X Marks The Box: Daniel Blythe

Daniel Blythe - X Marks The Box (2010)

Politics - 180 pages - my copy (paperback) bought for £7.99 from Waterstones, March 2010

- 2 nods

In light of the British political expenses scandal, a flood of books upon the disillusionment and dejection in modern society have washed upon the shelves of all good - and some bad - bookshops. Daniel Blythe's X Marks The Box is one of them.

The book is a quick read and stomp around the current electoral scene; a scene heating up with the impending General Election. Always jovial, Blythe takes the reader on a tour of political lingo (speaking of floating voters), of the parties and background on leaders (stretching back to the 1960s) as well as decisive elections in past decades; thus adding to the wide held belief that 2010 is also a decisive year.

Throughout all, Blythe adds many facts - both humourous and needless - which suggests a lack of actual material for the book rather than the intention of informing the reader. The majority of the text deals with scandal and betrayal, thus cementing the mood of ill feeling towards all politicians.

Never threatening for one moment to become too involving or stimulating, X Marks The Box book is a suitable book for anyone who wishes to reaquaint themselves in the British political scene.

Short Cuts: Raymond Carver

Raymond Carver – Short Cuts (1993)
Short Stories – 160 pages – my copy (paperback) taken from Starbucks, Armada Way February 2010
- 3 nods

A man who dresses in his neighbour’s blouse whilst looking after the home; a husband who on finding a dead female body, proceeds to enjoy a fishing trip before informing the authorities; an aggressive and vengeful baker and parents of a coma boy: welcome to the world of Raymond Carver.

Short Cuts is a collection of various short stories from Carver, taken as the basis of Robert Altman’s film of the early nineties. Excelling at the short story form, Carver’s work is critically noted as being about nothing in particular. These are snapshots of larger stories, snippets of the longer lives of his characters.

The writer forever strives to keep things simple – lots of he said, she said – and in so doing, he allows the thoughts and the actions of his characters do the talking. Rarely is the climatic enlightenment of the story’s bigger picture – a Joyceian revelation – ever realised. Carver has plumped for something else: not an unveiling of his characters, but rather life’s sinister moments and coincidences for his readers. Altman, the default editor of this collection, puts it aptly when writing: ‘I look at all of Carver’s work as just one story, for his stories are all occurrences, all about things that just happen to people and cause their lives to take a turn.’

Despite being the driving force of this project, Altman has not chosen the strongest of Carver’s stories. For that, the concerned reader must venture to his collections, particularly What We Talk About When We Talk about Love. The highlights of Short Cuts are So Much Water So Close to Home, in which a relationship is eroded due to a husband’s careless consideration of a dead body; and the death of a boy in A Small, Good Thing. There is much humour throughout, mostly coming in the form of the characters hopeless, dark situations, as well as much pointlessness (as shown in Collectors).

Throughout all, Carver speaks for the average American. Nothing spectacular happens in his pages; but throughout all, he manages to point out human qualities, both full of joy and full of sorrow, both destructive and positive.

A Life Like Other People’s: Alan Bennett

Alan Bennett – A Life Like Other People’s (2009)
Autobiography – 240 pages – my copy (hardback; 2009) a 2009 Xmas present
- 3 nods

As the years have gone by, Alan Bennett has cemented himself as one of the premier writers in Britain: there have been his plays, such as the recently successful The History Boys; screenplays such as The Madness of King George (that’s King George III for us on this Isle!); as well as many other pieces for the page and for the screen, such as the critical success that was Talking Heads.

This volume, gleamed from the larger autobiographical work Untold Stories, concerns itself with Bennett’s childhood, his family and his eventual parting with those around him. He recounts his mother’s insanity, the closely held secret of his grandfather’s death, his own father’s passing, as well as those of his boisterous aunts. As expected with a book full of death, much is mournful: yet Bennett’s purpose here is to breathe life back into his family members. An aim in which he wonderfully succeeds.

In tackling these memories, Bennett is tackling the pain, the angst and the embarrassment of former times. His mother’s bouts of insanity coupled with the saner moments when she strived to be like everyone else; his parents intense dislike of ‘making a fuss’, taking I to the extreme of becoming married without telling those around them and with his father heading straight for work after the ceremony; his mother’s eventual demise in a nursing home, no longer his Ma but rather an empty stranger.

Throughout all, Bennett is able to look back as a person removed from these scenes, yet one who is intrinsically linked. His humour is apparent throughout all, but also evident is his love of his parents. Yes, those same parents who he admits he felt so embarrassed of when younger, their parochial views and ways. Though not a full blown celebration, A Life Like Other People’s is Bennett’s refutation of the discomfited youth he once was. A read for anyone who has had growing pains; a read for anyone who misses those have parted.

The Making of Modern Britain: Andrew Marr

Andrew Marr – The Making of Modern Britain (2009)
History – 430 pages – my copy (hardback; 2009) bought from Waterstones for reduced price of £8.99
- 4 nods

Since leaving his post as the BBC’s political chief, Andrew Marr has notched up a career as the historian and commentator of modern Britain. First came his book upon the post-war decades, from victory days of Churchill to the slump days of Brown. Fast following in its success is The Making of Modern Britain; from the death of Queen Victoria to the end of the Second World War.

It is a period heavily covered by historians and writers alike. The big challenge is in adding something new to a historical landscape that is hard to shift about: there are two world wars that, obviously, dominate any book on the period. So, it is with Marr’s history. Though the author pulls back from heavy detail, warning the reader on the opening parts of both wars that his is not an analytical, event by event study; rather a portrait of an age with quick snapshots of the regular, the irregular and the outstandingly strange.

But although his pulling up of interesting and forgotten facts keeps the book fresh, Marr never goes for the jugular in defining the age. His continuing theme is to make the connection with the reader that although the times were indeed different, it was in these decades that our own conception of Britain was forged. Yet apart from this, Marr is bereft of adding anything new as to our perception of the early twentieth century; something his predecessor book did achieve (notably in his critique of our consumerist shopping culture lording it in the modern age).

Marr’s The Making of Modern Britain is a book recommended to those not acquainted with the period in question; for those looking for a light to shine on decades that appear remote and confined to black and white.