I put The Silmarillion on my Classics Club list largely for completionist reasons – I have already read The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit (once each) and I own pretty editions of all the books – including this one – from The Folio Society. So it was partly in the spirit of reading books I already own, partly to finish up all of the principal works, and partly because I thought I might enjoy getting some more backstory, that I decided to give The Silmarillion a try.

The Silmarillion is the tale of the Elder Days of Middle-Earth and a war that raged for generations over a set of gems called The Silmarils. The war involves Elves, Men, Dwarfs, gods, and Sauron’s boss Morgoth as the big baddie (although to be perfectly honest, even most of the Elves don’t come off great). A Goodreads reviewer referred to The Silmarillion as being kind of like the Bible of LOTR and I think that’s right. It’s very like the Bible (or those few parts I’ve actually read, anyway…) complete with flowery language and lots of “begats.” About that flowery language, this is how it all begins:

There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Iluvatar; and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made. And he spoke to them, propounding to them themes of music; and they sang before him, and he was glad. But for a long while they sang only each alone, or but few together, while the rest hearkened; for each comprehended only that part of the mind of Iluvatar from which he came, and in the understanding of their brethren they grew but slowly. Yet ever as they listened they came to deeper understanding, and increased in unison and harmony.

Um. Okay? I probably understood some of that, maybe. (To paraphrase the great investigative journalist Philomena Cunk, when are they going to start translating Tolkein’s books into proper English? You know, from like, ancient English? By the way – if you’re not watching “Cunk on Earth” yet, do go watch the first episode. I’ll wait.)

Anyway, as you can tell – with apologies in advance for the blasphemy I’m about to commit – I didn’t like The Silmarillion much. I actually tried to read it several months ago and put it down after five pages; when I picked it up again recently it went much faster, but that was because I was mostly skimming. It was hard to follow – especially because I’m not really a LOTR fan, have only read the trilogy and The Hobbit once each, and had basically nothing invested in the Middle-Earth origin story. Well – not basically nothing. I had nothing invested. Nothing at all. Most of the characters were unfamiliar to me, the war over the Silmarils seemed ridiculous (everyone in multiple worlds, from Gods down to dwarfs, goes to war over some jewelry? Okay then…), and because of the overblown language I found the plot next to impossible to follow. A lot of Elves died, and I really didn’t care at all. I think the reader is supposed to be very upset about some of the deaths, but – shruggyface.

If you’re a big Lord of the Rings fan and you’ve not yet read The Silmarillion, I’m sure you’ll love it. If you’re not a fan and feel no connection to that world or the books – like me – you can skip this one without FOMO.

Have you read The Silmarillion? Please tell me how wrong I am.

Another book that has been on my to-be-read pile for years, Beloved is perhaps Toni Morrison’s best known work, in which the author re-imagines the life of Margaret Garner, a real-life runaway enslaved mother who killed one of her children and tried to kill the others in an effort to prevent them being recaptured and re-enslaved. The real-life Margaret Garner was arrested and imprisoned, and ultimately released after becoming a rallying point for abolitionists who pointed to her as an example of the horrific consequences of slavery.

Spoilers ahead!

In Beloved, Margaret Garner becomes Sethe Suggs. Sethe came to the Sweet Home plantation as a young girl and yearned for freedom. For the enslaved persons who worked there, Sweet Home was neither sweet nor a home, but it was at least livable – if barely – under the Garners. Sethe was a trusted companion to the owner’s wife, and the five enslaved men who lived on the plantation were allowed to carry guns and learn to read (if they wanted to – which they didn’t), and Sethe was allowed to marry one of the enslaved men. But when the owner died, and his wife brought her brother-in-law (“schoolteacher”) to help with the plantation, life at Sweet Home became intolerable. When a plan to run away goes awry, Sethe finds herself on the run by herself – having sent her three children ahead of her to her mother-in-law in Ohio – heavily pregnant and pursued. After a horrifying attack by schoolteacher’s nephews followed by a lonely and harrowing journey, Sethe arrives in Cincinnati with newborn daughter Denver to join her mother-in-law, Baby Suggs, and her three older children (sons Howard and Buglar, and an unnamed older baby girl). But schoolteacher catches up with Sethe – and she makes the heart-wrenching decision to kill her children and herself rather than see them all taken back to Sweet Home. She only manages to kill one of her four children – the unnamed older baby girl – and is sent to prison after schoolteacher deems her not fit to return to the plantation.

