reading

A Border Passage (March 19, 2018)

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March is Women’s History Month in many parts of the world. To help celebrate the recognition of women, I will only be featuring female authors during the month of March.

A Border Passage: from Cairo to America — A Woman’s Journey

“As she journeys across cultures, an Egyptian woman struggles to define herself. In language that vividly evokes the lush summers of Cairo and the stark beauty of the Arabian Desert, Leila Ahmed tells the story of her life. This moving memoir begins with her Egyptian childhood amid the rich tradition of Islamic women, and ends with her longing to understand and to come to terms with her own identity as a feminist living in America. Growing up in Cairo in the 1940’s and 1950’s, Ahmed witnessed some of the major transformations of this century: the end of British colonialism, the creation of Israel, the rise of Arab nationalism under Nasser, and the breakdown of Egypt’s once multireligious society. Through the turmoil, she searches to define herself–and to understand how the world defines her–as a woman, a Muslim, an Egyptian, and an Arab. She poignantly reflects upon issues of language, race, and nationality while unveiling the hidden and often misunderstood world of women’s Islam.”

(from the blurb on the back cover of Ahmed’s memoir)

About the Author

“Leila Ahmed (Arabic: لیلى احمد‎) is an Egyptian American professor of Women’s Studies and Religion at the Harvard Divinity School. Prior to coming to Harvard, she was professor of Women’s Studies and Near Eastern studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She earned her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Cambridge before moving to the United States to teach and write.

In her 1999 memoir A Border Passage, Ahmed describes her multicultural Cairene upbringing and her adult life as an expatriate and an immigrant in the West. She tells of how she was introduced to Islam through her grandmother during her childhood, and she came to distinguish it from “official Islam” as practiced and preached by a largely male religious elite. This realization would later form the basis of her first acclaimed book, Women and Gender in Islam (1993), a seminal work on Islamic history, Muslim feminism, and the historical role of women in Islam.”

(from Goodreads)

 

 

Book of the Week: The Handmaid’s Tale (January 29, 2018)

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I read The Handmaid’s Tale when I was in high school, not too long after Margaret Atwood published it. I remember my teacher being really excited about it, how it was an honour to read a social commentary by none other than Atwood herself. And a CANADIAN!! Oh, well, my teacher’s eyes just lit up when she said that. At the time, I wasn’t really into Canadian literature, but this particular book really changed the way I saw the world and the North American political (and cultural and religious and … ) landscape. I became an immediate fan of Atwood’s.

Now that I am teaching this speculative fiction to my IB students, I feel like Atwood’s work has come full circle. Some of my students snickered when I began to draw parallels between the current political climate in America and the Republic of Gilead, but as we discussed it further, they began to see that there could — maybe, kind of, possibly, partially — be some foreshadowing in what Atwood has to say.

I am reminded of an article my friend Tricia shared with me recently. I was moaning about a Tweet I read recently and forgot to “like” (which makes it, of course, more difficult to find in the future). The Tweet in mention made connections between past fascists and the current U.S. president. She shared with me an article she found from The Guardian. It’s nearly 11 years old, but boy, does it ever apply today.

This is why literature is so important.

 

It secures the yesterday to today.

It makes assumptions, predictions, and prophecies.

It tells us stories to entertain, but also to help build resilience and resistance.

It coaches and coaxes.

It is a mirror into our past and a lens into our future.

 

Read. The Handmaid’s Tale. Now.

About the Author

“Margaret Atwood was born in 1939 in Ottawa and grew up in northern Ontario, Quebec, and Toronto. She received her undergraduate degree from Victoria College at the University of Toronto and her master’s degree from Radcliffe College.

Throughout her writing career, Margaret Atwood has received numerous awards and honourary degrees. She is the author of more than thirty-five volumes of poetry, children’s literature, fiction, and non-fiction and is perhaps best known for her novels, which include The Edible Woman (1970), The Handmaid’s Tale (1983), The Robber Bride (1994), Alias Grace (1996), and The Blind Assassin, which won the prestigious Booker Prize in 2000. Atwood’s dystopic novel, Oryx and Crake, was published in 2003. The Tent (mini-fictions) and Moral Disorder (short stories) both appeared in 2006. Her most recent volume of poetry, The Door, was published in 2007. Her non-fiction book, Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth ­ in the Massey series, appeared in 2008, and her most recent novel, The Year of the Flood, in the autumn of 2009. Ms. Atwood’s work has been published in more than forty languages, including Farsi, Japanese, Turkish, Finnish, Korean, Icelandic and Estonian.”

