Finished: The Aeneid (Virgil). I'm in awe of those ancient writers! To read over 300 pages of the free verse epic poem of the journey of Aeneas and enjoy it just shows how brilliant Virgil was. I'm not really into reading about battles and myths and gods, but Virgil kept me reading with The Aeneid just like Homer kept me reading with The Odyssey. There were probably a few too many repetitive battle scenes, considering the last half of the book was all battle, and...far too many names to keep up with amongst all the slain warriors, but it was still a good read. Let's just say....I'd take the journey of Aeneas any day over the journey of Dean Moriarty. :-)

Here are a few passages I liked. I think I quoted the "Rumor" passage from Ovid too:

Then through the cities wide
Of Lybia, all at once flies Rumor forth,---
Rumor: no evil is more swift than her.
She grows by motion, gathers strength by flight.
Small at first, through fear, soon to the skies
She lifts herself. She walks upon the ground,
And hides her head in clouds. Her parent Earth,
In ire, so they say, at the anger of the gods,
Gave birth to her, her latest progeny,
Sister to Coeus and Enceladus;
With nimble feet, and swift persistent wings,
A monster huge and terrible is she.
As many feathers as her body bears,
So many watchful eyes beneath them lurk,
So many tongues and mouths, and ears erect.
By night between heaven and earth she flies, through shades,
With rushing wings, nor shuts her eyes in sleep.
By day she watches from the roofs or towers;
And the great cities fills with haunting fears;
As prone to crime and falsehood as to truth,
She with her gossip multifold now filled
The people's ears, rejoicing---fiction and fact
Alike proclaiming; now that Aeneas, born
Of Trojan blood, had come, who Dido thought
Worthy her hand in marriage; now that they
Were passing the long winter in delight
Of luxury, unmindful of their realms,
Captive to low desires.

And a short one...after Pallas has valiantly fallen to Turnus' sword, Aeneas sends him home to his father to be buried before he continues on in battle:

The chariots of the hero then are led,
Dashed with Rutulian blood. His war-horse next,
Aethon, his trappings laid aside, moves on,
The big tears coursing down his sorrowing face.
And others bear the helmet and the spear;
For all the rest victorious Turnus held.
Then the sad phalanx comes, the Trojans all,
And Tuscans, and Arcadians, following on
With arms reversed. When all the train had passed
In long array, Aeneas paused, and thus
With a deep groan resumed: "War's direful fates
Now call us hence to other tears than these.
Great Pallas, here I greet you but to leave!
Forever hail! forever fare thee well!"
He said no more, but to camp returned.

Then, finally at the end, Aeneas is about to finally slay Thurnus at the end of the epic battle. Thurnus pleads for his life. Aeneas almost gives in to mercy when he sees that Thurnus was irreverent enough to wear the fallen Pallas' belt in battle. Aeneas finishes the job:

...pity, I beg,
My father Daunus' venerable age;
And me, or if you would rather, send back,
Despoiled of life, my corpse unto my friends.
You have prevailed. The Ausonians have beheld
A vanquished enemy stretch forth his hands.
Lavinia is your bride. Stretch not your hate
Beyond what you have done.
   Stern in his arms
Aeneas stood, and rolled his eyes around,
And his right hand repressed; and more and more
those words began to bend his wavering will;---
When, on the lofty shoulder of his foe
The unlucky belt appeared,---young Pallas' belt
Shone gleaming with its studs he knew so well;
Pallas, whom Turnus overpowered and slew,
And now wore on his shoulders the hostile badge.
He, as his eyes drank in the hateful sight,
Those spoils, memorials of that cruel grief,
Inflamed with fury, terrible in wrath,
"And do you think," he cried, "to escape my hand,
Clothed in the spoils you have snatched from my friend?
It's Pallas, Pallas slays you with this blow,
And takes his vengeance with your accursed blood!"
He spoke, and plunged his sword into his breast.
Relaxed, the limbs lay cold, and, with a groan,
Down to the Shades the soul, indignant, fled.

