Comments on: The Gift of a Book

By: Ben Matterson

Ben Matterson — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 20:37:35 +0000

Yeah, well, as Jack would say, “No *true* feminist puts honey on her oatmeal.”

By: Kevin

Kevin — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 23:49:08 +0000

I’m not sure that Ben speaks for all feminists.

By: Ben Matterson

Ben Matterson — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 23:33:05 +0000

But you’re not sure that fine idea is actually feminism, in spite of my sincere delivery? I’ll admit that my definition is simple and possibly simplistic.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 16:20:40 +0000

That’s a fine idea Ben and I certainly agree with it.

By: Ben Matterson

Ben Matterson — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 15:31:29 +0000

You say that you’re not much of a feminist, but I am inclined to disagree. Feminism is the idea that women are people, no less than men. I haven’t seen you do or say anything that suggests you disagree with that idea. Just saying.

By: Robin Martinez

Robin Martinez — Wed, 25 Sep 2013 00:51:03 +0000

When I was perhaps 12, my favorite relative (my great-aunt, my dad’s favorite relative too I believe) sent me “Little Women” for Christmas. Little women? Little WOMEN? A GIRL’S BOOK? What in hell was she thinking? (I was not a girly person. I was deeply disappointed. I had hoped she of all people might actually know who I was.)

But I was a voracious reader, and one day there was nothing lying around to read so I picked up “Little Women.” My great-aunt deserved a shot, after all. It was about a girl who wasn’t girly and her three girlier but individual-human-being sisters and their mother surviving the years when their father was away in the war and they had essentially no money except for what mother brought home, which wasn’t much. (Father was a clergyman so even in the best of times there wasn’t much, but this was scraping the bottom of the barrel.)

I loved it, and so did my much-girlier younger sister. It made me less judgmental in the classic “book by its cover” sort of way, too.

By: carol chandler

carol chandler — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 20:36:52 +0000

In reply to Kevin.

To my knowledge I had nothing to do with a chemistry book! I too fell for the great Gatsby trick – I saw the film in my teens but didn’t get the point so I read the book. Didn’t get that either. I saw the film again in my 40s but age made little difference. And now they have remade it.

The bath is likely to drown the kindle – I tend to fall asleep there!

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 20:02:32 +0000

I’ve violated Bamber Gasgoine’s Law (I’ve started, so I’ll finish) a few times recently and ditched an awful book or two before the end. I’ve found two loopholes in the law though. One is that you are allowed to put a book aside as long as you promise to come back to it (see The Federalist Papers & Crime and Punishment & The Sound and the Fury & Paradise Lost). The other is provided by Mr Besoz’s Magical Device itself. You are allowed to send yourself a sample for free and read the first couple of chapters before agreeing to see it through to the finish.

But Bamber had me finish a couple of truly horrible books recently, both of which were recommended by Everyone Important: The Great Gatsby was horrid. It was one of those books where, when I got to the end, I wondered whether everyone else in the world was conspiring together in some vast practical joke on me Let’s pretend it’s a Great And Important Book and see if we can trick Kevin into reading it. (see also Lolita). I even tried watching the movie in case I had missed some subtle point in the book but, nope. The movie was equally without merit. Anyway, well done everyone. I fell for your silly prank.

The other book was The Road which I only kept reading to see if the second chapter (and the third and the fourth) would be as bad as the one before it. I already have No Country for Old Men on my Kindle but I am afraid to start it in case it’s horrible and Bamber makes me read it to the end.

Don’t worry, Carol, your Kindle won’t electrocute you in the bath but the the bath might drown your Kindle. I’m glad I was able to successfully recommend at least one book in my life. Hmm… Now I think of it, I wonder if you had a hand in recommending that chemistry book. Did you?

By: Carol Chandler

Carol Chandler — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:26:47 +0000

Despite the many calls on my time in this modern day – work, golf, gardening, knitting, wine, “Bejewelled” on my Kindle, TV, more wine – like my brother, I must always have a book on the go. Unlike him, I can only do one at once but, once commenced, must finish it(although I do confess to the very odd failure). I read a wide variety of books, some literary treasures, some trash (as long as it’s written in “proper English” with real sentences and proper punctuation. I’ve read many a Dickens and Hardy novel (although the title of Bleak House has perhaps put me off that one). I too loved Call of the Wild as a child and read it often. I loved the book my little brother bought me some years ago – Les Miserables – and its on my “must read again some time” pile. We studied Sylvia Platt on a number of occasions in long-ago English literature classes and I could once recite some of her poetry, although an ageing mind has put paid to that! I shall now accept the recommendation for The bell jar, and download it to my Kindle, a newish toy which I am coming to love, although as yet I do think I still prefer the real thing (which is definitely less dangerous in the bath). Dad definitely never read a book, unless from the top shelf, but Mum did, and still does, read a lot so perhaps we got the bug from her. She was also guilty of telling little sister who was perhaps about 6 at the time, that the cat in Bleak House, which we visited when in Broadstairs once, did, of course belong to Dickens!

By: Georgina Lawrence

Georgina Lawrence — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 00:01:16 +0000

I think the Internet Killed the Book Star! I used to read a lot but just like the little clown, there’s too many temptations to sit and focus on a good book…shame really! I owe you for all the books you’ve read and summarised for me! Thank you…and maybe when we’re retired, I’ll let you recommend a book for me again! Not long now:)