Henrik Ibsen, Norwegian playwright (20 March 1828 - 23 May 1906)



Ibsen, born in Skien, Norway, wrote his first plays in 1850: Catiline and The Burial Mound. From 1857 to 1864 he was artistic director of the new Norske Theatre, the Bergen Theatre, and the Christiania Theatre. He married Suzannah Thoresen in 1858 and they had one son. After 1864, Ibsen exiled himself from Norway, returning home intermittently, for 27 years, living in Rome, Munich, Dresden; these are the cities where he wrote most of his best-known works, among them Brand (1866), Peer Gynt (1867), Pillars of Society (1877), A Doll�s House (1879), Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the People (1882), The Wild Duck (1884), and Hedda Gabler (1890). Ibsen suffered a stroke in 1900 that put an end to his writing, and when he died in 1903 he was accorded a state funeral in Norway. His reported last words were "To the contrary."

Other author birthdays this week include Louis L'Amour, Ama Ata Aidoo, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Flannery O'Connor, Toni Cade Bambara, Robert Frost, Tennesee Williams and Erica Jong.

I will finish reading the rest of the stories in The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Other Tales of Terror today.

Find-it-later post

I have finished Sleeping Murder right now. It was a delightful read. Miss Marple is great, so I found her appearance a bit rar in this book. The short stories I liked better, but still it was very good, It's Miss Marple!

Now I'm thinking about going back to Ring of Five Dragons, which is also good, but I am not entirely sure what I am to make out of the body swapping...
Or if I should start The Five Bells and Bladebone.
I think the Ring will make the run, maybe I can finish it soon.

I finished Gertruda's Oath. Excellent Book, a must read. I am now reading The Bounty: The True Story of the Mutiny on the Bounty.

I'm breezing through Garden Spells. It's nice to have a fun, easy read after a toughie.

I finished Lab 257 and posted my scathing, which can be read here.

It's probably not my most professional (or mature) review I've ever posted, but quite frankly, I don't give a damn. :) It was terrible and I'm glad I managed to post the whole thing without cursing a lot. :)

Anyways, here's hoping my next book will be better. Last night I started Pluto, Animal Lover. It's a bit harsh and cruel, and tough to read at times, but I'm really enjoying it so far.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 20, 6:30am.

I'm re-posting this: I finished Stitches: A Memoir by David Small. It's my first graphic novel and it was strong stuff, dark and haunting. I also completed the audio of Shanghai Girls by Lisa See, which I really enjoyed. I finished Midnight's Children for the Group Read. I did not dislike it but it was a difficult, challenging read. Who picked this anyway? Now back to the positives; I'm well into When Will There Be Good News and loving it, also started the audio of When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead. It's a young adult book and the 1st half is very good.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 20, 7:09am.

Just checking in to mark the thread. Still reading Crippen and loving it. Happy birthday Ibsen! If he'd had another day of life for every minute I'd enjoyed either reading or watching his plays he'd still be around now.

Nice Girls Don't Live Forever is what I am currently working on. :)

Right now I'm listening to Revolutionary Road, which I'm enjoying far more than I though I would, and reading The House of Tomorrow which is fantastic. I think it will be a big hit with people that grew up watching Empire Records and High Fidelity.

Later this evening I'll be starting Before I fall and I'm still plodding through my non-fiction book Memories and Adventures which is rather interesting.

I am still reading The Elegance of the Hedgehog and am really not far into it at all. It isn't because I don't like it because I do enjoy reading it once I pick it up. I am just having a hard time picking it up for some reason. Hopefully, I will feel the urge more often this week.

I finished Midnight's Children and I'm now reading Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde. Also still reading Civilization Before Greece and Rome by H. W. F. Saggs.

#13 - I found The Elegance of the Hedgehog picked up steam in the second half of the book, once I had a better understanding of all the various characters. Enjoy!

Currently I am reading Silk by Alessandro Baricco.

I am still reading Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith. I am about half way through and not as enamored of it as when I started.

>8 Welcome to the wonderful world of graphic novels/memoirs! I thought Stitches was amazing. I can recommend more if you're interested.

I'm reading The Lotus Eaters, an ARC about a photo journalist in Vietnam during the war. Just starting it, no opinion yet. Reading for a blog tour on Tuesday, so I'll need to finish it in the next couple of days.

I'm enjoying Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder and will soon begin Prague by Arthur Phillips for the TIOLI Challenge.

I read Vathek, a sort of faux Arabian tale (more Persian than Arabian really) that was written in the 18th century. It was a short, pleasant read, but not a great one.

I'm finishing up The Red Army and the Wehrmacht which is collection of documents from the Soviet archives concerning Soviet-German military collaboration between about 1922 and 1933. The Germans were prohibited by the Versailles Treaty from having tanks, heavy artillery, heavy bombers or chemical weapons. To evade the restrictions, they provided information, training and technical expertise to the Soviet Union in exchange for training and research facilities in the USSR. Sometimes dry, but often fascinating.

I've also started Engineer Garin and His Death Ray by Alexei Tolstoy, a 1920's Soviet science fiction novel. It's a sort of pulp novel filled with gangsters, seductive women and evil capitalists.

#15 Well, Silk is another one that does that. I actually read about 3/4 of it thinking 'Why is he telling me this? What is the point? and Why is the protagonist such a git?' Then, right at the end it explained all that and turned into somethiing of real beauty. It's only a shortie so don't give up on it as I almost did.

Happy Spring! I'm about halfway through The Informers by Colombian author Juan Gabriel Vasquez. It's about the WWII era in Colombia (among other things). As soon as the government broke with the Axis at the beginning of the war and aligned the country with the Allies, people of German descent began being hounded by the government, including having their assets frozen, their businesses closed and their jobs taken away. Eventually, there were actually internment camps. It's a fascinating topic. However, the book is good but not great, for reasons I will outline when it's review time.

I finished Brat Farrar for the group read and still working on Patience and Fortitude. I'll either start The Bachelors of Broken Hill or the ER that just arrived, Love's Shadow.

After having read that Miss Marple this morning I grapped Minna von Barnhelm by Lessing in one sitting. For such an old drama it really was exciting. I was completely caught into the actions. Really good one.

After finishing the engrossing Wild Swans by Jung Chang, and wanting more of China, I picked up American Shaolin by Matthew Polly which is fun and does contain more about Chinese culture that ties in to what I picked up in Wild Swans. To continue, I may read Snow Flower and the Secret Fan next, although is set about 75 - 100 years earlier than those above.

I'm midway through Things We Didn't See Coming and am ready to start A Dream in Polar Fog, but I got an ARC of the new Per Petterson I Curse the River of Time and that is tempting me greatly.

