Age of Desire: Discussion Notes and an Email Correspondence with Author

In a comfortable 1870's wood-frame townhouse in front of a charming fire in a wood burning stove, among a 12-member book group with maybe two e-readers in all, technology in the form of Skype brought author Jennie Fields into our meeting. Generous. Warm. Intelligent. Ms. Fields was everything that member B.B.said she was when she was B.B.'s writing mentor almost a decade ago.  (Sessions were held in the Barnes and Noble on 7^th Avenue.   I probably was not the only one who wondered why I didn't attend. What was I so busy with?)  And we found out that Ms. Fields was a neighbor—just two blocks away from where we were last night.

Briefly...

Some things we said last night before the call...

Members discussed how Edith Wharton's transformative love affair at 46 was as adolescent as any crush felt by a fourteen year old. And so with most adolescent crushes—it didn't matter who the object was. Even a promiscuous seducer like Morton Fullerton. Wharton's relationship with her husband, Teddy, was a shallow thing easily destroyed. Of the characters in Age of Desire, the only deep relationship she had was with Anna, her servant, her tutor, her governess, her editor, her typist.

During the call, some things we learned from the author...

All of Edith Wharton's letters in the book are actual letters—they are the framework for the Age of Desire. Edith's letters to Morton Fullerton were rescued/taken at gunpoint by a woman. (Morton remained single and a scoundrel, blackmailed more than once, until his death  in the 1950's in his 8^th decade. He never destroyed or returned the letters as asked. Fields speculated that he knew that they were valuable.)

In addition-something—serendipity? a dead soul's desire? a lucky break?--brought another set of letters to Ms. Fields just as she was fact checking her final draft of Age of Desire. The letters were Anna's. And, their contents confirmed Ms. Fields' intuition and speculation about Anna and her dealings with the Whartons.   Anna wanted to...more than that...desired to serve Edith...to make her happy...and to contribute to Edith's work. And she alone was able to soothe and comfort Teddy through his early bipolar episodes.

Don't judge historic figures by modern sensibilities.Edith's use of Anna...seemed despicable to some members--well at least one--this blogger.  It isn't fair to judge Edith for doing what the upper class of her period did with their servants. Nor is it fair to expect better behavior from women of genius than we expect from men of genius.

To the romantics in the group, it was good to learn that Edith most likely found love with Walter Berry...her early and enduring love. She called him "the love of her life".  

WHAT FOLLOWS, fittingly, is a correspondence between B.B. and Jennie Fields...

Hi Jennie,

Thanks so much for spending time with us this evening.  (I can hardly believe Skype worked out given our amateur approach on this end!)  Everyone agreed that meeting and talking with you topped off our discussion beautifully and made the book all the more impressive.  After we said goodbye to you, I thought to ask the others what they thought of the sex scenes and everyone laughed appreciatively and said they wished we'd told you how great they were.


Thanks again for this evening!

B.B.

Hi B.B.

I loved talking to your book group.  I'm glad they enjoyed it.  Too bad you didn't bring up the sex scenes.  I would have shared that among Edith's papers when she died was some extremely explicit erotica she'd written and kept hidden which helped me understand her sexuality. It gave me the courage to write those scenes.  If she could write hot scenes, hey, why couldn't I?

Thanks for inviting me, and thank everyone for taking the time to read my book.  If they find extra reading time, you might mention that Crossing Brooklyn Ferry and The Middle Ages are both set in Park Slope. (Must be all those years in advertising.  I'm always selling!)

Jennie

Outtakes with literary references and a reading suggestion...

Jennie:

BTW: I know that Edith meant May in "Innocence" to be a horrible example of repression, but I am intrigued by how she is presented: telling Newland he's free to break their engagement even though it would bring mortification to her, Announcing the pregnancy before the pregnancy and arranging a party to send  her rival packing, and, finally, telling a private version of events to her son.  Behind the conventional, child-like woman, Edith has created a steely shadow side, which Newland glimpses.  I think that's quite a feat for the author.  In some ways--and perhaps this reveals what a conventional person I am--May's the most interesting character in the book.]

B.B.

B.B.....

Wow, I couldn't agree with you more about May. (Age of Innocence by Wharton) There's something very manipulative about her which isn't innocent at all.  Actually I found that recognition somewhat chilling. She is the perfect product of her society, though. Think how they close ranks on Newland when they see him straying.  If you have the chance, read Roman Fever, to my mind Edith's best short story, and there's a moment at the end that is similarly chilling, and so brilliant.

Jennie

For more information visit Ms. Fields's website

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson is one of the five best books of 2013 according to NYTimes...

