Vendela Vida at a Book Talk: Sign Me Up!

I just returned from a local school's book fair where the featured speaker was Vendela Vida, author of the recently released The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty.  What a lovely person Ms. Vida seems to be, which is, of course, irrelevant, but still--I think the world needs more lovely people.  She read from her new novel, and now I can't wait to read it!

You'll remember from one of my earlier WHIRL posts that I loved her novel The Lovers. (Click here to see what I had to say about that.) This new book seems to be exploring themes of identity--of who we are and what shapes who we become.  Written in the second person, this sounds like a book Literary Masters members would love to 'dig deep' into!

Have you read The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty?  What did you think? 

I Loved Brooklyn the Movie! AND the Book!

Further to my post below on the wonderful book Brooklyn being made into a movie, I can tell you it's terrific!  If you're looking for a family film over the holidays, this one is a winner.  Here's a video clip about the film you may enjoy:

I went with some women from my personal book club, and now we are re-reading the book for this month's selection. 

Enjoy!

Wonder--ful Paris!

You all know how much I love the book Wonder by R.J. Palacio, right?  If not, here's my post on it--and my call for you to read it!  There's a part in the book where Auggie's mom tells him that "...there are more good people on this earth than bad people, and the good people watch out for each other and take care of each other."  I couldn't stop thinking about this when I saw the following clip on the news.  A father is discussing the events of last Friday in Paris with his son near the site where people have been leaving flowers and candles:

How WONDERFUL is this?  And WONDROUS!  He made me feel better, too.

Brooklyn--the Book now Brooklyn--the Movie!

This is exciting news!  I've often thought that it would be fun to devote an entire season of Literary Masters to reading books that have been made into movies.  That way, we could all enjoy a multimedia experience of each story.

And how FUN to come up with the list!  One outstanding book that has recently been turned into a film is Brooklyn, which was written in 2009 by Irish author Colm Toibin.  I read it and loved it; I even blogged about it.  Click here for my original post.

The book won many fans and much critical acclaim.  It won the 2009 Costa Novel Award, was shortlisted for the 2011 IMPAC Dublin Award, and made it onto the longlist for the 2009 Man Booker Prize.  And now, in 2015, it has been made into a film by Fox Searchlight Pictures.  It stars Saoirse Ronan, Emory Cohen, Domhnall Gleeson, Jim Broadbent, and Julie Walters, among others.

The film is already garnering great reviews.  Here's one from Flavorwire:
http://flavorwire.com/545905/brooklyn-is-a-portrait-of-leaving-and-finding-home-so-evocative-it-might-make-you-weep

And another one from the New York Times:
 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/04/movies/review-resettling-the-meaning-of-home-in-brooklyn-with-saoirse-ronan.html?_r=0

And according to the Washington Post, even Colm Toibin loves the film:
 https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/colm-toibin-loves-the-new-movie-version-of-his-brooklyn/2015/11/02/14db7ce6-8103-11e5-8ba6-cec48b74b2a7_story.html

I don't know about you, but I can't wait to see it!  Watch this trailer and I bet you'll feel the same!

Let me know if you go, and tell me what you think! 

Literary Masters Reads I Am Malala!

One of the books that Literary Masters members will be reading this month is I Am Malala, Young Readers Edition by the Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai.  Unless you've been living under a rock, actually even if you've been living under a rock, you know that in 2012, the Taliban shot this young Pakistani girl in an attempted assassination because she was advocating for girls' rights to an education.

This is an extraordinary story told by a truly remarkable young woman.  I encourage you to read the Young Readers Edition with your children; you will be amazed.  And you may even wonder, "What can I do to help?"  Indeed, a frequently asked question in the discussion of this book is "What can be done to help Malala in her quest to help get more girls an education?"

Well, every little bit helps.  And as Malala is showing the world, one person really can make a difference!

Literary Masters is thrilled to be teaming up with Schoola, the wonderful online school fundraising site, to benefit the Malala Fund.  Malala-Schoola bags will be distributed at our Literary Masters meetings, and if the girls choose, they can fill the postage-paid bags with used clothing and drop them off at the post office or leave them on their front doorsteps for the mail man to pick up and bring to the Schoola warehouse.  Schoola will sell the clothes online and donate 40% of the sale of every item to the Malala Fund, a non-profit organization whose aim is to empower girls through education.

