Discussion questions ~ Bonnie's answers

click to enlarge

This photo shows a cenote, defined as "a deep natural well or sinkhole, especially in Central America, formed by the collapse of surface limestone that exposes ground water underneath, and sometimes used by the ancient Mayans for sacrificial offerings."

8.  Frida tells Harrison, "The most important thing about a person is always the thing you don't know" (p. 218).  Years later, he writes to her, saying, "Frida, you always said the most important thing about any person is what you don't know.  Likewise, then, the most important part of any story is the missing piece" (p. 277).  How does this relate to the book's title?

Alison said (in a comment) that she's "still working on The Lacuna."  Getting through it was like work, in some ways.  The story wasn't exciting enough to pull me along, but when I reached the last part and the whole thing came together, I was left feeling very satisfied with the book.  I guess you can tell from the second set of questions (where I posted a different picture of an underwater cave) that part of my enjoyment came from the cave called "la lacuna" hidden beneath the waves.

A lacuna is a gap or missing part.  People seemed to think, for example, that they knew the author named Harrison Shepherd because they had read his books or because newspapers reported this or that about him.  At the end of the book (something for you to look forward to, Alison), Mrs. Brown discovered a gap in her knowledge of the man, when she realized she didn't know some important things about him, even though she had worked for him for years and had even traveled with him on business a time or two.  That's the lacuna that matters.

Joe McCarthy with his aide Roy Cohen

11.  Were you surprised by the way statements were twisted during the McCarthy trials?

Like Shirley (see the comments), I was really drawn to what Barbara Kingsolver wrote about the McCarthy period.  I remember how uneasy I felt about the televised hearings, even at the age of twelve, when we got our first television in 1952.  I cringed at the thought of Senator McCarthy ruining the lives of so many people, realizing, even then, that there was no way to refute the nebulous charges.

9. Did you like the format, using journals and letters?
10. What did you think of Violet Brown, who worked for Harrison?

Violet Brown was a mousy little woman, but she was completely loyal to her boss.  I can't say I liked her much, otherwise.  And she's the one (other than the book's author) who gets the blame for what we call "the format" of the story, using journals and letters.  Mrs. Brown is the one who chose what to include, which thing should come next, and how the whole fit together.

1.  Do Harrison's diaries feel realistic to you?  Does he sound like a 12-year-old at the beginning ... and later like a mature man?  What kind of boy was he?  What do you think of him?
12.  How did Harrison Shepherd change over the course of the novel?

Yes, his "later" writings seemed more mature, but no, the early ones didn't quite seem like the writings of a child.  Maybe it's because I'm teaching two writing classes that I'm aware of the meticulous wording and punctuation in his early diaries, so I'll forgive the (mostly) perfect entries -- except for an occasional comma splice or two.  (grin)  Harrison Shepherd became more reserved as he became aware of his own sexuality and of the world's unfathomable ways of treating anyone who thinks differently.  And finally, he was almost a hermit, trying to keep away from those who admired or hated him.  What he longed for, finally, was the ultimate escape.

7.   What new things have you learned from reading this book?

I've read reviews of The Lacuna by lots of people, including some who thought the author brought in too many famous people.  I think her choices worked the other way around, that she used the fact that Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Leon Trotsky were

Trotsky

all together in one place and time and plunked her protagonist (Harrison Shepherd) down in the midst of them.  Because these people were in the book, I looked them up and read more about them, finding Diego's mural in Detroit and his famous mural in Mexico City because I was really learning something about these people in depth for the first time -- even though I'd heard their names and could have told you a fact or two about Trotsky.

December's choice ~ The Housekeeper and the Professor

The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa is the book we chose for December, and it is almost time to start reading it.  Here's a summary from the publisher:

He is a brilliant math Professor with a peculiar problem -- ever since a traumatic head injury, he has lived with only eighty minutes of short-term memory.  She is an astute young Housekeeper, with a ten-year-old son, who is hired to care for him.  And every morning, as the Professor and the Housekeeper are introduced to each other anew, a strange and beautiful relationship blossoms between them.  Though he cannot hold memories for long (his brain is like a tape that begins to erase itself every eighty minutes), the Professor’s mind is still alive with elegant equations from the past.  And the numbers, in all of their articulate order, reveal a sheltering and poetic world to both the Housekeeper and her young son.  The Professor is capable of discovering connections between the simplest of quantities -- like the Housekeeper’s shoe size -- and the universe at large, drawing their lives ever closer and more profoundly together, even as his memory slips away.  The Housekeeper and the Professor is an enchanting story about what it means to live in the present, and about the curious equations that can create a family.

According to Wikipedia, The Professor's Beloved Equation is the title published in Japan in 2003; The Housekeeper and the Professor is the English translation by Stephen Snyder, which was published in 2009.

• Read an excerpt
• Read a review
• THATP ~ discussion questions

TL ~ second set of DQs

For our second set of discussion questions about The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver, I want to start with a quote from page 35, early in the book.  It's a bit long, but I was fascinated by the cave Harrison Shepherd found below the water line.

Mexican underwater cave (click to enlarge)

Today the cave was gone.  Saturday last, it was there.  Searching the whole rock face below the cliff did not turn it up.  Then the tide came higher and waves crashed too hard to keep looking.  How could a tunnel open in the rock, then close again?  The tide must have been much higher today, and put it too far below the surface to find.  Leandro says the tides are complicated and the rocks on that side are dangerous, to stay over here in the shallow reef.  He wasn't pleased to hear about the cave.  He already knew about it, it is called something alreaedy, la lacuna.  So, not a true discovery.

Laguna?  The lagoon?

