Matthew > Recent Status Updates

[2/2] However, in a Snape chapter of this book, Ron Hermione, Neville, and probably others too are "turning red" because of various classroom stimuli. It occurs in earlier chapters, as well. Everyone has very good circulation at Hogwarts, and it's always expressed by some variation on the phrase "turned red." Oh boy.

[1/2] Someone on here pointed out Rowling's reliance on the phrase "stretch one's legs" to describe those going for a stroll. Far more obvious to me is the frequent invocation of faces flushing red with emotion. In the first two books, it was mostly Ron turning red (whether it's his ears or his face), which I took to be a reference to his fairness and extreme Britishness (Irish or Scottish blood, whatever it is).

Really cool to see the centaurs in the Forbidden Forest. The shift in tone to something a little more heightened and Tolkeinesque is palpable. It's also good motivation to keep reading after some tedious Quidditch chapters and the business of unimportant amounts of points being taken from Gryffindor.

A bit odd that Harry immediately knows how to pilot a broom. Were there no brooms to try out at Privet Drive?

And the rules of Quidditch are just fundamentally flawed. All that business of the Bludgers, Beaters, and Chasers is pretty irrelevant when it comes down to the 150 point payoff of the Golden Snitch. I'd feel pretty useless if I was some Chaser fucking around until my Seeker got his mitts on a Snitch.

Some stray thoughts about my mother and Harry Potter:

I wonder if I've ever read this book on my own, or if the last time I was with it was when my mother read it to me when I was six.

I wonder if she pictured me as Harry Potter when she read it on her own.

Moments that I remember vividly from when my mother read them to me are now surprisingly short: neither the Sorting Hat's suspenseful indecision with Harry, nor (my old favorite) Harry and Ron eating snacks on the Hogwarts Express exceed more than a couple short paragraphs. That's just the difference between being six and being twenty-two, I suppose.

A rather fluffy look at Gygax's career. Seriously lacking information about his personal life and his social/historical context, i.e., a middle-aged guy hanging out with kids in the hippy 60s and burnt-out 70s. Might not finish this one.

Giving this another go for the sheer hell of it, and also to work up my long-form reading skills, which have taken a hit after three years of theater school.

First observation: I was totally surprised to see that the book begins with Vernon and the utterly English mundanity of his life. I didn't remember that at all.

Why do people on this website "LIKE" it when somebody updates how many pages of a book they've read? makes no damn sense

Admittedly, I have not gotten to the yellow garters scene, but this play has so far not been laugh-out-loud funny. But, like Shaxper's other comedies, it's festive and gives you a fuzzy feeling inside.

The interspersed short stories are negatively affecting the pace, which is very slow to begin with.

Good, but a bit bloated by Anglocentric psychedelic-era academia. "Mishima chose to die the most Japanese death possible." Please. Save it.

Good, but a bit bloated by Anglocentric psychedelic-academia. "Mishima chose to die the most Japanese death possible." Please. Save it.

Goodreads doesn't allow you to delete the updates you put on the books you're reading. Goddamn I made a fucking typo and Goodreads wants the evidence to be there forever

Interesting and somewhat incisive, but Franzan has a bad case of Golden Age Syndrome and people are not entirely wrong when they call him elitist.

Interesting and somewhat salient, but Franzan has a bad case of Golden Age Syndrome and people are not entirely wrong when they call him elitist.

Imagine if Goodreads hosted everything anyone ever said about every book. You'd be able to read Dante's thoughts on the Bible, Milton's thoughts on Dante, and Shakespeare's thoughts on Ovid. Plus, Nabokov's reviews would be delightfully bitchy.

I want to read something other than Mo Yan but I also want to finish him. Life is cruel.

Ding's story is enchantingly told, and the correspondence between Yan and Li Yidou presents a good case for both sides of an interesting argument. I hope I can finish this without school getting in the way.

rly gud

It's not even page 1 and he's already coming off like an intolerable, pompous cheat. Also, he's insulted Burroughs. He'll have to work to earn those points back.

Is he really writing on the coital knot...

It's sad to say this is the truth; the world is mean and man uncouth.