The joy & the curse of the tbr shelves

I love my tbr shelves. I'm a very lucky woman, as well as a very undisciplined one when it comes to buying books. I blame the internet & ebooks for the explosion of my tbr shelves over the last few years - it couldn't possibly be my fault. I'm also very easily led when it comes to ideas for what to read next &, as my mother would have said, my eyes are bigger than my stomach (or whatever the bookish equivalent is). So, the curse of the tbr shelves is that I often have a copy of whatever book has been reviewed in the blog post I just read or podcast I just listened to, especially as I read blogs that often focus on older books, & I want to read that book right now. Or as soon as I finish the three books I'm reading at the moment. But then, definitely, before the next inspiration strikes. So, the book moves from the shelves to the pile on my desk & sometimes sits there so long that I've forgotten what the original inspiration was. These are the books I've pulled off the shelves in the last few weeks & the reasons why they're there.

I read a list of the best WWI novels. I can't find the website now but it was on my Facebook timeline. It was an interesting list & I'd read several of the books already. One that I hadn't read but do own is Rose Macaulay's Non-Combatants and Others. Another book was Mrs Humphry Ward's Missing. This was free to download to my Kindle so I did that, knowing that I will never remember why I downloaded it when I finally get around to reading it. However, I was also reminded of John Sutherland's biography of Mary Ward. My Oxford paperback edition has some of the most laudatory quotes from respected biographers that I've ever read. "A major biography... it deserves a fanfare" Claire Tomalin, "John Sutherland's... account of her life is clearly the best yet." Julia Briggs, "gripping... a story that unfolds with the fascination of high tragedy." Margaret Drabble. So, why has it been on the tbr shelves since 1995? Maybe it's the very small print...

Continuing the WWI theme, I listened to a fascinating podcast from BBC Women's Hour the other day. It was an interview from the 1960s with Baroness de T'Serclaes, who began life as Elsie Knocker, one of the courageous women who set up ambulance posts & nursed during WWI, usually with very little help or encouragement from the establishment. I remember telling my self to order the paperback because I was never going to have time to read the hardback. Well, I did, & that was four years ago.

Simon Savidge recently reviewed Kate Colquhoun's new book about the Maybrick murder case, Did She Kill Him? Simon also interviewed Kate on his podcast, You Wrote The Book! I've read other books about Florence Maybrick & I love a good Victorian poisoning murder so I'm keen to read this soon. At least this is from the library so it's in the library tbr pile instead of my own personal tbr pile. Is there a difference, except that the library books have to go back eventually?

Then, I read Desperate Reader's review of Somerset Maugham's The Painted Veil. I have this lovely Vintage edition & I seem to be collecting Vintage editions of Maugham but not actually reading any of them.

I've also just read an interview at Nerdalicious with Elizabeth Norton, author of many historical biographies, including The Anne Boleyn Papers. This is a bit different though, as it's a biography told almost entirely through the contemporary sources for Anne's life. However, it reminded me that I have this beautiful Folio edition of one of the major sources for Anne's life, George Cavendish's Thomas Wolsey : His Life and Death. Somehow, I've also managed to order Elizabeth Norton's book as well... How does that happen?

Then, there was Heavenali's review of Sheridan Le Fanu's Uncle Silas & Cosy Books' purchase of the Virago edition of Charlotte Yonge's The Daisy Chain, which reminded me that I still haven't read the sequel, The Trial, which I downloaded a long time ago. I could also mention the new Persephones & the Slightly Foxed editions that I'm determined to read as they arrive & not let them be overtaken by other books - but I won't because this post is long enough as it is.
There you have it, my latest list of good reading intentions. Only time will tell how many of them I actually read. I have no idea what's coming up next because my brain is hurting.

Professor Sutherland's literary puzzles

I'm reading Thomas Hardy's A Pair of Blue Eyes with one of my online reading groups at the moment. I last read it over 20 years ago so the plot isn't exactly fresh in my mind but the scene where Elfride walks around the parapet of the church tower & almost falls, reminded me of one of the essays in John Sutherland's book of puzzles in 19th century fiction, Can Jane Eyre be Happy? When I checked the book, the chapter What is Elfride's rope made of? refers to a later incident but it reminded of this wonderful series of books written by John Sutherland.

