The Warden by Anthony Trollope

 “Trollope’s purpose is to present the dilemma of the just man involved in an inequitable system, and in the process to illuminate whole areas of public and private life, rather than merely to expose a few corrupt individuals.” — David Skilton from his introduction to The Warden 

The Warden is a short novel written by English author Anthony Trollope. It was published in 1855. It’s the first novel in the Chronicles of Barsetshire series, set in the fictional county of Barsetshire and its cathedral town of Barchester. The novels follow the clergy and the various social classes of the county. 

The Rev. Septimus Harding is a sincere and conscientious clergyman who is also serving as a warden to Hiram’s Hospital. His duties include looking after twelve elderly laborers who can’t earn a living anymore. The hospital was established by John Hiram centuries ago and according to his will, the person running the hospital and up to twelve elderly laborers who cannot work anymore receive an income. Over the years the money the land generates has grown considerably. This allows Reverend Harding to receive an impressive income as well as to feed and pay a group of retired laborers living at the hospital. 

Enter John Boyd, a young surgeon, reformer and activist. Believing that the laborers are not receiving a fair amount of the money and that Rev. Harding is receiving too much money, he begins an investigation by contacting lawyers. Then he makes things public by contacting a reporter. 

Rev. Harding, who only wants to do his job, take care of the old men, and support his daughter, is suddenly enveloped in scandal. To complicate things further John Boyd is in love with Rev. Harding’s daughter, Eleanor. 

Although the situation is treated seriously and Rev. Harding struggles with his conscience, the story is also told with humor. It’s part comedy of manners and part satire. Everyone has a different solution and no one can even think of compromise. No one is perfect and no one is left untouched by satire: the clergy, the reformers, the lawyers, and the press. Some of my favorite passages were Trollope’s satire of the press. For a book written in 1855, those parts hold up remarkably well today. 

The novel was a slow burn at first but I was drawn in. Once everyone was introduced and the situation was set up I was interested in all the characters and their outcomes. 

Trollope has an interesting style. He breaks the fourth wall and refers to the reader often. His descriptions of people and places were clear and he made them come to life. I also liked the dialogue between characters, especially during the various confrontations. I can also now say that I’ve read the Latin phrase sanctum sanctorum in something besides a Dr. Strange comic book.

On the other hand there were some places where I thought the narration went on too long. Also things get wrapped up rather quickly in the last few chapters. The ending felt a little rushed.

The ending wasn’t what I expected but it did come across as realistic. There were no outright villains, just various people thinking they were right and that others were wrong, unwilling to compromise, not understanding or blind to how their actions would affect others, with the most vulnerable having the most to lose. Like Trollope’s commentary on the press, it feels very familiar when compared with current events. 

There’s a quiet scene toward the end that really spoke to me. Rev. Harding is in London to meet with a lawyer. Tired, overwhelmed, and unfamiliar with the city, he manages to find a quiet moment in a cigar divan, a coffee house for smokers. I love this quote:

“What on earth could be more luxurious than a sofa, a book, and a cup of coffee?”

In reading reviews about this series it sounds like Trollope’s writing develops in the later volumes, his presentation of moral dilemmas becomes more subtle, and that since the other volumes are longer they don’t have the problem of a rushed ending.  I’ll be visiting Barsetshire and the town of Barchester again.

Pietr the Latvian (Inspector Maigret #1) by Georges Simenon

 “Inside every wrong-doer and crook there lives a human being. What he waited and watched out for was the crack in the wall, the instant when the human being comes out from behind the opponent.” — Georges Simenon describing Inspector Maigret from Pietr the Latvian 

This is the first book in the long running Inspector Maigret series by Belgian author Georges Simenon. After being notified that international criminal Pietr the Latvian is traveling to Paris, Inspector Maigret attempts to apprehend him. Things go wrong right away Maigret and begins searching through Paris for the criminal. 

Around the halfway point I put the book down and started wondering if anything other than following suspects around Paris was going to happen. I immediately picked the book back up, read a few more paragraphs and got my answer. Well played Mr. Simenon, well played. I was hooked. The rest of the book was a real page turner. 

