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Original post by _becca
Gulliver's Travels is one of the 37247947984729 books sitting on my desk glaring at me to read them, i hope to read it over summer!! :biggrin: I will be so glad to say goodbye to A Level English, the AOs are so stifling. I was told to remove half the references from my coursework because they were 'too academic'

... which for suuuch a vocational course as English would be disastrous *rolls eyes*



Make sure that you read it :cool:
I'm looking forward to English at Uni - where have you firmed? Agree about the AOs, it can feel so superficial at times. I want to be able to take unusual ideas about texts and explain myself. AOs don't give you that sense of discovery! Ah well, not long left now.

I have enjoyed A level English but I do think that it can be so restricting and I look forward to the challenges ahead.

I have a pile behind me waiting, just waiting to be read. Middlemarch and Othello are appealing. Six more weeks.....Six. More. Weeks.
Reply 6701
Original post by Obsidian
Make sure that you read it :cool:
I'm looking forward to English at Uni - where have you firmed? Agree about the AOs, it can feel so superficial at times. I want to be able to take unusual ideas about texts and explain myself. AOs don't give you that sense of discovery! Ah well, not long left now.

I have enjoyed A level English but I do think that it can be so restricting and I look forward to the challenges ahead.

I have a pile behind me waiting, just waiting to be read. Middlemarch and Othello are appealing. Six more weeks.....Six. More. Weeks.



I read Othello for AS - great play. I would highly, highly recommend reading it alongside AC Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy (link to contents here: http://www.shakespeare-navigators.com/bradley/ ). In the Othello bit I found particularly interesting his attempt to explain the play in 'real' terms - ie with characters with real motives and in 'real' time, the whole concept of character criticism and all. Personally I think it's a tad anachronistic to try and apply our modern ideas about characters to a Renaissance play but that's getting into a big argument haha.

I have firmed Durham, insuranced Royal Holloway but I plan to take a gap year to reapply to Oxford (got rejected this year which was hard to take.) What about you?
Original post by _becca
I read Othello for AS - great play. I would highly, highly recommend reading it alongside AC Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy (link to contents here: http://www.shakespeare-navigators.com/bradley/ ). In the Othello bit I found particularly interesting his attempt to explain the play in 'real' terms - ie with characters with real motives and in 'real' time, the whole concept of character criticism and all. Personally I think it's a tad anachronistic to try and apply our modern ideas about characters to a Renaissance play but that's getting into a big argument haha.

I have firmed Durham, insuranced Royal Holloway but I plan to take a gap year to reapply to Oxford (got rejected this year which was hard to take.) What about you?


I am really looking forward to reading it :biggrin:

I dipped into a bit of Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy when I studied Hamlet at AS. Bradley's text is one of the reasons I chose Othello as my next Shakespeare text as I have studied Hamlet and Macbeth at school, read King Lear and I want to read all of the essays without getting spoilers!

Oxford reject here too :smile: - I have firmed Leeds and insuranced Royal Holloway! This summer is going to be fun.

What are you planning to do in your gap year?
Reply 6703
Original post by Obsidian
I am really looking forward to reading it :biggrin:

I dipped into a bit of Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy when I studied Hamlet at AS. Bradley's text is one of the reasons I chose Othello as my next Shakespeare text as I have studied Hamlet and Macbeth at school, read King Lear and I want to read all of the essays without getting spoilers!

Oxford reject here too :smile: - I have firmed Leeds and insuranced Royal Holloway! This summer is going to be fun.

What are you planning to do in your gap year?



Ahh unlucky mate, which college did you apply to? Leeds is excellent though so well done for the offer! Do you have summer plans then? Other than reading... :P

Well I live in Oxford so I've got a job at Queen's college library over summer which is all conservation stuff, did it last summer and it was really fun! :biggrin: geekery ahoy hehe. After that if I can wrangle a job at a college that'd be fun, otherwise OUP or Blackwell's would be great perhaps :smile:
Original post by _becca
Hahahah #croak
Yes I have read The Wasps, though a long time ago! Would like to read again really.A lot of the political references etc are completely lost on me though :confused:

So, you like AG comedy, what about the tragedies? QUICK, Euripides, Sophocles or Aeschylus? :biggrin: (have to admit 'The Frogs' actually changed my answer to this question hehe)


I haven't read The Wasps before, though it's in the small volume I have sitting on my shelf. I buy a dozen or so books a week; some are ready instantly, others several weeks, or perhaps even months down the line. I haven't gotten round to it yet!

