Calendar of Events
Click on event title for information.
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Poetry Weekend
November 7-8, 2009
San Francisco Mini-Retreat
February 2010
Asilomar Weekend
April 16-18, 2010
Gold Country Mini-Retreat
May 8, 2010
Leader Training
May 15, 2010
Annual Picnic
June 13, 2010
Long Novel Weekend
August 21-22, 2010
Great Books in Wine Country
October 2, 2010
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October 2009
"You cannot teach a man
anything. You can only help him
discover it within himself."
--- Galileo Galilei
Dear Great Books Supporter,
The Fall-Winter 2009 issue of Reading Matters, in full color, is available on our website or click here for direct access. Included in this issue of Reading Matters, our premier publication:
- Asilomar Great Books Weekend 2010
- San Francisco Mini-Retreat, February 6, 2010
- Introduction to Council Vice President Susana Conde
- Long Novel Weekend Recap
- Potpourri by Rick White
- A quiz for readers
- And much more
Included in this GBCSF E-Newsletter:
- Great Books Poetry Weekend is sold out
- New Gold Country Mini-Retreat
- Great Books Foundation revises website
- Great Books in Wine Country recap
- The Great Books Team at Kiva is growing
- Check out Humanities West in Useful GB Links
Now you can refer your friends to our website and they can sign up there also. Your friends need only enter their email address in the yellow box on the website and click "GO".
At the bottom of this page we have included a link to most social networks, such as Facebook, so you can share this e-newsletter with your friends. Check it out.
You can reach our website by clicking on "More about us" in the Quick Links box or by clicking on the GB logo at the top of this page.
We
are continuing the Great Books discussions founded by Robert Hutchins
and Mortimer Adler of the University of Chicago in 1947. Great Books Counci of San Francisco (serving
Northern California) is a volunteer organization of motivated readers.
We coordinate over 40 existing groups, provide leader training and
sponsor literary events in scenic locations.
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24th Annual Great Books Poetry Weekend
November 7-8, 2009
This event is sold out.
More people have registered than ever before!
To learn more about Poetry Weekend check some of our previous issues of this e-newsletter. In the column to the left under "Quick Links" click on "E-Newsletter Archive" and go to September 2009, October 2008, Recap in May 2009, or September/October 2007.
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President's Letter from Jim Hall I was
elected president of the Great Books Council of San Francisco (serving
Northern California) in June of this year. I wish to express my gratitude to all the past presidents
and other officers of the Council for keeping this extraordinary organization
as lively and relevant and successful as it has been for over a half
century. We can only hope, and try, to live up to the standard set by our
predecessors. I intend to help us be even more lively, relevant, and
successful than ever. I will
support our media exposure initiative, more one-day mini-retreats, providing
more support to existing discussion groups, and the establishment of new groups
in Northern California.
None of
this is new. Everything listed
above was begun during the tenure of my immediate predecessor, Kay White. Serving as her vice president for two
years, I had the opportunity to observe her dynamic style. Kay is more organized and more capable
of running an organization like the Great Books Council than anybody I have
ever worked with. I have learned a
lot from her. I will be content
with my tenure as president if I can continue to expand what was started under
her watch, which she is still working on.
Many thanks, Kay, and husband, Rick, and the rest of the White family who
have been so supportive of our programs.
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Gold Country Mini-Retreat
May 8, 2010
 Save the date! This one day event is still in the planning stages. It will be held at the Mercy Retreat Center in Auburn, California. Located in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Mercy offers beautiful landscape and gracious hospitality enabling groups to interact
in an environment free of distractions, noise and stress. We are planning for a non-fiction reading. More information developing . . .
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Great Books Foundation website
GBF has
dramatically revised their website.
It is now much easier to find your way to all they offer. There are four main sections: K-12, Professional Development, Book
Groups and Higher Education, and the Bookstore. On the main page for
each section, on the left, is a clickable table of contents which will
take you directly to your destination.
In my opinion, this is a huge improvement over the old website which,
with all the Foundation has to offer, was too difficult to navigate. Great job! Click on their logo below to go to the new website.
Also,
Daniel Born writes: There's an announcement in our forthcoming monthly
newsletter about a special now running in our bookstore until Dec. 15: buy $75
or more of our titles (ADU-coded), and get free shipping.
I hope
you'll think about giving Great Books this holiday season. Several new titles
make excellent gifts, and just might be what can help bring new readers into
the Great Books community. The special offer is announced on our website, www.greatbooks.org,
as well as in a flier going out in this fall's catalog mailing.
