An open book that I still want to close

[venta]

Well, I've got loads of really tedious stuff to get done this evening. But you're nice people, aren't you ? You'll help out ?

Thanks. I knew I could rely on you. Y'see, I want something interesting to distract me from the tedium of accounts, tidying, and web design. And there's something I've been meaning to do for ages...

For those of you who don't know (and you really should), The Booklovers is a song by The Divine Comedy. The verses are a spoken list of authors, each with a comment after them. Sometimes the comments are clearly related to the author, sometimes less so, sometimes they're a rather sideways joke, and sometimes completely random. Now, I suspect that what I perceive as randomness is really just a case of me not being well-read enough, or something. Or not thinking laterally enough. Or maybe I'm just looking for subtleties which aren't there.

So, here's my thoughts on explanations - corrections, contradictions, conspiracy theories, comments and clarifications all welcome.

And by the way: yes, there's almost certainly a list somewhere on the web where someone else has already done this. And I could probably have solved a few more with some help from Amazon/Wikipedia. But this is so much more fun than just googling for it, don't you think ?

Aphra Benn: Hello	A lot of authors only say "hello" or "yes" - I don't know if that just means Hannon couldn't think of anything for them. Then again, Aphra Benn is (I think?) credited as England's first female novelist (in the modern age), so might reasonably say hello.
Cervantes: Donkey	Don Quixote sounds like Donkey Oaty ? Did he write anything about donkeys in particular ? His sidekick rode around on a donkey, according to narenek. And was called Sancho, according to snow_leopard
Daniel Defoe: To christen the day!	From Robinson Crusoe, where the hero christens his aboriginal accomplice Friday. Thanks to narenek.
Samuel Richardson: Hello
Henry Fielding: Tittle-tattle Tittle-tattle...
Lawrence Sterne: Hello
Mary Wolstencraft: Vindicated!	She wrote The Vindication of Women's Rights or something with a title quite like that. And no, I probably wouldn't know that if it weren't for the relevant Sandman novel :)
Jane Austen: Here I am!	Perhaps a reference to the fact that she was not as well known as an author in her own lifetime, but is now considered a classic?, suggests killalla.
Sir Walter Scott: We're all doomed!
Leo Tolstoy: Yes!
Honoré de Balzac: Oui...	Is French, but beyond that... no idea.
Edgar Allen Poe: Aaaarrrggghhhh!	Er, he writes scary stories ?
Charlotte Brontë: Hello...
Emily Brontë: Hello...
Anne Brontë: Hellooo..?	[note for people who don't know the song - this one is in a markedly rough/masculine voice] Is she meant to sound like a bloke because many people regarded Branwell as writing the books ?
Nikolai Gogol: Vas chi
Gustav Flaubert: Oui
William Makepeace Thackeray: Call me 'William Makepeace Thackeray'
Nathaniel Hawthorne: The letter 'A'	He wrote The Scarlet Letter, in which a woman convicted of adultery has to wear a red A on her clothing.
Herman Melville: Ahoy there!	He wrote Moby Dick, which is nautical enough to merit an ahoy.
Charles Dickens: London is so beautiful this time of year...	Er... wrote A Tale of Two Cities, and lived in London. Anything more specific ?
Anthony Trollope: good-good-good-good evening!
Fyodor Dostoevsky: Here come the sleepers...
Mark Twain: I can't even spell 'Mississippi'!	I think Huckleberry Finn might actually say this line in the novel named after him. It would suit either him or Jim, the runaway slave, anyway. - Thanks to purple_pen
George Eliot: George reads German	She certainly did, as secretrebel recalls. She admired the work of Germanic philosophers and refered to them in, um, Middlemarch?
Emile Zola: J'accuse	Title of an open letter published in a French newspaper condemning the government's treatment of (a) Dreyfus and (b) jews.
Henry James: Howdy Miss Wharton!
Thomas Hardy: Ooo-arrr!	Wrote novels of rural life.
Joseph Conrad: I'm a bloody boring writer...
Katherine Mansfield: [cough cough]	I'm guessing she died of consumption.
Edith Wharton: Well hello, Mr James!	Other than answering Henry James above, no idea. Were they lovers ? Apparently they were friends, and wrote novels in similar settings. Thanks to taimatsu, j4 and secretrebel.
DH Lawrence: Never heard of it
EM Forster: Never heard of it!

Chorus
Happy the man, and happy he alone who in all honesty can call today his own;
He who has life and strength enough to say 'Yesterday's dead & gone - I want to live today'

James Joyce: Hello there!
Virginia Woolf: I'm losing my mind!	Didn't she have periods of doubting her own sanity ?
Marcel Proust: Je me'en souviens plus	He wrote A la recherche du temps perdu meaning roughly 'Looking for lost times'. He also wrote Remembrance of Things Past (I'm confused - is this a different translation of the same title?) The comment translates as 'I don't remember (it) any more'. Thanks narenek, killalla and taimatsu. Remembrance of Things Past is the English translation of A la recherche du temps perdu, confirms ar_gemlad.
F Scott Fitzgerald: baa bababa baa	Renowned as the author of the 'Jazz Age', and I guess that's kind of jazz vocals? suggests white_hart.
Ernest Hemingway: I forgot the....
Hermann Hesse: Oh es ist alle so häßlich	Is that any more than the obvious pun (Hesse/häß)? asks onebyone
Evelyn Waugh: Whoooaarr!	Well, y'know, Waugh can be made to sound like Whoooaarrr! Thanks to onbyeone.
William Faulkner: Tu connait William Faulkner?
Anaïs Nin: The strand of pearls	She wrote Strand of Pearls
Ford Maddox Ford: Any colour, as long as it's black!	Henry Ford's alledged phrase when talking about the colours cars came in.
Jean-Paul Sartre: Let's go to the dome, Simone!	Something to do with Simone de Beauvoir ? white_hart says they were definitely a couple.
Simone de Beauvoir: C'est exact present
Albert Camus: The beach... the beach	A significant scene in L'Etranger takes place on a beach. - Thanks to purple_pen
Franz Kafka: WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!	'What do you want from me' sounds like it could well be a quote from The Trial, although I'm not 100%. Thanks to white_hart and killalla.
Thomas Mann: Mam
Graham Greene: Call me 'pinky', lovely	A reference to Pinky in Brighton Rock.
Jack Kerouac: Me car's broken down...	Wrote a novel (more than one?) based on a series of road trips.
William S Burroughs: Wowwww!	Was out of his tree on drugs a lot, I think.

Chorus

Kingsley Amis: [cough]
Doris Lessing: I hate men!
Vladimir Nabokov: Hello, little girl...	He wrote Lolita.
William Golding: Achtung Busby!	Um, he wrote Lord of the Flies, and this is a reference to U2's The Fly and Achtung Baby? Dunno where the Busby comes in.
JG Ballard: Instrument binnacle	The words 'instrument binnacle' occur in Ballard's Crash - a story of sex by, with and from cars - and hardly anywhere else. Thanks to addedentry.
Richard Brautigan: How are you doing?
Milan Kundera: I don't do interviews	Milan Kundera famously, um, doesn't do interviews. Thanks to white_hart.
Ivy Compton Burnett: Hello...
Paul Theroux: Have a nice day!
Günter Grass: I've found snails!
Gore Vidal: Oh, it makes me mad!
John Updike: Run rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run...	Wrote a book called "Rabbit run" and others in a series. Thanks to narenek
Kazuro Ishiguro: Ah so, old chap!	Ethnically Japanese, he nonetheless writes tales of the traditional English upper and servant classes, like Remains of the Day. Thanks to killalla, j4 and white_hart.
Malcolm Bradbury: stroke John Steinbeck, stroke JD Salinger
Iain Banks: Too orangey for crows!	He wrote The Crow Road. Not sure if he has any documented views on Kia-Ora.
AS Byatt: Nine tenths of the law, you know...	wrote Posession, which is "nine-tenths of the law" Thanks to purple_pen and triskellian.
Martin Amis: [burp]
Brett Easton Ellis: Aaaaarrrggghhh!	A plausible noise made by a victim of the American Psycho. Thanks to purple_pen and ewx
Umberto Eco: I don't understand this either...	A natural reaction to reading pretty much anything by Eco, I think.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Mi casa es su casa	sushidog confirms that Marquez writes in Spanish, but we're still not sure about the relevance of his house.
Roddy Doyle: ha ha ha!	From his novel, Paddy Clarke, ha, ha, ha. It's about an Irish kid whose parents get divorced, and the local kids chant "Paddy Clarke, Paddy Clarke, has no Da, ha, ha, ha!" Thanks to purple_pen and triskellian.
Salman Rushdie: Names will live forever...	taimatsu suggests this Rushdie quote: Names, once they are in common use quickly become mere sounds, their etymology being brushed aside like so many of the earth's marvels, beneath the dust of habit.

