The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

Chronologically The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is the fifth installment in the Narnia Chronicles and, to me, it is the funniest one so far. Lewis never openly criticizes modern books, modern parents or modern education, but his disapproval comes through loud and clear in his subtle and humorous comments. Because I’m a lover of beautiful and imaginative literature, I found his jabs at modern books to be the most hilarious.

In one of the book’s most famous scenes bratty Eustace encounters a dead dragon and goes into its cave:

Most of us know what we should expect to find in a dragon’s lair, but, as I said before, Eustace had read only the wrong books. They had a lot to say about exports and imports and governments and drains, but they were weak on dragons. That is why he was so puzzled at the surface on which he was lying. Parts of it were too prickly to be stones and too hard to be thorns, and there seemed to be a great many round, flat things, and it all clinked when he moved. There was light enough at the cave’s mouth to examine it by. And of course Eustace found it to be what any of us could have told him in advance – treasure. (p. 71)

Caspian and Reepicheep (from the book Prince Caspian) make a reappearance in Voyage and this book brings closure to their story. I liked Reepicheep in the previous book, but loved him in this one. All in all, Voyage of the Dawn Treader was a pleasant read. Now to get my hands on The Silver Chair!

Quote of the Week: Reading as Freedom

In many ways [our] new visual culture is pleasurable, but it is a tyrant. Literature, on the other hand, is democratic. One can pause and put a book down and debate with the author. One can take it up later, after there has been time to think or do some research. The reader's imagination can select what it wishes to focus on, whereas in electronic visual media the mind is pummeled with powerful stimuli that bypass conscious and subconscious defenses.

(Quote from A Landscape With Dragons by Michael O'Brien)

The Lively Art of Writing by Lucile Vaughan Payne

I read The Lively Art of Writing in preparation for a class I teach and liked it so much that I rewrote my syllabus around it. Its emphasis is on writing good essays, but the advice could apply to many kinds of writing. Although the book has not been updated since its 1969 publication (making some of the examples outdated), its information is still fresh and relevant. The Lively Art of Writing is a wonderful book for struggling writers. It clearly explains how to write a thesis, what makes a good thesis, how to write a paragraph, how to connect paragraphs and how to conclude well. Each chapter contains clear instructions as well as assignments for practicing each new writing skill.

Payne’s gentle witticisms reminded me of Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style. An example from page 104:

Sally saw the cat. It was a big cat. It was a black cat. It was a big, black cat.

You learned, obediently, what you had to learn: that sentences started with a capital letter and ended with a period, that Sally was a noun, saw was a verb, and big was an adjective. You probably learned, in addition, a few things that weren’t strictly a part of the lesson. You learned to hate Sally. You learned to hate Sally’s cat. And you learned to hate sentences. If sentences were this kind of stuff, who wanted them? You had the uneasy feeling that it was dangerous, even faintly immoral, to put a sentence in writing until you had starched and stiffened and sterilized it beyond any resemblance to natural speech.

While I’ll always be partial to the genius of Strunk and White, I thought that Payne did a more thorough job of explaining the mechanics of writing. This is a great book for those who would like to improve their writing.

Mrs. Miniver by Jan Struther

As a fan of classic movies I was only familiar with the film version of Mrs. Miniver. I didn’t know there was a book by this title until I read about it here. So I was glad to get a copy through PBS.

From the opening pages you know you are reading a book from a different era. After all, a woman who unabashedly loves her children, husband and home is considered “outdated”. But those are the qualities that make Caroline Miniver irresistibly charming.

This is not a novel, but a string of vignettes. They describe simple activities in the life of an English woman in the days leading up to WWII. The writing is lovely. (“It was a Wedgewood day, with white clouds delicately modeled in relief against a sky of pale pure blue”.) And the book is chock full of gentle philosophizing:

About once a year Clem rather ruefully suggested, and Mrs. Miniver reluctantly agreed, that it was about time they asked the Lane-Pontifexes to dinner. There was nothing really the matter with them. They were quite nice, intelligent, decent people; she was personable, and he was well-informed: yet for some mysterious reason one’s heart sank…

(Later as Mrs. Miniver is interviewing a woman to help with the dinner party, she immediately feels a kinship to her. ) Mrs. Miniver liked her more and more, recognizing in her that most endearing of qualities, an abundant zest for life. It was rare, that zest, and it bore no relation to age, class, creed, moral worth, or intellectual ability. It was an accidental gift, like blue eyes or a double-jointed thumb; impossible to acquire, and almost impossible, thank heaven, to lose. To be completely without it was the worst lack of all – and it dawned on her in a flash that that was what was the matter with the Lane-Pontifexes. (p. 49 & 50)

The book is full of pleasant insights into life and relationships and, frankly, I was sorry to see it end.