I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows last night, so I now have one fewer book up in the air (after starting three in a week, which for me is a lot). I'm about halfway through The Lady in the Tower, and (now) fully expect to finish it before it has to go back to the library on the first. And I might be able to put some more time into reading A Brief History of Stonehenge.

Finished Pluto, Animal Lover and really enjoyed it. Very dark and disturbing but also enlightening. Review posted.

Tomorrow I plan to start Pandemic by Daniel Kalla.

Finished The Swimming Pool. The ending was anti-climatic but filled with bitter truth. I am not sorry I read it, but it is not one I'd re-read. I am also on the final stretch of The Information Officer Yea! The last 100 pages are where all the strength is in this book. Even though it has taken me a little longer than my typical read, I'm sure I'd re-read it again. I love the description of the war and I'm sure I'd pick up clues to the murders that I missed on a first reading. If I'm lucky I'll finish this over the weekend. Heresy is the very best book I've read this year and although I'm not finished I'm recommending it highly. Looking to finish by Tuesday latest.

>25: Lucky you! I'll be interested to hear how the latest Petterson translation compares to his other books.

I'm still reading A Game of Thrones. I had a lot of stuff to do this weekend so I'm in the same spot I was in before . . Oh, well. I DO intend to finish it, but it may take longer than usual.

As of turning off the light last night, after midnight here or there, I was about half through The Kindly Ones (I have selected the correct touchstone for this, and I expect it will not work) by Jonathan Littell. I will probably finish it, but I may already have reviewed it. Time will tell.

Robert

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 20, 5:51pm.

Almost done with True Compass and will then move on to Cane River for my book club.

Happy Birthday to Robert Frost. My favorite Robert Frost is (I think it's him anyway) is what I used to tell my kids when they were leaving to go back to college: "Home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you in." I usually attributed it to Jack Frost. It always got a chuckle.

I finished Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith. It was good but not what I expected, so I was a bit disappointed.

Now starting A Corpse at St. Andrew's Chapel by Mel Starr. It is book 2 in the Hugh de Singleton, Surgeon series. A medieval mystery, and an LT ER book I got for February.

Reading Petals from the Sky by Mingmei Yip. It was on my wishlist from ER, but showed up as a free download from Amazon. I like it so far!

I finished Book 2 in the Three Pines series, Dead Cold which was just as good as the first book; don't know how long I can hold off Book 3 The Cruelest Month. I'm now reading and ER book, The Spare Room by Helen Garner.

I finished Maus : a survivor's tale by Art Spiegelman, a very interesting book about the author's father Vladek and their stormy relationship. It left me wondering, as I did in Little Dorrit, was the main character such a sour and difficult person to begin with, or was it his experiences during the holocaust that made him so?

Next up is Noah's Compass.

I'm still listening to Brideshead Revisited and am a great deal less enamored than I was with the movie. Turns out that Evelyn Waugh was quite the misogynist. Who knew?

Just finished Raucho by Ricardo Güiraldes. He's an Argentine author most famous for Don Segundo Sombra, the quintessential 20th century gaucho novel. This one is apparently much more autobiographical, about a boy who grows up on an estancia with his siblings and widowed father. As a young man, he decides to seek excitement, travels to Paris. There he ends up of living a life of sex, drugs, and dissipation. (These being the days between rock and roll.) Eventually, he finds his way back home. Structurally, there's not that much to it, but I found Güiraldes' prose to be quite beautiful.

I think I've finally given myself permission to quit Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. It's a decent read, I guess, but I can't seem to will myself to pick it up.

So I started In Defense of Food. And I'm instantly happier.

Finished today:

Josephine Tey, Brat Farrar, for group read discussion on an LT group

Monica Dickens, Mariana - a Persephone reprint about a girl growing up in England in the 1920s.

Currently reading:

S J Rozan, Reflecting the Sky: No 7 in series about two NYC PIs sees Lydia
Chin and Bill Smith on business in Hong Kong - it's been a while since I read no 6 and it's been nice catching up again. Will probably finish this tomorrow and start reading Winter and Night

Rachel Ferguson, The Brontes Went to Woolworths - a reprint of a 20th century novel - my copy is a Virago Modern Classic. This is one of several books that have been reprinted by Bloomsbury recently, and there will probably be lots of reviews appearing soon as it was a recent Early Reviewers giveaway (but only available in the US).

Matthew Quick, The Silver Linings Play Book - I've only read a few pages - so far, the main character has had a nervous breakdown - it's the last of the featured books in this season of a programme called TV Bookclub.

Joan Aiken, Dido and Pa - 7th in the Wolves of Willoughby Chase series which I'm rereading/reading my way through at the moment. Children's books, many of them about the adventures of Dido Twite, who is one of my favourite fictional characters.

Sue Townsend, Adrian Mole: The Cappucino Years
5th in the series of fictional diaries, part of a series reread/read - Adrian is a single father working as a chef. His Nigerian wife has left him. It's 1997 and his old flame Pandora Braithwaite is elected as a New Labour MP.

Ali Smith, The First Person and other stories

Wendy Moore, Wedlock: How Georgian Britain's Worst Husband Met His Match
Biography about an 18th century aristocratic marriage

Will probably also start reading, in the next couple of days

Rachel Hawkins, Hex Hall - YA book about witches' school, to review for The Bookbag

Finished Shadowrise by Tad Williams and started Psychohistorical Crisis by Donald Kingsbury.

My hub and I are on the road, spent a couple of days in Vegas and now are en-route to Phoenix for spring baseball. Finally finished Flaubert's Parrot which I thought was a great read. Also finished up A Chill Rain in January the night before we left and Hunger Games on the plane. The 2nd book is an OK mystery, and I thought the 3rd was an excellent YA book. Am currently devouring Anthills of the Savannah which is beyond excellent. I like it better than Things Fall Apart. Happy Reading everybody

I'm currently reading Great Expectations for school and enjoying it immensely, and to counter-balance that A Song for Summer by Eva Ibbotson. And snippets of The Book Thief on the sly.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 20, 9:12pm.

I finished my first Louise Penny mystery, Still Life. I thoroughly enjoyed it! I am starting The City & The City by China Mieville, and I continue reading The Death of the Heart.

Finished Nice Girls Don't Live Forever. I hope to read more in this series, its such a fun read.

I haven't decided what to read next. :)

Just finished City of Thieves. Trying to decide between about 10 choices for which book to read next! ;)

Just started The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

I bought Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks the day before yesterday and have just now finished it. It's wonderfully written. I highly, highly recommend it. It's a hard book to put down. I resented all interruptions.
Now I'm craving something fluffy - I've been reading some dark and demanding books lately. My brain wants a rest. I need something silly but not insulting to my intelligence. So often these are the most difficult books to find.

