Month: August 2021

Still Life by Richard Cobb

/ Bag Full of Books / 4 Comments
Still Life by Richard Cobb

*My experience of reading Richard Cobb’s ‘Still Life’ published by @foxedquarterly *

Historian Richard Cobb’s memoir about growing up in Tunbridge Wells in the 1920’s and ‘30’s and thereafter feels very much like a miniaturist painting – only transmuted to book form. 

For as the dextrous miniaturist painter adds infinitesmal detail to his work of art, so too has the author added layer upon layer of minute detail of his retelling of childhood.

As a reader, this has a few challenges. Some of the details might seem excessive at first or unnecessary, but in retrospect it is those details that render the painting or work so full of depth and it can ultimately feel quite rewarding. Cobb doesn’t write solely about important noteworthy people and events. His pen sweeps in every aspect of every person and place that his young person encountered, in the most quotidian detail. Mostly, as a young and sensitive boy he seeks reassurance in the continuity of things. Be that the presence of a town person walking on the common, or of the presence and unchanging aspect of Tunbridge Wells itself. 

Cobb’s family moved to Tunbridge Wells when he was four i.e in 1921. His family consisted of his father an ex serviceman in the Sudan Civil Service, his mother, with a penchant for playing bridge at the Ladies’ Bridge Club and his elder sister. 

Though Cobb’s mother seems to have a slightly snobbish character, enjoying her Club activities and being sensible of her middle class friends there, there was an absence of such class related sensibilities in Cobb’s personal narrative. This is why, we learn about all types of people who lived in Tunbridge Wells. Cobb leaves no-one out. No person is too lowly, no incident is too ordinary to prevent it being mentioned. 

In the early chapters, Cobb with the thoroughness of the historian goes into great depth regarding the geographical approach to Tunbridge Wells. Don’t be deterred by the minute details however, the later chapters relate incidents related to his mother and father, his assortment of relatives, some of them quite unusual – residing in Tunbridge Wells, how the Second World War affected (it didn’t affect) the towns people and more. 

An interesting chapter was that describing the Limbury-Buses – relations of the Cobb’s – who lead an extraordinarily insulated life, even during the war, not allowing any of their daily routines to be upset or any outside news to penetrate to the interior of the house.

I came away knowing about a place that I had never known before. I felt that perhaps I knew Royal Tunbridge Wells better than many places I had actually been before. Now that’s quite a feat of writing for you. 

I’d however, recommend this book for the reader who has an interest in small, exacting details. If you delight in the minutiae of a place and it’s people – then this memoir is for you. 

I was sent this book as a press copy from the folks at Slightly Foxed but all impressions are entirely my own.

‘Little Boy Lost’ by Marghanita Laski

/ Bag Full of Books / 4 Comments
‘Little Boy Lost’ by Marghanita Laski

It’s hard to pen this review without revealing certain details of its plot. The following review may contain some spoilers. If this may affect your future enjoyment of the book – I would come back to my review after reading the book. 

Late last night I finished Marghanita Laski’s poignant and soul searching novel ‘Little Boy Lost’ published by Persephone Books.

Once in a while, there comes a book that is so much more than the series of events it retells. Some stories have the power to evoke major existential questions, deal with emotions so raw and that lie so heavy on the heart, that the novel becomes deeply psychological and grapples with the character’s inner conundrums and dilemmas, inviting the reader to take part in the discussion. ‘Little Boy Lost’ is just such a book. 

Before the Second World War, English poet and writer Hilary Wainwright meets Lisa, a Polish girl who becomes the love of his life. Subsequent to their marriage, World War 2 strikes and the pair are torn apart – each to their own war related undercover activities. Hilary works as a British agent and Lisa is involved with the Resistance in Paris.

Lisa gives birth to a child, a son who Hilary manages to see for one day – the day after he is born and the very day before the Germans occupy Paris. And then Lisa’s ruse is discovered, the child is smuggled away to a friend for safety and the chaos of war ensues. 

In the enfolding terror and panic surrounding the War, Hilary’s small family is torn apart. He hears from Lisa, one last time. In her letter she fears for her safety and that of her child and pleads to Hilary, to come and rescue the child, keep him safe, in the event of something happening to her. And then the inevitable happens… Lisa is discovered. 

On Christmas Day 1943, Hilary is alone in London celebrating Christmas with his Mother and sister. A Frenchman, a friend of Lisa’s turns up on his doorstep and tells him that his son has disappeared without trace. 

“It was only then that Hilary fully realised that his son was lost. Since Lisa’s death he had ceaselessly dreamed that he would one day find happiness with a child who was not yet an imagined person but only a surviving symbol of his and Lisa’s love.”

