Sorting the Dashwoods

I'm going to attempt to sort the characters in Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility according to the Sorting Hat Chats system. The end of the post also analyzes the book wth these typings in mind.

Marianne Dashwood: Slytherin primary/Gryffindor secondary


It was difficult for me to decide between Slytherin and Gryffindor primary. Marianne has a close circle of friends and family that she values, and she doesn't think much about others. Very Slytherin. But she also seems to have a deeply felt sense of right and wrong that she follows implicitly. Very Gryffindor. I decided Slytherin because when those two are in conflict (for instance, when Elinor violates one of her deeply held feelings of what is right), she chooses her inner circle. Elinor (or Edward) can be excused of anything, no matter what.

Her secondary seems obvious. She does exactly what she feels boldly and directly.


Elinor Dashwood: Ravenclaw modeling Slytherin primary/Hufflepuff secondary

Elinor has a tight inner circle that she cares about, just like Marianne, but I believe that sense that HER PEOPLE are important is more constructed. She looks at the world and develops a system. She seems that, rationally, taking care of family and friends and being loyal and having deep intimacies is the best way. Her secondary as difficult for me to decide on. She certainly plans and thinks her way through life, which seems Ravenclaw, but she is very focused on propriety, doing right in community, and lessening the burden on everyone else. Because that is so central to the plot rather than planning, I decided that I would make her a Hufflepuff secondary.


Mrs. Dashwood: Slyterin primary/Gryffindor secondary

I think Mrs. Dashwood is pretty much exactly like Marianne, except that she's a bit more mature and is willing to be guided by Elinor.

"The resemblance between [Marianned] and her mother was strikingly great."



Edward Ferrars: Frozen Slytherin primary/Hufflepuff secondary

Edward looks like a frozen Slytherin to me because of this quote:

"Colonel Brandon give me a living! -- Can it be possible?"

"The unkindness of your own relations has made you astonished to find friendship any where."

"No," replied he, with sudden consciousness, "not to find it in you ; for I cannot be ignorant that to you, to your goodness, I owe it all. I feel it -- I would express it if I could -- but, as you well know, I am no orator."

Edward's family and regretted engagement with Lucy have made him think that he can never have an inner circle of people he loves. He has pushed himself out of his own inner circle, even, and he doubts his own merit severely. He meets Elinor, she is the kind of person he wants to cherish, along with her family, and then he marry her. His inner circle is broken and a disappointment, but he misses it and wishes for it.

He is a Hufflepuff secondary because the way he goes about this is a good heart, being in harmony with the community and his values, showing up to do the right thing. When he refuses to break his engagement with Lucy and is disowned, he doesn't do it as a Gryffindor, embarking on the right path with glorious swelling music. He does it like a Hufflepuff: he said he would, so he does. Day after day, no matter what.



Colonel Brandon: Slytherin primary/Gryffindor secondary

Colonel Brandon is Marianne as she ought to be (and we hope will be). He cares about his people and is loyal almost to a fault. He would do anything for Elinor, for Marianne, for the child of his childhood love. Screw around with his friends, and you'll end up in a dual. :) Once someone is in the circle, they are forever. His secondary is less obvious because he is so quiet and subtle and mature. But he acts directly when action is called for: he gives a living to Edward on the spur of the moment, he duals in a time when dualing was not so common in England, he rushes to London to help Eliza. He's the Gryffindor secondary with sense applied.


Mrs. Jennings: Hufflepuff primary/Gryffindor secondary

Mrs. Jennings wants all the world to be happy and married and prosperous. She has a general good will that isn't focused exclusively or even primarily on her inner circle. That seems Hufflepuff primary. Her secondary seems to be Gryffindor because she is so direct and bold and impertinent in a good hearted way.

Sir John Middleton: Hufflepuff primary/Gryffindor secondary

Pretty much exactly like his mother-in-law, Mrs. Jennings.


John Dashwood: Slytherin primary/Hufflepuff secondary

I believe that John Dashwood is a Slytherin primary because he is a one man dog. He has an inner circle that can only comprise himself and another person, so maybe he is a partially frozen Slytherin? I call him a Hufflepuff secondary because his means of getting stuff done is through community, connection, taking on the traditons and values of his circle. Too bad he chose a bad wife.

"He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather cold hearted, and rather selfish, is to be ill-disposed: but he was, in general, well respected; for he conducted himself with propriety in the discharge of his ordinary duties. Had he married a more amiable woman, he might have been made still more respectable than he was; he might even have been made amiable himself; for he was very young when he married, and very fond of his wife. But Mrs. John Dashwood was a strong caricature of himself; more narrow-minded and selfish."

Fanny Dashwood: Frozen Slytherin primary/Slytherin secondary

Fanny has an inner circle of one: herself. Not even her husband is valuable, except as he does what she wants. She isn't out for his good, only her own. To achieve her ends, she is endlessly adaptable, able to manipulate, able to be what she needs to be in the moment. Very Slytherin as well. The second chapter illustrates her adaptability well, I think. I won't quote the whole thing, but it's worth reading to see a Slytherin secondary in action: http://www.pemberley.com/etext/SandS/chapter2.htm.


Willoughby: Frozen Slytherin primary/Gryffindor secondary

Willoughby has an inner circle exactly like Fanny Dashwood: Willoughby is the only person in it. He has frozen his ability to love others and is entirely self-focused. We see him start to unfreeze and to let the Dashwoods into his inner circle, but when it came down to a choice, he chose himself alone.

His secondary, like Marianne and Colonel Brandon, is to be direct, open, active, and brash: Gryffindor definitely.

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After writing these up, I am struck by the new insights I gained about a book I've read a million times. The story seems to focus on two evils: Slytherins being frozen (when your inner circle is to constricted, you become a villain: John and Fanny, Willoughby, even Marianne at her worst thinks only of herself and maybe one other) and a Gryffindor secondary run wild instead of moderating one's actions with sense.

So this is the story of Marianne struggling to control her primary and her secondary in appropriate ways, and the other characters exhibit ways she could go right or wrong.

Damaged/Frozen Slytherin primary: Fanny, John, Willoughby, Edward
Just Right Slytherin primary: Elinor, Colonel Brandon

Gryffindor secondary run wild: Marianne, Mrs. Jennings, Sir John, Willoughby
Gryffindor secondary in check: Elinor, Colonel Brandon

Elinor is Marianne's model through the book, and in the end, her choice as to the direction of her character (healthy Slytherin primary/sensible Gryffindor secondary vs. frozen Slytherin primary/wild Gryffindor secondary) is also the choice in her husband.

Atlas Shrugged Characters Sorted

Check out Sorting Hat Chats for an overview of the system I am using. It isn't Harry Potter canon, because, let's face it, that f-ing hat was a pushover and fairly unobservant.

John Galt: Gryffindor/Gryffindor

I don't feel like I know him all that well because he's not a very fleshed out character, but based on the fact that the second he saw that a company was headed down a dangerous road, he walked immediately out and started a campaign to bring down the whole world, I'm going to say Gryffindor secondary. And probably Gryffindor primary because it isn't like we see him pondering this and figuring it out (though he might have done that at some point). Instead, he passionately experiences right and wrong in a very black and white way, so Gryffindor Primary.

