Mission Impossible: Twenty Minutes, Main Branch Library, Two Books

June had started, and I was on a time-critical mission.  I had 20 minutes to compare Russian classics, pick the easiest one to read, find it and Twelfth Night on the shelves, check out, and start the walk back to church in time for mass.  Easy-peasy lemon squeezy, right?

I entered the library and walked to the elevator, where I was reminded by the map that adult fiction was at the front of the library, in the display rooms.  As I backtracked, I sidetracked to the computer card catalog, since I had found other classics in the reference section before.  Confirmed, 822-something and 891-something.  There were no pencils and papers, but it was okay.  I could remember that.

I mashed both elevators' buttons and rode the first arrival to the third floor.  Only 15 minutes left.

12 in 2012: Reading Classics from around the World

"I should read that some day," I often think when I hear an allusion to a particular book.  But "some day" is vague and never happens, so in 2012 I decided to read more good literature.  What is "more"?  What is "good"?  And what is "literature"?

In 2012, I will read at least 12 classics that I have never read before, focusing mostly on non-American and non-British literature.  The classics can be fiction, non-fiction, novels, plays, short stories, poetry, essays, etc.  With the help of family, friends, and librarians, my goal evolved into reading at least one book from each (permanently inhabited) continent.  My tentative list of classics includes (bolded are ones I've read so far in 2012):

1. The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu (Japan/Asia) -- Tyler or Seidensticker translation
2. Night by Elie Wiesel (Romania/Eastern Europe) -- Marion Wiesel translation
3. Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, or Dubliners by James Joyce (Ireland/Western Europe)
4. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (Nigeria/Africa)
5. One Hundred Years of Solitude (or something else) by Gabriel García Márquez (Colombia/South America) -- ? translation
6. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (Afghanistan/the Middle East)*
7. Tao Te Ching by Laozi (China/Asia) -- Chichung Huang translation
8. The Analects of Confucius by his followers (China/Asia) -- Ames and Rosemont translation
9. The Art of War by Sun-tzu (China/Asia) -- J. H. Huang translation
10. Twelfth Night or King Lear by William Shakespeare (England/Western Europe) -- I would eventually like to read the Bard's complete opus, so I figure reading one this year is a good start
11. something Australian, preferably available at Dekalb County (GA) public libraries
12. something Russian (Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, or Nabokov)
13. oops, guess I still need something from North America, too -- maybe Canadian? (but nothing too cold!)