write about the books that I'm reading

I’ve consistently written notes for myself about every book that I’ve read over 4 weeks ie read book, write notes, read book, write notes. NOT writing up 4 weeks of books in one go.

I might even start writing notes as I read, but hey, lets not get too ambitious. I’ll keep using Instiki, aka mabel, as a place to write up and keep the notes.

I’ve been reading mysteries, and I’ve told myself I’m not allowed to read another book until I’ve written them up, so I better do that quick smart! The last one I read was Murakami’s “Wild Sheep Chase”. Very cool.

Today I read Jean Rhys’ “After Leaving Mr Mackenzie” first published in 1930. It’s a fairly bleak book, and in some ways I don’t know that things have changed much for women . . . I’ll have to think about it and write properly. I’d like to compare it with other things written at the time, like Orwell’s “Down and out in Paris and London” and some of Waugh’s books, and Anthony Powell, and Woolf.

I should follow Amy’s suggestion and get a blog going! (Yes, another blog! but it might encourage me to write more consistently, and more to the point. With fewer fragments.)

I started on the new Penguin edition of Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations yesterday. I bought it because of the cover, it’s beautiful, red and black and embossed on roughish white card. In the first book he writes a little bit about what various people have taught him. In the second book he writes more about philosophy, and I don’t really understand what he’s on about, I’ll have to go over it again.

I don’t have the book with me, or I’d put in a quote. It’s very cool.

It’s part of the Penguin Great Ideas series, and the cover design has apparently won:

the second prize in the International Typography Awards, 2004, book cover category. Each title in the series is dressed in the lettering or typographic style of the period of its original publication.

The prestigious biennial International Society of Typographic Designers Awards are open to professional designers worldwide with the aim of assessing current standards of typographic design and acknowledging excellence in this field. The awards are unique in that they are the only international design awards judged purely from the standpoint of typographic design.

For more information on the award visit the International Society of Typographic Designers website at http://www.istd.org.uk

There you go.