Tag Archives: classics

Babette’s Feast

Posted on by

Warning: spoilers ahead.

Usually when I talk about books or films here, I only share a part of the plot, some quotes, and my thoughts about them. I don’t want to give away the end or any surprises.

But “Babette’s Feast” is a short story. This post would only be a paragraph or two if I just shared a bit about it. Plus, I’d love to explore what it means and hear your thoughts as well.

“Babette’s Feast” is part of a collection published as Anecdotes of Destiny in 1958 by Isak Dinesen (pen name of Danish Author Karen Blixen). In 1987, it was made into an award-winning Danish film.

The story opens with two elderly sisters in Norway in the 1800s. Their late father was a pastor who created his own strict sect. “Its members renounced the pleasures of this world, for the
earth and all that it held to them was but a kind of illusion, and the true reality was the New
Jerusalem toward which they were longing.”

The women were beauitful and admired in their youth. Many young men noticed them, but those who approached their father for permission to court them were rebuffed. The girls were his right and left hand—would these young men tear them from him?

However, both young women had a chance at love. Lorens Löwenhielm, a rakish Calvary officer, was sent by his father to visit his aunt in the country and meditate on his ways. Lorens sees Martine in the marketplace. He visits her home and admires her all the more. But her purity seems to show up his own smallness. He eventually leaves to go back to his garrison and pour himself into his career. He marries a lady-in-waiting to the Queen.

An acclaimed singer, Achille Papin of Paris, visits the area on vacation. Bored one morning, he wanders into church and is captivated by the voice of Philippa. He offers to give her singing lessons, telling her father she will “sing . . . to the glory of God.” But inwardly, he thinks she could be a famous prima donna and sing with him.

He shares his dreams with Philippa. In one lesson, they sing a love song together and he kisses her.

Philppa tells her father she does not want to take singing lessons any more.

The young women ministered beside their father for years until he passed away. They continued charitable works in the community, helping the poor and needy, holding meetings in their home.

But the little congregation had thinned out and gotten old and contrary. Members focused on old wrongs with each other.

Now elderly, the women are startled when a pale woman shows up on their doorstep and faints. When she awakes, she gives them a letter. She was a French refugee fleeing from civil war in Paris. Achille Papin sent the sisters the letter asking them to take the women, Babette, in. It was proposed that she work as a cook and maid, but the sisters cannot afford to hire her. Babette does not want pay.

Babette recovers from her troubles and becomes a real asset to the sisters and the community. The sisters eat very plainly and show Babette how everything must be cooked. She’s savvy with merchants and saves the sisters money. Her efforts at home free them to minister even more to the community.

As the hundredth birthday of the sisters’ father approaches, they want to prepare a special dinner for the congregation. They not only want to honor their father’s memory, but they hope to inspire the congregation back to the ideals he taught.

Meanwhile, a friend of Babette’s in France had purchased a lottery ticket for her and renewed it every year. Suddenly, Babette receives news that she has won 10,000 francs.

The sisters rejoice in Babette’s good fortune but grieve that they will lose her. They are sure that with independent means, she will no longer need their hospitality.

But Babette wants to use her money to provide the feast for their father’s hundredth birthday dinner. The sisters reluctantly agree.

Babette wants to make an authentic French meal and orders supplies. The sisters are alarmed at the strange items that arrive, including a massive live turtle and several bottles of wine. The sisters face a conundrum. How can they allow these rich and foreign foods to be given to the congregation? But what can they do? They don’t feel they can offend Babette by rejecting her offer.

They go to the congregation and confess what has happened. The members understand and promise not to comment on the food, good or bad.

Meanwhile, officer Löwenhielm’s aunt wants to be included in the feast to honor the late pastor. And her nephew, Lorens, is in town: could he accompany her?

By now, Lorens has achieved all the honors he could want. But he sees it all as vanity. He remembers enough of what he heard back in the little congregation to convict him that there is more to life, and he has been foolish.

Finally the big feast arrives. Lorens is well-traveled and is the only one to recognize the superb quality of the wine and food. In fact, they remind him of the time he ate at a restaurant of one of the most famous and acclaimed chefs in Paris.

The sisters and congregants eat silently and tentatively at first. But soon the meal and the wine and the fellowship warms their hearts. They renew their love for each other and put away old wrongs.

When everyone leaves, the sisters thank Babette for the meal. They ask when she will be leaving them.

She won’t be leaving, she says. She has spent all her 10,000 francs on the meal. She had been the famous chef Lorens spoke of and gave the sisters and congregation the best meal she could produce.

_______

On the surface, this story could seem like a slam at the Puritanical practices of the sisters and an encouragement to enjoy life’s good things.

But I think the story goes deeper than that.

I don’t think it’s meant to be a slam, per se, but perhaps a different way of looking at things. The sisters’ religion looked on love and marriage as illusions. They were to concentrate on the life to come, not this one. But God gave us richly all things to enjoy, after all (1 Timothy 6:17). God’s Word and gifts do not just affect us on a spiritual plane. Some of His good gifts are physical and tactile. He wants us even to eat and drink as unto Him (1 Corinthians 10:31).

When the officer first visits the meeting at the sisters home, their father speaks of Psalm 85:10: “Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” The translation in the book says “bliss” rather than “peace.” When the officer comes back to the feast so many years later, not a general, he stands up to speak and shares this same verse and talks about grace. So perhaps the author is bringing together the idea that righteous and bliss are not antithetical.

One facet of the tale is the ministry of food. Psalm 104:14-15 says God causes “the grass to grow for the livestock and plants for man to cultivate, that he may bring forth food from the earth and wine to gladden the heart of man, oil to make his face shine and bread to strengthen man’s heart.” Craig Claiborne said, ” Cooking is at once child’s play and adult joy. And cooking done with care is an act of love.”

One article talked about the women caring for each other in their own way. The sisters provided a home, even though their means were meager. Babette made meals to their preferences, even though it must have galled her to do so, until the feast. They all grew to care for and appreciate each other.

Another aspect is to not judge a book by its cover. Though austere, the sisters were genuine and kind. They were wary of Babette’s foreignness at first, but came to see her heart.

Dione Lucas said, “The preparation of good food is merely another expression of art, one of the joys of civilized living.” And this idea of giving through one’s art is mentioned in the story of Babette. She tells the sisters that the people she cooked for in France “had been brought up and trained, with greater expense than you, my little ladies, could ever imagine or believe, to understand what a great artist I am. I could make them happy. When I did my very best I could make them perfectly happy.” Later she quotes Monsieur Papin, “Through all the world there goes one long cry from the heart of the artist: Give me leave to do my utmost!”

When the sisters lament that Babette will be poor all her life, now that she has spent her fortune, she replies, “Poor? No, I shall never be poor. I told you that I am a great artist. A great artist, Mesdames, is never poor. We have something, Mesdames, of which other people know nothing.”

Here’s the trailer of the film. It’s in Danish with English subtitles.


This article discusses the film and story and the differences between the two.

Have you read or watched “Babette’s Feast”? What did you think of it?

The Two Mrs. Abbotts

Posted on by

The Two Mrs. Abbotts is the third Barbara Buncle book by D. E. Stevenson. By this time, Barbara Buncle is the first Mrs. Abbott, having married her publisher, Arthur.

In the previous book, Miss Buncle Married, Arthur’s nephew, Sam, worked with Arthur and came to stay with the Abbotts frequently. A neighbor of the Abbotts, a young woman called Jerry, had her own business boarding horses and teaching riding lessons. Over the course of the last book, Sam and Jerry fell in love despite some comical obstacles, and finally married. So Jerry is the second Mrs. Abbott.

In The Two Mrs. Abbotts, WWII has arrived. Sam is away fighting throughout the book, but we have one scene with him. Arthur is only seen at the beginning of the book, unfortunately.

Soldiers camp in huts near Jerry’s house, so Jerry and her longtime cook, maid, and friend, Markie, pull their living quarters to a smaller section of the house and give the soldiers access to their kitchen. All through the day they find soldiers making food, writing home, washing clothes, etc. Markie, a much older woman, becomes a mother figure to the men, helping them compose letters and listening to them talk.

Early in the book, Barbara agrees to host a woman from the Red Cross who has traveled to speak to local women about how they can help. The Red Cross woman turns out to be Susan, Barbara’s closest friend from the first book, and one of the few who was not offended by Barbara’s books about their village.

Barbara does not do much writing in this volume, her time being taken up with her two precocious children and helping in the community.

However, one of her husband’s firms best-selling authors comes to town to speak at a festival. Janetta Walters. Arthur doesn’t like her books much, but they’re popular. There’s nothing wrong with them–they’re just fluffy and unrealistic. But Jannetta is thrown for a loop when a young man assigned to take her around and provide for her needs while in town tells her her books are “rot” and she could “do better.” Jannetta knows not everyone will like her books. This young man has a right to his opinions. He doesn’t mean anything to her, so his views shouldn’t affect her. But they do. Suddenly she is no longer interested in writing, much to the chagrin of her sister, who is dependent on her income.

Jannetta disappears for a while, and just about the time I began to wonder about her, she shows up again in the most clever way.

Another prominent character in this book is Archie Chevis-Cobb, Jerry’s brother. In the last book, he was immature and reckless, assuming he was going to be his aunt’s heir. But she keeps changing her will. In the end, he does inherit. But instead of this making him more spoiled, it sobers him. He wants to fight for his country, but Arthur and others convince him that his farm, which he has brought up to great standards, is needed to support the community.

A number of other smaller plots occur: sullen, sloppy evacuees are a trial to Jerry; Barbara tries to help her young lovesick neighbor through a relationship that is obviously not good for him; a spy is reportedly lurking in the area; Jerry takes in a paying guest, Jane; a runaway girl wants to stay with Jerry and Markie. Markie has a marvelous adventure.

Though Barbara is not as prominent in this book, the stories are delightful. In fact, this might be my favorite of the three books, but that’s with having the background of the first two in mind.

A few of my favorite quotes:

Jane felt glad to have known Markie, for Markie’s example had shown her that you could do humble things splendidly, and be happy doing them—and make others happy.

Janetta sighed. She reminded herself that hundreds of thousands of people enjoyed her stories and showed their appreciation by borrowing her books from libraries—or, better still, buying them and keeping them in their bookcases. She reminded herself of the large “fan mail” that poured into Angleside from all over the world (not only letters, but parcels of food from admirers in America and Canada and South Africa who were anxious to sustain her so that she might continue to delight them with her books).

In time she would realize romance was a good thing in the right place. It was not the whole of life—as Janetta had made it—nor was it entirely foolish, as Jane seemed to think. It was like chocolate cream, thought Archie, a certain amount of it was good for you and extremely palatable; too much of it made you sick.

Mrs. Marvel looked slightly annoyed, for she hated having to use her brain.

I listened to the audiobook, nicely read, as the others were, by Patricia Gallimore. My only complaint is that the narrator changed the voice she used for Jerry from the last book and made her sound snooty, which she wasn’t.

There is one more book that is sometimes included as a Miss Buncle book, The Four Graces. Barbara only appears at the very beginning at a wedding. But some of the other characters from The Two Mrs. Abbotts continue on. I’m enjoying listening to the audiobook of it now.

