25/3/2021 “SHUGGIE BAIN” by DOUGLAS STUART

INTRODUCTION

The proposer said that the author was born in Glasgow in 1977. Douglas Stuart was brought up in Sighthill in the East End of Glasgow and went to school in Pollock. Having never known his father he was brought up by his mother who was an alcoholic. He grew up incredibly poor, raised on benefits, the queer son of a single mother who died of her addiction when he was only 15.

He then lived alone in a bedsit and took responsibility for his education. He was bullied at school and underperformed. He was interested in writing from an early age but never received encouragement.

He gained the qualifications required to study at Heriot-Watt School of Textiles and Design in Galashiels and then went on to obtain an MA degree from the Royal College of Art in London. He was headhunted by Calvin Klein and moved to New York 20 years ago. He is married to Michael Carry and still lives in New York.

“Shuggie Bain” was written over a period of ten years. Stuart stresses that it is not autobiographical but is a work of fiction.

He writes about poverty, addiction and homophobia, all of which he has experienced. He acknowledges that “I come from what I write about” but insists the story is fictional.

The book was written in Stuart’s spare time as a means of healing. Writing was a pleasurable activity for him and he had no thought of the book being published.

It was rejected by 32 publishers before being picked up by Grove Atlantic in the USA and then Picador in the UK. It is to be translated into 34 languages and a television adaptation is planned.

Stuart has written short stories published by the New Yorker titled “Found Wanting” and “The Englishman” He has also had work published by the Lit Hub. His second book titled “ Loch Awe “ has been written but not yet published.

He is only the second Scottish Booker Prize winner over the 51 years of its existence. The first was James Kelman for ” How late it was, how late”, winning the Booker in 1994.

The proposer chose the book for a number of reasons:

.          At the time of reading it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

Speaking about the novel, he said “I did not expect it to win. I thought that the Glasgow dialect would prove to be incomprehensible to American readers. Californian friends have since advised me that their book reading group had no trouble deciphering the meaning of words or phrases and that they enjoyed the challenge.

• It describes living in Glasgow in the 80’s. A time and place I am familiar with. My mother’s family living and working in the tenemented suburbs of the city described in the novel.

• It explores the corrosive impact of alcoholism on both the individual and family. Circumstances I am also familiar with.

• I read the only other Scottish Booker prizewinner written by James Kelman “How late it was, how late”, a book exposing the grim underbelly of Glasgow.  Stuart refers to Kelman as an inspiration, stating that the book “ changed my life”.

• I listened to the book on Audio and was captivated by Angus King’s use of strong Glasgow accents to bring the story to life.

• I was totally enthralled by Stuart’s descriptive powers and gripped by his characterizations.”

The images of place and grinding poverty were juxtaposed with the overarching power of love and in combination they painted a vivid picture of life on the edge.

Critics have generally been complimentary but some have thought the book would have benefited from better editing. In their view the book is overly long and deploys more adjectives than necessary.

DISCUSSION

Following on from the proposer’s indication that he was familiar with the background of Glasgow at the time the book was set in the 1980s, quite a few members indicated similar familiarity with some aspects of the background. Others however indicated the setting was wholly outside their experience. In the reviewer’s assessment, those with some familiarity with the subject matter were more disposed to like and appreciate the book than those without such experience.

Some members with some experience of communities such as described in the book considered that the portrayal was a bit grim, unremittingly bleak, and overdone slum porn.

The impression given in the book was that the conditions people were living in were not their responsibility in any respect. The book displayed a sense of victimhood.

Not all people in such communities were addicts and criminals;   indeed most were hard working and keen to get an education and job.

Originally the book had been a series of vignettes of Glasgow life over which the author had labored for many years to bring to its current status. There was some debate as to whether the author had written a ‘Glasgow’ novel. The author had grown up in a Catholic family but the sectarianism of the time was underplayed and the emphasis of the book was very much about personal relationships within a family bubble, in particular the magnificent portrayal of  Shuggie and his mother.

Some members approached the book with trepidation. At first sight it fitted into the popular genre of misery memoirs about family dysfunctionality, poverty, alcoholism and growing up gay in a hostile society.

Despite the subject matter, most members enjoyed and appreciated the book. It was perceptive, remarkably well written with well described characters and riveting scenes.  It was formalized realism with a musical energy. Comparisons with Hardy and Dickens were mentioned. There was discussion of the significance of the different dust jackets in the UK and US editions. It was not all grim; Glasgow humour was noticeably present.  The ending was very effective.

For most, these qualities outweighed the depressing subject matter which made the book a hard read. For some members though the book was too depressing to be enjoyable and one member as a result could not complete the book though acknowledging the excellence of the writing.  

There was majority agreement that the book was too long, over descriptive and repetitive. Nevertheless most members considered the book as a fine novel which had been well worth reading..

25/2/2021 “THREE MEN ON A BOAT” and “THREE MEN ON THE BUMMEL” by JEROME K. JEROME

The Proposer chose Three Men in a Boat because from a young age he had enjoyed it and other Jerome writing. It continued to amuse him.

Jerome was born in 1859 to a well to do family, then experienced them falling on hard times. Brought up in the East End of London, his parents both died before he was 16 and he was left to make his own way in life. These experiences he considered responsible for his “melancholy and brooding disposition.” He became a clerk aged 14 and other similar jobs followed. He also became a part time actor touring the Provinces with a theatre company, writing plays, stories and essays in his spare time. On 21st June 1888, Jerome married Georgina Henrietta Marris (Ettie), nine days after she divorced her first husband. The honeymoon took place on the Thames in “a little boat,”  a fact that was to have a significant influence on his next and most important work, “Three Men in a Boat”.