The story opens eighteen years after this tragic history. Baby Suggs has died, the boys have left, and Sethe lives alone with Denver and the ghost of the unnamed baby girl. After her release from prison, Sethe had the baby buried under a tombstone bearing the one word she could afford – “Beloved.” Now the baby ghost is Denver’s only company – until Paul D, one of the Sweet Home men (not Sethe’s husband Halle, who never made it to Ohio) moves into the house and expels the ghost. Shortly thereafter, a young woman calling herself Beloved appears out of nowhere. Sethe and Denver take her in, over Paul D’s misgivings.

Denver quickly becomes attached to Beloved, but Beloved has eyes only for Sethe. But something is off about Beloved – she came from nowhere and can explain nothing about her origins; her feet are so soft she doesn’t seem to have walked a day in her life. Eventually, Denver puts two and two together and concludes that Beloved is her dead sister, returned in the flesh – but to what end? Denver believes – hopes – it’s to provide company and relieve her loneliness.

Denver neither believed nor commented on Sethe’s speculations, and she lowered her eyes and never said a word about the cold house. She was certain that Beloved was that white dress that had knelt with her mother in the keeping room, the true-to-life presence of the baby that had kept her company most of her life. And to be looked at by her, however briefly, kept her grateful for the rest of the time when she was merely the looker.

Paul D is less accepting of Beloved. He doesn’t like her sudden appearance or her immediate adoption into the household – but it’s Sethe’s house, not his, and he has no say. Soon he finds himself involuntarily driven from the house (which he suspects has something to do with Beloved), and when a neighbor tells him what Sethe was imprisoned for eighteen years before, he leaves altogether. At first, the three women – left to their own devices – give themselves up to the enjoyment of each other. One day, Sethe finds a pair-and-a-half of ice skates, and she and her two daughters (because Sethe too has concluded that Beloved his her dead daughter come back to her) spend a sparkling day on a frozen pond.

Nobody saw them falling.

Holding hands, bracing each other, they swirled over the ice. Beloved wore the pair; Denver wore one, step-gliding over the treacherous ice. Sethe thought her two shoes would hold and anchor her. She was wrong. Two paces onto the creek, she lost her balance and landed on her behind. The girls, screaming with laughter, joined her on the ice. Sethe struggled to stand and discovered not only that she could do a split, but that it hurt. Her bones surfaced in unexpected places and so did laughter. Making a circle or a line, the three of them could not stay upright for one whole minute, but nobody saw them falling.

Each seemed to be helping the other two stay upright, yet every tumble doubled their delight. The live oak and soughing pine on the banks enclosed them and absorbed their laughter while they fought gravity for each other’s hands. Their skirts flew like wings and their skin turned pewter in the cold and dying light.

Nobody saw them falling.

The ice skating day was the end of Sethe’s brief happiness with Denver and Beloved. Soon the balance of the household is upset – Beloved is consolidated her power, growing literally larger as Sethe shrinks. Finally Denver – who has never strayed far from the house since returning from prison with her mother as an infant, who was the first to recognize and believe Beloved to be her sister, who welcomed Beloved as much-needed companionship, who always feared her mother might kill again – decides it’s up to her to save their family.

There is so much in Beloved – an unsparing look at the horrors of slavery, paired with musings on family, desperation, malicious envy, motherhood, community, redemption… In trying to think of what I would write about this book, I was overwhelmed just by the number and complexity of the themes and the richness of the text. I’m not even sure what to say – and look, I’ve written paragraphs and paragraphs just summarizing the plot. Rather than skim the surface and fail to do justice to this slim but rich narrative, I’ll just encourage you to read it right away if you haven’t already. I wish it hadn’t taken me so long to get to Beloved, with its evocative writing and heart-wrenching, unsparing story.

