Spring/Summer 2009 book selections

See the movie at 5:30 pm, discuss book and movie at 7:30 pm

March ?
Orlando, by Virginia Woolf
http://tinyurl.com/au5gpm

April 7
Rebecca, by Daphne DuMaurier
http://www.dumaurier.org/reviews-rebecca.html

May 5 – Dorothy Parker discussion
Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (movie)
What Fresh Hell is This (book)
Selected poems will also be discussed
http://www.dorothyparker.com/

June  3
The Player, by Michael Tolkin
http://tinyurl.com/cazesq

July 7
Frost/Nixon (if available) – movie
Watergate Tapes (book)
http://tinyurl.com/92nuwx

August 4
Brokeback Mountain (Annie Proulx) based on short story
http://tinyurl.com/92nuwx

The Mist

Tuesday, October 28, the book and movie talk is about the Stephen King novella, The Mist.   The 1997 movie is R rated – no one under 17 admitted without parent or guardian – my coworkers who have seen it say it is pretty terrifying – beeeeeee preeeepared  Movie at 5:30, discussion at 7:30

Some good info about Wings of the Dove from Charles

Wings of the Dove

Wings of the Dove, 1997, R, 102 minutes

Tuesday, Nov. 25 -Movie – 5:30 pm
Discussion of book and movie -7:30 pm

Bring a brown-bag dinner if you’d like.

We will be meeting in the community room for movie and discussion.

 Here are some excellent links that Charles found – including the full text online of the Henry James novel:

The complete text of The Wings of the Dove is available online at:

 

 

 

http://www2.newpaltz.edu/~hathawar/wings1.html

Note that you can change the font size for more comfortable reading.

 

Here’s the Wikipedia entry–there aren’t any Cliffs Notes!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wings_of_the_Dove

Here’s info about the film:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120520/

And here are 26 critics’ reviews of the film–85% favorable!http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/wings_of_the_dove/

As a gratuitous bonus, here’s a link to my first-ever published letter
to the editor, in the New York Times (it’s second from the bottom):

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/opinion/l12elderly.html

It is in response to this article about “elderspeak”:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/07/us/07aging.html

 

Pot Luck Supper Wednesday, October 22, 6:30 pm

So far, Pat M., Pat K., Dorene, and Charles plan to come – the food is covered – it sounds like fun.  See you there, Kathleen

Here’s the archive from the old blog

Monday, May 7, 2007

The joy of reading…bad books

In the May 6 New York Times Book Review, Joe Queenan has an essay on the joys of reading bad books http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/books/review/Queenan.t.html?ref=books

“Bad books are an essential part of life,” he asserts.”Most of us are familiar with people who make a fetish out of quality: They read only good books, they see only good movies, they listen only to good music, they discuss politics only with good people, and they’re not shy about letting you know it. They think this makes them smarter and better than everybody else, but it doesn’t. It makes them mean and overly judgmental….”

“I would rather read ‘The Good, the Bad and the Undead’ by Kim Harrison [about vampire hunters] than one more novel about an enigmatic woman in a famous painting….”

However, he issues a caution: “As with bad movies, a book that is merely bad but not exquisitely bad is a waste of time, while a genuinely terrible book is a sheer delight.”

Queenan mentions several books that qualify as sheer delights, and offers guidelines for identifying others. This is a valuable resource to bear in mind when the MTPL Thursday Night Book group is drawing up its schedule.

–Charles

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Labels: Passion of Artemisia

Sunday, May 6, 2007

Artemisia – see the film Thursday 5/10 at 5:45 pm

If you’ve read the book, come to the library a little early to find out what went before Artemisia’s marriage and career – at least as seen by French director Agnes Merlot in the film Artemisia. (R, 1997) The book begins where the film ends, with the ecclesiastical trial of the painter Agostino Tassi for the rape of Artemisia Gentileschi – a historic trial with a transcript available in the Vatican. Read Ebert’s review here - http://tinyurl.com/p27ac

The book The Passion of Artemisia and the movie Artemisia have both been roundly criticized as historically inaccurate – read a little more about that controversy here: http://www.efn.org/%7Eacd/Artemisia.html

And for a version of the story more grounded in history, if less romantic, you could read Mary D. Garrard, Artemisia Gentileschi: The Image of the Female Hero in Italian Baroque Art (Princeton University Press, 1989). This book includes English translations of the artist’s letters and testimony of the trial.

