Why Be Happy, When You Can Be Normal, by Jeanette Winterson

The writer presents her book in a video

Mercedes Cebrián interviews Jeanette Winterson (video)

Conversation with Bel Olid (video)

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (film)

BIOGRAPHY

Jeanette Winterson was born in Manchester in 1959 and was adopted by a very religious family.

At 16, she discovered she was a lesbian and left home.

Her first book, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, a semi-autobiographical novel, tells us her experiences of her childhood and adolescence in this family. (There’s an adaptation of this book for the television.)

She got a job as an assistant editor for a feminist publisher.

Besides writing and editing, she refurbished a house in Spitalfields, and there she opened an organic food shop.

Other books of hers are The Passion, set in the Napoleonic period, and The Daylight Gate, based on the 1612 witch trials in Lancashire.

She had a relation with Pat Kavanagh, Julian Barnes’s wife, but it didn’t last, and Pat went back to her husband.

 

INTRODUCTION. The Wrong Crib.

This first chapter of Why Be Happy... is a sort of introduction to the book and presents some questions that are going to appear along the narrative: her adoption, religion, lesbianism, literature, feminism, parental and filial love. But sometimes you think it’s a kind of revenge against her foster parents, especially her foster mother, an authoritarian person obsessed with the biblical religion.

But all in all, the story is about the research of the protagonist’s biological parents and her own identity. And also trying to discover why she was an adopted girl: was she a desired child, was she given in adoption because her mother didn’t have any money? Because she was very young? Because was the fruit of a non-consented relation? But it seems there was another child to be adopted: why was she the chosen one?

She starts telling us she wrote Oranges and that when Mrs Winterson (her foster mother) finds out she got very angry. Jeanette now describes her appearance and personality: a tall, big woman with a paranoic obsession with religion and strict morality. But she has other peculiarities apart from going to church almost every day: she never sleeps with her husband, she keeps a pistol in a drawer, she believes in spirits…

And Jeanette herself is a very singular creature: she can be violent, she deceives her friends, she keeps a part from the rest of schoolmates, she likes reading…

 

And in the next chapters she is going to tell us how she learnt English Literature reading all the books of the library in alphabetical order, how she bought second hand books, and she had to hide them, how Mrs Winterson found them and burned them, and thus she decided to write her own, why she left her home at sixteen, how she earned some money working in a market, how she lived in a Mini, how she felt in love with a she-schoolmate, what were the working-class lives like under Margaret Thatcher, what were her opinions about her, how her Literature teacher took in her house, how she could go to Oxford to study Literature…

What kind of people were Mr and Mrs Winterson, what kind of relationship they had, why they didn’t sleep together, what kind of religion was the Pentecostal church, what kind of books she read…

There are also very interesting remarks about literature: i.e., people who read King James’s Bible could understand more easily Shakespeare because they were written in the same 17^th century English.

But the big part of the story is the research and finally, after a long process and innumerable bureaucratic hurdles, finding out who her mother was, meeting her and tying to accommodate herself with her new relatives.

 

 

QUESTIONS

-Do you think there’s always something missing in an adopted child?

-What would you say if a writer used your person as a character for a novel?

-What is for you to be “normal”?

-What can you tell about the story of Philomel?

-The narrator mention “stammering” when you have had a kind of trauma. What do you know about the causes of stammering?

-What can you tell us about these films: Secrets and Lies, by Mike Leigh, and Rosemary’s Baby, by Roman Polanski?

