Sunday, April 28, 2013
So Beth and I haven’t been so great
at keeping up to date with our original goal of a book a month. But because
I’ve been in work limbo where I never seem to know what my next assignment will
be or how many hours I’ll actually end up working throughout the week, I had
been devouring books like candy. Here are my brief views on the books I’ve read
on the side of our little project.
After finishing War and Peace
I knew I needed to tackle something a little lighter. But I also knew that I was
going to be spending a lot of time being useless backstage of the Reps as they
figured out tech and didn’t require my assistance except for the occasional
thing to run downstairs for. So I decided to read a book that came highly recommended
to me by various people on crew and actors (Aaryn had read it during Midsummer). American Gods by Neil
Gaiman is a fantastic book and I highly recommend it to others. It is epic and
brilliant, engaging and unique. It gives life to all the old gods of religions
you remember briefly talking about in old history classes and makes you wonder,
what does happen to all those gods
once the people have moved on? I was immediately drawn into the story and
although it had a slow build to the giant war, I was not bored or hoping for a
swift conclusion. Which is one of the only complaints I have about the book.
After such a drawn out foundation, the ending came way too quickly for me that
I was sadly wanting more.
So I turned to another Neil Gaiman
book, Stardust. I figured that I had already enjoyed his longer book and
I had less time as I was starting to actually do some work on the Reps so I
picked something short and familiar. However this short book that was then
turned into a halfway decent movie, was not one of my favorites and fell flat
after reading such an intriguing fantasy. I didn’t really care about any of the
characters and although it had that fairy tale feel, I never really understood
the point of the story. So I decided to leave the fantasy genre and going after
something a little darker.
World War Z was another book
that’s been on my to-read list for a while but I didn’t own it and didn’t
really want to shell out the money when I’m so anti the zombie-phase that
everyone seems to be obsessed with. But when we were packing and moving into
the new house Emily decided to donate most of her books and offered me first
dibs before she gave them away, which included this book. I was a little
surprised to say how much I enjoyed it. Written as a collection of interviews
explaining the build up to, survival tactics during, and consequences after the
Zombie War. It’s presently in a way that seems so factual and possible that you
can’t help but buy into this world that is created. In the way that Michael
Crichton would mess science and history and fiction to create these amazing
novels, Max Brooks created a history book that I actually liked.
After finishing up reading an
actual book instead of my digital books on my kindle, I dove back into my
digital world with abandon. Not quite knowing what kind of mood I was in when I
wasn’t running Christopher’s track for Coriolanus
and Wallenstein when he got strep
throat I chose my “classroom homework” book of Walden by Henry David
Thoreau and my “pleasure reading” book of continuing the Sherlock Holmes series
that I had started earlier with The Return of Sherlock Holmes. I then
found in one of my daily emails of digital book deals this satirical and
totally inappropriate dry humor gem How to Fail: The Self-Hurt Guide. So
I currently have been flipping between these three books depending on my mood. Walden
is hard to pick up but although I may not agree with all of Thoreau’s
extremist hermit ways, I can appreciate the sentiment behind them. Sherlock
Holmes stories are pretty quick and fun, so easy to pick up and put down. And The
Self-Hurt Guide is funny in a black comedy sense but something, it’s
hopelessness can get too much for me so I much switch back to one of the other “light-hearted”
books I’m reading. Winter’s Tale tech
starts on Wednesday, so hopefully I can finish one or two of these books and
less my self-imposed literary load which will nag at the back of my mind.
This action packed movie took a really long time to watch
what with life and my move to NE getting in the way. Then we had to wait to
actually install our cable and internet, so I couldn’t watch the movie until
that was done. After all that I really enjoyed the movie. Of course it reminds
me of the beautiful similarities of that genre with such colorful costumes and
locations, a poetry of motion to the fighting, and a sense of pride and honor
that is never quite conveyed in an American (or Western) film. In the same vein
of House of Flying Daggers, Hero, and
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon this film really showed a myriad of fighting
styles and sacrifice for the greater good. I enjoyed it and recommend it
highly.