I'm chuckling my way through the audio version of Sick Puppy by Carl Hiaasen. I read one of his every couple of years and although there is a sameness to them, his writing is hilarious.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 21, 1:36am.

>48 I loved Sick Puppy almost as much as Skinny Dip. I'm looking forward to his next and hope it comes soon!

Just finished The Fur Person by May Sarton. If you're a cat lover, you'll love this charmer.

I've also just started The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. I didn't expect to get to it as soon as I did but I'm not complaining. It sounds great. And I've got The Brutal Telling on my ipod and hope to get into it this week.

I am reading a good historical fiction called Down the Common: A Year In The Life of a Medieval Woman by Ann Baer.

I am looking forward to reading Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins this week as well.

I finished The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Other Tales of Terror yesterday and just started in From demons to Dracula today.

I finished two very good books yesterday, The Surrendered by Chang-Rae Lee (an LT Early Reviewer book) and Earth and Ashes by Atiq Rahimi.

Today I'll finish Mandarins, a collection of short stories about early 20th century Japan by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927) that was translated and published by Archipelago Books in 2007, and resume reading Albert Camus: A Life by Olivier Todd.

I finished The Remains of the Day yesterday, an excellent book. It's a humorous, poignantly sad book about the effects of a public self upon the private self. It points out that if one becomes too rigid and enamored with one's public self (as a professional, as an optimist, as a together one, etc) the result is isolation from others and oneself. The writing is superb as well.

Having read the greatst part I consider "Mein Kind hat Tics und Zwänge" as read. I just left the parts about ADHD and necessities, but it was a good read. It was not too packes with technical terms. The stories of affected families were very interesting and thought provoking and I was very pleased that the medical/explaining part did not insist on tablets or pills against the tourette syndrom. Nevertheless is was not at all what I had looked for, because it was in the first place written for parents with children who have the TS, not for partners, but still I learned a lot of things.

I just happen to be reading Flannery O'Connor this week, finally started in on The Complete Stories. Also reading Seize The Day by Saul Bellow.

Quite the mixed bag for me this week. My head's all over the place so my reading is following suit! Let's see - currently on the go at various times and places and moods: Cobain Unseen by Charles Cross (a kind of photographic companion to Heavier than Heaven, even though I haven't read that yet), The Count of Monte Cristo, Kate Harrison's chick lit novel The Secret Shopper Unwrapped, and at home Madness: A Bipolar Life by Marya Hornbacher. Oh, and Global Village Idiot by John O'Farrell, which is a book of amusing newspaper columns. Plus the occasional magazine when I really can't be bothered... I'd better get a move on with a couple of them - I've had a sudden flush of success with Member Giveaway/ER books after months of nothing at all, so I need to make some reading space soon!

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 21, 12:05pm.

Hi Ellie- I read Heavier than Heaven a few years ago and it was excellent! I'm a big Nirvana fan and it gave me a nice glimpse into Cobain.

Nice one, Mark! Looking forward to it myself - I found it a couple of years ago at the charity shop and snatched it up. I'm having a bit of a Nirvana renaissance, as it were, now the hormone-riddled years of 'liking anything loud' have passed, and liking them all the more this time for having a slightly more rounded view of the whole thing... :-)

I doubt I'll finish it in a week (motherhood keeps me pretty busy and Kidlet likes me to read to him), but I picked up The Hunchback of Notre Dame yesterday at the library. Good thing I can keep it for three weeks; I might just need that long!

Horray! I finished The Information Officer! Loved the ending which was cheeky. Of course I didn't see the twist coming although it was there the whole time. I'd give it a solid four stars. Also finished The Swimming Pool. Nearly finished with Heresy. This is so good I'd give it five stars. I love Bruno! You all must read this book if you like murder mysteries and bookshops.

#53 snash, what a perfectly clear and succinct post.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 21, 2:33pm.

I finished A Corpse at St. Andrew's Chapel by Melvin Starr, a medieval mystery and ER book.

I enjoyed it and still want to be there !

It was a bit slower than book 1, but still satisfying. Can't wait for book 3.

Now starting non-fiction, Your Hate Mail Will be Graded by John Scalzi. Ten years of random posts from his blog, Whatever . Very humorous.

I finished Up in the Air which was great and now I'm reading Unfinished Desires by Gail Godwin.

I finished the stunningly beautiful The Spare Room by Helen Garner which was an ER book that I was lucky enough to snag. Now I'm on to a bigger than life book, the new Stieg Larrson, Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest. At over 600 pages, I'll be on this for awhile.

Reading Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie.Just Love Miss Marple.

#20 - you are so right about Silk - I finished the slim novella rather quickly yesterday. What a beautiful story.

Right now I am reading The Kingdom of Ohio by Matthew Flaming - 55 pages in and hooked.

I just finished The Brontës Went to Woolworths. It's a fun little book, though at the moment I'm not sure what to think about it beyond that. The main characters are three sisters and their mother, who live in London during the 1930s. They all share a sort of imaginative game where childhood toys or people they've never met take part in their lives. There's not any overarching conflict or even that much of a plot. It does have a very sort of intimate feel to it, so it was very easy to get caught up in the characters and observe their interactions.

I've started Hunger by Michael Grant although I really shouldn't be reading right now i just can't concentrate on my work :S

I’ve been re-reading quite a few Miss Marple mysteries.

The first one is The Body in the Library. The link to my review is here,

http://www.librarything.com/review/57965574

And the second one is, The Moving Finger. The link to my review is here,

http://www.librarything.com/review/57965984

Also read Plays Pleasant by George Bernard Shaw. The link to my review is here,

http://www.librarything.com/review/57953845

I've been blazing through the Percy Jackson books. This weekend I read The Titan's Curse and The Battle of the Labyrinth. We don't own the fifth book, and I believe it's still in hardcover. I'm number 41 on the library's reserve list. Just as well -- I've been neglecting homework! Also reading All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor aloud.

Starting Little,Big. Someone else I think recently was reading it on here. . I think? Anyways, it piqued my interest, so I got it from the library.

Started The James Boys today, but addicted to watching the owls, taking away reading time!

http://www.ustream.tv/theowlbox#more

What a great site, thanks for the owls.

I finished From Demons to Dracula this morning, and will start in The Children's Book on my way home this afternoon.

.

I have just finished reading the book Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone by author Rajiv Chandrasekaran. Next
I will watch the movie version "Green Zone" in the cinemas.

.

I've started reading Flint by Margaret Redfern.

