Daily Book Excerpt: Adult fiction:
Next book on the shelf is The Small Rain
At last I can stop bitch-slapping one of my favorite authors!! It’s okay, Madeleine – you wrote, what, 150 books? It’s okay if a couple of ’em are stinkers.
The Small Rain is L’Engle’s first novel – and for a first novel it is rather extraordinary. She has a firm hand, it’s a sweeping story covering many years, and she never seems to be self-indulgent or showing off or lingering on her own good prose. It’s quite marvelous. She was in her early 20s when this was published – an actress, touring the country in plays – she wrote most of this book sitting backstage in many theatres. I love that. You can feel the atmosphere in the book – at least I can.
There are some issues with the book – it probably could be broken up into a series – like her other books – We follow her heroine, Katherine Forrester – from when she’s 8 to when she’s 24 or something like that. It’s a bit much. But still – that’s a quibble. Katherine is interesting enough to spend all that time with. AND – many many years later -in the 1980s (Small Rain was published in 1945) L’Engle wrote a sequel – which is called The Severed Wasp – Katherine Forrester now in her late 70s or 80s – and that book is one of my favorites of all of L’Engle’s books. It’s an amazing accomplishment.
Katherine Forrester is the child of two accomplished musicians. She grows up sitting backstage at Carnegie Hall. She is a serious child, who is a musical prodigy herself. L’Engle writes about people who have a VOCATION so so well. Whether they are scientists, priests, mothers (yes, I see that as a vocation – and some have more of a CALLING for it than others), actors, writers – whatever. L’Engle understands people who have grand passions that sweep away all else. People who are serious artists are often not understood by the larger population – (as in: “Do you need to practice 4 hours a day? Can’t you come out and play?” or “Why are you staying in on a Friday night to write? Everyone needs downtime!” Etc.) L’Engle writes about learning how to balance the demands of real life with the demands of art (or your vocation) – and how you just can’t worry too much about making people happy. She writes about that in her own life as well. She was HAPPY when she took time out of mothering to write – locked her door – let the kids fend for themselves for a couple of hours. Without that time writing, L’Engle would have been no good to anybody. Someone who doesn’t have that OTHER vocation – would look at that as neglect, would look at L’Engle’s behavior as selfish. And you know what? It is. Nobody ever said being an artist was a SOCIAL thing to do. It is blatantly anti-social – and artists for the most part are okay with that. Katherine Forrester is, from the very beginning, kind of anti-social. Music is her only love. She gets lost in it. She sits at the piano and just GOES … wherever it is that she goes.
The intricacies of the plot are lost to me – it’s been a while since I read it – but I know that eventually her mother loses the ability to play piano (her hands are ruined?? In an accident?) and eventually, she dies – (argh – sorry, can’t remember) – and it is such a loss, and so horrible – that Katherine is sent away to boarding school. Which is HORRIFIC for her. She has no privacy. She is not a social girl. She also has a slightly deformed hip – which means she has a limp – This is immediately noticeable to people and the girls in the school tease her about it. She is only “allowed” to play piano for an hour a day. Which is agony for her. It’s like cutting her off from the wellspring of life! In a way, it ends up being a blessing – because eventually – Katherine makes a friend (Sarah) – and Sarah too has a vocation – she wants to be an actress – so she doesn’t think it weird at all that Katherine would rather sit at the piano than play ping-pong or just sit around reading magazines. Sarah ends up betraying Katherine in a big BIG way (I remember being kind of devastated when I first read it … like: how could she do that???) – but that’s what happens sometimes between girls. When a man comes into the picture. It sucks.
Uhm – not sure what else happens. Katherine loses her virginity to a childhood friend named Charlot – a sweet character – She’s 17, 18, something like that. He asks her to marry him and she is basically like, “Uhm, no.” Finally, her term at boarding school ends, she’s 18 – and she’s able to be on her own. So she moves to Greenwich Village – into her mother’s old apartment (I love L’Engle’s description of that apartment on 10th Street – beautiful) – and begins her serious work as an independent artist. She practices for hours a day. She ends up meeting a group of real bohemians (and remember – this takes place in the late 30s – a very different New York back then) – actors, artists, playwrights – and the world of Greenwich Village, and its nightclubs, and night life opens up to her. She runs into Sarah again (this is before the betrayal – which basically ends the book). Sarah is in New York, trying to be an actress. Katherine begins to date Pete – something’s not quite RIGHT there, though … I like how L’Engle refuses to let things be NEAT. Because life isn’t neat. Pete seems perfect. But you just know that something is not quite right …
The book ends with Katherine alone again, with her music. Sarah has chosen Pete – and it’s a betrayal – but as long as there is still music to play, Katherine will survive.
