Books you should like...but don't.

[Max]

This is why I think the production I saw handled it so well. It had a focus on hypocrisy more generally, rather than the specific moral concerns of the play, which, as you say, are harder to relate to in the 21st century. Obviously

Spoiler:

it had to keep the central element of moral hysteria about sex outside marriage in the play

but it was done in such a way that it seemed simply an element of the current sleazy, hypocritical political climate - something that, in New South Wales, is, unfortunately, easy to relate to.

That's excellent. It's amazing how if you look at the twentieth century production history of virtually any Shakespeare play, every decade has its own radical reinterpretations. The plays seem capable of speaking not just to every age but to every apparently isolated circumstance in history, so long as a talented director is at work.

[Aletheia Dolorosa]

Exactly. One of the interesting things that Jeanette Winterson said in the interview I did last week was that we don't go to Shakespeare plays to find out about the concerns of the Elizabethan era. We go to find out about ourselves. I don't think that making Shakespeare 'relevant' should be the be all and end all of a particular production, but I do think it is an important element.

[sxygreenshoelace]

C'est La Vie...

that looked really good and sparked my interest with the cover art... then I started reading, and for some reason couldn't get past the first page... it just rambled to me, instead of being something I wanted to finish... so anyone want a free copy of it ?

[intotheworld]

Shakespeare- I haven't read one enjoyable story nor have I even liked a character from one.


I had a somewhat different problem with The Catcher in the Rye, I actually liked Holden but didn't care for about half of the story. I felt like a good portion of the book was simply wasted on Sunny and Maurice. The most intolerable character to me was actually the younger sister Phoebe. Not that I read many novels but Phoebe takes the cake for most annoying character not intended to be.

[Stelmaria7]

i could never read the Lord of the Rings. I just couldn't deal with all the plot description. my friend forced herself to read them. But i only got throught the Hobbit and then The Fellow Ship once. I also can't stand Anything by Tom Soyer. EVen thougth we have to read it every year it seems like. I made it throught and go a good grade on the tests even thougth i had no clue what was happening.

[Aletheia Dolorosa]

Umm, Tom Sawyer's a book, not an author. Unless there's a Tom Soyer I've never heard of...

I'm not a huge Mark Twain fan myself, though. Reading A Connecticut Yankee At King Arthur's Court hurt my Arthurian fangirl heart.

[Mockingbird]

I also can't stand Anything by Tom Soyer.

Any relation to Huck Finn?

I'm not a huge fan of Mark Twain's philosophy, it's so...American but I'm not an "unfan" of his work. I should say I'm also not really an "unfan" of Shakespeare anymore. *still harbors hate for Salinger, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and that entire school of prose*

[Qu Klaani]

*still harbors hate for Salinger, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and that entire school of prose*

*shoots Di*



Um...I don't really have anything else to add. I don't really like The Amber Spyglass, guess thats slightly controversial.

[Townie]

I like the first two more, but its still a stonking fine read!

[tyche]

I want to retract what i said about Catcher in the Rye. Just re-read it and this time it really struck a cord with me, possibly because of the twenty years premature midlife crisis i seem to be going through at the moment.

[Aletheia Dolorosa]

I want to retract what i said about Catcher in the Rye. Just re-read it and this time it really struck a cord with me, possibly because of the twenty years premature midlife crisis i seem to be going through at the moment.

Join the quarter-life crisis club!