photo via sarah.of.a.lesser.god
This feature (for now in the custody of sarah.of.a.lesser.god) is our way of sharing those book titles, both fiction and nonfiction, that have been standouts in recent reading, and hopefully getting some from our readers in return. The focus is primarily, but not necessarily exclusively, on books concerning women and feminism, and/or written by female authors.
My Pick: Mother of God: A History of the Virgin Mary by Miri Rubin. This was just published earlier this year, and I spent the past week reading it. Rubin does a terrific job illuminating the earliest writings and polemics surrounding the Virgin Mary, then tracing the history of Mary’s significance up until about 1600 C.E. One thing that Rubin does not explicitly mention, but that I certainly noticed, was that — surprise! — almost all these scholarly tracts on Mary were written by men. Rubin is refreshingly aware of how gender norms and misogyny have affected views of Mary, whether she’s noting that “Images of Mary are always affected by contemporary ideals of female beauty,” or quoting anti-Marian screeds that say Jesus had to be defiled by being carried in a woman’s “polluted” womb. Mother of God also contains excerpts of the writings of women like Hildegard of Bingen, a twelfth-century German nun who wrote famed musical compositions celebrating Mary, something that I found particularly interesting in terms of how Hildegard played the story of Mary off that of Eve. The featured illustrations are gorgeous and occasionally heartbreaking, particularly the work of 20th century American artist Delilah Montoya, who illustrates how Mary was used as a powerful instrument to spread Christianity throughout Central America and reminds the viewer of “the historical context of oppression and violence.” Above all, the book is a terrific study of how Mary’s role in Christianity served to bring the importance of a woman’s “purity” to new heights.
So, having put in my two cents, what is everyone else reading and recommending these days? And what was the best book you read all year?
Currently reading: D-Day, by Anthony Beevor. I love war books & films, and after reading Stalingrad it made sense to move onto D-Day – they’re the 2 battles I already knew the most about, so I’m enjoying learning more.
Best book of the year – I read about 5 new books, and the clear winner is The Secret Life Of Oscar Wao. It won the Pulitzer or Nobel or something, and it really is just that good.
Currently I’m enjoying “Redemption Song”, a biography of Joe Strummer. It’s very comprehensive and insightful.
Have the Dexter omnibus lined up next as beach reading (yes, it’s summer here!)
I’ve just started Donna Tartt’s The Little Friend (after enjoying The Secret History so much a few years ago).
Favourite books this year:
* The Slap (Christos Tsiolkas)
* The Greatest Show On Earth (Richard Dawkins)
* Breath (Tim Winton)
* Wolf Hall (Hilary Mantel)
* American Rust (Philipp Meyer)
I took a gander at Wolf Hall earlier this month, but alas I am not a fiction reader and I went back to my nonfiction ways after a few chapters. However, I know so many of my friends loved Oscar Wao and I may give that one a try. As for Dawkins, I have his Ancestor’s Tale, and it’s one of the seventy(!) books still unread in my apartment.
omg Sarah.o.a.l.g this book sounds like just what I love.
I just finished Chris Caldwell’s Reflections on the Revolution in Europe and I would love to hear some criticism of it.
I have only just started reading The Family by Jeff Sharlet after seeing him on Rachel Maddow so often this year, and it is every bit as chilling as you might imagine. Excellent so far.
I just read Kate Atkinson’s “Behind the Scenes at the Museum” and was absolutely knocked out by it. Another book I liked was a book of short stories by Tamar Yellin called “Tales of the Ten Lost Tribes”. I’m about to finish the first volume of the collected stories of Shashi Deshpande, a contemporary Indian writer. They’re very much concerned with the status and lives of women and are well told and moving.
