"Few documents portray the ethnicity of the Moors in medieval Europe with more passion, boldness and clarity than the epic of Morien...He first challenges, then battles, and finally wins the unqualified respect and admiration of Sir Lancelot...Ultimately, and ironically, Sir Morien came to personify all of the finest virtues of the knights of the European Middle Ages." - from "Nature Knows No Color-Line" , By J.A. Rogers
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Saturday, 18 February 2012
Thursday, 16 February 2012
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
"It is computed that eleven thousand persons have at several times suffered death rather than submit to break their eggs at the smaller end [...] Neither are any wars so furious and bloody, or of so long continuance a those occasioned by difference in opinion, especially if it be in things indifferent."— Musings upon the Big/Little end heresy, Gulliver's Travels
"One of the precursors of Speculative Fiction, [Gulliver's Travels], was written by Jonathan Swift as a parody of the now-dead genre of traveller's tale, satirising 18th century follies, but is now, sadly, largely remembered as a children's tale, despite being Swift'sMagnum Opus and a heavily satirical and adult book."- Tv Tropes
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"One of the precursors of Speculative Fiction, [Gulliver's Travels], was written by Jonathan Swift as a parody of the now-dead genre of traveller's tale, satirising 18th century follies, but is now, sadly, largely remembered as a children's tale, despite being Swift'sMagnum Opus and a heavily satirical and adult book."- Tv Tropes
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Wednesday, 15 February 2012
Pelle the Conqueror by Martin Andersen Nexø
"The great charm of the book seems to me to lie in the fact that the writer knows the poor from within; he has not studied them as an outsider may, but has lived with them and felt with them, at once a participant and a keen-eyed spectator... His sympathy is of the widest, and he makes us see tragedies behind the little comedies, and comedies behind the little tragedies, of the seemingly sordid lives of the working people whom he loves." - Otto Jespersen, Introductory note to English translation (1913)
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Tuesday, 14 February 2012
A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
"If nature has made you for a giver, your hands are born open, and so is your heart; and though there may be times when your hands are empty, your heart is always full."
"The word PRINCESS doesn't mean what it used to and I want to reclaim the meaning of this word from the pink swathed, tiara wearing, big eyed, marketing manufactured princesses now captivating the minds of most little girls under the age of eight."- books4yourkids review
"I loved it because at its heart this is a story about one of my very favourite themes: the power of stories and the imagination. It’s a story about how they help make us more compassionate by stepping into the shoes of fictional others, how they save us, how they can be a refuge, and how they give us hope." - Things Mean a Lot review
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"The word PRINCESS doesn't mean what it used to and I want to reclaim the meaning of this word from the pink swathed, tiara wearing, big eyed, marketing manufactured princesses now captivating the minds of most little girls under the age of eight."- books4yourkids review
"I loved it because at its heart this is a story about one of my very favourite themes: the power of stories and the imagination. It’s a story about how they help make us more compassionate by stepping into the shoes of fictional others, how they save us, how they can be a refuge, and how they give us hope." - Things Mean a Lot review
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Monday, 13 February 2012
Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral by Phillis Wheatley
To a LADY on her remarkable Preservation
in an Hurricane in North-Carolina.
THOUGH thou did'st hear the tempest from afar,
And felt'st the horrors of the wat'ry war,
To me unknown, yet on this peaceful shore
Methinks I hear the storm tumultuous roar,
And how stern Boreas with impetuous hand
Compell'd the Nereids to usurp the land.
Reluctant rose the daughters of the main,
And slow ascending glided o'er the plain,
Till AEolus in his rapid chariot drove
In gloomy grandeur from the vault above:
Furious he comes. His winged sons obey
Their frantic sire, and madden all the sea.
The billows rave, the wind's fierce tyrant roars,
And with his thund'ring terrors shakes the shores:
Broken by waves the vessel's frame is rent,
And strows with planks the wat'ry element.
But thee, Maria, a kind Nereid's shield
Preserv'd from sinking, and thy form upheld:
And sure some heav'nly oracle design'd
At that dread crisis to instruct thy mind
Things of eternal consequence to weigh,
And to thine heart just feelings to convey
Of things above, and of the future doom,
And what the births of the dread world to come.
From tossing seas I welcome thee to land.
"Resign her, Nereid," 'twas thy God's command.
Thy spouse late buried, as thy fears conceiv'd,
Again returns, thy fears are all reliev'd:
Thy daughter blooming with superior grace
Again thou see'st, again thine arms embrace;
O come, and joyful show thy spouse his heir,
And what the blessings of maternal care!
Biography of Phillis Wheatly
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in an Hurricane in North-Carolina.
THOUGH thou did'st hear the tempest from afar,
And felt'st the horrors of the wat'ry war,
To me unknown, yet on this peaceful shore
Methinks I hear the storm tumultuous roar,
And how stern Boreas with impetuous hand
Compell'd the Nereids to usurp the land.
Reluctant rose the daughters of the main,
And slow ascending glided o'er the plain,
Till AEolus in his rapid chariot drove
In gloomy grandeur from the vault above:
Furious he comes. His winged sons obey
Their frantic sire, and madden all the sea.
The billows rave, the wind's fierce tyrant roars,
And with his thund'ring terrors shakes the shores:
Broken by waves the vessel's frame is rent,
And strows with planks the wat'ry element.
But thee, Maria, a kind Nereid's shield
Preserv'd from sinking, and thy form upheld:
And sure some heav'nly oracle design'd
At that dread crisis to instruct thy mind
Things of eternal consequence to weigh,
And to thine heart just feelings to convey
Of things above, and of the future doom,
And what the births of the dread world to come.
