Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Louis de Bernnieres: Corelli's Mandolin

One Word Summary: Antonia

More Words: This book was Awful. Terrible. Depressing. Difficult. Insane. I loved it. It made me feel hopeful, despite human atrocities.

Questions:
  1. Does Carlo's homosexuality impact his heroism? Would he even be a hero if he weren't a homosexual? What do you think about his arguments against choice?
  2. Compare Mandras to Antonio. Francisco to Antonio.
  3. Hubris. What is Mandras' fatal flaw?
  4. How is Pelagia like a man? Is she different from other women in our day and culture?
  5. According to the author what comes of teaching women to think? Do you agree?
  6. What is the name of the literary technique for separating lovers and then reuniting them after it almost too late? What purpose does it serve? Is it true in real life?
  7. Is Antonio a coward, a lover not a fighter, a pacifist, a wimp? Why does he give up on Pelagia so easily?
  8. How did WWII change the world? Why is Cephallonia the perfect place to stage a story about change, and growing old, and being young and in-love. What do these things have in common? What other dichotomies can you identify in the book.
  9. Why does the doctor use such big words?
  10. Was Mussolini really crazy?
Quotes:
he also knew that everyman needs an obsession in order to enjoy life.

Another thing. Love is a temporary madness, it erupts like volcanoes andthen subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have towork out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivablethat you should ever part.

He had struggled for a better world, and wrecked it.


More Reading:
Tragic Greek Plays
Mussolini Biography
History of Greece
A farewell to Arms, and other Hemingway novels
An atlas

Censorship: I would want my daughter to wait until she was a senior in highschool at least. But she should read it again after college and when she's old.