Monthly Archives: February 2017

Reading In Eden: My Experience As The ‘Innocent Reader’, by Sarah Waite

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In our very first seminar, a question was raised which struck me as something that I had never fully considered before: when was the last time you picked up a book and read it without knowing anything at all about it? Well, of course I’ve read many books, the plots of which I’ve not known about beforehand, despite today’s TV culture which has serialized nearly every book that has a penguin stamp on it. However, the question got me thinking about how exactly I decide on which books to read and devote my time to.

Imagine I’m perusing a library, or a bookshop. I’d like to picture myself in a quirky secondhand shop where the books smell of moths and chewing tobacco, rather than suffering under the fluorescent glare of a WHSmith. Of course, first and foremost, I read the title. I need it to grab my attention and, I will admit, I am notorious for judging the book by its cover (I clearly learnt nothing from my primary school PSHCE lessons – Sorry Miss Salisbury!). I’m a tactile person so a book with embossed lettering or a crisp, matt sleeve is probably what my fingers will settle on first as I run my hands along the row of spines sitting upon the shelf. Secondly, I’ll flip the book over. Read the blurb. I like to have a clear idea of genre, plot and target audience, just to see if the book fits. For me, reading the blurb is like trying on a pair of jeans in a shop changing room. If it looks good, and suits my style, I’ll buy. Now who has made the commendations? If anyone from the Guardian has given it a thumbs up then I’m sure to keep hold of it. If I see the words “Daily Mail”, that book is going right back on the shelf without a second glance. Usually I will stick to the authors which I’ve heard of before and perhaps I’ve read some of their other work. Or I will select the authors which other people, whom I admire (or whom I loathe and have a secret wish to trump intellectually) have recommended to me. Book chosen, tea made, and scented candle lit, I’ll begin as most of us do, unless you possess the virtuous patience and discipline it takes to read the preface, with Chapter One. But if after twenty or so pages the book is not kindling that flutter of intrigue which occurs when I get hooked on a good story, and I find myself checking my Facebook notifications every other paragraph, then I’m afraid I will never meet Chapter Two.

So I came up with an idea. What if I actually tried reading a book that I had never encountered? Never seen the book on a best-seller’s list, never heard of anyone else reading it, never come across the writer, wasn’t even familiar with the title, let alone knew anything about its content. I thought it would make a good experiment to further consider exactly how we read and how our preconceptions of a book inform our overall understanding of it and affect our reading experience.

Even picking up a book ‘randomly’ myself would be in some small way informed by all my prejudices. So I recruited a friend (who studies Natural Sciences and stays away from the library like a vampire does the sun) to go into the forum on our Streatham campus and choose for me a book to read. She reported back five minutes later with Not Not While The Giro by James Kelman. Never heard of it. It took all my willpower not to turn the book over and start scanning the back for information, but I simply opened the front cover and started to read.

I read for about an hour and I thoroughly enjoyed the session. Not having any prior expectations made the reading experience a relaxing one, and instead of taking in the words while simultaneously evaluating whether the book was living up to reviews, or anticipating the plot that was promised in the blurb, I just read. Each chapter introduced me to new characters and presented me with a short moment of interaction; a conversation with an old man in a pub, whose drinking partner was found dead in his apartment, a brusque Irish man collecting money from a Labour exchange, an awkward date in a bachelor house which resulted in a merciless eviction. I was not entirely clear when it was set or who these people were and what their connection to each other was, which often made me feel disorientated, yet this encouraged my imagination to run on and construct a story in my head. The more I read, the more I began to piece things together and locate myself, but I found overall that my interpretation of the book was freed up noticeably more than in regular reading experiences.

What I found surprisingly exciting about this mode of ‘innocent’ reading was that the book in question was not something that I would have actively chosen to read myself. I was taken out of my comfort zone and forced to read a work that was heavy with dialogue and lacked long descriptive paragraphs that establish character and backstory. It felt more like reading scenes in a play than chapters in a novel, and I found the overall tone of the book rather terse. The book was clearly not aimed at my demographic (the young female reader) as many of the references to football teams, watery ales and war veterans went over my head. But I have to say I was pleased that I gave it a chance and will probably keep reading to the end.

So I would recommend having a go at this exercise. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with some context, but I believe that we as readers should aim to be a bit more conscious of what is preventing us from trying new things!

