A trip to London

Tomorrow, I am going to London with my mom, my first time ever. I am really looking forward to getting away from my studies for a few days to properly relax and experience a city that I have always wanted to see. 

Originally, we purchased our plane tickets and planned the trip as we got tickets to a Nick Cave concert at Eventim Apollo. I am a huge fan of Cave, his work (both music and literary), and when the tickets for the concert in Denmark immediately sold out, I was crushed. But then I stumbled upon an extra concert that was going to be held here at Eventim Apollo, and that few tickets were left...and I got two!

I really, really love his music. It speaks to me in a special way. He is simply a master of words, and I cannot wait to see him perform and go crazy on stage.

Also, we have purchased tickets to the Lion King musical which I have longed to see all my life, as Lion King has always been my favourite Disney film. I have heard so many great things about the musical, so I'm really looking forward to finally getting to experience it!

Additionally, we are going to go shopping (of course, right?). And me, especially, for books. As I have never been to London before, I wanted to ask you guys if you have any recommendations for shops, places, or something else that I should experience whilst being there - please let me know in the comments down below if you should have any such recommendations. I would really appreciate it! 

As I did not yet finish Valente's "The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led The Revels There", I am bringing this one to entertain me on the plane. I have chosen not to bring any more books, as I am sure I will buy quite a few. 

See you all when I get home! I will make a London haul-post when I get back, showing off everything I bought :-)

Dewey's Read-a-Thon: A Continuous Update

So the day has finally come, and in less than two hours, people from all over the world will spend the next 24hours in the name of reading.

I, myself, will start off my readathon in a few minutes, as I simply cannot wait any longer (and I will be passing time just to be able to start at 2pm anyway, so I'd rather just begin!).

My roommate (who will participate without updating his progress on social media) and I have now made snacks (pølsehorn) and I went grocery shopping to pick up some snacks, sparkling water, a bit of liquorice, and fruit. Now I will prepare my first pot of tea, a nice herbal blend, to start off my first reading hours. 

The first book I will delve into is "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho which I started on thursday. I have about a 100 pages left, so that should be read fairly quickly.

I hope you will all enjoy this day, and get lots of reading done. I will update this blogpost continuously throughout the whole Read-a-Thon, and lastly I will do a final pagecount to see what I managed to read.

Ready, set, go!

________________________________________________________________________
Pages read: 713

14:39
The official Read-a-Thon started around 40 minutes ago, but as I mentioned above, I began my reading a bit earlier. And now I have finished my first book of the day, namely "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho, which was a tale that took me away on a magical journey. A perfect way to start off the Read-a-Thon, I must say! I gave this book 5/5 stars on Goodreads (to see my account, press here) - I just simply loved it.

"It's true that everything has its destiny, but one day that destiny will be realized. So each thing has to transform itself into something better, and to acquire a new destiny, until, someday, the Soul of the World becomes one thing only" ("The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho, pp, 143)

Now, I will take a small break to figure out what to read next whilst catching a glimpse of how the Read-a-thon is taking form for other readers.

17:45
After the small break from reading, where I got a chance to catch up on different blogs where other readers update on their readings, I picked up Saga Vol. 3 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples. I really love this series, and the third volume was really amazing as well. I love the artwork and the fantastical world in which the story is set, but I didn't enjoy the third one quite as much as I did the two first volumes. This one was still really good and I enjoyed it a lot, but I ended up giving it 4/5 stars on Goodreads instead of the 5/5 that the others achieved.

After this one fast-paste read, I picked up "The Goldfinch" by Donna Tartt which I am currently around 450 pages through. I am really enjoying this novel even though I am not quite sure where the story is taking me. But the language is so captivating and even though it is a fairly slow-read book and quite long, I cannot wait to see how it turns out.

Now, I will take another break and prepare some dinner for me and my roommates, but I will return to reading shortly after :-) I hope you are all enjoying the Read-a-Thon as much as I am!

22:13
Even though it is not that late yet, my eyes are now heavy and I keep reading the same words over and over again. The last few hours I spend reading a bit further in "The Goldfinch", then I took a break watching a few episodes of Friends, and then I started my other easy-read book, "The Realm of the Gods" by Tamora Pierce.
Even though I hate to admit it, I think I have to give up reading more tonight. Instead I will go to bed quite soon and get a good nights sleep, wake up early in the morning and continue reading.

I have really enjoyed this day, just being able to read and read and read :-) I hope you're all reading a great book and that you have better luck in staying awake!

5:37
It is now the early morning hours of sunday and my alarm clock just sounded as a signal for me to start reading again. It is time for the last few hours of the Read-a-thon, which is a sad thought. I love how social media has exploded with bookish updates the last 16 hours. The invisble bond between booklovers show its face, and it is simply beautiful.
I've slept since around 11pm, where my eyes simply couldn't stay open yet another minute (the yearly Boatrace at Uni taking place on friday might have something to do with that). But now I'm up and ready to continue. But firstly, I will brew a pot of tea and then delve into "The Realm of the Gods" once more. I think an easy-read in these morning hours are the perfect choice.

Did you all manage to stay awake or did you let sleep overtake you?


10:40
I just finished my third book of the Read-A-Thon ("The Realm of the Gods") - a lovely reread; a fantasy novel with just the right amount of action alongside the sweetest love story. This series have always spoken to me deeply, and everytime I read them, I get the same warm feeling inside; a feeling of home, dreams, and childhood.
I will now take a quick shower to freshen up a bit while considering which story to finish of the Read-A-Thon with.

13:39
There is only 20 minutes left of the Read-A-Thon, and I will stop my reading for now. Lastly, I picked up "The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland And Led The Revels There" by Catherynne M. Valente, which I have been looking forward to read for quite a while now.

