Nu-ILB: What books have you purchased lately?

That's the middle one of the Shelby Footers, isn't it? I bought them for my dad a while ago. I remember thinking that he was maybe a bit pro-Southern... the stuff in the first book about how Jefferson Davis would only punish any of his slaves after they had been convicted by a jury of their peers struck me as being a bit O RLY. And in the volume you have he never even mentions Joshua Chamberlain at the battle of Gettysburg.

Sorry, that's my inner nerd coming out.

The Figes book is great crack. Maybe I should read it from cover to cover some time.

IR buy with birthday book tokens:

William Dalrymple's The Last Mughal, about the last Mughal Emperor and the Indian mutiny. I get the impression that this book will be a bit sadface. I've been meaning to read something by Dalrymple for a while, and am currently on an India kick (having just finished Mike Dash's Thug

Alan George's Jordan, a book about the country of Jordan. I am not *that* interested in Jordan, given that it is a boring country made up of leftover bits of other countries, but I found Alan George's book on Syria very interesting.

two textbooks!
the resettlement of british columbia: essays on colonialism and geographic change by cole harris
and a double issue of bc studies from 1997/98.

We had a Vancouverite poet read tonight, and I liked her work. N@talie Simps0n.

I seem to be on an east Asian religion bender lately. Yesterday I bought:

The Diamond Sutra, translated by Red Pine, with extensive commentaries, from Sanskrit and Chinese. Trade paperback in excellent condition. It was US$14.00 at Powell's, but I had $13.50 in trade and I used that.

The Book of Tea, Okakuro Kakuzo, used hardcover in a slipcase, a bit warped, but in decent shape. This is one of the older Tuttle editions that were printed in Japan. I owned this long ago and I don't exactly consider it indispensible, but it was nice to find a cheap (US$3.00) copy in OK condition.

i do not know that poet, but will recognise her name now if i see it!

i had a good day at value villiage:
-"night of the shooting star" by dan vipond. a 1970's conspiracy/thriller, set entirely in the canadian wilderness!
-"fellowship of the stars", a 1974 sci-fi anthology focused on "the friendship between humans and beings from other dimensions"
-"the tent peg", by aritha van herk. western canadian lit, about misfits ending up in the yukon.
-"survival: a thematic guide to canadian literature", by margaret atwood. a classic and a steal at $1.99
-"roadside empire: how the chains franchised america" by stan luxenburg. from 1985, all about the historical development of franchising in the US and the subsequent effect on cultural expectations.
-"act of faith: an illustrated history of the reform party" - a 1991 history of the western-based PC splinter that became canada's official opposition by 1997 and, in a vague sense, is currently in government.

I bought 2 Coetzees today, 'Waiting for the Barbarians' which is one of my favourites, and 'The Life and Times of Michael K' which I've not read before. Also 'Pale Fire' because I don't own a copy and was feeling rich.

Also 'Pale Fire' because I don't own a copy and was feeling rich.

Damn good excuse.

I prefer to think of it as a rationale.

A remainder-fest:

Pocket Guide to the Apocalypse, and Parasites Like Us (can't remember either author, but looked promising)
Mark Salzman: The Soloist, The Laughing Sutra
Robert Frost:Early Poems
The Letters of Sacco & Vanzetti
Somerset Maugham: Mrs. Craddock, The Razor's Edge
Hesse: Siddhartha (I'll probably regret this one, even at $3)
Hannah Arendt: Between Past and Future
DH Lawrence: England, My England and Other Stories
Iris Murdoch: The Good Apprentice, The Bell
Pynchon: Vineland
DuBois: The Souls of Black Folk
Conrad: `Twixt Land and Sea
Garland: A Son of the Middle Border

I visited my favorite cheapie bookstore today and came away with:

One Man's Meat, E.B. White, a collection of essays from the WWII years and just prior. A 1944 "new and enlarged' edition, hardcover with dust jacket, in good shape, $3.

Saints and Strangers, George F. Willision, in a 1945 hardcover edition, $1. This is a history of the Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony, starting from their days in England, up through exile in Holland and the voyage to North America. It seems to paint a pretty realistic picture of them.

The Golden Casket: Chinese Novellas of Two Millenia{, tr. into English by Christopher Levenson, from a German translation from the original Chinese. (Whew!) This is a used Penguin paperback in marginal condition and I don't think it ever sold very well, because I've never seen it before today. It seemed worth a tumble for 50 cents.

Beauty and Sadness - Kawabata Yasunari
The Stain in the Snow - Georges Simenon
Breakfast with the Ones you Love - Eliot Finushel
Alphabet of Thorn - Patricia McKillip
Varieties of Disturbances - Lydia Davis
Call Me By Your Name - Andre Aciman

Lonely (or is it Lovely?) Bones. Seems to be good.
Fast Food Nation (for less than 3 dollars!)
Cheap ass chicken recipe book (less than a dollar!)
Children Recipe book

I traded a bunch of books at Powell's yesterday and used up some of my credit to upgrade my paperback copy of The Dream Songs by John Berryman, to a used hardcover copy. It is a first printing (which I don't care about) in standard condition, and was heavily marked in pencil by the previous owner, so it was marked down to $15 from an overly optimistic $30. I have been busily erasing the pencil markings.

