Prior to the two Australian newspaper series we’re using to reconstruct The Mystery of the Marsh, the novel appeared serialized in the New York Ledger during the period December 1882 — March 1883. You may recall that Smith moved from Europe to the United States in 1870, residing […]
The scene shifts to Paris, where Smith can draw upon his youthful experience of bohemian life in the Latin Quarter. A character in our upper echelon has gone there to take care of some … unfinished business — of the serious kind. Here we meet a new brand […]
What a presumption of Burcham’s that Lady Kate’s cousin Clara Meredith will drop everything and marry him because an inheritance of five thousand a year hinges on it! He doesn’t need Mr. Brit to tell him there will be possibly much more for him when her father dies, […]
Almost a century and a half has passed since Smith launched his penny blood, so it is natural that a mere aside by the narrator can set off a question mark that repays investigation. In considering the theory of literature, the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur describes how a text […]
Margaret Oliphant’s essay ‘The Byways of Literature: Reading for the Million’ (1858) is something of a seminal study in literature and popular culture. Her elegant piece is by turns endearing — particularly in her approval of our man Smith — and a worry for its tone of condescension towards […]
This chapter presents insights into the motivations and machinations in play at the ‘higher end’ of society. A far cry from Mrs. Hurst’s scheme to have William and Goliah banged up for the ‘theft’ of the horse and wagon, motivated partially by her rivalry with Mrs. Gob over […]
I’ll keep good the promise made by the 1883 newspaper sources for this reconstructed penny blood mystery, by providing their mid-way summary. The author of the novel is the Englishman John Frederick Smith, the most popular writer of the mid-nineteenth century — but in later years all but […]
Smith lingers over May Day while introducing a new source of conflict. The early twenty-first century reader may wince at the themes of gender and morality so firmly foregrounded. In our era we have the advent of LGBT rights, and concurrent with them, the destabilization, at least, of […]
Picture a May Day festival on an English village green, complete with Morris dancers and maypole, the main setting for this instalment. May Day is a tradition widespread in the Northern Hemisphere, celebrating fertility and the return of Spring. There are indeterminate roots in the pagan Roman Floralia, […]
Part of this instalment outlines the troubled history of Bunce, the courageous tramp who risked his life to defend the two girls in the Red Barn. His childhood memories begin in one of about a dozen martello towers in Essex, which prompts the illustration this week, a scene […]
“You see, Japan does not actually rest atop an infinite pile of turtles, but on the back of a giant carp . . .”
In his mid-thirties, Australian freelance writer and PhD graduate Michael Guest headed for Japan on a whim, worked as Professor in a national university, and stayed fifteen years. Memoir and cultural reflection, his captivating story is one of growth, adaptation and an ever-deepening appreciation of an enchanting, at times perplexing, society. The author is a specialist in modern literature and humanities, with many academic and media articles to his credit, alongside international academic conference lectures.
“Rarely is a reader granted such enlightened insights into the people and culture of Japan. Guest takes us into the Japanese psyche, exploring social mores, the underlying meanings of simple actions, and the historical and religious fabric that knits the people together. . . .”—Brian Armour, author of Future Crime
“He draws his tight literary portraits from his experiences living and tertiary teaching in Japan. I was enchanted to learn the micro-details of a culture of micro-details.”—Gloria Lee McMillan, editor of Orbiting Ray Bradbury’s Mars.
“The book permeates your psyche . . . . his calm, poetic, detailed writing style, always with a touch of light irony, full immersion. The book is, indeed, very Zen. It is an absolute must for anyone going to Japan. It will make for an excellent primer.”—Virginia Arthur, author of Treed and Phat(’s) Chance for Buddha in Houston
