Wednesday Reading Meme
Nov. 13th, 2019 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerWhat I’ve Just Finished Reading
I finished William Heyliger’s You’re on the Air, which is about a young man who tries to break into local radio. This book reminded me of E. Lockhart’s Dramarama, which is also a novel about a young person who wants to break into showbiz. In both novels, the main characters discover they don’t have the talent to make it as a performer - but might have the requisite talents to work in a more backstage capacity, a fact that is explicit in Heyliger (Joe actually gets a job as a producer’s assistant) and implicit in Lockhart.
Perhaps that’s why I found Dramarama so frustrating: the book hints at Sadye’s possible talent for directing but never mentions in explicitly, so after Sadye’s dreams of a future in musical theater crash into nothing once she gets kicked out of musical theater camp, she’s left with nothing, and we the readers are left with no suggestion that she might find an equally satisfying new direction.
Joe, on the other hand, actually makes choices: once he realizes he doesn’t have the talent to make it as a performer, he gets a job as a producer’s assistant, and then decides he doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life watching the performers get crushed by the uncertainty and low pay of small-scale showbiz. His character development drives the plot, whereas the plot kicks Sadye around like a football.
What I’m Reading Now
William Dean Howells’ A Foregone Conclusion, in which an American consul to Venice during the Civil War (Howells was the American consul to Venice during the Civil War) befriends a Venetian priest, who first visits him because he’s invented a cannon that he hopes might be of use to the United States government in its fight against the South Americans. The consul gently explains that in fact the US is not at war with the entirety of South America, but only the American South, and also inquires if the good priest has any practical experience with cannon? Or firearms of any sort? Well, no, alas.
But the consul’s interest is nonetheless piqued by the priest-inventor, and they become friends, and the consul has helped find the priest a job as tutor in Italian for a young American lady. If the priest weren’t a priest, I would expect the Foregone Conclusion of the title to be a romantic rivalry over the young lady between the two friends, but as it is that seems somewhat unlikely so I really have no idea how the story will develop. We shall see!
What I Plan to Read Next
I have Rainbow Rowell’s Wayward Son.
I finished William Heyliger’s You’re on the Air, which is about a young man who tries to break into local radio. This book reminded me of E. Lockhart’s Dramarama, which is also a novel about a young person who wants to break into showbiz. In both novels, the main characters discover they don’t have the talent to make it as a performer - but might have the requisite talents to work in a more backstage capacity, a fact that is explicit in Heyliger (Joe actually gets a job as a producer’s assistant) and implicit in Lockhart.
Perhaps that’s why I found Dramarama so frustrating: the book hints at Sadye’s possible talent for directing but never mentions in explicitly, so after Sadye’s dreams of a future in musical theater crash into nothing once she gets kicked out of musical theater camp, she’s left with nothing, and we the readers are left with no suggestion that she might find an equally satisfying new direction.
Joe, on the other hand, actually makes choices: once he realizes he doesn’t have the talent to make it as a performer, he gets a job as a producer’s assistant, and then decides he doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life watching the performers get crushed by the uncertainty and low pay of small-scale showbiz. His character development drives the plot, whereas the plot kicks Sadye around like a football.
What I’m Reading Now
William Dean Howells’ A Foregone Conclusion, in which an American consul to Venice during the Civil War (Howells was the American consul to Venice during the Civil War) befriends a Venetian priest, who first visits him because he’s invented a cannon that he hopes might be of use to the United States government in its fight against the South Americans. The consul gently explains that in fact the US is not at war with the entirety of South America, but only the American South, and also inquires if the good priest has any practical experience with cannon? Or firearms of any sort? Well, no, alas.
But the consul’s interest is nonetheless piqued by the priest-inventor, and they become friends, and the consul has helped find the priest a job as tutor in Italian for a young American lady. If the priest weren’t a priest, I would expect the Foregone Conclusion of the title to be a romantic rivalry over the young lady between the two friends, but as it is that seems somewhat unlikely so I really have no idea how the story will develop. We shall see!
What I Plan to Read Next
I have Rainbow Rowell’s Wayward Son.
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Date: 2019-11-13 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-11-14 01:54 am (UTC)