The Library

[bellamarie]

I just ordered Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate.  I read a few pages of it at Barnes and Noble yesterday and looks very interesting.  My Facebook book club begins it in May.  Maybe we could consider it for a discussion here in the future.

[Jonathan]

Frybabe, you absolutely must read Winter Garden and participate in the discussion. It's a superlative book, on a par with Cherry-Garrard's Worst Journey. It explores territory which even angels would fear to tread. Absolutely engaging. My only advice would be not to read it before the discussion begins. Once begun, one can't put it down. It gave me the shivers.

[bellamarie]

Oh Jonathan, you make me want to delve right into my book now.  But I won't!  I have never been able to read ahead in our discussions no matter how tempting I was.  There is something about the element of surprise as we read and discuss a book that keeps me from reading ahead.  Good to hear you like Winter Garden.  Hmmmm..... "It gave me the shivers."  What ever could this mean?

Woke up to rain, and cold temps.  We have had NO Spring here in Toledo, Ohio.  I am craving for my flowers to grow and get my hands in the dirt to plant.  Maybe this will brighten your Sunday.  My Shasta daisies are usually the first to blossom, no sign of it yet, so here are last year's.

[hats]

This is Hats. I have been looking at the internet and finding different photos and information about "The House Of Seven Gables." Would Ginny and any of you like to have a discussion about the Classic? I'm all excited about reading it for some reason and learning more about Nathaniel Hawthorne.

[Frybabe]

Hats, what a great suggestion for those of us who have never read it. I've read The Scarlet Letter and one or two of his short stories, but never got around to reading House of the Seven Gables. ISo,  I second your suggestion. I like reading the classics I missed. Among those on my list to more of are H. Rider Haggard, George Washington Cable, and Wilkie Collins.

I am in between regular novels just now, but I still have a few chapters to go of an Audiobook SciFi classic as well as most of a non-fiction book on Quantum physics by Adam Becker. The SciFi is one of Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan series. Becker's book is new out this year.

I am still waiting on Winter Garden from the library. When I first put the request in, I thought I had a good chance of getting it soon, but it now appears that I am fifth in line at the local library and even farther back for the eBook at the FLP.

[PatH]

Hi, Hats.  That's good suggestion.  I read The House of Seven Gables as a teenager,which was so long ago I don't remember much except that I liked it.  I read The Scarlet Letter later, but I was still pretty clueless; I would surely see more in it now, and I liked it then.  Hawthorne is kind of wordy and roundabout in the way he says things, but in a way that's fun rather than annoying.

Does anyone else like the idea of going back to old New England for our next read?

[PatH]

Frybabe, that's a bummer about Winter Garden.  I put in my hold today--needed to wait until the library I can actually get to reopened from renovations.  But they have a few available copies, so it should be fine.

By any chance, was one of the Hawthorne short stories you read Rappacini's Daughter?  That made a big impression on me when I read it eons ago.

[bellamarie]

Hello, Hats it's good to hear from you.  I have never read The House of Seven Gables.  It's a great idea to make it a discussion.  PatH., I don't mind traveling to old New England at all, sounds like a great place to share a discussion.

[BarbStAubrey]

Wow what a treat to read Hawthorne - been years - great suggestion Hats...

[hats]

Thank you, Barb. Happy spring~

[ginny]

OMG I'm SO in, WHAT a  fabulous idea, HATS!!!!!!!!!!

 I absolutely loved it years ago but like Pat, it's been a long time. I can do it June 14, for our Summer Read,  if wanted. OR if that's too long to wait, perhaps another one of our DL's could do it before then.


OH HOW FABULOUS, it's perfect! I loved that book. Watch  me hate it now. But who could hate it with such a group?

Let me know about the scheduling  and if you can bear to wait till June 14 or want to do it sooner. You can't lose, either way.   It's probably free online. How exciting is this?

[bellamarie]

Ginny, I think June would be perfect to begin The House of Seven Gables, since we will be reading Winter Garden for May.  Thank you so much for offering to be the DL.    Hats, looks like you picked a winner!!!

