An Episode of Sparrows by Rumer Godden (1955)

 An Episode of Sparrows is another perceptive and sensitive novel by Rumer Godden. Godden’s writing is spare and unsentimental with a gritty realism, but also much beauty.

In the preface to this book she wrote:

'Finally the time came when I had to tell myself miserably, “You have squandered, muddled, and wasted everything, everything from opportunity to money. Wasted.”

There I was wrong. After the war years of hard work, poverty, and loneliness in Kashmir I needed that space of gaiety, companionship, even luxury, and I have come to believe that nothing is ever wasted; out of mistakes, or through mistakes, something quite worthwhile can come, in my case the seed of another novel.’

Living in the busy whirl of post-war London in a tiny little jewel of a house, she spent as much time as she could in the nearby park where she got to know the antics of the ‘London sparrows’- children from the poorer streets nearby. She picked her way through the bombed-out sections of London where weedy flowers pushed their way up through broken masonry and blossomed in the rubble.

Godden wrote that all her stories have themes underlying them, not actually stated, but there all the same. An Episode of Sparrows grew out of her stay in London but it wasn't until ten years later, in 1955, when she started to write it.

There are multiple characters in this story but the central figure, Lovejoy Mason, is a girl of about 11 years of age whose life held little love and no joy.

Lovejoy’s mother worked on the stage and had casually left her with Mrs Crombie and her husband, Vincent, a superb chef wasting away in an impoverished part of town with virtually no clientele, while she went off all over the place for work. From time to time the neglectful mother would return to her daughter who was devoted to her. Then there came a time when she didn’t come at all.

‘Mrs Crombie was kind, Vincent was very kind, but for Mrs Crombie there was really only Vincent and for Vincent there was only the restaurant. Lovejoy was a little extra tacked on.

She had never heard of a vortex but she knew there was a big hole, a pit, into which a child could be swept down, a darkness that sucked her down so that she ceased to be Lovejoy, or anyone at all, and was a speck in thousands of socks, ‘Millions,’ said Lovejoy, and then there was something called ‘no-one.’

The story revolves around a secret garden. Lovejoy who, with the help of some other London sparrows, steals some good soil from the rich neighbourhood gardens to start their own. Godden’s clever use of shifting perspectives brings in all the other supporting characters and gives us insight into their motivations, reactions and thoughts. 

Olivia and Angela are two unmarried sisters who live in the more prosperous area near Lovejoy. Olivia, the eldest, is dominated by her beautiful, high energy and opinionated younger sister. When Olivia finds a small footprint in the garden bed that points to the soil thieves, she says nothing and her heart is stirred to find out more about the Sparrows.

“It was not the absence of a man that Olivia regretted so much, though she could have wished that both she and Angela had married…that blank in her life was not the worst, but I wish children were not so unknown to me…Olivia divined something in children, not in her nieces and nephews…who were precocious and spoilt, but in the children who were let alone, real children…they seemed to her truer than grown-ups, unalloyed; watching them, she knew they were vital; if you were with them you would be alive, thought Olivia.”

As Lovejoy planted her garden in the bombed ruins of a churchyard, her soul grew along with her seedlings…

‘At night now, when she went to bed, she did not lie awake feeling the emptiness; she thought about the garden, the seeds, their promised colours. She had never before thought of colours…except in clothes, thought Lovejoy; now she saw colours everywhere, the strong yellow of daffodils…the deep colours of anemones; she was learning all their names; she saw how white flowers shone and showed their shape against the London drab and grey. She was filled with her own business. She had never had her own business before; directly after breakfast, on her way to school, she went to the garden and was thinking about it all day long.’

She spent most of her time waiting…for her mother to wake up in the mornings; waiting for her while she tried on clothes or went shopping; waiting outside pubs.

‘Why did people take it for granted that children had all that time to waste? I want to garden, not wait, she thought rebelliously.’

Rumer Godden’s writing is similar in some aspects to Elizabeth Goudge’s. They both were both masters of characterisation and understood human conflict. Godden’s style is terse, Goudge tends to be rambling and more philosophically inclined but both were adept at thematic undertones. I think Rumer Godden had a greater insight into children - The Greengage Summer is another example of her way of seeing from a child’s perspective.

