In her free time, Chieko would see the cherry blossoms and visit the cedar forests. It was a celebration of the world around us, and I enjoyed Kawabata’s pace. The world today moves so quickly, it was unusual to slow down and try to imagine this foreign 1950s world. Chieko’s Kyoto seemed on the cusp of embracing  Westernization.

And that was how the book felt to me: on the cusp. I can’t say I didn’t like it: I enjoyed it very much. But as I read, I felt it was on the verge of something beautiful, and I missed it. Only in retrospect does it all fit together for me. (Note that I’ve attempted to avoid major “spoilers,” if those are even possible.)

As I read, I thought, from beginning to end, that Chieko’s relationships drove the subtle story. First, there is the obvious observation of her unknown status to her adoptive parents. Was she a foundling? Was she a stolen child? The culture threw me off here, because apparently being a foundling is far worse than being stolen. (I would have thought that discovering that your parents were kidnappers was the worse alternative.) But beyond her relationship to her parents, and even more importantly, Chieko had competing suitors that seemed to vie for attention in the novel, and she develops a new relationship with the newly discovered Naeko. Just as I thought some resolution to these relationships was to come, the novel ended.

In retrospect, I realize I misunderstood the novel. It is titled The Old Capital because Kyoto was the capital of Japan for many hundreds of years. As I reflect on the novel, I realize that Kyoto is the character that Kawabata wanted me to focus on: the city streets, the festivals, the cherry blossoms and the cedar woods, the geishas. This traditional city is the Kyoto that Kawabata probably loved most, and he, as a modern individual writing 1957, can see the growing influence of those Western shops, for example, where one cannot even purchase a kimono or an obi.

Just as the two violets in the beginning grow a few feet apart, the Western and the Japanese traditions in the Old Capital seem to be growing apart. Do they know of each other? How do they interact? In this novel, we do not see them interact much at all. The violets parallel extends to Chieko and Naeko and Chieko’s suitors as well. How do they all fit together?

I want to thank Tanabata for leading a book group discussion (I’m a few months late…). One question she asked was this:

When Yasunari Kawabata was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1968, he apparently remarked “that in his work he sought a harmony among man, nature, and emptiness.”  Do you think he achieved this in The Old Capital?

Yes: in highlighting the beauties of the traditions of Kyoto, Kawabata illustrates just how the cultures should work together.

In the end, I believe Kawabata is writing in mourning for the Old Capital. In that sense, the novel is simply beautiful. I want to reread this someday after I’ve gone to Kyoto, or at least somewhere I can see a proper kimono and obi. In just 50 years, even in a global environment like the Internet, such traditions are overwhelmed by the Western.

What cultural traditions do you mourn the lose of?

Random Fact for those that have read the book: I read in my recent project book, DNA, that twins are statistically rare in Japan. Less than 3 out of 1000 pregnancies are twins. In a country in Africa, on the other hand, the rate jumps to 40 out of 1000 pregnancies. Is that rarity an explanation for the superstitions revolving around twins?

Read the Nobels

• The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington
• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (In Chancery and To Let)
• Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers
• The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon
• Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
• The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa
• The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (The Man of Property)
• The Student by Anton Chekhov: A Perfect Short Story
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

A Room of One’s Own

My favorite story that Woolf shared was about Shakespeare’s sister. (This sister was a complete fabrication on Woolf’s part, but it captured Woolf’s point.) Shakespeare had a sister who had just as much genius as Shakespeare, and who likewise dreamed of the stage. How did her life play out? Despite her inclinations, she was not sent to school to learn the classics; instead, she was encouraged to focus on the needlework and mending at home. Her father also wanted her to be married young to a local young man. Although she rebelled and fled to London, seeking a life on the stage, she was ridiculed and abused, for women were not actresses in 1600 London, let alone writers of plays.

In short, everything about society would have discouraged her genius. How can we wonder that there are not female “Shakespeare’s” throughout history of the written word? As Woolf points out, it’s very probably that the ever-popular “Anon” was such a strong woman, seeking to get her words into print, even if anonymity was the only way to do so.

Woolf speaks to women in the late 1920s. As I read, I was surprised to discover that this was written at such a late date. From her discussion of how men dismissed women (referring to them as the “weaker sex” among other more cruel things), I thought it had been written two decades earlier. Yet, even a decade after women in England gained the right to vote, men still neglected to accept women as capable of creative output.

At a few points, Woolf looks to the future. One comment in particular stood out to me:

Moreover, in a hundred years … women will have ceased to be the protected sex. Logically they will take part in all the activities and exertions that were once denied them. The nursemaid will heave coal. The shop-woman will drive an engine. All assumptions founded on the facts observed when women were the protected sex will have disappeared. (page 40)

(She also comments, I suspect in a bit of a mocking tone, that maybe such a life will allow women to die off much quicker since they won’t have protection: “Anything may happen when womanhood has ceased to be a protected occupation.”)

Virginia Woolf takes care to not praise women too highly. She does not want women to think it easy to become Shakespeare. No, it is a challenge to overcome generations of inequality in education. Shakespeare had the genius, after all: his success was not only due to his ambition and education. Woolf’s point, instead, is that women, just as men, need their own income and their own space in order to create. Certainly, prolific male writers have an income and space for creation: poverty does not beget creative output very often.

I think about my own life. I have the “leisure” to stay home with my son while my husband works full-time. I also have a computer of my own where I can write and blog. If I lost that resource and/or if I needed to financially support my son, my ability to write and blog would become depleted. But then again: I am able to get a job (let’s hope), a thing that middle class women in Jane Austen’s day could not do. I would still have the ability to create because of that freedom.

Although I had not yet begun the book (other than the introduction), I could not renew it on Wednesday as I’d intended because of another person’s hold; instead, I read it in a day and returned it quickly to avoid greater fees (it was already a bit overdue). That tells you how small this book is (about 110 pages). Why did it take me so long to pick up?! (Oh, yes, I always have too much library loot.)

The message it shares in those brief pages is informative but also heartening. As a woman, it reminds me to seek to become Shakespeare’s sister in an era that no longer discourages it (quite as much).

Have you read A Room of One’s Own?

Do you have a room of your own? (literally or figuratively)

What other classic books about women and women in fiction can you recommend for my Women Unbound reading?

• To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
• Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
• Why Women Should Rule the World by Dee Dee Myers
• Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dogs by Kitty Burns Florey + Giveaway
• Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn
• The Creative Family by Amanda Blake Soule
• Founding Mothers by Cokie Roberts
• Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman + Giveaway (Used Book)
• The Life of Wilkie Collins (Biographies by Clarke and Peters)

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

Why, then, did I struggle so much in reading it?

In October, after reading a few novels by Gaskell , Collins, and Dickens, I picked up Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. Eventually, though, I decided that I just couldn’t get into yet another Victorian novel, so I set it aside after about 100 pages. This month, I was determined to get through it, so I began again. Yet, the first 100 pages still almost derailed me. Once again, I was bored. I was confused by the sheer number of characters introduced. I felt confused because of my ignorance about the French Revolution.

What was different this time? Why did I not give up? The first reason is completely superficial: The book I checked out from the library was a brand new copy. It had a crisp paperback cover and the pages were newly printed, with a strong “new book smell.” I’ve been reading lots of books with old covers lately, and that new book just kept calling to me from my library loot pile.

The main reason I was able to get through the novel, though, was I kept reading. I forced myself, and I gave myself plenty of time to dedicate to the task. After the initial hump, I was engaged in the story. To balance my lack of understanding of the French Revolution, I referred to the timeline at the front of my copy, which highlighted both the actual history of the Revolution and the novel’s story as it progressed.  By the end of the novel, I was sincerely interested in the story, and I felt emotional engaged when it ended.

Was Dickens at all to blame in my overall disinterest in A Tale of Two Cities? I don’t think so. I fully accept that my lack of engagement in the novel was mostly my fault. I am not normally interested in dark and sinister stories, and the imagery in the beginning section really did not bring me in to the novel; in fact, it kind of made me shiver, exactly the wrong reaction needed for me to enjoy a novel. I also was ignorant of even a basic outline of the French Revolution, an issue Dickens’ original readers would not have had, since they lived just 60-70 years after it.

Ultimately, what finally did bring me in to the novel was the human interest: the characterization. Once I understood how all the different characters fit together, I found myself engaged in the novel. In the end, my favorite character was Miss Pross, who turns out to be more important than we realize at first.

In the end, I found A Tale of Two Cities far superior to Oliver Twist. No, I didn’t enjoy it as much; it was a difficult and somewhat uncomfortable read for me. But Dickens’ craft is far more refined in Two Cities than in Oliver. He seems to have a wide vision of the story from the beginning, unlike Oliver Twist which just seemed to go whereever Dickens wanted, with some nice convenient plot twists. Dickens held his focus in Two Cities from beginning to end, in ways that Oliver Twist did not. It was a superior novel, but not my favorite of the two.

What was the last book you finished that you knew was well done but you just did not like it?

What is your favorite Dickens novel?

• Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
• Victorian Second Helpings (The Moonstone by Collins and North and South by Gaskell)
• Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
• The Life of Our Lord by Charles Dickens
• Four Christmas Novellas by Charles Dickens
• A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
• Beauty and the Beast + The Complete Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault
• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
• The Odyssey by Homer, trans. Robert Fagles
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Don’t get me wrong: I’m glad I read it. However, I wouldn’t call Churchill’s tome a scholarly history. Even after finishing, I’m still not all that comfortable with English history.

Although I tend to avoid abridgements, I picked up this book after I read a selection of Churchill’s speeches back in October 2008. I wanted to read more Churchill. After all that time sitting on my shelf, I’m glad I got to it.

First some negatives: It reminded me of Charles Dickens’ History of England which I read last year. In places it simply felt like stories and traditions from the history, told in an interesting way and with plenty of opinion. There were few footnotes. Churchill’s writing is more detailed, informative, and overarching than Dickens’s was (Churchill made connections between kings, patterns, and eras). But I felt academic heft was missing. Despite that, I still got rather bogged down in the explanation of military strategies: I don’t care to know the details of each battle, but rather the outcomes and the effects of the battles.

And then the positive: I did really enjoy the first half, which was about the settlement of England and the kings of England. I feel so very ignorant! I am looking forward to reading Shakeapeare’s histories of England. Although those are fictionalized, Churchill mentioned some of them in passing.

I was really looking forward to the section on Victorian England, since I’ve been enjoying Victorian reads in the past month. Unfortunately, Churchill was a bit over the top with the politics and not so much about life, but it tells me where my interests lie for my next read! I have a number of Victorian English history books on my TBR list.

As for the abridgement, I can’t really compare it to the original (which I obviously haven’t read) but this abridgement, which was stated to be geared toward American audiences, had too much about America in it. Obviously, Churchill wanted to capture more than the history of Great Britain: he called it History of English-Speaking Peoples, after all. And since Churchill’s mother was American, he was just as interested in the U.S. history as the British. But I really wished Churchill would talk a little bit more about the other settlements. Surprisingly, Australia and New Zealand, in particular, had only about five pages total in this entire abridged volume. In contrast, the U.S. Civil War had a long section of about 80 pages. In a book that is less than 500 pages, that seemed a bit skewed.

In the end, I’m glad I finally got around to reading this. Churchill certainly has an interesting political perspective. But this wasn’t the best for a first look at English history.

Can anyone recommend a good nonfiction book about the history of Great Britain and its territories? I’d love to keep learning, and while I have some on my TBR, I’d always love more.

Which should be my first Shakespeare history play?

• Jane Austen: A Biography by Carol Shields, a Quote Book, and a History of England
• Speeches of Winston Churchill
• Daughter of Destiny by Benazir Bhutto
• Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott
• Will in the World by Stephen Greenblatt
• February in Review
• Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman + Giveaway (Used Book)
• The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington
• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (In Chancery and To Let)
• Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift

Yesterday began Black History Month in the USA! The Harlem Renaissance-themed Classics Circuit began yesterday as well, and I hope you follow along as bloggers unite in reading classic works by African-Americans.

Although this post is not for the Circuit, in preparing for that Classics Circuit, I did a lot of preliminary reading about the era and I really wanted to dabble in the poetry. I meant to post this weeks ago, but it never happened and now it’s already February! It works well, though, because I’d like to write at least one post about African-American literature each week in February.

In my library shelf searches, I could not find a comprehensive collection of Countee Cullen and Claude McKay and any of the other, less well known African-American poets of the Renaissance. I still haven’t really found a comprehensive Harlem Renaissance poetry anthology at my library, but I did find an out-of-print 1941 anthology of poetry for children that met my needs. (Thank goodness for my library’s reciprocal borrowing program with 15 other libraries!). This allowed me to read a number of different poets who were writing during the Renaissance and before.

Although Golden Slippers was edited and prepared for a “young readers” audience, it’s applicable to all, and while the poetry in it is not my favorite, it seems to have an important overview of some of the poets of the near-contemporary age to the Renaissance. Researching online, I found more poems by each poet. I also focused on Langston Hughes a little bit in the past few weeks.

When I say the poetry in Golden Slippers was not my favorite, I mean that the “traditional” dialect-written poetry seems a little bit stereotypical (a number of poems in the volume were labeled “traditional”). I struggle to read dialect. Not all the poems were dialect though, and I understood those more.

A few of Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poetry was dialect poetry in the Golden Slippers anthology. He died in 1906 (age 34), 14 years before the Harlem Renaissance actually began, and his poetry paved a way for other poets. I believe his poetry is more impressive than this volume illustrates, and according to Wikipedia, he was often held back from writing his preferred standard English poetry because publishers wanted to see black dialect poetry. He resented that, and I don’t blame him. His non-dialect poetry is amazing. I went and found more of it online (in the public domain). I most appreciated “Dawn” (in Golden Slippers), “Sympathy” (with the first line of “I know why the caged bird sings”),”Dreams,” and “Emancipation.” The last three aren’t in the Golden Slippers children’s collection. They are wonderful and I think children today could relate to the themes of dreaming, feeling trapped, and ultimately overcoming.

