Only a few hours away from the end of the year now. Tough year for me, and I think for most people generally. Perhaps not the best year to start blogging about one's mundane reading habits, especially since it took this one so long to actually finish a book. And, truth be told, I only completed reading 24 books. Still, that was an improvement over the previous year, so I have made some headway. I started the year with A. S. Byatt's Possession and ended with Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, which makes me seem like some cozy Victoriana nerd, but the year also had some Philip K. Dick (A Scanner Darkly), David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas, and Justin Cronin's vampire apocalypse epic The Passage. I also read some Richard Yates, J. D. Salinger, and a lesser Dumas work. Jumping all around, as is my usual.
If all works out, my first book of 2011 will be Lev Grossman's The Magicians, and it seems to be a good read so far. I've managed to get about 60 pages in in roughly a day, so I am hoping to capitalize on that momentum. I have fond memories of the time when getting 100 pages from the end of a book meant that there is a good chance I would finish it that night, but that was in the carefree days before I had much internet access. And no podcasts, either, which tend to occupy my train rides.
So, what is the book-related resolution for my 2011? I could tackle one of the 1000+ page doorstops in my possession: Infinite Jest, A Suitable Boy, A Glastonbury Romance, or second stabs at War and Peace, and Les Miserables (actually, that would be third stabs, on both). Maybe I should just try to work in an extra book a month, and shoot for 36 over this year's 24. Maybe it should be page related-get a certain page count per day.
Maybe I should make decisions like this before I post...
Anyway, see you in 2011. It will be better than 2010, I know it will.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Saturday, December 11, 2010
The Seasonal Read-Fall Edition
The following was a post that actually began early in the month of October, before all hell broke loose. I decided to finish it belatedly to prove that I actually did have something planned, and also, hey, it was almost done, and deleting it didn't seem the thing. Maybe it will do some good here. Otherwise, consider it housecleaning.
For the longest time, I used to celebrate Halloween by reading a horror or suspense novel. I do have a few on my shelf that might fill the necessity, but I'm wondering if I am even into the holiday that much anymore. It does have the advantage of happening in the middle of my favorite season, but my real enthusiasm for the holiday has waned, I guess. I will probably take my son out for some trick or treating, since we are in a good neighborhood for it, but he's not that into it yet, doesn't really get the significance of it other than the candy, so my chances of living vicariously through him are a bit slight. Maybe someday, that will change, but not just yet.
The obvious impulse has always in the past been to read a horror novel, or dark fantasy. I remember going through a good portion of The Stories of Ray Bradbury when that collection was first published, and Stephen King, Dan Simmons, and Peter Straub books have filled the coveted Halloween slot in the past. I have a few stray books on the shelf that might fit, if I were to go that way this year, but the mojo isn't quite there as it once was.
I still will read a horror book on occasion. This summer, I read Justin Cronin's The Passage, mostly to see if a writer with 'literary cred" (U of Iowa Creative Writing Program, acclaimed mainstream work, shortlisted for PEN awards, stuff like that) could really add something to the genre, and the answer was, not really, at least in this case. It was entertaining enough, but it was just another genre fiction, neither better or worse than the average tale written by a journeyman horror writer. The insights were no deeper, the deaths no more poignant, the situations no more existential. Maybe the prose was slightly better than the norm, and maybe it was a bit more tasteful than the normal horror book, but then, taste is not necessarily a positive in the genre. It's rather like being the most polite wrestler.
For the longest time, I used to celebrate Halloween by reading a horror or suspense novel. I do have a few on my shelf that might fill the necessity, but I'm wondering if I am even into the holiday that much anymore. It does have the advantage of happening in the middle of my favorite season, but my real enthusiasm for the holiday has waned, I guess. I will probably take my son out for some trick or treating, since we are in a good neighborhood for it, but he's not that into it yet, doesn't really get the significance of it other than the candy, so my chances of living vicariously through him are a bit slight. Maybe someday, that will change, but not just yet.
The obvious impulse has always in the past been to read a horror novel, or dark fantasy. I remember going through a good portion of The Stories of Ray Bradbury when that collection was first published, and Stephen King, Dan Simmons, and Peter Straub books have filled the coveted Halloween slot in the past. I have a few stray books on the shelf that might fit, if I were to go that way this year, but the mojo isn't quite there as it once was.
