![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldI bought a copy of Ernest Buckler's The Mountain and the Valley from Maria in the English Lounge today for two dollars. Me being money-poor and credit-dependent, I simply owe her the money, but I have a copy, at last.
Why is this important? Well, for almost as long as I can remember--certainly long before I began my Honours essay, or entered university--I've never read fiction (or poetry) of its own merit, or at least rarely. I've always approached fiction through the medium of academic studies. This doesn't mean, mind, that I've never enjoyed reading fiction (or poetry), or looked forward to text being assigned. It just means that I've never taken the initiative, being rather more interested in taking the initiative in reading factual books--the social sciences, history, literary theory, and points further afield--than fiction.
I don't know why this is the case. Maybe it's a chance configuration in my reading habits. Maybe it's some kind of innate preference for facts and theory ahead of uncertain emotionally-laden judgements. Maybe it's some kind of subconscious fear of litrature.
Anyway, I bought that book because, today, I presented the conclusion of my Honours essay to Dr. MacLaine, and came back with the conclusion that it's good. The text (exclusive of title, contents, and bibliography) will be some 55 to 57 pages in length, and anyone who wants a final draft should E-mail me with their address and ask for a copy and I'll happily give them one. This means, though, that my undergraduate career will come to an end, to be followed by a graduate career (hopefully and I'd like to think probably at Queen's).
In between, though, there will be a gap.
This Tuesday, I had a meeting with my UPEI counsellor at student services. She suggested that in order to feel more emotionally free, I should do activities which require some degree of freedom of movement: dance, aerobics, something. I think that adding reading fiction to the list would be just as good an idea. (Refraining from reading non-fiction might be a good corollary to this; I certainly won't have to worry, if I take a break, from falling tragically behind.)
So, Buckler coming up.
I'm just finishing up my portfolio, getting all of the papers ready for insertion. I'm in the Robertson Library right now, having printed off some cover pages and getting ready to take some more books out.
I did a project, in modern drama, on the Belgian dramatist Maurice Maeterlinck and his play The Intruder, so his works seemed like a good place to start. (His essays Beyond the Great Silence and On Emerson, his plays The Buried Temple and Pelléas and Mélisande, and a mid-1970s critical rreview in French of his work. This should be fun.
Why is this important? Well, for almost as long as I can remember--certainly long before I began my Honours essay, or entered university--I've never read fiction (or poetry) of its own merit, or at least rarely. I've always approached fiction through the medium of academic studies. This doesn't mean, mind, that I've never enjoyed reading fiction (or poetry), or looked forward to text being assigned. It just means that I've never taken the initiative, being rather more interested in taking the initiative in reading factual books--the social sciences, history, literary theory, and points further afield--than fiction.
I don't know why this is the case. Maybe it's a chance configuration in my reading habits. Maybe it's some kind of innate preference for facts and theory ahead of uncertain emotionally-laden judgements. Maybe it's some kind of subconscious fear of litrature.
Anyway, I bought that book because, today, I presented the conclusion of my Honours essay to Dr. MacLaine, and came back with the conclusion that it's good. The text (exclusive of title, contents, and bibliography) will be some 55 to 57 pages in length, and anyone who wants a final draft should E-mail me with their address and ask for a copy and I'll happily give them one. This means, though, that my undergraduate career will come to an end, to be followed by a graduate career (hopefully and I'd like to think probably at Queen's).
In between, though, there will be a gap.
This Tuesday, I had a meeting with my UPEI counsellor at student services. She suggested that in order to feel more emotionally free, I should do activities which require some degree of freedom of movement: dance, aerobics, something. I think that adding reading fiction to the list would be just as good an idea. (Refraining from reading non-fiction might be a good corollary to this; I certainly won't have to worry, if I take a break, from falling tragically behind.)
So, Buckler coming up.
I'm just finishing up my portfolio, getting all of the papers ready for insertion. I'm in the Robertson Library right now, having printed off some cover pages and getting ready to take some more books out.
I did a project, in modern drama, on the Belgian dramatist Maurice Maeterlinck and his play The Intruder, so his works seemed like a good place to start. (His essays Beyond the Great Silence and On Emerson, his plays The Buried Temple and Pelléas and Mélisande, and a mid-1970s critical rreview in French of his work. This should be fun.
