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1ajm490
I'm lax on my reading, and I haven't yet set any goals. I expect I'll do most of this over Summer Break (There is obviously something the matter when schoolwork interrupts reading), but who can really say. (Assumably) several will be rereads, but I'll try to avoid that as much as possible or not even include them on this list.
1. All the King's Men by Robbert Penn Warren
It's an interesting read for sure. It began as a school book but ended closer than I would have liked to my heart, or whatever. I believe it really finally grabbed me over a hundred pages in when it said something to the effect of "a captured aurora borealis" as the Boss and Jack hit up a strip joint. Tracing the parallels between the Kingfish and the Boss was an interesting task as well (did you know a doctor shot the Kingfish (over his job or some such nonsense, as it were...), just as Adam shot the Boss? How interesting!) In many ways I abhorred it though--the southernisms of it all, mostly. I ended up reading in the angsty voice of a longlost Johnny Truant though--in my mind an indistinct and limitlessly unaccented voice, and the whole reading was bettered by it. And surely, in some ways, the richness of a distilled Southern Decadence paradoxically shone through, and at the very least a greater appreciation of the theory of the South became me.
2. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
I could easily write this book and its counterbook. I've spent months on and off reading, rereading, not reading (for the purpose of filtering and digesting the loveliness of it all--lest I overdose), and I could have spent many more. The pure aestheticism imbued into these pages makes reading it, for me, a pleasurable sort of vice. I laughed at Basil as he paraded his works and his boy (knowing, full well, as anyone should, that he would lose his treasure quickly). And I befriended Lord Henry as he held stiff to ruining life as only he could fully commit to--or perhaps, of Cobertian proportians). And Dorian, I felt as he ran through whore houses, opium dens, 'the heights of aestheticism and the depths of decandence' throughout the sprawling Wildean London, I felt. Originally I sought this book to break my heart, as a girl told me that it would. However, she was only partially through it--and as she and I both found out, no one will ever feel sorry for Sybil Vane.
3. The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad
Shit, absolutely. One of my least tolerable reads ever. It's in the voice of that detached journalist providing an anecdote to begin his report--yet it keeps that tone throughout the entire book. The people are caged and observed and ultimately betrayed through her, and she doesn't care--you can tell. No, to her it's all description and detractions of the culture, with no human element whatsoever. A waste of time, very nearly wholly.
4. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
I did not love this book, at all. I tolerated it though. The ideas themselves are sound--truthfully, but I didn't love Siddhartha, the person, and that, for me, ruined the musings themselves. List them out if you must, Hesse, but do not wrap them in something that is not beautiful--that just shows that your system can flaw, an impossibility in your mind.
The stiffness of the prose was ugly and jarring, constantly. I couldn't put up with muddy words of it all, and feeling as if I was just pushing though it all. Ugh, more the static nature of it all--not like it was difficult to read, technically.
Just something else to sit still to.
5. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
"And in that moment, I swear we were infinite."
The poise in that sentence! the wonderful paradox! That of course infinity can only be bred within something else--/in/ that moment. That of course, in that moment, nothing, truly, can be infinite.
One of the loveliest things I've read in recent memory--the rawness and the feeling of it. It characterized my high school life and everything I wished it was.
In Progress
(10. A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle)
(11. Fellowship of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein)
(12. Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges)
TBR
(13. Wicked by Gregory Maguire)
(14. Julius Caeser by William Shakespeare)
(15. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls)
(16. Finnegans Wake by James Joyce)
(17. A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake by Joseph Campbell)
That's all for now, although there are obviously more in the pipeline than listed--I'm not sure if more than five would be prudent.
1. All the King's Men by Robbert Penn Warren
It's an interesting read for sure. It began as a school book but ended closer than I would have liked to my heart, or whatever. I believe it really finally grabbed me over a hundred pages in when it said something to the effect of "a captured aurora borealis" as the Boss and Jack hit up a strip joint. Tracing the parallels between the Kingfish and the Boss was an interesting task as well (did you know a doctor shot the Kingfish (over his job or some such nonsense, as it were...), just as Adam shot the Boss? How interesting!) In many ways I abhorred it though--the southernisms of it all, mostly. I ended up reading in the angsty voice of a longlost Johnny Truant though--in my mind an indistinct and limitlessly unaccented voice, and the whole reading was bettered by it. And surely, in some ways, the richness of a distilled Southern Decadence paradoxically shone through, and at the very least a greater appreciation of the theory of the South became me.
2. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
I could easily write this book and its counterbook. I've spent months on and off reading, rereading, not reading (for the purpose of filtering and digesting the loveliness of it all--lest I overdose), and I could have spent many more. The pure aestheticism imbued into these pages makes reading it, for me, a pleasurable sort of vice. I laughed at Basil as he paraded his works and his boy (knowing, full well, as anyone should, that he would lose his treasure quickly). And I befriended Lord Henry as he held stiff to ruining life as only he could fully commit to--or perhaps, of Cobertian proportians). And Dorian, I felt as he ran through whore houses, opium dens, 'the heights of aestheticism and the depths of decandence' throughout the sprawling Wildean London, I felt. Originally I sought this book to break my heart, as a girl told me that it would. However, she was only partially through it--and as she and I both found out, no one will ever feel sorry for Sybil Vane.
3. The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad
Shit, absolutely. One of my least tolerable reads ever. It's in the voice of that detached journalist providing an anecdote to begin his report--yet it keeps that tone throughout the entire book. The people are caged and observed and ultimately betrayed through her, and she doesn't care--you can tell. No, to her it's all description and detractions of the culture, with no human element whatsoever. A waste of time, very nearly wholly.
4. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
I did not love this book, at all. I tolerated it though. The ideas themselves are sound--truthfully, but I didn't love Siddhartha, the person, and that, for me, ruined the musings themselves. List them out if you must, Hesse, but do not wrap them in something that is not beautiful--that just shows that your system can flaw, an impossibility in your mind.
The stiffness of the prose was ugly and jarring, constantly. I couldn't put up with muddy words of it all, and feeling as if I was just pushing though it all. Ugh, more the static nature of it all--not like it was difficult to read, technically.
Just something else to sit still to.
5. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
"And in that moment, I swear we were infinite."
The poise in that sentence! the wonderful paradox! That of course infinity can only be bred within something else--/in/ that moment. That of course, in that moment, nothing, truly, can be infinite.
One of the loveliest things I've read in recent memory--the rawness and the feeling of it. It characterized my high school life and everything I wished it was.
In Progress
(10. A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle)
(11. Fellowship of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein)
(12. Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges)
TBR
(13. Wicked by Gregory Maguire)
(14. Julius Caeser by William Shakespeare)
(15. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls)
(16. Finnegans Wake by James Joyce)
(17. A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake by Joseph Campbell)
That's all for now, although there are obviously more in the pipeline than listed--I'm not sure if more than five would be prudent.
2ajm490
6. The People of Paper by Salvador Plascencia
Such an interesting read.... hmm. I think it defies a lot of criticism, but in that same vein, I can't say I was truly amazed by it. Some of the ideas were lovely, but it felt like diluted Garcia Marquez and Danielewski, which obviously didn't match either wonders.
And I'm not sure how many more versions of Remedios I can take, honestly.
Such an interesting read.... hmm. I think it defies a lot of criticism, but in that same vein, I can't say I was truly amazed by it. Some of the ideas were lovely, but it felt like diluted Garcia Marquez and Danielewski, which obviously didn't match either wonders.
And I'm not sure how many more versions of Remedios I can take, honestly.
3blackdogbooks
Welcome to the group,
Interested in your take oin Things Fall Apart.....wondering about putting that in a TBR stack soon and would like to hear your comments.
Also, enjoyed reading your thoughts about All the King's Men....read that one at an interesting time in my life and also found it pricking my heart.
Interested in your take oin Things Fall Apart.....wondering about putting that in a TBR stack soon and would like to hear your comments.
Also, enjoyed reading your thoughts about All the King's Men....read that one at an interesting time in my life and also found it pricking my heart.
4ajm490
7. The Tempest
It's an interesting read (I say that about everything, though xD). I kept drawing parallels to LOST, just due to the whole separated nature of the survivors after the tempest ripped up the ship and their wanderings and overall confusedness. Kind of lacked the depth I expected though, at least from Shakespeare. More entertainment than anything else.
There were three choice lines that I took from the book that really resonated with me:
"His complexion is perfect gallows... he hath the drowning mark upon his hand"
"It is foul weather in us all, good sir, When you are cloudy."
And "I would feel sorry for them, if I were human."
such lovely lines in the midst of mediocrity. ;-;
Anyways, onward, ho!
It's an interesting read (I say that about everything, though xD). I kept drawing parallels to LOST, just due to the whole separated nature of the survivors after the tempest ripped up the ship and their wanderings and overall confusedness. Kind of lacked the depth I expected though, at least from Shakespeare. More entertainment than anything else.
There were three choice lines that I took from the book that really resonated with me:
"His complexion is perfect gallows... he hath the drowning mark upon his hand"
"It is foul weather in us all, good sir, When you are cloudy."
And "I would feel sorry for them, if I were human."
such lovely lines in the midst of mediocrity. ;-;
Anyways, onward, ho!
5ajm490
@ blackdogbooks
I'm working through Things Fall Apart as we speak. It's a school book, so I may be in a sense biased. But I'll make sure I do a full(er) review than normal, just for you.
And I love the way you characterized ATKM, "pricking my heart" ♥
just perfect.
I'm working through Things Fall Apart as we speak. It's a school book, so I may be in a sense biased. But I'll make sure I do a full(er) review than normal, just for you.
And I love the way you characterized ATKM, "pricking my heart" ♥
just perfect.
6ajm490
8. Things Fall Apart
Achebe uses the first part of the novel to set up and expound upon African culture, facets and tradition. It's not the most interesting thing I've ever read, and at times I found myself cringing at how ugly it all seemed to me (although I've never before indulged in African culture, so perhaps that's part of it). There are several beautiful images, though, to contrast the ugly red/brown/mud colored visual pallet. There's scenes of people dancing in the forest under moonlight and children playing in the fields--things that help to buoy a failing attempt to showcase the beauty of an inherently vulgar culture (imo). To be honest, this first section, which is a little more than half the book, really didn't do very much for me at all.
Yet, for me at least, the book makes a complete turn around at the midway point as Part Two begins (and gets even better in Part Three). The arrival of the British helps to add interest as there is now a third party acting on the previously closed system of the African culture. The dynamics of--basically, infiltration--by the British, and the undermining and upheaval of African life is a poignantly interesting topic--one that is at times heartbreaking and at others, breathtaking (due to Achebe's skill in presenting these two conflicting cultures and ideas). Mixed with some great post-modern thoughts ("There is no story that is not true"), Achebe really had me by the end: I gained a much greater appreciation for African culture as well as other cultures that I have previously demeaned for lack of caring, and perhaps, too, understanding. We're all the in the same boat--finding the same thing out from (basely) the same culture. The malleability of the human form allows us to arrive at it from these varied ways, and Achebe helped me realize that.
Achebe uses the first part of the novel to set up and expound upon African culture, facets and tradition. It's not the most interesting thing I've ever read, and at times I found myself cringing at how ugly it all seemed to me (although I've never before indulged in African culture, so perhaps that's part of it). There are several beautiful images, though, to contrast the ugly red/brown/mud colored visual pallet. There's scenes of people dancing in the forest under moonlight and children playing in the fields--things that help to buoy a failing attempt to showcase the beauty of an inherently vulgar culture (imo). To be honest, this first section, which is a little more than half the book, really didn't do very much for me at all.
Yet, for me at least, the book makes a complete turn around at the midway point as Part Two begins (and gets even better in Part Three). The arrival of the British helps to add interest as there is now a third party acting on the previously closed system of the African culture. The dynamics of--basically, infiltration--by the British, and the undermining and upheaval of African life is a poignantly interesting topic--one that is at times heartbreaking and at others, breathtaking (due to Achebe's skill in presenting these two conflicting cultures and ideas). Mixed with some great post-modern thoughts ("There is no story that is not true"), Achebe really had me by the end: I gained a much greater appreciation for African culture as well as other cultures that I have previously demeaned for lack of caring, and perhaps, too, understanding. We're all the in the same boat--finding the same thing out from (basely) the same culture. The malleability of the human form allows us to arrive at it from these varied ways, and Achebe helped me realize that.
7blackdogbooks
Nice discussion of Things Fall Apart. I just put that in my TBR stack and am now looking forward to the journey you just ezxperienced through Africa and its cultures.
8ajm490
9. Women Who Changed History: Five Famous Queens of Europe
Haha this was such a bs read. I saw it in the discard pile of the library and picked it up. I wouldn't have even bothered but it was short (like a hundred pages). I feel bad putting in on the list, but I'm sooo behind in my reading. So here it is. :P
Haha this was such a bs read. I saw it in the discard pile of the library and picked it up. I wouldn't have even bothered but it was short (like a hundred pages). I feel bad putting in on the list, but I'm sooo behind in my reading. So here it is. :P
9ajm490
10. Twilight
Ugh, it felt juvenile only because the writing wasn't excellent. I still enjoyed it though. It's one of the few times i've not been /completely/ opposed to absurd stories. Vampire romance? Eh, I normally would pass (indeed, I did, the first time I perused this book at my local bookstore), but the way its presented is entertaining and forgivable.
...Although, I hear in the next one, she dates a werewolf...
Ugh, it felt juvenile only because the writing wasn't excellent. I still enjoyed it though. It's one of the few times i've not been /completely/ opposed to absurd stories. Vampire romance? Eh, I normally would pass (indeed, I did, the first time I perused this book at my local bookstore), but the way its presented is entertaining and forgivable.
...Although, I hear in the next one, she dates a werewolf...
