Category Archives: Literature

Reading is my first love. I like reading classics, and inspirational books, and biographies, and detective stories, and fantasy, and children’s literature. I try to read a bit of other genres but more often than not I go back to the ones I love love love.

Favorite SHERLOCK HOLMES Stories

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Whenever I read a Sherlock Holmes story, I feel as if I’m back in high school. It was one of my favorite books back then, and I would read the stories again and again even though I knew already who did what. In fact, one of the highlights of my London trip two years ago was going to the Sherlock Holmes museum at 221B Baker Street. (Special thanks to Dave B who went with me to the museum so that I could have my picture taken beside each of the exhibits.)

I distinctly remember writing an essay for a seventh-grade English project on my favorite Sherlock Holmes stories. I don’t have a copy of that essay anymore, but I still pretty much remember which my top 3 favorites were back then. I re-read the entire collection a few weeks ago and tried to come up with a new list of my current favorites, but it seems that the same stories are still my favorites. Here they are:

#1 The Adventure of the Speckled Band. I remember that this was also #1 in my seventh-grade list, and I recently f
ound out that it was also #1 on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s list of favorite Sherlock Holmes stories. I guess that tells you something if the author himself likes the story so much.

I love this story because the drama builds up slowly. You keep thinking something bad is going to happen, but like Watson (the narrator), you’re kept in the dark the whole time. And then after all the quiet waiting with bated breath, the speckled band comes out and strikes the criminal dead.

#2 The Adventure of the Devil’s Foot, which I know was either #2 or #3 in my seventh-grade list. This was also in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s list, although it’s at #9.

I love this story because it’s scary. You keep thinking that it’s impossible to have a supernatural solution to the mystery. This is a detective story after all! But the facts won’t add up any way you look at it that you’re forced to think that maybe the devil was behind the deaths and insanity of the family.

#3 The Adventure of the Dancing Men, which I remember was either #3 or #2 in my seventh-grade list. This is also on the author’s list at #3.

The idea that the drawings of the dancing men were being used as codes actually occurred to me when I first read it. That’s part of the reason why this became a favorite of mine – because it was one of the first ones where I could at least partly guess what would happen in the end.

To read my favorite Sherlock Holmes quotes, please click here.

What It Takes to Be a King (Narnia)

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Obviously, not everyone is of a royal line, but if you think about it, we can all act like kings (or queens). And I don’t mean that we should act like royal pains in the neck. What I mean is that we can always act with the nobility of character that is expected from royalty.

So what does it take to be a king? Here is an excerpt from chapter 11 of The Magician’s Nephew, which is the first in the chronicles of Narnia series. Aslan is talking to a kind-hearted London cabby named Frank, who will soon become the first King of Narnia. During this conversation, he will give a kind of checklist on the qualities that a king should have.

“My children,” said Aslan, fixing his eyes on both of them, “you are to be the first king and queen of Narnia.”

The cabby opened his mouth in astonishment, and his wife turned very red.

“You shall rule and name all these creatures, and do justice among them, and protect them from their enemies when enemies arise. And enemies will arise, for there is an evil witch in this world.”

The cabby swallowed hard two or three times and cleared his throat.

“Begging your pardon, sir,” he said, “and thanking you very much I’m sure (which my missus does the same) but I ain’t no sort of a chap for a job like that. I never ‘ad much eddycation, you see.”

“Well,” said Aslan, “Can you use a spade and a plough and raise food out of the earth?”

“Yes, sir, I could do a bit of that sort of work: being brought up to it, like.”

“Can you rule these creatures kindly and fairly, remembering that they are not slaves like the dumb beasts of the world you were born in, but talking beasts and free subjects?”

“I see that, sir,” replied the cabby. “I’d try to do the square thing by them all.”

“And would you bring up your children and grandchildren to do the same?”

“It’d be up to me to try, sir. I’d do my best: wouldn’t we, Nellie?”

“And you wouldn’t have favourites either among your own children or among the other creatures or let any hold another under or use it hardly?”