Saturday, March 16, 2013
Play the Game was kind of what I was expecting in a
combination of comedy and traumatizing images of the elderly in the dating
world. I did like the “twist” ending of this movie; it made the whole thing seem a little
less pathetic and simple. The writing and acting weren’t great and it’s not a movie that
I’d highly recommend but I do believe that it would be a fun movie to watch
with friends when you feel like watching something light and easy. I wish I had
more to say about the movie but it really wasn’t that memorable (for being either great or terrible). It was a palate cleansing movie to watch on our journey but now I'm ready to dive back into some more thought provoking movies.
On the side
of our various assignments I decided to tackle the epic War and Peace,
just for fun because that’s what the cool kids do. My goal was to finish the
entire book during the run of Hughie
and I was very excited to achieve my goal.
I have to
admit that I kind of love Tolstoy’s way of presenting the facts and the
different viewpoints of how history is presented in Russia to what really
happened before he dives into the story from the various characters’
perspectives. Except for the second epilogue where he just went on his own philosophical discussion of history and religion that I didn't particularly enjoy. It’s interesting and engaging and makes me enjoy reading about
the war even though I had to get though half the book to get to these beautiful
insights.
It’s funny
but the largest frustration I have with this book is its epic size. I find it
interesting, I enjoy the style it’s written in and although the numerous
characters can sometimes be hard to keep track of (especially switching back
and forth from Moscow to St. Petersburg to wartime to parties in the royal
society to Tolstoy’s own history lessons) I like picking the book up. But when
I look at how far I still have to go when I feel like I’ve been reading for a
lifetime, I get distracted and frustrated. Maybe the quick pace of society now
has transformed my attention span to make it hard to commit to such a long book
or maybe it’s just hard sitting down and reading such a massive book. I did
enjoy getting back into my school phase of highlighting and taking notes again
though. So here are a few of the quotes that stood out to me that I’d like to
share.
“One must be believe in the possibility of happiness in
order to be happy, and now I do believe in it. Let the dead bury their dead,
but while one has life one must live and
be happy!”
“If there were no suffering, man would not know his
limitations, would not know himself.”
“We imagine that when we are thrown out of our usual ruts
all is lost, but it is only then that what is new and good begins. While there
is life there is happiness.”
There were a lot of insights into
religion, the part of free will vs. inevitability that made me think and want
to right a term paper. Questions posed that made we want to dash to the library
and research the war, Tolstoy’s political views and why he wrote the book. The
second epilogue bored me with Tolstoy’s ranting on historians and their own
prejudices skewing the facts and misinterpreting the role the leaders such as
Napoleon and Alexander had on the people of France and Russia. But being the uneducated person that I am when it comes to history I still enjoyed his take on looking at the "facts" in many different lights. He would explain what happened in a battle about how the French would consider it a failure and why, how the Russians considered it a success and why, and what the historians were now saying about it changing the way that it happened at that time. I really found his insight into how history changes over time fascinating. It reminded me of when I was reading McNamara's book when I was working on Last of the Boys and the confusion and lack of accurate data that made it difficult for the men in charge to make decisions. But then once they were in the war and saw that they had gotten themselves too deep into a problem that they could not easily get out of, there was no turning back. And Tolstoy talks about how these Russian generals made decisions, hundreds of orders sent out that never seemed to make it on time, or the plans were never able to be fulfilled because war is unpredictable and doesn't make sense. But then years and years go by and historians write about what happened and what it led to and forget about all the failed plans until history is presented as a succinct timeline of events culminating in war. It become inevitable and the "genius" of Napoleon becomes exaggerated until that this the only way we perceive these events. People look back and question "why didn't the leaders see this coming and plan accordingly?" and forget all the hundred of other things going on and the thousands of possibilities that could have resulted. And I found this insight refreshing. Sometimes we need that reminder that there is more than one way to look at things.
