Paws in 2015 - Greeks bearing gifts

The wonderful and beautiful nine muses, with a little help from Apollo.

My Category Challenge theme for 2015 is the gods and goddesses of Ancient Greece. This doesn't mean I'm going to be up to my neck in old greek plays and such, though hopefully I'll get around to reading one or two. It does mean that I, as a lover of ancient civilizations and history in general, am ridiculously excited about starting the new year and the new reading.

I have put my name down for a few challenges and group reads but I'm not making any promises about numbers or even finishing a single read. Whatever I read will be good enough.

I've spent most of my time on LT in the Category Challenge group but this might very well change in 2015. We'll see.
Anyway, I'm going to pour myself some wine (what? Dionysus is one of my categories, I'm just doing research!) and have a look around my bookshelves...

The 2015 Category Challenge

Aphrodite
The goddess of love, beauty, desire and pleasure.
- LGBT literature and love stories.

Apollo
The god of music, arts, knowledge, healing, plague, prophecy poetry, manly beauty and archery.
- Plays, poetry and others arts.

Ares
The god of war, bloodshed and violence.
- World War 1 & World War 2.

Athena
The goddess of intelligence, skill, peace, warfare, battle strategy, handicrafts and wisdom.
- The Cold War and spying/intelligence

Artemis
The goddess of hunting, wilderness, animals, young girls, childbirth and plague.
- Graphic novels and comics.

Demeter
The goddess of grain, agriculture, harvest, growth, nourishment and the life and death cycle.
- Children’s books, young adult and short stories.

Dionysus/Bacchus
The god of wine, parties, festivals, madness, chaos, drunkenness, drugs and ecstasy.
- Easy reading and comedic books.

Hades
The god of the underworld, the dead and regret.
- Horror, crime and books with other scary things.

Hermes
The god of boundaries, travel, communication, trade, language and writing.
- Fantasy and sci-fi books.

Zeus
Finally the god of the sky, weather, thunder, lightning, law, order and justice.
- Classics.

The Erechtheoin caryatids at the Acropolis

BingoCAT

Welcome! Come talk to me, I love talking!

Beautiful artwork. I look forward to many BBs from you.

 

>7 majkia: Thanks for dropping by!

Wine. Hmmm, maybe I should do some research.

>9 NanaCC: Research is very important.

especially when that research involved personal experiments.

>11 majkia: Best way to learn!

Love the gods and goddesses categories.

>13 janeajones: Me too! :)

>1 PawsforThought: That relief has been beautifully photographed, the contours appear to come out of the screen, as though the figures could be stroked. Looks like you're going to have a busy reading year, Paws, but a good range of subjects.

>15 Oandthegang: I completely agree. Great photograph. I wish I could have even a percent of the talent needed.
And it might look busy, but I'm not pressuring myself in any way. As long as I read and feel good, I'm happy. I don't need to finish (or even take part in at all) any challenges. It's just incentive.

Great start to your thread

I like that challenge calendar and the gods, a nice approach.

Beautiful relief! And I like the Greek gods' categories too. I might borrow them with a bit of accommodation.

>19 h-mb: Borrow away!

I love that one of the Bingo card entries is "read a cat" - not "a book about a cat", but the cat itself!

>21 fannyprice: CAT is short for Categories and Themes, a joint challenge (three, actually) in the Category Challenge group.

>21 fannyprice:, >22 PawsforThought: Quite fun to read a cat, though.

>23 Oandthegang: I can read mine easily. "I want food."

>22 PawsforThought:, Aw.... Boo...

>24 PawsforThought:, Basically, yeah. :)

Whoohoo! I've been waiting for this day since New Year's and it's finally here! The book sale catalogues are out!

(For those who don't know, Swedish booksellers have an annual FANTASTIC book sale at the end of February and the big name booksellers send out catalogues a couple of weeks beforehand so you can check out what's going to be on sale (and compare prices!). The catalogues, and the online versions, came out today and I've spent most of the day perusing. Normally a hardback cost about 240 SEK, during the book sale that book can cost 70-100 SEK, and sometimes the early bird-offers are even better.)

