BOOK: The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester

The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester, 242 pages
also known as The Surgeon of Crowthorne

Nonfiction Five 2010; Our Mutual Read; Bibliophilic Challenge

Imagine how the first dictionary was written. How do they find all the words without leaving any out? I mean, all the words. It turns out to have been a many decade-long (seventy) process, to produce the Oxford English Dictionary. In this book, Winchester documents an interesting aspect of the making of this famous dictionary - Dr William Minor, one of the most consistent and prolific contributors, who lived in an asylum in England for the criminally insane for most of his adult life.

The book covers several stories - Dr Minor, his years in the American civil war, Professor James Murray and his role as main editor, the history of dictionary writing before the OED, life in an asylum, mental illness, the murder of George Merrett, and the dictionary itself. I liked the Victorian times, and how Winchester included so much information, without feeling like overload. Each chapter begins with a pertinent word's listing from the OED, giving people like me, who have never read from the OED, an idea of what it was like.  My only complaint is that by including so much extra information, Winchester sometimes inserted a random fact that just seems out of place, and inserted his views or biases of people or ideas. Nymeth discussed this in detail this week as well. My example was this one, in discussing Murray's friendships.

One was a Trinity College, Cambridge, mathematician named Alexander Ellis, and the other a notoriously pig-headed, colossally rude phonetician named Henry Sweet - the figure on whom Bernard Shaw would later base his character Professor Henry Higgins in Pygmalion, which was transmuted later into the eternally popular My Fair Lady (in which Higgins was played, in the film, by the similarly rude and pigheaded actor Rex Harrison). p37

Bam! Rex Harrison never saw that sucker-punch coming! Was he rude and pigheaded? I never knew that was common knowledge but I don't think it added to the story Winchester was originally telling. That sentence stopped me in my tracks for all the information in it and the judgments. But, that was a small aside in an otherwise interesting book that tries to give some honour to the murdered, wrong place wrong time George Merrett and his role in the making of the dictionary. (Without this murder, Minor would never have been in an asylum with no treatment and so much time on his hands to be able to contribute like he did.)

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also reviewed: nymeth at things mean a lot, lori at she treads softly,

BOOK: Bethlehem Road by Anne Perry

Bethlehem Road by Anne Perry, 308 pages

Historical Mysteries Challenge; Our Mutual Read Challenge

Setting: Victorian London, about 1880s

Series: # 10 of 25 in the Charlotte and Thomas Pitt mysteries, but the 20th one I've read. I spent much of the early 2000s reading Anne Perry mysteries, the Pitts and also the William Monk series, always available at the library

Series Overview: Charlotte Ellison Pitt married down in class for love, to a lowly policeman, Thomas Pitt. Thomas gets to rub shoulders with a higher class through Charlotte's family, including her rich sister Emily, and Emily's great aunt in law, Vespasia. Charlotte never minds getting involved with one of Thomas' cases. Thomas is smart and knows his place, and takes his job very serious.

This Book: Late one night, a British MP, Member of Parliament, is found with his throat cut and hung up on a bridge. Is there a personal motive or are the anarchists trying to destabilize the monarchy? Nice inclusion of the growing suffragette movement.

The Victorian times: Keeping control, concern of appearances, and maintaining a certain decorum and style are all the fun things to read about but thank heavens I never lived then. Writing in retrospect allows our main characters to be ahead of their time, noticing social injustices, with characters who are very tolerant of different ideas and people.
I liked that Perry included a major theme of the suffragettes in this book. The women are starting to rebel, to talk about their lack of rights. My biggest image of the London suffragettes has always been Mrs Banks marching while Mary Poppins looks after her children all day. (Mary Poppins!) Charlotte of course is very interested in women's rights, and recognizes that she lives a fairly privileged life, even if she only has one young girl to help her and a woman to come in to do the heavy work.

My Thoughts: I haven't spent time with Charlotte and Thomas in a long time and it was great to see them all again, especially Emily and Great-Aunt Vespasia. The mystery itself ended kind of strangely and quickly and it seemed like there should have been another twist. This is a series I'd like to read all and once you've read twenty books, the actual mystery isn't the story - it's the characters and their lives and relationships.

BOOK: The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, 609 pages

Our Mutual Read; Colourful Challenge

I have been wanting to read a Wilkie Collins book since I read The Suspicions of Mr Whicher in the summer of 2008. The Woman in White is considered one of the first of the mystery novel genre. I was surprised to find it was also epistolary, written as diary entries, letters, and extracts from official documents. Collins was a real leader in the types of books I like best. The Woman in White was originally written in serial form, and unfortunately for me, that makes for a bloated, long read.

I liked the book - I must have, I've been reading it on and off since January. Each time I picked it up, I read a good chunk, but it was slow going. As a credit to Collins' writing, I preferred a few of the narrators over others as some of that Victorian writing pains my poor head. Never use 2 words when 25 will do.

Laura Fairlie has to be the epitome of the vapid, delicate woman. Were women really like this? Too delicate to hear any pertinent information? Swooning? Blech. At least her cousin Marion was smart and forceful and cunning. She comes off as a man in the book because of that - there is no consideration of her marrying. She listened to me from beginning to end with a steady, silent attention, which, in a woman of her temperament and disposition, was the strongest proof that could be offered of the serious manner in which my narrative affected her. (page 100)

The best characters were wildly written, especially Uncle Frederick Fairlie, ESQ, who was hilarious and had the best line in the book - Was it at this point that I began to suspect he was going to bore me? I rather think it was. (page 337) I also enjoyed the outlandish Count Fosco and his wife, who played his villain role with relish.

So, while long and at times rambling, I enjoyed the book enough to still want to read Moonstone, another Collins mystery. Sometimes when I read classics that seem a little dated (the Victorian writing for example) I like to think how new and exciting a book like this must have seemed when it was first published. It allows me to enjoy the book on a different level than I might generally have.

about the cover: That is not the cover I had on my book and I cannot find it online anywhere. My camera wouldn't take a picture of it because it was white and kept reflecting back on me. The cover I've shown is a new release from Penguin.