Thank Heaven for Border Collies

"Chewy" is ready to play!

I finished Atonement this morning.  It was very, very sad... After I finished, I lay on the couch for a few minutes with my arm draped over the edge, petting our border collie, Chewy.  Dogs are great comfort sometimes, although Chewy is much better at accepting attention than administering comfort.  I was still glad to have a cuddly, furry animal close by when I finished the book.

My experience reading Atonement was heavily colored by my experience seeing the movie -- which is one of the reasons I generally don't like seeing a movie version until after I've read the book.  I enjoyed the movie -- but I'm not sure whether or not I "liked" the book.  It is certainly well-written and beautifully evocative, even powerful at times.  It definitely evoked strong emotions in me as I read it, particularly at the very end.

My favorite part of the book was Part I, which is the part that occurs before the tragic event for which Briony, one of the main characters, later tries to atone.  The first part of the novel is set in a British estate in the 1930s, and the description drips with sunshine and sultry days.  Much of this part is spent developing characters -- which helped me understand the story much better than I understood it after watching the movie.

Side note: it bothers me when someone tries to make a movie out of a book that relies heavily on psychology and description of inner thoughts and motivations.  I think that usually in these cases the movie fails to convey aspects of character and "action" that are crucial to the storyline -- it just doesn't work!  That's my opinion about movies made from Henry James or Edith Wharton novels, and to some extent about the movie version of Atonement.  I didn't really understand why Briony acts the way she does towards Robbie until I read the book.  Ok, rant over.

I got a bit bored in the second part of the book, which focuses on Robbie and the infantry's retreat in France.  Maybe I just don't like reading about war.  Maybe I just get tired of reading about atrocities, or feel a bit emotionally manipulated.  I don't know.  But after finishing the book, I understand why the author spends so much time on this section -- and it breaks my heart.

Ok, SPOILER alert in this paragraph.  You have now been warned.  I think the main reason I'm not sure if I "liked" this book is because I found it so heartbreaking.  Basically, in the very last chapter, the narrator (whom we discover is an elderly Briony) reveals that the "happy ending" to Robbie and Cecelia's relationship, which we read about in the previous chapter, was her own narrative invention.   Robbie died in France.  Cecelia died, heartbroken, in a bombing.  And Briony lacked the courage to go see her sister.  And so, at the end of the book we discover that everything we've read up to that point is actually Briony's own narrative, her attempt to atone for the wrong she caused.  Even as I write that summary, I'm tearing up -- it's so tragic.  Tragic to think of Cecelia and Robbie, their lives ruined just when their hopes were highest, just when they had found each other.  Tragic to think of Briony carrying the weight of her error/lies with her for the rest of her life, with no real hope for atonement, only an endless attempt through her writing.  This tragedy is too heavy for me.

Perhaps that's why I cannot say that I "like" Atonement -- reading it hurts too much. There is too much tragedy here -- and, paradoxically, too much beauty.

When you're recovering from surgery...

... you finish books quickly!

Image from a movie adaptation of George Orwell's 1984

I feel a bit like I flew through 1984 -- which surprised me, since I didn't really expect to like it.  But I loved it.  And I hated it, at the same time.  As you can probably tell, 1984 provoked strong emotions in me.  I got caught up into Winston's life as he struggled to control his every flicker of emotion and thought so as not to be found out by Big Brother, and went about his job of basically changing the past all the while struggling to conceal his knowledge that he knew on some level the whole thing was a fraud.  I loved the opening to the novel -- Winston's purchase of the journal with creamy white pages, an act of treason.

I was captivated by the middle part of the novel, Winston's relationship with Julia.  Few books have evoked for me such a sense of paradise in the midst of ugliness and danger.  I, like Winston, wished that period could have lasted forever.

But why, Winston!  Why couldn't you have just let well enough alone and kept on hiding your vibrant life with Julia from Big Brother for as long as you could!  It was inevitable, I suppose -- that in this world of 1984, no true human happiness -- no true humanness -- is allowed to last for long.