I also loved the poetry of James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) included in Golden Slippers: “Lift Up Every Voice and Sing” and “The Creation.” The first has been called the “Negro National Anthem” because of its motivating message. The second is a clever retelling of the creation of the world. I would like to revisit James Weldon Johnson in the future, because as with Dunbar, I suspect there is a lot more here to enjoy than the first glance reveals.

Countee Cullen (1903-1946) was greatly influenced by Johnson’s poetry, and “The Wakeupworld” has a biblical element to it as Johnson’s “Creation” did (it’s the story of a bird who missed Noah’s ark). Cullen also hearkens back to the other poets of his era in “For Paul Laurence Dunbar” and “For a Poet” (the later is, I suspect, Langston Hughes.) He also comments on the race inequalities of his day in “Incident: Baltimore” (a sad story) and “For a Lady I Know” (in which he ponders the afterlife for a lazy lady he knows.) Browsing on the web, I also found some other Cullen poems I really like: “Lines to My Father” and “Saturday’s Child” (this is so good, although very sad!).

Claude McKay (1889-1948) wrote a few poems in Golden Slippers: the ones that stood out to me were “Under the Mistletoe” and “After the Winter.” Other notable poets represented in Golden Slippers were Georgia Douglas Johnson (“I Learned to Sing,” “Tomorrow’s Men,” “Youth,” “Guardianship,” “Benediction,” and “My Little Dreams”),Waring Cuney (“No Images”), and Helene Johnson (“Bottled: New York”). Many of these did not seem race or time limiting, and anyone can relate to the emotions and encouragements given in them. I’m not that familiar with poetry in general, so maybe that can be my excuse for not having heard of them before.

And then I save the best for last. I loved Langston Hughes’ contribution to the Golden Slippers anthology, and I also purchased the Poetry for Young People volume (which turns out to have been a 2007 Coretta Scott King illustrator honor winner). Then I found some award-winning children’s picture books at the library. I really should do a completely separate post on Langston Hughes because his poetry is so wonderful – and I’ve only read a couple dozen of his poems! I will definitely be revisiting Hughes at some point. Actually, all the poets I’ve mentioned are wonderful, and I think it’s too bad I’ve only read a few of each of their poems.

(Side Note/Rant: I think it’s a sad commentary on the Poetry for Young People series editors that there are only two volumes by African Americans; the other is Maya Angelou. Why not one of Dunbar or Johnson or Cullen? But then again, maybe I’m the only one seeking these out.)

Just as with the other poets I tasted briefly through Golden Slippers, it seems Langston Hughes’s poems focus on dreams and the fulfillment of them. Some are positive (like the wonderful “I Dream a World” and “Dream Keeper” and “Dreams”) and some are more negative (“What happens to a dream deferred?/ Does it dry up/ Like a raisin in the sun?” from “Harlem”). He looks to the future of youth and tries to help them define themselves in poems like “Merry-Go-Round” and “Theme for English B” and “I, Too, [Sing America].” Hughes also seems to impart his advice (“Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair” from “Mother to Son”) and optimism (“We have tomorrow/ Bright before us/ Like a flame” from “Youth”).

The illustrations for the Poetry for Young People volume reminds me of the Harlem Renaissance art I found: it’s very appropriate. It’s not my favorite style, but illustrator Benny Andrews is obviously talented at capturing the African-American experience Hughes writes about. I am so glad this is a part of my Poetry for Young People library. And now I need to read the full collection of Hughes’ poetry: I’m sure I’m missing some great ones!

As I’ve had Langston Hughes in mind this month, I also noticed two award-winning children’s picture books of his poems!

The Negro Speaks of Rivers, illustrated by E.B. Lewis, was recently awarded the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor. It captures Langston Hughes’ titular poem with gorgeous, sweeping watercolors: “My soul has grown deep like the rivers.” It perfectly captures the modern and ancient echoes of Langston Hughes’ musing on the African heritage. I really enjoy the illustrations: they were so much more than illustrations.

This year’s Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award winner was also for a Langston Hughes poem. My People, photography by Charles R. Smith Jr., captures Langston Hughes’ thirty-three word poem with stunning black and white photographs of African-Americans of all ages. I love this: it is so beautiful. My son also loved looking at the photos. “Eyes!” “Hands!” “Hair!” he pointed out. Langston Hughes’ brief poem is also beautiful. Together, the book is a true celebration of African-American art and beauty.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Langston Hughes was my favorite: after all, I read more of his poetry than of any of the others. I sincerely enjoyed my brief foray into Harlem Renaissance and early African-American poetry, and I look forward to reading more in the future.

What are you reading to celebrate Black History Month?

• My Introduction to the Harlem Renaissance
• Reading Journal (16 December): A Classics Circuit TBR List from Wilkie Collins to Harlem
• Black No More by George S. Schuyler
• Poetry for Young People: Lewis Carroll
• Poetry Friday: Christmas Poems
• The Norton Introduction to Poetry + My Introduction to Poetry
• Poetry for Young People: Robert Louis Stevenson (edited by Frances Schoonmaker)
• Reading Journal (20 January): Distracted
• February in Review
• Jazz by Toni Morrison

Perhaps it was Cather’s perfect capture of New Mexico: while I have never been to New Mexico, I feel I now can perfectly imagine the place, the pain, and the joy that the setting evokes. Also, while there are religious elements in the book (after all, it tells the story of the first Roman Catholic Bishop of New Mexico), Cather’s emphasis seems to be the human connections, the legends, and the memories of those living in a challenging yet beautiful era in American history.

Archbishop was a different classic to read: in some respects, it is a collection of stories, not a novel. When early reviews complained that book was hard to classify, Cather herself said “why bother?” She at times calls it a “legend” or a “narrative” (from the introduction, Everyman Library’s Edition).

Because of its loose structure and subtle plot, it tells of the Bishop Latour’s life and that of his friend, Father Valliant at a leisurely pace. In fact, my first read (three weeks ago) surprised me: I found myself struggling to be motivated to read it. (It was also during the Christmas holiday, so I was busy and probably not in the mood for a thinking book.) Because I’m preparing some discussion questions for my infant book group, I decided to reread it this week. (I was feeling horribly nervous about keeping a discussion going. Unfortunately, this is how I feel every month when I go to prepare for book club!)

So I reread Archbishop, knowing that it is slow, thoughtful, and not so much a novel but more a series of vignettes. And I loved it. The last 75 pages last night had me in tears as I pondered the life of the priests. While I loved My Antonia, this is my new, absolutely favorite Cather (of those two, at least). It has far more depth to the characters, the language, and the setting , and I was emotional moved as I read it. I may add it to the “Books Read in 2010 That I Love and Want to Reread Someday” list I’m starting in my head.

Note: Because I don’t believe Death Comes for the Archbishop can be “spoiled,” I discuss the book in below without hesitating to reveal some details.

I finished rereading Archbishop last night, after having finished Mrs. Dalloway on Tuesday, and maybe it was the slow-reading mood I’d had with Woolf that made Archbishop so rewarding this time around.

I am not a Catholic, but I do consider myself religious. Similarly, Cather was religious, but she was not a Catholic when she decided in 1927 to tell the story of the 1850s Catholic missionaries to New Mexico. Yet, her book is a religious one because she describes nature in terms of religion.

This mesa plain had an appearance of great antiquity, and of incompleteness; as if, with all the materials for world-making assembled, the Creator had desisted, gone away and left everything on the point of being brought together, on the eve of being arranged into mountain, plain, plateau.  The country was still waiting to be made into a landscape. (page 94-95)

The book as a whole is not overly religious. Rather than celebrating any organized religion, Cather is celebrating humanity and the beauty of nature. She almost gives more space to the Indian traditions, legends, and religious beliefs than she does to the Catholic priests’ beliefs. The priests are just her vehicle to the legends. Catholic, Mexican, and Indian legends are all fascinating to me, despite the fact that I don’t know much about any of them!

A good portion of Archbishop is about service and friendship. I suspect this post cannot possibly capture the beauty of the text and the emotions I felt as I read about those subjects in Cather’s words, but I will try to do my best.

Because Father Valliant went to seminary in France with Bishop Latour, they are close. They were very different: Bishop Latour always planned ahead and Father Valliant was always full of energy to go do what was needed right now. But these differences were what made the book so rich. Both served the Catholic and non-Catholic populations and touched people in different ways, and because they saw life so differently, the moments of togetherness were perfectly captured and realistic. Although other relationships among the people touched me, it was the friendship between the two missionaries that touched me most: they’d given up a life of ease for a life of struggle, all because they wanted to serve. Yet they still had each other to understand how hard it was. How they must have depended on each other! (I say as if they were real… Although Cather based them on real missionaries, the story was a fiction.)

Finally, Death Comes for the Archbishop actually is about death, but it’s also about life and memory. In her introduction, A.S. Byatt indicates that there is confusion with the title:

“It arouses expectations in the reader which are not fulfilled – that death and the Archbishop are of equal importance in the narrative, whereas in fact the Archbishop’s death is only one further incident in the series of frozen gestures, moments of insight, small comedies and agonies which make up the fresco.”

I agree that the Archbishop himself is of utmost importance. But so are the Indian friends, and the New Mexico landscape, and dear Father Valliant, none of whom are mentioned in the title. I think Cather chose to include death in the title because that is what life is: we live to die. I am dying right now. How we live (i.e., what we choose to do with our time) determines how we will eventually die.

As he entered his last convalescence, Bishop Latour gave this bit of wisdom:

“I shall not die of a cold, my son.  I shall die of having lived.” (page 267)

Death Comes for the Archbishop tells the story of Bishop Latour’s death, which is how he lived. He lived in service to others, looking ahead and planning for the future. Only before his death could he stop considering the future and recall, with fondness, his past. Cather’s narrative is absolutely beautiful in capturing his story!

Now that I’ve finished this reread, I am incredibly excited for my book club meeting next Wednesday night! I feel I have so much I want to discuss, and this book has much more in it for discussion than My Antonia (which I think many people read in high school or college). I have barely touched on all the themes that stand out to me after these two reads. I just really hope the others didn’t get hung up on the “slow” aspects as I did at first.

If you hated My Antonia, have you tried this one? I’m curious to know if those who dislike Cather know about this masterpiece. This is, of course, much slower than Antonia in pacing (believe it or not), but the end result is far more rewarding, I believe.

Have you read any books lately that moved you emotionally (not necessarily in a tear-jerker kind of way)?

• My Antonia by Willa Cather
• Reading Journal (25 November): Unplugged Edition
• Death in Children’s Literature: Love You Forever by Robert Munsch
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
• What the World Eats by Peter Menzel
• March by Geraldine Brooks
• January in Review: A Good Start to 2010
• December in Review
• Death and War in Children’s Literature: Two Newberys about the Revolution

Jane Austen: A Life by Carol Shields

I loved Carol Shields’ biography of Jane Austen! The narrator for the audiobook had a lovely Austen-esque British accent, which gave it a great sense of place. Then Shields began by admitting that she’s an “amateur Jane Austen fan” who goes to the Jane Austen Society of North America meetings because she loves Austen so much. That made me think of her as a kindred spirit.

While I haven’t read many Austen novels (yet), I loved Shields’ emphasis on the fact that we can learn from and compare Jane Austen’s own life to the setting, characters, and situations in her novels.

It was very short (about 5 ½ hours, the equivalent of 180 pages) and yet I feel I have a greater understanding of the remarkable woman who wrote some delightful romances.

Some random facts about Jane Austen (and long-time Austen fans probably already know all of these things):

• Jane Austen spent her first years farmed out to a neighbor for nursing purposes. (Apparently, mothers did not normally feed their own babies.)
• Jane Austen had a romantic interest in Thomas Lefroy but neither of them had money, so nothing came of it.
• Jane Austen was engaged for one night to Harris Big-Wither. She returned the next morning to cancel the engagement.
• Jane’s sister Cassandra was engaged to a sailor, who died. He left Cassandra all his money in his will. Cassandra never married.
• Jane’s father wrote the query letter to a publisher for the manuscript of Pride and Prejudice; he really believed in her!
• Jane’s novel (now known as) Northanger Abbey was purchased for ten pounds, but never published; Jane eventually bought it back. It was not published until after her death.
• When her father retired (he was a vicar), he moved the unmarried Austen sisters to Bath, where he died, leaving his widowed wife and two unmarried daughters rather poor. Jane did not write any novels during the ten years she lived in Bath.
• Jane had to pay out-of-pocket to get Sense and Sensibility (first published novel) printed.
• Jane Austen was “encouraged” to dedicate Emma to the Prince Regent, which she was probably not happy about, since he probably never read it.
• Jane Austen died age age 41 of what may have been breast cancer (although Wikipedia suggests Hodgkin’s lymphoma).

Jane Austen’s Little Advice Book edited by Cathryn Michon and Pamela Norris

Then I turned to a short little quote book that jumped out at me while I was at the library one day. The editors of this quote book admit feeling a little guilty to earning money on this book, since Jane Austen herself never earned more than £700 in her lifetime. Yet, it’s rather cute and it was fun to read over the course of an hour.

Using only Jane’s own words, including letters, her unpublished works, and her published novels, the editors give us Austen’s “advice” on Men and Women, Love and Marriage, Family, Worldy Things, The Human Condition, Social Life, The Literary Life, Odd Topics, and Jane Predicts the Future. They readily admit that they take quotes out of context, and I must say that the editors’ comments on each quote are the most amusing parts. From those chapters, I must say my favorite part was the “predicts the future” section, with such quotes as these.

On Predicting the Success of the TV Series E.R.

