Jane Smiley - A Thousand Acres (Tisíc akrů)

Rose left me with a riddle I have not yet resolved: how we judge those that hurt us and show no remorse.      Indeed.

      This year's Birth Year Reading Challenge is going well! A Thousand Acres surprised me by being much more than I expected. Although really, I should've been prepared. There were hints. Like the Pulitzer prize. Or it being advertised as King Lear in Iowa. (I read King Lear a few years ago and since then successfully forgot what it's about. Shameful, I know, but at least I didn't quite expect the turns A Thousand Acres takes.)

      A girly detour: I should also admit that I made one serious mistake, otherwise I might've enjoyed the book even more. When the character of Jess Clark was introduced,  I decided it could be interesting to look up who played him in the movie based on Jane Smiley's book. I should never have opened google that day. Because that man, who comes and changes everything, who is so handsome and manly and seduces women and whatnot, is played by... click if you really want to know, stay away if you prefer that gorgeous man you dreamed up.

     Right from the start, one of the most important characters in the book is the land itself, those thousand acres, the kingdom of the farming family. And the king in his domain decides to sign the land over to his three daughters.  The middle one, Rose, together with her husband, is delighted with this move. Ginny,   the eldest daughter and the narrator of the story, is a bit more reluctant but as always sides with her sister and goes along with the plan, as does her husband. It's the youngest daughter, Caroline, who steps up and says she isn't sure it's the best idea. But she's also the only one who doesn't live on the farm anymore and  being a lawyer, doesn't have any intention to. In reaction to this, her father completely removes her name from all the paperwork with the attitude You don't want it, okay, you don't get it.
      The girls' relationship with their father is a complicated one and the two elder daughters tend to do what their father wants, because that's the simplest way to keep him happy. In their world, the farm and the family are everything and keeping their father happy is paramount to keeping the family together.
      This is a family drama but I think the characters' motivation is very well explained. The central fight to save the farm is surrounded by lots of smaller stories (well, smaller... I guess that depends on how much you like farms), all the characters go through personal problems that I believe help them to rethink their priorities and capabilities and in this way define the outcome of the whole story. Among other things, there's adultery (multiple), some proving one's worth, some maiming and even some dying. Well, Shakespeare.
      What I certainly didn't expect was the revelation that both Ginny and Rose had been used by their father when they were young. Ginny made herself forget all that but Rose brings those memories back to convince Ginny it's finally time to fight back when their father behaves more and more... irregularly. What makes this even worse is the fact that Caroline doesn't know any of that and thinks her older sisters (who have brought Caroline up and shielded her from their father) are only after the property.
      I won't go into all the details of the plot because what I think makes this book so good is the pacing of the narration and the way the land is omnipresent behind every decision made. (Also, you all probably have a pretty good idea what's going on because unlike me, you remember King Lear...) When I was reading it, I understood the motivations, felt transported to this to me strange vast country where everything depends on the land and the impression you make, scandals are kept hidden and a confident face is shown to the neighbours. I understand, but still would rather scream it out at the crossroad so that everybody could hear  than undergo all this. Hopefully.

     To sum it up, this book definitely deserved its Pulitzer...

Iain Banks - The Crow Road (Vraní ulice)

      Let me say right at the beginning that this book is amazing and I'll try not to repeat it too often. My love affair with Iain Banks' books continues to grow.

      As always, I'm finding it difficult to write something coherent about a book I like. (Mocking things is so much easier.) Well, The Crow Road is a family saga of sorts. At the same time, it's a mystery novel and it's about personal beliefs and it's full of inordinate drinking and Scottish landscape and accent. What is The Crow Road about? “Death, Sex, Faith, cars, Scotland, and drink” – Banks quoted in “Ian Banks and the Fiction Factory”. Well, the author knows best, I suppose.

      It deals with two generations of the McHoans, the Urvills, and some Watts.  More specifically, Prentice McHoan, the first person narrator of the most of the book, and his brothers James and Lewis, and their father Kenneth McHoan and his siblings Fiona, Rory and Hamish. Prentice's aunt Fiona married Fergus Urvill. That's probably enough of the genealogy. But it's important.

