Book a Week 2016 - W1: Happy New Year!!!!

[marbel]

I had a breakthrough this morning.  I am so excited!

 

I don't listen to many audiobooks because I haven't had a good device on which to do so.  If I'm going to sit down to read, I read.  I have a Kindle and could listen in the car, but I'm rarely in the car alone and one of my kids is averse to audiobooks.  A Kindle does not fit into any pocket of any garment I own, so I can't use it while moving around.

 

But for Christmas I got a smartphone, finally.  This morning after I went for a walk while listening to music on it - heaven! - I remembered:  I can listen to audio books on this!  While I do chores!

 

So instead of nagging my kids to get out of bed, vacation is over! I downloaded Overdrive to my  new phone and downloaded Austenland.  Want something light in case this doesn't work well. 

 

Darn it, though, I can't let the kids sleep all day while I do chores while listening to  a story.

 

So nice to join the 21st Century!

Edited January 4, 2016 by marbel

[Melinda in VT]

Sip coffee...type a few words...erase...sip coffee...

 

I struggle this morning with how to articulate my thoughts on To Siberia.  The novel immediately captivated me and held my interest.  The ending was less than satisfying though which seems to bring the entire reading experience down a notch or so.  Nonetheless I plan on borrowing Out Stealing Horses from my library at some point in the future.  Petterson's prose is lovely.

 

Melinda--are you still interested in the book?  Send me a PM if you want it.

 

It turns out my library has a copy, so I'm going to borrow this one and let you send yours on to someone who can't easily borrow it.

 

Thanks again, though. It makes me smile that you were willing to send it. :-)

 

[Ethel Mertz]

I finished Ted Koppel's Lights Out: A Cyberattack, a Nation Unprepared, Surviving the Aftermath. The quality of Koppel's work is beyond reproach and bears out his solid reputation as a topnotch journalist. His research is impeccable, startling, and well worth one's attention. Here is a blurb from fellow journalist, Tom Brokaw:

 

"[This book] is a timely warning about the vulnerability of America to a massive cyberattack that would cripple all we take for granted - electricity, communication, transportation. This is not science fiction. Hats off to Ted Koppel for putting us all on alert."

 

My next read is a light mystery: A Crane Christmas: The Morelville Mysteries, Book 6 by Anne Hagan.

[Jane in NC]

It turns out my library has a copy, so I'm going to borrow this one and let you send yours on to someone who can't easily borrow it.

 

Thanks again, though. It makes me smile that you were willing to send it. :-)

 

Sounds like a plan. Anyone else interested in sparse Scandinavian fiction?

[Just Robyn]

I have a question about Goodreads.  I was playing with it this evening and put it my one book I have read and the one I am reading right now for 2016. Then I saw the nifty deal that allows you to add your previous Amazon purchases and began merrily adding.  Is there a way to separate out the active list (2016) from what I own and have already read?  I deleted everything except the two books.  

 

You can make shelves and label them. If you go to My Books, you'll see "bookshelves" on the left, and at the bottom of your list of shelves you should see "add shelf." Many people have a shelf per year - as well as a variety of other categories.

[mumto2]

I just started a new Goodreads account to use to link with this group. I am using mumtotwo (note the two at end) for my name there. No idea how to link but I am trying to friend people so if you get a request it is me. You are welcome to send me a friend request if you don't hear from me....this seems to be technically challenging for me. My whole family has been helping...:lol:

 

Eta. I decided to do a separate account where I just record my books read and booklist from this group.

Edited January 4, 2016 by mumto2

[Stacia]

I just started a new Goodreads account to use to link with this group. I am using mumtotwo (note the two at end) for my name there. No idea how to link but I am trying to friend people so if you get a request it is me. You are welcome to send me a friend request if you don't hear from me....this seems to be technically challenging for me. My whole family has been helping... :lol:

 

Eta. I decided to do a separate account where I just record my books read and booklist from this group.

 

I see two of you, lol. One of your profiles has no books listed, the other one has some books listed, as well as a couple of friends from WTM. So I guess 'friend' you on the one w/ the book listings...???

[Pam in CT]

re: streams of consciousness swirling differently

Uhm... not naturally.  Ulysses didn't come even close to naturally for me... it stretched me as a reader in ways I've never stretched before, and couldn't have done before last year.  I didn't have the right tools or headspace to get any joy from it before then even if I had forced myself through it.

 

I find it weird to see Joyce, Faulkner, and Woolf grouped together - I can sort of see it, but Woolf lights up my mind and heart, Joyce sent my mind whirling and had some pieces that touched me, and Faulkner I've just completely bounced off of (though I am planning to try again this year)... they have, for me, wildly different flavors... no, not just flavors. they are entirely different food types as well as flavors.  ...using a similar cooking technique (like sauteeing...)

 

I haven't read Proust yet (on this year's optimistic list!), but Robin's description of how she read Proust with enjoyment matches how I read Woolf - not in bits and snatches, but only when I could let myself become immersed in the rhythm of the prose...

Re: Ulysses specifically -- well, maybe I'll get there in another decade or so.  There certainly were bits of it that I had me laughing out loud (which always helps me get through anything with SO MANY WORDS) and many parts that had me slack-jawed at the wondrousness of the language.  And the Goodreads structure (thank you!) helped a lot with decoding tools.  But I think it was what you're calling "head space" that finally sunk me...  I have quite enjoyed the shorter Joyce books and story collections I've read, but Ulysses was just.too.much, and "taking up too high a % of the limited neurons available" is a good metaphor for how it felt, lol...

 

... and re grouping Joyce, Woolf, Faulkner and Proust together: for me, I can see the reading experience of (shorter!) Joyce and Woolf as somewhat comparable (exulting in the language, congratulating myself on the fairly rare occasions that I'm clever enough to recognize the references, being mesmerized by the delve into the interior Random Walk of someone else's brain, etc); but the empathy experience is quite different between the two.  Peering out at the world through Woolf's eyes is FAR more accessible to me.

 

Faulkner for me is quite different -- it doesn't feel nearly so stream of consciousness-y, though that certainly is there -- I'm much more conscious (and appreciative) of the structure of the stories, and anticipating the twists and revelations that are sure to come (almost like your Shakespeare!), and SO much of the impact is about specificities of place and race and time... 

 

... and I've never even attempted Proust.  And, not now either.  I've signed up for Timaeus and can only take on so much!

 

 

 

 

re: peace, Quaker Wisdom, and the struggle to live deeply and authentically:

....I am very interested in this.  I spent so many of my younger years trying to believe I could be a pacifist...  I still believe there is incredible transformative power in that hashkafa (philosophy), but the price, however great the rewards, is more than I can in truthfulness with myself advocate.... though I still have wistful moments when I wish I could be that person... mostly, though, I am at peace with trying to find the next steps that come out of the person I am...

 

...but I am struggling.  I am having trouble seeing how to be my deepest self within the parameters (health and family) I have... and this is the first time I have ever felt this...

 

I love this.

 

:grouphug: It's all any of us can do, really.

 

I could not tell you how often I've returned to Rosie's authenticity post.  Many, many times.

[Chrysalis Academy]

 

 

Prariewindmomma re: Age of Innocence:  I was very, very unappreciative of AoI for many years... I felt so suffocated & I fought the book.

 

My most recent read (perhaps 2 years ago?), I finally connected with its amazing-ness - watching the muddled choices, the courage, the vividly depiction of a world, a culture, and some very human people within it.

 

 

 

 

Age of Innocence is one of my favorite books, ever. I didn't read it when I was young, for which I am grateful, I think I wouldn't have appreciated it. But I read it for my book group a few years ago, and I found it luminous, breathtaking, tragic, and amazing.  It worked for me much, much better than The House of Mirth, and it's the rather rare example of a male protagonist who I felt - completely.  I could get inside him, could see the world through his eyes, and my heart broke for him.  

 

I have an increasingly large list of books that I think shouldn't be read till you are 40, or at least 30 - they are wasted on the young, who haven't experienced the kind of self-sacrificing life choices that come with becoming an adult.  I know that there is a lot of pressure on this board (not necessarily this thread, but WTM in general) to have young people read lots of classics. I read lots of classics as a high schooler, and easily half of them were completely wasted on me. I'm finding it a completely different experience to revisit them, or visit them for the first time, now with a bit more maturity under my belt.

 

What is my point?  It's not that teens shouldn't read classics. I guess it's that we should never stop reading, or re-reading, and never assume that because we've read something in our youth, we're done with it. I guess what makes these books classics is that they have something different to offer us, a different conversation, that has the ability to change and grow as we do.

 

ETA:  And when I say "classics" I'm not referring to any canonical list, but to the books that speak to us on re-reading. How's that for a circular definition?  ;)  But I was thinking about this re-reading thing, in contrast to the comment from someone upthread that they revisited a past loved book with disappointment. I've had that happen, too.  So I guess I'm thinking of classics as books that meet you where you are throughout your life.  

 

Not that there isn't value in that book that hits you, just right, when you are young! I'm thinking of something like Catcher in the Rye - I suspect that if I read it now, I'd just find Holden whiny and annoying.  :lol:

Edited January 4, 2016 by Chrysalis Academy

[mumto2]

I see two of you, lol. One of your profiles has no books listed, the other one has some books listed, as well as a couple of friends from WTM. So I guess 'friend' you on the one w/ the book listings...???

I have managed to send you a friend request, I think. There are probably many of me......it kept locking me out after I had signed up (even worse after someone else had signed me up) or hooking up with my old account because fires remember....all amazon. Dh finally got it working for me, I hope. I currently have 3 books read, 1 current, and have some WTM friends. This has been way harder than it should have been.

[Lady Florida.]

I had a breakthrough this morning.  I am so excited!

 

I don't listen to many audiobooks because I haven't had a good device on which to do so.  If I'm going to sit down to read, I read.  I have a Kindle and could listen in the car, but I'm rarely in the car alone and one of my kids is averse to audiobooks.  A Kindle does not fit into any pocket of any garment I own, so I can't use it while moving around.

 

But for Christmas I got a smartphone, finally.  This morning after I went for a walk while listening to music on it - heaven! - I remembered:  I can listen to audio books on this!  While I do chores!

 

So instead of nagging my kids to get out of bed, vacation is over! I downloaded Overdrive to my  new phone and downloaded Austenland.  Want something light in case this doesn't work well. 

 

Darn it, though, I can't let the kids sleep all day while I do chores while listening to  a story.

 

So nice to join the 21st Century!

 

A smartphone is what finally got me listening to audio books. I can listen while I take a walk, fold laundry, chop vegetables, etc. I love it. I did get myself a set of blue tooth ear buds so I don't have to figure out how to tuck in the trailing cord attached to my phone. I also don't have to worry about always having my phone attached to me. I have this set.

[Lady Florida.]

For people like me, to whom stream of consciousness is torture, yes Faulkner, Woolf, Joyce, and Proust do all go together. Different styles, different prose, different emotional impact, but all equally torturous. :D

Edited January 4, 2016 by Lady Florida

[PrairieSong]

PrairieSong: re: reading 365+ books/year: I do that. I average a book a day & have for most of my reading life. At hard times, those books are more likely to be escape reading, but I could do without oxygen only slightly more easily than without reading.

 

I'm a fast reader, and always have been. My mother would give us new books for our cross-country drive & I would finish mine before we were two hours from home. (I wasn't, and am not now, trying to rush, it is just my natural reading pace.)

 

...and I don't have a television or any other hobbies.

 

I am completely amazed by your ability to read a book a day. I would love to increase my reading speed while retaining comprehension (tips, anyone?) but even if I could read a book a day, I don't know that my poor brain could handle all that information. I might explode. Kudos to you! It sounds like a natural gift.

[prairiewindmomma]

I think my hesitancy with Age of Innocence is that I lack compassion for people who cheat on their spouses.  I don't believe that we are destined to have one true love. Rather, love is a choice.  I disliked Anna Karenina and the movie The Duchess (about Georgiana (Spencer) Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire) for the same reasons. 

 

I do agree that a number of books are best read after much life experience.

[Chrysalis Academy]

I think my hesitancy with Age of Innocence is that I lack compassion for people who cheat on their spouses.  I don't believe that we are destined to have one true love. Rather, love is a choice.  I disliked Anna Karenina and the movie The Duchess (about Georgiana (Spencer) Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire) for the same reasons. 

 

I do agree that a number of books are best read after much life experience.

 

Ahh, read on . . . you will find much food for thought in AoI! Especially about choices. That is what I loved so much about it.

[Violet Crown]

More from Pepys and his book habits: he buys a copy of Samuel Butler's Hudibras, decides it's not so good after all, and gives it away. Everyone raves about it and insists it's cutting and hilarious, so he goes and buys another copy-- to give it a second chance. This sounds as familiar as his continual failed resolution to get his TBR pile ("press") under control.

[Tawlas]

I am curious to know what you thought of the Renaissance and Reformation series. I know many people on the Great Courses site gave the professor scathing reviews for his delivery, but I really enjoyed the lectures and his level of detail.

I'm enjoying it! I'm fascinated trying to figure out where all these millions different churches have come from and how it all came about. As for his delivery, I find it quite palatable. He has a nice voice, once you're used to it, and for me, it's not too dry or detailed of lectures. I also appreciate that he occasionally summarizes things that have happened so far lol!

 

It's a great intro for The History of the Medieval World by SWB which I'm trying to get to by February :)

[redsquirrel]

ok, I am having a difficult time keeping up with this thread, clearly.

 

I was under the impression that some were starting off the year with Voyage of the Beagle?  Did I get that wrong? 

 

Anyway, if I am correct, then I will be a little behind you all.  I was in line for Two Years, Eight Months, and Twenty-Eight Days by Rushdie and it came in faster than I expected.  So, rather than starting off the year with a classic, my usual habit, I will start it off with a new to me writer. Which, when I think of it, might be a better habit.

 

It is a fast paced book that I am finding easy to read, so I might not be too far behind you all...if there is a 'you all' to be behind.

