dchaikin part 2

No theme for the new thread. I will probably fall back on the plans I had Jan 1, but for now it feels more like I'm just stumbling along.

Currently Reading   


Currently Listening to
Rolling Stone Magazine Top 500 albums

Books read canvas

audioboooks finished canvas

links to all my old threads:

2009 Part 1, 2009 Part 2, 2010 Part 1, 2010 Part 2, 2011 Part 1, 2011 Part 2, 2012 Part 1, 2012 Part 2, 2013 Part 1, 2013 Part 2, 2013 Part 3, 2014 Part 1, 2014 Part 2, 2014 Part 3, 2015 Part 1, 2015 Part 2, 2015 Part 3, 2016 Part 1, 2016 Part 2, 2016 Part 3, 2017 Part 1, 2017 Part 2, 2018 part 1, 2018 part 2, 2019 part 1, 2019 part 2, 2019 part 3, 2020 part 1, 2020 part 2, 2020 part 3, 2021 part 1, 2021 part 2, 2021 part 3, 2022 part 1

Books read in 2022

links go to the review post in my part 1 thread
1. ****½ The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli (Read Jan 6-8, theme: TBR)
2. **** Madame De Treymes by Edith Wharton (read Jan 5 – 15, theme: Wharton)
3. *** Love and Other Thought Experiments by Sophie Ward (read by the author) (listened Jan 2-15, theme: Booker 2020)
4. **** The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare (read Dec 17, Jan 1 – Feb 6, theme: Shakespeare)
5. **** Memento Mori by Muriel Spark, read by Nadia May (listened Feb 1-10, theme: random audio)
6. ***** Maus I : A Survivors Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman (read Feb 2-10)
7. ***** Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began by Art Spiegelman (read Feb 14-28)
8. *** Boccaccio by Thomas Goddard Bergin (read Dec 25, 2021 – Mar 10, 2022, theme: Boccaccio)
9. **** The Decameron : A New Translation, Contexts, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) by Giovanni Boccaccio, translated and edited by Wayne A. Rebhorn (read Jan 1 - Mar 10, intro and afterward only, theme: Boccaccio)
10. ****½ The Fruit of the Tree by Edith Wharton (read Feb 6 – Mar 17, theme: Wharton)
11. ***½ The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, read by: Adenrele Ojo, Karen Chilton, Prentice Onayemi (listened Feb 11 – Mar 23, theme: random audio)
12. ***** The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio, translated by G. H. McWilliam (read Jan 4 – Mar 13, theme: Boccaccio)
13. *** Coriolanus by William Shakespeare (read Feb 20 – Mar 28, theme: Shakespeare)

links go to the review post in this thread
14. **** The Lais of Marie de France translated by Glyn S. Burgess & Keith Busby (Mar 28 – Apr 2, theme: random)
15. ***** David Copperfield by Charles Dickens (Jan 2 – Apr 13, theme: Victorian)
16. ***** Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition by Frances A. Yates (Dec 15, 2021 – Apr 19, 2022, theme: TBR)
17. **** When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teenagers by Ken Krimstein (Apr 9-24)
18. ****½ Anniversaries I by Uwe Johnson (Jan 2 – Apr 27)
19. **** Bewilderment by Richard Powers (Apr 27 – May 1, theme: Booker 2021)
20. ***** Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton (Apr 27 – May 3, theme: Wharton)
21. ****½ Henry VIII by William Shakespeare (Apr 10 – May 6, theme: Shakespeare)
22. ****½ An Island by Karen Jennings (May 1-7, theme: Booker 2021)
23. ***** The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector (Mar 24 – May 11, theme: random audio)
24. ****½ Second Place by Rachel Cusk (May 8-12, theme: Booker 2021)
25. **** China Room by Sunjeev Sahota (May 12-16, theme: Booker 2021)
26. **** Where the Jackals Howl and Other Stories by Amos Oz (May 25-29, theme: TBR)
27. **** No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood (May 29 – Jun 1, theme: TBR)
28. ****½ Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi, read by the author (May 11 – Jun 10, theme: random audio)
29. *** North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (May 1 – Jun 12, theme: Victorian)
30. **** King John by William Shakespeare (May 18 – Jun 19, theme: Shakespeare)
31. ****½ The Reef by Edith Wharton (May 22 – Jun 21, theme: Wharton)
32. **** Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas by Jennifer Raff, read by Tanis Parenteau (Jun 11-23, theme: random audio)

Same list of books read, but listed by the date originally published, or, roughly, by the date written.

1170 The Lais of Marie de France
1353 The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio
1591 The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare
1595 King John by William Shakespeare
1608 Coriolanus by William Shakespeare
1613 Henry VIII by William Shakespeare
1850 David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
1855 North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell
1906 Madame De Treymes by Edith Wharton
1907 The Fruit of the Tree by Edith Wharton
1911 Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
1912 The Reef by Edith Wharton
1959 Memento Mori by Muriel Spark
1964 Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition by Frances A. Yates
1965 Where the Jackals Howl and Other Stories by Amos Oz
1970 Anniversaries I by Uwe Johnson
1981 Boccaccio by Thomas Goddard Bergin
1986 Maus I : A Survivors Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman
1991 Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began by Art Spiegelman
2003 Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
2013 The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli
2015 The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector
2016 The Decameron : A New Translation, Contexts, Criticism (Norton Critical Edition) translated and edited by Wayne A. Rebhorn
2020
Love and Other Thought Experiments by Sophie Ward
An Island by Karen Jennings
2021
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teenagers by Ken Krimstein
Bewilderment by Richard Powers
Second Place by Rachel Cusk
China Room by Sunjeev Sahota
No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
2022 Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas by Jennifer Raff

Some stats:

2022
Books read: 32
Pages: 7732 (time reading: 335 hours)
Audio time: 93 hours
Formats: Paperback 16; audiobook 6; Hardcover 5; ebook 4;
Subjects in brief: Novel 16; Classic 10; Nonfiction 8; Short Stories 4; Memoir 4; Drama 4; Religion/Mythology/Philosophy 3; Graphic 3; On Literature and Books 3; History 3; Science 3; Biography 2;
Nationalities: United States 13; England 9; Mexico 1; Scotland 1; Italy 1; France 1; Germany 1; South Africa 1; Brazil 1; Canada 1; Israel 1; Iran 1;
Books in translation: 6
Genders, m/f: 15/17
Owner: Books I own: 30; Audible-included 1; Library 1;
Re-reads: 2
Year Published: 2020’s 9; 2010's 3; 2000’s 1; 1990’s 1; 1980’s 2; 1970’s 1; 1960’s 2; 1950’s 1; 1910’s 2; 1900’s 2; 1800’s 2; 1600’s 2; 1500’s 2; 1300’s 1; 1100’s 1;
TBR numbers: acquired 25, read from tbr 26, abandoned 1 = net -2

All stats - since I started keeping track in December of 1990
Books read: 1214
Formats: Paperback 646; Hardcover 254; Audio 188; ebooks 86; Lit magazines 38
Subjects in brief: Non-fiction 481; Novels 374; Biographies/Memoirs 210; History 186; Classics 180; Religion/Mythology/Philosophy 136; Journalism 94; Poetry 92; Science 85; Ancient 76; Speculative Fiction 66; On Literature and Books 64; Nature 59; Drama 48; Graphic 46; Short Story Collections 46; Anthologies 45; Essay Collections 45; Juvenile/YA 34; Visual Arts 26; Interviews 15; Mystery/Thriller 13
Nationalities: US 685; Other English-language countries: 252; Other: 271
Books in translation: 205
Genders, m/f: 766/352
Owner: Books I owned 853; Library books 284; Books I borrowed 66; Online 10; Audible-included 1;
Re-reads: 27
Year Published: 2020’s 31; 2010's 264; 2000's 280; 1990's 175; 1980's 119; 1970's 59; 1960's 53; 1950's 29; 1900-1949 66; 19th century 18; 16th-18th centuries 36; 13th-15th centuries 9; 0-1199 21; BCE 55
TBR: 693

14. The Lais of Marie de France
translation: from Old French by Glyn S. Burgess & Keith Busby, 1986
composed: circa 1170, maybe for Henry II of England
format: 134-page paperback (2003 edition)
acquired: library book read: Mar 28 – Apr 2 time reading: 6:10, 2.8 mpp
rating: 4
genre/style: medieval literature, theme random
locations: Brittany, Devon and Wales
about the author: unknown, but the lais themselves say Marie.

Medieval love tales from French Brittany translated from Old French verse to English prose. I requested this from the library after reading about Matrix by Laura Goff here in Club Read and on Litsy. I think someone said forget the novel, read the Lais and that stuck. Anyway, it's a tiny book. There are twelve Lais, found amongst four manuscripts. They were possibly written for Henry II of England around 1170. Lengths vary, but they average about 10 pages each (ok, 7.167 pages). These are all love stories with knights and damsels and tragedy. Fun stuff. They come with a prologue and each story has its own tiny prologue, in first person. Most of them say something like, "I relay to you the Lais of so-and-so, as told, of old, by the Bretons." The first opens, "Whoever has good material for a story is grieved if the tale is not well told." Another opens discussing how one should go about presenting a new story.

This is charming fun stuff. Easy reading in this Penguin edition.

>8 dchaikin: Yes, I remember it mentionned in another thread not so long ago.
Your review picks my curiosity once again, I might end up reading those lais...
BTW, I did not know they originated from Brittany. Obviously, as everything Breton or bretonnish, I'll want to read them.

No useful contribution from me, but oh my, that edition of Dickens... David Copperfield sure looks a lot like Kristy McNichol.

>10 lisapeet: i have no idea who Kristy McNichol is. But, that cover is pretty comically awful.

>8 dchaikin: That's one of the few books I saved from college because I enjoyed it so much. One of these days I'll get around to rereading it. Happy new thread!

I bought that same edition of The Lais of Marie de France quite recently and look forward to getting around to reading it soon.

I’m currently reading Clarice Lispector: Complete Stories as well. At least I am reading some of the stories. It’s my next book group choice: the meeting was supposed to be tonight but has been postponed because of illness. I’m not sure how many more I will read to be honest, given that there are 85 in the book and I can’t help thinking short stories are better savoured rather than rushed through. I’ve enjoyed several of the ones I’ve read so far but I think they are the sort of stories that maybe need a bit of thought.

>11 dchaikin: Oh you youngster! Kristy McNichol was a kid/teen star in the '70s—almost exactly my age, appealing but not too cute, and with the feathered haircut I desperately wanted but could never pull off.

>9 raton-liseur: I'm intrigued on the Brittany aspects and the locations - Brittany, Dover, Wales. I wonder how you might make out with the Old French verse.

>12 LibraryLover23: I understand why you kept this one (also it doesn't take much room). And thanks.

>13 rocketjk: Hope you enjoy the Lais Jerry.

>14 SandDune: I'm asking myself this same question. Do I take breaks or plough on through (which is easier in audio.) The first stories were all so palatable (as well a enjoyable. They're terrific). But second set of stories have these long wandering inside-my-head monologues, or maybe even 3rd person monologues. Stacked together it's a lot.

>15 lisapeet: She was a cute kid. And there is definitely a resemblance my 1981 mass market paperback edition of David Copperfield (printed 1988)

>16 dchaikin: I'll have to come back to you on that after reading the lais.
One of my distant neighbours is Merlin, as I live not so far from where Viviane has imprisoned him (Yes I know, there are various different places that claim the same, but ours is the one, right?), so King Arthur is definitely Breton (either little or great Britain), but it was a theme that was shared in both the French and the English courts, far beyond the Britain boundaries.

I really enjoyed Matrix, so will look for The Lais of Marie de France. In her acknowledgments, Groff says the lais piqued her imagination, so she did acknowledge them as a source for her novel.

>18 raton-liseur: My wife and I honeymooned in 2005 in Paris and then drove out to Brittany, and we took a beautiful hike in Merlin's Woods. Is that the spot you're referring to? While in Brittany we stayed in the small harbor town Lesconil in Finistère (Pays Bigouden). It was a glorious week, made even better by the fact that we drove out to that area without a specific destination in mind, trusting to luck, and more or less stumbled into town near the end of a hot July afternoon.

>18 raton-liseur: definitely you have some local inspiration. And I don’t know all this literary history of the medieval French and English courts. Just broken hints. I get more curious with each hint.

>19 BLBera: I imagine the Lais will be a nice compliment to the novel.

>20 rocketjk: great story

>10 lisapeet:, >11 dchaikin:, >15 lisapeet:

LOL - Kristie McNicol -- the girl we all wanted as our BFF, and who my husband STILL has a crush on

ETA: I googled her to see her age -- she's a year older than I am. And here's a current picture (Yay! She's aged too):
And now I will apologize for taking your thread away from good literary conversation into the realm of nostalgic pop culture

>20 rocketjk: Yes, I guess we are referring to the same place, in Brocéliande in the Paimpont.

Here is the tomb of Merlin, where he is imprisoned but not dead.


(And the Pays Bigouden is totally different, but very nice as well, a nice place for a July honeymoon, for sure!)

>21 dchaikin: I actually know little about this as well, but some of your recent posts picked my curiosity, I hope I'll find some reading space to (start to) satisfy my curiosity.
And sorry to highjack your thread with my Merlin neighbour!

>23 raton-liseur: "(And the Pays Bigouden is totally different, but very nice as well, a nice place for a July honeymoon, for sure!)"

Certainly. I should have been clearer in my comment. We took a drive from Lesconil to Brocéliande one day. And, yes, that's the spot, all right.

ooh, pictures!

>22 Nickelini: that is so funny. And, well, her name and your LT username...

>23 raton-liseur: and that's just cool. Thanks for posting the picture of Merlin's little prison. Please hijack with more Merlin. Something I stumbled upon today, in case anyone needs a rabbit hole: https://d.lib.rochester.edu/camelot-project

11 that cover is pretty comically awful - I agree, what a weird cover.

>26 Trifolia: in my defense I didn't buy it. My ex-neighbor gave to up while emptying her house. And I feel free to treat it terribly, tossing around. It has a second problem. The ends of the lines are too close the binding, so I have to force it open while reading. So, against my defense, it really wouldn't have been that hard to find a better copy.

>25 dchaikin: Oh, what a nice rabbit hole!

>25 dchaikin: Neat! Bookmarked for some quiet evening someday.

15. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
published: 1849/50, with revisions in 1868
format: 822-page Bantam classic, 1981 edition
acquired: 2020, from my neighbor
read: Jan 2 – Apr 13
time reading: 41:24, 3.0 mpp
rating: 4
locations: Suffolk, Great Yarmouth, London, Canterbury, Switzerland…
about the author: 1812-1870. Born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, but grew up in several places, including London and especially in Kent.

oye, that cover.

I enjoyed this. But I'm not sure I have much else to say. It's my second Dickens, and he again knows exactly what he's doing always. And it's a lot of fun, with a lot of iconic characters, and a whole lot going on, and a great impression of various aspects of early 19-century England, including a coastal town (Yarmouth), a look at Canterbury and a lot of London, high and low. And ultimately the story doesn't add up to whole lot. David does grow up, come of age, find things out about himself, but in all these stories he's mostly a harmless observer, even within his own love life. Even when he looks at himself, it's in retrospect, which has its own charm. I like that Dickens can pull out a moment of wonder when he wants, reminding us he was human and relatable. He also pulls heartstrings, and while I don't feel that has aged well, it was harmless enough here. And I forgive all his necessary coincidences.

