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Upcoming offerings
Salinger meetings, Group Picks, more on the Glass family, Olive Kitteridge meetings...
Dear All Souls Book Group,
Thanks for a good meeting
last night about J. D. Salinger's Franny and Zooey.
Below
is some information concerning upcoming offerings of the Book Group.
I.
Salinger meetings: First off, my apologies for the misinformation
as to meeting times in the April edition of the "Cathedral Connection."
I was not aware of this misinformation until last night. The
"Connection" says that the first Salinger meeting is the 22nd, which
would be this Thursday. This is incorrect. The first meeting was last
night, April 19th, and the second meeting will be this coming Monday
night, April 26th, at 7 p.m., in the Warner Building. I will not be at
this coming Monday's meeting as I will be in New England visiting my
family.
II. Group Picks: At our
meeting this coming Monday night (the 26th, in the Warner Building) we
will be selecting books to read for the summer, when I will be away. If
you have a book you'd like to read with the group, of any genre, please
bring to this Monday's meeting the author and title, along with a
brief description as to why you think it would make good material for
our group.
III. Study
Questions for Franny and Zooey: For those who are not aware
of the study questions for Franny and Zooey, or who would like to
review them before this coming Monday's meeting, please go to the
following website: http://www.allsoulscathedral.org/connect/groups-and-committees/book-group
This
is the Book Group page at the All Souls Cathedral website. Once there,
you'll see at the bottom of the page a link that says, "Click here for
Emilie's Notes and Questions." Once you click, you'll find that three
documents will come up, one of them for Franny and Zooey. Click
on it, et voilà.
IV. For those
wanting to read more about the Glass family: Salinger wrote other
stories about the Glass family. "A Perfect Day For Banafish" concerns
Seymour's suicide, and was published in Salinger's Nine Stories
(1953). And there are two more novella-length stories about the Glasses
collected in Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters and Seymour: An
Introduction (1963). From what I'm able to learn on the Internet,
it looks like these two stories were written concurrently with "Franny"
and "Zooey" (though collected together and published in a book two years
after the publication of Franny and Zooey.)
V. May
Olive Kitteridge meetings:
In
May we will be reading Elizabeth Strout's Pulitzer Prize winning
collection of linked stories, Olive Kitteridge, published in
2008. The meeting times and locations for Olive Kitteridge are
as follows:
- Monday, May 10th, 7 p.m., the first floor conference room of the Warner Building
- Monday, May 17th, 7 p.m., the Parish Hall
Copies of Olive Kitteridge are
now available at Accent on Books, on Merrimon Avenue, at reduced
cost, thanks to parishioner Lewis Sorrells.
Below is the description of Olive Kitteridge
from the back cover of the Random House trade paperback edition.
“At times stern, at other times patient, at times perceptive, at other times in sad denial, Olive Kitteridge, a retired schoolteacher, deplores the changes in her little town of Crosby, Maine, and in the world at large, but she doesn’t always recognize the changes in those around her: a lounge musician haunted by a past romance; a former student who has lost the will to live; Olive’s own adult child, who feels tyrannized by her irrational sensitivities; and her husband, Henry, who finds his loyalty to his marriage both a blessing and a curse. As the townspeople grapple with their problems, mild and dire, Olive is brought to a deeper understanding of herself and her life—sometimes painfully, but always with ruthless honesty. Olive Kitteridge offers profound insights into the human condition—its conflicts, its tragedies and joys, and the endurance it requires.”—from the back cover of the Random House trade paperback edition of Olive Kitteridge
Thanks to Bill Turner and to Jean Dunbar, who
provided last night's poem and prayer respectively. And thanks again
for a good meeting.
Sincerely yours,
Emilie White
