The Anti-Climax

[thisnewday]

 Well, I'm just back from my long-awaited, much-anticipated book club meeting on the subject of Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, and about half the group, including the moderator, hadn't read it and the half that did said that they'd struggled.

One bright spot was a retired English teacher, who had read Dalloway as part of his Master's program at Syracuse University, and he was very supportive and encouraging of those who had struggled, offering tips about how he had navigated the book's narrative complexities while coping with the pressures of his program..

I was able to share some insights as well, based in part on my reading of the Alexandra Harris biography. One of the gals who sat across from me said that one night she'd made up her mind to "just get it done" and had sat for two hours and read straight through to the end of it.

I told her that if I'd sat for two hours reading Virginia Woolf I'd have filled my pockets with rocks and walked into the river afterwards. Which got a laugh from the group.

Anyway, with that part of "The Woolf Project" now over, I'm finding that I can once again breath without extra medication, lol. And, since I've already read the next two club selections, I'm gonna relax and read the rest of my Virginia Woolf "collection" at my leisure.

Well, maybe not the "relax" part, because I'm not sure that's possible with Virginia Woolf...

LPK
Dreamwidth
9.28.2017

Comments

[rosegardenfae]

Oh how I enjoyed your comment about walking into the river. You must have been the highlight of the evening.

[thisnewday]

Thanks, not sure I was "all that" but did manage to lighten things up a bit, here and there. While there were a few interesting points made about the book, so much of it was about how difficult Woolf's style is, etc., etc. All of which kind of puzzled me because they seem to have a system whereby the group chooses the books for future meetings. But I didn't ask the obvious question and I haven't been there long enough to know if that was the process when "Dalloway" was chosen. In retrospect, I wish I had done more to steer the talk towards some specific examples of, say, the poetry and humor in the book but I really didn't prepare adequately to do that. Kind of thought that was the moderator's job but also assumed better preparation/participation by the members. I'd say that next time I'll know better but highly doubt that we'll see anything like this in the future. Hope you and yours have a great evening...L

[rosegardenfae]

Your experience reminds me why I no longer get involved in groups. My kids are always saying, "Get out more, it will be good for you." Yet, when I do, I find myself unsatisfied with the slipshod ways things are run and a general apathy/ignorance in other participants. But, I've always been like that, and in the way back days ended up becoming the group leader. (Eek I sound like an elitist snob.) Totally no desire to do that now.

I'm assuming the next book hasn't been chosen yet?

[thisnewday]

"Get out more, it will be good for you." While no one has said that to me, it's something I've thought myself. And then, at one point yesterday, I found myself thinking, "WTF am I doing here?"

And I don't think it was necessarily about the quality of the experience, it was just me being me, never the "social butterfly," to borrow a recently-used image, lol.

But I am hoping that yesterday's disaster was an abberration and I think, based on the circumstances and on the previous meeting that I'd been to, it probably was. I guess we'll see.

As for the elitist thing, naw. We've gotta have leaders and we've gotta have standards. If not in the White House, certainly in our book clubs, lol...