Finished: On the Road (Kerouac). Ugh...really didn't like this book! I think it's so highly overrated and can't understand WHY it's on so many top lists to read. I have no use for shiftless, goalless, selfish losers like the character around which all the action centers, Dean Moriarty. I just don't see the point in glorifying his lifestyle, or justifying, whatsover, his actions by writing a book about it. I can't imagine why this book is such a big deal. It's the late 1940's. Part-time college boy, Sal, meets aimless wanderer and pontificator, Dean, in New York. Sal and Dean cross the country, speeding, mooching off "friends", doing drugs, having sex with whatever girls they can find, sometimes stealing, always stinking (or so I imagine), and end up in Denver or San Fransisco to continue their lifestyles of debauchery. I say "or" because they do this several times throughout the book. Same old, same old...descriptions of their travels, pages of Dean's reaction to them listening to great jazz bands, etc. Dean has three different wives who he marries, divorces, has kids with, goes back to, leaves again, etc. He always ends up leaving Sal behind somewhere. And Sal, usually having got his life somewhat together when Dean shows up again, always drops everything and follows him. For some reason Sal worships him. I think he's scum. End of story. Kerouac, check.

Finished: The Sea, The Sea (Murdoch). An interesting book! It kept me reading anyway. I must say that I think the main character of the book, Charles Arrowby, is going to go on my Least Favorite Characters list. Not because he's evil or a murderer or anything. Just because he's so darn self-centered and egotistical! Of course, the book is basically a memoir or autobiography written by Charles Arrowby, so it would naturally be pretty self-absorbed. Some of his actions drive me crazy though!

Charles Arrowby is a 60ish successful actor and director who decides to retire from work and social life to a cottage by the sea where he will revel in being alone and writing his memoirs. In this small coastal village or northern England, he miraculously sees his first love, who he has not seen in 40 years, and who broke off their "engagement", shattering his heart. He has never been able to love in all the years since, despite his many relationships. Hartley, the woman, is now a 60ish woman, and much dowdier and aged looking than Charles. Charles becomes obsessed and convinces himself that Hartley is in an undesirable, near-abusive marriage, so he kidnaps her! He's sure that she will still be in love with him, as he is with her, and will run away with him. She is shocked and  unhappy and wants to go home, but he keeps her captive for a few days until friends finally convince him to let her go home. The entire thing is so selfish and egotistical! Plus, the many friends, old and new, who come in and out of the story have been victims of Charles' selfishness in one way or the other, but all still seem to love him. Anyway...there were many sad events and in the end, Charles reflects and decides maybe he wasn't still in love with Hartley after all, but just in love with the memory. A compelling book, but a bit sad as well. Murdoch's descriptions of the sea, though, were so wonderful! I think I appreciated them so much because I knew exactly what she was talking about at times....exactly how it feels to be standing on the beach in chilly Oregon and watching the Pacific waves pound! Here are a few snippets of her writing.

Charles' description of his father was so moving to me:

My father was a quiet bookish man and somehow the gentlest being I have ever encountered. I do not mean he was timid, though I suppose he was timid. He had a positive moral quality of gentleness. I can picture him now so clearly, bending down with his perpetual nervous smile to pick up a spider on a piece of paper and put it carefully out of the window or into some corner of the house where it would not be disturbed. I was his comrade, his reading companion, possibly the only person with whom he ever had a serious conversation. I always felt that we were in the same boat, adventuring along together. We read the same books and discussed them: children's books, adventure stories, then novels, history, biography, poetry, Shakespeare. We enjoyed and craved for each other's company. What a test that is: more than devotion, admiration, passion. If you long and long for someone's company you love them.

Charles' friend is analyzing him. Love this. :-)

   "The trouble with you, Charles, is that basically you despise women, whereas I, in spite of some appearances to the contrary, do not."
   "I don't despise women. I was in love with all Shakespeare's heroines before I was twelve."
   "But they don't exist, dear man, that's the point. They live in the never-never land of art, all tricked out in Shakespeare's wit and wisdom, and mock us from there, filling us with false hopes and empty dreams. The real thing is spite and lies and arguments about money."