I loved it, but felt it wouldn't make a good book for discussion...
Oops.

Life After Life link

December is here...

Get reading:  The Age of Desire--by Jennie Fields

Wharton Photos/Pictures


 Reading Group Guide...

The Orchardist: Discussion

A small group--only five of us--were there to talk about this well-liked book.  One member called it a fairy tale.  And it does have those elements.  Two wandering orphans lost in the woods. A fairy godmother--the midwife herbalist.  A lonely grandfatherly figure a la Gepetto.  And a crueler than cruel evil villain.  

What it doesn't have are the fairy tale resolutions.  There is no Prince Charming to wake up the sleeping beauties.  (Although some characters attempt a princely, but  hare-brained rescue.)  The most evil character doesn't die through the cleverness of a Princess.  The Grandfather doesn't transform himself in order to save the young.  Disappointing, however, as one member put it--we would have criticized the book mercilessly if it had a happily ever after ending.

And so the book leaves you with unresolved questions but with an appreciation for the simple  life that followed the rhythms of the seasons--that  was once upon a time.

Feeling as smug and self-satisfied as an ant scoffing at a lazy grasshopper....

Ordered all of the remaining 8 titles for the year and they are stacked in reading order on my bookshelf.  I am ready for a long winter. What about you?   Are you an ant or grasshopper?  Either way, know this --

Next up is:

The Orchardist  (linked to NPR review)

by Amanda Coplan

The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers: Discussion

Book:  Great. (Majority)
Discussion:  Okay.
Post:  Too short?  Sorry.

A poetic book telling the truth about a modern war--a war with no clear justification, goal, enemy, or heroes. Started by old men who never fought a war who had no exit plan, because they planned on staying there forever.  One member didn't want to read it due to the horror it would contain. And didn't come for the discussion. (She was encouraged to read it by a member who thought the book beautifully written; I'll let you know if she does.)  Another member came who disliked the book because of  its gruesomeness.

Everyone else thought the book captured what it must have felt like to be a young soldier in such a meaningless slaughter of innocence and youth. With beautiful language.

Minor issues:  The letter--was it a device or real?  What was Bartle's crime?  Should that have stayed a mystery?

Guilty that I hadn't finished the book in time and rushed through the last sections, I didn't offer this thought:  Does the poetic voice remove you from the horror and keep you as numb as the soldiers became?  Or was my speed reading keeping me from feeling the pain?

Politics entered the discussion:  Should there be a draft?  Would that prevent the U.S. from entering such wars in the future?  What has an all professional army done to the country and us?  Trained to be killers only; jobs that previously led to skilled worked performed by Halliburton--what is there for soldiers returning to civilian life?

Why was discussion okay?  Too much agreement.  We have to stop agreeing.

E-Magazine Publishes Member's Short Story

Follow this link:

Sister Love by Barbara McGillicuddy Bolton

2013-2014 List Updated April 2014

One member phoned in her recommendation from Montana.  Several couldn't attend, but gave recommendations.  Thanks to smart phones and smart operators, we were able to get detailed descriptions and thus, able to vote smartly.

Here they are:
October 16th meeting....

Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers

Yellow Birds Review

November 13th meeting...

The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin

The Orchardist Review

December 18th meeting...

The Age of Desire
  by  Jennie Fields

Review 

January 15th meeting...

The Messiah of Stockholm by Cynthia Ozick

A Review

February 12th....

I Curse the River of Time

  by Per Petterson

A Review

CHANGED to May 21st meeting...

Old Filth

    by Jane Gardam

Read A Review

April 23rd Meeting Book is:

I Await the Devil's Coming

  by Mary McClain

Some Background Information

CHANGED TO March 12th:

Are You My Mother?

     by Alison Bechdel

Review from NYTIMES

And the last book for the year...

June 18th...

The Tennis Player

    by Abraham Verghese

A Reading Group Guide!

2013-2014 First Meeting is September 18th at L.C. home

Bring one or two books to recommend...

Beth Elohim Author Talks...sent by MK

Brooklyn By The Book

Congregation Beth Elohim and Community Bookstore, two historic Brooklyn institutions, have joined forces to offer a monthly reading and lecture series at Congregation Beth Elohim. The Brooklyn by the Book events will provoke discussion, celebrate the life of the mind, and tap into the rich culture of writing and reading in Park Slope and the broader community of Brownstone Brooklyn. Programming will focus primarily on current events, literary fiction and other topics of interest to our audience. Park Slope is one of the nation’s premiere literary communities, and this is the first large-scale venue for all the passionate readers in the area to come meet and hear from their favorite authors.

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Summer Time Reading

Some suggestions...See links. 

