Time Machine - H.G Wells

A Time Traveller travels through time with a Time Machine to the future, to the year 802,701 AD, finds Englad in a state of dystopian-post apocalyptic situation. Instead of increasingly advanced technology, it has returned to barbaric times. He finds several little human groups who called the 'Eloi', and evil post-human monsters called Morlocks, live underground and eating eloi. The adventure of Time Traveller is thrilling, he runaway with Weena, the little people he saved from Morlocks. He must finding his Time Machine which stolen by Morlocks.

Here, Wells makes it clear to readers that this future is a direct evolution of the era in which the Time Traveller lives. I know this is just a theory and writer's imagination, I wonder what make little this human size decreasing? is it part of evolution ? Thus, in the far far future, it would be possible the human race is downsizing just like eloi. Another evolution happens to Morlock too. We see 802,701 AD from scientist point of view, he explain the wheater, the atmosphere and the vegetation of nature. 

For me, The Time Machine is best suited for cinematic portrayal than reading and visualizing. The depiction of apocalyptic world was blown my mind, but sometimes I didn't get into. While I am reading, I watched snippet from The Time Machine 1960 movies, to get visualize what it's look like. But, I admited, this masterpiece is beyond its time.

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬ (4/5)

​Title : The Time Machine

Author : H.G Wells

Publisher : Gramedia Pustaka Utama

Year :  15 April 2018 (First Published in 1895)

Pages :  160 pages

ISBN : 9786020382807

Pollyanna - Eleanor H. Porter

Pollyanna is a good children's classic. It says the story of Pollyanna Whittier, who was orphaned, and adopted by her aunt, Miss Polly Harrington. This, the first in the series, takes us through her life as a tweleve years old girl, leading her new life at Beldingsville, New England, Vermont. Her coming of age stories continue in second book, Pollyanna Grows Up.

Pollyanna's father, John Whittier is a poor priest in Western town. Her mother, Jenni Harrington died since Pollyanna was baby. Pollyanna and her father often playing 'The Glad Game'. The game teaches everyone that no matter how bad the life is, there is always something to be glad about. Soon she spreads the game to Beldingsville people. 

The story is quite interesting and enjoyable. I like the humor, Pollyanna is talkactive girl, and she has many friends but all of them are adult. Pollyanna's presence encouraging a positive outlook on life, fostering gratitude each day, and finding joy in everything, even during tough times. I think, Pollyanna has cheer up the reader too.

I love this kind of children classics, the stories will stay with us forever, when in difficult time, I remeber you, Pollyanna. Four stars for Pollyanna.

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬ (4/5)

​Title : Pollyanna

Author : Eleanor H. Porter

Publisher : Gramedia Pustaka Utama

Year :  2018 (First Published in 1913)

Pages :  260 pages

ISBN : 9786020395135

Passing - Nella Larsen

In 1920, America still implemented a system of racial segregation between blacks and whites. However, there are some descendants of mixed races or mulattoes who are considered to have passed, they can obtain the same social recognition and facilities as white community. Irene, with her light skin and black hair, was considered as passing, but because she married a black man (nigger), lived at Harlem street with her black community.

Clare Kendry, who looks exactly like a white person with blonde hair, married a white man, John Bellew. Clare lives in a white community, her husband is very racist and doesn't know the fact that Clare has black ancestry. Clare is Irene's childhood friend, lived together in a black neighborhood, in the 1920s, they accidentally met in a hotel restaurant, since then, Clare continued to meet Irene until they became close, but Irene felt a little uncomfortable with Clare's beauty and charm. He also really didn't like John Bellew with his offensive remarks about race.

Without knowing her husband, Clare's frequent visits to Harlem Street, indicate that she is unhappy with her current condition, she pretend as white for her husband, but it's tortured her. She longs to return  to the black community. Clare is the type of woman who will do anything to get what she want. But, for Irene, she don't want to get another problem with whites, especially with John Bellew. Irene's jelous thiking about Clare's charm is tortured her mentally, but she still maintaining her household, even though previously it was not good because of the political situation.

The idea of passing is really iteresting, this book is so thin yet so thick with meaning. Passing deals with issues that we are still dealing with today, no matter how far we think we have come, and no matter how far we'll go, we always longing the place where we used to belong. Without ignoring the political aspect, this novel is very good to read. 

