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Definitely not for meArchive for February, 2007
« Previous Entries Wednesday, February 28th, 2007Wordless Wednesday #4
British Library–London
To see more of Candida Höfer’s library shots, buy the book Libraries here.
View my other Wordless Wednesday library pics here.
Popularity: 4% [?]
Wednesday, February 28th, 2007Books Read in February 2007
7. The Birds by Aristophanes Rating: 2.5
8. The Black Pearl by Scott O’Dell Rating: 4.5
9. Silas Marner by George Eliot - Rating: 4.5
10. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert L. Stevenson - Rating: 5
11. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee - Rating: 5
12. Walking Across Egypt by Clyde Edgerton (bookclub pick)
13. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins Rating: 4.5
14. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad Rating: 5
Pages read in February: 1498
Pages read for 2007: 3420
Have you reviewed any of the above titles at your own blog? If you wish, enter them into Mr. Linky below.
Popularity: 5% [?]
Wednesday, February 28th, 2007Classics Challenge Completed!
Completed 2-28-07
1. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
2. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
3. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert L. Stevenson
4. Silas Marner by George Eliot
5. The Birds by Aristophanes
Popularity: 4% [?]
Wednesday, February 28th, 2007How Logical Are You?
You Are Incredibly Logical |
 Move over Spock - you’re the new master of logic You think rationally, clearly, and quickly. A seasoned problem solver, your mind is like a computer! |
Popularity: 4% [?]
Wednesday, February 28th, 2007Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
I will be reading more of Joseph Conrad’s work. English was his third language after Polish and French, and his writing is superb.
Heart of Darkness tells a story about colonialism in the Congo, but it is so much more than that. It is more about men’s ‘hearts of darkness’ and what they become after they leave ‘civilization’. Marlow is a steamship captain in search of Kurtz, who is one of the best ivory traders The Company has. It is said that Kurtz has become ill and The Company does not want to lose him because of his high productivity in obtaining ivory. But just how does Kurtz maintain his high productivity?
Kurtz isn’t the only one to leave his morals behind when he leaves ‘civilization’. The actions of The Company Men leave moral questions as well. Is it only the ladies, as Marlowe states, who try to uphold society’s mores, or are they just deluded in thinking society, left to itself, has any morals?
It’s queer how out of touch with truth women are. They live in a world of their own, and there had never been anything like it, and never can be. It is too beautiful altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset.
This book is short but very complex. It is one that I’ll definitely read again at some point to try to understand it a bit better. I’m still trying to figure out “The horror! The horror!”
Some interesting passages:
I let him run on, this papier-mache Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.No, I don’t like work. I had rather laze about and think of all the fine things that can be done. I don’t like work — no man does — but I like what is in the work — the chance to find yourself. Your own reality — for yourself, not for others — what no other man can ever know. They can only see the mere show, and never can tell what it really means.
The mind of man is capable of anything – because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future. What was there after all? Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valour, rage – who can tell? – but truth – truth stripped of its cloak of time. Let the fool gape and shudder – the man knows, and can look on without a wink.
I assure you to leave off reading was like tearing myself away from the shelter of an old and solid friendship.
The point was in his being a gifted creature, and that of all his gifts the one that stood out preeminently, that carried with it a sense of real presence, was his ability to talk, his words — the gift of expression, the bewildering, the illuminating, the most exalted and the most contemptible, the pulsating stream of light, or the deceitful flow from the heart of an impenetrable darkness.
When they are gone you must fall back upon your own innate strength, upon your own capacity for faithfulness. Of course you may be too much of a fool to go wrong — too dull even to know you are being assulted by the powers of darkness. I take it, no fool ever made a bargain for his soul with the devil; the fool is too much of a fool, or the devil too much of a devil — I don’t know which. Or you may be such a thunderingly exalted creature as to be altogether deaf and blind to anything but heavenly sights and sounds. Then the earth for you is only a standing place — and whether to be like this is your loss or your gain I won’t pretend to say. But most of us are neither one nor the other.
Whether he knew of his deficiency himself I can’t say. I think the knowledge came to him at last — only at the very last. But the wilderness had found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vegeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude — and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core….
But his soul was mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself, and, by heavens! I tell you, it had gone mad. I had — for my sins, I suppose — to go through the ordeal of looking into it myself. No eloquence could have been so withering to one’s belief in mankind as his final burst of sincerity. He struggled with himself, too. I saw it — I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a soul that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear, yet struggling blindly with itself.
1902, 80 pp.
Rating: 5
Popularity: 26% [?]
Sunday, February 25th, 2007New York Times Most Notable Fiction Challenge
You may read more about this challenge here.
I am totally nuts–insane, bonkers, crazy, etc. Why am I doing another challenge? Because I’m really enjoying the literary blogosphere. Because I’m “meeting” fellow bookaholics. Because I love to read. (And because a lot of the books were on my list, anyway!)
I am only reading 10. That’s wimpy compared to others, but that’s all I can do!!