“I never could abide such goings on, sir, and that’s the truth. I’d give ‘em what for if I caught ‘em at it,” said the cabby. (All through this conversation his voice was growing slower and richer. more like the country voice he must have had as a boy and less like the sharp, quick voice of a cockney.)

“And if enemies came against the land (for enemies will arise) and there was war, would you be the first in the charge and the last in the retreat?”

“Well, sir,” said the cabby very slowly, “a chap don’t exactly know till he’s been tried. I dare say I might turn out ever such a soft ‘un. Never did no fighting except with my fists. I’d try – that is, I ‘ope I’d try – to do my bit.”

“Then,” said Aslan, “you will have done all that a king should do.”

I really love the idea that a king must be the “first in the charge and the last in the retreat.” a somewhat similar theme is discussed in chapter 15, The Horse and His Boy, when Shasta, a boy who was kidnapped in his infancy and raised in the distant Calormen, found out that he was the son of the king and the rightful heir to the throne of Archenland, much to the delight of his flighty twin brother, who was younger than him.

“Hurrah! Hurrah!” said Corin. “I shan’t have to be king. I shan’t have to be king. I’ll always be a prince. It’s princes have all the fun.”

“And that’s truer than thy brother knows, Cor,” said King Lune. “For this is what it means to be a king: to be first in every desperate attack and last in every desperate retreat, and when there’s hunger in the land (as must be now and then in bad years) to wear finer clothes and laugh louder over a scantier meal than any man in your land.”

I guess being a king is harder than everyone thought it would be.

Classic Bulgy Bear Moments (Narnia)

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 For me, the Bulgy Bear is without a doubt the funniest character in Prince Caspian. Of course, I’m talking of the book Bulgy Bear and not the movie Bulgy Bear, who I think had only one line in the entire film, which was a husky “For Aslan!” For some reason, I couldn’t help giggling when he said that.

Anyway, since his character was underdeveloped in the movie, I’m putting here some classic bulgy bear moments from the book:

On a fine summer morning when the dew lay on the grass he set off with the badger and the two dwarfs, up through the forest to a high saddle in the mountains and down on to their sunny southern slopes where one looked across the green wolds of Archenland. “We will go first to the three bulgy bears,” said Trumpkin.

They came in a glade to an old hollow oak tree covered with moss, and Trufflehunter tapped with his paw three times on the trunk and there was no answer. Then he tapped again and a woolly sort of voice from inside said, “Go away. It’s not time to get up yet.” But when he tapped the third time there was a noise like a small earthquake from inside and a sort of door opened and out came three brown bears, very bulgy indeed and blinking their little eyes. And when everything had been explained to them (which took a long time because they were so sleepy) they said, just as Trufflehunter had said, that a son of Adam ought to be king of Narnia and all kissed Caspian – very wet, snuffly kisses they were – and offered him some honey. Caspian did not really want honey, without bread, at that time in the morning, but he thought it polite to accept. It took him a long time afterwards to get unsticky.

Here we find out that the bulgy bears have a “woolly sort of voice”, are “very bulgy indeed,” and gives “wet, snuffly kisses.” Aren’t they adorable?

The next scene happened during the feast and council on Dancing Lawn where all the old Narnians gathered to meet with Prince Caspian. The creatures were debating how to go about the council, and the chapter starts by saying: “The bulgy bears were very anxious to have the feast first and leave the council till afterwards: perhaps till tomorrow.”

“Is there time for this foolery?” asked Nikabrik. “What are our plans? Battle or flight?”

“Battle if need be,” said Trumpkin. “But we are hardly ready for it yet, and this is no very defensible place.”

“I don’t like the idea of running away,” said Caspian.

“Hear him! Hear him!” said the bulgy bears. “Whatever we do, don’t let’s have any running. Especially not before supper; and not too soon after it neither.“

The last scene was when they were discussing the duel of Peter and Miraz, and choosing who the three marshals should be.

