Gotta admit, I'm a little stuck on Ulysses. Going to take a break to read Turgenev's Fathers and Sons.
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Gotta admit, I'm a little stuck on Ulysses. Going to take a break to read Turgenev's Fathers and Sons.
I find I'm terrible at picking books back up after a hiatus. I just completely lose my focus on it, and don't get it back unless I was seriously engrossed in the first place. And if I was, I probably would have already finished it the first time through.
I can't imagine taking a break for however long, would be a good idea for something as dense as Ulysses, but you'd know best.
I never feel obligated to finish books - or movies, or games. If I'm not digging something, I'd rather put it down on move onto something that I might. There just isn't enough time in life to force myself to sit through something that isn't working, especially when there are so many awesome things out there to enjoy.
It's not really about finishing for completion's sake for me. It's more about: 1) the idea that a work should be judged as a whole, not as a fragment, and that it is not unusual for great art to reveal itself as more than the sum of its parts; and 2) the idea that a lot of my favourite books require pretty serious engagement and effort on the reader's part, and that if I'm not constantly entertained but instead working, then that's not necessarily a bad thing and may be more rewarding in the end.
And also, I pretty often have more than one book on the go, so to take a break from a 700 page novel to read a quick 240 pager isn't so big a deal.
I think I'll probably read China Mieville's "Kraken" next, because I am dying to read more of his work if it's good.
Some of the premises are incredible.
"The City & The City" sounds divine.
I hated The Art of Racing in the Rain with the fire of 10,000 suns.
Started The Corrections last night, and at the rate I'm going I'll be reading it for the rest of the year.
David Sedaris' new book is fiction? Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk looks to be examining human scenarios through little furry critters. I'm interested.
A student--not mine, praise the higher being--recently made waves when he demanded to be taken out of an instructor's class because the instructor was teaching subversive material.
The "subversive material"? David Sedaris
To conservatives?
Apparently, the student objected to Sedaris's sexual orientation. He also complained about a reading on alternative families.
Students who complain about such material are not exactly rare, but this guy was very vocal. My boss, who is awesome, sent him this email about the importance of being open-minded in college.
A friend of mine who teaches Western Civ often runs into this problem when she teaches Darwin.
I went to a private religious university, so complaints weren't unheard of, but I would imagine that most people who go to college aren't dead set against being exposed to any ideas other than their own.
I do remember a girl complaining about Moll Flanders in one of my classes.
This is a public college, and whenever this sort of issue arises, I can't help but wonder why these students didn't go to a private college if this is obviously such a sticking point in their education. The last I heard was this student would be removed from the class, and he will have to wait a semester to take it again, and hopefully, the next instructor will not have David Sedaris on the syllabus.
My favorite story: A really irate parent called my former boss about what she felt was an inappropriate movie on her son's Introduction to Film Studies syllabus. The movie? Dr. Strangelove. This person just assumed that it was some sort of porno based on the title. Sigh.
Before I saw that film, I thought it was about some sort of James Bond villain.
I'd request to leave that class too, though I doubt for the same reason.
So David Foster Wallace's unfinished novel gets released in April.
Will wait to see how the feedback is before picking it up, though.
The comments over there make me want to stab something.