Oprah Interlude

I have been a little absent from the blogging and general internet world over the past week or so. This week has been my last week at work before a two week break (yay!) so things have been pretty hectic and on top of that I also spent the first two days of the week in Sydney as I was one of the people lucky enough to score a ticket one of the shows being put on by Oprah on her recent trip to Australia.

I have been an Oprah devotee since my school and university days - and I've always been a close follower of her Bookclub and reading suggestions. It was an amazing experience to see her live on stage - she has such a presence and a warmth about her it is easy to see why some people go a little crazy when they see her (although I have to say as a mental health professional I was a little worried about the extreme reactions demonstrated by some people in the audience!!).

My best friend and I had a great time - and the diamond necklaces given out by Oprah as a gift to her audience was a very nice surprise!

I am also happy to see that Oprah's latest book club selections are two of Charles Dickens' most famous novels - A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations. One of my reading goals from this year was to read more Dickens and with only a few days to go in 2010 I am way, way behind on this goal - so thank you to Oprah for giving me the much needed kick to get started on my Dickens reading!

Freedom - Jonathan Franzen

Before writing this entry for Franzen's new novel I went back to look at my reflections on his other novel, The Corrections , which I read two years ago as I wanted to try and work out which book I would say I "liked" the best. Unfortunately my thoughts from two years ago didn't really help me all that much when it came to which book I would rate above the other - I think it has only confused me further!

Freedom is a book gaining a lot of press and attention at the moment, Oprah has chosen it as her new Book Club selection and even Australian reviewers are slogging it constantly in their columns. At 562 pages it is certainly an epic novel in terms of size and the themes it covers could also be considered as overarching and wide spread.

The novel starts with an overview of the upper middle class suburban Berglund family - husband and wife, Walter and Patty and their two teenage children, Jessica and Joey - with the narrator stating; "There had always been something not quite right about the Berglunds".

After the initial plot building chapter where we learn that the Berglund families situation has gone off the rails somewhat we are taken back in time to Patty's childhood as she relates her story of growing up in Westchester County, New York - an sport talented outsider in her artistic and intellectual family. Patty tells the story of moving to Minnesota to attend College (a school chosen because it was far away from home and because she knew it would annoy her mother) and meeting serious, studious Walter and his best friend - lead singer in a burgeoning rock band, Richard Katz.

The relationships between these three characters, Patty, Walter and Richard is at the heart of this book and it is what propels the story forward - and makes it stagnate at times. The story is told from the perspectives of all three (with my favoured being Patty) which allows you to see the same event from the viewpoint of all of them - a technique I do tend to like.

I had a real love/hate relationship with this book - there were times (particularly at the beginning) where I was loving it and couldn't put it down but the very long middle section really dragged for me - and then the ending redeemed it again. I thought it was way too long and overly repetitive in places but I also can see how all of this narrative was needed to develop the ideas being put forward by the author so I'm not sure what the solution is there!

The idea of freedom and who has it and how it can be achieved is explored through all of the characters and there are many different ways in which freedom is portrayed throughout the story - personal and political. Ultimately I found that the idea of freedom may not really be something we have any control over - ironically enough!

It was a labour - not necessarily always of love - to get through this book but I feel happy to now be able to think about the story that has been put forward and get involved in a discussion about the latest Franzen.

Magazines can be helpful!

As well as my addiction to books I also have a growing addiction to magazines - can't get enough of them! Now that we have a local Borders store my addiction for the latest UK and American magazines can be met.

A recent purchase was the latest edition of the O at Home magazine which contains an article written by the author Ann Patchett titled "One Woman's Work". Ann writes about the battle to sustain your creative endeavours when also required to take on board the role of wife and house cleaner. This is a constant theme for me in my life - not that I'm a wife and nor do I consider myself much of a housecleaner! But I guess I'm really just really focusing on the "chores'' and duties of everyday life and how they can begin to take over - if you let them.

Ann writes;

While I had nothing but respect for homemakers, I knew I was never going to be one. Sure, I aced home ec, but it was Bellow and Roth I had really fallen for. As soon as chores were done, I would throw myself across my neatly made bed and read. I planned to follow in the footsteps of Jane Austen and Eudora Welty and Flannery O'Connor - no children, no husband.

The article is really inspiring and interesting to read as Ann Patchett seems to have found a way to reconcile the different requirements of her life;

When I was a child, I had a strong idea of what a writer looked like (a lonely garret in Paris, a neatly mended cardigan) and what a housewife looked like (a blur of helpful activity). But seeing as how both images are born of useless cliches, I think it's time I stopped trying to live up to either one of them.

Sounds like good advice to me - although I still rather like the sound of that lonely garret in Paris...