Week One

Friends-

As this is the first post of the first week of the first book, I'm not quite sure what to write here. So please don't let this become the standard for posts and please please please feel free to take any discussion from this particular post in a different direction. That said, here are a few thoughts from the week's reading:

In Book 2 Chapter 7 Father Zossima says to Alyosha, "This is my last message to you: in sorrow seek happiness. Work, work unceasingly." Now of course Zossima speaks to Alyosha quite a bit more before he actually dies later in the novel, but his identification of this as his "last message" gives it particular importance, I think. But what's going on here? "In sorrow seek happiness?" And then he follows that with, "work, work unceasingly?" There seems to be a bit of a disconnect between those thoughts.

Dostoevsky seems to be anticipating some of the thought that will come from Catholic Social Teaching. Written in 1880, the Brother K predates Rerum Novarum (the start of CST) by 11 years, but the command to work unceasingly points to the idea that humans are partly defined by labor. Its pairing with sorrow, however, doesn't exactly follow. While there is much in Catholicism about sorrow, CST clearly states that the economy is made for humans, not the other way around. Yet a human made for the economy necessarily results in sorrow, while the former does not. So is Dostoevsky pointing to the labor conditions and capitalist system that created them in Russia at that time? Marx published Capital in 1867, so it is likely that Dostoevsky was familiar with the work. Of course earlier in his life Dostoevsky was arrested for being a member of a progressive (socialist utopian) group and sentenced to death for it. His last minute commutation and subsequent ten years in Siberia fundamentally changed his beliefs and writing. So it's probably a bit of a stretch to connect this with a critique on capitalism. But maybe it works?

I find it more likely that Zossima is making some reference to Jesus' suffering and crucifixion and imploring Alyosha to find solace in that cornerstone of faith. Or perhaps it is a reference to Dostoevsky's own life. Or maybe it was just convenient for what he wants to write next.

That's all I've got for now.

**Full disclosure** I've been getting a heavy dose of Catholicism here at ACE so any analysis I have to offer for this book is going to be strongly influenced by that fact.

Non-Novels

Rene Girard's The Scapegoat?
E. F. Schumacher's Small Is Beautiful: Economics As If People Mattered?
Wendell Berry's "The Idea of A Local Economy"?

...choose one to mix it up a little.

A welcome to the blog!

Dear readers of books,

For all of you who do not not know, the Notre Dame Book Club is beginning right now!

One Thursday night in the spring of 2010, Professor Stephen Fallon from the Program of Liberal Studies department shared some of his wisdom about education and learning to many Notre Dame students and friends who had gathered at what is called the "Peace House" on the 700 block of Frances Street in South Bend Indiana.

When one student in her senior year expressed her concern about maintaining intellectual discourse and analytical skills after graduation, Professor Fallon encouraged all soon-to-be graduates to do two things:

0 Subscribe to the New York Book Review and/or London Book Review
0 Start a book club

And that is what one of the resident's of the peace house set out to do.

The "Notre Dame Book Club" is the result of the efforts of Kristi Haas, University of Notre Dame Class of 2010. She gathered many names of interested folk and devised a format for the club that I believe will be the most effective in maintaining active participation.

And therefore, I now will describe the preliminary guidelines of the book club. Any comments or concerns are greatly appreciated.

Every three months, we will select three to six books that will be the books of the season. In trying to be flexible to all the interests and access to titles, a larger selection of books will give all participants the opportunity to read at least one book that they are interested. All members are in no way obligated to read any or all of the works.

Books will be selected through nominations from members.

Works will fit under these six categories and hopefully, each quarter there will be one of each category selected (though this is not mandatory; selections should be based on the desires of the participants):

1. Poetry
2. Contemporary Fiction
3. Contemporary Non-fiction
4. Classic/Old Fiction
5. Classic/Old Non-fiction
6. Essays

When nominating a work, the nominator should specify what category the work belongs to.

Anyone can post on the blog (within reason). This is meant to be a forum not just about books but also to stay in touch and intellectual while having fun. You don't have to be a Notre Dame student or alum to join in on the fun.

I have written the first of what I hope are many blog entries from many other people.

All the best,

Ellen Rolfes
ND, Class of 2010

P.S. (For those of you who don't know) The peace house is an institution in its own right: a hammock hanging on the porch, shared beds, posters of radicals, signs from union protests, and a flag with a peace symbol proudly displayed on the front of the house. The house is passed down each year by the previous residents to a new group of idealistic progressive-minded students who are committed to changing the world.