Dagny Taggart: Gryffindor/Gryffindor

When Dagny sees the whole Gulch and has it explained to her, that's not enough. She has to feel what is right down to her core. And when she feels the rightness of something, that's all it takes. She'll immediately rush in boldly and do everything it takes (examples: John Galt Line, banging Hank Rearden then dropping him like a hunky hot potato, flying a plane into what looks like a big mountain). We know she isn't a Slytherin primary because her loyalties shift as fast as Jim Taggart's ideals. She loves Francisco. When she meets a man she FEELS is BETTER (wow, so Gryffindor), she immediately moves on. Then again when she meets an even more IDEAL (wow, so Gryffindor) man. And she leaves her oldest friend to die in a disintegrating world, though he is the only good person she knew for most of her life and though he has been her greatest aid at work. But it's okay because he's only a Hufflepuff.

Eddie Willers: Slytherin / Hufflepuff

Eddie has an inner circle he loves and would die for. It includes Dagny and her railroad. Other people are fine and dandy, but they aren't HIS. That says Slytherin primary to me. I think his main method is to show up every single day and do the hard work that it takes to take care of his inner circle. He will just keep going forever, even on that train that his inner circle left him on to die, so Hufflepuff secondary. Some of my dearest friends are Slytherin/Hufflepuffs, and if any f-ing Gryffindors idealistically leave them on a train to die because they are only saving the world through hard work instead of flair, I'll be pretty mad.

Hank Rearden: Slytherin modeling Gryffindor primary/Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw secondary

Hank is my favorite, so I might accidentally be biased in my evaluation. But I'll try. I think he is a Slytherin primary who takes on whatever morality his inner circle holds. He takes care of his own: Lilian, his mother and brother, his family. He buys into the morality they hold about the co-dependent pairing of an over-giver and an over-taker. Then he learns through the book, it seems to me, not the system of morality a Ravenclaw might learn, but to love Dagny and John Galt and especially Francisco. When he loves them, he adopts their morality and becomes that. So he ends up modeling Gryffindor because of how strong a Slytherin primary he really is. As far as secondary, he seems to mix always showing up and doing the work (Hufflepuff) with the desire for data and facts (Ravenclaw). Basically, the dude gets to be a Randian hero because he learns to model Gryffindor primary like all the GOOD people.

Francisco D'Anconia: Gryffindor/Slytherin

Francisco seems another Gryffindor primary. He has a passion for the right and moral that is strongly felt. His secondary seems Slytherin to me, though, because of his extreme adaptability and ability to do all kinds of things to acheive the goal he feels so deeply to be right.

Ragnar Danneskjold: Ravenclaw modeling Gryffindor/Gryffindor

Now, I might be a little biased here because I desperately want there to be a Ravenclaw hero in every book, song, or movie. I don't know Ragnar all that well, but all the other characters are so busy telling me how into philosophy he is, how thinky he is, etc that I am going to imagine that he is a Ravenclaw who built his systems up into one where the best way to act on truth is to let it flow out of you in black and white rivers of moral rightness. So Ravenclaw building/adopting a Gryffindor primary model? And then anyone who decides the best way to enact the truth in the world is to become a PIRATE, an actual PIRATE, is obviously a Gryffindor secondary.

Hugh Akston: Slytherin / Hufflepuff

Slytherin primary seems obvious to me here. Akston has his 3 boys, and he'll make room for their wives. His little family is his world. John might have figured out everything on earth there is to know; Ragnar might have become a PIRATE of RIGHTEOUSNESS; and Francisco might be destroying everything he owns in one big manipulative game of identity hide and seek. But Hugh Akston just sees HIS BOYS. I think he's a Hufflepuff secondary because he uses love and community and stability and caring to help that inner circle acheive their goals. I wonder why he gets to be happy in the Gulch while Eddie dies in the train? They seem to have similar motivations and methods, but Eddie made the mistake of putting a railroad and a really fickle woman in his inner circle. Maybe girls are just too boy crazy in this world to remember their Slytherin/Hufflepuffs once they catch sight of their IDEAL men.

Robert Stadler: Ravenclaw / Ravenclaw

Uh oh, here's a person who is not a Gryffindor primary or modeling one or supporting an inner circle of Gryffindor primaries. Basically, the red shirts of Atlas Shrugged. Disaster is coming! Stadler has built a system of truth where science is the only thing that matters (That's where I see the disaster, BTW. Be a Ravenclaw by all means, but make sure that system models reality closely!). He is driven by the desire to keep improving his system at any cost, even his soul. He's basically the Atlas Shrugged Doctor Faustus. And his method for getting stuff done? Data, experiment, Ravenclaw secondary-ing the crap out of some goats.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about whether I typed these characters accurately. It's been a long time since I read the books, and there may be lots of details I have forgotten (or misremembered) that would change these types.

Two things that captured me today

First, a quote from Thich Naht Hahn's Breathe, You Are Alive: Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing:

"If we know the art of looking deeply, we wll discover reality as it truly is. By doing so, we remove all erors nd wrong perceptions. This is liberation through understanding, salvation by knowledge."

I was deeply moved by the Ravenclaw desire to learn our way to goodness.

Second, a poem:

Happiness by Jorge Luis Borges

Whoever embraces a woman is Adam. The woman is Eve.
Everything happens for the first time.
I saw something white in the sky. They tell me it is the moon, but
what can I do with a word and a mythology.
Trees frighten me a little. They are so beautiful.
The calm animals come closer so that I may tell them their names.
The books in the library have no letters. They spring forth when I open them.
Leafing through the atlas I project the shape of Sumatra.
Whoever lights a match in the dark is inventing fire.
Inside the mirror an Other waits in ambush.
Whoever looks at the ocean sees England.
Whoever utters a line of Liliencron has entered into battle.
I have dreamed Carthage and the legions that destroyed Carthage.
I have dreamed the sword and the scale.
Praised be the love wherein there is no possessor and no possessed, but both surrender.
Praised be the nightmare, which reveals to us that we the power to create hell.
Whoever goes down to a river goes down to the Ganges.
Whoever looks at an hourglass sees the dissolution of an empire.
Whoever plays with a dagger foretells the death of Caesar.
Whoever dreams is every human being.
In the desert I saw the young Sphinx, which has just been sculpted.
There is nothing else so ancient under the sun.
Everything happens for the first time, but in a way that is eternal.
Whoever reads my words is inventing them.

Today, hiking was the walk out of Eden into the rest of the world, soaking my feet in a puddle was a first bath with the kicking and splashing of new fashioned toes, and longing was the first separation of sky and earth when the world was created.

