We got the new carpet installed in the basement on Friday. It took three guys all day. It looks and feels great.
Now it is a matter of putting everything back together.
All the rooms are basically back in order.
We put the book cases and books back today. This was a huge chore. I have four (4) five shelf cases, and two (2) three shelf cases. Full. And we’re probably going to have to buy another five shelf case.
The novel begins with an “editor’s” description of how he came to be in possession of a manuscript.
There are huge, chunky paragraphs pf Latin, largely untranslated, but deftly worked into the continuing narrative.
Here is a parenthetical example - but in French - again untranslated.
I’ve finished the first chapter, the story of the editor/translator and his now third edition of the manuscript original, written by Adso of Melk. I am slightly irritated at the untranslated Latin and French segments, and as I start the next chapter I am slightly aware that I might not be completely in grasp of the literary events.
I began the journey, the odyssey, of reading “The Name of the Rose” by Umberto Eco on January 21st.
I purchased an “Everyman’s Library” edition with a gift card given to me by my Little League football team at our banquet last Saturday night.
Two things struck me as challenging as I read the Introduction, written by a certain David Lodge. It reads -
“It is recommended that first time readers of … do not read the introduction beyond the break on p. xiv until they have finished the novel.”
This footnote is a challenge - to read the book in order to return and read the rest of the Introduction. Right, this guy is so presumptuous that he is implying that his introduction is as important and majestic as the novel. Alternatively, it is also a temptation, of which I usually find difficult to avoid.
Secondly, in the last paragraph of this virginal part of the introduction, Mr. Lodge discusses the challenges most readers face within the first 100 pages, of which friends and editors of Eco’s recommend he shorten because they were “very difficult and demanding.”
Eco refuses, explaining that the pages were a “penance or initiation,” and those readers who were successful would “learn how to read the book, and would not be able to stop reading, having reached this point.”
One additional aspect of both Eco and the novel is that in some perverted way they intrigue me with the utter Catholicism of it all. Perhaps the what and why of the intrigue will be revealed in later discussion.
I intend these entries - T.N.o.t.R., Pt.x, etc. - to be a sort of commentary of my thoughts and ideas as I read this book. If anyone has comments, or has themselves read the book, please provide feedback and commentary as I go along. It is my intent to read, and thereby post every day until I have completed the novel.
I was reading another blog that contained a post listing a question and answer set concerning books that have made an impression on a person and thought I’d share my answers to the same set of questions.
I’ve seen other bloggers refer to something to the effect of “so and so ‘tagged me on a meme’” whereby they list the persons that read their blogs who they want to reply to the question set. Since I don’t have a clue as to who reads my blog, I’ll just post the Q&A set with my inputs and encourage those of you who read this blog (whomever you are) to post a comment with your answers.
Here goes - the Book Survey
1. A book that changed your life: The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand
2. A book read more than once: To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
3. A book you’d want on a desert island: The Complete Works, William Shakespeare
4. A book that made you laugh: Life Is a Strange Place, Frank Turner Hollon
5. A book that made you cry: Me and Paul, Kenneth E. Worthington
6. A book you wish you’d written: A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving
7. A book you wish had never been written: The Stepford Wives, Ira Levin
8. A book you’re currently reading: A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons, Geoffrey Hindley
9. A book you’ve been meaning to read: The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco