Blogs

The literary world was rocked last week, when the Pulitzer Prize board declared a three-way stalemate for 2012's fiction award. Outrage, indignation and anger were common reactions for readers and writers alike.

Ann Patchett, an author I respect and enjoy reading, wrote an editorial for the New York Times following the announcement, expressing her indignation. Irritated and even incensed readers have aired their opinions in the Times, and bloggers and other media sources are chewing theories and chatting conspiracies.

I think Patchett is an excellent author, and I appreciate the opinions of my fellow readers. However I find myself disappointed in the overall reaction.

Patchett tells us that reading fiction is important, and I wholeheartedly concur. That is where our thought-digestion processes split off however.

Much of what I have read, including Patchett's piece, follows one of two paths of reasoning for the board's non-decision: either the choices were equally good, or they were equally bad, neither of which hold up for me. Nor did it hold for the jury who deliberated before submitting Train Dreams, The Pale King and Swamplandia for the final decision.

Since 1918 (the Pulitzer was first awarded in 1917, but not in fiction), the three fiction finalists are selected by a panel of three jurors, then submitted to the Pulitzer Prize board who determines the winner. Historically, neither the board nor jury members are required to defend or explain their final decisions. However, following media speculation last week, two of this year's three jurors spoke out against the board's decision.  

Michael Chabon, author and winner of the 2001 Pulitzer for Fiction for The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, hasn't commented (to my knowledge). However, Susan Larson, former book editor for the New Orleans Times-Picayune, expressed her disappointment on NPR.

Maureen Corrigan, Georgetown University's Critic in Residence, described the frustration she and her fellow jurors felt in the Washington Post:

“Our directive was to nominate 'distinguished' works of fiction, published in book form in 2011 that, ideally, spoke to American themes. ... In our collective judgment, these very different novels are three very distinguished works of fiction.”

There was no lack of wonderful fiction published in 2011. Besides the three finalists, Ann Patchett, Julian Barnes and Edith Pearlman were just a few of many. However, the jurors and board members have a difficult choice to make every year, and there were ten years that resulted in no award at all. The answer is not as simple as good versus bad books.

I have also read the argument that, as a result of the three-way tie, readers are excited about three titles instead of one. This feeds into into a publishing world conspiracy theory that points the blame at attempts to boost book sales.

I'm against publishing monopolies as much as the next independent bookseller, but I hesitate to overshadow the publishing world with my villain-colored-paint-covered brush when I don't see a down side to books being bought and read.

Patchett writes about her rage as bookseller, comparing the Pulitzer Prize to the Academy Awards, saying the glitz and glamor stimulates excitement in movie-goers and book lover's alike.

This may be true, however, the big question for me is, why does an award cause so much excitement and matter so much? Yes, the Pulitzer is prestigious, and I do believe author's deserve recognition for their work. But reading and writing fiction is important regardless of the outcome of a literary contest. I think we should look at this as an opportunity to remember that the award is secondary to the writing, and regardless who wins, every year brings a fresh crop of wonderful fiction.

Awards, in various forms, already shape our lives in innumerable ways. What is an award really, except a recommendation? Granted, one from a reputable source, but still a source who gains power through an audience. We, the audience or reader, willingly give our decision making power to judges, restaurant reviewers and media sources. Whether we cite our reasons as being too busy, too ill-informed, just plain unable, or simply not caring, most often our decisions about what to wear, what to eat, how to dress, and what movies or books to read are made for us. This is a chance for readers to go beyond what is decided for us and recognize the writing instead of the award.

This stalemate is not a negative reflection of this year's crop of fiction or a conspiracy to keep book publishing afloat. If we choose to look at the situation this way, then what Patchett wrote in the New York Times is correct and this opportunity for readers, writers and booksellers to celebrate fiction is lost.

Instead, look at this year's trifecta as a reminder of why authors write--not to win awards, but so we can read! So, happy reading! Cheers.

A writer's job is to make sense of the world, but double meanings are frequent in life and fiction. Sometimes words are meant to evoke obscure, creating questions rather than divine answers.

When I want to make sense of my life, I turn to specific poems in which I enjoy, playing the game of hide and seek with words and their allusions. My relationship with poetry ebbs and flows, but is a constant presence. I read fiction to learn about people, poetry is for learning about myself (though the two are rarely mutually exclusive).

In my opinion, if fiction is “life with the dull bits left out,” then poetry is the heartbeat, the rhythm of living.

I am not a poet. My ten-year-old self wrote ballads inspired by “The Highway Man,” choked with similes and stumbling over forced rhyme schemes. As a teenager, I wrote verses dripping with angst, committed (as only a teenager can be) to the concept that I was massively misunderstood.

I have long since accepted that writing verse is not one of my gifts, nor is interpreting symbolism-heavy stanzas. However, not being a poetess does not preclude my appreciation for the art, and understanding pales next to feeling.