Now, this is all very exciting timing because the documentary film He Named Me Malala is premiering during September and October, so if you want to have a multi-media experience, watch out for the film coming to a theater near you.  Here is a  preview.

I hope you'll take the time to read this book with a young person, and even better--talk about it with them! 

Find out more about Schoola here:

https://www.schoola.com/

and find out more about the Malala Fund here:

http://www.malala.org/

The Literary Masters Reading List for the 2015/2016 Season is Posted!

The 2015/2016 Season of Literary Masters is officially kicking off today with the announcement of the reading list on the Literary Masters website.  You can visit and learn all about Literary Masters book groups and salons by clicking here.  And if you just want to see the reading list, here it is below.  Why not read along with Literary Masters?  Enjoy!

Controversy. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary app, controversy is “a discussion marked especially by the expression of opposing views.” Well, the 2015/2016 Literary Masters season is sure to be filled with all sorts of viewpoints! As always, our salons encourage debate and a spirited exchange of ideas. Our hope, of course, is that we come away from each meeting having learned from fellow members and with a more open, informed, and empathetic viewpoint. After all, isn’t that why we read and gather to talk about our books? Get ready to wade into a few controversies, fellow members!

Literary Masters 2015/2016 Season

October: Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee. To call the publication of this book a controversy is an understatement. Like it or hate it, Pulitzer Prize-winning Harper Lee’s second novel has generated one of the largest (and divisive) literary conversations in ages. And we’ll be taking part!

November: Redeployment by Phil Klay. This time it’s the subject matter that is controversial; these stories written by an Iraq war veteran will take us to a place that none of us have been to—but where we’ve sent plenty of fellow Americans. We should talk about this, right? What’s not contested is the merit of this book; it won the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, among others.

December: The Children Act by Ian McEwan. Can you force a sick child to accept medical treatment? Should you? What if that child’s religion forbids it? And who gets to decide? These and other controversial topics will be covered in our salons during December.

January: The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen.   The protagonist of this thought-provoking novel will undoubtedly make you look at the Viet Nam war (and America’s role in it) in a whole new light. Just how much responsibility does America bear, and how guilty should we feel? A controversial war, and a novel sure to generate a lot of debate.

February: Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow. There is universal sentiment that the literary world lost a lion when E.L. Doctorow passed away this year. However, this novel is full of controversy, both in its structure and its themes. We will have fun “digging deep” into this literary treasure, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award.

March: The Lonely War: One Woman’s Account of the Struggle for Modern Iran by Nazila Fathi. Is there anything about Iran that isn’t controversial? This memoir is our nonfiction selection for the season, written by a native Iranian and NY Times correspondent. This is sure to open a few eyes. Ben Affleck isn’t the only one who can transport us to Iran and back!

April: I Do Not Come to You By Chance by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani. This debut novel won its Nigerian author the Commonwealth Prize for Best First Book as well as the Betty Trask First Book Award. Set in Nigeria, the hilarious story (with some serious undertones) pits education against corruption as we enter the world of Nigerian email scamming. With a controversial nod to Western affluence and influence, this novel will, if nothing else, make you look at your emails with new appreciation!

May: Purity by Jonathan Franzen. Okay, just the author’s name generates controversy. But we’ll be closing out the season discussing the work of another literary…well, if not a lion, then at least a literary cub.   Perhaps we’ll have to don our feminist hats to decide once and for all whether Franzen is a misogynist. Perhaps we should invite Oprah to a salon?

Well, just in case you needed more evidence that reading and being part of a book group are good for you, here's an article by David Brooks of The New York Times that should satisfy you and set you looking for the nearest Literary Masters book group or salon!  Feel free to pass it along!

Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction 2015: We Have a Winner!

Well, I didn't see this one coming.  Congratulations to Ali Smith for winning this year's Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction for her unusual novel, How To Be Both!  For more info, click here.

Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction

There are a lot of literary prizes being awarded these days.  I tend to look at prize-winning authors and books as a filter.  I know this is a flawed method, but in a world with so many books and so little time, I have to rely on something to help me whittle down my choices.

One of the prizes I follow is the Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction.  The 2015 winner will be announced June 3rd.  The short list is:

• Rachel Cusk for Outline

• Laline Paull for The Bees

• Kamila Shamsie for A God In Every Stone

• Ali Smith for How To Be Both

• Anne Tyler for A Spool of Blue Thread

• Sarah Waters for The Paying Guests

Of these books, I had difficulty getting into two of them: How to be Both, and The Bees.   In fact, I put them down after a few pages.  If one of them wins on June 3rd, I imagine I'll pick it up again!  I have a feeling Sarah Waters is going to take the prize, but we shall see!

Should Your Book Club Read A History of Loneliness by John Boyne?

I read this book in two days, and would have finished in one if other duties hadn't insisted upon my attention!  Wow, you think a subject like the sex scandals of the Catholic Church have been done and dusted, and then you pick up a book like this and realize...where is the outrage???  Yes, your book club should read and discuss this!  Also, it's a very gripping and superbly crafted story.

So, what can your book club talk about?

Warp-speed plot summary: It's Ireland, and we're taken by the narrator from his childhood through his time as a priest in both Ireland and Rome as he reflects upon the Church's sex scandals, pondering all the while the culpability of those involved.

Father Odran Yates is our narrator, and you will no doubt spend a lot of time figuring him out.  Is he reliable?  Is he telling the reader the truth?  Is he telling himself the truth?  Is he the priest that his best friend Tom accuses him of being?  Or is he someone else?  Why does Odran join the priesthood, and why does he stay there?  What is he getting out of it?  Why is he telling us his story?

This may lead you to talk about the role of priests and other religious leaders.  What is their appropriate role?  What is their value?  Are they anachronisms?  What makes a good priest?

You'll want to talk about the structure of the book.  Does the form carry any meaning to the reader?  Is the structure an integral part of what the book is saying?  Would this be a completely different book if it were told as a linear narrative?  How does the story's structure express the theme of remembering?  Yes, you'll definitely want to consider the remembering that Odran is doing.  What purpose does it hold?  Is it healing?  Or does it re-tramautize?

Should there be a collective remembering?  Or have we all heard enough about such scandals?  Is this an important book to read?

Why do you think this book is titled the way it is?  Is there more than one explanation?  What about the epigraph?  How does this affect your understanding of the book?  How does it inform Odran's telling of the story?

One of the themes you'll want to 'dig deep' into is that of how our childhoods shape who we are.  And how far can we take this as an excuse for our adult behavior?  How long can we blame our parents for how they raised us?

What do you think of Odran's parents?  Are they simply doing what any Irish Catholic parents of the 1960's and '70's would do?  Are they good parents?  Or are they blind, unthinking sheep?  And what about all the parents of the boys who were abused?  Is it fair to say that no one could have realized what was going on except in hindsight?

What do you think of Odran's sister?  Why does he spend so much time telling us about her?

DENIAL.  You'll certainly want to discuss this. Who was in denial?  Who truly didn't know?  Is it even possible that one couldn't know?  Or suspect?  Or is that how we feel now because of everything we do know, now that the scandal has come to light?  You should also talk about the culpability of those who chose or choose to remain in denial.

You'll certainly want to talk about secrecy and its ability to protect those in power.   While you're reading the book, count how many times the words "embarrass" and "shame" show up.  Talk about the psychology of using those very words by those who should have been experiencing embarrassment and shame--a colossal understatement, I realize--against their victims.

Power.  Oh, yes, you will want to discuss this.  Who has it.  How they get it.  And how they keep it.  What happens to those who have it.  What happens to those who don't.

You'll want to talk about Ireland and its relationship with the Catholic Church.  Oh, and you'll want to talk about the Catholic Church.  This could, obviously, take up the entire meeting.  Talk about institutions in general.  Who is in control?  The individuals within them or the system itself?