All the questions that were brought up in the first half get answered throughout the second half. While the first half felt like a standard mystery or police procedural, the second half felt more like crime noir. One scene I particularly liked had Maigret interact with a suspect in a bar with no dialogue. While no words were spoken the encounter was still very intense. 

It’s a minor point but one thing I found distracting was the use of exclamation points. They’re used quite a lot. I was curious as to why there were so many but then I read the following from an article in The Guardian by Rupert Davies:

“The character of Maigret is introduced in Pietr the Latvian (1930). It’s a novel that bears some of the hallmarks of the hundreds of pulp novels Simenon had written in the previous years (a surfeit of action and exclamation marks), and this embryonic manifestation of Maigret is more of the alpha-male action hero than in the later novels…”

Aha!

At only 162 pages it was a quick read. I believe the other books are all around the same length. Apparently Mr. Simenon wrote them so each one could be read in a single sitting. 

There are 75 books in the series and 28 short stories. I’m looking forward to reading more. 

Books I Read in April 2022

 “My interest in writing has been with me for as long as I can remember. My first work dates from when I was nine years old. A poem about my dog, if memory serves me. I grew up loving words and what they could do. I liked film too, and it has obviously influenced my work, but it was always the words that counted, and as I grow older, they count even more.” 

— Joe R. Lansdale from his introduction to Bestsellers Guaranteed. 

I read six books this month. 

A Study in Scarlet (1887) by Arthur Conan Doyle

Great introduction to Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, 221B Baker Street, and an interesting mystery. I’d give this four stars but the long flashback to Utah towards the end really dragged and felt like a different book. 

I read this and some of the other volumes years ago so I know it gets better after this. 

The Sign of the Four (1890) by Arthur Conan Doyle

As in A Study in Scarlet, I enjoyed the interaction between Holmes and Dr. Watson as well as their investigation of the mystery. I also liked the introduction of Mary Morstan, the love interest for Dr. Watson. 

But just as in A Study in Scarlet, I enjoyed the first part much more than the last. The last chapter in which everything is explained dragged on. 

Storywise it’s an improvement over A Study in Scarlet, but I don’t think it reaches the greatness of the short stories that Arthur Conan Doyle would write after writing the first two novels. 

Piranesi (2000) by Susana Clarke

Piranesi lives in a labyrinth-like world composed of infinite halls and statues. The upper levels are filled with mists and birds. In the lower levels is an ocean which rises depending on the tide. 

We follow Piranesi as he keeps busy by investigating the halls and statues. He calls himself a scientist and takes meticulous notes in his journals. Then Piranesi starts discovering that not everything is as it seems. 

The story has a slow meditative pace but we learn something new in each chapter. 

In the beginning the world building drew me, afterwards the unfolding of the  mystery kept me reading. I also liked how Piranesi keeps a journal and how it turns out to be important to the story. 

Piranesi is a story of loneliness and solitude, but it’s also a hauntingly beautiful story of kindness and gratitude. 

The Snows of Kilimanjaro and Other Stories (1961) by Ernest Hemingway 

This is my second time reading this collection. Hemingway is one of my favorite writers. I like his prose. It’s smooth and clear. I also like the themes he covers like travel, wilderness, war, love, and loss. 

I liked every story in this collection but especially “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” and “The Short Happy Life of Francis MaComber.”

The Starmen of Lyrdis (1952) by Leigh Brackett

Michael Treehearne discovers that he is actually a member of the Vardda, the only race that can withstand the rigors of intergalactic flight.

Leigh Brackett is one of my favorite authors but this was slow going. Even though the chapters are short and Brackett’s prose shines in some places, the story is dry, lackluster, and has some jarring plot contrivances. It has a few interesting ideas but it’s missing the wonder and excitement of much of her other work.