Miss Buncle Married

Posted on by

In D. E. Stevenson’s novel, Miss Buncle’s Book (linked to my review), Barbara Buncle is a quiet single lady in 1930s England who needs to make some money. So she writes a book about what she knows–her neighbors. She changes their names and some of their activities. Her book becomes a best-seller. But some of her neighbors recognize themselves and their town. And some of them are determined to find out who is behind the pseudonym “John Smith.”

At the end of that book (spoiler alert), Miss Buncle marries her publisher, Arthur Abbott. They move to Hampstead Heath, away from the heat caused by Barbara’s book.

Miss Buncle Married opens with the newlywed couple enjoying married life, but not the city. They’re expected to be out almost every night, playing bridge with friends and attending events. They long for a quieter home life. So Barbara starts looking at houses in the country.

Barbara finds the house of her dreams in Wandlebury. Arthur isn’t sure about the fixer-upper. But Barbara has everything redone nicely, and they love their new home.

It’s not long before they meet their new neighbors. The pastor’s wife who loves to gossip, thinking it gives her and “in” with her neighbors, when really they hold her at arm’s length because they don’t want to become her subjects. A large, temperamental artist, his languid wife, and their three children, two of whom have claimed Barbara’s back yard as their playground. Mrs. Chevis-Cobb, the society matron who changes her will when her relatives displease her. Jerry, a young woman who supports herself by caring for horses.

Arthur’s nephew, Sam, comes to visit the Abbotts regularly and begins to mature nicely.

Of course, the reader wonders, “Will Barbara write another book? And will it get her into as much trouble as last time?” I’ll leave that for you to discover.

Barbara is presented in both books as somewhat naive and innocent, yet with amazing insight in some ways. She doesn’t mean to meddle, but her attempts to help people present some quite funny episodes in the book.

Some of my favorite quotes from the book:

He . . . looked at his wife, and, as he looked at her, he smiled because she was nice to look at, and because he loved her, and because she amused and interested him enormously. They had been married for nine months now, and sometimes he thought he knew her through and through, and sometimes he thought he didn’t know the first thing about her—theirs was a most satisfactory marriage.

Jerry found Barbara very soothing and comforting during this difficult time. It was not necessary to confide in Barbara to gain her sympathy—you just talked to Barbara about odds and ends of things, and you came away feeling a different creature.

“It’s turned out all right after all,” she said contentedly. “Things usually do, somehow. You worry and fuss and try to make things go the way you think they should, and then you find that the other way was best. I’m going to try not to worry about things anymore.”

As with the first book, this is a secular work, and thus I wouldn’t agree with everything here, like many classics. It’s a clean story, but there are some oddities, especially with the strange family next door.

But all in all, this was a sweet, funny story. I listened to the audiobook superbly read by Patricia Gallimore. The picture above is from the audiobook cover as well, which I like much better than the book cover.

Miss Buncle’s Book

Posted on by

D. E. Stevenson was a Scottish writer who lived from 1892-1973. Her books were best-sellers in their time and continue to be read widely today.

In Miss Buncle’s Book, Barbara Buncle is a single lady in her thirties. Due to a dwindling income, she decides to write a book to try to earn some extra money. She doesn’t have any imagination, she insists, so she writes what she knows–her neighbors in the town of Silverstream. She changes their names and has them interact in different ways. She sends the manuscript in under the pseudonym John Smith.

The publisher loves her novel, though he can’t quite decide whether it’s written satirically or straightforwardly. Either way, he feels the book will do well.

And he’s right: the book becomes a bestseller.

The only problem is, most of the inhabitants of Silverstream recognize themselves in the fictional town of Copperfield. Some think the book is great fun. Others are offended at the way they are portrayed or at their secrets coming out. Everyone agrees that “John Smith” must live among them—how else would he know them so well? So the hunt is on.

Meanwhile, the book has an effect on its readers. Some recognize their flaws and change. Colonel Weatherhead enjoys the novel but doesn’t see the parallels with his neighbors. He particularly enjoys the colonel in the book who dramatically proposes to his neighbor in the garden. But after finishing the book, Colonel Weatherhead finds himself restless. He’s never been discontent with his life before. But now he seems lonely. And somehow he never noticed before that his neighbor is both nice and attractive. Maybe he should call on her. . . Thus life for some begins to imitate art.

Barbara herself gets lost in her thoughts sometimes as to whether she’s in Silverstream or Copperfield. Her counterpart in the book, Elisabeth Wade, is much more confident. So Barbara begins to act as Elisabeth Wade.

But the discontented readers are worked up to a fever pitch in their search for John Smith and their desire to make him pay for what he has written about them.

Overall this was a fun book with a very satisfactory ending.

Having read much about writing and publishing the last few years, some of the comments on those subjects had me smiling.

Barbara’s publisher: “What fools the public were! They were exactly like sheep…thought Mr. Abbott sleepily…following each other’s lead, neglecting one book and buying another just because other people were buying it, although, for the life of you, you couldn’t see what the one lacked and the other possessed.”

Miss Buncle did impress him because she wasn’t trying to.

Mr. Abbott could have cheated Miss Buncle quite easily if he had wanted to. Fortunately for her, he didn’t want to. It was not his way. You make friends with the goose and treat it decently, and it continues to lay golden eggs.

Miss Buncle after signing her contract: “I’m an author. How very odd.”

Miss Buncle on receiving her first print copy of her book: “She had spent the whole morning reading her book, and marveling at the astounding fact that she had written every word of it, and here it was, actually in print.

“And why to me?” inquired Mr. Abbott with much interest. “I mean why did you send the book to me? Perhaps you had heard from somebody that our firm—­”

“Oh, no,” she exclaimed. “I knew nothing at all about publishers. You were the first on the list—­alphabetically—­that was all.” Mr. Abbott was somewhat taken aback—­on such trifles hang the fates of bestsellers!

Dorcas [the maid] was beginning to get used to living in the house with an author. It was not comfortable, she found, and it was distinctly trying to the temper.

