Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons

Do you ever have those books that you know you should read because you'd really like them but you just never seem to get around to them? That's how I've always felt about Cold Comfort Farm. I would pass it in Waterstones almost every time I went, look down at it, think 'I should read that' and then move on to something else. It wasn't that I didn't want to read it; it was just that I'm easily distracted.

Last week, aware that I would need somethings to read on the train to Stratford (the reason I didn't update on Thursday), I decided to get some books out of my university library to read. Things that I wouldn't necessarily buy but that would be in the English department. As I wandered the shelves, looking for things that weren't super heavy but weren't critical reading essay collections either, I ended up with a stack that included Cold Comfort Farm. Since it was the thinest of the pile, I decided to start with that one. It was a good choice.

Cold Comfort Farm tells the story of Flora Poste, a young girl around nineteen or twenty who finds herself orphaned by parents that she really didn't know well in the first place. Not very distressed, she stays with her friend in town and writes to a bunch of relatives, trying to find someone who will take her in. Although everyone graciously offers, Flora decides to take up her cousin Judith's letter, thinking that living on a farm in Sussex will be quite an adventure. 

Of course, Cold Comfort is not at all what Flora expects and at the same time, is exactly what she thought. Her cousin Judith keeps apologizing about a wrong her husband did Flora's father but won't speak on what it is, Amos is a fiery preacher who enjoys telling the congregation that they're all sinners, Seth is a womanizer who secretly loves the talkies, Reuben just really wants to run the farm and Elfine spends all day running through the meadows and hills to the beat of her own drummer.

As this book is a parody of the rural farm novels that were popular at the time it was written (1932), this is a very funny book. Even if you're not familiar with the idea of the stock farm novel (and it's completely understandable if you aren't), it's still plenty funny on its own. Watching Flora dealing quite admirably with these ridiculous characters is always entertaining. Plus, Gibbons's hilarious and quite timely writing style really adds to the story. There's just something about the way people wrote in the thirties that pulls you right into the time period and that's very present in this novel, despite it being set in the "near future." You can hear that early twentieth century sensibility coming through the minute Flora sets eyes on Elfine dancing about like a sprite and remarks that she really should try blue because light green is nice but doesn't go well with Elfine's coloring. 

Cold Comfort Farm is a very enjoyable and quick read. It isn't deep or dark or probing but it's fun and light and sure to put a smile on your face. I dare you not to enjoy it.

P.S. It also has a lovely movie adaptation that was made in 1995 starring Kate Beckinsale, Ian McKellan, Stephen Fry and (my favorite) Rupert Penry-Jones as the young Dick Hawk-Monitor. I whole-heartedly endorse it.

[014] Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

What the Back of the Book Has to Say:

In this parable of commitment, loneliness, hope and loss John Steinbeck has created a powerful and moving portrayal of two men striving to understand their own unique place in the world. Clinging to each other in their loneliness and alienation, George and his simple-minded friend Lennie dream, as drifters will, of a place to call their own. Eventually they find work on a ranch in the Salinas Valley. Yet their hopes are doomed as Lennie, struggling against extreme cruelty, misunderstand and feelings of jealousy, becomes a victim of his own strength.

Why I Picked It Up:

Another in the series of 'classics I have yet to actually read.'

What I Think: 

Of Mice and Men is another one of those books that, even if you've never read it, it's enough in society's consciousness that you basically know what happens anyway. Man and his friend who is rather simple travel the West in search of employment during the 1930s. Despite their strong friendship, there is a tragic event and George has to make a tough choice. You either read it in high school or your best friend did and complained about it to you (I was the latter). 

To be honest, after I finished the last page of the book, I set it back into my purse and blinked. All I could think was "....this is it? This is the quintessential high school novel? No wonder my class skipped it." 

Now, I'm not trying to make an overall judgment on Steinbeck with this. No one is saying that the overall plot is flawed. The main theme of the book, of a man having to make the ultimate decision in perhaps one of the hardest eras of American history, is very tragic and rings true when you read the ending. The last ten or so pages are very powerful. However, the way the book meanders to get there, how incredibly short it is and just it's overall composition left me completely underwhelmed.

This may, in fact, be partly my fault. I admit that I am extremely prejudiced against "American classic fiction". I know this is vaguely blasphemous as I am American myself but I cannot think of a single American novel regarded as a "classic" that I have ever enjoyed. I don't even like our original poets (don't even get me started on Whitman) but then again, I'm not a big poetry person. 

Of Mice and Men, unfortunately, fulfills every stereotype I have of a typical American classic: hard lives on farms with lots of regional accents and brown. This is my mental image when I think of American literature and this is everything that Steinbeck's novel is. I understand that that was the situation that he was writing in, that this was published in 1937 during the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl era but, quite frankly, it has just never been my cup of tea.

I also cannot stand when authors write in a dialect. While I understand that it is part of character formation, I can stand it for awhile but a whole novel of characters speaking in dialect just gets on my nerves. It's like reading in a bizarre code, making you pay more attention but also making you really wish the characters would just shut up. They say that only really great writers can write in dialect and have it work. To be honest, I have yet to read a novel where I appreciated writing in accents. We'll see if it shall ever happen. 

The characters in Of Mice and Men are intriguing, to be sure, and very intelligent creations in their own right. The only problem is that the novel is so short that I hardly felt like I'd experienced anything when it ended. I never got a chance to really care about any of them so it made the tragic ending a little less painful. Of course, while writing this paragraph I've thought up several reasons why Steinbeck would choose to keep their histories and personalities more vague (a comment on the coming and going of the times, on the low value of human life, or simply making it a more everyman tale) but I'm going to stick with my first impression. 

All in all, I can understand why this book is taught in high school. It is a good introduction into literary analysis and character study. However, I do not see why it would be read outside of the ninth grade. This seems like a book that should be taught and not read.