If there’s one challenge I regularly participate in each year, it’s the Back to the Classics challenge. I participate whether I complete it or not as it gets me reading more classics and often helps me with my Classics Club list. I’m so glad that it’s back this year to give me more focus with my reading.
Back to the Classics Challenge 2021 is hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate and I’m so appreciative that she’s hosting it again this year. I wasn’t going to join ….. in fact, I wasn’t going to join any challenges this coming year. But I couldn’t resist. It will at least give me a list to focus on. And so, I’ll give it a go ….
Here it is again, the Back to the Classics Challenge where we are challenged to read a number of classic books during the year! I’m very scared to attempt any challenges after the reading year I had in 2018, but I’m sloughing off my failures and having a very positive, sunny attitude towards my reading in 2019! With that in mind, I’m going to join Karen at Books and Chocolate‘s Back to the Classics Challenge! Here are the categories and possible book choices for them:
The Magdalen Reading ~ Rogier van der Weyden (Public Domain) source Wikimedia Commons
While the books listed are not set in stone, I’m going to try to stick as closely to them as I can. I think I’m most looking forward to the comedy category ….. I definitely need some comedic relief lately! 😉 I’m also excited about reading another Greek play and perhaps getting back into sync with my ancient Greek challenge, and I do need to read another Shakespeare to get me going on the Bard again. So many classic books, so little time!
If you’d like to join this challenge too, just hop over to Books and Chocolate and sign up. It’s truly one of the best challenges of the year!
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| Christmas at the Town Hall © Cleo @ Classical Carousel |
I’ve decided to include my reading challenges in this post because I’ve been doing so little reading lately that I’d have little to say otherwise. Isn’t that pathetic? Oh well, a new year is here and with it new resolutions, so here goes ……..
December went by so quickly. My grandmother ended up passing away 4 days before Christmas. It wasn’t unexpected but still it was sad to see her go. We’ll certainly miss her but it was fun to remember her stories and the spunk she showed until the end. She had a long life, well lived.
One challenge I participate in every year is the Back to the Classics Challenge hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate. I’m under the mistaken impression that because I read mainly classics, that this challenge will be easy to complete. Ha! My 2016 challenge is still lacking three books and one extra review. I’ll have to go back through my reads and do some fill-ins. Whether I achieve successful completion is anyone’s guess.
The 2017 challenge has familiar categorizes and those which have been changed up. Here are the guidelines and rules:
The challenge will be exactly the same as last year, 12 classic books, but with slightly different categories. You do not have to read 12 books to participate in this.
And here are the categories for the 2016 Back to the Classics Challenge:
1. A 19th Century Classic – any book published between 1800 and 1899.
2. A 20th Century Classic – any book published between 1900 and 1967. Just like last year, all books MUST have been published at least 50 years ago to qualify. The only exception is books written at least 50 years ago, but published later, such as posthumous publications.
3. A classic by a woman author.
4. A classic in translation. Any book originally written published in a language other than your native language. Feel free to read the book in your language or the original language. (You can also read books in translation for any of the other categories).
5. A classic published before 1800. Plays and epic poems are acceptable in this category also.
6. An romance classic. I’m pretty flexible here about the definition of romance. It can have a happy ending or a sad ending, as long as there is a strong romantic element to the plot.
7. A Gothic or horror classic. For a good definition of what makes a book Gothic, and an excellent list of possible reads, please see this list on Goodreads.
8. A classic with a number in the title. Examples include A Tale of Two Cities, Three Men in a Boat, Slaughterhouse Five, Fahrenheit 451, etc.
9. A classic about an animal or which includes the name of an animal in the title. It an actual animal or a metaphor, or just the name. Examples include To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, The Metamorphosis, White Fang, etc.
10. A classic set in a place you’d like to visit. It can be real or imaginary: The Wizard of Oz, Down and Out in Paris and London, Death on the Nile, etc.
11. An award-winning classic. It could be the Newbery award, the Prix Goncourt, the Pulitzer Prize, the James Tait Award, etc. Any award, just mention in your blog post what award your choice received.
12. A Russian Classic. 2017 will be the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, so read a classic by any Russian author.
And now, the rest of the rules:
Possible choices could be:
With a dearth of challenges that have been catching my eye for 2017, this one should get some particular focus. Wish me luck and if you’d like to participate, pop over to Karen’s blog and join the fun!
