Recent reading

[regshoe]

Lord Hornblower by C. S. Forester (1946). The grim conclusion to the original run of Hornblower novels (one more book is set later, but, contrary to my confused mis-osmosis, it's not next in publication order and is in fact very different from this one in tone and style; the rest are all prequels). The early part of the book, in which Hornblower is sent to quash a mutiny off the French coast, has some of the sort of ingenious tactical puzzle-solving that I like about these books, but it's undermined by being about, well, quashing a very understandable mutiny; Forester tries to give Hornblower a sympathetic attitude to mutiny but it comes across as rather trying to eat his cake and have it, especially since Hornblower ends up acting very badly in a way that really wasn't unavoidable. And Bush isn't even there! But then:

spoilers

Bush reappears, only to be rather summarily killed off offstage in a way I am a little bit indignant about. Then the war ends (for now), Hornblower goes about feeling terrible while the peace negotiations, sending Napoleon to Elba etc. are going on, then he cheats on his wife again in a particularly awful and ridiculous way...

In the final part of the book, Hornblower ends up leading a doomed guerrilla campaign against Napoleon during the Hundred Days, which while a bit grim was dramatically enjoyable: Hornblower and his tiny army are trying desperately to evade their much stronger foe, when we get a significant statement that it's the eighteenth of June... and I was on the edge of my seat for (literally) the rest of the book wondering whether the news would reach them in time. (This book is therefore the opposite of The Wounded Name: the battle of Waterloo happens offstage and it's vitally important.) Besides all that, it's very obvious that this book, taking place at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, was written towards the end of the Second World War; it doesn't really help things, and the descriptions of Hornblower felt a lot more Twentieth-Century Manly in their attitudes than similar descriptions in earlier books. Some good bits, then, but on the whole definitely not the high point of the series. But now, on to the prequels: more Bush! better writing! I look forward to it.

Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes by Robert Louis Stevenson (1879). Besides the NTS Kidnapped relevance, this is a lovely book. Stevenson continues to be a good travel writer, amusingly observant and self-deprecating, and this book also contains a lot of interesting cultural and historical background. As a Protestant-raised agnostic travelling through a majority-Protestant area of an otherwise Catholic country, Stevenson finds that the topic of religion comes up a lot: at one point he stays at a Trappist monastery where the other guests earnestly try to convert him; in another episode he meets a Plymouth Brother (?apparently a thing in France) who mistakenly thinks he is one too. His travels take him through the country of the Camisards, and he says a lot about them, drawing parallels with the Scottish Covenanters. He also mentions the Beast of Gévaudan, an intriguing historical mystery. And the subtextual presence of Fanny in his thoughts throughout is sweet—it's good to read this and know it ended happily.

In other exciting RLS news, I went to a favourite bookshop earlier this week and found a large and beautiful omnibus edition of several of his novels and short stories, which I am very much looking forward to digging into! It excludes his most famous works on the grounds that (paraphrasing) obviously everyone already has a copy of Treasure Island, so it'd be a waste of space; annoyingly, it also doesn't have The Master of Ballantrae, which I was hoping to read next. Never mind, I'll just have to read Prince Otto instead and find TMoB somewhere else...

The Adventures of Caleb Williams; Or, Things as They Are by William Godwin (1794). This book was written as a sort of accompaniment to the author's previous work, a radical political treatise on the ills and injustices of contemporary society, to articulate those principles through fiction. The narrator, Caleb Williams, works as secretary to a rich gentleman, and he discovers a terrible secret: his employer, Mr Falkland, once committed murder! Falkland finds out that Caleb knows his secret and thence persecutes him relentlessly: falsely accusing him of theft so he's sent to jail, having him tracked down when he escapes, blasting his reputation by publishing an account of Caleb's supposed crimes, making sure this comes to the notice of everyone everywhere he might otherwise get a fresh start; and throughout all, the institutions of society support Falkland and make things worse for Caleb. As an indictment of late eighteenth-century society it certainly has power—the sections on the injustice of the justice system, jails and assizes are especially good—but I think it falters in failing to commit to Falkland's character; Godwin doesn't seem quite able to decide whether he's a basically good man driven to do horrible things out of desperation or a total pantomime villain who was only ever faking being decent. Possibly, though, some of this was the result of (self-)censorship: looking the book up on Wikipedia, I find that the ending—which swerves back to the 'Falkland is actually good' side—was changed from Godwin's original manuscript, which is much more to the villain interpretation. The book is written in very overly-verbose late eighteenth-century style, which does not make easy reading; the edition on Gutenberg contains multiple prefaces (including one for a different book?), and Godwin here sets out in punctilious and earnest detail the specifics of his writing process, which was kind of cute and historically interesting.

Comments

[osprey_archer]

Okay, I can't resist any longer, I'm going to read Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes. Who am I to resist a Trappist monastery!

SHOCKED by your spoiler for Lord Hornblower, though. Contemplating whether I really want to give the series a go now that I know this... Your reviews have been less than enthusiastic, too. Maybe if I attempt a Napoleonic naval series, it should be Aubrey-Maturin.

[sanguinity]

Re the Hornblower books, regshoe is a masochist who is reading by pub order, thus putting the worst novels first. I almost always recommend starting with Mr Midshipman Hornblower (first by internal chronology) or Lieutenant Hornblower (second by internal chronology, the strongest novel in the series and a good stand-alone story).

But in my opinion, Lord Hornblower is the worst novel of the series. I'd hate for you to judge the series as a whole by it.

[regshoe]

It's not masochistic, I am saving the best till last :D

[sanguinity]

Aha! I stand corrected! :-D

[regshoe]

:D I hope you enjoy it!

As for Hornblower—as sanguinity says, I haven't got to what's considered the better half of the series yet (and Lieutenant Hornblower, which I read out of order, is great), and while I've not become the books' biggest fan, there has been a lot to like about them so far. (And I certainly wouldn't recommend reading Aubrey-Maturin instead; the Hornblower books are a mixed bag but those ones are just terrible, IMO.)

[garonne]

I haven't read Lord Hornblower yet and I'm now even less inclined to do so, even though I really enjoyed the rest of the series. (Lt Hornblower, which is also a mutiny story, is one of my favourites.)

For Caleb Williams, I listened to the Librivox recording I did not know about the prefaces in the Gutenberg edition. Very interesting. I must check them out.

The book is written in very overly-verbose late eighteenth-century style, which does not make easy reading

Yeah, this is a book where I'm glad to have read it, but kind of struggled while actually reading it!

I do wish Godwin had been able to keep the original manuscript ending! I think it would have been stronger.

[sanguinity]

I hated Lord Hornblower so much it almost bounced me out of the fandom the first time I read it.

And yes, it's interesting to lay this mutiny story alongside that of Lieutenant. And also alongside Doughty's story in Hotspur (which I shall not elaborate on further, because our host hasn't gotten there yet).

[regshoe]

You can probably do without it! I might re-read Lieutenant when I get back to it in publication order; the mutiny would make an interesting contrast.

Definitely agree about the original ending of Caleb Williams!