I don't have to understand poetry to feel the effects, just as our hearts pump blood whether or not we are familiar with the inner-workings of the cardiovascular system.
I admit that some poetry goes above my head, but if I let the words wash over me without grasping for specific meaning, I feel connected to a truth much larger than myself.

There are a handful of poems, garnered at different times of need in my life, that I carry inside me, like my own heartbeat.

April is poetry month, and I would like to share two poems that have greatly impacted my life, and bid others to share poetry they love with friends and family members.

These poems move and inspire me to respect and love myself. I am humbled, uplifted and, ultimately, connected to my inner strength when I read these two pieces by Anne Sexton and Mary Oliver respectively.

Young, by Anne Sexton

A thousand doors ago
when I was a lonely kid
in a big house with four
garages and it was summer
as long as I could remember,
I lay on the lawn at night,
clover wrinkling over me,
the wise stars bedding over me,
my mother's window a funnel
of yellow heat running out,
my father's window, half shut,
an eye where sleepers pass,
and the boards of the house
were smooth and white as wax
and probably a million leaves
sailed on their strange stalks
as the crickets ticked together
and I, in my brand new body,
which was not a woman's yet,
told the stars my questions
and thought God could really see
the heat and the painted light,
elbows, knees, dreams, goodnight.

 

The Journey, by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.

 

The red carpet is waiting to unroll for Ashland's 11th annual Independent Film Festival, just days from now. Flyers announcing the five-day event are plastered on lamp posts and the sides of buildings in our picturesque town, and even Bloomsbury's front window display features film related literature. Tourists and locals alike are buzzing with talk of the upcoming screenings, and anticipation reigns.    

When I was growing up, watching a movie in the theater was an extremely special treat, and was more about the popcorn, (the salty-goodness that, when cooled, had a flavor indiscernible from the brightly-colored cardboard I was eating from), partially melted Junior Mints and uninterrupted hours of air-conditioning, than the movie.

As an adult I rarely watch a film in the theater (the Film Festival being one of a handful of exceptions.)  This is mainly because the seats aren't as comfortable as my sofa, and I can't pause the movie for the inevitable bathroom break. Since I don't go very often, I still feel awed when I watch a movie on a giant screen. (The I-Max theater at OMSI in Portland is one of my favorites.)

I have always read more than I watch television or movies, but many of the books that I love are now movies of varying levels of quality and success. I truly believe that the book is better than the movie because what is shown on a strip of film is finite and what the human imagination can detail is infinite.

However, I do enjoy watching good movies (although I don't have a set criteria for what a good movie is), and a few book-inspired films have special places in my heart. In honor of the film festival, I would like to share books that I love, which have been turned into movies.

The most notable, Breakfast at Tiffany's, by Truman Capote, is both a classic short novel and iconic film. The movie is a product of a Hollywood on the brink of a new decade, teetering between the figurative black and white of the1950s and the Technicolor of the1960s. Complete with the gamine Audrey Hepburn swathed in cigarette smoke and pearls, the film reinvisions a story written by a broken but brilliant man. Despite numerous differences, the wild nature of Holly Go-Lightly has the same flavor off the page and on the screen. In addition to Capote's short novel, Fifth Avenue, 5 A.M. by Sam Wasson engagingly chronicles the transformation from Capopte's less-than-romantic ending to Audrey and George Peppard embracing in the rain.    

Happy Reading (and watching)!

Some Fiction Books I Love That Inspired Films:

1)    Big Fish, by Daniel Wallace
2)    Clan of the Cave Bear, by Jean Auel
3)    Girl with the Pearl Earring, by Tracy Chevalier
4)    I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith
5)    Invisible Circus, by Pulitzer Prize winning author, Jennifer Egan
6)    Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan
7)    Like Water for Chocolate, by Laura Esquivel
8)    Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold
9)    Rum Diary, by Hunter S. Thompson
10)  White Oleander, by Janet Fitch

Non-Fiction Books I Love That Inspired Films:

1)    A Dangerous Method, by Jon Kerr
2)    Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature, by Linda Lear
3)    Fast Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser
4)    Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, by Hunter S. Thompson
5)    Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer
6)    Julie and Julia, by Julie Powell
7)    Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, by John Berendt
8)    Out of Africa, by Isak Dinesen
9)    Running with Scissors, by Augusten Burroughs
10)  Under the Tuscan Sun, by Peter Mayle

Some Teen Fiction I Love That Inspired Films:

1)    Beastly, by Alex Flinn
2)    The Confessions of Georgia Nicolson, by Louise Rennison
3)    Emma, by Jane Austen
4)    The Golden Compass, by Phillip Pullman
5)    The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
6)    The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis
7)    The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
8)    The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, by Ann Brashares
9)    BookSpeak, by Laura Purdie Salas
10)  Stardust, by Neil Gaiman

Some Youth Fiction I love That Inspired Films:

1)    Anne of Green Gables, by L.M. Montgomery
2)    The Bridge to Terabithia, by Katherine Paterson
3)    Ella Enchanted, by Gail Carson Levin
4)    The Invention of Hugo Cabret, by Brian Selznick
5)    James and the Giant Peach, by Roald Dahl
6)    The Indian in the Cupboard, by Lynne Reid Banks
7)    Island of the Blue Dolphins, by Scott O'Dell
8)    A Little Princess, by Elizabeth Hodges Burnett
9)    A Ring of Endless Light, by Madeline L'Engle
10)  A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeline L'Engle

Some Children's Books I Love That Inspired Movies:

1)    Clifford the Big Red Dog, by Norman Bridwell
2)    Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, by Judi Baerrett
3)    Curious George, by H.A. Rey
4)    Jumanji, by Cris Van Allsburg
5)    The Lorax, by Dr. Suess
6)    Madeline, by Ludwig Poemelman
7)    The Polar Express, by Cris Van Allsburg
8)    Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak
9)    The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame
10)  Winnie the Pooh, by A.A. Milne

Someone very close to me used to say that the only certainties in life were taxes, death and the fact that I had a book in my purse. I am always reading something, usually multiple somethings, and welcome moments snatched for reading in my busy day.

I have relatively well-rounded taste, and try to read a little bit of every genre on a regular basis. Reading is a form of nutrition for me, and hitting all the book-groups is important for my overall health (I am joking, but most humor is funny because there is truth in the origins.)

I am only one person, however, and I enjoy many things as well as reading. In terms of lifespan versus the number of books already in existence, I have an infinite amount of reading material. (I often laugh about cloning myself so that I can be reading all of the time.)

Not only am I only one person, but I will admit that despite trying to keep a balanced reading-diet, I do have a slight preference towards certain genres, authors and even specific titles. I love historical biographies and fiction, modern memoirs, mythology and science. I read plenty of nature writing and non-fiction.

One genre I don't read a lot of, but always mean to, is science-fiction (sci-fi). I have read sci-fi that I enjoy before, like Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Ender's Game. In general though, I will dip into fantasy, with knights and spells and goblins, before venturing across time and galaxies to distant planets or space-colonies. I read a lot of Tamora Pierce as a girl, followed by Mercedes Lackey and Marion Zimmer Bradley as a teen, and feel more willing to suspend my sense of reality for a wizard than a new piece of technology or a space-traveler.

This may be because reading is a form of escape, and between my vibrating phone and glowing computer screen, frequently technology is exactly what I am trying to leave behind. I prefer losing myself in a world that no longer exists, outside of books and traveling festivals, over a story that feels eerily plausible in the technology age.

A friend of mine recently recommended that I try sci-fi author Neal Stephenson, explaining that very little suspension of belief is required to read him. After finishing Stephenson's newest work, Reamde, I know what my friend meant, but I wonder whether he really understood the nature of my problem.

Stephenson writes with ambition and attention to detail, creating a reality not very different from the world I walk through every day. Anything unfamiliar or imagined is described with such clarity, that the unreal is easily absorbed into the known. His plot-line doesn't venture into foreign galaxies or through time-travel tunnels. Instead his brand of dystopia derives from technologies I am already familiar with: guns and video games.

Despite Reamde not being my usual “brand” of book, I enjoyed the read immensely. This story has everything: video games, romance, the Russian mob, Chinese hackers, and a computer virus that holds data  files hostage. (Also, T'Rain, the massive role-player video game that begins the whole rigmarole, is a magical reincarnation of the Medieval  world, which helps satisfy my fantasy craving.) The entire story feels like a video game being played out in real life, and while every once in a while the weaponry jargon loses me, once I started I had to finish. His plot is that compelling. I am reminded of a Ken Follet spy novel mixed with Ernest Cline's, Ready Player One.

Since I have never read Stephenson before, I perused the backs of his other titles to get a feeling for how Reamde fits in with the rest of his work. I get the impression that Stephenson will not allow himself to be pigeon-holed as a writer, and his plot-lines draw from history as well as science.

If a reader is looking for a sci-fi book with both feet firmly on the ground, or an espionage novel with a twist, I highly recommend this read. Smart, a little sexy, and injected with adrenaline, Reamde is worth the one-thousand-plus pages!

Between laptops, iPads and cellphones, internet access is near instantaneous and constant. As long as the device is in range of a cellular tower, e-mail, Google, and the entire on-line world is at the user's fingertips. Like the codex, the most common book format, the internet revolutionizes how we receive, process and send information. I laugh whenever I catch myself using Google as a verb. I am sure that read was a strange verb in a mostly illiterate, feudal village centuries ago, but language matures alongside culture. 
   

With such ready access to the internet, there is no surprise that almost everything can be done online, especially reading. Scanning book reviews, searching for bookgroup discussion guides, and following blogs that discuss books are just the beginning of what is available for book lovers on-line.

I recently visited thebookreportnetwork.com, perusing reviews, upcoming titles and blog posts. I stumbled across a blog entry posted by Claire Bidwell Smith, author of The Rules of Inheritance, in which she wrote that reading was, “All about the words.”

This phrase swirled around in my brain, eddying along currents of thought and bandied about by waves of my past experiences. In the end, the phrase did not hold up, because I don't believe reading is all about the words. 
   

Words are powerful, but only because we make them so. Reading is about the unique experiences and associations we have with not only vocabulary, but also with the places we we leave behind as we open a book, and the format in which we read. I could argue that reading is all about the stories we build for ourselves as we turn the pages.
   

This is exactly the type of conversation I love having with friends or a friendly stranger in a bookstore, since the building block of both reading and writing is the free exchange of ideas. The internet is arguably based on the same principle, and I believe that technologies with the same purpose in mind should support and expand on each other. 
   

In many ways, the internet does expand the literary industry, allowing authors to publish more easily, students and professionals to research more effectively, and readers to download and begin enjoying a book in minutes, as long as they have web access. (Although, after fifteen minutes in a bookstore I feel relaxed and am happily absorbed in browsing. After the same time spent reading blog entries on my compute, my mouth gets dry, my tongue feels fuzzy and a ringing sound echoes in my ears.) Whether the nature of this expansion is symbiotic or invasive is still unclear, but the internet clearly changes the way we read and authors write, by changing the relationship between authors and readers, and by altering the nature of the stories we create for ourselves while we read.
   

A growing number of newly minted authors are bloggers first, whose readership and national or international attention led to publishing deals.
  Jenny Lawson, or The Bloggess, is one such writer, whose memoir, Let's Pretend This Never Happened, is to be released in April. Outrageous, offensive and sometimes hilarious, this book is an example of the differences to writing and reading rote by the internet and bloggers. 
 

Blogging makes writing dynamic on an extreme level, because the final page is always unwritten. The process of crafting a narrative has always been dynamic, because such a large task requires more than just one person. Banter between loved ones, friends, professional editors and mentors, helps shape and polish the finished project. 
   

Finished is the crucial word here, because once a book is published, very rarely will an author re-write. Even if they did, the originals still exist, mutable only with considerable effort. A published book is interactive in the minds of readers, not on the same level as a blog however.
   

Bloggers can elaborate on, or recind, an idea, which turns writing a story into a conversation. The sense of an unknown ending changes how we process what we read. Earlier I said that reading is all about the stories we create for ourselves. Blogging makes a different form of storytelling possible, a narrative form of conversation. Readers take an active part in the unfolding plot, so that the story we create for ourselves as we read is part of a larger dialogue between author and reader.
   

Lawson's blog, thebloggess.com, has hundreds of comments on each of her posts, each of which sounds like a joke made by a friend as they casually cross paths at the gym or in the grocery store. People commenting care about Lawson, and feel an affinity for her cultivated, wacky vulnerability.  The result is a book co-written by a blogger and her blog followers; a story written from many angles and with combined medias, with tangential offshoots. 
   

Read online, Lawson's blog is a crazy dialogue between a self-effacing, foul-mouthed Texan and anyone who cares to join. This conversation is the basis for her book. A good example is the chapter she includes in her memoir on her obsession with antique taxidermied animals. The chapter opens with Lawson receiving a strange package in the mail: a very dead, very stuffed and tattered squirrel. After a particularly rant-filled blog entry (although many of Lawson's entries verge on rant-like) covering Lawon's husband's refusal to buy a specific taxidermied animal, a reader subsequently sent the furry friend, along with a note chastising Lawson's husband.  
   

More complex than a pick-your-own-ending R. L. Stine novel, Lawson's memoir, based off her blog, is the brainchild of interactive writing. Lawson's writing is uncultured, uncouth and capable of continuing a new genre co-written by authors and readers: the blogoir.  



Experience is a wonderful teacher, but our scope is limited by factors like geography, age and gender. Good writing takes a reader back in time, sailing with Columbus aboard the Santa Maria, rationing during the Great Depression, watching as the Great Wall of China falls. Readers feel cultural isolation by proxy, inviting them to be more compassionate. They stroll through undisturbed nature in Thoreau's clear prose, helping to develop deeper relationships with the wild. Each book has the potential to alter a reader in innumerable ways.

Sometimes the change is as small as learning new words, and certain books are written with the intention of inspiring innovation. Reading enriches my life and broadens my mind in many ways; however, there is one book in particular that has changed my life.

I discovered Animal, Vegetable, Miracle a few years ago during a typical college weekend. Taking a needed study respite, I poked around Bloomsbury Book (before I was lucky enough to work there) hunting through rows of paper treasures. I drifted to the non-fiction section, smiling as I brushed passed familiar titles, and paused to explore pages of new finds. One such discovery was a work by Barbara Kingsolver.

I first encountered Kingsolver’s work in the sixth grade, when my teacher assigned, The Poisonwood Bible, as homework, and I continued nurturing a love for her writing.

When I slid the innocuous green paperback off the shelf, I was unprepared for the revelations tangled among Kingsolver’s vegetables. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle introduced me to a wonderful literary sub-genre, gardening memoirs, which continues to shape my life.

Similar to autobiographies, which are pictorials of an entire lifetime, memoirs present slices of an author’s experiences.

Kingsolver dropped me in the middle of her family’s garden in southern Appalachia, where I learned that a tomato straight off the vine tastes like a very distant cousin to the pinkish globules stacked in supermarkets (a lesson I tasted later that summer).

I began speaking the language of canning, the clink of glass jars reminiscent of summer afternoons in my childhood when I helped my mother put up apricot and blackberry jam. Window sills were suddenly potential miniature garden plots, and January of that year found me pouring over seed catalogs with the intense concentration I usually reserved for my statistics text-book.

By vicariously living a year of food life with the Kingsolver-Hopps, I realized how disconnected I had become from what I ate. As a student, both my food and time budgets were tight. I sipped cups of inky, hot coffee while I studied, and regularly munched sugary, vending-machine trail-mix between classes.

Even though I grew up with a small garden, and was taught appreciation for unprocessed, whole foods from a young age, I became caught up in the whirl of study and working. I slotted food at the bottom of my priorities totem-pole until I changed my outlook on nourishment, and everything began between the pages of a book.

My bookshelves are now crowded with gardening memoirs, manuals and manifestos, each with unique qualities.

The Kingsolver-Hopps have planted the original seed of thought, but they also encourage temperance. I have found that treating my body and the earth with respect is not a dogma and drinking a cup of coffee, or cooking with imported olive oil, will not de-rail positive intentions. I adore Kingsolver’s family and appreciate her dry sense of humor. 

Joan Dye-Gussow’s journeys described in This Organic Life, and Growing Older are soothing companions during grief, which illustrate how living close to the earth and laughing maintain a connection to those who have passed on.

Brad Kessler’s, Goat Song, has a tang similar to the home-made cheese his story centers on. Flavored with wit and vinegar, Kessler’s tale of raising goats alongside his garden is as artisan as the chevre he makes.

Prolific and pertinent, the list of wonderful gardening memoirs is too long for a mere blog entry. Trying to discuss the intricacies of how books change lives in a last paragraph feels like an insult to a complex topic as well (more fodder for other entries).

Reading inspires and makes more complex people. Enjoying a garden via an excellent storyteller’s words doesn’t automatically mean starting a compost bin and tilling soil, but gaining a new understanding and appreciation for any topic helps cultivate rich lives.

Happy reading.

 

 

Other Reccomended Gardening Memoirs:

The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball
COOP by Michael Perry
$64 Tomato by William Aslexander
Second Nature by Michael Pollan
The Chicken Chronicles by Alice Walker
And I Shall Have Some Peace There by Margaret Roach
Folks, This Ain't Normal by Joel Salatin
Everything I Want to do is Illegal by Joel Salatin
Growing a Farmer by Kurt Timmermeister
Farm City by Novella Carpenter
The Blueberry Years by Jim Minick
Cultivating Delight by Diane Ackerman
Made from Scratch by Jenna Woginrich
Grow the Good Life by Michaels Owens
Deep in the Green by Anne Raver
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
Goat Song by Brad Kessler
This Organic Life by Joan Dye Gussow
Growing Older by Joan Dye Gussow
Into the Garden with Charles by Clyde Wachsberger (Available for purchase 04/10/12)

Imagine a New Year's Day wedding; a devoted couple, a classic string quartet, and simple but elegant decorations of …book shelves?

 

A fixture in downtown Ashland, Bloomsbury Books is a part of many peoples' lives. Frequently a venue for author readings, events and book-club meetings, the store recently added a wedding to their repertoire.

Reading lovers are partly shaped by not only the books they have read, but also the stores where they browse and buy. 

I remember visiting Bloomsbury, chatting with Orlando, the beloved book store cat, relishing the rustle of pages as I perused a new read. I can still recall the earthy scent of the dusty air as I entered Cal's, feeling like I was walking into a cave filled with not stalactites, but books.

Taking wedding vows in Bloomsbury is a sweet example of the devotion readers have to their books, demonstrating that bookstores are more than places of literary commerce. The fate of books, and subsequently bookstores, in the digital information age is uncertain. Despite the unknown future status of local bookstores, I believe they will continue to evolve, staying alive well into the future.