Peter was just explaining to Caspian that he could not be one, because his right to the throne was what they were fighting about, when suddenly a thick, sleepy voice said, “Your majesty, please.”

Peter turned and there stood the eldest of the bulgy bears. “If you please, your majesty,” he said, “I’m a bear, I am.”

“To be sure, so you are, and a good bear too, I don’t doubt,” said Peter.

“Yes,” said the bear. “But it was always a right of the bears to supply one marshal of the lists.”

“Don’t let him,” whispered Trumpkin to Peter. “He’s a good creature, but he’ll shame us all. He’ll go to sleep and he will suck his paws. In front of the enemy too.”

“I can’t help that,” said Peter. “Because he’s quite right. The bears had that privilege. I can’t imagine how it has been remembered all these years, when so many other things have been forgotten.”

“Please, your Majesty,” said the bear.

“It is your right,” said Peter. “And you shall be one of the marshals. But you must remember not to suck your paws.”

“Of course not,” said the bear in a very shocked voice.

“Why, you’re doing it this minute!” bellowed Trumpkin.

The bear whipped his paw out of his mouth and pretended he hadn’t heard.

Well what can I say? You’ve got to love the bulgy bears, even when they’re sucking their paws!

Favorite Narnia Movie Lines (LWW)

Literature, TV & Movies, ,

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I know it’s been more than 2 years since The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe came out, but I thought I’d write about it today. After all, it is what led me to enter the world of Narnia as I mentioned here. If you want to read my favorite lines from Prince Caspian, please click here.

Susan: Gas-tro-vas-cu-lar… Come on, Peter. Gastrovascular.
Peter: Is it Latin?
Susan: Yes.
Edmund: Is it Latin for “worst game ever invented”? (Susan shuts her dictionary with a withering look at Edmund)
Lucy: We could play hide and seek!
Peter: But we’re already having so much fun. (looking at Susan)

Mr. Tumnus: And what about you? You must be some kind of beardless dwarf?
Lucy: I’m not a dwarf! I’m a girl. And actually, I’m tallest in my class.

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Lucy: (holds out her hand) Pleased to meet you, Mr. Tumnus, I’m Lucy Pevensie. (Mr. Tumnus looks at her hand curiously) Oh, you shake it.
Mr. Tumnus: W-why?
Lucy: I… I don’t know!

White Witch: I can make anything you’d like.
Edmund: Can you make me taller?

Professor Kirke: You seem to have upset the delicate internal balance of my housekeeper.
Peter: We’re very sorry, Sir, it won’t happen again.
Susan: It’s our sister, Sir. Lucy.
Professor Kirke: The weeping girl?
Susan: Yes, sir. She’s upset.
Professor Kirke: Hence the weeping.

Edmund: (after Peter hands a ladies coat to him) But that’s a girl’s coat!
Peter: (nods) I know.

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Susan: Did that bird just “pssst” us?

Peter: (upon first seeing Mr. Beaver) Here, boy, tsk, tsk, tsk.
Mr. Beaver: (after looking at the Peter’s outstretched hand) Well I ain’t gonna smell it if that’s what you want.

Peter: He said he knows the faun.
Susan: He’s a beaver, he shouldn’t be saying anything!

Mr. Beaver: When Adam’s flesh and Adam’s bone sits in Cair Paravel in throne, the evil time will be over and done.
Susan: You know that doesn’t really rhyme.
Mr. Beaver: I know, but you’re kind of missing the point.

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Peter: (to the beavers) I think you’ve made a mistake. We’re not heroes!
Susan: We’re from Finchley!

Peter: (watching Mrs. Beaver packing food) What are you doing?
Mrs. Beaver: You’ll be thanking me later. It’s a long journey, and Beaver gets pretty cranky when he’s hungry.
Mr. Beaver: I’m cranky now!

Mr. Beaver: (after seeing that his friends have been turned to stone) You take one more step, traitor, and I’ll chew you to splinters!
Fox: Relax. I’m one of the good guys.
Mr. Beaver: Yeah? Well, you look an awful lot like one of the bad ones. (referring to the wolves)
Fox: An unfortunate family resemblance. But we can argue breeding later.

