Ersatz TLS discussion
note: This topic has been closed to new comments.
Weekly TLS
>
What Are We Reading? 7 December 2020
Slawkenbergius wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Ha, but our French doesn't sound anything like their French."Believe it or not that's what the Québécois frequently say."
Can imagine! I remember talking to a Brazilian waiter in Portugal who told me he was having difficulty understanding Portuguese Portuguese as opposed to Brazilian Portuguese.
December can always be a tying up loose ends reading month for me, with the big plans and projects usually all completed, i tend to go for more short stories, short novels with a seasonal feel(not xmas, just winter)So i have just ordered Simenons "The Man from London" set in wintry Dieppe. It appeals to me on two levels, the season its set in and also that pre-covid i planned to traverse the french coast from Calais to Berck and onwards last summer. Interestingly, its not a Maigret...
Slawkenbergius (112) wrote: "a Brazilian waiter in Portugal who told me he was having difficulty understanding Portuguese Portuguese..."During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (or so they claimed!)
Justine wrote: "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (or so they claimed!)"We all have trouble understanding people from Glasgow!
Slawkenbergius wrote: "Not unlike Mr. Jourdain, who did prose unbeknownst to him, the English speak French without knowing it."I noticed while reading To Lose a Battle: France 1940 that British historian Alistair Horne takes advantage of both the Norman roots of English and its more direct appropriations of French words ("insouciant") when writing his engaging English-language books on French history to give them a slight Gallic accent.
I've finished the 9th in my slow-motion chronological reading of the novels of Ivy Compton-Burnett: Elders and Betters. Her usual Victorian / Edwardian, claustrophobic family setting, but with some variations on what I've come to expect from this author.
The main female character, Anna Donne, makes for one of Compton-Burnett's more complex psychological studies and Anna's aunt Sukey exemplifies the type of invalid-tyrant that has been the scourge of other Compton-Burnett families. At a few points the author relies on narrative exposition rather than dialogue or action to reveal a character's desire and motivation, which seems a weakness given the tendencies in her work to this point to tell the story as much as possible through the characters' words and behavior. As with her previous novel, Parents and Children, the characters are established at length in leisurely scenes before the plot kicks in.
One unusual touch are the scenes of young siblings Julius, 11, and Dora, 10, praying to a deity named Chung who they have imagined dwelling in a stone in the family garden. In these scenes the children - fairly typical Compton-Burnett juveniles wise beyond their years - comment on the novel's unfolding action as a kind of Greek chorus. Another spoiler-y difference is noted in my review, where the spoiler-defiant will also find a full chapter-by-chapter plot summary, something I've been doing when reviewing I C-B's novels for my own reference.
Bill wrote: "I've finished the 9th in my slow-motion chronological reading of the novels of Ivy Compton-Burnett: Elders and Betters. Her usual Victorian ..."
Her family history is fascinating, and could shed some light on quite how her books were constructed. She was one of twelve children, six siblings and six half-siblings, her father, who was a doctor married again, to produce the other six. I'm not sure which six she was part of, but the step mother packed her step children off to boarding school. A fractured family, with aspirational ideas, from quite a humble background. None of the 12 children had any offspring, there was tragedy in the family. The twin girls killed themselves. All eight girls remained single. Two adored brothers died, one of pneumonia, and the other on the WWI front at war... It's not surprising that family dynamics inhabited her writing life...
PaleFires (119) wrote: "The pharisaical fuckers who oversee the annual Bad Sex in Fiction award have cancelled the prize out of 'concern' for the public's over-exposure to 2020's harmful influences. The judges claim to fe..."They're not so much pharisaical as puritanical. What's harmful about a good snicker at a dirty joke?
Mod
"We all have trouble understanding people from Glasgow!..."
My sister worked in Cornwall for a while and when I visited her there at the age of 16, I often had to get people to repeat what they'd said several times. And when I saw Ken Loach's 'My Name Is Joe', I had to read the French subtitles for the first part of the film until my ears had adapted.
Ha! Well, I have a question for you all. When does fiction become HISTORICAL fiction? Anyone want to volunteer a date? Because this is the day I realise I myself have become historical. Brit Bennet’s The Vanishing Half has just won Good Reads Best Historical Fiction Award and it is set in the 1950s . But that was just yesterday! I was born in 1950 so that makes me a historical relic. Is there a difference between something that is « historical » and something that is « past »? Or does history simply start from yesterday?