Although both of the books just mentioned are focused on children, there are some themes that make them more suited to older readers. Greengage has some obvious mature content, An Episode of Sparrows only has one aspect that would make me hesitate to give it to a younger person - Lovejoy’s mother would entertain her male friends in her room while her daughter sat forlornly on the steps outside. It was a passing observation so it would probably go over a child’s head. However, I’d hold off until about age 14 because there is an underlying richness that may not be appreciated or understood by a younger child. From an adult point of view it is a story that has staying power and lingers in your mind and heart afterwards.

Both authors have been unjustly neglected but Elizabeth Goudge has made a comeback in more recent years and from what I’ve read this has been largely initiated by book bloggers. (Yay!) Rumer Godden’s works need a similar revival.

Biography | Rumer Godden

20 Books of Summer Challenge

Faking this challenge - it's winter here and I won't be reading 20 books but these are some I'm hoping to read:

1) The Power of Geography by Tim Marshall - I really liked his previous book, Prisoners of Geography and I was given this follow-up book for Mother's Day.

2) Under the Yoke by Ivan Vazov -  I've had this for a few years and have been meaning to read it at some point. Set in Bulgaria so will also use this for my 2021 Reading Europe Challenge which isn't going anywhere fast.

3) Mrs. Oswald Chambers: The Woman behind the World's Bestselling Devotional by Michelle Ule - another Mother's Day gift. I've been reading Oswald Chambers' book, My Utmost for His Highest on and off for years so am interested in his wife's story.

4) An Episode of Sparrows by Rumer Godden - this author had an interesting and unusual life and that's reflected in her books. Set in post-war London.

5) Keep Him My Country by Mary Durack - a novel by the author of Kings in Grass Castles. Durack was born into an Australian pioneering family and is recognised as one of the country's great literary figures. I hadn't heard of this one until I came across it in a secondhand book sale.

6) Pennies For Hitler by Jackie French - Australian author and a different perspective on WW2.

7) The Enchanted April by Elizabeth Von Arnim - I've been wanting to read this for quite a while; set in Italy so will also be part of the Reading Europe Challenge.

8) Gentian Hill by Elizabeth Goudge - an author I've binged on lately but I'll be getting to the end of the books I can source fairly soon. 

9) Crooked House by Agatha Christie - I've been on a Christie catch-up since last year but I haven't been writing reviews...

10) Spain by Jan Morris - this book was published in 1964 while Franco was still ruling in Spain. I don't know much about Spain generally so this will be a history lesson for me as well as a travelogue.

Possible additions:

The Citadel by A. J. Cronin

The Bee Keeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri

Dracula by Bram Stoker

Thanks to Brona for the Southern Hemisphere alteration at the top of the page.

The 20 books of Summer is hosted by Cathy @ 746 Books.

The Castle on the Hill by Elizabeth Goudge (1941)

 

Many of Elizabeth Goudge’s books have historical settings. The White Witch takes place during the English Civil War, Green Dolphin Country and The Dean’s Watch are set in the 19th Century. I expected The Castle on the Hill to be set at some remote period of time and was surprised when I started reading it that it was written at the beginning of WWII when England was being hammered by the Germans during the Blitz.

The outlook was grim and many people were feeling quite hopeless. It is into this insecure and desolate setting that Elizabeth Goudge weaves her story of loss and despair, love and hope, duty and sacrifice. There’s a good deal of sadness, as you would expect. No one quite gets what they were hoping for and have to settle for circumstances that weren’t their first choice. But, in typical Elizabeth Goudge fashion, sacrifice and duty are redemptive decisions that grow people’s souls. As one of her characters decided after surviving a bomb blast that crippled him, 

‘The other way would have been too easy a death for a man who had too easy a life. Now he would have time to make his soul.’ 

One of this book’s most likeable characters is Miss Brown, a nondescript woman of forty-two years who had nothing about her that stood out, ‘nothing to catch hold of.’ She had a gift for protective covering and managed to blend into the background wherever she was. She was a woman who loved more than she was loved. 

