Just in case everybody's wondering what I've been reading, I'm still working on The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe.. it's been a few months, and I'm about 3/4 done. Getting there! :)
Edgar is a poet right? thats cool getting to read something out of the ordinary such as poems, it reminds me of Transcendentalism.
Quote from: iago on November 02, 2006, 06:32:58 PM
Just in case everybody's wondering what I've been reading, I'm still working on The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe.. it's been a few months, and I'm about 3/4 done. Getting there! :)
Scary?
Quote from: BigAznDaddy on November 02, 2006, 07:00:30 PM
Edgar is a poet right? thats cool getting to read something out of the ordinary such as poems, it reminds me of Transcendentalism.
..... I never knew poems were out of the ordinary in the realm of literature. :-\
Quote from: BigAznDaddy on November 02, 2006, 07:00:30 PM
Edgar is a poet right? thats cool getting to read something out of the ordinary such as poems, it reminds me of Transcendentalism.
It's not entirely poetry...it's a lot of really well written, nice flowing prose, with the occasional rhyme (at least with his longest stuff).
The book is roughly 95% (or more) short stories and 5% poems. Though some of his stories (Fall of the House of Usher, for instance) contain poems.
Most of his stuff isn't scary. Some is. His scary stuff is awesome.
He's written happy descriptive stories, mysteries, essays (actual real ones, such as describing how an automated chess player works), criticisms, and more. It's all really interesting and cool.
Him being one of the few poets to come of the South, I think it would be rather interesting to read his work. Generally when I think South + 1800, I don't really think poet, or literate, for that matter.
Haha, in his reviews he totally puts down American writers in general. He also has a story about furniture, where he talks about how great people are at choosing furniture in England, France, Germany, India, China, and pretty much all of Europe/Asia, then he talks about how much people suck at choose it in North America. I thought that was funny :)
I have to admit, I skipped two of the stories so far -- one was a review of a poem I never heard of (I read most of his reviews, because normally he paraphrases the book first, but this time he didn't) and the other was a non-fiction account of the rise of the fur trade, and all the different people/places involved. Since I never heard of the people/places, and it was a long story, I was totally lost by the 5th page and gave up.
I'm getting back into weird stories, now, which I missed. I'm looking forward to the one I'm going to read today!
Quote from: iago on November 02, 2006, 11:36:17 PM
The book is roughly 95% (or more) short stories and 5% poems. Though some of his stories (Fall of the House of Usher, for instance) contain poems.
Most of his stuff isn't scary. Some is. His scary stuff is awesome.
He's written happy descriptive stories, mysteries, essays (actual real ones, such as describing how an automated chess player works), criticisms, and more. It's all really interesting and cool.
I'm intrigued. I saw this book in Borders yesterday, and now I might just have to get it.
Quote from: leet_muffin on November 03, 2006, 12:53:17 AM
Him being one of the few poets to come of the South, I think it would be rather interesting to read his work. Generally when I think South + 1800, I don't really think poet, or literate, for that matter.
Don't you dare make fun of the great state of Virginie! THE SOUTH WILL RISE AGAIN!!!
Incidentally, what's all this about the south? He was born/raised in New England (Massatoosis), iirc..
"He was born Edgar Poe to a Scots-Irish family in Boston, Massachusetts, on January 19, 1809, the son of actress Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe and actor David Poe, Jr."
wikipedia.org
:D
Apparently my history book sucks. It stated, very clearly, that he was from the South.
Well, he was born/raised south of Canada.. it's all relative :)