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The Exploits of Xenophon by Geoffrey Household

Mar1

So I finished this Landmark history book last night, and I really found it absorbing. Apparently, it’s a famous story that comes from the Anabasis by Xenophon, but my ancient Greek history is a little rusty. I’ve heard of Xenophon, but I didn’t know anything about this little incident. It’s really all about this orphaned Greek army marching all over Asia Minor and trying to survive and get back home. They encounter multiple enemies, raging rivers, treachery, harsh winter weather, and more treachery and finally the army does make it back to Greece, or at least near-Greece, maybe Thrace/Bulgaria, just across the Dardanelles from Constantinople?

I needed a better map in my head to follow all of the wanderings of the Greek army called the “Ten Thousand” because supposedly there were that many Greek soldiers in this super-duper Greek fighting force of mercenaries who were tricked into fighting for the younger brother, Cyrus, of the Persian emperor, Ataxerxes, in Cyrus’s attempt to take over his brother’s throne. The Greeks won the battle for Cyrus, but while they were enjoying a little plundering, Artaxerxes managed to kill Cyrus. So they became an army without a mission, trapped deep in enemy territory, with no way to get home safely. Artaxerxes just wanted to get rid of them, and so he allowed them to march north through Kurdistan and Armenia and then west to the Black Sea. Not that the Persians didn’t harass the Ten Thousand as much as possible, and then the Kurds were another problem, and the rivers and snows and mountains, and then more Persians and other “wild tribes.”

Xenophon apparently wrote the Anabasis, the story of the March of the Ten Thousand, in the third person, writing about how “Xenophon did this” and “Xenophon decided that”. He probably wrote his masterpiece that way to “distance himself as a subject, from himself as a writer,” according to Wikipedia. Mr. Household chose to put the whole story into first person and write it from Xenophon’s point of view, a perspective that is already in the original, just disguised a bit. I’m not sure why Household switches the narrative to first person, but it does make the story more immediate and modern-sounding. We’re rather fond of first person memoir in our day and time.

Household also says in the preface to the book that he modernizes some of Xenophon’s style and cut the story for this juvenile edition to quarter of its original length. However, all of the content is pure Xenophon. I think it would be fascinating to follow the Ten Thousand on their journey on a map of ancient Mesopotamia, Turkey, and Greece, and read this slimmed down version of the Anabasis aloud as a family—especially if you have a family of adventurers.

A few random facts, courtesy of Wikipedia:

“Traditionally Anabasis is one of the first unabridged texts studied by students of classical Greek, because of its clear and unadorned style.”

“The cry of Xenophon’s soldiers when they meet the sea is mentioned by the narrator of Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864), when their expedition discovers an underground ocean. The famous cry also provides the title of Iris Murdoch’s Booker Prize-winning novel, The Sea, the Sea (1978).”

Author Geoffrey Household served in British Intelligence during World War II in Romania, Greece and the Middle East. He was best known for his suspense novels, especially one called Rogue Male. Between the World Wars, he worked in the banking business in Romania, moved to Spain to sell bananas for United Fruit Company, and came to New York and wrote radio plays for children for CBS.

I really wish I knew more about how Bennett Cerf found and assigned different authors to write the books in the Landmark history series. Cerf on hiring authors: “I decided not to get authors of children’s books, but the most important authors in the country.” How did Mr. Household come to Cerf’s and Random House’s attention, I wonder?

Oh, by the way, Exploits of Xenophon is one of the more rare titles in the Landmark history series. It’s listed at anywhere from $30.00 to $80.00, used, at Amazon.

To learn more about the Landmark series of biographies and history books for young people, check out this podcast episode, Parts 1 and 2, of Plumfield Moms, What Are Landmark Books? Why Do They Matter?

Escape From Aleppo by N.H. Senzai

Jan20

The two previous books by N.H. Senzai that I read, Shooting Kabul and Saving Kabul Corner, were both about Afghan immigrants to the United States, and they were both good, informative reads. Escape From Aleppo is set in Syria, mostly in 2013, as the protagonist, Nadia, becomes separated from her family and is caught between government troops, rebel brigades, and ISIS fighters, as she tries to flee to Turkey for safety and to find her family.

The story is a little heavy on the “informative” side, probably necessarily so considering the ignorance of most Americans in regard to Syrian history and politics. Nevertheless, I enjoy learning about history and current events through the medium of fiction, and Escape From Aleppo tells a good tale of life and the struggle for survival in a war-torn country.

Fourteen year old Nadia, even as she is escaping the bombs and snipers of Aleppo, remembers her twelfth birthday, December 17, 2010, which happened to coincide with the beginning of the “Arab Spring” insurrections and demonstrations, all ignited by a young man’s suicide in Tunisia. The civil unrest and rebellion against “authoritarian regimes” moves to Syria in 2011, and to Aleppo where Nadia lives in 2012. All of this history is covered in the book by means of interspersed flashback chapters that interrupt the flow of the narrative about Nadia’s journey to safety at the Turkish border through war-torn Aleppo and through the Syrian countryside. However, I’m not sure how the background information could have been conveyed in any other way, and I did learn a lot about recent Syrian history and government, and a little about more ancient Syrian history.

The story includes some mystery; who is the mysterious old man with the donkey who agrees to help Nadia reach the Turkish border? And there’s quite a bit of suspense and adventure. Of course, since it takes place in the middle of a war, there’s violence and tragedy, but none of the descriptions is too horribly graphic. Nadia is the central and most fully realized character in the book, and readers will identify with her fight to grow up quickly, be brave, and take charge of her life and her journey.

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This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.

The Stranger from the Sea by Winston Graham

Jan19

This eighth installment of the Poldark Saga begins with King George III and his final descent into madness in 1810, and it ends with a marriage proposal for one of the Poldarks, refused, in 1811. Ten years have passed since the ending of the seventh book in the series, The Angry Tide. The growing-up years of Ross and Demelza’s children—Clowance, Jeremy, and little Bella—have been largely happy and uneventful. The Ross Poldark family are neither immensely rich nor poor, neither socially active nor reclusive, and finally comfortable and happy. Ross and Demelza are comfortable in their marriage; the enmity between George Warleggan and Ross Poldark has moved into a phase of distant truce, after the death of Elizabeth Warleggan at the end of The Angry Tide. Ross’s tin mine produces an adequate living, but not too much.

George Warleggan continues in this book to be rich, although he nearly loses his fortune in a bad investment decision. Ross Poldark continues to be idealistic and somewhat eccentric. Demelza is still salt of the earth and beautiful and commonsensical, all at the same time. In fact, all of the old characters from the previous seven novels make an appearance, each one playing his part. But the focus has shifted in this book to the younger generation: Ross and Demelza’s children, Valentine Warleggan, Geoffrey Charles Poldark, the progeny of the Sawle villagers, and other turn of the century young adults who are now coming of age and making their own decisions about love, friendship, and business.

Then, there’s the “stranger from the sea”, one Stephen Carrington, rescued from drowning by Jeremy Poldark and friends. It’s a bit odd that the book is named for Stephen Carrington, and I wonder who had the authority to give titles to these books, the author or the publisher? If Mr. Carrington were not the eponymous “stranger” of the title, he would not be nearly so important a character in the book as he seems, given the reference. Stephen Carrington is certainly mysterious throughout the book; I never did know whether to believe a word he said, even though he was a likable, perhaps harmless, liar. But the story is really about Jeremy and Clowance, not Carrington or any one of the other suitors attracted to Clowance, and certainly not either of Jeremy’s erstwhile flames. Jeremy is really more in love with steam engines than with with girls, although he manages to have loved and lost (a girl) by the end of the book.

I find the history woven into these novels—the Napoleonic wars, the madness of King George, the political maneuverings of Whigs and Tories, the Industrial revolution—by Mr. Graham to be fascinating, and the picture Graham draws of a society in the midst of upheaval and change is excellently well done. I recommend all of the Poldark Saga novels that I’ve read so far, and I plan to read the next one, The Miller’s Dance, post-haste in hopes of finding out what will happen to Miss Clowance Poldark and Master Jeremy Poldark as they come into adulthood.

You Bring the Distant Near by Mitali Perkins

Jan18

A multigenerational story of a family that combines and stands out with so many common traits and differences that it’s hard to keep up with who resembles whom and who’s going to defy cultural and family expectations and strike in a new direction.

The Das family is Bengali to begin with, immigrants from India/Bangladesh to the United States, via England and Ghana for brief stays in both of the latter places. Over the years in the U.S. the Das girls, Sunny and Starry, find their own connections to their Bengali heritage while forging a new connection to the United States and to its many peoples and varied cultures. And their children, the third generation, also have to negotiate the sometimes delightful and sometimes treacherous decisions that come with upholding tradition and opening oneself up to change at the same time.