Have finished reading

S J Rozan, Reflecting the Sky

Ali Smith, The First Person and other stories

Wendy Moore, Wedlock: How Georgian Britain's Worst Husband Met His Match

Now reading

Rachel Hawkins, Hex Hall - YA book about witches' school, to review for The Bookbag - Sophie has been sent to a reform school where witches, faeries, shapeshifters and the odd vampire are sent when their actions don't fit in with normal human society. I really like it so far and think it will be a quick read.

Rachel Ferguson, The Brontes Went to Woolworths - a reprint of a 20th century novel - my copy is a Virago Modern Classic. This is one of several books that have been reprinted by Bloomsbury recently, and there will probably be lots of reviews appearing soon as it was a recent Early Reviewers giveaway (but only available in the US). It's about an eccentric family composed of 3 sisters - two young adults and a sister at school, and their mum, in early 20th century London (1930s?) Interesting following on from Mariana by Monica Dickens, also about a young London woman in the 1920s and 30s.

Matthew Quick, The Silver Linings Play Book - Strange book about a man who has come out of psychiatric detention of some kind, and is trying to reconstruct his life - it's the last of the featured books in this season of a programme called TV Bookclub.

Joan Aiken, Dido and Pa - 7th in the Wolves of Willoughby Chase series which I'm rereading/reading my way through at the moment. Children's books, many of them about the adventures of Dido Twite, who is one of my favourite fictional characters.

Sue Townsend, Adrian Mole: The Cappucino Years
5th in the series of fictional diaries, part of a series reread/read - Adrian is a single father working as a chef. His Nigerian wife has left him. It's 1997 and his old flame Pandora Braithwaite is elected as a New Labour MP.

S J Rozan, Winter and Night #8 in Chin/Smith crime series
Catching up with this series, as I'm hoping no 9 will arrive in the post soon

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 24, 9:19am.

Last night I finished Hunger and started The Return of the King as I'm trying to engineer it becoming my 50th book of the year (slightly daft I know)

Finished up Heir of Sea and Fire last night and started the final book in the series The Harpist in the Wind. I'm also still working on Christine which is slow going as it's my lunch hour book.

Just finished Crippen - a great book apart from one or two tiny anachronisms (and one rather distracting very Irish usage from a character who is supposed never to have been there).

Time to settle down with another that has been on Mount TBR for a pathetically long time - After the Gold Rush by Lewis Buzbee. Goodness only knows why I've waited so long to get round to this one as he's a writer I admire immensely.

I started The Last Child-my Early Reviewer book this weekend and its been really good so far...also started The Annotated HP Lovecraft which is also good...and snuck in the first chapter of The Three Weismanns of Westport which also looks pretty good

I finished Full Dark House which I enjoyed and have moved on to Cooking with Fernet Branca by James Hamilton-Paterson. I need a little light literature before I move onto Shelby Foote's final volume of the Civil War.

#80 Changed my mind. I have other short stories on the go at the moment so sticking with Buzbee but going for a novel instead - it's going to be Fliegelman's Desire.

I just finished The Elegance of the Hedgehog. What an amazing, beautiful book! I loved it. I think I need some time to decompress though. I am in the middle of Beowulf on the Beach so think I will skim through that a bit before beginning my next selection - Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson.

Glad you asked!

I am currently rereading Count C.F.Volney's still controversial The Ruins, or, Meditatation on the Revolutions of Empires:and the Law of Nature. African-American academics have long valued this book because Volney was one of the first to champion the idea that early Nile Valley civilizations contributed to the rise of the "scientific method." Volney was also a member of the Friends of Blacks Club in France during the early days of the French Revolution.

While serving as Ambassador to France, Thomas Jefferson seriously imperiled his political future by secretly joining with the noted anti- slavery poet and founder of ''the American Mercury", Joel Barlow to provide his friend Constantin-Francois Volney with an English translation of The Ruins: Or a Survey of the Revolutions of Empires, a translation from the French Les Ruines ou Meditations sur les Revolutions des Empires, published in 1796 by William A. Davis, in New York. This is an admittedly radical work even by today's Liberal standards. Maybe that is why it took the University of Virginia 185 years to remember that Jefferson had given it not one, but two copies of his personally selected translations of Volney's work.

One copy was presented to the Library of Congress just in time for it's 200th birthday. This translation of Volney's work is the same edition as the one Jefferson had sold to The Library of Congress in 1815, but which was sadly lost to flames in 1851.
Several of my favorite quotations come from this book. Here's one.
"Those piles of ruins which you see in that narrow valley watered by the Nile, are the remains of opulent cities, the pride of the ancient kingdom of Ethiopia. Behold the wrecks of her metropolis, of Thebes with her hundred palaces, the parent of cities and the monument of the caprice of destiny. There a people, now forgotten, discovered while others were yet barbarians, the elements of the arts and sciences. A race of men now rejected from society for their sable skin and frizzled hair, founded on the study of the laws of nature , those civil and religious systems which still govern the universe. Lower down those dusky points are the pyramids whose masses have astonished you. Beyond that, the coast, hemmed in between the sea and a narrow ridge of mountains was the habitation of the Phoenicians. These were the famous cities of Tyre, of Sidon, of Ascalon, of Gaza, and of Berytus. "
Count Constantine Francis Chassebeuf De Volney - 1793 Thomas Jefferson, trans

Mark Dimunation, chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections division at the Library of Congress, has called Volney's work an “important source,..”, “that influenced Jefferson's thinking”. Just think, “Afro-Centric Scholars” (Not an oxymoron) have been teaching for decades that this particular translation of this work is an important primary source. Black Classic Press published an excellent paperback edition of the Jefferson-Barlow translation in 1991. This book was a reprint of the 1890 Eckler edition. Its taken almost 200 years, but thanks to the ongoing deification of Thomas Jefferson, more mainstream scholars may finally work up the nerve to examine Volney's message in the exact words that President Jefferson chanced so much to pass along.

Thanks Thomas,

Viator

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 22, 8:07pm.

So far I've finished The Postmistress by Sarah Blake and Fifteen by Beverly Cleary.

I'm still reading This Book is Overdue by Marilyn Johnson and I've started listening to The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey by Trenton Lee Stewart.

I'm planning on starting Soulless tonight.

Ah, Fifteen! I think I read it when I was fifteen. What a marvelous writer Cleary is. She created an awkward girl who was chosen by the class hunk and felt privileged and delighted at the attention. Then he revealed his true self and she proved to have enough gumption and self-confidence to see that she was in an unhealthy relationship. When it was over she was grateful to have had the experience and to move on, a happier and wiser girl.

What a great thing for a young girl to read ... and this was written before the Women's Movement!

