On her brother, Telemachus: “He is woven in green, with little tufted knots of white, like the olive in bloom where we used to play when I was six and he was eight years old.” My most favorite part was how the author began each chapter with Xanthe at the loom describing the colors she would use to represent a person, event or place that had meaning to her. I can say now that if it was as entertaining as Penelope’s Daughter I might have paid a lot more attention! It just took a few pages and I was caught up in Xanthe’s world with Corona’s entrancing style of writing and exquisite descriptions. Most of us know of Homer’s The Odyssey from required reading in school, but I have to admit that I don’t remember very much of the experience. Penelope’s Daughter, written by Laurel Corona, takes Homer’s The Odyssey and flips it on its head…focusing instead on what happened to his wife Penelope, daughter Xanthe and son Telemachus during his absence, as narrated to the readers by Xanthe while she weaves the story of her life on her loom. Lately, i have been enjoying the opportunity to serve as an enrichment lecturer on Silversea Cruises, and in my spare time, I am an avid tennis player, novice golfer, voracious reader, and a pretty good chef. I also freelanced in the 1990s, writing approximately 20 Young Adult titles for Lucent Books. I came to San Diego City College in 1990, first as a dean and then as a full-time professor of English and Humanities. Professionally, early in my career I was both an instructor and an administrator of academic support programs at San Diego State University and the University of California at San Diego. Graduate school at the University of Chicago (MA 1972) and again at Davis (Ph.D, 1982) followed. I couldn't believe I could get a degree by devouring novels and poetry in bed in my pajamas, and writing papers on ideas that burned in me as I read, but it turned out to be largely true.
As a result, by the time I graduated from The Bishop's School in 1967 and enrolled as an English major at the University of California at Davis, I had come to appreciate that good writing is extraordinarily difficult but well worth the effort. I was lucky enough to have parents who encouraged me from the beginning, and who showed their support by giving up much of what they must have wanted for themselves so my sister and I could get the best possible education. My first publications were in the Oakland Tribune in a weekly section for children called "Aunt Elsie's Page," and a newspaper I put out for my family which featured reviews of what I was reading and news about what was happening in the lives of my dolls. I have loved reading and writing ever since my older sister came home from first grade to teach me what she had learned that day.
0 kommentar(er)