Marilynne Robinson and Community, by Nick Ricketts

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Marilynne Robinson describes herself as a Calvinist.  An image of John Knox hectoring his congregation on their evil ways and their imminent consignment to hellfire and damnation if they fail to amend their lives has been my view of Calvinism.  There is the cry of the damned, “Lord, have mercy, relieve us from this torment; we did’na ken”, with the Calvinist God’s reply, “Well, ye ken the noo”!  It seems I have been misled about Calvinism or, more likely, not understood.  Marilynne Robinson is someone who has a deep feeling for her fellow man or woman and a strong belief in the essence of community.  She does not come across as someone who would recommend anyone for the fiery furnace – though she might make an exception for the defenders of Austerity!

 

Lila is a story about understanding and love.  By modern standards, I had a deprived childhood, with a lack of stability and few personal possessions, yet I couldn’t begin to understand how someone like Lila really views the world.  This may also be true of Marilynne Robinson, but her portrayal of Lila’s insecurity and lack of trust rings true to me.  Lila’s ‘family’ – if that’s what they are – cares not a jot for her and she is literally carried through her childhood in the arms of Doll, living with itinerant labourers and gaining a modicum of education before finding herself in a whorehouse following Doll’s disappearance and probable death.  We discussed whether Lila was vulnerable or confident and it seemed to me that these were not mutually exclusive.  I felt she was desperately vulnerable, yet had a confidence in her views of what was right.  She lacked trust, yet was prepared to face uncertain and potentially dangerous situations, and was remarkably open.  She didn’t hesitate to tell Reverend Ames that she didn’t know her real name and had worked in a whorehouse, perhaps to test whether he was serious about wanting to marry her.  Maybe she felt that if she held anything back, it would give him a reason to abandon her, as Doane had done, but she still kept mentally preparing herself for having to move right until her baby was born.

 

Lila also looks at community and what it means.  The first community that we are introduced to at the start of the book reads like a bunch of no-hopers camped out in a shack.  Doll is the only one of the group prepared to make any effort and, for no apparent reason, decides to take off with Lila.  They fetch up with the itinerant labourers led by Doane, who has a definite sense of honesty and that a job should be done properly, but he has no time for education or religion, or any real sense of communal responsibility.  The whorehouse is a community based on obligation to Mrs, from which Lila manages to escape and finds herself in the community of Gilead, in which Reverend Ames is the leading character.

 

Marilynne Robinson’s strong belief in the importance of community becomes clearer in When I was a Child I read Books.  This set of essays includes a strong religious flavour that deal with interpretations of passages in the Bible.  However, Robinson also deals with contemporary issues, such as austerity, the value of money and education.  The essay entitled Austerity as Ideology is a ferocious assault on the economic policies of Western governments, more especially since the financial debacle of 2008 and how the perpetrators have been able to transfer the consequences so that people’s livelihoods and education have been sacrificed while they have been able to increase their own wealth and influence.  There is a hint of the conspiracy theory in Who was Oberlin? where Robinson talks about C Street where “… men active in the national government … (are) … apparently devoted to the project of putting political power to the uses of an authoritarian or theocratic version of Christianity.”  This was written before 2012 and it seems that recent events may have borne this out.

Safety in (page)Numbers, by Simon Marshall

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It might be with not having done English in a little while.

And by ‘done English’, I crudely mean to have been sat reading, and really reading; be thinking about what I’m reading and its merits and lack thereof. Knowing I’d then sit with a group of people, discuss, debate and compromise with them, in aid of a module.

It might be because of that time apart (although my Drama term definitely covered those processes in a way; with the discussing, debating and compromising being on its feet, rather than sat down. And the acting making it then inhabiting those struggles on their feet, rather than talking them into the room and then politely escorting them out as with a seminar.)

It might be that because of all this, with my last time reading a novel for a class technically having been March 2016… that returning to books for this module, has felt a little like coming home.

I’ve had chance to grow attached to literature again, without something feeling at risk.
When rehearsing a play, your understanding of the words feels somewhat vulnerable, especially when knowing this would then be assessed. When writing, your understanding of your own words is all well and good, but it really is a guessing game for when put in front of someone else. With my playscripts recently, I have enjoyed rereading them, but I have feared for how, or whether they would land. Or equally, I have thought back on the successes and the surprises when they became vocalised, and felt relieved or nervous.