      The succession of deaths starts right at the beginning, with the sentence “It was the day my grandmother exploded.” Prentice comes home to attend his grandmother's funeral and from there, things only get worse for him for some time. One of his best friends dies in a road accident and the girl he's madly in love with marries his older brother. 

      ( At least, I thought brightly, she was here alone. For the last two years that I'd been worshipping Verity from afar she'd been going out with a gorm-free creature called Rodney Ritchie; his parents owned Ritchie's Reliable Removals in Edinburgh and were keen on alliteration. My father had met them once and coined a new collective noun: an embarrassment of Ritchies.)

He feels the need for some higher meaning in things and discussing religion with his rationalist father only leads to a dispute they never manage to settle. With an utter irony so typical for this book, Prentice's father Kenneth gets struck by lightning while climbing a church.

       (Dad drained his glass and put it down on the glass-topped table between us. 'Feel sorry for yourself because your friend's dead if you want, Prentice,' he said, suddenly calm and sober. 'But don't try to dignify it with what's supposed to be metaphysical angst; it's also known as superstitious shit, and you weren't brought up to speak that language.')

      Between all this madness, Prentice is obsessed with his uncle Rory's unfinished work. Uncle Rory's been missing for about ten years now and nobody knows whether he's dead or alive. He was a writer and was working on something big before he disappeared. Prentice gets his hands on some of Rory's notes (some from aunt Janice, Rory's ex-girlfriend, when he sleeps with her, (no, really) and some from his father's desk) and together with something his friend Ashley told him, he pieces together what it was Rory was writing and suspects Fergus Urvill killed him.

      Fergus' marriage wasn't that happy and one day he saw his wife with another man (one of the Watts). Some time after that, he crashed their car and killed his wife. It's hard to say whether he planned this or reacted on the spur of the moment, but Rory found out and probably confronted Fergus with his suspicions because he wanted to use this story for his literary project. And Fregus killed Rory and threw his body in a loch. Fergus didn't admit anything when Prentice came to him, but the following night, Prentice was attacked. The mysterious intruder didn't succeed in stealing Rory's notes and a few days after that, Fergus Urvill killed himself.

      That's the mystery plot, but I'd say the overall story of the McHoan family is more important here. Apart from current events we're also treated to some flashbacks to Prentice's childhood and also to Kenneth's childhood. We see the relationships in the family and in Prentice's circle of friends develop, and Prentice come to his senses and realize his love for Ashley. The descriptions of Scottish landscape are beautiful. Prentice's student life is... well, what you'd expect, a lot of sex, drink and drugs and talk about the Gulf war. Despite the number of deaths, the book is also quite funny, in that real-life way when absurd things happen at the wrong time.

      So like I said, not many coherent thoughts this time, only that The Crow Road is brilliant (oh, away the crow road = being dead) and definitely worth a read. And that so far, the Birth Year Reading Challenge is going much better than last year.

P. D. James - Potomci lidí (The Children of men)

      I did enjoy this book, although I'd been told multiple times before reading it that it would be better just to watch the film. I still have some issues with it, though. For start, I really don't like the Czech version cover. Or any cover that uses photos from the film, for that matter. It seems cheap and degrades the book because it shows they don't have faith it would sell without a pretty picture. (Not that I have anything against a bit of Clive Owen.) Also, it might have not been the library's smartest move to file it under the 'E.T.' tag  (E.T. means sci-fi for kids). Just a thought. But none of this has actually anything to do with the book itself. Oh well.
      I really like the concept behind the story. 'Humanity dying out' doesn't sound all that original but this world with its languid despondency and a tyranny no one cares about seemed very real and I wanted to know more about it. That's why I so enjoyed the first part of the book called Omega where this world is described to us via the diary of Theo Faron.
      One day, humanity just stopped being able to reproduce. The progressive realization that this is the end of everything allowed Theo's cousin Xan to declare himself Warden of England (and that's a much cooler title than what the Czech edition uses - Governor) and make some important changes, such as creating a penal colony on the Isle of Man, using 'sojourners' from other countries as slaves and basically forcing old people to commit suicide while calling the ceremony 'Quietus'.
      (Xan is probably my favorite character. He's obviously very intelligent and power-mad but there's also something else about him. He's hard to understand and guess what he'll do next. Also, he's very charming:))
       People - at least in England - only want to live the rest of their lives in fun and freedom, not to see any unpleasantness, and for this they are willing to overlook a lot of things. And the Council gives them just that. The bad things, the fear, are always covered up, never explicit.
       It was the second part of the book that I felt didn't live up to the first. The narrative changes into a sort of adventure love story as Theo falls in love with Julian, the first woman to be pregnant in 25 years, and who also happens to be part of a five-member dissident group. The problem is, none of the group seems a well fleshed out character and I just don't care about what happens to them.One is captured by the Council, another killed by a weird youngster group. Julian's disillusioned husband runs away and to the Council and the fourth is again killed by the Council. Obviously, evil Council, evil Xan. So in the end, it's just Theo and Julian, who simply doesn't want to give birth in front of the cameras.
      After Theo, Julian and the baby share a moment of happiness in a shed, Xan comes and thinks a stand-off with his cousin is a good idea. Well, turns out it wasn't, as Theo shoots him and takes his power over the country. And possibly lives with Julian happily ever after.

