Friday, February 19, 2010

Our Evening pleasure

Reading loud to my husband is my latest evening pleasure. We decided to break free from the TV dictatorship and do something that makes an evening last longer. Of course, I read it in German. The translation seems to be very good and preserves the irony which is very hard to do in German. Our language is well able to express it, but there is a feature about my home country's mentality that makes it difficult to practise the English sense of humor. I wonder if this is all that popular in America.
In my parents' Baltic home, there was something similar to English humor. It was a sophisticated game to perform debates (possibly similar to Jewish tradition) in which attacks had to be carried out in a way that was to hit but not to hurt, the rule was to remain fair and polite, and retaliation had to be similar, possibly even the better joke; and showing that you are offended meant that you lost the match.
Okay. Back to literature. We saw the movie and were very sorry that it will not be continued. I heard that there was protest from the Catholic church and boycott; we are eager to find out the reason.
I rarely read novels. But this one really got me, and I can't wait to read the next chapter to my cheering audience.

4 comments:

ArtSparker said...

This is one of my favorite books. I also liked the film. The second book in the series is also very good, although the final book gets a bit bloated and confused. I am glad you are reading it.

Chris Gray said...

I enjoyed the story too....and thought that the concept was quite "daring" for a children's book.

When interviewed, Pullman said that he'dhad no intention of "doing away with God"....it was nowhere in his thinking....

(..goes to show that good writers write from "somewhere else" doesn't it...)

Deborah said...

I enjoyed this book also. One of the things I miss most about not having my job is that I used to go to schools at lunchtime and read aloud to teens. I did this for several years.

Judy said...

I'm not familiar with either the book or the movie, so thank you for introducing me to it. I'm glad that you are changing your evening tradition....how refreshing not to be ruled by the tv. We watch movies in the evenings....ones that we choose!

xo