The delusion that it was bright hot morning

The quotation I've used today comes from a novel I read a little while ago now; Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night. Now, it being bright hot morning (well, afternoon actually, but near enough!) when I took these OOTD pictures was not in fact a delusion, but rather a harsh, humid reality. Looking at these images, you're likely going to think the only delusion going on is whichever one I had in my head that convinced me to wear a scarf wrapped nearly thrice around my neck in the middle of summer. I don't really have a great answer for that, except that it is quite a light-weight scarf, so I wasn't completely boiling.

Scarf: Calvin Klein via TJMaxx; Watch: Fossil

Top: Forever 21; Skirt: Tommy Hilfiger; Shoes: Enzo Angiolini via TJMaxx

It was actually quite a lovely day today, so I ventured out to the library (yay!) to return my Faulkner novel and James short stories. In their place I am now in possession of the novel The Shadow of the Sun by A.S. Byatt. I've never read anything by Byatt before, and actually never intended to read this particular novel. I became aware of this author through my favourite novel, The Time Traveler's Wife. Texts that make reference to other works are really great sources when you're trying to find new material; I already knew how much I loved Niffenegger's novel so I figured the outside quotations she worked in were worth checking out. By the way, The Shadow of the Sun isn't the book I was aiming for. I'm hoping to get my hands on Possession (also by Byatt), but all of the copies are out. . . and have holds on them for when they're returned. I decided getting something else out by the same author would at least give me a chance to test-drive her work while I wait.

In the interest of continuing to forge ahead con il mio italiano, I picked up three Italian films as well. They are: "Il Generale della Rovere" directed by Roberto Rossellini, "Don Giovanni" directed by Carlos Saura, and "Il Deserto Rosso" directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. If you're interested in foreign films (which I think everyone really ought to be), keep checking back to my blog. I'll be putting up reviews as I watch these films, so hopefully I can give you a couple of new recommendations!


Do you look internationally when selecting movies or literature? If you live outside of North America, are there any great films from your country that you would like to tell me about? Provided I can find them online or in a library, I will happily check them out!


-C
P.S. I thought I'd get back into the swing of things with this OOTD and include a couple of coral pieces. The mustardy-yellow of my top is another of my favourite colours, and putting these two together was, I think, a happy accident!

The chariot that bears a human soul

Today's quotation is actually part of the Emily Dickinson poem "There is no frigate like a book." I've never used poetry as a title before, so I guess today's a little something new. As you may be aware, I'm a student of English literature, so the times when I am NOT reading something or other are pretty rare. My love for the written word extends back beyond the bounds of my own memory. When I was a little girl, my mom bought me a book of poetry from each of Robert Browning, Edgar Allen Poe, and the aforementioned Emily Dickinson; the poem I've quoted was in fact my favourite of the collection (despite initially have no idea whatsoever what a frigate was).

Given my past and present attachment to literature of all shapes and forms, it won't come as a surprise that today I'm grasping yet another opportunity to talk about some of my favourite printed art. I am an avid follower of the blog Sprinkle of Glitter. I find that Louise's cheerful tone and colourful subject matter always bring a smile to my face. Today, I'm extremely pleased to be able to join her in her Wednesday LOTD: Book.

My favourite novel is Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, which I finished reading (for the 3rd time) yesterday. To me, this is an absolutely breathtaking novel. There is honestly something in this story for everyone. Niffenegger tackles the subject of time travel in a very approachable way for us readers; she doesn't make light of it as a fantastical ability but instead transfigures it into a tangible (when the character isn't travelling!) genetic disease, the implications of which constantly shape and reshape the lives of Clare Abshire and Henry DeTamble.

The heart of this tale is the unconventional love story of Henry and Clare. We watch them struggle through coping with loss, separation, joy, uncertainty, and a truly incredible amount of devotion. Even if the time travelling aspect doesn't hook you, you MUST READ THIS NOVEL if for the love story alone; it is the most powerful I have ever read, and that is saying something. The Time Traveler's Wife is also appealing on a psychological level as it battles the issue of free will. Henry's voyages back and forth through time may at first seem magical and exciting, but he is also constantly reminded of the fact that outside of his present (when he's not travelling), he has no agency. He frequently meets with events he wants to change, but lacks the ability to do so. Nothing can be altered because in Henry's past (which is where he mainly ends up), everything has already happened. Things will go the way they will go because they have already done so. Confused yet? It's understandable if you are. The novel explains all of this better than I can, plus each section lets you know what the date is and Henry's age (or ages, sometimes he exists twice in the same trip) at the time.

The bottom line is, this is an astoundingly beautiful story of the steadfast constancy of love through both space and time.