 

Robert Darnton's book, The Case for Books, is a cohesive, well-articulated collection of essays arguing that books are far from becoming extinct; the traditional codex will out live the e-book; libraries will survive past Google and that many inherent joys of reading cannot be digitized. 

 

Darnton, director of the Harvard University Library, covers a range of book-related topics, from the legislative struggles between Google and the authors or book right holders to the history of the modern book and the future of reading. With a background in journalism and his current position at Harvard's library, the former Princeton University professor is well poised to navigate our current, complex information landscape.

 

Google Books is a topic in which Darnton is well-versed, and through reading his book, my understanding of the 2009 settlement between Google and various authors and book rights holders has deepened and broadened. Darnton makes a good case for traditional books and bookstores by writing that Google is not a bibliographer.

 

Bookstores are not bibliographers either, but the book lovers who work in them organize books differently than the internet. Google and Amazon organize their results based on a specialized algorithm, not  on the  qualities of the publications. Data is gathered on how often people visit or use connected sites and digital texts. When book browsing online, search results are prioritized by  how often sites or texts are frequented, rather than their pertinence or quality.

 

Finding the first publication date for a book (or the original name under which an author was published), tracking down books with only a key phrase or piece of an author’s name, these are the adventures of working in a bookstore. I enjoy the treasure hunt, and never organize my results based on a mathematical equation designed to recycle the most popular information. This is one of the many reasons people continue to shop at bookstores--the human element. 

 

Darnton paints the future landscape as a combination of new and old information technology, maintaining a strong case for books, without trying to remove the ebook from the picture.  He stresses the qualities that make a book appealing: the heft, the texture of the paper, the scents that speak of time and place of origin.

 

An experience for all of the senses, Martyn Lyon's new work, Books: A Living History, is the epitome of what Darnton describes. Decorated with a row of worn book spines, the dust jacket is buttery-soft, and the weight balances easily in the hand. The glossy pages have a sharp, tangy scent, vaguely like varnish. As a photographic and textual history of the modern book, each fascinating page is a tribute to the evolution of text and reading.

 

The digital information age seems to have exploded over night, and the ebook is the first major formatting change since the development of the codex in the third century B.C.E. Both Lyons and Darnton note the tumultuous life of text as proof of the book-shaped place carved into the heart of society. 

 

True, people read differently today, gleaning stories, facts and entertainment from a variety of magazines, web-sites, and books, and most listen to music, or check Twitter updates as their eyes scan paragraphs. But this is not the first time in history that reading has changed. The industrialization of the book industry changed the way people read. The West has attained almost universal literacy, since reading materials are plentiful and can be cheaply acquired. 

 

But books have been knocked from the highest shelf. Where a reverence for their rarity and cost once made them precious, books are now splattered with an attempt at a new spaghetti sauce recipe. They lay in the sand with sunbathing readers and fold into coat pockets. Books aren't held in awe, but are a part of daily life, on par with our electronic devices. According to Lyons, books have existed for two and a half millenia, through the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. They don't need to recharge or reboot, and neither do bookstores. 

 

Bookstores are not just places to purchase books. They are a social hub, filled with the meeting of friends, the of rustling pages, the buzz of conversation, an electric charge of exchanging ideas. I have a difficult time picturing friends Skyping while simultaneously book browsing, though friends who live far apart might do this. However, when friends are together, a bookstore is the perfect place to meet. Ebooks and Google have their roles to play (a topic for a different blog entry), but bookstores have many offerings that can't be provided digitally. 

 

For readers interested in the life and future of books, Darnton and Lyons are two authors I would recommend. The future of books and bookstores seems uncertain, but I don't believe their roles will be usurped by digital text. Even if an e-reader has a sticker that smells like a book (antique or new), and the plastic is textured to mimic paper, even if rows of book-lined shelves are projected into the mind, readers will detect the difference. Some experiences can't be created digitally.                        

A fresh voice reanimates two literary-couples I adore and transports me to Pemberley, an English country estate held close in my heart. Surrounded by  delicate female conventions and gallant gentleman, I dine with old friends, bask in burgeoning true-love and witness a murder trial, while becoming acquainted with a wonderful, prolific author, P.D. James.  

Released in early December, Death Comes to Pemberley, is the eighteenth mystery ninety-one-year-old James has written. Since, Cover Her Face, her first publication in 1962, James has won a multitude of awards for her creative plot tools, advanced character development and pertinent social-commentary. In 2008, she was also admitted to the International Crime Writing Hall of Fame.

This nostalgic, new read is a sweet, satisfying, English murder mystery revolving around Jane Austen's infamous lovers from Pride and Prejudice, the Bingleys and the Darcys. With layers of vocabulary, diction and style, this work is not a frivolous dessert. This novel is like a traditional English trifle, sugary, filling and flavorful. The skillfully written escapade illustrates the living quality of language, reveals the role of the modern novel in history, and serves as a gateway book between crime novels and classic fiction.