I still will read a horror book on occasion. This summer, I read Justin Cronin's The Passage, mostly to see if a writer with 'literary cred" (U of Iowa Creative Writing Program, acclaimed mainstream work, shortlisted for PEN awards, stuff like that) could really add something to the genre, and the answer was, not really, at least in this case. It was entertaining enough, but it was just another genre fiction, neither better or worse than the average tale written by a journeyman horror writer. The insights were no deeper, the deaths no more poignant, the situations no more existential. Maybe the prose was slightly better than the norm, and maybe it was a bit more tasteful than the normal horror book, but then, taste is not necessarily a positive in the genre. It's rather like being the most polite wrestler.
In anticipation of the Coen Brothers' "True Grit"
I've never read True Grit. Of course, growing up as a child in the 70's, the image of a craggy, eye-patched John Wayne was a fairly identifiable piece of pop-culture iconography. I grew up with tv and movie westerns, Gunsmoke, the Big Valley, Bonanza, the John Ford/Wayne canon, spaghetti westerns, all pretty much until Star Wars and Close Encounters in 1977 knocked me headlong into science fiction and fantasy worship.
Perhaps it's my age (likely). Perhaps it's some growing conservatism (less likely), but more likely, it is a response to my decade of living in New York City and the pace, and perhaps the lack of an identifiable horizon. I think I'm longing for a time where you got somewhere when you got there, and the rides, though they be long, held the promise of a boarding house to get cleaned up, a saloon to take a drink, and maybe a town to save from a black hatted gunslinger. I'm not fooling myself that the times were any simpler or less problematic than our own, but I revel in the escapism, and the western is the closest we in the US come to having our own Illiad and Odyssey.
Perhaps it's my age (likely). Perhaps it's some growing conservatism (less likely), but more likely, it is a response to my decade of living in New York City and the pace, and perhaps the lack of an identifiable horizon. I think I'm longing for a time where you got somewhere when you got there, and the rides, though they be long, held the promise of a boarding house to get cleaned up, a saloon to take a drink, and maybe a town to save from a black hatted gunslinger. I'm not fooling myself that the times were any simpler or less problematic than our own, but I revel in the escapism, and the western is the closest we in the US come to having our own Illiad and Odyssey.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
The disappearing blogger...
Ok, so I've been gone a while. No posts in the month of October, because it was kind of a bad month. I had some personal things going on, and, at the end of the month, my grandmother passed away and we were out of town for a few days for funeral and family. Even if I was in my right mind, which I fully confess is not where I am right now, I would have had a hard time really getting anything substantial done. Also, they blocked a lot of sites accessible on the work computer, big, all encompassing categories like social networking and personal websites, so no catching up on posts on my lunch hour. I could, of course, write on a word doc and cut and paste, but that would be proactive and stuff. Can't have that.
I did manage to finish reading one book, My Year of Flops by Nathan Rabin, the AV Club writer who took a year to watch some of the most notorious cinematic failures in history. It was a quick read, and one that was easy to put down and pick up without losing too much. Maybe that is the answer for future reads. My backpack also has, unfinished by me, The Long Ships, by Frans G Bengtsson, a Swedish Viking adventure novel from the Forties, courtesy of my new favorite publisher, New York Review Books. If the link actually works, go there immediately. Lots of great old titles, both adult and children's, in very well-designed, mostly trade paperback editions. And my favorite book store, Book Culture in Morningside Heights (near Columbia University) has so many of them at discount prices.
(Ok, not only a digression from a digression, but two hyperlinks. Going off the rails a bit, here. I can tell I've been away for a while.)
Back to the point. So, the literary philanderer in me has been working in full force, as I have pushed aside The Long Ships aside to read My Year of Flops, and have also been cavorting with the copy of On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers, that I found among the titles in the left behind pile at my mother's house in Missouri. I also brought back a few Joseph Campbell books, and a copy of Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy to add to the 1000-plus page titles on my literary bucket list. Maybe I will just take a year, and hit some of these doorstops and just see how far I get. Might be worthy of a blog. But, clearly, as I am right now trying to pick up the shattered pieces of my reader's psyche, that might be too much to ask. Ok, maybe Infinite Jest at the end of the year, when there's holiday days off.
