Light, frolicking ride of a novel, playful, with a fantasy-esque twist. Yes, Virginia Woolf can be funny. But after the rich, rich A different Woolf--
Light, frolicking ride of a novel, playful, with a fantasy-esque twist. Yes, Virginia Woolf can be funny. But after the rich, rich experience of To the Lighthouse and The Waves, this book unfortunately pales in comparison—I almost put it down several times, but persisted just because it was written by Woolf—and I don't know if it's the nature of comedy and humor to be taken lightly, with less substance and meaning, than "serious" books, but despite its funny moments, I found it wanting. It wasn't boring—just okay. I wouldn't recommend this book as the first book by Virginia Woolf, as it gives the wrong impression of the author's other works. If you're a fan of Woolf, this might give you an entertaining—though not essential—insight into the wonderful author, so you might give it a try. ...more
It was good. I have to say it is a masterpiece, up there with The Waves, but more emotionally resonant, more absorbing. I didn't want it to end.Damn--
It was good. I have to say it is a masterpiece, up there with The Waves, but more emotionally resonant, more absorbing. I didn't want it to end. And all this time I'd avoided Woolf because she was known for incorporating stream of consciousness into her work—something I'd come to associate with the obscurity, dryness, and readerly annoyance of modernist literature (i.e. Joyce, Becket, and early Faulkner). But boy, she uses it in the service of the story, not just for the technique's sake. I thought she did a very fine job of it in Mrs. Dalloway, but here, she outdoes herself and makes it really, really work—one of those rare instances in literature when technique opens up a new vista, a new angle to approach the human condition and is used seamlessly, naturally as if the story HAD to be told in that exact way using that exact technique. The dinner scene in the first part alone is worth the money for its amazing portrayal of people's psychological dynamics (it's like seeing people's minds under a literary microscope). And then there are Lily's engrossing philosophical meditations ten years later. Barely any action or drama, but this is the kind of writing that makes it a complete non-issue (I almost want to say THAT'S NOT THE POINT). I really, really didn't want it to end. Definitely worth a reread and definitely will more books by her....more
Dense, intense, and hypnotic, just like listening to waves--
This is in a league of its own. Mrs. Dolloway was good, but this was really something elseDense, intense, and hypnotic, just like listening to waves--
This is in a league of its own. Mrs. Dolloway was good, but this was really something else. There is no plot, just six characters engaged in intensely lyrical soliloquies that are reminiscent of, for some reason, Richard III's "Now is the winter of our discontent..." in rhythm and cadence. I don't know why, but it still works. I don't think I understood everything—that calls for a reread—but I savored almost every word, every echo (for phrases and images recur, creating a wavelike rhythm), every character's thoughts and feelings. Even the short italicized interludes describing the sun and landscape were quite good (though less gripping than the soliloquies). It wasn't a fast read by any means—it should be read slowly, like a rich, rich dessert—but there was a hypnotic quality to the prose/poetry, and so once I began reading, it was hard to put the book down, hard to pull away from it. It was a strange reading experience.
Highly, highly recommended for anyone who loves the slow, hypnotic burn of introspection and poetry.
I learned about this book from one of John Gray's wonderful books, and so I stuck to it even when the first 140 pages out of the 239 pages are prMeh--
I learned about this book from one of John Gray's wonderful books, and so I stuck to it even when the first 140 pages out of the 239 pages are pretty dull—in fact, dull enough to put you to quarter (not full! or even half!) asleep. Narratively, it's structured so clumsily (to me at least) that I question the importance and necessity of the first 4 chapters that take place in Maidenbridge (which is not where the story takes place) as well as the LONG exposition that is the conversation between Mr. Weston and his companion, Michael that 1) makes unnecessarily overt hints at Mr. Weston's real nature (God) and introduces each and every character of Folly Down. And though characterization is quite good and funny, it's not good enough to carry the story on its own, and I really had a hard time getting into the story. That's partly because there's no real protagonist (apart from Mr. Weston, but then he's just one of the characters imo) and the story focuses on a lot of characters one by one without much narrative thrust so the effect is, well, you really don't care much about any of the characters (though I did like poor Luke Bird and Reverend Grove by the end). The story REALLY begins when Mr. Weston enters the inn on page 112 (Chapter 20), and it picks up a little bit and plateaus for a while and sort of ends with a whimper.
