Saturday, March 24, 2012
The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
For my IRP for the third marking period, I read the novel The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul by Douglas Adams.The main conflict in the book is how detective Dirk Gently is trying to figure out why certain mysterious things are happening and stopping them from happening. I found this book to be a bit challenging to read with its complex English, but it was overall a great book. First, I like how there are elements of humor scattered in perfect places throughout the novel. One of my favorite quotes would have to be "It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on earth has ever produced the expression 'As pretty as an airport.'" (page 1). In addition, the mystery part of the book is interesting. It is not a typical mystery where the the answer makes absolute sense in reality, but it is one that would not make any sense at all in our world today. However, there are parts of the book that do make sense in the real world, which I enjoy. In example, after a boy broke Dirk's nose, Dirk had been talking in a stuffy dialogue for a while. Despite all of that, I dislike how detailed the book is at some points. It sometimes is a little hard to withstand some of the extremely detailed parts, but I got through them. I would recommend this book.
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4 comments:
The book sounds interesting. I don't understand what you mean when you say that "It is not a typical mystery where the answer makes absolute sense in reality, but it would not make sense at all in our world today." Is it because it is a fantasy, or it just doesn't make sense? I also want to know how you even found this book, because I've never heard of it, and I probably never would have heard of it unless you hadn't mentioned it in your blog entry. I'm curious to know what time period this took place in. Other than that, I might try this book, but it doesn't seem to be my style of literature.
Varun, what I mean by that is that instead of the mystery being the cause of someone with a certain purpose, it is of supernatural beings that cause the mysterious happenings. Also, I knew about this book because the author, Douglas Adams, wrote "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy," too, which my dad told me to read.
Do you know how the title came to be? Based on your description, the title "The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul" seems to have nothing to do with the plot. Does it have any hidden meaning, or does it mean absolutely nothing: falling under the category of "not making sense in our world today"? Do I have to read the book in order to get the answer?
Louie, what would fall under the category of "not making sense in our world today" would be something such as "Who turned on the light?" "The ghost of George Washington." It does not fit into reality. Also, with the title, one part of the conflict has to do with mortality, so I think that that is where the title came from.
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