XIEOUYANG...once more tries the 75

It's only the first day of the new year and I find myself lagging behind most of you! Hopefully, I'll be able to catch up.
One of my reading plans for this year is to finish a couple of books that I started last year. They are non-fiction and (my excuse) require more close reading than fiction. I am listing the books in the second post below.

Aside from this, I am looking forward to seeing what you are reading this year, enjoying your reviews and learning new things from them.

The "year-long" books started last year are:
Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville
The Landmark Thucydides

In my defense, I am really studying both books, slowly and trying to remember key points, names, etc.

Welcome back! Nice start...

January
#1 Sabine Women by Marcel Ayme
#2 To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

February
#3 Quien Mato a Palomino Molero by Mario Vargas Llosa
#4 Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry
#5 The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene
$6 The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
#7 Dora Bruder by Patrick Modiano
#8 Effi Briest by Theodor Fontane
#9 Apology by Plato
#10 Euthryphro by Plato
#11 Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz by Octavio Paz

March
#12 The Ladies' Paradise by Emile Zola
#13 Outline by Rachel Cusk

April
#14 The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte
#15 Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
#16 The Shipping News by Annie Proulx
#17 The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford

May
#18 Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
#19 Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
#20 Dept of Speculation by Jenny Offil
#21 Villette by Charlotte Bronte
#22 Shirley by Charlotte Bronte

June
#23 One Fat Englishman by Kingsley Amis
#24 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis

July
#25 La Hojarasca by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
#26 El Coronel no tiene quien le escriba by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
#27 La Mala Hora by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
#28 Los Funerales de Mama Grande by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

August
#29 Cien Anos de Soledad by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Book #1 Sabine Women by Marcel Ayme
This is a short story by this French writer that I didn't know anything about. He lived in the first half of last century. The story, like others by Ayme, is rather fanciful but has moralistic tones.

Sabine, is a woman who has a strange gift; a gift of ubiquity is called by the author. She has the ability to reproduce herself, actually make identical clones of herself with no effort, just wishing it. Her clones, totally identical to her, take on other lives that Sabine would like to live but can't. At one point, there were over sixty thousand women like her all over the world, in different stations of life (some married, some single, living rich and extravagant, others not). In the end, naturally, Sabine dies and simultaneously all her replicas do die too.

The interesting thing is that even though the story is far out there, the characters seem very real. There is nothing plastic about the Sabine women- they all live interesting lives.

Have a wonderful bookfilled 2016, Manuel.

Happy New Year Manuel, found and *starred* :-)

I am back in full reading mode!

Happy New Year, Manuel. I've yet to post my first read so I congratulate you on achieving your first hurdle. Best wishes for a year of awesome reading!

Book #2 To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

When Go Set the Watchman was published last year that generated so much noise and conflict I decided that perhaps I should read To Kill a Mockinbird that, surprisingly to many, I had never read. I guess not going to High School in the states, the time when most people read, or are force to read, it kept me from the book.

I have nothing new to say about the book, millions of words have been written already. But I found that it's fame and popularity are definitely warranted. It was well worthwhile reading. I am debating whether the read the sequel (or is it a prequel?).

I am falling behind on my reading already. Part of my consulting work is that I have to give a "Center Stage" speech on the economic outlook next week in Las Vegas, at the annual Kitchen & Bath International Show. So I am feverishly rewriting and correcting what I am going to say. And I am spending most of my time on that presentation. The good thing is that Jay Leno is opening the show the same morning I am speaking so I may get to meet him.

Morning Manuel! Yes,it appears to be a prequel, one that I'm not all the enthusiastic to read.
Wow, your speaking engagement in Vegas sounds thrilling! Hope you do have the chance to meet your opening act.

>9 xieouyang: Wow! Good luck with the speechwriting. That's a big deal! Retirement doesn't seem much like it, I guess, with a full consulting load. You're always so busy!

I have loved To Kill a Mockingbird and have mixed feelings myself about Go Set the Watchman as the author didn't want it published. It's a prequel in the sense that it was written first, but it's a sequel in the sense that it portrays Atticus Finch as an old man and unregenerate racist. I'm not sure I want to see the difference in character either, which is the second reason I hesitate to pursue the new acclaimed posthumous book.

Chiming in on Go Set a Watchman: I actually enjoyed it. Atticus, true to the character we love in To Kill a Mockingbird, is more complicated than that - he's not a full-on, absolute racist in the book, although the grown-up Scout thinks he is for a while. I think some folks have misconstrued the flawed views of Scout in the book as the author's own portrait of Atticus and it's more complex than that. I'd say give it a go, if that's the reason you're hesitant about reading it, because it is, above all, well-written, I think. If you're bothered by the controversy around it being published, well, that's another thing...

