Recent reading

[regshoe]

The last reading post of 2025—I'll discuss the traditional new year's Sutcliff shortly. :)

Gothic Tales by Elizabeth Gaskell (1851-61; collection edited and published 2000). A collection of Gaskell's shorter fiction, the actual degree of Gothicness varying considerably: some of the stories are proper supernatural horror ('The Old Nurse's Story' is especially memorably chilling); others are still horror but more mundane, and 'The Crooked Branch' in particular is just a sad story that wouldn't have been out of place alongside Gaskell's other domestic fiction in the 'Cousin Phyllis' collection that I read a while ago. I enjoyed them all, however—she's an author with range! Besides 'The Old Nurse's Story', ones especially worth mentioning are 'Lois the Witch', Gaskell's take on the notorious witch trials of Salem, Massachusetts; and 'The Grey Woman', which is an enjoyably femslashy adventure story.

The Cuckoo's Lea: The Forgotten History of Birds and Place by Michael J. Warren (2025). About birds and place, primarily through discussion of how and why birds appear in English place names and what that might tell us about how the medieval people who came up with those names thought about places and birds. This is also obviously relevant to modern conservation, as sadly many of the birds are no longer found in the places named after them ('crane' is apparently one of the birds most commonly appearing in place names; there are only a handful of them in Britain now). The title refers to Yaxley in Cambridgeshire, by the way, geac pronounced 'yak' being Anglo-Saxon for cuckoo. It's a very interesting subject and an interesting book, though I thought Warren was a little bit too poetic for my tastes, and especially too quick to go into poeticising 'what does this mean?' rather than solid intellectual curiosity about mysterious facts like mismatches between the distribution of birds in place names and the (likely historical) distribution of real birds. I enjoyed all the Anglo-Saxon bird poetry. Warren then lost all my sympathy and admiration in the epilogue, where he tries to talk about the deep personal meaning to him of having moved with his family from one place to another over a long distance with no acknowledgement of the fairly non-poetic reasons why that's something parents should not do to their children. Worth reading for the historical linguistics, but if you want a book by someone who understands why and how places matter, read Howards End.

Comments

[desecrets]

I was this close to buying that exact Gaskell collection for a friend for Christmas! I ultimately didn't because I wasn't sure if it would be a little too densely Victorian in the prose style for them, but I kinda want it myself! (I ended up getting them 'Eerie East Anglia' from the British Library Tales of the Weird instead, but I may have to ask very nicely if I can borrow it off them at some point :D)

Thrilled to see that cuckoo in Old English was geac btw! It's still gjøk in modern Norwegian (gök in Swedish), pronounced more or less like 'yerk' if you're speaking British English :D I did Old English in uni but we didn't learn that one!

[regshoe]

I mean, Gaskell is a Victorian and sounds like it, but I definitely recommend the collection if you do get on with that kind of style :D

That's cool!—it is interesting to see the different historical bird names that turn up in place names.

[stonepicnicking_okapi]

I really love 'The Old Nurse's Story.'

[regshoe]

It's a properly chilling ghost story!

[ethelmay]

I think I have run into "gowk" for cuckoo.

[regshoe]

Yeah, I've heard that one. It is fun seeing the different historical bird names that turn up in place names!

[phantomtomato]

Another voice in the pile saying that I loved the tidbit about Yaxley! I had no idea; that’s so cool.

if you want a book by someone who understands why and how places matter, read Howards End.

Well, yes. :D

[regshoe]

Non-obvious place name etymologies are often cool to find out about like that!

:)

[sovay]

About birds and place, primarily through discussion of how and why birds appear in English place names and what that might tell us about how the medieval people who came up with those names thought about places and birds.

That sounds very neat except for the epilogue which you would think an editor might have side-eyed.

[regshoe]

Yes! Oh, well.

[osprey_archer]

I really liked Gothic tales - just a fascinating mix of stories. (Although I was puzzled why the fairy-tale remix story ended up in there, since it was neither classically gothic NOR sad.) I often struggle to remember short stories, but Gaskell's are memorable - as you wrote the title I remembered each one.

Why did Warren's family move? Was there a pressing reason for it (sick relative, could only find a job in new location, etc) or did the Warren parents just feel like moving?

[regshoe]

I suppose the fairytale one fits in as also being a supernatural/fantasy-ish story, which the sad domestic fiction generally isn't?

He doesn't say exactly why, only that they'd been considering it for a long time, so presumably not due to any sudden disaster.