dchaikin part 3 - where will I go after Chaucer?

I've finished The Canterbury Tales which wraps up Chaucer for me. I'm a little sad about this. Of course, I have more medieval plans along the way. But I'll miss Chaucer as much, I think, as I miss Dante, and those classic Greek playwrights. But, here's to moving on.

Currently Reading


Currently Listening to

My themes through the years, including 2024
Themes
2012 - old testament
2013 - old testament and Toni Morrison
2014 - old testament
2015 - old testament, Toni Morrison & Cormac McCarthy
2016 - Homer, Greek mythology, Greek drama, & Thomas Pynchon
2017 - Virgil, Ovid & Thomas Pynchon
2018 - Apocrypha, New Testament & Gabriel García Márquez
2019 - Rome to the Renaissance & James Baldwin & Willa Cather and Shakespeare
2020 – Dante, Nabokov, Willa Cather, Shakespeare
2021 - Petrarch, Vladimir Nabokov, Willa Cather, Shakespeare, the Booker longlists, 2020 & 2021 - added Edith Wharton
2022 – Boccaccio, Robert Musil, Wharton, Shakespeare, Anniversaries, the Booker longlists, 2021 & 2022
2023 – Chaucer, Richard Wright, Wharton, Booker longlists 2022 & 2023, Naturalisty
2024 – Chaucer and medieval stuff, Faulkner, Wharton, Booker longlists

Read in 2024

Part 1 books - links go to the review on my part 1 thread

1. **** Soldiers' Pay by William Faulkner (1926) (read Jan 1-7, theme: Faulkner)
2. *** Taft by Ann Patchett, read by J. D. Jackson (listened Dec 18 – Jan 10, theme: random audio)
3. **** How to Build a Boat by Elaine Feeney (read Jan 7-14, theme: Booker 2023)
4. **** The Return of Martin Guerre by Natalie Zemon Davis, read by Sarah Mollo-Christensen (listened Jan 18-22, theme: random audio)
5. **** Arturo's Island by Elsa Morante (read Jan 14-28, theme: TBR)
6. **** Whale by Cheon Myeong-Kwan, translated from Korean by Chi-Young Kim, read by Cindy Kay (listened Jan 17 – Feb 1, theme: random audio)
7. ***½ Mosquitoes by William Faulkner (read Jan 21 – Feb 7, theme: Faulkner)

Part 2 books - links go to the review on my part 2 thread

8. **** The Mother’s Recompense by Edith Wharton (read Feb 7-19, theme: Wharton)
9. **** Pearl by Siân Hughes (read Feb 14-22, theme: Booker 2023)
10. **** Hemingway and Faulkner in Their Time edited by Earl Rovit and Arthur Waldhorn (read Feb 18-25, theme: Faulkner)
11. ***** White Teeth by Zadie Smith, read by Lenny Henry, Pippa Bennett-Warner, Ray Panthaki & Arya Sagar (listened Feb 1-26, theme: random audio)
12. ***½ Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in Time by Penelope Lively (read Feb 23-29; theme: TBR)
13. **** The Brave Escape of Edith Wharton by Connie Nordhielm Wooldridge (read Mar 9, theme: Wharton)
14. **** Flags in the Dust by William Faulkner (read Mar 1-15, theme: Faulkner)
15. ****½ How to Say Babylon: A Memoir by Safiya Sinclair, read by the author (listened Feb 26 – Mar 21, theme: random audio)
16. ***½ A Dictator Calls by Ismail Kadare (read Mar 23-26, theme: Booker 2024)
17. **** The Details by Ia Genberg (read Mar 29-30, theme: Booker 2024)
18. **** Twilight Sleep by Edith Wharton (read Mar 16 – Apr 3, theme: Wharton)
19. **** Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck, read by Lisa Flanagan (listened Mar 21 – Apr 5, theme: Booker 2024)
20. ***** Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein (read Mar 30 – Apr 6, theme: Booker 2023)
21. ***½ The Silver Bone by Andrey Kurkov (read Apr 7-13, theme: Booker 2024)
22. ***½ A Brief History of Japan: Samurai, Shogun and Zen: The Extraordinary Story of the Land of the Rising Sun by Jonathan Clements, read by Julian Elfer (listened Apr 7-16, theme: random audio)
23. **** Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior (read Apr 13-19, theme: Booker 2024)

Part 3 books - links will go to the review on this thread

24. ***** The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer (read Dec 30, 2023 – Apr 27, 2024, theme: Chaucer)
25. ***** The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (read Apr 20-29, theme: Faulkner)
26. ***½ Lost on Me by Veronica Raimo, read by Carlotta Brentan (listened Apr 24-30, theme: Booker 2024)
27. ***** Western Lane by Chetna Maroo (read Apr 29 – May 3, theme: Booker 2023)
28. **** Undiscovered by Gabriela Wiener (read May 5-8, theme: Booker 2024)

Read in 2024, listed by year published
(links are touchstones)

1400 The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
1925 The Mother’s Recompense by Edith Wharton
1926 Soldiers' Pay by William Faulkner
1927
Mosquitoes by William Faulkner
Twilight Sleep by Edith Wharton
1929
Flags in the Dust by William Faulkner (complete version: 1973)
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
1957 Arturo's Island by Elsa Morante
1983 The Return of Martin Guerre by Natalie Zemon Davis
1994 Taft by Ann Patchett
2000 White Teeth by Zadie Smith
2004 Whale by Cheon Myeong-Kwan
2005 Hemingway and Faulkner in Their Time edited by Earl Rovit and Arthur Waldhorn
2010 The Brave Escape of Edith Wharton by Connie Nordhielm Wooldridge
2013 Ammonites and Leaping Fish: A Life in Time by Penelope Lively
2017 A Brief History of Japan by Jonathan Clements
2018 Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior
2020 The Silver Bone by Andrey Kurkov
2021
Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck
Undiscovered by Gabriela Wiener
2022
A Dictator Calls by Ismail Kadare
The Details by Ia Genberg
Lost on Me by Veronica Raimo
2023
How to Build a Boat by Elaine Feeney
Pearl by Siân Hughes
How to Say Babylon: A Memoir by Safiya Sinclair
Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
Western Lane by Chetna Maroo

my list again, as a quilt

books read this year


books listened to this year

Some stats:

2024
Books read: 28
Pages: 5404 ( 213 hrs )
Audio time: 83 hrs
Formats: audio 8; paperback 7; hardcover 7; ebooks 6;
Subjects in brief: Novels 21; Non-fiction 5; Classic 5; On Literature and Books 2; Memoir 2; History 2; Essays 1; Biography 1; Young Adult 1; Mystery 1; Poetry 1; Short Stories 1;
Nationalities: United States 10; England 6; Italy 2; Ireland 1; South Korea 1; Jamaica 1; Albania 1; Sweden 1; Germany 1; Canada 1; Ukraine 1; Brazil 1; Peru 1;
Books in translation: 9
Genders, m/f: 11/17
Owner: books I own 19; Library books 7; audible loan 2;
Re-reads: 0
Year Published: 2020’s 11; 2010’s 4; 2000’s 3; 1990’s 1; 1980’s 1; 1950’s 1; 1920’s 6; 1400’s 1;
TBR numbers: +17 (acquired 34, read from tbr 17)

All stats - since I started keeping track in December of 1990
Books read: 1348
Formats: Paperback 686; Hardcover 276; Audio 223; ebooks 125; Lit magazines 38
Subjects in brief: Non-fiction 518; Novels 454; Biographies/Memoirs 228; Classics 213; History 197; Religion/Mythology/Philosophy 138; Poetry 102; Journalism 98; Science 96; Ancient 76; On Literature and Books 71; Speculative Fiction 69; Nature 68; Essay Collections 53; Short Story Collections 51; Drama 48; Anthologies 47; Graphic 46; Juvenile/YA 35; Visual Arts 28; Mystery/Thriller 16; Interviews 15
Nationalities: US 749; Other English-language countries: 297; Other: 296
Books in translation: 232
Genders, m/f: 836/413
Owner: Books I owned 974; Library books 292; Books I borrowed 72; Online 10;
Re-reads: 27
Year Published: 2020’s 77; 2010's 280; 2000's 293; 1990's 184; 1980's 124; 1970's 62; 1960's 55; 1950's 36; 1900-1949 90; 19th century 21; 16th-18th centuries 38; 13th-15th centuries 14; 0-1199 21; BCE 55
TBR: 669

Recent milestones: 400th book by a female author

links to all my old threads:

2009 Part 1, 2009 Part 2, 2010 Part 1, 2010 Part 2, 2011 Part 1, 2011 Part 2, 2012 Part 1, 2012 Part 2, 2013 Part 1, 2013 Part 2, 2013 Part 3, 2014 Part 1, 2014 Part 2, 2014 Part 3, 2015 Part 1, 2015 Part 2, 2015 Part 3, 2016 Part 1, 2016 Part 2, 2016 Part 3, 2017 Part 1, 2017 Part 2, 2018 part 1, 2018 part 2, 2019 part 1, 2019 part 2, 2019 part 3, 2020 part 1, 2020 part 2, 2020 part 3, 2021 part 1, 2021 part 2, 2021 part 3, 2022 part 1, 2022 part 2, 2022 part 3, 2022 part 4, 2023 part 1, 2023 part 2, 2023 part 3, 2023 part 4, 2024 part 1, 2024 part 2

I adore your stats!

24. The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
edition: Broadview Editions, Second Edition, edited by Robert Boenig & Andrew Taylor (2012)
OPD: 1400
format: 503-page large paperback
acquired: April read: Dec 30, 2023 – Apr 27, 2024 time reading: 62:07, 7.4 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: Middle English Poetry theme: Chaucer
locations: on the road from London to Canterbury
about the author: Chaucer (~1342 – October 25, 1400) was an English poet and civil servant.

