What are you reading now?

[Don Basilio]

The Complete Novels of Thomas Love Peacock, edited by David Garnett. On The Misfortunes of Elphin at the moment. I still don't care for Gryll Grange, although it seems to be much admired. Nightmare Abbey is his masterpiece IMHO and I'm leaving it till last. I'm re-reading them.

Just noticed at Nightmare Abbey and Northanger Abbey were published within a year of each other, my two favourite anti romantic satires.

[french frank]

Try this -
https://www.quora.com/Marley-was-dea...74bc&srid=3XIj

Yes, I think that does it. The colon throws what follows back on to the statement that precedes it. The semi-colon introduces something new which follows on, slightly stronger than the comma (yes, I use it often too, Pulcie - not always on social media where I make much wider use of the dash, which I would otherwise frown upon). So if Dickens uses a colon the starting point would be, why? what can he intend?

Marley was dead: everything else stems from that fact. Maybe colon = consequential, semi-colon = sequential? That said, Victorian punctuation can seem odd at times.

The Complete Novels of Thomas Love Peacock, edited by David Garnett. On The Misfortunes of Elphin at the moment. I still don't care for Gryll Grange, although it seems to be much admired. Nightmare Abbey is his masterpiece IMHO and I'm leaving it till last. I'm re-reading them.

Just noticed at Nightmare Abbey and Northanger Abbey were published within a year of each other, my two favourite anti romantic satires.

Glad to see someone else still reading the 'classics', Don B

[vinteuil]

The Complete Novels of Thomas Love Peacock, edited by David Garnett. On The Misfortunes of Elphin at the moment. I still don't care for Gryll Grange, although it seems to be much admired. Nightmare Abbey is his masterpiece IMHO and I'm leaving it till last. I'm re-reading them.

... I always relish the rejoinder in Headlong Hall when the discussion turns to the design of landscape gardens -

"Allow me," said Mr Gall. "I distinguish the picturesque and the beautiful, and I add to them, in the laying out of grounds, a third and distinct character, which I call unexpectedness."
"Pray, sir," said Mr Milestone, "by what name do you distinguish this character, when a person walks round the grounds for the second time?"

I agree that Nightmare Abbey is his masterpiece.

.

[gurnemanz]

Laura Tunbridge, Beethoven A Life in Nine Pieces. My only LvB read so far in this anniversary year and very recommendable. She uses the nine works, including a couple of less predictable ones, as the focal point for key phases of his life.

[DracoM]

1935 detective stuff by 'Nicholas Blake' - who was.....any guesses?
Answer coming later.

[french frank]

... I always relish the rejoinder in Headlong Hall when the discussion turns to the design of landscape gardens -.

As perhaps you do the Rev Dr Folliott's "Which of you can tell who was Jupiter's great grandfather? or what metres will successively remain, if you take off the three first syllables, one by one, from a pure antispastic acatalectic tetrameter?" in Crotchet Castle?

[Petrushka]

1935 detective stuff by 'Nicholas Blake' - who was.....any guesses?
Answer coming later.

Cecil Day-Lewis and assume that the book is 'A Question of Proof', one of the great classic detective stories. Read it in 1969 and remember it well.

[vinteuil]

As perhaps you do the Rev Dr Folliott's "Which of you can tell who was Jupiter's great grandfather? or what metres will successively remain, if you take off the three first syllables, one by one, from a pure antispastic acatalectic tetrameter?" in Crotchet Castle?

... i think Univ: Challenge shd try these...

.

[Padraig]

'I told you these were shadows of the things that have been,' said the Ghost. 'That they are what they are, do not blame me.'

[teamsaint]

Winter Journey, Ian Bostridge. Reads nicely in the opening few pages. Interesting production values in the pb edition.

[DracoM]

Cecil Day-Lewis and assume that the book is 'A Question of Proof', one of the great classic detective stories. Read it in 1969 and remember it well.

Spot on!!

[Joseph K]

After a promising start on Indian music and flamenco I was disappointed by Bailey's sardonic, sweeping comments on both western classical music and jazz.

Well, I've almost finished it and the above comment was made before getting to what I can now say is the main raison d'etre of this slim volume - the sections on free improv and Bailey's biographical notes, also how he practices and other things. These are what has made the book worth-while for me.

[muzzer]

Slightly tangentially but I can’t find a more appropriate thread, I’m looking for a dictionary of Russian idioms as a Christmas present for a relative reading Russian as an undergrad, any suggestions would be very welcome.

[eighthobstruction]

....Carlo Levi : Christ Stopped at Eboli....a marvellous book about a political prisoner sent to a remote Southern Italian village in 1930's....Levi observes the inhabitants of the village and their cruel/self indulgent/ignorant interactions. It is autobiography really....fantastic watching/witness.

[Bryn]

Merlin Sheldrake's Entangled Life. As John Cage was fond of pointing out, Mushrooms and Music go together well, particularly in many dictionaries.