Bunny is good but it is NOT like the Secret History. They should not be in the same category. I find that to be unfair and will give you the wrong idea. I listened to it on audible and it is entertaining. Donna Tart is an amazing author that created a fantastic story with interesting characters. Bunny is a unique story that I enjoyed reading, but I would never compare it to The Secret History. Also, Jane Eyre is one of my favorite classic books. You will truly enjoy it. I read Wide Sargasso sea and was underwhelmed. I barely remember it.
if you really want to understand what’s happening, don’t start* with the history of Jerusalem, start with the history of British colonization of 🍉 and current American imperialism in middle east
Wide Sargasso Sea is sort of a prequal to Jane Eyre where it tells about how Rochester met with Bertha, his first wife in Jamaica and her declining mental health and delves into the topic of the 'mad woman in the attic'
Wide Sargasso Sea is one of my favourite novels! Its style is very different to Jane Eyre, but the writing and story is just as fascinating. Rhys really delves deep into Antoinette and her struggles with identity - it's not the easiest read but definitely worth taking the time to reflect with. Also the relationship between Rochester and Antoinette is soooo toxic but somehow.. amazingly written.
Ugh, I have one of the new penguin classics and it's so uglyyyyyy.... Even worse though, the pages are SO THIN. I ripped a couple just turning them before I got the hang of it :/
I'll read Wuthering Heights with you. It's been sitting because I don't want to read about cold weather alone. Also, can confirm In Cold Blood is nonfiction
Oh and the count of monte cristo is so much more than a boy book(sincerely one of the girlies). It's an epic tale about revenge and love, I read it back in 2021 and it took me months but it was worth it ❤
I read Wide Sargasso Sea and hated it, then I had to re-read it for my degree and completely fell in love with it. Rhys demolishes Jane Eyre. It's a wonderful talent of an author to challenge such a widely read classic and do it justice. It's no wonder why Wide Sargasso Sea is more studied than Jane Eyre nowadays; Rhys shows how dated Jane Eyre is. You can never read Jane Eyre the same way ever again.
@sarcastic_fish I don't know if Better World Books works in the UK, but they donate books to literacy programs for every book bought on their site. So that's an option.
@@karakask5488 i should really do a "where to by 2nd hand books online" vid huh, i'll get you guys to all give me your best tips!! also better world books does seem to ship to the uk let's hope it's not extortionatly expensive
Recommendation: the pillow Book by Sei Shonagon. Woman Japanese writer, poet, and court lady who served the Japanese Empress Teishi around the year 1000. There's a film too.
Banana yoshimoto (her book 'kitchen' is fabulous), mieko kawakami and sayaka murata are all really good female japanese voices if you're looking for more!
I read Drive Your Plow... earlier this year, and it was so good! It had a couple moments that literally made me LOL, but it's also an extremely smart and interesting take on Blake, his version of Romanticism, and how that Romanticism has ethical implications for our relationship with the natural world. I read Wuthering Heights ages and ages ago, but it just didn't do it for me. That said, Fredric Jameson's discussion of the novel in his book The Political Unconscious is SO good. It's a reading that I've always found to be inspiring, so much so that it's that rare case where the criticism is better than the literature that's the object of criticism. As for the new Penguin Classics covers, OMG, I couldn't agree more. At this point, I'm willing to go out of my way to find a Penguin with the older cover, and it infuriates me that the last volume in Penguin's new translations of Henrik Ibsen has the new cover design, not the old design from 2003. Not only is the new design simply ugly AF, but this one volume breaks the visual consistency of the other Penguin Ibsen books on my shelf. Me being me, I just know I'll buy the others again just so that they match, even though the translations themselves are actually deeply flawed!
Hi, Emma! I'm catching up on watching your last couple videos :) I haven't seen it, but I know there's a very well-received Mishima biopic, Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985), from director Paul Schrader. I'm determined to get to A Certain Hunger this year. I bought it around the time it came out but just kept picking up other things- partially because I do this thing sometimes where I put off books I think are going to be new favorites. But I actually had a booktube/online friend who died recently and I watched her 2024 TBR video afterwards and was just thinking, "She's never going to read these books! She can't!" So I've very much become invested in reading potential favorites right now. YES! Lol, we've already bonded in a previous comment exchange over the terrible Penguin redesigns! I've been adding to my Penguin Classics collection more frequently just because of how much I hate them and want the previous design ones! omg the way you're talking about the Romantics and the gothic makes me want to recommend the film Gothic (1986); it's so wild and fun and a bit spooky!
it is such a joy to get book videos / recommendations from you ☺️ you are so open-minded, i mean jumping from japan to the brontës to jerusalem?? its honestly refreshing
I recently saw a book called "why women have better sex under socialism" I havent read it (yet) but it just sounds like something that you woule enjoy and I would love to hear your opinion of it.
oooo also gothic fiction wise - northanger abbey by Jane Austen is so funny to me cause it basically just completely takes the Mickey out of allllll the gothic fiction tropes.
not emma breaking my heart telling me several times that my favourite book of all time sucks😫 yes, i am that same person who screams about if we were villains and tells you to read bunny 'cause it's genuinely good😔 i love you, emma, but sometimes you break my heart.... also, can't wait to see you read yukio mishima!
i JUST started rereading drive your plow over the bones of the dead (which i only read the first time because lorde posted it on her ig story lol), i love it so much. the castle of otranto is also one of my favorite books of all time
one of my favourite things I've heard about Jane Eyre is that it was heavily inspired by Jane Fairfax, a governess in Jane Austen's Emma. I just find it fascinating the way that everything is inspired by everything else.
38:00 that was me when I started reading it lmao. I made the mistake of thinking the book was fiction until I was a couple pages through. I genuinely thought it was going to be something like crime and punishment. If books about such topics freak you out then that one will definitely unsettle. I had to get rid of it from my bookshelf after I finished reading as it’s just so bloody negative and overall made me anxious, perhaps because I made the mistake of occasionally reading it at night, but especially because of the fact that it’s a real case - one that was completely senseless. It also deals with a lot of heavy topics, as it looks into the past of the perpetrators but also while they were on the run. Definitely take a look at the content warning. The book can get philosophical at times, and the author actually got close and personal with the case, meeting with the killers or at least one of them while they were alive. One really vile character loved the book the brothers kharamazov and I’m so annoyed that I retained that info cause now it comes to mind whenever I see it. There’s seriously nothing worse than this book coming to mind late at night when you hear a random noise outside.
