You'd have no idea, but I have been blogging hardcore all week. Unfortunately, none of you are seeing the products of it (are there any of you, anyways?). That is because I exported my posts from this blog and transfered the data to another site I have started that provides me with more versatility - giving me a way of producing a blog and book-reflection site at a much higher standard. I just hope that my writing follows suit.
To get to the new site and see what I've been doing all week, follow the link below.
LiteReader.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Regeneration - Pat Barker
I came upon Regeneration accidentally - or, at least, that is how it descended from my book shelf and into my hands, was spread onto my lap and its infectious words started to swoon me. "I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority, because I believe the war is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it." Well this is going to be interesting...
When I started reading Regeneration, I thought it was a not-all-entirely different book. You see, I thought it was Pat Barker's Booker-Prize winning novel Ghost Road. I am rather grateful that it wasn't, because I now have the opportunity to read two novels before I get to the third, Ghost Road, and will have a chance to understand her vision of the war all the more for it.
Regeneration is the first novel in the Regeneration Trilogy. It portrays the transformation of a man, or two (or more), in a mental health facility for those soldiers sent home from France in the First World War because of their mental afflictions. Shell Shock is not a generally accepted concept, so many of these men are not highly regarded by the society to which they are returning. Indeed, most have a sense of guilt for coming back mentally scarred rather than physically scarred. Moreover, most have a deep sense that they are missing out on the biggest clubhouse event of the century because of their inability to fight, or to ride horses, or to throw anymore grenades, or to run through no-man's land once more. Many do anything they can to return just so that they don't have to face their families or friends or communities as the weakling who died mentally but not physically.
The protagonist, Siegfried Sassoon, is a unique character in the mental health facility. You open the book convinced that there is nothing wrong with him mentally, and come to the conclusion (by the end) that there must be something wrong with him. He is a decorated soldier, a published poet who is relatively celebrated - and he refuses to fight. He knows there is nothing wrong with him - and he can't be convinced that there is. Which is the purpose of the antagonist William Rivers - a psychiatrist at this relatively isolated mental healthy facility: restore Sassoon to 'sanity', which means convincing him that he is wrong and them convincing him to become right, and then send him back to the trenches.
Rivers becomes the protagonist in this novel, unexpectedly. And everybody else in the hospital becomes his antagonist - so the transformations of heart that he is expected to push onto Sassoon and the other patients start to affect him. Perhaps this sounds cliche in this context. But the way that Barker does this, with subtlety and perfect characterization, is phenomenal.
Of course, and much to my ignorant surprise, Barker is well-known in the UK for her writing. I felt that, years ago when I selected her novel from the discount bin because I liked the First World War, I was discovering a new novelist. Not at all. Her bibliography is extensive, as is her list of awards and her list of literary talents. Many of which are displayed in this novel.
Being a novel about mental health in the wake of a war there are flashbacks that Williams has to pull from his patients. And Barker handles these with the highest degree of expertise. They are short - no longer than a paragraph - they are sparked - by the shape of the beach, or the storm, or by a smell that doesn't really exist but is imagined - they are graphic. And they are so well imaged with the text that you see them in the flashbacks to photos and movies, and you are affected.
The amazing and unexpected side of this novel is that it about more than the war - meaning the characters' interactions and stories and much more developed than one would expect. Women who don't want their husbands to come back but would prefer the war pension - or men who love other men but can only do so in the trenches because the war halted any developments in society's acceptance - or families that are angry at their mentally dishevelled sons - or women in need of sex and men trapped without sex. These characters are people to Barker (and this is the central part of her novel) - they become people to the reader.
Yesterday I posted my list of favourite reads from this year. This novel was included. I've now collected the second novel in the trilogy from my local library, and upon its completion will procure the third. Barker's accomplishment is to our benefit as a reader, and as a society - she helps us understand the war not in its immediate consequences but in the forces it places on its victims. Newton's first Law of Motion: Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it. Read this novel, and presumably the second and third novel, and see how impossibly strong the force of war is on the minds of young men.
When I started reading Regeneration, I thought it was a not-all-entirely different book. You see, I thought it was Pat Barker's Booker-Prize winning novel Ghost Road. I am rather grateful that it wasn't, because I now have the opportunity to read two novels before I get to the third, Ghost Road, and will have a chance to understand her vision of the war all the more for it.
Regeneration is the first novel in the Regeneration Trilogy. It portrays the transformation of a man, or two (or more), in a mental health facility for those soldiers sent home from France in the First World War because of their mental afflictions. Shell Shock is not a generally accepted concept, so many of these men are not highly regarded by the society to which they are returning. Indeed, most have a sense of guilt for coming back mentally scarred rather than physically scarred. Moreover, most have a deep sense that they are missing out on the biggest clubhouse event of the century because of their inability to fight, or to ride horses, or to throw anymore grenades, or to run through no-man's land once more. Many do anything they can to return just so that they don't have to face their families or friends or communities as the weakling who died mentally but not physically.
