It must be really hard to write a story better than Gogol's "The Overcoat", because few have managed it. How he managed to blend such poignancy, humorIt must be really hard to write a story better than Gogol's "The Overcoat", because few have managed it. How he managed to blend such poignancy, humor, and realism into one superbly effective tale is beyond my ability to fathom. I'd read it once before, translated by whoever Signet Classics chose, but this Pevear and Volokhonsky translation is certainly better; the funnier bits are funnier, the heartache is more acute. And while it's hard to argue that it's not the best story in the lot, most of these tales have a nearly-comparable quality to them.
For an author who Pushkin famously described as making the original Russian typesetters uniformly break into "laughter through tears," to pick up on all the verbal nuances it's important to read a good translation, and this is it. However, I'm not sure how they got away with calling it the "Collected Tales" as it's missing half the stories from the two volumes of his earliest story collection, Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka (his early Ukrainian tales). But it can't be denied that all his most famous stories, and then some, are here, so I'll quit picking nits.
You can really see why Dostoevsky and Tolstoy were so amazed by Gogol, so influenced by his works. And it's equally plain to see why Gogol is the best at what he did: those other Russians did not hold a candle to Gogol's ability to incorporate such wise satire and slapstick comedy into nearly all of his stories, even his bleakest and most serious ones. Nabokov and Bulgakov later managed to sometimes reach his level of absurdity, but I find them slightly less effective in the pathos department. As far as pure fiction writing goes, pure prose, Gogol was miles ahead of Dostoevsky; this collection is indispensable to anyone interested in the craft of fiction. And it's just so dang heartening and inspiring to read such inventive, creative, fantastic tales.
Gogol apparently has streets named after him in at least a dozen different cities in Russia/Ukraine. I think a new goal should be to walk down each and every one of them!...more
An incredibly phenomenal book about a disconnected 12-year-old girl who feels so smothered by her lifeless life in a dead-end town that, when her brotAn incredibly phenomenal book about a disconnected 12-year-old girl who feels so smothered by her lifeless life in a dead-end town that, when her brother announces his wedding and his plans to live far away, she's finally filled with hope because she thinks she can run off with them and join their lives, leaving behind her miserable life forever.
I don't know what it is about McCullers' best works (The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, and this one) that, for me, elevate her beyond the works of fellow "Southern School Masters" O'Connor and Faulkner, but there's some mysterious quality here that always keeps me coming back. Maybe it has to do with the way she handles her protagonists with such tender love, embracing all their flaws and self-doubt. She's brimming with love for her characters, and the self-torture they suffer is very real and very understandable, even if it's something they themselves don't understand. McCullers understood it, though, because her characters' pain and inner-turmoil come from her own adolescence. As a writer, she understood the very soul of people -- all people, people totally different from her, such as those of different sexes and races and those with grotesque disfigurations -- and she knew how to translate their mysterious feelings onto the written page like so few other writers have done. She's a real literary hero and saint of Humanity, and she deserves all the praise a writer can get.
This book might be her most poignant for me, probably because, like Frankie in this novel, I'm also struggling with coming to terms with feelings of entrapment and even helplessness and despair at times. Frankie is forever searching for something else, constantly wondering what it is that she's searching for, that will save her and transform her into who she needs to be. She doesn't know what it is, but she knows to the very soles of her feet that what she needs is far away from here. The novel largely depicts Frankie wondering and wandering, moody, agitated, and full of that longing for the else, for the other. We're allowed so far into Frankie's mind that it becomes gloriously claustrophobic, and her suffocations become ours. And I mean that in the best way possible.
Not a beach read, not a happy read, but also not as gloomy as it sounds, and surprisingly uplifting. Or maybe that's just me.
Carson McCullers, please come back to life. We need you forever. ...more
Despite Carson McCullers having been quite famous in her day (the 1940s and 50s)--and still today--I don't remember hearing abouTHIS. This is amazing.
