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metareading
Sep. 20th, 2010 12:03 pmHave concluded that Naomi Novik's "Temeraire" series has succeeded in eating me as a new fandom, at least to the extent of getting me to read (or at least browse) assorted reference materials that I probably wouldn't've read otherwise, ranging from world butterfly compendia to early Qing histories/biographies.
A particularly odd book that I found in the local library system is A Manchu Monarch : an Interpretation of Chia Ch'ing by A.E. Grantham; this particular copy was a 1976 reprint with no original publication details inside. It's "odd" in that its subject breadth isn't too different from a standard popular history and it doesn't wander into historical novel by inventing dialogue, but it keeps having stylistic freakouts into florid narrative overkill; e.g., "as the newly liberated spirit passed away from the sick-bed in the early hours of a spring morning, grateful itself, it may have merged more readily into all the blossoming loveliness outlined against the blue of a cloudless sky."( Read more... )
A particularly odd book that I found in the local library system is A Manchu Monarch : an Interpretation of Chia Ch'ing by A.E. Grantham; this particular copy was a 1976 reprint with no original publication details inside. It's "odd" in that its subject breadth isn't too different from a standard popular history and it doesn't wander into historical novel by inventing dialogue, but it keeps having stylistic freakouts into florid narrative overkill; e.g., "as the newly liberated spirit passed away from the sick-bed in the early hours of a spring morning, grateful itself, it may have merged more readily into all the blossoming loveliness outlined against the blue of a cloudless sky."( Read more... )