Reading

I have a copy of The Well Educated Mind by Susan Bauer.  It’s another book of lists suggesting what books you should read to have a better knowledge of the so called western canon.  But the author goes  beyond just listing books and explains how to critically read literature, a skill that I was never taught anywhere in my education. Yet, when I got to university it was presumed I would know how to read Plato with no problem.  Um..no.  (ed. You bitter?)




A third edition of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die will be out in March 2010.  I’ve written about this book a number of times and I still think it’s great.  The blogger Arukiyomi has updated his spreadsheet for this book. The spreadsheet has a full list of the books so you can keep track of what you've read, plus links into Amazon for each book. You have to see this spreadsheet, its monumental, and evidently they put quite a lot of work into it. I still figure I would have to read about 5 of the listed books per month to get through the list.  Unlikely, given half my time is spent with a vicious online gambling addiction….
But you shouldn’t not try.

Sadly,  P.K. Page one of my favourite Canadian Poets passed away last week. Canadian post-war poetry was mostly dominated by men.  She competed well against the like of  Irving Layton, Leonard Cohen, Al Purdy, and many others.  She had a very unique voice and style.  She was also a visual artist, under her married name P.K. Irwin. I have a great admiration for all those who wrestle with words and create something lasting.  We see through a glass darkly. Please recommend this post

Sure I Read War and Peace...*Cough*

The BBC has conducted a survey of the books most people lie about having read. The top two are George Orwell's 1984 and Tolstoy's War and Peace.

It never occurred to me that people would lie about having read a book. It seems risky if the person you're talking to says what did you think about what Bolkonsky did on page 738? Then you're screwed.

I can sort of understand why people lie about War and Peace. Its one of those quantity over quality things. You read that huge book, wow your smart...lets have sex...

I tried to read War and Peace several times but I found it quite tedious and not a very engaging story. Sorry if you're Tolstoy fan. I generally dislike long novels, the exception being Lord of the Rings which I couldn't put down.

Orwell's 1984 puzzles me a bit more. You can read it in one sitting and its totally captivating. In Alberta most people had to read it in high school as I did. I re-read it a couple of years ago and found it far more interesting. Bush and Harper made it seem more prescient.

Other books on the list include James Joyce's Ulysses and Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary. I tried to read Ulysses but got lost in the plot. Call me a plump stately Buck Mulligan. All that shaving... My excuse for not reading Madame Bovary was my promise to myself that someday I would read it in the original French. Also I read Woody Allen's short story the Kugelmass Episode which kind of ruined it for me.

Try not to lie about the books you've not read. That kind of thing makes me crazy. Please recommend this post

Reading Writing

I updated my MySpace profile for the what you read section, which is as far as I can tell mostly underused on MySpace because they're all a bunch of hoodlums selling cannibis. I'm sorry that was uncalled for.

I didn't realize how difficult it was to write a short descriptive blip about what you've read and what you like to read.

Here's the work in progress that I know will be edited about a 100 more times before I stop obsessing about it:

Favorite reading so far: C.S. Lewis Surprised By Joy, Catch 22, Anything by Kurt Vonnegut Jr., especially Slaughterhouse 5, anything by Graham Greene, especially The Quiet American. The Book of Psalms. The Imitation of Christ. The Entire Shakespeare body but especially the cross-dressing comedies (And no i'm not into cross-dressing). Any kind of Poetry, but especially the romantic poets, T.S. Eliot and the War poets of ww1. Canadian Poets: Leonard Cohen, Irving Layton, P.K Page and Anne Michaels. I like Naomi Klein's political writing as well, even when she infuriates me which is what a good writer does. I loved William Buckley Jr's weekly columns even though I never agreed with a single one of his ideas. He was a beautiful gifted writer he was just on the wrong side.

I hate propaganda and things that insult my intelligence so I don't often read newspapers.

I journal a lot, stuff that no one will ever read. Its neurotic I know. I write on two blogs, one about technology and the other mostly about nonsense. I sometimes mix up the updates and confuse the readers. I write a lot of web content and technical docs for work but I enjoy it a lot so it doesn't seem like work.

By necessity I read a lot about technology, especially about software development. Fortunately there are a lot of good authors out there so its not as boring or dry as you might think.

I admit to being a geek. Guilty as charged.

I'd like to find a girlfriend who might read Shakespeare or some nice poetry to me while I lay (lie?) my head upon her lap. Not to much to ask is it?

Its only a start. Please recommend this post