Anniversaries Readalong: August 28 – September 3, 1967

47 thoughts on “<em>Anniversaries</em> Readalong: August 28 – September 3, 1967”

1. August 28

   This entry is almost all about Jerichow except a small section presumably spoken by Gesine’s mother at some point, about Louise nee Utecht, the “sheep”. I will be watching out for more of that story.

2. In this short segment we learn quite a bit about Jerichow, and, consequently, about it’s inhabitants, who were not well-to-do, unless they were of the nobility. We get a glimpse of Cresspahl, who, it seems, should just keep going.

   This segment also underlines, for me, that reading this little by little is a great way to go through this massive book. Some of these kinds of sections, the first time, started to blur as I read them. Here, when I’m only reading a few paragraphs, I can keep my focus and get more out of it.

3. I noted earlier my concern about how much of the story was jumping to other years and not sticking to the idea that the sections of each date are telling us about that day. So far it has not really bothered me as there often has been at least some sliver of connection made to the given day of the entry. But not so here. This time we just get numbers of the dead in Vietnam and then abruptly switch to Jerichow in 1931 for the rest of the section. This section could have been placed pretty much anywhere and has nothing at all to do with August 28, 1967. So while the section is fine as a piece of writing it was still a disappointment.
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   To be clear, my objection is in creating a premise for how the book is structured and then, in the first few pages of the book, seeming to set aside the premise to do something different. If Johnson does not want it to be a strict telling of the specific days of the year starting in August 1967, that’s fine, but then don’t structure the book with dated entries for sections and don’t call the book “From a Year in the Life of Gesine Cresspahl” in the title. It’s turning out not to be from a year of her life, but from her whole life going back to her parents’ meeting. As with plays and films with dialogue that is written only to give the viewer some expository background, there are better and worse ways to handle these not-of-the-date sections. For today’s entry, it doesn’t even look like Johnson tried.
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   We get more of the shifting narrative voice happening late in this section in a way I still don’t really like. But I have figured out a way of viewing these shifts that makes them tolerable rather than just confusing. I suppose I will need to do the same sort of thing about the “year in the life” idea. I have already tried the idea that maybe these jumps to other times happen because Gesine happens to be thinking about these past events on the given date. That worked very seamlessly for the August 20 comparison of Baltic beaches with the Jersey shore. It doesn’t really work well at all today.

4. I was thinking that it would be quite difficult for me to take in if reading normally rather than a small section per day, so your observation of how it blurred together on your first reading, Trevor, is welcome.

5. August 29

   We learn about the vicinity of Gesine’s place of work. It is strange to read about the existing skyscrapers when at the time of Johnson’s writing, the World Trade Center was planned but not yet built. I can’t work out what building is being described. I would guess it is not the Chrysler building because he seems to be making a point about the uniformity of multiple buildings, of which this is one.

6. While I recognize what David is saying, my reaction is not one of disappointment. I don’t mind the passages that spend most of their time in the past. It’s one of the ways this book emphasizes how so much time — due to memory but also due to culture and identity and just the things that live on the edge of our mind as we go through the days — can be encompassed in just one day. I agree sections like August 28 aren’t, therefore, as impressive as ones like the opening section, but in the totality I think it works. In fact, I think if Johnson tried to always come up with ways to flow back and forth and tie it explicitly to the day in 1967 or 1968 the technique would become the focus and, likely, tiresome. Best if some days focus on the past.

   I do like August 29 for its descriptions of the building and the space. I also like the aside that show disgust with the way the Nazi leader gets to be buried with honor, his only crime being to incite the murder of Negroes and Jews. Johnson is establishing so much so subtly in these early sections.

7. I do want to say that if you’re falling behind, don’t feel discouraged. Please feel very welcome to bring whatever thoughts you have to the table whenever you are able.

8. I’m finding that the discipline and pleasure of reading day-by-day is an excellent new way to read. And perfect for this book. Pieces need to be put together and, this way, I take the time to do that. For instance, the profile of the town of Jerichow is now powerfully present in my reading. So much I would miss if I read in my usual forward march. (Though, of course, there’s lots of pleasure for me in that kind of reading too.) Reading people’s comments is an interesting endeavor that is adding a lot, whether I find myself nodding in total agreement or scratching my head at an interpretation. This morning the title — Anniversaries — finally really registered. I am thinking about the 10-year anniversary on August 31 of my mother’s death at age 95. And, in Gesine’s life, August 1931 marks the time her father first saw her mother. Re: August 27 Sunday reading of NYTimes. Anyone else think the reader might have been Marie rather than Gesine? It seemed like a precocious child’s take on things.

