Greg’s Comments (group member since Jul 02, 2014)

Greg’s comments from the All About Books group.

Joan wrote: "I’ll take November 3"

Thanks Joan! :)

dely wrote: "Self-promotion: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/..."

I deleted it dely - thanks!

Joan wrote: "Hmm, I wonder what it’s like to have things under control."

:)

Joan wrote: "Greg wrote: "Joan wrote: "The Grimke sisters figure into the plot of A Tangled Mercy - I’d not heard of them before this."

And Angelina's black grand niece Angelina Weld Grimké later became an imp..."

A talented and passionate family Joan! I hadn't heard of Forten - I'll check that out!

Myst wrote: "So far it's not my cup of tea (neither was Tom Sawyer), but a few things are coming to mind.

What exactly is a "towhead" (obviously not a blond haired person). They keep talking about tying up to ..."

I think the 'honey' endearments are a historical thing Myst; Jim is much older and sees Huck as a child ('chile').

As far as towhead, see this link, definition #3 [n]:

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/tow...

A sandbar or low-lying alluvial island in a river, especially one with a stand of trees.

If you scroll down, it even gives an example passage from Huck Finn. :)

Terri wrote: "Your birthday celebration sounds great, Greg! Belated best wishes.

It's getting towards late afternoon on a beautiful fall day--mild temps, sunny, nice breeze. I've spent the afternoon doing laund..."

Thanks Terri, and best of luck with the tests! I have some longstanding GI issues too - a real nuisance, but they don't appear to be too serious in my case; at least I'm still kicking! :)

Joan wrote: "The Grimke sisters figure into the plot of A Tangled Mercy - I’d not heard of them before this."

And Angelina's black grand niece Angelina Weld Grimké later became an important poet of the Harlem Reniassance. So now there is both an Angelina Grimké Weld and an Angelina Weld Grimké to remember! :) For a long time, I was getting them confused.

There was a fantastic book I read years ago about the history of the struggle for women's rights and women's suffrage in America. The stories were so lively and memorable! That's where I first saw Grimké mentioned. But later, I couldn't remember what the title of that book was, and I haven't been able to locate it. I'd love to read it again!

I still haven't set up any bookshelves in the new house. Once things are under control, I hope to set up floor to ceilimg shelves in one of the rooms. But there's so much else to do in the house - it could be quite a while!

dely wrote: "Here it's nearly 8 am and I'm awake since 4:30 am. I had a kind of nightmare in which my son made me really very angry. Though it was only a dream I'm upset with him, lol.
It happens often to me an..."

Haha, I don't think I've had that happen, but I have had it happen that someone really upsets me in an argument and after I've forgiven it and moved on, I suffer a handful of dream replays even more dramatic than what really happened over the following days. :)

Joan wrote: "Quite an image Greg, now I see D.H. Rubbing his hands and chuckling,too.

Your point about the “women question”, reminded me that
in Dracula, Bram Stoker portrays the main female character as stron..."

Definitely Joan!

It was a lively debate in Victorian times with quite famous writers and political figures on both sides ... some others inbetween. But there was a huge amount of debate on it for sure!

I think the conventional wisdom of the time was very much that women were by nature less logical, less capable of intellect, and possessing a unique "goodness" which was destroyed by activity and engagement with the world. Of course that was mostly an upper class conventional wisdom.

But the fascinating thing is that many writers were very bold in arguing against these ideas. It was a lively intellectual time in many ways--not stodgy at all--but the more that became true, the more violently the old guard protested the changes!

Leslie wrote: "Oh, Greg, that is a great book and perfect for November (the month of Veterans Day)!

I will withdraw my nomination and second Regeneration."

Yay Leslie! :)

Joan wrote: "Leslie, isn’t it great how differently we all react to writers. I really enjoyed D.H. Lawrence 30yrs ago, though I did not read him at school.

Those passages you quoted conjured up so many mismatc..."

There's the same sort of thing in The Fox as well. I like what you say Joan about them being mismatched. From these passages, it seems he has an inner darkness that he desperately needs his lover to "understand." She can't understand this darkness in him though, much less perceive it, and it leads to a perverse need to dominate, almost to destroy.

I do think part of this oddity is rooted in some ways Victorians thought about gender too. In The Fox, Lawrence seems to be dragging very common Victorian ways of thinking about women out into the light and carrying these ways of thinking to their inevitable and shocking conclusions. Many Victorians spoke of the "Woman Question" in such ways (activity destroying a woman's femininity, etc), but I get the sense that in actual private life, they didn't fully believe it .. or maybe more accurately in a tremendous act of pre-Orwell doublethink, they tried to believe all sorts of incompatible and contradictory things at the same time!

