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Has your group been daunted by the challenge of reading the classics? Do you wonder how other groups get through them? Read on to find out how the Inklings tackle those dreaded classics while still managing to make their reading group experience fun and rewarding. Thanks to Karen Traynor of the Sullivan Free Library in Chittenango, N.Y. for sharing her group with us!

Q. Does your group have a name or a theme?
A. We call ourselves the Inklings after the intellectual discussion group formed by J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and other writers. Our goal is to read all of the more difficult classics, things we have always felt we "should" read but were too intimidating to read alone. It's more fun in a group--misery loves company! It is said that to read literature, you have to have a good background in the classics and that is our goal.

Q. How long has your group been in existence?
A. Our group formed in the summer of '98 when five of us decided to read "Ulysses" by James Joyce.

Q. How many members do you have? What is the makeup of the group?
A. We currently have 10 members, 9 women & one token male. We are all 40+++. Several members are retired.

Q. How often and where do you meet?
A. We meet about once a month, depending on the complexity of what we are reading. We do not have a set meeting time, but determine a date that works for the whole group at each meeting. We meet at the Sullivan Free Library in Chittenango, N.Y., where several of us work.

Q. Do you eat at your meetings?
A. Eating is a fundamental part of our group! We say that we can read anything with enough good food and drink! The library provides beverages--coffee, tea, chai, etc. One member, Debbie Rose, does catering on the side and provides us with wonderful goodies, often tied to what we are reading. While reading "The Inferno," part of "The Divine Comedy" by Dante, she served us Devil's food cake; for the "Paradise section" we had Angel food cake and ambrosia. During the 6 months it took us to read "Ulysses" we had many helpings of Irish soda bread and scones.

At the end of each major work, we get together for a dinner--pot luck at the library or a themed dinner at a members house or a restaurant. After "Ulysses" we had "cock-o-leekie soup" (mentioned in the book) and Irish coffee at Debbie's house. After "The Divine Comedy" we went to an Italian restaurant. We are currently reading "The Iliad" & "The Odyssey" and plan a trip to a Greek restaurant between the two books.

Q. Who leads the discussion? Do you use reading group guides?
A. As the librarian, I coordinate the materials and logistics for the group, but no one person leads the discussion. Each person has their own area of expertise and contributes to the discussion. No one is afraid to speak up in this group! We use a variety of tools to help us get the most out of our selections--reading guides are not usually available for our selections but we use everything from Cliff Notes to annotations to literary criticism to dictionary of symbols etc.

Q. How do you choose your books? Do you choose one new book at each meeting, or do you choose the books for a number of meetings ahead of time?
A. We try to alternate one long classic that we stretch out over several months with one short one that we can discussion in a month's time. The group decides in advance what we will read and I find the copies. We have been gradually going backwards in time with our selections--we began with Ulysses, went on to The Canterbury Tales, then the Divine Comedy and now Homer. We plan to read "Beowulf" next. After that, who knows--cave paintings? Hieroglyphics?

Q. What were some of the best discussions or favorite books the group read?
A. Our best discussion was probably "Ulysses" by James Joyce, although it was certainly not everyone's favorite book! We were amazed by the depth of this work, by the millions of references in it. It gave us a great feeling of accomplishment to finish.

Q. How do you keep things fun?
A. Our group is pretty boisterous by nature. We all have good senses of humor and speak freely at meetings. We don't take ourselves too seriously. We encourage each other to stick with difficult works--we find that we each get something different out of each book and if we piece all of our understanding together, we usually have gotten a good sense of what the author intended.

We try to schedule fun activities along with the reading--we often go as a group to see a movie version of what we are reading. After finishing "Ulysses", we attended the annual "Bloomsday" celebration at an Irish pub and listened to groups read from the book. At the end of "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" we are hoping to go on a day trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and visit the Greek exhibit--led by our retired art teacher, Claire Winnewisser. We also reward ourselves for our efforts--we designed t-shirts after reading "Ulysses" with an obscure quote that only someone who has read the book would recognize! I make up certificates of achievement after each book (such as, Bud Penner has been "to Hell & Back" with Dante) and often give out special book marks to help us remember the good times we had with each book.

Q. Do you have any horror stories, amusing anecdotes, or other special tales to tell?
A. Well....after "Ulysses", we each nominated a book and drew from a hat. "The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas" by Gertrude Stein was selected, and to a member, we hated the book! We had a great time dissing it though, but when we found out WHY it had been nominated--one group member wanted to find the origin of the term "Alice B. Toklas brownies." Well, that was not mentioned in the book, but we found the information in 5 minutes on the Internet--we could have saved ourselves a lot of misery if we had known Debby's motives in advance!

We meet in a small library with very little space or privacy. Patrons have come to recognize our group and often tell us we are having "way too much fun" and can't believe we are having such a good time reading the serious things we are. Once, in the middle of a discussion of a the very bawdy "Miller's Tale" in "The Canterbury Tales" by Chaucer, a man who had been using a public access computer not far from us got up suddenly and left the library. We were horrified, thinking we had offended him with our frank discussion--but it turned out that he had just gone out to the car for some notes!

Q. What advice would you give to other reading groups?
A. Don't take yourself too seriously--have fun--the point isn't to end up as an expert on each classic that you read, but to come away with something you didn't know before.

Q. Is there anything else unique or noteworthy about your group that you would like to share?
A. After reading "The Canterbury Tales" by Chaucer, I challenged each group member to write their own tale and share it with the group at our last meeting. Chaucer's tales were social commentaries of his time and I encouraged members to write something about "our" times, in whatever format they chose. We got five entries. They each reflected the personality of the writer and were delightful. The unanimous winner was Patti Newell with "The Reading Group's Tale".

The Reading Group's Tale (Dedicated with great fondness to CJ, DG, RP, DR, KT and CW)

In this time and place, it has come to our ear
that some of you may walk around in great fear
that you will be found as not being as good
as some other folk in your own neighborhood,
for there's a phenomenon throughout the land
where learned assemblies of people will band
in public-owned libraries and secret nooks
to read and to study the world's greatest books
that they might their knowledge improve and increase
as they believe scholarship should never cease.
At least that is what they would lead you to think.
However, the truth would make all your cheeks pink!
Yes, even the ones that you sit on would blush
to learn that instead of a decorous hush,
some groups have preferred the more revelrous feats
of quaffing down wine and then eating up sweets,
until you'd swear that was the reason they met.
(In many a case, that would be a safe bet!)
And even when studying loftier tomes,
they much prefer Chaucer's more ribaldrous poems
to scholarly works that would cause them to think--
as that might, perhaps, interfere with their drink!
It's shocking to note that some Masters of Arts
would much rather spend their time laughing at farts
and reading the sexploits of Molly and Lee
and baking hash brownies with Miss Alice B.
than trying to better their minds, truth be told,
interpreting Milton and Dante of old,
whose works oft lose out to that most common Bard
because some would whine, "They're too dry! They're too hard!
So only appearing to house the elite,
these groups are just filled with the souls of clay feet.
And now that you know they are not what they seem,
you need not allow your great sense of esteem
to lead you to fear that you would not fit in.
In fact, you would soon shout above all the din,
to chomp and to swill and to laugh about turd,
as regulars do when they want to be heard.
You'll find once you've joined an "illustrious" team,
your awe will fade like a midsummer night's dream.

PS Newell,
June 1999