Monday Musician: Agnus Dei

Today’s Selection:

Agnus Dei (Part of the Pope Marcellus Mass) – Giovanni Palestrina

A beautiful piece from around the time of the Protestant Reformation, partially a response to the Reformers’ critiques of the way the Catholic Church treated music.  Not that you needed to know that; just a little nugget from my Music History class two years ago.  Anyway, enjoy!

SfC

A Year of Incredible Weather Events

Note:  I am not going to cover all the weather events everywhere that have shattered records and turned heads in the last 10 months, but I will briefly mention the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami in Japan, earthquakes in Turkey and New Zealand, historic flooding in Australia in January, and the record-breaking flooding currently taking place in Thailand.  These too deserve mentions as part of a very turbulent and extraordinary 10 months when it comes to the weather.

I will also warn that, as a resident of the Midwestern United States, I will most likely give extra coverage to the weather events that directly affected me, simply because I have personal experience with them.  I will attempt to be fair in my evaluations of non-local weather phenomena as well.

First of all, we began this year with:

Snowmageddon:  February 2011

Affected areas:  Northern, central & southern Midwest; East Coast

Very few of us in the Midwest can quickly forget the incredible snowstorm that slammed at least a third of the United States in early February.  I was attending a state-funded public university whose enrollment numbered in the tens of thousands, and the university was completely shut down for three days (to my knowledge, an unprecedented event).  Of course, some of our classes weren’t meeting even after that if the professors couldn’t escape from their own residences.  Friends of mine who attend the high school from which I graduated had two weeks out of school.  Chicago – not exactly a city unequipped for wintry weather – was completely shut down.  Overall, a stunning weather event that seemed likely to be the weather event of the year.  Sadly, we were all mistaken.

The Tornado Super-Outbreak: April 2011

Areas affected:  Midwestern and southern United States; Alabama hit especially hard

Tornadoes do happen; it wasn’t like this was the first time that tornadoes hit.  What was so remarkable about this event was watching the national weather and watching vast lines of tornado-producing storms tracking across multiple states, leaving behind them vast stretches of devastation that boggles the imagination.  The most destruction was felt in Tuscaloosa, Alabama; a major tornado descended in a major city doing damage on a scale that seemed like it was out of a weather disaster film, only this was no Hollywood production; this was real life.  Again, this was an event that seemed unrepeatable in its devastation; the Weather Channel just this last week released their data that indicates that this tornado outbreak was on par with the most destructive tornado outbreak in United States history.  No small deal…but hardly the last time we’d see devastation on such a scale.

Historic Flooding of the Mississippi River:  May 2011

Areas affected:  Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana

I think this weather event was less reported on, but it was still significant.  Heavy rains in Missouri, Arkansas, and further upstream of the Missouri River all converged to create a level of flooding of the Mississippi river that was on par with the historic flooding of the Mississippi during the Great Depression (and, ironically during another national economic downturn).  Many towns several feet above the Mississippi were inundated with water and many thousands of crops were annihilated by too much moisture.  Ironically, parts of the United States would soon be asking for even more.

Joplin Tornado:  May 2011

Areas affected:  Joplin, Missouri

I have always had a primal fear of tornadoes, to the point of being a recipient of some ridicule when I was much younger.  Yet even I had never imagined that something like this could happen…and I was within 100 miles of Joplin when this event took place.  One tornado striking one town killed more people than the Super-Outbreak a month earlier, destroying many thousands of homes and businesses and slicing a big gash through the heart of the town.  The only silver lining for Joplin has been a very positive out-flowing of generosity from their neighbors not only in Missouri but around the United States and the world.  Extreme Makeover recently built seven homes in seven days for seven different surviving families of the Joplin disaster.  Sadly, that is a drop in the bucket compared to all of the years worth of rebuilding that it will take for Joplin to fully recover…and the psychological wounds from that kind of event will likely never fade.

