So, George Orwell's book 1984 was written in 1948 and published in 1949. It is a futuristic novel about what life would be like once socialist/communist policies take over our lives.
I didn't graduate high school until 1988, so I guess this book wasn't required as much as reading when I was in high school. Obviously, we weren't so close to reaching the sort of disturbing life portrayed in Orwell's novel by 1984, when I was learning what high school was all about.
Isn't it odd that I have only now forced myself to choke it down? And yes, it was quite a choke. Sheesh!
Personally, I think it's effective days are over. But still, it's odd how some of the circumstances in that novel are rather....disturbing.
I need to ponder it a bit. I'm just not philosophical enough to get it right away. Give me time.
Sunday, March 19, 2017
Thursday, March 9, 2017
The Lord God Made Them All
Well, here it is well into March, and I am still not finished reading the 2nd book of the year to my kids. Ah well. It's still more than I did last year!
We are over half way through James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small. I decided to read it with a British accent, and thanks to high school drama classes, I only sound a little ridiculous.
I had forgotten how amusing Herriot's writing is!
We are over half way through James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small. I decided to read it with a British accent, and thanks to high school drama classes, I only sound a little ridiculous.
I had forgotten how amusing Herriot's writing is!
Friday, February 3, 2017
The Hills Are Alive...
If you haven't read Maria Augusta Trapp's book on which The Sound of Music is based, then you are really missing out!
I was pleasantly surprised at how much my children got out of my reading it aloud to them. Even little Martha sat patiently (for the most part) and took in the amusing way the Baroness describes her introduction to the Captain and his children, her resignation to becoming his wife and second mother to the children she already loved as her own, their flight from Austria, and their life in America during World War II.
What is utterly amazing is how perceptive she is about human nature. She makes a lot of observations about faith and love, but the advice that stuck with me most is this:
"Our age has become so mechanical that this has also affected our recreation. People have gotten used to sitting down and watching a movie, a ball game, a television set. It may be good once in a while, but it certainly is not good all the time. Our own faculties, our imagination, our memory, the ability to do things with our mind and our hands--they need to be exercised. If we become too passive, we get dissatisfied."
And this was in 1949! Imagine what she would say today.
Next up: James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small
I was pleasantly surprised at how much my children got out of my reading it aloud to them. Even little Martha sat patiently (for the most part) and took in the amusing way the Baroness describes her introduction to the Captain and his children, her resignation to becoming his wife and second mother to the children she already loved as her own, their flight from Austria, and their life in America during World War II.
What is utterly amazing is how perceptive she is about human nature. She makes a lot of observations about faith and love, but the advice that stuck with me most is this:
"Our age has become so mechanical that this has also affected our recreation. People have gotten used to sitting down and watching a movie, a ball game, a television set. It may be good once in a while, but it certainly is not good all the time. Our own faculties, our imagination, our memory, the ability to do things with our mind and our hands--they need to be exercised. If we become too passive, we get dissatisfied."
And this was in 1949! Imagine what she would say today.
Next up: James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small
Saturday, January 7, 2017
Books 2 and 3
I know that in college we all had to read more than one book at a time, but do you ever do so willingly now?
It was not easy to obtain a copy of The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria Augusta Trapp (you know--what The Sound of Music is based on), but through intra-library loan, I got one. Only problem is that I can only have it until January 14.
Which wouldn't be a problem, but I have had George Orwell's 1984 checked out for several weeks now while I was reading something else, and my renewals on it have run out. It is due January 13!
And I want to read them BOTH. But I am a PROcrastinator.
Solution: Read one aloud to the children each day and the other one by myself, usually after kids' bedtimes.
Can you guess which is the "read aloud" book?
It was not easy to obtain a copy of The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria Augusta Trapp (you know--what The Sound of Music is based on), but through intra-library loan, I got one. Only problem is that I can only have it until January 14.
Which wouldn't be a problem, but I have had George Orwell's 1984 checked out for several weeks now while I was reading something else, and my renewals on it have run out. It is due January 13!
And I want to read them BOTH. But I am a PROcrastinator.
Solution: Read one aloud to the children each day and the other one by myself, usually after kids' bedtimes.
Can you guess which is the "read aloud" book?
Friday, January 6, 2017
Come read with me in 2017!
Happy New Year!!
Just like most of us, I have plenty of potential New Year's resolutions--lose weight, exercise more, eat healthy, etc.--but (also like most of us) I am not overly optimistic about keeping them.
So I came up with something that is not only good for me, but actually might be doable. READ more!
Not very original, I know, but it's better than just resigning my lazy self to giving up and wasting a few more hours on Angry Birds or Candy Crush. And my resolve to read more has made me decide to keep record of it here on my rather dusty blog. Which means I will WRITE more, too! Win, win.
So here goes:
The first book I am reading (or rather finishing, as I started it during Christmas) is Puppet Masters by Robert Heinlein. Actually, I am re-reading it. I first read it about 25 years ago, shortly after getting married when I was on a Heinlein kick. It's a fast paced book and one of his best.
The odd thing about reading it now, as opposed to before the age of Internet and cell phone cameras, is how amusing the technology is. It takes place in 2007, and you have space travel with colonies that have lived and died on Venus, but recordings of interviews are on "spools." The communications between the federal government and state governments relies on local transmissions, thereby causing all kinds of mayhem when the aliens interfere. But cars can fly!
Next up: The Story of the Trapp Family Singers and 1984.
Just like most of us, I have plenty of potential New Year's resolutions--lose weight, exercise more, eat healthy, etc.--but (also like most of us) I am not overly optimistic about keeping them.
So I came up with something that is not only good for me, but actually might be doable. READ more!
Not very original, I know, but it's better than just resigning my lazy self to giving up and wasting a few more hours on Angry Birds or Candy Crush. And my resolve to read more has made me decide to keep record of it here on my rather dusty blog. Which means I will WRITE more, too! Win, win.
So here goes:
The first book I am reading (or rather finishing, as I started it during Christmas) is Puppet Masters by Robert Heinlein. Actually, I am re-reading it. I first read it about 25 years ago, shortly after getting married when I was on a Heinlein kick. It's a fast paced book and one of his best.
The odd thing about reading it now, as opposed to before the age of Internet and cell phone cameras, is how amusing the technology is. It takes place in 2007, and you have space travel with colonies that have lived and died on Venus, but recordings of interviews are on "spools." The communications between the federal government and state governments relies on local transmissions, thereby causing all kinds of mayhem when the aliens interfere. But cars can fly!
Next up: The Story of the Trapp Family Singers and 1984.
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