A Modern March Wrap-Up

I had a lot of plans for this event, and unfortunately I didn't get to all of them...I had planned on reading either The Sound and the Fury or A Portait of the Artist as a Young Man, but didn't get to either of them. I just didn't read as much during March as I did earlier in the year, unfortunately, and I was also distracted by some non-classic books. However, I did finish two books for this event, A Room with a View and The Old Man and the Sea. I also read The Paris Wife by Paula McLain, a novel about Ernest Hemingway's first wife, which is related to the event (but of course, can't be counted).

Even though I didn't read everything I planned to for the event, I'm pretty pleased with the two books that I did read. I ended up loving both of them and they taught me a little more about Modern literature, which I was only recently really introduced to.

February Wrap-Up and March Plans

Once upon a time, I thought today was February 29th. Well, folks, apparently I have not gotten used to the Western calendar in all my years of life.

Anyway, this month wrap-up was meant to be published in the month of February...I've decided that since I really like to read other people's monthly wrap-up posts, I thought maybe I would do the same. Nice way to keep on track with reading goals.

Books finished this month:
Ivanhoe
Great Expectations
Charles Dickens (biography)

Events I participated in:
Celebrating Dickens

Favorite book of the month:
Great Expectations

I just barely finished Great Expectations in the nick of time to review it for Celebrating Dickens. I expected to be able to read more during February, but I made the mistake of getting myself knee-deep in two chunksters (albeit smallish chunksters) at a time. Not so good. After feeling like I had been smack in the middle of both Ivanhoe and GE for weeks and weeks with no end in sight, my motivation started to decline just a bit...so next month (it's February 29th, remember? Work with me) I'm taking a break from chunksters! No need to beat myself to death with books; it's about having fun, right?

Right. So this month, as per A Modern March, I'm going to immerse myself in modern literature, allow myself to read some other stuff for my other challenges (and just for fun), and challenge myself to get through as many books as I can!

A Modern March

Guys! I'm very excited to tell you about a marvelous event that is happening in March!

Allie at A Literary Odyssey is hosting "A Modern March" event:

Fantastic button, eh?

In other words, throughout the month of March, I'll be focusing on Modernist literature. That's Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, T.S. Eliot, James Joyce...etc.

So I decided to jump on it right away, because a) ever since I learned to really enjoy Modern lit last year I've been a lot more interested to read more, b) learning to really enjoy Modern lit last year made me realize what a deficiency I have in that period, and c) I've been reading 19th-century stuff and will continue to be reading it for Celebrating Dickens in February so I'll probably be very ready to move to something different in March.

I've also been thinking that I need to revise my Classics Club list to include more Modern literature. It's chock-full of 19th-century books and even contemporary fiction (mainly the ones I know everyone reads in high school and I feel obligated to read at some point even though I know nothing about them) and practically skips over Modern lit. So over the next month, I'll be revising it to include some of the books I want to read for this event.

See you in March!

Books Read:
A Room With a View by E. M. Forster
The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway