From January 1 to Middlemarch

As promised, I’m kicking off this year with something that will get me back into two good habits: nightly reading, and semi-regular blogging: Over the course of the first few months of this year, I’ll be reading — and inviting others to read along with me — George Eliot’s Middlemarch.

The inspiration: Every year, I set myself a reading goal. Last year, I hit upon the bright idea of reading 25 books: Two books a month,[1] plus one Big Read that I’d slowly make my way through over the course of the year. Last year, the Big Read was Don Quixote. How do you get through a 1000-page novel? The same way that you write a 1000-page novel: one chapter at a time. So every night, I read one of the book’s eight- to twelve-page chapters, and by the middle of the year, I was done. Don Quixote, by the way, is totally worth the effort, and I highly recommend it.

Anyway, I got so much out of this that I decided to try it again, but rather than picking a book at random, I asked friends what they’d recommend for a project like this. There was plenty of Dickens, several recommendations for Kristin Lavransdatter, and one joker even suggested Proust. But in the end, Middlemarch was the clear winner. It was also the most polarizing: while numerous people lauded it to the skies, a small but respectable handful told me that they just couldn’t stand it. And while those negative votes at first pushed me away, in the end they were the reason that I decided that this was a book I needed to read for myself.

So, here’s the plan: starting this week, anyone who wants to reads a chapter a night, six chapters a week. We meet on Mondays to talk about what we’ve read. No spoilers if you’ve read it already!

Finally: if you’re someone who knows something about English lit and wants to talk in the comments here about the context of the novel or its author, have at it in the comments to this post! And watch this space for other random medium-form musings in the year to come.

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 [1] Obviously, this doesn't include books I'm just skimming or dipping into for work. If you're curious, the other book I'm reading right now is N.K. Jemisin's The Stone Sky; after that, I'll be rotating in some nonfiction with Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Post-Facts, and Fake News.

Two Challenges

Many folks make New Year's resolutions. But do you know when the urge strikes me? It's in the calm after the storm of Christmas, when the running around and stress lifts, and it's weeks and weeks before the semester begins, and you are feeling like you have a few weeks of grace.

That's how I woke up feeling this morning. Like there was a window of possibility. And so I'm issuing myself two challenges, and I'd be happy if anyone would want to join.

1. Clean [Digital] House: I've said in this space that I do better with short- and medium-term achievable goals, so that's the I'd like to have some short-term goals, usually one a month. But before the year even begins, I'd like to have a clean slate, a little breathing space. So here is the first challenge: By December 31, organize my digital life, purging as much as possible.
2. The Big Read: Every year, I have a goal of reading 24 + 1 books. The "plus one" ought to be a big, potentially intimidating classic that I've not read before; I take it a chapter a night, and gently work my way through it. This year's "big read" is George Eliot's Middlemarch. Join me beginning January 1. The plan is to read a chapter a night, six nights a week, and blog about it each Monday until we're done. 

That's it. Anyone care to join in?

(Oh, and if you're new here and would rather post anonymously, I'd recommend picking a pseudonym, so we don't have 8 different people named "Anon" posting.)

Planning a Return

Tentatively. In the New Year. Included will be a post-facto narration of my time in Blerg City during a moment of political chaos, and a weekly blogging of a chapter-a-day adventure through Middlemarch, which you are all invited to join in on.

And other random thoughts. As always.

How to Right the Universe (Blerg City Edition)

In response to yesterday's Researcher's Worst Nightmare, I received a couple of messages along the lines of "What will you do?" My answer, for today at least, was to try to deliberately turn things around by eating cheese and going shopping. But even that turned out not to be as straightforward as one would hope.

I set out on a beautiful Blerg City Saturday to do errands. Local SIM card for phone: check. A couple of cheap spiral notebooks[1] for the archives: check. Then: shoes. Blerg City is awash in nifty-looking shoes that you can walk all day in. Here's what I ended up with:

Basically a high-fashion sneaker.

Universal balance well on its way to being restored, right? Except... that while trying them on, I managed to throw out my back.

