Ramblings
On this grey-drizzle day we arrived at Tanners Lane beach
just as the intrepid kite-surfers were packing up for the afternoon.
These friendly gentlemen were happy to talk about the wind and the weather while I explained that in producing my daily blog I accepted whatever I was given.
This evening we all dined on Jackie’s delicious, wholesome, chicken and vegetable stewp.
For Ellie, like all young children, dogs, and cats, there is often more pleasure in the container than in a present.
She really loves hiding – behind a curtain, under a scarf around her head, beneath a stack of cushions, peeking round a door – in fact anything will do as long as she imagines she can’t be seen. In her nascent language this activity is termed “hidey”.
When she began hiding in an Amazon box, her mother converted this to a Hidey House and labelled it accordingly. On the day she dived into it rather too exuberantly Jackie repaired it with duct tape and it continued its usage until Flo remembered a different structure which, beginning with Louisa’s two children, our granddaughters Jessica and Imogen, now 17 and 15, has entertained a series of young visitors.
Flo brought it down from a cupboard upstairs and, with delighted hindrance from her daughter, erected it and set it up in place of the now redundant box.
With windows and a door, the tent-like structure can now accommodate parents possessing the required flexibility.
This evening we dined on smoked haddock fish cakes, Jackie’s ratatouille and piquant cauliflower cheese, creamy mashed potatoes, carrots, peas, and sweetcorn, with which I drank more of the Chateâuneuf.
A brief walk around the garden today featured
a variety of pink and red camellias, a daffodil, several hellebores and Daphne Odoratas.
This evening we all dined on KFC bargain buckets, sides, and fries, with which I drank Héritages Châteauneuf-du- Pape 2021.
Asya is the title of the third story in The Folio Society’s collection of tales of Love and Death.
It tells of how love can be missed for lack of courage to express what one really feels.
Our main protagonist, recovering from having been rejected by a flirt whom he had taken seriously fails to speak his mind to a young woman who, for her own reasons, cannot express what is in hers. During the first half there is a developing mystery concerning Asya’s erratic behaviour until its causes are revealed. Hopes are then raised about a positive outcome, which is not to be.
Once again we have insights into the mind of the narrator, and those of the brother and sister to whom he is drawn.
Descriptions of the countryside; the river Rhine, alternatively with sparkling or dark waves depending on the time of day or the weather; and on the appearance and clothing of the personnel are very well depicted. “The moon, it seemed, would stare down fixedly at [the town] out of a clear sky….and keep still and so quietly exciting to the soul”, while, on another occasion, “The sun had just set and its delicate crimson light rested on the green vines, the tall stems, on the dry earth strewn with large and small stones and on the white wall of a small cottage with sloping black beams and four bright little windows which stood on the very top of the hill we were climbing” show us the effect of differing light and dark. As usual, all the senses are engaged, as in “the delicate smell of resin in the forests, the singing and the tapping of woodpeckers, the inexhaustible babbling of glittering little streams with varicoloured trout on their sandy bottoms….”
Although the ending seems inevitable, we are disappointed when it arrives.
Elisa Trimby’s illustrations are as faithful as ever.
This evening we all dined on tender roast lamb; crisp roast potatoes and parsnips, Yorkshire pudding; firm cauliflower and broccoli; crunchy carrots; and tasty gravy, with which I finished the merlot.
Yesterday Flo cleaned the inside of our French widows. Today
Jackie cleaned the outside. Becky popped out to investigate.
This evening we all dined on oven fish and chips, onion rings, mushy peas, and baked beans with which Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Merlot
Today the weather was bright, sunny, and somewhat cooler.
Jackie and I took a late afternoon forest drive.
A pair of mallards perched on the branches reflected in the first of these images from Pilley lake jumped off as I arrived, while a toy cow waited patiently for a bus.
A group of donkeys wandered along Jordans Lane
On a hill up Beaulieu Road a pony became silhouetted against the traffic.
Ponies cropped the moorland grass alongside Holmsley Road.
Later, I posted
This evening we all dined on Jackie’s tasty lemon chicken, sautéed potatoes and mixed veg; and crisp broccoli with which she drank Puglia Fiano 2021 and I drank Réserve Pierre Merlot 2021.
This second tale in the Folio Society’s selection of Ivan Turgenev’s stories of Love and Death tells of serfdom, of a clumsily arranged marriage, of rivalry; of unrequited love, of a submissive and fearful young lady; of love between a handicapped giant and a small spaniel; and of the ultimate sacrifice of a man obeying orders.
“He took a strong dislike to his new way of life at first. From childhood he had been used to working in the fields and to country life. Alienated by his misfortune from other people’s company, he grew up dumb and powerful like a tree growing in fertile soil … Transported to the city, he couldn’t understand what was happening to him, and he grew homesick and perplexed like a young and healthy bull that has just been taken from the pasture where the succulent grass grows as high as his stomach – has been and put in a railway wagon, his full round body being at the mercy of spark-filled smoke and waves of steam, and is being rushed along with a great clanking and whistling, rushed along – God knows where!”
The quotation above gives examples of the author’s descriptive style, packed with simile. The isolation of a man born deaf and the powerlessness of of a serf, however physically strong, to do other than obey his owner, is narrated with insightful empathy – understanding totally lacking in this woman who expects to be obeyed in the question of the arranged marriage bound to create conflict among those bound to her beck and call at any time of the day or night.
We have two more of Elisa Trimby’s lithographs faithfully capturing characters’ expressions.
The six stories in this collection from the work of Ivan Turgenev are almost novella length. Beginning with “The Diary of a Superfluous Man” I will review them separately.
The format is of a diary written by a dying man, an unrequited lover, more significantly a self identified redundant human being. The author’s fine descriptive prose; incorporating all the senses, notably sight, smell, and hearing; presenting the environment the natural world, and personalities in the most crucial stages of his life. The weather plays its part in setting the mood.
He begins with childhood bereavement and consequent lifelong grief pervading his last two weeks. Above all, Turgenev offers the deepest thoughts of his protagonist, As a child his “tears would flow down effortlessly just like water from a brimming glass.” As an adult he becomes tongue tied at important moments.
We are treated to a fine uplifting account of the emotions of the diarist at the moment he fell in love with an ordinary, attractive young girl who herself falls for a dashing military man who inevitably leaves her. The surprise is that the ultimate winner is a perhaps equally insignificant character.
A duel provides further conviction to the diarist’s interpretation of his superfluity.
The introduction by the translator, Richard Freeborn is thorough, insightful, and covers the range of Turgenev’s work, putting this medium in the context of his shorter sketches, stories, and full length novels. He presents me with a considerable challenge.
The title page and frontispiece above feature Elisa Trimby’s lithographs. The header picture is of the boards and spine from her design.
This evening we were joined by Ian who returned in time to partake of succulent roast chicken; crisp Yorkshire pudding and roast potatoes, sweet and white; crunchy carrots; firm cauliflower, broccoli, and Brussels sprouts, with meaty gravy. Our son-in-law drank Hoegaarden, Jackie drank more of the pinot Grigio, and I finished the Fleurie.
These last two in the Folio Society collection of Gogol’s stories, which I finished reading this afternoon, each exhibit his dark humour aimed at the military and government classes; each concerns an attempt to secure a desired object which backfires.
The author’s fluid descriptive skills show the environment and personnel involved in the escalation of a bid for an alleged magnificent horse to become a desire for an even more magnificent carriage, neither of which lived up to their expectations. As we move up the hierarchy it is apparent that it is they who are being ridiculed. The circumstances of the exposure of the falsities was farcical.
Deception, and promises of unprepared splendid meals has been employed to ensnare a military gentleman in The Carriage, a story in which the deceiver is exposed by accident.
“…many times afterwards in his life he shuddered, seeing how much savage brutality lies hidden under refined, cultured politeness, and, my God! Even in a man whom the world accepts as a gentleman and a man of honour” – so speaks Gogol of a man who has been the butt of cruel jokes as he struggles to work at a boring occupation throughout his life. It is his coveted overcoat that is the subject of the story of which I will say no more except to show
Peter Sturt’s illustration. There is no picture attached to The Carriage.
This evening we dined on more of Jackie’s penne Bolognese with green and runner beans sautéed in garlic butter, with which she drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Fleurie.
Late this morning on which leakage from the overhead slate colander, presaging the anticipated onset of storm Jocelyn, dribbled down our windscreen in the headlight-gloom, Jackie drove us to Hockey’s Farmyard Café for brunch in this outlet very sparse of customers, most of whom had probably decided to stay at home.
Just before mid-day we seemed to be approaching twilight along Roger Penny Way.
The swelling stream sped across the ford at the foot of Abbotswell Road.
Livestock, seemingly knowing what was coming later, kept well out of sight, except for
a damp duo of donkeys a little further up the hill;
a sodden pair of ponies near Ibsley ford;
and a soggy couple of calves alongside Forest Road.
This evening we all dined on Jackie’s splendid penne Bolognaise and tender runner beans with which she drank Fattori Pinot Grigio 2022 and I drank Patrick Chodot Fleurie 2022.