Sonoma Country Life

Rediscovering the Bronte Sisters with Syrie James' Secret Diary

Look who was having a bit of an ice-cream social up there on the wild and windy Yorkshire moors, circa 1988? Yes, that's me, Scribbles Daily, on the far right, next to my partner in crime at journalism school, Bev (now a very clever television program developer in London) her sister Claudine (today's top make-up artist to the Brit stars) and my equally dear friend Marnie, who currently runs a hugely successful community education garden project in Islington, North London! As for the girl on the far left, sorry, absolutely no idea. My sister Kerry (who has since blown us all off the rugged crannies of Heathcliffe's Moors with her lofty, literary career) was there with us at the time, but clearly took the photo that she's not in. At least she didn't nick my 99'er Mr Whippy Soft Scoop off me beforehand!

Reason for tracking down this relic from the photo archives stuffed unceremoniously under the cupboards in my laundry room is that I've just finished reading Syrie James' Secret Diary of Charlotte Bronte.

Take it from me, you really have had to have trekked the rocky moors from the Bronte Parsonage up to the ruins that so long ago inspired Emily Bronte to pen Wuthering Heights to truly appreciate this insightful and richly emotive novel. 

I was transported. And this can be a most pleasant experience on occasion. The Bronte sisters were so removed from the world and yet so compelling to get to know. If you've ever been a Bronte reader, then I'd thoroughly recommend Syrie James' book. If you've never dabbled in Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights, what's stopping you?

Footnote: quoting email received from my friend Claire Eustace, yet another English rose transplanted here in Sonoma County: "Love today’s photo on your blog!  It all looks very familiar – down to the Mr. Whippy!  Thought I would mention this, as you are such a Bronte fan; I am related to the Brontes – my great-great-great-great grandmother’s sister was their mother – so I guess a cousin of sorts!  Their maiden name was Branwell and they were from  Penzance and the surrounding area, which is where all my mother’s side of the family is from (and my mum moved back there 20 years ago). Now, how cool is that?
  

A Pub, A Town and the Search for Home

Wall Street Journal columnist Gwendolyn Bounds took a major detour from the fast-paced life of a financial editor in Manhattan after the crushing September 11 collapse of the Twin Towers close to her city apartment.

Who could blame her? Spotting her book Little Chapel on the River while having a browse in the bookstore a couple of weeks back, I was easily lured by the simple subtitle A Pub, A Town and the Search for What Matters Most.

To quote Bill Bryson, "I'm a Stranger Here Myself." Though we all find our way home eventually, or would like to hope we do. Oftentimes 'home' is not exactly where we'd expect it to be.

Bounds recreates the first couple of years after the terrorist attacks as she rebuilds her confidence in her surrounds and discovers another side of herself within a small, tight-knit community of incredibly hospitable, Irish immigrants and their colorful, extended family.

The Guinans are legendary in the Hudson Valley community of Garrison, New York. But living history can only hang on for so long and as the pages turn on Little Chapel on the River, so does the passage of changing times.

It was a compelling read for me and extremely emotive as I was raised within a fairly remote, small-town community myself and fully comprehend the familial instinct to preserve tradition in a multi-generational mom and pop service industry such as Guinan's small-town shop and bar.

My Grandfather was a green grocer, small-town property developer in the old-fashioned sense that nothing much changed for decades after decades. Only when my Dad and my Uncle raised sufficient rucus to reign him in and allow them to make much needed tweeks to the family business did he faintly bow to their requests.

When my Dad sold his business after fifty plus years behind the counter selling newspapers from six in the morning, seven days a week, my siblings and I mourned the loss of the much-loved corner stores, newsagents and at one time, pet store, supermarket and laundry.

Liberated, my Dad has gone on to discover the pleasures of part-time driving jobs, tootling around the Fenlands in his late sixties, taking in the landscape and the never ending horizon he was shut away from in a relentless, shopkeepers' strict schedule for the bulk of his adult life. Change can be painful and sad. Change can be a release. But change will inevitably come around one way or another.