(from Goodreads)

Book of the Week: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (January 22, 2018)

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I read this book nearly four years ago and wrote a mini-review on Goodreads. Here it is in its entirety:

I saw Rebecca Skloot on The Daily Show months ago. Her interview with Jon intrigued me, so I added her book to my “to read” list.

I’ve always been fascinated by science. This book is a great combination of non-fiction, science, and science fiction. Skloot writes in such a way that a person without a background in science can understand the impact that Henrietta Lacks’s cells had on medical progress. She presents the family as real people, not just numbers or faces. The Lacks family has been deeply affected by the knowledge that Henrietta’s cells have been used to find cures for various diseases. Unfortunately, it wasn’t until Skloot’s book was published that they received any recognition at all.

This book reads almost like a sci-fi novel; it deals with medical research but also the ethical issues of race during the mid-20th century. It is truly fascinating what science can do. Henrietta’s name needs to live on, just as her cells have.

About the Author

“Rebecca Skloot is an award winning science writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine; O, The Oprah Magazine; Discover; and many other publications. She specializes in narrative science writing and has explored a wide range of topics, including goldfish surgery, tissue ownership rights, race and medicine, food politics, and packs of wild dogs in Manhattan. She has worked as a correspondent for WNYC’s Radiolab and PBS’s Nova ScienceNOW. She and her father, Floyd Skloot, are co-editors of The Best American Science Writing 2011 . You can read a selection of Rebecca Skloot‘s magazine writing on the Articles page of this site.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks , Skloot’s debut book, took more than a decade to research and write, and instantly became a New York Times best-seller. She has been featured on numerous television shows, including CBS Sunday Morning, The Colbert Report, Fox Business News, and others, and was named One of Five Surprising Leaders of 2010 by the Washington Post. The Immortal Life was chosen as a best book of 2010 by more than 60 media outlets, including Entertainment Weekly, USA Today, O the Oprah Magazine, Los Angeles Times, National Public Radio, People Magazine, New York Times, and U.S. News and World Report; it was named The Best Book of 2010 by Amazon.com and a Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Pick. It has won numerous awards, including the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for Nonfiction, the Wellcome Trust Book Prize, and two Goodreads Choice Awards for Best Nonfiction Book of the Year and Best Debut Author of the year. It has received widespread critical acclaim, with reviews appearing in The New Yorker, Washington Post, Science, and many others. Dwight Garner of the New York Times said, “I put down Rebecca Skloot‘s first book, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” more than once. Ten times, probably. Once to poke the fire. Once to silence a pinging BlackBerry. And eight times to chase my wife and assorted visitors around the house, to tell them I was holding one of the most graceful and moving nonfiction books I’ve read in a very long time …It has brains and pacing and nerve and heart.” See the press page of this site for more reactions to the book.”

(from Goodreads)

Book of the Week: Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay (January 15, 2018)

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“Pink is my favorite color. I used to say my favorite color was black to be cool, but it is pink—all shades of pink. If I have an accessory, it is probably pink. I read Vogue, and I’m not doing it ironically, though it might seem that way. I once live-tweeted the September issue.

In these funny and insightful essays, Roxane Gay takes us through the journey of her evolution as a woman of color while also taking readers on a ride through culture of the last few years and commenting on the state of feminism today. The portrait that emerges is not only one of an incredibly insightful woman continually growing to understand herself and our society, but also one of our culture.

Bad Feminist is a sharp, funny, and spot-on look at the ways in which the culture we consume becomes who we are, and an inspiring call-to-arms of all the ways we still need to do better.”

