Monthly Archives: April 2011

Looking at Hard Times

Posted on April 25, 2011 by

This photo of a bleached skull was taken in May 1936 by Arthur Rothstein and appears in Mary Murphy’s history Hope in Hard Times, New Deal Photographs of Montana, 1936-1942. Today, the Great Depression of the 30s is far in … Continue reading →

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Listen to the Voices

Posted on April 22, 2011 by

Yesterday I took a break from reading, and went to listen to a play. Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood is sub-titled “a play for voices”. Thomas wrote this long play in verse for the BBC in 1954.  It is a … Continue reading →

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Awash in The Waves of Virginia Woolf

Posted on April 21, 2011 by

Finally, I finished Virginia Woolf’s difficult novel The Waves. For several weeks I have been reading it at bedtime. The novel usually put me to sleep after reading no more than 20 minutes, but the final 35 pages came alive … Continue reading →

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Lost in a sea of words

Posted on April 18, 2011 by

My new book is When the Killing’s Done by T.C. Boyle. I really enjoy reading Boyle, it’s not just his stories (even though they are great) it’s the words; you can get lost in some of his sentences and eventually … Continue reading →

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Bumbling Detective saves Czarist Russia

Posted on April 14, 2011 by

A bizarre suicide in a public square teeming with Muscovites enjoying a sunny springtime day is the opening scene in this quirky Russian detective story The Winter Queen by Boris Akunin; the date is the 13 of May 1876.  A … Continue reading →

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A Romantic Telenovela Brings Drug Queen to TV

Posted on April 11, 2011 by

The Queen of the South is Spanish writer Arturo Pérez-Reverte’s epic novel of drug running, murder and intrigue. It is one of my favorite Spanish language novels. I read it several years ago, but decided to reread when I heard … Continue reading →

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Blue Dogs in my Dreams

Posted on April 10, 2011 by

Eyes of a blue dog is a collection of 14 short stories by the Colombian Nobel Prize winner Garcia Marquez, who is best-known in the US for his novels, One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) and Love in the Time … Continue reading →

Posted in eBook, Fiction, Spanish, Translation | Tagged | 2 Comments