The protagonist, Siegfried Sassoon, is a unique character in the mental health facility. You open the book convinced that there is nothing wrong with him mentally, and come to the conclusion (by the end) that there must be something wrong with him. He is a decorated soldier, a published poet who is relatively celebrated - and he refuses to fight. He knows there is nothing wrong with him - and he can't be convinced that there is. Which is the purpose of the antagonist William Rivers - a psychiatrist at this relatively isolated mental healthy facility: restore Sassoon to 'sanity', which means convincing him that he is wrong and them convincing him to become right, and then send him back to the trenches.
Rivers becomes the protagonist in this novel, unexpectedly. And everybody else in the hospital becomes his antagonist - so the transformations of heart that he is expected to push onto Sassoon and the other patients start to affect him. Perhaps this sounds cliche in this context. But the way that Barker does this, with subtlety and perfect characterization, is phenomenal.
Of course, and much to my ignorant surprise, Barker is well-known in the UK for her writing. I felt that, years ago when I selected her novel from the discount bin because I liked the First World War, I was discovering a new novelist. Not at all. Her bibliography is extensive, as is her list of awards and her list of literary talents. Many of which are displayed in this novel.
Being a novel about mental health in the wake of a war there are flashbacks that Williams has to pull from his patients. And Barker handles these with the highest degree of expertise. They are short - no longer than a paragraph - they are sparked - by the shape of the beach, or the storm, or by a smell that doesn't really exist but is imagined - they are graphic. And they are so well imaged with the text that you see them in the flashbacks to photos and movies, and you are affected.
The amazing and unexpected side of this novel is that it about more than the war - meaning the characters' interactions and stories and much more developed than one would expect. Women who don't want their husbands to come back but would prefer the war pension - or men who love other men but can only do so in the trenches because the war halted any developments in society's acceptance - or families that are angry at their mentally dishevelled sons - or women in need of sex and men trapped without sex. These characters are people to Barker (and this is the central part of her novel) - they become people to the reader.
Yesterday I posted my list of favourite reads from this year. This novel was included. I've now collected the second novel in the trilogy from my local library, and upon its completion will procure the third. Barker's accomplishment is to our benefit as a reader, and as a society - she helps us understand the war not in its immediate consequences but in the forces it places on its victims. Newton's first Law of Motion: Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it. Read this novel, and presumably the second and third novel, and see how impossibly strong the force of war is on the minds of young men.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Half Years and Such
I'm behind again, aren't I. Three books. Honestly, it is not intentional - there has been so much to do over the past couple of weeks that I've not really had time to reflect on my reading experiences with you. But I can assure you that the adventures I've been having, the pages I've read, have left me thoroughly impressed. I'll do my best this week to get you caught up.
This post is not about anything of that nature though. Instead, it is a celebration of a year of reading - or rather, six months of reading. I've counted, and have had the pleasure of reading 19 books thus far. Not an overly impressive number, but seeing as one book (Atlas Shrugged) took me nearly two months to get through rather than my standard 4 or 5 days, I'll take what I can get.
This gives me a great opportunity to look back at what I've read, and the places I've been. And the places I've been.
I've crossed into Japan and back with a man named Jacob de Zoet, traveled to the Ukraine and altered the lives and deaths of entire towns, witnessed the split of Czechoslovakia in the midst of a political art crisis, traveled to the backwoods of Canadian Identity in lakes of Quebec, discovered a post-Civil War Southern United States where lawlessness is terrifying, traveled to St. John's from Labrador with a transgendered almost woman almost named Annabel, perused Norway's backwoods where the war still haunts the memories of man and woman, and built a railway with a female tycoon only to have it taken away and be transported to a utopia while the world falls to pieces.
I've done well for myself, considering I've not actually left my town since New Years, no?
So where do I stand so far? What are my favourite reads?
I'm going to keep the number to six, just under a third of what I've read. A challenge, because, as you'd know if you've been following me all year, I don't really think I've read anything particularly bad this year. Here goes nothing...
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer - I'm sure this surprises nobody. After finishing this novel, I was in a reading funk; I could not convince myself that the books I was picking up to try and fill the void were doing it. The language and characters that fill the pages are truly special, and I look forward to reading it again.
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde - This is a haunting tale, and I'm sure that an academic could place it in a historical genre of magical realism if they were so inclined. I would listen, as I am sure that Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is also rightfully placed in it (and it also, is rightfully placed among the classics). What impressed me most was Dorian Gray's character, and how Oscar Wilde took hold of a theme and illustrated with a painting. Terrifying.
Regeneration by Pat Barker - Part One of a trilogy, I was impressed with this novel's subtlety. You'll find out more about it later this week (I promise), but the characters and their attachments to each other thoroughly impressed me, and the delicacy with which Barker captured the flashbacks horrified. The second novel is waiting for me to pick up from the local library. Truly, this trilogy should be exalted into the highest echelons of anti-war literature.
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand - If you knew me, you'd be shocked by this selection. My entire family scoffed at me for reading it, and then slowly came out of their respective closets: my mother read it in University, my Grandma read it while she was pregnant with my aunt. This highly controversial novel, though not perfectly written, is phenomenally constructed. While not a masterpiece in literature, it is a masterpiece in the mixture of ideology and plot and character. I battled with Rand throughout the story, because it challenged so many of my ideals - and still does. A powerful and demanding read expertly constructed.
Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel - Yann Martel wrote about Pears and Bananas and stole my heart. This story, this allegory, this symbolic portrayal of the destruction of an entire race of people - it proved to me that Martel can make me react to animals with more empathy than almost any other author can with human characters. Not only is the ending heartbreaking and confusing, but it asks for you to become involved. A short, disconcerting read.
Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy - Mr. McCarthy has something to say about the human condition, and he does by no means sing its praises. It does not trust, it does not see beauty. It destroys, and turns the world to darkness. There is no respite. And McCarthy's incredible painting of a landscape, both detailed and mysterious, and his populating of the world with people, both detailed and mysterious, astounds - he writes as though he has seen this, and though the world he portrays is the world he recognizes. And by the end of every novel he writes you are only more convinced. The characters and the plot of this story, neither elaborated beyond the bare necessity, feel like an exploration of the unknown, and the discovery of monsters turns this two-hundred page novella into an epic. Stunning.
Honourable Mention: The best parts of my judgement are telling me that I can't include The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell on this list. I just finished it tonight, but it impressed me immensely. I look forward to reflecting on it over the next week.
This post is not about anything of that nature though. Instead, it is a celebration of a year of reading - or rather, six months of reading. I've counted, and have had the pleasure of reading 19 books thus far. Not an overly impressive number, but seeing as one book (Atlas Shrugged) took me nearly two months to get through rather than my standard 4 or 5 days, I'll take what I can get.
This gives me a great opportunity to look back at what I've read, and the places I've been. And the places I've been.
I've crossed into Japan and back with a man named Jacob de Zoet, traveled to the Ukraine and altered the lives and deaths of entire towns, witnessed the split of Czechoslovakia in the midst of a political art crisis, traveled to the backwoods of Canadian Identity in lakes of Quebec, discovered a post-Civil War Southern United States where lawlessness is terrifying, traveled to St. John's from Labrador with a transgendered almost woman almost named Annabel, perused Norway's backwoods where the war still haunts the memories of man and woman, and built a railway with a female tycoon only to have it taken away and be transported to a utopia while the world falls to pieces.
I've done well for myself, considering I've not actually left my town since New Years, no?
So where do I stand so far? What are my favourite reads?
I'm going to keep the number to six, just under a third of what I've read. A challenge, because, as you'd know if you've been following me all year, I don't really think I've read anything particularly bad this year. Here goes nothing...
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer - I'm sure this surprises nobody. After finishing this novel, I was in a reading funk; I could not convince myself that the books I was picking up to try and fill the void were doing it. The language and characters that fill the pages are truly special, and I look forward to reading it again.
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde - This is a haunting tale, and I'm sure that an academic could place it in a historical genre of magical realism if they were so inclined. I would listen, as I am sure that Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is also rightfully placed in it (and it also, is rightfully placed among the classics). What impressed me most was Dorian Gray's character, and how Oscar Wilde took hold of a theme and illustrated with a painting. Terrifying.
Regeneration by Pat Barker - Part One of a trilogy, I was impressed with this novel's subtlety. You'll find out more about it later this week (I promise), but the characters and their attachments to each other thoroughly impressed me, and the delicacy with which Barker captured the flashbacks horrified. The second novel is waiting for me to pick up from the local library. Truly, this trilogy should be exalted into the highest echelons of anti-war literature.
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand - If you knew me, you'd be shocked by this selection. My entire family scoffed at me for reading it, and then slowly came out of their respective closets: my mother read it in University, my Grandma read it while she was pregnant with my aunt. This highly controversial novel, though not perfectly written, is phenomenally constructed. While not a masterpiece in literature, it is a masterpiece in the mixture of ideology and plot and character. I battled with Rand throughout the story, because it challenged so many of my ideals - and still does. A powerful and demanding read expertly constructed.
Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel - Yann Martel wrote about Pears and Bananas and stole my heart. This story, this allegory, this symbolic portrayal of the destruction of an entire race of people - it proved to me that Martel can make me react to animals with more empathy than almost any other author can with human characters. Not only is the ending heartbreaking and confusing, but it asks for you to become involved. A short, disconcerting read.
Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy - Mr. McCarthy has something to say about the human condition, and he does by no means sing its praises. It does not trust, it does not see beauty. It destroys, and turns the world to darkness. There is no respite. And McCarthy's incredible painting of a landscape, both detailed and mysterious, and his populating of the world with people, both detailed and mysterious, astounds - he writes as though he has seen this, and though the world he portrays is the world he recognizes. And by the end of every novel he writes you are only more convinced. The characters and the plot of this story, neither elaborated beyond the bare necessity, feel like an exploration of the unknown, and the discovery of monsters turns this two-hundred page novella into an epic. Stunning.
Honourable Mention: The best parts of my judgement are telling me that I can't include The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell on this list. I just finished it tonight, but it impressed me immensely. I look forward to reflecting on it over the next week.
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