Reading difficult books

Of course, I like reading easy books. I read books for pleasure and one pleasure is being absorbed into a world, a set of characters and train of events so thoroughly that, while I'm reading it, I feel involved. I'm still reading Scandanavian crime fiction - wondering if Erlendur's life will become any more miserable and looking forward to the second volume in Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy.

But sometimes I'm not looking for escape or easy answers. I want a book that makes demands on me, that takes me somewhere I hadn't expected or presents me with problems I won't be able to resolve and put away as I reach the final page.

With some books, the subject, plot and characters linger powerfully. I'm still caught in the world of Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall, which I finished only a few weeks ago. This is partly because it seems to present ethical dilemmas which resonate now: problems of wealth and poverty, the nature of influence in politics, the role of money and the market, the point at which the most well-intentioned individuals become complicit in violence and torture. But while these questions are raised, the novel also evokes a strong sense of the time and place in which it is set - it's a novel set around Henry VIII's court at the time of his obsession with Anne Boleyn.

Elsewhere the difficulty and the strangeness of part of the attraction. This is often at the level of language. I don't think I'll ever forget the delight I felt in opening a slim Penguin book in a small bookshop and finding the lines:

SIÞEN þe sege and þe assaut watz sesed at Troye,

Þe borȝ brittened and brent to brondeȝ and askez,

Þe tulk þat þe trammes of tresoun þer wroȝt

Watz tried for his tricherie, þe trewest on erthe:

Hit watz Ennias þe athel, and his highe kynde,

Þat siþen depreced prouinces, and patrounes bicome

Welneȝe of al þe wele in þe west iles.

It's the opening of the anonymous mediaeval poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and something in the language enthralled me in a way that Chaucer never has. It was the difficulty and the sense of strangeness, I think.

At about the same time I found a copy of Teach Yourself Greek in the library and found myself sounding out the Greek word for sand - and that determined me to find a way of learning Classical Greek. I was never particularly good at it but in recent days I've picked up my Loeb parallel text of books 1-12 of the Odyssey and am wallowing in the pleasure of a language I don't fully understand and systems of customs and belief that are strange to me.

I've also returned to Finnegans Wake. It's famously difficult and I haven't got very far. I keep re-reading, relishing the language and catching the jokes. Yes! There are jokes in Finnegans Wake. Nobody warned me about that but I found them for myself. It happened as I was reading (for the third time) the passage which, I think, is about a visit to a Dublin museum with exhibits about the Duke of Wellington and the Battle of Waterlook. It begins like this, with the voice of the museum guide:

This the way to the museyroom. Mind your hats goan in! Now yiz are in the Willingdone Museyroom. This is a Prooshi-ous gunn. This is a ffrinch. Tip. This is the flag of the Prooshi— ous, the Cap and Soracer. This is the bullet that byng the flag of the Prooshious. This is the ffrinch that fire on the Bull that bang the flag of the Prooshious. Saloos the Crossgunn! Up with your pike and fork! Tip. (Bullsfoot! Fine!) This is the triplewon hat of Lipoleum. Tip. Lipoleumhat. This is the Willingdone on his same white harse, the Cokenhape. This is the big Sraughter Wil-lingdone, grand and magentic in his goldtin spurs and his ironed dux and his quarterbrass woodyshoes and his magnate’s gharters and his bangkok’s best and goliar’s goloshes and his pullupon-easyan wartrews. This is his big wide harse. Tip.

In Finnegans Wake it's necessary to hear someone else's voice and take the risk that all children take when learning to speak and read - the risk of not understanding everything all at once. Learning a language is like that too. We have to face moments of uncertainty and live with incomprehension. It's not a bad basis for life. I'd recommend more difficult books and more willingness to say "I'm not sure" or "I don't understand." After all, the alternative is clinging to the safety of the familiar and never daring to leave home.

Book-reader!

One of the merits of advancing age is increasing invisibility. By the time my hair is white, I shall probably float ghost-like down streets and be able to act exactly as I like without anyone noticing. But I'm not quite there yet.

