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What are you reading Chapter 4
- Thread starter slobake
- Start date
This past week I've read:
The Book Of The City Of Ladies by Christine de Pizan - it's a medieval rebuttal of the typical view of the times (and also much more recent times!) that "men good, women bad". Basically, it's a lot of short vignettes of women throughout history (up until that point) showing that they are as capable as men, and each of these women is then a "citizen" of the "City Of Ladies" that the author is metaphorically building throughout. Interesting read, if a bit dry.
The Treasure Of The City Of Ladies, also by Christine de Pizan - a sequel of sorts to the previous book, this on focusing on how to be a good lady so that you would be worthy of the City of Ladies. Basically it's how to be a good medieval woman, no matter your social class, similar to Machiavelli's prince in style, but with a different audience and aim.
Grendel's Mother by Susan Signe Morrison - this book portrays Grendel's mother (who is given a name) as the main character, and tries to humanize her character as well as Grendel. It certainly changes some of the traditional Beowulf story once he enters, but is presented as a "true version" of the story, and that the story that we have heard so many times is biased against her. A fun read, and certainly well-written, but I'm still not sure how I feel about all of the liberties taken. However, the only negative I can really say is that it's published by what I imagine is a small company - there are a handful of simple editing errors in the text that should have been caught (like misspelling a fairly important character's name). Nothing too distracting, but odd for a "professionally printed" book.
Finally, I started Dante's Divine Comedy. I finished up Inferno yesterday, and will likely start Purgatorio tomorrow. Great read, and certainly in line with my medieval history and mythology trends of late.
The Book Of The City Of Ladies by Christine de Pizan - it's a medieval rebuttal of the typical view of the times (and also much more recent times!) that "men good, women bad". Basically, it's a lot of short vignettes of women throughout history (up until that point) showing that they are as capable as men, and each of these women is then a "citizen" of the "City Of Ladies" that the author is metaphorically building throughout. Interesting read, if a bit dry.
The Treasure Of The City Of Ladies, also by Christine de Pizan - a sequel of sorts to the previous book, this on focusing on how to be a good lady so that you would be worthy of the City of Ladies. Basically it's how to be a good medieval woman, no matter your social class, similar to Machiavelli's prince in style, but with a different audience and aim.
Grendel's Mother by Susan Signe Morrison - this book portrays Grendel's mother (who is given a name) as the main character, and tries to humanize her character as well as Grendel. It certainly changes some of the traditional Beowulf story once he enters, but is presented as a "true version" of the story, and that the story that we have heard so many times is biased against her. A fun read, and certainly well-written, but I'm still not sure how I feel about all of the liberties taken. However, the only negative I can really say is that it's published by what I imagine is a small company - there are a handful of simple editing errors in the text that should have been caught (like misspelling a fairly important character's name). Nothing too distracting, but odd for a "professionally printed" book.
Finally, I started Dante's Divine Comedy. I finished up Inferno yesterday, and will likely start Purgatorio tomorrow. Great read, and certainly in line with my medieval history and mythology trends of late.
When reading the story "If It Bleeds" by Stephen King, I didn't realize that it was actually part two of the Holly Gibney saga. We have part one, the book "The Outsider", so I'll read that next. Then I'll need to get "Holly" to finish it up.
I loved The Outsider, I think it's one of the best, if not the best, of his recent works that I've read. I haven't read If It Bleeds or Holly yet. For some reason I thought she was introduced in the Mr. Mercedes books? I never read those or watched the series.
I just finished Troubled by Rob K. Henderson. He was a foster child who made a good life for himself, a great read.
Yes! The Bill Hodges Trilogy, "Mr. Mercedes", "Finders Keepers", and "End of Watch" are where the character Holly Gibney is introduced and are worth a read. The TV series "Mr. Mercedes" is pretty true to the first book.
Missing in Matagami: A True Cold Case - John W Whiteside III
Story of a family trying to find out what happened to their missing daughter in 1977. She graduated from Duke University and moved to Austin, TX to start a music career. Didn't work out so she moved back to North Carolina and then up to Cambridge, Mass thinking the folk scene there would be a better starting place. She was to attend a protest rally over the Seabrook Nuclear Plant, but instead two days later was approached by a Canadian LEO up in the middle of nowhere in subarctic Canada north out of Ottowa. He recommended she leave and head back south as there was nothing up north of there except the Robert-Bourassa Hydropower Facility. He was the last person to see her alive. Her VW bug was still there by the side of the road a month later, although she had taken some items out of the car with her.
Story hits home. I knew her and her family. Met in high school Jazz Choir in '71; she was a senior and I was a soph. Very nice outgoing soprano blond folkie singer. Very warm hearted as was her entire family, including two sisters - one my age and another a couple of years younger. Just a devastating loss and mystery to some of the nicest people on this planet. Mom and Dad now rest in peace never knowing what happened to their beautiful daughter.
Reads well. Not the best writer in the world. Holds interest as the family experiences much frustration with law agencies on both sides of the border; the best investigation being done by a boyfriend from Austin who took a few months off from college to dig around Matagami and other towns nearby without much success. Heartbreaking.
Story of a family trying to find out what happened to their missing daughter in 1977. She graduated from Duke University and moved to Austin, TX to start a music career. Didn't work out so she moved back to North Carolina and then up to Cambridge, Mass thinking the folk scene there would be a better starting place. She was to attend a protest rally over the Seabrook Nuclear Plant, but instead two days later was approached by a Canadian LEO up in the middle of nowhere in subarctic Canada north out of Ottowa. He recommended she leave and head back south as there was nothing up north of there except the Robert-Bourassa Hydropower Facility. He was the last person to see her alive. Her VW bug was still there by the side of the road a month later, although she had taken some items out of the car with her.