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Great Books in Wine Country Recap
October 3, 2009
 We met at
the Calistoga Spa Hot Springs at the foot of Mt. St. Helena on a crisp, sunny
fall morning to discuss Joseph Heller's Catch 22. After a snack of pastry, fruit, quiche, orange juice, and
coffee or tea, Rick and Kay White, leader and co-leader, started our discussion
with a question about why the book opens in the hospital. Several responses, discrimination
between enlisted and officer classes and a military hospital being run like
commerce and others, led to larger discussions of other themes in the novel. Does enterprise mean you can get away
with just about anything as long as you keep delivering a desired product or
service? Is Milo and his
corporation too big to fail? Is
war just big business, a military-industrial complex? Are there any admirable characters here? What about the illogical that is
logical and vice-versa? Who had
the best survival/coping strategy?
Is the arbitrary exercise of power by authorities the great evil? There was some consensus that this
novel is not anti-war, but a satire of large organizations, businesses,
corporations, that wield power. The
discussion ran overtime, two and one half hours long, when we adjourned
for lunch.
In the afternoon we
watched the movie directed by Mike Nichols followed by a short discussion
comparing it to the novel. I think
most thought the movie did not do the book justice even with some of the
hilarious scenes well done. We
then spent about an hour tasting delicious cheeses and several, even more
delicious wines and finished about 5pm.
Everybody I talked to said they would love to do this event again next
year. Several people had stayed
over at the Spa or at local B&Bs, a great way for couples to spend a
weekend. A great book, even
greater discussion among enthusiastic participants and a pretty good movie made for an excellent way to spend a day.
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"He who joyfully marches
to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a
large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice."
---Albert Einstein
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New Poetry
Discussion Group in Berkeley
First Thursday of each month
First we laughed over Billy Collins' "Introduction to
Poetry" and especially his final stanza, "They begin beating it (the poem) with a hose, to find out what it really
means." We quietly incorporated that cautionary tale. Then, we went around the circle of
eleven, saying our name, and why we chose the poem we brought for
discussion. Our poetry selections
helped make our introductions.
One brought a poem he felt described his life, wondering how
to bring his talents into full bloom.
Another brought "Admission Requirements of U.S. and Canadian Dental
Schools" by Ron Koertge, a poem she found in the dentist's office that
day. Humor and relief are more
than welcome while waiting your turn with the dentist. Another brought W.H.
Auden's poem, "Old People's Home," which he introduced by telling us of his boyhood
times with Gran, sitting on the bed with her, talking into her good ear.
Another brought Walt Whitman's "I Saw in Louisiana a
Live-Oak Growing" which describes a solitary, lusty tree, standing without a friend
or lover near, and that the poet knew he could not stand alone.
Another said she likes poetry but never reads it on her own,
and that she wants the opportunity to read and talk over poems with others. We nodded our assent.
One person said she writes poetry, and brought a piece by
someone she recently met in a poetry workshop.
The remarkable attribute of a poem is how we project our own
understandings and feelings onto it; and that is what we did for the rest of our
two hour discussion. Give the same poem to eleven readers, and you get some
surprising insights, even with the first night's cold readings of the poems. But, perhaps best of all, we become
acquainted with one another's choices and interpretations.
Two people brought poems by Richard Wilbur, "The House", and
"Boy at the Window". The first had been selected from a recent New Yorker, a magazine regularly read by several in the group. Wilbur's poems are getting lots of ink
these days. His poetic visions are
concrete, and his descriptions provoke our buried experiences and feelings.
For me, the most engaging poem of the evening was "At Lake
Scugog" by Troy Jollimore, recently published in The New Yorker. Its verses
rolled and tickled with familiarity.
From Stanza 2.:
Out
in the canoe, the person I thought you were
gingerly
trades spots
with
the person you are
and
what I believe I believe
sits
uncomfortably next to
what
I believe.
When
I promised I will always give you
what
I want you to want,
you heard,
or desired to hear,
something else. As, over and in the
lake,
the cormorant and its image
traced paths through the sky.
Once we read and re-read this poem, Jollimore's clever
reflections settled into our circle, and his honesty brought us closer together.
For our discussions, each person brings a poem with some
interpretive questions to launch the discussion. We follow the Great Books shared inquiry method, keeping the
discussion focused on material we have each read (no outside references); there
is no right answer; we respect and enjoy different interpretations. This group essentially worked together as
a leaderless discussion, with careful listening and attention to one another. Carol Hochberg-Holker organized our
first meeting, and hosted it with her husband, Ralph.
We will meet on the first Thursday of each month, from 7-9
p.m. Carol and Ralph will host the
next meeting in their home at 2752 Mathews Street, Berkeley, on November 5.