Appendix - short excerpts from each of these
- Saint Jerome, Against Jovinian (ce 400)
- Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy (ce 524)
- William Thorpe's Testimony on Pilgrimages (1407)
- Benedict of Canterbury, The Miracles of St. Thomas Becket (1170s)
- The Twelve Conclusions of the Lollards (1395)
      --> (Recorded by Dominican friar Roger Dymock for Richard II, when writing against them)
- Jean de Meun, The Romance of the Rose (1275)
      --> False Seeming & The Old Woman
- William Langland, Piers Plowman (1360s-80s)
      --> The Fair Field of Folk & The Friar
- Guillaume de Machaut The Judgment of the King of Navarre (1351)
      --> The Plague
- Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron (1353)
      --> The Black Death & Patient Griselda
- Jean Froissart, Chronicles (1400)
      --> The Black Death, Flagellants and Jews (1349), The Campaign of 1359, The Peasants' Revolt in England (1381), The Election of Henry IV (1399)
- The Anonimalle Chronicle, anonymous (1396-99)
      --> The Rising is Suppressed
- A Model Indulgence (1300)
- Rudolph of Schlettstadt, The Host and Libels against the Jews (1303)
- The Remedy against the Troubles of Temptation (late fourteenth century)
      --> An Exemplum about Despair
- The Tale of Beryn (1410-20)
      --> The Pilgrims Arrive at Canterbury and Visit the Shrine

Chaucer is tricky because he’s hard to read and his tales vary so much, they are hard to summarize or classify. There is a Boccaccio element to them, but it’s a very different experience. Like Boccaccio, one thing that stands out is Chaucer’s naughty stories – sex and farts and trickery, money and wealth often playing a central role. The plague also has a role. One of Chaucer's tales is about three youths who hunt for Death because he has killed so many, and tragically find what they’re looking for. But what makes Chaucer most stand out from Boccaccio are the tellers of the tales. In Boccaccio, the ten youths are all of a class and many of them blend together, hard to differentiate. Chaucer’s tale is a social mixture – good and bad, wealthy and common. They are each distinct, wonderfully distinct, so much so that they, the tellers, stand out way more in memory than the tales themselves. These characters come out in the story prologues and there is simply more creativity, more social commentary, more insight into this medieval world than anything the stories themselves can accomplish, no matter how good the stories are. The Merchant’s Tale, my favorite, includes many references and wonderful debate between Hades and Persephone, a battle of the sexes. But it doesn’t touch on the Wife of Bath’s 1000-line prologue on being a wife to five men and all the experiences and judgments and justifications within, it’s not even close. She’s the best, but the Miller comes in early, drunkenly inserting this tale of sex and fart jokes, and bringing the whole level of content down. The Miller says, "I wol now quite the Knightes tale!" The knight has just told a more proper Boccaccio-inspired tale. By "quiting", the Miller means he his giving him some payback, getting back at him. (His tale has thematic consistency, but with common characters, farts and sex.) And the Cook’s tale is so awfully improper that it hasn’t been preserved, or maybe Chaucer only wrote 50 lines. Later, the Cook will throw up and fall off his horse. The Canon’s Yeoman exposes his own canon’s alchemy and trickery, getting fired on the spot before he tells his tale. This is all quite terrific stuff in and of itself, a rowdy uncontrolled mixture of societal levels, and mostly humorous confrontations (notably in a post-plague era of social mobility).

The other thing Chaucer does that Boccaccio doesn’t do in the Decameron, is write in verse. This is special all by itself. If you have read excerpts of Chaucer, there's a fair chance that like me you have been bewildered by it. It’s a weird language, oddly drawn out, then oddly compressed, obscuring the meaning, jamming in a weird accent. It doesn't make for great quotes or easy visits. But if you get deep into it, focus hard on it, something happens. It becomes magical, inimical, and lush in sound and freedom, the random inconsistent spelling as beautiful as the random inconsistent and sometimes heavily obscured phrasing. It also becomes recognizable. The more you read it, the more sense it makes. Although I was never able to scan it. Show me a page of Chaucer, and I’m immediately lost in indecipherable letters. I have to begin to read it and find the flow before it comes to life.

I find it interesting, but not inappropriate, that when Chaucer is discussed, it’s almost always his opening lines that are quoted - Whan that Aprill with hise shoures soote/The droghte of March had perced to the roote/And bathed every veyne in swich liquor/Of which vertu engendered is the flour What’s interesting is that Chaucer really doesn’t write that beautifully anywhere else. His language is generally much tamer and less trying, the rhythm more casual.