Friday, March 15, 2013
The final
book of the Farseer trilogy, I have to admit that I was kind of eager to read
it and then be done with the whole series. The farther I got in the series, the
more Beth’s comment about the similarities between Fitz and Harry Potter became
more apparent. Especially when just a small list of his heroic accomplishments
was named back to him by the minstrel. How many times can one guy save the
world, narrowly escaping death only to be needed again? The Catalyst is awfully close to the Boy Who Lived. The murderer with a heart of gold, who has magical abilities that cannot be matched by anyone and is surrounded by a loving network of friends that will die for him even when he rants and complains and takes out all his anger on them.
The farther I got in this series, the more irritated I got at the introductions at the beginning of each chapter. Fitz's excerpts from his histories that he is writing pretty much for no one but to pass the time in his lonely existence post-war and death. That was another Harry Potter similarity, the whole cheating death thing, which I honestly hate. I accepted Aslan's return in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe when I read that book in middle school (and was naively unaware of its strong Christian undercurrents and teachings) but cheating death is usually cheap in my eyes.
But there was a gnawing at me the entire time I read these three books. Why does this often used writing trope bother me so much with this
particular series when I so readily accept it for other stories? I wish I had an answer to this but I'm just glad that I am done with these books, I do not recommend them to the general public. Our next book is Casino Royale by Ian Flemming, the first James Bond book. I'm eager to find out if I love the books that the movies are based on.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
So for our
first documentary we tackled Life in a
Day which I stole from Anthony’s Netflix queue list. It was a very interesting
watch that was beautiful, horrifying, touching, intriguing and sad. It was a
story without a story, a look into the lives of strangers. It was poetic and
made me want to be philosophical. It asked what people love and fear. It made
me feel superficial and materialistic and the desire to just give everything up
and live simply pulsed though my chest. It made me want to call everyone I love
and tell them how much they mean to me and made me sad that I am so alone. It
made me think about myself and where I am and what I am doing, how I am both so
small in this world and made me question what my dreams of the future are. It’s
funny because where you are in your life and the people, places, books, movies,
day-to-day experiences that you share are what make you who you are and
influence your perspective at that moment. Because all my friends from high
school are having babies I’ve been thinking about family a lot. Because Micah
is going through treatments for his leukemia I’ve been thinking about death and how we never know how much time we have or what God's plans for us are.
Because I’m reading War and Peace I’ve been thinking about love and
hatred, the triviality of the traditional mating rituals and the futility of war. Duty and philosophy. All these things swirl around in my brain and if I
wasn’t doing or seeing one of these things than my perspective might be
completely different.
I guess I
don’t know how to write about this movie and how it made me feel. It made me
feel a lot of things but it also made me feel my lack of feeling. It made me
disgusted with the amount of time I waste, the amount of tv I watch and all the
goals I have abandoned. It makes me sad that I don’t wake up and write every
day, that I don’t go to the museums much any more and challenge myself in new
ways. It makes me sad that I have become complacent with the way that I live.
But this is me going off on a stream of conscious overflow.
I enjoyed
the movie but it made me sad because I wanted to know more about these people
and their lives and I know I never will. I wondered how in the world so much
beautiful footage was taken and I can’t even imagine how many hours in took to
watch, compile and edit all of the video.I was interested the entire time and although I didn't enjoy the final monologue and it made me question what the original intention of the documentary was, I really take my hat off to all the people who made it happen. I totally recommend it and maybe I'll have to watch it again some time.
Saturday, February 23, 2013
So here are some thoughts from when I wasn't even halfway through this book. I realize
that I have some major problems with it. I get the déjà vu of feeling like I
already have encountered this story. The similarities between this series and
the Alanna series overwhelm me. But unfortunately, I feel that the series
written for teenage girls was more compelling. Or maybe it’s just because I
found it easier to relate to, or because I read it first. But the farther I get
in the book, the more I don’t like the character of Regal. I partially blame
Anthony and his love of complex dark characters and anti-heroes. He and I
actually talked a little about Once Upon
a Time and how he felt that their “bad” characters were not interesting
enough for him. Regal is a character that is immature, greedy, selfish, egotistic
and presented as pretty much evil with no redeeming qualities. Now I feel that
similar to the character of Roger in the Alanna series, he desires more power
and the kingdom to bend at his will. He uses his good looks and cunning to sway
people to his desires. However, Regal is impatient and does not seem overly
intelligent as Roger was. They keep talking about how he was “weak” as a child
and did not learn to Skill, so much so that he must have this power and was
taught in secret by Galin who was so close with his mother. Spoiler alert! (in finishing the book, apparently I guessed wrong. Regal really is just a weak, manipulative douche) How
else does he know so much of what is going on and seem to have so much control
over everything?
