Trilling about Trollope

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From the Writer’s Almanac:

It’s the birthday of novelist Anthony Trollope, born in London (1815). Many of his novels originated from daydreams that he had as a child. He worked for the post office, and became a postal surveyor. And every morning before breakfast, he sat down to write 1,000 words, publishing about three books every two years. He wrote realistic novels about the daily life of ordinary people, including The Warden (1855), Barchester Towers(1857), and Framley Parsonage (1861).

And, because she asked, some random Trollope quotes (gathered in 45 seconds from Barchester Towers) for Dana

“Well, Madeline; so I’m going to be married,” Bertie began as soon as the servants had withdrawn.  “There’s no other foolish thing left, that you haven’t done,” said Madeline, “and therefore you are quite right to try that.”

How it is that poor men’s wives, who have no cold fowl and port wine on which to be coshered up, nurse their children without difficulty, whereas the wives of rich men, who eat and drink everything that is good, cannot do so, we will for the present leave to the doctors and the mothers to settle between them.

He wished to be what he called “safe” with all those whom he had admitted to the penetralia of his house and heart. […] His feelings towards his friends were, that while they stuck to him he would stick to them; that he would work with them shoulder and shoulder; that he would be faithful to the faithful.  He knew nothing of that beautiful love which can be true to a false friend.

Eight other blog posts about Trollope.  I. love. Trollope.

If You Were Me Today

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You wake up to the alarm, hit the snooze button and drift back into lala-land.

As you rise to the surface of consciousness your heart twitters: today is “High Holy Day”!  It is the first day of the annual Book Fair at the local university, the only opportunity for thrift books in your region. You close your eyes and smile, picturing the long tables covered with books.  You review the best snatches from previous years, and rejoice at the precious ones. 

Your son lets you borrow his car because yours is getting repaired.  You assure your husband that this year you will be reasonable.  Selective.  Discriminating.  You stop before you say Self-Controlled.

You go to work at the pharmacy where you are training for a new job because your life is in transition from home school mom to working woman.  But they know the significance of this day and you have leave to go to lunch at 10:45.

You arrive at the gymnasium where the sale opens, at a $5 premium, for the first hour.  To your dismay, you see Pastor Steele smack at the front of the line.  Pastor Steele has a doctorate, loves history, is a Calvinist–any good book you’d hope to snag will be grabbed by him first.  You also believe in providence, and wonder which books are predestined to go home with you.  You recall with relief the conversation where he insisted he didn’t read fiction.   

All chitchat ceases when the door opens.  Your $5 bill is ready, your Office Depot paper box is in hand and you scope, zoom, do a little skip-trot-jog step while trying to maintain an outward picture of dispassionate serenity.  You promise yourself you won’t stalk Pastor Steele trying to see what his box holds. 

The first table is passed up by all ten of the book sharks.  An opportunity! You plant yourself, tilt your head to read titles, throwing “worthy” books in your box as quickly as you can.  There’s always time to weed later, but if you don’t get it in your box, one of those sharks will snap it up.  You sneak a sidewards glance at the bookstore owner who is starting to fill his second box.  That’s okay: he has a family to feed. 

You start the second combing, letting your fingers flutter over the spines.  You are rewarded with a few titles which previously escaped you.

For twenty minutes you work quickly and intently.  Then you straighten, rub your back, take a breath and start working the room methodically. Satisfied with your catch, you pony up to the checkout table and pay your bill.

You return to work, mentally writing a blog entry whenever the internet hesitates.  You authorized a $9,055.00 payment to a vendor whose invoice is $90.55.  After canceling your overpayment, you go home to take an inventory and let your friends, folks fascinated by the banal detritus of your life, see the results.

Travel Books

Of Men and Mountains, William O. Douglas
Facing the Congo, A Modern-Day Journey into the Heart of Darkness, Jeffrey Tayler
A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, Eric Newby (preface by Evelyn Waugh)
Skeletons On the Zahara, A True Story of Survival, Dean King
In a Sunburned Country, Bill Bryson
A Passage to India, E. M. Forster
1.000 Places to See Before You Die, Patricia Schultz (x 2!)