9. This day’s entry (the 29th) inverts the usual pattern of brief news before going to something else. I suspect the reason for that is to place the description of Gesine’s New York right next to the description we just got of her father’s Jerichow. It’s a brief tale of two cities comparison.
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   Another element I first noticed in the entry for Sunday the 27th that we get again is a bitter sarcasm in how some of the news and news reporting is done. That narration on Sunday suggested a deep dissatisfaction with how (or even the fact that) Stalin’s daughter was being presented in the newspaper. Today we get this gem: “The slain Nazi will be permitted a burial of honor at a national military cemetery, since his only crime was incitement to the murder of Negroes and Jews.” The way the section ends with the mention of Mahalia Jackson being hospitalized (she had a “cold and fever”, the news report said) to highlight how much more serious news was overlooked in the press reminded me of a Depeche Mode song. Here’s a section of the lyrics to “New Dress”
   .
   Jet airliner shot from sky
   Famine horror, millions die
   Earthquake terror figures rise
   Princes Di is wearing a new dress

10. The past two days have really stuck out to me as giving special weight to numbers. 335 casualties in Vietnam, 2151 inhabitants of Jerikow, at least 1 million American housewife alcoholics, only 2 killed in Vietnam get their name is the paper because they’re from the state of New York, “as thought the exact total counted for nothing really compared to the hundred and ninety-five million citizens of America.”

    I also noticed that her habit of reading the paper every day has not gone unnoticed by her coworkers.

11. Gesine’s daughter appears to share the newspapers’ concern for Mahalia Jackson (Aug 30 entry). At least I assume it is her daughter – who decides to assume the name of an imagined daughter/spouse of James Fenimore Cooper, who she has already hailed as the greatest.

    The ‘she uses British slang’ line tickled me a little as I hadn’t noticed that as standing out in her letter – since as a Brit it read naturally to me!

12. August 30 – a very short but loaded entry, full of intrigue. Glad to see Louise mentioned again.

13. I agree, Colette, this is a short passage but it really adds intrigue to the book, just when we might have wondered if all we’d get were descriptions of towns and of the past. Here we come back to the present: Gesine getting home late from work, Marie leaving her a note (and David is right — she is an extremely intelligent young girl, to the point it might become unbelievable if we want hard reality, which I don’t) and asking questions that might be a bit uncomfortable.

    I again want to try to express how much I love how this book can be so internal. Here we are with Gesine, but Gesine isn’t fully present. These are things she’s reading, but the things she is reading suggest some of the ins and outs of her life, which isn’t all about the past or the newspaper. And, I don’t think it’s a spoiler to suggest, the past is a much more explicit part of the present in a way we’ll understand later. I think David will appreciate it!

    From Bee above:

    Anyone else think the reader might have been Marie rather than Gesine? It seemed like a precocious child’s take on things.

    Bee, I think that is possible but perhaps not likely. Marie inherits a lot of Gesine’s views on racism, which I think are very forward for their time, and I think it comes from Gesine’s own asides. Marie’s activity, perhaps even at this early time in the book, is a lot more blunt. Then again, her letter to her mom suggests she has a knack for brief cuts (she’d do so well on Twitter).

    Anway, this is an exciting short section because it introduces so much, including D.E.!

14. I agree, Colette, this is a short passage but it really adds intrigue to the book, just when we might have wondered if all we’d get were descriptions of towns and of the past. Here we come back to the present: Gesine getting home late from work, Marie leaving her a note (and David is right — she is an extremely intelligent young girl, to the point it might become unbelievable if we want hard reality, which I don’t) and asking questions that might be a bit uncomfortable.

    I again want to try to express how much I love how this book can be so internal. Here we are with Gesine, but Gesine isn’t fully present. These are things she’s reading, but the things she is reading suggest some of the ins and outs of her life, which isn’t all about the past or the newspaper. And, I don’t think it’s a spoiler to suggest, the past is a much more explicit part of the present in a way we’ll understand later. I think David will appreciate it!

    From Bee above:

    Anyone else think the reader might have been Marie rather than Gesine? It seemed like a precocious child’s take on things.