Charles thinking back on Hartley after she left him, and his first relationship afterwards with Clement:

And I thought of Hartley on her bicycle and of her pure truthful face as it was then, so strangely like and unlike her worn old face which had suffered and sinned away all those years when I was somewhere else with Clement and Rosina and Jeanne and Fritzie. I had invested so much, as the years went by, in my belief  in Hartley's goodness. Yet had I always cherished this icon? And I recalled now, dredged up out of the deep sea caves of memory, a conversation I had had about her with Clement. Yes, I had told Clement about Hartley. And Clement has said, "Put her away in your old toy cupboard now, my dear boy." My God, I could hear Clement's powerful resonant voice saying those words now, as if she were uttering them in the dark room. And I had put Hartley away, for a time. But I did not forget, and Hartley lay like a seed in my heart, and grew again, purified as of old.

Charles describing what it was like to spend the last month of Clement's life with her, both knowing she was dying any day:

That time of attentive mourning for her death was quite unlike the black blank horror of the thing itself. We had mourned together, trying to soothe each other's pain. But that shared pain was so much less than the torment of her vanishing, the terrible lived time of her eternal absence.

Sadly, how well I know those feelings! I have such admiration for these writers who can put such emotions into words. Five books to go of my top 100 authors. :-)

Finished: The Epic of Gilgamesh (Anonymous). The Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from Mesopotamia, otherwise known as the "cradle of civilization". The work of an anonymous Babylonian poet written over 3700 years ago, it is considered to be one of the oldest surviving pieces of literature. It is organized into tablets, and the version I read had many lines, at times 40 to 60 lines, missing on any one tablet. It made it a little difficult to read, but I kept a couple of sources open and read each tablet's "plot" before I read the actual tablet. It was interesting! I kept seeing references to Gilgamesh, and it's on the All Time Top 100 Books of the world, so I wanted to read it.

It is the tale of the demi-god Gilgamesh, ruler of the town of Uruk. After Gilgamesh becomes very cocky, always challenging the men of Uruk to tasks they can never win, and always "taking" each town bride on her wedding night, before her husband (which was apparently allowed of a ruler), the gods decide that Gilgamesh needs a friend who is his equal in strength to distract him. They create Enkidu, a man who is found living with the mountain animals. He becomes more humanized and becomes best friends with Gilgamesh. Together they battle and defeat both Humbaba, the mountain monster who guards the great cedar forest, and the Bull of Heaven, sent to wreak havoc on Uruk by the goddess Ishtar when Gilgamesh refuses to marry her. After completing many superhuman feats along with Enkidu, Gilgamesh is distraught when Enkidu dies. The gods had decided that together, the two were too powerful so one must be sacrificed to death. Mourning for Enkidu, Gilgamesh wanders the forest and decides to go and seek immortality. Gilgamesh travels to the ends of the earth to meet Utanapishtim, the Forever, who tells him of the great flood that wiped out most of civilization. (This highly resembles the story of Noah's Ark). Only he and his wife were left and then made immortal by the gods. Utanapishtim asks Gilgamesh, who of the gods will intervene on Gilgamesh's behalf? First, he must stay away for six days and seven nights without sleeping, and then they'll go from there. Gilgamesh sits down and falls right to sleep! After he awakes, Utanapishtim tells Gilgamesh that he cannot help him to be immortal, so he must go back to Uruk and live out his life. Gilgamesh travels back to Uruk.

I'm sure I never could have understood the story without the help of the sources I was reading along side, especially with missing lines at crucial parts! It was neat to read something so old though. :-)

Here are a couple of samples of the writing:

4th Tablet (when Enkidu and Gilgamesh battle Humbaba)

Let your voice bellow forth like the kettledrum, let the stiffness in your arms depart,
let the paralysis in your legs go away.
Take my hand, my friend, we will go on together.
Your heart should burn to do battle
--pay no heed to death, do not lose heart!
The one who watches from the side is a careful man,
but the one who walks in front protects himself and saves his
comrade,
and through their fighting they establish fame'"
As the two of them reached the evergreen forest
they cut off their talk, and stood still.