‘Little Boy Lost’ charters Hilary’s rocky road to searching for his lost son, three years after he goes missing. There are certain tenuous clues, a possible candidate- a little boy who might be his son. But the trail is very difficult to trace, the child is merely a five year old with little or no memory of his past life, having been separated from his mother at the age of two.

However, Hilary is struck with the moral dilemma of not wanting to open himself up to vulnerability, of loving and losing again … And though many points favour the fact that young Jean (the orphanage boy in question) may be his son, there is no instant recognition, no facts that absolutely determine that the boy is his, at least to Hilary’s doubtful mind. 

Set in post-war France, in Paris and an obscure provincial town blaster beyond recognition in northern France, ‘Little Boy Lost’ is also a depiction of the mass destruction that ravaged France and what it was like to live in France at such a time. The images that Laski evokes are haunting to say the least.

“This street curved away so that only its beginning could be seen from the square. He rounded the curve, and then found a wilderness of desolation. Save for a roofless church higher for the contrast of emptiness, there was not a building standing for half a mile in every direction. Red bricks and grey bricks, roof tiles and stucco, reinforced concrete spouting thick rusty wires, all lay huddled in destruction. Nothing seemed to have been cleared away save what was necessary to allow a few tracks to pass through, it was ruin more complete and desolate than Hilary had ever seen.”

‘Little Boy Lost’ is a book about ideals, about personal freedom and the search for happiness. It is a book tinged with poignancy but there are glimmers of hope tucked away in its pages. The innocence of the young child, his pleasure in simple pleasures and objects and his happiness in experiencing them – is joyful. 

I loved this book so much. From start to finish it was perfectly penned. And the ending still gives me the shivers …

The Swiss Summer by Stella Gibbons: A Summer Holiday to Switzerland

/ Bag Full of Books / 4 Comments
‘The Swiss Summer’ by Stella Gibbons

‘The Swiss Summer’ by Stella Gibbons was just one of the books reissued by Dean Street Press recently, as part of the Furrowed Middlebrow Collective. 

In the absence of any real summer holidays this summer, buying a copy of ‘The Swiss Summer’ seemed the best ticket to booking a summer holiday of armchair travel to a favourite country, in the heart of the Swiss Alps.

This summer holiday in Switzerland did not disappoint – let me tell you that in advance.

‘The Swiss Summer’ is set in the Grindelwald-Interlaken region of the Swiss Oberland, famed for its proximity to the giant peaks of the ethereal Jungfrau, Monch and Eiger. The story begins in the aftermath of the Second World War. The story is told through the eyes of a forty year old married woman called Lucy Cottrell. Lucy is tired of her busy life in London as the wife of an insurance agent, with its rush of social events and people. So when, a chance encounter with Lady Dalgleish, a woman owning a Swiss Chalet opens up an opportunity to spend a few weeks in this idyllic spot, Lucy jumps at the opportunity. The main reason for her visit is to act as an assistant to Freda Blandish, Lady Dalgleish’s companion, to catalogue Lady Dalgleish’s husband’s vast library of books and artifacts. However, what starts off as a secluded blissful holiday is converted to an uproarious holiday lodge with a crew of weird and wonderful characters. 

Though the loss of complete peace and quiet is a loss for Lucy, the people who stay at the Chalet Alpenrose form close bonds and forge friendships that will last them a lifetime. The book discusses issues such as childlessness, parenting, the breaking up of class structure in Britain in the aftermath of WW2, class sensibility and the way the British tourist was viewed by native Europeans, first love and the ideal of marrying for love versus money. It’s a lovely book – but to my mind – the wonderful sense of place in ‘Swiss Summer’ was the highlight of the book.

From the moment that Lucy views the ethereal vision of the silvery peak of the mountain Silberhorn, from her bedroom window she is mesmerised and she subsequently takes us along on her many many walks and trips to the surrounding countryside. Sometimes, it reads better than a tourist guide book. Here are actual locations and tourist spots to be read about and savoured. And they are written in the masterful storytelling style of Stella Gibbons. 

“For a long time she stared up into the clouds, and presently it seemed to her that at one point the grey was changing colour… And while she watched, with eyes refusing to believe in so much beauty granted to this world, the clouds as fleetingly began to drift across it again and it went in and was hidden. It was the Silberhorn.”

Many more trips to the peak of the Jungfrau, a trip to a mountain ridge named the Harder, rising high above the river Aare via funicular railway, to a ridge of the Augustmatthorn where wild ibex abound, a visit to the Aare Gorge, multiple trips into Interlaken and so much more – ‘The Swiss Summer’ has a wealth of opportunities for virtual travel. 

Perhaps, I will take this book out each summer and take a little virtual trip to the Oberland. This is a book to treasure and read again and again.