 

 

VOCABULARY

crib, McCarthyism, flare, Pentecostal, bare-knuckle fighter, copperplate, be borne up on the shoulders, duffel-coat. Shift, cover story, flash-dash, terraced house, tick-box, catapult, misfit, forensically, shot, Philomel, blotted, vale, thug, seances, poodle, larder, cap-gun

Hotel des Boobs, by David Lodge

BIOGRAPHY AND SUMMARY, by Nora Carranza

David Lodge (January 28, 1935, London, England) is an English novelist, literary critic, playwright, and editor renowned for his satiric novels about academic life.
Lodge was educated at University College, London, where he got his degree in Literature and where he is an Honorary Fellow.
He travelled to the United States, where he taught, and received his doctorate at the University of Birmingham, where he was professor of Modern English Literature from 1960 to 1987.
He left this university to dedicate entirely to writing.
Lodge is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and has received numerous honours, including Commander of the Order of the British Empire and Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres in France.
His early novels and fiction works go back to 1960, continuing with novels in which the writer satirizes academic life.
Lodge co-authored different plays and moreover produced works dealing in literary theory, essays written for The Washington Post and The Independent, and other books containing essays, lectures, reviews, and a diary.

 

Mentioning some of David Lodge literary works:

The Picturegoers (1960)

Ginger, You’re Barmy (1962)

The British Museum Is Falling Down (1965)

Out of the Shelter (1970)

How Far Can You Go? (1980)

Changing Places: A Tale of Two Campuses (1975)

Small World: An Academic Romance (1984)

Nice Work (1988)

Paradise News (1991)

Therapy (1995)

Thinks… (2001)

Deaf Sentence (2008)

Author, Author (2004) and A Man of Parts (2011) are based on the lives of writers Henry James and H.G. Wells, respectively.

The prolific writer David Lodge lives in Birmingham.

SUMMARY

This story takes place in some French Riviera hotel; Hotel des Pins seems to be its real name.

But some habits there make Harry, one of the guests, propose a different name: Hotel des Boobs.

Harry and Brenda are a British couple on holidays. They have always gone to spend the summer at Brenda’s parents, in Guernsey, with their children. 

This year, the children have already grown independent, and the couple is well off; thus they consider new options, and finally they end up going to a little hotel with swimming pool near St Raphael.

As Harry’s friends have mentioned, and Harry knows somehow, in some areas of the Mediterranean, at that time, women had started to practice topless. But what Harry finds and experiences there is beyond his previous suppositions.

First of all, there is Harry’s strong personal attraction for women’s breasts, since he’s always spending time and thoughts about this part of the female figure.

Already at the hotel, Harry can observe and enjoy more or less discreetly all the women by the swimming pool.

For instance, Harry remains peeping through the window in the couple room, getting Brenda so angry that she sends him down to the pool “to have an inspection” directly there.

Harry begins to characterize all the women at the hotel swimming pool, according to their nationalities, companions and activities while they sunbathe, but manly according to the shape, size, movement or aspect of their breasts. 

Harry carries a book, that in fact he doesn’t read, and a pair of dark sunglasses, the elements he considers useful to disguise his curiosity over topless women, who only avoid using the upper part of their bikinis by the swimming pool, and immediately cover themselves when moving to other areas of the hotel.

Harry entertains various ideas centred in nakedness, for example, what the other men there could feel, that the women would imagine their topless could arouse those other men... At the end, he gets enthusiastic and excited with the idea that Brenda, who has good boobs, should go topless before the holidays ended. The other men could look, but only he would be allowed to touch. Following this strong desire, Harry offers to buy Brenda some beautiful and expensive dress they saw in St Raphael, if she agrees to take her top off.

 

At this point of the story, there is a sudden change: in fact, there is a writer by the swimming pool, under an umbrella, and he is writing about the created couple Harry and Brenda, and about all the others there, the women in topless, the other guests, the waiter, all of them reflected in a pile of written pages.

But suddenly and unexpectedly, the local mistral wind starts to blow causing the written pages to fly all over, fall onto the water, disappear beyond the tall trees…, a true disaster for the writer, who feels violated.

Some of the presents manages to bring back a few pages to the author, and a lady sends her children to run and try and collect more papers.

The author (unknown name) doesn’t want the papers back and goes to his room to wait the return of his wife (unknown name) from St Raphael, where she has bought a nice, although not so expensive, dress.

The husband explains to his wife about the flying parts of the book, and wants to leave the hotel immediately, just in case someone could read what he has told in the lost pages.

His wife doesn’t consider it is a problem, but wants to know what the end of the story would be.

“Brenda accepts the bribe to go topless”, the author says. The wife doesn’t believe it would happen.

