Odds & ends

The NY Times has an article on book clubs. You can read it here.

By the way, who has finished The Wordy Shipmates? I'm still reading.

Any other ideas for this book club blog to keep it active?

In these times

I think we're reading this book at a particularly telling time, with the election and issues of leadership, civic duty, freedom swirling around. You can't help but think of our current climate when reading, or at least I can't. I was really struck by how much literature, writing, and knowledge were emphasized by the Puritan colony Vowell focuses on, basically our founders. It's sad to think how far we've gotten away from that. Especially when the love of knowledge, learning, traveling, writing, literature, complexity, and attending the very same Ivy League schools that the Puritans founded is referred to as 'elitist.' Just thought I would share.

Sarah Vowell on Letterman

In case you missed it, like I did:

Out today

The Wordy Shipmates is now officially out, so pick up a copy at your local bookstore or library. I did. I'm pretty sure Kate did. So I hope you all resort to peer pressure and do your part to boost our economy. Buy it. Or check it out. Just do it.

More Puritan Fun!

Even though I'm usually not a fan of books written in, well, the last couple of decades, I'll give "The Wordy Shipmates" a try if simply because I'm taking an American Literature class that focuses on Puritan Lit. Puritan Lit is as boring as hell (Puritans, if they were reading, would take offense not only because I dissed their literature but because I swore. That's why I did it). Winthrop is an abstract bore with one good catchphrase (Sarah Palin, it was Winthrop who coined "city on a hill" first, not Reagan. Although it is quite possible that ole Reagan knew Winthrop back in the day, Winthrop still deserves credit because frankly it's the one claim to fame he'll ever get); Jonathan Edwards inspires anger in even the meek with such classic imagery as spiders over cauldrons (sinners in this case being the spider and the cauldron...I'm sure you get what the cauldron represents); Bradford is a killjoy who even manages to make a trial over bestiality boring. All in all, I think I've done the most research for Vowell.

Rest In Peace

Phoenix rising, ship sailing

Perhaps we should dust this thing off and reconvene for the upcoming Sarah Vowell book The Wordy Shipmates. I think that could be a fast, informative and engaging read that everyone could agree on. You really can't go wrong with Sarah Vowell. What do you all think? It comes out October 7th. That way we also have time to finish any books we're currently reading and get all pumped up for our thrilling and participatory discussion on this very blog.

Who's with me? (Feel free to respond Aye, aye Captain!).

Come On Guys!

Wow, talk about disappointing. After my intial gushing over "To The Lighthouse" nobody seemed willing to follow it with a discussion of any kind. Well, I am currently reading "Jacob's Room," an early work of Virginia Woolf, which leads me to this blog. "Jacob's Room" is Woolf's first stream of consciousness novel, a work of art in its own right, which would seem more startling and noteworthy if not for the greater successes of "Mrs. Dalloway" and "To the Lighthouse" after it. It also uncovers similar themes of family, art (in this case history and the Greeks in place of To the Lighthouse's painting and literature), and of course, WWI. For as much as WWII dominates the History Channel and occupies about all the shelves in a bookstore's history section, WWI has produced a greater extent of literature and in my mind still remains the Great War. It disillusioned; it maimed if it did not kill first; it stunned and shell-shocked. "Jacob's Room" introduces these themes to a small extent, but if we were to get a discussion going on "To the Lighthouse" we would scratch the surface of what lies beneath the war that nobody talks about, the war that nobody remembers.

Finally--I Have My Vision! (Lame inside "To the Lighthouse" joke)

Finally, Lindsay, you realized the only way to entice me into writing on this blog was to pick a Virginia Woolf book! Okay, so first topics I suggest that we discuss for the first third of the novel ("The Window"):

-- Permanence (Mrs. Ramsay wants to preserve moments like the 'perfect' dinner party to fight Life, her enemy; Lily wants to finish her painting but is having trouble; Mr. Ramsay wants to at least get to R so his legacy can live on)

--The Windows/Frames of all the characters (Bankes sees things through a scientific frame, Lily through the aesthetic) --we talked about this in class and I'd be intrigued to hear your ideas

-- How effective is Woolf's "cubist prose?"'

When we get to the end of the novel I'd also be interested in hearing your answers on its meaning. I wrote a paper on it last week.

Happy reading! Enjoy the miracle that is Virginia Woolf!

moving along...

Just to let everyone know, I have finished The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (I think I already mentioned that), and I think I am going to go on to read To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. So if anyone would like to join me in my next reading adventure, that would be great.

I mean we could officially make it our next selection, but our discussions haven't been so lively, and I'm not sure if everyone is finished with Oscar Wao, so I thought I would just start in the meantime and whoever wanted to as well could, and if we wanted we could discuss both (if anyone is still interested in discussing Oscar Wao).

And some of you have already read To the Lighthouse (Cynthia, Erin, anyone else?), so you could participate in the discussion already.

Cool?

Hurrah for Junot!

