Question of the day.

Who is a character from a classic novel you really like, or at least relate to?

My answer:

If Anne of Green Gables is considered a classic, can all L.M. Montgomery be considered as such? If yes, then it’ll surely be one of her characters. While my favourite book/series by Montgomery is Emily of New Moon, my favourite female character from her books is actually Valancy Stirling, from The Blue Castle. I don’t know what it is about her, but I like her SO, sooo much, she was one of my first literary fazas. Also I find her and her life oddly relatable, and I can’t even put my finger exactly on why, but I suppose it’s more about the details rather than the full picture. I find Emily even more relatable, but slightly less likeable. My favourite male character created by L. M. Montgomery is Dean Priest from the Emily books, whom a lot of people consider to be a creep because he was in love with Emily even though she was I guess like twelve when they met and he was over ten years older than her, but I’ve never really seen it this way and I don’t think their relationship is creepy even though it doesn’t work out in the end. I think Dean is a very interesting character, and I also had a sort of faza on him, and when I first read Emily I was actually quite disconsolate to find out that, in the end, despite having planned to marry Dean, she chooses to marry Ted who has no personality imo and is absolutely meh. It took me some time to understand that it probably really would be a bit of a disaster with Dean and all Emily’s writing dreams would fly out the window. Also Pat Gardiner from Pat of the Silver Bush. I don’t love her, and the books are meh compared with some of the better books by Montgomery but I nevertheless found her extremely relatable when I was a kid because of her love for her home, and I was away from mine at the time, and I understood her need for stability and being where she belongs to, and her fear of changes.

How about you? 🙂

Question of the day.

Who, in your opinion, is an author or poet more people should know about?

My answer:

There’s tons of authors writing in less popular languages than English who don’t get translated, or even if they do, I guess literature translated to English only gets some little bit of the attention that the actual English-language literature gets. Many of these authors are really good, so it’s sad to think what people are missing out on. And it’s not even just English speakers because while I believe there’s more literature that is translated between other languages, it’s still not all, and here in Poland, most of translated literature that we have is from English. I’m now trying to think when was the last time I read a book that was originally written in, for example, Hungarian. I can only think of two. Or say Icelandic. Nothing comes to mind except sagas. Or even, so as not to venture too far away, in some of my favourite languages like Finnish or Dutch. Well, for Finnish there’s mostly just Mika Valtari and Tove Jansson whom I both love, but not much more than that, and with Dutch even less than that. As for non-European languages if I ever read anything in any of them I think it was mostly stuff like fairytales or the like but even that I’m not sure if it’s always been translated directly from the original. Oh wait, I did read a book translated from Arabic earlier this year, but even the translator wrote that there aren’t many books translated from Arabic to Polish. Now I even remember once reading some article in a magazine where it said that it’s quite sad that there aren’t many Polish translations of Czech books, despite we’re neighbouring countries, after all. There are some classics and stuff but it feels like given the relationship between our languages we should share more literature with each other. I don’t think they’ve translated a lot of ours either, . So yeah, there are definitely a lot of great authors and poets that many people don’t know and often they’re only known within their country. I always feel sad that my favourite Polish author, Małgorzata Musierowicz, isn’t better known abroad. I don’t think there are any English translations of her books. There are Italian ones, Japanese ones, I believe even Russian, but not English. Perhaps her colourful language, plus the quintessentially Polish vibe of her books and all the Polish nuances are difficult to translate. Actually not perhaps, but for sure. Still, it’s sad and I suppose if it was possible to transfer into Japanese, there should be a possibility to do it in English and someone who’d be able to do it.

But actually, the first author that sprang to my mind when I thought of the answer to this question was an English-speaking one. Namely another of my all-time, most favourite authors – Lucy Maud Montgomery. –
Yeah, I know, Anne of Green Gables, she’s super popular everywhere, and while I like her very much, I also think she’s a tiny bit overrated compared with her other heroines, and what I don’t like about her is that she’s not very realistic, at least as a child. How many people, who aren’t specifically and very hugely in love with her books, are even aware of those other heroines, or any of her other books existing, or of what they are called? Most people I’ve talked to about her have no idea she wrote anything else. And this is so sad because, like so many authors, she’s just been labelled as children’s author, even though, in my humble opinion, most of her books are actually better to read or re-read when you’re older as you get more out of them this way, and some, like The Blue Castle or A Tangled Web, I don’t think are suitable for children at all. Perhaps only Magic for Marigold is a proper children’s book. Then there are also all those short stories she wrote, some are better, some are worse, but I think they’re also definitely worth reading, perhaps unless you’re the type like my Sofi who needs instantly developing, quick-paced and adrenaline-filled action, then maybe you’ll feel underwhelmed with most of them. 😀 And her diaries are also a very interesting read.