10ajm490
11. New Moon
Okay so I kind of lied last time. Or at least, I underplayed my enthusiasm. I looooooove Edward and Bella so much it's hard to comprehend. /Why/ I love them? Who knows. I just feel so connected through these past 1600 pages I've read, truly, and right now I'm... well, later. I don't understand this connection, really. I felt it before, just the closeness to characters and events in Harry Potter, and I believed it an isolated event, because no book had ever really touched me with its liveabilty /like that/ before or after. I thought /that feeling/ was inherent to the Potter books (which I feel bad professing my love for, because I fear it makes me seem simple and vulgar when I feel anything but--) and that I'd never see it again and I was very much okay with that (I'd reconciled). But here it is again, popping up, the feeling seeming almost /snatched/ from the other series. Honest to God I didn't think it was possible, and here it is. And I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to avoid anymore the need to track down and find more books like it -- or to create something akin to it myself.
Anyway, in this installment, these two people who I'd come to love as a pair, a pair who actually came to understand and value the nature of their true love--and as I read it, it FELT like true love and I know that's incomprehensible to any extent but I really really felt it (a feat for meyer)--must separate. And I thought it such a novel idea, although I'm sure it's not new, the idea of what happens to someone who loses TRUE love, in the truest sense of the word (postmodernism isn't applicable here, btw), because of course we see it OCCUR in other lit., but there's always some implicit flaw within the relationship that causes it to crumble (something that must be chosen or decided upon character, i.e., not a vampire), and neither people are perfect for each other. But Edward is, in almost all senses of the word perfect, and Bella is (with Edward) also perfect, and together they are perfect, and they have to deal with their separation.
Anyway, they split, and I swear I almost ripped my heart out.
The description was, for me, eerily moving. It's what bothered me most, because she kept repeating the idea of a /hole/ and being in /pieces/ which is horribly cliche but I didn't care. I just didn't, because at that point I was so enveloped in Bella's story that she could say whatever she wanted and I would feel it. And she felt desolation. My day was ruined when I read this book, and perhaps I am just dull-spirited, because I have known others to get upset by books, but I am not one to do that regularly. And I seriously wanted to cry over Edward leaving and her pains.
Jacob appeared and I felt the sun she told us he was. It was hard at first, because I was still completely devastated about Edward, and I felt like it was a betrayal for her to be happy--again all of Bella's own sentiments, but I really felt them. And I want them to be real. But see eventually I started to like Jacob, and I didn't mind Edward's absence quite as much, but I still wished he'd be there. It was a long book, but I must say it was most definitely my favorite of the three. Just for the emotion I felt behind it.
12. Eclipse
This book was lovely as well. Some people have professed problems with this one, saying they decline as they are written, but I really don't think it's true. I'm sort of sad that there's not so much left to happen anymore, though. There will only be one book after this one, so I felt like I was on the downward slope while reading.
The biggest thing about this book was.... Sex. And I felt it. There was one scene where Bella is discussing with Edward about either 1) having sex or 2) turning her into a vampire and. it's. fucking. indistinguishable. which one she's talking about.
Amazing.
She's tempted us so long though in this book, with the idea of them coupling and the suspense and tension behind it is so palpable that I really DEMAND a sex scene, although I know I won't be getting one. It's just sad to know that, because it's such an intimate part of who the characters are at this point that it feels necessary to fully comprehending them as a pair and as characters.
In the middle of the book, Bella's writing graduation invitations with Angela. And she refers to Angela as someone who "doesn't feel the need to fill the silence with meaningless chatter" or something to that effect (although I believe that's nearly verbatim). And I really sympathized with her. I don't think people understand me when I want to be around them but don't actually say anything. And I don't think you necessarily /need/ to say anything. This happened in All the King's Men, too.
The Stantons and Jack would just get together and they would just sit there. In silence. For hours.
And how I yearned at those moments to live in that book forever, truly. And no one understands that anymore, that essence isn't necessarily infused with language--or it doesn't HAVE to be, anyway.
Now that I have to wait till august for the next one I'm suffering a sense of separation depression myself. I feel so sad, having to leave them, I really do. Again, only other times: harry potter, and a flicker after a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon. I am getting over it though.
-Sigh-, the dialogue in this book was lovely at all times, and incredible at others.
I WAS impressed with all three books, even if I am ashamed of it and am, as brida calls me, a fantasyfag. ;-;
These books have skewed my perception of myself as an aspiring writer. I don't to write something worthless (not that this... is, necessarily, but I'm unsure of the worth), but I DO want to write something that makes me feel this way and makes other readers feel the way these books made me feel throughout the past few days.
Unfortunately right now, those two fronts seem mutually exclusive.
Okay so I kind of lied last time. Or at least, I underplayed my enthusiasm. I looooooove Edward and Bella so much it's hard to comprehend. /Why/ I love them? Who knows. I just feel so connected through these past 1600 pages I've read, truly, and right now I'm... well, later. I don't understand this connection, really. I felt it before, just the closeness to characters and events in Harry Potter, and I believed it an isolated event, because no book had ever really touched me with its liveabilty /like that/ before or after. I thought /that feeling/ was inherent to the Potter books (which I feel bad professing my love for, because I fear it makes me seem simple and vulgar when I feel anything but--) and that I'd never see it again and I was very much okay with that (I'd reconciled). But here it is again, popping up, the feeling seeming almost /snatched/ from the other series. Honest to God I didn't think it was possible, and here it is. And I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to avoid anymore the need to track down and find more books like it -- or to create something akin to it myself.
Anyway, in this installment, these two people who I'd come to love as a pair, a pair who actually came to understand and value the nature of their true love--and as I read it, it FELT like true love and I know that's incomprehensible to any extent but I really really felt it (a feat for meyer)--must separate. And I thought it such a novel idea, although I'm sure it's not new, the idea of what happens to someone who loses TRUE love, in the truest sense of the word (postmodernism isn't applicable here, btw), because of course we see it OCCUR in other lit., but there's always some implicit flaw within the relationship that causes it to crumble (something that must be chosen or decided upon character, i.e., not a vampire), and neither people are perfect for each other. But Edward is, in almost all senses of the word perfect, and Bella is (with Edward) also perfect, and together they are perfect, and they have to deal with their separation.
Anyway, they split, and I swear I almost ripped my heart out.
The description was, for me, eerily moving. It's what bothered me most, because she kept repeating the idea of a /hole/ and being in /pieces/ which is horribly cliche but I didn't care. I just didn't, because at that point I was so enveloped in Bella's story that she could say whatever she wanted and I would feel it. And she felt desolation. My day was ruined when I read this book, and perhaps I am just dull-spirited, because I have known others to get upset by books, but I am not one to do that regularly. And I seriously wanted to cry over Edward leaving and her pains.
Jacob appeared and I felt the sun she told us he was. It was hard at first, because I was still completely devastated about Edward, and I felt like it was a betrayal for her to be happy--again all of Bella's own sentiments, but I really felt them. And I want them to be real. But see eventually I started to like Jacob, and I didn't mind Edward's absence quite as much, but I still wished he'd be there. It was a long book, but I must say it was most definitely my favorite of the three. Just for the emotion I felt behind it.
12. Eclipse
This book was lovely as well. Some people have professed problems with this one, saying they decline as they are written, but I really don't think it's true. I'm sort of sad that there's not so much left to happen anymore, though. There will only be one book after this one, so I felt like I was on the downward slope while reading.
The biggest thing about this book was.... Sex. And I felt it. There was one scene where Bella is discussing with Edward about either 1) having sex or 2) turning her into a vampire and. it's. fucking. indistinguishable. which one she's talking about.
Amazing.
She's tempted us so long though in this book, with the idea of them coupling and the suspense and tension behind it is so palpable that I really DEMAND a sex scene, although I know I won't be getting one. It's just sad to know that, because it's such an intimate part of who the characters are at this point that it feels necessary to fully comprehending them as a pair and as characters.
In the middle of the book, Bella's writing graduation invitations with Angela. And she refers to Angela as someone who "doesn't feel the need to fill the silence with meaningless chatter" or something to that effect (although I believe that's nearly verbatim). And I really sympathized with her. I don't think people understand me when I want to be around them but don't actually say anything. And I don't think you necessarily /need/ to say anything. This happened in All the King's Men, too.
The Stantons and Jack would just get together and they would just sit there. In silence. For hours.
And how I yearned at those moments to live in that book forever, truly. And no one understands that anymore, that essence isn't necessarily infused with language--or it doesn't HAVE to be, anyway.
Now that I have to wait till august for the next one I'm suffering a sense of separation depression myself. I feel so sad, having to leave them, I really do. Again, only other times: harry potter, and a flicker after a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon. I am getting over it though.
-Sigh-, the dialogue in this book was lovely at all times, and incredible at others.
I WAS impressed with all three books, even if I am ashamed of it and am, as brida calls me, a fantasyfag. ;-;
These books have skewed my perception of myself as an aspiring writer. I don't to write something worthless (not that this... is, necessarily, but I'm unsure of the worth), but I DO want to write something that makes me feel this way and makes other readers feel the way these books made me feel throughout the past few days.
Unfortunately right now, those two fronts seem mutually exclusive.
11blackdogbooks
Perhaps the answer lies in your feelings about the story you just read. Many people llok down their noses at novels and writing which doesn't seem "important". Stephen King suffered for years at the hands of critics as they deemed his writing mere pulp. Yet, in the last few years, he has gained more credibility with this sect of the reading population because, if you read his books, you cannot deny the power of his characters and his stories. They make us feel and cut to the heart of everyday life, relationships, and thought. His dialog is so true and the decisions of his characters through their lives on the pages are just as ugly as ours in life can be but also just as honorable and good as we humans can sometimes be.
So, if this story you read touched you because of the relationships, the dialog, the story telling, whatever, don't you think it has worth? Doesn't any story have worth if it helps us examine our own internal and external lives in some way? And, even if it doesn't do one of these things, who's to say that a simply told story, one that takes you away from your own internal thoughts or external life, doesn't that story also hold value for having allowed you to transport yourself, even if for a short time?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing that all novels and writing are inherently valuable. But, given the subjective nature of reading and writing, the value in any book is judged solely and independently by each reader.
Just my thoughts.
So, if this story you read touched you because of the relationships, the dialog, the story telling, whatever, don't you think it has worth? Doesn't any story have worth if it helps us examine our own internal and external lives in some way? And, even if it doesn't do one of these things, who's to say that a simply told story, one that takes you away from your own internal thoughts or external life, doesn't that story also hold value for having allowed you to transport yourself, even if for a short time?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing that all novels and writing are inherently valuable. But, given the subjective nature of reading and writing, the value in any book is judged solely and independently by each reader.
Just my thoughts.
12ajm490
Thanks for your take, blackdog, although I didn't respond to that earlier, it did, in fact, help me sort out my thoughts a bit.
However, I still feel guilty about this:
13. Twilight
14. New Moon
15. Eclipse
and
16. The Host
Because I've already talked about the Twilight Saga at length, I won't do it again, except to say that what I have realized is that the Twilight characters are all so fluid and emotional, caricatures in themselves (as all good characters are), and the inherent interest in taking those caricatures and throwing them together, just to see how they react, is extraordinarily interesting. And in the case of Edward, the fact that he is an enigma should captivate anyone enough so that they need not feel guilt for being, for a few thousand pages and several hours, consumed by the story, and by his persona.
The Host was an interesting read, because, for me, it showed the weaknesses of Meyer as a story teller. She's really good at moving character's stories and lives around for amusement, and the humor of her dialogue in the Twilight Saga is so entrancing that a much more plot-driven story and a nearly complete lack of humor made this seem rather bland by comparison.
Still, it's very sparse on details, which is a dual-edged sword. Some books will tell you all about how to properly care for a cow just to get you 'into that world', and that's shit, plain and simple. I'd much rather get a blurry image of setting and place, and deliver on characterization. But Stephenie does it improperly, using devices like ultra-super-duper medicines and just explaining them away as a benefit of the aliens aptitude.
In any case, I cared for the characters. Not as much, but I did care, and that's what I'm looking to find in my books, some compassion and relatability, no matter how diluted.
-shrug-
Also read:
17. Hamlet
Hamlet was spectacular. I have a twisted sense of humor when reading plays. Rather than visualize when instructed to do so ('the grass was green, the house was made of brick'--when told specifically in prose), in plays I tend to visualize everything with a much greater sense of clarity, because the choice is mine, and so I -- of course -- imagine into extremity. Meaning I see perfectly the watchtower, Elsinore, the field and pirate ship, but I also took it further, saw Gertrude and Claudius as disgruntled members of a peasant class, trying to thwart the rich society of Hamlet and Horatio. Now, that's obviously not the plot at all, and so I invented and did this beside the true reading of the story. But imagining Claudius as the defeated from the first few pages made his eventual demise so much more entertaining and thought-provoking.
Moving the characters for my own amusement.
I wish I had seen more of Gertrude, that she had had a final exposition before her death for why she married Claudius. Her character seems so interesting to me, rivaling Hamlet himself. In my belief, she wouldn't/didn't marry him because of he was the new king and she was greedy; the case for her would be much more than that. Even if it was just greed, how amazing an account it would have been for her to explain the torture of her life.
Hamlet's madness was so strange and wonderful and majestic that I'm really not entirely sure what I want to say about it. The ambiguity in the beginning was so eerily indecipherable that I was always on edge, doubting the madness, believing, doubting, believing -- so much so, that by the time that I finally finished it, his madness was no longer in question, but rather madness itself. Spectacular.
Hah, Shakespeare would hate me.
currently reading;
ender's game (that review is going to really long olol)
pride & prejudice (omg, soooo good)
the great gatsby (the clarity is intoxicating; paradox)
However, I still feel guilty about this:
13. Twilight
14. New Moon
15. Eclipse
and
16. The Host
Because I've already talked about the Twilight Saga at length, I won't do it again, except to say that what I have realized is that the Twilight characters are all so fluid and emotional, caricatures in themselves (as all good characters are), and the inherent interest in taking those caricatures and throwing them together, just to see how they react, is extraordinarily interesting. And in the case of Edward, the fact that he is an enigma should captivate anyone enough so that they need not feel guilt for being, for a few thousand pages and several hours, consumed by the story, and by his persona.
The Host was an interesting read, because, for me, it showed the weaknesses of Meyer as a story teller. She's really good at moving character's stories and lives around for amusement, and the humor of her dialogue in the Twilight Saga is so entrancing that a much more plot-driven story and a nearly complete lack of humor made this seem rather bland by comparison.