I’ve realised reading is much safer. Safer for me.
Lila, especially, may have cast me out onto a dusty path in 20th Century Midwest America, but gosh I loved the company. Something about the intimacy of Marilynne Robinson’s indirect third person, or the palpability of the three-dimensional, and yet faceless character of Lila, really caught me. Insisted I stayed close. For safety perhaps. Mine and hers.

As I mentioned in the seminar, I felt taught by the novel. This echoes Johanna’s comments of how we are occasionally not told enough to just read, and to use reading to help inform our own voice as writers. I have mixed thoughts about that, but definitely agree Lila has shaped my understanding of the easy power good writing can have over those receiving it.

This feeling of being taught also surfaced for me in the measured humanity of the novel. It’s rare you encounter a piece of fiction that seems to impart the sense of a life so completely as Lila does. How eventually, through the character, I feel you come to understand the notion of grace.

I also agree with the critics who observed how Robinson ‘slows’ the process of reading. My experience with Lila very much captured what Eliot conjured in Mill on the Floss, of how being being curled up with a book is similar to being aware of ‘a great curtain of sound’ being drawn around you. You are held.
Yet, escapism as it may be, you are still your actual self when reading. You encounter the book on the terms of who you were and what you were experiencing.

I feel there is something for me in how I was ill when I began the book, and feel better upon finishing it. For falling for reading again.

A Short List of Things That Moved Me, by Bethany Ashley

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This morning’s lecture certainly gave me a lot to think about regarding reading and emotion. I am not a passive reader. When I read, I expect to feel some sort of emotional response, even if this is resentment or critique that the author clearly should’ve got with a different angle. I often find myself talking through a text. Sometimes ohh that is nice phrase / yes I like that / why did they do that? More recently, I have come to write particular phrases down on post-its notes and stick them around my writing space. I don’t necessarily analyse them but keep them in the back of my mind.

Being purposeful to include a variety of forms, I have created a short list below of things that have moved me, at various points in my life.

All of these things began life as texts in one draft or another.

Lazarus Original Cast Recording

This is not the David Bowie version but Lazarus is instead sung by Michael C. Hall of Hedwig, Dexter, and Six Feet Under Fame. This opens with dark and powerful notes that transport me someplace else whenever it appears on my shuffle.

This song reminds me to stay grounded, and focus on what is happening in front of me. I saw the musical at King’s Cross Theatre on a day trip up to London during exam week. It is a very experimental show and whilst my Dad loved it, and I loved the soundtrack I wasn’t sure if I was going to quite get the show. However, when this was played early on, I knew I could settle in and relax for the rest of the show.

Fun Home – Alison Bechdel

Fun Home

Fun Home the Musical was adapted from Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel about a lesbian cartoonist navigating her father’s death and introduction to college.

Last year my best friend, who was graduating, and I decided to spend our term three student loan on a trip to New York to do something a little crazy before she went. We ended up going to the show but didn’t sit together. It was actually performed in the round, and she had been worried that tickets would sell out so wanted to buy them from the hotel. I didn’t want to spend that much money and knew they wouldn’t so I bought them later in the day.

So whilst, I ended up front row, she ended up many seats back quite a bit to the left of me. This is the one on the list that really made me cry, probably more accurate to say sobbing. When we met in the foyer, both of us were crying and every single time we stopped, would mention something else we loved that would set us off again. My playbill is actually tearstained.

The Woman in Black

The Woman in Black

I studied The Woman in Black in Year 10 for Drama GCSE. I was young, impressionable and had been to the theatre quite often since an even younger age. I had also never been so scared in my entire life. We sat in the stall, deeply immersed in the fog, loud noise, and occasional Woman in Black aisle appearance. I have never heard so many swear words or seen so many people fall out of their seats.

I also came out of it mildly traumatised. I didn’t sleep properly for weeks. And could barely remember the second act from hiding behind my scarf. Yet it still remains to be one of the greatest pieces of theatre I have ever encountered. The film with Daniel Radcliffe was released on DVD, a couple of years ago, and we tried to watch it as a family. Within the first five minutes, I cried and screamed at Mum to turn it off, much to the hysterical laughter of my sister.

I’ve decided The Woman in Black is just one of those films I will never get to see.

The Book of Strange New Things – Michael Faber

The Book of Strange New Things Cover Art

I actually read this book accidentally. I had been left in a train station in the Netherlands by a friend of mine for several hours. It was cold but I hadn’t had the chance to just sit and read uninterrupted for a long term so went to the bookshop to choose something. The blurb was the reason I was slightly confused after the first chapter: “Peter Leigh is called on a journey of a lifetime, a highly unusual humanitarian mission into deep space”. I saw space, and understood mission to be a specific task, rather than as a religious missionary. I can’t actually recall reading any science fiction before, so why I even chose this I’m not sure.

Peter is there to bring religion to the aliens. This was a concept I found fascinating and the discussion of linguistics and communications was enough to keep me more than entertained throughout. I do feel dissatisfied at the ending but just because it wasn’t what I wanted to happen, doesn’t mean that it wasn’t a good ending and I think I have come to accept this.

This is a book that I want to re-read knowing that I know the plot. I want to focus on the structure of the novel and the characterisation of Peter. I would recommend it to everyone who is even a little intrigued by the premise.

Homewrecker – Ocean Vuong

Night Sky With Exit Wounds

If I get the opportunity to talk poetry, I will often head straight to my favourite contemporary American/Vietnamese poet Ocean Vuong, who actually has a real life poetic name.

Homewrecker is taken from his debut collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds and it is beautiful.

You can (and should) read the full text here: https://linebreak.org/poems/home-wrecker/

As a warning, don’t listen to the audio available.It isn’t Ocean speaking and in my opinion, doesn’t do justice to the poem. Ocean naturally has quite a lilting and softly spoken voice that contrasts with his vivid and powerful imagery. His balance of rhythm, metaphor and anaphora create a strong sense of time and place. I particularly enjoy …’your fingers / sweeping through my hair –my hair a wildfire’ and ‘in the museum of the heart / there are two headless people building a burning house’.

Ocean is about the same age as me but already has such a craft of language that I could sit for several hours flicking through his collection and constantly find something new to underline, something else to wish I had written.

Hopefully you will enjoy this list, and the variety of emotions it will bring. I’d love to hear what things have moved you at various points in your lives.

Catherine Morland Would Have a Goodreads Account by Lizzy Flood

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In one of our earlier classes, I was surprised to learn that libraries were in their earliest days designed to be as much a place to be seen as a place to read. I think, in general, people today associate reading with a more introverted existence. A more reserved person’s ideal night is often excusing themselves from going out to stay in with a good book. E-readers now have also made it possible for most people to get their hands on a new book without leaving their home.

But while reading Northanger Abbey, I was struck by the social role that reading took in that novel. One of the first foundations of Catherine and Isabel’s friendship is when they find out they have the same taste in gothic novels and spend the whole day inside together reading them. It is also reaffirming to Catherine when Tilney acknowledges the joy in reading novels, rather than more practical and instructional histories. It strengthens their bond and, to me, is further proof of how well they work together.

While socially we now are now more connected than ever, sometimes it feels like reading and books get excluded from that. Thinking on it later though, I realized I belong to what functions as kind of a virtual library and a social network at the same time with the specific idea of what you’re reading being seen and advertised to others: Goodreads.

Goodreads is an online network where you can rate and review books you’ve read. It also lets you mark books you want to read one day. It is a place to organize and keep track of what you read. Also a place, for me at least, to sometimes procrastinate actual reading.

Goodreads takes the books you read and puts them in a public space where others can scroll through what you’ve read and how you liked it in a matter of minutes. I personally find Goodreads so addicting and love how it makes up for my own lack of organizational skills. If I can’t remember the name of a book I got from the library three years ago about a prisoner of war, all I need is to go look through my books and see that it was Unbroken.

The numerical 5 star rating system is tricky, though. Some books I’ve read and have really enjoyed I find myself giving three stars to while other books that I didn’t like so much I find myself giving four or five to simply because they’re considered to be of a higher literary merit. With the rating system, it’s hard to know if I should be rating purely on how good I thought a book was or how much I enjoyed it.

Writing reviews though allows me to fully explain what the book meant or how I saw it in the moment. I love also going through others’ (mostly strangers) reviews. Reading reviews of books that you love and seeing how others are able to capture what makes those books so great is an addicting experience that isn’t available that much outside of a college classroom or possibly a book club.