Now the beauty of all of this is; if you have gotten into this whole plot, if you have really invested in Katherine’s journey (which I did) – to then go and read the stupendous Severed Wasp – and find out what happened to Katherine is just unbelievably satisfying. World War II, her children, her marriage, her career … It really works. I am so glad that L’Engle decided to close that circle of her first novel.
Small Rain is a lovely book, full of well-drawn characters – and I love what it has to say about dedication to your art, whatever your art may be. I found this reader review on Amazon which pretty much sums it up:
As a pianist, I was deeply inspired by Katherine’s sheer determination and drive. She is a very admirable character, and by the end of the book, I felt like I had made a new friend. I read the book two years ago for the first time, and was amazed at the depth and understanding that Madeleine wrote with–she seemed to fully understand the feelings and struggles of the musician, I felt that I could empathise with Katherine, and to me that is very important in a book. I’ve started reading it again, and was totally inspired to work and work with my music. I have been going through a dry period with my music and have not felt much like practicing. Upon reading this book for the second time, that has changed. I am now inspired, and have been practicing 3 hours a day. I feel like I am a born again musician. It’s a thrill. I recommend this book for everyone who really wants to feel and empathise with a character, and especially for those of you who are musicians or artists.
Gorgeous.
Here’s an excerpt from the whole boarding school section of the book. Katherine is aching to play more, aching for serious piano study … It’s literally like she has been ripped away from her own oxygen source. And I think maybe her parents intervened? Told the school to let her play more, or get her a good teacher? Can’t remember.
Excerpt from a href=”http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0374519129?ie=UTF8&tag=thesheivari-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0374519129″>The Small Rain
But the next morning Miss Halsey called Katherine up to her desk, told her that her music master was back in Montreux, that his name was Monsieur Justin Michel Vigneras, that her first lesson was to be at five that afternoon – adding crossly that Monsieur Vigneras was the most expensive of music masters and that she hoped Katherine would apply herself to her piano lessons better than she had to her schoolwork.
At five Katherine knocked on his door in the Music and Art building, her heart beating violently, because she was almost sure that it was the door to the studio from which the music had poured so wonderfully the night before. The same pleasant French voice said, “Come in: and she pushed the door open and stood in the doorway.
Monsieur Justin Michel Vigneras did not turn around. He stood leaning against the piano, looking bored and sulky, and this expression seemed even more like Charlot than the composed adult one of the night before. Sheila was at the piano, struggling with a Mozart Sonatina. She looked up in relief as Katherine arrived, jumped up quickly, and ran her fingers through the permanent wave that had become frizzy from the indignant washings of Miss Anderson, the school nurse.
Monsieur Vigneras’ mouth set. “Finish,” he said.
Sheila pouted, sat down, and began the Sonatina again.
“Not the whole thing.” Justin Michel Vigneras raised his eyebrows. “Just from where you left off, please.”
“I don’t remember where I left off.” Sheila stuck her hands out in front of her. The girls were not allowed to have long or lacquered fingernails, but Sheila had managed to keep the little finger of her left hand free from inspection, and the nail curved out from it, long and pointed, in contrast to the short clipped nails on her other fingers.
Justin Michel Vigneras pointed to the music. “Here. Begin here.”
Sheila began to play and labored through to the end. “May I go now?”
“You certainly may. And if this term you would kindly practice at least half an hour between lessons, it would be less painful to us both.”
“I practice half an hour every day except Friday, Saturday, and Sunday – that’s the week’s end,” Sheila said righteously.
“And play at least one scale a week.”
“All right,” Sheila said, her pout gone and her best smile on, the heavy bands on her teeth in childish contrast to her permanent wave. “Good-bye, monsieur.”
