#77 Reading... and Wuthering Heights

I don't think it's a coincidence that every time I type 'Wuthering' it comes out as 'Withering'.

Let me begin at the beginning...

Children become readers by growing up around readers. Children learn to love reading after they read the first book that introduces them to the magic that is their imagination.

Children who love to read grow into adults who love to read.

I used to love to read in that way where you couldn't wait to finish work/run/dinner-at-friends' just to be able to get back to your book. I loved reading so much that I'd think and even talk about the characters even when the book was nowhere in sight. I could devour 3 books a week and never had a pile waiting - they didn't last that long once I got my hands on them.

But, one day, I stopped reading. And I've missed it. It's been literally years since I've read that way. The last book I read was I am Malala. It took me seven countries and nine months to finish it. I initially blamed my lack of interest in reading on the fact that I was writing. For some reason, I couldn't seem to do both. But I haven't written for most of this year, so that couldn't be it. I think I just got lazy.

It became too easy to be brain dead in front of the television, or to lose literal hours on social media. Brain numbing - brain dead. I don't want to do that anymore. I used to have an expansive vocabulary. I used to read in two languages for goodness sake! Until this week, I was lucky to be able to read two pages in a row and hold my concentration.

So I decided this week that I would fall in love with reading again. I went on an excursion to Collins Books and I bought a handful of books. I promised myself no television and no social media - just reading - and I HAVE LOVED IT.

I began by reading some Young Adult (YA) fiction - Me & Earl & the Dying Girl. I have to tell you, I hope the movie is better! Didn't matter though, because I was still motivated to read it and spent every spare moment I could until I finished it in two days.

Simultaneously, I listened to the audiobook version of Wuthering Heights just in case I really couldn't read anymore....

I also have always wanted to read the Classics. I thought this was one of them. I thought it was a love story.

My very brief summary of Wuthering Heights is this:

A narcissist with antisocial personality disorder torments two generations of the same inbred family. The End.

In my opinion, Emily Bronte grossly overuses the words ejaculate and erect. What an ugly tale about ugly people. I don't think I can bring myself to listen to Pride and Prejudice now for fear of what it might reveal.

Book-wise, I'm settling in to read The Umbrian Supper Club by Marlena De Blasi now. After just visiting Umbria, I'm excited for the memories it might evoke.

What are you reading?

#70 Dear Rocky - Still Alice

Read Rocky's Review here.

Dear Rocky,

I'm so glad we decided to review Still Alice, but more importantly, I'm so, so glad we decided to review the book as well as the movie.

Not so long ago, I caught a short flight. I've often found that some of the best books I've read have been those chosen spontaneously at the airport and read during stop-overs and flights. Still Alice was no exception. In fact, I would go so far as to say, Still Alice is the best book I've read in the last ten years.

Big call? Well, maybe, however I fail to recall any book that penetrated my psyche the way this book did.

As the author cleverly introduces us to the symptoms and progression of early onset Alzheimer's disease through the experiences of Alice and her family, I began seriously questioning whether they were Alice's symptoms or mine! This wasn't helped by a trick played on me by a houseguest - adding an unfamiliar photo to my heavily photo-laden fridge - while I was away. I came home and noticed it early on, completely perplexed at how I had no recollection of ever seeing the photo much less pinning it to my fridge!

This book got me in, massively. It took no time at all to read it and I felt every emotion portrayed on the pages.

Needless to say, I couldn't wait for the movie version, for which of course, Julianne Moore won her Best Actress Oscar.

Can I just put it out there from the get-go. I have never been so disappointed by a movie - EVER. Well okay, maybe it's close second to the disappointment I felt by Gone Girl.

First - the casting. Who in their right mind thought that Alec Baldwin was the best choice for John? Where in the book John struggled to cope with his wife's illness and couldn't step-up when she and the family needed him to, I found him to be a little week of character, a little pathetic if I'm honest. In the movie though, Alec just oozed arrogance and I found it gave a completely different feel to that sub-plot. It's controversial and thought provoking, isn't it. What would we do if our spouse was suddenly diagnosed with a degenerative, terminal illness.

I also couldn't come at the casting of Kate Bosworth as Anna. Yes she filled the role of the high achieving oldest offspring, lawyer, perfectionist, but I found her performance cold. I didn't feel anything about Anna, and so therefore I wasn't invested in her genetic test result nor her IVF success. It wasn't the only time I didn't 'feel' during the movie. Nothing about Alec Baldwin's performance moved me either. This is why I was so disappointed. I wanted to be moved. The book had me scared and crying all over the place!

The storyline was so rich and ripe for compelling, moving performances, but I'm afraid to say that Julianne Moore's performance gave me nothing either. Nothing. Except maybe in the very, very last scene, when she could no longer talk. But no tears.

