Thursday, December 28, 2006
What I haven't said
I've been thinking about the year just past, and mulling over whether or not to write a long post about all the things that happened that I never mentioned once on this blog. Events that took up major amounts of my brain space, not to mention hours in the day. Well, I decided I won't. Some things truly are too personal, or mean too much to air in public, and that's what my handwritten journal is for. Plus this keeps the mystery alive, as it were - sometimes it's better not to know too much about someone! As I've read other people's blogs this year I've thought a lot about how writers craft their personas, their voices, and what makes up a good online persona. Authenticity is the number one trait, I find - people being themselves, with all their opinions and good humor and pronouncements, are very interesting. But enough introspection for now. This persona has to get back to the books.
Last night I started reading Rural Rides by William Cobbett, in the Everyman edition (Dent 1925). The book was originally published in 1853, and covers Cobbett's perambulations around the English countryside in the 1820s and early 1830s, with an eye to landscape, husbandry, farming, and especially politics. In the introduction Edward Thomas says of Cobbett's writing style, "...what a thing that style is! What descriptions, what opinions, what campaigns of words!" (p.x) Many of his political diatribes I am skimming over because they mean little to me without an British political dictionary handy, but there are gems of description throughout that are worth lingering on, and fine passages such as this: "I passed through that villainous hole, Cricklade, about two hours ago; and, certainly, a more rascally looking place I never set my eyes on. I wished to avoid it, but could get along no other way." (p.17) He's certainly opinionated and it makes for great reading. I picked this up because I've had it sitting around on the to-be-read stacks for a year. I took it home from the shop because I love travel narratives and this little two-volume set is very attractive, and because I'm avoiding finishing The Iliad. Two books to go and I can't seem to sit down and get it done. And The Odyssey looms. So I am lost in Rural Rides instead - plus the day after Christmas I spent hours on the couch re-reading Rumer Godden's novel China Court, which I dearly love (stick with it, it's bookish), instead of finishing The Iliad. My goal is to finish it by the new year. Rural Rides will not help me accomplish this goal. I'm only halfway through volume one. Well, if this is my only difficulty, life sure is good.
Last night I started reading Rural Rides by William Cobbett, in the Everyman edition (Dent 1925). The book was originally published in 1853, and covers Cobbett's perambulations around the English countryside in the 1820s and early 1830s, with an eye to landscape, husbandry, farming, and especially politics. In the introduction Edward Thomas says of Cobbett's writing style, "...what a thing that style is! What descriptions, what opinions, what campaigns of words!" (p.x) Many of his political diatribes I am skimming over because they mean little to me without an British political dictionary handy, but there are gems of description throughout that are worth lingering on, and fine passages such as this: "I passed through that villainous hole, Cricklade, about two hours ago; and, certainly, a more rascally looking place I never set my eyes on. I wished to avoid it, but could get along no other way." (p.17) He's certainly opinionated and it makes for great reading. I picked this up because I've had it sitting around on the to-be-read stacks for a year. I took it home from the shop because I love travel narratives and this little two-volume set is very attractive, and because I'm avoiding finishing The Iliad. Two books to go and I can't seem to sit down and get it done. And The Odyssey looms. So I am lost in Rural Rides instead - plus the day after Christmas I spent hours on the couch re-reading Rumer Godden's novel China Court, which I dearly love (stick with it, it's bookish), instead of finishing The Iliad. My goal is to finish it by the new year. Rural Rides will not help me accomplish this goal. I'm only halfway through volume one. Well, if this is my only difficulty, life sure is good.
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Rural Rides is great! I've got the Penguin Classics paperback. I like reading a page or two before going to sleep.
--Charlie
--Charlie
# posted by 
: 6:09 PM
: 6:09 PM
I am happy someone else is reading "Rural Rides." Mystified, but happy. Thanks, Charlie - long live the obscure and the good! Though can I call something published in both Everyman and Penguin editions obscure? Maybe not...
And Jonathan, yes, sometimes not knowing is much better. Reality can be so drab.
And Jonathan, yes, sometimes not knowing is much better. Reality can be so drab.
Sahara, you blogged this:
"Some things truly are too personal, or mean too much to air in public, and that's what my handwritten journal is for. Plus this keeps the mystery alive, as it were - sometimes it's better not to know too much about someone! As I've read other people's blogs this year I've thought a lot about how writers craft their personas, their voices, and what makes up a good online persona. Authenticity is the number one trait, I find - people being themselves, with all their opinions and good humor and pronouncements, are very interesting. But enough introspection for now."
Sarah - it IS your persona to bring up such irresolveable issues - albeit through such tangential remarks that I translate into : "How do I edit my voice on a blog about daily thoughts and activity?"
This question strikes me as more difficult than writing fiction, where one has the freedom to adopt many different voices as the author chooses.
I have no solution to offer. As just one more voyeur in the blogosphere, I could say 'let it all hang loose'. Certainly, I have no use for reading sugary, upbeat patter when my reading between the lines tells me otherwise. Who does?
But I think blogging and lit (narrative in general) is at a different stage today than when confessional ruled the waves. You may be feeling tugged toward the confessional mode, it looks like it, while being influenced by all the Brits you've been reading lately; the ones who can be wry and witty without letting on how much they are laughing to keep from crying.
Well what's to say?
Write with your blood, not with your brain; easier said than done. By the way, the French poet Mallarmé said just the opposite. But I prefer the more emotional.
"Some things truly are too personal, or mean too much to air in public, and that's what my handwritten journal is for. Plus this keeps the mystery alive, as it were - sometimes it's better not to know too much about someone! As I've read other people's blogs this year I've thought a lot about how writers craft their personas, their voices, and what makes up a good online persona. Authenticity is the number one trait, I find - people being themselves, with all their opinions and good humor and pronouncements, are very interesting. But enough introspection for now."
Sarah - it IS your persona to bring up such irresolveable issues - albeit through such tangential remarks that I translate into : "How do I edit my voice on a blog about daily thoughts and activity?"
This question strikes me as more difficult than writing fiction, where one has the freedom to adopt many different voices as the author chooses.
I have no solution to offer. As just one more voyeur in the blogosphere, I could say 'let it all hang loose'. Certainly, I have no use for reading sugary, upbeat patter when my reading between the lines tells me otherwise. Who does?
But I think blogging and lit (narrative in general) is at a different stage today than when confessional ruled the waves. You may be feeling tugged toward the confessional mode, it looks like it, while being influenced by all the Brits you've been reading lately; the ones who can be wry and witty without letting on how much they are laughing to keep from crying.
Well what's to say?
Write with your blood, not with your brain; easier said than done. By the way, the French poet Mallarmé said just the opposite. But I prefer the more emotional.
Cy, everything you read between the lines is true. Alas, I am sugary and upbeat... But seriously, among my wide acquaintance I am known for being relentlessly optimistic. Although my chin wobbles, often, as any thinking/feeling/reading person's chin must. In writing autobiography I think it's a question of what to reveal, really, and what is truly interesting to others vs. what is self-indulgent solipsism. Or, more simply, what is boring.
I have a good pal who hates reading autobiographies or memoirs because he says the authors of them can't be trusted to tell the truth about their own lives. But he loves reading biographies!
Re. "Sahara" - is my blog an oasis in the internet desert? Hee hee...
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I have a good pal who hates reading autobiographies or memoirs because he says the authors of them can't be trusted to tell the truth about their own lives. But he loves reading biographies!
Re. "Sahara" - is my blog an oasis in the internet desert? Hee hee...
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