The Corrections is over!

I am back again readers with the last installment of The Corrections. I am glad it’s done and hope you have found some redemption from reading and thinking about this book.  As I think back there is so much in the book that many if ….nah, I really didn’t like the book but maybe the characters do appear in real life all around me and I am like Enid, I ignore them!

11. Why does it take so long for the Lamberts to acknowledge the seriousness of Alfred's illness?  Because unless we are hypochondriacs, we all ignore those little things that are keeping us back from good health. Is Alfred's deteriorating mental health solely a result of Parkinson's disease? Yes, we are all experts on PD! 

This entire line of questions is so offensive to me in regards to PD.  Since my own father suffered greatly from this and my mother supported and cared for him so valiantly, I cannot entertain this line of questions.  No one knows until they walk in the shoes.

17. Why is Denise drawn to both Robin and Brian? How attractive are they as characters? How does Denise's attraction to Robin initially manifest itself? Why is she unable to make a life with Robin?  Because she is a selfish bitch! Mostly she can only be happy if she is controlling the people around her and their activities.  She manipulates both Robin and Brian to their own personal failures.  So passive-aggressive and distructive.

20. Why does Denise tell Chip not to pay back the money she has lent him? What does the use of the word "forgive" suggest in Denise's plea to her brother? Like I said, selfish bitch and therefore she will still have something to hold over him in the future.

22. Is Alfred's death the key to Enid's happiness? How does the quality of her life change once Al is hospitalized? What reaction do his children have to his death? Are we meant to believe that their father's death is the catalyst for their "corrections"? For how much of the unhappiness in the Lambert household was Al responsible?

I can’t even begin to understand this question – do you?

Summer will be upon us shortly so we will have to have some light and fluffy beach reading very soon! 

Happy Reading Everyone!

Barbara

PS:  Maybe these Oprah questions would have been more palatable if I was drinking a good bottle of wine - the whole bottle!

Correct me if I am wrong!

Hello Readers,

This begins the first of two groups of questions on The Corrections.  These have been written well beforehand while I am on a visit to Colorado.  I hope you enjoy my responses to these Oprah questions.  I have left them  numbered  so you can relate them to the original listing if you care to. 

Discussion Questions:

4. Why does Denise choose to lose her virginity to Don Armour? Which qualities of her co-worker simultaneously attract and repel her? Why does Al sacrifice his job for Denise's privacy?

What a wacky woman this Denise is and yet sometimes during the book she seems the most sane.  Why she decided to have sex with Armour is beyond me and yet she seemed to think it would get her something.  Why her father decided to sacrifice for her is balanced by the fact that he could have turned the tables on Armour for harassment.  Again, this is a weird fact exposed in the book that had all the world of consequences in its secrecy.

6. How does the issue of class play out during the course of the novel? In what different ways does class drive Enid's behavior on the cruise and propel Denise's decision to sleep with Don Armour? How does concern over class status affect Gary and Caroline or Brian and Robin?

They had none but wanted it and the more they chased it the more they lost.

  

8. Discuss the different moral codes members of the Lambert family adhere to. Consider Enid's fear of her children's "immorality," Gary's obsession with Caroline's dishonesty, Alfred's refusal to engage in insider trading, Denise's rage at Gary for having betrayed the sibling code of honor and Chip's animus against the W_ _ Corporation and big business in general. Which of these judgments seem most valid? Does the book favor one moral view over another? 

This entire family was chasing their entire lives – except maybe Alfred who refused to play the game.  Maybe that is why I found the book so frantic.  Run, run, run to catch what?  I don’t think the book actually favored any moral code – the redemption of Chip at the end isn’t necessarily long lasting when you have seen his character throughout the book.  Alfred is dead and Enid gets to continue chasing something more that she feels she should be entitled to.   

9. Consider the atmosphere of suburban St. Jude (named for the patron saint of hopeless causes) in comparison to the more sophisticated surroundings of Philadelphia and New York. Why has the Lamberts' neighborhood evolved into a gerontocratic refuge? "What Gary hated most about the Midwest was how unpampered and unprivileged he felt in it" [p. 178]. What negative and positive qualities are attributed to the Midwest? How are the characters shaped by the cities or towns they live in?

Honestly, aren’t people just people no matter where they live and what ‘surroundings’ they live in?  These Oprah questions seem to me to constantly direct you to dislike someone else who has something different that you do.  Hat the corporation, hate the Midwest, hate the city, hate that restaurant, hate, hate, hate, --- it gets really disheartening!

  

10. What is the significance of "one last Christmas?" Is Enid's obsession with the holidays predictable for a mother of her generation or is it, as Gary fears, "a symptom of a larger malaise" [p. 148]?

Don’t we all desire to have family close to us for the sake of our spouse?  Enid knew that Alfred was failing, this would be the last gathering of his offspring – all together.  Why wouldn’t a wife want to give him a memory to hold onto?

  

I hope you all are enjoying Their Eyes Were Watching God, the Book of the Month for May.

Happy Reading,

Barbara

The Corrections by Franzen

Hello Dear Readers,

I will be (or am) in Colorado from April 27-May 11 so I am writing this review/questions a few weeks early and they will post via scheduling on the blog. 

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen…. What did you think?  This is the first book I have read by Franzen and although I enjoyed the book I am not sure if I’ll read another.  The Corrections was full of the typical situations that keep a reader reading.  Love, hate, anxiety, drama, mental and physical illness, separation, intrigue, assumptions, passive aggressive behavior and dominance were all present in this book along with every other psychiatric condition you could name. All of them were in my opinion, extreme.   T he pace of the book was frantic.  It was filled with chaos.  Of course all of this is my opinion.  

I don’t know if I have ever read a book where the pace of the words just pulled you along at a reading pace so quickly.  The characters were bounced around from the present to the past to a different character rapidly.  I almost gave up halfway through the book and know that if it wasn’t for our readers out there I wouldn’t have completed this book.  I am glad I did finish because the end was worth completing. 

In September 2001 this book was an Oprah Book Club Book.  The following are a sampling of questions that were presented from that discussion.  I am not going to complete them all but have selected a few that will appear over the next weeks.  Please enjoy the entirety at your leisure:

http://www.oprah.com/oprahsbookclub/The-Corrections-by-Jonathan-Franzen/3

Happy Reading,

Barbara

May Flowers, May Book, New Grandchild!

Hello dear readers,

As most of you know we are expecting our second grandchild at the beginning of May and I am in Colorado as the Grammy for Alexander while his mom is in the hospital.

I have selected another older book for this month:
There Eyes Were Watching God by Zaora Neale Hurston
According to Amazon:  One of the most important and enduring books of the twentieth century, Their Eyes Were Watching God brings to life a Southern love story with the wit and pathos found only in the writing of Zora Neale Hurston. Out of print for almost thirty years—due largely to initial audiences’ rejection of its strong black female protagonist—Hurston’s classic has since its 1978 reissue become perhaps the most widely read and highly acclaimed novel in the canon of African-American literature.

This book was suggested by my sister-in-law so I am hoping she'll be re-reading along and give her comments.  

Enjoy dear readers,
Barbara