Lark Rise to Candleford
Some time after I watched Cranford (see earlier review), I discovered another tv series set in nineteenth century Britain. In fact, it reminded me of Cranford, not merely because the two names Cranford/Candleford are similar. Like Cranford, this series is set in nineteenth century England (though roughly half a century later.)
The initial premise is smiliar too. A young woman, Laura Timmins, moves to live with an older woman – in this case her mother’s cousin, Dorcas Lane – to work in miss Lane’s post office, in a small town.
Again, like Cranford, this series is both funny and sad and most of all interesting. It too features a number of memorable characters, mainly female. In fact, that’s one of the few complaints I have. While there are.a few interesting male characters, the great majority are female.
Apart from Laura, the main character, and her relative and boss, Dorcas Lane, there are their two neighbours, Pearl and Ruby Pratt who own a shop selling the latest fashion, sometimes all the way from Paris. They are perhaps not exactly pleasant, but interesting and have their secrets, some of which are exposed in season 2 (which is as far as I’ve watched).
One of my favorites is Queenie (who lives in the hamlet Lark Rise, that Laura comes from). Queenie is easily the most likeable character in the whole series. She’s a wise old woman, who keeps bees, grows herbs and vegetables in her garden and knows much about healing. Over the years she’s taken in children and raised them as her own. Sadly, Queenie was never able to have children of her own. She lives with her common law husband (later they marry, properly in church), Twister. Twister is a bit excentric, perhaps going senile. He’s a good man, but he leaves the responsibilities of running their household entirely to Queenie.
Another favorite is Minnie, a girl taken in by Dorcas Lane, to train as kitchen maid. Minnie is funny, charming and filled with wide-eyed curiosity about her new world. She listens attentively and picks up new, long words like ‘extra-ordinary’ and learns to use them. Minnie, like many of the other characters, has her own dark back story, but despite all that, she remains happy and outgoing.
Mailman Thomas Brown, strict Christian, comes across as rather rigid and cold, but hides a heart of gold under his strict exterior.
Finally, I’d like to mention James Dowland – another favorite of mine. He shows up early in season 2 and he and Dorcas Lane end up arguing about just about everything, but it’s obvious that they’re attracted to each other. I won’t go into what happens between them. I will only mention that he’s one of Queenie’s foster children, who’s left Lark Rise, gone to London and returned to his native Oxfordshire, having made a fortune. James too has his secrets, but again, I won’t spoil the series for those who haven’t seen it. There are plenty of other interesting characters, but I think this will do as an example. If you like historic series, I can definitely recommend it.
Desperate Romantics
Desperate Romantics is another tv series set in the nineteenth century. It’s about the so called PreRaphaelite Brotherhood – a group of artists and poets who decided to challenge the current ideals of beauty and launched a new painting style (among other things). In private, many of them led tumultuous lives. They drank, took drugs, were involved with prostitutes and had affairs with each other’s wives. The series is narrated by a friend of the artists – Fred Walters – (I’m not sure if this man existed in real life or is a convenient invention to tell the story).
There’s a lot of sex and drama, and a bit of history, especially art history, but my remaining impression is the sad situation faced by women in those days. They either had to lead sheltered, anemic, boring lives or risk losing their reputations and end up as prostitutes. Dante Gabriel Rossetti (from a family of famous artists and poets) seems to have been a sex addict, chasing prostitutes and barmaids, as well as his own models, some of which were prostitutes and barmaids, but he married a young milliner’s assistant, Elizabeth Siddal. She becomes Rossetti’s model, wants to become an artist like him, but is frustrated both by the lack of interest in her work and her husband’s constant infidelity, and later dies of a drug overdose. It’s pretty much all like that. You get to see a lot of Aidan Turner’s naked body, and believe me, I’m not complaining about that, but also all those women. It made me sad.