[SEGway]

Age of Innocence is one of my favorite books, ever. I didn't read it when I was young, for which I am grateful, I think I wouldn't have appreciated it. But I read it for my book group a few years ago, and I found it luminous, breathtaking, tragic, and amazing.  It worked for me much, much better than The House of Mirth, and it's the rather rare example of a male protagonist who I felt - completely.  I could get inside him, could see the world through his eyes, and my heart broke for him.  

 

I have an increasingly large list of books that I think shouldn't be read till you are 40, or at least 30 - they are wasted on the young, who haven't experienced the kind of self-sacrificing life choices that come with becoming an adult.  I know that there is a lot of pressure on this board (not necessarily this thread, but WTM in general) to have young people read lots of classics. I read lots of classics as a high schooler, and easily half of them were completely wasted on me. I'm finding it a completely different experience to revisit them, or visit them for the first time, now with a bit more maturity under my belt.

 

What is my point?  It's not that teens shouldn't read classics. I guess it's that we should never stop reading, or re-reading, and never assume that because we've read something in our youth, we're done with it. I guess what makes these books classics is that they have something different to offer us, a different conversation, that has the ability to change and grow as we do.

 

ETA:  And when I say "classics" I'm not referring to any canonical list, but to the books that speak to us on re-reading. How's that for a circular definition?  ;)  But I was thinking about this re-reading thing, in contrast to the comment from someone upthread that they revisited a past loved book with disappointment. I've had that happen, too.  So I guess I'm thinking of classics as books that meet you where you are throughout your life.  

 

Not that there isn't value in that book that hits you, just right, when you are young! I'm thinking of something like Cather in the Rye - I suspect that if I read it now, I'd just find Holden whiny and annoying.  :lol:

 

To the bolded--

I just started C.S. Lewis' Of Other Worlds. Speaking in the context of re-reading and the reader filling in the gaps the writer must necessarily leave, he then says:

 

"It is [re-reading], of course, a good test for every reader of every kind of book. An unliterary man may be defined as one who reads books once only. There is hope for a man who has never read Malory or Boswell or Tristam Shandy or Shakespeare's Sonnets: but what can you do with a man who says he 'has read' them, meaning he has read the once, and thinks that this settles the matter? Yet I think the test has a special application to the matter in hand. For excitement, in the sense defined above, is just what must disappear from a second reading. You cannot, except at the first reading, be really curious about what happened. If you find that the reader of popular romance--however uneducated a reader, however bad the romances--goes back to his old favourites again and again, then you have pretty good evidence that they are to him a sort of poetry."

 

I'm not sure about how well I remember books from the first time around (sometimes the second reading really is a surprise, again! ha :) ), but that's my own personal memory problem. And, I'm pretty sure in the essay his term romance means something like popular fiction, not just love stories. But, the idea resonates. Possibly because I really like to re-read my favorites. And, they're not all classic, but they do start to feel like poetry after a while. Or, at least, the way I wish I could read poetry. 

[Chrysalis Academy]

ok, I am having a difficult time keeping up with this thread, clearly.

 

I was under the impression that some were starting off the year with Voyage of the Beagle?  Did I get that wrong? 

 

Anyway, if I am correct, then I will be a little behind you all.  I was in line for Two Years, Eight Months, and Twenty-Eight Days by Rushdie and it came in faster than I expected.  So, rather than starting off the year with a classic, my usual habit, I will start it off with a new to me writer. Which, when I think of it, might be a better habit.

 

It is a fast paced book that I am finding easy to read, so I might not be too far behind you all...if there is a 'you all' to be behind.

 

Shannon and I are going to read Voyage, but we won't start for a few weeks, we're finishing up earth science with readings from History of Science, then we'll dive into the Beagle. So we might be on the same schedule!

[Robin M]

ok, I am having a difficult time keeping up with this thread, clearly.

 

I was under the impression that some were starting off the year with Voyage of the Beagle? Did I get that wrong?

 

Anyway, if I am correct, then I will be a little behind you all. I was in line for Two Years, Eight Months, and Twenty-Eight Days by Rushdie and it came in faster than I expected. So, rather than starting off the year with a classic, my usual habit, I will start it off with a new to me writer. Which, when I think of it, might be a better habit.

 

It is a fast paced book that I am finding easy to read, so I might not be too far behind you all...if there is a 'you all' to be behind.

Good morning! You aren't behind. I have Voyage of the Beagle scheduled for April so no worries. Monthly themes and reads are listed on 52 books. Link is in my signature

[redsquirrel]

phew!  April is no problem.  Thank you

[Bluegoat]

To the bolded--

I just started C.S. Lewis' Of Other Worlds. Speaking in the context of re-reading and the reader filling in the gaps the writer must necessarily leave, he then says:

 

"It is [re-reading], of course, a good test for every reader of every kind of book. An unliterary man may be defined as one who reads books once only. There is hope for a man who has never read Malory or Boswell or Tristam Shandy or Shakespeare's Sonnets: but what can you do with a man who says he 'has read' them, meaning he has read the once, and thinks that this settles the matter? Yet I think the test has a special application to the matter in hand. For excitement, in the sense defined above, is just what must disappear from a second reading. You cannot, except at the first reading, be really curious about what happened. If you find that the reader of popular romance--however uneducated a reader, however bad the romances--goes back to his old favourites again and again, then you have pretty good evidence that they are to him a sort of poetry."

 

I'm not sure about how well I remember books from the first time around (sometimes the second reading really is a surprise, again! ha :) ), but that's my own personal memory problem. And, I'm pretty sure in the essay his term romance means something like popular fiction, not just love stories. But, the idea resonates. Possibly because I really like to re-read my favorites. And, they're not all classic, but they do start to feel like poetry after a while. Or, at least, the way I wish I could read poetry. 

 

He probably means it as a particular type of book, but it would be somewhat brader than what we think of as romances.  Books where feelings are important, might be a way to put it - a hard-boiled mystery wouldn't qualify, because it is action driven with typically little character interest.

[Lady Florida.]

More from Pepys and his book habits: he buys a copy of Samuel Butler's Hudibras, decides it's not so good after all, and gives it away. Everyone raves about it and insists it's cutting and hilarious, so he goes and buys another copy-- to give it a second chance. This sounds as familiar as his continual failed resolution to get his TBR pile ("press") under control.

 

I have a free copy on my Kindle, but recently read where some reviewers said it's not complete. I don't know how to find a complete e-book version, but I've had this on my TBR list for quite some time. Another diary I want to read is Daniel Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year.

[swimmermom3]

Sounds like a plan. Anyone else interested in sparse Scandinavian fiction?

 

Has anyone discussed Par Lagerkvist and The Sibyl?  Loved that book and it's a quick read. I've always meant to look up more of Lagerkvist's works.  

[Pam in CT]

re: wasting classics on the young:

Age of Innocence is one of my favorite books, ever. I didn't read it when I was young, for which I am grateful, I think I wouldn't have appreciated it. But I read it for my book group a few years ago, and I found it luminous, breathtaking, tragic, and amazing.  It worked for me much, much better than The House of Mirth, and it's the rather rare example of a male protagonist who I felt - completely.  I could get inside him, could see the world through his eyes, and my heart broke for him.  

