Nonsuch Book

international booker prize shadow panelistsselect a winner

The official announcement of the winner of the 2020 International Booker Prize has been postponed until later in the summer, to give readers more time to get and read copies of the novels.

But our shadow jury of bloggers and reviewers of translated fiction has already completed our reading and re-reading, so it seems fitting to announce our Shadow Winner on the original date of May 19th.

As a reminder, our own shortlist was, in alphabetical order of the original author's name:

 - The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar (Farsi – Iran), tr. Anonymous (Europa Editions)
 - The Other Name: Septology I-II by Jon Fosse (Norwegian – Norway), tr. Damion Searls (Fitzcarraldo Editions)
 - Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor (Spanish – Mexico), tr. Sophie Hughes (Fitzcarraldo Editions)
 - The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa (Japanese – Japan), tr. Stephen Snyder (Harvill Secker)
 - Faces on the Tip of My Tongue by Emmanuelle Pagano (French – France), tr. Sophie Lewis & Jennifer Higgins (Peirene Press)
 - The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (Dutch – Netherlands), tr. Michele Hutchison (Faber & Faber)

We were collectively impressed with all of these books, indeed all six had their champions among us.

And three books in particular were so close in our deliberations and our voting that it was almost tempting to go one further than last year’s anglophone Booker judges.  But instead we’ve kept with one winner, but decided to acknowledge two books as Runners-Up.

Runners-Up:
The Other Name: Septology I-II
and
The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree

Jon Fosse’s “slow prose”, unfolding his story in one long, flowing stream that reads with great fluidity, took us deep inside his narrator Asle's mind and thoughts.  And we were caught up in the heady mixture of Persian myth, story-telling and magic realism of The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree, a true ode to literature and to the deeply soothing role books and stories play in our survival of trauma.

But the winner of our 2020 Shadow Jury Prize is:
Hurricane Season, written by Fernanda Melchor, translated by Sophie Hughes and published by Fitzcarraldo Editions

Comments from some of our judges:

"Hurricane Season is an appropriate title for a novel that roars into the unsuspecting reader’s mind, with its long and winding sentences, and its refusal to flinch from the brutalities of its world."

“There is anger, pain, and the understanding of the role literature plays when it comes to compassion and empathy.”

"As author M John Harrison said of Melchor's novel '...she had shown me things I needed to be faced with.' and expanded my understanding of lives so very different from my own."

"It unflinchingly portrayed a world apart from us and artfully created another layer of distance from subject through the use of mythologized violence. That she both creates distance and 'makes us look' simultaneously was incredibly powerful for me."

"Melchor’s prose, in Hughes’s stunning translation, is raw, brutal and so, so necessary."

“As readers and intrepid voyagers down Melchor’s Dante-like vision, we are like riveted inmates, incarcerated either by law or by economics or gender, who stand to witness the depravity, despair and pain being inflicted upon this part of the world. The real evidence and reward here is not in unmasking the Witch’s killer or killers or in finding out why this happened, the true recompense of Melchor’s novel is to pay tribute by listening to the dead’s testimony,‘there is no treasure in there, no gold or silver or diamonds or anything more than a searing pain that refuses to go away.’“

And our congratulations extend to the publisher Fitzcarraldo Editions who provided two of our top three, and also now have two Shadow Prize wins in three years.

Now it’s over to the official jury for their decision.

Written by Paul Fulcher in collaboration with his fellow shadow panelists.

international bookershadow shortlist

Our shadow jury of bloggers and reviewers of translated fiction has completed our reading of the International Booker 2020 longlist, and has chosen our own Shadow Shortlist. 

In alphabetical order of the original author's name our chosen six books are: 

The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar (Farsi – Iran), tr. Anonymous (Europa Editions)

The Other Name: Septology I-II by Jon Fosse (Norwegian – Norway), tr. Damion Searls (Fitzcarraldo Editions)

Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor (Spanish – Mexico), tr. Sophie Hughes (Fitzcarraldo Editions)

The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa (Japanese – Japan), tr. Stephen Snyder (Harvill Secker)

Faces on the Tip of My Tongue by Emmanuelle Pagano (French – France), tr. Sophie Lewis & Jennifer Higgins (Peirene Press)

The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (Dutch – Netherlands), tr. Michele Hutchison (Faber & Faber) 

Firstly, we would like to congratulate the judges on choosing a very strong longlist. There are some stunning books on the list, and almost all of them, including those that missed out on our shortlist, had their champions among us. The books didn't always make for an easy read - some are quite graphic in their depiction of violence - but certainly a thought provoking one.