I also picked up a nice harcover edition of The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pisan and translated by Earl Richards. It was only $7.

Earlier this week I picked up a used copy of Ernie Pyle's posthumously published Home Country for $1. It's a just cobbled-together rehash of his journalism from before WWII, but I enjoy Pyle's style and observations, just as his millions of loyal newspaper readers did, so it's fine by me. He was another of those Indiana boys who mastered typing, like Vonnegut.

bought a few online over the last week
Angela Saini Patriarchs her latest book that came out last month. Do enjoy her writing and interviews.
This is looking at the phenomena of patriarchy and what alternatives there have been historically, both different types of patriarchy and different types of matriarchy. Looking forward to reading it.

Augusto Boal
Legislative theatre & Rainbow of Desire
THought I wa sgoing to get a few of his books from a friend but turns out it was only one book on him. & there were a few he has buried in te corner of a room because he's as untidy as i am it would appear.
But these are 1) Legislative Theatre a book looking at the time he was in the government and applying his Theatre of the Oppressed methodology to the act of government and legislation
& 2) Rainbow of Desire where he applies the methodology as therapy.
I had this ordered from the library but I think it's been lost or just not returned. Found it relatively cheaply so grabbed it online.

was also thinking of buying Orlando Patterson's book Slavery and Social Death cos I can't get it though the library.
Anybody read it?

Did also get a copy of George Perec's first 2 novels Things and A Man Asleep in one volume.

plus a continual stream of books from charity shops. If I can reinvent the passage of time I might get through a load of these.
Do have a bit more time now that the bike mechanic course has ended.

Did buy that Orlando Patterson so should be arriving over next few days. THought i would make one last Book Depositary purchase they close next week.

Angela Saini Patriarchs arrived a couple of days ago. I haven't really looked at it. Did strike me that it must have been sentthe one day I was physically near the shop and thinking I mightdrop in and ask if I could grab it. Didn't wind up goingthere after all. Seemed to take forever to get processed though. So wasn't sure of status.

Bought the rest of teh Time Life World of Art books that were in a local charity shop. So have 7 of them yesterday got Michaelangelo , Delacroix, Vermeer and Rembrandt. Had picked up Durer, Breugel and Da Vinci earlier.
Do not know how I managed to get the bag that was that heavy up the stairs last night. Couldn't stand up elsewhere.

& purchased a copy of Ugly things new issue yesterday too.

I weakened and, when a £3 copy of the Tadeusz Rozewicz volume in the Penguin Modern European Poets series came up on eBay, I bought it. Normally it's more like £30. Now I have collected the full run of that series, and completion feels more melancholy than it feels exciting. Should've known.

The poetry good though.

$2 each from a school sale. I was thrilled to find these.

John Dewey - Art as Experience
T. J. Clark - The Painting of Modern Life

Tadeus Borowski This Way For tHe Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen
Polish Auschwitz survivor's set of short stories about life in teh prison camp.
Every time i go and look in charity shops I find something I really want to read. JUst wish I could find a way of creating a new timestream or means of osmosing books since real time doesn't suffice.
Have heard this is extremely haunting and not easy reading.

James Burke Circles
The writer and presenter of Connecctions connected book which is a lot of short pieces on inventions.

The Phenomenon of Religion Moojan Momen
Summary and comparison of core tenets of mainstyream religions. THis looked like a book I'd wanted to read for years and now I wonder hwo soon I will get to it.

Alan Weisman The World Without us
speculative work on what the planet would do in our absence should a sudden calamity remove teh prevalent destructive species.
I've now listened to a few podcasts tied in with this and really want to get into it.

Adam Higginbotham Midnight In Chernobyl
Oral history of the Chernobyl disaster

Orlando Patterson Slavery and Social Death
survey of all historical instances of survey in society. GOing back thousands of years and loking at what it meant at theh time.

which are only a handful of a larger pile amassed recently. I want to read them all immediately as well as a stack of things from the library. & all the books I bought over the last couple of years

School book fairs always turn up some gems. I found a first edition hardcover of Cavell's The World Viewed for $3, as well as William Gass's On Being Blue.

Found a copy of Arlie Russell Hochschild's The Managed Heart by chance on Friday. Like it was what I was specifically looking for for the last few weeks but after being told that it doesn't turn up in charity shops i heard it calling to me in a 2nd hand place.Or close to. Went to the section and it was there, though nopt in the cover I would have liked.
BUt have been meaning to read it for years. May have read it soon after hearing about it in the early 00ies but if so I think I read it really fast and that was 20 years plus ago. So very glad that it turned up . & it was cheap. I had nearly ordered it on ebay.

Gifts from people (birthday etc.):

Charles Rosen - The Frontier of Meaning: Three Informal Lectures on Music
Geza Csath - Opium and Other Stories
Sergio Pitol - Mephisto's Waltz (Selected Short Stories)
Miguel de Palol - Garden of Seven Twilights
Yu Miri - The End of August

Otherwise I have bought v little over the last six months.

