The Road Ahead

Finally completed my IB marking for this year, just in time to board a plane to Casablanca. Then it's Marrakech, Fes, Rabat, Tangiers, Seville, Cordoba, Granada, Madrid - which sounds pretty busy to me. Still I'm hoping to find a bit of time to read, amidst all the sight-seeing, and it's with that in mind that I'm packing Neil Gaiman's Smoke and Mirrors, Orhan Pamuk's The White Castle and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus. Oh, and the early November issue of the New York Review of Books for less protracted stuff.

The great-sonnet-read-through will go into abeyance for a little while (to save on carrying books.) I'm now up to number ninety and WS has beating himself up for the last three or four, which was a touch tiresome, so it's a good time for a break. And I'm not too sure how frequently I'll be able to get on-line to blog here at this Far Place from those far places. Well, we shall see.

Identity Crisis

It's distinctly undermining to your sense of identity when the biometric system designed to allow you access to your place of work doesn't let you in.

The wonders of modern technology, eh?

A Real Point To Make

The last lines of Middlemarch: ... for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs. Typically didactic, and to some degree unnecessary as Eliot has already made the point abundantly through the very (apparently) real behaviour of her characters; but still worth insisting on as a profound moral truth. The Victorians were not shy of such truths, and perhaps we have gained something by being a little less certain of any truths, but our world is built on their shoulders and I for one, am aware that I am fortunate to be free of many of the ills of which Eliot would have been acutely aware.

The simple truth that Dorothea's generosity of character in going to the dreadful Rosamond to try and be of help to her when it would have easier and more 'natural' to have done very much otherwise, and in the process does immeasurable good for three other lives (and her own) in a way that nobody else will ever really see or comprehend is worth all the contrivance of plot it takes to get there. And isn't the contrast between Dorothea's sense of a self that needs to find itself and Rosamond's sense of nothing but self in some way the structural underpinning of the whole novel? The remarkable thing is that Eliot somehow understands Rosie - the writing of the note to Dorothea explaining Ladislaw's attitude to her, and the motivation for this (which is decent enough, but not exactly noble) is eerily spot on. Every reader knows how dreadful Rosie is but the remarkable thing is that we're invited to see the world in a way that entirely explains, almost justifies, her.

Great, great novel.

Slowly Mending

Just had a chat with John, now in his post-operation phase. He's still in a fair amount of pain, which is hardly surprising when you consider the extent to which his back has been knocked around. As far as I understand matters his spine is full of nuts and bolts at the moment, which sounds a lot more traumatic than the comparatively minor ops we've both had in the past simply to remove pesky slipped disks - and, my goodness, they could leave you feeling extremely sore for quite some time.

The good news is that John's doc thinks the procedure was a success, so we're hopeful that when the after-effects of the op fade he'll finally get a good night's sleep and be able to get around a lot more freely than was previously the case. As I've had occasion to mention before, I can't help but wonder if my brother-in-law's troubles are a sneak preview of the sort of thing that lies in store for me - assuming I live as long. So there's an element of selfishness in hoping for the best for him. But there's also a dollop of straightforward goodwill towards a good guy.

On the home front, my doc gave me a clean bill of health in spine-related matters just last week. Trust me, I'm enjoying my good fortune as long as it lasts, which I'm well aware won't be forever.

A Bit Of A Walk

Wandered out to Holland Village in the late afternoon, footing it all the way there and back, in an attempt to clear the cobwebs stuffed into my skull, occupying the space where my brain should be. The cobwebs settled there as a result of today's marking, and are still resident despite the walk and the rather jolly cup of tea I enjoyed at the Village. This is the problem attendant upon my system of marking which depends on achieving a fixed quota every day, come what may. On those days when my body and brain tell me in no uncertain terms they are just not interested in doing the necessary, the necessary still gets done - at a price.