Still, it's very sparse on details, which is a dual-edged sword. Some books will tell you all about how to properly care for a cow just to get you 'into that world', and that's shit, plain and simple. I'd much rather get a blurry image of setting and place, and deliver on characterization. But Stephenie does it improperly, using devices like ultra-super-duper medicines and just explaining them away as a benefit of the aliens aptitude.
In any case, I cared for the characters. Not as much, but I did care, and that's what I'm looking to find in my books, some compassion and relatability, no matter how diluted.
-shrug-
Also read:
17. Hamlet
Hamlet was spectacular. I have a twisted sense of humor when reading plays. Rather than visualize when instructed to do so ('the grass was green, the house was made of brick'--when told specifically in prose), in plays I tend to visualize everything with a much greater sense of clarity, because the choice is mine, and so I -- of course -- imagine into extremity. Meaning I see perfectly the watchtower, Elsinore, the field and pirate ship, but I also took it further, saw Gertrude and Claudius as disgruntled members of a peasant class, trying to thwart the rich society of Hamlet and Horatio. Now, that's obviously not the plot at all, and so I invented and did this beside the true reading of the story. But imagining Claudius as the defeated from the first few pages made his eventual demise so much more entertaining and thought-provoking.
Moving the characters for my own amusement.
I wish I had seen more of Gertrude, that she had had a final exposition before her death for why she married Claudius. Her character seems so interesting to me, rivaling Hamlet himself. In my belief, she wouldn't/didn't marry him because of he was the new king and she was greedy; the case for her would be much more than that. Even if it was just greed, how amazing an account it would have been for her to explain the torture of her life.
Hamlet's madness was so strange and wonderful and majestic that I'm really not entirely sure what I want to say about it. The ambiguity in the beginning was so eerily indecipherable that I was always on edge, doubting the madness, believing, doubting, believing -- so much so, that by the time that I finally finished it, his madness was no longer in question, but rather madness itself. Spectacular.
Hah, Shakespeare would hate me.
currently reading;
ender's game (that review is going to really long olol)
pride & prejudice (omg, soooo good)
the great gatsby (the clarity is intoxicating; paradox)
13ajm490
18. Ender's Game
I picked up this book (finally) at Ms. Meyer's recommendation. Apparently Speaker for the Dead, the second book in the series, is her favorite book. Going in, tracing back the influences on Twilight, it's, well... It's interesting. I feel like I'm on the hunt for something incredibly intangible, almost indefinable. But for the purposes of this note, I'll just call it the essence of the story. (The definite article there is important).
I'm coming to the conclusion that's it's something small, that it can be imbued not in the structure of a piece, but in -- possibly -- a few choice sentences. The sentences vindicate the work, in this instance. I'm going off a working model here, of course, but it's a lot like how one night can change your life forever, or better yet -- define it. How people utilize their inhumanity to great mechanical success, but just a glimpse of that concealed humanity can change everything, and allow a window into a person. With books, just the nature of the language as a combination of words... it's mechanical by default, which means you HAVE to create the window, and obviously, the bigger window, the better. But it's a strange relationship, one must have that essence first, or those sentences WON'T come, and you'll have a lifeless husk of a work at the end of the day.
It's hard line to walk, and I can't even tell if I invented the line into existence or if it's really there at all. Frustrating.
Anyway, there are just too many things to say about Ender's Game. It is, at once, a great achievement, and yet simultaneously lacking EVERYTHING, that ESSENCE, that /thing/ that makes Twilight and Harry Potter so successful with the fanbase that I want to attract.
It's got a good story. The training of a boy who's far smarter than any boy should be (but the Dedication in the book more than counteracted the obvious lunacy of the premise) to kill off the alien race that threatens (or previously threatenED) Earth. The way it's segmented is weird though. More than half the book is based on a gravity game that's played for no other purpose than to train the to-be commanders. No relevance to the buggers whatsoever, which made everything feel somewhat disjointed.
And God, for Pete's sake, how many times must one detail the battles that take place time and time again. Really. It's like reading about a soccer match fourteen times and still Card expects one's interest to remain constant and enthused. Granted, though, that Card's game is far more interesting than soccer.
Ender was so lifeless to me for most of the book, which in a way was the point. Well, not necessarily lifeless, but very distant and unrelatable. Due to his training he had to be compassionate, yet stoic enough to command and follow orders. That mixtures just makes for a very confused boy, and while I couldn't really /feel/ for him, I don't think it was the author's fault, per se, that the character felt jumbled.
Valentine&Peter/Demosthenes&Locke really saved the book for me. They served as the ideal that the world can be controlled by an individual. Which is impossible, and silly, and trite, because no one can be aware of every variable, but I love the idea of it. Two pre-teens take the fate of the world into their hands. They do it with the internet. It's fucking lovely, it's the dream of every blogger and youtuber and myspace celebrity wannabe. Fifteen-plus years early. That's pree' visionary, if you ask me. And it was just the whole /ambition/ of it all, that really caught me, that I really related to. Ambition is the flipside of complacency, of routine... of suburbia, of everything I'm wallowing in.
The ending was really the best part, though. The actual climax was anti-climactic. You find out that *spoiler* he destroyed the alien colony only AFTER he already destroyed it. It's very awkward. It's a twist that leaves you feeling like "Oh, I finished this book and didn't know it." Very unrewarding. But like I said, the ending was the best part -- not the climax, the denouement.
Probably one of the most fulfilling conclusions I've ever read.
Reallyreally.
Onward ho! to Speaker For the Dead
I picked up this book (finally) at Ms. Meyer's recommendation. Apparently Speaker for the Dead, the second book in the series, is her favorite book. Going in, tracing back the influences on Twilight, it's, well... It's interesting. I feel like I'm on the hunt for something incredibly intangible, almost indefinable. But for the purposes of this note, I'll just call it the essence of the story. (The definite article there is important).
I'm coming to the conclusion that's it's something small, that it can be imbued not in the structure of a piece, but in -- possibly -- a few choice sentences. The sentences vindicate the work, in this instance. I'm going off a working model here, of course, but it's a lot like how one night can change your life forever, or better yet -- define it. How people utilize their inhumanity to great mechanical success, but just a glimpse of that concealed humanity can change everything, and allow a window into a person. With books, just the nature of the language as a combination of words... it's mechanical by default, which means you HAVE to create the window, and obviously, the bigger window, the better. But it's a strange relationship, one must have that essence first, or those sentences WON'T come, and you'll have a lifeless husk of a work at the end of the day.
It's hard line to walk, and I can't even tell if I invented the line into existence or if it's really there at all. Frustrating.
Anyway, there are just too many things to say about Ender's Game. It is, at once, a great achievement, and yet simultaneously lacking EVERYTHING, that ESSENCE, that /thing/ that makes Twilight and Harry Potter so successful with the fanbase that I want to attract.
It's got a good story. The training of a boy who's far smarter than any boy should be (but the Dedication in the book more than counteracted the obvious lunacy of the premise) to kill off the alien race that threatens (or previously threatenED) Earth. The way it's segmented is weird though. More than half the book is based on a gravity game that's played for no other purpose than to train the to-be commanders. No relevance to the buggers whatsoever, which made everything feel somewhat disjointed.
And God, for Pete's sake, how many times must one detail the battles that take place time and time again. Really. It's like reading about a soccer match fourteen times and still Card expects one's interest to remain constant and enthused. Granted, though, that Card's game is far more interesting than soccer.
Ender was so lifeless to me for most of the book, which in a way was the point. Well, not necessarily lifeless, but very distant and unrelatable. Due to his training he had to be compassionate, yet stoic enough to command and follow orders. That mixtures just makes for a very confused boy, and while I couldn't really /feel/ for him, I don't think it was the author's fault, per se, that the character felt jumbled.
Valentine&Peter/Demosthenes&Locke really saved the book for me. They served as the ideal that the world can be controlled by an individual. Which is impossible, and silly, and trite, because no one can be aware of every variable, but I love the idea of it. Two pre-teens take the fate of the world into their hands. They do it with the internet. It's fucking lovely, it's the dream of every blogger and youtuber and myspace celebrity wannabe. Fifteen-plus years early. That's pree' visionary, if you ask me. And it was just the whole /ambition/ of it all, that really caught me, that I really related to. Ambition is the flipside of complacency, of routine... of suburbia, of everything I'm wallowing in.
The ending was really the best part, though. The actual climax was anti-climactic. You find out that *spoiler* he destroyed the alien colony only AFTER he already destroyed it. It's very awkward. It's a twist that leaves you feeling like "Oh, I finished this book and didn't know it." Very unrewarding. But like I said, the ending was the best part -- not the climax, the denouement.
Probably one of the most fulfilling conclusions I've ever read.
Reallyreally.
Onward ho! to Speaker For the Dead
15ajm490
i'm behind. fuck me.
I have twenty five plus books ready to go but I just can't commit my attention to them for any length of time.
fuck me.
i want medication for this.
anyway, I did finish 19. Twelfth Night which I conveniently picked up at a Salvation Army the other day. While I enjoyed the play -- simple, comical, fanciful -- I enjoyed the introduction tenfold.
Now, what one must understand is that typically I avoid introductions and prefaces (and, alas -- back covers too) like the plague. In my mind, I think that reading the book from the first page to the last is a great way to get into the author's head, see it exactly how they first wanted us to see it, not let the post-production get in the way.
But that day I thought, "Eh, it's Twelfth Night, I already KNOW the plot," so I commenced to read the introduction. Fucking fantastic. In a world like Shakespeare, where a lot could be said to be, well sort of 'fluff', this amazing critic (Herschel Baker, harvard) came in and completely set up the play in a way that made it better than it was originally. He set up the idea of the play being about illusions, which it could be, but Shakespeare tends to make finding the point of his plays a sort of game for the elite, and so the way the introduction introduced these ideas made finding them infinitely easier.
In fact, he set up the mood as well. Because (and excuse me for my ignorance) I didn't see this as an entirely fanciful tale until I was fed that idea by him. Then, viewing the idea of the clown and the tinge of lunacy to everything made the story so much more moving and relatable. I even saw it differently, in festive colors of the ball masque, of the seaside abode on the edge of reality.
"Life, as most men come to know it, is a frayed and tattered thing of unexpressed desires and disappointed hopes, and its tumults rarely find repose."
"But if, as the knotty and perplexing plot suggests, men are forced by circumstances into compounded misconceptions, they are also trapped by their illusions. Between the errors thrust upon them and those they generate themselves, they are caught as in a vise -- victims not merely of deceit but also of their own folly."
"Here, the lovers are delayed not by the customary impediments of parental disapproval or insolvency of politics, but by their own deceits and self-deceptions."
"Perhaps for this reason or perhaps because he makes us recognize ourselves in them, we are glad for these deluded people in Illyria, for they teach us what, alas, we need to know: that since we rarely win our way to truth, we must settle for illusion."
GODLY. I'm researching his published works, to see if I can get my hands on them.
As for the play, again, my Herschell-filtered version of the play was tremendous. The comic scenes were actually sort of funny, and the whole mental image of these events taking place was entertaining. It was all so light and carefree that I couldn't take great ideas from it, save a few:
"Anything that's mended is but patched." p48
"Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we,
For such as we are made of, such we be." p62
"The spinsters and the knitters in the sun
And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,
Do use to chant it. It is silly sooth." p72
"I say this house is as dark as ignorance,
though ignorance were as dark as hell." p115
Not soooo many as Hamlet where I highlighted nearly every page, but the quality of these are great."
Gatsby next. Interspersed with Speaker and Haunted.
Fuck Palahniuk.
I have twenty five plus books ready to go but I just can't commit my attention to them for any length of time.
fuck me.
i want medication for this.
anyway, I did finish 19. Twelfth Night which I conveniently picked up at a Salvation Army the other day. While I enjoyed the play -- simple, comical, fanciful -- I enjoyed the introduction tenfold.
Now, what one must understand is that typically I avoid introductions and prefaces (and, alas -- back covers too) like the plague. In my mind, I think that reading the book from the first page to the last is a great way to get into the author's head, see it exactly how they first wanted us to see it, not let the post-production get in the way.
But that day I thought, "Eh, it's Twelfth Night, I already KNOW the plot," so I commenced to read the introduction. Fucking fantastic. In a world like Shakespeare, where a lot could be said to be, well sort of 'fluff', this amazing critic (Herschel Baker, harvard) came in and completely set up the play in a way that made it better than it was originally. He set up the idea of the play being about illusions, which it could be, but Shakespeare tends to make finding the point of his plays a sort of game for the elite, and so the way the introduction introduced these ideas made finding them infinitely easier.
In fact, he set up the mood as well. Because (and excuse me for my ignorance) I didn't see this as an entirely fanciful tale until I was fed that idea by him. Then, viewing the idea of the clown and the tinge of lunacy to everything made the story so much more moving and relatable. I even saw it differently, in festive colors of the ball masque, of the seaside abode on the edge of reality.
"Life, as most men come to know it, is a frayed and tattered thing of unexpressed desires and disappointed hopes, and its tumults rarely find repose."
"But if, as the knotty and perplexing plot suggests, men are forced by circumstances into compounded misconceptions, they are also trapped by their illusions. Between the errors thrust upon them and those they generate themselves, they are caught as in a vise -- victims not merely of deceit but also of their own folly."
"Here, the lovers are delayed not by the customary impediments of parental disapproval or insolvency of politics, but by their own deceits and self-deceptions."
"Perhaps for this reason or perhaps because he makes us recognize ourselves in them, we are glad for these deluded people in Illyria, for they teach us what, alas, we need to know: that since we rarely win our way to truth, we must settle for illusion."
GODLY. I'm researching his published works, to see if I can get my hands on them.
As for the play, again, my Herschell-filtered version of the play was tremendous. The comic scenes were actually sort of funny, and the whole mental image of these events taking place was entertaining. It was all so light and carefree that I couldn't take great ideas from it, save a few:
"Anything that's mended is but patched." p48
"Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we,
For such as we are made of, such we be." p62
"The spinsters and the knitters in the sun
And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,
Do use to chant it. It is silly sooth." p72
"I say this house is as dark as ignorance,
though ignorance were as dark as hell." p115
Not soooo many as Hamlet where I highlighted nearly every page, but the quality of these are great."