There's some good stuff on offer this year, even if a lot is completely uninteresting to me. I'm going to make a list and compare different stors/sites. And I'll have to be really tough with myself - just because there's a sale doesn't mean I can buy ALL THE BOOKS. No. But there are some that I've been wanting to buy anyway and getting 60% off isn't too bad.

Book sale day! Whoohoo!
(Or as my friend texted me last night: "It's Christmas!")

I only bought four books today, which is actually quite a lot for me as I've been very restrictive with book purchases in the past decade or so. But they seem very good and the prices can't really be beat.
I got a world atlas (regular price 469 SEK, sale price 99 SEK), an art history/dictionary (regular price 429 SEK, sale price 139 SEK), a book about the iron curtain (regular price 299, sale price 89 SEK) and a book about WW1 (regular price 269 SEK, sale price 79 SEK).
And they had an extra offer of 4 for the price of 3 so I got the cheapest book for free.

If I had bought them at regular price it would have cost me 1466 SEK ($176/£114) but it now cost 327 SEK ($39/£25). One fifth! Pretty good deal, I'd say.

I will be buying a few more books but I'll get them online as the prices were better there. And I'll pop back into the book shop in a couple of weeks when the sale is winding down (and the prices have been cut even further and see if anything strikes my fancy - there were a couple more things I was interested in now, but not enough to buy yet. If they're still there when the prices are lowered again, I'll buy them.

Book sale crop part deux:

So, I bought a few more books. From an online retailer this time except for one which I found when shopping with mum yesterday.
The list goes as follows:
Salman Rushdie's Joseph Anton - orig. price 210 SEK, sale price 39 SEK
Spices and herbs encyclopedia - orig. price 269 SEK, sale price 129 SEK
5 biographies by Plutarch - orig. price 187 SEK, sale price 79 SEK
Biography about dying of cancer (2 parts)- orig. price 186 SEK, sale price 59 SEK (per part)
Book about Danish jews fleeing to Sweden during WW2 - orig. price 222 SEK, sale price 69 SEK
Vegetarian cookbook - orig. price 227 SEK, sale price 65 SEK
Book about the warship Vasa - orig. price 179 SEK, sale price 99 SEK

If I had bought them all off sale it would have cost me 1666 SEK (£130/$200). Now it cost me 598 SEK (£46/$72). That's just over 1/3 of the original price (36%).

I'm really excited about these books. I've been wanting to buy that particular vegetarian cookbook (it's a standard cookbook with EVERYTHING in it, and is from a publisher with very high renown when it comes to cookbooks) for ages but it was sold out at the sale last year and I don't want to pay full price for something I know is going to go on sale again. I have both the "regular" (non-vegetarian, all-encompassing) cookbook and the cakes/biscuits/other sweet things cookbook they make and they're amazing. Everything from "how to boil an egg" to gala dinners are in there. I'd love to buy the main competitor's work too, also very good (my parents have two copies and they've both been used so diligently they're in shreds).
Cookbooks always make for good deal during the book sale.

There are two more books I'd like to get but the online shop has run out. I'm hoping they'll get re-stocked soon, otherwise I'll buy them at the regular shop (if they still have them). And maybe something else that strikes my fancy when prices are lowered again.

Congratulations on your great haul!

>29 ipsoivan: Thanks. I'm quite impressed with myself for my efforts and thriftiness. This is the biggest haul I've ever had on a book sale. I've usually just bought a couple of books because I've been limited by space and economy. I still am, but hopefully won't be for long. And I've purged some books so there's a bit more room.

I certainly understand about not buying a lot. I went through 6 months last year of not buying a single book. After it was over, I bought a few things that I wanted, but mostly I've been ok with not buying much anymore.

I usually don't pull out my wallet until one of the university sales in my city. They have a lot of used literary fiction that is cheap and appeals to me.

