Moon Tiger

2016 Reading Challenge ✔️ A book I've been meaning to read

I'm a sucker for books that take part (partly at least) during WWII in North Africa, that are about aged characters looking back over their lives, and that play with various characters' perspectives. Lively did that particularly well--the vignettes went organically from one character to another, never feeling like just a device. Also, Lively is great at saying a lot with few words, she's funny, and smart--yet none of that ever seems to get in the way of the book.

I read this for book group. Usually the best discussions are for books that some of us like and some hate. Not this time. We had a great discussion, and unusually for us, everyone loved it.

On a personal note, this show more book also reminded me of the beauty of novels, the way you, as the reader, sometimes find something in a book that seems to especially speak to you. This was one of those times. Again and again, I found myself thinking of my grandmother, who in most ways was absolutely nothing like Claudia. But there was something there, just the same, that connected me. show less

36. Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively
reader: Ruth Urquhart
published: 1987
format: 7:51 audible audiobook (224 pages in paperback)
acquired: July 14
listened: Jul 15-29
rating: 5
locations: Cairo 1942, England and Massachusetts
about the author: English author born Cairo in 1933, who moved to England in 1945.

I really enjoyed this. It's smart, fun, moving, thoughtful, with sweeping history and terrific language, and I stumbled across it by accident, making it all the more of all of that.

I found it looking, indecisively, for audiobooks, trying samples. This sample begins with a the narrator telling me, roughly, "my John Aubrey is not your John Aubrey." And actually that was enough for me the pick the book. I stopped the sample there. The narrator show more is Claudia, lying in a hospital bed, dying, and writing a history of the world. Claudia is everything that proper, intellectual England English can do to raise one above the rest of humanity. Arrogant, narcissistic, brilliant, elegant, separate, and full of information. And she tells of her life, a lost father a World War I, working as a war reporter during World War II, a defier of all gender conventions and limitations. Early in the book she is dragged across the pond by her brother, a Harvard professor, and visits a recreation of the original Plymouth settlement, with character actors playing the time period and answering visitor questions. Claudia begins to warn these confused actors all their consequences, of all the American future flaws, begging them not to be so greedy as to import slaves. It's a scene worth the book.

But actually the heart of this book takes place over a brief period in Cairo, in 1942, on the brink of El Alamein, where the book turns romantic and builds in many details of Penelope Lively's own life. Lively was born to an expat British family in Cairo, and lived there until Rommel threatened in 1942, when she was about twelve. Her childhood experience seems to have struck a nerve.

This book breathes history. The way Lively/Claudia undermines it, plays with it, toys with the philosophy of it - all with extreme arrogance, adds another wonderful color to already terrific novel. One of my best audiobook experiences.

2021
https://www.librarything.com/topic/333774#7570831 show less

I have to admit that this has been a difficult book to reconcile myself with. Not only did the premise of reading about an elderly woman on her deathbed sound a little depressing but our main protagonist neither said nor did very much to endear me throughout the initial few chapters.

Claudia Hampton is a 76 year old woman; terminally ill and compiling her 'History of the World', a history that quickly descends into reminiscing about her life, the people within it, and the events that have shaped her. Throughout the sporadic retelling of her history, which occurs quite naturally and not necessarily chronologically as she slips in and out of consciousness, we meet significant characters and are transported through two world wars, the stark show more desert landscape of a besieged Egypt and an earth shattering romance to the present day to observe a strained and awkward daughter, a self-absorbed lover and a tortured, Hungarian artist visiting her bedside.

Although I struggled to get along with Claudia at first, upon reflection I get the feeling that Lively has quite deliberately created a woman who the reader isn't necessarily going to warm to right away. Why, after all, should we always been indulged like children and feel comfortable with every character we encounter? As a professional (albeit controversial) historian and war correspondent, she is a strong, opinionated, compelling character whose ramblings betray some intriguing points of view. On the other hand, I found her to be obnoxious, arrogant, self-centered, cold and superior, meaning that I spent the first few chapters wondering exactly why I should care about her life at all!

