User talk:Macspaunday/Archive 2016

A pie for you!

Hey man, this pie is just to say, you know, it's been a long summer and I just got finished with White-Jacket (Melville and his stupid hyphens), and hey, I'm sorry I didn't get to Gaskell yet. But I just emailed the Two Most Likely Colleagues To Have Cranford or North and South, so I'm on it. Oh, forgot to write those syllabi: fall is here... I hope this finds you well and ready to go for yet another exciting semester. Drmies (talk) 22:36, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

@Drmies:! That pie is delicious - thank you! I've had three slices already. Sorry not to have answered sooner - we're in the remote north woods where the internet and life and both slow, and I've avoided the web when we're on the road. - Anyway, I think I've changed my mind about recommending North and South - I've been reading it again, and it's more grim and slow than I remembered, though it's got some terrific bits. Cranford is short and wonderful, and still very much on the recommended list. This summer I got back to Dostoyevsky after a lot of decades, and The Brothers K. was even better than I remembered, and Notes from Underground is astonishingly good. But if you're curious about the nineteenth century novel, the German novelist Fontane is as great as can be. Effie Briest is so powerful that there were pages where I could hardly breathe while reading; the tone is low-key from start to finish; no big dramatic moments; but the whole thing is overwhelmingly dramatic and I don't know anything else like it. - Have you got any other medieval suggestions? Guillaume de Dole was a revelation. Always looking for more. - Now back to that pie (pie for breakfast is a rare treat). - Macspaunday (talk) 12:34, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

• I was afraid you might ask for more. My well is running dry. I assume you read the Mabinogian? You may run into the brand-new translation of Aucassin and Nicolette (which should really be called Nicolette and Aucassin) if you happen to stop by a specialized bookstore. Yes, my colleague told me that North and South was a bit depressing; we'll see. In the meantime, though, I had to pick up Herman Koch's The Dinner, but that's a quick read. Gotta tell you, I hate suspense; I have the feeling I won't know for many pages what video daddy found on his son's cell phone.

  You sound like you're having fun: you must be a very bad academic. I'm here plugging away at syllabi, only to discover that two of the three books I require have gone into new editions, overnight. *Le sigh* I hope I will be allowed to read your Fontane in English: life is too short to read in German. All the best, and may your semester not start for another week or more. Drmies (talk) 16:50, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

  • @Drmies: - The Mabinogion has been on my Amazon "save for later" list forever. Time to get it off there and into the shopping cart. Aucassin and/or Nicolette has been in the back of my mind too. (New translation? Will check this out.) - Where I am now, the closest bookstore is about sixty miles away, though that should change when the semester starts. As you guessed, I'm a very bad academic: I just got my last syllabus done and ordered books; should have done this weeks ago. - Yes, Fontane in English. I decided not to stumble through him in German; there's a paperback translation of Effie Briest available from the UK that seems to get it right. Also, there are plenty of old Oxford World's Classics editions of other titles out there. - Not surprised that your colleague reports being depressed by North and South; that's what it's been doing to me, so I went to Dostoyevsky to get cheered up a bit - a sentence I never thought I'd write. Herman Koch is completely new to me; will get a look. Meanwhile, the new semester is bearing down hard. A friend in Georgia is starting a week from Monday, I think, but I've a few days more breathing room. - Enjoy the semester! - Macspaunday (talk) 20:37, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
• Alright Macspaunday, I hope this finds you well. I've been meaning to tell you for a few weeks now that I am making good progress in North and South. My body count is at...let me see...Mrs. Hale, Ms. Higgins, Boucher, yes, three. Did I miss one or two? I keep wanting to say "it's picking up pace" but you know that's really a lie--and I can't really say who I want her to hook up with, that industrialist or Mr. Lawyer Fancypants from London. She certainly is exciting, though, and there's lots of interesting angles. I'm interested also in Mr. Hale's dissent, and I've edited and written articles related to such topics, and read a book or two, but man that's all so complicated. Ha, please don't ask me to untangle Old Mortality, haha. Anyway. It's midterm time and I have grades to hand in. Oh, I alternate between reading Gaskell and De Man; I never got around to Rhetoric of Romanticism. It's a dirty job, maybe, but someone's gotta do it. Adieu, Drmies (talk) 00:45, 14 October 2016 (UTC)