One off First Line Quiz

Oh-- classic novels, like I did ? Which ones did you affect most? We did not have much exposure to Nash, then. The only poetry that I had was what I bought, myself-- Larkin, Plath, Dickinson and Dylan Thomas mostly: what an odd lot! I did not like 'ooold' poetry, apart from Chaucer, Shakespeare in his plays (I bought a new S.play every fortnight when I was eighteen; I was enthralled,) and the Brontës.

One that you did not like? What about... Chitty Chitty Bang Bang? I always found that musical to me truly evil. And you think the same? Yay! there are too few people who agree with me on that count. I always found the end of Grease a bit sad; as did I every thing in which the 'heroine,' or 'hero' or whatever changes him/herself for gain. I was thinking, 'if he does not love you for what you are, Sandy, then there's no point in bothering!' But then, I guess, talking to characters in musicals.

I loved "Little Women", of course. It was my first classic novel. I read Louisa Mae Alcott books, Laura Ingalls Wilder (I really related to her character 'half-pint', I idealized a life like that.)
Let me think, I read Dickens, some Bronte's, ... I don't think I ever really met a book I didn't like either, but I'm careful about what I do and don't want to read. GIGO is the saying (Garbage in, garbage out). I liked poetry and remember really liking Emily Dickinson. I felt I could relate to her somehow. I do love Shakespeare as well, although I suspect I'm not as familiar with his works as you are!
I see what you mean about Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang. That child catcher scared the stuffin' out of me, but then again so did the witch in 'Wizard of Oz'! And we are completely sympatico about Sandy or any other character selling out!!!

Laura Ingalls, I don't think that I have ever heard of her; what did she write? Do you know, I will have to have a rant somewhere about this, but Have you seen the list of books to which people have raised 'challenges!?' All I can say is that these fascists are screwed up, priority-wise. I'll post a link to you, if you want.

I think that Dickens might have been better if he had not been so prolix. I am quite the same about buying books; I mostly buy novels published at least 40 years ago still, because I figure that, if they are good enough, modern books will persevere like the modern classics did.

O, what Shakespeares are your favourites?

The witch was evil; but, those kids in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang seemed evil to me too, what with their feigned English accents and all. I found something sinister about their personage... !

(Incidentally, Was there a Grease II?)

Laura Inagalls Wilder was an American writer who lived in and wrote about her life in 1800's America. She has a series of books, one of which is called "Little House on the Prairie", a popular tv sereies here in the seventies.

I'd like to see the list of books to which people have raised challenges! Maddening and fascinating!

I feel the same way you do about classic books. And oh, my favorite Shakespeare? I don't think it's possible to have just one...I love "Much Ado About Nothing", "Tempest", ...what can I say, I'm a Shakespeare fan. There's supposed to be a Shakespeare festival in Michigan somewhere. I know one of the plays is "The Merry Wives of Windsor". Would you believe I've never seen that one?
That's funny about the "Chitty" kids. Not being English, I never thout about their accent being fake!

p.s. There was a Grease II and it was awful! Michelle Pfifer starred as the girl. It was sort of a role reversal where the girl was the cool one and the guy was the 'nerd'. Oy!

Incidentally, I loved Much ado about nothing more than most of the straight comedies. I remember acting as Beatrice in a University production of Much ado. The director had initially planned that Beatrice and Benedick not fall in love, and remain singles, but she dropped the idea for fear of purists. Her lines were wonderful; it was a bit of a cop-out in the end when they did fall for each other, but she was a delight to play.

Gosh, I liked the whole "Little House" series, pretty much. If I had to pick just one, it might be "These Happy Golden Years". It's about her and her husband, Almanzo Wilder. You know, the whole fall-in-love, raise a family thing. I'm just a sucker for a happy ending! What can I say?... Although my favorite book of all time has a sad ending, the love story is just beautiful. I re-read it at least annually! It's called 'A Severe Mercy' by Sheldon VanAuken.
I cannot believe such books are actually being banned! That's insane! I agree with you about porn-and the harmful, but what are people thinking?!
Oh, I am so jealous that you've played Beatrice! She's one of my very favorite Shakespeare characters. I played Juliet once in high scool. It was fun acting, but doing it in high school, especially "R & J" was awkward!

I'm really glad that I highjacked this thread .

Aw! I like a happy ending more than a really sad one, but, most of the time, I prefer a weird one; which is probably why I'm drawn to 'Measure for Measure' and the like. It's something in one that likes to see things organized and sorted. What is 'A severe mercy' about? When did you read it first?

I know! it truly, truly is awful. There is a time and a place for censorship, and stopping children (up to the age of eighteen, remember) from reading classics is not it. 'Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too,' is what I say. It seems frighteningly Orwellian; removing books about the America's past darkness is, basically, restricting history to how it suits one. I agree with Camus; 'A free press can be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom a press will never be anything but bad.'

And yes, I did! It was a glorious costume piece; it was not transplanted to modern days, which often makes things lose their sparkle. (Did you hear about a version of 'King Lear' that revolved around a leather club in New Jersey??!) I got the piece probably not due to my ability as an actress, but because they thought that I suited Beatrice's rôle and character well-- someone happy being away from society's constraints (in those days, marriage,) and fairly acerbic when people defy my opinion. (It certainly was not my finest quip, but on my first day of University, I remember some lousy guy coming up to me, looking all sweaty and saying, 'so, uh, are you a girl or a woman, babe?' And I said 'I don't know; I don't check as often as you do.' :LOL:.

I acted quite a lot in my days, though, and I'm planning on making a theatre group in Armenia, to help people's ambitions and economic problems. I have played Ariel, Ophelia, Cordelia, Emilia (from Othello,) and Viola; but I always felt that Beatrice and Ariel were the two characters that suited me most.

I bet that you were radiant as Juliet, despite the high school crowd (did most not like Shakespeare?) What was the production like? Did it stick to Shakespeare literally? Did you get on with Romeo?

And another poem (3) :

Red - by Ted Hughes
Red was your colour.
If not red, then white. But red
Was what was wrapped around you.
Blood-red. Was it blood?
Was it red-ochre, for warming the dead?
Haematite to make immortal
The precious heirloom bones, the family bones.

When you had your way finally
Our room was red. A judgement chamber.
Shut casket for gems. The carpet of blood
Patterned with darkenings, congealments.
The curtains - ruby corduroy blood,
Sheer blood-falls from ceiling to floor.
The cushions the same. The same
Raw carmine along the window-seat.
A throbbing cell. Aztec alter-temple.

Only the bookshelves escaped into whiteness.

And outside the window
Poppies thin and wrinkle-frail
As the skin on blood,
Salvias, that your father named you after,
like blood lobbing from a gash,
And roses, the heart's last gout,
Catastropic, arterial, doomed.

Your velvet long full skirt, a swathe of blood,
A lavish burgundy.
Your lips a dipped, deep crimson.

You reveled in red.
I felt it raw - like the crisp gauze edges
Of a stiffening wound. I could touch
The open vein in it, the crusted gleam.

Everything you painted you painted white
Then splashed it with roses, defeated it,
Leaned over it, dripping roses,
Weeping roses, and more roses,
Then sometimes, among them, a little bluebird.

Blue was better for you. Blue was wings.
Kingfisher blue silks from San Francisco
Folded your pregnancy
In crucible caresses.
Blue was your kindly spirit - not a ghoul
But electrified, a guardian, thoughtful.

In the pit of red
You hid from the bone-clinic whiteness.

But the jewel you lost was blue.

Beautiful poem.
We really do seem to have taken over this plot of thread, haven't we?
I read 'A Severe Mercy' first with a book club. There was this woman, a wonderfully intelligent, highly intellectual, independent thinker... who went to my church when I was single. She started the -now defunct- book group. (I think I started dating my hubby in the midst of this book.) It's about a couple who fall in love, in England right around WWII. They marry and are separated briefly by the war. There is also correspondence in the book with my favorite author, C.S.Lewis. That's just an added bonus, but their love story is so beautiful I can hardly do it justice.
I can definitely relate to Beatrice and could see you making an excellent one! I used to act quite a bit as well, more in hight school than college, but it was mostly musicals and American plays.
We stuck to Shakespeare line for line. Our director was a purest! I'm glad. I got along well with Romeo. He still acts today. I see him at high school reunions, and I think he's gay!

We have indeed-- but, seeing as it's my questions this round, it really doesn't matter.

When did the book group finish? I find it a great shame when things become defunct. Did the woman move away? How are the letters connected to the plotline? It sounds interesting.

O, which American plays? Did you do any Miller?

The book group was done that year. Let's see, it was before we got married. Must've been '87 or '88. Unfortunately she and her hubby did move away.
Can you believe I'm trying to remember how the letters are connected? I guess I haven't had my annual read yet! I just remember that he (Lewis) was a great friend of the couple. The letters had to do with love and relationships... They were written around the time he was married. (He did so later in life, and subsequently lost his wife to cancer.)
Gosh, what plays have I done? That seems such ancient history!...There was 'The Nut Farm' (I forget who wrote it.), Barefoot in the Park - Neil Simon, The Diviner (I think it was called.), Some comedies written by my drama teacher, Cinderella (I did the play in high school and the musical in college), Tea and Sympathy, --why can't I remember them all?! ... Then there were the musicals: Hello Dolly, Half-A-Sixpence, South Pacific, Pippin, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat, West Side Story, Guys and Dolls, I remember doing plays at Christmastime for Civic Theatre, but I get the names all mixed up!... That's part of my resume anyway!

Another poem-- by Seamus Heaney. One of my Literature professors at University proudly proclaimed that she excreted in front of him as a child.

'Personal helicon'

As a child, they could not keep me from wells
And old pumps with buckets and windlasses.
I loved the dark drop, the trapped sky, the smells
Of waterweed, fungus and dank moss.

One, in a brickyard, with a rotted board top.
I savoured the rich crash when a bucket
Plummeted down at the end of a rope.
So deep you saw no reflection in it.

A shallow one under a dry stone ditch
Fructified like any aquarium.
When you dragged out long roots from the soft mulch
A white face hovered over the bottom.

Others had echoes, gave back your own call
With a clean new music in it. And one
Was scaresome, for there, out of ferns and tall
Foxgloves, a rat slapped across my reflection.

Now, to pry into roots, to finger slime,
To stare, big-eyed Narcissus, into some spring
Is beneath all adult dignity. I rhyme
To see myself, to set the darkness echoing.

What university did you attend, Ana? And BTW is that pronounced 'ona' or 'ana'?
I did most of my acting in high school. Some, but very little in college (for lots of reasons) and some after college. Did I say that I can't sing? I didn't mean to. I'm not 'professional soloist' good, but I could make a mean back-up singer. (A not-so-secret dream of mine)And in West Side Story I was just in the chorus as a Sharks girl - that was a blast. The dancing & costumes were the best.
My favorite role, I would have to say is (are you ready?)... Bloody Mary in South Pacific! First, I didn't expect to get it, and second, It was most unlike me in so many ways, including costume! They had to take a 'skinny' white girl and darken my skin with dark bronzer and pad me up a bit and blacken a tooth or two!
The 'Severe Mercy' story is/was real life, which is part of why it's so beautiful to me. The letters were also real.
And just one more thing, did you memorize the poem(s) you've been writing here and on various threads?

I went to Edinburgh for my undergraduate work, and Oxford for my postgraduate studies-- I was offered a place at Oxford for my first degree, but the city seemed then too claustrophobic to spend three years there. And my name is an abbreviation that I made from Andrea, so people usually say 'Ana', but I don't mind either.

You did say that you cannot sing; you said that you listen to people who can play and who can sing, rather than learning yourself. I bet that you would do great. Ooh, I forgot about the dancing-- it must have been hard! I can only do classical dances, like the tango and things.. I can't just 'dance,' I look like Elaine in that Seinfeld episode when I try dancing to modern stuff.

I'm unfamilar with that play; why is she called Bloody Mary; is she always in scraps?

I shall check it out, if I see it. I won't see it over where I am now, but when I have to return to England (to review an RSC performance in Stratford) I qill go around the bookstores.

And yeah, I have... I memorise poetry easier than other things. I know the whole of 'The Miller's Tale' by Chaucer by heart, because it is in couplets.