Historic Drought:  Summer 2011 (still ongoing)

Areas affected:  Southern United States, Texas hit especially hard

The northern Midwest started the year with record rainfall, yet starting in the summer, huge portions of the southern United States have had no rain.  Texas, which was already covered by significant drought in April, has felt the full force of an unending dry heat wave.  Meteorologists are saying that it will take many years for the state to recover (assuming consistent rainfall), and in the meantime many major cities of Texas are having to crack down on water consumption just to get by.  News agencies have caught wind of the fact that peanut butter prices are about to increase by as much as 30% due to the drought killing crops, but peanuts aren’t the only food affected; many millions of acres of farmland have failed to produce viable crops, meaning that food prices across the board are likely to increase…a very significant strain on many global citizens already struggling to put food on the table at night.  If people didn’t have reason to be frustrated with rising living costs and falling wages, they might now.
Hurricane Irene: August 2011

Areas affected:  Eastern and Northeastern United States

Irene was probably one of the only major weather events that received proper publicity.  For a time, it looked like Irene would be a major hurricane as it closed in upon New York City and images of shattering skyscrapers and The Day After Tomorrow filled our minds.  Thankfully, the disaster was not that bad…but that’s hardly a comfort to the people who lived through it.  Torrential rains brought upon mudslides and forced people well inland from their homes.  Others were left trapped in their own homes because the rains washed out roads and bridges, meaning that it took days for road crews to get aid to some people.  And if one round of torrential rain wasn’t enough…

Tropical Storm Lee:  September 2011

Areas affected:  Southern, Eastern and Northeastern United States

After dropping tons of rain in Louisiana (scarring some people into suspecting another Hurricane Katrina), moisture from the remnants of Lee raced to the northwest and dumped more rain on the region that had just suffered from a major blow from Irene.  The one-two punch of the two systems dumped more rain in parts of New England in a month than some places get in a year.  Again, I find it remarkable that the two systems weren’t stronger; if they had been, there’s no telling how much damage could have been caused.  But even then, New England can’t seem to catch a break.

Snowtober:  October 2011 (still ongoing)

Area affected:  Eastern and Northeastern United States

Well, I suppose the good news is that it feels like we’ve come full circle.

A freak storm that developed off of the defunct Tropical Storm Rina’s moisture combined with unseasonably low temperatures to create a snow storm that easily matches the one we in the Midwest had eight months ago.  It isn’t often that Halloween anywhere gets canceled from major snowstorms, but this is what happened.  Millions were left without power due to tree collapses (since many trees hadn’t shed their fall leaves) and more chaos and devastation carpeted the same region, which has now been hit by three major weather events in two months.

Very Short Thought

As I stated earlier, I almost wish that I could take the time to recount all of the weather events that have affected the rest of the world and not just the United States, but I fear that time would fail me.  Suffice it to say that this has been an incredible year for weather disasters.  Many people are already saying that it is global warming…and I must say that I can see why.  As I have articulated on this blog before, I find myself in the camp of Global Warming skeptics.  Not to say that I am dismissing all of these events altogether; I’m certain that one could make a compelling argument as to why these are evidences of global warming.

However, rather than starting a debate that I cannot finish at the end of my blog post, let me simply say this:  when I think of all the weather disasters the Northeastern United States has suffered from for two months, I find myself thinking of how Texas hasn’t seen almost any rain…and I wonder if perhaps the weather patterns have simply shifted the moisture away from certain places (like Texas) into others (the Northeastern U.S.).  Does that mean it’s not global warming?  No.  Theoretically, any number of strange and odd weather patterns could emerge if global warming was happening.

However, strange weather patterns alone are not proof of global warming.  These weather events, though bizarre and awe-inspiring for sure, can be explained by a simple misalignment of traditional weather patterns to bring greater amounts of weather-inducing factors to certain areas and shift them away from others.  And such a misalignment may be entirely natural to happen every hundred years or so, yet how would we know?

Well, whatever happens, I hope my readers are buckling down for a hard – and interesting – winter.

SfC

Monday Musician: Malinowski, Fantasy in F

Today’s Pick:

Stephen Malinowski – Fantasy in F

Suffice it to say, this is a very interesting piece of music with a more modern flavor to it.  It is written by the designer of the Music Animation Machine, which I have mentioned several times on my blog, I believe.  Anyway, I’m out of school for the summer and trying to get all of my stuff from college settled in to my home.  I’ll try to keep you all updated.  Later!

thefaithfulmind

Monday Musician: Rossini (Gottschalk), William Tell Overture (Gallop)

Today’s Pick:

G. Rossini, Gallop from the William Tell Overture.

Arranged by Louis Moreau Gottschalk.

