Prolific Living

classic

Louisa May Alcott: “Little Women”

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Reading Little Women on the iPhone

I did not expect to find so much lasting imagery from Louisa May Alcott’s beautiful “Little Women“:

The sisters writing plays and acting them out loudly up in their attic.
Mother coming home to 4 overjoyed girls who hang on her every word and move.
The sisters packing up their Christmas breakfast – tea and hot water included – and taking it for the desolate family next door.
The Pick Wick Paper, their own creation, newspaper layout complete with advertisements and articles.
Jo writing her novels with a pen and ink, the not-so-long-ago days even before the typewriter and the joys of writing on paper.
Laurie proposing to Jo and his bitter shock when she refuses him.
The rush of grief, emotion and anguish from loss of a sister which compel Jo to write her greatest novel yet.

I have been on a voracious consumption of the classics for over a year now, a journey of [Read more…] about Louisa May Alcott: “Little Women”

Alexandre Dumas: “The Count of Monte Cristo”

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Alexander Duma on the Kindle

Dear Monsieur Dumas,

It is the year 2010 today, nearly 166 years since you published The Count of Monte Cristo. Your contemporaries recognized it as the accomplishment it is, which is the least we can say for the treasures which have come to us from your period. It makes me immensely happy when a society understands a genius masterpiece in all its brilliance during the lifetime of its creator. Still, you would probably like to know that The Count of Monte Cristo, your labor of love and sweat, is cherished and recognized as a magnificent novel in the world to this day. It is even part of the reading requirement in most school education programs, albeit they sadly choose the abridged version much to your (and my) dismay. Not knowing any better when I was much younger, I too read the abridged version, which even in its brevity, left an indelible mark on me and a desire for return for more someday. [Read more…] about Alexandre Dumas: “The Count of Monte Cristo”

Revive your Literary Side

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I have a ritual with my books – first, to come into possession of book (through some generous source as I rarely buy books), read/inhale/digest the book, write a deeply personal blog post on book, keep book on shelf (if I loved it)/donate book to library (if I didn’t love it)/give book away to anyone who would take it (if one of “those books”)! The ritual, however, was more of a love affair with my Anna Karenina gem of a volume. I bought it well over a year ago on a whim and promptly nursed it on a shelf for months. I did not dare open it for fear of not fully appreciating a masterpiece by the Russian novelist Tolstoy until one day in January, I mustered enough courage to read this opening line.

“All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

It took me one instant to fall in love with Tolstoy and one day to fall in love with Anna K. [Read more…] about Revive your Literary Side

Reading Alice in Wonderland on the iPhone

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Have you moved to the world of electronic books yet?

I had been trying in vain. I even bought a Kindle; I have yet to really use it. The thing is, traditional books are a pain to give up. I am addicted to turning the pages, feeling the text, holding the book, marking my place, writing in the margin, and seeing a visual progress from start to finish. As if that is not enough for a permanently happy relationship, I like the absence of technology in a book. These sweet elements add pleasure to my reading experience. A shift into the electronic world, even for an avid consumer of technology such as myself, almost feels like a betrayal to the true essence of books.

Even so, something happened last week quite unexpectedly to change my view point: out of pure curiosity, I installed the Stanza App on my best friend in this world – my genius iPhone! The Stanza App people tell us: [Read more…] about Reading Alice in Wonderland on the iPhone

Leo Tolstoy: “Anna Karenina”

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“All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

With these captivating words, the supreme Russian artist, Leo Tolstoy, opens his magnificent masterpiece, Anna Karenina, and grips at my heart from that first paragraph until the closing words, 963 pages later. It is impossible to express everything I felt and experienced and learned from inhaling every word of Anna Karenina and yet I remain pertinacious to attempt so, a month after its completion. During this time, I have tossed one book after another aside, not because I found them to be in poor taste, only because it has been impossible to reap pleasure from lesser purity, lesser prose, lesser richness, anything lesser than Anna K. Reading Tolstoy is falling in love – with reading, with words, with characters, with thoughts, with dialogues, and with Anna and Tolstoy both – and finishing Anna K is that first love’s broken heart, never again will a novel touch me this profoundly, move me this deeply, and ache me so much. At least, I am sorely convinced as such today.

Reading Anna Karenina near Pacific Ocean

[Read more…] about Leo Tolstoy: “Anna Karenina”

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