The conceit of the book is really interesting—a(n anti-) Christian allegory that is also a farce—but the execution at the story level wasn't there for me at all (though I have to admit that at the sentence and paragraph levels, he is a deceptively simple writer who is really good at quick and dirty characterization).
How do you write rococo poetry? How can you use abstractions and big, syllable-sucking words and make them sensual? Look no further than SImpressive--
How do you write rococo poetry? How can you use abstractions and big, syllable-sucking words and make them sensual? Look no further than Stevens—he taught me how that can be done with panache.
To be honest, I was expecting more along the lines of the hyper-allusive-and-hence-elusive modernist poetry of, say, T.S. Eliot or Ezra Pound in their most fuck-the-readers moments, but I was fortunately proven wrong. Wallace Stevens writes pulsing poetry with rich abstractions, concrete imagery, and philosophical depth—a combination I have rarely encountered elsewhere.
What I most appreciate about Stevens is—to use his own word—his poetry's "gaudiness," which to me is interweaving concrete details with sexy abstractions and big, ugly Latinate words. One gorgeous e.g.:
The plum survives its poems. It may hang In the sunshine placidly, colored by ground Obliquities of those who pass beneath, Harlequined and mazily dewed and mauved In bloom. Yet it survives in its own form, Beyond these changes, good, fat, guzzly fruit. (from "The Comedian as the Letter C")
He uses those big words like flourishes, as in rococo furniture, and somehow makes them look/feel/sound sensual, which is no easy feat to say the least.
Another thing I loved about Stevens is his contemplative streak, which satisfied that part of me that loves complexity by showing how you can go beyond the sparse, albeit pretty, imagery-rich poetry pioneered by Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams (and still practiced today). And so in his famous "Sunday Morning," for example, he pronounces ā la Keats, "Death is the mother of beauty" while criticizing, à la Nietzsche, religion in favor of earthly existence and manages to stay grounded in imagery and sensual phrases ALL IN BLANK VERSE (unrhymed iambic pentameter). There were so many lines I underlined and put double check marks next to that I decided to just go ahead and memorize the whole damn thing (and I did). Take Stanza V, which is fairly representative of what I'm talking about:
She says, "But in contentment I still feel The need of some imperishable bliss." Death is the mother of beauty; hence from her, Alone, shall come fulfillment to our dreams And our desires. Although she strews leaves Of sure obliteration in our paths, The path sick sorrow took, the many paths Where triumph rang its brassy phrase, or love Whispered a little out of tenderness, She makes the willows shiver in the sun For maidens who were wont to sit and gaze Upon the grass, relinquished to their feet. She causes boys to pile new plums and pears On disregarded plate. And maidens taste And stray impassioned in the littering leaves.
Granted, not all his poems are accessible and I don't claim to have understood all of them, but they still offer enough rococo/sensual experience at the lexicographic, auditory, rhythmic, and imagistic levels that I really don't mind if the meaning escapes me, really. I'm actually having more trouble with Emily Dickinson's mysterious poems. Perhaps her poetry is more elusive, or maybe Stevens's poetry really resonated with me. Either way, I'll be reading more of Stevens (and in fact I am, in tandem with Dickinson).
More like 3.5 (between "I liked it" and "I really liked it")--
The thing that amazes me about this novella/longish short story is the smoothness of theMore like 3.5 (between "I liked it" and "I really liked it")--
The thing that amazes me about this novella/longish short story is the smoothness of the prose I can characterize only as "mellifluous." It's nothing flowery, but Joyce the author achieves complete invisibility from the world he creates--which is what authors should strive to do. The rhythm, the word choice, and everything mesh into one natural flow, which, I suppose, is the best instrument for the purpose of the story: natural description.
Learned a lot about the craft I didn't catch the first time I read more than three years ago.
I have a mixed feeling about Eliot's poems. I found his Prufrock impenetrable, The Wasteland annoying, frustrating, and mostly incoDon't really know--
I have a mixed feeling about Eliot's poems. I found his Prufrock impenetrable, The Wasteland annoying, frustrating, and mostly incomprehensible, Ash Wednesday somewhat interesting in parts but too heavily religious. His The Hollow Men, however, resonated with me in all its haunting and chilling overtones. Ariel Poems, Minor Poems, Unfinished Poems were all meh (and can anyone explain to me what the hell's going on in his eerily Beckett-esque Sweeney's Agonistes?!?!?). Four Quartets was quite interesting in its own light, but I wasn't exactly sure what he was trying to say or describe. I did underline some particularly good lines from it, though:
"Footfalls echo in the memory / Down the passage which we did not take / Towards the door we never opened / Into the rose-garden. My words echo / Thus, in your mind" ("Burnt Norton," I)
"Words, after speech, reach / Into the silence..." ("Burnt Norton," V)
"What we call the beginning is often the end / And to make an end is to make a beginning. / The end is where we start from" ("Little Gidding," V)
Overall, I probably have to spend more time absorbing them. A lot of things do get lost on the first read and it is in the slower second read that we can hope to gain a deeper understanding. Poetry is different from fiction, and I'm still an amateur reader of the verse.
