1001 Books You Must Read

stolen from http://justprettydeep.blogspot.com/

I have read 121. This does not include the movie versions. It does not include Ulysses, even though I stopped fifty pages shy of the end. It protests the inclusion of The Recognitions by William Gaddis (that is just NOT fair). It does not include the titles I own and have not yet read. It does include Don Quixote, even though I read only sections of it, they were the sections assigned by my instructor. I have read the first four on the list, which made me feel smug until I printed off the entire list and counted my grand total.


Volumes to Go Before You Die

2000s
Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
Saturday – Ian McEwan
On Beauty – Zadie Smith
Slow Man – J.M. Coetzee
Adjunct: An Undigest – Peter Manson
The Sea – John Banville
The Red Queen – Margaret Drabble
The Plot Against America – Philip Roth
The Master – Colm Tóibín
Vanishing Point – David Markson
The Lambs of London – Peter Ackroyd
Dining on Stones – Iain Sinclair
Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
Drop City – T. Coraghessan Boyle
The Colour – Rose Tremain
Thursbitch – Alan Garner
The Light of Day – Graham Swift
What I Loved – Siri Hustvedt
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Mark Haddon
Islands – Dan Sleigh
Elizabeth Costello – J.M. Coetzee
London Orbital – Iain Sinclair
Family Matters – Rohinton Mistry
Fingersmith – Sarah Waters
The Double – José Saramago
Everything is Illuminated – Jonathan Safran Foer
Unless – Carol Shields
Kafka on the Shore – Haruki Murakami
The Story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor
That They May Face the Rising Sun – John McGahern
In the Forest – Edna O’Brien
Shroud – John Banville
Middlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides
Youth – J.M. Coetzee
Dead Air – Iain Banks
Nowhere Man – Aleksandar Hemon
The Book of Illusions – Paul Auster
Gabriel’s Gift – Hanif Kureishi
Austerlitz – W.G. Sebald
Platform – Michael Houellebecq
Schooling – Heather McGowan
Atonement – Ian McEwan
The Corrections – Jonathan Franzen
Don’t Move – Margaret Mazzantini
The Body Artist – Don DeLillo
Fury – Salman Rushdie
At Swim, Two Boys – Jamie O’Neill
Choke – Chuck Palahniuk
Life of Pi – Yann Martel
The Feast of the Goat – Mario Vargos Llosa
An Obedient Father – Akhil Sharma
The Devil and Miss Prym – Paulo Coelho
Spring Flowers, Spring Frost – Ismail Kadare
White Teeth – Zadie Smith
The Heart of Redness – Zakes Mda
Under the Skin – Michel Faber
Ignorance – Milan Kundera
Nineteen Seventy Seven – David Peace
Celestial Harmonies – Péter Esterházy
City of God – E.L. Doctorow
How the Dead Live – Will Self
The Human Stain – Philip Roth
The Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood
After the Quake – Haruki Murakami
Small Remedies – Shashi Deshpande
Super-Cannes – J.G. Ballard
House of Leaves – Mark Z. Danielewski
Blonde – Joyce Carol Oates
Pastoralia – George Saunders

1900s
Timbuktu – Paul Auster
The Romantics – Pankaj Mishra
Cryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson
As If I Am Not There – Slavenka Drakuli?
Everything You Need – A.L. Kennedy
Fear and Trembling – Amélie Nothomb
The Ground Beneath Her Feet – Salman Rushdie
Disgrace – J.M. Coetzee
Sputnik Sweetheart – Haruki Murakami
Elementary Particles – Michel Houellebecq
Intimacy – Hanif Kureishi
Amsterdam – Ian McEwan
Cloudsplitter – Russell Banks
All Souls Day – Cees Nooteboom
The Talk of the Town – Ardal O’Hanlon
Tipping the Velvet – Sarah Waters
The Poisonwood Bible – Barbara Kingsolver
Glamorama – Bret Easton Ellis
Another World – Pat Barker
The Hours – Michael Cunningham
Veronika Decides to Die – Paulo Coelho
Mason & Dixon – Thomas Pynchon
The God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy
Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
Great Apes – Will Self
Enduring Love – Ian McEwan
Underworld – Don DeLillo
Jack Maggs – Peter Carey
The Life of Insects – Victor Pelevin
American Pastoral – Philip Roth
The Untouchable – John Banville
Silk – Alessandro Baricco
Cocaine Nights – J.G. Ballard
Hallucinating Foucault – Patricia Duncker
Fugitive Pieces – Anne Michaels
The Ghost Road – Pat Barker
Forever a Stranger – Hella Haasse
Infinite Jest – David Foster Wallace
The Clay Machine-Gun – Victor Pelevin
Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood
The Unconsoled – Kazuo Ishiguro
Morvern Callar – Alan Warner
The Information – Martin Amis
The Moor’s Last Sigh – Salman Rushdie
Sabbath’s Theater – Philip Roth
The Rings of Saturn – W.G. Sebald
The Reader – Bernhard Schlink
A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
Love’s Work – Gillian Rose
The End of the Story – Lydia Davis
Mr. Vertigo – Paul Auster
The Folding Star – Alan Hollinghurst
Whatever – Michel Houellebecq
Land – Park Kyong-ni
The Master of Petersburg – J.M. Coetzee
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle – Haruki Murakami
Pereira Declares: A Testimony – Antonio Tabucchi
City Sister Silver – Jàchym Topol
How Late It Was, How Late – James Kelman
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis de Bernieres
Felicia’s Journey – William Trevor
Disappearance – David Dabydeen
The Invention of Curried Sausage – Uwe Timm
The Shipping News – E. Annie Proulx
Trainspotting – Irvine Welsh
Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks
Looking for the Possible Dance – A.L. Kennedy
Operation Shylock – Philip Roth
Complicity – Iain Banks
On Love – Alain de Botton
What a Carve Up! – Jonathan Coe
A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
The Stone Diaries – Carol Shields
The Virgin Suicides – Jeffrey Eugenides
The House of Doctor Dee – Peter Ackroyd
The Robber Bride – Margaret Atwood
The Emigrants – W.G. Sebald
The Secret History – Donna Tartt
Life is a Caravanserai – Emine Özdamar
The Discovery of Heaven – Harry Mulisch
A Heart So White – Javier Marias
Possessing the Secret of Joy – Alice Walker
Indigo – Marina Warner
The Crow Road – Iain Banks
Written on the Body – Jeanette Winterson
Jazz – Toni Morrison
The English Patient – Michael Ondaatje
Smilla’s Sense of Snow – Peter Høeg
The Butcher Boy – Patrick McCabe
Black Water – Joyce Carol Oates
The Heather Blazing – Colm Tóibín
Asphodel – H.D. (Hilda Doolittle)
Black Dogs – Ian McEwan
Hideous Kinky – Esther Freud
Arcadia – Jim Crace
Wild Swans – Jung Chang
American Psycho – Bret Easton Ellis
Time’s Arrow – Martin Amis
Mao II – Don DeLillo
Typical – Padgett Powell
Regeneration – Pat Barker
Downriver – Iain Sinclair
Señor Vivo and the Coca Lord – Louis de Bernieres
Wise Children – Angela Carter
Get Shorty – Elmore Leonard
Amongst Women – John McGahern
Vineland – Thomas Pynchon
Vertigo – W.G. Sebald
Stone Junction – Jim Dodge
The Music of Chance – Paul Auster
The Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien
A Home at the End of the World – Michael Cunningham
Like Life – Lorrie Moore
Possession – A.S. Byatt
The Buddha of Suburbia – Hanif Kureishi
The Midnight Examiner – William Kotzwinkle
A Disaffection – James Kelman
Sexing the Cherry – Jeanette Winterson
Moon Palace – Paul Auster
Billy Bathgate – E.L. Doctorow
Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
The Melancholy of Resistance – László Krasznahorkai
The Temple of My Familiar – Alice Walker
The Trick is to Keep Breathing – Janice Galloway
The History of the Siege of Lisbon – José Saramago
Like Water for Chocolate – Laura Esquivel
A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
London Fields – Martin Amis
The Book of Evidence – John Banville
Cat’s Eye – Margaret Atwood
Foucault’s Pendulum – Umberto Eco
The Beautiful Room is Empty – Edmund White
Wittgenstein’s Mistress – David Markson
The Satanic Verses – Salman Rushdie
The Swimming-Pool Library – Alan Hollinghurst
Oscar and Lucinda – Peter Carey
Libra – Don DeLillo
The Player of Games – Iain M. Banks
Nervous Conditions – Tsitsi Dangarembga
The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul – Douglas Adams
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – Douglas Adams
The Radiant Way – Margaret Drabble
The Afternoon of a Writer – Peter Handke
The Black Dahlia – James Ellroy
The Passion – Jeanette Winterson
The Pigeon – Patrick Süskind
The Child in Time – Ian McEwan
Cigarettes – Harry Mathews
The Bonfire of the Vanities – Tom Wolfe
The New York Trilogy – Paul Auster
World’s End – T. Coraghessan Boyle
Enigma of Arrival – V.S. Naipaul
The Taebek Mountains – Jo Jung-rae
Beloved – Toni Morrison
Anagrams – Lorrie Moore
Matigari – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o
Marya – Joyce Carol Oates
Watchmen – Alan Moore & David Gibbons
The Old Devils – Kingsley Amis
Lost Language of Cranes – David Leavitt
An Artist of the Floating World – Kazuo Ishiguro
Extinction – Thomas Bernhard
Foe – J.M. Coetzee
The Drowned and the Saved – Primo Levi
Reasons to Live – Amy Hempel
The Parable of the Blind – Gert Hofmann
Love in the Time of Cholera – Gabriel García Márquez
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit – Jeanette Winterson
The Cider House Rules – John Irving
A Maggot – John Fowles
Less Than Zero – Bret Easton Ellis
Contact – Carl Sagan
The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
Perfume – Patrick Süskind
Old Masters – Thomas Bernhard
White Noise – Don DeLillo
Queer – William Burroughs
Hawksmoor – Peter Ackroyd
Legend – David Gemmell
Dictionary of the Khazars – Milorad Pavi?
The Bus Conductor Hines – James Kelman
The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis – José Saramago
The Lover – Marguerite Duras
Empire of the Sun – J.G. Ballard
The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks
Nights at the Circus – Angela Carter
The Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera
Blood and Guts in High School – Kathy Acker
Neuromancer – William Gibson
Flaubert’s Parrot – Julian Barnes
Money: A Suicide Note – Martin Amis
Shame – Salman Rushdie
Worstward Ho – Samuel Beckett
Fools of Fortune – William Trevor
La Brava – Elmore Leonard
Waterland – Graham Swift
The Life and Times of Michael K – J.M. Coetzee
The Diary of Jane Somers – Doris Lessing
The Piano Teacher – Elfriede Jelinek
The Sorrow of Belgium – Hugo Claus
If Not Now, When? – Primo Levi
A Boy’s Own Story – Edmund White
The Color Purple – Alice Walker
Wittgenstein’s Nephew – Thomas Bernhard
A Pale View of Hills – Kazuo Ishiguro
Schindler’s Ark – Thomas Keneally
The House of the Spirits – Isabel Allende
The Newton Letter – John Banville
On the Black Hill – Bruce Chatwin
Concrete – Thomas Bernhard
The Names – Don DeLillo
Rabbit is Rich – John Updike
Lanark: A Life in Four Books – Alasdair Gray
The Comfort of Strangers – Ian McEwan
July’s People – Nadine Gordimer
Summer in Baden-Baden – Leonid Tsypkin
Broken April – Ismail Kadare
Waiting for the Barbarians – J.M. Coetzee
Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
Rites of Passage – William Golding
Rituals – Cees Nooteboom
Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
City Primeval – Elmore Leonard
The Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting – Milan Kundera
Smiley’s People – John Le Carré
Shikasta – Doris Lessing
A Bend in the River – V.S. Naipaul
Burger’s Daughter - Nadine Gordimer
The Safety Net – Heinrich Böll
If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler – Italo Calvino
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
The Cement Garden – Ian McEwan
The World According to Garp – John Irving
Life: A User’s Manual – Georges Perec
The Sea, The Sea – Iris Murdoch
The Singapore Grip – J.G. Farrell
Yes – Thomas Bernhard
The Virgin in the Garden – A.S. Byatt
In the Heart of the Country – J.M. Coetzee
The Passion of New Eve – Angela Carter
Delta of Venus – Anaïs Nin
The Shining – Stephen King
Dispatches – Michael Herr
Petals of Blood – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o
Song of Solomon – Toni Morrison
The Hour of the Star – Clarice Lispector
The Left-Handed Woman – Peter Handke
Ratner’s Star – Don DeLillo
The Public Burning – Robert Coover
Interview With the Vampire – Anne Rice
Cutter and Bone – Newton Thornburg
Amateurs – Donald Barthelme
Patterns of Childhood – Christa Wolf
Autumn of the Patriarch – Gabriel García Márquez
W, or the Memory of Childhood – Georges Perec
A Dance to the Music of Time – Anthony Powell
Grimus – Salman Rushdie
The Dead Father – Donald Barthelme
Fateless – Imre Kertész
Willard and His Bowling Trophies – Richard Brautigan
High Rise – J.G. Ballard
Humboldt’s Gift – Saul Bellow
Dead Babies – Martin Amis
Correction – Thomas Bernhard
Ragtime – E.L. Doctorow
The Fan Man – William Kotzwinkle
Dusklands – J.M. Coetzee
The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum – Heinrich Böll
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – John Le Carré
Breakfast of Champions – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Fear of Flying – Erica Jong
A Question of Power – Bessie Head
The Siege of Krishnapur – J.G. Farrell
The Castle of Crossed Destinies – Italo Calvino
Crash – J.G. Ballard
The Honorary Consul – Graham Greene
Gravity’s Rainbow – Thomas Pynchon
The Black Prince – Iris Murdoch
Sula – Toni Morrison
Invisible Cities – Italo Calvino
The Breast – Philip Roth
The Summer Book – Tove Jansson
G – John Berger
Surfacing – Margaret Atwood
House Mother Normal – B.S. Johnson
In A Free State – V.S. Naipaul
The Book of Daniel – E.L. Doctorow
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter S. Thompson
Group Portrait With Lady – Heinrich Böll
The Wild Boys – William Burroughs
Rabbit Redux – John Updike
The Sea of Fertility – Yukio Mishima
The Driver’s Seat – Muriel Spark
The Ogre – Michael Tournier
The Bluest Eye – Toni Morrison
Goalie’s Anxiety at the Penalty Kick – Peter Handke
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou
Mercier et Camier – Samuel Beckett
Troubles – J.G. Farrell
Jahrestage – Uwe Johnson
The Atrocity Exhibition – J.G. Ballard
Tent of Miracles – Jorge Amado
Pricksongs and Descants – Robert Coover
Blind Man With a Pistol – Chester Hines
Slaughterhouse-five – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
The French Lieutenant’s Woman – John Fowles
The Green Man – Kingsley Amis
Portnoy’s Complaint – Philip Roth
The Godfather – Mario Puzo
Ada – Vladimir Nabokov
Them – Joyce Carol Oates
A Void/Avoid – Georges Perec
Eva Trout – Elizabeth Bowen
Myra Breckinridge – Gore Vidal
The Nice and the Good – Iris Murdoch
Belle du Seigneur – Albert Cohen
Cancer Ward – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
The First Circle – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
2001: A Space Odyssey – Arthur C. Clarke
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? – Philip K. Dick
Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend is Laid – Malcolm Lowry
The German Lesson – Siegfried Lenz
In Watermelon Sugar – Richard Brautigan
A Kestrel for a Knave – Barry Hines
The Quest for Christa T. – Christa Wolf
Chocky – John Wyndham
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test – Tom Wolfe
The Cubs and Other Stories – Mario Vargas Llosa
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov
Pilgrimage – Dorothy Richardson
The Joke – Milan Kundera
No Laughing Matter – Angus Wilson
The Third Policeman – Flann O’Brien
A Man Asleep – Georges Perec
The Birds Fall Down – Rebecca West
Trawl – B.S. Johnson
In Cold Blood – Truman Capote
The Magus – John Fowles
The Vice-Consul – Marguerite Duras
Wide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys
Giles Goat-Boy – John Barth
The Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon
Things – Georges Perec
The River Between – Ngugi wa Thiong’o
August is a Wicked Month – Edna O’Brien
God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater – Kurt Vonnegut
Everything That Rises Must Converge – Flannery O’Connor
The Passion According to G.H. – Clarice Lispector
Sometimes a Great Notion – Ken Kesey
Come Back, Dr. Caligari – Donald Bartholme
Albert Angelo – B.S. Johnson
Arrow of God – Chinua Achebe
The Ravishing of Lol V. Stein – Marguerite Duras
Herzog – Saul Bellow
V. – Thomas Pynchon
Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut
The Graduate – Charles Webb
Manon des Sources – Marcel Pagnol
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold – John Le Carré
The Girls of Slender Means – Muriel Spark
Inside Mr. Enderby – Anthony Burgess
The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
The Collector – John Fowles
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Ken Kesey
A Clockwork Orange – Anthony Burgess
Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov
The Drowned World – J.G. Ballard
The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing
Labyrinths – Jorg Luis Borges
Girl With Green Eyes – Edna O’Brien
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis – Giorgio Bassani
Stranger in a Strange Land – Robert Heinlein
Franny and Zooey – J.D. Salinger
A Severed Head – Iris Murdoch
Faces in the Water – Janet Frame
Solaris – Stanislaw Lem
Cat and Mouse – Günter Grass
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark
Catch-22 – Joseph Heller
The Violent Bear it Away – Flannery O’Connor
How It Is – Samuel Beckett
Our Ancestors – Italo Calvino
The Country Girls – Edna O’Brien
To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
Rabbit, Run – John Updike
Promise at Dawn – Romain Gary
Cider With Rosie – Laurie Lee
Billy Liar – Keith Waterhouse
Naked Lunch – William Burroughs
The Tin Drum – Günter Grass
Absolute Beginners – Colin MacInnes
Henderson the Rain King – Saul Bellow
Memento Mori – Muriel Spark
Billiards at Half-Past Nine – Heinrich Böll
Breakfast at Tiffany’s – Truman Capote
The Leopard – Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Pluck the Bud and Destroy the Offspring – Kenzaburo Oe
A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
The Bitter Glass – Eilís Dillon
Things Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning – Alan Sillitoe
Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris – Paul Gallico
Borstal Boy – Brendan Behan
The End of the Road – John Barth
The Once and Future King – T.H. White
The Bell – Iris Murdoch
Jealousy – Alain Robbe-Grillet
Voss – Patrick White
The Midwich Cuckoos – John Wyndham
Blue Noon – Georges Bataille
Homo Faber – Max Frisch
On the Road – Jack Kerouac
Pnin – Vladimir Nabokov
Doctor Zhivago – Boris Pasternak
The Wonderful “O” – James Thurber
Justine – Lawrence Durrell
Giovanni’s Room – James Baldwin
The Lonely Londoners – Sam Selvon
The Roots of Heaven – Romain Gary
Seize the Day – Saul Bellow
The Floating Opera – John Barth
The Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien
The Talented Mr. Ripley – Patricia Highsmith
Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
A World of Love – Elizabeth Bowen
The Trusting and the Maimed – James Plunkett
The Quiet American – Graham Greene
The Last Temptation of Christ – Nikos Kazantzákis
The Recognitions – William Gaddis
The Ragazzi – Pier Paulo Pasolini
Bonjour Tristesse – Françoise Sagan
I’m Not Stiller – Max Frisch
Self Condemned – Wyndham Lewis
The Story of O – Pauline Réage
A Ghost at Noon – Alberto Moravia
Lord of the Flies – William Golding
Under the Net – Iris Murdoch
The Go-Between – L.P. Hartley
The Long Goodbye – Raymond Chandler
The Unnamable – Samuel Beckett
Watt – Samuel Beckett
Lucky Jim – Kingsley Amis
Junkie – William Burroughs
The Adventures of Augie March – Saul Bellow
Go Tell It on the Mountain – James Baldwin
Casino Royale – Ian Fleming
The Judge and His Hangman – Friedrich Dürrenmatt
Invisible Man – Ralph Ellison
The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway
Wise Blood – Flannery O’Connor
The Killer Inside Me – Jim Thompson
Memoirs of Hadrian – Marguerite Yourcenar
Malone Dies – Samuel Beckett
Day of the Triffids – John Wyndham
Foundation – Isaac Asimov
The Opposing Shore – Julien Gracq
The Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger
The Rebel – Albert Camus
Molloy – Samuel Beckett
The End of the Affair – Graham Greene
The Abbot C – Georges Bataille
The Labyrinth of Solitude – Octavio Paz
The Third Man – Graham Greene
The 13 Clocks – James Thurber
Gormenghast – Mervyn Peake
The Grass is Singing – Doris Lessing
I, Robot – Isaac Asimov
The Moon and the Bonfires – Cesare Pavese
The Garden Where the Brass Band Played – Simon Vestdijk
Love in a Cold Climate – Nancy Mitford
The Case of Comrade Tulayev – Victor Serge
The Heat of the Day – Elizabeth Bowen
Kingdom of This World – Alejo Carpentier
The Man With the Golden Arm – Nelson Algren
Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell
All About H. Hatterr – G.V. Desani
Disobedience – Alberto Moravia
Death Sentence – Maurice Blanchot
The Heart of the Matter – Graham Greene
Cry, the Beloved Country – Alan Paton
Doctor Faustus – Thomas Mann
The Victim – Saul Bellow
Exercises in Style – Raymond Queneau
If This Is a Man – Primo Levi
Under the Volcano – Malcolm Lowry
The Path to the Nest of Spiders – Italo Calvino
The Plague – Albert Camus
Back – Henry Green
Titus Groan – Mervyn Peake
The Bridge on the Drina – Ivo Andri?
Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
Animal Farm – George Orwell
Cannery Row – John Steinbeck
The Pursuit of Love – Nancy Mitford
Loving – Henry Green
Arcanum 17 – André Breton
Christ Stopped at Eboli – Carlo Levi
The Razor’s Edge – William Somerset Maugham
Transit – Anna Seghers
Ficciones – Jorge Luis Borges
Dangling Man – Saul Bellow
The Little Prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Caught – Henry Green
The Glass Bead Game – Herman Hesse
Embers – Sandor Marai
Go Down, Moses – William Faulkner
The Outsider – Albert Camus
In Sicily – Elio Vittorini
The Poor Mouth – Flann O’Brien
The Living and the Dead – Patrick White
Hangover Square – Patrick Hamilton
Between the Acts – Virginia Woolf
The Hamlet – William Faulkner
Farewell My Lovely – Raymond Chandler
For Whom the Bell Tolls – Ernest Hemingway
Native Son – Richard Wright
The Power and the Glory – Graham Greene
The Tartar Steppe – Dino Buzzati
Party Going – Henry Green
The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
Finnegans Wake – James Joyce
At Swim-Two-Birds – Flann O’Brien
Coming Up for Air – George Orwell
Goodbye to Berlin – Christopher Isherwood
Tropic of Capricorn – Henry Miller
Good Morning, Midnight – Jean Rhys
The Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler
After the Death of Don Juan – Sylvie Townsend Warner
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day – Winifred Watson
Nausea – Jean-Paul Sartre
Rebecca – Daphne du Maurier
Cause for Alarm – Eric Ambler
Brighton Rock – Graham Greene
U.S.A. – John Dos Passos
Murphy – Samuel Beckett
Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
Their Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston
The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien
The Years – Virginia Woolf
In Parenthesis – David Jones
The Revenge for Love – Wyndham Lewis
Out of Africa – Isak Dineson (Karen Blixen)
To Have and Have Not – Ernest Hemingway
Summer Will Show – Sylvia Townsend Warner
Eyeless in Gaza – Aldous Huxley
The Thinking Reed – Rebecca West
Gone With the Wind – Margaret Mitchell
Keep the Aspidistra Flying – George Orwell
Wild Harbour – Ian MacPherson
Absalom, Absalom! – William Faulkner
At the Mountains of Madness – H.P. Lovecraft
Nightwood – Djuna Barnes
Independent People – Halldór Laxness
Auto-da-Fé – Elias Canetti
The Last of Mr. Norris – Christopher Isherwood
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? – Horace McCoy
The House in Paris – Elizabeth Bowen
England Made Me – Graham Greene
Burmese Days – George Orwell
The Nine Tailors – Dorothy L. Sayers
Threepenny Novel – Bertolt Brecht
Novel With Cocaine – M. Ageyev
The Postman Always Rings Twice – James M. Cain
Tropic of Cancer – Henry Miller
A Handful of Dust – Evelyn Waugh
Tender is the Night – F. Scott Fitzgerald
Thank You, Jeeves – P.G. Wodehouse
Call it Sleep – Henry Roth
Miss Lonelyhearts – Nathanael West
Murder Must Advertise – Dorothy L. Sayers
The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas – Gertrude Stein
Testament of Youth – Vera Brittain
A Day Off – Storm Jameson
The Man Without Qualities – Robert Musil
A Scots Quair (Sunset Song) – Lewis Grassic Gibbon
Journey to the End of the Night – Louis-Ferdinand Céline
Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
Cold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons
To the North – Elizabeth Bowen
The Thin Man – Dashiell Hammett
The Radetzky March – Joseph Roth
The Waves – Virginia Woolf
The Glass Key – Dashiell Hammett
Cakes and Ale – W. Somerset Maugham
The Apes of God – Wyndham Lewis
Her Privates We – Frederic Manning
Vile Bodies – Evelyn Waugh
The Maltese Falcon – Dashiell Hammett
Hebdomeros – Giorgio de Chirico
Passing – Nella Larsen
A Farewell to Arms – Ernest Hemingway
Red Harvest – Dashiell Hammett
Living – Henry Green
The Time of Indifference – Alberto Moravia
All Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Maria Remarque
Berlin Alexanderplatz – Alfred Döblin
The Last September – Elizabeth Bowen
Harriet Hume – Rebecca West
The Sound and the Fury – William Faulkner
Les Enfants Terribles – Jean Cocteau
Look Homeward, Angel – Thomas Wolfe
Story of the Eye – Georges Bataille
Orlando – Virginia Woolf
Lady Chatterley’s Lover – D.H. Lawrence
The Well of Loneliness – Radclyffe Hall
The Childermass – Wyndham Lewis
Quartet – Jean Rhys
Decline and Fall – Evelyn Waugh
Quicksand – Nella Larsen
Parade’s End – Ford Madox Ford
Nadja – André Breton
Steppenwolf – Herman Hesse
Remembrance of Things Past – Marcel Proust
To The Lighthouse – Virginia Woolf
Tarka the Otter – Henry Williamson
Amerika – Franz Kafka
The Sun Also Rises – Ernest Hemingway
Blindness – Henry Green
The Castle – Franz Kafka
The Good Soldier Švejk – Jaroslav Hašek
The Plumed Serpent – D.H. Lawrence
One, None and a Hundred Thousand – Luigi Pirandello
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd – Agatha Christie
The Making of Americans – Gertrude Stein
Manhattan Transfer – John Dos Passos
Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf
The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Counterfeiters – André Gide
The Trial – Franz Kafka
The Artamonov Business – Maxim Gorky
The Professor’s House – Willa Cather
Billy Budd, Foretopman – Herman Melville
The Green Hat – Michael Arlen
The Magic Mountain – Thomas Mann
We – Yevgeny Zamyatin
A Passage to India – E.M. Forster
The Devil in the Flesh – Raymond Radiguet
Zeno’s Conscience – Italo Svevo
Cane – Jean Toomer
Antic Hay – Aldous Huxley
Amok – Stefan Zweig
The Garden Party – Katherine Mansfield
The Enormous Room – E.E. Cummings
Jacob’s Room – Virginia Woolf
Siddhartha – Herman Hesse
The Glimpses of the Moon – Edith Wharton
Life and Death of Harriett Frean – May Sinclair
The Last Days of Humanity – Karl Kraus
Aaron’s Rod – D.H. Lawrence
Babbitt – Sinclair Lewis
Ulysses – James Joyce
The Fox – D.H. Lawrence
Crome Yellow – Aldous Huxley
The Age of Innocence – Edith Wharton
Main Street – Sinclair Lewis
Women in Love – D.H. Lawrence
Night and Day – Virginia Woolf
Tarr – Wyndham Lewis
The Return of the Soldier – Rebecca West
The Shadow Line – Joseph Conrad
Summer – Edith Wharton
Growth of the Soil – Knut Hamsen
Bunner Sisters – Edith Wharton
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – James Joyce
Under Fire – Henri Barbusse
Rashomon – Akutagawa Ryunosuke
The Good Soldier – Ford Madox Ford
The Voyage Out – Virginia Woolf
Of Human Bondage – William Somerset Maugham
The Rainbow – D.H. Lawrence
The Thirty-Nine Steps – John Buchan
Kokoro – Natsume Soseki
Locus Solus – Raymond Roussel
Rosshalde – Herman Hesse
Tarzan of the Apes – Edgar Rice Burroughs
The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists – Robert Tressell
Sons and Lovers – D.H. Lawrence
Death in Venice – Thomas Mann
The Charwoman’s Daughter – James Stephens
Ethan Frome – Edith Wharton
Fantômas – Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre
Howards End – E.M. Forster
Impressions of Africa – Raymond Roussel
Three Lives – Gertrude Stein
Martin Eden – Jack London
Strait is the Gate – André Gide
Tono-Bungay – H.G. Wells
The Inferno – Henri Barbusse
A Room With a View – E.M. Forster
The Iron Heel – Jack London
The Old Wives’ Tale – Arnold Bennett
The House on the Borderland – William Hope Hodgson
Mother – Maxim Gorky
The Secret Agent – Joseph Conrad
The Jungle – Upton Sinclair
Young Törless – Robert Musil
The Forsyte Sage – John Galsworthy
The House of Mirth – Edith Wharton
Professor Unrat – Heinrich Mann
Where Angels Fear to Tread – E.M. Forster
Nostromo – Joseph Conrad
Hadrian the Seventh – Frederick Rolfe
The Golden Bowl – Henry James
The Ambassadors – Henry James
The Riddle of the Sands – Erskine Childers
The Immoralist – André Gide
The Wings of the Dove – Henry James
Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
The Hound of the Baskervilles – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Buddenbrooks – Thomas Mann
Kim – Rudyard Kipling
Sister Carrie – Theodore Dreiser
Lord Jim – Joseph Conrad

