Peter Seeger: John Brown's Body

After reading The Good Lord Bird by James McBride, it seems appropriate to post Pete Seeger singing 'John Brown's Body'.

Le Mal du Pays, lazar berman

What was referenced throughout Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and his years of pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami was the Franz Liszt piece called Le Mal du Pays. In particular, Murakami favored the version by Lazar Berman. Here it is on youtube.

2016 Man Booker Prize long list announced

The long list for the 2016 Man Booker Prize has been announced.

José Eduardo Agualusa (Angola) Daniel Hahn, A General Theory of Oblivion (Harvill Secker)

Elena Ferrante (Italy) Ann Goldstein, The Story of the Lost Child (Europa Editions)

Han Kang (South Korea) Deborah Smith, The Vegetarian (Portobello Books)

Maylis de Kerangal (France) Jessica Moore, Mend the Living (Maclehose Press)

Eka Kurniawan (Indonesia) Labodalih Sembiring, Man Tiger (Verso Books)

Yan Lianke (China) Carlos Rojas, The Four Books (Chatto & Windus)

Fiston Mwanza Mujila (Democratic Republic of Congo/Austria) Roland Glasser, Tram 83 (Jacaranda)

Raduan Nassar (Brazil) Stefan Tobler, A Cup of Rage (Penguin Modern Classics)

Marie NDiaye (France) Jordan Stump, Ladivine (Maclehose Press)

Kenzaburō Ōe (Japan) Deborah Boliver Boehm, Death by Water (Atlantic Books)

Aki Ollikainen (Finland) Emily Jeremiah & Fleur Jeremiah, White Hunger (Peirene Press)

Orhan Pamuk (Turkey) Ekin Oklap, A Strangeness in My Mind (Faber & Faber)

Robert Seethaler (Austria) Charlotte Collins, A Whole Life (Picador)

Interviews with Elena Ferrante

Obviously, the world wants to know more about the writer, Elena Ferrante. Compiled just a few interviews with the elusive Elena Ferrante.

Vanity Fair: The Mysterious Anonymous Author Elena Ferrante on the Conclusion of her Neapolitan Novels

Vanity Fair, Part Two: Elena Ferrante Explains Why, for the Last Time, You Don't Need to Know Her Name

The Paris Review on the Art of Fiction

FT.com interviews Elena Ferrante in Women of 2015: Elena Ferrante, Writer

James Wood on Elena Ferrante

James Wood of the New Yorker writes about the fiction of Elena Ferrante, including My Brilliant Friend, in his essay titled Women on the Verge.

Cream puffs in My Brilliant Friend

After just discussing this month's book, My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante, I see that the Guardian has a post about food in books, complete with a recipe for pistachio cream puffs.

Book trailer for Little Failure by Gary Shteyngart

We read Gary Shteyngart's memoir, Little Failure, last year, but I have neglected to post this youtube trailer.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on TEDx

http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/We-should-all-be-feminists-Chim

Shelley shared with us this TEDx talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie called 'We Should All Be Feminists'.

Boy Kings of Texas

https://youtu.be/DjnhGwxQkFk

Domingo Martinez' memoir, Boy Kings of Texas, begins with the song, El Rey, and, yes, it is on Youtube sung by Vicente Fernandez.

On reading fiction

Some thoughts on reading fiction by 'Brecht' at dailykos in his post The Books We Talk About.

Great books, when they enchant our souls, do this and much more. They show us new ways of thinking, they teach our tongues to dance dozens of new steps with language, they blow the roofs off our minds and rain upon us visions of different people and worlds. I remember how, in my childhood, book after book set my mind ablaze with magical adventures, far beyond my own experience: Greek myths, Narnia, Middle Earth, Outer Space, millennia yet to come . . . they showed my imagination new colors to hunger and hope for.

His post is partly inspired by Tim Parks' writing in the New York Review of Books. Here Tim Parks writes about how he reads books.

As I dive into the opening pages, the first question I’m asking is, what are the qualities or values that matter most to this author, or at least in this novel? I start Murakami’s Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage and at once it is about a man who has been excluded from a group of friends without knowing why; the mishap has plunged him into a depression that seems disproportionate to the damage suffered. So I begin to look for everything relating to community and belonging, to the individual’s relationship to the community, to loneliness and companionship. I underline any words that fall into this lexical field. Is the community positive or negative or both? Are there advantages to being excluded, even when it is painful? Do loneliness and depression produce strength, creativity? Is the book aligning itself with the position of the person excluded?

Divisadero by Ondaatje

Discussion questions presented by Marlo:

Random House discussion questions

University of West Florida's discussion questions

something from a site called Free Patents Online

I honestly did not understand this review.

a link of poetry by Ondaatje

From Shelley: a piece on Divisadero from The New Yorker

Reviews of Divisadero:

by Pico Iyer in the New York Review of Books

by Elizabeth Waddell in the Quarterly Conversation

at Quill and Quire

at Bookishness by Charles Matthews

at Kim Werker

250 books by women all men should read

Absolutes are usually over the top but I thought this list is worth a look. This list was generated in response to Esquire's magazine list of books for men, of which included only one female author.

Excellent Women by Barbara Pym

Our book for June is Excellent Women by Barbara Pym.

The Barbara Pym Society seems to be the place to go to find everything you need to know about Barbara Pym.

Wikipedia on Barbara Pym

The Guardian on Barbara Pym, 'Very Barbara Pym'.

She wrote about worlds of genteel poverty and longing with great warmth and wit. Excellent Women is one of the 20th century's most endearing and amusing novels, writes Alexander McCall Smith

Amazon site

A blogger on Barbara Pym

Quotes by Barbara Pym . Here's one choice quote:

"Of course it's alright for librarians to smell of drink."

What was Charles Darwin's illness?

AP on recent speculations about the connections between Darwin, his travels and his illnesses.

Junot Diaz on disaster, Haiti, globalization and more

Junot Diaz's essay in the Boston Review.

Book for May

Our next book will be Amongst Women written by John McGahern.

What wiki says about the book
NYTimes book review
Amazon link
Penguin.com has a list of discussion questions
Novelist Coim Toibin writes about how he was first introduced to this book by the author, John McGahern

Screening of "There once was..."

At the Museum of Tolerance, May 9th, 7 PM.
More info at their site.

Q&A following the screening with flimmaker Gabor Kalman and the subject of the film Gyöngyi Mago

There Once Was tells the inspiring story of Catholic school teacher, Gyöngyi Mago’s fight to have her town’s Jewish history officially acknowledged and to chart a new course of tolerance in conflict-riddden Hungary, where the Nazi party is presently growing an alarming rate.

David Mitchell's The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

First off, enjoyed reading this book. One thing I was curious about: what was the reaction to his novel by Japanese and Dutch readers? Unfortunately, I had no success in finding anything via google. If you have more luck than me, please feel free to send any info along.
Update: Here's one: a writeup from the Japan Society in the UK

Interview with David Mitchell
Discussion questions on Litlover's site
Facebook site for The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

I found the following reviews of David Mitchell's book offering some criticism, unlike the bulk of the reviews out there.

The reviewer in the New Statesman was not impressed.
Speculation on why this book did not win a Booker Prize nomination for David Mitchell.
The Spectator seemed to be quite critical.

Background for his book
Wikipedia, Henrik Doeff, the Dutchman in Dejima who wrote a memoir about his time in Japan
Wikipedia, Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
Dejima in Wikipedia
The Phaeton incident

Carlos Fuentes on KCRW

So it turns out I ran across this bit: Mr. Fuentes has a new book out called Destiny and Desire.  Here he is on KCRW's Bookworm program.

The great Mexican writer modestly confides that yes, he has completed a new novel but it's really the same story, just with new characters. He elaborates: all stories are the same — the same global myths illustrating the same human truths

Pamuk fined for insulting 'Turkishness'

Via Bookslut, we find news that Nobel prize-winning Orhan Pamuk, we read his book Snow last year, has been fined.

...pay 6,000 liras (about 4,000 USD) to six individuals—1,000 liras each—in compensation for insulting their “Turkishness” after citing the number of Kurds and Armenians killed in Turkey.