A Latter-day Bluestocking

For the love of reading

Month: August, 2011

August 11, 2011

The List of Books I Want to Finish Reading Before the End of Summer (but won’t)

I am always very ambitious about my summer reading list and I always start out very strong.  The problem is that by the middle of the summer I’ve added books not on the original list.  For example, today I stopped into Barnes and Noble to pick up Lord of the Flies by William Golding.  I’m not really sure why I must read that book NOW but I am guessing it has something to do with my son’s sleepaway summer camp experience and the photograph of him with war paint on his face and painted handprints on his stomach.  Go figure.  Simple, right?  It’s only one more book, right?  Wrong, because I also picked up two more books, A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin (I’ve seen two random episodes of the HBO mini-series and I am intrigued, besides I’ve heard good things) and Why Jane Austen? by Rachel M. Brownstein.  The latter is because I am Jane Austen obsessed and I just cannot pass up any new book about her.

So in addition to my three latest acquisitions, here’s the rest my summer book list (this does not include the books I’ve actually read) which I will not be able to finish before the end of summer.

  1. American Creation by Joseph J. Ellis
  2. Jane Austen:  The Critical Heritage edited by B.C. Southam
  3. Jane Austen and the Province of Womanhood by Alison G. Sulloway
  4. Sex at Dawn:  How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethá
  5. Jane Austen:  A Life by David Nokes
  6. Room by Amanda Donoghue
  7. The Wind’s Twelve Quarters:  Stories by Ursula K. Le Guin
  8. The Woman Who Could Not Forget:  Iris Chang Before and Beyond “The Rape of Nanking” by Ying-Ying Chang
  9. March by Geraldine Brooks
  10. Six Frigates:  The Epic History of the Founding of The U.S. Navy by Ian W. Toll

I think I need a 12 step program for book addiction.

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Status | August 10, 2011

Quote of the Day: Confucius

Confucius as administrator

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“No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance.”  Confucius, 551 BC–479 BC

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August 10, 2011

A Book that Changed My Life

Siddhartha Buddha under Bodhi tree painting

When I was in my early to mid 20s I read a book that had a profound impact on my thought and attitude towards life. That book was Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. Before the age of 30 I was in grave danger of becoming world weary. I was disheartened and had no hope for mankind or for myself. This book helped to shake the lethargy from my brain; the simple story of Siddhartha, a young man who embarks on a journey seeking enlightenment, inspired me.

The book spoke to me as no other ever had. I took away from the story that happiness and enlightenment are not achieved by external factors but by self awareness; the acceptance of the world and self, the good and the bad. I am nowhere near the enlightenment and wisdom attained by Siddhartha but I still strive towards it.

“The world was beautiful when looked at in this way––without any seeking, so simple, so childlike. The moon and the stars were beautiful, the brook, the shore, the forest and rock, the goat and the golden beetle, the flower and butterfly were beautiful. It was beautiful and pleasant to go through the world like that, so childlike, so awakened, so concerned with the immediate, without any distrust.”

When I first read this book I vowed I would read it one day to my unborn child, to pass to him, in utero, what took me decades to comprehend. I am ashamed to say I never did. That beautiful boy is, on his own, showing an interest in the story of Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, and how he attained wise illumination through a contemplative life.

Perhaps, it’s not too late to read this book together, aloud.

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Status | August 9, 2011

Quote of the Day: Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling in his study, about this year

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“Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.”  Rudyard Kipling, 1865-1936

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August 9, 2011

Currently Reading: Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson

Cover of "Major Pettigrew's Last Stand: A...

Cover of Major Pettigrew's Last Stand: A Novel

I started reading Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand on Friday and because I’ve been so busy with, well…  life, I have been unable to read like I normally do.  Despite not having enough time over the weekend to curl up with this book, it has grabbed me right from the start and I have been reading voraciously on the subway and even, clandestinely, at work.  I absolutely love the character of Major Ernest Pettigrew.  Helen Simonson has wonderfully evoked an old-fashioned British military gentleman in the most traditional sense.  I imagine him with mutton-chop sideburns, chest pumped up, walking with a swagger, using his cane just so, a man used to a vast Empire, unchanging and staid.  But he is devoid of annoying pomposity exhibiting, instead, charm and gallantry.  He is a widower and is coping with the loss of his brother and an ingrate of a son.  He is lonely.

He begins an unlikely friendship with a Pakistani widow, Jasmina Ali, who runs the local grocery.  She is independent, clever, and well-read.  She is quietly struggling to find her own place within a culture that expects certain behaviors from women, especially widowed women without children, and get by in a Britain that does not easily accept her as one of them. 

The Major and Mrs. Ali come together and bond through their common loss of a spouse and a love of literature.    They meet for the first time at his home for afternoon tea to discuss, of all things, Rudyard Kipling!

Their story is attractive and sweet but not mawkish and I look forward to finishing the journey with them.

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Status | August 8, 2011

Quote of the Day: Edward Gibbon

Portrait, oil on canvas, of Edward Emily Gibbo...

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“My early and invincible love of reading I would not exchange for all the riches of India.”  Edward Gibbon, 1737–1794

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Status | August 7, 2011

Plain Truth from Honest Abe

An 1864 Mathew Brady photo depicts President L...

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“The things I want to know are in books; my best friend is the man who’ll get me a book I ain’t read.”   Abraham Lincoln, 1809–1865

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Link | August 6, 2011

Always wanted to be a librarian?

Image representing LibraryThing as depicted in...

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When I was a child I liked order.  This need for the well-ordered extended to my books, especially my books.  I always harbored the need to catalog and organize my books.  I used to put “library” cards in my books and assign them numbers.  I had stamps with dates and would play library for hours.  And now, even as an adult, I secretly long to organize and catalog.  Lucky for me that I have located a site that will allow me to do just that!

I discovered LibraryThing by accident and found it to be exactly what I require to indulge my inner librarian.  I even have a librarian’s endorsement for the site!!  So go ahead and catalog and organize all those books cluttering up your shelves (and your closets, floors, bathroom, tables, hallways), I know I will.

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Status | August 6, 2011

Wisdom from Walden

crayon portrait of Henry David Thoreau as a yo...

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“How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.”  Henry David Thoreau, 1817–1862

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August 6, 2011

"Give me but a little cheerful company, let me only have the company of the people I love, let me only be where I like and with whom I like, and the devil may take the rest, say I."

Jane Austen’s Will

If I could have tea with any one author, dead or alive, I would choose unhesitatingly, Jane Austen. Despite the countless books and articles, blogs, societies, websites, and fan pages dedicated to her, she remains an enigma. Oh, her books are studies in perfection, glimpses of her wit are revealed in her letters, and their are only two confirmed images of her (one only of her back) but do we really know who she was? I think everyone has an idea of who Jane Austen was but much of our perception of her is through the white-wash job presented by her Victorian relations. An insipid view, in my opinion, and far from the truth.

Her books, letters, Juvenilia, and unfinished manuscripts show a woman not demure and quiet but funny, engaging, intelligent, and, on occasion, peevish. I don’t doubt that Miss Austen would be a refreshing teatime companion and I would only hope to hold my own and not invite her jocular ridicule in a later letter to her sister, Cassandra.

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