Four Book Quotes that Remind Us Of the Exquisite Joy to Be Found in Small Moments

“Although Bertha Young was thirty she still had moments like this when she wanted to run instead

of walk, to take dancing steps on and off the pavement, to bowl a hoop, to throw something up in the air

and catch it again, or to stand still and laugh at - nothing - at nothing, simply.  What can you do if

you are thirty and, turning the corner of your own street, you are overcome, suddenly by a feeling

of bliss - absolute bliss! - as though you'd suddenly swallowed a bright piece of that late afternoon

sun and it burned in your bosom, sending out a little shower of sparks into every particle,

into every finger and toe?” 

                                                                                ---Katherine Mansfield, "Bliss"

"I became aware of the world's tenderness, the profound beneficence of all that surrounded me,

the blissful bond between me and all of creation, and I realized that the joy I sought in you

was not only secreted within you, but breathed around me everywhere, in the speeding

street sounds, in the hem of a comically lifted skirt, in the metallic yet tender drone of the wind,

in the autumn clouds bloated with rain. I realized that the world does not represent a struggle at all,

or a predaceous sequence of chance events, but the shimmering bliss, beneficent trepidation,

a gift bestowed upon us and unappreciated. "

                                                                                ---Vladimir Nabokov, "Beneficience"

                                                                      

“As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that

the cold white wine washed away, leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture,

and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste

of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.” 

                                                                                ---Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast

“Always when I woke up, I had the feeling which I am sure must be natural to all of us, a joy in being alive. I don’t say you feel it consciously – you don’t – but there you are, you are alive, and you open your eyes, and here is another day; another step as it were, on your journey to an unknown place. That very exciting journey which is your life. Not that it is necessarily going to be exciting as a life, but it will be exciting to you because it is your life. That is one of the great secrets of existence, enjoying the gift of life that has been given to you.”

                                                                        ---Agatha Christie, Autobiography

Photos are from my April trip to Paris.

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.  

Write for Your Life; Poetry Rx; Around the World in 80 Books; and Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? (Uh, No)

 

I'm off to North Texas this weekend to attend the high school graduation party of our granddaughter, Bailey. 

I finished Mary Barton this week, and I must say that I was a bit disappointed. Author Elizabeth Gaskell focused on the lives of desperately impoverished people of Manchester in Mary Barton and that was the part of this book I thought was impressive for a book that was first published in 1848. But the story plays out a little like a fairy tale, with bad people coming to a bad end and good people living happy lives, and that was my disappointment. 

I was also a little disappointed with On Quality, a posthumously published collection of quotes from writer and philosopher Robert M. Pirsig. It didn't really add much to what he'd already published in his two books, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Lila, but it was a nice reminder of the thoughts he'd already shared. And the illustrations, photos of Pirsig's tools, added a lot to the book.

I completed two 1001 Children's Books, Nobody's Family is Going to Change, a novel, and Gargling with Jelly, a humorous poetry collection. I read Anna Quindlan's wonderful Write for Your Life. And I wrapped up Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are, concluding that we probably are not.

Write for Your Life by Anna Quindlen (Nonfiction)

Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal (Nonfiction)

Nobody's Family is Going to Change by Louise Fitzhugh (1001 Children's Books)

Gargling with Jelly by Brian Patten (1001 Children's Books)

Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell (Chapter-a-Day; Classics Club)

On Quality: An Inquiry into Excellence: Unpublished and Selected Writings by Robert M. Pirsig (Nonfiction)

Another Year of Wonder: Classical Music for Everyday by Clemency Burton Hill (Nonfiction)

The Magician's Nephew by C. S. Lewis (Narniathon)

Around the World in 80 Books by David Damrosch (Book-About-Books)

Poetry Rx: How 50 Inspiring Poems Can Heal and Bring Joy to Your Life (Happiness; Poetry)

The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot (Chapter-a-Day)

Last week I posted here at Readerbuzz:

Sunday Salon: Kindergarten Graduation and a Walk Across the Prairie and Even a Little Bit of Reading

Books I Was So Excited to Get But Still Haven't Read Yet

Wordless Wednesday: Monet's Garden at Giverny

My husband has been suffering from a cough for several days and he finally took a Covid test (negative) and went to the doctor. The doctor thinks his allergies have gone crazy from all the time we've been spending outdoors, and we're trying to stay indoors a little more until all the pollen subsides.

All the time we have spent outdoors has 

allowed us to see several new-to-us species of butterflies lately.

Good Thing #1

Orange Sulphur

Good Thing #2

Spicebush Swallowtail

Good Thing #3

Southern Dogface

I'm happy you joined us here at the Sunday Salon. Sunday Salon is a place to link up and to share what we have been doing during the week. It's a great way to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

Some of the things we often talk about at the Sunday Salon:

• What was your week like?
• Read any good books? Tell us about them.
• What other bookish things did you do? 
• What else is going on in your life?

Other places where you may like to link up over the weekend are below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

My linkup for Sunday Salon is below. 

Monet's Garden at Giverny

 

For more wordless photos, go to Wordless Wednesday.

Books I Was SO EXCITED to Get, but Still Haven’t Read

Where do you get the books you read? I get books from the library, as gifts, from Paperback Swap, and from BookCrossing, in addition to buying books from a bookstore.

If a book comes in for me from the library, I'm going to read it. Right away. First thing. It will go back in two weeks, and who knows when it will come again?

A book that arrives as a gift? From Paperback Swap? BookCrossing? Books I've bought myself at the bookstore? I tend to set these aside until the stack from the library subsides.

And that's why I have this pile of books I really, really want to read that I haven't gotten to yet. 

The Novel Cure: From Abandonment to Zestlessness: 751 Books to Cure What Ails You by Ella Berthoud and Susan Elderkin...I started this one during a lull in library books and I loved reading it, but then it got set aside...

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller...I pulled this one from a BookCrossing bookbox after reading and loving Madeline Miller's Circe, but I've yet to start it...

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez...It was Emma from Words and Peace that set me onto this one...from another BookCrossing bookbox...unread so far...

The Queen of the Tambourine by Jane Gardam...I discovered the amazing Jane Gardam through her novels for adolescents, Bilgewater and A Long Way from Verona...Her books were brilliant, I thought, so much so that I wanted to write Gardam a fan letter...but didn't...Still, I found her novel for adults and couldn't wait to read it...but still haven't...

A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley...So many people have raved about this story and I've had this book for a long, long time...Absolutely no reason for not reading it...except that I haven't...

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah...I've checked this one out from the library several times and returned it, unread, and finally this arrived in my Little Free Library...still haven't gotten around to read it...

Peace Like a River by Leif Enger...A swim friend told me about this book one day at the pool..."My favorite book," she said...I've read it but I didn't really read it and think about it, if you know what I mean...So I found a copy, intending to reread it carefully...and I still haven't...

Village School by Miss Read...A book about a school...by "Miss Read"...and I've heard it's a comfort read...It sounds perfect for me...Why haven't I read this one?

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann...Over and over, I've heard great things about this nonfiction book, but I'm not really a true crime reader, so I hesitate...

The Thurber Carnival by James Thurber...This one just arrived last week, so I feel least guilty about this one...I'm eager to get to this collection of short pieces by one of the great humor writers, but there are lots of others I probably need to read first...

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.