Reading roundup, January 2024
In January I finished three titles:
The Far Side of the World (Bookshop|Library) by Patrick O'Brian
One of the landmark titles in the Aubrey-Maturin series that even non-readers may be familiar with as it comprises one half of the title of the 2003 movie inspired by these books. The general overarching plot of this one is the framework the film takes for its shape, too.
The novel struck me this time as something of a microcosm of the series itself, with many ups and downs as time progresses. The best interlude in my opinion was when Stephen falls overboard (of course) and Jack jumps in without thinking or telling anyone else, and they both just kind of drift out in the open ocean and very nearly perish. The scene within that interlude with the whale was wonderful, and the whole episode has some nice things to say about the nature of friendship, certainly the friendship of these two characters.
LOTS of creature references throughout this book. Having two naturalists aboard in the form of Stephen and Reverend Martin certainly helps that.
The Reverse of the Medal (Bookshop|Library) by Patrick O'Brian
This book is where we really see Jack Aubrey as close to broken as we get in the whole series. This time through the series I was able to focus enough to pick up on the irony of that, as he walks around for half of the book or more convinced that he has truly and finally figured it all out and made his fortune in life. What does that have to say to all of us, when he ends up first imprisoned in the Marshalsea during his trial for defrauding the stock market (but also, maybe mainly, for being the son of a prominent political enemy of the sitting government), and then in the pillory? And that pillory scene - it's so well known for a reason. Truly a high-mark of the series.
This book feels like much less of a Stephen book until the final parts of the story, when the overarching spy plot that started in Desolation Island (Bookshop|Library) leads to a major discovery with the potential for a happy resolution, while simultaneously setting Stephen up to get on a path to and through a dark personal interlude to be resolved later.
The Wind in the Willows (Bookshop|Library) by Kenneth Grahame
What struck me most about this book is how properly melancholy it is for large stretches. I think this can be appropriately read as some sort of romantic nostalgia on Grahame's part, but knowing what little I do know of his biography, I can't help but wonder how much of it is just personal melancholia - dare I say depression? Repression? Whatever the appropriate pop-psy term would be - on his own part. The two types are probably related anyway, but damn, some passages in this book just. Hit. You. Hard. "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn" and "Wayfarers All" particularly don't so much tug at the heartstrings as much as grab them and yank them straight through your rib cage and out of your chest. This is one to return to.
Also, Toad is just the most maniacal sociopath this side of the Joker. I get why children might be amused by his antics. I didn't really connect with him as a character. Probably just my misfortune for really encountering this material for the first time as a 37 year-old man.