Banned Books Club discussion

I saw the movie of The Hours a while ago, but I don't remember anything about it.

Have any of you read the book AND watched the movie? Which is better, the book or the movie?? I know that's a silly question, because the book is usually better than the movie, but I do remember there was an excellent cast in this particular film (I think), so you never know.

Also, I'm wondering if the movie stays true to the book version. (Often, movies are very different from the book.)

Anyway, I'm leaning more toward picking up the book (as opposed to watching the movie again) because I'm having some problems with my dvd player so I may not even be able to watch the film right now!!

Serena, I think you said you read the book. Did you like it???

THANKS!!!
b.

Hi Barbara, no actually, this is the first time I've heard of the book and the movie. Lol! It sounds interesting!

I agree most of the time the book is definitely better than the movie. Movies seem to simplify because of the length. LOTR is my standard of translating books to movies—if you can't do a faithful job as Peter Jackson had done, then don't bother. hahahaha! The "Clockwork Orange" is an example of great translation, but Kubrick being a genius and had such a strong personality, everything he did has the Kubrick stamp on it. "Clockwork Orange" in his hand became Kubrick's "Clockwork Orange" but with the soul of Burgess in my opinion. "The Shining", which Stephen King himself wasn't happy with the choice of Kubrick, became the one of the most brilliant films of all time...

Ok, I am straying from the topic, so I will shut up now. :)

Thanks Serena & Satia!!

I'm going to head over to Borders either tomorrow or Saturday. They're going out of business and have some huge sales going on, so I'm hoping to get both Mrs. Dalloway and The Hours (both in book version.)

Serena, I know I'll probably laugh at myself when you answer this question (because I probably do know what it means, but right now my brain is all over the place), but what is LOTR??? I think I've seen it used here before, but I can't figure out what it means right now!!! LOL.

By the way, Clockwork Orange and The Shining are two perfect examples of the type of books I can't read. When I was younger I loved this type of work, but ever since I fell into this "depression" that I've been in, one of the genres that I have to stay away from are books and films with evil, scary people who have serious mental illness issues (because in my opinion, the "evil" characters in are evil due to mental illness.)

I definitely appreciate the amazing creativity of Kubrick, Burgess, Stephen King, and other writers and directors of books and films in this genre, but I just remember being SO DISTURBED when I saw Clockwork Orange (the film -- I didn't read the book.) I think I had to sleep with all the lights on for a month after seeing that film. LOL!!!!

OK, now that everyone here probably thinks I'm a "sissy", I guess I'll have to admit that I am!!! Actually, the truth is that due to my depression, sometimes I have terrible nightmares, and also, sometimes the idea of people being evil, or even of really bad things happening to people, just sets me off into a state of complete panic!!!

I just wanted to let you all know this, so that if a book is chosen with a lot of evil people doing very bad and evil things to others (like in the two books/films we just mentioned), please give me a "heads up" so that I know not to read it!!!

Satia, I'm glad you liked The Hours (the book version) so much. I'm looking forward to reading it. I don't want to read Mrs. Dalloway and The Hours at the same time, so which do you think I should read first??? (I'm going to read one directly after the other.)

THANKS!!!

Hi Barbara,
Sorry, the title is so long and I am lazy so I use the abbreviation, it's Lord Of The Rings trilogy. :) sorry about that!

Ahh... I see. I don't read much horror genre, but have always been fond of some good Stephen King ones. Jack in The Shinning certainly was crazy, but I am not sure if I'd call him evil. But then again, it all depends on how one defines "evil". Lol! Hm.. Characters in Clockwork Orange I see as more of victims of circumstances and environment, after all, they are just kids trying to grow up in an awful world. (I think Saita disagree with this, lol!) Kubrick's version certainly adds a very creepy dimension to it, I'll have to credit that to Malcolm McDowell for doing such a good job! Lol!

Don't get me wrong, I was terrified of The Shining the first time I saw it! And I still feel the shiver now when I watch it!