It’s also refreshing to read reviews that are just by other ordinary readers. Reading movie reviews in the paper or talking about books in class both usually involve some level of critical analysis, references to theories from people who have studied film or literature academically. Sometimes it’s just nice to read about someone saying they really enjoyed this book because they found the main character relatable and it helped them through a bad break-up. It reminds me of how it is okay to just read for fun sometimes and that it is okay that if, like Catherine, not every book I read is the most educational.

Dividing fact from fiction, by John Stafford

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Referring to the unclear dividing fact and fiction in literature, Zunshine writes:
“Think of our own bookshops’ commitment to carefully demarcating shelves containing fiction from those containing non-fiction, even though the former offer plenty of information that deserves to be assimilated by our cognitive systems as architecturally true, and the latter contains a broad variety of cultural fictions (just consider treatises on dating and dieting).(Zunshine, Lisa, Why we read books, Section 5 of Part 1, Location 1314 in Kindle version)

This has had legal implications: the authors of “The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail” took Dan Brown to court claiming that Brown had plagiarised the framework of their book for “The Da Vinci Code”. The court ruled that because “Holy Blood” was alleged by its authors to be history, its premises could be interpreted in any fictional work without any copyright infringement (Wikipedia, edited)

Thus if it’s non-fiction, the facts can’t be copyright!

John Stafford

Richard Hoggart’s ‘The Uses of Literacy’, by Emily Wheeler

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Hi everyone, I just saw this article today and the sub-title caught my eye;

“How did our culture became so polarised – and what can Richard Hoggart’s The Uses of Literacy, written 60 years ago, teach us about how we live today?”

It seemed like it might be interesting in light of our module and seminar discussions, so I read on…

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/feb/18/lynsey-hanley-brexit-britain-divided-culture-uses-of-literacy

“The Uses of Literacy, published 60 years ago next month, was his second and by far his most famous book. In it, Hoggart argued that collective engagement in a project of civic literacy would grow naturally out of the increasing education of the working classes, and that knowledge really would translate into power.”

This has similar themes and concept to some of my Sociology work on mass culture production, including the mass-production of literature. The article describes how the ‘marketing man’ began to “take an unalloyed good like universal literacy and turn it into an expedient for selling mass culture – books, movies and songs created as if in a laboratory with a clinical focus on appealing to the greatest number.”

…”Hoggart’s definition of mass product was something that contained no emotional truth – nothing that could be measured or felt as real, however painful that reality might be to confront – because it was produced by people who believed their audience had no ability or desire to detect that truth. “Sex-and-violence novels,” he wrote, epitomised “an endless and hopeless tail-chasing evasion of the personality”, a description that could have been taken from a review of Fifty Shades of Grey.”

In particular, the comment about ‘sex and violence novels’ reminded me of our lecture and seminar discussions yesterday. To what extent is it true that writers just write what the publishers want to publish? For me, this doesn’t feel like the way that Robinson has approached Lila, and gathering from the seminar discussions this is partly why we all valued her integrity and writing style.

Anyway, I just thought that the article was an interesting link between reading, community and contemporary culture, and wanted to share it with you all,

Emily

On Pilgrim’s Progress, by Nick Ricketts

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I would like to comment on two aspects of the Pilgrim’s Progress workshop. Bob Owens implied that the characters who tried to divert Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress were meant to represent aspects of the establishment, particularly the Anglican Church. I could see what he meant by that, but I have always thought they represented Christian’s internal conflicts. The second aspect concerns the differences in mind-set between the England of the 17th century and today. We talked about today’s secularism, but didn’t really explore how Pilgrim’s Progress might have been read at the time. Religion formed the background to much of daily life and I see a strong millennial flavour in the idea that Christian, and later Christiana, were ‘fleeing from the wrath to come’ towards the Celestial City. It took the 18th century Enlightenment to really question that and two World Wars to significantly affect people’s views on Heaven and Hell.

A blog post about happiness, by Emma Bingham

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Ahh happiness. It sounds so simple doesn’t it?

I don’t think I ever thought I would be writing something public about what I think happiness means to me. Because that’s the thing about being happy, it is really personal. What makes one person happy won’t make another person feel quite the same, and as a result I don’t want this post to become a guide, or even some sort of ‘Agony Aunt’ advice clinic. Rather, this is just me, having been inspired by a wonderful lecture on literature and happiness, trying to work out what I think being happy means to me.

So here goes…

Why do we want to be happy?

