classic books
Grandma’s House TBR
Recent Reads: #Hobbalong, Shakespeare, Graphic Novel
Book Review: Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
When Tess Durbeyfield is driven by family poverty to claim kinship with the wealthy D’Urbervilles and seek a portion of their family fortune, meeting her ‘cousin’ Alec proves to be her downfall. A very different man, Angel Clare, seems to offer her love and salvation, but Tess must choose whether to reveal her past or remain silent in the hope of a peaceful future. – GoodReads Description
I love Hardy’s writing style, but what brand of stupidity is this story?!? I got so frustrated with the characters, and the plot is just so depressing and horrible at every turn. Nothing nice happens. Ever! Continue reading
Recent Reads: Children, Classics, Christian
Review: The Comedy of Errors
The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Two sets of twin baby brothers are cast adrift in a storm and wash up on shore in separate cities. When they are grown, they meet up again, not knowing of the others’ existence, and mistaken identities abound! One man’s wife mistakes him for his twin, and some creditors apply to the wrong twin for payment. The servants are totally confused, because they keep receiving conflicting commands from their masters.
While there are lots of hilarious situations, mix-ups, and puns and jokes galore, the plot is very straight forward with no surprises, and that made me a bit bored. It’s a very short play with a small cast of characters. It’s comedic fluff with not much of a story to it.
Maybe I’m just not in the mood for comedic fluff right now. Maybe if I saw it performed, it would be funnier, and I would enjoy it more. Reading a play is never the same as the real thing.
Book Haul Insanity
Poetry Review: Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage by George Gordon Byron
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is an epic poem in four Cantos about a young man, disillusioned with life, who goes on a tour of Europe, reflecting on wars fought in various countries and their histories, and ultimately deciding that life sucks, and there is no love or peace to be found anywhere. (Yay. So it’s a happy poem.) There are many references to a hidden emotional pain of Harold’s that forced him to leave England and haunts him wherever he goes, marring his enjoyment of life. What that painful secret is, we never find out.
The poetry itself is beautiful, of course, but I was hoping for more of a plot instead of all these ramblings and reflections on history and society. The entire poem is rabbit trails with no real resolution! There’s little to no structure in the story. Continue reading
Review: Coriolanus by Shakespeare
Book Review: Far from the Madding Crowd
Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This classic tells the story of Bathsheba Everdene, a young farm owner, and the three men who are in love with her. She has to make some difficult choices, some of which bring tragedy to her life, but ultimately she finds true love.
As with most classics, there is a lot of setup in the first chapters, but once the story gets going, it really moves along! Towards the middle and end, I was gasping and crying and laughing my head off. It’s definitely a wild story at times, and so brilliantly written.
Hardy has a reputation for writing depressing stuff, and there were some terrible depressing scenes that had me crying and horrified. But the ending is happy, so I was buoyed up again. Continue reading
Luminous Libro 