Art and Music

A World of Art, Henry M. Sayre
Stomping the Blues, Albert Murray
Gift from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindbergh
 
History

Founding Brothers, Joseph J. Ellis
Galileo’s Daughter, Dava Sobel (hardback, gift condition)
Tank versus Tank, Kenneth Macksey
Band of Brothers, Stephen E. Ambrose
German Boy, A Child in War, Wolfgang Samuel, Forw Stephen Ambrose
The Gathering of Zion, The Story of the Mormon Trail, W. Stegner
Desert Diary, Louise Van Dyke

Social History

How the Other Half Lives, Jacob A. Riis (a 1929 hardback)
Home, Witold Rybczynski
Rats, Robert Sullivan
Library, An Unquiet History, Matthew Battles

Home-ish

New Recipes from Moosewood Restaurant
Olives, The Life and Lore of a Noble Fruit, Mort Rosenblum
Quilts are Forever, A Patchwork of Insp. Stories, Kathy Lamancusa
Spirit of the Kitchen, Jane Alexander
Meditations for Women Who Do Too Much, Anne Wilson Schaef
I Married You, Walter Trobisch

School-ish

The Oxford History of Western Philosophy, ed. Anthony Kenny
The Courage to Teach, Parker J. Palmer
A Critic’s Notebook, Irving Howe

Fiction

One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Man in the Iron Mask, Alexandre Dumas
Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad
A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway
3 By Flannery O’Connor
The Old Order, Stories of the South, Katherine Anne Porter
The Moviegoer, Walker Percy
The Bean Tree, Barbara Kingsolver
The Prince of Tides, Pat Conroy

Children’s Books

Rascal, Sterling North
Redwall, Brian Jacques
Mossflower, Brian Jacques
Winterdance, The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod, G. Paulsen
Heidi, Johanna Spyri, illustrated by Jessie Wilcox Smith!!
The Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Multiplication Book, Jerry Pallotta
Book, George Ella Lyon, Peter Catalanotto
I Spy Gold Challenger, A Book of Picture Riddles
Holes, Louis Sachar
A Year Down Yonder, Richard Peck

You take a deep breath and smile. You stop gloating and start looking for a place to shelve the books.

       

I Want to Read This

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Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir

From the product description:

“I had more or less resolved not to write a book about my parents. But I’m a writer, and when the universe hands you material like this, not writing about it amounts either to waste or a conscious act of evasion.”

In twelve months between 2007 and 2008, Buckley coped with the passing of his father, William F. Buckley, the father of the modern conservative movement, and his mother, Patricia Taylor Buckley, one of New York’s most glamorous and colorful socialites. He was their only child and their relationship was close and complicated. Writes Buckley: “They were not — with respect to every other set of loving, wonderful parents in the world — your typical mom and dad.”

Memoirs are one of my favorite genres.  Right up there with histories, Victorian novels, travelogues and poetry.  Everyone has a story.  Because of my own personal history, I am all the more interested when the story involves the loss of a parent.  That sounds twisted, but think of it as “comparing notes.”

My first impression of William F. Buckley was “his vocabulary is massive.” And so, in my early twenties, I began reading his Blackford Oakes Novels with a dictionary, pen and paper next to me.  I was on a treasure hunt and looked up every word I didn’t know.  Buckley taught me more words than my English teacher with the southern drawl whose last name I can’t remember. [Her first name was Agnes.  I can still see her standing before the class giving a quiz; she said incongruous with a lilt that came out in-Con-gress. Forever will Congress and incongruous be linked in my brain.]

Firing Line was one of the shows we hated to miss.  We would scurry around finishing our chores, so we could sit down together and watch Buckley at play.  His eyes widened, he grinned and out came something erudite. 

I haven’t purchased this book whose publishing date is 2009.  But I am eager to read it.
 

Wait. And Pray.

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This week has been characterized by good news.  Isaiah was moved to Boise, ID (a six hour ambulance ride) to an acute care facility that specializes in head traumas.  While he is still in a coma, at times he has been responsive, giving a thumbs up when asked if he understood. 

We continue to wait and pray…wait and pray. 

From Elisabeth Elliot’s email today:
 

“At times nothing seems to be happening. So it must be for the bird that sits on her nest. Things are apparently at a standstill. But the bird sits quietly, knowing that in the stillness something vital is going on, and in the proper time it will be shown. It takes faith and patience for the bird, and such faith and patience never seem to waver, day after day, night after night, as she bides the appointed time.” 


In the last year our church has had many difficulties and many displays of God’s mercy.  In July, at a cabin in Imnaha, two-year old Andrew fell unseen into a raging river, bobbed past bystanders and was plucked out of the river at the last possible moment blue and barely breathing by Isaiah’s older brother and thus saved from drowning.  Witnesses say Brian almost ran on the water to get to little Andrew.   A month later Matt, a younger dad, went over the edge with his truck and miraculously no one was hurt beyond minor leg injuries.

