And here they are folks:

The Name of the Rose - Umberto Eco (Whitaker)
The Sound of the Mountain - Yasunari Kawabata (Whitaker)
Homage to Catalonia - George Orwell (Sherry)
War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy (Barbara)

Thanks to all of you who were willing to get through this earlier than usual, to those who voted and to those who nominated the books. Whitaker, you will have a busy 6 months with two book discussions to lead!

I should explain my reason for putting this forward - at the end of the month I am off for 3 weeks to Poland, the first week bird-watching with friends and the next two back-packing, complete with tent, on my own. I've lots to do before then and really appreciate your help.

Hope you're bringing a camera. It's such a help for those of us living vicariously.

Thanks, Ricki. I think this is the third time I've nominated Homage to Catalonia. FINALLY! And I've already downloaded the P&L translation of W&P to my Kindle. I'm really looking forward to it.

Thanks Ricki. Two I've already read, and the other two I would have voted for if I had remembered to vote.

Have a great trip. We'll leave the light on for you.

The Name of the Rose is one of my favorite books of all times, it will be great to hear what everyone has to say about it. And the other three are all books I had thought about reading at some point in time. I am looking foward to it all.

Thanks Ricki for puting it all together. Have a great trip. How brave to backpack and tent by yourself.

Excellent list! Two rereads for me. Yays.
Enjoy the trip!

Have enough fun for all of us, Ricki!

I just swapped for "The Name of the Rose"..hurray!

What book goes with what month (pray tell, sister of William)?

NE - That schedule will be determined after the votes for the other list (Reading List) because Sherry and Ricki will coordinate the selections so that people may be able to better balance reading both selections for a given month.

Name of the Rose is one of my favs ever -- CRs discussed it at length some years back but unofficially, I believe -- would have to check. The others are all ones I voted for -- so I'm hoping real life won't upset my plan to read three of four of the CC books the next 6 months.

Have a great trip and be safe (not from the Polish but in camping)! Hmm, I'll have to start where I left off in W&P as soon as I finish my reread of Out. I'll be interested to see how long it takes people to read it.

Wow... will definitely re-read The Name of the Rose. I read it centuries ago. Will see if I can find the others in the library here.

Have a great trip, Ricki. My mother and uncle were avid birdwatchers and camping in Poland sounds like fun.

Thanks for all the good camping wishes. I had the most serendipitious (can you use the word that way) afternoon yesterday - whilst browsing in my local Oxfam book shop what did I find right in front of me but a hardbook copy of War and Peace for only £7.99 - pristine, and the new translation. Also have the Eco book here and never got around to reading it. I'm very excited about the selections - they are wonderfully international.

That's great about your book shop finds, Ricki. The new translation is only about $8 on the Kindle, too. That's a lot of reading for your money.

Thank you, Dottie. I'm intrigued by the idea of re-reading War and Peace via the Kindle, but if it's read during the school year, that will be more of a pain than the summer.

Sherry -- The Peaver translation (Kindle download) is $12.21. I got my Kindle2 "free" from amazon in exchange for reviewing 40 ABNA contestants' entries in 2 weeks time. Looking at the Kindle store, I'm a bit taken aback at the prices. Many of the modern books are only three or four bucks cheaper than the book, which seems odd to me. I expected less than half the price.

Silly me. I forget this "payment" was intended to generate money for the givers. ;-)

Newengland:

The likelihood is very high that W&P will be read this summer.

They must have upped the price since I bought it, because I know I paid less for it.

That's what I don't get. It's just words in vapor space, yet they almost charge as much as they do when felling and processing trees. Am I missing something, or is it simply a case of profit?

Of course, you can get a copy of W&P for free from other sites like Gutenberg (if I could figure out the software downloading), but I want to see the new translation, too.

Yay, looking forward to this. Thanks for the hard work Ricki, and have a great holiday!

Wonderful list, W&P, new translation, has been in TBR stack for a while now, along with two others on the list. Yay!

Ricki, have a great time! :)

Hooray! War and Peace made it! I definitely want to read it during the summer too, newengland, for the same reason.

We'll take that into consideration when we make the schedule, Barb. Which is the very best month for you for us to start the discussion?

I have been intending to read Homage to Catalonia for many years now. It is time to get that done.

For those interested James Wood has an extended article on George Orwell in the April 13 issue of The New Yorker. I have mixed feelings about it. Mr. Wood can be a bit pretentious and extremely anxious to show off his vocabulary. However, there is good background about Orwell in this article.

I'm looking forward to War and Peace too! I'd also like to request a summer reading of that one, if possible.

:)

Sherry, I'm thinking that August would be best for me, if that works for the schedule. Thanks for asking!

August it is. Now we have to build the rest of the lists around it.

Does this mean you read it completely for an Aug. 1st discussion kick-off, or is the m.o. to read along as you discuss during the month?

For most books, we try to have it read by the discussion date. But for W&P, who knows. I expect a lot of people will be discussing as they go along. If you don't have it finished by the 1st, don't let it stop you from taking part in the discussion. (And might I add that you are a very handsome man, Newengland. Familiar, too.)