All the men, except John Millais, who had his own premarital problems, were more or less in love with the same women, but usually the charismatic Rossetti had the best luck with them. For years he had an affair with his friend and ‘brother’ William Morris’ wife, apparently with Morris’ full approval.
At the beginning of the series, the ‘brothers’ are trying to get the art establishment’s attention and eventually are able to gain the famous critic Ruskin’s approval. Ruskin is married to a frustrated young woman, Effie, but apparently he hasn’t consummated the marriage – he finds the female form unattractive. During the course of the series, it’s suggested that he might be a paedophile, but he strenuously denies the accusation. Perhaps he was what today would be termed ‘asexual’, but on the other hand, who would admit to being a paedophile? In the later part of the series, Ruskin goes everywhere with a young art student of his, a fourteen-year-old girl. Effie has the marriage annulled, after a humiliating physical examination to confirm the fact that she is still a virgin. Soon after, John Millais marries her. Apparently their marriage is both normal and happy and in the end they have eight children (but you don’t get to see that in the series). As far as I can tell, it deals with about ten years of the ‘brotherhood’s career.
The only really likeable character in this series is John Millais, and I suspect that’s partly because he’s not really a main character. He was never the rebel the others were, and even from early in his career gained recognition by the art establishment.
The others, especially Rossetti, claim to understand women, but end up hurting their feelings, through lack of understanding of their situation. Ultimately all the women, except Effie, formerly Ruskin, later Millais, are more or less unhappy.
Cranford
I’ve always liked historic series/movies/books and whenever there’s something like that on tv, I want to watch it. Cranford was no exception. The series was on a few years ago, and after it ended I read that there would be a ‘Christmas special’. I was hoping we’d get to see that too, but the Christmas of 2009 came and went and there was nothing like that. Fortunately, I had more luck last Christmas (2010). At least I assume it was the ‘Christmas special’ we got to watch.
At first I thought the tv adaption was focusing a little too much on (unintentional?) humour. Despite that, I found it interesting though rather sad. Some of the characters were really likeable, others less so, but still interesting and/or funny and definitely real and believable. Undoubtedly this was partly due to the cast. I’d especially like to mention Judi Dench, Julia McKenzie and Imelda Staunton, but the others too, famous or not so famous, did a great job.
Cranford is a little town in mid-nineteenth century England. It struggles with the changes their country is going through, not convinced that all change is for the better. For instance, railways are considered a threat. In the end, though, the people of Cranford find that nothing can stand in the way of ‘progress’ and perhaps they were wrong to try. The town is populated by a number of memorable people. Especially the women are described in detail.
At the beginning of the series, two elderly sisters, Misses Deborah and Matty Jenkyns, invite a young woman, Mary Smith, daughter of a friend of theirs, to come and live with them. You get to see Cranford and its inhabitants through her eyes. I suspect she’s the author’s alter ego. (I understand that Cranford is based on a series of books by a woman named Elizabeth Gaskell. I haven’t read them, but I think I might like to.)
Looking back on the series, my strongest impression is that it’s mostly about women who have never married, are widowed or whose prospects of marriage are poor, either because of lack of money or connections. Another theme seems to be the position of women in nineteenth century Britain.
Free library books online
Since I found out that library books are available as free downloads here in Sweden, I’ve wanted to try. For various reasons, I’d really prefer not to have to go to the library and pick up actual books (though when it comes to buying new copies at the book store, it’s the other way around.)
Anyway, last night I decided to have a go. I did a search for a couple of mysteries I’ve wanted to read, but not felt able to buy – a combination of lack of money and doubts about the quality of those books – and found five titles. I thought ‘Great!’.
Most of the books were supposedly available in several different formats, including mobi and epub. I’d read that you could download the books from your computer to a portable device (iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, any kind of e-book reader…). That’s interesting, even though I don’t own any such device, not personally. However, it was soon evident that all those symbols next to the title didn’t mean a thing. Adobe Digital Edition was the only software that worked. It gets worse.
