The Debut by Anita Brookner Ch. 1-5

As I was reading the first five chapters, the story of the Secret Garden kept running through my head. The way that the parents almost ignore the fact that they have a daughter is very similar to Mary’s parents in the Secret Garden. They kept her tucked away when their friends came to dine. Her mother was a great beauty, and her father was absorbed in her mother. Ruth’s parents are the same. The difference is that Mary’s parents died when she was very young, so we do not get to see them evolve with age. Ruth’s parents, on the other hand, evolve or devolve in the first five chapters. Her mother goes from being a beautiful actress to a lazy, voluntary, invalid while her father begins to move away from his wife and starts thinking for himself. I liked how chapter five ended with the father giving Ruth some of the grandmother’s things. You see the father’s concern for Ruth over the course of these chapters. Hopefully, it is a concern that will develop into a more active role in his daughter’s life as the novel continues.

Now, Mrs. Cutler is a character all in herself. Forget the fact that she should never work as a cook because of her untidy habits, she has absorbed herself with the mother and is enabling her to keep up the pitiful charade of the “Woe-is-me” lifestyle.

Sunset Gun by Dorothy Parker

The Maid-Servant at the Inn

I love this poem. I got to the second stanza and had to start over to make sure I was reading it correctly. I love the idea that she has written a poem from the point of view of a servant who witnessed the birth of Christ (at least, that is what I assume she witnessed). It is a novel approach to that story. To hear the birth of Christ without Him being the “Christ-child” is interesting. He is just a normal baby that was born in the barn. I love that she calls Him “his mother’s son”. Jesus is almost always referred to as “God’s son”. He is so deified that we forget He lived a regular life here on earth. He was a baby, child, and, yes, even a teenager (lovely how those years are left out of the Bible). I think Parker is portraying Jesus as God intended Him to be seen. God sent his son to live a perfect, sin-free life on earth, to live as a human. But, followers of Christianity are so caught up in Jesus being “God’s son” that we forget that he was also human. If we cannot see him as human, then why would we ever think that we could be like Him? If we cannot be like Him, then why should we strive to be good? Taking the humanity out of Jesus, in some ways, defies the whole example that He gave. I think it is refreshing and mind-stopping to represent Him as just a baby.

Big Blonde by Dorothy Parker

A little depressing, Big Blonde reads as a-day-in-the-life-of-an-alcoholic. Surprisingly, Mrs. Morse is not dead at the end of the story. You would think twenty sleeping pills would be enough to kill anyone. The character’s “fall from grace” is an interesting twist in the story. Instead of having a woman from the slums triumphantly making a better life for her, we have a woman who starts out on top of things; she is popular and works for her own living with generous assistance from admirers. Throughout the story, she begins to sink – one level at a time- into depression and alcohol dependence. Funnily enough, she looks to alcohol as her “up-lifter” when alcohol is a depressant. When Mrs. Morse becomes Mrs. Morse and trades her independence and self-reliance for relying on the kindness of men, she loses part of herself. While developing into the domestic housewife that is expected of her, she surrenders her self-confidence for the happiness of her husband and other men after him. She goes from a working class woman to a mistress, a kept woman. This story tells me that women of that time, and some even today, give up their chance for a viable future when they surrender to the standards of marriage. It reminds me of the movie Mona Lisa Smile. Julia Roberts plays a private-school teacher at an all-girls school in the 1960s (I think). She tries to get them to realize that they could have a life and career outside of marriage. She had one student who was accepted to Harvard Law School (if memory is correct), but the girl decided to get married and support her husband’s ambitions and dreams while putting all of her aspirations and talent in the trash. These girls were brought up to believe that they only needed education or a career until they married.

Song of the Shirt, 1941 by Dorothy Parker

Mrs. Martindale seems too good to be true. I love the way that she is described. The description of Mrs. Martindale coincides with the description of the lovely day. The alliteration used by Parker, such as “delicately done”, “so softly sheltered”, and “fragrant forties”, only add to the enjoyment of the story. The tone changes a bit when Parker begins to describe “Headquarters” and the work the Mrs. Martindale does to help the war effort. It changes from frivolity and liveliness to more of a classroom setting with the headmistress, Mrs. Corning, being the strict schoolmarm. Yet, almost immediately after Mrs. Martindale leave headquarters, the tone changes back to the carefree, light-hearted atmosphere that opened the story.

Mrs. Martindale is a dedicated patriot, which is to be commended, but she seems to be a little on the not-so-bright side of things. She is a wealthy woman who hasn’t had to do much for herself until the war broke out. She doesn’t know how to sew, which was the most common knowledge among women of this time. Although credit should be given towards her dedication, the end of the story really throws off the perfect picture one has of her. There is no doubt that she has a big and gracious heart. She is just not very clever. At the end, she has the opportunity to get help making the shirts. She doesn’t realize it. It completely goes over her head that the person who could “use Mrs. Christie” is herself.

The Wonderful Old Gentleman by Dorothy Parker

This story reminds me of Middlemarch when everyone was waiting for the “old man” to die. There are people who seem to care about the old man, and there are people like Mrs. Bain who are unclear. You are not sure if she really cares that her father is dying. Mrs. Bain displays the perfect amount of emotion at every instance. She is calm through most of the story, except when it is appropriate to be weepy. The only time when she does not act “appropriately” is when she is talking about her father’s will, which also reminds me of Middlemarch. There are people who truly need the money but end up getting not much. The people who do not need the inheritance get almost everything. But, she was too excited about the will and a little snobby in the way that she told everyone that she was getting the money.

Oddly, it reminds me of my grandmother who just passed, not the part about the will but everyone waiting for him to die. My grandmother was so old. She had been ready to go for quite some time. It was not a shock when I got the call about her illness and eventual death. I had been waiting for her to die for a couple of years now. It is not that I do not or did not love her, but I knew she was suffering and unhappy. I knew she was ready. She and I had talked about it several times. So, when she passed, I was relieved. I think the characters in the story are in the same frame of mind, except a little tainted by the idea of inheritance.

White Teeth by Zadie Smith Ch 15-20

These last few chapters were difficult to read through. There was a lot of technical stuff, such as ideologies, medical explanations, and preaching, that made it slow and painful.

I liked how all of the different plots culminated in this one event at the end. It was interesting to read the different sides of the “genetics” argument. I don’t know how I feel about the ending. It almost seems like a waste of time. The end just didn’t seem justify all of the build up to the event. Interestingly, the twins end up together. After all that was done by themselves and their family for them to turn out different from each other, they both ended up together sharing a punishment. Maybe, they will realize that they cannot escape each other. Irie ends up with Josh, who is now “step-dad” to the Millat/Magid offspring, living in the Caribbean with grandma. The parents (the Jones/Iqbals) end up the same as they have always been. In fact, nothing seems to have changed in the end.