BOOKPATHS

JUST BROWSING

This list is inspired by Alison Anderson's Darwin's Wink : a Novel of Nature and Love.

Charles Darwin : Voyaging and Charles Darwin : the Power of Place, by E. Janet Browne (Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press).
A highly recommended two-volume biography of Charles Darwin.

The Voyage of the Beagle, by Charles Darwin (various editions and accessible online: http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-voyage-of-the-beagle/)

APRIL 29th. -- In the morning we passed round the northern end of Mauritius, or the Isle of France. From this point of view the aspect of the island equalled the expectations raised by the many well-known descriptions of its beautiful scenery. The sloping plain of the Pamplemousses, interspersed with houses, and coloured by the large fields of sugarcane or a bright green, composed the foreground. The brilliancy of the green was the more remarkable because it is a colour which generally is conspicuous only from a very short distance. Towards the centre of the island groups of wooded mountains rose out of this highly cultivated plain; their summits, as so commonly happens with ancient volcanic rocks, being jagged into the sharpest points. Masses of white clouds were collected around these pinnacles, as if for the sake of pleasing the stranger's eye. The whole island, with its sloping border and central mountains, was adorned with an air of perfect elegance: the scenery, if I may use such an expression, appeared to the sight harmonious. -- from The Voyage of the Beagle, by Charles Darwin

Darwin, Charles. Origin of the Species (various editions and accessible online: http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-origin-of-species-6th-edition/)

Darwin, Charles. The Autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809-1882 (available in print and online: http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=2010)

Durrell, Gerald. Golden Bats and Pink Pigeons.
In her "author's note" for Darwin's Wink, Alison Anderson mentions Golden Bats and Pink Pigeons as one of the "two invaluable resources for the background on island biogeography and extinction of species." It's the account of Durrell's first two expeditions to Mauritius.

Quammen, David. "Was Darwin Wrong?" in National Geographic 206(5), November 2004.
A timely essay.

Quammen, David. The Song of the Dodo : Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinctions (New York : Touchstone, 1996.)
The Song of the Dodo is the other "invaluable resource" mentioned in Alison Anderson's "author's note." Quammen travels the world in this study of island biogeography, "the study of the distribution of species on islands and islandlike patches of landscape." This is an important book given that "ninety percent of the 171 extinctions of species of bird since 1600 have occurred on islands (Darwin's Wink, p. 13)."

What about you? Maybe you have read something, and maybe cared, about the extinction of species. Passenger pigeon, great auk, Steller's sea crow, Schomburgk's deer, sea mink, Antarctic wolf, Carolina parakeet: all gone. Maybe you know that human proliferation on this planet, and our voracious consumption of resources, and our large-scale transformations of landscape, are causing a cataclysm of extinctions that bodes to be the worst such event since the fall of the dinosaurs. Maybe you are aware, with distant but genuine regret, of the destruction of tropical forests. Maybe you know that the mountain gorilla, the California condor, and the Florida panther are tottering on the threshold of extinction. Maybe you even know that the grizzly bear population of Yellowstone National Park faces a tenuous future. Maybe you stand among those well-informed people for whom the notion of catastrophic worldwide losses of biological diversity is a serious concern. Chances are, still, that you lack a few crucial pieces of the full picture.

Chances are that you haven't caught wind of these scientific murmurs about ecosystem decay. Chances are that you know little or nothing about a seemingly marginal field called island biogeography. -- from The Song of the Dodo : Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction, by David Quammen

JUST BROWSING

United States (Boston; New York; etc.); India

The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri (Boston : Mariner Books, 2003)

The Namesake offers a touching, empathetic, and realistic look at two generations of the Ganguli family. The parents, whose ties remain in India, and their children, whose ties are increasingly American, will seem familiar to many. It is a story of distance between parents and children, but also of love, compromise, and the pull of family bonds.

"In so many ways, his family's life feels like a string of accidents, unforeseen, unintended, one incident betraying another. It had started with his father's train wreck, paralyzing him at first, later inspiring him to move as far as possible, to make a new life on the other side of the world. There was the disappearance of the name Gogol's great-grandmother had chosen for him, lost in the mail somewhere between Calcutta and Cambridge. This had led, in turn to the accident of his being named Gogol, defining and distressing him for so many years. He had tried to correct that randomness, that error. And yet it had not been possible to reinvent himself fully, to break from that mismatched name." --from The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri

Reader's Guide

http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/readers_guides/lahiri_namesake.shtml

Ukraine

Nikolai Gogol
The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol (New York : Vintage, 1999)
Dead Souls (various editions)
After reading The Namesake, you may be drawn to Nikolai Gogol.

"The Short Stories of Nikolai Gogol. 'For Gogol Ganguili,' it says on the front endpaper in his father's tranquil hand, in red ballpoint ink, the letters rising gradually, optimistically, on the diagonal toward the upper right-hand corner of the page. 'The man who gave you his name, from the man who gave you your name' is written within quotation marks. Underneath the inscription, which he has never before seen, is his birthday, and the year, 1982." -- from The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri

Most of Nikolai Gogol's work is available electronically. See Project Gutenberg.
http://promo.net/pg/

Afghanistan; California, U.S.