Jerome sat down to write the book as soon as the couple returned from their honeymoon. In the novel, his wife was  replaced by his longtime friends George Wingrove and Carl Hentschel (Harris). This allowed him to create comic and non-sentimental situations which were nonetheless intertwined with the history of the Thames region. The book, published in 1889, became an instant success and has never been out of print. Its popularity was such that the number of registered Thames boats increased by 50% in the year following its publication, and it contributed significantly to the Thames becoming a tourist attraction. In its first 20 years alone, the book sold over a million copies worldwide. It also sold a million pirated copies in USA.

With the financial security that the sales of the book provided, Jerome was able to devote all his time to writing. He wrote many plays, the most successful being “The Passing of the Third Floor Back”, essays and novels. In 1892 he was chosen, over Rudyard Kipling, to edit “The Idler”. The magazine was a satirical monthly catering for gentlemen who, following the theme of the publication, appreciated Idleness, and which had among its contributors Mark Twain and Arthur Conan Doyle. In 1893 he founded a weekly journal, “Today”, with some brilliant contemporary writers, which became one of the most successful journals of the nineties.

His literary contacts meant he became a member of the Allahakbarries, a cricket team founded by the author J.M. Barrie, which was active from 1890 to 1913. Notable figures who featured in the side included Rudyard Kipling, H.G. Wells, Arthur Conan Doyle, P.G .Woodhouse, G.K. Chesterton, A.A. Milne, E.W. Hornung, A.E.W. Mason, E.V. Lucas and himself.

In 1898, a short stay in Germany inspired “Three Men on the Bummel”, the sequel to “Three Men in a Boat”, reintroducing the same characters on a foreign cycling tour. The book was nonetheless unable to capture quite the same comic energy and historic rootedness of its celebrated predecessor, lacking as it does the unifying thread that is the Thames itself, and it has enjoyed only modest success by comparison. This said, some of the comic vignettes that make up “Bummel” are as fine as, or even finer, than those of “Three Men in a Boat”.

Jerome had a particular and abiding affection for Germany, in line with much British opinion of the time. He visited there many times and also visited Russia and made three lecture tours of the USA. During WW1, having been rejected by the British as too old, he acted as a voluntary driver with a French motorised ambulance unit near Verdun. He publicly supported the Lansdown Peace Initiative in 1916. He died in 1927.

So what did we think? The first reaction was that the humour was farce. Amusing but not laugh out loud. This produced comments from those who had “laughed out loud.” We looked at the comparison with Bill Bryson who as a more recent author, aimed at comedy with social comment. But the “Three Men” have to be seen in their time. Was the real aim to evoke the Thames of the 1880s? Was the humour more an adjunct than a centrepiece? The book contains a very sad tale, minute details of ordinary life, a love of nature and of course history. Many had walked along parts of the river and could compare their contemporary experiences. The individual accounts of scenes are sometimes just that. But sometimes we are sucked in only to be surprised and delighted when it all goes wrong! Was there the influence of early Dickens? Possibly the Pickwick Papers? Also from our times, a hint of a Ronnie Corbett anecdote? One of us asked if a book which was so undemanding was not too shallow? This view was resisted. PG Woodhouse is undemanding, but brilliant in his humour and social comment. There have been ratings of the all time best books and, for its humour, the “Boat” is still very highly regarded. With the passage of time, this is praise indeed.

It was noted that stories of Cromwell and the Magna Carta and some other potted history betray dated attitudes which now fall rather flat as part of a liberal illusion. This seemed to be accepted.

The majority were hooked on the “Boat”. But turning to the “Bummel”, some of the tales were very amusing, but the humour was not as universally appreciated. There was lots of interesting social comment. The book contained more generalisations, the recently conquered French speakers were vaguely spotted, but the war of 1870 seemed not to have been noticed. Mensur, the tradition for sabre fights among students, was grizzly enough, but one of us noted that a sabre cut on a cheek is still occasionally seen even if the full blooded events are now history. “Bummel” just did not have the sense of place that we enjoyed with the “Boat”. 

One member reported that Jerome’s books are still seen in school curricula in Sweden and Germany. We wondered if this was good or bad! What of the portrayal of women? This was mostly very dated but there were examples of real characters in Bummel.

Personally, if, as the scribe, I can add my tuppence worth, it is good during Zoom meetings during Corvid 19’s reign, to be able to smoke my pipe without complaints. Jerome posted the idea of using a tie instead of a belt for trousers. Ripping notion! Boys in shops were available to carry groceries home, or to the boat. Must ask the memsahibs at the local. Don’t throw boomerangs. I think this Jerome chap is on to a few good tips!

 

28/1/21 "WEIR OF HERMISTON" by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

Lockdown….. and as much snow and ice in the streets as if Edinburgh were in the Arctic…. 

Lockdown….murky by mid-afternoon and murky till mid-morning…

Lockdown…..your international blogger and influencer is travelling no more… 

But finally a ray of sunshine - a request to be guest blogger at the Monthly Book Group, nowadays Zooming around the world!

Shoosh, the proposer is talking..… 

“I chose to read all the works of RL Stevenson  as a Lockdown project. The Book Group has already tackled Jekyll and Hyde. However, we did not discuss Stevenson’s life, which is so interesting. In his  first  vital years he was much influenced by his nannie and to an extent his father. This produced the Covenanter in him. 

“Then in his youth he blossomed into a Romantic, a Cavalier and a Bohemian. He fell under the spell of an Edinburgh prostitute who then announced that she was about to emigrate to USA .He was bribed by his parents to try a career and was called to the Bar. This got him a period in an artistic community in the Loire valley where he met an American,  Fanny Osbourne. When he got a chance he followed her to her home city, San Francisco. This is covered in his first interesting book. She shook off her husband and temporarily her children and they married and spent an amusing honeymoon on Mount Silverado, again recorded in a book. Then back to Britain , with the Osbourne children. He talked well and built up a group of literary friends including Sir Sidney Colvin who saw what he might be capable of and forced him on. 