It occurs to me that in a lot of ways this is baseline of well written novel. I'm overstating. But it would serve; it would make a nice baseline of what a novel is, should it be thrust into the part.

Anyway, recommended to anyone with a spare 41 hours of reading time (or a much faster reading speed).

>30 dchaikin: I've started reading this one in installments, but did not pick it for the whole month of April, so David is stuck in Canterbury.
Maybe I'm expecting too much of this read and can't find it, so thanks for your review that reminds me that it might just be one of those books you enjoy, and not much else. I'll have to resume reading it when I am in a more adequate mood.

BTW, I actually like the cover! It shows a always-happy-never-worried child, and it goes well with how David navigates through life (at least in the parts I've read so far).

>30 dchaikin: Interesting review, particularly as I've not read this Dickens. 41 hours (or thereabouts) is a big time investment for something that sounds enjoyable enough but nothing more. I remain on the fence.

>30 dchaikin: I still have not read any Dickens beyond A Christmas Carol, which is a weird reading lacuna for me, and I've always eyed this one as a place to start. Though... I don't know, maybe something with a bit more dramatic tension would be the way to go. I'll think on it.

I've read 6 Dickens novels and I don't think I feel the need to read more. I prefer other Victorian authors (like Trollope, Gaskell, Wilkie Collins, the Brontes, etc.). But I feel I "did my duty" by reading the ones I did read! I did like A Tale of Two Cities, probably my favorite, and Bleak House.

>34 japaul22: Those two are my favorites too. I was never fully invested in the boy-coming-of-age trope (Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, Great Expectations).

I think the only Dickens I read was Great Expectations. I liked it I guess, but didn’t feel any compulsion to pick up another one. You haven’t sold me on David Copperfield, sorry Dan! Maybe I should try A Tale of two Cities.

After re-reading it this time, I think I’d now include the first half of Copperfield in my favourites. I never got on particularly well with A tale of two cities — there’s some very fancy writing in it, but I couldn’t really warm to Dickens-in-France. My real favourites (subject to revision at any moment) are Bleak House and Our mutual friend, which admittedly has an even sillier plot than Two Cities, but at least it’s set in contemporary London. I’m also very fond of Pickwick, but that’s not really a novel.

So many perspectives on Dickens. It surprises me how varied we all respond to him. tomcatMurr (who used to post here) was a big Dickens fan, of the sort that probably doesn't read him anymore, but has read a lot of him. I sense lot of readers feel that way - Dickens was a great influence at that impressionable point in their younger reading life. A great background influence. (Include Nabokov there.) But, of course, that only works for you guys who read this kind of stuff when you were younger. For us who missed that bus, I suspect we almost have to take him in in a different way. Anyway, this is the perspective I've brought into Dickens

>31 raton-liseur: I put it down for about two weeks and picked it up again without missing much of a beat. And I think it is a book to enjoy, but I think part of the enjoyment is the style and certainty of the author...not to mention all the iconic characters and other references that occur throughout popular culture and, of course, literature.

>32 AlisonY: I would wait until you're on the I-want-to-read-Dickens side of the fence. :)

>33 lisapeet: The 19th-century is a hole in my reading. So, I can relate. It was not by intent, but just how I stumbled through books.

>34 japaul22: That's interesting, all those authors you prefer. I read a Bronte in high school, but I haven't read any of these other authors. Regarding Dickens, my personal little guidebook (Beowulf on the Beach) argues Bleak House one of Dickens best, and A Tale of Two Cities as a lesser book.

>35 labfs39: See my comment to Jennifer just above. I read parts of Great Expectations in high school (I was supposed to read a whole abridged edition - and I dodged that). I liked it well enough, but it was really long too. I like his coming-of-age perspective.

>36 FlorenceArt: No worries, Florence. I'm curious what you might think of A Tale of Two Cities.

>37 thorold: I agree the first half is much better. But isn't that inevitable if you're releasing the beginning before you've written the end - that the beginning will be better? After that, you are kind of tied up. (See Mantel's 3rd Cromwell book.) I really appreciated your comments here and elsewhere on this. They stuck and you made me really want to read this book, just by sayings something like "Everyone should read David Copperfield if you haven't" or something similar. Noting your comments on the other novels. I have read Our Mutual Friend and it's very similar to this in some senses - lots of great set up, terrific memorable characters, and a soft wrap-up that makes it all lighter than it felt while reading it.

Side note - I've been wondering if David Copperfield would be a better book as a tragedy. It's goes over so much sad territory. But it all gets cleaned up and, despite some sad stories, it really all turns out ok. I loved Agnes, but David's final happiness is kind of anticlimatic. He was successfully a normal father of a normal household.

16. Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition by Frances A. Yates
published: 1964
format: 461-page paperback
acquired: 2013
read: Dec 15, 2021 – Apr 19, 2022
time reading: 33:01, 4.3 mpp
rating: 5
locations: Bruno lived in Nola, Naples, Paris, London (with a stop in Oxford), Wittenberg, Prague, Helmstadt, Frankfurt, Padua, Venice (where we was arrested) and Rome (where he was imprisoned and executed), 1548-1600.
about the author: English Historian associated with the Warburg Institute, University of London: 1899 –1981

Giordano Bruno is famous for fully embracing Copernicus's uncentering of the earth and taking it one step beyond - arguing for infinite universe, the earth just one object in this vast space; and that there was no center. No one else was arguing this. He was arrested in 1592 in Venice, interrogated by the church for 8 years and on February 17, 1600, with his tongue physically muffled, he was hung upside and burned in Rome. Among the intellectually swirling early years of the 17th century and later enlightenment, he was viewed as a martyr to science and as an exemplum of the muffling by the church of free exploration.

Yates book is a targeted correction of the myth. Bruno was no scientist. He was deeply religious and his entire outlook was spiritual. The infinite universe was, to him, kind of a reflection of the infinite thinking-space in our own minds, one which he made an active effort to cram, in memory, everything important (in order to better link in with god). But Yates goes one step further herself, arguing that Giordano Bruno was pursuing a Hermitic religion - that is he took the so called Hermetic writings, roughly discovered by Europe in the mid 15th century, as an ancient source of truth, more ancient than Christianity or its Judaic parent or any known ancient religion. These are very spiritual writings with a striking creation story, and full gnostic ideas related to Egyptian mythology, and full of magic, even providing instructions on how to create magical talismans and statues.

While I can't speak for how original her idea was in 1964, I think she could make her case in a short scholarly article. It's not doubtful. So while this book is thematically all about this argument, it's also a whole lot more: a background, biography and exploration of who Bruno was and what his influence was. The first half is an explanation of these Hermetic writings and what they were. The second half is the life of Bruno and an overview of his constant ferocious writing he continually published until his arrest. Then she ends with a look at how European scientific thought developed after Bruno. The scientific perspective began to dominate the intellectual world a few decades after Bruno's execution, led especially by Rene Descartes. The age of enlightenment did not look back on Bruno's ideas, but marched ahead as if it was always there. And Yates asks, what changed? What allowed the intellectual community to make the shift from religion, and spiritual ideas, and magic and alchemy, to, as Yates put it, "mechanical" sciences? And why is Bruno hanging out in between these two states of mind?

------

The writings of Hermes Trismegistus are a collection of Egyptian-influence Greek religious texts from the 2nd century. They are attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, but the true authors are unknown. In the 1460's they were translated from Greek into Latin by Marsilo Ficino for the Cosimo de' Medici. For roughly 150 years Ficino's Hermetica would heavily influence European religious and intellectual thought. They were considered nearly the oldest and most sacred texts available. They were seen to predict Christianity, and were also used to develop practical magic. Shortly after translation Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola merged the ideas in them with Hebrew Jewish Cabalism creating a religious magic philosophy - something not really at all Christian. But still Pope Alexander VI, of the Borgia family, blessed this work as if it were Christian. And this blessing allowed scholars throughout the western Christian world to openly study it. The text (mixed with some other key texts) formed the foundation of respectable occult thinking in Europe. This lasted until Isaac Casaubon, a scholar of Greek with a chip on his shoulder, attacked its age. The language of the work was not an ancient Greek, but a Greek from early Christian era. He published his attack in 1614, after Bruno's execution, effectively closing the Hermetic tradition (although the ideas would linger).

----

Giordano Bruno was a rejected Domincan. Born in Nola, near Naples, he was very religious but kicked out of his Dominican order. He left Italy looking for an audience for his ideas and some sponsorship. He went to Paris where he got some support from King Henry III, then to England where he lived with the French ambassador in London. He famously travelled to Oxford to lecture in what became a something of fantastic argument. Documents of the time point to English scholars slowly picking up on the Hermetic aspects of his Copernican ideas. (Apparently, they brought out their own copies of Ficino). Oddly Bruno was viewed as a papist by protestant Oxford. From England Bruno continued to wander - back to Paris, to Martin Luther's Wittenberg (where he was welcomed warmly), to Prague, Helmstadt, Frankfort, Switzerland, and fatefully to Venice. He had in mind a Giordanic religion. He was no charlatan. He was a sincere magus. Brunos ideas were all in the mind. He elaborated on the medieval memory systems, developing his own style with the goal that he could memorize all the occult information, hundreds and hundreds of facts, complete texts, and that if he could hold it all in his mind at once, he sort of become one with the universe, an all-knowing master. As Yates put it, "The possessor of this system {memorizing eveything} thus rose above time and reflected the whole universe of nature and of man in his mind." Or, as Bruno put it, "Unless you make yourself equal to God, you cannot understand God…If you embrace in your thought all things at once, times, places, substances, qualities, quantities, you may understand God." It's pretty cool stuff. It's also not Christian. Bruno was fearless. Other hermetic scholars tied the hermetica into Christianty. Bruno saw, correctly, they were independent (they are 2nd-century Egyptian gnostic ideas) and dove in. He always saw himself as Christian, but his ideas were truly heretical. This was why he was executed, not because of his patently non-scientific infinite universe.

In the odd swings of history, the documents from Bruno's trial were later carried to Paris and destroyed. But documents from his interrogation exist. And it seems Bruno stuck to his ideas faithfully to the bitter end.

----

I bought this in 2013 in an occult science phase (inspired a bit by Club Read's Poquette). I started it in December and finished last night. Pages of Hermetic magic, of Latin untranslated, and the writings G Bruno (in Italian and Latin), plus the French commentary, made for very slow reading. But after taking this all in, there is really a rich world to think about. And there is that science thing. The link between the drives of the metaphysical perspectives - those of religion, magic, and science - include a method of structured thinking, but also may be in their origins. Each demands a kind of enlightenment moment to start things off. Even science needs an inspiration. And here at that point of inspiration, Bruno fits all three ideas and makes a nice 3-point intersection. Recommended to anyone excited by these ideas.

>39 dchaikin: Thank you so much for this summary! I doubt I will ever have the motivation to read the book (especially not in my current mindset), but it's fascinating stuff.

>39 dchaikin: I echo Florence Art. I was fascinated by your summary and you certainly cleared up some misconceptions I had about Bruno, But I don't think I have the fortitude to read the book..

>8 dchaikin: Just one more comment about lais -- a couple of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales are also Breton lais -- the ones told by the Wife of Bath and the Franklin, if you're interested.

>38 dchaikin: Interesting idea about coming to Dickens as an adult, and so seeing the books differently on a first time read. There are two I haven't read yet, so I'll keep this in mind when I read them: (Barnaby Rudge, and The Mystery of Edwin Drood).

Great Expectations and Oliver Twist were terrifying to me as a child, but terrifying in the sense that you are enjoying the experience at the same time. I think they do offer a lot for adults though, in the same way David Copperfield does, when the lesser characters get their due attention.

>39 dchaikin: Fascinating. I wonder if Bruno's writing influenced Spinoza.

>40 FlorenceArt:, >41 janeajones: >42 SassyLassy: thanks for reading it. Not a quick read post.

>40 FlorenceArt: Glad you got something out of it. i admit I did not realize how much other language stuff I would need manage to get through this and that made it much more difficult than I expected. (I was constantly taking pictures with my phone, converting to text, and copying and pasting in google translate, fixing all the conversion errors. And when that app failed on my iphone 7, I had to have a google translation webpage up). But without that it's a slow-ish but readable book. I liked Yates.

>41 janeajones: thanks. It did take a little of the fortitude. Thanks for the notes on the Lais. I was looking for Boccaccio. I thought Mulin, the story of the lady who fell in love with knight by reputation (sight unseen) had a Decameron parallel...but actually I can't find which story. So maybe not. Not much else though.

As far as I can recall, the only Dickens I've read is A Tale of Two Cities, which we read in 10th grade English class and which suffered somewhat from the fact that our English teacher that year was more or less uninspiring. She didn't help my experience with Julius Caesar either, for that matter, though my teacher the next year made MacBeth come alive in a big way.

didn't read oliver twist till HS, long after I saw the movie, and wow talk about eye opening. Read Tale of Two Cities about the same time and loved it. Think my fav was Great Expectations, but might be the picture of Miss Haversham in her wedding regalia that keeps it on top

>42 SassyLassy: admiring you have read all but two Dickens, one of which was never finished. I saw Oliver Twist - as a musical and I think a movie as a kid. And it left an impression, but one I would rather block out whenever I read it. Of course, that won't be possible. Same for A Christmas Carol. I could only read it with different adaptations swimming around my head.

No clue on Spinoza. Yates doesn't mention him. Google led me to an interesting link, but it's more an exploration of the human sense of vastness - so an overlap, not an influence. ( https://faircompanies.com/articles/nature-nurture-spinoza-giordano-bruno-on-thin... )

>44 rocketjk: >45 cindydavid4: Thanks for sharing. Jerry, are you interested in trying Dickens again?

>47 dchaikin: "Jerry, are you interested in trying Dickens again?"

Hi Dan, Dickens isn't really particularly high on my list of authors I feel like I want to, or ought to, get back to. I never say, "Never," of course.

>46 dchaikin: Thanks for the Spinoza link - interesting article.

Both Spinoza and Bruno have appeared in my current reading. Olga Tokarczuk refers to him a few times in Flights. Then Hilary Mantel in her 1992 LRB review of Charles Nicholl's The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe in Mantel Pieces speaks of Bruno's time in England in 1583, saying with regard to the tension between Catholicism and Protestantism, Might there be a third way - another way of looking at God? Bruno's dream was of something more spiritually and intellectually attractive than the aggressive dogmas which dominate the age. She also mentions a theory which had Bruno spying for Walsingham. Bruno appears to be necessarily a small character in the book on Marlowe, but it looks to be a good book on that period.
Now I need to read your book and the Nicholl.

>49 SassyLassy: Bruno was a medieval peace hippie. He felt that the church helped create divisions and conflict by obscuring the true religion he had rediscovered. His true religion would resolve all that. 🙂 Not sure how he himself was tolerated, overconfident, hungry and passionate as he was, but his ideas have their own elegance, no question.

>39 dchaikin: Very nice review. Not sure I am in the mood for that kind of a book but noted.

We are used of thinking of science, philosophy and religion as different things these days but for a very long time, they were essentially the same thing... so applying the name scientists to most of the early scientists (or thinking that they pursued something close to what we will call science now) is a bit of a misnomer.

>51 AnnieMod: I think religion and philosophy are about the same thing. Science strictly defined is an ideal that comes out of philosophy. But I think science as practiced takes in a wide variety of discovery and refinement (and trial and error)…I could argue my cats and dog have their own versions.

>52 dchaikin: Oh, I don't disagree on how we see them now. Back in the middle ages and before - it was a bit murkier. Or so it would seem from reading the surviving works :)

>49Bruno's dream was of something more spiritually and intellectually attractive than the aggressive dogmas which dominate the age.

ok thats where I read about him - I have that same Mantel collection.

>50 dchaikin: yes a hippie indeed. he wasn't tolerated for long; horrible way to die.

>53 AnnieMod: history shows a strange intellectual path.

>54 cindydavid4: yes. Why would anyone do that to someone? (For what it's worth, he was executed during a Dominican-led revolt against the church in southern Italy. As a one-time Dominican himself, his execution at that time was probably a message to those rebel leaders.)

17. When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teenagers by Ken Krimstein
published: 2021
format: 232-page graphic hardcover
acquired: March read: Apr 9-24time reading: 2:27, 0.6 mpp
genre/style: graphic nonfiction theme random (LT inspired)
locations: 1930’s Yiddish Europe
about the author: A Jewish American cartoonist for the New Yorker, who teaches as DePaul and the Art Institute of Chicago.

Cyrel (torontoc) led me here. And the graphic novel thread led by Anniemod and Labsf39 sort of paved the way to drawing my interest.

It‘s amazing these stories exist. During a cleaning of St George‘s Church, a decommissioned church in Vilna, Lithuania, in 2017, a trove of hidden papers were found in the organ pipes. These were Yiddish biographies of teenagers from the late 1930‘s. They had entered a competition that was never awarded because of WWII. Of course there are no more Yiddish teenagers in Europe. The works were hidden from the Nazis and then the Soviets. Krimstein has illustrated 6.

Krimstein calls these stories voices of a lost world. They are not deep elaborate stories, and they of course were not composed under the duress of Holocaust or any awareness of what was over the horizons. So they feel lighter than we might want with our hindsight. They are optimistic, and also on the problems of their lives and era. They touch on tensions with the religious traditions, on Jewish youth groups associated with communist and socialist ideals, your membership largely reflecting your family's economics, and, of course, on teenage crushes. The stories were anonymous, based on the rules of the competition. But not everyone followed this rule. One girl who provided her name and photograph was recognized by her American children. She had emigrated to the US. I felt the graphic aspect was mixed. Some pages felt very unfinished to me, but others are memorable. You can get a feeling for them here: https://www.heyalma.com/the-skater/

18. Anniversaries I by Uwe Johnson
translation: from German by Damion Searls, 2018
published: 1970
format: 409 pages within a 1671-page full-set Nook ebook, from New York Review Books Classics
acquired: January
read: Jan 2 – Apr 27
time reading: 21:46, 3.2 mpp
rating: 4.5
locations: Germany
about the author: 1934-1984, East German author born in Kamień Pomorski in Pomerania (then in Germany, now in Poland)

This is just on part I of this 1700-page book following a child of Nazi Germany living in New York City in 1967, a single mother, a professional in a giant bank building, living on Riverside Drive in Manhattan with her ten-yr-old daughter and no other family, and many ghosts. While reading I had one day in NYC and we walked around a lot from Central Park to Columbia University. Gesine, lived on Riverside and 96th street. We were really close. One thing that struck me was that the parts of the city we walked through felt to me like a city still in 1967, full of pre-WWII buildings, and very 1960's-feeling clunky subway cars. Anyway, I felt some connection.

The book plays with the format of a diary with daily entries. Each has the day's news headlines as presented in the New York Times (Vietnam, crime, riots, an interview of Stalin‘s daughter). This is mixed with Gesine‘s life in 1967, with the story she tells her daughter of her parents in 1930‘s Germany and the politics of their small town, with the ghost voices in her head. The headlines themselves got me interested. I really enjoy that aspect. And then odd ghost voices. But eventually we get to know our characters, and the 1930's German characters. Overall it's oddly directionless and captivating at the same time. I really got into it and have thoroughly enjoyed it so far.

My April wrap-up

planned - actual
5 hours - 4:08 Henry VIII - acts 1-3
3 hours - 2:38 Ethan Frome - 1st half
3 hours - 2:05 The Lais of Marie de France - 2nd half - finished
19 hours - 17:41 David Copperfield - 2nd half - finished
7 hours - 9:20 Anniversiaries I by Uwe Johnson - finished part 1
12 hours - 12:56 Giordano Bruno by Frances A. Yates - 2nd half - finished
7 hours - 4:28 Bewilderment by Richard Powers - I've read 2/3 of this
6 hours - 0:00 An Island by Karen Jennings - not started
0 hours - 2:27 When I Grow Up by Ken Krimstein - finished
----
62 hours - 55:43

I felt like this was a soft month of reading, but actually I averaged 1:51 a day, just 13 minutes short of my 2-hr-4-min-a-day goal.

In May I have again optimistic plans, including finished Henry VIII, and starting King John. Finishing Ethan Frome and starting Edith Wharton's The Reef. Finishing Bewilderment by Richard Powers, and then working through three other Booker longlist books - An Island by Karen Jennings, Second Place by Rachel Cusk & China Room by Sanjeev Sahota. Starting Anniversaries part II by Uwe Johnson, North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell, and, for my neglected TBR, Where the Jackals Howl by Amos Oz.

>56 dchaikin: I noticed an LT review complained of the story accuracy in When I Grow Up. They link to a translation of one of the original letters, here: https://museum.yivo.org/translations/BebaEpsteinEnglish.pdf And they are entirely correct. This seven-page straight-forward letter full of details, broken into formal sections, has a feel that is very far from what is implied by Krimstein's book. He made it more casual and frivolous and free-flowing than it really is. I feel a little forgiving because he got me into the letters, and I feel some responsibility not to judge, but I still think it's worth noting what he drew is quite different than what was written.

wow, thats disappointing. Why would the writer do that? You are right about the letter tho. Why aren't all the letters put together as they are? I went to the YIVOsite for more information. Would have loved the discussion they had but whats with the cartoon Beba they have in the center of the photos? weird . ETA didnt realize this was a graphic novel never mind.

>60 cindydavid4: right, as a graphic novel it’s different. It allows a lot of freedom and it becomes an interpretation. I’m not comfortable, in my own head, with how he did it. I’m honestly just not sure. But I think every reader might feel a little differently.

looking on the VIVO site for an interview about the book Just found itBeba Epstein: The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Girl havent watched it yet but looks interesting

>63 cindydavid4: thanks! I’ll check that out.

19. Bewilderment by Richard Powers
published: 2021
format: 278-page hardcover
acquired: December read: Apr 27 – May 1 time reading: 7:19, 1.6 mpp
rating: 4
genre/style: Contemporary Fiction theme: Booker 2021
locations: Great Smoky Mountains, Madison, WI and Washington, D.C.
about the author: American author from Illinois, who partially grew up in Bangkok. Born 1957.

I'm finally getting back to the Booker 2021 long list. Five to go, starting with this one, and they're all short.

I was really pleased at how much I enjoyed this. I think most Powers novels, including this one, get mixed responses, even from professional reviewers. I tried to go in blind, as I haven't read any Powers before... and sat uncomfortably through a start with some tropy extremes - overwhelmed single recently-widowered* father, extra-intelligent unstable difficult son in need of treatment, extra-perfect deceased wife/mom who never flagged a moment while alive, and then questionable new untried treatment nudged by a smooth-talking scientist. I wasn't crazy about this. I didn't mind the sci-fi touches, especially AI-based Decoded Network treatment (which is a real thing). Also the isolation of the dad and son leave an odd resemblance to Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which I didn't mind. But this book really caught me. I got into it, and my anxiety ramped up as I rushed through faster. The difficult son is difficult because he has developed a deep connection into damaged state of our planet, emotionally and logically. He is only nine and later ten and doesn't have good self-control. He acts up, and then acts strange, but dad feels he can't really argue with his son because the boy is still recovering from his mother's death, as is the dad, and the boy is basically right. Our planet is doomed and humanity is pathetically helpless. Powers' gently tossing in of jealous fears over the deceased wife/mom only adds to the mood.

Powers has done something with our climate anxiety and our denial and the impact, specifically, of Greta Thornburg. It worked for me and left an impression and days later I'm still worked up. And, oddly, calming down involves mainly forgetting what I was worried about. (On Litsy I wrote, "Now calming my anxiety with denial again.")

A note about the ending - this is a major spoiler. Don't read unless you have read the book...even if you don't plan on reading the book: I was thinking through the tragic ending. It's a hard way to close this book and it bothers me. Part of me understands it's consistent with the whole doom and gloom undertone of the book, and it's where the literary energy goes. But part of me wants to make this book motivational, see it drive me and other readers to do something. A big problem with climate denial is that there is a sense that we are all doomed anyway; why bother wasting effort to help if we can't help. I think the end cements that impression. The boy, dying, becomes an example of what not to do. The message is, don't waste your effort, you will end up like him.

Anyway, I see some of the reasons why readers like or did not like this book. I would encourage anyone interested to go ahead and try it, especially if you like a little science in your literature.

*yes, that's a word

20. Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
published: 1911
format: 89-page Scribner Library paperback from 1970
acquired: This was my high school copy and has my handwriting. It was shipped to me, along with the rest of the books on my childhood bedroom shelves, in 2007.
read: Apr 27 – May 3 time reading: 4:20, 2.9 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: classic novella theme: Wharton
locations: fictional Starkville, Massachusetts
about the author: about the author: 1862-1937. Born Edith Newbold Jones on West 23rd Street, New York City. Relocated permanently to France after 1911.

My latest Wharton is such a one-off from her earlier works. And it's also perfectly executed. I was assigned this in high school and it left me with a warped view of Wharton. Unwilling or unable to see the masterpiece then, I came away with a sense of droll incomprehensible writing, and a sled. Starkville, MA is far away from Wharton's New York elite. Also it‘s winter and there‘s no money - two things that really define Ethan‘s cold marriage and spoken words. The prose is sparse, and the characters spoken words are far sparser, and none mean what they seem to say. And this drives Ethan's impulsive pursuit of the dancing Mattie Silver.

It has an interesting, carefully worded, but very slow start. Every word is important. But midway through I found myself really into this sparse shadowy cold world, reading inappropriately fast. Really, this is great stuff. It's sad, held by perfectly balanced stresses, with a wonderful sparse winter-isolation atmosphere, a strangely romantic narrative drive and ending in a terrific tragic element. All three main characters are permanently memorable - lanky thin Ethan, lively Mattie and dark brooding unreadable and bitter Zeena. Also I thought I caught a sly authorial smile embedded in there. I'm not sure how to context this with my Wharton reading, because it's so different, but I'm really happy to have read this.

>66 dchaikin: Think I’ll give that a go. My father was born in 1911.

>65 dchaikin: Like the endangered animals that the son focuses on with his painting and protesting, I thought the mom and son, with their close connection to and joy and empathy with nature, were also meant to be seen as endangered creatures that can’t survive in this heartless, modern world.

>66 dchaikin: I'm so glad you liked Ethan Frome, Dan. I remember the conversations about Wharton, and Ethan Frome in particular, last year before you started reading her. I was hoping your opinion would be more favorable. I'm glad it resonated.

>65 dchaikin: Sold! Though given your comments about anxiety I think I shall wait until after exams before reading it.

>67 dianeham: that’s cool. That’s the era my grandparents were born, but not the year as far as i know. Anyway any excuse is a good one.

>68 karspeak: that’s a terrific idea and not one I had considered. Hmm

>69 labfs39: I admit I had assumed I would like it this time. I really like what Wharton does. Part of me wishes I could have come upon it without any preconceptions other than Wharton’s previous work. It’s so distinct and so much more complete than her previous works (it’s kind of perfect). I have some fun trying to imagine my age 15 or 16 mindset, lost in all this text that seems to simple and clear to me now. I think mainly I just wasn’t a reader then.

>70 rhian_of_oz: my mission here is done. Good luck with your exams.

Enjoyed catching up with your thread Dan.

Although I find the idea of Hermes Trismegistus interesting I get the feeling that Francis A. Yates overplays the importance of the Hermetic Tradition.

>72 baswood: your feeling that Yates overplays it - does that come from my review or from other … stuff? I took her argument as strong. So your comment is a good challenge to what I was thinking.

>65 dchaikin: I think this is the Powers I'll start with. Debating between this and Overstory, just becuase it sounds like an interesting idea. But this sounds more my speed lately.

>73 dchaikin: I dipped into one of her books and thought - hang on a minute this all sounds like a theory that might have driven a film like The Da Vinci Code. Perhaps I need to actually read her arguments more closely. So just an immediate reaction.

>74 stretch: it was a good one for me to start with. And it’s a somewhat quick read.

>75 baswood: i really didn’t get anything like that impression from Yates. So, interesting. I do have a BS radar, but I could have missed something. She came across to me as solid and with something to prove.

21. Henry VIII by William Shakespeare
published: originally performed in 1613, and famous for causing the Globe Theatre to burn down. The signet classic originally dates from 1967, with a 1989 and 2004 update.
format: 208 pages within a King John/Henry VIII combined Signet Classic paperback
acquired: November read: Apr 10 – May 6 time reading: 8:03, 2.3 mpp
rating: 4½
genre/style: Classic Drama theme: Shakespeare
locations: London
about the author: April 23, 1564 – April 23, 1616

Editors
S. Schoenbaum – editing and introduction, 1967, 1989
Sylvan Barnett – series editor, contributions 1966, 1989, 2004
Sources
Raphael Holinshed – from Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 1587
John Foxe – from Acts and Monuments of Martyrs, 1597
Commentaries
William Hazlitt - from Characters of Shakespeare’s Plays, 2nd edition, 1818
Caroline F. E. Spurgeon – from Shakespear’s Imagery and What It Tells Us, 1935
G. Wilson Knight - A Note on Henry VIII from Shakespeare and Religion, 1967
Mark Van Doren - Henry VIII, from Shakespeare, 1939
Jane LaPotaire – Playing Katherine in the Vision Scene (4.2) of Henry VIII, from “Queen Katherine in Henry VIII”, in Players of Shakespear 4 edited by Robert Smallwood, 1998
S. Schoenbaum – Henry VIII on Stage and Screen, 1967, 1989, with postscript by Sylvan Barnett, 2004.



