Arnold Bennett Part II

Bennett was born in the Potteries town of Hanley, now part of Stoke on Trent in 1867. His father had tried varous jobs and trained as a solicitor. He married and was doing well financially. Arnold had a good education. Like Edwin Clayhanger, he wanted to do something different to what his father wanted for him. Bennett senior wanted him to become a lawyer, like him. Arnold loved literature and especially French literature and he wanted to write. He did several jobs, when he left school, but at the age of 21, he trained as a shorthand writer and left the Potteries, for London. He got work with his shorthand and began to write in his spare time. He made friends with a young man who also loved French literature and began to plan for a career as a novelist. In his mid 20's he got a job as a magazine editor and wrote a couple of novels. In 1903, after his father's death, he decided to move to France. He loved French culture and felt it would help with his writing. He was a very shy man especially with women.. but in France he met a woman, Marguerite Soulier. He fell in love with her and they married when he was 40. He spent several years in France, before World War One. He and Marguerite had no children. He was a prolific and very successful writer. Clayhanger did especially well... and he was comfortably off. However critics have felt that many of his novels were pot boilers, and not very good, being only written to make money..... He and his wife came back to England a year or so before the War. He bought a country house and he began to write plays, which were reasonably popular. He was asked to do propaganda work during the war, and that was his contribution to the war effort. However in 1921, his marriage was going downhill and he got a legal separation from his wife. He went on writing, and then met an English actress, Dorothy Cheston. Marguerite would not agree to a divorce, so Bennett and Dorothy lived together, and she changed her name to his. She also had a daughter by Bennett, Virginia Mary and she continued her acting career. In 1931, Bennet went for a holiday to France and drank some tap water there. It was not considered safe... and he soon became very ill. He died of typhoid within a few weeks. His career had its ups and downs. Critics deprecated his production of so many poor novels which were written mainly to make money. He was a northerner and some of his best novels were set in the Potteries and were about ordinary middle class people, living normal dull lives. He never went back to the Potteries after leaving at the age of 21, and many of his later books were set in London and a few were set abroad.

Clayhanger Part II

Hilda is the daughter of a widow who has a little house property, but is far from rich. She is intelligent but there is no role for an unmarried middle class girl other than helping her mother. Mrs Lessways dies and Hilda trains as a shorthand clerk and finds work. She meets George Cannon, a solicitor who helps with settling her mother's estate. He is an attractive man but a lot older than her. She falls in love and they get married. She becomes pregnant. Edwin loses touch with her, but he still cares for her - . Then Hilda discovers that George is not a qualified solicitor. He has legal experience but he has never passed the exams. And worse still, she finds that he married an older woman when he was very young and they are still married so he is not legally married to Hilda. She splits up with him and tries to make a living for several years, running a lodging house. She is not very good at it but she manages to keep her head afloat and look after her son George. Then she meets up with Edwin again. She tells him what's happened to her in the intervening years. They get married and he feels happy for a time. He is resigned to never getting to be an architecht, and running the printing works - and he is pleased that he has married the woman he has loved for so long. His family are not all that fond of Hilda. They think she's eccentric and arrogant.. She is not even a chapel goer. She gets bored with life as a middle class housewife. Edwin feel ambivalent about his wife. She is interesting and charming but wilful and easily bored. Hilda persuades him to buy a house out in the country, and travel to work by train. He is not sure he wants to do this but it makes Hilda happy to have a country place and she tries to set up a circle of arty people. She finds that George Cannon had ended up in prison for fraud. Edwin kindly lends him some money to get started again when he gets out and George pays him back. He feels that in spite of her faults, Hilda has made a romance of his life....

Arnold Bennet

I used to be a fan of Arnold Bennett - who was a very popular novelist in the earlier part of the 20th century. One of his major works was set in the Potteries towns, in the Midlands. Edwin Clayhanger is the son of a businessman, Darius, who has a large printing firm. Darius came up from poverty and he expects his son to go into the business. He is the only son. There are 2 daughters. Edwin wants to be an architecht, but he does not have the strength of character to fight against his father. He ends up going into the business and looking after his father as the old man declines. He is friendly with the Orgreaves, a neighbouring family who are more liberal minded but he still can't break free of his own family. Through them, he meets Hilda Lessways an unusual girl who wants independence. She trains as a shorthand writer. Edwin falls in love with her but he finds her hard to understand. More follows.