She had had to give up her home for military use and had just learnt that it was obliterated in a bombing raid and the news caused her to lose hope.

‘Her loss of everything she had hitherto known was making her feel as solitary as though she were the only human creature alive in the world. And what a world! It was June nineteen forty. Yesterday was gone, burnt up in the blazing inferno of its suffering. There was today, a tiny patch of foothold, but there was no to-morrow...Memory of the past and hope for the future are companionable things.’

Sitting outside the Free Library in London, feeling herself to be on the edge of a great abyss, a small thing lightened her despair. A violin played by a street musician began to reach her,

‘And she knew it was the truth she was listening to. She heard no words, she saw no vision, but she was slowly made aware that she was one of a multitude that went upon pilgrimage to something or other. She had no idea what the something was, or how they were to get there, all she knew was that the way was stony and painful, dreadful, terrifying; yet worth daring all the same.’

The music was Delius’ Song of Summer and hearing it played helped her transcend her circumstances. When one of Dostoevsky’s characters said that 'beauty will save the world,’ I think he was referring to this ability of beauty to reflect truth, inspire us with a sense of awe, and point to something beyond ourselves. 

Some favourite passages:

'Orderliness of life and thought must be maintained as far as possible. When these chaotic days were passed what was left of it would form the scaffolding upon which the new order could be built. “Order.” A good word. How passionately sane men longed for it, and how incapable they seemed of achieving it with any permanence. How passionately the insane hated it and how easily they could destroy it. Hitler’s contemptuous sneer at “the bourgeois virtues of peace and order” was typical of all the anarchists through the ages.'

'England, from the days of Ethelred the Unready onwards had never been ready for anything, and never would be, had not been ready with proper shelters when the Blitz came.'

'I wish I could live that afternoon over again and do it better...one ought to be given the chance to live certain scenes in ones life over and over again until one gets it perfect.'

As with every book I've read by this author, I found her characters very well described. Her writing progresses slowly because she spends so much time exploring personality and setting, which I enjoy. Her work is perceptive and reflects a deep understanding of human nature, much of it shown through the conversations and reflections of the characters in her books. 

She was living in Devon when World War II broke out and you get the sense that her own personal experience of vulnerability permeates the book.

Linking to Reading Europe: United Kingdom and British Isles Friday

Non Fiction: A Woman in Berlin (1954)

A Woman in Berlin is a firsthand account of the Red Army’s entry into Berlin during the last days of World War II. The anonymous author was a thirty-four year old female journalist who was living in the city at the time. Berlin had been bombed extensively and ninety percent of its buildings were destroyed. There was no running water or electricity. 

Hitler had rejected any idea of evacuating the two million civilians left in the city, thinking that his troops would defend the city more bravely if their wives and children remained there. The civilians were mostly women and children and included 120,000 babies and infants - young boys and old men had been forced into the German army as the Allies gained ground. 

The author recorded the events that occurred in Berlin during the time period of the 20th April 1945 up until the 22nd June, 1945 in a notebook. 

The diary was first published in an English translation in the United States in 1954 and not long afterwards in seven other languages, but when a German language edition was published in Geneva six years later it was very controversial and had a hostile reception in Germany. As a result, the author decided the book should not be published again while she was still living.

Her writing is considered important as a firsthand account as many of the atrocities committed against women, in particular, at the time have been repressed by both the Soviets and Germans. Not to mention the fact that history is often rewritten to fit in with current agendas.

‘This chronicle was begun on the day when Berlin first saw the face of war.’

The author’s account is harrowing and dreadful but she wrote in an objective, almost dispassionate manner at times which lessened the initial punch for me...for a little while, at least. Thinking back on her story, I almost wish I hadn’t read it. It's a book I'd be hesitant to recommend unconditionally because of the nature of the content so I'd suggest checking out these websites to know what you're in for if you do read it:

Here & here.

‘Our radio’s been dead for four days. Once again we see what a dubious blessing technology is. Machines with no intrinsic value, worthless if you can’t plug them in somewhere...At the moment we’re marching backwards in time. Cave dwellers.’

