Monday, October 08, 2012

Happy Monday

It's a good day today because:

a) the kids are back at school and I have the house to myself

b) I just bought the following:


I know, I know. It's been out for a while. I've always been a later developer.

And this:






And then this:



My plan is to read the bio, then Infinite Jest but I suspect I will have to intersperse with at least one other book, possibly the Pamuk although I think I'll want to read that exclusively.

I'm also more than half way through The Watch Tower by Elizabeth Harrower. It is interesting, not least because it was published in 1966 I think it was. Good stuff.

*

I'm also still plugging away with my first ms - let's call it The Feeling of Orange although it's had a bunch of other titles, including Moonshadows (there's something just a little too Cat Stevens-y about that.) I have an agent interested in looking at the whole ms - woo hoo. But don't get too excited, even that woo-hoo is possibly premature. I am so careful with the woo-hoos, they can be dangerous. 

And my second one, The Sugar Men I am excited about, that's still first draft stage though (some people call it Draft Zero, which I can kind of come at). Loooong way to go with that one based on how much revision and pottering and tinkering the first one has taken. Who knows?





3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's great news about your ms. One step at a time I guess...Looking forward to hearing the progress on it all.
I'm really keen to hear about your experience with Wallace. It's a brick of a book. I like your approach with reading the bio too.
I want to read Jeannette Winterson - Read her debut fiction (and practically autobiographical) 'Oranges are not the only fruit' and then her current memoir 'Why be happy when you could be normal?' purely because I LOVE that title.

Melba said...

Hi ifnotread, thanks again for your comment. I popped over to your blog, seems you are doing some interesting reading as well.

Am up to p120 of the DFW biography and it is fucking amazing. I am taking notes - the literary theory and critical stuff is soooo interesting and useful. It is validating too, because sometimes I feel that people don't get my stuff. A lot of people didn't get his stuff either, but of course I'm not a genius like he was. I suspect the bio will be more readable than Infinite Jest, but we shall see.

One really interesting thing is the influence that John Irving might have had on Wallace's writing. If I had to choose the book that first (maybe second, Wuthering Heights would be the first) impressed me majorly, that made me laugh and be blown away by how fiction could just cover everything possible in the world, it was Garp. It was so exciting discovering Irving, reading Garp, and his other early stuff. Invigorating. Unfortunately, like many writers who have long writing lives, he became bloated with self indulgence and a parody of himself.

I remember reading Oranges, but can't remember much of it other than I liked it a lot. I will revisit, and yes, her current memoir - fabulous title. Might consider that next after the next few DFW months. (I'm also reading articles about him online - we are lucky to have access to such material. In the old days.... well. Completely different.)

emoosh said...



شركة كيان لنقل العفش بالرياض والمدينة المنورة وجدة ومكة والطائف والدمام تقديم لكم دليل كامل لشركات نقل العفش بالمملكة العربية السعودية
نقل عفش شركة كيان
دليل شركات نقل العفش
شركة نقل عفش بالمدينة المنورة
شركة نقل اثاث بالرياض
شركة نقل عفش بجدة
شركة نقل عفش بمكة
شركة نقل عفش بالطائف