The last part of the book, I hated.  I hated it because I was meant to hate it -- it was ugly and painful and dehumanizing.  And yet, it was the right ending for this disutopia.  And the ending of the book -- absolutely brilliant!  If you haven't read the book yet, I won't spoil it for you.

One thing that struck me as I read the book was the concept of being able to change the past by changing all historical documents.  In 1984, the party is able to make it as if a person had never existed, simply by going back and erasing any written record of them having existed.  One of the running motifs of the book is that Oceania (the country in which Winston lives) is always at war with either Eastasia or Eurasia, and an ally with the other superpower.  However, every few years, they switch -- if they had been at war with Eastasia, now they're at war with Eurasia.  AND they're supposed to have always been at war with so-and-so, because the party cannot admit of change or mistake.  That would be weakness.  So, every few years they literally go back and reprint newspapers, books, etc. that refer to the war in order to reflect the current state of things.  They destroy all the old copies and print new copies.  In such a world, it's hard to know what is "true" and what is "historical."

Imagine if George Orwell had been writing these days, after the rise of the internet!  Talk about easy to eradicate the past!  It makes me really, really glad that 1984 is fictional...

On a side note, apparently my subconscious was quite taken with this book as well: a few nights ago I had a dream in which I was trying to maintain a relationship with someone without Big Brother finding out!

Surgery and Cold Comfort Farm

A few days ago, I had surgery: nasal septoplasty and turbinate resection, to be exact.  I know, very glamorous.  It went well -- I ended up not even having to stay in the hospital overnight -- although I am definitely feeling wiped out!  Too wiped out to do much other than watch TV, sleep, and read a bit.

Photo courtesy of Erik Rosengren

I did, however, finish another book on the List: Cold Comfort Farm.  I'd been looking forward to this one, having seen the movie with some good friends.  It's one of their favorite movies, and I liked it too.

The upstanding citizens of Cold Comfort Farm...

I enjoyed the book even more than the movie (surprise, surprise).  It is hilarious!  It's intended as a parody of some popular books at the time (1930s), as well as classics such as Wuthering Heights.

Stella Gibbons' style is not exactly subtle -- which is part of the book's charm.  A character named Aunt Ada Doom?  The Starkadder clan in general?  Cattle named Graceless, Feckless, Aimless, and Pointless, and a bull named Big Business?  Hilarious.

So in case you couldn't tell, I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of Cold Comfort Farm, every overwrought metaphor, every paragraph dripping with cloying prose... Get the picture?

Next up: 1984 by George Orwell.  Apparently Big Brother is watching...

Back from vacation with another book in the can...

Erik and I joined my family for a post-Christmas vacation in Arizona.  Now if you're like most people, hearing "Arizona" conjures up images of cactus, desert, rattlesnakes, etc.  Well, where we go in Arizona is in the mountains, with pine forest, creeks, and elk --  Christopher Creek, Arizona, to be exact.  Population approximately 100.  Elevation around 6000 ft.

The first full day we were at our cabin, it started snowing... and it kept snowing.  And kept snowing.  And two feet of snow later, we were officially snowed in!  Unlike Chicago, queen of snow-plowed cities, Christopher Creek is not exactly equipped to handle massive amounts of snow.  So, our plans for hiking were foiled for a few days, replaced by some sledding, raiding my grandparents' house for proper snow gear, and lots of reading by the fire.

As a result, I finished another book from my list: A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving.  It was an interesting book, and I'm glad I read it -- although I feel no urgent need to read it again.  I ended up almost hating the title character by the time I was half-way through the book.  I'm not entirely sure why it's considered a classic -- although there are definitely some unforgettable characters.  I also found the running theological themes interesting... although I'm not sure Irving actually broke new ground in that area.

I ran out of reading material up at the cabin, so I mooched from Erik (read and finished Gang Leader for a Day -- very interesting read) and from the cabin stock (reread part of Wuthering Heights).  Yesterday, I went to the library and got three books from the list.  I'm starting with Cold Comfort Farm, and so far I'm loving it!