1957: Reality and Prayer

Author/Editor: John Magee

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This book is by one of Puget Sounds most influential teachers and scholars, John B. Magee. In it, Magee examines types of prayer—not only the history of particular types of prayer, but also interpretations from a philosophical, psychological, and theological perspective.

Magee left a lasting impression on Puget Sound. His influence can be found lingering in the Magee Address, which showcases scholarly inquiry that reflects “…broad intellectual curiosity, scholarly ethics and rigor, personal excellence, commitment to the liberal arts”. It can be found in the Magee Professorship of Science and Values, currently held by Suzanne Holland.  And it can be found carrying on into the next generation of scholars via the John Magee Memorial Scholarship in the Philosophy department.

1958: Doctor Zhivago

Author: Boris Pasternak

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Many of us in the United States know Dr. Zhivago as a sweepingly romantic tale, perhaps from reading the novel, perhaps from the portrayal by Omar Sharif & Julie Christie or even the more recent version, with Keira Knightly and Hans Matheson. The story follows Yuri Andreeivich  Zhivago and Lara Guichard through their tormented romance and the historical upheavals of the early twentieth century in Russia.

What we sometimes forget in the focus on the novel as a romantic and literary classic is the focus on the historical events and traumas—as well as the tribulation Pasternak suffered as a result of this novel.  While documenting a classic love affair, the novel also highlights the suffering of the First World War, the internecine struggles between reformers, revolutionaries, and conservatives of all stripes in the Russian Revolution, and the subsequent hunger and repression that many suffered in the following years. We also may overlook the struggles Pasternak faced as a result of writing his book. It was deemed insufficiently interested in the progress of society, and refused publication in the Soviet Union. However, it was eagerly consumed as samizdat by Soviet readers, and cemented his reputation as an author. Pasternak died in 1960 of lung cancer, and despite minimal notices for his funeral, thousands came to his funeral.

1959: Titus Alone

Author/Editor: Mervyn Peake

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The third book in the Gormenghast Trilogy, Titus Alone is a bizarre story of identity and imagination. Following the journey of Titus Groan, an Earl who renounces his succession to explore the world, this book describes an almost nightmare world of death rays, shark-shaped cars, and mysterious, faceless policemen. Titus ultimately realizes how much of his identity is based on his former life that he abandoned and yearns for normalcy.

Because of the odd environment that he creates in Titus Alone, and a stylistic deviation from previous works, many readers have questioned the sanity of the author, Mervyn Peake; indeed, Peake showed signs of Parkinson’s disease and mental instability during the 1950s while writing this book. Despite this, the Gormenghast Trilogy has been referred to as “works of pure, violent, self-sufficient imagination that are from time to time thrown up…poetry flows through [Peake’s] volcanic writing.”

Mervyn Peake was born in China.  His parents were missionaries and from an early age he demonstrated a love of drawing and writing.  His family returned to England when he was a young man and he attended college in London and began a successful career as illustrator and writer.  The Gormenghast books are by far his best known.   It was in May of 1943 after a discharge from the army that Peake began his epic work.

Source Citation (MLA 7^th Edition)

Winnington, G. Peter. “Mervyn Peake.” British Novelists, 1930-1959. Ed. Bernard Stanley Oldsey. Detroit: Gale Research, 1983. Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 15. Literature Resource Center. Web. 10 Oct. 2012. Retrieved from:
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CH1200003444&v=2.1&u=taco25438&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=w

1960: To Kill a Mockingbird

Author/Editor: Harper Lee

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Harper Lee’s only published work, To Kill a Mockingbird, has won numerous literary awards, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1961. Addressing issues of race, social class, and prejudice, Lee tells the story of a black man falsely accused of raping a white woman in the Deep South and the resulting court case. Narrated through a child’s eyes, the story illustrates lessons of morality and social conscience – standing up for what you believe is right, even in the face of adversity.

Published just as the American Civil Rights movement was gaining momentum, To Kill a Mockingbird is notable for its condemnation of racial inequality and for its sophisticated narrative style. Despite the moral lessons therein, this book has often been on banned book lists because of the use of racial epithets.