7th Tablet (when the gods decide Enkidu must die)

My friend, why are the Great Gods in conference?
(In my dream) Anu, Enlil, and Shamash held a council,
and Anu spoke to Enlil:
'Because they killed the Bull of Heaven and have also slain
Humbaba,
the one of them who pulled up the Cedar of the Mountain
must die!'
Enlil said:'Let Enkidu die, but Gilgamesh must not die!'
Bur the Sun God of Heaven replied to valiant Enlil:
'Was it not at my command that they killed the Bull of
Heaven and Humbaba!
Should now innocent Enkidu die!'
Then Enlil became angry at Shamash, saying:
'it is you who are responsible because you traveled daily
with them as their friend!"'
Enkidu was lying (sick) in front of Gilgamesh.
His tears flowing like canals, he (Gilgamesh) said:
"O brother, dear brother, why are they absolving me instead of
my brother"
Then Enkidu said: "So now must I become a ghost,
to sit with the ghosts of the dead, to see my dear brother
nevermore!"

8th Tablet (Gilgamesh's mourning of Enkidu)

 

 

"Hear me, O Elders of Uruk, hear me, O men!
I mourn for Enkidu, my friend,
I shriek in anguish like a mourner.
You, axe at my side, so trusty at my hand--
you, sword at my waist, shield in front of me,
you, my festal garment, a sash over my loins--
an evil demon!) appeared and took him away from me!
My friend, the swift mule, fleet wild ass of the mountain,
panther of the wilderness,
Enkidu, my friend, the swift mule, fleet wild ass of the mountain,
panther of the wilderness,
after we joined together and went up into the mountain,
fought the Bull of Heaven and killed it,
and overwhelmed Humbaba, who lived in the Cedar Forest,
now what is this sleep which has seized you?
You have turned dark and do not hear me!"
But his (Enkidu's) eyes do not move,
he touched his heart, but it beat no longer.
He covered his friend's face like a bride,
swooping down over him like an eagle,
and like a lioness deprived of her cubs
he keeps pacing to and fro.
He shears off his curls and heaps them onto the ground,
ripping off his finery and casting it away as an abomination.
Just as day began to dawn, Gilgamesh ...
and issued a call to the land:
"You, blacksmith! You, lapidary! You, coppersmith!
You, goldsmith! You, jeweler!
Create 'My Friend,' fashion a statue of him.
... he fashioned a statue of his friend.
His features ...
...,your chest will be of lapis lazuli, your skin will be of gold."

11th Tablet (Utanapishtim tells of the flood and makes an offer to Gilgamesh)