Corydon by Andre Gide
Essays and a Writer's Guide by Phillip Lopate
Truth & Beauty by Ann Patchett
The Tennis Partner by Abraham Verghese
The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout

Send more....Add to comments section below.

photo by CARL NORR

Sense of an Ending: Discussion

Can you like a book about a fundamentally unlikable  main character?  Yes!  No! That's what it boiled down to.  No middle of the road wishy-washy mehs.  Two readers said that Tony, the flawed main character, made it difficult for them to care enough to keep reading although they valiantly did.   Others thanked the sponsor (me) for recommending the book.  (A first for this blogger --me-- I believe.)

What kept me engrossed was not the hope that Tony would change...would finally get it and immerse himself in life; although that hope was there. It was the desire to "get" what Tony did not get until the very end of the book. And what the reader finally realizes after rereading and rereading is that it is just as futile  to chase the truth in this book as it is in real life.   As Barnes points out --our memories are filtered and distorted by our need to invent our own  story. (Only more eloquently and powerfully.) And the lack of corroborating witnesses.  And the very nature of remembering.

The discussion  on memories brought up research on how memory works--the brain stores parts of memories in different sections divided by sense--thus memory of smell, sight, feel, ...and so on...are separate not "whole".  How reliable is that?  One b.g. member talked about a reunion of her sisters brought about a discussion of an event that they all witnessed/took part in.   All remembered it differently.



Despite the realization that we can't really know the whole story of  Tony, we tried to piece it together.  Folly?  (What is the real  mystery we are all trying to answer?  The story of our parents and their parents? How did the universe begin? ) The following big space is giving you an opportunity to avoid the spoiler discussion, (there is a twist at the end)  read the book, and return.

Spoiler Alert



Hypotheses:

Why blood money? Veronica's mother left Tony 500 pounds because she felt guilty for helping to break up the couple.  Sara tried to seduce Tony, he was clueless, and thus Sara talked against him.  She wanted fresh boyfriends brought home to try for. Veronica going against her parent/rival gave one last try to keep Tony by seducing him. When Tony rejected her, she chose Adrian.  A rebound choice that boomeranged tragically.

Another point of view on this question expressed after most of the group left for home...Veronica used the term blood money...to get back at Tony. For Veronica did love Tony and Tony loved her.  Why else the strongly worded letter?  And he threw their chance at happiness away.   Sara's leaving the money may not at all have been an act of contrition for her; just a token?


Just as the meeting ended a new  thread ...
Maybe this book is about good and evil.  Tony or Anthony is named for the  saint who finds/searches for lost things and people.  Veronica had the cloth with Jesus's face printed on it...(the cloth a shadow of the truth -- a page of the diary?)   Does that make Adrian Christ? There is a Saint Adrian...who was royalty from Hungary and killed by Vikings. Veronica is also Mary...explaining why she was a "second" mother to her brother.  Why she never married. (Or did she?)

Futile.  Stop.  Now.

Third and Final draft.

Next Book: The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

New York Times Review
Huffington Post Review
Guardian Review


Julian Barnes Bio

NPR interview










Books say: She did this because. Life says: She did this. Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren’t. I’m not surprised some people prefer books. — JULIAN BARNES

Discussion Board

Man From Saigon: Is it a Woman?

A popular book that kept everyone intrigued...except for one b.g. member. Not a great book...but a solid read was the majority opinion. Well researched and crafted.  A book whose images served to bring us back to the 60's and 70's.

 The Man From Saigon reminded us the war that help to destroy a president and briefly empowered a generation (ours) did not change our country as fundamentally as we once believed it had.  Tragically, the war built on lies and domino theories and paranoia did not prevent us from becoming embroiled in a war built on lies and paranoid fears about terrorists in  Iraq and Afghanistan.  Did not prevent us from years and years of brutalization of a people--"innocent" and "guilty".  Of fighting an enemy whose shape shifting led to mistrust of a whole race.  "Gooks" --"Towelheads"... The parallels make this book relevant for us now.

We all commented on the one thing that has changed. Even in this day of ubiquitous screens, the images of the war are no longer bombarding our senses day after day.  So we tolerate the unseen far away.  We tolerate the drones.  We feel safe as we create new generations full of anger at our country.

Vietnam is now a nation that welcomes American tourists...some of our b.g. members have visited.  Will that be true in Afghanistan?  Iraq?


.........

The book tells the story from the point of view of an embedded female magazine reporter, her Vietnamese photographer, Son,  and TV news reporter.  It is a love story--a triangle of sorts--that is intriguing and moving.  You  care.

