St. Pantaleone's Day
2004-07-27 @ 11:16 p.m.

Ploughing through two tutorials now, 8B and 9. Our syllabus for induction is boring. I paid scarcely any attention to Mr Tay during his lectures, and I still can do most of the tutorial. At our level, induction is just applying the same steps with minimal variations. Shen Ting tells me that induction in Further Mathematics is harder, which is obviously why I'm not taking it. Finished reading two short books today! The Eliot one and My Hungry Hell by Kate Chisolm, a former anorexic herself. It's a very insightful look into what goes on inside an anorexic's mind, even if the language is rather bland compared to a lot of the stuff I've read. Interestingly, after reading Brother Jacob, I find that Brother Jacob, Silas Marner and Chocolat all seem to echo each other. The most striking element common to all three is the idea of a stranger settling into a community, be it Edward Freely alias David Faux in Grimworth, Silas Marner in Raveloe, or Vianne Rocher in Lansquenet-sous-Tannes. They all experience initial rejection, but come to be accepted by the community they reside in. The difference is that Freely ends up leaving Grimworth in disgrace because his idiot brother, Jacob, inadvertently unmasks his true identity. Anyway, Brother Jacob proves that Eliot had a sense of humour! Now to choose between continuing with Blackberry Wine and starting on a poetry anthology of Alfian Sa'at or Philip Larkin. Reading has suddenly come to dominate my life...