{"id":1854,"date":"2008-09-02T17:44:00","date_gmt":"2008-09-02T17:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/?p=1854"},"modified":"2018-11-20T05:29:43","modified_gmt":"2018-11-20T05:29:43","slug":"big-read-tale-of-two-cities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/?p=1854","title":{"rendered":"The Big Read: A Tale of Two Cities"},"content":{"rendered":"


<\/a>I have to give some respect to the French Revolution.<\/p>\n

It was one of those portions of history that scared the crap out of me as a child. Along with the Dark Ages (seriously. The life of a serf? So<\/i> not good.), the Plague, slavery \/ the “Reconstruction,” and the Holocaust, the French Revolution just seemed like one long, horrific nightmare from which the French, commoners and aristocrats alike, would have dearly loved to awaken.<\/p>\n

Of course, I obsess over things that scare me. I read history books and drew pictures of madam guillotine<\/i> (Why is it Madame? Or the maiden<\/i>?) Why is it female? I mean, is it just the whole emasculating thing?). I inhaled<\/i> books about the French Revolution. I struggled through The Scarlet Pimpernel<\/i> when I was eleven. (I told my parents it was nonfiction [they didn’t look too closely]) — and I read A Tale of Two Cities<\/i> — in the 8th grade without having it assigned.<\/p>\n

Yes. It was a sickness. And, as with all panicky little obsessions, eventually my French Revolution mania faded, to be replaced by something else — a 10th grade obsession with evil Mary, who was trying to kill Good Queen Bess, if I recall correctly.<\/p>\n

Some of us took our history classes way<\/i> seriously.<\/p>\n

It’s time to read A Tale of Two Cities<\/i> again. Tomorrow, the madness begins anew. A knock at the door! Stitches dropped while heads roll! Mad Frenchmen and blood in the streets!<\/p>\n

Are you reading?<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Ah, Brockman<\/a>, Ah, Powells. Snarking on Midnight Sun<\/i> and Scholastic. Good times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have to give some respect to the French Revolution. It was one of those portions of history that scared the crap out of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[18],"class_list":["post-1854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-happenings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1854"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1854\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5112,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1854\/revisions\/5112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writingya.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}