Favorites Festival

This weekend is the first annual Favorites Festival! Jenn and Brenden left town for a wedding, and I am keeping the kids. Livy and I I have moved into the Casey house until Sunday. In order to make all the kids think that I am the coolest person in the universe (cause I want them to be rational and know the truth), I have invented the Favorites Festival. It's the weekend when we do everything we like best and get to see what the rest like best. We are going to eat all our favorite snacks and foods, watch our favorite movies and TV shows, read our favorite books, and generally revel in the best stuff we know in the world. My rule for the weekend is this: Will it kill you? If the answer is no, then my answer is yes! Here are the things we are gonna do, eat, watch, and read:

Morgan's favorites

drink: Shirley Temple
snack: cookies
meal: steak
game: Risk
TV show: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
movie: Goldfinger
book: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Ryan's favorites

drink: chocolate milk
snack: donuts
meal: rump roast at a Brazilian steak house
game: War
TV show: A-Team
movie: Home Alone
book: the second book of The Great Brain

Livy's favorites

drink: milk
snack: ice cream
meal: rump roast from Brazilian steak house
game: Uno
TV show: Firefly
movie: X-Men
book: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Sean's favorites

drink: chocolate milk
snack: Skittles
meal: Ritz crackers
game: Angry Birds in real life
TV show: Phineas and Ferb
movie: Phineas and Ferb Across the Second Dimension
book: Winnie the Pooh and the Missing Acorns

Kelly's favorites

drink: wine with the prettiest label
snack: chips and salsa
meal: rump roast from Brazilian steak house
game: Taboo
TV show: Doctor Who
movie: Mama Mia
book: The Ox-Cart Man

Follow us on twitter with the hashtag #FavoritesFestival.

Bristol and Bath: Running of the John Bull Line, Days 7, 8, and 9

Bristol and Bath were next on our trip, though it's hard to remember, as I am so relaxed from our luxurious Christmas hotel with steam room and sauna. :)

We stayed in Bristol, but we really didn't see much of it. It wasn't a place we really wanted to see, but it was much cheaper than Bath and within 15 minutes of it by train. The only cool Bristol thing we did was see Rory. He came over on Thursday afternoon from some place in Devon to hang out with us. We ate a late lunch, wandered all over Bristol, looked in at the cathedral, and ended up yapping in a pub. It was awesome, and we finally had someone to ask all of our questions about England. Have we been tipping correctly? (Pretty much, maybe a little too much.)Which button do you press on the toilet? (He can't figure it out either.) Should people walk on the left side of the sidewalk and stairs? (It's a crazy free-for-all, mostly.) And finally, why the hell didn't you go to Oxford? (Apparently, British people make stupid mistakes in their youths as well. Why didn't I go to Oxford, after all?) We were so glad to see Rory again, and it was even more fun than the last time.

Each day in Bristol, we took the train over to Bath. The first day, after leaving London, checking into our hotel in Bristol, and going back over to Bath, we just ate and wandered. Bath has an amazing amount of shopping, and after this first day, we managed to avoid those areas. :)

The next day, Thursday, we went to the Roman Baths in the morning before we saw Rory. They were bigger and more extensive than I remembered, and it was very interesting. Going to see them with an engineer made a difference in the focus; I do not remember Mama and I spending so much time looking at sluice gates and pipes. :) But seeing those things closely made me appreciate even more the amazing building abilities of the Romans. 

We especially enjoyed the section on curses. Apparently, a lot of folks came to the baths (dedicated to Sulis Minerva) in order to curse people who stole from them or messed with them in some way. They would have a scribe write their curse on a piece of metal and then throw it into the spring. Archaeologists have found a lot of them, and they go something like this: "Dear Sulis Minerva, someone stole my gloves from the baths. I think it was . Please make the culprit pay for this crime with his blood, his eyes, his fertility, and the lives of his children. Amen." We had fun reading them, and I loved trying to figure out the Latin. I threw a coin into one of the baths along with a curse for Sulis Minerva; we'll see how effective she is. :)

Friday, I went to Bath much earlier than Aaron for a Jane Austen day all to myself. I walked by the Circus, the Royal Crescent, the gravel walk, and down Gay Street (all mentioned in her books). I toured the Jane Austen Center which is primarily about her life in Bath. I bought ALL the cool Jane Austen souvenirs. I got a Jane Austen Choose Your Own Adventure Book, a quiz book so Aaron can entertain me with Jane Austen trivia on the train, her History of England By a Partial, Prejudiced, and Ignorant Historian (a delightful parody of schoolroom history books on the monarchy), and graphic novel versions of Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. The people at the Center were all very knowledgeable and all in period dress, and when I went back outside onto the regular streets, I was a bit disappointed to be in 2011.

Aaron went to Bath in the afternoon to try to go to the Hershel Museum (the guy who discovered Uranus, hee, hee), but it was closed for all of the holiday season. Darwin's house too, except for Dec 31, so we might still make that. The scientists aren't making a very good showing in England. I'm so glad that he got to go to the History of Science Museum in Oxford. Rory reminded me that Lyra went there in His Dark Materials and that she met Mary Malone there. It says something about my interests that that fact made it twice as appealing to me.

We left Bristol and Bath on Christmas Eve, heading back to London to spend out Christmas in a much nicer hotel that we would usually get, since there is nothing open and not much to do. I'll blog about our Christmas in another post.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Our Days in Oxford, Home of My People: Days 5 and 6

Oxford is not really the home of my people, not like you would think. My family isn't from there, and I've never been there before. But being in that city was like coming home. From the second I got my first look at the spires and read the lines I had printed out about when C.S. Lewis first saw Oxford, I was in love, in awe, in bliss.

On the first day, we visited the Bodleian Library. It is housed in the original medieval building, books on the shelves in the same order, but no chains holding the books in place like they had until the 1700s. (There were actually complaints that the library was too loud because of all the clinking and rattling.) The library tour was my favorite thing we have done so far because I got to learn all about the founding of Oxford University and about the use of the library in the past. Aaron thought it was gonna be dead boring, and even he loved it!

My next thing to do when I get home is to look at their archives online, find something I can research there in classical or medieval rhetoric, get a grant, and spend some time actually working in that library. It would be AMAZING!

I saw St. Mary the Virgin church, where Thomas Cranmer (among others) was martyred for refusing to be Catholic during the reign of Mary Tudor (who just keeps coming back like that damned cat in the song.) It was also the scene of John Wesley's last Oxford sermon before he got booted for being all Methodisty.

Later that evening, after it got too dark to gawk at beautiful buildings and pretend I am a fellow of some Oxford college in the early 1900s (and that they let women do that), we went in THE MOST AMAZING bookstore in the world. To my mother: It puts Square Books to shame. It was Blackwell's, and though they have other locations in the UK, Oxford was the biggest. They have a huge section for classical texts, in translation and in the original, a huge section of history divided into very specific eras (for instance, a full ceiling-tall shelf on the Anglo-Saxons, including both scholarly and popular titles), 4 full floors of books and the kind of books that you wouldn't find in your run of the mill Barnes and Noble.