Uncle Tom's Cabin IV

Cassy and Emmeline fake an escape to draw the search party away and they hide in the attic. Legree is drinking more and when they make weird noises, he begins to think that his house is haunted. He has Tom beaten to try and get him to tell where the women have gone. Tom refuses to say, and says that he can die.... Legree has him beaten so brutally that he is close to death. Then young George Shelby turns up to find his friend. He can see that Tom is dying, and he promises to set his slaves free and to do all he can to end slavery in America. Tom dies, forgiving his enemies and sending messages to his wife and children. George asks if he can bury him somewhere nearby, and Legree agrees. George buries Tom and some of the Legree slaves ask him if he will buy them. He tells them that he can't buy all the slaves who need rescuing. But he will do what he can. He returns to his home and tells Chloe and his mother what has happened. He helps Cassy and Emmeline to escape. He then frees all his own slaves, and hires them to work on the farm. Cassy and Emmeline make new lives for themselves and George Harris and Eliza and Harry go to Europe for George, who is a clever man, to study. He tells his former slaves that he is going to work to see the end of slavery and that Tom has no monument, but that he does not need one.

Uncle Tom's Cabin III

Eva begs her father to give Tom his freedom, and he agrees to do it. He knows his child is dying. After her death, he tells Tom that he will set him free, but he is a dilatory man. He writes to the Shelbys, but then before he can go ahead with the legal business, he gets involved in a brawl in a cafe. He tries to stop two men fighting and gets stabbed. He dies, and Marie decides to sell up the house and her slaves and go back to her father's house. Ophelia agrees to talk to her, about setting Tom free, as St Clare had intended, but she tells Tom she does not think she will be able to influence the selfish woman. Marie is harsh with her slaves and goes ahead with selling them, refusing to consider making Tom free or selling him back to his old home. This time he is sold down South to a Yankee man called Simon Legree. He owns a farm and he thinks that as Tom seems honest and good at managing a farm, he will make use of his skills. But Tom refuses to be harsh with his fellow slaves and Legree, who is both crazy and evil, develops a hatred of him. St Clare's letter goes to the Shelby family, but Mr Shelby has suddenly been taken ill and dies. Mrs Shelby and her son George are busy with Mr Shelby's death and the legal business of taking over the farm and the letter gets neglected. When it is read, George says he will go down south and try and find his old friend. But by the time this happens, Tom has been sold and is in the ownership of Legree and can't be found. In the meantime, Eliza and her son have travelled to Canada and been reunited with her husband George Harris. Tom is worked very hard on Legree's farm, as are all the slaves. He tries to help the weaker ones and continues to read his bible and pray. Legree has a couple of slaves who are his overseers and he uses them to join in his drinking bouts and to punish the rest of the slaves. A new girl slave has come to the farm with Tom and Legree wants her for his mistress but she refuses. Cassy, an older woman who was Legree's mistress tells her and Tom that she will help her to get away. Legree becomes increasingly mad..... when the 2 women disappear.

Uncle Tom's Cabin II

Ophelia is a typical New Englander, hard working, efficient, and good hearted. She does not approve of slavery, but when St Clare takes her home, and greets his slaves, he realises that she does not really like black people. She is shocked that he and Eva kiss and shake hands with the rest of the household. Tom settles into his new home, and is there especially to look after Eva. He is not happy though and wishes he could go back to Kentucky, to his wife and children. Back at the Shelby household, Mrs Shelby tries to persuade her husband to try and find Tom and buy him back and he says he can't afford it. Chloe, Tom's wife, is a very good cook, and she suggests that Mrs Shelby should hire her out to a confectioner in another town, and they can use the money she earns to buy Tom. Mrs Shelby knows it will take a long time before Chloe can earn enough money but she agrees. Tom tries to write a letter to Chloe but he can't write properly so Mr St Clare offers to write for him. Eva's health begins to decline. She is consumptive. She is only a little child, but she suffers from seeing the way that black people are treated.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

