My choice by Evandro Alves: The Old Man and The Sea by Hemingway

This is a novel written by Ernest Hemingway, that helped him to win a Nobel prize.
The book tells a story of an old fisherman named Santiago, who went to sea eighty four days
without fishing anything. Santiago has a young pupil named Manolin. His parents prohibited him
of going to fish with Santiago, because of his lack of luck, and, instead, ordered him to go with
other luckier fishermen.
Anyway, Manolin continued to help Santiago in the morning leaving him coffee and the bait. During the night he helped Santiago getting his gear out of the boat and they talked about baseball and his idol player: DiMaggio.
On the eighty fifth day, once again Santiago set sail, but this time he decided to go farther away into the gulf (he felt that his lack of luck was about to end). On that day, by noon, a marlin took his bait and the journey began...
What happened next is something of real emotion and adventure which can only be understood and felt by reading it...
Just one last note: I loved to read the Portuguese version of the book, but I would love to get my hands (and eyes) on the original one.

Writer of the Month - Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf was born in London in 1882 (January 25) and committed suicide in 1941, when she intendedly drowned herself with the pockets of her coat full of stones. She is considered one of the foremost modernist and feminist writers of the twentieth century. Her literary production is rich in allusions to women’s intellectual freedom.
According to her, “Intellectual freedom depends upon material things. Poetry depends upon intellectual freedom. And women have always been poor, not for two hundreds of years merely, but from the beginning of time. Women have had less intellectual freedom than the sons of Athenian slaves.” (1929 A Room of One's Own)
Fortunately, things have slightly changed since these lines were written!

Writer of the Month - David Leavitt

David Leavitt teaches English at the University of Florida. His novels and short-stories are widely known and can be found translated into Portuguese.
To learn more:
http://web.english.ufl.edu/faculty/dleavitt/

"Well, I kept writing stories. I thought about despair, and I thought about getting drafted. I tried to understand what made me love the stories I loved. The process was halting, usually exhuberant, sometimes graceful. I don't think I ever wrote a single opening line that ended up being the opening line of the story for which it was intended."

David Leavitt (2003) Collected Stories, Bloomsbury, Introduction xi

We are reading

Metro Stop Dostoevsky - Travels in Russian Time by Ingrid Bengis

Ingrid Bengis was born in 1944. Her parents were Russian Jewish immigrants that travelled to the United States. She is well known by her feminist book Combat in the Erogenous Zone and by her novel Metro Stop Dostoevsky - Travels in Russian Time (2003).

Metro Stop Dostoevsky – Excerpt

It was two o'clock in the morning of February 3, 1990, when the phone rang next to my bed. "I can talk for only two minutes," B said, shouting over the crackling line to make herself heard. "I'm calling from Siberia. I have my passport, and they just gave me an exit visa. There's a ticket available to America from Leningrad this Saturday, or else one for next August. Those are the only two dates available. I have to decide now. Do you still want me to come?"
I didn't have time to ask her why she was calling from Siberia instead of Leningrad, but she probably wouldn't have been able to answer anyway, with the Russian operator listening in. Nor had anything been said about how long she planned to stay. This was her first trip outside of Russia, and I knew from her last letter that she and her husband had just separated. Under those circumstances anything could happen.
By then, of course, I already knew about invitations, knew that you can't just say to someone in Russia, "I'd love to have you come visit me in America," and then forget about it. An invitation is an official gesture, requiring official documents, not just an invitation, but an Invitation, a Priglashenie, presented to the local Russian-government passport office as a request for an external passport, which, if granted, then becomes a request to the American government for a visa to enter the United States, and is followed by another request to the Russian government for an exit visa. Invitations are coveted trophies, particularly since Russians can receive permission to travel to the West only if they have a notarized invitation. People forge invitations, or buy them for astronomical sums, or agree to rent their apartments to people who are willing to give them invitations. Invitations are to Russians what green cards are to foreigners in America. This was true then, and it is still true now. Although many things have changed in Russia, the invitation has not, and Westerners who offer invitations in a general sort of way often have little idea of the leaps of heart produced by the gesture, nor do they have any idea of what they are potentially getting into.

Bengis, Ingrid (2003) Metro Stop Dostoevsky - Travels in Russian Time; North Point Press, pp3-4.