­Authors! said Dorcas to herself with scornful emphasis—­Authors indeed!—­Well, I’ll never read a book again but what I’ll think of the people as has had to put up with the author, I know that.—­Preparing meals, and beating the gong, and going back ’alf an hour later to find nobody’s ever been near them, and the mutton fat frozen solid in the dish, and the soup stone cold—­and them ringing bells at all hours for coffee, “and make it strong Dorcas—­make it strong!” and them writing half the night, and lying in bed half the day with people toiling up to their bedrooms with trays.—­Authors—­poof! said Dorcas to herself.

“Dorcas, I could never give up writing now,” she said, incredulously (nor could she, the vice had got her firmly in its grip, as well ask a morphinomaniac to give up drugs). “You don’t know how exciting it is, Dorcas. It just sweeps you along and you’ve no idea of the time—­”

I listened to the audiobook wonderfully read by Patricia Gallimore. She portrayed all the characters so well, from the sly Mrs. Greensleeves to the morose Mr. Bulmer and the haughty Mrs. Featherstone Hogg and so many more.

This is not a Christian book, so of course I wouldn’t agree with everything the characters do.

This book is the first of three about Miss Buncle. I’m pretty sure I’ll read the next one some time in the future.

Books Read in 2022

Posted on by

It’s been another great reading year, with a variety of new and old, fiction and nonfiction, mostly good, a handful not so much. By my count, I’ve read 79 books this year—a smidgen fewer than the last couple of years.

I’ll post my favorites tomorrow. The titles link back to my reviews. (MTBR) at the end of some titles refers to the Mount TBR Reading Challenge, where we read books we already owned before the year began. I noted them here instead of making a separate list.

Nonfiction:

  1. 100 Best Bible Verses to Overcome Worry and Anxiety, a devotional book by various authors (MTBR)
  2. Aging With Grace: Flourishing in an Anti-Aging Culture by Sharon Betters and Susan Hunt
  3. Always, Only Good: A Journey of Faith Through Mental Illness by Shelly Garlock Hamilton
  4. Another Gospel: A Lifelong Christian Seeks Truth in Response to Progressive Christianity by Alisa Childers
  5. Be Alive (John 1-12): Get to Know the Living Savior by Warren Wiersbe (MTBR)
  6. Be Compassionate (Luke 1-13): Let the World Know Jesus Cares by Warren Wiersbe (MTBR)
  7. Be Courageous (Luke 14-24): Let the World Know Jesus Cares by Warren Wiersbe (MTBR
  8. Be Determined (Nehemiah): Standing Firm in the Face of Opposition by Warren W. Wiersbe (MTBR)
  9. Be Distinct (2 Kings and 2 Chronicles): Standing Firmly Against the World’s Tides by Warren Wiesrbe (MTBR)
  10. Be Encouraged (2 Corinthians): God Can Turn Your Trials Into Triumphs by Warren W. Wiersbe (MTBR)
  11. Be Free (Galatians): Exchange Legalism for True Spirituality by Warren Wiersbe (MTBR)
  12. Be Responsible (1 Kings): Being Good Stewards of God’s Gifts by Warren Wiersbe (MTBR)
  13. Be Restored (2 Samuel & 1 Chronicles): Trusting God to See Us Through by Warren W. Wiersbe (MTBR)
  14. Be Successful (1 Samuel): Attaining Wealth That Money Can’t Buy by Warren W. Wiersbe (MTBR)
  15. Be Wise (1 Corinthians): Discern the Difference Between Man’s Knowledge and God’s Wisdom by Warren W. Wiersbe (MTBR)
  16. Daily Light on the Daily Path compiled by Samuel Bagster
  17. “Don’t Call Me Spry”: Creative Possibilities for Later Life by Win Couchman
  18. The Enchanted Places: A Childhood Memoir by Christopher Milne
  19. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown (MTBR)
  20. The Four Loves by C. S. Lewis (MTBR)
  21. Heaven and Nature Sing: 25 Advent Reflections to Bring Joy to the World by Hannah Anderson
  22. IBS for Dummies by Carolyn Dean and L. Christine Wheeler (MTBR)
  23. I Must Decrease: Biblical Inspiration and Encouragement for Dieters by Janice Thompson (MTBR)
  24. Jesus Led Me All the Way by Margaret Stringer (MTBR)
  25. Joy: A Godly Woman’s Adornment by Lydia Brownback (MTBR)
  26. Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey: The Lost Legacy of Highclere Castle by Lady Carnarvon.(MTBR, audiobook)
  27. The Middle Matters: Why That (Extra)Ordinary Life Looks Really Good on You by Lisa-Jo Baker (MTBR)
  28. O Love That Will not Let Me Go: Facing Death with Courageous Confidence, complied by Nancy Guthrie
  29. The Path Through the Trees by Christopher Milne )Audiobook)
  30. Ten Time Management Choices that Can Change Your Life by Sandra Felton and Marsha Sims (MTBR)
  31. Treasures of Encouragement: Women Helping Women by Sharon W. Betters
  32. Where I End: A Story of Tragedy, Truth, and Rebellious Hope by Katherine Elizabeth Clark (MTBR)
  33. Women and Stress: A Practical Approach to Managing Tension by Jean Lush and Pam Vredevelt (MTBR)
  34. The Writer’s Desk by Jill Krementz (MTBR)

Classics:

  1. Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin (Audiobook)
  2. The Confessions of St. Augustine (Audiobook)
  3. Dracula by Bram Stoker
  4. Framley Parsonage by Anthony Trollope (MTBR, Audiobook)
  5. Hospital Sketches by Louisa May Alcott (Audiobook)
  6. The House at Pooh Corner by A. A. Milne (Audiobook)
  7. The Last Chronicle of Barset by Anthony Trollope (Audiobook)
  8. Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell (Audiobook)
  9. Now We Are Six by A. A. Milne
  10. The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope (Audiobook)
  11. The Story of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (Audiobook)
  12. To Sir, With Love by E. R. Braithwaite (Audiobook)
  13. Victorian Short Stories of Successful Marriages by Elizabeth Gaskell, Thomas Hardy, and others.
  14. When We Were Very Young by A. A. Milne
  15. Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne

Christian Fiction:

  1. Bringing Maggie Home by Kim Vogel Sawyer (Audiobook)
  2. A Daily Rate by Grace Livingston Hill (Audiobook)
  3. Enchanted Isle by Melanie Dobson
  4. The Fifth Avenue Story Society by Rachel Hauck (Audiobook)
  5. Half Finished by Lauraine Snelling (MTBR)
  6. The Hatmaker’s Heart by Carla Stewart (MTBR)
  7. The Italian Ballerina by Kristy Cambron (Audiobook)
  8. Just 18 Summers by Michelle Cox and Rene Gutteridge (MTBR)
  9. A Lady Unrivaled by Roseanna M. White (Audiobook)
  10. Midnight, Christmas Eve by Andy Clapp (MTBR)
  11. The Lost Heiress by Roseanna M. White (MTBR)
  12. The Paris Dressmaker by Kristy Cambron (MTBR, Audiobook)
  13. The Reluctant Duchess by Roseanna M. White (Audiobook)
  14. The Road Home by Malissa Chapin
  15. The Search by Grace Livingston Hill (Audiobook)
  16. Shadowed by Grace: A Story of Monuments Men by Cara Putman (MTBR)
  17. Shadows in the Mind’s Eye by Janyre Tromp
  18. Snowed In for Christmas by Cami Checketts (Audiobook)
  19. Something Good by Vanessa Miller
  20. The Stranger by Melanie Dobson (MTBR)
  21. Three Fifty-Seven: Timing Is Everything by Hank Stewart and Kendra Norman-Bellamy (Audiobook)
  22. To Treasure an Heiress by Roseanna White (Audiobook)
  23. Worthy of Legend by Roseanna M. White

Other Fiction:

  1. Call the Midwife: A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times by Jennifer Worth (MTBR, Audiobook)
  2. The Christmas Hirelings by Mary Elizabeth Braddon (MTBR, Audiobook)
  3. The Girl in the Painting by Tea Cooper (MTBR)
  4. The London House by Katherine Reay (audiobook)
  5. Mourning Dove by Claire Fullerton (MTBR)
  6. Once Upon a Wardrobe by Patti Callahan (Audiobook)
  7. The Other Bennet Sister by Janice Hadlow (MTBR, Audiobook)

And that just about wraps it up for 2022! I’m close to finishing a couple more, but I’ll save them to review at the beginning of next year so they don’t get lost in the shuffle.

Reading is one of my highlights, so I was very thankful to be able to make time for it.

How was your reading year? The number of books is not as important as whether the books are enjoyable and edifying. In that sense, I’ve had a great year indeed.

Reading Challenge Wrap-Ups

Posted on by

I enjoy participating in reading challenges and sharing books I have enjoyed. Most of these challenges involve the type of books I would be reading anyway. The only difficulty comes in the time it takes for record-keeping. I haven’t decided yet which challenges I will participate in next year. But I can recommend any of these.

Most of the challenge hosts require a wrap-up post at the end of the year. I shared my Back to the Classics Challenge Wrap-Up, hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate here. But I decided to include all the rest in one post so as not to be tedious for readers.

Bev at My Reader’s Block hosts the Mount TBR Reading Challenge. The idea is to read books you already owned before the start of this year. Bev has made levels in increments of twelve, each named after a mountain, and we’re to choose a level to shoot for. Even though I’ve reached Mt. Ararat (48 books) the last couple of years, I decided to play it safe and stick with Mt. Vancouver (36 books).

That turned out to be a wise decision as I just made it with 38 books. Instead of making a separate list, I marked the books in this category with (MTBR) on my list of all the books I read this year.

Shelly Rae at Book’d Out hosts the Nonfiction Reader Challenge. She provided 12 categories of nonfiction, and participants chose which level they want to aim for. Thankfully, this year she has included a Nonfiction Grazer category where we set our own goals for how many and what kind of nonfiction to read. That worked best for me this year.

I read a total of 33 non-fiction books this year, which can be seen on my Books Read in 2022 post.

As to my personal goals for this challenge:

Even though I didn’t hit every category I wanted to, I did more in others, and I feel I had a rich and varied nonfiction reading experience this year.

The Audiobook Challenge is hosted by Caffeinated Reader. I aimed for the Binge Listener level at 20-30. I finished 30, so I was right on target. I also marked these on my list of books read this year. I posted what I had listened to through June at the check-in here. Here are the ones I listened to through the end of the year:

The Historical Fiction Reading Challenge is hosted by The Intrepid Reader. I aimed for the Medieval level of 15 books. I completed 22.

As you can tell, Roseanna M. White and Kristy Cambron are favorites in the category.

I’ve included split-time novels here, which have both a modern and a historic timeline. I’ve never been sure whether classics count—books written before our time but were modern in the time in which they were written. If so, I’d have eleven more.

And finally:

The Literary Christmas challenge hosted by Tarissa at In the Bookcase. For this I read:

I also started Hope for Christmas by Malissa Chapin, but haven’t finished it yet. Maybe I will by the end of the year.

I didn’t get quite as many in this category as I had hoped to, but we had a very busy December.

Whew. It’s been a good year of reading.

Back to the Classics 2022 Wrap-Up

Posted on by

“A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say” (Italo Calvino, The Uses of Literature).

