James Scholar's Tale

1. Auflage 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4835-4984-2
Verlag: BookBaby
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 384 Seiten

Master scholars have a reputation for often putting their work before their human relationships. This theme is boldly signalled from the outset and runs deep throughout The Scholar's Tale, a compelling new novel by David James. Celebrating his sixth major literary release, James invites readers on an exciting and thought-provoking journey that draws many of its elements from the life of a real renowned scholar.

Autoren/Hrsg.

James, David

Leseproben

CHRISTMASTIDE     Sunday Truth is Silly Putty. Back in Iowa City I would sit on the john, trousers around ankles, pondering the content of this text, the nature of the medium and the character of its anonymous messenger. The adage could be useful; it might provoke discussion in my linguistics seminar. Real texts are as gold dust. This one, scrawled in dark brown crayon or possibly human excrement, was one to treasure, rather more fertile than the adjacent cubicle’s ‘Derrida Sucks’ or ‘Balls to Bloomfield.’ A metaphor or an axiom, I wondered. Or just a damned lie like Tolstoy’s opening sentence in Anna Karenina, or a waggish statement of general truth, such as that much touted first line of Pride and Prejudice? I imagine Bloomfield must be all geared up for the New York Conference. I had hoped to have got him the revised Introduction, but with Christmas looming that looks increasingly unlikely. Trouble is these Elizabethans didn’t treasure texts like we moderns do. Half-a-dozen scribbled versions on scattered sheets throughout London playhouses are nothing to donkeys like George Peele. Here it is then – once again! The Owlde wifes tale printed in 1595, allegedly by one GP who never wrote a book in his life and died three years later of syphilis and in penury. This fake cover before me, featuring a woodcut of curly-headed sailors attempting to squeeze into a tiny boat, is a thousand times more arresting than these smudgy piles of annotated photostats. But it’s from these squiggles that my ephemeral present existence takes its sustenance. ‘You take it,’ she’s shouting from the bedroom. But they’ll call back. They usually do. Now, where were we? No, not The Old Wives Tale - not yet at any rate; for the moment it’s Jim Barrington’s project, abandoned while he swans off to Tunisia. Could you, Roy? Would you mind? It’s all hands to the pump these days, says the boss. The Battle of Alcazar, then. Now what exactly is the exact relationship between Abdulmeclec - also known as Muly Malocco, King of Morocco - and Sebastian, the King of Portugal? It’s becoming quite irritating, especially as the wretched copy text often misspells both names. Moreover, these photostats from the British Library are rubbish. Now why the hell did I let myself in for helping Bloomers out with Alcazar? Because I’m a born slave, I suppose. At least my name will be immortalised by the eventual publication of Volume Number Six of the first and no doubt the last edition of The Collected Works of George Peele (1556?-1596). ‘Answer it, Roy, please. I’m in the shower,’ comes the wife’s muffled voice. She’s still purifying herself for her evening at the Lucinda Sloane Académie de Dance, no less. Never mind the weather, never mind the rain. And bugger that telephone. Besides, sure as fate, the bloody thing will have stopped before I reach it. Malocco, Malocco, King of Morocco. So let’s see what this hefty tome has to offer. Christ, I’ve not opened this green and gold bible in years - a glossary of Arabic names, bought for that crazy bitch three years ago in Morocco. Thick pages, all giltedged. Mahamet, Mohommed, Mohammed, Mahmoud and Mamoud. What else? Nice pictures at the front. La Fontaine. JW Goethe. Mythological and Imaginary Beings. Idols etc. Chaps in turbans. Chaps with beards. Oh yes, Great Men of History. Sod you, bloody phone! She’s out of the shower now, in the kitchen and shouting something. She’s bellowing up the stairs, something about a message from Stanley Earle. She’s astounded, or pretending to be. Have I really not yet called him back? Stan’s obviously forgotten I’m on leave till Tuesday and out of commission on a Sunday night. ‘How’s it look?’ asks Midge, twirling in her black lace-edged dress, tucking her chin into a bare shoulder and batting her mauve and orange eye-lids coloured like some exotic beetle. ‘Delicious, my love. If I wasn’t so damned busy, I’d take up Lucy’s invitation. But you know how it is – bloody Elizabethan stuff. Not as if anyone’ll ever stage the thing.’ ‘Go on, you know you love it.’ ‘Almost as much as I love you.’ I kiss the top of her head, my lips brushing against a silky flower. She smells of violet, possibly flavoured with cedarwood. ‘Listen, Roycee, if the telephone should ring – ’ ‘You’re expecting a call?’ ‘- while I’m out, would you be a pet and take a message?’ ‘Of course, my dearest love. But why on earth don’t we invest in an extension?’ ‘Just answer it, Roy, and take a message.’ ‘Someone special?’ ‘My dressmaker, if you must know.’ I nod with pursed lips. No reason why I should know anything about her private life, any more than she should have the remotest about The Old Wives Tale. Although a satire gone wrong, it’s head and shoulders above Peele’s other stuff: his translations from Euripedes and bombastic ranting like Iphigenia, or his historicals and the Biblical epics. As for the work in hand, The Battle of Alcazar, for me it’s just one battle too many - to be obliged to read so many versions of the same turgid stuff, note variant readings and elucidate the many textual cruxes. But this fine-tuning - the annotation of Peele’s use of commas or hyphens for example - is precisely what we humble scribes are all about and what the series editor delights in – something to swell the Apparatus at the end of Volume Six, and to provide for the public the ultimate text, the exhaustive and conclusive scholarly text. Moreover, Bob the Nob just loves the melodrama of Alcazar, with all the blood splashed over its yellowing pages. Roy, old man, we really appreciate your offer to stand in. I’m sure you’ll do an excellent job for us. Then, wouldn’t you just know it, that obnoxious black snake disturbs us while we’re having our tea. I make for the study, but hang about on the stairs, listening. I hear her chirpy little voice: I’m afraid he’s engaged at the moment. Pardon? Can I take a message? Sorry? You’ve what? After a pause I hear the ting of the replaced receiver. Good old Midge! Professor Roy Musgrave is engaged in a vital project, under the combined auspices of The Humanities Research Foundation and the University of Nebraska Press. She doesn’t know it yet, but it could mean an expenses paid trip back to the States next summer to delve back into the Huntingdon archives and sort through the crop of letters in Texas and the New York Public Library. Some of these archivists haven’t a clue what treasure they’re sitting on; much is still not catalogued. It could mean fame and even fortune for the intrepid researcher. Except that it wouldn’t, and the most likely outcome is a microscopic entry in the PMLA annual register of scholarly work. Once she’s finally called out goodbye, having now changed her dress into the grey silk clingy little number she’d had tailored for Gillian’s graduation last year, given instructions about locking Claws in the kitchen, and scribbled some culinary advice on the pad, I manage to return to the great work. Well to Peele anyway, who, while not exactly Shakespeare, certainly deserves at least a 450-year memorial article on, say, The Harvesting Metaphor in The Old Wives Tale. All these neglected Elizabethans! Call them minor, if you like, but for sheer poetry every one’s a goldmine. Teach these modern drivellers a thing or two! After an hour or so of textual study I make my way down to the kitchen. On the table lies a scribbled message on how to heat the lasagne and not to wait up for her. She’s left me the usual two kisses. An addendum from yesterday tells me there had been two telephone calls: Mike Beasley and someone called Mme Lamotte. Mike’s would be about tennis tomorrow; the other was probably a cold-caller or a wrong number. I heat the food and consider how best to counter Mike’s wicked first serve. The lasagne is good. She’s a good cook, this Midge, say what you like about her fair, fat and forty figure. We’d first met at a bus stop a year or so ago. I’d taken her for a kid just out of school, but when she asked me how much longer it would be before the 53 bus came and why was there only one stop over the whole of Blackheath, I realised she was a lady of some style. She’d been here ages, she said, and she had an appointment at the Miller Hospital. What about me? What drew me out on such a naughty night? Her words struck a chord. It recalled Lear and the Fool on the barren heath: tis a naughty night to be abroad, nuncle. She’s no ignoramus, I decided, and I began to open up. I was what? Giving a lecture at Goldsmiths College! And travelling by bus!...