I was just about to leave a post about our very own selection winning the prestigious pulitzer! It actually made me feel very proud, very intellectual and like our club really lives up to its name. I also felt happy that the pulitzer recognized this young, fresh, somewhat unconventional use of voice and language - very exciting and progressive and hopeful. now if we could only get this convo going....

i do think that the issue of voice and perspective is a very rich topic in this novel and could inspire much discussion (as noted in my original comment to lindsay's post on the topic). I still have some reading to do, but i am at the section after Beli's story, where we have returned to the somewhat present, the first-person narrator has emerged and is college roommates with Oscar. This is a bit off topic, but i was started to be very curious about how closely aligned our narrator is with Junot himself. I cannot help but thinking that i am really hearing Junot's voice through our narrators, though i know this is a common fallacy. Nonetheless, i like to indulge it. My latest theory is that Junot is actually a mix between our narrator and oscar - or that they represents the two different sides of his personality/experience, or maybe even a fantasy/reality junot, like the narrator is more like a shadow figure to oscar/junot (a la Brad Pitt to Ed Norton in Fight Club). Food for thought.

Pulitzer

Erin has just informed me that our very own book club book has won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Go Oscar and Junot!

I'm done!

What's our next one? Just kidding. I'm ready to discuss stuff if we're so willing. Just thought I would let you all know.

Back on the bandwagon

Okay, gang. Let's get this thing going again. I propose our first topic of discussion: voice/point of view. Diaz has a distinctive style of writing - influenced by dialogue/dialect and slang. Now discuss!

Did it take anyone a little while to get into it? Do people not like the style of writing? Other thoughts, comments, observations?

The winner is...

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao! Start reading!

Should we have kind of a structure as far as postings/discussion? Of course, people should feel free to be able to post whenever on whatever, but maybe we should have some kind of plan so that we stay on course and have more of a discussion than we did for Atonement.

What do you think?

my vote...

ladies, i'm actually so excited about this e-bookclub. linds, i never thought i would see the day you became an IT fanatic! alright, i have to say i'm having a hard time deciding between Pollitt and Diaz. both books sound interesting, but i think i'm most attracted to "The Brief Wonderous Life" because of it's discussion on multiculturalism (maybe i'm a bit biased :-)) so, i guess that's my vote.

Decision time! Vote 2008!

Okay, so we've discussed our options here, and it also seems like people are excited about all three of our choices: Learning to Drive and Other Life Stories by Katha Pollitt, To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. All being great choices, I think we should aim for reading all three - although I'm sure there will be more books to add to our list. Now we just have to figure out the order. Shall we take a vote?

Even if you don't mind which one we read first, can everyone just choose one (even if it has to be at random...draw from a hat if you'd like)? Or from those of you who judge a book by its cover, see above. After we hear from everyone all of the members (and I am not averse to harassing those who have not yet voted), we will tally them and hopefully there will be no ties. In the case of a tie, since I do not know how any of those novels begin, we will choose the one whose first letter (of the text, not the title) comes earliest in the alphabet. Does this all seem fair? Man, democracy is a lot of work.

My 2 Cents

Well i am encouraged by the newfound enthusiasm to keep this little project of a multi-city virtual book club alive! and i love everyone's suggestions. Now, in the spirit of honesty and democracy (and not just to be contrary), i'd have to say that my first choice would be: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, a book I have heard a lot about and am very excited to read. That being said, i am a major Virginia W fan and would happily read or re-read anything of hers and Erica's non-fiction selection sounds great too! I guess i would say that a contemporary novel would be my #1 right now, and then i think we could move into the classics and non-fiction reads. but i am open and know that we should make a decision soon. Oh, and Rakiya, i am glad that you are now a member. For more reference on this book club, please see Office Episode, Branch Wars, featuring the original Finger Things Club, the inspiration for this esteemed group effort.

Welcome Rakiya! And now for our next book...

I would like to extend a hearty welcome to Rakiya, who has just recently joined our prestigious and exclusive book club. She is lucky enough to have joined just in time for the commencement of our second book.

If you have been following along with the blog discussion, the upcoming line-up that we seem to be leaning towards is To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf next and then Learning to Drive And Other Life Stories by Katha Pollitt. It seems that these would make good companion and complementary pieces. However, we are a democratic book club, and I welcome everyone's opinion on our next selections. What do the rest of you think? Does this sound good to everyone? Anyone have any issues or other suggestions?

Hi, my name is cb and I am a reader!

Okay, I am for the first time checking into The Finer Things Book Club though I have been a member according to my profile since March 2007 so I have had an awful lot of time to think about my first posting on a book we are reading together...except that I never got past about page 4 of our first selection, Atonement, and not due to it not being engaging from the opening lines but more because the obsession with things political has consumed my reading of late including a must-read book that I highly recommend to all, John Dean's Broken Government, as well as Hillary Clinton's Living History (that is not a political pitch for votes but just an explanation of the books I have been reading that have distracted me from Atonement) and Naomi Klein's the Shock Doctrine...but I am still circling around in chapter 2 of that book, I think it is going to have to wait.  SO I am most definitely ready for relief and a novel sounds just perfect...

