A classic mystery...

 

Title & Author:  Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay

Setting:  1900. Appleyard College, a private boarding school for young ladies in Australia. 

First line:  "Everyone agreed that the day was just right for the picnic to Hanging Rock--a shimmering summer morning warm and still, with cicadas shrilling all through breakfast from the loquat trees outside the dining-room windows and bees murmuring above the pansies bordering the drive.

The plot:  The book starts out with a pleasant outing: twenty girls and two teachers having a picnic lunch at Hanging Rock. Then four of the girls take an innocent walk up to the monolith. Only one of them comes back, hysterical. The others are nowhere to be found. The mystery of what happened to those three girls, and the repercussions of their strange disappearance and how it affects those left behind, take up the rest of this novel.

My thoughts:  This is not a fast page-turning thriller. The narrative is slow, almost methodical, with more description than dialogue. But I thought it was interesting, especially seeing the impact this one tragic incident has on those at Appleyard College. Although it's not the girls who are at the center of this novel. (A fact I found a little disappointing.) I like stories set in boarding schools, but there's no immediacy in this one, and no real sense of daily life. The school is mostly in the background.

There were three characters I liked: Michael Fitzhubert and Albert Crundall, two young men who help search for the girls, and Mademoiselle de Poitiers, the young French teacher at Appleyard. But I never felt a deep connection with any of them. There's an almost surreal quality to this novel. And the mystery is left unsolved at the end. Although I actually liked that about the novel. The truth probably would have been a letdown. I prefer the not-knowing. All in all, I'd give this one 3 stars. 

This book was published in 1967, and counts as my Mystery/Detective/Crime Classic for Karen's Back to the Classics Challenge. 

Happy Reading!

A French Classic...

 

Published in 1883, Au Bonheur des Dames (The Ladies' Delight) by Emile Zola centers around Octave Mouret's dazzling new department store in Paris, and all the lives it effects, both for good and bad. No one has seen anything like Mouret's seductive store which draws in scores of women and convinces them to buy more than they need because the prices are so low, while at the same time driving all the smaller competitors nearby out of business.

Mouret is a brash and energetic man who takes big risks for big rewards, and who loves to charm and 'conquer' his customers...and the other women he meets. And he's not shy about it. "I'm a passionate man, I don't just sit back and let life go by. ... It's wanting something and acting on it, you see, creating something, in short. You get an idea and you fight for it, you hammer it into people's heads, you see it grow and triumph."

Then there's Denise Baudu, a provincial young lady who comes to Paris with her two younger brothers. Needing work, she gets a job at Au Bonheur des Dames as a salesgirl. But life there isn't easy; her first day ends in tears. "From that day on, Denise showed great courage. Beneath her emotional crises, there was an intellect always at work and the bravery of someone weak and alone who was cheerfully determined in pursuit of the tasks she had set herself. She made little fuss, but went directly ahead towards her goal, taking any obstacles in her stride--and she did all this simply and naturally, because her whole nature was in this invincible gentleness. ....Her willingness to endure pain and her dogged determination kept her upright and smiling even when she was on the point of collapse, entirely exhausted by work that would have finished many men."

It is her modesty and gentle sweetness that draws Mouret's interest. His attraction deepens to love. (And almost obsession.) But no matter what he offers her, Denise refuses to become his mistress. Even though deep down, she loves him, too. Their lives revolve around Au Bonheur des Dames and its triumphal success.

Zola had a lot to say about consumerism and instant gratification in this novel, and how one man and one store can manipulate society so easily. But I enjoyed it mostly for his characters and the personal journeys each one takes. In many ways, Denise reminded me of Jane Austen's Fanny Price, quietly determined to do what she believes is right no matter what. Mouret's morals, on the other hand, weren't so admirable, but his business acumen was impressive. No one else believed his department store would be so successful. Except for Denise. These two make quite a pair. And while I found the ending a bit anti-climatic, I ended up liking this French classic (which counts as my Classic in Translation for Karen's Back to the Classics Challenge.)

Happy Reading!

P.S. The Penguin version I read was ably translated by Robin Buss.

Ethan Frome

Ethan Frome drove in silence ... he seemed a part of the mute melancholy landscape, an incarnation of its frozen woe, with all that was warm and sentient in him fast bound below the surface; but there was nothing unfriendly in his silence. I simply felt that he lived in a depth of moral isolation too remote for casual access, and I had the sense that his loneliness was not merely the result of his personal plight ... but had in it the profound accumulated cold of many Starkfield winters.

As much as I love Edith Wharton's writing is how much I didn't love Ethan Frome the first time I read it. Which is why I felt the need to give it a second chance. It's not a long novel, and there are really only three main characters:  Ethan Frome, Zeena, his grim and ailing wife whose "fault-finding was of the silent kind", and Mattie Silver, his wife's younger cousin whose coming to their house to help Zeena out brought "a bit of hopeful life (that) was like the lighting of a fire on a cold hearth" to Ethan's dreary existence. The harsh Massachusetts winter also plays an important role in this tragic tale.