A couple of months ago we looked at Louis Moreau Gottschalk in my US Music History class, and afterward I googled him on youtube and found this piano duet arranged by Gottschalk.  Of course, it didn’t surprise me that Gottschalk would do something like this; he was one of the first to hold musician performances for middle-class audiences in Europe, and he was the first to perform music other than what he personally had written.

What did surprise me was the technical skill required for this.  Maybe it’s just that I’m easily impressed, but I was blown away by this.  Enjoy!

Monday Musician: Bach, Concerto for 4 Harpsichords in D minor

Today’s Pick:

Johann Sebastian Bach – Concerto for 4 Harpsichords in D minor

thefaithfulmind

Monday Musician: Benedictinos, Gregorian Chant

Today’s Pick:

Benedictinos, a Gregorian Chant

thefaithfulmind

Weekly Schdeule, April 6-10: The Onsalught

Monday

-Music History – Movie Response Paper Due

-Writing About Literature – Reading

Tuesday

-Music Theory – Assignment

-Band Concert

-Writing About Literature – Reading & Response

Wednesday

-Music History – Quiz

Thursday

-Music Theory – Assignment

-Human Language – Exam (Delayed to 4/14)

-History – Paper Due

Friday

-Writing About Literature – Reading

For my history class, I just finished the book Carnival of Fury by William Ivy Hair, which is a historical novel about Robert Charles and the race riot of 1900 in New Orleans.  I must say, it was a fascinating, though somewhat shocking; I guess it is easy to forget how far we as a civilization have come in terms of civil rights and understanding have come in the last hundred years.  It is easy to look at all of the problems of modern civilization with disdain, but it is also valuable to remember that life in the United States has improved by leaps and bounds in the last century, especially for minorities.  Therefore, it should be our goal that people living in a hundred years are able to say the same thing about the 21st century.

I have also very nearly finished reading Tony Campolo’s Letters to a Young Evangelist.  Overall, I have it found it a very good assessment of the modern-day Evangelist movement, and it has been insightful to read his opinions and understandings of today’s complex issues.  He, too, is very vocal about his frustration about the apparent alliegiance of the vast majority of modern-day evangelists with the Republican party, which has led to a great deal of political agendas within the Evangelist movement.  He also points out that Fundamentalism (in the modern understanding) has begun to try to adopt the title of Evangelism to sound less politically and socially acceptable, and Campolo’s solution is for non-Fundamentalist Evangelicals to refer to themselves as “Red-letter Christians.”  Honestly, I find it far more simple to just say, “I’m a Christian,” and if someone asks for some kind of added specificity, I’ll reply, “I’m an independent Christian.”  Anyhow, that is not the only thing Campolo addresses: he also discusses the roots of modern-day Evangelism, the Praise & Worship movement, the importance of witnessing, the roots of “Rapture” theology, and many other issues.  If he ever reads this, I must offer a storng congratulations to Mr. Campolo; his book has been enlightening about many things, and he has encouraged me to think for myself on a wide range of issues.  Of course, I haven’t totally finished it, but that is where I am now.

In addition, I have very nearly finished reading the Bible from cover to cover.  After this, I will probably go back through the New Testament books again; in one of the Bible studies that I participate in, the teacher spent several weeks before Spring Break teaching us how to study the Bible for ourselves so that we can come to our own Bible-based conclusions on all issues that the Bible touches on, including Church doctrines.

Thursday, I finished reading Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison, which was a novel about Blacks living in America in the mid-20th century.  However, it doesn’t just address the white-black distinctions and prejudices of the time; it also touches on class differences within each race, the necessity for knowing one’s ancestory, and many different topics.  While it was definitely not a book I would normally read on my own, I did enjoy it and the insights that it provided into another range of thoughts.

Anyhow, I am now going to spend some time writing the paper for my music history class.  It is on the American musician Charles Ives, who is considered the first modern American musician.  WE watched a documentary on him before Spring Break, and so the paper is to be a sort of review of the documentary and on Ives in general.

Have a great day and God bless!

thefaithfulmind

My Journal Entry: February 18, 2009

For a couple of months now, I have been keeping a journal, where I try to write what thoughts have been going through my head lately.  Here’s what I wrote today:

“February 18, 2009:

Here’s what’s been going on in my heart lately:

In History class today, we talked again about the illegal and hateful removal of Native Americans from the Great Plains by American miners, soldiers, and the government (itself).

