Page 69

Recently found on the blog of the Guardian book section, this post about the suggestion that you can tell whether or not you'll like a novel by whether or not you like page 69. I pulled five titles off my shelf to try it out.

1. The Moon And Sixpence – W. Somerset Maugham

Page 69 starts in the middle of a conversation, and the two speakers are not named. But the first line of dialog is, “Do you mean to say you didn’t leave your wife for another woman?” Well, well. The gist of the rest of it is that no, he didn’t leave her for another woman, he left her because he wanted to become a painter in his middle age. Apparently, he’s been taking art classes in the evening, and telling his wife he was out playing cards. This is all highly intriguing. All sorts of questions present themselves, not least of which, why does he have to leave his wife in order to paint? Page 69 is a winner.

2. Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh

I really need to reread this, because I don’t remember this scene at all. It seems to be a description of the beginning of a dinner party hosted by the narrator’s father; he’s speaking to one of his guests about the scandal of having relatives in business. All in all, the effect is less beguiling than in the Maugham.

3. Coming Up for Air – George Orwell

A long paragraph reminiscing about school days. It would come across as hopelessly conventional if one didn’t know that it couldn’t be, on the basis of being Orwell.

4. Quo Vadis – Henryk Sienkiewicz

Reads the way you expect Graeco-Roman historical narrative to read. The scene depicted, as best I can tell, is a chariot-equivalent of a drive by shooting, with a kidnapping of a pretty girl as bonus. There’s an implication that some of the people involved are Christians, but I can’t tell which ones.

5. Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky

Raskolnikov is in a tavern and overhears two young men talking about whether or not they want to kill the hateful old woman that he himself has been considering doing away with. Then he goes home and sits in the dark. A compelling hook, if one doesn’t know the plot.

Conclusion: I guess page 69 is as good as any other...

Sounds Intriguing #1

I'm experimenting with better ways of keeping track of my to-read list - or, more accurately, my list of new (or not-so-new) titles that have lately come to my attention (or found a new reason to intrigue me). So I think I'll try periodically recording them here.

• Via NPR: Life and Death are Wearing Me Out - Mo Yan
• Via NPR and Sam of BookChase: Wild Nights!: Stories About the Last Days of Poe, Dickinson, Twain, James, and Hemingway - Joyce Carol Oates
• Via NYT Sunday Book Review: Personal Days - Ed Park
• And the thematically related: Then We Came to the End - Joshua Ferris
• Also via NYT: Dear American Airlines - Jonathan Miles
• Via Stefanie of So Many Books: Goldberg: Variations - Gabriel Josipovici
• Also: The Secret of Lost Things - Sheridan Hay
• Also (one that I forgot about the first time around): The Uncommon Reader - Alan Bennett
  
• Also (because Stefanie recommends so compellingly): Flaubert's Parrot - Julian Barnes
• Via I don't know: How I Became Stupid - Martin Page

Housekeeping and the Literary Art

A Broom of One's Own - Nancy Peacock

Confession: I'm quite bad at cleaning. If you read my other blog, you may have gathered as much. If I were to pursue a career in the arts and needed to support myself with a day job, I'd do much better as, say, a pet sitter, or a high school calculus tutor.

Not so novelist Nancy Peacock, who, even after publication of two books continued her work as independent cleaning lady to make ends meet. In this quirky memoir, Peacock reflects on the intersection of life as housekeeper and author. I came away with great respect for her tenacity - in addition to the frustrations inherent to any service job (please, flush the toilet before the cleaning lady comes) and the uncertainties of a writing career (how many rejection letters can I collect this week?), she fought the discouragement of her literary peers' discomfort with her circumstances and lack of formal education, and the feedback of elderly clients who enthusiastically informed her that her books weren't nearly as good as Bridget Jones' Diary.

Still, she points out the advantages of her situation. A writer benefits from time alone, but away from the page; manual distraction is healthy for the narrative; you can learn a lot of useful stuff in other people's houses. Between the anecdotes and reflections contained in the book's essays and the interviews and advice from the author at the end, I imagine this book could be an encouragement to the aspiring writer who's willing to face reality - Peacock is honest about the struggles and disappointments of her literary career thus far without descending into languid cynicism. And it's that last part that I most respect these days, cynic though I am myself.

Incidentally, I've never read either of Peacock's novels, and after finishing this book checked for them at my local bookstores (I won't suggest this was the aim, since I just finished praising lack of cynicism), but didn't find them anywhere. I'm not sure they sound like quite my thing, but I'm curious, and I'll keep an eye out.