Gatsby next. Interspersed with Speaker and Haunted.
Fuck Palahniuk.
16ajm490
20. A Doll's House
21. Oedipus Rex
I forgot about reading these plays. At first I thought I had read them in December, but then I found documentation (read: class notes) stating January, thus making them fair game.
I'd read the entire Oedipus Cycle in seventh grade, found them entertaining, but I understood them pretty fully even then. Not difficult. I've always found, whats his face?, Teriesas, or something similar. The blind seer. Eh.
Sparse.
I hate A Doll's House. Passionately. I thought the protagonist, uhhhhhh, Norma, nora, whatever, I thought she was just a sort of hapless, ignorant woman who screwed everything up. I failed to see how this story shows any reason for the empowering of women. Women's rights SHOULD be restricted if you read this story the way I did. Now, obviously Ibsen was saying that perhaps if she had had rights she wouldn't have been such an idiot. but like, gah, that's not a good message at all.
retarded.
21. Oedipus Rex
I forgot about reading these plays. At first I thought I had read them in December, but then I found documentation (read: class notes) stating January, thus making them fair game.
I'd read the entire Oedipus Cycle in seventh grade, found them entertaining, but I understood them pretty fully even then. Not difficult. I've always found, whats his face?, Teriesas, or something similar. The blind seer. Eh.
Sparse.
I hate A Doll's House. Passionately. I thought the protagonist, uhhhhhh, Norma, nora, whatever, I thought she was just a sort of hapless, ignorant woman who screwed everything up. I failed to see how this story shows any reason for the empowering of women. Women's rights SHOULD be restricted if you read this story the way I did. Now, obviously Ibsen was saying that perhaps if she had had rights she wouldn't have been such an idiot. but like, gah, that's not a good message at all.
retarded.
18ajm490
We could enter into a polemic on the sanctity of words and their connotations, but I'd rather not. I think I'd win and leave you thoroughly disturbed.
As I'm sure you're not really interested anyway in what I have to say, I think it's not really necessary that you should impose your own conservative view of words on me.
I speak in extremes, that's all I have to say, and I won't be reprimanded for my manner of expression.
In any case, now that I've sorted through unpleasantries, I'll move on to newer reads. I'm at the beach, currently (deplorable internet connection, but, who would suppose better...?), so I've gotten a lot of reading done in the two days I've been here.
22. The Great Gatsby
I looooooooved this book. The imagery, the way the sentences were crafted -- gah -- it was like a dance, or like a roaring 'twenties party the way Fitzgerald described it. The language, gah, I was overcome quite truthfully.
And the story, it was so sad and lovely and true. But it was so self-contained! I loved it for what it was, but the story never pulled on my heartstrings -- it was so far away. It served a different purpose, yes, but I view any book as, primarily, something that makes me /feel/ or at least understand what I have previously felt, sort through it.
This was distant, it was a composition of my secondary, tertiary, etc., needs in a novel, and so made up for the fundamental lacking of a /heart/.
Spoilars! {Gatsby's death was so unexpected, so tragic in its unexpectedness. And, oh! Poor Myrtle! But still, subjects, gestures and characters... not really people, if only because they are (now) ancient and archetypal figures and no longer the life of the party. ah! ah, ah...}
Still, I must say my favorite part of the story, aside from the whole beauty and lyricism of the prose, was the cover. It's majestic image summed everything, brought together the entire, lovely composition together into one dynamic and lovely scene. And how Fitzgerald worked the image into the story, the idea of daisy, of coney island, of t.j. eckleberg, of the ash heaps. s
So wondrous, so resplendent.
22. Speaker for the Dead
This was LOVELY. The characters, the heart, it spoke to a different, slightly older age than mine, to those of the 70s, the 80s, who sought epics and liveabilitiy a different way than I. But the execution, so wonderful.
Valentine's disappearance and resurgance, Jane -- gah -- just the entire conception of Jane should win the man the world. The piggies, the portugesse, I think I could have done without, but by the end I saw as Card saw, and found the children likeable and diverse (a feat, as Card's characters all appear similar and monotonous at first, just the dialogue, the gestures the whole orchestrated way to their reactions...), Nova Ivanova to be desirable, even found Ender to be a hero, and admirable, which is saying a fucking lot, no joke.
This is Meyer's favorite book; it's not mine. But the plot is superb, the characters obliquely defined, wonderous in its own, distant way.
I'm onto more works, in the middle of P&P, of Three Cups of Tea, of Mountains Beyond Mountains, of A Separate Peace.
Finally, a sense of catharsis.
As I'm sure you're not really interested anyway in what I have to say, I think it's not really necessary that you should impose your own conservative view of words on me.
I speak in extremes, that's all I have to say, and I won't be reprimanded for my manner of expression.
In any case, now that I've sorted through unpleasantries, I'll move on to newer reads. I'm at the beach, currently (deplorable internet connection, but, who would suppose better...?), so I've gotten a lot of reading done in the two days I've been here.
22. The Great Gatsby
I looooooooved this book. The imagery, the way the sentences were crafted -- gah -- it was like a dance, or like a roaring 'twenties party the way Fitzgerald described it. The language, gah, I was overcome quite truthfully.
And the story, it was so sad and lovely and true. But it was so self-contained! I loved it for what it was, but the story never pulled on my heartstrings -- it was so far away. It served a different purpose, yes, but I view any book as, primarily, something that makes me /feel/ or at least understand what I have previously felt, sort through it.
This was distant, it was a composition of my secondary, tertiary, etc., needs in a novel, and so made up for the fundamental lacking of a /heart/.
Spoilars! {Gatsby's death was so unexpected, so tragic in its unexpectedness. And, oh! Poor Myrtle! But still, subjects, gestures and characters... not really people, if only because they are (now) ancient and archetypal figures and no longer the life of the party. ah! ah, ah...}
Still, I must say my favorite part of the story, aside from the whole beauty and lyricism of the prose, was the cover. It's majestic image summed everything, brought together the entire, lovely composition together into one dynamic and lovely scene. And how Fitzgerald worked the image into the story, the idea of daisy, of coney island, of t.j. eckleberg, of the ash heaps. s
So wondrous, so resplendent.
22. Speaker for the Dead
This was LOVELY. The characters, the heart, it spoke to a different, slightly older age than mine, to those of the 70s, the 80s, who sought epics and liveabilitiy a different way than I. But the execution, so wonderful.
Valentine's disappearance and resurgance, Jane -- gah -- just the entire conception of Jane should win the man the world. The piggies, the portugesse, I think I could have done without, but by the end I saw as Card saw, and found the children likeable and diverse (a feat, as Card's characters all appear similar and monotonous at first, just the dialogue, the gestures the whole orchestrated way to their reactions...), Nova Ivanova to be desirable, even found Ender to be a hero, and admirable, which is saying a fucking lot, no joke.
This is Meyer's favorite book; it's not mine. But the plot is superb, the characters obliquely defined, wonderous in its own, distant way.
I'm onto more works, in the middle of P&P, of Three Cups of Tea, of Mountains Beyond Mountains, of A Separate Peace.
Finally, a sense of catharsis.
19ajm490
23. Pride and Prejudice
Wooow. It was so much fun to read, for the vocabulary it contained. Unexpected. It was like, gah, it resonates even now, despite everything that comes between that world and ours.
I loved Mr. Bennet, and his eventual, very oblique downfall encouraged the greatest sadness on my part. Catherine De Bourgh's final scene along the path with Elizabeth was one of the greatest, most astoundingly witty and simultaneously comic scenes if all of literature. I'm sure of it. (not collins', although his was enjoyable.)
Mark Twain hates Austen, but his rustic nature might demand it... who knows?, but anyone who can't see the worth in this are really quite deficient in spotting excellence (granted, it's been a long road getting this book respected as it deserves).
Still, the romance between Darcy and Elizabeth was not my cup of tea. Darcy remained flawed throughout, despite Austen's want of vindication. Elizabeth always seemed deserving of more, and her road back to loving him made me beyond sad.
Too, it was incredibly drawn out, and /some/ concision would have been appreciated. But it's no big deal, I felt thoroughly in that world for the duration of my stay.
24. A Separate Peace
I knew, going into the book, that there was some feeling of intimacy between these boys. And I learned from the back cover that one was an athlete and the other an aesthete, or at least, an intellectual. I didn't correlate this to my experience immediately, but as I continued through the exposition, I encountered my own story, really, paralleled in the story of Phineas and Gene.
My roommate is this superathlete and so I saw him in Phineas. Now, of course, there is no Phineas, for Phineas is an ideal, and the roommate doesn't compare in personality. But I've been coming to this idea of sports, lately, hearing Stephen (the 'mate) fretting over Manny Ramirez and seeing these sportscasters talk of trade deadlines, and -- GAH! -- it was so disturbing and I didn't know why.
A Separate Peace explained this feeling. In Phineas, there was a total lack of... of enterprise. It was all innocence. When he threw a football it was just that, a pass of a ball. It wasn't perverted by big business and fat men, it was so -- blissfully -- what-it-was.
And I miss that, I desire that above all else. It's what has been festering at the back of my mind, whispering its thoughts when I watched ESPN and wondered why the station felt so damn insidious. Perverted.
And of course, gah, the conclusion. Inexpressible sadness. An errant action leads to --. How atrocious, how visceral it was, and I can completely understand.
Words, lacking.
Wooow. It was so much fun to read, for the vocabulary it contained. Unexpected. It was like, gah, it resonates even now, despite everything that comes between that world and ours.
I loved Mr. Bennet, and his eventual, very oblique downfall encouraged the greatest sadness on my part. Catherine De Bourgh's final scene along the path with Elizabeth was one of the greatest, most astoundingly witty and simultaneously comic scenes if all of literature. I'm sure of it. (not collins', although his was enjoyable.)
Mark Twain hates Austen, but his rustic nature might demand it... who knows?, but anyone who can't see the worth in this are really quite deficient in spotting excellence (granted, it's been a long road getting this book respected as it deserves).
Still, the romance between Darcy and Elizabeth was not my cup of tea. Darcy remained flawed throughout, despite Austen's want of vindication. Elizabeth always seemed deserving of more, and her road back to loving him made me beyond sad.
Too, it was incredibly drawn out, and /some/ concision would have been appreciated. But it's no big deal, I felt thoroughly in that world for the duration of my stay.
24. A Separate Peace
I knew, going into the book, that there was some feeling of intimacy between these boys. And I learned from the back cover that one was an athlete and the other an aesthete, or at least, an intellectual. I didn't correlate this to my experience immediately, but as I continued through the exposition, I encountered my own story, really, paralleled in the story of Phineas and Gene.
My roommate is this superathlete and so I saw him in Phineas. Now, of course, there is no Phineas, for Phineas is an ideal, and the roommate doesn't compare in personality. But I've been coming to this idea of sports, lately, hearing Stephen (the 'mate) fretting over Manny Ramirez and seeing these sportscasters talk of trade deadlines, and -- GAH! -- it was so disturbing and I didn't know why.
A Separate Peace explained this feeling. In Phineas, there was a total lack of... of enterprise. It was all innocence. When he threw a football it was just that, a pass of a ball. It wasn't perverted by big business and fat men, it was so -- blissfully -- what-it-was.
And I miss that, I desire that above all else. It's what has been festering at the back of my mind, whispering its thoughts when I watched ESPN and wondered why the station felt so damn insidious. Perverted.
And of course, gah, the conclusion. Inexpressible sadness. An errant action leads to --. How atrocious, how visceral it was, and I can completely understand.
Words, lacking.
20ajm490
25. Fight Club
What you have to understand is that I ABHOR Palahniuk. I think he's pompous and arrogant, and his worldview leaves so much to be desired and yet he sticks to it unfalteringly despite criticism.
why must everything smell like shit?
Anyway, I've been laboring away through Haunted, which is absolutely atrocious. But I actually enjoyed this one. I think P. may have burned out after his first novel, but this one, gah, the writing is just incredible. Really.
sigh. I still hate him. :\
26. Breaking Dawn
I'm just posting my review here. TBH it's not really a review, it's just a criticism of the random for not appreciating Stephenie's work in the correct way. :\
-- A note, before beginning: This ‘review’ is more thorough than most that you will find. I’ve been trying to clarify my thoughts on Breaking Dawn for a few days now, and I have come to the conclusion that the best way to do so is in the form of a literary critique. Due to the nature of Breaking Dawn as the final puzzle piece (see below for more information…), this early endeavor has become a sort of monstrous, long review of the entire series. As such, this ‘review’ entails extensive spoilers – for each book – so if you haven’t completed this entire ‘saga’, please don’t continue onwards. Also, it’s beyond me to put up with ‘explanatory’ or otherwise ‘encyclopedic’ reviews (i.e. “Breaking Dawn, a romance novel written by Stephenie Meyer, released Aug. 2nd, 2008…” etcetera), and so this review will jump right into the thick of things. Try to keep up.
I.
The development of the Twilight Saga begins much like the development of a tree. The original seed, the dream of the lovers in the meadow-forest, sprouts into the hazy world we know as “Twilight,” the first novel. This original book is undefined and focuses all its interests on the intense budding romance of its two primary characters, focuses entirely on these two young protagonists, and the story is driven by their romance like a bullet. As Grossman of TIME notes, “They have one gear, and she guns it straight ahead till the last page.” That gear is the compulsion and tension formed by the Edward and Bella’s unique romance.
In New Moon, Meyer begins to branch out. As opposed to the first book in which we see two characters hopelessly enveloped in one another, in the second book, other characters – Jacob, Alice – begin to stand out, and we see a glimmer of what’s to come in the introduction of the Volturi Coven and Guard. With them, a notably less singular montage of themes and ideas emerges (read: not purely romance), much to the disdain of certain fans. Yet these prototypical teenage girls hold their collective tongue, and put up with the not-romance in reactionary anticipation of a return to the type of romance seen in Twilight. But it’s not something they really enjoy, I’d venture tosay.
Eclipse is the first time any foliage is noted on said tree, with the entire cast of characters – Werewolves, Vampires, and Humans – beginning to coalesce and become real.
