Post 2

This week, I began reading Kavalier and Clay. So far, I am enjoying this book to the fullest. I read up to page 68. Within these pages, Josef Kavalier and Sammy Clay meet for the first time in Brooklyn, NY. After that scene, it flashes back and focuses on Joesef' escape out of Nazi-Occupied Prague. He was all set to leave by train, but certain complications stopped him from doing so. He then turned to his former escape-artist teacher, a man named Kornblum, to help assist him in his efforts to leave the country. While reading, I noticed that the author, Michael Chabon, has an extensive vocabulary, and likes to insert sudden bursts of humor within conversations between characters. Also, when Chabon introduces a new character, he likes to use multiple paragraphs to describe every aspect of their character. To me, this is something that is good and bad at the same time. And as of right now, I havent noticed any particular themes in the book to develop a thesis on.

Post 1 - Proposal

The author I am interested in for this project is a man named Michael Chabon. He is an American author born in Washington D.C. in 1963. He has written such books as Wonder Boys (1995), The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (2000), and Summerland (2002) among many other books.

I am drawn to this author simply because of the plot lines in his books. In one of his recent works, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, the plot is around the creation of many classic comic books heroes in the 1930’s. I am a picky reader, so when I find something that strikes my interest at first glance I want to pursue the book and possibly other books that the author has written. I feel that Chabon can easily qualify as a classic American author because of many reasons. For one, The Virginia Quarterly Review praised him as “one of the most celebrated writers of his generation.” I would easily agree with this statement. In total, Chabon has written six books, two short story collections, and has one essay collection due out next month.

One of Chabon’s more popular books, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize award. This award alone makes Chabon an extraordinary author. With the first book he wrote in 1988, Mysteries of Pittsburg, he was instantly boosted to the celebrity level of society. Since then, he has written many books; all of them thrusting him more and more into stardom.

Most of Chabon’s books are fiction and all have similar themes in them, including divorce, abandonment, and fatherhood. This will make is easy to write a ten page essay on one of these themes. Since Chabon presents multiple themes in his books, I can easily pick one out and focus on it to make a clear and precise argument.

Since I have to read multiple books for this essay and project, I decided to choose books that I was very interested in. The two books that stood out to me were The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, and Wonder Boys. I know that the project requires me to read three books, but seeing as Kavalier and Clay is upwards of 600 pages, I thought it would be appropriate to just choose two books. As of right now, I am still reading my assigned book for my Physics class. After this, I plan on reading The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, and then Wonder Boys. I want to read them in this order for two reasons: one, because the plot line of Kavalier and Clay interests me more than WonderBoys, and two: since Kavalier and Clay is a much larger book, it will most likely present more themes. Therefore, reading a smaller book next will enable me to easily recognize similar themes from the previous book.

Both of these books sound very interesting to me. I am thankful that I found an author that both interests me and that can present themes to write and essay on. I look forward to reading these books and I am confident that they will expand my mind not only as a reader, but as a writer as well.