Book Summaries: Around the World in 120 Days, Week Three, Day Two

Introduction: Book Summaries: Around the World in 120 Days, Week Three, Day Two

This is the third week, day two of the book summaries for Around the World in 120 Days for The Invisible Mentor’s Virtual Literary World Tour. Yesterday, we stopped our Tour in Laos for The Coroner’s Lunch. Today we are back in the United Kingdom – England, Scotland and Northern Ireland – to look at Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, Lord of the Flies by William Golding, Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake and The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe.

On Day Two of Week Three of Around the World in 120 Days for the Virtual Literary World Tour, to me, it feels that all the books are quite heavy and sometimes depressing, although, Great Expectations ended in a hopeful manner. Charles Dickens is known for using his writing as social commentary to highlight what was going on in London at the time. Let me know your thoughts.

Global Reading List: Around the World in 120 Days, Week Three, Day Two

1. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
2. Lord of the Flies, William Golding
3. Songs of Innocence and Experience, William Blake
4. The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe

 Great Expectations (Penguin Classics) Lord of the Flies Songs of Innocence and Experience The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus: includes new illustrations and updated biography

Global Reading List: Book Summaries: Around the World in 120 Days, Week Three, Day Two

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

I read Great Expectations by Charles Dickens over a period of three weeks because life and work simply got in the way. I was impatient at times because it was taking so long to read the book because the book is over 400 pages. Dickens' books tend to be longer because he wrote in serial form so that he could be paid more. It's interesting that it took me three weeks to read volume one, which is 151 pages and one day to read the other two volumes because I wanted to know how the story ended.

Great Expectations is an excellent book filled with mysteries that Charles Dickens bring together masterfully in the end. After the book ended, I was feeling anxious and wondered where the anxiety was coming from, and I realized, that for me, it was from the book, and that's because I like to root for the underdog, and I like it when things work out for them. But in life, things do not always work out the way we want them to.

The story is told from the perspective of Pip Pirrip who had no great expectations in life. In Great Expectations, as the story unfolds, the reader sees Pip struggling for achievement and respectability. He wants to escape the commonness of his life. When he is older, Mr Jaggers, a lawyer tells Pip that someone has sponsored him to become a gentleman, but he doesn't disclose who the sponsor is, and he tells the youth that if he tries to find out, the agreement becomes null and void.

Pip incorrectly assumes that his benefactor is Miss Havisham. Jaggers offers to pay Joe for losing the use of Pip, but he refuses. Joe loves Pip and always has. The youth gets money to makeover himself before he leaves for London – his life changes, and he changes, and not always for the good. Much to his dismay, when Pip is about 23, he learns that his benefactor isn't Miss Havisham but someone he wished he would never see again.

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Lord of the Flies by William Golding is one of the books I read that I found very upsetting. An aircraft crashes on a deserted island, and the only survivors are boys. They are on the island with no supervision, and they try to mimic the behaviours of adults. Ralph is voted as the leader with Jack as second in command. Shortly after there is a power struggle between Ralph and Jack and we have a divided camp. Jack is transformed and participates in ritual sacrifice. Boys who were once civil turn into bullies and kill others for sport.

In life, we need a certain amount of rules so things run smoothly. People need to have roles and responsibilities that they take seriously. In Lord of the Flies by William Golding, when the power struggle starts and most no longer take their roles and responsibilities seriously, anarchy reigns and the community disintegrates. When the ship arrives, the boys revert back to being civilized. Lord of the Flies by William Golding ends with Ralph weeping for Simon and Piggy, who were killed, and the loss of innocence.

Songs of Innocence and Experience by William Blake

William Blake is known as the “mad” poet. Songs of Innocence and of Experience by William Blake is a book of poetry, and it is said that the late, Steve Jobs had a collection of the author’s poetry. Poetry is not a form of literature that I have appreciated in the past, so I am taking the time to learn to understand and appreciate it. William Blake based his poems on what he saw happening in late 18^th century London.

“Blake lived through a time of riot and revolution, experiencing events such as Gordon Riots of 1780 and the effects of the American Revolution. Blake composed Songs of Innocence through the 1780s: their publication date 1789… was the crucial year of the fall of the Bastille…by the time Songs of Experience were added in 1794, the ideals of the French Revolution had soured and a fearful Britain was at war with France. Together, Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience not only evoke eternal experiences of joy and disillusionment…but also reflect a rapidly changing wider world.”

