From the New York Public Library blog, "Mad Men Reading List"
If you follow The Battery Park City Library on Twitter then you've seen our tweets linking to books that have appeared in the hit television show Mad Men. These titles are a great way to gain insight into the episodes and the social and cultural times in which the series is set. Like the set and costume design, the literary choices of the show really add a stamp of authenticity. Dipping into these classics is also a great way to help with withdrawals while waiting for new episodes to air.
[needs photo of bookshelf or display]
ah, the New York Daily News did a feature story on librarian Billy Parrott:
The most in demand: "The Group," the 1963 Mary McCarthy novel about life after Vassar that Betty Draper, ex-wife of central character Don Draper, managed to keep from dropping in the tub.
"That's one that's constantly out. I can't keep it on the shelves," he said.
The Daily Beast in 2009 did some commentary and pulled a few book covers
Revolutionary Road
by Richard Yates (1961).A young married couple moves into a Connecticut bedroom town with a son and daughter in 1955 and then their lives fall apart. Sound familiar? Of course, the story is probably most familiar for moviegoers who saw Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet take star turns in the story last year. Show creator Matthew Weiner told The New York Times recently, “Revolutionary Road was given to me three years after I wrote the pilot.” He said if he had read the book, he probably wouldn’t have tried to write the show. “Yates was there. This is what he was writing about.”
An exercise for the reader: find a movie, assemble the reading list that goes with it. Which other videos inspire building a shelf full of books to go with them?
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