30 Day Book Challenge - Day 24
A Book you wish more people had read:
Sarah:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - translation by Simon Armitage.
this is an epic poem so it counts as a book alright?! i really cannot rave enough about Simon Armitage’s translation of the manuscript for this poem. the original author is unknown, but this is one of the narrative poems from the age of Chaucer, amongst many for whom the author is unaccounted for. the poem in its original form, the middle english, is beautiful enough in itself. however, Armitage’s translation is absolutely exquisite. he captures the essence of the original, the assonance and the alliterative techniques, the atmosphere and the meaning, the feel and sound of the verses as they are spoken (for this poem was originally told in the oral fashion), and even manages to retain some of the original words and terms. it tells the story of Sir Gawain in a gorgeous, swirling fashion which is buoyant and compelling and magical and absolutely absorbing. and i really really wish more people would think to pick this up and read it. Armitage has made one of the most beautiful Middle English poems accessible to everybody, and i feel that not enough people take advantage of that.
Andy:
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
So the rough outline of this novel is known to most people, especially thanks to the terrible film recently made of it, the man who sold his soul in order for his portrait to age and gained eternal youth. But the novel that Oscar Wilde writes is so much more than that, Dorian’s falter that leads him into this path creates a much more realistic sense to this book than most people would believe. I loved this book and really wish people would read it.
(Source: thedixiewolf, via thegirlandherbooks)
I do not love you as if you were a salt rose, or topaz
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
So I love you because I know no other way
than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.
– Love Sonnet XVII by Pablo Neruda. (via importanceofbeingme)
(Source: onebookthief)
30 Day Book Challenge - Day 11.
A Book You Hated.
Sarah:
Poetry by the Brontes
i’ve never really hated a book before, but i do hate poetry by all of the Bronte siblings except for Emily so this will have to serve as an alternative. it’s so unbelieveably boring.
Andrew:
The Twilight Saga by Stephanie Meyer
Well its time to make some tumblr enemies. I’m sorry to those who loved this book, but I just felt that all the characters that were created were two-dimensional and purely existed to embody a single personality trait, or fill a certain role in the plot. The writing quality was frankly worse than the character creation, and in total, I felt the whole series was just the same story retold in different ways. And before you challenge me, I have read the books to make this judgement.
I am standing upon that foreshore, a ship at my side
spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts
for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength.
I stand and watch her until, at length, she hangs like a speck
of white cloud just where the sea and sky come down to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says, “there, she is gone.”
Gone where?
Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast,
hull and spar as she was when she left my side.
Just as able to bear her load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me - not in her.
And, just at the moment when someone at my side says, “there, she is gone”,
there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices
ready to take up the glad shout, “here she comes!”
And that is dying.
– Gone From My Sight by Henry Van Dyke.
Blake’s Books
“Each plate would be hand-printed, and then individually water-coloured by him or his wife: by this method no two books were identical. He did not care that they could not be mass-produced; the gain in artistic control was worth it.”-Romanticism Anthology, 3rd, Blackwell
Weapon of Mass Delusion: Reconciliation
Some may have blamed you that you took away
The verses that could move them on the day
When, the ears being deafened, the sight of the eyes blind
With lightning, you went from me, and I could find
Nothing to make a song about but kings,
Helmets, and swords, and half-forgotten things
That were like…
(Source: mine-isthefury)
When you are old and gray and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;
And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face among a crowd of stars.
– When You Are Old - William Butler Yeats (1865-1939).
