New Century Reading

The Brontes: A Life in Letters

This book has been sitting on my shelf for years--more than a decade. I finally pulled it down earlier this year, feeling very studious and scholarly, and wanting to know more about the Brontes. It felt like what my friend Kristin would call a "spinach read"--something educational and good for me, but not necessarily very enjoyable. Something I could feel learned and smug about having read, if I finished it.

Scholarly, schmolarly. This is just a ripping good read. As in, hard to put down at times. Most of the letters here are from Charlotte. She was, after all, the longest living of the Bronte children, and the most socially outward. And, as it turns out, she was a kickass correspondent. Oh, to have been on the receiving end of her letters! We are fortunate indeed that one of her closest friends and frequent correspondents, Ellen Nussey, made a promise she had no intention of keeping: After their marriage, Charlotte's husband demanded that Charlotte's friends burn all her letters so as to leave no trace that could be interpreted as impropriety. Friend Mary Taylor apparently kept that promise, and there are few letters surviving to her. But Nussey did keep the letters, and they comprise a big chunk of the book. It's a shame we don't have all of the letters to Taylor, as apparently Charlotte was more forthcoming about her literary ambitions to her than she was to Nussey. It can't be helped, but let's just be thankful for what we do have.

And what we do have is the story of the very close Bronte family, their efforts to earn a living in the hardscrabble town of Haworth, the travels they undertook to find a living, the disastrous consequences of that living on Branwell and the tragic deaths of Branwell, Emily, and Anne, all within just a few months of one another. Charlotte's anguish in the letters after those deaths is palpable, as in this one, written shortly after Branwell and Emily had died and while it was becoming clear that Anne was gravely ill:

"My letters had better be brief at present--they cannot be cheerful. I am however still sustained, and still, while looking with dismay on the desolation sickness and death have wrought in our home I can combine with awe of God's judgements a sense of gratitude for his mercies. Yet life has become very void, and hope has proved a strange traitor: when I shall again be able to put confidence in her suggestions, I know not; she kept whispering that Emily would not--could not die--and where is she now? Out of my reach,--out of my world, torn from me."

Haworth is nearly unbearable in its silence and memories, but she is steadfast in her determination to remain with her father.

But then there's the long-suffering curate, Arthur Bell Nichols, whose love for Charlotte is spurned at first, not just by Charlotte, but by her father and several of her friends. The amount of interference that went into this dragged-out courtship is staggering. But in the end, he won her hand; in the letters dated between their wedding and her becoming pregnant, which proved deadly to her, you can see her fondness and respect for him growing into something deeper. And then...

Sigh.

There are far fewer letters from Emily and Anne, although a diary page from Emily speaks volumes about her:

"I am quite contented for myself--not as idle as formerly, altogether as hearty and having learnt to make the most of the present and hope for the future with less fidgetiness that I cannot do all that I wish--seldom or ever troubled with nothing to do and merely desiring that every body could be as comfortable as myself and as undesponding and then we should have a very tolerable world of it--"

A lovely, lovely read, and it's clearly time for me to return to some of these great novels.

Book of Ages

Book of Ages has such an interesting premise. It starts with something akin to Virginia Woolf's Shakespeare's sister theory, which says that women have not historically had the education and/or opportunities to make themselves as successful as men. It's a good baseline for the true story of Jane Franklin, Benjamin Franklin's youngest sister. Though they were both born into a large, poverty-stricken family, Ben (obviously) made quite a mark on the world, whereas Jane married very young to a ne'er-do-well, had many children (several of whom died young), struggled to manage a household when her husband was a debtor rather than an earner, and eventually had a significant role in raising both her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Ben gave her some fundamental literacy education, but while he was able to hone his skills and rise to prominence, Jane barely had time to read, much less become more proficient. Yet what little remains to be known of Jane--primarily letters she wrote to Ben--shows her to be intelligent, thoughtful, and more than a little irascible. Imagine if she could have put that intelligence to use in something other than daily survival.

Unfortunately, proving Woolf's theory doesn't take much time, and a great deal of this book ends up being about Ben Franklin and the fight for independence. That frustrated me, more than a little--if I'd wanted to read a book about Franklin or the Revolutionary War, I would have picked that up instead. I wanted to read about Jane Franklin. I'd read an excerpt of the book in the New Yorker and thought it sounded intriguing, but perhaps it was better as a piece of long-form magazine writing than as a book. Entire sections begin to feel like filler.

The best parts of the book use the few letters in existence to document the relationship between the two Franklin siblings. She clearly adored her brother, and though he rarely saw her, he tried to provide for her, helping out some of her children and, later in her life, providing her with the first stable home she'd ever had. He repeatedly asked her to tell him what she needed, and not trusting that she was being honest, he also wrote to her neighbor and pastor, asking them to please let him know if there was something she needed.

Yet in spite of this closeness, when he wrote his autobiography, he did not mention her even once. Not once. I have to say, that tidbit was a punch in the gut. But it really reinforces Lepore's--and Woolf's--point: no matter how much he cared for his sister, she just wasn't relevant in the scheme of history.

As Woolf wrote in "The Lives of the Obscure": "The obscure sleep on the walls, slouching against each other as if they were too drowsy to stand upright. Why disturb their sleep?"

I think I wouldn't have minded the digressions from Jane's (admittedly little-known) life if those digressions had focused more on other women. References are made to Abigail Adams, Anne Bradstreet, and Phyllis Wheatley, any of whom would have been a good source for deeper exploration. Instead, so much unnecessary detail about Ben just adds to the problem Lepore is writing about.

Marmee & Louisa

I enjoyed much of this book, but something troubles me. The subtitle is "The Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Mother." The premise of the book is that no one has ever looked at the relationship between Louisa and her mother; instead, biographers have focused only on the relationship between Louisa and her father.

That troubles me a bit, because I seem to remember reading other books about the Alcott family, where Abigail (Marmee) is an important figure. And even if my memory is incorrect, anyone who's read Little Women and knows that it's deeply (if not completely) autobiographical must realize how important the author's mother was to her. After all, Marmee is a central figure of that novel, while Mr. March is away most of the time.

So I don't know. The author of this bio is a distant cousin of Louisa's, and as such has some proprietary feelings toward the Alcott family. The passion she demonstrates in her scholarship is exemplary, and there were many aspects of the Alcotts' lives I wasn't aware of. I knew they were abolitionists, but wasn't aware of their early work for equal rights for women. I knew Bronson was, shall we say, problematic in terms of caring for his family, but didn't realize just how awful he truly was. I'd forgotten Louisa died at 55--relatively young, and after what could best be described as a life of utter toil and little pleasure.

So, yes, I learned things. However, I think this could have used a heavier editorial hand. There are mind-boggling descriptions of this relative and that relative, to the point it's hard to keep them straight.

And while this provides a great portrait of Abigail herself (who ranks up there with Sophia Tolstoy as one of the most beleaguered wives ever), Louisa is a bit more thinly drawn. Someone on Goodreads commented that they thought this would have been a better book if it had focused on Abigail and her brother Samuel, and I tend to agree. Abigail's brother was a critical component in Abigail's survival. He often provided money, of which there was never enough in the Alcott household, and he himself put his own career and livelihood at risk by supporting first the abolitionists and then the women's rights groups.

The author does succeed in positioning Abigail as a critical force in Louisa's life, but again, I'm not 100% convinced that was at question. Still, if you're interested in the Alcotts, or in the battles for freedom for slaves and women, this is a great starting point.

Virginia Woolf

For some time (cough *years* cough) I've been meaning to read Hermione Lee's biography of Virginia Woolf. But it's a bit intimidating. For one thing, it clocks in at nearly 1000 pages. That's a lot of biographical detail. Which is not to say I'm not that interested--I am--but that's a big commitment.

When I read that there was a shorter, perhaps more introductory bio of Mrs. Woolf by Alexandra Harris, I thought, hey, that might be just the thing to start.

And it was. Just 170 pages long, it obviously can't go into the level of analysis that the Lee bio can, but it's a good overview of Woolf's life, literary and otherwise. Sometimes the shortness of it means that little commentary is given to things like the abuse Woolf experienced as a child, or her attachment to Vita Sackville-West. Yet it still gave me a clearer picture than I had of Woolf as a person. Best of all, it increased my interest in reading the Lee bio. As soon as I read the novels I haven't yet read. Which now are leaping to the top of my TBR stack. For a short book, it sure did its duty.

Private Demons

After reading Shirley Jackson's novels The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle last fall, I wanted to learn more about Jackson herself. Hence, Private Demons: The Life of Shirley Jackson by Judy Oppenheimer.

As far as I can tell, this is the only book covering Jackson's life, originally published in 1988. While interesting, and at times enlightening (not surprisingly, Jackson had a strong interest in magic and the occult; unknown to me was the difficult relationship she had with her mother, and the nearly stereotypical marriage she had to Stanley Hyman, who adored her, but just slightly more than most females within his gaze). Difficult childhood, dysfunctional marriage--this is nothing new in the literary world. 

