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A recent piece by Scott Timberg on io9 raises interesting questions about the post-apocalyptic sub-genre. He poses that the scenarios depicted in these novels can be broken down into "hard" and "soft" (i.e. the world of The Road is clearly a bleak, unyielding environment, whereas Neil Gaiman's American Gods suggests softer, more habitable future landscape).
For this month's discussion we will see if Saramago's Blindness passes the litmus test. Sounds soft to me, but is it even a post-apocalyptic novel? Or just dystopic?
A city is hit by an epidemic of "white blindness" which spares no one. Authorities confine the blind to an empty mental hospital, but there the criminal element holds everyone captive, stealing food rations and assaulting women. There is one eyewitness to this nightmare who guides seven strangers--among them a boy with no mother, a girl with dark glasses, a dog of tears--through the barren streets, and the procession becomes as uncanny as the surroundings are harrowing. A parable of loss and disorientation and a vivid evocation of the horrors of the twentieth century, Blindness is a powerful portrayal of man's worst appetites and weaknesses--and man's ultimately exhilarating spirit.
Meeting Thursday, February 25, 2010, at 7:30 pm
Sunday, April 25, 6 pm--Special event at Jalopy Theatre (315 Columbia Street)
Music performance and book discussion with David Hajdu and Karen Oberlin
In conjunction with the release of his new collection of essays, Heroes and Villains, David Hajdu dishes about the music biz and performs with his wife, jazz-pop vocalist Karen Oberlin. James Marcus joins them on electric guitar and lap-steel guitar, along with Seth Fahey on stand-up bass and clarinet.
David Hajdu is the music critic for The New Republic and a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He is also the author of Lush Life: A Biography of Billy Strayhorn (1996), Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Fariña and Richard Fariña (2001), and The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America (2008). Heroes and Villains: Essays on Music, Movies, Comics, and Culture was recently published by Da Capo Press.
Karen Oberlin is an acclaimed vocalist with a deep background in classical music, jazz, cabaret, theater and musical theater who has performed at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Town Hall, Iridium Jazz Club, Feinstein's, Merkin Hall and The Metropolitan Room. The recipient of the Bistro and MAC awards, her albums include "My Standards" (Miranda Music), “Secret Love: The Music of Doris Day” (Miranda Music), and the forthcoming "A Wish" (Miranda Music).
Saturday, May 8, 2-6 pm
BBQ and Book drive for Books Through Bars