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 22, 11:37pm.

I finally managed to slog through all of The Witches of Eastwick. If it wasn't my book group's pick for the month, I'd have happily abandoned it a long time ago. I hated it, everything about it: the characters, the story, the writing, everything.

I'm still reading Beware of Pity, which I love, and Family Britain, which I also love. Plus, before April 1 I have to finish reading King of the Hill by A. E. Hotchner for the Missouri Readers group read. It is a memoir of his childhood growing up in St. Louis, long before he became Paul Newman's friend and business partner.

I didn't like Witches of Eastwick either. I thought it would be about girl-power, but it was the opposite.

I have temporarily paused A Game of Thrones and started reading Fang by James Patterson. It was a very fast and enjoyable read. I finished it yesterday and am now back on A Game of Thrones, which is taking a pathetically long time to finish, although it is very good. Also, I am sad to say six other books have come in from the library, so I am well and truly overloaded. Wonderful.

The Divine Miss having annoyed me beyond belief this past weekend with guests I had to cater to, and the ordinary general relationshipal angst, she (all unknowing until the next billing cycle) bought me Ares Express being the newly Americanly published sequel to Ian McDonald's brilliant debut novel Desolation Road, and Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay, which was urged upon me by several knowledgable fans of his as a good first read.

I'm like a dog with two juicy, nummy bones and only the one mouth...which one do I gnaw? So I'm going back and forth. I can't imagine putting either one down entirely to focus on the other!

I finished Your Hate Mail Will be Graded by John Scalzi, and am now starting Keeper of Light and Dust by Natasha Mostert.

I've also started reading Hackney, That Rose Red Empire by Iain Sinclair, in addition to the 6 listed above. It's a library hardback and it's too big to carry round. I'm considering buying my own copy, especially as I may not be able to renew this for long enough to finish reading it.

I started to read Bella and Edward's beautiful history.
Twilight

Finished The Oxford Book of English Detective Stories.

Now reading The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz.

I finished One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson. I love how the story drifts off on tangents about the character's thoughts and histories. Delightful.

I began The Brontes Went to Woolworths last night. I can't tell if it has a sinister quality or if I am jaded. Remains to be seen.

Hi bookaholicgirl-I agree with you about The Elegance of the Hedgehog- I absolutely loved that book- I did pick up Gourmet Rhapsody but haven't gotten around to rading it yet

I finished Noah's Compass which was fortunately a quick and easy read because it's a complete waste of time. Thanks to someone on this list I'm about to start In the Company of Crows and Ravens by John Marzluff and Tony Angell. Thanks for mentioning it. I don't have crows or ravens in my backyard but do have grackles, which I think are in the same family.

I started Cheerful Weather for the Wedding by Julia Strachey. I tried adding it to my LT library and I got a "fatal error." Hope that's not literal.

I am reading Silent Screams by C E Lawrence
It is a well written serial killer story. Not too gory and with a nice mystery. 50 pages to go! I hated to go to bed last night, but I had to work today!

I am currently readling Beloved by Toni Morrison and Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog. I just finished Monday a play by Arthur Miller All my Sons and would highly recommend it.

Review: Everyone has heard of Death of a Salesman and the Crucible by Arthur Miller. So when I went to look at some plays to read this year I thought both would be a good start. I needed one more so I threw in a third Arthur Miller. Wow, I had never heard of All my Sons, and I don't know why. It's a very short play, takes place in under 24 hours. Joe Keller is the head of the family and runs a factory which made parts during the war. Under all the pressure to quickly manufacture parts and trying to support his family, Joe send out defective parts to the air force. Twenty-one soldiers die when their airplanes malfunction. During the investigation, Joe claims he knew nothing of the defective parts and send his partner to jail. Joe's own son Larry goes missing while flying over seas. Joe tells himself Larry never flew P-40's. Three years later, Chris, the younger son proposes marriage to Ann. The daughter of Joe's business partner and Larry's sweetheart. Mrs. Keller has never accepted her sons disappearance and is still waiting for him to return home. When Ann's brother George goes to visit their father is jail for the first time the entire story breaks. I couldn't put it down. I have no idea why I had never heard of All my Sons. I haven't read the Death of Salesman or the Crucible yet, but I am afraid I will just now be disappointed. Great Great play.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 23, 3:08pm.

I picked up Bones of Betrayal by Jefferson Bass whilst out shopping today. It's a crime novel and Im already 6 chapters in so far, and it is proving itself worthwhile.

I'm reading My Father's Secret War by Lucinda Franks. Very good so far.

Finished Murder at the Vicarage,just about finished with The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. Going to start A Woman of Valor read her life story in a children's book back in grade school. Many many moons ago.Thought I would read the big people version, hope I enjoy it like I did back then.

I'm currently reading The Apothecary's Daughter by Julie Klassen...It's a tad bit slow at times, but I still holds my interest nonetheless

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 23, 10:11pm.

I'm enjoying one that has been on Mount TBR for far too long - Sweet Thames. It's one of those that I can't understand not having read as soon as it arrived and I can only assume it turned up in the middle of a very good haul. It will also mark the halfway point in my 'Books Off the Shelf' challenge, whih is going to make me feel very good indeed. I may take a break after this one and get on with some of the newer ones that have been waiting around. And I just happen to have Mother's Day tokens still to spend.

Finished The Corrections which was boring beyond belief and have now started 20th Century Ghosts.

I finished The City & The City, which was not my cup of tea, although very well written. I am not a big fan of the dystopia genre. but give it a try every so often. I am reading The Death of the Heart and starting to listen to A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny.

#108 Ditto re The Corrections!

I'm now reading Sorcerer's Legacy by Janny Wurts.

Although it's very famous I wasn't as impressed by Death of a Salesman as his other work but it may have been not having the depth of study and discussion - All My Sons and A View from the Bridge were one of my set texts at A level English literature, and we also read and were taken to see a theatre production of The Crucible. I think A View from the Bridge is worth seeking out too.

There is a film of The Crucible based on the play too, which seems to be available on DVD on both sides of the Atlantic - amazon uk lists affordable region 1s as well as region 2s.

Since I last posted I've finished reading

Rachel Hawkins, Hex Hall - YA book about witches' school, to review for The Bookbag - Sophie has been sent to a reform school where witches, faeries, shapeshifters and the odd vampire are sent when their actions don't fit in with normal human society. A quick and enjoyable read. Review for the Bookbag pending.

