The Royal Society of Literature’s Year(s) of Ruin

Hello Gentle Reader,

For some time now the Royal Society of Literature has been embroiled internal conflict and controversy. The accusations leveraged against the Royal Society of Literature by its own members, emeritus presidents, and colleagues, have been nothing short of damning. While the iconoclastic leadership of the now outgoing Chair of Council, Daljit Nagra and Director, Molly Rosenberg, are alleged to have fueled a ‘cultural civil war,’ within the society, which has raised concerns about the competing interests of diversity and inclusivity, and the administrations facilitating in restricting, muting, and censoring freedom of speech, in addition to lacking a robust defense and champion of it. The current president of the society, Bernardine Evaristo, has so far made no inclination of her own resignation, or even its being considered at this time.

The entire fiasco has reportedly been simmering for a few years now, but came to a head last February, when the Royal Society of Literature referred itself to the Charity Commission when the publication of its annual magazine “Review,” was postponed and the editor, Maggie Fergusson, dismissed without ceremony. Writers and fellows which includes Ian McEwan, the late Fleur Adcock, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Margaret Atwood expressed concerns over the societies lacking endorsement of freedom of speech, when it was understood that the publication was being withheld due to an article providing commentary on Israel’s actions in the Middle East; while Allan Hollinghurst and Ian McEwan wrote to the society demanding that it refer to itself to the Charity Commission over the accusations of censorship which contravene the fundamental literary values.

Further charges leveraged against the Royal Society of Literature is its loosening criteria for members to be elected, with many current members, past presidents, former chairs and directors, expressing concern over what could be considered a push and expedited drive to full fill diversity quotas and mission statements, at the expense of literary merit, all the while in the process undermines the core principles of the Royal Society of Literature which was founded in 1820 on the grounds to: “reward literary merit and excite literary talent.” In 2020, however, after the catalyst events which led to the monumental racial protests and subsequent social protests around the Western world, Molly Rosenberg sought to introduce efforts to increase writings from ethnic, racial, social and economic backgrounds which were previously without ‘representation,’ within the society. By 2022 with the announcement of the appointment of Bernardine Evaristo as the incoming president of the society, this mandate took precedence, as Evaristo introduced her presidency on well meaning, but perhaps doomed to failed principles as per their ideological backage:

“Literature is not a luxury, but essential to our civilisation. I am so proud, therefore, to be the figurehead of such an august and robust literature organisation that is so actively and urgently committed to being inclusive of the widest range of outstanding writers from every demographic and geographical location in Britain, and to reaching marginalised communities through literature projects, including introducing young people in schools to some of Britain's leading writers who visit, teach and discuss their work with them.”

Since then, there has been significant concerns raised about how literature is no longer considered the essential concern of the society, as more members were inducted on grounds of tokenism. As former president Marina Warner remarked that a fellowship “used to mark an acclaimed career.” In other words, to be elected as a member of the Royal Society of Literature was considered an honour to acknowledge a writer’s career. Not a participation ribbon. Furthermore, the institution only nominated fellows internally, it completely neglected and avoided the populist angle. Yet the brainchild of Rosenberg and further amplified by Evaristo, fellowships are now open for the public to recommend writers for fellowship, which will then assessed and whittled down by an internal panel. Novelist Amanda Craig said it best, while the Royal Society of Literature may have been at one point “a bit too plate, stale and male,” the expedited efforts have besmirched the societies reputation as Craig continues “no longer the kind of distinction that it was.” While Don Paterson is right to point out, under the current system all a writer or poet needs to do is publish a “a single poetry pamphlet,” or the bare minimum to be considered. Regardless, Bernardine Evaristo in hubris and in good intentions persists, defending the current practices for nomination and induction: “Even today, only 4% of the fellowship is under 40, while more than 55% of it is over 65 – and more than 34% is over 75. Sidelined? Clearly not.”

Further accusations of facilitating populist oriented censorship in the method of social media weaponization and cancellation included a lacking support for the controversial writer Kate Clanchy and her memoir “Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me.” While the memoir would go on to receive the Orwell Prize, issues were raised regarding the use of uncouth and or offensive language to describe some of the children, which ultimately led her and her publisher to part ways. Philip Pullman ever a spirited classical liberal resigned from the Society of Authors, for his adamant defense. The Royal Society of Literature was criticized for its tone-deaf response or lack thereof, for what could only be called a modernized version of witch hunt and kangaroo court proceedings, which resulted the intensity of public to demand censorship when it offends their sensibilities. Ironically, at the time of these proceedings Clanchy was a fellow of the society. She subsequently resigned her fellowship when in 2023 when her most prominent public social justice prosecutor Sunny Singh was elected to the same institution.

It wasn’t just Kate Clanchy that the society failed. After the attempted assassination of Salman Rushdie in 2022, the Royal Society of Literature was not only slow to acknowledge the attack but proved to be apprehensive to condemn and offer consolation and support to Salman Rushdie to avoid taking sides on the event or alienating anyone. Evaristo maintained that the Royal Literature Society needed to remain “impartial.” Thankfully Rushdie (a fellow) took to social media to ask if the “Royal Society of Literature is ‘impartial’ about attempted murder?” Only then did Evaristo become more adamant as president that the society continued to support Salman Rushdie as it did before during the initial fatwa and continued to.

There are further administrative issues within the society itself. Allegations of secrecy and weaponization of management to silence any dissidence from the board or trustees. While the public may not be completely aware of what is going on within the societies innerworkings, it has become clear that the organization was imbalanced with an internal culture of unchecked prerogative and executive centralization, which ultimately saw the decay of governance and the alienation of members from society staff and its board. Outgoing Chair of Council, Daljit Nagra is set to table the findings of the governance audit at the next annual general meeting on January 15, which comes at the same time as is effective resignation, while Molly Rosenberg is expected to hang on to her role into the end of March.

Regardless, it appears that the Royal Society of Literature has its work cut out for it. Years of iconoclastic administration and an ideological fervor has ransacked and bankrupt the society and its credibility. With a change in administrative leadership perhaps the society will reel in its well meaning but overly ambitious efforts to incorporate a more ‘inclusive,’ outreach program when it cheapens and diminishes the society, when acclaimed and hard-won careers are abandoned in favour of ill-suited metrics that have no interest in literary merit. Hopefully, the Royal Society of Literature will be able to turn the page and realign its principles and priorities once again in favour of literature and acknowledging great and worthy writers.

