Le Secret de la Licorne by Hergé
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Collectors Amok, or the Past in the Present, or Ever a Pleasure When I was a kid, I avidly read Hergé’s Adventures of Tintin in English translations. I loved to open a book and immerse myself in the Tintin world of clean lines, vibrant colors, vivid details, and dynamic action. Whether Tintin was solving mysteries or exploring in South America, East Europe, North Africa, the Himalayas, the Arctic Ocean, China, the Moon and so on, Hergé’s art, layouts, characters, and adventures were exotic and unambiguous, exciting and comical, cartoonish and realistic. I often read aloud, giving different voices to the different characters, like the intrepid cowlicked young reporter/explorer Tintin (a straight man for the outre characters around him), the alcoholic Captain Haddock (joyful, maudlin, or berserk when drunk), the incompetent and clumsy twin detectives Thomson and Thompson, absent-minded and hard of hearing genius Professor Calculus, and the cute, frank, doggy, and loyal terrier Snowy. Twenty years later while preparing for a graduate school French proficiency exam, I read Hergé’s Les Aventures de Tintin in the original French, enjoying them as much as when I’d been a kid. And recently I happened to watch—and dislike—Spielberg’s Tintin movie. It jams together parts of at least three books while leaving out some of the best parts, fabricates a new villain, indulges in too much showy non-stop action, inflicts constant egregious John Williams music, removes Snowy’s charm and “spoken” thoughts, adds a totally out of character dialogue in which Captain Haddock (!) gives Tintin (!) a corny morale raising speech about never giving up, and so on. Although Spielberg and company impressively capture the surface look of some scenes and characters from the original comics, their 3D CG approach makes it all feel less real and less appealing than in the original comics. Thus, the movie made me want to re-read the books, and I started with Le Secret de la Licorne (1943) because it’s one of my favorites. Le Secret de la Licorne is great. Into it Hergé interweaves two plots, one featuring a serial pickpocket targeting men’s wallets and one featuring three cryptic scrolls hidden inside three antique model ships and supposedly indicating the location of a pirate treasure. The pickpocket leads to a clever deus ex machina in the end and adds another layer to the book’s themes about our desires for material things, as with overly avid collectors. The stubborn model ship aficionado Ivan Ivanovitch Sakharine and the ruthless antique dealing Loiseau brothers are, then, mirrored by the well-organized pickpocket Aristide Filoselle, who, he says, is not a thief but a passionate collector of wallets. Even Tintin and Captain Haddock become eager to find a treasure. Of course, the Loiseaus are villainous partly because, unlike Sakharine and Filoselle, who genuinely love model ships and wallets, the brothers care nothing for the antiques they deal in, seeing them only as sources of money. And Tintin and the Captain are the moral compasses of the book, so they sure wouldn’t do anything unethical to pursue a treasure! Moreover, the plot originates from Tintin’s desire to give his nautical friend a model ship for a present. The prime part of the sixty-two-page book is a brilliant fourteen-page sequence early on in which Captain Haddock recounts—and reenacts—the adventure of his doppelganger ancestor the Chevalier Francois de Hadoque when, in 1698 in the Antilles his magnificent frigate the Licorne (Unicorn) was attacked by a smaller pirate ship captained by Rackham Le Rouge (Red Rackham). After an exchange of canon-fire, the pirates board the Licorne, resulting in a ferocious melee, with the Chevalier fighting off numerous pirates until he’s captured, after which he must try to find a way to escape. Throughout the sequence, Captain Haddock channels his late 17th-century ancestor, with the pictures of the Captain acting everything out for Tintin in the present, alternating seamlessly and amusingly with the pictures of the ancestor fighting etc. in the past, including props like the battered furniture, skewered pillows, and bottles of rum of the Captain’s apartment. Conflating past and present, it’s a visual and textual tour de force. And if you have a pirate fetish (as I did when a kid), the fourteen pages will scratch your itch. The book features impressive frames showing a busy marketplace or a sailing frigate or a country road and includes plenty of kinetic (often slapstick) action and a variety of camera angles and all of the best tricks that comics can perform when combining text and sequential pictures. There are amusing sequences featuring the detectives Dupont and Dupond (Thompson and Thomson) struggling with stairs, their hats, or a pickpocket, Milou (Snowy) tracking Tintin through the countryside, and Tintin fleeing from the ruthless antique dealers and their huge dog. As usual in Hergé’s work, there’s plenty of drops of sweat (especially conveying astonishment) and stars (especially conveying pain), but, despite stabbings, shootings, trippings, punchings, and the like, no blood. And no