#Reading Journal May 2024
01.05.2024 – First day of May…..now the next summer months will ‘whizz’ by and before you know ik we’ll be buying pumpkins to brighten up the front doorstep!
READ: I promised myself to read this book that has been on my bookshelf for years… Paul Morand….but it is so difficult to get started. When I look at the cover….PM’s face it just disgusts me. Collaborator…charmed everyone in 1960s and transformed his image. De Gaulle was not fooled….but so many were. No, NOT wasting my time on this French hypocriet! UPDATE: DNF Paul Morand.
UPDATE: READ: FINISHED Percival Everett’s Erasure – The novel is a mise-en-abyme (formal technique of placing a copy of an image within itself) – “frame story”…a novel about a novelist writing a book. The Black-American writer is not selling books, not making money. His publist says he’s not “writing BLACK enough!” Well, he decides to write that ‘book” b/c of cash flow problems supporting mother and brother. I had to SKIM the ‘black novel” ….it was just awful to read but according to the book it is a best seller! The author is so distraught a/b what he as had to write to get attention….he does not even want his name on the book!
FRENCH READ: FINISHED: Gaston Leroux’s – Le Fauteuil hanté…mystery. Good news: It is so easy to read…. Bad news: story is very predictable.
FRENCH: READING Zola’s “Paris” to complete the trilogy ‘Trois Villes’. It is 600+ pages…so I can only manage 40-50 pages a day before my head aches! Review next month.
SAD NEWS: Alice Munro has died at the age of 92. Oh, really, just felt awful. We are losing some great writers ….think of Helen Vendler and now Ms Munro. I ordered 6 of her books (…before they sell out this week!). I’m in the mood to read her writing…it is so soothing and yet very insightful. Acclaimed for her accounts of the darkness and desire found in everyday life, ‘the Canadian Chekhov’ has died, having suffered from dementia for more than a decade. GOOD summary of Ms Munro’s life an writing at The Guardian dd. 14.05.2024
PLAY: READ: Awake with thoughts about “Audrey Or Sorrow….so I sat down and re-wrote my first draft. I approached the play with LESS emotion on the surface level and tried to appreciate the skill and craft of the playwright, Ms Carr. I’m pleased I produced a more ‘coherent’ review instead of “just play-bashing” because Audrey Or Sorrow was NOT a play with comforting qualities (clear plot, plausible situations, realistic characters) that I expected.
Play: Pauls Vogel won Pulitzer for Drama 1998 for “How I Learned To Drive…which I enjoyed reading. Paula’Vogel’s new work “Mother Play” starring Jessica Lange on Broadway is about the hold our family (mother) has over us. Our relationship with our parents does not end when they die. It begins. #AmReading ..as soon as it is available in print!
NEW BOOKS: – Collection of Short Poems (rare edition) by Robinson Jeffers (….is expensive but c’est la vie) – recommedation Melissa (The Book Binder’s Daughter).
NEW BOOKS: – Percival Everett’s books So Much Blue, Telephone and Trees...all recommedations from Claire (Blog: Word By Word).
NEW BOOKS: I’ve been very careful not to order books on a whim, especially French ones. Today I invested in Collected Poems of Donald Justice, (44,–) Yes a bit $$ but such great literarure I can enjoy for a long time. Poetry has really impressed me the more I read about it (eNotes, GradSaver). Another book this month:
NEW BOOKS: Winners of the Pulitzer Prize 2024 were announced today. Biography King: A Life by Jonathan Eig…I ordered ia (650+ pages) as an Audible book.
New Books: Not all poems have to be deeply profound. Sometimes I just need something simple…that will brighten my day… “Saltines” by Raymond Carver did the trick! The title caught my eye…“
READ: Poem by Emily Dickinson “We Grow Accustomed to the Dark” – just a short poem but it is amazing how much Dickinson can express grief in just a few lines.
