In which I wrap up June

Things I have read

I have continued to read my way through the Chalet School through June, thought at a slightly slower rate of knots - and now have eleven left (of my own collection) to read.  But I have also read some other things. 

I finished Philippe Sands’ East West Street (just in time to be given his new book, The Ratline, for my birthday, which I am excited about) - and I would really recommend it. It’s a fascinating book that is part memoir and part history of two massively important legal concepts: genocide and crimes against humanity — and some of the strengths and weaknesses of both, discussed in relation to the history of twentieth century Europe, specifically the holocaust and the Nuremberg Trials. If all material about law was written this well, I would read more about it.  

A friend of mine loaned me a copy of Nicole Chung’s new memoir, All You Can Ever Know, which is about the her experiences of having been adopted by white parents and looking for her birth parents to help her ‘place’ herself. I found it really enjoyable and really easy to read, and a really strong presentation of the very complex nuances of adoption and cross-race adoption as well. 

The Lights of the Pointe-Noire is another memoir — this by Alain Mabanckou — about his return from Europe and the US to the Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville). I’ve wanted to read some Mabanckou for a while, as he’s on a lot of ‘recommended’ lists, and though I hadn’t realised this was a memoir rather than a novel when I asked for it (it was a gift), I really enjoyed it and will definitely be picking up one of his novels. It’s a lovely picture of a place and memories of a place, and of the realities of going home as the person who ‘made it’ outside the country. 

At the ‘lighter’ end of the spectrum I’ve read A Darker Shade of Magic by VE Schwab and The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins.  The former is the first in a trilogy I’ve been eying up for a while and the latter is (of course) the prequel to The Hunger Games. I hugely enjoyed both. I thought Ballad… did a great job of being in a familiar world and adding to it and of humanising a well-known villain. I kind of read it with the picture of Donald Sutherland as old-Coriolanus Snow in my head, and I think it kind of worked (though one has to wonder about life-spans in the Capitol of Panem).  After finishing A Darker Shade of Magic I promptly hopped off to Hive and ordered the second and third volumes, which tells you what you need to know about my enjoyment of it: I thought the world-building was really well done, loved the two main characters, and can see a lot of scope for interesting future plot development in the way that Kell’s position in Red London is set-up. 

Finally, I’ve moving to my brain back into a ‘work’-type space recently, so reading some of the pile of un-read books about theology and stuff I want to read related to my upcoming training (which will eventually turn into some pre-reading for college: I just ordered some Augustine…). 

So, I’ve read Casper ter Kuile’s new book, The Power of Ritual: Turning Everyday Activities into Soulful Practices, which explores the value of ritual in bringing depth and meaning to lives and how we can think about how we live and what we devote ourselves to. For me, this is valuable because if we don’t think about these kind of things, we’ll inadvertently find ourselves building habits and practices that put us into ways of life that don’t always contribute to our flourishing (and on this, if you’re in the Christian tradition, read James K.A. Smith’s Cultural Liturgies work and Tish Harrison’s Liturgy of the Ordinary). I’m also interested in exploring how some of what’s in the book can help think about discipleship within the Christian tradition, as it’s a really straightforward and practice-focused book. 

And I read A Black Theology of Liberation by James Cone, which is one of the classics of Black Theology, which I found a really helpful read in making think about how I read — even though I was familiar with a lot of the argument because of the influence the book has had. I thought the book sat in a slightly tense space between polemical text and systematics and doctrine: which is understandable, because Cone is explicitly trying to engage with [white] academic theology, especially systematics and doctrine while also being polemic. I found it a tension because my experience of these things is of different argumentative forms and while I could really engage with what the polemic was doing, at times I felt went ‘too far’ for the systematic points he was trying to make - which is, I think, in part the point, and in part a vivid picture of some of the faults in the academic dialogue and approach to writing theology. Which is why I say it was helpful in making me think about how I read - because every time I found a bit of the argument biting at me, I had to ask myself why and try and answer that question honestly and sit with the discomfort. 

Things I have watched 

Still missing the cinema, gang.  

I watched Artemis Fowl on Disney Plus, and it was fun fluff that passed an hour or so.  I’ve also started on The Luminaries on BBC, which I’ve been enjoying but not feeling the need to race through. I think it’s a very stylish adaption of a book that I loved, but a part of what I loved was the formal elements of the novel, and I’m not sure that that is coming across or is intended to in this form. 

I also watched the Royal Opera House’s From Our House to Yours lives on Saturdays, which I enjoyed — but only felt they really landed on it’s final week. The first two weeks, I loved seeing Frankie Hayward, Cesar Corrales and Vadim Muntagirov dance, and I did enjoy a chamber-sized Das Lied von der Erde, but it wasn’t a show. In the last week, they got Katie Derham on to host, and had her do interviews with the dancers and singers, and they also showcased singers from the emerging artist programme that they have singing some great songs. I want to hear more from all those singers, and I will even go to opera (I don’t go for it massively) to do so. 

A recommendation of some kind

In case you’ve missed this news: Hamilton is on Disney Plus from July, so watch the hell out of that.

Alternatively, if you’re into podcasts, the Reply All team have done a five-part podcast called The Scaredy Cats Horror Show, in which Alex gets PJ to watch horror films, to help him build up to watching Get Out. I am something of a scaredy cat when it comes to horror, in that I intellectually understand the value in what horror does but I do not want to sit through it, and I am likely to only watch a horror film if I know what is going to happen (I have seen Get Out, I knew what was coming) - and I felt for PJ a lot. I found this really enjoyable and am now considering watching some of the films that I haven’t seen (well, mostly Midsommar).

In the pile for July

I’m steadily reading through A Christian Imagination by Willie James Jennings, which I have been reading for about five years now but am finally finishing, and slowly reading Alex Ross’ The Rest is Noise on twentieth century classical music (he is such a great writer on classical music). I’ve started Aravind Adiga’s Selection Day, and I’m going to read at least A Gathering of Shadows (the next of the VE Schwab trilogy) and I have some le Carré and William Gibson on the to-read pile for summer reading.

There is also a new David Mitchell novel coming out (Cloud Atlas David Mitchell, as he puts it, to distinguish him from the comedian), so I expect to be reading that by the end of the month.

A photo from the last month

I finally (after thirty-odd years of calling Cornwall home) went to West Pentire to see the poppies. I’d always thought it was an entire headland of poppies, and was disappointed, as we approached, to see that it was about two half-fields. And then I discovered — optical illusions!