osprey_archer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
osprey_archer) wrote2025-01-02 04:14 pm
osprey_archer) wrote2025-01-02 04:14 pm
Wednesday Reading Meme on Thursday
Wednesday Reading Meme a day late this week on account of the New Year!
What I’ve Just Finished Reading
Penelope Lively’s A Stitch in Time, because I thought it was a time-slip novel, but in fact there’s a lot of musing about the nature of time and only the dimmest glimmers of timeslip: the squeak of a swing that’s no longer there, the glimpse of a long-ago girl’s face in the glass before her old sampler. Bit of a disappointment really.
Also Susan Cooper’s The Magic Maker: A Portrait of John Langstaff, Creator of the Christmas Revels. I read this solely because Susan Cooper wrote it, as I’d never heard of the Christmas Revels, although now that I’ve read this book I’d love to attend one. Revels differ from other performances in that they have a strong participatory element: the audience sings along with many of the songs and joins the dance at the end. Alas, the Revels seem to be mostly a coastal phenomenon: they started in Boston and spread to New York, California, Portland… Some of these locations have spring and autumn revels, too.
Cooper fans may be interested to learn that it was Jack Langstaff’s encouragement that propelled King of Shadows from a mere idea to a finished book. In fact, he gave her a copy of John Bennett’s Master Skylark, so there is a direct connection between these two “boy meets Shakespeare” books!
What I’m Reading Now
Charlotte Bronte has just left the Heger pensionnat in Brussels and returned to Yorkshire for good. Elizabeth Gaskell doesn’t mention her unrequited love for M. Heger, and neither, interestingly, does Mr. Shorter, who annotated the 1900 edition. Since all the principals were dead at that point (not only Charlotte herself but her father, her husband, the Hegers, etc) one might imagine he would feel more freedom to talk about it, but apparently not.
What I Plan to Read Next
I was planning to read Penelope Lively’s Astercote and The Ghost of Thomas Kempe, which are also supposed to be timeslip, but now I feel suspicious as to the actual amount of timeslip they contain. Has anyone read them? Do the characters from the past and present actually meet?
What I’ve Just Finished Reading
Penelope Lively’s A Stitch in Time, because I thought it was a time-slip novel, but in fact there’s a lot of musing about the nature of time and only the dimmest glimmers of timeslip: the squeak of a swing that’s no longer there, the glimpse of a long-ago girl’s face in the glass before her old sampler. Bit of a disappointment really.
Also Susan Cooper’s The Magic Maker: A Portrait of John Langstaff, Creator of the Christmas Revels. I read this solely because Susan Cooper wrote it, as I’d never heard of the Christmas Revels, although now that I’ve read this book I’d love to attend one. Revels differ from other performances in that they have a strong participatory element: the audience sings along with many of the songs and joins the dance at the end. Alas, the Revels seem to be mostly a coastal phenomenon: they started in Boston and spread to New York, California, Portland… Some of these locations have spring and autumn revels, too.
Cooper fans may be interested to learn that it was Jack Langstaff’s encouragement that propelled King of Shadows from a mere idea to a finished book. In fact, he gave her a copy of John Bennett’s Master Skylark, so there is a direct connection between these two “boy meets Shakespeare” books!
What I’m Reading Now
Charlotte Bronte has just left the Heger pensionnat in Brussels and returned to Yorkshire for good. Elizabeth Gaskell doesn’t mention her unrequited love for M. Heger, and neither, interestingly, does Mr. Shorter, who annotated the 1900 edition. Since all the principals were dead at that point (not only Charlotte herself but her father, her husband, the Hegers, etc) one might imagine he would feel more freedom to talk about it, but apparently not.
What I Plan to Read Next
I was planning to read Penelope Lively’s Astercote and The Ghost of Thomas Kempe, which are also supposed to be timeslip, but now I feel suspicious as to the actual amount of timeslip they contain. Has anyone read them? Do the characters from the past and present actually meet?
no subject
no subject
no subject
Ooh I forgot Green Knowe - the first one appears to be 1954 so I can probably sneak that in - thanks!