1800s
Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. – Somerville and Ross
The Stechlin – Theodore Fontane
The Awakening – Kate Chopin
The Turn of the Screw – Henry James
The War of the Worlds – H.G. Wells
The Invisible Man – H.G. Wells
What Maisie Knew – Henry James
Fruits of the Earth – André Gide
Dracula – Bram Stoker
Quo Vadis – Henryk Sienkiewicz
The Island of Dr. Moreau – H.G. Wells
The Time Machine – H.G. Wells
Effi Briest – Theodore Fontane
Jude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy
The Real Charlotte – Somerville and Ross
The Yellow Wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Born in Exile – George Gissing
Diary of a Nobody – George & Weedon Grossmith
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
News from Nowhere – William Morris
New Grub Street – George Gissing
Gösta Berling’s Saga – Selma Lagerlöf
Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde
The Kreutzer Sonata – Leo Tolstoy
La Bête Humaine – Émile Zola
By the Open Sea – August Strindberg
Hunger – Knut Hamsun
The Master of Ballantrae – Robert Louis Stevenson
Pierre and Jean – Guy de Maupassant
Fortunata and Jacinta – Benito Pérez Galdés
The People of Hemsö – August Strindberg
The Woodlanders – Thomas Hardy
She – H. Rider Haggard
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – Robert Louis Stevenson
The Mayor of Casterbridge – Thomas Hardy
Kidnapped – Robert Louis Stevenson
King Solomon’s Mines – H. Rider Haggard
Germinal – Émile Zola
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Bel-Ami – Guy de Maupassant
Marius the Epicurean – Walter Pater
Against the Grain – Joris-Karl Huysmans
The Death of Ivan Ilyich – Leo Tolstoy
A Woman’s Life – Guy de Maupassant
Treasure Island – Robert Louis Stevenson
The House by the Medlar Tree – Giovanni Verga
The Portrait of a Lady – Henry James
Bouvard and Pécuchet – Gustave Flaubert
Ben-Hur – Lew Wallace
Nana – Émile Zola
The Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Red Room – August Strindberg
Return of the Native – Thomas Hardy
Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
Drunkard – Émile Zola
Virgin Soil – Ivan Turgenev
Daniel Deronda – George Eliot
The Hand of Ethelberta – Thomas Hardy
The Temptation of Saint Anthony – Gustave Flaubert
Far from the Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
The Enchanted Wanderer – Nicolai Leskov
Around the World in Eighty Days – Jules Verne
In a Glass Darkly – Sheridan Le Fanu
The Devils – Fyodor Dostoevsky
Erewhon – Samuel Butler
Spring Torrents – Ivan Turgenev
Middlemarch – George Eliot
Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There – Lewis Carroll
King Lear of the Steppes – Ivan Turgenev
He Knew He Was Right – Anthony Trollope
War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
Sentimental Education – Gustave Flaubert
Phineas Finn – Anthony Trollope
Maldoror – Comte de Lautréaumont
The Idiot – Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Moonstone – Wilkie Collins
Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
Thérèse Raquin – Émile Zola
The Last Chronicle of Barset – Anthony Trollope
Journey to the Centre of the Earth – Jules Verne
Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
Our Mutual Friend – Charles Dickens
Uncle Silas – Sheridan Le Fanu
Notes from the Underground – Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Water-Babies – Charles Kingsley
Les Misérables – Victor Hugo
Fathers and Sons – Ivan Turgenev
Silas Marner – George Eliot
Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
On the Eve – Ivan Turgenev
Castle Richmond – Anthony Trollope
The Mill on the Floss – George Eliot
The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins
The Marble Faun – Nathaniel Hawthorne
Max Havelaar – Multatuli
A Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
Oblomovka – Ivan Goncharov
Adam Bede – George Eliot
Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
North and South – Elizabeth Gaskell
Hard Times – Charles Dickens
Walden – Henry David Thoreau
Bleak House – Charles Dickens
Villette – Charlotte Brontë
Cranford – Elizabeth Gaskell
Uncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life Among the Lonely – Harriet Beecher Stowe
The Blithedale Romance – Nathaniel Hawthorne
The House of the Seven Gables – Nathaniel Hawthorne
Moby-Dick – Herman Melville
The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne
David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
Shirley – Charlotte Brontë
Mary Barton – Elizabeth Gaskell
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Brontë
Wuthering Heights – Emily Brontë
Agnes Grey – Anne Brontë
Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë
Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray
The Count of Monte-Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
La Reine Margot – Alexandre Dumas
The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
The Purloined Letter – Edgar Allan Poe
Martin Chuzzlewit – Charles Dickens
The Pit and the Pendulum – Edgar Allan Poe
Lost Illusions – Honoré de Balzac
A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens
Dead Souls – Nikolay Gogol
The Charterhouse of Parma – Stendhal
The Fall of the House of Usher – Edgar Allan Poe
The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby – Charles Dickens
Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
The Nose – Nikolay Gogol
Le Père Goriot – Honoré de Balzac
Eugénie Grandet – Honoré de Balzac
The Hunchback of Notre Dame – Victor Hugo
The Red and the Black – Stendhal
The Betrothed – Alessandro Manzoni
Last of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner – James Hogg
The Albigenses – Charles Robert Maturin
Melmoth the Wanderer – Charles Robert Maturin
The Monastery – Sir Walter Scott
Ivanhoe – Sir Walter Scott
Frankenstein – Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen
Persuasion – Jane Austen
Ormond – Maria Edgeworth
Rob Roy – Sir Walter Scott
Emma – Jane Austen
Mansfield Park – Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
The Absentee – Maria Edgeworth
Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
Elective Affinities – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Castle Rackrent – Maria Edgeworth

1700s
Hyperion – Friedrich Hölderlin
The Nun – Denis Diderot
Camilla – Fanny Burney
The Monk – M.G. Lewis
Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The Mysteries of Udolpho – Ann Radcliffe
The Interesting Narrative – Olaudah Equiano
The Adventures of Caleb Williams – William Godwin
Justine – Marquis de Sade
Vathek – William Beckford
The 120 Days of Sodom – Marquis de Sade
Cecilia – Fanny Burney
Confessions – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Dangerous Liaisons – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
Reveries of a Solitary Walker – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Evelina – Fanny Burney
The Sorrows of Young Werther – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Humphrey Clinker – Tobias George Smollett
The Man of Feeling – Henry Mackenzie
A Sentimental Journey – Laurence Sterne
Tristram Shandy – Laurence Sterne
The Vicar of Wakefield – Oliver Goldsmith
The Castle of Otranto – Horace Walpole
Émile; or, On Education – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Rameau’s Nephew – Denis Diderot
Julie; or, the New Eloise – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Rasselas – Samuel Johnson
Candide – Voltaire
The Female Quixote – Charlotte Lennox
Amelia – Henry Fielding
Peregrine Pickle – Tobias George Smollett
Fanny Hill – John Cleland
Tom Jones – Henry Fielding
Roderick Random – Tobias George Smollett
Clarissa – Samuel Richardson
Pamela – Samuel Richardson
Jacques the Fatalist – Denis Diderot
Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus – J. Arbuthnot, J. Gay, T. Parnell, A. Pope, J. Swift
Joseph Andrews – Henry Fielding
A Modest Proposal – Jonathan Swift
Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift
Roxana – Daniel Defoe
Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe
Love in Excess – Eliza Haywood
Robinson Crusoe – Daniel Defoe
A Tale of a Tub – Jonathan Swift

Pre-1700
Oroonoko – Aphra Behn
The Princess of Clèves – Marie-Madelaine Pioche de Lavergne, Comtesse de La Fayette
The Pilgrim’s Progress – John Bunyan
Don Quixote – Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
The Unfortunate Traveller – Thomas Nashe
Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit – John Lyly
Gargantua and Pantagruel – Françoise Rabelais
The Thousand and One Nights – Anonymous
The Golden Ass – Lucius Apuleius
Aithiopika – Heliodorus
Chaireas and Kallirhoe – Chariton
Metamorphoses – Ovid
Aesop’s Fables – Aesopus

Fourth Trimester

number of weeks Grandma spent at our place: 4
number of weeks spent at Grandma's: 2
number of weeks in the fourth trimester: 12

number of outfits removed with scissors to avoid unnecessary fashion-induced crying: 1
number of outfits purchased: 0 (Thanks for the gifts and second-hand treasures!)

number of baths: 4 (We spot clean.)

number of times we have successfully employed the nasal aspirator: 3-ish

number of poopy diapers on a plane: 1
number of flights taken: 4

number of times infant nail clippers have been used: 0
number of infant nail clippers purchased in trepidation of "razor" infant nails: 2

number of baby slings purchased: 5
baby slings actually used so far: 2

number of cribs delivered: 3
cribs still in box: 1

number of rocking chairs delivered: 2
number of rocking chairs returned due to funky mold situation upon delivery: 1

number of flights to our apartment: 3

amount of tip for UPS delivery guy: 0 (How much? When? Is he allowed to take it?)

number of nursing bras purchased: 8
number that actually fit: 4

number of bebe au lait/hooter-hiders purchased: 2

number of newborn size diapers left over because she outgrew them: 80 (Where can I donate these?)

amount of merchandise ordered from Target.com: $$$ (They own me.)

number of strollers purchased: 0

number of times I have shaved my legs: 1
(number of times in 2008: 2)

number of blankets in our collection: approx. 23
number of blankets that we can't live without: 5

amount of caffeine consumed: 0 (Well, I do drink jasmine tea)
amount of alcohol: 1 tiny port wine and 1/4 glass white wine (I see a rich, red wine in my future.)

number of haircuts: 1 (The hairstylist came to my house because I couldn't figure out how to get to a salon with a baby.)

number of mommy-and-me yoga classes: 3

number of movies watched: 3

number of original songs composed while soothing the baby: endless
favorite song lyrics: Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya. Iza biza Bella mia, me oh my oh me oh mya.

Wild Geese

It turns out that one can read poetry while breast-feeding. I came across this one the other day and for some reason it keeps speaking to me. Can you guess which lines resonate with me?

It feels incredibly human to read poetry again. Iza will be ten-weeks-old tomorrow. Lucky girl, every Friday is her birthday. Soon I will have to give in and start counting by months. But for now, she is still small enough that each week she is a new baby with new challenges (for me) and new abilities (for her).

And here is the poem:


Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Giving Birth to a Better Brain

I first posted this article when it appeared in the Boston Globe in 2005. Now that I have my own little one, I thought I would revisit it and republish it.

Giving birth to a better brain: Do babies sharpen parents' minds?
By Erica Noonan, Globe Staff, October 31, 2005

Women with small children have long been saddled with an unflattering stereotype -- incompetent, dull-witted, frazzled, and preoccupied with domestic affairs. The derogatory cliches vary, from ''maternal amnesia" in medical circles, to the colloquial ''placenta brain" in the United States and ''porridge brain" in Great Britain. But a new body of research -- so far still mostly in animals -- is fueling the idea that motherhood may actually rewire the brain, making mothers (and involved fathers) more perceptive, competitive, efficient, and even socially aware. And sociological studies suggest that most of the symptoms of ''mommy brain" may be due as much to exhaustion and stress as biology.

Comparing the brain of a non-mother to that of a mother is ''like comparing a tree in the winter to one in full bloom in the spring, when it is much fuller and richer," said University of Richmond neuroscientist Craig Kinsley, a leading researcher in the field.

The transforming experiences of pregnancy, labor, and caring for small children ''enables the brain to process information much differently than it did before," he said.

Kinsley and other researchers have found that beginning a few weeks after giving birth, a female rat's cognitive abilities -- particularly smell and visual perception -- start to expand. Rats nursing a litter of pups discover and catch prey three times as quickly as virgin rats, he said.

Kinsley's analysis of brain tissue from rats in late pregnancy showed that neural pathways in the hippocampus, the center of learning and memory, were essentially ''remapped."

The changes, Kinsley and others said, probably come partly from the experience of pregnancy and labor, when elevated levels of estrogen, cortisol, and other hormones literally bathe the brain. The presence of pups and the demands of caring for them also contributes to brain changes in mother rats -- even caretaker rats who have never been pregnant. In repeated studies, mother rats with pups have proven to be bolder and quicker at finding hidden food.

''We believe the pups are having an effect on the mother, enhancing her efficiency," Kinsley said.

''The pups have a paw in their own survival. The mom isn't a passive caregiver. Rather, absorbing sensory information from the pups has an influence on her brain."

The phenomenon hasn't yet been studied in women, but the rodent studies have important implications for humans, said Kelly Lambert, chair of the psychology department at Randolph Macon College in Virginia.

''Rodents have all the same brain parts we have," she said. ''Human brains are thicker and more complex, but as a model it's a very reasonable place to start."

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Katherine Ellison made worldwide headlines earlier this year with her new book, ''The Mommy Brain: How Motherhood Makes Us Smarter," which looks at the experience of mothers in the context of new advances in brain research.

Ellison delayed motherhood until age 37 for fear it would doom her intellectual life. But two babies later, she actually felt more efficient and ''smarter" than ever.

''Although I'd had newspaper deadlines before, never had I been responsible for deadlines involving other people's lives and I found that duty made me more alert and focused," she wrote. ''I had many more reasons to worry, yet to my surprise, I felt calmer. And I kept running into other mothers who felt the same way."

But the news hasn't reached many pregnant and post-partum women, who often too-willingly buy into the ''Jello-brain" stereotype. In effect, this creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, said Ohio University neuropsychologist Julie Suhr.

Women in their third trimester, who were told they were being tested to see how the pregnancy had affected their memory and performance, scored significantly lower than equally pregnant women who were given the tasks without explanation. The pregnant women were clearly affected by the negative stereotypes about their brains, Suhr's students found.

``In essence, it shows that we can talk ourselves in and out of things," Suhr said. ''They performed badly if they thought they would."

Lack of sleep, the absence of adult companionship, and a shortage of time for exercise and relaxation can also make all parents -- men and women -- feel duller than they really are, Suhr said.

New fathers escape the brunt of maternal prejudices. But research in mice suggests they may still enjoy some of the same brain boosts of parenthood, as well as some of the biochemical changes exhibited by females.

Kinsley and Lambert found that father mice and marmosets performed better than non-parents at tests of foraging and remembering the location of hidden Froot Loops. And like mother rats, father rats experience growth in brain cells after fathering pups, albeit much smaller growth.
In the past five years, research into ''Daddy brains" has revealed expectant fathers experience the similar, smaller spikes in prolactin and estrogen levels well-documented in pregnant women.
Maternal brain research in animals has so far focused largely on cognitive tasks directly related to mothering, like foraging for food and seeking out shelter.

But some researchers say it isn't unreasonable to think that increased learning, performance, and efficiency could extend to other aspects of human life, including the workplace.
In a study of women and leadership, Sumru Erkut, associate director of the Wellesley Centers for Women at Wellesley College, found that in a survey of 60 high-achieving women, many said they used their more limited time at the office to get more done, and employ their newfound ''Emotional IQ" and management skills to increase office output, she said. They cited their use of traditional mothering techniques -- such as empathy and understanding -- to manage employees.

None of the women in the Wellesley study cited motherhood as a detriment to their work, Erkut said, although many women in the contemporary workplace regularly downplay their roles at home.

''Historically men have credited military and sports backgrounds as giving them tools to be leaders," said Erkut. ''It's not out of the question that women would someday list motherhood on a resume with pride, instead of trying to cover up the fact she's stayed home for a time."

Erica Noonan can be reached at enoonan@globe.com.

Latch Please

The lactation consultant and the nurse stood at the foot of my hospital bed. They exchanged a glance. That glance was eloquent: it said that they had no idea why my baby girl was not breast-feeding. We had tried all the tricks and positions. At each feeding I would put her hot little tummy next to mine and guide her to my breast. She would frantically root around for a few seconds and then eventually purse her lips before erupting in a hungry cry. Or she would simply refuse to wake up at all. I'm not sure which was worse. We pumped and fed her with with a finger feeder. We moved on to using a bottle. Each nurse who came on duty had a different trick and I eagerly tried each one. That worried glance exchanged at the foot of my bed taught me my first lesson of parenting: even the experts don't have all the answers.

