Friday Reads 1.19.23

It’s Friday, and you know what that means. Let’s talk about what we’re reading!

We had ten inches of snow on Monday, and that rarity was much enjoyed. I took the day off from work (it was MLK Day, so most everyone else did, too,) and spent the day in the kitchen and watching movies. I did some bread-making (not very well, my first foray into baguettes needs some mastering), perfected Randy’s sausage ball recipe, and watched THE HOLIDAY, 16 CANDLES, and INTO THE WILD. Yes, snow days are the best days.

I also worked on my 40 Scenes for the new novel, and if you’re following 22 Steps, I posted Step Four: Research. It was perfect for this moment because it’s time to read the research books I’ve been gathering! (True confession, I am also gathering research books for the book after this. It’s a problem 😂.) You’ll note a theme, both in the books and the poetry.

FERAL: Losing Myself and Finding My Way in America’s National Parks by Emily Pennington

INTO THE WILD by John Krakauer

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

I Live My Life in Widening Circles by Rainer Maria Rilke

A verse from Lord Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage was the epigraph for the movie version of INTO THE WILD, and is the ethos upon which my setting is built. I studied this poem in college, so it was really fun to pull out my trusted Norton Anthology of English Literature and read, only to be stymied because it stops midway through Canto III. Despite the Google searches to the contrary, this is in Canto IV, Verse 178. It is perfection.

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more.
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, I have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.

I was also deeply touched and amused to see I’d written “Byronic Hero” next to the poem’s title. This theme runs through my work, and it was funny to see its inception. The concept impacted me greatly. The Byronic hero is generally rebellious, a contrarian, and often fails in their heroic deeds. I’ve also defined them as doing the wrong thing for the right reason — our favorite fictional assassins come to mind. I love seeing that my 19-year-old self was enamored of this idea, and I’ve pulled that thread through my entire creative life. Thanks, Lord Byron.

Wolf Hall continues to be enjoyable. It’s become my Sunday evening ritual to read the chapters for the week and admire the innovation of the story. At one point, my writer's brain wondered if Hilary Mantel decided to change the POV from third to first, then got bored with that and decided to go with what felt right in the moment because there are plenty of shifts. Sometimes we’re in Cromwell's head, sometimes in the narrator’s. A fun exercise, for sure.

That’s it from me this week. How about you? Was it nutty weather there too? What’s on your reading plate this weekend?