Fox: Forgive me, your Majesty.
White Witch: Don’t waste my time with flattery.
Fox: Not to seem rude, but I wasn’t actually talking to you. (looks pointedly at Edmund)

Mr. Beaver: Come on, hurry up!
Peter: If he tells us to hurry up one more time, I am going to make him into a big, fluffy hat.

Susan: (when they were about to finally meet Aslan) Why are they all staring at us?
Lucy: Maybe they think you look funny.

Peter: (looking out towards Cair Caravel) Aslan, I’m not who you think I am.
Aslan: You’re Peter Pevensie, formerly of Finchley. Beaver also mentioned that you planned on turning him into a hat.

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Maugrim: (to Susan and Lucy who were playing by the water on their own) Please don’t run…
Wolf: We’re tired…
Maugrim: And we’d prefer to kill you quickly.

Gryphon: They come, your Highness, in numbers and weapons far greater than our own.
Oreius: Numbers do not win a battle.
Peter: No… But I bet they help.

Peter: For Narniaaaa!!! And for Aslannnn!!!

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Edmund: (when his horse suddenly rears up while he is learning to ride it and use his sword) Whoa, horsey.
Philip the Horse: (in haughty tones) My name is Philip.

Peter: (to Edmund, during the battle) There are too many of them! Go! Get out of here! Get the girls, and get them home!
Mr. Beaver: (dragging Edmund away) Come on, you heard him! (Edmund starts towards Peter) Peter said to go!
Edmund: Peter’s not king yet.

Favorite Narnia Movie Lines (PC)

Literature, TV & Movies, ,

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Here are some of my favorite lines from the movie Prince Caspian. To read my favorite lines from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe movie, please click here.

Edmund: (sitting on a bench beside Peter after helping him out of a fight without receiving a thank you) You’re welcome.
Peter: (stands up) I had it sorted.

Lucy: I wonder who lived here.
Susan: (picks up a small chess piece) I think we did.
Edmund: Hey, that’s mine! From my chess set!
Peter: Which chess set?
Edmund: I didn’t have a solid gold chess set in Finchley, did I?

Lucy: (holding up one of her old dresses in the treasure chamber) I was so tall.
Susan: Well, you were older then.
Edmund: As opposed to hundreds of years later, when you’re younger.

Trufflehunter: (after fighting with Nikabrik in Trufflehunter’s house and knocking down a bowl of soup) Look what you made me do! (muttering) Spent half the morning on that soup…

Caspian: What are you?
Trufflehunter: You know, it’s funny that you should ask that. You’d think more people would know a badger when they see one.
Caspian: No, I mean you’re Narnians. You’re supposed to be extinct.
Nikabrik: (sarcastically) Sorry to disappoint you.

Trufflehunter: (to Nikabrik, who wanted to kill Caspian) Enough, Nikabrik! Or do I have to sit on your head again?

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Trumpkin: (after Miraz strikes him across the face) And you wonder why we don’t like you.

Susan: (aiming her bow and arrow at the Telmarines, who were holding the tied-up Trumpkin over the river) Drop him! (the Telmarines toss Trumpkin in the water and run away)
Trumpkin: (to Susan, after being rescued) “Drop him?” Was that the best you could think of?

Lucy: (looking sadly at the woods) They’re so still…
Trumpkin: The trees? What did you expect?
Lucy: They used to dance.

Peter: (looking down a cliff over the water) Is there a way down?
Trumpkin: Yes. Falling.

Lucy: (to Peter and Susan, who didn’t believe that she saw Aslan) I wish you would all stop trying to sound like grown-ups! I didn’t think I saw him, I did see him.
Trumpkin: (pause) I AM a grown-up.

Caspian: (to Trufflehunter and Nikabrik, who were following him surreptitiously) I can hear you.

