Literary Memories - Essay Example

Literary Memories Just as in the case of a cousin of mine no one taught me to read. That doesn’t mean I couldn’t read long before I got to school. I just didn’t have a teacher. I began when my Daddy taught me to recognize the initials of my name, and I soon knew how books worked as I had seen my parents reading them. You started at the top at one end, carried on down the page and on to the next and so on, but there was no connection in my brain between the shapes on the page and words. My grandmother would sit me on her lap and read my stories , but still, although I knew that some of her stories came out of books, I didn’t even think about how that happened. Then quite suddenly one day it all fitted together. I was walking down the street to the local shop holding my mother’s hand when I spotted a wall advertisement in front of me. I don’t mean a poster. This was actually painted directly on to the brick work. As I had lived in the same house all my life up to that point I must have seen it often, but today it suddenly made sense - ‘Persil washes whitest’. ‘No it doesn’t’said my mother, ‘and it ruins your hands’ By this time we were inside the shop and we got some rather strange looks from the women waiting their turn at the till. I suppose it was like when you return to a jigsaw puzzle after an absence and suddenly know exactly which piece to pick up and where to put it. Soon I was reading absolutely anything, film posters, the headlines in the paper - even the label on the bottle of sauce which I discovered was in Arabic on one side and in some other language on the other. I now realise it was French, but my parents had studied only Arabic and a little English at school and knew almost no French. Together we worked out the meaning by matching words. We received two newspapers every day plus one at the weekend so these would take up much of my time, as would my mother’s weekly magazine, so bright and colourful, unlike my father’s rather dull papers with close set print in black and red and only the occasional poor quality photograph. The magazine included a children’s page with a story and a comic strip – I looked forward to the next issue almost as soon as the previous one arrived. I would wait almost 2 more years before I owned my own book, a present from my aunt I t was a book of old fashioned nursery rhymes – the kind my Grandmother would sing to me as she bounced me up and down. - and my baby sister tore a page out the first day I had it. I can still see the page with its beautiful old fashioned pale watercolour illustrations. I still know it was about someone called Susie and a kettle, but I never did get chance to read it properly as my mother immediately placed the book on a high shelf out of the baby’s reach. It is probably still there 20 years later. The destructive nature of very small children is perhaps why my mother hesitated to join the library. Eventually she gave in. I was still in my first few weeks at school however so the librarian insisted that I could only have picture books – you know the kind – one word on a page with a picture. For the one and only time in her life my mother was quietly furious in public. She marched into the adult library reference section, pulled a huge bright red volume from the shelf and marched back to the librarian. I know now that it was an encyclopedia “Open it anywhere”. No response, so my mother opened it herself – something about the House of Orange, the rulers of the Netherlands. I didn’t even know I remembered that until now. She sat me down at a table in the children’s section and I read the passage out loud. The librarian was mumbling about rules. My mother must have gone to the school and next week we went back to the library with a letter from the headmaster. I was issued with a ticket, and was even allowed to read adult non-fiction ‘at the discretion of the librarian’. I was off on a lifelong journey. The first book I borrowed had the word ‘serendipitous’ on the first page, but it was a great story about a gang of children living an ideal life in which adults barely intruded except at meal times, something totally alien to my upbringing but wonderful. They had a dog and bicycles. They even camped out overnight, cooked their own meals and sailed boats. It might as well have been science fiction it was so different from my world, and I couldn’t believe children really did those things, but wasn’t it brilliant. Soon afterwards I discovered the world of comics - and how valuable they were. Comics were currency - you could swap them - for more comics , but also for sweets or anything else on offer, stick insects, a skein of embroidery silk – or you could just lend them for awhile. These and my library books were full of adventures which I and my friends would act out at our peril. Many a beautiful outfit was ruined when playing also involved running , climbing, playing ball and jumping ropes and all the rest. We made tent houses and our mothers would pass in plates of little iced cakes and sandwiches. Not quite like in the books, but good all the same. I enjoyed my first weeks at school. Even phonic exercises of the ‘The Cat sat on the mat’ type were fun because they were new and I’d never had so many new people to play with. Writing came rather later for me. I had no need of it. So when I started school I had the reading age of a girl of about eight years old and the writing age of a new born baby. Another problem was that teachers expected you to write in a certain style with exactly the right amount of curve to your letters and even spacing between words. I hated these writing exercises which