romance—except for Tintin and Captain Haddock’s eternal bromance. Sometimes Hergé overdoes action scenes, as when the chases, escapes, and fights etc. add excitement but don’t move the plot. There are a few sequences of panels where nothing interesting happens visually, when characters stand or sit and talk to each other so Hergé can info dump. At one point, Tintin gets a villain to spill the beans for ten frames in which large text-filled speech balloons nearly force the two characters out of the panels. Thankfully, the racist stereotypes of the early books like Tintin in the Congo are absent here (apart from the absence of people of color!), but the only female characters are an earnest landlady or two and a troublesome woman inopportunely occupying a public phone booth in the rain. Anyway, I can’t help it—I’ll always love rereading the adventures of Tintin. Le Secret de la Licorne is the first of a two-part story, the second volume being Le Trésor de Rackham le Rouge (Red Rackham’s Treasure), in which Tintin and the Captain organize a search for sunken pirate treasure. I am looking forward to it! View all my reviews
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Fool's Fate by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars A fine end to the trilogy, but-- While in the first volume of Robin Hobb's Tawny Man Trilogy, Fools Errand (2002), Fitz returns to Buckkeep to risk his life and identity for the Farseer court, and in the second book, Golden Fool (2003), he develops his relationships with several key people in his life while witnessing crucial negotiations between Buckkeep and other cultures, in the third volume, Fool’s Fate (2004), he goes on a dangerous high stakes quest: to aid Prince Dutiful in winning the Outisland Narcheska Elliania’s hand by killing the legendary black dragon IceFyre. This will be no simple fairytale-like affair. For one thing, the dragon is rumored to be frozen deep in the ice of a glacier-covered island, and for another, the Fool has told Fitz that the Prince mustn’t kill it. As the self-proclaimed White Prophet out to push the world into a better future with the help of his Catalyst, Fitz, the Fool believes that their true mission is to free the last male dragon so he can mate with the last female dragon, Tintaglia, in order to return dragons to the world so as to temper human pride and domination. For that matter, why do the dodgy Elliania and her uncle Peottre want the Prince to perform the absurd or fatal quest for the head of IceFyre? When the climactic moment comes, will Fitz remain loyal to the Farseers and help Dutiful kill the dragon, or will he fulfill the desire of his best friend, the enigmatic Fool? As the novel begins, Fitz is trying to be the Skillmaster of a motley coterie comprised of the aged councilor/spymaster Chade, the super-Skill powered “half-wit” Thick, the Prince, and himself (Fitz is still learning about the Skill and how to teach it). He has also begun mentoring the ten-year-old Witted son of Burrich and Molly, Swift, while hiding his true identity as the royal bastard FitzChivalry. He is hoping to leave his foster son Hap in good condition with his apprenticeship and life. He is dreading the moment when the Fool will find out that he has arranged to go on the quest without him (because the Fool has told Fitz that he has foreseen his own death on the island of IceFyre). And Tintaglia, trying to learn about IceFyre, has been ominously appearing in the Skill dreams of Fitz’ unacknowledged daughter Nettle and himself (some of the best moments in the novel are Nettle and Fitz’ fraught and fantastic dream-Skill encounters). This third book will develop the compelling relationship between the Fool and Fitz, in an uncomfortable state since in the second book Fitz hurtfully told the Fool he’d never bed him, because he didn’t like rumors going round that they were lovers and didn’t understand the depth and nature of the Fool’s love for him. The third book will also explain why Fitz has been perversely playing dead so as to avoid both forging new relationships with people who should know the real him (like Nettle) and renewing old relationships with people who love him (like Molly, his first love, Burrich his foster father/friend and Molly’s husband, and Lady Patience, his stepmother). The book will also interestingly develop the relationships between Fitz and Chade, Dutiful, Thick, Nettle, and Swift. A flaw in this book is one I've noticed in the previous ones: the obtuseness of Fitz as to certain situations that a reader grasps before the highly experienced, observant, and intelligent assassin/spy does. We know from all sorts of hints dropped by Hobb from the first and second books in the trilogy and the start of this one, that Elliania and her people want Prince Dutiful to go on this quest because the nemesis of the Fool, the false White Prophet known as the Pale Woman in the Farseer trilogy and referred to in this trilogy as the Lady, is pulling the strings of the Outislanders so she can get rid of a dragon and a Farseer Prince at the same time and force the world into her own grim vision of it. Why Fitz cannot imagine this is beyond me. It smacks of plot contrivance. It’s irritating when Fitz Skill-speaks, “Chade, this does not make sense to me,” and Chade replies, “There is still too much that is not clear here, Fitz. I sense an unseen current in all this. Stay alert.” For that matter, the Pale Woman is a typical femme fatale wicked witch without any interesting back story or motivation. (view spoiler)[I was disappointed when, after a late chapter in which Hobb makes it seem as if Fitz will become King (regent) Fitz for Dutiful, finally fully and openly himself, she changes her mind and leaves him as Tom Badgerlock (absurd name!) with Molly and her family living on Withywoods estate away from Buckkeep and court politics. Sure, that’s partly what he’s been wanting, but to have him lose the Fool and gain a quiet life in the country after having Chade say to him, “After 15 years, do we finally have a true Farseer on the throne again? As you will, King Fitz” is disappointing. (hide spoiler)] Luckily, there are so many other great things in this climactic volume of the trilogy, like: --the message about embracing all of life, especially traumatic and devastating events and memories, without which one can never be whole and cannot fully engage with other people. --the relevant excerpts from documents about historical events, the Wit, the Skill, etc. to begin each chapter interestingly being sometimes accurate and sometimes inaccurate. --the climax followed by a long resolution full of mini climaxes and mini resolutions, all lasting for nearly 300 pages of the 914-page book. Also, there is lots of fine writing, about things like-- Wisdom: “Fitz, home is people. Not a place. If you go back there after the people are gone, then all you can see is what is not there anymore.” Perception: “I was like a man given back his sight. The edges of every leaf stood out when I glanced at it, and there, the veins, and a lacy heart where insects had fed.” Brutal honesty: “This was the measure of my cowardice. I could go off, sword in hand, hoping to kill the Pale Woman. But I could not face the daughter I had wronged.” Understated horror: “I knelt beside it like a man in prayer. Doubtless it had been a slow and careful skinning to take it off intact. Despite the way it had wrinkled as it fell, I knew it was one continuous flap of skin, his entire back. To take it off like that would not have been easy.” Poignant banter: “I dreamed I was you.” He spoke softly to the flames of the fire. “Did you?” “And you were me.” “How droll.” “Don't do that,” he warned me. “Don't do what?” I asked him innocently. “Don't be me.” Wow: The impact of that mutual touch blinded me for an instant, just as if I had stepped out of a dim stable into full direct sunlight. I twitched away from him, the snow bundle falling to the tent floor, and blinked, but the image of what I had seen was imprinted on the inside of my eyelids. I cannot say how I knew what it was I had glimpsed. Perhaps something in that closed circle of touching told me. I drew a shaky breath and reached recklessly toward his face with outstretched fingers. View all my reviews
Golden Fool by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars A Solid Second Book in a Trilogy While the first book of the Tawny Man Trilogy, Fool’s Errand (2002), sees Fitz getting back in the game of politics and adventure, the second one, Golden Fool (2003), has him developing a variety of old or new relationships as he grows as a father and as a teacher and retreats as a friend. It also features negotiations between the Farseer court and three different cultures: the Outislanders working out a betrothal between their Narcheska Elliania and Prince Dutiful, the Bingtown Traders asking for an alliance, and the Witted Old Bloods trying to coexist with the non-Witted folk of the Six Duchies. Change and intercultural understanding drive the novel: “But change proves that you are still alive. Change often measures our tolerance for folk different from ourselves. Can we accept their languages, their customs, their garments, and their foods into our own lives? If we can, then we form bonds, bonds that make wars less likely.” Instead of sending Fitz on a new quest, this second book presents him with simultaneous difficult and crucial tasks. He must protect Buckkeep castle and himself from the vengeful and scheming Piebalds. He must begin educating the Prince in the Skill and the Wit. He must (he believes) prevent his daughter Nettle from meeting him in Skill-dreams and discovering that he’s her biological father. He must help Councilor-Spymaster Chade do something about the servant Thick, who seems to be a “half-wit” but is really a superpowered instinctive Skill user. He must get himself back in fighting shape after 15 years living as a cottager and hunter. He must prevent his foster son Hap from going bad in town. He has to find out what's really going on with the Prince’s betrothal to the Marcheska. He must continue pretending to be Tom Badgerlock, the servant/bodyguard of Lord Golden (the current persona of the Fool), because he can't let anyone find out that he is the infamous, presumed dead Witted Bastard FitzChivalry Farseer. He must come to terms with the Fool’s belief in “the terrible strength of the White Prophet [Fool] and