Yesterday afternoon's discussion of Paul Auster's Sunset Park was somber and subdued, reflecting the depressive mood elicited by the characters and their life stories. This book evoked strong reactions and opinions about family issues and depression.
All agreed that the author wrote beautifully about difficult and troubled lives. Detailed descriptions of how the characters lived and went about their days and nights were realistic enough to interest everyone. An added dimension was the discussion in depth of subjects that engaged individual characters: baseball trivia, Vietnam, and the World War II movie The Best Years of Our Lives.
The story revolved around sad personal and family events. It portrayed how difficult it was for the younger characters to envision productive and joyful futures for themselves, despite the best efforts and hopes of family and friends. The characters always seemed to choose courses of action that led to a dead ends or sabotaged any hope of moving forward. They attempted to adapt to the emptiness of their lives by living communally and forming a family of sorts. This solution only enabled their aimlessness and in the end led to disaster. Although this quote describes the main character, it could apply to any of the others who inhabited his life in the Brooklyn, NY neighborhood of Sunset Park: "He is only twenty-eight years old, and to the best of his knowledge he has no ambitions, in any case, no clear idea of what building a plausible future might entail for him."
After reading and discussing Sunset Park members of the group agreed that they were ready for an uplifting book selection for the next meeting!
All agreed that the author wrote beautifully about difficult and troubled lives. Detailed descriptions of how the characters lived and went about their days and nights were realistic enough to interest everyone. An added dimension was the discussion in depth of subjects that engaged individual characters: baseball trivia, Vietnam, and the World War II movie The Best Years of Our Lives.
The story revolved around sad personal and family events. It portrayed how difficult it was for the younger characters to envision productive and joyful futures for themselves, despite the best efforts and hopes of family and friends. The characters always seemed to choose courses of action that led to a dead ends or sabotaged any hope of moving forward. They attempted to adapt to the emptiness of their lives by living communally and forming a family of sorts. This solution only enabled their aimlessness and in the end led to disaster. Although this quote describes the main character, it could apply to any of the others who inhabited his life in the Brooklyn, NY neighborhood of Sunset Park: "He is only twenty-eight years old, and to the best of his knowledge he has no ambitions, in any case, no clear idea of what building a plausible future might entail for him."
After reading and discussing Sunset Park members of the group agreed that they were ready for an uplifting book selection for the next meeting!
There was definitely a lot to talk about in this novel! Although the main focus of the book was on Miles and his father, I enjoyed getting perspectives on a number of characters of different generations and experiences.
ReplyDelete