That’s why I enjoy reading classics: they still speak to us after decades, even hundreds and thousands of years.

I’m thankful that the Back to the Classics Challenge hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate has expanded my horizons. Without it, I might have never have branched out beyond Dickens, Austen, and Alcott to discover Wilkie Collins, Anthony Trollope, and so many others.

Karen chooses different categories for the challenge each year. The categories this year are (titles are linked to my review of the books):

A 19th century classic. Framley Parsonage by Anthony Trollope
A 20th century classic. The Story of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting
A classic by a woman author. Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell
A classic in translation. Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin.
A classic by BIPOC author. To Sir, With Love by E. R. Braithwaite
Mystery/Detective/Crime Classic. Dracula by Bram Stoker. Though this is a Gothic novel, the nature and identity of the Count are also a mystery.
A Classic Short Story Collection. Hospital Sketches by Louisa May Alcott
Pre-1800 Classic. The Confessions of St. Augustine.
A Nonfiction Classic. The Four Loves by C. S. Lewis
Classic That’s Been on Your TBR List the Longest. Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne. I’m including all four Pooh books as one entry since they are so short.
Classic Set in a Place You’d Like to Visit. The Small House at Allington by Anthony Trollope
Wild Card Classic. The Chronicle of Barset by Anthony Trollope

We’re allowed three children’s classics for this challenge. I just had two: Dr. Dolitte and Pooh.

For completing all twelve categories, my name is entered three times into Karen’s drawing of a $30 prize towards books.

Next week I’ll wrap up my other reading challenges as well as share the books read this year and my top ten or so favorites.

Dracula

Posted on by

I’ve never been much into horror or “monster” stories, except for an afternoon TV program that was popular when I was a teenager (what is it with teens and vampires?)

But last spring, my oldest son told me about Dracula Daily. Dracula by Bram Stoker is epistolary novel, made up of dated notes, letters, telegrams, and journal entries. Dracula Daily sent out excerpts from the book on the dates of the letters, etc., so the reader got them in “real time.” There would be weeks with nothing, but then there would be several journal entries on one day when something major was happening.

I decided it might be fun to experience the novel that way, so I signed up. I didn’t think to mention it in my end-of-month posts where I listed my current reading, I guess because it wasn’t in my usual reading format.

The story begins with Jonathan Harker, a new solicitor, traveling from England to Transylvania with some paperwork for a Count Dracula, who has just bought property in England. After some weird and frightening occurrences, Jonathan finally makes it to Dracula’s castle. The Count seems nice enough, but the remoteness of the castle, the wildness of the land, the howling of wolves nearby, all seem spooky.

Over several days Jonathan notices weird things about the Count himself. He never eats. He sleeps during the day and is awake at night. He has very sharp, canine-like teeth.

Things just keep getting weirder and more horrible. And then Jonathan discovers he is imprisoned. When he finally escapes, he lands in a mental asylum for a time.

Meanwhile, back in England, Jonathan’s fiance, Mina, wonders why she has not heard from him. Mina travels to be with her lifelong friend, Lucy Westerna, whose mother is seriously ill. Lucy receives three proposals of marriage in one day, but she loves one man: Arthur Godalming.

But after a while, Lucy begins sleepwalking, and then exhibiting strange symptoms, and then becomes anemic.

Jonathan makes it home, and he and Mina get married. He doesn’t tell her all that has happened to him, but he writes it down. He tells Mina where it is and invites her to read if it she wants, but she decides not to—yet. And then one day while Jonathan and Mina are in town, Jonathan sees Dracula.

Meanwhile, Dr. John Seward, one of Lucy’s rejected suitors, is called to check on her. He calls in his friend, Van Helsing, who suspects he knows what Lucy’s problem is. He orders a blood transfusion and other measures, but doesn’t say why or what he’s thinking. Things might have gone better if he had, because people who didn’t understand accidentally sabotaged his efforts. But then, he probably would not have been believed.

Finally Van Helsing does tell the others about the Count, and they all team up together to find and destroy him.

As it happens, the Literary Life Podcast started doing a series on Dracula on Oct. 31 (appropriately). I’ve only listened to the introductory episode so far, but it was pretty fascinating and enlightening. According to those doing this podcast, in Victorian times (when Stoker wrote Dracula), monsters in stories represented the devil. (Dracula, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and The Picture of Dorian Gray were all written within ten years of each other). Stoker even chose the name Dracula because he thought it meant devil. These were classic good vs. evil stories in which evil must be defeated.

The podcasters say it wasn’t until after Freud that people began to sympathize with the monster, wondering what in his background made him like he was, seeing him as the victim instead of the victimizer. And in our day, people try to infuse modern sensibilities into old stories. But I agree with the podcasters that to truly understand what writer meant, we have to understand the context and times in which he or she wrote.

They also share some interesting tidbits that I would never have picked up on my own. For instance, Jonathan is traveling into Transylvania on the eve of St. George Day. That evening was something like our Halloween, and in those times, superstitious folks thought evil creatures were free to roam the earth that one night.

Then the meticulous record keeping later on is supposedly a nod to the Enlightenment–that even though this is a fantastic tale, they’re going to handle it in a very scientific manner. Yet there’s also a nod to Shakespeare’s quote in Hamlet: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy”–there are things that enlightened science and technology can’t explain or handle.

The podcasters (one of whom is a literature teacher) also said that Stoker was not the first to write a vampire story, but he established some of the tropes of vampire lore that still hold today. Yet the modern vampire story is very different from his. They said the idea of the mysterious sensual stranger vampire came from a story written by Lord Byron, which he wrote when he hosted a party in which the participants were challenged to write a scary story. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein then. Byron left his story unfinished, but his friend and doctor, John Polidori, wrote a similar one based on Byron. Byron was angry with him and terminated him, and then Polidori published his novel in revenge (You can read more about that here).