Thank-you for Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read

M. Mary

For Further Reading 

Daily Mail: "Royal Society of Literature in chaos as it loses chairman and director amid accusations it lowered standards to have a 'more diverse' membership and failed to support Salman Rushdie after near-fatal stabbing"

The New Statesman: "Inside the Royal Society of Literature’s civil war"

The Spectator: "The demise of the Royal Society of Literature"

The Spectator: "Royal Society of Literature in meltdown over diversity drive"

The Guardian: "Royal Society of Literature rocked by departures of director and chair"

UnHerd: "Is the Royal Society of Literature a lost cause?"

The Nobel Prize in Literature Nominations 1974

Hello Gentle Reader,

There can be no denying that the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1974 was exceptional in the prize’s history for the controversy and outrage it induced and continues to reverberate within the prize’s contemporary history. The 1974 award is routinely unearthed and dusted off by critics and readers alike, to be banded and wielded against the Nobel Prize in Literature and the Swedish Academy with unrestrained fervor. Especially to knock the prize and the academy down a peg, reminding everyone that the Nobel Prize, despite its ceremony and ritual, is just a common literary prize, complete with its own self-assured arrogance that it is the measure and the authority of what qualifies as great and enduring literature. Afterall, in 1974 the Swedish Academy decided to award and share the Nobel Prize in Literature between two of its own members:

Eyvind Johnson (Chair No. 11):

            “for a narrative art, farseeing in lands and ages, in the service of freedom.”

Harry Martinson (Chair No. 15):

            “for writings that catch the dewdrop and reflect the cosmos.”

Now this is not the first time, the Swedish Academy awarded one of its own with the Nobel Prize in Literature. In 1951 the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the Swedish Academy member and moralist Pär Lagerkvist (Chair No. 8), which passed without much mention or controversy. This same courtesy was not applied to either Eyvind Johnson or Harry Martinson. It is slightly ironic, however, that Pär Lagerkvist was one of the serial nominators for both authors to receive the Nobel Prize, both on individual grounds and jointly. 1974 was not the first time that the both writers who considered contenders for the prize. Support for Eyvind Johnson receiving the prize were beginning to intensify by the early 1970’s. Johnson was a member of the Swedish Academy’s Nobel Committee and routinely declined or dismissed to be taken into consideration before stepping down from the Nobel Committee in 1972, which inevitably made his nomination for laureate more tenable. A general consensus emerges whereby Eyvind Johnson is considered by the majority of the Swedish Academy to be the preferential Nobel Laureate, be it by their own literary taste or because of he was the superior craftsman; whereas Harry Martinson is described as being almost conciliatory in measure, to temper and even out the support for Eyvind Johnson.

For literary output, Eyvind Johnson is often described as a proletarian writer. A categorization which sits on the authors with uncomfortable and awkward results. While there are moral, social, and political issues detailed and written about in Johnson’s bibliography, there is no heightened moral pedigree granted to proletarian causes or endorsement of any collectivist ideas, thought processes, philosophies, or ideologies. In fact, Eyvind Johnson was a writer of a strong individualistic bent, who despised the Stalin’s Soviet brand of communism as well as the scorched earth policies and rhetoric of fascism and Nazism which devasted Europe. If, Eyvind Johnson is to be described as proletarian in any capacity it was due to his sociopolitical background more so than his literary output. The “Krilon,” trilogy “Group Krilon,” “Krilon’s journey,” and “Krilon himself,” are often described as Johnson’s masterpiece(s) for their historical acuity and allegorical criticism of the horrors of Hitler’s Nazis and Swedish Neutrality during the Second World War. Prior the publication of “Krilon,” Eyvind Johnson wrote realistic short stories and a series of autobiographical novels.

Harry Martinson is first renowned as poet, who introduced Asiatic literary modes and thought to Swedish Literature. Martinson’s early life was reflected in many of his work. His unloving and harsh childhood gave rise to his life as a vagrant and later seaman. Harry Martinson was a rejuvenating force of modernism in Swedish Literature, debuting with fellow Swedish Academy member Artur Lundkvist in a poetry anthology. Martinson’s poetry was renowned for the use of complex and original metaphors, in addition to an acute eye for nature and detailed observations. The same preoccupation for the natural world reappeared frequently in Harry Martinson’s prose work, as well as memories of his maritime years and life as a vagabond. The epic poem “Aniara,” which recounts the tragedy of a passenger spacecraft fleeing nuclear disaster of earth and seeking salvation on mars only drift off course amongst the stars and into the void.

In previous deliberations and consideration of the two writers for the Nobel Prize in Literature, Erik Lindegren commented: “They are really the opposite of everything provincial.” Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson remain highly regarded as some of the most exceptional writers of their generations, and generational defining modernists of Swedish literature. Still, the literary production of both Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson remains meager in abroad and in translation. Biographers and historians take careful consideration to both of the writers working class and harsh social backgrounds, highlighting their literary achievements and introducing the supposed ‘proletariat,’ background into their literary productions, which only proves the immense social progresses taken throughout the 20^th century, creating what is often viewed as the social democratic utopias of the world today. Even in the award ceremony speech, Permanent Secretary Karl Ragnar Gierow noted the two authors shared a proletarian background, which in its gradual societal eradication was a testament to social welfare, and in turn their backgrounds and perspectives did not plunder the literary landscape, but instead enriched it.

1974 was a peculiar year for deliberations. Three members of the Swedish Academy had died leaving their seats vacant and both Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson abstained form the prizes deliberations as they were in contention. The Nobel Committee proposed the following options for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1974:

Splitting the award between Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson.

Sharing the award between Nadine Gordimer and Doris Lessing. Nadine Gordimer would later receive the award in 1991 and Doris Lessing in 2007.

Award Saul Bellow singularly, or split the award further with Norman Mailer. Saul Bellow would receive the award in 1976.

