How to Discuss ‘Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters’
By Dave Itzkoff
By Dave Itzkoff
Quirk Books The cover of “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters” by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters.
These days, it seems, any book that stands a chance of being read by more than five people must include a reader’s discussion guide: a set of proposed questions at the back of the book for lazy book-group leaders and readers too timid to start conversations on their own.
Even the coming novel Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters, includes a discussion guide. But given that it’s a satirical work that combines Austen’s original text with sinister, tentacled creatures, its living co-author has decided to have a little fun with the questions.
Among the discussion topics that Mr. Winters suggests:
2. In “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters,” painful personal setbacks often occur at the same moment as sea-monster attacks, suggesting a metaphorical linkage of “monsters” with the pains of romantic disappointment; for example, Marianne is rebuffed by Willoughby at Hydra-Z precisely as the giant mutant lobsters are staging their mutiny. Have you ever been “attacked by giant lobsters,” either figuratively or literally?
5. Which would be worse: being eaten by a shark or consumed by the acidic stomach juice of a sand-shambling man-o’-war?
8. Have you ever been romantically involved with someone who turned out to be a sea witch?
10. Is Monsieur Pierre a symbol for something? Name three other well-known works of Western literature that feature orangutan valets. Are those characters also slain by pirates?
Readers of the novel Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters which kicked off the whole Austen-horror-mashup literary craze, may recall that its author, Seth Grahame-Smith, similarly refused to take his discussion-guide assignment seriously. Among the questions he suggested in that book:
6. Some critics have suggested that the zombies represent the authors’ views toward marriage—an endless curse that sucks the life out you and just won’t die. Do you agree, or do you have another opinion about the symbolism of the unmentionables?
7. Does Mrs. Bennet have a single redeeming quality?
10. Some scholars believe that the zombies were a last-minute addition to the novel, requested by the publisher in a shameless attempt to boost sales. Others argue that the hordes of living dead are integral to Jane Austen’s plot and social commentary. What do you think? Can you imagine what this novel might be like without the violent zombie mayhem?
Do you use discussion guides in your readers’ groups? Are there particularly good (or bad) questions that they have provided to you? Have you ever been romantically involved with someone who turned out to be a sea witch?
These days, it seems, any book that stands a chance of being read by more than five people must include a reader’s discussion guide: a set of proposed questions at the back of the book for lazy book-group leaders and readers too timid to start conversations on their own.
Even the coming novel Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H. Winters, includes a discussion guide. But given that it’s a satirical work that combines Austen’s original text with sinister, tentacled creatures, its living co-author has decided to have a little fun with the questions.
Among the discussion topics that Mr. Winters suggests:
2. In “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters,” painful personal setbacks often occur at the same moment as sea-monster attacks, suggesting a metaphorical linkage of “monsters” with the pains of romantic disappointment; for example, Marianne is rebuffed by Willoughby at Hydra-Z precisely as the giant mutant lobsters are staging their mutiny. Have you ever been “attacked by giant lobsters,” either figuratively or literally?
5. Which would be worse: being eaten by a shark or consumed by the acidic stomach juice of a sand-shambling man-o’-war?
8. Have you ever been romantically involved with someone who turned out to be a sea witch?
10. Is Monsieur Pierre a symbol for something? Name three other well-known works of Western literature that feature orangutan valets. Are those characters also slain by pirates?
Readers of the novel Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters which kicked off the whole Austen-horror-mashup literary craze, may recall that its author, Seth Grahame-Smith, similarly refused to take his discussion-guide assignment seriously. Among the questions he suggested in that book:
6. Some critics have suggested that the zombies represent the authors’ views toward marriage—an endless curse that sucks the life out you and just won’t die. Do you agree, or do you have another opinion about the symbolism of the unmentionables?
7. Does Mrs. Bennet have a single redeeming quality?
10. Some scholars believe that the zombies were a last-minute addition to the novel, requested by the publisher in a shameless attempt to boost sales. Others argue that the hordes of living dead are integral to Jane Austen’s plot and social commentary. What do you think? Can you imagine what this novel might be like without the violent zombie mayhem?
Do you use discussion guides in your readers’ groups? Are there particularly good (or bad) questions that they have provided to you? Have you ever been romantically involved with someone who turned out to be a sea witch?
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/02/how-to-discuss-sense-and-sensibility-and-sea-monsters/?ref=books
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