“The Outsider” by Albert Camus (May 5, 2021)

 There was a good turnout for dinner at The All Nations before book group started. It was nice to have a bit of extra time to talk and socialise, though really that’s a lot of what happens during an ordinary book group meeting.

There wasn’t a lot of love for Witi Ihimaera's Whale Rider. To me it just seemed run through a checklist of topics where the protagonist was shown to be woke, meeting his cousins in Kings Cross and seeing them in drag and while it worried his companion it was fine with him, seeing the racial prejudice directed against him and others by the family he stayed with in New Guinea, the environmental issues, it just all seemed a bit pat. Tom noticed that none of the characters developed through the story – they were all the same with the exception of the grandfather who came to see that instead of holding his granddaughter in disdain because she was a girl, she had worthy character traits.

I liked the use of the Maori language throughout and the strength of the family connections between the characters in the book was really interesting but perhaps a bit didactic.

We had the feeling that it might be a book that was really aimed at children and that it wasn’t really aimed at an adult audience, though I also wondered if coming after Toni Morrison’s Beloved if anything wasn’t going to be a disappointment.

For our next book we’re reading another Nobel prize winner’s book, The Outsider by Albert Camus. See you at the All Nations on May 5.

“Whale Rider” - Witi Ihimaera (Mar 3, 2021)

[I’m writing this some time after the meeting]

What a book! Toni Morrison’ s Beloved is an amazing excursion into another world, filled with nuance, horror and oppression. The discussion in book group was really energetic with people picking out one part of the book after another.

There were parts of the book that really stuck in my mind: the scene where the slaves were locked in their shallow pits in the soil all chained together while the rain teemed down until the walls started collapsing. Have to pull themselves out all together knowing that if one were to die, they would all perish because of the chain. Tugging and pulling on the chain to communicate and using the chain itself to pull out those who couldn’t get out themselves. There’s an amazing metaphor for using the instrument of oppression to set them free.

Myself and others had trouble through the book in keeping track of which character was which. I wonder whether Morrison had done that deliberately, a way of breaking these peoples’ identities so that they were less like individuals and more like objects, just possessions.

I was also shocked that the characters in the book had become so broken that they unleashed acts on each other that were like their masters’. They became their own enemies.

There was agreement that Morrison had been awarded a Nobel prize with good reason, I haven’t read any of her other work but I thought this book was a masterpiece. Beautifully written, deeply challenging.

After some to-ing and fro-ing at the end of the meeting, the first candidate was put aside because people felt it was too new and would be hard to find. We settled instead on Whale Rider by Witi Ihimaera, a NZ author.

Next meeting is at The All Nations on Mar 3, 2021!

“Beloved” - Toni Morrison (Feb 3, 2021)

Back again at The All Nations this month and it’s starting to feel a bit more like the new normal after so many months in lockdown. It was a good turnout and it was great being able to sit outside in the beer garden.

Our book was Notes From Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky  one of his first works. Noone seemed to care for it as a book much. Every now and then it would find its stride and the prose and dialogue would be engaging, a lot of the rest of the time it was just lots of words on the page that I felt I had to wade through. Interestingly, Richard listened to the audiobook and felt that the author was really into the story and made it very good to listen to. I had wondered whether maybe something had been lost in translation.

We then reverted to form and spent an enormous amount of time discussing which book to read next. There was a lot of talk about reading another of Dostoevsky’s books, The Brothers Karamazov, which are apparently much better but they all fall well outside the length limit. We eventually decided to go back to recent topic and decided on Toni Morrison’s Beloved. I’m looking forward to it, she’s a Nobel prizewinner no less!

See you at The All Nations on Feb 3, 2021!

“Notes From Underground” by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Dec 2, 2020)

It was an eerie experience rolling up to the All Nations last night after such a long break between book group meetings. As I was locking up my bike, I said to Edward that it felt almost a bit naughty being out in public to catch up with people.

Even entering the pub had a very different feel to it. We were asked to scan our drivers’ licences in and leave our phone numbers so they could contact us if necessary. On the chit that they gave us, someone noticed that they gave themselves permission to contact us with marketing material. No opportunity left untaken …

Rohan had made a booking (and coincidentally was having a birthday) and we were seated in the dining room I think to spread people out; I would have preferred being outside. Everyone seemed so excited to see each other — well, anyone they didn’t live with — that there was constant chatting, a good deal of it about the US election. We eventually rearranged the tables to make it a bit more conducive to talking as a whole group and got on with talking about the book.

The book we had read, We Have Always Lived In This Castle by Shirley Jackson, was great and prompted all kinds of discussion about the different aspects of it, an insight into a broken mind and how the little rituals are used to make sense and somehow influence the world, however futile that might be. The destruction that she has wrought on the family is mindblowing, yet she has no remorse. She senses that her cousin Charles coming to visit to get his hands on their money will shatter her world and possibly take away her precious sister Constance, she acts again.

Constance is such a strange character: she is utterly compliant, happily cooperating with every demand, to make uncle Julian a lunch of his choosing, cleaning the house each week for regular visitors who are barely tolerated. It’s only when she seems to loosely team up with Charles that she questions her role in the house. After Merricat’s last great act though, she just seems to slump into her sister’s mania and they take up new roles in the burnt shell of a house.