“ ‘The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ was a great success but Stevenson and his friends realised it was a detour not a destination. He was commercially successful with ‘Treasure Island’ and his three Jacobite novels. The last, ‘the Master of Ballantrae’ took him nearer to his objective. His poor lungs and addiction to cigarettes led to his emigration to the South Sea Islands where he set up home with the Osbourne entourage and latterly his mother. He wasted time on Island politics but Colvin continued to write urging ambition. ‘St Ives’ was his next book, unfinished but completed much later by another friend. 

Yours truly discreetly opens the five litre box of El Cheapo red cunningly placed just out of sight of the camera….

“Then at last he got stuck  into the novel he had been incubating, ‘Weir of Hermiston’ (1896). He had sketched out the general outline some years earlier and his letters show the development of the book. I find so much in it and I hope you do. 

“The last scene, and the scene before, took Weir to a climax of, as I see it, great drama. He finished, but perhaps he didn’t finish, writing about the meeting of Archie and Kirstie, then he taught his  family some French, had lunch and died. “How can I keep this pitch?” he had written. And he failed, I suppose. His step daughter claimed that he had outlined how the novel was to end. You will I hope have seen this in the editions you have read. But the Osbourne family shared a lust for reflected glory and and did RLS actually know how the drama would end? Does this matter? It should certainly not deflect attention from what he wrote. But as a means of shedding light of the work, it is perhaps justified…”

The proposer was not alone in choosing the complete works of RLS as a lockdown project as, remarkably, another member had done the same. And a third member had read most of what RLS had written, and drew attention to the excellence of his travel writing - such as “The Silverado Squatters” -  as well as the novels. Hermiston, however, was different - much more character-driven, with effort spent on establishing the characters and setting rather than narrative progress.

So the first part of the evening was to assess the unfinished book (or “fragment”, though clocking in at 122 pages), and the second part was to speculate about how the rest  of the novel might have gone.

Most were keen - very keen - on the book. “Superb!”. “Really liked it”. “Characters very strong, plot building well,  and real sense of place”. “It would have been a great novel, but as it stands it is a great fragment”. “Fantastic!”

It was interesting to see Stevenson attempting a “novel for grown-ups” rather than an adventure story, and to see influences not just from Scott but from other major nineteenth century novelists such as Emily Bronte and Thomas Hardy.

Indeed there were was only one of the dozen virtually present who did not have a positive view of the book. He could though see individual aspects of the book that were to be recommended, but would not recommend the book as a whole to someone else. There were too many dense passages that were hard work to wade through.

The use of Scots language attracted quite a bit of comment. For those not brought up in lowland Scotland, the passages in Scots posed an unwelcome problem, only partly relieved by the glossary found in most editions. The lowland Scots present admitted (to the surprise of others) that they did not recognise quite a lot of the words, and pointed out that even Burns had needed to put a glossary into the Kilmarnock edition of his poems (1786). But they understood enough words to be able to sail on picking up the general gist of words they didn’t know. Moreover, they felt the use of Scots - a language rhythmic, onomatopoeic and sometimes violent - gave a good sense of Scottish life at the time. “To imagine a language is to imagine a form of life”.

“Remember, your faither is a hard man, reapin’ where he hasna sowed and gathering’ where he hasna strawed. It’s easy speakin’ but mind! Ye’ll have to look in the gurly face o’m, where it’s ill to look, and vain to look for mercy. Ye mind me o’ a bonny ship pitten oot into the black and gowsty seas - we’re a’ safe still, sittin’ quait and crakin’ wi Kirstie in your own town chamber…”

The characters were very well drawn, above all the elder Kirstie. Stevenson indeed seemed to be in love with her, and there was an underlying eroticism in her late night discussions with Archie. Stevenson had married a woman some 20 years older, and had had other relationships with women significantly older than him.

Gosh, refilling my glass already…the wine box makes the process soundless and invisible…

As readers we were shown in depth what Archie and Kirstie senior were thinking and feeling, and a fair amount of what Frank and Kirstie junior were thinking and feeling. However,  Weir of Hermiston was viewed very much externally, with only occasional hints as to what might be going on beneath the hanging judge’s fierce exterior. Perhaps this reflected Stevenson’s own relationship with his father. There was also a distinct narrator in the novel - whose many reflections ranged from the nostalgic to the ironical,  sometimes very funny -  although such a narrator figure was rare for a late nineteenth century novel. “St Ives” also has a narrator, but that is St Ives himself, telling his story in the first person singular.

  

Stevenson’s nostalgia for Scotland while he was overseas in Samoa is very marked in the novel, and shown even in the dedication to his wife:

“I saw rain falling and the rainbow drawn

On Lammermuir. Hearkening I heard again

In my precipitous city beaten bells

Winnow the keen sea wind…”

Indeed all his best novels about Scotland were written while he was abroad.

The sense of place is rendered in fine descriptive writing:

“The road to Hermiston runs for a great part of the way up the valley of a stream, a favourite with anglers, and with midges, full of falls and pools, and shaded by willows and natural woods of birch…..

…..All beyond and about [Hermiston] is the great field of the hills; the plover, the curlew, and the lark cry there; the wind blows as it blows in a ship’s rigging, hard and cold and pure; and the hill-tops huddle one behind another like a herd of cattle into the sunset….”

Moreover, we had a view on where the place was ( a world first?!). Colvin as editor rejects the idea that the rural action is set in any specific part of southern Scotland, suggesting an amalgam of the Lammermuirs, Glencorse by the Pentland Hills, and in particular Upper Tweeddale.