Mind you, I was still able to summon the concentration to move into the final quarter of Middlemarch whilst quaffing the cup that cheers, so the journey wasn't entirely a waste. And I got to enjoy the trees along Commonwealth Avenue on the way back. These are not terribly special for the city, but special enough when you really focus on them to provide a splendid counterpoint to the MRT line running overhead and the various manifestations of the New Brutality in modern architecture that abound along the way.

The great thing about nature in this 'garden city' is that it manages to hold onto something of its disconcerting echoes of the wilderness, its essential aggressiveness, even when it's tamed along a roadside. It's not difficult to imagine the greenery taking it all back one day.

Crashing

Ate well at a wedding in the early afternoon - one of Arzami's daughters taking that long dark mystery ride. Since Noi wasn't around there really wasn't anything to distract me from the food. Then it was home to curry puffs and a monumental and much-needed late afternoon nap - though 'nap' seems too slight a word for the vertiginous plunge into the stream of unconsciousness I enjoyed.

And that's the place I'm happily going back to right after completing this. So there.

Together, Apart

We're off to Spain and Morocco this Thursday on a sort of Islamic-themed tour. This has involved getting a visa for Noi for the Moroccan leg of the journey, which has entailed her being without her passport for quite some time. Since she's been intending to go to Melaka to see Mak before we set off this has been a tad inconvenient, but she got it back this afternoon and is intending to drive up north on the morrow. I will sit lingering here, on account of getting papers marked for IB, so we'll be parted for the weekend - one of the irritants of our frequently (seemingly increasingly) mobile way of life.

I must say, though, the inconvenience has been massively ameliorated by an oxtail soup to die for cooked in honour of the occasion this evening, and a plenitude of freshly made curry puffs to get me through a lonely Saturday and Sunday. Miss Gloria Gaynor was right all along: yes, I will survive.

And while we're on the subject of togetherness, I enjoyed an excellent Friday sermon at Prayers today, concerning Muslim marriage. Full of good sense, I think some of its prescriptions would surprise those who appear determined to see Islam as innately oppressive to women. But there's no point in outlining these: those who don't want to know simply don't want to know.

Simply Chilling

Prior to coming to this Far Place I naively imagined I'd never be cold at work again. At that time I had no idea of just how much life in the tropics has been improved through air-conditioning. It's now possible to spend several hours shivering in the day as if working in some vengeful freezer for meat products. (I have no idea what 'meat products' are as I just invented the term, but I'm fairly sure they exist. And are kept chilled.)

For some reason air-conditioned staffrooms are regarded as some kind of luxury here. I'm sure they are expensive, but I'd gladly swop the one I'm in for somewhere with some slowly-revolving fans.

Self And Society

Just passed the halfway mark of Middlemarch and glorying in what an absolutely wonderful novel it is. It's so familiar to this reader that it's easy to forget the sheer ambition of Eliot here: a novel to diagnose the condition of England at a time of crucial historical change - yet, at the same time, to inhabit the most intimate corners of its major characters. I read the bit yesterday where Casaubon has found out just how ill he is and upsets Dorothea with his cold response to her concerns, then meets her late at night displaying a heart-breaking gentleness. Completely unexpected, yet true. As good as Tolstoy at his best. (And isn't it odd how this moment occupies the exact centre of the work?)

There is an advantage to having a degree of familiarity with the novel, I find. Instead of getting lost in the abundant detail of provincial life I'm more aware than in previous readings of what binds the enterprise together. In many ways what we are given is a series of studies in various forms of selfishness, and I'm including even the selfless Dorothea and Caleb Garth in that claim. But Eliot goes beyond merely laying bare the sad reality of what it is to be human. How that selfishness connects with our role as social animals is what's under often painful examination.

There's something disconcertingly bracing about this kind of moral seriousness.

A Contradiction

Kids are full of a boundless curiosity, as we all know, because everybody says so. So how is it I remember being bored as a child? - quite often, actually. Yet I can't remember ever being bored as an adult; certainly not in the last twenty years.