RANDOM JOTTINGS

Several years ago I read Manja by Anna Gmeyer which was published by Persephone Books.

"Written in London by a young Austrian playwright in exile, Manja opens, radically, with five conception scenes one night in 1920. Set in the turbulent Germany of the Weimar Republic, it goes on, equally dramatically, to describe the lives of the children and their families until 1933 when the Nazis came to power.".

Not an easy book for me and I struggled with it but when I finally reached the last page I was glad I had read it.  One of those books that you may never read again, but are there in your subconscious and, perhaps unknowingly, have left an impression that leads you on to reading other things.

One discovery that delighted me when reading the introduction to Manja, was finding that it was written by Eva Ibbotson, who has been one of my favourite writers for some twenty+ years with her books of enchantment and wit, set in Vienna, Russia and South America.  Another discovery was that she was Anne Gmeyer's daughter and the childhood she had described in her book The Morning Gift was based on that of she and her mother when they left Austria after the Anschluss.  It made the perfect link for me.

I am revisiting my past posts on Eva Ibbotson as the author Amanda Craig, amongst others, has been discussing her on Twitter and asking why she is not better known. I have been joining in the discussion and decided to see what I had written about her in the past.

Eva Ibbotson is well known for her children's books, Which Witch?, The Secret of Platform 13, The Island of the Aunts and The Star of Kazan to name a few, but for me Eva Ibbotson is the author of books imbued with her love of music, opera and ballet that I have read so many times and which I turn to on many occasions when no other book will do.  Though I love them all, the ones that appeal to me  most are those set in Vienna.

Oh, how I want to visit this city and I am so determined to do so.  Ever since I was a little girl this city has seemed to me to be a place of enchantment, the home of Johann Strauss, the Prater, the coffee houses, Sachertorte, the Schonbrunn, the home where Elizabeth of Austria reigned, she of the magical Winterhalter painting with flowers in her hair, the annual New Year's Concert and of the course, Viennese  opera and operetta.

I have a copy of  A Glove Shop in Vienna and other stories. I came across it in a second hand bookshop some years ago and grabbed it straight away. I have just gone on line to see if there is a new edition of it as there have been of many of Eva's titles but not this one it seems. The one pictured left seems to be the only one available at the moment,

I read the opening paragraphs of the first story on the first page and knew that I had another gem in front of me:

"It was mid-December and a night of snow.  All day the thick soft flakes had fallen quietly, covering the blank faced nymphs and satyrs on Vienna's innumerable fountains; blanketing the bronze rumps of the rearing horse on which dead warriors of the Habsurg Empire rode forever; giving the trees along the Ringstrasse a spare Siberian splendour.

The gas-lamps threw rings of brightness into the squares, the smart shops along the Karner Strasse looked like stage sets.  In the big apartment houses, those grand slightly crumbling Viennese houses which look like Renaissance palaces, but house simply doctors and lawyers and other self-respecting members of the bourgeoisie, the closed shutters were pierced by rays which the snow threw back in unaccustomed brightness.

One window in one such apartment house remained unshuttered so that a square of golden light went untrammelled into the dusk.  Inside Katrina fat and warm like all the best cooks in Vienna, produced an ever growing pile of gingerbread hearts and vanilla crescents; of almond rinds and chocolate gugelhuph".

To me this conjours up an warm, cosy, magical picture that never fails to beguile me. There is a word  'gemutlich' which Queen Victoria used when she and her beloved Albert were sitting around a fire with each other and surrounded by their children, happy, together and all well.  It is not possible to translate this word into an English equivalent which gives the same impression. Each of these stories, and in all her books, the heroine is small, enchanting and feisty. (I am aware that I am using the word enchanting far too often here but really it is the only one that will do…)  Ocassionally there are times when you feel that everything is about to topple over into whimsy and it is all a tad too sweet and picturesque, but the author seems to be aware of this danger and then a shaft of irony and wit pops up, just in time to avert this happening.

In another story in this collection, A Little Disagreement, Tante Wilhemina is on her death bed.  This happens about twice a year and is taken very seriously.  The family group around her with 'the weight and dignity of a Delacroix or a Titian'.  All the hushed relative are in the room, but where are the cats?  They must be there.   The housekeeper's son is sent to find them. Wotan and Parsifal present no problem

'huge neutered tom cats, they were perfectly prepared to finish their cream at the food of the bed.  Siegfried, however, was another matter.  Siegfried's operation had not been a success and he was absent on the tiles…..'

Wonderful.  Three cats, Wotan, Parsifal and Siegfried.  When I read this, only today, I hooted with laughter delighted that somebody else had had Wagnerian pets.  We used to have a Siegfried too, but he was a guinea pig……..

Very difficult to explain why I love these books the way I do.  When I first read A Glove Shop in Vienna and Madensky Square I was commuting into town each day, exhausting and frustrating.  But it all went by the board when becoming engrossed in these two titles..  I was in Vienna drinking coffee with whipped cream and eating a slice of Sachertorte while a small cafe house orchestra played the Emperor Waltz.

Nearly all of her books are available now though I disagreed with the rebranding of some of them a few years ago with ghastly covers, but there are newer editions available. Many of her titles such as The Company of Swans and and the Countess Downstairs seem to be aimed at the young adult market but really they can be enjoyed by us grown ups as well…

Do try them.