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, April 23, 2010

Shakespeare's Birthday~!




William Shakespeare. 1564–1616
It was a Lover and his Lass
(from As You Like It)
IT was a lover and his lass,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,
That o'er the green corn-field did pass,
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding; 5
Sweet lovers love the spring.
Between the acres of the rye,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,
These pretty country folks would lie,
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time, 10
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.
This carol they began that hour,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,
How that life was but a flower 15
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.
And, therefore, take the present time
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, 20
For love is crown`d with the prime
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.





Oh, and here's a big article on "Shakespeare Today" in the Telegraph.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Literary Linkage

First of readers, I'm just going to have to apologize. Posting will be continue to be light, light, "lite," until a certain date in May has come and gone.

That having been said, there were a few things on the intertubes I wanted to highlight.

  • Were the madwomen in literature really insane, or did society drive them to insanity? via BBC news ("Much madness is divinest sense," we say)
  • EBC patron saints Jennifer Weiner and Amy Tan are FORMING A ROCK BAND with Mitch Albom and Dave Barry, via WSJ. How awesome is that?
  • JK Rowling writes The Single Mother's Manifesto. You've probably seen this but I thought it was worth a link.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Two bookish blog-posts by yours truly

Can a Baby-Sitters Club Compete With Gossip Girls, Vampires and Our Memories? A BSC Fan Investigates (Essay) - Speakeasy - WSJ

But can the re-issued books, and the new prequel, live up to such vaunted memories? And the question on everyone’s mind: are these homework-completing heroines too innocent for today’s adrenaline and bitchiness-bred young readers?
For many young readers around the world, Anne Frank fits perfectly into the “heroine canon,” a long list of young adult and classic adult novels with feisty, introspective women at their core.

Review Roundup

Here, for your pleasure, is a collection of EXTREMELY SHORT Catch-up BOOK REVIEWS taking you to the gritty streets of Calcutta, Limerick, Tehran, and elsewhere.

Interpeter of Maladies
-- Jhumpa Lahiri's debut story collection (Pulitzer-winning!) is full of sorrowful breakups, cultural confusion, and quiet desperation. These stories take place in India and in the US and are less tightly focused on family and immigration than her other work, although these are still the dominant themes. Her prose here is tight and crisp, without a word out of place, and her stories slowly suck you in with their quiet everydayness and then snap your heart in two with perfect misery. Unforgettable.

Angela's Ashes--I can't believe I didn't read this narrative of Frank McCourt's impoverished upbringing in Limerick the first time around. I wrote about it briefly before, but it's really a wonder. An entire memoir narrated in the unwavering perspective of a child, innocent and full of wonder, poetic and uproarious without being treacly. McCourt never veers too far into sentimentality even through soaring and depressing moments. The benevolence of the narrator towards a world that treated him terribly is perhaps the most astonishing thing. And if you want to get at the pathology and beauty in the Irish relationship to history and the church, this is the book for you.


Persepolis I+II
Marjane Satrapi's beloved "graphic memoir." A long delayed book on my list. It's very similar tonally to McCourt's in the way it mixes riotous, irreverent, laugh-out-loud humor with absolute tragedy. She gives us an incredibly intimate look at the large and small costs of living under political repression. Although Satrapi's anger sometimes intrudes into a narrative that could speak for itself, this humanizes her. Her sparing words and stark illustrations grab your attention and emotional investment right away. She also succeeds in her goal of opening a window into a society that is hard to see otherwise because of political and media distortion.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Loveliest of Trees

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
AE HOUSMAN

LOVELIEST of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten, 5
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room, 10
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.



white blossoms

IMG_2722

IMG_2721

IMG_2708

Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Spring musings--what are you reading?


Hi guys. I'm in the middle of a reading frenzy. I finished Angela's Ashes and am in between Persepolis I and Persepolis II, which I'm trying to read to keep up with a student. Also reading Susan J.Douglas's "Englightened Sexism" for a piece, and about to delve back into the Baby-Sitters Club for a piece. And ALSO have a new review book to read and so on and so on until breathless...whew!

how about you? What are you bringing out into the garden or park to read as the weather grows mild?


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Friday, April 02, 2010

From the Vault: April Poetry

Good morrow, everyone! Spring is finally here. Here are some links back to April-related poetry I posted on the blog last year.