I’m in the middle of that feminist classic The Feminine Mystique. It’s really good so far, and quite eye-opening to this young feminist who knows shockingly little about recent history. However, I’m reading it alongside a series of essays dealing with race in the USA, which makes for a nice balance, as I’m finding that Mystique is sometimes frustratingly focused on middle-class white women. I keep finding myself going “but what about the lower classes?? What about women of colour?? But I realize that that’s not what Betty Friedan’s focus was in writing the book.
This looks like a very intriguing book, and one I will definitely check out soon.
My recent move (and new train commute) has instilled a much-needed new habit: reading on the bus to the train station, and then reading for the first half of the ride when the train is crowded and working on a laptop isn’t terribly feasible. As a result I was able to actually get some reading done in the last four months:
–Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain (a book I had been meaning to read FOREVER, and finally sat down and did so–and I thoroughly enjoyed it)
–North & South by Elizabeth Gaskell–another book I had meant to read forever, and also sat down and read in the last few weeks.
–I also re-read Emma for the first time since college, and I nearly howled in public on several occasions thanks to the lines given to Mrs. Elton, Mr. Woodhouse, and of course Miss Bates.
I’m now scouring my bookshelves for some titles I’ve neglected before buying any more books, and one of my New Year’s resolutions is to get a NYPL card so I’m not tempted to run to Amazon or Barnes & Noble when I want a book.
JJ – Both of Donna Tartt’s books are so good! But The Secret History stayed with me for so long after I read it! I still look at it longingly on my shelf. I need to reread it soon.
I am currently reading Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder, author of Mountains Beyond Mountains. It is excellent. I’m only about 1/3 of the way through but we are thinking of picking it for our freshman common reader and I really hope we do! It is about an African man who travels to NYC from Burundi and all the challenges he faces. Beautifully written and a real page turner. I think our students will love it.
One other thing about Mother of God is that it’s about 400 pages, so it’s neither a quick and shallow read nor a ridiculously weighty tome that’s a slog to get through.
@Jenny: Yeah, Friedan’s audience seemed at once narrow and broad, something that was designed to reach “the masses” while also thinking that those same masses fit into a certain type that was not all-inclusive.
@JJ: I absolutely loved Wolf Hall .
I’ve read a bunch of stuff while in India–I’ll write more about that later–but I really loved Richard Russo’s new novel That Old Cape Magic . I LOLed multiple times, and found myself writing down some of the lines in my “great quotes” notebook because they were so wonderful.
I just finished Nick Hornby’s latest, Juliet, naked. I’m not really a fan of Hornby, but I quite liked this one, it was a good read to get me through Christmas
And now I’m reading Max Havelaar: or the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company, by Multatuli. This is a classic in Dutch literature and has been really important for the perspective on the Dutch colonies and the way the local inhabitants were treated by the Dutch. It was written in the nineteenth century by a former government official who wrote it as an ‘accusation’ against the government in the Dutch East Indies.
My favorites of 2009:
-A book by the Danish author Jens Christian Grondahl, that hasn’t been translated to English yet (Danish title Den tid det tager)
- The love children by Marilyn French
- The other hand by Chris Cleave
- Disguise by Hugo Hamilton
- Snoop. What your stuff says about you by Sam Gosling
- All is quiet on the western front by Erich Maria Remarque.
I’m not a great fiction reader, but I did return to some fiction this year, amidst the non-fiction.
My picks for 2009, all of the Stieg Larsson books from the Millenium trilogy – I really really really enjoyed them.
I also reread “The Handmaid’s Tale”.
At uni, I did a philosophy course in American Pragmatism – so I picked up some books written by Richard Rorty, and started to get through them this summer. I find it interesting the differences between James et al with the neo-pragmatists especially on the issue of metaphysics.
Ah, sarah, I must go out and get this book immediately! I *love* the Virgin Mary and have done my own research on her role throughout history and have our lady of Guadalupe beside my bed, and I’m applying to grad school right now to, in party, study her significance.
sorry to gush, but I am just so damn excited about this book. haha.
oops. ‘in party’ should have been ‘in part’ but i like that typo.