Ethan's life is a series of misfortune, struggle, and bad luck. Even his marriage is a disappointing mistake. Only in Mattie does he glimpse a sympathetic companion and the hope of some future happiness. But Zeena's penchant for "complaints and troubles" makes even that dream impossible. And that leads to tragedy. As I reread this book last week, I felt only sympathy for Ethan Frome. He deserved better than what he got, but life can be hard and unfair. This is such a sad novel, but it's so beautifully written. And while it will never be my favorite, I do like it more than I did. Mostly because of Wharton's artistry and skill--her writing is so stylish and elegant--but also because this second time reading Ethan Frome helped me to appreciate it, and him, a little bit more.

Happy Rereading!

Rereading the Classics...

Some books should be read more than once. And lately, I've been wanting to reread some of my favorite books and authors, but I always seem to have a stack of library books that need to be read first. So I've decided that, for the next three weeks, I'm going to take a break from new reads and focus on rereads instead. Especially those classics I've been wanting to revisit for several months now. Here's the short list of books I'm hoping to reread over the next three weeks:

Jacob's Room by Virginia Woolf

Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton

1984 by George Orwell

Rinkitink in Oz by L. Frank Baum

The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot 

Invisible Man by H. G. Wells

And something by Willa Cather...I'm just not sure which one yet.

There are other books and authors that I want to reread, of course, but I can't read them all in three weeks. So I'm starting with these. If I have time for more, I might pick up Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne or What Maisie Knew by Henry James, because I'm kind of in the mood to reread those books, too. After all, as Robertson Davies once said:

"A truly great book should be read in youth, again in maturity, and once more in old age, as a fine building should be seen by morning light, at noon, and by moonlight."

 Happy Rereading!

Miss Marjoribanks

I was a bit apprehensive about reading this particular classic. There seemed to be more unfavorable reviews of it than favorable, and I was worried I might not like it. Happily for me, however, it turned out to be not only an enjoyable read, but a surprisingly funny one, too. Miss Marjoribanks by Margaret Oliphant is like a cross between Jane Austen's Emma and Elizabeth Gaskell's Cranford. It's heroine, 19-year-old Lucilla Marjoribanks, has been away at school, but now she's returned home to Carlingford with decided views about society and her father and her own duty to both.

"...the Doctor's daughter was not a mild young lady, easy to be controlled; but, on the contrary, had all the energy and determination to have her own way ... Lucilla felt more and more that she who held the reorganisation of society in Carlingford in her hands was a woman with a mission."

 She takes charge of her father's household, redecorates the drawing room in colors that complement her complexion so that she'll look especially well when she hosts her Thursday Evenings, and she quickly begins her successful "reign" over Grange Lane. But it's Lucilla's views on men, religion, marriage, and her own importance in society that really made me smile.  Here are four examples:

In such work as hers, a skillful leader is always on the outlook for auxiliaries; and there are circumstances in which a nice clergyman is almost as useful to the lady of the house as a man who can flirt.

For everybody knows that it requires very little to satisfy the gentlemen, if a woman will only give her mind to it." 

...(she) had been brought up in the old-fashioned orthodox way of having a great respect for religion, and as little to do with it as possible...  

 "I don't see the good of single women," said Lucilla, "unless they are awfully rich..."

I ended up really liking Miss Marjoribanks.  There's one sad thing that occurs in the second half of this book, but overall this classic novel not only made me smile, but on several occasions, it actually made me laugh out loud. I got the definite feeling that Oliphant was poking fun of Victorian society with Lucilla's egocentric yet "magnanimous" views of society and Carlingford's submission to this determined heroine, which is why I'm counting this book as my Humorous or Satirical Classic for Karen's Back to the Classics Challenge.

Happy Reading!

 

Back to the Classics Challenge

When I saw the categories that Karen at Books and Chocolate chose for this year's Back to the Classics Challenge I knew I had to sign up.  There are 12 different categories to choose from, but the challenge is flexible; you can read books in just six categories, or nine, or all twelve. The whole point is just to read more classics. And what could be better than that?

Here are the six categories (and the books) I'll for sure be reading this year:

A 19th Century Classic: Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell

A Classic by a Woman Author: The Castle of Wolfenbach by Eliza Parsons

A Very Long Classic Novel: Armadale by Wilkie Collins (which is 661 pages of very small, very dense type. Gulp!)

A Classic Novella: Either The Bunner Sisters or Madame de Treymes by Edith Wharton

A Classic with a Person's Name in the Title: Aurora Floyd by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

A Classic Children's Book: The Independence of Nan by Nina Rhoades

Here are the three categories that I might read this year:

A Forgotten Classic: A Long Fatal Love Chase by Louisa May Alcott

A Classic in Translation: Embers by Sandor Marai

A Classic Play: Henry V by Wm. Shakespeare (or maybe The Merry Wives of Windsor)

And finally, the last three categories that I probably won't get around to reading this year 

(but you never know):

A 20th Century Classic

A Humorous or Satirical Classic

A Non-fiction Classic

Aren't they great categories? Now you see why I couldn't resist signing up for this challenge.  Best of all? I actually own all the books that I've chosen...they're sitting in my TBR pile waiting for me to read them. Looks like this could finally be the year. Are you planning on reading any classics this year? If so, which ones?

Happy Reading!