Publius Ovidius Naso was born in Sulmo, east of Rome in the year 43 B.C. As a son of an upper middle class family, his father sent him to be educated in Rome to distinguish himself in a career in law or government. Ovid was known as an exemplary rhetorician and worked at minor magisterial posts before quitting his public career to pursue poetry. Immediate success followed his first published elegy and by 8 A.D., the year in which Metamorphoses was published, he was one of the foremost poets of Rome.
Suddenly, in the same year, the emperor Augustus Caesar banished Ovid from Rome, and the poet went into exile in Tomis on the Black Sea. The only clues we have to his exile is from Ovid himself where he refers to his carmen, or songs, and his error, or indiscretion. Speculations abounds as to these two causes. His poem Ars Amatoria, or The Art of Love, was a poetic manual on seduction and intrigue, which Augustus may have viewed as corrosive to the moral structure of Roman society, and may very well be the carmen of his sentence. Rome, at that time, was experiencing a period of instability and Augustus was attempting to re-establish traditional religious ceremonies and reverence of the gods, encouraging people to marry, have children, and making adultery illegal. Ovid’s earlier poetry espoused extra-marital affairs and Metamorphoses is ripe with a very pronounced, and oftimes strange, sexual element in the myths recounted. The treatment of the gods is not reverential and perhaps it wasn’t surprising that Augustus wished to rid himself of the popular poet. Lamenting his exile in his poem Tristia and Epistulae ex Ponto (letters to friends asking for help with his return), Ovid died in Tomis in 17 A.D.
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| Ruins of Tomis source Wikipedia |
Along with O at Behold the Stars, Cirtnece at Mockingbirds, Looking Glasses and Prejudices … and Jean of Howling Frog Books, I began to read Metamorphoses in January and what a read it has been! Here are links to my posts for all of the fifteen books of Metamorphoses:
Book I / Book II / Book III / Book IV / Book V / Book VI / Book VII / Book VIII / Book IX / Book X / Book XI / Book XII / Book XIII / Book XIV / Book XV
In Metamorphoses (Metamorphōseōn librī), or Book of Transformations, Ovid relates over 200 transformations. Composed in the epic meter of dactylic hexameter, as a whole, Ovid’s tales don’t appear to follow an obvious chronological order: stories break off and are continued in other books; some stories wrap back around on themselves, there is a curious lack of important detail in some (which we know from other sources); and often there are stories nested within stories told in a media res format. Even how Ovid relates his stories speak of flux and change.
The tales themselves offer a smattering of myths from Greek and Roman legend, including Cadmus, Perseus, Jason, Theseus, Hercules, the heroes of Troy and Julius Caesar, although the narratives can also include mortals and lesser deities. Murder, rage, hubris, affairs, rape, and judgement of the gods abound in his tales, leaving the reader shocked, disgusted, enamoured, sad, engrossed, irritated, and often, conflicted; Ovid can provoke a myriad of emotions within the same story, evidence of the efficacy of his writing.
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| Ovid Banished from Rome (1838) J.M.W. Turner source Wikimedia Commons |
While Metamorphoses is our primary source for some myths, such as Apollo and Daphne, Phaeton, and Narcissus, the playful and ironic tone of the work suggests that we can’t always take Ovid seriously in his delivery, and the myths themselves could have been subject to his alterations. In addition, the work was set out in fifteen books, rather than the usual twenty-four of the common epic standard, and certain important names and actions are missing from very important narratives, such as Dido, queen of Carthage, Jason and Medea, the Trojan War, etc. I can’t help but feel that Ovid was writing with an agenda. Was he perhaps attempting to “metamorphoses” the traditional epic poem, the traditional myths and the traditional religious tenor of Rome as well?
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| Ovid Among the Scythians (1859) Eugène Delacroix source Wikipedia |
Yet in spite of the speculation, the graphic description, the sexual inferences, the gratuitous narrative and even the confusion, Metamorphoses is unparalleled as a literary adventure. Ovid’s work is certainly one that has a life of its own and its owner a share of its fame. However, as the poem ends, Ovid reveals that fame and glory were his original intent.
” ….. But with the better part of me, I’ll gain
a place that’s higher than the stars: my name,
indelible, eternal, will remain.
