Book Chat

书聊

The Northbridge library has a Book Chat meeting every second Friday of a month. The last meeting was held on Friday last, 10th December 2022 but I missed that meeting as I had another prior family engagement. I did attend that November meeting on Friday, November 8th. The twelve attendees to that meeting discussed the books they had read and the reasons why they were recommending them to other members.

I had taken notes of all their recommendations and the four novels that I intend to discuss in this article are:

(a) Half Life by Jillian Cantor

(b) Still Life by Sarah Winman

(c) The First Cadfael Omnibus by Ellis Peters

and (d) The Forgetting by Sharon Cameron

Northbridge 图书馆每个月的第二个星期五都会举行读书会。最后一次会议是在上周五，即 2022 年 12 月 10 日举行的，但我错过了那次会议，因为我之前有另一次家庭活动。我确实参加了 11 月 8 日星期五举行的 11 月会议。参加那次会议的十二位与会者讨论了他们读过的书以及他们向其他成员推荐这些书的原因。
我已经记下了他们的所有建议，我打算在本文中讨论的四本小说是：
(a) 吉莉安康托尔 (Jillian Cantor) 的《半条命》
(b) 莎拉·温曼 (Sarah Winman) 的《静物》
(c) 埃利斯彼得斯 的《第一个 Cadfael Omnibus》
(d) 沙龙卡梅伦 的《遗忘》
 

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( a ) Half Life by Jillian Cantor

What can happen to us if, in life, we choose to take an alternative decision at a crossroad of our life? Personally, there are many such ‘ Y ‘ crossroads in my life. As an example, at the age of 22: What if I continued with life as a school teacher, without taking steps to follow the Quantity Surveying profession? Then, at the age of 30: What if I continued working for the Singapore Government and did not start my own private practice as a Chartered Surveyor consultant? Then, at the age of 39: What if I did not choose to immigrate to New Zealand with my family members of six - wife, mother, and four children?

(a) 吉莉安康托尔 (Jillian Cantor) 的《半条命》

如果我们在人生的十字路口选择另一种决定，我们会发生什么？就个人而言，我的生活中有很多这样的“Y”十字路口。例如，在 22 岁时：如果我继续担任学校教师而不采取步骤从事工料测量专业怎么办？然后，在 30 岁时：如果我继续为新加坡政府工作，而不是作为特许测量师顾问开始自己的私人执业怎么办？那么，在39岁的时候：如果我没有选择和我的六个家庭成员——妻子、母亲和四个孩子一起移民新西兰呢？

This story “Half Life” by Jillian Cantor, relates to the life of Marie Curie, the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. Way back in the year 1891, Marie Curie (then Marya Sklodowska), in Poland, was engaged to a budding mathematician, Kazimierz Zorawski. But when his mother insisted Marya was not good enough for Kazimierz, he broke off the engagement and a heartbroken Marya left Poland for Paris to study Chemistry and Physics. She went on to discover radium in 1910. Radium is a chemical element with the symbol Ra and atomic number 88. It is the sixth element n Group 2 of the periodic table, also known as the alkaline earth metals. Radium is used in luminous paint and was once used as a portable source of neutrons. It is still used in medicine to produce radon gas for cancer treatment. https://youtu.be/Cr4JO9SefVs

Jillian Cantor 的小说《半条命》讲述了第一位获得诺贝尔奖的女性居里夫人的一生。时间回溯到 1891 年，波兰的居里夫人（当时的 Marya Sklodowska）与一位崭露头角的数学家 Kazimierz Zorawski 订婚了。但当他的母亲坚持认为 Marya 配不上 Kazimierz 时，他取消了婚约，伤心欲绝的 Marya 离开波兰前往巴黎学习化学和物理。 1910 年，她继续发现镭。镭是一种化学元素，符号为 Ra，原子序数为 88。它是元素周期表第 2 族的第六元素，也称为碱土金属。镭用于夜光涂料，曾被用作便携式中子源。它仍然在医学上用于产生治疗癌症的氡气。

The question that this book considers is this:

what if Marie had made a different choice?

What if she had stayed in Poland, married Kazimierz, and never attended the Sorbonne or discovered radium? What if Marie had chosen her first love and a life of domesticity, still ravenous for knowledge in Russian Poland where education for women was restricted, instead of studying science in Paris and meeting Pierre Curie?

Half Life is a powerful story of love and friendship, motherhood and sisterhood, fame and anonymity – and of a woman destined to change the world.

本书考虑的问题是：
如果玛丽做出不同的选择怎么办？
如果她留在波兰，嫁给卡齐米日，从未上过索邦大学或发现过镭，会怎样？如果玛丽选择了她的初恋和家庭生活，仍然渴望在女性教育受到限制的俄属波兰学习知识，而不是在巴黎学习科学并会见皮埃尔居里，那会怎样？
《半条命》是一个关于爱情和友情、母性和姐妹情、名誉和匿名——以及一个注定要改变世界的女人的有力故事。

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( b ) Still Life by Sarah Winman https://youtu.be/imqgJUQywPs

This book is totally worth reading. It started off in Florence, in Italy, during World War II when a young British soldier, Ulysses, (barely 25) came across an elderly historian, Miss Evelyn Skinner, 64. She was commissioned to help identify masterpieces hidden in the Tuscan hills to protect them from theft and destruction. When Ulysses questioned the relevance of her work amid the human carnage of war, she had her answer all ready: “Beautiful art opens our eyes to the beauty of the world, Ulysses. It repositions our sight and judgment. Captures forever that which is fleeting,” Evelyn said. “Art versus humanity is not the question, Ulysses. One does not exist without the other.” Ulysses remembered these words of Evelyn’s and in the following decades, Ulysses met many interesting characters who tested the notion of Evelyn’s “Art versus Humanity”.

The themes of this novel are many but those that were sticking out most would be family, chosen family, friendship, love, art, and culture.

Due to some unforeseen circumstances, Ulysses found himself back in Italy living in Florence again with his chosen family. There were many characters in this story but the author had word-painted each of such characters with their flaws and beauties so realistically.

Sarah Whitman had placed a little bit of magic into this book that makes this book getting us to give it a five-star rating.

莎拉·温曼 (Sarah Winman) 的《静物》

这本书完全值得一读。它始于第二次世界大战期间意大利的佛罗伦萨，当时一名年轻的英国士兵尤利西斯（年仅 25 岁）遇到了一位年长的历史学家，64 岁的伊夫林斯金纳小姐。她受命帮助鉴定隐藏在托斯卡纳山丘中的杰作保护它们免遭盗窃和破坏。当尤利西斯在人类的战争大屠杀中质疑她的工作的相关性时，她准备好了她的回答：“美丽的艺术让我们看到了世界的美丽，尤利西斯。它重新定位了我们的视线和判断力。永远捕捉转瞬即逝的东西，”伊夫林说。 “艺术与人类不是问题，尤利西斯。缺一不可。”尤利西斯记住了伊夫林的这句话，在接下来的几十年里，尤利西斯遇到了许多有趣的人物，他们检验了伊夫林的“艺术与人性”的概念。
这本小说的主题很多，但最突出的是家庭、选择的家庭、友谊、爱情、艺术和文化。
由于一些不可预见的情况，尤利西斯发现自己回到了意大利，与他选择的家人再次住在佛罗伦萨。这个故事中有很多人物，但作者把每个人物的缺点和美都写得如此逼真。
莎拉·惠特曼 (Sarah Whitman) 在这本书中加入了一点魔力，使这本书让我们给它五星级的评价。

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( c ) The First Cadfael Omnibus by Ellis Peters

