My Month in Books: January 2024
My recent literary adventures: ice skating in Holland, cheating Madame Guillotine, and homesteading on the snowy prairie
It’s hard to believe that the first month of the new year is already behind us, and here we are at the start of February and Febregency! But before I dive back into the literature of Jane Austen’s era, I wanted to share my wintry reading highlights from January…
Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates by Mary Mapes Dodge
The twentieth of December came at last, bringing with it the perfection of winter weather. All over the level landscape lay the warm sunlight. It tried its power on lake, canal and river; but the ice flashed defiance and showed no sign of melting. The very weather-cocks stood still to enjoy the sight. This gave the windmills a holiday. Nearly all the past week they had been whirling briskly; now, being rather out of breath, they rocked lazily in the clear, still air. Catch a windmill working when the weather-cocks have nothing to do!
My Christmas present from Athos was an absolutely perfect winter read! I only regret that I didn’t start it earlier in December, because it includes a wonderful description of St. Nicholas Day. This book weaves together descriptions of Dutch history, literature, art, landscape, and culture with charming characters, a mystery, and, of course, a certain pair of silver skates! In some ways, Mary Mapes Dodge rotates between the different elements of the story - there are several chapters, for example, where Hans Brinker is absent while we follow a group of other characters on a skating trip - but on the whole, I thought all the elements came together beautifully, and the absence of the main character for a little while just whet your appetite for the mystery resolution and silver skates to come!
In fact, the whole scenario of ice skating along a beautiful canal to visit beautiful Dutch cities was one of the most enchanting and memorable parts of the book. I love how little anecdotes about Dutch figures from the past were shared as the boys visited different museums and sites. For instance, we hear about Handel playing a famous organ - with his nose! - and a painter, Berghem, who was so good-natured that “though he died early two hundred years ago, there are traditions still afloat concerning his pleasant laugh.” I have a feeling I’m going to need to go back to look up many of these names and learn more about them - or maybe I just need to plan a trip to Holland!
“We Hollanders, you know, consider our great engineers as the highest of public benefactors. Brunings died years ago; they’ve a monument to his memory in the cathedral of Haarlem. I have seen his portrait, and I tell you, Ben, he was right noble-looking. No wonder the castle looks so stiff and proud. It is something to have given shelter to such a man!"
“Yes, indeed,” said Ben, “I wonder, Van Mounen, whether you or I will ever give any old building a right to feel proud - Heigho, there’s a great deal to be done yet in this world and some of us who are boys now will have to do it.”
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
When Chauvelin reached the supper-room it was quite deserted. It had that woebegone, forsaken, tawdry appearance, which reminds one so much of a ball-dress, the morning after.
Half-empty glasses littered the table, unfolded napkins lay about, the chairs - turned towards one another in groups of twos and threes - seemed like the seats of ghosts, in close conversation with one another. There were sets of two chairs - very close to one another - in the far corners of the room, which spoke of recent whispered flirtations, over cold game-pie and iced champagne, there were sets of three and four chairs, that recalled pleasant, animated discussions over the latest scandals; there were chairs straight up in a row that still looked starchy, critical, acid, like antiquated dowagers; there were a few isolated, single chairs, close to the table, that spoke of gourmands intent on the most recherché dishes, and others overturned on the floor, that spoke volumes on the subject of my Lord Grenville’s cellars.
It was a ghostlike replica, in fact, of that fashionable gathering upstairs; a ghost that haunts every house, where balls and good suppers are given; a picture drawn with white chalk on grey now that the bright silk dresses and gorgeously embroidered coats were no longer there to fill in the foreground, and now that the candles flickered sleepily in their sockets.
Doesn’t that passage set the scene so perfectly? I love the way we can read the party that just left the room through the positions of the chairs and glasses. Thanks to all who joined in this month’s book club chat about this thrilling classic! As usual, I learned many new things from our discussion - I had no idea that The Scarlet Pimpernel was originally released as a play and that Orczy wrote sequels to it.
One thing that stood out to me on this reread was how superbly our mysterious hero, the Scarlet Pimpernel, can read human nature and use the foibles of others to further his disguise. He always stays cool and can turn even the blind mob madness of the French Revolution to his purposes. I definitely want to check out some of the other books in the series, because the set-up of all the characters makes you eager to read more about them!
