Poor beggars! Victoria's sons

[sovay]

On the whole, I liked A.S. Byatt's The Children's Book (2009) very much.¹ It has not displaced Angels & Insects (1992), which for whatever set of reasons seems to be holding as my favorite, but it's definitely ahead of The Virgin in the Garden (1978) and possibly The Biographer's Tale (2000), with which it shares some of the same commenting breakdown of narrative. Most of the name-checks did not bother me, because of the circles the characters move in; I liked the shifting panorama of the cast, which is no more fixed than the attention spent on any one year between 1895 and 1919; the language is at once highly wrought and conversational. They are not identical in either aim or focus, but it might be fun to read The Children's Book against Elizabeth Hand's Mortal Love (2004) and see what the combination says about muses.

1. The major exception can probably be fixed by paperclipping pages 391—396 together and ignoring them; otherwise they restate as an essay the novel's thesis about the Edwardian attitude toward children and its consequences, which is already perceptible from the characters and their behavior, and therefore add nothing to the discourse beyond the impression that the author has no confidence in her audience's ability to come up with conclusions on its own. Jane Gardam's Old Filth (2004) suffers from a similar problem in the form of a late-stage, superfluous letter whose contents the reader already has all the clues to divine, unread. It is not book-breaking, but it annoys me.

Comments

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

...and see what the combination says about muses.

Run away! Run away!

Nine

[sovay]

Run away! Run away!

But is that advice most pertinent to the artist, or the muse?

[movingfinger.livejournal.com]

In my limited experience, editors often demand the inclusion of such pace- and suspense-bursting summations, not trusting the readers as much as the authors do. Of course, it could also just be Byatt's own academical bent.

I have that but I've got to read Wolf Hall first. I like Hilary Mantel.

[sovay]

In my limited experience, editors often demand the inclusion of such pace- and suspense-bursting summations, not trusting the readers as much as the authors do. Of course, it could also just be Byatt's own academical bent.

You're certainly right in the case of Jane Gardam:

According to [her long-standing editor Penelope] Hoare, "she writes these organised, well-constructed books but they grow organically. You never know where it's going until it's written. The characters lead her. She talks about them as if they are real people, something readers pick up on. She often gets asked at literary events what happened to so-and-so after the end of the book." But Gardam shies away from pinning things down, and it was only at Hoare's suggestion that she inserted a letter towards the end of Old Filth which finally reveals the precise nature of her character's secret. "Maybe she is sometimes too subtle," Hoare says. "She hates explaining. She wants to keep the interpretation out of the books. She doesn't want to tell the readers what it means, as if that would take the bloom off."

I'll have to find out about A.S. Byatt.

I have that but I've got to read Wolf Hall first. I like Hilary Mantel.

I don't know her at all. What's she like?

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I really liked it, but I found the actual play very hard to read in a way I don't normally find things -- I had to stop reading and get up and walk around and come back to it because it was so hard to bear. I shall be re-reading it again fairly soon -- I read it in the spring when it came out.

[sovay]

I shall be re-reading it again fairly soon -- I read it in the spring when it came out.

I look forward to your report.

(I made the assumption you were re-reading it for a Tor post. If that is not the case, never mind; although I would still like very much to hear what you have to say about the book.)

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

It might be a public service to have a web site with charts about which pages to paperclip together in various books.

[sovay]

It might be a public service to have a web site with charts about which pages to paperclip together in various books.

Do you have any other nominations?

[deliasherman.livejournal.com]

Now I'm really unhappy I didn't buy this when we were in the UK. I shall have to go right out and get it. I've adored Byatt ever since Virgin Garden.

[sovay]

Now I'm really unhappy I didn't buy this when we were in the UK. I shall have to go right out and get it.

Fortunately, it just came out in this country! I will be curious to see what you think.

[clarionj.livejournal.com]

Well, now I've a ton more new things to read! I don't know why but I haven't read any Byatt since Possession. How did I forget to read more? And I seem to remember you mentioning Elizabeth's Hand at some other time (I lost all my old notes on people's recommendations for books and music when the old computer crashed). Time to start a new list!

[sovay]

but I haven't read any Byatt since Possession. How did I forget to read more?

Eh. I didn't read more because I bounced off Possession; it was only when I rediscovered her other work that I realized I liked her as much as I do.

And I seem to remember you mentioning Elizabeth's Hand at some other time (I lost all my old notes on people's recommendations for books and music when the old computer crashed). Time to start a new list!

I'm so sorry to hear about the old one! Definitely put Elizabeth Hand on it—Mortal Love (2004), Saffron and Brimstone (2006), and Generation Loss (2007) to start with.