All the leaves are off the trees now, but the woods near our house are blanketed with leaves that remind me of this painting everytime I go by.

Autumn (1877) Winslow Homer, 1836-1910 National Gallery of Art, Washington

       
Having now read A Closed Eye, I have only one of Anita Brookner’s 24 novels left to read. Hopefully the prolific 82-year old Brookner will keep writing, but as her output slows (she no longer writes a novel a year) I have come to a certain pre-emptive peace with the reality that it can’t go on forever. One of the reasons for my sanguinity is that her shortish novels are all so packed with nuance and emotion that they seem like the perfect books for re-reading.

I have often commented that I am not so good at distinguishing between Brookner’s novels. On the surface they all seem to be very similar. Inevitably the characters are loners who seem to get a sort of exquisitely painful pleasure out of their self-imposed isolation and their inability to connect emotionally with those around them. They all speak at least a little French, usually have flats in London, spend the majority of their time walking the streets, and seem to be waiting for sleep and/or death.

All of these things are present in A Closed Eye, yet I think it is the most different of all Brookner’s novels. Protagonist Harriet Lytton rages against the inertia of life like no other Brookner character in my memory. But true to Brookner’s fach, Harriet’s rage is silent and largely unacted upon. So intensely does she want her daughter Imogen to capture all the life she herself has missed that she fails to do anything about her own situation. She accepts, in fact encourages (albeit silently), Imogen becoming spoiled, self-centered, and insufferably intolerant of her. And although, like most other Brookner heroines, Harriet’s life is once of complacency, surrounded by death and depression and feelings of helplessness and hopelessness, she does at least have old school friends that form a support network. And Harriet makes at least one bold move that separates her from the typical Brookner model. And in the end–so subtle that one could miss it–there is a glimmer of hope.

There is something about these bleak books that not only fascinate me but comfort me as well. I recognize that there is something about the isolation that I find alluring. But I have opined before that I am also drawn to these characters because they are cautionary tales. Perfect examples of what I don’t want to become. A typically bleak scene:

Suddenly there was nothing for her to do. Freddie ate lunch out, so she made do with a sandwich. She could have taken a long walk, for in the early days of her marriage she had keenly regretted her lost liberty, but now that she was older she preferred to stay indoors and look out of the window. There was little to see in the quiet square; few people passed, and if she saw anyone she knew she retreated instinctively.

So what of the plot? There is one, there always is with Brookner. But the details and the emotions are so much the point that plot doesn’t really matter. And for once I have an answer to the question: “Which Brookner should I start with?” I have never been able to answer this before because of the sameness of Brookner’s novels. For those that think you would be predisposed to like this kind of book, you can start anywhere. But for those of you who aren’t sure, you should start with A Closed Eye. It contains enough action that it could unwittingly ease you into the depressing, but cosy, warm-bath-water-world of Brookner’s fiction. Like slipping into a coma.

On the other hand if you are prone to depression you might want to steer clear of Brookner entirely.

(And for reading fiends out there this one has lots of little references to literary works.)

 

 
Lucy my dog that is. (Although Lucille Ball is pretty great too.) She has only been with us since October 31st, but man oh man do we love her.

11/24 UPDATE: The more I look at the list below, the more it annoys me.

First, not only is all the formatting totally apesh*t, but it doesn’t even accurately capture the ones I put in blue. What I see as I compose this is not what happens when I publish this post, so you really won’t know which 35 I have read. My sense of tidiness and order is hugely offended by the mishmash that follows. I suppose I could learn something about HTML and fix it, but ye gods, I can’t know everything.

Second, Steve and Simon and others are right about the oddness of this list. It isn’t the first time I have seen it around the interwebs. In my excitement about a book list (any book list) I didn’t really think critically about what was on it. Although I did notice the Shakespeare duplication and the absolute dubiosity (I think I just made that word up, and I like it.) of Mitch Albom being on the list, I really didn’t think about what a crap list it is for the reasons that some of you noted in the comments and for others.

Most reading lists are bound to elicit praise and criticism in varying doses, it kind of goes with the territory. A vast world of books and a vast world of readers with different tastes and points of view, could there be any other result. I will say, however, that for all its faults the Modern Library Top 100 of the 20th century does a much better job than the “BBC list” of capturing some sense of great books that literate English speakers might consider canon-worthy.

Plus on the Modern Library list, I have read 61 out of 100 so I look a whole lot better. (Of course I have been purposefully reading from that list since it first came out in the late 1990s.)  You may already have noticed I have a permanent page up top devoted to my intermittent devotion to that list. You can also look at it here.

And many thanks to dpv at The Hogpath Bugle who gives us a great link that deals with the provenance of this FB meme.

 
And it’s lined with great fiction.

  
We kept passing Lloyd’s of Kew on our way to and fro but it always seemed to be the outside of business hours. So it was great that we managed a good, but quick browse on our last day in London.

The extremely friendly proprietor (Lloyd perhaps?).

Being near Kew Gardens, they had a great garden section. John was in heaven.

It has a great book tree. Rob Around Books has a much better picture of it.

Great little selection of original Penguins. One of these days soon I will share with you what I bought.

11/23 UPDATE: I only just now noticed that copy of The Woman in White. It would have gone into my luggage if I had noticed it that day.