Generally speaking, I prefer comedies and farces, though I'll read anything once, period withstanding. I've read Sophocles's Oedipus Rex and Euripides's Medea, though it was quite a while ago, and I could definitely benefit from a second reading. I'm currently wading through a series of Brecht plays at the moment, in an attempt to further my understanding of Godard's films (if such a thing is even possible). I'll see how it goes.
Original post by _becca
Ahh unlucky mate, which college did you apply to? Leeds is excellent though so well done for the offer! Do you have summer plans then? Other than reading... :P

Well I live in Oxford so I've got a job at Queen's college library over summer which is all conservation stuff, did it last summer and it was really fun! :biggrin: geekery ahoy hehe. After that if I can wrangle a job at a college that'd be fun, otherwise OUP or Blackwell's would be great perhaps :smile:


Awesome! I'm sure you'll have a great year :smile: I keep looking for Waterstones jobs but they are so scarce.

Mostly, I want to read and not make many plans. Just live a little spontaniously :wink: I will be going on holiday for a couple of weeks but beyond that, I am sleeping/reading/watching TV/preparing for Uni *fingers crossed* and seeing friends - revising really hits your social life! I'd love to go to the theatre too.

Literally have a stack of books on my shelf: Othello, Robinson Cruesoe, Middlemarch, Vanity Fair, Crime and Punishment and Paradise Lost. Might have to get some shorter texts to space those out a bit!

Question for everyone really - who likes re-reading books? I used to re-read occasionally but I want to re-read books much more now. Maybe that's due to A level English? Who knows? Just thought that I would throw that out there - so catch it :wink:
Reply 6706
Original post by Obsidian
Finished Jane Eyre last week, half-way through Great Expectations :smile: Who knows what is next? Might venture into poetry as revision should be mopping up lots of time.

Abiraleft - I did Streetcar for my AS coursework! I enjoyed it. We did a re-creative piece so I chose to write a scene to go at the end.


Finished reading A Streetcar Named Desire two days ago, thought it was great! It must have been very interesting doing it in class, I could see loads of places where production/stage directions and imagery could be discussed. I did Equus at AS-levels, which was also similar in that regard.

philistine
If you go with A Streetcar Named Desire, make sure you watch the film as well. Marlon Brando delivers, and delivers hard. Vivien Leigh is always a pleasure to look at, too.


I intend to, as soon as I can get my hands on a copy of it! :biggrin:

I think I'll start A Clockwork Orange now. :beard:
Original post by Abiraleft
Finished reading A Streetcar Named Desire two days ago, thought it was great! It must have been very interesting doing it in class, I could see loads of places where production/stage directions and imagery could be discussed. I did Equus at AS-levels, which was also similar in that regard.



I intend to, as soon as I can get my hands on a copy of it! :biggrin:

I think I'll start A Clockwork Orange now. :beard:


We spent a lot of time discussing symbolism and lots of people were doing different coursework questions so we had plenty of debate :smile:
I really want to see a production of it sometime to see how they stage it. Particularly the streetcar.... :smile:
Reply 6708
Original post by Obsidian
We spent a lot of time discussing symbolism and lots of people were doing different coursework questions so we had plenty of debate :smile:
I really want to see a production of it sometime to see how they stage it. Particularly the streetcar.... :smile:


Have you read any Arthur Miller? A Streetcar Named Desire struck me as being pretty similar to Death of a Salesman - as well as Sam Shepard's True West. I suppose there's is bound to be something of a similar feel in them given that they are all American plays that examine different stages of the failure of the American Dream, but with the first two, I thought there was also a broad stylistic similarity (not necessarily in a production sense, but in the way it's written. Also, while we're on the subject, Death of a Salesman is apparently being shown on Broadway in a production that's received lots of acclaim and Tony nominations, and stars Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Willy Loman :coma:).

There's also Miller's The Crucible, which is a completely different kind of animal, but is one of my favourite plays so I'd recommend anyway. :biggrin:
Original post by Abiraleft
Have you read any Arthur Miller? A Streetcar Named Desire struck me as being pretty similar to Death of a Salesman - as well as Sam Shepard's True West. I suppose there's is bound to be something of a similar feel in them given that they are all American plays that examine different stages of the failure of the American Dream, but with the first two, I thought there was also a broad stylistic similarity (not necessarily in a production sense, but in the way it's written. Also, while we're on the subject, Death of a Salesman is apparently being shown on Broadway in a production that's received lots of acclaim and Tony nominations, and stars Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Willy Loman :coma:).