Have you read any Toni Morrison?

Reading is my oldest and favorite hobby. I literally can’t remember a time in my life when I didn’t love to curl up with a good book. Here are my reads for April, 2023.

On Wings of Song: Poems About Birds, ed. J.D. McClatchy – A sweet little volume of poems all about birds felt like the very best way to welcome in April. I always enjoy the Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets books, and this one was no exception – just delightful from the first page to the last.

The New York Stories of Edith Wharton, by Edith Wharton – I love reading a book in its setting, especially when a sense of place is important to the story (or stories, as the case may be). So I knew exactly what I was bringing with me on our weekend jaunt up to New York City earlier this month – an NYRB Classics collection of Edith Wharton’s short stories set in the city. (Manhattan, mostly.) I usually have some hits and misses with short story collections, and there was definitely a range here, but I can honestly say that I enjoyed every story in this collection. (And it made me want to re-read my favorite Wharton novel, The Age of Innocence.)

Horizon, by Barry Lopez – This was a project, people. I downloaded Lopez’s ultimate travel memoir on Audible, in which he meanders through a lifetime of adventuring all over the world, because he concludes with a section about Antarctica. I had some pipe dreams of listening to that part while crossing the Drake Passage – and I could have done, if I was willing to take the book out of order, but I just don’t listen to books that way, even when it’s possible. There was a great deal to chew on and think about in here, and Lopez would certainly be an engaging travel companion (my aunt-in-law gushed about taking one of his books with her canoeing the Boundary Waters, which sounded just perfect) but by the time I made it through this nearly 24-hour-long audiobook, even listening on 1.2 speed, I was just over it all.

Beloved, by Toni Morrison – Full review to come for the Classics Club, but Beloved was an astonishing read. I think I was expecting something a little more straight historical fiction (not sure why, because the other Morrison books I have read have been heavy on magical realism, as this one was) and the ghost story was an engaging surprise.

The Swan: A Biography, by Stephen Moss – Looking for something a little lighter to pick up between intense Classics Club reads, I turned to the final one (for now) of Stephen Moss’s bird biography series. While I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as the others, that’s largely because I’m not as into swans for some reason – it was still a wonderful, beautifully written and engaging book.

The Color Purple, by Alice Walker – This is going to be one of my highlights of the year, I expect. Full review to come for the Classics Club, but briefly – I was actually nervous about reading this, worried about the abuse section of the storyline, but it ended up being a fairly small section, uncomfortable to read in the moment but important to the plot and not gratuitous, so I got through it. The story was wonderful, the characters leapt off the page, and I absolutely loved it and can see myself reading it again and again in years to come.

The Enchanted April, by Elizabeth von Arnim – I’ve read this one a few times now, always in April for obvious reasons, and it never gets old. A story of four unlikely companions who rent a crumbling Italian castle for a month away from rain and responsibilities is charming and fun to read. And perfect for spring.

East of Eden, by John Steinbeck – This has been on my list for ages – I love Steinbeck’s writing and have read and re-read favorites like Cannery Row and The Grapes of Wrath. East of Eden is probably his magnum opus and a candidate for The Great American Novel. I found it absolutely astonishing. Full review to come for the Classics Club in the next few weeks.

Slightly Foxed No. 77: ‘Laughter in the Library’, ed. Gail Pirkis and Hazel Wood – A new issue of Slightly Foxed is always a treat, and always adds something to my TBR. This one had me excited to read the latest Slightly Foxed Edition (True to Both My Selves, by Katrin FitzHerbert – I pre-ordered my copy and it’s on my bookshelf awaiting the right time) and to pick up Trollope’s Palliser novels once I’ve finished with the Chronicles of Barchester. Even the pieces discussing books that don’t strike my fancy are still delightful and fun to read – it’s so interesting to find out what makes different readers tick.