I know, another digression. Clearly I am trying to say too many things at once. Trying to make up for lost time. I'm acting like I am on deadline with this thing, when it is not supposed to be that way at all. It's the same thing with the books: the guilt about not reading makes the reading a chore sometimes, when it used to be just the thing I looked forward to most. There's no reason I shouldn't have finished The Long Ships, On Stranger Tides, and My Year of Flops all by now, and a couple of others besides. But now, it's like work, and I'm in the strange position of loving books, but hating reading. The relationship with writing is similar, though I'm not going to pretend that the writing has ever been particularly easy. I just get a lot of satisfaction when I see words on a page that I've created. I think I've fetishized a minute part of the process. Is "fetishized" even a word?
I am ending this tale now, if for no other reason but to see a date other than September on my posts. Time to gather a few thoughts, and work from there. If the links work, maybe I will create more. Maybe this will just become a blog of links to other things. Maybe.
I did manage to finish reading one book, My Year of Flops by Nathan Rabin, the AV Club writer who took a year to watch some of the most notorious cinematic failures in history. It was a quick read, and one that was easy to put down and pick up without losing too much. Maybe that is the answer for future reads. My backpack also has, unfinished by me, The Long Ships, by Frans G Bengtsson, a Swedish Viking adventure novel from the Forties, courtesy of my new favorite publisher, New York Review Books. If the link actually works, go there immediately. Lots of great old titles, both adult and children's, in very well-designed, mostly trade paperback editions. And my favorite book store, Book Culture in Morningside Heights (near Columbia University) has so many of them at discount prices.
(Ok, not only a digression from a digression, but two hyperlinks. Going off the rails a bit, here. I can tell I've been away for a while.)
Back to the point. So, the literary philanderer in me has been working in full force, as I have pushed aside The Long Ships aside to read My Year of Flops, and have also been cavorting with the copy of On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers, that I found among the titles in the left behind pile at my mother's house in Missouri. I also brought back a few Joseph Campbell books, and a copy of Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy to add to the 1000-plus page titles on my literary bucket list. Maybe I will just take a year, and hit some of these doorstops and just see how far I get. Might be worthy of a blog. But, clearly, as I am right now trying to pick up the shattered pieces of my reader's psyche, that might be too much to ask. Ok, maybe Infinite Jest at the end of the year, when there's holiday days off.
I know, another digression. Clearly I am trying to say too many things at once. Trying to make up for lost time. I'm acting like I am on deadline with this thing, when it is not supposed to be that way at all. It's the same thing with the books: the guilt about not reading makes the reading a chore sometimes, when it used to be just the thing I looked forward to most. There's no reason I shouldn't have finished The Long Ships, On Stranger Tides, and My Year of Flops all by now, and a couple of others besides. But now, it's like work, and I'm in the strange position of loving books, but hating reading. The relationship with writing is similar, though I'm not going to pretend that the writing has ever been particularly easy. I just get a lot of satisfaction when I see words on a page that I've created. I think I've fetishized a minute part of the process. Is "fetishized" even a word?
I am ending this tale now, if for no other reason but to see a date other than September on my posts. Time to gather a few thoughts, and work from there. If the links work, maybe I will create more. Maybe this will just become a blog of links to other things. Maybe.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Literary Philandering, Part 2
(Continued from 9/16)
...when it comes to books, I mean.
How many times have I found myself in the middle of a book, only to abandon it for the siren call of another book that catches my fancy? Some parts of my reading history are just a series of flirtations, cast aside like the cad I apparently have become.
Sometimes, I just have reading expectations that are too ambitious. Right now, for instance, I am reading The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell. This is a novel about the Nazi final solution, told as if from the memoirs of a German SS Officer. Tough going in the best of situations, given the subject matter and the main character, but the book is about 800 pages long, and contains what has to be some of the longest paragraphs in written history. Seriously, in the 100 pages so far, I'd venture to guess there are less than 50 paragraphs, which is a roundabout way of saying that the paragraphs seem to average out to about two pages long. Any dialogue is buried in these paragraphs, and let's not forget the liberal use of German military designations, which pretty much accumulate syllables like US generals get stars.
So, I slog to page 150 or so, and the books relentless brutality just does not sync well with my mood. Life is full of its own difficulties and turmoils, so this book does not necessarily provide the comfort or escape I probably need at the moment. I still want to read the book, really I do, but right now it just depresses me to no end. I had a similar experience with Blood Meridian a year ago, and that book lies unfinished on my shelf as well. The seeing other books on the side began about two weeks ago in the current case, as I would put a volume of poetry, or some short stories in the bag with the Littell book, almost like I was flaunting my infidelity. I wandered around, rootless, for a bit, and I think I have finally given up on the book, for now. My psyche is really not up to 800 pages of Holocaust depravity.