Award Eugenio Montale the award solely. Eugenio Montale would receive the award next year in 1975.

Overall, the Swedish Academy was in complete agreeance to split the prize between the two writers. Anders Österling is on record stating that the decision was unanimous. However, Artur Lundkvist who had previously raised concerns about awarding academy members the prize, opposed the notion of splitting the award between Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson, advocating instead to split the award between Nadine Gordimer and Doris Lessing. Artur Lundkvist remained the sole objector to the award and when it was put to a vote the decision was finalized the 1974 Nobel Prize in Literature would be split between Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson, and would later go down as being remembered as “the award that ruined everything.”

Artur Lundkvist is said to have encouraged both Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson to not accepting the award, with concern that the award would only bring the two authors misery. Fellow academy member Lars Gyllensten disagreed with Lundkvist’s rationale to exclude both members from receiving the award, first on technical grounds, nominations for both Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson came from outside of the Swedish Academy. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that the Swedish Academy was not merely self-congratulatory in its decision and chocking on the excess of its own sense of self-importance. Second, Gyllensten argued that if the Swedish Academy is to deny its own members from being taken into consideration for the prize, then they would only be degrading themselves with self-flagellation by inviting second rate writers to join the academy. Regardless, the 1974 Nobel Prize in Literature caused a storm at home for the Swedish Academy and instituted its first existential crisis.

Sven Delblanc writing in Expressen described the award as: “A disastrous decision,” and further raged that any to all credibility the Nobel Prize in Literature had “would be wiped out with mockery, rolling around the world.” Delblanc further his charges against the Swedish Academy for falling to the mire of corruption with the decision, going so far as to describe the award to two academy members as tantamount to embezzlement. Sven-Eric Liedman described writers as “passé,” in Göteborgs-Tidningen. The rest of the Swedish cultural and literary world concluded and agreed with the critics. The Swedish Academy didn’t just get it wrong, they openly pandered to what could easily been considered nationalistic concerns and provincial grubbing. Despite their renowned in Sweden, neither Eyvind Johnson or Harry Martinson found any international appeal. The popular Swedish poet Karl Vennberg, however, remained one of the few dissenting voices who favoured the award especially in the case of Harry Martinson. Sources accused the Swedish Academy of deliberately choosing writers of meager international appeal and renowned in order to not upstage the Soviet dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who would finally travel to Stockholm to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which he was originally awarded in 1970. Overall, the international press paid no mind to the award; only reviving it later to inject cynicism into the academy and the prizes decisions.

As for Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson, their press conference regarding the decision was noted for being muted even dour in tone, with both writers expressing a mixed bag of appreciation for the decision. Harry Martinson attempted to clarify and confirm that the occasion was happy, but ceded that that the criticism had certainly soured the festivities. Eyvind Johnson added: “There can never be just one author who is the world's best.” Both writers also agreed that the lacking translation abroad have seriously impacted their work being available in English. Harry Martinson described the English translation of his poem “Aniara,” as being scandalously poor. While Eyvind Johnson’s acclaimed autobiographical series of novels under the title: “The Novel About Olav,” have never been translated into English. Their lack of international presence remains a continued barrier against both writers. Both writers died only a few years after winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. Harry Martinson was particularly affected by the harsh criticism and committed suicide four years later. Artur Lundkvist speculated that the award expedited both of the writer’s death.

Unfortunately—or perhaps unsurprisingly—there was no debate about awarding two members of the Swedish Academy the Nobel Prize in Literature. In fact, the decision to engage in what is perhaps aptly described as “corruption via camaraderie,” was decided on without controversy or debate. Only one member dissented to the decision, concerned over the optics, while the thirteen other members completely carried on as if it was a normal selection and normal process. Its true the previous year set up some foreshadowing of the deliberations ahead regarding the award to another Swedish writer, as the then Permanent Secretary Karl Ragnar Gierow opened up the discussion, singling out: Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson and Vilhelm Moberg, as the greatest Swedish writers currently writing. Vilhelm Moberg sadly died in August of 1973. Regardless of the deliberations or lack thereof, the decision remains scandalously and blight inducing half a century later.

In 1974 the Nobel Committee for the Nobel Prize in Literature received a total of 101 nominated writers. 22 of these writers were new nominees. 9 women were nominated for the prize this year as well, which at the time was the highest record. These 9 women included both future Nobel Laureates: Nadine Gordimer (1991) and Doris Lessing (2007). Astrid Lindgren was also nominated, alongside Marie Under, Louise Weiss, and Victoria Ocampo. Fellow future Nobel Laureates who were nominated included: Eugenio Montale (1975), Saul Bellow (1976), Vicente Aleixandre (1977), Isaac Bashevis Singer (1978), Odysseas Elytis (1979), Czeslaw Milosz (1980), Elias Canetti (1981), William Golding (1983), Jaroslav Seifert (1984), Claude Simon (1985), Camilo Jose Cela (1989), Octavio Paz (1990), Ōe Kenzaburō (1994), Günter Grass (1999), V.S. Naipul (2001), and Harold Pinter (2005). Other notable writers who were nominated in 1974 were Francis Ponge, Stephen Spender, R. K. Narayan, and Elie Wiesel who would later receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986. The speculated favourites to win in 1974 were: Graham Greene, Jorge Luis Borges, Vladimir Nabokov, and Saul Bellow. Considering none of them (with the exception of Saul Bellow) considered

It is interesting to see Doris Lessing seriously considered the prize in the 1970’s, sadly when Lessing began to publish more science fiction oriented novels in 1979 and into the 1980’s, the Swedish Academy had grown more sour on her output, viewing it as a considerable decline from her previous socially explorative novels such as “The Grass is Singing,” “The Summer Before the Dark,” and interior explorative novels “The Golden Notebook,” “Briefing for a Descent into Hell.” It wasn’t until the 1990’s with the publication of her autobiographies did Doris Lessing find her ‘second wind,’ and was once again re-evaluated by the Swedish Academy. Even Doris Lessing is on record to have given no thought to the Nobel Prize in Literature. According to the late Lessing, she once encountered a member of the Swedish Academy who informed her that they don’t really like her work and so the decision was all sewn up.