When you are going through grief, distress, burdened and careworn, hymns speak to the soul in a special way.  These days I wobble more than sing! (Wobble? Warble?  Related?) Today we sang:

When through the deep waters I call you to go,
the rivers of sorrow shall not overflow;
for I will be with you, your troubles to bless,
and sanctify to you your deepest distress.  (from How Firm a Foundation)


Here in our sickness, healing grace aboundeth,
Light in our blindness, in our toil refreshment,
Sin is forgiven, hope o’er fear prevaileth,
Joy over sorrow.    (from Only-Begotten, Word of God Eternal)

And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long,
Steals on the ear the distant triumph song,
And hearts are brave again, and arms are strong.
Alleluia, Alleluia.    (from For All the Saints)

Let all the godly when they grieve and suffer
To Thee, O Lord, their supplications offer.
Surely when floods of mighty water rise,
They shall not reach him who on Thee relies.
Thou art a hiding place for those who serve Thee;
Thou, mighty God, from trouble dost preserve me.
Songs of deliverance everywhere resound:
Thou me with great rejoicing dost surround. (from Blest is the Man, Psalm 32)


People ask how Isaiah’s mom and dad are holding up.  Our pastor says “They aren’t.  They are being held.”  Can I quote these dear ones who are stretched beyond what they thought possible?

Isaiah’s mom: “God is sovereign!! He is in control of our past, present, and future and we will trust. And besides, we don’t have a choice. We MUST trust.”

Isaiah’s dad:  “Marathon, not sprint. I keep saying it. The Lord is good and gracious.”  His dad calls him my warrior Isaiah.

Thank you for your prayers.  This is one situation where Facebook has been a huge blessing in disseminating information to a large group of people.  One friend started to list states where people were praying for Isaiah.  The comments added countries, spots all over the globe, where people have prayed for our brother.  The outpouring of love (and you are part of that) is overwhelming.

Update of others in the wreck:  Jeff, the driver, died at the scene.  His wife and kids need prayer.  The other five boys are all discharged from the hospital in various states of healing.  We are praying for continued emotional and physical healing.  It is a mercy, an amazing mercy, that anyone survived falling 350 feet. 

Fine Art Friday, Sir George Clausen

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French Peasant Girls Praying, 1875
[This is a photo I took of a page from my book.
This is my introduction to Sir George Clausen;
I’m so thankful for what I’ve discovered
because of this picture.]


A Normandy Peasant, 1887
[I love the colors and the background;
the absent smile is haunting, no?]


Twilight 1909
[Of course I love this one! 
A girl, a light and a book.
I need to add this to my gallery
of readers in my hallway.]

Next week I’ll move on to another artist.
I think I will remember this winter as the
season I discovered Clausen.
big breath…happy sigh

Best place to learn more about Clausen.

Graceful Ghost

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Today….today!  One of my piano students completed and nailed this piece, Graceful Ghost by William Bolcom.  She conquered it!  Playing the piece is like wading through nails, it has that many accidentals. For those of you that don’t play the piano that means lots of sharps and flats and naturals.  Generally speaking, white notes are easier to read (in the music) than black notes.  Look at the video and notice where his fingers are the majority of the time.

My student has worked on this piece for nigh upon a year.  Isn’t it the difficult, seemingly impossible tasks which, when completed, provide the most satisfaction?  Graceful Ghost caused tears some weeks, but great smiles today.  Bravo Shelby!  I’m so proud of you!

I don’t know Richard Dowling, but he plays the piece very well.  I especially like the rubato [the freedom a pianist takes with the tempo for expression]. 

So sit back and enjoy!

The Light is Back

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Another sign of spring: there is a window of sunlight shining into our kitchen in the early mornings.  During the winter the yawning sun just can’t stretch its beams around to this spot.  Now it plays peek a boo for five minutes. In August it will linger long enough for a cup of tea.

The light that brightens the tulips and roses also illumines the bookshelf in the hallway.  Isn’t it odd how light can both lighten and lift our spirits?

William Cowper, my father’s favorite poet,
struggled with depression and wrote about the effect of light.

Sometimes a light surprises the Christian while he sings;
It is the Lord, who rises with healing in His wings:
When comforts are declining, He grants the soul again
A season of clear shining, to cheer it after rain.

(Click link for full lyrics)

~   ~   ~

God Moves in a Mysterious Way, another Cowper hymn,
was originally titled Light Shining Out of Darkness.

What is lightening your heart today?
 

A Deer in the Target

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Here it is halfway through April and I have not even mentioned National Poetry Month.  This poem, introduced to me by The Writer’s Almanac, delights me on many levels.  All my sons are deer hunters, but one spent time as a “team member” in a red polo shirt in Target.  Enjoy!

