Although Helene wrote to the Marks & Co. bookstore for twenty years, starting in 1949, she didn't actually get to travel to London until 1971, when she did things up right and stayed there for a month, getting to know a wide variety of people and being (as far as I can tell) incandescently happy.
Although I loved The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, and loved all that I learned from it about London and Great Britain, my favorite part of it was actually reading Helene's memories of how she first started educating herself through books:
"But Oxford I have to see. There's one suite of freshman's rooms at Trinity College which John Donne, John Henry Newman and Arthur Quiller-Couch all lived in, in various long-gone eras. Whatever I know about writing English those three men taught me, and before I die I want to stand in their freshman's rooms and call their names blessed.
Q (Quiller-Couch) was all by himself my college education. I went down to the public library one day when I was seventeen looking for books on the art of writing, and found five books of lectures which Q had delivered to this students of writing at Cambridge.
'Just what I need!' I congratulated myself. I hurried home with the first volume and started reading and got to page 3 and hit a snag:
Q was lecturing to young men educated at Eton and Harrow. He therefore assumed that his students--including me--had read Paradise Lost as a matter of course and would understand his analysis of the 'Invocation to Light' in Book 9. So I said, 'Wait here,' and went down to the library and got Paradise Lost and took it home and started reading it and got to page 3, when I hit a snag:
Milton assumed I'd read the Christian version of Isaiah and the New Testament and had learned all about Lucifer and the War in Heaven, and since I'd been reared in Judaism I hadn't. So I said, 'Wait here,' and borrowed a Christian Bible..."
This is the way most learning should take place. I like the idea of the book being propped open till you're ready and then going back to it.
I've started Hanff's book on Elizabeth I. Excellent. Some of it is familiar to me, but it is answering questions I didn't even know I had.
Hanff has a flowing style.
Posted by: Mrs. Thornton | 15 April 2009 at 08:27 AM
I agree, Mrs. Thornton. I wish I had unlimited time to follow up learning in books, and also that I had been smarter about doing that for myself when I was a kid and DID have time.
Helene is excellent. Period. Glad you're liking Elizabeth I.
Posted by: Citizen Reader | 15 April 2009 at 10:16 AM
I took Greek and Latin in college specifically because I was tired of coming across untranslated terms in those languages in older books. It was such a thrill the first time I encountered a word printed in Greek and actually knew what it meant!
Posted by: Jessica | 15 April 2009 at 11:17 AM
Jessica,
Wow. Color me impressed. I certainly never got around to taking anything like Greek and Latin. I think you and Helene would have gotten along!
Do you remember any of your greek and latin these days?
Posted by: Citizen Reader | 15 April 2009 at 12:33 PM
Very enjoyable posts on Helene Hanff. Thanks!
Posted by: Bookie | 15 April 2009 at 12:33 PM
You may have broken me down... I just printed out the location of 84, Charing Cross at the library and am going after work. Are you happy now?!
Posted by: Brian | 15 April 2009 at 01:11 PM
Bookie,
I'm so glad you're liking them. I am obssessed with Helene, I admit it.
Brian:
Yes!! (Very happy, as a matter of fact! I wish I was going to the library to get it for the first time.) Oh, I hope you'll like it. Pop back in and let me know what you think, okay?
Posted by: Citizen Reader | 15 April 2009 at 01:19 PM
and guess what I did yesterday! I bought 84, Charing Cross Road (and was dismayed how few pages it had) and finished 90% of while waiting for an author event to start! So very delightful.
Should I avoid the movie? (Am I skewing this comment thread inappropriately?)
Posted by: Care | 16 April 2009 at 06:25 AM
Care!
That is AWESOME. That is my one complaint with all of Hanff's books--they're all too short. I'd like lots more pages of Helene.
By all means see the movie. I did and completely enjoyed it; they did a nice job with it, I think, and it was nice to see Anthony Hopkins not playing a serial killer. Actually, the more I think about it, there were some wonderful little moments in the film that augment the book. Perfect. The whole 84, Charing Cross Road experience has been perfect, I must say, and how many experiences in life can one say that about?
Posted by: Citizen Reader | 16 April 2009 at 09:02 AM
Oh, that's wonderful. That really is literature, all those allusions and interwoven thoughts.
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