I went to London to visit my parents on the day before Mother's Day. I reckoned I was probably even less visible than usual, slightly shuffling and convalescent after a late winter virus got me by the throat and left me tired and shaky. I stopped at an unfamiliar supermarket to get lunch ingredients and when a young woman rammed my shopping trolley into me, complaining that I wasn't quick or efficient enough at making way for her, I decided I'd probably slipped into the role of Unnecessary Older Person, as far as she was concerned. Perhaps she was too young to realise that most women are so accustomed to mild brutality and insults from strangers, that a rammed shopping trolley is hardly more than a slight annoyance.

As an older woman, I feel rather safer than when I was young. I've never forgotten the time - nearly thirty years ago - when I was walking across a university carpark and a car-load of drunken students thought it funny to drive the car at me a few times, hurling sexual insults and shrieking with laughter at their "wit." That really was frightening. I don't think they planned to hit me - though I couldn't be sure - but I wasn't sure they were sober enough to control the car, or that I could run fast enough to get away. I didn't go to the police. The headlights dazzled me so that I couldn't see their faces though I had a good idea who they were from the brayed, precise insults. The police were unlikely to take my word against a group of posh - and well-connected - young men.

That was the scariest instance but of course there were others. Men sometimes tell me I'm stupid to walk alone after dark but years ago I decided that I preferred to risk abuse and threats rather than live in a prison created by abusive strangers. I've had a fuller life as result. And by now I'm used to dealing with the occasional insult. They've tailed off as I've grown older and become more confident. I worry for my daughter, of course.

It was good to see my parents. I don't visit often enough. This was another short visit - four hours' travelling each way doesn't allow much time to stay, but at least I managed to cook lunch, wash up and deliver small gifts to my mum. I was pleased I'd made it, but more tired than usual - this year's viruses seem particularly draining.

I'd worried a little about getting the tube at Putney Bridge. Dad and I had been watching the football results and the unlikely scoreline - Fulham 2, Manchester United 0 - could result in a few disconsolate United fans on the way home. But all I saw were yellow-jacketed police - some on horseback - outside the supporters' favourite pub. Jubilant songs and chants filled the air.

Reaching the Piccadilly Line, I realised I could be standing for quite a while. The Victoria Line was closed for the weekend, pushing passengers onto other routes. The platform wasn't too crowded as I arrived but within two minutes passengers were three or four deep and more kept arriving. There was no point in letting a crowded train go in the hope of a seat on the next one. I boarded and followed the usual command to "Move right down the carriage." I was just reflecting on how shaky I felt and my probable invisibility when a young man stood up and offered me his seat. I wasn't so invisible after all - and immensely lucky. Plenty of other people who could have done with a seat were left swaying and strap-hanging. After thanking the young man, I immersed myself in my book - one of the Scandanavian detective stories to which I've recently become addicted.

My journey involved a change of mainline trains and a pause in a waiting room. The book, which involved axe murders, a bright young woman inspector and an older beer-drinking, chess-playing detective, had gripped me. I settled down for my 25-minute wait and continued with the story.

There were three other people in waiting-room: a young couple wrapped up in one another and a solitary man listening to music. It felt safe enough. Then the youths came in, giggling, pleased with themselves, possibly a bit drunk. They swaggered round, giggling. I was more interested in my book and perhaps this annoyed them. They stood in front of me, staring, thinking of an insult. Eventually, one of them came up with the epithet they wanted: "Book-reader!" They giggled. They tried it out a few more times, circling round me. I looked up, unimpressed, and went back to my book, "Book-reader!" they said again. And then one tried, bemusingly, "Sexy! She's sexy for a book-reader. Sexy for a nerd." I think I was supposed to be scared. I wasn't. They went out.

Later, when a couple of more people had entered the waiting room, they came back. They tried saying, at no-one in particular, the worst racial insult they could think of. They said it again and laughed. It plainly didn't apply to any of the people in the waiting room. They tried to start a conversation with a solitary young woman who was witting there. She dismissed them with monosyllables and they gave up, giggled and went outside again. I think the youths were beginning to feel cross that no-one responded to them - I hope they were. Perhaps it was their turn to feel invisible.