Story hits home. I knew her and her family. Met in high school Jazz Choir in '71; she was a senior and I was a soph. Very nice outgoing soprano blond folkie singer. Very warm hearted as was her entire family, including two sisters - one my age and another a couple of years younger. Just a devastating loss and mystery to some of the nicest people on this planet. Mom and Dad now rest in peace never knowing what happened to their beautiful daughter.
Reads well. Not the best writer in the world. Holds interest as the family experiences much frustration with law agencies on both sides of the border; the best investigation being done by a boyfriend from Austin who took a few months off from college to dig around Matagami and other towns nearby without much success. Heartbreaking.
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Harry Turtledove - The Wages of Sin
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Started Dante's "Divine Comedy". About halfway through. It makes me wish I knew more of the various real-life "characters" he mentions meeting in the afterlife, as I know that quite often the people he knew firsthand were placed in specific regions of the afterlife as his own personal commentary on their relationship with him and their own personal way of life. I know many of the historic names, and have a general idea of who they are, but the contemporary Italians of lesser note usually escape me. Still, a fun read that I'm enjoying. Debating what to read after that. I should be getting The Anglo Saxon Chronicle and Heimskringla (History Of The Kings Of Norway) soon, but maybe not before finishing Dante. Maybe The History Of The Kings Of Britain or The History Of The Franks?
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Gilford Pinchot and the First Foresters: The Untold Story of the Brave Men and Women Who Launched the American Conservation Movement
-Bibi Gaston
Responses from the first Forest Service personnel to a letter request from Pinchot to remember duties, deeds, and adventures in shaping what is now the Forest Service. Thr responding letters were sent to the Library of Congress with hopes these stories would be written up in a book in the 1940s, but this never took place. The stories were filed away until the author searched them out and wrote up some of the responders letters about life in the woods in the early 1900s and bringing order into public lands instead of the pretty much free for all back then.
Well written. Great stories -- also with the author writing about the FS and it's development in between corespondences.
-Bibi Gaston
Responses from the first Forest Service personnel to a letter request from Pinchot to remember duties, deeds, and adventures in shaping what is now the Forest Service. Thr responding letters were sent to the Library of Congress with hopes these stories would be written up in a book in the 1940s, but this never took place. The stories were filed away until the author searched them out and wrote up some of the responders letters about life in the woods in the early 1900s and bringing order into public lands instead of the pretty much free for all back then.
Well written. Great stories -- also with the author writing about the FS and it's development in between corespondences.
Finished up a new (to me) translation of The Song Of Roland tonight. It's always fun to see these characterizations of famous pseudo-historical people from the past. When I studied in Germany, my town had a statue of Roland, so I knew that I had to learn about this knight at some point. It's a good story, though no way to know what actually happened at the battle it describes.
Tomorrow, I'm starting "The History Of The Kings Of Britain".
Tomorrow, I'm starting "The History Of The Kings Of Britain".
Read "The History Of The Kings Of Britain" last night - entertaining as a "history" book, and certainly fills in lots of gaps from my other texts. But overall, clearly fiction, as everyone knows. I still found it worthwhile just to get many of the various references I've read in my Norse sagas and various other European texts I've been devouring the past year, so it it was ultimately worthwhile. Giving my brain a rest tonight and watching one of Peter Jackson's earliest films - before he was doing well-known stuff. Will likely read a new-to-me translation of Beowulf tomorrow, which should be relatively quick as I have read many versions of the tale already. I think I'm up to 25 translations/adaptations at this point? I'm clearly a fan!
One of the most interesting figures in the history of cinema is the director John Ford (born John Feeney). He is most famous for his westerns, and his development of Monument Valley, Utah as not only a setting for movies but an emotional factor in the cinematography of famous movies.
I just finished The Cavalry Trilogy: John Ford, John Wayne and the making of three classic westerns.
Really well researched and very readable book. If you have seen Fort Apache, She wore a Yellow Ribbon or Rio Grande, you should be aware that they are among the very best westerns ever filmed. Although they're not connected by script, as a set they form a great tribute to the cavalry and to the US Military.
I'm just about ready to open Harry Carey Jr's Company of Heroes: My life as an actor in the John Ford stock company.
If you're a western fan, you owe it to yourself to learn more about John ford.
I just finished The Cavalry Trilogy: John Ford, John Wayne and the making of three classic westerns.
Really well researched and very readable book. If you have seen Fort Apache, She wore a Yellow Ribbon or Rio Grande, you should be aware that they are among the very best westerns ever filmed. Although they're not connected by script, as a set they form a great tribute to the cavalry and to the US Military.
I'm just about ready to open Harry Carey Jr's Company of Heroes: My life as an actor in the John Ford stock company.
If you're a western fan, you owe it to yourself to learn more about John ford.
LOTR. For the zillionth time.
I might buy this to read next
I might buy this to read next
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I agreed to join a book club at the office and it's all junk science books and we're reading "Surrounded by Idiots" by this buffoon who basically combines Myers Briggs with numerology horse snit and I skimmed 10 chapters and now I think I'm done.
There are many readers at my work - they know better than to ask what I am reading. My tastes are a little eclectic for them. Well, for most people!
