Monday, February 14, 2011

Cleopatra by Stacy Shiff

This book is fabulous! I learned so much. Whenever I heard Cleopatra I just pictured a dark-haired temptress being fed grapes (lame I know). Stacy Shiff will totally change what you thought you knew about Cleopatra. Her biography is brilliantly written (not surprising..she has won a Pulitzer Prize before).

It took me awhile to get through it. I was looking on maps and looking up names. A weekend will not be enough time to finish this book. Once you are through though, you will be glad you took the time.

Speaking of books...
My mom got me a cute little book of opening lines from famous books for Valentine's Day.
See if you can guess where these lines came from:

1. "Who is John Galt?"
2. " Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her."
3. "Letter One
To Mrs. Saville, England
St. Petersburgh, Dec. 11th 17--
You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings."
4. "There was no possibility of taking a walk that day."
5. "Call me Ishmael."
6. "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."
7. "When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle everybody said she was the most disagreeable-looking child ever seen."
8. "I am an invisible man."

Okay guys... how much have you read? :)

2 comments:

  1. Gosh...no one has responded. Well... I don't know #1, #2 is Emma Woodhouse...which I didn't read, #3 is Frankenstein, #4 I think is Jane Eyre, #5 is Moby Dick, #6 is Pride & Prejudice I think, #7 is The Secret Garden and I think #8 is The Invisible Man which I certainly did not read.
    Do you PROMISE I will enjoy Cleopatra?

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  2. I promise! You got them all right. Number one is Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I guess no one knew the answers huh?

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