(no subject)

[sebastienne]

just finished re-reading the lion, the witch and the wardrobe. oh god.

this book is my childhood. my father first read the series to me when i was 3 or 4, and i read it to myself when i was 5. and the sentences have the right rhythm and "are you a great overgrown dwarf that has cut off its beard?" and the way that every time i see "cair paravel" i have to shape it with my lips because it is so beautiful is better than all the turkish delight in the world. i can't quite explain it, but it is so long since i have responded this way to a book. i don't believe i have felt this way about anything since i first read lord of the rings at age 12. that's 7 years without feeling this about anything.

Comments

[anotherusedpage.livejournal.com]

I know the feeling. Narnia did it. LOTR did it. Very few other things have ever done it, and most of them are poncy and/or embarassing (TS Eliot's Four Quartets), with the exception of the Sandman comics...

On the other hand, you should read the Regeneration Trilogy. Because while it is not the same love-at-first-sight feeling, Billy Prior will take up residency in your brain and refuse to leave.

[neoanjou.livejournal.com]

The last book that was literally 'unputdownable' for me was 'Blindness' by José Saramago.

Horrible, scary and with the Iberian abiity to tell fairtales tremendously extraordinary but with such truth. All in all very, very good!

[queerpup.livejournal.com]

Hello there. I felt I had to comment here because the Regeneration trilogy are three of my favourite books (along with a fair few others).

These books send chills down my spine while I'm reading them, and can be very uncomfortable to read at times, which is partly why I think they're so fantastic.

They're by Pat Barker.

[threadbarewolf.livejournal.com]

Fitness.

Every time I see the word 'Narnia' I think SCORE THAT'S MY NAME BITCH. Not really to anyone in particular.

Anyhoo. We are planning a reading of TLTWaTW when it snows next to the Narnia lamppost. BECAUSE IT'S HERE. Hope you are ok. Will send letter soonly. SOONLY.

[cheekybrit.livejournal.com]

Narnia was certainly *the* escape for me when I was young(er), and perhaps still is.

...but it's that you went to the Red School that's got me all giddy. It's feeble that that's all it takes, really.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

wow!

(is there really just us, on all of LJ?)

somebody else who had to wear those summer dresses. ah, nostalgia.

[cheekybrit.livejournal.com]

Don't tell me they hadn't changed the summer uniform by the time you were there? Those pinkish, checkered frocks clashed wonderfully with the blazer and beret.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

ah, i was post-beret, but the red/pink/white check was still very much going strong.

i wish i had had a beret. they sound fun.

[cheekybrit.livejournal.com]

We'd get into a lot of trouble if we didn't wear them. They made excellent frisbees.

I can't get over that they phased out the berets but not those dresses. Crazy.

I gather the lunches improved around the time I left. Traditionally, if they didn't make you ill they made you cry. Many a time was "food" placed in the pocket of a denim apron to be smuggled to the rubbish bin outside.

A former Red-Schooler qualifies as someone I'd be willing to add to my "friends list." Would you mind?

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

not at all :)

i don't really remember the food very much at all - but i do remember odd things like playing classical music on the way into assembley and writing its name on a chalkboard, and how we always used to watch a film called Hot Shots when it rained, that had a sexual scene in it which we thought was very naughty.