Despite Carson McCullers having been quite famous in her day (the 1940s and 50s)--and still today--I don't remember hearing about her until the wonderful Hollie Fullbrook (Tiny Ruins) mentioned her recently. I'm incredibly glad I picked up this book. From the very first page (which begins, "In the town there were two mutes, and they were always together"), my eyes and heart were wide open. Carson had so much sympathy for all those people on the fringes of society, outsiders who have always wanted to belong but cannot, and it breaks my heart. Most of these characters have only one friend, and even though many have a mutual friend (Singer the mute), they can't manage to befriend the others. All of them are looking for something, but none of them know what it is. Somehow they all revolve around Singer the mute, who they really don't know anything about, but everyone talks to him and makes up their own ideas about him. “Owing to the fact he was a mute they were able to give him all the qualities they wanted him to have.”
Carson's deep insight into music, sadness, loneliness, and being lost is enough to make you weep. When Singer's only true friend, the other mute Antonapoulos, gets sent to a mental institute, Singer writes in a letter: “I found a cooked fly in my soup not long ago. It was mixed with the vegetables and the noodles like letters. But that is nothing. The way I need you is a loneliness I cannot bear. [...] I am not meant to be alone and without you who understand.”
One of the drifters in town sits down at the diner and orders anything: "'Any old leftovers will do. Just put them on a plate. You don't even have to bother to heat them.' The emptiness in him hurt. He wanted to look neither backward nor forward. He walked two of his short, chunky fingers across the top of the table. It was more than a year now since he had sat at this table for the first time. And how much further was he now than then? No further. Nothing had happened except that he had made a friend and lost him.”
Her description of the town is tangible and real, and even though it reads like it could be any Southern town, you get the sense that you'd never want to step foot in this specific one because you might get stuck.
McCullers had an open heart and two open ears for anybody and everybody. She was a real ally and spokesperson for Black Rights and an incredibly big Marxist. Her characters always point out all the ways that people are oppressed in America, whether because of race or class or sex or what have you. She put everybody on the same level, but she made no attempt to hide the very real tensions that arose when people of mixed races and classes interact with each other. Her characters voice different sides of issues (a la Dostoevsky) and never beat around the bush. McCullers was not afraid to say anything.
The first chapter could be taken as a stand-alone short story (and perhaps it originally was), and as such it is an absolutely phenomenal story. If by the end of that chapter you're not certain you've found a new love (in the form of this novel), you may be a lizard.
McCullers' writing was often called Southern Gothic and compared to Flannery O'Connor, but I think in the case of this novel (the only I've read from her), it's a lot lighter than O'Connor's world. Even though these characters are pretty damn grotesque, their sense of searching and yearning seems a little less dark, less inspired by intense guilt and zealous religion and more of a general need for basic acceptance and understanding. (That said, there are still zealous religious nuts and hacks walking and shouting around the town, so it's definitely Southern. Southern Realism, McCullers called it.)
I don't know what else to say other than this book is amazing. Should everyone read it? I think so.
The movie is surprisingly good, too, although naturally it's pretty diluted and narrowed-down. It feels like it should, though, and stars Alan Arkin as Singer, so that's all right!
Some of my favorite quotes:
“Her face felt like it was scattered in pieces and she could not keep it straight. The feeling was a whole lot worse than being hungry for any dinner, yet it was like that. I want--I want--I want--was all that she could think about--but just what this real want was she did not know.”
“All we can do is go around telling the truth.”
“Maybe when people longed for a thing that bad the longing made them trust in anything that might give it to them.”
“Harry in the country was different from Harry sitting on the back steps reading the newspapers and thinking about Hitler.”
“But look what the Church has done to Jesus during the last two thousand years. What they have made of Him. How they have turned every word He spoke for their own vile ends. Jesus would be framed and in jail if he was living today.”
“Wonderful music like this was the worst hurt there could be. The whole world was this symphony, and there was not enough of her to listen.”
