You know generally that Classics are good. Why would
classics be good? (picture me
swatting your head with a rolled up Classic Comicbook and saying) Because they
withstood the test of time, that is their definition (and another swat).
And if you have an electronic reading device they are good
for another reason: Classic books are
mostly free. I just finished reading
MYSTERIOUS ISLAND by Jules Verne.
I thought it was a very good read. The book starts out in Richmond, Virginia,
during the Civil War. Richmond was under
siege by the Yankees.
One night five men that were not really involved in the war,
one was a captured Yankee officer, who was an engineer; his man servant; a war correspondent; a student studying
biology; and a sailor, not the military
kind, but the merchant marine kind; and
the engineer's dog Top were fooling around with a hot air balloon that was
inflated, with hot air and somehow they got loose and the balloon was caught in
a hurricane and carried them out of the
country to the south seas and tossed them on a uncharted Island, which was
probably about two or three times bigger than Manhattan.
They had nothing but the clothes on their backs to
survive. With the engineer's knowledge they
were very resourceful and innovative in
making their island very comfortable.
Think of Robinson Crusoe and all he did.
The five men were a teem with no conflicts within
them.. Which I think would be highly
unusual.
I thought it was interesting that the makeup of the men was
much like the makeup of the captured men in the book, also by Jules Verne,
20,000 THOUSANDS LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA...
In each book you had a very highly intelligent educated person, his man
servant, and a sea man.
Speaking of 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA, the MYSTERIOUS ISLAND book is intertwined with its story and Captain Nemo also.
In the beginning I had trouble keeping up with all the
people I had no problem with Top the
Dog, but the others, wore several hats with names... such as the engineer was a
Captain in the Army; sometimes his rank was used, sometimes his occupation
of engineer was used, and sometimes his name was used. Each person had the same, which made about 20
names/nicknames and occupations to keep up with.
The man servant was black.
And you can tell by the writings the Jules Verne reserved all the manual
labor for him, like cleaning and cooking and lifting heavy things, and one time
when they slept in a cave he slept outside, he said he preferred it. It
was racism without saying so. Although,
to give credit, when they voted on something or had a discussion about
something, the servant's vote and opinion was valued as much as every one else..
They spent three years on the island. They all agreed they would be very happy to
spend the rest of their lives there. No
women in their lives? I think there
were no women in 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA either
These novels by the same person with no women reminds me of Tubby in the
LITTLE LULU comics. Tubby belonged to a club that had painted crudely on
their club house: NO GIRLS ALLOWED!
Speaking of LITTLE LULU, that was a classic.
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