by Jane Austen

An Annotated Edition

I’m making this year something of a “re-read” year.

Thoughts: Why is he never once called Mr. Willoughby? In EMMA, it is considered a serious affront when Mrs. Elton refers to Mr. Knightley and merely “Knightley.”

Edward feels like such a minor role… the 1995 movie version had to pad the role out significantly to make the most of Hugh Grant.

Mrs. Jennings comes across as a real dear, though she’s presented as mere silly comic relief at first. The annotations really hammered this home.

Marianne and Elinor are all too real.

I picked up the 1995 DVD from the library for some reason. I know I’m never going to have time to watch it.

by Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut is really special. He wrote this little slice of his life in 2005, two years before that life would end.

“I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresented life by leaving out sex.” Agreed… I like either books written in the past, or modern books; people who write new books but place them in the near-distant past I think are just trying to avoid the way we behave with technology.

Speaking of technology, the best part was where he describes how he used to send things out to be typed, by the mail, using a new envelope he would buy for the purpose at the nearby stationary store; all the people he would interact with. He had a crush on the post office counter girl, and purports that she would do things like frizz her hair or wear black lipstick just to entertain her clientele. I like that little appreciation for how we are all part of a big promenade, here to entertain our neighbors and be entertained in our turn.

After his lovely vignette about the post office, he concludes, “Electronic communities build nothing. You wind up with nothing. We are dancing animals. How beautiful it is to get up and go out and do something.”

Finally a quote from his son: “Father, we are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is.”