Amber, I think I'll give it a try later on based on your comments. I've been reading your posts and comments, as well as your impressive breadth and depth of reading, and I respect your recommendations,

Hope you are managing to stay warm over there in Wisconsin, Manuel. I often wish for cooler weather over here but not quite so blooming cool.

>13 xieouyang: Oh, goodness. Now I really hope you like it! Ha!

Book #6 - The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles

(I am trying to catch up...I'll write comments on the other books as I have time available)

I had never heard of this author until I received a recent issue of three of his novels in the Library of America series (I love this series). I was intrigued by the title and the brief biography of the author given at the end of the book. The other two novels contained in the book are Let it come down and The Spider's House that I want to read soon.

Back to The Sheltering Sky. We follow the story of a young married couple, Port and Kit Moresby, who are having marital problems and somehow they decide to move to North Africa (the Algiers/Sudan area), mostly it turns out at the instigation of Port. Port also, for some reason (maybe not to be alone with Kit on the trip,) invites a common friend named Tunner. We see them going to some poor, filthy, desolate villages in the desert areas of North Africa. They face, aside from the bad conditions, the unbearable heat during the day, cold at night, blowing sand in their faces, disease, etc. everything to make one really enjoy and appreciate life in the comfortable Midwest. Port is not happy so, at one point at the beginning of the trip when they meet an American mother and son also traveling through Africa, he decides to go to the next town with them, and has Kit go with Tunner in the train. Tunner, who all along is in love (maybe) with Kit manages to make love to her in the train. After this, she wants to avoid Tunner as much as possible, and is not sure whether to tell Port about this brief love affair (encounter may be a better word). They manage to mislead Tunner and encouragehim to go with the Lyles (the mother and son couple) to the next town they plan to visit- but they go to a different one. (I don't remember the names of those villages)
But once there, Port becomes sicker; he had already high fever on the way traveling in an uncomfortable bus filled with people, chickents, etc. Turns out that he has typhoid from which he dies shortly after. But not before Kit spends sleepless days and nights taking care of a very sick Port who is unconscious most of the time. When he dies, she packs a few things, locks the door and leaves into the desert night. He walks alone, fearful but still very determined to go away with no destination in mind. She joins a caravan of Arabians who are crossing through the desert and becomes the lover of a young man. He takes her to his house, where he conveniently has three other wives, and visits her almost daily in her room. She is alone most of the time. Eventually she manages to escape and ends up being recovered by an American Consul that will send her back home- frail and sick as she is.

What impressed me about this novel, aside from the rich descriptive narrative, is that Bowles conveys the sense of being in such an inhospitable landscape as the Sahara desert- it pulled me in totally. This is one of those novels that, once I finish it, I simply want to start reading again.

Book #7 - Dora Bruder by Patrick Modiano

I've been wanting to read something by Modiano, the French writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2014, for sometime now. Finally got around it and ordered this novel from Amazon.

This is a different type of novel. It's not a novel really, but a semi-documentary narrating the biography of the girl whose name is the title of the book- Dora Bruder. In a nutshell, Dora was a young French girl of Jewish parents who disappeared (ran away) in Paris, was captured and a few months later ended up being sent to Auschwitz. But her story, tragic as it is, is no different than that of million others who suffered the same fate; but I don't wanto to minimize them. What is different, very different, is the manner in which Modiano builds up her story.

Modiano became attracted to Dora's story when, in the late 80s, he saw a small notice in a 1941 Paris newspaper saying that Dora Bruder was missing. The note gave a brief description of her. From that moment, Modiano becomes obsessed to find everything he can about Dora. He reconstructs a few events from Dora's life, and he imagines a lot.

What makes this a very remarkable book is that throughout Modiano also rediscovers his self, his memories that had been lost. Also, realizes that so much of a person's life, such as Dora's, goes unrecognized and is lost to memory, as if she didn't exist.

Of the many books that I've read about the Holocaust and the treatment of the Jews in the 30s and 40s in Europe, this is one of the most troubling (to me at least). The writing is slow-paced and not sensational at all. But somehow it brings a constant suspense and expectation that made me think of the despair that those poor people had to live through.

I highly recommend this book.

