you guys, reading... it's just, so swell :')
― Madame Bob George (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 23 October 2016 19:07 (seven years ago) link
currently reading:
J.R. Ackerley - We Think The World Of You
just got few a couple dozens pages on my commute but so far so good. I love british novels with bracingly smart narrators, of which this is one
― flopson, Monday, 24 October 2016 16:37 (seven years ago) link
Started reading the Vivienne Westwood autobiography last night when I couldn't drop off to sleep. Had picked it up cos I found it cheap in TKMAxx. Just at a time that I was reading about her in The look by paul Gorman.just picked up a load of new stuff today too.
But hoping Vivienne might be inspiring in garment making.
― Stevolende, Monday, 24 October 2016 16:42 (seven years ago) link
The only JR Ackerley I've read is My Father and Myself, which is fantastic. An autobiography that takes in being gay in Edwardian London, fighting in the trenches in WW1, and a central mystery about his father that only comes to light after his death... it's a really compelling read.
― Zelda Zonk, Monday, 24 October 2016 23:16 (seven years ago) link
His memoir about his dog, My Dog Tulip, is also great: the non-fictional treatment of the experiences he also fictionalised beautifully as We Think the World of You.
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Tuesday, 25 October 2016 02:21 (seven years ago) link
I've more than half-finished Caro's LBJ volume 4, The Passage to Power, JFK is dead. The whole gang is headed to DC on Air Force One with the coffin on board. As the most dramatic moment of the story, the day of the assassination and Caro's accompanying observations occupies a very substantial number of pages. 100 or so? I haven't counted them. Caro does a good job of convincing the reader that LBJ's tasks in the days and months following JFK's murder are nearly impossible to pull off, so that when Johnson manages to pull it off we'll be suitably awestruck.
― a little too mature to be cute (Aimless), Tuesday, 25 October 2016 02:51 (seven years ago) link
Does he comment on the Paul Krassner story of what happened when LBJ was left alone with JFK's body.
― Stevolende, Tuesday, 25 October 2016 07:22 (seven years ago) link
finished 2000AD: THE APOCALYPSE WAR
Toni Morrison, SONG OF SOLOMON
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 25 October 2016 08:23 (seven years ago) link
the dialogue between Ackerley's stand-in and his in-laws is fantastic
― flopson, Tuesday, 25 October 2016 14:32 (seven years ago) link
Paul Beatty's The Sellout won Man Booker. Anybody here read it?http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/26/business/media/paul-beatty-wins-man-booker-prize-with-the-sellout.html?_r=0
― dow, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 00:27 (seven years ago) link
comment on the Paul Krassner story
nope
― a little too mature to be cute (Aimless), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 00:30 (seven years ago) link
The nobel went to a musician, now the UK book prize goes to an American. Does anything make sense anymore? ANYTHING?
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 00:50 (seven years ago) link
Did it make sense before?
― Madame Bob George (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 00:59 (seven years ago) link
I finally finished volume 1 of "The Demons" by Heimito von Doderer, which took ages* and felt like a shapeless first draft of "A Dance To The Music of Time" (or something) set in inter-war Vienna. I am genuinely torn about whether to follow up with vols 2 and 3, it's such a swirl of character and event that6 I found it hard to keep up with and often even a slog. Very little happens in the course of the 470 pages of volume 1, but somehow I want (all of a sudden) to know more about what happens to these people.
*Admittedly, and slightly confusingly, I slipped in a concurrent read of "The Emperor's Tomb" by Joseph Roth which follows a similar milieu at a not-so-different point in history in the same geographical location, albeit to very different ends. A few times I expected character from one to turn up in the other.
― Tim, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 15:50 (seven years ago) link
THat Krassner story is in the bottom right corner of this page of the Realist from their Archives http://www.ep.tc/realist/74/18.htmlLooks like there's a stack of the 60s satirical magazine on that site.
Apparently the rumour started there was believed by a load of people at the time that came out. It's presented as an unpublished part of the Manchester book on the investigation into The Death Of The President.I thought if they went into 100 pages on the flight they might have mentioned that somewhere.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 16:29 (seven years ago) link
why would a serious historian reference a story like that in his book?
― a little too mature to be cute (Aimless), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 17:27 (seven years ago) link
Tim - at this rate you are going to make me read The Demons. I've read nearly everything by Joseph Roth.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 17:53 (seven years ago) link
What he said
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 20:41 (seven years ago) link
something wicked this way comes - what a lovely book, enjoying this a lot. i waited until it got cold to read it and then on monday the chapter i was reading had a few lines about it being the 24th of october, which was good.
also dreamland sam quinones still, and just finished young skins by colin barrett, which i liked apart from some stupid indulgences, eg some dreadfully named characters, and calling the local chipper "carcettis" presumably due to liking the wire, almost unforgivable that one.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 20:47 (seven years ago) link
i just loaded Dreamland to my iPad! have you liked it?