Trufflehunter: (coming out of hiding) I just think we should wait for the kings and queens. (Caspian keeps walking) Fine, go then! See if the others will be as understanding.

Nikabrik: Or maybe I’ll come with you. I want to see you explain things to minotaurs.
Caspian: (stops abruptly) Minotaurs. They’re real?
Trufflehunter: And very bad-tempered.
Nikabrik: Not to mention big.
Trufflehunter: Huge.

Reepicheep: (brandishing his sword against a fallen Caspian) Choose your last words carefully, Telmarine.
Caspian: (incredulously) You are a mouse.
Reepicheep: (sighs) I was hoping for something a little more original.

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Peter: (stopping during their swordfight) Prince Caspian?
Caspian: And who are you?
Susan: (running) Peter!
Caspian: High King Peter?
Peter: I believe you called.
Caspian: I thought you’d be… older.
Peter: Well if you like, we can come back in a few years.
Caspian: No! No, it’s alright! You’re not exactly what I expected.
Edmund: Neither are you.

Lucy: (upon seeing Reepicheep for the first time) Oh my gosh, he’s so cute.
Reepicheep: (drawing his sword and looking around) Who said that?!?
Lucy: Um, sorry.
Reepicheep: Oh, uh… Your Majesty. With the greatest respect… I do believe courageous, courteous or chivalrous might more befit a knight of Narnia.

Reepicheep: (to Trumpkin the dwarf, who aided him in his attack) We were expecting someone taller!
Trumpkin: You’re one to talk.
Reepicheep: Is that supposed to be irony?

Pattertwig the Squirrel: (in response to the fear of being trapped and starved to death in Aslan’s How) We could gather nuts!
Reepicheep: (sarcastically) Yes! And then throw them at the Telmarines!

Queen Prunaprismia: (to Miraz, after he admitted that he killed Caspian’s father) I thought you said he died in his sleep!
Miraz: That was more or less true.

Miraz: Tell me, Prince Edmund…
Edmund: King.
Miraz: I beg your pardon?
Edmund: It’s King Edmund, actually. Just king though. Peter’s the High King. (after an awkward pause) I know, it’s confusing.

Edmund: (to Peter, after destroying the ice wall, where the ghost of the White Witch was tempting both Caspian and Peter) I know, you had it sorted.

Caspian: (to Susan, after she announced that she will never be able to go back to Narnia according to Aslan) I wish we could have had more time together.
Susan: We never would have worked, anyway.
Caspian: Why not?
Susan: Well, I AM 1300 years older than you.

Edmund: (upon their return to England) Do you think there’s any way we can go back? (the Pevensies stare at him in surprise) I left my new torch in Narnia.

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Quotes from To Kill a Mockingbird

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To kill a mockingbird cover

 

Today, I had about four hours to kill waiting for my boyfriend at Libis so I went to the nearby bookstore and chose a book to buy. I wanted something familiar and comforting, and couldn’t decide which one to buy – Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince or Volume 2 of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes collection. I previously owned copies of these books when I was in high school, but I lost them somewhere along the way or lent them out and never got them back. It never bothered me before since I never considered myself a book collector anyway. I usually just borrow books from friends or read them at Powerbooks  – thanks to the genius who allowed people to read the books at the store, sort of like a library; and put in Java Man Cafe as well that serves my favorite pasta with arrabiata sauce.

However, thanks to the influence of both my boyfriend Sidney and my good friend Mike R, I decided it would be nice to have my own personal library, so I guess I should start buying my books now. But anyway, back to the choosing: I put down Sherlock Holmes Volume 2 because I wasn’t sure if they had Volume 1, and I will only buy one volume if I’m sure I can buy the other. After more dilly-dallying, I finally put down The Little Prince because I realized that much as I loved the book, there’s no way it can last me four hours.