You will see that four of our choices overlap with those of the official jury.  

The Adventures of China Iron impressed many of us, but couldn't quite squeeze on to our list. Instead we chose the cleverly connected short stories from Faces on the Tip of My Tongue.

When we were predicting books on the longlist The Eighth Life was the novel we most expected to see given its undoubted popularity both in the Anglosphere but also internationally.  And we had expected it to make both the official and our shadow shortlist. Somewhat to our surprise, it missed out on both - the magic of the hot chocolate clearly doesn't work on everyone.

We were more surprised, and disappointed, at the exclusion of The Other Name from the official list - Jon Fosse's trademark slow prose is stunning, and it makes for a very different reading experience from the others on the list. It is a timeless novel, and we fear the jury's not unreasonable focus on novels relevant for the Covid-19 era may have counted against it. But with the next volume due in the autumn perhaps Fosse will make next year's shortlist. He's also overdue the Nobel Prize.

At the other end of the spectrum, the officially shortlisted Tyll didn't spark much enthusiasm in our panel. But the one provoking the strongest reactions was Serotonin: several of the books on our shortlist are brutal or visceral but parts of Houllebecq’s novel simply felt gratuitous. Only three of our judges finished reading it and none of those were terribly impressed by its inclusion on the longlist.

We'll now embark on the period of further re-reading, reflection and discussion to choose our winner. We wonder if we and the official jury will see eye to eye as we did in 2018, or reach a different view as we did last year.

This post was written by shadow panelist Paul Fulcher in collaboration with our panel - Meredith Smith, David Hebblethwaite, Vivek Tejuja, Oisin Harris, Anna Thompson, Barbara Halla, Stu Allen, and me.)

 

shadow booker international 2020

This is my third year shadowing the International Booker Prize (as it is now known) with a group of super smart and lovely people. Stu has taken the reins as chair once again which is quite fitting as he started the whole effort back in 2012. Although nothing in comparison to the work of the real judges who read a huge number of submitted books, this commitment demands a significant amount of time on the part of the shadow panelists. But it is such an enormous amount of fun as we read through all thirteen books on the longlist together, chatting frequently on our Slack group, helping each find access to all the titles in time, and sharing each other's thoughts on social media. We have different tastes and work styles, but a shared passion for translated fiction. It is a delight to read with this stellar group of bookish friends. 

Here is the list that we are reading together, working toward the composition of our own shortlist just prior to the announcement of the official one:

• Red Dog by Willem Anker (Afrikaans – South Africa), translated by Michiel Heyns
• The Enlightenment of The Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar (Farsi – Iran), with an anonymous translator
• The Adventures of China Iron by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara (Spanish – Argentina), translated by Iona Macintyre and Fiona Mackintosh
• The Other Name: Septology I – II by Jon Fosse (Norwegian – Norway), translated by Damion Searls
• The Eighth Life by Nino Haratischvili (German – Georgia), translated by Charlotte Collins and Ruth Martin
• Serotonin by Michel Houellebecq (French – France), translated by Shaun Whiteside
• Tyll by Daniel Kehlmann (German – Germany), translated by Ross Benjamin
• Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor (Spanish – Mexico), translated by Sophie Hughes
• The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa (Japanese – Japan), translated by Stephen Snyder
• Faces on the Tip of My Tongue by Emmanuelle Pagano (French – France), translated by Sophie Lewis and Jennifer Higgins
• Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin (Spanish – Argentina), translated by Megan McDowell
• The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (Dutch – Netherlands), translated by Michele Hutchison
• Mac and His Problem by Enrique Vila-Matas (Spanish – Spain), translated by Margaret Jull Costa and Sophie Hughes

 

And here are my fellow shadow panelists for 2020:

