Literature and that innit

Being an account of what I read in 2023.

Part One: Non-Fiction

Conquistadores

Fernando Cervantes

About the Spanish conquest of the New World. A fascinating insight into peoples who were in some ways more akin to each other than we might assume, and yet this book is a reminder that no time or place is a monolith. A story of good intentions, barbarism, religion, empires, alliances, arrogance, ignorance, glory, and gold.

If that was a tale of invasion and destruction, then this was a tale of invasion and preservation…

The Liberation of Paris: How Eisenhower, de Gaulle, and von Choltitz Saved the City of Light

Jean Edward Smith

A pithy, perfectly judged retelling from the surrender of France, to de Gaulle’s heroic rallying, to the race to save the capital from obliteration, an outcome made possible by vast cooperative endeavour, but even more importantly by individuals willing to diametrically disobey bad orders, sometimes at great personal risk.

Another history of enterprise and empire, but of a very different kind:

MCU: The Reign of Marvel Studios

Joanna Robinson, Dave Gonzles, and Gavin Edwards

The behind-the-scenes of the great cultural artefact of the 2010s, though the book itself doesn’t make such mighty claims. Thoroughly readable, with some interesting bits I didn’t know. It’s not a small book, but some films get very short shrift, leaving me speculating about a Beatles-ology-esque minute-by-minute version… The authors don’t editorialise much, but when they did I found it needlingly consensus-affirming. But it’s not a work of criticism, and as a first-draft history it’s welcome and impressively coherent. [SPOILERS] There’s a mid-credits scene!

The other backstage showbiz book (and the first thing) I read this year:

Tripping Over Myself

Shaun Micallef

Again, I didn’t necessarily agree with the critical evaluation of the oeuvre, which suggested an artificial artistic rise-fall-rise narrative that I didn’t buy. But any memoir from our country’s one comic genius is not to be sniffed at too thoroughly. He really likes Jerry Lewis! Nobody’s perfect.

Part Two: Non-Non-Fiction

Tales from the Perilous Realm

J. R. R. Tolkien [il. Alan Lee]

Short stories and poems from the Rings-smith. I think I got this for “Roverandom” because it’s a great word and it’s about a dog. Quite nice, though the prose is not celestial. I most enjoyed “Farmer Giles of Ham” – Tolkien displaying here a knack for the comic in an English dragon story. The hilarity is unintentional, however, in “Leaf by Niggle” – one of the most egotistical and self-pitying bits of vindicatory veiled semi-autobiography ever produced. It’s very relatable. The poems range from not much to very nice.

If I sound a bit flippant in re the prof, that’s an intentional counteraction to those devotees who hail him an infallible and peerless prophet. One of his peers (and idols) was E. R. Eddison, who probably thought Tolkien was a wokey little snowflake, because while Tolkien’s big on little people, goodness, and homogenous nomenclature, Eddison’s much more into heroic warrior brothers, martial prowess, and stabbing. So I gather from

The Worm Ouroboros

E. R. Eddison

The Lords of Demonland battle the King of Witchland. What you might call a witch king, I suppose. Published in 1922, the Elizabethan language is viscous but undeniably powerful. A superior, striking monument.

The other fantasy tome I read was

Little, Big

John Crowley

Memorable, but not the ingenious construction for which I had hoped. Well-written, but, well, written. And to generalise, I just don’t think Americans are very good at fantasy. (I find my go-to exceptions are all at least sci-fi adjacent). At least, American excursions to Faerie seem unconvincing – like someone speaking a second-language with a thick accent.

Yet some men walk between worlds…

Two Bottles of Relish: The Little Tales of Smethers and Other Stories

Lord Dunsany

The great Anglo-Irish fantasist (another Tolkien precursor/contemporary) puts elvish whimsy aside with the title story from this collection, a horror-tinged, ink-dark mystery that leaves Hardboiled far behind. A cool little crime compendium overall, with some lighter gems like “The Pirate of the Round Pond.”

With just as sinister a figure at its heart as “Two Bottles”:

A Kiss Before Dying

Ira Levin

Arguably over-scuzzy, but a supremely suspenseful and ingenious crime classic. I saw there was a movie, and I wondered how the filmmakers simulated the author’s brilliant creative gambit… they didn’t.