Storm (124) wrote: "Ha! Well, I have a question for you all. When does fiction become HISTORICAL fiction? Anyone want to volunteer a date? Because this is the day I realise I myself have become historical. Brit Bennet..."The generally accepted definition is 50 years prior to the date of writing. This qualifies The Vanishing Half as historical fiction. However The Queen's Gambit - currently popular because of the Netflix series - is set in 1968 but does not qualify because it was first published in 1983.
Gives you pause, doesn't it? We're all time travellers, heading into the future...
In the ENGLISH LETTERS of Eca De Querioz, Portugese 19thc novelist there is a fascinating set of letters on the 1877 Northumberland Miners StrikeEca describes the unique system of arbitration that was in vogue at the time in the county, which gave owners less sway and workers more chance to dispute pay cuts and redundancies. An early manifestation of the good that unions can do via mediation/arbitration
I have also started a slim Oxfam purchased volume on the A6 Murders by Blom-Coope. I am fascinated by these contempary accounts of crime, they show evidence of the high standards of 1960s writing (my other contermpary crime reading in last 18 months includes Parker on the Clapham Common Murders, Rebecca West on another murder, the Times Insight account of Profumo)
* contemporary as in being written barely a year or so after the scandals/crimes
Justine wrote: "The last month of the year is here, heading towards midwinter or midsummer, depending on where we stand on the globe. But whether it’s snowstorms or heatwaves that threaten, there are always books ..."
giveusaclue (115) wrote: "Justine wrote: "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (or so they claimed!)"We all have trouble understanding people from Glasgow!"
My father's family was from Glasgow and I know exactly what you mean! I really admire those British actors who can do regional accents on TV shows without the viewer wishing for subtitles.
Hi to everyone who knows/remembers me. I have had the strangest year in that I have been shielding almost continually since March and my reading has been all over the place, bit I have been reading. I have had, at most, 5 face to face encounters in all that time and have become quite the hermit. I have also been having eyesight problems with blurred vision and have found out that as well as the early stages of Macular D I have cataracts starting in both eyes. Nice.None the less. I have been reading around the theme of empire, what it meant particularly in Africa at the moment, the slave trade (I’m waiting for the Slavery Museum to reopen in Liverpool) and the so on. I read Octavia Butlers book Kindred which I found very interesting in terms of its time travel structure, but also very moving. I will review it properly next time I post. That and The Flood Trilogy are fiction, but there are also many non fiction books on my read and TBR list so I will get round to those in due course as well.
Reading is getting me through this long year. I don’t know what I would have done without. Hope you are all well.
Sara wrote: "Hi to everyone who knows/remembers me. I have had the strangest year in that I have been shielding almost continually since March and my reading has been all over the place, bit I have been reading..."The power of reading, it can help in hard times but sorry to hear of your 2020 and the eye issues.Have you considered audiobooks to take the strain off the eyes?
I hope you are a priority for the new vaccine....
Sara (129) wrote: "Hi to everyone who knows/remembers me. I have had the strangest year in that I have been shielding almost continually since March and my reading has been all over the place, bit I have been reading..."Oh hen, I feel for you! Do not fear getting the cataracts done, the surgery is a doddle, I know from hubby and his late mother's experiences. The treatment for macular degeneration sounds intimidating but apparently is very helpful. Keep reading and stay safe.
Storm wrote (#124): "When does fiction become HISTORICAL fiction?"Magrat wrote (#125): "The generally accepted definition is 50 years prior to the date of writing."
Ah, thanks Magrat. I was going to propose (without knowing for sure) something similar, as my local Blackwell's bookshop was classifying 'Classics' as being published pre-60s (presumably until this year), and before that it was pre-50s. So Storm, maybe consider yourself as Classic rather than as Historical (if that makes you feel a tad better!)?
Gpfr wrote (#123): "My sister worked in Cornwall for a while and when I visited her there at the age of 16, I often had to get people to repeat what they'd said several times. And when I saw Ken Loach's 'My Name Is Joe', I had to read the French subtitles for the first part of the film until my ears had adapted."Ah, I love My Name Is Joe! But I watched it at a time when I would rely on the French subtitles... For me the hardest when I came here to the UK was the Liverpool accent, and some Scottish too, but thankfully I got better over time.
@Paul in particular, but others too: nice story about a bookshop owner in Milan here: 'I'm often faster': Milan's bicycling bookseller takes on the online giantshttps://www.theguardian.com/world/202...
Sara wrote: "Hi to everyone who knows/remembers me. I have had the strangest year in that I have been shielding almost continually since March and my reading has been all over the place, bit I have been reading..."Magrat wrote: "giveusaclue (115) wrote: "Justine wrote: "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (..."
Hi, Sara. Hope I’m responding correctly here. My responses are all over the place. I did send you an email, but not sure if you received it.So sad to hear of your health problems. Hope all will soon be resolved, and that you are getting the support you need. I’m reading a Carol Shields, at the moment. Duet. Possibly re-reading. Brain fuzz abounds!
A book review from 2019:Reader, I Married Him. Tracy Chevalier.
A collection of 21 short stories inspired by "Jane Eyre". They run the gamut from alternative versions of episodes from the novel to events set today and at unspecified times and places in the future. In each case there is a link to "Jane Eyre", sometimes obvious, at other times less so. Several of the stories have a twist at the end. I enjoyed some of them more than others, since the collection is diverse. There is something here for everyone.
I have not generally been enamored of the short story form-I remember vividly being made to read the, to me, tedious short stories of Katherine Mansfield as a teen and hating them. .... It put me off for many years and as I generally prefer non-fiction to fiction I have not explored the form extensively. I enjoy the slightly macabre short stories of Walter de la Mare, however-"Alice's Godmother" being my favorite, and I love MR James.
So-while I didn't find the collection as unputdownable as I had hoped, I did enjoy seeing what other writers had done with the idea. The irony is that immediately before I bought the book, I wrote 2 pieces of Jane Eyre fan fiction-short stories in fact- so I am belatedly coming to appreciate the form..... I recommend this to anyone interested in fan fiction focusing on "Jane Eyre".
Gladarvor wrote: "@Paul in particular,"I've encountered him a few times, mostly near the canals, but I don;t know that I ever saw his old bookshop, which is a shame. There is a younger guy, whose name escapes me, who does something similar taking foreign language books around to festivals and plazas and social clubs in the immigrant neighborhoods.
Sara wrote: ."Ciao Sara! Sorry to hear of your health problems. I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on Kindred. I read it this past January and it really impressed me, and it's the book that has stayed with me the most through the course of the year.
Slawkenbergius wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "[...] we still ended up speaking English and not French"Not unlike Mr. Jourdain, who did prose unbeknownst to him, the English speak French without knowing it. Here's a short ..."
In my last position, at a very well known private university in CA, our then President was French-I liked him a lot. I used to have this fantasy conversation in my head.
Me: Vous êtes d'ou?
Prez: Je suis Français.
Me: Ah-mais d'ou en France?
Prez: De Normandie.
Me: Ah, presque Anglais.....
I never said it of course.....
Gpfr (123) wrote: "giveusaclue wrote (115): "Justine wrote (114): "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall... ""We all have troubl..."
The Cornishmen I couldn't understand were very jolly tin miners. This was in 1972. They were so friendly, but all I could do was smile dumbly. The last tin mine in Cornwall, I read, shut down forever in 1998.
Sara (129) wrote: "Hi to everyone who knows/remembers me. I have had the strangest year in that I have been shielding almost continually since March and my reading has been all over the place, bit I have been reading..."Hi Sara. As a fellow eye-disease sufferer, I sympathize! At least the cataract issue can most likely be dealt with fairly easily and successfully. I had mine done last year, and it has helped a lot.
AB76 (101) wrote: "Alan Rusbridger aka Proposed but Prevented Spender of the Scott Trust Monies remarks in a New Statesman column about audiobooks and it is still something i find un-appealling. Oddly i have never ..."
I am surprised by your dislike of radio, just as by your newly revealed reading of True Crime. We learn something new about one another every day. I'm definitely of the radio generation, but am surprised at how little radio drama on R4 seems to be aimed at my generation. They seem desperately to be trying to win over a younger generation of listeners rather than serving those who would be happy to enjoy something more traditional.
