... And it occurs to me that so far I have not been as productive with my free time as perhaps I should've been. It is a vacation, after all, but I am starting to feel like a bum. Perhaps I should review some of my writings - it's been awhile since I've written anything and I still have numerous projects waiting to be completed. I promised I'd straighten the house some when I get the chance... it'll happen eventually. I have spent my time watching a few movies, finishing The Dispossessed, starting Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, and sitting around on my couch. I have also been working on memorizing lines for my next show which will start rehearsals in January.
Oh, and we bought a car! We finally bit the bullet and traded in Sara's clunker, and purchased a used KIA Rio5. It's a sporty little blue number and so far we really enjoy it. We'll see how we feel once the payments start, but I will no longer worry, every time the phone rings, that Sara is calling me from the side of the road, stranded as her car is engulfed in flames. A little peace of minds is nice.
Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Sunday, November 14, 2010
I Can't Do It!
A few years back I finally read Moby Dick. (Here's what I thought about it!) It took me 5 attempts to get through the book! I know it's a classic and everything but Melville is boring! You don't even see the whale until page 576!
I've recently tried to get into Melville's The Confidence Man. I can't do it! His writing is too... I don't know what! It's hard to follow, he writes run on sentences, and then compounds them with too much detail! I explained it to Sara that I feel as if I am reading a foreign language half the time. I'll read a page and then realize I have no idea what has happened.
Here's an example:
"As among Chaucer's Canterbury pilgrims, or those oriental ones crossing the Red Sea towards Mecca in the festival month, there was no lack of variety. Natives of all sorts, and foreigners; men of business and men of pleasure; parlor men and backwoodsmen; farm-hunters and fame-hunters; heiress-hunters, gold-hunters, buffalo-hunters, bee-hunters, happiness-hunters, truth-hunters, and still keener hunters after all these hunters. Fine ladies in slippers, and moccasined squaws; Northern speculators and Eastern philosophers; English, Irish, German, Scotch, Danes; Santa Fé traders in striped blankets, and Broadway bucks in cravats of cloth of gold; fine-looking Kentucky boatmen, and Japanese-looking Mississippi cotton-planters; Quakers in full drab, and United States soldiers in full regimentals; slaves, black, mulatto, quadroon; modish young Spanish Creoles, and old-fashioned French Jews; Mormons and Papists Dives and Lazarus; jesters and mourners, teetotalers and convivialists, deacons and blacklegs; hard-shell Baptists and clay-eaters; grinning negroes, and Sioux chiefs solemn as high-priests. In short, a piebald parliament, an Anacharsis Cloots congress of all kinds of that multiform pilgrim species, man."
Actually, the above paragraph, from Chapter 2, was one of the passages I enjoyed from the less than 5 chapters I read before throwing in the towel. I don't know if I'll feel the need to come back and try again later, but for now I'm saying no to this classic. Melville is not my friend!
I've recently tried to get into Melville's The Confidence Man. I can't do it! His writing is too... I don't know what! It's hard to follow, he writes run on sentences, and then compounds them with too much detail! I explained it to Sara that I feel as if I am reading a foreign language half the time. I'll read a page and then realize I have no idea what has happened.
Here's an example:
"As among Chaucer's Canterbury pilgrims, or those oriental ones crossing the Red Sea towards Mecca in the festival month, there was no lack of variety. Natives of all sorts, and foreigners; men of business and men of pleasure; parlor men and backwoodsmen; farm-hunters and fame-hunters; heiress-hunters, gold-hunters, buffalo-hunters, bee-hunters, happiness-hunters, truth-hunters, and still keener hunters after all these hunters. Fine ladies in slippers, and moccasined squaws; Northern speculators and Eastern philosophers; English, Irish, German, Scotch, Danes; Santa Fé traders in striped blankets, and Broadway bucks in cravats of cloth of gold; fine-looking Kentucky boatmen, and Japanese-looking Mississippi cotton-planters; Quakers in full drab, and United States soldiers in full regimentals; slaves, black, mulatto, quadroon; modish young Spanish Creoles, and old-fashioned French Jews; Mormons and Papists Dives and Lazarus; jesters and mourners, teetotalers and convivialists, deacons and blacklegs; hard-shell Baptists and clay-eaters; grinning negroes, and Sioux chiefs solemn as high-priests. In short, a piebald parliament, an Anacharsis Cloots congress of all kinds of that multiform pilgrim species, man."
Actually, the above paragraph, from Chapter 2, was one of the passages I enjoyed from the less than 5 chapters I read before throwing in the towel. I don't know if I'll feel the need to come back and try again later, but for now I'm saying no to this classic. Melville is not my friend!
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