The Making of a Marchioness, by Frances Hodgson Burnett

I'm always amazed at how some of the themes currently at the height of interest were also touched upon by classic books. Case in question The Making of a Marchioness, by Frances Hodgson Burnett.  Written in 1901, it talks of financial peril, marriage of convenience and death plots for inheritance purposes...  

I came upon it  having watched "The making of a Lady" (I assume because the title of Marchioness is not well-known), a slightly rom-com set in a Victorian context - easy for a gentle afternoon watching, while knitting / cross-stitching / petting your cat, or whatever Victorians would do in the afternoon...

Recipe: grilled vegetable quiche

While I am an absolute carnivore, there are times I yearn for an abundance of vegetables.  

I will then go through phases of "vegetarianism", where I (re) discover the tastes and smells and colours of the vegetable family.  In such cases, it's always good to have a good source of inspiration:  in my case, it's Yotam Ottolenghi and his book "Plenty".  

Plenty recipes to choose from, but this vegetable quiche is one of my favourite staples.

Youth, by Isaak Asimov

Coming back from London on a Saturday evening, the world quietens down on board the Eurostar train.  People close their eyes, contemplate the events of the day, and try to enjoy the peace around them.  This is a time when I enjoy a good read: nothing too elaborate or big - just simple, good writing and a reasonable length to last the journey.

Such a read is Youth, by Isaak Asimov.  Written in the 1950s, it is of the futuristic genre but with no fanfare.  It rather reminded me of the Twilight Zone programme that I so enjoyed in my own youth...

The plot is fairly straightforward:  life in a distant future, where our present and recent past is considered as the "beforethewars" era (I really enjoyed that word, nothing fancy but leaving so much to the imagination...).  The main characters involve two scientists, who try to take up contact with aliens in a foreign planet, with the view to take up trade relations. Already I'm amazed at the little bits of wisdom that I read in between this simple story:

... was it reasonable to destroy almost all their tremendous civilization in atomic warfare over causes our historians can no longer accurately determine?

With them, we get to see their respective sons, longing for a future of their own, preferably in a circus.  They in turn discover some uncommon-looking creatures they think could be their ticket into this wonderful life - so they keep them in a cage and try to take good care of them.

The book is short and more than enough for the 2-hour travel to Brussels.  I really enjoyed the language used, but also some of the messages used.  While waiting for a signal from the aliens, the two scientists start debating about whether the aliens could in fact be hostile.  The pessimist of the two explains why he sees things this way:

The world has been at peace too long.  We are losing a healthy sense of suspicion

Linking it with the Twilight Zone, I came to a point where the twists are non-ending - who's watching whom here:  the scientists the children, the children the little creatures, or the children the scientists who are in truth the little creatures?  One can come to their proper interpretation of the story, but one thing is certain:  for such a tiny size, this book certainly stayed in my mind long after I had read it...   

The Classics Club - Spin No. 4

The Classics Club is organising a spin again!  A list of 20 classics to read, all ordered in a nice list, and on Monday, there will be a spin, and whichever number is picked, this book I'll read by January 2014 - Let's go!

My Spin list, by order of feeling:

My dreaded

1.  D.H. Lawrence - Lady Chatterley's lover (I've read it once, and found it boring...)
2.  Goethe - Faust (I'll either  love it or hate it...)
3.  Sueskind - Das Parfum (I've seen parts of the movie, and I was slightly nauseous...)
4.  Kafka - Der Prozess (I really don't know what to expect here...)
5.  Nietsche - Also sprach Zarathustra (why are 4 of my dreaded ones German???)

My desired

6.  Rushdie - The Satanic verses (finally, to read what the whole fuss was about...)
7.  Angelou - I know why the caged bird sings (both desired and dreaded, I hope it turns out     to be great!)
8.  Shakespeare - Taming of the Shrew (ohhh...)
9.  Sophocles - Οἰδίπους Τύραννος (Oedipus Rex - a classic masterpiece)
10.  Conan Doyle - Sherlock Holmes: Scandal in Bohemia (we all need a little scandal now and then...)

My oh well, whatever...

11.  Shelley - Frankenstein (can you believe I haven't read this?)
12.  Shakespeare - Othello (no comment)
13.  Camus - La chutte (I have no idea what to expect)
14.  Zola - Nana (leftover from Zolaaddiction...)
15.  Darwin - On the origin of species (I have to read this at some point...)

My free choices

16.  Swift - Gulliver's travels (I've been meaning to read this ever since I was a child)
17.  Orwell - Animal Farm (a re-read, one of the books that have left a mark on me)
18.  Christie - Murder at the Vickarage (a little whodunnit never hurts)
19.  Miller - Death of a Salesman (I've seen the play quite a number of times, I need to read the book..)
20.  Wharton - House of Mirth (I didn't like the first book of hers I read, so this is my second try)

I'm really curious to see which book I'll be reading - what fun!



UPDATE:  Spin number is 10 -- Scandal in Bohemia, here I come...

Recipe: Humble chicken soup and cheat ice-cream

What do you do when there are workmen in the house?  when you want to be there to keep an eye on things, but at the same time not to cause a disruption?  

My solution on such days, when workmen (macho men leaving dust and dirt wherever they go... but that's another story) are all over the house, when I am the guest in my own place, is to seek refuge in the kitchen. 

I do my own thing and if/when there is a matter to be cleared, I am available to sort things out!  

Seamus Heaney: my introduction to poetry

On hearing of Seamus Heaney's death recently, I was amazed at the reaction by many bloggers but also by people around me IRL:  rarely has there been a poet held in such high regard, let alone in our day and age. 

I did not know a thing about him (not something I can easily admit).  In such cases, I turn to people who are able to enlighten me and guide me through my ignorance:  here, an Irish colleague of mine, who kindly enough lent me his anthology of the 1966-1987poems. 

Heaney had a full life.  Reading about him, I discovered a person who could transform life's lessons into beautiful words, but who, at the same time, stood with both feet on the ground.  I suppose it was his grasp of reality that permeated his poetry:  for the first time, I could actually feel the words. 

There, I've said it.  I cannot understand poetry.  My reality is so … trivial, my imagination so limited, that up to now I could not "get it" whenever I read poems. I will not claim to love poetry (not yet), but I can – and this will be my triumph – get into a poet's mind now and see and feel what they mean to say. Of all the poems in this book, I understood about half of them.  Two really had an impact on me, with sentences sending shivers down my spine: 

Digging 

"…But I've no spade to follow men like them.

Between my finger and my thumb

The squat pen rests.

I'll dig with it." 

(We are all given the materials to make something of our lives – it is in our hands what and how we will achieve greatness…)  

Mid-Term Break 

"…Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple,

He lay in a four foot box as in his cot.

…

A four foot box, a foot for every year." 

(here, personal experience was the trigger:  losing a family member prematurely does indeed leave a scar)  

After some more searching, I came across his beautiful poem Anything can happen, written after 9/11, capturing the emotions going through:

Anything can happen

"... Ground gives. The heaven's weight

Lifts up off Atlas like a kettle lid.
Capstones shift. Nothing resettles right.

Telluric ash and fire-spores boil away."

Heaney was a great poet and a great person.  With his poetry, he has touched generations of  students who might have been otherwise unwilling, but who then turned into admiring adults (like my colleague). For my part, I slowly grasp the uniqueness of poetry, and am no longer afraid to explore this side of the literary world.