Zotta's blog

Dear Group,

I read the chapter on Stendhal and Rouge and Noir yesterday.  All I can say is I was far more impressed
with the novel than S. Maugham was, but I'd read half of it in french, at a slow pace, looking up a lot of words, while working in a bakery; so I can't comment on the "improbable ending", but I thought it was beautifully written.
Apparently the real Stendhal made it his project to seduce a string of married women, mostly unsuccessfully.
Maugham feels pretty sure that the protagonists in his stories represent Stendhal's ideal versions of himself,
with the characters finding romantic success by the same methods that were failing the author in real life!

I started the first page of the chapter on Balzac and Pere Goriot, which I also read some of in french in college.
Was it the professor or was it my mood of malaise at the time(but I was incredibly bored by that)?
Maugham thinks Balzac was the greatest novelist ever-- even though his characters are stereotypes
(but, he says, you never forget them).

Last night an attorney friend was berating Obama for not having a clear enough platform; and me for letting
his unclear message twist in the wind.  He said the democrats suck.  So, I will have to campaign because
God forbid I should be called "bad democrat" by old family friends.  Hey! It will be fun....

OMG, it was painful.  He took me to task for what you might call a defeatist attitude that says we can never have change in this country until we fix the voting system and stop intimidating all the black and/or immigrant voters.
I do still believe that, btw, but I am grudgingly grateful that a couple of fellow former-Hillary democrats
have alerted me to the fact that Obama's campaign is not necessarily sliding to victory on his silver tongue
without effort from his fans.

First of all, Maugham says, if a book of fiction doesn't grab you, why read it? Seriously folks,
especially at our ages, whatever they might be: Do not labor with something that refuses to
resonate after a certain good-faith effort, however short or long that may be(you know how you are:)

SM merged so effortlessly from his dicsussion of the bio to his discussion of the novel that
I was left at the end wanting more: I guess wanting to read the book, just as Maugham intended.
I'm afraid after this I'll even want to re-read the ones I already know! Enjoy!

Last night I suddenly remembered I had to print out and read through 37 pages of a capella music.
It is so good! some of it I know and some I am just reading.  I hope they are OK with my voice.
The host belongs to this group: 

http://www.theorianaconsort.org

Which is a little more formal of a group than I have joined this past year.

Here's the music for tonight: 

http://www.choralcalendar.org/amy

Last night I watched Masterpiece Theater: Foyle's War, while reading a couple of chapters of Sven's
novel.  It's so much better the way he reads it.  I've read it before and this is a reworking.  I'm sorry.
I do have to finish reading this and tell him about it before getting back to the great Maugham book.

Over the years I discovered that husbands don't want to hear from their wives about typos(or language
constructions that are unworkable).  They want to know whether you think it flows dramatically.

Sven has improved miles just through the constant process of re-editing his book; and in daily life,
his language has become so much richer.  The other day he used the word "touchstone" in a sentence,
in a non-cliche way.  I'm like, "Have you been going to class?"

What is your legacy?
Submitted by Beautifully Broken.

Well, I'll tell you this:  It needs a lot of editing and some burning!

What is the big news story in your area today and how does this news impact your life?

A man in our area is growing switch-grass for ethanol.  So far the plants are just little babies,
but they look promising! 

What is the most annoying stereotype people say about the country or place where you're from?

That we voted for Bush.

Hi! Everybody's welcome to join! To read more, as per the last comment by Lizzie
on my post, "Janette's Book List", see below:

Ten Novels and Their Authors is a work of literary criticism by William Somerset Maugham. Maugham collects together what he considers to have been the ten greatest novels and writes about the books and the authors. The ten novels are:

Tom Jones by Henry Fielding Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Le Rouge et le Noir by Stendhal Le Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac David Copperfield by Charles Dickens Madame Bovary by Gustav Flaubert Moby-Dick by Herman Melville Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky War and Peace by Tolstoy

I'm just going to start the group now....And I"ll call it "Ten Novels and Their Authors".

So far Lizzie and I are getting the book; and we welcome more readers of the book!