“Good-bye. And cut that absurd fingernail.” He took a white silk handkerchief with a blue border out of his pocket and blew his nose. Then he turned to Katherine, looking at her for the first time as Sheila went by her and shut the door.
He smiled at her, and she thought — It must have been an omen, his playing last night, and my hearing him. I’m glad I felt so awful and had to run and run. Otherwise, none of it would have happened —
“Are you my little friend of last night?” he asked.
“Yes. I am.”
“Your name, please?”
“Katherine Forrester.”
“What age have you?”
“Fifteen.”
“You have studied the piano before?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. Play something for me. Something not too long. I will probably stop you before you get very far, anyhow.”
Katherine sat down at the piano; her hands felt cold and clammy; she was trembling. She reached up and felt for her mother’s locket with unsteady fingers. — I’m behaving like an idiot, a damned idiot — she said to herself. — If I let myself get all panicky like this I’ll play badly. Mother’d be disgusted with me. — She clenched her hands tightly together for a moment to steady them, then began a Scarlatti Sonata. Once she had begun to play, the fear left her. Her sureness of the music gave her courage, and she played well. When she had finished, Monsieur Vigneras was no longer leaning against the piano.
But the first thing he said was, “Do you speak French?”
“Yes, a little,” Katherine answered, surprised and rather disappointed, because his English was very good and she knew she had played well. “I understand it all right.”
He spoke in French. When he spoke his own language, his voice deepened and a new warmth came. “Play something else.”
Katherine turned back to the piano and played the Bach Prelude and Fugue in F major.
“Now some Beethoven.” When she had finished he asked, “With whom have you studied?”
“With my mother.”
“Who is your mother?”
“Julie Forrester.”
“Is she a musician?”
“Yes, she — she –” Katherine’s face grew crimson because he didn’t know her mother was dead. “She was a very well known pianist in America.”
“I will look her up. Where is she?” So he hadn’t noticed the past tense.
“She — she’s dead.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. When?”
“Last April. The seventeenth.”
“She was training you to be a pianist?”
“Yes.”
“Then why in God’s name are you here?”
“Father wanted me to have some conventional education. I haven’t been to school since I was ten. And I don’t imagine he and Aunt Manya much wanted me around.”
“Who is Aunt Manya?”
“My father’s wife … They love me a lot, both of them, and I love them, I adore them both, but after all, what would they do with me? I’d just be in the way, and Aunt Manya’s opening in London …”
“Opening what?”
“Opening in a play.”
“Oh. Well, we’ll see what I can do for you. Have you done much Chopin?”
“The Etudes and the F major Ballade. Just because I wanted to, though. I wasn’t really ready for it.”
“Well, we’ll see what I can do for you. You shouldn’t be here. Half an hour’s practice every day.”
“I’ll do more. I’ll sneak it in somehow.”
She was suddenly terribly happy, with that sudden winging up of something inside her breast that seemed like the flight of a bird. She sang as she left the Music and Art building and went back to school, sang as she walked down the corridor, until Miss Halsey stopped her sharply. –I don’t care — she thought angrily, trying to keep the wonderful feeling from going. –I can learn here, the way Mother would have wanted me to. I’ll study and make her proud of me. Nothing else matters–
She slipped out of the preparation hall and upstairs to one of the empty practice rooms. It wasn’t used because the piano was so bad, but it was better than nothing. She went in and shut the door, standing by the window in the dark. The mountain sloped in terraces down to the lights of Montreux and the lake; and across the lake the mountains of France stood, shadowy in spite of the clear outline the snow gave them against the sky. Two lake steamers were moving slowly on the water in opposite directions, two small bands of gold lights approaching each other and crossing. In a straight line down the mountain ran the funicular, and, winding around, ran the small train. They were the only lights on the mountainside, and they seemed like something magic. Leaning there with her nose pressed against the windowpane, Katherine suddenly felt a sense of peace and strength. “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help,” she whispered, then withdrew from the window, turned on the unprotected ceiling light that glared down at her, sat down at the dreadful piano with the squeaking pedals and practiced until time for dinner. She went into dinner with a consciousness of her strength, of great indifference to the things that had been making her so miserable — a consciousness that was too conscious to be real.
