your appreciation of my rack is exceeded only by joshua's. your comments are (like my rack) buoying.
i'm liking the austen. i skipped sense and sensibility because i knew from the movies that the plots were a bit too similar for a direct follow-up, but i really liked pride and prejudice--i laughed, i cried, you know. it was entertaining! exploits! drama! misread manners! i don't know. mansfield park, which i just finished, was entertaining in turns, as well, but definitely a more seriously mannered novel than pride and prejudice. it had a much calmer center in the main character, more principled and thoughtful and slow to fire than, say, eliza bennett. it was a little more slow-going at first, mostly because you're not thrust directly into a mad dash search for husbands--the connections that are made are shaded, the connections hanging in the prospect are equally grey. the focus on missteps of manners is more lingering, the judgment less swaying throughout the story, but the characters for the most part are lovable, and the ones i didn't love, i loved to steam over. all in all, a pretty good book. they're the only two i've read, though.
i'm not sure how up to date your goodreads is. what have you been reading lately?
thanks millions for the "plots were a bit too similar.." because when i say that people either act like i'm an idiot or ignore it, & i'm there like, plz engage in dialogue w/ me world! i am asking something of you! promise i'm not just being a bitch! (refrain 4 lyf!) anyway i heard mansfield was way better so i'll have to hit that sometime. i dig subtlety, i am into development & a slowness to my fire.
i've been trying to use goodreads when i am ready to SAY THINGS about what i'm reading, so of course even some really amazing things don't end up there; jessicahallock.livejournal.com is pretty safe as i update that more. spent weeks working through simone weil's waiting for god, which, after some initial scoffing at a few more ridiculous lines, may be um - one of the most important books i've ever read?, esp. as far as its comprehension in tying together views (for me anyway?) on eastern philosophy, intellectual integrity, the goal of being, work towards the good. this 150 pgs has been taking me SO LONG, m, just plowing steady through, so slowly, w/ a great deal of repitition, w/ an entering, like a prayer. also a slim volume fourteen poems by oscar venceslas lubicz-milosz (randomly found in philly - you heard of this dude?) which should remind me of baudelaire but makes me think more of rilke (both good of course but i prefer what it's turning me towards to what it academically should). it's bangin, i'll probably have excerpts up soon.
the arundhati roy was good too but her nonfic? (as oposed to her fiction which i think engages story in a way that really just saves / kills / immortalizes / whatever great thing!) to me feels mostly the same. like, i dig it, but okay we already had this talk. same w/ vandana shiva. not to say it isn't a vital & important & inspiring talk! but we just had it, so i have trouble remembering the works as separate entities, trouble FEELING WAYS about their worth as works. maybe just the nature of collected essays cuz i think this happens w/ zinn & chomsky compilations too, maybe just the nature of accumulated knowledge re: specific problems? should stop expecting endless swigs of epiphany from a well meant to inspire action. revolution @ the computer desk much?
but i mean i think the thing is? & this specific to what roy's nonfic does - our crew, i think i can say, knows where shit stands. we know where our battles stand. we know corporate globalization is fucked & empire is ruthless. i don't think we need propaganda to that effect, or rallying cries. i think we need help, blueprints, something. i don't want my poems about battle so much as i want poems that battle, that are battle. & i appreciate the lessons but i don't know what they leave me. i don't feel good about reading the news or measuring the depth of the hole, anymore. so like if it's activism yr presenting well then let's see ladders.
i'm liking the austen. i skipped sense and sensibility because i knew from the movies that the plots were a bit too similar for a direct follow-up, but i really liked pride and prejudice--i laughed, i cried, you know. it was entertaining! exploits! drama! misread manners! i don't know. mansfield park, which i just finished, was entertaining in turns, as well, but definitely a more seriously mannered novel than pride and prejudice. it had a much calmer center in the main character, more principled and thoughtful and slow to fire than, say, eliza bennett. it was a little more slow-going at first, mostly because you're not thrust directly into a mad dash search for husbands--the connections that are made are shaded, the connections hanging in the prospect are equally grey. the focus on missteps of manners is more lingering, the judgment less swaying throughout the story, but the characters for the most part are lovable, and the ones i didn't love, i loved to steam over. all in all, a pretty good book. they're the only two i've read, though.
i'm not sure how up to date your goodreads is. what have you been reading lately?
Reply
i've been trying to use goodreads when i am ready to SAY THINGS about what i'm reading, so of course even some really amazing things don't end up there; jessicahallock.livejournal.com is pretty safe as i update that more. spent weeks working through simone weil's waiting for god, which, after some initial scoffing at a few more ridiculous lines, may be um - one of the most important books i've ever read?, esp. as far as its comprehension in tying together views (for me anyway?) on eastern philosophy, intellectual integrity, the goal of being, work towards the good. this 150 pgs has been taking me SO LONG, m, just plowing steady through, so slowly, w/ a great deal of repitition, w/ an entering, like a prayer. also a slim volume fourteen poems by oscar venceslas lubicz-milosz (randomly found in philly - you heard of this dude?) which should remind me of baudelaire but makes me think more of rilke (both good of course but i prefer what it's turning me towards to what it academically should). it's bangin, i'll probably have excerpts up soon.
Reply
but i mean i think the thing is? & this specific to what roy's nonfic does - our crew, i think i can say, knows where shit stands. we know where our battles stand. we know corporate globalization is fucked & empire is ruthless. i don't think we need propaganda to that effect, or rallying cries. i think we need help, blueprints, something. i don't want my poems about battle so much as i want poems that battle, that are battle. & i appreciate the lessons but i don't know what they leave me. i don't feel good about reading the news or measuring the depth of the hole, anymore. so like if it's activism yr presenting well then let's see ladders.
Reply
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