Today is Edith’s birthday. I read Age of Innocence a couple of months ago and wrote about it here on my blog. I remember reading Ethan Frome a long time ago, but I don’t remember much about it. The plot involved some kind of sledding accident, I believe. Anyway, I think Edith Wharton is interesting, somewhat disturbing and subversive. Right now I’m reading The King’s Cavalier by Samuel Shellabarger. Prince of Foxes (by the same author) is a fun historical fiction book set in Renaissance Italy. I think I’m going to enjoy this one, too, set in France in the 1500’s.
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Lord Byron Was Byronic
I just looked up the word “byronic” in the dictionary, and it means “of, like or characteristic of Byron or his writings, romantic, passionate, cynical, ironic, etc.” I just thought it meant tall, dark, and handsome, and I also thought Lord Byron, whose birthday is today, was supposed to BE wildly good-looking. Here’s the best picture I could find; you see what you think.
Maybe you’re more impressed than I am–or maybe I’m just being Byronic (cynical). Anyway, I did always like this scrap of poetry by Byron–even though I’ve heard people quote it Byronically (cynically and ironically):
SHE walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that ‘s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
It would be fun to have that written about me.
A Heart, a Cross, and a Flag by Peggy Noonan
I finished reading Peggy Noonan’s book, A Heart, a Cross, and a Flag. It’s a good book. Some of it I’ve read before since I started reading her weekly columns in the Wall Street Journal about a year and a half ago, and the book was really a compilation of selected columns. She’s a very good writer, quite insightful, sometimes disconcertingly Catholic, usually thought-provoking. She’s not afraid to tell people to pray–and to admit that she prays. We need a lot more journalists who pray and mention it casually and seriously.
Birthday of Edgar Allan Poe
Today is the birthday of the man who wrote my favorite poem. Note that he’s not necessarily my favorite poet, but he did write Annabel Lee, my favorite poem. I’m not sure why it’s my favorite poem; I just like the sadness and the romanticism and sound of the words.
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;–
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
She was a child and I was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love–
I and my Annabel Lee–
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud by night
Chilling my Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me:–
Yes! that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of a cloud, chilling
And killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we–
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in Heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:–
For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea–
In her tomb by the side of the sea.
From Pooh to Poe–what DOES this say about my tastes in literature?
Tonight we read Winnie-the-Pooh
Tonight we read Winnie-the-Pooh in honor of the birthday of A.A. Milne. I love Winnie-the-Pooh, maybe because I often feel like a “bear of very little brain.” I also love this article by Sam Torode from Boundless magazine about how he discovered Winnie-the-Pooh in college. No, Pooh wasn’t in college; Sam Torode was.
Favorite quotations:
“It’s a litle Anxious,” Piglet said to himself, “to be a Very Small Animal Entirely Surrounded by Water. Christopher Robin could escape by Climbing Trees, and Kanga could escape by Jumping, and Rabbit could escape by Burrowing, and Owl could escape by Flying, and Eeyore could escape by – by Making a Loud Noise Until Rescued, and here am I, surrounded by water and I can’t do anything.”
“And how are you?” said Winnie-the-Pooh. Eeyore shook his head from side to side. “Not very how,” he said. “I don’t seem to felt at all how for a long time.”
Pooh looked at his two paws. He knew that one of them was the right, and he knew that when you had decided which one of them was the right, then the other was the left, but he never could remember how to begin.
“Well,” said Pooh, “what I like best — ” and then he had to stop and think. Because although Eating Honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn’t know what it was called.
“I don’t see much sense in that,” said Rabbit. “No,” said Pooh humbly, “there isn’t. But there was going to be when I began it. It’s just that something happened to it along the way.”
And if you don’t see much sense in this blog, just remember that there was going to be sense when I started, but something happened along the way!
Winnie-the-Pooh can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.
E and I went to
E and I went to hear Max McLean give a dramatic presentation of the first 22 chapters of Genesis at Gloria Dei tonight. It was very good. It made me want to memorize scripture and also made me want to read aloud to the children with more drama and expression. When I came home, we did read from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and I and M went to bed wanting more. For my wish list: a CD of Max McLean reading Psalms and Proverbs in the NIV.