Which brings us to Breaking Dawn. Perhaps the tree metaphor fails us here, unless we see the nutrients of said tree (Meyer’s admittedly vast reserve of characterization and plot finesse) as finite resources that have become so dispersed throughout this gargantuan and rapidly growing tree that these stems, if you will, of the outermost branches can’t fully support the vitality characteristic in Meyer’s previous writings.
In other words: it’s a really big tree. It’s a really big world. And it’s moving really fast.
Another way to look at it:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world
– W. B. Yeats
Perhaps this excerpt from Yeats’ “The Second Coming,” which serves as an epigraph to Achebe’s aptly named “Things Fall Apart,” can explain the somewhat erratic nature of Breaking Dawn. The entire series has been flowing outwards from it’s core romantic center since the beginning of New Moon, and while I don’t personally believe things have fallen apart in this concluding installment, I can understand why some fans may construe it as such.
Breaking Dawn seems at first as if it’s deliberately trying to break away from its three preceding long-drawn-out-and-overly-romantic sister novels. There’s gore, more than I’ve seen in most horror movies. (You thought Victoria’s decapitation disturbing in Eclipse? Hah! Wait until you see Bella give birth!) There’s a real focus on battles and powers and hunting – not exactly romantic fare. Heck, part of Breaking Dawn isn’t even told from the perspective of a lover!
But more than the gore and the fighting and Jacob’s overtly masculine narrative, is the baby that comes into play in this novel, and with it – the nearly all-consuming maternal quality of Bella’s love. With the entrance of Renesmee (who I’m calling Nessa from now on to avoid the utter absurdity of such a name), most of the romance between Bella and Edward is immediately quelled, not in the sense that their love diminishes (the arbitrary but frequent sex scenes would rather contradict that assumption…), but that the novel itself takes on a decidedly different feel from that point onward.
This reeks of departure. This screams of fandom betrayal. However, Breaking Dawn is still very much in line with the series itself, it’s just no longer in line with its fans. I see Breaking Dawn not as a departure or turnaround, but rather as a sort of filter through which we can see the entire series in an entirely new, evenhanded light. And indeed, we must redefine the series as a whole, or else fall into the mistruth that this installment is a defection of sorts; it’s not. The first three books have not changed, but their fundamental nature has been revealed to us through Breaking Dawn.
A quick context: I’m a straight, teenage male. This entails a lot. The major point: I shouldn’t like this series. I do. Why? I’ve been asking myself that for long time, embarrassed about it, really, because I think myself somewhat intellectual and this is, what, mass-market fanfiction at best? But the fact remains that I have loved (and thus brooded over) these books from the onset, and now, in the pages of Breaking Dawn, I’ve found my answer to the fundamental question of Why do I like this series? and also found solace in the fact that I no longer need to be embarrassed about this once guilty pleasure.
To get to the core of this question of ‘departure’, we need to look at the sources for this series, which seem to me to be 1) the unpolluted dream of Edward and Bella, 2) her favorite books, and finally 3) Stephenie’s life and history and her resulting (subconscious?) yearnings for what life could be.
The first and most imperative source for the series is the dream that led to its initial creation. Without this first spark, there would be no Twilight, no New Moon, no Eclipse, but perhaps under certain circumstances… there could have still been a Breaking Dawn in some variant. (More on this later.) This dream was, to my knowledge, unpolluted. That is, it was detached nearly completely from Stephenie’s own life, as far as I can see from what she’s said publically, anyway. This dream of Bella and Edward the vampire in their meadow is so far removed from Meyer’s own life that it can only be said to be pure fantasy.
I’m postulating that this dream sprang from Meyer’s subconscious yearning for the flip-side to her life. She grew up part of a huge and close-knit family. She was already married and had been for years. She had three children, all of them boys. Therefore this idea of Bella, a girl with none of these… restraints, was instantly exciting to Meyer.
And then the question of how to put this exciting, unfamiliar romance into narrative form. Is it any wonder that Meyer drew on her favorite works of literature, being a first-time writer? So thus Pride & Prejudice goes to shape the Mr. Darcy-esque character of Edward, and the ideal of the Byronic Hero fills in the rest of his character traits. The action is limited, the dialogue the most important part of the text, harkening back to Shakespeare-style drama, where the most exciting event is written like so: They Fight. Paris Falls.
Now, I’m not excusing derivatives, if that was all that Meyer had done. If she simply stole the Byronic Hero and told it like Shakespeare in the guise of an Austen romance, this series would have floundered before it had begun. But of course, it’s all been modernized and thrust (and with a lot of foresight and composure, I might add) into the world of vampires.
But even this does not explain it! There’s a final puzzle piece, the part of the series that has been suppressed so long that it’s been nearly unnoticeable until now: her life. Paradoxically, as much as the Twilight Saga was an escape from the travails of her normal, boring life, this commonplace seeped its way into her work as much as her escape.
Remember the tree. The first book, Twilight, the sprout – source material was easy to find. Meyer wrote the opposite of her life. Single child, whisked away from sunny Phoenix to dreary Forks – blissfully unattached. Finds amazing vampire boyfriend – perfection manifest. Accepted into a world she hadn’t know existed -- a world that was not her own.
It’s easy to see Bella as a projection of Meyer. Does Bella not say over and over again that she doesn’t fit in with ‘regular’ people, that they’re uninteresting, that this fantasy-life is superior in every, single way? And doesn’t Meyer say the same thing? "I rarely write about just humans, you can get humans anywhere." It’s obvious she’s just creating a fantasy for herself, for her own amusement, as she will easily attest to herself.
It’s this early, unpolluted romance that fans latch onto. Girl fans. Lots. Adolescent girls who relate to the story of this clumsy yet endearing ‘everyday’ girl, who wish they had a boy like the enigma Edward. Meyer says, “I didn't set out to write a young-adult series, I started writing 'Twilight' for myself and I was a 29-year-old mother of three young sons. I always write to entertain myself; I let my agent figure out who the audience is.” This is absolutely fundamental to understanding the turn in the series that is to come.
I’m feeling that this book is going to upset a lot of this fanbase of juvenile teens and pre-teens that doesn’t want to cope with being a mother, with sacrificing self for others. This isn’t something they thought they would get out of this series. They didn’t want responsibilities. They wanted Edward and being eighteen forever. They wanted to never have to grow up.
But this is a multi-book deal, is it not? Not that Stephenie is out of material, not by any means, she’s just out of her dream material. She held the dream and her favorite books close to her chest, and while she’d exhausted the vitality in the essence of the dream, what remained was a framework of the Austen/Shakespeare hybrid that proved so successful in Twilight.
But it’s not enough. She needs mores, something else to ground the series in. She’s grasping at straws, if you look at it the wrong way. What do you turn to? What do you utilize? You use what you know, your life. If you look at it the right way, the way Meyer sees it, she’s a tree, stretching her limbs out before the sunlight, accepting the life around her.
So New Moon comes around and with it, Jacob. Jacob embodies Stephenie’s life moreso than any other character. The pack is an expression of her family. Jacob’s even named after one of her numerous siblings (as are several other characters). Emily Young, anyone? A motherly figure serving a den of werewolves plate after plate of food and being overjoyed about it? Yeah, that was Stephenie, mother of three boys, a house full of men.
But something very strange happened here, with the La Push crowd embodying Stephenie’s real life, seeping its way into her story (unbeknownst to her?). They weren’t normal. If it was her real life, these characters would all be mundane humans, but that’s not the case here, and it’s an incredibly important facet of this whole series. Somewhere between the dream of vampires and the introduction of werewolves, the people she loved most ended up with superpowers too. Here she is, the Eclipse Bella, warring over ‘Edward vs. Jacob’, ‘real vs. fantasy’. Meyer loves both, not choosing either over the other, but trying to find a way for them to coexist in peace. (That coexistence will only come to fruition in Breaking Dawn, the synthesis of all these threads.)
It’s sort of shocking, when watching videos of Stephenie receiving questions, and some silly girl would say “I hate Jacob! Can’t you kill him off?” Meyer’d looked shocked, seriously saddened (offended, perhaps?) that someone would be so insensitive. Jacob and the pack are an extension of her family, and thus, no, she could not kill him off. She couldn’t even keep him out of a book that was supposed to be about her not-life.
This insertion of Jacob & company throughout New Moon and Eclipse unsettled some. Well, a lot of people. Sides were drawn, debates were had. And out of it came a nearly unanimous conclusion: Edward Forever – Down With Jacob. These battle lines hold more meaning than they first appeared to, especially in light of Breaking Dawn. Edward and Jacob came to represent nothing less than an intense struggle between female and male wants, fast paced youth and happy stability, respectively. So of course, the young females chose Edward. It wasn’t even really a decision.
Finally, Breaking Dawn. When I read this novel, I had, quite literally, an “A ha!” moment, an epiphany of sorts, as all this new information, as this hinted-at atmosphere was finally delivered upon. Everything made sense, and I believe I saw it as Stephenie saw it. And so, of course, I loved the book.
The first 150 pages seemed to me to be a homage to the giggling fangirls. A wedding. A honeymoon. It was all so nice and uneventful, a fitting conclusion to the romance, it felt like to me. Perhaps some fans would rather have had Stephenie end it there.
After this first segment, the part I’m hearing referred to as ‘downhill’ begins, the conception of Nessa. Again, billed as ‘bad fanfiction.’ Seeing through Meyer’s eyes, I see this as the natural progression of the story of her type of romance. There is the meeting, the loving, the marriage, the baby. She’d covered everything up to the marriage, and really, for Meyer, that was all there was left. And let’s face it, Meyer, an unpracticed and unskilled writer (in a technical sense), who can blame her for ‘only’ being able to turn her life into a fantastical allegory?
It sort of sickens me that someone would call someone else’s life, in this extent, a ‘bad fanfiction.’
…
This seems like a case of selfish, immature girl not wanting to face the facts (and yes, wonderments!) of life to come. And really, if you can’t be as selfless and kindhearted as Bella, what makes you think you deserve an Edward?
The story then includes an amalgam of Jacob’s narration, of Nessa’s birth, a hunting jaunt and explanation of powers in preparation for the fight, all of which are fairly unromantic, and as I read, I kept thinking to myself, “This is so masculine.” It really struck me as I was reading, the first thought that really hit me was that this was going to change things, that this was going to be the bridge for guys to see this series the way I somehow already had. But then I realized that guys can’t read these books backwards. And girls who had gotten this far might not follow along with Meyer’s recently revealed, previously latent direction.
The essence of Breaking Dawn is what Meyer is all about. The romance is only one aspect. Breaking dawn is a montage of Stephenie’s entire life, and thus true fans of Steph have already come to realize that this book is her masterwork, her cornerstone in the entire series, the final puzzle piece that brings everything into place. Twilight would never have made it out if not for a dream, but Breaking Dawn is Stephenie in full stride, laid out bare in front of us for all of us to see.
(And so you would condemn her?)
The main fact that I am trying to highlight here is the slow but steady transition from the original conception of a fantasy romance into not only the acceptance of real world mundanities, but a fierce love of them that bred the eventual coexistence of both of Stephenie’s warring worlds. And unfortunately this series was written like a one way tunnel; it brings initial supporters of the romance through its depths and then shows them the full-featured world at the end. Had the world been open from the start, the fanbase could have been far more expansive than frivolous, thoughtless teenage girls bent only on gratification. In short, this is a series that is fatally flawed: While few men will brave the love story of the first few books, perhaps only a man can fully appreciate what Stephenie has created with the story’s finale in Breaking Dawn.
What you have to understand is that I ABHOR Palahniuk. I think he's pompous and arrogant, and his worldview leaves so much to be desired and yet he sticks to it unfalteringly despite criticism.
why must everything smell like shit?
Anyway, I've been laboring away through Haunted, which is absolutely atrocious. But I actually enjoyed this one. I think P. may have burned out after his first novel, but this one, gah, the writing is just incredible. Really.
sigh. I still hate him. :\
26. Breaking Dawn
I'm just posting my review here. TBH it's not really a review, it's just a criticism of the random for not appreciating Stephenie's work in the correct way. :\
-- A note, before beginning: This ‘review’ is more thorough than most that you will find. I’ve been trying to clarify my thoughts on Breaking Dawn for a few days now, and I have come to the conclusion that the best way to do so is in the form of a literary critique. Due to the nature of Breaking Dawn as the final puzzle piece (see below for more information…), this early endeavor has become a sort of monstrous, long review of the entire series. As such, this ‘review’ entails extensive spoilers – for each book – so if you haven’t completed this entire ‘saga’, please don’t continue onwards. Also, it’s beyond me to put up with ‘explanatory’ or otherwise ‘encyclopedic’ reviews (i.e. “Breaking Dawn, a romance novel written by Stephenie Meyer, released Aug. 2nd, 2008…” etcetera), and so this review will jump right into the thick of things. Try to keep up.
I.
The development of the Twilight Saga begins much like the development of a tree. The original seed, the dream of the lovers in the meadow-forest, sprouts into the hazy world we know as “Twilight,” the first novel. This original book is undefined and focuses all its interests on the intense budding romance of its two primary characters, focuses entirely on these two young protagonists, and the story is driven by their romance like a bullet. As Grossman of TIME notes, “They have one gear, and she guns it straight ahead till the last page.” That gear is the compulsion and tension formed by the Edward and Bella’s unique romance.
In New Moon, Meyer begins to branch out. As opposed to the first book in which we see two characters hopelessly enveloped in one another, in the second book, other characters – Jacob, Alice – begin to stand out, and we see a glimmer of what’s to come in the introduction of the Volturi Coven and Guard. With them, a notably less singular montage of themes and ideas emerges (read: not purely romance), much to the disdain of certain fans. Yet these prototypical teenage girls hold their collective tongue, and put up with the not-romance in reactionary anticipation of a return to the type of romance seen in Twilight. But it’s not something they really enjoy, I’d venture tosay.
Eclipse is the first time any foliage is noted on said tree, with the entire cast of characters – Werewolves, Vampires, and Humans – beginning to coalesce and become real.
