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Russell wrote: "“The Year of the French�� �� Thomas Flanagan (1979, NYRB reprint 2005)..."

Thanks for this. Sounds interesting.

Cabbie wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Coming of Age: Munich Youth 1942-73 has started well with a rigorous, intellectual positing of the argument that governments will create delinquency or the "other", as a means to exert..."

Inter-war like Kastner, Doblin,Kuen and co? or others?

Heinrich Boll is a great witness to that post-war world. Mach reviewed a Koeppen novel set in post-war Munich called "Pigeons on the grass", i have it in my pile and it will be interesting to compare it with the non-fiction accounts of Munich in this book, at a later date

Cabbie wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Coming of Age: Munich Youth 1942-73 has started well with a rigorous, intellectual positing of the argument that governments will create delinquency or the "other", as a means to exert..."

@Cabbie. I’d be interested in your opinion of Fay Weldon’s Letters to Alice. I mentioned it elsewhere recently, and another commenter said it hadn’t held up well. Perhaps people’s views have changed since it was published in ��84.

Machenbach wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "As for 'going outside' - my mother-in-law had a rather novel take on this: in the morning it was "too early" to go out, but after lunch it was "too late"."
Hah! That's very good..."

great story Mach, the big man has a tiny dog....lol

Roberts was a great centre and i think is a qualified doctor?

Scarletnoir wrote about going out before dawn...
Here’s another who gets up very early - sometimes it crosses my mind �� I wonder if Scarletnoir is up yet. Putting the clocks forward has put back the dawn breaking but the first streaks appeared this morning quite early. Chilly wind for stepping outside,

Machenbach wrote: "She's got something of her owner though: ...
..."

That's hilarious/adorable!

Casa Navas from my 'Door of the Day' series, from inside...Yay!



The sprog went to visit Casa Navas, in Reus in Catalonia over the Easter holiday as I'd asked him if he could take a photo of it with the light shining through the stained glass. he and his girlfriend went on a guided tour of the house (in Spanish). When they asked about the door they were met with bafflement. Eventually it dawned on the guide that this was because the door was always open and so the glass in the door was never seen.

When asked by the guide as to why they wanted to see this particular door when it was closed, my son said "my mother sent me'. There was a sort of collective sigh, as if all Spanish people could empathise with the need to appease their maternal 'dictats' in life... and the door was especially closed for him... so he could take a photo of it... Here it is, I hope...

Tam wrote: "Casa Navas from my 'Door of the Day' series, from inside...Yay!



The sprog went to visit Casa Navas, in Reus in Ca..."

Beautiful!

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "the big man has a tiny dog"
Comparative to him and my dog, yes, but not exactly tiny, no. Here she is. Lila or Layla or something.
NB I am not Ricky Gervais.
She's got something of he..."

was about to ask....do you remember Seona Dancing? A young musical Ricky Gervais...new wave....new romantic cross. i like the track

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Roberts was a great centre and i think is a qualified doctor?."
Yes he is, as was JPR Williams, who once treated me as a kid when I had a rugby injury, 'though, disappointingly, it was..."

CB Fry is possibly the best sporting polymath i can recall...rugby, football, cricket,acrobatics,teaching, politics, writing and i think a spell as a nude model...

Lljones wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "She's got something of her owner though: ...
..."

That's hilarious/adorable!"

i love dogs with huge sticks! our family labradors were like that, retreiving small trees and then carrying them stubbornly for hours in very awkward positions!

Tam wrote: "Casa Navas from my 'Door of the Day' series, from inside...Yay!

Lovely door!

Latest modern novel is :

Party Headquarters a 2006 novel by Bulgarian writer Georgi Tenev, published by the U of Rochester imprint Open Letter

Centered around the last years of communism in Bulgaria and the present day(mid 00s), the style is precise and questioning, fogged memories return as dreams. It opens on the Reeperbahn in Hamburg, a man has a suitcase with 1.5m Euro;'s in it, his father in law(an ex Communist boss) is dying and needs the cash...

Tam wrote: "Casa Navas from my 'Door of the Day' series, from inside...Yay!



The sprog went to visit Casa Navas, in Reus in Ca..."

That's some door, very much like my own (not). He's a good lad to do what his Mammy told him (even if for expediency).

