PARKING: Street parking and garage parking are available. There is a charge for garage parking prior to 7pm.
You will be required to collect a ticket at 6pm but you won't need to pay when you leave.
Nov 1 ANTHEM by Ayn Rand (272 pages) publ 1938
Science fiction taking place at some future date when mankind has entered another dark age as a result of what the author saw as the weaknesses of socialistic thinking and economics. Technological advancement is now carefully planned (when it is allowed to occur at all) and the concept of individuality has been eliminated (for example, the word "I" has disappeared from the language.)
Included on the Reader's List of Modern Library's 100 Best Novels/. Also, Project Gutenberg e-text of ANTHEM available here
Wendy will be leading discussion.
Dec 6 ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (432 pages)
first publ in Spanish in 1967, in English in 1970
Author is Nobel Prize wininer for Literature in 1982
Novel awarded Venezuela's prestigious Rómulo Gallegos Prize for literature in 1972.
Considered to be author's masterpiece, metaphorically encompassing the history of Colombia. The novel chronicles a family's struggle, and the history of their fictional town, Macondo, for one hundred years. A reader's guide with discussion questions is available at readinggroupguides.com
Helen will be leading discussion.
Readings for 2008:
Jan 3, 2008 THE HOMECOMING by Harold Pinter (96 pages) publ 1964
Author was 2005 Nobel Laureate in Literature
The cruel underbelly of society in the 60s surfaces almost surely with sexually explicit themes and themes of violence. The play is concerned with the return of Teddy, a professor of philosophy at an American college, to the North London house occupied by his father, uncle, and brothers, all of whom seem to operate on the fringes of working-class society, some distance from respectability. Teddy is accompanied by his wife, Ruth, who then finds herself at the centre of a series of Pinteresque power-struggles
---Wendy will lead discussion
Feb 7, 2008 THE ANALECTS by Confuscius (102 pages) written 479-221 B.C.
Since Confucius' time, the Analects has heavily influenced the philosophy and moral values of China and later other East Asian countries as well. Together with the other three volumes of the Four Books, it taught the basic Confucian values including propriety, righteousness, loyalty and filial piety, all centered about the central thought of Confucius – humanity. Recommended text will be the Penguin Classics paperback version but there are numerous other versions available including several downloadable from the web if that is your choice..
--Betty will lead discussion
Mar 6, 2008 OTHELLO by Shakespeare approx 100 pages) written around 1603
A tragic play about deception, manipulation, and revenge- The devotion seems ideal between Othello and Desdemona until they become victims of Iago's exploitation. Play will be performed live this Spring at the Alley Theatre here in Houston. A theatre gathering for our group will possibly be organized for a Sunday in the latter part of March
depending on interest. Text available for downloading online from:
http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext00/0ws3210.txt ---Alice will lead discussion
Apr 3, 2008 MALTESE FALCON by Dashiell Hammett (217 pages) publ 1930
A crime noir classic. A greedy and ruthless trio of characters bent on finding the statuette meet their match in Sam Spade. The plot, characters, and dialogue in The Maltese Falcon are perfectly controlled by Hammett, incorporating a vigor and style that became the paradigm for hard-boiled crime fiction. Possible discussion questions at www.readinggroupsguides.com ---Christopher will lead discussion
Note: Election tonight. Ballot here!
WAR PRAYER (2 pages) publ 1905 http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/warprayer.htmlNO. 44, MYSTERIOUS STRANGER (200 pages) publ 1982, not 1916 - Please read version publ by Univ of California Press 1982.
(other versions such as one published posthumously in 1916 reputedly not written by Twain) Mysterious Stranger is the story of a devil wreaking subversive havoc on a socially repressive culture by playing on their hypocritical terms. One example of where it can be purchased is on amazon.com
---Anne will lead discussion
Jun 5, 2008 THE STRANGER by Camus (123 pages) publ 1946
Author was 1957 Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature The new English translation by Matthew Ward published in 1989 is the preferred translation.