As a character, Cadfael is a conversationalist, entering the monastery in his forties only after being both a soldier and a sailor; this experience allowed him to acquire a range of talents and skills in monastic life. He was a skilled observer of human nature and a brilliant expert in herbal medicine (a skill he learned from Muslims in the Holy Land). He is naturally curious, energetic, and has an innate sense of justice and impartiality. The Abbot called on him to serve as a medical examiner, detective, doctor and diplomat. His worldly knowledge, while useful, entangles him with the series’ more dogmatic characters, and the seemingly paradoxical tension between the worldly and spiritual worlds becomes the central and ongoing theme of the story. Some of the men, by contrast, were young boys who had just started school, or who had gone into seclusion in their teens. Such monks were known as ‘puer oblatus’ or ‘oblates’ in the days of these novels. Many of Cadfael’s brother monks were sent to monasteries as children. The Abbot, Abbot Radulfus, instituted a policy of not admitting these young people into the monasterial life except for the purpose of attending school to receive a Catholic equation.

埃利斯彼得斯 的《第一个 Cadfael Omnibus》

Cadfael 窗口，什鲁斯伯里修道院。作为一个角色，Cadfael 是一个健谈的人，四十多岁时他既是一名士兵又是一名水手才进入修道院；这段经历使他在修道院生活中获得了一系列才能和技能。他是人性的熟练观察者，也是草药方面的杰出专家（他从圣地的穆斯林那里学到的一项技能）。他天生好奇、精力充沛，并且具有与生俱来的（尽管是现代的）正义感和公正感。方丈号召他担任法医、侦探、医生和外交官。他的世俗知识虽然有用，却使他与该系列中更教条的角色纠缠在一起，世俗世界与精神世界之间看似矛盾的紧张关系成为故事的中心和持续主题。相比之下，有些男人是刚开始上学的小男孩，或者在十几岁时就隐居了。在这些小说时代，这些僧侣被称为“puer oblatus”或“oblates”。 Cadfael 的许多修道士兄弟在孩提时代就被送往修道院。方丈拉杜尔福斯 (Abbot Radulfus) 制定了一项政策，不允许这些年轻人进入修道院生活，除非是为了上学接受天主教方程式。

The story is set between 1137 and 1145, in Anarchy, between King Stephen and Queen Maud. Many real historical events are described or mentioned in the book. For example, St Winifred to Shrewsbury Abbey is fictional in the first Chronicle, a morbid taste of bones, and too many corpses inspired by Stephen’s 1138 visit to Shrewsbury Siege of Shrewsbury Castle. The burning of Worcester sent these characters running into The Virgin on Ice. The looting of Winchester and the burning of the abbey there sends the monks at the center of the story to Shrewsbury Abbey. Excellent mystery. In Dead Man’s Ransom, the fictional characters are involved with the Welsh group who take part in the anarchy at the Battle of Lincoln, drawing the historic Prince Owain (Gwynedd Owain) into the plot. Queen Maud’s brief stop in London to try to get her coronation sanctioned during Stephen’s imprisonment was the starting point for a character in the show The Hateful Pilgrim.

故事设定在1137年至1145年之间， 无政府状态 ，是介于 史蒂芬国王 和 莫德皇后 。书中描述或提到了许多真实的历史事件。例如， 圣温妮弗雷德 至 什鲁斯伯里修道院 在第一个编年史中是虚构的， 骨头的病态味道 ， 和 一具尸体太多 灵感来自1138年史蒂芬（Stephen）对什鲁斯伯里（Shrewsbury）城堡的围攻。伍斯特（Worcester）的焚烧使这些角色奔跑而入 冰上的处女 。温彻斯特的掠夺和那里修道院的焚毁将故事中心的僧侣送到了什鲁斯伯里修道院。 极好的奥秘 。在 死人的赎金，这些虚构人物参与了威尔士小组，他们参与了林肯战役中的无政府状态，将历史悠久的王子奥文（Gwynedd Owain）吸引到情节中。莫德皇后短暂停留在伦敦，试图将她关押在斯蒂芬期间的加冕典礼获得批准，这是该剧中一个人物的出发点 仇恨的朝圣者 。布洛瓦（Blois）外套的亨利（Henry）的下一轮转变和斯蒂芬国王（Sting King）的不断上升的命运都牵涉到了方丈，并派出了三名新人进入密苏里州的Foregate和修道院。 掠夺者之掠夺 。的一个主要角色 艾顿森林的隐士 莫德皇后（Empress Maud）被困在牛津城堡（Oxford Castle）时被赶到了什罗普郡（Shropshire）。在 波特的领域 ，休·贝林加（Hugh Beringar）的部队被召唤到芬斯（Fens），以帮助史蒂芬国王（Stephen King）控制暴乱 杰弗里·德·曼德维尔（Geoffrey de Mandeville），艾塞克斯伯爵（Ears of Essex）;回来后，治安官仔细检查了一个从该地区逃脱并回到什罗普郡的角色的故事。之间的争吵 奥因·格温德（Owain Gwynedd） 故事讲述了卡德瓦拉德（Cadwaladr）谋杀威尔士南部公国王子的行为，以及他的浮躁小弟弟卡德瓦拉德（Cadwaladr），以及推动将罗马礼仪传播到威尔士的故事。 丹麦人的夏天.

