Jack London - A Collection of Stories

Downloaded a free collection of stories written by Jack London onto my Kindle. I discovered him through White Fang, which quickly became one of my favourite novels. He is a fantastic writer, with a traditional but highly skilled story-telling gift, able to write about natural environments with particular beauty. 

This collection featured an essay on human nature and the paradox between its obsession with war and murder and the rapid population growth; auto-biographical stories about his early life as a sailor, including a ghost encounter; and a short play.

Encouraged me to look up and get two more of his books, which I may take a while to get round to reading, because university is starting soon, and I have much else I need to read.

Evelyn Waugh revisited - 'Brideshead Revisited'

It has been quite a while since I read an Evelyn Waugh novel. By the end of the novel, I had realised why he is probably my favourite author. I decided to read the novel of his that everyone has read and I neglected: Brideshead Revisited.

There was a section around the second quartile where I was struggling to tune into the characters and not a lot of plot was happening, however, towards the end, I was lapping up Waugh's style and becoming invested in these characters.

It explores Charles Ryder's relationships with the Marchmains, particularly Sebastian. There is a homosexual subtext not made at all explicit in their strong friendship. Sebastian deteriorates into alcoholism, while Charles becomes more and more successful, thus making them grow apart. His complex relationship with Julia replaces Sebastian. "'You loved him, didn't you?' 'Oh yes. He was the forerunner.'"

Interesting exploration of religion's role in society and family, culminating in a deathbed conversion.

Almost always, when referencing his first wife, Celia, he says "my wife...".

I am usually casually amused when reading Evelyn Waugh, but every now and again, I fully laugh out loud. One such moment came in the section:

 "Supposing the Pope looked up and saw a cloud and said, 'It's going to rain,' would that be bound to happen?' 'Oh, yes Father'. 'But supposing it didn't' He thought a moment and said, 'I suppose it would be sort of raining spiritually, only we were too sinful to see it."

Maybe I enjoy the criticism of religion too much.

The life of Evelyn Waugh was one of slow conversion to conservatism and fast conversion to Catholicism. When reading his novels, it is useful to know whether it was written pre or post conversion to Catholicism (Brideshead being the latter). You can see the internal religious conflict in his writing. Priests - as shown above - are usually fools and hypocrites. Charles Ryder appears to be Waugh pre-conversion, with the end of the novel becoming incredibly passionate about miracles and death-bed conversions.

Brilliant section on page 170 where it describes Julia' perfect man. Fantastic use of language and humour. "I was not her man."

A wonderful read that made me both laugh and cry (the former: literally, the latter: nearly literally).

Sebastian Faulks 'On Fiction'

A very interesting exploration of some of the greatest characters in literature. Able to give me further insights into some of my favourites, as well as introduce me to some I haven't read yet.
There were, of course, characters I felt were missing, but this would be inevitable.

(Faulks wanted to name the book Novel People)

I thought I would get down some of the most interesting sections for future reference, with page numbers for further detail.

P.11 -
Faulks claims that in the novel, there is no such thing as the 'hero' any more. It now simply means protagonist, and these always seem to be flawed, dark, or just incredibly un-heroic.
Says that the villain is also a little out of place in the novel on P. 285

Sherlock Holmes
P.55 - Conan Doyle essentially invented the crime story, with perhaps the precursor of Edgar Allen Poe's C. Auguste Dupin, in The Murders in the Rue Morgue.
P.59 - Too much of Conan Doyle's writing delivered in dialogue and speech? Certainly it seems a departure from traditional styles, but seems to work, in its own way.
P.62 - Holmes and Freud coinciding.

Winston Smith, 1984
P.72 to 78 (and chapter opening) - Winston is clearly not a hero, but performs a very simple deed of remarkable bravery. Everyman hero. A man who still has a small spark of hope, in a world where there is no hope, as he eventually realises, when the state wins.

P.91 -
Jim Dixon, Lucky Jim, Kingsley Amis vs. Martin Amis, The Rachel Papers, John Self
Father had a more simplistic, traditional writing style, whereas the son was "a writer whose every sentence seemed pressurised by the tensions of its improbable juxtapositions."
P.92 - Fantastic section of language style analysis of Martin Amis's work.

Jeeves
Various humourous sections speculating about Jeeves' life, or quoting brilliant passages of Wodehouse
P.241 - Jeeves usually absent for a large middle part of the stories

Bond
Mainly explores the character of Bond by describing how he went about writing his own Bond novel. Tried to write with 80% of Fleming's style so that it was not a parody or pastiche.
P 268 - Fleming's reasons for specifying brand names. Keeps an otherwise fantastical story grounded in reality.

Fagin
P.303 - Only Dickens' second novel, and because of periodical publishing, was able to influence his first novel!
P.304 - Dickens' obsession with describing Fagin as The Jew is most probably not anti-semitic, but a result of a strong image of the character in his mind. Debateable.
P.307 - Juxtaposition between kindliness and cruelty

Steerpike, The Gormenghast Trilogy
P.327 - Interesting comparison between Tolkein and Peake

Jack Merridew, The Lord of the Flies
P.349 (and throughout chapter) - The idea of this novel as a parable, describing what people are like, rather than what this individual group of people are like. The characters are not given too much back-story or psychological motivation, because they are meant to represent everyone. They could be replaced by another group and would behave in the same way.

Other potentially useful books:
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D-Urbervilles
D.H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley's Lover
>>The style of lover is compared and contrasted in the 4 books above
Jane Austen, Emma
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White

And all the others, of course