And my library books have finally arrived! Which reminds me - where is PatLux?
Sandya wrote: "A book review from 2019:Reader, I Married Him. Tracy Chevalier.
A collection of 21 short stories inspired by "Jane Eyre"."
Did any of the stories involve the episode of Rochester's cross-dressing as a gypsy woman? That's always seemed to me to beg for some elaboration.
Bill wrote: "Sandya wrote: "A book review from 2019:Reader, I Married Him. Tracy Chevalier.
A collection of 21 short stories inspired by "Jane Eyre"."
Did any of the stories involve the episode of Rocheste..."
No, not one-I just checked. Most of the stories are set in modern times. I thought it was an omission, too. I should write it myself. There is one from the pov of Grace Poole, but it set my teeth on edge because in my view it would not have happened as written or even have been written as written. I don't think GP had much of an inner life.
None of the stories resembled anything I would have written, but that of course might simply mean I cannot write. There are a lot of "empty spaces" for new stories. I thought several stretched character and motivation in the novel implausibly. Ultimately, the modern stories might be regarded as more successful than those set within the novel, at least to me. The story I wrote explored, through Rochester, my own feelings about the prospect of an arranged marriage, which, as for him, blighted my youth. Unlike him, I escaped. It was fun to adopt the pov of a male protagonist, as CB did in her juvenilia, but I stuck to period detail, which several stories failed to do well.
The recent play (I saw it on YouTube at the start of lockdown) gave Jane a broad Yorkshire accent. Ugh. Anyone who has read the book in any detail knows that the Rivers sisters comment that "(Jane's) accent is quite pure". This does NOT imply broad Yorkshire however topical it is to celebrate regionalism.
Justine wrote: "And my library books have finally arrived! Which reminds me - where is PatLux?"PatLux has never made the move as far as I can tell...
I've also grown up listening to the radio, which was always on in the background. Starting in high school, I would also work with the radio on, and I still do, unless I need to really focus (say writing a scientific paper, in which case I switch to classical music or film soundtracks). That's created some tension at home in the past, since my husband is really disturbed by the radio, esp. music as it immediately worms its way into his mind and he can replay entire songs he's never heard before. Tricky!
No Room at the Morgue by Jean-Patrick Manchette, translated by Alyson Waters.
From his earlier work, Manchette stands as highly as the great Gallic noir writers, Garnier, Izzo, Dard, and the big daddy, Simenon. All four, Fatale , The Prone Gunman , and especially The Mad and the Bad and Three to Kill , are tremendous. He is a real favourite of mine.
So it was particularly exciting that NYRB have chosen to reissue three of his lesser know work; firstly Ivory Pearl , which I read and reviewed last year, and now this, and Nada , which I have, but have yet to read.
This is something different to his others, which are genuine French noir - gritty, hard-hitting carnage leading to a brutal end. Here, as a type of tribute, he emulates the writing of Dashiell Hammett, clearly one of his key influences.
He introduces Eugène Tarpon, a disgraced former policeman, now a Private Investigator. It begins with Tarpon at the end of his tether, he’s just thrown his badge in the river, when an unlikely client calls; his retirement plans are put on ice. He is swirled into an adventure in an abandoned house in the country (..typical Manchette..) where reinvented Palestinian activists and American mobsters cross swords by night. Down but not out, Tarpon makes his weary way back to Paris for the second part of the story, only to be tailed, abducted, and generally in peril from an assortment of movie directors, sociopaths, delinquents and murderers.
Though this is far from being in Manchette's usual style, it bears many of his trademarks; most evidently that his protagonists are loners, and realise their position during the novel. Here, Tarpon is exactly that, and once he realises it is quite happy, cocooned in his habits in the craziness of the city.
Its chief difference is that his stand-alones have more raw power, and at the end there is an abrupt halt, here with Tarpon, he holds back a little, there is after all a sequel, which I hope NYRB see there way to translating.
Thanks to the responders about what makes historical fiction. So anyone a day over 50 is history 😖 Also, appreciate you softening the blow calling me Classic. I’m off to lie down in a darkened room.
Justine wrote: "AB76 (101) wrote: "Alan Rusbridger aka Proposed but Prevented Spender of the Scott Trust Monies remarks in a New Statesman column about audiobooks and it is still something i find un-appealling. ..."