didn’t offer anything interesting to write about. Then I heard of how my parents and uncles and aunts had written to far away relatives when they were children, and how sometimes exciting parcels wrapped in large sheets of crackly brown paper arrived in response. I wanted parcels too. I wanted to do that - so that first letter was to Grandfather about how I wanted a real doll with eyes that opened and shut. I closed with my name in very large letters so he would know who it was from. The doll, with huge eyes and soft yellow hair and the most beautiful dress I could ever have imagined, arrived for my birthday. This was powerful magic. My father didn’t earn very much in those days, but at one point we lived far from a library and he began to buy what he saw as important books, one every month or so. The first was a leather bound collection of Arabic Fairy stories. He wanted me to read in English as well as Arabic, - but despite having a high reading age for my years I wasn’t ready for ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ ‘ and ‘Great Expectations’ both of which I hated. All those descriptions of awful scenes and horrid people. I would still hesitate to read Dickens, although I realise he is an important novelist as well as being a historical commentator. I didn’t enjoy reading much at school mainly because there was so little opportunity to just sit and read, or even to choose what to read. Playtimes and lunch breaks were too busy with other things and class time ran to a rigid regime of mathematics, spelling tests and all the rest. Once a week we would read round the class and I got so frustrated and impatient – everyone was on a different book and they would only read a line or two each so there was no story, usually not even enough to get you interested and to think ‘I’d like to read that.’. Some people stumbled over their words and read in an expressionless way and it was difficult not to butt in or to correct them. Later in senior school it was better, but in the early years where different abilities were all together it was hard. I know that everyone doesn’t read in the same way and this was something I didn’t mind most of the time, but not during reading time. My reading as a child fell into two distinct categories. The private to be enjoyed, especially if it made me giggle – silly poems and very Australian works such as ‘The animals Noah forgot.’ which my grandmother and I would also enjoy together, not just once , but many times. Later books such as ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.’ which is still on my shelves, as are other longer books such as ‘Dr Doolittle’ and ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ which were also read more than once, but several times at long intervals. Some books made me weep -‘ Black Beauty’; or even scare myself silly with ‘ Lorna Doone’ and ‘His Dark Materials.’ until an adult came in to tell me to go to sleep, come and eat dinner or go to the shop. Then there were books and comics to be shared. Sitting on a step sharing a comic with a friend, or reading a scene from an adventure story out loud with all the different voices, so that we could act it out. – these were activities I delighted in. I once got hold of a book of pantomime scripts which kept us busy for weeks. Some of them were based on ‘The 1001 Nights’ so I knew about Aladdin and Ali Baba, but Mother Goose, Robin Hood and Cinderella were new to me then, as was the whole idea of pantomime – a very English entertainment I think. My poor mother and her friends had to sit though all the horrors of little girls who just wanted to show off, who couldn’t remember the words and who would raid the wardrobes for costumes. . Having smaller relatives has inspired my writing. When I was about 6 or so I began to make up stories for my friends. As I got a little older the stories got longer and I began to write them down – although these were usually read out in the school playground only once and then stuffed in my school bag along with left over lunch, sticky lolly papers, gym clothes and pencil case - and finally forgotten. As I acquired cousins and then nieces, nephews, and now a son of my own, they needed stories too. There were plenty of books around by then, but sometimes only a story made up on the spot would do – one that would fit into a particular situation and could involve well known characters including the children themselves, just as Lewis Carroll did in ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’. Even Alice’s cat was included. I have made up a story for a small child in hospital, one about to fly for the first time, and one who was just very bored on a long journey. They can be used to help sort out difficult situations – the first day at school, the death of a pet, loosing a friend and all the rest. Although I do write other things it is the personal links that I like best. As old as I am I haven’t finished yet with children’s books – the 2009 ‘Big Book of Verse for Aussie Kids’ (Haynes) was a recent much appreciated gift from someone appreciates my tastes. My son is only 5, but this is a collection we can enjoy together , each at our own level. I’ll be glad though when he too can read for himself and I don’t have to read the same poem over and over again. His current favourite book is ‘The Hungry Caterpillar’, which is fine the first twenty times. I ‘m keeping ‘The Cat in the Hat’ ( Seuss, 1957) until he can read it for himself. As for reading myself I still read whatever is available – from gardening catalogues and cookery books to historical novels and even ‘chick lit’ although what are referred to as ‘airport novels’ aren’t