Via Jaquandor comes this book-related meme.
What was the last book you bought?
I just bought myself a copy of Neal Gabler's excellent biography Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination. Money being what it is, I hit the library a lot more often than I hit the bookstore. I save the money for art books, like Colin Giles's Girls (see sidebar to get your own copy) and the new Dean Yeagle books.
Name a book you have read MORE than once
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, of course. I've read L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus a couple of times. Just for the hell of it, I've just finished re-reading Ian Fleming's Casino Royale. Adams' The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy I've read a few times. There are quite a few like that. And every year I reread The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and A Christmas Carol. If plays count, there are a couple of Shakespeare plays I've read a couple of times. I think I'm about to read Moby Dick a second time.
Has a book ever fundamentally changed the way you see life? If yes, what was it?
The Grapes of Wrath, certainly. Carl Sagan's The Demon-Haunted World. Asimov's Guide to the Bible.
How do you choose a book? eg. by cover design and summary, recommendations or reviews?
All of them. Mostly it's recommendations or reviews. Sometimes I come across lists of books online, Best Science Fiction Stories of All Time or something like that, and I read those. I read a mess of books because Thurber recommended them for young students (they were mostly good). Cover design is certainly a factor. Sometimes it's good to find an author whose work I love and find out what books turned them on.
Do you prefer Fiction or Non-Fiction?
I like both, but I find I read more non-fiction than fiction. I like reading about history.
What’s more important in a novel - beautiful writing or a gripping plot?
I'd have to say writing. I've read a lot of books just because of the artful way they were written or the tight plotting of a story. Good writing keeps you turning the page.
Most loved/memorable character (character/book)
Here are a few.
Ebeneezer Scrooge, A Christmas Carol
Tyrion Lannister, A Song of Ice and Fire
Bigwig, Watership Down
King Theoden, The Lord of the Rings
Jack Pumkinhead and the Scarecrow, the Oz novels
Tarzan, Tarzan of the Apes
Jubal Harshaw, Stranger in a Strange Land
Ayla, The Clan of the Cave Bear
Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Buliwyf, Eaters of the Dead
Mr. Fox, Fantastic Mr. Fox
Which book or books can be found on your nightstand at the moment?
I've finished Casino Royale; I'm not sure if I'm still in the mood to read more Bond, or if I'm going to read something else. What, I'm not sure.
What was the last book you’ve read, and when was it?
Like I said, Casino Royale. Finished it yesterday.
Have you ever given up on a book half way in?
You mean the Ian Malcolm Rule? I got to the exact halfway point of Michael Crichton's The Lost World, a book stupidly written to justify a movie sequel starring a character who had died in the previous book and just thought... you know, life's too short and this book is really, really stupid. If I get halfway and the book is still godawful, chances are I'll just dump the thing.
That wasn't the first book, by the way. That was just what I ended up calling my rule when I talked about it at work (I was still at the bookstore then).
Thursday, November 20, 2008
License to Meme
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MYSTERY CARROT AWARD
8 comments:
My favorite thing about The Lost World is that it was so painfully obvious that it was written specifically to be turned into a screenplay for the theatrical sequel. You've got Malcolm not being dead after all, lots of action-packed chase sequences, and those oh-so-cinematic chameleon dinosaurs (any resemblance to the special effects of Predator would of course have been entirely coincidental), but almost none of it ended up in the actual movie. I like to picture Michael Crichton pitching a huge stomping hissy fit at all his wasted effort, but I know he just cashed some gigantic paychecks and moved on to his next book. What a jerk.
I was always kinda partial to Kehaar, myself. "Yark! Dam rabbits no good!"
I think my brother owns Casino Royale, I'll have to borrow it.
I..I actually liked The Lost World. To be fair I was listening to an abridged audiobook version of it (I can listen to my iPod while typing at work so goooooo audiobooks) so I didn't get too bored of it. I did roll my eyes a bunch of times during it, but I still enjoyed it.
Then again, I'm kind of a oddity with books. I love pulp action novels (Da Vinci Code, Matthew Reilly books, Stephanie Plum books etc), yet I also love classic literature (I read Pride and Prejudice every year without fail for instance). I read Agatha Christie mysteries, then go straight to the gore of Karin Slaughter books then on to Ian Fleming. And I LOVE sci-fi and fantasy. My bookcase and library history are...ecletic to say the least.
And now I want to steal your Disney books. Mmmm, Disney history and trivia.
Penh: It's a good racket, I guess. Gosh, I don't think I even made it to the chameleon dinosaurs. I remember getting up to the page that was the exact halfway point, with the T. Rex pissing on the jeep, and I let it go.
Megan: I need to read Watership Down again. I don't think I've read it since I was in high school. That was the third time I read it. I get Zero Mostel's head in my voice instead: "You stupid bunnies!"
