baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Marion Milner - On Not Being Able to Paint

Life changing ideas in here - she walks the line between eccentricity and brilliant insight extremely well. One of the best and most original writers I know.
 

jenks

thread death
Probably the most compelling account of 1917 Ive read:

512iL-h8DjL._SX342_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg


https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/17/october-china-mieville-russian-revolution

I've just started it - my son is studying Russian history and I thought I'd be able to help him til I realised how much I had forgotten. I am enjoying it so far.

Still reading the Kenner as recommended by Luka which is maybe one of the most entertaining litcrit books I've read in a long time.

Just finished A Natural by Raisin and Edward Docx's latest about a son taking his father to Dignitas.
 

luka

Well-known member
"Focussing the mind on a task is call
ed attention. It is a complex act,
and in large measure it is a skill that can be practised and learned. Different
kinds and powers of attention suit di
fferent tasks; also, concurrent but
separate continuities of attention will
need to be kept running in separate
channels, so that one train of reading and thought over a run of sessions will
not blur across into another. With practice you will learn to adjust and keep
control over attention, and maintain se
veral distinct layers and channels at
once. Here are a few initial suggestions. As you begin to read, size up the
scale and genre of the work so that yo
u are keyed into its tacit expectations,
the kind of reader-involvement it looks for. You will often need to reconstruct
this aspect historically, for a non-cont
emporary work. Pay attention to the
progressive disclosure of the work's structure and intentions. Observe the
features of style that build up characteristic textures of language usage, idiom
and figure and textual borrowing, an
d observe the ways in which these
features may also have their own internal development. Cultivate a close
memory for specific turns of phrase, images, cadences and prosodic
manoeuvres. But sometimes a prevailing idea may be implied only by
multiple profiles and ambiguities, to the extent that no precisely clear view is
ever offered; here we may have to hold on to shifting textures and nuance
rather than simplifying reductively. "
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Sorry mate I've been having a mental breakdown for the last three weeks. Haven't read anything. I had just started "Rings of Saturn".

Reading Shakespeare! I need to do it. I've read Othello, Henry IV pt 1, Macbeth and Julius Caesar in recent years. Hamlet at school. I've read some of the sonnets lately as well. But that isn't good enough, is it?
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
What's your favourite/s?

This is the sonnet (29) I've memorised:

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee—and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings,
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

I've always had a bit of a tin ear for poetry but that bit "and then my state, like to the park at break of day arising, from sullen earth sings hymns heavens gate" - is one of the few passages where I can "hear" the music of poetry as I've seen described.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Not a huge fan of the last two lines, though. I think the last two lines in the sonnets tend to be a bit of a letdown. Let the corrections commence!
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I had just started "Rings of Saturn".

Ah, you're in for a treat - if an extremely melancholy one, at that. I should read some more Sebald. RoS is the only thing of his I've read, apart from Austerlitz, as part of the Dissensus Reading Club back in what now seems like the bronze age. Edit: oh, I see you wrote 'had' and not 'have'. Worth persevering with, if you're in the mood.

Hope your, uh, brain is OK and stuff.
 

luka

Well-known member
ive just done as you like it for the first time. i didnt know a thing about it. it's a good 'un though.

in answer to your question
my faves are lear, midsummer nights dream and the tempest
but i certainly havent read them all, not even close
i will mark the ones ive read with an x

Comedies
Main article: Shakespearean comedy

The Tempest x
Two Gentlemen of Verona
The Merry Wives of Windsor
Measure for Measure **
The Comedy of Errors
Much Ado About Nothing
Love's Labour's Lost
A Midsummer Night's Dream x
The Merchant of Venice **
As You Like It x
The Taming of the Shrew
All's Well That Ends Well **
Twelfth Night
The Winter's Tale *, **
Pericles, Prince of Tyre *, ***
The Two Noble Kinsmen *, ***

so fuck all comedies then

Histories
Main article: Shakespearean history
i've read a fair few of these but cant remember which are which
King John
Richard II
Henry IV, Part 1
Henry IV, Part 2
Henry V
Henry VI, Part 1
Henry VI, Part 2
Henry VI, Part 3
Richard III
Henry VIII

Tragedies
Main article: Shakespearean tragedy

Troilus and Cressida **
Coriolanus
Titus Andronicus
Romeo and Juliet x
Timon of Athens **
Julius Caesar x
Macbeth x
Hamlet x
King Lear x
Othello
Antony and Cleopatra x
Cymbeline *


so probably about 13 or 14 all up with some major omissions like othello and the merchant of venice. shameful really but im bone idle
 

craner

Beast of Burden
Good choices. Midsummer's tends to get a bad rep because of force-fed GCSE experiences, but when you read it as an adult, with some romance and life force under your belt, it is the most beautiful, gossamer-light weave of words ever spilt on the subjects of love and foolishness, etc. A splendid music box, a rich fantasy.

Lear is just massive and monumental: so savage, yet so tender. And many other things too.

I like your rating conceit. I might have a go at that tomorrow. I've read almost all of them.
 
Top