>31 ipsoivan: Try six years of buying maybe 2 books a year (for myself, I'd buy stuff for oter peple for their birthdays and Christmas and such). Or maybe more. I'm not really sure. To be honest, I've never bought very many books. Certainly not in the past decade.
I could probably buy ten times my own weight in books if I bought used books. There's tons of them af the local thrifts shops and indoor flea markets and they're always cheap (5-10 SEK which is about a dollar). But I don't like buying used books. Or rather, I'm fine buying used books but only if they're in as new-condition. Which they very rarely are. I'm incredibly pickly with my books buying.

If anyone is feeling envious over my book sale deals, there's a drive at BookDepository right now (I know they're Amazon, but still - and they have free worldwide shipping!).
Tons and tons of Oxford University Press books at 40% off or more. I nearly fainted when I saw The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar and Oxford A-Z of Grammar and Punctuation but then I realized they were paperbacks and I don't do paperback (*crying*).
You can find the sale here and here (there one page with Humanities and one with Science & Medicine)

In other news, I received my book sale package (they books I bought online) today and the books are marvellous and beautiful and I loved them all. And now I want to buy more books. This really is an addiction.

Happy Pi Day!

This is the best news I've had all year: http://www.themarysue.com/brontosaurus-real-after-all/

Brontosaurus is my absolute favourite dinosaur. Feel good to have them exist again.

>35 PawsforThought: I never knew their existence was questionned so the resurrection was a double surprise!

I finished a book! Incredible!

I Will Repay by Baroness Emmuska Orczy

This is the second of the Scarlet Pimpernel novels and while I didn't like it as much as the first one it's a fun and breezy book. It's full of historical details and spilling over with satire of the French revolutionists. The main characters are not as easily likeable as the ones in the first book, which is the reason I'm not as fond of this one. Still, good fun and I'm definitely reading on in the series.

This will cover the bingo square for "A book centered around a major historical event" (the French revolution).

The Elusive Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy

This is the third of the Pimpernel novels and I had a really good time reading it. The story in this one once again revolves around the Percy Blakeney and Marguerite and I have to say I like it quite a bit better than the last one (I Will Repay).

This covers the bingo square "A book set in a country other than your own" (France).

A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie

I'd never even heard of this Marple-mystery before but picked it up alongside a pile of other Christie novels when I checked out a small mountain of books from the library for some "light summer reading". Christie always makes for great reading in summer and I read this one in the wonderful sunshine we had this past weekend. It's a bit different than Marples in general, or at least I thought so, but it had to be considering the setting.
I thought it was interesting how rather off-handed Marple's nephew was about having a gay friend (though using what we'd think of as a slur to describe him), even though the book was written (and set) in the early sixties.
I did like it, but it's not my favourite Marple.

This doesn't cover any bingo squares but fits into the Hades category.

Agatha Christie does make for great light summer reading! I read A Caribbean Mystery ages ago and don't remember much of it, but I'm sure I enjoyed it. Re-reading The Mysterious Affair at Styles at the moment - one of her best, I think.

>40 twogerbils: She does! I've only ever read Agatha Christie in the summer. Haven't read Styles, but I'll get to it - I know it's one of her absolute classics.

Hanging on to Max by Margaret Bechard

I initially liked this book, despite the incredibly "after school special" feel. I can't remember reading another book about a teenage dad taking care of his baby without the mother there, so that was nice.
And I liked it, until the ending. It just didn't sit right with me. I have no problem with the issue in itself, but it seemed to come out of nowhere and felt as if the author ended it that way because she'd decided it was going to end like that - not because it worked with the story and the characters.

This covers the bingo square "Read a book with a protagonist of the opposite gender" and fits into the category "Demeter".

I created a few lists the other day, mainly just as a reminder to myself but people are of course welcome to use them as suits their own needs. If you feel like it, please do add more titles as you see fit (just please don't add duplicates).

http://www.librarything.com/list/10367/all/Early-Modern

http://www.librarything.com/list/10366/all/Truly-old-classics

http://www.librarything.com/list/10364/all/Womens-reading-list (This one needs tons more titles but I haven't had time)

For your women's reading list, I recommend looking through A Bookshelf of Our Own: Must-Reads for Women (I have a tag for the books included: abooo) and the much more eclectic 500 Great Books By Women (a couple of people have tagged the books as 500-women).

