I read books. Probably more than average, but somewhat less than a lot of people I know with degrees in English or Information Sciences (i.e. librarians), etc. Still, I read a lot of books and, by definition, very few are my favourite. I read them, then I rate them on librarything and goodreads. (I only update my goodreads once a year and use librarything for my main book-listing-storage and don’t bother trying to get me to switch to goodreads full-time because of the social aspect. I am an antisocial person and reading is sort of the epitome of antisocial. If I could bring a book to the bus stop so as to never talk to Super-Mom again, I totally would, except that would be purposefully rude and I don’t know if I can do it. Damn socialization to be nice!)

So in reading a lot of books that aren’t my favourites, I read books that I don’t like much. That’s easy. Two stars or less depending on how much I don’t like them. Then I read books that are okay, so three stars, maybe three and a half. Books I like, four stars and up. (We are ranking out of five.)

But what do I do with books I didn’t like most of, but then the end sort of pulled everything together? Maybe the last twenty pages were a four, but the first four hundred were a one? A weighted average? Or the fact that the author managed to pull out of a nose-dive should factor in more heavily? Or a book that I thought was one of the most amazing books I had ever read about Central American death squads which then, in the last third, turned into a Jerry Bruckheimer action film and totally squandered any positive feelings I had towards the story? How do I rate that one? No one tells you how to rate those? Or the book of short stories that I internet-know the person who wrote it and I’m the only person who has it in their librarything list so whatever I rank it, she’ll know it was me and if it is a bad ranking, then maybe she’ll internet-curse me?

Maybe I just need to make lists and stop ranking. This is too much stress for easily-stressed-out me.

I have finished Volume One of War and Peace. That is, I have read approximately three hundred pages of the the thirteen hundred page, tiny nine point font, volume that Geoff purchased at that bookstore on Spring Garden in Halifax that may or may not still be there.

And I think I’m finally getting into it.

Long ago, as a puny undergraduate, I read Anna Karenina and, really, only cared about the personal love triangles and machinations and the people-stuff. Levin’s lengthy digressions about emancipation, I rolled my eyes and scanned rather than read. Philosophy of something also did not manage to stick in my brain. Basically, any time people were lecturing and no one was sneaking off to have sex or throwing temper tantrums or having a party, I ignored. Thus, with War and Peace, I figured I’d be flipping through the war parts and devouring the peace. I even read a book (one of the Anastasia Krupnik books) where a character reveals she never even read the war parts of War and Peace. So I’m in good company, I thought to myself. A fictional character from a kid’s book in the eighties agrees with me.

And here’s my confession though: the war parts are so much better than the peace parts.

Maybe because I am no longer a twenty year old, the gossip and intrigue and general cattiness of the Russian aristocracy no longer hold my attention. Instead, I’m sitting there reading and saying When are we going to get to another cavalry charge? Is this growth? Have I grown as a person?

Maybe I’ve just become more violent.

Was starting to get into War and Peace, then got to the beginning of Section Two, in which there is a discussion on what uniforms to wear for inspection. Ugg. Why is there so much stuff I don’t care about in Tolstoy?

Cracked War and Peace. Read thirty-seven pages. Fell asleep.

This does not bode well.

Sometimes I am just sitting there, reading a book, thinking “Okay, this is a good book. Maybe I’ll buy it for some people.” When bam, sexism comes along and ruins the day (sometimes it isn’t sexism – sometimes it’s poor writing or a stupid dénouement or suddenly ridiculous characters but the last piece of ruining came from sexism).

Somewhere (the internet?) told me that The Day the Crayons Quit was worth checking out. So I did, from the library. The crayons revolt and write letters of complaint to their owner Duncan. I read it to Tesfa and she enjoyed it and I enjoyed it until we got to the dreaded pink page. And what does this pink page have on it?

It’s because you think I am a GIRLS’ color, isn’t it.

And there you go, book ruined. It went from being a book that I was considering buying for my nephews for Christmas to a book that I am ready to return to the library today so that I never have to see it ever again.

Of my small readership, I know some of you are thinking Wow. Meghan overreacts to really odd stuff, to which I answer, This is not an overreaction. I don’t need to have some freaking children’s book enforcing gender roles for no good reason. Yes, maybe the book is pointing out how idiotic assigning certain colours to certain genders is, or at least trying to, but whenever I read books that are trying to point out subtle societal influences on children, I think:

1. Nurture Shock reports that generally books written for kids to enlighten them about societal issues actually backfires for kids under the ages of 7-8, i.e. a book about bullying geared to an audience that young doesn’t prevent them from bullying. Rather it teaches them words and phrases that are useful for bullying. So explicitly labeling a crayon a girls’ crayon, even mockingly, does nothing other than reinforce in a little kid’s mind that there are girl and boy colours.
2. What the fucking hell? Why is it okay to have off-handed gender comments? It sure wouldn’t for other marginalized communities. Find me a well-reviewed, contemporary book geared for the kindergarten set with the following sort of comment: It’s because you think fried chicken is food for black people, isn’t it. No Stormfront or KKK books accepted. See. You can’t. They don’t exist because that isn’t appropriate but somehow gender essentialism is? Fuck this shit.

The second point is basically my test for sexism – if you replace whatever the male/female commentary is with some commentary about black people and think to yourself “Damn, that’s some racist shit,” then the initial male/female commentary wasn’t appropriate to have in the first place. This is a test I used frequently with all the misogynistic comments and treatment I got in my undergrad and it works pretty damn well.

