Classics on Mr. Pointing

The Idiot

Fri, 01 Jan 1869 00:00:00 +0000

One of the first books I had to write about before finishing it. I’m on the last 50 pages, but it’s taken me almost two months to finish it. I will finish it today, but can’t say I’m in a rush. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, so much to say that even the boring parts were great. I’ve never cared so much about petty melodrama than before. The way Dostoyevsky writes makes the buffoonery these characters exemplify worth the endeavor.

Kokoro

Thu, 01 Jan 1914 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve really been killing it recently with the beautifully written tragic stories. This time, Meiji-era Japan as our theme and Natsume Soseki as our conductor. I really enjoyed Kokoro, and at many moments fueled with a tender inner-flame that kept me attached to the narrator. Even when it transitioned to Sensei’s story, I continued to read it from the narrators perspective.

I have a lot of thoughts and opinions about this one, so I’ll try to be brief. While I enjoyed the book a lot, and I’m surely not the first person to notice this, but sooooooo much of the events of this book become trivial when you consider how easy it would have been had these characters grew up in a setting where openly communicating your feelings was normal. This story could only work in the time and place the settings in, and for that I appreciate it for what it is. That being said, so many times I thought of how silly these characters are behaving.

Perfume

Tue, 01 Jan 1985 00:00:00 +0000

I’m super torn about this one. A beautifully written book about an man who commits horrible, atrocious acts that are unredeemable from a moral standpoint. It’s difficult to even dissect without getting right into it, so let’s just do that.

First of all, again, the way this author writes is right up my alley. It was engaging, kept me coming back even when I wasn’t sure if I wanted too. The world he draws you into feels so palpable, especially considering the main sense this book tries to make you feel is scent. It was enthralling hearing the ways he would describe the world and activities the main character participated in. Most of the book is like this, and a good amount of the exposition doesn’t even really come off as horror, and more classical. I thought I’d be more upset by that considering I only started reading this for the horror aspect, but I actually ended up loving it for that.

Moby Dick

Sat, 18 Oct 1851 00:00:00 +0000

What is the reason we write? I’m not sure if that’s the right way to start this review, but it was something that bothered me the entire time reading Moby Dick. What was the reason for all of this lexical analysis? Was there any benefit to my experience knowing the nitty gritty details of how whales are killed, dissected, and harvested for materials?

At first I thought it was meaningless; fluff to drive out the length of the novel. Fortunately, after finishing it and doing some more research, Herman’s expansive diatribes are somewhat useful. At the time of publishing (1851) the knowledge of whales and their general species was largely misinformed. You don’t have to go research to find that out, Ishmael literally tells you in great detail all of the faults of his modern-day understanding of the great leviathans. Part adventure story of course, but also part learning experience. I started to enjoy the longer chapters a little more when put into that perspective.