 

I have an increasingly large list of books that I think shouldn't be read till you are 40, or at least 30 - they are wasted on the young, who haven't experienced the kind of self-sacrificing life choices that come with becoming an adult.  I know that there is a lot of pressure on this board (not necessarily this thread, but WTM in general) to have young people read lots of classics. I read lots of classics as a high schooler, and easily half of them were completely wasted on me. I'm finding it a completely different experience to revisit them, or visit them for the first time, now with a bit more maturity under my belt.

 

What is my point?  It's not that teens shouldn't read classics. I guess it's that we should never stop reading, or re-reading, and never assume that because we've read something in our youth, we're done with it. I guess what makes these books classics is that they have something different to offer us, a different conversation, that has the ability to change and grow as we do.

 

ETA:  And when I say "classics" I'm not referring to any canonical list, but to the books that speak to us on re-reading. How's that for a circular definition?  ;)  But I was thinking about this re-reading thing, in contrast to the comment from someone upthread that they revisited a past loved book with disappointment. I've had that happen, too.  So I guess I'm thinking of classics as books that meet you where you are throughout your life.  

 

Not that there isn't value in that book that hits you, just right, when you are young! I'm thinking of something like Cather in the Rye - I suspect that if I read it now, I'd just find Holden whiny and annoying.  :lol:

 

I would very much like to see your list, if you're sharing.

 

 

Coming back around to the where do you get your books question, the re-reading business is a STRONG argument for owning and retaining and liberally marking up books.  The pleasure in re-visiting the marginalia of one of my college era books, and in so doing glimpsing my prior self, never gets old.  Similarly I really enjoy reading my elder daughter's commentary when she passes hers along...

[Woodland Mist Academy]

On the other hand...

 

There's something to be said about reading books when we're young and inexperienced. It gives our brains somewhere to go to for wisdom and our hearts somewhere to go to for comfort when later in life we find ourselves in uncharted territory or on unholy ground...

Edited January 4, 2016 by Woodland Mist Academy

[Guest]

re: streams of consciousness swirling differently

Re: Ulysses specifically -- well, maybe I'll get there in another decade or so.  There certainly were bits of it that I had me laughing out loud (which always helps me get through anything with SO MANY WORDS) and many parts that had me slack-jawed at the wondrousness of the language.  And the Goodreads structure (thank you!) helped a lot with decoding tools.  But I think it was what you're calling "head space" that finally sunk me...  I have quite enjoyed the shorter Joyce books and story collections I've read, but Ulysses was just.too.much, and "taking up too high a % of the limited neurons available" is a good metaphor for how it felt, lol...

 

... and re grouping Joyce, Woolf, Faulkner and Proust together: for me, I can see the reading experience of (shorter!) Joyce and Woolf as somewhat comparable (exulting in the language, congratulating myself on the fairly rare occasions that I'm clever enough to recognize the references, being mesmerized by the delve into the interior Random Walk of someone else's brain, etc); but the empathy experience is quite different between the two.  Peering out at the world through Woolf's eyes is FAR more accessible to me.

 

Faulkner for me is quite different -- it doesn't feel nearly so stream of consciousness-y, though that certainly is there -- I'm much more conscious (and appreciative) of the structure of the stories, and anticipating the twists and revelations that are sure to come (almost like your Shakespeare!), and SO much of the impact is about specificities of place and race and time... 

 

... and I've never even attempted Proust.  And, not now either.  I've signed up for Timaeus and can only take on so much!

 

 

 

 

re: peace, Quaker Wisdom, and the struggle to live deeply and authentically:

 

 

I love this.

 

:grouphug: It's all any of us can do, really.

 

I could not tell you how often I've returned to Rosie's authenticity post.  Many, many times.

 

Oh, yes. 

 

The older I get the more I am realizing how much my reading experience is shaped by who I am right now today - so each time I read a book, there are ways in which it is an entirely different book than the previous times...

 

This is more true of books with depth... with various layers to experience, but I have found it to be true of some comfort reads as well.

 

And, **YES** re the different empathy experiences for Woolf vs Joyce.  Comparing the third (?I think) section of Ulysses with its maximum stream of consciousness to Woolf's The Waves - which also dispenses with narrative markers - the latter was an immersible, deeply moving experience & the former and very cerebral one...

 

Do you have a particular Faulkner you might recommend? 

 

re: peace, Quaker Wisdom, and the struggle to live deeply and authentically:

 

I do love Rosie's post (thank you, love, for sharing from your heart like that :grouphug: ), but what I am struggling with now is in a different realm.

 

...it is how to be me, how to take the next steps in my personal journey to bring my light into the world... in ways that feel fully *me*, while having a body that doesn't work very well and a life full of other, very treasured, very important, commitments.  ...but I am seeing that if I live the rest of my life only as a mother, a grandmother, a member of my shul, even an intellectual with my own head space... even going back to teaching or some other work... and I do not take action that feels real enough... action beyond phone banking for a candidate or writing a letter... something that addresses social injustice more directly, then, right now at least, I will feel I have failed... failed at being myself. 

 

How I address that I do not know.  ...but it burns behind every moment of my life right now.

 

[Guest]

Age of Innocence is one of my favorite books, ever. I didn't read it when I was young, for which I am grateful, I think I wouldn't have appreciated it. But I read it for my book group a few years ago, and I found it luminous, breathtaking, tragic, and amazing.  It worked for me much, much better than The House of Mirth, and it's the rather rare example of a male protagonist who I felt - completely.  I could get inside him, could see the world through his eyes, and my heart broke for him.  

 

I have an increasingly large list of books that I think shouldn't be read till you are 40, or at least 30 - they are wasted on the young, who haven't experienced the kind of self-sacrificing life choices that come with becoming an adult.  I know that there is a lot of pressure on this board (not necessarily this thread, but WTM in general) to have young people read lots of classics. I read lots of classics as a high schooler, and easily half of them were completely wasted on me. I'm finding it a completely different experience to revisit them, or visit them for the first time, now with a bit more maturity under my belt.

 

What is my point?  It's not that teens shouldn't read classics. I guess it's that we should never stop reading, or re-reading, and never assume that because we've read something in our youth, we're done with it. I guess what makes these books classics is that they have something different to offer us, a different conversation, that has the ability to change and grow as we do.

 

ETA:  And when I say "classics" I'm not referring to any canonical list, but to the books that speak to us on re-reading. How's that for a circular definition?  ;)  But I was thinking about this re-reading thing, in contrast to the comment from someone upthread that they revisited a past loved book with disappointment. I've had that happen, too.  So I guess I'm thinking of classics as books that meet you where you are throughout your life.  

 

Not that there isn't value in that book that hits you, just right, when you are young! I'm thinking of something like Cather in the Rye - I suspect that if I read it now, I'd just find Holden whiny and annoying.  :lol:

 

Trying to see the world through his eyes is part of what broke the book for me when I was younger... because I cannot relate to the... trying to avoid spoilers here... to the ways in which he created the situation he then fought against. 