The author found some flowers growing and took them to a Frau Goltz, a lady she knew:

‘“What flowers, what lovely flowers.” The tears were streaming down her face. I felt terrible as well. Beauty hurts now. We’re so full of death.’

The author observed that she was ‘...coming down a level in way I speak...these are strange times - history experienced first hand, the stuff of tales yet untold and songs unsung. But seen close up, history is much more troublesome - nothing but burdens and fears... 

We are debasing our language in expectation of the impending humiliation.’

Before the Nazis surrendered, Hitler and Goebels sent out handwritten notices to rally the inhabitants of Berlin, but the residents were so used to the noise and fanfare of Nazi proclamations that these handwritten commands were ignored. One woman was heard to comment, “Well, just look what those two have come to.”

‘The handwriting looks pathetic and inconsequential, like something whispered.

Yes, we’ve been spoiled by technology. We can’t accept doing without loudspeakers or rotary presses...

Technology has devalued the impact of our own speech and writing.’

‘The cold doesn’t want to go away. I sit hunched on the stool in front of our stove, which is barely kept burning with all sorts of Nazi literature. Assuming everyone is doing the same thing - and they are - Mein Kampf will go back to being a rare book, a collector’s item.’

Linking to Reading Europe: Germany and Nonfiction Challenge: Wartime Experience

Pilgrim’s Inn by Elizabeth Goudge (1948)

Pilgrim’s Inn (also published as The Herb of Grace) is the second book in the Eliot Family Trilogy. Its best to read it after The Bird in the Tree as most of the characters are introduced in the first book and the central theme continues into the second book. I read both books one after the other.

The Bird in the Tree introduces the Eliot family and the history of Lucilla, the matriarch of the family, who purchases the house at Damerosehay, which she intends to establish as an inheritance and a place of refuge and beauty for her grandchildren.
Lucilla had very noble intentions but when her beloved and favourite grandson, David, entered into a relationship that was the antithesis of all she had planned and hoped for, she took some matters into her own hands.
The Bird in the Tree has the rumblings of WWII in the background and ends with on a shaky note regarding this relationship. Pilgrim’s Inn picks up the pieces at the end of the war and continues to work through the ramifications of the various individual decisions.

What I liked about this book:

• The setting (the coastal area of eastern England) and the descriptions of the countryside
• The theme - a moral dilemma; the choice between feelings/emotions and duty
•       Goudge doesn't offer quick fixes. Her characters feel pain and hopelessness but there is always a redemptive pathway
• The sensitivity shown by the author to the effects of marital breakdown on children
• Goudge’s lovely reflective writing:

‘Hers was the unconscious tyranny of inexorable great expectations.’

‘She knew how worrying, even how agonising sometimes, the questions of grownups can be to children whose capacity for experience so far outstrips their capacity for talking about it. And in afterlife it it’s the other way round...adult and educated folks seemed to experience so little of any consequence and yet to say such a vast and wearisome amount about it.’

Some Characters:

Lucilla, a grandmother who was quite manipulative at times. Yes, she loved her family, but her actions were often quite selfish towards some of them, especially her unmarried daughter, Margaret. I cringed a few times to read how she advanced her own (noble as they were) plans. She was a praying woman but perhaps felt the Lord needed some help from her!

Hilary, the eldest of Lucilla’s five children - a bachelor and a parish priest - on the other hand, was not in any way manipulative. Placid, patient, wise, utterly unselfconscious, utterly happy, much loved and popular within his parish. He did know when to speak out and did so when the time came.

Annie-Laurie, a gifted young lady with a dark past and a secret she dare not disclose.

Nadine, a beautiful woman who made a decision to put duty before passion but is now faced with working this out in daily life.

‘In even the smallest of selfless decisions there is a liberation from self...’

David, a young, sensitive man devastated by loss and only capable of ‘tattered loving.’

'Till whatsoever star that guides my moving
Points on me graciously with fair aspect,
And puts apparel on my tattered loving,
To show me worthy of thy sweet respect:
Then may I dare to boast how I do love thee;
Till then not lift my head where thou mayest prove me.'
- William Shakespeare

Pilgrim’s Inn is a slow, worthwhile read; descriptive and thoughtful with a satisfying outcome. I haven’t yet read the last book in the trilogy but this one didn’t leave me with a sense of unfinished business so unless the book falls into my hands I probably won’t read it.
Or should I? Have you read the last book in this trilogy? I’d be interested to know whether it really adds anything more to the story.