I'm reading through all Shakespeare's plays with a group on Litsy, and this is their second to last play. (King John will be the last.) The plays that least interested the group are the ones left, and this play seems to get more commentary on the authorship than the play. Most people assume Shakespear only wrote parts, and that the majority was written by John Fletcher. This play has a different feel from other Shakespeare plays. It‘s verse, but there is a lot less compression and ambiguity. Instead it‘s kind of surprisingly clear. And I appreciated that. It's also well blended and mostly seamless.

The play is made of six semi-independent plot points from Henry's reign - the fall and execution of the Duke of Buckingham, the fall and divorce of Katherine, the fall of Wolsey, who is prominently corrupt and influential up to his fall, the marriage of Henry and Anne "Bullen", a challenge to Thomas Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury who is saved by Henry, and finally the birth of Elizabeth.

A play full of spectacle (this is the play that burned down the Globe with a rogue cannon spark), some parts work better than other on the page. I found Katherine terrific. And I really appreciated how Wolsey was handled - first at his peak, and then his fall and elegant exit. In his last scenes he looks back as his life's arc, his rise from a butcher's son to Henry's most powerful adviser, key builder of Oxford, and his fall. And advises Thomas Cromwell going forward. It's my favorite part of the play (I saw a relationship between this and Hilary Mantel's Wolsey). The play ends softly, the birth of Elizabeth lacking drama. So maybe imperfect, at least on the page, but I thought the good parts were very good and really enjoyed this.

22. An Island by Karen Jennings
published: 2020
format: 182-page paperback
acquired: November read: May 2-7 time reading: 4:41, 1.5 mpp
rating: 4½
genre/style: contemporary novel theme: Booker 2021
locations: an unidentified island off Africa
about the author: born in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1982, the daughter of an Afrikaans mother and an English father; both of her parents were teachers. This book was written while she was living in Brazil.

Easily my favorite from the 2021 Booker longlist. A lighthouse caretaker on an otherwise empty spare island finds a body washed up, a still living man. As we begin to get a sense of this place, we see the flickers of the caretaker's past. The adjectives dystopian, bleak, and ambiguous come mind. It‘s a terrific novel, tightly constructed, creating wonder and discomfort.

>78 dchaikin: I still have this one on the pile next to my bed... probably should nudge it up a bit.

>79 AnnieMod: you might really enjoy it. It's a fairly quick read.

>77 dchaikin: I enjoyed seeing that in Stratford with John Thaw as Wolsey and Richard Griffiths as the king, but I don't remember a whole lot about the play. Google tells me it was 1983, and Michael Billington reviewed it under the headline "Mocked Tudor".

>78 dchaikin: Noting that for the "outcasts and castaways" theme!

>81 thorold: how cool about seeing H8. A lot of performances skip Cranmer. They go from Wolsey's exit to an abbreviated birth of Elizabeth. Wonder how they handled it. And, An Island works for castaways. Also Africa, dystopias...

I'm finally caught up on your thread! Lots of good stuff. I'm glad you liked Ethan Frome the second time around--that one seems to be frequently disliked, maybe because it's so different from her other works or because it is forced on people in high school. I also enjoyed reading your review of Henry VIII--no one ever seems to talk about that one and I can't recall reading any reviews of it or hearing about any performances.

>83 DieFledermaus: thanks for working through all this. I think Ethan Frome is a tough read for someone in high school who doesn’t like reading (which was me. 🙂). And it’s tough for someone who doesn’t like reading something a little slow. But otherwise I suspect most readers so actually like it. It’s an especially perfect little novel/novella. Henry VIII - I really liked the recreation of these iconic complicated characters. I liked how I could imagine the actors giving the lines. But my Litsy group mostly did not like it.

>66 dchaikin: and following regarding Ethan Frome. I am lucky Ethan Frome is not part of our curricular on this side of the Atlantic and Channel. So I decided to read it on my own (in 2013 according to my LT records). I think I read it because I had heard a lot about Edith Wharton and wanted to read something from her, but I was not interested at all in the upper-class settings she is familiar with.
My review is not that positive, but I think the book grew on me and I remember it with more foundness than my review would suggest. Maybe time for a reread?
And for another Wharton book? If I am still not that interested in the East coast upper class settings, I can handle it if it's for the sake of good writing and well built characters (my reading requirements change, and CR is not unrelated to as, as your reviews are not unrelated to my wish to revisit Edith Wharton!).

>85 raton-liseur: It occurs to me, reading your review, that Ethan Frome book is not friendly to preconceptions. It's very firmly in its own mindset, and the opening five chapters, half the short book, are slow going anyway and a little unforgiving. I'm glad it has hung around with you. And I think it's certainly a book that will reward rereading.

The other thing that occurs to me, is that I'm not sure many people read Wharton because they are interested in early 1900's leisure class New York life, which is actually kind of confining. Well, the readers of her time probably did have that draw. But I think readers today are more interested in her ability to capture character and feminist sense...if they pursue reading Wharton, they also find an exceptional writer. Her books are bigger than that time-period stamped little world. I think she, first, was a great and intense thinker and writer.

A preface to Clarice Lispector's stories:

Clarice Lispector born in what is now the Ukraine, making her arguably a Ukrainian author. In her early childhood her parents, who were both Jewish, suffered through pogroms during the Russian Civil War - the war that resulted in the USSR. Her mother was probably raped and so severely hurt that she was permanently paralyzed. The family emigrated in 1922, when Clarice, then Chaya, was two, eventually settling in Brazil. Clarice would grow up a Brazilian. Her mother died in 1930, when Clarice was 9.

This discovery partially led me to pick up a book by her in March. But it also reminded me that I also have a Ukranian heritage, but I had never thought of it that way. The four families of my great grandparents were all Jewish and all emigrated the US from Europe. The details are partially mythology, but three of these families came from what I was always told was Russia, but what is actually the modern Ukraine. My last name, Chaikin, is derived from the Russian word for seagull and is a somewhat common Russian Jewish name. I'm pretty sure all these families viewed their emigration as an escape, and there are crazy stories, some documented, including about the pogroms.

Needless to say I don't have any attachment to my Ukranian ancestral connection. Nor any negative feelings either. My feelings for the Ukraine are entirely those one has towards any country undergoing something tragic, but towards whom one has no connection other than one of humanity.

23. The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector
translation: from Portuguese by Katrina Dodson, 2015
introduction: Benjamin Moser, titled Glamour and Grammar, 2015
narrators: Gabrielle De Cuir, Susan Denaker, Hillary Huber, Kate Orsini, Emily Rankin, John Rubenstein, Stefan Rudnicki
published: 2015
format: 22:53 audible audiobook
acquired: March 24 listened: Mar 24 – May 11
rating: 5
genre/style: modern classic short stories theme: random audio
locations: Brazil
about the author: Ukrainian-born Jewish Brazilian novelist, 1920-1977

sections: The book is broken into sections that roughly correspond to Clarice's published short story collections
- Glamour and Grammar - an introduction by Benjamin Moser*(2015)
- First Stories - corresponds to Alguns contos, or Some Stories (1952)
- Family Ties - Laços de família (1960)
- The Foreign Legion - A legião estrangeira (1964)
- “Back of the Drawer” – a subset of the The Foreign Legion
- Covert Joy - Felicidade clandestina (1971)
- The Imitation of the Rose - A imitação da rosa (1973)
- Where You Were at Night - Onde estivestes de noite (1974)
- The Via Crucis of the Body - A via crucis do corpo (1974)
- Visions of Splendor – one story, Brasilia - based on her visits to the Brazilian capital in 1962 and 1974. The city was built in 1960
- Final Stories – three stories from two posthumously published collections: Not to Forget - Para não esquecer (1978) & Beauty and the Beast - A bela e a fera (1979)
- Appendix – Clarice’s comments on her writing of Family Ties. It was published in the “Back of the Drawer” section of The Foreign Legion, 1964
- Translator’s Note by Katrina Dodson, 2015

*Benjamin Moser has published a biography of Clarice, Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector, and has written a fantastic introduction here

This was my first time reading Clarice Lispector. She was defined for me early on in this collection, first by an excellent introduction, and then by her early stories, which are so fiercely direct and confident. In the midst of these early stories, especially after reading a longer story called Obsession, I wrote: "I'm really enjoying this on audio so far. These stories. Each one the narrator is looking you straight in the eye, speaking in full confidence, clear, rebellious and defiant, no matter how crazy they get. It's a wonderful series of studies of the desire for rebellion against the confines of life, the intent and act, and the inevitable compromises." I enjoyed this whole collection, but nothing else would inspire this response.

Obsession was for me one of most powerful stories. It brings up for me Amos Oz's My Michael, and Leonard Cohen's Master Song. And I liked to imagine both artists having this story nearby as they wrote, Oz for the voice, and Cohen for the impression. She does not ever come back to such raw writing in her stories. After these early stories, her stories evolved into different styles, but always there is a little distance, a normal distance, between writer and reader. These are 85 stories in 23 hours. They are short and pass by quickly, making stronger and weaker impressions. Sometimes they are very complex and sometimes they are quite simple, even sketches. At one extreme "A via crucis do corpo was written in three days after a challenge from her publisher, Álvaro Pacheco, to write three stories about themes relating to sex" (quoting Wikipedia, but it's also in mentioned in this book). I was certainly partial to her early stories and I also especially enjoyed The Foreign Legion, which was full of deeply worked out stories. I wasn't crazy about Family Ties, which I think is one of her more popular works, but felt to me like a collection of sketches. And I didn't take to story Brasilia as some worshipping webpages do - but then I have no awareness of Brazil or its capital.

This is a collection to mull over. As the introduction points out, it covers a life, youth, marriage, motherhood, aging, the confines of being a woman and a mother. Working through was an experience, and created a kind of reader's remove, or at least took me away. The seven audiobook narrators are consistently very good and that helped a lot. The collection goes a lot of places, and it's odd to have it all come to end in a translator's note. It wants a writer's epilogue, a retrospective. She wrote in 1974 in Brasilia about the crazy plans for the city to celebrate the turn of the millennium in 2000 and wondered what she might think of it, should she see it. But she died rather suddenly of ovarian cancer in 1977, aged 57, diagnosed after she completed what would be her final novel.

Recommended.

24. Second Place by Rachel Cusk
published: 2021
format: 180-page hardcover
acquired: November read:May 8-12 time reading: 5:04, 1.7 mpp
rating: 4½
genre/style: Contemporary Fiction theme: Booker 2021
locations: East Coast US tidal salt marshes
about the author: British-Canadian author born in 1967 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, who grew up partially in Los Angeles, but mainly in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk.

opening line:

"I once told you, Jeffers, about the time I met the devil on a train leaving Paris, and about how after that meeting the evil that usually lies undisturbed beneath the surface of things rose up and disgorged itself over every part of life."

I‘ve now read eleven from the 2021 Booker longlist; two to go.

I thoroughly enjoyed this. Cusk is intense, from that first sentence above. And the monologue never stops. If you can tolerate that, she‘s a wonderful writer who captures thought processes in complex ways that touch familiar. I'm sure I'm not alone in reading how she says what she thinks, and noticing how much it seems like my own thinking - not the thoughts, but the manner of them.

Here the married narrator invites a male artist to live on her property‘s extra place, the second place. Her property is unusual, natural and beautiful but not necessarily desirable. It lies somewhere among the Eastern US tidal marshes. When this artist takes her up on the offer, the novel teeters on the predicable trope problems, and stays there a while. The rest of the monologue plays with layers; and also with and against the expected tropes.

There is a lot here within these thoughts. She looks at gender roles and constraints, privilege, relationships, the difficultly of communication, art, identity, and into what makes a meaningful moment, and none of this directly. It's built in, the monologue inward looking, cutting in several different ways. It's quite a style and quite a novel.

If you like that first line, give this one try.

>The four families of my great grandparents were all Jewish and all emigrated the US from Europe. The details are partially mythology, but three of these families came from what I was always told was Russia, but what is actually the modern Ukraine. My last name, Chaikin, is derived from the Russian word for seagull and is a somewhat common Russian Jewish name.

Similar: my great grandparents lived near Lviv, which at that time was in Poland, and my mom always said we were polish, but looking on the map their village was definitely in the "jewish pale' of the Ukraine. Any one from those families who hadnt emigrated were slaughtered by the nazis in 41, as they plowed through the area. I started looking at my geneolgy and had the opporutnity to work on this with my oldest cousin, Apparently our name BYK was a polish one meaning gun; When they emigrated they decided they wanted it to be more russian sounding which at that time was more modern. So we are probably one of the few familes that acutally lenghtened their name to Bykov. knowing more about my family makes me feel i have an ancestral attachment to the county but like you we are connected with these countries if for nothing else, our humanity.

>90 cindydavid4: Lviv was a major Jewish Yiddish center before WW2 and the Holocaust. Thanks for sharing about your family. I was once told that a lot of Polish immigrants (non-Jewish and also Jewish) added a "ski" to the end of their Polish names upon immigration. The only well documented part of my family changed their German family name (which was Von something, long and started with a 'W') to a made-up name on immigration - to Weinkle. No clue where they came up with that. I did once meet a Weinkle who was not related, or Jewish.

>88 dchaikin: - Great review of the Lispector--added to the list. I did love The Hour of the Star. I don't think I knew that her family was Ukrainian so appreciated the context.

>89 dchaikin: - The first line sounds tempting, but I have Arlington Park somewhere and should probably read that first.

I was watching Jeopardy tonight and the question to one answer was The Decameron which I didn't get but I recognized! I had never heard of it before but because of your thread, I have.

>92 DieFledermaus: I'm curious about Arlington Park. I read an earlier novel by Cusk and enjoyed it and its sort of soft drama humor. But I think she hit on a powerful thing with her monologue narrator in Outline. There was no hint of that in the earlier novel (Was it A Country Place...nope... well, I had to look it up. It was The Country Life.) Just mentioning because Second Place is a variation of the monologue. Also I definitely want to read a Lispector novel, but no clue which one. Noting The Hour of the Star.

>93 raidergirl3: That's cool. I feel purposeful. :) Do you remember the clue/answer?

>94 dchaikin: hmm, something like - this collection of stories by Boccaccio about ten people telling stories- because it made me think Canterbury Tales but the author was wrong.

Candice Millar has a new book out, and I toddled off to her author page to see if I had missed any other books she's written. I had to chuckle when I read your review of Hero of the Empire. Not a fan of narrative nonfiction, I take it. :-) For my two cents, I see a big difference between a "history" book and a work of narrative nonfiction. I approach each of them from a different starting point. I open a history book expecting the things you were looking for in Millard's book: analysis, critical appraisal, and an acknowledgement of perspective. I open a book by Millard or Philbrick (haven't read Larson, whom you also name) expecting a good story. Unlike you, I know nothing about the Boer War or Churchill's youth. The escapades recounted sound interesting, but I'm not ready to pick up an academic book on the Boer War or Churchill's memoirs. So for an armchair historian, a book like this could introduce a newbie like myself to an element of history of which I'm not familiar and, if intriguing enough, lead me to other books and other perspectives of a more scholarly bent. While I do enjoy "history" books like Stalingrad and Bloodlands (both about WWII of which I already have a historical understanding), I also enjoy a rousing good story, and to me, that's what River of Doubt and In the Heart of the Sea are.

