tree_and_leaf: Watercolour of barn owl perched on post. (Default)
In non-plague news, today I learned that Val McDiarmid was inspired by childhood reading of the Chalet School:

in one of the more bizarre examples of literature influencing life I was guided by the Chalet School books, which I loved. It is through these that I realised that being a writer was actually a job. And all these girls went on to higher education at either the Sorbonne, the Kensington school of Needlework, or Oxford.
tree_and_leaf: Peter Davison in Five's cricket gear, leaning on wall with nose in book, looking a bit like Peter Wimsey. (Books)
Weird reflections of the day so far:

(a) One of the reasons I find Reg/ Len squicky is that the situation, particularly with Jo's peculiar and slightly troubling enthusiasm for it, reminds me a bit of Effi Briest (incidentally, that Wiki article is linguistically very odd), only with bonus squick, because however ill you think of Innstetten, he at least didn't hang around watching her grow up.

(b) I was trying to imagine a worship song dealing with dark night experiences (since there are hymns which fall into that category, such as Abide With Me), and found myself wondering if you wouldn't end up with something suspiciously like 'Hit Me Baby One More Time', simply substituting 'Jesus' or 'Lord' for 'baby'/ 'boy' (you've even got the dodgy power dynamics):

My loneliness is killing me
I must confess I still believe
When I'm not with you I lose my mind
Give me a sign,
Hit me Jesus one more time....†

Oh Jesus, Jesus, the reason I breathe is you (etc)

Oh dear. Too easy. Except, of course, it's a far better crafted song than most of what emanates from Hillsong or whatever the favourite of the month is...

† Batter my heart, three-personed God, and all that.

Profile

tree_and_leaf: Watercolour of barn owl perched on post. (Default)
tree_and_leaf

December 2021

S M T W T F S
    1 234
567891011
12131415161718
192021222324 25
262728293031 

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios