What are you reading tonight?

Dave Sutton's barnet · Post by **Dave Sutton's barnet** » Fri May 15, 2009 10:48 am

Classic bog-book Grumpy Old Men: New Year, Same Old Crap by David Quantick. Man's got a brilliant way with words, and is also a nice chap to boot (once spent a very long coach journey with mutual friends).

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Fri May 15, 2009 12:17 pm

[quote="Lord Kangana"]My experience of Shakespeare is mostly school quote]

Didn't realise you were that old! What was he like?

Sorry I have already got my coat!

Verbal · Post by **Verbal** » Fri May 15, 2009 12:57 pm

Has anybody read The Road?

If so, you will be interested to know that the movie adaptation is out in October.

Trailer here.

http://the-road--trailer.blogspot.com/

Prufrock · Post by **Prufrock** » Fri May 15, 2009 5:28 pm

William the White wrote:Oh yeah - I'd forgotten the MI5 link... And, of course that ill-educated poor provincial actor Will S was not clever enough to have written those plays...

Thanks for reminding me, Pru...

Which of Marlowe's plays do you like?

Oh, and Will wrote great comedies... do not traduce! The mechanicals scene in Midsummer Night's Dream has had me weeping with laughter... Comedy of Errors practically invents farce as a form...

Got given a book with four in when I was about 15. Both Tamberlaines, Faustus, and another I forgot the name of. Couldn't put it down. I know folk say it's not the same reading as seeing, but I have a good imagination, and nearly all plays I've seen live have been greek ones anyways. Loved his way with words, and much as I admired Ovid in Roman times, and the punk movement in the late 70's, I admire the way he doesn't give a feck about rules and conventions. Dr F particularly.

Also, for those interested (not that many I'm guessing) there's a theatre in Oxford that every year puts on a greek play, in greek. Vague subtitles above so you can follow the plot, but I found it very enjoyable.

Di Stefano · Post by **Di Stefano** » Fri May 15, 2009 10:17 pm

TANGODANCER wrote:
Lord Kangana wrote:My experience of Shakespeare is mostly school (the same for everyone?) .
Just before I left school we went to see Romeo and Juliet (the Olivia Hussy version) I fell in love with Juliet (who must be either a pensioner or dead by now)

She was only 15 when she made that, which makes her about the same age as you, I reckon! So Tango - which are you, pensioner or dead?

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Fri May 15, 2009 10:52 pm

Olivia Hussey

hisroyalgingerness · Post by **hisroyalgingerness** » Fri May 15, 2009 10:53 pm

Glamorama by Brett Easton Ellis. First book read by this author. 3rd way through, very promising

Dujon · Post by **Dujon** » Sat May 16, 2009 12:00 am

Is it not funny how experience shapes one's view of literature? My view of Shakespeare as a writer was initially formed by the curricula of my various schools and their teachers. Hardly a good start I can assure you.

If facts are indeed facts he produced in just a few productive years (about 20) 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems (data mined via Wikipedia). I would suggest that even the best of the best of modern authors or playwrights could not match him for output. Nevertheless we pupils have been subjected to a phrase by phrase analysis of his writings and the inevitable, but totally groundless, opinion on what the venerable bard meant as he penned his manuscripts under the light of a whale oil lantern, or even on the banks of the Avon where the sun shines brightly each and every day, using a goose quill and a pot of ink.

TANGODANCER · Post by **TANGODANCER** » Sat May 16, 2009 12:18 am

Di Stefano wrote:
TANGODANCER wrote:
Lord Kangana wrote:My experience of Shakespeare is mostly school (the same for everyone?) .
Just before I left school we went to see Romeo and Juliet (the Olivia Hussy version) I fell in love with Juliet (who must be either a pensioner or dead by now)
She was only 15 when she made that, which makes her about the same age as you, I reckon! So Tango - which are you, pensioner or dead?

Must be getting my dates mixed up a bit (no new thing these days, memory's not what it was

). Thought it was much earlier than that. I looked it up and she was apparently born in 1951 so she's about fifty eight now and suffers from agraphobia. Makes me eleven years older so it can't have been a school thing. I know I saw the film at the Odeon in Bolton as part of some organised outing or other and it was love/lust at first sight. I think it lasted a long time.

Prufrock · Post by **Prufrock** » Sat May 16, 2009 6:14 am

TANGODANCER wrote:
Di Stefano wrote:
TANGODANCER wrote:
Lord Kangana wrote:My experience of Shakespeare is mostly school (the same for everyone?) .
Just before I left school we went to see Romeo and Juliet (the Olivia Hussy version) I fell in love with Juliet (who must be either a pensioner or dead by now)
She was only 15 when she made that, which makes her about the same age as you, I reckon! So Tango - which are you, pensioner or dead?
Must be getting my dates mixed up a bit (no new thing these days, memory's not what it was ). Thought it was much earlier than that. I looked it up and she was apparently born in 1951 so she's about fifty eight now and suffers from agraphobia. Makes me eleven years older so it can't have been a school thing. I know I saw the film at the Odeon in Bolton as part of some organised outing or other and it was love/lust at first sight. I think it lasted a long time.

