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Subject: Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion on Walker Percy

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  • From: "Dye, Steve" <sldye AT bluegrass.org>
  • To: "Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion" <percy-l AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [percy-l] Group Read Suggestions??
  • Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2005 11:22:46 -0400

Excerpt from the September 12 issue of the New Yorker ("The Talk of the
Town" section) - "It isn't just that New Orleans has one of the highest
murder rates in the country; the city has repeatedly been the scene of
armed conflict, most notably during Reconstruction and the governorship
of Huey Long. Walker Percy's 1971 novel "Love in the Ruins", set on the
Gulf Coast outside New Orleans, imagined a scene not too far from
(though not nearly as bad as) what we've seen for the past week, with
armed bands roaming the countryside, columns of smoke rising on the
horizon, and people hiding out in half-destroyed buildings. Thirty years
earlier, in a memoir called "Lanterns on the Levee", Percy's cousin
William Alexander Percy proudly conjured up the echt-Bourbon picture of
himself facing down unruly homeless African-Americans in the wake of the
1927 flood"...

-----Original Message-----
From: percy-l-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:percy-l-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Tommy Armstrong
Sent: Monday, September 19, 2005 10:55 AM
To: 'Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion'
Subject: [percy-l] Group Read Suggestions??

I would very much like to do this--especially since there are a lot more
smarter people on this list than myself, and would very probably learn a
great deal.

What do you think Mr. Modrator?

Come up with some very simple ground rules such as a standard subject
line,
a start time and schedule--"reasonable time" is one of the operative
phrases
here, and the list could give their suggestions. With POB all the novels
were about the same length, but with Percy, some would obviously take
longer
than others. I am not sure about the novels of Percy and their
pagination
between different editions, but it did make for an easier discussion if
most
were using the same edition or at least if there was a cross reference
to
the quotation under discussion.

If it really got good, one could then compile all the posts about the
book
under discussion into a master document.

The way it worked with POB was that pretty much anything was fair game
as
long as it came from the novel that was being read. Links to maps,
definitions, historical material, etc. etc.

For example the recipe of a "Gin Fizz" in Love in the Ruins.

Tommy Armstrong
PO Box 484
Lillington, NC 27546
http://www.brickengraver.com

"If you're a big enough fool to climb a tree and like a cat refuse to
come
down, then someone who loves you has to make as big a fool of himself to
rescue you."
W Percy




-----Original Message-----
From: percy-l-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:percy-l-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Lawrence Rhu
Sent: Monday, September 19, 2005 8:56 AM
To: percy-l AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [percy-l] Group Read --has it been done?

Hello to all,

I think is would very interesting to work through the novels at a
reasonable
pace as a sort of on-line/list reading group. As for the non-fiction,
that
strikes me as harder to organize for such a discussion group.

Also, for any of you out there who are looking to write conference
papers
about Percy, there is an annual comp lit conference at USC (Columbia) in
February. Its topic this year is "Cultures of Evil and the Attractions
of
Villainy," which may make the experience of Tom More particlarly
relevant.
Would any of you be interested in putting together a panel on the two
More
novels and other relevant writings by Percy?

Larry

Lawrence F. Rhu
Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature University of
South Carolina Columbia, SC 29208
Tel: 803 777 0144
Fax: 803 777 9064
Email: rhul AT sc.edu

>>> tfa AT brickengraver.com 09/17/05 1:53 PM >>>
I was just wondering if anything like that had been done on the Percy
List.
I was once a member of a Patrick O'Brian list and they did a "group
read" of
all of the Canon of 22 books that POB wrote--1 each two months if I
remember. Would this be an appropriate use of this list. We used a kind
of a
standard subject line, such as "GroupRead Master and Commander" so that
email clients could easily easily sort on just that thread. People who
wished to participate did, those that did not simply filtered out that
thread.

I for one would love some sort of a stuctured way that would "force" me
to
go back through the Percy Canon--especially with some guidance from all
the
able bodied seamen that inhabit this ship.

Just a thought.

Tommy Armstrong
PO Box 484
Lillington, NC 27546
http://www.brickengraver.com <http://www.brickengraver.com/>

...with the method of science one beholds what is generally true about
individuals, but art beholds what is uniquely true.

Walker Percy
Signposts in a Strange Land





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