Do you...read them all, or are you including audiobooks?
― "Bi" Dong A Ban He Try (the table is the table), Saturday, 2 January 2021 02:13 (three years ago) link
I think there were maybe 4 audiobooks in that lot? But it's a lot faster to read a real book than listen to it as an audiobook.
― Tsar Bombadil (James Morrison), Saturday, 2 January 2021 07:31 (three years ago) link
314 - I have so many questions!
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Saturday, 2 January 2021 11:29 (three years ago) link
I...just don't understand how anyone can read that much without it being their job. Even if I counted the manuscripts and parts of books I read this past year, it would add up to maaaaybe 150.
So how do you do it?
― "Bi" Dong A Ban He Try (the table is the table), Saturday, 2 January 2021 12:27 (three years ago) link
Plotinus - The Enneads Stephen Mackenna translationFrancis Yates - Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic TraditionPetronius - The Satyricon and Seneca The ApocolocyntosisRonald Hutton - The Rise and Fall of Merry England: The Ritual Year, 1400-1700Greek Lyric Poetry trans M.L. WestBoccaccio - The Decameron G.H. McWilliam translationComte de Lautréamont - Maldoror and Poems (well I didnt finish the poems as they were so dispiriting and conservative)Thomas Browne - Pseudodoxia epidemica ed by Kevin KilleenA Man Very Well Studyed: New Contexts for Thomas BrowneSir Thomas Browne: The World ProposedFrancis Bacon - The Major Works OUPItalo Calvino - If on a Winter's Night a TravellerJohn Guy - Tudor EnglandLawrence Manley - Literature and Culture in Early Modern LondonArthur Kinney ed - Rogues Vagabonds Sturdy BeggarsLucian - Chattering Courtesans and Other Sardonic SketchesEamon Duffy - The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580Virgil - The Eclogues and The GeorgicsThomas Nashe - The Unfortunate Traveller and Other WorksPaul Griffiths ed - Londinopolis, c.1500 - c.1750: Essays in the Cultural and Social History of Early Modern LondonBen Jonson - Complete Poems OUPJohn Stubbs - John Donne: The Reformed SoulDekker, Jonson etc - The Roaring Girl and Other City ComediesJuvenal - The Satires OUPRoger Chartier - The Order of BooksBrian Ogilvie - The Science of Describing: Natural History in Renaissance EuropeEdward Topsell - The History Of Four-footed Beasts And Serpents And InsectsIan Donaldson - Ben Jonson A Life Pico Della Mirandola: Oration on the Dignity of ManMichael Hulse ed - The New PoetryGail Kern Paster - The Idea of the City in the Age of Shakespeare
― glumdalclitch, Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:00 (three years ago) link
Plotinus - The Enneads Stephen Mackenna translation
Admirable! No matter how I approach the Enneads of Plotinus, I can't seem to find a friendly entry. I've consigned it, sadly, to the group of universally acknowledged classics I just can't seem to scale.
― Respectfully Yours, (Aimless), Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:07 (three years ago) link
Insomnia, laziness, working part time, don't watch much telly, a magic monkey's paw
― Tsar Bombadil (James Morrison), Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:20 (three years ago) link
If you could locate the remainder of the monkey, I bet there'd be hot bidding for the other three, plus any other parts you could subdivide it into.
― Respectfully Yours, (Aimless), Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:38 (three years ago) link
Lucian I only know for a very early Sci fi precursor which I always meant to read but never did. I think it was a from the earth to the moon type thing from the time of Greece or Rome.
Glumdalclitch was the name of a witch's familiar in a story in House Of Mystery when I was a preteen. May have been borrowed from somewhere though of course.
― Stevolende, Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:44 (three years ago) link
James - you must be one of the few who reads books when lazy.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:45 (three years ago) link
Glumdalclitch was the name of the girl who owned Gulliver as a pet when he was among the Brobdingnagians.
― Respectfully Yours, (Aimless), Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:48 (three years ago) link
Oh right. Yeah that rings a bell.
