I digress just a bit from my usual, if wildly sporadic, thoughts on South and West to play a game of tag…
Literary Rapture was tagged by loves german books. I was tagged by Literary Rapture. And now I tag 10 Ideas and two very special non-blogger/Facing South readers (who will have to be contacted more traditionally to put their comments on this page).
Here’s our task:
1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.
I’ll start.
“Yes, in a way. But what about you, Gemma? Would you trade innocence for experience?”
…page 123 from my current read, The Sixteen Pleasures by Robert Hellenga. An unassuming passage except that Gemma is a sister in the Ordo Carmelitarum and the question is about celibacy.
This book has happily transported me back to Florence, Italy. It’s November 1966 following the Arno flood. Santa Croce, the Vasari Corridor, Fra Filippo Lippi, religion, politics, a faulty tape recorder and an international effort to rescue waterlogged frescoes and manuscripts (including one incredible book in the library of the Carmelite convent) are making this a pleasurable read, for sure.
FACING SOUTH 