World Book Night at Arcadia

I woke up on Saturday with a horrible horrible hangover, fresh from a dream where we had set World Book Night up on trestle tables on Otley Road, nobody had come and everything was covered in sand...

...so its fair to say I was sliiiiiightly nervous when it came to 6.30 that evening. The lovely lovely people at Arcadia had reserved the side room downstairs for us to use, and I started to sweat a little hoping I hadn't completely wasted their time and done them out of a night's takings.

By 7.15, with 60 books on the table, and a packed-out venue full of amazingly brilliant people talking about their favourite books, beer and how to set up book clubs in their local area, I was already grinning madly, and a couple of hours later the tears had started stinging in my eyes at just what a brilliant, brilliant thing was going on around me.



Some of the early arrivals with their chosen books

It started when we heard about World Book Night in November. I instantly applied to be a giver for what I believe to be a great incentive to get people talking about books. Twenty Five Titles, 48 copies each, given out by 20,000 people up and down Britain, with massive support from writers such as Margaret Atwood and Alan Bennett, this was always going to need a bigger boat. When I found out The Travelling Suitcase Library had been selected to be a giver of "Stuart: A Life Backwards" by Alexander Masters (thoughtfully and eloquently told real-life story of a man who is homeless and stimulant dependent, fighting for his rights in a world that seem designed to go against him) I was jumping for joy a wee bit.

A few shout outs on Twitter and I soon realised I wasn't alone in wanting to share the books with others. Together with Lauren (@walkyouhome) and Alice (@bulbnose) we decided to gatecrash Arcadia for the night and give out the books we had chosen (Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez for Lauren, One Day by David Nicholls for Alice) to the locals and regulars that frequent the CAMRA pub of the season.

Then, when I toddled off to ask the amazing management of Arcadia if I could borrow a table for the evening, I found that there had already been some interest. A Random Man had apparently asked if he too could give out books. Then R the manager heard from her old friend Paula that she too was looking for a base to give hers out. It was all getting a bit big.



Some of the books given out

Come Saturday I had no idea if we could pull it off. Having promoted the evening in some online publications I know I still wasn't sure how it would go; an awful lot of people say to me "what a marvellous idea" when it comes to the Travelling Suitcase Library, but enough to fill a pub on a Saturday night?

At 7 there was mine and Alice's books on the table. These were soon joined by ten copies of The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid given by the absolutely gorgeous Steve, who had given the rest to his rugby team that day in an effort to bring his hobbies together.

At 8 Paula arrived, her brown box full of copies of Toast by Nigel Slater, greeted by cheers.



Alice, Lauren, Me and Paula with our books

The Travelling Suitcase was open throughout and about ten people brought books to be swapped. When my very good old friend M arrived with a bag full of graphic novels I had barely time to read out the titles before they were snatched from my hands.



The Travelling Suitcase Library

People were talking passionately about their preferences. Whether this was aided by the venue's excellent choice of beers and wines I couldn't comment, but the couple of pints of Black Velvet definitely loosened my tongue!

I popped upstairs to announce "free books" and we suddenly had about fifty people clawing their way to the table to get their hands on copies. When Kelly pulled out copies of Case Histories by Kate Atkinson to contribute to the hoard they lasted, what two minutes? When Lauren arrived (after moving house!) with 48 fresh copies of Love in the Time of Cholera she was greeted like a hero.

And then, at about 9, just when it couldn't get any better, Rebecca arrived. She'd read about the event on the World Book Night website, would it be alright to give out her 48 brand new copies of Northern Lightsby Phlip Pullman? I almost cried.



Standing room only at World Book Night!


I must have spoken about reading to 80-odd people that night, including a rather socially relaxed conversation with three rather nice young men about how they should definitely take a copy of Northern Lights (which only one of them had read, and whose reaction to hearing his friends hasn't was far to explicit for me to repeat) and use it as a chat up line during their night on the town.

It also turned out G, the deputy manager of the pub, hadn't read it either, which astounded me but I'm now really looking forward to discussing the series with him!



My face in the crowd at about 8 o'clock... says it all really!