I read To Kill a Mockingbird when I was in grade 7 or 8 at UP Integrated School (which is equivalent to first or second year high school). I distinctly remember writing “Atticus… Atticus…” in my diary, which was supposed to remind me of my favorite character from the book, Atticus Finch. He was a widowed lawyer who always did what was right, even when it was lonely. The story still haunts me (although I did not cry this time) as it is very difficult for me to imagine that less than a lifetime ago, black people and white people seemed to live in two different worlds, being two different folks. But as Scout said in the book, when her brother Jem told her that he thought there were four different folks in their town, she replied, “I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.”

Anyway, here are some of my favorite quotations from the book which I highlighted in my copy as well.

SCOUT on reading: Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.

ATTICUS to his children: You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.

ATTICUS to his children again, when they got air rifles for Christmas, and as a reference to the title of the novel: I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit `em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.

MISS MAUDIE to Scout, trying to explain why Atticus told them that it was a sin to kill mockingbirds: Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat people’s gardens, don’t nest in corncribs, they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.

ATTICUS to his children on a drug addict neighbor who died clean though suffering from withdrawal till the end: I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do.

MISS MAUDIE to Scout, on why Atticus never boasted about his skill in marksmanship: People in their right minds never take pride in their talents.

CALPURNIA (the educated black servant of the Finches) to Scout: It’s not necessary to tell all you know.

ATTICUS to his son Jem, who couldn’t believe that the jury ruled against an obviously innocent black man: They’ve done it before and they did it tonight and they’ll do it again and when they do it – seems that only children weep.

Photo credit: seanelynn

Thought-Provoking Quotes from Fahrenheit 451

Literature, ,

Thanks again to my friend Mike R for introducing me to another great book – Fahrenheit 451 (which is “the temperature at which all books catch fire and burn”) by Ray Bradbury. I’ve heard of the author before, but for some reason I’ve never been interested in reading any of his books. Big mistake.

This is definitely a classic yet it’s quite easy to read; in fact, I finished this in only 3 sittings (two of which were during my lunch break), or less than two hours. But that’s another mistake. This book is not meant for speed-reading, which is why I’m planning to re-read this again (slowly this time).

Here are some of the interesting quotations from Fahrenheit 451 that can really make you think:

[Fire’s] real beauty is that it destroys responsibility and consequences. A problem gets too burdensome, then into the furnace with it.

With school turning out more runners, jumpers, racers, tinkerers, grabbers, snatchers, fliers, and swimmers instead of examiners, critics, knowers, and imaginative creators, the word “intellectual,” of course, became the swear word it deserved to be. You always dread the unfamiliar.

Intellectual as a swear word. I like that.

If the government is inefficient, topheavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it.

Why does this kind of government sound so strangely familiar? Oh well. I will NOT write about politics here.

If you don’t want a man unhappy politically, don’t give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none.

The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies.

That’s the reason why I love Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. It touches life beautifully.

You’re afraid of making mistakes. Don’t be. Mistakes can be profited by.

The most dangerous enemy of truth and freedom – the solid unmoving cattle of the majority.

There was a silly damn bird called a phoenix back before Christ: every few hundred years he built a pyre and burned himself up. He must have been first cousin to man. But every time he burnt himself up he sprang out of the ashes, he got himself born all over again. And it looks like we’re doing the same thing, over and over, but we’ve got one damn thing the phoenix never had. We know the damn silly thing we just did. We know all the damn silly things we’ve done for a thousand years, and as long as we know that and always have it around where we can see it, some day we’ll stop making the goddam funeral pyres and jumping into the middle of them. We pick up a few more people that remember, every generation.

Unfortunately, though this is a very beautiful verse, the first thing that came to my mind was the image of Jean Grey aka Phoenix from the X-Men, and Fawkes, Dumbledore’s phoenix from Harry Potter

Stuff your eyes with wonder… Live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. Ask no guarantees, ask for no security, there never was such an animal. And if there were, it would be related to the great sloth which hangs upside down in a tree all day every day, sleeping its life away. To hell with that … shake the tree and knock the great sloth down on his ass.

Another beautiful verse, ruined by the sudden image of Sid – not my boyfriend Sid – but Sid the sloth from the movie Ice Age, shaking his ass. 

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