I found this book to be both insightful and challenging. I am plain bread white Texan (with maybe a little bit of Native American heritage that’s been mostly lost in the annals of time). I have no cultural heritage except for the culture of white Southern/West Texas country folks. My family never expected me to square dance or two-step or enjoy certain books or music or dress is a certain way. And yet. I understand the pull of family expectations, both the ones I felt from my parents and the ones I have for my own children. I get the difficulties of combining very different families and learning to accept each other’s differences while appreciating the commonalities. Families are a great joy and a great challenge, and this book speaks that truth in a Bengali/American context.

It’s also a great book about growing up, about appreciating your family and their strengths and weaknesses while at the same time working to differentiate yourself from them. Sunny and Starry grow up to be just like their parents, except for the many ways that they are not at all like their parents. And the book also takes socioeconomic differences and challenges and decisions into account as yet another set of intricate cultural influencers that make the characters in the book look at themselves and and others in disparate, sometimes conflicting, ways.

Don’t get the idea that Sunny and Starry and their parents and their children are simply flat, stand-in characters representing Every Immigrant or the “immigrant experience” or AnyTeen who has a journey to make to “find herself”. The people in You Bring the Distant Near are memorable, well-rounded people who make choices that are sometimes surprising and sometimes predictable, always thought-provoking and endearing. Not all of the people in the book make the best decisions, but they are all trying, and as a reader I was rooting for them to succeed in building strong families and strong connections, the same things I want for my own family.

12 Children’s Books from Around the World to Read in 2018

Jan15

My Children’s Books Around the World project has been languishing somewhat. It’s not always easy to get one’s hand on the books, sometimes necessarily in translation, in order to actually read them.

Here are 12 books I’d like to go ahead and read this year:

Blinky Bill by Dorothy Wall. (Australia)

The Boundary Riders by Joan Phipson. (Australia)

Owls in the Family by Farley Mowat. (Canada)

The Horse Without a Head/ A Hundred Million Francs by Paul Berna. (France)

A Girl Named Disaster by Nancy Farmer. (Mozambique)

Simple National Slovak Tales by Pavol Dobsinsky (Slovakia)

Jungle Doctor by Paul White. (Tanzania)

Children of the River by Linda Crew. (Cambodia)

It’s a Jungle Out There! by Ron Snell. (Peru)

The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis. (Afghanistan)

The Storyteller’s Beads by Jane Kurtz. (Ethiopia)

The Princess and the Lion by Elizabeth Coatsworth. (Abyssinia/Ethiopia)

All of these, except for the Slovak tales, I have in my library, ready to be read.

I also have a separate list of British children’s books that I’d like to read this year and also a list of books about India (mostly adult), a country I’d like to focus on in 2018. Stay tuned for reviews and comments on all of these as the year progresses.

Wanted: Immigrants from ********

Jan13

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

This is America.

We invite and welcome refugees who are fleeing from impoverished circumstances or from oppressive governments or from cruel persecution.

We want the tired and poor and wretched and homeless to come to America where they can rest and breathe and work and live and worship and add their skills and imagination and industry to further themselves and their families and to build up this country and make it truly great. We want all of those who with good intentions and noble dreams want to come and work with us to further the American experiment—a government and a country that is led and built by the people, for the people, and of the people.

Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that America doesn’t want this kind of person or that kind of immigrant. Don’t listen to the worst voices who call you inferior or unwanted because you come from an impoverished background or from a disrespected group of people or from a place of war and chaos. You are wanted. You are needed. America is great only because Americans have welcomed those who came to help realize her vision of a free people, united in the quest to create liberty and opportunity for all.

America has not always lived up to her ideals. Sometimes, instead of being a shining city on a hill, we have been a purveyor of slavery and racism within our own borders and an exporter of American imperialism without. However, those tragic mistakes—the enslavement of black people and Asians, the annihilation of native American peoples, the imposition of foreign rule in other countries—are and have been just that, tragedies and a betrayal of the true meaning of the United States of America. We are better than our historic crimes and abuses, and we are and will be better than the current clamorous agents of dissension, discord, and disharmony.

I believe that those who are now using stupid and derogatory language to discourage and ridicule and disparage the homeless and the tempest-tost and yes, people of color, will eventually be out-shouted and out-numbered by the millions of Americans who join with Lady Liberty to say, “Send these! I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

I pray that those true, good, and grateful American voices will be heard clearly and soon.

Reading Through India: a 2018 Focus

Jan13

I thought I might try to focus on one country or part of the world each year, reading books and watching movies from that part of the world in order to develop a “feel” and store of knowledge about a particular country or region. 2018 is going to be the year of India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. So, the following are some books for me to choose from. I don’t plan to read all of these, but I do hope to read several.

Kim by Rudyard Kipling. I tried this classic novel of India from a British colonial perspective a couple of years ago, but I couldn’t get into it. IthinkI’ll try again.

