all astonishment
"The gentlemen pronounced him to be a fine figure of a man, the ladies declared he was much handsomer than Mr. Bingley, and he was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening, till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity"
It was back when I was thirteen, perhaps fourteen, that I finally came to read Pride and Prejudice, and ended up being drawn into a fervor that saw me through most all the novels of Austen, as well as those of each of the Brontë sisters - comedic, tragic, belletristic without fault. For reasons tied perhaps - perhaps not - to my nature, they came to be amongst my most favoured of reads, the hardships faced by their heroines - and it had to be a heroine - rousing a crush of empathies within me, and I would live out that part as I read on, through high and through low, to its satisfying finish. And I would invariably, though not always as I'd expected, get the man, and I would be pleased.
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For me it was Wonder Woman! And the purple-attired Batgirl! They were my heroines!!!!
By the way, what's happening with your date system? This post was dated several days before it emerged.
Most all the novels of Austen?
What kind of Philistine are you?
Other than the adorable kind, of course.
:)
I'm more a Neil Gaiman, Oscar Wilde kinda guy.
I have nothing against cropped hipsters and spandex bodysuits, quite enjoying them in fact, but it's the profound sense of propriety through which the characters are forced to live their lives that I find so involving.
This extends to their now-archaic use of language - thank you, Dr Faustus, I am the best kind of Philistine, though forgive me for I have always written this way ;) - itself somewhat regimented and just so damned proper that hearing it makes me smile. In that regard, I very much enjoy Wilde too (An Ideal Husband reads well), though I have not read any Gaiman that I can think of.
The date system is fine; what is happening is that I am so preoccupied with other things that I will start a line of an entry, get pulled away and be forced to save it for later, at which point it is timestamped, so when I do come to kick it out of my uterus, it will bear the time and date of when it was first saved :)
Good, for a minute there I thought I was losing my mind. Of course, that still can't be ruled out.
My impression, possibly quite wrong, was that Faustus was calling you a Philistine not for your language use, which I'm certain he appreciates, but because "most all" suggests you may have left out one or two :)
Matt, your impression is correct. I was taking Stairs to task for leaving Miss Austen's oeuvre incomplete. At the same time, though, his preferences make me melt in recognition of a kindred spirit, so I don't know how truly effective any efforts to be stern will be.
Perhaps I should use a reward-based method: finish the rest of them and I'll ________. I'm sure I know what I would put in that blank, but Stairs, you're welcome to insert the verb of your choice.
If I'm not making any sense, blame it on anticipatory jet lag.
Stairs - you haven't read any Gaiman?! *gasp of shock* *heartattack*. You're really missing out! He's one of the best storytellers alive!
He keeps a journal too! Neil Gaiman's Journal, which is frequently updated.
I'd suggest you look into reading either American Gods or Neverwhere. Or Smoke and Mirrors is a collection of short stories that are really quite good. I mean, who can resist a story about a woman that finds the Holy Grail in a thrift shop?
Or if you're in the mood for something side splittingly funny (and you're vaguely familiar with religious dogma, you might want to look into his collaboration with Terry Pratchett (of Discworld fame) written at the turn of the century , called Good Omens.
Yes, I'm quite a fan, and have been since his Sandman days.
Somewhat at a loss for a single-word suggestion ..."die"? I would hope otherwise, but I remain uncertain as to what you'd intended :) To be clear, I have an anthology comprising all of her works, so it may be that I have, in fact, read them all. Perhaps if I were to concentrate more on interpretability I'd avoid such miscommunications!
Incidentally, you should only really get jet leg when you go back home, but as NY is only five hours behind, it isn't likely to present a problem.
You're correct of course, Matt, not least because your supposition has been confirmed. Oops. From this day forth I shan't respond to anything at all until I've showered and eaten the first meal of the day. I haven't seen you online of late, but assume you're well - I hope you two have fun this weekend.
Minds are over rated.
Whether or not I'm really missing out on Gaiman would depend on whether or not I actually enjoyed his writing - I shall call upon your recommendation the next time I go hunting for dead tree and give his work a browse! Cheers for the heads-up.
Wow, this thread became a lot more high-brow than the direction of my comment! I suppose both directions would be logical, yet somehow the literary one seems so much more refined than the 'list your childhood fictional heroines, ie gay idols" approach.
I'll get my coat!
The thought that you would find the completion of that sentence with the word "die" to be a reward is somewhat unsettling. I was thinking of something both less extreme and more pleasurable for all involved.
I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you've read the entire anthology--for who, having begun, could not be swept along through to the end?
As for jet lag: the hour at which I'm posting this, while quite a civilized one in your country, is, alas, somewhat obscene in mine.
Beware, there are those who find such works even more dull than I do reality television.
No, I suppose that die wasn't quite what I was looking for either. Rest assured, I do not wish death upon you - not yet, in any case - nor would it be convenient were people to pass away every time I finished a novel; the guilt would destroy me.
I hope you enjoyed your stay in London, and that the production of your work was to your liking - wishing you a speedy readjustment!
Speaking of reality television, my hosts in your fair city were night owls, and so I ended up watching a lot of late-night reality TV. The most baffling specimen was The Villa, the point of which seemed to be to get six people as hammered as humanly possible and then have them humiliate themselves utterly for the delectation of the country. The most interesting was Wife Swap; though, according to my hosts, this was not a common dénouement, in the episode I watched, each wife saw how the other family involved existed without the problems that plagued her own family, and returned home with an understanding of how to make her life better and the motivation to do so. It was actually very moving.
Ah, yes, Sky One's finest export; I'd like to apologise on behalf of the British public for The Villa; it is really trashy television. I've not see the latter programme, but from what I've heard, your hosts were quite right in branding said resolution as uncommon; cat-fights are apparently more typical fare.
I notice, today, that Christmas decorations are already all over the place; this is some sorry state of crazy.