I’ve been reading about Anne
I’ve been reading about Anne Bronte (today is her birthday) here, and I found out several things I didn’t know. The author compares her writing several times to that of Jane Austen–less passionate and romantic, more calm and insightful than the novels of Charlotte and Emily. Since I’ve read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights and never read anything by Anne Bronte, I didn’t know her writing was so different. Also, Charlotte Bronte apparently didn’t care for Jane Austen and so really didn’t appreciate her sister Anne’s novels either. Maybe I should read The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and see what I think. And Anne was only 28 years old when she died. What a short life!
I’m reading Peggy Noonan’s book A Heart, a Cross, and a Flag: America Today. The book is a collection of her columns from The Wall Street Journal–mostly those written after September 11, 2001. However, I’ve been most impressed with one essay written by Ms. Noonan before 9/11; it seems so prescient. She wrote this in 1998:
“We live in a world of three billion men and hundreds of thousands of nuclear bombs, missiles, warheads. It’s a world of extraordinary germs that can be harnessed and used to kill whole populations, a world of extraordinary chemicals that can be harnessed and used to do the same. Three billion men, and it takes only half a dozen bright and evil ones to harness and deploy.
What are the odds it will happen? Put it another way: what are the odds it will not? Low. Nonexistent, I think.
When you consider who is gifted and crazed with rage . . .When you think of the terrorist places and the terrorist countries . . . Who do they hate most? The Great Satan, the United States. What is its most important place? Some would say Washington. I would say the great city of the United States is the great city of the world, the dense ten-mile-long island called Manhattan . . .”
How could she predict all that three years before it happened?
Today is Moliere the French
Today is Moliere the French playwright’s birthday. No, I don’t know how to make the little mark above the e; I don’t even know what it’s called. Anyway, here are two quotations from Moliere that I found especially for your encouragement and edification.
“Of all the noises known to man, opera is the most expensive.”
“When someone blunders, we say that he makes a misstep. Is it then not clear that all the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill our history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill in dancing?”
It’s a good thing that ALL of my girls are learning to dance.
Today is Edmund Burke’s birthday
Today is Edmund Burke’s birthday (b.1729, d. 1797) He was a British politician, and his most famous speech here in the US was his Speech on Conciliation with the American Colonies. Famous quotations (not necessarily from that speech) are:
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
Never despair; but if you do, work on in despair.
Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.
I finished reading The Last Jihad. There’s a sequel out in bookstores, The Last Days.
Alan Paton and Cry the Beloved Country
Today is the birthday of Alan Paton, born in 1903, died in 1988. Cry, the Beloved Country is one of my favorite books, tragic in the truest sense of the word. I also own and have read Too Late the Phalarope, but I can’t relate as well to the themes and characters of that book–although the descriptions are beautiful. I like a lot of little things about Cry, the Beloved Country— the way the dialog is written with dashes instead of quotation marks, the way the characters greet and take leave of each other with the words “go well” and “stay well,” the descriptions of home and the South African countryside, the two Episcopal priests who become friends in the midst of tragedy, the word “umfundisi.” Here are a couple of quotations:
—Cry the beloved country, for the unborn child who is the inheritor of out fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, not stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or a valley. For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much.
–I see only one hope for our country, and that is when white men and black men, desiring neither power nor money, but desiring only the good of their country, come together to work for it.
He was grave and silent, and then he said sombrely, I have only one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving, they will find that we are turned to hating.
i’ve always thought that was an incredibly sad and true thought. There is a window of opportunity for many things. Now is the window for Iraq. If the people of Iraq grab the opportunity, and forgive the Americans for whatever mistakes we may make in trying to help rebuild that country, and if the right people come forward to do the right jobs, and if we don’t give up and if Christian groups are allowed to work there and demonstrate the love of God, there is a possibility that Iraq can become a showcase for peace and democracy. But there’s the possibility that “one day when they are turned to loving, they will find that we are turned to hating.” What a waste that would be!
Here’s a pages with links to information about Alan Paton and his books. I noticed the other day when I was at Barnes and Noble that Cry the Beloved Country was displayed prominently, and I wondered why. I found out that it’s Oprah’s current book club selection.