Seed to Dust: A Gardener’s Story, by Marc Hamer – I’ve been meaning to get to this and spring felt like the perfect time (although this book covers an entire year in the garden – not just the busy spring season). Marc Hamer has lived a fascinating life – thrown out by his father after his mother died, Marc was homeless and vagrant for years before eventually meeting his wife and raising a family. In this book, he follows a year in the garden that he tends (professionally, for an elderly employer he calls Miss Cashmere) and sprinkles in reflections on his personal history, his relationships with his wife and children, and the role of nature in modern life. It’s a wonderful read. (Also, that cover is spectacular.)

Quite a wonderful April in books! Three for the Classics Club – WOW – plus some lovely nature writing, a Slightly Foxed issue, and New York City-themed Edith Wharton read in situ. Doesn’t get much better than that! I’m not sure I can even pick a highlight, but if you made me… I suppose I would note that it is always wonderful to return to “The Enchanted April” and that Edith Wharton never fails. On the agenda in May… I’m hoping to knock out one more Classics Club read, and it’s a doorstopper: “The Three Musketeers.” Beyond that, I’ll probably try to keep the reading light. We’re in the middle of a stressful family project and I’m going to be needing my best comfort books to get me through. (Nothing is wrong – quite the contrary – but Steve and I are managing a lot of moving pieces right now and I’ve been losing way too much sleep over it all. Can’t wait to be out of this phase and thinking about more fun stuff, hopefully by June.) Some convalescent reading – Agatha Christie, anyone? – will be on the May book stack for sure.

How was your April in books? What are you looking forward to reading in May?

Great Expectations has been on my TBR pile for so long, it had almost become my white whale. As I told my friend Susan years ago, “I don’t want to read Dickens, but I want to have read Dickens.” (There’s a difference.) My grandmother loved Dickens and read his entire bibliography, and years ago she gave me her collection of his complete works bound in green leather – which I’ve been moving from house to house ever since and occasionally picked up a volume or two. But I couldn’t really get past my teenaged impressions of Dickens: A Christmas Carol is okay, at least it’s short, but I didn’t see the fuss about the rest of it. After two good Dickens reading experiences in a row, now – I loved The Pickwick Papers – I may have to revise my opinion of Dickens in general.

Great Expectations is, in its most basic terms, the story of young Philip “Pip” Pirrip and his “expectations” – with all the anticipation and reversals of fortune they bring. When the novel opens, Pip is a young boy living with his adult sister (who has “brought him up by hand,” whatever that means – it’s not clear to Pip) and her husband, blacksmith Joe Gargery. Pip is destined to be Joe’s apprentice and eventual partner in the smithy, but in the meantime he wanders the marshes around the small, unhappy family’s cottage. While loitering in the cemetery one day – visiting the graves of his long-dead parents – Pip encounters a convict, escaped and on the run from “the Hulks.” The Hulks are brooding, terrifying prison ships that dock just offshore, and occasionally a prisoner escapes, swims for shore, and makes off through the marshes. They are usually caught, and Pip’s convict is no exception – although he makes a good attempt at freedom, with Pip’s (terrified, extorted) help – namely, a Christmas pie and Joe’s metal file, with which the convict saws off his leg irons.

Pip does his best to forget the frightening experience of meeting the convict in the marshes, and his fortunes take their first turn when he is summoned to attend at the home of Miss Havisham, a wealthy old woman who lives in a mansion in the nearby town. Pip and his family are baffled at the summons, which come out of the blue – but a poor young boy with no prospects does not disobey a summons from Miss Havisham. Not knowing what to expect, Pip presents himself at Miss Havisham’s mansion, where he is let in by the elderly recluse’s adopted daughter, the beautiful Estella. Estella’s beauty appears to be only skin-deep; she is haughty and cruel, looks down on Pip as “common,” and scorns to be in the same room with him. Miss Havisham, for her part, sits in a state of suspended animation, wearing a crumbling wedding gown and surrounded by a mummified nuptial feast and a set of clocks that she has stopped at 9:20, precisely the hour she was jilted at the altar.

Miss Havisham directs Pip and Estella to play cards, and then quizzes Pip on his feelings for Estella.

“You say nothing of her,” remarked Miss Havisham to me, as she looked on. “She says many hard things of you, but you say nothing of her. What do you think of her?”