That aside, Lively did a fairly good job at crawling back some of my compassion, although her (almost) mother-like relationship with Lazlo didn't quite do it, her passionate relationship with Tom, an officer fighting out in the desert in Egypt during WWII, certainly did. In this short portion of the book we could almost be reading the internal thoughts of a completely different woman; soft, loving and refreshingly vulnerable.

It is very difficult to really adore a book when you can't completely sympathise with characters or situations (e.g. I found her relationship with her brother Gordan to be a little disturbing, you'll have to read the book to learn more!) but I do relish a challenge and I do admire strong female characters. Do persevere with this book. It is very well-written, quite compelling and does create a bit of conflict in your mind. And if you persevere for just one thing, stick it out for the end. The final chapter contains some of the most beautiful and poignant passages I have read over the past couple of years. Claudia's honest approach to both her situation and the legacy she will leave behind is both admirable and thought-provoking. show less

Claudia Hampton's life is drawing to a close, drifting softly away to smoke and ash like a burning mosquito repellent coil, the Moon Tiger of the title...the symbol of a brief intense period of her life when love was the glowing eye at its center. As Claudia slips in and out of consciousness her mind is occupied with "writing" her autobiography. Her memories and musings of past affairs and other attachments are interspersed with vignettes from the point of view of some of the players in her story. Claudia was a war correspondent; a writer of popular history; an independent, not entirely likeable person whether seen from her own perspective or that of family, lovers or friends. And yet, her life makes quite compelling reading. At the show more end, we regret her failed relationships, the loss of her one great passion, and the falling of that last bit of ash only slightly less than she does herself. show less

Summary: Claudia Hampton, acclaimed author of texts on Cortez and Napoleon and fiercely independent, claims she will write a history of the world in her dying days. As she contemplates the content of her magnum opus, she traces her life (in no way chronologically) through its triumphs and tragedies.

While I struggled with this in the way I expected to (in that it required concentration and a notepad), the writing is truly exquisite. Lively has a brilliant touch with words and I am pleasantly unsurprised that this won the Booker in 1987 (I loathed the 1997 winner, The God of Small Things).

Claudia is a fabulous character. She is feisty, combative, contrary, intelligent and full of feminine wiles. She would sail through life, but that would show more be too easy. So she takes a lover in Cairo, and again in London. She raises a daughter who is so far removed from her as to be genetically improbable. She is very close to her brother Gordon - their sibling love and rivalry spans war and marriage. His wife seems terrible to all onlookers, yet given the narrative is sensible and sympathetic. Gordon is Claudia's alter ego and thus doesn't need the narrative to express himself. Claudia has terrible relationships with women throughout: flouting her mother's wishes, confused by and ignoring her daughter, apathetic towards her flatmate in Cairo. Reminded me of the fraught mother-daughter-son-in-law issues in the only other Penelope Lively I've read, Heatwave.

Some of Claudia's sparkle, just from the first few pages (I could easily end up quoting the whole book!):

"eclecticism has always been my hallmark"

"a kaleidoscopic view might be an interesting heresy" (when planning a non-chronological history of the world, which is what we are given in her thoughts about her life)

"my seventeenth century is not yours" - I don't quite know what to make of this. Her point is that our perception is coloured by our experiences thus far in life. I'm not sure.

Lively hits on a fascinating idea - the body as a unreliable record of history. Claudia's body records that she has given birth, that she has lost her appendix, yet her losses in love have left no physical scars. She certainly shows a vulnerability to love which is unexpected given her prickliness in the rest of the novel: "It's not you I'm afraid of, it's how I feel." We are treated to beautiful vignettes through her Hungarian foster son (of sorts): the story of how he stole into Kensington Gardens to cut her a bunch of daffodils takes 3 lines and yet stays with the reader.