There were questions about whether Merricat and Constance were in fact the same person, mashed together in Merricat’s broken mind. I didn’t think that was right because there were other characters in the story that referenced them separately. I do think that the nursery rhyme that the neighbourhood kids jeered as they saw her was internal to Merricat though, convincing her how she detested them and they her.

The book was fantastic really. Everyone really enjoyed it and talked about it enthusiastically. Highly recommended. Thanks Mark for suggesting it. The background to the author’s life was similarly shocking, dying at 47, addicted to amphetamines, alcoholic, morbidly obese and agoraphobic. A sad end for a great talent.

There was the usual long and circuitous journey to find the next book but we settled on a classic, Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes From Underground.

I’m hoping we’ll be back at the All Nations on December 2. See you there!

“We Have Always Lived In This Castle” by Shirley Jackson (Nov 4, 2020)

It was a wide-ranging and fast moving book group meeting, starting off with a crazy discussion about the merits of cauliflower steaks and whether any vegetable is better boiled than baked. Yes, really …

The book discussion moved amongst a number of themes that were explored in the book. A layered story of the protagonist’s descent into addiction and in spite of the people around him who liked him and tried to help, he was really unable to stop or even check the rate of descent.

There was also a lot of commentary about social strata and how that impacted peoples’ relationships. The African man who went to live in France with his white wife and how he was treated there. He talks of going to a dinner party where the hosts query whether he’s from the French Congo or the Belgian Congo, as if the nationality of the colonists defines who he is.

I think people liked the book. There were a lot of funny moments in it (like the pissing competition) which were really nicely drawn and involving. The “bicycle chicken” (bbq’ed) and “TV chicken” (microwaved) bought from the street vendor with manioc gave a sense of life in a small African town.

The discussion then moved onto quite a long talk between everybody about Trump, covid, conspiracy theories and the US voting system. It was great having Matt along because he has a lot of first-hand experience there.

We managed to decide the next book relatively smartly thanks to Mark coming along with a book he though would be a good choice and which we ultimately decided to read next. There were a couple of alternatives thrown up though, Palace of Dreams by Ishmael Kadare, and Caste by Isabel Wilkerson.

See you on November 4 for our next meeting!

“Broken Glass” by Alain Mabanckou (Oct 7 2020)

Another Zoom meeting with – I’m delighted to say – one new person (Matt) and one person returning after a long absence (Michael). Welcome and welcome back!

Since our last meeting, Quinn had had a significant birthday so we all sang happy birthday which, as happened last time, is a complete debacle over Zoom. Nonetheless, there’s a lovely sentiment that goes with it.

Our book, Go Tell It On The Mountain, by James Baldwin was a very hot topic of discussion. I found it a very difficult book to read, full of violence, oppression and stifling social roles. There’s a lot of biblical references in the books and I think if my bible knowledge was better then I could have linked some of the characters’ names to deeper connections in there. The biblical links run much deeper than that in the book and in many ways, this is the story of the struggle between father and son, as well as a less-than-successful redemption from sin . While the prose was sometimes a bit stilted, the dialogue was fantastic – it had a real ring of authenticity and rose off the page.

There’s a heavy emphasis on the contradiction in the church, marking out starkly the difference between the salvation that’s offered but also the power trip that’s granted to the elders. The hypocrisy between the actions of the ministers contrasted against what they demand from their congregation is also held up plainly. The ability of the minister to grant himself absolution from the sins that he’s committed are quite something, especially after he’s been so harsh on himself about his transgressions for so long.

There were a couple of documentaries recommended about James Baldwin but one seemed of particular note,I Am Not Your Negro.

We need to improve the process of picking a new book. It was over half an hour of going around in circles but we eventually settled on Broken Glass by Alain Mabanckou. Coincidentally, Mabanckou also wrote a biography of James Baldwin, Lettre à Jimmy.

I don’t know whether we’ll still be in lock down for the next book group meeting. It’ll be a funny thing to actually get back to seeing people face to face again.

“Go Tell It On The Mountain” by James Baldwin (Sep 2, 2020)

Even though we were again meeting via Zoom, it was a very lively discussion about last month’s book, The White Girl by Tony Birch. Everyone seemed to quite like it and it was a real eye opener to see the way that aboriginals were treated and the whole permit system which restricted their movement and the way that the police officiers in the district just seemed to own them.

That said, I thought that the characters lacked much in the way of depth, which is something that I’ve noticed in the historical fiction books that we’ve covered in the past, eg, The Secret River by Kate Grenville.

Edward spoke about how his old family car had come onto the market at some extraordinary price (£75k). It had been lovingly restored since it had been his father’s. There are pictures here https://www.jonathan-wood.co.uk/for-sale/1934-rolls-royce-20-25-sports-saloon/

It had been Grant’s 50th brithday only two days before so we all sang Happy Birthday to him which, as you can imagine over Zoom, was a complete debacle but the sentiment was lovely.

There was an extended discussion about the Chinese classes at RHS and how after some lobbying they will now be offering it at year 12 level.

The next book was settled on fairly smartly despite an attempted Gerald Murnane insurgence from Rohan. Instead, we settled on Go Tell It On The Mountain by James Baldwin. It felt like a fitting choice, coming on the back of an indigenous Australian story, “black lives matter” and recent death of John Lewis.

I suspect our next meeting will be via Zoom on September 2. I’ll send out an invite on the WhatsApp channel closer to the time. Let me know if you need to be added!