She were pretty, I'll give her that. Not seen anywhere near enough theatre live. It's 'uncool' nowadays, and whilst that's wrong, I don't really wanna pay 40 squid to go on my own.

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Sat May 16, 2009 11:15 pm

Poor Olivia, my partner suffers from agraphobia too and its vile

William the White · Post by **William the White** » Fri May 22, 2009 11:45 am

At last, another book leaves the Shelf of Shame. Near the end of May, and I've only managed to finish two.

This was defintely worth it though. Sebastian Barry's The Secret Scripture tells two stories, interweaving them throughout the text, and, finally, in a real surprise brings them together. Both stories are told in the form of private/secret writing.

Our two central characters are Dr Grene, a psychiatrist aged 65, about to retire, in charge of an old, grim Irish mental hospital, that is about to close and be demolished. The patients are leaving, for various destinations. His wife has died recently, his whole world is spinning. He writes a diary, attempting to come to grips with a life that has lost its two points of focus - marriage and work.

The oldest patient, almost 100 years, is Roseanne, who has been incarcerated for more than 60 years, and, in secret, is writing her memoirs, hiding them beneath a floorboard.

This is certainly a literary novel, spanning close to a century of fragmented and violent Irish history, the small village life, the iron rule of a reactionary priesthood, the repressive culture, the civil war, the violence, the poverty. And the central story revolves around Roseanne's transgression of that culture. And what happens to her.

Emotionally powerful, written with a love of language, highly poetic on occasions. No laughter. But a very good book.

William the White · Post by **William the White** » Sun May 31, 2009 8:27 pm

Book no 3 comes off the shelf of shame. Bought it more than two years ago, and left it unopened.

'The Book of Fathers' by the Hungarian writer Miklos Vamos looks like being a Central European family chronicle. I've finished the first chapter, and am captured. Set in 1705, and a tale of massacre and survival in a Hungary plagued by civil war and marauding bandits.

And a celebration af language and writing. And the 'gift' of clairvoyance.

My guess is we are going to go down the generations in a story of survival and magic through generations of historical disaster in Hungary/Austria/Germany.

Very good start... more when I finish!

Bruno · Post by **Bruno** » Sun May 31, 2009 8:29 pm

Re-reading Graysmith's ZODIAC

Prufrock · Post by **Prufrock** » Sun May 31, 2009 9:44 pm

Just finished a recommendation from Mr WTW. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell (not that one). Enjoyed it very much. Starts of very strangely with six short stories that seem to be unconnected, then the first five are resumed in reverse order and it all comes together. Interesting and easy to read around the idea of the will to power.

seanworth · Post by **seanworth** » Mon Jun 01, 2009 11:20 am

Burma: The river of lost footsteps by Myint U

About half way through and it is an utterly fascinating historical account of Burma. It puts Burmese history into perspective, and also brings up his personal family history. He has done (so far at least) a good to try to be as objective as possible. One doesn't get bogged down with unfamiliar names and events. While I don't know his conclusions, one can get an idea why this country is in such a mess.

Dujon · Post by **Dujon** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 1:24 am

I might check that out, seanworth, given that I'm reasonably close to both Thailand and coalition known as Myanmar. Of course Aung San Suu Kyi keeps the place in the news by various means so perhaps it might help me to understand why she does so as opposed to how she manages it. The latest seems to be some American swimming across her backyard swimming pool (a lake, I believe) for reasons unknown which has resulted in her now being incarcerated - again - rather than 'just' under house arrest.

On another tack:

I am part way through reading Charles Dickens' Pickwick Papers. Once again I find that I was influenced by my Eng. Lit. tutors for leading me astray: how dry they made his writings. To be honest I cannot remember the texts laid out for the studies of students of my class but poor old Charlie, not unlike Hathaway's Billy, left me looking out of my school windows counting trucks and recording the maker, model and configuration of each as they made their elephantine progress on the road, just fifty yards away, and which went about their unfathomable business along one of the highways of this man's imagination.

I shall refrain from further comment until such time as I can finish this writing, although it is short in time till I should return the book to the local library or can plead of an extension.

H. Pedersen · Post by **H. Pedersen** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 3:49 am

Between twice-weekly physical therapy and 20 minute subway commutes I've been tearing through books over here. Gets expensive to buy English books but with any luck I can sell some of them back when I leave. Right now I'm working on As I Lay Dying by Faulker, which is excellent.

Tried to read Gravity's Rainbow by Pynchon. Got 40 pages in and realized it's a pompous, intentionally confusing waste of space.

Verbal · Post by **Verbal** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:14 am

Trying to finish 'Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets' by David Simon. Great book, and even though i'm only halfway through it at 300+ pages, it doesn't drag at all.

Prufrock · Post by **Prufrock** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 1:30 pm

H. Pedersen wrote:Between twice-weekly physical therapy and 20 minute subway commutes I've been tearing through books over here. Gets expensive to buy English books but with any luck I can sell some of them back when I leave. Right now I'm working on As I Lay Dying by Faulker, which is excellent.

Tried to read Gravity's Rainbow by Pynchon. Got 40 pages in and realized it's a pompous, intentionally confusing waste of space.

Here's you....................... XXX
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