Break The Spine.

[BBP]

For Christmas I got Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, and I'm thoroughly enjoying it - that is, until now, as I've reached a section where somebody tells about his war experiences. Had to put it down. Eek. E. E. K.

[Rath Darkblade]

I started a book blog on my Tumblr and am really enjoying it.
http://bbp4bookshelf.tumblr.com/

Incroyable! I love the illustrations - particularly the Donald Duck Cooking Book for Children.

The illustrations in the Pushkin book look very familiar... <smile> When I was much, much younger, my babushka used to read me stories with exactly the same style of illustration. My Russian is fairly basic, but both my brother-in-law and my parents are fully literate in Russian. If you like, I can show these to them and get them translated.

Now is it a coincidence that, just today, I was thinking of (and practicing, from memory - including the math bits and the Russian bits) Tom Lehrer's song about Lobachevsky? Surely not...

It was on -
analytic and algebraic topology of locally Euclidean parameterization of infinitely differentiable Riemannian manifold.
Bozhe moi!

This, I know, from nothing!

(Hmm... am I strange for having memorised all that? I think not...)

[BBP]

That'd be great! I can read Cyrillic and do a bit of small talk, but that's it. Back in the day, almost 15 years ago, I was a Russophile owing to a Russian boy with beautiful eyes in my class, but I never got far with my Russian courses: all because I can't say the R.
Now I'm learning Japanese, and don't have to bother with the R.

There've been times I've wanted to pick up the studies but at the moment my love for Mother Russia is colder than liquid nitrogen.

[Collector]

Understandable.

[Rath Darkblade]

That'd be great! I can read Cyrillic and do a bit of small talk, but that's it. Back in the day, almost 15 years ago, I was a Russophile owing to a Russian boy with beautiful eyes in my class, but I never got far with my Russian courses: all because I can't say the R.
Now I'm learning Japanese, and don't have to bother with the R.

There've been times I've wanted to pick up the studies but at the moment my love for Mother Russia is colder than liquid nitrogen.

Ah, the rolling RRRR. I had trouble with that to start with, until I figured that I simply had to think of starting a motorcycle. By now, I've prrrrracticed it for so long that it almost comes naturally.

Well, feel free to PM me with whatever Cyrillic bits you'd like translated (perhaps scanned from the book?), and I'll see what I can do.

[BBP]

DId some research and found it's part of Pushkin's poem The Tale Of Tsar Saltan. Whew!

[BBP]

Finished Murakami, is an amazing book. Reading up about it was awkward as the ending seems to vary depending on your edition (the original US translation had 25,000 words cut - it's a genuine doorstopper) and the Dutch ending is apparently happier than the US one.

Am now onto HG Wells, War Of The Worlds.

[BBP]

Would love a book club but I'm not sure if it'd work.
Currently reading one of my birthday presents: The Evenings, by Gerard Reve, the audiobook. In Dutch, as read by the author.
I love The Evenings. It's the book I picked to read aloud at my Dutch oral exam, and I know the first page by heart.

De Avonden had never been translated into English, but finally Pushkin Press has announced they set Sam Gerrett onto it. Super excited!

[Tawmis]

Just finished the 3rd Harry Potter book and now onto the 4th.

[BBP]

Dad's pulled down three boxes from the attic - one was filled with old excerise books from elementary school (most of them are going away with the waste paper) but two were filled with mostly old children's books. Been drowning with nostalgia.

The second-hand shop visit on Monday was fun, got a picture book of Hiroshima and something called "How to write Adventure Games for the BBC Microcomputer Model B and Acorn Electron". There was also this book that had walkthroughs on Willy Beamish, Castle Of Dr Brain and Lemmings. Seemed a bit strange.

[Rath Darkblade]

A walkthrough for... Lemmings? Interesting. Surely that game relies more on how quick you are with assigning tasks for your lemmings, rather than puzzles.

Incidentally, I've never finished Willy Beamish. From what I remember of it, I don't think I've missed too much.

[BBP]

It was an originally Dutch book - still, seeing three non-serial games in one book is a bit odd, especially since there's one that's by a different publisher and there's one that's a different genre. For the Lemmings section the author'd printed each and every screenshot, and a not always totally clear description on how to solve the level. Looking back on it I should've checked to see how she described the Save Me! level (that's the second-to-last one that's monstrously hard).

[BBP]

Checked again at the 2nd hand shop and they had Dutch walkthrough books of LSL 1 to 5 and SQ 1 to 3. Didn't buy them since they aren't official and as such I doubt they're worth anything.

Anyway, I'm reading Murakami's 1Q84 trilogy. All in one volume; it's a hefty 1300 pages long, but the headway is massive, it's a great read! I love Murakami's aptitude at finding the correct simile for every situation. And I love how he can describe music in a way that you immediately want to listen to it. My life has changed for the better now that I know the overture to Rossini's The Thieving Magpie is perfect music for cooking spaghetti.
Anyway, especially for our resident Proust fan Andrea, here's a quote when protagonist Aomame has to spend a few months in hiding and her friend Tamaru asks if he can get her anything, like books:

-"How would you like to read À la recherche du temps perdu by Proust?" Tamaru says. "If you hadn't read that, now is the occasion for it."
-"Have you read it then?"
-"I was never in jail, and I never had to be in hiding for a long period of time. And they say that you can't get through the book in any other situation."
-"Do you know anyone who's finished it?"
-"I do know several people who have been imprisoned for a long time, but they weren't the type to display much affection for Proust's work."

[/quote]

[AndreaDraco]

Eheh!

I read it in the long, relaxing summer between high school and university, when I truly had nothing to do beside swimming, reading in the sultry afternoons and going out with friends in the evening.

[BBP]

I remember that summer... didn't go on holiday but I took a job delivering magazines. There'd be about 50 different ones: women's mags, fashion mags, a scifi thing, teenage mags, some children's stuff, and the Playboy. It's very weird knowing who has the Playboy.
Brmbl... Anyway I read, or at least flipped through, all the mags as I had the better part of a day between receiving them and having to deliver. It taught me a lot. Like when you read a teenage girl magazine, and there's a test in it "Is he the right one for you?" and the first question is: "What do you like best about your boyfriend? Is it: A: he's very sweet, B: he always treats you to Mc Donalds, C: his best friend?"
And then you read a women's magazine and there's a test in it: "Divorce or not? Take the quick test!"

And a week later there's a test in some other mag "Are you happy?" and question 1 is "When is the last time you walked barefoot through moss?"

I'd like to start a magazine sometime.


Aaaaanyway... finished 1Q84, it is an amazing output! I have another Beckman and Oblomov awaiting my time but at the moment I want to enjoy this one.