Chapter One Book Store

Marjorie A. Crawford Literature Seminar

2009-2010

Sponsored by the Bitterroot Public Library

 

The Bitterroot Public Library is pleased to sponsor this literature seminar, making it free and open to the public.  These lectures will be given by Shawn Wathen, and we welcome the return of Joni Lodmell for the January lectures.

 

October 6 & 8.  .  Street of Crocodiles  by Bruno Schulz.  The Street of Crocodiles in the Polish city of Drohobych is a street of memories and dreams where recollections of Schulz's uncommon boyhood and of the eerie side of his merchant family's life are evoked in a startling blend of the real and the fantastic

 

November 10 & 12.  .  Jakob von Gunten by Robert Walser.  The book is a young man's inquisitive and irreverent account of life in what turns out to be the most uncanny of schools. It is the work of an outsider artist, a writer of uncompromising originality and disconcerting humor.

 

January 12 & 14.  The Lay of the Land by Richard Ford.  An astonishing meditation on America today and filled with brilliant insights, The Lay of the Land is a magnificent achievement from one of the most celebrated chroniclers of our time.

 

February 9 & 11.  The Hive by Camilo Jose Cela.  The Hive presents a panoramic view of the lower-middle class in post-civil war Spain. Readers are introduced to over a hundred characters through a series of starkly rendered interlocking vignettes.

 

March 16 & 18.  Everything Flows by Vasily Grossman. Ivan Grigoryevich, is released after thirty years in the Soviet camps and has to struggle to find a place for himself in an unfamiliar world. This story, however, provides only the bare bones of a work written with prophetic urgency and in the shadow of death.

 

April 13 & 15.  Seven Nights by Jorge Luis Borges. Borges delivered these seven lectures in Buenos Aires in 1977; attendees were treated to Borges' erudition on the following topics: Dante's "The Divine Comedy," Buddhism, poetry, the Kabbalah, and blindness—a feast served by one of the most original minds in 20^th century literature.

 

Classes will be held in the basement meeting room of the Bitterroot Public Library (west entrance) from 9:30 to 11:30 am.  Books are available at Chapter One Book Store.  The Bitterroot Public Library will have a limited number of copies available for checkout.  Call 363-5220 or 363-1670 for more information

Irene and Nate Stanley are living a quiet and contented life with their two children, Bliss and Shep, on their family farm in southern Illinois when Nate suddenly announces he's been offered a job as a deputy sheriff in Oregon. Irene fights her husband. She does not want to uproot her family and has deep misgivings about the move. Nevertheless, the family leaves, and they are just settling into their life in Oregon's high desert when the unthinkable happens. Fifteen-year-old Shep is shot and killed during an apparent robbery in their home. The murderer, a young mechanic with a history of assault, robbery, and drug-related offenses, is caught and sentenced to death.
Dramatic, wrenching, and ultimately uplifting, " The Crying Tree" is an unforgettable story of love and redemption, the unbreakable bonds of family, and the transformative power of forgiveness.