Still reading

Rachel Ferguson, The Brontes Went to Woolworths - a reprint of a 20th century novel - my copy is a Virago Modern Classic. This is one of several books that have been reprinted by Bloomsbury recently, and there will probably be lots of reviews appearing soon as it was a recent Early Reviewers giveaway (but only available in the US). It's about an eccentric family composed of 3 sisters - two young adults and a sister at school, and their mum, in early 20th century London (1930s?) Interesting following on from Mariana by Monica Dickens, also about a young London woman in the 1920s and 30s. (I will finish this today, I think).

Matthew Quick, The Silver Linings Play Book - Strange book about a man who has come out of psychiatric detention of some kind, and is trying to reconstruct his life - it's the last of the featured books in this season of a programme called TV Bookclub.

Joan Aiken, Dido and Pa - 7th in the Wolves of Willoughby Chase series which I'm rereading/reading my way through at the moment. Children's books, many of them about the adventures of Dido Twite, who is one of my favourite fictional characters.

Sue Townsend, Adrian Mole: The Cappucino Years
5th in the series of fictional diaries, part of a series reread/read - Adrian is a single father working as a chef. His Nigerian wife has left him. It's 1997 and his old flame Pandora Braithwaite is elected as a New Labour MP.

S J Rozan, Winter and Night #8 in Chin/Smith crime series
Catching up with this series, as I'm reviewing no 9, published in the UK as Trail of Blood - I much prefer the US title, The Shanghai Moon

Have also started:

Iain Sinclair, Hackney: That Rose-Red Empire
A book about a very interesting area of north east London near where I live with lots of anecdotes about people and places and the history of the area.

Margaret Forster, Isa and May
A young woman who was named for her two grandmothers starts researching her family history in this new novel.

I started re-reading Cold Comfort Farm last night, as My Father's Secret Warturned out to be unsuitable for bedtime reading.

I finished Pandemic by Daniel Kalla, really enjoyed it. Will probably wait until tomorrow to start Crooked Little Vein by Warren Ellis.

My Wife's Affair by Nancy Woodruff..loved it.

See my review.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 24, 12:38pm.

I read Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier the other day. His writing amazes and haunts me. Review:

http://www.librarything.com/review/54583583

Now reading Cold Granite by Stuart MacBride that someone on LT recommended. It's really good! Thanks whoever you are!

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 24, 12:49pm.

msg 112- thanks elkiedee for the recommend.

I might have to switch out Death of a Salesman for A View from the bridge. If you weren't very impressed with it I am pretty sure I will be also disappointed. I don't want to follow what I thought was a great play with one that is more medicore.

I'm about 100 pages into In the Company of Crows and Ravens, and will continue to read it at work tomorrow, but for my at home day I'm going to start The Elegance of the Hedgehog which seems from this site to be a love it or hate it book. Here's hoping for the former.

Started reading Percy Jackson and the Battle of the Labyrinth it's going good so far and i will probably finish it tonight.

#120 gotta love Percy Jackson and the rollercoaster ride Riordan puts the readers on.

Just finished In the Fall by Jeffrey Lent, excellent. Will begin monkey hunting by Cristina Garcia on the train ride home.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 24, 3:55pm.

Finished Silent Screams by C E Lawrence. Really enjoyed this serial killer mystery. Better written than many I have read, or started reading.

Started Truly, Madly by Heather Webber. I got this as an Early Reviewer but it just turned up in my list. A chick lit romance with a paranormal twist. Pretty good so far.

I have never understood the love for Death of a Salesman when the man wrote The Crucible, for heaven's sake. I loved that play. I read it in high school, and it really made me think about things in a new way.

Reading Louisa May Alcott: the Woman Behind Little Women which is great, and various knitting books.

#123> So what you're saying is that in your view, Death of a Salesman should be liked, but not well liked?

Pretty much ;-) Seriously, DoS has been held up as a shining example of American theatre, and Miller wrote much better plays that don't get the exposure. I have a bit of an aversion to it, I suppose.

This is just my opinion, I have a million. Any other pontificating I can do for you?

Rockinrhombus, I saw a PBS special on LMA, and heard about that book. . .Sounds like a really good book!

I started Joe College by Tom Perrotta last night and it is just right. I'm halfway through it and he's managed to make me laugh quite a few times. Not little chuckles but actual spontaneous bursts of laughter.

We received our refund check and I am spending money on books like a drunken sailor but instead of a hangover I wake up to a stack of newly purchased books. Heaven!

I have started Mr. Shivers and an ARC that came in today's afternoon mail called Rooms. Rooms is so good that I have already read 95 pages straight. I have a feeling that this is definitely a keeper. I just wish I knew how to contact the Publisher and let them know how delighted I am to have this book.

Leperdbunny--it is great!! And the PBS special was good, but the book, as always, is better!

>87 NarratorLady, the story you describe is different from what I read in Fifteen (*spoiler warning* in this one, Jane goes out with Stanley, who is a generally nice guy, and while she finds confidence in herself they end up going steady *end spoiler*). I wonder if it was one of those books that the author went back and rewrote with updates?

I did indeed start Soulless as I had planned, and finished today. I had so much fun reading this book, loved the genre blending, and had trouble putting it down to go to work.

Now I'm rereading The Thief, getting ready for when the fourth book in the series, A Conspiracy of Kings, is available at my library.

Posted my review of Unnatural Fire by Fidelis Morgan. A seriously funny, good read. Just don't expect Detective Fiction:
http://www.librarything.com/work/69801/reviews/57618204

.........and I'm still wandering through The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril...which is turning out to be "much more than it seems". so far, so good.

;-}

I finished Sorcerer's Legacy so another one to add to the list :- I'm now reading The Forest of Hours by Kerstin Ekman.

> 130 and > 87 - I agree with Bell7's memory of Fifteen, I think the book remembered by NarratorLady must be a different one.

>132

I haven't read Forest of the Hours...but I have read Blackwater and own Under the Snow and Witches' Rings....so, I guess I like Kerstin Ekman's work. I'm curious to find out what you think of FOREST...

>113 elkiedee: I just have to ask. How do you read seven books at one time? I can't manage to read two at a time. Just wondering.

I finished my ER copy of The Brontes Went to Woolworths. Which I enjoyed but did not love.

I've begun Last Bus to Woodstock by Colin Dexter which is the first in the Inspector Morse story and is, so far, an interesting, well-written British procedural.

I finished My Father's Secret War which was unexpectedly moving. I'm going to finish Cold Comfort Farm before I move on to the third volume of Shelby Foote's history of the Civil War.

I'm reading Gail Godwin's Unfinished Desires but having trouble keeping my mind on it just now, so I pick up James McConkey's anthology The Anatomy of Memory and find words by Annie Dillard, from the title essay of her book Teaching a Stone to Talk. As I read, I am reminded of how life-affirming Annie Dillard's "voice" is for me, and then I see that her books share a shelf in my library with another essential "voice", that of Joan Didion, and, of course, on the shelf above them, there is Emily Dickinson, her soprano clear and true. And, not far away, other beloved voices chime in . . . Deborah Digges, Harriet Doerr . . . a heavenly choir indeed.