It has been such enjoyable 24 hours with literary adventures. The books I chose to read really suited my mood throughout the event, and I am pretty happy with my final pagecount. I have loved following all you booklovers and your progress - it is simply lovely to be able to share a day like this. Thank you all for being a part of these amazing 24 hours! I will evaluate on my experience later after a nap.

Readathon, Spring 2015

Through various bookish blogs I became aware of Dewey's Readathon that is held 2 times every year, - the next one taking place on Saturday on the 25th of April - and I simply cannot wait! I have not yet been able to participate, so this time will be my first. I'm so happy that I can finally be a part of it as I have no plans whatsoever on Saturday and I'm really looking forward to delve into some great books and spend the 24 hours (more or less) reading, following other participants, etc.

Short explanation of the concept of Dewey's Readathon:

It is basically 24 hours where people from all over the world commit to reading and enjoying bookish quizzes, mini games, etc. whilst following each other on different social media, fx Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You can read more about the event on the official webpage here.

I have planned to join in on all the reading fun this time, but I know myself well enough to know that I won't be able to read for 24 hours straight. So my goal is just to have fun and read what I can manage without pressuring myself too much. Basically, I just want to take the day out of my otherwise busy week and just spend it with literary enjoyment - in whatever way it might turn out.


The books I have chosen to read are the following:

•  I am currently reading "The Goldfinch" by Donna Tartt, and I'm about halfway through, so this one will be the main book for me during this readathon. I don't think I will be able to finish it, but if I could just get a bit further into it, I would be very content.
• I still have a few graphic novels I have not read yet, and I will use these when I start getting tired of reading the bigger books, as a fast paste read and as a diversion. The graphic novels I have chosen are the third volume of "Saga" by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples along with the first volume of "Death Note" by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.
• Also I have chosen an extra easy-read book, namely "The Realm of the Gods" by Tamora Pierce, which is the fourth book in the series about the girl Daine. I love this series and I read them over and over when I was younger.

I know I probably won't get to finish as much as I hope, but this will be the pile of books that I plan to delve into (it might change later on if I really don't feel like reading any of these in the moment).

On thursday, I will start preparing different delicious snacks and food that can be reheated on the day, so that I don't have to worry about preparing all kinds of things. I just wanna be free to read as much as I possibly can, without having too many obligations.
Also, I will try to update a blogpost on here throughout the day to evaluate and tell you all how far I've come :-)


Are you joining the Readathon? If you are, what are you planning to read? Do you prepare specific things beforehand? And lastly, do you have any tips for a "beginner" in the event? I hope to follow a lot of other book lovers on this day, so if you are planning on using social media in relation to the Readathon, please let me know where to follow you and your progress!

The phenomenon of music #1

Music can be a lot of different things depending on who is listening. Though it has a technical foundation which can be analysed and hereby understood with music theory it is not the essential part of the phenomenon. In my eyes, it is solely what the music (or the sounds that together frame a piece) do to the individual; what emotions are evoked and how one understands it - what it means to the individual.

‘music can appear to be about something, but its ‘aboutness’ can vary from context to context, within a context, and from individual to individual’ (Cross 2003, 108) 

It is not necessary to analyse and spend a lot of time thinking about what exactly a piece does that affects you, but instead it relies on the human instincts and our basic, given understandings of the sounds of the world. We know without looking further into a musical piece what emotion the piece is trying to convey; is it happy, sad, dreamy, etc. Our innate knowledge let's us understand that a slow song, often in minor, is somehow expressing a feeling of melancholy, whereas an upbeat song in major would suggest happiness. Rhythm of course also have a huge role in our understanding. 

In my bachelor project, I researched on how music as a phenomenon is both biologically and culturally conditioned in terms of our understanding, interpretation and its status in the world as we know it. Music is a huge part of our everyday life as it is playing almost everywhere we turn; in the supermarket, on the radio, etc. We have endless possibilities to bring our own music with us and play it however and wherever we want, and other times we are "forced" to listen as it is used in commercials as mood enhancers, manipulating us in different ways. This all comes from the many sounds that make up music. A bird tweeting suggests freedom, happiness, and of course a location (in this case, being outside), whereas a scream immediately suggests that something dangerous is going on. High pitched noises often connote danger or something panicky, whereas lower notes are associated with something scary - or if they are conveyed in a slow, expressive manner, it expresses a feeling of intensity and melancholy. 

Our understanding of sounds are a great part of the human evolution and by unconsciously employing our knowledge hereof, we are able to create musical pieces that expresses exactly what we want it to mean to us. Music is thus a language of its own, with its own syntax and semantics that together form a meaning. The beauty hereof is, that even an instrumental piece can convey strong emotions without anything other than sound directing your thoughts and understanding. This is also why the concept of music and the feelings toward it is such an individual thing. We all have our knowledge of the world, a special background, and memories connected to different periods of times that may remind us of a certain sound. Thus even a simple pop song with the most basic text, a love song for example, can mean the world to someone as it triggers some already stored feelings.

'...music is not only sonic, embodied, and interactive; it is bound to its contexts of occurrence in ways that enable it to derive meaning from, and interactively to confer meaning on, the experiential contexts in which it occurs, these meanings being variable and transposable’  (Cross 2003, 108)

This is the first part of a series of posts on the phenomenon of music. The theories of evolutionary psychology and bio-cultural reading will be recurrent in these posts as I find this perspective extremely interesting. I will also make an explanatory post soon on these theories that might help the reader understand the foundation for my thoughts. 

Works cited

Cross, Ian. 2003. ‘Music as a Biocultural Phenomenon’. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 999: 1, 106-111. University of Cambridge.