35 posts tagged “qotd”

If you could teleport to any place in the world right this second, where would you go?

People and Dogs on the Beach

What's your favorite flavor of ice cream?

I hate ice cream

As a sort of all-purpose way of responding to both the Question of the Day and the Vox Hunt, allow me to present to you what may just be my favorite novel of all time.  I mean, it's hard to say, really, since I specialize in novels; novels are my livelihood.  I am in love with so many and am reluctant to play favorites, but if you put a gun to my head and demanded that I choose, I would utter, without hesitation, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight.

The Real Life of Sebastian Knight

Vladimir Nabokov

It's Nabokov's first novel in English, and his insecurities about writing in a new language are clear -- in the plot, not so much in the language itself.  The dude is always foremost a technical virtuoso, and he plays with words in a way I have rarely seen others do.  Nonetheless, the hapless Russian narrator, V, is uncertain about the English language and writes in the shadow of his brother, an English novelist of some (perhaps dubious) renown.

In one of my favorite passages, V describes the writing style of his brother Sebastian Knight, the purported subject of this sham biography, as being something to which both the narrator and I blindly,desperately, aspire:

[Sebastian Knight] had no use for ready-made phrases because the things he wanted to say were of an exceptional build and he knew moreover that no real idea can be said to exist without the words made to measure.  So that (to use a closer simile) the thought which only seemed naked was but pleading for the clothes it wore to become visible, while the words lurking afar were not empty shells as they seemed, but were only waiting for the thought they already concealed to set them aflame and in motion.

Reading this was a defining moment for me -- my thoughts about language and the act of writing, the theory I would later develop for dissertatory purposes, Nabokov's status as Favorite Writer Ever of All Time Really -- everything can be traced back to this.  Not to be too dramatic, or anything.

What books did you love as a child? 
Submitted by hearts. 

Generally the "blah blah blah as a child" questions kind of hack me off -- it's almost as if we as a people have nothing in common but a shared, often ironic, nostalgia.  (The hip, ironic nostalgia has been getting on my nerves for years.  At one point I thought if I heard another be-porkchopped punk in the school cafeteria waxing on about Schoolhouse Rock I would kill myself.  As we see, though, I managed, narrowly, not to.)

This question, though, is another story.  Once I started adding books here, I kind-of couldn't stop! Let me assure you, though, my nostalgia is entirely earnest and post-ironic.  So, without further ado, we have Category One: Books I Read With Dad:

My dad is a chemist and a fan of The Sci-Fi-and-Such, so it's no surprise that we read C.S. Lewis, Tolkien, and Madeleine L'Engle together.  For better or worse, our copy of Lord of the Rings did not have Viggo Mortensen's face on it. When I found these books on Amazon, though, I saw that the Madeleine L'Engle set is called The Time Quartet, and I absolutely do not remember there being four of those books.  I only remember reading A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door (Super cool!  They go inside a cell to save some mitochondria...or something.  Anyway, it's cool.) an A Swiftly Tilting Planet.  I most certainly did not read the dubious fourth book, whatever it may be. (A quick search tells me it's called Many Waters.  Nope, definitely did not read it, which is fine with me, as it turns out that it's mainly about Sandy and Denys, my two least favorite characters in the series.  Incidentally, Dad insisted on pronouncing  Denys like Denny's.)

And now let us move on to Category Two: Girly Books I Was Told Were Below My Reading Level But I Did Not Care:

I loved all of the Judy Blume and Beverly Cleary books I could get my paws on.  I've just put a little selection here, but I'm sure I read all of the Ramona Quimby books, and I still love the name Ramona, but I now recognize Quimby to be a most unfortunate surname. (Dude!  Most Unfortunate!) And who among us did not love Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret?, that wonderful ode to the onset of puberty.  I remember being distinctly relieved that I would never have to use the strange belted maxi-pad contraptions described in the book.  I think we can all be thankful for the invention of the adhesive kind. My parents thought I should be reading more "advanced" books, whatever that means, and in addition to these, they sure as hell would have liked to disappear the entire Babysitters' Club series from my shelf.  I did learn about the genre of epistolary novels via Dear Mr Henshaw, though, so take that, parents!

Now comes the time for Category Three: More "Advanced," But Still Not What My Parents Were Hoping For:

And this brings us to Category Four: Books I am Surprised I Remember.  This is not so much a category as it is a single book:

The Owlstone Crown

Lately I have been trying to remember the name of this book, but it wasn't an especially pressing issue.  Faced with the QotD, however, I figured it was time to do some research and figure out what this book was.  All I remembered was that a brother and sister who are working on some lousy parsnip farm meet a Ladybug Detective named Lew, who takes them to some "other world" (you know how children's books always have some damn other world) to accomplish some "mission," and, of course, mayhem and intrigue ensue.  It turns out if you google Lew + Ladybug + Detective you will find this book immediately.  Why didn't I do that earlier? I remember it being a pretty great book, and one of which I was always vaguely reminded when I later read 1984. That makes it sound perhaps inappropriate for children, but I never really shied away from the darker stuff. I think I'd like to read The Owlstone Crown again.

And there you have it:  a brief tour through the books I loved as a kid.  We have these novels to blame for my bad posture (too many nights spent hunched over a book in bed, flashlight in hand) and my not-so-profitable attempt to pursue reading professionally.  Awesome!

UPDATE:  Oh my god, guys, I forgot a ton of books I should have included.  Luckily, my well-read neighborhood reminded me of some of them.  This means we'll need a Category Five: Books I Can't Believe I Forgot:

Encyclopedia Brown and the Great Brain were both role models for me.  They were always snooping around, solving cases, cleverly tricking people, and generally causing trouble -- all noble pursuits to which I aspired.  And who, after reading The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E. Frankweiler, didn't want to run off and live in a museum?  That book was freakin' great.  The Westing Game, too, with another hilariously named protagonist, Turtle Wexler.  Thanks for reminding me of all these great books, neighbors!

Other Honorable Mentions: Harriet the Spy, the Anastasia books (especially Anastasia, Ask Your Analyst, as my love of Freud began at an early age), and the Sherlock Holmes stories.

Pnin (Vintage International)

Vladimir Nabokov

This is a paralyzingly difficult question, especially for a bookish person like me.  The answer could change from day to day.  I have to say, though, that one character I always empathize with, in a weirdly powerful way, is Timofey Pnin. He's a bit bristly and deeply sad -- a man who sort of bumbles around just trying to do his job when all around him various academic jerkburgers are scheming him and his one-man Russian department out of existence, and yet still manages to throw the best college faculty party of all time. 

An insensitive reader might find him pathetic, but I find him just wonderful -- my heart catches in my throat every time I come to the part where he thinks he's broken the glass bowl.  And in the end, of course, things work out for Pnin: he drives off with the dog, not to be glimpsed again until his brief appearance years later at Wordsmith College.

Maybe I'll include some excerpts later (my copy of this book is at school), since my description clearly does the man no justice.

What character in a book can you connect with or relate to the most? 
Submitted by Eating A Book.

What song best describes your current mood*?
Submitted by Section31.

It's a toss-up, so you get two.  I basically can't get enough of this album.

The Good That Won't Come Out

Rilo Kiley

Paint's Peeling

Rilo Kiley

All-Time Top Fives:

Books:

1. The Real Life of Sebastian Knight - Vladimir Nabokov
2. Absalom, Absalom! - William Faulkner
3. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
4. Pnin - Vladimir Nabokov
5. À la récherche du temps perdu - Marcel Proust
   

Films:

1. Harold and Maude
2. The Graduate
3. Blue Velvet
   
4. The Big Lebowski
5. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
   

Music:

1. Dinosaur Jr.
2. Bob Dylan
3. Stevie Wonder
4. Frank Zappa
5. Ani Difranco

Top Five Things I am into Right Now, a Short, Multi-Media List:

1. Rilo Kiley - The Execution of All Things
2. Veronica Mars (Season 3)
3. The Zero Effect
4. Sugar - Copper Blue
5. The Office (U.S. version, Season 2)
   

In response to:

Books, movies, music; what's in your top 5 right now?

It was eighteen ounces of sizzling ground beef, soaked in rich, creamery butter, then topped off with bacon, ham, and a fried egg. I call it the Good Morning Burger.

In response to:

What's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? 
Submitted by Megan.

I think we all know the answer to this:

Ray Smuckles

In response to:

Which cartoon character best represents you? 
Submitted by Know It All.

My first job was at a Fuddruckers -- if you don't have one of those in your town, it's a hamburger joint that somehow treads the area between fast food and sit-down-type dining. Customers (a.k.a. "guests," as if!) order at a counter and then can dress their burger themselves at a "produce bar." There isn't table service, exactly, except for the people who had to go around offering to refill drinks.

I finally got that job thanks to the recommendation of a friend, and it couldn't have come at a better time: I'd been applying all over town and having no luck, what with the fact that I had no job experience whatsoever and was generally shy, nervous, and bad at interviews. Eventually, we managed to recruit several friends from school, and there was soon a huge group of us all working there, which made it an extremely fun job, in spite of its generally crappy nature.

The people who came in there were just unbearable at times: try asking some redneck from a trailer park how she wants her burger cooked, and she'll ask you to "char that thang black," because she "ain't wanna git that EBOLA virus!" There were families of screaming children, ladies obsessed with the caloric content of salad dressings, and proprietary middle aged men asking you to "smahl purty" if they didn't like the look on your face.

It really was a fun job, though, I swear -- especially when most of the people on shift were friends and therefore good for mocking the customers, and it got a good sight better when I got to move away from the front counter and try other positions. (Heh. Dirty.) The bakery was the best, because I got to go in hours before the first customer arrived, and I could play the stereo and mess around with bread dough all morning -- not to mention that I learned a lot about baking, which I still love to do.

In the coming years, I went on to become a computer lab monitor, carrot juicer, video store snob, barista, bank slave, and gradual student. Ah, but those are topics for another time.

In response to:

What was your very first job? 
Submitted by Laurel.