But he seems unaware that “Cauldstaneslap” Farm, the home of Christina (Kirstie junior) is named after “The Cauldstaneslap”, which is part of the old drove road through the southern Pentlands, and was familiar to the hill-walkers in our group. Using that as the clue, one of our members found it fairly easy to fit most of the rural action and descriptions into the Southern Pentlands, with Kirsty’s farm plausibly  being Harperrig Farm, and Hermiston being Baddingsgill Farm. The old drove road joins the two, with a climb up in either direction to a mass of peat hags in the central section. Glencorse Kirk is at the other end of the Pentlands, some eight miles to the north east, and the house at Swanston where the young Stevenson spent his summers is a mile or two further on. And the lonely gravestone of the “Covenanter’s Grave” lies only a mile or two away from the drove road over the ridge of hills to the south.

A writer in our group was intrigued by Stevenson’s creative process, as he talks of his books as eggs that he leaves, lifting the lid occasionally,  until they eventually hatch. But did this writing process of long maturation contribute to leaving the novel unfinished? At the time of his death he was alternating between writing Hermiston one day and the less demanding St Ives the next. Perhaps he had the habit of starting something off with enthusiasm and then dropping it. The Tusitala edition of his works includes eight other unfinished stories alongside Hermiston.

Stevenson was forward thinking in having Archie an opponent of capital punishment, a plot element that would have come out even more strongly if the plot as originally conceived had been followed in  having Archie himself sentenced to death…

….time to lay down the pen and have a generous refill of El Cheapo….

….But they were off again… it started with an innocent question - why are the “Black Brothers” called “black?” ….Well, part of the whole romantic push from the example of Dumas, to  make them seem  more villainous, indeed parts of this remind me of “Treasure Island”.…not that they were people of colour?…no, but maybe swarthy, like the pubs called “The Black Boy” which are not racist but are celebrating the swarthy Charles 2nd….well the one in Bristol is plausibly linked to the slave trade…well, black-haired?… the golden hair of Kirstie senior is contrasted with black-haired Kirstie junior…Stevenson makes a big deal of that black hair/gold hair contrast as if it has some special significance for him…

……struth!!….give a poor scribe a break!…

…indeed the novel is full of binary contrasts: town versus country, father versus son,18th versus 19th century attitudes, aunt versus niece, Scots versus French…perhaps we should expect nothing less from the author of Jekyll and Hyde….and so they went on….why two Kirsties?….why set near the end of the Napoleonic Wars?…………….

Waking with a start, I heard that………it was now the second part of the evening. Members had been asked by the host to consider how they thought the novel might have ended. There is an official version - from Stevenson’s daugher-in-law and secretary, Mrs Strong - of how he planned the rest of the novel. And some felt that novel as planned would have worked very well. But it was perfectly possible that he would have changed his mind as the novel progressed. In trying to write a more serious style of novel, he might have felt his plot as sketched out would have seen a relapse into adventure and melodrama (and one of us felt that there were already signs in the fragment of the adventure style of writing pushing through). And characters can of course develop unexpectedly in the course of writing - as, noted Mrs Strong, Kirstie senior already had done.

So - in another world first!!! - there follow two original proposals from Book Group members for how the book might have been completed, plus a a synopsis of the ending in the recent BBC Radio 4 dramatisation, plus Mrs Strong’s version. Fanfare!…..

………FOUR ENDINGS IN SEARCH OF AN AUTHOR….

ENDING A/. THE PROPOSER

“ Braxfield [on whom Lord Hermiston was modelled] was my heavy lead.” “Hermiston felt drawn to his son with a softness of sentiment he would not care to admit.” Of course RLS was like Archie, an only son of a somewhat austere father who certainly loved his son but may have had difficulty showing it. Lord Glenalmond also tells Archie that his father loves him. And the family doctor does. “Just try to be less of an idiot.” Sounds timeless from father to son. So I suggest that the Hanging Judge is supporting his son as the tale comes to its conclusion. Innes has to seduce or rape Kirstie junior. If she is seduced, I do not see Archie killing Innes, being imprisoned, and then reconciled to Kirstie. If she is raped does Archie got first to her, and then kill Innes? I do not see this either, but I certainly assume Innes is killed. 

The Elliot family are writ large and that invites the reader to put them in the frame. One could kill Innes. Stevenson in correspondence with friends has them possibly rescuing Archie from jail. In writing to JM Barrie he asks whether a tragedy and a comedy can start the same way and simply diverge with the last scene. He thought not. There is nothing but foreboding in the Introduction and is this not how it continues? We discussed Great Expectations a few years ago, and there Dickens intended a sad ending, a friend persuaded him to give way to sentiment, and he then admitted he should have followed his instincts. RLS is affected by the same conflict.

Then we have the two Kirsties. With a happy ending would they get on well together? No. Kirstie senior understood Archie as one who has seen him from birth and she is clearly a perceptive woman and very close to Archie. Also clearly, she loves him. Kirstie junior loves him too. But is this not the fancy of a young woman? She does not see the problems. Amor vincit omnia?  In the last scene, she thinks she is being dropped. Archie felt “a bewildered fear of the explosive engine in his arms, whose works he did not understand, and yet had been tampering with.” Colvin wrote “there is a change in the characters under the writer’s hand.” And Stevenson, “I will not betray my  secret or my heroine.” One of the Kirsties is that person, but which? Of course junior might have, with family help, raised the mob. But for me, the elder is more likely.