People have said I'm a "dead ringer" (which now has an added wrinkle, alas).

The reason I said August is that the discussion on the Classics books are supposed to start on the 1st day of the month, so that gives me June and July to read. However, as Sherry said, the talk on War and Peace will probably be going on for quite a while.

And, thanks, Sherry!

Yes, thanks Sherry. And thanks for not calling me out on that straight line, too.

Newengland wrote: "People have said I'm a "dead ringer" (which now has an added wrinkle, alas)."

Alas indeed. Off to dream about handsome Paul now...

If I start now, maybe I'll get War & Peace read in time for the discussion. My reading has been rather slow lately... I've been knitting up a storm, so much of my quiet time has been absorbed in yarn related actvities.

A re-read of Name of the Rose sounds good too. I'm currently reading Eco's Baudolino. It's just the right fit for my current reading mood, something a bit challenging, but not to heavy, or dark. (work & current world economic situation are depressing enough.)

ok, you're on. i've read anna karenina, but never war and peace, and i'm really excited that pevear and volokhonsky have translated it - that's an added bonus!

A friend of mine just loaned me the P&V translation of W&P - my goodness, it is massive!

I may have to start soon . . .

I confess... I am reading it through www.dailylit.com (horrors!!) which sends email instalments of books to the computer (twitter, cell phone...) That way I don't have to carry it around. The drawback is that I don't know who translated it.

I expect it's the older translation, since that one is public domain.

I thought I'd read the Constance Garnett as a lad, but no! I just found the old paperback and see it says "a new translation by Ann Dunnigan."

Not so new by now, of course, and only translators seem to know the "translator scuttlebutt." I got in this game a few years back when a new translation of Don Quixote came out and I researched the back-and-forths between defenders of this translator and that. It's a book I always wanted to read but never had, so I thought maybe...

But it remained just that. A thought and a maybe.

I think these are very good choices. I read War & Peace last Spring in the new translation and thought it was wonderful. My husband is reading it now. 30 years ago, I read Homage to Catalonia and don't remember a thing. The Name of the Rose was very enjoyable, but it is another of those novels that have wafted out of my memory. That leaves The Sound of the Mountain to be discovered. Katy H

Ah...I missed all the classics discussions so far (inc. Tarzan *snips*)
But thank goodness I've read The Name of the Rose as well as War and Peace. Gosh, I hope I can find a copy of Homage to Catalonia. The other one, that's new to me. Will check it out.

Silvana, you can get a free e-book of Homage to Catalonia on Feedbooks.com. That's where I got it.

Great picks! I have been wanting to read Homage to Catalonia for a while now.

Sherry wrote: "Silvana, you can get a free e-book of Homage to Catalonia on Feedbooks.com. That's where I got it."

I got it from here. Thanks anyway, Sherry :)
I absolutely love Orwell's works so far. Hope this one lives up the expectation.

Seems like Hollywood may be keeping tabs on what we are voting for in Classics Corner :)

"Colin Firth and Kevin Spacey are buddying up in Catalonia, an adaptation of George Orwell's book. The book was based on Orwell and his wife's visit to Barcelona, where the author joined an Anarchist brigade and fought in the Spanish Civil War. Per Variety, the film will center on the relationship between Orwell and his brigade commander. Cameras roll early next year." (from E!Online)

Funny! Firth and Spacey -- now that's a duo to think about. Should be an interesting film, I would think.

Shall we wait for an announcement of a new War and Peace then? We'll have to consider our influence on Hollywood in the next list and try to think of some that would be virtually impossible to adapt...any thoughts?

Ricki:

With all the new P&V translations making Russian literature more accessible - I would not at all be surprised to see some new Hollywood adaptations on the horizon . . .

Me chiming in late, as usual. Has a date been set for Homage to Catalonia? I skimmed through all the notes in this thread but didn't notice any schedule information.

Steve W. and I swapped some notes on this book, and I'll pass along the suggestion that I made to him: that you try to get hold of the Recorded Books audio edition of Homage read by Patrick Tull. It's one of the most powerful audio narrations I've ever heard, and believe, me, I've listened to plenty. By all means, read the book first in print, but then try listening to Tull's reading. You'll find it to be a revelation if you're not already hooked on audiobooks.

Thanks for the suggestion, Kent. You know I love audiobooks, and Homage was my nomination. The schedule is here:
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1456...

I guess I should also post the schedule on the Classics board.

I finished Homage to Catalonia two or three weeks ago. I then immediately returned to page one and commenced reading it again. I just finished it the second time. What a great choice as one of the few non-fiction books we have ever done here!

Now I must do some research as to how I might get that audio edition that Grouchy referred to above shipped or air-dropped into my current location.

I'm glad it was good. I've nominated it for the last two or three go-rounds, and it finally made it. I love Orwell, but haven't read this one. Also, my trip to Spain last year fueled my interest in reading it.