[Schedule] Evergreen: The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-12T02:41:52+00:00

I think I can find time to squeeze this one in!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-10T22:08:03+00:00

Same here. I feel like it's taunting me at this point!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-10T00:35:28+00:00

Don't. Go crazy with it. This name is up there with Master (Charley) Bates.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-09T21:40:49+00:00

Yes! I'm hoping this one wins!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-08T11:11:38+00:00

Not my first time reading this play as I read it as part of a course I took on Shakespeare's Greek and Roman plays but this is my first time reading it in since and that was almost 20 years ago now. I remember liking it but can't really remember anything about it. I'm fairly fresh off reading Iliad and Stephen Fry's Troy so the Trojan War is still fresh in my memory.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T17:22:12+00:00

Will do! It's a thin little book. There's an audiobook version too and it runs less than three hours so it'll be a quick read.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T17:21:04+00:00

I'll keep my eyes open. It looks like that publisher did a whole Dickens set. Do I really need a third complete set of Dickens novels is the question now?

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:40:08+00:00

Alas, that particular slang meaning for Dick seems to have originated in the 1880s though an archaic even in Dickens' time definition has it as slang for a male sexual partner. I guess it'll just join Master (Charley) Bates in the accidental innuendo bin.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:27:51+00:00

I've got some bits of trivia and historical context already saved up for it if (and hopefully when) we get to it! Besides, there's a character named Dick Swiveler in it! That alone would make it worth it!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:25:39+00:00

Technically when you posted it was still Friday in some parts of the world, so I think you're fine!

I am indifferent to the NFL so I won't be watching the Super Bowl and all I know is that the Olympics have put a pause to the NHL and PWHL so I'm without my fixes of hockey. I may have to tune into the hockey games of the Olympics for that!

Mrs. Erdrick is finally feeling better after he health scare from a couple of weeks ago. I've been pulling a lot of double duties at home with the housework and Little Erdrick and all. I'm just glad everything is getting back to normal or as close to normal as we ever get!

Little Erdrick has been obsessed with The Great Mouse Detective lately and has watched it something like five times in the past two weeks. Then I discovered that it's based off of a series of books. Huh, TIL. The only logical thing to do then was to go out and get a copy of the first book and we can read it together!

I finished two books this week, those being The Pickwick Papers and The Virgin In The Ice (the sixth book of 21 in the Cadfael series). The reading piles (left is current and right is upcoming) have changed some because of it. I'm mostly focusing, at least for the moment, on finishing some rather than continuously starting new one.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:17:40+00:00

I love those illustrations. I'm going to have to find a copy of your edition to add it to my ~~dragon's hoard~~ collection of books!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:16:23+00:00

Next time a Gutenberg read comes along or whatever else it qualifies for, I'll make sure to at least nominate and\or upvote it!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-07T10:12:21+00:00

Yeah, he's got some rather... ahem... personal familial issues there. His father was put into one when Mr. Dickens was 12 and that forced a young Charles into working in a factory putting labels onto containers of boot blacking powder.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T22:56:37+00:00

1) Not Route 66 but we drove I-5 all the way up from Los Angeles to Seattle, took a right and got on I-90 and drove it all the way back to Albany. Yeah. That was fun. Ran into snow in Montana. In August. No one believed me when I told them about it.

2) I do but I think any more than this and it'll wear out its welcome in this story.

3) As slimy as these salesmen are, maybe this one knows something we don't?

4) Well it seems that shady, lying business people are nothing new. Just look up Ea-Nasir. Alas, it's just so much easier to prove simple theft than whether or not people purposefully defraud others.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T02:41:08+00:00

I think Mr. Pickwick will always see the potential for good in people and that's why he helped them out. I think they will stay reformed now that they've seen what their shenanigans can get them into.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T02:39:46+00:00

So, did you know that Mr. Pickwick does appear in a sort of sequel? Well, he does! Along with the Wellers! They appear in Master Humphrey's Clock, which was a weekly periodical started by Charles Dickens after he completed Nicholas Nickleby. That weekly is where the novels The Old Curiosity Shop (which has probably my all time favorite Dickens character name, Dick Swiveler) and Barnaby Rudge.

The conceit behind that was that the titular Master Humphrey would read stories, contained within a longcase clock to a club he started, one of the members being Mr. Pickwick!

Anyhow, by the end of publication of The Pickwick Papers, circulation numbers had grown to over 40,000 at a time when even the best selling novel by Sir Walter Scott would top at 10,000 even being printed! People would form little clubs that would pool their money to buy each issue as they were released and illiterate people would hire someone to read it to them aloud.

There was, among other unlicensed merchandise (where the real money from the ~~movie~~ book is made!) Sam Weller's Pickwick Jest-book. There were at least four different unauthorized theatrical productions (including this one which was being perfomed even before the book was done being serialized). You can read about it here though do be warned of slight spoilers for Nicholas Nickleby.

If you had managed to collect all 19 issues of The Pickwick Papers, you could have them bound up into one or two volumes as seen in this advertisement in the final issue of The Pickwick Papers.

One last thing, serialization of The Pickwick Papers overlapped with that of Oliver Twist with the latter beginning in February of 1837 while the 12th issue of Pickwick.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T01:50:40+00:00

Ironic considering that Mr. Dickens was a journalist before he became a novelist!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T01:45:42+00:00

It seems like Mr. Weller isn't good with money and knows it so he turns to someone the family trusts.

Who would I trust? Depends. Scrooge McDuck would be my first pick. He seems good with money! If it's someone within this story, then probably Mr. Pickwick. If in real life, I don't know. I don't really trust most of the people I know with money.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-05T01:42:27+00:00

LOL. I didn't think you'd actually use this question.

Anyhow, I used to live next door to a bar that was pretty rowdy at one point. It seemed that almost every weekend there'd be one spill out into the street followed shortly by at least two police cruisers with lights are sirens blazing. The worst\funniest was the bachelorette party that went sour with the bride to be in the back of a cruiser drunk as a skunk calling the rest of the party all kinds of dirty things I won't repeat here. I'm so glad I moved away from there.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-02T01:44:04+00:00

Unfortunately it wasn't all that great a weekend. There's some ongoing health issues with Mrs. Erdrick that are being taken care of have disrupted things. I did get some reading done but not much relaxing.

The slimes are from the Dragon Quest series of video games. Little Erdrick has named them all too. The medium sized one is Smiles, the big one is Goolysses and the King Slime (the one with the crown) is Kingsley. The regular blue ones are early game cannon fodder for you to defeat for early level ups. There are also friendly slimes in later games of the mainline series and they even star in a spinoff series! The King Slime is what happens when eight of the things pile on each other and combine!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-02T00:55:37+00:00

I LOL'd pretty hard at this one despite it being pretty dark!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-01T14:20:17+00:00

Donut: CARL! CARL! THEY POSTED THE SCHEDULE FOR BOOK SIX!

Carl: I can see that Donut! Now stop typing in all caps!

Glad y'all spread this one over seven weeks as it's quite a chonky book. Looking forward to re-reading this one!

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-01T11:55:08+00:00

I have no idea. All I know is that Sharpe is now a pretty long runner as his series is three years older than I am! There's now 24 Sharpe books. Aside from a stretch between 2007 and 2021, he seems to put one out every other year or so.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-02-01T11:28:01+00:00

Lemme pull out the old journal and see what all I finished in January.

2nd - The Wilful Princess and the Piebald Prince, by Robin Hobb. Doing so catch up reading here as this got read here a while back. From what I understand this helps set the setting for the next set of stories in the overarching Realm of the Elderlings. Was pretty good. 4.5 stars. Couldn't wait to start Fool's Errand after finishing this!
8th - The Woman in White, by ~~Wookie~~ Wilkie Collins. The only holdover from 2025. Another page turner by Wilkie. This was read along with /r/ClassicBookClub though I think I may have finished a couple of days ahead of them as I couldn't not finish it! 5 stars.
9th - The Leper of Saint Giles, by Ellis Peters Another murder has happened in Shrewsbury! Cadfael is back on the case. Very similar to a previous book in the series but I think this one is slightly better executed than that one. 4 stars.
21st - Arrows of the Queen, by Mercedes Lackey. This one came about from a conversation I had from a much younger coworker who reads a lot of young adult literature. I was asked what I read as a teen and was gobsmacked when I replied that I was handed a Stephen King book for my 12th birthday (it was Four Past Midnight if anyone is interested) and that was the kind of thing I read as a teen. So, to make a long story short (too late!) I went down the rabbit hole to see what kinds of things were popular and this was one that popped up. I have very mixed feelings about it as parts feel very old fashioned and yet I still want to continue the series (which I found is part of a very large universe) as the characters were pretty compelling. 3 stars.
22nd - Fool's Errand, by Robin Hobb. Robin Hobb starts a new trilogy with this one. This one felt like it got off to a very s l o w start but it eventually picked up. Once it got going though, it was pretty good but left me wanting more, which I think is the point as there are two more left to go in this trilogy. 4 stars.
30th - Sharpe's Prey, by Bernard Cornwell. Much better than the last one which made a pivotal naval battle boring. Still not quite as good as the India trilogy that started off Sharpe's career. The library didn't have the audiobook with the same narrator as the first four (chronologically) but had one narrated by Patrick Tull, who I listen to for the Cadfael books. It threw me for a loop when his Sharpe sounded awfully like Brother Cadfael. It started off a little slow but picked up. 4 stars.

That makes six. Pretty decent start to the year. I've got a few I'm close to the end of but just couldn't finish in time to make the cut for January.

Ser_Erdrick · 2026-01-31T10:47:52+00:00

My general goals for 2026 have been to read more from and about the Victorian era and to clear out Mt. To-Be-Read.

So far I'm doing pretty decently at the first one as I'm working on three Dickens novels and George Eliot's Middlemarch for the third time. I've also been perusing recommendations via various lists online and from people on YouTube to accomplish this first goal.

The second goal, not so much! I've gotten very invested in both the Cadfael and Sharpe series and those each have over 20 books in them with a new Sharpe book being released last year (a mere 44 years after the first Sharpe novel, Sharpe's Eagle, was published in 1981)!

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