Archie. “He was dangerous when his heart was stirred.” But how dangerous? He might have gone home from the last meeting with Kirstie jnr , dismissed Innes who would leave in a few days, but Archie would have to give him money first for transport to his parents. Then possibly Innes seduces Kirstie and thinks that is ok as Archie has parted from her He then offers Archie and Kirstie snr this as his revenge. The killing must follow, and so this was a moorland death. Innes went out for a last walk before leaving the following day, and either Archie or Kirstie snr follows him and kills him. Kirstie sees no future for herself but would sacrifice herself for Archie. Might she do it? Then might Archie be arrested for murder and tried. Kirstie then comes forward and confesses. 

So what is the central role for Lord Hermiston? Could be that Innes goes for his walk on the moor, Archie wants to go out after him but Kirstie beats him to it and stabs Innes. The young bloods of the Tuesday Club assume, when the body is found, that Archie did it. They take pleasure in reporting what they know to the authorities. Archie is arrested and the news is passed on to Lord Hermiston who goes straight to the jail. Archie confesses he did it, but his father examines him and realises he is protecting someone. He also finds out about Kirstie Jnr. He turns every precept of his upside down to get Archie released. They both go to the farmhouse and find Kirstie snr has killed herself. 

Archie cannot cope with his sacrifice and he might then commit suicide, but his father as the “heavy lead,” devotes his time to saving his son with love and understanding. And Kirstie junior? The romance is over and her brothers would not take Archie into the Elliot family, so no happy ending.

B/. ANOTHER BOOK GROUP MEMBER

Frank makes advances but is rejected by the pure Christina. Feeling humiliated he seeks revenge by starting a rumour that she had succumbed! Dandie confronts Frank, and in a rage, Frank kills him and is arrested. Meanwhile Archie feels that he can’t live without Christina and decides to marry her no matter what his father says – after all he has defied him before. Surprisingly his father agrees to the match – “all the young lassies in Edinburgh are flighty and shallow and I, after all, married above myself!”

He is the “hanging judge” for Frank, but after this case he decides “no more” and retires. Have Archie’s feelings about hanging got through to him? 

He retires to Hermiston and passes many happy days in the company of Christina, a companion that he never had.

Archie returns to the Bar where he is a very successful defender of the “downtrodden” and becomes a just judge himself, held in the very highest respect by society.

I haven’t decided on how many children the happy couple have and Kirsty(elder) adores the happy family atmosphere!!

C/. THE BBC RADIO 4 DRAMATISATION (with thanks to our member in Sweden)

At 28 minutes in to the second hour-long dramatisation, we reach the point where the book is cut short. The BBC producers, however, plough on seamlessly and present in the remaining half an hour how they believe the tale would or should have ended. 

After the argument, Archie travels to Edinburgh to seek his father's approval to propose to Kirstie, but that is robustly refused and the relationship between Archie and his father is effectively ended. While Archie is away in the city, Frank Innes forces himself violently upon Kirstie, sexually assaulting her before fleeing Hermiston to take the coach to Carlisle. 

When Archie returns to Hermiston, the older Kirstie Elliot is waiting outside with the terrible news (in a scene reminiscent of the scene at the start of the book when Lord Hermiston is met by Kirstie Elliot with the news that his wife is dead). Archie collects his pistols and gallops off on his horse to intercept the coach. He stops the coach and challenges Frank Innes to a pistol dual at 10 paces. Frank cheats and fires his pistol early, misses Archie and then is shot dead by his adversary.

Archie is arrested and put in jail in Kelso. When his father comes to ask him before the trial why he shot Innes, Archie stays silent, only telling his father that he (Archie) has finally found the capacity to judge, having been judged by his father all his life. In order to protect Kirstie's honour, Archie refuses to report the crime that Innes had committed. Lord Hermiston subsequently sits in the public gallery during the trial of his son and cries out to Archie to "say something!", but Archie refuses and instead pleads guilty. He is sentenced to death.

When young Kirstie comes to visit him before his execution, Archies proposes to her in his cell and asks her to "celebrate this day forever" and remember him at the Weavers' Cairn. Kirstie is distraught and returns home to report the whole sorry story to Dand. That night Dand successfully leads a party to break Archie free from the jail in Kelso. The lovers immediately escape together to Glasgow, from where they set sail.

The dramatisation ends by informing the listener that Lord Hermiston never lived down the shame and that he died a broken man as a result. Finally, a letter arrives to Kirstie Elliot at Hermiston informing her that Archie and Kirstie are safe and making a new life for themselves in Boston, and that Kirstie has just given birth to a baby daughter.

D/. MRS STRONG’S VERSION

Sidney Colvin, in his editorial note, writes: “The intended argument, so far as it was known at the time of the writer’s death to his step-daughter and devoted amanuensis, Mrs Strong, was nearly as follows:

“Archie persists in  his good resolution of avoiding further conduct compromising to young Kirstie’s good name. Taking advantage of the situation thus created, and of the girl’s unhappiness and wounded vanity, Frank Innes pursues his purpose of seduction; and Kirstie, though still caring for Archie in her heart, allows herself to become Archie’s victim. Old Kirstie is the first to perceive something amiss with her, and believing Archie to be the culprit, accuses him, thus making him aware for the first time that mischief had happened.

“He does not at once deny the charge, but seeks out and questions young Kirstie, who confesses the truth to him; and he, still loving her, promises to protect and defend her in her trouble. He then has an interview with Frank Innes on the moor, which ends in a quarrel and in Archie killing Frank beside the Weaver’s Stone. Meanwhile, the Four Black Brothers, having become aware of their sister’s betrayal, are bent on vengeance against Archie as her supposed seducer. They are about to close in upon him with this purpose, when he is arrested by the officers of the law for the  murder of Frank. He is tried before his own father, the Lord Justice-Clerk, found guilty, and condemned to death.