Bestsellers Guaranteed (1993) by Joe R. Lansdale

I’ve been wanting to read something by Joe R. Lansdale for a while. I figured I’d start with this collection of early short stories and a novella. While most of the stories are horror stories the last two are more crime noir. One story was too surreal for me (“Bob the Dinosaur Goes to Disneyland”) and one story was just too dark for me (“The Job”) but I enjoyed the heck out of all the others. The stories range from quiet horror to humorous to just plain dark. 

Favorite stories: 

“The Dump” 

“God of the Razor”

“Not From Detroit”

“The Events Concerning a Nude Fold-Out Found in a Harlequin Romance.” 

My favorite story in the collection is the novella, “The Events Concerning a Nude Fold-Out Found in a Harlequin Romance.”  A man down on his luck, his daughter, and the owner of a used bookstore investigate a possible murder. This East Texas gothic was a real page turner with great characters.

I liked the variety of stories, the author’s introduction, and the story introductions. In them he gives lots of interesting details about his influences and how the stories came about, without giving away any plot details.

I’ll finish with a passage from his introduction that really spoke to me. It’s about his reading interests and how they influenced his writing.

  “I read everything from fairy tales to books on lost civilizations to adventure to the classics to comics, especially “Batman” and “Detective Comics.” I had no idea that one type of fiction or non-fiction was supposedly better for me than another. I think this is one of the most fortuitous things about my career. Ignorance.

I read what appealed to me, not what was supposed to be good for me. That being the case, it was only natural that I would gradually mix genres, and eventually run them through the mental strainer of my East Texas experience to arrive at the sort of stories that appeared in By Bizarre Hands, and the sort of stories I write now. These are among the best of the stories I wrote on the way to that destination. I like to think it was a pretty good trip, and that I’ll be starting a new trip soon, branching out from what I do now, going yet another mile and finding new passions, new stories.”

I’m looking forward to reading more by Joe Lansdale.

Should Writers Read?

“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”— Dr. Suess

I love reading. One of my earliest memories is of learning how to read. I have vivid memories of sitting in my kindergarten class and reading from the Dick and Jane books. As I looked at the pictures and learned to read the words it felt like another world was opening up to me. I soon started reading anything I could get my hands on, starting with comic books and storybooks. 

One day I started writing. The first thing I wrote was a story book. I must have been about eight years old. Using a storybook that I really liked as a basis, I wrote one sentence and drew one picture per page. For years I drew my own comic books. In high school I wrote Dr. Who fan fiction and a sword and sorcery short story. 

I eventually stopped writing, but I never completely lost interest. I got back into writing a few years ago. It’s one of the reasons that I started this blog. It helps me write regularly, not just these blog posts but also fiction.

I regularly read books about writing. I also read posts on Reddit in the writing subreddit. One question about writing that I see is, “Should writers read?” The answer seems obvious to me, but I see the question come up regularly. I think it’s essential. I admit that I’m biased when it comes to reading. I think everyone should read, but especially someone who wants to write. Novels, essays, folk tales, poetry, you name it. Even if it’s just for fun you can learn from it. But don’t just take my word for it. Here’s advice from two of my favorite authors. 

“You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself.” — Stephen King 

“Compulsive diligence is almost enough. But not quite. You have to have a taste for words. Gluttony. You have to want to roll in them. You have to read millions of them written by other people. — John D. MacDonald from his introduction to Stephen King’s Nightshift

The advice from the following writers goes into the how and why. 

“Read, read, read. Read everything -- trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it.

Then write. If it's good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out of the window.”

― William Faulkner

“First, read a lot, trying to find a balance between what you love and what you suspect you “should” be reading. The ratio of input (reading) to output (writing), especially early on, should probably be something along the lines of 10:1, maybe even 100:1. You just need to steep yourself in literary language and storytelling/literary techniques. And read reverse-engineering style: don’t just “like” and “dislike” things—try to figure out what exactly it is you're liking and how the writer is creating that effect (whether it be a character, a description, the structure of a scene, etc.). Read like a writer, in other words.”

