reading – Ellen Kolb

Choice reading for the new year

color illustration of packed bookshelves

I learn something from other readers’ year-end lists of favorite books. I’m bound to find something interesting – an author with whom I’m unfamiliar, a title that’s new to me, and sometimes rediscovery of a classic. My own list looks different from what I might have expected when the year began. Let me offer itContinue reading “Choice reading for the new year”

Open Book: on completing a commonplace notebook

A few evenings ago, I picked up a well-worn notebook from my desk and began to copy a short passage from the work of fiction I was reading. I wrote to the bottom of the page in the notebook, turned the page, and found I’d reached the end of the volume. It had taken 20Continue reading “Open Book: on completing a commonplace notebook”

Open Book: a classic outside a classroom

Greek amphora decorated with images of warriors from the story of the Iliad

I was casual about the reading lists from my English courses in high school. “Recommended” reading looked different to me from required reading. I interpreted recommended as “not quite assigned.” When I read Edith Hamilton’s Mythology – the required starting point for what was at the time a 3-year Advanced Placement English curriculum – IContinue reading “Open Book: a classic outside a classroom”