The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. I think I read this children’s classic when I was a child, but I’d like to re-read.

Two Under the Indian Sun by Jon and Rumer Godden. Famed author Rumer Godden and her sister Jon collaborated on this memoir of their childhood in colonial India, 1915-1920.

The Peacock Spring by Rumer Godden. Two British (white) half-sisters, Una and Hal, come to India to live with their divorced U.N.-diplomat father. Both girls become romantically involved with Indian men.

Kingfishers Catch Fire by Rumer Godden. Fiction about a young widow, Sophie, who goes with her two daughters to live in rural India, written in the wake of Rumer Godden’s own experience of living with her children in an isolated house in Kashmir. The title of the novel comes from a poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins.

Freedom at Midnight by Larry Collins and Dominique LaPierre. “A famous, major work on Gandhi, Jinnah, Nehru, Admiral Lord Mountbatten, and the partition of India.” (Goodreads)

City of Joy by Dominique LaPierre. Fiction inspired by the true story of a doctor who moved to Calcutta in the 1960’s and experienced a spiritual awakening.

The Indian Bride by Karin Fossum. Norwegian mystery about a bride from India.

On the Far side of Liglig Mountain: Adventures of an American Family in Nepal by Thomas Hale. Medical missionary memoir.

The Raj Quartet by Paul Scott. The Jewel in the Crown, The Day of the Scorpion, The Towers of Silence, and The Division of Spoils. The origins of Paul Scott’s vast masterpiece.

My Seventh Monsoon: A Himalayan Journey of Faith and Mission by Naomi Reed. “From the view point of her seventh monsoon, Naomi Reed takes time to look back on the seasons of her life. As she does so, she shares with us her journey of faith and mission and reveals poignant truths about God and the way He works His purposes in our lives through seasons.” (Goodreads)

The Faith of Ashish by Kay Marshall Strom. Christian fiction from the Blessings in India series. Sequels are Hope of Shridula and Love of Divena.

Teatime for the Firefly by Shona Patel. India, 1943 and following.

Life of Pi by Yann Martel. I’ve heard of this book and seen it on numerous lists of recommended reading. I fear that it will be too “spiritual” and ecumenical for my tastes, but maybe not.

Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie. Not sure about this one either. “Born at the stroke of midnight, at the precise moment of India’s independence, Saleem Sinai is destined from birth to be special. For he is one of 1,001 children born in the midnight hour, children who all have special gifts, children with whom Saleem is telepathically linked.” It sounds very posh and literary, which may or may not be what I want to read.

A Passage to India by E.M. Forster. This novel is another one that I remember trying to read once upon a time, but I didn’t get very far with it. Maybe a second try is in order.

A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth. In the early 1950’s, Lata and her mother, Mrs. Rupa Mehra, are both trying to find — through love or through exacting maternal appraisal — a suitable boy for Lata to marry.

Churchill’s Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India During World War II by Madhusree Mukerjee. I love Churchill, but he definitely had his faults and his blind spots. India was one of them, I think.

Mandala by Pearl S. Buck. “News reaches Maharana Prince Jagat and his wife, Moti, that their only son, Jai, has been killed by the Chinese in a border skirmish. An inconsolable Moti sends Jagat out to bring the boy’s spirit home. On the journey, the prince becomes involved with a beautiful and mysterious young American woman.” (Goodreads)

Dancing Princess by Jean Bothwell. Set in 16th century India during the reign of the Mughal emperor Akbar. Or I may settle for some other novel by this author; many of her novels are set in India, and I’d like to try out her work.

Sold by Patricia McCormick. Verse novel about child sex slavery and prostitution.

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. My friend Bethany says she “would recommend it as being worth reading, but warn that the fine balance seems strongly tipped to the despairing side of life.” I may or may not be in the right mood for this 500+ page tome sometime this year.

City of Djinns: A Year in Delhi by William Dalrymple. “William Dalrymple explores the seven “dead” cities of Delhi as well as the eighth city-today’s Delhi.” (Goodreads)

Outcast by Dianne Noble. Someone recommended this novel of modern-day Calcutta to me. A Hundred Hands by the same author sounds good, too.

Again, these are all books that I have yet to read, so I’m certainly not recommending all of them. Do you have any books about or set in India, Nepal or Sri Lanka to recommend?

12 British Children’s Books I’d Like to Read in 2018

Jan12

I’ve been an Anglophile ever since I was a child, when many of my favorite reads were written by British authors: C.S. Lewis, Philippa Pearce, E. Nesbit, JRR Tolkien, Kenneth Grahame, and A.A. Milne.