I partly enjoyed the bookstore (cause really, it was so interesting), and partly, it made me feel terrible. I had a crisis moment when I realized how frivolous I have been in my reading. I can't believe how much there is to read and how I have frittered away my time. I am going to start on a much more serious reading plan when I get home (not in Marianne Dashwood style, though, as I am going to be reasonable and not get all carried away with plans I cannot carry out). I am going to sign up for the Anglo-Saxon language class that I have been putting off, rejuvenate the Sex Vultures, and read more classics, especially from Greece and Rome. I realized that by age 33 (my age on Jan 3), Jesus had lived and died, been a messiah, and started a religion. I haven't even learned Sanskrit. So I have some work to do.

We spent a second day in Oxford because it was so great. I got up early and took an earlyish train from London by myself to fit in more awe. Aaron joined me later for lunch. Before I met up with him, I toured Bailiol College and Trinity College. I enjoyed the grounds, chapels, and history of both. Oxford colleges are so weird to me. They are so independent of the overarching university and have so much personal character; their isolation within a greater body is fascinating. The tutorial system is also foreign and intriguing to me. I had a chance to study abroad in Oxford as an undergraduate and passed it up, and I regret it deeply. It makes me sad to think of the mistakes that I made because of how little I understood myself back then. I was ON THE PATH to grad school and world domination, but as it turns out, I am more relaxed and a soak-in-the-atmosphere kind of a person. Oxford would have been perfect. I also didn't apply for the Rhodes scholarship (which would have been unlikely), as I was busy getting married and stuff.

Aaron and I had lunch (not Indian food, strangely, since that beloved stuff makes up about 80% of our diet), and then we split up again. Aaron went to an exhibit at the Oxford History of Science Museum on timepieces, astrolabes, and stuff like that, which he liked A LOT. He says that the highlight of the visit was a metric clock where they tried to divide the day into 10 hours with 10 divisions each. It didn't catch on. :)

I went on a walking tour of Oxford that I printed out from a C.S. Lewis fan sight. I saw where he stayed when he first arrived in Oxford, saw the pubs where the Inklings met, and toured Magdalen College where he was a fellow. It was my favorite college so far, by a landslide. The buildings were spectacular, especially the cloisters and the chapel, and the grounds were amazing. I couldn't believe that I was still in Oxford. It was totally quiet, and I was almost completely alone. I walked for miles and miles on the paths that Lewis walked, along the Cherwell River, past the Deer Park, and around Fellow's Garden. Part of the paths are called Addison's Walk, and that walk was the place where Lewis was convinced to convert to Christianity by Tolkien and another Inkling whose name I cannot remember. I walked there for most of the afternoon. In the chapel, I lit a prayer candle (not as a prayer, but as a memorial and a symbol of affection) for Lewis and for all the kings and queens of Narnia from Frank and Helen on down to Tirian and for Reepicheep. Lewis might have rather had a prayer, but I think he would have approved the gesture.

I didn't finish my walking tour because I spent so much time on Addison's walk at Magdalen. I did stop in at a tiny churchyard nearby to hunt out the interesting dead, and I looked at the outside of Merton College where Tolkien was a fellow. I intend to go back on Boxing Day to tour Christ Church College and try to get a look inside Merton. And to visit the bookstore again like I would a religious shrine. :)

I cannot accurately describe to you the feeling Oxford gave me. It was like a religious experience, like coming home after being away many years, like coming to the surface of the water and taking a deep breath just when you had run completely out of air. It was a mixed feeling, half glory, half grief. Glory because a place like that exists and people like me must have made it and might still inhabit it. Grief because the giants of that place, my people, are not easy to spot anymore, if they ever were easy to spot and if there are any left. I felt at home and at the same time horribly lonely. It's the feeling I always have when I read a Matthew Arnold poem: this guy and I are just alike, and he and I will never meet. I can only describe it as sublime.

Day 5 of the Great Trace Chase: Going Home

We got up on Saturday morning, had a little breakfast our of our cooler, and headed to our last big Trace location. We wanted to visit the Grand Village of the Natchez Indians that was on the south side of Natchez before we left town and started for home. There was a little museum with exhibits on pottery, religious ceremonies, dress, and diet of the Natchez Indians, a tribe descended from the Mississippian mound builders that we had been learning about all trip long. Outside, there were two mounds to climb and a reconstruction of one of their houses. We also hiked a nature trail on the property of the village.

After this last Indian site, we started home. W decided that instead of going the old boring route,we would go south from Natchez and drive along the beach at least for a while. It was a grey, rainy kind of day, but we still got out and padded around the beach in our bare feet with our pants rolled up to our knees. We touched our toes to the water, but it was COLD. Livy chased sea gulls for the first time.

After that stop, we drove for the rest of the day (a total of nearly 12 hours) toward home. We finished Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, both by Roald Dahl. Livy read to me from Phonics Pathways, her newly beloved reader. We ate fast food because we were sick of our stupid cooler. And when we reached home at nearly midnight, as I carried the sleeping Livy into the house, I said, "We're home, sweetie." She replied, still mostly asleep, "I love home."

Day 4 of Great Trace Chase and What I am Thankful For

Today, we left my mom's house and headed back to Jackson to start our final leg of the Trace where we left off before Thanksgiving. It was a full day, and some of our favorite things of the trip happened today.

The highlights:

1. We finished Matilda and started Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Livy likes Roald Dahl A LOT! She says he is tied with J.K. Rowling. I love these books too; they are like Narnia mixed with Jonathan Swift. Sharply satirical and heroic/fantastical at the same time. (Not that C.S. Lewis wasn't satirical, but this is acrid satire, very Swiftian.)

2. We hiked under a waterfall. It was a tiny waterfall, but it was so neat to climb underneath its overhang and put our hands in it from the back.

3. Livy climbed on everythings. She climbed the Sunken Trace (where the Old Trace is sunk way down below the treeline with lots of exposed roots), down into a ravine where she crossed a creek on a big log, and up several Indian mounds.

4. We walked through the remains of an old town and through its cemetery. We found the oldest grave, a lady who was born in 1778 and died in 1859.

5. We explored Mt. Locust, the only remaining inn from the hayday of the Natchez Trace. We did a scavenger hunt all over the grounds and inside the building, hunting up slave graves, magnolia trees, and furniture to hold chamber pots, among other things. Livy turned in the Junior Ranger book that she had been working on the whole trip here and got her badge. She and I agreed that this was one of the highlights of the trip. I liked the Pharr Mounds from Day 2 better, but Mt. Locust was a close second. The scavenger hunt made exploring really fun.

6. We climbed up (and Livy rolled down) the second biggest Mississippian Indian Mound in the counrtry, Emerald Mound. The sun was starting to set, and it was beautiful to look down over all the surrounding forests.

7. We reached the end of the Trace in Natchez at twilight and drove across the Mississippi River into Louisiana and back. I love the river; I always have. It's so fun seeing how wide it is, and I love the moment when half of the car is in Mississippi and half in Louisiana. Afterwards, we drove through downtown Natchez to look at their Christmas decorations, which are AWESOME

.

A little Mexican food and several pages in our phonics reader later, Livy and I are settled into our motel, watching Phineas and Ferb.

This has been the most amazing trip. I just love traveling alone with Livy. She and I really get reconnected, and we do the most spontaneous, fun things. I would never do some of the things she pushes me to do, like jumping from hay bale to hay bale or climbing under a waterfall, even though it is off the path. It's awesome to listen to some many great books as we drive, and when we are together for long periods of time, she talks more than she does at home. Traveling together makes me feel so close; there are none of the distractions of home, just hanging out.

So this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for how cool Livy is, for her being the kind of kid who enjoys my wandering ways and who makes a good companion. I'm thankful for Aaron, too, who understands my need to be on the move when I start to feel like a cud-chewing cow. I love that he doesn't feel left out when Livy and I take off. (The truth is that he really likes the alone time, as much as I like the wandering.) And I am thankful for the big world full of wonders and marvels to experience.

Great Trace Chase: Day 3

Today, we set out early for another full day on the Trace. We made it as far as Jackson before heading east to my mom's house for Thanksgiving. We got to her house tonight, and I am so tired that I am only going to make a list of things we did, though I will try to include entertaining details.

1. We started out at the Visitor Center in Tupelo, where we saw some exhibits, touch deer skulls with antlers, and picked up a hitchhiker - an armadillo puppet named Sparkles who especially enjoys Native American historical sites and whom Livy taught to read a map all day long.

2. We hiked two sections of the Old Trace, the actual trail that the Kaintucks (that's Ohio Valley farmers who came down the river and hiked the trace home) walked along. We pretended we were Kaintucks, Chickasaw Indians, and even robbers (of which the Trace had its fair share). We wished we had horses so we could pretend to be mail riders.

3. We visited a Chickasaw Indain village, two more sets of mounds, and a house and barns circa 1840. We were excited to see a plow just like the one Almanzo would have used, harrow and all!

4. We did a nature trail through a cypress swamp, which was beautiful. I really wanted to see an alligator, but Livy was slightly terrified the whole time and was glad that we didn't. We didn't even see a turtle, but at different parts of the day, we saw cranes, hawks, and lots of horses.

5. We picnicked at a pretty overlook. It wasn't historical or interesting at all in that way, but we laid back on our blanket on the hill and had a delightful lunch of ham, cheese, veggies, hummus, and yogurt. Livy also ran up and down the hill about 48 times.

6. We watched the sun set over Ross Barnett Reservoir (very beautiful), and Livy threw about 600 sticks into the water.

7. We finished James and the Giant Peach and started Matilda (also by Roald Dahl).

I probably won't post until we are on the road again. We are going to spend 3 days here in Meridian and then head out again to do the rest of the Trace from Jackson to Natchez. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Day 1 of We Crave Caves: A Little Drive with a Big Spirit

Livy and I set out tonight at 9:30. We only drove for an hour and half, but I wanted to get started today so that we would feel like our adventures had begun.

On the way, we listened to The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which I think is an excellent soundtrack to an adventure trip. Caspian and crew are on an adventure to the eastern edge of the world, and we are on an adventure to Kentucky. Pretty much the same, if you ask me, especially since we have a noble, voyaging kind of spirit.

Our trip is called "We Crave Caves" because our destination is Mammoth Caves National Park. We aren't just driving straight there, though. We are going to take in the interesting island stops on the way, just like true Narnians.

Tonight we heard a quote from my dearest Reepicheep himself that seemed a good motto for our adventures. They have found the island where the 3 lords sleep at Aslan's table. Reepicheep declares that he will stay the night at the table, and Eustace asks him why. "Because," said the Mouse, "this is a very great adventure, and no danger seems to me so great as that of knowing when I get back to Narnia that I left a mystery behind me through fear."

How I Could Once Have Been "Shelley or the Idealist" by Ann Jellicoe

I just finished a play today called Shelley: or the Idealist, and I really enjoyed it. It is about the life of Romantic poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and judging from my relatively small amount of knowledge about his life, it was pretty accurate.

In the play, Shelley is portrayed as naive, thoughtless about other people's feelings, brilliant, devoted to his principles, and impulsive. I feel a lot of kinship to him and am ambivalent about that feeling.

I love that I am spontaneous, sensitive to the beauty of the world, idealistic, and open to new and world-changing ideas. I don't love so much that I am sometimes oblivious to the effects of my actions on other people and often jump too quickly into ideas and actions without thinking them through.

I was a lot more like Shelley when I was younger, and after reading the play, I am so happy that I have learned a lesson or two that will make my life turn out so much better than his did. It's hard to say if the changes came with Objectivism or with adulthood, as I acquired both at about the same time.

I learned not to use youth, poetry, passion, or the beauty of the wild, untamed, animal part of myself as an excuse to be irresponsible and callus. I learned to think about the consequences of my behavior to myself and to others. I learned to find poetry in a committed life, a life with responsibilities, a rooted life. I learned that Jane Austen had it right when she wrote, "Without scheming to do wrong, or to make others unhappy, there may be error, and there may be misery. Thoughtlessness, want of attention to other people's feelings, and want of resolution, will do the business" (Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 24).

I cannot hate Shelley because so much of the misery he causes and endures comes from his naivete. But I can see that he gets the just reward of holding (and living) bad ideas and of refusing to take responsibility for his actions. And while I can empathize with him and remember when I was much like him, I am also glad to have grown up.

6 Months of Books

It's been a while since I have done a post telling you what I am reading, so I thought I'd pull out my trusty book journal and get to it.

First, a few fun stats. So far this year, I have read 44 books. 16 of them have been rereads, which is actually kind of low for me. I guess I have been on a new book streak. 8 of them were non-fiction.

Since I know everyone is dying to know exactly what I read, I think I am going to list all those 44 books and intersperse comments.

January

• The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder
• Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
• Rhetorica Ad Herennium (in translation) by an unknown author -- (If you are interested in the techniques of persuasive writing, this is a fabulous text. Very old, but very relevant.)
• Greek Declamation by DA Russell
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
• Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

February

• De Oratore by Cicero (in translation)
• "A Rhetorician's Vade Mecum" by Lucian (in translation) - not book length
• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
• In the Arms of Mr. Darcy by Sharon Lathan (Mostly trash, but I just love Mr. Darcy.)

March

• Persuasion, Mansfield Park, and Emma by Jane Austen (This time, I think Mansfield Park was my favorite. Oh, Jane Austen, how do always change so, though you've been dead for hundreds of years?)
• Captain Wentworth's Diary by Amanda Grange (Absolute trash, but I just love Captain Wentworth.)