(Although one has to rear back with astonishment when reading a particularly venomous letter Jackson's mother wrote to her late in Jackson's life, after seeing her daughter's photo in Time magazine: "Why oh why do you allow the magazines to print such awful pictures of you?...I would sue them for libel. Your children love you for your achievements but they also want you to be worth looking at too. If you don't care what you look like or care about your appearance why don't you do something about it for your children's sake and your husband's. I do not know if the book review is good or not--and I have been so sad all morning about what you have allowed yourself to look like.")

Still, there are things in the book that bothered me. I would have loved more in-depth analyses of Jackson's writing; some of the bigger pieces are covered, like The Lottery and The Haunting of Hill House. Still, given Jackson's history, more attention would have been merited. 

Even more troubling is that Oppenheimer had access to Jackson's children and several of her childhood and adult friends for interviews. That's great, but she often reports their quotes as established facts. Certainly someone looking back many years at a now-dead friend who has become famous may have some very hazy memories, or interpretations of those memories, and they should be taken with a large grain of salt, but Oppenheimer seems to trust them completely. 

While acknowledging the Jackson's and Hyman's household was chaotic and far from the norm of the 1950s, Oppenheimer surprisingly doesn't make much of an effort to show how Jackson's parenting affected the four offspring. They were all adults when interviewed; surely that would have been an interesting topic for this bio.

I guess what it comes down to is: if you're curious about Jackson's life, this isn't a bad read. I just don't think it's up to a rigorous set of biographic standards.

 

Made for You and Me

Made for You and Me: Going West, Going Broke, Finding Home by Caitlin Shetterly is the at-times harrowing story of one young couple facing the economic fallout in this country. Caitlin and husband Dan, both freelancers, decided to move from Maine to California to pursue more freelance work in 2008. As you might guess from the title, things didn't work out so well; Caitlin unexpectedly became pregnant with the pregnancy from hell, which left her uanble to work. Dan found work at first, but the worsening economy dried up many of his prospects. Shortly after the baby was born, Caitlin's mother suggested they move back to Maine and live with her until they could get back on their feet.

So they did; two underemployed freelancers, one two-month-old infant, one dog, and one elderly cat who--spoiler--did not survive the trip.

But returning to Maine doesn't solve the problems. Caitlin and Dan holed up in cramped space in Caitlin's mother's house, trying to help her out (as she's not doing so well in the recession either) while looking for work--any kind of work.

If you're one of the far-too-many people who are feeling the pain of the current economy, this book may not be for you. Yes, Caitlin and Dan had a fallback position, but it wasn't easy. They loved Maine, but returning in such abject failure did nothing for their confidence:

"What we felt was that we could no longer dream. That was, possibly, the most dangerous aspect of what had happened to us."

But the book isn't strictly one young women's self-centered tale, either. As they cross America by car, once with great optimism, once in fear and despair, they see the toll that's being taken everywhere:

"What happened to our small towns? If we have no small towns and no community, does America have any future at all?"

This could have been such a big pity party of a book, but to Shetterly's credit, it isn't. She's clear about the mistakes they made, and the fact that they were far from alone in what was happening to them. What's more, she's able to--slowly--take an appreciation of what their experiences have taught them, especially about the concept of home:

"I'd thought that going west was our most American of journeys, but this journey--the going home--was when I felt America reach out to me and beckon me with its long legacy of triumph over adversity. I started to feel, as we made our way east, that the whole reason we'd ever gone west was to come back home."

This isn't a book that ends with a beautiful, "Oh, hey, we got back to Maine, and voila! Our dream jobs appeared and now we're doing just fine!" which is part of what makes it so believable and sympathetic, if hard to read for people in the middle of that struggle themselves. Nevertheless, a worthwhile read about what the current economic and political climate is doing to people today.

Just Kids

I'm late to the party, but what a lovely book this is. Mostly the story of Patti Smith's "coming of age", in a way, and her close relationship with artist Robert Mapplethorpe. What really surprised me about this book was how warmly affectionate Smith is towards Mapplethorpe. Sure, that may be in part because he's dead, but even when describing difficult times in their relationship (such as when, after having had a long-term romantic relationship, he begins to explore his homosexual feelings, something she was in no way prepared for), there's a sense of love and protection that was very appealing. She doesn't paint him as a saint of any kind, but as a conflicted, talented artist who was a very important part of her life. Still is, it seems.

