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Media Roll Call
Dec. 23rd, 2012 09:45 pmAnd the 52nd book has been read! I actually completed my personal challenge and it feels good.
... I'm also now free to re-read books if I like. Which is lucky because I need to do my annual reading of A Christmas Carol. I'm trying to decide if I should do this again next year. Maybe even up the ante and read more than 52!
52) Ophelia by Lisa Klein - A rather neat take on a very worn-out play (worn-out in terms of pretty much everyone who has ever written a paper on Shakespeare has written about Hamlet - I know I did... Twice.) With Ophelia being such a passive sort of character, a victim of circumstance, and a short-hand symbol for ineffective trapped ladies, it was interesting to read a version of the familiar story told from her point of view. More so when the writer is someone who has actively taught the play at college-level and has studied Elizabethan works as her dissertation. For the most part, I liked this Ophelia - though she sometimes rang with a bit too-forceful grrl-power. She was human and intelligent and, while she was still trapped to some extent, she fought it and, in the end, coped and adapted. I also admit that I really liked Horatio in this. Poor bastard always got the raw end of the stick, I thought. Gertrude was also much more interesting and realistic. Of course, a lot of this would come just from the fact that you're not looking at events through a decidedly biased Hamlet's eyes.
My main complaint, really, was the ending. It wasn't bad, per se, and I was rather happy with the idea of the ending but it felt rushed. Like a deadline was looming and she had to wrap it up. One part of the equation had groundwork laid for the ending but the other half... Not so much. It knocked Ophelia down a wee notch or two in my estimation. Silly, fluffy moment.
... I'm also now free to re-read books if I like. Which is lucky because I need to do my annual reading of A Christmas Carol. I'm trying to decide if I should do this again next year. Maybe even up the ante and read more than 52!
52) Ophelia by Lisa Klein - A rather neat take on a very worn-out play (worn-out in terms of pretty much everyone who has ever written a paper on Shakespeare has written about Hamlet - I know I did... Twice.) With Ophelia being such a passive sort of character, a victim of circumstance, and a short-hand symbol for ineffective trapped ladies, it was interesting to read a version of the familiar story told from her point of view. More so when the writer is someone who has actively taught the play at college-level and has studied Elizabethan works as her dissertation. For the most part, I liked this Ophelia - though she sometimes rang with a bit too-forceful grrl-power. She was human and intelligent and, while she was still trapped to some extent, she fought it and, in the end, coped and adapted. I also admit that I really liked Horatio in this. Poor bastard always got the raw end of the stick, I thought. Gertrude was also much more interesting and realistic. Of course, a lot of this would come just from the fact that you're not looking at events through a decidedly biased Hamlet's eyes.
My main complaint, really, was the ending. It wasn't bad, per se, and I was rather happy with the idea of the ending but it felt rushed. Like a deadline was looming and she had to wrap it up. One part of the equation had groundwork laid for the ending but the other half... Not so much. It knocked Ophelia down a wee notch or two in my estimation. Silly, fluffy moment.