the Catalyst [Fitz] to shoulder the future from the rut of the present and into some better pathway.” And he must do all that while gutted by the loss of Nighteyes, his long-time bonded wolf partner, without whom he feels truncated and exposed. Apart from a brutal tavern brawl and a vicious fight to the death, the book avoids violent action but is still suspenseful and exciting, because we care about Fitz and his friends. The best parts of this book, as with most of Hobb’s books, are her characters and their interactions with each other. This is especially so with Fitz and the Fool, because the Fool is so enigmatic and sympathetic and because Fitz is still in near homophobic denial that his best friend is in fact (we know from early in the first book of the trilogy) the great love threading in and out of Fitz’ life. Other interesting relationships are between Fitz and Queen Kettricken (before becoming a stone dragon, her husband Verity possessed Fitz’ body so as to conceive their son Prince Dutiful), Fitz and Prince Dutiful (yearning so much for a father and for someone who’ll treat him as a person instead of as a Prince), Fitz and Thick (ugly, lonely, childlike, and powerful with Skill, “playing” a constant Skill-music composed of ambient sounds and a melody his Mam taught him and fearing Fitz), and Fitz and Chade (part of Fitz will ever be the small boy trained to be an assassin by Chade, who is too excited about learning to Skill). Fitz and Starling and Jinna are less interesting, because Hobb lapses into melodrama with them. Hobb continues to almost perversely deny Fitz public recognition for his vital and self-sacrificing service to the realm and the Farseers. Supposedly if the news got out that Witted and Skilled Fitz were alive, civil war would rive the six Duchies, but you’d think that the Queen, Chade, and Fitz could find a good way to get the truth out there. Fitz says he doesn’t want Molly and Burrich to know he's alive because he doesn’t want to threaten their happy married life. But wouldn’t they want to know he's alive and couldn’t he give them his blessing? Fitz’ reluctance to return as himself to the world must partly be due to his trauma in the Farseer Trilogy, and I tip my cap to Hobb for not giving us much sugar, but Fitz is one of the most unfairly unsung heroes in epic fantasy literature. A plot contrivance flaw in the novel occurs when Hobb maintains Fitz’ obtuseness vis-à-vis the Lady referred to by the Outislanders. From the second chapter of the novel, I’m suspecting that she’s none other than the Pale Woman who was a malevolent force in the Farseer Trilogy and who in the first book of the Tawny Man Trilogy is explained to Fitz as being a false White Prophet trying to make a bad future for the world. If I suspect that early on, Fitz, a highly experienced, observant, and intelligent assassin/spy, would too. He wouldn't say lame things like, “That woman remained a complete cipher to us. Her references to a Lady were unclear, unless she referred to an older female relative with authority over Elliania.” Hobb is capable of turning out some mediocre prose: “I took a breath. ‘Only some of what you tell me is news to me. Only a few nights ago Piebalds stalked me on the road from Buckkeep Town. I am only surprised that they let me live.’” But most often her writing is fine, as in the following examples. Lost in the Skill: “It was like watching a child wading in the shallows suddenly caught and born away on a current. I was at first transfixed with horror. Then I plunged into it after him, well aware of how difficult it would be to catch up with him.” Alien telepathy: “Then her thoughts abandoned me as a retreating wave leaves a drowned man on a beach. I rolled to the edge of my bed and retched dryly, more battered by that prodigious mind contact than by the beating I'd taken from Rory. The foreignness of the being that had pressed against my mind disrupted me, gagging my thoughts as if I had tried to breathe oil or drink flame.” Pithy sayings: “One man armed with the right word may do what an army of swordsmen cannot.” Psychology: I walked wounded through my life in the days that followed, unaware of just how mutilated I was. Golden Fool is a solid second book in the trilogy. It takes care of a few loose ends from the first novel, develops some new mysteries for this one, and sets up the big quest of the third one. View all my reviews
Fool's Errand by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Fitz Back in the Game In Robin Hobb’s Farseer Trilogy (1995-97), the royal bastard FitzChivalry Farseer recounts his growth to maturity via a series of traumatic experiences and arduous adventures, learning to be an assassin/spy and trying to save the Six Duchies from an Outislander invasion and a villainous usurper. Fitz had to “die” as the Farseer heir and adopt an alter-ego as the nobody Tom Badgerlock, because too many people thought he had killed King Shrewd and knew he had the Wit (verboten “Beast Magic”). Fool’s Errand (2002), the first book in Hobb’s Tawny Man Trilogy (2002-04), begins fifteen years later, as Fitz is living a quiet, simple, free life with his adopted son Hap and Wit-bonded wolf Nighteyes in a small cottage