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Dana (24 KP) rated Tender Buttons in Books
Mar 23, 2018
This book of poetry is chaotic, at best. But that does not mean it is without meaning or cohesion. Through its chaos, the story emerges in little hints and connections that track and follow the speaker through their thought processes in each of the sections of the book: Objects, Food, and Rooms.
I don't normally enjoy modernist poetry much because I feel it tries too hard to be something it is not. It tries to solve problems it cannot, but I have enjoyed this book a lot. Instead of always trying to solve problems, it states how it is. The problems are still there, the chaos is still there, but there is still a sense of peace at what the world is. The speaker is an ordinary person doing ordinary things, thinking about a world that has gone to shit, and that is really relatable.
There is a lot of attention to color in this collection. In the first section, there was a focus on Red and Yellow. In the second, coal is a constant. The colors represent the changing times, the coal especially. Red, the color of blood and war. Yellow, the color of change, and illness. The war had become an illness that had spread across Europe and eventually, the world.
I love how the style is not really a poetic style. Instead it is written in a prose form, but not as a coherent story with a plot line. I appreciate how Stein is creating and experimenting with different styles of writing to try to convey what she wants to.
In the section Objects, there was a quote that I very much liked because I felt like it summed up how that section had been flowing, for me at least. "Book was there, it was there. Book was there. Stop it, stop it, it was a cleaner, a wet cleaner and it was not where it was wet, it was not high, it was directly placed back, not back again, back, it was returned, it was needless, it put a bank, a bank when, a bank care." (30) This quote is showing the chaos of the mind, the disruptions of how it thinks when trying to focus or process what is happening to it. This is how many people's thoughts may have seemed during and after the two World Wars, something Modernist literature and poetry often brings up.
"There is coagulation in cold and there is none in prudence. Something is preserved and the evening is long and the colder spring has sudden shadows in a sun." (40) I like this quotation from the second section, Food, because it acknowledges that even in a time of rebirth, there is still coldness and death. There are shadows in Spring because it is acknowledging the death that had to happen for the rebirth to occur. The "coagulation" can be a congregation of people when the times get tough. When it is "cold" people come together, but in times of prudence, or in times of happiness and peace, people do not feel the need to come together. There is a self-isolation that occurs in the good times.
"A sentence of vagueness that is violence is authority and a mission and stumbling and also certainly also a prison. Calmness, calm beside the plate and in way in. There is no turn in terror. There is no volume in sound." (40) In this section, there it shows that you cannot control the world. There will always be chaos and pain and violence, but you have to learn how to live through it and survive because if you do not, you will be left in your pain with no way out.
"This shows the disorder, it does, it shows more likeness than anything else, it shows the single mind that directs an apple. All the coats have a different shape, that does not mean that they differ in color, it means a union between use and exercise and a horse." (67) This quote shows the reason and necessity of the poem. Like I said before, this book is chaotic to show the connections in chaos. It is a portrayal of the mind in a chaotic state. Everything is able to be connected because it is all from one mind and person.
Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book. I thought it was very relevant to today, even though it was written over one hundred years ago. I recommend that you read this, even if you are not really in to modernist writing because, even though it is confusing at first, once you start thinking about it, it becomes very poignant and interesting.
I don't normally enjoy modernist poetry much because I feel it tries too hard to be something it is not. It tries to solve problems it cannot, but I have enjoyed this book a lot. Instead of always trying to solve problems, it states how it is. The problems are still there, the chaos is still there, but there is still a sense of peace at what the world is. The speaker is an ordinary person doing ordinary things, thinking about a world that has gone to shit, and that is really relatable.
There is a lot of attention to color in this collection. In the first section, there was a focus on Red and Yellow. In the second, coal is a constant. The colors represent the changing times, the coal especially. Red, the color of blood and war. Yellow, the color of change, and illness. The war had become an illness that had spread across Europe and eventually, the world.
I love how the style is not really a poetic style. Instead it is written in a prose form, but not as a coherent story with a plot line. I appreciate how Stein is creating and experimenting with different styles of writing to try to convey what she wants to.
In the section Objects, there was a quote that I very much liked because I felt like it summed up how that section had been flowing, for me at least. "Book was there, it was there. Book was there. Stop it, stop it, it was a cleaner, a wet cleaner and it was not where it was wet, it was not high, it was directly placed back, not back again, back, it was returned, it was needless, it put a bank, a bank when, a bank care." (30) This quote is showing the chaos of the mind, the disruptions of how it thinks when trying to focus or process what is happening to it. This is how many people's thoughts may have seemed during and after the two World Wars, something Modernist literature and poetry often brings up.
"There is coagulation in cold and there is none in prudence. Something is preserved and the evening is long and the colder spring has sudden shadows in a sun." (40) I like this quotation from the second section, Food, because it acknowledges that even in a time of rebirth, there is still coldness and death. There are shadows in Spring because it is acknowledging the death that had to happen for the rebirth to occur. The "coagulation" can be a congregation of people when the times get tough. When it is "cold" people come together, but in times of prudence, or in times of happiness and peace, people do not feel the need to come together. There is a self-isolation that occurs in the good times.
"A sentence of vagueness that is violence is authority and a mission and stumbling and also certainly also a prison. Calmness, calm beside the plate and in way in. There is no turn in terror. There is no volume in sound." (40) In this section, there it shows that you cannot control the world. There will always be chaos and pain and violence, but you have to learn how to live through it and survive because if you do not, you will be left in your pain with no way out.
"This shows the disorder, it does, it shows more likeness than anything else, it shows the single mind that directs an apple. All the coats have a different shape, that does not mean that they differ in color, it means a union between use and exercise and a horse." (67) This quote shows the reason and necessity of the poem. Like I said before, this book is chaotic to show the connections in chaos. It is a portrayal of the mind in a chaotic state. Everything is able to be connected because it is all from one mind and person.
Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book. I thought it was very relevant to today, even though it was written over one hundred years ago. I recommend that you read this, even if you are not really in to modernist writing because, even though it is confusing at first, once you start thinking about it, it becomes very poignant and interesting.
Rikki Hammond (33 KP) rated Drakon (fourth edition) in Tabletop Games
May 24, 2019
Quick to teach and learn (2 more)
Fast Turns, little downtime
Player powers are balanced
Higher player counts can be too chaotic (2 more)
Infinite loops can become annoying
Some games are more exciting than others
A Simple, Light Filler of a Dungeon Game
The best way that I can describe Drakon is that it is 'Carcassonne in a dungeon.' It's just as easy to pick up and play, but adds the concept of building your own dungeon as you progress through the game.
Each player will have 4 tiles in their hand, and on their turn, they can either place a tile (drawing a new one afterwards) or move their character into an adjacent chamber. Each tile has a door or an arrow on each side. You can place a tile door to door or arrow to door, but never arrow to arrow. Once a player moves through a door, you can't go back the eay you came (by the usual means anyway.) The goal of the game is to collect 10 coins through entering a chamber with gold in it, or by stealing them from another player. Each coin will have a value between 1 and 3, and the players keep them secret from the others.
A chamber might have an effect associated with it, which is activated when someone mives into it, such as allowing you to rotate a chamber, removing one from the game entirely, teleporting to another part of the dungeon, or even unleashing Drakon the dragon into the dungeon.
Once Drakon is in the dungeon, whoever next lands on her space can move her up to 3 spaces, ignoring doors and arrows along the way. If she ends on a space with a character, that player must put back a random coin into the stack and return to the entrance chamber.
Once someone collects 10 coins total, they win the game. If the tile stack runs out, the game automatically ends, and the player with the most coins at the end will be the winner.
For the base game, I would say that Drakon is TOO simple, and I highly recommend playing with the alternate methods, which gives each character it's own unique power to use once per game, and whoever collects 10 coins must then either make it back to the entrance chamber, make it to a teleport tile, or use an escape tile. This makes the game a lot more fun in my opinion, and also adds the element of the other players trying to stop you if they suspect you are trying to escape.
Drakon can be a mixed bag. Sometimes the games are really enjoyable, as the chambee effects can really play havoc with other players, esoecially if Drakon comes out. Other times, it can be rather boring, and sometimes a player can build an infinite loop of collecting coins, with no way of stopping them, which isn't really fun for anyone. I also feel that anything over 4 players makes the game a little too chaotic, and it can make the game overstay it's welcome. Generally though, Drakon is a quick, light filler game that can hold up well in anyones collection.
Each player will have 4 tiles in their hand, and on their turn, they can either place a tile (drawing a new one afterwards) or move their character into an adjacent chamber. Each tile has a door or an arrow on each side. You can place a tile door to door or arrow to door, but never arrow to arrow. Once a player moves through a door, you can't go back the eay you came (by the usual means anyway.) The goal of the game is to collect 10 coins through entering a chamber with gold in it, or by stealing them from another player. Each coin will have a value between 1 and 3, and the players keep them secret from the others.
A chamber might have an effect associated with it, which is activated when someone mives into it, such as allowing you to rotate a chamber, removing one from the game entirely, teleporting to another part of the dungeon, or even unleashing Drakon the dragon into the dungeon.
Once Drakon is in the dungeon, whoever next lands on her space can move her up to 3 spaces, ignoring doors and arrows along the way. If she ends on a space with a character, that player must put back a random coin into the stack and return to the entrance chamber.
Once someone collects 10 coins total, they win the game. If the tile stack runs out, the game automatically ends, and the player with the most coins at the end will be the winner.
