3 days ago
‘The Handmaid's Tale was instrumental in my feminist coming-of-age'
I was intrigued by the savage turns of fortune in A Little Princess as well as by the descriptions of the lavish doll's clothes. Little House on the Prairie, by contrast, was a fantasy of wilderness living utterly foreign to me as an urban child. But both books troubled me, which is why I re-read them so often, I think, as I tried to figure out the underlying histories of imperialism. Re-reading them with my own kids I realised so many things that eluded me as a kid: the subplots of diamond mines in India under British colonialism, the appalling child poverty in London of A Little Princess. The mistreatment of Native Americans in the Little House books is a recurring theme: the character of Laura as a child is always questioning her mother's attitudes towards the traditional owners of the land. Both are brilliant books for kids that are also brilliant for adults.
My favourite classic read is Middlemarch every time. I came to it late but reread it about once a year: Dorothea Brooks, who doesn't accomplish anything the world acclaims but makes a difference to those around her, is a remarkable heroine. I always find new things to admire in the book: at the moment it's the scene at the start in which Dorothea admires the jewels left by her mother and thinks of keeping them near her 'to feed her eye at these little fountains of pure colour'. It's such a beautiful image of emeralds in sunlight.
