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zalenaThe NYTimes Book Review has a review of Fay Weldon's Chalcot Crescent today. I haven't read it, yet, but I do know that the review (and reviewer) are a little behind in keeping up. Crescent was published in 2009, her latest, Kehua! came out this past August.
However, I have noticed that ever since The Spa (also 2009---at least in this country) Weldon's last three books have been published by small and utterly random presses. Stepmother's Diary (which looks to be an extension of a chapter from The Spa) was published by 'Quercus'; Chalcot Crescent (just out in paperback... there's the link) was published by 'Europa Editions'; and Kehua! was published by 'Corvus.'
* Quercus is a British indie press now famous for publishing Stieg Larsson.
* Europa Editions is a small US house best known for their work in translations.
* And Corvus appears to be a small imprint in Atlantic (UK) that specializes in macabre thrillers. (They also appear to have some Joyce Carol Oates.)
What is most striking about this is not just the random selection of small presses, but that she has done three books in the space of just a few years and has not stayed with the same press. Weldon is notorious for her abrasive opinions. Not so long ago she offended everyone with her 2007 What Makes Women Happy (published by the Chicago Review Press). I posted a few interviews from this period, but to get a sense of the reception of this book you have to look no further than the Amazon page which offers these two reviews one can hardly believe are about the same book.
From Publisher's Weekly (which is notoriously literal as it is known for its trade overviews rather than criticism):
According to prolific novelist and playwright Weldon, women's sources of happiness are sex, food, friends, family, shopping and chocolate—in that order. Women can be "wonderfully" happy, but only for 10 minutes because after that, they are beset by anxiety and guilt (re chocolate: "My God, did I actually eat all that?"). Other failed attempts at witty, self-help advice: women should not be upset by men's fondness for porn because "men are creatures of the cave" and porn "just helps a man get through the day." Falling down some kind of rabbit hole that seems to have landed her in the 1950s, Weldon encourages women to fake orgasms because faking is "kind to male partners of the new man kind," who otherwise might become too anxious to perform. Her counsel to infertile women is downright dangerous: before pursuing grueling fertility treatments, first try getting pregnant from random sex with a stranger and then pass off his baby as your husband's. Famous as a novelist for clever feminist observations about the war between the sexes, Weldon (She May Not Leave) caused controversy in the U.K., where this latest effort was perceived as reactionary. Americans will surely find Weldon pathetically out of touch with her core readership with this mishmash of pointless parables and banal advice that won't make anyone happy.
From Booklist: In prolific British author Weldon's considered opinion, not only does a woman's happiness stem from only six possible sources--sex, food, friends, family, shopping, and chocolate--it's also frustratingly elusive when it does arrive, lasting only 10 minutes before subversive doubts creep in to undermine any unadulterated joy. Women are, she posits, their own worst enemies, trapped in an eternal nature-versus-nurture conflict that makes lasting tranquility unobtainable. The better question, then, is why are women so unhappy, and to this end, Weldon uses her prodigious powers as a storyteller to create intricate parables that illustrate often simplistic moral imperatives, such as "if you want to be happy, try being good" and "pursue a fit shelter for the soul and the body will look after itself." Weldon brings the full strength of her finely tuned observational abilities to bear in a multidisciplinary exploration of this endlessly fascinating conundrum. Part memoir, part self-help guide, Weldon's theory is completely thought-provoking.
What is it? Smarmy, reactionary garbage, pseudo-psychology, feminist-insight, or brilliant satire? Is it possible to be all of the above? Weldon comes across as sincere in her interviews, but no one knows where she stands anymore... and I've come to wonder if she even knows. But the question remains as to whether it's her work people are finding objectionable, or her personality. Is she difficult to work with? I don't know. But I suspect there are many editors out there unwilling to work with her, again, particularly since her out-put is so prolific. There is also the question of margins. Weldon fans are loyal, but she's not really a best-selling author, anymore. Smaller presses are better placed to make profit off slender margins: but why so many of them?
Please click on my link above for my take on What Makes Women Happy, while being aware I HAVEN'T ACTUALLY READ THE BOOK, YET. I have been catching up on Weldon since I first discovered her in 2003. The description of the 'dystopian' Chalcot Crescent doesn't surprise me. I suspect she's satirizing the British welfare state, but I'm guessing there is no reviewer with the balls (literal or figurative) or the knowledge-set to take this on. Weldon was a trained economist and this ignored aspect of her education often peeks through in her work.