…

In Music History class today, we started covering how the Americans began blending European music traditions with African musical traditions.  What sickens me is, it was done to make fun of Blacks.

And, of course, I heard yesterday that over 50 million babies have died of abortions (since 1973).  Fifty million friends, families, loved ones, snuffed out.

And now, everyone is saying that we don’t have enough food to feed the world’s population, that we don’t have enough money (50 million people missing from the workforce) to support the elderly in our country, so influential, atheist ethicists are saying that elderly should voluntarilly euthanize themselves to remove the strain from the world’s economic system.

Isn’t religion accused of supporting and validating corrupt, unequal systems of government (and society) by atheists?  What about atheism?  Doesn’t anyone see what’s happening right now, in our enlightened society in this enlightened age?

Doesn’t America waste more than any other nation on Earth?  Don’t we spend more (money) on trash bags than some nations have to spend on such essentials as food and water?  And now, with this economic crisis, are we asking our grandparents, the old and wise and experienced among us, to sacrifice themselves so we can afford our bucket of chicken from KFC?!

When will this insanity end?  When will man stop hurting man?  When will Sin’s Cycle of Death be broken?  When will death be wrong again, instead of something people accept as something that others must experience so we can live as we please?”

I suppose I should add, it would cost $10 billion dollars to build wells for everyone on Earth to drink clean water.  Compare that with the $450 billion Americans spend on Christmas.

I know I’ll probably make some people mad, maybe even furious with this…but I can’t be sorry for speaking out against perceived wrongdoings, not when so much suffering is allowed to go unnoticed.

SfC

Monday Musician: Weber, Oberon Overture

Today’s Pick:

Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber, Overture to Oberon

Monday Musician: Mozart, Minuet in G Major, K. 1

Today’s Pick:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Minuet in G Major, K.1

A very simply but good composition from early on in Mozart’s career.  Enjoy!

Monday Musician: Beethoven, Sonatina in G Major

Today’s Pick:

Ludwig Van Beethoven, Sonatina in G Major

SfC

Monday Musician: Bach, Brandenburg Concerto No. 3

Today’s Pick:

Johann Sebastian Bach, Brandenburg Concerto No. 3

1. Allgero Moderato
2. Adagio
3. Allegro

I found this to be a wonderful and enjoyable piece, and I hope you enjoy it as well.  I hope to soon make a post about my return to college life, but I will work it in as I find the time.

SfC

Monday Musician: Bach, Jesus Christus Unser Heiland

Today’s Pick:

Johann Sebastian Bach – Jesus Christus Unser Heiland

Monday Musician: Bach, “Air” from Suite No. 3

Today’s Pick:

Johann Sebastian Bach, “Air” from Suite No. 3 in D Major

SfC

Monday Musician: Beethoven, Piano Sonata 17 in d minor, Op. 31, No. 2

Today’s Pick:

Ludwig van Beethoven, Piano Sonata 17 in d minor, Op. 31

1st Movement:  Largo-Allegro

2nd Movement:  Adagio

3rd Movement:  Allegretto

Some Thoughts: Why American Seems to Lack Great Thought and Art (Creativity & Consumerism)

These are some thoughts of mine that have been taking shape for several months now.  I have often looked with awe upon the great minds of our past:  Da Vinci, Jefferson, Washington, Luther, Luther King Jr., Leonardo, Aristotle, Socrates, Moses, Jesus, Chaucer, Milton, Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Einstein, Curie, and the brotherhood of great minds that they, along with so many others, have formed in the modern conscious, great men who, with their lives, changed the course of humanity in their respective fields,  changing the face of the globe as a result of their thoughts, words, literature, and convictions.  However, when I look at the United States and simply modern times in general, I see something very curious: there seems to be a diminished respect in the modern society for men and women that are striving toward the betterment of mankind, not to mention that there seems to be very few of this breed left.  I have often wondered why this is the case, and I want to explore this topic.

