I thought I was going to read Nathan Hill's The Nix next... still swooning from the effects of his other novel, Wellness... but then I happened upon this--
--and I really, really wanted it. A beautiful, illustrated book...in a beautiful, illustrated box. And you know how I love books in boxes.
But there were two problems: (1) I'd never heard of this writer or this book, and (2) it cost $120. Plus $18 shipping. $138. That's pretty steep for one book.
But I still wanted it. So I found a copy at the library, thinking that I'd read it until (1) I became disappointed and lost interest, (2) I finished it and decided I didn't need to own it, (3) I decided I had to have it.
So that's why it's The Shadow of the Wind and not The Nix.
Day 1 (DDRD 2,357) April 14, 2024
Read to page 80...and that's with church, lunch out, and an opera, so that should tell you something about how compelling this one is.
It's got a secret underground library and a book which only sold 77 copies and a writer no one's ever heard of. And a quest to find that writer's lost works which evokes Ulysses' Gaze for me (one of my favorite movies). This is so far up my alley that if I open my mouth you'll see its eyes peering at you.
"One of the pitfalls of childhood is that one doesn't have to understand something to feel it. By the time the mind is able to comprehend what has happened, the wounds of the heart are already too deep." (35)
"...it occurred to me that perhaps the papier-mâché world that I accepted as real was only a stage setting." (36)
Yep.
Day 2 (DDRD 2,358) April 15, 2024
Read to page 147. So only 67 pages today...but I'm heading to bed now, so I might could tuck a few more in before I shut my eyes.
"Our world will not die as a result of the bomb, as the papers say, it will die of laughter, of banality, of making a joke of everything, and a lousy joke at that." (107)
ADDENDUM: only got in a few more pages...to 150.
Day 3 (DDRD 2,359) April 16, 2024
Read to page 173. More than a bit short of what I wanted, but hospital volunteer plus plumber plus cutting the grass left me only enough time for 26 pages 😞.
"Darwin was a dreamer, I can assure you. No evolution or anything of the sort. For every one who can reason, I have to battle with nine orangutans." (157)
"The words with which a child's heart is poisoned, through malice or through ignorance, remain branded in his memory, and sooner or later they burn his soul." (167)
Wow. That is some powerful stuff. Makes you want to mind your Ps & Qs, doesn't it?
Day 4 (DDRD 2,360) April 17, 2024
Read to page 223--50 pages, so a little better...but another busy day with two doctor appointments, then another appointment, and then a karaoke session for Jacqueline and Joe.
😫
By the way, our friends at Wikipedia tell me that this book is the first in a tetralogy:
El cementerio de los libros olvidados series (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books)
La sombra del viento, 2001 (The Shadow of the Wind)
El juego del ángel, 2008 (The Angel's Game)
El prisionero del cielo, 2011 (The Prisoner of Heaven)
El laberinto de los espíritus, 2016 (The Labyrinth of Spirits)
La ciudad de vapor, 2021 (The City of Mist; stories, some connected to the novels)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ruiz_Zaf%C3%B3n
Or, depending upon your point of view, a pentalogy.
The LFPL has all of them. Multiple copies. Sadly, though, not a single one of them is checked out...other than the one I've got in my hot little hands. So we'll see where that goes.
Day 5 (DDRD 2,361) April 18, 2024
Read to page 273. Really wanted to read more, but....
On page 246 there's a reference to the Hospice of Santa Lucia. That St. Lucy just pops up everywhere.
When Fermín and Daniel visit the hospice, Zafón describes a nun in this way: "She wandered off into the shadows, carrying her bucket and dragging her shadow like a bridal veil." (252) As Kurt Vonnegut was wont to say, "If that's not good, I don't know what is."
I had to stop by the library today to drop off a dvd of the Handel opera Giulio Cesare, and while I was there this
leaped into my arms and
started nuzzling my left breast. So yes, I took it home with me...but I'm not committing to anything yet. We'll see how The Shadow of the Wind goes first.
Day 6 (DDRD 2,362) April 19, 2024
Read to page 308.
Thunderstorm = 4:00 am wake-up call from son who is terrified of thunderstorms & wants to talk. Then a long day with a doctor visit, A two hour luncheon for hospital volunteers, and finally home to make dinner, clean cat poop pans, and collapse on the sofa. Oh, look, here's something that would make me feel better:
I probably won't go for it, seeing as the library does have these books. But I still wanna.
If they'd put these fuckers into a box, it'd already be heading my way. I really like books in little boxes. Seriously.
Day 7 (DDRD 2,363) April 20, 2024
Read to page 349. Hoping to read more later.
"Waiting is the rust of the soul." (315) Speaking of which, I'm going to see the Shelby County Community Theatre production of Waiting for Visit tomorrow.