A sick chamber may often furnish the worth of volumes. (from Persuasion)

On Not Worrying About the Ozone Layer

What fine weather this is… at least everybody fancies so, and imagination is everything. (from the letters of Jane Austen)

There are 125 pages worth of fun quotes, and reading through them got me even more excited to read Sense and Sensibility (as well as the other novels) in the future.

Two Histories of England by Jane Austen and Charles Dickens

Jane Austen’s The History of England and A Child’s History of England by Charles Dickens are a bit harder for me to write about because, um, I know nothing about the history of England. Therefore, I missed the delightful jibes and jokes that Austen wrote and, while I understood Dickens had an interesting bias and judgment of history, it did not make sense to me in a historical way as the writer of the introduction indicated it would.

Jane Austen wrote her short manuscript for her sister when she was 16, and it was clearly a parody of history books. From my perspective, it certainly was amusing. For example:

“Edward the 5^th: This unfortunate prince lived so little a while that nobody had time to draw his picture.” (page 5)

Her snide remarks about various kings and queens really went over my head, since, as I mention, I know little about England’s history. I can only assume her frequent and over-the-top defense of the Stuarts was more sarcasm.

Charles Dickens’ A Child’s History of England is also sarcastic and judgmental. He refers to King James the First as “His Sowship” because that’s what James’ favorite helper called him and Dickens “cannot do better than call his majesty what his favourite called him” (page 72). The disdain is just dripping throughout the descriptions of the king’s reign.

But Dickens’ history (which is much longer, and apparently is only an excerpt from the whole) is packed full of all sorts of extraneous details that make it fascinating and fun. I loved learning about the Gunpowder Plot through Dickens’ imaginative story!

To me, the most amusing thing about Dickens’ account  is that, according to the introduction, it was actually a part of the school curricula for British school children “well into the 20^th century” (introduction, page ix). My question is: was it used as a history text or rather as a humourous part of British culture? As I read, I kept laughing at the thought of this being a proper history textbook. There were so many descriptive beheadings!

I first saw this on Heather J.’s blog and I had to get it!

Have any people from England read Austen’s or Dickens’ histories? I’m curious as to the “accuracy” and/or the impact of the humor on those that actually are familiar with the history of England.

Which Austen novels are your favorites? I’ve still only read Pride and Prejudice and Northanger Abbey. (But I’ve seen all the movies!)

• Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
• Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples, abridged by Henry Steele Commager
• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
• The Life of Our Lord by Charles Dickens
• Personal History by Katharine Graham + Why I Love a Great Biography
• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams
• November in Review + Reading Journal (2 Dec)
• Victorian Second Helpings (The Moonstone by Collins and North and South by Gaskell)
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
• A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

I think there’s something about reading historical fiction that occurs in nineteenth century China that is always painful for me. I dislike the way women and girls are discounted, I don’t understand the traditions (seriously, crippling girls’ feet makes them more attractive?!), and I am often frustrated by my ignorance of place, food, status, and culture. That last point is the main reason I feel I should continue to read about Chinese history: there is so much I do not know.

Although I enjoyed learning about the culture and traditions, the novel did very little for me emotionally. I disliked Lily from her childhood, and I found few other characters to draw me in to the novel. There was one character I found complicated and interesting (Snow Flower) and by the end, although I felt frustrated with the story and with Lily, I felt there were pertinent issues relating to friendship and trust to consider and ponder.

Yet, I unfortunately found the writing stilted and boring, although many people have praised it as beautiful. Maybe that boredom came from the fact that I read the incredible Beloved by Toni Morrison immediately before this novel? I suspect I would have abandoned this novel from boredom if not for my in real life book club, which was meeting at my house.

Nevertheless, despite my lukewarm reaction to Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, I am glad that I read it. Viewing a fictionalized snapshot of nineteenth century China made me incredibly grateful for living where I do now. There are good issues raised about friendship and trust; betrayal; and, ultimately, a woman’s relationship to her husband, friends, and children. I’m sure many people will (and do) enjoy this book more than I did, so please don’t take my word for it.

Because I was hosting the book club in my home, I decided to find something edible from the book to feed to my guests, so I read the book looking for food. That made reading the book fun, too, and it saved me from utter boredom. I ended up making congee and deep-fried sugared taro root.

During a deadly typhoid epidemic, Lily feed her children only congee, a rice pudding. While those who ate the diseased animals died, Lily’s family survived. The congee I made had vegetables and chicken stock and it was quite good. I suspect Lily’s would have been a bit more boring, to say the least. Probably just rice and water. Boiled. For a long time.

Every summer when Lily and Snow Flower met in the village, they ate a special deep-fried sugared taro root desert. I’d never eaten taro root before, but it’s a potato-like tuber. I sliced the taro like thick French fries, fried them in oil, and then coated them in sugar. It was surprisingly tasty! Find links to the recipes on Rebecca’s Cooking Journal.

I guess that goes to show that for me, this “in real life” book club makes a book much more fun than just reading it myself, and not just because we had a fun discussion!

Since I didn’t love this book (note that I didn’t hate it either, it just didn’t do much for me), I found as many other reviews as I could find so you can get a second opinion. If I missed your review, let me know.

Other reviews: 1 more chapter; A Novel Menagerie; A Striped Armchair; American Bibliophile; Bending Bookshelf; Bloody Hell, It’s a Book Barrage!; Book Club Girl; Book Nut; Bookin’ It; Books for Breakfast; Books Lists Life; Dear Author; Devourer of Books ; Dolce Bellezza; Fyrefly Books’ Blog; Literate Housewife; Lotus Reads; Reading Adventure; Reading Matters; Sassymonkey Reads; Small World Reads; So Many Books, So Little Time;  Some Reads; Stone Soup; The Bookworm – Naida; tiny reading room; Tif Talks Books

• The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
• Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
• To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
• The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa
• The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters
• The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
• Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
• Beloved by Toni Morrison
• The Norton Introduction to Poetry + My Introduction to Poetry
• Caldecott Corner: Wintery Miscellany

Of course, the two Swift works are different genres, so comparing them is probably not fair: it’s like comparing apples to zucchini. “A Modest Proposal” is an essay, and Gulliver’s Travels is a full-length novel. “A Modest Proposal” was, I believe, written in response to a certain political situation and thus was intentionally political. Gulliver’s Travels is primarily a story, and thus is a more universal criticism of human nature. Yet, even the word “criticism” seems wrong when I consider this novel: Lemuel Gulliver’s cynicism is amusing and yet still highly relevant. It was neither an easy nor a challenging read, and it’s surprisingly accessible tone, amusing anecdotes, and pertinent commentary made it a completely satisfying read.

Gulliver’s Travels was a strange kind of funny to me. I laughed out loud on occasion, and when I finished the last page, I turned it over and read the first few pages again, just because the tone finally made sense: I finally understood what Jonathon Swift’s point was. In some respects, I’d like to reread the novel, now that I comprehend a little bit what the ultimate commentary is.

I realized that these subtle jokes made it a politically charged novel, but it did not feel like a political book as I read it. Rather, Swift tells the story of Lemuel Gulliver’s four voyages around the world. On each voyage, he ends up alone in a remote land, where he meets the local people. There are strange aspects about the humor of this book: while visiting each country, Gulliver seems compelled to mention everything from excrement to the relationships between men and woman to their various living habits. The novel comes across as rather crass, and that adds, I believe, to the illustration of satire of humanity in general.

I’d heard of Lilliput before, and I found Gulliver’s observations of the six-inch high people to be just as ridiculous as would be expected. His descriptions of every-day life (in this country as in the others) compared Lilliputian habits to those of countries he’s familiar with, including his observations of things as insignificant as their writing:

Their manner of writing is very peculiar, being neither from the left to the right, like the Europeans, nor from the right to the left, like the Arabians, nor from up to down, like the Chinese, but aslant, from one corner of the paper to the other, like ladies in England. (page 60)

Further, by observing the pride of the little people, Gulliver illustrates the ridiculousness of pride in might. Because Gulliver literally towers over them, he is asked to stand as a colossus while the proud Lilliputian army marches between his legs (page 40). Gulliver subsequently wins a battle with a neighboring kingdom by walking across a stream and “capturing” the other miniature army, showing how insignificant the “mighty” armies of the little people really were. And despite the Lilliputian taboo of voiding near the palace, he puts out a deadly palace fire with his urine, thus saving the kingdom. And yet, of course, this act is subsequently shunned and Gulliver is ultimately banished from the kingdom.

In Brobdingnag, Gulliver is the miniature-sized person in a land of giants, deeply offending the peaceful giants by offering them the great “gift” of gun powder (page 155-157). The thirty-foot tall dwarf is his only adversary in a land of 60-foot tall humans, as Gulliver finds himself pampered and taught about better government.

In the flying-island land of Laputa, Gulliver found himself a bit bewildered by the intellectually “advanced” Laputans, with a number of scholars researching important new techniques:

[The scholar] was, by a certain composition of gums, minerals, and vegetables, outwardly applied, to prevent the growth of wool upon two young lambs; and he hoped, in a reasonable time to propagate the breed of naked sheep, all over the kingdom. (page 216-217)

And his observation of the women was likewise amusing, since they were not given an education and therefore were the only ones in the nation not distracted by insignificant inventions. Ironically, then, they were therefore the most intelligent in the country.

Ultimately, I, like Gulliver, found the last land of Gulliver’s travels to be the most fascinating. The human-like Yahoos are frightening creatures, and Gulliver finds comfort from the horse-like Houyhnhmns, which teach him much about humanity.

I hesitate to comment further on Swift’s ultimate commentary, especially for that last land, for I fear I missed most of it myself and explaining any more would spoil some of the joke of the novel. In the beginning, I intended to refer to literary criticism to help me make sense of the book, but in the end, I decided that the story and cultural jokes that I did understand were sufficient for me to say without hesitation that I’m glad I read this book. I read about 100 pages a week over the course of three or four weeks.

As one point, in the country of Laputa, Gulliver discusses the history of problems in Europe with a scholar, but then he clarifies for the reader of his adventures:

…however [I did so] without grating upon present times, because I would be sure to give no offense even to foreigners (for I hope the reader need not be told that I do not in the least intend my own country)… (page 237)

I love that little ironic reminder from Swift that yes, actually, he’s talking about his own England.

He also clarifies to the reader that he did not declare the lands he “discovered” for the crown of England, and he gives his reasons. This comes at the end of the book, and could be a spoiler, but I love this quote, because it puts the book into perspective, so highlight it if you’d like to read it and be “spoiled.”

I confess, it was whispered to me, “that I was bound in duty, as a subject of England, to have given in a memorial to a secretary of state at my first coming over; because, whatever lands are discovered by a subject belong to the crown.”  But I doubt whether our conquests in the countries I treat of would be as easy as those of Ferdinando Cortez over the naked Americans.  The Lilliputians, I think, are hardly worth the charge of a fleet and army to reduce them; and I question whether it might be prudent or safe to attempt the Brobdingnagians; or whether an English army would be much at their ease with the Flying Island over their heads.  The Houyhnhnms indeed appear not to be so well prepared for war, a science to which they are perfect strangers, and especially against missive weapons.  However, supposing myself to be a minister of state, I could never give my advice for invading them.  Their prudence, unanimity, unacquaintedness with fear, and their love of their country, would amply supply all defects in the military art.  Imagine twenty thousand of them breaking into the midst of an European army, confounding the ranks, overturning the carriages, battering the warriors’ faces into mummy by terrible yerks from their hinder hoofs; for they would well deserve the character given to Augustus, Recalcitrat undique tutus.  But, instead of proposals for conquering that magnanimous nation, I rather wish they were in a capacity, or disposition, to send a sufficient number of their inhabitants for civilizing Europe, by teaching us the first principles of honour, justice, truth, temperance, public spirit, fortitude, chastity, friendship, benevolence, and fidelity.  The names of all which virtues are still retained among us in most languages, and are to be met with in modern, as well as ancient authors; which I am able to assert from my own small reading. (page 350-351)

As I mention above, I finished the book and turned it over to reread the beginning again. Certainly, I did not understand it fully, but the ultimate joke is on all of us. That I can appreciate.

Incidentally, in between each two-to-five year adventure, Gulliver returned home for a period of a few months. Each time, his wife greeted him with surprise. I kept hoping she would kick him out, and yet her consistent acceptance of him added, I suspect, to the ridiculous imitation of other adventure tales. (Of other contemporary tales, I’ve only read Robinson Crusoe, but Gulliver’s “thirst for adventure” was insanely ludicrous compared to Crusoe’s.)

I read Gulliver’s Travels as a part of my reader’s history of children’s literature project. Lerer did not discuss Gulliver’s Travels in great detail in his book, but upon reading it, it’s clear this novel is a part of the adventure literary tradition.

Have you heard of Gulliver’s adventures? From the brief descriptions of each land I mention above, which one would you prefer to live in? I’d like to stay where I am, despite it’s flaws, thank you very much.

• A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift
• Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott
• Utopia by Thomas More
• Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn
• Reading Reflections: A Book Kingdom
• Poetry for Young People: Robert Louis Stevenson (edited by Frances Schoonmaker)
• November Month in Review and December Reading Journal
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• Animal Farm by George Orwell
• Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov + Giveaway

As I read about Chicago architecture last month, I found myself curious to read about Mormon architecture (such as the Salt Lake Temple) as well. The only published book I found that talks about the architectural aspects of Mormon architecture, from Kirtland to Utah, was Nineteenth-Century Mormon Architecture and City Planning by C. Mark Hamilton, an academic volume on the subject.

Because it is academic (published by Oxford University Press), I’d suggest it’s only for extremely curious readers. I liked reading it, but I was specifically looking for it! I was mostly interested in the Temple architecture when I picked up this volume, but I admit that all of it interested me to some extent.