Radio and me, its strange, i was never, at any age a fan and it never gripped me. I have never had a working radio or bothered to tune any of devices (in ye olde pre digital radio days).
As for true crime reading is generally focused on criminal trials and procedures,rehabiltation, penal reform and the social factors behind crime rather than the more modern style that retell the gory details. Motive and background fascinate but i'm highly selective and i dont like voyueristic "crime porn"
Storm wrote: "Thanks to the responders about what makes historical fiction."I have a personal definition of what I consider historical fiction: fiction set in a period prior to the author’s lifetime. So that a 65-year-old writing a book set 50 years in the past is not writing historical fiction, but a 30-year-old writing one set 40 years in the past is.
For the record, my definition of a “classic” is a book that has been re-published with the addition of an introduction, afterword, and / or notes by someone other than the author of the original book.
Bill wrote: "Storm wrote: "Thanks to the responders about what makes historical fiction."I have a personal definition of what I consider historical fiction: fiction set in a period prior to the author’s lifet..."
i broadly agree with these definitions Bill and i think that any book re-published with added notes, intro and a new perspective falls into the classic category, although Morriseys auto-biog in Penguin Classics was odd, as he wrote it and had it issued as a classic in same year...thats odd
Bill wrote: "Did any of the stories involve the episode of Rochester's cross-dressing as a gypsy woman? That's always seemed to me to beg for some elaboration."That's probably the reason why the otherwise excellent BBC adaptation starring Toby Stephens as Rochester skipped that detail entirely.
AB76 wrote: "December can always be a tying up loose ends reading month for me, with the big plans and projects usually all completed, i tend to go for more short stories, short novels with a seasonal feel(not ..."For me, AB, those romans durs of Simenon’s are the best ones. I see it’s just been reissued. Looks a great cover. It’s one I haven’t read, so looking forward to hearing what you think,
giveusaclue wrote: "Justine wrote: "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (or so they claimed!)"We..."
Douglas Stuart does a good job with the regional dialogue.
Though it does need careful reading at times..
Magrat wrote: "giveusaclue (115) wrote: "Justine wrote: "During my first year or so in London, I had great trouble understanding people from London's East End, Glasgow and Cornwall. All of them speaking English (..."I had a big problem many moons ago when I worked with a Geordie lad and had to ask him to repeat everything.
I find it astonishing that Apeirogon, the most impressive new novel I’ve read since George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo, did not reach even the Booker shortlist. Were all six of the chosen works really better than this one? Were the committee members worried that critics would scoff, arguing that it isn’t fiction, or did they not want to get embroiled in the controversy about whether an Irish author should be allowed to write about Palestine / Israel?As the book reveals, there are many who believe Rami Elhanon, an Israeli, and Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian, have no right to tell their own stories. Maybe that made the committee anxious as well.
The book, structured as a mosaic of brief narratives, information, observations, descriptions, adds up to a complex imaginative retelling of those men’s experiences, each a grieving father whose innocent child was killed by the ‘other side’. Even its structure reveals the struggle to ‘only connect’ in apparently impossible circumstances, as do its many examples: a flock of migrating birds maintains its formation over hundreds of miles; Philippe Petit walks on a tightrope from cliff to cliff high above a valley and doesn’t fall even when a pigeon unexpectedly digs its claws into his scalp; the 6500 wooden pieces of the Minbar of Saladin in Jerusalem hold together without metal nails or glue for nearly 800 years until a crazy tourist sets it alight … and Rami and Bassam travel the world together, making pleas for justice and peace. It’s a moral work but not moralistic; it never looks away from murder, cruelty and pain, never pretends it’s all going away, but it offers to readers the example of two ordinary men who have been able to, well, grow up, put away the urge to hurt back, instead saying, ‘Hey, this is the only way we’re going to get where we all want to be’.
Beautifully written and very highly recommended.
Note; This is a repeat of my GR review. I've kept it relatively short (for me), wishing to avoid the temptation to deliver some personal sermonette on the molehill.
Slawkenbergius wrote: "Bill wrote: "Did any of the stories involve the episode of Rochester's cross-dressing as a gypsy woman? That's always seemed to me to beg for some elaboration."That's probably the reason why the ..."
