So Many Bookmarks

Jenny wrote a post recently on bookmarks, and I would just like to say here at the outset that she snitched my idea. I was considering doing that same post (only about my bookmarks, not hers) on that same day, and what do I find when I look at her blog? She got there before me! This is what happens when your brain is shared by another.

I like bookmarks. Memorizing page numbers gets tiresome and flipping around looking for one's spot in a book often leads to the unpleasant discovery of spoilers, so I nearly always use some form of marker to hold my spot. In a pinch I'll use a Kleenex. In even rarer instances I'll use a book's dustjacket, but that often leads to the disfigurement of said jacket, especially if the book is of significant size. Most of the time, however, I use a proper-ish bookmark.

I have a number of these lying about in my room, some more frequently used than others, some that have never been used at all. Right now I have a 2010 Alibris bookmark in Kidnapped - the colors coordinated and the quote on the bookmark, "There is no frigate like a book to take us lands away," seemed fitting for a Stevenson novel. It has puncture marks in it where Buster has gnawed it. In The Imitation of Christ I have a bookmark with Philippians 4:8. It's cracked in places, also where Buster gnawed it. I keep a pink Beatitudes bookmark with tassels in Faith's Checkbook, and amazingly, Buster has not gnawed that one.

Jenny pointed out in her post that clothing tags double as excellent bookmarks. I only have one of these: an elegant "Lapis" tag with a sleeping fairy on one side and a quote from A Midsummer Night's Dream on the back: "Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind." Rather an odd quote to use for a clothing brand, but I like it all the same. The bookmark is fairly new, but I expect I'll use it frequently.

Another new bookmark is one my cousin gave me. Titled "Old World," it has a picture of an antique map on it, a red beaded tassel at the top, and a quote (apparently by Confucius) at the bottom: "Wherever you go, go with all your heart." A little ironic, considering that I never go anywhere, but perhaps it's referring to the world of books.

A heap of others make the rounds through my books: a blue gilded one that says "Friends" (a gift, as you have no doubt guessed, from a friend!); a bland red-and-white "Trinity City Books" one that is only for mystery novels (don't ask me why); yellow and blue paint cards, the one with a canary on it, the other with a hydrangea. A bookmark made of wood or bamboo, handpainted somewhere exotic, is still in Red Moon and Black Mountain, which I have yet to finish. A little blue one, made by a friend and with the quote from The Song of Solomon "many waters cannot quench love," peeks out of Desiring God. If I poked, I would probably find a host of others still hiding in books. I try not to leave works unfinished, but sometimes even the best of intentions fail.

So you see, I have quite the host to choose from when I start a new book. And yet the other day when I had two books downstairs and no bookmarks at hand, what did I do? Tore an index card in half and used the pieces.

How typical.

Pieces of Eight

I didn't read Robert Louis Stevenson when I was a child, save for his poetry. I remember picking up my brother's copy of Treasure Island, determined to read it just to say I had; that resolution didn't last long. I can still recall confused ideas of pirates and blood and spots and a boy and money and maybe an inn and a mother - which I consider quite an accomplishment, as that sums up nearly the whole of the first chapter or two (which is as far as I got). But I was under the impression that the book was terrifying and gory and would have me cowering in fright, so I gave it up.

Thus went my first ill-fated foray into Stevenson's works. I didn't try again until last year, when in a fit of obstinacy and desperation I picked up The Master of Ballantrae - obstinacy because my sister-in-law, a wonderful judge of literature, had said she didn't like the book; desperation because it was one of those times where none of my books looked appealing, and I wanted something different.

I'll confess that I wouldn't advise others to begin their education in Stevenson by reading Ballantrae: it's a very odd sort of story. I liked it for the author's writing style and for the voice of the narrator, but the characters were nearly all hateful and nothing very riveting happened except one duel. And yet for some strange reason, I came out of it wanting to read more of Stevenson. (Maybe that was more of the obstinacy.) So last month I read Treasure Island, and now I'm reading Kidnapped, and Stevenson is fast becoming one of my favorite authors.

"...he seemed to pick the right word up on the point of his pen,
like a man playing spillikins."

- g. k. chesterton

So Chesterton described Stevenson's writing, and I can't help agreeing. His style is much blunter than, say, Dickens', but at the same time, it never wavers: it always remains constant. He always has that perfect word on the end of his pen. Sometimes I'll come out of the story to look at the writing itself, and I wonder if Stevenson ever had to sit there and stare at his paper until he could grasp the word he wanted, or if they always simply came to him. I'm sure they didn't, but in the finished product it is easy to wonder.

Another thing I have found interesting in reading these three books is the fact that all of them are written in first person, and yet the "voices" differ between them. In The Master of Ballantrae the narrator is an older man, so that is understandable; but in both Treasure Island and Kidnapped the protagonists are boys just becoming men, and I expected that the latter would have much the same tone as the former. Not so. They are each unique, each distinctly Jim Hawkins and David Balfour. Perhaps this is due to David's Scottish brogue compared to Jim's smoother English; perhaps it is because of the differences between the characters themselves. I admire it either way, and though I have never written a first-person novel, I hope that even my third-person narration pulls this off.

When I was first reading The Master of Ballantrae, I noticed that in some ways Stevenson's writing seems to resemble my own (although, of course, far better). I could hardly lay a finger to the reason, but that was the feeling I got; something about his style particularly speaks to me. Thus the reading can be a little frustrating, as I see elements that he captures superbly and that I want to understand and learn from: his balance of narrative and dialogue, in particular. I believe that in general he has more of the former (which is different from my writing, where I tend toward the latter), and yet I never find it heavy or want to skim - a temptation even when I read Dickens, grand as he is. That is something I admire and would wish to incorporate into my writing.

These, then, are my rambles concerning Robert Louis Stevenson.