My Life in Houses

 

My Life in Houses by Margaret Forster

This a book club choice. If you thoroughly enjoy one detailed description of rooms and houses after another, it is definitely something for you. But for someone who isn't at all enthralled by a continual succession of such accounts, the question in my mind from the start was what on earth can there be to sustain interest?

I could find very little. A touch of humour would have helped. Nay, an outsize overdose of it. But this is straight-faced, straight-laced writing. Some greater insight into climbing up the socio-economic ladder from a rented home on a working-class council estate in Carlisle to owning a large house in London, a weekend cottage in the Lake District and a holiday home in Portugal all at the same time, might have helped. Alas, there was little of that either. Even the autobiographical background is minimal and also very sketchy. For example, Forster suddenly reveals that she got married from one of her homes and out of nowhere we learn she has a husband, not a word about him having previously been mentioned. And like her parents and children, he remains a shadowy figure. There tends to be more detail about wallpaper than her family. And as I was not waiting with baited breath to discover whether there would be a sitting tenant in the next abode or noisy neighbours, I can only label the book – for me – a colossal bore. Moreover, it adds insult to injury in exceeding its proclaimed mandate by describing houses other people lived in (Elizabeth Barret Browning and Daphne du Maurier) in addition to Forster's own.

I fear this made me maliciously hope she would discover all her dwellings were suffering from untreatable dry rot, woodworm, leaking roofs, ditto drains, flooding and severe subsidence, while a horde of the most obnoxious sitting tenants, who had been temporarily absent and whom she didn't previously know about, suddenly turn up to claim their right of abode. Plus that the neighbours on either side and at the back are the loudest and most abusive people on the planet. It might have injected some spark of life into the book. At best, I thought it could have made a series of articles in a House & Home-type magazine.

The others in the group may well have had very different views. In my exile, I still don't know, although the meeting at which it was to be discussed has been held. Most of the online reviewers would certainly disagree with me – but then a large percentage of them proclaim themselves to be Forster admirers on the basis of her other books. When I looked, both the UK and US Amazon sites had 150-odd 'global' reviews, i.e. they were substantially the same, and both had an average rating of 4.6 (!). GoodReads had 76 reviews and 605 ratings, with an average score of 3.9.

https:stanleybloom.weebly.com

https://www.slideshare.net/StanleyBloom/about-swedenpptx

Dismal Reading

A 432-page dystopia would not be my preferred reading at any time let alone in these dire days. But that is what members of the book club chose at their last (online) meeting, for discussion next time. Owing to the 9-hour difference between Stockholm and the location where I am stranded, I had no say in the matter. But the next meeting is due to take place two hours later, to accommodate me.

Thus I have been struggling to get through at least a substantial part of the work, reading reluctantly in fits and starts and escaping for relief after each chapter to anything from Sherlock Homes (I hadn't read all the tales) and The Three Musketeers (I hadn't read that either) to books on photography, publishing and making soup, (all downloaded free of charge from you-know-where.) Almost to my own surprise, the one that has intrigued me most, as it would seem to contradict my distaste for the dismal, is Daniel Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year 1665.

Those were very different times when it comes to medical knowledge and resources. And there was no means of rapidly transporting people from one country and continent to another, taking the disease with them. Yet there are some remarkable similarities with the present situation. Despite all the advances of the past three-to-four centuries, knowledge of the current affliction and how to cure or prevent it is woefully weak. Then as now, there were the unscrupulous, quick to take advantage of our ignorance and fears, nowadays with a surge in cyber fraud, at that time by going around offering to sell wonder potions that were either useless or dangerous.

Then, although transport may have been very different in 1665, the first two cases Defoe mentions were Frenchmen in London. Moreover, many of the wealthier citizens left the city for the countryside, thus spreading the disease to rural areas that might have remained free of it. And while surrounding boroughs recorded alarming increases in the number of fatalities, the City of London suffered much less owing to draconian measures announced by the Lord Mayor, something of an equivalent to the lock-down of our day but very much harsher, with imprisonment for anyone who did not comply.

To some extent the measures were counter-productive as nobody was allowed to enter or leave a house where someone had contracted the disease. Such a house was watched night and day. It meant that others in the household who might have escaped the illness were condemned to stay where they were most likely to get it and according to Defoe, many died as a result.

Not pleasant reading, yet I turn to it in preference to Atwood's fictional Gilead, which I have now finally decided to abandon.

 

https://stanleybloom.weebly.com

Mythos

Thoughts on Mythos, the Greek myths retold by Stephen Fry

Mythos, a book-club choice, effectively reveals what an extraordinarily large crowd of cunning, self-seeking, vengeful cut-throats and sexual predators the Greek deities and demigods were. Without saying as much, it clearly illustrates that there was no attempt to combine morals with religion in those times. But it is mostly what the book doesn't do that leaves me dissatisfied.

Thus there is little or no attempt to place the myths in a wider context. What are their origins? What are the influences from the prehistoric past? What do they tell us about the people, or peoples, and their societies that devised them? The Hellenic world covered a vast area in the eastern Mediterranean. How widespread was belief in these mythical beings? All, or only some of them? And if morals weren't mixed up with religion, sport certainly was. Why no mention of this?

The ancient Games at Olympia were devoted to Zeus, those at Delphi to Apollo and so on. Participation or attendance was part of a religious duty or devotion. Yet the only mention of sport of any kind comes when Cadmus, said to be unrivalled in throwing stones, the discus and javelin, states that he is pretty good at running round the track as well. Round the track?! The ancient Greeks didn't run round tracks! They ran over a straight course. Then we are told that Cadmus's female companion bursts out: “My hero!” And buries here head on his chest! It makes me wonder whether Fry is writing the script of a third-rate Hollywood film or perhaps a Mills and Boon novelette?

To be fair, it's not all like that, but it does raise the question of whether trying to put twenty-first century supposedly 'with-it' language into the mouths of ancient Greek characters makes the whole thing sound ridiculous. Then Fry admits in his Afterword that he has 'tinkered' with the tales, and says that is what people have always done with myths. But unless we are already very knowledgeable on the subject, how are we to know what is Fry and what is ancient Greek? And if we know all about the myths already, why read this book? Many volumes have been written on the subject. Does this add anything? I doubt it.

One useful thing Fry does, however, is to point out words in the English language that are derived from the names of these beings. But such references are scattered here and there. I would have liked to see a comprehensive list of them, as well as a clearer table of the main deities. I found the great list of names at the beginning simply too long to be anything other than off-putting.

A final thought: without any kind of analysis, reading tale after tale about these characters and their antics simply became tedious. The club as a whole gave the book a weak three out of five, using the Amazon-Goodreads etc. rating system, – which, let it be said, was well below the average on those sites. I gave it two-point five.

Eleanor Oliphant - a book club choice

When travelling abroad I still like to keep up with what the Stockholm Bookworms are reading and send them my thoughts on the current book, usually together with some of the comments I have found online from other readers. This is what I had to say about Eleanor Oliphant is Perfectly Fine by Gail Honeyman. But a word of warning. It does reveal details of the story.

The question I asked my self repeatedly while reading the book was, “How plausible is Eleanor?” Extreme loneliness is undoubtedly widespread, especially in the cities, and all-too-many people have lived through a horrendous childhood and cannot but be affected by it for life. But how can one reconcile Eleanor's intelligence – after all, she went to university at the age of seventeen and is a wizard at cryptic crosswords – with her extreme naivety and ignorance of the world around her. She lived with foster families when she was growing up and even if she took no part in social life at university, she must have gone to classes and lectures with other people and was subsequently aware of what her office colleagues thought and said and were up to.

Then there's her language.She speaks as though she has learned English from a Victorian textbook full of words and expressions that nobody today would use in normal speech. Who on earth would talk about 'micturation' or say 'heaven forfend'? 'Rebarbative', 'vertiginous', 'catatonic', 'mammaries' and many more words seem designed either to have readers pat themselves on the back for knowing what they mean, or rushing for their dictionaries. It is difficult to believe the families she lived with spoke like that and they most certainly didn't at the office where she had been working for eight years.

I thought the counselling with Maria worked far too easily. Eleanor had had counselling many times before, obviously without much effect. How come it worked so well and so quickly now? I also see the telephone conversions with Mummy, portrayed with never an indication that they were anything other than real and from a prison, as a gimmick allowing the author to add a little surprise at the end. And then Honeyman does heap calamities on her poor heroine. Not enough with being bruised and beaten before the final childhood disaster of the fire, plus the unhappiness of living with the foster families she was sent to, but the author then had her spending two years with a man who used her as a punchbag!

Another question is how Eleanor could remain unscathed by her vodka consumption, then suddenly give it up so easily. Her “iron constitution” would not have saved her from its consequences. Then there are all the unanswered questions about Mummy? How come she died in the fire? Had she intended to commit suicide and take the kids with her? Or did something go wrong and she got caught up in the flames while Eleanor, in some miraculous and unspecified way, managed to escape despite going back into the blaze to try to rescue her sister, who was locked in a wardrobe? Who was Marianne's father? Was Eleanor's little sister the result of another “assault”? And did Mummy really go to all the places Eleanor mentions? Or were they also figments of Eleanor's imagination? You can write your own back story.

Finally, how plausible are Raymond and Sammy and his family? Are these real people?

Having said all that, although I thought it was rather long-winded until being brought to a rather rapid and happy end, I found the book reasonably interesting and not difficult to read, apart from the micturation etc. Nevertheless, fact may be stranger than fiction, but for me this fiction was too strange to be swallowed whole.

Many of the online reviewers had no difficulty in doing so, however. When I looked, the average score on Amazon's UK site was a very generous 4.7 from some 6,000 readers, while on Amazon.com it was 4.6 from 4,000-odd people. Goodreads had no fewer than 319,400 ratings and more than 34,000 reviews, with an average score of 4.3.