“Sometimes this fellow's music was like little colored pieces of crystal candy, and other times it was the softest, saddest thing she had ever imagined about.”
“He watched her and felt only a sort of gentleness. In him the old feeling was gone. For a year this love had blossomed strangely. He had questioned it a hundred times and found no answer. And now, as a summer flower shatters in September, it was finished. There was no one.”
“Some of you young people here this morning may feel the need to be teachers or nurses or leaders of your race. But most of you will be denied. You will have to sell yourselves for a useless purpose in order to keep alive. You will be thrust back and defeated. The young chemist picks cotton. The young writer is unable to learn to read. The teacher is held in useless slavery at some ironing board. We have no representatives in government. We have no vote. […] We cannot lift up our voices. Our tongues rot in our mouths from lack of use. Our hearts grow empty and lose strength for our purpose.”
“Wherever you look there’s meanness and corruption. This room, this bottle of grape wine, these fruits in the basket, are all products of profit and loss. A fellow can’t live without giving his passive acceptance to meanness. Somebody wears his tail to a frazzle for every mouthful we eat and every stitch we wear—and nobody seems to know. Everybody is blind, dumb, and blunt-headed—stupid and mean.”...more
This is the 2nd-best book I've read this year. The first was Independent People, by the same author, which is easily one of the 5 or 10 best books I'vThis is the 2nd-best book I've read this year. The first was Independent People, by the same author, which is easily one of the 5 or 10 best books I've ever read. If you want to discover a truly phenomenal writer, one with as much pathos and humanity as tenderness and good humor, with some of the most stunningly beautiful passages imaginable... I would suggest Mr Laxness to you! No, I would almost demand that you let this saint into your life. These two books are something on another level altogether. He wrote with so much honesty and passion, warm and fuzzy yet cold and distant when needed. (He is Icelandic, after all). Reading Laxness feels like sitting in front of a blazing fire with wool socks, watching a terrifying blizzard from the single-plane windows of your house which may or may not stand up to the elements (but you hope that it does, so that you don't freeze to death, and can read all of his other novels when you're finished with one).
Laxness's protagonists are fairly impoverished and rather single-minded, simple on one level but intrinsically complex, and intelligent enough to scrape by. There are heaps of other characters buzzing around his epic tales, ranging from greedy tobacconists, hypocritical pastors and evil Christian men, strong-headed young women, tyrannical politicians, strange and lonely spiritual mediums, etc. Needless to say, most of the townsfolk we meet along the journey are quite grotesque in one way or many. The anti-hero of this novel is Ólafur, an orphan who "was sent away from his mother in a sack one winter's day." The first quarter of the book (originally published in four installments) details his awful childhood with equal parts sympathy and subtle anger. (The same can be said of the whole novel, really.) Weak and extremely unloved by all, he lives a bleak existence that somehow never quite becomes bitterness. His only solace is learning how to be a poet, which he does while in his sickbed for two years, meanwhile memorizing every knot and crack in the wood floor and ceiling in his corner of the cold hut. He soon comes across a book, a sole book, which he reads in private, knowing that the house would be outraged if he were caught reading a "filthy" book (meaning any book that is not the Bible). Alas, he is caught and the book is burned in a tragic episode. "Admittedly he had never understood the book, but that did not matter. What mattered was that this was his secret, his dream, his refuge; in short, it was his book. He wept only as children weep when they suffer injustice at the hands of those stronger than themselves. It is the most bitter weeping in the world. That was what happened to his book; it was taken from him and burned. And he was left standing naked and without a book on the first day of summer."
He eventually is ostracized from the house and taken on horseback to a faraway village. He is guided by Reimar the poet, the most popular in the region. He finally works up the courage to ask, “Don't you find it exceedingly difficult to be a poet, Reimar?” “Difficult? Me? To be a poet? Just ask the womenfolk about that, my friend, whether our Reimar finds it difficult to be a poet! It was only yesterday that I rode into the yard of one of the better farms hereabouts, and the daughter of the house was standing outside, smiling, and without more ado I addressed her with a double-rhymed, quatro-syllabic verse that just came to me as I bent down from the saddle to greet her. No, it's not difficult to be a poet, my friend, it's a pleasure to be a poet.”
In this new land, he is free, though equally poor. His one desire is to write poetry all day long and look at the world around him. His only thought of the future is to write poetry, with no questions about food or employment. He seeks not friends, but only vaguely to be understood. In short, he's a bit naive...but he is, after all, only 17 at this point. "He went on composing poetry for most of the day, and reciting his poems to Nature and lying on his back on the grass and loving the sky. Late in the afternoon he drank some water from the brook. He was sure that the birds of the sky would bring him tidbits in their beaks whenever he got hungry."
His life continues on, with a handful of genuine (though mild) ups, and many downs. It is the saga of good Ólafur, who merely wants to be a true poet and not bother anybody. But in the process he somehow ends up bothering almost everybody... Surrounding him are all the narrow-minded and corrupt people in high positions, and the hard-working, hungry townsfolk who are more and more oppressed at every turn. Of course, much of the book deals with bleak things, but it's never bleak for long - there is good humor throughout, even in the speeches of the corrupt hypocrites, and even in the deep despair of young Ólafur. What's more, the genuine joy to be found in such simple things as the sun splashing onto the hair of a first lover in the morning, the glimpsing of a beautiful glacier, the divine power of feeling the heavens, the palpable spirit of an inspired poem...these moments fill your soul like they're actual breaths of fresh glacial air.
There's a lot about spirituality, and much talk about Christianity (especially the two religious leaders of the town, who are just about the opposite of godly men). Near the end of the book, however, we meet a pastor who often pays a visit to jails. Turns out this guy, at least, has a bit more of the kind, humane, gentle personality of the figure Christians are meant to look up to most.“If I have a face that rejoices in God's grace, my brother, it is because I have learned more from those who have lived within the walls [of this prison] than from those who lived outside them,” said the cathedral pastor. “I have learned more from those who have fallen down than those who have remained upright. That's why I am always so happy in this house.” I think it's fair to say that the reader will feel the same: reading this book, we learn more about goodness from those who have fallen than from those who have supposedly "remained upright."
I finished this book a month and a half ago, thinking I'd find the words to write a proper review about it. Those words are still avoiding me, so I'll just give up and tell you to read this book if you like books that have the power to change the way you think about life.
Laxness was a god among men, and these two books are incredibly inspired. Independent People was written before World Light, so I would suggest starting there, but that's like choosing between Rubber Soul and Revolver: completely pointless; you need them both in your life, and the sooner the better.
And here are a few more of my favorite passages!
-- "Was this perhaps life, then?—to have loved one summer in youth and not to have been aware of it until it was over, some sea-wet footprints on the floor and sand in the prints, the fragrance of a woman, soft loving lips in the dusk of a summer night, sea birds; and then nothing more; gone."
-- "Whoever thinks that beauty is something he can enjoy exclusively for himself just by abandoning other people and closing his eyes to the human life of which he is part—he is not the friend of beauty. He who doesn't fight every day of his life to the last breath against the representatives of evil, against the living images of evil who rule Sviðinsvík—he blasphemes by taking the word beauty into his mouth."
-- "Children should live a wholesome and natural life and go about with a mussel in one corner of their mouths and a shrimp in the other instead of sweets."
-- "I'm an extremely wealthy man. I own the sky. I have invested all my capital in the sun. I'm not bad-tempered, as you seem to imagine, nor do I bear grudges. But like all wealthy men, I'm a little frightened of losing my fortune."
-- “And here we sit on someone's threshold shivering in the night, you a hero and I a poet: two beggars.”
