SCARAMOUCHE by Raphael Sabatini and My Back to the Classics 2013 Wrap Up

What if the French Revolution was actually spurred on not solely by the anger and desperation of the masses, but for the love of a noblewoman? That is the swashbuckling, romantic premise of Rafael Sabatini’s historical adventure Scaramouche. When my dear friend Tasha of Truth, Beauty, Freedom and Books said that this was one of her favorite books ever, I knew I had the “Classic Adventure” category for the Back to the Classics Challenge nailed – but I didn’t anticipate how much fun it would be. I absolutely loved this book!

Andre-Louis Moreau is a young lawyer of uncertain parentage who has been educated by his godfather, M. de Kecadiou. He is in love with Kecadiou’s niece Aline, although considering that everyone in pre-Revolutionary Brittany believes him to be the bastard child of his godfather, he has no hope of ever marrying her. Andre-Louis is particularly disgusted when an older aristocrat of the worst king, M. de la Tour d’Azyr, asks for Aline’s hand in marriage. When Tour d’Azyr kills Andre-Louis’s young priest friend for his speech against the French establishment, the two men are set against each other in a feud that it seems can only end with the death of one of them.

Andre-Louis naively believes that his knowledge of law will bring Tour d’Azyr to justice. But he is forced to confront for the first time the French system in which privilege is more important than justice. At that point, he puts his powerful ability for rhetoric to work for the cause of reform, although it’s by no means clear whether or not he actually believes in the cause himself, or just wants to make trouble for Tour d’Azyr and his kind. From that point on, Andre-Louis goes from adventure to adventure, first as a roadie for a circus troop, and ultimately its star, Scaramouche. From there he becomes a master swordsman, owner of a fencing academy, and ultimately a politician, always guided by the move that will bring Tour d’Azyr the most misery. In a letter to Tour d’Azyr, Andre-Louis reveals the depths of his hatred:

Had you died, had you been torn limb from limb that night, I should now repine in the thought of your eternal and untroubled slumber. Not in euthanasia, but in torment of mind should the guilty atone. You see, I am not sure that hell hereafter is a certainty, whilst I am quite sure that it can be a certainty in this life; and I desire you to continute to live yet awhile that you may taste something of its bitterness. p. 209

Italian-English Sabatini has a real gift for recreating the sensibility pre-Revolutionary France, and I loved how he peppered the novel with historical characters so seamlessly. Knowing the outcome only increased the sense of doom gathering, like watching the guillotine platform being built. I really don’t want to say anything else, because I’m afraid of giving anything away. You simply have to read it! Truly, you must.

Back to the Classics 2013 Wrap-Up

So that’s my last review of the year, finishing up one of the few challenges I entered – seems fitting. I really enjoyed all of the books for the challenge:

1. 19th century classic: Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
2. 20th century classic : Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
3. Classic from the 18th century, or earlier: Dangerous Liaisons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
4. Classic related to the African-American experience: Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
5. Adventure classic: Scaramouche by Raphael Sabatini
6. Classic about an animal, or with an animal in the title: Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi

I love the mix of English language and translation, male and female authors and varying time periods that this year’s list represents. My favorite was definitely Their Eyes Were Watching God -- it was an absolute revelation. But it would be difficult to pick a least favorite among the group – I’d recommend any of them. Every author was new to me, which was one thing I hoped to accomplish with this Challenge, and aside from de Laclos (who was apparently a one-hit wonder, literarily) I would definitely read other books by the same authors.

I've finished six titles from my Classics Club list since August, so I am happily ahead of the 10/year pace. Scaramouche, like so many classic titles, was available as a free Kindle download. That means my total for the Classics Club remains at $12.29, or about 2.05 per title! Happy New Year, and Happy Reading, everyone!

PINOCCHIO: THE TALE OF A PUPPET by Carlo Collodi

When it came to this year’s Back to the Classics Challenge, the one that really stumped me was the “Animal” category. My immediate thought was to include a classic children’s book in that slot, since kids and animals seem to go together. But it wasn’t as easy as you’d think. I didn’t want to do a re-read, so Charlotte’s Web and Call of the Wild were out. And I didn’t want to read something that was going to make me cry, so forget Old Yeller or Black Beauty. In desperation, I turned to goodreads.com and found an unlikely list: “Best Anthropomorphic Animal Books." (Random, don’t you think? I am beginning to think there’s a goodreads list for everything!) And that’s why I whittled away (sorry I couldn’t resist) a couple of hours with this children’s classic last month.