And everywhere that Roman power has sway,
in all domains the Latins gain, my lines
will be on people’s lips; and through all time —
if poets’ prophecies are ever right —
my name and fame are sure: I shall have life.”
While Ovid’s works went out of fashion for a time, in the late 11th century classic literature gained a new life. Ovid’s writings began to have a significant influence on culture, the 12th century often being called The Ovidian Age. As cathedral schools flourished in the early Middle Ages, Ovid’s work was widely read as moral allegories, with added Christian meaning. William Caxton published the first English translation of Metamorphoses in 1480, and the poet’s influence continued, imbuing Shakespeare with many of his comparisons. In fact, the many Ovidian allusions within Shakespeare’s works are part of what makes it difficult reading for modern day readers, unless they are familiar with this work. Ovid certainly has approached a fame and regard worthy of a great poet, and perhaps has vindicated himself within the realms of classic literature.
“It is difficult to make a dull garden, but old Mr. Wither had succeeded.”
Stella Gibbons writes rather odd books. Cold Comfort Farm, her best known and highly acclaimed novel, follows an orphaned, pert young woman to a mucky, rural farm and observes while she neatens and tidies all the morose, lurking, and deranged occupants into their proper places, finding love in the process. Gibbons has a knack for depicting rather unusual and sometimes bizarre characters, and this flair for the unique has continued in her writing of Nightingale Wood. The introduction to the story labels it as a “fairy tale” and it is, although not along the usual lines one would expect from such a tale. Gibbons’ evil creatures often have angelic faces, and her happily-ever-afters can leave the reader uncertain of reality. In playing with her characters, Gibbons appears to play with society and even the reader himself. Her writing is not easily defined.
When Viola Wither finds herself a widow, parentless and very nearly destitute, she must accept the hospitality of her in-laws for her subsistence. However, the Wither household is a quirky one, yet Viola, with her quiet and rather doe-eyed vacuity, manages to navigate the excessive expectations of her father-in-law, the ineffectualness of her mother-in-law and her two sisters-in-law, one who is a rather mannish, outdoorsy, opinionated woman, and the other a dull, thin, conventional woman with strangled hopes from an overbearing father. Yet, in spite of the tedious country life she is forced to accept and Viola’s credulous and nascent view of the world, she somehow manages to find her Prince Charming in this unlikely place.
“It has been hinted that her nature was affectionate; now that it had received encouragement there was no holding it; she was in love, so much in love that she did not realize that it was Wednesday morning and the letter had not come; and that the man she was in love with was the legendary Victor Spring. Victor had now become Him. He was less of a real person than ever. She never once thought about his character or his income or his mother. She was drunk. She wandered about like a dazzled moth, smiling dreamily, and running downstairs when the postman came, crying: ‘Anything for me?'”
Right away, we notice that Gibbons fairy-tale has some rough edges, that will never be filed smooth. It is romance, but romance with an uncomfortable twist. While Viola’s Prince Charming is not only handsome, debonair and rich, he’s also engaged to be married. And although he is physically attracted to Viola, he doesn’t even seem to remember her name. His reaction to Viola after the ball is not one of an idealized lover:
“He was most strongly attracted to her, but not romantically. The intentions of the Prince towards Cinderella were, in short, not honourable: and as we have seen, he thought it the prudent thing not to see her.
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| Sleeping Beauty source Wikimedia Commons |
However, this story is not only about Viola, and the Withers. We have a number of other unconventional characters who populate the pages of this unique novel: Hetty, Victor’s cousin who loves books and her family not so much; Saxon, the young, handsome chauffeur whose family has come down in the world, as he tries to manage his rather slovenly, yet sexually indiscriminate mother; the loud and dirty woodland Hermit who takes great delight in terrorizing the gentry with his insightful, yet indelicate observations; and many, many more colourful personalities. It’s a kaleidescope of the English country life of the 1930s, but while the surface is nice and tidy, underneath there are swirling passions, undisclosed sentiment, and hidden resentment.
Certainly the novel has a fairy tale flavour to it, sprinkled with hyperbole, but Gibbons ensures that she imbues it with a healthy dose of realism. In a lovely fantasy-style, Gibbons bestows on each character their heart’s desire, yet the outcome of their desires are firmly entrenched in the reality of the 1930s, and their desires can perhaps turn out not to be as desirable as first expected. On one hand, Gibbons shows incredible insight by investigating human desires, and then showing us how capricious the hand of fate can be, and how indiscriminate human nature can be, yet sometimes she doesn’t seem to like her characters, almost manipulating and abusing them in a way that makes you wary of liking them, even if you wish to. Reality descends on the characters, but often they seem to reject it, living inside a mental shell of their own making. It’s sort of an odd experience. I feel that I’ve witnessed an explosion of Dodie Smith meets Virginia Woolf and I’m not sure if I like it.
Having written over 20 novels, Gibbons was rather annoyed that none of her other works received the attention of Cold Comfort Farm, yet perhaps the criticism is somewhat deserved. While I enjoyed this book, I felt that it was difficult to really get to know any of the characters. Perhaps this mental barricade was due to the radical treatment that Gibbons gives her characters, pressing the loud pedal at one time, and the soft at another. Just when you think you have a character sketched, they behave in a way completely unexpected and you have to start all over again with a likeness. The characters themselves struggle not only within the definitions Gibbons imposes on them, but societal definitions and self-definition, so the read becomes somewhat unsettling. A fairy tale, yes, but a splintered fairy tale, where actuality rears its ugly face and blows away the clouds of expectations.
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| Prince Charming (1948) Rene Magritte source Wikiart |
Karen @ Books and Chocolate is once again hosting my favourite challenge of the year, the Back to the Classics Challenge. Admittedly, it’s my favourite challenge because it’s my easiest challenge. About 95% of the books I’m reading lately are classics, so I’m all over this one. I don’t usually make a list for this challenge, as the books I read naturally correspond with the categories, however, I want to concentrate on my Classics Club List for this coming year, and my WEM Biographies Project continues, so there are some “maybe” titles that I can choose:
Once again O at Behold the Stars is hosting the Reading England challenge. I did well with my attempt at this challenge this year, so I’ve decided to do it again and learn more about English counties!
I don’t have any set books planned for this one, but I’d like to read some counties that I hadn’t covered in the 2015 Reading England challenge. And I still have to read my nemesis, Thomas Hardy, so his works are a possibility.
And last, but most exciting, is the Ancient Greek Reading Challenge which I posted about here. I’m planning on reading the dramatists, Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, some comedies, and perhaps even make it to Plato and Aristotle if I’m feeling rather brave.
Other than these 2016 challenges, I have on-going projects such as:
My C.S. Lewis Project:
I did wonderfully the first year but last year was a sorry sight. I need to read at least a couple of Lewis this year. Mere Christianity should be a “gimme” and I’d also love to start and finish The Screwtape Letters. Otherwise Miracles is my favourite and The Abolition of Man would be a good one to try, as I struggled with it the first time I read it.
My Barsetshire Chronicles Read:
Sigh! This was a complete failure last year. I didn’t even get one book read. The next up is Framley Parsonage, so I’m going to have to focus, focus, focus!
The Well-Educated Mind Biographies:
Okay, this is one challenge where I’m doing well, thanks to Ruth! She keeps me honest. Next up is Gertrude Stein’s The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. There are 10 biographies left before we move on to Histories, so hopefully we’ll finish them all this year.
My Shakespeare Project:
I’ve been moving reasonably slowly through this lately, but at least I’m moving. I hope my Bardathon challenge will help me read some more of the Bard in 2016.
I’m also doing a few read-alongs including O’s The Pickwick Papers Read-Along, Amanda’s Children’s Literature Event in April, and a few of us are reading Ovid’s Metamorphoses (beginning now) and Edmund Spenser’s The Fairie Queene (beginning mid-April). If anyone wants to join in on the last two, please let me know. We keep getting new recruits!
“To be or not to be, that is the question …….”
First publish around 1602 (although a working copy is thought to have been in use in 1601), Hamlet has come down to us in two forms. Issued in 1603, a corrupt or crude and probably pirated copy called the “First Quarto” (Q1) was produced, then in 1604 a more complete and artistically styled “Second Quarto” (Q2) followed. It is supposed that the errors in Q1, complete with pretentious and often meaningless rhetoric, spurred Shakespeare and his company to press for a more complete and credible version. Surprisingly, Hamlet was never performed or printed in its entirety during Shakespeare’s lifetime and the copies we read today are a compilation of Q2 and the 1623 Folio edition. In spite of the errors and incompleteness of the play, there is little doubt that it is Shakespeare’s as it was performed by his own acting company. The evidence of the dating of the play is quite fascinating, as it not only uses clues from registries, but clues imbedded within the play to events that happened in 1601 and 1600. Shakespeare actuates very detailed detective work.
