Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Failures all around
At the eleventh hour the haddock hash was vetoed on the grounds of salt. Had to settle for plain steamed smoked haddock with leeks and mashed potato. Will be working on the matter and hopefully have resolution in time for next week's visit to the man from Hastings.
And then, to add to the misery, lost broadband sometime on Sunday and am still off the air, despite one of those interesting conversations with the people at Bangalore. So this from Epsom library; not quite such a flashy facility as that at the Western regional capital, but not bad. And not fully populated at 1000 this Tuesday morning so one does get in. But it does share a dislike for Mr G's security certificates. Must be something to do with the software used to support banks of public access PCs at public libraries. But we get there or you would not be reading this.
Nearer home, have finally finished reading my banned novel from 1929, 'Sleeveless Errand'. I am sure I have mentioned it before, but various searches fail to bring it back into the light of day. Written by one Norah C. James and published by Babou & Kehane of Paris because it had been banned for immorality by the (late lamented. I went past their building the other day; it looked unused. Whatever will happen to it? It must be listed by the heritage folk so they won't be able to knock it down...) Bow Street magistrates at the instigation of one Sir William Joynson-Hicks. A sorry tale of a sorry lady in her twenties in the twenties who commits suicide by driving in a hire car over Beachy Head. There is some talk of booze and sex, but all fairly mild compared with Lady C - also published in Paris at about the same time, along with that other book of notoriety, Ulysses. Maybe we English were going through a fit of puritanical blues after coming down from being on the winning side on the first war; something the French and Germans managed to avoid having been on the losing side. Well OK, the French were not formally on the losing side, but they did not do very well. The Germans were still in occupation of large chunks of their land when the ref. called time.
Not a very good book, but an interesting and well used peice of book production and an interesting observation peice on the mores and morals of the time. Including some stuff on concert parties. Now we had been reviewing Brighton Rock the other day, courtesy of either the Daily Mail or the DT, in which one of the main charectars is a lady in a concert party. She is a tawdry, plump blonde with a heart of gold. They are a gang who have a makeshift stage on or just off the beach, dress up in white clown costumes (pierrot?) and belt out tacky songs to small numbers of punters in deck chairs. Looked absolutely awful; but I suppose that is what people did for entertainment in those far off days when neither film nor vinyl were widely available. And it just so happens that Norah C. describes a very similar outfit, and quite apart from being grim to watch, it sounds like it was grim to live. Performing in all weather through an English summer, not making much money, living in smelly theatrical digs, drinking too much, thrown in with a rather dodgy crowd... One might as well be on the building.
And, last but not least, a surprise from the TLS. It seems that the prolific A. N. Wilson has written a book about our times. Now I always thought, on the basis of very little knowledge, that he was an educated chap with manners. Worked away in the BM reading room when he was not knocking out his column for the Evening Standard. But according to the reviewer of this book, a scribe of biographies of eminent Conservative politicians, Wilson spends a lot of time in this book being crassly offensive about people he does not like. There is also a lot of sloppy writing. Maybe Wilson was having a bad month, lost a bundle in the crash and so whacked out something in a hurry to keep the wolf from the door. For some reason I have faith in the reviewer and will not be enquiring further. Wilson's reputation irretreivably besmirched in these parts of Epsom.
And then, to add to the misery, lost broadband sometime on Sunday and am still off the air, despite one of those interesting conversations with the people at Bangalore. So this from Epsom library; not quite such a flashy facility as that at the Western regional capital, but not bad. And not fully populated at 1000 this Tuesday morning so one does get in. But it does share a dislike for Mr G's security certificates. Must be something to do with the software used to support banks of public access PCs at public libraries. But we get there or you would not be reading this.
Nearer home, have finally finished reading my banned novel from 1929, 'Sleeveless Errand'. I am sure I have mentioned it before, but various searches fail to bring it back into the light of day. Written by one Norah C. James and published by Babou & Kehane of Paris because it had been banned for immorality by the (late lamented. I went past their building the other day; it looked unused. Whatever will happen to it? It must be listed by the heritage folk so they won't be able to knock it down...) Bow Street magistrates at the instigation of one Sir William Joynson-Hicks. A sorry tale of a sorry lady in her twenties in the twenties who commits suicide by driving in a hire car over Beachy Head. There is some talk of booze and sex, but all fairly mild compared with Lady C - also published in Paris at about the same time, along with that other book of notoriety, Ulysses. Maybe we English were going through a fit of puritanical blues after coming down from being on the winning side on the first war; something the French and Germans managed to avoid having been on the losing side. Well OK, the French were not formally on the losing side, but they did not do very well. The Germans were still in occupation of large chunks of their land when the ref. called time.
Not a very good book, but an interesting and well used peice of book production and an interesting observation peice on the mores and morals of the time. Including some stuff on concert parties. Now we had been reviewing Brighton Rock the other day, courtesy of either the Daily Mail or the DT, in which one of the main charectars is a lady in a concert party. She is a tawdry, plump blonde with a heart of gold. They are a gang who have a makeshift stage on or just off the beach, dress up in white clown costumes (pierrot?) and belt out tacky songs to small numbers of punters in deck chairs. Looked absolutely awful; but I suppose that is what people did for entertainment in those far off days when neither film nor vinyl were widely available. And it just so happens that Norah C. describes a very similar outfit, and quite apart from being grim to watch, it sounds like it was grim to live. Performing in all weather through an English summer, not making much money, living in smelly theatrical digs, drinking too much, thrown in with a rather dodgy crowd... One might as well be on the building.
And, last but not least, a surprise from the TLS. It seems that the prolific A. N. Wilson has written a book about our times. Now I always thought, on the basis of very little knowledge, that he was an educated chap with manners. Worked away in the BM reading room when he was not knocking out his column for the Evening Standard. But according to the reviewer of this book, a scribe of biographies of eminent Conservative politicians, Wilson spends a lot of time in this book being crassly offensive about people he does not like. There is also a lot of sloppy writing. Maybe Wilson was having a bad month, lost a bundle in the crash and so whacked out something in a hurry to keep the wolf from the door. For some reason I have faith in the reviewer and will not be enquiring further. Wilson's reputation irretreivably besmirched in these parts of Epsom.
# posted by Jim @ 1:57 AM 
