Friday, October 14, 2016

The 306 Greatest Books #139 - Vanity Fair

The next up on my reading of the 306 greatest books is Vanity Fair by William Thackeray. This book can be found on the SybervisionObserverand My Book Lists.



Vanity Fair had sat on my shelf for many years because I was not in the mood for more of the 18th century "romance novels". The kind of novels that were exemplified by the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen's works. They are all right to read once, but too much of that stuff wears me down. I feel there is no real "meat" in those books, just all fluff. Vanity Fair, though, is not one of those 18th century romances. In fact, it is the quintessential opposite in which Thackeray purposely makes fun of those novels. Thackeray's main characters are often vain, selfish, petulant, and immoral. Everything you wouldn't expect from an 18th romance novel. This actually made it a pleasant reading experience. I even laughed out loud at several instances throughout the book. The book is set up as written by someone who is acquainted with the main characters and is narrating their story as a storyteller would. This goes so far as to even have the narrator frequently making reference to the fact that you are reading a book that he is retelling. In terms of story, the main character, Becky Sharp, is not a hero. She is not even likable through much of the story. The only time that she may actually be likable is when you aren't sure if she is being sincere, which I am not convinced ever happens. Although she is the main character, the plot of the story works its way through two main families (the Crawleys and the Osbornes), taking it's leave of Becky when other story lines would take precedent. The plot and time moves steadily on throughout the story with characters coming and going as needed. My main problem with the book, though is that even though the writing is very well done, the story itself is rather dull at times. At over 700 pages long, it takes a long time to work through the narrative. The story could have been trimmed up pretty easily making the pace move a bit faster. I would often get bored of reading the book and need to put it down for a few days because there was nothing drawing me to read more. However, as I moved on towards the end I felt the urge to keep reading build up. Overall, I would say that the story was enjoyable, and funny at times, if not a little bit long winded, but I recommend it nonetheless. 

Thursday, October 13, 2016

The 100 Greatest Movies - #97 Bringing Up Baby

I am in the process of watching all of the 100 Greatest movies according to AFI. 

The current film I just watched is Bringing Up Baby, which is #97


This movie is also on the 10th Anniversary List (#88), the 100 Greatest Comedies list (#14), and the 100 Greatest Romances list (#51).



This movie caught my eye a while ago because it was about a paleontologist, and being a paleontologist myself I was curious. Since this is an older comedy though I was cautious. What people found to be funny at that time and current days standards are often very different, however this was on the 100 Greatest Movies list and seemed to be ranked highly among comedies so I gave it a shot. In regards to the movie itself, even though the paleontology was downright atrocious (if those dinosaur skeletons looked any faker I may have vomited) the movie was actually enjoyable. I even laughed out loud a couple of times, something I don't often say for these older movies even if I enjoy them. The plot is thin but the characters are fun for the most part. Hepburn's character could use a good punch in the face though. She plays a very spacey woman who seems to not understand what she is doing the majority of the time while in the process of "ruining" Grant's chances of obtaining a grant for his museum. Things work out in the end of course, because how often do they not? Overall, I'd say an enjoyable movie and well worth the cost of admission.