For a good few years now – at least three, I’d say – as the sun makes its way higher in the sky and the days warm up, I get a strong urge to read classics, particularly Victorian and late Georgian. It always happens around late April to May and sort of finishes in July at the time the sun’s decent becomes noticeable.

There are certain factors that come into play – the classics I feel most drawn to are ones that for one reason or another I relate to happy, sunny days. Austen gets a big look in; aside from Persuasion, which is full of windy strolls by the sea and which I first read when ill with a cold, all her books I associate with summer. I read Pride And Prejudice in February, but it was a sunny February and there is a lot of summer in the book. I read Sense And Sensibility in April of the same year; Sanditon in July.

Dickens gets a glance or two – usually, on further consideration, I don’t see it as appropriate. My thoughts of Great Expectations in relation to summer rest firmly in the fun chapter of rocking chairs and parental mishaps – I forget exactly what happens, I just know I loved it. But the book in general wouldn’t be a great choice.

Bronte… the windy moors, general trauma, and pathetic fallacy don’t make them good choices. Though for some reason Daphne Du Maurier appeals. I would approach another Hardy with trepidation but would approach it nonetheless.

A lot of it rests on the idea of re-reading; if I read a book I hadn’t read before, who’s to say it would fit the weather?

Actually, re-reading is another part of it – re-reading always seems a good idea come summer. Summer always feels like a holiday even if it isn’t, children off school for weeks being a reminder of your own childhood summer holidays; the possibilities, the feeling that you’ve lots of time during which you can do whatever you want. In terms of books, re-reading feels more of a holiday than reading new books, with less effort required and thus more relaxation promised.

But I’m yet to get round to reading classics or re-reading anything in the summer. A couple of years ago I made a point of sitting outside one early morning with a coffee and Elizabeth Bennet and it was lovely for the time it took to read two chapters. I never got round to carrying on. Last summer I spent early mornings in the garden reading new books. I think it’s the ‘another day’ problem; I can always do it another day. But that day hasn’t come yet.

Do you favour certain genres at certain times of the year?

For many reasons, I’ve never liked my full name. But recently I’ve been looking to feel a bit more comfortable with it and that has been bolstered by historical figures I’ve discovered. Brontë, of course, but also Perkins Gilman and, literature aside, Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. I’m never going to revert to the name myself but I can at least feel better about it, align it with some great writers.

To this end I’ve decided to focus on well-known writers, in the hope of developing an appreciation and positive relation. I’m choosing writers whose work is in the public domain for ease, the limited numbers, and because of my interest in history… and because it costs a lot less to read free books.

So I took myself to Project Gutenberg and searched to catalog. There are a number of Charlottes listed so I’m going to focus on those for which there’s some information. My list is short – I think that’s best, and is as follows: Brontë, Perkins Gilman, Turner Smith, Lennox, Mary Yonge. It doesn’t go as far back in history as I’d like – Turner Smith and Lennox were born in the early decades of 1700s – but then I’m dealing with historical texts written by women. I’m also perhaps sort of cheating as I’m half-way through my second Gilman and have read two Brontës. But I couldn’t really leave them out.

I’m particularly looking forward to reading Turner Smith, Lennox, and Yonge because I’d forgotten about them. Turner Smith I first discovered some years ago but her book, Emmeline (a Cinderella-type story) was only available online in scanned fragments of old editions and about as much in print. In the years since, Project Gutenberg have produced a text – finding that made my day. There aren’t aren’t notes in regards to sourcing but it’s the best yet.

Lennox I only knew from seeing The Female Quixote listed on Girl Ebooks. Having read that it’s a parody of Cervantes I’m very much looking forward to it. Granted, my knowledge of the story is limited to Nik Kershaw’s song and the bookmark in my father’s copy that never moved from 1/4 of the way through, but it’s enough. It also appears to be shorter and there’s no need to worry about finding the right translation.

Yonge I heard of through well, you guys, and it’ll be The Heir of Redclyffe that I’ll be reading. In researching her I discovered she lived and died in Hampshire so I may make a trip to see her house and grave. The novel is mentioned in Little Women.