― Todd Hasak-Lowy

“Read work outside your preferred genre. Whenever I teach an intro to creative writing course most of my students just want to stay in their lane. If they read science fiction or poetry or literary fiction or nonfiction or whatever they want to just read in that genre. That’s BS and it doesn’t help them become better writers. It can be helpful to read within the genre you’re writing to understand the conventions of the form, but ultimately it’s limiting. Reading widely will open you to influences and concepts you might not realize in such a narrow space.” 

— Matt Young 

While I stopped writing for a time, I never stopped reading. For years my preferred genres were science-fiction and fantasy with some historical adventure and crime. Now I read a much wider variety of genres. The change occurred gradually but it started around the time I got more serious about writing. Part of it was the advice I encountered from writers like Stephen King and Ray Bradbury, but part of it was something else. After years of reading the same genres, I was restless and curious about what else was out there.

I’d like to think I’m on the right track. All the advice given above makes sense to me, especially as I attempt to write my own fiction. Now I just need to write more. 

Books I Read in March 2022

 “If he be Mr. Hyde,” he had thought, “I shall be Mr. Seek.” — Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 

I read six books this month. Five paperbacks and one on Kindle.

On Tyranny: Twenty Lesson from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder (2017)

This book by historian Timothy Snyder consists of lessons from the 20th century on how to defend democracy against authoritarianism and fascism. I found the lessons insightful and worthwhile. It motivated me to read more about European history, specifically about Russia and Ukraine, as well as fiction by Russian and Ukrainian authors. I wrote a full review in my previous blog post here: 

We Learn by Writing: On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder

American Primitive by Mary Oliver (1983)

Out of the little poetry I’ve read so far, Mary Oliver is my favorite. Most of the poems in American Primitive are about nature, animals, and the passing of seasons. Oliver won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for this volume.

The Mammoth Book of Folk Horror edited by Stephen Jones (2021)

This is a collection of folk horror, a subgenre of horror which often, but not always, has elements of folklore. Other elements usually included are rural settings, isolation, the power of nature, and local beliefs. Overall, this is a good mix of old and newer stories. As with most anthologies I liked some stories more than others. 

Favorite stories:

Jenny Greenteeth by Alison Littlewood

The Offering by Michael Marshall Smith 

Sticks by Karl Edward Wagner 

Gravedirt Mouth by Maura McHugh

Wyfa Medj by Storm Constantine 

The Gypsies in the Wood by Kim Newman 

The last story “The Gypsies of the Wood” by Kim Newman was a little different from the others, and not just because it’s a novella instead of a short story. 

A member of a group called the Diogenes Club is called in to investigate mysterious happenings in a village. In this story the Diogenes Club is a secret wing of the British government which investigates supernatural threats. It’s based on the gentlemen’s club of the same name which first appeared in the Sherlock Holmes story “The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter.” 

While this story has elements of folk horror, it also has elements of fantasy, mystery, and adventure. I like the writing style a lot. Every character is interesting, and the dialogue is sharp, witty, with a touch of humor once in a while. It made for a real page turner. I’ll be seeking out more of Kim Newman’s work. 

Frantic by Noel Calef (1958)

This is a French crime noir novel from 1956.  A man commits what he believes is the perfect crime but then gets trapped in an elevator. After an exciting beginning. things slow down a little as various groups of people are introduced. Then the story picks up as events begin to unfold and start coming together. The chapters are short and move from character to character. The story is moody, and things go from dark to darker. I thought the ending was very well done. I grew to care for a secondary character that I had absolutely no interest in when first introduced. 

I like that Black Gat Books used the original cover art by Mitchell Hooks and that Hooks incorporated his signature into the art as graffiti on the wall. You can see his name just under the figure’s elbow. 

The book was adapted into the 1961 French crime film Elevator to the Gallows using the book’s original title. 

Carmilla by Joseph Le Fanu (1872)

This gothic novella about a vampire was written 26 years before Dracula. The story is narrated by Laura, a young woman who lives in a large manor with her father and a few servants. Nearby is a deserted village and the ruins of a castle. 

After a carriage accident, a mysterious young woman named Carmilla stays at the manor to recover. Then strange things begin happening. Laura finds herself attracted to Carmilla but she is repulsed as well. The story is eerie, atmospheric, and it moves along quickly. 

