World Book Day?

What? No Hallmark Card?

In honor of this austere day (I’m sorry – isn’t every day BOOK day?!?) The Independent asked 100 Literary Lumineries (most of which I’ve never heard of) to name their favorite literary characters. [link from bookslut]

So, I’ll play:

Robert Jordan
For Whom The Bell Tolls
Ernest Hemingway

I’m actually not a big Hemingway fan – but I love this book. First off, best.love.scene.ever starts Chapter 13 (that’s right, run out RIGHT NOW to read it!) – it’s beyond moving and beautiful and there’s a romantic desperateness that can only be born from living in a cave during the Spanish American War. Oh, Robert Jordan, you had me at rabbit.

Speaking of which…

Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom
Rabbit, Run; Rabbit Redux; Rabbit is Rich; and Rabbit at Rest
John Updike

I spent a summer alternating between loving and hating this guy – not a hard feat at all. But in the end, I was so sad to leave him. I mean, really sad. I missed the fucker like all get out. He’s a bastard to be sure, but you can’t help but feel for the guy as he wanders through the decades.

Melanie Wilkes
Gone With the Wind
Margaret Mitchell

I was eleven when I read Gone With the Wind and it’s stayed with me forever – I am and forever will be a hopeless romantic, so there’s not much more to say except the emotion I felt when I read Melanie had died will stay with me forever. I was sprawled across my parent’s bed one afternoon after school. I remember my friend called to invite me out for a bike ride and I couldn’t understand how she could want to “play” when the sweetest, most understanding, most gentle, most moral human being ever to live was DYING. Dying I say, all because babies were the miracles that make life worth living. Sniff, sniff. Damn that Margaret Mitchell! Oh yeah and I loved Rhett too.

Louisa
“Carried Away,” Selected Stories
Alice Munro

Okay, so it helps that she’s a librarian and a pathetic one at that, but the way this story winds together is breathtaking. And Louisa, the way she falls for the boy that writes to her from the war, while pathetic, also fits that romantic sensibility I was talking about earlier. And the scene with her and Arthur in the library during the storm, well, it just stabs at your heart like only Alice’s pen can.

That’s all I got right now. I’m sure I could come up with more if I tried. This little exercise was harder than I thought – I realize now that while I attach an emotional response to books I love (or hate, for that matter), I don’t necessarily form an emotional attachment to character – in fact sometimes it’s hard to really remember characters at all. Hmmm. Very interesting. I do remenber all the characters I’ve writen though. They are tattoed on my soul. Maybe because they’re all really me.

Okay. Enough maudlin sentimentality. Don’t forget to wish Wendy a happy birthday today. What a coincidence: The Bookish Girl‘s birthday is World Book Day! Hossana!

And can I just say, that Alison is one popular girl! She linked to me on her blog yesterday and I got twice as many hits! All from her blog. Wow. I guess there was good reason to stalk her…. 😉

Oh and one last thing – thanks for all your feel betters yesterday – they worked. And thanks for all the compliments on my color choices for Short Rows. I’m sorry if I didn’t email you back – something’s weird with MT and I didn’t get the emails. Appreciate it though. 🙂

Thursday is class day, so it’s off to work. They were nice to me this week though – everybody wrote short.