In the end the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1974 was less successful than the Swedish Academy had hoped. It would be another 37 years before another Swedish writer would receive the award, with Tomas Tranströmer receiving the award in 2011. Comparably, Tomas Tranströmer has a more lasting impact and reputation internationally then both Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson, and the decision was not met with controversy at all. Still the scandal and bitter burn from the 1974 award dodged and perhaps hindered Tranströmer from receiving the award earlier. When discussing the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature, the then Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy Peter Englund, also made a point of confirming with the press that it has been almost forty years since a Swedish writer had received the award. This inevitably means that the Swedish Academy has taken a very cautious steps when evaluating and discussing any Swedish writer for the award. Lesson was certainly learned. Unfortunately, the archives do not provide much insight into the deliberations in the discussions for the award. We are not granted a full contextual understanding of how the Swedish Academy came to their very misguided conclusion, but reviewing old articles certainly provides enough context to understand that the decision went over like a lead balloon.

 

Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
 
M. Mary

– XXXV –

If I ever wrote an autobiography I would have to add: Fiction, as a subheading; because the possibility of what could have been, rather than the reality as is, is far more compelling. 

Tua Forsström Resigns from the Swedish Academy

Hello Gentle Reader,

During the Swedish Academy’s annual meeting and celebrations held on December 20^th, it was announced that the Finnish-Swedish language poet Tua Forsström of Chair No. 18 would forfeit her seat after previously been elected five years prior in 2019. There is no drama or ill tidings trailing Forsström’s resignation. Since 2018 the Swedish Academy’s members have had the freedom of choice to resign. Prior to that the bylaws stated that all terms of any academy seat were for life. However, during crisis it became necessary for the academy to update it governance protocols in order to allow members to resign and be replaced so the academy could still function. This flexibility according to Tua Forsström was the main contingency of why she accepted the invitation to join the academy, with the understanding that her term within the institution would be for a limited time. Now five years later, Tua Forsström has decided that the term has been met and has formally resigned from the Swedish Academy. The Swedish Academy was appreciative in their acceptance of the resignation with wonderful parting words which express the value that Forsström brought to the Swedish Academy and their deliberations.

While Tua Forsström’s resignation is the first since the Swedish Academy’s crisis six years ago, it is marvelous to see a member part on amicable grounds. As both Tua Forsström and the Swedish Academy maintain and repeated, the decision was made five years prior, and was a contingent point of Forsström accepting the invitation. Once again, the Swedish Academy is not at a full roster, as they will begin the work of finding a new member to fill Chair No. 18.

On a personal note, it is disappointing to see Tua Forsström depart from the Swedish Academy. It was always my own selfish wish that with her position on the academy, Tua Forsström would be able to put forward the candidacy of Finnish writers for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Sadly, that did not happen over the past five years – that I know of. Hopefully in the future though we will finally get a new Finnish laureate, as the language and literature is glaringly overlooked on the world stage, due to linguistic complexities.

While it is disappointing to hear the news of Tua Forsström resignation from the Swedish Academy, her insights within the awarding institution cannot be overlooked, and the Swedish Academy’s own appreciative farewell to the Finnish-Swedish language poet is poignant in its reluctant acceptance and appreciative well wishes.

Thank You for Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read

 

M. Mary

For Further Reference and Reading Please see the following hyperlink:

The Swedish Academy's festive gathering

Scene of the Crime

Hello Gentle Reader, 

In Patrick Modiano’s short novella, “Afterimage,” the elusive, fading, and willfully transparent photographer, Francis Jansen admits his favourite punctuation mark are ellipses. Those three elusive periods trailing off into nothing. They are the incomplete punctuation. The cliff hanger; the hang man. Ellipses lack the finality of the period; the engaged and curious nature of the question mark; the excitement and enthusiasm of the exclamation mark. Each of these previous punctuation marks strike the border, carving out a defined end of a sentence. They conclude with authority. Ellipses, however, lack an ending. Rather than strike down with gavel assurance they trail off. For ellipses its not a matter of the end of the line, rather the track was never installed. They fade into the incomplete and the unknown. Dissolving into nothingness. They are the evaporating transparent ending. Perfectly fitting for Francis Jansen who seeks to continually pursue a state of invisibility, an ambition and trait shared by so many of Modiano’s characters. Sublimation is a particular Patrick Modiano literary quality. Fixed nodal points and individuals inevitably vanish as if sublimated to a vaporous state. Despite their vapid departure they linger in shadow, cutting haunting figures as grey ghosts. They are spectral and phantasms existing in the unreliable recesses of memory; summoned forth by happenstance, chance, and circumstance. Existing in the vague recess between lamplight and shadow, incorporeal and incoherent.

Patrick Modiano is often compared to fellow countrymen and writers Marcel Proust and Alain-Fournier for his dedication to the theme of memory, loss, absence, incomplete romances – if one can call them that. Yet, Proust’s exploration of memory was gilded and luxurious. The famous madeleine scene showcases Proust’s extravagant and sensuous sensibilities cascading in an uncontrolled torrent of sensations as reminisces and memories stir from their hibernation and incarceration whereby, they are inspected like fine china or silver in need of a polish, but whose values are more then obvious to the beholder. Proust’s madeleine experience is the gateway to the essence of memory, the involuntary and unfiltered impressions invoked by unknown ritual and ceremony, whereby they bubble to the surface containing experiences and sensations. For Proust involuntary memory retained a sense of unembellished purity and naturalness; free from the adulterations and manipulations of willfully recalled or intellectual produced memories, and by being unburdened by any editorial contextualization, embody the essence of the past in all its wistful and ungraspable longing. For Proust memory was the process of rebuilding a gilded and golden chateau. Elaborate and luxurious, an otherwise romantic ideal, safe from the corrosive acid wash of reality. Inconsequential details or unsavoury veracities are left behind at the gates. Remembrance, regardless of how its produced, inevitably will align itself with convivences and personal narratives. For Modiano, memory is less a rebuild of times past, as it is the recovery of faded photographs and film scenes salvaged from the banks of the river oblivion. Incomplete registers, diaries, address books, newspaper articles and phonebooks, are the only souvenirs and evidence of a bygone era, cataloguing a new dissolved city and world lost within the inevitabilities of progress and time marching forward. A netherworld and purgatory that plunges Modiano’s characters, personas, and pseudo stand-ins into continually delving into an aimless and inarticulate search of the past.

