Books Magazine
I am still thinking of Donna Tartt. The Goldfinch. And all the ways her writing effects me. (I use Grammarly's plagiarism checker because the theft of someone's ideas is just as wrong as the theft of a famous painting around which she based her latest book.)One of the things that I love about Donna Tartt's writing is how she always opens doors to me. She has given me a whole new point of view on what it is to be a student in the classic languages of Latin and Greek. She has shown me the abyss of drug and alcohol abuse. She portrays Christmases which are less than merry and bright. She makes it more than okay to be an avid reader of classic literature such as The Idiot, to whom Prince Myshkin is referenced in the last part of her latest book. And in reading The Goldfinch she has not only brought to life a previously obscure to me painting, but music which I searched on the spot. And immediately downloaded.You, probably, have already heard of these composers. You, probably, already have them in queue on you iPod. But as for me, I had not heard of either Giovanni Pierlugi da Palestrina, who was an Italian Renaissance composer of sacred music, or Arvo Part, an Estonian composer who based his minimalist style on Gregorian chant.Both of these composers write music which is one of Tartt's gifts to me this Christmas. For it is by her writing of these men that I am now aware of their glorious music.