The boat was finished by sunset.
The launching was very difficult.
They had to keep carrying a runway of poles front to back,
until two-thirds of it had gone into the water(?).
Whatever I had I loaded on it:
whatever silver I had 1 loaded on it,
whatever gold I had I loaded on it.
All the living beings that I had I loaded on it,
I had all my kith and kin go up into the boat,
all the beasts and animals of the field and the craftsmen I
had go up.
Shamash had set a stated time:
'In the morning I will let loaves of bread shower down,
and in the evening a rain of wheat!
Go inside the boat, seal the entry!'
That stated time had arrived.
In the morning he let loaves of bread shower down,
and in the evening a rain of wheat.
I watched the appearance of the weather--
the weather was frightful to behold!
I went into the boat and sealed the entry.
For the caulking of the boat, to Puzuramurri, the boatman,
I gave the palace together with its contents.
Just as dawn began to glow
there arose from the horizon a black cloud.
Adad rumbled inside of it,
before him went Shullat and Hanish,
heralds going over mountain and land.
Erragal pulled out the mooring poles,
forth went Ninurta and made the dikes overflow.
The Anunnaki lifted up the torches,
setting the land ablaze with their flare.
Stunned shock over Adad's deeds overtook the heavens,
and turned to blackness all that had been light.
The... land shattered like a... pot.
All day long the South Wind blew ...,
blowing fast, submerging the mountain in water,
overwhelming the people like an attack.
No one could see his fellow,
they could not recognize each other in the torrent.
The gods were frightened by the Flood,
and retreated, ascending to the heaven of Anu.
The gods were cowering like dogs, crouching by the outer wall.
Ishtar shrieked like a woman in childbirth,
the sweet-voiced Mistress of the Gods wailed:
'The olden days have alas turned to clay,
because I said evil things in the Assembly of the Gods!
How could I say evil things in the Assembly of the Gods,
ordering a catastrophe to destroy my people!!
No sooner have I given birth to my dear people
than they fill the sea like so many fish!'
The gods--those of the Anunnaki--were weeping with her,
the gods humbly sat weeping, sobbing with grief(?),
their lips burning, parched with thirst.
Six days and seven nights
came the wind and flood, the storm flattening the land.
When the seventh day arrived, the storm was pounding,
the flood was a war--struggling with itself like a woman
writhing (in labor).
The sea calmed, fell still, the whirlwind (and) flood stopped up.
I looked around all day long--quiet had set in
and all the human beings had turned to clay!
The terrain was as flat as a roof.
I opened a vent and fresh air (daylight!) fell upon the side of
my nose.
I fell to my knees and sat weeping,
tears streaming down the side of my nose.
I looked around for coastlines in the expanse of the sea,
and at twelve leagues there emerged a region (of land).
On Mt. Nimush the boat lodged firm,
Mt. Nimush held the boat, allowing no sway.
One day and a second Mt. Nimush held the boat, allowing
no sway.
A third day, a fourth, Mt. Nimush held the boat, allowing
no sway.
A fifth day, a sixth, Mt. Nimush held the boat, allowing
no sway.
When a seventh day arrived
I sent forth a dove and released it.
The dove went off, but came back to me;
no perch was visible so it circled back to me.
I sent forth a swallow and released it.
The swallow went off, but came back to me;
no perch was visible so it circled back to me.
I sent forth a raven and released it.
The raven went off, and saw the waters slither back.
It eats, it scratches, it bobs, but does not circle back to me.
Then I sent out everything in all directions and sacrificed
(a sheep).
I offered incense in front of the mountain-ziggurat.
Seven and seven cult vessels I put in place,
and (into the fire) underneath (or: into their bowls) I poured
reeds, cedar, and myrtle.
The gods smelled the savor,
the gods smelled the sweet savor,
and collected like flies over a (sheep) sacrifice.
Just then Beletili arrived.
She lifted up the large flies (beads) which Anu had made for
his enjoyment(!):
'You gods, as surely as I shall not forget this lapis lazuli
around my neck,
may I be mindful of these days, and never forget them!
The gods may come to the incense offering,
but Enlil may not come to the incense offering,
because without considering he brought about the Flood
and consigned my people to annihilation.'
Just then Enlil arrived.
He saw the boat and became furious,
he was filled with rage at the Igigi gods:
'Where did a living being escape?
No man was to survive the annihilation!'
Ninurta spoke to Valiant Enlil, saying:
'Who else but Ea could devise such a thing?
It is Ea who knows every machination!'
La spoke to Valiant Enlil, saying:
'It is yours, O Valiant One, who is the Sage of the Gods.
How, how could you bring about a Flood without consideration
Charge the violation to the violator,
charge the offense to the offender,
but be compassionate lest (mankind) be cut off,
be patient lest they be killed.
Instead of your bringing on the Flood,
would that a lion had appeared to diminish the people!
Instead of your bringing on the Flood,
would that a wolf had appeared to diminish the people!
Instead of your bringing on the Flood,
would that famine had occurred to slay the land!
Instead of your bringing on the Flood,
would that (Pestilent) Erra had appeared to ravage the land!
It was not I who revealed the secret of the Great Gods,
I (only) made a dream appear to Atrahasis, and (thus) he
heard the secret of the gods.
Now then! The deliberation should be about him!'
Enlil went up inside the boat
and, grasping my hand, made me go up.
He had my wife go up and kneel by my side.
He touched our forehead and, standing between us, he
blessed us:
'Previously Utanapishtim was a human being.
But now let Utanapishtim and his wife become like us,
the gods!
Let Utanapishtim reside far away, at the Mouth of the Rivers.'
They took us far away and settled us at the Mouth of the Rivers."
"Now then, who will convene the gods on your behalf,
that you may find the life that you are seeking!
Wait! You must not lie down for six days and seven nights."
soon as he sat down (with his head) between his legs
sleep, like a fog, blew upon him.
Utanapishtim said to his wife:
"Look there! The man, the youth who wanted (eternal) life!
Sleep, like a fog, blew over him."
his wife said to Utanapishtim the Faraway:
"Touch him, let the man awaken.
Let him return safely by the way he came.
Let him return to his land by the gate through which he left."

Finished: The Crying of Lot 49 (Pynchon). Totally confusing book. I'm still not sure what I spent the last few hours reading. It's the 1960's. The protagonist, Oedipa Maas, gets notice that she's the executor of her former boyfriend's rich estate. Oedipa heads to St. Narcisco, CA where former boyfriend, Pierce Inverarity lived, and owned most of the businesses in the town. She stumbles upon a postal service conspiracy when she finds evidence of a clandestine postal organization, the Trystero, complete with secret symbol, mysterious history, and everything. She spends days trying to unravel the mystery, as her own life unravels as well. Her husband back home, Mucho Maas, starts taking LSD. Her psychotherapist, Dr. Hilarius, turns out to have been a Nazi who performed experiments on people in the Nazi camps. He goes crazy. She meets a stamp expert named Genghis Cohen, an apparent underground mail supporter named Mike Fallopian, and a band of four American teenagers who sing in British accents with Beatles haircuts who call themselves The Paranoids. In the end...she'd not sure if it's all an elaborate joke set up by her former ex-love, or the truth. It's all so nonsensical, I'm not sure it matters. Pynchon, check.

Finished: Lullaby (Palahniuk). Verrry disturbing, but verrry good! I'd never read a Chuck Palahniuk book before, but I knew he was the author of Fight Club. Having seen Fight Club the movie, I didn't want to read that book. So...I picked Lullaby, which was part thriller, part moralizing, part disturbing, and wholly entertaining! It is about a reporter who is supposed to be doing a story about Sudden Infant Death Syndrome...why do babies die unexpectedly? In reality, he thinks he already knows why. There is a poem in an old lullaby book called a culling song which in ancient times was read to terminal people as they were dying...it helped speed the process and aided in a peaceful death. The reporter unknowingly read this poem to his infant daughter and his wife twenty years before, and they were dead by the next morning. In current times, he recites the poem to his newspaper editor (who he's not very fond of) to test his theory...and the next morning the editor is dead! He realizes what power can come from being able to kill whoever you want at any time. Or, the horror of the poem floating out in society being read to untold number of children in schools, etc. He discovers a realtor who also accidentally killed her child twenty years before, who knows about the culling song. There are only 500 copies of the book in the U.S. They go on the road, together with two other characters, in hopes of destroying the rest of the books. At least that's his hope...the realtor wants to find the original source of the book in hopes there is a reverse spell. She wants to bring her baby back, who she's kept alive (I think in a cryogenic facility??) Anyway, the other two characters have their own plans as well....and another former friend of the reporter's who figures it out and uses the culling spell for his own creepy devices. Lullaby kept me turning the pages once again, with several twisty surprises at the end. It reminded me alot of a good Dean Koontz book. :-) I may read some more Palahniuk down the road!

Finished: a mercy (Morrison). A very intense, moving book about a slave girl given by her slave mother to a different owner, hoping to make her life better. The girl, Florens, is so young when it happens, though, she never realizes her mother was trying to make things better for her. She just thinks her mother chose to keep her baby brother over her. The reader might not even realize it until the last few heartbreaking sentences of the book. I'm really glad I read this book by Toni Morrison. I tried three different times to start her big hit, Beloved, and I just couldn't get into the rhythm of it at all. This book grabbed me and didn't let go. It's hard to put into words, but there are just some writers who have that rare gift of keeping you engaged, while showing you the inner thoughts of each character, with well-balanced dialogue and interaction between characters, as well as vivid descriptions of conditions and surroundings. In a mercy, Morrison certainly did all that.

