Posts filed under ‘fiction’
Wharton Rocks my Socks off!
… only, I am not wearing socks today because I have grading to do. Keeps me focused. The sooner I get my grading done, the sooner I get to wear socks. Okay, slightly twisted, it started in my high school days when I was trying to motivate myself to finish a project. I came up with the idea that I wouldn’t wear socks until I had finished. So far, it has worked. And telling my little secret to other people always elicits smiles because they never quite get it. I am not sure, I do, either, other than it is a habit, and I like to maintain consistency. Now, then, on to E. F.
Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton 1862-1937
Lovely book, albeit more than slightly depressing. I love the language, especially the language of nature. It’s like Wharton has created a character out of place and nature. The dead sense of winter, with snow constantly falling, adds to the darkness of the novel. Powerfully awesome!
Mostly, I think that Wharton was attempting to play with narrative structure as she starts out with a separate narrative who seems distant from Ethan Frome’s story, then enters into the story of Frome, and finally ends with the unnamed narrator again. Ethan’s story centers around himself, Zeena (his wife whom he met after she moved in to help take care of his parents), and Mattie (Zeena’s cousin who has no place to go, but moves in to help take care of Zeena because now she is sick). Really, they are all a bit messed up, and it seems as if Ethan, while the central character of the novel, can never make a move which will define the story. The other characters, even Mattie, seem to have more control over the events of the story.
I would also say, then, that Wharton is making a commentary on women. Obviously, the last line of the book overtly speaks to that, “I don’t see’s there’s much difference between the Frome’s up at the farm and the Frome’s down in the graveyard; ‘cept that down there they’re all quiet and the women have got to hold their tongues.” Of course, since this is said by a woman (the younger Mrs. Hale), does that subvert the point altogether?
I love that Wharton is willing to play with the narrative, and to question some societal conventions about men and women. Wharton is taking risks, and as a female writer, I appreciate and connect with her audacity, courage, and bravery. Go Wharton.
I am still unsure about the narrative structure aspect. After reading some commentary, it would seem that Wharton took some flak from her own contemporaries for the choice of narrative structure. And, I agree. If this were shorter and in workshop, I would have said that the narrative structure was too easy. But, it’s not shorter, and it’s published by an amazing author, so I guess I can’t say stuff like that. Hmm… I am just thankful that in the end, I am not the manipulated narrator. Although, in saying that, I get the foreboding feeling, that as the reader, perhaps I really was the manipulated narrator.
Wow, she’s good.
Add comment April 30, 2009
Just So We’re Clear (This could potentially be very pathetic…)
The BBC believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?
25. Though I claim that the Bible should count for 66 altogether which would put me closer to 80 something. Damn, I have a lot of catching up to do!
Instructions:
Look at the list and mark those you have read.
* = read it
** = read it, remember it.
$$ = own it, haven’t read yet.
So many books, so little time!
1 Pride and Prejudice Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings JRR Tolkien $
3 Jane Eyre Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series JK Rowling * (not all of them)
5 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee ** (FAVORITE BOOK!)
6 The Bible ** (I would hope so)
7 Wuthering Heights Emily Bronte * (Thank you, AP English)
8 Nineteen Eighty Four George Orwell * (See number 7)
9 His Dark Materials Philip Pullman * (Not all of them)
10 Great Expectations Charles Dickens *
11 Les Miserables Victor Hugo
12 Little Women Louisa M Alcott*
13 Tess of the D’Urbervilles Thomas Hardy
14 Catch 22
15 Complete Works of Shakespeare
16 Rebecca Daphne Du Maurier
17 The Hobbit JRR Tolkien
18 Birdsong Sebastian Faulk
19 Catcher in the Rye JD Salinger $
20 The Time Traveller’s Wife Audrey Niffenegger
21 Middlemarch George Eliot
22 Gone With The Wind Margaret Mitchell
23 The Great Gatsby F Scott Fitzgerald
24 Bleak House Charles Dickens
25 War and Peace Leo Tolstoy
26 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams
27 Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh
28 Crime and Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky
29 Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck
30 Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll
31 The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame
32 Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy
33 David Copperfield Charles Dickens
34 Chronicles of Narnia CS Lewis **
35 Emma Jane Austen
36 Persuasion Jane Austen
37 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe CS Lewis **
38 The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini *
39 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin Louis De Bernieres
40 Memoirs of a Geisha Arthur Golden
41 Winnie the Pooh AA Milne
42 Animal Farm George Orwell *
43 The Da Vinci Code Dan Brown *
44 One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel Garcia Marquez $
45 A Prayer for Owen Meaney John Irving
46 The Woman in White Wilkie Collins
47 Anne of Green Gables LM Montgomery *
48 Far From The Madding Crowd Thomas Hardy
49 The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
50 Lord of the Flies William Golding *
51 Atonement Ian McEwan
52 Life of Pi Yann Martel $
53 Dune Frank Herbert **
54 Cold Comfort Farm Stella Gibbons
55 Sense and Sensibility Jane Austen
56 A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth
57 The Shadow of the Wind Carlos Ruiz Zafon
58 A Tale Of Two Cities Charles Dickens
59 Brave New World Aldous Huxley
60 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Mark Haddon
61 Love In The Time Of Cholera Gabriel Garcia Marquez )
62 Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck **
63 Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
64 The Secret History Donna Tartt
65 The Lovely Bones Alice Sebold
66 Count of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas
67 On The Road Jack Kerouac **
68 Jude the Obscure Thomas Hardy
69 Bridget Jones’s Diary Helen Fielding
70 Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie
71 Moby Dick Herman Melville *
72 Oliver Twist Charles Dickens
73 Dracula Bram Stoker
74 The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett
75 Notes From A Small Island Bill Bryson
76 Ulysses James Joyce
77 The Inferno Dante $ (borrowing… which is owning for the moment)
78 Swallows and Amazons Arthur Ransome
79 Germinal Emile Zola
80 Vanity Fair William Makepeace Thackeray
81 Possession AS Byatt *
82 A Christmas Carol Charles Dickens **
83 Cloud Atlas David Mitchell (Wait a minute…???)
84 The Color Purple Alice Walker
85 The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro (Saw the movie. Does that count?)
86 Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert
87 A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry
88 Charlotte’s Web EB White **
89 The Five People You Meet In Heaven Mitch Albom
90 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
91 The Faraway Tree Collection Enid Blyton
92 Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad * (Yes. It was painful. I cursed the names of many people that week!)
93 The Little Prince Antoine De Saint Exupery *
94 The Wasp Factory Iain Banks
95 Watership Down Richard Adams
96 A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole
97 A Town Like Alice Nevil Shute
98 The Three Musketeers Alexandre Dumas
99 Hamlet William Shakespeare *
100 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Roald Dahl
3 comments February 27, 2009
Blurbing Book Club Book Reviewer
So, one of my all time favorite young adult authors, John Green, has a social networking site with his brother, Hank Green. As various people have commented and the site has grown, they have decided they need some moderators. John requested several informal applications from a variety of people, and after a few weeks, Hank informed people of their positions.
I am, hereby, the Blurbing Book Club Book Reviewer. My posts will be on Fridays here: http://nerdfighters.ning.com. I feel honored and slightly speechless. And, I am going to need several Young Adult book recommendations. I already have several ideas, but not quite enough for one per Friday! Whew!
Wait, wasn’t I supposed to be doing something productive like grading or studying for my GRE? Hmm…
1 comment February 19, 2009
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