Tara Road

It’s time to say goodbye. The semester is at last drawing to a close.

This project has been fun. I’ve had a good time putting it together. I have also enjoyed making time to read with the my normally hectic schedule. It’s been slightly surreal this past semester. I’ve been working so hard for the final goal of graduation and it has finally arrived. I’m a little scared as to what’s to come. However, I think it will be exciting, fun and different. I’m ready to make my place in the world. So as graduation looms, my advice to everyone, “Take some time out to enjoy the now, or you’ll never notice what’s around you.”

The value of books is amazing. Important lessons in life can be learned from books and writings. It’s important to learn from other people and experiences through the transitions of life. I hope that this Web site has allowed you to enjoy books again.

Have a great holiday season! Have a great year as well!

East of Eden shows why John Steinbeck is such an acclaimed author. Following the lives of the Trask family from 1860’s Connecticut to the Salinas Valley, Northern California during World War I, the novel explores human nature and the choices that people make in their lives. The Hamilton family, Lee the Chinese philosopher-cook, and others who are involved in and influence the lives of the Trasks, also play important roles in the novel, adding character and variety to the story.

The story of Adam and Catherine Trask parallels the biblical story of Adam and Eve; the story of their sons, Caleb and Aron Trask parallels the story of Cain and Abel. Like the Hebrew version of both biblical stories, East of Eden, revolves around the Hebrew word, Timshel - thou mayest - to which Steinbeck attributes great significance. The narrative explores the choices that the main characters make and leads the reader to examine his or her own choices in life.

A reflective commentary on human nature, East of Eden takes the reader on a tour of the human mind and focuses on people’s abilities to deal with emotions, as seen through the eyes of Steinbeck. The novel’s characters encompass a wide cross-section of humanity - the poor and the rich, the dreamer and the pragmatist, philosophers, poets, the brave, and the cowardly, giving the reader insight into a diversified human morass. Readers might question the authenticity of the one-dimensional character of the evil Catherine Trask, but even this character serves to illustrate a facet of human existence - life without a conscience.

Although the novel moves at a sedate pace, it augments the story rather than detracts from it, giving readers time to think and absorb, something they are bound to do when reading this novel. Those who enjoy philosophical discussions and are intrigued by the human mind will enjoy this sensitive, thought-provoking, and fascinating portrayal of humanity. n

Emma is quite possibly my favorite book out of all the books that Jane Austen wrote.

I am a fan of classic literature. I read some new books. However there is something a lot more alluring about a classic. One that has been read time and time again. Emma can actually apply to real life as well. If you’ve seen the movie Clueless, then you have more or less gone through the story of Emma. There are so many similarities between the two that it is startling.

In the book, Emma who is the main character is born into a life of privilege. Her mother has passed on, so she lives with her father. They are the premier family in town. Emma thinks that she knows what is best for everyone, which a lot of people do so it’s forgiveable. Initially I didn’t totally like her. I do now though. She becomes friends with Harriet who is of lesser class. She guides Harriet through. Yes, I am leaving a lot of meat out of the story because if I told you about the whole book. I would still be here hours from now. And no doubt you wouldn’t. In the end, everything works out. Emma ends up with whom she should as does Harriet. Everything is as it should be.

It’s a great book. I think that it is better than Pride and Prejudice, which has become recently popular with the release of the movie. I usually hate books made into movies. They usually destroy the whole story. This is a movie though that I think does justice to the original work. So Emma is a good read. Pride and Prejudice also a good read but a good movie as well.

Leo Tolstoy was born on August 28, 1828 at Yasnya Polyana, in Tula Province, the fourth of five children. His parents died when he was a child. Relatives brought him up. In 1844 Tolstoy started his studies of law and oriental languages at Kazan University, but he never got a degree.

Tolstoy was treated for venereal disease in 1847, and for most of the rest of his life was troubled by his tendency to debauch himself on a grand scale. After contracting heavy gambling debts, Tolstoy accompanied his elder brother to the Caucasus in 1851, and joined an artillery regiment. In the 1850s Tolstoy also began his literary career, publishing the autobiographical trilogy Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth.

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Truman Capote was born in New Orleans, as the son of a salesman and a 16-year-old beauty queen, Lillie Mae Faulk. His father, “Arch” Persons, worked as a clerk for a steamboat company. Arch never stuck at any job for long, and was always leaving home in search for new opportunities. The unhappy marriage gradually disintegrated. When Capote was four, his parents eventually divorced.