-- "The spirit of this penniless folk poet, whom the learned dismissed and the major poets despised, has lived with the Icelandic nation for a thousand years, in the smoky farm cottage, in the destitute fisherman's hut under the glacier, in the shark-catcher off the north coast when all fishing grounds are lost in the black midwinter night of the Arctic Sea, in the tatters of the vagabond who beds down beside a hill sheep in the willow scrub of the moors, in the fetters of the chain gang convicts of Bremerholm: This spirit was the quick in the life of the nation throughout its history. The five strings of the poet's harp were the strings of joy, sorrow, love, heroism and death."...more
A strange, beautiful book about moving on in the face of loss. Mikage is orphaned when her grandmother dies, so moves in with one of her grandmother'sA strange, beautiful book about moving on in the face of loss. Mikage is orphaned when her grandmother dies, so moves in with one of her grandmother's favorite people, Yuichi (the boy from the flower shop) and his transvestite mother Eriko. The three of them are quirky and delightful, and, like in much Japanese fiction, a lot of mundane moments become magical and fascinating. Banana Yoshimoto gets compared to Haruki Murakami a lot, because they both so perfectly capture the loneliness and isolation of modern life (especially amongst younger people), and judging by this book, probably also because they love writing about making and/or eating food, and the things that happen inside of a kitchen. Those are some of the best moments of the first part of this book.
The second story here, "Moonlight Shadow" is slightly less subtle about its tragedy and the ways to overcome it, and the metaphor is much less realized. Still, it's a fulfilling story, full of sadly beautiful moments and expressions.
QUOTES
"One caravan has stopped, another starts up. There are people I have yet to meet, others I'll never see again. People who are gone before you know it, people who are just passing through. Even as we exchange hellos, they seem to grow transparent. I must keep living with the flowing river before my eyes. I earnestly pray that a trace of my girl-child self will always be with you."
"In the uncertain ebb and flow of time and emotions, much of one's life history is etched in the senses. And things of no particular importance, or irreplaceable things, can suddenly resurface in a cafe one winter night."
"She had reminded me that I could get excited over something unknown, and a tiny window opened in my heart. Even if nothing happened -- even if it turned out to be just the two of us watching the sparkling glint off the cold, flowing river -- it would feel good. It would be enough for me."
"In retrospect I realize that fate was a ladder on which, at the time, I could not afford to miss a single rung. To skip out on even one scene would have meant never making it to the top, although it would have been by far the easier choice. What motivated me was probably that little light still left in my half-dead heart, glittering in the darkness."
"Why is it that everything I eat when I'm with you is so delicious?" I laughed. "Could it be that you're satisfying hunger and lust at the same time?"...more
It says a lot for this book that so much of it was so familiar to me, even though I hadn't read it since 5th grade (17 years ago)! Sure, I saw the movIt says a lot for this book that so much of it was so familiar to me, even though I hadn't read it since 5th grade (17 years ago)! Sure, I saw the movie a few years after that, but never since. It's simply an unforgettable book with a whole bunch of unforgettable characters.
Surely one of the most compassionate books ever written, it's about much more than just racism and Christian hypocrisy. The first part illustrates the absurdity of a new method of teaching which provokes anger in the teacher because a student learned how to read at home instead of at school. There's also a lot of great insight into class warfare, sexism, single parenting, courage, pride, fighting for the values you believe in when everyone else is at your throat about it. This book covers a lot of ground, and needs to be essential reading for each and every child (and adult) in the world.
To Kill a Mockingbird strikes the perfect balance between a "literary masterpiece" and a "popular" one. The prose is superb, subtle when it needs to be, nuanced, and deep, yet it's accessible to all ages and a very fast read.
Above all it's beautiful and funny (as much as it's ugly and sad). Scout and Jem are two of the loveliest main characters in literary history, and Atticus is a wonderful heroic figure.
There's a lot of great dialog here. One of my favorites is early on when Scout and Jem first meet their new neighbor kid Dill.