>96 labfs39: ooh, fun topic. And I feel strongly about this. I think narrative nonfiction should always honor the truth or our awareness of it. 🙂 (And if you’re writing a history, even a narrative one, show off your scholarship. Why hide it? Unless you’re insecure about it…)

Millard could simply have said, “according to what Churchill wrote in his own book” and then everyone knows how reliable it is. And she could have thrown in there, at least at one crazy point in the book, some wonder about how accurate Churchill was or was able to be. Some things were impossibly convenient. Probably he was protecting people and making himself look better. That she didn’t say anything to hint at doubts (hers or others) implies she read his books uncritically. That made me uncomfortable. Maybes it’s all a quibble, but I feel pretty strongly that everything written down has an aspect of fiction and unreliability to it, and that it’s really irresponsible and foolish to think otherwise.

Philbrick - that’s not a quibble. He was historically criminal in Mayflower. He reported a propaganda posthumous “autobiography” as a truthful. I don’t forgive him. (Feeling mean suddenly. But he deserves it. 🙂)

>95 raidergirl3: :) I haven’t watched the new jeopardy since Alex Trebek passed. I like the question!

>97 dchaikin: I'm with you on all this. "Narrative nonfiction" is still, in my view, nonfiction, and I expect a strong degree of reliability. For me, the difference between "history" and "narrative nonfiction" resides mainly in the manner of the telling, not in the quality of the research or the truthfulness of the content. For me it's not the same as, say, the difference between "autobiography" and "memoir."

>97 dchaikin: I think narrative nonfiction should always honor the truth or our awareness of it.

Im dinosaur, I know, but how is narrative non fiction is different from historic fiction. For HF, I expect good research close accuracy and a good story, telling me somewhere what is real or what is poetic license. I see where this book would be a good bouncing off read to get to more meaty stuff, but they can get that from good HF (again Im a dinosaur so just ignore me!) And both are different from straigjt non fiction which should have no question about accuracy

>100 cindydavid4: well, one is supposed to be nonfiction. : )

Is it narrative nonfiction when you smush several people together in one person? Didn’t Obama do that?

For the sake of compression, some of the characters that appear are composites of people I’ve known, and some events appear out of precise chronology. With the exception of my family and a handful of public figures, the names of most characters have been changed for the sake of their privacy.

>100 cindydavid4: Narrative nonfiction is nonfiction written as if it were a novel—with a plot and a timeline, bringing in multiple characters and their voices. None of it is imagined, but it's arranged to tell a story. It's not essays, or a technical book, or nonfiction that centers facts/theories without bringing in people.

Historical fiction is fiction written around true historical events, but the characters' interior lives, voices, and many of their actions are invented or conjectured by the author.

Neither of these is a particularly new construct, though the term "narrative nonfiction" is used more often in the past 20 or so years by the publishing industry to label (and sell) a certain kind of book to a popular audience.

Lisa thanks for that, I understand the distinction now. But how does one tell which is which when looking for a book about a specific topic?

>104 cindydavid4: The jacket copy or front matter should spell it out. Publishers are pretty clear about genre.

>99 rocketjk: I mostly agree. Since narrative nonfiction draws on writing skills, there is a muted assumption that it’s probably softer on the research side. In practice I think a regular nonfiction should be incorporating and questioning primary and all other sources. It should be questioning previous research. A narrative nonfiction takes other research, secondary sources, as valid sources. It’s more of a repackaging

>102 dianeham: protecting identities is a normal and important fictional element in a nonfiction work. I believe it still qualifies as nonfiction. Better if the author acknowledges what was changed.

>103 lisapeet: yes, nice explanation. Thanks!

>104 cindydavid4: my mind goes to end members, which are fundamentally different. But there surely is some gray space. Curious where you’re encountering uncertainty.

>105 lisapeet: that’s my experience.

>97 dchaikin: Just to clarify, I never said or implied that narrative nonfiction should not be truthful. My point was that as I reader I expect different levels of scholarship and readability from scholarly history and narrative nonfiction. I tend to read the latter with topics I am less familiar with, as nn is often more approachable, and the former with topics I want to study in greater depth.

>107 labfs39: I guess what I’m getting at is it’s so easy to manipulate information. And if an author uses the context of nn to justify failing to do the proper analysis (even if it’s hidden for sake of narrative) and proper acknowledgement of limitations (by definition, this can’t be hidden), that to me rings of willful misinformation…and highlights an author’s negligence towards managing their own prejudices. I want the author to prove to me that I can trust them - even if they pursue a non-stringent format.

I do like narrative nonfiction. I really like efforts to collect and transform information into different ways for different perspectives. I still demand to be convinced to lay my natural distrust aside.

I think we live surrounded by destructive misinformation and we really feel it. So I’m sure i bring that into my response.

Enjoyed catching up (I'm way behind on LT). Took a few BBs there.

Glad Anniversaries is working for you (volume 1 at least). I wonder will the shine have worn off for us by volume 4?

>106 dchaikin: That's a bit of a moving line, though, to be considered book by book, in my view. And example would be the The Reluctant Mr. Darwin by David Quammen, which I read recently. You would certainly call it narrative nonfiction, and yet Quammen comes up with new information and challenges longstanding ideas relatively frequently within the work. I get what you're saying, but I would be wary of a hard and fast rule along those lines. I've never felt the term "narrative nonfiction" entails or implies an allowable fudging of fact to serve the narrative, although of course some authors will do that. Some "standard" biographers and historians will do it, too, though. To put it another way, if I learned an author was fudging facts or otherwise leaning on poor scholarship, I wouldn't say, "Oh, well. It's just narrative nonfiction, after all." I would stop reading that author. Well, each of us has his or her own criteria along these lines, I guess. Another moving line, as it were.

>my mind goes to end members, which are fundamentally different. But there surely is some gray space. Curious where you’re encountering uncertainty.

not sure what you mean by end members/ And there is definitely gray space, My uncertainty is how readers are supposed to know what is realand what is memorex, if that is not indicated in the book

>110 rocketjk: To put it another way, if I learned an author was fudging facts or otherwise leaning on poor scholarship, I wouldn't say, "Oh, well. It's just narrative nonfiction, after all." I would stop reading that author. Well, each of us has his or her own criteria along these lines, I guess. Another moving line, as it were.

Same here, for all non fiction works. There is a moving line between types and like all books everything depends on the authors writing, integrity and how the book is marketed.

I do have a question tho: if narrative non fiction can be declared non fiction, how do customers and students search for what they need? Yes read the endpages but Im not sure thats enough. Not saying we shouldn' read narrative non fiction, but have an easy way for readers to know.

to help me; could someone give me examples of narrative nonfiction?

>110 rocketjk: I think we agree. And there is a shifty line since ultimately we are, I think, looking for a sense we can trust the author.

>111 cindydavid4: not sure what you mean by end members/ And there is definitely gray space, My uncertainty is how readers are supposed to know what is realand what is memorex, if that is not indicated in the book

End members are the extremes. Maybe David McCullough on nn end and Larry McMurtry on the historical fiction end. McCullough writes history books. McMurtry writes novels in a historical setting.

I think if the author doesn’t acknowledge it’s real than we should assume it’s fiction. But if the author says it’s real, you still need to critically evaluate.

>109 AlisonY: i haven’t opened book 2 for Anniversaries. I’m in a weird reading place and it just hasn’t felt right. But Hopefully I will soon. Also, thanks for catching up. What titles caught your Interest? 🙂

Interesting conversation here. If you would like to broaden it to reach the whole group, and you two (Dan / Lisa) or one of you would like to write the question, I could post it on the Avid Reader thread as the first question for June.... let me know on my thread or message.

>116 avaland: hmm. A question like - what are the standards for nonacademic history or nonfiction books? Or a question like - is ok to simplify or relax to standards of nonfiction works for literary purposes? Or, literary nonfiction is a genre in its own right. Do you hold it to the same standards as say a peer-reviewed research paper? If not, what standards do you relax? But I’m not sure, Lois, these specific questions do more than emphasize our blue personality traits.

>114 dchaikin: oh I see, thanks. Its that blurry line inbetween that is always the challenge.

"I think if the author doesn’t acknowledge it’s real than we should assume it’s fiction. But if the author says it’s real, you still need to critically evaluate." Yes indeed

>117 dchaikin: I really like those questions; should make for a very interesting discussion,

While I love history I do tend to read more HF, and often expect the same standards for the latter, allowing for poetic license in the story. I get very miffed when they get history horriby wrong for the sake of a tantilizing story (looking at you, Phillipa Gregory)

>111 cindydavid4: "I do have a question tho: if narrative non fiction can be declared non fiction, how do customers and students search for what they need? Yes read the endpages but Im not sure thats enough. Not saying we shouldn' read narrative non fiction, but have an easy way for readers to know.

When I owned my used bookstore, the easy way for readers to know the difference between historical fiction and narrative nonfiction was that the historical fiction was in the fiction section and the narrative nonfiction was in its appropriate nonfiction or history section. So the book I referenced in my post above about Darwin would have been in the science section, because it is a biography of a scientist, even if the style of presentation makes it "narrative nonfiction." I think most bookstores follow similar policies.

Narrative nonfiction is nonfiction. It's right there in the name! :) It's one kind of nonfiction. It's a description of things that actually happened and/or things that were actually done by the people who actually did them. In narrative nonfiction, as of course you know, information is presented in a somewhat more flowing fashion than in straight histories, a somewhat more readable form, emphasizing the story that the facts and figures tell us rather than just presenting those facts and figures. Honestly, I think most histories and biographies published these days have a strong element of narrative nonfiction to them. Gone are the days that drily written, "academic" histories can expect to take up any shelf space in bookstores or libraries. Mostly, these writers are telling fascinating stories. There's no reason those stories shouldn't be entertaining in the reading. (That's my two cents and worth every penny!)

As an example of that last point, above, I offer David McCullough's 1776: America and Britain at War. David McCullough is certainly considered an Historian with a capital H, and his books are thought of as history books rather than narrative nonfiction. But, honestly, when I think back to my reading of that wonderful book, I can discern essentially no difference in the manner of storytelling (or the presentation of facts/information, if you prefer) than in other works that are presented as narrative nonfiction. So maybe the difference is, at this point, essentially in the reputation of the author. Or maybe it's a question of how and, as you say above, to whom an individual book is being marketed.

Historical fiction, for me, is a whole different deal. It is story telling above all else, usually fictional characters moving within specific historic settings. Even if the fictional characters are representations of real historical figures, even if we like our historical fiction authors to present historical contexts and even events accurately, still we know we are dealing with fiction.

>119 cindydavid4: "allowing for poetic license in the story."
Exactly. We give this sort of wiggle room in historical fiction because the author's job is to serve the story first. We don't expect a writer of narrative nonfiction to be thinking about poetic license.

"I get very miffed when {writers of historical fiction} get history horribly wrong for the sake of a tantalizing story."
Amen. Laziness is laziness and never to be condoned, unless we're talking about my own. But speaking personally, and only for myself, now, when I read historical fiction, though I hope the author has taken the time to get the milieu and any historical figures being portrayed at least reasonably accurately, what I care most about is the quality of the writing on a sentence level and of the characterization and plotting. I take the word "fiction" to heart. I've read that even Larry McMurtry has written that he now regrets the extent to which he romanticized the time and place he wrote about in the Lonesome Dove series. I would still love to read those books sometime, not because I think they'd teach me about the West, but because by all accounts they represent great storytelling. I totally get that folks have different expectations and criteria about all these things. I'm only presenting my own, here. Some people love Phillipa Gregory! Waddaya gonna do?

Forgive me for questioning, I am trying to understand. Based on your description, I guess I could call some of my favorite histories narrative non fiction? confederates in the attic, Hamilton, the war of two, Marmee and Louisa, Galileo's Daughter. Am I on the right track? Ive heard the term "popular history' Is it the same?

Nothing to forgive. It's a fun discussion.

I would not say that "The Good War" is narrative nonfiction. These are interviews that Studs Terkel conducted, as I understand it, so it's a book of individual personal accounts of people's experiences, rather than a single narrative account of an historical event or era.

Confederates in the Attic (which I haven't read), probably yes. Though it seems to have a travelogue/memoir component, so that adds a level of subjectivity to it. I guess it's sort of a memoir/narrative non-fiction hybrid. But, generally, yes. Horwitz's stated goal seems not really to be historical accuracy, but more a book of reportage about the somewhat loony (in his telling) legacy of the Civil War. (The LT synopsis calls it "part travelogue, part social commentary" but doesn't mention it as history at all.)

Chernow's Hamilton (which, again, I haven't read) is considered a straight "historical" biography. I think very few folks would consider it "narrative nonfiction," which gets to my point about blurred lines. Chernow is certainly telling the story of Hamilton's life in narrative form. But Chernow's goal is a traditional one: take an historical figure and tell the entire story of the person's life. So we just call it a "biography."

Again, I haven't read "Marmee and Louisa." Based on the synopsis on the book's LT page, it seems like narrative nonfiction to me. But look: "But in this riveting dual biography, Eve LaPlante explodes those myths, drawing on unknown and unexplored letters and journals to show that Louisa's "Marmee," Abigail May Alcott, was in fact the intellectual and emotional center of her daughter's world." So the author is using new sources to change an historical perspective. But here, as opposed to the Hamilton bio, LaPlante is instead focusing, it seems, on a single aspect of Alcott's fame and creativity: the familial source of his inspiration. So maybe it's that singular focus or theme that helps put it in the narrative nonfiction realm.

Galileo's Daughter (another book I haven't read; you've skunked me entirely!) I would have said off-hand would be considered narrative non-fiction. But, basically, it's a biography of Galileo that sees his life through the prism of his relationship with his daughter. So if it is well-researched and historically accurate, as far as we can know from this far remove of centuries, what real difference does it make if it's a "history," and/or a "biography or "narrative nonfiction?" Dan's point, I think (Dan, apologies if I'm misrepresenting you, here), is that if it's called narrative nonfiction, then the standards for historical accuracy and our faith in the author's scholarship are by definition lowered. I don't automatically agree about that.

But speaking of historical accuracy and scholarship, as you can see I am entirely willing to conjecture and opine about five books I haven't read, so I hope you'll accept all this for what it is, which is a sort of groping in the dark attempt to deal with a concept that I haven't really considered much before: the difference between "histories" and "narrative nonfiction." Maybe we can say that the "narrative nonfiction" term comes in part from the writing style, and maybe also in part from the idea of seeing history through a narrowed lens--Galileo's daughter and Alcott's mother--rather than with the standard wider lens of history books and bios.

I hope some part of all this makes sense and is helpful and that Dan will forgive me for scribbling on his thread.