I'm taking my Traveling Buddy, Jacqueline. Her mom asked her (skeptically) if she knew what the plat was abiut, ANF my girl answered, "Two guys talking."
Yep.
Later.
"While you're working, you don't have to look life in the eye." (363)
Which Miguel Moliner says to ridicule himself, claiming that his obsessive devotion to work is a way of avoiding self-examination (with a side-order of Socrates). But it immediately hit me...and this might be one of those non-hillarious Delta 8 moments...that you could also see a little dead Tocqueville pin-maker thing going on: work eats away the time and energy needed to examine The Life, hence the working stiffs (funny how that summons up an image of zombies, ennit?) are essentially denied access to their inner lives. Which is an excellent strategy if you want to keep a large number of people from asking too many questions.
Day 8 (DDRD 2,364) April 21, 2024
Read to page 388...which means less than 100 pages to go. Things have gotten a bit confusing for me in the Nurse Monfort section: too many names for my smooth brain. Nevertheless, I persist.
"...he now lived only for memories and regrets." (391)
Mmm-hmm.
Day 9 (DDRD 2,365) April 22, 2024
Read to page 433. I'm thinking one more day ought to do it. And you know, while I have enjoyed this book...sometimes immensely...and while I'm still thinking that I might go ahead with this tetralogy/ pentology business...and while I still salivate when I see that Folio edition...I'm glad that I didn't throw down that $120. I am pretty sure that I'll never read this book again...and I'm too old to be able to own things for very long...so it would have been a waste of money. Sad but true.
"One lives truly only once in a lifetime...." (407)
This feels both true and not true. If it is true, then my True Love was undoubtedly my second wife (also second ex-wife). Even though I haven't communicated with her in any way for years, I still think about her every day. And not the snarling witch who screamed at me, called my children retarded, and threw a bulletin board at me...although as you can imagine that was a vivid moment. No, I remember the gal who loved me unreservedly, who laughed with me and went on adventures with me. I miss her. I wish that I could talk to her. Even now. Which is sad...maybe even pathetic...but like nicotine, "one absorbs it in spite of one's precautions."
And by the way, the Shelby County Community Theatre production of Waiting For Godot was truly excellent.
And seeing it with Jacqueline intensified the fun dramatically. She just laughed and laughed...as did I...while most of the audience just looked puzzled...and occasionally aghast.
"Most of us have the good or bad fortune of seeing our lived fall apart so slowly we barely notice." (419)
🔥
And along similar lines: "We make so many mistakes in life...but we only realize this when old age creeps up on us." (426)
Yep. I should have stayed in the Army. I had a chance to re-up for a station in Berlin. Could have seen all of Europe. Could have lived somewhere over there when I retired at age 48 with a full pension. Could have written the novels I wanted to write. But all I can say us "If only."
"Memories are worse than bullets." (427)
Day 10 (DDRD 2,366) April 23, 2024
Read to page 487 = The End.
"We're all whores, sooner or later." (480)
This was a good book, for sure, but I don't feel that it was a great book...which is what I'd expected. I think Ill still go ahead with the second book, but I'm not really feeling a commitment to the entire series at this point.
DDR Day 1 to 1,000: 13,449 pages read, 13.45 Average Pages Per Day
A History of Philosophy Volumes I - XI
History of Civilization in England Volumes I - III
Miscellaneous and Posthumous Works of Henry Thomas Buckle Volumes I - III
Civilization and Capitalism, 16th - 18th Century Volumes I - III
The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip IIl Volumes I - III
This Happened In My Presence: Moriscos, Old Christians, and the Spanish Inquisition in the Town of Deza, 1569-1611
The Stolen Village: Baltimore and the Barbary Pirates
Peat and Peat Cutting
+
DDR Day 1,001 to Day 2,000:
(1) Leviathan 63 days, 729 pages
(2) Stalingrad 27 days, 982 pages