Right. Okay. So babies don't come with instruction manuals. I knew that. But I didn't realize how much I depended on instructions manuals. Though I may have my nonconformist streak, I have always deeply trusted the authority of experts. I may not be a rule follower, but I am a people-truster. With my new baby in my arms I finally learned that I was now supposed to be the expert regarding my new baby. I would have panicked if I had an extra ounce of energy to fire up the appropriate hormones. As it was, our failure to enter into that lactation love zone had me in a raw emotional state that threatened a composure implosion.

After our beautiful natural birth (see previous entry), I was ready to take my place in the creaky rocker for the 3 am feeding with my baby at my breast. We would gently rock and gaze into each other's faces, no matter how bleary my sleep-deprived eyes might be. Instead, there I was at 3 am with two suction cups attached to my breasts, the persistent whir-whir of the breast pump providing the lullaby for my baby if I was lucky. Often she would just wail while I tried to pump enough (2 - 4 ounces / about 10 minutes) for the next feeding.

Here was our routine:
1) arrange a vast and complicated array of pillows, (cycle through blaming the chair, the nursing pillow, the disarray of pillows)

2) place baby next to my breast, (baby whose face is scrunched up in hunger, but whose lips are pursed)

3) watch her attempt to latch and fail and usually wail with hunger, (become convinced that she has a fever and send Grandma and Tata on a frantic search for the thermometer)

4) feed her my breast milk with a bottle, (notice that the loving sweet words I whispered while she tried to breast-feed were absent and attempt to be loving even as my heart breaks)

5) burp/rock/soothe to sleep, (Grandma or Tata took over this part as I pumped)

6) pump for ten minutes, (ten long minutes feeling like a cow)

7) store milk, (worry that I am not properly handling the milk storage paraphernalia and that spoiled milk will sicken her)

8) obsessively write down time of feeding, amount given in bottle, as well as her wet and poopy diapers,

9) somewhere in there change her diaper and get her dressed,

10) every several hours wash the pump parts with hot soapy water and

Start over at two to three hours from the beginning of feed.

Day and night became irrelevant. Time was marked by daytime talk shows--Ellen, The View, and Oprah became milestones. (We don't have cable or decent reception. Still I had to have something on to keep me alert.) It was bleak.

There were moments of joy--friends dropping by, muffins, a lobster dinner, and a surprise baby shower. Washing her hair. Oh how she loves to have her hair washed! She has "electric hair" that stands up straight no matter what we do. I love to smooth it down and watch it spring back in rebellion.

All the books say that the baby will naturally root to the breast and begin to feed if placed on the breast immediately following birth. Sounds natural. We are mammals and we are born to suckle our mamas. Why didn't/wouldn't Iza?

I think there were many factors. In part it was due to a mechanical problem with her mouth and tongue because she had a slight to moderate tongue-tie (which we had clipped in the hospital)-- although some experts say that the tongue-tie doesn't interfere with breast feeding. I think that my nervous nature compounded by postpartum hormones and emotions didn't help. Tense. You haven't seen tense. My obsessive nature inhibited our efforts, yes, but it also meant that I refused to give up. Six weeks is an eternity.

I have heard that some women keep up a similar pumping regime for months or even a year. I am not made of that mettle. We barely left the house and I hardly left our bedroom. Iza became this little entity defined by the fact that she would not feed instead of my sweet, hot, little newborn.

In the effort to make it work, we stayed an extra day in the hospital, saw five lactation consultants, a speech and feeding specialist (who told us at four weeks that her compression suck was not conducive to breast feeding and that if we wanted permission to quit, she would give it), and returned to the pediatric surgeon who clipped her tongue tie for a reevaluation. Some of these experts gave me diametrically opposed evaluations. More than one person told me to "trust my instincts." But I had no instincts! Or rather my instinct was to consult the "experts" for help.

It turns out that no one seems to truly understand the science and art of breast-feeding. For Iza and me it was a simple matter of time--she needed to learn how to organize her tongue and grow in strength. As I look back I can see that she was making progress over the weeks. I didn't see the progress, however, because I didn't know what the final result would look and feel like.

We returned to the pediatric surgeon on a Monday. I had called him in tears the previous Friday. He examined her and concluded that her mouth and tongue should not be impediments to her feeding. This was good news--there was nothing wrong with her. Yet is was frustrating to find out that there was no one problem to be solved. He was wonderful--he sat in his office with me and discussed his wife's struggles. She pumped for a year as their son wavered between the breast and the bottle. By the end of the meeting, I was crying, of course. He gave me a hug. Iza screamed all the way home. We sat down amidst our pillows and she latched on for thirty minutes, falling into the textbook milk-drunken state of sleep I had only imagined. The next day she went to the breast for most of the day. The rest of the week I breast fed and supplemented with the bottle because I was afraid that she wasn't getting enough sustenance. A regular pooper, she didn't poop for two days and I was frantic. (The only way to know a breast fed baby is getting enough is to measure what comes out the other end.)

At my six-week appointment with my midwife that Friday we made the transition. After Iza performed brilliantly at the breast, my midwife suggested that we were ready to stop using the pump and the bottles. Lactation Liberation.

We have been feeding only from the breast since then!

We drove home from the midwife and immediately I reorganized our rooms, putting all the pumping gear out of sight and mind. I cleaned and prepared the way for a new phase in our parenting lives. Tata was was pretty shocked at my sudden and complete resolution to start fresh--pleasantly shocked of course. And it has been a huge change. We have a little girl.

Key to our success: Grandma. My mom came and stayed for three weeks and then returned for another week! She spent countless hours in the rocker with Iza while I pumped and generally freaked out about being a new mom. And of course Tata was essential as he took over the daunting tasks of keeping me fed, hydrated, and sane. It was a three-person job to get Iza to the breast, with a supporting cast of at least ten. But we did it.

Also key to our success was Susan Davies, a lactation consultant who came to our home on two occasions and checked in by phone several times. She gave us good tips about the hows of feeding and also was relentlessly optimistic and supportive. (I need to write an paean to the women in our communities who work to support breast-feeding. Truly they have a treasure of knowledge gained from years of hands-on experience.)

Another key in making the transition from a bottle-fed baby to a breast-feeding baby--a struggle that took six full weeks of around-the-clock attention--is the fact that I am not working outside the home right now. If I had to go to work, I am sure that the struggle would have been too costly. Breast-feeding seems to have become an option for those who can afford to pursue it. It is cheaper than formula in terms of dollars paid out, but extremely costly in terms of time invested both in the initial establishment of the relationship and the normal feeding schedule. I became a mother at a point in my life where I can afford to breast-feed, meaning I can stay home and allow my daughter's feeding needs to set our daily rhythm.

At about week five I started to come to terms with the fact that we might have to go to formula. I can't explain why breast feeding had become so important to me. I suppose it had something to do with the fact that it felt like I wasn't able to make a choice about how my baby would eat. Instead we were being robbed of an opportunity. I knew breast milk was the best thing for my baby and I had an aversion to using anything artificial with her. But when it become a reality that she might not go to the breast, I had to imagine myself as a mother who bottle feeds. This involved much grief. In the end, however, I can say that I changed my perspective on formula. I can say now that I am grateful that formula exists. What if Iza couldn't have gone to the breast? Formula would have been her only option. And I am sure she would have thrived as bottle fed babies do. But feeding her from my breast sustains us both in ways that cannot be fully articulated, at least by me. At least not yet.

By week 7 plus several days, yes, I am starting to feel like the authority on Iza. Not an expert. Not yet. But certainly I know her better and better each day.

Birth Narrative

Iza's Birth Narrative: Draft 1

Here is my first draft of the story of Izabella's birth. I am sure other details will come to mind. But here is my first attempt to record Iza's entry into the world. Most bodily fluids have been omitted. Natural Childbirth is beautiful, but not exactly pretty.

***********************************************************************************

I had just returned to bed after making a bathroom run and so I knew it was my water breaking when a gentle gush of liquid barely saturated my pajamas. I made sure the waters were clear and without odor, both signs that the baby might be in distress. I returned to bed to wait and see what my body would do. Within fifteen minutes I was up again with what I would soon recognize as contractions. It was 1 am. It looked like I was in for a night labor, which can be exhausting. Usually you are asked to come into the hospital when your water breaks because there is an increased risk of infections. I knew that I wanted to labor as long as possible at home. Instead of calling the midwife or my doula, it seemed natural to tell my my husband I couldn't sleep and creep out of the room. It would be me and my baby for the first seven hours of labor.

There was work to be done. First, I took the piles of onesies, booties, diapers, etc. off the floor in the baby's room and arranged them on the shelves that my husband had just that night installed. I put a few more items in my hospital bag. Then I moved downstairs, settled on the couch with a good book, and waited. Soon I knew that it was indeed labor and I began to conserve my energy by trying to sleep between each rush. I knew it was imperative that I rest as much as possible and stay hydrated. After a while I figured out that the best way to do this was to sit on the couch and rest my head between contractions. If I laid down, I had to sit up for each rush and it woke me up too much. It was much easier to semi-recline and rest when I could.

Around 4 am I decided I needed to move a bit and passed the time by returning upstairs to burn two birthing soundtracks--one filled withe Enya, George Winston, and Gershwin, the other with more upbeat numbers. (Later I would prefer the Winston tunes). I made two sets--one I packed in my hospital bag and the other I took back downstairs and played while I continued to labor.

At 6:30 am I called my doula and alerted her that the baby was on the way. I made myself some toast with elderberry-orange jam and a cup of jasmine tea. L. slept late by his normal standards and came downstairs at eight. I told him that the baby was on the way. He was calm and soon enough believed me as he saw me ride a contraction. He put the car seat in the car--we would figure out how to install it after the birth-- and cleared the car of snow and ice. He also had to pack his bag. The baby was coming at 38 weeks and 1 day, which is considered full term yet still a few weeks earlier than we expected.

At that point the plan was to go to the midwife at the clinic just to confirm that is was indeed active labor, but it became clear to me that we needed to get to the hospital. The car ride was brutal. By that time the contractions were about 5 minutes apart. It took about 4 contractions to get there. Being trapped in the car, halted at red lights with strangers eye-to-eye with my intense contortions, was not pleasant. For once I kept telling L. to driver faster, faster! There was one more contraction on the sidewalk in front of the hospital.

My doula was waiting for me as we arrived about 10 am and she helped me to the the elevator while L. parked the car. The maternity ward is located on the fifth floor. We loaded up in the elevator and believe it or not fellow passengers pushed the buttons for floors 2, 3, and 4. I was deep inside my contractions but this didn't stop an internal monologue. People, please. (I know, maybe the person who pressed floor 2 had a heart condition or was going to see a terminally ill parent. But still. I was in labor. Note to self: next time I get into an elevator with a woman in labor, take her express to the maternity floor!) The elevator car bounced and retracted on each floor.

In the hospital I was first evaluated by the midwife on duty, who I had not yet met. I remember that she came into the room while I was in the middle of a contraction. I was standing and bent over the bed, resting my head and chest on the mattress. I barely said hello. It turns out that I am a moaner. I was moaning long and deep when she introduced herself. Without checking my dilation, she moved us to the labor and delivery room. It was a long, long walk down that hall. Handrails had been thoughtfully installed. I was able to sway and move my hips as we walked to encourage my baby to move down.

