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What are you currently reading?

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The Photographer in Blowup

10:18 / 26.12.02

I am the only person in the world, it seems, who hasn't read the Harry Potter books.

Don't flatter yourself, you're not the only one.

It's not that i'll never read them, but until i don't read everything else in the world, and that includes the lost volumes that were lost forever when the library of Alexandria was burned, then i won't read Harry Potter - it's a sort of priority list i have.

Anyway, i'm reading Wilkie Collins: an illustrated guide, by Andrew Gasson - got it for Christmas; it's interesting.

Tryphena Absent

14:16 / 26.12.02

I often notice a snobbish attitude towards the Harry Potter books that I don't quite understand. This lovely series of books is treated as if some she-devil on speed wrote them but they're only about an unhappy little boy with an evil family who's turned out remarkably well. Read the books, they're nice, especially when you feel ill. Rowling actually isn't a bad author and you don't have to spend your lifetime dedicated to reading them especially considering how fast some of you Barbe-folks must read! I guarantee by the end of Goblet of Fire you will be itching to find out what happens next.

17:03 / 26.12.02

I have never read an Harry Potter book either. My feeling is: I can read something better than that. Snobbery certainly, but I might try one someday.

Just finished re-reading Condfederacy of Dunces. Much better the second time; I didn't remember it at all. Brilliant.

Aside to Barry Auckland: You were right; Nomad of the Timestream rocks! Are there any other Moorcock books in this series?

Optimistic: well, if you like Illuminatus, you might jump into The Schröedinger's Cat Trilogy. It's more of the same but totally different.

The Photographer in Blowup

18:17 / 26.12.02

I often notice a snobbish attitude towards the Harry Potter books that I don't quite understand.

I'm not the sort of people who thinks Shakespeare is the 'greatest playwright of all times' just because a bunch of critics say so - actually, i prefer Christopher Marlowe to Shakespeare, which some people tell me is very a sad thing to admit - nor do i define literature in terms of 'Wow, what an incredible introspection of the way this writer interprets life and questions the meaning of everything, and i mean everything, blah-blah-blah...'

I define it by this: i spent money on a book; did it entertain me? Was my time and money well spent?

And when i think of Harry Potter, something tells me i wouldn't find my money/time well spent, so i avoid it.

Is that snobbish? I think it means i don't have an unlimited bank account and have to choose wisely what i read.

Tryphena Absent

21:58 / 26.12.02

Join a library, I say that but my fines are disgusting, I can't get any books out because I can't pay them! If you ever want something easy to read and you do have the money to spend I recommend them and that's all I'm saying!

22:27 / 26.12.02

Harry Potter is worth at least borrowing from a library. The first book is good and refreshingly different, being on a cusp of the kidult renaissance... the second is identical but with some better anecdotes, the fourth is overwriting tripe, but the third is fantastic because it's actually quite nasty at points and turns lots of conventions upside down.

I'd still recommend reading Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy first, but only because that's going to be seen in years to come as well, the real masterpiece of the era.

wembley can change in 28 days

14:15 / 27.12.02

Paleface, you took the words right out of my mouth. I effing love His Dark Materials. Those books reminded me why I used to stay up all night reading by flashlight, and to boot the research done is enough to satisfy anyone with a taste for the high-brow. Plus the author has an obvious soft spot for Finland, and I get a kick out of all the finnish names and little traditions - especially with the witches.

Goodness Gracious Meme

17:33 / 27.12.02

Rosa, it wasn't some grand proclamation, more a comment on my circles of acquaintance, I guess. And I hadn't read them pretty much cause I don't/can't afford new books (and am also in hiding from my local library. gah) so don't buy them. Or if I do, have to know I'm going to *love* them. Which makes me a pretty conservative book buyer.

Probably wouldn't've got around to buying them for myself, not being keen enough (christmas pressie) But I really enjoyed them. No, they didn't feel like a life-changing experience, but i did find myself reading them late at night, not wanting to stop until I'd finished them; the stories carried me along... And reminded me (exacerbated by being in the bed i grew up in) totally of that 'reading by flashlight' excitement.

Paleface: you're quite right. Four days ago I couldn't have named you more than two characters, and now I *do* want to know what happens next (and is it me, or is no.4 really badly structured?)

They're fluff. But good fluff. (although some of the ideological cliches/assumptions made me squirm. And are 'balanced' by some rather heavy-handed, 'look, there are black kids here too' stuf... hmm)

Like some of the ideas/implications, that the idea of the wizard community throws up eg: the Quidditch games being mixed sex, as it doesn't really make any difference when you're playing sport with broomsticks and wands... But think she could have done a lot more with them...