Writer of the month - James Finn Garner

"James Finn Garner was born in Detroit and grew up in the company town of Dearborn, Michigan. After graduating from the University of Michigan (where he won a Hopwood Award for one of his short plays), he moved to Chicago and worked in a number of jobs, including house painter, baker, warehouse clerk, public relations whipping boy, and editor of real estate appraisal publications. Seeking a creative outlet, he began to take improvisational comedy classes and terrorized various Chicago nightclubs for many years.


Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, Garner's first book, has sold more than 2.5 million copies in the U.S. and has been translated into 20 languages. It spent 65 weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers list. The runaway success of this book spawned two others, Once Upon A More Enlightened Time and Politically Correct Holiday Stories, both of which also appeared on the N.Y. Times list for extended runs. Other Politically Correct projects included calendars, computer games, and TV pilots. His most recent book is Recut Madness, which shows people from the far right and far left wings how to edit classic movie scenes to protect themselves from differing viewpoints."

taken from http://www.jamesfinngarner.com/bio.html

Those who attended our English (Summer) Course will certainly remember tales like “Little Red Riding Hood” or “Snow Melanin-Impoverished and the Seven Vertically Challenged Persons”. Those who didn’t can find information on this author in http://www.jamesfinngarner.com/ or in his blog http://www.jamesfinngarner.com/wordpress/

If you want to read his tales in Portuguese, you will find a translation in the Library of the ESEB. In English or in Portuguese, Finn Garner stories are excellent summer books.

Harry Potter

It is already this month that the seventh and last book of Harry Potter’s adventures comes out. The magical world of Hogwarts School has delighted children, teenagers and adults around the planet since the first volume. In fact, Harry Potter’s books are translated into 61 languages and can be bought in more than 200 countries or on-line, of course.
Have you ever read any of these books? Have you enjoyed them or do you think they are too childish?

If you want to learn more about Harry Potter or J.K.Rowling, check out these sites:
http://www.jkrowling.com
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/specials/harry_potter/default.stm
http://www.kidsreads.com/HP07/content/index.asp

If you are a big fan of this little wizard, visit

http://www.kidsreads.com/HP07/content/trivia.asp and test your knowledge.

Paul Auster

"Becoming a writer is not a 'career decision' like becoming a doctor or a policeman. You don't choose it so much as get chosen, and once you accept the fact that you're not fit for anything else, you have to be prepared to walk a long, hard road for the rest of your days."
Paul Auster in Hand to Mouth

Paul Auster was born in Newark, New Jersey, on Febuary 3rd, 1947. He is the author of numerous novels, screenplays, and works of non-fiction. His other titles include poet, translator and film director. His latest novel "Travels in the Scriptorium" was published this year.
His last film project entitled "The Inner Life of Martin Frost" was filmed in Portugal in May 2006. In fact, this was not the first time that Portugal played a big role on his projects. In Oracle Night the plot starts when a man decides to buy a blue notebook made in Portugal. If you want to read his books, you can find them written in English or translated to Portuguese.
Paul Auster is one of my favourite writers because he is brilliant in exposing and exploring human fears and feelings. My favourite books are Moon Palace, The New York Trilogy and Timbuktu, although I’ve read almost all of his books.

Biography
The Art of Hunger
The Invention of Solitude
The Red Notebook
I Thought My Father Was God
Hand To Mouth

Film
Blue In The Face
The Music of Chance
Smoke
Lulu On The Bridge
The Inner Life of Martin Frost

Fiction

Leviathan

Mr Vertigo
Timbuktu

In The Country of Last Things
The Brooklyn Follies
Moon Palace

Travels In The Scriptorium
The Book of Illusions
The New York Trilogy
Oracle Night

The Music of Chance

If you want to learn more:
http://www.englisch.schule.de/auster/group4/start4.htm
http://www.paulauster.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Auster
http://paulauster.meetup.com/

Music and Literature

William Harnett American, born Ireland, 1848(?)-1892
Music and Literature,1878

Titania, music call; and strike more dead
Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

Every month we are going to dedicate a post to Literature and Music.
These two artistic expressions have been combined since our ancestors created language, once Oral Literature and musical expression predate the written word. Both literature and music can be divided into genres, although this characterization may not always be consensual. Nevertheless, learning more about the literary and musical expression of a specific country can be an interesting way of learning more about its culture. If you think about fado or samba, Salman Rushdie or Cervantes, which countries come up to your mind?

In this space we won’t discriminate against any literary or musical expression.
We are looking forward to hearing your opinion and preferences. What are your favourite books and your favourite music? Why?
(The “remarks” can be written in Portuguese if you prefer).