      Like I said, I love the concept, I just don't care about the characters. Not even Theo, but I think that's because he seems a little impersonal. At first, I had problems with the narrative shifting from 1st person view in the diary to 3rd person narrative and back, because Theo and the narrator have pretty much the same voice and it's easy to get them confused. I guess this made me feel Theo isn't really part of a story and is more of an observer, outside. I would have loved to read more about what and how happened during those 25 years.
      I did watch the movie afterwards. It doesn't have much in common with the book. It only follows the second half of the book. They got rid of the love story, which is probably good, but they also made the pregnant woman an African refugee and made everything more violent, the anti-government people more organized and made the whole country seem like one big violent conflict, which goes right against the feel of the book. On the whole I liked the book better.

ETA: And no Xan! The film was doomed from the start. 

Birth Year Reading Challenge 2011 - Time Machine

      The Birth Year Reading Challenge is here again! Okay, it's been here for some time, but I didn't want to join because of all the books I have to read for school.. and stuff. But the steady diet of American literature needs some diversity, so there it is, and this year with a twist. It's actually a Birth Year +/- a Roll of a Dice Challenge and for me that means books from 1992.
      The rules are pretty much the same as last year and you can find them at Hotchpot Cafe, so I won't repeat them here.

      For now I'm hoping to read:

      1) P. D. James - Children of Men √ (I've been meaning to read this for so long! I didn't watch the film yet specifically to be able to enjoy the book.)
      2) Iain Banks - The Crow Road √ (It's destiny, you see. I already got the book from the library a day before I decided to roll the dice and participate. And then I'm browsing 92 books and look what is there!)
      3) Jane Smiley - A Thousand Acres √ (Never heard of it but it won the Pulitzer, so...)
      4) Cormac McCarthy - All the Pretty Horses (wiki says: Its romanticism (in contrast to the bleakness of McCarthy's earlier work) brought the writer much public attention. Child of God certainly was bleak enough. I'm curious.)

      I hope to add more to them and read more than last year, but we'll see... I'm starting with James right now:)

Birth Year Reading Challenge Wrap-Up

      Okay, I know I'm doing it wrong. The books I chose might tell me something about the writing style in my birth year, but nothing about that period itself, since they're all set in the past, one of them in the 17th century and the other two in the 1920s - 1930s. But to me, the main thing is to enjoy the book and that I did, even though I didn't like the protagonist of one and the translation of another.  (Although as far as writing style goes, I can only say thumbs up!)
      I also intended to read more than three books but I got distracted, of course, and when I couldn't find Dan Simmons' Carrion Comfort in the library or in the big bookshop I usually go to, I went and bought another Dan Simmons novel instead. And then I had to read other books for school and... See, it's not my fault!

      Still. 'Twas fun and thanks to all that participated over at Hotchpot Cafe, I got to see all sorts of great books from other years.

      Oh, and the original post is here. That's how it's done, right?

Kazuo Ishiguro - The Remains of the Day (Soumrak dne)

      I finished this ages ago. Only by then I was so sick of looking at the screen that I kept putting off writing this post until I forgot it. But behold! Deadlines are miraculous things.