First of all, I believe that our civilization doesn’t really lack great minds.  I believe that, in truth, great minds have always been among us and always will be among us.  The key to recognizing them, however, is to be listening for them and looking for the signs of a Great Mind.  Let me also clarify that, when I’m talking about Great Minds, I’m not just talking about someone with a high Inteligence Quotient.  Sadly, I have found that some of the high-IQ people I have met in my life are also the least motivated and the least determined to do something with their gifts.  When I say a Great Mind, I’m placing a person in the company of the men and women who have changed the course of humanity by their contribution.  High IQ might have something to do with it, but I’m convinced and convicted that having a high IQ isn’t enough to qualify for this elite-of-the-elite group; one must also have a drive to change something wrong with this world (M. Luther King, Jr.) , to take humanity to the next level of exploration (Hubble), or to simply make the world a better place (Jesus).  In achieving this, I believe that IQ is secondary, and our society’s push on IQ tests totally misses the point of what the point of our existence is.  What am I saying?  I’m saying that the point of our existence does not begin and end on a test score, whether that be your IQ, ACT, SAT, or whatever.  If that was the point of our existence, Jesus would have taken an IQ test, scored perfect, and then gone to get baptized, but he didn’t, so it isn’t.

So, if our civilization really does have some great minds, why can’t we recognize them, or why do they seem to be so difficult to locate?  To be honest, I believe that not all of them are so obscure; there are plenty of effective and pioneering writers, mathmaticians, scientists, and historians in today’s world, not to mention artists, musicians, and every other occupation concievable.  The ones that are obscure are more difficult to find because ours is a large society of 300 million people, and sadly, when you have that many people, locating any single person with any outstanding characteristics becomes categorically difficult.  In a society that is so full of so many people producing so many works of art, music, and thought, I believe that the most brilliant works are obscured by the overwhelming flow of passable or even deficient counter-parts.

However, I believe that the central reason for our apparent lack of great minds and artists comes down to the society in which we live, which has become saturated with a new breed of hyper-individualism, hyper-consumerism, and hyper-capitalism.

This is based on this thought:  I believe, as a Christian, that God created the world (I do believe that God did it in a week as well, but that piece of information is hardly useful for this thought).  Thereby, when I look at the cosmos as a created order -when I look at the Earth and the numerous and complex life that exists here, and look up and see the stars without number that have been placed in the sky -I must draw the conclusion that our God is an infinitely creative and imaginative God.  Now, the Bible tells us that humanity was made in God’s image (Genesis 1:27), so it logically follows that our creativity and imagination are a gift from God, having been made in his image.

Of course, creativity is not impervious to corruption.  There are plenty of ways in the modern world in which creativity has been used not for the joy that comes with creating something, but it is instead done out of greed, pride, hatred, or malice.  However, it is also a personal conviction of mine that creativity is a gift to our personalities from God’s personality, that we are most like God when we are being creative out of pure reasons.  These reason could be simply for the joy of creating something, or out of service to Him and His Church.

So, this also brings forth a question that I believe can be answered a couple of different ways:  what is the opposite of creativity?  When I have asked some of my friends this question, most of them responded “destruction,” which is correct.  So, I ask, what is the mentality that accompanies consumerism, especially the hyper-consumerism that has prevaded and enslaved our society?  Consumerism is all about consuming, which is another form of destruction.  In essence, I’m saying that our society is so busy consuming things -food, clothes, vehicles, electronics, and media -that we have lost the innate desire to be building something rather than destroying something.

This hyper-consumerism is a double-edged sword against creativity in this society:  on one hand, it distracts people from recgonizing thruly great minds among them.  This has a lot to do with our standard of living, which is defined by the movies and television shows we watch, the commericals we see, and what everyone else in society seems to by consuming.  You see, we don’t want to fall behind in our work, so we work extra hard to get ahead; we don’t want to live below the standard of living, so we try to exceed it; we don’t want to appear deficient, so we all try to appear superior.  It reminds me of C.S. Lewis’ chapter on pride in Mere Christianity.  The end result of all of this is that we have all become brainwashed participants in a rat race to achieve a standard of living that goes beyond what we need to all of our numerous wants.  We are so busy trying to “live the life” that we miss the real point of living.  So, what is the real point of living?  My answer is based on my Christian faith, but I do believe that the answer is as near a universal answer as possible: relationships.  Most of us know that, that regardless of our faith, color, gender, or personal background, we desire relationships more than we desire money, cars, houses, and wealth.  However, we are so caught up in checking the clock, racing to meet our deadlines, and trying to live luxuriously in-between that we miss real life, and reserve it to the “someday” category of our life.  This last paragraph is a bit of a tangent, but my point is, if people aren’t even willing to slow down their busy lives to really live life, then how much more are they not slowing down to pay attention to the great minds among us when they do speak.