Very likely. It was an excellent and very interesting adaptation. Speaking as an Indian, I noticed they changed St. John's destination to the Cape, not India, I suspect for fear of offending the large UK Indian community. I also liked the science theme, being a scientist. I think the colonial tropes in the novel are interesting but not my primary interest, despite being Indian-the novel has been for me a source of strength lifelong despite that.
Andy wrote: "AB76 wrote: "December can always be a tying up loose ends reading month for me, with the big plans and projects usually all completed, i tend to go for more short stories, short novels with a seaso..."i didnt realise it was a roman durs, excellent then, i have enjoyed all the "durs" i have read so far, i really havent read much Maigret
its a lovely cover and i like the idea of Dieppe setting, off season,seaside towns off season can be haunting, empty places
AB76 wrote: "although Morriseys auto-biog in Penguin Classics was odd, as he wrote it and had it issued as a classic in same year...thats odd"Always on the lookout for "new" older books, I regularly check out what's new in Penguin Classics (as with those of several other "classics" publishers). I had never heard of Morrisey and didn't know what the book was until I did some Googling. It sounded like a kind of vanity project to have it published under that imprint. I take it it did not have the usual scholarly intro, afterword, or notes.
Justine (156) wrote: "I find it astonishing that Apeirogon, the most impressive new novel I’ve read since George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo, did not reach even the Booker shortlist. ..."I don’t know if this reflects a sentiment more widely shared in the literary world, but the first review I read of Apeirogon was a highly negative one, by Dwight Garner in the daily NY Times:
McCann’s shards are set apart from one another on the page by a thumb’s-width of white space. They are tiles without grout. This trending method of organizing a novel (for example, Jenny Offill) is not yet insufferable but has a trap door: It exaggerates a writer’s weaknesses.The Sunday Book Review, as I expected after reading Garner’s piece, had a much more positive assessment.
Offill’s weakness is that, despite her comic tone, her wit can fizzle. McCann’s is that, even in his best novels, such as the National Book Award-winning “Let the Great World Spin” (2009), his work can be humorless and self-important.
“Apeirogon” — the title refers to a shape with a limitless number of sides — is so solemn, so certain of its own goodness and moral value, that it tips almost instantly over into camp, into corn. It’s as if the author were gunning for the Paulo Coelho Chair in Maudlin Schlock.
Bill (150) wrote: "Storm wrote: "Thanks to the responders about what makes historical fiction."I have a personal definition of what I consider historical fiction: fiction set in a period prior to the author’s lifet..."
Surely you must encounter practical difficulties with that. How do you know when the author was born? The date of first publication is a matter of public record.
I don't have any problem with your definition of "classic", except to say that being a classic - like the entire Persephone list - doesn't make a book canonical.
Magrat (161) wrote: "How do you know when the author was born?" Are there many authors in the modern era whose birthdates are a mystery? Perhaps a few that may be disputed by a year or two, but I don’t imagine there are cases the question would arise of whether a book was historical fiction by my definition.
And I don’t accept publication date as determinant – this past weekend the NY Times had a roundup of books in different categories, one of which was “historical fiction”. It included a book set during WWII:
Siegfried Lenz’s THE TURNCOAT (Other Press, 384 pp., paper, $17.99), which was written in 1951 but rejected by his publisher and only appeared in 2016.I could never consider that historical fiction by any definition. (The Lenz and another German novel from 1951 - Pigeons on the Grass (set in 1948!) were the only novels in that "historical fiction" roundup I found tempting.)
This topic has been frozen by the moderator. No new comments can be posted.
Ersatz TLS
Books mentioned in this topic
August (other topics)August (other topics)
The Making of a Sonnet: A Norton Anthology (other topics)
No Bed for Bacon (other topics)
The Making of a Sonnet: A Norton Anthology (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Durs Grünbein (other topics)Elke Erb (other topics)
Durs Grünbein (other topics)
Tove Ditlevsen (other topics)
Tove Ditlevsen (other topics)
More...
Not unlike Mr. Jourdain, who did prose unbeknownst to him, the English speak French without knowing it. Here's a short ..."
yes, french words are a significant part of english. i always remember reading the shorter, sharper words we use (mostly swear words) have a anglo-saxon root, while the longer words are french origin. crap(saxon) vs establishment (french). though its kinda obvious, it did make me go through a lot of words when i read it