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬ (4/5)

​Title : Passing

Author : Nella Larsen

Publisher : Penguin English Library

Year :  2020 (First Published in 1929)

Pages :  114 pages

ISBN : 9780241472712

Read-along Dorian Gray Chapter III - VIII ❤❤ Sybil Vane❤❤

Lord Henry asked his uncle about Dorian Gray family, He is the grandson of Lord Kelso, and his mother was the beautiful Lady Margaret Devereux. Margaret married a man Lord Kelso did not approve of, and her father arranged for the man to be killed in a duel. Dorian’s mother died within a year, and Dorian was raised by his grandfather. When Dorian comes of age at twenty-one, he will inherit enough money to enable him to live comfortably.

Dorian falls in love with an actress named Sybil Vane, She performs many of the great Shakespearean roles in a tawdry theatre in the back streets of London. He tells his lover, but Lord Henry suggest no to marry.

'...She is all the great heroines of the world in one. She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter, and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, Harry, how I worship her!’ (Dorian)

but, Lord Henry said this :

'My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over morals.’

With those words, is like a .. meh ..☺☺ me as the woman in modern life feels like my feminist soul is crawling. At sometime, I like Lord Henry idealism and the way he talk about philoshopy which is not in common, but  for me Lord Henry is red flag.

Read-along The Picture of Dorian Gray Chapter I - II

The Picture of Dorian Gray  is a masterpiece by Oscar Wilde about a narcissistic young man named Dorian and his self-portrait. He wanted his physical appearance not to age so he exchanged his 'soul' so he would stay young forever, but his portrait aged and became ugly to reflect the destruction of his soul.

First Lines:

The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden there came through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the pink-flowering thorn.

Chpter I - II  Introduced the character of Dorian Gray from two points of view, Basil Hallward and Lord Henry Wotton. In his studio, painter Basil Hallward is painting a portrait of a very handsome young man who he really admires, Dorian Gray. Lord Henry, his friend was very curious about the young man in the portrait, so he asked Basil to meet him. 

'Dorian Gray for the first time. When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation of terror came over me.' ( Basil Hallward, chapter I, pg. 14)

‘He is all my art to me now,’ (Basil Hallward, chapter I, pg. 19)

Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, with his finely-curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at once. All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth’s passionate purity. One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from the world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him.  (Lord Henry's mind, Chapter II, pg. 27)

Basil says he will not exhibit the painting because he has put too much of himself in it :

‘An artist should create beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We live in anage when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall never see my portrait of Dorian Gray.' 

( Basil, Chapter 21, pg. 21)

Lord Henry Wotton is the person who like to influence Dorian, because he is still young and easily to be manipulated. He influences Dorian to be hedonistic and loving his youth life which is not last forever, offcourse, naive Dorian fell for Lord Henry's bait.

'......If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that – for that – I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!’ (Dorian, Chapter II, Pg. 41)

My thoughts:

• I just read early chapter of this book, but It's so much philosophic words and I love it.  So many prose by  Wilde's flamboyant style to be highlighted as long as the sentences is inline with the story. It's like I talk to Oscar Wild, himself.
• The atsmosphere of  Basil's studio was like Victorian aesthetic, ooh  take me to there !! 
• About Basil Hallward feeling to Dorian is quite vague, whether just a feeling as an artist who love beautiful things or the forbidden same-sex feeling, but knowing  the author was a homo-sexual,  I think Wilde wanted to shock Victorian readers by openly writing about that feeling, So maybe this is the covert way to inform that the man like that is exist, because homo-secuality is a crime backthen in England.

Review David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

The story is centered on the principal protagonist, David Copperfield, and runs from his childhood to his adulthood and success as a writer which is principally narrated through his perspective. David's description of all the obstacles that have kept him from achieving peace, financial stability and finding true love is so detailed. It's considered to be Dicken's partial autobiographical novel.

David Copperfield enjoy his childhood with his mother and her faithful servant, Peggotty, until his mother marries again and proves powerless to protect him from the cruelty of his stepfather, Mr Murdstone. Mr Murdstone sends David to a boarding school in London where he makes friends with Steerforth and Traddles. When David’s mother and his brother die, His step father exploit him and sent to work at Mr Quinion’s business. David, who is only a child at seven years old must deal with slavery work till he runaway to Dover to find his only relative, aunt Betsy Trotwood, then he met Agnes Wickfield and Uriah Heep. The story is even more interesting, because the more David grown-up and, the more obstacle in life to deal with, the more mature he become.

This book is one of the popular works of Dickens and is widely read. And everyone is more or less aware of the storyline and the characters. The sinister sibling of Mr and Miss Murdstone (metallic woman) is not something to be easily forgotten. The first impression of Mr. Murdstone according to little David's view was quite charming but after the mariage, his true nature comes out, he becomes cruel and dictator. His evil and violent behavior traumatized Little David. 

