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Recent reading
Jan. 31st, 2026 05:08 pmRe-read The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith (1955), which I first read some years ago and remembered as an enjoyably twisted tale of murder and impersonation that's also pretty gay. Actually I failed to remember quite how gay it is: Tom Ripley's repressed homosexuality and terror of other people perceiving it are both pretty much textual and important parts of his character and motivation. Anyway, the whole murder-and-impersonation thing is very well-written and great fun in a nicely stressful way. The copy I read has a review-blurb on the front cover that describes Ripley as 'amoral, hedonistic and charming', and while that's true, I think it gives a mistaken impression, because he is also needy, deeply insecure and kind of pathetic and it's the combination that's really fascinating. I also enjoyed how the later part of the book plays out like a murder mystery from the reverse side, with the narrative following the murderer and his attempts to escape detection while the detectives and involved side characters try to figure things out in the background. Perhaps the degree to which they fail is a little bit overly lucky for Ripley, but I think it's a good ending. Highsmith wrote several more books about him; without having read them, and accounting for my general suspicion of sequels and series, I think this was a mistake. Ripley neither needs nor deserves any sequel, meaning 'deserves' both ways round.
Puck of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling (1906). This is, what it had been vaguely in my awareness for years as, something to do with A Midsummer Night's Dream, but I became more interested in reading it when I learnt that it's also a series of stories about the history of England. Two children living near Pevensey in Sussex meet Puck by inadvertently acting bits from A Midsummer Night's Dream in a local fairy ring; Puck introduces them to various people from or connected to the area throughout its history, who tell the stories of their lives. It is a good bit of historical-folkloric dramatisation, but on the whole I was unconvinced: Kipling's thought is just too conventional, in the politically-conservative way and also in the 'Good Kings and dates and battles' view of history way (he wraps the book up by making the whole thing about the memorable Magna Charta by way of some strange antisemitism). Sutcliff, Mitchison and Clarke have all done it better.
The stories are interspersed with poems, and whatever else can be said about Kipling it's certainly true that he can write a good poem. My favourite thing about the book, actually, was the sidelong relationship between the poems and the stories: the poems are all connected to the subjects of the stories but are mostly not directly about them and not actually referred to in them or in the framing story, and so they act as a sort of outside-view commentary on or expansion of the stories' world. And some people have set them to music, so have a couple of recs:
(This is my favourite of the poems; yes, when you think about it, eighteenth-century smugglers are just like fairies. Via Wikipedia I saw this pub wall in Dorset on which is displayed a verse of the poem, with—presumably to make things nice and clear for contextless pub-goers—the word 'Gentlemen' changed to 'Smugglers', and thought, well, you've missed the point, haven't you.)
Puck of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling (1906). This is, what it had been vaguely in my awareness for years as, something to do with A Midsummer Night's Dream, but I became more interested in reading it when I learnt that it's also a series of stories about the history of England. Two children living near Pevensey in Sussex meet Puck by inadvertently acting bits from A Midsummer Night's Dream in a local fairy ring; Puck introduces them to various people from or connected to the area throughout its history, who tell the stories of their lives. It is a good bit of historical-folkloric dramatisation, but on the whole I was unconvinced: Kipling's thought is just too conventional, in the politically-conservative way and also in the 'Good Kings and dates and battles' view of history way (he wraps the book up by making the whole thing about the memorable Magna Charta by way of some strange antisemitism). Sutcliff, Mitchison and Clarke have all done it better.
The stories are interspersed with poems, and whatever else can be said about Kipling it's certainly true that he can write a good poem. My favourite thing about the book, actually, was the sidelong relationship between the poems and the stories: the poems are all connected to the subjects of the stories but are mostly not directly about them and not actually referred to in them or in the framing story, and so they act as a sort of outside-view commentary on or expansion of the stories' world. And some people have set them to music, so have a couple of recs:
(This is my favourite of the poems; yes, when you think about it, eighteenth-century smugglers are just like fairies. Via Wikipedia I saw this pub wall in Dorset on which is displayed a verse of the poem, with—presumably to make things nice and clear for contextless pub-goers—the word 'Gentlemen' changed to 'Smugglers', and thought, well, you've missed the point, haven't you.)
