celebrating books & the literary lifestyle
Happy Bloomsday! If you are not a Ulysses geek, click here for my previous post on why you should be.
As Leopold Bloom notes early on,
“Good puzzle would be cross Dublin without passing a pub,” (Joyce Ulysses, 48),
so please note these tips and tricks for drinking in Ulysses, or 1904 Dublin:
Do you celebrate Bloomsday on June 16?
June 16, 1904, is the day on which Leopold Bloom – hence Bloomsday – walks around Dublin in James Joyce’s Ulysses.
(If you have already read Ulysses and already celebrate, you may enjoy my tips & tricks for drinking in Ulysses.)
The history of this post, which will attempt to convince you to read Ulysses, goes back more than a decade:
I ended up, by accident, at a Bloomsday festival at Mike & Molly’s beergarden in Champaign where people who apparently had read Ulysses and appeared to like it were taking turns reading it from a stage. The book’s language was tedious, and I honestly remember joking to my friend (a detail I left out of the intro to my thesis defense), “Well…I never need to read that book.”
I’m only two thirds through Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy, so this post isn’t about the story, it’s about the book.
Literally the book.
Just look at this old book and how much it’s been through. The front matter and preface, which have physically fallen out of the spine, are stamped with DISCARDED 50 cents. Inside the front cover is a card holder for a “Textbook Control Card” that I’m using for a book mark.
Once upon a time I announced my goal to read 40 books out of my own bookcases.
Thankfully I put no time limit on that goal because months passed and I had only read exactly five. That’s right – five books in 10 months.
I loved Book #1.
I loved Book #2. Continue reading
I was only a few chapters into The Heart is a Lonely Hunter when I knew it would break my heart. I just didn’t know how.
The book was building towards something. But what? What horrible thing will happen? And to who?
I knew it wasn’t going to end well. But I kept reading.
When we were house hunting, it came down to two houses. One had a three-car garage, was on a lake, and had built-in bookcases. The other, which we now live in, didn’t have these particular things, but was great in other ways.
My husband gave up his dreams of fishing out of his back yard and keeping all his trailers and boats on-site.
And I thought I was giving up my bookcases.
Once upon a time I did not read literary criticism. My internal contemplation, profound or not, was enough.
Returning to this mindset during a recent reading of Jane Austen’s Emma, I indulged myself in some (not so) deep thoughts:
I don’t want to spill the secrets of Rebecca, billed as “the classic tale of romantic suspense” to anyone who has not yet read it, so I won’t focus on the plot here. Instead, I’ll just note the story reminds us that situations, and people, aren’t always what they seem, and, as the narrator learns, we shouldn’t waste our time “building up false pictures in our mind” to sit before and obsess over.
If you see me breaking into swing kicks during my neighborhood walks, it’s because I’m listening to the Great Gatsby soundtrack. I admit it—I’m in love with all things Gatsby right now.
This affair started around 15 years ago though I can’t remember exactly when I first read the book or when I read it a second time. In fact, I recently had to admit to myself that I couldn’t remember much about it at all minus some passages I liked and a general story line. So, when I walked over to my glorious bookcases, with the intention of plucking it out for a quick re-read before seeing the new Baz Luhrmann film, I stared at my Fs in disbelief. (Yes, most of my fiction is alphabetized, one of the very few areas of true organization in my life.) In fact, I found nothing from F. Scott Fitzgerald there except a collection of short stories. I walked away disturbed and confused, wondering what had happened to my book in which some favorite passages were underlined.
Amazon Prime comes fast but not as quickly as my opportunity to finally go see the new film ended up presenting itself. With two pre-schoolers, it is rare that “no kids” coincides with a specific movie’s schedule, so these opportunities must be seized quickly. Thus, my re-reading was, gasp, going to have to wait until after the film. I cringed at this literary faux pas.
© 2024 Leslie's Bookcase
Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑
