The Learning Curve

For me, it's huge. I have just finished reading Eleanor of Aquitaine by Alison Weir, which I've been reading in tandem with The Medieval Machine - The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages (hey Sarah, has Rainer read that one? Thoughts?)

I have to say right off the bat that I'm not enthralled with the Middle Ages. I don't have a "thing" for the chivalric code or knights or ladies and castles. I have no desire to be swept back in time to an era where I could be abducted, violated, tossed aside, and then held accountable for no longer retaining my purity. (The more I read, the more I'm thinkin' "Well, no WONDER so many women were barren by the time they hit 25! GOSH!") I enjoy, appreciate, and truly value the rights, priviledges, and freedoms bestowed upon me as a woman in the 21st Century. Ew.

However, that said, reading these two books together was fascinating. It was nice to get a glimpse into that period which looked deeper than the stereotypes of the age. I enjoyed reading in detail the activities of the people and the economic and industrial development of the region in context with the political climate and the social systems in place at that time. The experience was far more fascinating than I'd given the Middle Ages credit for, I'll tell you that.

So this got me thinking, and I have some truly exciting ideas stuck in my head and completely incapable of making it out in one piece just before midnight. Sorry. But anyway, if you get the niggling to try something like this (combining two facets of history in a tandem reading session), please share with us what you read and what you thought! I think a reading list along these lines has the potential to make one phenomenal logic or rhetoric stage history/economics/sociology study!

Kiss those babies!
~Dy