>44 ELiz_M: Great, thanks! I'll have a look at them both. I've really been wanting to read more "women's lit" (urgh, awful phrase).

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne

This was recommended to me and I had very high expectation when I started reading but found it a bit slow and was irritated by the main character throughout so couldn't enjoy it as much as I wanted. I had a feeling all along how it was going to end and I'm glad I was right, because any other ending would have seemed strange.

This covers the bingo square ""Read a book chosen by someone else" (my mum) and fits into the category "Ares".

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

I'd made a note ages ago about reading this but forgot all about it. It's been on several "must-read" list that I've looked up recently which spurred me to pick it up.
I really liked this. It's a short story so a fairly easy read in that sense but books about mental issues are never "easy" and this was very well written so I felt drawn into the delusions and hallucinations.

This doesn't cover any bingo square for me but fits into the category "Zeus".

I put in an order at Book Depository last week and the books are already here! It usually takes two weeks so I was very pleasantly surprised.
The books all look great and I can't wait to read them (though I'll have to, because I have library books that are due back).

This is what I got:
Angela Carter's Book of Fairy Tales
Princesses Behaving Badly: Real Stories from History without the Fairy-Tale by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie
Tesla: Inventor of the Electrical Age by W. Bernard Carlson
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard
The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Sandman: Fables and Reflections and
Sandman: Brief Lives by Neil Gaiman
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
Joy in the Morning,
Thank You, Jeeves and
Right Ho, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse

How in the world did I miss your thread for this whole entire year so far?! Starring.....

>48 PawsforThought: Your listing of The Princess Bride reminds me that maybe that's just the movie I need to cheer myself up. :)

I have My Man Jeeves on my Kindle.

>49 avidmom: Well, I've not been very active so that might be part of it...

And you should definitely watch The Princess Bride if you need some cheering up. You can't not feel good after having watched that!
I've not read My Man Jeeves yet. It's on the list, though (and on the wishlist for future purchases).

>50 PawsforThought: I don't know if you have a Kindle, but Amazon offered it for free. :)

>51 avidmom: Nope. No Kindle for me (no e-reader at all). Thanks, though.

>48 PawsforThought: Nice! Id love to hear your thoughts on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, if you get to it sometime soon :)

>53 ELiz_M: I love the play and the movie, so I'm sure I'll love it in written form too.

>48 PawsforThought: Just catching up on your thread - and a lovely haul! I read Princess Bride earlier this year, looking forward to your thoughts on that one.

>55 reva8: I'm looking forward to reading it, though I doubt it'll be within a foreseeable future.

Does anyone have any thoughts on Evelyn Waugh and his writing? I've been thinking about reading Brideshead Revisited because I love the mini-series with Andrews & Irons but I don't know. Is that the natural "first Waugh book" or would it be better to read something else first and work my way up to BR?
I know Waugh has a generally high rating on LT but that doesn't really tell me much.

Brideshead Revisited was one of my favorite books for 2013. I think it deserves its high rating. I haven't read anything else by Waugh, so can't compare it to his others.

>58 NanaCC: Could you tell me what you liked about it?

I thought the writing was beautiful. It evoked a lot of emotions, but I do remember finding it hard to write a review. That does sometimes happen to me when I really like a book.

Edited to add that I believe his other works are more satirical or humorous. Again, not having read them, I don't really know.

>60 NanaCC: Thanks.

>46 PawsforThought: the main character in The boy in the striped pyjamas bothered me as well. He sounded a lot younger than he was supposed to be, a lot more naive, a lot less inquisitive than I expect a child to be. I wasn't sure how well it worked as a book for children either - struck me as relying a little bit too much on being able to work out what was veiled by the descriptions.

Brideshead Revisited is the second Waugh I've read, the other being Decline and fall. They are very different, even though I see both got 4.5 stars. I'd agree with >60 NanaCC:, it's beautiful. I found it suffused with an air of melancholy. The time it describes is conjoured up with regret that it has passed and will not be again. Decline & Fall, on the other had, is much more a wicked satire, taking witty side swipes at the absurdity of the class system. I would suggest that Brideshead is possibly more accessible of the two, but that's just my opinion and what do I know. >:-)

>62 Helenliz: Yeah, those were my exact problems with the character and the story. I've worked with a lot of kids through the years and kids are NOT stupid. They figure things out twice as fast as many adults. I just couldn't believe him as a real person.

