In case you haven't already read

The Road by Cormac McCarthy, now is your chance. Oprah has made it her most recent book club pick. Dear oh dear she annoys the crap out of me...

And if you live in Chicago (or Illinois in general) the new One Book, One Chicago pick has been selected: Go Tell It On The Mountain by James Baldwin. I haven't previously participated in One Book, One Chicago-- but I plan to this time around and I am awfully excited about it. It has proven in the past to be a great way to unite our large and diverse city AND Chicago (i.e. Daley) sponsors all sorts of great (AND FREE) lectures and films surrounding the book pick. (Truth be told, I don't think anyone in Chicago reads this blog--so mostly I am writing to express how excited I am to read this book.)


And another book club option , which can have a bit of action via luminous if you are so interested, White Noise by Don DeLillo. I am reading the book here in my home city with a few other friends who also haven't read it yet, I think we are the last people alive to have not read it, which leaves me hoping many of you will have all sorts of opinions about it.

Tolkien Jr. finishes Tolkien Sr.'s final Lord of the Rings book

Children of Hurin, the last book J.R.R. Tolkien began in the Lord of the Rings series, in 1971, has been finished and will be published next month. What? I don't know anything about Christopher Tolkien, but could the stakes be any higher? Is there a more beloved series than Lord of the Rings?

Here's another story from the old grey lady about Tolkien fans and Children of Hurin.

Stanley Cavell and the end of the exam series

As the 7 people who stop in at Luminous know, I have been studying for my comprehnsive exam for my masters. Now, it's down to the wire, 7 more days to study and read from those wonderful texts I can nearly recite backwards. "wife a of want in be must, forutne good a of possession in man single a that, acknowledged universally truth a is It." See.
Anyway. I've been reading (over and over) Stanley Cavell's chapter on It Happened One Night from Pursuits of Happiness. He's pretty smart. I'm in to posting pictures of these scholars and philosophers. It makes a litte impression on me when I've been reading these people, and eventually to come around and take a look. They are usually older, white, often bespectacled, balding. Stanley here appears to be clutching his chest, which is never a good sign. Just hacking on you Professor Cavell. Love your work.


This isn't that interesting. Well it's a bit interesting to me.

The Year of Magical Thinking

I picked up Joan Didion's most recent work this past weekend, The Year of Magical Thinking, and basically plowed through it. I found the book very moving and comforting, but how could you not? Its so personal and about such a difficult subject. I suppose the big shocker for me was that someone could have the ability to give others such a detailed inside look at their grief. In this case, it seems very self sacrificing--I suppose I think that because so many of the people who will pick it will be doing so because they need something to relate to, but personally I just don't know how she did it.

Here is an interview with Didion if you are interested.

Some books about books...

It took me a while to get through Matthew Battle's book, The Library: An Unquiet History, but once I finally picked it back up I breezed through it and learned all sorts of interesting new stuff about the Library: from the burning of the Library at Alexandria, to Swift's arguing the Ancients over the Moderns, to just how crazy and backwards the genius of Dewy was. Each chapter had an over arching time frame it focused on and within the chapter a more specific event of that period meant to bring the reader in. Personally I would have been fine with out the fifty pages that focused on Swift (but maybe that's because of the aversion I have had towards him since college) which also happened to the part of the book that stopped me up for two moths, but I think some of you would really enjoy that part (namely, my husband). In short, if you find yourself in awe when you go into the library and would like to learn a bit more about it's history this book is a good place to start.

I found myself totally engrossed in Maureen Corrigan's book, Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading-so much so that I felt disgruntled existing in any world other than hers. I highly recommend picking it up if you are an avid reader, she not only gives you an amazing book list to look into but she also discusses so many great and new ideas that are fun to ponder. I particularly loved her idea of the "female extreme adventure novel" in which she argues that female characters, more often than we recognize, have extreme --life suspending--adventures that get passed over because they don't speak to that outward notion of adventure we have become so used to. She also discussed the "honorary male" or "learned androgyny" status women adhere to to be taken seriously in the world of reading--both in real life and in stories, an issue I struggle with in my life and therefore found very eye opening. If there is one book you should pick because of this blog, this is the book. It's wonderful.

Fun with Norton Critical Editions.

As I continue to study for my comps, I get to read all kind of randomness published in the back of Norton Critical Editions. After readingthe Norton Importance of Being Earnest cover to cover, I am now reading through the Pride and Prejudice. Let me tell you, there is a wealth wonderful oddities and fun in there.
Here are two of the pleasures that I read.
The first is from some early Austen writing, called Love and Friendship. It is a dialogue about someone knocking on a door.

"My father started--"What noise is that," (said he.) "It sounds like a loud rapping at the Door"--(replied Mother.) "it does indeed." (cried I.) "I am of your opinion; (said my father) it certainly does appear to proceed from some uncommon violence exerted against our unoffending door." "Yes (exclaimed I) I cannot help thinking it must be somebody who knocks for admittance."

Seriously. This continues for about a page or so. Dizzyingly circular discussion about how they all agree someone is knocking on the door, and that whoever it is wants to come in. It's wonderous how it goes on and on.
The other fun thing has less to do with Austen. It comes from a critic named Richard Whately, who wrote an essay called "Modern Novels," published in Qarterly Review 24, in 1821. He's talking about how well Austen handles her Christianity by just not talking about it. I must say I was a tad surprised and comforted to read his great reasoning.