So I think Erin has made a particularly impassioned and strong case for Virginia Woolf...especially your description of Mrs. Dalloway including "a shell shocked veteran of WWI whose presence haunts the novel" that has absolutely reignited by my desire to read that book. I am also a big admirer of Virginia Woolf based solely on To The Lighthouse which I read in college and was mesmerized by, and recently, had purchased Mrs. Dalloway and was admittedly unable to get past the first chapter, I just couldn't and Erin has given me new hope to persevere. And Lindsay says she has not yet read a single Virginia Woolf novel and has wanted to so that obviously must be remedied.  So I say we go for Virginia Woolf and I would go with To the Lighthouse because I think it is a masterpiece and is engaging from the opening lines and would be the best pick if you had the chance to only read one Woolf book I would hate it if someone had never read To the Lighthouse.  

I also like to suggest Bella Abzug because Laura gave this to me as a gift this Christmas and I am planning to read that next (upon finishing Living History) and I can't wait to read it and continue my current obsession with strong, determined women of conviction and action...but I also think To the Lighthouse is a book I can read for our club and at the same time start my read of Bella....So I am sticking with my pick for To The Lighthouse.  And, I think my feminist obsession right now could be well met by Erica's book suggestion so I could go with that too and something humorous could be just what we need right now to balance all the serious activity of electing our next President!!!!  

Here is a preview that aptly combines in one paragraph my current reading with future reading, it is the last paragraph of Bella, Hillary Clinton speaking of Bella:

"As I travel around the world. . . I am always meeting women who introduce themselves by saying, 'I'm the Bella Abzug of Russia,' or 'I'm the Bella Abzug of Kazakhstan,' or 'I'm the Bella Abzug of Uganda.' Now what these women are really saying, whether or not they wear the hat of an advocate like Bella, is that they, too, are pioneers, that they are willing to take on the establishment and the institutions of their society on behalf of the rights of women, but not just that, on behalf of what families need, on behalf of peace, on behalf of civil society, all the many and varied causes that Bella stood for throughout her long and active life. . . She liked to say, 'First they gave us the year of the woman, then they gave us the decade of the woman.  Sooner or later, they'll have to give us the whole thing.'  She never stopped fighting for 'the whole thing.'  So when women around the world say to me, 'I am the Bella Abzug' from somewhere, I know what they really mean is that they'll never give up."

Another suggestion

Yeah for the book club blog! My suggestion for our next book (or a future book) is Katha Pollitt's "Learning to Drive: And Other Life Stories" which is a book of short stories about Pollitt's own life. It's very funny and it allows for deeper discussions of feminism.

My Suggestions

All three of these suggestions happen to be by Virginia Woolf. Why? Because she's "the greatest author ever to walk this Earth" *
*According to Erin, February 14, 2008

If you STILL want to know why. I would first criticize you for asking so many damn questions, and then I'd tell you this: Nobody does it like Virginia. Her stream of consciousness brings me near tears. In all of her books there comes times when I have to set down the book and just let my brain go over the beauty of her words. She makes you want to write, live, be British, go to a Lighthouse, or transform from man to woman over centuries.

Now the suggestions!

1) Orlando -- My first Virigina Woolf experience. It was junior year and I was doing a presentation on her for British Literature. My only exposure to her was through the wonderful movie and book "The Hours." Reading summaries of her most famous books, I immediately knew I HAD to read this one. It sounded farfetched with its magical sex change half way through and Orlando's immortality, Also wonderful about it: it is a love letter to Virginia's friend/lover Vita Sackville-West.

2) Mrs. Dalloway--I read this on the way to France. At first I didn't like it as well as Orlando, but then everything changed. This is my favorite novel. Seemingly mundane, all about an older woman planning a party, it also features a shell-shocked veteran of WWI whose prescence haunts the novel. I have never seen the streets of London, but through Virginia's words, I have lived there. "What a lark! What a plunge!"

3) To the Lighthouse-- The Ramseys are even more intriguing seeing that they are based on Virginia's parents. It is a portrait of family, of loss and love, of mortality. The second half of the novel astounded me. I am also reading this for my British Literature class.

New book?

Well I don't know how well you all considered this went this first time around, considering we didn't have much discussion and who knows who will actually read this and when, but shall we keep this going and move on to another book? I think it does help in applying more pressure to actually read and finish a book.

Erica, I know you had a suggestion. I forgot the name, but it had to do with driving and feminism.

I have a few books from Christmas/my birthday that I'm planning to read soon that might make good choices too. They include: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, The Braindead Megaphone by George Saunders (a book of essays) and Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson (that one is huge).

Thoughts?

GR leads us in song

for a dramatization at the beach