Thursday 14 February 2013

It's alive, sort of.

I don’t often give up on novels, I tend to plough on hoping that things may improve. Barbara Kinsolver’s The Lacuna was one recently. It was fine until Frida Kahlo showed up and then it turned to mush. I liked The Poisonwood Bible so I must have a look at some of her other books. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is bogging down too, the high minded tone is unremitting and the psychology seems false. I read it years ago and it was heavy going then. Why would Victor Frankenstein after labouring for years on the reanimation of dead tissue run away just when it seems to be a success? Because there wouldn’t be the novel that we have perhaps or having established that plot line at the age of 20 she had to stick with it. She wrote another story which is included in the Norton Anthology, Transformation. To me it seems a farrago.

Today I found The Towers of Trebizond by Rose Macaulay in Charlie’s for €1. It has the famous opening line:

”Take my camel, dear”, said my aunt Dot, as she climbed down from this animal on her return from High Mass.

Hello Dame Rose, goodbye Mary Shelley.

2 comments:

Vidya said...

Another line I remember from this book is this:
"I fear we may have trouble with this animal. It ought to see a psychiatrist, or even an alienist"

ombhurbhuva said...

Hi Vidya,
Yes she’s marvelous. I was reading her while waiting at the dentist and she took my mind off things. Her sort of travel is definitely better that the more realistic that was on offer from National Geographic.