sherry ashworth

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’Tis Pity She’s A Hoarder Wednesday 13th January 2010

My new Iphone has brought out the worst in me.  Since I’ve got it, I’ve been busily loading it with all the apps I can find of even remote interest – the complete works of Shakespeare, music quizzes, maps, airport mania, diner dash, Last Fm, the tube map, word searches – and I’ve been ripping all my CDs to put on the Ipod – and put my whole collection of photos on it - and I’ve downloaded podcasts from the Beeb, and even bought my fave episode of The Sopranos (Pine Barrens).  Lucky Brian doesn’t read my blog as I haven’t plucked up the courage to tell him this yet, since we have the episode in our box set, but I just wanted it on my phone, OK?

So far, I’ve actually USED my Iphone for texting, checking emails, playing a few games … err … that’s it.

I’ve got all the other stuff just in case.  And having it all makes me feel really good.  I’m even thinking of subscribing to Spotify just so I can have all the music I’d ever need on my phone.

Why?  Am I greedy? Am I a control freak?  Well, yes, but I don’t think that explains the pleasure I get from having stuff I haven’t used yet.  It’s the same as having a pile of books you haven’t got round to reading, or a whole box set of TV drama to watch.  It’s a sense of possibility – the knowledge that there’s all that pleasure just waiting for you round the corner – extending that blissful pause before plunging in for as long as you want.

Yes – I’m one of those people who always leaves the tastiest morsel of dinner till the last mouthful.

Hooray for deferred pleasure!


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The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo Thursday 7th January 2010

Nothing beats opening a crime novel that you know is going to be really, really good.  How do you know? Well, rave reviews help, as do numbers of copies sold, and recommendations from people whose opinions you trust.

But those are only indications.  Just a few pages into The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, I was certain I was in for a treat.  I liked the assurance of the story-telling and in particular Larsson’s ability to give the reader exactly the right amount of information – enough so we don’t get confused, but also there’s that tease, that promise that there is much, much more to reveal.  The characters were strong and distinct, and of course the Swedish setting adds to the mix. 

But.

Why is it that nearly always the end of a crime novel disappoints – and Dragon Tattoo was no exception?  I think it’s partly because we read crime fiction for the chase – once the chase is over, there’s just profound anti-climax.  So that’s the mystery solved, then.  So what?  The show is over.

But in the case of the Larsson there’s something more, and I’m partly embarrassed to say what this is, because I worry I’m going to end up sounding like some Victorian aunt.  But here goes.  Much of the content of the novel was too disturbing for me.  I know that in a crime novel one really ought to expect a crime, and in the twenty-first century the depiction of the crime is likely to be unmediated by any censorship – and even fuelled by a desire to shock the reader.

And I don’t mind being shocked.  Heck, I LOVE the Sopranos and have watched decapitations without blinking.  I teach undergraduates creative writing and they love nothing more than to push the boundaries.  I accept completely that sometimes difficult things need to be said, and need to be said strongly.

But.

Ha!  I realise what it is!  And don’t read on if you’re afraid of a spoiler.  What made me pull away from The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was the violence against women.  While the plot concerned a potentially arms-trading corrupt financier, I was happy.  But once the story took me up close and personal to the most appalling act of violence against a young woman that I have ever read, the pleasure I took in reading, stopped.  And never really recovered.

So this is not prudery (phew!)  It’s hating violence against women even when it’s fictional.  Perhaps BECAUSE it’s fictional – because the writer is imagining this happening and making us imagine it too.  In a slow-mo, detailed, loving way.  In the Sopranos. Richie Aprile hits Janice, and she shoots him.  Go, Janice!  But even where there is violence against women, it’s related through a sequence of fast-moving images – we are told what we need to know – and then we deal with the consequences.  It’s true that in the Larsson, the victim of violence takes an ingenious revenge on her assailant– but still, we are expected to suffer her humiliation with her.  Frame by frame.  Word by word.

This is not an argument for censorship – it’s just me exploring why I found I was distancing myself from this best-seller.  All the more so because it IS a best-seller, and millions of men are reading the same horrendous details that I did.  For entertainment.  Because a crime novel is generally for entertainment.

Maybe I am a prude.  Or just getting old.  It’ll be tea with the vicar next …


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Wot I did in my holidays Monday 4th January 2010

It’s been common knowledge for the past two thousand years or so that the bay of Naples is one of the most divine areas known to mankind.  We spent the New Year there and it was blissful.

 

Sitting on our balcony overlooking Vesuvius I made my New Year Resolution – no, not to be even more explosive – but to simply appreciate each moment, and not to live too much in the future (which is my besetting sin.)  Yes, I also did the dieting resolution thing – why break an age-old tradition?

 In our mini-break we wandered round Sorrento (good shops!), and took the bus to Amalfi. We careered round hairpin bends with a driver who took his hands off the steering wheel every time he saw a statue of the Virgin Mary.  These were situated in niches at the more extreme bends …  We visited Capri and revelled in its beauty.  Brian took the chair-lift to the top of the island while I explored the village of Anacapri and came across some guys shooting a film.  In this sequence an impossibly gorgeous Italian actor opened the door to his girlfriend.  They had to re-shoot several times, as is the custom.  Each time they did so, the same two cats shot in and out, clearly thinking this was some kind of game – or that they might get fed.

 

We made it to Pompeii.  Oh – My – God!  It’s been my lifetime’s ambition to go there, and it didn’t disappoint.  It’s not the graffiti or the frescoes or even the plaster casts of the victims that amazed me, but the sheer scale and reality of this Roman town.  You can stand in the forum, worship in the Temple of Apollo, walk along proper streets.  Real time travelling.  And an opportunity to use schoolgirl Latin.  Sherry et Brian in foro sunt.  Wicked!

 

 

Best of all was seeing in 2010 in the central square of Naples, being entertained by Renzo Arbore and his Orchestra Italiana.  We danced and sang along with the choruses.  At midnight the sky exploded with very noisy fireworks (the Vesuvius effect) and the lovely Neapolitans around us offered us their champagne and we danced some more.  Then opposite our hotel at 2 am we watched a spectacular fireworks display.

 

Two tips for would be travellers to Naples.  Forget all the stories about low-life Neapolitans.  The locals we met couldn’t have been more friendly, helpful or generous.  But do NOT expect to be able to buy a meal on New Year’s Eve – all the restaurants are shut.  We went to bed hungry but very happy.


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