Tryphena Absent

17:43 / 27.12.02

Oh. Fourth book badly structured, don't have a clue what you people are talking about, I'm just a child where stories like this are concerned.

His Dark Materials, hmm, Northern Lights is a wonderful book, The Subtle Knife I enjoyed, The Amber Spyglass is quite poor and drags. I found it extremely boring and felt that I was reacting to the author, he bailed with the story, he didn't want to finish it and what was truly interesting seemed to get lost somewhere along the way.

Old brown-eye is back

18:25 / 27.12.02

I rather like Harry Potter myself, but there you go. Still ploughing through Coldheart Canyon and having less fun with every passing page, the Satanic orgies having been replaced some bullshit satire about Hollywood. Have a choice between Sexual Personae by C Paglia or the whole of The Invisibles in one go waiting for me at the finishing line.

The Return Of Rothkoid

05:49 / 28.12.02

The Difference Engine has just cropped up in my pile o'books. Pretty good, so far...

08:34 / 28.12.02

I'd disagree with you very strongly, Anna. The third book is where it all finally begins to make sense. It is the slowest, but in some ways necessarily so. What did you think all the interesting stuff was? From what I could tell (and interviews with Pullman, etc) it's all the Milton/Kabbalah/collapse of heavenly authority that is really what interests him and he's been getting around to it all the long. You just need to get the kids and the readers to grow up enough (ie: read the first two books) in order to finallly appreciate the scale of what you're faced with. I kind-of see what you mean about "finishing the story"... but at the same time, I get the feeling that was how Pullman wanted to finish the story. One thing I loved in that book were the chapter-epigrams; he wasn't pulling punches any more with all his Blake/Herbert/Milton referencing. It's all out in the open. And the more I think about it, the more I love the vignettes in that book, but particularly Mary and the Mulefa, which just strikes me as being wonderful.

Wembley - we had a powercut one night for several hours here, and I was reading the Amber Spyglass at that point... and ended up lying on the living room floor, and read the entire second half of the book in one sitting by candlelight. Carpet burns on my arms and all. Brilliant.

pointless and uncalled for

09:25 / 28.12.02

Just abanodoned The Republic (temporarily) to read a loaned copy of George Bernard Shaw's - An Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism.

While written in the 1920's it seems very relavent today, with the exception of the intelligent women bit. It should be everyone's guide really. Kudos to Shaw for the efforts to educate women while such practices were controversial.

12:36 / 28.12.02

Just finished Douglas Coupland's Miss Wyoming, which was OK. But didn't set anything alight, really. Bit disappointed, but not offensive to my sight. And I did finish the damn thing. Now: now idea. Possibly back to Moonshadow amidst a pile of HG Wells.

Tryphena Absent

15:44 / 28.12.02

I adored the simplest ideas in those books, the demons, the Northern Lights and the human relationships across worlds. When I got to the third book there seemed to be this insane jump in the pace of Pullman's writing, probably because it was written later then the other two, it just felt like he stopped dead in his tracks for a little while and then began to crawl along the story. I really dislike that sudden change in pace. I much prefer Rowling's writing because it is always accessible and maintains the same sort of approach through all four of the books even when they wind you up by finishing.

15:59 / 28.12.02

I hate Rowling's writing. Her characters and readers grow a year per book. Her writing style does not. It's full of subject-verb-object, it's very basic; there's no flashback or foreshadowing - it's relentlessly linear and whilst that's OK in Book 1, really, Book 4 ought to be a bit more advanced. It's not. Rowling said she'd grow up with her readers, and she quite clearly hasn't - the problem is, she's not a good enough writer for the task she's set down. That's yet another reason I dread the later books, if they ever happen.

This is a particular beef of mine.

17:59 / 28.12.02

You know, there are several threads in this forum devoted to Rowling and Pullman - if people are going to have good, meaty discussions about those two it would be good if you could take yourselves there, rather than having them in this (essentially fluffy) thread...

Goodness Gracious Meme

21:58 / 29.12.02

Actually, trying to describe the HP books to a friend, found myself liking them alot less... don't think the conflation of what feel like a 30s school stories worldview and a presnt-day worldview works too well.

eg when describing it too a friend, found myself loathing the whole jolly hockeysticks/'jock' 'well as long as you're good at sports, man, you're a hero' schtick.

Ug.

and yeah, rereading Goblet of Fire and *actually* reading the writing this time rather than following the plot, she can't write for toffee

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