Sense & Sensibility

I'm pleased to say I am almost finished with the first of three parts. I honestly didn't know the book was split up but when I flipped to the end to see how many chapters there were, the last chapter was like, 12 or something and I was on chapter 11 ... that's like a 200 page chapter? Then I realized the section breaks.



A picture of my $2.50 book. =)



Anyway, I'm getting there! Slowly but surely! I grabbed a copy at Half Price Books the other day and have been reading in bed, reading on the couch, reading while tanning in the backyard ... the language is dense and sometimes she (Jane) tends to go off on Dickensonian rambles about what someone thought someone else said (or wore, or the shabbiness of their carriage! lol) but they really didn't say it they just heard someone else say it and were talking about it themselves and were confused ... ??? Yeah. I'm getting there. ;)

Offices of Note (or: An Ode To Books)

I have always had a soft spot for a really great office. Nothing modern and stark though or too 'cookie-cutter'; I prefer vintage offices with walls of bookshelves, revealed brickwork and lots of windows (If you've seen 'Stranger than Fiction', I want the office where the character played by Dustin Hoffman works).

There is something about vintage, academic-looking offices that appeals to me: like the professor's office from the 70's with entirely too many resource books piled messily on shelves and then stacked on the floor once the shelves are crammed full; a paper-smattered desk with a few cold coffee mugs and a couch and lamps casting a yellow glow ... comfortable and haphazard.

Also, there is something lovely and artistic and relaxed about books themselves - heaps of them - just sitting around the office or the bedroom, waiting to be read or reread. I guess it's just the nature of books -  thoughtful, educational, intuitive? - that lends a smart but candid air to any room where they sit randomly stacked upon each other in colorful, dusty towers. They are a design element in themselves - all the paper and cardboard and glue and dust jackets eclectically mingled with completely unmatching neighbors. Joan Didion, Jane Austen and a study of Christian end-times theology, making friends in a corner.

In an age of progressively less and less paper and more and more technology and apps and touch screens, there is something wonderfully librarian and tangible about scratchy pages and dark black ink that you can see and smell and touch in your own hands ... don't you think?

Jane Austen Confessions

I have a confession to make.
This is very bad.
I don't think I've ever really acknowledged it.

I haven't read any of Jane Austen's books. 

The stigma, of course, being that I have seen every book-turned-movie and nearly every version -- all 7 novels! American and BBC versions! -- some of them many times over and yet ... I haven't read the books that inspired them.

I grew up quoting this (oh, and recreating the dances with a group of friends like the huge nerd I was):

Then I converted to this version in 2006 (yes, there is a great debate apparently as to which version is the 'best') despite my best efforts at NOT liking it (gotta say I have not been a Keira Knightley fan):

I remember seeing this in theatres and then buying and watching it like a hundred times:

I remember LOVING this movie so much (still do) that I asked for and got the soundtrack for my (I think) 10th birthday. Yeah. nerd.

I remember seeing this lovely film and feeling so sorry for poor Anne and Wentworth and their embattled romance:

This is really, very awful. I resolved just this afternoon to set it right. I must read all of her books. I just ... have to. Actually I want to; surely it won't be a painful endeavor. I have simply told myself that it's something I must do to balance the scales.

I have read the 'Lord of the Rings' triology; heck I even read 'The Silmarillion' in all it's verbosity. I've completely earned all the 'Jane Eyre' films I've seen over the years (this topic calls for its own blog post!); I must have read that book 20 times (it is my favorite after all). I even did a character presentation about Jane Austen in costume AND British accent in middle school. Still haven't read her books. *slaps wrist*

I will read all seven of Jane Austen's novels before the end of the year.

I think I'll read them chronologically which, according to some moderate research on this website, means I'll be reading 'Sense and Sensibility' first.

That is my Four-Months-Into-The-New-Year Resolution.