Thanks for your thoughts on Waugh. It's really helpful.

Go Ask Alice by Anonymous (Beatrice Sparks)

This book is crap. I can't believe the publishers tried to pawn it off as "true story" because it's painfully obvious that it was written by an adult to warn young people of drugs. And it does a terrible job of it. Not only is it clear as day that do teenager writes the way this "diary" is written, and you don't have to have much knowledge of drugs to point out the glaring mistakes regarding drug use (WHO would, after having tried LSD once - by mistake - offer up their arm to a complete stranger and have them inject you with speed?), but it's also incredibly moralizing about sex and sexuality.
I realised after reading that it was written in 1971, which makes perfect sense, but I think it's amoral of the publishers to keep this book on the shelves.

This covers the bingo square "Read a book that's completely outside your comfort zone" and fits the category Demeter.

>64 PawsforThought: I remember reading that book when I was a teenager. My mother bought it for me (I asked for it). What was I thinking? Talk about dark and depressing! I remember reading it felt like chug-a-longing spoiled, curdled milk. It just left me nauseous. Of course, at the time I bought the whole thing, hook, line and sinker.

*bleh*

>65 avidmom: Was it new when you read it? I really can't imagine anyone growing up today (or anyone having grown up in the last 30 years) thinking that book is believable. It reminded be of the "No, it's Becky" and "Faces of Marijuana" memes.

>66 PawsforThought: No, this must have been maybe the late 70s when I read it - I was probably in 6th grade or junior high. We lived in a small town where the hardest drugs we'd (at least I'd) heard of was marijuana.

>67 avidmom: Still, fairly new.

Since the weather is going to be rather awful here this weekend I've decided to have myself a readathon. I made a thread over in the 75'ers thread and anyone who's interested is welcome to join me!

I don't know how I've not come across your thread before. You did much better at the bokrea haul than I did - one book for me, but I enjoyed it!

My experience with Go Ask Alice was similar to avidmom's. I read it fairly close to when it came out, and I was too young for it (maybe 11-ish?). I'm pretty sure it led to some nightmares. I'm sure now it reads as dated and sensationalized, but just not my cup of tea.

>70 ljbwell: Hello! And welcome to my thread! I haven't been very active this year, which is probably why you haven't notised me before now.
I don't know if it's better or worse to get a good haul at the book sale, to be honest! But I was very satisfied with my purchases so that's good. Which book did you get?

I can understand if people who read Go Ask Alice when it was fairly new bought into the story (and especially if you were very young when you read it) but I genuinely hope no one reading it today thinks the events are likely or even possible. And I really think the publishers should pull it from the shelves - keeping it is perpetuating beliefs regarding drug use and sexuality that are outright dangerous.

>71 PawsforThought: it was actually a graphic novelization of Stieg Trenter's Färjkarlen. I also picked up Tove Jansson's Resa med lätt bagage, but that one wasn't part of the sale.

No doubt re: Go Ask Alice. To put my fears at the time (remember I was pretty young!) in some context, I also was put off by the utterly ridiculous film Reefer Madness.

>72 ljbwell: I really shouldn't cast judgement. When I ~11 I was reading Virginia Andrews's Flowers in the Attic and thought it was good and believable. O.O

At Bertram's Hotel by Agatha Christie

Ah, it's so nice to get to read a book you really enjoy! There's been to many boring and/or frustrating ones lately that this really was a breath of fresh air.
It's not Christie's greatest but it's different from most of the ones she's written (that I've read). It isn't about someone getting murdered and Miss Marple figuring things out and telling the police who did it. The murder doesn't happen until almost the end, you realise quite early on more or less what is actually happening (not the details but the gist of it) and the majority of the sleuthing is done by an actual police officer!

This didn't cover any bingo squares for me but fits the category "Hades".

