arethinn: glowing green spiral (Default)
(Yes, the title is directly, if somewhat squinting-sideways-ed-ly, connected to this entry - but then, anyone who is reading this is likely to grasp that immediately, anyway.)

Okay, you cats are never gonna believe this. See, I am a bathroom reader. If I am not working on a specific book at the moment, I habitually pluck something random off my shelf to take in there and read for a few minutes. Generally this is something I've read a million times before; the Hitchhiker's Guide books are favourites for this purpose - a Pope's gotta keep up on her scripture, you know!

Last night the choice, for gods only know what reason, was The Grapes of Wrath. I hadn't touched this book in ten years, since I was forced to read it as part of my grade 10 English class. [insert feeling a bit old here] This was in fact the exact same book I had touched ten years ago, with my name written on the side in big black letters and lots of underlining and notes written inside it (quite annoying, actually).

I had intended to read a few pages at random, flush, and then put the thing back on the shelf. But I found myself actually reading it, and getting something out of it. To my "oooOoOOoo! in surprise and alarm", I found myself compelled by what was written on the pages, and kept reading 'til about 4:45 AM (although skipping around, not reading straight through).

This curiously annoying - I'm only just now on a level with this book? Should I have been when I was 14, and I'm just slow, or something?

(I picked the mood because it's the only one in the list that I actually don't even know what it means. It sounds sort of like what a dissection subject is. "This is an ex-Tass!!" heheh.)

Date: Feb. 25th, 2003 02:54 pm (UTC)From: [identity profile] amberite.livejournal.com
Nothing to do with being on the book's level or not. I thought everybody knew that any book you are forced to read as part of a class becomes automagically lousy and stays that way until a certain cycle of time has passed -- there are various theories of what determines that cycle . . .

Also, I'm pretty sure "exanimate" is a fancy word for dead. Not absolutely, though.

Date: Feb. 25th, 2003 04:23 pm (UTC)From: [identity profile] tyrsalvia.livejournal.com
I tried to read it at that age and got very little out of it as well.

To be honest, I think we get a lot less out of virtually everything we are forced to read in school (before college, at least).

Date: Feb. 25th, 2003 04:48 pm (UTC)From: [identity profile] starlightforest.livejournal.com
1. Lifeless; dead. --Spenser.
2. Destitute of animation; spiritless; disheartened.


*shrugs* I figured, too, hence the reference to a dissection critter. But it seemed like a cool word. ("...At first!" --random MST3K ref.)

Date: Feb. 25th, 2003 05:16 pm (UTC)From: [identity profile] starlightforest.livejournal.com
err, nix "Spenser" in that one, I edited out the short example quotes dictionary.com gave, but missed the attribution on that one.

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Arethinn

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