Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Notes on Walking a Literary Labyrinth: A Spirituality of Reading

By Nancy M. Malone.


"While the line of print in a novel, for instance, proceeds mostly in unbroken fashion from one margin of the page to the other, and plot and character development drive us forward until we reach a sense of wholeness at its end, to read a poem well we must go slowly, attend more carefully to all its elements.  Line breaks and their meaning arrest us.  Our innate sense of rhythm and, in some poems, our appetite for rhyme, though less robust in us than in readers of the past, are fully satisfied.  Above all, we must savor the words themselves for their full import, their sound and resonances, their relationship to other words in the line, the poem."


"...reading is a keenly personal act...reads a book against the template of his own personality, experience, tastes, and dispositions at the moment, so that in a very real way each reader is the co-creator of the work being read; it is not a one-sided affair."



"Accept" rather than "tolerate", Quotations


I don't like the word "tolerate".  It sounds like you're saying that there's something wrong with someone, but you're okay with them in spite of their faults.


I much prefer the word "acceptance".  You accept that there are differences between people, but you don't think of them as faults.


Here are some of my favorite quotes:


"It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live." ~ Albus Dumbledore


"We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals." ~ Immanuel Kant


"Be open to the possibilities!"


"Real men aren't bullies."


"People may forget what you said, forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel."


"Not all the law, Inspector, is written in books."


"How you treat me is your karma, how I react is mine."


"If you spend too much time thinking about the future, you aren't living your life."


"Be the change you want to see in the world."


"The path to fearless living goes straight through the roadblocks, not around them."


"An ending doesn't have to be said.  It's the only way to begin something new."


“Tears are words the heart can't express” ~ Unknown


"For Creativity to thrive, it needs a place to call home."


"A true outlaw finds the balance between the passion in his heart and the reason in his mind. The outcome is the balance of might and right." ~ John Teller


"The message is that there are known "knowns."  There are things we know that we know.  There are known unknowns.  That is to say there are things that we now know we don't know.  But there are also unknown unknowns.  There are things we do not know we don't know."
~ Donald Rumsfeld.

Monday, August 1, 2011

Books Read in July 2011

Andrade, Carlos
- Ha’ena: Through the Eyes of the Ancestors
Non-fiction, about the Ha'ena area of northern Kaua'i.

Braun, Lilian Jackson
- The Cat Who Could Read Backwards
- The Cat Who Ate Danish Modern
- The Cat Who Turned On and Off
Fiction, first three cozy mysteries in the Cat Who series starring a newspaper reporter and his cats.

Charters, Lowell
- Thunderheart
Fiction, half-native FBI agent is assigned to solve the murder of a Native American man on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.  Great movie starring Val Kilmer and Graham Greene.

Clark, Mary Higgins
- The Second Time Around
Fiction, financial correspondent is assigned to report on a murder case of a prominent cancer researcher.

Crichton, Michael
- Disclosure
- A Case of Need
Fiction, mystery revolving around a Seattle company merger and a sexual harrassment case, movie starring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore; medical mystery.

Davidson, Diane Mott
- Catering to Nobody
- Dying for Chocolate
- The Cereal Murders
- The Last Suppers
Fiction, first four books in the Goldy Culinary cozy mystery series with recipes.

Evanovich, Janet
- Sizzling Sixteen
Fiction, sixteenth book in the very funny Stephanie Plum bounty hunter cozy mystery series.

Fielding, Helen
- Bridget Jones’s Diary
Fiction, diary of a year in a woman's life, movie starring Renee Zellweger, Colin Firth, and Hugh Grant.

Galenorn, Yasmine
- Night Veil
Fiction, second book in the Indigo Court paranormal urban fantasy series (great series, as are all of her books!)

Loebel-Fried, Caren
- Hawaiian Legends of Dreams
Non-fiction, book of Hawaiian legends that involve dreams, along with narrative explaining the Hawaiian deep connection with dreams.

Maillet, G. M.
- Death of a Cozy Writer
Fiction, first book in the St. Just English cozy mystery about a lord of the manor and his offspring.

Noyes, Martha
- Then There Were None
Non-fiction, chronicles the effect of non-natives on the Hawaiian people, very informative, short book, documentary movie by the same name.

Patterson, James
- The Midnight Club
- Along Came a Spider
- Jack and Jill
- See How They Run
Fiction, first four books in the Alex Cross mystery series, dark and very intricate.

Roberts, Nora
- Blood Brothers
Fiction, first book in the Sign of Seven paranormal trilogy involving three young boys who become men, the women in their lives, and the terrible force they have to fight.

Winton, Tim
- Blueback
Fiction, charming tale about an Australian woman and her son living off the ocean.