(By the way, the movie bears little resemblance to the book, but I think they were spot on when they chose Greer Garson for the role. She definitely exudes the charm of Mrs. M.)

A Word to Ponder - Intolerance

Perhaps it would not hurt to be reminded that the Incarnation was, in fact, an act of colossal intolerance on the part of God, by which I mean to say that it was an act of immeasurable love. He loved us so much that he would not let us die in our sins. He was intolerant of our slavery and was born among us for the express purpose of doing something rather drastic about it... It may well be asked if such a tainted word can be properly used to describe a characteristic of God. He is, after all, rich in mercy and slow to anger. But it must be remembered that both the Old and New Testaments speak of times when the justice of God must act - for he will not permit evil to devour everything.

... This is the intolerance of the physician who is prejudiced against viruses because he has seen an epidemic ravage a people. This is the intolerance of a mother who fiercely protects her little ones from predators. She suffers from a bias against rattlesnakes and wolves. This apparent narrowness is the wisdom of those who have known many roads and have found only one sure route out of the regions of desolation.

(From A Landscape With Dragons by Michael D. O'Brien, p. 161-163)

London 1945 by Maureen Waller

 

My interest in World War II history centers on the home front rather than on the battlefield so it was only natural that I’d be drawn to Maureen Waller’s book about life in London during that time. Although London 1945 emphasizes the final year of the war, Waller includes many facts about the harsh realities before and after the war as well.

I enjoy watching films that were made during the 1940’s. To boost morale and encourage patriotism these films often glamorized the war. Modern day critics call this “propaganda”, but I find that label too simplistic. To me, the movies are an amazing thread in the fabric of WWII history and how people coped with the war.

The first half of the book reminded me of those films in that it highlighted the determination and courage of the English people to protect their homeland. But the second half of the book points out the devastating results of the war without a bit of sugar coating. The upheaval of community life due to bombed out neighborhoods, absent fathers, working-for-the-war-effort mothers and closed schools led to a huge increase in juvenile delinquency and out-of-wedlock pregnancies. Single motherhood and abortion were frowned upon, which led to 50,000 babies being put up for adoption by war’s end.

We’ve all heard of the Blitz that ravaged London from September 1940 to May 1941, but I’d never heard of the V-2 rockets that devastated the city (what was left of it) near the end of the war. Neither did I know that England was bankrupted by its participation in the war and that food rationing continued on until the 1950’s. Many other hardships are detailed by Waller, making this book a treat for history buffs.

Quote from A Lantern In Her Hand by Bess Streeter Aldrich

When I first heard about Bess Streeter Aldrich, I quickly ordered a copy of A Lantern in Her Hand. It is the story of Abbie Deal who moved with her husband Will to the Nebraska territory in the 1860's. In this passage her daughter is chiding her mother for the smallness of her life.

"Your life has been so narrow, mother. You ought to get out and see things."

Unwittingly, as she often did, Grace had hurt her mother's feelings. For a moment Abbie nursed her little hurt, and then said quietly, "You know, Grace, it's queer, but I don't feel narrow. I feel broad. How can I explain it to you, so you would understand? I've seen everything and I've hardly been away from the yard. I've seen the snow on the Lombardy poplars. I've seen the clouds piled upon the edge of the prairie. I've seen the ocean billows in the rise and fall of the prairie grass. I've seen history in the making... three ugly wars flare up and die down. I've sent a lover and two brothers to one, a son and son-in-laws to another, and two grandsons to the other. I've seen the feeble beginning of a raw state and the civilization that has developed there, and I've been part of the beginning of the growth.

I've married... and borne children and looked into the face of death. Is childbirth narrow, Grace? Or marriage? Or death? When you've experienced all those things, Grace, the spirit has traveled although the body has been confined. I think travel is a rare privilege and I'm glad you can have it. But not everyone who stays home is narrow and not everyone who travels is broad." (p. 198)