Can you believe this is the last check-in of this year’s MARM?
The temperatures have steadily dropped all month and just the past two mornings, instead of waking up to a layer of frost there has been a skitter (a dusting) of snow, so December is just around the corner. For reals.
In just a few days, I’ll post a wrap-up to highlight everyone’s contributions (if you have participated and contributed but haven’t yet added a link, please add below, so that other MARM-ers can read about what you’ve been reading/watching).
In last week’s New York Times Book Review, (was it last week? I’m perpetually behind with papers), Jenny Slate answered the By-the-Book question “What’s the best book you’ve ever gotten as a gift” in appropriately MARMish fashion:
“My mother gave me ‘Cat’s Eye,’ by Margaret Atwood, when I was in seventh grade. It’s about an artist affected by the social trauma of her teen years. I wasn’t faring well in the social set, and it must have killed my mother to see me become suddenly quiet and flinchy. The book completely rerouted my experience. It was as if I were untangled from a net.”
This year, even more than most years, I have been looking to MARM reading for that kind of untangling.
It has been comforting to think of other people prioritising this kind of reading, thinking of all of you, who also value the work of writers and artists who ask hard questions, willing to engage rather than simply consume (not that I think everyone must always read like this, for this single reason, or always for this reason: there are other reasons and other ways to engage).
MARM 2024 PLANS
Launch (November 1)
Dancing Girls, “Training” (November 5)
Old Babes in the Wood, “My Evil Mother” (November 7)
Week Two: Update and Check-In (November 10)
Dancing Girls, “Lives of the Poets” (November 12)
Old Babes in the Wood, “The Dead Interview” (November 14)
Week Three: Update and Check-In (November 16)
Margaret Atwood’s 85th Birthday (November 18)
Dancing Girls, “Dancing Girls” (November 19)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Impatient Griselda” (November 21)
Week Four: Update and Check-In (November 24)
Dancing Girls, “Giving Birth” (November 26)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Bad Teeth” (November 28)
Wrap-Up (November 30)
In a year with a record number of democratic elections around the globe, and with the recent American election having such far-reaching implications globally, it’s felt more important than ever to feel in company.
Somewhere in the NYT (it was probably the same weekend in which Jenny Slate’s “By the Book” appeared, someone quoted Timothy Snyder writing in a Philadelphia newspaper: “They want you to be alone. Nobody is going to fix this alone. That’s not how this works.”
If you’re MARMing, you’re not alone! If you’re reading this, you aren’t alone. (And even if you’re not reading this, you’re not alone either.)
And here’s a bit of proof from England and Australia—5.709 km and 18,142 km from where Margaret Atwood lives—with:
In a similar spirit of recalling community, Stefanie (who’s not technically MARMing, but who’s been steadily commenting) recently shared this video in her cosy digital corner of the world, with Michael Franti & Spearhead performing “Brighter Day”.
She wanted to embed the video but ran into a technical limitiation, so I’m including it here for all of us, in case you missed her share. Hopefully it brightens your day too, and maybe you can share it as well.
Pass it on, says seventh-grade me.
This past week, I watched that video a few times. And I read the Dancing Girls and Old Babes short stories for that week and this week, to see how well I’m doing with my Bingo—still no rows or columns complete, and that’s probably where things will settle out (thank you Photos, for regularly asking me if I want to delete my cluttered images, I appreciate being reminded of my clutter-love with too many books and papers). Then I watched the two-hour-long video about the Griseldas.
This week I will read another essay from Burning Questions (which I have borrowed three times from the library and should really add to my collection) and begin Stacey Abrams’ debut thriller (which MA recommended on Twitter shortly after it was published). These two volumes are my small nod to #LoveYourLibrary which BookishBeck hosts monthly on the last Monday, pictured alongside with my updated Bingo card.
How about you? Were you reading Margaret Atwood in the seventh grade? (I most definitely was not.)
What did seventh-grade you read instead? (The Three Investigators mysteries, L.M. Montgomery’s girlhood stories, and the Anastasia Krupnik series.)
Did your social set make you flinch? Do you follow “By the Book”? (Devotedly.)
Are you a fan of Jenny Slate? (I was a Marcel the Shell fan before he got famous.)
Margaret Atwood
“If you were a rocky, watery northern country, cool in climate, large in geographical expanse, small but diverse in population, and with a huge aggressive neighbour to the south, why wouldn’t you have concerns that varied from those of the huge aggressive neighbour?”
Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (1972)
Oh that’s a great video – thanks to Stefanie and you for making it happen here.
Seventh grade? Are you talking first year high school? (As in K-6 in primary school for us and then 7 in high school when we were 12/13?) If so, I certainly wasn’t reading Atwood. First, she was in her late teens then so books like Cat’s Eye were a while away. My own reading was more like what you were reading as I recollect – family stories. For school I read some Aussie novels like Frank Dalby Davison’s Man-shy and Vance Palmer’s The passage. It was a very positive year for me – the teenage angst your Cats Eye person had was yet to come! This I think is because I was still living in a country town where life was less complicated and much more free. I remember “boys”, and “wallflower” concerns at school dances, but no nasty girl stuff. In fact, I never really experienced serious nasty girl stuff, just angsty self-focused stuff.
So glad you enjoyed it! I might have it on repeat for the remainder of January or, say, for the next four years.
I just wasnt even thinking about reading that kind of fiction at that age. The longest books I read would have been the L.M. Montgomery books. For school, we had Steinbeck’s The Red Pony (1933) in the seventh grade, along with Jack Schaefer’s Shane (1949). I was attending school in a small place at that age too (just a few streets, with about 1,600 people in the surrounding township) but all that nasty girl stuff reigned supreme, perhaps because I was “from away” but also perhaps because it was a very conservative homogeneous community (but, then, that’s true of most villages and towns, by their nature).
I read Survival a very very long time ago. I was likely in my late teens. At the time, I remember thinking ‘this is a different kind of book. It’s the kind of book that makes you smarter instead of just passing the time’. And I still think that about some books today LOL
I actually went through a non-reading slump in my high school years. I remember reading a bunch of Harry Potter, assigned readings from class, and that’s about it. Which is funny, because now I can’t imagine NOT having a book on the go. It seems sacrilegious. I actually blame the fact that we didn’t have enough books hanging around the house, and I didn’t have a car to drive myself to the library (we lived in a very rural area, as i think I mentioned before).
It’s not the kind of book one would normally read for fun, stuffed with CanLit nerdery. But for some, that’s ideal!
I went through a non-reading slump this November. lol Mostly kidding, but I can relate. Mostly I’ve been within walking distance of a library and once lived across the street, which would have been divine, except it was such a small library it was possible to read every book in it (if I’d been so open-minded…I just reread my favourites to bits lol). Would you have been midway between the Guelph Library and Cambridge Library? I’m guessing the school library didn’t have much to offer…
yah, basically between those two. It was really only the Puslinch/Wellington county library that we had a library card too at that point. If I was really passionate about it, I’m sure my parents would have driven me, but I was too busy being a teenager and all that comes along with it LOL
Thank you for sharing the song/video! It’s so uplifting, isn’t it? Also did you know Jeremy Snyder has a really good substack? He’s been making some excellent posts these last weeks.
I was definitely not reading Margaret Atwood in 7th grade. I didn’t know about her until college. What I was reading in 7th grade was Flowers in the Attic 😀
I wish I’d known you in seventh grade; I had to wait until ninth grade to meet the Dollanganger family. lol
I don’t know why, but I always kinda, “read past” Timothy Snyder, recognising his name, but thinking he was not someone I’d want to read. I investigated just a little after coming upon that article, and I immediately saw several interesting things, so I can’t even think why I had that idea, but I’ll work to mend the gap now.
Thank you for the mention Marcie!
Such a lovely way of contextualising MARM in this post – it is reassuring to feel we are not alone.
I read Cat’s Eye in Year 11 and it definitely resonated in terms of social sets earlier in my life. I found it really powerful.
In Year 7 I was reading Paula Danziger, Lois Duncan, the Brontes and I’d just discovered PG Wodehouse.
Thanks for joining it: that’s the true testament to our not being alone! hee hee
I wish I’d read it a little younger; it would have offered some comfort to flinchy-little-me.
You were way ahead of me with the Brontes; I reread the Lowood school section of JE and then stalled out, repeatedly, until I was, oh, I dunno, 30, I’m guessing.
OhEmGee, I loved Lois Duncan’s books so much. I contributed a bio to Literary Ladies if you’re curious about her development as a writer (I never knew she’d suffered such a personal tragedy, perhaps you didn’t either).
Thanks so much for the link Marcie, I will take a look. I only learned of Lois Duncan’s personal tragedy last year – so shocking.