"Hey." "Hey yourself," said Jem pleasantly. "I'm Charles Baker Harris," he said. "I can read." "So what?" I said. "I just thought you'd like to know I can read. You got anything needs readin' I can do it..." "How old are you," asked Jem, "four-and-a-half?" "Goin' on seven." "Shoot, no wonder, then," said Jem, jerking his thumb at me. "Scout yonder's been readin' ever since she was born, and she ain't even started to school yet. You look right puny for goin' on seven." "I'm little but I'm old," he said. "Why don't you come over, Charles Baker Harris?" Jem said. "Lord, what a name." "'s not any funnier'n yours. Aunt Rachel says your name's Jeremy Atticus Finch." Jem scowled. "I'm big enough to fit mine," he said. "Your name's longer'n you are. Bet it's a foot longer." "Folks call me Dill," said Dill.
Naturally, with a book that focuses quite a bit on a lawyer father and a fiery courtroom case, there's also a lot of great monologs. Atticus has plenty, and here's one of the best (and most quoted) things he/Harper Lee says:
"As you grow older, you'll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don't you forget it—whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, that white man is trash."
Words to remember for life, from a book to remember for life....more
"When someone seeks, it can easily happen that his eyes only see the thing he is seeking and that he is incapable of finding anything, incapable of ta"When someone seeks, it can easily happen that his eyes only see the thing he is seeking and that he is incapable of finding anything, incapable of taking anything in, because he is always only thinking about what he is seeking, because he has an object, a goal, because he is possessed by this goal. Seeking means having a goal, but finding means being free, open, having no goal."
One of the many essential quotes from this amazing, short novel. It's all about seeking, finding, accepting, denying, living, dying, self-searching and enlightenment; starting life anew when you find that your life is not at all going the way you wanted it to, full of values you've always detested. Siddharta's path is epic and full of turns that at first glance may seem like "wrong" turns, but this book shows that all wrong turns ultimately make up the soul and meaning of a person: in short, every sour note in life helps to build character, will-power, and the knowledge of essentiality.
Starting from a child and ending in old age, the novel has an epic arc without the length: it uses words sparingly; indeed, there are several pages dedicated to expressing the futility of words (which, of course, is a sort of paradox). The events and enlightenments in the novel are succinct and never rambling, yet it never feels fast-paced and is loaded with plenty of scenes in which Siddhartha is merely watching a river or garden, contemplating all. It's a beautifully spiritual book, full of soul and real passion for the spirit, giving meaning to spirituality. It mainly deals with Buddhist ways of living and thinking, though Hesse's background in Christianity adds a certain element, as well. Because of all these varying elements, I think the novel is very universal and would apply to anyone.
It reminds me in part of Persig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, in that it offers countless pieces of essential life advice, and a reader in the habit of reading with a pen will end up with a very colorful text, indeed. However, Siddhartha ultimately seems a lot less lofty or stuffy, and has no inkling of pomposity or of trying to display the author's incomparable genius. (Persig is a brilliant writer and thinker, but he could learn a good lesson from Hesse in terms of brevity and grace.) Both books, however, deal with similar themes (though in rather different ways).
Here's another great quote, spoken by the Ferryman to Siddhartha:
"Look, I am no scholar. I do not know how to talk and I also do not know how to think. I only know how to listen and how to be respectful. I have not learned anything else. If I could express that and teach it, perhaps I would be a wise man. But as it is, I am only a ferryman, and my task is to take people across this river. I have taken many across, thousands, and for all of them my river has been nothing but an obstacle on their journey."
The novel tries to eliminate the thought of negative "obstacles" in life, looking at them instead as positive happenstance to smile at. Hesse urges the willing reader to take life far more pleasantly and peacefully, gracefully and graciously - to slow down, look around, and fill your lungs and eyes with the air of life.