“Meanwhile the elder Kirstie, having discovered from the girl how matters really stand, informs her nephews of the truth: and they, in a great revulsion of feeling in Archie’s favour, determine on an action after the ancient manner of their house. They  gather a following, and after a great fight break the prison where Archie lies confined, and rescue him. He and young Kirstie thereafter escape to America.

“But the ordeal of taking part in the trial of his own son has been too much for the Lord Justice-Clerk, who dies of shock. “I do not know” adds the amanuensis, “what becomes of old Kirstie, but that character grew and strengthened so in the writing that I am sure he had some dramatic destiny for her.”

Phew! As I finally laid down my pen, some clever clogs informed us that Stevenson’s death had been precipitated by the strain of pulling a cork from a wine bottle……….

….guiltily I looked again at the easy-pouring wine box……then refilled my glass and drank a toast to RLS.

21/12/20 “ENTER THE AARDVARK” by JESSICA ANTHONY

Get stuffed!

“You, you faggot, are an aardvark, an irrational, everlasting Earth-product, and whether you are ready to accept this or not, you have been, all this time, it must be said, wearing the skins of your enemy.”

In December 2020, at the end of a difficult year, the Monthly Book Group convened digitally for an extra meeting to discuss “Enter the Aardvark”, the third novel by Jessica Anthony, an American author who has been attracting considerable attention of late. Her third novel deals with taxidermy, “the Herero, the Namibians sporting the skin of their oppressor”, and links the twenty-first century affairs of a Ronald Reagan obsessed Republican congressman, Alexander Paine Wilson and his partner Greg Tampico to an earlier relationship between a Royal Leamington Spa taxidermist, Titus Downing, and his affairs with a 19th century African explorer, Sir Richard Ostlet.  The explicit link is an Aardvark, caught and prepared for display in 1875, and delivered to Wilson by a Fed Ex employee, starting a train of events that lead to Wilson’s downfall in a tragi-comic black farce, teasing the reader by playing with the notion of déjà vu.

The proposer said he had laughed out loud while reading the book and chose it as he thought the political satire would bring much needed light relief to the un-assembled club. He spoke briefly of Anthony’s background as a young, east coast liberal, and how she wrote the first draft of the book in six weeks while guarding the Maria Valeria Bridge between Štúrovo, Slovakia and Esztergom, Hungary. Apparently, she started with the title, then developed the story from there. Our proposer introduced us to a new (to most of us) plot device, a “McGuffin” – an object or device in a film or book that serves no purpose other than to trigger the plot, for example used by Hitchcock in the 1930s.

He was intrigued by mirroring of the two plots, although preferring Georgetown to Leamington Spa. Some aspects of the plot were ambiguous, was Richard alive or a ghost, following the loss of his eyes and their insertion in the aardvark?  He felt the writing style was typical of contemporary US writers and made mention of the use of the second person, which divided opinion among the group, although all would agree it was not a “showstopper”. He was moved to look at the nature and science of aardvarks, proposing the metaphor of the illogical creature that defies evolution. Where do we take that, the emphasis on homosexuality, the repressed senator that idolizes Ronald Reagan, the absurdity of contemporary US politics? He suggested that, although Donald Trump is not mentioned explicitly, (the book was written in 2017), he was probably the inspiration, and the author had been quite clever in settling on Ronald Reagan rather than Trump as the subject of Wilson’s obsession. The parody reference to the 1776 revolutionary spirit of Thomas Paine alludes to Trump’s America when congressman Wilson reveals his Paine-inspired manifesto to separate Democrats and Republicans, “It’s Time for Two Americas”.

What were our impressions of the book?

First and foremost, everyone, well almost everyone, found it very funny and praised the timing of the choice. There was favourable comment on the staccato format of short segments switching between the past and present and that the author had managed so well to switch mood between the Victorian and contemporary US modes of depiction. Some were less sure of the treatment of homosexuality, and by extension the stereotyping of politicians (or taxidermists?) as gay. Did the author have experience of gay relationships? One of us was surprised that the author was female, but perhaps we should be circumspect.

The theme of evolution was important. Our expert commented on the idea of causality, from formation of the earth to today, and how events in Victorian times affected the US 20th century. The prologue starts, “a swirling mass of vapors is unhinged, shooting through outer space”, continues with the emergence of the “virgin class Mammalia”, the discovery of the “Earth Pig”, so called by the African hunters, entered in the notebook of Ostlet’s assistant, stuffed by Downing, delivered on Wilson’s doorstep about one hundred and forty-two years later. One liked the zoological references, reminding him of first year at university. A colleague agreed, teased about evolution, colonialism, love and sex. He kept on reading rather than think deeply about the several themes that were introduced. Another suggested that perhaps the author had ‘swallowed Wikipedia’, too many themes were dumped on the page rather than integrated in the plot, but again, that was a minority view. The proposer agreed that too many elements in the story might make it indigestible, a possible flaw, but also suggested it was better to leave it on the surface and not to dive too deeply into it.

Another agreed it was clever, well-constructed, but found it a bit difficult in switching between the past and present, losing the thread. It highlighted the difference between the US (dollar fixation) and the UK (status fixation). There were other serious themes, the lack of empathy on the part of the US senator, how he despises woman, doesn’t care about climate change, and is contemptuous of homosexuals in his repressed state. Turning again to the McGuffin, did the constraint of the chosen title make the imagination deeper, attributing Andre Gide. He further suggested that aardvark symbolizes man’s inhumanity to the animal kingdom, and referred to the Jiva, the continuity of life through all types of sentient being, e.g. in the transference of the eyes from Richard Ostlet to the aardvark.