It reminds one just how little we know of authors’ lives, for the most part (and perhaps that’s fine, even for the best maybe but, in this case, given the change in tone over her career, it does seem peculiarly relevant).
addendum: for my birthday in year 7 my father gave me With Wolfe in Canada. I might read that for MARM ’25 too.
Did you mention that you are also reading Catherine Leroux’s The Future? (Trans. Ouriou) WWinC would actually be fab background reading; most Canadians by now have likely forgotten about that battle (and how easily things might have gone the other way, with a French victory).
My family, all in other towns and cities now, still stop me from being alone. But this bookish community has proved a surprising source of friendliness over the past decade, and I’m sure without it my mind would be a desert.
The first adult book I owned was a gift at the end of grade 6 – Evelyn Waugh’s life of the English saint, Edmund Campion. I read it, but I mostly read age appropriate stuff for another few years. I can remember us taking turns in Form 1 (year 7) to read Tom Sawyer aloud.
The first MA that ended up on my shelves was The Blind Assassin, but well into adulthood. I probably should read it for MARM ’25.
And you know deserts better than most, so that’s a serious statement.
I remember a segment of Tom Sawyer being read aloud in that year as well, now that you mention it! (Huck Finn would be assigned in full, five grades later.)
You will be horrified, I know, to hear that one of the adult books on my shelf at that time was The Thorn Birds (I read the “dirty parts” a few years later heh, but didn’t properly read the book until fairly recently).
If you’re up for it, I would love to count on rereading TBA next year. I have been wanting to revisit but waiting to see if I feel like rereading a novel for MARM doesn’t seem to work for me because there are so many new books out in this season that distract me from rereading.
I have next year’s calendar, so I’ve written at the end of September: read With Wolfe in Canada, The Blind Assassin for MARM 2025
The end of September?! #overachiever (I should try to shift my reading so that I am not always last-minute-ing. I think it’s because I’m afraid I’ll forget what I’ve read, or muddle it with other books if I start “early”, but I take notes, so that really shouldn’t be a concern.)
I will be watching that music video a few more times, too – thank you for passing it on!
In seventh grade, I was not reading MA… I was reading L.M. Montgomery mostly, but also some Judy Blume, Frances Hodgson Burnett, and Lois Lowry.
Grade 7 was probably my hardest year in terms of who my friends were. I was moving from one set to another, but spent a bit of time lost in between. What would I have done without LMM?
I’m glad to hear it: I’m sure you have already passed it on to a couple of people at least!
Ohhhh, yes, Judy Blume, for sure. And The Little Princess (I didn’t read The Secret Garden until well into adulthood). Did you ever go back to finish the later Anastasia books? I grew out of them at some point, but rediscovered them via the library about ten years ago and they are still great fun!
Sounds like you had friends though, so I guess you didn’t need Cat’s Eye quite as badly as Jenny Slate. heheh
Thanks for the shout-out. I will finally have some reviews for you tomorrow or Wednesday. Fun to see Michael Franti’s name here. He was a regular at a music and arts festival we used to attend up until c. 2010 and could be relied on for uplift.
I finished reading the last novella I was working on last week, and even managed to write my summary of it, but I still haven’t formatted my novella post. /hangshead So I can relate to your sense of scrambling at the end!
That’s so cool. I like re-encountering artists on the global stage after having seen them at local events first.
I most definitely wasn’t reading Atwood in 7th grade. It’s funny, Cat’s Eye was my first of hers too, I think. I read it in high school and loved it. 7th grade me was reading a mix of juvenile and adult titles – I think I read Danielle Steele in 7th grade, alongside teen thrillers by Christopher Pike. I only know Jenny Slate from her role on Parks and Rec – she played Mona-Lisa (LOL!) the sister of Jean-Ralphio. So funny.
As far as MARM goes, this year it was not meant to be for me. I tried Good Bones and Simple Murders, and I realized that I don’t have the patience for flash fiction. At least not in a “read this in a timely fashion” sort of way. I prefer a novel – or at least a short story – to sink my teeth into. A page or two doesn’t give my much of anything. (But curiously, a poem gives me a lot. Go figure!)
Thank you for the reminder that we are not alone! It is comforting to think of all the bookish friends out there bravely facing the challenges of daily modern life.
I didn’t get into Danielle Steele romances until high school, but you have reminded me that I did delve into some adult books too (true crime! gah!).
I forgot that you, also, are a P&R fan!
Ahhh, yes, I read just three of those flash stories last year. I know others have read them cover-to-cover, but I think I would need to let them set with me over a year’s time.
It makes the world feel just a little cosier.