Thursday 24th August 2023

School is back. The first full week of 6 o’clock alarms is almost done. It’s a more intense year for the boy this time. Important exams, decision to make, that sort of thing. How did we get here already?

We’re in that time of in-between seasons. Chillier mornings giving way to warmer days and muggy nights. Summer still holding on, but its grasp is loosening. I was working in the big polycrub this morning, and the bees were very busy - definitely a sign of the seasonal shift.

I haven’t really been inspired by the garden much this year. I’ve felt quite overwhelmed by it all, to be honest. Mind you, I have been very involved in a sizeable community project, which took up a lot of time in May and June. Then my visitors arrived and the holidays began, so I’m not being too hard on myself about it. Now that things have quietened down, I have felt a bit more motivated to get out there.

It’s not been a total loss - there are tomatoes and chillies ripening, vegetables and fruit are being harvested, flowers have bloomed and vases have been filled. I’m already planning for next season, as far as anyone can. Winter crops and biennials have been sown, bulbs have been ordered, and I have a to-do list I want to tackle over the autumn.

That’s about it right now. Life returning to its term-time rhythm. I’ve been reading a lot over the summer, and I’m planning a bookish post soon.

Today, in the potting shed, I finished listening to The Great Gatsby, perfectly narrated by Jake Gyllenhaal on Audible. It was a masterpiece.

I was sowing a tray of lupin seeds as the words of that closing passage drew the novel to an end, and I wept.

Sunday 21st May 2023

I’ve been very busy lately - not really getting a minute, to be honest. Committee and board meetings, getting the garden ready, chivvying the boy along during his study leave and exams, and a wee building project happening, on top of the myriad of everyday things that need attention. It’s easy to get overwhelmed when you are on you own.

But then, a bout of covid brought a halt to all the busy-ness, as it does. Just me, fortunately. The boy, having finished his exams was able to fend for himself, and so we waved to each other at a distance. He has just started getting over long-covid, and neither of us want to go there again.

So, a week off - all commitments dropped, except to myself. Rest, fluids, more rest, more fluids, a few pages of reading, a few rows of knitting and more trash TV than I have watched for a long time. I stayed away from Church today, just in case, but I definitely feel as if I am on the mend.

This morning was warm and sunny. Everything here is still so very green, with just a few pops of colour here and there, but you can sense that summer is straining at the leash. I took my coffee out to the patio and read the May chapter in Ronald Blythe’s last collection of meditations on his life, faith and community. His writing is simply wonderful - I can’t say anymore about it than that. The entries for each day are short, but I was led down so many rabbit holes, as he invariably mentions a person or event sends me to the search engine on my phone to explore further.

He quoted a line from a poem which had me looking up the Amercian poet, Robert Lowell. The name seemed so familiar that I fancied there might be a book of his poems in the house. I popped back in to check and soon emerged, triumphantly with the slim volume - and another coffee. Interesting man and life, but not very happy, by the sounds of things. His poems feel quite bleak, as post war poetry can be.

Blythe describes watching a tv interview with writer Muriel Spark , aired not long after her death. I remember watching it too. I felt a connection with him - as I did when he remembered his grandmother being horrified when he brought a bunch of lilac blossoms into the house. My mother had the same superstition, and I feel consternation when I see all those jars full of lilac flowers on instagram kitchen tables and window sills

Further on, I downloaded an image of John Constable’s painting of The Ascension, currently hanging in St Mary’s Church, Dedham, Suffolk, and listened, on Spotify to the Choir of Kings College Cambridge sing Hubert Parry’s anthem, I Was Glad. The latter is having a bit of a moment, after featuring in King Charles’s Coronation, but it has always been a favourite Psalm of mine.

The lushness of Blythe’s prose stayed with me most of the day. It is so nourishing. Quite enabling too, as later on, inspired by his description of watching the cow parsley flowers wave in the breeze outside his kitchen window as he did his washing up, I ordered a jumbo packet of seeds from ebay.

So, anyway, that’s where I’ve been, and where I am. I never mean to stay away for so long, but - life, and all that. Priorities - priorities.

Wednesday 11th January 2023

No school today as teachers were on strike, but the boy was still working at home, because there are prelim exams next week.

It was nice not to have to set an early alarm, and I slept in until 9 am! That kind of upset my routine somewhat, but I pottered around and did get some tidying up and laundry done.

When I went to make dinner, however, I discovered that the steaks I had taken out the freezer was actually boiling beef, so we ended up with a frittata type of thing instead.

