Juliet McDermott

During the last week of January, students gathered at various college houses to discuss this year’s Kurtz Book Club’s selection book, “The Midcoast” by Adam White, a thriller set in Damariscotta, Maine.

The Kurtz Book Club is supported by the Donald and Barbara Kurtz fund, which was created to encourage the interactions between the academic sides of campus and the College Houses. The club initially started off as an event first years could participate in after completing their orientation trips. Students would read a wide range of books, from nonfiction to fiction and even graphic novels, such as “She’s Not There: A Life in Two Genders” by Jennifer Finney Boylan or “Maus” by Art Spiegelman.

Tricia Welsch, professor of cinema studies and faculty advisor to MacMillan House, led one of the book club meetings.

“For many, many years, we had a book that was read by all the first years incoming during orientation.… The students were assigned into one meeting or another, and it would be faculty and staff [leading them]. Sometimes, I instituted upper level [class years] to help us do that,” Welsch said. “We would cover the book, and then often we would have the author come. It was really a first year academic event that was the only academic related event during orientation.”

After a hiatus of some years following the discontinuation of first-year programming, a new version of this book club started up again with a focus on college houses, the “living rooms” of Bowdoin. Alex Gates, the Assistant Director for Residential life, was in charge of organizing this iteration of the book club.

“I think it was born out of the goal to have more faculty and staff participate in things at the college houses. Because it’s really great to have students and faculty and staff making connections in a low-barrier entry setting, where all you have to do is read a book and be ready to talk,” Gates said.

While the book selection process differs every year, this year, the faculty advisors to the college houses provided a selection of books to choose from. After that, the students in the College Houses voted on the one they were most interested in.

“I hope and think that it helped increase the engagement a little because it was a book that students were really excited about,” Gates said. “The advisors are great, and they’re all not in college anymore. They come up with great books, and sometimes there are books that students might not be as excited about, so I think the students getting a say and choosing the book really meant a lot to them and a lot to our turnout.”

Several themes were brought up in the discussions about “The Midcoast.” Margaret Chioffi ’28, who participated in the book club, elaborated on the discussions.

“We talked a lot about the writing style. We talked a lot about how it felt very disjointed,” Chioffi said. “We also talked about how accurately it represents Maine, and what you can learn about Maine, and the tension between moving forward, attracting tourism and making money from that, and remaining the same and resistant to change, because that was a big plot of it as well.”

The Kurtz Book Club was also special for Chioffi because it provided an opportunity for different students to interact.

“It was special to meet people that I never otherwise would have interacted with [or] that I’ve never seen before,” Chioffi said.“There were a number of professors and staff members who I never met, and I just got a list of book recommendations from them.”

Welsch also elaborated on the importance of book clubs in creating a sense of community, and the sense of joy that not only comes from reading but from reading together and discussing the different opinions one may have had.

“Will we enjoy reading it? [It may] not really be fun, necessarily, but will we enjoy it having done it? Will we feel like it enlarged our perspective?” Welsch said. “Even if the book is wrong, even if we don’t like the book that much, we enjoy putting it down together. We enjoy arguing together. We enjoy pointing out its flaws, when it comes to that.”