Fables Vol. 2: Animal Farm by Bill Willingham

I love Fables and I can't work out why I haven't finished this one sooner. I started on it right after I read volume 1 but stopped about a third of the way through. I'm glad I picked it up again and finished it.
The minds of the people behind these stories are great - there's really not much more I can say about it. The first book was great and this one too, I know there are less stellar works further along in the series but so far I'm enjoying it greatly.

This fits the category "Artemis" and covers the bingo square "Read a book based on a fairy tale or a myth".

Fables, Vol. 3: Storybook Love by Bill Willingham

Yet another great installment. I love the detail that goes into these stories, and the nods to various stories even when they're not part of the main plot. This one has a bit more blood and gore than I recall from the first two (there was gore in the second volume too, but there are pages coloured red in this one), though it's not too much, I don't think.

This fits the category "Artemis" and covers the bingo square "Read a book with a mythical creature".

I always used to add pictures with my book "reviews" in the thread - don't know why I haven't done it this year. It's looking a bit grey and boring here without them so I think I'll add them in one of these days. Possibly tomorrow but we'll see if there's time.

Double Sin and Other Stories by Agatha Christie

I read this one really fast on the train down south. It's a collection of shorts and while some are less than stellar (the one about the medium) some were really great and on the whole, I enjoyed the read. Both Poirot and Miss Marple show up and while I usually have no favourite of the two, the Poirot stories in this one were better, I think.

This doesn't cover any bingo squares but fits into the category "Hades".

I've been absent lately but I have good reason. I was away on holiday from last Thursday until today (I am very tired right now) and the week preceding that I was very busy preparing everything about the trip, which was rather stressful. My feet are full of blisters from all the walking I did but I had a lovely time and that's what matters.

Managing blisters and lovely time : that's true wisdom. I hope you'll have time to relax - with a book.

>80 h-mb: No pain, no gain! And my feet are feeling a lot better now that I've taken care of the blisters and rested a little. I do have the weekend off but then it's back to work (NO!!! I don't want to!) so not much resting for me. But I will have time to read a little.

Smiley's People by John le Carré

I don't think i'm smart enought for these books, or at least not attentive enough. I missed a ton of small details that later proved to be important and forgot a ton of others. There's just too much for me to keep track of, which is a shame because the books are good, if you can really stick with them. I particularly like Smiley himself (who I now can't imagine any other way than as Gary Oldman) - he's a phenomenal character. I had a hunch about the ending and was very proud of myself when I turned out to be right.

This fits into the category "Athena" and covers the bingo square "Read a book with correspondence or letters".

Are there any poetry lovers here?

My bookshelves are severely lacking in poetry so I've been browsing the poetry sections of my go-to online bookshops but I seem to have a bit of a brain freeze coming up with ideas of poets to look for. I like poetry, even though I don't read poems very often (that probably has something to do with the fact that I barely have any poetry books at home...)
I generally prefer older, rhyming poems to more modern stuff but I'm not an absolutist.

So far my embarrassingly short list of names includes:

Byron, Shelley (Percy) and Keats - the "trio of lyrical treats", as the wonderful Dorothy Parker put it
Dorothy Parker herself
Sara Teasdale
William Blake
Wordsworth & Coleridge

And that's all my poor mind can conjure up at the moment. I DID say it was embarrassingly short.

Not a big poetry lover myself, although I do appreciate what I do like.

Names that popped into my head are Alfred Lord Tennyson (Charge of the Light Brigade being one of my favorite poems due to the passionate reading my German teacher (who taught us a lot, sometimes even German), gave it one day in class.

Then I can think of Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson.

My aunt gave me a book once by James Kavanaugh called Laughing Down Lonely Canyons which I loved.

Oh, &€#&! I can't believe I forgot Tennyson. I'm going to go hide in shame now.
And Dickinson, of course.

Thank you.

>85 PawsforThought: LOL! You do realize that every time I think "Oh, I love that poem" I have to go look up who wrote it.

Where you hiding? I gotta come too!

D H Lawrence of course.

>86 avidmom: Haha! I'm like that a lot of the time too. Or at least "Oh, yeah, I know this poem. Who's it by again?" We never did the whole "memorizing poetry" thing in school. In fact, we barely talked about poetry at all, that's something I've had to investigate and learn about myself.