Talk about Odran's experience in Rome.  Why do you think he tells us about his time there?  What do you make of what Odran tells us about his sexuality?

Is the book excusing anyone?  Is it explaining anything?  Does it add to your understanding of the sex scandals?  Does it make you more empathetic/sympathetic toward anyone?  Does it make you angry and want to DO something?  Is it indicting anyone?  Is it indicting YOU?

National Book Critics Circle Awards: Winners Announced!

I love the National Book Critic Circle Awards!  How could I not?  On their website under Mission Statement it reads:  "The National Book Critics Circle honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism and literature.

"...fosters a national conversation about reading..."  Hm...remind you of anyone you know?

Literary Masters is all about fostering the love of reading and the love of talking about what we read with others!

Congratulations to the winners!  For all the info on the NBCC, click here.  Make sure to check out how they select the winners.

For a snapshot of the winners in each category, continue reading:

Fiction:  Lila by Marilyn Robinson.  I can't wait to read this book!  (I can't believe I haven't done so yet.)

Autobiography:  Can't  We Talk About Something More Pleasant? by Roz Chast.  For my review of this wonderful, laugh out loud, cry all day, graphic memoir, click here.

Criticism:  The Essential Ellen Willis by Ellen Willis

General Nonfiction:  The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Emancipation by David Brion Davis

John Leonard Prize for outstanding debut book in any genre:  Redeployment by Phil Klay.  You know that I am a big fan of this collection of short stories!  I will try to post about it sometime soon!

Biography:  Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh by John Lahr.  (What a wonderful title!)

Poetry:  Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine

Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award:  Toni Morrison  (I'm thinking it's time to read another of her wonderful novels!)

Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing:  Alexandra Schwartz   

Should Your Book Club Read The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton?

The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton was this season's classic selection for Literary Masters book groups and salons.  Most members loved the book, but not all.  A few found the writing too dense, too flowery, too old-fashioned.  Hm...well, the majority of us loved it and thought it was brilliant.  Many members said they can't wait to read more Wharton!  So, YES, your book club should read this literary treasure!!!

So, what can your book club discuss?  Please note there are some SPOILERS BELOW!!!

SO MUCH!!!  but in order to have a reasonable length post, I'll just go over a few topics, just to get you started!

Warp-speed plot summary:  It is the Gilded Age in New York City and the stunningly beautiful Lily Bart is running out of time to find a rich husband who will secure her future.  Her options are plentiful and dazzling at first, but Lily is holding out.  For whom?  For what?  As the story progresses, Lily's suitors become fewer and much less alluring.  Complicating matters is Lily's dire financial situation as well as the rumors swirling about her behavior.  Will Lily's Prince Charming arrive in time?  Will Lily save herself?  If you think this story sounds vapid, you are seriously mistaken!  This novel is so layered and nuanced; it will get you thinking--and keep you thinking!

AND DON'T TRY TO CHEAT BY WATCHING THE MOVIE!  Part of the pleasure of The House of Mirth is the prose.  You WILL want to discuss this.   Wharton is witty, ironic, satirical, but best of all she evokes visions in your mind as you read.  It's as if scenes are playing out, one after the other.  All inspiring writers would do well to study the craft of Edith Wharton!  I kept thinking about Jane Austen's writing as I read this novel, and I also thought of the scenic quality of Somerset Maugham's The Painted Veil.  It is no wonder that these authors' works are turned into films; they are masters at the "screenplay" style!

There are many interpretations of this novel, so if you want to do some research, you'll find feminist, psychoanalytic, deconstructive, and Marxist readings of it, to name a few.  It's not necessary to read any of them, of course; you can simply discuss your own "reading" of House of Mirth, but I am highlighting here that your book club may all "see" the story very differently.  That's one of the beauties of the book!

You'll want to "dig deep" into Lily.  What motivates her?  What does she want and why?  Does she even know what she wants?  Do her desires change over the course of the novel?  Talk about how Lily has been raised and how this has affected her.  Talk about the other influences in her life also.  Who/what has defined who Lily is?

Is Lily a sympathetic character?  The answer to this seems to color a lot of how readers feel about the entire story, so it's a simple but important question.  What makes her sympathetic or not?  Does she have a moral compass?