That's right: I threw out my back while trying on shoes. The indignities of middle age know no bounds. So now, with a cute pair of shoes, but with no archive and a wonky back, I'm still a bit in the negative column in terms of how things are going thus far.

Fortunately for me, this weekend is also the final weekend of Blerg City's annual booksellers' fair. Dozens of bookstores and publishing houses all with booths in a plaza in the city's old center. So I (slowly, carefully) made my way there. And for slightly more than the price of one of those two shoes, I came away with five small books, and the balance of my own personal universe more or less restored.

Of course, I couldn't be content with just "in balance"; I wanted to end the day on the positive side of the ledger.

Cherry with chocolate flakes, in case you were wondering.

And so I had ice cream for dinner.

Finis.


[1] I used to buy those moleskin notebooks. They are things of beauty in their simplicity and tactile perfection. But they are also damned expensive and the elastic on the band doesn't hold up. And they don't lie flat. So: practicality wins out over beauty: I buy sturdy spirals in small and medium, save a bundle,and don't feel at all bad about tearing out pages.

Waitress Nightmares for Researchers

I used to have waitress nightmares all the time. Those of you who have waited tables know what I'm talking about. For those of you who haven't: A waitress nightmare is when you turn around and all the tables in your section have not only been seated while you weren't looking, but somehow they've all been sitting there for 20 minutes, and their water is empty, and you've given some of them the wrong meals, and the others have gotten so incredibly fed up waiting that they've gotten up and left just as you were about to get to them, and how could this happen?

I always joked that my waitress anxiety nightmares were worse than any similar ones I had about teaching or comps or whatever. But every profession has one of these. Where you are actually good at your job, but in your dream, everything goes so impossibly sideways that it's ridiculous and you wake up half-sobbing, half relieved that it's not real.

Here's one for academic researchers: you are on a sabbatical or other leave that you hardly ever get, and you get up and get to the archive your FIRST full day there, jet lag be damned, because you know how short and precious your time is. And for once you have made a list and are totally prepared, and you even have a plan of this archive in the morning and that archive in the afternoon and you've done most of your advance work for the first time in ages, and then you get to the archive and sit in the reading room by yourself because the entire staff has gone on strike, indefinitely.

That is some waitress-quality nightmare-ing.

But here's the twist: This time, it's REAL. And I don't get to wake up and shake it off. I get to wrack my brains for what to do, now that I'm here with no access to the materials I planned to consult, and no way to get this time back.

::sigh::

Weekend Stockpiling

Once upon a time, I ran writing groups.

I ran a few here, and those became unwieldy. So then I ran a few on Facebook, and those were better, though still a lot of work. I realized that I can run a writing group, or write, but I can't do both without going nuts. So I'm not running them for the foreseeable future.

Still, I learned a few important lessons. The first was write every day. Every day you are away from the work is a day to lose your place. Every day you are writing -- even frustrating days where you only write two sentences -- is a chance that you might find your spark.

Paradoxically, the other lesson I learned was that some days you shouldn't write. I learned this from having writing group members with families and children, who wanted to keep those weekends sacred. As a solo flier with no children, I literally hadn't even thought of this. But I quickly realized how important those two days were: not just to recharge the batteries, but to stockpile raw materials for the week to come.

So, this weekend I've been trying to follow my own advice, reading and taking notes. So far, I've read two articles about Blerg City's fish market. Tomorrow I'm going to dive into my scanned sources and find out all I can about the city's porters and bearers. And then, come Monday, it'll be off to the races, I hope.

I've got an ambitious goal. I'll need to blow well past my usual 500 words a day to make it happen. But so far, so good.

This is going to be the least relaxing summer ever.

Throwing Down the Gauntlet

I have slightly less than 2 chapters to write this summer.

By odd coincidence, one of my M.A. students has pretty much the same feat to accomplish for their thesis. I wrote my student to inform them of this interesting fact. And I issued a challenge: Shall we do this together?

I'll let you know if xe accepts.

And... just as I was about to post this, I got a reply: turns out xe only has one chapter left to go... but also the intro. So we're on for racing to the end of our respective chapters.