far from the machinations of court. His goals involve guiding Hap to become a good young man and writing a history of the Six Duchies (though he usually ends up writing about his own life). But Fitz and Nighteyes are sensing a change coming. The first emissaries of that change are three old friends who visit the cottage: Starling Birdsong, Fitz’ minstrel lover; Chade Fallingstar, Fitz’ mentor, father figure, and teacher in the arts of assassination and spycraft; and the enigmatic Fool, Fitz’ not completely human more than best friend. It takes about ten leisurely chapters to involve Fitz again in Six Duchies and Buckkeep politics: a delicate and vital mission to find and return the missing Prince Dutiful, who is the secret son of Fitz’ body, which King Verity possessed in the Farseer Trilogy to conceive an heir with Queen Kettreckin. The Prince must be back at Buckkeep in a fortnight, because a delegation from the Out Islands is coming to work out a betrothal between one of their Narcheskas and the Prince as prelude to an alliance between the two former enemy cultures. There will be adventure, pursuits, fights, confrontations, choices, and revelations. There will be interactions between characters we come to care deeply for as real people. There will be magic, from the charms of a hedge-witch to the animal bonding and communication of the Wit and the telepathic manipulation and communication of the Skill. There will be no cardboard villains. The antagonists have understandable motivations. The ruthless Piebalds, a Witted faction, have had enough of being persecuted for their natural magic and are out for violent revenge against the Farseers. Complicating matters is the presence of the main Witted community, whose members call themselves Old Blood and are trying to negotiate with the Queen for protection from persecution. The story is about duty, love, loneliness, communication, relationships, fear of the other, and father and son relationships. Fitz is a complicated and appealing character, having sacrificed and suffered so much for the Farseers and the Six Duchies, with only a few people knowing of his heroism or even that he is alive, and his body and heart being so scarred that he has convinced himself that he doesn’t want to contact the people who loved him as Fitz and think that he’s dead, like his loving step-mother Lady Patience, his first love Molly, and her husband Burrich (who raised Fitz), let alone either of the two children he fathered but never parented, Prince Dutiful and Nettle. Nighteyes is a great character, too--lupine and yet human via his relationship with Fitz. He has a dry sense of humor and is the wiser of the two. Their italicized telepathic “conversations” are pithy, funny, or moving, especially when Nighteyes calls Fitz “little brother,” because Fitz is older than the wolf, but the wolf's lifespan is shorter than a human’s. One of the poignant parts of this novel is our awareness that people usually live longer than their animal companions. “Little brother, do not treat me as if I am already dead, or dying. If you see me that way, then I would rather truly be dead. You steal the now of my life away, when you constantly fear that tomorrow will bring my death. Your fears clutch cold at me and snatch all my pleasure in the day's warmth from me.” The Fool is a fascinating character: androgynous, wise, and enigmatic, believing that he’s the White Prophet tasked with changing the course of the world into a better track with his Catalyst, Fitz. His persona as Lord Golden, a wealthy foreign merchant treated like a visiting royal celebrity in Buckkeep, is tiresome, like a wannabe Oscar Wilde without any good bon mots, but the relationship between Fitz and him flirts with same sex love, though Fitz is very heterosexual and nearly homophobic in his allergic reaction to anyone suspecting that he and the Fool are bed-partners. Supporting characters like Councilor Chade, Huntswoman Laurel, hedge-witch Jinna, and Prince Dutiful are good to spend time with. The one unappealing supporting character is Starling Birdsong. To help immerse readers in the fantasy world, each chapter begins with an italicized excerpt from some “historical” source that explains things and people like the Wit, the Skill, hedge-witches, stable masters, the Elderlings, hunting cats, the Piebald Prince, the Red Ship War, public executions of Witted people, and so on. There are many poignant, funny, scary, or fine moments in the novel, and much vivid writing-- Wisdom: --“If a man does not die of a wound, then it heals in some fashion, and so it is with loss.” Psychology: --“I found that having strangers regard me benevolently for no reason was more unnerving than having them distrust me on sight.” Magic: --“I drew a deep breath and cautiously let my Wit unfold into a general sensing of the day around me. My awareness of both Malta and the huntswoman’s horse sharpened, as did their acknowledgement of me. I sensed Laurel, not as another rider beside me, but as a large and healthy creature. Lord Golden was as unknowable to my Wit as the Fool ever was. From even that sense, he rippled aside, and yet his very mystery was a familiar one to me. Birds in the trees overhead