You'll want to invite Lily to lie down on the couch!  What is going on with her and the decisions she makes?  Is she being self-destructive?  Why?  Is her behavior being motivated by unconscious desires?  Is she an early feminist?  How would she have become one?  Is she simply clueless as to the consequences of her actions?  Or does she know exactly what she's doing?  Is she a case of arrested development?

Is Lily a victim of the times and society in which she lives?  Or is she complicit in her demise?

Does Lily end her life on purpose or accidentally?

If there is one point in the novel where you would put Lily on a different path, where would that be?

You'll want to talk about LOVE in this story.  Does anyone love anyone else?  Connected to this, no doubt you'll talk about marriage and how it is portrayed.  How do the husbands fare?  How do the wives fare?  You'll talk about the transactional nature of marriage, and who gets what from the deal.

Power is a huge theme in this novel, so you should talk about this!  What gives the characters their power?  Money?  Beauty?  Reputation?  Personal contacts?

Money is also prominent in the story.  Old money versus new money is one of the major themes and plays out in every way: how the characters live, entertain, travel, dress, emote--how they come about their money--in virtually every aspect of their lives.  Yes, you can "dig deep" into what the book is saying about money, class hierarchy, and their complicated relationship.

Related to the above, you may want to discuss the time period of the novel and the changes that were going on during the Gilded Age.  This may give you some interesting insight into the story.  Ask yourselves, what is the book saying about the values and mores and the high society people of the Gilded Age?

You will of course want to discuss the other characters!  How do you feel about Seldon?  Does he truly love Lily?  What does he desire and why?  Is there any "good" character in the story?  How do you feel about Carrie Fisher?  How do you feel about Rosedale?  Wow--these are complicated characters!

Here's something to debate: When Rosedale tells Lily he will marry her if she brings down Bertha Dorset, the next morning Lily knows her decision.  However, we as readers do not.  Does Lily decide to do what Rosedale has suggested?  What stops her from doing so?  Or has she decided upon waking that she cannot?

You should discuss Gerty and her purpose in the novel!

I am leaving out SO MANY characters here that you'll want to discuss, each one representing a different strata of society--make sure you "dig deep" into each one!

Save time to discuss the imagery in the novel!!!  Notice the theme of imprisonment, note the water imagery, note the references to mythology!  Note how nature is portrayed and the characters' relationship to it.  Note the architecture and the clothing!  What about the names?

What about the title?  It is taken from Ecclesiastes: "The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth."  How does this influence your understanding of this book?  The original title was A Moment's Ornament, and Wharton's working title was The Year of the Rose.  What do you think of this?

We are just scratching the surface here!!!  However, I've probably tried your patience by making you read this far.  One more thing, though: make sure to discuss what this book is about.  Why do we read it year after year?  What is it saying?  Is it relevant to us today?  (I think so!!!)  Is it an important novel?

Let me know how your book club gets on with this literary treasure!!!

Should Your Book Club Read Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? by Roz Chast?

Although I loved reading comic books as a child, I haven't read many graphic novels as an adult.  I picked this up because I had heard so much about it, and WOW, am I glad I did.  I spent an afternoon laughing out loud, weeping into my tissues, and sending texts to multiple friends imploring them to Run out RIGHT NOW and get this book!

Roz Chast, a cartoonist for the New Yorker, has written a memoir about her relationship with her elderly parents.  Let me 'cut and paste' the description from the back of the book here:
"Roz Chast and her parents were practitioners of denial: if you don't ever think about death, it will never happen.  Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? is the story of an only child watching her parents age well into their nineties and die.  In this account, longtime New Yorker cartoonist Chast combines drawings with family photos and documents, chronicling that 'long good-bye'."

So, should your book club read it?

Hmm...not an easy question.  You see, I think this book is important--we all should be talking about these things with our families, but I'm not sure that anyone, well anyone over the age of say 75, really wants to talk about these things with fellow book club members.  Don't get me wrong--I think this is an important book that raises important issues.  I also think it's brilliantly done.  As I said, I think everyone should read it, and I think all families should discuss it.  I think many book clubs would enjoy talking about it.  But I also think that it may not be the best selection for book groups with elderly members.