my thing. I usually prefer novels to have some basis in past reality, an escape from the 21st century bustling all around me, hence my preference for historical novels such as the ’Cadfael’ ( Ellis, 1994 onwards) stories set in the 12th century. I like such stories to have a mystery element and a strong female character such as ‘Sister Fidelma’ (Tremayne 1994 onwards) , - being set in Celtic 7th century Ireland which makes them almost like science fiction as the setting is so strange for me – is a bonus. They tell me about a kind of life, a woman holding her own in a man’s world of long ago, a world I hardly knew existed, as well as dealing with the problems of being a detective long before the days of fingerprinting and modern forensic science. The BBC has put out a list of 100 books which they say everyone should read. Like many other people I have read some of them, but I didn’t enjoy all of them. The fact that a writer is skilled and writes an amazing story and even interesting story isn’t all there is to it. So for me writers such as Steinbeck and Tolstoy just don’t make it , whereas other books are treasure houses - the kind you read more and more slowly as you near the end so that the story lasts as long as possible – anything by Laurie Lee, Lindsey Davis and her Roman detective Falco. Davis books are the kind that you read more and more slowly as the number of pages you have left get fewer and fewer – when you’ve finished you know it will be 18 months before she publishes another one, and then there is the library waiting list. I love animals and have recently discovered the writings of the zoologist Gerald Durrell – starting after a television showing of ‘My parents and other animals’. Could his family have really been so crazy? I love the fact that his wife Lee says she married him in the first instance because he had gorillas – where did I. read that? Has Australia produced a similar writer, someone who not only loves animals, but who also has the scientific knowledge and well as the ability to write about it all at a level anyone can enjoy? His stories are exotic – about places I almost certainly will never get a chance to visit, swamps in South America, islands off the coast of Africa and of course an island in Greece. So are the Precious Ramotswe stories set in distant Botswana. How can a man from Scotland write so empathically about a woman from southern Africa, even if he has visited the area? (Mc Call Smith ,2002) Perhaps it’s a bit like an author researching an historical period and then setting a story in it? Biographies vary from the incredibly dull to the amazing. Who wants to read another footballer’s life story, written by a ghost writer when the subject is still only 23? The 60’s were my parent’s era and so they are introducing me to true life stories about people such as the then King of Jordan, Jackie Onassis, President Nixon Mary Quant and so on. As old as I am I haven’t finished with children’s books just yet I’m, glad to say , not just because I now have a child of my own. Jim Haynes ‘Big Book of Verse for Aussie Kids’ was a recent gift from someone who knows me well. I’m being very methodical with that so that I don’t miss anything - but I know that somewhere in there is the poem ‘The Triantiwontigongolope’ ( C. Michael James Dennis’ ) which someone shared with me years ago – I remember that I didn’t think there really could be such a poem – now to my delight I know better. . Many of my favourites, including my favourite cook book which I’ve even read in the bath - ‘The Art of Eating Well’ Artusi, 1996 – like rather a few of my books it has somewhat wavy pages and several , what might be, strawberry marks. – those were from an earlier reader so I don’t know. They also left lots of comments in the margins and a recipe for strawberry and rhubarb jam that I really must try out one day. I love too Middle Eastern food – the kind my parents eat every day. I like the kind of cookery books that aren’t just recipes, but include legends and myths, stories of origins. My grandmother’s cookery book – hand written - has notes in the margins - “Sushi’s wedding” or “Try with more basil” and even “He didn’t like this , but I do so he’s better be on his best behaviour.” I love any of Claudia Roden’s books of Middle Eastern cookery too - a friend has promised to lend me her copy of ‘Tamarind and Saffron’ (Roden 2000) , and I’ve just heard about ‘Arabesque’ (2005) which someone else has, but she lives a long way away and I’ll have to wait until she’s tried out just a few more dishes. I love libraries, the bigger the better – after all there are lots of books I want to read just once, as well as reference works to consult, and I do need room at home for some other things besides books.. I also love book shops full of new books, piles and piles of them that no one has ever opened, and the amazing printing ink smell of a new book and the noise that it makes as you open it flat - it will never make that noise again. However I can’t always afford these products - long live the charity store and the second hand book stall - even the ‘Two for a dollar’ box can on occasions be a treasure trove – where else would you find Harry Potter in Italian, a Spike Milligan that I haven’t got, and a packet of Van Gogh post cards from Paris. What more can anyone want? – except perhaps some of that and some of the strawberry and rhubarb jam, some white sliced and a nice cup of something hot. . Obviously I read Australian stories -‘Red Dog ‘by Bernieres ( 2008) was a special joy, because his love of the land comes through, and he is such a skilled writer that you don’t even notice the skill, or that