Those who like me haven’t read Carlo Collodi’s original story of the marionette who comes to life might be surprised at how closely the folks at Disney actually followed the original Pinocchio. There are differences, of course, but the bulk of the plot was the same. As you might expect, the original is way more violent than the Disney version -- Pinocchio manages to kill the conscientious cricket who was later renamed Jiminy by folks at Disney during their first meeting, for example. Strangely, the original is also way preachier than the Disney version, with constant lessons about young boys’ behavior.

I guess the biggest surprise for me was that Pinocchio is a lot less likeable as a character in the original version of the story. He’s no sooner sentient than he’s jeering and rude to poor Gepetto. The innocent quality of the Disney version was entirely lacking. Pinocchio isn’t led off the straight and narrow because of bad company in Collodi’s story; his flaws appear to be innate. I found that such an interesting take on the nature of children. Are they inherently innocent and needing to be protected, or are they inherently bad and needing to be brought to heel?

For example, toward the end of the book, Pinocchio’s bad behavior causes him “donkey fever,” and his kind friend the Marmot has to tell him the sad truth about what has happened to him:

”My dear boy,” said the Marmot, by way of consoling him, “you can do nothing. It is destiny. It is written in the decrees of wisdom that all boys who are lazy, and who take a dislike to books, to schools, and to masters, and who pass their time in amusement, games, and diversions, must end sooner or later by becoming transformed into so many little donkeys.” Kindle location 1265 of 1637

I actually enjoyed reading Collodi’s Pinocchio, but here’s the thing: I’m not sure that the average 21st Century parent would relish reading the original version of this classic to their children. Yes, there is ultimately a happy ending, but that comes through Pinocchio learning the difficult lessons of self-denial and obedience -- and those things seem somehow woefully out of fashion today. Cleverness and individuality and most other values that contemporary children’s book authors focus on are entirely absent in Collodi’s tale. But that may be too bad, because thrift and selflessness are still powerful values for children to emulate. In fact, they may be increasingly important values for the generation of kids who need to deal with problems like global warming and the knowledge gap. Maybe there’s a place for another interpretation of the tale, minus the corporal punishment and violence, but more in keeping with the redemptive nature of work, from Collodi’s perspective?

So that’s the fifth book for the Back to the Classics Challenge, and number 5 on my Classics Club list. And the good news is that I have the last book read, so that review will be coming tomorrow, meaning I will at least finish the one Challenge I joined this year! Pinocchio: The Tale of a Puppet (translated by Alice Carsey) was available as a free Kindle title, so the cost of the challenge after 5 books remains $12.29 -- or about $2.46 per title. Thanks to Sarah Reads Too Much and the Classics Club crew for hosting the 2013 challenge! I'm looking forward to participating in 2014 when it will be hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate.

THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD by Zora Neale Hurston

I was completely taken in from the first page of Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. And yet I’ve struggled with this review because I just can’t seem to put the book into words. So maybe it will be easier to put it into one word: voluptuous. I have never read a novel that appealed so viscerally to my senses.

She was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was a marriage! She had been summoned to behold a revelation. Then Janie felt a pain remorseless sweet that left her limp and languid. p. 13

That’s pretty heady stuff for a walk in the woods!

A member of the Harlem Renaissance movement, Hurston attempted to capture a microcosm of the post-Civil War experience of African-American women with Their Eyes Were Watching God. The book begins with Janie Crawford, a beautiful teenager, awakening to the sensuousness of the South in springtime. Her grandmother panics at her first kiss, fearing she will go down the path of the mother who had and then abandoned Janie, and so she marries her off to a secure but boring local farmer. Janie’s personality can’t be contained, however, and she walks off the farm one day with Jody, a man she believes will lead her to adventure. He brings Janie to one of the newly-built African-American towns in Central Florida, and quickly becomes the town’s mayor. But Janie finds out that having money and prestige is very different from having happiness.