were bright startles of life amongst the leaves. From the largest of the trees we passed I sensed a deep green flow of being, a welling of existence that was unlike an animal awareness and yet was life all the same. It was as if my sense of touch expanded beyond my skin to make contact with all other forms of life around me. All the world shimmered with life, and I was a part of that network. Regret this oneness? Deny this expanded tactility?” Hobb imagines a vivid fantasy world with a history and different magics and cultures and complicated and appealing characters and develops those elements gradually so that by about halfway into the book when the action ratchets up it becomes difficult to stop reading. After finishing the book, I couldn’t wait to start the second one in the trilogy. View all my reviews
Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers by Deborah Heiligman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars informative, suspenseful, absorbing, and moving--but oh, the present tense and short sentences! To write Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers (2017), Deborah Heiligman read the letters between the brothers and their family members and friends and spent years researching and thinking about her subjects until she was ready to write her book. And it is excellent: informative, absorbing, suspenseful, and moving. Heiligman tells the story in fourteen parts called Galleries, beginning with a Threshold and an Entresol and ending with an Exit, as if in reading her book we are walking through an exhibition of Vincent's paintings and the life that produced them. The Galleries range from Beginnings (1852-1872), move through topics like Missteps, Stumbles (1875-1879), The Quest (1880-1882), An Expanded Palette (1885-1887), and A Sense of the Finite (1890) and end with Remains (1890-1891). Each Gallery is made up of multiple chapters with titles like The Rose and the Thorn, Vincent and Theo Walking, Sorrow, Uncle Vincent’s Paintings, A Happy Visit, and Theo Alone. There are plenty of epigraphs from letters. Each Gallery begins with a two-page monochrome reproduction of a relevant sketch or a painting by Vincent. In the middle of the book, there is a set of eleven color reproductions of important paintings. After the book come useful appendices: People (family, friends, colleagues); Vincent and Theo's Journey (a chronology); Author’s Note (why and how Heiligman wrote the book); a Bibliography (books and articles); Endnotes (supplemental information and citations of letters); and Index. Through the course of the book, Heiligman provides many interesting details about Vincent’s family, childhood, failed attempts to become an art dealer and a missionary, painstaking efforts to learn how to become a painter, early dark sober works, discovery of vibrant color, artistic theories, techniques, and media, struggle with mental illness, friendships with other artists, relationship with Theo, and so on. As for Theo, there are interesting details on his successful career as an art dealer in the Netherlands and Paris, his relationship with his beloved (but difficult) older brother, his long pursuit of an initially uninterested woman and eventual marriage to her, his syphilis, and so on. If, as Heiligman says before her book begins, “The world would not have Vincent without Theo,” she also demonstrates that the world would not have Theo without his wife Jo. Not only did Theo support Vincent financially and emotionally and believe in his art and make possible the many paintings by his brother that we love today, but his wife Jo indispensably supported Theo in his support of Vincent and also believed in his art. I had known nothing about her before reading this book. In Vincent’s watercolor painting of a windmill near the Hague, two male figures face each other, one looking taller than the other but also slumped, rumpled, and importunate, and although it rarely shows up in books about Van Gogh, according to Heiligman it should be one of his most famous works. In their letters, the brothers mentioned meeting at that windmill and drinking milk there and talking, and the author’s analysis and description of that encounter and of the painting and of its significance to the relationship between the brothers and her belief that “it makes sense to see the men as Vincent and Theo,” make reading this book worthwhile. I learned many other interesting things from this book. For example-- --Vincent’s difficult childhood, including his awareness that a year before he was born his mother gave birth to a stillborn son who was also called Vincent, and his tendency to destroy his youthful attempts at art if his family praised them. --Vincent’s guilt over being such a financial burden on his brother, and Theo’s saintly generosity and assurances, as in one letter that's excerpted for an epigraph to a chapter: “Your work and... brotherly affection... is worth more than all the money I'll ever possess.” --it’s possible that just as Van Gogh perhaps did not cut off his own ear (did Gauguin do it, and Van Gogh cover up for him?), Van Gogh did not shoot himself (did a boy playing with a gun do it?). -- Theo suffered from syphilis and died horribly