From October 9 to October 21, 1976 I read:
The Rest of the Robots, 8 Stories from Isaac Asimov
This was fun to read, I still remember Robopsychologist Dr. Susan Calvin
wikipedia.
The Clewiston Test, Kate Wilhelm
My note--mucho depressing feminist "attitude" study
The Silent Clowns, Walter Kerr
The Story of a Novel, Thomas Wolfe
this site shows a picture I particularly like of Wolfe standing with his foot propped up on "one of three crates containing the sprawling manuscripts for
Of Time and the River.
Yikes. I read all of Wolfe's books when I was a teenager, and he appealed to my enthusiasm and energy. I don't know if I could re-read him. Maybe. He's pretty much overflowing with lyrical stuff. Of course, he did die at the age of 38, so maybe he had to squeeze it all in.
I had to love the (probably untrue) story of editor Maxwell Perkins informing Wolfe that his book was now complete and getting the reply, "It is?" I probably wouldn't be so fond of that story if I hadn't absorbed the idea that it is somehow "better" to be a genius pouring out great quantities of prodigious manuscript. You write what you write. Legendary editors like Perkins aren't available for most of us poor slobs either. So we have to deal with it the best we can.
Such a Strange Lady, Janet Hitchman
Bio of Dorothy L. Sayers, my recollection is that it seemed like a very sad life--perhaps a motivator to create such a strong dream world in her fiction. this site has a more intimate picture than you usually see of her (though not as carefree as the one of Agatha Christie with her surfboard--I kid you not, there is such a picture!)
Shogun, trying to finish
I had thought I finished this earlier, but I guess I put it down and picked it up again. My note was: 10/17 = finished whew!
October 9 to October 21, 2006 I read:
Reading Lolita in Tehran, Azar Nafisi
This is an interesting book, and an exquisitely written one, as the evocative title suggests. But it's definitely not a fast read. The author is covering 17 years of living and teaching Western literature in her hometown of Tehran, as it slipped into the kind of totalitarianism where the works of Western fiction she was teaching about were viewed as dangerous. Eventually, to satisfy her need for uncensored educational experience, she began teaching a special class in her home for the more motivated female students. I finished the book at a leisurely pace, and was glad to have read it for the evocation of an unknown world as well as the insights on Nabokov, Henry James and Jane Austen as they relate to the condition of women who have been robbed of most of their civil rights due to a fundamentalist religious state.
One thing that made my interest level in the book rise and fall was the way it slipped back and forth in time. I identified enough with the author that I was relieved when she got out of Dodge, as it were, without getting arrested for teaching an illegal class, letting her veil slip or getting caught having a cup of coffee with a male colleague. Just reading about that degree of repression was claustrophobic, and hearing of the sad fate of so many people in the book saddened me. The author's powerful belief in the elevating effect of literature gave it a transcendent quality as well.
this site has an article by Nafisi.
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