While a piping hot White Rocker might be easy to digest, the major motion picture Precious was one hard film to stomach.
Based on the novel Push by Sapphire, this film details the suffering and eventual retribution of a sixteen-year-old, illiterate, and overweight high school girl looking for self worth. A modern day echo of Alice Walker's The Color Purple, Push is a hard-hitting piece of literature.
Before I heard of plans for a movie, I read this very graphic and revealing novel. Sapphire uses a dialect similar to that of Zora Neale Hurston in Their Eyes Were Watching God. As Precious is illiterate at the onset of the story, she spells her words phonetically and pens sentences without considering grammar. This stylistic approach makes the subject matter more realistic to the reader, putting the blatant neglect of a child's education in the forefront. As Precious progresses through secondary schooling, her reading and writing scores sky rocket and there is a notable difference in the language used. Precious lives with her obese, invalid mother who lives off of welfare checks. Precious is pregnant with her second child as a result of childhood abuse from her father, who proceeded to leave the family with the news of his daughter's pregnancy. Sapphire uses a literary style known as stream of consciousness. With this style, the author illustrates the main character's every thought in the order they occur. This framing of the story along with the novel's dialect make the first twenty pages difficult to follow. As with the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, readers adjust to the dedicated author's mission to make Precious' experience as tangible as possible. I recommend this novel to people who haven't already seen the movie, and even to people that have. The film makers that worked on Precious obviously did a fantastic job as it was nominated for six Academy Awards including Best Picture.
Being the extreme party-goer and socialite that I am, I also dedicated parts of this weekend to exploring various fashion blogs. I was on a search for a new homepage and was led to the popular fashion blog Jak and Jil. I read a story in March's Vogue about ten new fashion blogs that made an impression on the Powers That Be in Vogue. Jak and Jil as well as Style Sightings are layouts of stylish candids that are taken on location--lately in Paris. Jak and Jil is updated constantly, usually drawing from the model-esque beauties roaming the streets of Paris.
For all those interested, check out this fabulous blog at http://jakandjil.com/blog/
At the bottom of the Jak and Jil web page, there is a list of other equally interesting fashion blogs such as Style Sightings. Style Sightings uses a similar technique with street style candids. The photos are organized into categories with themes such as "Furry Friends" or "Denim Days"
The URL again is, http://www.stylesightings.com/
To close, I'd like to open up a new addition to my blog called What've You Read Lately? I love hearing about the literary choices of my peers, so let me know what you're currently reading or what you've already read and really enjoyed. Good night and Happy Easter (if you're into that kind of thing).
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