Bellezza (Meredith Smith) is from Chicago, Illinois, and has been writing a blog focusing on translated fiction, Dolce Bellezza, since 2006. She has also written reviews for Shiny New Books and hosted the Japanese Literature Challenge for 12 years. Her Twitter name is @bellezzamjs

 

David Hebblethwaite is a book blogger and reviewer from the north of England, now based in the south. He has written about translated fiction for European Literature Network, Splice, Words Without Borders, Shiny New Books, and Strange Horizons. He blogs at David’s Book World and tweets as @David_Heb

 

Vivek Tejuja is a book blogger and reviewer from India and based in Mumbai. He loves to read books in Indian languages and translated editions of languages around the world (well, essentially world fiction, if that’s a thing). He also writes for Scroll.In and The Quint. He blogs at The Hungry Reader and tweets as @vivekisms. His first book, “So Now You Know”, a memoir of growing up gay in Mumbai in the 90s is out in September 2019 by Harper Collins India. 

 

Paul Fulcher is a Wimbledon, UK based fan of translated fiction, who contributes to the Mookse and Gripes blog and is active on Goodreads, where he moderates a MBI readers’ group. He was on the jury of the Republic of Consciousness Prize (@prizeRofC), which rewards innovative fiction, including in translation, from small independent presses. His reviews can be found at @fulcherpaul and via his Goodreads page.

 

Oisin Harris lives in Canterbury, UK and is an editor-in-the-making with a Publishing MA from Kingston University and an English degree from Sussex University. He is an academic librarian, and a freelance editor and proofreader. He has written about Women in Translation, Book Histories and how they can affect Book Futures as well as on Islam and Literature in the West. When not reading or writing he can be found on Twitter @literaryty

 

Antonomasia (Anna Thompson) is a UK-based freelance commercial writer. She has been posting on Goodreads since 2011, and has over 700 book reviews under her belt, some of which are being imported to a new blog. For four years, she has been the main compiler of Goodreads lists of newly-translated fiction eligible for the Man Booker International Prize. You can see the 2020 MBIP-eligible list here. Like Paul, she is a moderator in the Mookse and the Gripes Goodreads group. 

 

Barbara Halla is an Albanian translator and researcher who splits her time between Paris and Tirana. She is an assistant editor for Asymptote Journal. She spends her free time reading literary fiction, feminist theory and 20th century Italian literature, written mostly by women. Her tweets can be found @behalla63. 

 

Stu Allen is an NHS staffer by day where he works on a ward helping people in crisis and with other problems find a way back into the community. He blogs at winstonsdad. Stu calls himself the everyman of world lit, a normal guy that loves world lit. He has reviewed close to a 1000 books from 100 plus countries since he started the Shadow IFFP in 2012. After a two year break, Stu is returning to chair the panel this year. He started the hashtag #translationthurs and tweets from @stujallen.

 

the year in reading

My reading year ends with River by Esther Kinsky, translated by Iain Galbraith. There will not be enough time today to finish another book before we welcome 2019. This book is a satisfying way to wrap up a wonderful year in reading though. It cannot (or should not) be read quickly, and I have spent the last few days wandering with the narrator, relishing the role of observer. Or of me observing the observer. Pondering both the permanence and impermanence of place. “Again and again during those wind-buffeted weeks, I picked up my battered suitcase with the intention of setting off on a journey.” The narrator finds the river in each place her journeys take her, and delivers detailed and unflinching descriptions of place and more distant but no less insightful observations about the people she encounters. This moving book is easily one of my favorites of the year.

What other books stand out from the one hundred and some odd books I read this year? I began the year reading The Juniper Tree by Barbara Comyns and was so taken by it, reminded of why I love this author's work so much, that I re-read every Comyns novel about the house, aided in part by Eric, Twitter friend extraordinaire. If you are new to Comyns, I would recommend that you do not start with Our Spoons Came From Woolworths, a popular and worthy novel but less wonderfully weird than her other work. Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead might be a great launch pad to the body of work because, as Ben Marcus put it, the novel is "deranged in ways that shouldn’t be disclosed.” Reading The Juniper Tree, informed by the fairy tale from the equally twisted Brothers Grimm, was a delicious exercise in managing dread.

