I met a lemming crossing the road

I asked, "Where are you going to?"
He said, "My friend, come and carry the load--
I don't know where I'm going...
But you can come, too!"

So, in the spirit of complete lemminghood, the first four of the five questions re: books that have been going around.

1) Total number of books I own:

Oh, somewhere in the vicinity of 1,000, I imagine. Probably more but I haven't counted in forever. Actually, I need to weed out some of them.

2) The last book I bought:

Yesterday, actually - oh, shoot, what did I get? Oh, that's right:

Patricia McKillip's Od's Wizard
Two collections of short stories by Lord Dunsany
Jo Walton's Tooth and Claw

(When I'll actually get around to reading them is a different matter.)

3) The last book I read was:

Hwell, I'm in the middle of slogging through the latest Artemis Fowl which is a series that started with potential and then went nowhere. I'm only reading this one (although, granted, I've started skimming) because it was lent me. No more buying Eoin Colfer for me!

The last book I completed with Joseph Pearce's C. S. Lewis biography which was amazing. I've started reading his Oscar Wilde biography but the passion that Pearce had for Lewis he does not seem to have for Wilde and the biography lacks because of it. Apparently, Pearce is working on one about Shakespeare, for which I am very excited.

4) Five books that mean a lot to me:

This is a tough one. Mean what? Only five? OK, at the risk of feeling redundant, I'll go with the ones that have profoundly affected me in some way. In no particular order:

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo - this book, as I often say, changed my life. It gave me a love for the grand scope of the ordinary, it gave me a love for the hugeness and smallness of the world, for the Divine Plan, for the quality of mercy, for grand themes, for minute details, for self-sacrifice and redemption, for "beauty in the breakdown." And it is long overdue for a reread! Also, by its very size - and my own age when I read it (12? 13? Over 8th grade year) - it stands as sort of my "I can read this; I can do anything" approach to challenges. "Say not that you are too young." Naturally, the book and the musical are very much entwined in my head, since it was a promotion for the latter that lead me to read the former - but to go into love for opera, for the theatre, etc. is another subject for another day! (Or the remainder of this blog.)

Illusion by Paula Volsky - I learned that Les Miserables can be done in my favorite of all mediums: fantasy. And her sublime language! And her worldbuilding! Exquisite! Dref! Dref!

This is probably cheating, but I'm going to lump together Grimms & Anderson's fairy tales - I checked them out of the library nearly every week each summer until my grandma gave me $100 to go to one of the first Barnes & Noble's superstores where I immediately purchased complete copies of both. I don't know that I really need to explain why their fairy tales are so important to me - but for those who've missed out, can we just say: Bearskin, King of Fools, Niamh and the Hermit and several more coming up? Cha. But for a better context: it's just the pureness of the medium that I love. Utter complexity within utter simplicity. Utter mystery and loveliness.

I'm going to cheat and lump together as well The French Revolution by Nesta Webster, next to second semester Junior year's Great Books Program, which included Locke, Hobbs & Rousseau, as well as The Battle of the Books by Jonathan Swift - you want to know what the truth is? Why we think the way we think? Where we diverged from classical thought? Why were so screwed up? How the culture of death came to be? The lies perpetuated by the victors of the Endarkenment - read these. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton, and more or less all of his works. The saint of common sense comes through and debunks all the books of the previous bullet! Yee-haw Orthodoxy!

The last tag was a tag on other bloggers to do this meme, but I happen to hate anything approaching mail chains, so either do or not do as you desire.

Mood: TRES heureux!
Music: Hugh Jackman's glorious voice in Oklahoma! (In preparation for the Tonys, mais naturallement!)
God is so Good files: So, Jules and I went to the 5 p.m. mass today and - the Nicholson brothers did the music and it was so peaceful and prayerful and praiseful and Steubenville and oh, praise God! And please God! Keep this up! Amen!