So, the meeting ended. As was usual in these video evenings, the discussion was shorter and more focused, for good or bad. Inspired by the opening quote, your scribe listened again to ‘Fairy Tale of New York’ by the Pogues.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

26/11/20 “NAPLES ’44: AN INTELLIGENCE OFFICER IN THE ITALIAN LABYRINTH” by NORMAN LEWIS

Our host introduced the book very briefly, skipping the customary preamble on the author’s biographical details. He explained that this book had grabbed his interest through the writings of Max Hastings the British journalist and military historian. The Anglo-American liberation of southern Italy is a part of WW2 that few of us had read about, neglected by popular history-writers, almost ignored by newspapers of the time, yet very costly in lives.

The book is a war memoir written from diaries 30 years after the event by Norman Lewis, an intelligence officer in the newly-formed branch of the British Army known as the Field Security Service. He and 11 others were sent to Naples in late 1943 following the fall of Mussolini and the Armistice between Britain and Italy. The book is harrowing, with searing images of poverty, despair, chaos, corruption and famine. Yet the prose is beautiful – the book is Lewis’s masterpiece.  The memoir was written from his diary; not verbatim but developed and perhaps embroidered from his reflections.

Was the recruitment of intelligence officers really so lax? Only blue-eyed men from red-brick universities with a foreign language were chosen in a dubious interview process. Were the duties really so vague? No definition was given of the mission, and there was an almost complete absence of orders from London headquarters. Little linkage or sharing of information with the American allies is evident. It was a shambles; how did the British ever win the war?

The author travelled with the US 5th Army to Salerno as part of the invasion convoy in the Dutchess of Bedford, arriving on September 1st 1943. The briefing lecture by an intelligence officer revealed little; Lewis says the lecture could have been summed up in a single sentence ‘we know nothing’. Then a few days later, they landed at Paestum on a beautiful beach which he describes as one of the ‘fabled shores of antiquity’. All seemed tranquil, yet what the author would experience in the coming weeks and months in Naples would be hellish.

The book is a first-hand and detailed account of the war-torn city and the desperate state of its people. The male population resorted to theft and black-market trading whilst for the women, prostitution was the principal source of income. The soldiers from USA and Canada behaved very badly indeed. Is it always thus in war? Lewis describes the state of affairs in a matter-of-fact way with great precision. Some of his accounts are horrific, some very touching – demonstrating that human compassion occasionally exists even when circumstances are dire.  The southern Italian character comes across strongly – the importance of family, the region, religion, the sense of pride too. But there are no heroes.

We all liked the book, even those who confessed to avoiding books about war. We have read several war books and we made comparison between this and Nella Last’s War – a very different book but like this one, a haunting account based on diaries. We also read Geoffrey Wellum’s  First Light – the diary of a WW2 RAF fighter pilot. As in this book, we noted the shambolic recruitment process, and again we wondered how the British had managed to win the war. It is strange that some of our generation, raised in peacetime, are so obsessed with war; perhaps because war is so often glorified. There is no glorification in Lewis’s book, yet if one looks for old newsreel accounts of the war in Naples the story was quite different – see for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IytTr99paJ8

In this Pathé movie we British and our North American friends are the heroes who rescue and liberate the grateful Italian populace.

There are moments of beauty: the coming of spring and the appearance in the street of the broad bean seller; the view of Naples from afar; the description of a trip to Capri with Frazer (from Peebles) and the two girls in fox-fur; the account of an eruption of Vesuvius on March 19th – evoking Pliny’s description of the AD 79 event. However, these moments are rare. Nor is there much humour; irony, yes. One has the impression that Lewis is a ‘good chap’ able to empathise with the ordinary people yet not capable of doing much about their plight.

Was his personal war effort of any use? Not that we could discern, except that he did intervene in an attempt to send twenty venereal-diseased prostitutes to the north for the purpose of infecting German soldiers. His routine contributions were well-intentioned – for example – trying to bring black-marketeers  to justice and doing his best to stop soldiers marrying local girls. He seems to have behaved well towards the locals, making friends, but towards the end he began to lose their trust by refusing gifts which he thought were disguised bribes. Was the entire southern Italy campaign any use in the War effort? The Americans never wanted it in the first place; it was Churchill’s project to attack ‘the soft underbelly’ of Europe. What Max Hastings wrote in the April 2008 New York Review was:

“Worst of all, it became perceived as a place of failure, where each small territorial gain was achieved at such cost that talk of victory became choked in ashes. Salerno, the Rapido, Anzio, Cassino were names inscribed in blood and grief in the annals of the American and British armies. When the breakthrough to Rome belatedly came in June 1944, it was promptly eclipsed in the world’s attention by D-day in Normandy”.

Some of us told our own stories about Naples. One member had a connection through the Italian-Scot family of Crolla, famed in Scotland for bringing Italian wine and food to our northern shores. I hope to read something about this in “Dear Alfonso” by Mary Contini, a Director of the famous delicatessen and wine merchant, Valvona & Crolla.

Although we all enjoyed the book, there were some quibbles. One of our members challenged our assumption that diary-based accounts were to be relied upon to tell the truth. ‘Look at autobiographies’ he said in support of his position, and we agreed that he had a point. Two other members noted a degree of disjunction in the book– which at one level is a sporadic narrative, jumping in a series of short chapters from one scene to another. Others joined in, saying they preferred novels because only in the novel can the proper development of character emerge. ‘You learn more from a novel than a diary’ someone said. And, ‘if this were a novel you might not believe that events could turn out so dire as this’.

As often occurs, the conversation turned to football. The excuse this time was that Diego Maradona had died the day before our meeting, and there had been great mourning in Naples (he scored 81 goals in 188 games for Napoli according to Wikipedia). There ensued a conversation about who was the greatest footballer in modern times. I had previously discovered that Messi and Pele have a far better average and now it falls to me to make a spreadsheet of goal averages and trophies gained (Maradona, Pele, Messi, Best..and Alan Shearer is in the running too).

