Civil War Re-enactment Confederates at Perryville circa 1992
There is a group participation website called Sunday Scribblings that throws out a word or phrase that you respond to by writing an essay then adding your link. It is a great site and I throw in my two cents every now and then. As of late I have not been moved to submit anything.
Oh, if only they would throw out "rain" and I could write about the drenching I took at 430am when the thunder and lightening awoke me and I thought, "My car windows" and sure enough, they were partially open.
Or "road trip", I could write a book on that one.
"Fragrance" would be another good one. The air is perfumed with the magnolia tree next door. Memphis is so thick with Japanese Honeysuckle that the air should be tinted yellow.
What would really release me, unlease the beast of an essay I have boiling up inside of me would be "The Civil War". I know, I know....it is kind of unexpected and crazy but not if I explain.
I put my name on a waiting list at the library for the bestseller, "Rhett Butler's People". After about a two month wait I finally got my hands on it and read it in about two days (it was about 600 pages, don't you know). I think I began reading it thinking I was not going to like it because I was automatically going to compare it with "Gone with the Wind"....or the movie version because I read GWTW about 100 years ago. Anyway, I like it despite the fact he got several things wrong. Scarlett's waist was 17 inches, not 16 and he spelt Cynthiana incorrectly every time he mentioned it. Then, in the final chapters he called it Cynthiana Tennessee instead of Kentucky! I was outraged and could not find a website to contact him and alert him to his heinous mistakes!
When I returned the book I picked up "Jacob's Ladder".
Then I read "The Judas Field".
After that I picked up "The Killer Angels".
I'm now half way through "The Year of Jubilo".
I am becoming something of a Civil War buff. And I am astonished at how much I did not realize, how ignorant I actually am concerning the history of the war between the states. Did you know that over 600,000 soldiers lost their lives. That is not counting civilians. The 600,000+ deaths are more than The Mexican-American War, WWI, WWII , the Korean War and Viet Nam added together.
This piece is a WIP......I'm not quite sure where I am heading with this. Earlier this year I signed up to participate in a reading program that encouraged you to go outside your normal genres and comfort levels. I thought that history would be a good for me and it seemsI have immersed myself into the years of 1861 - 1865.
Like I said, a WIP.
4 comments:
I was so "into" the Civil War in my younger days, I wrote my high school term paper about it. (Everyone else chose authors or literary topics. I chose American History.)
I have always loved history, and the history of the Civil War is fascinating. I will have to get my hands on some of those books.
Lisa :-]
I'm throwing it out there: THE CIVIL WAR.
Go on, essay-e-voux! I love history, but usually I love it the most when I don't have to read it. Just listen to it.
Let me add ... I've recently gone off on a new reading challenge of my own. Every book I read must not have a detective, a homocide or a mystery. I'm loving what I'm finding. ;)
You listed a few books I haven't read. I wrote them down to look into. I also put the link for Sunday Scribbling in my fav. to check it out once in awhile and see if something comes up to inspire me to write and participate. It's amusing in itself that you put Sunday Scribbling in your entry. I titled my latest entry Mad Scribbling....(Hugs) Indigo
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