Nature and Favorite Books of 2013

Below are several photos taken outdoors this morning and a few book reviews.

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These two go together. They're long. They're challenging. But wow. I knew that both had won Britain's Man Booker Prize in 2009 and 2012 which put both on my "to-read" list until I realized their relation to my spring 2013 "The Early Tudors: Literature and Reformation" course. Then, they were read and enjoyed immediately. Author Hilary Mantel traces the rise and fall of Thomas Cromwell, one of Henry VIII's closest advisors. The writing is incredible. Both books required focus and close attention and it helped to be learning about the time period and the Tudors at the same time, as Mantel's wide research is evident and successful as she provides accuracy and close description in both. Wolf Hall begins the trilogy while Bring up the Bodies, which traces the fall of Anne Boleyn, is my favorite. I'm looking froward to the final installment in 2015, The Mirror and the Light. 

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I was assigned a few stories from this monstrous book in the fall of 2012 in my Creative Writing course. The first few I read were powerfully written and helped shape the remainder of the semester and my own writing. I soon set out to read the whole book. It took many months, but I finished it this past fall, finding that nearly every story in here is wonderfully written and like any good story, lingers for a few days.

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So, so good. A collection of Whitman's Civil War poetry, prose and letters, it's short and isn't the quickest read, but the language is powerfully realistic. I usually don't jump onto the bandwagon of classic literature, I have little to comment on Shakespeare, Austen or Dickens, but Whitman! He's another story. 

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I had read Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner a few years before, and was looking forward to this one. The first 80-100 pages were disappointing as I felt that all description and realistic writing was missing. It seemed too, that the male writer wasn't successful in writing through the eyes of a young woman. And then, suddenly, the story Hosseini told magnified and overshadowed. As the story widened, I realized Hosseini's talent lies in his ability to tell a story. He may not have had elaborate prose or weighty description, but the story of Afghanistan before and after the Taliban rule through the eyes of two young women and two families was triumphant, tragic and somehow, relatable. 

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I had enjoyed Tracy Chevalier's Girl with a Pearl Earring a few years ago, and this was similar in depth, characters and exploration of a different culture. A mixture of American/British Quakers, westward migration and the fugitive slave law, The Last Runaway was powerful, engaging and exciting. :)

December

It seems that natural winter colors are a mixture of white and brown and green. The season is not solely white (snow), but encompasses a mixture of snow, ice, white and blue sky, dirt, mud, mulch, drowned grass and moss. I think winter might be the least attractive season -- despite the beauty snow and ice brings, but it seems to be the most distinct too. We fail to see the extraordinary in the ground we walk on and the sky we live under. The photos below were taken on Christmas day (yesterday) and today.

frozen lake.

wooden windowsill view.

Boston and Books

I visited Boston a few days ago, met with a few friends and laughed for what felt like several hours.

The city was beautifully decorated for Christmas and it was a welcome relief to emerge from the deep forest and be surrounded by people.

I met my friend Julie from Scotland outside South Station. We usually traveled to and from Boston - St. Andrews together last year as we were both full-year American abroad students. We hadn't seen each other since we both returned and it was wonderful to share the readjustments we've both experienced.

Julie and I in the Highlands in April.

Later, I met up with one of my best friends from Saint Michael's, Katie.

We could not stop laughing. It was joyous.

Katie and I at a ball when she visited St. Andrews last February.

Seeing the ocean...those shades of blue...it was majestic. It was also quite warm with barely any wind. If the snow hadn't been there, it might have been July...or March.

We were hoping to run into Paul Revere in this Quincy Market alley.

This was incredible. After literally stumbling upon Quincy Market and the Faneuil Hall Marketplace, we saw dozens of new Americans emerging from Faneuil Hall with their families, certificates and American flags. There was so much joy and excitement among everyone. We stood for a while and smiled at it all. :)

As we walked towards Charlestown, we found ourselves across from the Vermont Building!

Friday was warm in New Hampshire with quite a bit of snow meltage. I woke up...

to this dangerous peril! These snow-ice clusters were hanging from the roof... 

As for the "Books" part of the post, the bookcases were bathed in sunlight on a recent afternoon and I like what I captured below:

Books are so meaningful to me. I think they're physically beautiful on bookshelves too. I haven't yet embraced the kindle, but perhaps someday.

My Mom's Robert Frost collection from college. :)

My poetry anthologies. Each one has such a story behind it which I love. I see one of Joan Didion's in here that I found on a 'free book' table in the School of Business and Management in St. Andrews, another that I received as a gift from my Dad, others that I picked up at a used book store while in San Francisco with my brother, a few that I purchased over the summer at Bookstock, one from Amazon, and others with stories from their past. 

Lastly, religion continues to interest me and I've thought often recently about the politics of religion that divide us. I see our religious decisions, ideas and beliefs in politics and persuasion. I wish I could express it all better and had a better explanation and grasp of my own beliefs or ideas, but I'll leave it to the following quote that I read earlier by Kathy Reich from her book Cross Bones. My friend Susanna is to thank for it.

"Despite the rituals, the rhetoric, and even the bombs, every religion is saying mostly the same thing. Buddhism. Taoism. Zoroastrianism. Sikhism. Shamanism. It doesn't matter, take your pick...The Torah, the Bible, the Koran. Each offers a recipe for spiritual contentment, for hope, for love, and for controlling basic human passions, and each claims to have gotten the recipe straight from God, but via a different messenger. They're all just trying to provide a formula for orderly, spiritual living, but declare the boundaries of correct belief, outsiders are labeled heretics, and the faithful are called upon to attack them. I don't think it was meant to be that way."

Snow, a Library and a few Book Reviews

Despite the chill, the snow we have here is beautiful! I haven't yet gone calf-deep exploring through the snow forest as I've been planning, but it shouldn't be too long before I do.

I keep noticing the darkness and early sunsets here and continue to wonder how I survived at this time last year when the sun dipped below the horizon by 2 p.m. and the night stretched for sixteen hours. It continues to baffle me.

I headed to the nearby Dartmouth College library this afternoon in the attempt to do a bit of academic work. I found this Burberry scarf and was doing my best to look the part. 

Dartmouth's main library, Hanover, New Hampshire

Below are a few book reviews. :)

The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Poetry.

This anthology is rather enormous. It was required reading this past spring for my American Poetry class in St. Andrews and some burst of determination convinced me to read the full anthology. Sometime in late July, it was finished. Even for those who may not be too into poetry (I often find my mind wandering when reading it...) The anthology includes the perfect selection of twentieth century poets. Poetry isn't always political, but I like to think that it reflects the thoughts and energy and opinions of the day whether or not it attempts to. Poetry seems to get at what isn't spoken about in public, what history books might have overlooked, the thoughts, emotions and conversations we avoid in the moment. (Book image found here.)

Almost Catholic.

Despite the author keeping a distance from Catholicism throughout and proclaiming his content at the end for not being Catholic, he gets at the admiration for Catholicism, the ritual and history, the practices and teaching and how and why it appeals to non-Catholics. It's written well, he covers many aspects of the faith especially it's presence in the modern-day. I felt it to be particularly relevant with the current popularity of Pope Francis. (Book image found here.) 

The Best American Essays of 2011.

(As a side note, I'm sure the 2012 or 2013 versions would be wonderful, too! This was the $1 copy I found over the summer) Incredibly good essays and powerful writing! Similar to the anthology described above, it was lengthy and involved concentration. Moving and thought-provoking. (Book image found here.)