Some writers are accused of covering the same ground within their work. Their literary themes and preoccupations developed and ingrained. In the case of Patrick Modiano, its not a matter of a writer returning to the same old haunts, it’s the writer writing the same novel in different variations. The entirety of Modiano’s bibliography is best described as a Yayoi Kusama infinity room, where the gleam and sparkle of light reflects and ripple over and over again in a mesmerizing designed illusion. So too are Modiano’s novels. While each one is independent in scope, they all inevitably cross and crisscross the same ground. Some critics have described Modiano’s novels as mere chapters within a larger tome. Each one a celestial body within the vague ether of space. Names and characteristics are recycled and reused throughout the bibliography adding to the delirium and continued sense of déjà vu. This explains why critics implore readers to sample a variety of Modiano’s novels in order to gain a robust understanding of the authors output, whereby readers are enveloped in the distinct gossamer prose, coming across familiar names, situations, and streets. Retrospect is yet another significant component of Modiano’s bibliography, as youth is described best in his novel, “Out of the Dark,” in all of its vagrant incompleteness:

“We had no real qualities, except the one that youth gives to everyone for a very brief time, like a vague promise that will never be kept.”

In this regard, Patrick Modiano’s characters are always silhouettes. Mere traces and impressions left behind. Outlines and shapes dissolving away. They exist in a translucent state of transience, whereby they slip further away. Their fates always unknown, but they leave an aftertaste of menace and melancholy, components of guilt and mystery.

“Scene of the Crime,” folds back—imperfectly, slanted, and angled of course—on an earlier Modiano novella, “Suspended Sentences.” “Scene of the Crime,” should not be described as a sibling, child, or offshoot of “Suspended Sentences.” Nor is it a spiritual successor. The notion of successorship is best abandoned. The events of “Suspended Sentences,” haunt and linger within “Scene of the Crime,” as details are salt and peppered throughout the narrative: a house on Rue du Docteur-Kurzenne (previously incarnated as Rue du Docteur-Dordaine in “Suspended Sentences,”), overgrown gardens, the house of the immortally famous Dr. Guillotine, a cast of characters concealing an incoherent darkness. Even the protagonist of “Scene of the Crime,” Jean Brosman is yet another Modiano iteration, repurposed and remerging in a new independent light from his previous incarnations. Yet these facts and facets do not align. They’ve been altered and reconfigured. Patrick Modiano further pathologizes and questions the veracity and reliance on memory and recollection of events as ordained fact. What emerges from the stagnant bog of memory and the imperfect shores of oblivion, is the dread and menace that haunts, lingers, and quietly tortures Modiano’s characters. In the case of Jean Brosman, it’s the vague events of his childhood. Virtually abandoned by his parents, his mother is referenced as an actress touring and his father merely absent, he is left in the custody of friends. While referenced as affectionate if albeit distant surrogates in “Suspended Sentences,” they’ve taken on a more menacing phosphorescent glow. In typical Modiano fashion, Bosman is reintroduced to this world once again by coincidence and chance, by both a song and spying a luxurious American watch. In turn, the enigmatic Camilie Lucas, a bookkeeper who is endearingly referred to as “Deathmask,” for her inscrutability:

“Right from their first meeting, he had noticed that Camille was very good at keeping quiet. Usually people talked way too much about themselves. But he had understood pretty quickly that she would always remain silent about her past, her relationships, her doings and perhaps her accounting work. He did not blame her. You like people the way they are. Even if you might not fully trust them.”

Re-introduces Bosman to a world of shifting shadows, whereby recollections and childhood memories are brought reawakened but brittle and incomplete:

“He only had to think about those two people to become all the more sensitive to the dust, or rather smell, of time.”

A certain Guy Vincent who maybe Roger Vincent from “Suspended Sentences,” haunts the “Scene of the Crime,” like a low hanging fog. The name Rose-Marie Krawell repeats through the novel like an incantation, leaving readers to wonder if she is Annie from “Suspended Sentences.” Modiano never clarifies or confirms. Just as Jean Bosman gropes and fumbles through his own memories, readers are equally left in the dark with a sense of mystery that never quite materializes or is solved. Of course one does not read Patrick Modiano for plot, narrative, or suspenseful attempt at solving the case. To read a Modiano novel is the pleasure of being engulfed within the elegiac atmosphere populated by shadows and devious ambiguous threats, whereby the verity of memory is always in a state of questioning. “Scene of the Crime,” is no different then any of the previous Patrick Modiano novels, another chapter within his repetitious bibliography of existential noir novels. What separates “Scene of the Crime,” from other Modiano novels is its apparent insinuations of kinship between itself and “Suspended Sentences,” without aligning in any coherent fashion reinforcing the questioning nature of memory. “Scene of the Crime,” in turn distances itself further, as Jean Bosman looks back at the events of his life in a spectrum of time, with each recollection casting more doubt over the preceding events. In turn as a protagonist, Jean Bosman is more antagonistic and bolder then Modiano’s usual characters who drift through the novels in a daze. Bosman gives the impression of delighting in his flirtations with the threats that stalk him, all the while resigning himself to pursuit of becoming silent. As in the case of Francis Jansen, Modiano’s novels fade into ellipses unresolved and the sense of being incomplete. “Scene of the Crime,” is no different. Jean Bosman reviews the dubious events of his childhood without coming to any clear understanding of the stakes at play. Bosman’s retrospective operates in that vague borderline between memory and fabrication, with Bosman showing neither interest or concern with clarifying dreamed events to that of fact.

 

Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read

M. Mary

– XXXIV –

Grow up, break free, let loose, achieve; but most importantly: Live.  

Breyten Breytenbach Dies Aged 85

Hello Gentle Reader,

Breyten Breytenbach was one of the greatest South African Afrikaans language writers of his generation, an icon of who defended human rights and revolted against the barbaric delineation of apartheid. A statement from Breytenbach’s family perfectly summarizes and defines the author shortly after his peaceful passing:

“an immense artist, militant against apartheid, he fought for a better world until the end.”