      I've already read two other Ishiguro's novels and I liked The Remains of the Day just as much as the other two. Also, I will probably never stop being amazed by some people's capacity to talk/write like the main character, Stevens, does in this novel - the overly elaborate, elegant style that in five sentences tells you less than I say in one. (Incidentally - what is the word for that?)
     So, it's 1956 and Stevens reminisces about his life that he spent as a butler in Lord Darlington's house. A wealthy American now owns the place and once grand house with lots of servants isn't what it used to be anymore. When Stevens gets the offer of a week off with a car at his disposal and at the same time receives a letter from Miss Kenton (actually now Mrs Benn), he decides to take up the offer and go visit her.
      This motoring trip. as he calls it, gives him much time to spend thinking about his past, his relationship with his father and with Miss Kenton and about his job and ultimately about whether his life was any good. These musings are narrated in first person and addressing someone, as if it is a long letter, although it's never stated to whom.
      Stevens is an extremely unreliable narrator. Or rather - that guy is really in denial. I think it's more a matter of deceiving himself than deliberately lying. What's more, whether he does that on purpose or his memory is actually failing him, he often confuses episodes he recollects and later amends to them or states they must have happened differently at a different time and so on.
      It seems that his entire life, he was striving to achieve what he understands makes a great butler - dignity. More particularly dignity in keeping with his position. That basically means occupying the role of a butler at all times unless he's completely alone, fulfilling his employers expectations, loyalty, and most of all never letting anything lose his composure. Oh, and also being attached to a distinguished household, that means one of some importance, where important things take place.
      At the beginning of his trip, Stevens gives the impression of being quite pleased with himself. He often repeats how some butlers have said of him he is one of the best and there can be no doubt Darlington Hall was a distinguished household, what with all the great people who gathered there after WW I. But his 'dignity' also has other results. For example when his father, also a butler, suffers a stroke and is dying in his room, Stevens isn't there with him because he has to attend to the guests. It actually pleases him, because it is a trial for his ability to keep his dignity at all times. Similarly, his attitude ruins his relationship with Miss Kenton. She used to work in Darlington Hall for a long time, meeting with Stevens every evening to discuss professional matters and chat. She tried to get closer to Stevens a few times but never got past his policy of never showing emotions. In the end, she gave up, got married and moved.
      While Stevens is on his way to visit Miss Kenton, he tries to convince himself it's because she may have hinted in her letter that she would like to come back to Darlington Hall, but the more he thinks about it and gets more anxious as he gets closer, he realizes there's more to it. When they do finally meet, Miss Kenton tells him she will stay with her husband, because that's her place and now it is too late. And in that moment, Stevens actually admits feeling his heart breaking.
      To top it off, all this reminiscing and a few incidents that happened during the trip make Stevens finally see, that the one thing that was a comfort to him all these years, his being a great butler in a distinguished household, isn't true either. Lord Darlington was once an important person influencing the future fate of Europe but sadly, his influencing consisted in making friends with the Germans after the WW I., an English nobleman being generous to a defeated foe. But as it all turned out, that wasn't really the way to go. And now not only does Stevens regret his blind loyalty and never questioning his employer's motives, he can't even say he served someone who spread the good in the world, and he's finally left with a feeling that his life has been for nothing.

     Quite a depressing story, but an excellent one.

E. L. Doctorow - Billy Bathgate

The edition I've got is so bad, I couldn't even find a picture of it.