A Deer in the Target 
by Robert Fanning 

I only got a ten-second shot,
grainy footage of the huge deer
caught in the crosshairs
of a ceiling security camera, a scene
of utter chaos in a strip mall store,
shown on the late local news.
The beautiful beast clearly scared
to death in this fluorescent forest,
its once graceful legs giving out
on mopped floors, think Bambi
as a fawn its first time standing.
Seeing the scattering shoppers,
you’d think a demon had barged
into this temple of commerce,
as they sacrificed their merchandise,
stranded full carts and dove for cover.
And when the aisles were emptied
of these bargain hunters, who was left
but an army of brave red-shirted
team members, mobilized by
the store manager over the intercom
to drive this wild animal out.
I wager there’s nothing on this
in the How to Approach
an Unsatisfied Shopper
section in the Target employee handbook,
but there they were: the cashiers
and stockers, the Floor Supervisor,
the Assistant Floor Supervisor,
the Store Manager,
the Assistant Store Manager,
the District Associate Manager,
the District Supervisor,
the District Assistant Supervisor
and visiting members from
the Regional Corporate Office,
running after it, it running after
them, bull’s eye logos on their red golf shirts,
everyone frenzied and panting: razor hooves
clattering on the mirror-white floor tiles,
nostrils heaving, its rack clearing
off-season clothes from clearance racks.
All of them, in Target,
chasing the almighty buck.

How to Cook a Wolf

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“Nothing seems particularly grim
if your head is clear
and your teeth are clean
and your bowels function properly.”

The problem is how to characterize How to Cook a Wolf.   

~  It is a cookbook, but one with only 75 recipes added like seasoning to the prose.  Along the way you will learn how to cook fish, eggs, fritattas, polenta, gravy, bread and War Cake.

~  It is a book on frugality.

~  It is a survival book including a basic recipe for a gruel/sludge that will keep you alive.

~  It is sort of a social history, illuminating life at home during the second world war.

~  It is a dialog between the author and herself.  She wrote the book in 1942 and revised it in 1954.  The original is kept intact and revisions added in [brackets].  This is one of the most entertaining features.  As any writer knows, reading your work at a later date can make you alternately wince or nod your head.  Fisher, an opinionated writer, tends to argue with herself, retract a statement or two; but she admits at the end of one chapter that she is pleased with what she wrote. 

~   It is a book worth reading for its delightful prose.  W. H. Auden wrote about M.F.K. Fisher “I do not know of anyone in the United States today who writes better prose.”  Here’s what I want you to do: click on the link above, click on the picture of the book “Click to Look Inside” and read the table of contents.  I don’t know any other book with better chapter titles. 

If you are curious about the wolf in the title, it comes from the ditty by C.P.S. Gilman: There’s a whining at the threshold.  There’s a scratching at the floor.  To work! To work! In Heaven’s name! The wolf is at the door! 

Here’s some morsels of Fisher’s writing to further tempt you:

As for butter and other shortening,
I have always felt that I should prefer
too little of the best
to plenty of the inferior kind.  p. 18

[As an older and wiser frittata cook
I almost always, these richer days,
add a scant cup of good dry Parmesan cheese
to the eggs when I mix them.
Often I add rich cream too.
How easy it is to stray from austerity!]  p.61

I believe more firmly than ever in fresh raw milk,
freshly ground whole grains of cereal,
and vegetables grown in organically cultured soil.
If I must eat meats I want them carved from beasts
nurtured on the plants from that same kind of soil.  p. 71

The doubtful triumphs of science over human hunger
are perhaps less dreadful to the English than to us,
for in spite of our national appetite for pink gelatine puddings,
we have never been as thoroughly under the yoke
of Bird’s Custard Sauce as our allies.  p.152

In the old days, before Stuka and blitz became part of
even childish chitchat, every practical guide to cookery
urged you to keep a well-filled emergency shelf
in your kitchen or pantry.
Emergency is another word
that has changed its inner shape;
when Marion Harland and Fanny Farmer used it
they meant unexpected guests.
You may, too, in an ironical way,
but you hope to God
they are the kind who will never come.  p.187

Easter Monday

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From the view of the sunrise outside our front door
to the pitter-patter of raindrops on the roof as we fell asleep,
Easter was a magnificent, glorious, rich celebration.

Today, Easter Monday, is a day of hugs and good-byes
with family returning to their homes,
a day for the washing machine to exert itself,
a day of putting away,
a day of happy, contented sighs.

I read somewhere that in Greek villages,
they celebrate Easter Monday with practical jokes,
reflecting the cosmic “joke” of Christ’s resurrection.
It is a holiday in many countries, a designation I fully support.
I think I’ll take a walk.