Contemporary Reads: Moral Disorder

Moral Disorder (2006) is a book by Margaret Atwood.

Contemporary Reads: The Passion of the New Eve

The Passion of the New Eve (1977) is a novel by Angela Carter.

Great classics: The Story of an African Farm

The Story of an African Farm (1883) is a novel by Olive Schreiner.

Contemporary Reads: Possession

Possession (1990) is the Booker prize novel by AS Byatt.

Modern Classics: Wide Sargasso Sea

Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) is a novel by Jean Rhys.

Modern Classics: The Handmaid's Tale

The Handmaid's Tale (1985) is a novel by Margaret Atwood.

Untranslated Lit: L'Amant de la Chine du Nord (The North China Lover)

L'Amant de la Chine du Nord (1991) is a novel by Marguerite Duras. It is a retelling of her early Goncourt winning novel L'Amant (The Lover). Back in later 1920s French Indochina, a 15 year old girl and a Chinese man in his 30s have an intense love affair. She is the daughter of a poor French teacher and he a rich heir with a European education and a future in banking. She has never loved anyone other than her younger brother Paulo, whom their mother and Thahn try to protect from their opium-addicted older brother. The Chinese man is enganged to be married to a wealthy Chinese girl.
The lack of characterisation (most of the characters are not even given a name) does not make this novel any less beautiful and sad. Duras draws for her own life and her experiences of colonial life (like the girl in the novel she was born and raised in Indochina herself and seems to have had a Chinese lover when she was 15 herself). The impossible love affair ends when the child goes back to France by boat. Years later, now settled in Paris, she receives a telephone call from the Chinese man who tells her that he never stopped loving her.
Subtletly narrated and sometimes structured as a film script - L'Amant was indeed turned into a movie but Duras did not approve of it and this second version of the novel is most probably a reaction to it - this book is of a rare beauty and, despite its subject matter, utterly unsentimental.

Contemporary Reads: The Ghost Road

The Ghost Road (1995) completes the Regeneration trilogy by Pat Barker. Perhaps more introspective than its predecessors, this novel sees Prior's return to the front in France. We thus get a present tense account of the horrors of war for the first time in the trilogy. His (bi)sexuality is also very explicitly explored. We also get a look into River's work in Melanesia before the war. A very poignant and interesting book, the best one out of a remarkable trilogy.

The other books in the trilogy are: Regeneration and The Eye in the Door.

Untranslated Lit: Je Voudrais Que Quelqu'un M'attende Quelque Part (I Wish Someone Were Waiting for Me Somewhere)

Je voudrais que quelqu'un m'attende quelque part (1999) is a collection of short-stories by French writer Anna Gavalda. 12 short-stories set in modern day France, episodes in the ordinary lives of ordinary people told in the first person singular. The language is also everyday French but also blunt and even crude sometimes.

I am not the biggest fan of short-stories but, as a French student, I have greatly enjoyed most of the stories on this collection.

Rereadings: Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit

Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit (1985) was Jeanette Winterson's first novel. I have just finished reading it for the second time (I read it the first time as a student). It is such an original powerful book. The story (at least in part autobiographical) was a very daring one to tell at the time of its publication: the novel is about an adopted girl being raised in Lancashire by a self-righteous born-again Christian mother. Its structure is not any less daring as it is original: without being told in strictly chronological order, the story is not hard to follow. The reader (or at least I did) will get a sense of the "madness" Jeanette, for that is the narrator/protagonist's name, was brought up in and also how she will finally be able to find her way out of it. Precisely, in the last chapters there is a parallel fary tale-like narrative that works to help the reader understand the protagonist's progress.

Other novels I have read by the same author: The Passion and Sexy the Cherry.

Contemporary Reads: Fair Play

Fair Play (1989) is a novel by Finnish author Tove Jansson. Although she is better known internationally as a children's writer and illustrator thanks to her creation The Moomins, there has been some recent interest on her adult fiction after the publication of the English translations of The Summer Book and a collection of her best short-stories The Winter Book. Personally, my introduction to Jansson's fiction has been through Fair Play. A novella made out of vignettes depicting the lives of two elderly friends Mari and Jonna. The narrative is simple and straightforward and nothing much seems to happen: trips abroad, stays on an island, life on their Helsinki apartments, visits from friends, ... What I got from this book is a minimalist description of true friendship. The confidences, shared memories, little conflicts, etc.