      I've been trying to read this book for months and couldn't get past the first 30 pages, because it's terrible. Well, not the book itself (it's actually quite compelling (for some sensitive people, the sight of this word is obviously too painful) gripping and was nominated for Pulitzer!) but the translation. (It appeared in my favorite used books shop right after I decided to include it on my birth year reading list, so I obviously couldn't resist. Damn you, bookshop!) And when I say the translation is terrible, I mean will-melt-your-brain kind of terrible. I should have been warned by the fact that it says By the scriptwriter of Reghtime on the cover. But more on that later.
      Once I got the hang of deciphering, I started to enjoy the book. The story of how he became a member of Dutch Schultz's gang for a brief time is told by Billy Bathgate himself. He was an ordinary 15-year-old poor boy living with his slightly crazy mother in a Bronx flat in 1935 (I think). One day, Billy got lucky and the gangster boss Dutch Schultz noticed him, the quiet skilled juggler boy. Billy saw his chance there and sneaked into the gangster main office and got lucky again when they didn't kill him right away but employed him as a message-boy. From there, Billy slowly builds his position in the gang. But he soon realizes that he joined Dutch Schultz at the time of his downfall. Dutch has to go to court, but by settling in the country for summer and playing nice, practically throwing money in the farmers' faces, he manages to secure himself a dumb and sympathizing jury and win the case. But that only leads to more hostility from the authorities back in New York.
      Meanwhile, Billy spends a lot of time with Drew, Dutch's mistress who, for the sake of the locals, pretends to be his governess, and slowly falls in love with the 20-year-old girl.
      After the process, Billy is the only one able to deliver messages or bribes to people in New York and the rest of the gang has to hide. But when Billy is reporting to the gang hiding in New Jersey and plotting to get rid of the most inconvenient enemies, the gang is attacked and Billy, by that time in the bathroom, is the only one to escape. Right before his death, the financial brain of the gang gives him the combination to the safe, so Billy takes the money and is eventually able to start a new life with his mom and his and Drew's baby. (Yes, they had a baby, but Drew's not around anymore. She's not the type to stay in one place.)

      The main storyline sounds quite simple, but the charm of the book is in the details, in the way Billy grows up as he witnesses the murders and gets used to the life filled with constant danger. The 1991 film is on my to-watch list.

      Now, a few examples of the wonderful translation:
      Most of the time, the sentences are just slightly off, missing conjunctions or not making much sense, following the English syntax, but you can understand what's going on. The text just feels a bit weird. Like this one: "Kromě toho všeho jsem vychutnával zajímavý a krásný život, kde byl prostor, pohled na Sound, který v mých očích byl oceánem, široký horizont šedého moře, které plynulo a mizelo poklidně jako ty břidlice a kámen měnily polohu, kdyby nebyly přitahovány k zemi."
      But there are also things that look more like a computer translated it. Idioms translated word by word. Yes, here comes the fun. For example this: "Jste moje vychovatelka." "To jsem si myslela, ale asi v době, když ty ses staral o mně." Sounds okay, but in context it doesn't make any sense. So the reader has to stop and think and only when he realizes that the original probably used the words '... but about time you took care of me.' he's back on track.
      Not to mention such trivial mistakes like declining indeclinable words etc... (vstal ze sofy)

      I tried to google the translator - PhDr. Zuzana Čaplová - and found out that her translation won the 1994 Skřipec (an award for the worst translation of the year). So there. Lucky me for buying the book, now I've got something to scare kids with.

      But to end optimistically, I really liked some bits (and I don't know how much of that eerie feel was E. L. and how much Miss Translator but the result is nice) that characterize the book perfectly.
"Svlékala se před pistolníky, vodou, sluncem, život ji odstrojil, pochopil jsem proč s ním šla, to nebylo jako matky a otcové v normálním životě, tady se nebrala v úvahu láska, to nebyl svět lásky, ve kterém žili, to šoustání a zabíjení, to byla surová dospělost hnaná terorem."

Rose Tremain - Restoration (Navrácená milost)

 

 I was first introduced to Rose Tremain in the last year's Language through Literature class. I chose her Music & Silence as a book to review then, and I remember our teacher being surprised it wasn't Restoration. I loved Music & Silence (and I got an A :)), so I was glad to see Restoration on the 1989 books list. I can say now that my instinct was right the first time to pick Music & Silence over Restoration. The 380 pages were about twice as much than I would consider completely satisfying. That is not to say this book is bad - only I didn't like it.

      It's usually a good thing when a book is convincing but not this time. I didn't like Restoration mostly because I couldn't bring myself to like any of the characters. Not even understand and accept their motives, or at least pity them... and Rose Tremain did a good job making those characters so convincing.