Well, er, I thought I had more ideas than that. Apparently not. Go on, show you're better read than me!

Comments

Let's see, now...

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Mark Twain: I can't even spell 'Mississippi'! I think Huckleberry Finn might actually say this line in the novel named after him. It would suit either him or Jim, the runaway slave, anyway.

Albert Camus: The beach... the beach A significant scene in L'Etranger takes place on a beach.

AS Byatt: Nine tenths of the law, you know... Wrote Possession. 'Nuff said.

Brett Easton Ellis: Aaaaarrrggghhh! Wrote American Psycho Presumably what one of his victims might say!

Roddy Doyle: ha ha ha! From his novel, Paddy Clarke, ha, ha, ha. It's about an Irish kid whose parents get divorced, and the local kids chant "Paddy Clarke, Paddy Clarke, has no Da, ha, ha, ha!"

Er.... that's it from me!

[triskellian]

Ooh, thanks! I've been wondering what some of those lyrics were for ages, and kept forgetting to look 'em up apart from when I was in the car listening to the song and unable to access the interweb.

In return, I can tell you that AS Byatt wrote Posession, which is "nine-tenths of the law", and that I think Roddy Doyle wrote a book called Paddy Clarke ha ha ha

[mr-tom.livejournal.com]

You know, every time I hear that song, I want to smash Neil Hannon's smug gurning face in with a brick.

I don't think it's meant to have that effect, but...

[narenek.livejournal.com]

Cervantes: Donkey
Presumably related to Don Quixotes sidekick who rode around on a donkey?

Daniel Defoe: To christen the day!
From Robinson Crusoe, where the hero christens his aboriginal accomplice Friday.

Fyodor Dostoevsky: Here come the sleepers...
Didn't he write war and peace a notoriously long and dull book?

Mark Twain: I can't even spell 'Mississippi'!
Wrote such books as the adventures of Tom Sawyer/Huckleberry Finn, who's adventures often featured the Mississippi as a source of adventures.

Marcel Proust: Je me'en souviens plus
Proust wrote À la recherche du temps perdu. The comment translates as I remember it more.

John Updike: Run rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run...
Wrote a book called "Rabbit run" and others in a series

I suspect you can get more by looking at what books people have written on Amazon.

In Short

[killalla]

Let's see:

Jane Austen - Perhaps a reference to the fact that she was not as well known as an author in her own lifetime, but is now considered a classic? (Random fact - did you know some of her brothers joined the Royal Navy and ides admirals? ;)

Proust - Author of Remembrance of Things Past, and the line in French refers to the act of memory (verb souvenir), I think.

Kafka - Author of The Trial and other novels which are known for their depiction of existentialism - it fits, I think.

Updike - Wrote many novels with a character named Rabbit, they are is most well known works - I think one might actually be called Run, Rabbit, Run or similar.

Ishiguro - Ethnically Japanese, he nonetheless writes tales of the traditional English upper and servant classes, like Remains of the Day.

Less plausibly:

Scott/Tolstoy (Heh.) - Both wrote epic dramas with lots of war and angst and such?

Marquez - I thought he wrote House of Spirits, but that may be Allende, now that I think of it.

[white_hart]

Proust - Je m'en souviens plus is something to do with memories, and he wrote Remembrance of Things Past.

