The Age of Reason by Jean-Paul Sartre

The Age of Reason is also a book by Thomas Paine. Apparently it argues for critical thinking and God, maybe if I read that I would understand the other Age of Reason better.

Though actually I resent having to read other novels in order to understand novels. It’s elitist and pretentious and annoying.

Ain’t nobody got time for that.

So The Age of Reason is actually ok. It’s surprisingly compelling, enough to vaugely interest me in reading the rest of the Roads to Freedom trilogy but not enough to make me actually do it. Though I did look for an online summary because I wanted to know what happened to everyone. I’m not sure that was the point, but whatever.

It’s a bit insular? And philosophical? The women tend to be odd and flat and uninteresting. Marcelle is basically a womb within a womb. She’s always hot and pink and naked in a single room. And pregnant which is pretty much the plot.

Not that she does a thing about that. Very passive.

I guess that’s the idea? It’s a novel about people who can’t quite bring themselves to take any actions. Daniel wants to drown his cats and doesn’t, or kill himself and doesn’t. Mathieu wants something, to propose or run away or something. Ivitch and Boris don’t even seem to want to do anything, they’re ok to be young and actionless. When an action is necessary Boris gets Mathieu to do it.

It has a tendancy to stop when it gets most interesting. Mathieu’s about to sneak into a dead woman’s room and rob her and suddenly two page digression on…something. His state of mind? I skimmed it. Maybe that was a deliberate choice but no one is going to read those pages properly so why bother.

Anyway The Age of Reason. Read it or don’t.

Barry Lyndon – William Makepeace Thackeray

Last night when I was writing about Vanity Fair and was so tired that what I was mostly interested in was whether or not ‘Makepeace’ was a middle name (Yes) I had some vague idea of writing about Barry Lyndon.

Or more correctly ‘The Luck of Barry Lyndon’. Lyndon is a tour de force in the unreliable narrator.

I don’t know if the snide notes from the editor are overdoing it. It has a lot in common with Vanity Fair, it deals with an ambitious, barely genteel, morally unsound not-really-a-hero. A person on the up and not over-encumbered with morals. Barry Lyndon is a bit more of a straightforward braggart that Becky Sharp. Maybe it’s just because you’re stuck with him (first person narrator) but the man has all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. You can’t imagine him fooling anyone for long. The ending is also somewhat lacking in subtlety. Vanity Fair gets kind of dark but Barry Lyndon goes down the well worn, spending all your ill gotten gains and winding up in jail, path.

Barry Lyndon manages to climb his way up to one of the foremost ‘gentlemen’ in the country only to lose it all by having the impulse control of a drunk toddler. And so the wheel turns and the wicked shall be punished etc. etc. Barry Lyndon is definitely interesting as precursor to Vanity Fair but I’m not sure how interesting it is in it’s own right. It feels like heavy going at times.

As an autobiographical note, did you know Thackeray was born in Calcutta? I suppose you did but it makes me think of Joseph Sedley on an elephant.

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

There is some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that I am already losing track of which books I have reviewed so god knows how I will keep track of things till I get to 1000.

The good news is this book is a delight.

I got it as a Christmas present and it brought with it all the joys of the season. Not that it is in any sense a Christmas book. It’s definitely a spring book. In setting and outlook. It is, that curious thing, a coming of age book for girls. In a good way. You definitely don’t have to be 17 to enjoy it. The whole setting is about as magical and romantic as any Gothic novel could hope to deliver and the story line far less grotesque. Enchanting is a good word for this book. Cassandra mentions Austen and her heroines a few times and it’s an apt comparison. Beautiful somewhat accomplished sisters living in genteel poverty, hoping to snag a rich neighbor. But updated and with an ending that’s both a little less satisfying and a little less conventional. I think it’s easier to discuss a book you don’t much like that one you really do. So there we are I’m out of things to say, it’s like diving into a pool and emerging into the most golden summer of childhood but with a more adult awareness of all that is magical and transient.

Nights at the Circus by Angela Carter

 

This gorgeous image nicked from here and is very appropriate for this gorgeous book.

I think I mentioned before my love for Heroes and Villains so it should come as no shock that I also adored Nights at the Circus. It’s a lovely easy read. By which I don’t mean that it’s simple or dull or anything like that. It’s wonderful and you should absolutely read it. Also it has a female who farts, and is still attractive. That’s like a blue literary moon.

However, the ending. The question. Trying to not be to spoilery, the plot revolves around Fevvers an aerilaliste who may or may not be possessed of wings. And it’s one of those things that gets left unsatisfying unanswered. It makes me think of something I read Kazuo Ishiguro say about A Pale View of The Hills.

‘The ending is almost like a puzzle. I see nothing artistically to be gained by puzzling people to that extent. That was just inexperience—misjudging what is too obvious and what is subtle. Even at the time the ending felt unsatisfactory.’

Which is basically how I feel about all open to interpretation endings. I get that it’s the point or half the point. Her wings symbolism New Women who get referenced a bit or something and there’s an interesting musing on marriage and me-ness. But fuck it decide either way. Schrodinger’s Box novels suck.

Anyway it is a very good book which I can heartily recommend.

And on a similarly titled note The Night Circus is also a damned good read.

Frustration and Departure

I’ve tried printing copies of the list to carry round with me. Carefully highlighting books I have read and making little pencil lines under ones I want to read but frankly it makes for an impractically long list and I am careless enough that it quickly becomes dogeared and stained. Thus I end up reading books that were never on the list simply because the name sounds kind of familiar. It doesn’t help that my library doesn’t seem to know which 1000 books we all ought to be reading and persists in stocking the wrong ones. Anyway this week I ended up reading Heroes and Villains by Angela Carter (who is on the list for three other books so that counts right?) and The Distant Land of My Father by Bo Caldwell. Even though they may not be essential life time reading as endorsed by The Guardian they are both excellent and if you feel like attempting the list I suggest replacing Clarissa with one or both of these books.