This volume covers nineteenth-century Mormon temples, tabernacles, meetinghouses, other associated buildings (such as cultural halls and offices), domestic architecture, and various other buildings (such as governmental buildings, warehouses, and schools). It also had a chapter discussing the Mormon concepts of city planning and a background chapter on Mormon history. It was not, however, a Mormon book: it was an architecture book. Details from Mormon history are interspersed throughout simply because the history helps explain various architectural styles.

The facts behind a number of specific buildings fascinated me.

The Kirtland (Ohio) Temple (built 1833-1836) is a mixture of various styles, including Georgian, Federal, Greek, and Gothic. The classical elements both inside and out were probably from patterns in carpentry textbooks to some extent. Many of the builders were young amateurs.

The Salt Lake (Utah) Temple (built 1853-1893; yes, forty years) is a distinctly English architectural style, specifically when one looks at the medieval crenelations at the top. That may have been influenced by Brigham Young’s familiarity with England. I admit that I love the look of this building, and learning that it’s walls are six-to-eight feet thick really does make it more fortress-like in my mind.

Many of the other temples built in Utah in the nineteenth-century were likewise crenelated and fortress-like. Personally, I think these settlers were trying to say “No, we’re not leaving this time!” (Mormons had been driven from Kirtland, Ohio, where they’d built a temple; Jackson County, Missouri; and Nauvoo, Illinois, where they’d also built a temple.)

I also was interested in construction of the Salt Lake Tabernacle (home to the Mormon Tabernacle organ and Choir and a hall with excellent acoustics; built 1863-1870) and the Assembly Hall (Victorian-Gothic; 1877-1882).

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I hadn’t heard of (let alone seen) many of the other beautiful meeting houses and other buildings discussed, but I was surprised by how architecturally creative the buildings were, considering the time period and the geographic isolation of the people building them. Even in the 1860s, many buildings were built by following 1820-1840s popular styles because the builders were so removed from the core of architectural thought. Once the railroads came through Utah, more mainstream architecture was built in Utah.

While I’d seen Brigham Young’s Beehive House (built 1852-1854) and Lion House (built 1854-1856) before, I hadn’t seen a picture of his Forest Farmhouse (built 1861-1863), which I like better. It just looks so homey!

I also liked to learn about Brigham Young Academy (built 1884-1891) in Provo, Utah, because that is the town where I went to college. While this text (published in 1995) mentioned that the Academy Building was slated for demolition, since then it has instead been restored and is now a gorgeous local library. I’m so glad it wasn’t destroyed!

The text was scholarly and had very thorough endnotes, which I enjoy. I would have preferred footnotes because I read all of them. I also was regularly referring to the photographs of the buildings, so I had my hand in three pages of the book at once whenever I read it!

I found this book to be surprisingly easy to read (especially after the Chicago architecture one) and I think that’s partially because I’m more familiar with Mormon history than I was with the Chicago history. I also think the Chicago architecture book was a bit more technical as it discussed the buildings. Hamilton’s volume used lots of architectural terms I was not familiar with, but by looking at pictures and reading sentences in context, I learned the terms fairly easy.

I’m glad I read about some buildings I was curious about; I do think they are beautiful. Now I am curious to learn about the twentieth-century Mormon buildings too, buildings like the modern temples (I love the Hong Kong Temple), the Conference Center, and even the Office Building. I really like learning the history of these buildings.

What building(s) do you think are beautiful?

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• The Chicago School of Architecture by Carl W. Condit
• Chicago, Chicago!
• Reading Journal (26 Aug): Focused Reading
• Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage
• Reading Journal (19 Aug): Miscellany
• Reading Journal (2 Sep): Vacation Prep
• Christ and the New Covenant by Jeffrey R. Holland
• August in Review
• Chicago Poems by Carl Sandburg

The Chicago School of Architecture

The architects that flocked to Chicago after the fire of 1871 found a willing city. Chicago was determined to rebuild, and the architects were eager to comply. The most interesting aspect was that for the first time in history, architects were able to look upward: new engineering techniques were encouraging taller buildings. Yet,

[I]t became more and more difficult for [the architect] to develop an exterior form that grew out of and gave expression to the dominant social factors of the time, chiefly the new conditions of urban life in the great centers of trade and manufacture. (page 2)

Thus, a new style was needed for the new type of taller and larger buildings that were being created.

Condit’s book had long sections at the beginning and end about architecture and where it was and is going. For example, “architecture is the only art that is both utilitarian and aesthetic and hence ought to express its practical function as well as the inspiration that leads to the creation of beauty” (page 9). These passages were slow and difficult for me to read, but I still learned a lot about architecture as an art, and I feel a new interest in this field of art. It may be a new favorite, along with photography which always has been.

What I liked most was the direct discussion about the specific buildings and how certain buildings were influential. I liked hearing what the architectures themselves said about their designs. One significant architect (and my favorite) was John Wellburn Root, who died in 1891. I wonder how the face of modern architecture would be different if he had lived longer!

For example, Root says,

As far as material conditions permit it to be possible, a building designated for a particular purpose should express that purpose in every part. The purpose may not be revealed by conventional means, but it must be so plainly revealed that it can be escaped by no appreciative student. . . . another essential characteristic of all true art work – moderation. (page 47-48, italics added)

The Monadnock

Monadnock, image via Wikipedia

My favorite building that I read about was one of Root’s buildings, The Monadnock (mouth-watering but copyrighted picture here). It was one of the last masonry constructed buildings, and yet, it was in a design that seemed to indicated it was a sky scraper (a building which could only truly reach the sky once steel framing was readily adopted):

…[T]he projecting bays of the walls with their large glass area give the structure a light open appearance in spite of its great mass and the relatively small size of the windows. Stripped of every vestige of ornament, its rigorous geometry softened only by the slight inward curve of the wall at the top of the first story, the outward flare of the parapet, and the progressive rounding of the corners from bottom to top, subtly proportioned and scaled, the Monadnock is a severe yet powerfully expressive composition in horizontal and vertical lines. It presents in its relentless exactitude the formal beauty latent in the commercial style, but at the same time it demonstrates the limitations of the old method of construction. (page 68)

When I first read about this building, I thought back to Lost Chicago (thoughts here), which documented all the buildings in Chicago that have been torn down. I got very scared and ran to my computer: Is the Monadnock still standing?! Yes, it is. I love to look at this building: I keep searching for more pictures on the Internet (such as here and here). I can’t wait until my next visit to Chicago so I can go see it in person. (Yes, I am a nerd.)

I love it even more when I read the contemporary praise of this building:

This building has no precedent in architecture. It is itself a precedent. Yet is has a precedent outside of architecture; it comes up to an ideal, and by virtue of its correspondence with this ideal it becomes a work of art. (page 68, quote of Robert D. Andrews of Boston Architectural Club).

The Auditorium

Auditorium Theater, image via Wikipedia

Another significant Building was the Auditorium, built by Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. I didn’t feel any connection with the building, but it was interesting to see the impact:

Like the Monadnock, [the Auditorium] was the high point of masonry and iron construction in the new age of mechanized industrial techniques. It brought the old system of construction to a close and at the same time substantially advanced the new structural technique growing up and around it. (page 77)

I’m glad I didn’t start with a book about or by Louis Sullivan, even though he was one of the only architects I’d ever heard of. Sullivan was one of the most well-respected architects in the world, always encouraging “the rule with no exceptions in the concept ‘form follows function’” (page 36), and yet it seems he was a bit of a feisty, rude man. His own pride and his cantankerous personality were his downfall: once his partner left the firm, he was unable to gain any large commissions.

My History with Architecture

When I was in a seventh or eighth grade elective class (I think it was an art class), we had one week of lessons on architecture. As a special field trip, we walked around the houses near my junior high school and my teacher told us “That one is Victorian style” and “Notice the gables on that one” and so forth. That was all I’d ever learned about architecture.

Because I’ve been reading about Chicago lately, I have become quite interested in the buildings down town. They didn’t mean anything to me, so I researched, and apparently, there is an entire school of architecture based on the buildings created in late 1800s in Chicago! Duh! I should know these things.

While The Chicago School of Architecture was a slow and sometimes boring read, I’m so very glad I read this book. I look forward to learning more about various architectural styles, preferably the 19^th and twentieth century architecture styles.

Have you read any easy-to-approach architecture books? I’m in the middle of another dense one, and I’m hoping the next after that isn’t quite so academic.

What is your favorite type of art?

• Chicago, Chicago!
• Nineteenth-Century Mormon Architecture and City Planning by C. Mark Hamilton
• Chicago Poems by Carl Sandburg
• Reading Journal (26 Aug): Focused Reading
• Reading Journal (29 July): Summer Mode to Blog Reading
• Reading Journal (19 Aug): Miscellany
• Listen to the Wind by Greg Mortenson and Susan L. Roth
• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams
• Kid’s Corner: Birthday Books (Age 2)
• All the President’s Men by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward

I found that many of the books I got were quite dry histories, and I didn’t have much patience with them. I read some and mostly I looked at the pictures of some. My history lesson came from videos. Here are two of the books I’ve read and one of the videos that I’ve enjoyed lately.

Chicago: Then and Now by Elizabeth McNulty was the first book that I picked up. It’s a coffee table book, and it compares street corners and neighborhoods over the years. It provided a short paragraph about the scene, and had the “then” picture on the left-hand page and a “now” picture on the right-hand page. I am not very familiar with Chicago today, let alone in the past, so it probably wasn’t the best starting point, but it was still interesting. I was interested enough to keep searching for more information.

Lost Chicago by David Lowe focuses on the buildings that have been torn down. Since I’ve never lived in the city, it’s not as tragic to me, and I got rather tired of the drama (this building has “disappeared” and this “gem” has been horrifically removed). Beyond that, though, the book provided a very general history of Chicago in between the photographs, starting with Louis and Clark and going through the Chicago fire and to the early 20^th century. Because the focus was on the photographs of the now-torn down buildings, the history was not too dense for me. I learned about a little about the Chicago School of Architecture and I’m eager to learn more. I also found myself interested in some more of the history.

I mentioned the video Chicago: City of the Century in my Reading Journal post last week. It was excellently done, and I thought watching a three-disc documentary was a wonderful way to grasp some of the history of Chicago without having to read a 700-page book. It was slightly cheesy in its drama, but overall, this movie was a great beginning. I know it was not too cheesy because I also started a different one that was so horribly done I couldn’t watch more than 30 minutes. I won’t bother pointing you to that one.

What to Read?

As I’ve read and learned about Chicago, I’ve found a lot of different things to add to my “to read” lists. If you’ve read any of these, please let me know what you thought.  What Chicago books come to your mind? It seems Chicago isn’t often a memorable setting for novels, as London and New York are.

Nonfiction

• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams. Autobiography of a serious Chicago social humanitarian. I’ve already started this, and I’m loving the insight into a difficult place and people.
• The Autobiography of an Idea by Louis Sullivan. Autobiography from one of the initiators of the Chicago school of architecture.
• The Chicago School of Architecture by Carl Condit. I’m interested in more Chicago architecture info; even if I don’t read these things in full, it’s still interesting to skim through.

Fiction

• Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser. A Chicago author that wrote a turn-of-the-century Chicago novel. I want to read it now.
• The Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters. Poetry from turn-of-the-century Chicago. Apparently each poem is from the perspective of a different dead person in the cemetery, telling the story of his or her life.
• Native Son by Richard Wright. A novel about a citizen of Chicago.
• Lucy Grayheart by Willa Cather. I love the few Cather novels I’ve read. This one has some scenes in Chicago.
• The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. I don’t really want to read this, but I feel I should. Especially after learning all about Chicago’s stockyards. Yuck already.

I really wanted to end with a little Frank Sinatra singing about That Toddlin’ Town. But I can’t find the real man on YouTube. Here’s a cover band.

And if you’d rather, here’s the Obama version.

• The Chicago School of Architecture by Carl W. Condit
• Chicago Poems by Carl Sandburg
• Nineteenth-Century Mormon Architecture and City Planning by C. Mark Hamilton
• Reading Journal (26 Aug): Focused Reading
• Moments: The Pulitzer Prize-Winning Photographs by Hal Buell
• August in Review
• Reading Journal (29 July): Summer Mode to Blog Reading
• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams
• Two Books on Literacy (Growing a Reader from Birth and The ABCs of Literacy)
• Kreativ Blogger Award

The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean is a fine example of that. A year ago, I may have dismissed it entirely because it seems so superficial to me. (Actually, I probably would have dismissed it as “modern trash” when I got to what I thought was a rather awkwardly written sex scene on page 25.)

This year, on the other hand, I thought it an okay novel. I’m feel like I’m just barely finding my way in the world of modern fiction, but this one met my expectations.

In the present day, Marina and her husband Dimitri attend her grandchild’s wedding, and her Alzheimer’s reaches new stages of confusion for her and for her family as she relives her months living through the Siege of Leningrad during World War II. As a part of the staff for the Hermitage, she and her aunt and uncle had lived under the museum. During the many months of starvation, she had comforted herself with the empty picture frames of the museum, reminding herself of the pictures that would someday return to their frames.

The flashbacks were confusing to me at first, and I never loved Dean’s style of writing. The entire book is written in the present tense: both flashbacks and current events. But as I became somewhat accustomed to the style, I came to appreciate the stories. The lack of tense shift accurately portrayed the confusion Marina experienced with her Alzheimer’s and it added to our own sense of confusion as to what was going on now.

I only wished that there were more to the novel.

As a short 225-page novel, Dean was unable to fully delve into either story: the siege story and the modern-day story. In the modern day, her children were trying to come to terms both with their mother’s Alzheimer’s and with the story of her past, which they had never heard in full. We saw glimpses of Marina’s daughter Helen trying to understand Marina’s condition, but it seemed that this key issue was only briefly addressed. I felt like I only got the barest introduction to Helen throughout the novel, and the book ended before there was any type of resolution. I suppose the point is that there is not a resolution to a disease like Alzheimer’s. The surviving relatives must go on without completely understanding their suffering loved one.

I’m not sure that one would want to read any more details about the horrors Marina experienced while starving in Leningrad. And yet, I likewise felt something was missing in that part of the story. I only got a glimpse of their life and I wondered a number of things, especially how she escaped the city and how she was reunited with her husband. In fact, after finishing this book, I’m most interested in learning more about the siege, for that was the most interesting part of the story to me. I felt like the siege sections ended abruptly. Again, this is probably a good indication of how Marina’s memory is working at this point: she probably can’t remember the details either. Her life all must blur together.

(Totally random side note: I also wondered about long-term health effects of the siege. I remembered reading something about the siege in Hunger, which I read a few months ago, but I can’t recall what it said about long-term effects.)

Even if the incomplete stories were an appropriate portrayal of Alzheimer’s and it’s effects, to me, it gave the novel a superficial feel, which was disappointing to me. The premise held such promise.

In the end, The Madonnas of Leningrad was a touching look at both how Alzheimer’s affects those we love and at how the siege of Leningrad impacted the people caught in it. I also liked learning about the art and seeing how the art got mixed up with reality in Marina’s mind. I did walk away from the book with a greater understanding of the issues and with a few memorable scenes in my mind. This book is about memory on many different levels, and some of the scenes Dean created are not ones I will forget easily.

Incidentally, the story of the frames being left empty is a true one: while most of the pictures were evacuated from the Hermitage during World War II, the frames were left as a promise to the people that the paintings would someday return.

If you are interested in art, the siege of Leningrad, and/or the effects of Alzheimer’s disease and memory throughout our lives, The Madonnas of Leningrad may be for you. It’s a quick and easy read, and I found it out of the ordinary, albeit a bit superficial.

I normally ask a question at the end of my reviews, but I feel like this book was so short and my thoughts about it so brief and superficial in themselves that I have nothing to ask. It does look like a lot of people have already read it, and most people don’t seem to notice any problems with in their reviews. Maybe I’m the only one that found it somewhat superficial. What did you think about this book?

Other Reviews (which are more thought-provoking than mine):

• Boston Bibliophile
• Bonnie’s Books
• The Literate Housewife
• A Fondness for Reading
• Bibliohistoria
• Caribousmom
• Booking Mama
• S. Krishna’s Books
• Out of the Blue
• Lesley’s Book Nook
• Age 30+ A Lifetime of Books

If you have reviewed The Madonnas of Leningrad on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here. I’ve only added the first ten that showed up via Google search, so make sure you let me know if you also wrote one.

• Library Summer Reading Programs Completed!
• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
• Poetry for Young People: William Shakespeare
• The Complete Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelma
• Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud
• March by Geraldine Brooks
• Black No More by George S. Schuyler
• Foundation by Isaac Asimov
• Churchill’s History of the English-Speaking Peoples, abridged by Henry Steele Commager
• Carmen by Prosper Merimee

While this was an incredibly challenging book for me to get through*, I am incredibly glad I persevered. While I of course was familiar with the Cold War relations between USSR and the USA, I hadn’t seriously considered the state of the world after the Cold War. Huntington’s book is quite interesting, although it is dated. Because it was written in 1995, I found myself wondering many times how 9/11 changed the face of the world in terms of his philosophies.

In some respects, I think 9/11 may have been a direct result of exactly the issues Huntington addresses. Western civilizations like the USA did not comprehend the significance of Islam and/or expected Islamic countries to both modernize and Westernize. Also, Western civilizations assume “Western” ways of thinking are superior to other civilization traditions. This simply adds to the conflict between the civilizations, and it makes sense that the rising generations of the civilizations grow up relatively “anti-Western.”

On the other hand, Huntington does not address terrorism and terrorist states much at all. I kept thinking something was missing in his picture of the world: where do terrorists fit in the picture of world civilizations and developing states? Is the world really just a collection of civilizations and states surrounding those civilizations? What about the rouges?

I’ve read the book, and there is a lot in it. I don’t feel qualified to say whether or not I agree with Huntington, or whether or not his arguments are sound. As an amateur (i.e., not a political science academic), I found it very interesting, albeit overwhelming. I also don’t want to start a political debate: I really don’t know what I’m talking about. I was interested in this book and I still am interested in the concepts.

I now wish to learn, for comparison purposes, what the other political theories are in this post-Cold War era.  Huntington wrote his book in the 1990s, just between the Cold War and this new age, whatever it has become. Even more, I want to know what the post-9/11 theories are. Can anyone suggest a book that might help me on that endeavor? While I’m not sure I’m up to it this month, I certainly want to learn at some point in the future. I hope that reading more political theory might make political theory in general less overwhelming.

I read this for the World Citizen Challenge. It certainly helped me appreciate my place in terms of world politics! The parts I most appreciated were his exploration of the difference between Westernization and modernization. It was important for me to see how my way of life is starkly different from that of many other civilizations simply because I’m Western, and Western is not necessarily better. I also appreciated the history Huntington discussed because it helped me understand his arguments a little better; I’m not familiar with political theory, but history I enjoy.

*My husband studied politics and economics as an undergraduate; he says this is actually a very easy book of this type to read. Nonetheless, I struggled.

Other Reviews:

If you have reviewed The Clash of Civilizations on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• Why Women Should Rule the World by Dee Dee Myers
• Daughter of Destiny by Benazir Bhutto
• Kissinger by Walter Isaacson
• Political Reading
• The Words We Live By: Your Annotated Guide to the U.S. Constitution by Linda Monk
• Comfort Reading
• Will in the World by Stephen Greenblatt
• Speeches of Winston Churchill
• A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift
• What the World Eats by Peter Menzel

Galsworthy’s writing was just as beautiful and the stories were just as interesting in terms of the social history they tell, but I failed to relate to or enjoy the characters as much as I enjoyed The Man of Property. In a sense, the first novel was powerful because of the strong emotions the main characters faced. As the characters became less likable (first Soames, and then his daughter Fleur), I also felt like I could not relate to their emotions as much. In fact, in the third novel (To Let) I only felt a strong emotional draw in the very last scene as Soames reflects on his life.

In Chancery

When I first began this section, I mistakenly thought “Chancery” was a place. No: Chancery is a court in England. According to Merriam-Webster, “in chancery” now means:

1: in litigation in a court of chancery

2: in a hopeless predicament

The Forsytes certainly face rather hopeless predicaments in the turn-of-the-century England, as this section revolves around two significant divorce cases in the Forsyte family. Divorce was a scandalous public occurrence, and no one in the family wants the shame. However, divorce is the only way to pursue the path necessary for happiness. A few second-generation families must decide what is most important to them: reputation or happiness.

Again, young Jolyon Forsyte seems to put the difference between the generations in perspective best. He is of the second generation, speaking to his cousin:

We may live to their age, perhaps, … but self-consciousness is a handicap, you know, and that’s the difference between us. We’ve lost conviction. How and when self-consciousness was born I never can make out. My father had a little, but I don’t believe any of other of the old Forsytes ever had a scrap. (page 421)

Each generations of Forsytes gains more self-consciousness, and therefore less interest in the public appearance of things. The younger, Edwardian, generation makes personal choices that are in stark contrast to those that the image-important Victorian generation would make.

This section didn’t feel as developed as the first. Part of that may come from the fact that I loathed Soames far more than I did during the first part. Also, Galsworthy seemed to stop telling the story of Irene and Jolyon. I wanted to see their love affair develop; instead, I got to see Soames making another woman’s life miserable. I couldn’t relate to Soames’ self-centered adoration of the idea of a child; he never ceased to be a “Forsyte” in that he never stopped thinking of his image.

The most intriguing scene to me was that of the funeral of Queen Victoria: it was the end of the era in many ways. Just as Irene and Jolyon had rebelled against “reputation,” youngsters of that generation were repeatedly rebelling against Victorian ideals. Soames’ inability to understand the import of the upcoming Edwardian era was a stark contrast to the rebelliousness. (page 602-604)

Awakening

Just as “Indian Summer of a Forsyte” seemed like a stand-alone story, this short interlude seems like one too. Young Jon comes to be aware of the people in his life, including his mother, who he loves and feels very close to. It’s a sweet story of a child growing up. I didn’t love it as much as I did the previous interlude, but in retrospect is was important to the final novel, as it described the reasons his relationship with his mother was so important.

To Let

The epigram at the beginning of the third novel, To Let, comes from Romeo and Juliet. Just as Romeo and Juliet fall in love despite their parents’ wishes, so do two young people in the 1920s. What is at stake once again is the conflicting ideals of marriage, self-determination, and the changing era in England.

Young Michael Mont says the line that captures the title of this novel.

“You’ll see,” he said. “There’s going to be a big change. The Possessive principle has got its shutters up. … The house is to let.” (page 859-860).

Soames becomes a rather minor character in this part of the story, as the story of the two young lovers takes center stage. However, I so strongly disliked Fleur that I disliked the story too; while I liked Jon, I couldn’t determine why he like Fleur. There was no convincing “love” between them, and all seemed superficial. Therefore, the entire premise wasn’t believable.

This novel, overall, felt plot-driven, rather than character-driven. In the other books, I enjoyed the internal monologues and debates and therefore could relate to some extent to the characters. The only emotional tie I had to this book was how much I despised Soames for his choices: it ended with Soames miserable and lonely, and I didn’t pity him at all. He lived his life selfishly, so he deserve misery in the end.

The Bottom Line

In the end, The Forsyte Saga was memorable as a look at the changing era at the turn of the century. I loved the first novel, but the second two didn’t quite stack up.

John Galsworthy’s writing carefully captures characters and I loved some of the introspection. On the other hand, it got tedious after 900 pages. If you are interested in experiencing Galsworthy’s writing, I’d highly suggest reading simply The Man of Property, which powerfully sets forth the issues and emotions dealt with during a volatile time of change.

A movie was made 1969, black and white, and a remake was made in 2002. While I don’t normally enjoy remakes of books I like, I was going to watch at least one of them to give it a chance. One commenter suggested that the remake is awful. Now I’m considering not watching either of them. Do I really want to spend another seven hours, let alone fourteen hours, with the Forsyte family? (Each movie is about seven hours, as these are series.)

Do you normally watch movies of books? Why or why not?

• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (The Man of Property)
• Bloggiesta Progress
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
• Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
• Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
• Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman + Giveaway (Used Book)
• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
• Painting a Novel: East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• The John Cheever Audio Collection

Enter: Founding Mothers by Cokie Roberts. In a conversational tone, Roberts shares some of the stories about the women who founded the country. She, too, had been tired of hearing about how remarkable the men were founded the country: what about the women? This, then, is full of some of their stories. Roberts’ conclusion was (interestingly) that the women behind those men were no more extraordinary than you and I: they simply did what was asked of them.

The book had plenty of flaws. Most of the author’s asides and explanations were rather distracting, and it sometimes felt rambling and off-topic. I do wish it was better written or at least better organized. The casual tone made me feel like I was listening to random anecdotes rather than a comprehensive historical account. It didn’t feel comprehensive, nor did it feel like a true historical record. It was a collection of stories about women, full of sometimes extraneous detail. And there were a lot of women!

However, because I was listening to the audiobook in short intervals, such an anecdotal format was okay for me. And the details did make it interesting.

I may remember some interesting facts and the names. I’m already forgetting most of the details, and some of the women are mixing up in my mind. That’s okay for me. I’ve had an entertaining and yet informative introduction to the founding ladies of the United States. I’m glad I checked it out.

The audio book was narrated by the author. Overall, I enjoyed it, with one exception: to my disappointment, I noticed only after checking it out that it is “Unabridged Selections.” In other words, it is abridged. I have no idea how much was excised from the book, and I wholeheartedly wish there was a completely unabridged option in audio. The author’s asides were still annoying in the audio format. Did she just add them because she was reading it aloud?

Will you like this book? I don’t know. It’s casual almost to a fault. But that may be just what you’re looking for.

What woman from the U.S. Revolutionary Era would you like to learn more about? Can you name any influential women from the 1700s and what they did?

As I listened, I kept remembering David McCullough’s powerful, carefully researched, and comprehensive biography of John Adams. That’s a biography I’d love to reread. I’m fascinated by Abigail Adams, and I’d love to learn more about her.

Other Reviews:

• Book Nut
• Marion’s Blog

If you have reviewed Founding Mothers on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
• A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
• Will in the World by Stephen Greenblatt
• Why Women Should Rule the World by Dee Dee Myers
• The Life of Wilkie Collins (Biographies by Clarke and Peters)
• Abraham Lincoln: A Man of Faith and Courage by Joe Wheeler
• The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin
• Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn
• Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling by Richard Lyman Bushman
• Personal History by Katharine Graham + Why I Love a Great Biography

Almost from its original publication in 1719, Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe had an immense impact on literature for children and adults. It has been widely seen as one of the first major novels in English; as the stimulus for a range of adventure stories; as the kernel for abridgments and adaptations; and as the marker for particular personal and political experience. (page 129)

I can believe that. I liked Robinson Crusoe’s themes (reviewed here), and I can see how people through history could pick and choose various themes to expand upon both in criticism and when creating adaptations.

For the sake of this month’s project, I decided to look at some of the modern-day abridgments and adaptations of Robinson Crusoe to determine how it is still viewed. In Lerer’s analysis of some of the adaptations from the 1800s, he observers that many of the themes of Robinson Crusoe are taken away in making it an adventure story, and each rewritten version focused on a different moral lesson. The main difference among all the early retellings was the tone (page 137).

I came to this project torn as to whether abridgments for children are good. I wished that I could determined that adapters are more faithful to the original in this day and age, but I also wished I could suggest that everyone just stay with the original,  simply because I like classics to be left alone.

