Screeeeeeeech!

This blog is, to say the least, boring. It may not be boring to you, in fact I've gotten some very nice comments on here that seem to point to the fact that this is not boring.

But it is. It is boring me.

You see my other blog my writing blog is a part of me, when I feel down or in need of companionship I write a post on there about my writing or feelings about writing. In the ten months I've been a writer writing and blogging about writing have become such a part of me that if for some reason that blog got deleted I think I would be in tears, correction, I KNOW I would be in tears. This blog though I don't feel much affection for. I feel formal and stiff when writing on it, like I've got to live up to some standard. I steer away from spoilers and try my best to sound profound. And it's not working

So I'm calling a screech. Instead of blah de blahing about the different books I've read trying desperately to sound like an official book blogger I'm just going to write what I feel like writing. Book reviews yes, but my kind of book reviews, the kind where I just talk about what this book meant to me not try to sound scholarly. Oh and this blog is getting a make over too. 

You see Jillian, a blogger I greatly respect and the founder of the Classics Club, writes about her won personal Journey through the classics about how the classics are her "room of her own" her peace and quiet and her time to herself. She started blogging as she started reading the classics, both things together.

I on the other hand started book blogging cause I thought the Classics club sounded cool. Now I'm thinking a little differently.

A lot of people talk of reading and writing as a journey. well that may be cliche but I like it. So now this blog is my journey, my four fold journey through Classic Literature, History, Poetry, and Plain Old Good Books.

The next four posts will be detailing how I see these panning out and all that good stuff. Hopefully in the next three years{my years left in high school} I hope these four rather separate personal studies will roll themselves into one since I consider all these to be similar and part of each other and best studies together.

Peaceful nonsense to you all!

With love,

 The Anne girl     

A Tale of Two Cities

Where to begin? What to say? This is my beloved Dickens. This is Sydney Carton. This is the French revolution. This book is the one I almost picked for my favorite classic.

This book broke my heart.

Read it please. It will break yours.

France is flowing with blood and rage, gasping for more of both. Among it's throngs several characters are brought out of the red mist to play out there story on the bold relief of it's curtain.

A girl comes to claim her father from a decrepit wine shop where he was being cared for. He had been taken from the Bastille where he had lost his memory. Escorted by an old family friend Mr. Lorry, Lucie Manette and her father leave for England never expecting to come to France again. 

Their paths cross two men, Charles Darnay and Sydney Carton, who look remarkably alike and yet could not be more different...except in their love for Lucie. 

Charles is gentlemanly, eager, and industrious. Sydney is sloppy, rough, and he drinks. It is Charles of course who wins the love of Lucy. But when the characters are once again drawn to the bloody streets of France the true meaning of "hero" becomes apparent 

Read this book with a growing lump in your throat.

Sydney Carton is the point of this book. I loved other characters I held my breath for other characters, and I was fascinated by the other plot lines, but Sydney was something different.

Miss Havisham, Estella, Steerforth, Lady Dedlock. I begged for them, I pleaded for them, I cried for them. Sydney put them all behind him. I was almost praying that the book would end different then I knew it would.

So what's so special about Sydney Carton? He's no John Ridd.

No he's not. And that was what hurts so much. He could have been one of the most brilliant men who ever lived. He could have been the one Lucy loved, he could have been epic. But he wasn't. And it was his own fault. He was to lazy to develop hid enormous brain capacity. To lazy to make something of himself. And he had no one to blame but himself.

Why does that hurt so much? Why? Why cant we just put him down as Tip Dorrit and move on? It's because he knows it. And because I see myself in him. I'm lazy, you're lazy. Every human is lazy. Sydney went under because of it.

And he knew it. But to late. I cried my way through the second half of the book. I wanted a second Valjean. Valjean turned to God and changed his ways before it was to late.  

Sydney doesn't. He dies in peace but his life spilled and wasted behind him. For one day he is a hero. For only one day he stands tall as a man and does something that was worthy of Sir Percy himself.