Even beloved characters will never be forgotten, I love aunt Betsy Trotwood- the best aunties ever, Peggoty-who always understanding Davy,  the spoiled Dora Spenlow- the childlike lady (David's love interest) but very cheerful and enjoying her life, and the eccentric ones, Mr, Micawber-  always speaks sophisticatedly like Shakespeare and seems hard to understand, but luckily has a wife who loving him unconditionally. About Agnes Wickfield, for me, she is too perfect. For David,Those people means a lot. 

  

This is the first time I read Charles Dickens' novel in english edition, take a lot two months ! I admit this is the longest Dickens' novel I ever read. If we can't be the hero for somebody else, at last we can be the hero for our own.

"Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show." (Chapter 1, pg. 5)

Rating Ruang Buku Megga : ✬✬✬✬ (4/5)

​Title : David Copperfield

Author : Charles Dickens

Publisher : Wordsworth Classics

Year :  2000 (First Published in 1850)
Pages :  750 pages

ISBN : 9781853260247

Review dan Ulasan Novel Of Love and Other Demons - Gabriel García Márquez

Of Love and Other Demons adalah buku ke 6 atau yang paling terakhir yang diterbitkan, dari penulis pemenang penghargaan Nobel Prize, Gabriel García Márquez. Bertempat di Amerika Selatan pada era kolonial, secara langsung menyaksikan masa-masa kepercayaan metode pembasmian setan, orang-orang penderita kusta dan kejayaan orang-orang suci. Márquez terinspirasi dari legenda yang diceritakan oleh neneknya saat ia masih anak-anak. Menurut pendahuluan dalam buku ini, legenda tersebut berhubungan dengan pembongkaran makam Sierva Maria de Todos yang sudah menjadi tulang belulang namun rambutnya masih tetap tumbuh sepanjang  22 meter 11 cm. Gabriel García Márquez menyaksikan pembongkaran tersebut pada saat ia menjadi jurnalis di Cartagena de Indias pada tanggal 26 Oktober 1949. Sungguh pendahuluan yang menarik, seolah kisah dalam buku ini berdasarkan kisah nyata, namun setelah aku mencari-cari data dan berita mengenai kisah tersebut, tak ada satu pun fakta mengenai itu.

Of Love and Other Demons, berkisah pada Sierva Maria de Todos, 12 tahun, anak perempuan dari Marquis yang digigit anjing rabies. Kelahiranya dianggap sebagai pertanda buruk bagi keluarganya, Ibunya tidak ingin mengurus Sierva, maka ia dibesarkan oleh seorang budak negro Afrika. Rambutnya tidak pernah dipotong dan telah dijanjikan kepada Perawan Suci. Di bagian awal buku ini, Sierva digigit anjing rabies, namun tidak menunjukan gejala penyakit rabies. 

Namun banyak keanehan yang ditumbulkan dari kelakukan Sierva Maria membuat sang Uskup mengaggap penyakit Sierva Maria ini tidak lain adalah kerasukan iblis. Maka dari itu Ayah Sierva Maria berusaha mencari obat untuk mengobati anaknya tidak hanya pengobatan medis tapi juga pengobatan spiritual. Dibawalah, Sierva Maria ke Biara Santa Clara untuk menjalani metode pengobatan secara ortodoks, ia dikurung selama 93 hari.

"O  harta karun cantik, ditemukan untuk dukaku."  (Cayetano, hlm. 143)

Cayetano Delaura, seorang pendeta yang cerdas dalam segi keilmuan,  terlibat kisah dengan Sierva Maria pada saat masa 'pengurunganya'. Ia sering mengunjungi Sierva dan bercakap-cakap seperi orang normal biasa. Cayetano Delaura bergelut antara hasrat sekuler dan tugas Katoliknya sebagai pendeta, meski pada akhirnya, cinta romantis menguasai dirinya. Kelogisan dan pemikiran De Laura yang modern membuat ia dirundung kebimbangan apakah ritual penyembuhan Sierva Maria merupakan cara yang benar ataukah salah, di satu sisi ia harus menunjukan ketaatanya terhadap biara.

Dengan buku ini, Márquez menyampaikan secara simbolis, bahwa cinta yang universal adalah cinta yang bisa menyingkirkan ego, kebencian dan hirarki manusia. Empat bintang untuk  Of Love and Other Demons. Walaupun double terjemahan karena versi bahasa Indonesia ini diterjemahkan dari terjemahan bahasa Inggris (bahasa original-nya bahasa Spanyol) tapi buku ini sama sekali tidak kehilangan esensinya. 