I am hiding under the covers in my bed. Gotta be comfortable when hiding.

I'm not a great fan of poetry, and I'm certainly no expert. We studied the war poets at school, so maybe I like those as I think I understand them a bit. Dulce et decorum est I did have to learn by heart and still can recite... some things do stay with you.
The other sort of poetry I'd read willingly is modern language versions of middle ages oral tradition poetry, the alliterative verse form. I greatly enjoyed Seamus Heaney's "Beowulf" and Simon Armitage's "Gawain and the green knight" and "The death of King Arthur". They take a bit of getting used to, as it is not a rhyming poetry style, it's an alliterative one, and depends on stressed syllables and repeated sounds forms. I find myself reading them aloud to myself, as they work better in that form.

>89 Helenliz: Oooh, great idea. We did read some of The Iliad and bits of Beowulf (which I read myself last year), the Song of Roland and the Niebelungenlied.
I've never read the Arthurian myths in poetry form, only prose.

Thanks for the tips! You absolutely don't have to "be on the know" or whatever to give tips on poets. I'm certainly no expert on poetry. I just need people to name names because my brain seems to be on permanent vacation and refuses to do it.

I agree with >89 Helenliz: that the World War One poets are phenomenal, especially Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon. Shakespeare's Sonnets are rather good :) A few years back two LTers had a "tutored read" of them that was fascinating. The first thread is here: http://www.librarything.com/topic/134269

If you like the late Romantics (Shelley, Byron, Keats), give the early Romantics a try too - Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Blake. For Victorians, beside Tennyson I'm partial to both Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Getting a bit more modern is Christina Rosetti and W.B. Yeats., and Robert Frost, though they are much more traditional and accessible than say Ezra Pound, e.e. cummings, or T.S. Eliot (who I know is a genius and people worship, but I personally hate).

I'm going to put in a plug for two of my favs, Dylan Thomas and Langston Hughes, and for some Canadian Poets too: D.C. Scott, E. Pauline Johnson, Charles G.D. Roberts, F.R. Scott, P.K. Page, Earle Burney, and Al Purdy. Two of my favourite Canadian novelists, Margaret Atwood and Michael Ondaatje, also write gorgeous poetry. I should note that the last half-dozen or so names are more modern and less rigid with their structures and use of rhyme schemes.

I'm not a huge poetry reader anymore, but I have an English Literature degree, so for a few years I read a LOT of poetry! As you delve further into this vast world of words you might find that you prefer some periods over others. I've only really listed major names, so if you find, for example, that you love the six major Romantic poets, let me know and I can give you some lesser known names from the same time period to check out too.

Sorry if this list is too long and overwhelming! I think I got a bit carried away....

>91 Cait86: I love Shakespeare but I'm not planning on getting his sonnets just yet because I want to get the collected works and I can't find any in hardback at the moment.
I did list the early Romantics, all three that you mentioned! ;)
Browning, of course!

I did English (language, not literature, though there was quite a bit of lit in there) at uni, which is were most of my knowledge of Byron and Keats comes from. The two of them, Wordsworth and Shakespeare made up the majority of the poetry we studied.

And it's not overwhelming at all. I'm familiar with nearly all the names (not the modern Canadian ones other than Ondaatje and Atwood, though I'm only aware of their novels) and getting lots of names is what I was after. As I mentioned, it's not a matter of me *learning* about poetry, it's just to jog my memory which seems to have gone on holiday.
Thanks for the suggstions!

>92 PawsforThought: Oops! I swear I read your initial post and yet I still missed some of the names you listed! Too early in the morning I guess ;) My apologies! Enjoy your poetry reading!

>93 Cait86: No worries! Thanks anyway.

Here's a link to a PPT I made for my poetry class covering the major poetic movements in English and American poetry: http://faculty.scf.edu/jonesj/JanesPPT/LIT%202030/MajorPoeticMovements.pptx . It's still on the web, but I don't know how long it will stay there as I have retired.

Oooh, cool. Thanks!