Still, Janie’s disappointing marriage to Jody eventually leaves her a young, rich widow. And her independence gives her something she’s never had: choices. When she meets Teacake, a guitar-playing gambler, she experiences the “springtime” she remembers from her youth. Because she owns a home she can choose to leave it. Because she has lived conventionally she can choose to flout convention. Janie’s self-actualization becomes an allegory for the Harlem Renaissance itself, ready to break free from the constraints of white society and create something truly unique and beautiful on its own.

I’m sorry it took me so long to get this review up – it would have been a perfect choice for Banned Book Week, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone looking for a great Harlem Renaissance title. It is partially written to capture the Southern African-American vernacular of the time, and that slowed down my reading a bit at times, but it didn’t detract at all from my enjoyment: it just made me focus. One thing I found personally captivating was the book’s location. I lived in Gainesville, Florida, for six years, so I had an easy time imagining the wild lushness of rural central Florida and its small, isolated little towns. I would encourage all lovers of literary fiction to read this book. Southern literature enthusiasts and classic romance readers would enjoy it as well. It spans so many boundaries: humorous but heartbreaking, classic but out of the ordinary, ancient but totally fresh.

What a fantastic Classics Club title! I can’t figure out how Their Eyes Were Watching God was a completely new title to me – I saw it on the ALA’s list of Banned and Challenged Classics and couldn’t remember ever having heard about it. But a quick look at the synopsis told me I’d found a title that fit the African-American Experience Classic for the Back to the Classics Challenge – and the story looked compelling to boot. So I plonked down the whopping $9.78 cost of the Kindle edition and got to work (for anyone keeping count, that’s $12.29 for my Classics Club reading so far, for an average of about $4.10 per title). I’m quite sure this going to be one of my favorite books of the year, so it was more than worth the cost of the e-book. And both of those challenges are happily on track! Next up – two classics that fit into the RIP Challenge coming soon!

LADY AUDLEY'S SECRET by M.E. Braddon

When I joined The Classics Club, the first thing I did was go through the list on Kindle, to see which of the books were available for free or reduced fees. This is one of the great things about reading classics—many of those in the public domain are available at no cost for e-readers through the volunteers at Project Gutenberg. I figured I would load a couple of Kindle titles immediately so I didn’t waste any late night reading time, which is when I really enjoy using my Kindle. And one of the first items I loaded was M.E. Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret. Lucky for me, a night of insomnia led me to yet another unexpectedly enjoyable classic!

Lady Audley’s Secret is often described as the quintessential Victorian “sensation” novel, providing a glimpse into that tightly ordered world by examining what happens when its conventions are completely abandoned. The novel begins with the poor but beautiful Lucy Graham winning the heart of widower Lord Michael Audley. Formerly employed by the local doctor as a governess, Lucy’s life before coming to Essex is veiled in some sad mystery. Lord Audley adores spoiling his young and charming wife, hoping to make up for her past unhappiness, to the disgust of his own daughter Alicia (who happens to be about the same age as her new stepmother).

Meanwhile, back in London, presumptive heir to Lord Audley’s title barrister Robert Audley runs into a dear old friend, George Talboys, just richly returned from a gold-panning expedition to Australia, who is searching for the young and beautiful wife he abandoned in an attempt to change their dwindling fortunes. The fortunes were dwindling, I might add, because George’s father disinherited his son when he rashly chose to marry the beautiful but penniless Helen. Alas, just as George triumphantly returns to England, her death is announced in the papers, breaking his heart. But fate brings the many threads of the story together at Audley Court – until, of course, George Talboys mysteriously vanishes, and Robert is compelled to find out the meaning of his friend’s disappearance – no matter the cost to his beloved family.

I like to think of it as the Grandmother of every radio serial and soap opera ever produced –many of the motifs that pack this 300 page novel are still playing out on the airwaves and Internet today: revenge, doppelgangers, orphaned children, unscrupulous parents. I read that it was originally printed in installments, which explains why each chapter adds some information about Lucy’s past – and ends in some kind of cliffhanger. Reading it all together makes for quite a rollercoaster. The seven deadly sins get quite a workout in Lady Audley’s Secret, but as you’d expect from a Victorian novel, the heavenly virtues are also in evidence, drawing a very clear delineation of those who live within society’s boundaries, and those who live without. There’s also a healthy dose of the occult. For example, Alicia’s dog seems to have a preternatural fear of the new Lady Audley:

The Newfoundland rolled his eyes slowly round in the direction of the speaker, as if he understood every word that had been said. Lady Audley happened to enter the room at this very moment, and the animal cowered down by the side of his mistress with a suppressed grow. There was something in the manner of the dog which was, if anything, more indicative of terror than of fury; incredible as it appears that Caesar should be frightened by so fragile a creature as Lucy Audley.p. 72

I thoroughly enjoyed every frothy, overwrought minute of this novel. It was so true to its time period, yet edgy in its confrontation of social taboos. I had never even heard of Lady Audley’s Secret until, trying to expand beyond Elizabeth Gaskill, I looked up a list of female Victorian authors and found Mary Elizabeth (M.E.) Braddon. The book also appeared on the Manchester Guardian’s 1000 Books Everyone Must Read: The Definitive List. That’s a pretty bold claim for any list, and I certainly found some striking omissions (not surprisingly, the list is very English-centric), but I think it’s a fabulous resource, conveniently broken up into genre: comedy, crime, family and self, love, science fiction and fantasy, state of the nation, and war and travel. I will definitely be culling this list for more ideas for future challenges, as the recommendations so far have been outstanding.

This book counts as my 19th Century Classic for the Back to the Classics Challenge, hosted by Sarah Reads Too Much, and is my second book for The Classics Club. It was free for my Kindle, which keeps my total for that Challenge so far at $2.51. Since this is considered a crime genre classic, I am also linking it to the R.I.P. VIII Challenge, hosted by Carl V. of Stainless Steel Droppings, which started just a little bit early this year.

DANGEROUS LIAISONS by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos

Dangerous Liaisons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos was not what I expected. I blame advertising.

Let me explain. I happen to be one of the seven people on the planet who has not seen the movie versions of Dangerous Liaisons. Not the one with John Malkovich and Michelle Pfeiffer, both of whom I esteem as actors. Not even the one with my movie crush Colin Firth, which was for some reason titled Valmont. But what I do remember seeing was ads for those versions. Bunches of them. And from those commercials I came away with the impression that the book would be somehow in the style of a “light opera.” I knew there would be naughty bits – the titillating trailers were clear there – but I had the impression that it would somehow be humorous. So I went into this first book for The Classics Club and Back to the Classics Challenges thinking I was going to get a slow start.

Imagine my surprise when I realized I was actually reading was a very dark explication of treachery, in so many different forms.

Dangerous Liaisons is an epistolary novel detailing the complex, sexually charged relationship between the Marquise de Merteuil, a beautiful widow leading a double life, and the Vicomte de Valmont, a well-connected roué. Former lovers, they share a frank enjoyment of seduction. The novel begins with the Marquise requesting Valmont’s help in humiliating her former lover, the Comte de Gercourt, by deflowering his convent school educated intended, Cécile Volanges. (The fact that Cécile is not only the daughter of her best friend, but also her cousin, doesn’t even register with the Marquise.) Valmont demurs, as he is already actively engaged in seducing the virtuous Présidente de Tourvel, but events later make him reconsider the conquest. However, by this point Cécile has already fallen in love with her music instructor, the Chevalier Danceny, considerably complicating an already complicated situation.

Although it was written in 1782, I found Dangerous Liaisons almost shockingly modern. At one point, the Marquise points out that Valmont’s supposed “skills” at seduction are really just the result of luck:

And, pray, what have you done that I have not surpassed a thousand times? You have seduced, ruined even, very many women: but what difficulties have you had to overcome? What obstacles to surmount? What merit lies therein that is really your own? A handsome face, the pure result of chance; graces, which habit almost always brings; wit, in truth: but jargon would supply its place at need; a praiseworthy impudence, perhaps due solely to the ease of your first successes; if I am not mistaken, these are your means, for, as for the celebrity you have succeeded in acquiring, you will not ask me, I suppose, to count for much the art of giving birth to a scandal or seizing the opportunity for one. p. 103-104

Happily, I enjoyed this book, despite my surprise at its darkness, as well as my inability to like most of the characters very much. Maybe it’s because I’m the mother of teenaged girls, but I found myself focusing on – and feeling very sorry for –Cécile. I was also angry at Danceny, who totally abandoned Cécile in the end – only Valmont seemed to notice that his behavior had not been so different from hers. The book certainly captures the double standard for sexual conduct that existed at the time. But I was disappointed we didn’t hear more from Cécile – her last letter comes well before the end, not allowing for her perspective on the climactic events of the novel.