The rule of thumb I've always followed is to look first at the footnotes/endnotes:
— If there are many notes and most are references to sources or other works it's probably pitched as a scholarly work
— If most references appear to be to primary sources (letters, diaries, official papers, etc.) it's probably claiming to be original research; if not it's most likely an analysis/review of what earlier scholars thought
— If there are few or no specific references (e.g. chapter bibliographies listing secondary sources) it's likely to be in the "narrative nonfiction" category
— If it purports to tell you what someone thought or felt, or it reports direct speech in situations where such speech would not have been recorded, it's probably historical fiction

>123 thorold: Yes, great point. Though I've read histories/reportage where the author tried to fudge the lines by creating thoughts and/or statements for figures described in their work. But mostly these are good guidelines in terms of an author's process and intent.

Never knew there was such a thing as narrative non fiction. I don’t think I have read any. Read a couple of “biographies romancées” (fictionalized biographies) but they make me uneasy. I like to be clear on which parts are established facts, serous hypotheses or just made up stuff. That’s one reason I still haven’t read Wolf Hall.

>117 dchaikin: Yeah, ok, I get it :-)

I think of narrative nonfiction as a way to present journalism or research that brings in a human aspect, transcribed or recorded dialogue, and storytelling—which is not to say invented in any way, just presented in a plot-like format. Biography is different, in my mind, though I guess that line is very blurry in practice and that's OK. On the other hand, blurring the line between fiction and nonfiction—presenting conjecture or invented dialogue/interior monologue with the rest of the work—is bad practice if it's not acknowledged that it's not researched fact. If a writer is explicit about it—"this is what might have happened in those early morning hours" etc.—I'd let it slide, but otherwise it falls into the category of historical or metafiction.

Two strong and popular works of narrative nonfiction that come to mind right away are Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and Patrick Radden Keefe's Say Nothing. Both are exceptionally well-researched, but put a very human face on the subjects and are carefully structured—plotted, if you like—to keep the stories relatable and immediate.

>127 lisapeet: Well, you just said in a paragraph pretty much what I was trying to say with my long posts, except you said it better. Thank you!

Here is Book Riots' list of 50 Great Narrative Nonfiction Books. I've read 11 and own another 7, so you can see I'm a fan! Categories range from science to global issues to history, so there is quite a range. Within history, the following are listed:

Warmth of Other Suns
Unbroken
Boys in the Boat
Sin in the Second City
Eighty Days
In the Garden of Beasts
Killers of the Flower Moon
The Wordy Shipmates
Galileo's Daughter
The Romanov Sisters
City of Light, City of Poison

Because I love lists, here is Book Riots' lists of great historical fiction in different genres including by era, about people, by genre, international, and YA. Some of my favorites from the list include

Pachinko
Dream Life of Sukhanov
Beloved
Homegoing
The Mountains Sing
The Underground Railroad

I love you all. This is a terrific series of posts.

One issue I think about with nonfiction is prejudices and trust. We all know everyone has prejudices and that our sense of history is warped by being mainly exposed to books written by European men from their perspectives and prejudices. Lately we see a lot of intentional prejudices-well, manipulation. But much of this is by authors making accidental mistakes by not questioning themselves enough.

Millard, my 2016 rant-review of which led Lisa (Labfs39) to spark this conversation, was arguably writing in the former sense. She wrote a dead white man history of a dead white man (even if she’s a woman). My complaint was that she didn’t appear to question the reliability of her main source - the writings of Churchill. In hindsight I might point out that she ignore whole aspects of South Africa, focusing only on the British perspective - a difficult war with Dutch Boers and its impact on the UK and their future WW2 leader. (What about its impact on Africa?) But anyway, my point is a difficult one to express.

You can write a history. Check off all the boxes of documentation. Believe what you wrote is true. Be able to stand by that. And still fail to get past your prejudices and essentially have written a bias misinformative work.

So how do you evaluate an author’s bias? And when is it laziness and when is it acceptable? Does an author need to question their perception of the world?

>131 dchaikin: So how do you evaluate an author’s bias? And when is it laziness and when is it acceptable? Does an author need to question their perception of the world?

Ooh, these are really good questions. I'm off to think...

>122 rocketjk: um the touchstone is wrong for the war of two this one works

>122which is a sort of groping in the dark attempt to deal with a concept that I haven't really considered much before: the difference between "histories" and "narrative nonfiction.

yeah I think this discussion makes me feel the same way.

>125 FlorenceArt: Wolf Hall is considered Historic Fiction, however much of it is based on research. You are missing a great read!

>127 lisapeet: I think of narrative nonfiction as a way to present journalism or research that brings in a human aspect, transcribed or recorded dialogue, and storytelling

that makes sense, but its still confusing (I loved Henrietta Lachs)

>129 labfs39: oh dear that list makes it even more confusing...

So I think Im going to just ignore the divisions and keep choosing books of history, biography, travel that interest me; non fiction books that are about real people and real events, well researched, that are enjoyable to read.

Another book I love is Sovietistan. fits to a t. a combination of travel, history, biography written about people, that is enjoyable to read.

>131 dchaikin: yes. I need to think more on this as well (Avaland, think your
question might be discussed right here! :) )

>134 cindydavid4: hmm. Now that you mention it, maybe that is the right question for the avid reader.

>126 avaland: Lois, what do you think?

>131 dchaikin: I think the trap of narrative non-fiction or staright non-fiction is that it uses facts and figures to form a story. How that story is written is going to form new myths that have to be debunked later. Bias bleeds into everything and the choices authors make to fill gaps in the narrative are envitable. We abhor a vacuum, gaps in our facts are going to be twisted and complications that are true to life are smoothed over all in the name of making cohesive stories.

Unless outlined by the authors themselves, detecting bias and even lazy fact finding is on us as readers. We must read around the subject to understand the choices of author and get a fuller picture. I don't think people are honest enough with themselves to present an unbiased view of the world, no matter how well-intentioned they are. Expecting that from what is often a non-expert (in the case of narrative non-fiction being written primarily by a journalist) trying to convey a cohesive story is going to be a tall ask.

I think the trouble is that general readers sometimes only want one story, so that can become the definitive story. Which is where the danger of bias and laziness of research lies. In the erosion of expertise, the consensus is no longer the guaranteed the winner of the stories. The better storyteller who is most capable of spinning facts and figures favorable to their narrative is often the winner. This is of course nothing new to the world, even if we treat it like it is, but reflects our own lack of critical thinking and our own bias as consumers of non-fiction. We have to accept that we are being told a story, one story of an event or events that are messy, full of contradictions, and full of gaps that have been filled in by another human that wasn't there; that for reasons made choices that may or may not being totally grounded in fact.

Over the years, I found the truth in of one of my professors in undergrad: You have to get comfortable with uncertainty. That definitive answers to the questions we ask are rare. And that our interpretations right, wrong, or indifferent are the best we're going to get, so use the tools at your disposal and try to come to the best fit you can.

>136 stretch: i like your answer and i like the statement “You have to get comfortable with uncertainty.” But I’ll challenge you a little. You suggest it’s the reader’s responsibility. But does that mean for an author anything goes? And if not, because I imagine no one thinks that, where do we draw the line of author responsibility? So, I mean, are good quality secondary sources enough and on the right side of that line? (That’s Clockwork Universe, one of my favorite nonfiction books). How about good intentions, if we could evaluate that—are good intentions by author enough? Does an author need to question themselves or is that _solely_ the responsibility of the reader?

>137 dchaikin: I'm not implying it is the reader's responsibility to decern the factualiness of any signal volume. That'd be unreasonable. What I am asserting is that we as readers are making choices. We are choicing to read singularly about a topic and that comes with risks. The largest risk is being lied to for a lack of a better word. We also run the risk of entraping ourselves in our own bubbles. We can choose to escape the bubble by making the consious effort to read to more broadly on a single topic. Popular non-fiction presents a problem in that it's intent is to educate the masses, at least that's what good popular non-fiction does, so by thier vary nature the author's of these works are not setting out to decieve anyone (well most of the time) at lest not intentionally. So how do we judge thier truthfulness?

What the purpose of popular political non-fiction is an open question, and a whole rabbit hole of how political bias does or doesn't play into narrative is a whole series of philosophical questions that tends to make me question humanity.

I think a lot of the questions that popular non-fiction presents are the same kinds of questions of why doesn't publishing fact check non-fiction titles?

In an academic setting, the peers are the judges of whether a work is rigorous or well sourced. This process is often messy and imperfect, for sure. But it is also consensus building. It's the best answer we have for now, and will most likely change as new information becomes available.

While I think in a perfect world, publishers would fact-check every work they publish. I also acknowledge that isn't feasible. Some topics have a number of experts that can judge the veracity of the work, but who you chose matters as much as the author. Some topics only have a handful of people that even understand the topic and probably have better things to do than fact-check a book.

That leaves us as readers in the conundrum that your questions suggest. How do we trust what we are reading is truthful?

My answer is we can't. Not fully anyway. I can't tell you what the author's intentions are. I can read interviews, and I can read what they say, and I can take their words at face value. It's a judgment call. I also can't tell you if their secondary sources are rigorous and complete. I know nothing about Japanese history, the George Samson book I'm reading seems well researched and thorough, but I truly have no idea if the sources he draws from are complete, accurate, or still relevant. I know from my own knowledge that the geology in his opening paragraph is wrong, but he wrote it in the early 60s, prior to the plate tectonics theory revolutionizing our understanding of how the Japanese archipelago was formed. It was mostly correct for it's time. Does that make his other information wrong? I can't be 100% sure. Is it fair to hold an author writing in the 60s to information that came out later that makes what they wrote factually incorrect? New information is developed all the time that can change how we view any given topic, especially in the last few decades, opening new archives and information that was once only available to a localized few. What we thought of as stone-cold facts yesterday could very well be tomorrow’s myth. A source is only as good as long as the information used in its creation is still valid. As new data comes to light, then the old hypothesis must change or be thrown out. Which to me means that nothing we read is static. That everything is subject to change and what I once held to be a definitive narrative on a subject might just not be with total certainty true.

So then, with uncertainty being the only thing that is certain. That leaves us with the author’s intent. Do they intend to give us the readers a truthful and reliable accounting of the most current understanding of the subject? Are they holding themselves to an ethical standard to seek out factual information and to as unbiased as their biases will allow?

In our current mess of a system, I think as readers, we are forced to answer ‘yes’ to those questions. At least yes, within reason. That author’s by in large are not out to deceive us. They are intending to tell us a narrative as they have conceived to be as factually correct as they can make it. I as a reader am making that choice whether I acknowledge it or not. It is particularly interesting in light for me in that I enjoy reading books about creationism and now flat earth. I know they are wrong. My training and background tells me that they are fundamentally wrong. I don’t think they are setting out to deceive anyone. They are forming a narrative and choosing facts that fit their story. They're our examples of people that have set out to deceive, like Jonah Leher or James Frey. They are relatively few, but are a powerful erosive force. And have been publically shamed for their deceit, which is our only tool to hold unethical people to account. In the end, we are stuck with the unfortunate state of taking authors of popular non-fiction for their word. Trusting our own limited capacity to evaluate their sources. To understand that nothing is as set in stone as we think and is likely going to change as more data and information is discovered. The line for me is wavy, there is no singular standard I can hold a popular author to that wouldn’t be hypocritical. I can’t hold them to the same standard I’d hold to I’d hold a paper on geomorphology, I don’t have that kind of level of expertise. I can’t say that an author has done enough self reflection or questioned their worldview enough to be unbiased when I know that I myself hold beliefs that are factually incorrect. What I can control in all this is the ability to seek more sources and read widely if I choose to seek a full understanding of a subject.

It is a wholly unsatisfactory answer to the questions you posed. The standard by which we judge a book is complicated and variable. Otherwise, I think we are forced to view non-fiction through a much more cynical lens. The motives and biases play a role in all our lives. Hell, my background in science and geology informs this very attempt at answering your questions. We do our best to remove ourselves from what we believe to be factual, but it still bleeds through. No one story is going to be complete. No matter how well sourced it is, no matter how much fact checking is done, it’s a story. A story that could be wrong. It could be incomplete. It could be devoid of perspective. It could be prejudicial. It could be convenient. It could be self-serving. It might be all those things and more. We live that uncertainty, making judgements with our own biases and prejudices.

So I guess in the long run in popular non-fiction the author’s intent matters. I as a reader believe that the author’s intent is not to intentionally deceive me. That their intention through their own research is to form a narrative from the facts that they believe to be truthful. That doesn’t mean that they can’t be wrong, just that they aren’t being deceptive. That this belief comes with a certain amount of trust and understandings: that what is known today can and probably will be upset by information in the future, that we come to everything with our own set of biases, that sources and the research done will likely be in support of any individual's narrative, that no story is truly ever complete. There are probably more things to add to this list that I am blind to. This is an interesting set of questions to have in my mind while evaluating my own current reading. It is something that is infuriatingly hard to do when I know what I am reading is wrong even in my strangely obsessive readings into creationism and now flat earth.

Towards the end of this wall of text, I realized I switched from talking about narrative non-fiction to popular non-fiction. I am not sure, I make that much of a distinction between the two when trying to answer your questions as haphazardly my rambling thoughts on all this are.

Just to add to the confusion - these categories don’t even make sense in some languages. Take Bulgarian (and most other Slavic ones as far as I know for example). There are no fiction/non-fiction categories. There is a different line where things split and most of the English language-defined narrative nonfiction is in the same boat as fiction, not the rest of the non-fiction (the split is the literary elements being used (similes, hyperbolas and so on) and not if the story is factually correct - stories belong together regardless if they are true or not). The term used is roughly translates as “artistic literature” (most dictionaries/translations will have it as “fiction” but the scope is slightly different - the Bulgarian term is broader).

>139 AnnieMod: is that true in libraries also?

>138 stretch: i tend to see narrative nonfiction as popular histories. I know they aren’t the same, but there is a lot of overlap.

That was quite a post, Kevin. I think you trust authors more than me. I find all authors flawed (and all non-authors) but I’m never sure precisely how until I start thinking through how is plays out in what they write. I like thinking that through, and I also appreciate when the work distracts me from the question. As a reader, I agree we have to read to figure this stuff out, finding writers we imagine I trust.

>139 AnnieMod: whoa. Huh

>140 dianeham: great question

>139 AnnieMod: that system makes a heck more sense to me.

>138 stretch: The way I check for facts and truth is by looking at the bio of the author, news articles about her, and look at earlier works that I might know something about. I also judge by what I already know. Good example is in Memories: from moscow to the black sea I know enough about the russian revolution and its aftermath,but I didn't know much about the people who were with her in their journey to exile. Seeing that what she wrote about the revolution jived with what I know, I felt I could trust her with the rest, and learned a great deal that I didn't know.

My dad used to say there are three sides to any issue,yours, mine and the truth. I very rarely take something at face value without checking what the other sides of th story are.

>140 dianeham: Well, my only experience with Bulgarian libraries is from the two I used in my home town and in my grandparents' village (the ones I used while in Uni do not count as they had their own organization and did not have fiction at all). By the time I cared to learn more about how libraries work and so on, I was not using any Bulgarian libraries (and I moved Stateside shortly after)...