Which brings us to Breaking Dawn. Perhaps the tree metaphor fails us here, unless we see the nutrients of said tree (Meyer’s admittedly vast reserve of characterization and plot finesse) as finite resources that have become so dispersed throughout this gargantuan and rapidly growing tree that these stems, if you will, of the outermost branches can’t fully support the vitality characteristic in Meyer’s previous writings.
In other words: it’s a really big tree. It’s a really big world. And it’s moving really fast.
Another way to look at it:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world
– W. B. Yeats
Perhaps this excerpt from Yeats’ “The Second Coming,” which serves as an epigraph to Achebe’s aptly named “Things Fall Apart,” can explain the somewhat erratic nature of Breaking Dawn. The entire series has been flowing outwards from it’s core romantic center since the beginning of New Moon, and while I don’t personally believe things have fallen apart in this concluding installment, I can understand why some fans may construe it as such.
Breaking Dawn seems at first as if it’s deliberately trying to break away from its three preceding long-drawn-out-and-overly-romantic sister novels. There’s gore, more than I’ve seen in most horror movies. (You thought Victoria’s decapitation disturbing in Eclipse? Hah! Wait until you see Bella give birth!) There’s a real focus on battles and powers and hunting – not exactly romantic fare. Heck, part of Breaking Dawn isn’t even told from the perspective of a lover!
But more than the gore and the fighting and Jacob’s overtly masculine narrative, is the baby that comes into play in this novel, and with it – the nearly all-consuming maternal quality of Bella’s love. With the entrance of Renesmee (who I’m calling Nessa from now on to avoid the utter absurdity of such a name), most of the romance between Bella and Edward is immediately quelled, not in the sense that their love diminishes (the arbitrary but frequent sex scenes would rather contradict that assumption…), but that the novel itself takes on a decidedly different feel from that point onward.
This reeks of departure. This screams of fandom betrayal. However, Breaking Dawn is still very much in line with the series itself, it’s just no longer in line with its fans. I see Breaking Dawn not as a departure or turnaround, but rather as a sort of filter through which we can see the entire series in an entirely new, evenhanded light. And indeed, we must redefine the series as a whole, or else fall into the mistruth that this installment is a defection of sorts; it’s not. The first three books have not changed, but their fundamental nature has been revealed to us through Breaking Dawn.
A quick context: I’m a straight, teenage male. This entails a lot. The major point: I shouldn’t like this series. I do. Why? I’ve been asking myself that for long time, embarrassed about it, really, because I think myself somewhat intellectual and this is, what, mass-market fanfiction at best? But the fact remains that I have loved (and thus brooded over) these books from the onset, and now, in the pages of Breaking Dawn, I’ve found my answer to the fundamental question of Why do I like this series? and also found solace in the fact that I no longer need to be embarrassed about this once guilty pleasure.
To get to the core of this question of ‘departure’, we need to look at the sources for this series, which seem to me to be 1) the unpolluted dream of Edward and Bella, 2) her favorite books, and finally 3) Stephenie’s life and history and her resulting (subconscious?) yearnings for what life could be.
The first and most imperative source for the series is the dream that led to its initial creation. Without this first spark, there would be no Twilight, no New Moon, no Eclipse, but perhaps under certain circumstances… there could have still been a Breaking Dawn in some variant. (More on this later.) This dream was, to my knowledge, unpolluted. That is, it was detached nearly completely from Stephenie’s own life, as far as I can see from what she’s said publically, anyway. This dream of Bella and Edward the vampire in their meadow is so far removed from Meyer’s own life that it can only be said to be pure fantasy.
I’m postulating that this dream sprang from Meyer’s subconscious yearning for the flip-side to her life. She grew up part of a huge and close-knit family. She was already married and had been for years. She had three children, all of them boys. Therefore this idea of Bella, a girl with none of these… restraints, was instantly exciting to Meyer.
And then the question of how to put this exciting, unfamiliar romance into narrative form. Is it any wonder that Meyer drew on her favorite works of literature, being a first-time writer? So thus Pride & Prejudice goes to shape the Mr. Darcy-esque character of Edward, and the ideal of the Byronic Hero fills in the rest of his character traits. The action is limited, the dialogue the most important part of the text, harkening back to Shakespeare-style drama, where the most exciting event is written like so: They Fight. Paris Falls.
Now, I’m not excusing derivatives, if that was all that Meyer had done. If she simply stole the Byronic Hero and told it like Shakespeare in the guise of an Austen romance, this series would have floundered before it had begun. But of course, it’s all been modernized and thrust (and with a lot of foresight and composure, I might add) into the world of vampires.
But even this does not explain it! There’s a final puzzle piece, the part of the series that has been suppressed so long that it’s been nearly unnoticeable until now: her life. Paradoxically, as much as the Twilight Saga was an escape from the travails of her normal, boring life, this commonplace seeped its way into her work as much as her escape.
Remember the tree. The first book, Twilight, the sprout – source material was easy to find. Meyer wrote the opposite of her life. Single child, whisked away from sunny Phoenix to dreary Forks – blissfully unattached. Finds amazing vampire boyfriend – perfection manifest. Accepted into a world she hadn’t know existed -- a world that was not her own.
It’s easy to see Bella as a projection of Meyer. Does Bella not say over and over again that she doesn’t fit in with ‘regular’ people, that they’re uninteresting, that this fantasy-life is superior in every, single way? And doesn’t Meyer say the same thing? "I rarely write about just humans, you can get humans anywhere." It’s obvious she’s just creating a fantasy for herself, for her own amusement, as she will easily attest to herself.
It’s this early, unpolluted romance that fans latch onto. Girl fans. Lots. Adolescent girls who relate to the story of this clumsy yet endearing ‘everyday’ girl, who wish they had a boy like the enigma Edward. Meyer says, “I didn't set out to write a young-adult series, I started writing 'Twilight' for myself and I was a 29-year-old mother of three young sons. I always write to entertain myself; I let my agent figure out who the audience is.” This is absolutely fundamental to understanding the turn in the series that is to come.
I’m feeling that this book is going to upset a lot of this fanbase of juvenile teens and pre-teens that doesn’t want to cope with being a mother, with sacrificing self for others. This isn’t something they thought they would get out of this series. They didn’t want responsibilities. They wanted Edward and being eighteen forever. They wanted to never have to grow up.
But this is a multi-book deal, is it not? Not that Stephenie is out of material, not by any means, she’s just out of her dream material. She held the dream and her favorite books close to her chest, and while she’d exhausted the vitality in the essence of the dream, what remained was a framework of the Austen/Shakespeare hybrid that proved so successful in Twilight.
But it’s not enough. She needs mores, something else to ground the series in. She’s grasping at straws, if you look at it the wrong way. What do you turn to? What do you utilize? You use what you know, your life. If you look at it the right way, the way Meyer sees it, she’s a tree, stretching her limbs out before the sunlight, accepting the life around her.
So New Moon comes around and with it, Jacob. Jacob embodies Stephenie’s life moreso than any other character. The pack is an expression of her family. Jacob’s even named after one of her numerous siblings (as are several other characters). Emily Young, anyone? A motherly figure serving a den of werewolves plate after plate of food and being overjoyed about it? Yeah, that was Stephenie, mother of three boys, a house full of men.
But something very strange happened here, with the La Push crowd embodying Stephenie’s real life, seeping its way into her story (unbeknownst to her?). They weren’t normal. If it was her real life, these characters would all be mundane humans, but that’s not the case here, and it’s an incredibly important facet of this whole series. Somewhere between the dream of vampires and the introduction of werewolves, the people she loved most ended up with superpowers too. Here she is, the Eclipse Bella, warring over ‘Edward vs. Jacob’, ‘real vs. fantasy’. Meyer loves both, not choosing either over the other, but trying to find a way for them to coexist in peace. (That coexistence will only come to fruition in Breaking Dawn, the synthesis of all these threads.)
It’s sort of shocking, when watching videos of Stephenie receiving questions, and some silly girl would say “I hate Jacob! Can’t you kill him off?” Meyer’d looked shocked, seriously saddened (offended, perhaps?) that someone would be so insensitive. Jacob and the pack are an extension of her family, and thus, no, she could not kill him off. She couldn’t even keep him out of a book that was supposed to be about her not-life.
This insertion of Jacob & company throughout New Moon and Eclipse unsettled some. Well, a lot of people. Sides were drawn, debates were had. And out of it came a nearly unanimous conclusion: Edward Forever – Down With Jacob. These battle lines hold more meaning than they first appeared to, especially in light of Breaking Dawn. Edward and Jacob came to represent nothing less than an intense struggle between female and male wants, fast paced youth and happy stability, respectively. So of course, the young females chose Edward. It wasn’t even really a decision.
Finally, Breaking Dawn. When I read this novel, I had, quite literally, an “A ha!” moment, an epiphany of sorts, as all this new information, as this hinted-at atmosphere was finally delivered upon. Everything made sense, and I believe I saw it as Stephenie saw it. And so, of course, I loved the book.
The first 150 pages seemed to me to be a homage to the giggling fangirls. A wedding. A honeymoon. It was all so nice and uneventful, a fitting conclusion to the romance, it felt like to me. Perhaps some fans would rather have had Stephenie end it there.
After this first segment, the part I’m hearing referred to as ‘downhill’ begins, the conception of Nessa. Again, billed as ‘bad fanfiction.’ Seeing through Meyer’s eyes, I see this as the natural progression of the story of her type of romance. There is the meeting, the loving, the marriage, the baby. She’d covered everything up to the marriage, and really, for Meyer, that was all there was left. And let’s face it, Meyer, an unpracticed and unskilled writer (in a technical sense), who can blame her for ‘only’ being able to turn her life into a fantastical allegory?
It sort of sickens me that someone would call someone else’s life, in this extent, a ‘bad fanfiction.’
…
This seems like a case of selfish, immature girl not wanting to face the facts (and yes, wonderments!) of life to come. And really, if you can’t be as selfless and kindhearted as Bella, what makes you think you deserve an Edward?
The story then includes an amalgam of Jacob’s narration, of Nessa’s birth, a hunting jaunt and explanation of powers in preparation for the fight, all of which are fairly unromantic, and as I read, I kept thinking to myself, “This is so masculine.” It really struck me as I was reading, the first thought that really hit me was that this was going to change things, that this was going to be the bridge for guys to see this series the way I somehow already had. But then I realized that guys can’t read these books backwards. And girls who had gotten this far might not follow along with Meyer’s recently revealed, previously latent direction.
The essence of Breaking Dawn is what Meyer is all about. The romance is only one aspect. Breaking dawn is a montage of Stephenie’s entire life, and thus true fans of Steph have already come to realize that this book is her masterwork, her cornerstone in the entire series, the final puzzle piece that brings everything into place. Twilight would never have made it out if not for a dream, but Breaking Dawn is Stephenie in full stride, laid out bare in front of us for all of us to see.
(And so you would condemn her?)
The main fact that I am trying to highlight here is the slow but steady transition from the original conception of a fantasy romance into not only the acceptance of real world mundanities, but a fierce love of them that bred the eventual coexistence of both of Stephenie’s warring worlds. And unfortunately this series was written like a one way tunnel; it brings initial supporters of the romance through its depths and then shows them the full-featured world at the end. Had the world been open from the start, the fanbase could have been far more expansive than frivolous, thoughtless teenage girls bent only on gratification. In short, this is a series that is fatally flawed: While few men will brave the love story of the first few books, perhaps only a man can fully appreciate what Stephenie has created with the story’s finale in Breaking Dawn.
21FAMeulstee
ajm490
I have not red any book from this series, your review makes me curious. I might add them to my wish-list ;-)
I have not red any book from this series, your review makes me curious. I might add them to my wish-list ;-)
22Dawnrookey
A little guidance about the cultural context might help you to appreciate the play more. Yes, Nora is annoying but she is annoying because of the "learned" behaviors society inflicted upon her and her obliviousness of her own identity. In this society women had no identity that could be extricated from her father or husband. This play marks one of the first times that a woman's rights and place in society is truly questioned in public--in art. If a woman had an affair or left her husband and most shockingly her children, it certainly wasn't to be justified by any means in Victorian society and this play made a sound justification for Nora (the little Squirrel) leaving Torvald. Imagine if you couldn't take out a loan without a man's consent or that if you chose to leave your husband by law you are choosing to leave your children too. Hence the play became famous and known for "the door that slammed around the world" because Nora did what no one else would have done in her culture-- she was no idiot.
23ajm490
cultural context does not obviate shit. sorry.
it was only successful in the time because it counteracted the society that repressed it. now it's just shit, because it's unnecessary.
cultural context my ass. a waste of a read, but it's long past me and so i'm past caring and thinking on it longer than needed.
it was only successful in the time because it counteracted the society that repressed it. now it's just shit, because it's unnecessary.
cultural context my ass. a waste of a read, but it's long past me and so i'm past caring and thinking on it longer than needed.
24Dawnrookey
Este mensaje fue borrado por su autor.
25Dawnrookey
Hmmm, why so vituperative? So, cultural context doesn't "obviate shit."Well, "life's disappointments are harder to take when you don't know any swear words" --Bill Waterson. It appears you have an arsenal for your let downs. But, fair enough. So why do you think it's still a required text in high schools and colleges? Why do you think it is still performed world-wide? I wonder why Anthony Hopkins wanted to play Torvald or Jane Fonda Nora (not my favorite performance of he play). Why does it have staying power? Why do people still read and perform Ibsen's other plays. Ah, no need to waste your time responding to these nominal curiosities, but I am interested in why you think a work becomes unnecessary. Is Hamlet unnecessary now that it has been repackaged in so many other works of literature and art, particularly in your own culture? When does a work no longer become relevant? I haven't read the Myers books but a dear friend and colleague says they are plot driven and pastiche. They remind her of 19th century romances like Pride and Prejudice--as a side note she loves the Myers books. Does this now make those 19th century works "unnecessary?" I would love for you to enlighten me here as to what you mean by unnecessary. And please, continue to be dismissive of A Doll's House. I'm not trying to convince you to like it. There is a big difference in "liking" a work and understanding it--ask your ass about it ;0 I'm sure it has a lot to say being that it appears you pull so much out of it!
A last thought-- I am indulging myself here.