Linking to 2020 Back to the Classics: Classic with a Place in the Title

Saplings by Noel Streatfeild (1945)

Saplings is the story of the Wiltshire family: Alex and Lena and their four children, Laurel, Tony, Kim and Tuesday, who are by all accounts a successful middle class family, well off and happy. That is, until the war began.
With the bombing of London imminent, the Wiltshire children were evacuated to the country to stay with their grandparents. Alex was involved in special war work and had to stay in London. He wanted Lena to go to his parent's home with the children but she refused to leave him.

‘The children were darlings, but she was not a family woman, she was utterly wife, and, if it came to that, a mistress too, and she meant to go on being just those things.’

As the war progressed, the grandparents had to give up their large home to the military and move to a smaller place. There was a change of schools for the older ones and the children were farmed out to different relatives creating much unrest and misunderstanding.
Lena had unshakeable poise and was pretty and narcissistic.

‘There was nothing she liked better than to be envied and admired.’

‘For all her perfection you couldn’t help feeling that Lena was more blown together than built on a foundation.’

Bit by bit the family disintegrates and Lena loses her control over the life she had built for herself. She was unable to cope with the changes forced upon her by the war and with no inner resources to call upon, she was extremely needy and neglected her children.

In Saplings, Streatfeild examines the effect of trauma and separation on children. Her ability to view the world from a child’s perspective is just superb. I was reminded in some ways of Dorothy Canfield Fisher’s book, The Homemaker. They are very different books (I think Fisher’s is the better written one) and Saplings is definitely a much darker story, but both authors display very astute insights into how children interpret their experiences of the world and the attitudes of those around them.

It was interesting that while there were a number of kindly and warm-hearted people in the lives of the Wiltshire children, Streatfeild often concerned herself with the seemingly small comments, attitudes and decisions that can impact children who are already insecure. She uses the thoughts of these people to highlight their concerns about each of the children's inner struggles and does this very well.

This is definitely an adult book, unlike many of her others which were written for children.
It felt unfinished to me. I really wanted a more decisive closure but I think that was possibly Streatfeild’s way of showing the nature of trauma and its lingering effects.
This book has been republished by Persephone Books. I love their covers!

London Blitz, 1941

Linking to Back to the Classics Challenge 2020 for a Classic About a Family;
Reading Classic Books: 3) Read a classic that takes place in a country other than where you live & to the Classics Club

The Makioka Sisters by Junichiro Tanizaki (1943 - 1948)

Set in Japan on the eve of World War II, The Makioka Sisters has been described as the greatest Japanese novel of the twentieth century. Not having read many Japanese novels I’m not in a position to agree or disagree with that observation, but it is certainly a compelling and poignant picture of an upper-class Japanese society in decline.

The four Makioka sisters belong to an aristocratic family whose parents are no longer alive. The two eldest, Tsuruko and Sachicko are married and Tsuruko’s husband, Tatsuo, has taken on the Makioka family name and with that responsibility for the unmarried sisters.
Yukiko and Taeko prefer living with Sachicko and her husband in Osaka while the eldest sister and her family make their home in the ‘main house’ in Tokyo, which causes tension at times.

Yukiko, the third daughter, has turned down numerous marriage proposals over the years and the family has acquired a reputation for being too haughty. With the family fortunes in decline and Yukiko now in her early thirties, their expectations are beginning to be more realistic.

‘It was strange that whenever talk came up of a husband for Yukiko, some really insurmountable difficulty always presented itself. Yukiko seemed to be unmarriageable, and Tsuruko found it hard to shrug off as only a superstition the belief that women born in the Year of the Ram had trouble finding husbands.’

