Victor Hugo- Les Miserables

Les Miserables is by far my favorite book that I have read in school thus far.  I could say a lot about this book, but all that I will say is, READ IT! Well, read the abridged version (becuase it focuses more on the redemption side of the story, and it is more uplifting) unless you like really, really long books :)
Ultimately, this story is one of redemption and sacrifice.  Of one man paying for his sins and then living a changed life where he soon discovers the responsibility of caring for another.
Also, if you want to, the broadway musical is fun to listen to, though there are several songs that are inappropriate, just to warn you!

"An invasion of armies can be resisted, but not an idea whose time has come."

"The quantity of civilization is measured by the quality of imagination."

This is my all time favorite song from the musical called "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables"

MARIUS
There's a grief that can't be spoken.
There's a pain goes on and on.
Empty chairs at empty tables
Now my friends are dead and gone.

Here they talked of revolution.
Here it was they lit the flame.
Here they sang about `tomorrow'
And tomorrow never came.

From the table in the corner
They could see a world reborn
And they rose with voices ringing
I can hear them now!
The very words that they had sung
Became their last communion
On the lonely barricade at dawn.

Oh my friends, my friends forgive me

(The ghosts of those who died on the barricade appear)

That I live and you are gone.
There's a grief that can't be spoken.
There's a pain goes on and on.

Phantom faces at the window.
Phantom shadows on the floor.
Empty chairs at empty tables
Where my friends will meet no more.

(The ghosts fade away)

Oh my friends, my friends, don't ask me
What your sacrifice was for
Empty chairs at empty tables
Where my friends will sing no more.

 

 

George Macdonald

George MacDonald has been one of my favorite authors since about the fourth grade when I read At the Back of the North Wind for a reading contest.  Since then I have read The Princess and Curdie, The Princess and the Goblin, The Day Boy and the Night Girl, and the Light Princess.
The Princess and the Goblin was probably one of my favorite books, so here are a couple excerpts from it.
"Seeing is not believing - it is only seeing."
"Here I should like to remark, for the sake of princes and princesses in general, that it is a low and contemptible thing to refuse to confess a fault, or even an error. If a true princess has done wrong, she is always uneasy until she has had an opportunity of throwing the wrongness away from her by saying: 'I did it; and I wish I had not; and I am sorry for having done it."
"It is when people do wrong things wilfully that they are the more likely to do them again."
"It was foolish indeed - thus to run farther and farther from all who could help her, as if she had been seeking a fit spot for the goblin creature to eat her in at his leisure; but that is the way fear serves us: it always sides with the thing we are afraid of."
I was very interested to find out that George MacDonald was one of CS Lewis' inspirations for writing.  No wonder I like them both!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Longfellow has been one of my favorite poets since 6th grade when my class had to memorize the Midnight Ride of Paul Revere and then present it. Even though he was a Unitarian and had some odd beliefs, some of his poems bring happiness.  This poem is called The Children's Hour...


Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day's occupations,
That is known as the Children's Hour.

I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.

From my study I see in the lamplight,
Descending the broad hall stair,
Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,
And Edith with golden hair.

A whisper, and then a silence:
Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.

A sudden rush from the stairway,
A sudden raid from the hall!
By three doors left unguarded
They enter my castle wall!

They climb up into my turret
O'er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me;
They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses,
Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine!

Do you think, o blue-eyed banditti,
Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all!

I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away!

C.S. Lewis

It seemed appropriate to start with and excerpt from C.S.Lewis...this is the last paragraph from the book The Last Battle.
"And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them.  And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after.  But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before."

This one is from Mere Christianity...

"Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself." 

C.S. Lewis has always been one of my favorite writers.  His stories, like the Narnia series, are written for children, yet they have a deeper meaning that often times children would miss.  He has a unique way of appealing to children as well as adults through his writing.

Behind our Title

Words create.  God spoke the words, "Let there be light" and there was light.  He spoke the earth into being.  We believe that our words have power too.  The power to speak life or death.  This quote by Emily Dickenson is so true in this regard.
Our goal is to always speak life-giving words, and that is what you will find on our blog. 

Beginning

Ever since we were little girls, listening to our Dad read the Narnia series, we have always loved reading.  When we were a little older, we would read to each other, and now, we wish to bring you, our audience, into our love of reading. From Edgar Allan Poe to J.R.R. Tolkien, from poetry to prose, our goal is to make you as passionate about literature as we are. We seek to do more than to entertain; we seek to find our inspiration from the Creator.