Lawrence though shows them what people would be like if they actually believed consistently in all the crazy things they were saying. It's hard to say how much of it is a conscious choice or how much was just a tortured internalized reaction to all these ideas floating around in his time.

Lawrence certainly had some inner torment and darkness. His relationship with his mother was difficult, and he's a strange fish. Some of his prose feels almost fetishistic.

But I also sometimes wonder if he's doing some of it on purpose .. trying to shock his contemporaries by showing them what their ideas would actually mean if they really believed them. I can see him in his study rubbing his hands together imagining the shocked reactions as he scrawls down quickly his next scene of startling sexuality with his pen.

Joan wrote: "I asked a old friend from Vermont, her family has been farming there for more than 200 years. She said that Concord grapes need a long cool fall to develop the best flavor - she doesn’t know if the..."

I love this Joan!! - this explanation rings true for me. I like your idea too Heather and Leslie, and it still could be true, but Joan's explanation really appeals to me.

The pleas for mist to retard the warmth of the sun seemed somehow important to me from the start. I sensed there was a metaphor for human aging in there somewhere, but I couldn't fully put together what it meant without this excellent inside info about grapes! As Frost lived in New Hampshire, it makes sense he might be thinking of Concord grapes. Thank your friend for us Joan - much appreciated! :)

Marina wrote: "Life is quite overwhelming for me at the moment. I'm still reading quite a lot, though not so much as usual. I have a hard time concentrating. I'm not reviewing anymore, or very rarely, not even fo..."

I definitely see many on AAB as friends too Marina! I think doing what you can at your own pace is good. :) Take care of yourself, and hopefully over time your concentration will come back so that you can do all the reviewing for your blog that you enjoy!

Chrissie wrote: "Heather, you wanted feedback about if the shorter thread would work better for email notifications. I DID get a notification for this!!!!!!!!! Let's hope this continues."

So glad Chrissie!! :)

Joan wrote: "Is your rating of a book affected by the professional experience of the writer?
I just read two books, one by a new writer and one by a highly acclaimed writer; I quite liked both, so 3 or 4 stars...."

Like Patti, I do scale based on the type of book. So a very good humorous story, a very good mystery, a very good work of literature, etc, I rate the same (as very good). 5 stars though I reserve for something that touched me on many levels; so it's a bit tougher to reach that for certain sorts of books.

New authors, hmm, I don't read a great many new authors, but I think I'd tend to round a new author up instead of down on the grounds that they're still early in their journey. It wouldn't change the number of stars, but if it was 3.5 stars, I'd be more inclined to round up to 4 instead of down to 3.

Esther wrote: "Greg wrote: "Esther wrote: "Right now I am trying to get the laundry done so we have some clothes to pack for our trip.
This week it feels like winter is really here as we have been leaving the ho..."

That sounds like an adventure Esther!

B the BookAddict wrote: "Glad you had a good birthday, Greg, My best wishes for the day."

Thanks Bette! :)

Joan wrote: "Leslie, I read that in ponds with both migrating and non-migrating geese the two groups don’t mix! Like Capulets and Montagues,
We have non-migrating geese too."

How imteresting Joan! And thanks also for the video of the poem reading!

I'd love to see (and hear) the migrating geese Joan and Leslie!

I did some research on grape farming sites, and you're right that frost is the problem Leslie. But this is the fascinating part: the amount of HTUs (an estimate of average warmth of the weather) determines when the vines bud. If it is too warm early on, the vines absorb that warmth and then later bud too early - this causes them to be vulnerable to frosts. The idea is that it's better for the vines to have cool weather early on because then the vines bud only after the frost dangers are passed.

How fascinating!

An extract I found:

"Using what are known as Heat Summation Units (HSUs) — an index calculated based on daily average temperatures greater then 50 degrees Fahrenheit — winemakers can estimate when grapes will be ready to harvest based on the date of the bud break and the average accumulation of HSUs for the location.

With those two bits of information, they can estimate when they should harvest the crop and put together a strategy to maximize the quality and quantity of the harvest.

The timing of “bud break” is one of the most important issues to take into consideration when strategizing. If bud break happens early, the crop becomes exposed to the risk of frost damage. Early frost, then, could result in reductions in the eventual yield of the vineyard.

Because of these early risks, winemakers note that grape quantity is determined in the spring."

The poem is clearly referring to autumn though (October); so I think your interpretation is right Leslie. I still feel puzzled that he asks the sun to be retarded with gentle mist though. Wouldn't heat be good for grape harvests in the autumn?