Whenever I read these two Roald Dahl autobiographies, I tend to read them together, because they are two halves of the same story. Boy talks about Dahl’s childhood, and sets the stage for Going Solo, which is about Dahl’s career with the Shell Company right before the outbreak of the Second World War, and then it’s about his service in the Royal Air Force. I love the introduction to Going Solo, which mentions that the first part of the book is edited to take out the boring bits, but the second half includes everything, because “every moment was…absolutely thrilling.”

Dahl has long been one of my favourite authors, and I keep meaning to read his books for adults, some of which are supposed to be quite racy. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one of my favourite children’s books, and Danny the Champion of the World is one of my favourite books of all time, bar none.

So anyway. Boy is truly awesome, and you can see where Dahl got his inspiration for many of his books, ranging from ferocious mean adults to sweet store pranks. One thing about the book which particularly interests me is his discussion of corporal punishment in British schools. It was a widely accepted practice when Dahl went to school, and he wrote quite compellingly about his repugnance for the practice. I’ve also noted that several of his books also condemn corporal punishment, so it’s obviously something that continued to bother him long after he grew out of childhood.

It’s also fascinating to read about Dahl’s family, from his one-armed father to his determined mother who managed to keep their family together after the death of her oldest daughter and Dahl’s father in a short period of time. That can’t have been a mean feat in Wales in the 1920s. There are also a number of comic vignettes in the book which are quite sweet and excellent.

In Going Solo, I loved reading about Dahl’s time working for the Shell Company in Africa, and the adventures he had there. His experiences as a pilot are also fascinating to read about, and his quiet condemnation of the way that the war was fought in the Middle East and Greece is quite excellent. He certainly pulled no punches when he bemoaned the “pointless waste of life” among young RAF pilots, and with good reason: of the 16 men he trained with, 14 died in the war.

These books read like Dahl’s children’s books, in some ways, only all the more exciting because they are real, supplemented with excerpts from letters and photographs.

Demographics:

Boy, by Roald Dahl. Published 1984, 176 pages. Autobiography.

Going Solo, by Roald Dahl. Published 1986, 210 pages. Autobiography.

I haven’t read Dracula in a very long time, and I’m not sure what inspired me to pluck it from the shelf last night, but I found myself deeply engrossed in it. The book was certainly different this time than the last time I read it, or rather I have changed enough that my perspective on the book is radically different. I remembered it as being rather stuffy and cumbersome, but instead I found it a rather compelling and action-packed read.

The last time I read Dracula, I obviously hadn’t read as much feminist literature as I have now, and one thing which really intrigued me about the book was the tacit fear of female sexuality. The female vampires in the book are described in extremely sensual terms, with ruby red lips and flowing tresses. In the scene where Jonathan Harker is accosted by the three female vampires in the castle, the description of his experience is charged with sexual excitement, with lines like “the moisture shining on her scarlet lips and on the red tongue as it lapped the sharp white teeth…lower and lower went her head as the lips went below the range of my mouth and chin…”

Mina Harker and Lucy Westenra, on the other hand, are not really described until Dracula’s influence falls upon them, at which point they, too, become highly sexualized. It was extremely intriguing to see sexuality equated with evil and bestiality, with Lucy essentially punished for her wanton thoughts of marrying three men at once. The implication there seemed to be that Lucy was more susceptible to Dracula’s sexual power because of her wantonness.

Indeed, both Lucy and Mina come across as innocent, wholesome women until they are corrupted by the influence of the vampire. In a sense, I almost felt like the book was an allegory about the effects of the modern world on women, with Stoker suggesting that the world was filled with corrupting influences which would turn perfectly nice assistant schoolmistresses into fiendish, sexualized creatures. There are even a few unfavorable references to the “modern woman” in the book, as though to ensure that readers would not miss the parallel.

The book also seemed to deal a lot with repression and dreamworlds, where anything is possible, and in that sense it was almost like an exploration of Stoker’s own mind. Perhaps I’m being a bit too Freudian here, but the book gave me the sense that Stoker had some issues to work out, especially around female sexuality. In a way, the book felt like Stoker’s attempt to reclaim his manhood, with the virile team of men ultimately triumphing over rampant sexuality, despite significant temptation in the scene where Van Helsing puts down the female vampires in the castle.

I can see why Dracula has remained a classic, not only in the horror genre, but in the fiction genre in general. There’s a lot going on in this book, and I have a feeling I’ll be reading it again in the near future to explore it even further.

Demographics:

Dracula, by Bram Stoker. Published 1897, 520 pages. Fiction.

The cemetery series begins again, thanks to a whirlwind Saturday trip to capture the three coastal cemeteries* we hadn’t shot yet. I’ll start with Inglenook Cemetery, which had to be the smallest and least exciting cemetery we visited. I suppose that’s not too surprising, since Inglenook is one of the smallest and least exciting towns I have visited. (Sorry, Inglenookians, but it’s true and you know it.)

One awesome thing about Inglenook cemetery was the few really old graves, like this one, which is right by the side gate:

It’s the grave of Reverend McKinney and his wife Louisa, and it dates from the turn of the last century. Pretty cool, eh? There’s another McKinney grave next to it, also very old, but the shot didn’t come out at all well, alas, because the headstone was so dark.

I really loved this wheat carving on an obelisk:

Wheat, incidentally, symbolizes rebirth, because grain crops die away and then renew themselves. This is one of the more detailed wheat carvings I have found on a headstone.

My first Shriner headstone:

A beloved pilot:

Check out those superlatives. Go ahead. Click through and read them. Inglenook can wait.

The Jensens have a headstone with a little character. I like that, and I like David’s motto.

*Our cemetery shooting has excluded private cemeteries, for the obvious reason that they are neither publicly listed, nor accessible unless I want to trespass. We did take a few photos of the pioneer cemetery in the Botanic Gardens as well, but it has been so sterilized that they were pretty dull. That said, if any of my local readers would allow me to photograph their family cemeteries, I would be honored, because I have a deep love for private family cemeteries on farms and so forth. Ultimately, I would like to be buried on my own land, assuming that I ever live on a farm far enough from city limits to get a cemetery permit.

The International Olympic Committee needs to get its act together, according to Sally Jenkins at the Washington Post.

MASSIVE DEFEAT takes pictures. They are neat. Go look at them. Did I mention that they are pictures of Iraq?

Green products are all the rage, which raises the question of we know that products are genuinely green.

Methinks the lady doth misspeak too much.

Polls suggest that the Democratic infighting may lead to a massive defection in November. Get used to saying “President McCain,” kids!

Honey gets a new look in the LA Times food column. Mmmmm…honey.