Uncle Tom's Cabin opens in a farm in Kentucky, where Tom is a slave who is married with several children. Mrs Shelby the mistress of the farm, hates slavery... but her husband owns several slaves. He finds himself in financial trouble and decides that he has to sell some of his slaves. Tom is a sensible man and a good farm manager, and there is a young woman who has a small child, Harry... and Shelby sells them to a slave dealer. He wants the child, who is bright and strong, and Tom who is efficient. But Mrs Shelby is horrified and tells Tom that as soon as they can, they will buy him back. Tom is a Christian and is resigned to whatever happens to him. But Eliza, the mother of the little boy, tells him that she cannot let her son be sold down South, and she is going to run away. Her husband, an intelligent man called George, has a cruel master and he has talked of running away to Canada. Tom tells his wife that he supports Eliza escaping, as it is natural for a mother to want to save her children. She flees with Harry, and manages to cross an ice bound river and make her way to a Quaker settlement. The Quakers dont believe in slavery so they are willing to hide her and help her to go North. Tom is taken away on a journey down the river, to New Orleans. On the boat, there is a little girl called Eva, who is travelling with her father and her father's cousin Ophelia, from the North. Eva takes a fancy to Tom, and asks her father to buy him. Mr St Clare does not like slavery, but he is an indolent man and has never made the effort to free his slaves. His wife Marie, is a cold silly selfish woman and she is hard on her slaves. St Clare tries to mitigate her harshness and he agrees to buy Tom. He has become worried about his house and his daughter. Marie does nothing about the house and is lazy. He is concerned that Eva who is in delicate health, needs a mother figure, so he has brought his cousin Ophelia from New England to manage his house.

Uncle Tom's Cabin By Harriet Beecher Stowe

Just been re reading this book about slavery in the USA, before the Civil War. Mrs Stowe was a member of a very religious family who were active in helping slaves. She was accused of getting things wrong about the South but she proved in the Key To Uncle Tom's Cabin that the brutalities of slavery depicted were absolutely true. Her strong views on slavery were due to her Christian faith. As a mother, it hurt her to think that slave families could be broken up and mothers could have their children taken from them and sold. Will write some more later....

The Kitten Lady

I like to mention Hannah Shaw, known on the Internet as The Kitten Lady. She rescues all sorts of animals and teaches people how to look after them. But her main focus is on kittens because they are so vulnerable. She teaches classes on kitten care, and writes children's books about animals. She runs a charity, the Orphan Kitten club, which helps to rescue kittens who are born outside or abandoned or ill treated. She can be found on social media, with videos about her various little cats. She sponsors Trap, Neuter Return, where people trap outdoor cats, have them spayed and then return them to their home areas. She also takes in kittens who have health problems and dedicates herself to trying to help them to get better or at least to improve. She has 2 adult cats who came in as fosters, one (Chou Chou) had a severe cleft palate and could not eat so she tube fed him till he was big enough to have surgery. The other, Ferguson, had a kidney disease but he has lived now for 5 years and is in reasonably good health. Another "medical" cat of hers - who was adopted by someone else - was Chloe, a little cat who had paralysed back legs. Hannah took her for acupuncture and went to the lengths of getting a wheelchair made for her. Though Chloe did not like the wheelchair and preferred to get around on her 2 working legs. She has a happy life and was adopted by someone. Hannah has made enormous efforts for her medical cats and has helped many to a good life.

Barbara Pym

Barbara Pym was a well known writer - she was born in 1913 and died in 1980. As she grew older her novels did not do so well. They were deemed old fashioned and she had difficulty getting published. She did not publish anything from the early 60s until 1977, but she continued to write. She got a degree at Oxford in English, in the 1930s. She visited Germany quite often, then and was intially attracted by the novelty of Nazism. She fell in love with a young Nazi, but she afterwards realised that fascism was evil and recanted her sympathy. However, her family became uneasy at her frequent visits to Germany as it was becoming clear that Hitler had to be stopped and that in due course, Britain would be at war with the German state. She joined the Womens naval service during the war, and worked at censoring letters. After the war, she took a post in the International African Institution and became an editor of their scholarly magazine about Africa and anthropology. She worked there till her retirement. She never married or had children, but she had several affairs. Her relationships with men seemed to go wrong...and in her fiction, she tends to portray men as arrogant and selfish. Her lovers tended to be unkind to her after a while and the affairs fizzled out. She lived with her sister Hilary in Queen's Park, London. In 1977, she was mentioned by 2 writers, Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin as a very under rated writer. This sparked off new interest in her works and she published a new novel Quartet in Autumn. In the 1970's, she developed breast cancer and then stomach cancer. She died in 1980. Her works are now quite popular, and she was one of the first writers to create sympathetic gay characters.

Elizabeth Goudge 1900-84

Elizabeth Goudge was a prolific novelist, of the 20th century. She wrote children's books, romances, historical novels, and religious works. She was born in Wells, Somerset, a cathedral city where her father worked in the Theological college. Her mother was from Guernsey in the Channel Islands. One of her earlier books was set in Guernsey. She wrote several books set in Wells, using a fictional name for the city. She was an Anglican, and religion is shown in many of her stories. After her father's death she looked after her mother. She found it stressful, combining housekeeping with writing. She never married, and moved to Oxfordshire in later years, living with her sister. She died there in 1984. I hope to write more about her works in a later blog.

