1) If you are at all an Anglophile or at least a fan of BBC productions and British authors (Jane Austen comes to mind), the series "Downton Abbey" is a must see
2) I am reading David Copperfield, and I hate Dora. I hope Dickens kills her off soon, or makes her elope or something.
3) I am currently thinking through some ways in which my congregation might get more involved in serving the poor and "needy" in the Greater Chicago area. Anyone out there have some suggestions about what sort of things have worked for you (or not), people to talk to, organizations to investigate, etc,?
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Crime and Punishment
I did it! I finished a really really long Russian novel without major glitches!!
Some background: I have tried (and failed) to finish The Brothers Karamazov at least four different times. One time, I was really making progress... and then my grad school classes resumed. Try focusing on Brothers K while your mind is trying to juggle 10 different theological texts at once... yeah, didn't happen. The only other Russian novel that I remember reading is Demons (also by Dostoevsky) in my senior seminar with Dr. Roger Lundin (Wheaton College). It was a great class, but I still had a hard time connecting with that particular novel. I had assumed that enjoyment of the great Russian classics would simply not come naturally to me.
Crime and Punishment changed all of that. I loved it! I genuinely loved it and loved the experience of reading it. I'd like to read some critical essays on the novel so that I can delve deeper into some of the major themes of the novel -- I don't think this is a novel that you read once and say, "Ok, I've mastered that one."
I found myself mesmerized by the characters in the book, particularly the protagonist, Raskolnikov, and the magistrate, Porfiry Petrovitch. (Side note -- one advantage of my undergraduate foray into Dostoevsky is that I was prepared for each character to have a zillion names and nicknames that would be difficult to remember...). I also found it brilliant the way D. crafted the relationship between Sonya, a young girl who is forced into prostitution to support her family, and Raskolnikov. And to make Sonya the most "Christian" of the characters -- also brilliant. The ending of the novel was perfect -- if you haven't read it, I'm not going to spoil it for you here. Just read it. (But don't read it first -- allow the book to build as D. intended!)
On a separate note, I read this entire book on my iPhone, using the Kindle app. I actually found it easier to read the book this way -- I'm not sure why. Perhaps the fact that the text was broken up into shorter pages because of the small size of the iPhone screen helped encourage me that I was making progress -- helped make it seem to go faster. Perhaps it was the fact that I could read the book in bed while my husband falls asleep without needing a light on...
So my next project is David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, another author whose works I sometimes struggle to finish. I am also reading this one on my iPhone, since I found I could download a free copy! So far I'm loving this book too -- I'm on a roll!
Some background: I have tried (and failed) to finish The Brothers Karamazov at least four different times. One time, I was really making progress... and then my grad school classes resumed. Try focusing on Brothers K while your mind is trying to juggle 10 different theological texts at once... yeah, didn't happen. The only other Russian novel that I remember reading is Demons (also by Dostoevsky) in my senior seminar with Dr. Roger Lundin (Wheaton College). It was a great class, but I still had a hard time connecting with that particular novel. I had assumed that enjoyment of the great Russian classics would simply not come naturally to me.
Crime and Punishment changed all of that. I loved it! I genuinely loved it and loved the experience of reading it. I'd like to read some critical essays on the novel so that I can delve deeper into some of the major themes of the novel -- I don't think this is a novel that you read once and say, "Ok, I've mastered that one."
I found myself mesmerized by the characters in the book, particularly the protagonist, Raskolnikov, and the magistrate, Porfiry Petrovitch. (Side note -- one advantage of my undergraduate foray into Dostoevsky is that I was prepared for each character to have a zillion names and nicknames that would be difficult to remember...). I also found it brilliant the way D. crafted the relationship between Sonya, a young girl who is forced into prostitution to support her family, and Raskolnikov. And to make Sonya the most "Christian" of the characters -- also brilliant. The ending of the novel was perfect -- if you haven't read it, I'm not going to spoil it for you here. Just read it. (But don't read it first -- allow the book to build as D. intended!)
On a separate note, I read this entire book on my iPhone, using the Kindle app. I actually found it easier to read the book this way -- I'm not sure why. Perhaps the fact that the text was broken up into shorter pages because of the small size of the iPhone screen helped encourage me that I was making progress -- helped make it seem to go faster. Perhaps it was the fact that I could read the book in bed while my husband falls asleep without needing a light on...
So my next project is David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, another author whose works I sometimes struggle to finish. I am also reading this one on my iPhone, since I found I could download a free copy! So far I'm loving this book too -- I'm on a roll!
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