[Jonathan]

More shivers, Bellamarie. Toronto had to endure a nasty winter storm over the weekend. Part of the same weather system as yours in Ohio. Ice and snow and rain, blown about by strong winds. It had me checking my supply of candles and batteries and other  survival essentials. For comfort I logged onto Seniornet and was greeted by all your lovely daisies. Ah...what a shiver of delight went through me thinking of things to come. After all, it is almost May. With it's flowers and....

Winter Garden is the most feeling book I have ever read. Pat has it right  when she talks about a binge with Hannah.

How nice to hear from you, Hats. Do you remember discussing Wharton's House of Mirth? I always enjoyed your posts.

[bellamarie]

Oh Jonathan, I woke up to a layer of snow this morning, and I am beginning to feel Spring will never happen.  There was so much flooding happening over the week end in my home town of Monroe, Michigan due to high winds and rain.   It most certainly gave me the shivers. I'm glad you got prepared and hunkered down.  Good to hear my daisies brightened your day.  I took this pic this morning.  My hyacinth is shivering from the cold and snow.



Jonathan,

Winter Garden is the most feeling book I have ever read.

Now you really have me intrigued!

[ginny]

Oh how pretty, Bellamarie! Our own Winter Garden here in the Library, love it.

I am very pleased to say that despite my speaking too soon out of my total enthusiasm for the House of the 7 Gables, (and seeing my old Philly buddy Hats again), that PatH has come to our rescue and agreed to take it on for June, which is the best news we could possibly have.

 I was so excited about it and the enthusiasm from you all here,  I took on more than I can chew at the moment, given my schedule,   but Pat will do a fantastic job as always and I will definitely be joining you and  kibitzing right along as well, just not leading it, when I get back in the country.

But we need something for the late summer/ Fall  Book Club Selections, as well, and looking ahead,  I  would like to know what you would might  think about Brunelleschi's Dome by Ross King  as a possible offering to read together in the late summer, early Fall, following the House of Seven  Gables?

It's not a big book, it's not new, but it IS probably one of the best books  you'll ever read. If you have read it, you probably went out and told everybody you know about it,  and wished you had somebody to talk to about it.

 If you haven't read it,  you've really missed something and it seems something this group could really get their teeth into.

It's the story of the building of the dome of the Duomo in Florence. It's incredible.  Here's more on it:

On August 19, 1418, a competition concerning Florence's magnificent new cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore--already under construction for more than a century--was announced: "Whoever desires to make any model or design for the vaulting of the main Dome....shall do so before the end of the month of September." The proposed dome was regarded far and wide as all but impossible to build: not only would it be enormous, but its original and sacrosanct design shunned the flying buttresses that supported cathedrals all over Europe. The dome would literally need to be erected over thin air.

Of the many plans submitted, one stood out--a daring and unorthodox solution to vaulting what is still the largest dome (143 feet in diameter) in the world. It was offered not by a master mason or carpenter, but by a goldsmith and clockmaker named Filippo Brunelleschi, then forty-one, who would dedicate the next twenty-eight years to solving the puzzles of the dome's construction. In the process, he did nothing less than reinvent the field of architecture.

Brunelleschi's Dome is the story of how a Renaissance genius bent men, materials, and the very forces of nature to build an architectural wonder we continue to marvel at today. Denounced at first as a madman, Brunelleschi was celebrated at the end as a genius. He engineered the perfect placement of brick and stone, built ingenious hoists and cranes (among some of the most renowned machines of the Renaissance) to carry an estimated 70 million pounds hundreds of feet into the air, and designed the workers' platforms and routines so carefully that only one man died during the decades of construction--all the while defying those who said the dome would surely collapse and his own personal obstacles that at times threatened to overwhelm him.