From tossing seas I welcome thee to land.
"Resign her, Nereid," 'twas thy God's command.
Thy spouse late buried, as thy fears conceiv'd,
Again returns, thy fears are all reliev'd:
Thy daughter blooming with superior grace
Again thou see'st, again thine arms embrace;
O come, and joyful show thy spouse his heir,
And what the blessings of maternal care!
Biography of Phillis Wheatly
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Monday, 6 February 2012
The Way of an Eagle by Ethel M. Dell
"And, sure, it’s not feminist literature or anything, but I found it charming, in a disturbing kind of way, and I’m sorry I put it off for so long. Yes, there’s a helpless, slightly dithery young woman, but she’s only helpless and dithery in fairly trying situations. Other times, she likes to play hockey. And yes, the hero is powerful and commanding and all that, but he also looks like a monkey and is slightly insane (Dell repeatedly describes him as looking like a monkey. The insanity I figured out on my own.)" - Redeeming Qualities review
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Sunday, 5 February 2012
Jennie Gerhardt by Theodore Dreiser
The novel is referenced by Harvey Pekar in the film American Splendor (2003).
"In a 1911 review, H. L. Mencken wrote, "Jennie Gerhardt is the best American novel I have ever read, with the lonesome but Himalayan exception of Huckleberry Finn." Beautiful, vital, generous, but morally naïve and unconscious of social conventions, Jennie is a working-class woman who emerges superior to the succession of men who exploit her. There are no villains in this novel; in Dreiser's view, everyone is victimized by the desires that the world excites but can never satisfy." - The Library of America
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"In a 1911 review, H. L. Mencken wrote, "Jennie Gerhardt is the best American novel I have ever read, with the lonesome but Himalayan exception of Huckleberry Finn." Beautiful, vital, generous, but morally naïve and unconscious of social conventions, Jennie is a working-class woman who emerges superior to the succession of men who exploit her. There are no villains in this novel; in Dreiser's view, everyone is victimized by the desires that the world excites but can never satisfy." - The Library of America
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Friday, 3 February 2012
Dubliners by James Joyce
Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves...His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.
- "The Dead"
"Mostly it's what it says on the tin, it's about Dubliners, people who live in Dublin, many different sorts of people... It certainly does not feel nearly a hundred years old; any of these stories could appear in a modern literary magazine tomorrow and not appear dated. That is rare." Rush-That-Speaks
"And Joyce is excellent at fulfilling those expectations: he gives us the truth of things, and much more than that, beautiful things for us to look at." - about.com
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- "The Dead"
"Mostly it's what it says on the tin, it's about Dubliners, people who live in Dublin, many different sorts of people... It certainly does not feel nearly a hundred years old; any of these stories could appear in a modern literary magazine tomorrow and not appear dated. That is rare." Rush-That-Speaks
"And Joyce is excellent at fulfilling those expectations: he gives us the truth of things, and much more than that, beautiful things for us to look at." - about.com
Read It!
Audio Book
Thursday, 2 February 2012
Class War? What Americans Really Think about Economic Inequality by Benjamin I. Page and Lawrence R. Jacobs.
University of Chicago Press Free eBook of the Month
"Class War? is the right question, and Page and Jacobs provide the right answer: Americans are more concerned about inequality and less divided over what should be done about it than the pundits presume. Everyone interested in America’s widening income gap—and everyone, including our leaders, should be—needs to read this book."—Jacob S. Hacker
"It should be read, not as a carefully balanced contribution to the literature, but as a polemic, as a challenge, as a call to arms." - John Benson, University of Wolverhampton
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This book is free only until February 29th 2012
"Class War? is the right question, and Page and Jacobs provide the right answer: Americans are more concerned about inequality and less divided over what should be done about it than the pundits presume. Everyone interested in America’s widening income gap—and everyone, including our leaders, should be—needs to read this book."—Jacob S. Hacker
"It should be read, not as a carefully balanced contribution to the literature, but as a polemic, as a challenge, as a call to arms." - John Benson, University of Wolverhampton
Read It!
This book is free only until February 29th 2012
Wednesday, 1 February 2012
A Negro Explorer at the North Pole by Matthew A. Henson
FIRST PANEL: (two explorers, one black, one white, both with parkas and mustaches)
Black Explorer (Matt Henson): Like I said Peary, here it is.
White Explorer (Robert Peary): At last! It's mine!
SECOND PANEL: (we now see that Peary is strapped to a dog sled)
Peary: Now get me out of this sled so that I may be the FIRST to set foot on the NORTH POLE!!
THIRD PANEL:
Henson: Well, I already did, before we drove you here.
Peary: Oh, Henson, you know what I mean.
FOURTH PANEL: (Henson has a serious look on his face)
Heson: Yes, I see
FIFTH PANEL:
Henson: Man, it sure feels nice, being up here on the North Pole.
Peary: Henson let me out of this sled.
SIXTH PANEL:
Henson: Gonna do some squats.
Peary: HENSON
Henson: On the North Pole. Feels good.
SEVENTH PANEL
Henson: Phew! All those squats, they're making me tired! Who's ready to go home?
EIGHTH PANEL: (the dog sled races away. Henson is grinning ear to ear. Peary looks as mad as hell. )] - Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton
"It is always interesting to note that at the very same time that Canadian immigration was insisting black people couldn't handle the cold, a black man was the first non-native person to set foot on the North Pole. This is such a stupid country sometimes." -Kate Beaton
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National Geographic Profile of Matthew A. Henson
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