Okay, this monthly wrap-up is much, much shorter than all my others have been, and I know you’re all sighing with relief because boy-oh-boy are the other ones way too long to read properly. To your happiness, I’m now a hard-working university student who doesn’t have time to even remember what a book is – oh no, that’s right, Wuthering Heights is a book. It all comes flooding back to me now.
I’ll keep these reviews short; as I read these books for university, I’m finding myself unable to review them without thinking how does this relate to the keywords canon, class, gender, ideology?
Anyway, I read four books this month. Well, actually, that’s a lie. I read the following four books in this blog post, but I also made my way through A Series of Unfortunate Events. If you’ve been following these reading posts, you’ll know I don’t review those books, for reasons unknown even to me.
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
I didn’t enjoy this.
To those who say this is an epic romance, I tell you not the kind of romance I want. Aggression, violence, tragedy; nothing about this story appeals to me! I found the characters’ behaviour exaggerated and their woes of love to be entirely their own fault. I couldn’t relate to anyone; the most I could relate to was the gloomy setting: Wuthering Heights itself, as the nature reflects the miserable events of the book.
My rating: 3/5 stars
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
This was a short novel, and I didn’t dislike it. Without uni I wouldn’t have read it, but it was quite interesting. I enjoyed going into this culture and seeing their way of life, which is vastly different from my own.
My rating: 3/5 stars
Poetry Notebook 2006-2004 by Clive James
As I mentioned in this post, this book wasn’t prescribed for my English Unit, but it helped me sort out some thoughts for an essay about Yeats.
Originally, I found this book difficult to read for leisure, but as soon as I started to read it with a research-mind it became much more interesting and easier to take in.
My rating: 4/5 stars
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
I didn’t enjoy this novel either.
I loved the descriptions of the world around our narrator, Marlowe, as he’s on a boat surrounded by nature. I enjoyed the setting, and diving into his conscience. What I didn’t like was the story following Kurtz, and the blurred line of sanity and insanity that comes with that. I did appreciate something in this novel, however, hence the higher rating.
My rating: 4/5 stars
Sarah xx
the softest words 