The Dutiful Daughter's Guide to Caregiving: A Practical Memoir
Judith Henry, 2015
Broadcloth Books
164 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780996278805
Summary
For the sixty six million people in the U.S. who are assisting a disabled, sick or aging family member, stress has become a way of life.
Why? Because caregiving, even when performed with great love, is difficult work that few people are truly prepared for. For Judith Henry, it turned out to be a six year position with plenty of on-the-job training as she helped care for elderly parents.
Learning to laugh over the expanding contents of her leather life-support system, aka a purse, and making lemonade from her father’s tart comment about being a dutiful daughter, this experience has culminated in a book entitled, The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide to Caregiving: A Practical Memoir. It became her inspiration for creating a well-loved writer’s group in Tampa, Florida specifically for caregivers; and has garnered her national recognition by the U.S. Department of Women’s Health through their Spotlight interview series.
Her book, a reassuring combination of financial planner, family therapist, geriatric care manager, and cheeky best friend, offers personal stories and practical wisdom on topics such as:
- Addressing financial and legal issues
- Avoiding caregiver burnout
- Choosing a rehab center
- Dealing with grief and loss.
Filled with laughter, tears and lessons learned, it is a valuable resource for anyone taking on more responsibility for a parent’s well-being.
Author Bio
• Birth—May 8, 1953
• Where—Chicago, Illinois, USA
• Education—M.A., Indiana University
• Currently—lives in Tampa, Florida
In addition to writing for online publications and working on her next book, Judith is the creator of a well-loved writer’s group for caregivers in Tampa, FL.
She also gives workshops and presentations on a variety of topics that include caring for elderly parents, the benefits of expressive writing, how to create a legacy letter for family and friends, and having the last word by writing your own obituary. (From the author.)
Visit the author's website.
Follow Judith on Facebook.
Book Reviews
The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide to Caregiving is like having a close, smart friend guide me around the potholes of caring for an aging parent. She writes with humor and poignancy on this complex and sensitive subject.
Val Perry, Coordinator, Instructor, Bloomingdale Life Story Writing Program, Valrico, FL
The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide to Caregiving is a little gem of a book, packed with the kind of information that every caregiver needs. Delivered with laughter, and not a few tears, it’s a must-read.
Anne Lawrence, Caregiver, Tampa FL
Judith has delved with humor, complete seriousness, and full knowledge into one of the most complicated aspects of relationships – helping people leave their lives through the gift of active love. Readers will find meaning and support on their own journey as caregivers.
Marilyn Lairsey, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist, Portland Maine
Discussion Questions
1. What is the central idea discussed in this book? What issues or ideas does The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide explore? Are they personal, sociological, global, political, economic, spiritual, medical, or scientific?
2. Do the issues described affect your life now or will they in the future? How so?
3. Do you think the approach of offering advice and suggestions through the lens of memoir is an effective way to deliver the information? What does or doesn’t work?
4. What kind of language is used in the book? Is it objective and dispassionate or passionate and earnest? Does the language enhance or undercut the value of the book?
5. What are the implications for the future of both aging and caregiving? Are there long- term or short-term consequences to the issues raised in the book? Are they positive or negative, affirming or frightening?
6. What solutions does the author propose to assist you in the role of family caregiver?
7. What are some of the memorable passages that you found interesting, profound, amusing, illuminating, disturbing, or sad.
8. If you are currently a caregiver or see that as your role in the future, how does The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide prepare you for this?
9. Why do you think the author used humor to introduce such serious subjects? Did you find it enjoyable or inappropriate?
10. What have you learned after reading The Dutiful Daughter’s Guide? Did it address issues you hadn’t thought of before in terms of becoming a family caregiver?
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
Reading Clauius: A Memoir in Two Parts
Caroline Heller, 2015
Penguin
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780385337618
Summary
A stunning elegy to a vanished time, Caroline Heller’s memoir traces the lives of her parents, her uncle, and their circle of intellectuals and dreamers from Central Europe on the eve of World War II to present-day America.nn
In this unforgettable dual memoir of her parents’ lives and her own, Caroline Heller brings to life the lost world of European café culture, and reminds us of the sustaining power of literature in the most challenging of times.