I suppose one of my major disappointments with this book is in only seeing things through
Fitz’s eyes.I don't get a chance to really understand the other characters or hear their stories even if I find them more interesting than his. I also have been swayed to Beth's initial reaction of frustration with the top of each chapter beginning with his ramblings or his history segments. If you are going to trap me in one person's perspective than stick to his story, otherwise give me a view of the enemy and his plans. I really hope that the third book reveals more to Regal's desires than just avenging his mother's supposed murder, because that felt like such a weak motivation for destroying the entire kingdom that I immediately rejected it as only a piece of the puzzle and not the full thing.
Maybe it’s the combination of
reading too much about war, maybe it’s seeing the similarities and comparisons
between different art forms like I was taught in school but so much about this
book frustrates me in a “haven’t I already read or seen this before?” kind of
way. The ships fighting the Raiders makes me think of Pirates of the Caribbean, the whole story makes me think of the
fantasy stories of my youth. At times it feels like a jumbled mess of every kind of fantasy thrown together to make sure that the author has hit everything that could draw in his readers, and at other time I really am intrigued by the interesting story. I want the mystery solved and I want to discover who and what is behind it all. So I keep reading even though the end of this book left a bad taste in my mouth.
Friday, February 15, 2013
Typical John Wayne western that seems just ridiculous enough
to be enjoyable but not real at all. There’s a love triangle, lots of
action-packing brawls, a gold rush and a typhoid fever epidemic all thrown
together in an hour and a half. Sometimes the scenes just rush by and you
wonder how it’s possible that so much could happen in only a few short minutes.
It was a pretty bad movie, although I enjoyed watching it for its “badness.” I
have to say that I was surprised that there was not more time and energy spent
on the love triangle (or square). Once it was set up, the other woman suddenly
disappeared and became a silent, unseen threat. Then a totally unexpected plot
twist with the gold rush coming on. So hat’s off to you, writers, on totally
surprising me with that one. I was not expecting the singer to suddenly abandon
the town and man she loved to become a nurse with all the grungy men of the
gold rush. I also learned that if you ever want to prove yourself a badass
without a fight all you have to do is bend a quarter and give it some kid like
it was no big deal. I’d write more about this movie but really there isn’t a
whole lot to say, it’s not John Wayne’s best. Our next movie to tackle is a documentary called Life in a Day.
Monday, February 4, 2013
So the first book we were to read
was The Assassin’s Apprentice. I’ve been reading so much science fiction
lately that I forgot how palate-cleansing fantasy can be for me. In reading
this story I thought of my teen fantasy series that I like to read and re-read
even now as an adult written by Tamora Pierce. This story goes back to the good
old medieval-like times where most fantasy is set, in the rough days of raiders
on ships and kingdoms ruled by princes and kings. It also has its share of
magic but not in the sense of spells and potions. The “Skill” and the “Wit”
melds minds of humans and animals alike.
I actually
wouldn’t mind continuing this series. Although I wasn’t too excited about the
ending and I felt that there were a lot of interesting, unexplored subplots,
one can only hope that they grow and develop in the following books in the
series. There were a lot of questions posed that I felt never got answered and
even if a book is part of a series, I believe that it needs to be a whole
piece. That is the problem with most sequels in a trilogy that you are left
with an ellipsis at the end. But overall I enjoyed the relationships and felt
that it had a lot of potential to continue the excitement. I wasn’t too large a
fan of the Raiders ability to turn the people into zombie-like shells of their
former selves. I wanted the strange dynamics of the royal family, servants and
soldiers to be explored a little more. And what is up with the Fool? Is he a
prophet? What is his connection to Fitz and why does he take it upon himself to
steer him in a certain direction or not? Also, I felt like the book kept
hinting at the secret past of Burrich’s that I never quite understood. Even
though I enjoyed the book, it left so many questions unanswered. I also feel
that it could have been simplified a lot and still been enjoyable because they
instead of a ton of little stories interconnected, their would be few fleshed
out storylines driving the central plot. But that’s just my personal opinion
and preference.
