The Mookse and the Gripes discussion

Any thoughts on next year's list yet? Doug has started the list here - please add to it if you can:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

You could always start one!

There are a few titles already listed in the comments for last year's.

Antonomasia wrote: "You could always start one!

There are a few titles already listed in the comments for last year's."

I have sent Doug a private message - I will start one if he doesn't want to but I don't want to duplicate unnecessarily.

Hugh wrote: "Any thoughts on next year's list yet? As far as I can see Doug has not created his usual Listopia list yet - if anyone can find it I will post the link here."

That we should probably wait to find who the judges are as that does seem to be key.

And this year I won't be able to eavesdrop on the previous chair trying to sell the job to the new chair, and telling them what the prize is looking for!

Will be fascinating to see who the chair is as Florence and Busby clearly put their stamp on it.

I bet you that the new Ishiguro will be on it

Well if the current jury is reappointed it will be on the longlist but not the shortlist.

Actually Buried Giant didn't feature did it - a very underappreciated book.

I wonder if Loch Awe will be published in time to back it back to back nominations for Douglas Stuart. Likely not I suspect

Buried giant wasn’t longlisted

Of you want to really think outside the box then panenka by Rónán Hession

Robert wrote: "If you want to really think outside the box then panenka by Rónán Hession"

Surely that's inside the box? 6 yards inside the box, to be precise.

How did I miss that Panenka was by Ronan Hession!? I saw his Tweets about the cover, but didn’t read closely. That’s good news. I loved Leonard and Hungry Paul, but I hope this book has some teeth in it. I don’t need another book quite that warm and sweet.

I want to know what the connection of the book to a Panenka is (I feel my joke was a tumbleweed moment - it made me laugh anyway)

And me.

If anyone doesn't know what "panenka" means - it is this, from 1976: https://youtu.be/ROG4-QPIDgo?t=101

I liked it, Paul. :) An amazing end to an incredible game.

6 yards being the goal kick by a man named Panenka? We might need to know this if Ronan was thinking of Panenka when he wrote the book.

A Panenka is a particular way of taking a penalty kick named after the player who invented it and unleashed it on the world in 1976 (that was the biggest football game of that year as well). Rónán must have been thinking of it as that’s what a panenka is, I don’t think there is any other meaning.

Robert said thinking out of the box. But a penalty kick is taken from the penalty spot which is 6 yards inside the penalty box.

Anyway here’s a new short story by Rónán in the meantime, one that discusses the relationship between writer and translator:

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/bo...

A new Olga Grushin novel out in January - The Charmed Wife - a rare treat, keeping up her one novel every 5 years run rate.

That link is US edition but she has just confirmed on Twitter that Hodder & Stoughton will publish in UK.

I don't think her last one 40 Rooms ever got a UK publication but I remember liking The Dream Life of Sukhanov.

The Dream Life of Sukhanov was wonderful - I liked The Concert Ticket and 40 Rooms a lot as well. (The Concert Ticket was The Line in the US, or vice versa)

Paul wrote: "Robert wrote: "If you want to really think outside the box then panenka by Rónán Hession"

Surely that's inside the box? 6 yards inside the box, to be precise."

Late to the thread, but laughed immediately at the joke!
:D

I sort of understand different UK/US book covers, but why different titles for The Concert Ticket?

From what I remember the book had a lot about the culture of queueing in Communist Russia, and The Line is more literal, but in the UK most would call it a queue and that has its own cultural resonances.

It looks like a direct sequel to The Silence of The Girls.

Since it is Pat Barker, I would expect a third too.

There were the Greeks and the Trojans, what women will the third book cover?

Who wrote the recent novelized book about the enslaved women in Odysseus killed? I have read a few Greek retellings this last year they’re running together, but I don’t have one about the women In Penelope’s house. Maybe I’m thinking of an older book.

Maybe the third book will be when Odysseus returns home. No matter what, I’m looking forward to her next book.

Someone added Jhumpa Lahiri’s new novel to the list and I’m excited about that. I really admired The Lowland, though it’s themes were heavy and rather depressing.

One thing about the new novel, though: the description says it’s her first novel written in Italian and translated to English. Would that make it ineligible? Or could it squeak by because she’s the translator?

Colm Toibin has a new one out next year, called The Magician about the life of Thomas Mann. There is no goodreads listing for it as yet, so I haven’t added it to the list.

As I read the rules, the Lahiri is International Booker eligible but not Booker eligible if originally written in Italian and self translated.

Wendy Silence of the Girls was (apart from when it switched to a male point of view) told in first person by a Trojan woman. The new book looks like it’s exactly the same woman, so a direct follow up.

Troy has fallen and the victorious Greeks are eager to return home with the spoils of an endless war–including the women of Troy themselves. They await a fair wind for the Aegean.

It does not come, because the gods are offended. The body of King Priam lies unburied and desecrated, and so the victors remain in suspension, camped in the shadows of the city they destroyed as the coalition that held them together begins to unravel. Old feuds resurface and new suspicions and rivalries begin to fester.

Largely unnoticed by her captors, the one-time Trojan queen Briseis, formerly Achilles’ mistress, now belonging to his companion Alcimus, quietly takes in these developments. She forges alliances when she can, with Priam’s aged wife the defiant Hecuba and with the disgraced soothsayer Calchas, all the while shrewdly seeking her path to revenge.

WndyJW wrote: "There were the Greeks and the Trojans, what women will the third book cover?

Who wrote the recent novelized book about the enslaved women in Odysseus killed? I have read a few Greek retellings th..."

Are you thinking of Margaret Atwood's the Penelopiad? There was also a lot of discussion of the slave girls around Emily Wilson's Odyssey translation.

Is it heretical to say I am bored with retellings of Greek myth and don't want to read any more of them?

