Author: Catherine (Page 52 of 54)

Book review: Victorian Girls: Lord Lyttleton’s Daughters, by Sheila Fletcher

February 8, 2008 / Catherine / 0 Comments

I’ve just finished reading Victorian Girls: Lord Lyttelton’s Daughters, by Sheila Fletcher. It’s a really excellent read, and a very fascinating picture of Victorian family life and sensibilities. Sadly, it also manages to not even remotely address the question that intrigued me enough to pick it up in the first place, namely why on earth would three intelligent women, whose father was actually responsible for the introduction of grammar schools for girls, consider the question of female suffrage ‘laughable’ and sign a petition against it?

This is mentioned in the preface, but never once in the book, and what we see of the girls’ characters does not, at least to me, provide illumination on this score.

I can’t say I feel cheated, though – it’s one of those rare non-fiction books that can be read in about the same amount of time as a novel; I couldn’t put it down. This was helped by the fact that all four daughters (Merriel, Lucy, Lavinia and May) kept diaries and wrote numerous letters to each other and to family friends, so that a very large amount of their personalities come through. Of course, as is always the case, the most fascinating parts are inevitably in the diaries and letters that didn’t survive.

Politics: It’s Time!

November 23, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

What I want for my name-day is a new government. By which I mean one NOT headed by the Coalition for Mediocrity and Selfishness.

Australia, do you think you could manage that? My name day is this Sunday, just so you know. As it happens, there will be an election between now and then, so…

All flippancy aside, I do hope we can get the Liberals out tomorrow. I don’t think the ALP is perfect, but the Coalition has shown itself to be purely destructive – paranoid, self-centred, xenophobic, consistently supporting the strong against the weak whether it be in healthcare, employee relations, or in their (our) treatment of the Aboriginal community, of migrants, and of refugees.

This government has made Australia less. Not less than what it could be – which would be forgiveable – but less than what it has been. Than the bare minimum of what it should be. I am angry about this. I feel shamed by our government. But most of all, I want to weep for what has happened to us. Perhaps the thing that makes me the saddest is that I have lost my idealism about government. I never expected government to be completely altruistic, but I did, for many years, believe that the majority of people on all sides of politics were acting in what they genuinely believed to be the best interests of the country.

I can no longer believe that any more. Not about Howard. Not about the Liberal Party. And I’m not at all sure about the other parties, either.

We don’t know what the ALP will do if they get into government. But we do know, we must know by now, what Howard will do if he gets another term: the same, and more.

Please, let’s not give him another chance.

Politics: What is Australian?

October 9, 2007 / Catherine / 2 Comments

I’ve been thinking about Australian-ness for a while, partly inspired by a friend’s blog posts about nationalism in France, and partly inspired by the new Citizenship Test and other acts of idiocy currently being perpetrated by our government.

And I’ve come to the conclusion that I have some ideas about what being Australian is all about that are perhaps more unusual than I’ve thought. Because to me, the key thing that makes Australia Australia is immigrants, immigration, and the stunningly diverse population we have as a result of these things. Let’s face it, with the exception of the few people of Aboriginal and Koorie descent, we are all immigrants here. And most of the waves of immigrants, now I think of it, have been from classes or races that were at the time considered socially unacceptable (criminals! Irish! Miners! Chinese! Greeks and Italians! Chinese again! Vietnamese too! Muslims! Sudanese!). I find it both sad and ironic that the descendants of these earlier settlers now feel the need to turn around and reject classes of immigrants based on religion, colour or alleged criminal tendencies. And this from a country whose most long-established families take pride in being descended from… convicts. Or, less romantically, economic refugees fleeing the Highland Clearances. Or, if they were lucky, Catholics, which carried a fine set of prejudices in its day.

Politics: Decriminalisation of Abortion in Victoria

October 2, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

Taken from the Victorian Law Reform Commission Website.

