Here are my favorite reads for the week:
At first, In the Wake of the Plague: The Black Death and the World It Made
But, the second half of the book proved me wrong.
One reason I had my initial reaction is the depth of knowledge demonstrated by Norman F Cantor about such a wide range of topics.
From the Plantagenet dynastic history to the changes in societal structures, each section is covered very thoroughly. Really, it was to the point that I sometimes forgot which history topic I was actually investigating.
Cantor went deeper than I was expecting with certain chapters, but he does always manage to bring them back around to the Black Death and make me remember the book’s title with a start.
By the end of the book, I gained a strong appreciation for how Europe changed because of these waves of deaths.
They affected the dreams of monarchs for power and territory. They transformed the economics of an agrarian society dependent upon human labor and consequently upset the previously rigid class structures.
I especially found the chapter on Jewish history fascinating. Under torture, Jews were forced to confess that they were causing the plague. Their subsequent murders and banishments around Europe really set the stage for how their histories came to play out in the twentieth century.
In the Wake of the Plague
Audiobook Challenge: one down, eleven to go.
Both the noir genre and the hard-boiled detective genre are so iconic these days that they are practically punchlines. The first time this chocolate-and-peanut-butter combo really came together, though, was in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep.
I’m a fan of both genres although I’ve seen more movies and TV shows than I’ve read books. So this is the first time I’m meeting Chandler’s famous Philip Marlowe. Unlike Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade, Marlowe is more of an upstanding guy by our standards. Marlowe is like a knight-errant in the service of his clients. Even though we may not be able to see why his particular clients in this story are so worthy of his sacrifices, he knows he has to continue living by his own code.
This brings romanticism to the character, but we also know of the alienation and bleakness that arise from his choices. As good as he is at what he does, he is not a happy man.
The plot of The Big Sleep
I would liken it to what Agatha Christie writes, where the story is enjoyable and the characters are interesting, and really, you may as well relax about the solution to the puzzle because you’re not going to figure it out. The author didn’t create the work with the intention of helping you along.
The Big Sleep
So what’s so brilliant about the plot then? One, Marlowe succeeds right off the bat, and I can’t elaborate further about that without spoiling the action. Two, Marlowe becomes the mystery, and again, I can’t say any more. Structurally, Chandler has done something so witty and playful here. Unfortunately, an understanding of his humor on this front won’t be possible until the end.
But in the meantime, all throughout the book, Chandler is going to make you smile. There are just great turns in the language.
New Author Challenge: four completed, eleven to go.
1001 Books To Read Before You Die list: 79 down