The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini (New York : Riverhead Books, 2003)
The Kite Runner gives readers a needed glimpse into Afghanistan through the story of Amir, a child of wealth, and Hassan, the son of his father's servant. Beginning in the early 1970s, readers are reminded that Afghanistan was once a country of relative safety and stability, a place for childhood play, stories, and "kite running." Then "an unspeakable event" changes their lives, haunting Amir as he grows to adulthood in California. War torn Afghanistan and the life of the exile make for a heart-wrenching story, one that is good for the intellect and the soul.

"I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975. I remember the precise moment, crouching behind a crumbling mud wall, peeking into the alley near the frozen creek. That was a long time ago, but it's wrong what they say about the past, I've learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out. Looking back now, I realize I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years." -- from The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini

Reader's Guide
http://www.readinggroupguides.com/guides3/kite_runner1.asp

JUST BROWSING

Western United States
Cadillac Desert : the American West and Its Disappearing Water, by Marc Reisner (New York : Penguin, 1993)
Reisner provides an important look at the misuse of water in the West.

"What is remarkable, a hundred years later, is how little has changed. The disaster that [John Wesley] Powell predicted -- a catastrophic return to a cycle of drought -- did indeed occur, not once but twice: in the late 1800s and in the 1930s. When that happened, Powell's ideas -- at least his insistence that a federal irrigation program was the only salvation of the arid West -- were embraced, tentatively at first, then more passionately, then with a kind of despearate insistence. The result was a half-century rampage of dam-building and irrigation development which, in all probability, went far beyond anything Powell would have liked." -- from Cadillac Desert : the American West and Its Disappearing Water, by Marc Reisner

Japan
The Tale of Murasaki : a Novel, by Liza Dalby (New York : Anchor, 2001)
Liza Dalby imagines the life of Murasaki Shikibu, author of the "world's first novel," The Tale of Genji. The exquisite and sensual language allows readers entry into the life of Murasaki Shikibu and eleventh-century Japan.

"The author of this extraordinary work [The Tale of Genji] is the subject of The Tale of Murasaki. I have pieced the existing historical fragment of her diary into an imagined reminiscence, much as an ancient vase might be reconstructed by setting the original fragments into a vessel of modern clay -- a sort of literary archaeology. The shape of the shards dictates the structure of the vessel, so my tale is in the form of a poetic diary, a literary genre well established in Murasaki's day. And while the material of reconstruction is new, I have blended into it eleventh-century sensibilities, beliefs, and preoccupations." -- from the "Foreward" to The Tale of Murasaki, by Liza Dalby

An excellent website complements the book:
http://www.lizadalby.com

Los Angeles, California
Twilight : Los Angeles, 1992, by Anna Deavere Smith (New York : Anchor Books, 1994)
Based on her one-woman performance, Anna Deavere Smith allows individual voices to speak about the impact of Los Angeles's 1992 riots. It's a compelling and necessary read. If you have a chance, see Smith perform.

"I am a dark individual,
and with me stuck in limbo,
I see darkness as myself.
I see light as knowledge and the wisdom of the world
and
understanding others,
and in order for me to be a, to be a true human being,
I can't forever dwell in darkness,
I can't forever dwell in the idea,
of just identifying with people like me and understanding me and mine."
--from "Limbo/Twilight #2, Twilight Bey, Organizer of Gand," in Twilight : Los Angeles, 1992, by Anna Deavere Smith

PBS Website:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/stageonscreen/twilight/

JUST BROWSING

Ghost Wars : the Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, by Steve Coll (New York : Penguin, 2004).
For almost 700 pages, Steve Coll follows the CIA's involvement in Afghanistan. It is an enlightening read for anyone struggling to understand today's world.

"In history's long inventory of surprise attacks, September 11 is distinguished in part by the role played by intelligence agencies and informal secret networks in the preceding events." -- from Ghost Wars, by Steve Coll

Lovesick, by Angeles Mastretta (New York : Riverhead Books, 1997. Out of print, but available from used book sources.)
A little bit romance novel, a little bit soap opera, Lovesick rises above both with its compelling characters, historical background, and strong sense of place. Set primarily in Puebla, Mexico, at the time of the revolution, readers are drawn into the characters' lives and loves. A charming, passionate book.

"Josefa Veytia had always said it was not necessary to pursue destiny, because nothing was less foreseeable yet so surprising in its innate predictability than fate." -- from Lovesick, bu Angeles Mastretta

"Puebla is like my mythical territory," [Mastretta] says. "I think things happen there that don't happen elsewhere. A part of me sincerely believes that. Setting my stories there makes them possible because Puebla for me is endearing. At least the Puebla that I invent. I hear the stories and a part of me lives there, in the Puebla in my head, the imaginary."

Old School, by Tobias Wolff (New York : Vintage, 2004)
Set in an eastern prep school in the early 1960s, this quiet book is filled with insight and truths. If you love books and writing, read Old School.

"No true account can be given of how or why you become a writer, nor is there any moment of which you can say: This is when I became a writer." -- from Old School, by Tobias Wolff