In one of the all-time most famous works of classical music (The “Moonlight” Sonata), Beethoven cryptically dedicates the tune to a Countess Guilietta Guicciardi, whom he taught piano to. Julie, as Morrisroe re-nicknames her, did not leave behind much in history, but as detailed in the Author’s Note, she likely had some form of romantic relationship with the Ludwig van Beethoven. Morrisroe imagines this relationship and Julie’s life as a whole in this work of…
This story is founded historically off of events around the Western European front of World War II. It enticingly employs a technique called “triple narrative” in which the plot is told from three perspectives across varying timelines. Altogether, it mixes together several thematic tales – of love, of the horrors of war, of family, of Jewish and Christian identity, of women overcoming obstacles, and of the power of the individual in authoritarian regimes. Runyan generally…
Franz Kafka lived in Germany in the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries He is most well-known for his work The Metamorphosis, in which the protagonist grotesquely wakes up one day as a giant cockroach. The work of this review (The Castle) was started and left unfinished in 1922, two years before Kafka’s death in 1924. It was only published posthumously in 1926 – against Kafka’s expressed wishes in his…
I read this book as a part of a book study led by McRay (the author himself). These stories, mostly from Israel-Palestine but also from Northern Ireland and South Africa, chronicle the difficulties we humans have in securing peace among each other. They tell of how each side of really difficult conflicts can come to live peacefully and non-violently with the other. McRay is not the subject here. Rather, he is the interviewer. He has…
Set in the 1950s, this story resides in the literary area of fictionalized memoir (though written about a family member’s experiences) or historical fiction. Erdrich writes about the struggle of a Native American tribe (the Chippewas) to retain the land on their reservation. This land was deeded to them in perpetuity by the United States government. However, U.S. Congress sought to disregard (discard?) these treaties and to take over autonomous land. The fight to overcome…
Stone’s protagonist is super-smart student Justyce in his senior year at a high school in Atlanta. Thing is, he’s black. As such, he was falsely arrested at the beginning of the novel. He and his best friend were shot after an incident of presumed racial profiling. His best friend died, and Justyce has to testify in the case against the shooter. Justyce also must deal with reverse racist issues. He falls in love with a…
This story begins as a tale following two girls coming-of-age while learning to overcome their need to be accepted, and it ends as a story of justice and triumph of the human spirit over circumstances. Over the way, its action leads the reader to confront the truth about the characters’ secrets and about her/his own life. Lindsey is working as a nanny for a summer about to begin her “real life” as a museum curator.…
This poem attempts to mark a great historical event in English history. It does so not by chronicling history but by celebrating the human spirit. King Alfred the Great, against all odds, defeated Danish invaders in the year 878. The Battle of Ethandune went a long way in establishing the constitutional unity of an English people. Chesterton, writing over a millennium later, sought to use his prodigious talents to excite the English people to embrace…
Hawthorne is known for his cataloging the Puritan history and culture of New England in fictionalized format. This volume of short stories does exactly that. Hawthorne writes tales about conscience and rebellion against the King of England, about the follies of financial success and the shortcomings of moral excess. I grew up in the American South in an evangelical home. The church taught me moral hand-wringing that allows me to relate to the characters in…
European and Western disillusionment with life was at a peak after World War I. The twentieth century was supposed to be humanity’s greatest; instead, it was full of greater ways (think, nerve gas, machine guns, and trench warfare) for humans to destroy themselves. In this context, Kafka wrote this novel, published only after his death. In this story of an everyman, the dilemma of Josef K. (or just K.) raises the question of what we…