“I loved this book,” writes a 5-star reader in the UK. “It made me laugh out loud and weep too.” Others also talk about Eleanor making them laugh and cry? I'm not in the habit of crying over books, but have been known to laugh out loud. Though not at this one. “I finished it a week ago,” this person continues, “and I've really missed her this week. I would recommend it to anyone.”

Other 5-star people write in much the same vein. “There is so much to Eleanor,” states one. “In the beginning, I thought that I didn’t care too much for her but as time went on and she opened up, well, I fell in love with her. … Beautifully written and just a lovely story, you will fall in love with Eleanor too.”

“Ohhh, I could not wish for a more perfect book,” is another 5-star comment.

Moving down slightly in the ratings, there was still little fault-finding. “There wasn’t a big BANG ending but I enjoyed the journey to get there as Eleanor’s character is a pleasure to get to know,” writes this 4-star reviewer. “Unlikeable at first but I warmed as the book went on as I began to understand why she behaved as she did.”

But move down to 3 stars and faults are found a-plenty. How about this? “Not my usual book choice, it's one of those “book club” books which I tend to avoid. Some witty prose, but really a bit clichè & predictable, apparently all you need to cure interminable loneliness and personal tragedy is a make over & a romantic life lesson, hmmm, seemed a bit shallow.” That writer may not be so hot on punctuation, but let that not detract from her views.

A slightly less critical 3-star verdict was: “I did come to like and sympathise with Eleanor and the other characters in the book; but I found it a bit of a fairy tale and I wasn't entirely convinced. The story of Eleanor's coming to grips with her traumatising past, and overcoming it, seemed a bit too pat and simplistic. It is well written, and I wouldn't say I didn't enjoy reading it, but it is not the type of book I would normally choose.”

At the 2-star level the criticism is not only greater, but even personal. Listen to this: “I bought this book because it was recommended by my book club and also as I used to work with the author, albeit in a different department. From memory, the author does not have a social work, counselling or care background and this shows in her book.

I, however, do have some personal experience related to the book and for this reason I was extremely disappointed upon reading it. Professionals are presented so negatively and inaccurately. … Nor is it so easy to overcome loneliness, abuse and mental health problems. The whole situation with Sammy and his family is very unrealistic - it would never happen. I met you two minutes ago, come to my party etc.

The ending was so disappointing. My book group agreed... The author has undertaken insufficient research into very serious issues and it's an insult to get this all so very wrong”

Yes, sometimes it can be difficult to distinguish 2-star readers from those entertainers who give a book the lowest score. Here's one who reads books somewhere I have never considered before. “It's Mother's Day, and my family handed me bath salts and my new book and told me to go for it. They know I'm just crazy enough to read an entire book in one bath, and I was ready to do it.” I bet the water was cold by the time she got to chapter 3 or 4.

“I prepared my bath, and I began reading, and I was (very quickly) almost in physical pain. I don't mean to be rude to the author; I know how hard it is to write a novel and get it published, but this would not have made it past my eyes, if she had handed it to me.Again, ALL APOLOGIES, but this is Mother's Day, and you have one annoyed mother on your hands. You have ruined my bath, and in doing so, you have released the Kraken!!
MUST the reader be invited in to experience every one of Eleanor's bowel movements and meals? MUST we suffer through every not-interesting-in-the-least observation on life?...According to Eleanor, she has "white contours of scar tissue that slither across my right cheek." Here's where I just about threw the book. Explain. No, seriously. Explain how scar tissue slithers across a face. Do you mean as you are speaking or making funny faces? Did you attend Hogwarts? Are you a Slytherin? Help, please! ...

I saved myself from drowning by stopping at page 50.”

Pretty difficult for the 1-star people to beat I would say, although they tried. Here are some of their comments:

“It's a long time since I have been so completely disappointed by a book, or seen such a triumph of marketing over material. Eleanor Oliphant is a perfect bore, self-opinionated, judgemental and frankly bereft of a single likeable characteristic...”

“Seriously, no one is THIS odd and able to hold down a job in a busy office plus take care of themselves alone, paying bills on time and all the rest of it. Social ineptitude of this degree would have you jobless in no time, how did she even get past an interview? Of course ,sadly, there are certainly people who cannot function in society; without family to support them, they end up on the streets, unable to cope. They tend not to be promoted to office manager!”

“We are asked to believe that an alcoholic can drink herself into complete oblivion every single weekend, but never misses a single day's work due to her alcoholism. Has the author ever met any real alcoholics?”

“Eleanor Oliphant is empatically NOT fine. In real life she would probably have been sectioned, but clearly there is nothing remotely "real" about this book which manages to trivialize both genuine loneliness, alcoholism and severe mental illness in one fell swoop!”

“I read it to the end for book club, but it left me feeling like crawling into the back of a dark closet and sitting there for a day or two. (I went outside and tried to recover with some therapeutic gardening instead).”

Gardening? Maybe, but it's reading in the bath that intrigues me most. Unfortunately, it's no longer possible for me to try as my bath tub disappeared with the “mini-upgrade” to my flat. Could try the shower, of course... Well, perhaps not.

Have a great meeting.

Stanley

https://stanleybloom.weebly.com