As a writer, Breyten Breytenbach literary themes were formed in relation to that of Nadine Gordimer, J.M. Coetzee, and Antjie Krog, an unmistakable outrage and disgust over the National Party’s hyper racial segregation policies and oppression of the majority black population or any other ethnicity designated ‘non-white.’ During his time at university, Breytenbach founded the Sestigers literary group with fellow wrier Andre Brink. The Sestigers were a group of dissident writers who opposed and challenged the prevailing doctrine of apartheid; they also sought to elevate the Afrikaans language, transcending it above its two-dimensional political associations of being a language of an oppressive minority. The Sestigers is affectionally referred to as a literary movement of exile within its own country, and its continued legacy reverberates today, being the foundational lifeblood of the explosion of Afrikaans language and art. The notion of Afrikaans language and the idea of Afrikaner were complex subjects for Breyten Breytenbach remarking:

“I'd never reject Afrikaans as a language, but I reject it as part of the Afrikaner political identity. I no longer consider myself an Afrikaner.”

As in the case of many writers whose work is influenced by its criticism of political realities, language for Breyten Breytenbach became homeland. In the 1960’s Breytenbach entered exile, living abroad in Paris, but remained a cultural icon in South Africa and a vocal critic. In the 1970’s, Breytenbach returned to South Africa, but was promptly arrested for allegedly supporting resistance movements and was sentenced to seven years in prison. Unrepented and unhindered Breyten Breytenbach continued to write poetry during his incarceration. The then French president François Mitterrand worked to facilitate Breytenbach’s release in 1982, afterwards Breytenbach would be granted French citizenship. These years of imprisonment provided Breyten Breytenbach the necessary material to write the monumental novel “The Albino Terrorist,” an account of his in incarceration, including the first two years spent in solitary confinement. Ever politically motivated Breyten Breytenbach continued his political discourse even as apartheid ended, refuting Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress of becoming corrupt and corroded with power.

Rest in Peace Breyten Breytenbach.

Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
 
M. Mary

Tanikawa Shuntarō Dies Aged 92

Hello Gentle Reader,

The grandfather of modern Japanese poetry and the Japanese master of free verse, Tanikawa Shuntarō has died at 92 years old. Japanese literary sensibilities are deep as they are subtle and refined. Emphasising understand brilliance; capitalizing on the contrast between subject and the negative space. The haiku is the perfect example of the concentrated principles of this aesthetic, whereby the entirety of the world is both captured and reflected within a single morning dewdrop. Tanikawa Shuntarō described the postwar period of Japanese society as bleak, the intellectual and cultural environment a vacuum with writers and thinkers continually turning away from previous lodestone institutions to find a new place for themselves within a society that had been bombed, obliterated, and ravaged by war. Those of Tanikawa’s generation who pursued postsecondary education involved themselves in political movements. Thankfully, Tanikawa was spared these political orientations and indoctrinations which allowed the poet to formulate a poetic style all his own. A free verse unbridled from the literary traditions of its forebears and open to exploring new literary frontiers. In a sparse and conversational style, Tanikawa Shuntarō crafted poetry that surveyed emotional truths and reflected on profound ideas all the while being set within the intimate and shared reality. Tanikawa’s debut collection “Two Billion Light Years of Solitude,” was an immediate bestseller in Japan and remains one of the most popular and beloved collections of poetry. What followed was a legendary poetic career of one of Japan’s most important and brilliant poetic voices, whose work remained a chameleonic and cutting-edge presence exploring new modes and literary expressions within the Japanese poetic canon. The hallmark of Tanikawa Shuntarō’s poetry is the approachability of the poems founded in a deceptive simplicity all the while sparkling with sophistication. In addition to poetry, Tanikawa was also a prolific translator, specifically of children’s literature, which included the Mother Goose Rhymes, Maurice Sendak, and Schulz’s  Peanuts comics. Tanikawa Shuntarō’s poetry introduced the world to the possibilities of Japanese poetry, and helped the nation move beyond the dour bleakness of the postwar years to a startling and brilliant future, one of possibility not ruin and devastation. Tanikawa Shuntarō’s poetry will continue and endure, recited and enjoyed by readers and students not only in Japan but around the world. The poetry of Tanikawa encompasses that full spectrum of the human condition, the multitudes of wonder and amazement, the struggles and drudgery of life, and still the perseverance to continue. In reflecting on his own death, Tanikawa Shuntarō reflected on the comfort of curiosity of what comes afterwards and continued on to live until that time. Despite not winning the Nobel, there is no doubt that Tanikawa Shuntarō is and was a deserving laureate in his own right, as his poetry inspired, renewed, and rejoiced at all the ideals of humanity, its flaws, and the countless possibilities.  

 
Rest in Peace, Tanikawa Shuntarō.
 
Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
 
M. Mary

The Booker Prize Winner 2024

Hello Gentle Reader,
 
This years Booker Prize has been awarded to the English writer Samantha Harvey for her novel: “Orbital.”
 
“Orbital,” is the second shortest book to have received the Booker Prize, accounting for four pages longer than Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1979 Booker winning novel “Offshore.” Perhaps Samantha Harvey’s win with “Orbital,” proves that shorter novels are more then a match to larger novels. Even more so, considering shorter novels require a gardener’s hand for pruning and a jeweler’s eye detail. Where larger novels can juggle multiple balls, granting them permissible room to let some inconsequentially fall without ceremony or fault. Whereas a shorter novel juggles only a few jeweled eggs, but there is no allowance for mishaps.
 
To contrast this years Booker Prize from last years award, judging chair Edmund de Waal confirmed that this year’s winner was chosen unanimously by the judges and that the judges read all 156 nominated books to completion. The unanimity of the judge’s decision according to de Waal recognizes the intensity of Harvey’s literary ambition in recognizing not only the preciousness of our shared planet, but also its precariousness. The novel itself recounts the one day in the life of twelve astronauts as they orbit the earth. The novel recounts not only the routine of life on the space station, but also their lives back on earth which tether and anchor them home. Through sixteen sunrises and sunsets, they orbit the blue celestial marble of home. “Orbital,” is a breath of fresh air. The novel is the necessary injection of literary pleasure and craftsmanship the Booker Prize needed, after years of politically charged and statement like novels. “Orbital,” embraces the possibility of the writer’s capacity to imagine and reflect on the vastness of space and our own celestial provincial attitudes in comparison to the magnanimity of space.
 