He had great postcards of books in the shop. I bought several that I will share with you all once I scan them in.

I don’t think John was going for this blurry effect, but I quite like it.

  
I remember seeing pictures of Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill House back when I was a kid.  When I realized that our friends’ new place in Kew was in the same neck of the woods and that the house has been recently restored, it seemed like a fun thing to do. It turned out to be somewhat interesting. They are doing a meticulous job in the restoration, but still have a ways to go and haven’t furnished it yet. Plus, they had not one copy of Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto in the giftshop.

The arches swing out, that’s how you get the books back there.

Much more fun with books.

John documenting himself.

Give me my money!

 
As we walked down the King’s Road toward Sloane Square, it was only by chance that we noticed John Sandoe Books down a side street. In recent months both John and I had come across references to this bookshop. John saw it in a design magazine and I saw it in my Book Lover’s Guide to London. But neither of us were looking for it, or even thought to look for it, when we stumbled upon it.

Its piles of books reminds me a bit of the lovely little Primrose Hill Books in another part of London, John Sandoe is easily the most gloriously disheveled bookstore I have ever been to. I have been to far crazier second hand shops, but these were all new.

While there I discovered Slightly Foxed editions and bought two two volumes of which I will blog in the near future.  Afterwards we went for a little tea in Sloane Square.

   
On our last day in London we had a magical morning at Kew Gardens. Not only did the gardens look amazing in the heavy fog but there were so few people there it was like we had the place to ourselves.

Usually when I post things about travel I do it in chronological order as it happened in real time. But there is nothing usual about the subject of today’s post, so I am throwing caution to the wind to tell you (out of order) about the wonderful time I had meeting a great group of UK-based bloggers.

Several months ago, when I knew we were headed to London for a short stay to visit friends, I asked if there was anyone out there in bloggo land who wanted to get together. To my relief there were several who replied in the positive. With a helpful assist from Miranda, arrangements were made and we had a truly lovely afternoon with a book browsing meet-up at Persephone followed by a walk to the British Museum for tea.

I arrived in central London about an hour and half early, and, despite having a whole city to look at, the excitement of my first trip to the Persephone bookshop got the best of me. I tried to slow myself down with a little lunch and some window shopping, but to no avail. I had to satisfy my curiosity about the Persephone shop.

Here it is on Lamb’s Conduit Street just a short walk from the Russell Square tube station.

Once I got inside I realized that showing up an hour early was exactly the right thing to do. Faced with all of those Peresephones, I suddenly forgot which ones I wanted to buy. And worse, I forgot which ones I already owned.  Although the shop is tiny, it is also a bit of organized chaos, so it took me a while to get my bearings and get down to business. It was still a bit overwhelming trying to have a thoughtful browse to decide what I wanted to buy. In the end I had to look at the catalog to help me choose my Persephone bounty.

Once I started pulling aside books I wanted, it didn’t take me long to get a stack of nine that I wanted to buy. With that transaction complete I still had about thirty minutes to kill before the other bloggers arrived. So I went out for a bit of a stroll until the appointed time. When I returned to the shop Hannah had already arrived and greeted me as soon as I walked in. Once we introduced ourselves it all became a bit of a blur. As if on cue, the other bloggers started showing up at a steady pace and suddenly there were a lot of very talkative people in the small shop. There were a few customers trying to see the merchandise who must have been curious and a little annoyed  about us taking up all that floor space. As Simon noted later, those customers would have been well served by turning to any one of us for assistance in choosing a book. Alas, they did not.

 As conversations broke out all around the shop, I realized the moments were slipping away without me taking any photos. So I got a bit bossy and made them pose for me. Above you see Hayley, Polly, Simon, and Hannah.

I was sheepishly admitting to Claire that I had no interest in reading Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day because of the too frothy, too American film version, when I broke away from the conversation to snap this photo of Miranda and her mum Donna. Donna bought three books that day but I never did find out which ones she took home.

(l to r) Claire, Hayley, Thomas, Simon, Hannah, Polly, and Miranda

 And here we all are (minus Donna who took the photo) posed out in front of the mothership. I might hold a contest later for the most creative answer to what Simon may have been distracted by.

Claire, who has already written about the great elevator fiasco on her blog,as seen through a forest of tea things. We each had one of these to ourselves. The dainties at top look pretty but my real interest was in the scones on the bottom tier.

I wish I had more time before I had to rush off to work to tell you more about all these great bloggers, Hayley and I bonded over dogs, Polly and I commiserated over shopper’s-block, Hannah, Donna, Miranda, and I talked about the pitfalls of having an online life, Claire and I talked about, well it seems like we talked about everything. Despite being across the table from each other at tea we managed to chat quite a bit. And then there is Simon. What can be said about Simon? Witty, clever, Simon. I would say he is just like his blog–which does a great job capturing his personality–but that doesn’t quite do him justice.

The only disappointment of the day was not having a enough time to chat with everyone. I will post soon about  the 9 Persephones I bought that day.

For other takes on our Saturday at Persephone or for a look at each of their blogs here are the links:

Claire at Paperback Reader
Donna at Rambling Fancy
Hannah at Hannah Stoneham
Hayley at Desparate Reader
Miranda at Skirmish of Wit
Polly at Novel Insights
Simon at Stuck in a Book