U Reads 2007

The Art of Possibility: Transforming Professional and Personal Life
Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander
Recommended by Darlyne Bailey, Dean, College of Education and Human Development and Assistant to the President
Dean Bailey says, "Sometimes when you need 'The Message' the most, walking through your favorite bookstore gives you just what you need! Such was the case with the Zanders' book. The attraction was instant: from the cover's title, through the first page's 'praises' (two of the four were written by friends of mine), to the multidisciplinary perspectives of the authors. What I didn't know at the time was that re-reading my margin scribbles and underlined sections in late 2005 was actually 'watering the seeds' of my pending move here to Minnesota, the U, and our new College of Education and Human Development. The Art of Possibility is a wonderfully composed reminder that 'when you are oriented to abundance, you care less about being in control, and you take more risks,' and that 'true scarcity and scarcity thinking are different phenomena,' and when we 'trust that the evolution set in motion that will serve you over the long line' of life, you may actually find yourself taking that leap of faith and quickly discovering that what you are now doing is exactly what you should have been preparing for all along. I hope this book serves you as well. Enjoy!"

Telling to Live: Latina Feminist Testimonios
The Latina Feminist Group
Recommended by Rusty Barceló, Vice President and Vice Provost, Equity and Diversity
Vice President Barceló says, "As a Chicana educator in higher education, Telling to Live: Latina Feminist Testimonios conceptualizes and theorizes the journey many Latinas negotiate and endure in higher education as scholars, writers, and teachers. On the one hand, the stories, narratives, and poems validate my own personal and professional experience in the academy. On the other hand, and more importantly, their collective work has expanded my own thinking about how higher education can indeed transform the academy through multiple voices. Whenever I am troubled about a difficult issue, I reach for Testimonios to remind me that I am not alone and that change is possible."
See a video of Vice President Barceló discussing Telling to Live: Latina Feminist Testimonios on the U Reads homepage.

Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature and Climate Change
Elizabeth Kolbert
Recommended by Robert Crabb, Director, U of M Bookstores
Mr. Crabb says, "Field Notes from a Catastrophe is an exceptional work of nonfiction on the subject of climate change. Kolbert simply, but with overwhelming force, lays out before us the dire state of our small planet. The book is inspired; perhaps the best and final warning of the future awaiting us and our descendants. If there were ever a cause worth fighting for, this is it. We honor our forefathers for this abundant world left to our care. I question what our legacy might be."

Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood
Marjane Satrapi
Recommended by Dr. Jon Hallberg, Professor of Family Medicine and MPR health commentator
Dr. Hallberg says, "As a young boy living in Brussels, Belgium, I fell in love with comic books. I read the standards like Mickey Mouse, Uncle Scrooge, and Archie, but the "Tintin" series was my absolute favorite. The volumes I pored over again and again were oversized, hardbound, and in French—which meant that I never really 'read' them. But that didn't matter. I loved the adventures of this boy-journalist and his dog, Snowy. Perhaps the fact that I couldn't actually read much of the text increased my love of these books; I was forced to focus on the detailed art to tell the story. I was hooked. But, like many childhood passions, I outgrew my love of comics. Or so I thought.

"Years passed before I would read another one. Then, when I was a medical student in 1991, Art Spiegelman's second book on the Holocaust, Maus II, was published. Reading this brilliant and horrifying graphic novel (and the first Maus) was a revelation. I was again captivated by this art form, realizing that powerful, adult stories could be told in a simple, visual, radical way. But it took another twelve years for me to really get hooked. That happened in 2003 when Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood was published.

"This novel tells the story of modern Iran in a graphic novel form that is imaginative, comprehensive, illuminating and compassionate. Satrapi's style is almost childlike, with clean, bold, black and white frames. And it works beautifully. I love this book. I love it for the story it tells and for the fact that it seemed to usher in a new acceptance and popularity of the graphic novel. Reading it has made me a huge fan of graphic novels—and comics (again!). I've re-read several "Tintin" adventures (this time in English) and I've introduced my 10-year-old son to comics-and to one of our favorite haunts, Big Brain Comics. (Our absolute, no-question-about-it current favorite series is Jeff Smith's Bone. It's like a comic Lord of the Rings epic that is, well, simply awesome. He and I can't wait for the next installment to be released.) I've also greatly enjoyed David B's Epileptic, Tyler Page's three-part series Stylish Vittles, which feels weirdly, amazingly like my own experience at St. Olaf College, Craig Thompson's Blankets, and just published in 2007, Gene Yang's American Born Chinese. But for me, it really began with Persepolis."
See a video of Dr. Hallberg discussing Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood on the U Reads homepage.

Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World
Tracy Kidder
Recommended by Larry Jacobs, Walter F. and Joan Mondale Chair for Political Studies, and Director, Center for the Study of Politics and Governance, Hubert H. Humphrey Institute
Professor Jacobs says, "This is a nonfiction account of Dr. Paul Farmer who has led a public health crusade to save millions of lives in the poorest areas—Haiti, Russian prisons, South American ghettos, and elsewhere around the world. The book shows both the deeply embedded hurdles to overcoming power and the remarkable contributions of one person."
See a video of Professor Jacobs discussing Mountains Beyond Mountains on the U Reads homepage.

The Year of Magical Thinking
Joan Didion
Recommended by Mary Jo Kane, Director, Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport, College of Education and Human Development
Professor Kane says, "'Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it.'
--- Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 2005

On January 13, 2001, I turned 50. Three days prior, on January 10, I learned that my younger sister, Jane, had terminal cancer. Six weeks later, on February 22, she died. She was 46. Over the next two years, three more friends and colleagues died unexpected (and in one case sudden) deaths.

So where is that place called grief? In The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion lays down this marker: Living with death, and navigating the grief that follows, is like having 'crossed one of those legendary rivers that divide the living from the dead¿' It is a river I too have crossed, a place where I have lived since February 22, 2001. Didion's deeply personal account about the death of her husband of 40 years, John Gregory Dunne, and the illness (and subsequent death) of her only child, touched me and helped me to understand my own grief as an intensely private yet universal experience. It also brought to mind something a wise person said to me shortly after my sister died: though death may end a life, it never ends a relationship.
Hold¿that¿close."
See a video of Professor Kane discussing The Year of Magical Thinking on the U Reads homepage.

George Washington Gómez: A Mexicotexan Novel
Américo Paredes
Recommended by Louis Mendoza, Chair, Department of Chicano Studies
Professor Mendoza says, "George Washington Gómez is a compelling book about Chicano life in South Texas in the first half of the 20^th century. Its message, and the trials and tribulations of its young protagonist who is caught between two worlds that tug him in different directions, are still relevant today as the country continues to be Latinoized. From his Mexican-oriented family he learns to value tradition, respect for his elders, a sense of obligation to his community, a desire to improve his life and the lives of his family and community members. Yet, these values are pitted against the competitiveness, individualism, and ideas about racial superiority he is taught in American schools that often make him ashamed of his ethnic heritage and class background. The resulting bifurcated sense of self the protagonist experiences, exemplified by his name, provides unique insight into the profound desire for a sense of belonging and how our national multicultural heritage is a work in progress that has yet to be reconciled."
See a video of Professor Mendoza discussing George Washington Gómez on the U Reads homepage.

On Late Style: Music and Literature Against the Grain
Edward W. Said
Recommended by Clarence Morgan, Chair, Department of Art
Professor Morgan says, "I recently read a book by the late cultural critic Edward Said, titled On Late Style: Music and Literature Against the Grain. Many people have a romantic notion of the artistic life-style. Images of Willem de Kooning (1904-1997), Agnes Martin (1912-2004), and Henri Matisse (1869-1954) come to mind: artists who lived a creatively productive, full life and whose work is perceived as resolved at the end of their life. Said writes poignantly about another reality for artists whose life might be coming to an end and the anxiety of knowing that you're leaving things 'unresolved' in your work—that time is running out before your creative ambitions are fulfilled. This book struck an important nerve in terms of how I think about mortality and the creative and intellectual life of art work."

Incomplete Knowledge: Poems
Jeffrey Harrison
Recommended by Julie Schumacher, Director, Creative Writing Program
Professor Schumacher says, "This is language at its most beautiful and most exact. Jeffrey Harrison reminds us of what words can do—his graceful, lyrical poems convey the bafflement and grief and wonder and euphoria of being alive."
See a video of Professor Schumacher discussing Incomplete Knowledge on the U Reads homepage.

On Beauty
Zadie Smith
Recommended by Jenny Weber, U of M student, host of Rock & Roll Over on Radio K
Jenny says, "I love the two offbeat and lively families depicted in this novel. The characters are so believable and funny that I found it easy to get lost in their dysfunctional lives. Additionally, Smith provides insight on the subjects of academia, family relations, race, and sexuality."