Honore de Balzac - The Quest of the Absolute
William Shakespeare - Macbeth
Mircea Cartarescu - Solenoid

What did you think of Solenoid?

The past few purchases have all been book club readings

Clarke, Piranesi

Enger, So Brave, Young and Handsome

Grann, The Wager

Whitehead, Harlem Shuffle

that csath collections is... interesting? also at times somewhat gruesome

think the only book i've purchased at all recently is the updated edition of the electric muse by lang, dallas, denselow & shelton

Just reading the Csath now. It's an amazing book.

What did you think of Solenoid?

― dow, Thursday, 17 August 2023 bookmarkflaglink

Looking to crack it open in the next month.

I found two more books on the cheap, ofc.

Thomas Bernhard - Gargoyles
Marguerite Duras - L'Amour

Sold a bunch at Skoob for:

Gottfried Benn - Primal Vision
Samuel Beckett - Three Novellas
Louis Ferdinand-Celine - Fable for Another Time
Euclides da Cunha - Backlands
Hans Magnus Enzenberger - Mausoleum

Also:

William Shakespeare - Romeo and Juliet
Henry Green - Caught

Look Homeward Angel Thomas Wolfe
autobiographical novel by a writer I was turned onto as an influence on Jack Kerouac about 40 years ago. I may have read this back then.
BUt found it for a euro yesterday so Thought I'd take the plunge.

The Day Of The Locust Nathaniel West
Book about turn of theh 40s Hollywood that I've meant to read for an age. I saw the 1974 film of it a couple of weeks back then found this in teh charity shop I got the above from. May have a copy in a different imprint floating around somewhere.
Also reminds me that I need to read the City of Nets about the same era Hollywood. have had taht sitting around for a while.

Al Capone's Beer Wars John F Binder
history of prohibition era gangsters in Chicago. Looked good anyway.

& I just bought a copy of C. Willett Cunnington's A handbook of English Costume in teh 19th century
hoping that it is at least presentable cos it is listed as Poor but the better quality versions are upwards of £50 a copy.
Hoping that an ex library version dating back to 1966 with some writing inside is going to be rated as this if not in absolutely pristine condition . Well will see. It is up on archive.org but I do want a physical copy.
writer's name sounds like a particularly middle class sexual euphemism or something.

went slightly book mad and ended up with close to a year's worth of reading:

kafka - stories 1904-1924
grossmith & grossmith - diary of a nobody
somerville & ross - the irish rm
anthony trollope - the pallisers
ivy compton-burnett - parents & children
ivy compton-burnett - a father & his fate
sylvia townsend warner - mr fortune's maggot
elizabeth bowen - the last september
capel boake - painted clay
dali - hidden faces
john berger - g
stig dagerman - games of night
thomas tryon - the other
simenon - maigret sets a trap
henry james - english hours
dickens - selected journalism 1850-1870
stevenson - dr jekyll & mr hyde/weir of hermiston
horace walpole - castle of otranto/hieroglyphic tales
the common muse: popular british ballad poetry
roland barthes - selected writings
cervantes - don quixote
rabelais - gargantua & pantagruel
balzac - cousin pons
gautier - mademoiselle de maupin
flaubert - madame bovary
pushkin - eugene onegin
bulgakov - the white guard
thomas hardy - wessex tales
thomas love peacock - novels of
cs lewis - that hideous strength
michael moorcock - an alien heat
michael moorcock - the hollow lands
roger zelazny - isle of the dead
julian symons - bloody murder
graham greene - a gun for sale
robertson davies - the deptford trilogy
russell hoban - riddley walker
thomas pynchon - crying of lot 49
italo calvino - our ancestors
elias canetti - auto da fe
willa muir - imagined selves
george painter - marcel proust
gerard manley hopkins - poems and prose
joyce cary - the horse's mouth
ralph ellison - invisible man
joseph heller - closing time
deighton - billion dollar brain
deighton - game, set, match trilogy

also a number of pulp/crime/ghost/horror anthologies. now to try and find shelf space for them all.

I have come to accept that I do not have meaningful amounts of shelf space left, nor do I have wall space to put shelves against, and I'm just a person who is going to have piles

Carrying all those books will do that to you.

Just logging my last buys and stuff I got from Xmas gifts now:

S. Yizhar - Preliminnaries
Miguel Asturias - Mr. President
Alejo Carpenter - Explosion in the Cathedral
Shakespeare - Julius Ceasar
Lucio Cardoso - Chronicle of the Murdered House
Andrei Platonov - Chevengur
Stanislaw Witkiewicz - Insatiablity
Wittold Gombrowicz - Ferdeyduke
Yasunari Kawabata - The Old Capital
Yasunari Kawabata - The Rainbow
V. S. Prtchett - A Cab at the Door
Henry Green - Concluding
John Donne - Sermons
Jeremy Taylor - Four Sermons
Osvaldo Lamborghini - Two Stories
Horacio Quiroga - Beyond

if you have piles you could take a book suppository
or not as the case may be.