1961: Catch-22

Author: Joseph Heller

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Catch-22 is a scathing critique of the bureaucracy of war published at a time when America was still reveling in the success and glory of World War II. It was embraced by disillusioned young people and veterans of the Vietnam War, which took place a few years after publication. The literary style of multiple narrators and non-chronological storyline is recognized as one of the finest pieces of writing of the twentieth century.

The term Catch-22, a military policy in the book that the protagonist is constantly coming up against and unable to resolve, has become a common expression of a circular “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” situation.

1962: A Clockwork Orange & Silent Spring

A Clockwork Orange

Author: Anthony Burgess

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This book is no stranger to controversy.  In 1973 a book seller in Orem, Utah was arrested for selling the novel!  This book has been removed from high school libraries across the country due to objectionable language!  Like a Handmaid’s Tale (1985), this book also offers a glimpse into the future.  A future where criminals take over.  The book is told by the central character Alex.  The state undertakes to reform Alex, but at what cost.  Anthony Burgess provides insight in his introductory comments, titled, A Clockwork Orange Resucked in which he discusses that the original edition released in the United States did not include the controversial twenty-first chapter.  1971, a film adaption was released to critical acclaim written and directed by Stanley Kubrick.

Silent Spring

Author: Rachel Carson

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Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was, for many, a first alert to chemical pollution and a launching point for the environmental movement.

Carson clearly and dramatically documents the effects of DDT on people and organisms when applied thoughtlessly. She brought the problem of bioaccumulation, inadvertent harms, and the idea of biocontrol to the attention of the public at large.

Even before Silent Spring was published, Carson was decried as radical, unhinged and (that perennial favorite) hysterical. Still, her book was widely read and while she is sometimes now accused of being the cause of malaria deaths in developing nations by causing a reaction against DDT, much evidence indicates that DDT spraying declined in these areas because, as Carson herself notes, mosquitoes very rapidly become resistant to DDT.

The controversy generated forced us to confront the question of how much humans can control the environment, and where boundaries should and can be drawn—a question we continue to struggle with.

1963: Where the Wild Things Are

Author/Editor: Maurice Sendak

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The beloved children’s book, Where the Wild Things Are, was initially banned by many school libraries, but was soon found to be very popular among both children and their parents. The engaging illustrations of this wild land represent a child’s imagination, but also his anger at having been sent to bed without supper. After having essentially conquered these “wild things” and by extension, his own wild side, he calms down and returns home to find that his supper is “still hot”.

This tale of a child overcoming his feelings in a way that only a child can – through his imagination – is timeless and has been enjoyed by several generations of children and their families.

1964: Why We Can’t Wait

Author/Editor: Martin Luther King, Jr.

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This is King’s powerful treatise on why African Americans could not wait for freedom and his strategy of non-violence as a course of action for achieving equality. Included is King’s famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” a response, in part, to a group of white clergymen, who argued that civil rights leaders ought to fight their battles in the courts.

1965: The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Author/Editor: Malcolm X, Alex Haley

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The Library of Congress says it all:

“When The Autobiography of Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little) was published, the New York Times called it a “brilliant, painful, important book,” and it has become a classic American autobiography. Written in collaboration with Alex Haley (author of Roots), the book expressed for many African Americans what the mainstream civil rights movement did not: their anger and frustration with the intractability of racial injustice. In 1998, Time magazine listed The Autobiography of Malcolm X as one of ten “required reading” nonfiction books.”

1966: In Cold Blood

Author/Editor: Truman Capote

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Another book selected by the Library of Congress as one of the books that shaped America, In Cold Blood is a nonfiction novel inspired by a story

“…about a murder that led Truman Capote to travel with his childhood friend Harper Lee ( author of A Kill a Mockingbird)  to Holcomb, Kansas, to research his nonfiction novel, which is considered one of the greatest true crime books ever written. Capote said the novel was an attempt to establish a serious new literary form, the “nonfiction novel,” a narrative form that employed all the techniques of fictional art but was nevertheless entirely factual. The book was an instant success and was made into a film.”

A portrait of Capote as a young man by Carl Van Vechten courtesy of the American Memory Project.

–http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004662664/