Soporific

[jethrien]

I'm trying to read Tristram Shandy. This book is magic. I get three or four pages in, I'm entertained, and then I wake up. I try again, get another few pages, and suddenly realize that I've misread the same sentence four times because despite the fact my eyes are open and moving, I am in fact asleep. I wake up. Repeat.

Now, I have a certain stubborness about finishing books. I've read Les Mis and War and Peace. I got through Foucault's Pendulum and actually rather loved it. I survived The Autumn of the Patriarch, despite the fact that I think Marquez used exactly one period, at the end. I absolutely despised Gravity's Rainbow, but I finished it, goddamn it.

I don't know if I can make it through this one. Not out of a lack of desire, but just because I cannot seem to keep my brain online long enough to make any headway. Arrgh. Maybe I can alternate (I'm reading it on my Nook) - ten pages of Shandy and then a couple chapters of Jeeves and Wooster or something.

Comments

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

At the moment I am reading the Bhagavad Gita on the subway. I keep having to reread things. Cause if my mind wanders even a little I completely lose the train of thought. And if I put it down, I forget what all the sanskrit words mean and have to flip back through to find their definitions.

For example: Rishis who are sinless and pure attain to Brahmanirvana. Rishis of what description? Those whose doubts have vanished, who hold their Atman a prisoner and who rejoice in the good of all creatures.

Light reading, eh?