This is what I love about books, they really do bring people from all walks of life together. Yes we were all adults, but students, locals, regulars and staff came together to talk about something they love and that should be celebrated. My favourite part of the night was possibly when regular Barry walked out with two books, and a massive grin on his face. It was also a pleasure to see a couple arguing massively over why she should take more books. "You already have five shelves!", "Oh really, and what about all your cricket gear?". Classic.

As the night wound down, and the good 400 books that had been given away from both the World Book Night haul and The Travelling Suitcase Library were packed carefully away into bags and coat pockets, we reflected on what we had done. Many people had said they would now be joining the book club, many more people have talked about the need to create one of their own. All in all I couldn't have been more pleased with how the night went, I just hope that everyone who came was inspired, and enjoys their new books!

Thank yous... to the amazingly supportive and accommodating Arcadia Bar, especially Tom and the team who were working that night, it was really really busy and you did a fantastic job (like you always to)

To R & G, the management, for continued love and support. Could not have done any of this without you.

To N, who has just been an utter utter rock. Bigger and better things next time!

To L, M, J and A for being there. Thank you.

To Lauren, Alice, Rebecca, Paula, Kelly and Steve the book givers who shared there passion and books with us. It would have not been half as amazing without.

To the word "amazing" that apparently sponsored this blog post!

And finally to every single person who came and took a book (or eight!). Enjoy them, read them, and pass them on. If one more person read one more books out of this whole thing, its a success, so thank you



Me, at the end of a long night, with books


Happy Reading!
BookElf
xx

Book Club the Bigger! Meeting the first!

Venue: Arcadia Bar

Date: 30th January 2011

Time: 5pm - 7pm

Agreed on: The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon 

Discussed: The White Woman on the Green Bicycle by Monique Roffey

 Right, despite this being the first time we had all met up, we wasted no time in getting started, barely waiting for the introductions to settle!

Thankfully, this book was one of those rare gems that inspired very different feelings - both positive and negative in its readers - and each of us had particular aspects that had caught our eye, so after some initial trepidation, we were able to discuss the book in detail.

There were certain points that more than one person agreed on:

• The vast majority of us did not find the beginning of the book to be particularly engaging - the word boring was used by more than one. Although the story develops, and the latter stages in particular were very enjoyable, the weak start left some of us with that horrid sense of 'have to finish', rather than 'WANT to finish', which IMHO, is not a great way to read a book.
• For the first half of the book, the character of George roused little sympathy, and was not someone that we readers particularly liked. The grotesque physical descriptions (ugh, with the prostitute for example) reinforce his extreme dislikability (is that a word? well, it is now!).
• The author very effectively used the blimp, a prominent feature throughout the book, to build up a steady and pervasive attitude of fear and paranoia in those that lived below it, mirroring the long term implications of the colonial period. 
• Likewise the sporadic references to football, and the one crop dependent economy, were effective and subtle, building up the sense of place. 
• We were somewhat divided by the letters - some enjoyed them, others would have preferred to have seen those parts from Sabine viewpoint in a less diluted form.
• We almost all of us preferred the second half of the story, finding the voice of Sabine to inspire far more empathy. Her motivations seemed far more open and honest, and the disintegration of her sense of self in a mutually destructive marriage was both raw and passionate.
• Almost all of us thought the beautiful and evocative descriptions of the island were fantastic, and although not all of us agreed that the book was 'a love letter to the country of Trinidad', we would all be interested in visiting.
• The structure of the book confounded some of us. The first half of the book tells you how the story ends, the second providing all the context. Some were suspicious that the author had written the book in a straightforward linear progression, and then ripped it in half and swapped the beginning for the end, and vice versa. This would explain why local dialect words were provided with translation in the second section and not the first. The vast majority found this device to be awkwardly applied and unnecessary.

While some of us had our quibbles, others loved the book, particularly the historical and political aspects. 