Kathleen

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Artemisia

This week we will discuss The Passion of Artemisia, by Susan Vreeland – the story of Renaissance painter Artemisia Gentileschi, reputed to be the first woman to actually support herself through her artwork.

Several years ago the Metropolitan Museum had an exhibit of the work of Artemisia and her father, Orazio Gentileschi – the exhibit’s website is available here: http://tinyurl.com/2gzlgj

In addition to two of the Judith paintings, and Susanna and the Elders, you will find this painting, titled Self Portrait as a Lute Player” and painted in about 1616, when Artemisia would have been in her early twenties. http://www.metmuseum.org/special/Orazio_and_Artemisia/images/57.L.jpg

Kathleen

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Labels: Passion of Artemisia

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Brueghel: A Man for All Seasons

Pat sent me this great article about Brueghel before the discussion of Headlong, but I did not get a chance to copy it. If you are not completely off Brueghel by now, this is a good resource – if you click on “print” at the top of the page, you will get a “printer-friendly” version that is a little easier to read.http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,942177,00.html

Kathleen

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Friday, April 20, 2007

More about Susan Vreeland

Barnes and Noble has some information about Susan Vreeland, author of The Passion of Artemisia, plus an interview available as a podcast – pretty neat technology! Just click on “Susan Vreeland” above to get to the Barnes and Noble page with the interview.

Kathleen

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Labels: Passion of Artemisia

Talking about Artemisia – Thursday, May 10

On May 10 at 7:30 pm the Thursday Evening Book Group will discuss the historical novel, The Passion of Artemisia, by Susan Vreeland. Read a review here: http://www.mostlyfiction.com/history/vreeland.htm

See the “prequel” before the discussion – at 5:45, we will be screening Artemisia, directed by Alice Merlot, starring Valentina Cervi – it is a visually stunning film about Artemisia Gentileschi in the years leading up to the trial – the novel is about her life after the trial. Be warned, though, that “Artemisia” includes scenes with nude artists’ models, both male and female, in a context appropriate to the film. Filmed in Italy, in French with subtitles. Read Ebert’s review here: http://tinyurl.com/p27ac

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Labels: Passion of Artemisia

See The Kite Runner at the State Theater

From Ellie Strbo to the Thursday Evening Book Group

The State Theatre in New Brunswick will have The Kite Runner play on May 14th and 15th at 10:00 a.m. and again at 12:00 p.m. I called the State Theatre and they said the tickets were only $7.00. State Theatre group sales person Kate told me that she would prefer to deal with a group as opposed to individual sales. I’m not quite sure how you can do that but it most definitely is worth a try. I’m going on Monday, I believe. I thought some of the book club members might like to see this play.

Take care. Sincerely, Ellie Strbo

If anyone is interested in trying to go as a group, please get back to me, and I will see if I can do a little organizing – I’ll need a volunteer, though, to actually buy the tickets. Can’t do that from my library job.

Kathleen – email kligon@mtpl.org

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Labels: Kite Runner

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

An Interview and a portrait of Michael Frayn in Bomb Magazine

I always wonder what the author looks like – this is an interesting little interview. It is linked from the title – “An Interview and a portrait….”
Kathleen

There’s not much about Headlong – here’s what M. Frayn had to say:

mk Your latest novel, Headlong–I know how it began: You’re a frequent visitor to the Kunsthistorisches Museum–that wonderful museum in Vienna. You’d been in the Brueghel room many times, and one day you noticed a little sign saying that the paintings depicting the seasons were part of a series, and that one painting was missing.
mf That’s right.

mk How many years had you been carrying the idea before you actually started working on the novel?
mf Not a question of years, but days. Claire and I were in Vienna, we saw this sign, I immediately began to think about the novel and as soon as I came back to London I started to do the research and got completely obsessed.

mk Did the process of your research mirror the central character Martin Clay’s research?
mf Yes. Well, we were both doing rather the same thing. I was trying to find out whether there had been such a picture and what the subject would have been like had it existed. And Martin Clay was trying to prove a similar thing, that a picture he’d found was that missing picture.

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Labels: Headlong

Reading Group Guide – Headlong

Some questions to talk about at the discussion tomorrow – Kathleen

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Labels: Headlong

About the author – Headlong

Wikipedia on Michael Frayn

Kathleen

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