One perfect example of this is a story my old youth leader at my high school youth group has told of a very famous musician who performed one day at one of the Monorail terminals in Washington for a newspaper article.  The man was an exceptional musician, performing on a 300-year-old multi-million dollar violin, performing some of the most advanced and difficult music ever written for violin.  This guy was used to living a very upper-class life, and most tickets for a concert performance by him would start in $700-$900 range.  Yet, of the 1,000-some people who walked by this man during his hour-long performance, less than 1% actually stopped to listen to him.  The other >99% walked by, completely oblivious to what was unfolding in their midst.  One man who was later interviewed for the newspaper article was able to remember every single lottery number he played that morning (10 or more, I believe), but when asked, he could not even remember that there was a musician playing a violin at that terminal.  Unless I’m mistaken, only one person who stopped to listen to the musician and was later interviewed by the newspaper recognized what happened:  when asked, the man replied that there was a musician at the terminal whose performance was absolutely stellar, complimenting the musician’s form, style, precision, and the performance as a whole.  Sadly, I believe that the other 1,000 people who walked within feet of the musician and missed it are the chorus of today’s society:  “I don’t want any fancy art, music, or thought-provoking treatises; all I want is a multi-million dollar lifestyle, whereby I can live as I please.”

The other wound that consumerism deals out to creativity in our society is by distracting not only the public at large, but people who have real potential to be among that brotherhood of great minds.  I honestly believe that, with the advent of all of the technology available to us in these days, there is no limit to the societal flaws that could be corrected, the injustices that could be rectified, and the betterment that could occur in our society if people would only use the tools that have been provided to them for the sake of mankind at large.  However, it isn’t that we own our electronics; ours is a materialistic society as well, so our stuff owns us.  We try to live life by waking up early in the morning, rushing to work, rushing around to our various activities, and rushing home to sit in front of a television screen for a couple of hours before going back to sleep and starting the cycle over again.  I don’t think I’m the only person whose saying, “Surely there has to be something more than all of that.”

That is why I have chosen to pursue that brotherhood, to attempt to change the world for the better.  I might achieve something with my life and I might not, but I find more excitement and happiness in the pursuit of changing the world for the better than I can imagine finding in simply existing.

SfC

Monday Musician: Debussy, Clair do lune

Today’s Pick:

Claude Debussy, Clair de Lune

SfC

Monday Musician: What Child Is This?

Today’s Pick:

Josh Groban, performing the hymn “What Child is This?”

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and God bless!

The Banned Books Meme

Taken from Grumpy Teacher, who got it from Julie Carter, who got it from Scavella, who probably got it from someone else.

Look through this list of banned books.  If you have read the whole book, bold it.  If you have read a part of the book, italicize it.  If you own it but haven’t gotten around to reading it yet, *** it.

1. The Bible
2. Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
3. Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
4. The Koran
5. Arabian Nights
6. Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
7. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
8. Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
9. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
10. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
11. The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli
12. Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
13. Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
14. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
15. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
16. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
17. Dracula by Bram Stoker
18. Autobiography by Benjamin Franklin
19. Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
20. Essays by Michel de Montaigne
21. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
22. History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
23. Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
24. Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin
25. Ulysses by James Joyce
26. Decamaron by Giovanni Boccaccio
27. Animal Farm by George Orwell
28. Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
29. Candide by Voltaire
30. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
31. Analects by Confucius
    