In fact, it occurs to me that all artists, whatever their medium, could hardly do better than to meet someone who ends up being a soulmate, something beyond romance, someone to whom a commitment can be made: we'll stick with our art and each other until we make it. That was the pact Patti and Robert made, and they bolstered each other through some hard times until each was successful in their own way.

By the way, I never realized that Patti Smith kind of "fell into" being a punk rocker. She came to New York to explore a career in visual arts, and later poetry; music came along much later. Who knew?

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

I really liked this book. It's an interesting, frightening, saddening story of medical morals run amuck. I'm late to the blogging party with this one, and you probably know the backstory: Henrietta Lacks was an African-American woman who had a horrible case of cervical cancer, from which doctors and researchers withdrew cell tissue for research without informing her or getting her consent. This was pretty standard at the time, but what wasn't standard was the fact the Lacks's cells continue to replicate to this day, something incredibly unique and something which has led to medical discoveries and cures of all kinds.

However, Lacks and her family didn't know about this for many years, and author Skloot spends time showing what their lives are like: poor, mostly, and without health insurance to pay for some of the advances their mother's cells have provided. It's a stark contrast and raises provocative questions about what the medical community has rights to and what patients have rights to. 

It's also reflective of race relations in the 1950s, when other horrendous medical treatments were going on in the name of science, far more harmful than what Lacks went through. But Lacks's daughter, Elsie, faced her own form of racist medical treatment to horrific ends after Henrietta's death, a side story in this book that, to me, deserves its own book.

It's a worthwhile read, if hard to continue at places just because of things like Elsie's story. Skloot is a good writer, making scientific topics understandable to this layperson, and delving deeply into the Lacks family members lives and making them very real and very poignant, especially Deborah, who spends most of her adult life on a crusade to get people to understand that HeLa wasn't just a group of cells, but a mother, a daughter, an aunt.

Pretty impressive for a debut book.

Wolf

I read a review of this book quite a while ago, and even though I haven't read any Jack London since high school, it sounded intriguing, so requested it from the library.

Holy moley. I could hardly put it down. For a guy who died when he was only 40, London had an incredible life. Or, as the book's subtitle notes, lives plural. The chapters are each titled for a separate stage of London's life, told chronologically, from his "Work Beast" youth when he was sent out to work in a cannery at the age of 8, to his adventures as an "Oyster Pirate" and "Seal Hunter", onto becoming a serious student and writer, then becoming a gold prospector while waiting out a harsh Alaskan winter, then a war correspondent, and a celebrity, and a guy who designed his own 45-foot boat to sail to the South Pacific...you get the picture. The guy was not exactly a slugabed.

The author's writing is lively and thoughtful. He doesn't sugarcoat some of London's lives, whether it was his infidelities to his second wife or, for that matter, the disastrous train of thought that lead to his first marriage. At the same time, London's affinity for animals was strong:

"What he beheld along the path up to the Chilkoot Pass made his heart ache. Many of the Klondikers had--stupidly--brought horses to do their hauling for them, despite the terrain, the season, and the lack of forage. As the trail became worse, they whipped the overloaded animals mercilessly. Some were beaten to death; some tumbled from the trail into gulches, where they lay flailing with broken legs or broken backs, with no one willing to spend a bullet on them to end their misery. Later, it was probably only a small exaggeration when it was said that one could walk the length of the trail to the Chilkoot Pass and never set foot on anything but dead horses. To London it was a soggy hell."

London's efforts to teach people about his beliefs in socialism have an eerie resonance in today's political world:

"But London had become increasingly aware that to the average American indoctrinated with the ideals of patriotism, socialists, communists, and anarchists had all become lumped together into a bomb-throwing, vaguely Slavic cartoon that was inaccurate, and out of which they needed to be educated."

London's driving force (besides escaping poverty and the misery of being the Work Beast) was to use his time, as much as he had, to do--just do. (Insert Nike joke here.) While others in his literary circle fell prey to their own social lives, London lived separately from their salon-like existence and maintained a rigorous 1000-word daily regime. But besides writing his popular fiction and less-popular political works, he also traveled extensively, ranched, and had a very active love life--not to mention some less than savory run-ins with alcohol and drugs.

This is a fascinating book about a fascinating man, and you can bet that some of his fiction just jumped up several steps on my "should read soon" list.

Sophia Tolstoy

I became interested in reading this biography after reading Jay Parini's novel The Last Station (which, in turn, I read because I'd like to watch the movie starring Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren, both nominated for Oscars for their roles). The Parini novel is a fictionalized account of the last year of Tolstoy's life. To say it's complicated is a huge understatement, but I'll try to paraphrase: after becoming a widely revered novelist, Tolstoy renounced his fiction and became extremely religious, and felt that the life of luxury and property was wrong. He felt there was no greater life than to toil, and he wanted nothing to do with money nor belongings.

Yet somehow he was happy to have others do a great deal of work around him, and he signed over his estate (the beautiful Yasnaya Polyana) to other family members so he could, technically, not be a landowner--even though he continued living there until just a few weeks before his death.

His desire to glorify the peasant life did not sit well with his long-time wife Sophia, who wanted to preserve their home--and his literary heritage--to take care of his family. For that, Tolstoy's ardent followers villainized Sophia and, after Tolstoy's death, suppressed her writings in order to preserve Tolstoy's saintly image.

However, in the last 15 years, some of Sophia's papers, diaries, and parts of a memoir she wrote have been slowly been released to the public. Biographer Popoff uses that new source material to create a shockingly different portrayal of the woman at Tolstoy's side. Rather than the greedy, grasping shrew who thwarted his heart's desire, she was the helpmate who worked with him continuously on his writing, copying and recopying his works after days spent in the hard labor of a woman's work on a large estate. No languishing aristocrat was she--her days were full of household work, plus raising children since--ahem--Mr. Tolstoy had a strong sex drive and an even stronger aversion to contraception, meaning poor Sophia became pregnant 16 times during their marriage, even when she tried to reason with him and get him to understand the physical toll the household work, literary work, and childraising was having on her.

Tolstoy was utterly clueless about a woman's work and life, and often spoke condescendingly of women in general. His doctrine of giving up all material comforts and not becoming attached to family often had devastating results; one young follower left his pregnant wife and child without any means to live while he chased after Tolstoy. Sophia in turn brought the abandoned wife under her wing and provided her with midwife training, so she would have a way to support herself.

To be fair, Tolstoy wasn't a complete douchebag. During a national famine, he organized massive relief efforts, and he was on the front lines, making sure the food and supplies got into the hands of those most needing it. But Sophia was a major contributor too--she organized donation campaigns and oversaw the receipt of tens of thousands of rubles in contribution, which she not only used as intended, but painstakingly documented how and where every penny was spent, so that her husband could not come under criticism in any way. (Wyclef Jean, are you listening?)

Tolstoy even wrote a novella, The Kreutzer Sonata, that had the main character killing his wife because of the "animal excesses" in his life. It could not be interpreted as anything but hostile to Sophia, who in turn wrote her own novella, Who's to Blame, which directly countered the theories in Tolstoy's book.

At the very end of Tolstoy's life, he abruptly left Yasnaya without telling Sophia where he was going, aided by daughter Sasha and the worst of the followers, Vladimir Chertkov (who, after Tolstoy's death, took the leading role in blaming Sophia for everything). Tolstoy had in mind a hut where he could live out his final days, but on the train journey, he fell ill and died at a station. Sophia tracked him down before he died, but was only allowed to see him when he fell unconscious. Chertkov later claimed Sophia drove Tolstoy out of the house; Popoff points to Sophia's own theory that Tolstoy knew death was close and wanted simply to find a small, quiet place to wait for it.

You'd think Sophia would have been somewhat relieved to be rid of him. But no--his death was a stunning blow for her. Married nearly 50 years, she loved him in spite of everything, and fervently believed in his literary legacy which she continued working on until her death, work that involved court battles with Chertkov over the ample archives Tolstoy left behind.

Even when completely at odds with Tolstoy and his sycophantic followers, she stood up for his convictions and fought battles with the government to remove censorship from his nonfiction writings, even when she didn't agree with them. She also zealously oversaw his papers and, later, his property, carefully documenting everything for preservation. She knew his legacy was critical, and she tirelessly worked to take care of it, even selling the estate at a much lower price in order to preserve it as a museum, when she could have earned much more money selling it to private buyers. She insisted that everything in his study be left exactly as he left it, including the book The Brothers Karamazov open on his desk, where he'd been reading it.

Theirs was a tempestuous marriage, full of storms and reconciliations, full of love and despair, full of pain. This isn't a book for the faint of heart, nor, perhaps, is it for a reader who doesn't want their view of Tolstoy as perfect to be disrupted. It's also tangentially about Russian history and politics, all of which reared their often-ugly heads during Tolstoy's time.

But most of all, Popoff paints a striking portrait of two immensely complex people in an incredibly complicated marriage. It could be argued that they were mismatched, but it could also be argued that Sophia was the ideal partner for Tolstoy--possibly the only woman who would have held on through the bad times and kept her devotion to her husband's work intact through it all.

Still--glad I'm not her.