Koeniou: I liked Jurassic Park, and most of the Crichton I've read, but I just couldn't bother with the rest of The Lost World. I could see where you could have it on an iPod and let a reader do all the work (ha). After that, I never liked a Crichton book again. I didn't like Timeline or Disclosure or Airframe or whatever the hell it was called.
Your bookcase sounds about like mine. But a quarter of mine is devoted to science fiction. I'm trying to find a copy of every one of the 500 or so books Isaac Asimov wrote.
What was the last book you bought?
20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill (Stephen King's son, the dedicatee of THE
SHINING)
The Worst Person in the World by Keith Olbermann
Name a book you have read MORE than once
My Gorgeous Life by Dame Edna Everage
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkein
Carrie, 'Salem's Lot, The Shining, & The Stand by Stephen King
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
Little Me, Auntie Mame, by Patrick Dennis
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne
Many, many others.
Has a book ever fundamentally changed the way you see life? If yes, what was it?
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. I read it the first time when I was 14, and it fundamentally changed how I thought about everything.
The Sexual Outlaw by John Rechy. It made me political about my sexual
orientation.
How do you choose a book? eg. by cover design and summary, recommendations or reviews?
Who the author is. What it's about.
Do you prefer Fiction or Non-Fiction?
No preference. Read both. Have written both.
What’s more important in a novel - beautiful writing or a gripping plot?
Both. A book can get by with either, but not with neither. At The
Mountains of Madness by HP Lovecraft has a great story, but Lovecraft's prose is always a trial. (Holds true for all of Lovecraft.) Edgar Rice
Burroughs wrote great yarns, but his prose was GHASTLY! No one is ever quoting the "Great prose" of L. Frank Baum. On the other hand, in the Lucia novels by EF Benson, almost nothing ever happens; in fact, the plots are trivial beyond belief, but his hilarious writing style makes them engaging and so readable, that I plowed happily through all 1100 pages of MAKE WAY FOR LUCIA in sheer joy. The novels of Gore Vidal, HG Wells, and Charles Dickens have both.
Most loved/memorable character (character/book)
Belle Poitrine, LITTLE ME
Mame Dennis, AUNTIE MAME
Valentine Michael Smith, STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND
Sherlock Holmes, THE SHERLOCK HOLMES STORIES
Norman Bates, PYCHO
Count Dracula, DRACULA
Myra Breckenridge, MYRA BREKENRIDGE & MYRON
Kal-El, SUPERMAN COMICS
Mrs. Emmaline Lucas (Lucia), THE LUCIA NOVELS
Dame Edna Everage, MY GORGEOUS LIFE
Captain James Hook, PETER PAN
Mr. Micawber, DAVID COPPERFIELD
Many others.
Which book or books can be found on your nightstand at the moment? (This
is ALWAYS a LARGE stack)
Groucho, The Life and Times of Julius Henry Marx, by Stefan Kanfer
20th Century Ghosts, by Joe Hill
My Life in Porn, by Bobby Blake
Elsa Lanchester Herself, by Elsa Lanchester.
Me and Jezebel, by Elizabeth Fuller
The End of Faith by Sam Harris
Brando Unzipped, by Darwin Porter
Michael Palin Diaries 1969-1979 The Python Years, by Michael Palin
Strangers on a Train, by Patricia Highsmith
A Slight Trick of the Mind, by Mitch Cullin
Hazel Court Horror Queen, by Hazel Court
What was the last book you’ve read, and when was it?
Over the last month:
My Trip Down the Pink Carpet, by Leslie Jordan
The Terror, by Dan Simmons
The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins
Nightlife of the Gods, by Thorne Smith
The Worst Person in the World, by Keith Olbermann
Have you ever given up on a book half way in?
Many, many times.
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, by Stephen King
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole (It's in my
to-be-finished-someday pile)
Black House, by Stephen King & Peter Straub
The Regulators, by "Richard Bachman"
From a Buick 8, by Stephen King (Note a trend, In recent years, King has become the King of books I don't finish, though I enjoyed CELL and Bag O'Bones.)
I love the Oz books and The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus, but L. Frank Baum's prose is actually pretty terrible. Especially in those books like Ozma of Oz and Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, where Baum had an eye to adapting the books into stage plays and has Dorothy talking like an ingenue.
I too love the Oz Books. I read them all as a kid, and I reread the
entire series (ONLY Baum's I mean. I could never stand Ruth Plumly
Thomson's Oz books, even as a kid. Too "Girly.") in order in my mid-30s. (My mother reread them in her 60s, to my dad's disgust, who could not see what an elderly woman could see in reading children's books.) I like the ones with strong story lines, OZMA OF OZ, PATCHWORK GIRL OF OZ, THE LOST PRINCESS OF OZ, THE TIN WOODMAN OF OZ (Which has that extremely weird
existential conversation between the Tin Woodman and his "Flesh" head, arguing over which of them is the real Nick Chopper. And then they meet Chopfyte, who takes identity issues still further into the Twilight Zone. Kids who know only the movies have no idea that the Tin Man has a name.).