Book is one of the best-known examples of absurdist fiction. Some classify it as Existential. The setting is Algiers. The stranger of the story is a young man who commits an unpremeditated crime in a moment of aberration and then is slowly and methodically condemned to death. One of the translations is available HERE .
---Wendy will lead discussion
Jul 3, 2008 A HANDFUL OF DUST by Evelyn Waugh (publ 1934) 308 pages
Included in Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels.
Story focuses on the breakdown of a marriage. Waugh's own marriage was disintegrating when he wrote this, and his unhappiness led him into wider realms of feeling—pathos, rage— than any you find in his earlier triumphs. If this is Waugh at his bleakest it's also Waugh at his deepest, most poisonously funny as described HERE
--Carol will lead discussion
Note: Meeting will be in downstairs conference room.
Aug 7, 2008 THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER by Carson McCullers (356 pages) publ 1940
One of the top one hundred works of twentienth century fiction chosen by the Modern Library.
A haunting, unforgettable story that gives voice to the rejected, the forgotten, and the mistreated. Tells an unforgettable story of moral isolation in a small Georgia mill town in the 1930s where a deaf man encounters a young girl, a labor agitator, a restaurateur, and an idealistic African-American doctor. Possible questions for discussion available HERE
- Cassie will lead discussion
Sep 4, 2008 THE ROAD by Cormac McCarthy (publ 2006) 256 pages
Pulitzer Prize winner, an Oprah Book Club Selection. Movie to be released in November 2008.
A post-apocalyptic tale describing a journey taken by a father and his young son over a period of several months across a landscape blasted years before by an unnamed cataclysm that destroyed civilization and, seemingly, most life on earth. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearting, a cart of scavenged food — and each other. Possible discussion questions HERE
--Susan will lead discussion
Oct 2, 2008 ELLEN FOSTER by Kaye Gibbons selected by the Houston Public Library
Set in the rural South in the 1970s, the story of 11-year-old Ellen's fight for survival and search for a home. Since 2002 Houston Public Library has hosted an annual community-wide project to foster a culture of reading by encouraging people to come together to discuss a selected book. Click Here for more info.
Possible questoins for discussion available HERE
--Alice will lead discussion (unless someone else wants to volunteer?)
Nov 6, 2008 CATCH 22 by Joseph Heller (publ 1961) 464 pages The novel, set during the later stages of World War II from 1943 onwards, is frequently cited as one of the great literary works of the Twentieth century. Classic novel of wartime madness. Story is a general critique of bureaucratic operation and reasoning, among other things. Joseph Heller's brilliance lies in his ability to exaggerate an issue, idea or element of society so perfectly that we see it for just how foolish it is.
--Wendy will lead discussion
Note: At end of November discussion, group will consider election of a
play from available Houston theatre schedules - (classic preferred,
excluding musicals for now) --hopefully one performed somewhere in
Houston in March. Play to be discussed at our March 6th meeting so
play needs to be one where text is available.
Dec 4, 2008 TROPIC OF CANCER by Henry Miller (publ 1934)
The Modern Library named it the 50th greatest book of the 20th century. Only a historic court ruling that changed American censorship standards permitted its publication.
Famed mixture of memoir and fiction, which chronicles with unapologetic gusto the life and sexual adventures of a young expatriate writer, his friends, and the characters they meet in Paris in the 1930s.
--Susan will lead discussion
Note: At end of discussion, group will vote on new titles for upcoming reading list..
Jan 1, 2009 No discussion this month because of holiday. This should give you more time for extra long book to be discussed in February.
Feb 5, 2009 MIDDLESEX by Jeffrey Eugenides (publ 2002) 544 pages
2003 Pulitzer Prize winner, 2007 Oprah Book Club selection
The narrator and protagonist, an intersexed person has 5-alpha-reductase deficiency. The bulk of the novel is devoted to telling his coming-of-age story growing up in Detroit, Michigan in the late 20th century. ...story is intertwined with elements of a family saga, meditations on the era's zeitgeist and bits of contemporary history. Possible discussion questions HERE
--Marcella will lead discussion
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