Literary analysis has no off button
Aug. 11th, 2009 10:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolorosa_12Following through with my Michael Ende kick, I read The Neverending Story. (You might be surprised that I hadn't read it before now, but my childhood reading was very, very Australian.) I was considering posting a review-type post over on Wordpress, but my thoughts were too incoherent and scattered to really do the book justice.
However, while I was reading, something odd struck me. A few days ago, I'd been having a conversation in #btts about Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and made a throwaway remark along the lines of 'Sorry I can't switch off the literary analysis. I'm such a literature student, it's wired in me.' One of my friends said, 'Well, that's excellent that your studies *encourage* your literary analysis impulses. When I was a student, I couldn't bear to think about books that way.'
I thought I was exaggerating. Then I looked at my notebook (well, two small squares of my journal), which, by the end of the three hours it took for me to read The Neverending Story, were filled with tiny, cramped writing in green pen. Clearly, the urge to analyse texts is inescapable for me.
So, I thought I'd treat you to the raw product - what my mind spews out as I'm reading a new book. It's probably gibberish. Oh well, I'll put it behind a cut. Also, I should warn that there are spoilers.
(Direct quotes in bold. My notes in regular type.)
'I wonder what's in a book when it's closed. Oh, I know it's full of letters printed on paper, but all the same, something must be happening.'
Childlike Empress=Earth? Life? Thought? Imagination. In any case, she's an anthropomorphic personification.
She needs a new name! :)
'Only the right name gives beings and things their reality. A wrong name makes everything unreal. That's what lies do.'
C.E.=LIFE. Confirmed by Old Man of Wandering Mountain.
And Shakespeare visited, of course.
C.E. and Old Man=Huginn and Muninn? B. even calls her 'Moon Child', which evokes Muninn in sound at least. And Thought does eat Memory.
Saving the Otherworld=saving the 'real' world because both need one another. cf Sophie Masson.
Dame Eyola---->Triple Goddess ie Woman as Change.
'Every real story is a Neverending Story. [...] There are many doors to Fantastica. [...] There are other such magic books. A lot of people read them without noticing. It all depends on who gets his hands on such books.'
However, while I was reading, something odd struck me. A few days ago, I'd been having a conversation in #btts about Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and made a throwaway remark along the lines of 'Sorry I can't switch off the literary analysis. I'm such a literature student, it's wired in me.' One of my friends said, 'Well, that's excellent that your studies *encourage* your literary analysis impulses. When I was a student, I couldn't bear to think about books that way.'
I thought I was exaggerating. Then I looked at my notebook (well, two small squares of my journal), which, by the end of the three hours it took for me to read The Neverending Story, were filled with tiny, cramped writing in green pen. Clearly, the urge to analyse texts is inescapable for me.
So, I thought I'd treat you to the raw product - what my mind spews out as I'm reading a new book. It's probably gibberish. Oh well, I'll put it behind a cut. Also, I should warn that there are spoilers.
(Direct quotes in bold. My notes in regular type.)
'I wonder what's in a book when it's closed. Oh, I know it's full of letters printed on paper, but all the same, something must be happening.'
Childlike Empress=Earth? Life? Thought? Imagination. In any case, she's an anthropomorphic personification.
She needs a new name! :)
'Only the right name gives beings and things their reality. A wrong name makes everything unreal. That's what lies do.'
C.E.=LIFE. Confirmed by Old Man of Wandering Mountain.
And Shakespeare visited, of course.
C.E. and Old Man=Huginn and Muninn? B. even calls her 'Moon Child', which evokes Muninn in sound at least. And Thought does eat Memory.
Saving the Otherworld=saving the 'real' world because both need one another. cf Sophie Masson.
Dame Eyola---->Triple Goddess ie Woman as Change.
'Every real story is a Neverending Story. [...] There are many doors to Fantastica. [...] There are other such magic books. A lot of people read them without noticing. It all depends on who gets his hands on such books.'
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-08-12 01:23 pm (UTC)You say your childhood reading was Australian - what are some of the authors that figured? Any pre-90s ones? I'm curious - while I did read some Australian books they definitely didn't dominate.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-14 06:06 pm (UTC)In terms of 'Australian' childhood reading, it was mostly stuff from the 90s, and the 80s (when authors, whom I discovered in the 90s, had been writing for a while). The first 'chapter book' I read was Rain Stones by Jackie French (which is actually a book of short stories) and I adored all of Jackie French's other books. Other favourites included Robin Klein (at one point I could recite Hating Alison Ashley off by heart, and corrected my teacher when she skipped over bits in class! I also adored Victor Kelleher, Isobelle Carmody, Gillian Rubinstein, John Marsden, Ruth Manley, Christobel Mattingley, Catherine Jinks (I know all the 'Pagan' books off by heart) and...umm, it's hard to remember the rest. These were certainly the ones that left the strongest impression on me.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-14 11:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-13 11:38 am (UTC)But surely you read the LM Montgomery Anne or Emily series (I think you'd like Emily - she's also a writer) or the Enid Blytons? And the Louisa May Alcott (Little Women) books (not just the little women series, she also wrote a lot of short stories)!
Of course there are some great Aussie authors. Did you read 7 little Australians? I don't know if we discussed as far back as children's books, besides your love for Philip Pullman (upon which we didn't agree) and some of the crap books you reviewed.
Those books of your childhood stick with you forever. While most other books are fleeting and of the moment, the ones I read when I was young that touched me in some way, I still remember.
I even bought a Judy Blume awhile ago (Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself) because I needed to re-read some of it.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-14 06:12 pm (UTC)I've never read any of the L.M. Montgomery books, and it's a great gap in my childhood reading. You can see from the list above that I wrote in response to