As a bonus, I’ll also add Norwegian author and Nobel Prize winner Sigrid Undset, because I’ve read several of her books and now that I’m kinda sorta learning Norwegian I feel like I’d like to refresh them soon, not in Norwegian, I’m too scared for that just yet and I don’t know where to get Norwegian books from online, but in Polish or in English. Her books are probably not for everyone but I wish she was better known so that people could at least find out if they like or dislike her books.

Who’s such an author in your opinion? 🙂

Question of the day.

What was the first adult book you ever read? How old were you? Did you ever read YA when you were age appropriate, or did you jump from children’s books to adult books?

My answer:

I was thinking hard about it and it took me really a long time. Probably both because I read a lot, and I don’t really have memory for such details like which book was first and when exactly, I’ll typically remember the plot line of the book, or other things that happened around the time when I read it, what was going on in my life, what were my reactions to/associations with the book etc. But actually when I thought hard enough I figured the answer was much easier than I thought, because one of the first books I read was a proper, very adult, very difficult book. And I’m pretty sure I’ve even written about it on here not that very long ago. I just got signed into the school library and was reading my first, short children’s books, but they weren’t particularly interesting and too short for me to be enough between the times when I was able to go to the library. So I wanted to try something longer and something that I knew I’d actually like, and asked about brothers’ Grim fairytales. I got a huge book, but, to sum it up, because as I said I wrote about it earlier in more detail, there was a mistake and the book I got was nothing like brothers Grim’s fairytales! And the funny thing was that, despite as I read on and couldn’t get myself at all engaged into the oh so boring, dull plotline, and it wasn’t at all like the brothers Grim book my Mum had read to me, no alarm went off in my brain that, uh oh, perhaps I’ve got the wrong book. I thought perhaps it was some really long introduction (though why it was completely off topic I had no idea either). Finally, a young girl who was volunteering in our boarding school group at the time once came over to me and asked just out of curiosity what I was reading. I complained to her that I got brothers Grim from the library but it’s so much more boring than when my Mum read it to me and actually seems like a whole different book, and there’s a lot about animals. She wanted to have a look at the cover and we were both surprised to realise that it was actually some very fancy book about… white lions? if I remember correctly, something like that. Super geeky! I was still very much learning what the whole literature thing was about and how to deal with books, and while I could read the title page myself and did, it must have probably been too disorientating for me yet. I don’t think I’d be into something like that even nowadays, although I’m sure I wouldn’t keep on reading it for as long as I did, it wasn’t really very much like me, I generally get discouraged with books quickly and give up on them ’cause why read something that’s not particularly interesting if there are so many more interesting books out there, I hate being bored.

Anyway, I must have been about 7-8 at the time it happened.

As for adult book in the context of a book containing so called adult content, when I was maybe a preteen, I was a member of our local talking book library. I loved to read and I would happily to it all the time but I could hardly have enough Braille books at home even with all the different sources I got them from, so mostly I listened to talking books on tapes. The library ladies liked me very much and were very nice, but I don’t think they really knew themselves what they had in their library, what the books were about and what ages they were appropriate for. Because I got lots of books from them that, even though I was quite a smart kid, were often for one reason or another not really appropriate for my age either intellectually or emotionally, in hintsight. That particular “adult” book was about a 15-year-old girl, so actually it could probably classify as YA only it did have a lot of sexual scenes that I absolutely wasn’t ready for then, and found all of that quite shocking, together with that the protagonist’s family was very much pathological, and she herself had a sort of lifestyle that I didn’t realise a 15-year-old could live. I think I did knew the basics about the birds and bees by the time, but not much beyond that, and it was just something very new and very overwhelming to me. I don’t think there was anything pervert or anything like that, just very graphic and the whole book overall had a sort of rough feel to it the way I remember it which made it feel even more overwhelming. In a way though, this new world was even quite fascinating. But I felt very much disturbed and after some time I talked about all that with Mum, and she reassured me, explained some things to me that were in this book and that I was wondering about, and said that if I didn’t feel like reading it further, I didn’t have to, and so I left it. I don’t remember the title of it now, I only have a vague recollection that it was German but I’m not even sure of that.

And as for YA, oh of course I read it! A lot! Since quite an early age, and enjoyed it a lot. Moreover, I still do and read a lot of it.

How about you? 🙂

Question of the day.

Hi people. 🙂

My another book related question for you is:

What is a book you can always reread?