McConkey's book begins with words from Emily: "The Brain - is wider than the sky -" which ends . . .

"The Brain is just the weight of God -
For - Heft them - Pound for pound -
And they will differ - if they do -
As Syllable from Sound -"

I picked up Snoop from a remainder table yesterday and was hopeful enough about it that I expected to read all of it last night. I trudged through 74 pages of off topic tedium and now question whether I will continue it.

Robert

>138 Argh! Teaching a Stone to talk!! - I had to translate that for a french class several weeks ago :S Twas rather stressful

Finished Return of the King last night and I started Castle Dor for my March du Maurier book and earlier this evening I started Glass Houses which is a re-read.

#137 : Did you like My Father's Secret War? I loved it when I read it about 2 years ago. As you said, it was very moving, and I can't help wishing her father had told his children about his past so they could have understood him better and provide him the kind of comfort he probably needed.

I've had a good reading week, and finished Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, and absolutely fabulous book and Swan for the Money by Donna Andrews. I'm not yet sure what I'll read when I get home this evening. I might break out Kindred in Death by J.D. Robb

#141 I did like My Father's Secret War. I was impressed with her researching skills, but I suppose that's what you would expect of an investigative reporter with the NY Times. I have to admire him for keeping his secrets, even though I agree with you that revelation may have brought him solace. It was a stoical generation.

I've just started A Place to Stand which seems quite promising. I'm also reading Shadow of Sirius, a collection of poems by W.S. Merwin.

>138: Molly, once again your eloquent words touched my heart. I'm not sure about the Memory book, but I do want to acquire Teaching A Stone To Talk based on the title and, of course, my love of the words of Annie Dillard, part of your heavenly choir.

I'm now beginning And Only to Deceive by Tasha Alexander.

Still, still reading A Game of Thrones and I also started Elegy for a Lost Star by Elizabeth Haydon. I put down both of them to start and finish Night Pleasures by Sherrilyn Kenyon (which was a VERY good book). I'm now back to the other two and have started The Day I Turned Uncool by Dan Zevin; I feel like I need a light, funny read to make up for the grimness of A Game of Thrones. I seriously need to get all eight of the books waiting on my dresser read, since six more books are coming in at the library. I'm being buried alive by books! Yay! :)

I started listening to Lost in a Good Book, the 2nd Thursday Next book. It's light and fun. I'm over halfway through with Last Night in Twisted River and it's been very good and lastly, I've started my 2nd Graphic Novel, The Arrival ,which also looks to be wonderful!

I've finished Crooked Little Vein already, having just started it last night. Lots of crude humor that I chuckled at regularly, but definitely not recommended for everyone.

Tomorrow I plan to finally read Fahrenheit 451. I knew I'd get around to it eventually...

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 25, 8:55pm.

I have one lead book, very occasionally two, and there's usually one or two others that I read a bit faster. I also have some non-fiction library books that are much too big to trug around.

I'm reading My One-Night-Stand with Cancer: A Memoir by Tania Katan... HILARIOUS and at the same time very touching. Great for those of you who like LGBT non-fiction, too.

I vegged out over spring break and didn't get as much reading done as I intended. I did listen to several YA books while traveling. I finished Calder Game which I have had on CD for a long time. I also finished listening to Going Bovine. I was disappointed with this book. I thought it was going to be a grand adventure in mythology and instead it ended up being a disease of the month book. It was well written and teens will probably love it (just because of the overuse of the F bomb) but I don't think it is deserving of all the press and talk that it has received.

I started a nice light romance Duke of Her Own for a change of pace because Midnight's Children is so hard to read. I am really enjoying Collapse and learning lots from it.

Taking a break from Little,Big. . now reading Real Murders by Charlaine Harris. This book isn't too terribly long, maybe I'll finish it tomorrow.

#145 ktleyed--I read And Only to Deceive last month. It was so good, I can't believe it sat on my shelf for three years. Really good!

Question: How does one follow up To Kill A Mockingbird? No, really. I had never read the book before, it lived up to all the hype, and now I'm searching in vain for something to read next that won't feel distinctly like a downgrade.

What to do, what to do. Suggestions welcome. Also, read TKAM!

To kill a Mockingbird is a classic all in its own genre. Its difficult to find a book of similar stature. For books of a previous era, I would suggest The Scarlet Letter. For more recent books, I would suggest The Help, The Secret life of Bees, or The Night.

Right now I am reading Freedom Evolves by Dennett. It is a fine book, the initial chapters in my opinion were a bit unfocussed, but now Dennett has come into his own and his arguments are crystal clear. Even though I dont agree to his definition of 'free will' nor with his philosophy, I still find it a very interesting read.

'

I have just finished reading the book How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell . Next I will watch the movie version.

.

#155: Very hard to find a follow-up to To Kill a Mockingbird. There are two wonderful books told by children that I think of being in the same vein as TKAM: Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith. Although not as powerful as TKAM, both are excellent reads.
But if you want to move away from that specific genre and you're looking for an excellent book that won't disappoint, try Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro.

#130/133: Obviously I've got it wrong. Am racking my brain to think of what I confused with Fifteen to no avail. Isn't it awful when the brain cells crumble?

>3 richardderus...OK I'm curious, what's a "Find-it-later post" ? Is it like having someone hold your place in the queue? Is it better to be #3 than #91 where you actually posted? Just curious!

I'm halfway through Henry Green's brilliant Loving and have just begun a short biography of Lord Beaverbrook by David Adams Richards.

I finished Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater, a very enjoyable YA novel, and now I've started The Wives of Henry Oades by Johanna Moran.

I finished The Kingdom of Ohio last night. I found it to be an interesting historical fiction with a nice blend of science, time travel, mystery and footnotes of historical facts - yes, there are footnotes - all bundled up in an easy to follow story. Review posted:

http://www.librarything.com/work/8290172/reviews/53659851

I haven't decided what to read next.

To follow up TKAM, you might be interested in Mockingbird, a biography of Harper Lee. I like to read more about authors I discover. Then, in a lighter vein, you might like Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe. In the same state, and covers the same issues, with a few others thrown in. It is funny, though.

I finished Sweet Thames and am now on one I picked up second-hand, called Cute, Quaint, Hungry and Romantic: the Aesthetics of Consumerism which is a lot more fun than it sounds.

I'm going back to Shelby Foote and reading The Civil War: Red River to Appomattox. I need to find out how it ends.

