Whew!

LA COLMENA is proving a difficult book for me to wind through. It's not that the Spanish is hard. Reading vignette after endless vignette that are supposed to be related yet seem to leave only hints is wearying to me. I can't wait till it's over with. I had wanted to ENJOY my journey through Spanish literature. The first time that I read the first chapter of LA COLMENA, I truly did enjoy it! Now I am sloughing my way through Chapter Three and feeling so miserable. What happened?

I have been watching the movie LA COLMENA (1982). It helps me a little, but not all that much. I hope I will find enjoyment again later on in the bookk.

I am continuing my slow journey through Cela's La Colmena. Martín Marco is becoming an ever more interesting character as I read.

I am no longer writing from  a netbook, but from a REAL laptop. What a difference. Spanish puncuation is now much easier!

I am enjoying my slow journey through Cela's LA COLMENA. I like reading about Martín Marco even though I feel sorry for him because he is homeless and broke.

I now believe that Cela cared about his characters, at least more than I thought. I don't think he's enamored of Dona Rosa's ways, however.

I am having some trouble getting Spanish punctuation to work on this blog. It may be that it doesn't work very well with an Acer Netbook.

Down With My Characters?

Camilo José Cela gives the impression that he thinks the characters he creates are a bunch of stupid jerks. I need to learn a lot more about this author! However, I find La Colmena to be very interesting and will continue to read it.

Next, I am reading a book by Camilo José Cela: LA COLMENA. I am reading it in Spanish, its original language. How grateful I am for our computer and internet world, for who  would I have to talk to about these books?

A Word About Don Quixote

I was fascinated by Cide Hamete Benengali, the Moorish scholar who wrote down the history of Don Quixote in Arabic. I also found the Bachelor Sansón Carrasco to be an interesting character. Isn't it amazing that he announced the study of Don Quixote at his school in Salamanca?

I would love to study this book and make more comments, but I had to return the book to the library. When I can get my own copy, I can highlight and comment to my heart's content. I  may live in the dark ages, but I am not yet into downloading books onto Kindle or Nook I like those hard copies!

I HIGHLY recommend Edith Grossman's translation of Don Quixote.

FANTASY WORLDS

I wish that I could read all of those stories that Don Quixote was into about knights and enchantment. But in our day, don't we have many more fantasy stories of our own? I doubt that anybody ever went daft for the reading of them.

DON QUIXOTE LIVES IN ENGLISH! I have never read Don Quixote in Spanish, and the English translations I came across in the past were terribe; either academic and boring or "dirty old book" partial translations. A few days ago, my husband brought home from the library the new translation by Edith Grossman. It's not boring at all! In it's full context, it's not a "dirty" book in the least. It's a much more wonderful read than I could have imagined. I felt very sad when I read about the priest and the barber preparing to burn Don Quixote's books. Books were not abundant in those days. In today's world we would deem it silly to blame mental illness on a bunch of fantasy knight stories. Storybooks were a very good scapegoat, weren't they?

CHANGED MY MIND! I am going to open this blog up again. I have been gone a long time because of illness, but now I am well.