READING: The Forsyte Saga
Meet the Forsytes. [insert Soap theme here...]
No, seriously: that's what you'll spend the first chapter doing when you start reading The Forsyte Saga. And you totally should. Go on. Click the link. Order the book. And then tell me all about ordering the book since I'm on a moratorium from book buying for this year. And probably the rest of my life.
I own four copies of War & Peace. Four. And three of them are the exact same edition I just linked to. The other one is a substandard edition, that looks like this. If you're going to pick up a copy of War & Peace -- well, first, drop me an email and I'll give you one of mine. But if you don't want me having your address, or if you can't wait, or if by the time you get to me I've given my two extra ones away, make sure you get the Constance Garnett translation rather than the Aylmer Maude translation.
"Dude, whatever. It's a long book. Why do I even care who translated it?"
Good question. I recommend the Garnett over the Maude for one scene: Count Rostov and Marya Dmitryevna dance something called a Daniel Cooper. I'll let Tolstoy/Garnett take it from there:
______________________________
The count danced well and knew that he did, but his partner could not dance at all, and did not care about dancing well. Her portly figure stood erect, with her mighty arms hanging by her side (she had handed her reticule to the countess). It was only her stern, but comely face that danced. What was expressed by the whole round person of the count, was expressed by Marya Dmitryevna in her more and more beaming countenance and puckered nose. While the count, with greater and greater expenditure of energy, enchanted the spectators by the unexpectedness of the nimble pirouettes and capers of his supple legs, Marya Dmitryevna with the slightest effort in the movement of her shoulders or curving of her arms, when they turned or marked the time with their feet, produced no less impression from the contrast, which everyone appreciated, with her portliness and her habitual severity of demeanour. The dance grew more and more animated. The vis-à-vis could not obtain one moment’s attention, and did not attempt to do so. All attention was absorbed by the count and Marya Dmitryevna. Natasha pulled at the sleeve or gown of every one present, urging them to look at papa, though they never took their eyes off the dancers. In the pauses in the dance the count drew a deep breath, waved his hands and shouted to the musician to play faster. More and more quickly, more and more nimbly the count pirouetted, turning now on his toes and now on his heels, round Marya Dmitryevna. At last, twisting his lady round to her place, he executed the last steps, kicking his supple legs up behind him, and bowing his perspiring head and smiling face, with a round sweep of his right arm, amidst a thunder of applause and laughter, in which Natasha’s laugh was loudest. Both partners stood still, breathing heavily, and mopping their faces with their batiste handkerchiefs.
"That’s how they used to dance in our day, ma chère," said the count.
"Bravo, Daniel Cooper!" said Marya Dmitryevna, tucking up her sleeves and drawing a deep, prolonged breath.
______________________________
Did you see what he did there? Everything about that passage is amazing and marvelous and should make you run out and get that copy of War & Peace along with The Forsyte Saga. Notice how towards the end of that passage, as the action of the dancing gets faster, the clauses get shorter? Can you feel Natasha's excitement at watching her father dance, that 12-year-old's pride when it's still okay to love your parents and your dad is dancing, do you see that? Dancing? Aren't you looking? And when it's over, I love that Natasha's laughter is heard above it all -- because it totally would. I love that Count Rostov's legs are described as "supple." I love that Marya Dmitryevna (who is called "The Old Dragon") doesn't dance so much as pulse in place. But what I love the most -- what sends a chill up my spine and what, I shit you not, makes me tear up every. single. time is that final exchange between the Count and the Old Dragon. Rostov is no longer Rostov -- he's the dance itself; he's Daniel Cooper.
In short, Count Rostov? Has totally brought it.
The Maude version? Meh. Natasha leads the applause -- but isn't heard above it. Maude says that Marya Dmitryevna "did not want to dance well" rather than the more lyrically carefree "did not care about dancing well." And at the end, Marya Dmitryevna simply says, "That was a Daniel Cooper!" Rostov isn't Daniel Cooper for Maude. And finally, Maude shows Marya Dmitryevna "tucking her sleeves and puffing heavily." Which I think robs Marya Dmitryevna -- and the scene -- of the dignity and kick-assedness that the Garnett translation bestows.
And that, oh my best beloveds, is why I think if you're going to read War & Peace, you have to read the Garnett. She cares about the characters more. Aylmer Maude blows.
So anyway. The Forsytes.