READ: poem – “The Pupil” by Donal Justice (1925-2004) – Won Pulitzer Prize 1980 – Treated myself to Collected Poems of Donald Justice (2006) just because I was so impressed by what I have read about his poetry. Love his quote: “…one of the motives for writing is surely to recover and hold what would otherwise be lost totally—memory or experience.” If you see one of his books in the library…have a look!
READ: poem – “High Windows” by Philip Larkin – Regardless of which era teens grow up in, they all will pass through the ‘window’ of adulthood to find themselves in the nothingness of midlife.
READ: Poem W.H. Auden’s poem “Musée de Beaux Arts”….just breathtaking!
READ: Poem: As I Walked Out One Evening by W.H. Auden…just beautiful Glad I finally discovered this poet!
READ: Poem “Ithaka” by C.P. Cavafy. One thing about Ms Hirshfield’s book…she’s introduced me to Cafafy, the Greek poet! “Ithaka” has long been recognized as one of Cavafy’s finest poems. The theme of the poem may be summed up in one phrase: it is better to journey than to arrive. Life should not be wasted. Cavafy puts all this advice in context by setting it against the background of the Odyssey…but reverses it. Odysseus always longs for home. He does not enjoy his long journey…but we should do the opposite.
TRIVIA: “Ithaka” by C.P. Cavafywas read aloud at the funeral of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in 1994.
READ: Poem “Oysters” by Seamus Heaney – I just cannot follow Hirshfield’s thoughts about this poem…and return to the poetry scholar Helen Vendler (book: Seamus Heaney, published 1998) . She is the only one who has explained to me the 5 stanza poem. Stanza 1 and 3 contrasts with 2 and 4 (…discover this yourself!). Stanza 5 is an attempt to “resolve the inner quarrel”…that Heaney is experiencing. What is the base foundation for poetry according to Heaney? The senses “…that its tang might quicken me…” and freedom “…in the clear light, like poetry or freedom.”
READ: Poem “Nothing Gold Can Stay” by Robert Frost. I love his poetry…but Hirshfield’s analysis is over complicated. For example: “Poems allow us not only to bear the tally and toll of our transience….” I feel Ms Hirshfield is trying to outdo the poets she’s discussing. In short: Nothing good lasts forever – colors change (“..nature’s first green is gold” ); the sun sets (…so dawn goes down to day”); and seasons change (…nothing gold can stay”). That’s it. That’s the poem.
READ: Finished Eliot Weinberger’s 34 essays “Essential Things” – The book was AWFUL! Skimmed 50%…while trying to sleep. I don’t know…but the book worked better than a sleeping pill!
READ: Finished first book for #20BooksOfSummer “The Story of Art Without Men” by Katy Hessel. I found this book during #NonFicNov23. It was good…but there is so much information about many female artists…it overwhelmed me.
Women Artists: Clara Peeters – Beautiful still life… flowers, fruit, cheese, bread, etc. Beautiful!
Women Artists: Very impressed with the painting of Sofonisba Angissola (1532 – 1625). Here is self-portrait of the artist (28 yr). Have a look on Wikipedia.org for more of the portraits she had done of her sisters, mother and many royals of Spain, Portugal and Austria.
Women Artists: But the hands down favorite for today’s reading is Lavinia Fontana (1552 – 1614) Just look the detail in the clothes of Bianca Degli Utili Maselli, holding a dog and surrounded by six of her children. Beautiful!
May 2024:
- Audrey or Sorrow – Marina Carr (play) 2024 – REVIEW
- If All the World and Love Were Young – Stephen Sexton (76 poems) – REVIEW
- Erasure – Percival Everett (Oscar winning film “American Fiction” based on this book) – REVIEW
- Ten Windows – J. Hirshfield (poetry analysis) – REVIEW
- Le Fauteuil hanté – Gaston Leroux (1909) mystery at L’Académie française – REVIEW
- An Elemental Thing – E. Weinberger (34 short essays) – REVIEW
- Paris – E. Zola (1894) – (pg 471/631) – READING
- James – P. Everett – REVIEW
- History of Art – K. Hessel – REVIEW
NancyElin 