The government has given the commission terms of reference to develop legislative options for abortion decriminalisation and asked the commission to report back by 28 March 2008.

People who want to make a submission to the project should do so by Friday 9 November 2007.

A brief Information Paper about the state of the law in Victoria and other Australian jurisdictions has been posed to this website and includes discussion questions for consideration in submissions.

I have every intention of making a submission. I have no idea what it will say yet, but I want to say something. I’m also going to contact my local politicians on as many sides of government as I can. I encourage Australians reading this post to do likewise – the women in particular. Not that I won’t be encouraging my male friends to get writing about this, because you can be sure I will (it must be added that my husband and other male friends are bloody excellent feminists, which is one of the reasons I love them), but you know, this issue does affect women first and foremost. It is about our bodies and about our health (as well as being about all sorts of other things). We have a particularly personal interest in this debate.

We owe it to ourselves and to the world to make sure we are active and visible in working for the issues that affect us.

(and that statement has application well beyond feminism and reproductive rights)

Acrostic: Nightmare

September 21, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

This is mostly an experiment, to see if I could make an acrostic and an ABCABCABC rhyme scheme work.

No respite after work and weary day
I lie awake, awaiting morning’s light
Gazing with sleep-starved eyes into the deep
Hoping for kindly sleep, already prey
To whirling thoughts, to formless, foolish, fright.
Monstrosities pursue me – horrors creep,
And cruel disaster smiles to block my way.
Run down by my mind’s hounds, I dread the night
Exhaustion rides me – yet I fear to sleep.

Book review x 2: Swordspoint and Privilege of the Sword, by Ellen Kushner

August 2, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

So… I finished reading these two books a couple of days ago, but haven’t had time to write and do them justice. This is rather a pity, because it has meant I’ve had to start reading other books, and I wasn’t really ready to leave that world. It’s also a pity that I read Privilege of the Sword before writing a review of Swordspoint, because it has, I think, coloured my view of the first book.

Where to start? Both books are set in a world that seems like a cross between Georgette Heyer’s regency London and 18th century Paris, and the world of Dangerous Liaisons. The intrigue, however, is largely political rather than sexual (which is not to say that sex does not play a part in the political intrigue – it clearly does), and, thank goodness, there are no stupid-but-virtuous pawns. Actually, there isn’t much conventional virtue to be seen anywhere, but the virtuous characters – and the rather more prevalent sympathetic characters – are in general as intelligent as the more appalling ones, which is a great relief. I particularly like what I can’t help seeing as a glimpse of what Mme de Merteuil might have been, had she turned her energies to politics. I’m not telling you which of the two books she is in, though. That would be cheating.

Sonnet: His Mistress Replies to Sonnet 130

April 23, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

In fact, I wrote this back in 1995 or thereabouts, inspired by Pamela Dean’s Tam Lin and the character who wrote a sonnet a day ‘to keep his hand in’. I tried taking psychology lecture notes in sonnet form for a while, but it didn’t help. Anyway, this was one of my better efforts. It’s a reply to this sonnet by Shakespeare.

My poet’s pen is sharper than nine swords;
I thought true love should muzzle unkind truth.
What right have you to mock me with these words?
For nor are you some godly-handsome youth!
It’s true I find your closing lines are sweet;
What woman would not wish to be called rare?
But wilful Will, admit that ’tis not meet
To slight the colour of your lady’s hair!
Your style of loving sonnet is unique;
A compliment, you tell me, to my wit.
Still, it’s not pleasant to be told I reek;
Good Will, will you not flatter me a bit?
Yet my goodwill you have, for this is true:
Imperfect like meets like when I meet you.

Song: 50 Ways to Find a Dead Mouse (with apologies – profuse ones – to Paul Simon

April 17, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

Because not all the mice our cats kill get eaten. Some of them get put aside for later…

(This song goes to the tune of 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover. Also, it’s fairly disgusting, as you might have guessed from its title. That’s what happens when you have cats…)
The mouse is underneath the bed, she said to me
Or maybe in the bath, or under the TV…
Surprising presents are the nicest, don’t you see?
There must be fifty ways to find a dead mouse.

She said, It’s hard to say just where a dead mouse could belong
Furthermore, I hope my mousie won’t be lost for long
Or else you may find its aroma is quite strong…
There must be fifty ways to find a dead mouse.
Fifty ways to find a dead mouse…

What’s that stench by the bench, Dench?
Does that pail have a tail, Dale?
Did that dish just go squish, Trish?
I don’t want to see…
Did it fall in the hall, Paul?
I’ve found half in the bath, Garth
And there’s gore in the drawer, Shaw
But where could the rest be?

Could that part be the heart, Mart?
Will the brain leave a stain, Jane?
Is that hair on the chair, Claire?
Or is it something more?
Here’s a rat on the mat, Pat
Disembowelled on a towel, Raoul,
Entrails read on the bed, Ned
The future is sure…

She said it grieves me so to see you in such pain
But here’s a nice dead mouse to make you smile again
I said I appreciate that and would you please explain
Just where you left that mouse…

She said it’s much more fun to find it in the night.
When you get up to go to the bathroom without the light
And then she purred at me and I realized she probably was right
There must be fifty ways to find a dead mouse.
Fifty ways to find a dead mouse. Or rat…

Fling the thing in the air, Cher
Make it fly up on high, Guy
Let the bowl be your goal, Noel,
And the coffee mug, too…
Get it wedged near the fridge, Midge
Hide it snug ‘neath the rug, Doug
On the floor by the door, Lenore
As a present for you!

Find the treat with your feet, Pete
Smell its scent through the vent, Brent
When you tread on its head, Ed
Won’t you be proud of me?
Feel the ooze ‘tween your toes, Rose
Hear the crack of its back, Jack
See it spread as you tread, Fred
Now, find the other three…

(I know, I know. Some of the rhymes don’t [which is completely self-inflicted, because for some reason I felt compelled to do a triple rhyme when a double was all the original called for], and I really had to push my luck with some of the names – if you have any better suggestions, please let me know. But, oddly enough, the scansion should be pretty close to the original, which is a little weird in places anyway)

Politics: Changes to Electoral Law

April 4, 2007 / Catherine / 0 Comments

The government has just passed legislation closing the voting rolls at 8pm on the day the election is called. This means that anyone who is not already registered to vote on that day will be unable to vote at the next election.

This legislation will particularly disadvantage young people (first time voters who would not yet be registered) and, I would think, the less well-off; non-home owners or new home owners (people who have moved house in the last 3 years and have not updated their registration would not be eligible to vote in their new electorate, and possibly not in their old one either) – in other words, the people most likely to vote against the current government.

Apparently, they are also bringing in new legislation on April 16 that will make it harder to register for voting generally, which is just charming.

I do wonder about the legal inconsistency of all this, since voting is compulsory – it seems that the government is making it very difficult for disadvantaged people to obey the law.

In any case, if you are an Australian reading this, please, please visit the AEC website and make sure you are currently correctly registered to vote.

And please also consider signing this petition to the government to overturn this dangerous piece of legislation.

We have a really, really good electoral system in this country, and it would be a shame to see it eroded.

Book review: Dante’s Paradiso, in translation by Dorothy Sayers

December 20, 2006 / Catherine / 0 Comments

I’ve just finished reading Dante’s Paradiso. As in – literally just finished. I walked into the computer room, book in hand, reading the last few pages of notes, because I couldn’t wait to share the last few lines with you all…

Thither my own wings could not carry me
But that a flash of understanding clove
Whence its desire came to it suddenly

High phantasy lost power and here broke off
Yet, as a wheel moves smoothly, free from jars
My will and my desire were turned by love,

The love that moves the sun and other stars.