What Are You Reading

[Corto]

I just started The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat. Sucked me right it. It's already augmenting the (spectacular) movie. Great sea story.

 

["Skeet" McD]

Skeet, thanks for the link! This is the first time I've read any of Joyce's work, and I'm starting to think I may be in a little over my head. :eusa_doh:

Dear Lamplight...don't worry: we're ALL in over our heads. Joyce was enough of a B-st-rd to enjoy dropping a few red herrings in, just (as he's on record as saying) to keep 'em busy for the next hundred years....

But, seriously: the intellectual ammunition almost required to read Joyce and understand what you're reading is a fairly good knowledge of the history of Ireland and a fairly good knowledge of Catholic belief and (pre-Vatican II) practice. Having these (or access to a good set of notes that will fill you in) gets you most of the way there. General knowledge of the ways and thoughts of the late 19-early 20C is also nice.

But, if you just hang in there--luckily, it works the other way, too (if you keep your eyes and brain open): Joyce was consciously trying to set in amber the world he grew up in...and did so at an almost photographic level. You'll know an awful lot more about these things when you finish PORTRAIT than you did starting out, I'll bet. And then....on to ULYSSES (which follows Stephen/Joyce's doings on one day, about 6 months after PORTRAIT closes).

An early warning: if I had a nickel for every copy of ULYSSES with a bookmark stuck a page or two into the 3rd chapter, I'd be a rich man. PORTRAIT is a pretty straight-forward, linear tale. So is ULYSSES (mostly... ); there are only two chapters that are...frankly incomprehensible to almost everyone. Joyce made a tactical mistake in making one of those....the third chapter (the other, known as "Oxen of the Sun" occurs much, much later in the book). The point is....it's SUPPOSED to be incomprehensible. This is the first look inside Stephen's/Joyce's mind...and the whole issue is..Stephen thinks too much. All that really happens in that chapter is that Stephen walks along the seashore and sees a few things....cockle pickers; a dog; a ship, etc. The rest is what his WAY too busy, WAY too educated mind makes of this rather meagre stimulation.

Just forge on....read it like poetry. Things go back to being normal a few pages later

While I'm anything but a serious Joycean...feel free to PM me if I can be of any help or consolation to you along the way...

 

["Skeet" McD]

I have it on good authority that THE CRUEL SEA has an error in it...

I just started The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat. Sucked me right it. It's already augmenting the (spectacular) movie. Great sea story.

Boy, ain't it, just: I've never read the book, but you're making me want to (frankly, didn't even realize it had been a book before the film).

I was lucky enough back in the mid-80s to be in London when the film was on a one-night showing at the Museum of the City of London. I had just happened to be there, saw it was on that night, and went back to see it (this was of course pre-DVD, pretty much pre-VHS, as far as I was concerned...you saw movies when you could!); I had also never seen it on the big screen.

Well, Yank that I am....I couldn't help but notice that the elderly gentlemen sitting behind me were taking a rather....professional interest in the doings onscreen.

When the film ended, I plucked up my courage, turned to them, and asked if they had, in fact, been on that service during the War? And, unsurprisingly, they had (God bless 'em). I commented that, to an outsider, the film had a real sense of being right on the money, historically....but, was that really true?

They looked at each other for a second; then both nodded and said it was absolutely the way it really was....(wait for it....) with one exception: these lads said the only error they could see was where someone comes in and asks whether anyone wants cocoa. "No one would EVER have said that....it was 'char.'"

And that was my close encounter with a couple of heros. If they could say that....I'm willing to take the film as a documentary. And a damn good one!:eusa_clap

 

[LynnLaBlanc]

Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald

As for nonfiction, I'm reading Reefer Madness:Sex, Drugs and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market by Eric Schlosser on and off. Its interesting and I reccomend it.

Also The Great Influenza by John M. Barry is really good for understanding the pandemic's cultural effects, though it does get a bit dry at times.

 

[miss_elise]

On the Road by Jack Kerouac

 

[Slate Shannon]

I just started The Lost City of Z by David Grann. Very interesting, so far.

 

["Skeet" McD]

I just started The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat. Sucked me right it. It's already augmenting the (spectacular) movie. Great sea story.

Dear Corto, well, you sucked ME right in....just ordered up a copy from Amazon and looking forward to reading it. Thanks for the tip!

"Skeet"

 

[Smithy]

I just started The Lost City of Z by David Grann. Very interesting, so far.

Funny, I just picked this up yesterday. Looks to be a fascinating read.

 

[Raging Hat On]

I've begun re-reading my collection of books by David Icke.

Right now, "The David Icke Guide To The Global Conspiracy(And How To End It)"

 

[DeeDub]

Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak.

It's slow starting, with many characters introduced at the beginning. I'm hanging in there, though. I'm curious to find out what could bring so many characters together. Got to be something revolutionary.

 

[carter]

The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling. A tale or two at bedtime with a cuppa tea.

 

[Darhling]

^ speaking of bedtime stories, I have downloaded a bunch of free e-books as podcasts and it is so relaxing to fall asleep to! The speaker has the most soothing voice and even though I might never make it through the book since it makes me fall asleep quickly, I love it to bits. The e-book is The winter of Frankie Machine.

 

[Ethan Bentley]

I've begun re-reading my collection of books by David Icke.

Right now, "The David Icke Guide To The Global Conspiracy(And How To End It)"

I've heard of this chap, he lives on the Isle of Wight, not far from me. He's the guy that thinks the Royal Family are reptiles, I think. Is he anything to do with John Rhodes?

I'm currently waiting for the biography of Sir Richard Burton to arrive.

 

[Feraud]

I'm currently waiting for the biography of Sir Richard Burton to arrive.

Which bio?

 

[Mike1939]

I just finished 'Hammett: A Life at the Edge' by William F. Nolan. It's a good read, I especially liked the chapters about the Pinkerton days and San Francisco in the 1920's. I walked away admiring Hammett the man as much as I do his writing.

 

[carebear]

Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak.

It's slow starting, with many characters introduced at the beginning. I'm hanging in there, though. I'm curious to find out what could bring so many characters together. Got to be something revolutionary.

He's here all week folks... Be sure to try the veal. :eusa_clap

 

[Ethan Bentley]

Which bio?

"Burton" can you recommend any others?

 

[Raging Hat On]

I've heard of this chap, he lives on the Isle of Wight, not far from me. He's the guy that thinks the Royal Family are reptiles, I think. Is he anything to do with John Rhodes?

I check Mr. Icke's website daily and have read almost all his works. To my knowledge, he's never linked himself with John Rhodes.

 

[Feraud]

"Burton" can you recommend any others?

You must mean Sir Richard Burton the actor. I was thinking of Sir Richard Francis Burton the explorer.

 

[StaceFace]

We - Yevgeny Zamyatin
Where the Wild Things Were: Life, Death, and Ecological Wreckage in a Land of Vanishing Predators - William Stolzenburg