 This drama was played out amid plagues, wars, political feuds, and the intellectual ferments of Renaissance Florence-- events Ross King weaves into the story to great effect, from Brunelleschi's bitter, ongoing rivalry with the sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti to the near catpure of Florence by the Duke of Milan. King also offers a wealth of fascinating detail that opens windows onto fifteenth-century life: the celebrated traditions of the brickmaker's art, the daily routine of the artisans laboring hundreds of feet above the ground as the dome grew ever higher, the problems of transportation, the power of the guilds.

 The interesting thing about this book to me is that you don't have to go to Florence or know anything whatsoever about it, or the period, or the people or anything at ALL, I didn't,   to thoroughly enjoy it and pull for the clockmaker who defied the odds and emerged triumphant while  the reader is holding his breath, cheering him on, the entire time.

It's a wonder,  it really is. Is there any interest here in this at all for a future read?

[Frybabe]

Ginny, is this the guy that did something ingenious with the interior brickwork and scaffolding holding up the dome? I'm in. My library system actually still has three copies available, so it must still get checked out occasionally.

Seems to me I saw a documentary about it some years ago. NOVA did one, but I am nor sure that is the one I saw. Also, I found this lecture by the author on Vimeo. It is almost an hour and thirty minutes. https://vimeo.com/45824822

PS: I trust the Latin classes when well this season. I may be back in the fall

[Tomereader1]

Oh, that sounds marvelous.  I will definitely read along whenever you assign a time.  I may even have a copy here on one of my many shelves.  But I haven't actually read it yet.

[Jonathan]

Florence Revisited!!! What a dream. I'm eager to go back. The Ross King book is an excellent guide, a tale well-told. You might like to know that on our first visit there we also heard of another book on the subject: The Feud That Sparked The Renaissance: How Brunelleschi and Ghiberti Changed the Art World, by Paul Robert Walker.  Barb thought very highly of it. And it is, indeed, very good.

[mabel1015j]

From my Openculture newsletter this morning..........much good reading and watching coming to the public domain.

http://www.openculture.com/2018/04/an-avalanche-of-novels-films-and-other-works-of-art-will-soon-enter-the-public-domain.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29

[ginny]

Interesting, Mabel!

Tome and Frybabe!! I was so excited to see you "in," wonderful!  (The Latin is  going splendidly, Frybabe,  thank you, but we miss  you).

Unfortunately (and it's no surprise, it's a super book and we don't miss many) Jonathan,  you are much too kind, I'm informed that we've already done it here and you led it.

 I hate I missed it, if you did it, I know it was wonderful, it was your recommendation for our Summer read last year which I think actually changed my point of view on a lot of things,  but Brunelleschi's Dome is  only 167 some  pages so anybody who missed it  does want to read  it, they will be glad they did:  it's super.

We don't do redo's here so the quest is still on for a Fall Selection, but the good news is Fall is not next week. So we have time.  We need something out of the box for Fall, really out of the box, suggestions welcome!!

[BarbStAubrey]

Good Heavens - did y'all know this?!? I had no idea - do not think I would believe this even 2 years ago but now it seems what we thought were conspiracy theory nutcases were actually telling the truth - Looking for some books and came across this as a recommendation to anyone interested in Brunellesichi's Dome , a modern day CIA story.

"In The Cultural Cold War, Frances Stonor Saunders reveals the extraordinary efforts of a secret campaign in which some of the most vocal exponents of intellectual freedom in the West were working for or subsidized by the CIA—whether they knew it or not.

Called "the most comprehensive account yet of the [CIA’s] activities between 1947 and 1967" by the New York Times, the book presents shocking evidence of the CIA’s undercover program of cultural interventions in Western Europe and at home, drawing together declassified documents and exclusive interviews to expose the CIA’s astonishing campaign to deploy the likes of Hannah Arendt, Isaiah Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, Robert Lowell, George Orwell, and Jackson Pollock as weapons in the Cold War. Translated into ten languages, this classic work—now with a new preface by the author—is "a real contribution to popular understanding of the postwar period" (The Wall Street Journal), and its story of covert cultural efforts to win hearts and minds continues to be relevant today."

[Jonathan]

Ginny, I was looking forward to going back to Florence and Brunelleschi. My DL skills were lacking and we never did get through the book. The Dome was left unfinished and I don't dare show up in person.

How about George Eliot's ROMOLA? The novel about the historical, cultural, political and religious Florence?

'There is no book of mine about which I more thoroughly feel that I swear by every sentence as having been written with my best blood.' George Eliot.

[Frybabe]

Ambitious, Jonathan. The only Eliot I've read is Silas Marner for class when I was in high school. I don't think I liked it very much. I do have, Mill on the Floss and Middlemarch (which, I believe, was discussed here) on my eReader, still TBR.

I viewed this interesting YouTube video: The Top Ten Books of All Time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB-Sps7fx3k The presenter did not include religious and political texts on purpose. The books are listed by number of books sold. Number One and Ten surprised me. Also, I learned about the plot of The Little Prince. Who knew it included a main character claiming to be an alien. No Shakespeare? No Homer? Well, I can see where they might have been nudged out of the Top Ten by Tolkien and Rowling. I am off on a quest to find Dream of the Red Chamber.

[Frybabe]

Oh, my! Over 1,000 pages. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/12/dream-of-the-red-chamber-cao-zuequin-chinas-favourite-novel-unknown-west I see that it was made into an Opera which premiered at the San Francisco Opera in 2016. Ambitious. And here I haven't even got my hands on The Romance of the Three Kingdoms yet. Both of these are on the Four Greatest Classic Chinese Novels list. The other two are Water Margin and Journey to the West.

[BarbStAubrey]

Ha and while you are at it Frybabe how about The Tale of Genji -  written by the noblewoman and lady-in-waiting Murasaki Shikibu in the early years of the 11th century. We tried it here on Senior Learn. Out of 54 chapters we got as far as chapter 26 by which time everyone bailed -

[PatH]

The Genji discussion was before my time, Barb, but I had the same experience by myself--dropped out.  I kind of liked it, but got weary.  There is a more recent, supposedly better, translation now, and I could believe that sometime I could get through it when I was in the mood.

[PatH]

Interesting list, Frybabe, so now we know what makes a mega best-seller.  Here's the list in writing:

1.  Don Quijote
2.  A Tale of Two Cities
3.  The Alchemist
4.  The Little Prince
5.  Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
6.  The Hobbit
7.  And Then There Were None
8.  The Dream of the Red Chamber
9.  The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
10. The Da Vinci Code

I've read all but 3, 8, and 10, though not every word of Don Quijote.  He mentions a 400th anniversary edition put out by the Spanish Royal Academy, whose entire very large printing was snapped up.  I have one, sort of by accident.  We were reading Don Q here, I wanted a Spanish version to read bits for comparison, and it was as cheap as the paperbacks.  For $10, you got a hardback with nice paper, good type font, and a sewn binding.  Unlike Shakespearean English, Spanish had already settled into its modern form, so the difficulty is the same as reading current Spanish, still not easy for me, but possible.

[bellamarie]

Ginny, your book sounds very interesting, as do all the others.  Can I please ask we stay with black text, my eyes went a bit berserk with the green.  I think as I am aging, my eyes are becoming sensitive, I deal with dry eyes and must use drops in the morning.

PatH., I think I have read only two on your list, #2 & 10. 

Mabel, what an exciting link!  So much to look forward to.

Literature

All these books, and these books, including the classics:

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Cane by Jean Toomer
The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
The Ego and the Id by Sigmund Freud
Towards a New Architecture by Le Corbusier
Whose Body?, the first Lord Peter Wimsey novel by Dorothy L. Sayers
Two of Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot novels, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd and The Murder on the Links
The Prisoner, volume 5 of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time (note that English translations have their own copyrights)
The Complete Works of Anthony Trollope
George Bernard Shaw’s play Saint Joan
Short stories by Christie, Virginia Woolf, H.P. Lovecraft, Katherine Mansfield, and Ernest Hemingway
Poetry by Edna St. Vincent Millay, E.E. Cummings, William Carlos Williams, Rainer Maria Rilke, Wallace Stevens, Robert Frost, Sukumar Ray, and Pablo Neruda
Works by Jane Austen, D.H. Lawrence, Edith Wharton, Jorge Luis Borges, Mikhail Bulgakov, Jean Cocteau, Italo Svevo, Aldous Huxley, Winston Churchill, G.K. Chesterton, Maria Montessori, Lu Xun, Joseph Conrad, Zane Grey, H.G. Wells, and Edgar Rice Burroughs

