The Obscure Reading Group discussion
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Welcome, Sara! You'll make a wonderful addition to this thoughtful group.
I am missing Abigail also, but very much looking forward to the next read.
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I do a lot of reading and realize, at age 77, I better get going if I'm to get through all the interesting books I've collected or hope to read. I like hard copies, but also access e-..."
Welcome, Erin! What interesting experiences you've had. I am feeling the need to read faster too, but I think you'll enjoy the pace here, and our choices are serious but we bring fun to them too. Looking forward to you adding to the discussions!
Erin wrote: "Hi, I'm Erin,I do a lot of reading and realize, at age 77, I better get going if I'm to get through all the interesting books I've collected or hope to read. I like hard copies, but also access e-..."
Welcome, Erin!
I couldn't help but smile reading your last comment about sending books forward to other readers. That's what I'm doing, too.
I also appreciate your titles; I've enjoyed reading "Abigail" and now look forward to reading others by her (after making it through a patient tower of books before me.)
I'm happy you're part of our group.
My Best, Jan
Erin, delighted to meet you!Kathleen, totally happy to be here with you all.
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Welcome Erin. I too wonder how I will ever read a reasonable portion of the books on my tbr list . I’m 72 now with some thousands of ideas for reading to choose from. But it is a delightful predicament.
I think many of us are realizing we will die with a TBR a mile long. I might request that the list of unread books be buried with me, just in case heaven has a library. 😃
Sara wrote: "I think many of us are realizing we will die with a TBR a mile long. I might request that the list of unread books be buried with me, just in case heaven has a library. 😃"Now THAT would be a lovely heaven; I may try a bit harder to get in now. (ha ha)
I have a friend who is certain her tbr insures immortality. Just as she starts each book, she prays "God, don't let me die til I finish this one!". But that library in Heaven sounds pretty good too.
No matter how much we pray, Diane, we are destined to die in the middle of a book.
That's quite true, Sara. I just hope it's one I was going to dnf anyway!
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Hmm. This is a problem I hadn't thought of. I wonder if it would it be overly-Egyptian to request to be buried with my current reading ...
Diane wrote: "That's quite true, Sara. I just hope it's one I was going to dnf anyway!"lol. We can but hope. Maybe if I feel the first pangs of death I will have time to get hold of something I'm sure I won't like.
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Heck, if they can do that, they can surely bury us with a book likeness in our hands. Or a book in the casket. Or a book in our ashes. Or whatever we can get Marcus Aurelius to approve!
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Heck, if they can do that, they can surely bury us with ..."
Great idea! Marcus A--now that's yester-millennium!
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Heck, if they can do that, they can surely b..."
I recently finished my reread of the lovely Meditations and am amazed at how similar his outlook (and the Stoics, for that matter) is to the Buddhists. Very much a living-in-the-moment kind of thing working in that great mind. That and working like hell to accept the naturalness of death. (I can attest that it's a task.)
Aurelius calls it logos, but the Buddhists would use another word. Not sure which one because they use so many and not all are clear to me (I am not a blackbelt Buddhist by any means). ;-)
I love that prospective conundrum of dying while in the middle of a book. Diane, while I appreciate your idea of it being a DNF, I think I’d rather I be enjoying some wonderful prose, maybe forever lost in a Faulkner sentence, though I think I may reach a point where I won’t be able to find my way through a Faulkner sentence!
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Meanwhile, I wrote my review of good-old Abigail this morning, as I finished it out on the dock overlooking a Maine lake yesterday.
More exciting yet? I get to post the final discussion thread tomorrow night (What? Sunday already?), and we get to compare notes on Szabó's ability to bring it home, as they say.
Looking forward to that!
Sara wrote: "I think many of us are realizing we will die with a TBR a mile long. I might request that the list of unread books be buried with me, just in case heaven has a library. 😃"What a lovely idea! Maybe I should put my Kindle in my will. It's loaded with 300+ books in it.
Sue wrote: "forever lost in a Faulkner sentence"What a lovely thought, Sue.
lol. hilarious.
Hello all! I’ve just discovered your group and am happy to join! I’m a former English teacher from San Francisco, now a copywriter in Nice, France. I am a constant reader, especially drawn to classics and, well, more obscure titles. I’m looking forward to your discussions!
Feel free to friend me as I always appreciate seeing what others are reading.
All the best,
Daniel 📚
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Welcome, Daniel! That's my dream, spending my life reading and getting paid for it. Just friended you -- Yvonne
Welcome, Daniel. I am going to friend you too. I am a constant reader also and of a wide range of genres though classics have always been a weak area for me. I look forward to seeing your reading list.
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Hello!!! I am so excited to find this group. I am a lover of the classics and have finally discovered Thomas Hardy. In this short time, I have become 100% completely obsessed with his writing.
I recently finished Far from the Madding Crowd and Return of the Native. Just started Tess of the D’Uberville.
I’m not the greatest with technology 🤣 but my friend Ann uses goodreads to the fullest and I asked if she could find a Thomas Hardy group for me and here I am!
I live in Florida with my dog, Eddie. He's listened to all of the books with me, a well-read guy 😉
Looking forward to future discussions!
Kelly
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I hope you read some non-Hardy books, too. You know. Obscure ones. Like that Jude dude.
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Sara wrote: "lol. hilarious."Welcome, Daniel!
I look forward to this new book and learning more about all these wonderful readers. You're in fine company, indeed.
