read more classic literature

Hiroshima by John Hersey.
A slim book, a copy of which I found in my parents’ attic, probably stashed there since 1946 when it was first published, bought and read.
The style of Hersey’s writing lent itself to the dogged living and suffering of the book’s subjects. The tone of the book is faithful to real-life Japanese culture and society. It was easy to think I was just reading some strict narrative until Hersey began to draw subtle conclusions about the ethics of “throwing two billion gold dollars into an important wartime gamble.” It was something only the U.S. could do.
I also found that I really wanted to know what happened to Miss Sasaki and Father Kleinsorge, Mrs. Nakamura and Reverend Tanimoto in the aftermath of the bombing and immediate recovery, after the telling of this story ended. They were real people whose stories, great and small, were made real and important, whose lives extended beyond the tragedy of Hiroshima. Hersey made me see the tragedy of the event but also the humanity of it and the people and culture and world it affected.

This was much more readable than I thought it would be! I really got into it. I always wanted to read Dracula at Halloween-time and so this year, I just did it (though, of course, it took me all November to actually finish it). It was scary and funny and fast-paced. In fact, I started The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman somewhere in there and kept thinking about Dracula so I just took Dovekeepers back to the library and finished Dracula. (I used to really like Alice Hoffman and this book got good reviews but it was super annoying and not just because Dracula was calling me…just annoying on its own.)
So, highly recommend Dracula!

Enough said.
Again, I read an old copy that I found at my mom and dad’s house and it turned out to be my great-grandfather’s copy. I liked imagining him reading it, too.

I guess this is classic literature, classic Russian literature. While I appreciated the historic importance of the book (the introduction to my edition was the most interesting part of the book!) I can’t rave over the actual book.

I did like the imagery in the book, the witches and the humor of the cat…the atmosphere of secrecy and celebration. The chapters about Pontius Pilate were interesting, too but it seemed I had to wade through a lot to get to the good parts.

I like reading introductions after I read the book especially when I know they will be explanatory and this time was no exception. The introduction really brought the story and the history into perspective but, unfortunately, it didn’t make me reconsider the book in any revelatory way!

Wow.
This starts out slow but, like every great book, if you stick with it, you end up loving it. There came a time when I could not put this book down, when I cried silently over Ma and Tom and Ruthie and Rose of Sharon. But I could not cry long for them because they did not cry for themselves. This was a novel of devastating lows and yet, in their own way, very hopeful highs. I don’t need to know what happened to the Joads after the book ended because I know that they made it, somehow.
The Grapes of Wrath also spoke to me on an environmental and political level. It seems that era marked the beginning of what farmers still struggle with today. The dying of small farms and farmers with the onset of technology is directly related to issues that are important to me right now. As the co-owner of a family farm that, in many ways, has entirely bought into modern farming, but yet also someone who is more and more aware of how that affects the environment, our health and wallets and businesses, this book really opened up yet another level of my thinking.

This goal is so worth it. I feel as if I have to make myself pick up books that I know I should read but don’t always seem appealing. Yet (except for Wuthering Heights!) I have been rewarded. I think I will go back and read the introduction to Grapes and learn more about these people and that time. It will stay with me a long while…

Well. I suppose it is a classic. And no one said all classics were going to be easy to read or even satisfying. I suppose. And while I did enjoy the gothic and ghostly elements of this book, they were too few and far between to keep me that interested. The real problem for me, besides the aforementioned unwieldy size of the actual book, was the skipping around of the narrative. I wasn’t sure, especially toward the end, who was telling this story anymore…and I almost didn’t care. My main goal became to finish it and so that’s what I worked for.
This particular edition also contains Jane Eyre and I’d thought I move right on to it but I think I need a break from this sort of dark and dense reading…

So I finished The Call of the Wild last night and it was quite un-put-downable and surprisingly easy to read. What a good story. I think what made it even more enjoyable was that the copy I read was a 1903 edition I found at my parents’ house that belonged to my grandpa and his brothers and in fact has their surname written in the front. Also, one of them, when reading it, must have scribbled notes in the margins and they were like little treasures to find. One part of the book describes how Buck played with some fellow dogs and one of my great-uncles or my grandpa scrawled at the side: “Old Pard did that.” At another spot, a protective dog licks Buck, like a mother and someone has jotted at the side: “Just as little Teddy licked old Pard.”
So my grandpa’s childhood dogs were named little Teddy and old Pard! What a gem of a find! I love it.

I started Wuthering Heights after that but I only read the first chapter. It is part of a collection of Bronte books in one bigger book so not as easy to curl up with and lose yourself…

I just finished Animal Farm yesterday. What an appropriate story for our recently passed era.
Then I started The Call of the Wild and am already halfway through it. I had forgotten how good a good story can be.

God, when you read a lot of so-so books and writing like I have been, it is just so downright wonderful to read something amazing like this. I want to read it again right away! Not only did it bring back wonderful memories of Paris (I was at some of the places he hangs out in!) but it was re-inspiration for sticking to some writing routines. There were fascinating stories of famous writers that Hemingway drank with and coddled and looked up to. And it was just a good story, too, in addition to being autobiographical. I think it was coupland who recommended this to me (I can’t tell now b/c once I clicked on the button indicating that I consumed this, the recommendation suggestion disappeared…) so many thanks to him. It was perfect.
Hopefully, I will be reading a lot more worthwhile writing. This is why they’re called classics. This book will stick with me and most likely be reread.

I coasted through. I went to a fairly good college and majored in English where it was just assumed that I actually did all the reading I was supposed to do, was assigned to do. But I just couldn’t see how that could be done. There was so much else to do – parties, friends, meetings, shows, other classes, papers, tunnels to explore! And I spent four nights a week in the library! Literally. I hated my housemate junior and senior year and so I spent every night at the library from about 5 until like 10. Yeah, the other nights, I’d go out, but… I’d see all these other people spending hours and hours in the commons talking and eating and laughing – when did they study? So I just thought they must not be actually doing the work for the classes, just blowing off what they can get away with… maybe… I should have read so much more of what I was supposed to. Even after college, I started reading crap. I don’t mean Danielle Steele or anything that bad but I didn’t read anything worth reading, nothing I remember now. I read complusively but now I’m going to start reading things that are worth reading…