(please respond, especially if you can't make it to the meeting but are doing the reading! don't make George cry!!)...
I'm not sure I'm qualified to ask discussion questions but here goes (you can pick whichever one(s) interest you most to answer):
- What are your initial impressions of the characters? Is there one you relate to most, or who stands out to you for some other reason?
- What's your favorite James O. Incandenza film concept? Why?
- What's in this book for you? What's the lens through which you're reading it? (For example, for me it's depression/mental illness, for Nick it's addiction, for Patricia it's the Kierkegaardian themes... etc*).
- Is there any part/aspect of the book that's giving you trouble? Is it hard to read? Do you like the footnotes? What, if anything, are you struggling with?
- What's your favorite scene, from what you've read so far, and why?
* I'm failing to mention Conrad here not because he doesn't have an interesting perspective to bring to the table (he does), but because he has such diverse interests that his lens can't really be pinned down like those mentioned can.**
** Also, look at me using footnotes, what fun!
ONE LAST NOTE:
on the sidebar of the blog, there's a box that says "Follow by Email" above it. If the blog/discussion thing is going to work, people should probably put their emails in here so that you get notified when stuff is happening on there - so PLEASE DO THIS! (Think of poor George!!)!!
ONE LAST NOTE:
on the sidebar of the blog, there's a box that says "Follow by Email" above it. If the blog/discussion thing is going to work, people should probably put their emails in here so that you get notified when stuff is happening on there - so PLEASE DO THIS! (Think of poor George!!)!!
I'll answer a few so you all feel bad if nobody responds :P.
ReplyDelete(1) I like Hal. I relate to him from the get-go. Mario stands out, too.
(2) I think I already said something about this, but "CAGE III - Free Show" actually made me tear up a little (don't judge). To me, the plot of this one (in which Death runs a carnival show in which spectators pay to watch performers "undergo unspeakable degradation so grotesquely compelling that the spectators' eyes become larger and larger until the spectators themselves are transformed into gigantic eyeballs in chairs, while on the other side, Life invites spectators to undergo unspeakable depredations in order to watch people slowly turn into giant eyeballs) - is both extremely tragic and extremely relevant to the modern world in a way that makes my soul hurt.
(3) The scene that's gotten my goat the most so far is the one in which Kate Gompert asks the doctor for shock therapy (p 68-78). I'm really interested in the failings of the mental healthcare system, and I think that this is a really tragic fact: that inevitably, the people who end up caring for mentally ill people will never, and can never, empathize with the people they're treating. The isolation in this scene is really cutting, but in a really good (I think?) way.
Your turn!
Oops - I was answering 5, not 3.
Delete