The edition I read was edited by Carmen Maria Machado. It includes an introduction by her as well as footnotes. I’m glad I read the introduction after reading the novella, as it goes over the story in detail and includes a lot of fascinating information about its origins. 

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (1886)

This classic gothic novella has been on my to-read list for a long time. Dr. Jekyll’s association with sinister Edward Hyde leads to the hunt for a killer in fog shrouded London. Even knowing the final revelation, it made for an interesting and entertaining read. 

I have mixed feelings about the writing style. While there were some great lines I thought some parts were too wordy. That didn’t stop me from enjoying the story though. It’s an excellent exploration of duality and the struggle between good and evil. 

On to April. 

On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder

“Fascists rejected reason in the name of will, denying objective truth in favor of a glorious myth articulated by leaders who claimed to give voice to the people.”

— Timothy Snyder, from his introduction.

On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by historian Timothy Snyder consists of lessons on how to defend democracy against authoritarianism and fascism. To make his point in each lesson, the author uses events from European history to identify conditions that enabled democracies to transform into dictatorships. 

Examples of some lessons are “Defend institutions,” “Believe in truth,” “Investigate,” and “Learn from peers in other countries.” 

Some of the events that the author touches upon include the Great Terror of the Soviet Union, also known as the Great Purge, Hitler’s rise to power, events that led up to the Holocaust of European Jews by Nazi Germany, Germany’s invasion of Poland, and Britain fighting back against Germany in WWII. 

Considering what is happening in Ukraine currently, some of the more recent events that are touched upon seem even more important now, Putin’s rise to power and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2014. It puts helpful perspective on the events of today.

I found the lessons insightful and worthwhile. The following are quotes that stood out to me.

On Hitler’s rise to power:

“The mistake is to assume that rulers who came to power through institutions cannot change or destroy those very institutions — even though that is exactly what they have announced.” 

On democracies becoming a one-party state:

“Some of the Germans who voted for the Nazi Party in 1932 no doubt understood that this might be the last meaningfully free election for some time, but most did not.” 

“No doubt the Russians who voted in 1990 did not think that this would be the last free and fair election in their country’s history, which (thus far) it has been.”

On being wary of paramilitaries:

“The SS began as an organization outside the law, became an organization that transcended the law, and ended up as an organization that undid the law.”

On the media and thinking of your own way of speaking:

“Staring at screens is perhaps unavoidable, but the two-dimensional world makes little sense unless we can draw upon a mental armory that we have developed somewhere else. When we repeat the same words and phrases that appear in daily media, we accept the absence of a larger framework. To have a framework requires more concepts, and having more concepts requires reading.” 

On believing in the truth:

“You submit to tyranny when you renounce the difference between what you want to hear and what is actually the case.”

“Fascists despised the small truths of daily existence, loved slogans that resonated like a new religion, and preferred creative myths to history or journalism.”

On figuring things out for yourself:

“It is your ability to discern facts that makes you an individual, and our collective trust in common knowledge that makes us a society. The individual who investigates is also the citizen who builds. The leader who dislikes the investigators is a potential tyrant.”

“Journalists are not perfect, any more than people in other vocations are perfect. But the work of people who adhere to journalistic ethics is of a different quality than the work of those who do not.” 

On the difference between being a patriot and being a nationalist:

“A nationalist encourages us to be our worst, and tells us that we are the best.”

“A patriot has universal values, standards by which he judges his nation, always wishing it well — and wishing that it would do better.”

“A nationalist will say that “it can’t happen here,” which is the first step toward disaster. A patriot says that it could happen here, but that we will stop it.”

If I have any criticism, it’s that the author could have gone into greater depth regarding some of the historical events. For example, he doesn’t talk about the degree of coercion that people were subjected to in some of the events he uses as examples. 

On the other hand, I think this book is a good introduction and overview of authoritarianism in the 20th century. It's short but it does a good job of provoking the reader to think more deeply about some of the major issues that we face today. It’s motivated me to read more about European history, specifically about Russia and Ukraine, as well as fiction by Russian and Ukrainian authors.

