strange and random happenstance

O Caledonia by Elspeth Barker
Published by: Scribner
Publication Date: September 20th, 2022
Format: Paperback, 208 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy

Janet lived for sixteen short years. Her family went away on holiday without her because she was being punished because of her behavior and she was gutted like a rabbit at the foot of the stairs. Stabbed by a family retainer for being a "whore." But as everyone said, it's what she deserved. She never was normal. She liked books too much and boys barely at all, an extra irony given why she had a falling out with her parents before the holiday and what her murderer thought of her. Her mother despaired of her. All she wanted was the perfect daughter, someone to chat and gossip with, but instead she got Janet. A girl who couldn't be bothered to wear a simple white dress to the hunt ball and instead insisted on a purple gown that was a bit too grown up. But then, she got what she deserved. And Janet didn't see her death coming. She loved life. The castle that was home to her family and the eighty odd boys her father taught during term time, Auchnasaugh, she loved more than anywhere else in the world. The castle wasn't just a castle, it was her castle, her home, and somehow, when they moved there, it's almost as though her wish to be a princess had come true. She explored every room and turret and turn of the stair until it was her domain completely. The countryside she explored on foot and hoof. Watching the changing of the seasons. Rejoicing in the flora and fauna that was a part of her world. Learning about mycology from her eccentric relative Lila. She spent every minute she was indoors in her room sitting perfectly straight in a chair reading. She loved poetry, she loved the sounds certain words made, but she learned early on not to share this with anyone. Her brother thought it stupid, her younger sisters weren't anything like her, and as for when she finally went to school, her classmates thought her a joke. Who actually wants to learn Greek and worship their gods? Learning is a burden and everything else is what life is about. But not for Janet. Janet was different and therefore she got what she deserved. Because girls shouldn't want to decorate their rooms to reflect the work of Edgar Allan Poe, they should want mirrors and makeup and not have jackdaws making homes in their dollhouses. But at least her family was ride of her. At least she got what she deserved.

One can see why people superficially compare the heroine of this book traditionally to Merricat Blackwood and more contemporaneously to Flavia De Luce, but they're missing a key detail, we actually got to deeply connect with those two heroines while I know the barest hints of who Janet really is. Her story is told at a remove. We don't get to know her at all and I WANT to know about the girl who had been dying to quote Nina from The Segull to her mother and claim that she was "in mourning for [her] life." This is someone who I think I could be friends with. Instead I know that she likes Greek and hates math. I know as much about her after reading this book as I would a perfunctory job interview with her. Her entire brief life is here and yet I am as ignorant as when I started this short yet excruciatingly long book. But the worst part is I don't know if Elspeth Barker loved Janet and all her eccentricities or wanted to make an example of her, after all, she got what she deserved. It's said over and over again. She was a sixteen-year-old who was murdered and she deserved it!?! For what? For being different? Because that's what this book says again and again, if you're not normal, if you're not feminine, if you're not towing the expected line in regard to traditional gender rolls, you deserve death or the insane asylum. And yes, her eccentric relative Lila does go to the insane asylum, driven there by Janet's mother. Oh, and let's not forget the number of sexual assaults that Janet fends off. I'm sure if she hadn't been so resourceful she would have "gotten what she deserved." This book was being touted everywhere as a rediscovered classic. Who says it's a classic? Just because there are superficial inklings of the Mitfords or Dodie Smith or Shirley Jackson does that mean we are to embrace this simply odoriferous mess of victim blaming? Who said, this book is what people need to read now? No, in a post #metoo world this is the exact kind of book we should be holding up and saying NO MORE! No more to just accepting that women deserve to be victimized by their family and by the opposite sex just for existing. This book was first published in 1991 and a lot has changed in the world since then, and yet I feel like a woman author should have known better even then because it feels so dated. This tripe needs to be called out. And not just for abhorrent treatment of females but for lack of character development, lack of plot, and if anyone says the language and turn of phrase is beautiful, yeah, occasionally, but is that when Janet's describing her dream funeral or a friend of the family is showing her his cock before she pushes him into the hogweed?