Side note unrelated to this “assignment;”
after a couple of months of struggling through reading one of the “classics of
literature,” I also finally finished reading One Hundred Years of Solitude.
Although I have to admit I did enjoy it much more than Love in the Time of
Cholera, I was still not a fan of Marquez or the magical realism genre. I
know that it is a symbolic literary choice to make all the characters have the
same name, but it makes for very difficult and confusing reading when people
live to be over a hundred years old and are living in incestuous relationships
and then naming their children the same names as their grandparents. Yet again,
I am adding another literary classic to the list of books that I was not that
impressed with. Maybe I just don’t give these epic novels the time and
attention necessary to truly enjoy them but I’m finding it hard to stay engaged
in these gigantic books. Atlas Shrugged made me angry with its black and
white view of the world and its tendency to redundantly over-explain its
methodology. Don Quixote I gave up reading three quarters of the way
through because I was sick of all the side stories that took forever to tell
and ended up going nowhere. I supposed some day I’ll pick it up again to finish
so I can officially say I read it and disliked it but I was tired of spending
so much time on a character that I didn’t find that sympathetic or heroic, but
arrogant, selfish and foolish. I hope that my next epic classic, War and
Peace fares better. I also want to finish the Sherlock Holmes series since
I enjoyed the first couple of books I did read and I recently finished watching
the television show Sherlock on Netflix,
which was highly rated by both of my siblings. Although each episode is almost
an hour and a half long, they are fascinating and I eagerly watched both
seasons. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a contemporary look at
some old classics that I can get behind. Although, I did find it interesting
that they chose to give Sherlock an addiction to nicotine patches instead of
his cocaine habit that he indulges in in the novels.
Monday, January 28, 2013
So I finally watched Planet of the Apes which has been on my
must watch list for quite some time. I guess I should specify, the 1968
version, I had no interest in seeing the 2001 version. Although maybe I will
have to watch it later and then compare. Unfortunately I am a purist snob and
most of the time I am not a fan of remakes. V would be rolling her eyes at my
frustrations with putting Shakespearean plots in modern times. I am all for a re-imagining of a classic story, but one of my pet peeves is the smashing
together of conflicting time periods. I am not ok with saying “Oh happy dagger”
and pulling out a gun. Either change the line or the prop. But I’m veering away
from the assignment.
Now I’ve seen the iconic shocking
twists of Planet of the Apes on AFI’s
movie lists multiple times so I knew that the movie would have a little less
shock value when I saw it. But even if you know the spoilers of an iconic
movie, you still want to see why it is so iconic. Like watching Psycho, which is still haunting even
though I’d seen who the murderer is and the last creepy scene before I saw the
movie. Or Soylent Green, knowing what
it is from the very beginning. (See what I did there? I’m trying really hard to
not write spoilers, even though I’m not writing this for random people to read)
I think that Hitchcock is a brilliant director and that his movies stand up to
multiple viewings and are still engaging to the audience member. And while the
book Make Room! Make Room! on which Soylent
Green is based has very few plot points in common with the movie, I still
wanted to dive into a story that could be so horrifying and yet, slightly
plausible for a future of overpopulation.
It’s interesting to me to see a
“classic” movie both to enjoy the story that is being told and to remark on how
much the film industry has changed in a relatively short time span. I’ve also
been on quite a sci-fi kick lately so it was really fascinating for me to watch
this movie after having just finished reading the Foundation Series by Isaac Asimov.