(from Goodreads)

About the Author

Roxane Gay’s writing has appeared in Best American Short Stories 2012, Best Sex Writing 2012, Oxford American, American Short Fiction, West Branch, Virginia Quarterly Review, NOON, The New York Times Book Review, Bookforum, The Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The Rumpus, Salon, The Wall Street Journal’s Speakeasy culture blog, and many others. She is the co-editor of PANK and essays editor for The Rumpus. She teaches writing at Eastern Illinois University. Her first book, Ayiti, is a collection of fiction and nonfiction about the Haitian diaspora experience. Her novel, An Untamed State, [was] published by Grove Atlantic and her essay collection, Bad Feminist, [was] published by Harper Perennial, both in 2014.

(From Goodreads)

Book of the Week: Guapa by Saleem Haddad (January 08, 2018)

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“Set over the course of twenty-four hours, Guapa follows Rasa, a gay man living in an unnamed Arab country, as he tries to carve out a life for himself in the midst of political and social upheaval. Rasa spends his days translating for Western journalists and pining for the nights when he can sneak his lover, Taymour, into his room. One night Rasa’s grandmother — the woman who raised him — catches them in bed together. The following day Rasa is consumed by the search for his best friend Maj, a fiery activist and drag queen star of the underground bar Guapa, who has been arrested by the police.

Ashamed to go home and face his grandmother, and reeling from the potential loss of the three most important people in his life, Rasa roams the city’s slums and prisons, the lavish weddings of the country’s elite, and the bars where outcasts and intellectuals drink to a long-lost revolution. As Rasa confronts the simultaneous collapse of political hope and his closest personal relationships, he is forced to discover the roots of his alienation and try to re-emerge into a society that may never accept him.”

About the Author:

Born in Kuwait City in 1983 to a Lebanese-Palestinian father and an Iraqi-German mother, Saleem Haddad was educated in Jordan, Canada, and the UK. He has worked as an aid worker with Doctors Without Borders in Yemen, Syria, and Iraq, and currently lives in London, where he advises on inclusion of refugees, women, and young people in the transition and peace processes of the Arab Spring.

 

*Story and author blurbs are taken from the jacket of Haddad’s 2016 novel, Guapa.

NEW FEATURE: Book of the Week

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Hi everyone!

As you most probably know, I love using social media and posting ideas, suggestions, and compelling things online. Over the break, I decided to put my social media usage to even better use by creating more interest around the vast number of books I have in my classroom library. Thus, in an effort to get more students (and staff!) reading, I am going to be posting a “Book of the Week” here on my digital portfolio.

Each week, I will copy the blurb from a selected book into a blog post along with some information about the author. I will then feature the book in my classroom window. My hope is that this idea will garner enough traction that even more books get checked out (literally and figuratively) from my classroom.

If you have any book suggestions, please let me know. I have enough books set aside right now to keep me going until Chinese New Year, but I’d love to hear from other people as well. Which books do you recommend for others?

Don’t forget to watch this space for my weekly update! Cheers!!

Holiday Reading 2: Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

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There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding the personal essay as of late. As an IB Language & Literature teacher, I know the IB doesn’t particularly like the personal essay and doesn’t suggest it as an acceptable text type on which students can base their Written Tasks. Earlier this year, Jia Tolentino of The New Yorker wrote an article stating that the personal essay is a dying genre. To counter this, Arielle Bernstein of Salon wrote a rebuttal, claiming that while “Tolentino sees the end of a boom, what we are […] experiencing is an evolution — of writers being encouraged to not simply mine personal feelings for a quick click, but to make connections between the personal and the political more explicit.”

Enter Trevor Noah.

Now, anyone who knows me well knows that I am a huge fan of The Daily Show. This is the show I watch in order to get my fill of politics and global news. I was heartbroken when I learned that Jon Stewart would be retiring from TDS in order to pursue a more noble lifestyle (Jon and his wife Tracey run Bufflehead Farm, an animal sanctuary in New Jersey). I didn’t think anyone could possibly take his place and do a decent job of presenting the news with humour, wit, and just a touch (a touch!) of sarcasm.

I guess I was wrong.

Trevor Noah hosted his first show on September 28, 2015 and I was immediately impressed. He was charming, witty, and included just enough sarcasm to make me think, “Yup. OK. This guy can do it.” He had gained another fan.

