(no subject)

[extemporally]

Studying in the library: still the most unproductive thing ever. I keep taking two-hour breaks for book-browsing. Ay yai yai!

That said: I came away with two YA novels and Swann's Way, so. Also this:

High Fidelity, by Nick Hornby.

I basically... hated this book and how jaded Rob was about music and relationships and EVERYTHING ON EARTH. This is a man bereft of delight, and this is a book bereft of delight, and at first it was funny in a hangdog kind of way, then it just started being el pathetico.

That said, I enjoy when Nick Hornby lets go of Sad Rob and starts talking about the transcendental (gosh I usually have so many hangups about the usage of this word, but today, oh, fuckit, that's right, I meant it TRANSCENDENTAL) and occasionally ruinous nature of art:

People worry about kids playing with guns, and teenagers watching violent videos; we are scared that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands - literally thousands - of songs about broken hearts and rejection and pain and misery and loss. The unhappiest people I know, romantically speaking, are the ones who like pop music the most; and I don't know whether pop music has caused this unhappiness, but I do know that they've been listening to the sad songs longer than they've been living the unhappy lives.

And:

It seems to me that if you place music (and books, probably, and films, and plays, and anything that makes you feel) at the centre of your being, then you can't afford to sort out your love life, start to think of it as the finished product. You've got to pick at it, keep it alive and in turmoil, you've got to pick at it and unravel it until it all comes apart and you're compelled to start all over again. Maybe we all live life at too high a pitch, those of us who absorb emotional things all day, and as a consequence we can never feel merely content: we have to be unhappy, or ecstatically, head-over-heels happy, and those states are difficult to achieve within a stable, solid relationship.

... #gpoy

Except that I don't want to be Rob, I never want to be Rob, and come to think of it I never did see Rob being either unhappy or ecstatically happy in this book. He was just... completely and utterly miserable.

Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China, by Leslie T. Chang | The Boy Next Door, by Irene Sabatini | Singapore Shifting Boundaries: Social Change in the 21st Century, edited by William S.W. Lim, Sharon Siddique, & Tan Dan Feng | The Frenzy, by Francesca Lia Block | Goodnight Mister Tom, by Michelle Magorian | The Spirit Catches You And Then You Fall Down, by Anne Fadiman | Saraswati Park, by Anjali Joseph | Eston, by Stella Kon | Rape: A Love Story, by Joyce Carol Oates | Rice Bowl, by Suchen Christine Lim | The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell | Renaissance Singapore? Economy, Culture, and Politics, edited by Kenneth Paul Tan | Miss Seetoh in the World, by Catherine Lim | Free Food for Millionaires, by Min Jin Lee | Jointly & Severably, by Eleanor Wong | Wills & Secession, by Eleanor Wong | Mergers & Accusations, by Eleanor Wong | GASPP: A Gay Anthology of Singaporean Poetry & Prose, edited by Ng Yi-Sheng | Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier | Gone Case, by Dave Chua | Sex and the City, by Candace Bushnell | The Waters & the Wild, by Francesca Lia Block | Growing Up: Getting Along in the Sixties, by Tisa Ng | Oreo, by Fran Ross | Caucasia, by Danzy Senna | Chavs: The Demonisation of the Working Class, by Owen Jones | Racism: A Very Short Introduction | Modern China: A Very Short Introduction, by Rana Mitter | Feminism: A Very Short Introduction, by Margaret Waters | A Game of Thrones, by George R. R. Martin | Tam Lin, by Pamela Dean | Sons of the Yellow Emperor, by Lynn Pan | Scapegoat: Why We Are Failing Disabled People, by Katharine Quarmby | Tipping The Velvet, by Sarah Waters | Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro | The Lantern Bearers, by Rosemary Sutcliff | The Silver Branch, by Rosemary Sutcliff | The Eagle of the Ninth, by Rosemary Sutcliff | The Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald, edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli | Brick Lane, by Monica Ali | The Savage Detectives, by Robert Bolano | Homage to Catalonia, by George Orwell | Cat On A Hot-Tin Roof, by Tennessee Williams | Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women Who Made America Modern, by Joshua Zeitz | Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, by Jeanette Winterson | The Moon By Night, by Madeleine L'Engle | To Live, by Yu Hua | Into The Wild, by Jon Krakauer | The Next Competitor, by K.P. Kincaid | Raffles Place Ragtime, by Phillip Jeyaretnam | Bella Tuscany: The Sweet Life in Italy, by Frances Mayes | Mao's Last Dancer, by Li Cunxin | Marie, Dancing, by Carolyn Meyer | Man Walks Into A Room, by Nicole Krauss | How To Be Good, by Nick Hornby

Comments

[goshemily.livejournal.com]

ugh i hated rob

that is the sole thing i took away from this book :(

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

HATE HATE HATE.

I mean, I'm sure there was a message about 'universal boyhood' in there, I just... couldn't look beyond my dislike of Rob to think about it.

[goshemily.livejournal.com]

'universal boyhood' at the expense of ladies was pm what i remember of the book, though whether that's true or not i now don't really remember.

i don't think i could reread the long way down now or probably ever again, but when i read it i remember thinking the older woman in it was well done.

[rumpleghost.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, yes. Hated Rob with the burning passion of a fiery suns, this book can suck it.

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

I just wanted to read a really good novel about music :(

then Rob started hating on Kate Bush what is this

[forochel.livejournal.com]

I am sad you read a book you hated ): usually if I hate a book ... I stop reading it. anyway! I think you should read GENTLEMEN OF THE ROAD by MICHAEL CHABON because it is rollicking good fun and the main characters are all characters of colour or minority people and it's set in the Caucasus in 300AD or something. AND IT IS ROLLICKING GOOD FUN. have I already written you a comment about this? I MIGHT POSSIBLY HAVE. also there is SPOILERSPOILERSURPRISE in it that I can't even begin to hint at because it would RUIN EVERYTHING. so there you go.

[extemporally.livejournal.com]

Ahahaha dude, even as a kid I somehow got it ingrained in me that I MUST finish reading a book! I must, I must! Also, thanks for the book rec :D that sounds amazing, I've only read Kavalier & Clay (and enjoyed it loads as I recall) and the main characters all being POC??? Rollicking good fun??? I AM SO THERE. Also want to know what the SPOILERSURPRISE is so maybe I will read it.

PS. Speaking of social justice-y books, you should read Jonathan Norrell & Mr Strange by Susanna Clarke!!! I quote wikipedia: "Using techniques of the genre of alternative history, Clarke creates events and characters that would have been impossible in the early nineteenth century. She also explores the "silencing" of underrepresented groups: women, people of colour, and poor whites.[41] Both Strange and Norrell suppress the voices of these groups in their rise to power. Mr Norrell, for example, attempts to buy up all the books of magic in England in order to keep anyone else from acquiring their knowledge. He also barters away half of Emma Wintertowne's (Lady Pole's) life for political influence, a deal about which, due to an enchantment, she cannot speak coherently." YEEEEEAH.

[forochel.livejournal.com]

;A; I think I may have killed myself before finishing Emma. By spontaneous implosion. I can lend it to you! Except that my copy is IN LONDON, so, uh, maybe not.

OK DO YOU HAVE A COPY :D