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: #MeToo, Auchnasaugh, Castle, Dodie Smith, Edgar Allan Poe, Elspeth Barker, Flavia De Luce, Gender Roles, Merricat, Mitfords, Murder, O Caledonia, Poetry, Scotland, Sexual Assault, Shirley Jackson, The Seagull

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Published by: Penguin
Publication Date: 1962
Format: Paperback, 160 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

"Merricat, said Connie, would you like a cup of tea?
Oh no, said Merricat, you'll poison me.
Merricat, said Connie, would you like to go to sleep?
Down in the boneyard ten feet deep!"

Mary Katherine Blackwood, called Merricat, and her sister Constance have lived their life for the past six years shut away from the world caring for their Uncle Julian. Their only other companion is Merricat's cat Jonas. Merricat is the only one ever to leave the house, on Tuesdays and Fridays, which are bad days. As she walks to the store she can feel the eyes watching her. A good trip into town is one with minimal contact with the outside world, a bad trip is one that ends in taunting. The three remaining Blackwoods have been beyond the bounds of society behind the fence that Constance and Merricat's father erected before that fateful and fatal dinner. Constance was arrested six years ago because she was the only one who didn't use the sugar laced with the cyanide. Constance was the only one at the table to survive that dinner without any aftereffects... Uncle Julian survived, but he was never able to walk again and his mind wanders, though that night never leaves him. He is dedicating what remains of his life to recounting that final day. The day when he lost four of his family members, one of them his wife.

The aftermath of Constance's acquittal, despite everyone believing in her guilt, was that she shut out the world. Connie never ventures past her garden anymore. She spends her time cooking and looking after her two charges, keeping the world shut out. Merricat is just as paranoid of others as Constance, but she has buried treasure and symbolic items scattered throughout their land in a type of rustic magic to ward off everyone. One day she finds that her wards have failed and at that moment there is a knock on the door. Their cousin Charles has arrived. His branch of the Blackwoods severed all connections at the time of the trial, not even willing to take Merricat in, that night she was sent to bed without dinner, and though it saved her life it meant she was banished to an orphanage for a time. Charles does not have the best of intentions. He is avaricious, only seeing the money in everything. And in his alliance with Connie, Julian and Merricat are just obstacles to be dealt with, nothing more. But Merricat won't go down without a fight, because this kitty has claws. She has a feeling that it will be her left in the house with Constance, not Charles. Charles should remember, bad things have been known to happen to members of the Blackwood family. Especially those who send Merricat to bed without her supper.

This book is the most terrifying and accurate story of paranoia I think I have ever read. There's a part of me that is very antisocial and would rather be left to my books. I have easily gone a week without leaving the house and I can see some things in Merricat that I can relate to in her OCD behaviors. During times of stress I notice that certain ticks I thought I had gotten over return. Washing hands a certain number of times, needing to touch objects in a certain order, things needing to be placed just so. But I remind myself that despite a genetic propensity for agoraphobia, my paternal great-grandmother never left her room for forty years, that at least I do leave the house. I do go out into the world. I don't have a reason to be paranoid. I am not a Blackwood. The difference is their isolation isn't without just cause. Yes, it's odd and haunting the way they lock themselves away, but they do so for a reason. The villagers, more than the crime, made them what they are, or at least exacerbated the situation enough to cause them to turn inward. Coming to the house, taunting, cat calling, daring each other to go to the home where everyone died. Asking Connie to come out so they can see what a mass murderer looks like. "Merricat, said Connie, would you like a cup of tea?" Childish glee in their hatred of the hoity-toity and reclusive sisters is evident in the villagers.