 

Shadow paneling for the Man Booker International Prize was a tremendously rewarding reading experience, yielding four of my favorite books of the year. Now you might be looking at the images above and thinking that Such Small Hands by Andrés Barba and translated by Lisa Dillman did not make the long list for this prize. And you are right. But the panel wished that it had, and we talked of bumping off an official selection to make room on our own list. Sinister and disturbing, this novel's elegant prose creates an unsettling juxtaposition against the violence it casually presents. 

Vernon! The panel had dramatically opposing views on this one, but I was marvelously entertained by it. The more I have thought about it over the year, the more I liked it, and I want to read the next in the series. Where does one land in middle age when sex, drugs, and punk are but memories? Or do you really need ever to abandon them? A simplification but fun questions to ponder.

Die, My Love by Ariana Harwicz and translated by Sarah Moses and Carolina Orloff was a punishing read. Best described by its publisher, Charco Press. "This is a brutal, wild book – it’s impossible to come out from reading Ariana Harwicz unscathed. The language of Die, My Love cuts like a scalpel even as it attains a kind of cinematic splendour, evoking the likes of John Cassavetes, David Lynch, Lars von Trier and John Ford. In a text that explores the destabilising effects of passion and its absence, immersed in the psyche of a female protagonist always on the verge of madness, in the tradition of Sylvia Plath and Clarice Lispector, Harwicz moulds language, submitting it to her will in irreverent prose. Bruising and confrontational, yet anchored in an unapologetic beauty and lyricism..."

And Flights by Olga Tokarczuk and translated Jennifer Croft. My favorite book of the year. Like River, a book about wandering on the surface, rooted in questions of permanence. But unlike River, this one is mystical and whimsical and funny. And a book that I need to re-read because I consumed it so quickly the first time.

Sleepless Nights by Elizabeth Hardwick, The True Deceiver and Fair Play by Tove Jansson, The Library Book by Susan Orlean, Cemetery in Barnes by Gabriel Josipovici, and Educated by Tara Westover complete my list of my favorite books of the year. All remarkable.

And I almost forgot - Essayism: On Form, Feeling and Nonfiction by Brian Dillon. Part memoir, part scholarly work that reads so easily, like the best conversation, that you scarcely feel its weight, its precision, its charming flirtation with both subject and reader.

Reading plans for 2019. I am not sure yet, and am resisting committing. I will be reading Japanese literature, including The Pillow Book, with Meredith for a while. Anniversaries waits patiently on the shelf. I want to read books about food and cooking, community bred through shared meals. The Patrick Modiano section of my shelves is comparable to the long-suffering spouse who keeps waiting for a little attention. The lovely folks of Twitter keep talking about Anthony Powell, tempting me to re-read A Dance to the Music of Time. And I keep thinking of a Sylvia Townsend Warner deep dive.

Occasionally I think of posting here more often, more often than a once per year summary of the year in reading. But maybe not. What about you? What will you read next year? How will you share or record or celebrate your reading life?

shadow paneling for mbip 2018

I have been lifting translated fiction recommendations from the efforts of this panel organized by Stu and Tony for years including back in the IFFP days. Several panels members are moving on this year so when Tony opened it up to new participants, I decided on a whim to participate. After three years of reading the entire longlist for the Man Booker with this group of lovely ladies, I appreciate the benefits of stretching my reading muscles a little even when the lists do not match my tastes or expectations. I am also looking forward to discussing the works with this new group of readers that includes one friend with whom I have enjoyed shared reads many times, Bellezza. This year's shadow panel includes:

Tony Malone is an Anglo-Australian reviewer with a particular focus on German-language, Japanese and Korean fiction. He blogs at Tony’s Reading List, and his reviews have also appeared at Words Without Borders, Necessary Fiction, Shiny New Books andAsymptote. Based in Melbourne, he teaches ESL to prospective university students when he’s not reading and reviewing. He can also be found on Twitter @tony_malone

Lori Feathers lives in Dallas, Texas and is co-owner and book buyer for Interabang Books, an independent bookstore in Dallas. She is a freelance book critic and board member of the National Book Critics Circle. For the last two years she has served as a fiction judge for the Best Translated Book Award. Her recent reviews can be found @LoriFeathers

