Ramuz, Merimee

Since my last post, I've read an issue of OK Magazine and an issue of Eclectic Reading. I've also ploughed through about 25 of Ramuz's novels, all the ones that were published, trying to figure out why this author was picture on Switzerland's currency, the 200 franc note. Well, I finally got it, Derborence, a novel with a wonderful, evocative sense of space, about a rockfall in the Alps. Wonderful. The rest are ordinary and didn't hold my attention. It was a slog, all these quiet bourgeois people. Then I read all of Merimee's novels and short stories, and while these were less boring than Ramuz, nothing stands out that much.

Zweig, Merimee, Goncourt

Since my last post, I've read one issue of OK Magazine.

I've read the journals of Stefan Zweig, short stories by Prosper Merimee, Manette Salomon, a novel by the Goncourts, Renee Mauperin, another novel, and the first volume of the Goncourt diaries. Look out, there are 19 more volumes of those. Merimee had some interesting short stories, but they were not all good. The novels by the Goncourt were forgettable, I hate to say. I imagine the journals will get better as time goes on, but I already find them critical enough of some figures of the Parisian literati of the 1850s...As for Merime, I'm hoping his novels are better. I've ordered his novels from interlibrary loan.

Goncourts, Merimee, Soyinka

Since my last post, I've read the last of the Morand novels. His range impresses me, but I think I'd like to read his book-length essays. I also read Octave Mirbeau's Journal d'une femme de chambre, which was incredibly daring for its day. It recounts the sex life (without explicit details of any kind, it all happens off-stage) of a chamber maid pursued by men of her own and other classes. Then I read two biographies of the Goncourt brothers, one by Billy in French and one in English by Robert Baldick. Both were so enthralling I ran off and got all their novels and five of the twenty volumes of their journals. I must say, however, that I couldn't tell it was the same people the two authors were talking about. I also read a four volume biography of Prosper Merimee, in preparation for reading his novels and short stories, by Trahard. Four volumes -- that's a lot. I read Soeur Philomene by the Goncourts. Finally, I read Death and the King's Horseman by Wole Soyinka