Maya :) > Recent Status Updates

i picked up this book to alternate with mirror (partly because i’m worried about my slow progress and partly because that book is arduous and seldom rewarding without guidance) i love essays and i can already tell that i’m going to adore this essayist, who is frank and vulnerable and for gods sake french. what more could one ask for? i expect to progress faster in this book than the other.

it’s an interesting read but it’s so heavy, very tiring to read on a tight deadline what was constructed across multiple generations

i’m loving this!!! the authors’ determination to emphasise the dialogue between them in the prose interlinks are so interesting and right up my alley! it makes you feel like you’re in the room with them while they’re composing

note: add 40 pages to whatever page you’re on bc goodreads doesn’t account for the intro

just finished the introduction, i can already tell it’s going to be a doozy but i’m excited if remarkably intimidated

i love these characters so much, and am fully prepared to stick with them for another 500 pages. i suspect that i’m not supposed to find mr fairlie quite as amusing as i do, but i just think he’s great. these characters propel the plot forward in a way which is wonderfully sympathetic for the reader. i am however already growing tired of the author’s fixation on women’s appearances and how beautiful they are.

i genuinely could not be more upset, could they not have at least died together???? and the last line spoken by arabella that STRUMPET…. every time she showed up i hoped she’d go away and she never did, it just kills me i cannot stand it how could they have married again? what a miserable miserable excellent book. i love when you can follow someone’s entire life through a novel, this was just so sad!

as much as i am really enjoying hardy’s writing and find the prose absolutely beautiful, there comes a point where you wonder how many bad things can plausibly happen to these people before you begin to perceive each tragedy as another blow on the already mounting load? there can only be so much sorrow in a book without relief before it begins to sound a little repetitive. all the same, i enjoy it.

i hate the victorians… please just fuck already

what’s really interesting is sue and her secularity, also how she’s been transformed from a bit of a wild card to a suffering, trapped woman. it’s clever of hardy that the reader can’t understand how things have turned out the way they did, which makes them even more tragic. in a strange way the bleakness of jude’s life makes it romantic, there’s always something dramatic and important happening.

i find that immersing myself in the context completely and following along with the author’s notions and intentions has been most rewarding in my reading, but i cannot help but feel slightly more sympathetic for arabella than hardy intends, but really only slightly. once again jude is so relatable to me which makes this a very resonant read. it’s really wonderful, i’m having a good time.

i really relate to the main character and i love the reflection on the paradoxical nature of god’s love because his creatures benefit from hurting each other.

the fact that you could tell what was going to happen made this book so much better, every moment was filled with an impending sense of doom. such a spooky, sickeningly eery story i absolutely loved it! hill has this skill of creating an atmosphere that really places you in the book, you really do feel fearful which isn’t common with books, it was a bit like watching a very good horror film, amazingly cinematic

i can’t believe i didn’t update as i was reading but read this summer, really really loved it, amazing exploration of the sublime and really exciting commentary on morality and beauty as a corrupting force. i also really liked really vivid exploration of olfactory senses since it’s something i relate to quite specifically. also the inherent ability for humanity to identify an other (good or bad) very cool!

I really enjoyed being inside the mind of the mad woman, watching the deterioration from within is usually something reserved for male protagonists in the Gothic so this was refreshing and somewhat more complex. I do think that the gender commentary was commonplace for modern times but obviously for its own time period it was probably radical. I liked this! really good ending, and very sad more than anything else.

some fun themes but really basic and not very stylistically interesting or conceptual. seems like her poetry is largely constrained by the need to cultivate an image.

really enjoyed this book, a lot more than what i was expecting, elaborated on problems in a culture which i know nothing about so it was really interesting from both a fictional and non fictional perspective. a really well crafted work of literature that i think deserves more attention. do wish there had been more consistent exploration of symbol of virgin mary but i might just be a sucker for religious imagery

not as useful as i thought it would be for my essay prompt, but still very interesting and offered an unexpected amount of practical writing advice for writers. the introduction which explained aristotle’s view that the writer is a methodical craftsman and not some sort of intuitive genius who gets possessed by a muse really helps to contextualise his approach to poetry. i enjoyed it, even if i didn’t agree.

one of the most structurally intriguing books i’ve read, i really enjoyed her unconventional (if unsubstantiated) interpretations of penelope and the maids, as well as incorporating modern culture into ancient myth. my favourite narrative form was definitely the court case to criticise the prevalence of victim blaming in modern culture, using the maids to question how much better we are than our predecessors.

i’ve finished this book once, but i always like to read poetry collections multiple times to pick up on themes and motifs. so far, some of the imagery is very pretty but equally quite repetitive. there are a few poems that have substance but there are others which are clearly aesthetic oriented and quite poised. i think she’s still coming into herself as a poet and learning to write unrestrained by expectation.

things i’m enjoying so far:
maintaining the classical philosophy that immortals are foolish and shallow because their time is endless
it’s not got the same sentiment of feminine empowerment that a lot of depictions of circe have, there is definitely that element but it’s explored in a more complex/interesting way which doesn’t feel like pandering
loads of references to homeric metaphor,playing with language

what a shame that i only enjoyed this book at the end. ferrante admits that the best writers let go of their identity entirely and become something else through their writing, just as dante attempts to become the voice of a woman through his Beatrice. writing helps us become and understand the experiences of others, it is not about the individual because it is inherently a dialogue between writer and reader.

the most interesting depiction of vampirism i’ve ever read, really lays down the folklore for the more sexually suggestive scenes in the book which i think is important. it was constantly refreshing to realise that this is a book from 1872 which centres around a passionate romance between two girls, certainly not something you’d expect to see. i’d love to learn more about the history of this book, loved it.

i would like to conjure mary shelley’s spirit, make a pot of tea and absolutely Dissect this book with her like it’s an autopsy. this book gave me even more reasons to adore gothic literature and i will never ever stop coming back for more. there are so many ways to examine this work but the next time i read it i will do so solely for pleasure, because while i certainly enjoyed myself it deserves another reading.

i think i’m pretty much clear on what i’m speaking about in my essay, so i’ll make a note about personal enjoyment: this is one of the best books i have ever read, i want to use a ouija board to have a conversation with mary shelley about classical reception in this book, because it is just genius. one thing which did kind of fall flat is E’s death… seemed like it was written by a male writer. but very good