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| Portrait of Hamlet (c.1864) William Morris Hunt source Wikimedia Commons |
The legend of Hamlet goes back centuries, dating to around the Scandinavian sagas. It was familiar to the people of Iceland in the 10th century, although Shakespeare possibly drew from Histories Tragiques (1559-70) by Francis de Belleforest, relating tragic stories of great kings and queens whose lives had been ravaged by love or ambition. A second hypothesis is that Shakespeare revived an extant version of a play by Thomas Kyd, revising this earlier piece to become the Second Quarto (Q2), and then afterward rewriting the complete acting text and play, which then became the basis for the Folio of 1623. With regard to the first hypothesis, the similarity of the stories are too apparent to be coincidental, but there are differences in names and some differences in narrative that indicate Shakespeare was intent on making the play his own.
Hamlette at The Edge of the Precipice hosted a Hamlet Read-Along beginning in October and set a very leisurely pace, which was wonderful as it allowed me to dig very deeply into the play. My scene-by-scene postings were as follows:
Act I : Scene I, Scene II, Scene III, Scene IV, Scene V
Act II: Scene I, Scene II
Act III: Scene I, Scene II, Scene III, Scene IV
Act IV: Scene I, Scene II, Scene III, Scene IV, Scene V, Scene VI, Scene VII
Act V: Scene I, Scene II
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| The Young Lord Hamlet (1867) Philip Hermogenes Calderon source Wikimedia Commons |
The play itself begins in Denmark at Elsinore castle where two soldiers see a ghost on the ramparts. It is the ghost of the newly dead King Hamlet and immediately they inform his son, Hamlet, of the apparition. Horatio, his friend, keeps watch with him the following night, whereupon the ghost claims to his son that he has been murdered by his own brother, the new king, Claudius. To add insult to injury, Claudius has married Hamlet’s mother, Gertrude, an outrage that can hardly be borne by Hamlet. Yet questions pile upon Hamlet, enough to smother. Was the ghost truly there, and if so, was it really his father? Revenge was called for but how could the deed be done, and was he justified in taking a life? His father’s life was cut short “in the blossoms of his sin”, but if he dispatched Claudius in his guilty state, would not their deaths become parallel?
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| Hamlet encountering the Ghost (1768-69) Benjamin Wilson source Wikimedia Commons |
The contrary questions paralyze Hamlet into a mire of inaction. He then works out a contrary persona, playing at an odd type of insanity, yet often dispensing insightful, sharp and clear rhetoric to torment Claudius into confusion. Is Hamlet as dangerous as Claudius believes or is he merely an innocent victim of the circumstances, grief-stricken over the death of his father? After Hamlet unwittingly commits the murder of Polonius, the advisor of Claudius, he forces the hand of the new king who sends him to England, with the intent of extinguishing any threat to his kingdom. Yet Hamlet has also injured the mind of one once dearest to him, Ophelia, the daughter of Polonius, and her decent into madness colours the kingdom with further calamity. Upon Hamlet’s return, the culmination of this revenge tragedy is set into motion. Will Claudius’ plotting bring him success? Can Laertes avenge his father, Polonius’, murder, and will Hamlet’s revenge bring him the peace he seems to seek?
You can see throughout the play the emphasis on action vs. inaction, words vs. action, thoughts vs. action, etc. While Hamlet bemoans his inability to act to avenge his father’s death, on the surface seeming cowardly and ineffective, the actuality is quite the opposite. All throughout the play, Hamlet uses thoughts and words to manipulate his enemy. His thoughts, though he bemoans them, actually have more of an effect than he imagines, controlling certain small acts in a very effective manner. His act of insanity twists Claudius into a Gordian knot of uncertainty, his letters announcing his return to Denmark pushing Claudius to drastic action. Thoughts and words appear to be more important and certainly more effective than action, torturing his enemy to the very limits of his endurance. While it’s demonstrated in the play that revenge only brings suffering, is there a underlying theme that words can be more effective than action?
