Wednesday Reading Meme

[osprey_archer]

What I’ve Just Finished Reading

Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cousin Phillis, which has many good points - I enjoyed its sketch of a rural idyll - but ends quite abruptly; I did a bit of hunting and it turns out that she and her editor had a misunderstanding about how much space the story would get, so she had to wrap it up all of a sudden even though she had a longer ending planned.

I imagine she might have lengthened it later, but she dived into Wives and Daughters right after (which I haven’t read, and really ought to) and then died, so she didn’t have the chance. Ah well.

I loved Joan G. Robinson’s When Marnie Was There so much that I snagged The Teddy Robinson Storybook, which is the only other one of her books that my library has. It’s for much younger children and hasn’t grabbed me by the heart like When Marnie Was There, although the teddy bear illustrations are adorable and full of character.

What I’m Reading Now

Frances Hodgson Burnett’s That Lass O’Lowrie’s. Joan Lowrie, the eponymous heroine, is a pit girl of heroic stature and even more heroic character, who bravely steps up to protect a former pit girl who has turned up with an illegitimate child. Joan lifts the baby high so all can see, and castigates them all for attacking such a poor helpless creature, and takes the girl and her baby into her own house so they won’t starve in the streets.

Joan is fabulous. She has also become embroiled in a love quadrangle, in which all the characters involved are far too noble and love each other too much to allow their jealousy to destroy their friendships, and indeed leap at the chance to promote their friend’s love affairs at their own expense: suffering all the while, but making the sacrifice willingly.

Also, Joan has been fearlessly traipsing around in the dark of the night to protect the man she loves from the depredations of her evil father, who was discharged for putting the mine in danger of an explosion and wants VENGEANCE. But he shall not have it while Joan is alive to interpose herself between them!

This is the kind of quality Frances Hodgson Burnett action that I am all about. Channel my id some more, Burnett! (Also I think all four of them will be happily coupled by the end, once one of them unbends enough to actually speak the name of his beloved, LOOKING AT YOU DERRICK, a lot of trouble could have been avoided if you had just said “I love Joan Lowrie” outright when you asked your friend for advice.)

I’ve also started reaching Michael Pollan’s new book, How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, which honestly has been a bit of a slog so far: he’s talking about the history of psychedelics and their legal status and honestly I am just here to learn what they have to tell us about Consciousness et al.

I’m having a similar problem with Laurel Thatcher Ulrich’s A House Full of Females: Plural Marriage and Women's Rights in Early Mormonism, 1835-1870: the title promises plural marriage and women’s place in early Mormonism, but so far the book is mostly following Wilford Woodruff around on his missionary work, with occasional mentions of women he met on the way.

I realize that when one is writing history one must to a certain extent follow the evidence, and Woodruff kept a very thorough diary which makes him a potentially invaluable source, although possibly for a different book. I’m here to read about women, not Woodruff. We’ll see if it gets more interesting once plural marriage begins.

What I Plan to Read Next

I’m contemplating interlibrary loaning some of Joan G. Robinson’s books for older children.

Comments

[asakiyume]

Wow, the Francis Hodgson Burnett story sounds right up my alley too!

I love listening to Terry Gross's Fresh Air (sometimes) because then I get to hear Michael Pollan (or whoever) **talk** about the book and don't actually have to read it. I heard him talking about this book and was really taken with the possibilities of this therapy (though it seems as if legally it'll be a while before it can/could get off the ground). He told a story about one woman who completely vanquished her fear, and he told it in a very compelling way--so much so that I've retold the story several times to people.

[osprey_archer]

I think once he gets to the meat of the book it's going to be quite interesting, but - I want to get there already! I really don't care too much about the long and arduous history of how all these things were discovered, and how they were outlawed, etc. etc., I just want to know what they do.

[evelyn_b]

Joan Lowrie, the eponymous heroine, is a pit girl of heroic stature and even more heroic character, who bravely steps up to protect a former pit girl who has turned up with an illegitimate child. Joan lifts the baby high so all can see, and castigates them all for attacking such a poor helpless creature, and takes the girl and her baby into her own house so they won’t starve in the streets.

I have never heard of this book and it sounds AMAZING, love quadrangles aside.

[osprey_archer]

I think you would enjoy it. It is probably the least annoying love polygon in the history of all literature; in fact it's sometimes quite charming, because they all so intently desire to promote their friend's love affairs and interests even if they believe those conflict with their own. ALL OF YOU ARE SO NOBLE, IT'S BEAUTIFUL.

[evelyn_b]

Awwww. I think I would!

[skygiants]

I don't think I've ever read an adult-aimed Burnett and clearly I should remedy that!

[osprey_archer]

This is probably my favorite of the adult-aimed Burnett's that I've read, although A Lady of Quality is also worth reading purely for the number of times that the high-spirited heroine Clorinda is pronounced "beauteous."

[amaebi]

Ah, that answers my question: you have read other adult Burnetts. I have them nearly all of them and have read most, but not all-- you spur me on to read That Lass o'Lowrie's.

I'm enchanted that you like A Lady of Quality-- it has seemed to me that almost no one does, and I do. Partly as an interesting instance of late 19th-century feminism in fiction, but also because the diction is so dreadful.

But do you really mean that you prefer A Lady of Quality to T. Tembaron, The Making of a Marchioness, and The Shuttle?

I read When Marnie Was There when I was about eleven, and forgotten nearly everything about it except the spooky picture on the library copy I read, and the mood that came with it. I'll have to find a copy and reread it.

[osprey_archer]

I haven't read very many of her adult works. But I didn't like The Making of a Marchioness nearly as much; Emily is just SO grateful to the duke for marrying her, and of course I can see why given her other options, but all the same it gets rather repetitive to read about. Of course, so do descriptions of Clorinda's beauteousness, buuuut on the other hand she kills a guy with a horsewhip and that makes up for a lot.

[amaebi]

I like Emily Fox-Seton. That's probably because I come from an upbringing in which I could never be Little Dorrit enough. And I acknowledge that FHB likes Emily Fox-Seton too audibly. :D

The Contest of Beauties paradigm is subverted pretty deliciously, though, including the Marquis's depiction as a privileged, shopworn middle-aged man. :)

Are you aware of the sequel, in which an Enemy tries to defeat Marchioness Emily by means of Indian Magic?

[osprey_archer]

I think I read The Making of a Marchioness and its sequel all together in one book. Emily had a child and the marquis becomes extremely protective when it's clear she and the little one are in danger?