Bellezza (Meredith Smith) is a teacher from Chicago, Illinois, who has been writing Dolce Bellezza for twelve years and has hosted the Japanese Literature Challenge for 11 years. Reading literature in translation has become a great passion, especially since the five years she has been a shadow juror for the IFFP and now the MBIP. Her Twitter name is @bellezzamjs

David Hebblethwaite is a book blogger and reviewer from the north of England, now based in the south. He has written about translated fiction for Words Without Borders, Shiny New Books, Strange Horizons, and We Love This Book. He blogs at David’s Book Worldand tweets as @David_Heb

Vivek Tejuja is a book blogger and reviewer from India and based in Mumbai. He loves to read books in Indian languages and translated editions of languages around the world (well, essentially world fiction, if that’s a thing). He also writes for Scroll.In and The Quint. He blogs at The Hungry Reader and tweets as @vivekisms. His first book, “So Now You Know”, a memoir of growing up gay in Mumbai in the 90s, is out in April 2018 by Penguin Random House.

Paul Fulcher is a Wimbledon, UK based fan of translated fiction, who contributes to theMookse and Gripes blog and is active on Goodreads, where he moderates a MBI readers’ group. He is on the jury of the Republic of Consciousness Prize (@prizeRofC), which rewards innovative fiction, including in translation, from small independent presses. His reviews can be found at @fulcherpaul and via his Goodreads page.

María José Navia lives in Santiago, Chile. She has an M.A. in Humanities and Social Thought (NYU) and a PhD in Literature and Cultural Studies (Georgetown University). She is currently an Assistant Professor at Chile’s Catholic University. She is also a published author (one novel, two collections of short stories) and is in the process of translatingBattleborn (by Claire Vaye Watkins) into Spanish. You can read one of her stories, in English, in the Nov/Dec 2017 issue of World Literature Today. She blogs at Ticket de Cambio and her twitter name is @mjnavia

Naomi Morauf is a voracious reader and avid tweeter with a particular interest in translated and speculative fiction. She moved to London for her philosophy degree and fell predictably into its clutches, working in media analysis as a broadcast editor before moving into book publishing. A Creative Access alumna and active member of the Society of Young Publishers and BAME in Publishing, she is a regular at Post Apocalyptic Book Club and the Dark Societies series of events. She is currently reviewing submissions at Unsung Stories.

Oisin Harris lives in Canterbury, UK and is an editor-in-the-making with a Publishing MA from Kingston University and an English degree from Sussex University. He is an academic librarian, and a freelance editor and proofreader. He has written about Women in Translation, Book Histories and how they can affect Book Futures, as well as on Islam and Literature in the West. When not reading or writing he can be found on Twitter@literaryty

The longlist will pop up on March 12, and the shortlist will follow one short month later on April 12. With 12 or 13 books to read in four short weeks, I am trying to read titles now that might show up on that list. There were quite a few already in the house, two easy pick-ups at the library, and two that happened to be just sitting on display tables yesterday at a local bookstore. Take a look at my stack and let me know what probable titles you think that I am missing?

the year in reading

Odd year. Too many days with distressing or infuriating news. Often, news difficult to believe that it was not some elaborate parody of the life I wished I inhabited. But my reading life was marvelous, and not just as escapism either. It would have been memorable for any reading year, in any political climate.

I will get to those most memorable books in a moment, but I also want to share that one of the things that made this a great reading year for me was amped-up book pimping to my littlest friends. I am a school leader in an elementary school, and have always prided myself on the number of books I get kids to read happily each school year. This year I took my efforts up a notch, and partnered with lots of generous spirits that helped me make sure that my kiddos had books in their homes too. Books to call their own. And lots of them. It is a long story, and I will not share the details now, but I would encourage anyone that loves books, that values their reading life, to look for opportunities in the new year to support the intellectual lives of children, especially those not likely to have books of their own choosing in their lives.

My favorite book of the year, hands down, was The Complete Stories of Leonora Carrington for a few reasons that I touched on here, and more as I continue to re-read.