There's also Miller's The Crucible, which is a completely different kind of animal, but is one of my favourite plays so I'd recommend anyway. :biggrin:


Ooooooh. Not yet - I'll put it on my to-do list :smile:
Thanks for the recommendations :biggrin:
Reply 6711
Original post by Hype en Ecosse


:lol:


I should probably get round to reading Atlas Shrugged at some point. :ninja:
I just took another look at Edmund Spenser's Mutability Cantos.

http://www.luminarium.org/renascence-editions/queeneM.html

They're really really good - epic poetry about the 'titaness', Mutability, and her attempt to usurp power from the Roman pantheon on the grounds that, since they are all changeable and very similar in personality to mortals, they are under her sway and should fall under her authority - her whole argument seems to be Spenser ridiculing pantheism in general, it's pretty clever:

But you Dan Ioue, that only constant are,
And King of all the rest, as ye do clame,
Are you not subiect eeke to this misfare?
Then let me aske you this withouten blame,
Where were ye borne? some say in Crete by name,
Others in Thebes, and others other-where;
But wheresoeuer they comment the same,
They all consent that ye begotten were,
And borne here in this world, ne other can appeare.

Then are ye mortall borne, and thrall to me,
Vnlesse the kingdome of the sky yee make
Immortall, and vnchangeable to bee;
Besides, that power and vertue which ye spake,
That ye here worke, doth many changes take,
And your owne natures change: for, each of you
That vertue haue, or this, or that to make,
Is checkt and changed from his nature trew,
By others opposition or obliquid view.


It ends when 'Great Dame Nature' steps in and delivers a pretty unclear rebuttal where she suggests that, rather than change ruling over everything, everything uses change in order to 'work their own perfection so by fate'. It's really interesting.

(This is how I procrastinate.)
Original post by Obsidian
Awesome! I'm sure you'll have a great year :smile: I keep looking for Waterstones jobs but they are so scarce.


Good luck! Working at Waterstone's was the best job I ever had, it's an amazing place to work.

Wrt the question about rereading books; I don't tend to because there are way more books I want to read than I'll ever have time to in my life so I want to get as many as I can read rather than repeating what I've already done.
Original post by Norfolkadam
Good luck! Working at Waterstone's was the best job I ever had, it's an amazing place to work.

Wrt the question about rereading books; I don't tend to because there are way more books I want to read than I'll ever have time to in my life so I want to get as many as I can read rather than repeating what I've already done.


Thanks :smile:
You have a good point and it really is a personal preference. I like to re-read sometimes, particularly if I have read something rapidly. Re-reading King Lear at the moment and this made me realise that Thomas Hardy had quoted it in 'Tess of the D'Urbervilles'. :biggrin:
Reply 6715
Finally getting settled into A Clockwork Orange. Not the easiest book to read: really struggled through the first chapter (about 9 pages :s-smilie:) quite simply because of the back and forth required between the text and the Nadsat glossary. Doesn't help that it's not written in a particularly normal syntax.

Enjoying it so far nonetheless. :h:
Reply 6716
Original post by Abiraleft
Finally getting settled into A Clockwork Orange. Not the easiest book to read: really struggled through the first chapter (about 9 pages :s-smilie:) quite simply because of the back and forth required between the text and the Nadsat glossary. Doesn't help that it's not written in a particularly normal syntax.

Enjoying it so far nonetheless. :h:


I found that I had to read it twice. The second time round it seemed to flow more, as I recognised the words. (My edition didn't have a glossary, so I've probably mixed them up!)
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 6717
Original post by jsb123
I found that I had to read it twice. The second time round it seemed to flow more, as I recognised the words. (My edition didn't have a glossary, so I'v eprobably mixed them up1)


:shock: How on earth did you get through it?
Reply 6718
Original post by Abiraleft
:shock: How on earth did you get through it?


I became very good at guessing words by their context, by the end. Then it made sense. Ish.
Reply 6719
Original post by jsb123
I became very good at guessing words by their context, by the end. Then it made sense. Ish.


Ah, I see. A couple of times, however, I've already got a possible meaning in my head - brain automatically filling in the blanks - but I turn to the glossary to make sure anyway, and it turns out to be a different meaning. The unusual syntax compounds things a bit, I think. :p: I'm certainly glad I have a glossary (though now you could probably just get it off the internet). I wonder how much easier it is for people who know Russian to understand the text (I understand that most of the words are taken from/have roots in the Russian).

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