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Houston Montrose Great Books - Ballot for Sep 1, 2005
Titles suggested for September 1, 2005 ballot include:
AGE OF IRON by J.M.Coetzee
(208 pages) publ 1998
From Library Journal: "This is the South African novelist's most direct indictment of apartheid yet. It takes the form of a letter-diary from Mrs. Curren, a former classics professor dying of cancer, to her daughter in America. She details a series of strange events that turn her protected middle-class life upside down."
Great Books Penguin Selection summary and questions available. . Author won Nobel Prize in 2003
---suggested by Alice
HADJI MURAD by: Leo Tolstoy
(192 pages) written 1904
"..a great chieftain, Hadji Murád, broke with the Chechen and fled to the Russians for safety. Months later, while attempting to rescue his family from prison, Hadji Murád was pursued by those he had betrayed and, after fighting the most heroic battle of his life, was killed." Per an Amazon reviewer: "an action-packed, well-written, historically interesting story with compelling characters."
---suggestion by Alice
THINGS FALL APART by Chinua Achebe
(224 pages) publ 1958
”Just two years before Nigeria declared independence from Great Britain, the book eschews the obvious temptation of depicting pre-colonial life as a kind of Eden. Instead, Achebe sketches a world in which violence, war, and suffering exist, but are balanced by a strong sense of tradition, ritual, and social coherence.” (Novel suggested for Great Books 50th Anniversary Series.)
---suggestion by Janet
TAKE ME OUT by Richard Greenberg (a play)
(128 pages) - publ 2003
”The New York Empires locker room will never be the same after a charismatic young baseball star at the top of his game casually reveals a personal truth: he's gay. …A joyous tribute to baseball that celebrates the glory of the game, and the men who love—or learn to love—America's pastime. Winner of the 2003 Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Best Play and a finalist for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.”
-suggestion submitted by Sofia
MRS DALLOWAY by Virginia Woolf
(194 pages) originally published 1925
landmark of modernist fiction that follows an the wife of an MP around London as she prepares for her party that afternoon. Direct and vivid in its telling of details, the novel shifts from the consciousness of Clarissa Dalloway to that of others, including a shell-shocked veteran of World War I whose destiny briefly intersects with hers.
--suggestion by Sofia
A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
(384 pages) – originally publ 1922
portrays Stephen Dedalus's Dublin childhood and youth, providing an oblique self-portrait of the young James Joyce. At its center are questions of origin and source, authority and authorship, and the relationship of an artist to his family, culture, and race.
---suggested by Kelly
GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
( 180 pages) originally published 1945
“..arguably Fitzgerald’s finest work…Self-made, self-invented millionaire Jay Gatsby embodies some of Fitzgerald's--and his country's--most abiding obsessions: money, ambition, greed, and the promise of new beginnings.
---suggested by Steve
TO THE LIGHTHOUSE by Virginia Woolf
(209 pages) originally published 1942
“..explores the subjective reality of the everyday life of the Ramsay family of the British Hebrides islands. A 'feminine' book, filled with irony, sadness, and doubts about life.””
---suggested by Steve