The writer then continues telling the end of the story: Brenda doesn’t go to bed with Harry, she disappears for two hours, gets from Antoine the bouquet-prize for the best breasts, goes to his room where they make love, and Brenda considers Antoine much better lover and much better equipped than Harry.

The author's wife says that is the worst ending.

But then the author goes on saying that Brenda has invented that story, that nothing has happened. But Harry remains disturbed thinking Brenda doesn’t appreciate his male attributes and, shaking his head, he gazes at the blue breastless margins of the pool.

Harry’s obsession about women breasts has changed to anxiety about his own body.

Finally, the writer’s wife asks him if he would like her to go topless, and he answers of course not, but he doesn’t sound really sure, or true. 

*

In this story, there are two couples and one story inside another.

Perhaps in some aspects, the writer uses Harry to express his own feelings or preferences.

Perhaps similarities or differences can be found between the four of them. 

The story gives the chance to think about what women breasts signify in different cultures or societies. From naturally exhibited, to denied or hidden. Female breasts as tender and essential for a baby, or charged with sexual attraction. 

At the beginning of topless time, many people considered it totally indecent and didn’t approve or follow the new style.

For some people, to go naked to the beach is an act of freedom and naturalism.

For others, it means discomfort and shame. 

As the psychoanalysts explain, sexuality is a big and unknown mystery for human beings. 

QUESTIONS

-What ideas do you have to stop the “binge tourism”?

-Do you consider disrespectful / offensive / sexist / anachronistic the beginning of the story?

-Do you think nakedness is sexy only according to the situation?

-“May a cat look at a king?” I mean, can a gaze / stare be bothering? Do you have to ask permission to look at someone / something?

-The writer is telling his wife the story he’s going to write, so what is the difference between a story casually told and a work of art?

 

 

VOCABULARY

Peeping Tom, squint, Geddit, Knockers, were... off, pricey, extravagant, filched, weaned, pore, snooty, tubby, lathe, belied, matey, foolscap, wont, Schadenfreude, longhand, mistral, Paperchase, hard-on

Psychology, by Katherine Mansfield

SUMMARY, by Cristina Fernández

An ex-lover goes to visit a woman, and both of them are pleased with it, just the sensation of being together and feeling the attraction. When he looked at her, she moved quickly away to prepare tea, interrupting their courtship.

Both of them wanted to speak about what she had said the last time they met, but she needed time for herself, to grow calm, to feel free. Friendship was a good option.

He was so comfortable with her that wanted to go on from where they left off last time, but she tried to stop it from happening again.

The attraction was in the air, they spoke nervously, lovingly, they wanted to succumb, but then their friendship would be in danger and she would suffer.

He wanted to stay but decided to go, she wanted him to stay but didn’t say, she cried, felt rage. The bell rang and she hoped it was him; instead it was an old friend: she hugged her and said goodbye.

Then she went to the writing table and wrote a letter for him, inviting him to come again like a friend.

QUESTIONS

-What do you think about the cliché “[women] long for tea as strong men long for wine”?

-What kind of traveller are you? What is the difference between a tourist and a traveller? How can a tourist be respectful with the environment and the native country?

-Do you think that spoiling things is something in our nature (tread virgin snow, breaking silence, breaking the smooth surface of the water)?

-What do you think of that kind of friendship called “friends with a benefit”? “Sexual love destroys friendship”: According to your point of view, is it a cliché?

-To your mind, is psychoanalysis effective or is it only quackery?

-What kind of novels do you like: psychological, historical, detective / crime novels…? Can you tell us about one you’ve read recently?

-Tell us some examples of the contradiction between clock time and psychological time. Do you have any anecdote?

-What do you do when you have a badly timed visitor?

 

VOCABULARY

lingeringly, shade, sharp, offspring, shooed away, utterly, wads, Roll (one's eyes), entreat, to the bone, be off, outlook, stodgy, put a spell on (somebody), jingle, soiled, reeled

AUDIOBOOK

ANALYSIS

ANOTHER ANALYSIS

The Birthmark, by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Nathaniel Hawthorne at the Wikipedia

The Birthmark at the Wikipedia

Audiobook

The Birthmark, film

Nathaniel Hawthorne, by Remedios Benéitez 

BIOGRAPHY 

Nathaniel Hawthorne was born on July the 4^th, 1804, Salem, Massachusetts, and died on May the 19^th, 1864, Plymouth, New Hampshire). He was an American dark romantic novelist and short-story writer. His works often focus on history, morality and religion.

An ancestor, William Hawthorne, was the first of his family to emigrate from England to America in 1630.

Nathaniel was the only son of Nathaniel and Elisabeth Clark Hawthorne. His father, a sea captain, died in 1808 of yellow fever. After that, her mother moved back into her parent’s house with her children.

With the help of relatives. Nathaniel entered Bowdoin College in 1821 and graduated in 1825.

He published his first work in 1828, the novel Fanshawe. He published several short stories in periodicals, which he collected in 1837 as Twice-Told Tales.

He worked at the Boston Custom House and joined Brook Farm, a transcendentalist community, where he met his future wife, Sophia Peabody. They got married in 1842. The couple rented a home in Concord where they were neighbours with writers as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau and the Alcott family.

The Hawthorns struggled with debt and a growing family, and eventually returned to Salem in 1845. There he worked a few years as Surveyor of the Port at the Salem Custom House.

Hawthorne published his most well-known work, The Scarlet Letter, shortly after, in 1850, bringing him fame and financial relief. He then began working on The House of Seven Gables, a novel based on an old family, the Pyncheons, in Salem.

He was appointed to the consulship in Liverpool, England, by his old college friend president Franklin Pierce (14^th USA president). While in Europe, he wrote The Marble Faun and Our Old Home before moving back to his house in Concord in 1860.

Hawthorne suffered from poor health in 1860, and died in his sleep during a trip to the White Mountains in 1864.

 

THE BIRTHMARK

Aylmer is a brilliant scientist and natural philosopher who has abandoned his experiments for a while to marry the beautiful Georgiana. One day, Aylmer asks his wife whether she has ever thought about removing the birthmark on her cheek. He thinks that her face is almost perfect, but he wants to remove it. She is angry at first, and then she weeps, asking how he can love her if she is shocking to him.

He obsesses about the birthmark. He can think of nothing else. For him, it symbolizes mortality and sin. He wants to remove it, even if it ends her life. Finally, she agrees for love.

QUESTIONS

Talk about the characters:

Aylmer

Georgiana

Aminadab

What is exactly “natural philosophy”? (27, 2)

“A spiritual affinity more attractive than any chemical one” (27, 3-4). Do you know what do people mean when they talk about “elective affinities”?

Is there any scientific explanation for a birthmark?

Can you describe Georgiana’s birthmark?

Why do you think Aylmer didn’t see it before marrying her, or why did it appear after getting married?

Why did Aylmer, and then Georgiana, want to erase her birthmark?

In the story, Aylmer has a dream.  Can you tell us this dream? For you, what are the meaning of dreams?

Do you know the myth of Pygmalion?

Can you find a similitude between this story and the legend of Faust?

The story tells us that a lot of Aylmer experiments are failures and there is a risk for Georgiana’s life if he tries to delete her birthmark. Why do they want to take risks so dangerous?

Do you think there’s any relation between the birthmark and the speck in the saying, “You can see the speck in your friend’s eye, but you don’t notice the log that is in your own eye"? What were Aylmer flaws in this case?

Do you know who were these people: Albertus Magnus, Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus? And what was the Brazen Head?

What do you know about alchemy?

According to your opinion, what is the meaning of Georgiana’s birthmark? Remember that when Aylmer removes it, she dies.

 

VOCABULARY

votaries, weaned, charm, wont, fastidious, flaw, aught, shudder, affrighting, bears witness, mar, patentee, boudoir, pastil, lore, sway, thence, concoct, heretofore, penned, shortcomings, quaff, rapt, musings, goblet, lofty, ere, clod