The "Occasional Verse" section had some cool, charming poems, and let me quote a section from it:
"The enduring is not a substitute for the transient. /Neither one for the other. But the abstract conception / Of private experience at its greatest intensity / Becoming universal, which we call 'poetry', / May be affirmed in verse" ("A Note on War Poetry").
Overall, Eliot's poems taught me how important it is to spend time with each poem and how difficult is to read poetry in general. It seems the reader is looking for poems that best describe their "private experience at its greatest intensity," which means the reader blatantly reads meaning into the text (who doesn't?). To the extent that I came away with a poem I liked (The Hollow Men), I'd say the reading was fruitful....more
Calvino's (translated)writing is awesome. I was mesmerized especially by the first chapter of this charming one-of-a-kind boDelightful & Sassy (3.5)--
Calvino's (translated)writing is awesome. I was mesmerized especially by the first chapter of this charming one-of-a-kind book that bends all the holy rules of story-telling and performs not just one but TEN sacriligous acts of supreme reader annoyance by introducing the beginnings of ten novels(or 11, counting the first paragraph of yet another novel formed by the titles of the ten novels)only to cut them short precisely when things pick up and the desire to read on becomes intense.
And the ending. Hats off to Calvino for a good, neat ending. Somewhere in the course of the history of literature, writers began neglecting the ending, especially the modernists and post-modernists, and I very much appreciate good endings like any other reader, and Calvino pulls it off like the wizard he is billed to be.
Unfortunately, though, I wasn't a fan of many of the incipits. Although they are all wildly varied and promise good stories beyond themselves, that's precisely the reason I had a hard time sustaining my focus. The concept is really cool, and I enjoyed the whole second person perspective, too. As a story, it was pretty entertaining. But the upshot of it all is that I wasn't as engaged throughout as I would have liked to be because of the inherent annoyance it provoked by the interupptions. I'd say the book is as entertaining as it could get with the structure it has. In a sense, the concept it realizes (i.e. about reading) is pretty much FULLY realized - i.e. it can't get any better than that. In other words, Calvino makes the best of his material.(David Mitchell took the structure and invented a whole new book (The Cloud Atlas), but he left out Calvino's central concept about the reader and the experience of reading, so although Mitchell's book is more entertaining, it doesn't really outdo If on a Winter's Night a Traveler since it's not about the experience of reading).
Overall, it was a good read. I enjoyed his writing, some of the incipits, and the ending....more
Full of interesting philosophical concepts applied to a story, but it felt like the book was a pale, and at times even cheap, imitation of Dostoevsky,Full of interesting philosophical concepts applied to a story, but it felt like the book was a pale, and at times even cheap, imitation of Dostoevsky, trying to weave the philosophical into the raconteurial.
The book begins with Nietzsche's concept of eternal recurrence and ends (kind of) with his fateful day in 1898 when he went around the bend, and being a fanatic Nietzsche fan, I did like the full range of Nietzschean ideas at work in the novel. As a novel, unfortunately,it presented a rather boring and bland story. I seriously didn't care about the characters, and the story was not really engaging, except the last part about the dog Karenin - which was moving to say the least - and that was the only saving grace about the story aspect of the novel.
Writing - or the translation of it - I thought was very good, especially when he launches into philosophical ruminations. But as the novel should be more about the story than style or concepts embedded in it - although they are in themselves important (e.g.,Joyce's Ulysses) - it gets the rating it gets....more
The first time I read this was when I was in middle school, when I was struggling to learn English. I had a totally different image of the stIt's OK--
The first time I read this was when I was in middle school, when I was struggling to learn English. I had a totally different image of the story and it was a surprise.
In sum, Book I was really good, Book II fell short and was plain boring with nothing much happening but fishing and talking, and Book III was OK, with a long, slow section followed by a bit of action.
