A Sign of Life

Do you remember almost a month ago when I wrote a post saying that I was going on a holiday to France but that I would be back in two weeks? Yeah, that's what I thought back then. The reason why you haven't heard anything from me since is that despite all probabilities I'm not back at home yet. As I'm writing this I'm sitting at the Cretan airport waiting for my flight home: my mama surprised me and my brothers with a holiday at the beach the very day after I came back from France. Isn't my life stressful?!

This is basically a don't-worry-I'm-still-alive-and-having-a-good-time-post, but unless another unexpected trip pops up I should be back to blogging regularly tomorrow. And good God, I'm swooning at the thought of how I'll ever be able to catch up with all your great posts! 

Don't get me wrong, the last three weeks were amazing, especially my time in France was incredible (perhaps I'll write a little post about it another time?), but I will be quite happy when I'm comfortably at home again. I have missed reading your thoughts on books and life more than I would have thought possible and I have a vast number of posts in my mind which will hopefully all be written soon. Don't be annoyed if I'm a little over-active in August, I have to make up for my involuntary blogging break in July!

Anyway, my reading has not been as scarce as my reviewing, in fact I have a whole bunch of reviews yet to write. In France I read Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South, which surprised me completely by how much I loved it (I'm giving up, Diana. Never again will I doubt the awesomeness of a book you recommend!).

Then I finished An Ideal Husband, which I found good, of course, but not outstanding. Perhaps I've read a little too much Wilde recently? I'm getting very used to his humour. 

In contrast to it I picked up Wuthering Heights - you see I stayed faithful to the Victorians for Allie's Victorian Celebration, although unfortunately I did not manage to write my reviews in time for it. In my opinion the event could have lasted some more weeks, the Victorians and I are becoming the best of friends!

In August I hope to catch up with the Les Misérables readalong which I have once again shamefully neglected as well as participate in Alice's The Moonstone readalong; that is if she still lets me.

I have also promised to read a book by Jane Austen (and if you know me, you'll know what that means for me) but more about that in another post.

Lastly (quickly, because my flight was just announced) and completely unrelatedly I want to thank you all for the nice comments on my last post. I was really overwhelmed by all your lovely wishes for my trip. I couldn't answer them then, but now I do: thank you very much, I feel honoured to belong to such an amazing blogging community. 

So, time to go home!

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

 A Little Princess, The Secret Garden, Little Women and now of course Anne of Green Gables - How come I never read any of the common children's classics when I was young? Sadly, those wonderful English books are hardly known here and if children are familiar with their stories at all, then only thanks to movie adaptations. Perhaps all those classics are so little-known in Austria because they always lose some of their charm when they are being translated, but I cannot help wondering why we don't have any German classics to pass from generation to generation instead. The only thing I'm sure about is that I will hand my copy of Anne of Green Gables on to my future daughter, so that she will know what her mother was like when she was her age.

Here is something which should never appear in a review, but which I have to admit in all honesty: I cannot talk neutrally or objectively about Anne of Green Gables. Anne Shirley is so much like the little girl I used to be that I desperately wish I had read about her when I was still a child. Then I would have known that so many kindred spirits are out there that even books are written about them! I read some passages (especially speeches of Anne dropping with big words and greater ideas) to my mother and she was amazed because apparently I regularly delivered similar monologues when I was a child. Quite coincidentally I even had red hair until some years ago when it lightened to strawberry blond, and believe me, being called "carrots" is a capital offense which totally deserves being punished with eternal hate.

Anne's passionate nature, her limitless curiosity and of course her imagination are very familar to me too. Unfortunately I also share her habit of losing my temper when someone treats me disrespectfully.
Reading this when I was still Anne's age would have been a wonderful experience, but I enjoyed it very much anyway now that I finally came across it. While reading I was reminded of many episodes of my childhood which I had completely forgotten and I have to say that perhaps it is a good thing I never heard of Anne Shirley when I was young: I cannot even imagine all the mischief her stories would have inspired me to.
Needless to say, I love the character of Anne Shirley and envy Diana quite ardently for being her bosom friend.

“Kindred spirits are not so scarce as I used to think. It's splendid to find out there are so many of them in the world.”

Mrs Montgomery certainly had a fantastic talent for creating characters, for although I will probably quickly forget most of Anne's childhood adventures, the people surrounding her will stay with me for a long time. Matthew's pride of and care for Anne especially warmed my heart and Marilla reminded me of my grandmother in her harsh but loving way. The ending was so sad that I actually cried, which happened the last time to me at the ending of A Tale of Two Cities.
Oh, and I am very curious what will become of Gilbert Blythe, I think I see some romance coming. Usually I don't care too much for long series and I don't promise I will read all eight Anne books, but I guess it's safe to say that Anne of Avonlea will be among my birthday presents this year.

