Shakespeare
July 10, 2008 at 8:58 pm (Uncategorized) (biography, the bard)
Shakespeare: The World as Stage by Bill Bryson
I actually listened to this one as an audio book, but I’m still going to write it up in here. I haven’t quite decided whether I think that listening to a book is the same thing as reading it. I think that for me, it’s actually more challenging. Regardless, I’m reading through it in book-format now.
For all that I love Shakespeare, I’d never read a biography of him before. This one came quite highly recommended by quite a few people, and as I really like Bill Bryson, and was curious to hear him read his own work, I decided to listen to his book. I was surprised to learn as I started listening to it how little I actually knew about Shakespeare.
Bryson’s work emphasizes the fact that I’m clearly not alone in this. Very little is known for certain about Shakespeare at all. I loved the way that Bryson exposed this fact while still managing to put together a coherent biography, and simultaneously avoided making assumptions as many other scholars have. He also filled in the gaps in Shakespeare’s life with a fascinating sketch of London as Shakespeare would have known it.
I think the part of the book that surprised me the most was the section about the Sonnets. I’d never read the Sonnets before, despite having taken a class on Shakespeare alone in university, and never read about them either. So I was surprised to learn about the Fair Youth and the Dark Lady, and interested to hear the theories about who these subjects may have been in Shakespeare’s life. Regardless of who they were, or if they even had counterparts in Shakespeare’s life, I am grateful for this section of the book for introducing me to the Sonnets. I’ve fallen in love!
My one complaint about this book is that when discussing possible likenesses of Shakespeare, Bryson failed to mention the Sanders portrait. I don’t generally approve of scholars making unfounded assumptions, but I still do it myself, and to me, the Sanders portrait is the face of the Bard.
The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes
July 1, 2008 at 4:28 pm (Uncategorized) (19th century, detective fiction, mystery, short stories)
The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Ever since I discovered Sherlock Holmes back in December, I can’t seem to get enough of him! I haven’t been reading the stories in any particular order, as I began with the Adventures and Memoirs of Holmes (together in one volume), went back to A Study in Scarlet, where Holmes was first introduced, and finally came to this last collection of short stories that Conan Doyle published about Holmes a few years before his death.
I found that this particular collection had a completely different feel to it, especially compared to the Adventures and the Memoirs. Part of this can be explained by Conan Doyle’s experimentation with different narrative voices, as unlike the previous collections I read, the entirety of this collection was not narrated by Watson. A few were recounted by Holmes, and one was in the third person omniscient voice. While it was really interesting to read the unfolding mystery from Holmes’s perspective, it definitely gave a completely different feel to the stories (particularly because, unlike Watson, Holmes always knows what’s going on, and has to be careful not to reveal everything from the outset!).
But more than the different narrative style, I found that overall these stories seemed both more dark, and less like adventures. It seems a bit silly to remark that the Adventures has a more, well, adventurous, feel to it than the Case-Book, but that’s really the best way to describe it. Even though eleven out of the twelve stories are titled “adventures” rather than “problems”, they read more like puzzles to be solved. I’m not sure if I felt this way because I’m becoming accustomed to Holmes’s problem-solving style, or if they’re really objectively more like puzzles. I’m not sure how to determine this.
In any case, I still found the stories extremely enjoyable, but would again recommend starting your aquaintance with Sherlock Holmes by reading the Adventures or the Memoirs rather than the Case-Book or A Study in Scarlet.
The ideas of my friend Watson, though limited, are exceedingly pertinacious. For a long time he has worried me to write an experience of my own. Perhaps I have rather invited this persecution, since I have often had occasion to point out to him how superficial are his own accounts and to accuse him of pandering to popular taste instead of confining himself rigidly to fact and figures. “Try it yourself, Holmes!” he has retorted, and I am compelled to admit that, having taken my pen in my hand, I do begin to realise that the matter must be presented in such a way as may interest the reader.
