And thank you, my dear! ♥ It's for both, actually. There are four parts: Reading and Use of English, Writing, Listening and Speaking. And, well, of course my writing is correct when I'm on the Internet and I can use mozilla's spell-check add-on... :D Getting it right on the exam is going to be a bit more tricky, though I'm mostly worried about my awful pronunciation if anything.
Mostly, the teacher wanted us to chose a book/movie pair because the Writing part requires us to choose between writing a proposal, a report, a letter and a review. The last option is supposedly easier and by choosing something that is both a movie and a book we're covered on both front. :D
Agreed that Interview with the Vampire is a bit weird (it's certainly not The Great Gatsby or Pride and Prejudice, which were some of the approved examples) but I have at least both watched the movie and read the book. While I can't stand The Great Gatsby's purple prose (though I loved the last two movie adaptations) and Austen bores me a bit (I always go: but wasn't that the period of the Napoleonic Wars, why wouldn't you give me some juicy naval battles too?). As for the Godfather I only watched the movie version and besides, isn't that plot a bit difficult to summarize too? Mmm, I don't know, I think I'd better rule out thrillers and the kind...
Back to Interview with the Vampire, I noticed that it generally had good reviews on the Net so I thought it was a suitable enough choice. Plus, I was fresh out of ideas and I remembered it well enough, that was mostly it... :D And, well, of course movie is OTT: much like with True Blood, if it weren't for the campiness of it I'd be way more freaked out by all the murdering and blood-sucking going on. I'm a pretty sensible soul after all... :D To me, what I found most interesting about Interview with the Vampire is that, as most gothic fantasies, it lends itself to metaphorical interpretation, how the vampirism itself is in a sense a plot device, a way of presenting characters who cannot die or age or be harmed, so that the philosophical questions of life itself can be explored. Or, like Anne Rice said in an interview, the whole theme of Interview with the Vampire is Louis's quest for meaning in a godless world. (And I can totally relate to that.)
But yes, generally I prefer The Vampire Lestat too - and The Queen of the Damned which introduces all those new fascinating characters and all their complicated relationships! Actually, I think that one of the most fascinating thing of the Vampire Chronicles is that, as this interesting ao9 article says, "taken as a series, the books have a lot to say about vampirism as an inherently feudal, imperialist state. [...] It sets up a system of recognized bloodlines and reciprocal obligations straight from the Middle Ages, and vampires survive on the literal blood of the lower classes. (Let's never forget the time Marius made human Bianca into a vampire so she could do his grocery shopping for him.) Rice's vampires all undergo moral qualms at regular intervals—even Lestat isn't immune to the occasional bout of devastating guilt. But they're often more interesting in their obliviousness, as adventuring, murderous royalty whose lives are endless and whose purpose almost luxuriously useless."
But, yes, maybe a bit too dark for an English exam... :D Pplus let's not forget pansexual vampires and all the overwhelming subtext. Actually, the exam being in mid-June, I still have plenty of time to practice writing reviews, I think I might do that help-me-choose post after all. *nods*
no subject
And thank you, my dear! ♥
It's for both, actually. There are four parts: Reading and Use of English, Writing, Listening and Speaking.
And, well, of course my writing is correct when I'm on the Internet and I can use mozilla's spell-check add-on... :D Getting it right on the exam is going to be a bit more tricky, though I'm mostly worried about my awful pronunciation if anything.
Mostly, the teacher wanted us to chose a book/movie pair because the Writing part requires us to choose between writing a proposal, a report, a letter and a review. The last option is supposedly easier and by choosing something that is both a movie and a book we're covered on both front. :D
Agreed that Interview with the Vampire is a bit weird (it's certainly not The Great Gatsby or Pride and Prejudice, which were some of the approved examples) but I have at least both watched the movie and read the book. While I can't stand The Great Gatsby's purple prose (though I loved the last two movie adaptations) and Austen bores me a bit (I always go: but wasn't that the period of the Napoleonic Wars, why wouldn't you give me some juicy naval battles too?). As for the Godfather I only watched the movie version and besides, isn't that plot a bit difficult to summarize too? Mmm, I don't know, I think I'd better rule out thrillers and the kind...
Back to Interview with the Vampire, I noticed that it generally had good reviews on the Net so I thought it was a suitable enough choice. Plus, I was fresh out of ideas and I remembered it well enough, that was mostly it... :D
And, well, of course movie is OTT: much like with True Blood, if it weren't for the campiness of it I'd be way more freaked out by all the murdering and blood-sucking going on. I'm a pretty sensible soul after all... :D
To me, what I found most interesting about Interview with the Vampire is that, as most gothic fantasies, it lends itself to metaphorical interpretation, how the vampirism itself is in a sense a plot device, a way of presenting characters who cannot die or age or be harmed, so that the philosophical questions of life itself can be explored.
Or, like Anne Rice said in an interview, the whole theme of Interview with the Vampire is Louis's quest for meaning in a godless world. (And I can totally relate to that.)
But yes, generally I prefer The Vampire Lestat too - and The Queen of the Damned which introduces all those new fascinating characters and all their complicated relationships! Actually, I think that one of the most fascinating thing of the Vampire Chronicles is that, as this interesting ao9 article says, "taken as a series, the books have a lot to say about vampirism as an inherently feudal, imperialist state. [...] It sets up a system of recognized bloodlines and reciprocal obligations straight from the Middle Ages, and vampires survive on the literal blood of the lower classes. (Let's never forget the time Marius made human Bianca into a vampire so she could do his grocery shopping for him.)
Rice's vampires all undergo moral qualms at regular intervals—even Lestat isn't immune to the occasional bout of devastating guilt. But they're often more interesting in their obliviousness, as adventuring, murderous royalty whose lives are endless and whose purpose almost luxuriously useless."
But, yes, maybe a bit too dark for an English exam... :D Pplus let's not forget pansexual vampires and all the overwhelming subtext.
Actually, the exam being in mid-June, I still have plenty of time to practice writing reviews, I think I might do that help-me-choose post after all. *nods*