Do the classics get better as we age?

One of my favorite classes in high was (not surprisingly I'm sure) my freshman English class. With Mrs. Reardon I experienced for the first time Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Lady or the Tiger, The Lottery, The Odyssey and countless other important works of literature. One of them, To Kill a Mockingbird, quickly turned into a favorite of mine. In fact, I revisited it again in college and wrote my undergraduate thesis on its critical response. 

Near the end of our time in Mrs. Reardon's class she mentioned that she and a fellow teacher had recently discussed whether or not To Kill a Mockingbird was wasted on high school freshmen. Were we really capable of digesting all of the complicated themes and grown-up world ideas as 14 year-olds? Of course we thought we were, and we told her so.

Since that first reading more than 20 years ago, I've read the book several more times, and Mrs. Reardon was right. With more life experience, the book means more to me each time I read it.

Fast forward to last week. With my American Literature class at the homeschool co-op where I teach once a week, we began discussion of Willa Cather's My Antonia. Cather is one of my favorites too. I find her prose lovely. It really makes me want to visit Nebraska and see those rolling prairies for myself (one day).

If you're not familiar with My Antonia, the basics with regard to the point I'm making involve a narrator named Jim looking back on his time growing up on his grandparents' rural Nebraska farm, particularly around a special friend he made, Antonia, who was the oldest daughter of Bohemian immigrants on a nearby farm. There is some question of whether Jim falls in love with Antonia (it makes for good class discussion).

But, years later, Jim is a successful New York City attorney, and his job requires some travel across the country. On one trip out west he arranges to visit his hometown. He's heard bits and pieces from Antonia and about her over the years, but it's been decades since they've seen each other. He borrows a horse and buggy and drives out to the farm where she lives with her now-husband and nearly a dozen children. Antonia is surprised and happy to see him. Jim relishes their time together catching up and meeting her children.

Jim is struck by how time and hard work on the farm have changed her appearance, though her personality has remained very much the same. After their visit, Jim returns back to his life in New York City and his wife.

During our class discussion last week, I had a Mrs. Reardon moment when I almost let slip out of my mouth, "Read this book again right after you've been to your 20th high school reunion!" I thought better of it, both because as homeschoolers they may not ever attend a high school reunion and also because they might have had the same indignant reaction my classmates and I did.

I imagine that, like To Kill a Mockingbird, My Antonia would have not had such a profound effect on me in high school. 

A Modern-Day Juliet

I recently finished reading Anne Fortier's Juliet, a caper through Italy's Siena, the supposed setting for the original version of Romeo and Juliet, made famous by William Shakespeare but a story that predates him. This historical fiction novel is one I picked up off the Notable Paperbacks table on a trip to Raleigh's Quail Ridge Books. Whatever I pick up from this table never disappoints. One of the reviews cited on the back cover says the book "reads like a Da Vinci Code for the smart modern woman." So of course I had to have it.

Much like another fictional book I've recently about a previous work, The Sherlockian, Juliet alternates back and forth between the heroine, the modern-day Juliet, an American woman in her mid-20s who returns to her native Italy to sort out a family secret and possible inheritance from her mother, and the original Juliet, the daughter in a powerful, feuding family in the 1340s. The two Juliets are connected by family lineage and the modern-day one has a mystery to solve with the help of her twin sister Janice. The two of them have to decide who to trust of the new Italian relatives and acquaintances, a task that proves difficult.

I loved the spunky modern Juliet and how she approaches her mystery. I liked the characters she came in contact and the descriptions of how society in this small Italian town gets things done. Of course I liked it because of the Shakespeare references and this timeless romantic story. But the biggest reason why I picked up this book and enjoyed it so much is because I've been to Siena.

About 10 years ago my grandmother and I visited the northern half of Italy with a tour group and Siena was one of the places where we spent a day. We learned about Il Palio, an ancient horserace that has happened twice each year since the Middle Ages and then saw the Piazza del Campo where the finish line of the race is in the center of town. There is one horse and jockey in the race for each neighborhood in the city, and the winner gets major bragging rights until the next race: first priority seating in restaurants around Siena and all kinds of other preferrential treatment.