 

...but reading it the other year, seeing it not as a story where I identify with Newland, but one where I can see the webs of choices, of situations, of a set of strengths and weaknesses which aren't mine, but... there are ways in which I, too, have been a partner in my own... well, imprisonment is an awfully melodramatic term... constraints, perhaps?  ...and to navigate those constraints, to see how I, perhaps inadvertently, chose them & how I make peace with that, how I live with integrity after that.

 

...and May... I've always related more to her - to someone who wants peace, stability, security, who wants to hold onto my loved ones... (there are many other ways in which I don't connect with her at all)... but see how that can lead to distortion, to falsity, to a hollow shell of one's dreams...

 

Ellen is more opaque to me - but I see her victimization more clearly now... and the ways in which Newland uses her are very painful. 

 

 

I appreciate many books more now... but partly because I encountered them as a teen, as a young adult... and then again now.   I have the layers of the different encounters... and even the ones I didn't really *see* when I was 12 or 17 or 23... have shaped who I am and how I read and my little part of the "Great Conversation"

 

...there are books I'd have been better off not trying until I was in my 30's or 40's... but I think my list would be radically different from yours.  I hated Catcher in the Rye with an intensity I doubt I'd experience now... but George Eliot rocked my world when I was in my midteens... *that* I could relate to... and Austen... and Shakespeare... but none of the things one thinks of as teen lit... not a flicker of connection.

 

When I've done lit with my teens, I've always given them a menu of options (often one we've created together) & they were always free to set aside anything...

 

 

[Nan in Mass]

...

...but I am struggling. I am having trouble seeing how to be my deepest self within the parameters (health and family) I have... and this is the first time I have ever felt this...

...

Eliana, I think this time in our lives that just IS difficult. At least if you life has a shape that somewhat resembles that of the traditional homemaker/mother.

Hugs

Nan

[Guest]

For people like me, to whom stream of consciousness is torture, yes Faulkner, Woolf, Joyce, and Proust do all go together. Different styles, different prose, different emotional impact, but all equally torturous. :D

 

*giggle*  I guess it is like my peanut allergy... it doesn't matter if it is a Thai peanut sauce or peanut brittle... it is all peanuts to me.

 

It does take a different kind of reading, doesn't it?  I guess it was invisible to me as a register because it isn't one of the ways my mind sorts my reading experiences...

 

 

 

 

I am completely amazed by your ability to read a book a day. I would love to increase my reading speed while retaining comprehension (tips, anyone?) but even if I could read a book a day, I don't know that my poor brain could handle all that information. I might explode. Kudos to you! It sounds like a natural gift.

 

I think some of it is just how I'm wired & some is that I've used that wiring so much... so it has had a chance to achieve some of its potential.

 

I don't think there is any intrinsic value in *more*.  The value is in the reading experience, in what is absorbed, enjoyed, engaged with...

 

On the other hand, I imagine that as one reads more, one's capacity might gradually increase? 

 

Although my reading speed has been about this for as long as I can remember, I have been fascinated and delighted to see how my capacity for different types of writing, different *ways* of reading has expanded over these past few years - thanks to the encouragement and examples here!

 

 

 

 

I think my hesitancy with Age of Innocence is that I lack compassion for people who cheat on their spouses.  I don't believe that we are destined to have one true love. Rather, love is a choice.  I disliked Anna Karenina and the movie The Duchess (about Georgiana (Spencer) Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire) for the same reasons. 

 

That is a plot point that grates on me too when I encounter it, but what I've found is that there is an enormous difference (for me) in stories that romanticize betrayal and ones which depict it and contextualize it... in AoI I do not see it as romanticized (well, *Newland* romanticizes it, but I don't see the authorial voice doing so)... I see a story which shows how we can squash down our selves & then externalize our sense of lack... how we can create our own constraints... and then hurt others by balking at them... and how we can choose to find peace and a measure of integrity.

 

Though if you disliked Anna Karenina (the book, not the character), you might not like this one either.  I felt AK showed the sordid heartache that comes with choosing selfishness over integrity (among many other things)... but also how her choices grew out of a loveless marriage with an unfaithful husband... and her desperate, needy clutching... her externalization of her internal emptiness and sadness is where I see the tragedy... the love story in AK is not a tragic one.. and it doesn't involve Anna herself...

 

(If you are reacting to the movies of either of the above, I have no insights... I suspect the connections with their source material is frequently tenuous)

 

 

...as I also suspect with The Duchess.... her biography is fascinating... but also very sad, on so many levels.  

 

....but as I think about it... why is it Anna's choices that are the ones condemned as "adultery" and not her husband's (ongoing, long standing) lack of fidelity?  ...and with Georgiana... the... social mores of her class at the time are one of the more absurd mockeries of anything one might call marriage - much like some eras of the French aristocracy.  ...a bit like today's "open" marriages, but with a weird set of ground rules.  (the weird ground rules being the source of the absurd mockery, imho).

 

Even sadder is Emma Bovary.  ...I kept thinking on my last reread that she needed meaningful work in her life so desperately, she is such a sad, empty, person... and trying to frantically to fill her emptiness with the only thing she knows "romance"... 

 

...but I don't think seeing those tragedies and where they come from is the same thing as sympathizing with a choice to betray someone. 

 

Newland's decision to press for an early marriage *because* he was being pulled in another direction is despicable.  ..and his choice to keep fanning the flames of his attraction equally so.  ...but I don't think the text disguises that at all... we can see so clearly his wrongheadedness, his selfishness, his cowardice and unwillingness to face his own truths or to deal straightly with others.

 

...but there are ways in which we all do that.  Not that we would perpetrate that heinous a betrayal... but in smaller ways, don't we all sometimes lack the courage to face ourselves?  Doesn't that lead to little betrayal, ways in which we hurt or let down those whom we love?

 

...and what do we do next?  How do we stop and look at ourselves and our choices and the constraints we've committed to?  How do we find peace? Live with integrity?  ...and how imperfectly?

[idnib]

I have Predictably Irrational:  The hidden forces that shape our decisions by Dan Ariely

 

I finished this last month. Let me know if you want to discuss when you're done.

 

A quick question, though:  Where do you guys find all your books to read?  Since this year I'm doing a lot of re-reads, I will own most, if not all, of the books I'm reading (others are ones I've ordered or that I already have but haven't read yet), but I'm assuming that most everyone, if they're reading all new books, isn't buying them all.  Or are you?  

 

I buy more books than I get from the library, but I also weed through and donate fairly often.  Most of my buying is from our local library's book sale, although I tend to stock up more on books for the kids there. (Yes, I have bought back a few of my donated books at the book sale!) Our library is a smaller system but in CA it's often true that you can get cards for a city's library simply by being a resident of the state. For this reason I also have a few other cards for nearby cities and also one from my hometown for when we visit. I also use Audible but not much, although the kids use it a lot. For classics, which I often read with the goodreads Classics and the Western Canon group, I go digital as those are out of copyright usually and it's easy to find nicely formatted PDFs. I have an Archipelago subscription thanks to the readers here letting me know about it, and sometimes we trade books as well. I also request books and gift cards to B&N or the local bookstore from my in-laws for my birthday.