― Stevolende, Sunday, 3 January 2021 01:56 (three years ago) link
James, we don't own a television, so I also have that advantage. Still boggles my mind.
― "Bi" Dong A Ban He Try (the table is the table), Sunday, 3 January 2021 12:57 (three years ago) link
I read about 150 - these are my favourite 25 or so:
Simone de Beauvoir - Memoirs of a Dutiful DaughterGraham Swift - WaterlandJack London - John BarleycornAlbert Camus - The First ManGitta Sereny - Into That DarknessAlberto Moravia - Conjugal LoveHjalmar Soderberg - Doctor GlasPaul Bailey - Chapman's OdysseyErnesto Sabato - The TunnelSven Lindqvist - The Dead Do Not DieHaruki Murakami - Norwegian WoodIris Murdoch - The Black PrinceNaguib Mahfouz - Palace Walk: Cairo Trilogy 1Robin Maugham - Escape from the ShadowsBeverley Nichols - A Case of Human BondageElias Canetti - The Tongue Set FreeJosé Saramago - BlindnessLeon Goldensohn - The Nuremberg InterviewsCharles Jackson - The Lost WeekendWashington Irving - The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.Gregor von Rezzori - Memoirs Of An Anti-SemiteEmmanuel Bove - My FriendsStephen Vizinczey - In Praise of Older WomenDavid Kidd - Peking StoryRussell Baker - Growing UpFrank Tallis - The Incurable Romantic
― Aiden, Sunday, 3 January 2021 18:02 (three years ago) link
John Farris - When Michael CallsCarsten Jensen - We, The DrownedR.W. Spryszak - EdjuWilliam Morris - The Water of the Wondrous IslesAndrew Michael Hurley - The LoneyBernard Taylor - The Moorstone SicknessColin Wilson - The Mind ParasitesColin Wilson - Super Consciousness: The Quest for the Peak ExperienceBrian Aldiss - HothouseH. G. Wells - The War of the WorldsMarta Randall - IslandsE.F. Benson - The Horror Horn And Other StoriesJ. P. Martin - UncleDaphne du Maurier - Jamaica InnDaphne du Maurier - RebeccaKurt Vonnegut - The Sirens of TitanJoe Hill & Gabriel Rodríguez - Locke & Key (Vols. 1-3)Mark Helprin - Winter's Tale(dnf yet - I'm setting it aside for a while because I can only tolerate so much wide-eyed wonder in one calendar year. currently reading Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique tales)
― ridingstarbassxd (unregistered), Sunday, 3 January 2021 19:18 (three years ago) link
+ Michelle Paver - Wakenhyrst
― ridingstarbassxd (unregistered), Tuesday, 5 January 2021 02:35 (three years ago) link
terrible year for reading, in what i thought would be a good year. factors:
XX - Angela Chadwick (won an award, useful in that it made me realise I *really* don't like this sort of fiction)All the Agatha Christie PoirotsAll the Agatha Christie Miss MarplesTinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy - JLC (reread)A Perfect Spy - JLC (reread)The Honourable Schoolboy - JLC (bad not good)Mordew - Alex Pheby (a complicated indifference and mild dislike, also combined with the fact that the last book i really disliked was also galley beggar press made me wonder whether they've got a house style that i don't like. of this sort of book, reading Gormenghast for the world building and Mason and Dixon for the style. Oddly like reading a computer game at times. Not entirely without interest).Reinhardt's Garden - Mark Haber (did not like)Infinite Detail - Tim Maughan (liked mildly)An Indifference of Birds - Richard Smyth (sort of liked i guess)Theory of Bastards - Audrey Schulman (enjoyed but then ran out of interest)The Four Books - Yan Lianke (struggled with but it's an interesting perspective on chinese history, and an interesting set of aesthetic and storytelling choices)We Are Made of Diamond Stuff - Isabel Waidner (enjoyed, it was better than better books, fluid, interested in the scutty side of UK, sexually mutable)The Black Swan - Nicholas Nassim Taleb (a weird brittle, bombastic man, this book provides a lot of sensible thinking around downside risk and not being stupidly scientistic about stuff. Taleb insistent, not without a certain amount of charm for an essentially charmless man, on 'Levantine Philosophy' as a thing.The Windup Girl - Paolo Bacigalupi (after a reading a load of business type books this organic science fiction was like taking acid, and though that initial feeling wore off, and i got a bit bored, it remains an interesting portrayal of a city under siege and no characters really being able to fulfil their aims - agency is an interesting question in it. interesting that Bacigalupi regularly struggled writing