Newsreels:
- Much more coverage than is really necessary of Oscar Pistorius
- Catholic church keeps resigning
- Daniel Day-Lewis is awesome and of course anybody who watched Lincoln knows this
- Horsemeat takes over the world
- Egyptian balloon crash
- I break a finger by doing absolutely nothing
- I cried like a baby at Cloud Atlas
"Check out Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell"
I asked, about a year ago, a question relating to a book I'm writing. This was an answer to the question.
The book in question has more or less taken over my life, as my fortnightly round-up evidences. When I saw Cloud Atlas last Saturday, I spent most of the credits sat in my seat, sobbing. But when the guy who had sat in front of me saw the exact same film as me, he spent most of the credits walking out of the cinema, shortly after saying "Don't know what that was all about".
To put it simply, he didn't pick up on the main themes of the novel/film, which were about the way we are all connected. He would have probably had an easier time had he instead watched An Inspector Calls, which has the incredibly easy to interpret* speech from the Inspector, which goes as follows:
"But just remember this. One Eva Smith has gone - but there are millions and millions and millions of Eva Smiths and John Smiths still left with us, with their lives, their hopes and fears, their suffering and chance of happiness, all intertwined with our lives, and what we think and say and do. We don't live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other. And I tell you that the time will soon come when, if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish. Good night."
Naturally, he didn't talk in bold, although that would be awesome. The play itself is a message about being responsible for one another, and the way in which we are connected. That theme is relatively obvious, but what might be less obvious is the way in which this is an anti-capitalism play, and each of the characters either represent one of the Seven Deadly Sins or an ill of society (and in most cases - both).
I define a truly excellent novel as one with themes. One that presents you with a story, and gives you so much more underneath it. And more often than not, the enjoyment of a novel (As I discovered when reading Never Let You Go by Kazuo Ishiguro) hangs on the understanding of not just what's happening, but what the author is trying to tell you through the medium of themes, carefully laid in the novel.
Sometimes, it's not about was has been said, but what hasn't.
*Although that's coming from me, and I'm doing AIC in an English Literature course
- Much more coverage than is really necessary of Oscar Pistorius
- Catholic church keeps resigning
- Daniel Day-Lewis is awesome and of course anybody who watched Lincoln knows this
- Horsemeat takes over the world
- Egyptian balloon crash
- I break a finger by doing absolutely nothing
- I cried like a baby at Cloud Atlas
"Check out Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell"
I asked, about a year ago, a question relating to a book I'm writing. This was an answer to the question.
The book in question has more or less taken over my life, as my fortnightly round-up evidences. When I saw Cloud Atlas last Saturday, I spent most of the credits sat in my seat, sobbing. But when the guy who had sat in front of me saw the exact same film as me, he spent most of the credits walking out of the cinema, shortly after saying "Don't know what that was all about".
To put it simply, he didn't pick up on the main themes of the novel/film, which were about the way we are all connected. He would have probably had an easier time had he instead watched An Inspector Calls, which has the incredibly easy to interpret* speech from the Inspector, which goes as follows:
"But just remember this. One Eva Smith has gone - but there are millions and millions and millions of Eva Smiths and John Smiths still left with us, with their lives, their hopes and fears, their suffering and chance of happiness, all intertwined with our lives, and what we think and say and do. We don't live alone. We are members of one body. We are responsible for each other. And I tell you that the time will soon come when, if men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish. Good night."
Naturally, he didn't talk in bold, although that would be awesome. The play itself is a message about being responsible for one another, and the way in which we are connected. That theme is relatively obvious, but what might be less obvious is the way in which this is an anti-capitalism play, and each of the characters either represent one of the Seven Deadly Sins or an ill of society (and in most cases - both).
I define a truly excellent novel as one with themes. One that presents you with a story, and gives you so much more underneath it. And more often than not, the enjoyment of a novel (As I discovered when reading Never Let You Go by Kazuo Ishiguro) hangs on the understanding of not just what's happening, but what the author is trying to tell you through the medium of themes, carefully laid in the novel.
Sometimes, it's not about was has been said, but what hasn't.
*Although that's coming from me, and I'm doing AIC in an English Literature course
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