Inexcusable delay

It would be fair to say that my Powell blogging has been sporadic at best and, well, pretty much non-existent at worst. So here is my first attempt to make amends. Whilst I have been under time constraints I think I was also put off by the fact that (a) I couldn't remember much about vols 1 - 3 by the time I got back from holiday (extreme cold and liberal alcohol consumption have that effect on me) and (b) I finished vol 4 a while back and then never got round to blogging, and then forgot what I wanted to say.

And really, Casanova's Chinese Restaurant - which I finished this morning, so you get this fresh from the presses, so to speak - has been the first one that I've really *wanted* to write something about. I actually like some of the people in it! I was moved to describe Moreland to Will as a "sweetheart". OK, so that was before his little dalliance with Priscilla Tolland, but even by the end of the novel, I still liked him. I was also pleased to find at least one semi-realised female character - not Jenkins' wife, as one might expect (although now I come to think about it, Powell has given us absolutely no reason to expect that his wife would feature as a fully-rounded character), but Matilda. I do hope she turns up again in later volumes, although I suspect I may be disappointed on that front.

The other section which surprised me was Stringham's appearance at his mother's party. I don't mean I was surprised by his turning up; as various posters have pointed out, people 'turn up' in Powell ad nauseam. Incidentally, whilst I was initially bothered by this, I'm not any more. Only last night I met a woman at a Welsh Lawyers do who I'd last seen doing an internship at Lovells about 10 years ago. These things happen, particularly in small communities such as, er, the Welsh community in London. Anyway, I digress. I was surprised by how moving I found the whole description of Stringham's effective incarceration by Tuffy. I had no great fondness for him in the early volumes; whilst he was meant to be charismatic, that didn't really come across in the writing, and he was also rather cruel. But in the scene at the party Powell manages to give a real sense of wasted potential, and I thought Stringham's docile acceptance of his lot in life was well done and very sad.

I can't make my mind up about McClintick's suicide - I was never particularly sure about him as a character (although I thought the marital despair bit was pretty good) and it almost felt a little tagged on at the end. I did like the sudden plunge into 'everything's rubbish and we're all going to die' in the ghost train bit in the last paragraph, though. I thought it worked much better than Powell's previous random musings at the end of the other novels, which seemed designed to make what is essentially an upper class soap opera (can't claim credit for this, description kindly donated by a colleague) seem more profound than it in fact is.

One thing is really bothering me, though. I get that you pronounce St John as 'Sinjean' or 'Sinjun' or something along those lines. But how do you pronounce 'St. J' as various characters will insist on calling him? Every time it comes up I sit there for, ooh, at least 30 seconds pondering this. Is it 'SinJe'? 'Singe'? I feel this obsession is beginning to destroy the flow of my reading. Any answers will be most welcome - although as the poor old chap has now popped his clogs, I assume there will be less of the 'Singe'-ing in future.

Right, have wasted enough time wittering on and I am sure I've bored you all rigid. I march onward to The Kindly Ones. By the way, I am assuming no-one minds spoilers as I am so far behind the rest of you; if anyone is bothered (Daniel, I have no idea whether you're still reading) let me know and I will be good next time.