I wasn't really impressed by Hemingway's writing style that supposedly combines startling imagery using conjunctions (or pretentiously, polysyndeton) and gives off an air of "biblical grandeur." Maybe I was too busy and distracted to notice it, but I didn't see it or feel it. His attempts at describing emotions "scientifically" I think failed spectacularly, but then I haven't dissected the novel with a literary scalpel, so I might be dead wrong.
In my opinion, though, his The Old Man and the Sea is FAR better than this jejune and overly celebrated book.
I haven't read Hemingway since high school when his The Sun Also Rises was a required reading. At that time I thought it was boringSolid story (3.5)--
I haven't read Hemingway since high school when his The Sun Also Rises was a required reading. At that time I thought it was boring. Also at that time I was a hardcore math/science person and had little interest in the world of letters.
So I picked up For Whom the Bell Tolls because I heard so much about it.
In a nutshell, a good story told in simple, stoic prose with awesome portrayal of human consciousness. I thought, however, the whole anachronistic medievalism in translating Spanish was clunky and unnecessary. Also, many of the stream-of-consciousness sections were slow, somewhat irrelevant to the story, and not as effective in depicting the characters in that what they thought didn't necessarily show their character, which is a waste of writing space in my opinion because everything should be there for a purpose.
One last problem I had with the story was that I couldn't really identify with the characters all that much. I didn't find the protagonist all that fascinating or deserving of sympathy. The most interesting of all the cast was probably Pilar, with her stormy personality that is at the same time possessive, loving, scolding, rebellious, caring, impudent, strong, sensitive, and independent. Pablo was also interesting, but not as much as Pilar. After reading it, I didn't feel like I knew Robert Jordan well.
But overall, it was a good read packed with actions, thoughts, and emotions....more
As you might very well know,this novella consists of 127 pages in large print with what looks like 1.5 spacing. Sad to say,Sheer Force of Simplicity--
As you might very well know,this novella consists of 127 pages in large print with what looks like 1.5 spacing. Sad to say, I've never read the book and was skeptical. I mean, how good a story would an old man and a fish possibly make? The subject matter seemed utterly boring and the prospect of a good story almost nil.
But boy was I wrong.
The beginning is slow, but as soon as the old man hooks the marlin, the story gathers speed and by the time he catches it, you REALLY REALLY want him to go back in one piece with the large marlin he's ever seen, and whenever that damn shark takes a bite off that marlin, you get REALLY REALLY pissed off.
This, in other words, is the art of making the reader identify with the character at its BEST. And what simplicity of prose and story. One old man against one giant fish and a pack of sharks!
It's amazing how Hemingway can make me care about the old man SO MUCH that I was there with him in everything he did, cheering for him and sympathizing with him. And that in so little space and so simple a story.
I don't care what critics say, but I haven't read anything that comes this close to the perfect story as this one.
And the simplicity of it all; I was floored. ...more
Having read three major works by Faulkner, I never thought Faulkner's prose to be THAT long and convoluted until I read this one. The seA Tough Read--
Having read three major works by Faulkner, I never thought Faulkner's prose to be THAT long and convoluted until I read this one. The sentences go on and on, sometimes for half a page, sometimes for an entire page, strung together with clause after clause, requiring the reader to really focus and remember what the subject of the enormous sentence is, though retaining and figuring out what all the clauses are referring to is often times hard to determine as you get lost in that meandering prose that keeps burgeoning like this, sometimes ignoring grammar altogether, sometimes even omitting commas when listing euphuistic obscure poetic little adjectives, punctuated with long parenthetical asides (kind of like this, making it hard to follow the gist of the sentence and causing momentary amnesia whereby the subject of the sentence you tried so hard to retain throughout the long serpentine sentences is almost completely obliterated, sometimes made more complex by an insertion of another parenthetical aside inside of it (like this, you see?) compelling you to go ALL THE WAY back to the beginning and skip the asides altogether and re-read the entire damn thing again to wholly understand what the hell it's saying), the inexplicable semi-colon followed by a dash -- the dash long and imposing, confusing and unnecessary, enclosing more clause after clause in this fashion, severing the subject from everything else that is relevant and instrumental in understanding the sentence as a whole;-- the dash further elongating and compounding the sentence, and all those "not only...but" constructions that are sometimes embedded in or juxtaposed with a negative clause, making it outright ANNOYING (here it is, just CHECK this out) not because they are unpoetic (it can be at times) or stylistically uninteresting (because sometimes - just sometimes - it is) but not only because they are unnecessary and time-consuming to read but because they are just damn confusing!