Charlotte Niese, a German writer, was looking like a possibility, but there’s only one story available in English and I’m not so sure there’s any fiction to be had. She campaigned for women’s rights but Wikipedia states she wrote only within socially acceptable boundaries. If, once I’ve read the above five authors, I want to continue, I’ll consider Niese; I’ve got to remember that as much as my first thought was to compile a list of every literary Charlotte, non-fiction texts don’t quite match the concept I had in mind.

Still to decide: do I extend my reading to other countries’ versions of the name? I considered ‘Carlotta’ but I actually rather like the one so it wouldn’t really fit what I’m trying to do and as previously alluded to, it’s difficult to work with translations.

I’ve no dates, no schedule in mind, it’s more a general reading goal. I may or may not post updates – most likely I’ll just review the books.

Any famous literary Charlottes I’ve missed?

When I became a book blogger, half-way through the first year I tracked my reading, I made a point of reviewing the previous few months’ books and summing them all up at the end. But besides the odd mention here and there, I never noted the books I’d read before tracking/blogging. This number is obviously a bit too high to make into a blog post and trying to remember everything I’ve read would take a while. In planning this post I’ve realised the truth of my memories of using the library a great deal when younger – I don’t have copies of most of the books I know I read then.

Due to how many books this idea would involve, I’ve limited it to those I own (so regarding the above, not many) and I’m excluding children’s books, including only young adult books and ‘teenager’ books – I think that’s more accurate to what we called them back then. Including only the books I own has the added bonus of me knowing for certain that I read them.

I’ve left out books I’ve re-read since starting my blog. I may end up re-reading some of the books listed – I certainly hope to in some cases – but writing this post ensures I’ve at least commented on them somewhat. Lisa Jewell’s pre-literary/historical work dominates.

I’m not sure the above makes total literal sense – I’m suffering a bit from heatstroke – but hopefully it’s enough for you to get the idea. I thought I’d list them in the order I remembered them in rather than alphabetically – it has the added bonus of creating two equal ‘halves’. Here we go:

Alma Alexander: The Secrets Of The Jin-Shei – A historical fantasy. This is about a China where women are the dominant gender. It has some magic in it, some battles, and is fairly diverse, but a word of warning must be given regarding the sexual violence which isn’t softened by the magical concepts behind it, no matter how much that may have been the intention. I intend to re-read this one and get an idea of how it reads now I’m old enough not to be so in subjective awe of the genre.

Arthur Golden: Memoirs Of A Geisha – Historical. This is about a young girl who grows up to be a geisha in the years towards the end of the profession. Since made into a film so I doubt I need to note too much. I’m not sure if I’ll re-read it.

Lisa Jewell: Ralph’s Party, Thirty-nothing, One-Hit Wonder, A Friend Of The Family, Vince & Joy, 31 Dream Street – Chick-lit. I’m going to sum these up as it was a phase and say that they were pretty good, escapism. Didn’t like Jewell’s use of ‘spastic’ however and am glad she seems to have now dropped it from her more recent books.

Maile Meloy: Liars And Saints – Contemporary, mostly and may be classed now as literary fiction. This is about different generations of a family, fairly dysfunctional people. Reading this made me feel very grown up. I want to re-read it in the near future as I’d like to read it in the way I read now and work out just what all the sex was for.

Anchee Min: Empress Orchid – Historical about the last empress of China, Ci Xi. Min is quite forgiving of her character but not completely. Suffice to say this is a difficult read at times but good nonetheless. I intend to re-read it.

Terry Pratchett: The Colour Of Magic, The Light Fantastic, Equal Rites, Mort – The first four Discworld novels. I wasn’t too keen on the first two, but Granny Weatherwax of the third is great and Mort remains my favourite so far.

Celia Rees: Witch Child – Historical fantasy. A girl with witch-like powers travels to the New World. I don’t remember too much of the story but do remember it made me cry. I’ll re-read it at some point.

Celia Rees: Sorceress – Fantasy. Set in the present day this is about a descendent of the heroine of Witch Child and her discoveries. Pretty good but not as good. I’ll probably read it as par for the course.

I used to read a lot more fantasy than I do now, though I still love it. The later teen years were when I discovered historical fantasy; for a while I read nothing else. I still have the sequel to the Alexander on my shelves to read; I bought it because it made sense at the time but upon reading the blurb I discovered it’s quite a bit different. Still, I’m glad I have it because it’s difficult to find nowadays.

