Biggles in the Baltic
(in Biggles’ Big Adventures)
Captain W.E. Jones
211 p.

For Decades ‘08.

Prion, 2007.
(first published 1940.)

Back cover blurb:

none

Biggles! Biggles, Biggles, Biggles. When I was young, the only proper series of childrens’ books I read was the Nancy Drew novels, which admittedly weren’t the most fascinating things ever, but they managed to pull me in, at least. Having read Biggles now, I feel that I ought to have spent my childhood reading those books. Not only would it have suited me much better as a person, but also they are better novels, with more rounded and convincing characters. Biggles? Pretty cool. Algy? Hilarious. Ginger? So cute. And an evil Nazi! It felt so remniscent of all these modern films where there are evil Nazis, Communists, etc., except this was from the time where the Third Reich was actually going on! Oh, I haven’t read much Second World War fiction, but I feel that a childrens’ novel from that time is good enough.

And everything was so British! And no one swore, even though people smoked quite a lot. The only thing I can say against this novel is that they had so much plane terminology which I’m not familiar with, but seeing as they are about planes, it isn’t that strange. Hopefully I will learn.

Plotwise, this novel is hilarious. They are hiding in a rock and doing raids on German places now and then. I think they lose about five planes, and later they steal a German plane and people get stuck on the rock and everyone loses everyone else, and it is just brilliant. So over-the-top! When you think the novel should end, because everything is fixed, you realise there are another fifty pages, and something will go horribly awry before the novel ends. And, I think, because of all these crazy stuff that barely seems plausible, it is an extremely good story.

Skicka hem N:r 7
Lisa Eurén-Berner
189 s.

B. Wahlströms Förlag, 1934.

For Decades ‘08.

Back cover blurb:

none

After reading two disappointing books (Den unge Werthers lidanden and Vi skulle älska om vi bara kunde), I needed something good to read. My parents advocated that I had to read Skicka hem N:r 7, and so I did. And it was hilarious. Although it might not hold such an intrinsic value, it is a nice reminder of the heaps of girl-novels were written in the thirties. I haven’t read many of them, but they have all the same happy attitude to most things. And this novel is the same. It made me happy to read it. It was so cheerful, and even when things were bad, I knew that things would look up, even though I couldn’t justify why. The girls’ enthusiasm made me smile and it was such a joy to read. That is all I can say.

Maurice
E.M. Forster
263 p.

Penguin Classics, 2005.
(first published 1971 by Edward Arnold - written 1913-14)

For Decades ‘08.

Back cover blurb:

Maurice Hall is a young man who grows up confident in his privileged status and well aware of his role in society. Modest and generally conformist, he nevertheless finds himself increasingly attracted to his own sex. Through Clive, whom he encounters at Cambridge, and through Alex, the gamekeeper on Clive’s country estate, Maurice gradually experiences a profound emotional and sexual awakening. A tale of passion, bravery and defiance, this intensely personal novel was completed in 1914 but remained unpublished until after Forster’s death in 1970. Compellingly honest and beautifully written, it offers a powerful condemnation of the repressive attitudes of British society, and is at oce a moving love story and an intimate tale of one man’s erotic and political self-discovery.

The introduction, by David Leavitt, explores the signifcantce of the novel in relation to Forster’s own life and as a founding work of modern gay literature. This edition reproduces the Abinger text of the novel, and includes new notes, a chronology and further reading.

I read this book for the first time about a year and a half ago. I finished it quickly, perhaps due to the four-hour train-rides. Still, I was instantly intrigued, so intrigued that I bought A Room With A View to get some of Forster’s language. For his language is one of the best things with him. It is subtle and so beautiful. One of my favourite passages goes thusly:

Durham could not wait. People were all around them, but with eyes that had gone intensely blue he whispered ‘I love you.’ (48)

To be honest, I have some problems with Clive (Durham). This is not because of his character (or yes it is, he’s a bit of an arsehole when he turns straight), but it is because he is played by Hugh Grant in the film-version. So everything he says I hear in Hugh Grant’s voice. I mean, I’m not one of the millions who seem to hate him, but still! It’s a little strange. Strangely, I don’t get the same thing with the rest of the characters. This might be related to the fact that they aren’t well-known characters. Perhaps. Nevermind! Here is another passage I adore!

He shook the ladder and glanced into the woods, but the wish to go into them vanished as soon as he could go. What use was it? He was too old for fun in the damp.

But as he returned to his bed a little noise sounded, a noise so intimate that it might have arisen inside his own body. He seemed to crackle and burn and saw the ladder’s top quivering against the moon-lit air. The head and the shoulders of a man rose up, paused, a gun was leant against the window sill very carefully, and someone he scarcely knew moved towards him and knelt beside him and whispered, ‘Sir, was you calling out for me? … Sir, I know … I know,’ and touched him. (170)

I will not comment on this because I would just splutter incoherently.

Admittedly, I was not quite as taken with the novel this time. This is, however, more to personal reasons than literary. (I felt I recognised Maurice’s and Clive’s relationship a little too well for my liking.) It has, however, made me want to read more Forster again. But I don’t know what to read! Well, seeing as I am pretty much booked full (ohoho, I’m so funny!) until the summer, it’s perhaps good. When time presents itself, I can always ask my literature-nerd-parents what to read.

One thing I love with this novel is that the homosexuals get the happy ending - not the heterosexuals. It is brilliant. I would say “funny”, but that would give you the wrong connotations. Oh, brilliant ol’ Forster!

Brott & straff
(Преступление и наказание = Crime & Punishment)
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Translated by Hans Björkegren.
325 + 309 p.

Wahlström & Widstrand, 1979.
(first published 1866 in several installments.)

For Decades ‘08 and Russian Reading Challenge.

Back cover blurb:

Brott och straff har kallats “världens mest berömda roman”. Denär också en av världens mest lästa böcker. Den kom ut 1866 och alltsedan dess har hundratals miljoner läsare följt den fattige studenten och mördaren Raskolnikov på hans febervandringar genom Petersburg. Generationer av psykiatriker, religionspsykologer, kriminologer, sociologer och litteraturforskare har hämtat argument och exempel ur denna gastkramande berättelse om en “övermänniskas” väg mot katastrofen. Brott och straff har aldrig förlorat sin aktualitet och gåtfulla spänning. Ännu i dag känns den märkvärdigt levande och modern.

En nyöversättning till svenska har länge varit efterlängtad. Hans Björkegrens tolkning av romanen är genomgripande och har gjorts i samarbete med sovjetiska experter.

After two sentences I was smitten. I must have known I would be this smitten, or I wouldn’t have longed to read it as much I did - I spent a great deal of time last term eagerly waiting for the time for us to come when we were going to read this book. We are not expected to have finished it yet. We are supposed to have begun it come the next Swedish lesson. But I honestly couldn’t wait once we had started talking about it. I plowed through it in five or so days (it probably would have taken less time if I had not been forced to be nice and social to my family) and I loved every moment of it. Who would have thought I would be so intrigued by a poor ex-student turned killer?

The character of Raskolnikov never ceased to amaze me. Of course, the times he gave all of his money to different people I ground my teeth in frustration - why couldn’t he think of himself?! Though, I guess, that’s one of the reasons I found him so fascinating. I couldn’t help but feel for him, despite him killing a person “just because”. He is such an exquisite and chiseled character. In fact, all of the characters feel remarkably alive and real, much more so than anything else I’ve read in the past few months.

Like I mentioned before, this is one of the novels I am studying in school (or will be studying on Tuesday). I know for a fact that many of my friends and classmats will despise this book, because of the simple reason that I think it is so good. Or maybe it’s related to that one of the other Swedish classes have already read it and there seems to be many who despise it there. Hopefully none of the people I know well hate it, but I can’t bet on that. The most tragic thing is that when I will try and defend it all I will be able to say is “BUT IT’S SO GOOD”. They’ll all write me off as a nut who loves it because I study Russian. Actually, this me studying Russian proved a bit of problem when I was reading it. Sometimes I found myself staring at a name, wondering how that is spelled in the cyrillic alphabet, if it had an у or an о, a ю or a ё. Now, my Russian skills are at a very basic level, but let’s admit it: my dream is to one day be good enough at the language to read at least a bit of literature in it. I don’t know if this is the goal of many people studying languages, but else, what’s the point? One day I might reach this goal. Maybe I’ll fail miserably and in five years’ time I will look back at this and laugh at myself, but hey - you can have dreams, can’t you?

There is a BBC serial based on this novel, with John Simm as Raskolnikov. Anyone who have known me for any time the last two months will know that when I watch this, I will explode. And then I’ll be back for more - the next month and a half’s worth of Swedish classes will be full of discussions regarding this book. Yum.

(a couple of notes: a) the cover of the edition is impossible to find. which is a pity, because I quite like it. It’s really plain, but still!
b) The copy I read was my parents’, only because the one I got from school was too ugly. Apart from aesthetics, I have also gained a few other things. It is quite practical to have parents who’ve studied literature at University.)