A Momentary Taste of Being

Can You Forgive Her? is the first novel in the "Pallisers" series.  I'm not certain whether this series of novels was ever known in Trollope's time under this name; however, ever since the BBC production of the entire series, they have become known as such to us.  The Pallisers is a series of six novels that center around Platagenet and Glencora Palliser--although in this novel the couple is hardly at center stage.  Or, if at center stage they share it prominently with one other trio and are shadowed by yet a third trio. Indeed the novel is a novel of twos and threes.  There are three groups of three people--Glencora, Plantagenet, and Burgo Fitzgerald; Alice Vavasor, her cousin George Vavasor, and John Grey; and Mrs. Greenow (an Aunt to Alice Vavsor), Captain Bellfield, and Mr. Cheesacre.  The first two listed are the centerpieces of the novel, the last trio is present largely for broad comic relief--the poor Widow Greenow besieged by suitors on all sides whi...

I can say with some pleasure that this is the first of Maugham's books that I have ever finished.  I've tried many-- Cakes and Ale, The Moon and Sixpence, The Razor's Edge, Of Human Bondage , and none of them ever quite did it for me.  Maugham's style is rather flat and his plots and events something of potboilers.  And so it is with this one as well. However, in this case, I like the particular pot that was boiling.  The Painted Veil reads a bit like a two-penny version of any of Greene's great works (I'm thinking here of The Heart of the Matter or The End of the Affair as particular examples).  Whereas Greene prefers Africa for his exotic locale, Maugham has chosen China to set his story of infidelity, broken marriage, and redemption. Vane, shallow, brow-beaten Kitty marries an infatuated intellectual--Walter Fane.  Walter Fane is a bacteriologist in the service of the Royal Colony of Hong Kong and he soon enough sweeps her away to that dismal land...

While I liked Wolf Hall , I was not nearly so enthusiastic as Frank is in this review.   I found her use of third person at times extremely thorny and confusing, and felt that we lingered a trifle in places where I would have preferred to speed on.  On the other hand, I enjoyed it greatly while I read it.  I must say though, that it has no lingering power with me.  Nothing from it sticks in my head as particularly provocative or evocative after having read it nearly a year ago.  This is, ultimately, how I judge the value of what I have read.

Short Stories from the 20s

After London reviewed

The Mayor of Casterbridge reviewed

"The Scholar and His Dog" usefully glossed

The Tragedy of Miriam, The Fair Queene of Jewry Fascinating, I need to find it. More information The Work Itself

Another sharp observation from the pen of Barbara Pym. From Excellent Women Barbara Pym I let Dora go on but did not really listen, for I knew her views on Miss Protheroe and on organized religion of any kind. We had often argued about it in the past. I wondered that she should waste so much energy fighting over a little matter like wearing hats in chapel, but then, I told myself that, after all, life was like that for most of us--the small unpleasantnesses rather than the great tragedies; the useless longings rather than the great renunciations and dramatic love affairs of history or fiction.

Mistress of the Elgin Marbles reviewed

Virginia Woolf's The Voyage Out reviewed.

Some information about Orlando Gibbons's "Daintie Fine Bird" a Madrigal for 5 voices. I mention this because I was listening to Pandora when this came on and it just stood out from the other brilliant and refined pieces of the age.  Glorious, silvery, and sounding entirely like the religious music of the age.  Music to be taken seriously and to be savored, sipped, and taken in small amounts, a cordial.  A cordial of melancholy, to be sure, and yet, so very lovely.  I hate to ask the trite question--but is there similar music today?  Is there the same silvery, lingering sound that will resound long after its makers have passed?  Obviously, I don't expect madrigals, but I do wonder about the substance sometimes of music--how well it will endure--Lady Gaga can excite the crowds at her concerts, but I'm not certain that I expect "Poker Face" to be placed alongside Orlando Gibbons, or even, to be honest among the more rustic tunes that come down to us from ...