Without knowing it, I'd always had two unspoken arrangements with the world. The first was that I would not trouble it with unpleasant conversation...
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Jolie's journal entries on her visits to many countries as a representative of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees are, indeed, notes, not a well-constructed travelogue or sociological narrative. For this reason, they serve as an entry point for further explorations, not as a definitive source. To be clear, I think that the intention behind publishing them was to expose readers to the content on refugees and the human costs of conflict and poverty. It is interesting to consider Jolie's growing personal sophistication and writing skill as these chronological accounts unfold. A good introduction or training text on international and human rights concerns.
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I am a dictionary reader--not like Shea, who reads them straight through, but in a more desultory manner, as occasional pleasure reading. I am one of those people who list a good dictionary when asked which 5 books I'd take with me to a desert island. I am as likely as the next dictionary reader to play word golf, looking up associated words and concepts in the same or other reference books. I have two favorite dictionary reading games. One is to trace words with related etymologies, an activity that does not seem to move Shea. I would be a much slower dictionary reader than he, because I find the origins more interesting than the words themselves. The other is to read translating dictionaries, both for the satisfaction of understanding how another language's words are constructed, but also primarily because the "X to English" section presents the English words in non-alphabetical order, creating a sequence of English words that may be read as a story. Who needs new books when you have a Greek-English dictionary? It is full of new tales.
I enjoyed Shea's narrative in much the same way as Jacobs's The Know-It-All, Fatsis's Word Freak, or, in the non-linguistic sphere, Koeppel's To See Every Bird on Earth--as a tale of obsession and acquisition. I'd have liked the chronological narrative, which falls after a successive letter heading and before interesting words beginning with that letter, to relate to each letter in some way. Otherwise, why subsume it under the letter heading? Still, I enjoyed this account without feeling inadequate that I have no desire to replicate it.
To learn more about the OED, read Winchester's The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary and The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary.
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I want to like this collection of (mostly) political essays more than I do. I'm not sure why I didn't enjoy it much--Vowell's thinking jumps and associates amusingly, her topics are coherent and interesting, and her writing is usually fine, if sometimes also unremarkable. When I've heard Vowell speak, I've found her funny. Whatever the reason, this simply didn't appeal.
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(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
For a while I thought Meyer was going to pull this off. Early in the book I could see plot and structural elements that she had set up hundreds of pages before, and I was hopeful. However, this 4th installment in the Twilight series is the weakest of the group. The major flaws are these:
* The shift to Jacob's perspective was jarring and serves as an example of clumsy expository technique. Unfortunately, Jacob's voice is so much more interesting than Bella's that her return as narrator is disappointing.
* Meyer seems to be trying to respond to criticism of Bella's passivity and Edward's controlling by going to the opposite extreme. Edward and others wring their hands while Bella, aided by Rose, gets what she wants, putting just about everyone at grave risk.
* Dull writing, dull, overinclusive detail, and dull interpersonal interactions pull the book's potential away from innovation and solidly toward the romantic beach reading genre.
* Bella's fierce longing for Edward is almost immediately supplanted by her fierce longing for Renesmee (perhaps the ugliest name I've encountered in all of fantasy and science fiction). Yes, she is supposed to be even hotter for Edward afterward, but the assertion falls very flat because is is unsupported emotionally.
* There are too many unsupported plot thread resolutions and too many inconsequential red herrings. This is not a tightly-woven narrative.
* The showdown with the Volturi is about as well written as J. K. Rowling's worst run-on Quidditch scene.
It's too bad that this series has garnered so much adulation when there are better teen vampire books out there. I can only hope the appeal is the sentimentality, or the message about teens not having sex until they're married, and not a cultural return to women as objects--which for all the assertions about Bella as subject, is largely what she remains.
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(5 of 10 readers found this comment helpful)
Moore and Pekar have chosen a good assortment of comics for this inaugural volume in The Best American Series. Comics chosen represent a range of graphic styles and topics. Notably, manga and Heavy Metal are absent. All of the comics, whether factual reports from the battlefield or fantasies about life after death, have a linear narrative (though Dart's narrative is plural). Crumb, as is often the case, provides the most visual texture and richness (though Reklaw does a creditable job with background detail and Barry fills every space with baroque oddities and scrawls. The sequence generally worked, though I'd have placed Dart's "RabbitHead," with its multiple simultaneous narratives, immediately after Hall's "La Rubia Loca," a long story about a woman who has what looks to me like a manic episode on a Green Tortoise bus to Mexico. Interesting introductions and bios round out the collection My one complaint is the format. Some comics are reproduced so small that even with reading glasses and a bright light, I had a hard time reading some text. I'm sure I missed some visual detail as well.
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(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
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Shoshana has commented on (284) products.