Meetings are starting back up again, and I had my first one yesterday. Fortunately it was on zoom, as it was a pretty stormy evening, and I didn’t want to move far from the fireside. I also typed up the minutes for one of my other committees, which meets at the end of the month. I am usually rushing at the last moment to do this, so it felt good to get that out of the way.

I’ve started reading Tristram Shandy, and I’m struggling with it. I know it’s a notoriously odd book, and I am finding it really quite funny. The trouble is I have to wade through an awful lot of text to get there. I’ll give it a bit longer.

Early Summer Reading

I thought I would do a wee round up of of my latest reading. I always have a book or sometimes two on the go, but during my recent bout of covid, I read a lot more. Here are some quick reviews from my Early Summer reads.

I read these first two books just before I came down with the virus.

Etta Lemon was a Christmas gift from my elder daughter. She knows my reading tastes very well. I had actually misplaced this book for ages and kept looking for it, so I was glad to find it again. It’s a biography of Etta Lemon, one of the three Victorian women who were instrumental in starting what became the RSPB. It tells her story and that of her campaign against the feather trade. Wild birds were hunted and slaughtered - some species to the point of extinction, to provide trimmings for womens’ hats. Etta was a formidable campaigner and worked doggedly all her adult life to bring about and end to this practice. During her time, the RSPB grew increasingly influential, and yet she was side-lined and ignored. I have to confess I knew nothing about her.

The book looks at her life and work, and also, in parallel, compares her story with that of the more well known Emeline Pankhurst. It examines how the different attitudes and circumstances of both women played a part in their different campaigns. Etta Lemon, herself, was anti - suffrage and there was a most interesting discussion around that. I really enjoyed this book and learned so much. I thought it was very well researched and touched on aspects of women’s history that I wouldn’t otherwise have known.

Jane and Prudence, by Barbara Pym was an absolute joy, as all her books are. Set in 1950s England, with rationing and food shortages still in evidence, it tells the story of Jane, as a scatty vicar’s wife and her attempts at matchmaking for her younger, glamourous friend, Prudence.

It’s a very funny story and introduces some incredible Pym-esque characters, such as Fabian Driver and Mrs Dogget. She just evokes those run-down, slightly seedy, post war Britain vibes perfectly and I always enjoy her books.

I’d had this on my shelf for a few years, thinking it might be a good read aloud with the boy. Sadly those days are over and the book remained tucked into a bookshelf. When I was struck down with the virus I wanted something to take my mind off how I was feeling, and often a good vintage childrens’ book is just at the right level. This was absolutely perfect. A rollicking spy adventure, set again in the 1950s, with a whiff of John Buchan about it. Alastair Cameron travels to Skye to stay with a distant relative and before he even arrives, he becomes involved in a myster,y which follows him to the island. There were more than a few twists and turns in this exciting wee story. I really enjoyed it.

Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cranford was a nice wee read. Not much happens in it, to be honest. Its just really scenes of women’s lives set in a provincial town in the 1840s. The women, all either unmarried or widowed, call on each other, gossip and reminisce. There are some gentle adventures - the visit of the conjurer, the failure of a savings bank and others, which I won’t reveal. All very low key stuff - a few poignant lines and some very witty moments. A perfect read when you need to rest and recuperate.

Father, by Elizabeth Von Armin (Enchanted April) was a similar gentle read, although there were bleaker undertones to the tale. Set in the inter-war years, Jennifer has devoted her life to looking after her Father - a promise to her dying mother. Father is an acclaimed writer, but is a household tyrant. One day he arrives home for lunch with a very young and beautiful woman, to whom he has just been married. Jennifer is delighted by this turn of events (cue one of the funniest scenes I have read in a while), promptly shoots off to rent a cottage in the country and live off her small inheritance from her mother. It’s not all roses though. I’ll say no more. It started really well but I think she ran out of steam at the end. It is still a very enjoyable read with some very sharp commentary on the restrictive lives of the surplus women left after WW1

I also read Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen , but I forgot to photograph it. This was definitely my least favourite Austen. I just didn’t take to any of the characters and felt the plot and the prose was boring. It just didn’t have the sparkle that her other works have. Sorry, but there it is.

This has been my favourite book of this selection. Barchester Towers, second in the Barchester Chronicles series by Anthony Trollope. I absolutely loved everything about this book. A continuation of The Warden, this moves the story on in a masterful way into the world of church politics, with all the backstabbing, plotting and wild assumptions that ensue. It is wickedly hilarious and Trollope’s use of the ‘fourth wall’ is inspired. I definitely tried to savour this book and take it slowly - and yet I found myself reading ‘just one more chapter’.