      It's a story set in the 17th century England, during the reign of Charles II.
      The main character (and narrator) is Robert Merivel, an ugly (he says so himself, don't blame me), sensual selfish glutton.
      Then we've got his friend - an ascetic, scrawny, goody quaker John Pearce, whose most precious possession is a spoon, which he carries around all his life. (Somebody should have told him it's a towel you're supposed to have, not cutlery.)
      There's also Merivel's wife - a young, beautiful girl who would do pretty much anything to be with the king. Readers are probably expected to sympathize with Célie, but I thought she was really dumb. One of the king's lovers and she thinks she'd change him and get him to marry her. You're about a century too late for that, lass.
      Who else? Not many. Finn is a painter who throughout the novel strives to get to the court and is willing to bribe, lie, peach, whatever, to achieve his goal.
      Aaaand, we're getting there.... the King himself. His main diversion seems to consist in uttering cryptic statements that are supposed to enlighten the lower.

      Robert Merivel is a student of medicine, but he deliberately forgets everything he's learned when the king makes him his personal vet. Instead he gradually becomes the court's clown and for some reason he believes that the king really loves him because he pulls him by his ugly nose. Makes perfect sense. So he gladly obeys when he's requested to marry one of the king's lovers (that would be Célie) - to avoid jealousy of another lover. As a thank you he gets a manor house in Norfolk. And only after a year or so in Norfolk it occurs to him that it isn't exactly a sign of love to leave one forgotten in the country. So he spends his time moping around and trying (in vain) to learn to paint and to play the oboe. That's where Finn comes in - teaching Merivel to paint, he hopes to get some help in accessing the court.
      After a while, Célie joins him at the manor. I've already explained what her problem was - and she was sent there to come to her senses and content herself with what she's got.
      Long story short: Célie sings so beautifully that even crude Merivel falls in love with her and does the forbidden thing -  tries to kiss her. Célie is disgusted, Finn tells the king, Célie returns to London, Merivel is banished from his manor. King speaks his cryptic truths: Don't sleep, Merivel. Um, okay.
      So what Merivel does? (He still loves the king, mind you, and tries to do what he's told) He joins friend Pearce in a small quaker mental hospital (really meaning 3 barns). But he has to leave again because he's got one of the crazy girls pregnant. (Oh, and Pearce dies.)
      So then he lives with his new girlfriends at her mother's. Finn is there as well - the king didn't like his painting and locked him up for two years, so that redeems him in Merivel's book. Merivel finally returns to medicine and works as a doctor. (Oh, and his girlfriend dies. Giving birth to a baby girl.)
     And we're almost done. The king is finally pleased with Merivel (he's not sleeping - he works and he saved a woman from a fire, Yippee.) and awards him with a room (like, literally. one room.) in the manor in Norfolk. So that's a happy end. Merivel has a kid and a room, king likes Merivel, Finn and Merivel's dead girlfriend's mother hook up.

     Like I said, it's a perfectly believable story, well depicted setting and all. I just guess we've met each other at the wrong time, me and Restoration.

Birth Year Reading Challenge

completed so far: 3/3

Aye, this sounds fun!
So after the Book Awards IV Challenge, I'm joining also the Birth Year Reading Challenge, because it seems like a good idea - to know what was going on in the literary world when I couldn't quite follow new books because sleeping and eating took up all my time.

As some of you may have noticed (duh!), I decided to write my posts concerning the challenge(s) in English, which makes it even more challeng-ey:) (Maybe I'll translate my own posts some time later and feel like a celebrity:D)

As for the rules, here's what they say at Hotchpot Cafe:

RULES


1. Join anytime between now and November 30, 2010. The challenge ends at midnight EST on December 31, 2010.
2. Books may come from your TBR pile or list, but they don’t have to.
3. Overlaps with other challenges are allowed and encouraged.
4. Change your list at any time.
5. Reviews and reactions are encouraged, but you don’t need to have a blog to participate.
6. All genres and formats are eligible. If it’s a book, you can count it.
7. One candle is awarded for each qualifying book you read. There is no limit on how few or how many candles you can earn.

So for the time being, my list of books published in 1989 is:

1. Rose Tremain - Restoration  √
2. Kazuo Ishiguro - The Remains of the Day √
3. E. L. Doctorow - Billy Bathgate √