I was left a little non-plussed by the ending. She receives her sweetheart's diary and quotes it, but the diary isn't as emotional as I had imagined, given his last words. We then return to the nursing home for Claudia's last moments, but they are uneventful and anticlimactic. Hence this beautiful short novel (206 pages) loses one point, but while I don't feel evangelical about it, I would recommend it as a gentle, peaceful read with a magnificent central character.

(from my blog: http://readingfuelledbytea.typepad.com/blog/2011/01/moon-tiger-penelope-lively-9... ) show less

“A history of the world, yes. And in the process, my own. The Life and Times of Claudia H. The bit of the twentieth century to which I’ve been shackled, willy-nilly, like it or not. Let me contemplate myself within my context: everything and nothing. The history of the world as selected by Claudia: fact and fiction, myth and evidence, images and documents.”

Protagonist Claudia, age seventy-seven, lies in a London hospital bed, dying of cancer. She is sifting through memories. Born in 1910, she pursues a career in journalism and history, going against the societal expectations of a woman of her era. Through flashbacks, flashforwards, and multiple points of view, the reader learns the story of Claudia’s life. She has an early show more incestual bond with her brother. She falls in love with a soldier while on assignment in Africa during WWII. She experiences turbulent relationships with family and lovers.

Claudia is an independent woman who has lived life on her own terms. She has made some decisions she regrets. I particularly enjoyed the vivid scenes in Africa, where the emotional core of the novel lies. I think the author does a great job of portraying the way memories come in fragments, lead to other memories, then circle back. Themes include love, loss, time, mortality, and memory. It is subtle, meditative, and sad. I can see why this book won the Booker Prize in 1987.

“Death is total absence, you said. Yes and no. You are not absent so long as you are in my head. That, of course, is not what you meant; you were thinking of the extinction of the flesh. But it is true; I preserve you, as others will preserve me. For a while.”

4.5 show less

Nearing the end of her illustrious life, Claudia Hampton decides that her final work as a historian should be to write the history of the entire world. While she may not achieve this lofty goal, Claudia succeeds in providing the history of her own life. Lively uses her narrator's profession to great advantage, and the novel is comprised of Claudia's ruminations on her past told in the first person, as well as glimpses of her experiences told in third person. Her philosophies about history--which permit both anachronisms and fictionalization--dictate the manner in which her life story unfolds. Claudia informs us, "I've always thought a kaleidoscopic view might be an interesting heresy. Shake the tube and see what comes out. Chronology show more irritates me." Her other assessment, that she is "a myriad Claudias who spin and mix and part like sparks of sunlight on water," also provides the framework for which the story will be told, and is representative of the poetic tone Lively uses throughout the novel.

The majority of the novel recounts Claudia's experiences as a journalist in Egypt during World War II, where she engages in a fondly-remembered romance with a soldier named Tom. With the exception of the unusually close bond she shares with her brother Gorden, most of the other events and interactions in Claudia's life--however exciting and life-altering--pale in comparison to her love for Tom. Her relationship with her daughter, Lisa, is strained, probably because two of Claudia's most admirable traits--professional ambition and wanderlust--result in frequent absences from the child's life. Although her relationship with Jasper, Lisa's father, is amicable and provides one of the few constants in Claudia's life, it lacks the intensity she feels with Tom. As her life draws to an end, Claudia considers the separateness of the past and present, while not discounting the former's everlasting influence.

While the temporal and narrative shifts are initially confusing, they work well within the greater concept of the novel, and it is interesting to watch Claudia's life unfold from the "kaleidoscopic" view. Occasionally, a scene narrated by Claudia will then be told in the third person, with slightly different details, adhering to the notion that history is never free of fiction. Lively's narrator is witty and amusing, albeit distant and abrasive to those around her. She's seldom apologetic or regretful which, strangely, seems to make her more likable. Claudia does not try to drive people away for the sake of being icy or vindictive, it is simply part of her nature to give precedence to her own pursuits. (As I was reading, Katharine Hepburn came to mind. Claudia would have been right at home in Hepburn's repertoire of unconventional, fiercely independent wartime heroines.) show less