Today, my copy of In Search of Zarathrustra, a part travelogue, part journalistic history of the ancient Middle Eastern prophet, began to catch my gaze from across the crowded room. We danced a bit, and I tore off the dust jacket, and read the first chapter, sort of the equivalent of a quickie in the cloakroom. The book sits next to me on the desk, and it's telling me to stay awhile, hang out, have a little fun. And my mind is asking for something to help the spirit, so, I think I have ended the relationship with the Littell book, for a while at least. I can only hope it will take me back some day.
...when it comes to books, I mean.
How many times have I found myself in the middle of a book, only to abandon it for the siren call of another book that catches my fancy? Some parts of my reading history are just a series of flirtations, cast aside like the cad I apparently have become.
Sometimes, I just have reading expectations that are too ambitious. Right now, for instance, I am reading The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell. This is a novel about the Nazi final solution, told as if from the memoirs of a German SS Officer. Tough going in the best of situations, given the subject matter and the main character, but the book is about 800 pages long, and contains what has to be some of the longest paragraphs in written history. Seriously, in the 100 pages so far, I'd venture to guess there are less than 50 paragraphs, which is a roundabout way of saying that the paragraphs seem to average out to about two pages long. Any dialogue is buried in these paragraphs, and let's not forget the liberal use of German military designations, which pretty much accumulate syllables like US generals get stars.
So, I slog to page 150 or so, and the books relentless brutality just does not sync well with my mood. Life is full of its own difficulties and turmoils, so this book does not necessarily provide the comfort or escape I probably need at the moment. I still want to read the book, really I do, but right now it just depresses me to no end. I had a similar experience with Blood Meridian a year ago, and that book lies unfinished on my shelf as well. The seeing other books on the side began about two weeks ago in the current case, as I would put a volume of poetry, or some short stories in the bag with the Littell book, almost like I was flaunting my infidelity. I wandered around, rootless, for a bit, and I think I have finally given up on the book, for now. My psyche is really not up to 800 pages of Holocaust depravity.
Today, my copy of In Search of Zarathrustra, a part travelogue, part journalistic history of the ancient Middle Eastern prophet, began to catch my gaze from across the crowded room. We danced a bit, and I tore off the dust jacket, and read the first chapter, sort of the equivalent of a quickie in the cloakroom. The book sits next to me on the desk, and it's telling me to stay awhile, hang out, have a little fun. And my mind is asking for something to help the spirit, so, I think I have ended the relationship with the Littell book, for a while at least. I can only hope it will take me back some day.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Literary Philandering, Part 1
My life is filled with abandoned reading. I look across the room right now, and I see two very tall bookcases filled with volumes, some shelves have smaller titles in front and back rows. A single one of those rows probably holds somewhere around 25 to 35 books. 14 shelves total, and with doubling of some shelves, it means 25 "shelves," and that means there are anywhere between 625 and 875 books on those shelves. That's probably a conservative estimate, and there are a few stacks of books in my closet, and some stray stacks elsewhere in the house. So, 1000 books, probably. It boggles the mind.
Some of these books are foundlings. Some are new purchases. Some have traveled with me from Missouri, and have been with me for decades. There are remainders, galleys, book club purchases, Borders, B&N, The Strand, Labyrinth Books/Book Culture, Shakespeare and Company, purchases from stands in Grand Central, Penn Station, and various airports, and from my years at the Drama Book Shop.
It would be great if I could look at this vast collection of titles, and proudly state that I have read all of that material, or even most of it, but to be honest, I don't think that I have read completely even half of these books. Some, of course, are reference books that are more for specific research questions rather than wholesale consumption, but that isn't a huge number of the unread, or unfinished. Even excepting out poetry and short story collections that are acceptable for less than complete perusal, there is a staggering amount of unused paper on my shelves. I look over the uncracked spines, and ask myself why, and I have come to this conclusion.
I have a bit of a wandering eye.
(to be continued)
Some of these books are foundlings. Some are new purchases. Some have traveled with me from Missouri, and have been with me for decades. There are remainders, galleys, book club purchases, Borders, B&N, The Strand, Labyrinth Books/Book Culture, Shakespeare and Company, purchases from stands in Grand Central, Penn Station, and various airports, and from my years at the Drama Book Shop.