I definitely fell wholesale into Trollope’s world and was reluctant to leave those wonderful characters. I’m currently watching the 1982 BBC series on Youtube, where the characters are so far living up to my imaginary ones. Dr Grantly is maybe slightly too thin, and the Rev. Harding maybe too plump, but all in all it’s easing my withdrawal symptoms.

I did consider going straight on to the next book in the series - Dr. Thorne, but I decided to save it for another time. I aim to work through all the Barchester and Palliser novels though, so look out for them in the future.

And now on to the books I am currently reading.

Both Word from Wormingford and Letters from Hamnavoe are collections of columns the authors wrote for local newspapers.

Ronald Blythe wrote for the Church Times about life in the Parish of Wormingford in deepest Suffolk. His entries are based around the liturgical year, starting at Advent. I started reading it then, and have dipped into it every Sunday morning. I’m being very restrained and savouring a few pages every week. It is delightful - tales of rural life - bluebell picnics, Eastertide, parish characters and history, illustrated by John Nash’s beautiful engravings.

Ronald Blythe mentioned Letters from Hamnavoe in his book, and actually goes to Orkney to visit the poet George Mackay Brown. I was encouraged by this chapter to seek out the actual book, and it is just as delightful. Again, a compilation of his columns for a local newspaper - The Orcadian, the range of subjects he covers in this collection of short pieces is deep and vast.

And I’ve just started The Shell Seekers. I think I am the last person I know not to have read this book. I have read Winter Solstice by Rosamunde Pilcher, and had a love/hate relationship with it. On one hand, I loved the cosiness of it all - the roaring fires, the bracing walks by the loch and the softly falling snow. The perfect Christmas atmosphere. But I had trouble with the excruciatingly stereotypical idealisation of a highland village, and I struggled to put that aside. I was also not very keen on the two main characters - in fact I actively disliked them.

So I have been quite resistant to picking this one up after I bought it in a charity shop a few years ago. However - two chapters in, I am quite enjoying it. It just seems where my reading head is right now, coming after a book I really loved. It feels pleasant and safe. I’ll report back.

Dectectorists

One of the TV programmes that was streamed on BBC during lockdown was Dectectorists. A gentle comedy about the lives of two men whose hobby is metal detecting. It’s very low key, subtle stuff. Not laugh out loud, in your face type of funny, but understated and beautifully observed. It’s about looking for gold, and finding it in unexpected places. I watched all three series over the course of a couple of weeks. I loved it. The theme tune haunts me still.

And now a lovely book has been published - Landscapes of Detectorists. This is a real academic book, but it’s very readable. It contains four short geographical interpretations of the programme, with additional essays by the writer/lead actor, and the producer. It’s a genuinely informative book and exactly the kind of non- fiction writing that I like. (I might have more to say on that in a future post.)

Apart from making me want to rush off and buy a metal detector and get out there, both the book and the series have made me look at my own landscape in a different way. The idea, in one of the essays about the land being a palimpsest is just so wonderful. I know it’s an obvious one, but we don’t always notice what’s on our own doorstep. I live in this amazing ancient landscape - the layers of story written by the successive generations of people that have lived here for at least 5,000 years is there to be seen - if I take the time to look for it.

Summer of books

One of the things on my Summer Intentions list was to read summery fiction. I managed to read around a dozen books over the last couple of months. I enjoyed most of them, in the main, although there was one where I didn’t get past page 75.

Now that we are in the last week of August, I think it’s time for a little review.

A Month in the Country, J.L Carr was one of my early summer reads. I loved this book. A really short read - a novella - set in the long hot summer of 1920 and is an autobiographical story about the authors’s time spent renovating a mural in a country church. It’s written as a reflection on the events of that time, soon after WW1. The language is almost poetic - it’s a beautiful and evocative book, and had me yearning for that time and place. And, any book that involves cake - well…

“ I remember the cake too, seedcake, first rate. Now that’s something you’d be lucky to find in London, then or now”

What can I say? Summer reading wouldn’t be complete without a visit to Miss Read and her quintessential tales of English village life.

Rose Cottage, by Mary Stewart was a pleasant enough read. It was a light romantic novel, set in the summertime - a comfortable story with a bit of a mystery going on. I read it while sitting under the trees in the garden on a beautiful sunny day - perfect summer reading.