My other favorite reads of the year in no particular order:

• Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
• Three Possible Lives by Fleur Jaeggy
• Solar Bones by Mike McCormack 
• Compass by Mathias Énard
• The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James
• Autumn by Ali Smith
• Common Ground by Rob Cowen
• Eggshells by Caitriona Lally

There were surprises as I compiled this list. I find it really funny that while reading this year's Man Booker nominees with the usual lovely ladies, I did a bit of grousing about the literary titans dominating the lists. And then picked three of those titles here as best reads of my year. Oh well. I also was really excited about reading Banville's Mrs. Osmond, and re-read the James antecedent in excitement to prepare. And while I appreciated the new work, I was, as always, blown away by the James. No comparison.

In a year where I read a whole lot more nonfiction, the Cowen work was a standout not just for the perspective it offers on the natural world but also for the gorgeous prose, the personal vulnerability that aligned so beautifully with the fragility of nature at times. The Lally work was not what I expected at all. Certainly whimsical as promised, but also an astute observation of a life seen from the unique perspective of a protagonist with emotional disabilities. I do find it odd that more people have not discussed this aspect of the novel in more explicit terms.

Compass stands alone. Something to spark multiple other reading paths.

As I look to the new year, I find myself looking at authors more than specific books. I think I would like to take some deep dives into the works of individuals. In consideration are Barbara Comyns, Marcel Schwab, Jane Gardam, Rachel Cusk, Angela Thirkell, Patrick Modiano, Henry Green, plus some Graham Greene re-reads. Maybe some more Henry James re-reads as well. All of these things are already on my shelves. The good intentions of years past. Where I also seem to have a good bit of Japanese literature to which I have not given enough time.

What reading plans do you have for the new year?

the annual bookering: from thirteen to six

For a third year in a row, Teresa, Meredith, Rebecca, Nicole and I have spent the last several weeks reading as much of the Booker longlist as we could each manage. I chose not to read the Auster, would have read the Mozley had it arrived in time, but did get to the other eleven titles. For the first time, my personal list matches our group list although it came down to the wire for the sixth pick with a back and forth between Days Without End and Exit West, both worthy novels. So without further ado, our shortlist contains the following in no particular order:

• Autumn by Ali Smith
• Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
• Days Without End by Sebastian Barry
• Solar Bones by Mike McCormack
• Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor
• Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie

This year's longlist contained many predictable names, but our group shortlist turned out balanced between the established and lesser known authors. I'm not sure how I will rank them yet, but will admit a great admiration for Solar Bones, and that Lincoln in the Bardo tore at my heart in unexpected ways. Teresa has done an admirable job of reviewing the books as she read them, and our group conversation is certain to gain energy once the official shortlist is published. Conversations to look forward to especially if our list differs greatly from the one to be announced this Wednesday. What does your unofficial shortlist look like? Any particular book you would like to see take the prize?

"for the straightforward pathway had been lost"

"If there are infinite worlds and infinite sets of laws, then nothing is essential, and we are relieved from straining past the limits of our immediate reality and comprehension, since not only does what lies beyond not apply to us, there is also no hope of gaining anything more than infinitesimally small understanding. In that sense, the multiverse theory only encourages us to turn our backs even further on the unknowable, which we're more than happy to do, having become drunk on our powers of knowing - having made a holiness out of knowing, and busying ourselves all day and night in pursuit of it. Just as religion evolved as a way to contemplate and live before the unknowable, so now have we converted to the opposite practice, to which we are no less devoted: the practice of knowing everything, and believing that knowledge is concrete, and always arrived at through the faculties of the intellect. Since Descartes, knowledge has been empowered to a nearly unimaginable degree. But in the end it didn't lead to the mastery and possession of nature he imagined, only to the illusion of its mastery and possession. In the end, we have made ourselves ill with knowledge. I frankly hate Descartes, and have never understood why his axiom should be trusted as an unshakable foundation for anything. The more he talks about following a straight line out of the forest, the more appealing it sounds to me to get lost in that forest, where once we lived in wonder, and understood it to be a prerequisite for an authentic awareness of being and the world. Now we have little choice but to live in the arid fields of reason, and as for the unknown, which once lay glittering at the farthest edge of our gaze, channeling our fear but also our hope and longing, we can only regard it with aversion."