More isolated winter cabins for me, this time in Maine, with Herman Raucher's Maynard's House
This can be read on two levels; as a less than serious ghost story more atmospheric than scary, or as a much deeper philosophical foray into the life of a man who chooses to deal with his traumatic stress after serving in Vietnam, by taking himself off to an isolated cabin in the woods in rural Maine in the middle of winter.
For a while I was on the first level, but about midway through Raucher grabbed my attention, and it was much better appreciated. Its just a pity it wasn't sooner.
Two loners realise they have something in common in the jungles of Vietnam. As Maynard becomes a casualty of war, he bequeaths his Maine house to Austin Fletcher. It is remote, forlorn, and reputedly haunted.
Though this is a type of psychological horror with an unreliable narrator, it works and impresses for different reasons. The cabin is lined by shelves of Henry David Thoreau books, and the fairly light episodes of horror are interspersed with the influence that Walden; or, Life in the Woods, and Maynard's journal, have on Fletcher.
Subconsciously, Fletcher is trying to cope with his mental state in seclusion, perhaps what Thoreau might have advocated, but Raucher considers the possible side effects on such a man of living too extreme a solitary life.
Its quite a different book that is well worth a read.
Herman Raucher is more famous for another book set in the Maine woods, Summer of '42, and the film made from it.

I finished A Single Man over the weekend ... read a bit more of Apeirogon, and started and stopped This Is Happiness, which I "borrowed" from my mother at Christmas. I'm waiting for An Invitation to the Waltz and The Weather in the Streets to arrive presently, on the recommendation of those hereabouts.

I very much enjoyed A Single Man ... I seem to be enjoying everything precisely "4" these days; I'd seen the very stylish film some years ago but could only remember George's drinking scene with Charley. The novel is impressive, an affecting character study the lighter moments of which don't quite balance the despair. There are some laugh out loud moments, my favourite perhaps "The stew turned out quite a success, though not noticeably different from all Charlotte's other stews; its relationship to Borneo being almost entirely literary." I think I'll have a go at something Bornean myself this evening.

Andy wrote: "More isolated winter cabins for me, this time in Maine, with Herman Raucher's Maynard's House
This can be read on two levels; as a le..."

Odd coincidence, i have Thoreau's The Maine Woods lined up for sometime in the summer, a book about the study of nature. Have you read it Andy?

Lass wrote: "your opinion of Fay Weldon’s Letters to Alice..."

@Lass - just downloaded it and will give it a go once I've finished The Invoice.

AB76 wrote: "Inter-war like Kastner, Doblin,Kuen and co? or others?..."

Now you've sent me on a hunt - too many books, not enough time. I like the sound of the stuff by Doblin and Kuen. Up to now I've been reading memoirs (Christabel Bielenberg, Sebastian Haffner, Die Weiße Rose) and also Hitler: A Study in Tyranny.

And now I'm going to throw a spanner into the works and ask for any decent recommendations from anyone for fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution, particularly based in the South, stretching from the Spanish border to Genoa in Italy.

Loving Silas Marner. I do like Eliot.

How do I write in italics here, please? I've been through the Help thread, but couldn't find an answer there.

CCCubbon wrote: "Scarletnoir wrote about going out before dawn...
Here’s another who gets up very early - sometimes it crosses my mind �� I wonder if Scarletnoir is up yet. Putting the clocks forward has put back th..."

I noticed that your email to me the other day was timed at 5.36 am and was amazed. I don't get up until after 8 am these days. Except for today when the plumber came to look for the leak in my boiler! Then I went out to the garage to move all stuff off the racks which are screwed to the window frame because the joiner is coming to fit a new window any day now, before the old one falls out.

Cabbie wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Inter-war like Kastner, Doblin,Kuen and co? or others?..."

Now you've sent me on a hunt - too many books, not enough time. I like the sound of the stuff by Doblin and Kuen. Up to now ..."

Doblin is a key novelist for the period you are reading about, as is Kastner. I would also recommend Feuchtwanger (Justine loved The Oppermans) and Keilsons "Life Goes On". The former is about Jewish life in that period, the latter about the period just before the Nazi's take power and dont forget Hans Fallada "Little Man: What Now?"

Not so helpful on french revolution sadly.....

Anne wrote: "Loving Silas Marner. I do like Eliot.

How do I write in italics here, please? I've been through the Help thread, but couldn't find an answer there."

You have to 'do it yourself' by typing the html, At the top of a comment box you'll see in tiny letters: (some html is ok). Click on that link for directions.

Italics = < i > to turn it on and < / i > to turn it off (remove the spaces within the arrows).

test

Oh, thank you, Lisa.

Reen wrote: "Tam wrote: "Casa Navas from my 'Door of the Day' series, from inside...Yay!



The sprog went to visit Casa Navas, i..."

