Translated from the German by Anthea Bell
THE LIFE AND OPINIONS OF THE TOMCAT MURR together with a fragmentary Biography of Kapellmeister Johannes Kreisler on Random Sheets of Waste Paper isn’t a fairy-tale, but it is magic realism, it is gothic and it is satirical. It also features pronounced post-modern antecedents and intertextuality in spades. And you could get nearly all of that from the title alone. Why read the book?
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Phoebe was recently asked at school to name the thing which annoys her the most. I would have expected her to cite younger sisters or embarrassing parents, but no. Phoebe’s bête noire is William Horwood.
Horwood is in the doghouse for describing baby wolves as cubs, when the correct nomenclature is pups. I am not qualified to arbitrate, so that’s between Horwood and Phoebe, but this is only a small part of Phoebe’s difficulties with fiction.
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My struggles with the Tomcat Murr are really no excuse for using up his nine lives, but alas, this book seems destined to meet with a bad end.
With only fifty or so pages to go I decided to take it along to middle daughter’s sports day. Hoping to bring proceedings to an expeditious conclusion. (Yep. Could equally be talking about the book or the event.) Given a forty-five minute interval before kick-off this isn’t quite as reprehensible as it sounds, but the race to the finish, once begun, was almost irresistible…
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This is a big book. Lots of pages. Plenty of scope to blow hot and cold. And I did. Blow hot and cold. This is clever. That is tedious. That doesn’t work. This is beautifully descriptive.
It isn’t just lots of pages. It is lots of everything. Spanning late Victorian, through Edwardian, and taking in the full horrors of the first world war. Several huge upper-class families, three generations thereof. Figures from history, fictional characters, and some disturbing chimeras, neither one nor the other. Theosophy, Fabians, Socialism and the women’s suffrage movement. Artists. Writers, potters, and performers.
Themes encompass parenthood, feminism, loco parentis, creative genius and homosexuality. Motifs include the arts and crafts movement, pots (ceramics), puppets and fairy tales.
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From booklet found in Cornish holiday home:
The author of said booklet seems firmly allied with those Cornish who were allegedly less than fond of their illustrious visitor. I believe that they are rather more partial to him now, although I have some doubts regarding his efficacy as a tourist magnet.
Karen Russell’s debut novel was my first choice for holiday reading. Before making a final choice it seemed prudent to check out some reviews, the first of which stated ‘NOT holiday reading.’ Advice I ignored. Obviously.
Swamplandia! is an alligator themed fun-park, based on an island and run by Chief Bigtree and his improbably named progeny, Kiwi, Osceola and Ava. The alligators are known, equally improbably, as Seths. The colourful Bigtrees, despite false claims to a native-American heritage, running daily alligator wrestling shows and maintaining an outrageous family museum, are losing out to a new theme park on the mainland, The World of Darkness.
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It seemed like a good idea at the time. Continue reading
A little rainfall, complete absence of hay fever (yay!), and official holiday reading was ebbing away faster than expected. Regeneration was the unexpected saviour, from the holiday cottage bookshelf. Smart Penguin packaging; a connection with Byatt’s The Children’s Book (read recently), which also touches on WWI and borrows from historical figures; and the clincher, I recognised it from 1001 Books…
I was not disappointed in my choice, but this haunting novel lingers and left me reluctant to return to books abruptly rendered frivolous.
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