Tristram Shandy

i want to write mostly about children's literature on this blog, because that's my favorite type of literature. but, this week i had to read tristram shandy for a graduate class, so it's on my mind. the novel is supposed to be about the life and opinions of the title character, tristram, but by the end of the novel, the reader actually knows very little about him.

the false allusion the title gives isn't what strikes me most about the text. what i notice is that while i am reading, i feel like i am reading someone's blog. the narrator rambles on about things that are important to him, the night he was conceived, the night he was born. he talks about his father, his uncle, and his uncle's friend. all things that seemingly shouldn't interest a paying audience, and yet the book has remained in print for hundreds of years. as i keep reading this book about random events, i also wonder why i read other people's blogs. somehow i think all of the randomness makes us feel connected. we read and post hoping to find others that feel the same way we do, but we're too busy to go and meet them, we just want to connect with them during some moment of someone's free time.

tristram shandy's an interesting read, mostly because it just tells a normal, random story with interjected moments of humor.