Life, The Universe and Everything
It was another quiet day for the most part. Did pop by Borders and bumped into a few friends, in particular Gregory, a fellow Singaporean PPEist and Stefano Mariani, who used to attend squad practices regularly and was on the University Challenge champion team from Corpus Christi. It was nice chatting to them. Ordered a couple more books off my reading list which will arrive in a week, and despite this I still get 20% off for them which is nice!
There was a sneak preview of the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, so I managed to get some people out to watch it including Katie M, Jon Ayling, Sam Geen and some other Trinity people as well as Laurel and a friend of hers whom she had met for dinner. It was quite a faithful adaptation of the books and was definitely quite funny though it tended to drag in the middle. I especially loved how they did Marvin the Robot as well as Beetlebrux, the President of the Galaxy.
Other than that, tried and failed to make much headway into an essay about the causes of the first world war. Also, decided not to go for choir practice in the afternoon, the time of which was spent in a long conversation with Sam Geen - so much for tackling some of the reading for my essay! Thus is Oxford life.
Currently reading: The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane. I have decided to start on a general series of novels relating to the theme of 'war' this term, having started off (on a whim) with Tim O'Brien's book. This is considered a classic of War Literature, especially in terms of dealing with the psychological effects of warfare on a person. I have gotten through about half of it right now, and it certainly is a very interesting novel, full of acute observations of human nature and warfare, something all the more impressive for the fact that Crane had never himself been through any military training or experienced warfare firsthand. I have been finding the author's writing style a bit stilted and dull however, and I have not been able to really get 'into' the book, or get a real feel for it. Perhaps I have become to accustomed to modern war literature, and the style of such writers as O'Brien which tends towards the more personal, first person accounts rather than the way Crane writes which is strictly third person, and often observational. Still, I will wait till I finish it for a full assesment, and it is still a worthwhile read within the genre.
There was a sneak preview of the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, so I managed to get some people out to watch it including Katie M, Jon Ayling, Sam Geen and some other Trinity people as well as Laurel and a friend of hers whom she had met for dinner. It was quite a faithful adaptation of the books and was definitely quite funny though it tended to drag in the middle. I especially loved how they did Marvin the Robot as well as Beetlebrux, the President of the Galaxy.
Other than that, tried and failed to make much headway into an essay about the causes of the first world war. Also, decided not to go for choir practice in the afternoon, the time of which was spent in a long conversation with Sam Geen - so much for tackling some of the reading for my essay! Thus is Oxford life.
Currently reading: The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane. I have decided to start on a general series of novels relating to the theme of 'war' this term, having started off (on a whim) with Tim O'Brien's book. This is considered a classic of War Literature, especially in terms of dealing with the psychological effects of warfare on a person. I have gotten through about half of it right now, and it certainly is a very interesting novel, full of acute observations of human nature and warfare, something all the more impressive for the fact that Crane had never himself been through any military training or experienced warfare firsthand. I have been finding the author's writing style a bit stilted and dull however, and I have not been able to really get 'into' the book, or get a real feel for it. Perhaps I have become to accustomed to modern war literature, and the style of such writers as O'Brien which tends towards the more personal, first person accounts rather than the way Crane writes which is strictly third person, and often observational. Still, I will wait till I finish it for a full assesment, and it is still a worthwhile read within the genre.
posted by Caleb Liu | 6:45 AM
2 Comments:
You know Stefano Mariani? *impressed* Does he wear that sexy Nehru-collared jacket all the time, or was that just for the TV?*droolingly*
come on, caleb - spill!
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