So what can your book club talk about?

The book raises questions that you should be discussing with your aging parents, a conversation that will differ from the one you will  have with your book group.  The latter conversation will be more about the book itself--although as I type this, I can imagine that many of those thorny 'aging parent' issues will be talked about also!  In fact, I think this is one of those books where the discussion will be about the book BUT ALSO about your own life.  Yes, it's a very personal story, indeed.

You'll want to talk about the form of the book itself.  Do you think, like I do, that the message could not have been delivered so brilliantly any other way?  Take it from someone who has lived a version of this book: if you don't laugh along the way, you will do nothing but cry.

I read somewhere once that it's a shame that grown-up books don't have pictures.  You really should each take a turn discussing your favorite picture from this book--and say why it is.  My personal fave: actually, more than one--all the real photos of the author with her parents.  They are smiling for the camera while she looks like she'd like to murder them and then the photographer.  A picture paints a thousand words...

What do you say to your parents when their home (possibly your childhood home) is...grimy?  Is this their sweet revenge for all those years you were a complete slob growing up?  Now the tables have turned, but you can't threaten to ground them if they don't clean up their mess.  So, how DO you handle this?

I suppose the conversation with aging parents is so difficult partly because there is an uncomfortable role-reversal taking place.

No doubt you'll want to talk about that role-reversal and how to handle it.  No right answer here.  Definitely no easy answer.

You'll want to talk about the relationship that Roz has with her mother and father.  Does it affect how she deals with them as they age?  Is she generous to her parents, especially when we consider how her mother treated her?  Or is it her duty, as it would be any child's, to care for them?  What is motivating her?  What would motivate you?

Perhaps you'll want to discuss the elephant in the room.  Yes, that's right.  $$$.

How does one plan for this?  Whose responsibility is it to plan for aging parents?  The parents?  You?  What if no one does?  What if there's not enough money? 

How can a child deal with the resentment of being put in the position of caretaker?  How can that child deal with her siblings who may or may not be helping?  How can that child deal with the guilt from having felt resentment for being put in the position of caretaker?  Not everyone can write a graphic novel to process her feelings!

You'll want to discuss whether this raw, honest, personal book goes too far.  Are Roz's parents disrespected in any way?

Perhaps you'll want to discuss how our culture--and other cultures--deal with the elderly and dying.  Nursing homes, hospice care, keeping one alive as long as possible--all topics you can consider.  Have other cultures figured out a better way than ours?

This book hit home for me, but I wonder if there are people who will read it and not relate at all.  How could that be?  Perhaps you can discuss this.

Rightey-ho, this should get you started.  Don't forget: when you've wrapped up your discussion with your book club, you've still got the MORE IMPORTANT discussion to go.  Call your parents!  Or, if you ARE the parents, call your kids!

Literary Masters Leads the Way and Facebook Follows!

The other day I posted a New Year's Resolution suggestion to join or start a book club.  Here's the post.  Then, this morning, I read that Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook fame, has done just that!  I'm not claiming cause and effect or anything, I'm just saying...seems like a strong coincidence, doesn't it?

Language Matters

This came to me from someone who knows how I feel about the power of language.  It is from the Financial Times, copy and pasted here.  Enjoy!

And the Golden Flannel of the year award goes to . . . 

Lucy Kellaway

On New Year’s eve, just before the final judging session of my 2014 Golden Flannel awards, I put out a last minute plea on Twitter. What were the most irritating new phrases uttered by business people last year?

Reach out, lots of people replied. Lean in. Going forward. Push back. Space. Learnings. Passionate. Content. My ask of you.

As I read these suggestions I started to get pretty irritated myself. These phrases were aggravating in 2014. But they were also annoying in 2013 and earlier. Reaching out and going forward started grating back in the last millennium.

Yet the response proves something about the jargon space last year. If it was a feeble one for innovation, it was one in which existing guff spread wider and got more bothersome than ever.