I wonder if Baum could get away with the transgender plot of THE
MARVELOUS LAND OF OZ today. (Not to mention it's anti-feminist subplot,
which Rush Limbaugh would love. Talk about your Feminazis!)
In 1960, there was a TV adaptation of the second Oz book, with an adult
Shirley Temple playing Tip/Ozma (It was an episode of her TV series,
SHIRLEY TEMPLE'S STORYBOOK), Shirley played most of the show in drag. It turned an entire generation gay. ("Instead of nasty old boy, you'll be a fairy princess!" "OH GOODY!")Your beloved Jack Pumpkinhead was played by
Sterling Holloway, and not just the voice. Sterling had to wear the outfit and the Jack O'Lantern head. Mombi was Agnes Moorehead (Who looks
JUST like the illustrations). Glinda was played by Candice Bergan's mother! The female-army-conquers-Oz subplot was jettisoned, and it's Jonathon Winters and Arthur Treacher who conquer Oz.
Some of Baum's books are just tired retreads though. TIK-TOK OF OZ is
just OZMA OF OZ back through the meat grinder a second time. DOROTHY AND THE WIZARD IN OZ is a very tiresome, plotless mash-up of stuff, as is THE ROAD TO OZ. RINKITINK IN OZ is almost unreadable.
I did not care for THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF SANTA CLAUS. Frankly,
moving Santa from The North Pole to a forest on the continent with Oz and Ev ("AFRICA?" asks Sarah Palin.) turns one off right at the start. It's like writing a biography of Sherlock Holmes, and beginning with "Sherlock Holmes lived his whole life in Rio."
I have QUEEN ZIXI OF IX on a shelf but I have yet to try to read it.
But Baum was no prose stylist. When you compare his writing with a real
stylist writing for kids, like AA Milne, Sir James Barrie, or Lewis Carroll, Baum falls right off the turnip truck. Some of his puns are good.
On my dining room wall is a poster for the flim of THE WIZARD OF OZ, from a 1969 rerelease, that is signed by Margaret Hamilton. She wrote: "Almost got you, Doug. Now always watch it! Witchie Wishes and luck from me. WWW Margaret Hamilton." And she drew a tiny witch hat and broom. It is my most prized posession.
The first thing I ever wrote on my own, as in for fun, not a school assignment, was a play titled THE MAGIC HAT OF OZ, which was staged by Lunada Bay Elementary School starring me in 1960. It's not very good, but then, I was only 10 years old. It did however set my feet upon the path to being the professional writer I am today.
A few years ago there was an Oz exhibt at the Hollywood Public Library, just three blocks from where "Ozcot" had stood, where Baum wrote the later Oz books. In a frame was a pencil about two inches long, discoloured from use. It was mounted on a sheet of paper on which were handwritten these words: "With this pencil, I wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in 1899. L. Frank Baum." It is the holiest relic I have ever touched, except perhaps for the time I placed my hand on the desk on which Dickens had written A TALE OF TWO CITIES.
I read some of the Ruth Plumly Thompson books. THE ROYAL BOOK OF OZ is probably the best one, although I liked JACK PUMPKINHEAD OF OZ (of course) and KABUMPO OF OZ. I liked the latter mainly because it was about an elephant, though. I stopped at JACK PUMPKINHEAD. The only other Oz-related books I've read since (and loved) were Eric Shanower's graphic novels.
When I read the books as a kid, DOROTHY AND THE WIZARD IN OZ and THE ROAD TO OZ, one coming right after the other, were hard to get through. DOROTHY AND THE WIZARD was so episodic, and almost none of the episodes really grabbed me (although I never forgot the vivid illustration of the Wizard slicing the vegetable man in half with his sword).
I'd heard about the Shirley Temple episode before. When I was about 10 I saw a video of a play (we rented it at our local outlet) of THE MARVELOUS LAND OF OZ. It had Jelia Jamb and her army in it; the line that got the most laughs was Tip's "The women are revolting!" coupled with the Scarecrow's "You feel that way now, but you won't think so when you're older."
RINKITINK IN OZ is the worst of the Oz books. I do love THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF SANTA CLAUS; there's an interesting graphic novel version by Mike Ploog that is very Scandanavian and looks like a Teutonic epic.
There's a comic book series I'm reading now called THE OZ-WONDERLAND CHRONICLES, another attempt to put both worlds together that, for the most part, is succeeding. It's obvious the authors have read both the Oz series and the two Alice novels for a change. They get Wonderland right by emphasizing the illogic/logic instead of the weirdness. I've met the guys who do it (one of them is kind of prickly).
Milne, Barrie, Carroll... maybe you just have to be British or Canadian.
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