Review: A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life

A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life by George Saunders
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Must-read for any teacher of writing, and certainly for any would-be writer; also for any aficionado of Russian literature. This book is a distillation of the author's creative-writing class; reading it feels much like attending his class -- all that's missing is the back-and-forth of a seminar.

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Review: The Road Less Traveled: The Secret Battle to End the Great War, 1916-1917

The Road Less Traveled: The Secret Battle to End the Great War, 1916-1917 by Philip D. Zelikow My rating: 5 of 5 stars View all my reviews

Kite Runner is with us again

Six or so years ago, I taught The Kite Runner to three successive sets of tenth-graders, and marveled at the effect the novel had on me and on these adolescents. That age is a marvelous time for a humanities teacher, as we see callous children grow out of their self-centered cocoons and flex their world-empathic feelers. They grow into the world outside them and realize they truly have agency -- or will have agency and responsibility for human actions. Amir, the main protagonist of Kite Runner is so identifiable with those adolescents learning to take responsibility for their callous actions. And of course we think of Kite Runner now that Afghanistan once again plunges into Taliban rule -- we particularly worry about the fate of the Hazara (news stories already cite random executions of Hazara men). We can only wring hands and pray that the Taliban will have to adapt and tolerate more than they did before -- but I am not optimistic. ...

Review: The Empathy Diaries: A Memoir

The Empathy Diaries: A Memoir by Sherry Turkle My rating: 5 of 5 stars I cannot stop talking about this book, and not just because the author is a favorite of mine, with her earlier books about the effect of technology on education and our psyches. She describes encounters with so many other famous writers and technologists -- she was Present at the Creation of our computer-saturated internet world. Note that the title is purposely plural: several personal points are interwoven into the chapters, sometimes repeating details that a "normal" book would elide. But she is a talented writer and psychologist: the very writing style is intended to affect the reader and illustrate psychological points. I did cringe at the repeated references to the Freudian incident with her stepfather (fear not, dear reader -- no outright abuse here, just psychological trauma unearthed by years of analysis, along with all-too-typical infidelity and familial...

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