It would be great if I could look at this vast collection of titles, and proudly state that I have read all of that material, or even most of it, but to be honest, I don't think that I have read completely even half of these books. Some, of course, are reference books that are more for specific research questions rather than wholesale consumption, but that isn't a huge number of the unread, or unfinished. Even excepting out poetry and short story collections that are acceptable for less than complete perusal, there is a staggering amount of unused paper on my shelves. I look over the uncracked spines, and ask myself why, and I have come to this conclusion.
I have a bit of a wandering eye.
(to be continued)
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
The distraction that is the internet
So, another day of one hour of lunch break, spent sitting at my desk, searching through the web for, I don't know what. Check Facebook several times, go to the AV Club website, what's going on at Thinkprogress and Democratic Underground, and do I have any emails? That's gmail, hotmail, and yahoo. Going home, it's the same thing. Such a time waster.
Often enough, I find myself on the internet rather than do other activities, such as reading whatever book I'm into, and with my time divided between that and Nate, I don't get as much done as I could at night. What, exactly, am I looking for during that extended web surfing session. My email and facebook don't get updated that much!
Of course, to write this, I am on the internet yet again, but I consider this at least an active use of the time, rather than passive old surfing. I'm am putting some words down, and maybe will get some use out of them, if I keep it up enough.
Just what I need though-justification to stay online longer...
Often enough, I find myself on the internet rather than do other activities, such as reading whatever book I'm into, and with my time divided between that and Nate, I don't get as much done as I could at night. What, exactly, am I looking for during that extended web surfing session. My email and facebook don't get updated that much!
Of course, to write this, I am on the internet yet again, but I consider this at least an active use of the time, rather than passive old surfing. I'm am putting some words down, and maybe will get some use out of them, if I keep it up enough.
Just what I need though-justification to stay online longer...
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
A mission statement, of sorts...
Ok, so here is this blog thing, that will eventually be filled up with all kinds of words, links (if I ever get proactive enough to figure that part out) and all sorts of other yummy goodness, but to what purpose? What do I hope to get out of this? What do you hope to get out of this? Will there be money exchanged?
Perhaps I should at least answer the first question. As the title of the blog suggests, I once devoured text at an alarming rate, and it was good. Then, one day, I got cable television. Eventually, I got married. That produced a child, and I had to get a real job that taxes my brain to no end (they made me learn Excel, ma! It was horrible!). Such is the lapse in brain power that I really don't feel that I can make a proper introduction at this time. The best I can hope for right now is to finish typing and hope it makes sense.
I've become a creature of distractions. I procrastinate, I start projects, only to abandon them, and I generally feel like I haven't had an original thought in eons. It wasn't always that way, and I want to at least try to reclaim some of that feeling of accomplishment, and maybe if I can manage to keep up this blog for more than a couple of posts, it may help. Or perhaps not, but the illusion of accomplishment is preferable to no accomplishment at all, right?
At any rate, here is the blog. Hope you like it. I will try to keep the windows clean, and the rugs vacuumed. I've tried to enforce the shoes-off inside policy, but hell, half the time I forget I have them on. The peanut butter in the fridge is mine, though.
Perhaps I should at least answer the first question. As the title of the blog suggests, I once devoured text at an alarming rate, and it was good. Then, one day, I got cable television. Eventually, I got married. That produced a child, and I had to get a real job that taxes my brain to no end (they made me learn Excel, ma! It was horrible!). Such is the lapse in brain power that I really don't feel that I can make a proper introduction at this time. The best I can hope for right now is to finish typing and hope it makes sense.
I've become a creature of distractions. I procrastinate, I start projects, only to abandon them, and I generally feel like I haven't had an original thought in eons. It wasn't always that way, and I want to at least try to reclaim some of that feeling of accomplishment, and maybe if I can manage to keep up this blog for more than a couple of posts, it may help. Or perhaps not, but the illusion of accomplishment is preferable to no accomplishment at all, right?
At any rate, here is the blog. Hope you like it. I will try to keep the windows clean, and the rugs vacuumed. I've tried to enforce the shoes-off inside policy, but hell, half the time I forget I have them on. The peanut butter in the fridge is mine, though.
The problem, as I see it
The problem with free association is that you generally get what you pay for.
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