What are you reading now?

[Pulcinella]

That's another example: I loved Moby Dick but could see how many others might find it impossible to get along with.

Sounds like you and my friend would really hit it off!

[smittims]

A much-loved rarity: Commonplace, a novella by Christina Rossetti. A quiet family drama, it would make an excellent BBC costume mini-series. Like Margaret Drabble more recently , Rossetti had the art of writing from a woman's perspective without sounding like a ranting feminist, and thus has something to offer the male reader.

[DracoM]

Re-iterating my support for the quiet, finely narrated 'In the Heart of the Country' by JM Coetzee.
Truly worth reading and re-reading. An author I have been delighted to follow for years.

[smittims]

see my R3 jazz over New Year above. I agree.

[gradus]

Back to Evelyn Waugh after a long gap, Vile Bodies remains very funny but I found Put out more Flags a bit flat although being EW there are always smiles to be had.

[Pianorak]

Michel Barnier: My Secret Brexit Diary. Fascinating trip down memory lane. Somwhow seems like ancient and modern history rolled into one.

[AHR]

'Injury Time' by D. J. Enright. I knew him only as a poet so this, part journal, part memoir, part splendidly in defence of language, has been quite a discovery.

[smittims]

Richard III, to follow my re-reading of the Henry VI plays. On ething I hadn't appreciated before was the variety of writing in these plays, which of course has given rise to much speculation about joint authorship , especially in Henry VI part One.

These plays have had many different attempts ot interrpet them on stage, including the very realistic TV version with Bendict Cumberbatch. Reading them again convinces me that I would prefer a more ritualistic, symbolic approach. Trying to put two armies on one stage is doomed to failure, as Shakepeare admits in the prologue to Henry V. But the verse is fascinating and would repay being brought into relief by a less active staging.