Poetry Study: Something Simple

"After St Augustine"
By Mary Elizabeth Coleridge

(Yes, related to that Coleridge.)

Sunshine let it be or frost,
Storm or calm, as Thou shalt choose;
Though Thine every gift were lost,
Thee Thyself we could not lose.

Source

Music: Beethoven, Symphony 3 ("Eroica")

I watched a documentary on Beethoven recently, and this symphony came up. I was reminded again about how much I love Beethoven, and why.

Apparently, Beethoven originally composed this in honor of Napoleon as the great liberator, but once he crowned himself emperor Beethoven scratched violently through Napoleon's name on the music manuscript and renamed the symphony "Eroica," or "Heroic."

Book Review: The Lighthouse, by P.D. James

I really enjoyed this story. I don't know if it was the time (lunchtime), the setting (my office during office hours), or the book itself, but this one kept me flipping the pages in a hurry. I think I read the first one hundred pages in a single sitting, because I just couldn't put it down.

Famous -- not to mention highly persnickety and cantankerous -- author Nathan Oliver has been discovered dead, hanging off the deck rail of the lighthouse on Combe Island. And because Combe Island is itself a private location, set aside for heads of state who need a break from the stresses of work and life, Dalgliesh is called in to handle the delicacy of the crime.

The setting of the island makes the crime easier to solve in some ways, and spectacular in others. The island is completely isolated, and no one enters or leaves without a number of other people knowing. As a result, Dalgliesh has a controlled number of suspects. The real issue is trying to figure out who had the most opportunity and the most motive. (Once again, we get motive again, although I'll look past it since this one is pretty good.) And just as Dalgliesh is making headway, a very unlikely danger puts a halt to his own investigation and leaves it in the hands of his subordinates. In a startling moment of clarity, though, Dalgliesh is still the one who solves the crime, and in a way that really works for me. I came across a quote recently that claimed the solution to a mystery novel should always be "inevitable." In other words, all of the clues should be there: they should just be so confusing as to make the solution tangled until the main character sorts through them and re-assembles them correctly. This is exactly what happens in the case of The Lighthouse. It's all there. It just turns out that the details can't be assembled clearly without a little imagination, which Dalgliesh fortunately has.

I'm not alone in thinking this is one of the better James mystery in some time, and it's definitely better than The Private Patient. It just pulls together better, and it flows more clearly. The extra elements -- those red herrings that are present in almost every mystery -- fit into this story more clearly and don't feel as irrelevant. Also, James has enough sense to make the inevitable passing (if unspoken) reference to Virginia Woolf, which is essential in a story with a title such as this. While this one might not be a "swansong" for James, but she can be proud to add this one to her list of final accomplishments.

On a totally irrelevant note, as I read this book during my office hours, I tried to be as discrete as possible. (You know, reading mysteries when I should be looking productive by creating Blackboard applications or grading papers...) At one point, though, I had to fetch the professor who shares the office for a phone call and accidentally left the book -- cover up -- on the desk by the phone. As she was on the phone, she gestured toward the book, smiled, and gave me a thumbs up.

Apparently, she's a James fan as well. Needless to say, I don't feel so bad about reading P.D. James during office hours.

Year of publication: 2005
Number of pages: 352

Book Review: The Private Patient, by P.D. James

This is apparently the most recent of the Dalgliesh mysteries by P.D. James, although I accidentally read it before The Lighthouse (to be reviewed later). No biggie. It's one of the more interesting mysteries I've yet to come across, although I'll admit upfront that the solution to the mystery was something of a letdown. I'll get to that later.

Rhoda Gradwyn is a renowned journalist who has built her career on exposing the secrets of others, but she has a problem of her own that she is reluctant to discuss: as a child she was disfigured when her drunken father threw a broken bottle at her and cut open her face. The scar has always been a part of her, and at the age of forty-seven she finally decides to undergo a plastic surgery procedure to have it removed, "because she doesn't need it anymore," as she says.

Rhoda seeks out the equally renowned plastic surgeon George Chandler-Powell to complete the procedure, a decision which takes her to Chandler-Powell's private surgery location of Cheverell Manor. The procedure goes well; the surgeon does excellent work; and then the night after Rhoda's surgery, someone strangles her in her bed as she is recovering.

The crime is brutal, and the private nature of the location means that Dalgliesh is called in once more to deal with the delicate nature of the situation. Along the way, Dalgliesh uncovers a number of tangles that make the crime much more complex than it actually was. What is more, Dalgliesh's investigation takes him back in time as he attempts to sort through events from a few decades back and even a few centuries back. As I mentioned above, the climax ultimately feels a little anti-climactic. The perpetrator ends up being the most likely suspect: the real mystery is the motive, although I tend to agree with Dorothy L. Sayers (and, through her, Lord Peter Wimsey) that motive really doesn't mean anything. People can be completely guilty of a crime without a clear motive, nor does motive make a person guilty. But that's beside the point. The mystery is still solved, and frankly somewhat less problematically than in some of the other Dalgliesh novels.

Given my most recent review of a James mystery, I thought I should point out something else I found. In researching The Private Patient, I discovered that other reviewers have found a pattern in James that I also noticed: the victim of the crime tend to be "unpleasant" and in many instances unlikeable. Whew! I'm glad to discover that I'm not the only one who saw that. And in this case, Rhoda Gradwyn is pretty unpleasant. Her unfortunate situation aside, she is bitter, sardonic, and altogether the sort of person you'd leave off the list of birthday party guests. I doubt she'd mind.

The author of this review also notes that this story appears to be Dalgliesh's "swansong." I didn't see that, frankly (although I saw it more in The Lighthouse, which is also a better book). Nor is The Private Patient necessarily the best Dalgliesh mystery that James has written. But it's very good and (I think) better than Death in Holy Orders, so if you have the choice go for this one first.

Year of publication: 2008
Number of pages: 368

Anniversary Post

(Not the blog anniversary.)

Yesterday was my eighth wedding anniversary. Eight years of marriage. I feel old.

Moving on (because age is, of course, inevitable and with it comes wisdom...I hope), I thought I'd honor my husband by mentioning eight things I love about him. My husband doesn't make too many appearances in the blog except for the occasional mention, but he's definitely a very present part of my life. No mean feat given the fact that out of eight years of marriage, he's actually been deployed for close to half of that.

Obviously, there are more than eight things I love about him, but I'm going to be cute and kitschy and feature eight for this anniversary.

1) I love that my husband is a man of honor. He will always do the right thing -- even if it's not the easy thing. And in a society that is raising up people who are increasingly devoid of personal responsibility, his sense of honor is admirable.

2) I love that my husband is not afraid of learning new things and applying them to his (and our) life. When we were first married, I was the homeschool-loving, Calvinist-leaning, postmillenial-believing, paedobaptism-supporting, organic-embracing, chemical-eschewing one. I accepted that he thought most of these ideas were pretty loony, and I decided to let him make his own decisions. And over time, he began looking into things, thinking through ideas, researching and reviewing to bring him to the place where he is now. And these days, he could give me a run for my money on a lot of these issues (with the exception of paedobaptism, which he still doesn't like). I have so much respect for someone who puts the time into educating himself in order to make decisions.

3) I love that my husband has a serious frugal bone. You think that you might be cheap? Meet my husband. This is the man who asked me to go out the front door instead of opening the garage when I get the mail, because it saves electricity. And this is the man who -- after discovering that Costco had begun stocking a different brand of organic eggs -- realized that, much to his irritation, we are now paying one-tenth of one cent more per egg. But silliness aside, he knows how to save, and he understands the value of planning for the future. Since I tend to be more of a spender, I'm grateful to have the balance that he brings.

4) I love that my husband has terrible taste in movies. Now, this might not sound like such a flattering thing, but it's actually kind of cute. And I finally discovered -- just the other day! -- why a man with a degree in ocean engineering and experience in nuclear engineering is drawn toward the most ridiculous fluff in films. The reason? He gets lost way too easily in even the simplest film. We were watching Julie and Julia (not a challenging movie by any stretch) the other night, and he couldn't figure out why the people in the Julia Child episodes were dressed oddly. Uh, because the Julia Child episodes were meant to be flashbacks, hon? Seriously. He had no idea. Then again, the real problem may be that he watches movies with a computer on his lap, so he isn't really paying that much attention.

5) I love that my husband is a hard worker. He puts all of himself into everything he does, and he's not afraid to roll up his sleeves and give something his best shot. Currently, he's in the process of converting the lawn mower to run on propane (just for the fun of it, I suspect), and he's mulling over a way to force the cool air in the basement up into the house during the summer months so that we don't have to run the air conditioner. If he could find a way to convert the energy from the sump pump into energy for our house, he would.

6) I love that my husband is incapable of even the simplest domestic task. I'm also irritated by it, but I have to admit that I find it kind of endearing. He simply doesn't get it -- because it's too simple, perhaps? I asked him to vacuum our bedroom a while back, a job that takes me all of five minutes. Forty-five minutes later he was still in there, vacuuming away, moving all the furniture around and giving the carpet one good massage. His one foray into laundry resulted in blue whites, and I dare not ask him to make dinner or wash up afterward at the risk of burned food or broken dishes.

7) I love that my husband is always patient with me. My personality is volatile, to say the least. I'm the Gemini that swings from one extreme to another, going from excited to disinterested in a matter of minutes. I make split-second purchases and change my mind about everything. And all the while, my husband is there, offering wisdom and stability, seldom losing his temper, always knowing when to ignore the stupid things that I say, and providing the constancy of a Taurus to the flightiness of a Gemini.

8) I love that my husband understands how to be a husband. In a day and age when so many young men remain foolish, immature, and incapable of appreciating the role and responsibility that a husband has to nurture and lead his family -- without becoming absurdly overbearing or controlling -- my husband has found that balance. He is gentle and gracious, insistent when he needs to be; and he knows when to step back and let me be myself.

Did I say it enough? I love my husband.

Movie Review: Être et avoir

This will be a very quick review, but since this documentary made such an impact on me I wanted to mention it as very much worth viewing.

The focus surrounds a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse in Saint-Étienne-sur-Usson, France. The instructor works with children ranging in age from about three or four to upwards of twelve or so (before the children go to what is there called "middle school"). The actual story is just one of a different type of education and how effective it is. As the days go by, the viewer watches the teacher Georges Lopez (who is half Spanish) instruct the children in the basics of education -- teaching the "little ones" how to write their letters and count (in the film, they're just getting to the number seven), teaching the older students how to complete their math assignments and even make omelets. This is not so much a documentary about a pedagogical style as it is a tale about one group of students in a small, agricultural area of France. The individual attention that the instructor gives each student may or may not make smarter students -- the film doesn't really say -- but it certainly provides each student with a sense of worth and gives the instructor a clear idea of how to assist each student.

Obviously, the documentary is in French, and unless yours is really good I'd recommend getting a copy with subtitles. Mine is sketchy, and I would never have been able to pick up on all the details of the conversations.

My favorite moment in the film: the instructor tells the students that he will be retiring and that he has other things he hopes to do. One of them asks if he'll go to Tahiti, and he says no. After considering it, they all nod in agreement: here is better.

Year of production: 2002

Book Review: Death in Holy Orders, by P.D. James

I snatched this up in the bookstore on the same trip where I discovered the books by Ngaio Marsh and Agatha Christie, and I waited to read it last, since I was looking forward to it the most. Of the books that I bought that day, this was certainly the best, although I can't say for sure it's the best of the books that I've read by James. It was, however (and perhaps, of course), beautifully written and clever enough to keep my interest from start to finish.

The story begins with the news that a student at St. Anselm's Theological College with the death of Ronald Treeves. The school and the police believe that Ronald killed himself, but some aren't sure. In particular, the boy's father -- the powerful Sir Alred Treeves -- receives an anonymous note suggesting the his son's death was far more sinister, so Adam Dalgliesh is sent to investigate. As he arrives at St. Anselm's, several other guests also arrive, and the situation quickly becomes ugly. In particular, Reverend Matthew Crampton, Archdeacon of Reydon, shows up and creates a general awkwardness. The archdeacon believes that St. Anselm's, which is a small location getting well past its prime, should be closed -- much to the frustration of the school leaders and the students attending there, all of whom are very loyal to St. Anselm's. Fortunately for them (if I'm allowed to put it that way), the archdeacon is murdered very brutally, and his plans to close St. Anselm's come to a screeching halt. Also fortunately, Dalgliesh is on the scene to uncover the truth.

Like all of the mysteries from P.D. James, this one takes a number of twists and turns and even sends Dalgliesh into the past (metaphorically speaking) to dig up some details that are lingering into the present. I will say that the solution to this mystery was somewhat less satisfying than I had hoped it would be. Frankly, the murderer has to confess and does so in a letter to Dalgliesh. And all of the other loose ends are tied up, although the darkness of this particular story tends to remain with the reader. Additionally, I was a bit frustrated, not so much by the mystery but by the fact that the idea of the setting felt a bit overused -- as though I've already read at least one James mystery set in unusual communes and on lonely English coastlines. But I think that's my problem and not the author's.

I have noticed something about murder mysteries from James -- and from most mystery writers, I suppose -- that leaves me a little unsettled about how I read these books. The murder of an archdeacon sounds like a terrible thing, but honestly this is one seriously unlovable character. And how convenient for St. Anselm's, and a bit satisfying for the reader, that someone gets him out of the way. Obviously, Dalgliesh has to discover the murdered, and as a reader I'm glad he does so, because murder is a heinous crime. But there's another part of me that isn't sorry the archdeacon won't be coming back. James has a clever habit of making the murder victims in the stories out to be the types of characters you're not too sorry to see gone. I guess I'd do the same thing if I were a writer, since it's a lot harder to kill off someone likable. And maybe there's a larger point about the obligation we have to discover the truth about murder, even when the victim seems fairly...expendable. But I always feel like there's something wrong with me when the character I really don't like is killed.

Back to the real review, this is a well-written and enjoyable mystery, and I'm glad I added it to my collection. It's not one of the best by James, but even one of her weaker books is stronger than many other books, so that definitely earns two thumbs up from me.

Year of publication: 2001
Number of pages: 429

Best Arabian You'll Ever See

Check out Chester the Cheetah in the background (on the left side of the video), having a blast during the Arabian dance. I'll give the guy credit: he makes an otherwise yawn-inducing dance interesting.

Still Here! Really!

I haven't abandoned the blog again. (Not yet, at least.) I've just been overwhelmed with one college semester ending and another (of half the length) beginning.

I'm sitting on three blog reviews -- and lots of other ideas -- right now, so with hope I'll be able to produce some decent posts during this week.