Last year I read Troilus and Criseyde and was enraptured in the language. There is no question the language there is better than here. And is drawn out, as he stays with long monologues that go pages and pages, the reader lost in the rhythms. This here is just not quite like that. Yes, he gets carried away a lot. But it’s always a little jerky and bumpy. There are monologues, but these are story telling monologues, with quick-ish plots. While I liked staying in the Merchant’s Tale, the writing clearly elevated and interesting, it was not the same. But T&C is both made and limited by its singular story. The Canterbury Tales expands on its cacophony of voices. The stories for me actually fade. But the prologues leave such lush impressions, they are somehow so real, and charming and Discworld-ish, and uncontained. It’s a much more powerful thing in my head.

As many know, I read this every morning beginning with April’s shoures soote on January 1. And, with the exception of the prose tales, the Tale of Melibee and The Pardoner’s Tale, it was always the best part of my day. The same could be said for T&C last year. I’ll miss being lost in this. A really special experience, and special gift to English speakers and the language's history.

>8 janoorani24: thanks 🙂

Chaucer - take 2 - All 24 stories in a very brief descriptions. This might not be readable...

Fragment 1

1. The Knight's Tale: from Boccaccio’s Teseida, which is based on The Thebiad by Statius (40-96). Palamon and Arcite, two Theban brothers imprisoned in Athens, fall for the same Athenian princess and fight over her.

2. The Miller's Tale: He quites the Knight. John, a rich old carpenter of Oxford has a young wife Alisoun (age 18). His clerk, Nicholas, finds an elaborate way to sleep with here. This has the most famous fart joke. I think this is also from Boccaccio. Note the same theme of two men finagling over a young woman.

3. The Reeve Tale: Two students are cheated by a Miller. But when the Miller must board them, then end up sleeping with his wife and daughter and getting all their stuff back. I think this is also based on a Boccaccio story.

4. The Cook's Tale: In 48 lines we get a womanizing, gambling apprentice cook who is dismissed from his job.

Fragment 2

5. The Man of Law's Tale: How one lady, Custance, left adrift in a boat, converted England to Christianity. Has themes on suffering and spirituality.

Fragment 3

6. The Wife of Bath's Tale: A very long prologue, about 100 lines of difficult but wonderful stuff on good and bad aspects of marriage, or many marriages. The story is about a rapist knight who is saved by old maid and forced to marry her. She turns beautiful after the marry.

7. The Friar's Tale: A court Summoner makes a living by taking money by people who don't want to be summoned to court. He meets the devil and tries to show off to him, but ends up going to hell.

8. The Summoner's Tale: Offended, he quites the Friar with tale of bad Friar who searching for a donationg, gets a fart.

Fragment 4

9. The Clerk's Tale: A take on Boccaccio’s patient Griselda

10. The Merchant's Tale: Boccaccio's cuckold story with pear tree, which itself is based on Persian sources. Despite the lowly sex-theme, it's a very ambitiously written story with classical references, and drawn-out debate over the sexes 0between Hades and his captured wife Persephone.

Fragment 5

11. The Squire's Tale: a story from the court of Ghengis Khan, it devolves into a long sad story by a crow told to Ghengis Khan's daughter with crow, until it's cut off (by the Franklin)

12. The Franklin's Tale: A story of a happy marriage. And squire gets a pledge from the happy wife that if he removes all rocks from Brittany she will marry him. He does it, with magical clerk, but lets her off the hook.

Fragment 6

13. The Physician's Tale: A retelling of Livy's story of father who kills his daughter to keep her from a lustful judge.

14. The Pardoner's Tale: Another long prologue where the Pardoner's tells everyone how awful he is, and how he manipulates everyone to sell is indulgences. His story is of three young men who set out to kill death. They do find him. The plague lies under this tale.

Fragment 7

15. The Shipman's Tale: A monk Duan John uses a loan he doesn't have to pay to sleep with his friend's wife.

16. The Prioress's Tale: An elegant prologue to Mary is followed by an ugly story where Jews murder a faithful Christian boy for no reason.

17. The Tale of St. Tropas: Chaucer is the storyteller. Sir Thopas of Flanders is knight loved by maidens. He is chaste but in love with an elf-queen whom he has seen in a dream. Sir Olifaunt, a giant, tells him to ride off, since the elf-queen is nearby. The host cuts Chaucer off, saying the story is awful.

18. The Tale of Melibee: - Chaucer offers a prose tale instead. This is a story of a woman named Prudences who councils her husband on how to respond to the attack on his daughter, using wisdom and classical references. It's long and dull.

19. The Monk's Tale: A collection of short tragedies

20. The Nun's Priest's Tale: This is from Marie de France, the Romance of Renard. It's a fable where a cock Chauntecleer, is captured by fox trying to show off to his favorite hen, Pertelote. (Apparently, it's a lot more complex than that, but I missed all that.)

Fragment 8

21. The Second Nun's Tale: This has a prologue with a translation of Dante's prayer to Mary. The story is the martyrdom of St. Cicilia in Rome.