Book #8 - Effi Briest by Theodor Fontane

I had read recently that Effi Briest was a novel comparable to Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary in their treatment of adultery from a female perspective. I proceeded to purchase it and have been disappointed- no wonder I really hadn't heard much about this novel. It does not come close to either of the other two in the depth of emotions that the protagonists go through. Although, in all fairness, Effi Briest deals with the social aspects and implications of the relationship to Effi in a detailed manner, but it's not handled in a satisfactory manner.

The story briefly is thus. Effi is a young, 16 year old, pretty girl living in a small town with her parents; she is the only child. She is married to a 36 year old baron who, although she does not love, expects to come to love him. Her behavior is that of a very obedient girl. Upon the marriage they move to Kessin, the town where her husband, Geert Innstetten, resides. It's not very appealing town- Effi does not have many acquaintances but becomes involved in a brief love affair with Campas, a married man who is also a loose soul. She repents from it and agrees with her husband to move to Berlin, an opportunity that is offered to him in his civil service work. They have a child, before moving to Berlin, and all is well until one day, about 6 years later, Geert discovers some letters that Campas had written to Effi that, for some reason, she'd kept even though he was not in her mind that much anymore. Geert, with his pride and honor wounded, challenges Campas to a duel and kills him. He then divorces Effi who is forced to leave her house, and her daughter, with the promise not to see her again. Even though her parents had disowned her, because accepting her after her adultery would damage their relations in town, a few years later they realize that it's foolish to ignore their daughter. So she is allowed to move back home where she dies shortly afterwards.

The story is almost the proto-typical story, but one that Fontane does not make interesting or enjoyable to read, at least to me. On top of this, the edition that I purchased has been very badly edited (or actually not edited at all) with many types. I think it may be a copy that was scanned from an earlier edition and many of the words, that the scanner didn't read properly, were not corrected. The most annoying one is that for some reason the letters "ue" in words such as queen, question, duel, cruel, etc. were missing. So you end up reading the words as qen, qstion, dl, crl, the best one is occurrence of the letter "d" that stand for "due."

Thomas Mann, the German Nobel prize winner, is supposed to have said that if he had only six books, Effi Briest would be one of them. Hmm, makes me lose interest in reading anything by him.

>18 xieouyang: Good review Manuel. I can safely agree with you that Mann's recommendations would be unlikely to get me rushing to the bookstore.

Book #9 - The Apology by Plato

Although this is a short book, one of the famous Dialogues of Plato if read carefully, that is slowly, paying attention, and thinking about it, it takes as much time as a much longer book. But who counts pages anyway?

This book deals, as most of you surely know, with the trial of Socrate and the arguments that he puts in his defens; all to no avail of course. His indictment was based on two points. One is that Socrates was a corrupter of the youth. The second one is that he did not believe in the Gods of th Greeks but made up new ones.

Although he makes valid and convincing arguments on the falsity of the charges he is found guilty. The die was cast from the moment he was accused and brought to trial I think. But in the end the vote was close - if 30 of the votes had gone the other way, to find him innocent, he would not have been found guilty.

I should have mentioned that I am reading this, and several other dialogues, as an assignment in a MOOC course I am taking through Coursera. The course is called "Ancient Philosophy: Plato and his predecessors."

>19 PaulCranswick: - thanks Paul!

Manuel, you write such good reviews! Plus, the books you choose are so very different from mine. I always enjoy what you have to say and the chance to learn about authors and books new to me.

>16 xieouyang: Doesn't sound like it would appeal to me at all.
>17 xieouyang: Sounds like something to look for.

Hope you're doing okay and weathering this last (hopefully) winter storm. Luckily, I can walk to all the essential places in my daily life, so no worries for me.

Have a wonderful Easter.

Thanks Paul-- I am a little behind...I am trying to catch up on reading posts. I am checking yours soon.

I am trying to catch up!!!

Book #11. Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz by Octavio Paz
Although I knew about the famous Mexican poet-nun Sor Juana from my high school days in Guatemala, I never read any of her poetry. I guess the assumption was that her poems would be overly religious and, since I was attending a religious high school I was getting enough religion in class, I saw no need to burden myself with more of the same. But recently I learned about a MOOC course offered by a Mexican university, appropriately named "Universidad del Claustro de Sor Juana" (University of Sister Juana's Cloister), focusing on the poet. The course's title is "Seducciones de Sor Juana" (Sister Juana's seductions) which was sufficiently titillating title to attract my attention. This persuaded me to read some of her poetry and acquire this biography by the Mexican poet Octavio Paz, himself a winner of the literature Nobel prize (1990.) I'll comment on Sor Juana's poems once I am through reading them, but it's going to take a while since she was a very prolific writer.