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| Ophelia (1863) Arthur Hughes source Wikiart |
While the cultural precepts of the Danish society in Hamlet seem to support the desire for revenge, Shakespeare’s Elizabethan audience would have viewed the thirst for vengeance as primitive, and perhaps rather shocking. There is evidence throughout the play that revenge brings only suffering and death to those involved. Fortinbras, the heir of the Danish kingdom at the end of the play, calls for all the noblemen to hear the story of Hamlet:
” Let us haste to hear it,
And call the noblest to the audience ……”
He wants the nobles of the kingdom to attend to this tragedy and learn from it. Horatio responds:
“But let this same be presently performed,
Even while men’s minds are wild, lest more mischance
On plots and errors happen.”
Hamlet does get a hero’s remembrance, but the deaths, suffering and pain caused by his vengeful actions, and those of others, are strongly emphasized.
There is a question throughout the play of Hamlet’s sanity. Is he truly mad, or is it simply an act produced to set a trap for the murderer of his father? I tend to think the latter, but Shakespeare appears to quite closely link insanity with revenge, perhaps alluding to the fact that vengeance has a detrimental effect on our minds, distorting perceptions to bring about a type of madness. Hamlet is playing at being mad, but madness also plays with him, his malevolent sentiments poisoning his very psyche, and modifying his entire moral perspective. The whole character of Hamlet is played out in the agonizing conflict within his mind. Mad he is, and mad he is not, perhaps making him at once to be and not to be.
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The Club of Queer Trades is a “society consisting exclusively of people who have invented some new and curious way of making money,” and Chesterton’s delightful collection of fantastical tales give us a view of these entrepreneurs who ply their trades in perhaps an unorthodox manner and often with surprising results.
The Tremendous Adventures of Major Brown: The subject of this title seeks out Rupert Grant, an amateur detective, and with the help of Swinburne, the narrator, and Grant’s brother, Basil, a former “mad” judge, they proceed to cleverly solve his dilemma. Retired and living comfortably and quietly in a tiny picturesque villa, Major Brown has a mania for pansies. One day while strolling down a lane, he meets a man pushing flowers in a wheelbarrow and is convinced to purchase the pansies among them. Yet before departing, the man whispers that if the Major will only climb the garden wall, he will see the most admired pansies in the whole of England. Against his nature, Major Brown accepts a boost up and is flabbergasted by what he sees. It is not the pansies themselves that catch his attention but the arrangement of them, spelling out “Death to Major Brown.” Never one to quail in any situation, Brown introduces himself to the gardener of the house who takes him inside to meet a peculiar lady who is staring out the window, but he remembers to warn him beforehand not to mention the “jackal.” They begin to converse but suddenly their conversation is cut short by a blood-curdling screech, “Major Brown, Major Brown, where does the jackal dwell?” When the Major runs outside, he spies a coal-black decapitated head on the sidewalk, where apparently the screams are coming from. What is going on? Who is trying to kill the Major? And why does idiosyncratic Basil seem unconcerned? Chesterton ties up his story with his usual aplomb, and yet still leaves you wondering. There is also a neat contrast between Basil and Rupert, the former using his intellect and the latter acting on impulse. A very fun tale!
The Painful Fall of a Great Reputation: Charles Swinburne, the narrator of the last tale, and Basil Grant are travelling on the top of a deserted tramcar, speaking philosophically about the plight of the poor and the perception of them. Basil declares that in spite of their circumstances, the majority of the poor are good people and that “the very vileness of life of these ordered plebeian places bears witness to the victory of the human soul.” No sooner has he uttered these words than he spies a man on the street and his astonishment is palpable. He announces that he’s observing the most wicked man in the world. When Swinburne requests to know the man’s sins, Grant admits that he has never seen him before this moment. Swinburne is startlingly perplexed. How has Basil made his assumption? But there is no time to question as his friend grabs him and they are off on a chase after the most wicked man in the world. In a world of fact versus impression and appearance versus reality, how are they to know whom to trust?
The Awful Reason of the Vicar’s Visit: Swinburne is dressing to meet Basil Grant at a dinner party when suddenly the sound of the doorbell resounds through the house. It is the Reverend Ellis Shorter who has heard of his friend, Major Brown’s adventures and has come to seek help. Swinburne, impatient to be off to his engagement, gets impatient with the Vicar’s dodderings and prevaricating whereupon the Vicar gives him leave to go, but states if he does not hear him out before he does, a man will be dead! He relates a queer story of being kidnapped by a women’s sewing club, and a subsequent photograph of himself that had never been taken. Swinburne is perplexed and takes the vicar to Basil to sort out the mystery!
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| Reverend Oliver Maron, Vicar of Lancaster George Romney |
The Singular Speculation of the House Agent: Lieutenant Keith Drummond manages to excite Rupert’s suspicions and barely concealed contempt with his larger-than-life stories and exaggerated claims. Upon Drummond requesting a loan from Basil and claiming a visit to a house-agent, Rupert near demands to accompany him in hopes of exposing sinister purposes. All four men set off together, and after a curiously unintelligible conversation between the odd little house agent and Drummond, in which the agent presents a ferret, some lizards and a spider, Drummond escapes before the rest. When they follow him, they come upon a commotion and find that there has been a brawl. Drummond has been part of it, with his clothes torn and his sword, which he commonly carries with him, drawn. The police get his address, yet Swinburne, Basil and Rupert discover the next day that the address was a fake. Rupert is exultant with the proof of his suspicions of Drummond’s disreputable character, but Basil merely laughs, claiming that Drummond his one of the most honest men and that truth can be stranger than fiction. How can this be? Is some of the mad judge’s madness finally showing through? The truth will be discovered at the address that doesn’t exist.
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| Purley, Surrey (now south London) source Wikipedia Commons |
The Noticeable Conduct of Professor Chadd: Basil Grant doesn’t have many friends, but the ones he does have are a motley collection of idiosyncratic characters. One day, he is discussing with his friend, Professor Chadd, an eminent ethnologist and expert on the relation of language to savages, the impact of science on the observable knowledge of Zulus versus the knowledge gained by living like a Zulu. Chadd, a stuffy academic, who has recently been appointed as curator of the Asiatic manuscripts at the British Museum, answers in stuffy, didactic prose. The next morning, Basil receives a telegram from one of Chadd’s three sisters: Chadd has suffered a mental breakdown and Basil is entreated to come at once. Upon his arrival, Basil discovers that the Professor will not communicate with anyone and, instead, will only move his legs in a kind of rigid, hopping dance. The doctor is with him and when Basil approaches, he asks for a moment with his friend. The observers are surprised to see the respectable Mr. Grant with a paper and pencil, following Chadd about and jotting notes as he goes. They are further astounded when he begins to hop around in a parody of Chadd. The situation is further complicated with the arrival of Mr. Bingham of the British Museum. Great Scots! How can a lunatic be curator of the Asiatic manuscripts?!! Yet Basil declares to Bingham that they need to pay Chadd £800 per year until he stops dancing. What? Has Basil gone mad as well? Are there two lunatics, one or none?
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| Bedford Gardens, Bloomsbury source Wikimedia Commons |
The Eccentric Seclusion of the Old Lady: Swinburne is walking with his friend, Rupert Grant, the amateur detective, when Grant spots a milkman walking ahead of them. Suspicious because of the careless way the man carries his milk can, Grant swears that if they follow him, they will find a mystery at the end of the trail. When the milkman disappears down area steps to a basement, Grant follows and emerges triumphant. He has heard a cry for help in the downstairs room, repeating, “When shall I get out? Will they ever let me out?”. Determined to rescue the imprisoned lady, they enlist Basil’s help and with his usual aplomb, Basil gains entry to the house but when he emerges, he claims that the men inside are good chaps. Incensed, both Rupert and Swinburne insist on entering the house themselves to find the victim. The “chaps” allow them in but a fight ensues in which our three rescuers are pinned. Will they get free to release the poor woman who’s been detained? Yet with Basil Grant, nothing is every as it seems.
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| Milkman and cart 1900s source Wikimedia Commons |
In Basil Grant, Chesterton creates, not a scientifically brilliant detective like Sherlock Holmes, but one who is astute in the workings of human nature, which makes for truly fascinating cases. Another fantastic effort by Chesterton who keeps the reader guessing, and never quite sure whether up is down or down is up in The Club of Queer Trades.
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