April

• North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (Elizabeth Gaskell is the clear highlight of all the new books I read this year so far. Diana Hsieh recommended her, and I was not disappointed. I liked Wives and Daughters best, but North and South was also delightful. Where else can you find a good man who is also an industrialist in good literature? I didn't like Mary Barton so much as these two. It was too focused on the poor in a dingy town from me to love it. I missed my country characters that you get in North and South and in Wives and Daughters. Fans of Jane Austen should definitely try Elizabeth Gaskell.)
• The Millionaire's Dinner Party: Adapted from the Satyricon by Petronius (in Latin) (Freaking hilarious. Will Ferrell and Adam Sandler have nothing on the Romans.)
• Dead Until Dark, Living Dead in Dallas, and Dead in the Family by Charlaine Harris
• Lanterns on the Levee by William Alexander Percy (This book is the most poetic prose I have ever read. The feelings its author has about the South, about Sewanee, about cemeteries are almost exactly like mine. However, beware the racism. It was written long ago.
• Lives of the Sophists by Philostratus (in translation)
• Institutes of Oratory by Quintilian (in translation)
• On Christian Doctrine by Augustine (in translation)

May

• Club Dead, Dead to the World, Dead Reckoning, and Dead as a Doornail by Charlaine Harris
• D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling (What can I even say about this? If you haven't read Harry Potter by now, there is clearly something wrong with you that may be incurable.)
• Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell

June

• The Darcy's and the Bingleys by Marsha Altman (Mr. Darcy buys a copy of the Kama Sutra for Bingley on his marriage. Total trash. But have I mentioned how I love Mr. Darcy?)
• Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, Shadow of the Giant, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind by Orson Scott Card (Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow get the number two spot after Elizabeth Gaskell for how much I adore them and where have they been all my life. I've never read sci-fi like this before. Go read it, even if you don't read science fiction. They are acutally well-written.)
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by JK Rowling

July, so far

• Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell
• Bangladesh by Tamara B Orr (I don't really recommend this book or this country.)
• The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Currently Reading

• Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors by Nicholas Wade (Love this book so far. Lots of newer genetic information confirming or calling into question older theories based on the fossil record and archaeological findings. Very readable.)
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling
• The Romantic Manifesto and The Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand
• Values of Harry Potter by Ari Armstrong (will be reviewing this before too long)
• How to Write a Sentence and How to Read One by Stanley Fish (The exciting and fun alternative to Strunk and White. Stanley Fish is a wonderful writer, and I like his rhetorical way of approaching writing.
• Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card (reading it again in research mode)
• selections from Livy's Legends of Early Rome (in Latin)

So, what are you reading?

Racism and My Childhood in Mississippi: Inspired by The Help by Kathryn Stockett

I just finished reading The Help by Kathryn Stockett (a novel about the relationships between black maids and their white employers set in Jackson in the mid 60s), and I enjoyed it very much. But this post is not a book review. After reading Kathryn's afterward about growing up in Mississippi and about writing the book, I feel inspired to write a few memories about racism from my childhood.

I am 32 years old, so I grew up in the 80s and 90s. That sounds all modern when you write it out like that, but it's not quite that simple. We were integrated, of course--sort of. Black children went to school with me; my Girl Scout troop had black and white girls; and black people could go into all the public places.

But we weren't really all that integrated, except legally. There were (and are) black and white churches, black and white neighborhoods. I hardly ever saw interracial couples until I came to Atlanta, and when I did it was a shock. Only white trash girls dated black boys, and I cannot remember ever seeing a white boy with a black girl.

At school, black and white kids segregated themselves completely by middle school. You could be friendly with kids of the other race, but you weren't really friends. I had a black girl that I called my friend (and I wish we realy could have been), but when my mom and I drove her home from school, we had to drop her off two blocks away from her house so that her daddy wouldn't see her get out of the car with a white lady. I remember once when she went to church with me. That's literally all I remember; it was a shocking enough thing to do that such a little nothing event still stands out after all these years.

I remember that the word "nigger" was used in ways that were so commonplace that it almost lost the power of a racial slur, like calling a wimpy boy "pussy" or calling a disappointing event "gay." My parents were very progressive, and I would never have said such a nasty, racist word, but I frequently heard a game called "nigger-ball" or a kind of firecracker called a "nigger-chaser." I knew that it was wrong to use that word, but it was only years later that I really understood how built-in the racism is when little children use names like that completely nonchalantly.

When I was learning to drive, my mom took me to a cemetary to practice. We stopped when we saw a very newly and terribly defaced grave. It was James Cheney, a young black man who was killed along with two other civil rights activists in Philadelphia, not far from my hometown, in 1964. It was still being defaced, apparently, in 1995.

One of the murderers, Edgar Ray Killen, a local preacher, was acquitted at the first trial, but he was retried and convicted in 2005. It was a big freaking deal then. I was so proud because I had heard the story of how my mother had driven one of my relatives to a homecoming in a church where Edgar Ray Killen was going to preach, and she wouldn't go in. She just sat in the car. Thank god Mississippi finally did what my mother had known all along was right.

I was slapped once in a racially-motivated incident. A little friend of mine, a truly sweet girl, won our class's citizenship award. Another girl in the class said to me that she only got it because she was white. I replied, "She won because she is way nicer than you." She slapped me across the face, hard. Of course, I just tattled on her because I was Hermione Granger all the way. I wish I could tell you that I slapped her right back. That would make a better story.

When I was in about the 7th grade, I entered an essay contest for Martin Luther King's birthday. It was good. I remember nothing about it but that it was really good. I always won everything. That's bragging, I know, but you have to understand that I was a far better writer than any child in school. I didn't win the essay contest, and I was pretty sad. But when I found out who won, a girl that I knew could not have written an essay better than mine, I was furious. I remember my dad explaining to me that they were not going to pick a white child, that would look bad for publicity. I cried and cried and yelled Martin Luther King quotes about the content of someone's character (and essay) being the important thing. And I remember my dad saying, "You're right. MLK would be horrified. But this is the way things are."

I don't know what to say about all these things. They are wrong, all of them, though some much more horrible than others. I just wanted to get them down, to share them with people who may not have grown up with that kind of thing. I just wanted to say that it's not as over as some people think it is.

Update on our Harry Potter Marathon - more serious spoilers

We're finished with all the movies up to The Goblet of Fire. Tonight we are going to get through at least Half-Blood Prince, and maybe some of Deathly Hallows.

Highlights:

• I love the Yule Ball scenes from Goblet of Fire. I love the burgeoning romance between Ron and Hermione; I love Harry and Ron not wanting to dance. I love Neville staying out til 2. I love Hagrid and Madame Maxim and his inability to keep his hands where they should be. I just love the whole thing.
• I LOVE Rita Skeeter. She is just exactly what she should be, and in my best imaginings when reading, I could never have made her that perfect. I wish her role was even bigger.

Low Points:

• I HATE Dumbledore in the movies. He has none of the real Dumbledore's sense of humor; he's not caring and warm and batty; and he gives me the creeps. He doesn't figure out immediately that Harry did not put his name in the freaking goblet, and I can't love him like I do the real Albus.
• I don't like how small a role Dobby plays in the movies. We meet him in Chamber of Secrets, and then where the hell does he go? He doesn't give Harry Christmas socks in Prisoner of Azkaban. He doesn't steal the Gillyweed for Harry in Goblet of Fire. How am I supposed to sob (like I did while reading the books) when he takes that knife in Malfoy Manor, when I can't get close to him over the whole series of books?

It's so fun to watch them all again. I'll report more later.

Harry Potter Movie Marathon - Book and Movie Spoilers Included

To get ready for the last Harry Potter movie, which comes out this weekend, Livy and I are watching each of the movies again. Last night, we watched Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. I thought my readers might be interested in my observations.