He’s the guy that came up with the three laws of robotics and is the king of
science fiction writing. His Foundation Series apparently was based on the fall
of the Roman Empire and so reading the books made me question, “what makes us
human? And what can create and destroy a society?” So Beth picking this movie
for the first assignment was perfect for me. This movie also made me want to
re-watch Season 5, Episode 9 of The
Twilight Zone “Probe 7, Over and Out.” This episode is about Adam and Eve
and presents a very interesting and heretical story of man’s beginnings here on
Earth.
I actually loved the movie. Maybe
it’s because I’m in the right frame of mind for a movie like this but I found
it intriguing, comedic and tragic. The satire of the apes talking about their culture,
religion, laws and evolution was fascinating. It makes me think of high school
and how I was taught to change everything I learned and that we have to
discover our own beliefs for ourselves. Sometimes you are faced with the choice
of the red pill or the blue pill and you have to decide your own fate. Will you
fall down Alice’s rabbit hole or will you choose blissful ignorance and accept
whatever you are told? Because the truth may hurt, it may not be what you were
expecting and you may wish to change your mind after your eyes have been opened
to return to your former naivety.
Thursday, January 24, 2013
When close friends are separated by profession, time and distance but not shared interests how do they keep in touch? In the digital age we are all connected and the world is a lot smaller thanks to social media and the power of the internet. But somewhere along the lines of technological discovery we lost the power of real social connection. In How I Met Your Mother Season 7 the characters discuss this dilemma in Ted's dating life of "mystery vs. history." Because it is easy to figure out everything about a person online from their profile, you no longer need to have that first conversation where you learn a person's likes and dislikes. But they also show in a funny yet disturbingly true clip that because everyone has their smartphones, conversation dwindles to the clacking of a person's nails on the phone's screen as we are torn between various other worlds and distractions outside of the present moment we are in. But that's just me ranting about things that bother me. I work with Shakespeare every day so obviously I'm a fan of antique or "classic" things.
Even though I no longer live with Beth and V, I still consider them my roommates. Because "friends" doesn't do our relationship justice and even though they are as close to me as my own family "former roommate" is the only inadequate title I can think of that coveys this sense of closeness. One of the things I love about our phone conversations is that we never have any problems talked for hours, and that was before time got in the way and months would pass making "catching up" take a lot longer. When we lived together, we could all cuddle on the couch with blankets and a movie marathon or we could sit each other's rooms and just talk about anything and everything. That was my favorite part about college. D8
So in an effort of enacting a New Year's Resolution of doing better at catching up, we decided to start our own movie and book club that spans the country and keeps our friendships strong. Thanks to the glory of Netflix and our Kindles, we can watch movies that have always been on our "must watch sometime in my lifetime" list and read books while having someone to discuss them with. Instead of indulging in our obsessions solo, we have made this into a social experiment. And I'm the dork that misses school and loved homework so the first assignment is to watch Planet of the Apes and read Robin Hobb's Assassin's Apprentice. We gave ourselves ample time for the first round to dive into the homework just in case work and real life got into the way. We have a little over a week to watch the movie and a month to read the book.
Even though I no longer live with Beth and V, I still consider them my roommates. Because "friends" doesn't do our relationship justice and even though they are as close to me as my own family "former roommate" is the only inadequate title I can think of that coveys this sense of closeness. One of the things I love about our phone conversations is that we never have any problems talked for hours, and that was before time got in the way and months would pass making "catching up" take a lot longer. When we lived together, we could all cuddle on the couch with blankets and a movie marathon or we could sit each other's rooms and just talk about anything and everything. That was my favorite part about college. D8
So in an effort of enacting a New Year's Resolution of doing better at catching up, we decided to start our own movie and book club that spans the country and keeps our friendships strong. Thanks to the glory of Netflix and our Kindles, we can watch movies that have always been on our "must watch sometime in my lifetime" list and read books while having someone to discuss them with. Instead of indulging in our obsessions solo, we have made this into a social experiment. And I'm the dork that misses school and loved homework so the first assignment is to watch Planet of the Apes and read Robin Hobb's Assassin's Apprentice. We gave ourselves ample time for the first round to dive into the homework just in case work and real life got into the way. We have a little over a week to watch the movie and a month to read the book.
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