Mark Twain and The Awful German Language

And there I thought I was having a difficult relationship with German! Compared to Mark Twain I am a faithful and devoted admirer of its curiosities. In his essay The Awful German Language he spares no pains to prove its horrible shortcomings, complete disorder and lack of system; in fact Mark Twain takes his criticism as far as the boundaries of satire and his imagination will let him.

First off: I don't really know how I liked this "brilliantly witty piece of literature" as the blurb of my edition states. It is a very light, short and entertaining read for anyone who has ever had troubles learning an illogical and complicated language. While I of course could not relate to the problems any foreigner must have learning German (for I admit it has a horribly difficult grammar), I remembered a lot of similar difficulties I had with other languages such as French, Spanish and Italian. And this is where my criticism begins.
I am by no means influenced by national pride -there is hardly a harsher critic of my land and language than a true Austrian-  but for a native speaker of German some of Twain's remarks are simply ridiculous.

Mark Twain cannot have had much experience studying foreign languages, because the predominant part of his critique can be applied to almost any European language, not just German. The completely random distribution of sexes for example is a part of any language I have ever studied (except for Japanese, but that has its own stumbling blocks). That the English language is free from grammatical sexes of any kind is a wonderful relief, but then I don't know any other language whose grammar is so simple and clear as the English. I can tell you, though, that English has its own difficulties for eager students (vocabulary! You have so many words for one and the same thing! And then tenses! In my opinion there are roughly twenty ways of expressing that something will happen in the future...but I'm departing from the topic).

What really irritated me was that some of Twain's points of criticism are simply wrong. In one paragraph he talks for instance about the German habit of over-describing things.

"A German speaks of an Englishman as the Engländer; to change the sex, he adds inn, and that stands for Englishwoman -- Engländerinn. That seems descriptive enough, but still it is not exact enough for a German; so he precedes the word with that article which indicates that the creature to follow is feminine, and writes it down thus: "die Engländerinn," -- which means "the she-Englishwoman." I consider that that person is over-described."

Now, first of all the particle to signalise a woman is -in, not -inn (the multitude of spelling mistakes in this short essay makes Twain's authority as a competent judge of the language somewhat less believable). Secondly, "die" means exactly the same as "the", so "die Engländerin" translates literally to "the Englishwoman", which makes it exactly the same as in English. In my opinion it is even easier, because an -in at the end of a word always means that the person is a woman, which avoids a lot of confusion. I can have a male friend, "Freund", and a female friend, "Freundin" and instantly know the difference, whereas when someone talks in English about a friend I am always wondering whether this is a woman or a man.

Then at one point Twain moans about the long German words. It is true, we tend to use only one word when the English use several, but I don't really see why "Unabhängigkeitserklärung" which literally translates to "independencedeclaration" should be so much worse than "declaration of independence". And some of his remarks are nothing but inaccurate: contrary to Twain's claim there is no German word which changes its meaning depending on which syllable is emphasised. Also, I get the impression that he never learned French, which is far, far more intricate and haphazard, since he believes that "a gifted person ought to learn English (barring spelling and pronouncing) in 30 hours, French in 30 days and German in 30 years".

Obviously I cannot consider myself as gifted, for I have spent the last five years studying French and am nowhere near fluent. 

But who would dare to question Mark Twain's expertise in German, a language he has studied for nine whole weeks?

I have just noticed that this post sounds much harsher than I intended it to be. Who would have thought that? Perhaps I am a tiny little bit proud of my mother tongue after all? Anyway, I admit: German grammar is systemless and this essay really amusing, just don't take it too serious. It is probably more enjoyable and easier to dwell in Twain's dry humour for someone who cannot control the accuracy of all of his critical remarks.

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

This book blew me away. Literally. Whenever I think that I finally know what to expect from a classic, a novel or even an author a book like The Picture of Dorian Gray comes along and changes everything. Reading this felt like spending a night at a glittering feast: the world becomes a haze of elaborate ball gowns, sublime music, exquisite champagne, fascinating people and seductive, dangerous ideas.
To quote the key-word of the novel; reading it was a pleasure and not only an intellectual but a sensuous one, that is probably why I feel unable to write a coherent review. Instead, I will try to record some of my rather intricate thoughts.


The Story

Dorian Gray's story has become such a cliché by now that I won't bother summing it up here. What surprised me, though, is that the story unfolds very slowly, with hardly anything dramatic happening during the first half of the book at all. In fact I got the impression that the plot was nothing but a frame for Wilde's study of his century and his society's moralites with a lot of attention dedicated to chracter development.
A very big subject of the book are sins - after all the infamous name of Dorian Gray has almost become a synonym for a careless and sinful way of living, but the extraordinary thing is that the vast majority of the sins he commits are never really mentioned in the book. As a reader you of course notice that his character is quickly becoming shallowly self-obsessed and ruthless because Dorian starts to choose "beautiful" actions which bring him pleasure over right or kind ones, which is very noticeable in his changing behaviour towards Basil Hallward and Sibyl Vane, but most of his actual sins are never revealed. Basil Hallward lectures Dorian on how immoral he has become and delivers a whole list of people, including Lord Henry's sister, who have come to ruin (several even committing suicide) because of his influence, but what exactly happened to them is never explained. In the afterword of my edition is mentioned that Oscar Wilde once said that "every man sees his own sin in Dorian Gray".

The Language

Wilde's language is a subject all of its own. In dialogue he is extremely witty, apparently never serious and immensely elaborate; in fact his phrasing becomes the more sophisticated the more trivial its subjects are. The conversation scenes reminded me a lot of The Importance of Being Earnest, especially Lord Henry's parts, but Wilde's prose is very different from that. The descriptions and the general style of writing are something to get lost in: they are very visual and again I felt as if they touched me on a deeper level than a merely intellectual one. It is curious, somehow this whole book has evoked in me a bunch of very vague but exciting ideas about what life and what literature should be like. I'm sorry that I'm expressing this so nebulously, but I hardly know myself what I'm meaning! That is also the reason why it took me so long to finally write this post, I already finished The Picture of Dorian Gray a week ago.

 L'Art pour l'art: Aestheticism

However, something I do know is that I find the concept of Aestheticism, of which I was completely unaware until now, a fascinating way of thinking. The idea that sheer beauty is more important than morality, truth, honesty, love, friendship and everything else a society like the Victorian could possible stand for is a daring, but spellbinding one. Despite the fact that I don't regard The Picture of Dorian Gray as an immoral book at all, I can certainly understand why its publication caused such a scandal.

Although I could never imagine to live on the principles of the Aesthetic movement (and I don't really think that anyone completely could) I find it an intriguing gedankenexperiment. I'd love to read more on this subject and would be grateful for recommendations!

The main characters in Wilde's novel seem to regard their lives as works of art and all of their actions simply as small contributions to their grand magnum opus. They themselves become the artists and the objects of art alike, which forces them to centre all their thoughts on beauty and pleasure, a way of thinking that consequently eats away at their humanity. How far this goes is quite shocking, after Sibyl Vane's death Lord Henry states for example that:

“It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such
an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their
absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack
of style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us
an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that.
Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of
beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the
whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly
we find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the
play. Or rather we are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder
of the spectacle enthralls us.”

Ironically the one character in the whole novel to whom this rule does not apply is the only one who creates real art: Basil Hallward. He is an artist and a good person. Somehow I knew from the very beginning that the story could not end well for him. But on the other hand, it does not end well for Dorian either, obviously it does not pay to choose beauty over conscience after all. Although I find it easy to imagine how shocked Victorian society must have been by this "poisonous" novel, I believe that the key to understanding Oscar Wilde at least partly lies in this definition of Lord Henry by Basil Hallward in the first chapter: "You are an extraordinary fellow! You never say a moral thing and you never do a wrong thing."

The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde

"I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance. Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone. The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever."

In my opinion Oscar Wilde himself would be the only one truly worthy of writing a review about The Importance of Being Earnest. For in this play he works the miracle of writing more than 70 pages and entire dialogues about - in fact - absolutely nothing at all. And how delightful this nothingness is!
Unfortunately, Mr Wilde's services as a critic are currently not at my disposal, so you will have to content yourself with my humble thoughts.

I said the play was about nothing at all, but that is not entirely true: it is a farce built upon the fact that two young gentlemen  (of course dandies, since we are reading Wilde) have both created a fictional alter ego to escape boresome social obligations. There is a lot of spontaneous love and confusion, and the characters are all the very opposite of earnest. This alone, especially if combined with Wilde's almost heavenly wit, would be enough to make a very enjoyable comedy, but the way it mocks Victorian conventions and hypocrisy
makes it downright hilarious.

We read the whole play aloud in English class and not only did every single student love it, but several teachers who heard us suggested that we should perform it on stage. It was amazing: I read the role of Lady Bracknell who is, to put it into Wilde's own words, a real Gorgon:

“Never met such a Gorgon . . . I don't really know what a Gorgon is like, but I am quite sure that Lady Bracknell is one. In any case, she is a monster, without being a myth, which is rather unfair.”

Superficially she is the very picture of Victorian respectability, but in fact she satirises London society at least as much as the young men who openly admit how little they think of earnestness. For example, she states that:

"Thirty-five is a very attractive age. London society is full of women of the very highest birth who have, of their own free choice, remained thirty-five for years. Lady Dumbleton is an instance in point. To my own knowledge she has been thirty-five ever since she arrived at the age of forty, which was many years ago."