The Tale of Snow White and the Widow Queen written by Jonathan Pageau, illustrated by Heather Pollington
One day, on the feast of Candlemass, a crow perched in a tree just above her as she was sitting in the garden. Startled in her mending, the Queen pricked her finger and a drop of blood fell onto the pristine snow. In that moment she knew that she would have a child and that her prayers had been answered…though she also knew that it would come at a terrible price.
It seems appropriate to include this quotation since the feat of Candelmas is tomorrow, February 2! I’m sure the inclusion of that date has significance, because Pageau is keenly aware of symbolism in the retelling of this classic fairytale. I keep remembering details in the story, different points he made in the podcast, and I keep reopening the book to admire the lavish and stylistic illustrations. I can’t wait to see more from this “Symbolic World Press” series!
These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder
“You’ve tackled every job that ever came your way,” Pa said. “You never shirked, and you always stuck to it till you did what you set out to do. Success gets to be a habit, like anything else a fellow keeps on doing.”
Again there was a silence except for the squeaking of the sled runners and the clop-clop-clop of the horses’ feet on the hard snow. Laura felt a little better. It was true; she always had kept on trying; she had always had to. Well, now she had to teach school.
“Remember that time on Plum Creek, Half-Pint?” Pa said. “Your Ma and I went to town and a blizzard came up? And you got the whole woodpile into the house.”
Laura laughed out loud and Pa’s laugh rank like great bells in the cold stillness. How little and scared and funny she had been, that day so long ago!
“That’s the way to tackle things!” Pa said. “Have confidence in yourself, and you can lick anything. You have confidence in yourself, that’s the only way to make other folks have confidence in you.”
You can’t beat Pa’s sweet, strong, and straightforward wisdom. I’ve been putting off starting These Happy Golden Years because I didn’t want my reread of the Little House on the Prairie series to end! This book and the one preceding it (Little Town on the Prairie) are particularly delicious. The characters are so warm and wonderful, their matter-of-fact grit and resilience are so inspiring, there are so many interesting and evocative details - and it’s hard not to swoon over Almanzo and Laura. There’s one scene when Almanzo is deciding whether or not to brave 40 below (!!!) temperatures to drive Laura home to her family for the weekend, and another great character, Cap, sees him looking at the thermometer and just says, casually, “God hates a coward.” 😂 I think I’m going to have to work hard to resist not starting to reread the whole series over again once I finish, it is truly a delight.
A Backward Glance by Edith Wharton
I used to say that I had been taught only two things in my childhood: the modern languages and good manners. Now that I have lived to see both these branches of culture dispensed with, I perceive that there are worse systems of education. But in justice to my parents I ought to have named a third element in my training; a reverence for the English language as spoken according to the best usage.
Alas, I did not get to editing my travel vlog from The Mount this month, but I did celebrate Edith Wharton’s birthday by continuing to make progress in A Backward Glance. In her novels, Wharton showcases the severe shortcomings of the society she grew up in, but her autobiography, published in 1934, is more nuanced. It’s fascinating to see her look back and see both the good and the bad and to reflect on how the world as a whole had changed.
I have lingered over these details because they formed a part - a most important and honorable part - of that ancient curriculum of house-keeping which, at least in Anglo-Saxon countries, was so soon to be swept aside by the “monstrous regiment” of the emancipated: young women taught by their elders to despise the kitchen and the linen room, and to substitute the acquiring of University degrees for the more complex art of civilized living. The movement began when I was young, and now that I am old, and have watched it and noted its results, I mourn more than ever the extinction of the household arts. Cold storage, deplorable as it is, has done far less harm to the home than the Higher Education.
It’s clear from earlier passages - like when Wharton reviews the books she read in her father’s library or appreciates the masterful use of the English language that her parents taught her - that she is very aware of the value of an educated woman; but the fact that she is also very aware of the value of “the more complex art of civilized living” is what impresses me so much about Wharton and makes me want to read more!
But to turn my reading attention to the future, I’m excited to begin Belinda and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage this month! In addition to the Febregency readathon, I will also be co-hosting a readalong of The Long Loneliness by Dorothy Day for Lent - but I might wait until early March to start that so that I can focus on the Regency Era throughout February.
Happy reading, friends!