You know you're a lit nerd when...

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Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:49:02 +0100

alexalcamo: Great Gatsbys on Hark! A Vagrant

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 10:25:19 +0100

alexalcamo:

Great Gatsbys on Hark! A Vagrant

The Sherlock Holmes museum, 221B Baker Street, London.

Mon, 10 Sep 2012 18:46:39 +0100

The Sherlock Holmes museum, 221B Baker Street, London.

I wonder why you think Arthur Conan Doyle gave Holmes "the flaw of being a cocaine addict"? I have reada good 30 Holmes books (during a long bout of mono) and such an addiction really never comes up as an addiction, just a casual habit that is very rarely mentioned and really not a flaw. Did you read about this second hand or am I missing something?
I do like your blog a lot, am just curious.

Mon, 10 Sep 2012 18:43:00 +0100

Hrmm… That is a very interesting topic. I have read all of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and loved them, and I also found the idea of Holmes’ cocaine “addiction” an interesting one.

(This is also very well timed, as I have only just returned from visiting the Sherlock Holmes museum at 221B Baker Street, where, incidentally, they sell pens in the shape of syringes in homage to said addiction - perhaps a little bad taste, but certainly amusing).

Personally, I like Doyle’s inclusion of Holmes’ cocaine “addiction” because it makes Holmes a more rounded character. Previous to this revelation, the reader tends to put Holmes on a pedestal due to his heroic and almost superhuman qualities, and Doyle uses a cocaine addiction to prove to us that even HE is human. The references may be few, but they are certainly memorable, perhaps for the above reason.

Perhaps symbolically, Watson can see the danger that this causes to Holmes’ health - Watson being Holmes’ “guiding light” - and his insistance that Holmes should give up cocaine perhaps ultimately saves Holmes’ life. Holmes’ obedience to Watson’s request also shows the relationship between the two, as giving up a substance that he was addicted to would have been difficult, and Holmes would never have done so if anyone other than Watson had requested.

It also shows the reader that being a detective, and the intellectual stimulation it brings, is Holmes’ life. Holmes has nothing else to challenge him, as he would find any other occupations to pose any sort of problem for his active mind to solve, he has no commitments, and, previous to Watson, no friends. When there is a lapse in work then, Holmes has nothing else to do, so gets bored, which results in his use of cocaine.

The use of drugs such as cocaine, as well as opiates (which Holmes shows contempt for) were neither illegal nor uncommon in Holmes’ time, and the impact of Holmes’ addiction, as well as Doyle’s thought processes behind it, is explored here.

Personally, I interpret Holmes’ addiction in this way, though I am welcome to other interpretations - in fact, I welcome them, so any one, feel free to contribute. Hope this helps :)

You know you’re a (foolish) lit nerd when you quote the last lines of Ulysses in an email to...

Tue, 28 Aug 2012 17:32:29 +0100

You know you’re a (foolish) lit nerd when you quote the last lines of Ulysses in an email to your (male) teacher about University applications (after having watched a youtube video a few months ago in which Stephen Fry says that it’s his favourite book and talks about the overwhelming positivity of ‘yes!’ and so thinking that quoting it would be a good way of expressing positivity) without actually knowing the context of that last chapter since you’ve only gotten up to Oxen of the Sun. So embarrassing.

#Joyce #Ulysses

You know you’re a lit nerd when you’ve considered naming one James and the other Joyce if you ever have twins.

Tue, 28 Aug 2012 17:31:55 +0100

Sorry, for some reason this has my name attatched… to clarify, this is from Tara (teajaylea@gmail.com), with many thanks! :D

samyulle: don’t you hate it when you’re reading a chapter and then it’s coming to its climax and...

Mon, 27 Aug 2012 18:18:15 +0100

samyulle:

don’t you hate it when you’re reading a chapter and then it’s coming to its climax and omg what’s gonna happen, then woops, your eyes dart to the last line and you spoil yourself and hate yourself for it

Uh, hi. I was wondering if you could give me four really good quotes from The Collector and whether Clegg or Grey said them? Please and thanks!!!

