Goucher Reads
What do you read?
The Goucher community loves to read,
and I want to keep talking about it.
-
Max Eber
1. Who are you and what are you interested in?
My name’s Max Eber, I’m a 2011 graduate of Goucher College and studied English, concentration creative writing while there. I’m pretty scattered interests wise, it causes a bit of a problem as it sort of leaves me unable to pursue all of them. For instance I love art but didn’t have time to finish an art minor while at Goucher. I was also lured into acting by my friends (as in forced) but having done it I found I really loved it and since then I would love to do more theatre and cultivate that craft through dance and singing lessons. But it’s hard to fit that in at the moment since I also enjoy horticulture and garden design and since graduation have started my own landscape design business as a means to support myself. Have already had a few clients this spring already so it’s looking to be an interesting year. Otherwise I really enjoy play and screenwriting, I’m in the midst of writing a play adapted from this Italian folktales that’s turning into sort of a Shakespeare pastiche. It’s bawdy but in a frothy way which is pretty fun.
Otherwise I’m into superhero comics (particularly the Batman Family) and vintage film, animation, illustration, clothing and design. Pretty much anything to do with aesthetics and design interests me.
2. What are you reading now?
It’s a bit embarrassing since it’s not very literary, but outside of plant nursery catalogs, I’ve actually been engrossed in reading cooking books. I’m a foodie and can make some deserts but I’m rather lazy when it comes to making savory food for myself. I’ve been experimenting and have been making a point to try to actually cook actual meals. Other than that I’ve been reading Italian Folktales retold by Italo Calvino, of which the tale I’m adapting for my play is from. It was the only story in the book that was relatively pedestrian and domestic. There was no magic or any of the other fairytale trappings that pepper the other stories in the book and so it really stood out to me and reminded me of Taming of The Shrew and Much Ado About Nothing.
3. What is the most important book you have ever read?Really hard question as I sort of equate a lot of books to food, you read them and sort of absorb them as you would food’s calories and nutritional content. So they all contribute whether you like it or not. I could say admittedly I get impatient with a lot of novels. I find really well written short stories can deliver a much more concentrated shot of emotions or leave one particularly disturbed. I really owe a lot of my creativity though to a lot of the picture books and young adult novels I grew up with. I’m very visual so these days I appreciate when revisiting my childhood library those books that had beautiful illustrations. My mom used to work at a children’s bookstore so she had a pretty extensive cache of children’s classics and sort of forgotten oddball works around the house growing up. I guess favorites, pretty unsurprising would be things by Doctor Seuss and Maurice Sendak (doesn’t take much to figure out why I liked Where The Wild Things Are) especially Pierre (A Cautionary Tale) and love even ones he didn’t write but illustrated as he did for a Sesyle Joslin book on manners called What Do You Say Dear? Other things are the sort of amazing for their art is Imps. Demons. Hobgoblins. Witches. Fairies & Elves by Leonard Baskin, Masquerade by Kit Williams and The Practical Princess by Jay Williams, illustrated by Frisco Henstra.
As far as determinate life changers, probably reading Thorton Wilder’s playThe Skin of Our Teeth sticks as it brought together both a bizarre flippancy and dead seriousness together in one package sort of through me for a loop. I also owe a lot of credit to Italo Calvino, Oscar Wilde, and J.D. Salinger.
4. If you could suggest one book, what would it be and why?
Probably Italo Calvino’sDifficult Loves, the Riviera section of stories is truly beautiful.
I sort of worship Salinger’s 9 Stories though, it’s far superior to Catcher In The Rye. I adapted the story Teddy from this book to the stage for class at Goucher but since Salinger’s estate pretty much has embargoes on his work so I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to stage it anywhere. It’s funny I remember having to read the book in ninth grade and I sort of wanted nothing to do with it. But after the fact and during discussion I started really enjoying the short stories. Salinger’s work is also pretty dated, obviously influenced by the movies of the time, and I’m not sure if it’s sadistic but I enjoy seeing Salinger’s sort of affluent rich white people having mental breakdowns, being alcoholics. The general permanence of sadness and unrest in many of the stories is very, I also like how he writes children. Probably half the appeal to me is to see that idealized chic image of post WWII sort of upper class aesthetic and lifestyles being sort of punctured or sullied by mental illness, alcohol and depression as well as other vices and issues. It’s a wonderful juxtaposition that reminds me of some episodes of The Twilight Zone, as well as Hitchcock movies and the Hitchcock Blonde concept where often very kept people that often embody that aesthetic are thrown into odd situations and or suddenly or even quietly unravel before us. Despite the heavy hitters like A Perfect Day for Banana Fish and Teddy the book has some wonderfully sweet, sincere moments too that I envy a lot as a writer. I’m more inclined to write comedy so it’s always very enviable when other writers can pull off tender and somber moments without it appearing too trite on either.
-
Asa Eisenhardt
1. Who are you and what are you interested in?
I’m Asa, and I enjoy music, long journalism articles and film. I’ve also recently improvised my own peanut sauce and given my amateur cooking abilities, I’m kinda excited about it! I graduated from Goucher in 2010 with an English degree (creative writing concentration), and have absolutely made use of the skills honed then while working as a technical writer for the past couple of years.Goucher is such a reading- and writing-heavy school, and the meat grinder of literary analysis I went through really helped me become the dependable documentation dude I am today.2. What are you reading now?