The contractions were concentrations. I had expected to feel the contractions on the top of my belly. I had always heard that you have to push down and so I assumed that the muscles on the top of my belly would be involved. Instead the contractions were deep inside of me, located in the same spot where menstrual cramps originate. They were a force unleashed in my belly that concentrated my entire body in the center. I kept telling myself: "I am more" and envisioning a full daisy, which I had read somewhere measures 10 centimeters. Each time my body took over and concentrated itself, I moaned and tried to open and relax my mouth and throat.

I was concentration. I was completely unaware of time, but later I would learn that I labored for a few hours before moving into the bathtub as my labor became more intense. They offered me something to drink and I chose ginger ale from the list of options. I drank a lot of ginger ale during those hours and afterward in the hospital. I mention this because I have never really liked ginger ale, but it was so sweet tasting during labor. The bubbles were light and smooth in my dry mouth. I tried to eat some saltine crackers, but barely had the energy to get them past my dry lips.

The bathtub was marvelous. I can't imagine laboring without it. In fact, I would have been happy to deliver my baby in the water. The tub, however, was too small and not designed for water births. I was able to totally relax my body between contractions, feeling weightless and comforted by the warm water. Soon I began to push. The midwife did not tell me "push!" like doctors do on the big screen. Instead, it felt like I needed to shit. (Not pretty, but true.) And so I pushed. As I moved through the contractions, the midwife let me lead the way. She would moan along with me, cueing my own moans by moaning low and deep in the throat. Or if my breathing became too rapid, she would take deep breathes to cue me to do the same. Without saying a word, she communicated what I needed to do. I knew to mimic her and instantly my pain was more manageable.

My midwife never left my side. Newton-Wellesley's policy is to assign one nurse to each woman in labor. I had my midwife, my nurse, my doula, and L. with me the entire time. Well, L. did step out for lunch. When my midwife checked my dilation for the first time, I was dilated "10 +" or so she said. It was time to move out of the tub and into the bed. It was at this point that the nurse realized that L. was gone. She had him paged. He didn't respond. They called him on his cell. He didn't respond. I was only dimly aware of these events. Just as I stood from the waters, dripping and pushing, L. returned. It was good timing.

As they guided me toward the bed, they asked me how I wanted to deliver. All throughout the labor I couldn't stand to be on my side or on my back. I leaned on the bed, I sat on the birthing ball, I was on all fours, I sat on the toilet. I moved. I knew that I needed to deliver on all fours. I managed to get up into the bed and arrange myself with my knees on the bed and my upper body supported by leaning on the elevated back of the bed. L. stood behind the bed, facing me and holding my hands. My doula was on my right. Instead of looking out toward my midwife and the room, I was able to totally go inside of myself and concentrate on each push. In between pushing, I would lower myself in the yoga pose called the child's pose. The pushing was intensely painful and I made grunting sounds like I didn't know I could. It hurt. It hurt a lot more than contractions. But I was glad for the pain. It meant that she was moving. She was on her way and there was an end in sight! While I had labored, there was no sense of how long it would continue. Even though pushing was more painful, it was more bearable because it was clear that we were making progress.

After about 30 minutes of pushing, she emerged screaming at 1:38 pm, Feb. 8, 2008. As she began her passage into the world I felt tremendous sensations of stinging and tearing. (As it turns out, I didn't actually seriously tear.) The midwife had me stop pushing momentarily to allow the baby to help me stretch out. And then, she was here. Screaming and flailing. The midwife passed her up between my legs and into my arms. The first words out of my mouth: Thank you, thank you, thank you. (As in thank you all you wonderful people who helped me birth Iza NOT thank you for witnessing my stellar performance.) I know what my first words were because we have a video of it. (If Paris Hilton and her cohorts can post sex tapes on the internet, can I post my baby's birth on YouTube? The video is only about 2 minutes long. What would Iza say?)

My husband cut the cord and with a firm snip we were two. We then watched as the placenta was delivered. (Tata took a magnificent picture of the bloody placenta.) I had requested a mirror during the delivery, but didn't use it because I was facing backward. They put it in place to allow me to watch the placenta pass. It was amazing to see it balloon out of me. The midwife showed us how our baby had fit inside while she grew.

We stayed in the delivery room for a couple of hours with our new baby. She was placed immediately on my chest and made her first attempts at breast feeding. After a while they took her across the room to be weighed. When asked if I wanted her to be bathed, I requested that they wait until the next morning so that her skin would soak up all the vernix--the white filmy substance that covers a baby in the womb and keeps their skin soft.

She was born with so much dark hair! I was shocked to see all that hair. L. and I both thought that she looked just like him. In fact, we thought she looked just like her grandpa Barabasi. Newborns look like little old people and so it was no surprise that we could see Nagytata (grandpa) in her face. Now she has blue eyes, which come from mama, but her true eye color may change. As a good friend suggested, she looks like tata on the outside but she is all mama on the inside!

What a rush. I was enormously proud of myself. Tremendously. The rush of hormones was a high like I have never known. Physically I felt not only not bad, but really great. I had only a minor tear that needed stitching and otherwise I was filled with energy. Of course, when I got out of bed to be cleaned up I was a bit shaky. But ecstatic. My body knew what to do. I am not the natural earth mama type. I am more of the skinny-nervous, over-wrought, consult the textbook type. But my body knew what to do and I just had to get my head out of the way and let my body do its work. What joy.

Sunday Funnies: Yes, Pecan!

Stolen without permission from: http://justprettydeep.blogspot.com/

She Sleeps, Izabella, Queen of Transylvania

And sleeps. And poops big yellow poos. And coos. And when she is trying to wake up she makes terrible faces and does the most advanced baby yoga stretches with all her might.

Grandma went home yesterday leaving us alone with our baby girl after more than three weeks. We did okay last night after we figured out that, yes, she does want more to eat (what a champ!) and, yes, it does work better to tag team on the feeding/burping-rocking/pumping circuit. Since I do the breast and pump by default, we need to pass the baton when it comes to the bottle of mama's breast milk, burping-rocking (and washing out the lactation pump elements) jobs. A full time job indeed.

Now she is sleeping for the first time in her co-sleeper/bassinet. Up until a few days ago, Iza was mostly naked. She slept skin-to-skin with me in an effort to help her learn to love her food source. This means that at night I sleep flat on my back with baby Iza's belly on mine. She sets her little cheek right on my heart beat. This way I can sense her rousing immediately and tend to her needs. When she is sleeping during the day she often sleeps right in our big bed with all the covers removed and only her swaddling. Now that Grandma is gone and Iza is growing stronger and a bit more active, I decided to try out our bassinet. So far it has been a great place to store her clothes and blankets. She is happily swaddled there, her freshly washed hair standing up in electric shock.

I know I intended to post about her birth, but I am not quite there yet. I do want to write about it as soon as possible to capture as much of the detail as possible. On the other hand, her birth story is being told and as I tell it it grows more refined as the noise is filtered out and only the most salient elements remain. I will write it. Soon.

A note on her name: We struggled up until she was born about what to name our little one. Szilvia was a close second. We chose Izabella because we loved it and it is a Hungarian name that works in both Hungarian and English. We were disappointed to discover that Isabel and Isabella are both in the top fifteen popular names right now. Yet once we read about Queen Izabella of Hungary who ruled in Transylvania, I think we were hooked. (Tata is from Transylvania.) Queen Izabella (1519-1559) was a Renaissance lady who spoke four languages. (See her image above. Read more about her at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Jagie%C5%82%C5%82o) Izabella seemed perfect for our little Transylvanian.

Of course, I have quickly learned to explain: "It is I-z-a-bella, that is the Hungarian spelling."

There are endless nicknames for Izabella. We often refer to her as "Iza," which is pronounced with a long e sound followed by a z sound plus a schwa. Thus, something like "ezuh." She is bella baby, belza, bizzy, izuka, and sugar plum fairy.

By now Iza has awoken, fed, fussed, latched on with a nipple shield for 20 minutes, fussed, burped, had a diaper change, and zonked out next to me here on the bed.

A friend commented in an email that she admired my energy to keep on blogging. All I can say is, it keeps me human. My nipples ache. I can't seem to get out of the house. But I can manage a quickie-blog now and then to keep in touch in the virtual world.

I will write the birth story. Next time.

Natural Childbirth: Assembling Team Iza and the Birth Plan

We made our baby in South Bend, Indiana. Her arrival was scheduled after our move to Boston, Massachusetts. I would need to find the right midwife and and hospital in a city filled with an overwhelming array of top notch medical facilities. I was overwhelmed. In the end, I would not change a thing about my labor and delivery. Newton-Wellesley hospital was the perfect setting for Iza's natural birth.

I knew I wanted a natural childbirth and I knew I wanted a midwife. (How did I know these things? That deserves another blog entry of its own.) While I was open to a home birth or a birthing center, my husband was less sure. So, how to determine which midwife is the best for me in a city where I don't know a soul? (Or at least the souls I do know are not in the birthing phase of life.) As a well-schooled student of Eve Ensler, I simply asked women about their experiences. As I walked the streets of Boston in my apartment search back in the Spring of last year, it occurred to me that I was passing women with their infants happily strolling along. The experts were right in front of me. And how they loved to talk. I gathered a few stories and a few names seemed to repeat. This is how I found Elizabeth "Biddy" Fein at Harvard Vanguard. One of her happy moms assured me that she was excellent. I scheduled an appointment soon after we moved to Boston.

At first I thought that my choice of midwife limited me to a delivery at Brigham and Woman's hospital. I toured their facilities and was impressed by their professionalism. Biddy let me know at my next appointment that she also attended births at Newton-Wellesley hospital. Honestly, having another option was almost unwelcome. I just wanted a place to give birth, not more decisions to make. Nevertheless I scheduled a tour at Newton-Wellesley just to make the comparison. It was a BLINK decision. It was clear to me that Newton-Wellesley was the better place for a natural birth. Not only were the rooms and the fresh muffins each morning impressive, but they also assign one nurse to each patient and have a reputation for being open and welcoming to moms who want to labor and deliver without medical interventions. Don't get me wrong, this is no Ina May Gaskin retreat. While they are open to natural childbirth, it is still not the norm. The nurse assigned to me was pleased to witness my natural birth because it is a rarity.

Not expecting my husband to coach us through labor (who can remember all those labor signs and aids?), I also hired a doula. As is the case with most hospital midwifery practices, you are assigned to a midwife for your prenatal care. The midwife who attends the birth, however, is determined by whoever is on call when you go into labor. Thus you cannot know in advance which midwife will be present. It was important to me to have a doula present because she would be the one person (besides my husband) who knew me and knew my birth choices. I wanted a familiar face. I found Tara Kenny through a recommendation from Isis Maternity. I interviewed a few doulas, but felt most comfortable with Tara. I highly recommend her services (and can put you in touch if you leave a comment). Tara is actually a midwife who is building her practice here in the Boston area. I was lucky to have her expertise.

I imagined that Tara would assist my labor in my home and help me to determine when to go to the hospital. She would bring all the tricks of the trade--her experience and skills as well as the birthing ball. She would tell me when and how to breathe. As it turned out, Tara would meet us at the hospital--more on that later. Tara helped me write my birth plan (see below), detailing my preferences for labor and delivery. The birth plan was sent ahead to the hospital and given to the midwife and nurse on duty. They knew my choices and honored them.

Put my picture on the natural childbirth brochure. Put Iza's picture on the cover of the Newton-Wellesley hospital's informational packet for parents looking for a natural childbirth. My midwife, Dianne Reynolds, was amazing. The nurses were outstanding. If you live in this area and want to have a natural childbirth, but are a bit hesitant about a home birth of a birthing center, go with Newton-Wellesley. That's my vote.