SPOILERS
And yet to me the greatest moment of his heroism is not when he trades with Charles. To me his greatest moment is when he spends his last moments comforting the young seamstress who would proceed him to the guillotine. His life was a total waste but his death was not. Frankly though I care about poor Lucie and Charles  I think the greatest deed Sydney carton ever did was to comfort that poor trembling girl in the moments before the blade fell.
END OF SPOILERS

Sydney Carton made me want to live my life with purpose.

Read about him please. He'll do the same for you.

It is a far better thing.....               

Classics Club August Meme: My favorite classic

Captains Courageous, Lorna Doon, Anne of Green Gables, Johnny Tremain, Ivanhoe. These are all "my" books. The ones that are linked with something I love something that I will always cherish. And there are many more.

But I am supposed to pick one aren't I?

OK! I pick the french revolution!You know, Tale of Two Cities, The Scarlet Pimpernel, and Les Misrables.

I can't pick a time period? Rats.

I pick Charles Dickens! Little Dorrit, Bleak House, ect...

I can't pick an author either can I?

Fine!

Great Expectations.

My sister Amy is what you call a Janite. She pities the people who think Austen is a city, her favorite hero is George Knightly and she wants of those shirts that say "I'm waiting for my Prince Charming Mr. Darcy."

I sniff at the use of "Dickens" as an expression. The first time I cried while watching a movie was watching John Chivery propose to Amy{Dorrit}. My little sister calls me Handel.

I don't know if there is a word for a Dickens lover. So I'm making one up, I am a....

Pumblechookian

'cause that is a word Dicken's made up and he is awesome. In fact my sister says I should call him My Sweet Chuck {referencing my love of Robin Hood}. Please note the new page.

Why the Pumblechook book?  What makes them special to me?

When I was younger Amy read Oliver Twist. Well being the annoying little sister i was i got out the shortened version from the library and read it. Then Amy found it on my bookshelf and told me that it wasn't the real thing.

Oh the disillusionment.

The next time I was smarter. Amy read Great Expectations. Of course I had to tag along. I picked it up and at the age of somewhere between eight and nine {I think} read about half of it. Yawn. It was boring. It was depressing. And it made me feel like being in a great open cold place that had no colors except gray and dusky smoldering red{I think and feel in colors and sense images, unlike Amy who thinks in letters and words, an enviable talent since she can spell and I can't. Rabbit trail.}. Back then I didn't like red. Gray is the color you get when you rub hope out. Needless to say I hated Great Expectations.

So I started reading Shakespeare instead. After all I had to have something big girl and mature. BTW I'm now a big Shakespeare fan.

Then in 8th grade I discovered that I loved to learn. That school was fun! I begged Mom to let me read David Copperfield for school. I yearned for something thick to set my teeth into, to gobble and chew. A book I could slurp in great thick creamy gulps. A book colored rich brown and impressive shine-black. I adored David Copperfield.  Steerforth broke my heart, I fell in love with Ham, I beat my fists over Davie's misfortunes, wriggled with delight over Tommy Traddles, bit Mr. Murdstone with great relish and Davie's mother with mustard. I drew a picture of Agnes and shredded it. I wept over poor Dora, loved Emily, and learned how to do a perfect Uriah Heep imitation.

Then Amy and I watched Little Dorrit. I now knew that Dickens was something special. I read the book, then Bleak House. This year I took a deep breath and decided to retry Great Expectations. I expected to hate it.

And I didn't.

I loved it.

The gray was heartbreaking but I loved having my heartbroken. Miss Havisham had me in tears, Estella had me in tears, Pip had me in tears, Joe had me in tears. you get the picture. Every time I picked it up I speant the whole time with my hand pressed over my mouth trying to smother gasps of pleasure at the silver threads of imagery Dickens scattered in between the gray. Trying to smother tears when he picked up my heart a turned it in his hand along with the hearts of the characters. Trying to smother laughter when for half a minute the clouds broke and the Dicken's dry sunshine shone through in the form of wit.

