A library is a fuelling station for your mind.ConsultPivotal.com
Steve Leveen
The wisdom of giving up on books is compelling. New York University professor Atwood H. Townsend wrote in his Good Reading: A Helpful Guide for Serious Readers, “Never force yourself to read a book that you do not enjoy. There are so many good books in the world that it is foolish to waste time on one that does not give you pleasure and profit.”
Steve Leveen, Author--The Little Guide to Your Well-Read life
Hi, My Name is Linda. Yesterday my friend Sam pointed out The Cranky Librarian link (see list of links to the right) to you and all the great e-books and artwork that resides at that site. He even introduced the first several paragraphs of a classic of literature--Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky. I want to introduce a couple paragraphs of another literature classic and challenge you to identify it. Here goes:Chapter 1
I am by birth a Genevese, and my family is one of the most distinguished of that republic. My ancestors had been for many years counsellors and syndics, and my father had filled several public situations with honour and reputation. He was respected by all who knew him for his integrity and indefatigable attention to public business.He passed his younger days perpetually occupied by the affairs ofhis country; a variety of circumstances had prevented his marrying early, nor was it until the decline of life that he became a husband and the father of a family.
As the circumstances of his marriage illustrate his character, I cannot refrain from relating them. One of his most intimate friends was a merchant who, from a flourishing state, fell,through numerous mischances, into poverty. This man, whose name was Beaufort, was of a proud and unbending disposition and could not bear to live in poverty and oblivion in the same country where he had formerly been distinguished for his rank and magnificence. Having paid his debts, therefore, in the most honourable manner, he retreated with his daughter to the town of Lucerne, where he lived unknown and in wretchedness. My father loved Beaufort with the truest friendship and was deeply grieved by his retreat in these unfortunate circumstances. He bitterly deplored the false pride which led his friend to a conduct so little worthy of the affection that united them. He lost no time in endeavouring to seek him out, with the hope of persuading him to begin the world again through his credit and assistance. Beaufort had taken effectual measures to conceal himself, and it was ten months before my father discovered his abode. Overjoyed at this discovery, he hastened to the house,which was situated in a mean street near the Reuss. But when he entered, misery and despair alone welcomed him. Beaufort had saved but avery small sum of money from the wreck of his fortunes, but it was sufficient to provide him with sustenance for some months, and in the meantime he hoped to procure some respectable employment in a merchant's house. The interval was, consequently, spent in inaction; his grief only became more deep and rankling when he had leisure for reflection, and at length it took so fast hold of his mind that at the end of three months he lay on a bed of sickness, incapable of any exertion.
His daughter attended him with the greatest tenderness, but she saw with despair that their little fund was rapidly decreasing and that there was no other prospect of support. But Caroline Beaufort possessed a mind of an uncommon mould, and her courage rose to support her in her adversity. She procured plain work; she plaited straw and by various means contrived to earn a pittance scarcely sufficient to support life.
Do you recognize this famous novel also at The Cranky Librarian? It is Frankenstein , or the Modern Prometheus written by Mary Wollstone Godwin Shelley in 1818, so she was only 21 when she wrote it. Mary Shelley lived from 1797 - 1851.
http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9481497
Some general Mary Shelley quotations-
Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of the void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself.
A slavish bondage to parents cramps every faculty of the mind.
It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world.
I do not wish women to have power over men, but over themselves.
It is hardly surprising that women concentrate on the way they look instead of what is in their minds since not much has been put in their minds to begin with.
Read in order to live.Henry Fielding, English novelist, 1707 - 1754
Henry Field@BrainyQuote.com
© Bob Hoff, 2007
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