My answer:

I like rereading books I love. Those that mean a lot to me in this or that way, that are very pleasurable or that just evoke a lot of emotions. Or even just those books that maybe even don’t have that much of a power over me but I read them during some good time previously and want to refresh the memories while reading, that’s also a good motive for a reread for me. My most most most favourites I can reread even once a year. Like the Jeżycjada series by Małgorzata Musierowicz – I know all books in it and even remember fragments of some of them by heart, I’ve read them since I was maybe about Zofijka’s age, but still rereading them makes me laugh at the same things and I still love them no less. –
Or “Emily Of New Moon”. Or another author that I love rereading is Sigrid Undset, I don’t even know why, I love some of her books but not the way I love “Emily” for example. It’s also very true that each time you reread a book you’re very likely to look at it from a different perspective, which is an interesting experience for me to observe.

How is it with you? 🙂

{CATEGORY Diary,Books]

Question of the day.

What is a book you dislike that everyone else seems to love?

My answer:

“Harry Potter”, “Twilight” and other trendy stuff that people get mad about. I just don’t feel it one bit. I tried convincing myself to “Twilight” but I actually really dislike books about vampires they are so odd and I just don’t see what’s so appealing about them. Especially about the romance part, ugh, a vampire like Edward Cullen is certainly not my type of a guy. One thing is I simply don’t like most of the fantasy genre, so it’s just boring for me. And another is that if everyone seems to love something, I will most likely dislike it. 😀 That’s just how I am. There are exceptions, but I won’t like something, or even I won’t usually read something, just because everyone else does.

What is such book for you? 🙂

Question of the day (18th June).

What’s your least favourite book?

My answer:

I have no clear idea. Usually, if I strongly feel like I dislike a book, I won’t bother reading it unless I have to for whatever reason. Overall I didn’t particularly like most of the compulsory readings we had at school, like most people. I am usually not a fan of fantasy, sci fi, paranormal and crime stories, unless they’re about something very specific that I’m into or just have something that I can love about them, but I don’t like these genres as such mostly.

Question of the day.

What kind of books do you like to read?

My answer:

Overall, anything that is somewhat related to my interests, books which can help me develop them and learn more about them. Other than that, I’ve always loved girly books, with my favourite author being Lucy Maud Montgomery, I liked authors like Louisa May Alcott, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Eleanor H. Porter (the one who wrote Pollyanna or the book about that other girl Billy), and other such, and I still like this kind of books. I also love authors like Bronte sisters, Jane Austen or Elizabeth Gaskell. I love Scandinavian literature as long as it’s not crime novels or alike. My most favourite Polish author is Małgorzata Musierowicz and I really like her style, but I also sometimes read other similar authors, just light stuff that could be read by pretty much whole family. I like some authors who wrote definitely for children, with Astrid Lindgren being my absolutely favourite in this category. I like anything to do with folklore – myths, legends, fairytales, etnographic books about some aspects of culture or folklore. – But folklore is actually one of my interests so I’ve already said that. I like historical novels but not all of them, same about other historical books, it really really depends on lots of factors and I’m very picky here. I like to read to develop myself spiritually so I often read some Christian books too, same about books about psychology/mental health but that’s also among my interests. So, very basically, that would be it, I suppose. I am a bit picky when it comes to literature, but I think I am also fairly eclectic. I usually stay away from crime novels, most of science fiction and modern fantasy.

How about you? 🙂

Question of the day.

Do you like doing anything artistic?

My answer:

Anything artistic… I have an impression that when most people use the term art or arts, or artistic, they mean visual arts. If so, sure not. Or maybe not that I don’t like it, but I’m not good at it, not rather able to do much arts stuff on my own, so… nothing exciting, I’d say.

But if we include other kinds of art, I may say that yes, because I really love writing. It helps me with self-expressing, with which I usually have issues and writing seems to be the most successful and most enjoyable way of doing it for me. I’ve been blogging on and off since I was 13, gaining “fame” in my blogging environment for writing unacceptably lengthy posts, have started multiple diaries, written in them loads of things and then destroyed them after some period of time for one reason or another. 😀 Now I think I’m more stable with this and really wouldn’t like to delete my current diary. Also I like to write short stories (which actually almost always come out very long and detailed 😀 ) or novellas from time to time. The problem with my short stories is such, that when I’m writing it, I usually think it’s great, that my idea is great etc. but soon after I’m finished with it and I reread it, I’m doubtful about its quality at very best and usually get rid of it. And I don’t have the habit of storaging what I’ve written as for the short stories. I might keep something if I think it’s fair, but I don’t usually feel very attached to it and sooner or later I don’t even know where I put it on my computer lol. Sometimes I’m talking to someone and mention I’ve just written something and they seem very interested and ask me to show it to them and are very surprised that I already deleted it. 😀 “Why on Earth? Why did you delete something you’ve been working on for so long and that you created on your own?” 😀 But that’s just how it is with me and my crazy brain, I don’t really care about what I write and honestly usually hate to reread it as I’m afraid I won’t be so proud of it as I was while writing it and straight afterwards.