Don't worry about him doing stuff against his own inclinations. I don't think he would. Though possibly dragged around quite a few art galleries and museums, across Europe, as well as at home in the UK, throughout his childhood, simply because there was no one else to look after him at the time, everything he has done, art wise, since 14 or so, was entirely his choice!..

He was looking forward to it, as they have been locked down, within their own municipality, for the past few months, and he is a historian, so they like to go out and look at old stuff, from what ever era.

Last week I listened to an English version of Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis (the one for speaker and chamber ensemble, not the three songs for soprano), with Claire Bloom as the narrator.

But until today, while reading Michael Gorra’s review of the new Blake Bailey Philip Roth biography in NYRB, I was innocent of the fact that Bloom was once married to Roth and apparently wrote a book about it, Leaving a Doll's House: A Memoir.

Gorra also mentions, parenthetically with no details, that Alfred Brendel was among the people Bailey interviewed for the biography. I am intrigued enough by what connection the pianist could have had with the novelist to want to read the biography if it shows up at my local library.

Bill wrote: "Last week I listened to an English version of Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis (the one for speaker and chamber ensemble, not the three songs for soprano), with Claire Bloom as the narr..."

I'm interested in Bailey's biography, too - not for any musical reasons though. (Did know about Bloom's marriage to Roth previously, but not about her memoir. Might take a look at that too.)

Bill wrote: "Last week I listened to an English version of Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis (the one for speaker and chamber ensemble, not the three songs for soprano), with Claire Bloom as the narr..."

I read Louÿs's Aphrodite: Moeurs Antique around a year ago and liked it enough that I was thinking of trying the Chansons but never managed to find a cheap copy online. They're prose poems, is that right? I was wondering how they could be set to music but I see from your description the text is narrated over the music rather than sung.

Aphrodite is a curious attempt at the evocation of a lost world, one with different ideas to ours about religion and sexuality. Or perhaps just Louÿs's decadent 1890s vision of how he would have liked the ancient world to be. Either way, an interesting read.

Berkley wrote: "They're prose poems, is that right? I was wondering how they could be set to music "

There are, separate from the spoken version, also

Cabbie wrote: "AB76 wrote: "
And now I'm going to throw a spanner into the works and ask for any decent recommendations from anyone for fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution ..."

I think I asked the same question once on the old Guardian TLS but can't remember now what the responses were. I have Mantel's book here somewhere but would like to a non-fictional history as well.

I think it's very apropos to think of these two historical events together - the French Revolution and the Nazi era in Germany 150 years later - not because I think the Jacobins were as bad as the Nazis, but because of how the two events loomed in the cultural imagination for generations afterwards.

I've been reading a lot of 19th century fiction and non-fiction the last few years and that's one thing that's really struck me: how earth-shaking an event the French Revolution was. The personalities involved were known to the average educated person in a similar way to how we today have mental images of not just Hitler but Goering, Himmler, Goebbels, Heydrich, etc, even if we haven't done historical research on the subject. They've become part of the cultural landscape, though perhaps that is no longer the case for younger generations today, just as I didn't really have a mental picture of any French Revolution actors beyond Robespierre until I started reading a bit about it.

Berkley wrote: "Cabbie wrote: "AB76 wrote: "
And now I'm going to throw a spanner into the works and ask for any decent recommendations from anyone for fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution ..."

I th..."

i studied the french revolution at university and have read a pile of books about it but i cant think of many focusing on the south so much. the terrible events in the Vendee and Lyon have a lot of coverage(i sort of include Lyon in the middle of France)

i cannot think of many contempary novels of that time beyond De Sade (ooh err)

Robespierre is a fascinating character, a north french lawyer, who became a figurehead of a movement that ate itself and him. "fatal purity" by ruth scurr is worth a read and also a much later play by Georg Buchner called "Dantons Death" that i saw performed at the National

Plus reading anything that compares what happened in Haiti with the revol is interesting too. "The Black Jacobins" by CLR James

Lastly, the revol has been given a great overview by writers as christopher hibbert and william doyle

I am finding myself grumbling about the price of some books lately, i feel too many 250 page books, padded out by 100 pages of footnotes and an index are priced above £15, which is extortion

Now as a fan of academic publishing, i'm prepared to pay £30 for something specialist which isnt stocked in waterstones next to a cookbook or a self-help guide but i keep finding wildly over priced "pamphlets"(ie under 300 pages)and i wonder what is going on

or i'm just getting miserly in my middle age...

Cabbie - "fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution" - For fiction Hilary Mantel is unsurpassed. For a fairly recent non-fiction survey you could try “The Terror�� by David Andress (2005). It is drenched in blood and has several passages on events in the south.