    Bee, I think that is possible but perhaps not likely. Marie inherits a lot of Gesine’s views on racism, which I think are very forward for their time, and I think it comes from Gesine’s own asides. Marie’s activity, perhaps even at this early time in the book, is a lot more blunt. Then again, her letter to her mom suggests she has a knack for brief cuts (she’d do so well on Twitter).

15. The 30th is a bit of a tantalizing entry. It adds more to the strangeness in this family of how people refer to each other, with Marie (Mary?) addressing Gesine by her first name. The postcards to “Miss C” from the 20th seem now definitely to have been from Marie. (I had been holding out on the possibility that they might have been from a friend of Marie’s.) We also now seem to have confirmation (if we needed it) that Gesine is not married to Marie’s father – she has twice been called “Miss” and her surname is her father’s, not a husband’s.

16. That Gesine was not married was made obvious in the first section. Even though the postcards she received were addressed to Miss C, the people in the house next door address her as Mrs Cresspahl.

17. I agree with Trevor (August 29, 2019 at 1:07 pm) about time, and one of the pleasures of the book is how well it shows that we never live purely in the present (or indeed mentally in one place). It’s “A Year in the Life of GC” rather than “Day by Day in the Life …”.
    While I’m on time, I’m trying to get the right speed: day by day is too slow for me, but don’t want to read too much ahead, and a slow pace is excellent for this book. Caught between and among times, like the characters.
    August 31: the intensity of the ‘relationship’ with the NYT, personified. I imagine there will be plenty of comment on this.

18. Colette, in a book where there has been much discussion about whose POV we are getting at various times and where the way characters are referred to is very odd and shifting I would say “obvious” is a bit strong. Marie (or is it Mary?) refers to her mother in ways that are extremely unusual – “Miss C”? I’ve never heard any child address her mother that way, so it calls into question whether this is a faithful report of Gesine’s name. And when Mary (Marie?) signs her note to her mother with a made-up name it further supports the idea that the names used might not fully reflect reality. In a more contemporary setting Gesine being known as “Miss Cresspahl” could indicate there was a marriage and then a divorce after which she took back her original surname, but that is less likely (I think) in the 1960s. But in the first section people referring to her as “Mrs.” is at least some reason to think she might be married. It would be odd for them to just assume she was married if she had not presented herself to them as married, especially when they see her postcards that are addressed to “Miss C”. And then there is the fact Gesine was travelling under a fake name in 1962 on a fake passport.
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    Let me put it this way: If we eventually get to a day where we are told “But, of course, ‘Gesine Cresspahl’ was not actually her name and Marie was not actually her daughter.” launching us into some sort of Mad Man-esqu Don Draper / Dick Whitman revelation, it would not surprise me at all. [NB – I have not read ahead at all and have no idea what actually happens later in the book, but if this comment turns out to be remarkably prescient, then yay me! :-) ]

19. August 31, 1967. The extended metaphor of The New York Times as aunt is quite masterfully done. The first part of the description really informs us more about the nature of “Aunties” in the world that Gesine grew up in. It gives us a bit of social history of Germany more than saying much about the newspaper. Then the description of the paper as aunt gets a lot more detailed in ways that probably tell us more about Gesine’s imagination than it does about the newspaper. And then there is a shift to a third section of very short paragraphs where the attributes of the newspaper as aunt take on more a role of praise for the nobility and importance of the paper. And then we get the last sentence, a rhetorical question, that makes us wonder if that praise is all deserved. The end is in keeping with some of the reservations already expressed several times about reporting in the paper. Very nicely done.
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    I wonder if Johnson was influenced at all in this metaphor with the fact that The New York Times has sometimes been called the “old gray lady”. Maybe.

20. David, I think you missed the point of the Miss / Mrs in the first section. It was about how the neighbours insisted on seeing her, as Irish Catholic, like themselves.

21. An Irish Catholic woman can be single. Remember: In the opening section we are not told that Gesine has a daughter at all, and even if we were told that we don’t know that she told the neighbours she has a child. (If she is concerned how they might judge her for being a single mother, she might tell them “the postcards are from my neice” or, making more sense of the “Miss C” salutation, “the postcards are from the child of one of my friends”. The reader has no basis in reading that section to think they would imagine she is married because she has a child, especially since we don’t have good reason yet to think she has a child. Or if we have a reason to suspect it, we don’t have good enough reason to think that must be the explanation. It’s still an open question at that point.

22. Well, I feel I know what was meant by it, but there doesn’t seem to be much point discussing it further.

23. Colette, I agree that now it seems pretty clear what was meant. I just think it was not always so clear. That’s one of the complex things about this book: Changing perspectives, changing perceptions of the characters, little mysteries being introduced along the way. As with how we might view anyone, sometimes we think we have a handle on some aspect of them and then it slips a bit. But August is now over, so on we go to September! I’m ready! (I think….)

24. Just one more comment on that, I hope. It was clear to me on day 0 because I understand what Irish Catholics would have wanted to think in 1967. It is not about what Gesine wanted them to think. She was bemused by it. Please don’t assume that things can only be deduced at the point that you are able to see them. It will be a long year if you continue to do that.

25. September 1st: It appears that Gesine has her hands full with both Marie and D.E., and perhaps especially as a combination.

26. Colette, here is what happened:
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    I said: “We also now seem to have confirmation (if we needed it) that Gesine is not married to Marie’s father – she has twice been called “Miss” and her surname is her father’s, not a husband’s.
    .
    You initiated a discussion with me by replying: ““That Gesine was not married was made obvious in the first section.”
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    I replied: “I would say “obvious” is a bit strong.” I then offered reasons for that view.
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    You added a comment about the Irish Catholic thing. I replied to that. Then you declared the whole conversation pointless to go on with. I briefly replied. Then you snapped back in and did decide it was worth replying again, but mostly just to state your annoyance.
    .
    I don’t understand why you seem to be angry that we disagree. (There seems to be a lot of that going on on this site these days.) I get the feeling that some people find any discussion of disagreements as if they are personal attacks rather than just discussing different points of view of the story – as if they are criticisms of the person who made the comment and not just criticisms of the comment itself. And yes, it will be a very long year if you continue to see things that way. I would suggest that if you don’t want to discuss disagreements then don’t engage people in them in the first place. It was, after all, you who came in in the first place to assert your disagreement with me. If disagreement triggers you this much, then just state your view and don’t reply to others. You can’t expect that you saying something contrary to what others say is ok and them replying to that is not ok.
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    From my point of view this was a constructive discussion of what the story is about and how best to understand it. I learned more about the story from our discussion From your point of view it seems to be a contentious battle of wills where you need to get the last word in, angrily declare the conversation over, and then pick it up again because I dared to respond with another comment. Life and reading is a lot more enjoyable if you take discussions of books to be about the books, not the egos of the people commenting about them. I got real value from your comments about the book in this discussion. You seem to have only gotten miffed that I would disagree with you. To each their own.
    .
    If it gives you any peace of mind, I won’t reply to any of your comments anymore unless you first reply to me. But if you do keep replying to me, as you have done here, you have to accept that I might respond and it might take the form of “I disagree because….”
    .
    .
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    I came here to comment on today’s entry, but suddenly that seems a lot less fun or interesting. But that’s ok. Tomorrow is another day. See you all then. Same Bat time. Same Bat channel.

27. Love the comparison of the New York Times to a maiden aunt: the glamorous, forceful one, rather than the sad or gentle spinster. And in today’s entry we discover that Gesine has a rich admirer from the home country (well, from the DDR). Marie seems to have taken to him, and it’s not quite clear to me yet why Gesine is not at all keen on him.

28. Marina, I was also curious about why Gesine is less interested in marriage than he is. His excessive drinking (probably alcoholism) is mentioned a number of times, which would be reason enough to be reticent. But we also at one point are told about “D. E.’s string of quick love affairs”, suggesting she might have doubts about his faithfulness. Then there is the previous comment in Marie’s note to Gesine suggesting that she might have another man she is interested in (“We have to do something about D. E. He doesn’t believe that you were in New Jersey alone … Were you in New Jersey alone?”) It could be any of these or something else entirely. Interesting.

29. September 2. For Gesine, a quiet Saturday morning in the park near her home on the Labour Day weekend. For me, a quiet Monday morning on my porch on Labour Day reading about Gesine and Mrs. Ferwalter, the newest character to arrive center stage. We know her name from Marie’s note to Gesine earlier (“Mrs. Ferwalter is mad at you or at me. She hasn’t called for a week.”). Mrs. Ferwalter’s daughter Rebecca, previously appeared on Marie’s list of her best friends. But now we get a full introduction. My first impression is I like her a lot and hope we get to see a lot more of her. But the big revelation of the day is learning about Gesine’s feelings of guilt over someone named “Gronberg” she says she “had to send … away.” What did you do, Gesine?

30. I must admit to looking up Gronberg in the ‘kleines adressbuch’ when I read this entry. I won’t spoil the surprise – but what I will say is that we will find out the answer …. in April next year.

    I am fascinated how this reading over a year project will work out – will the extensive cast of characters become more memorable this way, or, to take this example, will we get to April and find out we have forgotten that Gronberg was ever mentioned before.

31. fulcherkim, I have an electronic copy of the book and have converted a version of it as a word processor document so that I can easily search words in the text. So far I have mainly used to when a name comes along to see if they are mentioned before. That’s how I got the quotation I used earlier about Mrs. Ferwalter and how I was reminded that Rebecca was listed as one of Marie’s friends. I also searched “Gronberg” just to see if this was a first mention, which it was. I might forget Gronberg in a couple of weeks or months, but when the name comes back I will probably search it and find this entry again.

32. I’ve nearly reached to p. 770 of vol. 1, and like David have some reservations about the jumping around time-frames. As I reread these early…entries I suppose they’d be called, I appreciate how the point is that the past bleeds through into the present all the way through, without necessarily any calendar symmetry. For example, the references to war criminals’ trials (and crimes), Svetlana Stalin and her murky past (and present); even more poignantly, the glimpse of the number tattooed on Mrs Ferwalter’s forearm. That mercurial narrative voice is difficult to keep track of, too. The sections in italics seem usually to be spoken (or imagined) words from characters encountered just before – but it’s not always clear which one. And why are they sometimes broken up into different line lengths, almost like poetry? Is this to represent pauses, intonation patterns? Maybe I’m just not a smart enough reader, but I’m often left baffled about what’s going on, and end up skimming over the obscurities. And I find this frustrating. Trevor is quite right to assert it’s not meant to be ‘reality’, but…A couple of other points: Auntie as a name for the NYT reminds an English reader like me that the BBC has always been known as Auntie, too. An affectionate nickname, but also reflecting the institution’s shortcomings (maybe not radical enough to cope with modernity, etc.) 27 Aug: sinister reference, added to frequently thereafter, to Horst P’s Nazi thuggery: he and his farmer friend ‘had to go to Greez for their street fighting’ because the Jerichow Social Dems ‘were their neighbours’; there is jet black humour like this laced through. Sep. 2: ‘the dead should keep their mouths shut’: aphorisms like this, and the connotations, make up for much of the obscurity noted above.

33. This is Damion Searls, who translated Anniversaries. I’m so glad people are reading and enjoying the book, and I’ve been following and learning from your insights, without wanting to weigh in and forestall anybody’s guesses or explorations. But the thing with the italics seems to be causing some real frustration, so I thought why not clear it up.

    The italics are Gesine’s inner dialogues, usually with the dead, but occasionally an unspoken conversation with Marie or someone else alive. The line breaks/paragraphs are because it’s dialogue, not poetry — each new paragraph is a new speaker. Someone addressing “Gesine” is how you can tell who’s who (i.e. the person addressing Gesine is one who’s not Gesine), plus paying attention to the voice. E.g. Louise herself tells Gesine “I wasn’t a sheep” and Gesine angrily confronts her grandmother saying Yes you were. Or Gesine brings up to her father what he (not she) did to Gronberg and he tells her to shut up. Often a dead character described in the unitalic story weighs in, as it were: Gesine in her head can hear them saying what they think (to be literal: what they would think) of her version. On Aug 22 the newspaper vendor, calling Gesine lady, tells her (in Gesine’s mind) “yeah you’re being nice now and saying Good morning but it won’t last,” in other words Gesine imagines he’s sceptical of her politeness. The “kick her heels” teasing in the first chapter is a more generic voice from her past that she’s hearing/remembering, or maybe a specific friend we don’t know about. Gesine is frustrated in the Sept 2 line that Tredynas quoted and wishes the dead would stop pestering her. And so on. Once you get the convention you can pretty much always figure out who’s saying each line.

    Ok, back to lurking for me! Enjoy September.

34. Slight correction on the Gronberg dialogue — I was responding from memory. The first line is Gesine’s father (clearly Gesine felt overwhelmed with guilt and wanted to run away from Mrs Ferwalter; he’s telling her not to flee the park bench; clearly Gesine has seen Heinrich’s “sending Gronberg away” as part of her Holocaust-related guilt, and Heinrich wants to put her in her place or excuse her or himself or something along those lines). The second line is Gesine.