― flopson, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 21:08 (seven years ago) link
Yes it is great! I don't think it's amazing writing and he sometimes repeats his own invented similes, but it is a brilliant story well-investigated. So sad and wrong, especially the stuff about OxyContin. my mum is a pharmacist and she saw my copy and bought it, should be interesting to hear how much she likes all the gang stuff in it.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 21:38 (seven years ago) link
Some recent readings:
Jo Nesbø: Blood on Snow -- never read any by him before, and this was perfectly OK, 1970s Oslo-set noir pastiche with hitman and femme fatale; won't be rushing to read more
Sjón: Moonstone -- this is the 3rd by him I've read, and probably my favourite: teenaged cinema-obsessed rentboy in Reykjavík gets job as body-lugger during the post-WW1 Spanish Flu outbreak
Nina Allan: The Art of Space Travel -- SF novella that gains almost nothing from being presented as SF, despite being well-written and thoughtful
Alexis Smith: Glaciers -- sweet, sad novella about a day-ish in the life of a woman in love with a fellow librarian who is about to go back to fight in the Gulf for no easily articulated reason
Georges Simenon: The Hand -- another excellent, harsh non-Maigret, apparently newly translated and published because David Hare has based a play on it
Ferenc Békássy: The Alien in the Chapel -- selected poems and letters by Hungarian poet who studied at Oxford was a sort-of friend of Rupert Brooke (they were both after the same girl) and was killed by Russians on the Eastern Front in 1915 at age 22
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 23:17 (seven years ago) link
Reminds me, I just found a library shop copy of Simenon's Aunt Jeanne---is it good?
― dow, Wednesday, 26 October 2016 23:34 (seven years ago) link
I've never even heard of that one, tbh. But you're probably pretty safe getting it!
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 23:42 (seven years ago) link
I also recommend The Emperor's Tomb, which has some of the quietest pathos that's ever moved me in a book.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 26 October 2016 23:58 (seven years ago) link
something wicked this way comes - what a lovely book, enjoying this a lot. i waited until it got cold to read it and then on monday the chapter i was reading had a few lines about it being the 24th of october
― Funkateers for Fears (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 28 October 2016 13:59 (seven years ago) link
looking forward to listening to november rain every day next month
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Friday, 28 October 2016 14:08 (seven years ago) link
Reading Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys. Not to diminish her, but her sentences give very easily to poetry - chunks of this are positively Prufrockian.
I've had enough of these streetsthat sweat a cold, yellow slime,of hostile people, of cryingmyself to sleep every night.
I've had enough of thinking,enough of remembering.Now whisky, rum, gin, sherry, vermouth, winewith the bottles labelled 'Dum vivimus, vivamus. ... 'Drink, drink, drink.As soon as I sober up I start again.
― Sunn O))) Brother Where Art Thou? (Chinaski), Friday, 28 October 2016 21:12 (seven years ago) link
John Jeremiah Sullivan - "Pulphead". Just finished reading the piece about the Christian rock festival. Excellent stuff and not as sneery as you might expect
― Neptune Bingo (Michael B), Tuesday, 1 November 2016 09:20 (seven years ago) link
just finished Moby-Dick
there's a good story in there, probably 30 chapters of the entire thing. the rest of it reads like an afternoon hopping around on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cetology
(and then there's the buzzfeedy '10 worst depictions of whales in art')
― koogs, Tuesday, 1 November 2016 09:27 (seven years ago) link
i really want to read it after chatting to mark s about it. i love the other melvilles i've read but i don't expect it's like bartleby or the confidence man.
just started reading a collection of horror stories by e nesbitt, having finished something wicked this way comes. i am really loving the tone and rhythm of these and the posh british settings are v different from a lot of what i've been reading. also just great scary yarns.
after that i've got an in-tray of jon mcgregor, jl carr's a month in the country ( as recommended itt), and no doubt some more i'm forgetting.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Tuesday, 1 November 2016 10:08 (seven years ago) link
Just finished Vivienne Westwood autobio and the book on Boutiques by Marnie Fogg which were both really interesting.About half way through the Gangleader For A Day book and things are becoming a bit complicated for the sociology student since he's becoming involved with several sides of a community that the Black kings are living in.
Just started Wedlock by Wendy Moore about shenanigans in the 18th century concerning a conman and his conned bride.
Need to work out what the next book I read in bed will be. have several lined up. Possibly A man called Destruction the Alex chilton biography though I've read a lot of rock bios recently, so not sure.
― Stevolende, Tuesday, 1 November 2016 11:41 (seven years ago) link
I read another few Bradbury shorts after Moby dick (he did the screenplay for the film). Had read most of them before but it's never a chore to reread Bradbury. The one about the astronauts in the aftermath of the explosion. Marionettes Inc is a fantastic little thing. The city.
(Am 10% into the first of the two 1000 page omnibuses)
― koogs, Tuesday, 1 November 2016 13:03 (seven years ago) link
I'm reading The Professor's House, Willa Cather, and I'm halfway through it. It is definitely a weaker effort than O, Pioneers! or Death Comes for the Archbishop. She assembles her modest cast of nine or ten characters, but she seems barely acquainted with them in comparison to her deep understanding of the characters in those two other novels.