I thought Dracula was very well-written. It was both suspenseful and scary, yet with a thread of hope throughout.

Some of my favorite quotes from the book:

We learn from failure, not from success!

How good and thoughtful he is; the world seems full of good men—even if there are monsters in it.

Loneliness will sit over our roofs with brooding wings.

Though sympathy alone can’t alter facts, it can help to make them more bearable.

She is one of God’s women, fashioned by His own hand to show us men and other women that there is a heaven where we can enter, and that its light can be here on earth. So true, so sweet, so noble, so little an egoist—and that, let me tell you, is much in this age, so sceptical and selfish.

It is in trouble and trial that our faith is tested—that we must keep on trusting; and that God will aid us up to the end.

We believe that God is with us through all this blackness, and these many dark hours. We shall follow him; and we shall not flinch.

I’m looking forward to learning more from the Literary Life Podcast.

The text of Dracula is available at Project Gutenberg. Dracula Daily also has their missives in the archives.

I’m counting this book for the Mystery/Crime/Detective category of the Back to the Classics Challenge. Even though it’s both a horror and a Gothic novel, I think it fits as a mystery because who the Count is and what’s going on with him and then with Lucy, are all mysteries to the other characters. The Count does commit crimes. And then the measures to find him all fit with a detective story.

Eugene Onegin

Posted on by

Eugene Onegin is a classic Russian story by Alexander Pushkin, first published serially in the early 1800s before being published as a book. The most unique feature of the story is that it is all written in verse. In fact, Wikipedia says the form of poetry used in the book has come to be known as the “Onegin stanza” or the “Pushkin sonnet.”

Eugene is only 26, but he is rich and bored with his world, tired of balls, parties, etc. He’s self-centered: when the uncle who was to provide his inheritance was sick, Eugene complained of how boring it was to sit by his uncle’s sickbed. Euegen is described a couple of times as a misanthrope.

Eugene meets and befriends a young poet named Vladimir Lensky. Lensky is engaged to Olga Larina and invited Eugene to dine at the Larina’s house.

Olga is fun-loving and carefree. Her sister, Tatyana (or Tattiana, depending on the translation) is introverted and bookish. Tatyana is particularly fond of romance novels. For some reason, she falls hard for Eugene. After he leaves, she pours out her heart to him in a letter.

When Eugene comes again, he tells her he is flattered but not interested in marriage. She would be his pick if he did marry, but even though they might love each other intensely, he would eventually grow bored with her. He also warns her about naively being so open and vulnerable—some men might take advantage of her.

Tatyana is, of course, embarrassed and heartbroken. They don’t see each other for a while, until Lensky invites Eugene to Tatyana’s name day celebration. Lensky leads Eugene to understand that the celebration will be with just a few people. But instead he finds it’s a country version of the type of balls he is so bored with. He’s so irritated with the situation, he flirts and dances a lot with Olga. Lensky gets mad and challenges Eugene to a duel.

In duel having killed his friend
And reached, with nought his mind to engage,
The twenty-sixth year of his age,
Wearied of leisure in the end,
Without profession, business, wife,
He knew not how to spend his life

Some years later, Eugene attends a ball in St. Petersburg. He sees a beautiful woman and realizes it’s Tatyana. She is married to an older man now, called a prince in one place and a general in another. Eugene finally feels alive and determines to declare his love. Tatyana still loves him but refuses him. She’s determined to remain faithful to her husband.

That’s pretty much the whole plot, though there are a few side scenes, including a nightmare of Tatyana and a visit from her to Eugene’s house when he is not there.

I listened to the audiobook available free at Librovox. Even though it was nicely read, it was very hard to follow. The parts that contained action or dialogue were understandable, but suddenly the narrator would be off in some kind of musing where I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. At one point, he even says, “Haste, haste thy lagging pace, my story!” I read parts of it, but I think it would have been better to read the whole thing (this Kindle version was 99 cents but Project Gutenberg also has it online here). This version was translated by Henry Spalding, who gives some helpful comments on footnotes. One example: “It is perhaps worthy of remark, as one amongst numerous circumstances proving how extensively the poet interwove his own life-experiences with the plot of this poem, that it was by this road that he himself must have been in the habit of approaching Moscow from his favourite country residence of Mikhailovskoe, in the province of Pskoff.” It’s amazing that he could translate from Russian to English and still have it come out rhyming.

Wikipedia’s article helped me get more from the story than I would have on my own. I especially liked this line: “Another major element is Pushkin’s creation of a woman of intelligence and depth in Tatyana, whose vulnerable sincerity and openness on the subject of love has made her the heroine of countless Russian women.” There’s also an interesting section on how the duel didn’t conform to the usual rules.

Probably most people are familiar with the story through the opera by the same name written by Tchaikovsky. I watched it last night on YouTube (which thankfully had subtitles) while Jim was out of town. The music was wonderful (only the music at the opening of Act III was familiar to me, but it all sounded very Tchaikovsky-ish). The opera left out the boring parts and added in a few things, but it kept the greater part of the story elements. In fact, I picked up on points that I missed in the book. I have to say I much preferred the opera to the book in this instance. While looking for more information on some of the singers, I found this nice review of the DVD version of this performance.

I’ve not watched opera in a long time. I’m always amazed by the power of operatic voices. Opera writers and singers know how to milk a dramatic moment for all it’s worth. 🙂 I thought the first ball, the country one, looked a little clunky and mused that the smoother ones in movies are probably heavily edited: we usually just see various steps and moments rather than zooming out to see the whole thing. But then the later ball in St. Petersburg was very synchronized. So perhaps the first one was clunky on purpose to show it was a “country” one.