I also read some lovely award-winning and classic British children’s books last year: The Little Grey Men by BB, Minnow on the Say by Philippa Pearce, The Family From One End Street by Eve Garnett, and of course, four of the Swallows and Amazons books by Arthur Ransome.

This year I’d like to read:

Winter Holiday by Arthur Ransome (and any others of the Swallows and Amazons books that I can get my hands on).

Ameliaranne and the Green Umbrella by Constance Heward. Classic story from 1920. Ameliaranne, “whose family is very poor, goes to a party and tries to bring back all of her food-cakes, tangerines, sweets-hidden in her umbrella to feed her ailing brothers and sisters.” I may not be able to find an affordable copy of this one, and it may not be available from the library. I guess I could read it online, but I don’t particularly enjoy reading books that way.

Autumn Term by Antonia Forest. Classic boarding school fiction. “Twins Nicola and Lawrie arrive at their new school determined to do even better than their distinguished elder sisters, but things don’t turn out quite as planned.”

Borka: The Adventures of a Goose With No Feathers by John Burningham.

The Camels Are Coming (Biggles) by W.E. Johns. I’ve been meaning to read one of the books in this series about a WWI flying ace for a long time. 2018 is the year.

The Diddakoi by Rumer Godden. I have a copy of this book about a Romany (gypsy) girl.

The Little Duke by Charlotte Yonge. Recommended at Ambleside Online.

(something, to be decided) by Enid Blyton. Suggestions?

Our Island Story by H.E. Marshall. Also a part of the Ambleside Online curriculum.

The Peppermint Pig by Nina Bawden.

Goodnight Mr Tom by Michelle Magorian.

The Railway Children by E. Nesbit. I had planned to read this particular Nesbit title in 2017 along with an online reading group that I follow, but I didn’t. So this year for sure.

Are there any other British children’s classics that you would recommend?

Christmas in Ireland, c.1970

Dec5

Rumer Godden’s novel, The Diddakoi, features a half-Romany (gypsy) and half-Irish orphan girl named Kizzy who after her grandmother’s death must come to live with the “gorgios”, or non-gypsies. One of those gorgios is Admiral Twiss:

“Admiral Twiss . . . made models, chiefly of ships, sometimes sail, sometimes steam; he never spoke to the village children, nor they to him—they were afraid of the eyebrows and moustache—but he made a model church, big enough for each child to creep into, and every Christmas stood it at the House gates. The church was lit up so that its stained-glass windows shone, every tiny piece perfect, and from inside came music, carols that Kizzy liked to think were tiny people singing—Prudence would have told her at once it was a tape—and at midday and midnight, bells would ring a miniature carillon.
In the wagon Kizzy could hear them and knew it was Christmas. Admiral Twiss, too, always sent Kizzy’s Gran a cockerel for Christmas, some oranges and dates, and a bag of oats for Joe. Sometimes Kizzy thought the oranges and dates were for her; sometimes she thought the Admiral did not know she existed.”

This one is another of my book-buying finds. I knew the author from her adult novels, In This House of Brede and Black Narcissus and also her doll stories for children. This story, of a child who experiences prejudice and bullying but manages to learn to trust the trustworthy adults in her life and with their help overcome the racist attitudes of her peers, looks to be a winner.

Christmas in Cornwall, 1789

Dec1

From Winston Graham’s second Poldark novel, Demelza:

“It was a fine night and an hour before Sawle Church choir had been up to the door singing carols. Demelza had never had much to do with religion but she still said the prayers her mother taught her, adding a postscript of her own to keep them abreast of the times; and at Christmas she had always felt an inward impulse to go to church. Something in the ancient wisdom of the story and the fey beauty of the carols tugged at her emotions; and with a suitable invitation she would have been willing to join the choir. She specially wanted to help them this evening, hearing their depleted voices struggling through ‘Remember, O thou Man’. But even her enjoyment of the two carols was a little spoiled by anxiety as to how she had best behave when they knocked on the door. She sent Jane Gimlett for the cakes she had made that afternoon and took down a couple of bottles of canary wine from Ross’s cupboard.

**********
Demelza nervously gave them all a drink and took one herself; she would almost sooner have entertained Sir Hugh Bodrogan than these humble choristers; at least she knew where where she was with him. She pressed cakes upon them and refilled their glasses and when they rose to go she gave them a handful of silver—about nine shillings in all—and the carolers crowded out into the misty moonlit night, flushed and merry and opulent. There they gathered round the lantern and gave her one more carol for luck before filing off up the valley towards Grambler.”