Notes from My Travels: Visits with Refugees in Africa, Cambodia, Pakistan and Ecuador by Angelina Jolie
Shoshana, July 20, 2009
Jolie's journal entries on her visits to many countries as a representative of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees are, indeed, notes, not a well-constructed travelogue or sociological narrative. For this reason, they serve as an entry point for further explorations, not as a definitive source. To be clear, I think that the intention behind publishing them was to expose readers to the content on refugees and the human costs of conflict and poverty. It is interesting to consider Jolie's growing personal sophistication and writing skill as these chronological accounts unfold. A good introduction or training text on international and human rights concerns.(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
Reading the OED: One Man, One Year, 21,730 Pages by Ammon Shea
Shoshana, July 20, 2009
I am a dictionary reader--not like Shea, who reads them straight through, but in a more desultory manner, as occasional pleasure reading. I am one of those people who list a good dictionary when asked which 5 books I'd take with me to a desert island. I am as likely as the next dictionary reader to play word golf, looking up associated words and concepts in the same or other reference books. I have two favorite dictionary reading games. One is to trace words with related etymologies, an activity that does not seem to move Shea. I would be a much slower dictionary reader than he, because I find the origins more interesting than the words themselves. The other is to read translating dictionaries, both for the satisfaction of understanding how another language's words are constructed, but also primarily because the "X to English" section presents the English words in non-alphabetical order, creating a sequence of English words that may be read as a story. Who needs new books when you have a Greek-English dictionary? It is full of new tales.I enjoyed Shea's narrative in much the same way as Jacobs's The Know-It-All, Fatsis's Word Freak, or, in the non-linguistic sphere, Koeppel's To See Every Bird on Earth--as a tale of obsession and acquisition. I'd have liked the chronological narrative, which falls after a successive letter heading and before interesting words beginning with that letter, to relate to each letter in some way. Otherwise, why subsume it under the letter heading? Still, I enjoyed this account without feeling inadequate that I have no desire to replicate it.
To learn more about the OED, read Winchester's The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary and The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary.
(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell
Shoshana, July 20, 2009
I want to like this collection of (mostly) political essays more than I do. I'm not sure why I didn't enjoy it much--Vowell's thinking jumps and associates amusingly, her topics are coherent and interesting, and her writing is usually fine, if sometimes also unremarkable. When I've heard Vowell speak, I've found her funny. Whatever the reason, this simply didn't appeal.(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
Breaking Dawn (Twilight Saga #4) by Stephenie Meyer
Shoshana, July 20, 2009
For a while I thought Meyer was going to pull this off. Early in the book I could see plot and structural elements that she had set up hundreds of pages before, and I was hopeful. However, this 4th installment in the Twilight series is the weakest of the group. The major flaws are these:* The shift to Jacob's perspective was jarring and serves as an example of clumsy expository technique. Unfortunately, Jacob's voice is so much more interesting than Bella's that her return as narrator is disappointing.
* Meyer seems to be trying to respond to criticism of Bella's passivity and Edward's controlling by going to the opposite extreme. Edward and others wring their hands while Bella, aided by Rose, gets what she wants, putting just about everyone at grave risk.
* Dull writing, dull, overinclusive detail, and dull interpersonal interactions pull the book's potential away from innovation and solidly toward the romantic beach reading genre.
* Bella's fierce longing for Edward is almost immediately supplanted by her fierce longing for Renesmee (perhaps the ugliest name I've encountered in all of fantasy and science fiction). Yes, she is supposed to be even hotter for Edward afterward, but the assertion falls very flat because is is unsupported emotionally.
* There are too many unsupported plot thread resolutions and too many inconsequential red herrings. This is not a tightly-woven narrative.
* The showdown with the Volturi is about as well written as J. K. Rowling's worst run-on Quidditch scene.
It's too bad that this series has garnered so much adulation when there are better teen vampire books out there. I can only hope the appeal is the sentimentality, or the message about teens not having sex until they're married, and not a cultural return to women as objects--which for all the assertions about Bella as subject, is largely what she remains.
(5 of 10 readers found this comment helpful)
The Best American Comics 2006 by Harvey Pekar and Anne Elizabeth Moore
Shoshana, July 20, 2009
Moore and Pekar have chosen a good assortment of comics for this inaugural volume in The Best American Series. Comics chosen represent a range of graphic styles and topics. Notably, manga and Heavy Metal are absent. All of the comics, whether factual reports from the battlefield or fantasies about life after death, have a linear narrative (though Dart's narrative is plural). Crumb, as is often the case, provides the most visual texture and richness (though Reklaw does a creditable job with background detail and Barry fills every space with baroque oddities and scrawls. The sequence generally worked, though I'd have placed Dart's "RabbitHead," with its multiple simultaneous narratives, immediately after Hall's "La Rubia Loca," a long story about a woman who has what looks to me like a manic episode on a Green Tortoise bus to Mexico. Interesting introductions and bios round out the collection My one complaint is the format. Some comics are reproduced so small that even with reading glasses and a bright light, I had a hard time reading some text. I'm sure I missed some visual detail as well.(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
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