Now that we've met and have exchanged e-mail, the poems will
be circulated in advance. If you are interested in joining our poetry group, contact
Carol Hochberg-Holker at (510) 666-8496.
by Kay White
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New GB Discussion Group in San Francisco
Fourth Meeting: Tuesday, November 10, 2009
"It was a dark and stormy night" when last we met, but we still had a great turnout of sixteen people to discuss Why War? by Sigmund Freud. We extend an open invitation to all in the bay area, especially San Francisco and Marin County to join us. We meet at the Richmond Branch Library, near the Presidio and easy to get to. We have chosen to use the Introduction to Great Books anthology. Current plans are to meet on the second Tuesday of each month. Please notify Cliff if you wish to attend at clifford.louie@sbcglobal.net or by phone at 415-750-1786. 
The Melian Dialogue by Thucydides will be the work discussed at the next meeting. Email Cliff Louie for a copy if you don't have one.Date: Tuesday, November 10, 2009.Time: 6 - 8 p.m.Place: Richmond Branch Library Location: 351 - 9th Ave. (between Geary Blvd. and Clement St.)Note: Keep an eye on this space for news of another Great Books discussion group being started by Laura Bushman in the El Cerrito/Albany/Berkeley area. The first meeting will be Monday,January 11, 2010. They
intend to work through all the GBF series beginning with the earliest available. Contact Laura at laurabushman@yahoo.com. Laura is out of town right now. You may contact me at jimsrhall@earthlink.net or 707-696-8335. |
GBSF Lending Team at Kiva
Kiva.org is an organization, headquartered in San Francisco, that has expanded on the original idea of micro-lending by offering credit to small entrepreneurs worldwide, especially in developing countries. The executive committee of the Great Books Council of San Francisco voted to form a lending team along with the more than 7,000 other lending teams at Kiva. Our team is now set up on the Kiva website. The GBSF team has three members and has made twenty loans so far. Click on either of the logos above to go to our team page. When you lend through Kiva, usually $25, your funds are combined with other lenders to fund a loan to a specific borrower whose history and reason for the loan and a picture are available at all times. When the borrower makes a payment or repays the loan the money is credited to your account to be redeemed by you or to lend to someone else. Here is an example of how Kiva works: Serozha Vardanyan is making his payments on time and has repaid 25% of his loan. Click here to learn more about this borrower.
 Mr. Vardanyan is married with three children. He owns a shoe business where
he repairs and makes shoes. He began his business just repairing shoes.
Later he began to take orders to make individual shoes as well. Making
shoes has become quite a profitable part of his business.
You do not have to make a loan to join our team. Click here to go to our team page. On our page, click on the JOIN NOW button at the upper right. Just enter your name, email, and a password and click on the Sign Up button at the bottom of the page. You can then click on the LEND button at the top of the page to choose a borrower and make a loan if you wish. Be sure when you make a loan that it is listed as a loan from our team. |
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Some Useful Great Books Links
GBCSF is affiliated with the Great Books Foundation which was started in 1947 by Robert Hutchins and Mortimer Adler and produces most of the reading material used by Great Books discussion groups around the country. Their website provides a wealth of information and a list to find groups in your area or how to start a discussion group if one is not available near you. GBF also publishes Junior Great Books for use in schools or at home for K-12 students.
Center for the Study of the Great Ideas, founded by Mortimer Adler and Max Weismann, exists to help citizens understand why philosophy is everybody's business and to promulgate the insights and ideals embedded in Dr. Adler's lifelong intellectual work in the fields of Philosophy, Liberal Education, Ethics and Politics. This is a comprehensive website with something for everybody interested in Great Books and Great Ideas.
Classical Pursuits offers learning vacations around the world with location appropriate Great Books discussions. Our 2010 Calendar is now available at our website. Coming up in January: THE POESY OF KEY WEST, Selected poems of Elizabeth Bishop,
Wallace Stevens and Mark Strand
in Key West, Florida. We would love to have the pleasure of your company. Ann Kirkland also produces one of the best e-newsletters available.
Self Made Scholar is all about self-education - people learning what they want to know without formal schools or classrooms. Consider starting with the classics . . . delve into the literature that defines Western civilization and reflects the "great conversation" - an ongoing discussion seeking answers to society's timeless questions. Not only can studying the classics give you a greater understanding of history, it can give you a deeper understanding of what is going on in the world today. (Editor's note: This blog is a tremendous resource. For an introduction, click here.)
Humanities West presents a wide-ranging series of lectures and performances encompassing
the fine arts,
social history, music, politics, and philosophy of the arts.
Since 1983 these interdisciplinary programs have been designed to entertain and
educate diverse audiences in an effort to illuminate and elevate the human
spirit through exploration of the many sources of modern culture.
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"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers
of society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened
enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not
to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education." ---Thomas Jefferson
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Thank you for your interest in Great Books. Is there something you would like to know that we can add? This is your e-newsletter, so let us know.
Be sure to forward this email to your friends who might be interested in Great Books. Just click on "Forward email" at the bottom left.
Sincerely,
Jim Hall
Great Books Council of San Francisco
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