I read Ian McEwan’s Atonement over a stormy weekend. It’s not what you would call a light summer book, but the first part is set on a hot summer day in 1935. It was a superb novel - rich and atmospheric. A story in three parts. about the consequences of a lie, set against the backdrop of the second world war. I was gripped by it and needed to keep reading. I found the middle part about the journey to Dunkirk, and the descriptions of life as a nurse in London at that time completely fascinating. The feelings from this book stayed with me for a long while.

I’d forgotten I’d read this until I was looking back in my photos for this post. I picked it up in a charity shop at the beginning of the year, but seeing it was set in the Summer of 2003, I put it on my seasonal pile. I enjoyed it - I like Ali Smith’s writing - quick and smart and funny. This one was too, although quite cliched in places. A familiar story of a strangers turning up and disrupting the lives of an already dysfunctional family, and the consequences of that. Good fun.

This was a holiday purchase from an amazing bookshop in St. Andrews. I had never come across this author before, and have to admit I chose the book for the title and cover, more than anything. But what a revelation it was. Such clever, witty and understated writing. There isn’t much of a plot - a wealthy 40 something widow has married a man 10 years her junior who is rather feckless and workshy, then an old family friend returns to the village. The story really examines the various relationships of the well drawn characters. It’s surprisingly racy for it’s time (late 50s?) and there is an unexpected ending that left my mouth agape. It was one of my favourite books - a perfect read.

I loved Elizabeth and her German Garden - written by the author of Enchanted April, and published, anonymously, in 1898. This was a joyous and authentic celebration of her love of nature and her, often hapless attempts to recreate her vision. I laughed so much, reading this short book - she is wickedly funny, and there are many acerbic observations on some of her acquaintances and the social situation of her time and position. Her love for her children - The Babies as she calls them, and her rather less affectionate relationship with “The Man of Wrath,” as she refers to her husband, is sharply drawn.

Yes, she lives a very privileged and selfish life, and some of the passages certainly made me wince - it’s definitely a book of its time, but through it, I could detect a deep sense of frustration at the constraints she felt as part of the minor aristocracy at the turn of the 19th Century.

This book - bought purely because the title fit into my Summer reading theme, was a bit of a curates egg, to be honest. I realise now that I read it in the wrong way, and should have been dipping into it as summer progressed. Instead I read it all at once - well over several days. It is a collection of nature writing, edited by Melissa Harrison - some older work, but quite a lot of it was “new nature writing” and I struggle with that particular genre at times. I find it often to be very formulaic and perhaps more about the author’s clever “writing” about the nature, or landscape or whatever, than about nature itself. I much preferred the older works - the Gilbert Whites, and W. H Hudsons than anything from this century. But that’s just me…

I ended up just ploughing through it to get to the end, which wasn’t the way to read it.

The Go-Between by L.P Hartley was my favourite book of the summer. It haunts me still. From that famous, poignant opening line:

“The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.”

right to the very end, I was hooked.

Set in the summer of 1900, it’s a quiet drama - almost gentle, gradually building to the inevitable climax, as the heatwave intensifies day by day. The writing is brilliant and beautiful, perfectly evoking the life of the English upper class in the decade before the Great War.

It’s the tale of a 12 year old boy, narrated by his older self, who goes to spend a summer with a school friend, and finds himself being caught up in a situation he is too young to cope with. Its a story of exploitation and loss of innocence, and the consequences of that in his later life.

I’ve somehow managed to never see any of the many film and TV adaptations of this novel, so I can’t comment on those. The book is truly magnificent though - I’ll read it again.

There was another book that I tried to read - a highly rated novel, written in 2016, but set at the beginning of WW2. I just couldn’t get to grips with it. I wont name it, because book reviews are highly subjective, but I found it contrived and wondered if the author should have been writing a screenplay instead of prose. Anyway, I struggled on for 75 pages before I had to throw in the towel. Normally I keep going with a book I’m not enjoying, more out of a sense of duty to the author, but I’m afraid I couldn’t with this one. Maybe another time.

And now to my current read. I’ve just started Jane Austen’s Emma - inspired in part by our visit to The Georgian House, but also because her writing is so enjoyable.This is more my kind of thing - sharp witty observations in a delightful setting - and a perfect August afternoon to read it.

So - that’s been my summer reading this year. Common themes have been, summer - obviously - war, class and society, and older rather than modern fiction. It’s been very interesting to look back on for this post, and I think its fair to say that, regardless of the weather, it’s been a great summer of books here - what about you?