May & June 2021 - Classic Group Read - Nomination Thread

[Alannah]

It's time once again to nominate your choices for our last group classics read of 2021, this time for May and June 2021. For convenience, we at AAB are defining a 'classic' as a book that was first published 50 or more years ago, i.e. first published in 1971 or earlier.

Nominations will be run for 7 days and will close late on 15 April or when we hit six books in the poll. The poll will then until the 22 April 2021.

During this time anybody can nominate and second a book. The 6 books with the most second votes at the end of the 10 day nomination period will go into the poll. Each person can either nominate one book or second one book. There are no limits to the number of seconds a book can receive, although please be mindful as our polls do not fill up as quickly as they used to.

Please only nominate, second or vote for a book you will read with the group if it should win. Please also check that your chosen nomination hasn't been a group read in the past. You can do this by looking at the group bookshelf or browsing through the Group Fiction folder.

If you have any questions on the nominations process please post here, use the 'Ask the Moderators' thread or contact one of the moderators and we will be happy to help.

[Alannah]

I nominate David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.

[Kat]

I nominate Mary Shelly's Frankenstein: The 1818 Text.

[Alannah]

Kat wrote: "I nominate Mary Shelly's Frankenstein: The 1818 Text."

Sorry Kat, this was already a classic group where we discussed both editions of the text. https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Kat]

Alannah wrote: "Kat wrote: "I nominate Mary Shelly's Frankenstein: The 1818 Text."

Sorry Kat, this was already a classic group where we discussed both editions of the text. https://www.goodreads.c..."

upps sorry, actually checked but messed up, my bad. I'll come up with something else 😅

[Nidhi]

I nominate The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni, if not read by the group already.

[Alannah]

Marcelo wrote: "To Kill a Mockingbird"

Sorry Marcelo, it's already been a classic read.
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Samantha]

I nominate Repressed Feelings of Self Portrayal

[Alannah]

Nidhi wrote: "I nominate The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni, if not read by the group already."

Thank you :)

[Alannah]

Samantha wrote: "I nominate Repressed Feelings of Self Portrayal"

Who is the author?

[LauraT]

Marcelo wrote: "The Leopard instead?!"

I second this!!! It's high time I re-read it

[Alannah]

Nominated Books
The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni

Books Going To Poll:
The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

[Karin]

I nominate Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas since it's book 2 in The Three Musketeers series :)

[Kat]

How about a younger classic, "younger"... published in 1965: Dune by Frank Herbert.

[Steve]

Wow, what a selection of great books to choose from! I want to read all of them, but I will second Dune by Frank Herbert.

[Nancy]

I'd like to nominate The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

[Nancy]

I second The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

[Alannah]

Marcelo wrote: "Madame Bovary as a 2nd suggestion..."

You can only nominate one book.

[Jade]

Alannah wrote: "I nominate David Copperfield by Charles Dickens."

I second this one.

[Alannah]

Nominated Books
The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni
Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas
The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

Books Going To Poll:
The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Dune by Frank Herbert
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

[Alannah]

Three spots left.

[Leslie]

I'll second The Betrothed

[Alannah]

Leslie wrote: "I'll second The Betrothed"

Thanks Leslie.

[Alannah]

Nominated Books
Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas
The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

Books Going To Poll:
The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Dune by Frank Herbert
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni

[LauraT]

Leslie wrote: "I'll second The Betrothed"

I'm always stunned when foreigners want to read this; It is such a must for Italy that all studens have to read it in school, and we all hate it. I did as all others.
I've re-read it some 10 years ago and have to admit that it has more good points than bad ones. I'd be curious ti read it with international friends!

[Leslie]

LauraT wrote: "Leslie wrote: "I'll second The Betrothed"

I'm always stunned when foreigners want to read this; It is such a must for Italy that all studens have to read it in school, and we all hat..."

I had never even heard of it before! But it was the only book awaiting a second that I haven't already read so I checked out the blurb. Now I am curious!!

[Nidhi]

It is in Boxall 1001 list also, that's why many people want to read it , i have an interest in historical fiction , but the book is lengthy.

[Alannah]

Nominations closed, poll linked here:
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

[LauraT]

You see, Italy wasn't a Nation till 1861, when unified by the Sabauda dynasty from Turin with the help pf Giuseppe Garibaldi, the famous - at least for us - hero of two worlds.
This is to show you how during almost the whole of the XVIII century our"intellectuals" had other things to think about than the growth of the middle class, as in England, France, Germany or Russia. And, saying it grossly, that is the main issue of the establishing of the novel as a genre fundamental for the people (Dickens on one side, Flaubert or Zola on the other of the channel, Goethe or Tolstoy or Dostoevsky.)
We do not have very important novels as those the writers I mentioned before have written; we "only" have some writings on the unifications struggles (The Viceroys, My Ten Years' Imprisonment, and other similar things.
And then we have Alessandro Manzoni, who wrote poetry, poems and this masterpiece. Set in XVII Italy (that is of course the mirror of the Italy the author was living in) it describes in a language he had to "reinvent" (divided into different states, we had a lot of dialects, Manzoni went to Florence to polish the novel, considering Dante Alighieri's city the mother place of the Italian language) a Country that was about to become one. It is considered our “foundation novel”.
Manzoni was a strong catholic, and all his writings are permeated with his religious views, sometimes too deeply. And he can be hard to read, especially his poems.
Still, if read wholly, The Bethrothed: shows pages of subtle irony that for students in school are usually not easy to be seen.
Aside, a big part of it is set in Milan during a pestilence; and never as now it could be interesting to see that some mechanism have not changed.