This is an action/adventure book. Blood pumping action, heart thumping adventure. This book is about high adventure in Africa made famous by stories of big game hunters and old legends of lost treasure.Lifting his gun, he let drive at the last, a young cow. By some extraordinary chance the ball struck it full on the back of the neck, shattering the spinal column, and that giraffe went rolling head over heels just like a rabbit. I never saw a more curious thing.
....books are easier to understand when they are written in plain languageand
...a true story, however strange it may be, does not require to be decked out in fine words.This book, more than any book I've read from that period, reads in a style similar to modern writing. Gone are the too-flowery descriptions and heavy language. It's blunt, it's strong, and it's brutal. I say, fine job.
And then the response popped in my head. You score 3 extra Rambler points for guessing the correct response.
This was a strange little short story. Remember Moby Dick? Remember it's depth and symbolism and all that yada yada? Well, this was written by the same person. People have come up in arms to defend this short story and explain all its depth and symbolism and yada yada.
The anger and frustration and confusion and pain of a dying man, surrounded by people who have little or no concern for him at all. His entire life has boiled down to a few friends who are nothing more than coworkers interested in his position, and a family that does not love him but thinks of him as a burden. That's this book in a nutshell. It's famous as one of Leo Tolstoy's great achievements, a mastery of the mind.
Let me start by saying I had no idea this was mid-1800s chick lit when I started reading it. I plead ignorance. But I will try to give it an honest review, although I hold the "man card" in reserve to say something "ignernt" as we go on.
Now I want to talk about society at large, and how this book was accepted. When I read this I kept thinking how crazy it was that people would really treat Tess so badly. Hardy seemed to be overdoing it. But then it turns out that this book was actually turned down by several publishers "on the grounds that it was immoral in its sympathetic depiction of a fallen woman." What? I double checked that source and its true. That was a quote by Professor Patrick Allitt, Historian at Emory University.Durbeyfield was what was locally called a slack-twisted fellow; he had good strength to work at times; but the times could not be relied on to coincide with the hours of requirement; and, having been unaccustomed to the regular toil of the day-labourer, he was not particularly persistent when they did so coincide.
"I was like, what are you talking about?"
"Dad, you're not allowed to say 'like'."My 10 year old informed me that "old people" can't use "kid words". Well, I told that young lady a thing or two! I grew up in the 70's and 80's. We invented half the slang they use today.
"I know, right?"
"Dad, you can't say 'right' anymore, either."
Even after just a few chapters, I could feel this thing driving forward with a single purpose, to a predetermined end that left no room for conjecture - the destruction of a young girl.
But I can't discount the part Eliza and George played in this book. That was exciting and kept me on the edge of my seat. Early in the story, she took her son and ran away. One of the most dramatic moments of the book was when Eliza picked up her son and ran across the Ohio River, jumping from ice patch to ice patch. To be honest, I really thought she was going to die. I thought that Harriet Beecher Stowe planned to kill her off as an example of the brutality of slavery. But she didn't. I'm so glad! We were all in her corner, rooting for her! Go Eliza!!