22. The Canon's Yeoman Tale: Another great prologue. The Yeoman meets Chaucer's party and tells of his boss, a Canon who cons people with false alchemy. The Canon rides up after him, fired him and runs away. Then the Yeomen tells his tales of alchemy.

Fragment 9

23. The Manciple's Tale: Here in the prologue the cook throws up and falls off his horse. The story is from Ovid and tells Apollo. A crow informs Apollo his wife is cheating on him. Apollo curses the crow.

Fragment 10:

24 The Parson's Tale: A prose guide to penance. This was 7.5 hours of dull reading for me, and a downer end. I imagine it made Chaucer feel better.

The tales end with Chaucer's retraction

There are 29 members of Chaucer's pilgrimage, but only 22 give tales, plus the Canon's Yeoman who joins them later. The seven who don't give tales are the Knight's Yeoman, the Haberdasher, the Carpenter, the Webbe (weever), the Dyer, the Tapycer (tapestry maker), and the Plowman.

Wow you should be proud of yourself to acheive this goal. Tho I bet its unsettling to finish....now what? Im sure youll find it

>12 cindydavid4: next, a few days off, then Silence: A Thirteenth-Century French Romance by Heldris de Cornuälle

>11 dchaikin: Happy new thread, and congratulations on completing your reading of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. It's a tremendous project, and I have enjoyed following you on the journey and reading your comments. It has been a special experience for you, certainly, but it is so nice that you shared it with all of us as well.

I recently read about this book and thought of you, especially since you found the Wife of Bath so interesting. Marion Turner, a professor of English at Oxford, has written a book about the Wife of Bath specifically, which was published last year by Princeton University Press. It won several awards, and might be of interest (apologies if you've come across it already).

Marion Turner - The Wife of Bath: A Biography

>9 dchaikin: Thanks for your fantastic review, Dan, and congratulations on passing this milestone. It’s such a testimony to Chaucer’s gift to the world that he should still be so enjoyable 1000+ years later. What to read after Chaucer is a great question. (Have you read Malory’s Morte D’Arthur?)

>14 rv1988: thanks! I read Marion Turner’s biography of Chaucer but not of The Wife of Bath. I’ve heard of it but been a little hesitant. Maybe it’s time I check it out.

>15 dianelouise100: I have not read Malory! I’ve thought about pursuing and Arhurian theme. It definitely interests me. But i haven’t planned anything yet. By the way, I’m still enjoying The Sound and the Fury, but Benjy’s section was easily my favorite.

>9 dchaikin: Congratulations on completing your quest!

>9 dchaikin: I’ve enjoyed so much reading about your Chaucer reading. Congratulations on finishing it!

>17 rhian_of_oz:, >18 FlorenceArt: thanks guys!

>9 dchaikin: What an achievement! Congratulations. I’ve enjoyed tagging along (and I really enjoyed this post).

Congratulations on your achievement 🙌. Well done 😍.

I'm impressed too! And just think, you'll never have to start a sentence with "Well, I've never read Chaucer, but..."

Congrats on finishing the Chaucer project! I'm always so in awe of your reading projects and themes.

Congrats too on reading your "400th book by a female author"!

>20 rachbxl: >21 Ameise1: >22 lisapeet: >23 mabith: wow, thanks all.

>22 lisapeet: That's funny. Might have been a missed opportunity.

>24 labfs39: ah, someone noticed! #400 was Arturo's Island by Elsa Morante

>1 dchaikin: >9 dchaikin: I'm going to miss your Chaucer too, but given your projects to date, I'm looking forward to whatever comes next.

>26 SassyLassy: thanks. I miss my Chaucer mornings.

25. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
OPD: 1929
format: 348 pages within an ebook anthology: William Faulkner: Novels 1926-1929: Soldiers' Pay / Mosquitoes / Flags in the Dust / The Sound and the Fury
acquired: January 1 read: Apr 20-29 time reading: 12:22, 2.1 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: Classic stream of consciousness novel theme: Faulkner
locations: Mississippi 1928 and near Harvard in Cambridge, MA, 1910
about the author: 1897-1962. American Noble Laureate who was born in New Albany, MS, and lived most of his life in Oxford, MS.
,
I really just want to talk about the opening Benjy section.

I'll hold off a moment for context. This is the story of Caddie Compson, but typically for Faulkner so far, she doesn't get any say. We get the story first through each of her three brothers, in three sections, all stream of conscious, then from a 3rd-person narrator in the last section. Caddie is always off screen, her childhood, pregnancy, divorce, and separation from her daughter. The rest of family, and its five or six black servants, collapse in on themselves and their sense of pride and privilege. It's also a story of a family's dissolution.

That opening section, from Benjy. He's mute and mentally compromised and can only moan. When the book opens, it's his 33rd birthday and he's cared for by a charmingly inept young black servant, Luster, who must constantly manage him, and who feeds him. But Benjy observes everything. He watches and feels and can't interact or even express his feelings. He's like a reader.