Nicole Krauss, Forest Dark

 

"I know something interesting is sure to happen... whenever I eat or drink anything"

The Complete Stories of Leonora Carrington, published by the Dorothy Project some months back, is my favorite read of the year to date. Bending not just social conventions but explicitly rejecting the realities paraded before her, Carrington crafted stories both chilling and hilarious, written equivalents of her surrealist paintings. The stories have captured the imagination of numerous readers and critics recently, and there are many engaging viewpoints captured about the works including in the introduction to the text by Kathryn Davis and in pieces such as this and this. Quite a few have focused on the treatment of eating or hunger in the works, themes that immediately stood out to me as akin to Carroll's Alice as well as sometimes violent expressions of vulnerability.

Food and drink are related to themes of class, the need for sustenance portrayed as base or animalistic, as in this from "Uncle Sam Carrington:"

"I felt a bit embarrassed. There were no aristocrats in my family. She saw my hesitation and said with the most charming smile, 'My dear child, you must realize that here we deal only with the affairs of the oldest and most noble families of England.'

I had an inspiration, and my face lit up. 'In our dining room at home...'

The horse kicked me hard in the backside. 'Never mention anything as vulgar as food,' he whispered."

The aristocratic ladies leave her, and instruct her to read The Vulgarity of Food while they tame very animated vegetables with whips in the kitchen garden so that they might effect a trade with the young lady of questionable birth.

Food and drink are frequently viewed as the only means available to a needed end just like Alice consumes from vessels marked EAT ME and DRINK ME without regard for what they might contain but as an audacious attempt to navigate a bizarre and unfamiliar world.

"My soul?' replied Virginia. "I sold it a long time ago for a kilo of truffles. Go ask Igname the Boar for it."

And the descriptions of appetite often carry stories of shame along with them, the desires for the forbidden indulged but not confessed. Or needs boldly satisfied.

"She sucked, sucked for long minutes, and her body became enormous, luminous, magnificent. Her feathers shone like snow in the sun, her tailed sparkled with all the colors of the rainbow. She threw back her head and crowed like a cock. Afterwards she hid the corpse in the drawer of a chest."

I want to reread Carroll's Alice work this fall to look beyond food and drink as just imagery of class distinctions in Victorian England, to look into how both Carrington's characters and Alice both accept and reject the realities around them, how they challenge how one's corporeal existence defines one. Also super curious about Carrington herself and her other work.

Highly recommended reads. Both Carroll and Carrington.

my personal canon

Anthony started all of this, prompting the Twitter crowd to define their personal canons. It is voyeuristic fun to take a peek inside people's heads, and their reading tastes certainly define the participants in unexpected ways. I put off the exercise for a few days, holding reservations about how authentic lists of these types might be when called upon to construct them for consumption by others rather than just one's own use. But today, I found myself on the world's dullest conference call, and decided to just start writing whatever came to my head until the end of the call. Not exactly the best approach for so weighty an endeavor, but I generally prefer spontaneity in all matters. So here we go, driven by the droning voice of a greedy attorney:

• The complete works of Proust, Woolf, Marias and Spark
• Flaubert, Madame Bovary
• Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
• White, The Once and Future King
• Camus, The Stranger
• Morrison, The Song of Solomon
• Joyce, The Dead
• Melville, Bartleby the Scrivener
• Norris, The Octopus
• Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy
• Seuss, The Lorax
• Bolano, 2666
• Ford, The Good Soldier
• Dickens (Monica), Mariana
• Greene, The End of the Affair
• Williams, Patterson
• Mann, The Magic Mountain
• Yourcenar, Memoirs of Hadrian
• Perec, Life: A User's Manual
• Lispector, The Complete Stories
• Carson, Nox
• Shakespeare, The Tempest and A Midsummer Night's Dream
• Cather, My Antonia
• Frederic, The Damnation of Theron Ware
• Williams, Stoner
• James, The Ambassadors
• Duras, The Lover
• Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
• Muller, The Land of Green Plums
• Fowles, The Magus and The French Lieutenant's Woman
• Beavoir, The Mandarins
• Chopin, The Awakening

And then the call was over, and I stopped writing as I promised myself. I really like seeing how one thought led to another, the connections between some of these books. And I chose the image at the top of the post because I had not thought of Yourcenar's work this week as I read other lists, but then there it was. Always good to surprise yourself.