On the “Formerly, Great American Novelist” with a special guest

December 1, 2023February 19, 2024 / shawnam / Leave a comment

On November 21, 2023 member Robin S. presented on the works of Jonathan Franzen. In 2010 Time magazine declared Franzen “The Great American Novelist”. By 2021, the BBC called him America’s most divisive novelist. Robin looked at the author’s evolution and by the end of her talk, she made a good case for picking up one of Franzen’s novels. Robin started by introducing her special guest, Coffee. Coffee is a service dog in-training.

Jonathan Franzen is a prolific fiction and non-fiction writer. His novels The Corrections, Freedom, and Crossroads look at unhappy family life in middle America. He has written a memoir, The Discomfort Zone, which is really 6 essays about his life. For the speaker, Franzen’s detailing of his teenage angst was in the discomfort zone.

In addition he has authored a number of essays on a wide range of topics, frequently in a confrontational style. His essays and interviews frequently go a step to far and have landed him in controversies with Oprah fans, environmental groups, and the Audubon Society (among others). In his interviews and essays, Franzen has shown his intense personality. He is a compulsive bird watcher and has advocated for protecting birds from high-rise glass.

Robin briefly outlined Franzen’s biography and gave readings from his essays. She then went on to his fictional works, which she prefers. She descried them as big social novels – family sagas that address current trends and critique American culture and politics. His style is clean, with limited use of metaphor or simile (unkind reviewers might say a lack of style). Robin gave readings from all of Mr. Franzen’s novels to illustrate his spare style.

The Corrections (2001) is a sometimes autobiographical parody of a dysfunctional American family. It was a hit, and won several prizes including The National Book Award. His success got him invited to the Oprah show. However, his negative comments about Oprah’s book club soon got him uninvited. In 2010, his next novel Freedom (Robin’s favourite) was published, again to critical acclaim. After public apologies to Oprah, Franzen this time joined her on her show. However, the universal praise for his book was used on social media as an example of bias of the literary world toward white male authors.

Crossroads (2021) is Franzen’s latest novel, and reading it led Robin to choose this author for her presentation. Again, an unhappy American family is profiled. Critical reception has been mixed.

At the end of Robin’s talk, I was ready to dive into these family sagas. I might also check out one of Franzen’s essays (or a podcast) and see why he describes himself as “Mr. Difficult“.

At this meeting, we welcomed new member Eudy J. This was the last presentation of our fall session, but if you are interested in joining in the spring, click here. Our updated presentation schedule is here.

Challenging Order and Intellect

October 29, 2023 / shawnam / Leave a comment

*Encyclopædia Britannica, accessed Oct. 28 2023.*

On October 24, CWLC President Mooréa G. presented on British playwright and author Tom Stoppard. Mooréa has been a member for more than 5 years and has previously presented on Stephan Stephansson and J.K. Rowling. She has served as Social Chair and as Vice President prior to her current role as President.

Tom Stoppard is a British author, best known as a playwright. His work often relies on clever wordplay. The plots and dialog are not difficult to follow but challenge the listener to ask questions and to take exception to the world order. Humor is used to offset some very dark subjects.

Mr. Stoppard is a prolific artist, and Mooréa chose to discuss three of his works (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead; Arcadia; and Leopoldstadt) to give the audience a sense of his wit and world view over almost 60 years.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead was first performed in 1966. It highlights two minor characters from Hamlet, who are in many ways featureless and interchangeable. Mooréa gave several readings from this work that showed how Stoppard seamlessly moves the dialog from modern English to the Shakespearean lines. Clever but silly wordplay between the title characters almost gives them personality and shows up their lack of agency in the plot.

Arcadia (1993) is set around a family dining table in a British estate in two time periods: the early 19th and late 20th centuries. The early 18th century plot has a precocious teenager filled with 20th century ideas about science, her 22 year old tutor who is having an affair with the wife of one of the guests (this lady is also Lord Byron’s lover (what woman wasn’t?)), and fellow residents. The plot is second to the clever discussions between these unlikely housemates.

Leopoldstadt was first performed in 2020; it was also performed in 2022 for Holocaust Memorial Day. The play is semi-autobiographical, presenting generations of a Jewish family set in a bourgeois apartment in Vienna. Like Stoppard’s own family, some retain their Jewish faith and traditions, others are secular or converts. In some ways, this play is Stoppard’s search for his own Jewish heritage.

With 29 characters set in several time periods, the play is dense and difficult to follow. The main character, Leopold/Leonard has similarities to Stoppard. The play’s emphasis on unknown family is intended to show how we are responsible for even things we do not know.

Thank-you Mooréa for giving us a taste of this challenging author. Join us next week when we host Calgary’s poet laureate, Wakefield Brewster.

Literature with the density of poetry

October 23, 2023 / shawnam / Leave a comment

On October 17, member Della Mae W. presented on the works of Irish author John Banville. Mr. Banville is a prolific author of fiction, who has also written screenplays, reviews and podcasts. Della Mae has been a member of the CWLC since before 2010, and this is her sixth presentation – she’s glad she has finally found a presentation category that fit for this author. Like the author and John Steinbeck, Della Mae handwrites her presentations on a yellow legal pad.

Della Mae started by saying that she is drawn in by Banville’s beautiful writing even when the story and the character’s don’t appeal to her. She has not read all of his works (he has written 26 novels), but her husband has them all. Mr. Banville’s work, The Sea, was awarded the Booker Prize in 2005.

In the early part of his career, John Banville wrote literature with the density of poetry, painstakingly crafting his sentences. Then, inspired by Georges Simenon, the author of the Maigret novels, he tried writing spontaneously. He produced a series of mysteries under the pseudonym Benjamin Black. In 2020, he abandoned the pseudonym and started publishing mysteries in his own name. These mysteries include Marlowe, written in the style of Raymond Chandler – another favourite of Della Mae.

Della Mae puts bookmarks in passages she is especially touched by in books. For Banville’s works, too many pages were bookmarked for her to read all of them to us. She did give a number of readings from his books including The Sea, Snow, The Book of Evidence, and Marlowe. These readings highlighted how Mr. Banville seduces the reader by painting a detailed picture with words.

Join us next week, when CWLC president Mooréa G. presents on British playwright Tom Stoppard.

At this meeting, we welcomed several guests and new members. Interested but not a member yet? Not a problem: click here to find out more.

More information on our 2023-2024 program can be found here:

calgarywomensliteraryclub.com/2023-2024-program/.