Book Club

[LoriLori]

@smoky22  wow!  Good for you!  I missed a key word in the clue:  "long" and guessed Madame Bovary.  

Four of the books on the list are among the forty favorites I have on Goodreads, and I don't list Shakespeare plays there.  So I'm impressed with me too LOL.  And rather than "Lolita" I much prefer "Pale Fire" or it would be five!

So last night I fell asleep but the more George RR Martin talked about Gatsby the more I thought, what book did he read?  Then Allison Williams brought it back to why I love it so much.

[smoky22]

I just saw this weeks episode.  For some reason it was the most boring to me of all the shows so far.  It focused on all aspects of love.  Call me cold hearted, I guess.

This is about the third time they've focused on The Great Gatsby (makes me think it's going to win).  This time Allison Williams even talked about it.  Last week, she said her favorite book was Frankenstein and we should vote for it (which I do).

So according to some authors, Anna Karenina is #1 of the 10 best works of fiction, but it isn't even part of this PBS list of 100 books.  And I've said from the beginning, it's a travesty that Middlemarch isn't on the list either.  I can see that the PBS list is from a much younger sampling of readers. 

Only two more weeks to go.  The voting ends on the 18th.   

[LoriLori]

@smoky22  I'm surprised that more people aren't watching from here and posting and I'm not surprised because it's not very well done and Meredith Viera is just not a good host and the constant repetition of "your list" is driving me batty.

But I'm posting here to make sure you heard that Princess Eugenie, at her wedding, had her sister do a short reading from "The Great Gatsby."  They're lovely lines but given the entire book I found that headscratching to say the least.

[LoriLori]

@smoky22 @ValuSkr

Just got this in my email -- the current top 10 and no, Gatsby isn't on it:  It's listed alphabetically.  I've never even heard of "Outlander."  Not "my" list, no no no, Meredith Viera.

Charlotte's Web
The Chronicles of Narnia (Series)
Gone with the Wind
Harry Potter (Series)
Jane Eyre
Little Women
The Lord of the Rings (Series)
Outlander (Series)
Pride and Prejudice
To Kill a Mockingbird

[ValuSkr]

---

@LoriLori wrote:

@smoky22  I'm surprised that more people aren't watching from here and posting and I'm not surprised because it's not very well done and Meredith Viera is just not a good host and the constant repetition of "your list" is driving me batty.

---

LOL re Meredith!  I couldn't agree more.  I'd have thought - this being PBS and all - that they could have found a more suitable host.  Her frequent interruptions ruin the pace of the show, and make it seem more like an infomercial or PBS fundraiser.

[proudlyfromNJ]

---

@ValuSkr wrote:

---

@LoriLori wrote:

@smoky22  I'm surprised that more people aren't watching from here and posting and I'm not surprised because it's not very well done and Meredith Viera is just not a good host and the constant repetition of "your list" is driving me batty.

---

LOL re Meredith!  I couldn't agree more.  I'd have thought - this being PBS and all - that they could have found a more suitable host.  Her frequent interruptions ruin the pace of the show, and make it seem more like an infomercial or PBS fundraiser.

---

Agree about Meredith Viera. For The first Royal Wedding she hosted on one channel and appeared to be so un -knowledgable.So many traditions that she didn't know, and they were American ones also, not just British. She didn't come across as very bright.

[smoky22]

@LoriLori  Outlander is a very popular series on Starz so I'm not surprised the book is on the list.  I've never read it but fans for it seem to be obsessed with it.  The only book on the list that I vote for every day is Jane Eyre.

I know you said you wouldn't read it, but ever since the Watchman book came out, I see To Kill a Mockingbird in a new light and I don't vote for it.  It seems very idealized to me now.  To Kill A Mocking bird is still a very good book, but I think a lot of its continued popularity is actually due to Gregory Peck.

At this point, I hope Charlotte's Web wins.  I'm going to vote for it from now until the end. 

[smoky22]

---

@LoriLori wrote:

@smoky22  I'm surprised that more people aren't watching from here and posting and I'm not surprised because it's not very well done and Meredith Viera is just not a good host and the constant repetition of "your list" is driving me batty.

But I'm posting here to make sure you heard that Princess Eugenie, at her wedding, had her sister do a short reading from "The Great Gatsby."  They're lovely lines but given the entire book I found that headscratching to say the least.

---

@LoriLori  Princess Eugenie is British, right?  I'm just surprised that they would choose an American book for a reading, regardless of subject   There is so much English literature to choose from.  You can see I know nothing about British Royalty. What were the lines, if they weren't too long?

[insomniac2]

I appreciate LoriLori sharing the top ten list. I think it's a solid grouping--I'm impressed!

[LoriLori]

@smoky2016 wrote:

@LoriLori wrote:

@smoky2016 

...But I'm posting here to make sure you heard that Princess Eugenie, at her wedding, had her sister do a short reading from "The Great Gatsby."  They're lovely lines but given the entire book I found that headscratching to say the least.

@LoriLori  Princess Eugenie is British, right?  I'm just surprised that they would choose an American book for a reading, regardless of subject   There is so much English literature to choose from.  You can see I know nothing about British Royalty. What were the lines, if they weren't too long?

Here is the reading, done by her sister Beatrice, in which Nick talks about the allure of Gatsby's smile:

“He smiled understandingly — much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced — or seemed to face — the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey. Precisely at that point it vanished — and I was looking at an elegant young rough-neck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I’d got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care.”

I find it especially headscratching considering:

Spoiler

That Gatsby is a fraud and in this passage Nick instantly realizes that,and is calling him out on it.  And that Gatsby, never does regain his love and find happiness and he comes to a tragic end in a horrible twist of fate.  I bet it's the first wedding in history to use that!!!

 

The day of the wedding and the day after I read some British journalists and other people giving their opinion that it was inappropriate and/or disrespectful to use an American author.

In the wedding programme (hah, British spelling) it was explained that she read Gatsby soon after meeting her groom and the smile made her think of him.  But if she was so determined to use it, why didn't she stop at "convey?"  Mystifying and for many in the UK, maddening.

Spoiler

Here's hoping that Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank share a much better life -- and death -- than James Gatz did.

[LoriLori]

@smoky2016 wrote:

@LoriLori wrote:

@smoky2016 

...But I'm posting here to make sure you heard that Princess Eugenie, at her wedding, had her sister do a short reading from "The Great Gatsby."  They're lovely lines but given the entire book I found that headscratching to say the least.

@LoriLori  Princess Eugenie is British, right?  I'm just surprised that they would choose an American book for a reading, regardless of subject   There is so much English literature to choose from.  You can see I know nothing about British Royalty. What were the lines, if they weren't too long?

Here is the reading, done by her sister Beatrice, in which Nick talks about the allure of Gatsby's smile:

“He smiled understandingly — much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced — or seemed to face — the whole eternal world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey. Precisely at that point it vanished — and I was looking at an elegant young rough-neck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd. Some time before he introduced himself I’d got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care.”

I find it especially headscratching considering:

Spoiler

That Gatsby is a fraud and in this passage Nick instantly realizes that,and is calling him out on it.  And that Gatsby, never does regain his love and find happiness and he comes to a tragic end in a horrible twist of fate.  I bet it's the first wedding in history to use that!!!

 

The day of the wedding and the day after I read some British journalists and other people giving their opinion that it was inappropriate and/or disrespectful to use an American author.

In the wedding programme (hah, British spelling) it was explained that she read Gatsby soon after meeting her groom and the smile made her think of him.  But if she was so determined to use it, why didn't she stop at "convey?"  Mystifying and for many in the UK, maddening.