It seems like being happy is the new craze. From feel good playlists on Spotify, to bullet journaling accounts on Tumblr, to Humans of New York’s inspirational photo stories on Instagram, to videos of real-life heroes on Facebook, to my new Positively Pooh book I got for my birthday, it seems like society is saturated with ideas on how to be happy, the importance of being happy, and of other people’s happiness.

Yet, on the flip side, within this bombardment of happiness is the potential of putting pressure on people to be happy, even when they’re not. Sometimes, pretending that we are happy could result in things getting worse.

Late last year, I went to watch a musical called A Pacifist’s Guide to the War on Cancer.

Yup, it was a musical about cancer.

I was intrigued to say the least. However, confident in the abilities of The National Theatre, Complicité, and director Bryony Kimmings, I went with two friends to go and see it.

There are enough reviews online that will tell you how inspiring, sensitive, heart breaking, self-aware and honest this production was. Never in my life have I been moved by a piece of theatre. There was not one member of the audience who was not crying, and not just crying, I mean crying.

However, I would like to draw attention to one moment in the performance that responds to this idea of what it means to be happy. In one song, the cast (whose characters were in fact entirely representative of real people), sang about social media’s influence on how cancer patients think about cancer. The song made a poignant criticism of the many videos online that show cancer patients being brave, strong, resilient, and happy. The song acknowledged that cancer is not like this all the time, and sometimes you don’t want to be brave, you need to let yourself feel like shit.

And this applies not just to the issues being debated within the musical, but to everything.

The importance of being happy is being delivered to us in bucket load. Even the government have invested in the understanding of the impact of happiness through their Public Happiness and Wellbeing Agenda.

And I don’t want to criticise this. I think it is brilliant that we are becoming so much more aware of the importance of being happy, and finding your own happiness. It just makes me wonder to what extent does the world around me shape my desire to be happy, and whether, by extension, the desire to be happy has shaped who I am.

What does happiness mean to me?

I think I first started becoming hyper aware of my desire for happiness when I was doing my A Levels, I presume in response to my record levels of stress! Having gone through a stressful time in my life, I came out the other side with a desire, not necessarily to be happy, but to be the best and happiest version of me. And this is a thought process that has persisted ever since.

I recognised that ‘stressed Emma’ was not who I wanted to be. I would push away those closest to me and shut myself off from everything. And I’m not like that. And more importantly I don’t like being like that.

Over the years (that sounds like I am old and wise, I am neither old nor wise), I have worked out that I absolutely love making other people smile, and I think this has significantly shaped how I have grown up (though I like to think I am not yet fully grown). Anything that I can do to make others feel happy, results in me feeling happy too.

And this isn’t anything profound. It’s just little things like being bubbly and energetic when you can see that those around you are super tired, just to try and perk them up. Or it’s smiling at someone when you’re all in a really nervy situation, waiting outside an audition room for example, just to show them that you’re nervous too, but it’s going to be okay. None of the things I do on a daily basis are big gestures, but I think I get so much happiness out of trying to make others feel happy and at ease.

I’m not sure that makes any sense. I suppose a lot of my ‘positive thinking’ links to the people I am around, truly valuing those people, and wanting to make them happy.

I know someone who can explain this far better.

The problems of my version of happiness

I would argue that I am a happy person. And when it comes to other people, I am super duper positive. In fact, I believe in my closest friends and family more than I believe in myself.

And there’s the paradox.

Yes I would say that I am happy, but at the same time I am acutely aware that I have low self-esteem, and I often am rather pessimistic when it comes to my own endeavours.

So I suppose sometimes my positivity towards others can be mistaken for me having a positive and optimistic outlook on my own life.

Now I don’t want to dwell here. But this begs the question of how I can feel happy, but still struggle to feel proud of myself, or confident, or calm in stressful situations.

And I suppose, now I think about it, that’s because happiness and positivity are different. If happiness for me is mostly an external process, defined more so by the happiness of others, then positivity is a much more internal thing for me.

So when something gets me down, I don’t think that means I am unhappy necessarily. Instead, the feeling I have is more closely linked to self-esteem and positivity.

HOWEVER

(Let’s move on before this gets depressing)

I am totally aware of this aspect of my personality. As a result I consciously work towards trying to raise my self-esteem and feel more positive about myself. In fact, being happy in general really helps me with this, because happiness gives me the energy, determination, enthusiasm, and support to do so.

The Little Things

There are lots of little things that I do purposely, though now they feel more like habit, to make me feel more happy, and in turn more positive and confident. I have compiled them into a list, perfectly illustrating one of the things I do to make myself feel more self-confident: I write lists.

  • Having close relationships and cherishing my nearest and dearest. I am a super lucky human being because I am surrounded by the most wonderful, lovely, kind, generous, fun, determined and ambitious group of people in the whole entire world.
  • Gratitude diary  Everyday, I write one thing in my gratitude diary that has gone well. That means that even if I think my day has been horrible, I have to find something good in it. And do you know what? I always do! The things in my diary range from ‘The man who was singing out loud while walking down the high street listening to music through headphones’ to ‘IT’S CHRIIIIIIIIIISTMAAAAAAAS!!!!’ to ‘I had the perfect day at the Donkey Sanctuary with the housemates’. Again, nothing profound, just the little things.
  • Planning and organising  I LOVE ORGANISING! It is my favourite thing. Everything is colour-coded. I have lots of stationary. At the top of my weekly plan, I always write a positive thought and a song lyric. It’s just a little something I have added to increase the positivity out of something that already fills me with joy.
  • emma bingham
    • Photographs, memories and trinkets  I have photos all over my room. It means that the first thing I see when I wake up are the people who I love the most in the world. I am someone who does place importance on anything with a memory attached to it. Which explain the slightly terrifying mini-figure of the Loch Ness Monster on my shelf…
    • Doing the things that I love  I sing in a choir, I sing in the shower (sorry housemates), I go to the theatre, I do yoga in the morning and fall over a lot, I eat a lot of chocolate, I watch ‘Naked Attraction’ with my housemates, I like to sit with my legs crossed by my head like a pretzel, I will always opt for the cosy night in over the crazy night out, I do pole fitness (no Nanny, it is not my ‘back-up plan’ for if everything goes wrong post-graduation)… And I do a degree that I love.
    • Take some risks and always try your best Sometimes you have to push yourself out of your comfort zone.
    • Not all days will be good days Off days are normal and they happen all the time. I am gradually learning to accept that some days won’t be as productive, or full of joy, or energetic as others, and that’s allowed.
    • I smile… a lot

    Tah-dah!

    So that’s my big splurge about my own view of happiness. And do you know what?

    I am feeling pretty happy now I have written it 🙂

Catherine Morland, my new best friend, by Emma Bingham

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I am one of those humans who has mixed feelings about Jane Austen… don’t kill me. Ironically, Catherine, the protagonist of Austen’s first written though last published novel puts the reason for this best:

‘If people like to read their books, it is all very well, but to be at so much trouble in filling great volumes, which, as I used to think, nobody would willingly ever look into, to be labouring only for the torment of little boys and girls, always struck me as hard fate’ (Austen, 79).

Like Catherine was forced to read history books, at school I was forced to read Austen. As much as I loved Pride and Prejudice the first time I read it, after two years of analysing the narratology and the stress of having to retake the exam, Austen became a ‘torment’ rather than a joy.

However…

I absolutely love Northanger Abbey. Not only is it hilarious, it is perceptive, subtle and hard to put down. To me, this is Austen at her best. Catherine has to be one of my favourite literary characters. Here is why…

‘… for they were in general very plain, and Catherine, for many years of her life, as plain as any… She could never learn or understand anything before she was taught; and sometimes not even then, for she was often inattentive, and occasionally stupid’ (Austen, 3).

Cutting perhaps, but I love this description. Catherine is just normal. She sounds just like me, or you, or anyone. She’s not the strong willed, bright eyed Elizabeth, or the forthright, out spoken Emma. She’s plain old Catherine, and I love that.

Northanger Abbey follows Catherine’s adventures on her first trip to Bath. With her nose in Ann Radcliffe’s gothic romance, The Mysteries of Udolpho, she meets lots of different people on her trip, including eligible bachelor Henry Tilney. When she is invited to stay at his family’s abbey, she cannot contain her excitement. A real abbey! Just like the ones she reads about! What follows are events that neither Catherine, nor the reader could have predicted…

Austen supplies many different ways to interpret this book. Is it a critique of reading for pleasure? Is it a critique of gothic romance? Is it a critique of readers? Or is it a critique of society?

Who knows? But by looking more closely at Catherine Morland’s character, I hope to get a little closer to answering these questions.

