This forum has many things to offer, I'm so glad it didn't disappear into the graveyard of powered down servers... I can find cookery suggestions & ideas, compile reading lists, shop for bargains without fisticuffs at checkouts and seek tips on veg gardening. Oh, and then there is all the musical discussions as well....
What are you reading now?
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Reading Lampedusa's The Leopard for the third time. I first read it as a student, then in middle life and now.....
It is ASTONISHING. What I can't understand is how it manages to be so good in translation. Is the language and the dark humour as good in Italian, or is the translator (one Archibald Colquhoun) an especial genius?
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Originally posted by kernelbogey View PostTony Judt: Postwar, A history of Europe since 1945 (2005) [933pp!]. Still on very early chapters of this monumentally erudite work. I am fascinated by the detail of the postwar chaos being brought into order by the Allies on one side and the Soviet Union on the other - my cradle years....
ps re The Leopard. Should we a start a thread on "books worth rereading several times"?Last edited by Alain Maréchal; 30-09-17, 10:38.
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Originally posted by Alain Maréchal View Postps re The Leopard. Should we a start a thread on "books worth rereading several times"?
Originally posted by ardcarp View PostReading Lampedusa's The Leopard for the third time. I first read it as a student, then in middle life and now.....
It is ASTONISHING. What I can't understand is how it manages to be so good in translation. Is the language and the dark humour as good in Italian, or is the translator (one Archibald Colquhoun) an especial genius?
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He's just dug out the English (Colquhoun) translation he has, which neither of us has read, so I might give it a go
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Originally posted by ardcarp View PostI'd love to hear your comments when (if?) you do. The level of description and comment on inner feelings are just breathtaking throughout. For humour, try Don Fabrizio's visit to a closed nunnery, or his shooting trip with Donnafugata's church organist. [Don Fabrizio is a Sicilian prince-ling and I suppose the whole book revolves around his feudal obligations..and a few privileges..in a changing society.] In case I've made it sound like a Don Camillo novelette...it isn't!
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The Bombing War: Europe 1939-1945 by Richard Overy.
Just started this and already it's apparent that here is a book that at last treats the subject on the scale it deserves instead of concentrating on the Blitz or the air war over Germany. Engrossing stuff and wonderfully well written."The sound is the handwriting of the conductor" - Bernard Haitink
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Originally posted by ardcarp View PostReading Lampedusa's The Leopard for the third time. I first read it as a student, then in middle life and now.....
It is ASTONISHING. What I can't understand is how it manages to be so good in translation. Is the language and the dark humour as good in Italian, or is the translator (one Archibald Colquhoun) an especial genius?bong ching
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Originally posted by ardcarp View PostReading Lampedusa's The Leopard for the third time. I first read it as a student, then in middle life and now.....
It is ASTONISHING. What I can't understand is how it manages to be so good in translation.
What I am reading now is Beyond Nature and Culture by the French anthropologist Philippe Descola, which seems so far a worthy successor to the most eye-opening and thought-provoking books on related subjects by Claude Lévi-Strauss.
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Originally posted by Petrushka View PostThe Bombing War: Europe 1939-1945 by Richard Overy.
Just started this and already it's apparent that here is a book that at last treats the subject on the scale it deserves instead of concentrating on the Blitz or the air war over Germany. Engrossing stuff and wonderfully well written.
Addendum--I just checked Amazon under Overy and I realize that I read his previous book, the one that is precisely about the bombing campaign over Germany, 1940-45. Have you read his previous work, Perrushka? How much of the new book is recycled material?
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