Greek To Me is a lovely book, by a former copy editor from the New Yorker, a magazine that I absolutely love, since my senior high school English teacher passed out a stack and said read this magazine today, it's the best magazine, with pristine English. She wrote a book on the comma, and the book says it is "adventures of the Comma Queen".
When I came to NYC I read the New Yorker all the time. I don't currently subscribe because I'm poor but you can be assured that when I get back into the solvent zone and have some discretionary funds, I'll be subscribing again. It's OK to take a break from the New Yorker because it's such an intense magazine to subscribe to, even if they lighten it with cartoons.
She talks about the horror of suggestibility (and empathy) at reading Sylvia Plath who committed suicide despite being a published author and married to a handsome English poet, with lovely children (and her Catholic taboo against it). I'm suggestable in that when she keeps talking about Ouzo, I want to drink some.
Speaking of mythology, Norris has a lovely chapter on Athena, whom she seems to be attracted to. She also put a poster of a gorgon on her desk to try and channel the fierceness needed to survive in the New Yorker offices.
I did not know that Edith Hamilton began writing when she was 55. That gives me hope, not so much to be a writer, but to be a late bloomer in life.
Norris got to study with Froma Zeitlin at Rutgers before she moved onto Princeton. I quickly looked up her books but nothing called out to me, like an earlier mention of a book called Why Homer Matters.
There are lots of interesting insights, like "dawn's rosy fingers" means not rays of red fingers, but the touching of early sunlight on things. Also wine like waters mean they are dark, not that they are red colored. Her miscommunications while traveling are funny.
This book was a mixed bag of many interesting items. There is lots of interesting etymology of English word parallels with Greek, and reflections on language. The saddest thing in the book is how her father wouldn't let her study Latin when it was offered to her. She obviously would have thrived learning Latin. The gossip from the New Yorker is also interesting. She has a chapter on acting in 2 plays in ancient Greek. The last two fifths of the book are on travel in Greece.
Her travel on the Sacred Way was good travel writing. (I want to read more: "Ritual Path of Initiation into the Eleusinian Mysteries" by Mara Lynn Keller.)
She has a beautiful description of Petra tou Romiou that had me looking up photos on Google. (You can read The Story of Aphrodite’s Rock, it's only a page)
She has a chapter on the Acropolis. She goes to the real one thrice, and the one in Nashville with an Athena statue completed in 1990. I wish I could remember the complicated mathematics that makes the Parthenon look like it's even when it's not. Of course a photo is not the same thing as being there in person, but there are some stunning photos of the Acropolis and the Parthenon. The Acropolis is the hill, and the Parthenon is the building.
I read a review that slightly slut shamed Norris. I had no problem with her ownership of her sexuality and indeed her individualism to travel alone. She was a bit like the author of Wild, who hiked alone, and Bill Bryson who traveled Europe without any language skills.
When she discussed the icons of the Greek Orthodox Church, I thought back to the amazing Greek Orthodox Church in Santa Fe that my pop compared to a museum.
The end of the book was about Patrick Leigh Fermor. He walked across Europe and wrote a lot of cool books that I put on my reading list.
I think it's really cool she mentions how her gratitude at these experiences has made her easier to get along with, twice. I have gratitude for Mary Norris' lovely book.
One bit of errata for Bobby Baird, the fact checker in the acknowledgements: The hotel with the Eiffel Tower on top is not off the BQE, it's off the Long Island Expressway. It's closer to where the Grand Central Parkway crosses the LIE, than it is to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.
When I came to NYC I read the New Yorker all the time. I don't currently subscribe because I'm poor but you can be assured that when I get back into the solvent zone and have some discretionary funds, I'll be subscribing again. It's OK to take a break from the New Yorker because it's such an intense magazine to subscribe to, even if they lighten it with cartoons.
She talks about the horror of suggestibility (and empathy) at reading Sylvia Plath who committed suicide despite being a published author and married to a handsome English poet, with lovely children (and her Catholic taboo against it). I'm suggestable in that when she keeps talking about Ouzo, I want to drink some.
Speaking of mythology, Norris has a lovely chapter on Athena, whom she seems to be attracted to. She also put a poster of a gorgon on her desk to try and channel the fierceness needed to survive in the New Yorker offices.
I did not know that Edith Hamilton began writing when she was 55. That gives me hope, not so much to be a writer, but to be a late bloomer in life.
Norris got to study with Froma Zeitlin at Rutgers before she moved onto Princeton. I quickly looked up her books but nothing called out to me, like an earlier mention of a book called Why Homer Matters.
There are lots of interesting insights, like "dawn's rosy fingers" means not rays of red fingers, but the touching of early sunlight on things. Also wine like waters mean they are dark, not that they are red colored. Her miscommunications while traveling are funny.
This book was a mixed bag of many interesting items. There is lots of interesting etymology of English word parallels with Greek, and reflections on language. The saddest thing in the book is how her father wouldn't let her study Latin when it was offered to her. She obviously would have thrived learning Latin. The gossip from the New Yorker is also interesting. She has a chapter on acting in 2 plays in ancient Greek. The last two fifths of the book are on travel in Greece.
Her travel on the Sacred Way was good travel writing. (I want to read more: "Ritual Path of Initiation into the Eleusinian Mysteries" by Mara Lynn Keller.)
She has a beautiful description of Petra tou Romiou that had me looking up photos on Google. (You can read The Story of Aphrodite’s Rock, it's only a page)
She has a chapter on the Acropolis. She goes to the real one thrice, and the one in Nashville with an Athena statue completed in 1990. I wish I could remember the complicated mathematics that makes the Parthenon look like it's even when it's not. Of course a photo is not the same thing as being there in person, but there are some stunning photos of the Acropolis and the Parthenon. The Acropolis is the hill, and the Parthenon is the building.
I read a review that slightly slut shamed Norris. I had no problem with her ownership of her sexuality and indeed her individualism to travel alone. She was a bit like the author of Wild, who hiked alone, and Bill Bryson who traveled Europe without any language skills.
When she discussed the icons of the Greek Orthodox Church, I thought back to the amazing Greek Orthodox Church in Santa Fe that my pop compared to a museum.
The end of the book was about Patrick Leigh Fermor. He walked across Europe and wrote a lot of cool books that I put on my reading list.
I think it's really cool she mentions how her gratitude at these experiences has made her easier to get along with, twice. I have gratitude for Mary Norris' lovely book.
One bit of errata for Bobby Baird, the fact checker in the acknowledgements: The hotel with the Eiffel Tower on top is not off the BQE, it's off the Long Island Expressway. It's closer to where the Grand Central Parkway crosses the LIE, than it is to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.
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