Read, Listen, Watch

Staff Picks and Suggestions

The Woman in White

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins is a great (and lengthy) summer mystery read.  Walter Hartright, a struggling artist, is about to begin a new career as a tutor to half-sisters Marian Halcombe and Laura Fairlie.  Just before he leaves London for Cumberland, he encounters a mysterious ‘woman in white,’ in evident distress.  I won’t reveal too much more of the plot, but this 1859 novel deals with powerlessness (of women in particular) in the face of injustice. Have any of you read Collins before?  (I also really liked The Moonstone).  What do you think?

The Mysteries of Udolpho

I recently finished The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe.  I have read her Romance of the Forest, and Udolpho had been on my list for awhile.  It was most famously lampooned in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey.  In my freshman year of college, I took a course on gothic literature and we actually read excerpts from The Mysteries of Udolpho.  Our teaching fellow explained that it even though it was one of the formative (and genre-defining) gothic texts, it had been so thoroughly panned in the course feedback that they decided to drop it from the course.  One of my classmates said that she had read it on her own and it was a waste of time, and that she felt very disappointed in the mysterious “reveal.”  So I certainly had a good deal of forewarning, but I still wanted to read it myself.  Udolpho’s heroine is the young, beautiful and virtuous Emily St. Aubert.  She is a Frenchwoman and a good deal of the novel is her traversing the ‘sublime’ landscapes of France, Italy, the Alps and the Pyrenees.  After the death of her parents, she is spirited away by her aunt and new, villainous step-uncle Count Montoni to Italy.  They first travel to Venice, and then to Montoni’s ancestral pile-the Udolpho Castle of the title.  There, Emily becomes a prisoner, and realistically becomes concerned that Montoni will sell her to the highest bidder.  Radcliffe is also famous for creating the “explained supernatural”-a trope probably most exploited by (and familiar to viewers of) the Scooby Doo series.   Terry Castle is an academic who wrote the introduction to my Oxford edition, and she makes a very good case for The Mysteries of Udolpho‘s contributions to our current understanding of death and memory.  However, if you’re a general interest reader, I’d probably advise you to skip it.  If you’re interested in an early gothic story, I’d recommend The Monk by Matthew Lewis.  It’s much juicier, and a good deal shorter than 672 pages! Has anyone else read The Mysteries of Udolpho?  What do you think?

MYSTERY!

One of my favorite summer traditions has started up again with MYSTERY! on PBS.  This summer they seem to be featuring Inspector Lewis, Foyle’s War and the Inspector Lynley Mysteries.  And it looks like it will be the final season for both Foyle’s War and Inspector Lynley.  I’m not crazy about their credits redesign and Alan Cumming as host, but I always love a good British mystery.  I also find that most British productions feature the same rotating crew of about 80 actors, so there’s always a familiar face. The Inspector Lynley and Lewis mysteries are also based on literary detectives-Elizabeth George writes the popular Lynley mysteries and Inspector Lewis is a spin-off of Colin Dexter’s Inspector Morse series.  You can pick up one of these at Snell Library today!

Saturday

SaturdayContinuing my TBR 2008 Challenge, I read Saturday by Ian McEwan.  I loved McEwan’s Atonement, but was less crazy about McEwan’s Amsterdam and put down The Cement Garden after only a few pages.  My admittedly limited exposure to McEwan’s early works suggest that he takes a pretty dark view of human relations (and I think this shifts with Atonement, and Saturday, which follows it).  While I didn’t love Saturday with the same fervor as Atonement, I did find it interesting and well-written, and I’d recommend it to most readers. Saturday is the story of one London neurosurgeon’s Saturday-from his pre-dawn awakening, through his squash game, visiting his senile mother, his son’s jazz concert, to an evening family reunion, to a midnight surgery, to sleep.  In addition to this journey through one man’s life, the novel also looks at larger social issues.  Terrorism forms the backbone of the story, at both a macro and a micro level.  Henry Perowne is awakened by what he thinks is a plane crash caused by terrorists, and protestors against the Iraq War have gathered in the streets and parks of London on this February Saturday.  These protestors disrupt his day in multiple ways-forcing him to take alternate driving routes (and causing an accident with serious repercussions) and compeling him to grapple with his own thoughts and opinions on the British (and American) invasion.  Saturday also deals with other types of terrorism-the fear and raw tensions of city life-beatings and muggings, home invasion-dormant threats that are ever-present, and part of Henry’s bargain to live in the city.  The novel maintains a pretty constant state of high anxiety and it has what I would consider to be a nail-biting climax.  (I read it on the T and could feel my adrenaline surge).  I also think that it’s a fair and thoughtful novel, and it makes good use of Matthew Arnold’s ‘Dover Beach.’ Have any of you read Saturday?  What did you think?  And what do you think of Ian McEwan?

Reading for the International Traveler

In the last six months, I have traveled to nine different countries between Australia and Europe. I have fed a baby kangaroo, yelled “Probst!” in Munich, Germany, ate Bolognese sauce in Bologna, and ate Swiss chocolate while climbing the Alps. But no matter where I traveled to, I always had a book handy in case of an impromptu 14-hour train ride to Budapest. Here are the top five books I read while abroad that kept me from throwing myself onto the Eurorail tracks.    1.) Under The Tuscan Sun by Frances May – I bought this while waiting in the Rome train station, about to depart to Sienna, Tuscany. Having never seen the movie, I had heard that I was in store for beautifully described landscapes and explanations about Italian culture that couldn’t be found in any tour guide. It turns out that there is nothing compared to actually seeing Tuscany with it’s rolling fields and tangerine sunsets, but this book is the next best thing.   2.) Daughter of the East: An Autobiography by Benazir Bhutto – After the shocking news of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s assasination last December, I decided to do my research and discover for myself why the first female Prime Minister of Pakistan’s death was such a blow to freedom fighters around the world. This book profoundly inspired me not only as a woman but as a human being, and changed the way I look at politics and international relations.   3.) Something Borrowed by Emily Giffin – No, it’s not just a chick book. Well, ok, maybe it is, but it’s a smart and well-written chick book, a rare breed in this day and age. With every chapter comes a new twist and most who pick up this book cannot put it back down again until it’s finished. I was in Fiji, one of the most beautiful places in the world, and read this whole book in one day while basking in a hammock. It’s that good, as is it’s sister book, Something Blue.   4.) Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden – A true classic. I was browsing in the library at my school in Gold Coast, Australia when this book happened to fall out of place and onto my feet without reason, and I am very thankful it did. Arthur Golden has a unique way of writing, and his art of storytelling is unrivaled. Another book I couldn’t just couldn’t put down. 5.) Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century by Hunter S. Thompson – I am a well-known Thompson-junkie, but I can promise you that I have no bias about how great this book is. One of his last works before he committed suicide in 2005, Thompson shows in this book why he is known as the Father of Gonzo. Most of the book features incoherent ramblings about politics and detailed recollections about some of his wackiest adventures. The chapter about the time he threw an elk heart onto actor Jack Nicholson’s porch as a “joke” will have you in disbelief, not to mention in stitches.