And back once more across the Atlantic for

The Floating Admiral

The Detection Club

The detective story not just as a game for the reader, but the writer as well. The Detection Club was a society of Britain’s mystery authors (I think some iteration of it still exists). The idea was that one member would come up with an opening chapter, and then hand the project on to the next writer. Then they’d write a chapter and pass it on, and so on. And eventually one unlucky sap had to figure out how to tie it all up at the end. (His chapter’s one of the longer ones.) At the back of the book, you get each writer’s solution to the puzzle, based on what they had so far. Agatha Christie’s one of the contributors, and her solution is typically brilliant. There is of course a certain schizophrenia to the project, but it’s a lot of fun.

Not even an army of authors could keep up with Anthony Trollope, who would write a book before breakfast, invent the post box, have lunch, and then go to the publishers to collect the profits in the afternoon.

The Way We Live Now

Anthony Trollope

At 100 chapters, his longest novel. Trollope doesn’t have Dickens’ nigh-unparalleled genius for characterisation, but his characters are all fully-realised people; like Shakespeare, he affords everyone the dignity of their own perspective. One of the central figures in this saga is Melmotte, a (Schrödinger’s) uber-rich swindler businessman who enters the world of politics; one would find it difficult to argue that the title had slipped into obsolescence.

Written the same year:

Harry Heathcote of Gangoil

Anthony Trollope

Trollope had been to Australia to visit one of his sons, a sheep farmer. He’d also promised the publisher a Christmas story; and so, hit upon a novelty. For me, the uniqueness of this teeny twelve-chapter Trollope wasn’t in a warm Christmas, but in a Queensland-set Victorian text. The plot largely concerns the threat of bushfires, and so it too doesn’t feel totally removed from today.

To a world that will for all the rude winds of time never weather, I once again returned to Blandings Castle.

Heavy Weather

P. G. Wodehouse

This entry picks up where the last left off, thus uncommonly contiguous. Another trifle of scandalous memoirs, private detectives, and beloved pigs. A key device is a formerly engaged couple who ineffectively pretend they’ve never met.

But for big laughs what could beat my introduction to Sweden’s national treasure:

Pippi Longstocking

Astrid Lindgren

Pippi is an unsupervised, super-strong, irrepressible force of nature. When she’s being Pippi at bullies and thieves it’s delightful; but when it’s innocent bystanders, you do feel sorry for them. A classic for a reason. As is:

The Wind in the Willows

Kenneth Grahame [il. E. H. Shepard]

(Which I reread.)

Part Three: Books with Lots of Pictures

I Want My Hat Back; This is Not My Hat; We Found a Hat

Jon Klassen

Or the Hat trilogy. The first is an all-timer picture book, with one utterly brilliant page. The second has a great sense of movement. The third subverts the darkness of its precursors.

A Ball for Daisy

Chris Raschka

Touching, wordless story of a dog and her ball. Admirable simplicity.

Turning to the funny pages:

Camping with Unicorns; Virtual Unicorn Experience; Unicorn Famous

Dana Simpson

Three more volumes of life with young Phoebe and her friend Marigold Heavenly Nostrils.

Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow

Tom King [il. Bilquis Evely; Matheus Lopes, colourist]

Slated to be adapted into a Major Motion Picture, this book sees the Kryptonian in a cosmic adventure, taking cues from diverse influences. The colouring is the standout for me; lots of great choices. I do find (from the little I’ve read) that the modern comics style, which wants to devote space to building out singular moments, coupled with the desire when tackling a legacy character to make some all-encompassing and defining statement, renders the narrative uncomfortably squashed.

Tintin and Alph-Art

Hergé

An exercise in reconstructing the Belgian reporter’s unfinished last adventure (which would’ve poked some fun at modern art). Involving even in that sketched state, whilst shedding light on the maestro’s process.

Mr Pump’s Legacy {The Stratoship H. 22, Part One}; Destination New York {The Stratoship H. 22, Part Two}; The Valley of the Cobras