i finally finished The Marble Faun by Nathaniel Hawthorne weekend before last.  It was a good, good day.  i have been reading on this one for a good four months at least.  Yes, i enjoyed it, but sheesh, Mr. Hawthorne wass definitely and thoroughly opinionated about Rome, the Catholic faith, and art, among other things.  He postulated on his opinions in looooonnng passages.  And, all the characters spoke with the same "voice" - they were all his voice, so i imagine.

There were a few passages i rather enjoyed (i suppose because i related to them).  Here's one of them:  "It is the iron rule in our day to require an object and a purpose in life.  It makes us all parts of a complicated scheme of progress, which can only result in our arrival at a colder and drearier region than we were born in.  It insists upon everybody's adding somewhat--a mite, perhaps, but earned by incessant effort--to an accumulated pile of usefulness (especially liked this phrasing), of which the only use will be, to burden our posterity with even heavier thoughts and more inordinate labor than our own." Indeed.

And i especially love that my copy was originally a gift to Grace from Stovey in 1911.  It has that particularly musty bookish smell that makes my eyes roll back into my head with pleasure. *sigh*

So naturally, i had to take a break and read something really, really trashy this last weekend about a werewolf who falls in love with a half-vampire.  But, of course.  i mean, really.  So, maybe i'll top it off with another trashy choice before i get back into Possession, which i recently began.  hmmm...