Month: July 2008

Northanger Abbey

Posted on by Dana

Northanger AbbeyJane Austen’s Northanger Abbey is the story of the naive Catherine Morland. Catherine accompanies Mr. and Mrs. Allen, family friends, to Bath and meets and befriends Isabella Thorpe, the daughter of one of Mrs. Allen’s school friends. Catherine also meets Henry Tilney and is instantly smitten. Catherine also befriends Tilney’s sister Eleanor and secures an invitation to visit the Tilneys’ home Northanger Abbey from General Tilney, Henry and Eleanor’s father.

Every synopsis of Northanger Abbey that I’ve read has been misleading. Even the title is misleading. I was misled into believing the entirety, or at least a large portion of the book would take place at the imposing Northanger Abbey, ancestral home of the Tilneys. I judge about half the book is actually set at Northanger Abbey. Also, most synopses of the book that I’ve read reference Catherine Morland’s romantic imagination convincing her that a strange gothic history has taken place at Northanger Abbey, but that episode occupies only a small part of the plot of the novel — a few chapters at best.

I don’t think this novel is so much a parody or satire of gothic novels as it is the story of how a young girl loses her naiveté. It was a quick, enjoyable read, and I liked it better than Emma, though I don’t think it quite tops Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility. Catherine was a likable character, and I enjoyed the dialogue in the novel (as always in Austen’s writing).

I read Northanger Abbey as part of the Historical Fiction Challenge. At this point, my progress in the challenge stands thusly:

I don’t think I’ll pick up Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell again next, but I’m not sure what I will read, as I expecting a bunch of books in the mail and would like to choose from among them; which one I choose depends on which arrives first. I’ll update once I have the books in hand and have made a decision.

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Emma

Posted on by Dana

This morning, DailyLit sent me my final 191st installment of Jane Austen’s Emma, which I read just a few moments ago. Upon finishing the book, I have to say that while I love DailyLit and the idea behind it, daily subscriptions were perhaps not the best way to read this particular novel (and perhaps Jane Austen in general — I am not sure). Austen has a subtlety and requires, I think, a great deal of concentration from her reader. Reading this novel over the course of about six months made it hard for me to remember some of the events. Of course, I could have had installments sent more quickly by requesting them (by default, the subscriptions will not be sent any more frequently than once a day). A second problem I had in receiving the book this way is that it was very poorly transcribed. On several occasions, my transcription cut off in the middle of someone’s speech or would even end as someone was about to say something (even cutting off at a comma instead of a period). I found this maddening and most of the time either requested the next installment or had to go back and re-read the end of the previous one. Another fault in the transcription were grammar errors — the possessive “hers” was rendered “her’s” on several occasions in the text.

As for the story, I have previously read Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, and am currently reading Northanger Abbey (I have also attempted Persuasion twice). Of the novels with which I am familiar, I have to say Emma contains my least favorite storyline and characters. I never really managed to quite like Emma. She seemed to me to be quite shallow and snobby. I did like Mr. Knightley, but I fail to see what he saw in Emma. Mrs. Elton was hilarious, as Austen’s most annoying characters typically are. Still, even though I didn’t enjoy the novel as much as I typically enjoy Austen, it was an entertaining read. I had seen Clueless, and it was interesting to see how closely Amy Heckerling followed her source material.

Not one soul commented to tell me which Dickens novel I should read of the three: Great Expectations, David Copperfield, or A Tale of Two Cities. Therefore, I used the only means of divination I could think of and asked my seven-year-old daughter Maggie, who has no investment in my choice except that perhaps the title of the third sounds like a Garfield movie. And of course that’s the one she chose for me.

Meanwhile, I have discovered yet another use for my Goodreads account in addition to keeping a record of all the books I have read and am currently reading. Up until the last couple of days, my “to-read” bookshelf has held only the couple of books that were on my immediate list of books I wanted to read. I have begun cataloging the books I find interesting so I won’t forget about them later, and I am finding that to be really helpful for me. My mother has for years kept a notebook with a list of books she find interesting and checks them off as she acquires them, so consider my Goodreads account my notebook.

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Brunonia Barry’s The Lace Reader

Posted on by Dana

I heard about Brunonia Barry’s novel The Lace Reader yesterday via Book Club Girl’s blog.  Book Club Girl has an interview with Barry that really intrigued me, and you ought to give it a listen if my description of the novel intrigues you.  I was lucky to be one of the first ten commenters, which means Book Club Girl will be sending me a free advance reader edition of The Lace Reader.

Perhaps one of the most intriguing aspects of the novel is how it came to be published.  Trying to get a book published is hard, trying, and often disheartening work.  Rather than spend years trying to find a publisher, Barry published her book herself.  The book became popular with readers and book clubs, and it attracted the attention of publishers who then had to bid for her book.  I love that part of the story.  Barry was able to score a $2 million book deal; the novel will be published by William Morrow and has already generated film industry buzz.