For the base game, I would say that Drakon is TOO simple, and I highly recommend playing with the alternate methods, which gives each character it's own unique power to use once per game, and whoever collects 10 coins must then either make it back to the entrance chamber, make it to a teleport tile, or use an escape tile. This makes the game a lot more fun in my opinion, and also adds the element of the other players trying to stop you if they suspect you are trying to escape.
Drakon can be a mixed bag. Sometimes the games are really enjoyable, as the chambee effects can really play havoc with other players, esoecially if Drakon comes out. Other times, it can be rather boring, and sometimes a player can build an infinite loop of collecting coins, with no way of stopping them, which isn't really fun for anyone. I also feel that anything over 4 players makes the game a little too chaotic, and it can make the game overstay it's welcome. Generally though, Drakon is a quick, light filler game that can hold up well in anyones collection.
Suswatibasu (1701 KP) rated Heart Berries: A Memoir in Books
Mar 18, 2018
Chaotic coming-of-age manifesto from a First Nations female survivor
This memoir about pain and trauma written by an indigenous woman should not be typecasted and categorised as "Native Writing", although many themes do arise in this area.
As the author explains, this book is less about identity and more about coping with huge swathes of pain - from having a baby taken away right after birth, child sexual abuse to being institutionalised with bipolar disorder, Terese Mailhot is first and foremost a survivor. What she reveals in her writing, is that these issues take different shapes in every community, and for her, she attempts to consolidate her experiences and what she has learnt from her parents together.
In one instance, she talks about how she can't understand the notion of forgiveness preached by white therapists, because she has learnt that pain is a ritual to undertake. And in this way, we see where she appears similar to other survivors and where she diverges because of her belief structures. She also speaks about pain being inherent in the Native condition because of centuries of mistreatment by colonial powers - and so she refers to it differently than some.
Where I struggled with this, is her relationship with her 'boyfriend' Casey, which felt irritating because it took up far too much of the book - and I did just want to shake her and tell her to get a grip especially as she has young children, and it seemed almost juvenile. But overall, an important piece of literature in this growing sphere.
As the author explains, this book is less about identity and more about coping with huge swathes of pain - from having a baby taken away right after birth, child sexual abuse to being institutionalised with bipolar disorder, Terese Mailhot is first and foremost a survivor. What she reveals in her writing, is that these issues take different shapes in every community, and for her, she attempts to consolidate her experiences and what she has learnt from her parents together.
In one instance, she talks about how she can't understand the notion of forgiveness preached by white therapists, because she has learnt that pain is a ritual to undertake. And in this way, we see where she appears similar to other survivors and where she diverges because of her belief structures. She also speaks about pain being inherent in the Native condition because of centuries of mistreatment by colonial powers - and so she refers to it differently than some.
Where I struggled with this, is her relationship with her 'boyfriend' Casey, which felt irritating because it took up far too much of the book - and I did just want to shake her and tell her to get a grip especially as she has young children, and it seemed almost juvenile. But overall, an important piece of literature in this growing sphere.
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BookInspector (124 KP) rated Invisible In A Bright Light in Books
Sep 24, 2020
This story is told from multiple perspectives and the protagonist of this book should be Celeste, a girl who wakes up in a basket as someone else, a girl called Maria. Celeste is very confused about who is this Maria, and why she is living her life. Even though this book tells Celeste’s journey, for me, the true protagonist of this book is Hildegard, a young girl, who was abused and bullied by her self centred mother. This whole story is kind of about her. That is the beauty of this book, the characters are so closely connected and entwined, that it makes this book a one beautiful and complex work of art.
I have to admit, this book was quite hard to read sometimes. Even though the plot is great and absorbing, the writing style felt quite jumpy and chaotic, and that made this book a little difficult to understand sometimes. I have to admit, if I would read it as a child, it would not make sense to me, but reading it as an adult, I truly learned how to enjoy it to the fullest. The author discussed very important topics in this book, such as emotional and physical abuse against children, lack of confidence in children, loss, friendship, self-obsession, and many more. The plot was quite layered, sometimes it is a ghost story, sometimes an adventure and it is filled with plenty of magic as well, all these changes in the atmosphere kept me entertained throughout the pages.
I have to admit, this book was quite hard to read sometimes. Even though the plot is great and absorbing, the writing style felt quite jumpy and chaotic, and that made this book a little difficult to understand sometimes. I have to admit, if I would read it as a child, it would not make sense to me, but reading it as an adult, I truly learned how to enjoy it to the fullest. The author discussed very important topics in this book, such as emotional and physical abuse against children, lack of confidence in children, loss, friendship, self-obsession, and many more. The plot was quite layered, sometimes it is a ghost story, sometimes an adventure and it is filled with plenty of magic as well, all these changes in the atmosphere kept me entertained throughout the pages.
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