it is fiction. Such tales are part of a new Australian heritage, but so too are western stories from the U.K. and Italy and even Russia and Greece, because that is where my neighbours come from. Arabic writers are there on my book shelf too – including modern women such as Raja al Sanea and ‘ The Girls of Riyad’ 2007. Written in what used to be called the epistolary genre, a story told in letters, but in this case it e-mails. Once banned it deals with the numerous and difficult problems Muslim young women face every day. Does it bring women into disrepute? You’ll have to read it. Sometimes my friends pass on feminine literature such as ‘The Women’s History of the World’ ( 1989 Miles) which I know my mother thought was shocking - even though it is rather more full of facts than radical opinions. I like factual history too, as in Amin Maalouf’s ‘The Crusades Through Arab Eyes’ My favourite - that‘s hard - probably a more traditional, somewhat romantic book such as ‘Pride and Prejudice ‘ mostly I admit for the very first line ‘It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.’ That being said, why haven’t I found him? Think of how many books I could buy. I’d better start making a list. Colleen McCullough is a favourite antipodean author. My mother remembers ‘The Thornbirds’, and has even got a McCullough cookery book, but I haven’t read it yet – something to look forward to. I’m going to get a Kindle and one of the book I intend to read on it is another by McCullough (2009) ‘The Independence of Miss Mary Bennett.’ I gather from reviews I’ve read that it is rather controversial. Wouldn’t Jane Austen giggle to know that her rather boring Bennet sister was considered to be ‘controversial’, or would she just be puzzled and surprised to think that anyone was still reading her stories. My son will grow up in a very different world. Firstly he is a boy and secondly he’s an Australian. We speak to him in both English and Arabic and he can swap back and forth at will. Also he is a new generation which will have its own new writers, some already established and others still too young to pick up a pen or open a keyboard yet. Writers I have never read and some of which I will never even hear of. Communication methods are different, even in a few years. Will he buy books or e-books? DVDs or down load pages from the web? He’ll develop his own methods and own favourites and somehow I don’t think ‘Pride and Prejudice’ in a romantic lacy cover will be at the top of the list, although a car repair manual might be – each to his own. Reading has many purposes, and he seems to be a serious minded lad, as well as growing up fast, but I hope he’ll find in his busy schedule time for plenty of fairy stories, children’s adventures, a little science fiction , poetry, and lots of jokes. I’ve been reading about Aboriginal writer Sally Morgan ( undated). She didn’t know until she was in her mid teens that she was an Aboriginal. That is a crime, so many wasted years. Who made such a decision to hide her past away in a file? My son will know very well what his heritage is – including its literature. As for myself – there are still so many books to read. One I must include will be the Macquairie Penn Anthology of Aboriginal Literature.’ (editors Heiss and Minter, 2008). The native peoples here, as in so many places, have had a hard time, and so often haven’t even had a voice – the least I can do is listen to them. More poetry of course, for reading in bed or in the bath - I like showers , but you can’t read at the same time – but also for sharing , with friends, my son, my mother, my husband - anyone who will listen really and really enjoy . Works Cited Adams, D. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a Trilogy in Five Parts, Heinemann, London, 1979 Artusi. P., The Art of Eating Well, Random House U.S.A. 1996 ( first published in 1894) Austen , J, Pride and Prejudice, London, 1813 BBC, The Big Read, August 2004, 26th May 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml Bernieres, L. Red Dog, Vintage Books, London, 2002 Carroll, L. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Davis, L, The Silver Pigs , Arrow, London, 2008 Haynes, J. Big Book of Verse for Aussie Kids , Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 2009 Heiss, A. and Minter, P. ( editors) The Penn Maquarie Anthology of Aboriginal Literature, Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 2008 Lofting, H, The Story of Doctor Dolittle, 1920, 28ht May 2011 http://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Hugh_Lofting/The_Story_of_Doctor_Dolittle/, Maalouf, A, The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, Beirut, 1984, McCall Smith, A. The Number 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, Anchor Books, 2002 McCullough ,C. The Independence of Miss Mary Bennett., Kindle, 2009 McCullough, C. The Thornbirds, Harper Collins, New York, 1978 Miles, R., The Women’s History of the World, Paladin, Sydney, 1989 Patterson , A.B. The Animals Noah Forgot, first published 1933. Peters, E. Cadfael novels , 1994 onwards. Roden, C., Arabesque: A Taste of Morocco, Turkey and Lebanon, Michael Joseph, London, 2005 Roden, C., Tamarind and Saffron, Penguin Paperbacks, London 2000 Sally Morgan. (undated) , 28th May 2011 http://www.abc.net.au/schoolstv/australians/morgan.htm Sanea R., The Girls of Rijad, ‘Banat al-Riyadh’. 2007 Seuss, Dr, The Cat in the Hat, Random House Children’s Books, London and New York 1957 Sewell, A. Black Beauty, Swift J., Gulliver’s Travels, first published 1735 Tremayne, P,, Sister Fidelma novels, 1994 onwards. Read More

 

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