35. I never would have worked out that the newspaper vendor scene was the inner dialogue of Gesine instead of the newspaper vendor. It’s good to know that those are always Gesine’s thoughts, that should help with future reading.

36. Damion wonderful to see you here – and congratulations on being longlisted today for the The American Literary Translators Association 2019 National Translation Awards in Poetry and Prose!

    The Gronberg one is also interesting. I knew the guilt was Gesine’s father – but only from reading ahead to the April 1968 entry – read in isolation the September entry came across more like guilt on Gesine’s behalf (as people assumed in the comments above). It all builds up to a very rich picture.

37. Damion – quite the lurker! Congratulations on such an extraordinary feat of translation. It’s a magnificent piece of writing in its own right.

38. How nice to return after the Labor Day holiday to see some more excellent discussion as well as the helpful comment from Damion. I need to read today’s entry, but I did keep up over the weekend.

39. Quite the dark way to end this week’s reading. September 3’s entry begins with a lovely description of a moment of peace but then we go into the horrific crimes of the Best of Buchenwald, who had just died on September 1. Mixed in this are reflections on the early days of courtship — if you can call it that here — between Gesine’s parents. I find this entry enigmatic in a provocative way, the past coming hard at Gesine, the beauty of it very much overshadowed by the horror in this particular passage. It is no consolation that Isle Koch is no longer in the world.

40. Damion, thanks for the clarification, but I’m not sure I quite get it yet. In the September 3 entry there are a lot of italicized sections that don’t seem to be Gesine’s inner dialogues at all, but are a conversation (or conversations) between her parents shortly after they met. Without your comment I would have read these sections as being their actual conversations, but are you saying that this is merely conversation Gesine imagines they might have had and did not actually have at all?
    .
    For a more general comment about September 3rd, I had the thought that the intercut of the two stories here is supposed to suggest some sort of connection. But Gesine’s parents are talking in 1931 and Ilse Koch’s crimes came years later. It could be just showing the reader the kind of world the courting couple are going to find themselves in eventually and get caught up in, but as the conversation is one about marriage and Koch’s position was as a result of being a wife to a camp commander, it almost invites a comparison of the marriages. Perhaps the comparison is relevant because there is another man Louise is supposed to marry, and which man she chooses could have dramatic effects on her life with the coming political changes in Germany.

41. I hope this does not cause another argument, David, but Louise is not the one marrying Heinrich – she is the mother of the woman Heinrich is talking to about getting married (and will be Gesine’s grandmother – who she calls the sheep in an earlier entry, though it wasn’t obvious until today’s entry who Louise was).

42. Yes, Colette, you are right. I got the name mixed up there because I think (and correct me if I am mis-remembering again) Gesine’s mother has not yet been named.

43. I think that is correct, she has not yet been named. It is a little tricky keeping everyone straight.

44. September 4th – Labor Day, so Gesine will not be working. I have to guess that the incredulousness about the Czech writers article is Gesine’s, though I don’t understand why she feels that way. “We don’t want to believe it”. As if it is an afront?

45. September 4 – Czechoslovakia is back again. We started with Gesine reading about the death of an American man in Prague and the information that Gesine was in Prague in 1962 with a fake American passport (Aug 21), then were told that Mrs. Ferwalter was from eastern Slovakia (Sept 2), and now get some news about the fallout from the June 1967 Congress of the Union of Czechoslovak Writers. I knew before I started reading this book that 1968 was a significant year in the history of Czechoslovakia and expected it to come up in the story, but now I wonder if it might not become quite central to it. One question I had about the book was ‘Why start on August 20th 1967 rather than any other day?’ Picking a start day where something significant happens or January 1st are more natural choices. This one seemed quite random. But then today looking up a bit of information about the Prague Spring I learned that the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia took place on the night of August 20, 1968. It would seem likely that this will play a significant role in the conclusion of the book and might explain Johnson’s selection of the start date for the book.
    .
    [PS – Trevor? I think we need a new section for the new week.]

46. The new section was posted a few days ago, David. It should be on the readalong’s main page (at the bottom as well as in the index) and in the general feed. I will continue to post them a few days before the prior week ends, so they usually won’t be at the top of the general feed on the first day of that week’s reading.

47. Oops. I guess I missed the new section with the other new posts that came after it. I will make sure to look more carefully next time.

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