One of the most fortunate incidents of my youth back in Jordan is being exposed to "Kitab Fi Jarida" (a book in a newspaper). Where you get a free book printed in a tabloid form. This great feast of culture is selected by a group of most known and respectable Arabic intellects. Kitab Fi Jarida helped me grow intellectually to a great extent as it offers a cheap and reliable source for Arabic culture.
Unfortunately I had to get disconnected from Kitab Fi Jarida when I moved abroad. This bitterness came to an end when I found out that they are now publishing their production online www.kitabfijarida.com. So now any Arabic reader would still get the chance to enjoy their cultural products. The website still has few pitfalls in terms of it didn't cover all their serier back to the beginning. And that it is hard to go over the books without first downloading them as a PDF. open the document, then see what the title of the book is. To overcome the second difficulty, I will be using this blog as a memoir for the number of issues that I particularly enjoy and hence recommend.
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Thursday, November 27, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
The Innocents Abroad
I am currently reading The Innocents Abroad, by Mark Twain. The book shows a great style of writing an a good sense of humor. As I read through the book, I will type the quotes of it that made me laugh!
-...They were like nearly all Frenchwomen I ever saw-homely. They had large hands, large feet, large mouths; they had pug noses as a general thing, and mustaches that not even good breeding could overlook...p120
- ... The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become, until he goes abroad. I speak now, of course, in the supposition that the gentle reader has not been abroad, and therefore is not a consummate ass. If the case be otherwise, I beg his pardon and extend to him the cordial hand of fellowship and call him brother.
- ... As far as I can see, Italy, for fifteen hundred years, has turned all her energies, all her energies, all her finances, and all her industry to the building up of a vast array of wonderful church edifices, and starving half her citizens to accomplish it...p202
- ... Look at the grand Duomo of Florence - a vast pile that has been sapping the purses of her citizens for five hundred years, and is not nearly finished yet. Like all other men, I fell down and worshiped it, but when the filthy beggars swarmed around me the contrast was too striking, too suggestive, and I said, "O, sons of classic Italy, is the spirit of enterprise, of self-reliance, of noble endeavor, utterly dead within ye? Curse your indolent worthlessness, why don't you rob your church?"...p203
- ... We never read of Pomprii but we think of that of that soldier; we can not write of Pompeii without the natural impulse to grant to him the mention he so well deserve. Let us remember that he was a soldier - not a policeman - and so, praise him. Being a soldier, he staid, - because the warrior instinct forbade hom to fly. Had he been a policeman he would have staid, also - because he would have been asleep. ... p265
-...They were like nearly all Frenchwomen I ever saw-homely. They had large hands, large feet, large mouths; they had pug noses as a general thing, and mustaches that not even good breeding could overlook...p120
- ... The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become, until he goes abroad. I speak now, of course, in the supposition that the gentle reader has not been abroad, and therefore is not a consummate ass. If the case be otherwise, I beg his pardon and extend to him the cordial hand of fellowship and call him brother.
- ... As far as I can see, Italy, for fifteen hundred years, has turned all her energies, all her energies, all her finances, and all her industry to the building up of a vast array of wonderful church edifices, and starving half her citizens to accomplish it...p202
- ... Look at the grand Duomo of Florence - a vast pile that has been sapping the purses of her citizens for five hundred years, and is not nearly finished yet. Like all other men, I fell down and worshiped it, but when the filthy beggars swarmed around me the contrast was too striking, too suggestive, and I said, "O, sons of classic Italy, is the spirit of enterprise, of self-reliance, of noble endeavor, utterly dead within ye? Curse your indolent worthlessness, why don't you rob your church?"...p203
- ... We never read of Pomprii but we think of that of that soldier; we can not write of Pompeii without the natural impulse to grant to him the mention he so well deserve. Let us remember that he was a soldier - not a policeman - and so, praise him. Being a soldier, he staid, - because the warrior instinct forbade hom to fly. Had he been a policeman he would have staid, also - because he would have been asleep. ... p265
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