32. Dubliners by James Joyce
33. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
34. Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
35. Red and the Black by Stendhal
36. Das Capital by Karl Marx
37. Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire
38. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
39. Lady Chatterley’s Lower by D.H. Lawrence
40. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
41. Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
42. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
43. The Jungle by Uton Sinclair
44. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
45. Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels
46. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
47. Diary by Samuel Pepys
48. The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
49. Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
50. Fahrenheit 451 by Rad Bradbury
51. Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
52. Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant
53. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
54. Praise of Folly by Desirderius Erasmus
55. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
56. Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X
57. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
58. Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
59. Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke
60. Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
61. Mill Flanders by Daniel Defoe
62. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksander Solzhenitsyn
63. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
64. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
65. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
66. Confessions by Jean Jacques Rousseau
67. Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais
68. Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes
69. The Talmud
70. Social Contract by Jean Jacques Rousseau
71. Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
72. Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence
73. American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
74. Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler
75. A Separate Peace by John Knowles
76. The bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
77. Red Pony by John Steinbeck
78. Popol Vuh
79. Affluent Society by John Kenneth Galbraith
80. Satyricon by Petronius
81. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
82. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
83. Black Boy by Richard Wright
84. Spirit of the Laws by Charles de Secondat Baron de Montesquieu
85. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
86. Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
87. Metaphysics by Aristotle
88. Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
89. Institutes of the Christian Religion by Jean Calvin
90. Stepphenwolf by Hermann Hesse
91. Power and the Glory by Graham Greene
92. Sanctuary by William Faulkner
93. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
94. Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin
95. Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
96. Sorrows of Young Wether by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
97. General Introduction to Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud
98. Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
99. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Alexander Brown
100. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
101. Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines
102. Emile Jean by Jacques Rousseau
103. Nana by Émile Zola
104. Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
105. Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
106. Gulag Archipelago by Aleksander Solzhenitsyn
107. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
108. A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
109. Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
110. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
111. Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
112. The Harry Potter seires by J.K. Rowling
113. The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
114. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle
115. The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Keatly Synd
     

Obviously, the purpose of this is less for me to show what I have read, and more to show what I have yet to read.  Many of these books are familiar to me, even if only vaguely.  Perhaps some of these will make their way onto my Reading Log over Christmas Break.

Anyhow, I just finished my History final and turned in my history paper with it.  Only two items left before the semester is over!

SfC

The Final Countdown! Commencing: 10…9…

I know that I already posted a music video today, and this doesn’t exactly fit in with the classical music that I have posted so far, but given the nature of this post, I thought it appropriate.  This is actually another song that I played in high school; we played it for our pep band games, so we played it quite frequently.

So, today is the first day of the last week of regular class, thus my excitement…and my extensive list of things that I have to study and work on for the next week especially.  Here’s how things look for me:

The Final Countdown:

10.  Music Theory – Assignment
- Due Tuesday Morning (tomorrow)

9.  English – Final Exam
-Wednesday

8.  Religious Studies – Final Exam
-Wednesday

7.  Music Theory – Assignment
-Thursday

6.  Music Theory – Music Project (bars lines of personally composed music, a parallel double period)
-Thursday (due at the same time as the assignment)

5.  English – Paper
-Due Friday

4.  History – Paper
-Due next Monday

3.  History – Final Exam
-Next Monday

2.   French Horn Jury
-Next Tuesday or Wednesday

1.  Music Theory – Final Exam
-Next Friday

That’s how my schedule looks for the next couple of weeks.

Despite the imminent concern of my papers and exams, I won’t be postponing work on my book.  In fact, I’ve recently found myself being able to write more and better through a very simple practice that I have often started but have rarely been able to keep up with for an extended time: journaling!  I don’t understand why I find myself unable to consistently write in a journal, seeing as how I have often noticed how journaling helps not only me but many other writers in their endeavors.  Anyhow, for about a week now, writing in my journal has become a part of my to-do list, which is part of the maturation process of my to-do list.  Originally, it’s purpose was to force me to cut down on wasting time.  By now, it has matured to the point that it helps me stay focused on studying and gives me the freedom to do some more recreational stuff throughout the day, like journaling, drawing, and doing some stuff for Kenushi Ryu.

Speaking of which, I have also made some progress on writing a language for my book.  It isn’t much, but I’ve simply started writing down consonant and vowel sounds from the English language and have been determining the symbols, which will compose the alphabet for my language, as well as determining what sorts of sounds each symbol will represent.  However, I’m hoping to use some innovations for this new language: for starters, I’ve decided on having basic consonant and vowel sounds like in the English language.  What I’ve thought of for the vowels, however, is that I will have two categories of vowels:  (4) basic vowels and (2) modifying vowels.  Each vowel (basic or modifying) has its own sound, but the modifying vowels, when placed directly in front of  a basic vowel, will produce a different sound.  In addition, a modifying vowel can modify itself and each other, so that, in the end, all 17 vowel sounds in the English language (that I’ve accounted for, anyway) are properly capable of translation into the new language, which I have called the language of Origin (tentatively; as I’ve said before, this is all in progress and subject to alterations).

Those are the ideas I’ve been toying with.  Thanks for reading!

Have a great day!

SfC