Biblio Beau

Monday, August 10, 2009

102. Rowling, J.K. The Tales of Beedle the Bard. 111 pages. 8.10.09.

I am incredibly disappointed with The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling. The book, presented as a collection of wizard fairy tales annotated by Albus Dumbledore, lacks the inventiveness of the children's novels that have made Rowling famous. The short tales themselves, which contain all the elements familiar from classic fairy tales, can be quite charming (I myself enjoy reading classic fairy tales, and Rowling's writing varies very little from the style and intent of classic collections). However, the "extensive commentary by Albus Dumbledore" is uninspired and does little to accentuate the collection or the past character of the headmaster of Hogwarts. While I am no Harry Potter fangirl, I did enjoy the original novels, and The Tales of Beedle the Bard does not live up to the imagination Rowling showed in her previous writing.

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Favorite Quotes

"To tell people what to read is, as a rule, either useless or harmful; for the appreciation of literature is a question of temperament not of teaching [...]. But to tell people what not to read is a very different matter, and I venture to recommend it as a mission..." - Oscar Wilde, "Letter to the Pall Mall Gazette on the Subject of 'The Best Hundred Books'" (qtd. Wright, Built of Books, 317).

"I wish you joy o'th' worm" - Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, 5.2.270.

"The world must be peopled!" - Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." - Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice.

"That a man who has sons brings up chickens for his own table ... whereas daughters are chickens brought up for the tables of other men." - Samuel Richardson, Clarissa (77).

“No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” - Samuel Beckett

And then there is more Oscar Wilde:

"It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it."

"You can never be overdressed or overeducated."

"You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit." - The Picture of Dorian Gray.

"Appearance blinds, whereas words reveal." - Personal Impressions of America

"A poet can survive everything but a misprint." - "The Children of the Poets", The Pall Mall Gazette

"There is no sin except stupidity." - The Critic as Artist

"One should always be a little improbable." - "Phrases and Philosophies for the use of the Young"

"The truth is rarely pure and never simple." - The Importance of Being Earnest

"Even when reading is impossible, the presence of books acquired produces such an ecstasy that the buying of more books than one can read is nothing less than the soul reaching towards infinity... we cherish books even if unread, their mere presence exudes comfort, their ready access, reassurance."
--- A.E. Newton