this. It shows.)Dune 1-3 - Frank Herbert (re-read)The War of the Poor - Eric Vuillard (epistemically weird in the same vein, but much less good imo than Order of the Day. annoyingly thought provoking though with some good sentences and thoughts).Anthony Price Stuff from Our Man in Camelot up to War Game. (all re-reads, didn't quite get to the '44 Vintage, a very weird somewhat pointless book. price's characters are all terrifically Tory, and like agatha christie's all go on about fucking tax the whole time).Hag's Nook - John Dickson Carr (reread for about the 1000th time, total comfort reading)Continued reading Jen Calleja, I'm Afraid That's All We've Got Time For (really enjoyed these short stories and looking forward to seeing more - believe there's a novel out this year)The Liar's Dictionary - Eley Williams (oddly disappointing. lightweight, though that's not necessarily a bad thing. clearly a love letter to her partner, also nnabt. didn't enjoy it half as much as her short stories, but wondered if this is because i approached with the wrong expectations. still fun enough if you're looking for a light bagatelle. also wonder - see engagement point above - whether i missed some depths).Syllabus: The Remarkable, Unremarkable Document That Changes Everything (really good book on creating syllabuses, and how to learn and teach from them)Exhalation - Ted Chiang (enjoyed these. right up my wheelhouse, so to speak. initially thought they might be a bit techbro, but have genuine emotional content and insight. very good).How to Write an Autobiographical Novel - Alexander Chee (also enjoyed these essays - still interested to know why the table is not the table doesn't like him).Because Internet: Understanding How Language Is Changing - Gretchen McCulloch (a relatively vanilla but interesting analysis of language usage on the internet and over the history of the internet. could have been terrible but is a good, clear set of thoughts about how our communications adapt to digital platforms and capabilities).The Art and Craft of Feature Writing - William Blundell (almost as enjoyable reading the excerpts from pieces that are examples here as Blundell's thinking) Casino Royale - Ian Fleming Covering McKellen: An Understudy's Tale - David Weston (an entertaining enough luvvie account of a disastrous world tour under Trevor Nunn of Lear, with Ian McKellen. Written by his understudy.)The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam - Barbara Tuchman (terrible theory behind it, but the general accounts of history are ok enough).Like - AE Stallings (Curates egg of a poetry collection. some stuff very good indeed, some stuff seemed facile, but i'm terribly unpracticed at reading poetry and i may be approaching it a bit clumsily)Against the Gods: The remarkable story of risk - Peter Bernstein (good)The Story of the Stone vol 1 - Cao Xueqin (introduction, plus first book, currently a dnf but will be picking up later this year i hope)Managing Britannia: Culture and Management in Modern Britain - Robert Protherough (dnf, part of my 'faster u fuckaz' obsession. this guy is v anti management bullshit and bullshit jobs, and tbh i'm not sure i agree and some of the tone these days is quite tedious imo, may write up further in thread)The Accursed Share vol 1 - Georges Bataille (dnf, but keen to pick this up again, very enjoyable slightly ludicrous introduction, French theory at its finest - wild and boundary shifting assertions totally free of evidence. pure music to my ears)How to Make the World Add Up: Ten Rules for Thinking About Numbers - Tim Harford (a boring boring bastard imo, but sometimes right, and it's just about worth reading these things for #epistemic_health reasons)Doctor Who: Day of the Doctor - Steven Moffat (almost unreadable in points of style, almost hysterical, immensely jarring, and totally incomprehensible to the extent that it replicated the experience of reading when seriously drunk. explained a lot about the tone of the TV programmes - tho i think moffat and indeed this episode is good not bad. dnf)Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World (terrible awful garbage, maybe useful tips)Clean: A Story of Addiction, Recovery and the Removal of Stubborn Stains - Michele Kirsch (really very good - funny and moving)The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes - Janet Malcolm (really excellent, nuanced approach of biography, death, testimony and memory)