-C

Like making a bed

Happy Monday, all. I haven't posted anything for the last few days, and I'm sorry about that. I had some important stuff going on this weekend so blogging had to take the back seat. I know that I probably could have tried to push myself to do it anyways, but if I did I suspected that my writing would turn out subpar, which isn't especially enjoyable for either you or I. Also, I'm very much a perfectionist with my writing. Generally, I can be confidently and correctly categorized as a type-B personality. However, when it comes to any sort of work I have to do, be responsible for, and live with the effects of afterwards, I'm type-A through and through.

Things, to put it mildly, have been pretty super-fantastic with me over the past little while. Lots on my mind, but in a good way rather than a bad. I've had a lot of time for thinking lately and have found myself up late frequently doing just that. That and writing. Not blog writing, unfortunately, just writing writing. I occasionally go through phases where almost every night I have a million little ideas running through my head and I absolutely have to record them. . . or at least attempt to. These things come to me as I'm ready to fall asleep and if I can repeat them to myself often enough, I will attempt to actually roll over, switch on my bedside light, dig out my journal, and write down a close enough approximation to whatever I was thinking/feeling/remembering in a way that I feel is original and pleasing enough satisfy me as to the fact that it was worth jotting down and that I can now go to sleep, unburdened of said phrase my brain has been arranging. It sounds rather horrible, doesn't it? It's a very comfortable feeling though, being able to create something, even a line, that I just love, and then having the will power to refuse to let it slip my mind until I have tucked it away for the night. I put it to bed with black pen. It can rest on my lined paper as though between its own cotton sheets.

Normally I think of the title of each post before I begin to type. That way, I give myself a starting place and allow myself to consider the quotation as I write; expanding and exploring it, probing at it, looping it in and through my ideas until I am satisfied. Today I didn't have anything definite to put up in that little "Post title" rectangle, but now I do. Right now I'm reading Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife for possibly the third or fourth time (I've mentioned more than once that this is my favourite novel). My own description at the end of my last paragraph has reminded me of a line in this novel that I find particularly comforting: "Turning each page is like making a bed, an enormous expanse of paper slowly rises up and over." A good friend of mine has told me more than once that folding one's laundry is cathartic because it mimics putting one's life in order. Writing itself can be like this for me; like making a bed, it is relaxing and orderly.

What are you reading at the moment? I am genuinely interested to know as well how you construct your blog posts. Some of mine involve OOTDs, etc. and so I simply take the pictures and mould the rest around that visual story. For those that don't, as I've mentioned in this post already, I just find a pleasing quotation and then am off and running with it until I reach what feels like the end of my thought or the bottom of this bottomless, virtual typing box.

-C

My little. . . unwalled section of the world?

I think I must have been suffering lately from onlyblogatnight-itis. From my own experience I can report that said condition is quite hampering, but can be combatted with a remedy of perseverance mixed in equal parts with force-yourself-to-do-it. Seriously though, I feel as though I'm slacking off a bit with this blog, and I don't have a really solid explanation as to why. I'm just getting lazy perhaps; hopefully you can excuse this as I do believe it happens to the best of us.

So today has been another veritable scorcher here in my little corner of the world. I always find that a bit of a strange phrase. Why on earth (no pun intended) would someone select "corner" as a likely place to position oneself whilst living on a sphere? It only makes me think of living inside a giant box, which is not really the pleasantest of feelings. I'll leave someone else to puzzle over that for now and digress back into more present matters. As I've said, it was very hot today, and being quite a fair-skinned individual, I did manage to burn myself. In a weak attempt to defend my skincare negligence, I have to say I was sitting outside so much because I was trying to finish the novel Vanity Fair. I read all the way up to the final chapter, but I stopped there. As much as I've been wont to complain about the length and frequent wordiness of this novel, I have honestly really really enjoyed it. This book has made me laugh out loud in some places, and cry my eyes out in others. I'm going to finish reading it tonight and have the extremely satisfying experience of a final page turn.

What have you all been reading lately? Anything you find yourself coming back to again and again? I've told you that my favourite novel is The Time Traveler's Wife and I'm beginning to get the itch to pick it up off the ol' bookshelf again. There's really nothing quite as nice as finishing one great novel with an old favourite on the horizon.

-C

To world enough, and time

I only have another quick post today, so my apologies. I got home from seeing "Prometheus" with my friend and I wanted to show you what I wore. I ended up going for what turned out to be a sort of nautical outfit. I really love my navy and, as you should definitely be able to tell by now, my coral. I felt that this outfit was cute, comfortable enough to sit in the theatre in for a couple of hours, and still stylish, though technically just denim and a tank top. The pants are actually capris, but I've been rolling down the cuff lately because I think they look great as cropped pants too. I'm wearing flip-flops in these pictures, but I ended up going in brown leather gladiator sandals and the brown leather Fossil bag (which I was also wearing in a previous post). These shots also give you a look at my glasses, which I don't normally wear out. I snapped these before doing my makeup just to make sure I had a few images of my clothing before my friend arrived to pick me up.

