So we beat on--
Mar. 8th, 2006 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityofoneToday I am supposed to: write my Great Gatsby essay.
Today I have:
1) Managed a vague outline of my Great Gatsby essay while mostly looking over various bits of the book and sobbing, sobbing, because no book ever has or does move me like this one; it tears me apart and I am totally inadequate to the task of explaining why.
2) Eaten a sandwich.
But seriously, regarding 1)--I maintain and will continue to maintain that Gatsby is the greatest novel ever written, packing more into less than 200 pages than what others can manage in nearly 2,000 (and I have read War and Peace, so I know *g*). I cry every time I read it (and when I'm reviewing my notes to write an essay on it, apparently). Those of you who have read it: does it effect you in the same way? The class I'm writing the essay for is an American Lit class taught at an Irish university; the tutor has stressed that she thinks the novel highlights American themes--do you think that's true? I would say that the themes of Gatsby--trying to recapture the past, yearning to be known, loved--are universal. But then I am American, so I could be projecting. We do that.
What's your favorite book of all time? What book has moved you more than any other?
Today I have:
1) Managed a vague outline of my Great Gatsby essay while mostly looking over various bits of the book and sobbing, sobbing, because no book ever has or does move me like this one; it tears me apart and I am totally inadequate to the task of explaining why.
2) Eaten a sandwich.
But seriously, regarding 1)--I maintain and will continue to maintain that Gatsby is the greatest novel ever written, packing more into less than 200 pages than what others can manage in nearly 2,000 (and I have read War and Peace, so I know *g*). I cry every time I read it (and when I'm reviewing my notes to write an essay on it, apparently). Those of you who have read it: does it effect you in the same way? The class I'm writing the essay for is an American Lit class taught at an Irish university; the tutor has stressed that she thinks the novel highlights American themes--do you think that's true? I would say that the themes of Gatsby--trying to recapture the past, yearning to be known, loved--are universal. But then I am American, so I could be projecting. We do that.
What's your favorite book of all time? What book has moved you more than any other?
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-03-08 02:02 pm (UTC)No. I found it kind of clunky. I read it recently, actually. I liked it a *lot* but I'm not in love with it. It made me think of architecture - I'm a big fan of architecture. And it was a good era for architecture.
I like the way no one in the book "says" anything. It's always "exclaimed" or "remarked" or "cried" - all the things they tell you not to do in writing class. And yet - I kind of liked it. It gives this melodramatic appeal to everyone's actions - made them larger than life.
I was comparing it to the Brett Euston Ellis (because the Rules of Attraction is like the last fiction book I read - reading fuck all lately) whose style is so succinct and brief. No comparison, really, but I think the 'lifestyles of the young, rich and bored' idea is kind of similar. There's an essay in that somewhere...
My favourite book of all time: Lady Hackett's Household Guide. Indispensable.