Rating Ruang Buku Megga ✭✭✭✭ (4/5)

Judul : Of Love and Other Demons

Penulis:  Gabriel García Márquez

Alih Bahasa: Eka Kurniawan dan Edith Grossman (dari bahasa Spanyol)

Penerbit: Gramedia Pustaka Utama

Tahun Terbit: 2023 (Pertama kali, 1994) 

Tebal: 170  halaman

ISBN : 978-602-06-7235-9

Review Novel Klasik North and South - Elizabeth Gaskell

North and South is a Victorian realism novel written by Elizabeth Gaskell. It is quite dark and satire, but spiced up by romance. The story begins in South, the protagonist Margaret Hale has lived happily in beautiful southern village, Helstone. She was the daughter of a Clergyperson, but suddenly her father leaves the Church of England because his unexplained doubts and cricis conscience, so he decided to become a tutor in a nothern town, Milton. 

Milton is an industrial town that is mostly in cotton manufacturing. The Milton atmosphere dominates the main story, most of the smokiness and pollution. It's opposite from southern Helstone which is clearer, greener and fresher. There is a wealthy and influential manufacturer, John Thornton, master of Marlborough Mills, whose destiny is intertwined with Margaret. John Thornton is one of Mr. Hale's student. Margaret and Thornton are at odds with each other. He saw the beauty of Margaret, but was annoyed with her initial prejudice.

‘A more proud, disagreeable girl I never saw. Even her great beauty is blotted out of one’s memory by her scornful ways.’  (John Thornton, Pg. 99)

https://www.morganodriscoll.com/art/laurence-stephen-lowry-industrial-town/57184

Margaret finds the town of Milton is strange, the new condition that she must deal with. She is upset by its poverty and dirty environment. The poor people of the south are not as terrible as in the north. Margaret befriends the daughter of the worker, Bessy Higgins. When Bessy worked at a cotton mill, she was too polluted by the 'fluff'. The workers must face dangerous working condition at the cotton mill.

‘Fluff,’ repeated Bessy. ‘Little bits, as fly off fro’ the cotton, when they’re carding it, and fill the air till it looks all fine white dust. They say it winds round the lungs, and tightens them up. Anyhow, there’s many a one as works in a carding-room, that falls into a waste, coughing and spitting blood, because they’re just poisoned by the fluff.’ ( Page 118)

Margaret tried to please herself by talking with Bessy, Since then, Margaret became concerned about poverty and the health of manufacturing workers, and then, she had the opportunity to hear about the strike (the workers refuse to work) from the perspective of a working family. Because her father was a good friend of John Thornton, Margaret became close to the Thornton family. She met Mrs. Thornton, John's mother and his sister, Fanny. Gaskell shows two sides and two points of view between the workers and the masters. We see the way the workers view their masters, and what the workers thought about the master.

....Th’ women are as bad as th’ men, in their savageness, this time. Food is high,—and they mun have food for their childer, I reckon. Suppose Thorntons sent ’em their dinner out,— th’ same money, spent on potatoes and meal, would keep many a crying babby quiet, and hush up its mother’s heart for a bit!’ (Bessy, pg. 177) 

‘Yes; the fools will have a strike. Let them. It suits us well enough. But we gave them a chance. They think trade is flourishing as it was last year. We see the storm on the horizon and draw in our sails. But because we don’t explain our reasons, they won’t believe we’re acting reasonably. We must give them line and letter for the way we choose to spend or save our money...."

'Do you give your servants reasons for your expenditure, or your economy in the use of your own money? We, the owners of capital, have a right to choose what we will do with it.' (John Thornton, pg. 137)

Technological advances that drove the industrial revolution made entrepreneurs gain multiple profits, with very fast and large production. The workers in the north were no longer slaves, they worked with machines. But workers are humans, not machines. If there's something that they disagree with the master, they must riot and rebel because it's the only way the master would hear. If they united, they have the power to shut down industrial. So, this could be a weapon against the master when they want a higher wage.  

The North and South is not only about northern versus southern, but also about master versus workers. If it was a competition, who would be the winner? If there's any win-win solution to both of the welfare? The balance of industry lies in the workers and masters. A mill cannot run without a master, and a master can not operate a mill alone. Master and workers are like a symbiosis mutualism. They must work together to achieve the balance. But, the thing is, how the master treats them. Do they treat as a slave or just mere machines?