"For when the purpose of inculcating a religious principle is made too palpably prominent, many readers, if they do not throw aside the book with disgust, are apt to fortify themselves with that respectful kind of apathy with which they undergo a regular sermon, and prepare themselves as they do to swallow down a dose of medicine, endeavouring to get it down in large gulps, without tasting it more than is necessary."

Isn't that lovely. I think so. For kicks, Whately ends his essay with, "We know not whether Austen ever had access to the precepts of Aristotle; but there are few, if any, writers of fiction who have illustrated them more successfully." I couldn't agree more. There are few, if any, novels I know of that are more perfectly crafted and and exectued as Pride and Prejudice. I love it.

Speaking of taking an hour...

I picked up O Pioneers! this past weekend as part of goal I set for myself, which is currently (not so cleverly) called Ten in Ten. Over the remaining ten months of 2007 I plan to read ten books I have had on my shelves for over a year- in addition to my normal reading. The first of which was O Pioneers! Needless to say, I am pretty excited about this. I have more books than I would like to admit that have been collecting dust for sometime now-and this is a fun way to pick up those books I have always wanted to have read but never really felt like reading. As for my reaction to O Pioneers!--well to begin with there is an exclamation mark in the title and that is just awesome. I think of this book as high school reading, and by that I mean, it is often required that highschooler's read it. Which is a damn shame. If I had read it in high school I know I would not have appreciated it at all, instead I am sure I would have found it boring and pointless. As it is, I have been out of high school for quite sometime, and I have to admit: I loved it! The characters, the long crafted speeches about the land, the heartbreak, I felt as though I was allowed in to this part of history that was formerly not open to me...and now I have some sense of how people lived and thought in the early 20th century. I should say, at no point did I feel I could empathize with the characters but Cather's prose really brought the time period alive. And for that, I am thankful. Not to mention, its so short there really isn't anytime to not like it.

As for the remaining 9 in 10, I plan to read:
Heart of the Matter
All the Pretty Horses
My Antonia
Big Rock Candy Mountain
White Noise
The Street Of Crocodiles
The Sea, The Sea
A Handful of Dust
& Cold Mountain

breaking news: Importance of Being Earnest, Wilde, Funny

I've been pouring over Importance of Being Earnest, one of the texts on my comp exam. It is so damn funny. I know we all know that, but man, it's awesome.
For example:

If I am occasionally over-dressed, I make up for it by being immensely over-educated.

Algy: The truth is rarely pure, and never simple. Modern life would be very tedious if it were, and Modern Literature a complete impossibility.
Jack: That wouldn't be at all a bad thing.
Algy: Literary Criticism is not your forte, my dear fellow. Don't try it. You should leave that to people who havne't been at university.

It goes on and on. I just wanted to remind everyone. Take an hour and read it, it's good stuff.

Baudrillard: "Rest in...simulated secondary access to post mortem Peace" ?

Jean Baudrillard has died. Our favorite Hyperrealist was 77. His life was spent detmerining that there was no reality to try to tap in to so you're better off not trying, or something.
During his life he wrote more than 50 books, denied that the first Gulf War took place anywhere outside the media, claimed that the current Iraq was is an attempt by America to "put the rest of the world into simulation, and most importantly, inspired, if you call it that, the Matrix, to which he said that the references to his work "stemmed mostly from misunderstandings." Sorry Larry and Andy. You just don't get it.

Here's a "picture" of what Baudrillard "looked like."

Author Identification:

Last fall when I was seeking employment I happened to apply at this little independent bookstore in my neighborhood that specifically caters itself to Women and Children. After bringing in my application and resume they asked me to sit down for a short test that they require all potential employees to take. When they explained the test to me I was pretty excited but that excitement quickly turned to shock and resignation as I realized I didn't know as much as I thought I had. Well, this weekend, I happened to stop back in the store as for a copy and now I present it to you. Below is a list of female authors and the rules are simple: 1. Name a book written by the following authors. 2. No cheating, you are on the honor system. 3. Add up the number you know and post. And for those of you that are curious, I knew books by all of 12 of these authors, not so hot!

Toni Morrison

Mary Oliver

Sandra Cisneros

Sara Partesky

Octavia Butler

Ana Castillo

bell hooks

Jeanette Winterson

Lillian Faderman

Baraba Kingsolver

Margaret Atwood

Rebecca Walker

Gloria Steinem

Anne Lamott

Sarah Schulman

Leslie Feinberg

Gerda Lerner

Gish Jen

Amy Tan

Penelope Leach

Kathleen Norris

Mary Karr

Ursula LeGuin

Terry Tempest Williams

Audre Lorde

Zadie Smith

Jhumpa Lahiri

Alice Munro

Martha Nussbaum

Jane Hamilton

Annie Proulx

Susan Faludi

Adrienne Rich

What'cha Reading Now?

I am reading Les Miserabls, and I have to admit, most of this book is more boring than any other book I have ever read. But I am only 150 pages in, so I have my fingers crossed.