So if you made it this far in my review and took the time to understand what I said above, you should be able to handle Absalom, Absalom!. Or maybe not. Though there are ups and downs, the entire book is written in this convoluted style. So know what you're getting yourself into before tackling this difficult work.
The story, on the other hand, is interesting. Though 90% of it is really telling and not showing at all, it's generally interesting enough to impel you through the dense, clattered prose and understand the story of a mysterious and impeccable man bent on building a dynasty of his own. In a nutshell, it's a good Shakespearian tragedy (the son destroying the dynasty) with a good Southern twist (in particular, racism).
Overall, despite my parody of his style, I did enjoy the unique experience of reading Faulkner at his most convoluted. An interesting (yet hard) read....more
The longest yet the easiest to read of the three Faulkner books chosen by Oprah for herPretty Darn Good--
This is probably my favorite Faulkner by far.
The longest yet the easiest to read of the three Faulkner books chosen by Oprah for her book club, Light in August is more of a traditional novel with an engaging plot that is both rich and complex, and multidimensional characters who are incredibly alive and real. Unlike in As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury, however, Faulkner uses a minimum of stream of consciousness, making it much easier to read and understand what's going on. And like other two novels, it's got multiple POVs that reveal without causing any confusion the characters themselves and the unfolding of the main story.
And GOSH he can write. Granted, his prose is serpentine and elaborate; but MY HE CAN WRITE. At many places I was simply dazzled not only by the sheer lyricism of it but by the mastery with which he portrayed the tense scenes and the myriad characters - even and especially the minor ones. That is something only true masters can pull off. Hats off to the Nobel laureate!
In this slim volume (260 pages), Faulkner packs 15 POVs to tell a rather simple story of a pretty fucked-up fMy first Faulkner (difficult, but good)--
In this slim volume (260 pages), Faulkner packs 15 POVs to tell a rather simple story of a pretty fucked-up family journeying to a faraway town to bury the mother. The story is simple, but the kaleidoscopic telling makes it a toil to read through it. It's one of those books that makes you work and commands a second read.
I'm glad I finally read Faulkner because his prose, especially in Darl's chapters, is beautiful, almost enigmatic. Some of his descriptions, too, are poetic, unique, and fascinating.
Although there were some slow parts I had difficulty plowing through, As I Lay Dying in its narrative techniques, character portrayal, and menagerie of the tragic, the comic, the grotesque, and the absurd, is definitely worth the read.
My second Faulkner did not disappoint me or bore me out of my mind.
The story, at first utterly perplexing and inscGood (w/ my favorite new villain!)--
My second Faulkner did not disappoint me or bore me out of my mind.
The story, at first utterly perplexing and inscrutable, gets clearer and clearer as it progresses. The first section tells the story from the mentally impaired Benjy, and is WILDLY experimental in portraying a mind living in constant impressions and associations as the scene switches back and forth between present and past, sometimes without warning. Once you get the hang of how Faulkner shifts time, the section becomes quite readable.
The second section narrated by Quentin has striking similarities with Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in representing a young, intellectual mind filled with tortured thoughts and indelible memories of the past wandering around and going through a rather ordinary day.
The last two sections are really easy to read and clarify a lot of things that went unsaid but implied in the first two sections.
Here, let me just add that Jason Compson - satisfyingly evil, refreshingly active, and almost beyond-good-and-evil - is one of those villains that you come to like and admire as a villain, belonging to the same class of awesome and fascinating villains as Barabas, Shylock, and Iago. And why is this? In direct contrast to his tortured Hamlet of a brother, he is the only person in the family that does ANYTHING and gets things done. In fact, his section is PACKED with actions. He's always doing something, running around getting things done, and to accomplish what he sets out to do, he does not scrupulously choose his means. His obsession with money goes beyond petty morality, and he gets what he wants. For that, you can't stop admiring him. Definitely an excellent villain. Love it!
The great thing about this novel is that you get to know all those characters intimately and identify with them. Maybe I'm in the minority to like Jason Compson the Awesome Villain who is inexplicably (and satisfyingly) cruel but who actually gets things done, and hate his effeminate and overly intellectual brother Quentin for his cowardice and grousing and inability to do jackshit. The point is that though the book is hard to get through especially in the beginning, it's a book that gets you acquainted with its diverse array of characters like they are actually alive.
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