I know this book touched me deeply because I am mentally going through every person I know to figure out who I can recommend i
What did you expect?
I know this book touched me deeply because I am mentally going through every person I know to figure out who I can recommend it to. Most of them, I think. It's that kind of book that-- while still telling its own individual story --contains so many universal themes. Life, death, love, family, failure, integrity. And it's exactly the right amount of sad; bittersweet, I would say.
It tells the life story of William Stoner, a man we are told in the very beginning of the book would be remembered by hardly anyone after his death, the marks he made during his lifetime being faint and few. But what this leads into is an extremely well-written story of a man who grew up on a farm, was sent to study agriculture by his father and, there, at the University of Missouri, fell madly in love with literature and teaching.
Sometimes, immersed in his books, there would come to him the awareness of all that he did not know, of all that he had not read; and the serenity for which he labored was shattered as he realized the little time he had in life to read so much, to learn what he had to know.
Stoner did very little to carve himself a place inside my heart. Maybe it was the simple, humble nature of him that asked for so little and gave so much. His passion for teaching was pure and endearing. If anything, I sometimes wanted him to fight for himself a bit more, but it was not in his gentle nature.
In his forty-third year William Stoner learned what others, much younger, had learned before him: that the person one loves at first is not the person one loves at last, and that love is not an end but a process through which one person attempts to know another.
Along the way, he marries, has a child, gets into a conflict with a colleague and loses friends and students to two World Wars. His life is full of ups and downs, sometimes allowing him happiness, often not. Through it all, he finds a certain comfort in his books and his classes. His turning to literature during the hard times spoke to me personally.
Summarised like this, it seems like such an unremarkable life and, as the opening paragraphs tell us, it sort of was, but I guess what is so wonderful about this story is that it shows how even a fairly average, unremarkable life is so full of passion and love. Personally, I didn't want to put it down....more
The Machine Stops was a really good short story. Forster, writing in 1909, predicts Facetime / Zoom, amongst other things, though he sets it in a creeThe Machine Stops was a really good short story. Forster, writing in 1909, predicts Facetime / Zoom, amongst other things, though he sets it in a creepy nightmare future where humanity lives underground and everything they need is controlled and delivered by the Machine.
There are certainly parallels with our own world and concerns. The Machine is perhaps best likened to the Internet-- it connects people (who live in solitude) with others around the world, plays music, caters to their every need and whim. In this world, people view mountains, nature and people through the machine, but rarely, if ever, have any direct contact with any of them. People worship the machine and cannot imagine life without it. While we're not exactly living in Forster's dystopia, some aspects of it are eerily prescient.
In my copy of this book, it also came with the short story 'The Celestial Omnibus', which I didn't care for. It was silly and, maybe because it came so soon after my reading of The Machine Stops, it lacked impact. My rating is for The Machine Stops only....more
Some parts of the story are more compelling than others. I enjoy reading about conniving awful people getting what they deserve, but I found Roubard and Severine one-dimensional compared to Therese and Laurent.
Roubard opens the novel by discovering his wife has been sexually-involved with old lecher Grandmorin and then beats her up. Severine herself is eye-rollingly naive and insipid. I suspect the author has her declare she has never experienced sexual desire to make the contemporary reader more sympathetic toward her and, in fact, this is not the only time in the book that a ridiculous show is made of women having to pretend to be sexually disinterested and fight off their lover to appear virtuous. But such were the times.
The other central character-- Jacques --for no apparent reason, desires to hurt and murder women. When he is introduced to us in chapter two he sexually assaults a woman.
God, this was so bad it was almost funny. This is literally just a book full of philosophical emo journal entries.
“I'd woken up early, and I took a loGod, this was so bad it was almost funny. This is literally just a book full of philosophical emo journal entries.
“I'd woken up early, and I took a long time getting ready to exist.�
"Each face, even if it belongs to someone we saw only yesterday, is different today simply because today is not yesterday."
"I've just re-read these pages, in which I write with a clarity that will last only as long as they last, and I ask myself: What is this, and what is it for? Who am I when I feel? What dies in me when I am?"
I often ask myself why I am so obstinately endeavouring to win the love of a young girl whom I do not wish to deceive, and whom I will never marry.
I often ask myself why I am so obstinately endeavouring to win the love of a young girl whom I do not wish to deceive, and whom I will never marry.
Hell, Pechorin is a piece of work! A classic example of an emotional vampire who, in his quest for a brief feeling of excitement and fulfillment, completely destroys the lives of those around him.
As the above quote suggests, he pursues and seduces several women, earning their affections without any intention of loving or marrying them, only to discard them once he becomes bored. He is cynical, self-centred and nihilistic, a Byronic hero I guess. His inability to find any true satisfaction in his life is almost worthy of pity, if it didn't result in him trampling others in his reckless pursuit of it.
I liked the framing of the story. So many classics frame narratives inside other narratives - in this case, an unnamed narrator hears part of Pechorin's story from Maxim Maximych, then introduces us to the second part straight from Pechorin's journal - and so few modern books do this. I personally think it works well most of the time. ...more
A Death in the Family posthumously won Agee the Pulitzer Prize. It was adapted into a film, a play and a TV movie. It was the inspiration behind an opA Death in the Family posthumously won Agee the Pulitzer Prize. It was adapted into a film, a play and a TV movie. It was the inspiration behind an opera by William Mayer and a stage musical by Frank Galati. It is considered a classic.
And all I can think is: I don't get it.
Don't get me wrong, it's not awful. I gave it three stars, which means "liked it" on Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ. It showcases a family's grief after the loss of their husband/father/son-in-law/etc. and some of it was moving. Maybe it is the high expectations I had after all the fuss that was made about this book, but I honestly don't understand why it's so special.
Is it because it was autobiographical? Was a big deal made about the fact that the author was deceased and his widow and kids really needed the proceeds of the book? I don't know.
The beginning was the strongest part and I was anxious alongside Mary when she was waiting to hear of Jay's fate. Then, once we knew, I felt everything stalled, each detail of them telling the children, meeting the priest, Rufus and Catherine bickering, the funeral and wake... was dragged out far longer than it needed to be.
I just don't feel strongly about it. I was expecting something more and I never got it....more
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