The Guinan legacy will live on through Bounds book and in the generations of Garrison residents who will remember the good old days as long as they themselves are a part of the rich fabric of this small community.

Jim Guinan, proprietor of the Little Chapel on the River passed away April 1st, the day before I bought this book. I hadn't looked online for a real-time update until starting to write this review. RIP JG. And thanks to Gwendolyn Bounds for bringing me home for the duration of her book!
 

Vanessa and Virginia Monologue

"Vanessa and Virgina", a superb short novel by Susan Sellers on the eternal bond which tied bohemian artist Vanessa Bell to her even more famous sibling, the author Virginia Woolf (pictured above) will appeal to anyone who has a sister (or two) sharing a familial creative streak.

Not that competition was the main thrust of their compulsive, individual quests for superior creativity. A compelling portrait unfolds in this fabulous work of fiction pacing the sisters' typically, turn-of-the 20th century restrained, Bloomsbury girlhood through their coming of age amidst family tragedies and loss, and a realization of art over the era's society expectations of orderly and stereotypical constraint.

We all know what happened to Virginia (remember The Hours, and Nicole Kidman's Oscar-winning prosthetic snoz?), but I for one, have long wondered how Woolf had come to her sad conclusion. Seller's novel narrates in sister Vanessa's voice, in small vignettes of scenes from Bloomsbury to St Ives to Bell's eclectic artists' haven, Charleston and Woolf's nearby Monk's House in Sussex.

An intriguing episode unfolds as Bell and her long-term, bi-sexual beau, artist Duncan Grant set up home at Charleston as a country meeting place for the writers, painters (lovers) and intellectuals known as the Bloomsbury Group. Inspired by Italian fresco painting and the Post-Impressionists, the prolific Bloomsbury artists decorated walls, doors, fireplaces and furniture at Charleston. Virgina Wolf flits in and out of the limelight of this unorthodox crowd in a poignant series of cameo prose. 

About half way through the book (on loan in English paperback from fellow Brit, artist friend Gail Faulkes - you can find her wonderful work on the walls in the current exhibit at Aqus Cafe) I'm so entrenched in the sisters' story that I can't wait to get back to whipping through the remaining pages after finishing this post.

Vanessa and Virginia is one of the few recent reads I haven't wanted to end. Its an exploration of an intimate relationship that only the closest of sisters can claim to have shared. And if I'm entirely honest with myself, the idea of a post Victorian, English countryside commune of genteel, artistic types is not entirely unappealing.

Happily planning a UK visit this summer, I'm certainly putting Charleston on top of my list of places to visit in Sussex (didn't you go there yourself not too long ago, youngest sister of mine?). I'm highy likely to take a notion to move right in, though the National Trust may very well have something to say about that. Until then, I'm thinking of painting the tiles around my fireplace in some vibrant hues of bohemian design. Then again, maybe I ought to stick to the writing and commission my friend Gail for the more exotic paint work.

Book Pick: Personal Effects of a Failed Affair

Flicking through the February issue of Elle Magazine, I was easily enthralled by a three-page spread on a  newly released book based on a fictitious auction catalog for the dissolution of a New York couple's collective and eclectic household.

Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry may all sound a bit dreary. I mean, who on earth would want to flick through a photographic diatribe of a failed relationship? All sorts of stuff collected over the period of a few short years, including everything from post-it notes, show tickets, chipped pottery poodles, vintage Prada, Paul Smith socks and Halloween party Polaroids.

The prime attraction for me as a baker, writerly type, was the eye-catching full-page photo of hip, youngish, Canadian author Leanne Shapton, seated studiously atop her boho NYC kitchen counter top, licking the batter of a bowl of cake mix from the back of a spoon. The question begged: 'how can anyone so gloriously indulgent of her own cake batter have had this kind of PR success for such a peculiar sounding book?' I was hooked.

Cakes and equally delicious looking tins and tubs of enticing foods were seemingly scattered in a believable manner in every nook and cranny of this most appealing kitchen scene. References to old-fashioned British sweet tea-time treats such as the Singing Hinny had me sold. As did the super-glossy shots of several other lip-smackers such as lemon drizzle cake and something chocolatey with stout.

What's more, Shapton's fictional Lenore Doolan was slated as a cake baking columnist for the New York Times. Convinced I'd get along swimmingly with Doolan if she were actually real, I decided then and there I'd be up for the challenge of wading through the auction catalog of her doomed romance.

And then came the book. Looking like nothing I've ever seen in print before. An original read which isn't very pretty from the outside, but absolutely fascinating once you figure out the format for the largely visual telling of Doolan and Morris' particular (made up) tale.

Creator Leanne Shapton is, quite apparently, a New York Times art director, illustrator, and artist based in New York. She has contributed work to Harper’s, and The New Yorker, among others and, in a very smart move, has her own publishing company.

Which certainly explains partly the uber-feature in Elle. Without which, I probably would have been highly unlikely a candidate for drooling over the cover in Copperfields. Just goes to show. Cakes sell books. Especially chocolate stout cakes. Shapton's Canadian heritage explains the rather surprising elements of English cake lore popping up in an American book, plus her smart choice of making the moody Morris an ex-pat, prickly Brit.

Travel, fashion, love notes, niggling emails of trouble at mill, literature, music, did I mention cakes? I'm ready for a sequel already. Though they'd have to go out and buy all new stuff if they got back together. Not in this economy!

The one unanswered question is why would you get rid of your oven gloves, cake plates, vintage aprons , classic book collection and swimsuits if you were splitting up? Beats me.  

Streets of London

Forget about it being "Black" Friday today - who needs to be tromping around overheated big box stores looking for bargains on items no one really needs when we could be meandering along the festively bedecked streets of old London?

For today marks the opening day of the 30th Anniversary Great Dickens Christmas Fair at the Cow Palace in San Francisco.

I'll be there this opening weekend, in full Victorian regalia, welcoming members of the Bay Area's modern day media to the life and times of the man who invented Christmas as we know it and celebrate it today.

More from the Fair via handy iphone blog posts later in the day.....

The Dickens Christmas Fair runs four weekends and today (Friday November 28th) through December 21st, 2008. 11 am to 7pm. Call 800 510 1558 for advance or group ticket rates. Discount tickets are available at participating Bay Area Longs Drugs Stores. Children 5-11 -$10 (under 5- free), Adult tickets at the door are $22.  

Frontier Mom's Literary Blacklist Hoax or Red Alert?

Really, I was planning to steer clear of slapping too many political posts on my normally chirpy little blog about the foibles of family life here in lovely, liberal wine country.

But how could I possibly not pass along the rumoured hit-list of the type of American and world literature that Sarah Palin reportedly might have tried to have banned from the Wasilla, Alaska Library:

Judy Blume, Madeleine L'Engle, Maurice Sendak, Roald Dahl, Mark Twain, Shakespeare for heaven's sake. And that's just in the kids section. Burgess, Faulkner, Geoffrey Chaucer (highlight of my high school English lit classes), Heller, Miller, Steinbeck, DH Lawrence... a mind-bloggling list of immense works of literary art.

Whatever your own, personal religious or political beliefs, how could you possibly go for an attack on literature? Keep these sorts of classics off your own book shelves, Sara, by all means, but don't you dare try to have them removed from the libraries of America. This is becoming insane.

Take a long, slow look at this list, hoax or not, for these are perfect examples of the titles most likely to have been in Palin's mind, and then tell me that she was an appropriate choice for McCain.

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L¹Engle

Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden

As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

Blubber by Judy Blume

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

Carrie by Stephen King

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

Christine by Stephen King

Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Cujo by Stephen King

Curses, Hexes, and Spells by Daniel Cohen

Daddy¹s Roommate by Michael Willhoite

Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

Decameron by Boccaccio

East of Eden by John Steinbeck

Fallen Angels by Walter Myers

Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure) by John Cleland

Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes

Forever by Judy Blume

Grendel by John Champlin Gardner

Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer¹s Stone by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling

Have to Go by Robert Munsch

Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman

How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell

Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

Impressions edited by Jack Booth

In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak

It¹s Okay if You Don¹t Love Me by Norma Klein

James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

Lady Chatterley¹s Lover by D.H. Lawrence

Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Love is One of the Choices by Norma Klein

Lysistrata by Aristophanes

More Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz

My Brother Sam Is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier

My House by Nikki Giovanni

My Friend Flicka by Mary O¹Hara

Night Chills by Dean Koontz

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer

One Day in The Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn

One Flew Over The Cuckoo¹s Nest by Ken Kesey

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Ordinary People by Judith Guest

Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women¹s Health Collective

Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy

Revolting Rhymes by Roald Dahl

Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones by Alvin Schwartz

Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz

Separate Peace by John Knowles

Silas Marner by George Eliot

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

The Bastard by John Jakes

The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

The Devil¹s Alternative by Frederick Forsyth

The Figure in the Shadows by John Bellairs

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson

The Handmaid¹s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Snyder

The Learning Tree by Gordon Parks

The Living Bible by William C. Bower

The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare

The New Teenage Body Book by Kathy McCoy and Charles Wibbelsman

The Pigman by Paul Zindel

The Seduction of Peter S. by Lawrence Sanders

The Shining by Stephen King

The Witches by Roald Dahl

The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Snyder

Then Again, Maybe I Won¹t by Judy Blume

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

Webster¹s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster Editorial

Staff Witches, Pumpkins, and Grinning Ghosts: The Story of the Halloween Symbols by Edna Barth

Lashings of Ginger Beer

No self-respecting British primary school teacher could deprive her own little daughter of an early introduction to the exciting world of epic English children's author Enid Blyton, though lashings of ginger beer perhaps on hold for a couple more years!

Long before J.K.Rowling took the junior literary world by storm, Enid Blyton was busy at her typewriter, knocking out some 700 children's books, including the ever-popular UK series sets of Famous Five and Secret Seven, The Faraway Tree, St Clare's, Malory Towers and of course, the inimitable Noddy.

Publishing her first legendary works of English children's literature in the 1930s, Blyton was an unstoppable force in adventure story finesse throughout World War II and into the early 1960s. If you spent any part of your childhood in the UK, New Zealand, or Australia, and probably Canada, you'll likely have the fondest memories of Blyton's unforgettable characters. The dashing, daring Julian, Dick and Anne, George and Timmy the Dog. Moonface and Dame Slapalot to name but a mere few of these fantastic folk sprung to life from what the author described as her 'under mind'.

While our American friends were toting scrumpled paperback copies of The Hardy Boys for the school bus-ride home, we were nose first in full immersion of the formal, but 'awfully fun' British boarding school experience in the Malory Towers series.

I read once that actress Kate Winslet was a huge fan of The Faraway Tree series, and has a reprint set on her family bookcase for reading to her own British/American offspring. Like Kate, there was no way I could have let my kids grow up without the Enid Blyton 'awfully smashing', daring and delightful summer adventure tales.

So my sister's photos from Blyton's historic holiday haven by the Southern English coast around Bournemouth, Dorset, are a sweet reminder of the sort of summers we all felt we'd grown up with thanks to Blyton's prolific pen.

Driving rain so often thrashed the window panes in mid-July when English schools traditionally broke up for the 'hols' . The closest we came to exploring secret islands, underground tunnels and abandoned castles full of smuggler's loot was curling up in the window seat with a gripping Enid Blyton adventure book! Of course we did have our fair share of fun and exploration when the sun did shine, but I never have quite managed to stumble upon a farmyard kitchen with an open door and table full of freshly carved ham, cold roast chicken, soft boiled, farm-fresh eggs, newly baked bread, buns, scones, clotted cream, home made jam and of course, the unstoppable, effervescent  flow of lashings and lashings of ginger beer.

So popular was the recent movie made about Lakeland author/artist Beatrix Potter, I'm surprised that we haven't yet seen a big screen adaptation of Enid Blyton's incredible literary career. With enticing homes named "Elfin Cottage', "Old Thatch', and 'Green Hedges' wouldn't we all love a look inside her personal story? Maybe Winslet will be the one to re-trace Blyton's footprint? Until then, if you should find yourself in Dorset some day, take an afternoon to adventure by steam train to Corfe Castle, and perhaps the paddle steamer back to Bournemouth.