(3) Life and Fate 26 days, 880 pages
(4) The Second World War 34 + 32 + 40 + 43 + 31 + 32 days = 212 days, 4,379 pages
(5) Baron Wenckheim's Homecoming 10 days, 572 pages
(6) The Great Bridge 25 days, 636 pages
(7) The Path Between the Seas 29 days, 698 pages
(8) Blake: Prophet Against Empire, 23 days, 523 pages
(9) Jerusalem 61 days, 1,266 pages
(10) Voice of the Fire 9 days, 320 pages
(11) The Fountainhead 15 days, 720 pages
(12) The Pacific Trilogy: Pacific Crucible 23 days, 640 pages
(13) The Pacific Trilogy: The Conquering Tide 28 days, 656 pages
(14) The Pacific Trilogy: Twilight of the Gods 31 days, 944 pages
(15) Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence 13 days, 304 pages
(16) Toward Jazz 18 days, 224 pages
(17) The Worlds of Jazz 13 days, 279 pages
(18) To Be or Not...to Bop 14 days, 571 pages
(19) Kind of Blue 4 days, 224 pages
(20) Kind of Blue: Miles Davis and his Masterpiece: 5 days, 256 pages
(21) Miles: The Autobiography 16 days, 445 pages
(21) A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album: 8 days, 287 pages
(22) Ascension: John Coltrane and His Quest 8 days, 304 pages
(23) Living With Music: Ralph Ellison's Jazz Writings 11 days 325 pages(24) The Pickwick Papers 28 days, 983 pages
(25) Oliver Twist 16 days, 542 pages
(26) Nicholas Nickleby 27 days, 1,045 pages
(27) The Old Curiosity Shop 22 days, 753 pages
(28) Barnaby Rudge 24 days, 866 pages
(30) Martin Chuzzlewit 32 days, 1,045 pages
(31) American Notes 10 days, 324 pages
(32) Pictures From Italy 7 days, 211 pages
(33) Christmas Stories Volume I 10 days, 456 pages
(34) Christmas Stories Volume II 15 days, 472 pages(35) Christmas Books 17 days, 525 pages
(36) The Annotated Christmas Carol 7 days, 380 pages
(37) Dombey and Son 30 days, 1,089 pages
(38) Sketches by Boz 22 days, 834 pages
2nd 1K Total: 26,834 pages (to SBBII) = 28.76 Average Pages Per Day
Grand Total: 40,273 pages, 20.83 Average Pages Per Day
(39) David Copperfield 21 days, 1,092 pages(40) The Uncommercial Traveller 12 days, 440 pages
(41) A Child's History of England 10 days, 491 pages
(42) Reprinted Pieces 14 days, 368 pages
(43) Miscellaneous Papers Volume I 18 days, 542 pages
+ 25 pages Bleak House and 9 pages Miscellaneous Papers II = 2,000 days' worth.
2nd 1K Total: 29,801pages = 29.8 Average Pages Per Day
Grand Total: 43,250 pages, 21.625 Average Pages Per Day
DDR Day 2,001 to Day 3,000:
(1) Miscellaneous Papers Volume II 28 days (don't count, while reading BH), 494 pages
(2) Bleak House 37 days, 1,098 pages
494 - 9 = 485 + 1098 - 25 = 1073 = 1,558 pages towards 3K...in 37 days, for a daily rate of 42+ pages (!).
(3) Hard Times 11 days, 459 pages
(4) Little Dorrit 29 days, 1,606 pages
(5) A Tale of Two Cities 9 days, 460 pages
(6) Great Expectations 16 days, 580 pages
(7) Our Mutual Friend 29 days, 1,057 pages
(8) The Mystery of Edwin Drood 6 days, 314 pages
FTR vis-a-vis Dickens: 18,671 pages in 468 days = 39.9 pages per day!
(9) Dickens and Kafka, 7 days, 315 pages
(10) Franz Kafka: A Biography 8 days, 267 pages
(11) The Frozen Sea: A Study of Franz Kafka 5 days, 198 pages
(12) Franz Kafka, A Writer's Life 12 days, 385 pages
(13) The Lost Writings 2 days, 138 pages
(14) Amerika: The Missing Person 11 days, 333 pages
(15) The Brothers Karamazov 24 days, 816 pages
(16) The Eternal Husband & Other Stories 8 days, 375 pages
(17) Poor Folk 5 days, 164 pages
(18) The Double 4 days, 190 pages
(19) The Landlady 3 days, 90 pages
(20) Netochka Nezvanova 6 days, 196 pages
(21) The Village of Stepanchikovo 8 days, 265 pages
(22) Uncle's Dream 4 days, 162 pages
(23) The Insulted and the Injured 14 days, 451 pages
(24) Notes From a Dead House 8 days, 327 pages
(25) Notes From Underground 4 days, 171 pages
(26) Crime and Punishment 13 days, 555 pages
(27) The Gambler 10 days, 405 pages
(28) The Idiot 21 days, 682 pages 4,849 total Dostoyevsky pages as of now
(29) A Poetics of Handel's Operas 12 days, 386 pages
(30) Blue Lard 8 days, 360 pages
(31) Opera as Hypermedium 0 days (overlap), 198 pages
(32) Why Do the Heathen Rage? 4 days, 191 pages
(33) Wellness 7 days, 608 pages
(34) The Shadow of the Wind __ days, 487 pages
() The Nix __ days, 737 pages
() Demons
() The Adolescent
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