No, lacuna.  He said it means a different thing from lagoon.  Not a cave exactly but an opening, like a mouth, that swallows things.  He opened his mouth to show.  It goes into the belly of the world.  He says Isla Pixol is full of them.

8.  Frida tells Harrison, "The most important thing about a person is always the thing you don't know" (p. 218).  Years later, he writes to her, saying, "Frida, you always said the most important thing about any person is what you don't know.  Likewise, then, the most important part of any story is the missing piece" (p. 277).  How does this relate to the book's title?

9.  Did you like the format, using journals and letters?

10.  What did you think of Violet Brown, who worked for Harrison?

11.  Were you surprised by the way statements were twisted during the McCarthy trials?

12.  How did Harrison Shepherd change over the course of the novel?

World War II in the Netherlands ~ Kingsolver did her homework

Aerial view of the gap in the dike at Westkapelle, with the sea coming in

A very small comment by Shepherd caught my attention because I have a friend in the Netherlands.  Some of you will remember Margreet, who was one of the earlier Book Buddies when we met on Oprah's site.  This is the question I sent to Margreet this morning, followed by her answer.

I have been reading The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver (2009).  I'm having trouble confirming -- for myself -- whether this part of the novel really happened or not.  The book is written mostly as journals of the main character (a novelist), and this section was labeled February 1.  It would have been 1945, I think.

"Tonight's news:  the Allies broke open the dikes along the Netherlands coast, letting in the sea and drowning thousands of German soldiers in the flood.  Like the Azteca opening dikes to drown Cortes and his men on the shores of Lake Tenochtitlan.  But fiction is nonsense, the war is real.  Tomorrow the farmers of Walcheren will wake to see a tide standing over their crops, the floating corpses of their cattle, every tree in the land scalded by the salt on its roots.  The glory of war is so frequently disappointing" (p. 294).

Flooding and devastation after breaching the dikes in the Netherlands

I looked up Walcheren in Wikipedia:  "Strategically placed at the mouth of the River Scheldt, Walcheren was the key that allowed use of the deep-water port of Antwerp..."  But I haven't found anything about the Allies flooding the area.  Oops, I just now found this:

"To hamper German defence, the island's dykes were breached by attacks from RAF Bomber Command: on October 3 at Westkapelle with severe loss of civilian life; on October 7 at two places, west and east of Vlissingen; and on October 11 at Veere.  This flooded the central part of the island, forcing the German defenders onto the high ground around the outside and in the towns, but it also allowed the use of amphibious vehicles."  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Scheldt)

Maybe I've answered my question, but I would like to hear anything you could add.  I agree with Kingsolver's protagonist that the glory of war is disappointing.  In my opinion, wars are not the best solutions to problems, and should be avoided if at all possible.

Love,
~~~ Bonnie

Margareet wrote back:

Hi Bonnie Bookworm:)

Interesting part of my country's history...and I never knew this. I am familiar with another part of Holland being 'inundated' as it's called here. The Wieringermeer polder. My grandfather had a farm there in the new land, with his family. My mom was 13 in 1945, when they were warned that the dikes had been demolished (on purpose) so they had one day to gather some belongings and flee back to family in Groningen. But Walcheren, I didn't know that. It was a common way of making access impossible for foreign armies, as far back as 1000 years ago. So I can assure you that it really happened.

Please let me know if you find more about this subject, love 'talking' to you hon!!

Lots of Love, Margreet

TL ~ first set of DQs

This mural by Diego Rivera is in Detroit.  It shows his interest in the workers of the world and also gives us an indication of the wide admiration of Rivera's art.  The story in The Lacuna centers on Harrison Shepherd's connection with Diego Rivera and his wife Frida Kahlo. I've read Parts 1, 2, and 3 of the book, most of which is set in Mexico, interrupted by Harrison Shepherd's short stay with his father in Washington, D.C.

1.  Do Harrison's diaries feel realistic to you?  Does he sound like a 12-year-old at the beginning ... and later like a mature man?  What kind of boy was he?  What do you think of him?

2.  What prompts Harrison to begin his journals?  Why does he write?  What does he mean by referring to his notebook as "prisoner's plan for escape"?

3.  How about Harrison's mother?  In what way does her profligate life affect how he decides to lead his own life?

4.  What do you think of the Rivera/Kahlo household?  How does Harrison see Rivera's influence over Kahlo?  Have you seen the 2003 movie Frida?  If so, does that film influence your reading of The Lacuna?  (I hadn't even heard of the movie, but I'm surprised at how much these actors look like the real Diego and Frida.  Click the link to see photos I posted earlier.)

5.  I like Barbara Kingsolver's writing.  In October, I visited the cemetery where my parents are buried; both born in October, they married each other exactly between their birthdays.  When I read this a few days later, I realized my parents are still my family, but I've never thought of it that way.  What do you think?

2 November, Dead People's Day
"Leandro is at the cemetery to put flowers on his dead people: his mother and father, grandmothers, a baby son that died when it was one minute old, and his brother, who died last year.  Leandro said it's wrong to say you don't have a family.  Even if they are dead, you still have them" (p. 32).

6.  Leon Trotsky, born Lev Davidovich Bronstein, was one of the leaders of the Russian October Revolution.  I had intended to ask you why he was called "Lev" in the book, but when I found this photo at Wikipedia, I learned Lev was the name he was born with.  I had never heard that, and the book left me confused about why that name was used.  What do you think of Harrison's assessment of Trotsky, quoted below?  Why do you think things didn't turn out the way Lev anticipated?

"Even in the horror of war, Lev [Trotsky] is optimistic; he says it will make internationalists of us all.  A modernized proletariat will unite, because war so conspicuously benefits rich men and kills the poor ones" (p. 224).

7.   What new things have you learned from reading this book?