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Home >> Poetry & Literature >> What book are you reading?

11.01.2008, 21:54 quote

Chet24
Chet24 Joined: 20 Mar 2007 Posts: 11976 Location: United Kingdom, England, London
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David Gemmell - The first Chronicles of Druss

A book about hero wielding a deadly axe called Snaga
_________________
It's always times like these,
When I think of you And I wonder,
If you ever think of me?

 
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13.01.2008, 12:19 quote

Anonymous

paganpoetry wrote:
Eek! - one of the reasons why I love secondhand books so much is that you can try and puzzle out what's behind inscriptions, or read other people's margin comments - there's a whole story to the book itself to do with its previous owners.

But that's a story I wouldn't be in a hurry to discover.....


It`s always telling when dense and thorough margin notes start to thin out, then disappear altogether, as students lose patience or interest in a book. Any copy of Plato`s Republic should prove my point!

Today I am reading "Cases and Materials on Employment Law, 6th Edition", by Richard Painter and Ann Holmes, their gripping follow-up to "5th Edition".

 
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13.01.2008, 18:02 quote

Anonymous

Jane Green - Second Chance

 
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13.01.2008, 20:52 quote

Anonymous

John Donne - Selected Poems

 
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13.01.2008, 23:56 quote

Anonymous

Not really reading per se, more like dipping into before bedtime -- the history of the kings and queens of England and Scotland. Quite gossipy/interesting as opposed to just dates and names.

 
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15.01.2008, 16:27 quote

Anonymous

I've finally found a copy of Moby Dick that isn't the size of a breeze-block. I have no intention of reading it again though. Life's too short. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure that I've even read it once. It's just one of those stories that's so familiar that you assume you have.

I also bought Selected Short Stories by Maupassant. He caught syphilis (which used to be compulsory for artistic Frenchmen) and died young.

 
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15.01.2008, 21:03 quote

Anonymous

Evil Cults-various authors.

 
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17.01.2008, 16:37 quote

Anonymous

Nixy69 wrote:
Evil Cults-various authors.


Evil cults? UKIP, Liverpool FC and The Robbie Williams Fan Club are top of my list.

I've started reading Maupassant's short stories, but they are awful. Perhaps they lose something in the translation?

 
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20.01.2008, 16:13 quote

Anonymous

went to the library today and got

Notorious, the life of Ingrid Bergman... i love reading about stars of the old silver screen, they are so much more interesting than today's 'stars'.

 
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22.01.2008, 15:39 quote

paganpoetry

bayle wrote:
I've finally found a copy of Moby Dick that isn't the size of a breeze-block. I have no intention of reading it again though. Life's too short. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure that I've even read it once. It's just one of those stories that's so familiar that you assume you have.


Moby Dick is the one book that defeated me and the ridiculous thing is that I still feel guilty that I never finished it. I'm not trying again though, trying to read it felt like chewing woodchip wallpaper....

Currently reading Georgina Howell's biography of Gertrude Bell, Daughter of the Desert. What a woman, the stuff she achieved in a time when women were supposed to be fragile decorative creatures languishing on chaise longues smelling of lavender water. I mean, she did use lavender water - but out among the Bedouin tribes in the middle of Iraq! Total girl power and about 81 years before the Spice Girls

It's a really good read - sometimes biographies can be a bit dry or stilted but this is a cracker!

 
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22.01.2008, 18:11 quote

Anonymous

My mum is currently reading Gertrude Bell - I had never heard of her - and has promised to lend me her book when she's finished. Sounds truly fascinating, I loved Wilfred Thesiger but....a woman?? WOW!!

 
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22.01.2008, 20:02 quote

Anonymous

paganpoetry wrote:
Moby Dick is the one book that defeated me and the ridiculous thing is that I still feel guilty that I never finished it. I'm not trying again though, trying to read it felt like chewing woodchip wallpaper....


My record for giving up on a book is still "The Ambassadors" by Henry James. I stopped about two-thirds of the way down the first page when I realised that I was still reading the first sentence. A bad case of verbal diarrhoea.

 
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02.02.2008, 14:34 quote

paganpoetry

Just finished reading Elizabeth Gaskell's Mary Barton for my Victorian Literature module. Isn't it funny the difference it can make to your enjoyment of a book when you're reading it because you HAVE to? I love Gaskell, think she's got far more depth to her than Austen, whom I also love, and Gaskell's Cranford and Wives and Daughters are firm favourites. Mary Barton was good, but it just didn't feel the same, somehow....

Just for light relief I am reading Sodomy and The Pirate Tradition by B.R Burg Raises some dead interesting points - they were all at it, and buccaneer sexuality was totally different to that of other all-male institutions like prisons with their attendant regimented structure of rules and oppressive supervision - it flourished in a society in which homosexuality was not just tolerated, was the norm and conditions encouraged its practice.

Sheds a new light on the traditional stereotype of your dashing pirate ready to ravish any woman within 3,ooo fathoms.... Twisted Evil

 
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02.02.2008, 15:11 quote

Anonymous

paganpoetry wrote:
Just for light relief I am reading Sodomy and The Pirate Tradition by B.R Burg


Now wouldn`t that old Yellow Pages advert have been far more entertaining if, instead of J.R. Hartley looking for `Fly Fishing`, we`d had B.R. Burg trying to track down an original copy of `Sodomy and the Pirate Tradition`?

I`m currently reading `Philosophy of Law`, by Raymond Wacks, by the way.

 
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05.02.2008, 21:45 quote

paganpoetry

bayle wrote:
paganpoetry wrote:
Just for light relief I am reading Sodomy and The Pirate Tradition by B.R Burg


Now wouldn`t that old Yellow Pages advert have been far more entertaining if, instead of J.R. Hartley looking for `Fly Fishing`, we`d had B.R. Burg trying to track down an original copy of `Sodomy and the Pirate Tradition`?

I`m currently reading `Philosophy of Law`, by Raymond Wacks, by the way.


What's even better is when you get an unassuming, nondescript middle-aged man who comes in regularly looking for everything by Belle De Jour and the Marquis De Sade. Made my day when he asked for The Vagina Monologues, very quietly, and I had to ask him to speak up..... I didn't really, I'm just rather mean...

Having booked to go see Tosca in the amphitheatre in Verona in July, I am currently reading everything I can about Italy - so looking forward to two weeks wandering round Tuscany and Venice and Lake Garda. Very Happy

Just read the three books that Marlena de Blasi has written about moving to Italy. She's a chef, so there's lots of food and recipes in them, she's also a bit of a whimsical creature - hard to describe in a way that won't make her out to be annoyingly New Age, but they're worth a read.

Her take is interesting on the experience of an American woman marrying a Venetian then going to live in Tuscany. I really enjoyed them anyway Razz

 
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