The youngest sister, Taeko, is rebellious and modern in her views but has to wait until Yukiko is married before she can entertain the idea of marriage herself. Meanwhile, she doesn’t let that stop her from throwing herself into scandalous situations.
Up until the end of World War II, Japanese men and women were introduced to each via a matchmaker. This could be a relative or a another third party who arranged a ‘miai’ where the two potential spouses met over a formal meal in the company of some family members and the matchmaker. They were also given the opportunity to spend some time conversing on their own.
The two parties investigated each other’s backgrounds using a detective agency to check there were no skeletons in the closets or problems such as insanity or hereditary issues in the family, so the Makioka’s were always afraid that Taeko’s indiscretions might surface and put an end to negotiations.

This book is a quiet and delicate immersion in Japanese culture, from cherry blossom festivals and kabuki theatre, to family traditions and cultural beliefs.

Kabuki Theatre

Embed from Getty Images


The author started writing the story as a series during World War II and the events of The Makioka Sisters take place between 1936 and 1941 as Japan was building up its military presence in the area.
The Makioka family seem to live in a bubble while their culture is disintegrating around them but from time to time hints about what was going on in the outside world break into the story: ‘the national crisis,’ ‘the China Incident,' and ‘National Spiritual Mobilization,' for example.

The Osaka sisters became quite close to the Stolz family, a German couple and their three children living next door to them, and when the family returned to Germany, letters were exchanged. They reveal some of what was taking place over there in 1941, the attitude of the people to the war, and the false security they felt about the outcome.

‘As you know, there is a shortage of manpower in Germany, and it is very difficult to find a maid...Once I had time to write letters in the evening. Now I must get out a basket of stockings, all with big and little holes in them. In the old days I would have thrown away worn-out stockings, but now we must economise. We must work together to win through, and each of us must do his part, however small it may be. I understand that life is harder in Japan too...
But we must bear the burden. We are both young nations fighting our way up, and it is not easy to win a place in the sun. And yet I do believe that we will win in the end...When we win our victory and everything is normal again, you can visit Germany.'

This is an unusual and very interesting perspective.
The Makioka Sisters is beautifully written and has stood up well in translation into English while retaining an authentic Japanese flavour.
530 pages; would suit an upper high school student studying Modern History, or Ambleside Online Year 11 if you wanted to include a literary book from an Asian perspective in an Australian curriculum.


Linking to 2019 Back to the Classics: A Classic From Africa, Asia, or Oceania.

Back to the Classics: Requiem for a Wren by Nevil Shute (1955)

It’s been a while since I’ve read anything by Nevil Shute and this book reminded me how much I enjoy his writing. I thought I’d already read the best of his novels but Requiem for a Wren certainly deserves to be placed on a par with works such as Pied Piper, A Town Like Alice, and Trustee From the Toolroom.
Set partly in the time of WW2 and the years following, it is filled with Shute’s trademark aviation knowledge, which surprisingly doesn’t hinder this non-tech reader’s enjoyment of his writing.
I’ve previously mentioned the author’s ability to get into the skin of his characters who are never ‘standard heroes’ but just very ordinary people whose courage is called upon by unlooked for dilemmas and circumstances; common, quiet folk who rise for a short time, do what needs to be done and go back to their quiet lives. This book is no exception.
From the very first page there is a sense that this story is going to be tragic. There is an inexorable pull in that direction as Alan, the narrator, tells the story of his brother, Bill, and Janet, the young woman he would have married had he survived the war.
All three had met just before the invasion of Normandy but were never to meet again.
The brothers were Australian and the story takes place in Britain and Australia.
After the war Alan sets out on a quest to find Janet, a search that takes him back to England, across to America and then back to Victoria in Australia. What he finds out in his search poignantly reveals Janet’s character and background. Alan is determined to find her and to offer her a home with his parents on their rural property which would have been her lot if circumstances hadn’t intervened to prevent her marriage to Bill.
Unfortunately, Alan always found himself on the back foot in his search. Between Janet’s many moves, the post war confusion, his hospitalisation and rehabilitation after being seriously injured in an air battle, he would arrive somewhere expecting to find her only to discover she had moved on.

'Like some infernal monster, still venomous in death, a war can go on killing people for a long time after its all over.'