June Forsyte is engaged to marry a guy none of the Forsytes like so much. He wears a questionable hat that poor Aunt Hester mistook for a cat, which she tries to shoo from her chair. "She was disturbed when it did not move." When the novel opens, it is at a dinner in "honor" of June and this guy, Phillip Bosinney, of the questionable cat hat. Bosinney, being a Bosinney and not a Forsyte, is measured and found entirely too lacking:
"Like an artist for ever seeking to discover the significant trifle which embodies the whole character of a scene, or place, or person, so those unconscious artists--the Forsytes had fastened by intuition on this hat; it was their significant trifle, the detail in which was embedded the meaning of the whole matter; for each had asked himself: 'Come, now, should I have paid that visit in that hat?' and each had answered 'No!' and some, with more imagination than others, had added: 'It would never have come into my head!'"
And the Forsytes just get bitchier and funnier from there. The novel takes place towards the end of the Victorian era -- at a time when the 1800s are making their goodbyes, air-kissing, and promising to do lunch, real soon. They're wealthy, the Forsytes -- but they're nouveau riche and kinda on the tacky side, having made their money in industry. Money that's made by doing nothing -- by simply being given it -- has always meant more than money one had to soil one's hands to get. But at this point in time, there are fewer and fewer trust-funders and more and more folks who come from families where dad went to a job for the money. Here's another great scene that illustrates that point nicely:
"'What was her father?'
'Heron was his name, a Professor, so they tell me.'
Roger shook his head.
'There's no money in that,' he said.
'They say her mother's father was cement.'
Roger's face brightened.
'But he went bankrupt,' went on Nicholas.
'Ah!' exclaimed Roger."
Anyway. I'm only 60 pages in; it could start sucking. I really hope it doesn't, though, both because the last book sucked so much and because it's so good right now. There's trouble brewing in one marriage, and a father-son reconciliation in the works that could prove tricky for another character later on. Besides, I think a book can never suck if it has a line like this one in it:
"Timothy alone held apart, for though he ate saddle of mutton heartily, he was, he said, afraid of it."
PS: I have a crazy scheme in the works. I'll say more about it later, when there's something more to say about it than the fact that it's a crazy scheme. I'm mentioning it mostly because it means now one of you will soon say, "Hey, about that crazy scheme..." which means I'll have to keep up with it.
Keep me honest, my pets.
No, seriously: that's what you'll spend the first chapter doing when you start reading The Forsyte Saga. And you totally should. Go on. Click the link. Order the book. And then tell me all about ordering the book since I'm on a moratorium from book buying for this year. And probably the rest of my life.
I own four copies of War & Peace. Four. And three of them are the exact same edition I just linked to. The other one is a substandard edition, that looks like this. If you're going to pick up a copy of War & Peace -- well, first, drop me an email and I'll give you one of mine. But if you don't want me having your address, or if you can't wait, or if by the time you get to me I've given my two extra ones away, make sure you get the Constance Garnett translation rather than the Aylmer Maude translation.
"Dude, whatever. It's a long book. Why do I even care who translated it?"
Good question. I recommend the Garnett over the Maude for one scene: Count Rostov and Marya Dmitryevna dance something called a Daniel Cooper. I'll let Tolstoy/Garnett take it from there:
______________________________
The count danced well and knew that he did, but his partner could not dance at all, and did not care about dancing well. Her portly figure stood erect, with her mighty arms hanging by her side (she had handed her reticule to the countess). It was only her stern, but comely face that danced. What was expressed by the whole round person of the count, was expressed by Marya Dmitryevna in her more and more beaming countenance and puckered nose. While the count, with greater and greater expenditure of energy, enchanted the spectators by the unexpectedness of the nimble pirouettes and capers of his supple legs, Marya Dmitryevna with the slightest effort in the movement of her shoulders or curving of her arms, when they turned or marked the time with their feet, produced no less impression from the contrast, which everyone appreciated, with her portliness and her habitual severity of demeanour. The dance grew more and more animated. The vis-à-vis could not obtain one moment’s attention, and did not attempt to do so. All attention was absorbed by the count and Marya Dmitryevna. Natasha pulled at the sleeve or gown of every one present, urging them to look at papa, though they never took their eyes off the dancers. In the pauses in the dance the count drew a deep breath, waved his hands and shouted to the musician to play faster. More and more quickly, more and more nimbly the count pirouetted, turning now on his toes and now on his heels, round Marya Dmitryevna. At last, twisting his lady round to her place, he executed the last steps, kicking his supple legs up behind him, and bowing his perspiring head and smiling face, with a round sweep of his right arm, amidst a thunder of applause and laughter, in which Natasha’s laugh was loudest. Both partners stood still, breathing heavily, and mopping their faces with their batiste handkerchiefs.