I've known women who have recognized themselves in the character of Nora whose epiphany like Nora's is that they too had been playing a role dictated by their culture that they themselves had never questioned. Your generation of women aren't pushed to get married to the "right" man and have babies like so many before them, and they are not taught that a devotion to such a life is preferable to any other, but nonetheless, scattered about the world women are still taught this everyday, who knows maybe they'll stumble upon some copy of A Doll's House tattered and smelling of mildew and read it while dinner is in the oven and the children are napping.
A last thought-- I am indulging myself here.
I've known women who have recognized themselves in the character of Nora whose epiphany like Nora's is that they too had been playing a role dictated by their culture that they themselves had never questioned. Your generation of women aren't pushed to get married to the "right" man and have babies like so many before them, and they are not taught that a devotion to such a life is preferable to any other, but nonetheless, scattered about the world women are still taught this everyday, who knows maybe they'll stumble upon some copy of A Doll's House tattered and smelling of mildew and read it while dinner is in the oven and the children are napping.
26dihiba
Are you saying women aren't oppressed anymore? That all women in this world are free and do not fear control, violence, or societal dictates?
27Dawnrookey
Who me? #25? No, I'm am not saying that women are not oppressed anymore--a hasty generalization. Any half-witted observant person could easily discern the prolificness of female oppression . I am saying young women, today, particularly American, are not taught that their identity is synonymous with the that of their husbands or fathers as they once were. My mother's generation and her mother's generation were taught that success comes from finding the "right" husband and a husband's rule was law.
28dihiba
Actually, I was asking ajm490, but I appreciate your observations, Clea. I was wondering if you (ajm490) thought there was no longer any reason to read or care about the place of women in society, or "women's rights", etc., re The Doll House.
29ajm490
i realize this is a discussion, but it wasn't exactly supposed to be a /debate/. I reported this Clea person regarding personal attacks. While I do realize that I denigrate several works, i do not denigrate people for their opinions.
I have more class than that ;D
In any case, you set yourself up for a fall, because Hamlet is EXACTLY the example I would use. And, gah, you totally misinterpret my use of words, and preface your argument with your maligned assumptions. Hamlet -- and the vast majority of Shakespeare's work -- is still relevant today because of its universality. It's existential questions pervade every person at some point in their life, and so it resonates for that reason. "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so"? How further to the core of human nature can you get?
ADH does not resonate, because it speaks to surface level human elements that have been so turbulently changing throughout all of man's history. Women's rights were important at the time of publication -- but they aren't anymore for AMERICAN society (and since I am an American this is the viewpoint I speak from.) The play's about oppressed women in a society of women who are NO LONGER opressed (for the most part -- Hicks will be hicks and most certainly NOT be changed by the book/play that they will never read). A Doll's house seems redundant in today's society because its protagonist is a stupid, foolish girl who doesn't understand the way the world works, when in fact, she /could/. For this to be a role model in American society is akin to relating her to a Paris Hilton or Britney Spears, and even they are more self-aware than her.
The fact that we have overcome female oppression can be in some ways attributed to this work, and for that I am grateful. But similar to the Constitution or the Magna Carta, it's just a work that shows landmarks in history, and not worthy as a piece of literature.
But Hamlet will continue to have relevance to our lives until we stop questioning life, meaning and purpose. Which, sure, could happen one day.... Not.
Further, to counter your argument of experience, girls that I read this with took up arms as to Nora's ignorance and foolishness. They saw her as a product of the times, but NOT a feminist symbol due to all of her weakness in her role.
Can you see where they're coming from?
I have more class than that ;D
In any case, you set yourself up for a fall, because Hamlet is EXACTLY the example I would use. And, gah, you totally misinterpret my use of words, and preface your argument with your maligned assumptions. Hamlet -- and the vast majority of Shakespeare's work -- is still relevant today because of its universality. It's existential questions pervade every person at some point in their life, and so it resonates for that reason. "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so"? How further to the core of human nature can you get?
ADH does not resonate, because it speaks to surface level human elements that have been so turbulently changing throughout all of man's history. Women's rights were important at the time of publication -- but they aren't anymore for AMERICAN society (and since I am an American this is the viewpoint I speak from.) The play's about oppressed women in a society of women who are NO LONGER opressed (for the most part -- Hicks will be hicks and most certainly NOT be changed by the book/play that they will never read). A Doll's house seems redundant in today's society because its protagonist is a stupid, foolish girl who doesn't understand the way the world works, when in fact, she /could/. For this to be a role model in American society is akin to relating her to a Paris Hilton or Britney Spears, and even they are more self-aware than her.
The fact that we have overcome female oppression can be in some ways attributed to this work, and for that I am grateful. But similar to the Constitution or the Magna Carta, it's just a work that shows landmarks in history, and not worthy as a piece of literature.
But Hamlet will continue to have relevance to our lives until we stop questioning life, meaning and purpose. Which, sure, could happen one day.... Not.
Further, to counter your argument of experience, girls that I read this with took up arms as to Nora's ignorance and foolishness. They saw her as a product of the times, but NOT a feminist symbol due to all of her weakness in her role.
Can you see where they're coming from?
30Dawnrookey
Dear AJM490
Please accept my apology for "attacking" your opinion;what I wrote was in no way an ad hominem response; I saw it more as light hearted banter. I mean, after all, you were the first one to mention your ass; I was simply referencing your previous post. I do appreciate your response and your analysis-- it's much more mature than just labeling a work as "shit" just because it didn't have a personal resonance (You must know the English Teacher mantra "show don't tell"). I could argue that your are making the same case for a Doll's house as you are Hamlet, but honestly I just returned to work and don't have that kind of time.
I will note that I find your reading list impressive--and at least you read ADH, unlike many of your peers who opt for spark notes, and you do have an opinion (albeit somewhat unsupported, initially).
By the way, did you lift that Shakespeare quote from Tolle's New Earth ? I read it today during my faculty meeting; how odd to see it in your post but It seems like I remember you mentioned somewhere that you were reading NE.
I hope there is no hard feelings. Keep Reading.
Clea
Oh, and I do see where girls you read this with are coming from-- they've never had a life like Nora, so they find it difficult to understand her niavete'. Also, if your reading this with high school students in general, it usually does not resonate because it is a story of middle class marital strife, but give a student Hamlet or even the Scarlet Letter they tend to have more interest because of the intensity of the work-- adultry, murder, betrayal, sex-- who doesn't want to read about that?
Please accept my apology for "attacking" your opinion;what I wrote was in no way an ad hominem response; I saw it more as light hearted banter. I mean, after all, you were the first one to mention your ass; I was simply referencing your previous post. I do appreciate your response and your analysis-- it's much more mature than just labeling a work as "shit" just because it didn't have a personal resonance (You must know the English Teacher mantra "show don't tell"). I could argue that your are making the same case for a Doll's house as you are Hamlet, but honestly I just returned to work and don't have that kind of time.
I will note that I find your reading list impressive--and at least you read ADH, unlike many of your peers who opt for spark notes, and you do have an opinion (albeit somewhat unsupported, initially).
By the way, did you lift that Shakespeare quote from Tolle's New Earth ? I read it today during my faculty meeting; how odd to see it in your post but It seems like I remember you mentioned somewhere that you were reading NE.
I hope there is no hard feelings. Keep Reading.
Clea
Oh, and I do see where girls you read this with are coming from-- they've never had a life like Nora, so they find it difficult to understand her niavete'. Also, if your reading this with high school students in general, it usually does not resonate because it is a story of middle class marital strife, but give a student Hamlet or even the Scarlet Letter they tend to have more interest because of the intensity of the work-- adultry, murder, betrayal, sex-- who doesn't want to read about that?
31ajm490
Oh my god, I'm so sorry D:
I didn't even remember saying that in the first place.
I can't express how sorry i was for misinterpreting your playfulness.
D:
Anyway anyway, I have A New Earth on my bedside table, but I didn't get past the first few chapters when I started in March-ish. I found his personality exceedingly annoying, if only because it was akin to mine (which I find repulsive in all forms, ex. Palahniuk not that Palahniuk and Tolle are anything alike, haha). It bugged me that he was so certain he had found the perfect and correct 'solution' to life, which is always what had perturbed me about religion in the first place.
Anyway, no I didn't steal the quote from there, Hamlet's just one of my favorite all-time pieces of literature, and I'd like to think it wasn't just because of the murders and weird kind-of-incestuous sex.
:P
I didn't even remember saying that in the first place.
I can't express how sorry i was for misinterpreting your playfulness.
D:
Anyway anyway, I have A New Earth on my bedside table, but I didn't get past the first few chapters when I started in March-ish. I found his personality exceedingly annoying, if only because it was akin to mine (which I find repulsive in all forms, ex. Palahniuk not that Palahniuk and Tolle are anything alike, haha). It bugged me that he was so certain he had found the perfect and correct 'solution' to life, which is always what had perturbed me about religion in the first place.
Anyway, no I didn't steal the quote from there, Hamlet's just one of my favorite all-time pieces of literature, and I'd like to think it wasn't just because of the murders and weird kind-of-incestuous sex.
:P
32ajm490
27. The Grimmerie Haha, I don't know if I should really count coffee-table books, but I'm only a third of the way done with the challenge and only have a third of the year left.
I did actually read the contents of The Grimmerie, of which there is actually quite a lot, so I don't feel exceptionally guilty for including this here. And since The Grimmerie contained the book & libretto for Wicked, this can sort of serve as my thoughts on the musical as well.
I saw the musical in... June. I could go on and on about how our showing was one of the last featuring Stephanie J. Block, and about how much I favor her over Idina Menzel, but since this is a book discussion website, I'll try to keep it related to the plot, or at least a comparison of books & theater musicals.
Anyway, I really enjoyed the show. I think humor has become the mandate for anything to be popular in today's society. Humor is endearing, it draws people in and once you have them hooked in lightheartedness, you can really play with their emotions on more serious topics.
I thought the friendship presented was so sparse between the two, though. It never really impressed me as becoming something more than just acquaintance. But then again, I suppose one has to take a lot more at face value in a 2 1/2 hour stage production versus a thousand pages of characterization in a book. But I was totally convinced by Fiyero & Elphaba's love, which I found to be totally believable, even for its rarity and improbability.
I had a lot more to say about it in June, but.
Oh! One of the most important aspects I was struck by (especially due to The Grimmerie) was the manner by which books can be diluted, reinvented, and filtered, to become better than their original counterparts. I have Wicked, the book, but I'm not sure I'm going to read it any time soon. But through the book, I saw that the original plot condensed, morphed, and widened in certain areas to become the shape it's finally been cemented in. While one could look at it as irreverence towards the book to change many of the plot lines and details, my mother (who has read Wicked) firmly attests that they feel 'a part of the same world,' if not the same story. Furthermore, I see it as a case of taking some raw material -- the book Wicked (that was taken from other raw material -- the Wizard of Oz) and refining it to the point that it reaches its peak emotional impact.
Hell the wizard muses on revisionist history within the context of the musical -- I think that metafiction-esque remark is a testament to the rightness of this refinery.
The story has been created by one man, altered by a movie, another book, a musical, but through all the variations we come to see the original idea in all its indisputable grandeur. In a way, I'm answering Clea's question: When does a work become unnecessary? I don't think that it does. If it can be adapted, reinvented, and expounded upon. If the original ceases to hold true in the new light, it becomes a pathway and forerunner to the full-bodied existence of the work, an antiquated document deserving, perhaps, honor, but it is something that cannot be credited with remaining a part of the created 'world,' or theme, be it friendship and self-exploring journeys, or women's rights and empowerment.
I did actually read the contents of The Grimmerie, of which there is actually quite a lot, so I don't feel exceptionally guilty for including this here. And since The Grimmerie contained the book & libretto for Wicked, this can sort of serve as my thoughts on the musical as well.
I saw the musical in... June. I could go on and on about how our showing was one of the last featuring Stephanie J. Block, and about how much I favor her over Idina Menzel, but since this is a book discussion website, I'll try to keep it related to the plot, or at least a comparison of books & theater musicals.
Anyway, I really enjoyed the show. I think humor has become the mandate for anything to be popular in today's society. Humor is endearing, it draws people in and once you have them hooked in lightheartedness, you can really play with their emotions on more serious topics.
I thought the friendship presented was so sparse between the two, though. It never really impressed me as becoming something more than just acquaintance. But then again, I suppose one has to take a lot more at face value in a 2 1/2 hour stage production versus a thousand pages of characterization in a book. But I was totally convinced by Fiyero & Elphaba's love, which I found to be totally believable, even for its rarity and improbability.
I had a lot more to say about it in June, but.
Oh! One of the most important aspects I was struck by (especially due to The Grimmerie) was the manner by which books can be diluted, reinvented, and filtered, to become better than their original counterparts. I have Wicked, the book, but I'm not sure I'm going to read it any time soon. But through the book, I saw that the original plot condensed, morphed, and widened in certain areas to become the shape it's finally been cemented in. While one could look at it as irreverence towards the book to change many of the plot lines and details, my mother (who has read Wicked) firmly attests that they feel 'a part of the same world,' if not the same story. Furthermore, I see it as a case of taking some raw material -- the book Wicked (that was taken from other raw material -- the Wizard of Oz) and refining it to the point that it reaches its peak emotional impact.
Hell the wizard muses on revisionist history within the context of the musical -- I think that metafiction-esque remark is a testament to the rightness of this refinery.
The story has been created by one man, altered by a movie, another book, a musical, but through all the variations we come to see the original idea in all its indisputable grandeur. In a way, I'm answering Clea's question: When does a work become unnecessary? I don't think that it does. If it can be adapted, reinvented, and expounded upon. If the original ceases to hold true in the new light, it becomes a pathway and forerunner to the full-bodied existence of the work, an antiquated document deserving, perhaps, honor, but it is something that cannot be credited with remaining a part of the created 'world,' or theme, be it friendship and self-exploring journeys, or women's rights and empowerment.
33ajm490
28. Three Cups of Tea
This is sort of why I hate non-fiction. Because I never know what to say after reading it, especially when it's sort of portraitesque. I agree with everything stated in the book -- it really won me over on the issue of education as a means to combat terrorism and such. The finale was positively fantastic, it brought together all the interwoven ideas and facets of the man's life in such a way that it really, really was a moment of lucidity, which is utterly rare.