The mob mentality of people who appear normal is a far scarier thing than two agoraphobic girls peering through slits in the windows at a life they will never have nor want. The bile that is brewing in the town has far greater scope then the murders that happened to the Blackwood family. It's the age old fear, fear of the unknown. The girls are distinctly "other" and not so much because of the family legacy or their aristocratic airs but because of their problems. If the girls went out into the world more, interacted with the town, much like Charles does, the constant reminder of the crime would diminish over time. It wouldn't be a talking point anymore, just something that happened in the past. Instead, by locking themselves away they are, in the mind of the villagers, antagonizing them and making themselves a target. In fact the more I think about it the more I realize that not only is this a book about prejudice and paranoia but it's about the stigma of mental illness. These girls need help, but instead they are ostracized. I am lucky enough to have friends around me who support me during my dark days and when I'm having problems. I don't deny that I have issues with depression. But on a larger stage it's still verboten to talk about it. This book shows in the most graphic way that compassion not fear should be how mental illness is treated.

Because there is no doubt that Merricat and Constance are mentally ill. Merricat is 18 in this book, yet her behavior is more like that of a 12 year old, her emotional development and well being stunted when the poisoning happened. Constance wonders if she was right to shut Merricat away from the world, but it seems to me a mutual decision. Merricat, despite being more willing to leave the house, is really suffering more, and very much a sociopath. She has far more rituals and dark thoughts than Constance ever had. There is the rigid schedule to maintain, there are the coins buried in the river bank, the doll under the rock, the blue marbles, and the book that was nailed to the tree. Even when Merricat isn't checking on them her thoughts dwell on the powers these items give her, the layer of protection she has. Like a person who has to turn the light on and off so many times before leaving, Merricat's life is built around these rituals that have evolved around her to protect the two sisters, who, despite everything, deeply love each other. These are really ingenious coping mechanisms. Because it keeps them busy, keeps them active. For Constance cooking and cleaning, for Merricat there's her magic. While others might say these rituals are symptoms of their disease, I'm more forgiving, I see them as ways they can survive. Whatever you need to do to get by right? And they aren't hurting anyone.

Yet, even with the best coping mechanisms there is always that hope, that light at the end of the tunnel that someone will come and save you. That a hero will emerge from the darkness and make everything OK. Who hasn't dreamt of a knight in shining armor? When you're lost in the deepest recesses of your mind sometimes the idea that you can be rescued by someone else is all that gets you through. Which is why it makes sense that Constance responded to Charles. She's trying to find a hero, sadly Charles isn't it. He's a morally corrupt human being willing to pit two mentally ill sisters against each other in order for monetary gain. I mean, seriously, this family has issues. Lots of them. Yet he's the socially acceptable one, which again highlights how we need to remove the stigma of mental illness. I was seriously hoping that Charles might go the way of the previous Blackwoods. Though much more painfully. Though the war that Merricat wages on him is something not to be missed. Because Merricat knows the truth, in the end you have to rescue yourself. She's the hero of this tale, not some loser cousin looking for a handout. She's a flawed heroine, but the best ones are.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Agoraphobia, Arsenic, Blackwood, Cats, Going Gothic, Greed, Knights, Mental Illness, Merricat, Mob Mentality, Money, Murder, Paranoia, Poison, Shirley Jackson, We Have Always Lived in the Castle

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Published by: Library of America
Publication Date: 1962
Format: Hardcover, 832 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy
None of the villagers go to Hill House. No one will hear you scream, in the dark, in the night. Dr. Montague views the house as the ideal location for his research of supernatural phenomena. He sends out numerous invitations to participate in his summer long program taking place at Hill House. Dr. Montague has selected those people who are prone to or have encountered the supernatural before. In the end he gets the shy and awkward Eleanor who spent much of her life caring for her mother who is recently deceased and she doesn't even remember the incident for which Dr. Montague recruited her. Nell just views Hill House as her first real adventure and a way to get out from under the stifling life she's living on a cot at her sister's. Theo was chosen because of her apparent psychic abilities. Then there's Luke. Luke is the heir to Hill House. He has not abilities or haunting experiences, he just needs to get out of his troubling patterns and his grandmother thinks locking him away at Hill House as a guarantee against Dr. Montague's lease is a lovely idea.