The first book in the series, Is Heathcliff a Murderer?, was written as an antidote to the deadening effect of literary criticism on the enjoyment of the ordinary reader. Sutherland is a well-known academic & critic with a lively sense of humour & fun. He has edited many 19th century classic novels for the Oxford World's Classics series & is obviously as intrigued as any common reader by the mistakes, errors & unanswered questions in these books. The questions he asks in Is Heathcliff a Murderer? range from What is Jo sweeping? (Bleak House) to Is Will Ladislaw legitimate? (Middlemarch) What does Arabella Donn throw? (Jude the Obscure) and Why does the Count come to England? (Dracula). He looks again at questions that have puzzled many readers & critics. What sex is Lady Bertram's Pug in Mansfield Park? At different times in the book, Pug is referred to as He & She. Then there are the obvious mistakes like the apple blossom in June in Jane Austen's Emma.

Of course, there's also the title essay where Sutherland examines the evidence of Hindley Earnshaw's death in Wuthering Heights & speculates whether the beating he received from Heathcliff contributed to his death. There's also Joseph's evidence that he was sent for the doctor & Heathcliff & Hindley were left alone for some time when anything might have happened. As Joseph says, '... he warn't deead when Aw left, nowt uh t'soart'. The joy of these essays is that Sutherland discusses the characters & situations as though they are real. He discusses the improbability of a 27 year old man like Hindley drinking himself to death in a single night. Although Joseph is not a sympathetic character, he is invariably honest & Heathcliff had a motive in wanting Hindley dead - his ultimate aim of triumphing over the Earnshaws & taking control of the Heights. This is Sutherland's conclusion,

Whether or not Heathcliff is guilty of capital crime remains a fascinating but ultimately inscrutable enigma at the very heart of the narrative. For what it is worth, I believe he did kill Hindley, although for any unprejudiced jury it is likely that enough 'reasonable doubt' would remain to acquit him.

Is Heathcliff a Murderer? was so successful that a second & then a third volume was called for. Sutherland quotes some of the letters he received from readers querying his conclusions & suggesting other conundrums that had always puzzled them. The title essay asks how Jane Eyre can expect a happy married life with a man who locked his first wife in the attic, discarded mistresses all over Europe & tried to trick her into a bigamous marriage. Sutherland's tongue is often in his cheek but anyone who loves 19th century fiction would enjoy these books. Some of the other essays in Can Jane Eyre be Happy? are about Vanity Fair (How many pianos has Amelia Sedley?), Armadale (What, precisely, does Miss Gwilt's purple flask contain?) & Tess of the D'Urbervilles (Who will Angel marry next?). In Who Betrays Elizabeth Bennet? the conundrums continue. The essay on A Christmas Carol is on a point that has always puzzled me. How do the Cratchits cook that enormous turkey sent by Scrooge on Christmas morning? In the title essay, he discusses how Lady Catherine could have heard the rumour about Lizzie's imminent engagement to Mr Darcy in Pride & Prejudice.

Sutherland then moved on to Shakespearean enigmas, including the evidence that Henry V was a war criminal for his actions after Agincourt, does Lady Macbeth really faint when she hears of Duncan's murder or is she putting on an act? and how old is King Lear?

20th century fiction is covered in Where was Rebecca shot? Now, we all know Maxim de Winter shot Rebecca in the boathouse on the beach near Manderley but the essay asks where on her body was she shot? Why did Maxim just happen to have a gun with him when he went to the boathouse that night? Who was the woman whose decomposing body Maxim identified months later? She is lying in the family vault but when Rebecca's body is found in her boat, this other woman & her identity are ignored. No inquest takes place to enquire into her identity & how she died. Was she left in the family vault beside Rebecca? All excellent questions that the reader ignores in the excitement of devouring a wonderfully absorbing book as Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca.

Finally, the Folio Society have produced a volume of Sutherland's essays relating to books they have published.

I often dip into these books when I'm reading a 19th century novel & enjoy all over again Sutherland's close reading of the books & his ingenious solutions to the many mysteries he investigates.