Hi all, I've just joined the group and looking forward to some discussions. I'm Matt, I'm twenty-three years old from Worthing near Brighton in the south of England. Thanks for inviting me, Ken. Look forward to reading some good books with you all.
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Great to see you here, Matt!
Hi everyone,I'm Jean and have been "lurking" a couple of weeks reading the posts, so thought I should introduce myself. How I found you is unusual ... Someone liked a review of mine ... I checked out his profile (we are now friends ... Hi JimZ :) ) and was intrigued by your group's name so looked further!
As a lover of Thomas Hardy's novels and some poetry, I thought that any group who thoroughly enjoyed reading (what I consider) his best work, must be a interesting group of people :) Even if you never read anything by him as a group again ;)
So here I am, and delighted now to see my good friend Sara here and others!
Just realised that this is supposed to be a "quick hello" so will close by saying thank you for making this an open group. I'm English, a Charles Dickens fanatic, and am looking forward to the occasional intriguing read with you all :)
Hello jean! I just joined as well for similar reasons! I was looking for a group where people might also love Thomas Hardy’s work as much as I do, so I’m very glad to meet you!
I will add you as a friend if that is all right :)
Jean - So happy to see you here. This will be my first read with the group, but I lurked during the end of the read of Abigail and knew this was a group I would want to be a part of.Kelly - nice to meet you as well. I'm also a big fan of Hardy!
Kelly wrote: "Hello jean! ..."Hello! Of course, yes :) Thank you.
Hello - I have just discovered this group thanks to Bionic Jean, and followed her trail to the Obscure Reading. I have come to United States more than 20 years ago from Eastern Europe, and am looking forward to reading my first novel of Thomas Hardy. Unfortunately, this author has not been a part of my school program - sadly, this is true for most classics discussed here - but I am happy to enjoy and experience it all without the push and the pressure of mandatory school reading.Professionally, I started as an engineer and then gradually changed course to finance, and then to data analysis and business intelligence.
I was really "stirred and shaken" by "Sophie's Choice" and am looking forward to reading along with you.
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I'm Jean and have been "lurking" a couple of weeks reading the posts, so thought I should introduce myself. How I found you is unusual ... Someone liked a review of mine ... I checked..."
Hello and welcome, Jean.
I'm from New England just across the pond from Jolly Olde. Glad we are increasing our international perspective here.
As for Dickens, maybe next go-round someone (you, perhaps?) will nominate a more obscure novel of his. I've read The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, Hard Times, and A Christmas Carol (umpteen times, as a licensed sentimentalist).
CDs I've yet to play include the more obscure but critically acclaimed Bleak House as well as Our Mutual Friend, Nicholas Nickleby, Martin Chuzzlewit, and God knows what else I can't think of.
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Hi, Helen, and welcome. Maybe some day we'll read another Thomas Hardy. Maybe, too, I need to rewrite the introduction to this group so people don't think it is a Thomas Hardy Only book group. I don't know.
I do know I'm happy to see you here. I have Polish roots myself (close?), but mostly Irish ones.
Bionic Jean wrote: "Hi everyone,I'm Jean and have been "lurking" a couple of weeks reading the posts, so thought I should introduce myself. How I found you is unusual ... Someone liked a review of mine ... I checked..."
Hi Jean. Nice to see you on here! I found this group because a friend suggested I might be interested in it. It is nice how we all end up in a group such as this...I was pleased at the potential selections for this coming read....indeed the books were a bit off the beaten path but appear to deserve a wider audience.
The Obscure Reading Group
Books mentioned in this topic
A Pair of Blue Eyes (other topics)The Woodlanders (other topics)
Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family (other topics)
The Castle of Otranto (other topics)
The Mysteries of Udolpho (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Thomas Hardy (other topics)Italo Calvino (other topics)
Anthony Trollope (other topics)
Charles Dickens (other topics)
Eddie Izzard (other topics)
More...
I do a lot of reading and realize, at age 77, I better get going if I'm to get through all the interesting books I've collected or hope to read. I like hard copies, but also access e-books and audiobooks.
I grew up in the Pacific Northwest in a reading family and I'm so grateful that, when I left home at 21 to move to San Francisco, we still had not bought a TV. The school and public libraries were resources, and it has never taken me long to fill up bookshelves. I love to learn, and reading was one of the best ways to explore the world, history and people of all sorts doing all sorts of things with their lives.
From 1991 to 2014 I lived in Moscow, Russia teaching English and it was tremendously fulfilling and educational. I was also in a position there to travel to parts of Russia, the former USSR and northern Europe. One of my high points was a successful American Literature Discussion Club I led for 3 years. Of course, I have been reading (in translation) the Russian classics and moderns as well as Russian history. I continue to find interesting books in this area to add to my understanding.
Now, I have been living in Montgomery, Alabama for 5 years with my husband and so have tried to learn more about the South in general, the Civil War and Reconstruction Period, and Southern authors.
When I learned about this Goodreads book club and that it was reading "Abigail" by Magda Szabo, I readily joined. I have already read her "Iza's Ballad" and "The Door" and "Abigail" was already in my library. For my taste and needs, too many book clubs do not take on challenging or serious books. I'm hoping I've at last found a pretty good match.
At present I have a whole stack of books I've finished in the past 5 months that I must get around to reviewing soon. My husband insists I move them along to other readers.