One member wanted to discuss the choppiness of the structure--the back and forth from present to past.  The very feature that disturbed the above mentioned dissenting b.g. member.  (To be fair, she was reading quickly to finish in time...perhaps that was what was disturbing.)

After the meeting I read a review that says the choppiness was deliberate and intended to build tension and to mirror how a person in a perilous situation would actually think...constantly being jerked back into reality of mortal danger after drifting back into heightened memories of the past.

Another member, this blogger, was bothered that Son, the photographer, was the inscrutable Asian.  An "Oriental"  whose true self was hidden from westerners.  Was he the man from Saigon or the man from Hanoi?

But he also is a character that you care about ... You want him to survive.  You want him to find happiness and love.  You want him to find peace in the Vietnam of his picture map--of natural beauty.

Read it.  Comment.

MAY Book is The Man From Saigon

The Meeting has been moved to May 22nd

 Want to read a review?

Or visit the author's page?

The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News Discussion NOTES

Last month rave reviews.  This month...lots of raving...but not all positive.

Opinions ranged from {paraphrased despite the quotation marks}:

--"I savored each part of the book wanting to enjoy every moment.  I felt the way that I did when I first discovered Jane Austin."  to...

--"I did not want to read the book...it was too awful, too dark." prefaced by:  "Your reactions  to a book are always determined by where you are in your life emotionally and could change if you picked up the book at another time."  In fact that has happened to the member expressing this opinion more than once.  But from the look of sheer disgust on her face, I doubt that she will ever pick this book up again.

"How can you want to read a book when you care for none of the characters?" To many in the group, not even the child victim Patrick is sympathetic.  So they are certainly not going to find the grown-up Patrick appealing.  After all, he  looks at the world through nearly the same distorted lens as his father did--although on the surface he is kinder.  And he has a profound understanding of his behavior.

In Never Mind -- no one never ever minded small Patrick?--one parents' neglect and the others' abuse are truly horrifying.  But for some the dark humor, the marvelous insights into the British upper class society,   the punishment of the abuser...make it all bearable and more than that --even eminently readable.

We meet the characters one by one and then watch the strong eviscerate the weak at a formal dinner.   Parallels to Downton Abbey, Pride and  Prejudice, Upstairs Downstairs with just a dark, dark, dark slant.

In Bad News--not clear that a single human feels that the news is bad--we are caught up in Patricks' s search for oblivion through drugs as a way of getting beyond the bad news that has filled  his life up until then.

A few members had read beyond the first two novellas and onto Some Hope and Mother's Milk.  They  report that Patrick's struggles do become a little wearying by book four.

It's clear that some of us will not be continuing on (maybe even placing their copy of the book on the stoop? or the recycling bin?) and a few others (about 25%?) will gladly continue to immerse themselves in the Patrick Melrose saga.  Even purchasing the latest novella:   At Last.                .

Order the next book: April 17th is fast approaching

Want to read an excerpt?get a review?  author bio? BOOK group guide? read a summary?

Gilgamesh: Book Talk Summary by BB

Seven of us met to discuss Gilgamesh.  Our hostess/book sponsor passed around pages of cuneiform and pictures of ancient statues of Gilgamesh and Humbaba, then read from the text.  

We marveled over the story line—Gilgamesh’s initial self-centeredness, the civilizing effect of love-making on Enkidu, the deep friendship between the two men and their adventures in the Cedar Forest and with the Bull of Heaven, Enkidu’s death which plunges Gilgamesh into mourning and causes him to seek immortality, and finally at the end of his quest his acceptance of the human condition.  

Our discussion took many tangents—BC/AD versus BCE/CE, homoeroticism, blessings and curses, gender roles in the ancient world.  (What would be Rachel Lloyd’s take on the cult of sacred priestess/prostitute?)  But ultimately we kept returning to the text to read aloud from Stephen Mitchell’s beautiful rendition of the poem.

By the way, the March 4 issue of the New Yorker contains “Summer of ‘38” by Colm Toibin—whom we know as the author of Brooklyn—which deals with family secrets, the subject of our last month’s post-meeting conversation over birthday cake.

Gilgamesh Modernized

Interested in what critics had to say?  New York Times review

   My Gilgamesh

At Barnes and Noble

this past Sunday night

after I thought

I had spent

a profitless day

looking at

Easter hats

in front of

St. Patrick’s Cathedral

I found Stephen Mitchell’s

translation of Gilgamesh

telling of one who had

seen all

who had felt all

who had journeyed

to the edge of the world

who carved his trials

on stone tablets

who restored the

holy Eanna Temple

sacred to Ishta

and slew Humbaba in

the cedar forest then lost

the marvelous plant

which was the antidote

to the fear of death

and finally resolved his grief

with a walk on the wall of Urek

observing its gleaming ramparts

its glorious palaces and marketplaces.