Heller vividly evokes prewar Prague, where her parents lived, loved, and studied. Her mother, Liese Florsheim, was a young German refugee initially drawn to Erich Heller, a bright but detached intellectual, rather than to his brother, Paul. As Hitler’s power spreads and World War II becomes inevitable, their world is destroyed and they must flee the country and continent. Paul, who will eventually become the author’s father, is trapped and sent to Buchenwald, where he survives under hellish conditions.
Though Paul’s life nearly ends in Europe, he reunites with Liese in the United States, where they marry. Their daughter Caroline, restless and insecure, carries the trauma of her parents’ story with her, but her quest to make peace with her heritage is eased by her love of books and writers, part of her family legacy. Through the darkest years of Hitler’s rule, Caroline’s parents and uncle had turned time and time again to literature to help them survive—and so she does as well.
Written with sensitivity and grace, Reading Claudius is a profound meditation on the ways we strive to solve the mysteries of our pasts, and a window into understanding the ones we love. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Where—Riverside, Illinois, USA
• Education—B.A., University of Chicago; M.F.A, Bennington College; Ed.D, University of California,
Berkeley
• Currently—lives in Boston, Massachusetts
Caroline Heller is the director of the interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in Educational Studies at Lesley University, where she is also a professor in the graduate school of education. She lives in Boston with her family. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
Reading Claudius, Caroline Heller’s memoir...[recounts] the lives of her parents, her uncle and their circle of intellectuals and dreamers in Prague on the eve of World War II. Following them through the war years and beyond, it becomes a complex elegy to a vanished time. I was lucky enough to read an early draft, and can’t wait for it to reach the hands of many more people.
Leah Hager Cohen - New York Times Sunday Book Review
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)
Unrequited: Women and Romantic Obsession
Lisa A. Phillips, 2015
HarperCollins
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062114013
Summary
Unrequited is a powerful, surprising, and empathetic exploration of one-sided romantic obsession.
The summer Lisa A. Phillips turned thirty, she fell in love with someone who didn’t return her feelings. She soon became obsessed. She followed him around, called him compulsively, and talked about him endlessly. One desperate morning, after she snuck into his apartment building, he picked up a baseball bat to protect himself and began to dial 911. Her unrequited love had changed her from a sane, conscientious college teacher and radio reporter into someone she barely recognized—someone who was taking her yearning much too far.
In Unrequited, Phillips explores the tremendous force of obsessive love in women’s lives. She argues that it needs to be understood, respected, and channeled for personal growth—yet it also has the potential to go terribly awry. Interweaving her own story with frank interviews and in-depth research in science, psychology, cultural history, and literature, Phillips describes how romantic obsession takes root, grows, and strongly influences our thoughts and behaviors.
Going beyond images of creepy, fatally attracted psychos, male fantasies of unbridled female desire, and the platitudes of self-help books, Phillips reveals a powerful, troubling, and surprisingly common phenomenon. As she illuminates this mysterious psychological experience, placing it in a rich and nuanced context, she offers compelling insights to help any woman who has experienced unrequited obsessive love and been mystified and troubled by its grip. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—August 9, 1968
• Raised—Newtown, Connecticut, USA
• Education—B.A., Oberlin college; M.F.A., University of Pittsburgh
• Currently—lives in Woodstock, New York
Lisa A. Phillips is the author of Unrequited: Women and Romantic Obsession (2015) and Public Radio: Behind the Voices (2006). Her articles have appeared in many national publications, including The New York Times, Psychology Today, Cosmopolitan, Salon, Washington Post, and Boston Globe. A former radio reporter, she has contributed stories to NPR, Marketplace, and other radio programs. She is a journalism professor at State University of New York, New Paltz.
Phillips has received many reporting awards, including several regional Edward R. Murrow awards and a New York State Coalition Against Sexual Assault Media Excellence Award. She is the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts grant and writing residencies at Yaddo, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Ucross, and Jentel. (From the author's website.)
Visit the author's website.
Follow Lisa on Facebook...and on Twitter.
Book Reviews
I hope they make this required reading not only for every teenage girl in America but for every boy, man and woman,whether partnered or not, because we could all use a dose of its well-researched wisdom.
Washington Post
Unfortunately, there is no cure for the pain of rejection, although researchers are working on it. Until then, Phillips suggests we "honor passion by confining and using it instead of letting it diminish us."