I typed in my library card number and borrowed the first book on my list. So far, so good. I checked that I could at least open it on the computer and I could. Then I went on to the next two books and unfortunately, I got them in the reverse order of publication. When I’d finished the download of book nr 2 in the series, I get an error message saying I can only download three books in a seven day period. Three? I looked over the download window and the file where the books were saved. No. Just two. But the site was convinced. I’d already downloaded my three books. Since I refuse to read book 2 in a series before book 1, for all intents and purposes, I only got one book out of the whole frustrating experience. Three books might have been enough for seven days, one definitely isn’t.
Then my sister tried to transfer the book to her iPhone, just to see if it could be done and – to make a long story short – it couldn’t. Well, to be clear, it could be transferred, but then it couldn’t be opened. She went to check on the newspaper article where we’d found out about electronic book borrowing, and eventually found a couple of solutions that were supposedly going to work. Again, to make a long story short, neither of them did.
By that time, I was beginning to regret thinking of this idea in the first place, but at least I’ll now be able to read book three in a series where I’ve actually read books 1 and 2. And I’ll be able to try again in seven days time.
All this has also given me food for thought.
After our successful experiment with the Kindle, I had begun to plan ahead to a time when I’ll be able to afford an e-book reader and/or an iPod Touch or possibly an iPad. Now I’m wondering if I should bother. I love the Kindle. I’m sure I’d like the iPod Touch and the iPad, but would I actually have any real use for them?
I’m a book lover first and foremost even if I do love a shiny gadget, but the way I see it, I’d primarily be getting the e-book reader so I can download all those free books from Project Gutenberg and similar sites. I don’t see myself spending any money on new e-books. For one, they’re actually a lot more expensive than a paperback, and as far as I can understand, I won’t be able to read my free downloads on the Kindle. Secondly, in my opinion, nothing beats the feeling of holding a ‘real’, printed paper book in my hands.
I could get an iPod Touch when my old iPods (very old) stop working, which might be relatively soon, judging by the time it takes to charge them and how long they last before the next charge. But if I can’t even read my library books on it, maybe it won’t be worth it. As it happens, I really prefer listening to something with better sound quality. I’m not into taking all kinds of gadgets along when I go out. It’s just not worth it.
Maybe I should just be grateful I’m leaning towards an option that will save me a lot of money, but somehow that doesn’t seem very cheering. At this time I could really use some cheering up.
Oh, well, I should probably just wait and see. For all I know, my financial situation could change in the near future and then I could take the whole thing under consideration again.
The Kindle
My sister and I are working on getting our own books published. Eventually, we hope to be able to publish other people’s books too. In the course of our work, we decided that we’d need an e-book reader to optimize the file formats.
So I set to work doing a bit of research online.
To begin with, the Kobo was my primary choice and my sister was preferred the Nook. Unfortunately, we found out that neither are available here in Sweden, or at least that they’d be very hard to get. The only readers we can easliy get our hands on are some European ones, that were probably great when they were first made, but are beginning to look old. The iRiver Story looks great, but for various reasons I won’t go into now, eventually we decided against that too.
So we were back to square one. Early on, I’d looked at the Kindle and been very impressed, but I didn’t like the fact that you can’t change the internal battery. If the battery dies you need to send your Kindle back to Amazon and get a replacement, which will cost you almost as much as buying a new one, if I’ve understood correctly.
But since we felt that the Kindle was our only really positive option, we looked into it again. Apart from the battery issue, everything else I’d read about the Kindle was fantastic, so in the end, we decided to get one.
Ordering one to have it shipped to an address in Sweden was no trouble at all. We just had to get an adapter, but that was easy enough.
Then we just settled down to wait. Can you imagine our surprise when we got a notification only two days later? Two days after we ordered it, it was delivered to our house. All the way from America.
Alright, I’ll stop gushing now. LOL.