My eyes ran with this verse

I was like the watcher of the skies

who sees a new planet swim into view

and I was like the beguiled poet who read

Chapman’s Homer first time.

Gail Tuch

Reminder that the March book is not just any old Gilgamesh...it is the version by Stephen Mitchell.  Don't show up with your old college version and think you can talk myths at the March meeting. ( February's review of  In the Garden of the Beasts is below."

In the Garden of the Beasts: Meeting Notes

Not one, not two, but three cakes were brought to celebrate a member's birthday.  Unbeknownst to each other, three book clubbers decided to remember a birthday--including the birthday celebrant herself.  The white cardboard boxes were lined up on the counter waiting for  the meeting to be over to reveal their deliciousness.   Short story fodder?  Think O'Henry?  Reader you will have to wait until the meeting notes to find out more about the cakes.

The meeting was all positiveness about the book--one of the most positive group reactions in recent memory (which granted is not very long nowadays).   The presenter encouraged the group to not only talk about the content--Hitler's early Nazification of Germany but also the technique that the author used to make this nonfiction so appealing.

Several members initially had low expectations for their enjoyment of a book on a very familiar topic;  yet once they started In the Garden of The Beasts they were enthralled by it and its revelations. So much so that some members felt that what they were reading was fictionalized despite all of the footnotes.  Don't skip them, by the way!

The main characters  William E. Dodd, ambassador from America to Germany--and his daughter Martha (his wife and son are minor players) are naive Americans who share the negative view held by the majority of  their fellow Americans towards Jews and towards getting involved in foreign wars.  (No chance they would enter a foreign war to stop persecution of Jews.)  In short, the Dodds are imperfect, flawed characters.  Dodd will not do anything extraordinary or history making.  Just like many others Dodd meets with Hitler and comes away believing in the villain's desire for peace; although by the end of his tenure Dodd understands the beast for what he is.  Martha is remarkably free and independent; she falls for the beauty of the Nazi youth as she falls for a long line of men.  (Slut one member called her; which led to a side chat about the sexism of the term.  Can a man be a slut? Yes? No? Can you be a slut if Carl Sandburg is your lover and sends you poetry?)

As to technique; one member used this metaphor:  Erik Larson structured his book much like a Downtown Abbey episode--focusing on one angle, person or story; leaving them to go on to another and another before returning. Pulling the reader in and moving them along, keeping them hooked.  Even the use of chapter titles smacked of fiction writing.

Now for dessert:  Two cakes from Little Red Hen--one chocolate; one apple pie.  One chocolate cake from Sweet Melissas.  (I should have heated it; tasted better that way!  Yes I had another slice.)  So much left that we briefly considered freezing them and bringing them back to every book group meeting until they were eaten. Briefly.

Oh:  Don't forget Gilgamesh next month.  Not just any edition--see earlier entry.  And if Gilgamesh is   the search term that is getting hits from porno sites--it is getting deleted.

In the Garden of the Beasts: Next Up for Book Group

Read an excerpt?  NPR link
Review New York Times Review

The Echo Maker: Discussion

Although the book was a bumpy ride for some--the best parts were end of the beginning and the end?;  the talk flowed in a steady stream--evenly balanced between negative and positive comments.  What follows are a few remembered comments.

The repetitiveness of The Echo Maker left some of us thinking the author was being self-indulgent--pouring out all of his deep scientific knowledge about the brain, birds, land use--without editing to help the reader.  "Everything thrown in ( including or but) the kitchen sink."

Seesaw to the idea that some of the characters were really delightful--Mark and his friends in particular.  One member said that she was happy to read a book with characters who were NICE for a change.

And...
It is rare and refreshing for a book to be about siblings.

What made the meeting really fun, was the collaborative unraveling and dissecting of the themes in Echo Maker:   Some remembered...

1.  Not only the brain injured suffer from delusions.  After 9/11 Americans have bought into delusions that led us into two wars, torture, detention camps.  We all still get electronic news proving that the Pentagon wasn't hit by an airplane.

2.  Like a number of characters in this novel, we all feel inauthentic at times--we are our own doubles-- an echo of  our true selves.

3.  We are facing the inevitable ruin of our planet by the greedy and the powerful and the corrupt.


Some links:

New York Times Review

The Guardian Review

Richard Powers Website

Gilgamesh Made More Readable...

Reminder that the March book is not just any old Gilgamesh...it is the version by Stephen Mitchell.  Don't show up with your old college version and think you can talk myths at the March meeting. ( February is In the Garden of the Beasts..)