Benjy also mixes timelines. When you open this book, you can vaguely sift out golf in the distance, but suddenly Luster is gone and there are other people around and Benjy seems different. It's confusing and can be frustrating. Timelines are changing, but how? What is what? When is when? Confused and intrigued I looked up some guidance online and got this very simple set of guidelines

1. Pay attention to Benjy's caretaker. When Versh is taking care of Benjy, he is around 3 to 5 years old. When it's T.P., Benjy is a teenager. When it's Luster, Benjy is 33
2. There are two Quentins - Benjy's suicidal brother and his promiscuous niece.
3. Bengy is named Maury at birth, after his uncle, but his mother insists that they change it after discovering his mental disability.

So I had read 30 pages, amused and confused. After this, I went back to the beginning, and what I got was magical. Some of the best reading I've ever had. Benjy floats through time, weaving the present and various times in the past in meaningful ways. He catches everything essential, and much that is beautiful and he senses all this. He becomes somehow a warm beautiful character, even though we can't really know his character. But we know his condition.

The rest of this book is fine. Quentin, the boy, wanders around Harvard tortured. Jason is a monster. Dilsey, the main black house servant, is a hero of the book. For all the racism in Faulkner's other books, you can't help but adore all his black characters here. But Dilsey has a resolution and accidental warmth that stands out, notably in contradiction to the overly-proud dissolving family she serves.

This was a nice step into Faulkner's best stuff. I loved the book, and was enraptured by the Benji section.

26. Lost on Me by Veronica Raimo
reader: Carlotta Brentan
OPD: 2022 translation: from Italian by Leah Janeczko (2023)
format: 4:55 Libby audiobook (224 pages in paperback)
acquired: Library loan listened: Apr 24-30
rating: 3½
genre/style: autobiographical fiction theme: Booker 2024
locations: contemporary Rome
about the author: An Italian writer, translator, and screenwriter, born in Rome in 1978

My sixth from the internation Booker longlist. I've liked them all, including this one, but oddly haven't really taken to any yet. Add this one to the list. It has its appeal. It's curious and gives us some things to think about, although she certainly doesn't openly acknowledge that.

This is chatty memoir of growing up in Rome and becoming a single writer. It has a surface that I'm uncomfortable with - it might be charming if it weren't so affected. And maybe it is charming. But what's strange to me is the indifferent lying, and unreflective irreverence, almost disdain, for integrity. This is autobiographical. But our narrator makes it a point up front that she lies freely, without any clear reason, without worrying about it. Which means that we should take note that our narrator probably lies to us constantly. We should accept this. Everything is a story with an embellishment or completely made up. Every story she tells us consistently has her lying about something to somebody, sometimes more important than other times.

What does it mean? What is it all for? And if these lies don't mean anything, why does she spend so much time dwelling on them?

We get story of a girl growing up with an older genius brother who sleeps in the upper bunk and reaches down to hold her hand all night so that she can sleep. A girl who sleeps in her grandfather's bed and sees her grandmother as a stranger made up to watch TV alone. A girl who can't answer the question, "What can you do?" in her twenties. A girl who tries to tell us she had years of teenage sex without realizing what it was. Who isn't married, recently split with her long-term boyfriend, aborted her only pregnancy in her mid-30's. And who writes, as does her brother. A grown nearly middle-aged woman, not a girl, living alone, who misses her father and grandfather, both deceased.

So I guess I'm puzzling this. I appreciate the Rome-ish sense of rapid-fire irreverence, and I wonder at that inability for our narrator to look at anything straight. It's always distorted. How can she see anything?

This is a quick fast read, for anyone interested.

>29 dchaikin: This actually interests me despite your slightly negative review, and especially as it’s on audio. I hadn’t noticed this on the international Booker longlist, possibly because I have difficulty reading lists now. It’s only $8 on Audible so I’ll probably just buy it. There’s a 16 week wait at my NYPL. We can only have three holds there as well and I don’t want to knock any off.

>30 kjuliff: well, my post may exhibit a misguided confidence. Right after posting i read the othet LT review which observes “ Vero … use(s) storytelling and lies as an escape”. I hadn’t really understood that. Makes sense. And demands some rethinking.

I hope you get a chance to try it out. I’m curious on other takes.

>31 dchaikin: After your last post I read the other review. I’ll definitely be reading the book now and I’ll be in a better position perhaps to understand it. It’s often hard to understand humor in a different culture.

I'm so glad you were so taken with The Sound and the Fury--I think it's my favorite Faulkner. Tales of the Compton family continue in Absalom, Absalom.

I'm also glad you loved The Sound and the Fury. It was my first Faulkner novel and I read it in high school! I had zero idea what was going on during Benjy's section - no internet to look anything up! I was so confused by the male and female Quentins.

Like you, I love Benjy's section (especially upon rereading - I think I've read it 3 or 4 times now), but I'm also a Quentin fan. If/when you read Absalom, Absalom his story is continued.