There are so many books I want to re-read to see how I find them in, as said above, to ‘read it in the way I read now’. I have that urge to re-read constantly, finding that the more I read the more I feel I should go back and re-read books read previously because I’ve changed, grown as a reader, and so on. I even find myself feeling that way about books I read in more recent years. I think we all feel this way at times.

What books did you read in your younger years that stood out to you? Do you think you’d still like them if you read them now?

How long a time between starting a book, leaving it, and picking it up again would you/do you need before you choose to restart? This is presuming you were enjoying the book and put it down out of necessity (maybe you just didn’t get back to it). In this, the ‘you’ is you yourself rather than people in general.

From my experience so far, a fair amount of time needs to have passed between putting down the book and restarting it. If attempts are being made to continue it can make it more difficult; just continuing the book, to me, means having only really read the latter part or so on, two distinct reading periods creating the effect of reading two books.

A restart after a long time feels right to me because by then I’ve forgotten enough to feel that it would be an entirely new read. I view the decision in the context of reviewing – I won’t have done the book or author justice, I won’t have had as good an experience, if I just continue. I’ve found restarting too soon adds up to wasted time – it’s the extreme reverse of ‘sunk cost’ and effectively just creates a variation on a theme.

Sunk cost comes into it for me, though, and so whilst I may restart, I have to be far enough away in time for that to really work. I kind of have to get away from my own imposed ideal.

What has been your experience?

I can’t remember the last time I read a short story that wasn’t part of a larger collection. And I admit to avoiding them these last few years.

I love short stories but in terms of reading I don’t know what to do with them, whether in terms of record or reading.

Record: a few years ago I read a novella that was to all intents and purposes a short story and whilst it was nice to have another number in my statistics, I felt uncomfortable with it – it was not really a book. I doubt anyone would begrudge me a single digit for the ‘book’ but I felt I was cheating myself.

Reading: a while back I read the Everyman’s Jane Austen collection – Sanditon, various other shorter works, and didn’t review it for a couple of reasons. It was my first collection in a while, my first collection since I’d started reviewing, and the thought of trying to condense it all to a thousand or so words was overwhelming. But reviewing each story separately seemed silly as there wouldn’t have been enough to say to make it worth it.

Yesterday I was researching Kate Chopin. I want to return to The Awakening, delve into the themes in more detail, and so I was researching the book, the author’s life, influences… I ended up reading Désirée’s Baby. I then started down one of those research rabbit holes, wanting to learn about the French Creoles Chopin writes about, and ending up a couple of hours later reading about Native American Territories.

I’ve decided to record short stories read in a different place to my general reading, with the idea that it will be exclusively stories that weren’t collected and in the public domain. Classic work is what I’d like most to focus on and recording will allow me to remember for later. This takes me to a sort of sub-decision: recording the publication details of the story. In part because I’m aware Désirée’s Baby was published in a collection a year after it was printed in Vogue (14th January 1893 – I was pleasantly surprised to find the exact date) and thus is actually out of the bounds of what I’m aiming for, I want to keep a record of all those magazines and pamphlets that stories were published in. My thought is it’ll be interesting to note trends, to see where writers shared space, and to learn more about early literary publications. (I’ve often thought of looking at Dickens’ Household Words away from the context of the fiction itself, and as Vogue is now synonymous with fashion, Chopin’s inclusion is intriguing – what’s the history there?)

As to how to review them, I’m considering the ‘mini-review’ collective format some bloggers use. I’ll likely read stories in author phases, so to speak, and round up that way. As for Chopin, because many (all?) of her stories were collected, that will see a bog-standard review. In these cases I’ll likely defer to the original compilation rather than any from our present day.

I’m going to do the same with any poetry I find myself wanting to discuss. I don’t know nearly enough to consider a poem per post. There are some Tudor poets out there, often included in fiction, that I’d like to study. Shakespeare’s excluded for now because I wouldn’t know where to start, but as I said last week I’m enjoying reading about Aemilia Lanyer. I’ve found her poetry online – an easy read which, although it would be considered too simple nowadays, is quite enjoyable.

I think the ‘too long; didn’t read’ version of this post is that I’m giving myself more literary freedom. I think (hope!) I’m at the point now in my journey where I’m reading in such a way and with enough background context that I can discuss shorter works for more than a couple of sentences.

How do you go about reading (and reviewing, if relevant) short pieces of literature?