In 2016, Noah published a collection of personal essays entitled “Born a Crime.” I put it on my list of books to read, but then never got around to checking it out. It wasn’t until I happened to be in our high school library and saw it on a shelf that I was reminded of my promise to myself to read this book. I took it with me on holidays and once again finished it within a couple of days.

Noah has not had an easy life. In fact, it’s incredible to think of who he is now considering all the adversity he faced growing up in South Africa. One particular quote in his book really stood out; I earmarked it so I wouldn’t forget:

“I never let the memory of something painful prevent me from trying something new. If you think too much about the ass-kicking your mom gave you, or the ass-kicking that life gave you, you’ll stop pushing the boundaries and breaking the rules. It’s better to take it, spend some time crying, then wake up the next day and move on. You’ll have a few bruises and they’ll remind you of what happened and that’s okay. But after a while the bruises fade, and they fade for a reason — because now it’s time to get up to some shit again.” (Noah 90-91)

I think these are some really good words to live by. Take life as it comes. Take the punches. Cry. Let it out. Then get up and try again. In my opinion, Noah’s “Born a Crime” is a great place to try something new.

Holiday Reading 1: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

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Students have been telling me for years that I should read this book. I was always reluctant. Why? I can’t possibly say, but every time I looked at the cover, I thought “this book will make me cry.”

Well, I was right.

I took this book on holidays with me and devoured it within two days. Some on the plane, some in the airport between flights, some on the beach, some by the pool, some in bed before I fell asleep. At one point, I didn’t care who saw me gasping, who saw me holding my breath, who saw me sobbing. It was a real page turner. Anderson writes the way I speak; I felt like I was reading pages from my own teenage diary. My heart broke every time Melinda (the main character) wanted to speak but couldn’t find her voice. My freshman year of high school was much different to hers, but I still felt the pain of not fitting in. Now as a teacher, I think about those students I see in my classes who are voiceless and I wonder if they are going through the same horrible things that Melinda goes through.

God, I hope not.

This is the kind of book I think all young adults should read. And if you’re not a young adult, you should still read it to remind yourself that those quiet kids who sit at the back, who frequently miss class, who avert their gaze, who don’t seem to have any friends … they are the ones we should be paying more attention to.

Perhaps they are harbouring a secret they are afraid to reveal.

Perhaps they are scared.

Perhaps they want to speak, but don’t know how.

Speak to them, and allow them as much time as needed to speak to you.

October Reading: The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden by Jonas Jonasson

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A couple of years ago, one of my seniors gave me a book entitled The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window and Disappeared as a thank you gift when he graduated. That book sat on my shelf for a while until one day, I decided to give it a go. I was so enamoured by the story that I had trouble putting it down. I even went so far as to describe some of the plot to my daughter (who wasn’t really interested in the stories of a 100 year old man) because I felt like I had to talk to someone about it. It was that good.

Now fast forward to October 2017. Two days before the half-term break began, I came across another one of Jonasson’s books on the desk of one of my colleagues. Naturally, I snatched it up and took it home, figuring I’d tell her about it the next day. Well, by the next morning, we received a frantic email from said colleague who wanted to know if anyone had taken the book from her desk. You see, she had put it aside because a parent wanted to borrow it for the break! Great minds, right? Well, I pled my case and told her I’d bring it back if she really wanted me to, but I probably wanted to read it more than the parent so could-I-please-take-it-on-holidays-with-me-and-I-promise-to-bring-it-back-and-give-it-to-the-parent??

Thankfully, she said yes.

So I took this book to Bali with me and once again, I inhaled it (not literally, mind you). Jonasson knows how to tell a story. He knows his history and politics, too, and he is seamlessly able to weave these historical facts into his fictional story. I found myself looking up certain things just to see if they are true (hint: they are!). Without getting too much into it, let’s just say that on the surface, it seems improbable that a young girl from Soweto, South Africa could ever have anything to do with the King of Sweden, but she does. And it’s funny. And it’s heartbreaking. And it’s good. And I recommend it.

Go get it from your library, but please ask before your borrow it …

5/5 coffees