Chicago Tribune
Phillips explains the psychology and biology of extreme love—not so different from OCD or addiction—and notes the damaging tendency to excuse stalkers if they are women.
Pacific Standard
Phillips writes of the obsession that "changed me from a sane, conscientious college teacher and radio reporter into someone I barely knew—someone who couldn't realize that she was taking her yearning much, much too far.
Chronogram Magazine
Phillips is a fluid storyteller, incorporating her own experience with unrequited love into a cross-disciplinary journey through changing ideas of desire.
Publishers Weekly
Lisa A. Phillips tackles a timely, deeply personal topic....This is a compellingly written, eye-opening guide.
BookPage
The heart, indeed, is a lonely hunter. As Phillips shows, the hunt may be more engrossing, more thrilling, but more disappointing than the catch. Unrequited lovers will learn they are not alone, and they will also acquire useful tips on ways of letting go for good.
Booklist
A sympathetic exploration of the misunderstood phenomenon of women and "the stubbornness of romantic obsession."
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. In Unrequited, Lisa A. Phillips argues that loving someone who doesn't love you back is not necessarily a waste of time—rather, it can be a powerful, revealing, and life changing experience. Do you agree? Has the pain of unrequited love ever changed you in surprising ways?
2. Phillips also cautions that unrequited love in its most extreme form can go awry, becoming destructive and invasive—and that society more likely to give women a "gender pass" for this kind of behavior and see it as more of a joke than a problem. Do we view stalking and other forms of relationship aggression differently when women are the perpetrators? Why?
3. Unrequited also looks at self-destructiveness: women who have abandoned their sense of self in the pursuit of an elusive love. Have you witnessed this in others, or experienced it yourself? Why, when love is supposed to be enriching, do people lose themselves to romantic obsession?
4. Teen crushes can be painful experiences, but Phillips argues that, during the emotionally turbulent years of adolescence, crushes are in many ways more beneficial than mutual relationships. In retrospect, do you think your own teen crushes provided any plusses along with all the angst?
5. Phillips reveals a lot about her own experience of unrequited love over the course of the book. How did you connect with her as a narrator? Were there aspects of her story or her approach that rubbed you the wrong way?
6. The case studies she presents are accounts that, in another context, may seem "cringe-worthy" -- stories of women too hung up on people who are "just not that into" them. Which accounts had the greatest impact on you? Did you feel tempted to judge any of the women? Did you identify with anyone? Who seemed most sympathetic? Most empowered? Most dysfunctional?
7. Phillips recounts the stories of women who have been inspired and transformed by unrequited love. Has this ever happened to you? If not, does it seem possible?
8. If tomorrow you began to feel sucked into a passionate attraction to someone you know you could never have a relationship with, how would you deal with it? Would you fight it off or embrace it?
9. At the end of Unrequited, Phillips offers guidance to people who are struggling with a romantic obsession. Did any of her recommendations have an impact on your life, and if so, how?
10. Phillips argues that society should do more to educate young people on the psychological and ethical dimensions of romantic love—a kind of "relationship ed." Do you think this could make a difference in how people cope with unrequited love and romantic rejection? What would a good "relationship ed" program entail?
11. Did Phillips change the way you think about love and relationships? How?
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
Confessions of a Librarian: A Memoir of Loves
Barbara Foster, 2015
Riverdale Avenue Books
248 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781626011519
Summary
Ever wonder what a university librarian--a highly praised and widely translated author--does at night after spending the day at the reference desk answering questions?
Barbara Foster’s latest endeavor is a no-holds barred memoir that describes her erotic pilgrimage to the “wilder shores of love,” including Turkey, India, Israel and Argentina, as well as frolics with the Mob in her home town, swinging Manhattan. A nice girl from Philadelphia turned female Casanova, Barbara has recorded her encounters in Confessions of a Librarian: A Memoir of loves. Though her Confessions expose the hot and dirty, they are always literate. Unlike the sparsely written and made-up genre of “mommy porn,” Confessions descends from the classics of erotic love: Casanova’s Story of My Life, Anais Nin’s diaries, and Catherine M’s Sexual Life, with a nod to Erica Jong and Toni Bentley. And what happens to Barbara really happened. The 250 page manuscript is complete, carefully edited, and legally vetted.
Confessions is structured around a group of memorable women friends (and sometime rivals) who meet bi-weekly in New York, where Barbara recalls her erotic pilgrimage, both geographically and spiritually. Barbara fits in although she is a mature, married, career academic with expertise in biographical writing. The Club is an actual group that Barbara attended, and the women’s personalities clash and evolve. The names and descriptions of participants have been changed, and where advisable places and dates altered.
Barbara’s erotic stories invite her readers to participate vicariously in global adventures that have become too dangerous for most. Terrorism, kidnapping, sexually transmitted diseases may have curtailed the opportunity for erotic travel, but not the desire. Barbara’s writing style is both romantic and down-to-bed. Her personal conflicting duality creates a tension that makes her own character come alive. The men portrayed are a compelling lot: rich or poor, shady or respectable, romantic and surprising in the boudoir. The memoir, like its author, is both bawdy and bookish. Confessions will forever change the image of the librarian!
Author Bio
• Birth—June 27, 1948
• Where—Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
• Education—B.A., Temple University; M.A., Columbia University
• Currently—lives in New York, New York
Barbara Foster is an Associate Professor and research librarian at City Univerity of New York. She is co-author of three highly acclaimed books, including the biographies Forbidden Journey (Harper/Collins) and The Secret Lives of Alexandra David-Neel (third printing Overlook, 2007). The New York Times reviewed her biography of David-Neel favorably on three occasions: the “Bear in Mind” column called it “a wonderful biography,” and “New and Noteworthy” stated: “Hers was a great human life very well written up.” The New York Review of Books rated the biography "one of the best books of all-time." Her biography of Adah Isaacs Menken, America’s first superstar, A Dangerous Woman, was published in 2011 by Globe Pequot Press. She was profiled in the German newspaper Berliner Zeitung and did a reading at New York University’s Deutsches Haus.
Barbara is a world traveler in the tradition of the heroic women she writes about. She has acted as a referee for Britain's Royal Geographical Society. Barbara has lectured on David-Neel (the French explorer of Tibet) at universities, conferences, museums, and libraries worldwide—including Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Cal Tech in the U.S., and Sidney, Buenos Aires, Prague, Mexico City, and Calgary among international venues.
Recently she spoke before an unprecedented joint meeting of the Harvard-MIT Club. Barbara has written numerous articles, for print and the Net, both scholarly and popular. These pieces have appeared in: New York Archives Magazine (2012) Tablet (Jewish magazine), Travel and Leisure, Richmond Review (London), Drexel Onlline Journal, North Dakota Quarterly, Journal of the West, Culturefront (Summer 2000), Nineteenth Century (cover story--Spring 2002), Jewish Quarterly, Jewish Currents (2006), California Territorial Quarterly (2007), PopMatters, Ascent (Canada), Amarillo Bay, Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood, Ego (Indian magazine) 3am (2009, UK) Smith Magazine, Evergreen Review, Chimera (In English with French translation (2010), Anthropology and Humanism Quarterly as well as on the Net in popular sites dealing with sexuality, such as Nerve, Clean Sheets, Diverse Publications (UK), Ruthie's Club, Phaze anthology, Oysters & Chocolate, and Lucrezia (Australia), Playgirl, Sliptongue, Ravenous Romance anthology, Historynet. com, Huffington Post, Koktejl (Magazine Czech Republic), 2013.
Barbara has also published dozens of poems in journals in every English speaking country. She is included in Contemporary Authors, Who’s Who of American Women, Marquis Who’s Who.
Barbara is joint author of Three in Love: Menages a Trois from Ancient to Modern Times (HarperSF, 1997), which is presently an Authors Guild Selection available on iUniverse and Amazon. The subject of favorable feature stories in the Philadelphia Inquirer and NY's Daily News. Entertainment Weekly praised Three, calling it “racy and engaging”; the Washington Post said: “the first serious study of collective intimacy”; The New Yorker called it “a people’s almanac of love triangle lore.”
Barbara has been on the “Curiosity” show (Discovery channel 2012), interviewed by the BBC (Channel Four), CBC, ARTE (EU TV—international distribution), S. Korea's SBS-TV, and CBS' 20/20 for TV documentaries on Polyamory, Eve Ensler’s latest documentary on love as well as for articles in the New York Post and the Times Literary Supplement.
She is at work on a sequel to Three, which will be the definitive study of the history and psychology of plural love. Barbara has completed her intimate memoir of her experiences in New York and other exotic locales: The Confessions Club: the Secret Life of a Sexy Librarian. (From the author.)
Visit the author's website.
Book Reviews
We can’t wait for the movie!
Bill Profita & Kevin Gallagher - WBRP-FM
A great new book to read in bed!
John Fugelsang - Sirius XM Satellite Radio Network
Having the time of their lives! . . . Life is Good!
Mike McDonnel - WLW-AM 700
Discussion Questions
1. If a wife is having outside affairs should she be honest and tell her husband?
2. Is the cougar relationship, older woman and younger man, a step forward or back in male female communication? Is a cougar woman letting herself in for real disappointment? Will the man sooner or later bond with someone closer to his age?
3. Can a woman safely travel to exotic spots these days with the world in such turmoil, terrorism, etc?
4. Does a mature woman have to make too many compromises to have a lover in her life? Will men back off, preferring a younger partner?
5. Can an intellectual woman prevail in relationships where the man expects her to keep her intelligence muted in order not to threaten him?
6. If a husband and wife's relationship is becoming dull, should they add a third to spice things up?
7. Can a husband and wife develop emotionally by their exposure to other, outside partners?
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
Hamlet's Dresser: A Memoir
Bob Smith, 2002
Simon & Schuster
288 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780684852706
Summary
The true story of a boy whose life was saved by literature, Hamlet's Dresser is a portrait of a person made whole by art.
Bob Smith's childhood was a fragile and lonely one, spent largely caring for his handicapped sister, Carolyn. But at age ten, his local librarian gave him a copy of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, and it transformed him.
In Bob's first look at Shakespeare's penetrating language—"In sooth I know not why I am so sad"—he had found a window through which to view the world. Years later, when the American Shakespeare Festival moved into Stratford and Smith was hired as Hamlet's dresser, his life's passion took shape.
Blending tragedy and comedy, Smith gracefully weaves together his childhood memories with his experiences backstage and teaching the plays. The result is a gorgeous, tender, infectious book about the restorative powers of literature and art. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1942-43
• Where—Stratford, Connecticut, USA
• Education—High school degree
• Currently—lives in Stratford, Connecticut
Bob Smith is the American author of Hamlet's Dresser (2002), his memoir centering on his troubled family caring for a severely retarded sister. At the age of 10, Smith found solace in reading Shakespeare and by 16 began working in the summer months as a dresser for the American Shakespeare Festival in his hometown of Stratford, Connecticut.
Smith memorized lines from Shakespeare's plays and sonnets and was considered somewhat of an expert among his theatrical associates, including actors who would come to him for coaching. Eventually, however, Smith became a painter, making a living off the sales of his art.
Then, at the urging of his friends and associates, he turned from painting to teaching his beloved Shakespeare. Though he never went to college, Smith taught graduate and undergraduate students at Temple University and the State University of New York at Purchase. By the 1990s he decided to follow his other passion—working with the elderly at The Y at 92nd Street and The Stein Senior Center. Over the years hundreds of students, of varying ages, attended his classes, and it was a 1996 article about him in The New York Times that led to his contract with Scribner for Hamlet's Dresser.
Writing the memoir prompted Smith to close up his Booklyn Heights apartment and move back to his hometown of Statford to better immerse himself in memories. (Adapted from the New York Times.)
Book Reviews
That words have a healing power may be a cliche for some, but in this intimate, often wryly funny memoir, their ability to transform lives is demonstrable.
Toronto Globe and Mail
Smith depicts characters so vividly and orchestrates their interactions so poignantly that the memoir would work if Shakespeare were absent. His presence makes the book more moving still.
Chicago Tribune
Hamlet's Dresser is touching, mesmerizing, intelligent, poetic, fascinating, and beautiful—you will love it.
Book-of-the-Month Club
In this intimate, inspiring account, Smith concludes that words and ideas possess the ability to heal and transform a life no matter how dire and painful the circumstances, using his own difficult childhood and productive adulthood as proof.... Veteran memoir readers will find this book absorbing, refreshing and touching.
Publishers Weekly
Smith's memoir tenderly breaks your heart into pieces and, with the sagacious insight...weaves it into a resplendent crown of joy.... Smith is the teacher we all should have had to introduce us to Shakespeare. Fortunately, he has given us this bejeweled book. —Barry X. Miller, Austin P.L., TX
Library Journal
Disjointed memoir of a troubled family.... Smith's own passion for the Bard of Avon might have been more fully explained, not because a love of Shakespeare is so hard to understand, but because it is the memoir's primary conceit.... Alternately touching and informative, but it fails to cohere.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Countless people advised Carolyn's parents to "put her away." Were the Smiths' efforts to care for Carolyn at home noble or misguided? Should they have institutionalized her at a younger age? If they had, how might Bob Smith's life have been different? To what extent should parents care for a disabled child at the expense of other siblings?
2. Discuss the role of religion in Bob Smith's childhood. Why was Smith drawn to the priesthood as a boy? Why did Shakespeare eventually offer Smith more solace than God? If this memoir can be read as a vindication of art, can it also be read as a condemnation of religion?
3. How did Smith's childhood immersion in art and literature simultaneously alleviate and deepen his loneliness? Are children with anguished family lives more often drawn to the arts than those in less troubled circumstances? Why or why not?
4. "I was going to school those days and nights in the theater," Smith writes. "I never needed anything so much as what I needed then, and never has so much been given to me." What exactly was he given? Discuss how the "lessons" he learned at the American Shakespeare Festival Theater were different from those available in a conventional classroom.
5. Of his time at the theater, Smith writes: "I was being taught that poetry and beauty are not simply antidotes to horror, sometimes they are the horror. I was learning that art can be a brutal thing, not just some decoration placed over the truth, but...the truth itself." Discuss.
6. "I'm no scholar," the author tells us in the prologue. "I've got no formal education past high school." Smith's relationship to Shakespeare is more personal and heartfelt than academic, yet he has made a vocation of sharing his passion with actors, students, and seniors. Do you think he considers himself a teacher or simply an enthusiast? How do you think Smith would describe his approach to Shakespeare?
7. How does Smith's love of Shakespeare serve as a catalyst in his forming relationships? Recall, for example, the easy camaraderie Smith develops with the actors and directors at the theater and his later affection for his elderly "students." Does Shakespeare's work in particular facilitate friendship and intimacy? Or would such closeness result from the sharing of any enthusiasm or interest?
8. Recall and discuss Smith's relationships with elderly people, from his own grandparents to the seniors he teaches. Why does Smith cherish old people? What do they offer him that others can't or don't? Did this book alter your impressions of the elderly?
9. Throughout the book, Smith quotes passages from Shakespeare. What purpose do these excerpts serve? Did they prompt you to read Shakespeare yourself? If so, which of his works are you most inclined to revisit or explore for the first time and why?
10. Some may consider Shakespeare's writing formal or highbrow—even daunting. What are your own feelings or biases toward Shakespeare? Did Smith's memoir change your perceptions? If so, how and why?
11. "When I talk about the plays I unfold myself to myself," Smith writes. For him, reading Shakespeare elicits myriad memories and emotions. Why does reading Shakespeare afford us unique access to our inner selves, our pasts, and our humanity? Does Smith's memoir imply that reading Shakespeare can make us better people? If so, "better" in what sense?
12. Why, in middle age, does Smith move back to Stratford, Connecticut? What is he trying to recapture or come to terms with? Why have you returned to a particular place from your past? What did you hope to gain? Did you? What does Smith's decision to return to New York signify?
13. Do you blame Smith for withdrawing from his sister, Carolyn, for so many decades, or do you sympathize with his inability to face her? Why does he stay away for so long? Why do you think he finally decides to visit Carolyn at Southbury? What gives him the strength?
14. Although Smith attests that Shakespeare "saved his life," he still retains much of the "invisibility" of his childhood and writes that he has "never completely emerged from that darkness." What does Smith's memoir reveal about the power and limits of art's redemptive qualities?
15. Compare and contrast this memoir with others you've read. What makes a memoir unique or extraordinary? What scene or passage are you most likely to remember from Smith's account several years from now?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)