In his childhood Capote made friends with Harper Lee, who portrayed him as Dill in her world famous novel To Kill a Mockingbird.

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Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Illinois, starting his career as a writer in a newspaper office in Kansas City at the age of seventeen. After the United States entered the First World War, he joined a volunteer ambulance unit in the Italian army. Serving at the front, he was wounded, was decorated by the Italian Government, and spent considerable time in hospitals. After his return to the United States, he became a reporter for Canadian and American newspapers and was soon sent back to Europe to cover such events as the Greek Revolution.

During the twenties, Hemingway became a member of the group of expatriate Americans in Paris, which he described in his first important work, The Sun Also Rises. Equally successful was A Farewell to Arms, the study of an American ambulance officer’s disillusionment in the war and his role as a deserter. Hemingway used his experiences as a reporter during the civil war in Spain as the background for his most ambitious novel, For Whom the Bell Tolls. Among his later works, the most outstanding is the short novel, The Old Man and the Sea, the story of an old fisherman’s journey, his long and lonely struggle with a fish and the sea, and his victory in defeat.

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John Steinbeck is an American writer, who described in his work the struggle of people who depend on the soil for their livelihood. He was born in Salinas, California. Steinbeck was educated at Stanford University.

When he was in his twenties, he worked as a ranch hand and fruit picker. His first novel, Cup of Gold, romanticizes the life and exploits of the famous 17th-century Welsh pirate Sir Henry Morgan. In The Pastures of Heaven, a group of short stories depicting a community of California farmers, Steinbeck first dealt with the hardworking people and social themes associated with most of his works. His other early books include To a God Unknown, the story of a farmer whose belief in a pagan fertility cult impels him, during a severe drought, to sacrifice his own life; Tortilla Flat, a sympathetic portrayal of Americans of Mexican descent dwelling near Monterey, California; In Dubious Battle, a novel concerned with a strike of migratory fruit pickers; and Of Mice and Men, a tragic story of two itinerant farm laborers yearning for a small farm of their own.

Steinbeck’s most widely known work is The Grapes of Wrath. The stark account of the Joad family from the impoverished Oklahoma Dust Bowl and their migration to California during the economic depression of the 1930s.

Steinbeck’s other works include The Moon Is Down, Cannery Row, The Wayward Bus, East of Eden, The Winter of Our Discontent, and America and Americans. In 1962 he wrote Travels with Charley, an autobiographical account of a trip across the United States accompanied by a pet poodle. Steinbeck was awarded the 1962 Nobel Prize in literature. His modernization of the Arthurian legends, The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights, was published posthumously in 1976.

Jane Austen was born in Steventon, Hampshire, England. She was the seventh child of eight. Her constant companion throughout her life was her sister, Cassandra. She never married. Jane has almost no formal education.By the time she was 23 years old, Austen had written three novels, Elinor and Marianne, First Impressions, and Susan. In 1801, her family moved to Bath. When her father died 4 years later, Jane, Cassandra, and their mother moved several times, settling in Chawton. There is where she wrote most of her work. All of Austen’s novels were originally published anonymously. Pride and Prejudice was an instant success as was Emma.

Two common themes in Austen’s books are the loss of illusions, usually leading characters to a more mature outlook, and the class between traditional moral ideals and the everyday demands of life. She is regarded as one of the greatest novelists of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The Spiral Staircase was written by Karen Armstrong. The author of this book was a nun for 7 years before leaving her position as a nun to study at Oxford. She describes her feelings in the Spiral Staircase. She felt lost in a world that had continued to spin in the 7 years she had been a nun. When she returned to the world that existed outside of the ministry, she knew nothing about people, geography, politics, dating or socializing. She lived in a world of minimalist ideas. So when she did re-enter society, she found it difficult. There is a particular quote that I like from this book:

“Once the fixed point of home is gone, there is a fundamental lack of orientation that makes everything seem relative and aimless.” Read the rest of this entry »

I usually go to garage sales on Saturday morning. This last Saturday morning, I found across an older copy of Gone with the Wind. I’ve been reading it ever since. I’ve read the book several times. It has to be one of my favorite books. It has so much to offer to the reader. Action, comedy, drama, and emotion is set forth throughout the whole book. Gone with the Wind is set in Atlanta during the Civil War. It recounts the horror of the Civil War and how it destroyed the culture and traditions of the South. Read the rest of this entry »