So for both of them, the adult section had a similar structure:
- the artistic literature (see above on the translation of the term) was first split into "written in Bulgarian" and "translated" and then in each group, you had "novels and stories", followed by those books we are talking about (with other things like essays (but not all) thrown into a genre on its own called after the french belle-lettres but having grown a bit around it). Poetry and drama were always separated, sometimes after these, sometimes before them and immediately after "novels and stories". Occasionally some genres will be pulled on their own - romance, crime/mystery and science fiction/fantasy were the three the big library in my town had separate; the village one did not bother separating anything.
- the rest, split into genres but not by original language anymore and then there were the science section split between popular science and actual science (none of that really maps cleanly into English either...).

There is a corresponding genre on the non-artistic side of literature, which is often called opinion journalism but contains journalism and essays, travelogues, memoirs, novelized biographies. Those were one of the sections of that second part. Another ones were "history" and "philosophy". Not exactly part of the library my teen self frequented so I am sure I am missing some. :)

So the library actually looks very similar to an American one -- except that the history works (for example) may be split between two sections...

Some online stores these days show the books in a similar order on their menus - simply because people are used to looking for them there. Although some show them both where a Bulgarian used to libraries will expect them and where someone who uses the fiction/non-fiction split in the English way would expect them - sites are easy that way. Most brick and mortar bookstores tend to come up with their own plans for the things that are not poetry/drama/novels/stories. Some will stick all history in one place, organized by period and/or country. Some will follow the way the libraries used to and have the serious history separate from the popular ones. Some come up with even weirder ideas (at least one I used to know well back then shelved all books about and from a certain country together (for the big countries anyway) for example so American novels and history books about USA will be next to each other (not mixed exactly but still).

I know I am making a mess of the explanation but... it is a bit hard to explain when the terms are defined differently (without going into a long explanation) and I really never learned the actual country rules for how libraries order their books on the floor.

Edit: typos

>143 AnnieMod: very interesting.

>141 dchaikin: True, my trust is colored by own experience and the writing of my thesis which got to be the right story for exactly 94 days before being invalidated by a post-doc a thousand miles away who never layed on eyes on the rocks. At least my BAR (Big Ass River) still exists, just everything around it and its environment is compeletly wrong. It's the trouble with geomorphologist we can't resist a good story even if half of them are just made fantasies.

Yeah the only examples of narrative non-fiction I can come up with are historical. But in my head popular non-fiction also fills in gaps and smooths over the roughness within narrative with different elements of story telling.

>143 AnnieMod: I canconfirm that this system is true in Romania as well. Even though it's a romance language they organize bookstores along similar lines. Made finding a book that was both in Romanian and English a bear to find for my American wired brain.

>145 stretch: I think it may be more Eastern European than Slavic really (Romania is the off country in that split and I am not surprised they followed the regional way - makes it easier for people who cross borders I guess). I just don’t know enough Romanian to judge the terminology (while I know it in a few languages on the Slavic site) and had never been in a Romanian bookstore or library. Now I wonder about Greece and Turkey (which are regional but we’re never part of “Eastern Europe”).

On bookshops: I think the primary distinction between "belles-lettres" and utilitarian writing is fairly general outside the English-speaking world, certainly in Western Europe. Here in the Netherlands "literatuur" gets split up by language first (Dutch, English, Other) then by genre and form, so things like poetry, drama, essays and memoirs follow on directly from novels in each language. The Dutch and English sections separate out genres like "crime" and "science-fiction and fantasy" as well, with varying degrees of sub-division, and there's often a split between Dutch and Translated novels in the Dutch section. Sometimes there's half a shelf in the English section for "Dutch literature in translation" as well. Utilitarian (i.e. general non-fiction) books are always arranged by subject without regard to language.

>143 AnnieMod:, >145 stretch:, >146 AnnieMod:, >147 thorold: you all are seriously messing with my understanding of the world.

>145 stretch: sorry about your thesis. Although I can’t help fretting how close you were to needing to rewrite everything. I think my thesis was both full of good intentions and rife with errors of inexperience.

>148 dchaikin: It’s the small things that trip you when you change cultures. Like this one. No one warns you about things like that :)

>147 thorold: I think that one of our French members also mentioned somewhere once that non-fiction does not exist as a lump category in French either (aka memoirs and history do not belong to the same overarching genre as they do in English). Which I think ties in all that and where people expect to find a book in stores (and libraries eventually).

>150 AnnieMod: "(aka memoirs and history do not belong to the same overarching genre as they do in English)."

Interesting. In my own bookstore, memoirs had their own section, which I shelved in alphabetical order by author. But I did not have a dedicated general biography section. Biographies went into their appropriate nonfiction section (history, science, sports, etc.).

so i take it the dewey decimal system never made it to east europe? I still have all that memorezied from when I worked at the school library in HS and college; we still use it in our libraries tho I know they don't in bookstores. interesting world and the variations it brings

>145 stretch: Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Kevin. Nicely stated.

the only examples of narrative non-fiction I can come up with are historical

Some examples from Book Riot (and that I enjoyed) include books from categories like science, global issues, and contemporary reporting:

Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick
Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi
Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman
The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu by Joshua Hammer
Five Days at Memorial by Sheri Fink

>152 cindydavid4: Not sure. It is there now - but not sure if it used on the floor of a library (and how it is used at all). For all know, the history/philosophy/popular science section may have been using it. :)

>151 rocketjk: So where would you shelve autobiographies - with the memoirs or with the biographies? And how about collections of letters? I am just curious :)

>155 AnnieMod: The way I looked at it, an autobiography is just a subset of biography. My perception is that if you're calling your book an autobiography, you're implying both a comprehensive nature to the work (writing about your whole life, soup to nuts, as it were) and also a high degree of veracity. A memoir, as the label implies, can rely on memory, one's own perspective on events. There's not the same expectation to provide a comprehensive background to the events being described. Also, a memoir often focuses on a particular aspect of the author's life. Surviving their own depression, or their relationship with a parent, or being the bass player in a famous band, etc.

So, at any rate, that's how I handled it.

As for collections of letters, that would depend on the correspondents. A book of letters from a correspondence between two writers would go in the writers biography section. Two scientists writing to each other would go in the science section. Presumably, the writers would be talking with each other about writing, at least to a certain extent, and the scientists about science. A mother's correspondence with her grown daughter might go in the memoir section, unless one of the correspondents was famous. So if it was an famous actor writing to her mom, maybe in the "Movies & TV" section where I kept the actors' bios.

At all times the goal was to put books where somebody just browsing a particular section might get interested. So, for example, a book of letters between Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds would most likely peak the interest of somebody already interested in actors who was browsing that section. A collection of letters between Joseph Conrad and his editor would most likely find a new home via the shelf of author bios. Remember that the object of the exercise wasn't to maintain genre purity in the shelves, but to sell the book. (And also to maintain some sort of fighting chance of remembering where I'd shelved something somebody asked for.) I never had a customer ask me if I had a letter collection section. I did have people ask me for my memoir section, which I happily showed them. A request for my Biography Section would necessitate a tour through most of the store! I was happy to do that, too.

>151 rocketjk: I like that way on interfiling the bios. Some libraries do that too.

>157 dianeham: Thanks! I thought it was the more interesting way to do it, but also the best way to sell more books. For example, I figured someone looking for a biography of Lucille Ball would be more likely to also buy a history of TV sitcoms as an add-on purchase (actor bios with TV/movie section) than to buy a biography of Napoleon (all biographies shelved together regardless of subject matter).

>156 rocketjk: Nah, I was not thinking of genre purity, I was just interested. If I had seen a memoirs section, I’d expect everything people wrote about themselves to be there - including full blown autobiographies. Letters I am not so sure where I would look for but my first check will be in the memoirs section again I suspect. :)

I understand what you are saying though - and it makes sense. And if I am just browsing the books related to movies section for example, I would be more likely to see and buy the book with an actor’s bio or auto-bio indeed. But my brain splits them differently so if I am here for the book by them, I’d check the memoirs section. That’s why I asked. :)

>159 AnnieMod: Oh, I was not implying that you were thinking of genre purity. Sorry that I gave you that idea. I was only getting at the fact that my criteria were always what would serve the business best, rather than what would satisfy my own philosophical predilections. I would hope that if you were in my store and you checked the memoir section for some actor's autobiography and couldn't find it, you'd have asked your friendly bookseller, who would have shown you to the TV/Movies section, where the actors' bios and autobiographies were awaiting your pleasure. :) Seriously, though, that, I always thought, was the worst case scenario: I would get a question and have an opportunity to talk to my customers. My rule was that I always knew who was in the store and I had an internal clock that told me when a customer had been in the store for about 10 or 15 minutes. I would always make a point of checking in and asking folks if they were finding everything they were looking for. That way, it was an easy fix if folks were looking in the wrong place (or if I had shelved things incorrectly, depending on one's perspective). Can you tell I miss that store?

>160 rocketjk: I would have loved your bookstore.

Encouraging browsing is quite different from subject cataloguing. I always have found and find bookstore organization frustrating. I wish they would just have a shelf of good books. 🙂

Enjoyed this conversation!

I was once hired to create a library in three months. One of the challenges (besides the aggressive timeline) was that the board wanted it organized more like a bookstore, yet still have an online catalog like a traditional library. I ended up creating my own taxonomy and classification scheme. I was able to be one of the first libraries to use Tiny Cat, and it was great to get to work with Tim. Very fun.

>161 dchaikin: You would have. Here's a small photo of me in the store with the late, great Yossarian, the Bookstore Dog.

>163 rocketjk: Yossarian. Great name for a dog in a bookstore!

>115 dchaikin: The Rachel Cusk novel and An Island spoke to me.

I get what you mean about Anniversaries. I enjoyed the first two, but the thought of another two that are much the same experience is putting me off at the moment. I'd probably feel different if they weren't such a large time investment.

Lisa - loving those lists you posted. I've read quite a few on one of the lists but no so many on the others. These kind of reads are right up my street to going off to scribble these down somewhere.

Also loving Jerry's book cataloguing posts - what an interesting thread to catch up on!

This is a super interesting conversation! labfs39, my hat is off to anyone who can manage taxonomy... my boss and I did it for the LJ website and a) it was really hard and b) after several years of using it, I'm here to tell you we did a crappy job. I mean, we did the best with the knowledge we had, but I think we were reverse engineering more than we should have. It's not a great skill to have to pick up by the seat of your pants.

It's is a bit long for a "check this out" article, but this—"Ditching the New Yorker Voice"—is a really interesting musing by Kate Rossmanith, an Australian author, on writing narrative nonfiction and trying to make her tone fit the work that the book was doing. The fact that she was that conscientious makes me want to read the book: Small Wrongs: How we really say sorry in love, life and law.

>166 lisapeet: Thanks. It helps that I took a class in grad school on constructing taxonomies and another on indexing. I love thinking about how knowledge can be best structured for retrieval. I've constructed at least three taxonomies from scratch. Fun stuff.

>163 rocketjk: such a great dog. And those shelves…

>165 AlisonY: yay, on An Island. I had that feeling too. It just reached me. As for Anniversaries, i was really going to pick it back up yesterday, but instead decided to finally complete that Booker longlist and purchased and started No One Is Talking About This. So, next book. : )

Lisa’s (Labfs39) bookriot lists were dangerous

>166 lisapeet:/>167 labfs39: this information stuff sounds fun. Lisapeet - I’ll bookmark that link.

a couple reviews to catch up on



25. China Room by Sunjeev Sahota
published: 2021
format: 243-page hardcover
acquired: November read: May 12-16 time reading: 6:05, 1.5 mpp
rating: 4
genre/style: Contemporary Fiction theme: Booker 2021
locations: Punjab India 1929 and 1999
about the author: A British author born in Derby in 1981. His parents are from Punjab, India. (According to Wikipedia he read his first novel at age 18…so ~1999)

As I work through last year's Booker longlist, longest to shortest book, this is book 12 of 13.

Strictly on its own, this novel is good. A little MFA-ish, but it works. A drug-addict English kid visiting his Indian relatives is a nice touch. As a semi-autobiography/semi-family history it becomes a terrific look into Punjab, now on the Pakistani border, in the 1920‘s under British control; and a curious self-examination.

The novel takes place partially in 1929 in Punjab India on a farm where the wives of three brothers do not know who their husband is, the conjugal duties done in the dark without speaking. Some Handmaid's Tale vibes early, but the themes bring in Muslim/Hindu/British tensions. In a second interwoven story, the narrator looks back at himself in 1999, the great grandchild of one of these pairs, born and raised in England, visiting his uncle after failing his first year at his university and dealing with a secret heroin addiction. There are autobiographical elements as the narrator is the same age as the author. Wikipedia notes Sahota claims to have discovered literature in 1999, age 18, on a flight to India.

I think I have my paragraphs in the wrong order, but anyway, if it interests, go check it out.

26. Where the Jackals Howl and Other Stories by Amos Oz
published: 1965 in Hebrew
translation: 1973, 1976 & 1981 By Nicholas De Lange & Philip Simpson
format: 230-page Mariner Books paperback published 2012
acquired: May 2020 read: May 26-29 time reading: 8:15, 2.2 mpp
rating: 4
genre/style: Israeli short stories theme: TBR
locations: mostly a Kibbutz in Israel, ~1960. Also Jerusalem and a Biblical-era desert.
about the author: 1939-2018, Israeli author born in Jerusalem

This is Amos Oz‘s first book, a strong but mildly difficult collection of short stories mostly on Israeli Kibbutz life. Oz left his home to live permanently on Kibbutz at age 15 (~1954). So he writes from an experienced perspective on years where the Kibbutz was made up of European refugees, the founding philosophers, and their non-refugee children. The stories are a bit brutal, exploring these stoic idealist leader-philosophers working against the raw elements on these new farms; and exploring what this hard life does to people.

This is my fourth book by Oz, and I purchased this one because I wanted to read his first book. The other three, My Michael, Black Box, and his memoir, A Tale of Love and Darkness, were terrific. This was good writing, interesting, but not really fun reading. So only recommended to the really curious.

>170 dchaikin: Been waiting for your review since I saw the title in "recently added". Despite the 'not really fun' aspect, I think I will look for it just to see how his writing developed, as like you, I have really like what I have read so far. That is an interesting time frame when he lived on a kibbutz.

>169 dchaikin: - Impressed with your Booker longlist progress!

>170 dchaikin: - Will make a note that this isn't the place to start with Oz.

>171 SassyLassy: that curiosity drove me to read this first Oz too. It rewards that. The stories are interesting also because he was so young when he wrote these, and there was so much ahead of his life - wars and working for peace.

>172 DieFledermaus: Amos Oz is great. Start anywhere. 🙂 As for the Booker, I finished the list this morning. Processing that last one - No One Is Talking About This.

Really enjoyed the conversation about nonfiction, narrative nonfiction, historical fiction. I've always thought all three should be rigorous and accurate with historical facts. As several have noted, I have generally felt that what is called narrative nonfiction is merely presented differently, i.e. with a narrative arc making it flow like a novel, but nevertheless retain the accuracy of nonfiction.
This all felt relevant to me since I just finished a book about the Bounty mutineers, which purported to be nonfiction but which turned out to be the most egregious example I have ever read of an author presenting as fact things he could only have invented out of thin air. For example, in a description of one of the mutineers attacking another with an ax, we are told many times the ax struck, where it struck, where the blood spurted, where the brain matter scattered to, and then the author switches point of view and tells us what the victims was thinking as the life sapped from his body. We are told what people were thinking during sex, what recurring dreams they might have had, their daydreams, the extent of their regret over what they did, and on and on. These and many similar things had me ready to throw the book across the room, yet the prologue states that the book will tell the true story of what really happened to the Bounty mutineers. Enough!

