"The Germans dont use hyphens, and we all know what
happened in their country in 1939."
--Sarah Funke
I realized today that for some strange reason I've had Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat in my head for the past month. It started out with me trying to remember some of the songs during one of my endless bouts of vacuuming, now it just won't go away. Sometimes I even find myself whistling that bit from the beginning of "Father We've Something to Tell You." Mostly it's the Pharoah song and the end with Joseph and his brothers that plays over and over and over after all of my other thoughts have gone away. I haven't listened to Joseph in at least three years. Darn you, Andrew Lloyd Webber. Still, it's better than any of that Rodgers and Hammerstein crap.
I've actually been wandering through strange worlds of adult fantasy on my way to children's literature. One of the things I'm most pleased about right now, though, is the fact that I bought a hard cover E. Nesbit book that I've never read and it's sitting on my bookshelf waiting for me. I think I will wait until the school year to read it, it will make me happy when Pat Ralston starts getting me down. I have two classes with her next semester. I told myself I'd never do that again. I hate myself. The Nesbit is called The Magic City. I don't know anything about it, but I love her other stuff, except maybe The Wouldbegoods because it gets repititious, even though I really liked The Treasure Seekers (the book to which it is the sequel).
I read Tanith Lee last week, a book called White as Snow. It's a really interesting blending of Snow White and the myth of Persephone. It has interesting pagan and scriptural undertones--one part of the story has an almost re-enacting of the story of the sacrifice of Isaac. There was altogether too must sex-in-dark-corners for me, though.
This week I read Patricia A. McKillip's newest novel, Alphabet of Thorn. I love McKillip, and the best part is she seems to get better with every book. I loved this book because it was all about an amazing library, huge and hanging onto a cliff above the sea like a barnacle, and a girl who worked there. There should be more libraries in fantasy books. I love McKillip's magic because she emphasizes words and the power of words so much, and she has such a dreamy style of writing. I find it very engrossing. And she never seems to have a message, which I find intensely irritating in fantasy stories.
Now I'm reading The Golden Compass which I've been meaning to read for sometime because it's in the His Dark Materials series which seems to be quite influential on the modern children's fantasy scene and Philip Pullman (the author) seems so opposed to C. S. Lewis and his influence. I remember the third His Dark Materials book, The Amber Spyglass, being thoroughly condemned in World magazine, just as Harry Potter was, which of couse made me want to read it.