Dear Readers,


I now consider this blog to be my Juvenelia. Have fun perusing the archives, and find me at my new haunt, here.

Friday, February 26, 2010

Snowpocalypse De-Lurk--What Are You Reading?

Dearest readers. It's been a wild week and the wildness should continue for a while. I've been doing various betrothal-related errands, I caught Cathleen Schine's reading at Barnes and Noble, I had to finish all my work by Weds because I was due to serve a deadly boring period of voir-dire free jury duty (which I did, and it gave me a migraine), I attended a loud, late, fun pop concert which may have contributed to said migraine, I stressed out about the figure skaters and skiiers each night (seriously, the Olympics are not good for blood pressure), and although I happily got another MFA acceptance, I know that after the acceptances (and then the silences that equal rejection) comes my decision and so that very slight, but persistent pressure is mounting. Oh, and we've been hit with the most insane snowstorm yet! I was hoping for a weekend of skiing to purify my soul and perfect my technique, but it looks like conditions are keeping us stranded in the city.
Sigh.

Still, these manic periods in la vie moderne have a fun quality to them--they're exciting, they make you feel alive. So much is happening, you sort of have to surrender control. And I've been reading wonderfully inspiring literature throughout it all. I read a great review book for PW that is very EBC-ish and am now making my slow, tear-stained way through Jhumpa Lahiri's first published book, her Pulitzer winning collection of stories Interpreter of Maladies.

If there's one contemporary writer I want to be like, it's definitely she. Some day in the distant future, after my MFA program and the cruel realities of adult life have honed my blunt, youthful pen to a fine-tipped edge, I'd like to see myself as a Jewish Lahiri with a tiny bit of a satirical touch.

I love her writing because its brilliance lies in directness and honest rather than rhetorical flourish. Her style is so unobtrusive that 'we're launched right into the worlds of her character and often forget the conceit. She isn't afraid to "tell" us what her characters are feeling as well as showing us. She valiantly confronts the awful things in life like death and infidelity and bitter disappointment, but she does it lovingly, not cruelly. I just can't rave about her enough.

So what are you reading beneath these sleety, snowy drifts of weather and of life? Come check in with your harried blogstress and share.

5 comments:

  1. Enjoy the snow. Where I'm at it's dour and grey, but no fluffy whiteness. While buried under writing that needs to be done, I procrastinate by reading: Phonogram vol. 1, Savage Detectives, and perhaps some comics.

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  2. I believe we got hit here in Chicagoland with that snow first but it wasn't too insane here as it it hit there. Everything's still crisply white which I appreciate 'cause I hate seeing the ground in winter. It's so hard on the plants and I like plants.
    One last tale to Eliot's "Clerical Life" and I'm done. I love that little book. You can just feel her ramping up for the marvelous future books she'll pen later. She catches the idiosyncrasies within a personality so well! I've gotten a few good laughs over what she catches. I'm reading "Jane Eyre" in tandem with this and you can fight me but really, Eliot blows C. Bronte out of the water. True, their goals in writing are so mightily different it's not really fair to compare but Still. So I'm rushing madly through "Jane Eyre" so I can get to "Becoming Jane Eyre" which looks so nom-able. Le sigh! So much reading and only one pair of eyes.

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  3. Anonymous10:30 PM

    Since I'm taking an erotica class right now, my reading consists entirely of flipping through various erotica anthologies, particularly X and Smut Volume 1. It's fun, but I do look forward to a bit more of a balanced diet soon.

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  4. I'm reading an interesting YA book called How to Say Goodbye in Robot. Very quirky.

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  5. Thanks for sharing. @gettsr I can't wait to hear how you like savage detectives. @catherine we'll have to talk about Eliot vs. bronte. very torn about it. @dora That class sounds kind of awesome. @Claire I need to read more YA.

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