So until I return the book to the library, I’ll replace that line with:

Don’t you realise how versatile pink can be?

In any case, fuck The Day the Crayons Quit for raising my hopes only to dash them against the rock of sexism like a toy dinghy in a typhoon.

Sometimes the books stack up so high that Tesfa tells me she’ll reorganise them so they don’t fall over and crush me in my sleep.

Sometimes my RSS feed gets so backed up that feedly (I miss you google reader) just says 500+ for the number of articles I haven’t read yet.

Sometimes there is just too much.

They picked number four.

Can I argue how they “randomly” picked this number? True random? Pseudo-random? random.org? Some degree of random which means I don’t have to pick number four?

I will be reading War and Peace. Off to find Geoff’s copy.

So I got this from here, which in turn got it from here. Since I have time, why not?

It’s time for another Classics Spin for any who are interested. What is the spin?

It’s easy. At your blog, by next Monday, Aug 19, list your choice of any twenty books you’ve left to read from your Classics Club list.

You have to read one of these twenty books in August & September. So, try to challenge yourself. For example, you could list five Classics Club books you are dreading/hesitant to read, five you can’t WAIT to read, five you are neutral about, and five free choice (favorite author, rereads, ancients — whatever you choose.)

Next Monday, we’ll post a number from 1 through 20. The challenge is to read whatever book falls under that number on your Spin List, by October 1. We’ll have a check in when October arrives, to see who made it the whole way and finished the spin book.

Five I’m Dreading
1. Jane Austen. I have never read a thing by Jane Austen because it always seems so inanely dull. So I don’t know. I should pick something I don’t really know the plot to. Or maybe I should pick something I do know the plot to so that I won’t get annoyed because at least I know what’s coming. I’ll choose later if this is the number picked.
2. Collected Stories of Anton Chekov by Anton Chekov.
3. That big Mavis Gallant collection at the library that taunts me whenever I walk past it on the shelf and leave it there for another week.
4. War and Peace by Lev Tolstoy. Yes Geoff, I know it is your favourite book, but it is long and full of terrors.
5. Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Wolfe.
    

Five I’m Neutral About

6. The Metamorphosis and Other Stories by Kafka, the copy that Geoff keeps handing over to me to read and that I never do.
7. Within A Budding Grove by Marcel Proust. So I did Swann’s Way. On to the next one.
8. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. Supposed to read this in Grade Twelve English, but managed to not have to take Grade Twelve English and go straight to OAC instead. Huzzah!
9. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood.
10. The House of Mirth by Edith Warton.
     

Five Can’t Wait to Read

11. Beautiful Losers by Leonard Cohen. I actually read this a long time ago in high school but should probably read again.
12. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. I’ll go for reading it in English though. My French is too rusty.
13. What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver
14. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
15. Some Hope: Trilogy by Edward St. Aubyn.
     

Free Choice

16. A Grain of Wheat by Ngugi Wa Thiong’O.
17. Sozaboy by Ken Saro-Wiwa
18. 84 Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff
19. 2666 by Roberto Bolaño.
20. Eichmann in Jerusalem by Hannah Arendt.

So check back on Monday to see what I must read.

Tesfa’s patience and memory have finally stretched out enough that we can read chapter books. So far, we’ve gotten through:

• The Twits by Roald Dahl,
• James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl,
• Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White,
• Matilda by Roald Dahl,
• Mrs Frisby and the Rats of Nimh by Robert C. O’Brien,
• and currently going through Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang by Mordechai Richler.

We’ve attempted, but not succeeded with:

• The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster,
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl, and
• Sideways Stories from Wayside School by Louis Sachar,

with the lack of success likely due to pictures more infrequent than in the books with which we have succeeded (Tesfa colours next to me while I read with instructions that I inform her when a page has a picture on it).

After we finish Jacob Two-Two, I’m going to try The Secret World of Og by Pierre Burton because we’re Canadian there are pictures on every page so it may keep her attention better. I’m trying Ramona after that.

I look at the books I’m picking and I’m struck by one, very obvious, fact: these are the same books I read when I was a kid and while most are classics, some haven’t aged that well. The female rats of the Rats of Nimh aren’t encouraged to do anything other than raise families and don’t attend meetings about The Plan. In Matilda and Sideways Stories, people are really rude, calling each other stupid and idiot, etc. There’s a few spots of very mild racism in Roald Dahl books. The illustrations in Jacob Two Two are seventies-tastic with bell-bottoms and sideburns and maybe that book speaks less to Tesfa than it did to my mother who read it to us obsessively when we were Canadians in London, UK as Mordechai Richler was when he wrote it. Still, when the option is these books or the Berenstein Bears book we mistakenly let Tesfa choose at the Costco over the Richard Scarry’s Cars and Trucks and Things that Go where you have to find Goldbug on every single page which is awesome, I’m going to pick the classics.

But I’m still looking for newer chapter books and all I find are books clearly too old for Tesfa because of the requirement of pictures on at least every other page:

• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making,
• The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place,
• Harry Potter (which I don’t actually even like that much – I know, scandalous – especially the later books that need massive editing and are clearly rushed),
• A Series of Unfortunate Events (which I haven’t read, but maybe it’s okay. I can take it out from the e-library and find out).

Chapters recommends something called Ivy and Bean to me. Is Encyclopedia Brown still around? That’s probably too old for her too. Otherwise Known as Sheila The Great? From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E. Frankenweiler? And I’m back to books I read when I was a kid.

Maybe I’m stuck with the Berenstein Bears for a while yet.