Now that I think of it, she is not so very different from my real character at all!
The characters of Jack and Algernon who are, as I have heard is typical for Wilde, the very incarnation of the word dandy, I am glad to have rediscovered in The Picture of Dorian Gray, which I will finish soon; especially Algernon reminds me a lot of Lord Henry. They take nothing seriously, except for pleasure.

"I love scrapes. They are the only things that are never serious."
"Oh, that's nonsense, Algy. You never talk anything but nonsense."
"Nobody ever does."

Honestly I think that everyone should read this play. It was the first work of Wilde I've ever read and while it is primarily profoundly entertaining, there are many universal truths about society to be found in it. My class has started with An Ideal Husband, so we'll see if he will be able to live up to my expectations a second time, but I am not too worried about that: relying on the words of my teacher, Oscar Wilde probably was the closest to God that ever visited our earth.

Plans for June: A Victorian Celebration

Like every single other person around here on the bloggosphere I am taking part in Allie's Victorian Celebration this June and July (Allie: thanks for hosting by the way!).
I have been looling forward to it for months now, because what could be more awesome than a summer full of Victorian Literature?
Unfortunately I was quite disappointed with the result after having piled up all Victorian books hidden on my shelves: there are only five I haven't read yet! These are pretty basic titles, so please keep in mind that I never consciously read a single classic until last November before laughing at me. Let's start the list with Dickens who is an obvious choice but also an intimate friend of mine:

• Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens (I am a little afraid of this one because it is one of his best-known works and I usually tend to prefer those books of an author which are not so appreciated in general.)
• A Study in Scarlet and
• The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Exciting because I love Sherlock)
• Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (this is technically a re-read because I once read a simplified version, but it had only 70 pages and I don't remember anything except for desperate love)
• The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde  (Surprisingly, I have nothing to say about this one, but I am not especially looking forward to it.)

Additionally I have The Fall of the House of Usher and other Tales by E. A. Poe waiting on my TBR pile, but since some of these tales were written before the Victorian Era it will probably remain there.

I would like to finish all of these titles during the event because I really want to focus on Victorian Literature. If things go very well I will even make a huge Victorian Amazon order and post a new list at the beginning of July.

However, what I will not abandon during the Victorian Celebration is Les Misérables. I am finally on schedule with the readalong again and I am enjoying it. Also, the lovely trailer for the new movie just came out and motivated me extremely. 

Probably I will continue with the Divine Comedy too, so I would like to finish Purgatorio in June. That way I will always have something to turn to when corsets, street children and Victorian psychopaths start getting on my nerves.

Which Victorians have you chosen? Anything else on your nightstand for June?

I hope you all have a lovely month and better weather than in Austria!

Read at once if convenient - If inconvenient read anyway

Almost two years after the original release Austrian television has finally performed the miracle of broadcasting BBC's Sherlock. Since I am really late to jump on the bandwagon (and also because they are exactly what everyone else is feeling) I am going to keep my emotions on the topic short. I have slowly travelled through three mental stages: first, doubt.
I guess this is obvious: when you think of Sherlock Holmes you think of a man brooding with a pipe over pages of handwritten and ink-stained notes, not of a texting guy with nicotine patches. Also, I had read some of the short stories before and always thought that "the Victorian feeling" made up quite a part of their charm.
Needless to say, I was completely wrong. Sherlock still lives, so the modernisation feels like the most natural thing in the world; which brings us to stage two, enthusiasm.
No explanation is necessary. This show is the best I have seen on TV for many, many years.

Unfortunately there is stage three, desperation, lurking in the shadows. The Reichenbach Fall is the last episode left to be broadcasted and then there will be no more Sherlock for at least a year. In addition to the impending break, the reactions I have picked up online regarding the finale of Season Two have been somewhat traumatic. Oh yes, I am frightened. Thank God there is something to cheer me up:

It is about time I seriously started reading Sherlock Holmes! 

My latest acquisitions

In between the books you see a really beautiful  book mark I received from the owner of a bookshop in Grado, the Libreria Dante. He gave it to me when my mama bought a newspaper there and I shot longing glances at an Italian copy of the Divine Comedy. I explained to him in very broken Italian that I would love to read it, whereupon I had to promise him that I would come back and buy it once my Italian was good enough.

 As a substitute for Sherlock on TV and also as part of Allie's Victorian Celebration starting in June, I ordered The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and A Study in Scarlet. Isn't the edition amazing? I usually don't like book covers with actors on them, but in Sherlock's case I am overjoyed. Thank you, BBC Books!