The Themed Reading Challenge sounds like great fun, but I haven’t yet decided on a theme. Here are the [very unoriginal] themes I’ve thought up so far:
a) Titles: containing a colour/bird/title (i.e. Mrs, Mr, Lord etc)
b) Setting: the tropics (Caribbean, Pacific islands etc)/Europe
c) Country of Origin: Russia/Japan/Australia/Latin America
d) Text type: biographies/any non-fiction/poetry/plays
Okay, I’m being ridiculous now, because the books would be extremely hard – if not impossible – to find, but it would probably be interesting if I chose one option from a, b, c and d. So for instance, Australian poetry set in Polynesia with titles containing bird names, or Russian memoirs set in Norway containing a colour in their titles. I suppose I could take Option B (from the real challenge rules) and mix two themes. So maybe just ‘Russian memoirs’.
No, no – actually I think I’ll just stick with one theme. Right now, I’m leaning towards biographies or colours or books set in the Caribbean…
EDIT: I’ve chosen my theme! In the end, I decided on non-fiction writings by/on artists (I’ve included writers in my definition of ‘artists’). See full list here
We of the Never-Never and The Children’s Bach are both interesting titles. Now you get me all curious. I’ll look them up! :)
Posted by Matthew | November 23, 2008, 2:48 pmMatthew – they’re both Australian books. I haven’t read them myself, but I was also intrigued by the titles~
Posted by tuesday | November 23, 2008, 3:04 pmA suggestion for artist’s non-fiction: Stella Bowen’s ‘Drawn From Life’ – she was an Australian painter, well known in Adelaide (where she was born) but I’m not sure how much she’s known elsewhere in Australia. She married Ford Madox Ford, he had an affair with Jean Rhys. Very interesting autobiography.
Posted by JRSM | November 23, 2008, 6:29 pmI don’t know much about her, but I have heard of her – I had to do a compulsory Australian art elective as part of my Visual Arts class a few years back. Thank you for the suggestion; I’ll keep my eye out for the book (my local library will probably own a copy)
Posted by tuesday | November 24, 2008, 9:10 am