Born on the island nation of Dominica in 1890, Jean Rhys carved out an impressive literary career. There are 17 titles listed on her Wiki page, most of them fiction. Although she was of British descent, she was considered a white Creole. Her most famous work is
Wide Sargasso Sea, a prequel to the Charlotte Bronte classic
Jane Eyre. It provides the back story of the woman Rochester secreted in the attic. Like the author, the character's origins are in the islands. Published in 1966, it has cracked many top 100 lists and won the prestigious W.H. Smith Literary Award. It is reprinted regularly. There are six versions on Rhys' first Amazon page listing. I just finished it and found it unsatisfying, although I was not bored. I concluded that the protagonist was indeed mentally ill and not the victim of a plot by an avaricious husband. If that is correct, it seems to negate any feminist argument the author wishes to inject. The narrative also serves as an indictment of colonialism, which is valid, although the system is largely, perhaps entirely, a relic of the past and therefore only mildly interesting to people of the modern western world. The prose and dialogue are not easy. The 112 pages of the large paperback edition that came my way read like much more, the print small. I do not know why Rhys chose the title. The Sargasso Sea is part of the North Atlantic, distinguished from other parts by its characteristic brown Sargassum seaweed and often calm blue water. Perhaps it's a metaphor for what lies beneath. 280 users at Amazon have rated the novel, forging to a consensus of four on a scale of five. I fly in contrast to the praise, rating it two. Rhys, who seemed to live a Bohemian lifestyle and had her own mental health issues, passed away in 1979 at 88. Here's a pic of her as a young woman:
There's great news in the
Fast Takes column in today's
NY Post. Despite a rise of two billion in world population the past 25 years, poverty rates have fallen considerably. 138,000 escaped it daily during that span. Today 40% of the poor live in Nigeria and India. The latter has seen a 24% reduction but obviously still has a long way to go. Apparently, globalization is working.
In case you were wondering, there's an article in today's
Post about which subway lines have seen the most complaints about masturbation: F - 60; No. 1 - 19; L - 17; A - 14; No. 7 - 11. Overall, there were 376 complaints, including violations in stations, throughout the system in 2017, up from 296 in 2016. Who will be the first player to hit the 400 mark?
I scored the most favorable parking spot this morning and it afforded the least toil possible for the floating book shop on this blazing hot day. My thanks to the elderly Latina who bought another thriller,
Rage by Wilbur Smith, and to the middle age woman who purchased three works of non-fiction, on the Royal Family, the Carters and Christianity. What a relief it was to douse my head with cold water upon my return home. One more day of this nonsense.
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