But I’m also writing a novel, which I’m really attached to and I’ve mentioned it before. It’s called “Jack Hamilton” and it has helped me to survive in various awful situations. I am really attached to its main character Jack Hamilton, consider him my best friend and find this book very private as well as my relationship with Jack, therefore I finally decided never to release it. I am working on this book for years now, I started it in my early teens and now Jack is unfortunately a really aged man, but I can’t force myself to quit writing, or to kill him. My Mum says soon he’ll be so tired of life he’ll kill himself if I’ll be still unable to do it. I have also a draft and some pieces written from another novel I’ve wanted to write. It is a harlequin! Really. 😀 I started to think about writing a harlequin a few years ago some time after I started to be very seriously concerned about my future and what I really want and am able to do. I’ve heard somewhere that people earn quite a lot on writing harlequins as they’re so popular everywhere. At that time I didn’t even know what a harlequin was, but became familiar quickly and thought it seems so boring and easy to write I can at least try to do it too. I thought I’d do a historical romance, firstly because it seemed more interesting and more ambitious to me, secondly because we don’t seem to have many of them in Polish, I mean there are tons of translated romances, but I’ve never seen a historical romance written originally in Polish. So I’ve come up with the plot and wrote a bit of it but since my life got a bit stormy soon I left it and have only a bit written. At the moment I definitely don’t think like writing it but I may come back and probably will in future. But of course I will publish it under a pseudonyme haha don’t want to ruin my reputation. 😀 Also I have some bits and snippets written for another novel, this one is a fantasy novel about Nordic mythology and I think it might be very interesting, but also hard to write, and as recently I am not the most motivated, it waits for better times.

Sometimes I also try to write poetry, but it’s rather miserable, in my opinion. I was writing some occassional little poems for school when they discovered I have some writing skills, like for Teacher’s Day or before holidays etc. but I didn’t like it and don’t think they were good, they were just OK and just what they wanted. At times, I wrote some sometimes even maybe a bit obscene, sarcastic poems in my free time, just to have fun and my friends had fun of them. Sometimes they were a bit gallows-humoured. I really enjoyed them and still have some of them, although most of them I now consider a bit childish. Sometimes I still write stuff like that, when I’m either extremely frustrated or upset or really significantly high. However I’ve always regretted I can’t seem to express myself more in poems or write some more valuable poetry as I saw quite many people just letting out their feelings in poetry. I don’t seem to be good at that, or maybe I didn’t try enough, or as my Dad suggests maybe I’m not sentimental enough, 😀 although I don’t think it’s the case of sentimentality, the more that actually I think I am a bit sentimental.

My big dream is to translate written texts in future, even at least as a hobby, and my actually biggest dream is to translate my crush’s Cornelis Vreeswijk’s works into Polish. He was a poet among others. And am very happy I’ve translated a few of his poems already. They aren’t great translations, but good, and what I think is most important now is that I just did it. I wouldn’t believe it would happen so quickly, I thought I would have to have a degree in Swedish or something. 😀 It’s hard to translate him, it’s damn hard, but I prooved myself it’s manageable. And although I haven’t translated anyting new in years now, I’m still glad I did those his poems which I did then. I think it could be also considered as something artistic.

At school they always expected from me to be involved in music, but I know it since many years that I feel much better as a recipient/listener of music, than a performer. It’s too exhausting. But although now you’ll never force me to sing in public or even in front of more than three people, I like to sing in the shower or when I’m alone at home with Misha. By the way I’ve noticed recently that sometimes when he’s upset and someone starts to sing, he relaxes more and it seems to catch his attention, unless you don’t sing too loud like Zofijka does. So maybe he’s musical lol. But that’s just a recent observation, maybe that’s not true at all. Anyway if singing in the shower can be considered something artistic, I surely like it. 😀

When I was younger I was terribly fascinated by sound engineering and I tried to make some music on my computer with different apps. And actually as for my abilities in that field back then it really wasn’t that bad. 😀 I enjoyed it very much and I think I could still like it, but there are too many things I like more and that are more important for me to do.

Which kinds of arts do you like to do, if any? 🙂 Very curious.