Travellin' Penguin

All I can say about the past couple of days is….The best laid plans…  So we continue with a shortened version of these three books so I can catch up.

The alphabet books from my shelves continue.

Ff

 This is an Australian book published in 2019 by Hardie Grant books, Melbourne and compiled by Rebecca Huntley and Sarah MacDonald. The Full Catastrophe is quite relevant in today’s climate. This is a book of memoir, essay and anecdotes of experiences of various personalities who recall times in their life that were so catastrophic at the time it is almost funny.  It is described as “We’ve all had days when if we didn’t laugh, we’d cry. Whether it’s domestic drama, career cockup or just a run of the mill disaster, we’ve all been there-no matter who we are. In this hilarious and moving collection well-known Australians from all walks of life share their stories as a kind of mass therapy.

An excellent read for times like we are going through now.

Gg

Now to something a bit more classic. The wonderful author Collette, Gigi and the Cat. In these two superb stories of the politics of love, Collette is at her witty obstructive best. Gigi is being educated in the skills of the courtesan: to choose cigars, to eat lobster, to enter a world where a woman’s chief weapon is her body. However when it comes to the question of Gaston Lachaille, very rich and very bored, Gigi does not want to obey the rules. In The Cat, a wonderful story of burgeoning sexuality and blossoming love, an exquisite strong minded Russian Blue is struggling for master of Alain with his seductive fiancée, Camille. (blurb on the back cover).

I picked a couple of Collette books up from the shelves at the Tip Shop as I had not read her before and several people who I follow on blogs really love her.

Collette was born Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette in January 1873 and died in August 1954 in Paris. She was married three times. She was a French writer of the first half of the 20th century whose best novels, largely concerned with the pains and pleasures of love, are remarkable for their command of sensual description. Her greatest strength as a writer is an exact sensory evocation of sounds, smells, tastes, textures, and colours of her world. (Brittanica)

Hh

The final feature for today is an interesting graphic novel called Heimat: A German Family Album by Nora Krug.  I picked this up as it is such a beautiful edition and the illustrations are wonderful.  I will share a couple of them here.

It was a winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography, V & A Book Illustration Award and shortlisted for the Orwell Prize. The author goes back to explore the time of the Holocaust and her family’s role at that time.  It is a hard book to describe as there are so many illustrations.

The Guardian describes her as: a professor in the Illustration Program at the Parsons School of Design in New York City. Her drawings and visual narratives have appeared in publications including The New York Times, the Guardian and le Monde Diplomatique, and in a number of anthologies.

This post has been short and sweet and hopefully we’ll be back on track to continue this little project.  I hope everyone has a good Easter despite the social isolation of folk around the world.  At least maybe we can look forward to a bit of chocolate.

Ee

When I was in the midst of collecting as many vintage Penguin books as I could I also included collecting their older and anniversary series Boxed Sets. At one time I had 37 of the boxed sets.  As most of my Penguin Library went to auction a few years ago I did keep most of the Boxed sets and all of the cerise Penguins that are Travel and Adventure. They are very hard to find these days and I still really love them.

The set I am featuring today for the letter E is the English Penguin Journeys.  The English Journeys come in a set of 20 numbered shorter books of around 100 pages each.  They are excerpts from the original book that would have been published in the past.

The set was published in a box in 2009 and I noticed now there are quite a few second hand sets on eBay and Abe books for sale for reasonable prices if anyone is interested. They are nice little books to pop into a bag to read when out and about or sitting for a time in a waiting room somewhere.

I particularly love the covers on these books. Today I will share those covers and give you a list of the 20 titles. I continue to come across these books in op and second hand shops but they seem to have been separated from their set and are sold cheaply individually.  I imagine I will be hanging on to these for some time to come.