>28 dchaikin: Well, nuts. I have actively resisted reading Faulkner for my entire life and, based on your review, I went and bought a copy of The Sound and the Fury today.

>32 kjuliff: i did think about the humor while listening to Lost on Me. It’s mainly in her tone, how she says it. So it’s always there, just didn’t quite work for me (in translation).

>33 arubabookwoman: wow. Your favorite. But… then it’s all downhill the rest of the way?! I’ll get to Absalom! Absalom!

>34 japaul22: I had no idea you were such a Faulkner reader. 3 or 4 times is impressive and sounds interesting. I think I could see reading Bengy over and over. And I’ll be happy to spend more time with Quentin.

>35 RidgewayGirl: I have such mixed feelings. I’m so flattered by that, really, thanks. But, goodness, what if you hate it? But, more seriously, give Bengy two tries. One to stumble and then one to just experience it.

>28 dchaikin: I’ve been meaning to read Faulkner for a while, and The Sound and the Fury sounds really tempting now. Thanks for the great review.

>29 dchaikin: Interesting review. I put it on my library list.

I'm no Faulkner expert, but reading him in high school really opened up my eyes to inventive formats in literature. I've only read about five of his novels, and I've read most of the Blotner biography and one other nonfiction work about him. But almost all of that happened before I joined LT. I still have a few of his novels on my shelf that I haven't read yet. Maybe soon.

I’m glad The Sound and the Fury worked for you! It’s the first of his “great” novels, at least 4 or 5 outstanding works. So not downhill at all! (Not all uphill, either, though…remember the Snopes trilogy)

Just checking in on your new thread. Goodness you've been busy, both with your reading, your great in-depth reviews and the conversations they've inspired. Great going! My reading this year has been mostly either rather obscure or pretty lowbrow: baseball histories and 1940s murder mysteries and such. See ya around the bookstall!

Sorry all, traveling. Saw my daughter this weekend and even made City Lights (in San Francisco)…than had dim sum around the corner.

>37 FlorenceArt: Ts&tF should work as well in French. Thanks.

>38 Ameise1: oh good. 🙂

>39 japaul22: funny how invisible pre-LT is. The all sounds rewarding. Which have you read? What’s calling you?

>40 dianelouise100: good good good. 🙂 Looking forward to As I Lay Dying

>41 rocketjk: tis the season to read baseball books. (Unless, perhaps, your team opens 12-22)

>No, not all downhill from here. You've got several more that I love to look forward to (besides Absalom, Absalom which is also a favorite along with Sound and Fury). These include Light in August, Intruder in the Dust, and As I Lay Dying. While I liked The Snopes Trilogy, I liked all of these better.

>43 arubabookwoman: That looks like a good short-list. As I Lay Dying will be next. And thanks for the encouragement.

April



Those are the 18 books I've bought on or since my birthday, thoroughly destroying my buy-to-read balance. Not A River finally arrived last week, at its US release day. Simpatia was actually bought in May, but I'll leave it in there. I bought it at City Lights in San Francisco. :) Up until these, I've been trying to buy only as many books as I read, for, I think, four years now... well 3 years and 3 months. Some of these are for the 2024 Booker International longlist, several are from talking about Booker books on the Booker Prize run facebook group. The Blue Flower is there because it infamously did not make the Booker long or short lists. Booker listed books include Not A River, Undiscovered, Simpatia, Master George, Hotel Du Lac, Midnight's Children, and, I think, There but for the. Also my themes - Faulker and Chaucer contemporaries.

I also read some books in April - actually it was a terrific reading month. I finally finished Canterbury Tales and now miss it. And I gave five stars to two other books - Study for Obedience and the unexpectedly fantastic classic, The Sound and the Fury. For the month I read 54 hours (not bad), listened to 27 hours (also good), and finished 9 books, 3 on audio.

May plans are...well, it's already May 11... But anyway, I will finish The Children by Edith Wharton. I've already read Western Lane by Chetna Maroo (another five stars!) and Undiscovered by Peruvian author Gabriela Wiener. I'm in the early part of Roman de Silence, a 13th-century Arthurian romance written in Old French verse. I'm reading in translation, and it's quick and charming, much like the lais of Mary de France. And I'm in the early part of Asphodel by H.D. This is written such that a "paragraph" is a block of text filled with all sorts of stuff, including entire conversations, 1st and 3rd person narrative (of the same person), commentary, and playful lazy classical references. It's fun, but slow. I'm trying to adapt. Hopefully I will also get to The Years by Annie Ernaux and my next Faulkner, As I Lay Dying

>45 dchaikin: I'm glad you loved Western Lane. It's a quiet book and with so much being unspoken, it sometimes is dismissed as trifling and I'm still thinking about it despite having read it a year ago.

And that is a very nice stack of books!

27. Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
OPD: 2023
format: 151-page hardcover
acquired: December read: Apr 29 – May 3 time reading: 3:48, 1.5 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: Contemporary Fiction theme: Booker 2023
locations: contemporary London and Edinburgh
about the author: A British Indian author born in Kenya, who lives in London.

A novel of wonderful rhythmic hypnotic prose. It took me a few sittings, but I found myself swept up in Gopi's world of grief and squash.

This is an unassuming novel on a grieving family of Jains in England. Jainism is an Indian religion akin to Hinduism, Sikhism, and even Buddhism. Their religious emphasis is non-violence and vegetarianism, none of which plays a direct role in the story. But the father takes pains to let his Pakistani friend know they are Jains, and so, different.

Sorry, where was I? The family is a dad and three very close sisters grieving over the recent loss of their mother. Her death hit the whole family hard and they try to make do. Dad is an electrician, so he has an income but not a big one. The older girls pick up some chores. And then Dad gets them into squash, more and more, eventually several hours a day. But while the older girls slowly back out of this training, the youngest daughter, Gopi, embraces it, taking to the sounds and rhythms of the play and the game flow and its strategies. She and her father watch the best squash players on a video cassette and discuss them. She is 11.

The entire book revolves around her world of squash, and her family's grieving. And while i knew to look for the rhythm, I didn't find it at first. For a bit it was just a regular book, and I set it aside a few days. Then I picked it up a four-hour flight and found myself deeply into it before I noticed the prose rhythms behind it. Yes, it's a nice story. But the telling is captivating. I got emotional in all the emotional spots. I fully bought in, sometimes slowing myself down so I could remember the reading, instead of the rush to finish. I was sad to finish.

>46 RidgewayGirl: ha, you posted that as I was finishing my review. I have seen some of those dismissive comments about Western Lane and they made me anxious they were right. But I don't think those readers appreciated what Maroo was able to do with this text, how well she works in the rhythm and flow, changes it, redirects, really carries the reader along with a rich text. As a story, of course, it's very simple and straightforward. But I loved reading it. And I'm glad you're still thinking about it.

So, Western Lane finishes the 2023 Booker longlist for me. I've been reading the longlist since 2019 and this was a really good year in the small window. Nothing terrible, no weird or questionable entries. I gave five stars to four different books. I really liked that there was a lot of value given to poetic prose, not purple, but poetic and rhythmic and reflection-generating. Many of the authors are also published poets, and it shows.

Here's my Booker 2023 summary.

My five-star reads
1. Study for Obedience** by Sarah Bernstein (Canada)
2. Prophet Song** by Paul Lynch (Ireland)
3. In Ascension* by Martin Macinness (Scotland)
4. Western Lane** by Chetna Maroo (England - Kenya-born British Indian)

Other fantastic reads - still highly recommended
5. The House of Doors* by Tan Twan Eng (Malaysia)
6. All the Little Bird-Hearts* by Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow (England)
7. How to Build a Boat** by Elaine Feeney (Ireland)
8. Pearl** by Siân Hughes (Wales)

Great reads - still recommended
9. This Other Eden** by Paul Harding (USA)
10. A Spell of Good Things by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀ (Nigeria)
11. Old God's Time* by Sebastian Barry (Ireland)

Good, but mixed - YMMV
12. The Bee Sting by Paul Murray (Ireland)
13. If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery (USA - Jamaican descent)

-----
* means I really liked the prose style and it has a really nice rhythm to it
** means I thought the prose was poetic in spirit

So many enticing titles! I thought I wouldn't enjoy Western Lane because of the sports theme and so didn't dig any further, but it looks like it might be worth a try.

>45 dchaikin: What an interesting stack of books. Never mind the ratio.

>47 dchaikin: A lovely review. I've had my eye on this book, I'm glad you liked it.

>45 dchaikin: Hooray for supporting book publishing!

So many great books on your thread, both read and to-be-read. I'm glad the International Booker treated you well this year.

>50 Dilara86: i can recommend Western Lane. I don’t know anything about squash and it didn’t hinder me at all. It’s about reading other people.

>51 rv1988: thanks for your blessing on damning my ratio. 🙂 i hope you get to and enjoy Western Lane

>52 labfs39: yes, i know, my limits are counter to helping writers. 😕 So I’m happy to help a little. I’m mixed on the international booker this year but i’ve read only about half the longlist. The main Booker list was fantastic. I don’t imagine 2024 will be able to compete. (In case anyone is confused: The Booker prize are for books for living authors who publish in original English in the UK over a specified year. The living author part probably eliminates Paul Auster’s and Cormac McCarthy’s latest from 2024. The International Booker is for translation to English. For books translated into English and published in the UK over a specified year.)

>53 dchaikin: Sorry, I meant I was glad the Booker treated you well this year, but wrote the International Booker.

>54 labfs39: I thought maybe that was it. But was afraid to assume. :)

Nice review of Western Lane, Dan. Congratulations on finishing the 2023 Booker Prize longlist!