Languish in a Literary Escape

Fancy yourself on a magic carpet this July, as we brace ourselves for virtual travel plans in a season of extortionate air and road trip costs?

Dive into San Francisco/Beirut author Rabih Alameddine's glorious, gorgeous and bewitching "The Hakawati" , which Bay Area great Amy Tan describes as "Both genius in and out of the Ink Bottle".

Gifted to me for the birthday by Naomi (who shares with me a very similar taste in literary diversions), The Hakawati has something for everyone looking for an outstanding read this Summer. True love, family saga, adventure, fable, informative, adventure, this new classic is said to be the bomb when it comes to all of the above!

After the fires are out (this weekend will offer a critical turning point in wildfire ravaged Northern Cal), and the air quality steadily improves, long, lazy evenings outdoors with an unforgettable book are begging to be indulged in. There's nothing to compare with the heartbreaking beauty of a superbly written story sweeping the reader into its magical realm as the soft, peachy glow of an evening sunset bathes the page, the porch, the paving stones leading back into the open kitchen where a crisp bottle of pinot gris is chilling in the fridge for supper.

Father's Day at Jack's Place

 

  



Writer/readers in the blogosphere will relate to this particular post. Had a bit of a tricky time deciding on today's extracurricular Sunday afternoon activities here in sunny Southern Sonoma County. Not only was it Father's Day, it also happened to be my birthday. Bad timing. Or maybe not, two birds with one stone and all.

Which roughly translated to a tricky situation. Who precisely was to take priority in the self-indulgence department? A day of golf, or an afternoon tromping round some vine-studded, literary-related locale in eighty degree sunshine. With troops of respective (& highly opinionated) offspring in tow. Naturally.

Needless to say, the beguiling natural delights of Jack London's 1,400 acre Glen Ellen Beauty Ranch was the order of the first part of the day, at least.

And I for one was delighted to discover that the nifty National Parks Association had completely restored the charming London ranch home since my last visit to the park some two or three years ago.

Exploring the ranch house as it was furnished during Jack and Charmain's colorful 1911 to 1916 occupancy, was an absolute feast for a writer's senses. With three or four desks and writing tables set amidst two book-lined writing rooms, what more could an author ask for in personal space for expression. And spreading out all of those notes.

Jack also had a writing porch in which he slept and pinned his scribbled expressions to a washing line with wooden pegs. Enchanting and inspiring, for it was there in those very rooms that London wrote many of his later stories and novels before his untimely death at aged forty.

A comfortable romp along the vines and redwoods to London's man made lake is the loveliest interlude to imagining his inimitable spirit strolling the ranch for time immemorial.

And then they played golf. So everyone was happy.

The Great Book Group Dupe

Though I always look forward to the next book group gathering, next week's meeting of regular readers should be a feisty affair, for I can't wait to hear who else figured out the tantalizing twist in Amy Tan's brilliant Saving Fish From Drowning.

Not since Water for Elephants have I enjoyed a book group pick as much as this. Tan's tale of a chosen group of Bay Area elite on a modern-day imperious mystery ride through the wilds of Burma, is one of the most original, thought-provoking, entertaining and ironic works of fiction to grace the old, red bookshelf in the past few years.

So much so that if you are one of the many friends and readers that I've rattled on to in regards to the striking subject matter and method of narration in this particular book pick, you might want to stop reading this post right now.

For this ardent reader's rug was pulled right out from under her this morning when she finally took five to google the main characters...........

I ended up exactly where dozens of Tan's Bay Area readers before me found the hard, cold floor in the midst of what had been the most exhilarating, floaty literary trip.

I'm only half way through the book. I guess I had a sneaky suspicion that this tale was way to cool to be entirely non-fictional. And it does say at the very beginning (in tiny type) that it is a work of fiction. Fool that I am for any well written account, I didn't want to imagine an illusion in its entirety.

Lesson learned: reader beware.