Montrose Great Books Blog is UP and ready for your comments about Mark Twain discussion
A Aman
Enjoyed the discussion last Thursday. If you didn't say everything
you wanted to say, you still have an opportunity. Or if you didn't
attend but still want to add your "two cents", go for it.
I just uploaded my entry for our Mark Twain discussion to the blog at
http://www.houstonbookclubs.org/blog/. Feel free to add your
comments. Let me know if you have any problems reading or writing to
the page.
--Alice
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UPCOMING SELECTIONS
=========================
-- Jun 5, 2008 THE STRANGER by Camus (123 pages) publ 1946
Author was 1957 Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature
The new English translation by Matthew Ward published in 1989 is the
preferred translation.
Book is one of the best-known examples of absurdist fiction. Some
classify it as Existential. The setting is Algiers. The stranger of
the story is a young man who commits an unpremeditated crime in a
moment of aberration and then is slowly and methodically condemned to
death. One of the translations is available at:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15969/Albert-Camus-The-Stranger
---Wendy will lead discussion
-- Jul 3, 2008 A HANDFUL OF DUST by Evelyn Waugh (publ 1934) 308 pages
Included in Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels.
Story focuses on the breakdown of a marriage. Waugh's own marriage was
disintegrating when he wrote this, and his unhappiness led him into
wider realms of feeling—pathos, rage— than any you find in his earlier
triumphs. If this is Waugh at his bleakest it's also Waugh at his
deepest, most poisonously funny as described at:
http://www.time.com/time/2005/100books/0,24459,a_handful_of_dust,00.html
--Carol will lead discussion
-- Aug 7, 2008 THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER by Carson McCullers (356
pages) publ 1940
One of the top one hundred works of twentieth century fiction chosen
by the Modern Library.
A haunting, unforgettable story that gives voice to the rejected, the
forgotten, and the mistreated. Tells an unforgettable story of moral
isolation in a small Georgia mill town in the 1930s where a deaf man
encounters a young girl, a labor agitator, a restaurateur, and an
idealistic African-American doctor. Possible questions for discussion
available at:
http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/readers_guides/mccullers_heart.sh...
--Cassie will lead discussion
-- Sep 4, 2008 THE ROAD by Cormac McCarthy (publ 2006) 256 pages
Pulitzer Prize winner, an Oprah Book Club Selection.
A post-apocalyptic tale describing a journey taken by a father and his
young son over a period of several months across a landscape blasted
years before by an unnamed cataclysm that destroyed civilization and,
seemingly, most life on earth. They have nothing; just a pistol to
defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the
clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food — and each other.
Possible discussion questions at:
http://www.randomhouse.com/vintage/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780307...
--Susan will lead discussion
-- Oct 2, 2008 Title will be same as selection for Books on the Bayou
- Title will be announced by library at the first part of September.
-- Nov 6, 2008 CATCH 22 by Joseph Heller (publ 1961) 464 pages
The novel, set during the later stages of World War II from 1943
onwards, is frequently cited as one of the great literary works of the
Twentieth century.
Classic novel of wartime madness. Story is a general critique of
bureaucratic operation and reasoning, among other things. Joseph
Heller's brilliance lies in his ability to exaggerate an issue, idea
or element of society so perfectly that we see it for just how foolish
it is.
--Wendy will lead discussion
Note: At end of discussion, group will consider election of a play
from available Houston theatre schedules - (classic preferred,
excluding musicals for now) --hopefully one performed somewhere in
Houston in March. Play to be discussed at our March 6th meeting so
play needs to be one where text is available.
-- Dec 4, 2008 TROPIC OF CANCER by Henry Miller (publ 1934)
The Modern Library named it the 50th greatest book of the 20th century.
Only a historic court ruling that changed American censorship
standards permitted its publication. Famed mixture of memoir and
fiction, which chronicles with unapologetic gusto the life and sexual
adventures of a young expatriate writer, his friends, and the
characters they meet in Paris in the 1930s.
--Susan will lead discussion
Note: At end of discussion, there will be an election of titles to
update our reading list. Anyone who has attended at least two meetings
may submit candidates for the ballot. Suggestions should be submitted
in advance to Alice.
-- Jan 1, 2009 No discussion this month because of holiday. This
should give you more time for extra long book to be discussed in
February.
-- Feb 5, 2009 MIDDLESEX by Jeffrey Eugenides (publ 2002) 544 pages
2003 Pulitzer Prize winner, 2007 Oprah Book Club selection
The narrator and protagonist, an intersexed person has
5-alpha-reductase deficiency. The bulk of the novel is devoted to
telling his coming-of-age story growing up in Detroit, Michigan in the
late 20th century. ...story is intertwined with elements of a family
saga, meditations on the era's zeitgeist and bits of contemporary
history. Possible discussion questions at
http://www.bookbrowse.com/reading_guides/detail/index.cfm?book_number...
-- Marcella will lead discussion