This is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn by Aidan Chambers
Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars *****
Summary:
This is All by Aidan Chambers is a coming of age story about 19 year old Cordelia. The book is heavily character based rather than plot based. Cordelia uses the form of the Japanese Pillow Book to compile the story of her teenage years and her thoughts.
This is All is the last book in a sequence of six novels that explore different aspects of teenage love and self discovery. Each book is a stand alone novel, so it doesn't matter if you have read them or not to read this one. The book ends up as a compilation to give to her daughter in the future to help her through her teenage years.
Note: This book is not suitable for younger readers as it contains some parts that can be quite disturbing, triggering or adult themed.
What is a Japanese Pillow Book?
On the blurb it says Cordelia:
'passionately needs to write and choosing the old and famous Japanese pillow book as her model, she compiles the story of her teenage years'
What a pillow book is can be found through a quick 'google' but Chambers gives us a beautiful definition on the title page:
This book is split into six sections: Book one is The Red Pillow Box, Book two is The Green Pillow Box, Book Three - The Orange Pillow Box, Book Four - The Black Pillow Box and Book 5 - Yellow and Book 6 - Blue. The order of the pillow book is explained at the end of the novel, but the book is compiled beautifully together.
The Green Pillow box is the one part of the book that took me the longest to read, as it has a very unusual format. The left hand side of the page is (a) and the right hand (b). It does get a little confusing as you don't know what way to read them as the (a) sides follow the (a) narrative and (b) sides follow the (b) narrative. You can choose whichever way you want to read it, even the author, chambers, suggests this. On his website he addressed the why the green pillow box is written that way which I will highlight some of his answer here but if you want to read the whole answer check out his website:
http://www.aidanchambers.co.uk/thisisall.htm
In reference to this part he says:
In Book One of TIA the passages are not jumbled, but are arranged so that there is a storyline to follow, with 'pillow book' poems and lists and Cordelia's thoughts on various subjects placed in between the episodes of the story. These passages sometimes relate to the episodes of the story and sometimes don't. In other words, Book One is very like Sei Shonagon's book, except that it has a clear storyline. The reader is expected to read the pages of Book One in sequence as they would any novel. But of course, we know that readers can do as they like, and that sometimes they skip and come back to the skipped passages later, and so on.
In Book Two, however, the story episodes are all together without any interruption on the right hand (b) pages, and the pillow book passages are all together on the left hand (a) pages. There is a relationship between the (a) and (b) pages but it isn't immediately obvious. The reader has to decide how to read the Book. You might decide to read all the (b) pages - the story pages - first, and then come back and read all the pillow book passages on the (a) pages. Or vice versa: all the (a) pages first and then all the (b) pages. Or you might 'interleave' them, so to speak - in other words, mixing the (a) and (b) passages for yourself, as you feel like it
I decided to read the chapter of the book as a normal book, and didn't find myself confused apart from when I put the book down for a few hours or days. If you do decide to read the chapter as a normal book from (a) to (b) to (a) pages, I would recommend reading as much in one sitting as possible. But you can read bits a pieces of each part however you want and whatever ever works for you, as that is how the author intended it to be read.
My opinion of the Book
I fell in love with this book, I have never read anything like it before and I struggle to put into words how amazing this book is. The book talks to you, you find yourself inside the book as much as you read the story of the characters. The lyrical and poignant language is wonderful and enchants the reader. The book is highly rate on goodreads with an average rating of 4.28 and its very deserving of it. If you love words and writing and books and poetry and in general the power of words, I believe you will love this book. It is a chunky 800+ pages, but it is truly worth it and not all pages are full up with written text from top to bottom as there are poems and lists that fill pages. I got this book from the library and it breaks my heart to give it back because I feel this is one book that the copy you read means so much to you, I ended up filling the pages with sticky notes where I found quotes and passages I fell in love with and found I really related to and was gutted to take them all out to hand the book back.