from it barely one year after his brother’s death. That Theo accomplished as much as he did for his brother and for the world of art while declining in health is miraculous. That he managed to avoid giving the disease to his wife is as well. Chapter 101, Vincent’s Paintings, is remarkable. For it Heiligman selects some titles from the almost 150 paintings he made during a year in an asylum and arranges them in a two-page spread. The selected titles swirl around the pages like the clouds in the sky in the famous Starry Night painting, and the title of that painting appears on the two-page spread larger than those of the other titles and is placed in the center of a swirl just like the moon in the original painting. Another remarkable chapter is 120, Vincent’s Brother, January 25, 1891, which consists of but two potent paragraphs of one sentence each: Vincent died in Theo’s arms. Theo dies alone. The main flaw I find in the book is that Heiligman writes in the currently trendy style of so much young adult American literature: present tense (which feels affected in a biography) and short sentences, paragraphs, and chapters. I'm not against those things per se, but I do think they are overused in too many books these days and in this one in particular. The 409-page book consists of 121 chapters. The extreme brevity of Chapter 120 increases the tragic power of its contents, but because there are similarly short sentences and paragraphs everywhere in the book, the emotional impact of that chapter and of short sentences and paragraphs anywhere else in the book are attenuated. There are MANY places like the following: Vincent and Gauguin are both prolific, and Theo is having success selling Gauguin’s work. Soon, Vincent is sure, Theo will sell more of his, too. The brothers’ hard work is paying off. Vincent is realizing his dream of the studio in the South. Although he and Gauguin are not the easiest of companions and the arguments continue, it all really does seem to be working. Until it isn't. Anyway, I learned from this book so many interesting things about Vincent and his paintings, Theo, Jo, love, and the art world of the late 19th century in Europe. View all my reviews
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
My rating: 5 of 5 stars A Comical, Sublime, Poignant, Charming Classic Every second and every word of Anne Flosik's reading of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows were a pure pleasure to listen to. If I wasn't laughing at the incorrigible Toad's absurd, selfish, reckless, and yet somehow heroic antics, I was shutting my eyes to imagine and savor the warm friendship between Rat and Mole and the rich descriptions of the different seasons of the natural world around the River. The novel achieves great poignancy when Mole misses his home and when Rat hears the call of the south, and sublime beauty when the friends see--and forget--the Piper at the Gates of Dawn. I like the ambiguous nature of the animals, who obey the "etiquette" of the changing seasons according to their animal natures, use paws, live in holes, and are aware of their differences from human beings, and yet who also wear clothes, eat human foods, and equip their holes with comfortable human furnishings. And just what is their size? If they are the naturally sized smallish animals (like any rodents or toads) they sometimes seem to be (like the seafaring rat from Constantinople), how could a field mouse go out shopping for Christmas feast supplies and come back laden with a pound of this and a pound of that and how could Toad crash stolen motorcars, disguise himself as a washerwoman, and ride a stolen horse? This blurring of naturalism and fantasy is one of the pleasures of The Wind in the Willows. Is The Wind in the Willows a children's book? Hmmm. I suspect that (as with the Alice books) adults may enjoy it more than children, though the Toad chapters should make every reader laugh. The book may be criticized for its conservative views on class and gender, but I treasure its humor, beauty, wonder, warmth, nature, and art. And Anne Flosik enhances all those virtues perfectly with her husky and measured voice and appealing wit and emotion. View all my reviews
The Letter of Marque by Patrick O'Brian
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Laudanum, Balloons, Privateers, Lucky Jack Aubrey Early in The Letter of Marque (1988), the twelfth entry in Patrick O’Brian’s splendid age of sail series, a character thinks, “How delightful it is to be at sea once more.” Amen, this reader thinks, because the previous novel, The Reverse of the Medal (1986), takes place almost entirely ashore, and the books are most compelling at sea. In that 11th volume, Jack Aubrey was removed from the list of post-captains and expelled from the British navy for his (innocent) involvement in a stock manipulation scandal. To restore some zest for life in Jack, his friend Stephen Maturin (suddenly wealthy after inheriting a fortune) bought Jack’s old ship the Surprise and secured a letter of marque enabling Jack to go to sea as captain of a private man of war (don’t call it a privateer in front of Jack!). Stephen has become, then, not only the ship’s surgeon, but also its