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VERY dark materials
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From: Ruth I Gordon <druthgo>
Date: Thu, 3 May 2001 18:02:13 -0700
Dear CCBC'ers:
How I wish that I possess the intelligence of those of you who can comment on the Pullman "dark materials" books. Alas, I could not fight my way through the first ("Golden Compass"), which, I admit, was sent to me under very difficult conditions by the publisher's agent's jobber friends who wanted an instantaneous intelligent reaction on a hernia-making book. I did try to read it because it was/is a Pullman product, and he is an author whose works I have admired and do admire (although not the "Dark and VERY heavy Materials" series). It was, alas, quite beyond me. My age? My educational background? My inability to learn yet another new language? My unwillingness to suspend my life while I glommed on to Pullman's created language and overly complex sentence structure? When I read books for non-children, I read them with a certain other intelligence. expectation. Yes--maybe that's it. This is a book for VERY BRIGHT people, not mere children such as the one I once was, the ones with whom I worked except for exceptions. I am that same child for most other Pullman's--but not this one. The strange thing is, I have absolutely no problem with anything R. Hoban has written--no matter how experimental. And I can also read James Joyce (no, not the "Wake") with no problems. But these darkish materials escaped me. Somehow there is a problem here--mine, of course. Or, is it?
Anyway, I'll be interested to read what souls and minds brighter and sharper and wiser than my own have to say to illuminate my darkness on what I somehow perceive as an author's exercise in pretention. Then again, I have often, too often, not been correct in my perceptions.
Grandma (who does have a Ph.D.)
"You may not be able to change the world, but at least you can embarrass the guilty." Jessica Mitford (191796)
Received on Thu 03 May 2001 08:02:13 PM CDT
Date: Thu, 3 May 2001 18:02:13 -0700
Dear CCBC'ers:
How I wish that I possess the intelligence of those of you who can comment on the Pullman "dark materials" books. Alas, I could not fight my way through the first ("Golden Compass"), which, I admit, was sent to me under very difficult conditions by the publisher's agent's jobber friends who wanted an instantaneous intelligent reaction on a hernia-making book. I did try to read it because it was/is a Pullman product, and he is an author whose works I have admired and do admire (although not the "Dark and VERY heavy Materials" series). It was, alas, quite beyond me. My age? My educational background? My inability to learn yet another new language? My unwillingness to suspend my life while I glommed on to Pullman's created language and overly complex sentence structure? When I read books for non-children, I read them with a certain other intelligence. expectation. Yes--maybe that's it. This is a book for VERY BRIGHT people, not mere children such as the one I once was, the ones with whom I worked except for exceptions. I am that same child for most other Pullman's--but not this one. The strange thing is, I have absolutely no problem with anything R. Hoban has written--no matter how experimental. And I can also read James Joyce (no, not the "Wake") with no problems. But these darkish materials escaped me. Somehow there is a problem here--mine, of course. Or, is it?
Anyway, I'll be interested to read what souls and minds brighter and sharper and wiser than my own have to say to illuminate my darkness on what I somehow perceive as an author's exercise in pretention. Then again, I have often, too often, not been correct in my perceptions.
Grandma (who does have a Ph.D.)
"You may not be able to change the world, but at least you can embarrass the guilty." Jessica Mitford (191796)
Received on Thu 03 May 2001 08:02:13 PM CDT