Now to the biography itself. More than a biography this book is a critical analysis of Sor Juana's principal works on poetry, drama and prose. Besides dealing with Sor Juana's story and her writings, Paz puts everything in the context of the colonial period in Mexico in the second half of the seventeenth century (1650 to 1700). One of the interesting things about the book is that Paz emphasizes the importance of the colonial period (he doesn't refer to it as colonial but rather the "viceroyalty" period of Mexican history) in the social and intellectual development of today's Mexico. He sees Mexico during this time not as being subservient to Spain, but rather a royal property almost equal to Spain itself.

As far as Sor Juana and her poetry, Paz defines it not as overtly religious or mystic, but rather a product of the baroque. Her poetry is not romantic, but rather the emphasis is on the word and phrases. It deals a lot with the conflict of being a cloistered nun and an important intellectual woman at that age. That's right, she was not only a great poet and writer but also an intellectual of consequence; well respected by the Mexican society of the time. She befriended two consecutive Spanish viceroys of Mexico, as well as their wives. Even though she was cloistered she had visitors with whom she could discuss a range of subjects, not necessarily religion. She was a defender of woman's rights, far ahead of her time. She stated that women should be taught how to read and write because it was not only legal, but also very advantageous for society.

The sad part is that, at the end, the church forced her to admit that her life was an error. She was forced to give up her books and her writing forever. In fact, she was forced to sign a document, in her own blood as was customary at the time, stating the error of her ways with "I, the worst of all."

Book #12 A Ladies Paradise by Emile Zola

Oh boy, am I behind in writing these summary notes!!! I read this book back in March but I want to write a brief summary, mostly for my own selfish purpose since I use them for reference.

This was a book selection of one of the reading groups at the local library. I don't belong to that group, never attended it before, but since they were reading a Zola novel I thought I would attend. I went ahead and read the book but it turns out I missed the meeting; I had put it in the wrong day in my calendar!

This novel is one of the so-called Rougon-Macquart series of novels that Zola wrote to capture the society of his time. In these novels, he has a number of characters with ties to the same Rougon-Macquart families, that are enveloped and in the mist of a major social, political, or economic event. The people are to a great degree driven, their lives are driven, by events out of their control. Although some of them take advantage of those events to improve their social or economic well being. But many others are run over by those events.

In this novel the societal change is driven by the advent of the department store. Zola traces the development of department stores through the story of Octave Mouret who introduces the concept to Paris audiences, mainly aimed at women. Through the years he brings many advances that did not exist before; simple things that are common to us but were novelty at the time. Things such as mixing all types of goods in a store- prior to that time if you wanted to purchase an umbrella you went to an umbrella shop, ditto for shoes and any other item. But this novelty of selling many different things under the same roof, while it attracted customers in droves, drove to bankruptcy many small operations- all the stores concentrating in one item. As is the case today with Wal-Mart, Amazon and others like that, that transform the current practices, many people saw them as evil and creating distress. But this is true only if seen from the eyes of the stores that are put out of business. Not from the eyes of the millions of consumers who benefit from such stores.

One of the suffering families in The Ladies Paradise, that incidentally is the name of the department store, is a small shop owned by Baudu, uncle of Denise one of the main characters in the novel. Baudu sells silks in his shop standing across the street from The Ladies Paradise. His business slowly deteriorates as the other one succeeds- and Baudu is witness to this. Denise too.

Denise had come to Paris with her two younger brothers when their father died- they were orphans and their uncle Baudu agreed to house them. But, as his financial situation was deteriorating, he makes sure they leave his house. Denise takes a job at The Ladies Paradise to her uncle's disconcert. She is quiet and somewhat introvert, unlike the other girls who work there. And this is what attracts Mouret to her. You know this part of the story. They fall in love but initially she rejects him because of what he apparently stands for, some kind of evil being. But in the end she agrees to marry him and everybody is happy- even those co-workers who hated Denise.

The exciting parts of the novel are the gradual developments of the store's features. How, gradually, different concepts are introduced and how the customers react to them. Intertwined with them are a myriad of relationships among all the workers in the store, among themselves and with management.

Is this a novel worth while reading? Yes, I think so because, as I said above, the manner in which Zola brings in a major social development and how it affects people. The novel is very powerful.

Happy Merry Christmas week, Manuel! Hope all's well!