It was overly long, but it was Mortenson's whole life, basically, so I suppose that deserves three hundred pages of my attention.
(I recommend people read this in conjunction with seeing Charlie Wilson's War. Very similar in terms of messages.)
I have to read one more school book before I can continue onto Emma and This side of Paradise, if I have time.
This is sort of why I hate non-fiction. Because I never know what to say after reading it, especially when it's sort of portraitesque. I agree with everything stated in the book -- it really won me over on the issue of education as a means to combat terrorism and such. The finale was positively fantastic, it brought together all the interwoven ideas and facets of the man's life in such a way that it really, really was a moment of lucidity, which is utterly rare.
It was overly long, but it was Mortenson's whole life, basically, so I suppose that deserves three hundred pages of my attention.
(I recommend people read this in conjunction with seeing Charlie Wilson's War. Very similar in terms of messages.)
I have to read one more school book before I can continue onto Emma and This side of Paradise, if I have time.
34ajm490
29. Mountains Beyond Mountains
Again, nonfiction. Farmer is sort of ridiculous, but it's a menial point; the work he does exonerates him from criticism.
A lot more boring than Three Cups of Tea, where the protagonist was at least a wholly likeable guy.
Again, nonfiction. Farmer is sort of ridiculous, but it's a menial point; the work he does exonerates him from criticism.
A lot more boring than Three Cups of Tea, where the protagonist was at least a wholly likeable guy.
35ajm490
30. The Scarlet Letter
31. The Scarlet Letter
Yes, I read it twice. The first read-through for fun, the second for the purpose of annotating. It was necessary to be thorough when I discovered the work to be as complex in its characterization and symbolism as this one is.
A lot of the upperclassmen last year who had to read The Scarlet Letter, said it was ridiculously boring, ugly, complicated by befuddling wording, but I found none of that to be true. In fact, most of my classmates (to my surprise) also enjoyed the novel.
The first time I attempted Hawthorne was in the interval betwixt my Sixth and Seventh grade years. I fooled my mother by buying many classics into thinking that her son was smarter than he really was. I am only now starting to delve into Austen and Dickens, Shakespeare and the like. But I tried to read House of the Seven Gables, which is a fascinatingly titled work, but I couldn't comprehend it at that age. I believe I'll go back and attempt it again (not waste my mother's money), but only after I finish goddamn This Side of Paradise, which is proving tedious and not as finely put together as Gatsby, alas.
To say too much of The Scarlet Letter at this point in time would be rather foolish as I haven't really let it sink in. I think it's a fabulous book, absolutely fabulous, in that it gave beauty to a period in time that I previously conjectured had had none. Perhaps, once I write a few essays on it for school, exhaust a few of its themes, I'll be able to talk about it at length.
31. The Scarlet Letter
Yes, I read it twice. The first read-through for fun, the second for the purpose of annotating. It was necessary to be thorough when I discovered the work to be as complex in its characterization and symbolism as this one is.
A lot of the upperclassmen last year who had to read The Scarlet Letter, said it was ridiculously boring, ugly, complicated by befuddling wording, but I found none of that to be true. In fact, most of my classmates (to my surprise) also enjoyed the novel.
The first time I attempted Hawthorne was in the interval betwixt my Sixth and Seventh grade years. I fooled my mother by buying many classics into thinking that her son was smarter than he really was. I am only now starting to delve into Austen and Dickens, Shakespeare and the like. But I tried to read House of the Seven Gables, which is a fascinatingly titled work, but I couldn't comprehend it at that age. I believe I'll go back and attempt it again (not waste my mother's money), but only after I finish goddamn This Side of Paradise, which is proving tedious and not as finely put together as Gatsby, alas.
To say too much of The Scarlet Letter at this point in time would be rather foolish as I haven't really let it sink in. I think it's a fabulous book, absolutely fabulous, in that it gave beauty to a period in time that I previously conjectured had had none. Perhaps, once I write a few essays on it for school, exhaust a few of its themes, I'll be able to talk about it at length.
36wunderkind
If you don't like This Side of Paradise, might I recommend Tender is the Night instead? I liked it even better than Gatsby, and I also thought that Paradise was disappointing.
37ajm490
I'll check it out. It was post-Gatsby so one could expect it to be at least on par as far as the actual writing goes, if not the substance of the work. This Side of Paradise is wonderful in that Fitzgerald feels very free in his writing, there's almost a flamboyance about it, especially in the descriptions. But obviously it clashes with the nature of The Novel, and it becomes frustrating. Something I just feel like sitting still to. But I did really enjoy Gatsby, and I suppose, just Fitzgerald himself, so I'll give Tender is the Night a try.
38Dawnrookey
Nice to know that you appreciate the Scarlet Letter. My AP and honors students are just now finishing it. What I find is that students who understand it, love it; those who do not (and there are many that do not want to challenge their reading) understand it, hate it. The vocabulary, nuances, and symbolism are often over their heads and the book requires true reading attention that those who hate it are not willing to give.
39ajm490
Our teacher told us to annotate in different colors so that we'd pay attention, and to do so often. I think I went a bit overboard:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v600/aj490/book1.png
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v600/aj490/book2.png
That said, I was able to grasp the nuances, even if the result was that I ended up with no sleep :P
Hey, Clea, do you know if SL is taught throughout all the schools in NC, or is this just coincidence?
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v600/aj490/book1.png
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v600/aj490/book2.png
That said, I was able to grasp the nuances, even if the result was that I ended up with no sleep :P
Hey, Clea, do you know if SL is taught throughout all the schools in NC, or is this just coincidence?
40Dawnrookey
Wow, if my students were that attentive, I would never have to worry about them passing the AP test! In NC, the state does not regulate the books we teach; however, local districts and schools can. Some schools (thank goodness it's not mine) require certain texts at certain levels. I know many schools require When Things Fall Apart for sophomores and SL for juniors. I love SL but I also know that many students are not ready for it. A work with a teacher who said at her previous school she had to teach it to her standard level English students. I cannot imagine what torture that must have been as many standard level students cannot read simple texts. I usually teach Of Mice to that level for its language simplicity. I am currently trying to get them to enjoy
451 but they are so resistant. Most complain they cannot understand the text, and this is with me reading it to them for 20 minutes a day and discussing it!
451 but they are so resistant. Most complain they cannot understand the text, and this is with me reading it to them for 20 minutes a day and discussing it!
41Fourpawz2
Dang - the 3M company (or its equivalent) must looooove you! And I thought I got carried away. (By the way, reading your comments about The Scarlet Letter made me want to tackle it. Have had a serious aversion to Hawthorne since The House of the Seven Gables in high school.)
42ajm490
Yeah, I read Things Fall Apart as a sophomore. It's on this list, actually xD.
I'm in IB, so we have a lot of extra expectations of us to do well on books like these (or at least just understand them), however probably a third of my class complains about how difficult it is and a select few didn't even read it all. But as part of IB, we have a fairly defined reading list. It's sort of fun, though.
The Great Gatsby
Scarlet Letter
Crime and Punishment
Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Perfume
Hamlet
The Alchemist
No Exit or 1984
Poetry by Wordsworth and Plath
Select fiction by Achebe, Cisneros, Flannery O'Connor, and Joyce
I think it's a fair sampling--a lot better than what honors/AP/standard students get to read at our school. Then again, our IB exam consists of talking about 40 lines of randomly chosen text from one of these works into a recorder for 12 minutes, so it sort of evens out.
(This may be imposing, so disregard this if you need to) I have to start my Senior Exit this year, and the one thing I really love is books (which should be obvious since I'm here on LibraryThing). However, neither my teachers nor myself have been able to come up with a topic focused around that. I considered "The effect of Postmodern Literature on Youth in American Society" (shockingly, there's a lot of information on this), but I haven't been able to come up with any application of this basically theoretical idea for the product.
Have you heard of any students doing something literature related for their senior exit, and if so, could you explain a little about it? :3
I'm in IB, so we have a lot of extra expectations of us to do well on books like these (or at least just understand them), however probably a third of my class complains about how difficult it is and a select few didn't even read it all. But as part of IB, we have a fairly defined reading list. It's sort of fun, though.
The Great Gatsby
Scarlet Letter
Crime and Punishment
Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Perfume
Hamlet
The Alchemist
No Exit or 1984
Poetry by Wordsworth and Plath
Select fiction by Achebe, Cisneros, Flannery O'Connor, and Joyce
I think it's a fair sampling--a lot better than what honors/AP/standard students get to read at our school. Then again, our IB exam consists of talking about 40 lines of randomly chosen text from one of these works into a recorder for 12 minutes, so it sort of evens out.
(This may be imposing, so disregard this if you need to) I have to start my Senior Exit this year, and the one thing I really love is books (which should be obvious since I'm here on LibraryThing). However, neither my teachers nor myself have been able to come up with a topic focused around that. I considered "The effect of Postmodern Literature on Youth in American Society" (shockingly, there's a lot of information on this), but I haven't been able to come up with any application of this basically theoretical idea for the product.
Have you heard of any students doing something literature related for their senior exit, and if so, could you explain a little about it? :3
43ajm490
32. This Side of Paradise
It's good, really. I don't know, it's just so dated and feels temporal. I felt all the best elements were in the exposition, which seems indicative of a good idea more suited for a short story than a longer narrative. It's whatever.
33. Perfume
I had never heard of this book before it was assigned to me. It's creepy, it eerily pulls you in, and despite being horrible in what it promotes inadvertently, it's strangely fascinating. I don't know if it's well known or not, just that it's good. The language, the words: they're all so beautiful, but like a perfume it feels transitory and in the end as if it may never have existed at all. Despite that, the work is endearing. It was light fun regarding the story of a murderer.
strange.
It's good, really. I don't know, it's just so dated and feels temporal. I felt all the best elements were in the exposition, which seems indicative of a good idea more suited for a short story than a longer narrative. It's whatever.
33. Perfume
I had never heard of this book before it was assigned to me. It's creepy, it eerily pulls you in, and despite being horrible in what it promotes inadvertently, it's strangely fascinating. I don't know if it's well known or not, just that it's good. The language, the words: they're all so beautiful, but like a perfume it feels transitory and in the end as if it may never have existed at all. Despite that, the work is endearing. It was light fun regarding the story of a murderer.
strange.
45blackdogbooks
Really? That bad an impression of Matheson, huh?
46ajm490
yeah, it was like the voice of today's fanfiction writers interposed into the 1950s. I haven't read the short stories in the back of the book, which I hear are superior, but I can't really say till I read them. I Am Legend didn't give me much incentive to continue, though.
47ajm490
35. The Fountainhead
Wow, this was a really, really amazing book. There's kind of a vacuum effect surrounding this work--it says everything on its own and requires nothing else on the part of the reader: only acquiescence and change. In a lot of ways it contradicts everything I believe, and yet I still really, really appreciate it. It has a way of making the world feel inclusive in itself--and then once you're back in the real world, reality feels larger because of the push Rand has accomplished with her work.
I would say more on it now, except that I'm going to read Atlas Shrugged next, and a few criticisms, before I respond to Objectivism itself. What I will say is that I was terribly impressed by the way Rand romantically presented her philosophy. It wasn't a story on two levels--both were integral to each other--and while it is a very unemotional book as a whole, it is effusively romantic.
Rand's writing is wonderful. It says exactly what it means without ornament, which makes the "excessive" length of her writing even more astounding. My only flaw for the moment is in the way that she has to reverse /everything/. I don't mean simply that she choose to say selfishness is the new selflessness--although it all stems from that one point. Rand actually turns everything on its head when it really isn't necessary. It seems Atlas Shrugged will be no different. My back cover says "You will discover why a productive genius becomes a worthless playboy, why a great steel industrialist is working for his own destruction, why a composer gives up his career on the night of his triumph." All of the revelatory ideas that flip the perceived on its head are entertaining (before they become formulaic), but in the end, might they all just be for shock value?
In any case, I find Rand to be an amazing writer and thinker, but I'm not sure if I agree with her. We'll see--I'll giver her 1000some pages more to convince me.
Wow, this was a really, really amazing book. There's kind of a vacuum effect surrounding this work--it says everything on its own and requires nothing else on the part of the reader: only acquiescence and change. In a lot of ways it contradicts everything I believe, and yet I still really, really appreciate it. It has a way of making the world feel inclusive in itself--and then once you're back in the real world, reality feels larger because of the push Rand has accomplished with her work.
I would say more on it now, except that I'm going to read Atlas Shrugged next, and a few criticisms, before I respond to Objectivism itself. What I will say is that I was terribly impressed by the way Rand romantically presented her philosophy. It wasn't a story on two levels--both were integral to each other--and while it is a very unemotional book as a whole, it is effusively romantic.
Rand's writing is wonderful. It says exactly what it means without ornament, which makes the "excessive" length of her writing even more astounding. My only flaw for the moment is in the way that she has to reverse /everything/. I don't mean simply that she choose to say selfishness is the new selflessness--although it all stems from that one point. Rand actually turns everything on its head when it really isn't necessary. It seems Atlas Shrugged will be no different. My back cover says "You will discover why a productive genius becomes a worthless playboy, why a great steel industrialist is working for his own destruction, why a composer gives up his career on the night of his triumph." All of the revelatory ideas that flip the perceived on its head are entertaining (before they become formulaic), but in the end, might they all just be for shock value?
In any case, I find Rand to be an amazing writer and thinker, but I'm not sure if I agree with her. We'll see--I'll giver her 1000some pages more to convince me.
48Whisper1
Atlas Shrugged is my husband's favorite book. Honestly, there are times when I grow weary of his repetitive comments about the wisdom of this book. This was true, especially during the recent election here in the US....over and over and over he would reference this book as a brilliant commentary on the failure of the "system."
51TheTortoise
> 50. No one is a failure on the 75ers thread. Read and enjoy is our motto, the numbers are extra.
See you on the 2009 thread.
- TT
See you on the 2009 thread.
- TT
53BookAngel_a
I definitely think you focus on quality when you read. You really let the books sink into your mind. I think that is admirable.