• Although most of us were very ignorant about Eric Williams and the history of the island, we almost universally would like to find out more.  
• The character of Sabine was also very favourably viewed, especially her interest in the world around her. It was posited that she understood the country that she and George were living in far better than he did; though he loved it, in his ignorance, in a way she never did.
• The balance of power was also very beautifully described. The ex-colonials, like George, were able to enjoy wealth and power in a way they would never have 'back home' - classic Failed In London, Try Hong Kong. 
• Similarly, Sabine lost her power to George, particularly after the birth of her children - a thing made more cruel by how she had predicted it, and had been so insistent that they wait until they returned to Europe to have children. 
• The characters of Eric Williams, the polar opposite siblings, Lucy, the island woman herself, and the changing viewpoints of the Trinidad population relating to race are also particularly well realised.

Finally we concluded that it was a tricky book to get into, that may have been more enjoyable had it been told sequentially, but that the writing was eloquent and the writing about the unheard voice of the island herself damn near poetic. 

Rating average: 6/10

* * * * * 

Arcadia LBC

21 - Nov - Hard Times - Charles Dickens
20 - Oct - The New York Trilogy - Paul Auster - GUEST - @CultureLEEDS
19 - Sep - The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins - GUEST - @CultureLEEDS
18 - Aug - The Princess Bride - William Goldman
17 - Jul - A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini - GUEST
16 - Jun - Cry the Beloved Country - Alan Paton
15 - May - 1984 - George Orwell - GUEST - @CultureLEEDS
14 - Apr - BloodChild and Other Stories - Octavia Butler
13 - Mar - The Year of the Hare - Arto Paasilinna
12 - Feb - Heat Wave - Richard Castle
11 - Jan - The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint - Brady Udall
10 - Nov - Flowers for Algernon - Daniel Keyes

09 - Oct - Grace Williams Says It Loud - Emma Henderson

08 - Sep - The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald

07 - Aug - Reading Lolita in Tehran - Azar Nafisi

06 - Jul - The Line of Beauty - Alan Hollinghurst

05 - Jun - Soulless - Gail Carriger

04 - May - Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell

03 - Apr - Touching the Void - Joe Simpson

02 - Mar - The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon

01 - Feb - The White Woman on the Green Bicycle - Monique Roffrey

* * * * *

Book Club - Table of Contents

* * * * *

Full Table of Contents 

World Book Night

This is a bit of Shameless self promotion on my part, but I would like to warmly invite anyone who lives in Leeds (and is over 18) to come to the Travelling Suitcase Library's World Book Night Event.

We will be in Arcadia Ale and Wine Bar, in Headingley, from 7 pm.

I will be giving out copies of Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters. I tend to find that emerging readers, who I would prefer to receive free copies, like true-life stories, and this is a beautiful sad book.

Other book-givers will be joining me giving away books. I'll also be bringing the Travelling Suitcase Library and be running a book swap.

Yes, World Book Night has caused a fair bit of controversy, but personally I think that anything that promotes reading for pleasure is a good thing.

I hope to see lots of people on Saturday!

xxxx

If I have to leave - D.E. Barrell

Today, I have mostly been trying to remember poetry that I last read in 1998, for my O Levels. 

Thanks to facebook, I now know that the book we studied was Revival (which I am now scouring the internet for), and have managed to track down my personal favourite from the set, and one that I recited for a school production my final year in Zimbabwe. 

I still love it! 

If I have to leave - D.E. Barrell

If I have to leave,

...I shall take from Africa,

No assegais;

But arrows of laughter in the eyes;

From the Shona women

Sorting washing,

Stitching sheets with me

In a mutual murmer;

The flicker of black hands

Smoothing sheets

And my sons cradled in their shadow.

Laughter in the kitchen,

In the market, in the meeting place;

Shrewd glances over business

Appraising each other's skills.

Black hands helping with sickness;

And that one wet night

As I drove her through darkness:

The awful pain of her childbirth

In my womb.

If I have to leave,

I shall take from Africa this strength,

This strange bond of women.

* * * * *

School Days Over

Leaving Certificate Poetry

• Eavan Boland
• William Shakespeare
• Michael Longley
• John Keats
• Seamus Heaney
• Elizabeth Bishop

GCSE Poetry - T'Elf

If I Have To Leave - D.E. Barrell

Natalie Williams

A Level Poetry 

• Utter Filth

O Level Poetry

• They Walked and Talked - Uche Okeke

* * * * *
School Days Over Table of Contents 

* * * * * 

Full Table of Contents 

If you like it then you should have put a ring on it...