In the end, I’d suggest that there are similar changes in tone in the various children’s adaptations of Robinson Crusoe today, and some of them eliminate or completely rewrite the major themes of Robinson Crusoe. But this is not always bad.

The Original versus Adaptations

The original Robinson Crusoe was not just about his adventure marooned on an island; it had some beginning stories, starting with how Crusoe was kidnapped by pirates, sold into slavery, escaped, and then began a plantation in Brazil, and it also had further story after he was rescued from his island. The original contains recognition that the savages are cannibals, since Crusoe finds human remains. Do you think the cannibal theme is appropriate for children? At what age can they deal with that theme?

But for me, Robinson Crusoe was not simply an adventure story: it was a spiritual journey as Crusoe came to peace with God. It also had strong themes of loneliness, fear, and survival. Emotion carried the story, for, with no other characters, Robinson Crusoe’s emotions had to be supreme.

One of my favorite aspects of the story was Crusoe’s religious transformation, so I worry about how much of that might be eliminated in adaptations for children.

The question is, then, which parts do abridgments excise from the story? Are they faithful to the spirit of Robinson Crusoe? Why are challenging words considered bad for children to read?

Are Adaptations Good?

After reviewing a number of adaptations, I’d have to say that adaptations do have a place. They are much easier to approach than Defoe’s daunting novel, and they may introduce children to important themes.

I think the afterward to the Classics Starts edition did a good job of explaining why adaptations might be okay:

Even for a gifted young reader, getting through long chapters with dense language can easily become overwhelming and can obscure the richness of the story and its characters. Reading an abridged, newly crafter version of a classic novel can be the gentle introduction a child needs to explore the characters and story line without the frustration of difficult vocabulary and complex themes.

Reading an abridged version of a classic novel gives the young reader a sense of independence and the satisfaction of finishing a “grown-up” book. … (Classic Starts edition, page 149)

The modern-day language retellings won’t help a young child prepare to read Defoe’s language, and I hesitate to suggest that reading them (including the Classic Starts version) is reading a classic “grown-up” book; it’s reading a classic story, not a classic novel. The characters and themes are not the same as those in the original classic.  Even themes are changed to fit the adapter’s moral agenda. But there is a purpose behind these abridgments. Introducing a story to a young child may be a worthwhile endeavor, and the larger themes (as interpreted by the adapter) can be understood.

As I said, I came to this project torn as to whether abridgments are good or bad. I still think it really depends; one must read each abridgment to determine if it does a good or bad job at capturing the spirit of the original classic.

My biggest pet peeve is that most abridgments are not clearly marked as such: the Puffin Classics abridgment, which cuts out a lot of the themes, retains most of Defoe’s words, and simplifies the language, mentions an abridger in the very small print on the copyright page and on the back cover. It would be easy to miss. Therefore, if you are buying a classic for your child, read the copyright page to determine if it is an abridgment. Even if you think it’s the “real thing,” it may still be an abridgment or adaptation of the original.

The Verdict

The original and the adaptations that I read or skimmed are as follows:

• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (Tor Books). 337 pages. The original; read in full
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (Puffin Classics). Abridged by Robin Waterfield, 1986; 273 pages. abridgment; skimmed
• Robinson Crusoe retold from Daniel Defoe (Scholastic Junior Classics). E.W. Doloch, 1958; 127 pages. adaptation; skimmed
• The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (Great Illustrated Classics). adapted by Malvina G. Vogel, 1992; 230 pages. adaptation; skimmed
• Robinson Crusoe retold from the Daniel Defoe original (Classic Starts). Deanna McFadden and Illustrated by Jamel Akib, 2006; 150 pages, including discussion questions. adaptation; read in full
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe illustrated by N.C. Wyeth (Scribner Storybook Classic). Abridged by Timothy Meis, 2003; 52 pages. illustrated abridgement; skimmed
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe adapted by Sam Wray and Pat Boyette (Classics Illustrated). 1991; 44 pages with comic-like illustrations. illustrated abridgement; skimmed
• Robinson Crusoe (Usborne Young Reading) from the story by Daniel Defoe. Retold by Angela Wilkes, Adapted by Gill Harvey, Illustrated by Peter Dennis; 2003; 62 pages. illustrated adaptation; read in full
• Robinhound Crusoe (The Adventures of Wishbone series) by Caroline Leavitt, inspired by Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. 1997; 142 pages. retelling; skimmed

In my subjective opinion, some of these remain faithful to the spirit of Robinson Crusoe and some don’t.

My favorite abridgment by is the Scribner Storybook Classic, which is a short 52 pages of what is mostly Defoe’s writing. It is beautiful for perusing, but faithful in theme and language to Crusoe’s original. I love the beautiful paintings: they evoke the beauty of solitude in nature, as well as the adventure quality of Crusoe trying to fend for himself and the spiritual development that comes from his struggle. It is a beautiful book for children to be introduced to the story, and I highly recommend it to child and adult alike. I just need to find a copy of it for my personal library!

The abridgment by Robin Waterfield is the most complete abridgment, cutting out repetition and some of the religious themes but keeping the language of Defoe. To be honest, I like the fact that some irrelevant details are excised. I didn’t read (just flipped through it and skimmed portions) but in the end (and much as I hate to say it), I would suggest this to a reader wanting to learn the story and experience Defoe’s language but daunted by classic literature. We want teens to want to read the classics. This is as close as you can get without being the real thing.

Despite my dislike of the generic, modern writing, I really enjoyed the Classic Starts adapted version of the story. I loved the discussion questions at the end; this added some degree of scholarship, even though the stark change in language took some scholarship away from the classic. This is not a classic novel; it’s the classic story. Its main moral theme was that Crusoe regretted disobeying his father. Crusoe’s story is completely retold and rewritten, using modern colloquialisms (“that’s for sure”) and lots of exclamation points. And yet, it is so readable, I found myself reading the entire thing. It does have serious typos throughout.

As I mentioned, I reviewed a lot of adaptations this week. For more detailed analysis and for quotes for each of them, visit this page for my detailed summary. (It was so long, I didn’t want to post it on the main page!)

What are your experiences with adaptations? Have you had a bad experience? I read a bad adaptation on Little Woman when I was twelve years old; I always afterward thought I’d read it but of course I hadn’t really.

Have you had a good experience reading an adaptation and then reading the original? I’m curious if these adaptations do help one prepare for true classic novels.

• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss
• Reading Journal (June 10): Book Clubs
• April in Review
• Treasure Island and Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
• Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
• Reading Journal (June 4): Reading More Than One Book at a Time
• Pat the Bunny and Other Interactive Books for Kids

While Sandburg’s poetry isn’t my favorite style nor does it focus on favorite subjects, I enjoyed reading Chicago Poems, and I loved the historical context of his poetry. He made the people of early twentieth-century Chicago real as he wrote of their plight. This was Chicago a hundred years ago: child factory workers, poor people dying of sickness and starvation, and the tragedy of every-day death.

His most well-known poem, “Chicago,” begins:

Hog Butcher for the World,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,
Player with Railroads and the Nation’s Freight Handler;
Stormy, husky, brawling,
City of Big Shoulders.

Because he described the city by the people that lived and worked in it, and by the industry that was so prevalent in the early 1900s, Sandburg’s Chicago is completely foreign to the Chicago I see today, visiting from the suburbs for an occasional Saturday as I do.

Millennium Park

Granted, I only visit Chicago for site-seeing, my husband for going to an office: the Chicago I experience is a sky-scraper city, a city of offices, a city of tourism, a city of events, a city of expensive parking and lots of traffic.

Chicago as seen in the Bean

I’m certain there is still a “plight of the worker” in Chicago, and there still are poor people struggling and dying in Chicago. If a modern poet lived among the people, he or she might be similarly able to describe the city from the perspective of the workers; it might be just as foreign to me.

The underside of the El

And yet, I highly doubt most people can relate Chicago to the “Hog Butcher for the World” title anymore.

Some of Sandburg’s poems are not about the plight of the worker, and these happened to be some of my favorites. Take, for example, this short poem:

Fog

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

I liked these short, small images. The subject is more general and so I relate to it better than the specific “plight of the worker” theme. But also, I like short poetry: it seems most poetic to me.

The majority of Sandburg’s poems in this volume were not easy to read, and not simply because of the painful subject matter. Many poems had lines that continued for three or four lines without a break. I struggle with poetry without adequate line breaks: I always wonder (and this is my ignorance of poetry speaking), what is it that makes a long paragraph without line breaks into a poem?

What do you think makes writing poetry?

While I appreciated reading all of the poems and the subject matter has historical significance, especially as I think of the metropolis I’m a part of, I still liked the shorter poems best.

Sandburg wrote many more volumes of poetry, earning a Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his complete collection in 1951. I wonder, then, if Chicago Poems, his first collection, is an adequate sample of his poetry: maybe reading his complete collection would help me to see his development as a poet. I look forward to revisiting his complete collection of poetry some day.

Carl Sandburg also wrote a few volumes of short stories, a novel called Remembrance Rock, and a biography of Abraham Lincoln, which won the Pulitzer Prize in history in 1940. He died in North Carolina in 1967. For more biographical information, see Wikipedia.

What author writes about or from your home town? Write a post about it for the upcoming Bookworms Carnival; details here.

• The Chicago School of Architecture by Carl W. Condit
• Chicago, Chicago!
• Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell
• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams
• Babylon in a Jar: New Poems by Andrew Hudgins
• Poetry Friday: Christmas Poems
• Stories by Guy de Maupassant (Introductory Thoughts)
• Poetry for Young People: Robert Louis Stevenson (edited by Frances Schoonmaker)
• Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner by A.A. Milne

The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy tells the story of the end of the 1800s and the early 1900s: the cusp of modernity. The younger generation is sending off the older generation by living outside of the norm, much to the horror of the elderly Forsytes.

Such horror is only understood when one understands the Forsyte family. The Forsytes are atrociously self-conceited and yet cold. It is a family we’d all hate to be a part of today, let alone 100 years ago: everyone must be proper and follow tradition. Emotions are shunned in favor of practical, reasonable business. The main life goal of the ten Forsytes of the first generation was to propagate money. They are now comfortably upper-middle class and hope the second generation Forsytes keep things that way.

For those Forsytes that do stray from the “right way,” they are sure to be shunned. The Forsyte Saga is their story of life.

The Forsyte Saga, An Introduction

The Forsyte Saga is a collection of three full-length novels about the Forsyte family, with interludes between them. It is the first of three similar volumes (hence, nine independent novels) in The Forsyte Chronicles, which covers, I believe, forty years in the history of the fictional Forsyte family.

They were published as follows (information thanks to Wikipedia):

• The Forsyte Saga, 1906-21, 1922
  • The Man Of Property, 1906
  • (interlude) Indian Summer of a Forsyte, 1918
  • In Chancery, 1920
  • (interlude) Awakening, 1920
  • To Let, 1921
• A Modern Comedy, 1924-1928, 1929
  • The White Monkey, 1924
  • (Interlude) a Silent Wooing, 1927
  • The Silver Spoon, 1926
  • (Interlude) Passers By, 1927
  • Swan Song, 1928
• End Of the Chapter, 1931-1933, 1934 (posthumously)
  • Maid In Waiting, 1931
  • Flowering Wilderness, 1932
  • One More River, 1933 (originally the English edition was called Over the River)
• John Galsworthy also wrote numerous short stories about the Forsyte family at various stages of his writing career.

My edition of The Forsyte Saga has a family tree at the front; this reveals the subsequent genealogy of all the novels, therefore revealing the plot twists (i.e., spoilers). For me, though, learning how things happen is the most interesting part of the novel, so “spoilers” are impossible. This is story of changing social perceptions and how amazingly realistic people live and react in such a volatile social time.

Beyond the subject matter, I love Galsworthy’s writing. He writes as if he is not in a hurry: he takes the time to flesh out the characters, including their thoughts and feelings. For, despite the fact that emotion is frowned upon by Forsytes, they certainly have real ones within them. While the entire plot may be considered similar to a soap opera (such as a wife having an affair with her husband’s cousins’ fiancée), Galsworthy writing makes the story real: the social world of the late 1800s becomes real to me as I read.

John Galsworthy was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932 for his body of writing. He died in 1933.

The Man of Property

The Man of Property is the first of the nine novels in the entire collection. “Man of property” has a double-meaning as it refers to Soames Forsyte, a second-generation Forsyte.

At first, I thought “man of property” simply referred to Soames’s purchase of land and a mansion in the country. For the first generation Forsytes, owning land and owning “things” is a distinction of being a Forsyte. Soames, a second-generation Forsyte, is therefore showing his status by building property. Soames’ uncle Jolyon says at one point, “I don’t know what Soames is about … to make a fuss over a few hundred pounds. I thought he was a man of property.” (page 258). Thus, being a man of property is a status symbol to that generation. To Soames’s surprise, his wife and others in his generation don’t seem to grasp the impact of this status; the times are changing and he’s not certain what is significant anymore.

But it soon became apparent to me that there was another, more significant way that Soames was a “man of property”: “property” refers to Soames’s wife, Irene. Irene has expressed her dislike of him and desires to leave the relationship. The older generation Forsytes urge Soames to beat his wife into submission, to take the locks off of her doors, and to force her to submit to him and be a “proper” wife. Yet Soames is a man torn between two generations. He cannot do so: he loves his wife and does not want to hurt her. And yet, he still holds to some of the ideals of the old generation and considers his own “status” before that of his poor wife, who loathes him.

Ironically, Soames is only one “man of property.” Another of the second-generation, young Jolyon, has been cut off from the Forsyte family for “breaking up” his own marriage fifteen years earlier. When he re-enters the family arena, he likewise adds to the modern generations’ views, for he can understand a spouse being unhappy in the marriage and seeking freedom. He’s the opposite of Soames in that he cannot understand much, if any, of the import of “property” and why it should be praised.  He has the best grasp of the situation, as his thoughts show when he visits the zoo with his father.