A very well earned prized. Congratulations to Samantha Harvey.
 

Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read


M. Mary

Mina’s Matchbox

Hello Gentle Reader,

By the end of October, the north wind has rampaged through. The leaves routed from their trees. They've ruptured and burst forth into the roaring wind, scattering on the street. Winter looms over the horizon. A starved dog whose howls close in every night as the sun pulls away. Never content to remain ominous or threatening in the distance, a smattering of snow anointed the ground, and while it has since melted, snow marks the conclusion of autumn. Once dandy trees peacocking with their burning foliage are reduced to gnarled shadows. Etherized, they contort and frame the early dusks. Their scaffolding branches claw at the sky, creep along the streets, and lurk outside windows. Autumn recedes further away as October closes. Soon November will sail in on slate grey clouds imbued with cemetery light. Frost will thread and sew its way through the grass; while the filigree of hoarfrost engraves the windows. As October concludes on a brittle note, one can’t help but suspiciously eye the romantic attitudes and airs projected on the month. Of course, October reaps the splendors of its harvest regalia, it is also a month of closures and hollowing out. A time of preparation and harvest; taking stock and giving thanks. In turn, October is a month of transitions and shifting borders. Here at the end of October everyone slips into the forlorn mists, swept up and away, retreating just a little further into themselves. Night falls suddenly, leaving all to cozy up with their memories. Under the circumstances its best to quote the venerated October Poet, Louise Glück:

            “We look at the world once, in childhood. The rest is memory.”

Childhood is a nebulous subject, shifting and shaping. Ranging from the coyly saccharine sugared imaginings of bewildering entertainment, to more serious literary explorations of individual development and the lodestone of the human condition. All individuals look back on this development period with their own imbued perspectives. Some recount homes that were more hovel than house, where ignorance and violence were the preeminent languages. A world acquainted with the predatorial philosophy and Darwin law of “survival of the fittest.” Others described autocratic and tyrannical fathers or claustrophobic communities, where power was unimpeachable, taking the form of violence and brutality, enforcing conformity and complacency. The vocabulary of these homes and of these families were each the same: overcrowded, meager, unwanted, unsustainable. Thumps in the night always foreshadowed further impoverishment. The term ‘unwanted pregnancy,’ was synonymous with further suffering. For a wife and already overwhelmed mother, another link in the chain to the iron ball dragging her to unknowable depths. For an unwed daughter or sister, it was the beginning of the fall. An expedited journey to ruin and the end. They were described as being filthy and dirty; branded as whores who bitched and catted around. The shame was palpable, coloured in contusions. All of them were excited to caste out anything that could be described as of an ill-reputed nature or cheapened or spoiled. One of the rarest of moments in which they can elevate themselves beyond their squalor and piss on another. Despite this, they were all in the same pit, vying and clawing for the edges. While others describe their childhood in pastoral shades. The closet version of Arcadia that earth could facilitate. Then there are others whose lives were full of the same, the otherwise grey mundane; not without but no splendor to spare. Childhood is where one is forged and oriented to the workings of life.

Memory is a perennial preoccupation in the works of Ogawa Yōko. In the dystopian parable “The Memory Police,” Ogawa observed an island in a continual state of loss and redaction. Throughout the novel the inhabitants of the island lose their memories and their gradual connection to the world, all the while their entire reality reduces in size and scope. When calendars are deemed obsolete, the island nation finds itself transfixed in permanent winter. The entire world is lost in a whiteout, redacted further into the reductionist of nothing. In the still untranslated novel, “The Ring Finger,” a woman works at a laboratory, where clients bring in specimens (a bird bone, a melody, a scar, mushrooms) to be preserved by the memorial taxidermist, who preserves not only the specimens but also the associated and corresponding memory. Another untranslated novel “The Museum of Silence,” a woman collects and curates a macabre collection of mundane miscellaneous objects pilfered from people’s homes just after they have died. While in “The Housekeeper and the Professor,” the 88-minute-long memory of the professor, becomes more an eccentric plot point of the novel, rather than abstract theme, but allocates the novel the ability to float temporally in weightlessness while engaging in the abstract beauty of mathematics. In “Mina’s Matchbox,” Ogawa Yōko returns to the theme of memory, as the narrator looks back on a year of her childhood where she begins to transition from the dreaming and imaginative world of childhood and enter the more actualized reality of young adulthood.

As a novel “Mina’s Matchbox,” is more akin to “The Housekeeper and the Professor,” then “The Memory Police,” or “Revenge.” Where “The Memory Police,” a parabolic in its dystopian vision, contemplating the responsibility of remembrance and the corrosion of obsoletion and forced amnesia having the reductionist power to redact the world, but also discombobulate and alienate individuals’ relation to reality, and slowly releasing them into nothing. Whereas “Revenge,” showcased Ogawa as a master of the macabre. A consummate curator, Ogawa assembled, organized, and crafted scenes and landscapes transfixed and static in their clinical ordinariness, and then began to autopsy these otherwise starched and ironed scenes, revealing the absurd, deranged, and visceral undercurrent coursing beneath the otherwise unexceptionally ordinary. What is best described as the macabre or the madness of the mundane. Instead “Mina’s Matchbox,” bubbles and floats on the gentle effervescence of Ogawa’s observational and unadorned prose, explicitly in alignment with that of “The Housekeeper and the Professor,” while providing Ogawa the space to indulge in detours, details, and the shadows shifting in the periphery. Of course, as in “The Housekeeper and the Professor,” the quotidian is relayed on the slant. Whereas the titular professor’s 88-minute memory injects a sense of eccentricity into the narrative; in “Mina’s Matchbox,” the unconventionality comes not only in the niche habits and quirks of its characters, but also in the form of a pygmy hippopotamus, the sole survivor of a private family zoo, now a pet and mode of transportation. Ogawa’s straight forward prose hits the necessary punches in order to evade sentimentality and kitsch. Regardless, from 1972 to 1973 prove to be a formative year for Tomoko, who looks back on her stay with her distant and affluent relatives in Ashiya, who provide her a new world of discovery and knowledge. Counterbalancing the whimsy and the unconventionality of the relatives, Ogawa Yōko laces time specific details within the text, not only grounding it but enlivening the narrative into a greater context, enriching the narrative with a necessary palpability. Specifically, the 1972 Summer Olympics are by and large a defining feature of the year, with both Tomoko and Mina transfixed by the Japanese Olympic Volleyball Team’s journey to Munich and the aspirations the team would win gold. The two girls’ devotion to the team became borderline fanatical; but their rationale regarding their admiration towards individual team members delineated how the girls viewed the team. Mina logically evaluated the statistics and abilities; while Tomoko frivolously admired the beauty and appearance of another.