AB76 wrote: "I am finding myself grumbling about the price of some books lately."

Same here. I think that's partly pandemic-related, I haven't seen many good sales in the past year. But I also think Penguin has been overcharging for some time.

SydneyH wrote: "AB76 wrote: "I am finding myself grumbling about the price of some books lately."

Same here. I think that's partly pandemic-related, I haven't seen many good sales in the past year. But I also thi..."

i mean i accept the £10-12 price for most books but i resent paying up to £20 for paperbacks. i avoid the hardback market and never have bothered with it,....but i know thats where cash strapped publishers make a lot of money. Covid sadly is probably going to burn a hole in many a wallet, my broadband, tv and energy bills have gone up, with no value for that buck

French Rev recommendation? Simon Schama’s Citizens.

Cabbie wrote: "And now I'm going to throw a spanner into the works and ask for any decent recommendations from anyone for fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution"

Off the top of my head, A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens (fiction) and Thomas Carlyle's The French Revolution (non-fiction).

Lass wrote: "French Rev recommendation? Simon Schama’s Citizens."

I certainly second that!

Thanks, everyone, for the suggestions. Of the few I've already read, Dickens is fantasic, of course. Victor Hugo's 1793 was a mild disappointment - not bad but not especially memorable, for me.

Carlyle was interesting stylistically, but I think I would have appreciated it better if I'd had more of a handle on the history and especially the personalities involved before reading it.

The Büchner play is interesting because if I recall, he took all the dialogue - or was it just all Danton's own dialogue? I forget - from historical records: trials, speeches, etc. Again, I think I would have felt it more deeply if I'd known more about the French revolution going into it.

Actually, perhaps "known" isn't quite the word I'm looking for: what I thinking of is more along the lines of those culturally embedded mental pictures I was talking about earlier. I think most 19th-century readers of Danton's Death would have had an idea of who Danton was, what happened to him, the role he played in the French Revolution, even his appearance and personality. Just as we might have an idea of, say, Marilyn Monroe, even if we've never actually read about her or watched one of her movies.

There are certain people and events that take on this kind of second life in the collective consciousness, and I think Danton and other French Revolution leaders were figures of this sort for about a hundred years or more, but are no longer so today, for most people.

Speaking of Büchner, my favourite work of his by far is the short story Lenz, which I think is a masterpiece of the very first rank, one of the greatest things anyone has ever done with the short story form.

by Andrea Camilleri (1925-2019).

This is the 25th book in the long-running Inspector Montalbano series, and contains all the usual elements - Montalbano's individual methods (hardly 'by the book'), his interest in quirky mysteries, and his obsession with eating well. As he approaches retirement age, he appears even more irascible than usual, and we can see the shadow of the curmudgeon he may become in time... At the same time, his heart (and his creator's) is in the right place, as he attempts to balance a sense of justice with protecting those whose 'crimes' have been carried out for understandable motives.

In truth, these books are a bit unusual in that they often deal with weighty matters, but with a very light touch. The protagonist (and author) have a social conscience, but the themes - such as a sympathy for those escaping war zones for a better life - never overwhelm an essentially optimistic world-view. Here, though, we don't get a great deal on those more political subjects, but the unravelling of a few moral conundrums on a personal level. Don't expect anything profound, though, as you won't get it!

Anyone who reads the books is likely to have also followed the generally very faithful TV adaptations, starring Luca Zingarelli - who inhabits the role brilliantly, despite not physically resembling the Montalbano of the novels. In this book, the inspector combs his hair (Zingarelli is as bald as an egg) and his moustache gets wet (Z. is clean shaven).

The humorous passages involving the station's simple 'receptionist' Catarella tend to be repetitive, and I have never felt that translator Stephen Sartarelli has managed to convey successfully the verbal humour of the original, which he attempts by putting some very mangled English into Cat's mouth to, presumably, imitate either a Sicilian accent or Sicilian dialect. Otherwise, the translations appear very effective in telling the tales.

Very briefly, then - the novel contains essentially two unrelated mysteries - the incursion into a school of what appears to be a terrorist gang, and some baffling films brought to Montalbano to see if he can unravel their meaning. These are not the strongest tales in the series, and the author provides plenty of clues for the reader to solve the mysteries well before the end (though these aren't really 'puzzle' crime stories, so don't get that false impression). Despite feeling that this late book was some way short of the best in the series, I still enjoyed it... Montalbano is not to everyone's taste, so if you like one, you'll like them all - and if not...

Machenbach wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "As for 'going outside' - my mother-in-law had a rather novel take on this: in the morning it was "too early" to go out, but after lunch it was "too late"."
Hah! That's very good. Did she, by any chance, work in the French civil service?"

No! She was a hairdresser - but in later life suffered from emphysema (which she used as an excuse to become housebound - I suppose walking was an effort, to be fair). She also seemed to think that she'd 'created' my wife to look after her in her old age, but life isn't like that... and of course, after she had a small stroke and my wife arranged a place for her in a home only a few hundred metres from her house, she refused to go.

Nice dog stories - we often know the names of the dogs, but not the people... so, we meet 'Mr and Mrs Celt' (now 'Mogs'), the 'Four-dog couple', 'Mrs Truffle', and, exceptionally - because of her jacket - Mrs 'Caca-de-oie'.

The rugby stories reminded me of one concerning Gethin Jenkins and a back (it might even have been Shane Williams) - the then fitness coach sent the players out on a long run - the back headed off with other skinny types, but after quite a while they could hear some puffing and grunting behind them - looked round, and saw a tubby figure catching up and then trundling past... Jenkins had an amazing engine, and his stamina was legendary!

Machenbach wrote: "AB76 wrote: "the big man has a tiny dog"
Comparative to him and my dog, yes, but not exactly tiny, no. Here she is. Lila or Layla or something.
NB I am not Ricky Gervais.
She's got something of he..."

Thanks for that - especially for the link to Dr Jamie's dog tweet - nice to start the day with a laugh!

CCCubbon wrote: "Scarletnoir wrote about going out before dawn...
Here’s another who gets up very early - sometimes it crosses my mind �� I wonder if Scarletnoir is up yet. Putting the clocks forward has put back th..."

Changing the clocks doesn't seem to change much as far as waking up is concerned! Woke at 04:20 today, but didn't go out yet... that depends on the weather, as you surmised. When I do go out, it's not only to check out the weather (and birds), but also to take a look at the sea - which lies downhill in the distance, behind the town. When it's rough, you can see the whitecaps.

The only time I can remember waking up to actual daylight on a regular basis (in recent years, anyway) was during a holiday in Iceland - when it never got properly dark!

Cabbie wrote: "(I'll) ask for any decent recommendations from anyone for fiction or non-fiction about the French Revolution..."

I have a suspicion that what you have in mind is history or 'historical fiction'... but just in case you are interested and can read French... I have just received Tu montreras ma tête au peuple by Francois-Henri Désérable - my favourite author of the moment - which recounts the final days and hours of some well-known victims of the guillotine. The title comes from Danton's last words...



I haven't read it yet, but if I don't enjoy it hugely, I'll eat my hat!

Thanks to everyone who replied about the French Revolution. I've got a good list to work through now.

I'm ashamed that until recently I'd only read A Tale of Two Cities and had forgotten most of that, and Marie Antoinette: The Journey. Then there was the dreadful Carry On Dont' Lose Your Head. I started doing a bit of research for a project and found a French paper online containing extracts of letters written by a man named Captain Basset, who was big in the Société Populaire in Nice and Monaco (he was also the grandfather of French writer Adrien Robert, who I've never read). That led me to online copies of the revolutionary newspaper Père Duschene, whose writer lost his head during The Terror.

scarletnoir wrote: "Tu montreras ma tête au peuple by Francois-Henri Désérable..."

Very interesting.

Lljones wrote: "Hello, all! Spring sprang for a few hours last week, the grass needs mowing and flowers are blooming everywhere. Now we're back to gray skies and intermittent rain. How are things where you are?

I..."
The usual mix of weather here in the Great Northwest: wind, rain, fog, bits of sunshine, and clouds. Lots of clouds.

Robert wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Hello, all! Spring sprang for a few hours last week, the grass needs mowing and flowers are blooming everywhere. Now we're back to gray skies and intermittent rain. How are things w..."

The weather has been unseasonably mild, lovely and sunny, just refusing to turn cold or wet. Up to 28C today, but a bit muggy. Cool change predicted for tomorrow, with rain. Possibility of hail on Saturday! It's Melbourne weather on steroids, you just don't know what to wear or - more importantly at the butcher's - cook. I'm sick of salads.

It’s a cold grey day here in Lincolnshire with the sky almost seeming to press down on the daffodils so they bend their heads. The blackbirds are scurrying about looking for nest building material and the male pigeons doing that strange bow to the female in hope.
Twenty eight degrees and a salad sounds rather nice but too cold for us so it’s lamb casserole with purple sprouting broccoli, maybe a rhubarb crumble for dessert.