“I don’t like to say,” I stammered.

“Tell me in my ear,” said Miss Havisham, bending down.

“I think she is very proud,” I replied, in a whisper.

“Anything else?”

“I think she is very pretty.”

“Anything else?”

“I think she is very insulting.” (She was looking at me then, with a look of supreme aversion.)

“Anything else?”

“I think I should like to go home.”

(Miss Havisham would take a good deposition. That “Anything else?” – masterful exhaustion of the witness’s recollection.)

After presenting himself regularly to play cards with Estella, Pip is summarily dismissed one day when Miss Havisham declares that it is now time for him to be apprenticed to Joe, and he can expect no further help or support from her. By now, though, he is thoroughly spoiled for a blacksmith’s trade, and instead craves an education, the status of a gentleman, and the prospect of winning Estella’s cold heart for his own. Little does Pip know that his fortunes are about to shift again; one day a prominent lawyer appears on his doorstep and notifies him that he has “expectations” – a mysterious benefactor has left him a fortune and desires only that Pip should move to London and be educated as a gentleman (in keeping with his new station). The lawyer, Mr Jaggers, arranges for Pip to lodge with Miss Havisham’s cousin, Matthew Pocket, to be tutored. In London, Pip befriends his tutor’s son, Herbert Pocket, and his lawyer’s chief clerk, and speculates about who his mysterious, anonymous benefactor might be.

Everyone – Pip, Herbert, the rest of the Pockets, Estella, and Miss Havisham’s grasping relatives, believe that Miss Havisham herself is Pip’s patron. Pip latches onto the idea that he is “intended for” Estella, and that they belong together. When summoned to Miss Havisham’s side again, she quizzes him on his impressions of Estella and exhorts him to love the haughty girl.

“Is she beautiful, graceful, well-grown? Do you admire her?”

She drew an arm round my neck, and drew my head close down to hers as she sat in the chair. “Love her, love her, love her! How does she use you?”

Before I could answer (if I could have answered so difficult a question at all), she repeated, “Love her, love her, love her! If she favours you, love her. If she wounds you, love her. If she tears your heart to pieces – and as it gets older and stronger, it will tear deeper – love her, love her, love her!”

Pip persists in his understanding that Miss Havisham is his benefactor and that she intends him to marry Estella even after Herbert discloses Miss Havisham’s true designs vis-a-vis Estella. Having never recovered from being jilted at the altar – by a cruel scoundrel who ruined many lives, as the history becomes clear – Miss Havisham adopted Estella with the intent of bringing her up to break as many hearts as possible in revenge. Estella herself is cold and frequently describes herself as heartless – yet she feels something for Pip, because she actively discourages him from pressing his suit or from loving her. Estella explains to Pip that he is the only man she cannot bring herself to lead on or deceive. But she doesn’t need to – Pip leads himself on. Yet he’s not always completely lacking in self-perception.

The unqualified truth is, that when I loved Estella with the love of a man, I loved her simply because I found her irresistible. Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be. Once for all; I loved her none the less because I knew it, and it had no more influence in restraining me, than if I had devoutly believed her to be human perfection.

I won’t divulge whether Miss Havisham really is Pip’s mysterious benefactor, what happens between Pip and Estella, or anything more about the plot – it would ruin the delight of speculation, if you haven’t already read this wonderful story. (I will say, because I can’t resist patting myself on the back, that I worked out for myself who Pip’s patron is.) Pip is a self-important fool who misses the obvious all around him, fails to value his earliest and truest friend – his brother-in-law Joe Gargery – and lets his sudden wealth go immediately to his head… but he’s endearing all the same, and I found myself rooting for him despite my best judgment. Estella is cold, cruel, and proud – she is exactly what Miss Havisham raised her to be – and yet I rooted for her, too. This is a meandering, engaging novel about seeing the true value in people, however humble their origins – but it’s also just a cracking good story. I’m so glad I got around to it at last.

Maybe I like Dickens after all…

Have you read Dickens? What’s your favorite of his novels?