February 16, 2009
The Penguin Great Ideas series (review of George Orwell’s Books v Cigarettes below). I’m slavering over the computer screen. Just look at this:
(image via cartelagency)
It would only cost $600 to buy every single one.
Archive for February, 2009
February 13, 2009
If your heart is rent by the strength and grief necessitated by Victoria’s February bushfires, as are all our hearts, then here is a very good summary of some practical ways to assist.
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Those of you who know that I went on a seven week holiday to West Africa, with books in tow and books collected along the way, may be wondering where all the book reviews are. And so you should. But my MacBook has spat the dummy — the hard-drive drama which claimed my first iPod having struck again. I blame Apple for the flimsy outer shell construction of their goods, and myself for not learning anything about my consumer decisions. Anyhow, this means that my father, sister and I are all sharing one computer, which has itself seen better days. Reow. So the book reviews will come toddling around after I get my computer fixed, which will be in the next couple of weeks or so.
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I signed up to be an usher at the Writers at the Convent festival this weekend. If you are already attending, look out for the bereft-of-computer-yet-strangely-competent usher hanging around. If you’re not, check out the program! It’s a diverse, compact menu of fun literary stuff. There is some good food available at the Abbotsford Convent too.
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Michael Kirby retired from the High Court of Australia a couple of weeks ago. This, for me, is worthy of notice because for many years he was the most morally courageous, compassionately principled judge on the bench. His final judgment was an example of these traits. Kirby wrote a dissenting opinion disputing the constitutionality of an amendment allowing the Commonwealth Government to take non-voluntary five-year leases over Aboriginal land. Other judges roundly criticised him, but he drew upon his anti-strict constructionist views to characterise the majority opinion as racially discriminatory.
There is a lot to say about Kirby (the now ex-) J, and by no means did I agree with his every decision, nor always with his methods. But with his stepping-down from the bench, Australian society has lost the direct influence of a great public intellectual, who championed human rights for those with few friends at the top.
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Good weekend, everyone.
February 11, 2009
‘I try to realize in a space of text the specific ambiguities that I feel — not
randomly chosen ones, but specific ones. This, I think, is the greatest clarity
we can hope for.’/…/
‘The meat of the lying class was a series of exercises that I would devise in
order to magnify and focus the practical powers of deception of the class
members. These operations were not always appreciated by the
families/spouses/loved-ones of the class-members. One such involved the
imposition of a false memory. The idea is this: you select an individual with
whom you have a long acquaintance. On a particular day, you sit with this person
and speak for a while. When you have acquired a looseness to your verbal manner,
you begin to recall, in camaraderie, a story from the distant past that involves
both you and the person in question (X). You choose the story with great care.
It should substantiate some belief that X has about himself, something he wants
to be true but that perhaps isn’t quite true. For instance, if X fancies himself
to have been crazy during his high school years, and likes to recall that about
himself, you can easily tell X a story about those high school years involving
X’s craziness (always a complimentary story), and get X to agree that it
happened. The whole thing must be done casually. What you are trying to get out
of X is not just his agreement that the fictional events occurred (that’s quite
easy). Rather, you want X to add to the story once you’ve begun it, and laugh
gladly in memory of old times, etc. Then, X will be telling you the end of a
false story you created, and he will actually be thinking that it’s true! You’d
be surprised how well this works, and how easily.’
– from a Bookslut interview with Jesse Ball about his book The Way Through Doors
February 10, 2009
Usually, I equate George Orwell’s name with visionary, serious political fiction. But Books and Cigarettes allowed me to add good humour and frank self-examination to the list of things I like about his writing. This itty-bitty (126 pages) book is one of Penguin’s Great Ideas series. It’s a collection of essays, all of which were originally articles published towards the end of Orwell’s life.
(You can read some of Orwell’s reviews here.)
As to the short and sweet titular essay, the text of which you can read in full here; finally — the quintessential question resolved! For the record, I have been in the ‘books’ corner from the cradle (and, I suspect, will be until the grave), though I’m perhaps not a good judge, never having been tempted even once by those lethal little sticks George Orwell proposes as their adversary. Don’t expect a treatise on the virtues of both. This essay leans more towards economic analysis, with Orwell challenging the old excuse that books are too expensive to enjoy regularly.
Other essays in the collection deal with the experiences of lumpen schoolboys at British preparatory schools (ghastly and hilarious), public hospitals in France (just plain ghastly), and freedom of speech (people don’t seem to know what it is). In most of the articles, Orwell draws from his own experiences. My favourite of the compositions was, of course, ‘Confessions of a Book Reviewer’, an ostensibly hypothetical dissection of the horrors of that profession. It contains the following gem:
Until one has some kind of professional relationship with books one does not
discover how bad the majority of them are. In much more than nine cases out of
ten the only objectively truthful criticism would be ‘This book is worthless’,
while the truth about the reviewer’s own reaction would probably be ‘This book
does not interest me in any way, and I would not write about it unless I were
paid to’.
(You can read some of Orwell’s reviews here.)
I, unlike most non-professional readers, rarely allow myself the pleasure of discontinuing an acquaintance with even a very bad book. First, savaging the end product of a highly objectionable writing/marketing/publishing process is sometimes worth the pain. Second, well, I paid my money. And third, I like to see things through until the end. But ‘Confessions’ and ‘Bookshop Memories’ (which details Orwell’s experiences working in a second-hand bookshop) show that Orwell regarded professional engagement with the publishing industry as a killer of passion for books.
Though I can sympathise with being tired of handling endless books and the people who love to love them more than you and other quirks of the industry, I disagree that such attitude-deterioration is inevitable. Obviously, considering that I review and edit written material even in my spare time. But I can definitely agree to reading Orwell’s non-fiction writing any day.
February 3, 2009
A review of The God of Small Things in the style of the same novel:
When historical circumstances of intricate inevitability converge upon Small Places like Ayemenem, Bad Things Happen.
Circumstances include things like:
a) Caste Systems
b) Family Pride
c) Marxist Politics
d) Oppressed Female Sex-shoo-a-lee-tee.
a) Caste Systems
b) Family Pride
c) Marxist Politics
d) Oppressed Female Sex-shoo-a-lee-tee.
This novel is an abruptly poetic account of Some Bad Things That Happened. The Things made lots of noises and occurred amongst creatively named shades of green. The abruptness comes from questionable. Sentence structure. That is a little overdone. But the poetry emerges too, irreverently, impressionistically, villanelle-ly. Contrary to Expectations, though, this book does not simply give up its secrets in a hyperelegant manner.
Instead it is an eventually comprehensive compilation of Brittle Historical Chips, the gradual introduction of which may initially have you searching for An Arrative Thread. Be consoled that everything comes together, tessellated, like the release of a long-held breath.
One thing is for sure in Roy’s vision: when History has you in its sights, it never lets go. Also, History can be just another name or excuse for Not Doing the Right and Hard Thing. There is talk of Putting One’s Hand into History’s Waiting Glove, etc. It took me a little while and a little context (Roy’s fierce activism) not to read this novel as simply fatalistic, a dirge sung over bodies lacking the wherewithal to defy inevitable decline. But that would be a Nincomplete Reading of this book. Consider Roy’s opinion of Choices as historically paramount even in Unwinnable Battles.
I didn’t mind it. But quite slow at the start.