The thing I loved about it was that I felt for all the characters. All of them. From Pumblechook, to Pip to Miss Havisham. The only one I would have scooted off the scene with a right good will was the avenger. That kid made me want to scream and tare things. Yet I loved the feeling. Great Expectations helped me understand the importance of purpose driven writing. Of having your characters{even your villains} twine themselves around the readers heartstrings.

It taught me that gray is good.

Remember. Gray is the color you get when hope is rubbed away. Gray is so that the hope shows up even brighter. That it tinges more welcome and more rosy. After all why did God allow sin? So that man should see his need of him. Why does a writer allow hopelessness into the book? Same reason. That the reader will see the need for hope.

Dickens is awesome. 

Book Three: The Triumph of the Scarlet Pimpernel

The Formal

Plot: Chauvalin and Robespierre are once again trying to lure The Scarlet Pimpernel in to be captured this time using a woman to try and get under his protective awesomeness.

Age Suggestion: Teens and up This is pretty intense stuff. Nothing objectionable though just a lot of suspense.

Rating: Eight out of ten.

The Informal

We must blame the lateness of this post on the business of my life. I had time to blog but reviewing for some reason is harder for me then just sitting down and writing a normal blog post so though i continued to read my book review's got pushed farther and farther to the back of my mind.

Anyways this book was wonderful. There was this one part where Percy is helping some young hotheads escape the will of the people and it was like so totally awesome my mouth was hanging open at the end of the scene. Superman? pfff! Give me Percy and chocolate.

The cravat scene! You all know the scene above from the movie? Well it's in this book! Almost exactly the same words. I love when Percy and Chauvalin have a face off. Unfortunately this revue must be cut short because I read the book over two days about three months a go and I don't remember much. To make up for it I will direct you to the awesomest Percy blog Evah where you can here me and my sister sing about the wonderfulness of the pimpernel.

The Whys and Wherefores

Of why I have never read Narnia, Twilight, Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, or Harry Potter.

A little while ago on Scribblings I mentioned that I don't read Narnia and LOTR and I got a few shocked comments. I was at a history competition last week and was discussing books with someone I met there and when LOTR came up I had to say that I knew nothing about it. Not surprisingly this got a shocked response. Then Petie posted her vlog about Snow White and the Huntsman and that got me thinking about stating opinions and telling others about what you believe.


So here I am this is my second opinion post on Scribblings and my first on Rustlings and I'm beginning to think I should do this more often.    

First of all lets deal with Twilight and Harry potter. I am a christian and I believe that witchcraft and vampires and other things of evil to be off limits. The Bible says no so I won't read books about them. End of story.

LOTR and Narnia however are a different matter.  You see most people I know have read them. Most christian girls my age have read them. Most bloggers I know are looking forward to the Hobbit movie. So as you might guess I'm a little nervous that I might tread on some toes, but I am just going to be as considerate and thoughtful as I can and we'll see how it goes.

Both have magic in them. I believe that magic is not honoring to the Lord. But wait, isn't Narnia an allegory of the gospel or something?

I don't know I haven't read it. But even if it is does that make it right? The book is about another world one which God did not create and it uses a created being {a lion} to picture God. I'm sorry but to me that sounds to me a bit like violating the second commandment. Now I'm not saying that the people who read Narnia are bowing down and worshiping an idol or that C.S. Lewis was making one. What I'm saying is that it seems wrong to picture God as an animal.

Also the Bible says "what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness?" now this passage is about being yoked with unbelievers but it really applies to everything. What business does an allegory about Christ have being mixed up with witches? 

So I'll get off my soap box now. But that's why I don't read Narnia & Co.

P.S I am not saying however that every little fairy tale is evil, just questioning whether Christians should be reading stuff about witches and dark magic. Oh go and watch Petie's vlog. She's talking about some of the same stuff only different.