What does innocence mean? What about experience, what does it mean? If you gain experience, do you lose your innocence? How does innocence and experience relate to each other? Songs of Innocence and of Experience by William Blake is in two sections, first you have Songs of Innocence and then Songs of Experience. I noticed that the poems moved from being lighthearted to being darker and more sinister. In both sections you have a religious undertone.

The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe

The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe is based on the English translation of Historia con D. Johañ Fuastens, the first of the Faust Books. Marlowe added a few sections of his own and omitted others. The play is one Act with 17 Scenes.

The play starts off with a chorus singing the story of Faustus, then it moves into the first scene with Faust in his study. Faust performs a soliloquy – he wants to live and die in Aristotle’s work – Sweet Analytics. He wants to be a seer, a prophet, be noticed and glorified.

The good angel and evil angel enter Faust’s study. The good angel reprimands him for what he is reading and tells him that he should be reading the Bible, while the evil angel tells him to go forward. Faustus wants to practice magic and communicate with the dead. Valdes and Cornelius, his friends, also enter. Valdes agrees to instruct Faustus in the rudiments of the art.

Fautus sells his soul to Lucifer, Belzebub for 24 years of fame and fortune. Faustus gains fame and notoriety and is known as practicing black art. Finally, 24 years have elapsed and Faustus is growing weak. He wills his possessions to his servant Wag. He tells his friends what he has done to get fame and fortune and they ask him why he didn’t tell them before so they might pray for him. Lucifer, Belzebub and Mephistophiles have come to collect and Faustus dies.

Interview With Jill Johnson

Avil Beckford: What five books would you recommend to others to read?

Jill Johnson:

1. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
2. The Endurance by Caroline Alexander and Frank Hurley
3. Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand
4. The Lexus & The Olive Tree by Thomas Friedman
5. No Ordinary Time: Franklin & Eleanor Roosevelt by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Others I really liked too:

1. Galileo’s Daughter by Dave Sobel
2. Pict The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement by David Brooks

Avil Beckford: If you were trying to convince people to visit the US or Minnesota, what would you say to them?

Jill Johnson: Of the four greatest rivers in the world – the Yangtze, Amazon, Nile and Mississippi – the Mississippi River is the only one where the source is readily accessible to the public.  In Itasca State Park, you can actually step across the beginning of the mighty Mississippi. The towering Norway pines in this park were seedlings at the birth of the nation of the United States in 1776. Minnesota also borders the largest freshwater lake in the world – Lake Superior.  The Minneapolis area is a great cultural center and home to the Mall of America, the second largest shopping center in America.

About Jill Johnson: Jill Johnson is president and founder of Johnson Consulting Services, a leading management consulting firm based in Minneapolis that specializes in strategy development. An award-winning consultant since 1982, Jill has personally impacted nearly $3 billion worth of decisions for clients in 21 states, as well as in Europe and Asia.

Global Book List for Week Three: Around the World in 120 Days

1. Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: A Celebration of the First Edition (The Chronicles of Narnia), CS Lewis
2. Black Beauty (Signet Classics), Anna Sewell
3. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, 25th Anniversary Edition, Douglas Adams
4. Frankenstein , Mary Shelley
5. The Coroner's Lunch, Colin Cotterill
6. Great Expectations , Charles Dickens
7. Lord of the Flies, Centenary Edition, William Golding
8. Songs of Innocence and Experience, William Blake
9. The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe
10. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot
11. The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition, Caroline Alexander and Frank Hurley
12. Seabiscuit: An American Legend , Laura Hillenbrand
13. The Lexus and the Olive Tree: Understanding Globalization, Thomas Friedman
14. No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II, Doris Kearns Goodwin
15. Galileo's Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love, Dava Sobel
16. The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, David Brooks
17. The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream (Vintage), Barack Obama
18. How Women Lead: The 8 Essential Strategies Successful Women Know, Sharon Hadary
19. My American Journey, Colin Powell
20. Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell
21. The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel, Garth Stein
22. The Bluest Eye (Vintage International), Toni Morrison