Dean
said "yes" to attending the event: Humour - Thank You for Smoking.
date: February 23, 2010 07:00PM
location: The Pantry, 425 6th Street, New Westminster, Canada
description: At last night's super fun X-mas celebration, we broke the tie for February's Humour theme and decided to read Thank You for Smoking by Christopher Buckley. We will meet at our usual location, The Pantry on 6th Street. Hope to see you then!
Dean said: Thank you for participating. ]]>
Carol, that was fun. Thanks.
I was amused, during the presentation of Pierce's idea of icon, to see the appearance of Magritte's painting of a pipe with the caption "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" (This is not a pipe). ]]>
Thanks, Megan. That was fun. ]]>
Dean
said "yes" to attending the event: Break-out Novels - White Teeth by Zadie Smith.
date: January 26, 2010 07:00PM
location: The Pantry, 425 6th Street, New Westminster, Canada
description: We kick off our "year of themes" with a bash - the break-out novel! Members have voted and chosen White Teeth by Zadie Smith. Meetup is at the usual spot, the Pantry in New Westminster, now consistently aiming to meet on the LAST TUESDAY of every month! Hope to see you then!
Dean said: Oana, I know the feeling. Starting Saturday I will have Latin homework.
tibi aliisque valete. ]]>
I just e-mailed you my info. Thanks, Andrea. ]]>
You did a terrific job, Jason. Thanks for all of your contributions in keeping this group running so smoothly. ]]>
This is a beautiful novel. So simple yet so evocative so full of life even though or perhaps because death is such a central theme. This simplicity arises from a lack of internal dialogue. We are presented with Shingo’s states of mind by his dreams and his emotions. Shingo sees and feels.
Shingo seemed placid in the face of death. The only discomfiture seems to have been the regret which he feels concerning his wife's sister. He wonders if his daughter would have been better looking and his son better behaved if he had married his wife's sister rather than his wife?
Another occasion when he allowed himself to be carreid away by emotion was the moment when he nearly kissed the No mask. The purity which the mask represented overwhelmed him.
Shingo’s composure is disturbed again when he sees his white whiskers on his clothes after using the electric razor. He quickly brushes them away. It seemed to me a moment of panic in the face of a reminder of his age.
Kikuko gave him the razor and seems to be a bridge between the tradional and the modern. It is my understanding that, traditionally, when a Japanese woman marries she leaves her family and becomes a member of her husband’s family. So the care with which she treats Shingo is not surprising. She is treating him as an honoured father. Shingo returns the respect to a beloved daughter. What is surprising is that she showed that she had some control of her life by aborting and returning to her family.
Suichi’s mistress also had a definite agenda. She used Suichi to have a child. Her room-mate tells us that for a war widow there were not many options to have a legitimate family.
If Shingo is tradition, then Suichi is a post war self-centeredness which is mitigated in the end with the return of his wife. Suichi helping his father in the garden was a touching moment. ]]>