The Smith Club of London Book Group 1979 - 1997 The Book Group of the Smith College Club of London meets once a month in the home of members living in central London to discuss books relating to a yearly topic. Members volunteer to be the “presenter” for a particular month’s reading. The presenter is responsible for introducing the morith’s reading by making a short presentation before general discussion starts. The monthly sub-topics and the books on the reading list are suggested by various members of the group, although each presenter has the final say about her month’s books and topic focus. One member functions as the group’s organiser, making sure there are a monthly topic, reading list, presenter and host for each month, from October to June, and sending out mailings to all other members, The last meeting of the year features a guest speaker, usually someone eminent in a field relating to the year’s reading, and is followed by a dinner ‘Yearly Topics for Reading 1979/80 222 Overall topic 2 (Historical periods of English history??) 1980/81 29 Overall topic,?? (20" Century English Literature?) 1981/82, Victorian England 1982/83 Expatriates in England 1983/84 Counties of England + 1984/85 ‘Theatre 1985/86. British Artists 1986/87 Commonwealth Literature 1987/88 British Politicians 1988/89. Ireland 1989/90, Europe and 1992 1990/91 U.S. History Viewed From Abroad 1991/92, ‘Theatre 1992/93 English Women Abroad 1993/94 ‘The Middle East 1994/95 Women’s Auto/Biography 1995/96 Children’s Literature 1996/97 Ancient Classics Katie Day ‘Smith Club of London Page L 11/01/97 Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT1979/80 | (history) (biography) Ie tine (biography) | England + The fee Age (all novels) 1980/81 BOOKS ‘et Saki Short Stones Autobiography | * ‘Testament of Youth: 1900-1923 jc * Upitie Line to Deaths The War Poets, 1514-18” Collected by Brian “Febaagy Novel * Officers and Gentlemen __t.Uneonditional Surrender ‘Smith Club of London Book Group Reading Lists © Richard of Bordeaux (play) ‘The Game of Kings (novel) Mary Il - Queen of England Cecil Woodham Charlotte Bronte _2 Peter Rabbit (children’s book) Contemporary” | * August is a Wicked Month Margaret Drabble | Beryl Bainbridge + The Bottle Factory Remember Me George Orwell Evelyn Waugh ‘['Bemard Levin1981/82: Victorian England MONTH SUB-TOPIC BOOKS) General British "> Pax Brittanica “October “Artists TFerome K Jerome | Ruth Brandon URrchitecture ‘Theatre Biography + Charlie's Aunt "> Eminent Victorian Women 1982/83:_ Expatriates Who Worked Abroad WTR ry Je ‘Wings of the Dove Henry James | novelist * Princess Casamassima Henry James by S. + + The Golden Bowl Gorley Putt : Henry James at Home by H, Montgomery Wov” "Nehru, Larry Collins &”” Nehru by Michael | politician I Dominique Edwardes Lapierre ‘Stanley Sadie Bec GF Handel, T cnn SOMMPOSEE Jan Karl Marx, “Fite Communist Manifesto Karl Marx | philosopher + Karl Mars, His Life & | David McLellan Feb) CM. Whistier, "> Whistler. A Biosrapiy "Stanley Weintraub | | artist eee eee cee cH L osepin + Giant in Exile TM. Whistler | novelist Victorian Outsider L by McMullen | eminent family in| of Fortune | finance, science, | * The Rothschilds at Mrs. James de | ouiandarts__. Waddesdon Manor | Rothsehild | | May T'S. Eliot, + Four Quartets VFS" Eliot poet | © Old Possum’s Book of eee a a . | Jun” | Russell Hoban,” ")"+"Pileermann | Lcaeneant Rovelist Pee eee i Katie Day Sinith Chub of London Page 3 11/01/97 Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT1983/84: Counties of England The Making of the English Landscape "F'Samuel Palmer f Dorothy We (Septe October. November: 1984/85: Theatre "AUTHOR Congreve 5 (Times art critic) 1985/86: British Artists BOOKS, wen and Augustus John | pliotographers speaker: Marina Vaizey Katie Day 1/01/97 ‘Smith Club of London Book Group Reading Lists Page 4 DRAFTown October December 1986/87: Commonwealth Literature [suRropIe BOOKS) | Hong Kong *"An Insular Possession lia, + Voss Vindia A Passage to India ‘*"The Malavan Trilogy Paurior | Timothy Mo Patrick White, TEM. Forster George Orwell rtson Da 1987/88: British Pol i FFamaty ‘Thomas More +.A.Man for All Seasons (play) ‘The Elizabethan Deliverance + Elizabeth: A Study in Power and Intellect + Elizabeth and Essex af Books on Cromwell and Charles il + Clive of India “S Weilington After Waterloo | + Wellington: Pillar of State + Melbourne Melbourne Disraeli * The Young Lloyd George '* Lloyd George: From Peace to War, 1912-1916 * Testament of Youth The Strange Death of Liberal England + Their Finest Hour + The Last Lion (biography of Churchill) + The War Diaries + Churchill's War. The Eden Memoirs | + Anthony Eden + Anthony Eden: A. Biography _ “+ ‘The Statesman and the Fanatic: Thomas Wolsey and Tasper Ridley TAUTHOR | Robert Bolt Arthur Bryant | Paul Johnson | Lytton Strachey. Mark Bence-iones | Neville Thompson | Elizabeth Longford | Philip Ziegler David Cecil fobert Blake sarah Bradford ‘ohn Grigg | Toha Grigg | Vera Brittain | George Dangerfield | Winston Churchill | William Manchester | Colville Anthony Biden | Sidney Aster | Robert Rhodes James. Katie Day 09/02/97 ‘Smith Club of London Book Group Reading Lists Page 5 DRAFT1988/89: Ireland October”) > Ireland! Land of Troubies ' | The Damnable Question | 4 Ireland | Peter Harrison et al * Irish Folktales | Henry Glassie + Celtio Mythology. need Proinsias MacCana ‘The Year of the French: A Thomas Flanagan | | Edmund Burke + The Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man | James Joyce + Troubles of Two Days in Aragon | Molly Keane (MJ. F: ‘The Crack: A Belfast Year LC. Fitzgibbons O'Connor David Beresford Katie Day ‘Smith Club of London Page 6 11/097 Book Group Reading DRAFTMar ‘Apr "Britain & Ireland Basten Europe 'S Eastern Europe 1740-1983" Feudalism to 1989/90: Europe and 1992 AUTHOR Stanley Budd Rupert Comweli | Luigi Barzini | Theodore Zeidin + France Today John Ardaugh + Charles de Gaulle Don Cook ___2 Citizens; A Chronicle of the French Revolution Simon Schama _ ‘Germany and the Germans John Ardaugh + The Two Germanies since 1945 | Henry Ashby Tumer _t Lowest of the Low 7 i * The Spaniards / * Spain ' + A History of Spain and Portuzal + As | Walked Out One Midsummer Morning + For Whom the Bell Tolls Laurie Lee Emest Hemingway | Homage to Catalonia nan George Orwell! * Macmillan; 1957-1986 (Vol ii of the official ‘Alistair Home biography) + The Times Guide to 1992: Britain in a Europe ‘without Frontiers Richard Owen & [Robin Okey Communism | + We the People: The Revolution of 89, witnessed in ‘Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin & Prague + The Uses of Adversity: Essays on the Fate of | Timothy Garton Ash ‘Timothy Garton Ash | Central Europe | ¢ The Waking Giant: The Soviet Union under Martin Walker oe es Gorbachev 7 oo ct i May | German Reading: recent newspaper articles Z | unification = - eee eee Jun! Speaker: | ord Harris # See eae oat Katie Day Smith Chib of London Page? LLOL9T Book Group Reading Lists DRAFTPow “American Revolution saTOPIE "| BoOKE) |S Faces of the Revolution 1990/91; U.S. History Viewed from Abroad + The First Salute: A View of the American Revolution + Redcoats and Rebels: The War for America 1770- 1781 + Burr (novel), immigrant Experience i "| New York” Al War Speaker: Hugh Brogan. + Battle Cry of Freedom: Civil War Era + Traveller (novel) 2 Beloved (novel)... + American Immigration * Destination America + The Uprooted + The Jungle + My Antonia * Blood, Class, and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Tronies + America: A User's Guide ("> Life om the Mississippi (1883) + The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) + Bonfire of the Vanities + Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco + Liat’s Poker _ * The Pelican History ‘of the United States | Bernard Batlyn | Gor. “fom Woife ° aeRO Barbara Tuchman Christopher Hibbert idal die Tocqueville Char Oscar Handlin Upton Sinclair Willa Cather. “) Mark Twain Mark Twin | Jonathan Raban. Dee Brown’ Byan Burrough John Helyar Michael Lewis Hugh Brogan Dickens James M. McPherson Richard Adams Toni Morrison, “Maldwyn A. Jones Maldiwyn A. Jones & 1991/92: Theatre [sDaneing at Lughnasa eee 3 Birds Alighting on aField ‘Timberlake Wertenbaker Ride Down Mt, Morgan Arthur Miller | Speak ‘The Rules 2 Game” "Shakespeare, Edward Bond Jatinder Verma and Ranji Rriel Dorfinan Luigi Pirandello Jonathan Kent, director | * Attributed to Shudraka (circa &* century), (1991), Katie Day 11/01/97 ‘Smith Club of London Book Group Reading Lists Page 8. DRAFT1992/93: English Women Abroad MONT SéRTORIE 1 'Speaker: v Bettina Selby. THOOKS | + Travelling Ladies: Vietorian Adventuress (1983) | Alexandra Allen | ¢ Anything by or about Freya Stark or Gertrude Bell | "Love Among the Butterflies: The Travels and "Margaret Fountaine oR + My Journey to Lhasa’ The Personal Story ‘White Woman who Succeeded in Entering the Forbidden City (1927) jiexandra David-Necl | # Inside the Treasure House (1990) Catriona Bass + Tibet: Behind the fee Curtain Vanya Kewley + The Rose of Tibet (no "Starlings Laws + Travels in West Affica (1893-1895) | Mary Kingsley + Riding the Desert Trail: By Bicycle to the Source of | Bettina Selby the Nile oe ‘ Passion’s Child (a biography of Jane Digby) + The Wilder Shores of Love (re Isabel Burton, Jane Digby, Amice Dubueq dur Riverty, and Isabelle Eberhardt) "Tune Vendall Clark Lesley Blanch * Letters from Fevpt, 1863-65 | Lady Duff Gordon + Mother without a Mak: A Westemer’s Storvofher Patricia Holton Arab Family, : . Wheels Within Wheels (her autobiography phy + Full Tilt | Dervia Murphy + Fight Feet in the Andes Bee ‘The Ginger Tree (novel) 1 * Unbeaten Tracks in Japan (1880) Isabella Bird i + The Life of Isabella Bird (Mrs, Bishop) (1906) | Anna M, Stoddart | + A Curious Life for a Ladv: The Story of Isabella Bird | Pat Barr | (1970) Adventures of a Victorian Lady * Spinsters Abroad (1991) ve Birkett + Passenger to Teheran *"An Indian Attachment Sarah Lioyd + Against a Peacock Sky Monica Connell + Letters from Madras (1843) Julia Maitland | © Wester India in 1838 ‘Mrs. Marianne Postans ‘gers, Durbars and Kings, (1988), eevee Samet Dunbar, ed. | © Chinese Characters: A Journey Through China Sarat Lloyd + Hong Kona: Epilogue to_an Empire | Jan Morris + A Traveller in China (1985) | Christina Dodwell + The Yangtze Valley and Beyond Isabella Bird + The Ginger Griffin Ann Bridge + Peking Picnic f vnc, Bnd Katie Day 1/0/97 Smith Club of London Page Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT1993/94: The Middle East AUTHOR Chris Horrie & Peter | Chippindale | + Muhammad: A Westem Attempt to Understand | Karen Armstrong Islam (1992) | + Muhammad: Prophet and Statesman pow wooRT 1 soa Fone islam "5 What is islam? (1990) Nov "The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and | Daniel Bee) No assigned reading | Jan +The Dead Sea Serolis, 1547-1969 | Edmund Wilson ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls Uncovered (1993) | Robert Eisenman & | Michael Wise, ed + The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception (1991) | Michael Baigent & | Richard Leigh | + The Kingdom of the Wicked (novel) __ Anthony Burgess _ 1'e The Prophet & Pharoah: Muslim Extemism in; Giles Capel | Fundamentalism | Egypt | L [Today | # A History of the Arab Peoples. _| Albert Hourani (Mar |The Peace)" The New Middle East (1993) Shimon Peres | | Accord | © Gaza First: The Secret Norway Channelto Jane Corbin Lh nnn gage Between Israel and the PLO (1993) ae Apr | Women inthe | * Bevond the Veil Fatima Memissi | Middle East | * Women and Gender in [stam | Leila Ahmed | | | © Women in Saudi Arabia | Soraya Altorki eee nt Dis inaret and oth All Z (May) Mythotogy/oik Andrew Lang, ed | aly Tale : [Speaker Katie Day Sinith Chub of London