Perhaps I should mention that I’m a major book lover, if you didn’t know that already. Books (and animals) are my life. Printed books, that is. However, there are thousands of free books available on Project Gutenberg, and though in the past I’ve read some of those on my computer, I thought it might be time to get something more lightweight. (Not that my laptop weighs more than about two kilos.)
I don’t think e-book readers will ever replace the feeling of holding a paper book in my hand, but I’m also a bit of a tech freak, so the thought of another gadget is rather appealing.
In any case, iearning how to use it was very easy. I only glanced at the manual, because the controls on the device are more or less self-explanatory. Easler in fact than handling my sister’s and my mom’s iPhones.
It’s also really cute. 🙂 And not very heavy. Holding it with one hand for a long time, might get a bit much, but you can always switch hands or put it on the table or on your knees etc. We named it Spock, because my sister’s iPhone is Uhura. (Ok, enough with the geek talk.LOL)
My sister promised she’d get round to writing a more detailed review of the Kindle including a comparison with an IPhone as an e-book reader, and also, if we’re lucky, and some store near us begins to sell it, with an iPad (at least as much as they’ll let you play with it without buying it. LOL:)
Danish cop series 'The Crime'
Last week I watched the last episode of the Danish cop series ‘The Crime’ (Forbrydelsen 2, 2009). It was season 2 in the series and though I watched season 1 (2007) and liked it to some extent, this one felt like a big improvement on the first. That could be partly because season 1 was made up of 20 episodes (and to put that into perspective, I’ll have to mention that the series only dealt with one case) and season 2 only had 10 (again, dealing with only one case).
As most (or even all) Danish series I’ve seen, this was of very high quality. The acting, the plot, the scenery. For instance, one of the last episodes was (ostensibly) set in Afghanistan and though I’ve never been there, I thought, judging by the news footage I’ve seen, that it was made very realistic. I’m guessing it was shot in the Balkans somewhere. (Slovenia?)
One of the ‘problems’ I had with season 1 (one that I have with many otherwise great cop series) is that there were too few main characters. In this case, there’s only one, detective Sara Lund though there are recurring minor characters, for instance Sara Lund’s mother and son, as well as her boss, Lennart Brix.
She’s considered a brilliant cop, but not very socially competent. The first season ends with her in disgrace. Season 2 opens with her ‘exiled’ to the border police, where she lives alone, in a bare rented home.
A series of brutal murders puzzling her former homicide detective colleagues leads to her being called back to Copenhagen. Many people dislike the decision and fight to keep her out of the case. Her boss reluctantly tries to balance his position between her and his own bosses, one of which seems to be his lover (Ruth Hedeby).
Soon there are leads pointing to the army and a suspected war crime committed in Afghanistan. Even from the start it’s clear that there’s also a tie-in with the government.
I won’t go into the twists and turns of the case, I’ll just say that though some of the politics (a parallel plotline is set in national politics) were a bit boring, the plot was nowhere near as complex (as in too complex) as in the first season. All in all it was exciting and fascinating to follow the police work and the lives of the politicians too.
In fact, I will say something about the politicians. Unexpectedly, there were some very sweet slash vibes between two unlikely people, as well as some male/female bonding.
Another plotline dealt with the Danish army and there too, was some pretty cool (platonic) bonding between two rather unexpected people.
The ending was excellent, with the suspense building then declining temporarily, to climax in a brilliant finale. This time, I approved far more of the ending, I might add. No disappointment lingering after the last scene.
Fortunately, there’s already a season 3 on the way and I can’t wait to see it.
I also just found out that Swedish and Danish tv are working on a joint project, another cop series, ‘The Bridge’ (Broen/Bron, estimated release 2011) that promises to be just as good as ‘The Crime’. (The bridge mentioned in the title is the bridge crossing the sea between southern Sweden and Denmark.)
I know I’ve been complaining about the tv series from the second half of the 00’s until now, but I guess I’ll need to revise my opinions a little, thanks to the Danes (and to some extent Swedish tv).