Scarlet Feather Part VI

Cathy feels very guilty that she allowed her being so busy to distract her from keeping an eye on the children. When she talks to them, she finds out that they innocently gave Walter the signing in codes for getting into their kitchen.. and when the police investigate they find that he was the one who burgled the place and stole her few valuable bits of silver. The insurance company now has no excuse for not paying out, as this was not an inside job. Muttie puts on an accumulator bet on the horses at a race meeting, which means that if the horses he picked all win, he will win a very substantial amount of money. The family watch the races and nearly have heart attacks, and in the end, Muttie's horses all come in first and he wins a handsome pay off. They will have a comfortable sum for their old age, and Simon and Maud will have an income from their parents' house. Tom has grown tired of his relationship with Marcella. She tells him she went to London to pursue her dream, of being a model, and ended up being expected to do glamour modelling. He realises that she and he are too different to work out and they split up. He can see how fed up Cathy is with the selfish Neil and she and her husband separate. Clearly, Tom and Cathy will end up together. Walter flees to England. His family are now disgusted with him. But Simon and Maud are happy to be living with Muttie and Lizzie. Tom and Cathy collect the insurance and start afresh with the business.

Scarlet Feather V

When the children disappear, there is a hue and cry. Then Muttie remembers how he had promised them to take them to the races and they find the 2 children and Hooves. It's very clear that their parents are simply not ever going to look after them properly. Walter has also disappeared and there is evidence that he has stolen some things. Cathy is getting fed up with Neil. He tells her he loves her but he doesn't want her to have the baby. She is very upset, and then, working very hard, she has a miscarriage. Neil veers back and forth, wanting her to get over the miscarriage but also not sure if perhaps he should agree to them having a baby. Cathy realises how selfish he is, and partly blames him also for pushing for Simon and Maud to go back to their parents, which has caused them to run away. It's decided that for the time being, Simon and Maud will live with Muttie and Lizzie, and they are delighted. But the family realise that the Mitchell parents are completely useless and it wasnt right to send the twins back to them. It's decided that the house should be sold, and the money used to provide a living for the children, firstly. Kay looks likely to be in hospital most of the time. Kenneth looks like he's going to flee to England...

Scarlet Feather IV

Cathy and Tom work very hard, to try and earn enough money to replace their kitchen. Cathy has discovered that she's pregnant but when she tells Neil, he says he doesn't think their lifestyle is suitable for children. They are both working so hard, he may decide to go and work abroad. He hints that she should have an abortion. Tom finds that his girlfriend, Marcella, is concentrating more and more on trying to start a modelling career. Some of his friends tell him that there is no way that Marcella can become a model. It is a career for the young and she's already 25. She goes to England to see if she can find work and Tom is miserable but he feels their relationship is over. The business' accountant, James, tries to get the insurance company to pay up. Muttie and Lizzie both miss the twins and Muttie goes to see them, but their parents are so snobbish and unpleasant he is hurt and feels it might be best not to try and go to their house. But Cathy is aware that they are not being looked after. Muttie sends a £5 note to the children, so that they can come and visit him, but Walter sees the letter first, and destroys it, taking the money for himself. Neil's father, who employs Walter in his legal firm, is fed up with his nephew's laziness and he suspects him of dishonesty. His brother is clearly not taking much care of Simon and Maud and Kay, his wife, is in and out of hospital again. Simon and Maud had hoped that Muttie would take them to a horse racing fixture, as he had promised to do. When they dont hear from him, they feel afraid that he doesn't like them any more. But they decide to take Hooves, the dog that Muttie bought for them, and go to the races on their own.