James does a wonderful job evoking the 1800's in her in her twenty-first century publication. Austen's writing mirrors and impishly exaggerates her world, eventually preserving her observations in ways she could have never imagined. Read today, a whimsical record of daily life in 1813 is alien and historical, and the language is odd, social conventions out-dated. Every modern novel will eventually become a piece of history; a motif for a writer resurrecting stories.

To capture the cadence of Austen's era, James carefully mixes period vocabulary and employs specific speech patterns, transporting readers across the marble floors of the Darcy estate. Imitating Austen, Darcy declares an event an, “invidious situation.” She also spells colorful, colourful, and calls today's prison warden a turnkey.

Invidious is seldom used today, and certainly not in daily conversation. A person does not call a situation in which we feel manipulated, invidious; we say, calculated, or set-up. This kind of careful word choice evokes a particular time and place, a reminder that modern contrivances and contentions are melting away. As readers move through history via an author's pages, the language patterns change. This shift reflects both the themes of the book as well as the changes in culture across centuries.

Spelling discrepancies like, colourful, are not only indicative of the time, but also of the English setting. Differences between American English and British English include both spelling and pronunciation. These discrepancies became largely normalized with the publication of the first American English Dictionary in 1828, further declaring independence and difference from Britain.

James effectively uses these differences in the use of vocabulary and diction to maintain a reality in which Kitty Whickham is hysterical in the foyer and two men are lost in the dark, storm-tangled forest. This period mystery, a re-make written in another era's English, highlights an important truism: the English language is a living creature, constantly evolving

Death Comes to Pemberley encourages me to reach for an old friend, my worn copy of Pride and Prejudice. I also found a copy of Innocent Blood, by P.D. James, circa 1980. Her characters are multidimensional, her story intrigues, yet doesn't terrify. I have another author to enjoy.  

A treat of a mystery, Death Comes to Pemberley,  is a connecting point between two genres: English crime novels and classic literature. It is a gateway book for fans of Austen, James, or both. I recommend a good dose of each for a well-rounded book-diet.

Happy reading.

Recently, Pulitzer Prize winner Jeffery Eugendies' third novel, The Marriage Plot, transported me to Regean-era America, where three Ivy League undergraduates are faced with the impending future; life after graduation.

A fan of Eugenides since The Virgin Suicides and a devotee of Middlesex, I almost expected to be disappointed, but this re-imagined love story is poignant, pertinent and far-reaching. 

In many ways Regan-eara America's economy and today's struggling economic circumstances are mirror images. Current college students undergo a heightened “what next” phenomena because they are not guaranteed a job after graduation.

Regardless of the state of the economy, life after college is a daunting task. College is only a petri-dish community, whether we are in 1980 or 2011, and the real world is just waiting to dash the idealists and raze the realists. Suddenly the neighbors who throw loud parties, the quarter-eating washing machines, and the vending-machine meals seem sweet and safe.

Eugenides' characters, Madeline, Leonard and Mitchell, are facing similar circumstances at the novel's onset as three Brown undergraduates on commencement day, facing an uncertain future. These characters come alive; they breathe across the pages. Their identities are undefined and their beliefs untested. Readers feel the wonder of spirituality, the danger of giving too much in romance and the breathless flush of unfolding sexuality.

The novel's title makes a direct connection with one of Eugenides' protagonists, Madeline,  whose senior thesis grapples with the roles of the “marriage plot” in modern novels. Drawing on authors like Jane Austen, Theodore Dreiser and the Brontes, Eugenides compares and contrasts the socially repressed Victorian Age to the socially sanctioned excess of the modern college experience.

Eugenides characters face mental-illness, religious disillusionment and enlightenment. They take the cliched post-graduation backpack through Europe, encountering debauchery, sex and feminism, eventually reaching convention in the post-graduation marriage.

However, unlike Austen-era works that inspired the novel's title, this story does not end with the culminating marriage, but continues after. With unflinching prose, Eugenides describes being robbed, both fiscally and of faith; his characters are humiliated and hurt, warped, and wonderfully human.

According to Madeline, the marriage plot was the driving force of the novel until 1900 when they both petered out.

The marriage plot works as a literary device only when conflict, and humor, with a wedding-cherry-topping, is readily consumed by the reading masses. According to Madeline, Dreiser ended the marriage plot with his novel, Sister Carrie, by sending the heroine, Carrie, through adultery with Drouet. From promiscuity Carrie fell to an unsanctioned marriage with Hurtwood and took a final flight to the Hollywood stage. When women began outwardly protesting the strictures of a male dominated world, the marriage plot commentary became unnecessary, uncouth, and essentially dead. 

As I read this book, I wondered whether Madeline's assertions were true; or was that Eugenides' point, that she wasn't?