 

ETA: Looking at your children's ages, I suggest the 11.5 year-old have a new job of taking the books to the library, unless that 1/2 mile is particularly dangerous to walk or ride a bike. Our rule is (more or less) to dump a library book in the trunk of my car as soon as you're done with it. My son (11) walks to the library 1.4 miles with all our books from the trunk if we're getting behind. We rarely do, though, because we have a book club twice/month there. Having them in the trunk also allows me to swing by and return books if I have time.

Edited January 4, 2016 by idnib

[Kareni]

I just finished an enjoyable science fiction romance ~  Dark Horse by Michelle Diener.   (The book is currently on sale for 99 cents for Kindle readers; I believe the sale ends January 9.  I'd heard such good things about it that I actually bought it.)

 

There's a balanced review here.

 

The book description:

 

"Some secrets carry the weight of the world.

Rose McKenzie may be far from Earth with no way back, but she's made a powerful ally--a fellow prisoner with whom she's formed a strong bond. Sazo's an artificial intelligence. He's saved her from captivity and torture, but he's also put her in the middle of a conflict, leaving Rose with her loyalties divided.

Captain Dav Jallan doesn't know why he and his crew have stumbled across an almost legendary Class 5 battleship, but he's not going to complain. The only problem is, all its crew are dead, all except for one strange, new alien being.

She calls herself Rose. She seems small and harmless, but less and less about her story is adding up, and Dav has a bad feeling his crew, and maybe even the four planets, are in jeopardy. The Class 5's owners, the Tecran, look set to start a war to get it back and Dav suspects Rose isn't the only alien being who survived what happened on the Class 5. And whatever else is out there is playing its own games.

In this race for the truth, he's going to have to go against his leaders and trust the dark horse."

 

 

The next book in the series (featuring another couple) is out as of today.  The author also writes historical romance; I may have to read one of those soon.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Nan in Mass]

re: wasting classics on the young:

 

I would very much like to see your list, if you're sharing.

 

 

Coming back around to the where do you get your books question, the re-reading business is a STRONG argument for owning and retaining and liberally marking up books. The pleasure in re-visiting the marginalia of one of my college era books, and in so doing glimpsing my prior self, never gets old. Similarly I really enjoy reading my elder daughter's commentary when she passes hers along...

I love reading my mothers books because she marks the occasional beautiful passage.

 

Nan

[shukriyya]

I love reading my mothers books because she marks the occasional beautiful passage.

 

Nan

 

A whole other narrative to follow!

 

[shage]

 

 

re: peace, Quaker Wisdom, and the struggle to live deeply and authentically:

 

I do love Rosie's post (thank you, love, for sharing from your heart like that :grouphug: ), but what I am struggling with now is in a different realm.

 

...it is how to be me, how to take the next steps in my personal journey to bring my light into the world... in ways that feel fully *me*, while having a body that doesn't work very well and a life full of other, very treasured, very important, commitments.  ...but I am seeing that if I live the rest of my life only as a mother, a grandmother, a member of my shul, even an intellectual with my own head space... even going back to teaching or some other work... and I do not take action that feels real enough... action beyond phone banking for a candidate or writing a letter... something that addresses social injustice more directly, then, right now at least, I will feel I have failed... failed at being myself. 

 

How I address that I do not know.  ...but it burns behind every moment of my life right now.

 

 

There is much in this post which resonates with me.  (Except I am in good health--let me say that upfront because I know how health shapes the moments of days.  Good health allows me to do more, though possible in a less empathetic and thoughtful way.)

 

I am at the 10+ year point of homeschooling and could, theoretically, continue for another 8 years if the kids chose that path.

 

I also am at a crossroads with my part-time career and I am finding the crossroads tricky to navigate.

 

For background, I was raised in a "peace" church and continue to worship where pacifism is the norm (not required) and feels authentic to me.  I also have a background with mental health and the judicial system, and somehow have managed to find a path in that world that is in line with my religious convictions.  It has not been easy, but neither has it been overly difficult. I know and love the world of the incarcerated mentally ill, even though it can be harsh, for reasons which are impossible to articulate.  Odd wiring? The influence of unusual mentors? I can't say.

 

Now, though, I have the opportunity to moves towards working WITH law enforcement, not with the prisoners, and this is creating an internal crisis.  I don't know if I can find a path in that world.  Yet, the work of social justice (and specifically treatment of people with mental illness) within law enforcement settings is immediate and possible, and to walk away feels wrong too.

 

And of course there is the pull between professional life and that of mother, wife, and homemaker.  I make no apologies for choosing to protect fiercely those roles because there is a level of comfort and love from those bonds that no professional job could ever provide.

 

Do I retreat to home?  Press forward?

 

I have a few months, possibly longer, to make some decisions.  Somehow it is comforting to me to encounter others facing similar yet different dilemmas.   

 

The list of justice oriented themed books in this thread alone has given me pause because maybe there is a starting point? 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 4, 2016 by shage

[Nan in Mass]

Eliana, I am somewhat familiar with your dilemma. Sigh. My personal solution is to try to do some of the prep work for the next thing I want to do while I am in this family-heavy stage of my life. I,m doing it piecemeal, as I find the energy, in a not very organized way, figuring that any prep is better than nothing. I am finding even the little here and there comforting. It isn,t as though I want to hurry this bit of my life. I can,t really see now how I am ever going to manage to fit all the pieces together to make room for the contributing-to-the-world piece, but I am leaving that part for the future. In my experience, impossible-seeming things often somehow happen, providing I pay attention. But maybe you already are doing all that...

 

Nan

[Nan in Mass]

A whole other narrative to follow!

 

Yes!

 

I have been thinking about you because I am reading An Illustrated Life. : )

 

Nan

[redsquirrel]

Oh, and after going through this thread I've added so many books to my 'want to read' list that I will probably never, ever get through them.   :lol:  I'm guessing that's a permanent state for everyone here?

 

A quick question, though:  Where do you guys find all your books to read?  Since this year I'm doing a lot of re-reads, I will own most, if not all, of the books I'm reading (others are ones I've ordered or that I already have but haven't read yet), but I'm assuming that most everyone, if they're reading all new books, isn't buying them all.  Or are you?  

 

Our library kind of sucks (plus I owe them an insane amount of money), so we rarely visit.  Though I keep telling myself I need to go pay my fines because Link is a voracious reader and soon our shelves won't be able to keep up with him.  The kid's reading level is higher than mine, I swear.   :lol:

Then I just have to practice actually remembering to take the books with me to return when I leave the house.  You'd think it wouldn't be that hard since it's literally a 1/2 mile away and I have to drive by it if I go anywhere.  But yeah, I never ever remember.

 

So I could potentially do the library after I pay them.   :lol:  There's also the possibility of borrowing books from friends, if they have any books I'm interested in.

 

Anyway, yeah, so where does everyone get their books?

 

I get my books from the library.  But...my dh is a librarian at a major library. Because he is faculty/staff he can keep the books indefinitely.  However, I have to admit that I do more and more of my reading on my Kindle.  I borrow them from the library.

