2. Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys
SnakBacklisted Book Club
Bliv bruger af LibraryThing, hvis du vil skrive et indlæg
1k6gst
https://www.backlisted.fm/episodes/2-jean-rhys-good-morning-midnight
Did you listen to this episode? Did you read this book? What did you think?
Did you listen to this episode? Did you read this book? What did you think?
2k6gst
This was my review when I read it a couple of years ago:
A dissolute woman dissolves over a few days in interwar Paris. It’s a sort of experimental, stream-of-consciousness crawl through the unromantic demimonde. She’s mostly trying to find bars in which she hasn’t had a public breakdown:
"He always called that bar the Pig and Lily, because the proprietor’s name was Pecanelli. It is in one of those streets at the back of the Montparnasse station. Got up to look like an olde English tavern. I don’t see why I shouldn’t revisit it. I have never made scenes there, collapsed, cried—so far as I know I have a perfectly clean slate."
At one point she resolves to upgrade from her insect-ridden flophouse room and comes close to renting a nicer, airier room. But then she resigns herself to the terrible room:
"A beautiful room with bath? A room with bath? A nice room? A room? … But never tell the truth about this business of rooms, because it would bust the roof off everything and undermine the whole social system. All rooms are the same. All rooms have four walls, a door, a window or two, a bed, a chair and perhaps a bidet. A room is a place where you hide from the wolves outside and that’s all any room is. Why should I worry about changing my room?"
It is supremely sad, tough-minded, humane, and beautiful. Recommended.
Listen to the Backlisted podcast episode #2, decide if you want to read it, and then listen again after reading it.
A dissolute woman dissolves over a few days in interwar Paris. It’s a sort of experimental, stream-of-consciousness crawl through the unromantic demimonde. She’s mostly trying to find bars in which she hasn’t had a public breakdown:
"He always called that bar the Pig and Lily, because the proprietor’s name was Pecanelli. It is in one of those streets at the back of the Montparnasse station. Got up to look like an olde English tavern. I don’t see why I shouldn’t revisit it. I have never made scenes there, collapsed, cried—so far as I know I have a perfectly clean slate."
At one point she resolves to upgrade from her insect-ridden flophouse room and comes close to renting a nicer, airier room. But then she resigns herself to the terrible room:
"A beautiful room with bath? A room with bath? A nice room? A room? … But never tell the truth about this business of rooms, because it would bust the roof off everything and undermine the whole social system. All rooms are the same. All rooms have four walls, a door, a window or two, a bed, a chair and perhaps a bidet. A room is a place where you hide from the wolves outside and that’s all any room is. Why should I worry about changing my room?"
It is supremely sad, tough-minded, humane, and beautiful. Recommended.
Listen to the Backlisted podcast episode #2, decide if you want to read it, and then listen again after reading it.
