Bookworm Post #2
I'm still here! Where are yoooou, and what have you been doing?
I've been working and eating and sleeping and showering and watching television (Sarah Connor Chronicles) and watching movies (Million Dollar Baby) and talking on the phone and wanting to respond to emails (I can't just shoot two sentences off and be satisfied. It always has to be an tome, and so I procrastinate.)
But I've been reading too! (Meaning: my LJ friendslist, and actual books) There is nothing quite like the indulgence of sitting with a novel and ignoring the voice-in-the-head that says "You should really be doing something else..."
(I am veryveryveryveryvery apprehensive about losing my eyesight as I become an elderly person. Audiobooks are not the same experience.)
Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso. When we first subscribed to Netflix, I had this nutty, impossible idea of watching movies in alphabetical order. I know, right?! But I love movies and there are so many that pique my interest. I couldn't decide! So I just shruggged, "Might as well start at the beginning..." Julie Andrews told me it's a very good place to start. :-)
Which led me to watch After the Harvest, a movie starring Sam Shepard and, uh, nobody else familiar. The plot synopsis promised "a dark drama about a dysfunctional Canadian prairie family coping with change." I was intrigued.
...and ultimately, bored. So bored that when I learned of the film being based on a novel, I thought, "Well, the book has to be better!" Surely, there was a reason someone wanted to make it into a movie in the first place.
Well, Wild Geese surpassed the drab film with flying colours! It was written in 1925, and that fact alone is normally enough to make me roll my eyes and yawn. I'm immediately transported to high school English class and university English class -- where I was instructed to analyze texts I (was forced to!) read. And always pressured by deadlines, of course.
Where is the enjoyment in that?! Ha!
It was such a pleasure to turn pages at my own pace. And what a story! Wild Geese tells of a specific family living on the Canadian praries. Ruled by a tyrannical man, his wife and children must submit to his every demand. All energies must be focused on the flourishing farmland. The children are not allowed to attend school or church or socialize with neighbours. Days are for hard labor and nothing more. The plot centers on the rebellious nature of eldest daughter Judith and her plan to escape the bleak surroundings.
(As is the case with many "classic" books, there was an afterword. And silly me, I read it. Only to discover the person who wrote the afterword interpreted the novel as being overtly sexual?! Jeez Louise. Maybe that's the standard when offering up "literary criticism.")
But read the book! It is good, yo.
I've been working and eating and sleeping and showering and watching television (Sarah Connor Chronicles) and watching movies (Million Dollar Baby) and talking on the phone and wanting to respond to emails (I can't just shoot two sentences off and be satisfied. It always has to be an tome, and so I procrastinate.)
But I've been reading too! (Meaning: my LJ friendslist, and actual books) There is nothing quite like the indulgence of sitting with a novel and ignoring the voice-in-the-head that says "You should really be doing something else..."
(I am veryveryveryveryvery apprehensive about losing my eyesight as I become an elderly person. Audiobooks are not the same experience.)
Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso. When we first subscribed to Netflix, I had this nutty, impossible idea of watching movies in alphabetical order. I know, right?! But I love movies and there are so many that pique my interest. I couldn't decide! So I just shruggged, "Might as well start at the beginning..." Julie Andrews told me it's a very good place to start. :-)
Which led me to watch After the Harvest, a movie starring Sam Shepard and, uh, nobody else familiar. The plot synopsis promised "a dark drama about a dysfunctional Canadian prairie family coping with change." I was intrigued.
...and ultimately, bored. So bored that when I learned of the film being based on a novel, I thought, "Well, the book has to be better!" Surely, there was a reason someone wanted to make it into a movie in the first place.
Well, Wild Geese surpassed the drab film with flying colours! It was written in 1925, and that fact alone is normally enough to make me roll my eyes and yawn. I'm immediately transported to high school English class and university English class -- where I was instructed to analyze texts I (was forced to!) read. And always pressured by deadlines, of course.
Where is the enjoyment in that?! Ha!
It was such a pleasure to turn pages at my own pace. And what a story! Wild Geese tells of a specific family living on the Canadian praries. Ruled by a tyrannical man, his wife and children must submit to his every demand. All energies must be focused on the flourishing farmland. The children are not allowed to attend school or church or socialize with neighbours. Days are for hard labor and nothing more. The plot centers on the rebellious nature of eldest daughter Judith and her plan to escape the bleak surroundings.
(As is the case with many "classic" books, there was an afterword. And silly me, I read it. Only to discover the person who wrote the afterword interpreted the novel as being overtly sexual?! Jeez Louise. Maybe that's the standard when offering up "literary criticism.")
But read the book! It is good, yo.