Anyway, I've read so many of her books at this point that I've forgotten which ones I haven't read. While I long knew about the sponsorship deal involved in The Bulgari Connection (the cover of which made me think she was another Danielle Steel) I think the first book I read was Letters to Alice Upon First Reading Jane Austen. This is very different from her other books, in part because it worships at the altar of 'high culture.' Though as a brief and accurate description of women's lives at the turn of the 19C, it is without parallel.
Her most famous book is probably The Life and Loves of a She-Devil: due primarily to the film adaptation starring Meryl Streep and Roseanne Barr. I think it's a minor work. Amusing, but blunt. This spring at Conference of World Affairs Werner Herzog kept pointing out the 'needle-like' dagger that Aguirre carries in Aguirre and the Wrath of God. "This dagger is so thin it could kill you without bleeding," he said. Most of Weldon's work is like a tenderizing meat-hammer. But Weldon at her best has that needling-thin lethality. I would recommend the following books as 'essential' Weldon, while also admitting that my choices are totally random and subjective:
* Auto da Fay: supposedly Weldon's memoirs, though large portions seem invented, and some are even told in third person. I have often suspected that Weldon has been writing the same book her entire life: this 'autobiography' gives the reader some indication as to why.
* She May Not Leave - an utterly ruthless satire on the problem of childcare. Weldon's solution is shocking and wicked and deserves to be talked about more widely: particularly as it relates to the problem contemporary feminism hasn't solved: who does what traditionally is 'women's work?' I cannot believe that more of my contemporaries have not read this book. It should be required reading on Women's Studies lists. (But is far too controversial and not PC enough for that, not to mention that none of Weldon's books present women in a necessarily positive light.)
* Life Force - Weldon mentions her connection with George Bernard Shaw and his free love compatriots in many of her novels. She is related to them and often invokes Shaw's 'life force' in her books. Shaw believed that the urges we feel---particularly those of a sexual nature---are an evolutionary force which guides humanity to perfection. In other words, you may have nothing in common with the dumb-fuck you are sleeping with, but the product of your sexual union many generations on may create the next Mozart.
I don't think I need to point out the idiocy of this theory (being a big fan of 'random mutation') even as I recognize there is a force that grips people not just to fuck, but---in an age where people can actually prevent conception---to actually bear children. I won't get into my thoughts on this now... suffice to say, Weldon feels that Shaw's ideas of 'life-force' have had long-lasting repercussions down the generations. (The sins of the fathers!) She has long explored the impact of these kinds of philosophies in praxis (Praxis is also the title of one of her novels dealing extensively with this issue) on women's lives.
I've always thought that Life Force: about an artist and his mistresses and his long-suffering wife, takes the nasty back-biting one finds in many of her books and elevates it into art. The ending of this book is the whole purpose of reading it. I don't want to give away too much, but it turns the table on predatory and parasitic relationships, while also being scathing satire on the way women interact with each other and their men. In my opinion, Life Force is a successful revision of one of Weldon's earlier books Female Friends. It took the same characters and moved them forward a bit, developmentally. I can't wait to see if she tackles the material, again.
In addition to Kuhua!, it looks like Weldon has provided some grist for Signet's (as in Signet classics... everyone remembers those cramped editions of Shakespeare we had to use in school) forthcoming edition of Paradise Lost. I cannot wait to hear what Weldon has to say about Milton, who I claim as one of the great literary Puritans---despite his lack of residence in the New World---due to his proximity to Oliver Cromwell and the subsequent stripping of power due during the Restoration. As for Blake's famous comment that Milton is of 'the Devil's Party' ... so is Weldon! It strikes me that there is a kind of Prurience of Puritans (perhaps what we should call a group of them) so obsessed with purity that they become some of the best chroniclers of sin.
P.S. Weldon was one of the creators and original writers of Upstairs/Downstairs in the notoriously abrasive first season. I thought I would mention that fans of the series will be pleased to note that a fifth season will be appearing on Masterpiece this spring... Jean Marsh is returning as Rose and it is set in the 1930s. While the links between sympathies between the British landed-gentry and the Nazi party have already been explored, I'm not entirely certain we've adequately covered the upstairs/downstairs pov when it comes to the rise of fascism.
