As final exams approach, it may be difficult for undergraduates to fathom pleasure reading. But more than 230 members of the Duke community tuned in Wednesday night to a webcast of the DukeReads book of the month.
Steve Nowicki, dean and vice provost for undergraduate education, and National Public Radio’s Frank Stasio, host of the live program “The State of Things,” discussed Ann Patchett’s 2001 novel “Bel Canto” on the live webcast.
During the webcast, Nowicki and Stasio discussed the development of relationships in the text, which tells the story of an extravagant birthday party that turns into a four-month-long hostage situation after terrorists take over. Nowicki and Stasio examined the themes of love, hope, survival and terrorism in terms of the novel’s strong visual setting, ambiguity and abrupt ending.
“The narrative is in some ways very slow,” Nowicki said. “Not much happens—just a few events are pivotal, but I found it a page turner.”
DukeReads, in its third year, is an online book club created by Duke graduates to help fellow alumni stay connected to the University, said Rachel Davies, assistant director for the University’s Lifelong Learning and Travel organization. Alumni invite Duke faculty to select and present the books with DukeReads host Frank Stasio on a monthly basis, Davies added. This year, the book club presented seven books, including freshman summer reading novel, “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.”
“It also gives faculty members the chance to choose a book that they don’t teach in class so people get another insight into both the thought process of the faculty as well as learning more about Duke,” Davies said.
Previous presenters have included President Richard Brodhead, Provost Peter Lange, Dean of the Chapel Sam Wells and James B. Duke Professor of English Reynolds Price.
Nowicki’s pick, “Bel Canto,” is set in a South American country closely resembling Peru. He noted that it reminded him of the Shining Path and Túpac Amaru revolutionary movements that emerged while he was conducting graduate research there in the late 1970s.
He also said the book is “psychologically quite difficult.”
Part of this psychological complexity arose from the reader’s development of sympathy for the terrorists as the story unfolds, Stasio and Nowicki said.
Because the story was published in the first half of 2001, Nowicki said it would be interesting to know if Patchett would have characterized terrorists as pitiable individuals following the attacks of 9/11.
Members of the Duke community can look for further literary discussions on the live DukeReads webcast about once a month. Discussion questions are posted in advance and the video is available on Duke’s Ustream channel afterward, Davies said.
“Literally, this is classrooms without borders in a sense that you can tune in wherever you are, as long as you have a computer,” Davies said.
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