owner. Thus, the beginning of The Letter of Marque consists of Jack trying to mold the crew of the Surprise, about half of whom are former smugglers and privateers, the other half former Surprise men, into a capable, responsive, and well-moraled whole by going on a two-week trial voyage. Jack will integrate the different groups of men via rigorous gunnery practice. He’s also hoping for a reasonably challenging blow (storm) to further unite the diverse men. Through his intelligence (spy) connections, Stephen is able to inform Jack that the villains responsible for his scandal have escaped to France and that sensitive political considerations will prevent his being reinstated in the navy for a while. But it couldn't hurt his cause if Jack were to capture some prize ships, especially a French or American frigate of equal or greater size and strength to those of the Surprise (the War of 1812 is ongoing). And Stephen would like to score another intelligence coup against the Bonapartists of France. To help him sleep and deal with the pain of his wife Diana having absconded to Sweden with a handsome young officer, Stephen is also still prescribing himself laudanum, figuring that “it's no more injurious than smoking tobacco.” And the way that laudanum and hot air balloons converge in the novel is funny, scary, and moving. As ever in his novels, O’Brian efficiently brings readers new to the series up to speed (without boring veteran readers) by sketching Jack and Stephen’s situations and their contrasting and complementary characters: big Jack is capable “Lucky Jack Aubrey” aboard ship but a gullible financially and legally entangled mark ashore, while small Stephen is a dyslexic seaman, a “perpetual lubber,” aboard ship but a shrewd agent on land. And both men have their respective instruments (violin and cello), love of classical music, and deep friendship, too. (They often refer to one another as “brother” or “dear.”) Like all of O'Brian's novels, this one is a pleasure to read. It features early 19th-century politics, culture, nature, fauna, music, complex and appealing characters, witty and historically appropriate conversation, sudden and suspenseful action, and vivid depiction of being at sea in the age of sail. All of it excellently written. There are many vivid sensual details of sailing on a ship: “... choppy seas smacking against her starboard bow and streaming aft, mixed with the rain.” “It was indeed the sweetest evening, balmy, a golden sky in the west, and a royal blue swell, white along the frigate's side and in her wake.” “Everything looked superficially the same, the familiar sun-filled white curves above, the taught rigging and severe shadows...” “…watching the distant battle as it moved slowly across the western sea in a night all the blacker for the flashes of the guns.” “... The complex aroma, made up of scrubbed planks, fresh sea breeze, stale bilge water, tarred cordage, paint, and damp sailcloth.” O’Brian has a dry sense of humor, too: --“The landlord came back with a satisfied expression of one whose worst fears have been realized.” --“It is a remarkable fact that in all my years at sea, I have never come across an incompetent carpenter.” Unlike the tenth and eleventh novels, this twelfth one ends with a fair amount of closure, which is nice, while still leaving some loose ends to look forward to being tied up in future books. It is a fun, suspenseful, and moving novel. And Ric Jerrom is, as ever, the ideal reader for the audiobook, smoothly donning different accents, singing an infectious sailor-work song, and greatly enhancing the experience. (view spoiler)[Jack had been so unlucky in recent novels in the series that it was a relief to see him run into a big run of luck, both on sea and on land, for a change. And it was good to see Stephen with Diana again. (hide spoiler)] View all my reviews |
Jefferson Peters
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Jefferson's books
by Sabaa Tahir
A Young Adult Epic Fantasy with Lots of Violence & Romance
Elias is an elite Martial soldier, Laia a naïve Scholar slave. As they alternate telling their stories (in trendy Young Adult first person, present tense narration), we soon rea...
"It must be due to some fault in ourselves"--
George Orwell's Animal Farm (1945) is an anti-totalitarian-communist allegory in which the exploited animals of the Manor Farm kick Farmer Jones out and set about running the farm. At first...
by Lu Xun
Perfect Stories of Life in Early 20th Century China
Chinese Classic Stories (1998) by Xun Lu is an excellent collection of seven short stories by perhaps the most important 20th century Chinese writer of fiction. Lu Xun (1881-1936) stu...
Fine Writing, Great Characters, Immersive World
The Surgeon's Mate (1980) is the 7th novel in Patrick O'Brian's addicting series of age of sail novels about the lives, loves, and careers of the British navy captain Jack Aubrey and the ...
An Overwritten, Oddly Compelling Gothic Father
Matthew Lewis' notorious and influential Gothic novel The Monk (1796) takes place during the heyday of the Spanish Inquisition. Ambrosio, the monk/friar/abbot/idol of Madrid, is nicknamed ...
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