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Busy, busy, busy
Nov. 7th, 2001 07:27 pmI haven't been able to update lately because I only have internet access at work, and I've been taking on more responsibility recently so my days have been very full. I love it, however, so I may have to be content with updating with less frequency.
Anyhow, I finished Graham Swift's -Ever After-, which I enjoyed very much. I didn't knock my socks off with it's brilliance the way -Waterland- did, but I think that's because it was more understated, not less brilliant. Swift really does an amazing job of capturing his narrators. Also of bringing about a thousand different topics into his novels. There's no possible way I could give a coherent summary of -Ever After-; it deals with marriage, technology, suicide, Darwinism, adultery, the spiritual crisis of the Victorians, geology, family, revenge, academia, religion, surveying, ambition, fame, Hamlet... It's good.
And now I've started -Rabbit is Rich-, the third book in John Updike's Rabbit series. Anyone who has been reading at all faithfully knows that I have had fairly ambivalent feelings about the first two books in the series, so we'll see how I feel about this one. One interesting thing about embarking on the third book, however, is that I am beginning to have an appreciation for the impressive nature of the series as a whole. Updike has really done a good job of portraying the ways in which Rabbit is changed by the times he lives in. It provides a series of very interesting and detailed snapshots of certain American cultural moments...
In other reading news, E. gave me a copy of Ursula K. LeGuin's most recent book, which is an extension of her Earthsea series. I'm just not sure if I want to read it. In my opinion, that series is so perfect the way it is, and I'm afraid that there's no possible way she could continue it without somehow marring the perfection that already exists... If anyone has read it, please let me know.
Anyhow, I finished Graham Swift's -Ever After-, which I enjoyed very much. I didn't knock my socks off with it's brilliance the way -Waterland- did, but I think that's because it was more understated, not less brilliant. Swift really does an amazing job of capturing his narrators. Also of bringing about a thousand different topics into his novels. There's no possible way I could give a coherent summary of -Ever After-; it deals with marriage, technology, suicide, Darwinism, adultery, the spiritual crisis of the Victorians, geology, family, revenge, academia, religion, surveying, ambition, fame, Hamlet... It's good.
And now I've started -Rabbit is Rich-, the third book in John Updike's Rabbit series. Anyone who has been reading at all faithfully knows that I have had fairly ambivalent feelings about the first two books in the series, so we'll see how I feel about this one. One interesting thing about embarking on the third book, however, is that I am beginning to have an appreciation for the impressive nature of the series as a whole. Updike has really done a good job of portraying the ways in which Rabbit is changed by the times he lives in. It provides a series of very interesting and detailed snapshots of certain American cultural moments...
In other reading news, E. gave me a copy of Ursula K. LeGuin's most recent book, which is an extension of her Earthsea series. I'm just not sure if I want to read it. In my opinion, that series is so perfect the way it is, and I'm afraid that there's no possible way she could continue it without somehow marring the perfection that already exists... If anyone has read it, please let me know.