Scarlet Feather III

Simon and Maud are nervy and odd children, having been brought up so badly by their parents. Cathy feels that Neil is wrong to believe that they would be better off with their own family, as they were clearly improving under the guidance of Muttie and Lizzie. She is starting to get a bit fed up with Neil's concentration on his left wing social causes and feels that he does not really understand people very well and cares more for "the underdog" than for his own family. He also thrown 2 bits of news at her, which upset her very much. One is that he doesn't want children. He thinks they are too busy to look after a family, and that he prefers to devote his time to his work. Cathy is very worried as she has a suspicion that she might be pregnant. He also tells her that he has been considered for a job with an international organisation to help refugees and might be working in Brussels or Africa. The twins ask Cathy if they can do some work for her, to earn a bit more pocket money. She is not sure they will be much good but lets them work at polishing up her silverware. They are thrilled, and are keen to tell their brother Walter all about it. He is rather sneery about them doing anything.. or getting a job from Cathy, whom he regards as little more than a waitress. But he then realises that the naive children might do him a good turn. He needles them and they tell him that Cathy has a lot of valuable stuff in her kitchen and she has a security system for keeping it safe. He prods them into letting him know how to get past the security... Meanwhile, Muttie goes to see the kids at their home, and their father is snobby and does not want him calling. Walter decides to go to Cathy's business kitchen and steal anything valuable as he has gambling and other debts. When he gets in, using the passwords, he finds that Tom and Cathy don't really have much that is valuable but he needs money badly so he decides to take whatever he can sell. In his anger that the kitchen silverware is not worth very much, he breaks many of the other things like plates and glassware and leaves a horrible mess. Then he makes off with the silver stuff. Cathy is distraught when she sees that her kitchen has been virtually destroyed, and she and Tom find that it will take a lot of money to replace everything that was stolen or broken. However, when she looks into claiming on the insurance, she finds that the police think it might be an inside job and therefore the insurance company may not pay up. She and Tom start to work incredibly hard, working in a small kitchen and taking any job they can find. She can't understand how the police think its an inside job but they point out that there was no sign of forced entry.

James Joyce

I'm reading about James Joyce, who is Ireland's premier novelist. He was born to a middle class Irish Catholic family, in 1882. He was sent to a good school, run by the Jesuit order, which was academically good, and also appealed to the better off Catholics for educating their sons. Joyce's father was very bad at making a living and their finances were very uncertain. Joyce loved and hated Dublin. He found late Victorian Ireland stifling, and narrow, especially because of the influence of the Catholic Church, which he rejected. He wanted to write modernist fiction, and to live a free life. He was aware of technological developments which changed life for most people. He was also interested in pscychology which was a new discipline at the time. His novel Ulysses is written in a stream of consciousness format, following the internal monologue of the main character, a Dublin Jew called Leopold Bloom. Other novelists also wrote in this format at the time including Dorothy Richardson and Virginia Woolf. Joyce met a girl called Nora Barnacle, in Dublin, on 16th June, 1904. She was a simple country girl working as a maid. He fell in love with her and they became sexually involved. He did not want to marry; he wanted to live a freer life than was possible at the time.. in a conservative provincial city like Dublin. To live with a lover was difficult in England and impossible in Ireland. The couple left Ireland and went to live in Europe, in different countries, where Joyce taught English and did clerical jobs, to make a living and worked at his great novel, Ulysses. Nora understood very little of his writing.

Scarlet Feather II

Just when Cathy and Tom are getting a kitchen to work from and starting off the business, Cathy gets some financial backing from her aunt Geraldine. Geraldine is her mother's sister, who has gotten out of poverty and set up her own business. She is single and has a lot of admirers. Then, Neil's family have a crisis. Jock Mitchell, Neil's father, has a brother (Walter's father) who is a failure at business and always in financial trouble. His wife Kay is very neurotic and she drinks. The couple have two other children who are a lot younger than Walter. Simon and Maud are twins and still school children. Kay is a neglectful mother because of her "nerves" and drinking. Kenneth, the father is not much better. Kay ends up in hospital because of her drinking, and the children are sent to Jock Mitchell's house as there's noone to look after them. They are rather bratty because their parents have never cared much for them. Hannah Mitchell has them to stay for a couple of days and they steal food and leave a bath running so that the ceiling collapses. She is not particularly maternal so she passes the kids on to Cathy after the bathroom disaster. Cathy tries to look after them but she is very busy, and her parents Maurice and Lizzie Scarlet offer to help. Strangely, the children in spite of their bad behaviour, take a liking to the older Scarlets, and begin to improve...Muttie (Maurice) tells them about betting on the horses, which is his passion. But he insists they do their homework and help in the house. Cathy can see that they are improving, and is pleased and begins to like them. She can see that their parents are terrible and have let them grow up wild. But Neil feels as a lawyer with left wing views, that children should be with their blood parents. He tries to work at getting Kenneth and Kay to take on their responsibilities and look after Simon and Maud. After a couple of months, he succeeds in working out a new arrangement with the parents, but Cathy does not believe they will stick to their promises to provide the kids with pocket money, feed them properly, and let them go to see Muttie and Lizzie once a week. Simon and Maud are upset at being moved back home, and have little faith in their parents. They are also afraid that they have done something wrong to upset Muttie and Lizzie, and that the Scarlets no longer like them or want them to visit.

Scarlet Feather by Maeve Binchy

I just came across a copy of Maeve Binchy's last full scale novel, the other day. The title refers to the surnames of the lead characters, Cathy Scarlet and Tom Feather. They are both chefs and have just started to run a catering business in Dublin. Cathy's family are not well off. Her father is a bit of a lazy chap who has rarely worked, due to a "bad back". He likes to gamble. Her mother is a shy woman who has worked as a cleaner all her life, to bring in an income. She feels inferior to the families she works for. Lizzie, the mother, has worked for many years for the parents of Neil, and Hannah, Neil's mother is a bully and a snob and treats her badly. To make matters worse, Neil, who is a young barrister, falls in love with Cathy and they plan to marry. He is passionate about helping the underdog and fighting for human rights. Cathy wants to run her own business. They get married and Hannah is absolutely furious at her son marrying her maid's daughter. She thinks that Cathy is marrying him for his money and puts her down all the time. Cathy pairs up with Tom, another catering student, who is in love with Marcella, a beauty therapist who wants to be a model. They start the business, doing a party for Hannah and Neil's father Jock. Walter, Neil's brother occasionally works for them as a waiter but he is lazy and dubiously honest and Cathy wishes she could get rid of him. End Part I.

Shel Silverstein

Having learned of the death of Dennis Locorriere, a few months ago, I find myself remembering the songs of Shel Silverstein. He was a comedy genius, who wrote sentimental stories for children... and also wrote racy and suggestive lyrics for songs and was a friend of Hugh Hefner. A strange combination. Dr Hook started off by performing a lot of his songs and it was only later that they began to do love ballads which were more commercially successful. Shel did an album of his own comedy songs, with Dr Hook backing him. One of my favourites is "Polly in a Porny", about a man who takes out a girl who is very prim and proper. Then he goes to a porn cinema to watch a movie.. and he sees Polly, taking part in the film with a pony. Another is called "Stacy Brown got two".. about a man with 2 penises. Another is titled, "Ever since my Masochistic baby went and left me, I got nothing to hit but the wall". Shel's most famous comic song is probably the Johnny Cash hit, A Boy named Sue. Shel wrote it as a poem and Johnny liked it, so he told his band, at a concert that he was going to sing it and they should follow his tune. He didn't even know the words, but he had a great hit with it. It's about a young man whose father "went and named me Sue" so he was teased all through his childhood. He goes in search of him, and finds him at a bar dealing stud, and challenges him. They have a fight, but his father tells him that he only named him Sue because he wanted to make him tough... and all ends happily. Another very popular song was Freaking at the Freakers Ball", which is about a dance for sexually weird people. The FBI attend and are dancing with the junkies, gay men and lesbians boogie together, sadists and masochists do the same...singing "Please hit me, and I'll hit you." Another song I like is "A Front Row seat to hear old Johnny sing". It's a comic song about a redneck guy who has only wanted a few simple things out of life, including "A TV set and a truck and a wife".. and the big one was "a front row seat" to hear Johnny Cash. So he drives to Nashville and tries to get a ticket. He keeps being moved around to different places and finally he gets to the Opry, and is told that the show is booked up, and he will have to wait for another concert. One of the staff says "We've been booked up for months and months, and this poor insane fella wants, a Front row seat to hear old Johnny sing." The guy gets angry and draws his gun and shoots - and he winds up in jail. And Lo and behold, the prisoners have a show, and it's Johnny Cash.. so he finally has his front row seat to hear him.

Henry James

Im hoping to read some more American classic novels, some of which I have not looked at for years. One of the best known American authors is Henry James who was born in New York in 1843. His family were very rich on both sides, and his father was a gentleman of leisure. They were of Scottish and Irish descent. The family travelled to Europe when Henry was a child and he was educated by a tutor. They returned to America, but Henry had a bad back which meant he was unfit for service in the American Civil war. He studied law for a time but his chief interest was in literature and he mixed with writers and artists. His brother William studied medicine and became a psychologist. Henry went to Paris in the 1870s and stayed in Europe for most of the next 30 years. He spent time in England where he made friends and wrote his first novels. Now settled in Europe he was influenced by French writers such as Zola. His books tended to be about the conflict between the naive and innocent Americans, and the more subtle and often decadent Europeans. The Portrait of a Lady is about a naive American girl Isabel, who marries a European nobleman and finds that he does not love her. More Will Follow.