#157 NarratorLady

Could it be another Beverly Cleary book Jean and Johnny? It's about a girl who falls for a popular guy but finds out that she likes him more than he likes her. There is a nice steady boy who isn't as flashy but is a better match and she finds that out by the end.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 26, 11:44am.

>158 abealy, I leave my LT Talk page set to "Your Posts" at all times, so threads in big groups like the 75-Books Challenge don't make it impossible for me to find the threads I'm active in. Since I'm a member of that group, "Your Groups" is an unhelpful setting for me. Sometimes, if I get back to a thread before a day elapses, I'll just edit the "find-it-later" post; this took a while, so I posted a new comment to the thread.

I do my housekeeping in a funny way, I guess, but trying to be involved in over 50 threads makes some McGyvering necessary.

I've got a number of reviews to post...have to do that soon, it's almost April!!

Re-read Sleeping Murder by Agatha Christie. The link to my review is here,

http://www.librarything.com/review/58145715

#154> studio1, I can understand your plight. There have been some good recommendations for books that are in the same mode or (in the case of the Lee bio) subject matter of Mockingbird. But your problem is that you don't think any other book will live up the quality of Mockingbird and so seem like a letdown. That's a slightly different proposition. I recommend going in the entirely different direction. Find some sort of good quality but totally escapist reading to do. A fun murder mystery or sci fi novel, perhaps. Something, in other words, that offers enjoyment in a completely different manner than a classic like To Kill a Mockingbird. That way, there will by many fewer unhappy comparisons to be made between the two. And then when you do get back to more "weighty" reading, the comparisons won't seem so stark.

>145: ktleyed : Hope you enjoy Only to Deceive. I found myself hooked on the series.

Finished reading the first Three Pines book in the series, Still Life and am looking forward to reading the rest in the series. Very charming.

Am now reading Politically Correct Bedtime Stories by James Finn Garner and Chess Story by Stefan Zweig

hmmm. When I've read something great and know that it can't be matched, I often go for a decent genre read. So for me that's a mystery (The Three Pines series is great), for someone else it might be sci fi or romance.

I find it to be a palate cleanser to do that and have no hope of comparison or competition.

Edited for very bizarre spelling mistake - no instead of know.

Mensaje editado por su autor, Marzo 26, 4:29pm.

>157 I'm so glad to find someone else who loved Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns one of my all time favorites. Another of my favorites that could also follow To Kill a Mockingbird would be Stones for Ibarra by Harriet Doerr. Interestingly both Burns and Doerr began writing rather late in life and weren't prolifiic writers.

Re-reading Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" while I locate the 3 titles chosen for summer book discussion group: "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" by Muriel Barbery, The Picture of Dorian Gray" by Oscar Wilde, "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin.

Really enjoying A Woman of Valor.

Have finished Winter and Night by S J Rozan today, and have read a lot of The Silver Linings Play Book by Matthew Quick and a collection of short stories about England during WWII, Good Evening, Mrs Craven by Mollie Panter-Downes this evening.

For anyone interested in really funny reads, try Politically Correct Bedtime Stories by James Finn Garner. I couldn't stop laughing at how he's changed the context of some of our old favorite bedtime stories and gave them politically correct slants.

I'm still reading A Game of Thrones and Elegy for a Lost Star. I'm almost finished with it, so I can finally get on with the twelve-book stack that's waiting for me . . .

I just finished Roses by Leila Meacham, not bad, but not as good as I thought it would be.

#174 Mollie Panter-Downes? As in 'pants down'? Is that a real name? Or is it just that I still have a six-year-old's sense of humour? Sorry.

I know the new thread is up, but I wanted to say thanks to everyone who added to my TKAM discussion. Still haven't chosen anything new yet (which in some ways is good because I've been reducing the TBR pile of magazines for something to read), but I have been eyeing a Jessica Mitford book...

#145 -- I loved And Only to Deceive. The whole series is great, IMHO.

Well hey there Quicksiva, glad to see your multiple posts referencing Thomas Jefferson's translation of Volney's Ruins of Empires.

I'd just like to point out that the 1796 William Davies edition is not the Jefferson-Barlow translation. The first Jefferson-Barlow edition was published in Paris in 1802 (Jefferson was already president at this time; he and Volney conceived their scheme to translate the book when Jefferson was serving as VP under Adams, sometime during Volney's travels in the USA: 1795-98). Dixon and Sickels published the first US edition of the J-B translation in 1828.

But more importantly, you ask: why did Jefferson translate this book?

Jefferson saw the book's general principle--empires rise if government allows Enlightened Self-Interest to flourish--as an affirmation of the American Experiment. The book is a review of human history seen through the eyes of a post-Enlightenment philosopher, a kind of primer on the Natural Law principles from which Jefferson derived The Declaration of Independence.

The book's rather brief references to "a race of men now rejected from society for their sable skin and frizzled hair" have long-fascinated Africa scholars. Volney visited Egypt in his youth and was France's leading expert on the region before Bonaparte's expedition to Egypt. In both Ruins of Empires (1791) and in his earlier book, "Travels through Syria and Egypt" (1787), Volney notes that the Lower Nile civilization we call "Egyptian" appears to have come from a race of black-skinned humans based in the Upper Nile region.

For those interested in Africa studies, I recommend the 1990 Black Classic Press paperback edition of Ruins of Empires. It is a reprint of the Jefferson-Barlow translation although the publishers seem strangely unaware of this fact (the discovery that Jefferson translated this book was first made by Gilbert Chinard in 1923). Be that as it may, there is a nice essay on the back cover discussing Volney's controversial observations.

Here's a link to the cover of the Black Classic Press edition: (it's the cover on the right)

http://www.librarything.com/work/3941051/covers/

In terms of influence on African-Americans and the history of the USA, consider this: it is now widely accepted that Jefferson translated Ruins of Empires and that Abraham Lincoln read the book as a young man. That means Lincoln's anti-slavery attitudes may have been established or at least reinforced by the reading of this book.

Many thanks, Quicksiva, for raising a very interesting topic.

First post on LibraryThing!

I've just finished "Player Piano" and have now moved on to "The Sirens of Titan". While "Piano" seemed to be more fixed in reality, a la "Breakfast of Champions" or "Hocus Pocus" (to continue my Vonnegut theme), "Titan" is looking to be more sci-fi, like "Slaughterhouse", but even more so.

Welcome to the site and the thread, sunshine423! Unfortunately, you picked a thread that changes every week so this one is now out of date. Don't worry - the current 'What are you reading now' thread is over here - http://www.librarything.com/topic/89320#1917443. Hope you have lots of fun here!