Catherine – the ultimate fan girl?

I read Catherine as the ultimate fan girl. Urban Dictionary defines a ‘fan girl’ as follows:

‘A rabid breed of human female who is obsessed with either a fictional character or an actor. Similar to the breed of fanboy. Fangirls congregate at anime conventions and livejournal. Have been known to glomp, grope, and tackle when encountering said obsessions.

Hugh Jackman: ‘ello.

Fangirl: SQUEEEEEE! *immediately attaches to Jackman’s leg*

Jackman: Security!’

I don’t think Catherine’s preconceptions of Northanger Abbey or her actions when she arrives are much less extreme than the above definition illustrates. Rather than ‘SQUEEEEEE’ at Hugh Jackman, she follows in the footsteps of her gothic heroines, echoing their language and actions almost precisely, as if she is following a set of instructions.

‘This is strange indeed! I did not expect such a sight as this! – An immense heavy chest! – What can it hold? – Why should it be placed here? – Pushed back too, as if meant to be out of sight! – I will look into it – cost me what it may, I will look into it – and directly too – by daylight. – If I stay till evening my candle may go out.’ (Austen, 118).

Catherine’s actions here are very funny, and we laugh at her even more when all she discovers is ‘a white cotton counterpane, properly folded’ (Austen 119). But why are we laughing at her? Are her actions embarrassing, or even dangerous and deluded?

During these moments, the narrative voice seems to drastically change. Austen is known for her cutting authorial intrusion, yet in Catherine’s little gothic fantasy, Austen seems to hide her authoritative voice, giving the impression that Catherine is now leading the plot, the heroine in her own story. The reader becomes deeply aligned to Catherine, and is given an insight into her imagination, with Austen only obviously critiquing Catherine’s naivety when Catherine herself has realised her folly. This allows us to become as deeply immersed in Catherine’s narrative as she is, even when we begin to distrust Catherine’s deductions, we are still engaged and wanting to know what the anti-climax will be this time!

Perhaps as she progresses deeper and deeper into her gothic fantasy, blames General Tilney of murder and takes it upon herself to explore the private sections of the abbey, we do become angry at Catherine’s naivety. Certainly, as I was reading the novel, I began to become frustrated as Catherine began to fixate on her goal to uncover ‘the truth’ about General Tilney the murderer at the expense of her friendship with Eleanor Tilney and respect for the family. When asking Eleanor about her mother, rather than support her clearly dejected, upset and lonely friend, Catherine instead invasively enquires ‘Was she a very charming woman? Was she handsome? Was there a picture of her in the Abbey? And why had she been so partial to that grove? Was it from dejection from spirits?’ (Austen, 131). Furthermore, her confidence that the General must have been cruel to his wife just because he has not hung her picture up in the house is immature and naïve; I couldn’t help thinking that perhaps the General is still grieving and therefore cannot face looking at his dead wife’s picture.

Despite this, I find it very hard to be too critical of Catherine’s actions. I think really a lot of the reason I find her character amusing and warm to her so quickly is because I see myself in her.

Even now, when I visit somewhere new I want to explore. I remember the first time I visited my Granny and Papa’s new house; they have loads of cupboards that connect behind the walls, and in those cupboards are loads of their old clothes, books, and other random items. I used to explore there all the time with my cousin, making up stories, playing hide and seek, and trying to find Papa’s secret stash of fudge. Still, this Christmas, I played these exact same games with my little cousins at Granny and Papa’s house. I don’t think you ever really grow out of this want to explore, or this ability to create a fiction out of what is around you, just because it is fun and exciting. I can hardly blame Catherine for her false deductions when I did the same.

So is what Catherine is doing really that bad? She is so fascinated by the books she reads she gets excited about visiting places in those books, just like I get super excited about travelling in London now I have watched the BBC series of Sherlock…

I don’t think, therefore, that Austen is critiquing Catherine the reader, or the books that she is reading. If anything, Catherine’s imagination helps her to learn to be happy in the ‘real world’. I suppose, in a way, books for Catherine are a bit like Instagram or vlogs for us. Sometimes it can be difficult to separate yourself from what you see online, or what you read in books. Perhaps, it is only through learning about how to separate yourself from this and find happiness in your own life that we can go on Instagram or read the magazines and be positively, rather than negatively influenced by them. This is the lesson that Catherine learns – to be happy with what she has.