Link for all things Weldon:
http://zalena.livejournal.com/tag/weldon
However, I have noticed that ever since The Spa (also 2009---at least in this country) Weldon's last three books have been published by small and utterly random presses. Stepmother's Diary (which looks to be an extension of a chapter from The Spa) was published by 'Quercus'; Chalcot Crescent (just out in paperback... there's the link) was published by 'Europa Editions'; and Kehua! was published by 'Corvus.'
* Quercus is a British indie press now famous for publishing Stieg Larsson.
* Europa Editions is a small US house best known for their work in translations.
* And Corvus appears to be a small imprint in Atlantic (UK) that specializes in macabre thrillers. (They also appear to have some Joyce Carol Oates.)
What is most striking about this is not just the random selection of small presses, but that she has done three books in the space of just a few years and has not stayed with the same press. Weldon is notorious for her abrasive opinions. Not so long ago she offended everyone with her 2007 What Makes Women Happy (published by the Chicago Review Press). I posted a few interviews from this period, but to get a sense of the reception of this book you have to look no further than the Amazon page which offers these two reviews one can hardly believe are about the same book.
From Publisher's Weekly (which is notoriously literal as it is known for its trade overviews rather than criticism):
According to prolific novelist and playwright Weldon, women's sources of happiness are sex, food, friends, family, shopping and chocolate—in that order. Women can be "wonderfully" happy, but only for 10 minutes because after that, they are beset by anxiety and guilt (re chocolate: "My God, did I actually eat all that?"). Other failed attempts at witty, self-help advice: women should not be upset by men's fondness for porn because "men are creatures of the cave" and porn "just helps a man get through the day." Falling down some kind of rabbit hole that seems to have landed her in the 1950s, Weldon encourages women to fake orgasms because faking is "kind to male partners of the new man kind," who otherwise might become too anxious to perform. Her counsel to infertile women is downright dangerous: before pursuing grueling fertility treatments, first try getting pregnant from random sex with a stranger and then pass off his baby as your husband's. Famous as a novelist for clever feminist observations about the war between the sexes, Weldon (She May Not Leave) caused controversy in the U.K., where this latest effort was perceived as reactionary. Americans will surely find Weldon pathetically out of touch with her core readership with this mishmash of pointless parables and banal advice that won't make anyone happy.
From Booklist: In prolific British author Weldon's considered opinion, not only does a woman's happiness stem from only six possible sources--sex, food, friends, family, shopping, and chocolate--it's also frustratingly elusive when it does arrive, lasting only 10 minutes before subversive doubts creep in to undermine any unadulterated joy. Women are, she posits, their own worst enemies, trapped in an eternal nature-versus-nurture conflict that makes lasting tranquility unobtainable. The better question, then, is why are women so unhappy, and to this end, Weldon uses her prodigious powers as a storyteller to create intricate parables that illustrate often simplistic moral imperatives, such as "if you want to be happy, try being good" and "pursue a fit shelter for the soul and the body will look after itself." Weldon brings the full strength of her finely tuned observational abilities to bear in a multidisciplinary exploration of this endlessly fascinating conundrum. Part memoir, part self-help guide, Weldon's theory is completely thought-provoking.
What is it? Smarmy, reactionary garbage, pseudo-psychology, feminist-insight, or brilliant satire? Is it possible to be all of the above? Weldon comes across as sincere in her interviews, but no one knows where she stands anymore... and I've come to wonder if she even knows. But the question remains as to whether it's her work people are finding objectionable, or her personality. Is she difficult to work with? I don't know. But I suspect there are many editors out there unwilling to work with her, again, particularly since her out-put is so prolific. There is also the question of margins. Weldon fans are loyal, but she's not really a best-selling author, anymore. Smaller presses are better placed to make profit off slender margins: but why so many of them?
Please click on my link above for my take on What Makes Women Happy, while being aware I HAVEN'T ACTUALLY READ THE BOOK, YET. I have been catching up on Weldon since I first discovered her in 2003. The description of the 'dystopian' Chalcot Crescent doesn't surprise me. I suspect she's satirizing the British welfare state, but I'm guessing there is no reviewer with the balls (literal or figurative) or the knowledge-set to take this on. Weldon was a trained economist and this ignored aspect of her education often peeks through in her work.
Anyway, I've read so many of her books at this point that I've forgotten which ones I haven't read. While I long knew about the sponsorship deal involved in The Bulgari Connection (the cover of which made me think she was another Danielle Steel) I think the first book I read was Letters to Alice Upon First Reading Jane Austen. This is very different from her other books, in part because it worships at the altar of 'high culture.' Though as a brief and accurate description of women's lives at the turn of the 19C, it is without parallel.
Her most famous book is probably The Life and Loves of a She-Devil: due primarily to the film adaptation starring Meryl Streep and Roseanne Barr. I think it's a minor work. Amusing, but blunt. This spring at Conference of World Affairs Werner Herzog kept pointing out the 'needle-like' dagger that Aguirre carries in Aguirre and the Wrath of God. "This dagger is so thin it could kill you without bleeding," he said. Most of Weldon's work is like a tenderizing meat-hammer. But Weldon at her best has that needling-thin lethality. I would recommend the following books as 'essential' Weldon, while also admitting that my choices are totally random and subjective:
* Auto da Fay: supposedly Weldon's memoirs, though large portions seem invented, and some are even told in third person. I have often suspected that Weldon has been writing the same book her entire life: this 'autobiography' gives the reader some indication as to why.
* She May Not Leave - an utterly ruthless satire on the problem of childcare. Weldon's solution is shocking and wicked and deserves to be talked about more widely: particularly as it relates to the problem contemporary feminism hasn't solved: who does what traditionally is 'women's work?' I cannot believe that more of my contemporaries have not read this book. It should be required reading on Women's Studies lists. (But is far too controversial and not PC enough for that, not to mention that none of Weldon's books present women in a necessarily positive light.)
* Life Force - Weldon mentions her connection with George Bernard Shaw and his free love compatriots in many of her novels. She is related to them and often invokes Shaw's 'life force' in her books. Shaw believed that the urges we feel---particularly those of a sexual nature---are an evolutionary force which guides humanity to perfection. In other words, you may have nothing in common with the dumb-fuck you are sleeping with, but the product of your sexual union many generations on may create the next Mozart.
I don't think I need to point out the idiocy of this theory (being a big fan of 'random mutation') even as I recognize there is a force that grips people not just to fuck, but---in an age where people can actually prevent conception---to actually bear children. I won't get into my thoughts on this now... suffice to say, Weldon feels that Shaw's ideas of 'life-force' have had long-lasting repercussions down the generations. (The sins of the fathers!) She has long explored the impact of these kinds of philosophies in praxis (Praxis is also the title of one of her novels dealing extensively with this issue) on women's lives.
I've always thought that Life Force: about an artist and his mistresses and his long-suffering wife, takes the nasty back-biting one finds in many of her books and elevates it into art. The ending of this book is the whole purpose of reading it. I don't want to give away too much, but it turns the table on predatory and parasitic relationships, while also being scathing satire on the way women interact with each other and their men. In my opinion, Life Force is a successful revision of one of Weldon's earlier books Female Friends. It took the same characters and moved them forward a bit, developmentally. I can't wait to see if she tackles the material, again.
In addition to Kuhua!, it looks like Weldon has provided some grist for Signet's (as in Signet classics... everyone remembers those cramped editions of Shakespeare we had to use in school) forthcoming edition of Paradise Lost. I cannot wait to hear what Weldon has to say about Milton, who I claim as one of the great literary Puritans---despite his lack of residence in the New World---due to his proximity to Oliver Cromwell and the subsequent stripping of power due during the Restoration. As for Blake's famous comment that Milton is of 'the Devil's Party' ... so is Weldon! It strikes me that there is a kind of Prurience of Puritans (perhaps what we should call a group of them) so obsessed with purity that they become some of the best chroniclers of sin.
P.S. Weldon was one of the creators and original writers of Upstairs/Downstairs in the notoriously abrasive first season. I thought I would mention that fans of the series will be pleased to note that a fifth season will be appearing on Masterpiece this spring... Jean Marsh is returning as Rose and it is set in the 1930s. While the links between sympathies between the British landed-gentry and the Nazi party have already been explored, I'm not entirely certain we've adequately covered the upstairs/downstairs pov when it comes to the rise of fascism.
Link for all things Weldon:
http://zalena.livejournal.com/tag/weldon