I also couldn't understand why they changed the setting for the story from Boston the NYC and why was their favourite diner now a Yogiberry?

So I've already mentioned I found the book dealt with the spousal coping scenario much more thoroughly and satisfactorily. I also thought it dealt incredibly well with the concept of genetic testing and all of the children's dilemmas regarding testing and their results. I know books have more scope to deliver background information about internal processes, but I almost felt like the film skimmed over it.

There were a couple of scenes that I could empathise with, I suppose. In the photo below, we see Alice standing in front of her psychology class about to give a lecture that she had given hundreds of times before. But she can't figure out which lecture she is supposed to give. We see her scrawling through her folders, and she doesn't have any idea which to click on. That's painful to watch from the perspective of a psychologist and a university lecturer - one of my teaching nightmares in a way.

I could also relate to the scene depicted below involving Kristen Stewart who I think was brilliantly cast and ironically, the most likeable character. In this scene, she asks her mother what it's like when she doesn't remember. I think it's poignant and human and also a question I think I'd find myself asking.

I can't believe Julianne Moore won best actress. I'm sorry because I know you wanted her to win. But for me, that performance was lacking. I think Felicity Jones did a much better job.

I'm not going to rate the film Rocky, other than to say, I clearly loved the book more!

Over to you.

Jodie

#51 Dear Rocky - The End of Eve by Ariel Gore

Dear Rocky,

I just finished reading my advanced copy of Ariel Gore’s The End of Eve: A Memoir.  I read it in three sittings and it only took that long because of things like work and sleep.  Three sittings may not sound that impressive to the avid reader, which I used to be, but considering I’ve finished an estimated total of three books in the past 18 months, three sittings is saying something.
One of the reviews of this book states that it is “damn near sublime” and I have to admit as I turned the second page I agreed and prepared myself for perfect word selection at every sentence.
We both share Ariel as a writing teacher.  The universe was certainly looking after me the day the Literary Kitchen was recommended to me for online writing classes.  I’ve not met Ariel face-to-face and therefore it is easy for me to create her as an enigma in my mind.
In my version of Ariel, she writes only one draft of everything and gets it right, off the bat.  She then walks down to her publisher who willingly accepts her latest masterpiece and returns home to begin her next best-seller.
Of course I know this is vastly romantacised on my behalf, especially since we were lucky enough to read drafts of Eve in our last class in the Kitchen.
Ariel writes the way I want to write – as if she is sitting and telling you the story.  She writes like she talks – at least, the way I assume she talks.

Our job is to review movies, not books, but before giving you my ideas about the movie version of The End of Eve, I’d like to make a few comments about this story about Ariel’s relationship with her mother Eve after Eve is diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer.

Ariel challenges my idealised and idolised image in my mind of herself throughout this story as she communicates a subtle vulnerability at various times in response to Eve’s outlandishness.  At times, her quiet reserve frustrated me as I cheered for her to stand up to Eve time and time again, yet at the end it was the integrity and the strong sense of calm and inner peace that directed Ariel’s choices and responses that made me respect her even more.  She is now a goddess in my imagination – sorry Ariel!
I’m unsure how she conveyed this in words.  Perhaps it was the duration of the story, all the pieces together, that helped deliver that image of her to me.

Throughout the book, Ariel also talks a lot about food and shopping for food, preparing and cooking food, sharing food with loved ones.  I have to admit, I felt guilt-ridden and envious of the exquisite organic diet Ariel has.I wonder if the food helped give some symbol of normalcy in an otherwise very unconventional situation in a really interesting setting.  The message that life goes on even when our mother is dying.There’s a part near the end when Ariel interacts with her mum for the first time after not having seen her for ten months and Ariel comments that in spite of everything, she’s always really liked Eve.  This for me is the crux of the book.Through life’s toughest lessons, we have a biological, human need to feel loved by our attachment figures.  Eve described it so well after reading a book Ariel loaned to her, unaware of the message inside about love.  Waiting for love.The messages Ariel takes from her journey with Eve to the end are life changing and not just for Ariel.  But for her readers as well. 

I am so impressed and in awe.

Back to the movie side of things, I believe that this book would make a wonderful movie and I have carefully considered my cast.  Check it out:

Ariel Gore           -              Julianna Margulies

Eve                         -              Jane Fonda

Maia                      -              Peyton List

Sol                          -              Michelle Rodriguez

Maxito                 -              Blake Garrett Rosenthal

The Chef              -              Olivia Wilde

Can’t wait to read your cast list!  

Any other characters you’d care to explore?

Jodie

Read Rocky's review here!