Recently, I’ve finally kicked my butt back into a decent reading-for-pleasure regimen. I can’t say I frequently read the same caliber of material as some of the previous Goucher Reads interviewees, but for me anything is a step in the right direction back to the reading voracity of my youth.As of late, I’ve been rekindling my longtime love of noir/crime/detective fiction. Drive was an excellent film based on a similarly excellent novel. It’s Hemingwayish in its minimalism and conveyance of character behavior. A quick and awesome read.The other book I’m just finishing up is called Queer Street, and it’s the third (and sadly last, I believe) of Curt Colbert’s Jake Rossiter detective novels. Each one uses considerable historical accuracy in examining postwar Seattle’s various social issues through the lens of a tough-as-nails private eye— police corruption (Rat City), Japanese immigrant conflicts during and after the institution of internment camps (Sayonaraville) and the underground club scenes of the gay/lesbian/transgender community (Queer Street). I was honestly kinda worried I’d be really offended at how a private eye— especially an ex-marine, as Rossiter is— would handle the lifestyles in Queer Street, given that homophobia was even more rampant in those days than it is now and detective fiction isn’t known for being egalitarian (see any Mickey Spillane novel, yikes). I was honestly really impressed, though— Colbert doesn’t use any homophobic motives to keep Rossiter tough.
Sadly, in my lengthy search for Queer Street, I found out Colbert’s publisher went under. I really hope it’s not the last the world sees of his writing— Rat City is so instantly addictive, it’s unbelievable. For anyone into Sam Spade, Phillip Marlowe or olden-day America, I can’t recommend it enough.3. What was the most important book you have ever read?
This is truly a tough one. I think the slew of sci-fi and fantasy I read as a kid is pretty indicative of the day-dreaming escapist I am. I feel like Ray Bradbury imbues his work with this sense of wonder that sort of transcends genre. He makes you feel the same. whimsical sort of emotions as his characters and I think that sort of resonance is a profound connection with the audience that most artists seek. So in that way, Something Wicked This Way Comes was ONE of the most important books I’ve ever read— it’s as much a wide-eyed and spirited a coming-of-age tale as it is a deliciously ghoulish Halloween yarn.But on a slightly more contemporary note, I think High Fidelity is a masterpiece. Rob, its protagonist, isn’t the best guy— in fact, dude is quite repulsive. He brags about this and that sexual conquest, rambles on about his musical knowledge, and becomes an overdramatic wreck when his girlfriend leaves him. But at the same time, there’s some comfort in his being flawed. He’s a warts-and-all hopeless romantic who has to conceal his true nature under a spikey layer of pop-culture elitism and mid-30s jadedness. It’s like reading a book of painful confessions from a close pal.Though I hardly pay as much attention to the comic book industry as I should, Watchmen is something I will forever evangelize. I’m not one for nerd rage, but it bums me out that most people might remember it as a stupid eye candy movie and not a self-contained, brilliant series that addressed American history, Cold War paranoia, the ubermensch and all these vastly different character stories under the premise of a simple question: what if superheroes were real? I’ve read the thing more than any book I own and more times than I can count, and yet I still find new things every time I pick it up. Absolutely indispensable.4. If you could suggest one book, what would it be and why?Man, I feel like the answers to this question and the previous one are interchangeable! In addition to the books I mentioned there, I’d also add Stephen King’s On Writing. I have great respect for the man’s work, though I’ve read little of it save for a traumatic glance through Cycle of the Werewolf at the tender age of ten. That said, his humor, wisdom and unpretentious insight are phenomenal and On Writing seamlessly switches between advice and memoir. -
Lily Dodge
1. Who are you and what are you interested in?
I’m a senior English major interested in: postmodernism, deconstruction, feminism, queer issues & sexuality, locally based social justice, writing and the future of publishing, mental health, creative writing, community and family structures, and the culinary potential of peppermint.
2. What are you reading now?
Right now I am reading: Infinite Jest (assigned for Great Big American Novels with Penny Cordish), Ana Historic* (assigned for Postmodernism with Penny Cordish), Go Tell It On The Mountain (assigned for Images of God in Black Literature with Kelly Douglas), Dialogue and Dialectic by Gadamer (assigned for Hermeneutics and Deconstruction with John Rose) and Sum* by David Eagleman, for pleasure. I also read tons of online content, from blogs to lit mags.
3. What is the most important book you have ever read?
This question is really difficult! Lord of the Rings by Tolkien (and his other Middle Earth writings) were deeply important to me as a kid because they gave me a fantasy world to retreat into. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier were crucial to the shaping of my identity in high school because of what they had to say about the relationship between creator, created and creation as well as evil, respect, and personal agency. House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski opened me up to experimental forms that I now explore in reading and writing. Finally, as a Christian person some very important texts for me are the Bible (don’t ask me which translation), Opening to God* by David Brenner, and New Woman New Earth and Sexism and God-Talk by Rosemary Radford Ruether.
4. If you could suggest one book to read what would be and why?
If I could suggest one book, it would be the work by Foucault most relevant to a person’s interests (History of Sexuality and Madness and Civilization are personal favorites.) I love Foucault and think he makes everything make sense. If I was restricted to fiction, I would suggest Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas* by Tom Robbins, because it’s a fantastically fun book. It’s just so enjoyable. One time in high school a jock was bragging that he hadn’t read a book in ten years because he hated reading, and I made a bet with him that he would like that book. The terms of the bet were that he would read the first 10 pages, and if he hated it as much as he claimed to hate all reading, he would put it down and win the bet. If he liked it, I won. He brought it back to me the next day after I lent it to him - he had been so captivated that he read it overnight. I recommend it to everyone; I’ve lost three copies lending it out.
*Ana Historic by Daphne Marlett, Sum by David Eagleman, and Opening to God by David Brenner, Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas by Tom Robbins are not available in the Goucher collection, but can be ordered through Interlibrary Loan through Worldcat. If you want to read this book, suggest it to be added into our circulation!