Here is the list:

1. Voices of Akenfield by Ronald Blythe
2. The Wood by John Stewart Collis
3. From Dover to Wen by William Cobbett
4. The Pleasures of English Food by Alan Davidson
5. Through England on a Side Saddle
6. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard and other Poems
7. A Shropshire Lad by A.E. Housman
8. Cathedrals and Castles by Henry James
9. Walks in the Wheatfields by Richard Jeffries
10. The Beauties of a Cottage Garden by Gertrude Jekyll

11. Country Churches by Simon Jenkins
12. A Wiltshire Diary by Francis Kilvert
13. Some Country Houses and Their Owners by James Lees-Milne
14. The Clouded Mirror by L.T.C. Rolt
15. Let Us Now Praise Famous Gardens by Vita Sackville-West
16. One Green Field by Edward Thomas
17. English Folk Songs by Ralph Vaughan Williams and A. L. Lloyd
18. Country Lore and Legends by Jennifer Westwood and Jacqueline Simpson
19. Birds of Selborne by Gilbert White
20. Life at Grasmere by Dorothy and William Wordsworth

Hobart is presenting us with another drizzly, cloudy day but the rain on the color bond roof sounded nice during the night. One of the things I have noticed during these days of self isolation is the amount of people I’ve never seen walking past our house. People of all ages with dogs, without dogs, waving at Ollie and I in the yard. Who ARE these people? Evidently neighbours within our community who work during the day and are now at home. The foot traffic is quite remarkable while there is a definite decrease in the car traffic.  These times are presenting all kinds of changes now.

But…. on with the books.

Dd

*1.  The first book I am going to share from my shelf is one I found in a sad little Op shop that I couldn’t leave behind. I have quite a collection of dog books published from the late 1800s to no later than 1955. I collect them not so much for the stories but for the illustrations. Cecil Aldin is my favourite but I have also loved and owned several Albert Payson Terhune (Lad series) whose books I grew up with. Real Tales of Real Dogs comes to mind and I still have my mother’s childhood copy.

The book is Australian and called The Day of the Dingo (1955 published by Thomas Nelson  & Sons who published many children’s books) by John Kiddell.  I can find little information about Mr Kiddell anywhere. I am hoping that some older Australian born readers might shed some light on him for me. He has several books for sale on Abe books and though he seemed to cater for a young readers market the illustrations by Neave Parker drew my attention to this one. I am assuming Neave Parker is British but can’t swear to it. He spent most of his life working at the Natural History Museum in London reconstructing dinosaurs. Most of his art work is in that field as well but he did draw illustrations of other animals for books. He lived from 1910 to 1951.  Again there are art auctions online who represent his work but little biographical information about him. I will simply share the illustrations from this book and you can decide for yourself. I may spend more time doing online research to see if I can find out more about these two people.

Magpies

Willy Wagtail

**2. Next on the list is: Drawn From Memory by Ernest H. Shephard (Penguin books 1957, reprinted 1975). Ernest Howard Shepherd was born in 1879 in London. He was educated at St Paul’s School; and studied art at the Heatherleys and Royal Academy Schools. He had his first picture exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1901, and began drawing for Punch in 1907. During the war he served in the Royal Artillery and after the war he began illustrating books – especially children’s books. Among his more famous illustrations are those for Winnie the Pooh and Wind in the Willows. He was awarded the O.B.E. in 1972.

The book represents his childhood memories during the 1880s. In words and drawings he uncannily recalls a horse-drawn London where a penny was wealth and the fire at Whiteley’s the event of the year. A kindlier, less austere view of Victorian England emerges from these recollections of the Jubilee, of bathing at Eastbourne and hop picking in Kent, of the Drury Lane Pantomime and aunts and illnesses, of hansom cabs and pea soup fogs. It was a world where the spirit of Charles Dickens walked. He died March, 1976 in London. (Penguin)

***3.  After talking about a couple of books of interest to children I am going to walk down a different path here with one of my all time favourite books. I only need to say two words. George Orwell. No, not 1984 as that while his most famous book, is probably the least favourite book of his as I am not a big dystopian fan though I do appreciate the meaning behind it and how relevant his writing remains.

My favourite books of his are his memoir/auto-biographical books. Burmese Days, Homage to Catalonia, The Road to Wigan Pier and this one, my favourite, Down and Out in Paris and London. I’ve read Animal Farm a couple of times and seen the play years ago but it broke my heart and I can’t read it again.

Orwell was born as Eric Arthur Blair in June 1903 in Motihari, India. He died in January 1950 at the too young age of 46 in London of tuberculosis.  He was such a prolific novelist, essayist, journalist and critic.  I can’t help but think of how much more he would have blessed us with had he not died so young.