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Here we are four week in.
And how are you doing?
If you’re falling behind, I want to encourage you to keep going and not let the timeline end your progress. If you’ve given up because you don’t like it, I’d like to hear. If you’re still going strong but are lurking, that’s fine too! Here’s to another fine week!
Here is the post for any and all discussions about passages from September 11 – 17, 1967.
For the main page of this read-along, please go here.
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I did a bad thing & kept reading way too far ahead, so I’m now ready for this thread. I’ve been afraid to comment b/c I wasn’t sure I’d get the dates right, but I’ve enjoyed this discussion so much. I am enjoying the book even more.
I’m glad you’re enjoying it, Ella! You go right ahead and drop your comments once the threads go up. We’ll catch up in time!
September 11 (will that ever be just a date again?)
It feels to me that the author is writing essays with these personifications of the NYT (Auntie).
Interested to hear from anyone reading this on Kindle. I have the paperbacks, and wouldn’t read it any other way, but may need the Kindle occasionally when travelling, and wonder if it’s also useful for checking names etc?
(Trevor – minor thing – I don’t think there’s a hyperlink to this page on the main one yet. Apologies if I’ve got it wrong)
I am reading only on the Kindle (the paperbacks are too unwieldy) and it certainly adds to the ability to check names. If you’re reading at home (I read while commuting) reading paperback plus Kindle to hand would be great … but expensive (the Kindle cost rather reflects the paperback cost).
Today’s description of Gesine’s strategies for her commute was, for me, another example in this book of “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Johnson could almost have been documenting my own various approaches to “confronting the clock” in my working life.
I’m so appreciative of the set of details he’s chosen to build of life in 1967. “Yes, it was like that.” There’s more to the book than that, of course, but that’s what struck me today.
What do you make of the italicised section? (Sep 13). It seems Gesine enjoyed her overtime work, but is more implied than being an interpreter?
I must say, the September 11 entry (or better yet, love letter) to the NY Times was brilliant. One of the pleasant surprises of the early parts of this novel is seeing the paper have a more substantial and meaningful part in the narrative, rather than just a marker of time passing. Seeing the “relationship” of the paper to both Gesine and Marie develop is fascinating. And I agree with others before me, the precocious interruptions and quips from Marie are entertaining. I cannot wait to see her character develop more.
Colette,
Today’s whole entry gave me the creeps. Frank Sinatra loses two teeth talking back to his employer, then we get an extended sequence on Gesine’s self-imposed zero tolerance for tardiness due to the lack of union protections at her work, and then the italicized bit about intimate unpaid overtime.
It seems more like laying groundwork for future interactions with her boss or bosses, but it definitely feels like “it was an exception” is a foreboding way to phrase it.
September 16 – Hurricane Doria! Quite the coincidence.
I got behind there for a bit. Sat down this morning and read the previous week’s entries.
I am fascinated by Marie. She seems such a grown up and mature little girl for 10 years old. I love the way it is her weekly job to do the grocery shopping. I would never have sent my daughter shopping at 10 years – maybe not even now at 21. Also really like the way that Gesine and Marie treat each other as independant people – not as mother and daughter. They act as friends and make their own decisions. But at the same time Marie has never been on the ferry to Straton Island by herself. Maybe there is still a bit of the child there.
Regarding her name: my sister is called Marie, but we always called her M’rie. I hadn’t really thought of it before. It was just the way it was.
I’m enjoying this discussion. I will try to keep up in future.
I know I’m a bit behind on this, but I found the entry for September 15 to be particularly powerful. It covers a lot of ground on topics from the paper, but the themes on responsibility, being a “guest” here, and the limited time we have alive struck a chord.
I’ve fallen behind quite badly – just started reading from 10th September until today (21st) – hope to finish that today. Although it feels like a shame to be reading so quickly. I love the comparison between NYT and Herald Tribune. My father was a subscriber to the International Herald Tribune, so I had to laugh at the Via Condotti ankle-boots comment!
The 17 Sept entry about Cresspahl and ‘his’ business in Richmond is quite moving, obliquely. How the actual owner, Gosling, has no idea about the business which fell into his lap, but keeps wanting to supervise or point out how he fought the Germans in the First World War. That familiar anti-German rhetoric, which would have been quite strong in Uwe Johnson’s day, especially after the football World Cup in 1966.
Not sure why my previous comment didn’t take. I was apologising for falling behind, have now read 11 days’ worth in 1 day.