Of course you'd want to avoid things that can give you nightmares. I am sorry to hear that. :( And don't worry, I will certainly warn you if a book's chosen with overly amount of evil characters in it. Lol! Now I think about it, if "Choke" was ever chosen, that'd be the first one you'd want to avoid. :)

Hi Serena,

Thanks for the warning about Choke!!!

Well, there's always so much to read, and now that I'm working full time I'm reading a lot less than I used to, so if Choke is chosen I'll just read some other stuff that month!!

So LOTR is Lord of the Rings!!! You know I think I saw the first movie. (If it's a trilogy, I guess it's three books and they made each of them into a movie??) I enjoyed the movie, but I've never read any of the books. Do you recommend them?

Satia,

I'm going to go to Borders tomorrow. Since they're going out of business, I guess there may be some good deals on some of the books. They don't have the greatest selection (I guess since they're going out of business they obviously haven't been re-ordering books they've been running out of.)

But I'm hoping that both Mrs. Dalloway and The Hours are available there. I want to get both of them, and read both of them, but I don't want to read them at the same time (I think it will be too confusing.)

I'm planning on reading one and then reading the other immediately after, so that I can discuss both here in the group.

Which one would make sense to read first??? Obviously Mrs. Dalloway was written first, but do you think I'll enjoy Mrs. Dalloway more if I read The Hours first, or the other way around???

I thought The Hours was based on Virginia Woolf's life (in some way.) Is Mrs. Dalloway based on her life as well??

I'm looking forward to both of them!!!

Thanks Satia!!

I'll definitely have to check out LOTR at some point, and I will read Mrs. Dalloway before I read The Hours.

I hope they have Mrs. Dalloway at Border's tomorrow!!! I just have a few pages left of A Visit from the Goon Squad, so I'll be finishing it tonight and I need to start something new tomorrow!!!!

"Fiddle dee dee!" Lol! The first time I read that, I thought: "hmm.. so that's what the teenagers say to be cool during that time eh?"

It's true there are plentiful of libraries in NY, it's pretty awesome. I have membership at the Brooklyn Library, which is huge. I borrow some books if I don't want to purchase them, like The Witches. But books like Gone with the Wind, or my first Woolf, I feel like owning them because, "I think it's time to own a copy of Virginia Woolf/Gone with the Wind." I don't own a lot of books right now, I'd say it's under 100. I also re-read books like crazy, all of my Vonneguts have been re-read few times. And if I get a desire for a specific title and can't find it on my shelf, I get real upset for few days. I know, it's weird... :)

I know we're off topic, but just to answer your question, I would LOVE to be able to take books out of the NY Public Library, but I can't. Two years ago I was renting all my movies from there. Once a week I went there, took out the max amount of movies you can take at a time (I think the max was 10), finish all 10 in a week (I'm an insomniac), then return them and get 10 more.

Well, at some point I was sort of "redecorating" my apartment, and somehow two dvds fell behind one of my shelves (but it took me a long time to figure out where they were.) So my late fees at the library are through the roof. It will probably take me the rest of my life to pay off these fees, so I can still go to the library for research, etc., but I don't think I'll be able to borrow books or movies from there again.... ever.

Hehehehe... Satia on TV talking about her hoarding problem.

Leather bound copy of LOTR?? Nice...

Oh sorry to hear that Barbara. I think that might be the main reason why I don't always get books out of the library. The fear of forgetting to return something, since I am very spacey, I am just never good at it. I agree with Satia, libraries should have limit on overdue fees, up to the cost to replace the item.

Oh damn, that's a crazy story about your grandfather! And very good that he survived. Thank goodness. At Scholastic we constantly use survival short stories as "hi-low" reading material, I've certainly never seen a "buried by books" story!

"The Man Who Has Too Many Books".

Yes, Barbara, I'd also recommend reading LOTR, if fantasy is your genre. It's actually a great literature series in my opinion. But perhaps you can give The Hobbit a try first? Although the story style of the Hobbit and LOTR are different, The Hobbit is a good way to ease into the world Tolkien had created. And damn! What a world it is!