Lots of books impact me, but there are a rare amount of books that give me this feeling after reading them, I don't know whether it's enlightenment or just give me the power to think and the feeling of reading a beautifully written book, but this gave me a similar feeling to that of when I read Markus Muzak's The Book Thief over five years ago. Although the book is not plot centred, I found myself wanting to read more and more, and the writing has something to do with that. The rest of my review is just going to be parts of the book I adored for you to see why and how this book is now one of my favourites that I will always remember and stay with me. Enjoy! And I really recommend this book, if you ever get a chance to read this, do :)
Quotations and Passages I loved (THERE IS A LOT!):
(P.S, some of these quotes are just for me, as future reference and documentation to remember my favourite bits, but I hope some of this intrigues you. I don't think any of these really spoil the book at all though)
p.29
'I like that phrase, 'beside myself', it's so right. At such time you do feel you're two people - the angry one exploding your body, and the other you, watching - calm, cool, scornful of your tiresome anger'.
P.53
'Everyone wants to all someone into their most secret self. Everyone feels so alone inside their deepest wish is for someone to know their secret being, because then they are alone no longer'
P.113
Here in the book, for Cordelia's 16th Birthday she is given a dictionary of every word Shakespeare has ever used or made and for me a lit student, this was amazing, I wanted my own copy! The book is feature often in the book and hope one day I can own something just like it, or it!:
P.134
This quotation I loved, because one of modules at university was Literature and Psychoanalysis where I wrote an essay about Doctor Who and the use of the Uncanny and some of the research I looked at reminded me of this and I found it not only a reminder of really interesting theories but also beautifully written:
' Mili-second of light- shadows caught by chemistry in the tomb of a camera. Photos are always memorials, the graves of ghosts. All photo albums are cemeteries'
P.147
Paths - 'How many feet make a path? All those previous soles still imprinted in the earth. All paths are history written in footprints. We keep them alive by reprinting them with our own footsteps. History dies without the present. There is no future without the path made to it by the past'.
P.157
'There are times when I feel I could blow up the entire world and myself with it'
P.200
This page Cordelia lists 'some beautiful things', this quote is for book lovers everywhere:
'A well produced new book: the look, the smell, the sound, the feel of it in my hands as I open it for the first time. In my opinion, a well-made book is the most beautiful and user friendly object ever made by human beings'
p.202
On the continued lists of beautiful things Cordelia talks about daffodils as they are brave. I loved this part as Daffodils are my favourite flowers. I found myself so much in the character of Cordelia.
On this page she also talked about who she is writing to which I think is really interesting from a writers POV.
Who am I writing to? 'Perhaps the self who writes is writing to, and writing for, one of more of my other selves. Maybe my readers are my other selves'
P.208
This is a poem Cordelia includes and it really spoke to me.
' Sometimes
I wish I
Were what I
Was when I
Wished I were
What I am now'
p.224
This section sees Cordelia write about old sayings made new + Unusual and amusing words. This part I highly recommend as it breaks apart language we don't think anything about and finds words that are perfect for using in places where you didn't know there was a word for it.
P.260/262
On these pages Cordelia talks about why she loves rain and English weather and this part really spoke to me as it summed up my own thoughts about rain and English weather and how wonderful it is and how lucky I am to live in a climate that is so varied and changing.
p.264
Cordelia talks about footnoting and the conundrum about them being in a book and how to read them which I really loved and found interesting. What do you think about footnotes in a book, do they distract you from the story or do you enjoy them?
Before I highlight one of my favourite parts of the books I want to include a few more pages I really loved.
p.276 - sleep
p.310 - past present and future
p.487 - chapter 15
p.496/7 - what is imagination?
p.550-552 - bed
p.569 - future and being decisive
p.570/571 changing from a child to an adult and the way what we think and act differs so much
p.681 - learning
p.688 - studying English lit and careers
p.752
and The Afterword
As you can see this book I found myself wanting to highlight everything and write on the pages, but I couldn't because it was a library book. But here is one of my favourite bits :P
p.562-563
The End :) I hope you enjoyed this review, It is very different to my normal ones, mostly because I didn't know how to describe this book other than show you through the language and quotations I adored. Let me know if you have read this book or plan on reading it :)
So... as soon as I got these books, I was dying to read them... I just didn't know which! In the end I chose the book with the release date that is soonest, which was What Light by Jay Asher. And I am really glad I did :)