‘Mr. Thornton,’ said Margaret, shaking all over with her passion, ‘go down this instant, if you are not a coward. Go down and face them like a man. Save these poor strangers, whom you have decoyed here. Speak to your workmen as if they were human beings. Speak to them kindly. Don’t let the soldiers come in and cut down poor-creatures who are driven mad. I see one there who is. If you have any courage or noble quality in you, go out and speak to them, man to man.’ (Margaret, pg. 209)

I think Margaret's existence in Milton could be a mediator between master and workers. She is strong-minded, incredibly cares for working-class people, but she is very bold when she speaks about humanity and poverty to upper-class people. The story about poverty caught the reader's sympathy. What I like about John Thornton is, he is a family man. I admire his hard work from zero to become a successful businessman. He is a figure who puts his mother first, quite like mama's boy but he is a kind of man who doesn't talk much but acts. There's a character that I do not quite like. She is Mrs. Hannah Thornton, because she was underestimated Margaret, she considers Margaret a peny-less woman and do not equal to her son. 

This is my first experience reading Elizabeth Gaskell novels. So long I've been curious about her writing. I really enjoyed my reading process. Obviously, it's not disappointing, I love it so much, it's really expanding my 19th Victorian reading which I like the most. Sure, I will read many of her masterpieces novels in the future.

Fun fact: Elizabeth Gaskell wanted the novel to be titled after the heroine, Margaret Hale, but Charles Dickens, the editor of this series, insisted on North and South.

Rating Ruang Buku Megga : ✬✬✬✬✬ (5/5)

​Title : North and South

Author : Elizabeth Gaskell

Publisher : Penguin Popular Classics

Year :  1994
Pages :  521 pages

ISBN : 9780140620191

Review dan Ulasan Novel Klasik Tess d'urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Tess of d'Urbervilles is a romance classics novel, naturaly portray the peasant life of fictional town called Wessex. The protagonist, a young Teresa Durbeyfield is innocent and pure, because what her family believe that they are decesdent of d'Urbervilles, the old house who came from Normandy with William The Conqueror as appears by Battle Abbey Roll. Tess live with her drunkard father, mother and her little brother and sister.

She had errand to seeking for financial support and fortune, she began a journey towards d'Urbervilles  mansion to klaim kin. Little does she know, at d'Urbervilles mansion, her apparence captivated in Alec d'Urbervilles' eyes, a men who turns up her world up-side down. Tess gets a job as his mother poultry keeper.  Tess's life at Tantridge was quite pleasant, her income may help to support  family. But, an incident came, she impregnated by Alec, the incident is not by her will and she does not love Alec, Tess is swore that she never ever see him again. Tess return home and give birth Alec's child, the poor child named Sorrow only given a short life. 

Thomas Hardy Challenge

THOMAS HARDY

• 
  Thomas Hardy, Lahir di Stinsford, Dorset, Inggris pada 2 Juni 1840, sampai meninggalnya tanggal 11 Januari 1928 karena sakit pleuritis.
• Novelis dan penyair di era Victoria. 
• Tema Novelnya Victorian realism, Novelnya sangat kritis, terutama terhadap menurunnya status masyarakat di pedesaan di Inggris di era Victoria.
• Seorang Naturalis, Sebagian besar karyanya, berlatar di daerah semi-imajiner bernama Wessex, diwarnai deskripsi puitis dan fatalisme.
• Melahirkan 18 judul novel, 11 judul puisi dan 1 naskah drama
• Novel-novel nya sering masuk nominasi Nobel Prize hingga 25 nominasi, namun tidak pernah menang.

Hardy's Cottage 

Hardy's Cottage adalah tempat terpencil yang indah Hardy tepat di luar Higher Bockhapmton, dibangun oleh kakek buyut Hardy pada tahun 1800 dan hanya sedikit yang diubah secara eksternal sejak saat itu. Ini adalah tempat yang populer bagi wisatawan untuk mengunjungi dan melihat di mana Hardy menulis Under the Greenwood Tree dan Far from the Madding Crowd.

https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryMagazine/DestinationsUK/HistoricSitesinDorset/

Dafar Novel Thomas Hardy :

Novels of  Character and Environment (Karakter dan Lingkungan)

• The Poor Man and the Lady (1867, tidak diterbitkan dan hilang)
• Under the Greenwood Tree (1872)
• Far from the Madding Crowd (1874)
• The Return of the Native (1878)
• The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886)
• The Woodlanders (1887)
• Wessex Tales (1888, kumpulan cerita pendek)
• Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891)
• Life's Little Ironies (1894, kumpulan cerita pendek)
• Jude the Obscure (1895)

Romances and Fantasies (Fantasi dan Romansa)

• A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873)
• The Trumpet-Major (1880)
• Two on a Tower (1882)
• A Group of Noble Dames (1891, kumpulan cerita pendek)
• The Well-Beloved (1897) (pertama diterbitkan secara berseri sejak 1892)

Novels of Ingenuity (Akal budi)

• Desperate Remedies (1871)
• The Hand of Ethelberta (1876)
• A Laodicean (1881)