sure there was more bits, stray fragments etc, but this covers it more or less i think
oh, the introduction and general content of Claudia Roden's The Book of Jewish Food is wonderful.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 20:12 (three years ago) link
oh and
Small Lives - Pierre Michon electrified me after a period of very tedious reading, reminding me the extraordinary perception and depths imaginative writing can have, really one of the most masterly writers there is at the moment. but i was so overcome with the intensity and richness of it, liking fotheringham-thomas, i had to put it down. it was like i was on acid, i was just going 'wow, this is just wow, man, you can see *everything*, and each word and sentence was mind-blowing with the consequence i just had to put it down because it was so full. last had this experience with Leskov. will definitely return this year for a less precious reading.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 20:14 (three years ago) link
ledge! love that you liked lud-in-the-mist. what did you think of mrs palfrey at the Claremont? maybe you have already covered these things in the what are you reading thread. i've only been an intermittent visitor this year.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 20:18 (three years ago) link
similarly if you posted on jocelyn brooke, no lime tangier, be interested to see what you thought.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 20:20 (three years ago) link
Fizzles, tbh, it's just not my thing, but I also tend to have an issue with most mainstream queer stuff. It's just too middle class and polite for me.
(I also think he's a grifter).
― Pere Legume (the table is the table), Tuesday, 5 January 2021 21:22 (three years ago) link
on that subject, bit surprised to see no mention of real life by brandon taylor on anyone's list. i read it and thought it was very good on lab-based graduate school, with which i am tragically familiar, but was less sure about the relationship stuff.
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Tuesday, 5 January 2021 21:26 (three years ago) link
Mrs Palfrey was fine, I have nothing to say against it and it had its moments but I couldn't really get on the same wavelength - I wonder if I have something of a blind spot for mid/mid-late female british lit fic given similar experiences with Pym, Lessing, Murdoch, even (gasp) Spark.
I bumped the 1926 poll thread hoping for your thoughts on lud-in-the-mist: Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of 1926
― ledge, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 21:33 (three years ago) link
ah, so you did. will respond - agree on the 'fairy fruit as hard drug' bit though.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 21:52 (three years ago) link
Similar to other weird preferences, I tend to shy away from "blistering coming of age story" hyperbole and stuff that's approved by the NY Times, at least as regards fiction. I find what passes for "mainstream" literary fiction these days to just bore me.
Non-fiction and memoirs? Different story, for some reason. I love and teach Kiese Laymon's "Heavy" all the time, for example.
― Pere Legume (the table is the table), Tuesday, 5 January 2021 21:54 (three years ago) link
Fizzles, tbh, it's just not my thing, but I also tend to have an issue with most mainstream queer stuff. It's just too middle class and polite for me.(I also think he's a grifter).
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 23:54 (three years ago) link
for some reason i wanted to use the phrase “performative touchstones” wrt the grifter point - something about v neatly doing things that will earn gold stars. not fully formed.
― Fizzles, Tuesday, 5 January 2021 23:56 (three years ago) link
I mean, Glück is nowhere near as well-known as he should be. Chee provides a blurb here: https://www.nyrb.com/products/margery-kempe?variant=29087445024820
That's the kind of thing I really love, Bob is an all-time hero and lovely person.
I think one of the things I dislike about Chee is that he basically learned everything from New Narrative and packaged it in a more marketable way, and there are some New Narrative people who should be much better known.
― Pere Legume (the table is the table), Wednesday, 6 January 2021 00:21 (three years ago) link