My birth plan:

******************************************
The Birth of My Child

My goal is to deliver a healthy baby. I would like to have a gentle and natural birth and would like support to begin breast feeding. In addition to my midwife, my husband and my doula will be present.

Labor:
· I prefer the use of intermittent, external fetal monitoring.
· I am aware of the medications available and will ask for them if I need or want them.
· I plan to move and bathe as needed during labor.
· I prefer not to have an IV unless it becomes medically necessary.
· I prefer to allow my waters to break without assistance.
· I would like to avoid the use of pitocin or other medical inducements.

Delivery:
· I would like the option to use a mirror during delivery.
· If there is difficulty during pushing, I would like to use gravity or pelvic positioning and be given more time as long as baby and mother are healthy.
· I prefer no episiotomy cuts, but would like the use of perineal support/compresses.

Following Delivery:
· I would like the baby placed on my chest immediately and allowed to find the breast, allowing as much time as needed.
· The baby’s bath, exams, and vitamin K shot should be delayed until after the baby has had a chance to feed for the first time, allowing as much time as needed.
· I prefer to refuse the prophylactic eye drops.
· I prefer that the cord be allowed to stop pulsing or at least that it not be cut until I am ready to consent. My husband or my doula will cut the cord.
· I prefer that my baby receive only breast milk and request that the hospital not give the baby any formula or provide a pacifier.
· I would like to be consulted in all decisions regarding the baby.

Cesarean:
· If a cesarean becomes absolutely necessary, my husband and/or my doula will accompany me.
· If the baby is not in distress, then the baby should be given to my support person immediately after birth.

Thank you for your consideration regarding my wishes for a healthy and happy birth!

***********************************

Next installment:

the blog-appropriate narrative of Iza's birth. . .

Iza's Due Date

Today is February 24th, Iza's due date.

She has been with us for two weeks already and we can hardly remember life before her arrival.

Breast Feeding Update: She is still learning how to latch. Two weeks is a long time to study the art of the latch. At least it is a long time for a mama trying to coax a little one onto her breast. But we are hanging in there. And now that she has arrived (as of her due date), we are sure that a true latch is in her near future.

Last night Iza decided to "latch" and do her suck-suck swallow thing between midnight and one thirty. We set the mood by playing her birth soundtrack with heavy doses of Enya and George Winston. There was invigorating music. There were bare breasts. Bodily fluids. Moans. Pip squeaks. A belch. This morning we received a very kind email letting us know that our lactation party kept the neighbors awake. Seriously. I guess the music traveled via the air ducts in our turn-of-the-last-century condo. Yay! Iza is such a party girl. She has already had the neighbors complain about her milk antics! Things may get so rowdy they might have to call the Boston Police.

There is much to write about. Little time. Let me just say, thanks for the muffins. There is nothing more loving.

And thanks for the pep talks. New mantra: "I am the mama" and I will decide that my baby girl gets her mama's milk. Now we just have to convince baby Iza to forgo the china and drink straight from the fountain.

Team Izabella

It takes a team to bring a baby into the world....

Yes, I was the one pushing and yes we used no medical interventions. Her arrival was 100% natural. (Labor narrative with all its juicy details to follow, perhaps.) Yet let there be no mistake, we had plenty of assistance. Team Izabella 2008. And for the record, I fully support anyone who does use medical interventions. I have been there, I know the painful intensity--it empowers and humbles you.

And since the delivery, we have needed a whole battalion of helpers--lactation consultants, cheerleading friends, the nurse who generously gave us a handmade knitted cap when baby Iza's went missing as we tried to leave in freezing weather. Without Grandma, all would be lost. (Thank goodness we have even had an offer of a volunteer Grandma in the future when my mom will need to return to the land of Oz. Be careful what you offer!) Not to mention the 20 or people who have massaged my breasts in the past six days, none of whom have been my husband.

The smell of her soft skin. The silk of her hair. Her scrunched up face and her yellow baby poo. What more is there?

First attempt at blogging post-Iza arrival: I fired up the laptop and then couldn't resist a lean down and a gentle kiss on her exposed arm (she was born with a fist up next to her cheek and loves to have the hand near her face) and BAM my laptop crashed from my lap to the floor, inches from my state-of-the-art lactation machine. Hence: kisses trump keyboards in this new state of our affairs.

For those of you who know me: picture this: J.K. Kelley changing a little teeny diaper on a skirmiquin of a sweet baby girl, careful not to irritate her cord.

Still. How can I not blog my little girl's world? I have to give her something to be embarrassed about in about 13 years.

Izabella
born at 38 weeks and 1 day
born 2-08-2008
6 pounds 12 ounces
all spunk and spittle

By the way, still no crib or changing table. Yet we are sleeping, poopalooing, and doing just fine. My belly was plenty big after all that worry. And we do have our Bundle Me (thanks Ash!) and our Burberry diaper bag (thanks Jji!). We are in style and as soon as we figure out how to latch (or as L. calls it in ESL, "leach") we will be on the way. . .

38 Weeks

A typical pregnancy lasts between 38 and 42 weeks. You are assigned a due date at 40 weeks. Today the baby is 38 weeks. This means she could decide to arrive any day now. L's workplace has a betting pool with various dates ranging from Feb. 23 to March 1. We have had our fingers crossed for Feb. 29, leap day, just for the high jinks of it.

Things that are prepared for baby x's arrival:
diaper bag (tres chic! thanks to Jji)
car seat (not yet installed!)
co-sleeper/bassinet
supply of diapers, changing pad
baby clothes
my suitcase is packed
Boppy billow AND a My Breast Friend pillow
baby wash clothes
Bloom baby lounger
assorted slings
cotton balls
assorted infant care instruments--thermometer, nail clippers
assorted paperwork for the hospital

We have a doula. We have a pediatrician. We took the hospital tour. I am a regular at prenatal yoga. I swim.

Things that need to be prepared:
birthing soundtrack
crib
stroller
changing table
nursing foot stool
her name!

Things I obsess about:
1. furniture for the baby's room--we still have not purchased crib/changing table/storage but not for lack of my Internet searches. Hours. Still no combination of design/price/usefulness that satisfies. So, minimalism is the route we are going. So much for the "perfect" nursery.

2. My Belly. In particular, size. I measured too small. All is fine. But I can't imagine that a little person of 6 pounds has enough room in there. And so,

3. Her movement. I miss the big decisive tango moves. Things are more subtle now. I worry. I admit that I prod her a bit to get her to dance. It makes me feel better to see her undulate.

Any day now. . .

In the meantime, I'm off to prenatal yoga. Really, a sight to see.

"Babies Buying Babies"

Check out this segment from the radio program This American Life. While the entire program is entertaining, it was the third act of the Jan. 18, 2008 episode #347 Matchmakers that I thought was worth passing along. It makes you think. Dolls may not talk (most of them), but they say a lot about us.

You can listen to the entire program for free (or download it for 99 cents). The "Babies Buying Babies" segment starts at about minute 40.

http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=347

Segment Description from Website:

Elna Baker reads her story about the time she worked at the giant toy store, FAO Schwartz. Her job was to sell these lifelike “newborns” which were displayed in a “nursery” inside the store. When the toys become the hot new present, they begin to fly off the shelves. When the white babies sell out, white parents are faced with a choice: will they go for an Asian, Latino, or African-American baby instead? What happens is so disturbing that Elna has a hard time even telling it. (16 minutes)

Primary Decision

I'll admit it. I am still undecided. I am one of "those" people interviewed in the street on the eve of a primary vote who claim indecision.

Although I am sure I am the last to hear of the Washington Post "Choose your Candidate" quiz, I'll pass it along here. I found my results informative, but not shocking. It takes time, but it is worth it. Even if you are already "decided."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/interactives/candidatequiz/

Date Night? Cheap Trip to Transylvania

Music with Film
Film
Transylvania
8:10 pm
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Remis Auditorium

Transylvania by Tony Gatlif (France, 2006, 103 min.). In this picaresque gypsy musical road movie, Zingarina (Asia Argento), rebellious, young, and pregnant, travels to Transylvania with her best friend to search for the man she loves. She met him in France, but one day he left without a word of explanation. With her friend Marie, who jealously watches over her, Zingarina throws her body and soul into a romantic quest in a fascinating land. But when she finds her former lover in the midst of a pagan festival, he brutally rejects her. Mad with anguish, she flees Marie, who reminds her of her past, and meets Tchangalo, a kindred spirit without borders or ties. In French with English subtitles.


MFA members, seniors, and students $8; general admission $9.

Buy Tickets: http://www.mfa.org/calendar/event.asp?eventkey=31782&date=1/31/2008

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of the night he'd reach out to touch the child sleeping beside him.

Then they set out along the blacktop in the gunmetal light, shuffling through the ash, each the other's world entire.

gryke
grike: CREVICE, CRACK; especially : an opening in rock widened by natural forces (as weathering or solution)

Grimacing at the day. He pulled the boy closer. Just remember that the things you put into your head there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.
_____You forget some things, dont you?
_____Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget.


vestibular
vestibular: of, relating to, mediating, constituting, or affecting the vestibular sense
vestibular sense: : a sense mediated by end organs in the vestibule of the internal ear that contain otoliths and are stimulated by the pull of gravity and by the starting and stopping of rectilinear head movements; broadly : LABYRINTHINE SENSE

He rose and stood tottering in that cold autistic dark with his arms outheld for balance while the vestibular calculations in his skull cranked out their reckonings.

The grainy air. The taste of it never left your mouth. They stood in the rain like farm animals.

Look around you. Ever is a long time. But the boy knew what he knew. That ever is no time at all.

Can you do it? When the time comes? Can you?

Make a list. Recite a litany. Remember.

Dark of the invisible moon. The nights now only slightly less black. By day the banished sun circles the earth like a grieving mother with a lamp.

No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes. So, he whispered to the sleeping boy. I have you.

rachitic
of, relating to, or affected by rickets

siwash
Etymology: Chinook Jargon, from French sauvage savage, from Middle French -- more at SAVAGE

This is my child, he said. I wash a dead man's brains out of his hair. That is my job. Then he wrapped him in the blanket and carried him to the fire.

All of this like some ancient anointing. So be it. Evoke the forms. Where you've nothing else construct ceremonies out of the air and breathe upon them.

_____We're going to be okay, arent we Papa?
_____Yes. We are.
_____And nothing bad is going to happen to us.
_____That's right.
_____Because we're carrying the fire.
_____Yes. Because we're carrying the fire.

catamite
Etymology: Latin catamitus, from Catamitus Ganymede, cupbearer of the gods, from Etruscan Catmite, from Greek Ganymds
: a boy kept for purposes of sexual perversion

kerf
groove

cochere
Etymology: French porte cochère, literally coach door
1 archaic : a passageway through a building or screen-wall designed to let vehicles pass from the street to an interior courtyard
2 : CARRIAGE PORCH

Can you do it? When the time comes? When the time comes there will be no time.

The chary dawn, the cold illucid world.

intestate
Etymology: Middle English, from Latin intestatus, from in- 1in- + testatus, past participle of testari to be a witness, make a will, from testis witness -- more at TESTAMENT
1 : having made no valid will
2 : not bequeathed or devised : not disposed of by will

He thought each memory recalled must do some violence to its origins. As in a party game. Say the word and pass it on. So be sparing. What you alter in the remembering has yet a reality, known or not.

He could not reconstruct for the child's pleasure the world he'd lost without constructing the loss as well and he thought perhaps the child had known this better than he.

If they saw different worlds what they knew was the same.

knurl
1 : a small protuberance, excrescence, or knob
2 : one of a series of small ridges or beads on a metal surface to aid in gripping

mae west
Etymology: Mae West died 1980 American actress noted for her full figure
Date: 1940
: an inflatable life jacket in the form of a collar extending down the chest that was worn by fliers in World War II

_____You're not the one who has to worry about everything.
_____The boy said something but he couldnt understand him. What? he said.
_____He looked up, his wet and grimy face. Yes I am, he said. I am the one.

