#achebe
Grad School Achebe #2: 2 Things 2 Apart!
Grad School Achebe #2: 2 Things 2 Apart!
Gerry and Aaron are back for more Things Fall Apart, talking about parts two and three of the novel! We also talk The Sopranos, Watchmen, Breaking Bad, bad fans, The Things Fall Apart film, just a little Vonnegut, and Achebe’s 1973 essay “Named for Victoria, Queen of England”…
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/gradschoolvonnegut/GSA2_Things_Fall_Apart_whole_book.mp3
A Whole Summer’s Worth of Links Crammed into a Two-Weeks-Sized Bag
A Whole Summer’s Worth of Links Crammed into a Two-Weeks-Sized Bag
Some of my own stuff that’s gone up lately: Grad School Achebe #3: No Longer at Ease, my review of Lynell George’s A Handful of Earth, A Handful of Sky: The World of Octavia E. Butler, “Science Fiction and Utopia in the Anthropocene” from American Literature 93.2, and my scorching hot take on Loki and Black Widow.(There’s a mini-scorching-hot-take on Loki and The Suicide Squad in this Twitter…
10/10 does not mean I found no fault within the book, it just means I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Map: Collected and Last Poems of Wisława Szymborska: 10/10 The Cynicism found in poems and break from other poetic conventions is refreshing and enjoyable
Persuasion by Jane Austen: 7/10 Might be your cup of tea if you prefer real books, I found it pedestrian, and much prefer the stories of the Brontë sisters
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemmingway: Unread
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner: 10/10 Meant to be found ironic in the way that it is an inversion of the classic Hero’s Journey of Greek Mythology (specifically that of The Odyssey)
Oedipus Rex by Sophocles: 5/10 While the symbolism in it is apparent and lends itself to deeper interpretations, there is no other subtlety present in the play, largely as a result of the genre
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka: 10/10 Kafkaesque is timeless and unbeatable in its exposition of problems with the modern way of living and in the very thought process we behold
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe: Unread
Short Stories by Flannery O’Connor: 10/10 Liberal use of symbolism and metaphors lends itself to a far richer interpretation, the cynicism expressed in the short stories is refreshing
Update!
I have finished Things Fall Apart
I give this a 10/10. It was not what I expected. I definetly feel like there is an overwhelming amount of American and European literature out there, but I haven’t seen much African literature (whether it be because of language barrier, or I am just looking in the wrong place). I found that the way the book was written (focusing on Umuofia as a whole rather than any one specific character) allowed the reader to understand the narrative from multiple perspectives. If anyone has any book recommendations which provide an African view rather than a European or American one I would love to hear them! I am looking to expand my literary horizons.
Charity … is the opium of the privileged; from the good citizen who habitually drops ten kobo from his loose change and from a safe height above the bowl of the leper outside the supermarket; to the group of good citizens (like yourselfs) who donate water so that some Lazarus in the slums can have a syringe boiled clean as a whistle for his jab and his sores dressed more hygienically than the rest of him; to the Band Aid stars that lit up so dramatically the dark Christmas skies of Ethiopia. While we do our good works let us not forget that the real solution lies in a world in which charity will have become unnecessary.
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