Trying to start a blog has proved too much for my cahllenged laptop today. Will try again tomorrow.
Post boxing day-day has its own blank and numb charateristics – but is very very peaceful. Time to think about a lifetime of books and other readings that shape someone like me. This says it all:
“
…she was a receptor who became richer the more she received. Her way with the chaos in her mind was to cultivate it through the articulations of others, by which she meant the reading of a lifetime with whose aid she created the interesting architecture and geography of herself. She had constructed over the years a rich and civilized country, full of history and culture, with views and vistas she had never dreamed of…” P.135 – Tony & Susan, by Austin Wright.
I think I decided to start a blog to try and trap the chaos in my mind. It’s awfully sad that Austin Wright has never found the recognition that he deserved. What an incredibly good storyteller. (I believe he is now dead.) And I think that was his one and only book. Note to self, must find out.
Currently reading She’s come undone by Wally Lamb. I bought it in 2000 – one of those book splurges that results in half a dozen beautiful newly published books by authors you’ve read before and really enjoy (AYRBARE). So they start off in a pile beside the bed (bloody hell – eleven years ago) and then graduate to the book case, in a pile of horizontal unread but beautiful recently published books. There’s a couple more stages between that one and the vertical spines in carefully co-ordinated colour matches stage – where the unread, and slightly yellowing pages of books by authors you’ve read before and enjoyed rub covers with books you’ve read and have kept because you love keeping them. It feels deliciously thrifty and post boxing day-dayish being able to go to the bookshelf and take down one of those creatures (AYRBARE). Up to page 295 of the 465 page book. It’s an uncomfortable read because I want to be numb and blank-ish while enjoying a read on PBDD, but Wally’s making me feel engrossed in the depressing story of Dolores whose life goes from interesting to bad to really bad – so depressing. I must be so addicted to mindlessly happy endings so it’s challenging me to read until I get to one. It seems the edition I bought in 2000 was the second publishing (first published in 1992) which happened a year after the success of Wally’s novel – I know this much is true – that was a humdinger of a novel too – huge and really enjoyable.
I do happen to have his latest novel in my bookcase The Hour I First Believed (it started life beside my bed and is now in a horizontal pile, indicating its stage in the life of BBAYRBARE). I think I bought it midway through 2011. Note to self – must read before 2023.