Its been a long time since I wanted to throw a book accross the room, yet I very nearly did on more that one occasion reading The Thorn Birds, by Colleen McCullough.

I chose this book as it is supposedly a modern classic, and was reprinted by Virago Books in 2007 for its thirtieth anniversary addition. Having recently read Gone With The Wind and The Far Pavillions I was keen to add another romantic epic to my Done list... plus the blurb was fantastic.

And it *is* fantastic. Fantastic in scope: fantastic is the way is describes the landscapes of Australia and New Zealand: fantastic in the way is describes the people. I just hated it. And it's all the characters fault.

The story starts in 1915. The Cleary family are poor sheep farmers living in New Zealand. Father Patrick (the only really substatial character I actually empathised with at all) was an Irish immigrant who married into the local definition of aristocracy. Fiona, the mother of the seven Cleary children, is a bitter woman, disappointed in love, who marries Patrick under imense family presure after having a child, Frank, with an older married man.

Together they raise the six boys and their daughter Meggie in poverty, with the proper obedience to the Catholic Church to which they belong. The first part of the book is amazing, and I was immediatly gripped by McCullough's beautiful descriptive writing; this is the perfect example of "show, don't tell", the fundamental rule of writing which she apparently forgets as time goes on.

We are then introduced to Patrick's much older sister, Mary Carson, who is also an immigrant, having married a rich Australian land owner and now living as the spider-like widow in Drogheda, a beyond-massive farm in Western Australia. Mary intends to leave the farm to Patrick and so invites the family to live as sort of farm-managers on the homestead. This is a massive relief for the Clearys, who are living in poverty, and the entire family up sticks and go.

At Drogheda, the family settle in quickly, the men-folk loving the sense of freedom that comes with the Australian landscape, again beautifully described. The women have less of a time of it (naturally) but every seems to plod along nicely enough.

Meggie, who is ten when they move, falls in with the local young priest, Father Ralph, another Irishman who has wound up in Drogheda and has stuck around in order to leach off Mary Carson, who worships him because of his good looks. Its about this point I began to feel the inklings of doubt gnawing at the corners of my brain; why does Father Ralph spend so much of his time and effort on Meggie? Oh, because she's got "innocent eyes". That makes it all alright then doesn't it.

A couple of years go by, with Frank growing all the more resenting towards Patrick, not knowing that he is not actually his father (even though he looks nothing like either of his parents and is compleatly different in every way). This all blows up one evening and Frank runs away to Sydney to become a boxer. Fiona is so wrapped up in herself she has no thought to any of her children, who are all, (apart from Meggie, who's a spoilt little stuck-up thing with nothing on her mind apparently than riding her horse, and innocently wrapping Ralph round her little finger)great and gutted to loose their brother.

More time goes by. Meggie grows into a young woman, working on the farm. Mary Carson has twigged long ago that she ain't getting nothing off the gorgeous Ralph whilst Meggie is around. She has her revenge on him by dying, leaving all her money and the farm to the Catholic Church, with Ralph in charge. The Clearys are kept on, with loadsa money, but only as managers.

This means Ralph now had Loads of Money and Power, which is what he wanted, but is gutted about because he will "lose" Meggie. But he's conflicted about her anyway, because he loves the child not the woman, and now she has a womanly way and he hates her for it and oh how incredibly tragic everything is.

And my first wanting-to-throw-the-book-accross-the-room occured.

I am not a Catholic. I was not raised in a Catholic country and I do not have any experience of how Catholocism really works. I get Ralph is completly torn between the love for his God and his role in the Church, and his love of Power that his role brings him, and his physical love for Meggie. Ralph goes on a bit of a journey himself realising that he is not a God, merely a man with a man's foibles. However. This doesn't stop his from basically pissing about for years, keeping Meggie on a string, pretending that its her oh so bloody innocent spirit that he loves (I should bloody hope so seeing as she's A CHILD) then suddenly telling her to find someone else as soon as she hits womanhood and makes a play for him.

Meggie I hate even more than Ralph because she is a twit. Now I've been lovesick, oh God I've been lovesick, and I've bored my friends with it for *years*. I've loved a man I couldn't have. However. I Haven't Fucked My Entire Life Up On Purpose Just Because I Couldn't Have Him.

Meggie marries Luke, a farm hand, for no reason whatsoever except for he looks a bit like Ralph. Luke is a worker; he works, thats it, thats literally all he is interested in doing. He's also a Massive Bastard to Meggie and drags her to Queensland, where its very hot and nasty, to live as a maid to fortunatly a lovely couple whilst he does the Man thing in the fields.

And again, I nearly threw the book accross the room. Meggie twigs pretty quickly that her and Luke ain't gonna work out. Despite hating everything about her life and longing to go home her stupid pride won't let her; she remains convinced that she must stay with Luke and raise his children (which he doesn't want) because its the only way to get Ralph out of her system.

Now one thing I did like about the book was how it showed the differenced between the men and women's roles. In the books the genders live totally disparate lives, with only two male characters actually ever having a functional relationship with a woman. Meggie is completely oblivious about sex and conception until she marries, because her God-awful mother never spoke to her about it. Luke always uses condoms and when Meggie figures that this is the reason she isn't getting pregnant (because if she had his baby, Luke would settle down, apparently, even though that's clearly bollocks) she seduces him into having unprotected sex. Even though she hates it.

I can't hate Meggie for her ignorance but I was extremely upset by this part of the novel. Meggie has a little girl, Justine, Luke is obviously not bothered at all about either of them And Yet She Carries On Being Married To Him.

And then, THEN, she is REWARDED for it by being given a lovely free holiday on an Island Paradise, where Ralph, who miraculously appears on occasion in his sports car, shows up and they finally Get It On. This of course leads to ridiculous amounts of soul searching and brow beating, but of course Ralph loves his lovely Power (sorry, sorry I mean GOD) and he Can Never Ever Ever Leave...

And OF COURSE Meggie ends up pregnant with Ralph's baby, and she again seduces Luke before leaving him, in order to make sure he thinks the baby is his. She returns to Drogheda and a whole new cycle begins.

Justine and Dane, the new generation of Clearys, are brats from the off. Justine, who again has no sort of functional relationship with her mother because Meggie prefers the son of the man she actually loves (cyclical patterns anyone?), grows up resenting everyone except for her brother, despite living in luxury and being aloud to do whatever she likes, including become an actress and move to Sydney. Ralph makes the one appearance during this time (he's a Cardinal by now). Oh and there's a war, where we actually get to see the family function as a unit.

The children grow up and move to Europe, Justine to act, Dane to train as a priest under Ralph's tutorship. Meggie sends Dane off to Ralph, who never realises Dane is his son until the end, as a punishment for his abadonning her. Even though HE NEVER DID. Meggie KNEW he was a priest. She KNEW he could never marry her. She KNEW all of this, and yet somehow they can't just get on with their lives. Oh no, it has to be unbearably tragic At All Times.

Its like Wuthering Shites but set in Australia, and on a slightly bigger scale.

The book is about reserve and the unsaid and duty and how basic lack of communication ruins people's lives. Every single problem they have would have been solved by a) them having a conversation with each other and b) them getting the fuck over themselves. Ralph and Meggie LOVE each other, he just got into religion too young. Its not like he cheated on her with her best mate, she knew from the off she could never have him. She just fucks up another generation with pining for something that ain't never going to happen.

It is an epic. But it isn't an epic romance. This is Greek Tragedy at its best (a fact that is highlighted several times throughout the book). Its almost Brectian in a way. The last third is dialogue heavy nonsense and the last fifty pages I skim read because I couldn't stand to be in the same room with someone has horrid as Justine.

Would I recommend this book? Well I have to say yes because a) it is fantastically well written for the most part b) it is highly thought provoking and c) I have been in the worst of moods all week so hardly most conducive for appreciating Vainglorious Toss. I might even read it again, in a good few years. But right now, no likey, no lighty. Sorry folks.