To shut up a lion or tiger in confinement was surely a horrible barbarity. But no cultivated person would admit this.

The idea of its being barbarous to confine wild animals had probably never even occurred to his father, for instance … In his eyes, as in the eyes of all Forsytes, the pleasure of seeing these beautiful creatures in a state of captivity far outweighed the inconvenience of imprisonment to beasts whom God had so improvidently placed in a state of freedom!

But as young Jolyon had in his constitution the elements of impartiality, he reflected that to stigmatize as barbarity that which was merely lack of imagination must be wrong; for no one who held these views had been placed in a similar position to the animals they caged, and could not, therefore, be expected to enter into their sensations. (page 162)

Young Jolyon had been in such a cage: a loveless marriage. Therefore, he understood the plight of the animals. Being cut off from the Forsyte family as a result of escaping his “cage” meant lots of struggle. But although young Jolyon is destitute, it seems clear to me that he is the “richest” of all the Forsytes, simply because he is happy. If anyone is a “man of property” in this book, I’d say it’s young Jolyon, for he is happy in his status: no other second-generation Forsyte has that, riches not-withstanding.

Indian Summer of a Forsyte

After the novel and before the next begins, Galsworthy has written an “interlude,” which is an extended story about a few of the Forsyte characters. This first interlude is absolutely beautiful: it describes the last summer of old Jolyon, who is dying of old age. Galsworthy perfectly captures old Jolyon’s thoughts and emotions as he seeks for some special connection with beauty and with the rest of the world, a world that has changed much over his long lifetime. It is beautiful, and reads like a self-contained story, even though it does relate to the other novels, and in fact is quite important to the next novel.

I’ve already made great progress on the second novel in The Forsyte Saga. I’m enjoying the continuance of the story and I look forward to more.

Have you read The Forsyte Saga? Does this sound interesting to you?

What social period would you most like to see developed in a “saga” over forty years? I never would have thought the 1880s to 1920s would be so interesting!

• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (In Chancery and To Let)
• Reading Journal (June 4): Reading More Than One Book at a Time
• Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
• Bloggiesta Progress
• The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
• The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
• Bloggiesta!
• Reading Journal (June 10): Book Clubs
• Reading Journal (May 27): Distraction
• June in Review

And yet, describing the series as a whole is challenging. They all, but one, involved magic of some kind. They all, but one, focus on a mid-twentieth century child or children having adventures. They all, but one, focus on Green Knowe itself as the center of action. Half of them focus on a mysterious connection with the past. All of them have some delightful characters, but one does have a disturbing, wicked character.

As a series, then, the novels do not always feel to be connected to one another. All the same, I enjoyed the visits to the mysterious manor house, and I knew that adventures of some kind were waiting. While I enjoyed some stories more than others (and one I would never recommend to a child), I think most children will enjoy the stories of a time when children could play freely by themselves, all summer long, in an old castle and the grounds surrounding it.

The six children’s stories are as follows:

• The Children of Green Knowe, 1954
• Treasure of Green Knowe (called The Chimneys of Green Knowe in the U.K.), 1958
• The River at Green Knowe, 1959
• A Stranger at Green Knowe , 1961
• An Enemy at Green Knowe , 1964
• The Stones at Green Knowe , 1976

The Children of Green Knowe is a compact and fun story. It follows young Tolly as he spends his Christmas holiday with his great-grandmother Mrs. Oldknow. Green Knowe comes alive with the history as Mrs. Oldknow tells the family stories, particularly when they are visited by three young children (Toby, Alexander, and Linnet) who died in the castle of the great plague. Yet, while this book is a ghost story, it is a delightful one, and Tolly cannot wait until the next visit from his ancient friends. I thought this was a perfect children’s story: it was mysterious and haunted, and yet not too scary.

In Treasure of Green Knowe, Tolly finds himself straddling time again as he visits with Susan and her family and friends in the late 1790s. The castle is again a character, and Tolly is brought into history again. While Susan was an interesting character, I didn’t feel the characters overall were as engaging in this story. As a first-time reader of this series, I was also disappointed that there was no continuance from the previous book, other than the two characters of Tolly and Mrs. Oldknow. (The three children who had haunted Green Knowe so delightfully no longer appeared.)

The River at Green Knowe has a different feel from the first two books for two reasons. First, it has completely new characters. Second, it deals with fantastical elements along the river, not at Green Knowe itself. Dr. Biggin and her friend Miss Bun have rented Green Knowe for the summer, inviting her niece Ida and two “displaced” orphan children, Oskar and Ping, to join her. The children spend the summer finding adventure on the river, from flying horses to giants. It’s a fun story of childhood and shows the dichotomy between realistic (and boring) adults and children who are willing to see the unusual.

A Stranger at Green Knowe is also strikingly different from the first two books of the series, and I found it to be my absolute favorite, although children probably won’t agree with me. This book begins in the jungles of Africa, when a baby gorilla is taken from his family. Ten years later, Ping meets the gorilla, named Hanno, in the London Zoo; Ping feels a bond, for just as Ping had been “displaced” from his family and home, Hanno has been displaced from his home and feels lonely in his cement, impersonal zoo world. As Ping travels to Green Knowe to spend the summer with Mrs. Oldknow, he discovers that Hanno has escaped from the zoo. In the coming days, Ping secretly helps the wild gorilla enjoy his sought-after freedom. I loved this book because I felt that Ping was superbly developed and real as neither he nor any of the other characters had been in any other book. A Stranger at Green Knowe won the 1961 Carnegie Medal, I believe it probably was well deserved. However, children that loved the first three books may be disappointed with the practical personality study and find themselves wishing for more fantastic elements, as the other three books had. In some respects, it’s a different type of book and feels out of place as a “Green Knowe” story; I still loved it.

An Enemy at Green Knowe also has a different feel from the other, innocent stories in the series. Because it deals with a witch who practices black magic and literally worships the devil, I also would hesitate to recommend it for children. I found it quite disturbing; any sensible person would request a police restraining order on the woman who so manipulated and threatened, not to mention invaded the privacy of, the residents of Green Knowe. There is magic in this book – but much of that magic felt satanic to me, while in the other books it felt playful. Now, I’m sure someone out there is rolling their eyes at the thought of me taking this book so seriously, but I honestly felt this book had less innocence and playfulness than the others had; so much less that this book was disturbing to me while the others had not been.

I am so glad that L.M. Boston came back twelve years later to finish the series with The Stones at Green Knowe. This again has the playful, magical feel that the first three books had, and I loved how it brought all the series together. It takes place in the years just after the Norman conquest, as young Roger d’Aulneaux watches his father building a grand manor house, to be called Green Knowe. He wonders about the children who will live in it after him. When he discovers a set of stones that take him backwards and forwards in time, he is able to meet Toby, Alexander, and Linnet; Susan; and Tolly and Mrs. Oldknow. This was again light-hearted and I loved how it made various points in history come alive. (I couldn’t help observing that Roger could not have possibly communicated with the other children, since the language English wasn’t recognizable as such until the 1500s or 1600s; but that is beside the point.)

I listened to all the books (except Treasure) via audiobook. The narrator, Simon Vance, was wonderful, and it has been a very enjoyable experience for the past month and a half to listen to Green Knowe Chronicles as I ran my errands.

In the end, I enjoyed a trip back to an age where children age 9 and 10 could canoe down a river by themselves, a world where magic stones could transport you 850 years in the future, and where home is an ancient castle inhabited by friendly ghosts of children long past. The series was delightful (with one exception) and I’d mostly recommend it for children looking for fantastic adventure.

• Castle Waiting by Linda Medley
• May in Review
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (translated by Simon Armitage)
• The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
• A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
• Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling (and BBAW giveaway)
• The Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle Treasury by Betty MacDonald
• Alexander McCall-Smith
• Poetry for Young People: Robert Louis Stevenson (edited by Frances Schoonmaker)
• Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! by Laura Amy Schlitz

Much of her autobiography was written prior to 1988, before she was elected prime minister. She says she wrote it “to set down the record of the brutal Martial Law regime of General Zia ul-Haq” (page 374). The remainder of her book shares how she was briefly allowed to serve the country and restore some democratic freedoms before a dictatorship again gained control of the country.

Despite all the drama with which Bhutto wrote, for much of the time I was reading, I fundamentally didn’t understand the import of resisting the regime. From my couch in the USA, it seemed to be an unnecessary, violent political struggle. Then I read a letter Bhutto received from a political prisoner:

I prefer to be hanged than live under the oppressor. To give in is not our principle. We are not ready to call a donkey a horse, or black or white, out of fear of Martial Law. (page 276)

I finally understood a little bit what it meant to live under a dictator: it meant denying what you know to be true because you’re threatened.

That type of understanding is why I read about the histories of other cultures. I feel I cannot relate at all: I live in a peaceful country and have my entire life. Bhutto’s story is one of a country that had been (relatively) peaceful her entire life (for she was born into an independent Pakistan), until a military dictator took over the democratically elected government and established military rule.

Benazir Bhutto shares her passion for Pakistan, the people of Pakistan, and democracy in her autobiography. I only wish it were better told: Daughter of Destiny had serious flaws that made it a frustrating read.

Destiny and Choices

Because Benazir Bhutto was born into a wealthy family, she was given many opportunities as a Pakistani and as a woman. She learned about democracy and she became a role-model for women, showing them that they can make a difference. She reminded me of Katharine Graham’s role as a woman in power (which I read about in Graham’s autobiography Personal History, reviewed here), and also  of Nelson Mandela’s fight for freedom and basic rights (which I read about in his autobiography A Long Walk to Freedom, read in pre-blogging days). Mandela, too, was wrongly imprisoned for many years, all while being a leader of an illegal political organization.

But of course Benazir Bhutto’s story is far different from these other two individuals. Bhutto reiterates throughout her book that she was “destined” to be a leader. In some respects, I agree. Her father was a politician and eventually prime minister, thus encouraging her interest in the subject. However, Benazir Bhutto had choices. She chose to study politics, while her sister did not and her brothers became terrorists. When Bhutto knew that she would be going to jail, she stayed and faced the dictator; many people did leave the country. No, Benazir had choices: her life was not destined. She chose to walk in dangerous paths.

Problems with the Text

Unfortunately, despite the fascinating subject matter, I found Daughter of Destiny to be horribly written.

Most of the book jumps from past to present tense, using flashbacks. Yet, even the flashbacks are not consistent or clear. Even without tense shifts, her thoughts are all over the board. In some places, it seems she can’t remember what the focus of a chapter is (was there ever a focus?). She desperately needed an editor or ghost writer to help her gain structure.

I also disliked how many of the dramatic events were told as if the book were a memoir. Bhutto included very specific conversations that dragged for multiple pages, complete with character actions and overly staged emotions. I feel the story would have been dramatic without the added details, so this was rather painful to read. I wished for a more straight-forward “this is my life” account, rather than a dramatic attempt to convince me that the politics of a dictator are bad.

My last criticism is that Benazir Bhutto complained a lot. Of course, this is a political biography of a political person. I didn’t realize until page 376 (as quoted above) that her main purpose was to show the wickedness of the Zia dictatorship; I thought I was reading about her life. In that sense, then, this book was a very negative portrayal of her life: every horrible thing that happened to Benazir was General Zia’s fault. I felt she failed to take responsibility for things that really were her choice. Of course General Zia made life challenging, but he didn’t make every small choice for her.

Politics Are Hard for Me

I enjoyed reading this book, but I struggle very much with these types of books: I find myself very angry with the U.S. government’s choices, and I wish something else could have been done.

In this particular case, I also found myself angry with Benazir Bhutto’s biases, especially about her father. She venerates him through the book, even considering that when he was prime minister in the 1970s, he began a nuclear program. I thought this was quite strange, considering his greatly impoverished country needed education (and basic rights!) for women and girls. It was odd to me that Benazir didn’t see the strangeness of that political decision in the midst of the Cold War. I’m not convinced her father was the wonderful leader she always claimed him to be.

I’m also not convinced that Benazir was necessarily a great political leader. Not that she was a bad one, but I felt I wasn’t getting all the story. It confused me that the Bhutto family always led. While their family obviously had the financial means, it seemed undemocratic for the leadership to default to the wealthy widow or child of the previous leader. Rich heiresses (or heirs) do not necessarily make good democratic politicians. Even when Benazir wrote her political will in 2007, she requested that her husband take over the party. That seems odd and inappropriate to me: throughout this book he never had political inclinations. He is now president of Pakistan. Does this seem odd to anyone else?

All that said, I’m glad for Bhutto’s leadership in the country when they desperately needed a democratic leader. I am very glad that Obama is expressing support of Pakistan’s democracy, and I hope the democracy can last. Pakistan needs support if this democracy is to be sustained: the country seems rather susceptible to military dictatorships.

Why I Read It

When Myrthe mentioned the Global Voices Book Challenge, I decided to join. The concept of the challenge is to read a book, fiction or nonfiction, about a country that you have never read about before by April 23. I chose to read about Pakistan;  although I read Three Cups of Tea last year, that was mostly about the American. I also didn’t finish by April 23. So I cheated.

All that said, I’m glad I took the time to read this, even though it was poorly written. I learned a lot, and I’m all the more interested in the region.

Benazir Bhutto also recently wrote Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy, and the West, this time with the help of professional writer (thank goodness!). I’ve read that it’s a rebuttal to Samuel P. Huntington’s The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, which I’m currently reading. I look forward to her thoughts.

Can you recommend a nonfiction book about Pakistan and/or Afghanistan? I’m interested in reading more about the region.

I read Daughter of Destiny for the Global Voices Book Challenge and for the World Citizen Challenge (“Biography”).