In 1662, Florens is only eight when she's given to Jacob Vaark, a Virginia farmer and trader who accepts her as payment when the sleazy tobacco farm owner who owes him money can't pay. Jacob doesn't trade in human flesh, but when he sees the pleading look on the face of Florens' mother, he takes Florens home thinking she can be of some comfort to his wife who has lost all her children. Jacob has taken in two other "orphans" since his marriage, a native American girl, Lina, and another  slave girl, Sorrow. And, Jacob himself was an orphan as a child, so sympathizes with their circumstances. They become this rather misfit family, even though it's clear that Jacob is "Sir" and his wife is "Mistress". In other words, I'm not at all downplaying that the two slaves are still slaves.

The book is told from the perspective of each of the main characters and you feel for each one of them as you come to understand them and what motivates them. When Jacob dies, and it looks like his wife may die, then Lina (who helps to run the house) comes to realize that she, Sorrow and Florens will have no where to go. There are no heirs to the property, which would be auctioned off and they would all probably be auctioned off as well. The wife survives the illness, and they all stay on, for a time anyway.

A couple of my favorite passages. Sorrow is named Sorrow because of her horrific childhood before she comes to Jacob. She has even created an imaginary Twin who she talks to all the time, so most everyone at the farm thinks she's a little crazy. After they all go through the death of Jacob, and Sorrow has a baby girl of her own, she gives herself a new name: 

Twin was gone, traceless and unmissed by the only person who knew her. Sorrow's wandering stopped too. Now she attended routine duties, organizing them around her infant's needs, impervious to the complaints of others. She had looked into her daughter's eyes; saw in them the gray glisten of a winter sea while a ship sailed by-the-lee. "I am your mother," she said. "My name is Complete."

Gosh I love that! Then, the very last chapter of the book is from the viewpoint of Florens' mother eight years after she gave her up. When the mother had first arrived at her slave owner's farm, she'd been taken to the shed and "broken in" which resulted in the birth of Florens. Her mother could see the slave owner eyeing Florens in that same way as she was getting older, and so to prevent her from that fate, she begged Jacob Vaark to take her as payment. Here's the passage, and from here comes the name of the book:

   You caught Senhor's eye. After the tall man dined and joined Senhor on a walk through the quarters, I was singing at the pump. A song about the green bird fighting then dying when the monkey steals her eggs. I heard their voices and gathered you and your brother to stand in their eyes.
   One chance, I thought. There is no protection but there is difference. You stood there in those shoes and the tall man laughed and said he would take me to close the debt. I knew Senhor would not allow it. I said you. Take you, my daughter. Because I saw the tall man see you as a human child, not pieces of eight. I knelt before him. Hoping for a miracle. He said yes.
   It was not a miracle. Bestowed by  God. It was a mercy. Offered by a human. 

Finished: The Time Machine (Wells). Before Brave New World, 1984, and Anthem there was The Time Machine. Hmm...interesting little book. Written in 1895, it seems to be a sort of grandfather to those futuristic books. The Time Traveler creates a machine that takes him to 802,701 A.D. He discovers, or assumes, that mankind has split into two forms of beings, the Eloi and the Morlocks. The Eloi are happy, light, unintelligent creatures who love flowers and eat only fruit. They live above ground and seem to be provided for with clothing, etc. They are terrified of the dark. The Morlocks live in a subterranean world full of machinery. It is assumed they keep the Eloi in their clothing, etc. They are meat-eaters...when the dark comes, they eat Eloi.

The Time Traveler decides that the Morlocks are the part of mankind that used to be the working class, and the Eloi used to be the upper class. Neither seem to have keen intelligence, so he postulates that mankind finally succeeded in becoming so technically superior, with no more disease, war, etc., that mankind had no more need for intelligence, strength or ingenuity...the things needed to make those accomplishments. So, mankind evolved into the slap-happy Eloi and the base-needing Morlocks. After the Morlocks steal his time machine, The Time Traveler has an adventure getting it back. He is nearly killed by the Morlocks and his one little Eloi friend, Weena, is presumed to perish as The Time Traveler is escaping the Morlocks. The Time Traveler takes off in his machine, and goes all the way to the end of time, stopping in a few more "times" along the way...watching as the earth evolves into a lifeless nothing. Frightened and discouraged, he sets the switch back for his current time and makes it back home. It has only been a few hours in real time. Of course, none of his friends believe him. He decides to set off again, and this time take some supplies and a camera (duh!!). After three years, he has still never been heard of. The End.

I'm not a SciFi fan at all, but it has been interesting to read each of these books and see how each of the authors viewed mankind turning out. Of course, The Time Machine went further in time than the others, so I wonder what H.G. Wells' in between time period of a Brave New World or a 1984 would have been. Anyway...yay...I think I'm done with SciFi. :-) Although...after I finish reading all the other books I want to read, I may give one of the longer Ayn Rand books a try...maybe. I don't know if they're SciFi or what though.

Finished: A Farewell to Arms (Hemingway). Gosh, that was a good book...sad, but good! I generally don't like to read books about war, but this one kept me turning the pages. I didn't know anything about the story, so I never knew what to expect. The narrator, Lt. Henry,  was an American who joins the Italian army as an ambulance driver in World War I. He meets a British nurse, Catherine, right before he goes out on an ambulance run and is severely injured. He's sent to a hospital further from the  front lines in Italy, and so is Catherine. While he recuperates and she tends to him and the other wounded, they fall in love and before he is sent back to the front line, she lets him know she's pregnant. When he gets back to the front line, within a couple of days the battle conditions are terrible and the Italian army and civilians are all in a mass retreat. The Italian police go crazy and start executing any officers who are not with their regiments. Lt. Henry is taken to be executed. He sees what's going on, jumps in the river, hops a train, goes back to Catherine, and they escape into Switzerland. Hemingway is so good at describing the horrific details of the war, and the harsh, rainy conditions of the retreat...and the mental stress that the soldiers are under, yet also the camaraderie of the soldiers who become like family. It's heartbreaking. :-(  He's so capable of writing that good mix between sharp, quick dialogue and authentic descriptions. It's like you can just hear Lt. Henry narrating the story. Once in Switzerland, Lt. Henry and Catherine have an idyllic life for a few months until the baby is born. They are truly in love and in such sync with each other and plan to marry after the baby is born. Things take a tragic turn, however, when the baby is still born and then Catherine dies of hemorrhaging. Lt. Henry is left to walk back to his hotel in the rain by himself. Sigh, heart wrenching.

As of today I have read 100 books, plays and novellas, and 109 poems in 2012! Ten more authors to go to finish my top 100 list: Virgil, Morrison, Miller, Pynchon, Palahuik, Kerouac, Murdoch, Wells, Baldwin and Irving. I have my ten books all lined up and ready to go! After I finish them, then I look forward to all the other books I have ready to go that are author repeats, like War and Peace, Crime and Punishment, East of Eden, As I Lay Dying, Othello, Mansfield Park, Jude the Obscure, David Copperfield, etc. And, I have a list of books by authors that didn't make the top 100, but are highly recommended like Invisible Man (not to be confused with THE Invisible Man), The Age of Innocence, Things Fall Apart, A Handful of Dust, I, Claudius, etc.

I have read 90 of the top 100 authors, plus a few authors more, some who were on the original top 100 list and some who weren't. Of the top 100 authors, several I had read before 2012, but I've reread any authors whose work I feel I may have forgotten, i.e., I probably read it in high school. :-) I have not reread Twain, Dickens, Joyce, Dante, Hawthorne, Poe or King. I remember the books I've read by those authors vividly (Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, A Tale of Two Cities, Ulysses, The Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, Dante's Inferno, The Scarlett Letter, The Tell-Tale Heart, Annabelle Lee, and Cujo). :::shuddering at Cujo::: I never read another King book!

I didn't NEED to reread Shakespeare or Austen, but I have because I love them so much. I'm now reading A Farewell to Arms, by Hemingway, and so far I really, really like it! I'm rereading Hemingway because even though I remember reading The Old Man and the Sea, it is not very vivid in my mind. For that matter....Dante's Inferno probably isn't THAT vivid in my mind, but I definitely remember reading it. Weird how I can't just call that The Inferno...but I must say Dante's Inferno.

Anyway....the countdown is on. I'll probably read a few more books after the top 100 before I decide on MY favorite 100 authors, but I've been making a preliminary list.

Happy reading to me! :-)