F Scott Fitzgerald was renowned as the author of the 'Jazz Age', and I guess that's kind of jazz vocals?

Sartre and de Beauvoir were definitely a couple, hence the linkage.

'What do you want from me' sounds like it could well be a quote from The Trial, although I'm not 100%.

Kazuo Ishiguro is Japanese and writes extremely English novels.

Milan Kundera famously, um, doesn't do interviews.

[taimatsu]

Wharton and James could well be regarded as similar. They may have an explicit literary connection of some sort, I don't know; I know critics compare them (often?). No idea if they were personally connected.

Their books are predominantly about 'old New York' and the advent of nouveaux riches therein, and resulting and similar culture clash.

[j4.livejournal.com]

Kazuo Ishiguro: Ah so, old chap!

Kazuo Ishiguro is Japanese, but grew up in England, & The Remains of the Day is a terribly English novel. So I guess "Ah so, old chap!" is supposed to signify his Japanese-ness and his English-ness. It's a bit silly though.

Sir Walter Scott: We're all doomed!

Scott is to Scottish literature what Shakespeare is to English, allegedly (according to a former boyfriend who was doing a PhD on Scott and Shakespeare). I can hear "We're all doomed!" in my head being said in a Scottish accent, but I don't know where that's from, I think it's just something I've heard people say, which means it's probably from something I haven't seen.

Oh, and Edith Wharton and Henry James were friends, definitely, but I dunno about lovers. Friends enough that I managed to find a bibliography of books on their friendship, though.

[secretrebel.livejournal.com]

George Eliot: George reads German

She certainly did, as I recall. She admired the work of Germanic philosophers and refered to them in, um, Middlemarch?

[(Anonymous)]

Aphra Behn. actually-and not Wolstencraft (?? Wolstonecroft)

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

Proust: In remembrance of things past is the English translation of A la recherche de temps perdu. Hey, working in a modern languages library has taught me something!

[stompyboots.livejournal.com]

Salman Rushdie: He won't live forever, and is even less likely to thanks to the fatwa?

[taimatsu]

Re Salman Rushdie, this Google-cached, not-properly-referenced quote suggests he had a thing about dead names. Would have to prod further to be really useful, though, and I have to go and cook.

[ewx.livejournal.com]

An old favourite of mine, that, and the track that really got me into DC. I particularly like the sound of "Edgar. Allen. Poe."

Brett Easton Ellis is most famous for American Psycho, a first-person account of a style-obsessed stockbroker who spends his spare time killing people in gory ways, filmed not so long ago with a well-cast Christian Bayle.

Burroughs - Was out of his tree on drugs a lot, I think.

Yes.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Gabriel Garcia Marquez; South American magic realist author. Wrote Love in the time of Cholera, a hundred years of Solitude, and Nobody writes to the Colonel, and some other stuff. Jolly good stuff. Writesin Spanish, but I've no idea which his house should be anyone else's all the same. (The phrase translates as "my house is your house", which is just a generic "Welcome" kind of thing, I guess.)

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

The words 'instrument binnacle' occur in Ballard's Crash - a story of sex by, with and from cars - and hardly anywhere else. I heard the song first and the words leapt out when I read the novel.

(A good counterpart list song to 'The Booklovers' is 'Endless Art' by another Irish group, A House, which lists dead artists. It was pointed out to them that all their artists were male and they recorded a B-side called 'More Endless Art' to collect dead female artists.)

[(Anonymous)]

> For those of you who don't know (and you really should), The Booklovers is a song by The Divine Comedy.

I didn't, but I do now. It's also a completely different song by Broadcast. Do I win any points for knowing that?

[(Anonymous)]

Mary Wollstonecraft: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. No Sandman novel for me, I have an actual copy actually of it.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Virginia Woolf: I'm losing my mind! Didn't she have periods of doubting her own sanity ?

And killed herself because of it (the doubting, that is).

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Hermann Hesse: Oh es ist alle so häßlich

Is that any more than the obvious pun (Hesse/häß)?

Iain Banks

[shrydar.livejournal.com]

If only they'd greeted Iain M Banks I might have had a chance - I know they're allegedly the same person, but they don't write like it!