Also, Jane, as you're an expert on the subject, do you have any particular favourite eras/movements/poets/whatever? Or is there something or someone that often gets overlooked or forgotten?

I'm a big fan of H.D. (Hilda Doolittle), Elizabeth Bishop, Adrienne Rich and Anne Carson lately -- also love William Blake, Whitman, Dickinson, Wallace Stevens and William Carlos Williams and, of course, Shakespeare's sonnets.

Several new names there. Thanks for the tips (the PPT is great, I'm going to go through it more thoroughly when I have a bit more time and am not about to fall asleep at the computer screen).

I wish more hardbacks were printed with covers as nice as the paperback editions. So many more nice paperback covers than hardback dittos. And I can't stand paperbacks.
If these Bulgakovs were available in hardbacks (with these covers) I'd buy the lot, immediately. But alas!

Beautiful covers! Are these US or UK editions? I have to admit I have a very poor opinion of American book covers.

>10 PawsforThought: Eh, I don't know. I saw them at Bookdepository which is a UK site, but they have international editions as well so... The publisher's called Alma classics, I think.

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James

I read this a few days ago - I had to analyze it for coursework so I didn't really have a choice. I'm not sure what I think about it; it's rather strange. I think I liked the story itself well enough (especially the very typically Gothic ghost story beginning) but the writing wasn't quite my thing. And it ended very strangely. I've only read James once before (that was also a short work) and I had similar feeling towards that one so I'm not sure how I feel about reading any more by him.

This fits into the category "Zeus" and the bingo square "Read a CAT" (I was intending to take part in the HoororKIT but life got in the way).

Hah! Alma Classics is a publisher based in London.

I haven't read The Turn of the Screw yet but I intend to, some day.

>104 FlorenceArt: Well, there we go. UK editions it is, then.

And that's kind of how I've always felt about Henry James. "Someday".

Enjoying the poetry talk, which I just caught (loved that PowerPoint, Jane, in >95 janeajones:)

James is someday for me too, although I like to think I mean it optimistically.

>106 dchaikin: I'm more of wary than optimistic when it comes to my "Henry, someday". I wish I could be optimistic about it/him but two reads that have been underwhelming or difficult doesn't make me very optimistic, I'm afraid.

Today was my thingaversary. 3 years, so that'll be four books for the thingaversary and a couple more as a late birthday present for myself.
Anyone have any tips?

Happy Thingaversary!

Tips? As in what books to put on your list?

Hmm...

How about As You Wish: The Inconceivable Tales from the Making of the Princess Bride by Cary Elwes
I haven't read it yet, but I have seen really good reviews of it here on LT.

>109 avidmom: I've already got that one! Couldn't help myself, I just had to get it. Haven't read it yet, though. Thanks anyway.

>110 PawsforThought: Ha! It was on my mind because I saw it at the store Friday and thought, "oh, I want that!" There is a new book making its rounds on LT that sounds wonderful titled The Little Paris Bookshop.

Happy thingaversary! Have you decided on purchases? Any specific kinds of books you're looking for?

>112 ljbwell: Thank you! No, not decided yet. Knowing me, it'll probably be Christmas by the time I actually buy anything. Not really looking for any particular kind of book. Just hardcovers with pretty covers. I've been looking for nice editions of some of the classics but there doesn't seem to be very many around.

A Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin

Finally.
I love these books so I don't know why it's taken me so long to finish this one, or rather, why I've kept putting off finishing it. It's great to be able to read a novel where you really don't know what's going to happen. A lot of the time, especially with fantasy novels, you know roughly how it's going to end but not with this.

This fits into the category "Hermes" and the bingo square "Read a book where an animal is of importance".

Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh

Audiobook read by Jeremy Irons, and I doubt anyone could ever do it remotely as well as he did. Wonderful reading.
I loved the first part of the book, when Sebastian was there and the relationship between him and Charles. Was bored to tears by the second half with Julia - such a dreary character.
Also didn't feel as if the book had a proper ending, which is obviously how life actually works, but it felt very unsatisfying in a novel.

This fits into the category "Zeus" but not into any of the bingo squares.