriptions of personal crisis than actual stories: a central figure feels that his/her inner self is coming apart. If they fit into an existentialist thought-scheme, it’s a struggle to work out exactly how.

But one of the six – Le hôte / The Guest – is outstanding, a perfect 20-page tale involving a teacher, a police officer and an Arab prisoner, set in the empty terrain on the southern slopes of the Atlas Mountains. This one is well worth looking out.

RussellinVT wrote: "L’exil et le royaume – Albert Camus

One hardly thinks of Camus as a short story writer, and indeed several of these six nouvelles read more like descriptions of personal crisis than actual stories..."

I read these on a beach about 20 years ago and they are superb, i am also keen to read "A Happy Death" which seems to be an early version of "L'Etranger". His Algerian set fiction is brilliant and he is possibly the best witness to the working class pied noir culture that is now dispersed and forgotten.

RussellinVT wrote: "Tam wrote: "I cant remember if I put up this article on Earnst Jünger's fictional imaginations, so here it is for those interested as I was quite taken by the similarities of him imagining somethin..."

i totally missed you including that article Russ, am going to read it now, oh dear, the link seems dead

AB76 wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "Tam wrote: "I cant remember if I put up this article on Earnst Jünger's fictional imaginations, so here it is for those interested as I was quite taken by the similarities of hi..."

Do a search for 'Ernst Jünger’s Narratives of Complicity' and then select The New Yorker

AB76 wrote: "i totally missed you including that article Russ,..."

It was actually Tam who found it. I’ve now read the piece myself. It is most impressive in laying out everything that is attractive and repulsive in the life of this “warrior-aesthete”. Ross says enough about Junger’s other published works to make me think that once I have finished the Paris Diaries I will leave it at that.

RussellinVT wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i totally missed you including that article Russ,..."

It was actually Tam who found it. I’ve now read the piece myself. It is most impressive in laying out everything that is attracti..."

ah thanks tam
i have actually read that before, when i was reading On The Marble Cliffs last Xmas, a great article

For me, the greatest crime of him and his ilk was the complicity in the destruction of the Weimar Republic, where the combined forces of conservatism were quite happy with a faustian deal with the Nazi's, if it restored their reactionary world, military expansion and german nationalism. If i am exceptionally harsh, he is one of hundreds of thousands of non Nazi but right wing Germans who reaped what they sowed and one can re-look at this criticism of the Nazi's in 1940-45 and think "surely an intelligent well read man could see this coming and what the faustian pact really meant?"

AB76 wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i totally missed you including that article Russ,..."

It was actually Tam who found it. I’ve now read the piece myself. It is most impressive in laying out everyth..."

AB76 wrote: "RussellinVT wrote: "AB76 wrote: "i totally missed you including that article Russ,..."

It was actually Tam who found it. I’ve now read the piece myself. It is most impressive in laying out everyth..."

I think that the general feeling of many Germans before WW-I was rather complex, and nuanced, and that the belief in a 'cleansing War' to purify the rotten core of Europe was seen by many to be necessary. I wrote about it here, in 'Franz Marc and The Fate of Animals' many years ago using artist Franz Marc as a classic example of how Utopian thinkers and artists, as well as many ordinary Germans, really did believe that they were engaged in heralding in a better world! https://jediperson.wordpress.com/2021...

I think Alex Ross was a bit harsh in his judgement of Jünger but I thought it was an interesting article. I find myself wondering what kind of experience Jünger had when taking LSD trips with Albert Hofman? The mind boggles... a bit...