One side note I found interesting. I had wondered how Onegin was supposed to be pronounced. The narrator of the audiobook pronounced it with a long O and E and soft G, accent on the second syllable. But in the opera it sounded like O-nya-gin–long O and A and soft G, which I am sure is more accurate.

I read/listened to this book for the “Classics in translation” category of the Back to the Classics Challenge hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate. One advantage this book has as opposed to others in its category is that it’s a lot shorter. Other Russian books I’ve read are some of the longest novels. But I am glad to be familiar with the story now in both the book and the opera.

Are you familiar with Eugene Onegin?

Mary Barton

Posted on by

19th-century writer Elizabeth Gaskell is known these days for Wives and Daughters and North and South (linked to my reviews).

But her very first book was Mary Barton. Elizabeth began writing at the urging of her husband after the loss of their son. But she was also motivated by “a deep sympathy with the care-worn men, who looked as if doomed to struggle through their lives in strange alternations between work and want; tossed to and fro by circumstances . . . Whether the bitter complaints made by them, of the neglect which they experienced from the prosperous—especially from the masters whose fortunes they had helped to build up—were well-founded or no, it is not for me to judge. It is enough to say, that this belief of the injustice and unkindness which they endure from their fellow-creatures, taints what might be resignation to God’s will, and turns it to revenge in too many of the poor uneducated factory-workers of Manchester (from the preface to Mary Barton).

Mary’s father is a mill worker who is critical of the rich in general and the “masters” (mill owners) in particular. He feels it’s unfair that the working class puts in so much effort with so little in return. The rich unfairly (it seems to him) not only have more, by seemingly little or no merit of their own, but they don’t help the poor in their need. The death of John’s wife and son fuels his views and his anger. He’s left to raise his daughter alone.

The story fast-fowards several years. Mary is now a teenager working in a dress shop. Jem, the son of family friends, has loved her since they were children. But she thinks of him as a brother. Henry Carson, the mill owner’s son, has noticed Mary and flirts with her on her breaks and after work. Mary is flattered by Henry’s attentions. She knows her father’s feelings about rich people. But she feels that once she marries Henry and her father experiences the benefit of his riches, he’ll be all right with her marriage.

Several issues between the mill owners and workers come to a head, with the workers threatening to strike. Some of the owners feel they need to concede to some of the workers’ demands. However, most of the owners, including Henry Carson, feel they need to stand firm; if they relent on any of these issues, the workers will just strike whenever they want something.

When the workers’ appeals fail, a group of them decides more drastic measures are needed.

Meanwhile, Jem comes to Mary to plead his case for her hand. She decisively tells him there is no hope. She could never love him. Not long after he leaves, however, she realizes she does love him. She agonizes over how to let him know and decides that it wouldn’t be right to go after him. She’ll just have to convey to him in more quiet manners her change of heart when they see each other. She tries to break things off with Henry, who doesn’t take no for an answer.

But Jem, taking her at her word, arranges to be away from home when Mary comes to visit his mother.

Then, suddenly, Henry is shot.

Jem is accused of the crime because his gun was found at the scene and because he was heard threatening Henry over Mary a few days earlier.

But Mary is sure she knows who the real killer is. How can she help Jem without betraying someone else?

Besides the industrial and romantic plot lines, Mary’s friend, Margaret, lives with her wise and level-headed grandfather, Job Legh. Margaret has a beautiful singing voice and but is going blind. Alice Wilson is an older lady who is everyone’s friend and the go-to helper when someone is sick, until she falls ill herself. Esther is Mary’s aunt, who disappeared from the family early on but shows up again. Jem’s mother, Jane, lose her twins and then her husband.

Elizabeth tries to help both sides of the industrial concerns to see the other truthfully. She definitely thinks the masters can be more compassionate and do more, and she spends more time on their shortcomings than the workers’. But she cautions that they have their troubles, too. In one scene, John Barton is going to a druggist’s for a friend.

It is a pretty sight to walk through a street with lighted shops; the gas is so brilliant, the display of goods so much more vividly shown than by day, and of all shops a druggist’s looks the most like the tales of our childhood, from Aladdin’s garden of enchanted fruits to the charming Rosamond with her purple jar. No such associations had Barton; yet he felt the contrast between the well-filled, well-lighted shops and the dim gloomy cellar, and it made him moody that such contrasts should exist. They are the mysterious problem of life to more than him. He wondered if any in all the hurrying crowd had come from such a house of mourning. He thought they all looked joyous, and he was angry with them. But he could not, you cannot, read the lot of those who daily pass you by in the street. How do you know the wild romances of their lives; the trials, the temptations they are even now enduring, resisting, sinking under? You may be elbowed one instant by the girl desperate in her abandonment, laughing in mad merriment with her outward gesture, while her soul is longing for the rest of the dead, and bringing itself to think of the cold-flowing river as the only mercy of God remaining to her here. You may pass the criminal, meditating crimes at which you will to-morrow shudder with horror as you read them. You may push against one, humble and unnoticed, the last upon earth, who in Heaven will for ever be in the immediate light of God’s countenance. Errands of mercy—errands of sin—did you ever think where all the thousands of people you daily meet are bound? Barton’s was an errand of mercy; but the thoughts of his heart were touched by sin, by bitter hatred of the happy, whom he, for the time, confounded with the selfish.

Just occasionally, the narrator (possibly Gaskell herself) might come across as a little preachy by today’s standards. But I think in her time, she wasn’t trying to “preach” as much as to open people’s eyes to the plight of others.

Though Wives and Daughters and North and South are still my favorite Gaskell books, I did enjoy Mary Barton very much, especially the last half.

I listened to the audiobook, which was included as part of my Audible subscription. Juliet Stevenson did a superb job with the narration and different dialects. But I also got the free Kindle version to read parts there. the novel is also only via Project Gutenberg here.

Have you read Mary Barton? What did you think?