So, I am reading a lot. I see things I think I'd like to read; I put a hold on at the library; at some unspecified time in the future, the book will arrive. Sometimes I even forget where I heard about a book, some are revelations and some are, of course, duds.
This September I saw that there was a movie at TIFF of Thérèse Raquin, by Emile Zola. (I see they have retitled it In Secret.) It has that cute Tom Felton as a sickly and pale husband, who has to be disposed of by the lovely and talented Elizabeth Olsen and her tall, dark, handsome lover, Oscar Isaac. Now, I like a good movie, but I do like to read the book first, so I decided to read Thérèse Raquin, and in the original French. Heck, it's only 32 years since I got a BA in the subject, after all. It was surprisingly easy to get back my ease of reading in French, perhaps because this is a book about people who live in a city, hang around home, kill off husbands... all pretty straightforward vocabulary.
Chuffed with that success, I took on Madame Bovary.
In this book, I bet 17 different kinds of trees are named; 37 different fabrics; there are furnishings, kinds of clothing, architectural bits, carriages and medical terms. Sometimes I knew what the words meant but things still didn't make sense. I had an English translation nearby -- I still often wondered why he'd put that sentence just there. A bit more challenging, for sure.
I have a stack of other books by the bedside, and I even bought some more French books. Now, I think, a thriller in English, though. And starting today with Madame Bovary, I will put a list in the sidebar of books I have finished.
Cool! Though if you want to track your books, there's GoodReads. It's kinda like Ravelry for readers ;-). I should get myself overthere, come to think of it.
ReplyDeleteI've been reading a bunch lately too. I have a couple of library holds that I hope I can finish before they can't be renewed, and a couple more I'm hoping will arrive before my week off. Right now I'm reading "The diamond age, or, a young lady's illustrated primer" by Neal Stephenson, which is the ultimate fantasy for educational technologists. So good!
I love to read, too. I've recently read Yokohama Burning, about the 1923 Tokyo/Yokohama earthquake, two books about young girls who survived Auschwitz - After Auschwitz and Edith's Story. I've found two new authors - Kerry Greenwood and MC Beaton. Greenwood writes the Phryne Fisher mysteries and Another series about a baker called Corinna, who gets mixed up in mysteries. MC Beaton writes the Hamish McBeth series and another series about Agatha Raisin, a busybody who likes to investigate. Also, Soul Survivor, about a little boy who is the reincarnation of an American WW II pilot.
ReplyDeleteOh goody, I like getting more suggestions for books to read!
ReplyDeleteOh, and I use Librarything to track what I'm reading - I've got a widget for it which shows up in the sidebar of my blog so you can see what I've recently been reading.
ReplyDelete