Other Reviews:

If you have reviewed Daughter of Destiny or Daughter of the East on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) by George Orwell
• Three Cups of Tea: Counterpoints (Guest Post)
• Martel-Harper Challenge (Fourth Quarter 2008)
• My Life, According to Literature
• Kissinger by Walter Isaacson
• March in Review
• The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington
• Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams
• Personal History by Katharine Graham + Why I Love a Great Biography
• Political Reading

The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin was a combination of both types of nonfiction. In a general way (for such a topic can hardly be comprehensive), Boorstin discusses the discovery of ideas, concepts, places, and facts from the dawn of time until about 1900. But in a very specific way, he teaches about some of the individuals and eras that make such general concepts important. I felt I read mini-biographies of hundreds of notable people, just by reading one book!

I loved the time I spent reading The Discoverers. It contains sections about the discovery (or, more accurately, the development) of concepts of time, the discovery of different lands, the discovery of science from the cosmos to the circulatory system, and the discovery of social development, from the printing press to vernacular languages. I learned a lot, both general and specific. This is a book to reread!

Reading The Discoverers became quite a project. At 680 pages with very tiny print and small margins, it is literally packed with information. Every ten pages took me about an hour to read, so it was quite time consuming (especially considering how fast I read other books). I began the first of January (literally) and I read it, regularly, until the middle of April. But I loved it, and I didn’t want to hurry through it.

What’s it About?

Because The Discoverers is so long and comprehensive, it may not be for everyone. In fact, if there is some aspect of discovery you are interested in, you may just want to consult the individual chapters for details. (My copy has a very good index.) In some respects, though, I kept thinking about all the books I don’t have to read now because I’ve already got a basic understanding.

“I don’t need to read a biography of Columbus now,” I thought as I read a chapter about him. “I’ve learned a lot of great facts and my curiosity is satiated.” I though similar things about many of the chapters I read.

For my future reference and for your information, here are some of the subjects introduced and discussed in The Discoverers. Each subject also introduces the individuals involved, complete with a brief biography of their birth and life.

Time

• The development of monthly calendars from antiquity to present and the development of a seven-day week as standard
• The beginnings of astrology and the impact
• Water clocks and the development of “the hour” as a regular unit of measurement
• The development of clocks, including portable clocks, and the development of the minute increment of time
• The discovery of longitude and it’s significance
• The development of time in the East versus the West

Land Discovery

• The developing imagination about the world (thinking beyond one’s own city)
• The negative influence of Christianity on geographical discovery
• The discovery of the East by the West and missionaries in the East
• The geographical exploration by the Mongols
• The development of trade
• Ptolemy’s view of the world
• Portuguese sea exploration and the people involved (including sea exploration of Africa and India)
• Arabian and Chinese exploration by sea (or, rather, the lack of it)
• Viking “discovery”
• Seeking the “Indies” and finding the Americas (and the people involved)
• Naming the land via a new geography
• The era of sea discovery
• The impact of secrecy on the geographic discovery
• Negative discovery (i.e., Antarctica instead of a useful land)

Nature/Science

• Copernicus’ astronomic system
• A new view of astronomy and the individuals involved
• The development of the telescope
• The religious clash with telescopic and astronomical discovery
• The development of the microscope
• Similar astronomical and microscopic discoveries in China
• The early study of human anatomy in the middle ages and the influence of Galen
• The discovery of the circulatory system
• The development of a modern anatomy (apart from the “humors”) thanks to human dissection
• Microscopic anatomy
• How science was made public (and why that mattered)
• The development of a decimal system for measurement
• Newton’s influence on science (editorial note: he was really quite a jerk)
• The fight for scientific credit for various discoveries
• The attempt to catalog creation, including developing the concept of species
• Understanding the age of the world
• The discovery of the process of evolution

Society/Social Development

• The ancient art of memory and the importance of being learned during the middle ages
• The beginnings of book duplication and the invention of the printing press
• The development of a vernacular language
• The influence of the printing press on learning
• An exploration of why printing may not have developed in various other parts of the world
• The development of history as a subject to study and the influence of Christianity on its study
• The beginnings of archeology and learning about the past through ruins
• The development of various social systems and how people learned from history
• Defining culture
• Learning about primitive man
• The development of economics and social statistics
• The discovery of the atom and its influence on the world

Which discovery or discoveries are you most interested in?

I spent four months reading The Discovers by Daniel Boorstin. I loved it, and week after week I was excited to share with you, my readers, what I loved about it. Then I finished the last chapter, and now I’ve spent two weeks debating what to say in this review of it. It’s hard to go back after the fact and recall all the excitement I had for each chapter. This has convinced me that I should write my reviews as I read.

When do you write your reviews: during or after?

I read The Discoverers for the 9 for 09 project (“Long”).

Other Reviews:

If you have reviewed The Discoverers on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman by Richard Feynman
• Hunger: An Unnatural History by Sharman Apt Russell
• The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington
• The Planets by Dava Sobel + A Giveaway
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• A Caldecott Celebration by Leonard Marcus
• A Few Science Book Reviews (The Great Equations by Crease and Two by Gawande)
• Foundation by Isaac Asimov
• Utopia by Thomas More
• Two Neuroscience Books (Proust was a Neuroscientist by Lehrer and Sacks’ Musicophilia)

Invisible Cities

Invisible Cities is a collection of very short stories between one and three pages long. These stories are about strange cities around the world. Some are cities with the ground in the sky, some are cities of strange people or religions. These sketches are framed by conversations between Marco Polo, the Venetian traveler in China, and Kublai Khan, the ruler of China. We find in these conversations that Marco Polo is the one telling the aging Kublai Khan about these outrageous cities. And by the end, we find that Marco Polo’s many cities seem to merge together. Was he really describing just one city? Is he describing cities at all?

I enjoyed the conversations between the two people more than I enjoyed the stories. The conversations seemed to have interesting discussion that gave light to the brief sketches about cities. Toward the end, Marco Polo says, “It is not the voice that commands the story: it is the ear” (page 135). To which Kublai Khan responds, “I hear, from your voice, the invisible reasons which make cities live, through which perhaps, once dead, they will come to life again” (page 135-136).

Calvino, then, in describing (possibly) one city in so many different ways, brings that city to life in many different ways. Yet, my ear strained to get the meanings out of this book. If it is the ear that commands the story, my ears failed me. But I sense a deep purpose and philosophical meaning behind it all.

HTR&W

Bloom’s commentary on Invisible Cities makes no sense to me after reading the book. I will cease to try to make sense of Bloom, and I return once again to my own question: Why do I trust Bloom’s list of books to read? I don’t comprehend the depth of some of these works, and I believe I must be reading them at the wrong time in my life because I am not connecting with them at all. I will have more thoughts on this in my upcoming HTR&W short story retrospective. (Calvino was the final short story author for my HTR&W project.)

Suffice it to say, though, that Bloom believes Invisible Cities to be a masterpiece to be read and reread:

Calvino’s advice tells us again how to read and why: be vigilant, apprehend and recognize the possibility of the good, help it to endure, give it space in your life. (page 64)

I appreciate those reasons, but I didn’t get that out of the strange book. It was beautifully written and odd at the same time. I am determined to revisit it when I have more patience to struggle through it.

Are other books by Italo Calvino this odd? I’ve heard a lot of blog talk about If on a winter’s night a traveler, but if that’s also odd, I’m probably not interested any longer.

Other Reviews:

• OF Blog of the Fallen
• This Book and I Could Be Friends

If you have reviewed Invisible Cities on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
• My Life, According to Literature
• Stories by Tommaso Landolfi
• How to Read and Why: Short Stories Retrospective
• April in Review
• The John Cheever Audio Collection
• Sailing Alone Around the Room by Billy Collins
• Stories by Anton Chekhov
• Stories by Guy de Maupassant (Favorites)

To my delight, the short summaries on the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs were fascinating as well as the photographs. In just a few days, I found myself engrossed in the stories of the photographs. I had to read it!

Because the Pulitzer Prize was awarded for general photography (1942-1967), spot news photography (1968-1999), feature photography (1968-current), and breaking news photography (2000-current), the book had a huge variety of types of photographs. What tied all the stories and photographs together was the randomness of the moments. And that is why I enjoyed Moments. It was a spattering of historical moments throughout the last seventy years.

Some moments were not historically significant. For example, the winning photograph  of 1954 by Mrs. Walter M. Schau, an amateur, was of a rescue from the cab of a truck that was dangling over a bridge, and the 1958 photograph was of a policeman bending over to talk to a young boy during a parade. Other photographs are memorable – such as the 1945 winner by Joe Rosenthal of the flag raising at Iwo Jima and the chilling photographs of the Oklahoma City bombing (1996 spot news photography winner) . The book as a whole showed the changing focus of the world, as the 1960s and 1970s winners tended toward chilling Vietnam photographs and the 1990s and more recent photographs tended toward those suffering in Africa. Some years featured political photographs (such as the Monica Lewinsky scandal) and others featured domestic issues, from the impact of school bussing (1976 feature winner) to children of drug abusers (1998 feature winner).

Moments, therefore, is at both times delightful and frightening to browse through. While it captures an amazing number of “moments” through history, some are horrendously shocking. For that reason, I’m glad it’s not a coffee table book I’ll keep around my home. At the same time, I found both the stories and the photographs fascinating.

Wikipedia lists the winning photographs/photographers, and the Pulitzer Prize site provides links to lists all recent winners; browse the lists at the general photography winners, feature photography winners, spot news photography winners, and breaking news photography winners. This years’ winners will be announced on April 20.

Partial or full portfolios of photography are on the website post 1995; however, if you are sincerely interested in the photographs and the stories behind them, you may want to find Moments. It’s quite worth a perusal. The copy of Moments I read only provided the winners through 1999; a new edition has been released with the subsequent decade.

Do you have a favorite Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph? What types of “moments” do you like to remember in photography?

Other Reviews:

If you have reviewed Moments on your site, leave a link in the comments and I’ll add it here.

• Masterclass in Photography by Michael and Julien Busselle
• Upcoming Bookworms Carnival: Pulitzer Prizes
• Fundamentals of Photography by Tom Ang
• A Caldecott Celebration by Leonard Marcus
• Material World by Peter Menzel
• The End of Publishing?
• Ongoing and Personal Challenges – 2009
• From Conception to Birth: A Life Unfolds by Alexander Tsiaras

My son loves his “touch-and-feel” books that we have. We have three “Little Scholastic” books: Numbers, Alphabet, and Shapes. These books all have pages with fussy, rough, smooth, or otherwise, texture-filled pages. They usually only keep his attention for about five minutes at a time, but that’s still something, especially in the middle of church when I’m hoping he’ll stay quiet.

We’ve also read Where’s Spot? by Eric Hill. It doesn’t provide textures, but the pop-up interaction made reading fun as we searched for the hiding dog.

When I read Golden Legacy a few weeks ago, I was struck by how books like Pat the Bunny redefined children’s literature in the last century. In 1940, the author had a hard time finding a publisher willing to invest in a book with sandpaper and cottony textures. Now, I can’t imagine my toddler son’s library being complete without books like that!

Apparently, even John Locke’s ideas of the early 1700s were urging such books for children.

John Locke was a philosopher and educator born in the 1600s. Apparently, we have him to thank for the plethora of children’s literature these days. According to chapter five of Seth Lerer’s Children’s Literature, John Locke was one of the influential philosophers urging a literature for children.

For the first time, “the Lockean narrative revealed the children responding to, absorbing, or reacting against things and actions” (Lerer, page 105). I found it helpful to compare Locke’s concepts to Pilgrim’s Progress, as Lerer does. In Pilgrim’s Progress (which I reviewed in January), the characters only speak rather didactic lectures. The “Lockean” books, on the other hand, were light-hearted stories. And sometimes, that was it.

In summarizing Locke’s Some Thoughts on Education and its influence on children’s literature, Lerer says:

Playthings could also be used to teach the child to read. Letters could be pasted onto dice and polygons; words could become toys; books themselves could become objects of delight. … So influential was Locke’s advocacy of such toys that John Newbery, in the 1740s, offered balls, pincushion, counting stones, and polygons for sale along with his books.  … The book becomes one more item in the furnished room of childhood. (page 106-107, emphasis added)

I think it’s good to know where things got a start – and it certainly is interesting to see where children’s literature has come since the didactic days of Pilgrim’s Progress. What would we do without touch-and-feel books for kids?

What are your favorite interactive books for young children? I’ve only mentioned a few here, but there are almost an infinite number of them today!

An Update to My Children’s Literature Project

I’ve been working my way through Seth Lerer’s book Children’s Literature: A Reader’s History from Aesop to Harry Potter, and I stagnated in January, mostly because I was packing, moving, and unpacking. I’ve read halfway through the book, and I’m going to get back into a habit of posting more regularly about the chapters. While I’m sure I could sit down and finish reading it now, I’m going slowly because I am also reading some of the “children’s” classics Lerer discusses, such as Pilgrim’s Progress, which I finished in January. I’m currently reading Robinson Crusoe, and then I plan to read Gulliver’s Travel’s and Swiss Family Robinson. Also, while it’s a few chapters away yet in terms of the project, I’m going to begin working my way through Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tales; I really enjoyed reading Grimm (although it was rather grim and bloody), so I’d like more fairy tales (just in time for the Once Upon a Time Challenge).

For more detail about this project, see my page dedicated to this project.

• Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
• Divine Songs by Isaac Watts (Poetry Friday)
• Speak, Child: The Illiad as the Infancy of Children’s Literature
• Treasure Island and Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
• Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown
• Ingenuity and Authority: Who Really Wrote Aesop’s Fables?
• Kids Corner: Winnie-the-Pooh Books Inspired by Milne and Shepard
• Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! by Laura Amy Schlitz
• Robinson Crusoe Adaptations for Children