dora ♡ > Recent Status Updates

reading this book as sappho intended (while listening to an ancient greek lyre playlist). god this is the best reading experience i’ve ever had i’m having the time of my life

starting from the beginning again i won’t give up at the long descriptions of new york this time i promise

oh my god do not start reading this book on a plane

sudden ending…

girl is it casual if the two of you are bonding over your shared ex together in a mental hospital and then she says “i like you. i like you better than buddy willard” and then you flashback to all the times you saw women at your college being with other women. and then she tells you she likes you again and then you tell her she makes you puke and then walk out of the room. leaving her there. on your bed

pulling this out of my bookshelf probably just to end up dnf-ing it again in a month. ONE DAY i will finish this book. unfortunately this short measly children’s book is a colossal challenge for me

i really can’t read chinese anymore, i’m trying to have the english and chinese versions side by side to compare as i read but the chinese is utterly incomprehensible to be even though it’s simplified

i love literary modernism i love modernist paintings i love modernist art movements of all shapes and sizes i’m so excited for this book

ivan leaving after that hell of a chapter that is “the grand inquisitor”… ivan pls don’t leave us you’re the most interesting part of the whole book :(
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anyways…i have Many thoughts about the grand inquisitor and ivan’s views on the devil + the 3 temptations in the gospels, i love ivan that was an INSANEEEEE chapter.

so i’m on book 5 chapter 4 “mutiny” aka “rebellion” in other translations, and ivan talking about the utopia that’s dependent on the suffering of a single child is CRAZY to me. i’ve done a debate inspired by ursula k le guin’s short story “the ones who walk away from omelas”, and i did NOT know that story is inspired by this book…and originally a discussion about RELIGION AND JESUS. LIKE WHAT.

“do not hate the atheists, the teachers of evil, the materialists, even the wicked among them” “o lord, save all of those for whom there is no one to pray, save even those who are unwilling to pray to you” “have no love of silver and gold, do not hoard” ELDER ZOSIMA SPITTING BARS ON HIS DEATHBED 😭😭 what a legend i love him

alyosha wanting to peacefully go about his day, but his elder is dying and his oldest brother is insane and might murder his dad and already beat the aforementioned dad half to death, and his second brother wants to see him to discuss aforementioned beating, and the injured dad himself wants to see him too, so does the oldest brother’s wife, and now a 14 year old girl is in love with him.
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GIVE HIM A BREAKKKK.

insaneinsaneinsane

ivan not believing in god itself but believing in the necessity of religion’s existence to uphold a moral society, even going insofar as to argue for a theocracy, is something so interesting to me and refreshing to read about. i loooove ivan.

this book is just dostoevsky arguing with himself

god: i’m bringing you out of slavery in egypt!
israelites: aww thank you! how should we express our eternal gratitude to you? should we make an altar or sacrifice a lamb or…?
god: don’t eat bread with yeast for 7 days.
israelites: ???? sorry what 😃😃
god: bread. no yeast. 7 days.

i should’ve been productive but instead i spent all day today obsessing over these semi-obscure roman statues that i may or may not be seeing during my italy trip next year.

there’s a group of 15 identical statues called the pasquino group and they either depict menelaus carrying patroclus OR ajax carrying achilles. and there are statue fragments in various museums AND I WANNA SEE THEM. SO MUCH.

my mom is like, how is the brothers karamazov going? and i’m still. on page one. 😃😃😃

“i can see them already, deep in the undergrowth,
deep in each other, mating like birds”
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YOU MEAN THE WOMEN????? 😭😭😭😭 DEEP IN EACH OTHER????? MATING LIKE BIRDS??? 😭😭😭😭😭😭
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i love euripides this is insane i love euripides

what if…you hate me…but i also make you mad (literally)…and you lock me up but i escape to find my way back to you…and i dress you like a woman and fix your hair…and you tell me you’re in my hands…and we’re cousins…
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(that was the worst sentence i have EVER written i’m deleting this tomorrow)

“we all compete for wealth and power,
and for every thousand hearts a thousand hopes.
some wither, some bear fruit.
but the one who lives from day to day,
finding good where he can:
he is happy—
he is a lucky man.”
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WTFFFF 😭😭 EURIPIDES SPROUTING PURE POETRY FROM 400 BC

dionysus: i am a god
pentheus: no you’re not! fuck you! i will kill you! rot in prison forever!!!! 😡😡
dionysus: but—
pentheus: FUCK YOUUUU 😡 ROT 😡😡😡😡
dionysus: …anyways do you want to watch a bunch of drunk women dance on the streets?
pentheus: ☺️☺️☺️ yeah! ☺️
dionysus: you have to put on a dress tho
pentheus: ewwwww what but i’m not a 🤮 woman 🤮

reading this play makes me want to write the secret history part 2 like seeing the vibes and bachanal stuff in this play i understand EXACTLY how donna tartt felt.

i don’t even like euripides. and i don’t even have time to read. but.

(i don’t even not-like euripides i’m just pettily biased against him because how dare he make medea murder her own children on purpose.)

started thinking about the oresteia way too hard, then the next thing i knew i wrote a 5k word story centred around iphigenia, chrysothemis, and elektra from greek mythology 😐😐 when i was supposed to be locking in 😐😐 for other stuff 😐😐😐

taking this book out of dnf because now that it’s summer i’m back on the classics grind (jk i attempt to read this book every year and always end up giving up)

it’s been a year but i FINALLY finished genesis. that was SO GOOD.

“If my mother was Hamas—unpredictable, impulsive, and frustrated at being stifled—my father was Israel. He’d refuse to meet her most basic needs until she exploded. Then he would point at her and cry, ‘Look at what a monster she is, what a terror!’ But never once did he consider why she had resorted to such extreme tactics, or his role in the matter.”

…that was ICONIC.

no more ap exams we are SO back