Page 10 11/0197 Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT1994/95: Women’s Auto/Biography [semronie TRO “ib | British "My Own Story (1914) ‘Emmeline Pankhurst | | Suffragettes * The Life of Emmeline Pankhurst (1935) Sylvia Pankhurst | | + Svivia and Christabel Pankhurst | Barbara Castle | | © The Fighting Pankhursts (1967) David Mitchell The Pankhursts (1970) David Mitchell 7 ~)'s"Amelia Earhart (1989) Doris L: Rich | * Straight On Till Moming: The Biography of | Mary S. Lovell Ed by Betty Radice | Stephen Clissold evil's Brood (1957) (novel) Alfred Duggan | Aquitaine + Eleanor of Aquitaine (1978) | Marion Meade + Video: “The Lion in Winter” i Eleanor and Franklin (1971) ‘Tosepi B. Lash Roosevelt & | * Eleanor: The Year Alone (1972) | Joseph P. Lash Abigail Adams ¢ No Ordinary Time (1994) Doris Keams Goodwin + Letters of Abigail Adams ___t Abiail Adams (1987) _ Phyllis Lee Levin +A Very Close Conspiracy: Vanessa Bell and Jane Dunn Virginia Woolf (1990) : + Deceived with Kindness: A Bloomsbury Angelica Gamett Childhood (1984) ‘+ Omega and After: Bloomsbury and the Isabelle Anscombe _+ Decorative Ang 1981) : : ‘The Road From Coorain Tit Ker Conwa + True North Jill Ker Conway i + Natalie Zemon Davis: Interview and article | ct Composing a Life a, Mary Catherine Batson | [May Quaker Women” |" Margaret Feli: Mother of Quakerism Tsabel Ross in 17%¢ England | * Women and Quakerism in the 17" Century Cristine Trevett | The Weaker Vessel: Woman’s Lot in 17" Antonia Fraser Tune” Speaicer + Mrs, Jordan's Profession’ The Story ofa Great Claire Tomalin Claire Tomalin, Actress and a Future King Katie Day ‘Smith Club of London’ Page 11 1V0U97 Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT1995/96: Children’s Literature 1 ’Roald Dahl (biography) | + Bov: Tales of Childhood (1984) | G@utobiography) | + Going Solo (1986) (autobiography) | + Matilda (1988) + Jamos and the Giant Peach (1961) «The Witches (1983), - * The Children of Green Knowe (1954) plus other books in the series and Xouth (1979) (autobiography) __ Jane, a Smith graduate, is head of children’s __publishing at Hamish Hamilton in London, © The Secret Garden (1911) * Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886) ‘A Little Princess (1905) ‘+ Waiting for the Party: The Life of Frances | _.Hodgson Bumett, 1849-1924 (1974) _ Feb Peter Pan: Book * Peter and Wendy (1911) or Peter Pan and | vs. Movie | Wendy (1921) or Peter Pan in Kensington I ‘Gardens (1906) 2 Video: Peter Pan ee i ‘Anything from one of these series: ‘The American Girl Collection | |The Goosebumps series | | The Boxcar Children series |The Nancy Drew series ‘The Mouse and His Child (1967) i | + Fremder (1996) Tune “Speaker: | Russell Hoban | May” Russell Hoban Memory in a House (1973) (autobiography) Perverse and Foolis ir of Childhood eg | Jeremy Treglown: i i | Roald Dahl Roald Dahl Roald Dahl Roald Dahl Roald Dahl Lacy Boston Lucy Boston Lucy Boston Ann Thwaite IM. Barrie Walt Disney _ Carolyn Keene Gertrude Chandler Russell Hoban Russell Hoban Katie Day ‘Smith Club of London 1/01/97 Book Group Reading Lists Page 12 DRAFT1996/97; Ancient Classics ] | « The Greek Way (1930/42) | + The Greck Experience (1958) | Maurice C. Bowra + | * Classics: A Very Short Introduction (1995) | Mary Beard & John | | Henderson | + The Encyclopaedia of the Ancient Greek. World | | David Sacks 1 us sation (1981) (novel) an Gre Vidal | ‘Oedipus the King and Oedipus at Colonus | Sophocles 1 (productions at the National Theatre) “The Greek Myths "Robert Graves Myths of the Greeks and Romans. | Michael Grant 1 Greek ‘¥ Sophie's World (novel) ‘Jostein Gaarder i | Philosophy + A History of Greek Philosophy | W.K.C. Guthrie A History of Wester Philosophy. Bertrand Russell * The History of the Peloponnesian War Thucydides | + Thugvdides: On Justice, Power, and Human | Paul Woodruff Nate Katie Day Smithy Club of London Page 13 11/0197 Book Group Reading Lists DRAFT