After each of the people successfully battle their way past the suspicious caretaker, Mr. Dudley, and get explained the rules as regards meals and clean up by his wife, Mrs. Dudley, the group settle in. It does not take long for weird knocks to happen at doors in the night as well as severe temperature drops. The doors don't like to remain open, if this is Mrs. Dudley, or the house, they can't figure it out. Very shortly they instigate a rule that no one is to wander alone, especially at night. Yet what is actually happening, if they where to write it down as per Dr. Montague's research guidelines, they wouldn't or couldn't be able to put it into words. Strange writings, noises, voices, drafts and above all four very different personalities clashing, not counting the possible personalities of the house's former occupants. Is any of this real? Or are they hallucinating? Or should they all leave the house as fast as they can and never look back?
  
The Haunting of Hill House is kind of the standard to which ghost stories are held. Even Stephen King has been known on more than one occasion to extol the virtues of the book. My question is why? Jackson is an amazing writer, she is able to depict places and characters so well that you feel you are inhabiting them. Yet this one fell short for me. I think I had a similar reaction to this as I did to my first experience with The Turn of the Screw, which this book very much emulates, in that I was left scratching my head and wondering why. We are left with open ended ambiguity, which, while I'm ok with that, after all I really liked Jackson's other famous work, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which also had an ambiguous ending, but still, there was a feeling of resolution. The story goes on, yet we leave them where Jackson wanted us to, there's more, but we get enough. Here, I DID NOT GET ENOUGH!

There isn't even enough of what one would deem a plot. Any time anything vaguely spooky happens it's just glossed over. The big scene where Theo and Nell are running from something, that's it, they ran, cut to the next morning where it will never be mentioned again. This is just not scary, you just don't know what's going on and you just don't care after a while. If Jackson was trying to build suspense and paranoia by not showing us things than she failed, miserably. You have to show us enough so that or brains can fill in the gaps with our own horrors. Showing nothing at all is basically writing a story about nothing.

Nell is interesting, but you can't really get a read on her. You know what it's like to be inside her, but it quickly becomes clear that this isn't an asset to the storytelling. Her mind jumps and contradicts and doesn't make any kind of sense. I can see why the newest film version tried to make some sort of reasoning for Nell's behavior. Because if she is crazy, she didn't really come across as crazy; not like Merricat in We Have Always Lived at the Castle. Plus the leisurely pace of badminton and long meals and chess games builds no tension. You don't feel that these characters are just sitting around in fear of the next event, more that the next event will just be a little blip in their otherwise languorous lifestyle. They are so laid back about the "haunting" that it is very easy to believe the theory that the house isn't in fact haunted in the least and it might all be Nell. I think the final nail in this book's coffin for me is that the laughably bad Jan De Bont version of the film left more of an impression on me than this book. Though I should mention, no matter how bad the film is, it was really well cast.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments  

Labels: Jan De Bont, Merricat, Shirley Jackson, Stephen King, The Haunting of Hill House, The Turn of the Screw, We Have Always Lived in the Castle

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Published by: Library of America
Publication Date: 1962
Format: Hardcover, 832 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy
"Merricat, said Connie, would you like a cup of tea?
Oh no, said Merricat, you'll poison me.
Merricat, said Connie, would you like to go to sleep?
Down in the boneyard ten feet deep!"