This is a sad book with a mix of mystery and WW2 events. Somehow Shute imbues his tragedies with a not altogether bleak outlook. There is some hope within the pathos.
An achingly beautiful read. Highly recommended!

For my thoughts on other books by Nevil Shute see here and here.


Linking up to the 2019 Back to the Classics Challenge: Classic Tragic Novel

Christian Classics: The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis (1942)

The Screwtape Letters is a satirical work of fiction that gives the reader a window into the spiritual world using the vantage point of a demon named Screwtape. In a series of letters to his young nephew, Wormwood, Screwtape instructs him in how to bring about the downfall of the young man he has been assigned to plague.
There are so many memorable passages and wise insights in this book. Often when we look at something from an opposing stance we are forced to see things we would not have seen from a position of agreement. This is the device C. S. Lewis uses in The Screwtape Letters and he does it exceptionally well.
He warns us that there are two equal and opposite errors we believe about devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence and the other is to believe and have an unhealthy and excessive interest in them. He reminds us that the devil is a liar and that Screwtape is not always seeing things truly, himself.
Lewis said of this book that he’d never written anything more easily or with less enjoyment; that it was easy to twist his mind into a diabolical attitude but it was spiritually stifling. The world he had to enter ‘was all dust, grit, thirst and itch. Every trace of beauty, freshness and geniality had to be excluded.’

Some highlights of this book:

Men are killed in places where they knew they might be killed and to which they go, if they are at all of the Enemy’s party, prepared. How much better for us if all humans died in costly nursing homes amid doctors who lie, nurses who lie, friends who lie, as we have trained them, promising life to the dying, encouraging the belief that sickness excuses every indulgence, and, even, if our workers know their job, withholding all suggestion of a priest lest it should betray to the sick man his true condition!

Wormwood's 'patient' is a young unmarried man and the setting is at the start of WW2. Screwtape encourages him to turn the man's gaze on himself. He also advises him on ways to inculcate pride, selfishness, lust and fear in his patient and to exploit him during his dry spells:

Now it may surprise you to learn that in His effort to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else...
He cannot ravish. He can only woo...
He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs - to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than through the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best...He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy’s will, looks around upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.

Whatever their bodies do affect their souls. Whenever there is prayer, there is the danger of His own immediate action.

In the last generation we promoted the construction of...'a historical Jesus' on liberal and humanitarian lines; now we are putting forward a new 'historical Jesus' on Marxian, catastrophic, and revolutionary lines.

Martin Luther said that 'the best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn.' Lewis uses his sharp wit and inspired imagination to open our eyes to the true nature of the spiritual world & to help us understand that there are spiritual beings whose purpose is to undermine our faith and prevent the formation of virtues.

I've used this book with students around the age of about 14 or 15 years and up.




Linking this to the Official 2018 TBR Challenge

Education and Life

Something I both love and am frustrated by at times is when 'Education' get sidelined by 'Life.' The past few weeks have been rather crazy and frustrating, because my well-laid plans didn't work out the way I wanted. 'Life' intervened. Enter Charlotte Mason's motto:

Education is an Atmosphere, a Discipline and a Life

'The only means a teacher may use to educate children are the child's natural environment, the training of good habits and exposure to living ideas and concepts. This is what CM's motto "Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life" means'

It started off with a few of us sick with a flu-type illness, and of course, when you have a houseful, everyone gets sick one after the other so you feel like you're running an infirmary. I hardly ever get sick but I did this time. I'd already arranged to look after my Mum for 10 days while my sister was interstate and she wasn't too well either when I picked her up. Between the two of us we were a bit miserable for a couple of days.
We didn't get any book work done in those ten days but my daughter spent time with her Nanna, who she doesn't get to see very often. She gave up her bed for those ten nights and slept on the lounge chair downstairs; she helped me get my Mum to take her medications, which was a herculean effort at times; she took her for a short stroll around the house most days and talked about the plants we have in the garden, made her cups of tea and sat and read House & Garden magazines with her.
I thought at the time that we were creating an atmosphere for Mum by encouraging her to get outside, which she never does any more, and to take an interest in the garden, which used to be so pleasurable for her. Getting her to read again was something I was really happy about as she used to be an avid reader but has neglected that in recent years.


The worst part of not being well was that I had to keep away from my eldest daughter who is expecting her first baby in about four weeks. I was also trying to plan a baby shower at the same time and ended up having to do most of the preparation at the last minute.

We had the baby shower last weekend and the night before we had been to see a performance of Giselle. I wrote about some books we've used that are great to read before you head off to a live performance, here. Despite the last minute rush, everything turned out well, including having perfect, slightly overcast weather for the afternoon on our upstairs balcony.

A recipe for the Carob Balls pictured above:

3/4 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup sultanas/raisins

1/4 cup carob powder (cocoa or cacao may be used instead)

1'2 cup dessicated coconut

1/2 cup skim milk powder

Put peanut butter, honey, water and sultanas into a saucepan & bring to the boil for about 3 or 4 minutes, stirring all the time.

Remove from stove, add carob and coconut and when cooled, skim milk powder.

At this stage I usually put the mixture in the freezer for about 1/2 an hour and then take it out; roll into balls of desired size & roll in coconut.

Store in fridge or freeze ahead of time.

Moozle made her specialty lemonade scones - only three ingredients!

Below is an old recipe a friend gave me when I was first married - it is always a hit so maybe you may like to try it out (let me know if you do!). I've often omitted the chopped almonds and this time I used some almond meal instead. A great recipe to freeze ahead of time:

Some of my helpers setting things up...

Other happenings in the past two weeks included a visit from our niece who lives in Northern NSW. She was chosen as a student representative to travel to the battlefields in Belgium and we caught up with her for breakfast on her return trip as she came through Sydney.

Our eldest son and his wife returned to Australia after six weeks in Finland, the Scottish Highlands, Croatia, Spain and Portugal. The highlights for them were the Highlands & Spain, especially Barcelona.

Portugal... 

My mother-in-law came down from Queensland for the weekend of the baby shower and spent some time doing Origami with Moozle and listening to her practicing the cello.

I watched this film again with my Mum. I didn't enjoy the book as much as I did the movie, but I have to admit, I did rush through reading it while I was visiting family interstate one year. I haven't got around to re-reading it yet but I just love the scenery in this film and the sparse narrative:

Reading:


Me - I just finished 'My Love Must Wait' by Ernestine Hill. An excellent Aussie classic on the life of Matthew Flinders.
I recently started Life Under Compulsion by Anthony Esolen. I've read his previous book, Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child and thought it was very good:

My Husband - he's been reading David Baldacci's Camel Club series. You can read about them here.
He likes Vince Flynn's books but has read them all and Baldacci's books are a similar type. I haven't read any of them but they are all spy/espionage/thriller books.

My Mum used to read a lot but has got out of the habit in recent years so I gave her an Agatha Christie book to read while she was staying with us. She'd read it years ago and enjoyed re-reading it.

Moozle is on another Biggles splurge.

Benj is reading and enjoying 'Worship' by Graham Kendrick, which was written in 1984 and that we bought around the time it came out. Out of print.

Education is a Discipline

I started Latin Alive 1, published by Classical Academic Press with Moozle this week. I'll be posting a review about it in early to mid November and will be hosting a couple of giveaways here and on some other blogs.

Moozle is now swimming six hours a week - squad/competition training. The lessons are either early morning (very early) or late afternoon. She was swimming one afternoon per week during this past year and wanted to do more, but I was reluctant to add any more afternoon lessons as it is right on dinnertime & I have three hungry young lads and their Dad arriving home. So I reluctantly added two early mornings. I thought I'd die and I didn't think my young lady would be wakeable at that early hour but we've surprised ourselves. We'll see how long we last...

Getting back to well-laid plans getting saboutaged - I think when you decide to educate your own children you do need to count the cost, which my husband and I did nearly 25 years ago. There will be seasons that will be difficult because of sickness, pregnancy, and unexpected interruptions & there is also the aspect of constant change as your children grow, but in spite of these things, it's important to have a peaceful heart and to trust God that what we sow will bear fruit in time to come.

To the faithful He shows Himself faithful. Psalm 18:25



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