The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and Tolkien - The One Ring

by **celebalqua** » Sun May 10, 2009 6:31 am

Hey all, hope you are all well.

Had a lovely weekend. We had mother's day here which is always special. Last night I took the whole family to see the new Star Trek at IMAX. It was soooo goooood!

Great action, interesting and almost credible story (in the Trek universe) with an interesting twist. All the old characters, Kirk, Spock, Bones made new and young. Karl urban does a very convincing and amusing Bones. Lots of subtle and not so subtle references to the old series and movies.

Four stars!

Cel

by **Parmamaite** » Mon May 11, 2009 6:36 am

Thanks for the link Hobby, on the first glance it does seem like a rather contrived theory.

Of course, C. S. Lewis was interested in the planets, and he did write fiction about them: "Out of the Silent Planet", "Perelandra" and "That Hideous Strength".

by **Parmamaite** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 5:14 am

Anybody here?

*Parma enters the Lounge to find it empty and quiet, it feels doubly weird since there's usually always good company to find here. He finds a comfy chair, a good book (Tristram Shandy perhaps?) and a glass of choice single malt, expecting that good friends will come round sooner or later.*

Last friday I handed in my final paper, so now I can call myself a Bachelor of Science :horse:

- provided I pass of course.

One of the books I used for my paper referred to Sterne's "Tristram Shandy", and that got me so interested that I've ordered the book home to my library, does anyone of you know it?

by **striderchick** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 1:51 pm

I failed an essay on Plato.. by like one mark.. 'cause the lecturer said that while what i'd written showed intelligence and understanding, it didn't answer the question properly. But gave me a chance to rewrite it. So I'm over halfway, but still have a bit to go and I'm going to see Cats today so.. mean essay is getting in the way.

by **truehobbit** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 2:32 pm

Good luck with the second chance, striderchick!
You're still going to see Cats, though, aren't you? Or do you have to cancel because of the essay?
If you get to go, let us know how you liked it!

Parma, oooooh, yes, I read Tristram Shandy when I was doing 18th century novels at Uni. You have to let us know how you like it!

Personally, I thought it was pretty much the most amazing experiment in novel writing I've ever seen, and that includes all modern novels I've heard of. Hilarious stuff, too, although the 18th century style did make it appear a bit cumbersome occasionally, and the joke, to my mind, turned repetitive after a hundred pages or so. Still, extremely memorable. I doubt I'll ever hear about the subject of noses again without thinking of Tristram.

What was the context it was referred to in your book?

by **striderchick** » Fri Jun 05, 2009 3:37 pm

Yeah I'm still going. But will be staying in a hotel with friends, so i have to take the essay with me to work on it.

by **Silwen** » Sat Jun 06, 2009 2:14 am

Noses? Now you have me intrigued, Hobby.

Right now I am reading "Der Vorleser" (The Reader), but I haven't come far yet for lack of time. It should be a good read, I expect.

by **striderchick** » Sun Jun 07, 2009 2:10 pm

Cats was brilliant, it was a great show lots of fun, and I've managed to get my essay done.

by **Parmamaite** » Tue Jun 09, 2009 3:29 am

Well done Striderchick, I'm sure you'll pass this time around.

The reference to Tristram Shandy was in a very discursive afterword by Robert K. Merton in: "The Travels and Adventures of Serendipity", which I read because my paper was about serendipity.

In that learned if rather rambling afterword. He conciders, among many other things, the concept of "Self Exemplification". I'll quote the passage touching on Tristram Shandy in full:

Concider another, and concluding, example of self-exemplifying idea, which Laurence Sterne tucked away in his eighteenth-century literary masterwork, Tristram Shandy, a sportive work that broke new ground for the novel by instituting a tortuous, stream-of-consciousness style, based on Locke's notion of the association of ideas, an inner-monologue style that would not reappear until early in the twentieth century [............] Here, then, is Tristram's instance of what amounts to a self-exemplifying observation, this one on the singular behavior of hypotheses: "It is in the nature of an hypothesis, when once a man has conceived it, that it assimilates everything to itself, as proper nourishment; and, from the first moment of your begetting it, generally grows the stronger by every thing you see, hear, read, or understand."

Merton also mentions Tristram Shandy later, when he explains how a scientific text aren't a description of the proces that lead to a discovery, but rather a logical construction written after the conclusion has been reached. The former method would be akin to the ramblings of Tristram.

Needless to say, those references made me so interested, I ordered the book

by **Silwen** » Fri Jun 19, 2009 12:33 am

Mark read a chapter of Roald Dahl to me at night - and I fell asleep. Oops. :oops:

by **Parmamaite** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:30 am

well, that is the purpose of bedtime stories, isn't it?

by **Silwen** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 12:55 am

True. Now I have to read it again on my own before we can go on to the next chapter. :lol:

We haven't read stories for some nights now because I've just been too sleepy very early. Last night I fell asleep before 11 pm. :shock:

It is all that exercise I am doing now and it just tired me out.

There was a charity book sale last week and they had LOTR and The Sil in very old editions for just a Pound, but I didn't buy them. They weren't particularly valuable and I didn't have anymore cash on me - if I did, I would have bought at least the Sil. Now some acqaintances have asked me to buy the books for them and I shall see if they are still there in July.

I found some books for myself: The Piano, which I only had in German before; Te Kaihau/The Windeater, which is by an author I had in my doctoral thesis and read at uni long ago; and finally Spadework by Timothy Findley, a Canadian I wrote about in my Master thesis. There were so many more books I would have bought! I am looking forward to my first payday so I can spend money on those books.

(Got a part-time job with Lush! :happydance:

)

by **Parmamaite** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 3:29 am

Congratulations with the job

Does this mean you can get discounts?

by **Silwen** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 11:24 am

Oh yes. 50%!

by **striderchick** » Tue Jun 23, 2009 11:37 am

That's cool.

Ugh.. exam today. Then two on saturday.

Have fun where you are, people.

by **heliona** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 6:23 pm

Congrats on the job, Silwen. :yippie:

Now I know who to get in touch with if I ever need a lot of LUSH products.

striderchick, I hope those exams went/go well. At least it'll all be over soon, right?

My reading has gone down the tubes recently. I really need to kick myself back into it. Perhaps I'll get a little more done this morning. I've got this long list of books to read and it's not getting any shorter! :lol:

by **striderchick** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:06 pm

I've got two left, both tomorrow. Ughhhhhhhhhhh. Brain doesn't want to study anymore.

by **heliona** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:39 pm

I know the feeling.

All I can suggest is to get a good night's sleep beforehand, and don't let anybody tell you that looking at the books just before you do into an exam is a bad thing: I once learnt something about 5 minutes before going into an exam that came up. Boy, was I ever glad I read that bit!

by **striderchick** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:46 pm

Yeah. I'm just so tired, having to cram all this study into yesterday and today. And I am way too good at procrastinating.
Love the smileys in your sig btw, I just copied them for messenger my friend thinks they're cute too.

by **heliona** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:50 pm

I once had to do resits over three days (two exams on the first and second days, and one on the third day) and I did them on about 3-4 hours sleep. By the third day, I was exhausted. Not something I intend to ever do again!

As for the smileys, aren't they cute?

I found them on DeviantArt, I think.

I've got another one too:

I can't lay claim to any of them, though.

by **striderchick** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 8:08 pm

Hehe glomp is cute too. If only one of my other friends was online so I could show him. He sent me one where it goes < 3 and you watch it turn over into a heart and turn pink.
The annoying thing is my first exam tomorrow is one I'm repeating from last year so I don't want to fail it under any circumstances, but I think my brain is turning to mush.

by **Parmamaite** » Mon Jun 29, 2009 4:34 am

I just got the results for my bachelor, I got a C. Not altogether satisfying, but at least I passed.

So now I can call myself Bachelor of Science :horse:

How did your exams go striderchick?

by **Silwen** » Mon Jun 29, 2009 12:37 pm

After all the :bookworm:

you can finally have some :drink:

! Well done and congratulations, Parma! Grab your favourite beer and relax.

by **striderchick** » Mon Jun 29, 2009 1:43 pm

Well.. I'm still kinda dreading getting results back, especially for the first one, but I don't think the last two went too bad. Well the last one I was just waffleing and slightly making things up a little, but it was just a paper to fill in my timetable.
So all I can do is wait and pray really. Results should start coming out next week.

by **Parmamaite** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 1:03 am

Silwen wrote:After all the you can finally have some ! Well done and congratulations, Parma! Grab your favourite beer and relax.

That's an advice I'll gladly follow!

We'll keep our fingers crossed striderchick.

by **Silwen** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 1:31 am

Somehow I knew you would.

Lately, I've realised I am getting really bad with books. Well, some would say it is a good thing: I keep buying new books when I find something in a secondhand shop, even though I know I won't have time for a while to read them. Things are piling up.

I forget we don't have proper bookshelves in the flat (yet)! So there is no more space for stuff like that, but I just can't help it. I found some nice Folio editions of The Hobbit and the Sil, but haven't bought them because they are a bit pricy. I'd like to get them sometime though.

by **oldtoby** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 5:17 am

just try some symmetrical book stacking :wink:

by **rowanberry** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 10:08 am

Congratulations, Parma!

by **truehobbit** » Tue Jun 30, 2009 1:17 pm

Congrats, Parma! :thumbsup:

Also, congrats to Silwen on the job!

And good luck to striderchick for the rest of the exams!

Love the sig, heliona!

by **Silwen** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 11:11 am

Bought 5 more books at a sale today. :nono:

Absolutely no space now.

Thanks, Hobby, got the job and already know 4 hours of standing on my feet is a bit too much.

The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and Tolkien - The One Ring

THE LOUNGE FOR BOOKWORMS 5

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