The novel is subtle but it reaches where a lot of more complicated books fail to reach. It's true, it's honest and I love it.

Contemporary Reads: The Emperor's Children

The Emperor's Children (2006) is Claire Messud's latest novel. It is a wonderful comedy of manners set largely in New York city in the months leading up to 9/11 . The book has been hailed by critics from both sides of the Atlantic. To read the review published on the New York Times click here.

Contemporary Reads: The Eye in the Door

The Eye in the Door (1993) is the second novel on Pat Barker's trilogy about the Great War. The story this time centres around one of Dr River's patients, Prior, and Charles Manning. Apart from themes of class and anti-war sentiment that were already tackled by her previous novel, Barker also deals with persecution and prejudice.

The Eye in the Door is perhaps a richer novel than Regeneration and I am sure it can be as enjoyable read on its own as as part of the trilogy.

Contemporary Reads: Regeneration

Regeneration (1991) is a novel by Pat Barker. It fictionalises the real-life encounter between army psychologist W.H.R. Rivers and Siegfried Sassoon. Other real life characters, notably poet Wilfred Owen, are part of the narrative.

Pacifism, class, psychology, anthropology or the effect of the Great War on ordinary people are all elements of this important novel.

This novel is the first of the Regeneration Trilogy together with The Eye in the Door and The Ghost Road.

Untranslated Lit: Stupeur et Tremblements (Fear and Trembling)

Stupeur et Tremblements (1999) is a novel by Belgian writer Amélie Nothomb. It narrates the year a Belgian girl spent working for a Japanese firm in Tokyo before returning to Europe to become a writer. During that year, faux pas after faux pas, our heroine was subjected to several humiliations at work. Having been employed as an accountant she is finally demoted to guarding the toilets or being 'Madame Pipi' as she puts it.

This novel is partly biographical and her witty observations on modern-day Japan are hilarious when they are not tragic.

Although I have read it in the original French, the novel has been published in English in the UK and I certainly recommend it.

Contemporary Reads: Digging to America

Digging to America (2006) is the latest novel by American writer Anne Tyler. You can read many reviews on this novel by clicking here.

Modern Classics: Surfacing

Surfacing (1972) is Margaret Atwood's second published novel. A nameless young woman returns to the small Quebec island where she was raised to search for her missing father. With her comes along her boyfriend, Joe, and a married couple, Anna and David.
As the days pass, each characters' individuality is exposed. The protagonist begins to drift in and out of reality, remembering painful episodes of her past.
After her father is found dead (by drowing), she runs away from her friends and hides until they leave the island. She decides to stay there in communion with Nature.
This novel explores themes such as powerless of expression through language or the alienation of women (the protagonist/narrator has been married in the past and had a child whom she considers her husband's but not hers); and motifs such as the American expansion or Canadian national identity (the Québec setting is no accident).
This is a short but rich novel that has been hailed by critics as one of the major works in North American literature and probably one of the most canonical Canadian books.
Other books that I have read by the same author: Cat's Eye, The Robber Bride and The Blind Assassin.

Contemporary Reads: The Tenderness of Wolves

The Tenderness of Wolves (2007) is the first novel by Stef Penny. Set in Canada in 1867, much has been made of the fact that Penney has never been to North America. I do not think that is the problem with this novel. The setting is convincing enough. I just found the book a bit long for what it is and was not particularly fond of the style.

If you want to read a more positive review, please click here.

Modern Classics: The Waves

Virgina Woolf described her book The Waves (1931) as 'playpoem' rather as a novel. It is in fact a highly poetical work and one of the essetial texts not only of Modernism but of English literature.

It is wise that readers follow Woolf's advice and approach this work as a poem. Once you accept that what you have on your hands is not a 'conventional' novel, reading it becomes a superbly rewarding experience.

Other books I have read by this author: Mrs Dalloway and A Room of One's Own.

Contemporary Reads: Cat's Eye

Cat's Eye (1988) was the ninth novel published by Margaret Atwood. It is a Bildungsroman charting the life of painter Elaine Risley.

This novel explores brilliantly the complex relationship between a bully, Cordelia, and her victim, Elaine. We also get to see how this relationship changes throughout the years from the victim's perspective. As with all books by Atwood I read to date, Cat's Eye does not fail to impress.

Other books I have read by this author: The Robber Bride and The Blind Assassin.