Possibly but I completely agree.

I’m getting that type of fatigue as well. In my case it’s always the same era. I am looking forward to Haynes Medusa book though.

Paul wrote: "As I read the rules, the Lahiri is International Booker eligible but not Booker eligible if originally written in Italian and self translated."

If an author herself translates her book into another language, why is that seen as a 'translation' and not the same book re-written in a different language?

This reminds me of Beckett who wrote some of his novels in French and then re-wrote the same thing in English. I find it hard to see those books as works of translation, especially if there is no other person involved in the process.

Jibran wrote: "Paul wrote: "If an author herself translates her book into another language, why is that seen as a 'translation' and not the same book re-written in a different language?."

Those are the rules (I'm not arguing they are necessarily sensible)

Anglo Booker: "No English translation of a work written originally in any other language is eligible"

International Booker: "Works that have been self-translated are eligible"

Which given these rules are from same organisation seems pretty clear self-translated goes into International bucket.

I think only exception would then be if an author argued that the English version was a brand new novel e.g. significant changes.

The Women's Prize is a bit more ambiguous as the following two rules contradict each other for a self-translated book:

"Any full-length novel written in English by a woman of any nationality is eligible.
Translations of books originally written in other languages are not eligible."

Hugh wrote: "Is it heretical to say I am bored with retellings of Greek myth and don't want to read any more of them?"

With you 100%.

Emily wrote: "Hugh wrote: "Is it heretical to say I am bored with retellings of Greek myth and don't want to read any more of them?"

With you 100%."

My only departure is I was never too enamoured of them in the first place. Albeit that reflects in part my own lack of knowledge of (and to an extent interest in) the sources in the first place - e.g. I enjoy Shakespeare retellings rather more.

Paul wrote: "My only departure is I was never too enamoured of them in the first place. Albeit that reflects in part my own lack of knowledge of (and to an extent interest in) the sources in the first place - e.g. I enjoy Shakespeare retellings rather more. "

Me too. And I'm starting to think there are enough of those too! Though I've been going out of my way to read retellings (not Greek) this year so it may just be my impression. Strangely, however, there is no proper retelling of A Midsummer Night's Dream. I wonder why not...

Emily wrote: "Strangely, however, there is no proper retelling of A Midsummer Night's Dream.."

I'm reading one now actually (well it's not really a re-telling, more the characters wander in and out of the play) - the latest in the Tilly and the Bookwanderers series, which I purchased out of gratitude to the author for her Women's Prize tip.

There was Love in Idleness some years ago

I read The Silence of Girls, so I think I was thinking of Emily Wilson’s depiction of the enslaved women.

I have enjoyed a few of the novelized versions, the best being Ransom, so I wouldn’t mind reading more, just now more Iliad, Odyssey Stories. And I still have to finish Fagles’ translations of the originals. I found I like his best.

Maybe the Hogarth Shakespeare series will commission an author to retell Midsummer’s Night Dream. They’ve had Edward St Aubyn do King Lear, Jo Nesbo do MacBeth, Howard Jacobson do The Merchant of Venice, Anne Tyler did The Taming of the Shrew, Jeannette Winterson did A Winter’s Tale, and Tracy Chevalier did Othello. Gillian Flynn is doing Hamlet Jan 2021. I have them all, ur tragically the covers are not matching. The reprints have similar covers, but first editions are each unique.

Paul wrote: "Emily wrote: "Strangely, however, there is no proper retelling of A Midsummer Night's Dream.."

I'm reading one now actually (well it's not really a re-telling, more the characters wander in and ou..."

Is that the book your darling daughter was so pleased to get?

WndyJW wrote: "I read The Silence of Girls, so I think I was thinking of Emily Wilson’s depiction of the enslaved women.

I have enjoyed a few of the novelized versions, the best being Ransom, so I..."

And let's not forget Margaret Atwood's Hogarth take on The Tempest, Hag-Seed. And I can never pass up an opportunity to rave over Ransom.

Right! I did forget Hag-Seed. I haven’t loved all of the Hogarth books, unfortunately.

Ransom is the excellent isn’t it? The language is lovely and the story is moving,

Atwood does Hamlet in two pages, if anyone's interested:

https://lucylit.weebly.com/uploads/6/...

WndyJW wrote: "
Is that the book your darling daughter was so pleased to get?"

Yes!

I also think authors can be influenced (and pay tribute to) the form and style of the Greek epics without needing to tell the same story - it's one of the things The Shadow King does very well.

And Everything Under. Off the top of my head I’d say it was the least obvious tribute to a myth of the books I’ve read.

Paul wrote: "WndyJW wrote: "
Is that the book your darling daughter was so pleased to get?"

Yes!"

She’s adorable. I love kids who love books. My teenage granddaughters do, well, one loves books, one likes books, but my devilish grandson said he doesn’t like to read because he likes to have fun. I explained that I don’t expect him to sit inside a beautiful sunny day, but bedtime, rainy days, waiting in lines are the perfect time to read. Bedtimes don’t work in spite of my daughter’s best efforts to continue reading because the boys are 7 and 4 so they spend more time talking and wrestling than listening.

I think even the 7 yr old will eventually be a reader because I will sit on him and hold a book over his face, or, if that doesn’t work, I’ll count on his relentless curiosity about everything to send him to books where the knowledge of the world can be found.

I’m so happy that my two year old niece likes reading. She carries books with her and we have to read them ten times an hour (goodnight moon and the tiger who came to tea are the big faves)

I hope she remains a lifelong reader, Robert,

Seems quite a buzz about Richard Flanagan's latest The Living Sea of Waking Dreams and indeed I see currently "top" of the listopia.

Rave review from Australian press:
https://www.smh.com.au/culture/books/...

Interview today in UK press:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...