Jonah’s Gourd Vine by Zora Neale Hurston, 229 pages.
We read this classic novel for our June Big Book discussion. Dr. April Langley, from the University of Missouri, Columbia, led the first discussion, and it was a lot of fun. The fifty or so readers talked about the characters in the book, mostly; with each table choosing a character with whom to identify. In the beginning of the book, the main character, John (first introduced as John Buddy) leaves the home he has lived in with his loving mother, his adoring siblings and his abusive stepfathater. He is 16, and he promises his mother that he will reform his (at this point not so) wild ways. Throughout the book he tries to be a good man, and can, in fact, be a very good man when he listens to his wife Lucy, but he cannot to seem to help but stray; he is addicted to his dalliances with other women, from Mehaly, whom he meets on his first day back at Pearson’s plantation, to the young Ora, with whom he spends his last night. John's weakness haunts him his whole life and he cannot mend the fabric of his life.
I blogged about our Wednesday night discussion in June here, and here.
We read this classic novel for our June Big Book discussion. Dr. April Langley, from the University of Missouri, Columbia, led the first discussion, and it was a lot of fun. The fifty or so readers talked about the characters in the book, mostly; with each table choosing a character with whom to identify. In the beginning of the book, the main character, John (first introduced as John Buddy) leaves the home he has lived in with his loving mother, his adoring siblings and his abusive stepfathater. He is 16, and he promises his mother that he will reform his (at this point not so) wild ways. Throughout the book he tries to be a good man, and can, in fact, be a very good man when he listens to his wife Lucy, but he cannot to seem to help but stray; he is addicted to his dalliances with other women, from Mehaly, whom he meets on his first day back at Pearson’s plantation, to the young Ora, with whom he spends his last night. John's weakness haunts him his whole life and he cannot mend the fabric of his life.
I blogged about our Wednesday night discussion in June here, and here.
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