The novel is the story of Towner Whitney, a native of Salem, MA who can read the future in patterns of Ipswich lace.  She returns to her hometown after the murder of two women.  Barry says that her inspiration for the story was Joseph Campbell’s theory of the monomyth, around which I built a senior English elective at my school.  Needless to say, a new book deliberately written with the Hero’s Journey in mind intrigued me.  Barry explains that “Most stories that follow this pattern have a decidedly male orientation: a lone individual acts heroically and saves the day. I wondered if there might be an alternate form, a feminine Hero’s Journey.”  Barry is right.  Of the books I chose, all of them had a male protagonist, and it wasn’t that I didn’t want to find a book that had a female protagonist — I couldn’t.  I chose books like The Iliad, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Le Morte D’Arthur, The Ramayana, The Hobbit, Star Wars, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (which was nixed by my principal), among a few other selected texts.  In part I am intrigued by this book for possible inclusion in my course.

I am about one-quarter into Northanger Abbey, and it’s been a delight.  I love the “heroine” Catherine, and I am looking forward to discovering what the Editrix of Austen Blog loves about Mr. Tilney (I’ve only seen him twice so far).  Austen, as always, has a pitch-perfect ear for conversation, and I was completely charmed by chapter six, in which she recounts a dialogue between Catherine and Isabella Thorpe (whom I also adore).  I should be finishing Emma this weekend, so please look for a review some time on Sunday.  I have decided I will read Charles Dickens next on DailyLit, but I am having trouble choosing a book.  I have narrowed down the list to three selections, and if you have thoughts about which one I should choose, please leave me a comment.

David Copperfield would take me more than a year in 447 daily installments, but A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations are broken into 170 and 231 parts respectively.  When selecting novels for DailyLit, I try to choose books that I think I would otherwise not read, and all three books fit that description, so if you don’t help me, I’m afraid I’ll have to rely on eenie, meenie, miney, and moe for assistance.  Here’s incentive for you: if you successfully convince me to read the book of your choice, I will send you a DailyLit subscription to the book of your choice (so long as it’s free), and you can enjoy a bit of DailyLit in your own inbox.  What do you say?

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Books That Change Lives

Posted on by Dana

Last week Lifehacker asked its readers to vote for the books that changed their lives. I think the resulting list gives a lot of insight into the kind of readers Lifehacker has, but it also made me wonder what I would say if someone asked me to list books that had changed my life. Whenever I have to fill out profiles that ask for my favorite books, I always say “too many to list,” which is quite true, but I wonder if I can narrow down the books that changed my life? In no particular order, this is my list:

To Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

This story of racism and prejudice in the Deep South profoundly affected me when I first read it in the 11th grade. If I recall, it was the only assigned reading in high school that I actually read ahead of the reading schedule. I really enjoyed that book. Since then, whenever I have shared it with students, I have fallen in love all over again — with the language, the characters, the story it tells. Harper Lee calls her novel “a love story” (the paperback version linked here includes this reference Lee makes on its back cover). It took me a long time to figure out what she meant, but I believe I understand.

Gone With the WindGone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

While today I find the characterization of the African-American characters to be at best romantic and at worst racist, I have to admit this book was my first “adult” novel and really taught me how amazing and wonderful the world of books could truly be. I took the book with me everywhere and read it whenever I had a free moment. It took me two or three weeks to finish the first time I read it. I think I will most likely always have a soft spot for this novel.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, 10th Anniversary EditionHarry Potter Series, by J. K. Rowling

No other books have given me so much delight and have so frequently been on my re-reading cycle. Believe it or not, I have endured a lot of criticism for liking these books — some of it from people I am close to. I have had to defend my interest in these books to adults who think I should know better than to love children’s books. I just can’t understand why those people feel it necessary to be so narrow-minded and joyless. Why should they care? I fell in love with these books some time during my reading of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. If I had to select an exact moment, it might be when Hagrid shows up at the hut in the sea. In fact, my favorite scene in any of the books remains Harry’s first trip to Diagon Alley to get his school supplies.

The Great GatsbyThe Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Containing some of the most beautiful prose in American literature, The Great Gatsby remains one of my favorite books to teach. I have many of my favorite passages highlighted. I actually enjoy the language more than the plot of the story. I pulled out my favorite passages and wrote about them many years ago.

The Mists of AvalonThe Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley

I know I really like a book when I finish and wish with all my heart that I had written it. Why I feel it necessary to make it even more mine than it is after having read it, I’m not sure, but I have felt it several times. However, I think the fist time I felt it was after reading this novel. I still maintain, even after ten years have passed since I read it, that it is the best rendition of the King Arthur story I’ve read. I’ve never looked at the character Morgan le Faye the same way since then (or Guinevere, for that matter). To me, this novel was pitch-perfect, or it was when I read it. I was enthralled by it.

I’m sure I could expand upon this list with a bit more thought. It would never include any Ayn Rand, however.

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