impudent – adj - Of, pertaining to, or characterized by impertinence or effrontery.
I was thinking about my misspent youth over the weekend, and I recalled that impudence was a charge often laid against us when we were young, e.g., "Of all the impudent tricks, this one takes the cake!"
Aside to Jeff: Dumas wrote two sequels to The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After and The Man in the Iron Mask. Have you read either of them, and, if you have, what did you think? I got TTM for Christmas in 1960, and I almost literally couldn't put it down; I remember reading it in the car, in my room (under the covers with a flashlight), and even soaking in the bathtub. As soon as I finished, I was off to the library for TYA, but I just couldn't get into it. All I remember is that one of the musketeers (Aramis?) had taken Holy Orders and become a monk or priest. I was just a kid at the time, so maybe I'd like it better now. How say you?
Still another tangent: I've just realized that one reason I never excel at anything is that I have too many interests and am constantly bouncing from one to the other. For example, right now I'm moving back and forth among church history, medieval culture, Alexander Dumas (pere, not fils), finishing Shakespeare's plays, poems, and sonnets, and English literature in general (which includes American literature, so maybe I should say English language literature). And that's aside from raising two children and earning a living. What's an aspiring polymath to do?
2 comments:
both works are actually fairly fascinating reads. TYA has a bit of a tragic (in a Shakespearean [sp?]) sense, but not a bad read. Doesn't really move like TTM does though. Iron Mask is quite suspenseful, however. I recommend it over TYA which is just to wrap up the lose ends of "whatever happened to those heros?" Iron Mask is full of intrigue, more so than was TTM which was more of an adventure. I recommend it. TYA, take it or leave it, I only recommend it for completeness - even if I think it is a good read.
Thanks for the comments; I'll add both novels to my list. I'm now into TTM, and it's even better than I remembered - some of Dumas's wit probably went over my 11-year-old head first time through. Fraser was right about the pace; the story moves along "like a drunk falling down a flight of stairs." Natalie, give this one a try - you won't be bored.
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