― a little too mature to be cute (Aimless), Tuesday, 1 November 2016 16:53 (seven years ago) link
Structurally it's too neat by half, but the Tom Outland section is fascinating, and I like the homoerotic undertones.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 1 November 2016 17:31 (seven years ago) link
going to Buenos Aires on friday so I'm reading...
Alfredo Bioy Casares - The Invention of Morel
it's weird as hell so far. with a great introduction by Borges
― flopson, Tuesday, 1 November 2016 18:25 (seven years ago) link
Moby-Dick is so good. Held out against reading but raced through it last xmas. The story is just a skeleton to hang stuff, and his prose.
Been reading Empson's complete poetry. The author's notes are absolutely hilarious and brilliant. Needs a reissue, a very peculiar book (like the man) (sorta want to read Haffenden's biography)
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, 1 November 2016 19:21 (seven years ago) link
going to Buenos Aires on friday so I'm reading...Alfredo Bioy Casares - The Invention of Morelit's weird as hell so far. with a great introduction by Borges
― From a Vanity 6 (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 1 November 2016 20:30 (seven years ago) link
Nice, Casares looks like another one to add to the list - am almost finished Hopscotch and am interested in The Invention of Morel, too. More weird-as-hell Argentine literature, pls!
― Federico Boswarlos, Wednesday, 2 November 2016 00:34 (seven years ago) link
Yeah, Morel is great. And a great example of SF for people who think they don't read SF.
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Wednesday, 2 November 2016 00:48 (seven years ago) link
Vladislav Vančura: Summer of Caprice -- this must be the most Irish novel ever written by a Czech; priests and lifeguards and soldiers hang around and have convoluted arguments in unlikely language, and a magician comes to town and everything goes mad
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Wednesday, 2 November 2016 00:50 (seven years ago) link
W.B. Yeats, MICHAEL ROBARTES AND THE DANCER (just 20 pages of poems)
back to OSCAR WAO which I don't rate
and started Jonathan Coe, NUMBER 11, which I'm finding really engaging; sort of pure pleasure of narrative fiction with little idea yet quite how the many pieces he'll orchestrate will come together.
― the pinefox, Wednesday, 2 November 2016 09:15 (seven years ago) link
picked up a copy of the Pancatantra yesterday cos I saw it in a charity shop. Don't remember hearing of it before but now would be surprised if i hadn't come across at least mention of it.A series of interlinked fables told to 3 lazy royal brothers to hopefully help them along the path to wisdom. Seems to date back to the 4th century BC and has been translated into European languages since about the 6th Century AD.
I'm seeing it compared to Aesop's fables. Looks like it could be very interesting.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 2 November 2016 09:52 (seven years ago) link
collection of horror stories by e nesbitt
shamefully replying to my own post, but i'm enjoying this so much. each story has that first person grand english confessional tone that's so classic for horror, and they all address the reader in a sort of over-written way - like "you shan't believe what i am about to tell you, but i swear that it is true, even though i cannot, not even in darkest moments, begin to fathom how". i'm three or four in and they're all these quintessential english ghost stories, all the tropes are perfectly delivered. like in nearly every story somebody will move in to a house or say they're visiting a person, and a stranger they meet, usually a maid or someone else in the serving classes will raise an eyebrow or briefly refuse to take them there, like a victorian version of "the animals are always the first to know". somehow all of these tropes just make the stories kind of rich and familiar, and there is some beautiful writing in there.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Wednesday, 2 November 2016 10:00 (seven years ago) link
I've been reading Mr. Sammler's Planet by Saul Bellow. It's probably not anyone's idea of top-drawer Bellow, and some of the musings on contemporary culture (this is the early 1970s) seem reactionary if not racist, but perhaps that's the character talking and not Bellow. On top of that, the plot seems like rather a rickety afterthought to hang Sammler/Bellow's ethical (in the Aristotelian sense) musings upon. Despite all that, it's not unreadable, and the reader feels the comforting sense of being in sure narrative hands.
― o. nate, Thursday, 3 November 2016 01:55 (seven years ago) link
I keep putting down novels from that Bellow era (inc. MSP).
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 3 November 2016 01:59 (seven years ago) link
In some ways it seems like Bellow by the numbers, but there is guilty pleasure to be had for instance in the narrator's deeply un-PC generalizations about women, and as usual with Bellow there is the occasional particularly fine sentence.
― o. nate, Thursday, 3 November 2016 02:04 (seven years ago) link
2/3 done Casares and I still have nfi what's going on lol
― flopson, Thursday, 3 November 2016 02:10 (seven years ago) link
It all has a pleasantly unambiguous explanation, flopson, don't worry
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Thursday, 3 November 2016 04:09 (seven years ago) link
The end of the book, that is, not life in general
― I hear from this arsehole again, he's going in the river (James Morrison), Thursday, 3 November 2016 04:10 (seven years ago) link