Britt-Arnhild's House in the Woods

Reading time, in Norway and in Syria, but.......

@brittarnhild

Advent is for me in many ways time for reading, and what I love most is to find some old classics in my shelves and reread them. It can be Charles Dickens, the Norwegian Levi Henriksen, Narnia, old folk tales, Tolkien, or as I am doing this year - rereading Harry Potter. I bought my first Harry Potter book in 1999. Soon, well, as soon as they were published, I had them all, first in English, then in Norwegian. I read them for myself and I read them aloud for the girls. The boys were too old to be read for by then, though actually you are never too old to be read too, are you.......but that´s another tale. Anyway, I know Harry Potter and his gang in an out. Well, I thought I knew them. Now when I have started to reread Harry Potter and the Philisopher´s Stone, I realize that there are so many detalis, wonderful brics and bracs that I have forgotten. I am looking forward to finish the whole series one more time.

I had some reading time after work today, before starting dinner. After some pages I took a break to check my twitter account, @ArnhildBritt Among Norwegian news, British garden updates and charming photos from YorkshireSheperdess (@AmamdaOwen8) there were updates from a Syrian account I follow: 7 years old Bana from East Aleppo, tweeting together with her mom. The last few hours, the last couple of days have been dramatic for Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana) and her family. Her latest post shows a bombed house, followed by the words - This is our house. My beloved dolls died in the bombing of our house. I am very sad but happy to be alive-Bana.  Some hours before that she wrote: We have no home now. I got minor injury, I didn´t sleep since yesterday, I am hungry, I want to live, I don´t want to die. A few days ago Bana wrote about her best friend who died in the bombing.......

Then, as you can see from the photo above, 4 days ago Bana and her brothers were reading Harry Potter.

 

Me in safe and warm Norway, with the first advent candle lit, some soft Christmas music on. She on a sofa in Aleppo, with her two younger brothers, hours before her friend was killed, their house was bombed.

 

What is happening to our world?
What is happening to our children?

 

Thank you Bana and mother Fatemah for tweeting from the war. Thank you for letting us know, for not letting us forget. I am so sorry that too often we close our eyes, light our candles, listen to our music, eat our food.......and forget. Please forgive us. Please forgive me. Keep on reminding us.

 

And let us together fight the evil, just like Harry Potter did.

 

Reading the Classics, January

 

  On April23rd  2004 I happened to visit a bookstore in Oslo. Since it was The World's BookDay that day I had a very good excuse to buy a few books, and among finds was Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi.

I started the book several times, but as I had no knowledge of Lolita, the book didn't make sense to me, and I put it away. A couple of years later I happened to find Lolita by Vladimir Nabakov in a Norwegian translation. Again I started a book several times, but put it away after a few pages. I didn't like the theme of the book, a grown man falling in love with small girls.......it felt disgusting.

 

Both books were stored away, but somehow I couldn't forget them. There was something about Nabokov's way with words that fasinated me, and I couldn't get the title Reading Lolita in Tehran out of my mind.

At New Year we were invited to friends together with an Iranian couple, refugees here in Norway, and during the party our conversation was about the situation in Iran, both the Iran of today, and the Iran this couple knew from their youth.

 

During the night I made a desicion, Lolita and Reading Lolita in Tehran would be my first Classic/follow the classics reading of the New Year.

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I read alot. Mostly because it is a good way to relax and as I never watch television I have alot of time available for my books. Reading is also a great way to travel, to imagine, to dream, to learn, to laugh and to cry. Many of the books I read are for entertainment. Lolita was not entertainment. As I wrote in an earlier post, the book was disgusting. Still I had a hard time to put the book down as soon as I got into the story. Nabokov's writing is the writing of a master, and though the story in many ways made me sick, it was fascinating to see the world through the eyes of a man so far from anything I believe in. In many ways a sick person's mind.

 

So far I've only read the first chapters of Reading Lolita in Tehran. The writer, Azar Nafisi is still writing down the setting, the background to give us some understanding about what reading was all about for her and her students in the Iran of the 1990ies. Now I know Lolita, which will help me even more to set the background, and I am looking forward to read along with the group on Tehran.

 

My next classic reading will probably Lord of the Rings by Tolkien, which I haven't read in at least 20 years.

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I look forward to hear about your reading, classics, modern, poems, magazines, newspapers, blogs......whatever. If you have a blogpost about your redaing and send me your link, I will add it here.

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Note: the photos show an old organ we have in our hallway. Now we need the space for more bookshelves and we have no idea what to do with the organ. I wish I could wrap it up and offer it as a giveaway........

 

 

 

Making it a snowday

 

I've had my longest Christmas break ever, at least the longest one in my grown up life. But tomorrow morning there is no way back, I have to go back to work.......Well, I love my work and I love my colleagues, so I am not complaining, but a two week's Christmas holiday has been just what I needed.

Long mornings, long walks, hours in the kitchen to prepare food for family and friends, parties, boardgames, music, reading.....

 

It is Terje's birthday today. As soon as I finish here I'll go down to make us a very nice breakfast, and then do some preparations for tonight's big party. It has stopped snowing so our plan has been to cross country ski, but now it is bitterly cold outdoors. A better idea than skiing will be reading in front of the fire I think. With lots and lots of coffee, and also a glass of Terje's sweet, sparkling, Christmas limonade.

 

I have been reading alot over the holidays, and I hope to continue also now when the busy everyday scedule starts again. I am looking back at your comments from my reading post a few days ago and making a list of books I want to read. Anna Blueball, you mentioned rereading the classics. I think that's something I want to do this year. Rereading and reading the classics. I can't claim that I have read them all already.

I am reading Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose right now, so this will be my first reread. It might not be old enough to be called a classic yet, but it will be, I am sure of that. When I've finished it I might go on to read Austen, or Dickens, James, Trollope, Ibsen, yes, I am sure I'll read Ibsen. My dear friend Carolyn, gave me an old real leatherbound Ibsen in English while I was in India, may be I should read A Doll's House in Englsih just to see what it "looks like" in a foreign language?

 

Tracy will also be reading the old classics this year. Who else will join us? I plan to make one day a month a "reading the classic - day". What about the 15th of every month? I'll post here in The House in the Woods and I can link to other reading the classic's post around. Let me know if you want to take part, and I'll make a list on my sidebar.

 

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Snowphotos from The House in the Woods will be up in The Blue Garden (soon), meanwhile I have one from Granåsen Nordic Ski Arena where we walked yesterday to watch Maris, Ingrid's boyfriend.