Books 3 & 4:

Living up to her rep, Cather provides us with some amazing descriptions of the landscape. Book 3, Chapter 3 in particular had some of my favorite imagery... including her comparisons of the desert to the first Creation and of the earthly mesas reflected in the sky, one the duplicate of the other. Another image that stuck with me -- the desert as sea... "The sandy soil of the plain had a light sprinkling of junipers, and was splotched with masses of blooming rabbit brush, that olive-colored plant that grows in high waves like a tossing sea, at this season covered with a thatch of bloom, yellow as gorse, or orange like marigolds." (I loved all the colors, too.)

Aside: Many thanks to my trusty pal Google. What would I do without him to show me "gorse" quicker than I can say the word, um, "gorse"?

As I get deeper in to the novel, my affection for LaTour and Vaillant continues to grow. I share Jacinto's respect for LaTour -- so honest, earnest and straight-forward. I also have great affection for Vaillant -- especially when he turns Father Gallegos' parish around from party zealots to religious zealots, each parish member trying to outdo the next with acts of righteousness. So funny!

My one-track mind keeps going back to the question: How does Cather intend for us to feel about the church v. the existing culture? She keeps pushing us back and forth, I think. She gives us things to respect, and question, in both. LaTour, as respectful and insightful as ever, plays upon the similarities to bring the two together. At the end of Book 4, Father LaTour remarks on the superstitions and beliefs of the Indians. He says "that [the Indians] veneration for old customs was a quality he liked... it played a great part in his own religion."

Oh, and also, there was a buttload of imagery and symbolism that I'm to dense to understand completely. My tiny little brain is hurting from trying to figure out "the lips."

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Some dates:

June 26th: I'll post discussion questions for Books 3 and 4 of Death Comes for the Archbishop.

July 3: Kelly will post discussion questions for Books 5 and 6.

July 10: Kelly will post discussion questions for Books 7, 8 and 9.

August 1: We'll start a new book... to be announced soon.

Some questions:

What do you think about the club's format?

Do you wish that we would discuss the book in one shot at the end of a month instead of breaking it up?

We think that we will choose a book bimonthly instead of monthly. What do you think?

Some things to think about:

Don't forget that you can to post your own discussion questions at any time.

That's all. Really just one thing to think about, I guess.

OK. So what the heck was I thinking?! I don't know nothin' 'bout nothin'. At least that's the psychological crisis I'm currently going through thinking that I could ever pull off mediating an online book club. I've pretty much convinced myself that everything I could say about this book is either obvious, unoriginal or most likely both.

But I'm doing it.

And, what I'm saying is... If I'm going to put myself out there, you have to do it too!

There are all kinds of things you can do to appease my crisis: Start your own thread. Ask a question. Comment on my threads to validate my existence.

Are you up for it, bookish girls? (And... Dad?)

Yes, I think you are.

OK, now.

Go!

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Willa Cather was not a Catholic. (This is something she and I have in common.) Still, Death Comes for the Archbishop clearly empathizes with the plights and has reverence for the priorities and endeavors of the two priests. I like this.

I think the novel takes for granted that the mission of the priests is indeed good and worthy. I bring this up because I wonder if some might question these kinds of works of the church, any church. I think some might ask: Is it necessary to impose this religion on the natives of the New Mexico territory? Does it contribute to the destruction of the Native American culture?

Of course, my own life experiences give me empathy of my own for the priests. I sincerely believe in the need for sacraments done with the proper authority (or ordinances, in the case of my own religion and, let's face it, probably yours too).

So, what do you think? Did Cather intend for us to ever question the missions and purposes of Bishop Latour and Father Vaillant?

Books 1 & 2:

Bahahahaha! Didn't you think it was funny when the old woman on Lujon's ranch determines that Father Vaillant is so ugly that "he must be very holy" (Book 2, Chapter 1)?

Cather does seem to make a connection between appearance and spirituality. Despite the old woman's contention that holiness is next to ugliness, Cather draws a more traditional line between goodness/beauty and evil/ugliness. A case for both can be found in Book 2, Chapter 2 with Buck Scales and his wife, Magdalena. The murderer Scales is described as an "ugly, evil-looking fellow... ill-formed." On the other hand, after Magdalena devotes her life to service in the church "she became beautiful... she seemed to bloom again in the household of God."

One of my favorite parts of the book so far is the idea put forth by Bishop Latour that divine love corrects human vision. Bishop Latour tells Father Vaillant, "I do not see you as you really are, Joseph; I see you through my affection for you" (Book 1, Chapter 4). So later, when the Bishop sees Magdalena again and says that she "became beautiful", I doubt that she had changed all that much physically. I believe the Bishop just saw her more this time with divine love.

And isn't that just totally awesome?

Welcome, readers! The kick-off book for our virtual book club is Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop.

Published in 1927, Death Comes for the Archbishop enjoys spots on both the Modern Library's 100 Best Novels and Time Magazine's 100 Best English Language Novels. Cather herself considered it her best work.

Death Comes for the Archbishop follows a Catholic bishop and priest as they struggle to establish a diocese throughout the New Mexican territory in the mid-19th century. Like much of Cather's work you can expect it to be a simple story full of beautiful descriptions. Because of the book's structure, Cather hesitated to call Death Comes for the Archbishop a novel. Rather it reads more like a collection of short stories about the two main characters, Bishop Latour and Father Valliant.

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The idea for an online book club started, really, with my bookish sister Kelly who loves books and who loves to discuss books but who lives too far away to participate in a bona fide book club, at least, that is, with me. This was a real bookish bummer. So one day we were thinking about all the other members of our family, and friends too, who live just too darn far... but who are nevertheless quite bookish. We wanted to discuss books with all these bookish folks, too!

And we were thinking that maybe there were other bookish people out there in the world who want to discuss books and who maybe don't want to leave the house so much to do so. And, so maybe, we thought, a book club could be a blog? We weren't sure... but we wanted to find out. And that, my bookish friends, was the genesis of the Bookish Girl Book Club.

The Bookish Girl Book Club is very new and somewhat experimental. We've come up with a loose framework for how we think things should, or may, go... but everything is subject to change (or hopefully, improvement).

Here's what you need to know so far:

1. First of all, join! Email us at bookishgirlbookclub@gmail.com to be added to the club. Of course, if you'd rather read along as more silent-observer and less active-participant, that's fine too! But we hope to facilitate discussions here and we'd love to hear your voice. (Figuratively speaking, that is.)

2. We will be discussing the book as we go. Each book will be broken down into smaller sections. Discussion points or questions will be posted every week. These questions will be posted by either me or Kelly... but we will be turning to other readers to take the reins on books in the (near) future. Especially if your book is chosen as a book club selection, which leads me to...

3. Make suggestions! We will be posting a schedule for the upcoming months. Is there something that you'd like to read and that you think other bookish girls would enjoy? Email us or leave a comment.

4. In addition to the discussion points we'll have along the way, we encourage readers to post questions at any time. If you join via email, you'll be made a blog contributor. Just pose your question or discussion point as a post. Other readers can chime in in the comments section of your post.

5. While bookish girls are slaves to their novels, they are never slaves to this club. You can come... or go. Cherry-pick the novels that interest you the most; we don't mind! That's why we intend to publish a schedule. (Very soon, we hope!) That way you can plan ahead and choose what works for you. Maybe it will be all of them? We would like that, too!

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This week's assignment is to track down a copy of Death Comes for the Archbishop and read the Prologue and Books One and Two. (This is only about 80 pages.) I'll post something next Wednesday.

Have fun and see you next week!

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