U is for Usrula Le Guin

My U is Ursula Le Guin, legendary fantasy and science fiction writer. I wanted to read The Dispossessed, but the library didn’t have a copy of that, so I ended up reading Buffalo Gals, and other animal presences instead.
Buffalo Gals is an anthology of short stories and poetry, centred around animals and their effect on us humans, along with our impact on them. The first story is the most intriguing, and tells the tale of a young girl who finds herself alone and injured after the plane she was in crashes. A coyote takes her under her wing, and treats her like one of her own cubs. In the course of the story, the girl sees the coyote as human and not as a wild animal. When they go to the coyote’s house, the other animals who live nearby also appear to her as humans, but with animalistic traits and characteristics. The owl, for example, is wise, while the small mammals like the rabbits have lots of children. The other stories and poems range from a tree observing the development of roads and cars to rock sonnets. I mean, actual rocks, not like : rawk sonnets. Speaking of music, thanks to my love of It's a Wonderful Life, I couldn't stop singing Buffalo Gals for the entire book. That's not a bad thing, but it is still six months from Christmas. Boo.

Ursula K Le Guin, as she is sometimes known, was born in 1929 and has written countless numbers of books, poems and papers on a variety of subjects. According to her biography on her website, she’s also been winning awards since 1968. Now nearly eighty, she has yet to see a satisfactory adaptation of her work on the small or big screen. Sometimes I think that this is the mark of a great writer. The purpose of writing is to express something that can’t be expressed (which is probably why there are so many love songs) and ultimately, cannot be translated visually or as everyone has envisioned it. Roald Dahl has ‘enjoyed’ lots of adaptations of his work, but I have yet to see something that comes even close to capturing the spirit of his books. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory comes close, but still no cigar.
Some of you may remember the Studio Ghibli film Tales of Earthsea, which is an adaptation of Le Guin’s series of Earthsea books. She reportedly agreed yo this as she had seen Miyazaki’s My Neighbour Totoro. However, being the curmudgeon that she appears to be, the fact hat Hayao’s son, Goro, did it instead, did not hold well and she expressed “mixed feelings towards it”

I’ve never managed to read a whole Le Guin book before – I find them to be a bit dense and impenetrable. I’ve tried reading Earthsea, but it’s quite long, the text is quite small and her love of science fiction peppers the prose with unintelligible vocabulary. Like most authors, though, there’s a rhythm to her writing which is rewarding and almost soothing, once you get used to it. Once this challenge is over, I would like to begin with A Wizard of Earthsea. It’s strange and a bit unknown, but after reading Buffalo Gals I want to explore the world she’s written over the last forty years.

What about you? Is there a prolific writer that you’ve never read anything of because one thing put you off? Are you a Le Guin lover and have recommendations to ease me in gently?

Ch-ch-ch-changes

After the snow fall that Norwich had this weekend, I’m suddenly feeling a lot more Christmassy than I was. Let’s face it, I wasn’t exactly scrooge-like before, so I’m basically an elf now!

The snow even inspired me to buy some Christmas presents, huzzah. My spreadsheet’s coming along nicely, especially since I employed the traffic light system… I still have no idea what to buy some people, though. I find it pretty hard to buy presents for other people that aren’t secretly (or not so secretly, in some cases) for myself. In fact, I am one of those people that has to buy themselves presents when Christmas shopping so they don’t get jealous. Sad, I know. Maybe I didn’t get enough love in my childhood or something! I’m kidding, of course. I definitely didn’t! (boom boom)

Of course, I’m not going to tell you who I’ve bought for and who is causing problems. Suffice it to say, I should have managed everything by mid-December, which’ll be nice. I like being super organised for Christmas – and we need to be this year as we’re leaving for Plymouth early on the 23rd, so we need to have finished everything by the weekend before. That’s because we’re off to the cinema that weekend and then my work Christmas do is on the Monday.

Well, I say work Christmas do. What I actually mean is ‘one of the work Christmas dos’. At the last count, we’ve got four. Four! One huge, department event at Carrow Road, a smaller team one at a pub in Norwich, a small team one somewhere else and another one which I’ve forgotten the reason for and no doubt will be in a pub in Norwich. Phew! This does mean that I need a new drrrrresssss. I want a strapless, electric blue prom dress, perhaps with a bow at the back. I also want a tux jacket to go over the top. Any ideas? I’m going shopping with Miss S this week so hopefully it’ll all be sorted out in plenty of time. To be honest, I could scrape by with what’s in the wardrobe, but where’s the fun in that?