As for the movie itself, the main idea it left me with is that if ever I find myself on an alien planet, I will absolutely NOT touch anything.

The quotation I've used for this post is from my favourite novel, Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, but originally references the poem "To His Coy Mistress" by Andrew Marvell. I thought this might be appropriate for today/tonight since this entry marks the one week mark in my blog's existance! To tack on an extra meaning, which you know I can never resist doing if there's an opportunity, I could also say that the "world enough" part is how I feel after seeing "Prometheus." I can say that this film has completely put me off space travel for the time being and the Earth is looking like a pretty lovely place to be this evening.

Top: Hollister; Capris: DKNY via TJMaxx

Happy one week to my dear blog and onwards and upwards from here!
-C

Lying on the shore where Fortune has stranded me

The title of this first and most daunting post is one I have paraphrased from the novel I'm currently reading: Vanity Fair. Blogging is something I have never before attempted, much like the reading of said novel. Let us hope that soon, both my flow of thoughts and reading experience will be going along smoothly. I'm a person who writes down the things she likes, particularly when it comes to literature. Right now (well, not RIGHT right now, it is summer holidays after all) I'm studying English lit in university, so basically every single day of the school year I find myself confronted with mountains of words and heaps of sentences through which I must sift and try my darnedest to emerge victorious with some kind of point. Fortunately for me, the discipline I've chosen and the professors I've had are both open to multiple, if not infinite, interpretations. Even so, every once in a while, it's extremely comforting to grab onto a particular sentence or even a short phrase that really makes sense/hits home/floats my boat, etc. etc. This brings me back to the title of this post.

You may have already decided to pack it in at this point, seeing as my capacity for written rambling is nearly boundless. However, if you're still hanging in there, waiting for me to turn this thing into something spectacular, then I think we're off to a good start together. In the aforementioned literary masterpiece that is Vanity Fair, the quotation I have selected is used to describe the state of a woman whose family has fallen on the hardest of hard times. In her shoes, others may have thrived, but this particular female absolutely gives herself up to the universe and struggles no further (or maybe she will, I've already said I haven't finish the book yet). This seaside prostration is a position I have come upon myself in, but I'd rather not leave things up to Fortune, or at least not just yet.

Above all things, I value honesty. I am going to be honest with you right now and tell you that I'm really not 100% certain where this blog is going. Gosh, I'm not even 100% certain where this post is going. I did write out what I thought I wanted to say in my premiere publication, but somehow none of that information has made the cut. So far, I find it's more fun this way. I can tell you a few things about myself though, which will hopefully hook you in and win you over so that you might feel motivated to check out my blog again. I'll keep it simple for now, in case one of your suggestions is that I keep these posts shorter! I've already told you that I'm in university and that I study English lit. I'm also trying to get through with at least a minor in Italian, despite the fact that I come from a family of purely Scottish descendants, making it rather difficult to actually practice the language at home. I have a real, honest-to-goodness love of literature, so I try to read as much as I can. This is considerably easier during the summer when I have the leisure to read for pleasure. The list of my favourite novels grows all the time, but my so far irreplaceable favourite is The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.

Outside of the literary realm, I watch a fair number of movies; a habit helped along by a good friend of mine who did a double major in English and Film. I haven't watched an inordinate number of films, but I am willing to branch out. If you have any marvellous suggestions for me, please leave a comment and I'll let you know whether I've seen it, or, if I watch it, what I think. Also, related to both novels and films, I'm willing to write reviews on here, so if there's something you really want to find out about, I can promise you a thorough look at it through an honest perspective.

One final interest I'll leave you with is for fashion and beauty. I'm a member of a small, middle class family, so I don't buy loads of things constantly, but I do appreciate them! I can honestly spend hours watching my favourite vloggers on YouTube tell me what they've bought in a recent haul or how they've been finding such and such an eyeshadow. The name of my blog, "C of Corals," is inspired by this love of all things pretty as well as the literary nerd in me that relishes a good double meaning (C of Corals. . . "C" like "sea" and "Corals" as either the colour family or the aquatic plant). Also, my first name begins with C, so there is a more practical meaning in there along with my strange attempt at creativity.

Anyway, please let me know how I'm doing. Don't be too hard on me (it is my first try!), but feel free to make suggestions and ask questions.

-C