Book binge

I'm at it again. After a few weeks of relative austerity, I'm buying books once more.

On Saturday, we went to Waterstone's to buy a book for Jo, Cynical Ben's long-suffering spouse. It wasn't there, but I came away with Persepolis and The Spirit Level, which explains why equal societies are more successful. I also ordered a few books online last week. Like a proper addict, I can't even remember what they are. It's the ordering that's important, not the reading. And now I need another fix.

Today I received two wonderful books: The Mammoth Book of Alternate Histories, and Nancy Mitford's very funny satire of 1930s fascism, Wigs on the Green in a handsome Penguin edition. It was only previously published once because she withdrew it under family pressure: one of her sisters (Diana) was the second wife of Oswald Mosley, leader of the Blackshirts, known in the book as the Union Jackshorts. Another sister, Unity, stalked Hitler until they became friends, and (unsuccessfully) shot herself with a gun the Fuhrer gave her on the day war broke out. Despite being dead, she appears to be on Facebook and Twitter…

Today, I've ordered Owen Sheers' White Ravens and Russell Celyn Jones's The Ninth Wave - part of lovely Seren Books' series retelling tales from the Mabinogion, the great collection of Welsh legends. Oh, and Mitford's The Blessing, just to be completist. And Delillo's latest, Point Omega. And Gottlieb's The Culture of Fascism: Visions of the Far Right in Britain for something I'm thinking of writing.


Oh dear.

Sorry students!

I just talked for almost two hours on Why Iago Isn't The Bad Guy In Othello And Why God Is. Failed to build in much interaction. Still, it was a fun exercise in critical theory.

Only one session left this week… and an awful lot of marking.

Still hurting from the football. But some books have helped. On Kim and Ben's recommendation, Kathleen Jamie's Findings, and a very rare pamphlet, Decca Treuhaft's (aka Jessica Mitford's) 1956 Lifeitselfmanship, an affectionately humorous guide to Leftwing Linguistics, and a witty riposte to her sister Nancy's Noblesse Oblige, which listed U (Upper-class) and Non-U usages.

e.g.
Non-U - serviette, dentures, lounge. U - Napkin, False teeth, Hall or dining room.

Non-L: Suggesting a bum plan. L: projecting an incorrect perspective.
Non-L: Time will tell whether that plan was OK. L: The correctness of that policy will be tested in the crucible of struggle.

Lifeitselfmanship is a typed brochure with line drawings. The very few copies were sold for 1 shilling. I've just paid £30 and think it's a bargain.

If you go down to the woods today (redux)

Morning all. How was your day of from my incessant, vacuous ranting? Thanks to Emma for keeping me updated with cricket scores. England + Wales/Australia sounded like fun, and Ireland hammered Kenya!

We went to Cannock Chase for a good long ramble. No dogging involved at all. It's a weird place. Some of it is horrible commercial timber plantation, some bits are quite bleak, while other areas are idyllic. We saw green woodpeckers, buzzards, kestrels, rabbits, lots of bilberries and two types of deer (roe and fallow). Needless to say, they all evaded my camera very impressively - here are a couple of snatched shots of shy deer. The Map Twats didn't get away quite so easily - the full set's here

Obviously, being in the woods and on the heath didn't preclude me from buying books: Oxfam in Stafford is very impressive. I picked up an oldish translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, Nancy Mitford's lightweight Voltaire In Love, Michael Frayn's witty A Landing on the Sun and two very throwaway books for summer reading: The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies and Michael Dobbs' House of Cards.

Gentle Readers: feed my habit

Given the t'web is global, and I'm getting readers from all over the world, I thought I'd ask you for help. I'm looking for a book (friends may not be overly-shocked by this announcement). It is Nancy Mitford's Wigs on the Green (1934), republished together with Highland Fling in the mid-1970s. Wigs is a satire about the British Union of Fascists, and she withdrew it when her sister Diana objected (Diana married Oswald Mosley, leader of the BUF). 

Nancy clearly didn't think much of either of them - she wrote to Churchill (a family acquaintance) objecting to the Mosleys' release from prison mid-way through the war. However, the book remained unavailable until this one 1970s reprint - and I can't find a copy anywhere. Tried Amazon, tried ABE etc. etc. If you see a copy, buy it, steal it, scan it - I'm planning a piece on satirical treatments of the BUF - Wodehouse (not entirely innocent himself), lampooned Mosley in a Jeeves novel as leader of the Union Jackshorts - all the more distinctive garments had already been bagged by other groups).