Aside from the numerous, multiple work dos, I have a hugely busy week this week. Not that I’m complaining, but here’s how my week looks: Monday: Tim Minchin, Tuesday: hair makeover/football match, Wednesday:dress shopping, Thursday: The Vagina Monologues and Friday: The Waterfront for 90s night. Sheesh. It’s only Monday and I’m shattered already. Oh. Dear.
Still, I do enjoy being busy. I also have a driving lesson at 09.30am on Saturday, so I’d better make sure I only have one or two pints – there’s nothing worse than learning to drive with a hangover! The last time I did that we went to the beer festival, which was really good fun but drinking different, very high percentage ciders for 6 hours and then getting up at 7.15am to drive was not the best morning of my life.

O, we found out last night that the showing of “It’s a Wonderful Life” is being shown in the technicolour version. Boo. We were all set to haul fifteen of us to go and see it, exchange secret santa gifts and enjoy a roast dinner the Sunday before Christmas. If anyone has seen it in colour and black and white, I’d love to know what you thought. The stills I’ve seen in colour just look horrible – uber bright and basically, just plain wrong. So, we need a change of plan. Personally I think a pot luck at someone’s house (the one with the biggest living room) would be pretty cool – we could borrow a projector from somewhere and camp out on the floor. Pot luck would be cool too – it would mean the host(s) wouldn’t have to worry about feeding fifteen people and everyone could pitch in. I’m singing “Buffalo Girls” just thinking about it. Yay.

I spent six hours last Saturday reading “Breaking Dawn”. For those of you who don’t know, it’s the fourth in the Stephenie Meyer series about the love story of Bella and Edward. They’re ace. They make me feel like I should be sixteen again in order to read them and appreciate them properly, but in a way they make me feel like I am sixteen again. They’re well written and well thought out – it doesn’t try to hard to be clever and the most important thing – they’re funny. Bella spends the series trying to convince Edward to turn her into a vampire to stop her getting wrinkly (and so they can be together forever, blah blah blah) and Edward spends the series tying to get her to marry him before she’s a vampire, so she can have the human experience he never had. There’s more to it than that, of course, but it’s pretty funny. I recommend them to anyone who enjoys Buffy, Angel – any Joss Whedon stuff, mixed with a bit of Gossip Girl.
The other great thing about Stephenie Meyer is that (apart from having FOUR Es in her name) she lists her music playlist in all of her books, the bands that inspire her to write. I think this is great as I believe that music is extremely inspiring and can alter our mood in an instant. Just think about when you’re walking down the street listening to your i-pod and something with a fantastic beat comes on – The Clash’s Should I stay or Should I go, Kaiser Chief’s “Yours Truly, Angry Mob”, anything by Soulwax etc etc. I don’t know about anyone else, but my pace automatically speeds up, my head raises, I stand straighter and it makes me nearly dance. Anyway, the point is, Meyer’s inspirations appear to be taken directly from my CD collection – Arcade Fire, Muse and Interpol to name a few.

There are four books in the Bella/Edward saga. I enjoyed every one of them. If you’re stuck for a Christmas present, I recommend them. For you or someone else. Thanks to my good friend Miss B for introducing me to them and for having such good taste in books (and music and film!)

Say goodbye to my brown hair, friends. Tomorrow (Tuesday) I will be getting my old colour stripped and a brand new colour laid on. I’m jonesing for a white blonde. I’ve wanted to be white blonde since I crushed on Dash-X from Eerie, Indiana.
The downside is that the only person I can think of with the right kind of blonde is this guy:




Although the suit is amazing, I am worried about his expression and the fact that it may rub off on me if I dye my hair his colour. I don’t think that will happen, though. It’s more likely that the hairdresser will refuse to make it that colour. Never fear, bleach savvy friends – it’s organic colour so it will be much better for my hair. I’m quite excited, though.

Wish me luck! I may post a photo on Wednesday…. Happy week, dear readers.