The Classic: Emma by Jane Austen (1815) “Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.” So begins Jane Austen’s comic masterpiece Emma. In Emma, Austen’s prose brilliantly elevates,…… Continue reading Classics Club Review: Emma by Jane Austen
Where in the heck did I hear about How to Suppress Women’s Writing by Joanna Russ? If you wrote a blog post about her in the past couple of months, do let me know. Anyway, Russ was an influential science fiction writer in the 1970s, so I’d been aware of her for a while and always meant…… Continue reading Feminist Friday Review: How to Suppress Women’s Writing by Joanna Russ
The Classics: Doctor Faustus (published in 1604 but performed earlier) by Christopher Marlowe Faust (1808/1832) by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Was it what I expected?/Did I Like It?/Is it worth reading? I don’t have much to say about Faust, but I thought I should say something, because I wanted to read these plays as part of my many-times-mentioned…… Continue reading Classics Club: Doctor Faustus by Marlowe and Faust by Goethe
I’m picky about short stories. They have to be truly amazing for me to care at all. Where worldbuilding or a few interesting characters might get me through a novel, a short story has limited pages to make an impression. I have some I like, mostly science fiction (or scifi-inflected) with the occasional classic like…… Continue reading Review: Seven Men by Max Beerbohm
The Classic: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1910) by L. Frank Baum L. Frank Baum’s tale of a little girl who discovers that there’s no place like home is one of the most beloved novels ever written. When a cyclone carries Dorothy and her little dog Toto into the magical land of Oz, she and her…… Continue reading Classics Club Review: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
The Classic: The Invisible Man (1897) by H.G. Wells With his face swaddled in bandages, his eyes hidden behind dark glasses and his hands covered even indoors, Griffin – the new guest at the Coach and Horses – is at first assumed to be a shy accident victim. But the true reason for his disguise is…… Continue reading Classics Club Review: The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by David Hewson and A.J. Hartley, read by Richard Armitage, was one of my favorite books last year and one of my favorite audiobooks of all time. Hewson and Armitage also did a version of Romeo and Juliet, another Audible exclusive audiobook, and a year later I finally had the opportunity to buy and listen…… Continue reading Review: Romeo and Juliet, A Novel, by David Hewson
Winner of a 1989 Lambda Literary Award, this collection of twenty-four entertaining and haunting 19th-and 20th-century tales from the US, Britain, and Latin America reclaims a literary tradition that has long been overlooked. Using such techniques as magic realism, allegory, and surrealism, the authors re-imagine the cliches of supernatural fiction, focusing on female characters and…… Continue reading “What Did Miss Darrington See? An Anthology of Feminist Supernatural Fiction” — Is This Feminist?
The Classic: One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Probably García Márquez finest and most famous work. One Hundred Years of Solitude tells the story of the rise and fall, birth and death of a mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendia family. Inventive, amusing, magnetic, sad, alive with unforgettable men and…… Continue reading Classics Club: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Classic: Giovanni’s Room (1956) by James Baldwin Set in the contemporary Paris of American expatraites, liasons, and violence, a young man finds himself caught between desire and conventional morality. James Baldwin’s brilliant narrative delves into the mystery of loving with a sharp, probing imagination, and he creates a moving, highly controversial story of death and passion that reveals the unspoken complexities…… Continue reading Classics Club: Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
Hannah Reads Books 