You know you’ve really enjoyed a book when you find yourself thinking about it after you’ve finished. I found myself wondering what the reaction to this book must have been at the time. I even wondered if in describing society so frankly -- and amorally -- Dangerous Liaisons had helped contribute to the French Revolution. I heartily recommend this novel to anyone who thinks classics are “boring” – this will disabuse them of that idea from the first page. This was a great kick-off to my Classics Club Challenge, and counts for my 18th Century Classic in the Back to the Classics Challenge, hosted by Sara Reads Too Much. I got this classic novel for my Kindle at the bargain price of $2.51 – I’ve decided to keep a running total for the 5-year challenge, mostly because I have the idea that reading classics should be good for the book budget! I’ll be updating the total on my Classics Club page as well.

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive a free copy of this book for review.

COLD COMFORT FARM by Stella Gibbons

One of the things about being generally regarded by your friends and family as “well read” is this: you are subject to stares of utter disbelief when you admit to not having read a book that someone else consider “classic.” “YOU haven’t read Kafka on the Shore? I can’t believe it! You went on and on about The Belly of Paris last month, and you haven’t even read Murakami? Even my Cousin Waldo the Luddite has read THAT one!”

It’s kind of hard not to take it personally.

One of the books that I routinely got berated for not reading was Stella Gibbons’ Cold Comfort Farm. English friends in particular could not believe this galling oversight in my reading biography. So needing a 20th Century classic for the Back to the Classics 2013 Challenge over at Sarah Reads Too Much, I decided to see what all the fuss was about.

Finally, I realize why everyone was amazed that I’d waited so long to read this book. There aren’t too many novels I’ve found as absurdly funny as Cold Comfort Farm. And believe me, that’s saying something. Because absurdly funny is one of my favorite things.

The novel is mostly set in rural Sussex in the early part of the 20th century. Flora Poste, an orphan at 19 and possessing a tiny inheritance and virtually no work ethic, decides her best course of action is to sponge off her distant relatives, the Starkadders of Cold Comfort Farm. The Starkadders agree to take her in because they seem to believe that they have some grave wrong to make up to her – a wrong about which she has absolutely no clue. However, on arrival, she finds her inherent need for tidiness immediately assaulted by the very messy condition of the Starkadders lives, due mostly to the imperious machinations of the formidable matriarch of the family, Aunt Ada Doom. So she immediately sets to work solving the Starkadders various problems.

The novel has a large and sometimes confusing cast of characters, complete with ridiculous and evocative names and neuroses to match. Flora puts her city street smarts to bear on the bucolic chaos, arranging and rearranging marriages, careers and personal habits. Her snarky insights and polite inability to take no for an answer were hilarious – she sort of reminded me of Katherine Hepburn’s character in Bringing Up Baby: ditzy like a fox!

It is Flora’s great strength that she sees clearly who her kin are, and works her fixes for them without ever trying to change their natures. Local gigolo Seth, for example, has fantastic looks, no brains and a desire to be the center of attention. Flora’s solution? Make a matinee idol out of him! So she arranges a meeting between Mr. Neck, the producer, and her wayward cousin:

A silence fell. The young man stood in the warm light of the declining sun, his bare throat and boldly moulded features looking as though they were bathed in gold. His pose was easy and graceful. A superb self-confidence radiated from him, as it does from any healthy animal. He met Mr. Neck’s stare with an impudent stare of his own, his head lowered and slightly forward. He looked exactly what he was, the local sexually successful bounder. Millions of women were to realize, in the next five years, that Seth could be transported in fancy to a Welsh mining village, a shoddy North country seaside town, a raw city the plains of the Middle West, and still remain eternally and unchangeably the local irresistible bounder. (pg. 184)

I loved watching Flora’s plans come together, and laughed out loud at her insights more than once. I did find the dialect that the cousins’ dialogue was written in a bit slow going, but it didn’t detract at all from my enjoyment of the story. I would highly recommend it to anyone who loves British comedy. And to anyone tired of the incredulous looks – it’s quite painless to banish them in this case!

Okay, better late than never for the Back to the Classics Challenge. I am finally on the board. Thanks to Sarah for hosting.

FTC disclosure: I did not receive a free copy of this book to review.