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Alicia

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Alicia is Currently Reading

Alicia is currently reading

The Long Weekend/The Reader Over Your Shoulder

by Robert Graves

bookshelves: history, currently-reading

Reading for the 2nd time

read in October 2012

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Alicia said: " Finding a good book is a study in serendipity. I have a bookish pen pal who loves travel books and who introduced me to Patrick Leigh Fermor, the polymath author of the trilogy about a 1938 walk from England to Constantinople (A Time of Gifts, etc). Finding a good book is a study in serendipity. I have a bookish pen pal who loves travel books and who introduced me to Patrick Leigh Fermor, the polymath author of the trilogy about a 1938 walk from England to Constantinople (A Time of Gifts, etc). Fermor lead us to thoughts of the years between the WWI and WWII. [Side note: Fermor is more than a little fascinating both as a intellectual and an adventurer, a pal of Nancy Mitford and a very handsome devil.] I lean towards history and my pal leans towards travel. The two interests intersect more than a little. I am especially lucky because my correspondent is very well read, demanding of his authors and our senses of humor usually coincide.

He highly recommended A Road to Oxiana, by Robert Byron--a 1933 trip through (then) Persia and Afghanistan. In cruising the net to find a source for Oxiana, I stumbled across Bright Young Things--an episodic telling of those British children of privilege (financial and lineal) who made an art of outrageousness and still managed often enough to to produce work of literary merit and usefulness. [Imagine today's celebrity press, then add an Oxford education.] It turns out that Robert Byron was a Bright Young Thing. Oxiana was intended to be a survey of ancient architecture but ends up being, at times, a hilarious view of the Shah's fumbled efforts at modernization and the terrors of travel, and, at times, a highly opinionated view of architecture. But while looking around, I found The Long Week-End.

It is a social history of Great Britain 1918-1939. Robert Graves is poet, author (I Claudius) and another polymath, a fairly major figure of British letters. I hadn't heard of Alan Hodge, his co-author, except that Graves ended up taking Hodge's wife as his own third wife. [Thanks, Wikipedia]. This book is deft discussion of the political ferment, labor at rest and unrest, social trends, books and plays, new technologies and their impact on the country, as well as a survey of philosophical and religious eruptions. The book overall is a survey with odd little digressions. (I couldn't understand the extended discussion of TE Lawrence until I found out elsewhere the Graves had written a book about his friend. Lawrence turns out to be more than Lawrence of Arabia.) It is a fascinating overview. The Long Weekend does give what feels like an authentic accounting of the 'life and times' -- and every time I put it down and pick up the newspaper [that is, cruise the net for news], parallels leap out. The book is historical, but it is the reader, not the authors, that bring a sense of foreboding. The preface tells us the book was finished as the Dunkirk evacuation was taking place (June 1940) and their sources generally newspapers, but it is impossible to imagine their own impressions and experiences are not reflected. It is smoothly assembled, and a comfortable read. It also has lots of little discoveries ("Dame" --equivalent to being a Knight, e.g., Dame Judi Dench --was invented during WWI or so to allow honors to be given to women. Insert dry comment here.)

Traditionally, historians failed to give sufficient weight to the 'mood of the nation' or the seemingly minor events that shape a nation and its eventual political actions. Social psychology and influences of the times do much -- if not everything -- to influence the choices and determine the outcome of the events set in motion by political leadership. This view has increasingly gained credence in the treatment and assessment of history. The Long Weekend should go on the shelf of the next author attempting a treatment of 20th century western history.

So I meant to read a travel book but now find myself looking forward to the next two chapters: 'The Depression' and then 'Pacifism, Nudism, Hiking'. How can I not be hooked? ...more "

Nov 10, 2012 03:52PM · see review

Alicia is currently reading

Don Quixote

by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

bookshelves: currently-reading

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Alicia said: " I am 'currently reading" Don Quixote in the same sense that I am currently a cat owner. We live in the same house and we interact from time to time. (In the cat's case, it is at her whim.) I stole this book from my son who was a philosophy major but I am 'currently reading" Don Quixote in the same sense that I am currently a cat owner. We live in the same house and we interact from time to time. (In the cat's case, it is at her whim.) I stole this book from my son who was a philosophy major but I can tell from the binding that evidence is good he never actually finished the book. I also made a conscious decision a while back to try to read literature's foundation authors that I might have missed, a sort of bucket list decision.

I am not enthralled.

I try hard, when reading books written long ago, to cast off my modern impedia-- I try to place myself, if I can, in the shoes worn by the author's contemporaries. So for this one, I imagined myself being a Lady of Spain, figuring that the literate book owners were more likely to be the aristocracy (or clergy). The odds probably drop for there having been lots of literate ladies, but there is only so much I can do for verisimilitude. I assumed that long books that meander were more desired because, lacking the internet and being a lady of leisure, I had time to kill. I tried hard not to demand linear plotting -- or much plotting-- and I assumed there would be references I would not get having only a hazy grasp of Spanish history. I assumed the definitions of 'polite behavior' and 'social norms' would be different for a literate lady of long ago. Being 'the first novel,' I assume that Cervantes didn't have the advantage of professors of literature and lessons in deconstruction or the proper use of metaphors to teach him the tricks of trade: he is the progenitor, not the pupil. I am not at all sure it is possible to completely cast off one's prejudices from a lifetime of reading (plot, subtlety, language use, having a point as well as a theme seem to be more modern demands) but, honest, I'm trying.

I am still bored silly. The poor Don is a lost soul, running afoul of circumstances that are not only unlikely but (modern sensitivities intrude)just sad. I am not a fan of slapstick, so some moments that others might find funny fall flat for me. The real time it takes for the reader to get from here to there seems to about equal the time it took the Don, step by limping step.

I stole the book from my son because it is a Classic, because no one who claims to be well read can admit to not reading it (that is, because of imagined peer pressure) and because it must be a Classic for a reason that I can grasp. I'm here to learn. So far, it is Cervantes 1, me 0. But I still periodically pick it up and read for a bit, propelled by the idea it must be good for me. I am certain the failures are all mine, but still, this is going to be on the "currently reading" list for a long time. ...more "

May 13, 2012 01:35PM · see review

Alicia’s Quotes

“Human kind is made up of two sexes, women and men. Is it possible that a mass is improved by the improvement of only one part and the other part is ignored? Is it possible that if half of a mass is tied to earth with chains and the other half can soar into skies?”
― Mustafa Kemal Atatürk

tags: inspirational, rights, women

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