First, my god Harry is young in the first movie. I had forgotten that. Harry is little and cute and less confident. Hermione is a pain in the butt. Ron can play chess, but other than that, he's kind of a dud. They are all sweet kids and clearly brave, but it is unbelievable to me how much these characters grow and develop through the movies. Will that happen to Livy? Will I look back on the way she is now and wonder how she could be so different?

The first movie was pretty good, I thought. The plot of the book was simple enough that you didn't miss much in the movie. My only big complaint is that Hermione's logic problem with the potions was missing. I loved that; it's not all flashy magic. And I love that Hermione, Snape (who made that task), and Dumbledore saw that logic was as important for a wizard as spells, and also very rare.

Even though the Chamber of Secrets is one of my favorites of the books, I wasn't crazy about the movie. It just seemed to jump from action scene to action scene without really tying everything together. I didn't feel connected to it, partly because there was no depth to Ginny's experience with the diary, I think. It was just a magical object, not the way a horcrux should be, sucking the life out of anyone who gets emotionally close to it, like in the book.

The fun part of watching the movies again with Livy is that, this time, she's read the books. (We are in the middle of Deathly Hallows.) As we watch, we're talking about the differences between the books and the movies, recounting the scenes that get left out, talking about what will happen in the books later. It's fun to see her connect the hints in Chamber with what happens in the last two books. When we first saw the diary, she shouted, "Harry, that's a horcrux!" When Harry uses the sword on the basilisk, she said, "Oh, look, now it's getting basilisk power so it can kill the locket." We discussed Snape's behavior all the way through. At this point, she still thinks that he will be evil because of killing Dumbledore, and she's having a hard time reconciling how he helps Harry and Dumbledore with the evil Snape she imagines.

Ender's Game Reading Group for ATLOS

I'm very excited about a new project of mine: an Ender's Game reading group for ATLOS. The idea is for a small group to study the science fiction book Ender's Game, giving a bunch of fans a chance to talk the book over and giving me a chance to teach some of the best ways to approach a novel in order to better understand it and enjoy it more deeply.

Ender's Game is the perfect book for us, I think. It is beloved and accessible to the group, a mixture of people ranging from me, all booky and literary, to people who almost never read fiction. We need something that is meaty enough for me to find it fun and with enough depth to really explore how to read literature. But we also need something that this group will enjoy so much that they want to think about how to get more out of it. It's just not gonna happen with lots of my literature choices, and I haven't found overmany sci-fi books with the required depth. But Ender's Game is perfect.

I've thought a lot about the format, and I think I found the way I want to do it. During the first meeting, we'll introduce ourselves (Yay, we have some people who are newish to the group doing this!). I'll do a very short little presentation on how to get more out of fiction. If I'm feeling bloggy, I'll post the presentation here when I am finished with it. It won't focus on plot, theme, rising action, and stuff like that; instead it will deal more with how to be a better noticer, how to ask good questions of yourself and the story, and how to pursue an interest that you find in a book.

After this little presentation and any questions or comments on it, we'll begin our discussion of Ender's Game with a lovefest. I don't think our group can be happy or go deeper without first having a chance to talk over how much we love this book, who our favorite character is, who we hate, and what Ender's experiences reminded us of in our own lives. And I think this is a great thing about the group that will be meeting. Because they haven't ever been English-teachered into hating sci-fi (at least they were left with one or two kinds of fiction to love), they still read it selfishly and without any of the soul-killing habits with which they read other fiction (like the game of "find the theme"). They will not be happy in this reading group unless they get to share how this book personally affected them, and good on em.

On the subsequent meetings, we will discuss the book thematically, rather than chronologically. I have a list of things I am interested in discussing (adults/children, simulations and the making of art, the complex parental relationships which both nurture and manipulate in this and other books about children, Ender's relationships with Peter and Valentine, the characters and author's position on total war), and I will keep a list of interesting things that come up from others in the discussion to revisit later. The group will come to an end when we feel finished.

I'm excited about this group as a part of ATLOS as well. It's one of the optional value groups that I think of as so key to the success and the uniqueness of our group, and it's the first time that we have held a reading group for a book that wasn't connected with Objectivism and philosophy. I like this direction, and I hope that more reading groups will spring up to delve into books that ATLOS members are passionate about.

If you are interested in this group, our first meeting is Saturday, July 23 at 2 pm at Stoney's. You should have read the entire book before the first meeting. See you then!

Science and Art Adventures

I finished an amazing book that was an adventure itself, The Wilder Life by Wendy McClure. Wendy, an avid Laura Ingalls Wilder fan, immersed herself in Laura world by reading history, revisiting the fiction, and travelling to the Laura Ingalls Wilder historic sites. She records her adventures in a witty and modern book that was fascinating to me as a fellow Laura lover and that was often hilarious.

Aaron and I went to a lecture at the Tellus Science Museum by a technician who worked on the Saturn V rocket and by a model rocketry enthusiast. It was okay. It was fun to see all the familiar Apollo 11 footage, but we knew almost everything the technician said about the Apollo missions. I wish he had given us more inside details about his job putting together the rocket and what it was like to be at the launches. The rocketry enthusiast was just a little too enthusiastic. I wasn't particularly interested in that part, and he was convinced that it would hold our family together Republican-style if only we would build rockets. A little weird.

Afterward the lecture, we went to dinner with friends and then to see the New X-Men movie. It was amazing! I have always loved Magneto best, and this was his movie. The backstory on the friendship and parting of the ways between Magneto and Professor X was wonderful, and the very young and insecure Mystique was a delight. This might have been the best X-Men movie yet, even without Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart.

My Reading Journal and Why I Keep It and A List of What I've Been Reading

I have a little brown book with leather covers embroidered with designs, rough, handmade looking paper, and a string to tie it shut. It was given to me during a romance, and the inscription reads, "For your words, when my ears aren't around to hear them." The romance ended, and it was a long time before I felt ready to use the little book. I'm not a journaler, but because of the strong memory of the intense girl who gave it to me, I wanted to stay true to the intent of the gift. She and I talked about books and about writing, and so I decided to keep it as a list of the books I had read.

I enjoy looking back over it, even the recent things, but what I hope is that one day, when I am old and gray and full of sleep, nodding by the fire, I will take out this journal and remember the things that I read and see the patterns of my life laid out in books. I imagine that I will remember Livy's childhood through children's classics that I read aloud, my education with journal articles and more technical books, and the changes in myself as I age by which things are reread and how often. I imagine that my life will be chronicled, not in things I did or people I knew or places I went, but by what I read.

October, November, and December So Far Reading

Rebecca by Daphne DuMarier

A reread for me of a book about place. The novel begins and ends with a house, and I am fascinated by how Manderlay and its ghosts and secrets drive the plot and the characters. Whenever I reread this book, I think about the South and our obsession with place, even places from the distant past, and I feel a connection to DuMarier. Egger Cemetary and Caledonia, MS shape the lives of my family, I think, but thank heavens the shaping is less sinister than in Rebecca.

A River in the Sky by Elizabeth Peters

A fun reread of my dearest archeologists, Amelia Peabody and Radcliffe Emerson. I have no idea which of the novels this is, as they are all the same. The spice lies not in the plot, but in the characters.

The Two Towers and The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkein

Tolkein wrote in a letter that he had a "basic passion . . . for myth (not allegory!) and for fairy-story, and above all for heroic legend on the brink of fairy-tale and history, of which there is far too little in the world." I share his passion. Tolkein provides me with characters that live, really live, for me; I know what they would do even if the story veered into new ground. They are men and women whom I love, whom I am proud to love, and whom I hope would include me in their counsels and their fellowships if we met.

The Lost Hero and The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan

Fun new novels about Greek heroes (the first) and Egyptian magicians (the second). Very similar to his earlier series about Percy Jackson.

American English by Wolfram and Schilling-Estes

A linguistics textbook that rocked, though my class on the subject was terrible. I was fascinated by the Northern Vowel Shift, which is why so many of you dear Yankees sound so very odd. :)

Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

An amazing new find. See my review of Hunger Games. See it immediately, then go read these dystopic young adult novels about oppression, revolution, and freedom.

Egyptian Myths by Jacqueline Morley

Livy and I did these as a read-aloud, and I loved them. Very different from Greek myths, which I am so familiar with, and very exotic. They felt like a window into a very different kind of culture with very different concerns and values. Lots of fun. Went wonderfully with The Red Pyramid.

The Paleo Soution by Robb Wolf

After my Whole30 experience, I thought I would go to Dallas and Melissa's source, Robb Wolf. The book was funny, readable, very informative, and it raised some questions for me about how high-fat our diets should be and the place that saturated fat should hold in those diets.

A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle

My first of the Sherlock Holmes novels. Just as wonderful as the stories. And there were Mormons, a fascination of mine.

Currently Reading

A walk-through of Wheelock's Latin to supplement my AOS Latin Club (recently renamed the Sex Vultures - see Livy's History of Rome and his version of the Romulus and Remus legend for the reference). This reread of Wheelock's will probably take the rest of my life to finish.

African-American English: What a Writing Teacher Should Know by Teresa Redd and Karen Webb

The Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle

The Story of the World: Ancient Times by Susan Wise Bauer (read-aloud with Livy)

James Herriot's Treasury for Children (read-aloud with Livy and Aaron)

The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder (read-aloud with Livy)

D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths (read aloud with Livy and Aaron)

The Silmarillion by J.R.R Tolkein

Writing About Your Life by William Zinsser

The Art of the Personal Essay: An Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present compiled by Phillip Lopate

Book Recommendation: The Hunger Games

The young adult librarians from Dragon Con are my heroes. Every year, I write down their recommendations, and every year, the books are golden. This year, they recommended The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I am sorry that I didn't read it in September; if I had, I could have had Katniss and Haymitch etched into my head for 3 extra months.

The book takes place in a dystopic setting; a totalitarian government rules over a prosperous capital city and 12 miserably poor and oppressed districts. Katniss, the heroine of the story, is a girl who supports her mother and sister with her illegal hunting and gathering. Every year, 2 teens from each district are chosen to fight in gladiator style games for the entertainment of the capital city. The book follows Katniss to the games.

I am not usually a fan of dystopic novels, but I liked this one a lot. The darkness is balanced by the wonderful and heroic characters in the novel. Unlike some young adult novels, the characters are well-drawn and powerful, and though there is teen romance, it isn't the center of the story.

Katniss herself is a survivor, a tough kid who can do what needs to be done, but we can love her because she is compassionate and her hard life has not destroyed her sweetness or her desire to do the right thing. Her trainer, Haymitch, is a wonderful character as well - not so lovable and innocent as Katniss, but rich and a little mysterious.

The plot of the story is engaging, and there are twists and turns throughout the novel. I couldn't figure out how on earth the author was going to resolve the story in a way that might satisfy me, but she did (and in a believable and powerful way). The book is the first in a series, but the novel comes to a satisfying conclusion. I don't like books that leave you hanging completely. This one leaves some larger issues about the society and the characters open but closes up the specific plot of the Hunger Games themselves.

The second my last paper is turned in this week, I am going to get the other books in the series. The Hunger Games will definitely go on my constant reread shelf.

What I Have Read, What I'm Reading, and What's on Deck

September reading

Seeing a Large Cat, The Ape Who Guards the Balance, The Falcon at the Portal, and He Shall Thunder in the Sky by Elizabeth Peters (novels from the Amelia Peabody series that everyone in the whole universe should read immediately)

4 Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle: "The Speckled Band," "The Adventure of the Copper Beeches," "The Stock-Broker's Clerk," and "The Red-Headed League" (I like "The Speckled Band" best cause it's so exotic and morbid.)

Prologue to Confessio Amantis by John Gower (Absolutely loved it. Must get to the whole thing one day.)

Piers Plowman by William Langland (Meh. Enjoyed seeing the portraits of the 7 deadly sins. Portrait of gluttony made me quit smoking.)

The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African-American Students by Gloria Ladson-Billings (Didn't agree with everything, but found her insight and the insight of the master teachers into the needs of African-American students helpful. Made me want to learn more about African-American English, so I may take a class.)

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein (Nothing need be said about this marvel of the modern world. Even the elves didn't have anything this good.)

By the Shores of Silver Lake by Laura Ingalls Wilder (How the Ingalls family gets settled on their final homestead. Adult Almanzo enters story. Yay!)

about a million articles about composition theory and pedagogy that I don't think any of you care about but were very edifying

Things I am Reading Right Now

The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder

Rebecca by Daphne DuMarier (Wow, this is depressing, but her psychological state is really well written.)

The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkein (More perfection surpassing even the works of the men of Westerness.)

Writing About Your Life: A Journey Into the Past by William Zinsser (Half Auto-Biography, half how to write aut0-biography.)

Talking to Tweens: Getting it Right Before It Gets Rocky with Your 8- to 12- Year Old by Elizabeth Hartley-Brewer

The Story of the World:History for the Classical Child: Volume 1: Ancient Times by Susan Wise Bauer

about a million articles about composition theory and pedagogy that I don't think any of you care about but will be very edifying

What I Have on the Shelf to be Read

Between Parent and Child by Haim Ginott

A Yank Back to England: The Prodigal Tourist Returns by Denis Lipman (won this at Dragon Con for answering a Shakespeare question correctly)

A River in the Sky by Elizabeth Peters (a NEW Amelia Peabody, and this time she's in Palestine!)

Archaeology by David Hurst Thomas and Robert L. Kelly (My mom took a course in archaeology, and this was her text. Livy and I are both very interested, so I thought this might be a good starting place.)

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach

Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories

James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan (a new series about the Egyptian gods from the author who gave us Percy Jackson)

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (recommended by nerdy librarians at Dragon Con in the Young Adult Track)

More Sherlock Holmes stories (probably chosen at random)

First Test by Tamora Pierce (another YA Dragon Con recommendation)

The Original Mother Goose (with all those old and beautiful illustrations)
about a million articles about composition theory and pedagogy that I don't think any of you care about but will be very edifying

What have you read lately? What's on your shelf?