We have become accustomed to meeting via Zoom. Attendance is higher, although the conversation doesn’t flow quite so freely. Nor does the wine; it’s a different experience by Zoom and the meeting ends sooner – perhaps after less than two hours.

29/10/20 “KITCHEN CONFIDENTIAL” by ANTHONY BOURDAIN

 Our virtual host for the evening explained that he had discovered a copy of “Kitchen Confidential” in his house. It had been left by one of his sons, who is a chef, following a visit. His original choice of book had been “ Scottish Journey” by Edwin Muir but it had proved difficult to source and this required him to find an alternative. He found “ Kitchen Confidential” to be an entertaining read and was interested to hear what others thought of it.

A surprising choice. Very “alternative ”. Few of our virtual group had heard of Anthony Bourdain and those that had mainly recollected seeing him on television presenting programs on, travel, international culture and cuisine. No one had read this book or indeed any of his writings. Our host proceeded to enlighten us with a brief overview of Bourdain’s life and an insight into the creation of the book.

Born on 25th June 1956 in New York, Bourdain’s mother was an editor at the New York Times and his father an executive at Columbia Records. His father’s parents were French and it was through holidaying in France that young Anthony discovered his love of food.

He was a rebellious child. His challenging nature got him into trouble at school. He started to experiment with drugs and eventually dropped out. His fascination with the food industry was re-enforced while working in various kitchens in Provincetown Cape Cod. Initially a dishwasher he worked his way up through the various cooking stations before obtaining a place in the prestigious Catering Institute of America He graduated in 1978.

There followed almost 20 years of experiencing and exploring the practices of the cooking industry and developing his critique of these. In 1997 The New Yorker published his controversial article” Don’t Eat Before Reading This”. It was a brutally honest account of the inner workings of the restaurant world. This was the precursor to “ Kitchen Confidential” and heralded a step change in his fortunes with the launching of his popular TV series “ A Cook’s Tour” and “ No Reservations”.

He married twice, divorced once and separated from his second wife with whom he had a child, Ariane, in 2007. Tragically Bourdain, aged 61, was found dead in his hotel room in Kaysersberg, France on June 8, 2018, after committing suicide.

The book was generally well received with many admiring his no-nonsense writing style. Always direct and to the point while at times aggressive. His prose was considered to be unpretentious and entertaining. His attention grabbing use of “Kitchenese” was referred to by one critic as:

 “A simmering stew of spicy adjectives and bitter expletives slung on to the page.”

His use of imagery and metaphors combined with a distinctive vocabulary brought to life the situations and circumstances he describes.

“Your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.”

Those that enjoyed the book tended to do so on the basis of particular chapters or more general insights into the workings of the industry or the characters inhabiting it. This suggested an imbalance in the relative strengths of the different chapters or the themes being covered. It was suggested that this could be related to some confusion with the chronology of the main narrative. His frankness and apparent honesty were generally appreciated, all the more so when these attributes were layered with a total disregard for political correctness and the lack of filters of any kind.

“ I just didn’t give a shit at all what people might think. I didn’t think anyone was going to read it, so what did it matter. I just told the truth on every page.”

His use of short provocative chapter openings to entice the reader to read on were noted and thought to be effective. It was thought that Bourdain’s frank disclosures of his own weaknesses; particularly his early drug addiction gave him credibility in describing the horrors of the kitchen world. His reflective and self-deprecating manner was identified as important factors in the popularity of the book and his unique way of expressing this was admired by those who enjoyed the book.

“ I treated the world as an ash tray” and;

“ If you look someone in the eye and call them a worthless puddle of badger crap it doesn’t mean you don’t like them. It can be-and often is-a term of endearment.”

His exposure of kitchen culture, the personality of restaurant proprietors, the work ethic, the abuse of staff , the dishonesty and the unsanitary truth about the way the business works were all eye openers and had something of interest for most of the group However, it was his vivid evocative writing delivered in a helter skelter fashion that captivated most.

He was described by one of our group as the punk rock version of a chef. The Johnny Rotten of the culinary world. Outspoken and prepared to try anything once. He even ate and apparently enjoyed Haggis and deep fried mars bars when visiting Scotland during his Cook’s Tour series. It was suggested that the book should be of greater interest to those working in the industry; homage to their work ethic. However, it was pointed out that it had in fact been written to warn, inform, expose and alert all of us who dare to patronise restaurants.

Two members of our group did not enjoy the book. One thought it somewhat pretentious. Exaggerating for effect and boasting. Another was disappointed at the lack of characterisation. Even the advice given to avoid fish on a Monday or a brunch menu (often seen as an opportunity to get rid of leftovers) was dismissed as simply common sense. Advice on the best pots and pans, plates and kitchen knives to purchase was also scoffed at.

As often happens we digressed and spent time considering the work ethics of immigrant labour. This discussion was triggered by Bourdain’s many references to the hard working Mexican, Dominican, Salvadorian and Ecuadorian kitchen labour. It was suggested that their work attitude was based on the poverty they had experienced and their hunger for self-improvement.

It was thought that immigrant labour in the UK is also considered to be harder working and that this reflects attitudinal differences. Experience of many foreign students in Scottish Universities appears to support the contention that they are more motivated and harder working than locals.

As we drew the discussion to a close thoughts turned to the task of coming to terms with the advice. “Don’t Eat Before Reading This”. It was, after all, more than 20 years ago and based on New York restaurants. It was agreed that life without restaurant eating would be greatly diminished but perhaps safer.

Our host was thanked for proposing “ Kitchen Confidential “ and for leaving us more discerning and appreciative of restaurant food.