Leeway Posted February 19, 2015 Report Posted February 19, 2015 FINISHED!!! Finished Clarissa: 1499 pages, 537 letters in the Penguin (1st) edition. A challenging read, but a marvelous experience. I had hoped to finish it on Valentine's Day, because, after all, it is a love story, albeit gone seriously wrong. I can see why this novel typically ranks high on lists of "best English novels." Richardson does a magnificent job maintaining voices and characters through the many hundreds of epistles. Furthermore, the social texture of the novel is extraordinarily dense and rich. Questions of sex and gender, rich and poor, virtue and vice, individual and community, tradition and modernity, so many other fundamental elements, it gives the novel the quality of myth. I'm truly glad I read it. Congrats, that is quite an accomplishment. I have to admit this was not even on my radar, but you have piqued my curiosity. I don't intend to add it to my reading list at any point in the near future, but perhaps someday... Did you start with Pamela? That seems more my speed, and if I make it through that ok, I might eventually consider Clarissa... Thank you. Actually Clarissa was enjoyable, one gets caught up in the deep psychology and sociology of the story, just requires perseverance. No, I have not read Pamela, just jumped into the deep end first. But I do have Pamela on my list to catch up with. Quote
Royal Oak Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 I am trying to get started on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", picked up in a charity shop. It's so big, and the first couple of pages are a touch dry, so it may take a while to get going. Maybe one for the holiday in May (I'll read anything while I'm on holiday) Quote
erwbol Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 I am trying to get started on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", picked up in a charity shop. It's so big, and the first couple of pages are a touch dry, so it may take a while to get going. Maybe one for the holiday in May (I'll read anything while I'm on holiday) Who knows, it might come in handy if the hotel runs out of toilet paper. Quote
Brad Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 Did you ever read his first one about the War in North Africa? That was quite good. Quote
Royal Oak Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 I am trying to get started on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", picked up in a charity shop. It's so big, and the first couple of pages are a touch dry, so it may take a while to get going. Maybe one for the holiday in May (I'll read anything while I'm on holiday) Who knows, it might come in handy if the hotel runs out of toilet paper. Is that a comment on the book's literary merits, or it's political leanings? Serious question btw. Quote
erwbol Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 I am trying to get started on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", picked up in a charity shop. It's so big, and the first couple of pages are a touch dry, so it may take a while to get going. Maybe one for the holiday in May (I'll read anything while I'm on holiday) Who knows, it might come in handy if the hotel runs out of toilet paper. Is that a comment on the book's literary merits, or it's political leanings? Serious question btw. Political leanings. Quote
Royal Oak Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 I am trying to get started on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", picked up in a charity shop. It's so big, and the first couple of pages are a touch dry, so it may take a while to get going. Maybe one for the holiday in May (I'll read anything while I'm on holiday) Who knows, it might come in handy if the hotel runs out of toilet paper. Is that a comment on the book's literary merits, or it's political leanings? Serious question btw. Political leanings. Thanks. I suppose I'll just have to get on with reading it.... Quote
kinuta Posted February 20, 2015 Report Posted February 20, 2015 Did you ever read his first one about the War in North Africa? That was quite good. Yes, I've just finished it and continued straight into The Day Of The Battle. Quote
ejp626 Posted February 21, 2015 Report Posted February 21, 2015 I haven't read that, but I did read The Hungry Tide. I thought it was great. Quote
Simon8 Posted February 21, 2015 Report Posted February 21, 2015 A first for me, never read him before. Auspicious first chapters, lively, well-drawn. Quote
Matthew Posted February 23, 2015 Report Posted February 23, 2015 Soren Kierkegaard: A Biography by Joakim Garff. A very long biography of Kierkegaard, but interesting. Quote
johnblitweiler Posted February 23, 2015 Report Posted February 23, 2015 Halfway through "Tortilla Curtain" by T.C. Boyle - pretty devastating, so far. Is he always satiric, does he always write this well? Quote
ejp626 Posted February 23, 2015 Report Posted February 23, 2015 Halfway through "Tortilla Curtain" by T.C. Boyle - pretty devastating, so far. Is he always satiric, does he always write this well?I haven't read everything but have a few of his novels and most of his short stories. I'd say he is even better in his short stories than novels, so you might want to check some of those out.I'm nearly done with Taylor's A Game of Hide and Seek. It is well written, but I find the main character (Harriet) to be fairly insipid and yet her love interest not particularly worthy of her attention. Quote
johnblitweiler Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Oops. Here I was admiring "The Tortilla Curtain" until on page 274 the husband-and-wife illiterate vagrants are running for their lives from a horrific forest fire and Boyle writes, "What would he liken it to?" Good grief. When was the last time you were seized with fear and thought, "I need a simile for this"? That line is so artificial and literary that it smells of Creative Writing School. Down with Literature. Quote
BillF Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Novelist and literary critic David Lodge's autobiography, Quite a Good Time to Be Born. Particularly interesting if you've read his novels/have a background in English literary studies. Anglo/American comparisons abound. Quote
Head Man Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Just finished this one myself last week. Very easy to read, as was the previous volume about the war in North Africa. I'm now awaiting delivery of the third and final volume about the invasion and liberation of Europe. He's an excellent writer.... Quote
ejp626 Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Faulkner As I Lay DyingIn the on-deck circle, Julian Barnes's A History of the World in 10½ Chapters and Djuna Barnes Nightwood. Quote
kinuta Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Just finished this one myself last week. Very easy to read, as was the previous volume about the war in North Africa. I'm now awaiting delivery of the third and final volume about the invasion and liberation of Europe. He's an excellent writer.... 'Crusade', his account of The Gulf War is also very good. I'm on the last few pages of The Day Of The Battle and will start The Guns At Last Light today. He's a good writer, plenty of detail and anecdotes and a clear narrative type drive that doesn't tire the reader by straying into academia. Quote
jlhoots Posted February 25, 2015 Report Posted February 25, 2015 Emily St. John Mandel: Station Eleven Quote
Leeway Posted February 26, 2015 Report Posted February 26, 2015 The question was what to read after spending over a month with Clarissa. The answer turned out to be an old friend, Iris Murdoch, and her The Green Knight, published 1993, and her 25th novel. Murdoch was diagnosed with Alzheimers in 1997, so I expected that this novel might find her seriously off her game. I don't think it does. It has the usual Murdoch strengths and weaknesses, but overall it is quite a good read. And since the novel does make use of the Green Knight myth, I decided to read: Simon Armitage's modern "Englishing" of the original alliterative poem. I very much enjoyed reading this modern version, but it also has the original Middle English text on the facing page, so one gets the best of both. Quote
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