Finished titles:
*The Echo Maker by Richard Powers
*The Road by Cormac McCarthy (to be reviewed after I re-read print version)
*Everyman by Philip Roth
*The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
*The Translator by Leila Aboulela
*Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
*Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
*Lisey’s Story by Stephen King
Last Evenings on Earth by Roberto Bolano
Suite Française by Irene Nemirovsky
Edit: I am adding some more possibilities. The ones with the asterix above are definites. I can still commit to only 10, but after doing some more research, the following titles are interesting as well:
Arthur and George by Julian Barnes
Intuition by Allegra Goodman
Black Swan Green by David Mitchell
The Dream Life of Sukhanov by Olga Grushin
The Inhabited World by David Long
Popularity: 4% [?]
Saturday, February 24th, 2007The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
This book took me a loooong time to read, but I’m really glad I read it. It is so well-written and a really good mystery. I did guess some of the plot elements, but I still was very engrossed and wanted to keep reading to make sure my guesses were correct.
The “woman in white” is Anne Catherick, who has escaped from an asylum and knows, or think she knows, a Secret about a nobleman. This nobleman wants to marry Laura Fairlie, but she is in love with her art instructor, Walter Hartwright. Marian Holcomb is Laura’s half-sister and is always looking out for Laura’s interests. The two are inseparable. Will Laura marry the nobleman–Percival Glyde–the man her father wanted her to marry? Or will she marry Walter Hartwright, the love of her life? Who is really after her money? Is Count Fosco just a charming foreigner or a “foreign spy”? Whose interests is he looking after? These questions and more will be answered when you embark on this wonderfully written gothic tale–a classic mystery that should be read by all.
1860, 569pp.
Rating: 4.5
Popularity: 14% [?]
Friday, February 23rd, 2007The voting process on American Idol stinks!
Antonella and Alaina should have been GONE. I wish that you voted people out instead of in. People end up voting for contestants they want to see one more week instead of voting for their favorites. Blech. I don’t think the girls who were voted out would have won, but they sure deserved to be there one more week, and Antonella and Alaina didn’t.
Comment brought over from other blog:
1 comments:
Lisa said…
I agree that antonella should be GONE. I was glad to see Paul go, but a little sad that Rudy is gone. I didn’t think he was the best, but certainly there were worse.
February 23, 2007 9:26 AM
Popularity: 4% [?]
Thursday, February 22nd, 2007Thursday Thirteen #4
Thirteen Pulitzers
12 to be read in 2007, and 1 that I read last year and loved.
1. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson Rating: 5/5
(Read in 2006)
—Pulitzer 2005
2. Alice Adams - Tarkington
—Pulitzer 1922
3. The Good Earth - Buck
—Pulitzer 1932
4. The Yearling - Rawlings
—Pulitzer 1939
5. A Death in the Family - Agee
—Pulitzer 1958
6. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee - Rating: 5/5
—Pulitzer 1961
7. Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner - Rating: 4/5
—Pulitzer 1972
8. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
—Pulitzer 1983
9. The Hours - Cunningham
—Pulitzer 1999
10. Interpreter of Maladies - Lahiri
—Pulitzer 2000
11. Empire Falls - Russo
—Pulitzer 2002
12. The Known World - Jones
—Pulitzer 2004
13. March - Brooks
—Pulitzer 2006
To see any of my reviews, go to http://3mreviews.blogspot.com.
To view more Thursday Thirteens, go to http://www.thursdaythirteen.com
Comments brought over from other blog:
5 comments:
Raggedy said…
Thursday Thirteen has come to an end.I have enjoyed my visits here and consider us friends.Thank you for sharing your thirteens with me.The comments you left me filled me with glee.It is hard to believe it is really true.I am trying very hard to not be blue.Happy TT’ing!*^_^(=’:'=) (”)_ (”)Š Raggedy
February 22, 2007 12:40 AM
Kimo & Sabi said…
Is there any Pulitzer books about cats?
February 22, 2007 1:57 AM
Karianne said…
#3 is one of my favorite books of all time. I hope that you enjoy it!
February 22, 2007 6:09 AM
Lisa said…
I love your lists, so sad to see TT going away. I’m adding you to my google reader tho!I can’t believe you’ve read so many on the TBR Challenge already. I’ve read ONE. Better get on that!
February 22, 2007 12:17 PM
Les said…
Now what are the odds that we’d both post this Pulitzer list today?! Insert Twilight Zone music! You have a lot of the same titles on your list as I have on mine.
February 22, 2007 10:31 PM
Popularity: 4% [?]
Wednesday, February 21st, 2007Wordless Wednesday #3
Rio de Janeiro
Comments brought over from other blog:
Rav`N said…
such a gorgeous library. like this one, many other in that bookk are a wonder in themselves, nevermind the books they hold.
February 20, 2007 7:35 PM
Wow! Fantastic! That a library? So huge.Mine is up too.
February 20, 2007 8:49 PM
How awesome is that! I love books and would love to go to a library like that!
February 20, 2007 10:47 PM
What a great picture!There is so much to read.Happy WWMine is posted
February 21, 2007 1:43 AM
So impressing, I’m speechless. And what’s more intelligent than posting a photo from a library at WW?Outstanding:)))
February 21, 2007 5:19 AM
Popularity: 8% [?]
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