Sun, 12 Aug 2012 17:37:33 +0100

Sure - not sure what kind of theme you wanted, so I just put down my favourites :)

“When you draw something it lives and when you photograph it it dies”
~ Miranda

“We all want things we can’t have. Being a decent human being is accepting that.”
~ Miranda

“They’re beautiful. But sad.’ Everything’s sad if you make it so, I said.”
~ Conversation between Miranda and Clegg.

“Art’s cruel. You can get away with murder with words. But a picture is like a window straight through to your inmost heart.”
~ Miranda

“I am one in a row of specimens. It’s when I try to flutter out of line that he hates me. I’m meant to be dead, pinned, always the same, always beautiful. He knows that part of my beauty is being alive. but it’s the dead me he wants. He wants me living-but-dead.”
~ Miranda

“I just think of things as beautiful or not. Can’t you understand? I don’t think of good or bad. Just of beautiful or ugly. I think a lot of nice things are ugly and a lot of nasty things are beautiful.”
~ Miranda

Hope that helps :)

"It is only when our characters and events begin to disobey us that they begin to live."

Sun, 12 Aug 2012 17:05:59 +0100

“It is only when our characters and events begin to disobey us that they begin to live.”

- John Fowles, “The French Lieutenant’s Woman”

askshiguresohma reblogged your post: You know you’re a lit nerd when you wonder what...

Wed, 08 Aug 2012 15:11:14 +0100

askshiguresohma reblogged your post: You know you’re a lit nerd when you wonder what Julia’s Room 101 would have been.

block

“Maybe it was lack of sex?”

Omg yes.

vwphotography: Free Books.

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 18:03:19 +0100

vwphotography:

Free Books.

Shakespeare's Insult of the Week (Surprise!!)

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 19:19:17 +0100

alwaysiambic:

“Away, you scullion! you rampallian! you fustilarian! I’ll tickle your catastrophe.”

— Henry IV, Part 2

"…human language is like a cracked kettledrum on which we beat our tunes for bears to dance to, when..."

Sun, 22 Jul 2012 19:42:42 +0100

““…human language is like a cracked kettledrum on which we beat our tunes for bears to dance to, when what we long to do is make music that will move the stars to pity.””

- “Madame Bovary” by Gustave Flaubert.

"Haven’t you ever happened to come across in a book some vague notion that you’ve had, some obscure..."

Sun, 22 Jul 2012 19:40:17 +0100

““Haven’t you ever happened to come across in a book some vague notion that you’ve had, some obscure idea that returns from afar and that seems to express completely your most subtle feelings?””

- Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary (via written-in-prose)

You know you're a lit nerd when books are "Es muss sein!" of your life.

Sun, 22 Jul 2012 19:13:00 +0100

A six-year-old judges classic novels by their covers.

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 20:00:48 +0100

A six-year-old judges classic novels by their covers.:

My personal favourites were “The Great Gatsby”, “Jane Eyre”, “Wuthering Heights” and “Fifty Shades of Grey” (although personally, I think the little girl’s plotline was better than that of the latter)

Classics re-written as erotica.

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 19:54:36 +0100

Classics re-written as erotica.:

You are reading this correctly. Apparently it’s been termed the “Fifty Shades of Grey effect” - Holmes and Watson as gay lovers, Henry Tilney and Catherine Morland’s erotic fantasies, Darcy’s “manhood” being buried in Elizabeth “up to the hilt”, Jane Eyre as sexually submissive and sexual tension 50,000 leagues under the sea - all courtesy of “Clandestine Classics”.

I kid you not.

"We would be together and have our books and at night be warm in bed together with the windows open..."

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 19:24:22 +0100

“We would be together and have our books and at night be warm in bed together with the windows open and the stars bright.”

- Ernest Hemingway (via towesttexas)

You know you're a lit nerd when, during the holidays, you're averaging a book a day.

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 22:37:40 +0100

You know you're a lit nerd when you start your Christmas list in July so as to narrow down the potential books to a reasonable number.

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 22:36:22 +0100