Yes, a modern novel is a polaroid of current society; a frame frozen in time, one image of many lost and discarded potentials. Some modern novelists, like Jane Green or Anita Shreve, write about love inside divorce, infidelity and other untenable events; a modern woman's marriage plot. Granted, other modern novelists write political and social satire for maximum effect.

Was the original “marriage-plot” meant as an authentic plot-line, or as a good-humored poke at society?

The infamous Miss Austen ended her plots with flowers and wedding veils, even the clannish Brontes granted love to their suffering characters. However, Austen and the Brontes were not writing epistles to the gorgeous romance of their time. A modern reader might find Austen or a Bronte old-fashioned, sweet and breathtakingly romantic, in fact the stories are comedies akin to the naughty, sometimes mocking Shakespeare, whose plays were farces mimicking the cruelty and exaggerating the foolishness of high-society and social rules.

However, people read marriage-plot novels, continuing to read Austen and Bronte in schools and homes across the world. Could the marriage-plot-line really be dead if the classics, are still read, for all the high-handed, flowery language?

While hardly a classic, the already infamous Twilight saga is another a marriage-plot with attractive youth. Boy woos girl, boy declares his undead love, boy and girl live happily-ever-after, at least as the story is written. Therefore, not only are classic marriage-plots still read, but the literary device is still in employ.

Marriage creates drama; so does an engagement, a birth, promiscuity and a divorce. Life is drama, or a stage, as Shakespeare said. This enigmatic playwright from the heart of England knew that dramatic flair enhances entertainment. Video games, films and television are progressively more violent, with more desolate landscapes and heart-rending situations; these are forms of escape from reality, just like reading. As long as there is drama in entertainment, the marriage-plot won't go anywhere, even as the social landscapes inevitably change.

One unchangeable however is my vivid memory of studying the seven basic story plots in high school English. I also remember my teacher, a thirty-ish blonde in sensible heels and nylons, saying:

“ Seven plots or one, there are justifications for each. The question is, how detailed is the plot?”

Here Eugenides completely re-paints the marriage plot for today, a time when a woman's marriage is not planned between parents or necessitated by poverty, age and desperation. Men and women attend college together and enter the workforce together; women can file for divorce and men can stay at home raising children. Today a Jane Austen marriage still works for a nostalgic or  for word lovers. 

Stories are retold, in fact there is no story untold. Stories reflect life and humanity; a cycle of patterns. The marriage plot still exists, but the details are different; the shape of the pattern stays the same, but the colors change.

Welcome to Becky's Book Blog, where I share my love of books and reading with fellow bookaphiles! From bestsellers, to those who self-published; from shiny hardcovers and supple paperbacks to antiques, I enjoy them all. Reviews of new and upcoming titles, nods to nostalgia-bearing childhood favorites, musings on the future of the book--this blog is a goulash of books and book-related topics and is completely self-indulgent. This is what I really love doing; talking with people about books.

I never write in the first person; I like to develop friendships, (and readers inevitably become friends with the characters they read), slowly. Using words like, “I” and “you” create a current of false intimacy, suspending readers and characters in a haze-filled honeymoon period; a common lust of words and stories with no real truth established.

First person feels like an appropriate voice for a blog about books however, and I enjoy engaging with an imaginary thought-spar partner as I write. So here is a good piece of my truth: I believe in magic. Time travel, fairies, life if JFK was never assassinated...these all exist between the pages of books.

Books are magical; this is the truth that everything I write here is based on.  
Really, I should be grateful for the false sense of intimacy, because why else would someone care to read my opinions of books, especially after my declarations? Except I know that anyone who has let hours slip away while they read knows about the qualities of books, even if the word “magic” never touches their lips.

While hardly a literary expert, I am a devoted reader, I was converted, possibly, in the womb. My childhood was spent exploring the forests of Narnia, daydreaming in Green Gables with Anne, and playing along the banks of Plumb Creek. I befriended Betsy, Tacy and Tib in Deep Valley and imagined delicious feasts with Sara and Becky in Miss Minchin's cold attic.

My parents nurtured my love of books, and I responded by reading ravenously. I survived a sad orphanage with Jane Eyre, loved Francie Nolan's alcoholic father, and visited Lilliput with Gulliver. I adventured across New Orleans with Ignacious J. Reilly, and captured the castle with Cassie. I devoured whatever I could find about Egypt, the Pharaohs and the extensive gods, as well as anything ballet-related. In college I thrived on spirited debates recounting the symbolism of punctuation, and whether or not Kerouac needed to self-edit and female roles in literature.

Working in a bookstore, especially a charming independent like Bloomsbury, is amazing for a bookaphile like myself. The store's shelves are lined with friendly faces, like Janet Fitch's  White Oleander, mixed with exciting strangers, like Murakami's new IQ84. The best parts of my job include hearing about what other people are reading, what is coming out soon and which books received which awards. I love books and I want to share that love! So feel the love; and pass me my book.

Happy Reading!