I first encountered this book back in about grade seven or eight, when our class read it together. I remember liking it quite a bit, and also bring frustrated with the class’s pace in finishing it — most of the reading was done out loud, and I tended to get in trouble for not knowing where we were when it was my turn to read, because I was reading ahead. I remembered parts of the story, but certainly not the entirely of it, and so when I spotted it on BookMooch I snagged it right away. I’m all about the nostalgic reads.
How to Survive a Renaissance Drama
(A practical survival guide in case you should ever find yourself in a play written during the English Renaissance.)
1. Try to ascertain whether you are in a comedy or a tragedy: Comedies may feature cross-dressing, fairies, forests, crude sexual humour, and illicit romance. Tragedies may feature murder, incest, madness, gratuitously violent acts, crude sexual humour, and some seriously illicit romance.
If you’re trapped in a comedy, take heart: hardly anyone ever dies in a comedy. If you’re trapped in a tragedy, the rest of this guide may prove useful.
Dear Internet: Huh?
Recent search terms, because they amuse me:
how to talk paraguay languish I suspect that this means “how to talk paraguay language” which might be more usefully rewritten as “learn to speak Spanish” … or Guaraní. If you want to know how to talk to languishing Paraguayans, I probably can’t help you.
WHAT DO i DO WITH UNWANTED BOOKS PROBABLY YELLING IS NOT THE FIRST STEP. TRY LOOKING HERE INSTEAD. THANK YOU.
Review: The Bartimaeus Trilogy, by Jonathan Stroud
The Bartimaeus Trilogy comprises, unsurprisingly, three books: The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem’s Eye, and Ptolemy’s Gate. And, oh buddy, are they ever fantastic. This is probably the best fantasy series I’ve read in a long time, and though I think technically they’re YA books, all three are thoroughly enjoyable for adults.
The series takes place in an alternate England, where magic is predominant, rather than technology. The country (and the Empire, naturally) is ruled by an over-class of magicians, who call upon spirits to help maintain their iron rule. Those who we might know as politicians — Gladstone, Disraeli, Churchill, etc. — were in fact some of the most powerful magicians of their respective times.
Critique This Blog!
No, really.
As term draws to an end (at last) I am left to face the mountain of housework and other general upkeep things that tend to get pushed to the bottom of the to-do list when school gets busy. One of the things I’ve fallen behind on is this blog, not just in terms of updates but also in terms of design, navigation, archive management, etc.
So there’s some stuff to do — but of course, school has killed my brain, and I don’t remember what the half of it was. Which is where you come in.
In Memoria
Many of you will have already seen the post entitled Sad News posted on Dewey’s blog by her husband. She passed away last Tuesday.
I can’t pretend that I will miss Dewey in the same way that her family and (offline) friends will. But I respected and admired her, and I will miss her posts, her generosity, and her seemingly tireless enthusiasm for books and readers.
Dewey was the force behind Weekly Geeks and the semi-annual Read-a-Thons, as well as the Bookworms Carnivals. She was, I think, a true pillar of the book-blogging community.
In Lieu of Actual Content
. . . Here are some things that amuse me:
Reading Ulysses: Introductory Notes
I haven’t really mentioned it here before, but I’ve been reading James Joyce’s Ulysses this term, for one of my seminar classes. In some ways, I regret that I’m reading it now — not because it’s overly difficult or crazy, but because I’m finding it to be thoroughly enjoyable, and the rest of my schoolwork keeps getting in the way. I’d rather be reading Ulysses than writing yet another Hamlet paper. But life (and certainly not fourth year) does not progress that way, and so I’ve been squeezing it in as I’ve been able to, in chapters here and there.