Goofreads 2020 Update of Books You Need to Read to Be Considered Well-Read #64 ~ Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

For daring to peer into the heart of an adulteress and enumerate its contents with profound dispassion, the author of Madame Bovary was tried for "offenses against morality and religion." What shocks us today about Flaubert's devastatingly realized tale of a young woman destroyed by the reckless pursuit of her romantic dreams is its pure artistry: the poise of its narrative structure, the opulence of its prose (marvelously captured in the English translation of Francis Steegmuller), and its creation of a world whose minor figures are as vital as its doomed heroine. In reading Madame Bovary, one experiences a work that remains genuinely revolutionary almost a century and a half after its creation. - Publisher

Madame Bovary, when it was first published in 1857, was considered very shocking. It is a gorgeously written story of Emma Bovary, an immature and romantic woman, who has grown up believing in a very romantic vision of how her life would be. When her life turns out to be mundane she searches through spending and infidelity to find everything she had dreamed of as a child. Her quest for romance and passion ends up destroying the husband who has loved her no matter what and finally destroying herself. A great cautionary tale of the times with a valid truth for today.

I wasn't far into reading Gustave Flaubert's masterpiece when I realized that at some point in my foggy past I've read it before. It didn't stop me from reading it again.

I have to say the characters are annoying as hell . . . LOL . . . but the writing is like poetry, flowing and a pleasure to read. Flaubert has an amazing ability to give dimension to all his characters. There is a great deal of underlying humour and sarcasm as well.

Madame Bovary is a must read for anyone who loves the beauty of words.

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A Taste of Canada ~ Fiddleheads

I do enjoy fiddleheads. They have a green bean-y, asparagus-like, pea-ish taste and they are just fun to look at. From Chateline Magazine: HOW-TO It’s Almost Fiddlehead Season! Here’s How To Cook This Springtime Veggie Properly Fiddleheads are a Canadian delicacy, but undercooking them can lead to food poisoning by Amy Grief Updated Apr 9, 2019 Fiddlehead season is short, so when you see the adorable green curlicues at your grocery store or farmers’ market, buy them while you can. Before chowing down on these little springtime delicacies, there’s a few things you should know first since fiddleheads can cause food poisoning if they’re not cooked properly. What are fiddleheads? These tightly curled coils are ostrich fern fronds. They start appearing in late April and early May in Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick and are usually found in forests, marshes and by rivers and streams. Taste-wise, fiddleheads, which are popular amongst food foragers, are often co

Week #2 Challenge: Paper . . . and I mean ALL of your paper.

Annual Organization Challenge Week #2 How did you make out with last week's challenge? Did you find your work table? Here's this week's challenge: Your challenge this week is to S.P.A.C.E. your paper - - and I mean ALL of your paper: cardstock, patterned paper, specialty papers, and all those SCRAPS! SORT: Bring all of your paper to one area. Sort it all into piles: KEEP, SELL, DONATE, TRASH PURGE: bag up, and assign a price to paper bundles that you want to SELL at a garage sale or online, and put the bags in the garage sale box. Throw out the TRASH pile. Bag up the DONATE pile and immediately make arrangements for drop-off/pick-up or put in your vehicle. ASSIGN: separate your paper into categories that make sense to you. For example, you may want to divide it simply into cardstock and patterned paper. If you have a huge stash of paper, you may want to divide it by colour, theme, or manufacturer. **Another way to sort your paper is in

Journal Prompt ~ One Thing You Do Really Well

Name one thing you do really well . . . One thing I do really well is solve crossword puzzles.

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