Watchmen Discussion Possiblities

Got to thinking about what I wrote in the last post about the Watchmen being a good choice for a book club. Why not a group of students. Might be a good way to get a book club started in your school, or mine. Went online to find any resources that might be useful and came up with these links:

Who Discusses the Watchmen? (TheBooklist.com): Short, general article on topics you might use to get the discussion rolling.

The Annotated Watchmen: Your complete guide to the series. (www.capnwacky.com): Not so much a guide for discussion as an explanation of the many references within the book. For example:

"In our world, Ford was vice-president from 1973 (when Spiro Agnew resigned) to 1974, when Nixon resigned and he became president. In their world, somebody, maybe the Comedian, snuffed Woodward and Bernstein before they could report Watergate, and this, combined with Nixon's popularity following the victory in Vietnam, led to his serving at least five terms."

Might prove helpful for younger readers as they tackle some of the cultural and historical references in the book.

Watchmen Questions (petermerel.newsvine.com): Seems to be based more on the movie than the book, but still some interesting questions that could be thrown in during a discussion of the book.

Watchmen Discussion Points (Jack Mangan's Deadpan): Online discussion of the book. Read through all the posts to get ideas for discussion topics. For example

• Question for the panel - who was really the most disconnected from humanity, Manhattan or Ozymandias? [Ed from Texas ]
• The title of “Watchmen” comes from a story written by Juvenal about guardsmen hired to watch the wife of a jealous husband. Juvenal posed the question “quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” or “who watches the watchmen?” Why is this an important question when reading “Watchmen”? [ditto]

Wikipedia entry: Lots of information here including some discussion of the themes. For example:

"Putting the story in a contemporary sociological context, Wright wrote that the characters of Watchmen were Moore's "admonition to those who trusted in 'heroes' and leaders to guard the world's fate." He added that to place faith in such icons was to give up personal responsibility to "the Reagans, Thatchers, and other 'Watchmen' of the world who supposed to 'rescue' us and perhaps lay waste to the planet in the process"

If any other teachers or book club members have some resources that might be helpful, leave a comment.