Sometimes I think it's so unfair that a book that I have every intention of hating turns out to be really good. Case in point Native Son. It was written in the 1930s as a protest novel to the treatment of African Americans and the author said he wrote it to make you feel it in your gut. He didn't want to write a book that bankers' daughters could read, cry over, and then go to lunch. He wanted something that would change people's lives.
And this book did. I can't say too much about it without giving everything away, but if you don't like blood and violence you shouldn't read this book. I had to read it in the library because I refused to associate it with my apartment because I would never be able to sleep again if I did (luckily my professor had warned us that it was graphic and would cause nightmares). So I was dead set on hating it after reading the first 2 sections. The main character just made me so angry and I did not like him at all and I felt no sympathy for him whatsoever. But then I read the last section, and everything changed. Sure I didn't like the guy a whole lot, but I came to understand him a lot more.
And even though this book was written to protest the treatment of African Americans so many decades ago, I couldn't help but think about how it still applies. How each of us contributes to the creation of another person (not in the parent/procreative aspect, but in shaping a person's beliefs and attitudes). Every interaction we have with a person affects the rest of their life. If we continually treat someone poorly they will remember it. Even if its just the guy that gives us our food at McDonalds, our treatment of him affects him. You cannot have an interaction with someone without it affecting their life. So give that a thought. The next time you're in a bad mood and don't want to talk to the guy next to you on the bus, or in the elevator with you, just think about what you want to be accountable for... and try to make that person's day a little better.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Friday, February 27, 2009
It's Killing Me...
So since and including Christmas I've gotten about ten new novels and I haven't had time to read ANY of them. Every night I look longingly at my bookshelf and think about how badly I want to read one of them and not have to think about what I'm going to say in class about it the next day. I love school, but I really love the summer when I can just read to my heart's content. Even though I'm so happy that I'm getting married this summer and that Andy isn't going to be doing EFY I really loved all the time I had last summer to just read and delve into books again.
Growing up I was always reading... sometimes a book or two a day during the summer. Sure I had friends, but I tended to ignore them during the summer in favor of my books. Then summer after graduation I quit reading. I spent all summer playing with my friends from work and doing absolutely nothing. Then the summer after freshman year I spent playing with my roommates and the people in my ward. Don't get me wrong, I loved it, but I really loved last summer and connecting with myself again and realizing why it is that I want to be a librarian. I love books. I love how they teach you so many things and take you out of the world for a little bit. One of the books I read for class described it perfectly. Reading is a little piece of paradise to help you deal with the awful reality of life (or something like that). Ever since school started I've missed my time with my books, but with 100+ pages to read every night, it's not like I can really do a whole lot of reading besides that. Oh well... only 7 more weeks of classes and then it's back to my books!! I'm so excited!!!!
Growing up I was always reading... sometimes a book or two a day during the summer. Sure I had friends, but I tended to ignore them during the summer in favor of my books. Then summer after graduation I quit reading. I spent all summer playing with my friends from work and doing absolutely nothing. Then the summer after freshman year I spent playing with my roommates and the people in my ward. Don't get me wrong, I loved it, but I really loved last summer and connecting with myself again and realizing why it is that I want to be a librarian. I love books. I love how they teach you so many things and take you out of the world for a little bit. One of the books I read for class described it perfectly. Reading is a little piece of paradise to help you deal with the awful reality of life (or something like that). Ever since school started I've missed my time with my books, but with 100+ pages to read every night, it's not like I can really do a whole lot of reading besides that. Oh well... only 7 more weeks of classes and then it's back to my books!! I'm so excited!!!!
Monday, February 16, 2009
How Many Have You Read?
"The BBC reckons most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here... which is pretty darn sad!
Instructions:
1) Look at the list and put an 'X' after those you have read.
2) Add a '+' to the ones you LOVE.
3) Star (*) those you plan on reading.
4) Tally your total at the bottom.
5) Tag the friends you want to fill this out (including the person who tagged you.)
- - - - -
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen X+
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien X
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte X+
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling X
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee X
6 The Bible X
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte X
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell X
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman X+
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens X
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott X+
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy*
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare *
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier X+
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger X
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger X+
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot*
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell X
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald X
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy *
25 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams *
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky *
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck *
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll X
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame *
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy *
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis X+
34 Emma - Jane Austen X
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen X
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis X
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini X
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden X+
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell X
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown X
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez *
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery X
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood X+
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding X
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan*
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel *
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen X
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens *
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley X
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon *
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez *
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck *
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov *
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold X
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas *
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville X
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens *
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett X+
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce *
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath *
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray X
80 Possession - AS Byatt *
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens X
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker *
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert *
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White X
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom X
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle *
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad X
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery *
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas *
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare X
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl X
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo *
Have read: 41
Will read: at least 27
So what about you? How many have you read?
Instructions:
1) Look at the list and put an 'X' after those you have read.
2) Add a '+' to the ones you LOVE.
3) Star (*) those you plan on reading.
4) Tally your total at the bottom.
5) Tag the friends you want to fill this out (including the person who tagged you.)
- - - - -
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen X+
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien X
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte X+
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling X
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee X
6 The Bible X
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte X
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell X
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman X+
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens X
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott X+
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy*
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare *
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier X+
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger X
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger X+
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot*
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell X
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald X
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy *
25 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams *
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky *
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck *
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll X
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame *
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy *
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis X+
34 Emma - Jane Austen X
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen X
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis X
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini X
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden X+
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell X
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown X
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez *
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery X
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood X+
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding X
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan*
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel *
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen X
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens *
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley X
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon *
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez *
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck *
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov *
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold X
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas *
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville X
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens *
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett X+
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce *
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath *
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray X
80 Possession - AS Byatt *
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens X
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker *
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert *
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White X
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom X
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle *
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad X
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery *
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas *
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare X
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl X
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo *
Have read: 41
Will read: at least 27
So what about you? How many have you read?
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