>65 dchaikin: I am so glad you liked the Richard Powers. He is one of my favorite authors, and even though I haven't liked every book of his (I have read them all except for his first), I find he always has something interesting to say. I am always a bit hurt when someone really pans him

>66 dchaikin: Like you I was forced to read Ethan Frome in 10th grade, and I really did not like it. By early college age, though, I had become an Edith Wharton fan, at least of her more well-known books. I never ventured to reread Ethan Frome however until about 10 or 15 years ago, when I absolutely loved it. And that was reinforced by our recent Litsy read. Great review.
One thing about Wharton as I have read her books over the years I have found that I liked her books about the impoverished or the country folk more than her "society" novels. I'm thinking of Ethan Frome, Summer, The Bunner Sisters and probably others I'm forgetting.

>169 dchaikin: If you are ever interested in reading more by Sunjeev Sahota, I did not particularly like China Room, but absolutely loved The Year of the Runaways, which I think was his first book.

>174 arubabookwoman:

I suspect I would have trouble with that book even if it acknowledged the fictional elements. I think you should punt it and read North and South with us, where there is a proper fictional mutiny...even if it takes place off stage. :)

Richard Powers - yes, I'm now a fan. I would read more by him. I own The Echo Maker (partially because it might involve sound waves and so might tie into my seismic life).

Edith Wharton - I'm putting that opinion in my pocket to revisit after I read Summer. I'm enjoying The Reef a lot.

Sunjeev Sahota - I'm on the fence with him. Noting The Year of the Runaways, which sounds good. Thanks.

May wrap-up

planned - actual
5 hours - 3:55 - Henry VIII - acts 4-5 & afterward, finished
3 hours - 1:42 - Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton - 2nd half, finished
4 hours - 2:51 - Bewilderment by Richard Powers, last ~40%, finished
6 hours - 5:41 - An Island by Karen Jennings, finished
6 hours - 5:04 - Second Place by Rachel Cusk, finished
6 hours - 6:05 - China Room by Sanjeev Sahota, finished
4 hours - 8:15 - Where the Jackals Howl by Amos Oz, finished (I had planned to only read half)
0 hours - 4:32 - No One is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood, read ~90%, and finished on June 1
4 hours - 3:47 - King John acts 1 & 2
4 hours - 2:28 - The Reef by Edith Wharton, book I of V
11 hours - 12:46- North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell, 1st half
9 hours - 0:00 - Anniversiaries II by Uwe Johnson
---
62 hours - 57:06

I touched on 11 books, and finished 7, which seems like a lot. This was my Booker wrap-up month. I finished four from that list and I got within 30 minutes of completing the longlist (I finished Wednesday morning, June 1). This was a full month for my reading head, although I wish I had taken better advantage of some chances to get those extra 5 hours in and reach my goal of 62 hours. My reading drive faded mid-month, and then sort of recovered a bit. I struggled to get into North and South (but seem to have recovered), and never could pick up Anniversaries.

I've have now finished No One is Talking About This. So my June plan is to finish three of those remaining last four on that list above, and get back into Anniversaries. Also I want to begin a book I bought at the Texas A&M University Press building the one time I visited back in 2010, El Llano Estacado : Exploration and Imagination on the High Plains of Texas and New Mexico, 1536-1860 by John Miller Morris. I know nothing about the book other than the title and that it was published in 2003.

Whew! Catching up on your May discussion list. Interesting conversation about narrative nonfiction, etc. Academic literature departments have certainly picked up on narrative non-fiction as a literary genre in the last decade or so.

>66 dchaikin:, >85 raton-liseur:, >174 arubabookwoman: -- I may be one of the few highschoolers who actually enjoyed Ethan Frome, but I entirely attribute to having seen a terrific TV production of it starring Julie Harris and Sterling Hayden in Junior High.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0207458/

I too recommend Summer as a non-NYC upper class novel. I think it's terrific.

>177 janeajones: I need to put a little glass of water at the end here, for when you catch up. Summer, the Wharton novel, is two books away for my group read. After The Reef it's The Custom of the Country. I'm enjoying The Reef. Book II was very entertaining.

That's really cool about that 1960 tv version of Ethan Frome.

Are you on vacation?

>179 dianeham: no. I have been quiet though. Taking a little LT break.

I hope everything is OK for you. Although I lurk more than I post, I really enjoy your thread!

>181 Dilara86: thank you! Everything is fine here. Just need a brain refresh. I’m still reading too - although not finishing much. (I did finish No One Is Talking About This and I’m liking it more the more I think about it.)

Thanks for hosting that earlier amazing discussion; I've finally got over here to finish (?) it. Ain't LT great!

>183 avaland: :) Yes. LT is special. I loved the conversation.

>178 dchaikin: - I'll be interested to hear your thoughts on The Reef. I generally enjoyed it but felt like the ending was a cop-out.

>185 DieFledermaus: hi Maus. I've been neglectful here, sorry. This week I'll find out why there is a book V in The Reef, because it feels like a completed story after book IV.

>182 dchaikin: Interested to hear your thoughts on No One Is Talking about This! It seems to pretty pretty divisive - I liked it.

>187 ursula: my poor reviews are adding up. Five now to write... I liked No One Is Talking about This, and then I settled down to let it filter through my head, and I liked it a lot more.

I finally made it to your thread! I am in awe of the discussions here, especially the one about narrative nonfiction. I had never heard the term before, although I think that I know what it is. Food for thought!

>30 dchaikin: Like you, I have only read two Dickens novels, David Copperfield and Oliver Twist. The latter was my first one, and I read it aged 25.

"I sense lot of readers feel that way - Dickens was a great influence at that impressionable point in their younger reading life. A great background influence. (Include Nabokov there.) But, of course, that only works for you guys who read this kind of stuff when you were younger. For us who missed that bus, I suspect we almost have to take him in in a different way."

I found these thoughts very interesting and I agree. I enjoyed these two novels and I have many more Dickens novels on my shelves that I always think I want to read, but never do! The time investment is so high and I think that although I really enjoyed the two novels I have read (I gave David Copperfield five stars!) I now wonder how much these novels will give me or what I will get out of them. That sounds too harsh, but I cannot put it any other way! However, I still hope to read them one day, as my initial plan was to read one each winter, in which I failed miserably ;-)

>66 dchaikin: Ethan Frome is one of the Wharton novels on my shelf and I have a feeling that it will be the first of her novels I will read! Somehow it is the one that I am most drawn to.

>189 MissBrangwen: I swear, there should be refreshments waiting here at the end.

Your comments on Dickens bring up a lot of my own unresolved thoughts. Dickens demand time. There are so many words. But, you know, it's a different experience reading a long slow 19th-century classic verse any other experience, and especially when a lot of that other experience involves twitter like draws and demands for immediate attention. That's why I've held off on Dickens and why, when I read him, I have some much trouble adjusting to his mindset. But he was very good as what he did, he does entertain. I'm hoping to make him a theme for myself one year (or maybe a few years) and just read a whole lot of Dickens at once. I think it could work.

Ethan Frome is slow but also short, and a neatly drawn up construction. I hope you can enjoy it. My only complaint would be that is doesn't hint at the rich world of Wharton's other writing.

27. No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
published: 2021
format: 210-page Kindle ebook
acquired: May 29 read: May 29 – Jun 1 time reading: 4:55, 1.4 mpp
rating: 4
genre/style: Contemporary novel theme: Booker 2021
locations: Ohio and an alternate Twitter
about the author: born in Fort Wayne, Indiana in 1982, grew up in St. Louis and Cincinnati and did not attend college

So I finished this one and then sat on it for five days. Finally, I wrote a Litsy review - 451 characters or less...with a spillover sentence. I think it's one of my successful Litsy reviews:

Twitter personality wrote a Twitter novel. And it works. It‘s creative, powerful and, I thought, confusing to our mental senses. A spray of information through bitesized expressions with meaning, each contained and concluded; and they‘re insightful, and they go rushing by in a flurry of not-really-random information. And there is a story within, broken up and unfocused by the chatter and yet patently there. I‘ve been mentally twirling this one.

I think it‘s a strange, fantastic creation, and the nature of how it works or doesn‘t is as interesting as whether it works or doesn‘t.

But this little book, that was driving me crazy about 50% in, has refused to settle down 3.5 weeks later. Initially I wondered to myself whether it's just a gimmicky style, creative but one anyone could write. But I still felt it was well done. And I quickly realized the story was ok on its own but not a novel. The perspective is everything. The mental mind bend, the struggle from distraction to what we perceive as substance, as grounding. From the - he said watching me that I look dead, I've never been more alive internet zone-in - to breakout out of that. And then, us, readers, to look back and wonder why we were ever in... wait, present tense, why we ever let ourselves be in this state. (even if its hopefully more balanced than our narrator's).

Anyway, a book that does not work for everyone, but has something there that is really special. Recommended.

>191 dchaikin: Great review! I've been waiting for your comments.

I really liked No One is Talking About This. I liked the gimmicky start, but it couldn't be sustained, so when the story changed, it worked for me. I liked the 'twitter' world, but how it wasn't real when reality actually happened.
Books that won't leave your mind, and insist on being thought about after the fact, whether for good or bad, are impressive.

>192 raidergirl3: thanks for such a nice comment. It's interesting how some reading experiences get sort of under our consciousness and then sit there and work away.

>191 dchaikin: I also found myself thinking a lot about No One Is Talking about This. I remember feeling a little resentful when the book took on a more serious tone. And I enjoyed the way it made me examine my own response. So yeah, what you said. :)

>189 MissBrangwen: I read those when I was in HS; Loved Tale of Two Cities, and Great Expectations at that time as well. might want to them to your list

>195 cindydavid4: They are already on my shelf, among other Dickens novels - I will move those two up the tbr for next winter! Thanks!

>194 ursula: I think we had similar responses. Which is another check for the book. Also, glad it's not just me. :)

>195 cindydavid4: someday, Cindy! Actually, I read parts of an assigned and abridged Great Expectations in high school and I remember enjoying what I read. I've wanted to go back to it ever since, well, with an unabridged version.

28. Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
reader: the author
published: 2003
format: 17:36 audible audiobook (356 pages in paperback)
acquired: May 11 listened : May 11 – Jun 10
rating: 4½
genre/style: Memoir theme: random audio
locations: Tehran 1979-1995
about the author: Iranian-American author born in Tehran in 1948. She studied abroad from age 13 and emigrated to the US in 1997.

Nafisi, who claims decent of 800 years of Nafisi family writers, was educated abroad from age 13. She returned to Iran in 1979 to teach English literature, just in time for the Islamic Revolution and its associated dystopian oppression. She had some protectors, a spouse with a stable income, and she was mostly able to continue to teach within the Islamic Republic, despite all its insane treatment of women and its censorship and hatred of the west. When she was prohibited from teaching, she started her private reading group of former students, and they started with reading Lolita.

She had quite an experience, and the book covers it all - the revolution, street riots, arrests, executions, invasive law enforcement and its intense focus on preventing women from committing the sin of doing anything or appearing an anyway that might possibly make any young man aroused, and also constant bombing by Iraqi bombers. Meanwhile she taught, kept teaching, had children, and kept reading. Her students would be arrested at demonstrations, or even on vacation, and then tortured in unknown ways, and sometimes summarily executed. Her colleagues faced the same threats, some executed on the roadside. And she processed it all through literature. If you believe her take, she was very bold. During the early uncertain swings in the revolution she had her class put The Great Gatsby on trial, the revolutionary students prosecuting, and other students defending, and she played the defendant, the book. Her literary critiques become commentaries on the repression of this Islamic revolution - insightful to both it and to the books. (Beyond Nabokov and Fitzgerald, she also has a theme on Henry James and Jane Austen - actually it was Austen who led to her reading group).

Certainly, her literary take is unique, and tied to these experiences, and amplified by them. These English classics become far more intense for her and her students than for any normal reader. A well-quoted line struck me near the end. Shortly before leaving Tehran, a literary friend tells her that when she gets to the US, “You will not be able to write about Austen without writing about us, about this place where you rediscovered Austen … The Austen you know is so irretrievably linked to this place…”

This very long book is such an awkward thing, and yet I agree with the conventional wisdom on this. It's terrific, even if awkwardly terrific. It stumbles in so many ways. For example, her efforts to conceal identities make the fake identities confusing, so much so that I was completed baffled as to who was who. I quickly gave up trying to follow. (She reads the audio herself, in her Iranian accent, which also awkwardly works well.) But it's unique and tragic, passionate, flawed, and also makes for a creative use of literary criticism.

Recommended if intense literary responses and the Iranian revolution interest.

>198 dchaikin: I'm glad you enjoyed it too, Dan. In the beginning I made a seating chart of her reading group and jotted a few notes beside each person to keep everyone straight. Having just finished your Nabokov marathon, what did you think of her comments on him? It made me want to read Invitation to a Beheading.

>197 dchaikin: one of my all time fav characters in literature is Miss Haversham. MadamDeFarge is another, also by Dickens

>199 labfs39: I liked her comments a lot and wanted more. Her comments on Invitation to a Beheading were very interesting from her perspective. Nabokov was writing as an emigre, but she was reading from inside that prison. It gave her a different perspective and the book a very interesting turn. I think you know it was one little book that I really took to.

>200 cindydavid4: Dickens does wonderful characters. 🙂 They are not necessarily original, but they are completely captured. I think experiencing his characters is an important part of enjoying his writing.

struggling to find the mindset to write reviews. (not so great on reading lately either. But getting some in). But No One is Talking About This completes the 2021 Booker longlist for me. The 2022 list is due out this month, July 27.

So, quick summary:

BOOKER LONGLIST 2021 VERY PARTIAL SUMMARY

My favorites
No One is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood - which led to a lot of thinking on my part
An Island by Karen Jennings - which I just enjoyed a lot. A sort of African parable.

Others I really liked a lot
Second Place by Rachel Cusk - this is actually really brilliant. Just a little bit tough to stay in this monologue.
Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro - fun and thought-provoking
Bewilderment by Richard Powers - it just worked for me
A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam - All in his head, philosophical, and so slow. But it works.

Others that I also liked a lot, but maybe a little less than those above
The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed - this weighed on me a little, but the last 100 pages are terrific.
The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris - oddly charming.

I liked these, but they rank down a notch
Light Perpetual by Francis Spufford - better in hindsight as he gets a little carried away in the moment
The Promise by Damon Galgut - the winner is good. The satire-no-but-this-is-serious mixture was mixed for me.
A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson - the lightest novel here. It's very readable.
China Room by Sunjeev Sahota - imperfect, but it works

the only one I didn't like
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead - it's in hindsight I don't like this

moving on - new thread here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/342768