Oops. I didn't mean to say I can't sing. I'm not the best singer, but I've done my share. It's been a little while since I've solo'ed (?) in public, but I do group things now and then. I meant I can't play the piano, alas, but one-handed.
The dancing was the hardest part of West Side Story, but it was so fun! I love to dance. In fact, in my single days, I was a 'dancin' fool'! LOL about dancing like Elaine. That episode cracked me up! Is Seinfeld your favorite American tv show? What else do you like of American or English tv?
South Pacific is a 'classic' American musical. It's set during WWII in the South Pacific war theater. It's about a nurse who falls in love with a frenchman who has tonkinese children (native to that area, I guess), because he was married to a now deceased native, and the prejudices in dealing with those circumstances. Bloody Mary is a 'colorful' character who's sort of a merchant to the American military. She hawks shrunken heads and the like. Her daughter , Liat, falls in love with an American. And I don't really know why they call her 'Bloody Mary'! I remember basically copying the Bloddy Mary in the movie. She was so different from anything else I had ever played!
I'm impressed by your poetry memorization! I used to memorize all kinds of things as a kid (lines, etc.) I don't get a chance to do much of that now! Most of what I memorize now comes from the movies my kids watch! They love when I impersonate the characters!

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When was the last time that you sung solo? My last time must have been-- six years ago, when I played Ariel. Oh, I cringed; whereas I would act the whole of a play out, alternating my voice for each of the characters, I don't like singing in public. It's somehow different.

Are there any sorts of dances that you prefer? Unfortunately, yes, it's true that I'm like her when I try to dance to normal stuff, but I'm good when it's tangoing! I loved that episode, too. In fact, I don't think that I ever disliked an episode of 'Seinfeld.' It and Frasier are two of the very few things that I would watch, should they be on the television. Unfortunately, because our stations are dumbing down even more, and getting rid of everything without obvious humour. If they are shewn, it's every three weeks at 1 am. The shows that I like are those two and 'Curb your enthusiasm,' although I have seen it just once. I loved the English programme, 'The Fast Show,' when it was running, too, and a show called 'Little Britain;' I'm not sure whether you get them where you are? I also liked 'Father Ted,' 'Cheers,' and 'Becker,' but these are even less shown. How about you? WEhat are your favourite shows?

That musical sounds really interesting-- I am just a tad surprised that it is a musical, with such a serious plotline. It's very impressive that you took on such a difficult rôle. Is there action in it that is not sung? Does it end happily?

Thank you; it's something inherent, I guess. I forget directions, instructions, (I could never work in a normal job, being subordinate, etc) and the like, but I can remember the whole of 'Crossing the Water!' Which characters from films do you and they like your playing the most? For some reason, I imagined your doing 'Lilo and Stitch,' even though the only thing that I know of that movie is that there is a blue thing in it.

The last time I sang solo was probably about three years ago at a friends wedding. I sang Ave Maria. I love that song & I was so nervous. Can you believe I never sang it before? I also did a duet in the wedding (A CCM - Contemporary Christian Music...)
I guess there aren't necessarily any dances I prefer. I'm not classically trained, although I'd like to have been. I can 'fake' a few things, but mostly I just do my own thing.
The heavy issues in South Pacific are hidden in the light-heartedness of the characters and singing. It's not all singing, like an opera, there's dialogue. It ends happily for the nurse and the Frenchman, not so for Liat and her Lieutenant.
Oh, and tv show... I like Frasier the best. The writers on that show! The lines just crack me up! I see some English, comedies mostly, on our Public Broadcasting station (PBS) when I have insomnia, but otherwise I don't know English tv. I don't really sit down and watch tv, but have a habit of leaving it on for noise sometimes.

Oh, I bet that the song went well; did it? Contemporary Christian music one does not see around here, apart from in University chapels trying to attract more people in; it usually works the opposite. Is it big where you are? With whom did you duet?

As for dancing, I am in the opposite; I learnt how to tango during my months down in Argentina, which was great, but I can't do freestyle at all. You could still learn-- what classical dances would you like to know?

I should check the play out if an when it comes out here. I prefer going to the theatre than anything else; I dislike TV but I like movies, but decent films were not often shown where I lived. It is a shame that Frasier finished (did you see the final episode?) but I think that they should have finished when Daphne figured out. That was the backbone of the plot, and it would have been quite a way to have bowed out. Do you remember any of the English shows that you have watched? Did youlike any particularly?