"That’s how they used to dance in our day, ma chère," said the count.
"Bravo, Daniel Cooper!" said Marya Dmitryevna, tucking up her sleeves and drawing a deep, prolonged breath.
______________________________
Did you see what he did there? Everything about that passage is amazing and marvelous and should make you run out and get that copy of War & Peace along with The Forsyte Saga. Notice how towards the end of that passage, as the action of the dancing gets faster, the clauses get shorter? Can you feel Natasha's excitement at watching her father dance, that 12-year-old's pride when it's still okay to love your parents and your dad is dancing, do you see that? Dancing? Aren't you looking? And when it's over, I love that Natasha's laughter is heard above it all -- because it totally would. I love that Count Rostov's legs are described as "supple." I love that Marya Dmitryevna (who is called "The Old Dragon") doesn't dance so much as pulse in place. But what I love the most -- what sends a chill up my spine and what, I shit you not, makes me tear up every. single. time is that final exchange between the Count and the Old Dragon. Rostov is no longer Rostov -- he's the dance itself; he's Daniel Cooper.
In short, Count Rostov? Has totally brought it.
The Maude version? Meh. Natasha leads the applause -- but isn't heard above it. Maude says that Marya Dmitryevna "did not want to dance well" rather than the more lyrically carefree "did not care about dancing well." And at the end, Marya Dmitryevna simply says, "That was a Daniel Cooper!" Rostov isn't Daniel Cooper for Maude. And finally, Maude shows Marya Dmitryevna "tucking her sleeves and puffing heavily." Which I think robs Marya Dmitryevna -- and the scene -- of the dignity and kick-assedness that the Garnett translation bestows.
And that, oh my best beloveds, is why I think if you're going to read War & Peace, you have to read the Garnett. She cares about the characters more. Aylmer Maude blows.
So anyway. The Forsytes.
June Forsyte is engaged to marry a guy none of the Forsytes like so much. He wears a questionable hat that poor Aunt Hester mistook for a cat, which she tries to shoo from her chair. "She was disturbed when it did not move." When the novel opens, it is at a dinner in "honor" of June and this guy, Phillip Bosinney, of the questionable cat hat. Bosinney, being a Bosinney and not a Forsyte, is measured and found entirely too lacking:
"Like an artist for ever seeking to discover the significant trifle which embodies the whole character of a scene, or place, or person, so those unconscious artists--the Forsytes had fastened by intuition on this hat; it was their significant trifle, the detail in which was embedded the meaning of the whole matter; for each had asked himself: 'Come, now, should I have paid that visit in that hat?' and each had answered 'No!' and some, with more imagination than others, had added: 'It would never have come into my head!'"
And the Forsytes just get bitchier and funnier from there. The novel takes place towards the end of the Victorian era -- at a time when the 1800s are making their goodbyes, air-kissing, and promising to do lunch, real soon. They're wealthy, the Forsytes -- but they're nouveau riche and kinda on the tacky side, having made their money in industry. Money that's made by doing nothing -- by simply being given it -- has always meant more than money one had to soil one's hands to get. But at this point in time, there are fewer and fewer trust-funders and more and more folks who come from families where dad went to a job for the money. Here's another great scene that illustrates that point nicely:
"'What was her father?'
'Heron was his name, a Professor, so they tell me.'
Roger shook his head.
'There's no money in that,' he said.
'They say her mother's father was cement.'
Roger's face brightened.
'But he went bankrupt,' went on Nicholas.
'Ah!' exclaimed Roger."
Anyway. I'm only 60 pages in; it could start sucking. I really hope it doesn't, though, both because the last book sucked so much and because it's so good right now. There's trouble brewing in one marriage, and a father-son reconciliation in the works that could prove tricky for another character later on. Besides, I think a book can never suck if it has a line like this one in it:
"Timothy alone held apart, for though he ate saddle of mutton heartily, he was, he said, afraid of it."
PS: I have a crazy scheme in the works. I'll say more about it later, when there's something more to say about it than the fact that it's a crazy scheme. I'm mentioning it mostly because it means now one of you will soon say, "Hey, about that crazy scheme..." which means I'll have to keep up with it.
Keep me honest, my pets.
posted by Mike at 9:07 PM
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