150 Pounds No Less

The last thing I expected was to develop a complex about my belly being too small.

I am 36 weeks plus 3 days into the 40 weeks of a typical pregnancy. Two weeks ago I lost a few pounds and my belly measured a few inches below the expected range. Low grade panic developed.

I attempted to eat more despite near constant heartburn and the low groan of a belch always ready to erupt. (It is pregnancy, people. Worse bodily discomfort to come. I can't promise to spare you from the gore if you want to bask in the maternal joy.) I swear my stomach is the size of a lima bean and who knows where my intestines are located these days.

Still, I ate: often, and with a renewed sense of urgency for feeding the little one. On Friday morning I am proud to report that we tipped the midwife's scale at a healthy 150 pounds. It was a relief to see that number on the scale.

As my weight has increased over the course of the pregnancy, I have been amazed to watch the ever increasing digits balance on the scale. I was expected to gain somewhere between 28 - 40 pounds (according to one estimate) and I am just about there. Here is the breakdown in weight gain as estimated by www.babycenter.com based on my pre-pregnancy height and weight:

Maternal weight
Uterus: 2.82
Breasts: 1.17
Blood: 3.64 (Almost four pounds of blood!)
Water: 4.89
Fat: 9.74

Baby weight
Fetus: 7.5
Placenta: 1.89
Amniotic Fluid: 2.32

Total: 33.97 pounds

Still I worry that my belly is below par for the top of the ninth. Those near and dear to me assure me daily that my belly is HUGE, and so BIG, and plain BEAUTIFUL. I take deep breathes and stick it out as far as I can when I am not trying to waddle down the stairs or tie my shoes.

This weekend I corralled the family to a photography studio for a family portrait. I will attempt to keep a photographic record of the baby's life. (Thus far in my many years I have compiled exactly ONE photo album.) When better to start for baby X than with a few shots of her mama's Big, Huge, Amazing belly? I hope to hang the images in the baby's room to welcome her. Well, not to welcome her exactly. I am sure she will probably arrive before I manage to get the photographs ready for display.

Here is a fun, slightly sad fact: I noticed that my first instinct in front the camera was to cock one contrapposto hip and suck in the abdomen. Fat chance!

The baby is due Feb. 24th.

Free Cycle (got it? need it?)

Check out this idea:

Freecycle: A Web of Free, Unwanted Things by Ted Robbins

www.freecycle.org

Yesterday I posted an offer of two desk chairs that we no longer need.
Today seven people have expressed an interest.

One more way to purge. In general I like the idea of supporting Salvation Army and Good Will, who use the proceeds from donations sold in their shops to fund their job training and other social justice work. On the other hand, I've had these chairs for ages because it was too low priority to get them down to the car and across town to donate.

(Works all across the country. Check out the website for a network near you.)

Book Talk: Sue Miller's The Senator's Wife

This evening I made my way to Brookline Booksmith, a local independent book store, to hear Sue Miller speak about and read from her new book, The Senator's Wife. We read one of Miller's less well known works for Book Club a while ago, The World Below, which prompted a lively discussion about the secrets we keep in families and across generations.

I hadn't heard much about her new novel before I set foot in the bookstore. I have to admit that I left intrigued enough to add the title to my soon-to-be-read list. (Currently I am trying to avoid purchasing books, opting to use my shiny new library card instead. Trying to be green. Waiting for my Kindle.) Even though I hadn't heard of Miller's new book, it has already been reviewed. She opened her presentation with a note of thanks for the emails she had received from readers contesting a particularly nasty review in the New York Times by Judith Warner called "Stand By Your Name." Miller didn't linger on the issue. She moved on to discuss her sources and her research for the novel.

Miller spoke about how she become interested in how divorced spouses sometimes return to one another in a time of illness or need to physically care for one another despite all that may have transgressed in their history. She was also interested in how the physical care for an infant shapes, indeed creates, a mother's love for her infant. These dynamics gave rise to her characters in the novel. Her research included reading the biography of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and What to Expect When You Are Expecting. She even made a trip to the local pharmacy and bought a pregnancy test, took it home and used it! (She was not pregnant.)

After these brief comments, she read a passage from the novel. She chose to read from a section in which the senator's wife returns to his side to help him campaign for a second term despite his horrific betrayal. She chooses to put on a public game face to do this thing for him. Miller reads quite well and it was easy to sit back and enjoy the story unfold.

Apparently there are twists, turns and a catch-your-breath (maybe slam it down) ending. I haven't read it, so never fear that I will give it away!

When I made my way home I switched on NPR and checked my pot roast (my first EVER) in the crock pot. It turned out to be a Sue Miller night--her taped interview with Tom Ashbrook was on air. Check it out: Sue Miller: "The Senator's Wife"

Sue Miller

Spreading the "News": No Pants 2K8

Beware Of Passengers Without Pants On T

http://wbztv.com/local/Improv.Everywhere.No.2.627321.html

BOSTON (WBZ) ― If you're on the Red Line Saturday afternoon, you might see something unusual on the train - hundreds of passengers without pants.

The New York-based group Improv Everywhere is encouraging people to sign up for the stunt in Boston and nine other cities January 12. The Boston event kicks off at 3 p.m. at the Alewife station on the T.

The group says there are only two requirements for participation. You "must be willing to take your pants off on a subway" and be "able to keep a straight face" while doing it.

They request participants don't wear a thong or anything else that might offend passengers.

"Our aim is to make people laugh, not [make them mad]." Boston organizer Adam Sablich posted on Facebook. He also urges participants not to cause trouble. "MOST IMPORTANTLY: If you are asked by ANY person of authority (even rent-a-cops) to put your pants back on, DO SO. We aren't trying to get anyone arrested and we aren't protesting anything, so don't be stupid."

The site also contains very specific instructions for participation, including:

-Not talking to each other. "No one knows each other"

-"Sit in a car as you normally would" until your assigned time to de-pants. Then "stand up and take your pants off and put them in your backpack… If anyone asks you why you've removed your pants, tell them that they were "getting uncomfortable" (or something along those lines.)"

-At assigned stops participants are to exit and "stand on the platform, pantless."

-" If questioned, tell folks that you "forgot to wear pants" and yes you are "a little cold". Insist that it is a coincidence that others also forgot their pants. Be nice and friendly and normal."

More than 300 people have reportedly signed up for the event, which is being called "No Pants 2K8." On its Web site, the group claims it has pulled off more than "70 missions involving thousands of undercover agents."

WBZ-TV contacted the MBTA about the event. According to T spokesman Joe Pesaturo, "If they pay their fares and conduct themselves in a safe and orderly fashion without breaking any laws, then there should not be any problems."

Guest Writer: Obama in '08

I recently received an email from a friend who expresses her support for Obama's campaign for presidency. I appreciated her political energy and gained her permission to publish it here to reach a different slice of cyber space. I am still an undecided voter and open to conversation. As you may recall, we recently jaunted up to New Hampshire to see McCain speak. I would love to see ALL the candidates. Sadly I missed the debates this past Saturday as we had theater tickets. I did read all the coverage on Sunday. In short, write me. Tell me who you are voting for and why. Inform me. Persuade me. Word of mouth is a powerful tool.

Below is the letter, the second in my series of guest writers. (You can be the third!)

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In an e-mail to friends and family, DJ wrote:
Hey, peeps,

Refill your coffee mugs, void your bladders, and settle into a cushy chair, because I'm about to gush at length, and you are a captive audience.

I'm en fuego for Obama in '08, as I think each of you knows from my spazzing about him over the past few months. (I just had an odd dream last night in which Barack and his lovely wife Michelle were house guests at my mother's house and had to sleep head to toe on a sectional sofa because we didn't have a guest bedroom; you will be relieved to learn that they were considerate guests and rose before the rest of the house to fold up their bed clothing so that the household would have full use of the sofa during the day; if that doesn't say Should Be Leader of the Free World, I don't know what does. But, then again, I've never studied policy. . . .)

Anyhoo, back on track for a minute, my hubby has been following Barack Obama's federal political career with great interest for years now. I remember where I was standing (the kitchen, near our sensible Consumer Reports--rated, bottom-of-the-line Sear's oven) when he first said to me, "Honey, keep your eye on this Obama guy. He's going places." Because of my Caro Sposo's excellent judgment, we've been following Barry's upward progress since the first half of this decade and were thrilled when early last year El Obama threw his hat in the ring for president. We've been his staunch supporters from the beginning.

After seeing Barry's inspiring first-place finish in the Iowa caucuses on Thursday night, I was moved to the height of armchair philosophy and ordered Obama in '08 t-shirts at CafePress.com for our little household. And then Chris Matthews (or Keith Olbermann or someone) made an off-hand comment about The Youngins Not Doing Anything to Effect Political Revolution Other Than Wearing Snarky T-Shirts. I felt the sting of the rebuke and got online and joined the 'Bama'bandwagon officially. And so, I write you, my intelligent, passionate, idealistic, exquisitely practical family and friends.

I know it seems early to make a decision about presidential candidates. This is a DEADLY serious issue (just ask our be-camouflaged buddies hanging out in Iraq), and of course I support your taking the time appropriate to weigh the issues at hand. But I urge you to begin looking closely at the candidates (on both sides) now and to especially consider what Barack Obama's candidacy has to offer.

From the beginning, Barack Obama has marshaled his intelligence, poise, and power to stand up for the disenfranchised. After graduating from Harvard Law School, he moved to Chicago, Illinois, inspired by the policies of Harold Washington, Chicago's first African American mayor, who vowed to be "fairer than fair" to all of his constituents who had suffered for decades under the imbalanced administration of the Daly dynasty.

As a state representative, Obama cooperated with Republicans and Democrats to craft legislation on health-care, ethics, welfare, and death-penalty reform.

Since his election as Illinois state senator in 2005, Obama has championed environmental, border-security and immigration, and lobby reform and has worked to deescalate the war in Iraq and improve health care for children.

His presidential platform promises

1. universal health care by the end of his first term in the Oval Office,
2. greater transparency in governmental decision making (a welcome relief from the Bush administration, frankly),
3. increased funding for child education (with an emphasis on math and sciences, which I think is critical for our nation's long-term security),
4. tax-code reformation (repealing taxes for the poorest retired and increasing taxes on the wealthiest 1 percent), and
5. environmental reform (targeting big-business polluters and national oil dependence).

Unlike other politicians, from 2002, the beginning, Obama has opposed the war in Iraq, accurately predicting that entering into a conflict without adequate troop numbers or strong international support would only heighten the tensions in the Middle East and imperil American security. In the face of the war, entering into its fifth year (can you believe it?), Obama would phase out deployment of troops from Iraq and pursue aggressive diplomacy with Syria and Iran, coupled with harsh sanctions. He believes the United States of America should not arrogantly seek to bully the international community into submission but should rather regain military, diplomatic, and moral leadership through example. Putting his money where his mouth is, Obama has removed personal financial holdings from Sudan-related stock and from companies that do business with Iran.

I believe in this guy. I believe that his administration will effect great change in our nation. I believe that he can unify the bitterly divided. I believe that he represents some of the best of the United States of America. I want him crafting policy. I want him as a world leader.

If you are interested in throwing your support behind Barack Obama as my little family has, check out http://www.barackobama.com/, and join the revolution.

And I also think you ought to consider any number of super-cute t-shirts from CafePress.com, which are also snarky while on-message.

Pax and philia,
DJ the Rabid

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Read DJ's blog at: http://justprettydeep.blogspot.com/