 

Here is something for you to investigate, but you need two things: a kindle and a big city with a big library that allows anyone in the state to borrow.  Because I am a NY resident I can get a card for the public library system of Manhattan.  Their selection of ebooks is frankly, overwhelming. And there is no chance of late fees with ebooks, when it is due, they suck it off your ebook reader, unless you go offline.

 

So between dh's library, our excellent local library and my NYC library card, I am in piggy heaven with books. But, if I weren't I would find out when a big library book sale is happening near me. It is worth a day trip to a nearby city to hit a good library sale. 

 

 

[Chrysalis Academy]

 

That is a plot point that grates on me too when I encounter it, but what I've found is that there is an enormous difference (for me) in stories that romanticize betrayal and ones which depict it and contextualize it... in AoI I do not see it as romanticized (well, *Newland* romanticizes it, but I don't see the authorial voice doing so)... I see a story which shows how we can squash down our selves & then externalize our sense of lack... how we can create our own constraints... and then hurt others by balking at them... and how we can choose to find peace and a measure of integrity.

 

Though if you disliked Anna Karenina (the book, not the character), you might not like this one either.  I felt AK showed the sordid heartache that comes with choosing selfishness over integrity (among many other things)... but also how her choices grew out of a loveless marriage with an unfaithful husband... and her desperate, needy clutching... her externalization of her internal emptiness and sadness is where I see the tragedy... the love story in AK is not a tragic one.. and it doesn't involve Anna herself...

 

(If you are reacting to the movies of either of the above, I have no insights... I suspect the connections with their source material is frequently tenuous)

 

 

...as I also suspect with The Duchess.... her biography is fascinating... but also very sad, on so many levels.  

 

....but as I think about it... why is it Anna's choices that are the ones condemned as "adultery" and not her husband's (ongoing, long standing) lack of fidelity?  ...and with Georgiana... the... social mores of her class at the time are one of the more absurd mockeries of anything one might call marriage - much like some eras of the French aristocracy.  ...a bit like today's "open" marriages, but with a weird set of ground rules.  (the weird ground rules being the source of the absurd mockery, imho).

 

Even sadder is Emma Bovary.  ...I kept thinking on my last reread that she needed meaningful work in her life so desperately, she is such a sad, empty, person... and trying to frantically to fill her emptiness with the only thing she knows "romance"... 

 

...but I don't think seeing those tragedies and where they come from is the same thing as sympathizing with a choice to betray someone. 

 

Newland's decision to press for an early marriage *because* he was being pulled in another direction is despicable.  ..and his choice to keep fanning the flames of his attraction equally so.  ...but I don't think the text disguises that at all... we can see so clearly his wrongheadedness, his selfishness, his cowardice and unwillingness to face his own truths or to deal straightly with others.

 

...but there are ways in which we all do that.  Not that we would perpetrate that heinous a betrayal... but in smaller ways, don't we all sometimes lack the courage to face ourselves?  Doesn't that lead to little betrayal, ways in which we hurt or let down those whom we love?

 

...and what do we do next?  How do we stop and look at ourselves and our choices and the constraints we've committed to?  How do we find peace? Live with integrity?  ...and how imperfectly?

 

I'm inspired to pull Age of Innocence of the shelf and read it again . . . 

[Lady Florida.]

Although my reading speed has been about this for as long as I can remember /quote]

 

 

 Though if you disliked Anna Karenina (the book, not the character), you might not like this one either.  I felt AK showed the sordid heartache that comes with choosing selfishness over integrity (among many other things)... but also how her choices grew out of a loveless marriage with an unfaithful husband... and her desperate, needy clutching... her externalization of her internal emptiness and sadness is where I see the tragedy... the love story in AK is not a tragic one.. and it doesn't involve Anna herself...

 

 

 

Even sadder is Emma Bovary.  ...I kept thinking on my last reread that she needed meaningful work in her life so desperately, she is such a sad, empty, person... and trying to frantically to fill her emptiness with the only thing she knows "romance"...

 

I was going to split your quote, but code has suddenly stopped working for me. 

 

I love reading your analyses of books, especially classics.

 

 I took a speed reading class in community college because two of my friends were taking it and we wanted to take as many classes together as possible. We carpooled, so it was easier on all of us if our classes ended at or around the same time. Anyway, the problem was that grades were based on improvement. I was already quite a fast reader and didn't have a lot of room for improvement (I nearly topped out in the test given on the first day). The instructor convinced me to drop the class because he said the best I'd be able to get was a C, and that was being generous.  :lol:

 

Re: Anna Karenina vs. Madame Bovary - I felt more pity for Emma than for Anna, though I preferred AK as a novel. Though both were selfish and both were pitiable, to me Anna had more of the former while Emma brought on more pity.

[Jane in NC]

...it is how to be me, how to take the next steps in my personal journey to bring my light into the world... in ways that feel fully *me*, while having a body that doesn't work very well and a life full of other, very treasured, very important, commitments.  ...but I am seeing that if I live the rest of my life only as a mother, a grandmother, a member of my shul, even an intellectual with my own head space... even going back to teaching or some other work... and I do not take action that feels real enough... action beyond phone banking for a candidate or writing a letter... something that addresses social injustice more directly, then, right now at least, I will feel I have failed... failed at being myself. 

 

How I address that I do not know.  ...but it burns behind every moment of my life right now.

 

 

My dear, you are spreading the light from your corner of the world through our discussions and book recommendations.  Please keep that in mind. Dreamer that I am, I hope that some of our silent followers of this thread are influenced.

 

Something that has been in the back of my mind for a while...Whatever happened to the collective societal memory of influential figures like Jane Addams? When I was in elementary school, she was my hero. The school library had a number of biographies of famous Americans (standard series that was probably everywhere).  I borrowed, read and reread the Jane Addams book regularly.  Her biography by Louise Knight has been on my (very long) library list for a few years now.  Your comment pulled the book onto my radar again.  What a role model!

 

I'll try to stop at the library this week to borrow Jane Addams:  Spirit in Action.  Thanks for the nudge--across the ethers.

 

[Chrysalis Academy]

re: wasting classics on the young:

 

I would very much like to see your list, if you're sharing.

 

 

I will have to think about this more.  Some  of the books that have been mentioned here, actually - Age of Innocence, Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, I'd add Medea - I think you need a little life perspective to get past either judgement or outrage.  For me, Virginia Woolf was impossible until I was a grownup.  Beloved by Toni Morrison. The Grapes of Wrath. I'm sure there are others I'm not thinking of at the moment - I don't actually have a physical list.  ;)

 

It's not that teenagers shouldn't read this stuff.  It's just that I've had such an eye-opening experience having read these as a teen and read them again in my 40s, I can hardly believe they are the same books.  And as I work on my own teen's high school reading list, and pore through the lists in TWTM, it's just been on my mind a lot lately.