Mary Katherine Blackwood, called Merricat, and her sister Constance, have lived their life for the past six years shut away from the world caring for their Uncle Julian. Their only other companion is Merricat's cat Jonas. Merricat is the only one ever to leave the house, on Tuesdays and Fridays, which are bad days. As she walks to the store she can feel the eyes watching her. A good tip into town is one with minimal contact with the outside world, a bad trip is one that ends in taunting. The three remaining Blackwoods have been beyond the bounds of society behind the fence that Constance and Merricat's father erected before that fateful and fatal dinner. Constance was arrested six years ago because she was the only one who didn't use the sugar laced with the cyanide. Constance was the only one to survive that dinner without any aftereffects... Julian survived, but he was never able to walk again and his mind wanders, though that night never leaves him. Julian is dedicating what remains of his life to recount that final day. The day when he lost four of his family members, one of them his wife.

The aftermath of Constance's acquittal, despite everyone believing in her guilt, was that she shut out the world. Connie never ventures past her garden anymore. She spends her time cooking and looking after her two charges, keeping the world locked out. Merricat is just as paranoid of others as Constance, but she has buried treasure and symbolic items scattered throughout their land in a type of rustic magic to ward off everyone. One day she finds that her wards have failed and at that moment there is a knock on the door. Their cousin Charles has arrived. His branch of the Blackwoods severed all connections at the time of the trial, not even willing to take Merricat in, that night she was sent to bed without dinner and though it saved her life, it meant she was banished to an orphanage for a time. Charles does not have the best of intentions. He is avaricious, only seeing the money in everything and in his alliance with Connie, Julian and Merricat are just obstacles to move out of his way, nothing more. But Merricat won't go down without a fight. She has a feeling that it will be her left in the house with Constance, not Charles. Charles should remember, bad things have been known to happen to members of the Blackwood family.

This book is the most terrifying and accurate story of paranoia I think I have ever read. There's a part of me that is very antisocial and would rather be left to my books. I have easily gone a week without leaving the house and I can see some things in Merricat that I can relate to in her OCD behaviours. Yet, I find that this book has kind of cured me of all those feelings, at least on a cognitive level. All paranoia and agoraphobia has to face the test of implementation. It's all well and good to think you're ok, but you never know though until you try. Constance does try, but such a man as Charles as her "saviour" could never work, I was hoping he might go the way of the previous Blackwood, though more painfully, and Constance has Merricat. Merricat is 18 in this book, yet her behaviour is more like that of a 12 year old, her emotional development and well being stunted when the poisoning happened. Constance wonders if she was right to shut Merricat away from the world, but it seems to me a mutual decision. Merricat, despite being more willing to leave the house, is really suffering more, and very much a sociopath. She has far more rituals and dark thoughts than Constance ever had. There is the rigid schedule to maintain, there are the coins buried in the river bank, the doll under the rock, the blue marbles, and the book that was nailed to the tree. Even when Merricat isn't checking on them her thoughts dwell on the powers these items give her, the layer of protection she has. Like a person who has to turn the light on and off so many times before leaving, Merricat's life is built around these rituals that have evolved around her to protect the two sisters, who, despite everything, deeply love each other.

Yet, while their isolation from the world seems odd and haunting, it is not without cause. The villagers, more than the crime, made them what they are, or at least exacerbated the situation enough to cause them to turn inward. Coming to the house, taunting, cat calling, daring each other to go to the house where everyone died. Asking Connie to come out so they can see what a mass murderer looks like. "Merricat, said Connie, would you like a cup of tea?" Childish glee in their hatred of the hoity-toity and reclusive sisters is evident in the villagers. At the end of the book, when the villagers have to reluctantly help the sisters, they take the opportunity to unleash their "everyday evil." Because the poisoning only hurt the immediate family, while the bile that is brewing in the town has far greater scope. The mob mentality of people who appear normal is a far scarier thing than two agoraphobic girls peering through slits in the windows at a life they will never have nor want.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments  

Labels: Agoraphobia, Blackwoods, Merricat, Mob Mentality, OCD, Paranoia, Poison, Shirley Jackson, We Have Always Lived in the Castle