Reading Journal: Tuesday 2nd February 2010
February 3, 2010 by Rob
Filed under Reading Journal
So last Friday (29th) saw the 150th anniversary of Anton Chekhov’s birth. I had wanted to do something special on the day, but alas, time was my greatest enemy. Thankfully, for now, I’m keeping up with my Chekhov Tuesday’s and at least dipping a weekly toe in the pools of Chekhovian delight, and with yesterday being Tuesday the reading kicked off with a couple of Chekhov shorts.
First up was Anyuta, a tale which centres around medical student Stepan Klotchkov as he prepares for an exam. Anyuta is the female with whom he share a dingy room with in a large apartment block, and in his exam preparations he borrows Anyuta to pose as his ‘living skeleton’.
I read this story while out ‘walk reading’ with Steinbeck (my dog if you didn’t know), and I finished reading it just as I was about to enter my local forest. I then spent the entirety of my time in the forest – around 45 minutes – trying to work out exactly what this story was all about. In the end I came up with three possibilities: it was about the silent sufferings of a young woman; it explored the pretentiousness of medical students; it was a contemplation on pre-exam nerves. In the end I couldn’t reach a definite conclusion on which of the three it may have been, and so I just decided that it was a combination of all of them; a decision which I’m sure would have delighted the Russian storyteller. Ambiguity is not something I’m used to when reading Chekhov, and I say a little more on it in my official afterthoughts for Anyuta.
The second tale, Ivan Matveyitch, turns out to be a bit of heart warmer but in a wholly subtle way. The main character, known simply as ‘the man of learning’ is at his wit’s end with his young male secretary, Ivan Matveyitch. Always late and rambling on about his adventures in the Don region, ‘the man of learning’ is determined he’s going to give Ivan a piece of his mind.
I’m not going to tell you whether ‘the man of learning’ does reprimand Ivan or not, but what evolves from this story is real sense of warmth and well-being. There’s a nice bit of nineteenth-century literary name dropping in this tale too – Turgenev and Gogol both get a warmly mention. You can read a little bit more in my afterthoughts post for the story. Oh and P.S. I also picked up a new word reading this Chekhov tale – amanuensis; defined as a stenographer: someone skilled in the transcription of speech. Can’t see me using the word all too often though 
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Well I did it! I finally finished the 430+ page ‘hefter’ that is Kader Abdolah’s The House of the Mosque (Canongate). and what a spectacular, spectacular reading experience it has given me. This is a sensational work of fiction-fact-fable and in all my years of studying history – both at home and at university – I’ve never seen historical events so eloquently and so imaginatively presented. Needless to say, even before my afterthoughts are posted, this is destined to be my first five-star read of the year, and it is oh so deserving of it. You know that feeling you get when you finish reading a book and you know you’re going to remember it forever? Well The House of the Mosque is that kind of book for me.
::Wednesday’s reading plans::
- I need to do a bit more catching up with my Fifty-Two Stories reading so the next two stories are lined up. First is Thad DeVassie’s Cricket Hymn which is going to take me seconds to read because it’s a piece of flash fiction. The second story, which I’m really looking forward to reading, is from one of the big names of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston, with a really interesting story entitled, Mother Catherine
- Having now finished reading The House of the Mosque I’m free to continue my journey through the stories of Arthur Miller in Presence: Collected Stories (Bloomsbury). The Turpentine Still is the second last story of the whole collection, and the biggest at 60+ pages.
- As for my main read, well I’m in between books right now as you know, and I want to do a slight re-shuffle. The favourite though, should I get my forethoughts post sorted out for it, is Chinua Achebe’s supremely interesting autobiographical work The Education of a British-Protected Child (Allen Lane).
‘Reading Journal’ provides an unedited, on-the-fly record of the bookish highlights in Rob’s reading day.
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Rob, a self-confessed bibliophile, is without any hope of rehabilitation. He gets unnaturally excited over anything book-shaped, and if book sniffing were a crime then he would have been locked up years ago (which wouldn't bother him in the slightest provided his cell were lined with books)
I’m so glad you loved The House of the Mosque. It’s one of those books that have caught my attention for a very long time now, but not knowing what it’s about. I’ll be putting it on my wishlist.
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