Bea Howe was the dedicatee for Sylvia Townsend Warner's immortal first novel, Lolly Willowes in 1926, and in 1954 she published A Galaxy of Governesses, thanking Sylvia for her support in the acknowledgements. She and Sylvia spent Sylvia's last birthday together, her 84th, in 1977. That's a long and fruitful friendship. Bea published some novels … Continue reading Bea Howe, A Galaxy of Governesses
Category: travelogue
J B Priestley and Jacquetta Hawkes, Journey Down a Rainbow
I found this book of travel writing about the south-west of mid-1950s USA in The Second Shelf, a new antiquarian bookshop in London specialising in works by women. This was only the second book (partly) by a man I've seen there (the other was a lesbian pulp novel apparently written by a man with a … Continue reading J B Priestley and Jacquetta Hawkes, Journey Down a Rainbow
My gifts to the Oxfam bookshop
The Mere Wife, by Maria Dahvana Headley I didn’t finish this. I got to the bit where the character in the Hrothgar role got killed, and the character in the Beowulf role is in a car with the character in the Wealtheow role, considering kissing her. I did not want to read on because the … Continue reading My gifts to the Oxfam bookshop
Kathleen Jamie, Among Muslims
Once again, Kathleen Jamie's prose is a deep immersive pleasure, the kind of writing that stays with you for days. She's a poet and knows how to compress emotion and meaning into letters and pauses. I loved her Sightlines and Findings, both collections of essays and short pieces. This, earlier, book is, I think, even better. … Continue reading Kathleen Jamie, Among Muslims
Clair Wills, Lovers and Strangers. An Immigrant History of Post-War Britain
I bought this book because I wanted to patch the gaps in my reading about immigration, and Lovers and Strangers deals with the 1950s to the present day. Although the book is marketed as focused on the Windrush generation, it's much more complex than that, and does a very welcome job of showing how immigration … Continue reading Clair Wills, Lovers and Strangers. An Immigrant History of Post-War Britain
Madeline Miller’s Circe
I pre-ordered Madeline Miller's Circe on learning its publication date, and then couldn't bear to read it for months in case it turned out to be not as good as I wanted it to be. I loved loved loved her The Song of Achilles, so I was hoping for great things of this second novel, more … Continue reading Madeline Miller’s Circe
Adam Nicolson, The Seabird’s Cry
Update: The Seabird's Cry won the Jeffries Prize this week! Further update: it also won the Wainwright Golden Beer Book Prize for 2018! The subtitle to this stunning book is ‘The Lives and Loves of Puffins, Gannets and Other Ocean Voyagers’, but it really ought to include ‘Deaths’, because I have never read such a … Continue reading Adam Nicolson, The Seabird’s Cry
Ann Leckie’s Provenance
Ann Leckie’s new novel, following the triumphant success of her multiple award-winning novels Ancillary Justice, Ancillary Sword and Ancillary Mercy, is Provenance, and it is not at the same level. Her invention and world-building are still top quality, but the plot of Provenance sags, and the characters feel like marionettes, moving without feeling. Yet I read to … Continue reading Ann Leckie’s Provenance
The trouble with Penelope Lively: Oleander, Jacaranda
I've been having trouble with Penelope Lively lately. I love most of her adult novels that I've tried, with the glaring, embarrassing, exception of Booker-winning Moon Tiger which I found dull. I now have two theories as to why Moon Tiger is in all the charity shops, but few of her other novels are. The … Continue reading The trouble with Penelope Lively: Oleander, Jacaranda
Penguin New Writing 36: into 1949
Note for 20th-century linguistics historians: in his introduction to this issue of Penguin New Writing John Lehmann remarks on the number of neologisms that have occurred in the tiny lifetime of the magazine. ‘The last ten years have been an express formative period in the English language, new words, new expressions have become acclimatized in … Continue reading Penguin New Writing 36: into 1949