The next turn of Henry in the Blois coat and the rising fortunes of the Sting King implicate the Abbot, sending three newcomers into the Foregate and Abbey in Missouri. Predator’s plunder. One of the main characters in The Hermit of Ayton Forest was cast out to Shropshire when Empress Maud was trapped at Oxford Castle. In Potter’s Field, Hugh Beringar’s troops are called to the Fens to help Stephen King contain the riot Geoffrey de Mandeville , Earl of Essex; on his return, the Sheriff scrutinized the story of a character who had escaped from the area and returned to Shropshire. The quarrel between Owain Gwynedd and the story of Cadwaladr’s murder of the Prince of the Southern Welsh Principality, his impetuous little brother Cadwaladr, and the push to The story of the transmission of Roman etiquette to Wales.

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( d ) The Forgetting by Sharon Cameron

沙龙卡梅伦 的《遗忘》

There is this walled city of Canaan.

Once every twelve years, the entire population forgets, cannot remember everything in the past.  The entire city becomes a city of lawlessness and bloodshed. 

Some of the more educated citizens rely on their dairies to remember who they are and what they have done in their past.

Teenager Nadia is not like all the other citizens, however.  Somehow, she can remembers everything.  She has been scaling the city’s walls to escape from the city of Canaan to the other side of the wall where such ‘forgetting’ is not norm.

Then the charming Gray catches her and demands that she take him over the wall as well.  She cannot refuse him for fear of being reported to the governing Council. 

The story continues with a world-shattering truth revealed in the second half of the novel.  The sweet romance between Nadia and Gray is hard earned and realistic. 

Memory and how it shapes our future is at the heart of this absorbing story.

有这座有城墙的迦南城。
每十二年一次，整个人口都会忘记，无法记住过去的一切。整个城市变成了无法无天和流血的城市。
一些受教育程度较高的公民依靠他们的日记来记住他们是谁以及他们过去做过什么。
然而，少年纳迪亚并不像所有其他公民。不知何故，她能记住一切。她一直在攀登城墙，以便从迦南城逃到城墙的另一边，而这种“遗忘”并不常见。
然后迷人的格雷抓住了她，要求她也带他翻墙。她不能拒绝他，怕被报告给理事会。
故事继续，小说后半部分揭示了一个惊天动地的真相。 Nadia 和 Gray 之间的甜蜜浪漫来之不易且现实。
记忆及其如何塑造我们的未来是这个引人入胜的故事的核心。

鄧麗君 Teresa Teng 遺忘 Forgotten https://youtu.be/lVbgXEgBkSo

为什么你走得那么遥远
像一缕淡淡轻烟消失天边
你说过我们俩还要再见
到今天我才知道那是谎言
你已有新侣伴
哪管我情可堪
我只有思量
怎么把你遗忘
为什么你走得那么遥远
像一缕淡淡轻烟消失天边
你说过我们俩还要再见
到今天我才知道那是谎言
你已有新侣伴
哪管我情可堪
我只有思量
怎么把你遗忘
你已有新侣伴
哪管我情可堪
我只有思量
怎么把你遗忘