It'd have to be the Machen over Chesterton. These lists are reminding me I should read more Conrad. And some Forster.
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Monday, 21 September 2020 15:35 (three years ago) link
Enchanted Castle all the way. E. Nesbit's masterpiece. She has such incredible control over her atmosphere: it's an extraordinary blend of humor, prosaic realism, flashes of transcendent beauty, and this deepening sense of the uncanny that keeps the story walking the border between fantasy and horror.
― Lily Dale, Monday, 21 September 2020 16:30 (three years ago) link
Now let's talk about this "Secret Of The League" book:
The Secret of the League is a 1907 dystopian novel by Ernest Bramah, which describes the overthrow of a democratically elected British Labour Party Government through a carefully prepared plot by members of the upper classes, and depicts such an overthrow as being a positive and desirable outcome.
i want to read this now -- you sold me.
― sarahell, Monday, 21 September 2020 16:53 (three years ago) link
i've only read ozma of oz and the man who was thursday. i kind of like chesterton's writing but something about this book didn't sit right with me. i assume his worldview and mine are fairly incompatible but i guess i did enjoy the book well enough right up until the denouement. so i guess i'm going with ozma, which was my favorite of the oz books back in the day (also the source of most of the plot of return to oz).
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 21 September 2020 20:31 (three years ago) link
Leroux's Yellow Room is a great mystery but boy is the prose in the English translation bad.
― wasdnous (abanana), Monday, 21 September 2020 21:46 (three years ago) link
Here's the start of a paragraph from a random page: "The boy-faced reporter speedily made himself many friends, for he was serviceable and gifted with a good humour that enchanted the most severe-tempered and disarmed the most zealous of his companions."
― wasdnous (abanana), Monday, 21 September 2020 21:57 (three years ago) link
The original flows a bit better but its sequence of tenses is clumsy, to say the least:
Tout de suite, le rédacteur imberbe se fit beaucoup d'amis, car il était serviable et doué d'une bonne humeur qui enchantait les plus grognons, et désarma les plus jaloux.
― pomenitul, Monday, 21 September 2020 22:03 (three years ago) link
xpost: can't help but read that paragraph in mr burns's voice
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Monday, 21 September 2020 22:52 (three years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Wednesday, 23 September 2020 00:01 (three years ago) link
I feel guilty about not knowing any of these
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 23 September 2020 01:09 (three years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Thursday, 24 September 2020 00:01 (three years ago) link
Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of 1908
― Daniel_Rf, Thursday, 24 September 2020 16:10 (three years ago) link