[Nan in Mass]

When I was choosing which great books to put on my highschoolers, reading lists, I chose ones that I thought they would enjoy, or at least be able to grapple with immediately, and would be unlikely to read on their own, later. I had no idea what many of them were, their were tons of them, I was still haunted by a few I had been made to read, and I didn,t see why I couldn,t pick ones that wouldn,t make my not very academically minded boys decide they hated literature. Part of that was deciding that I was going to skip moderns entirely and substitute scifi, which I considered a necessary part of their education anyway. Judging by their reading now, this approach was very successful. : )

 

Nan

[Woodland Mist Academy]

I will have to think about this more.  Some  of the books that have been mentioned here, actually - Age of Innocence, Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, I'd add Medea - I think you need a little life perspective to get past either judgement or outrage.  For me, Virginia Woolf was impossible until I was a grownup.  Beloved by Toni Morrison. The Grapes of Wrath. I'm sure there are others I'm not thinking of at the moment - I don't actually have a physical list.  ;)

 

It's not that teenagers shouldn't read this stuff.  It's just that I've had such an eye-opening experience having read these as a teen and read them again in my 40s, I can hardly believe they are the same books.  And as I work on my own teen's high school reading list, and pore through the lists in TWTM, it's just been on my mind a lot lately.

 

I've been thinking about it lots lately too.  I've decided not to choose many of my teen's books. It's so personal - I have no idea how she will react - now or later. There are a few must reads, but very, very few. I'm trying to give options or leave it entirely up to her.

 

The other day we arrived at the bookstore and went our separate ways. When we met again she had Crime and Punishment in her hands. I would never have chosen that for her holiday reading, yet she read it in 3 days and was captivated. She knew much better than I what she needed at that moment. 

 

I read The Little Guide to Your Well-Read Life several years ago. It may be time for me to read it again as high school weighs heavily and the walls of various lists begin to close us in..

[MaeFlowers]

So, I think I'm going to take another stab at this. I faded quickly last year as life picked up.

My first book of the year was The Fellowship of the Ring. I finished it yesterday. This was not a reread for me. My dad tried to get me to read the series as a teenager and I never could get into them. I read The Hobbit last month and am loving the series so far.

I started A Pilgrim's Progress last night and am now about a quarter of the way through. I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. There is a big glaring issue for me but I guess I need to think about that a bit.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to a great year in reading. I really like the monthly read alongs and can't wait to get started.

[Jane in NC]

Has anyone discussed Par Lagerkvist and The Sibyl?  Loved that book and it's a quick read. I've always meant to look up more of Lagerkvist's works.  

 

Not at all familiar with the author, Lisa.  And unfortunately not available at my library.  :(

 

re: wasting classics on the young:

 

I would very much like to see your list, if you're sharing.

 

 

Coming back around to the where do you get your books question, the re-reading business is a STRONG argument for owning and retaining and liberally marking up books.  The pleasure in re-visiting the marginalia of one of my college era books, and in so doing glimpsing my prior self, never gets old.  Similarly I really enjoy reading my elder daughter's commentary when she passes hers along...

 

My complete Shakespeare has been a part of my life since I took at college class in Shakespeare at age 17.  I love encountering my marginal comments or pencil slashed passages that I thought were interesting.

 

Another thing about rereading my books is finding the stuff that I stuffed within them. There are postcards, small pieces of art, sometimes newspaper articles.

 

I will have to think about this more.  Some  of the books that have been mentioned here, actually - Age of Innocence, Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, I'd add Medea - I think you need a little life perspective to get past either judgement or outrage.  For me, Virginia Woolf was impossible until I was a grownup.  Beloved by Toni Morrison. The Grapes of Wrath. I'm sure there are others I'm not thinking of at the moment - I don't actually have a physical list.  ;)

 

It's not that teenagers shouldn't read this stuff.  It's just that I've had such an eye-opening experience having read these as a teen and read them again in my 40s, I can hardly believe they are the same books.  And as I work on my own teen's high school reading list, and pore through the lists in TWTM, it's just been on my mind a lot lately.

 

I have been revisiting books that I loved post-undergrad when I threw myself into American Expatriate Lit and discovered Eastern/Middle European authors.  What is wonderful is finding that I had pretty good taste at age 22 or 26!  Yes, there is much greater depth than the naive Jane realized but my introduction at an earlier age helped shape me--books are that real to me.

 

But we have a House o' Books.  The joke about my inlaws was that they did not need walls, that books could hold the ceilings and roof up.  Some of those books found their way here, adding to our already robust collection.  I really try to use the library now simply to keep the books in some level of control. 

[Violet Crown]

I have a free copy on my Kindle, but recently read where some reviewers said it's not complete. I don't know how to find a complete e-book version, but I've had this on my TBR list for quite some time. Another diary I want to read is Daniel Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year.

The Diary I just read is abridged. I don't have it in me to slog through all the volumes. While it's full of fascinating and engaging narrative, Pepys didn't write it for publication, and so there's a lot of very abridgeable content also.

 

(The editor btw is the poet Richard Le Gallienne, best known in this house as the father of actress Eva Le Gallienne, who wrote Flossie and Bossie, the best children's book ever.)

 

ETA: I read Journal of the Plague Year last year, and it would be a great companion book for Diary as Pepys lived in London during the Plague and ensuing Great Fire, and writes about them.

Edited January 4, 2016 by Violet Crown

[swimmermom3]

 

...it is how to be me, how to take the next steps in my personal journey to bring my light into the world... in ways that feel fully *me*, while having a body that doesn't work very well and a life full of other, very treasured, very important, commitments.  ...but I am seeing that if I live the rest of my life only as a mother, a grandmother, a member of my shul, even an intellectual with my own head space... even going back to teaching or some other work... and I do not take action that feels real enough... action beyond phone banking for a candidate or writing a letter... something that addresses social injustice more directly, then, right now at least, I will feel I have failed... failed at being myself. 

 

How I address that I do not know.  ...but it burns behind every moment of my life right now.

 

 

:grouphug:  There are over 300 responses in this thread that talk primarily about how words move us, change us, help us grow, help us grieve, and help us become one step closer to our truer selves.  I think I am stating the obvious, but Eliana, sweetheart, I see you making a difference through your words. Yours is such a unique, lovely, and moving voice.  I look forward to reading your posts even when you are just talking young adult books written half a century ago or which translation to read for The Iliad. When the conversations go deeper, your words often touch the raw nerve and I somehow feel soothed, more at peace. But then I only know you through the board and perhaps you are already an accomplished novelist. That wouldn't surprise me at all given that you are a woman of many talents.

 

In a nation and a world of angry, thoughtless, fear-driven soundbites, a voice like yours is a rare gift.  Perhaps words are the means for you to address social injustice more directly.

 

 

[swimmermom3]

The Diary I just read is abridged. I don't have it in me to slog through all the volumes. While it's full of fascinating and engaging narrative, Pepys didn't write it for publication, and so there's a lot of very abridgeable content also.

 

(The editor btw is the poet Richard Le Gallienne, best known in this house as the father of actress Eva Le Gallienne, who wrote Flossie and Bossie, the best children's book ever.)

 

ETA: I read Journal of the Plague Year last year, and it would be a great companion book for Diary as Pepys lived in London during the Plague and ensuing Great Fire, and writes about them.

 

The Journal of the Plague Year is on my shelf as I just reread Moll Flanders after a 30 year break and since you have been offering tantalizing snippets of Pepys diary, I think these both will definitely have to go on my 2016 list. Thank you.