The second half of the novel mentions the word "smile" so many times that it's impossible not to smile yourself, and feel immense pleasure while reading such a rich, optimistic book. Here's an earlier segment of the book that makes me smile:
" 'You must do what you have learned to do, and get money and clothes and shoes for it. There is no other way for a poor man to get money. What can you do?' 'I can think, I can wait, and I can fast,' says Siddhartha. 'Is that all?' 'That is all. No, I can also compose poetry. Will you give me a kiss for a poem?' "
I'd like to give Hesse a kiss for the poetry of Siddhartha. I'll have to settle for kissing his tombstone....more
Should get ten stars, because I like it twice as much as any other.
Since first reading this book 5-6 years ago, I read it at least once a year. So thShould get ten stars, because I like it twice as much as any other.
Since first reading this book 5-6 years ago, I read it at least once a year. So this time I read the Alan Wakeman version, which is the third English translation I've read (there are at least five total). It's fantastic! I think I like it more than the Katherine Woods translation (if only because I feel a few of my favorite passages are inferior in hers). There's a lovely introduction by Wakeman that makes me believe he has a passionate love and understanding of this beloved text, both the story and St-Ex's labored sentences themselves. I think it pays off. The translation runs very smoothly, and if you don't get caught up on the handful of British stylings, it's a delight.
For some reason, this edition also features watercolor illustrations by Michael Foreman. Some of the pictures are quite beautiful and remarkable, with lovely tones of blues and golds. But the shame is that his pictures replace all of St-Ex's originals - a criminal act in itself, but also an extremely perplexing one. Why would anyone think this is necessary? Don't get me wrong, I've seen some wonderful art inspired by this book (just look at the exquisite Korean version), but in book form this artwork should be extra - not in replacement. Shame. To Foreman's credit, a lot of the illustrations he did are close approximations of the originals, but there are some drawings left out altogether. Why? ...more
I think at this point I might as well just declare Saroyan as my favorite playwright. These are brilliant. The Time of Your Life is neck-to-neck with I think at this point I might as well just declare Saroyan as my favorite playwright. These are brilliant. The Time of Your Life is neck-to-neck with Wilder's Our Town as my favorite play, and The Beautiful People is almost as good. In fact, the only one here that didn't thoroughly thrill my noggin was Love's Old Sweet Song, which was still great but simply had some parts that dragged it down a bit. Maybe it'd help to see it performed - granted, it'd be great to see ANY of these performed, but reading them as written is a real treat in itself.
Long live Bill Saroyan, that sweet, hilarious humanist....more
Wonderful book! It's hilarious, and it tells you things. That's about all I need.Wonderful book! It's hilarious, and it tells you things. That's about all I need....more
I'd give it more stars if I could. My new favorite play. It oozes with humanity, is smart and innovative, and points out the best things in life - whaI'd give it more stars if I could. My new favorite play. It oozes with humanity, is smart and innovative, and points out the best things in life - what more do you need?...more
Up there with Dahl's best, meaning this is as good as a children's book gets. I'd read the text before, but this is the first time I've seen the magniUp there with Dahl's best, meaning this is as good as a children's book gets. I'd read the text before, but this is the first time I've seen the magnificent illustrations, hugely colorful and absorbing. They really add a lot to a perfect story (yes, that's a true sentence).
Dahl managed to finish this story before he died, and it's full of grace and beauty and nature. Above all, it's full of life.
Definitely on par with Charlie and James, although this story is on a more "mini" level - in terms of length (and in regard to the Minpins, of course).
They definitely need to make a movie of this....more
Wow, this is probably now my 2nd favorite kids' book. It's got everything essential: more creativity than many writers pack into their whole careers, Wow, this is probably now my 2nd favorite kids' book. It's got everything essential: more creativity than many writers pack into their whole careers, lovable and hatable characters, humor everywhere, over a hundred new and hilarious words for kids (and adults) to fall in love with and incorporate into their daily vocabularies, and quite a few tidbits of wisdom thrown in throughout. I think the only reason I might prefer this to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or The Minpins is all those crazy, gloriumptious new words. It's a brand new dialect. How wondercrump! You think I is swizzfiggling you?...more
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