This year I’m awarding a special prize to an organisation that ought to have risen above jargon, but has been dragged down into it. Winner of the inaugural Fallen Angel award goes to the Church of England, which in a paper on training bishops talked of “a radical step change in our development of leaders who can shape and articulate a compelling vision and who are skilled and robust enough to create spaces of safe uncertainty in which the Kingdom grows”. Our Lord, looking down on a sentence in which His Kingdom was obliterated by a dozen dreary management clichés, must have found his genius for forgiveness sorely tested.

My next award is given to a big name chief executive who has delivered standout services to guff during the year. One has to admire the actually baffling way in which Randall Stephenson, CEO of AT&T said: “We actually think that the industry is at a place where you can actually see line of sight to the subsidy equation just fundamentally changing in a very short period of time.”

But in the end the judges actually felt that Tim Cook — who spookily was also chosen as the FT’s person of the year — deserved to be the 2014 Chief Obfuscation Champion. Under his leadership, Apple, hitherto the world’s only example of a successful company that uses words elegantly, succumbed to drivel.

As he took the stage at Cupertino he declared “At the end of the day . . . this is a very key day for Apple”, thus combining two empty, clashing phrases. More bafflingly, when all those topless pictures of stars escaped from their iCloud, he said: “When I step back from this terrible scenario . . . I think about the awareness piece. I think we have a responsibility to ratchet that up. That’s not really an engineering thing.” Maybe it isn’t. But it makes Mr Cook my 2014 COC.

One of my favourite prizes every year is the best euphemism for firing people; this year I’ve decided to withhold the award, as no entries were worthy of it. ABN Amro fired 1,000 people to “further enhance the customer experience”, which was good, but nowhere near the brilliance of EY, which in 2013 sacked people explaining it was “looking forward to strengthening our alumni network”.

Instead I’m giving a new prize for the least appropriate start to an email. Stephen Elop began a 1,200 word message in which he axed thousands of jobs at Microsoft with “Hello there.” But he was beaten to the prize by Uber, which started a message to customers concerned by the alleged rape of an Indian woman by an Uber driver with the jaunty salutation: “Hey”.

The next category is the Communications Cup, given out for the ugliest new way to describe the simple activity of talking to people. Here the competition was fierce: during the year I was asked to “hop on a call” — grating for its false jauntiness — and to “send me dates, and we can lock in”. Better than either was “circle back with”, which though not new, got worse in 2014 as the preposition “to” was replaced by the cheesy and nonsensical “with”. But then, in an email from a PR, I found something even better. To reach out is yesterday. The new and more fashionable way of using this hateful term is back-to-front: “I’m outreaching to you . . .”

The next award is for the silliest job title. The judges admired the way that Tesla calls its car salesmen “Delivery Experience Specialists”, but after fierce debate, have given the prize to PwC in Switzerland for calling its HR head: Territory Human Capital Leader. The first three words are intolerably pompous, and the fourth is a lie. HR people don’t lead.

In choosing my overall Golden Flannel phrase of the year, I considered the dementing “does that resonate with your radar?” but quickly saw it was puny compared to the terrific new verb “to action forward” which I heard an otherwise sensible manager utter last month. “Actioning forward”, with its dazzling combination of two of the most irritating bits of jargon ever, resonates with my radar so powerfully I fear I may have broken it.

Happy New Year! Literary Resolutions for 2015!

Happy 2015!  Have you promised yourself you will eat better and exercise more?  Good job--taking care of your body.  But how about your MIND???  It is vitally important to exercise your brain, your mind, and your spirit, and here's the perfect new year's resolution that will enable you to do all three:

Join a book club!  Or start one.  It is scientifically proven that reading is good for your brain, and do you know what's even better?  Talking about what you've read with others!

Your brain will thank you, and perhaps even more importantly, your spirit will thank you!  Being part of a book club checks off numerous "good for you" boxes, and my Literary Masters members constantly tell me that gathering with fellow members for our discussions is a highlight of their month.

Whether you join a Literary Masters salon or start/join your own, just do it!  (Thanks, Nike!)  And if you need tips on how to do so, stay tuned for future posts!

Here's wishing you and yours a wonderful 2015!