Here are a few of my (scanned in) photos of my visit to Siena. Whether or not you've been to this beautiful, ancient Italian town, I highly recommend reading Fortier's Juliet.

Recent Read: The Book of William

I'm borrowing The Book of William: How Shakespeare's First Folio Conquered the World by Paul Collins from a friend who loans me many of the books I blog about. She's the same friend who was in London with me in 2010 and one of the things we did while we were there was visit the British Library to see all the manuscripts they have on display. It was really wonderful yet overwhelming to see so many original manuscripts of so many important British novels, religious texts and even handwritten lyrics that later became hit songs by the Beatles. I had some paper in my bag which was great because taking notes helped me remember later all the amazing things I had seen.

I was excited to read about one of the manuscripts I'd seen in person at the British Library, Shakespeare's First Folio. I was disappointed in Collins' book though. He jumped back and forth between the publishing history of Shakespeare's works and present-day rare book auctions, which made the narrative choppy. I kept hoping Collins would establish his own credibility in the rare book world. I know he must have some clout to have written the book but I wanted to know more about why he wrote the book, why he loves Shakespeare, why he's interested in the first publications of his work, etc. I'd hoped to hear about the journey of the First Folio I saw in the British Library. I'd hoped for more overall.

Have you read this book? Did I miss something big?

Westminster Abbey

While in London, I got to visit Westminster Abbey twice - once for a tour, and one for a service. Both were wonderful. If you haven't been to Westminster, anything I told you about its magnificence still wouldn't do it justice, so just take my word for it. Of particular interest to me here was the Poets' Corner, where over 100 writers are buried and/or celebrated. I was most interested in seeing the Williams (Shakespeare, Blake and Wordsworth), Chaucer, Burns, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats, Austen, Byron, Dickens, Lewis Carroll, the Bronte sisters, George Eliot, Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Henry James. It was really overwhelming to see so many important literary contributors all mentioned together. Luckily, I had been able to study up on everything before my visit, thanks to a book Teresa bought for me on the Poets' Corner during her London trip three years ago. What fun!  

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

I'm finally getting back to more about my trip to London, and I'm promising that I'll have more London posts coming this week and next.

One of the highlights of the trip for me (in a trip filled with highlights) was seeing Henry IV Part 2 at Shakepeare's Globe Theatre. At first we were thinking of spending five pounds on a groundling ticket to get the effect of that; we changed our minds after all the walking we did that day. We paid 20 pounds instead for a front row seat and rented a cushion for the show. I recommend that route.

I have been lucky enough to study this play twice - once each in undergraduate and graduate school. However, it was the voice of my undergraduate Shakespeare professor whose voice I kept hearing in my head during the play, reminding me about the colorful personalities of each character and other little tidbits. It was such fun to see the play come to life right before my eyes in this historic place. The play was so much more bawdy than I remembered (or noticed from just reading it rather than seeing it performed), and much more comical than I remembered too. I wrote in my travel journal that night that it was the best play I'd ever seen; however, I hadn't yet seen the other two fantastic plays I saw later that week in London. Since those two, I'd have to rank Henry IV Park 2 as in my top five.

Perhaps the friendliest Londoner we met while we were there happened to be sitting behind us during the play and chatted with us during intermission and after the play ended. She clued me in on the little choreographed jig done by all the play's characters at the end. It was designed, she said, to be performed at the end of all Shakespearean plays per Elizabethan tradition, ensuring that even after a tragic play, audience members would go home happy. I never knew about that before and thought it was wonderful.

From the outside in the daylight.

Here I am, in all my English major excitement.

The set before the play started.

  The balconies and the sky visible during the open-air performance.

Rare Books and Manuscripts

Yesterday I finished my third of three books about books (you can see my thoughts on the first two here and here), titled simply, Books by Larry McMurtry. I was hoping it would be much like one of these recent reads, The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop by Lewis Buzbee. Instead, it covered decades of McMurtry's life as book scout and seller of rare and valuable books. It was interesting enough, though he dropped only a few names I recognized and many, many I didn't. However, I really enjoyed hearing about all the rare books he's found over the years in basements, on bookshelves of both regular people and the rich and famous, and the ones he's sold himself and been paid a pretty penny for.

While I was in London, I, too, got a taste of rare books and manuscripts by visiting the British Library. This facility houses 14 million books, 920,000 magazines and journals, 58 million patents and three million sound recordings, according to their website, which you can visit here. I knew before I went that I'd see a Gutenberg Bible, several versions of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and some other things. I wasn't prepared, though, for feeling overwhelmed by seeing so many world-changing works all housed in one place. It was so much that I knew I'd forget a lot of it, so I started jotting down notes while I was there. Here's a sampling of what I saw/heard:

• A recording of James Joyce reading from Finnegan's Wake
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• Jane Austen's third volume of a journal she wrote from age 12 to 17 with writings composed for her family's enjoyment

• Jane Austen's writing desk, given to her by her father. It was kind of like a lap desk that held supplies in compartments.

• Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre manuscript

• A notebook containing writings by Virginia Woolf that she used to write Mrs. Dalloway

• Original sheet music by Handel for Messiah and the Wedding March he created for A Midsummer Night's Dream (which just so happens to be my favorite Shakespeare play, and the musical selection I chose to walk out of the church to with my new husband in 2007 at our wedding)

• The beginnings of Beatles songs scribbled on napkins, paper scraps and other things that eventually became hit songs

• Notebooks from Leonardo Da Vinci

• The Magna Carta

• A letter from Charles Darwin to a friend which became the basis for Origin of Species

• A lecture draft written by Sigmund Freud

• A version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland illustrated by Salvador Dali

• Shakespeare's first folio, which was open to Henry VI Part I

And that's just a sampling of all that is there and on display. It was truly amazing to see. Of course there's no picture taking on the inside, but here is the library from the outside:

Reading = Good Memories

I've just finished reading a very satisfying book by Lewis Buzbee called The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop. In light of my recent review of The Case for Books: Past, Present, and Future, it was especially nice to read a book that celebrates all the good feelings that come with facing down an entire bookstore and choosing something out of all the inventory available to be YOUR book, and later, opening the pages of that book to savor the contents.

When Buzbee began talking about what really made him become the voracious reader he is, it struck a chord with me. He said that rereading a book can take a reader back to where he or she first experienced that book in such a way: "I was ____ years old when I happened on a novel called _____, and within six months I had read every other book by the writer known as ____." As he also mentioned, he can most times remember his surroundings when he read a particular book.

For me, I was 20 years old when I read As I Lay Dying. I was in my sophomore dorm room on the yellow futon and I read all afternoon each day that week while my roommate was in class. That is how I knew I was completely hooked by 20th century American literature. I was 21 and in a course on Shakespeare's comedies and histories when I put on a crown with streamers and read the part of Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream in Meredith College's pre-renovated Joyner Hall. I was 16 and in my junior English class, listening to my teacher read out every word of the first chapter of The Catcher in the Rye. Each of these times, and many more, I knew I was really cut out to be a reader.

And, if I pick up The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop and read through it again years from now, I hope I will remember where I was when I read it: in a rocking chair on the front porch of a beach house while the sun went down for two nights in a row. My favorite place.

Love Stories

In honor of Valentine's Day on Sunday, I've compiled a list of my favorite love stories. In no particular order, they are:

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller
A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare
The Senator's Wife by Sue Miller
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

The Canterbury Tales

Thursday night I attended The New American Shakespeare Tavern's adaptation of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, and it was fantastic! The dialogue had been slightly changed, so though I didn't get to recite the Prologue word for word along with the actors, I was so entertained by the beer cans, Converse sneakers, a ballroom-dancing Chanticleer, tour bus, puppets, two added tales and Southern accents to notice.

I went with my friend, Lori, who gets just as excited about books, plays and history as I do. We had a great time, and hope to do more fun stuff in Atlanta soon.

The New American Shakespeare Tavern has occupied its space on Peachtree Street in Atlanta for 20 years, and they are celebrating all season with a winter schedule that includes several great plays still to come: Romeo + Juliet, King Lear and The Taming of the Shrew.

If you have the chance to see a play at this theatre, you just simply must.