Two short stories – one short review.
From the very first page, where Mrs Donaldson encounters Terry in his tangerine Y-fronts with a mobile phone tucked into the waistband pondering problems in the back passage, I knew I was in for a rollicking read.
Classic Alan Bennett, revealing the quirks and foibles of human nature in his characteristic down-to-earth, dry and drole style.
Who could even begin to imagine what might go on behind closed doors?
Hats off to these two middle-aged ladies for veering off the trodden path of an ordinary, humdrum existence and venturing into unseemly pastures new. ( )

The Greening of Mrs Donaldson, 1 star
A story about a widow who, being a bit short of income, takes in lodgers; students. The first couple that she has, are short on rent for a few months, and offer to let her observe them having sex to compensate her.
The widow is also a pretend patient for student doctors. I enjoyed the part where she played a pretend patient, but I did not enjoy the other. A male author thinks a woman would enjoy this? ( )

La señora Donaldson es una viuda reciente, de cincuenta y cinco años, con una hija casada, puritana e insoportablemente convencional que pretende que su madre viva reverenciando la memoria de un difunto marido muy aburrido. Aburrimiento contra el que la señora Donaldson no se rebelaba, y ni siquiera cuestionaba, educada en la firme creencia de que ser y hacer lo que se espera de nosotros son los pilares de la cotidiana felicidad. O conformidad. Pero ahora su vida comienza a cambiar. Ha conseguido un trabajo en un hospital: actúa interpretando a pacientes, con sus correspondientes enfermedades, para ilustrar las clases del doctor Ballantyne. Y, de interpretación en interpretación, la señora Donaldson comienza a descubrir pliegues y honduras que ignoraba de sí misma. También ha alquilado una habitación a una pareja de estudiantes que le proponen un pago en especies para saldar lo que le deben: le ofrecerán un espectáculo porno sólo para sus ojos. Y ella, contra todo pronóstico, acepta, los contempla y cuando terminan les ofrece una taza de té. Y comienza La señora Donaldson rejuvenece. En cuanto a La ignorancia de la señora Forbes, su hijo Graham va a casarse con una chica que lleva el muy vulgar nombre de Betty. Y aunque muy rica, es fea. La dominante y esnob señora no entiende el porqué de todo esto, los guapos siempre se han casado con guapas, y viceversa. Ella lo hizo, y por eso tiene un hijo guapo. Además, su familia está en el escalón más alto de la clase media, donde no se usan nombres como Betty. El señor Forbes, por su parte, asiente a todo, y lo único que le inquieta es que Graham es y ha sido la principal ocupación de su esposa, y si se casa y se marcha, todo el peso de la insoportable señora Forbes recaerá sobre sus hombros. Y el bello Graham, a su manera, quiere a Betty, y hasta puede follar alegremente con ella, siempre que haya un espejo en el que él pueda verse, y quizá imaginar otros cuerpos menos femeninos, como el de Gary, por ejemplo. Porque la señora Forbes ignora muchas más cosas de las que sabe... Alan Bennett, con su mirada entre cándida y malévola, construye con estos dos relatos, tan indecentes como inteligentes, un conmovedor y muy divertido grotesco de la clase media.

This book made me laugh. I prefered the first story, which had a beautiful ending, to the second, which had too many points of view, but was entertained by both. ( )

I presume that there will be a similar response to Bennett's "Smut," as to Albee's "The Goat, Or Who Is Sylvia?"; replacing zoophilia with a sort of sexual game of "six degrees of Kevin Bacon."

It's good to remember that these are "stories," they are not real occurrences, so taken as stories, they are quite amusing, wonderfully told in a Roald Dahl meets Evelyn Waugh meets just about any British sitcom.


quotes:

"Oh yes. They're taught it but it's life that should have taught them it. Experience. And just as you are too young to be doctors they are too young to be nurses. The best nurses are middle-aged, except they won't be nurses any more, they'll be administrators. So stop asking for a nurse when all you want is someone to do the feeling for you. If there's comforting to be done or consolation to be offered you're the doctor; do it yourself."

....

"Let's look on the bright side,' said Cora. 'If we switched her off it would reduce her carbon footprint.'
Jackie began to wail.
Partridge sighed.
'Well,' said Partridge 'we'll play it by ear.' He shook hands with the sisters. 'We'll give her another week or two.'"

....

"She knows the moments when had she not been so timid she could have intruded on the action herself even though this, for her momentous, intervention would have amounted to no more than laying her hand on the boy's lunging rump."

....

"'It's also interesting,' he continues, 'that though a daughter can say "I have do everything for her" about her aged mother, at the other end of life a mother would never say of her infant child "I have to do everything for her." Why do we take the helpless condition of intancy without complaint but not that of senility? Culley, any thoughts?'
Culley considered.
'The shit smells worse for a start.'"

....

"Mrs. Donaldson shook her head, he gave her a thumbs-up sign and applied himself to the girl.
'This is what she likes,' Ollie said.
'No, I don't.'
'You did yesterday.'
'She doesn't want a running commentary.'
'Maybe she does,' said Ollie. 'Do you want a running commentary because I'm just about to slip my hand between my girlfriend's legs.'"

....



"'I mean face facts, Edward. He's very good looking; she isn't. Marriage is supposed to be a partnership. Good-looking people marry good-looking people and the others take what's left.'"

( )