I feel like a kid in a candy store seeing all these titles!  We haven't done a mystery novel in this discussion group for a very, very long time, wouldn't it be fun to tackle one of Agatha Christie's?

[BarbStAubrey]

On Senior Learn we have read

1.  Don Quijote
2.  A Tale of Two Cities
5.  Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
6.  The Hobbit
7.  I know we did Agatha Christ - not sure which one though - And Then There Were None
10. The Da Vinci Code

We Read...Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf and we read some Proust. I think it was Swan's Way - we have done an Edith Wharton, Joseph Conrad, Jane Austin, Trollope, A. Conan Doyle, Shaw's St. Joan and Pygmalion, Dorothy L. Sayers - and many more

When you are reading you may want to check the archives and see the discussion - except for a very few in the beginning they are all there - That being said, as you say Bellamarie there are still so many authors - Joy... 

I know I've Cane by Jean Toomer on my to-read pile - Italo Svevo is another that is on my pile as is D.H. Lawrence and Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita.

With so many books and still so many classical books we have not yet tackled I just know we can find books and authors that we will all be interested in reading - it is not like the best of them were all read over the last 20 some years - a goodly number yes, but there are soooo many more.

For instance from the Modern Library list of the 100 best we have not done...
DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
UNDER THE VOLCANO by Malcolm Lowry
THE WAY OF ALL FLESH by Samuel Butler
SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut
NATIVE SON by Richard Wright
HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow
APPOINTMENT IN SAMARRA by John O’Hara
ALL THE KING’S MEN by Robert Penn Warren
THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY by Thornton Wilder
GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN by James Baldwin
THE HEART OF THE MATTER by Graham Greene
TROPIC OF CANCER by Henry Miller
ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac
THE SHELTERING SKY by Paul Bowles
THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE by James M. Cain
MIDNIGHT’S CHILDREN by Salman Rushdie
TOBACCO ROAD by Erskine Caldwell

Amazon also has a list of classical literature - for as many that we have read there are just as many we have not tackled.

Tucked indoors because of weather seems the perfect time to both read and plan what other authors to read and so we are all looking forward to some great suggestions.

[Frybabe]

Barb, from your Modern Library list is have read only one, The Bridge of San Luis Rey. It was one of those books we were required to read in high school. Of course, I remember nothing about it.

My Modern Library collection is limited to two Aristotle books and Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra. Can't say that I understood Nietzsche very well when I read him.

Of Bellemarie's list from Open Culture I've read several Gibrans, including The Profit(which I no longer have), the same for Dorothy Sayers and Agatha Christie (I still have the Christies).

Although I wasn't a big poetry fan earlier in life, I did manage to collect a few volumes includong my favorite, Robert Frost. Since I have been on Senior Learn, I have become more interested in poetry and now have quite a few volumes on my eReader. We've tackled Latin poetry in Latin classes, some of which translated quite beautifully.

Among the list of Works is Lu Xun, who was a leading writer in modern Chinese literature. I am hopeful that a few of his writings will be translated into English and put up on Project Gutenberg. I've been quite taken by modern Chinese Science Fiction, so naturally, I want to read other Chinese works.

On another note, I picked up Winter Garden from the library yesterday. I will have to read it ahead of the discussion because I won't be able to renew it with others waiting in line.