Tomoko’s reminisces of her time in Ashiya prove to be crystalline, but also express a gap in memory or a child’s lacking maturity to fully realize the depth of the situation. Through all their eccentricities, their indulgences in intellectual pursuits, and their lavish surprises, the family is dogged by secrets and familiar tensions. Mina is asthmatic, but her conditions severity gyrates between crisis and projected exaggeration by those around her. Despite this, Mina’s medical remand has nurtured an imaginative and creative mind, as the novel is spiced with a few of her matchbox stories. Tomoko’s uncle is charming dazzling, but beyond his smooth and shiny veneer lurks an ungraspable tension. His absences fill the house and while his returns are celebratory, Tomoko perceives a tension between her uncle and her maternal aunt. While her aunt in turn spends her days drinking and smoking, reading texts and books scanning for typographical errors. When Mina’s beautiful brother Ryuchi returns from Switzerland, Tomoko once again reflects on a concealed strain between father and son. From Grandmother Rosa, Tomoko comes to learn about the Holocaust, and the survivor’s guilt that plaques her grandmother, all the while the horrible massacre and terrorist act of the Munich Olympics, becomes a shattering reminder of the human capability for terror, marking one of the unadulterated moments when the idyll of childhood is infiltrated with the violence of the external world. The novel in turn traces first loves and there fated disappointments. All the milestones in the march to growing up. Ogawa’s prose is casual and laconic as it languishes over the details, which is also the novels weakness. Details effervescently emerge and while their intentions are ominous or foreshadow conflict, they instead burst or drift off course, never quite actualizing. Just who is the uncle’s mistress? While Tomoko circles the issue and approaches it, the subject is never explored further. Ogawa’s tasteful desire to refuse to linger on overtly dramatic events, be it a home invasion or a fire, allow her to bob and weave the entrapments  and indulgences of melodramatic histrionics, but the lack of completion or conclusion or at the very least hard lined definition can be considered underwhelming. Yet, in Ogawa’s defense, children are minuscules in comparison to the machinations of the adults around them and as such as scaled to their environment. The hypersensitivity and overprotectiveness of Mina is in turn leveraged against Tomoko, and while she exercises some agency in her movements, she is otherwise tethered to the house. In addition, as a child Tomoko may be reluctant to explore or investigate an issue of an extra marital affair further. The revelation of the holocaust was enlightening to the human capacity for horror and cruelty.

“Mina’s Matchbox,” was originally written in a serialized format, which explains the short chapters and the episodic feel of the narrative skipping along, in addition to the abrupt endings. The novel is a marvelous exploration of the domestic, and while many readers have praised Ogawa’s foray into the realism and domestic novel, it still retains a slanted perspective betraying the signature flirtation with the macabre. The overgrown Fressy Zoological Garden remains a haunted landscape. Mina’s matchbox stories integrated themselves into the narrative naturally. I found this time the transition between novel and independent fable more symphonic; whereas with “The Memory Police,” chapters from the narrators’ novels did not blend within the narrative as organically. Ogawa Yōko’s continued exploration of the finer nuances of memory are on perfect display with her novel “Mina’s Matchbox.” While it eschews Ogawa’s usual underpinnings of the grotesque and ghoulish, it succeeds in being a charming domestic novel. Ogawa’s prose shone in the crisp gracefulness, a lightness of touch continually feathering out and insinuating each detail. While others are quick to categorize “Mina’s Matchbox,” as a coming-of-age story, Ogawa Yōko has skillfully skirted the mechanical form of such novels and stories. This ‘year in the life,’ novel layers events and details naturally form, never fixating or magnifying on any particular event as having a significant contribution to the development of either girl. All the while through the course of the novel they inevitably do change and grow. Time marches forward, yet as Tomoko reminisces, it was a transformative year. Ogawa succeeds at encapsulating those moments of youth. The awkwardness of self-awareness. The frustrations of infatuations. Those insignificant moments which haunt us throughout our lifetimes; much like the little girl catching falling stars in a bottle, on one matchbox cover. This is Ogawa’s strength, the ability to effortlessly examine the subtle shifts and changes in her characters psychology and relation to the world.

“Mina’s Matchbox,” is a welcome – like all future Ogawa Yoko publications – and overdue entry into the English language. “Mina’s Matchbox,” showcases Ogawa’s range as writer, her ability to move beyond the visceral or mundane violence of her other works, and instead explore a quieter and intimate family narrative. Ogawa’s prose remains natural and unadorned, never burned by ostentatious formatting and achieving at their crests a wistful lyricism, much like the radium-fortified drink Fressy which appears throughout the novel. “Mina’s March,” provides a holistic portrait of one’s memory and one’s relationship to it, but also the complicated relationships and how they’ve adapted and changed through the ages, and how they too are remembered. In a manner similar to Kazuo Ishiguro’s “Klara and the Sun,” Ogawa Yoko moves through time deftly and with ease covering a period of thirty years through highlights and applying a short epistolary format. As in “Klara and the Sun,” which fixated on only a short pinnacle period of a character’s life, Ogawa ended "Mina's Matchbox," without cheapening the prose, but coming to a rounded conclusion. 

 

Thank you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
 
M. Mary