If you get a chance to see Forbrydelsen 2 I think you should. Maybe even buy the DVD box. Since I’ve already seen it and know the ending, I probably won’t, but I don’t think it will disappoint anyone.
Reflections on music and movies
I’m a big fan of 80’s music. From what I can tell, without being an expert at music, the songs made in those days really were good, no matter how you define ‘good’. In any case, I’m not the only one who thinks so. I rather like 90’s music too, but not quite as much. The same goes for 7ö’s music and older music as far back as to the 1950’s.
Lately, I’ve begun to realize that at least in my opinion, the 90’s was a time of great tv series and movies. That didn’t dawn on me until relatively recently, when I was considering the lack of good tv series these days. Up until 2004 or so, there were still a few good series coming along and movies too, but from then on they’ve become more and more scarce. Fortunately, there are still exceptions but I’m dreading a future when no good tv or film will be made. But to use an expression from the Oz books: no need to borrow trouble. Here we say ‘don’t grieve over a day you haven’t seen’. Who knows? The current penchant for ‘reality’ tv and game shows might vanish.
Facebook again
As some of you know, I a while back, was debating with myself whether I should join Facebook or not. The end result of that was that I reluctantly signed up. I used to be very negative, but in fact I’ve gradually changed my mind.
It’s like with me being vegan (except the other way around) – on the one hand I’m sorry there aren’t many more delicious flavors of icecream, pralines etc that I can eat (I’m also lactose intolerant), but on the other, I’m grateful I can’t eat those things anymore. If I could, I’d probably be even fatter than I am. (Ok, I’m not exactly fat, but a bit overweight, especially now.)
With Facebook one reason I like it are the games, but those games make me waste even more time there, so the less said about that the better. However, in my defence, I really need a distraction from my life so I’m not apologizing either. I do what I have to do.
Apart from the games, I have come to realize that Facebook has its advantages. Again, some of them might be disadvantages at the same time.
‘Everyone’ is there. It annoys me, but it’s undeniably good to be able to reach all my friends in one place. Almost all my friends (a few are still holding out and I admire that, but I still wish I had a way to contact them more easily).
The ads – strangely enough I like them. Normally, I hate ads, but these seem to be a little targeted and it makes me think I could use them for my own advertising. I’ve found so many useful links in those ads, that I hope other people appreciate them as well. LOL. I never thought I’d say this, but it’s true.
As you must know, I also have causes that I’m passionate about. Facebook (as well as Twitter) is an ideal place to promote them. I only hope it will help. Still, given that ‘everyone’ is there, it should help a little at least.
So, I guess all in all, I have to say that Facebook is alright. Nothing is perfect, but so far I haven’t regretted signing up.
Östersund
The first place is Östersund. The reason I’m so interested in this town is that I used to live there, for a while when I was very young. As far as I can remember now, i was very happy there. It’s a beautiful town, in a beautiful spot. The entire region is beautiful, but I’ll go into that in a later post.
It says on Wikipedia that Östersund is the only town in present day Sweden to have been founded and chartered in the 18 century. I didn’t know that. What I did know was that people from the south colonised it, to tax the free farmers who lived up there and were more or less independent of any king of archbishop.
The town lies on the shore of a lake, and in the lake there’s an island where many of the town’s inhabitants live. One of Sweden’s most famous composers made his home there and the house is open for visitors today. There’s a runestone on the island, the world’s northernmost runestone.
Just like Loch Ness, Storsjön (The big lake) has a monster! In fact, at least one other lake in Sweden supposedly has one, but Storsjöodjuret is the most famous.
There’s a lot more to say about Östersund, but I want to keep this short. I’ll just say that I have many fond childhood memories from Östersund.
More history
As part of my historic blog posts, I’m going to post a little about a town/city or other area here in Sweden. Obviously, I’ll focus on the history of the place, but I might also go into some other facts.