[BarbStAubrey]

Wonderful Frybabe that you were able to borrow Winter Garden -  your greatest challenge will be not to share what comes next - oh dear and that can be a challenge even coloring what we read early on - that is the part of planning the book discussion that after a bit I did learn that those reading often picked up what I overlooked in my rush to get the structure of the story to figure out good breaking points. After getting caught up in the discussion based on another's observation it was much easier for me to go with the story rather than being conscious of what is to come. If you figured out a technique Frybabe to stay with the discussion please post - your experience would be great to hear about because many of us get caught up in the story and end up reading ahead.

Help - can anyone remember the name of a book - something like the man who would be right - it was a Brit nineteenth century novel about a guy who has to always be right so that he looses his love - do not think he was married or if he was then he looses his wife with the theme about 'being right over a love'.

I thought Eliot with her Danial Deronda having been turned into a PBS masterpiece because whatever this book is that I cannot remember the name was also a PBS masterpiece shown some time after Danial Deronda. Reviewed her books and not there - in fact nothing even close - hmm something does not remind me of Dickens I wonder Thackery

[bellamarie]

These lists are great to have as references for when I go to the library in search of something to read.

Frybabe, It's good to hear you are becoming more interested in poetry.  I have been a writer and lover of poetry since a child.  I've had a few poems published, and wish I had bought more than just one copy when offered to me.   

I happened to run across a wonderful book containing all four novels the Bronte' Sisters wrote, Jane Eyre, Wurthering Heights, Agnes Grey, and Villette.  The book is almost fifty years old, the pages have gotten a bit discolored, but it was only a couple dollars!  I feel like I found a treasure.  I saw the movie Wurthering Heights back years ago, but have never read any of these books.

Barb, how is your weather?  We woke up to a layer of snow on the rooftops and ground, but now has melted with the sun shining.  I am so longing for warmer temps. 

[ginny]

 Sorry about the ink color, Bellamarie. I use it in all the  Latin classes and sometimes  I forget not to do it  here. It looks so strange not to be green. I just did it by reflex  and had to erase it from this post.

[BarbStAubrey]

Just cold today - had to turn on the heat - everything is green but the wind was blowing hard

Please can anyone remember - it was a PBS masterpiece - a book - something like the man who would be right - it was a Brit nineteenth century novel about a guy who had to always be right so that he looses his love because being right was more important

[PatH]

Hats, Frybabe, Bellamarie, Ginny, and whoever I missed, you get your wish.  After Winter Garden, we'll discuss The House of the Seven Gables, probably starting in early June, depending on how fast Winter Garden goes.  Hats, thanks for suggesting it.  I'm looking forward to getting to know the book again.  Anyway, getting hold of a copy shouldn't be a problem.  My library system has over two dozen copies available, though maybe during the school year tyey all get checked out.

[bellamarie]

Path.,  this is great news!  I just checked and there are several sites you can download The House Of Seven Gables for free.

Barb, we have been very blessed with two days of temps near 60 degrees which is finally Spring temps.

[Dana]

Have just ordered the first volume of The Red Chamber/Story of the Stone, thanks to you guys.  It sounds marvellously interesting.  Was looking for something different to read.  Thank you!

[Dana]

I forgot to mention, I read recently another really super book recommended here....Generations of Winter by Vassily Askyonov about a family in the time of Stalin,......many thanks to whomever mentioned it.

[bellamarie]

I am almost finished reading The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck, one of the books we were deciding on for our May discussion.  It is basically about the lives of three women who have loved and lost their husbands to World War II.  I am glad we decided on Winter Garden.  I think I need a rest from reading about the wars for a while.

[Frybabe]

Has anyone read Circe by Madilyne Miller? It is a fantasy telling of the life of Circe who features in Greed Mythology. It is on  Unbound World's list of SciFi and Fantasy books for book clubs. Here is their list. http://www.unboundworlds.com/2018/04/best-sci-fi-fantasy-book-clubs/ I've been considering it but what with all the other books I already have that need read, it is on the backburner, as is Station Eleven (also on the list). Kindred is there too; it is one that PatH and I were thinking about suggesting for a book discussion. I am not real big on time-travel, but apparently this is on a lot of recommended book lists.