Which brings me to one piece of advice that the author gives that I think is one of the most important: 

Read books.

Seven Things I Learned from Andrew Stanton’s TED Talk: The Clues to a Great Story

 “We all love stories. We are born for them. Stories affirm who we are. We all want affirmations that our lives have meaning. And nothing does a greater affirmation than when we connect through stories.” — Andrew Stanton

Andrew Stanton (A Bug’s Life, Toy Story, Finding Nemo, WALL-E) is an animator, storyboard artist, film director, and screenwriter. I recently watched his 2012 TED Talk, The Clues to a Great Story. I haven’t watched that many TED Talks, but the ones that I have watched have all been informative. One of the things that I find interesting about them is that speakers are limited to a maximum of eighteen minutes. 

Although he talks about writing screenplays, his advice applies to writing stories in general. Here are seven things I learned from Andrew Stanton’s presentation. 

 

One: “Storytelling is joke telling.”

He opens his talk with a joke, gets a laugh from the audience, and then says, “Storytelling is joke telling.” After listening to his explanation, I have to agree. 

“It’s knowing your punchline, your ending, knowing that everything you’re saying, from the first sentence to the last, is leading to a singular goal…” 

 

I think that’s why when it comes to writing stories, rewriting and editing is so important, to make sure that everything leads to your goal. That’s challenging at first. You may not be sure of your goal when you begin writing or what you think is the goal changes as you make new discoveries as you write. 

Two: “Make me care” is the greatest story commandment. 

Another good point. If the audience doesn’t care, they'll lose interest in the story. But how to make the audience care? First, he points out the importance of the opening of a story. He explains that the opening of a story should make a promise that the story will lead somewhere worth the audience’s time. But then how to keep the audience engaged? 

 

Three: Make your audience work for their meal.

“…the audience actually wants to work for their meal. They just don't want to know that they’re doing that. That’s your job as a storyteller, is to hide the fact that you’re making them work for their meal.”

He calls it the Unifying Theory of 2 + 2. He says don’t give your audience four, give them two plus two.

“The elements you provide and the order that you plan them in is crucial to whether you succeed or fail to engage the audience.”

He adds that this isn’t a magic formula and that there are many ways to accomplish this. I realize that all my favorite books and movies do this in one way or another. 

Four: “Drama is anticipation mingled with uncertainty.”

This is a quote by British playwright William Archer that Mr. Stanton came across. Mr. Stanton explains that in a good story the audience not only wants to know what will happen next in the short term, but also how the story will conclude in the long term. This can be done by creating honest conflict that creates doubt in the audience’s mind about the outcome. 

Mr. Stanton came across the quote as he was researching screenwriting. This was after he had already written Toy Story and A Bug’s Life. I was impressed with the fact that even after writing two successful screenplays he was still motivated to learn more about writing. He says “...I wanted to become much better at it and learn anything I could.”

Five: "The best stories infuse wonder."

I agreed with this right away but also wondered how writers can infuse wonder in their stories. I think part of the answer lies in this next part.

Six: “Use what you know.”

I’ve come across this advice many times as “write what you know.” I think Mr. Stanton has the best explanation of what that actually means:

“Use what you know. Draw from it. It doesn’t always mean plot or fact. It means capturing a truth from your experiencing it, expressing values you personally feel, deep down in your core.”

Seven: “Storytelling has guidelines, not hard and fast rules.”

I really agree with this. Just learning or memorizing rules isn’t enough. As in learning a language, learning about rules is important, but it's just the first step. Next is writing regularly so you can practice, experiment, and discover what works and what doesn’t. His presentation motivated me to keep doing that.

In Conclusion 

There are a few other lessons in his presentation, but these are the ones that stood out to me. He covers a lot of ground in his eighteen minutes, and he does it in an entertaining way. If you're interested in storytelling, it’s really worth watch. Here's a link to the presentation.

Andrew Stanton: The clues to a great story | TED Talk