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What are we reading? 26th July 2021
I started recording the publishers of the books i read since about 13 years ago and i looked up the list, after the Picador discussionSo since 2007, the top 5 publishers of the books i have read in last 13 years:
Penguin (62)
Vintage (20)
NYRB Classics (21)
OUP (11)
Text Classics (9)
I think it shows the variety of publishers, that text classics(only discovered in 2018, is in the top 5), just outside the top 5 are:
New Canadian Library (8)
Faber (8)
Norvik (7)
Harper (6)
North Western Uni Press (6)
Pushkin CLassics (6)
10% of the 380 books in my list2007-2021) are published by University presses. It doesnt include every book i have read in that time period but about 85%
Machenbach wrote:I strongly associate a few authors with Picador - Swift (Graham), Toibin, Eco, De Botton, Oliver Sacks and, most strongly of all (for me), Ondaatje. Others include Carl Jung, Andre Dubus, Edmund White, Richard Klein and Angelo Maria Ripellino. So, still only 2 women - 3 if I include Slaves Of New York which I once had, but evidently no longer seem to.
Ha, I found some more! Your post reminded me of the Swifts and Co. I must have been really tired yesterday evening, not keeping up with the alphabet and stopping at R for Rushdie. Here’s the ones starting from S:
That poor Edmund White edition looks really battered... oh dear. But it’s still going strong. Kind of appropriate for this author.
Like scarletnoir, I own some Picador Chatwins, and these were the ones that came to mind first, and not much else. Glad I misremembered! I have also started categorizing the other books now, at least with looks (Virago proving quite interesting, too, for example)… if it gets worse, I will have a new hobby!
Also, found out that Patricia Duncker’s Seven Tales of Sex and Death and James Miranda Barry were Picador publications as well – another female author, again with colours. I used to own her Hallucinating Foucault, too. Another one that was not returned, grrr. However, I am not sure whose cat to puke on in this case… And there’s that I was never much of a puker either. And not even much of a drunk, except for almost once. But that’s a story for another day, maybe. (My friend still gets an amused glint in her eye when this comes up.)
I looked at the (few) French-language books I own and noticed that various books from Gallimard's folio are a little similar to Picador’s white spines (Simone de Beauvoir, Memoires d’une fille rangée; Jean-Paul Sartre, Huis Clos; Camus, L’étranger; Fred Uhlmann, L’ami retrouvé;…)
Machenbach wrote:
Royle reckons that The Debt to Pleasure is one of the three most commonly encountered. He also includes a brief interview with Jackson iirc - a book I don’t know anything about.
I was really curious about Mick Jackson’s The Underground Man, too! I don't remember much, except that I thought it fairly well-written, but was not swayed at the time. (But it is so long ago that I might well think differently today!) From some glimpses just now, it has started to remind me of Christian Kracht’s Imperium (published after Jackson’s novel), but that may be a false impression.
I will let one of the narrators speak for himself:
I seem to find the less I eat the livelier I become. Each rejected savoury gives me an extra charge of vim. All these years I have thought it was food that kept me going – the fuel for my body’s fire. Now I am not so sure. Recently I went for a whole day without eating a single thing and when I woke the following morning felt just as bright as a button. Mealtimes have begun to slip by without even a hint of an appetite stirring in me. […] But it is not as if I am starving myself. Yesterday I ate a pear and two dry scones. Today I have already had an onion pastry and shall not be in the least surprised if I have something else before I retire. (pp. 164-165)
Machenbach wrote:
Oh, and Josef Skvorecky was a Picador writer. I was very fond of him back then. Eric Newby has also popped into my head. I’ll stop now.
Ach, please don’t. I am intrigued, have not read anything by either. Of course you would know both, AB76, as you are the one coming up with German-language summer novels (hats off)!
@Hushpuppy: Regarding the Picador bias, I am not sure either, like Mach. This was a time when I would read a lot of authors who were just becoming modern classics – and there is a bias, still…
Good luck from me, too, Lisa! And thanks, Paul, I laughed out loud at your comment.
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"No you don't."
I'm back from courthouse now; everyone was sent home after 30 minutes - "No trials today." Submitted my jury compensation form for $10/day and 65 cents in mileage. If the same thing happens tomorrow, I'm good to go, having met my two-day assignment. Still working on my tics and twitches.
CCCubbon wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Anne wrote: "AB76 wrote: "GOOD BOOK DEED:I mentioned yesterday that i had discussed with an old lady at the day centre i volunteer at, that i would get her an Enid Blyton book to read..."
Puck of Pook's Hill is worth a read. I read it as a child and enjoyed it. English History, and with all the caveats about Kipling, still good stories. Huon of Bordeaux and the Lady Esclairmonde feature in it I think- Elves in the style of JRR Tolkien-unless that is "Rewards & Fairies".
Anne wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "... 'Gatsby' being the only definite let-down - it didn't work, for me ..."We're members of a very small club. I dislike The Great Gatsby too, but most of the worl..."
I'm a member of that club. I read Gatsby-once-I thought it was totally boring and overrated. The movie too.
scarletnoir wrote: "Sandya wrote: "My Mother used to tell me "If you aren't a good girl, we will send you to India and marry you to an old man".It was a terrifying threat to someone aged only 11 or 12. That poor gir..."
A horrible dilemma.
giveusaclue wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Standing outside the courthouse, waiting for it to open. A man just approached me and said “If I go to trial I want you to be on my jury.”"Love it - had he been charged with stalk..."
Ooh er !
Lljones wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Well, definitely a novel pick-up line! Your response?...""No you don't."
I'm back from courthouse now; everyone was sent home after 30 minutes - "No trials today." Submitted ..."
lets hope your travails are over tommorow and no more "grand mal" fake seizures or tics are needed. Maybe you should declare that Trump didnt lose the election and you will be escorted out within seconds...
Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Quite sure I am not the only one who chuckled (or rather, snorted) this week on reading up!Picadors:
I enjoyed looking for white Picadors just now. At the outset, I was pretty sure about some Bru..."
I had a wee chuckle at the places of puking. I once puked up by the door of the Roisin Dubh pub in Galway when I was a student circa 1999.
Machenbach wrote: "Nicholas Royle, White Spines: Confessions of a Book CollectorGiven the nature of this book, it’s perhaps fitting that the only book of Royle’s that I’ve previously read was picked..."
It really is an amazing collection, but my reaction was 'it's so organised, almost clinically so'. Yes, I am stating the obvious. I looked around at my own slapdash, randomly crammed bookshelf and sighed. There are even pillars of books dotted around the house. Maybe I need to buy more bookshelves.
I looked at the photo a couple of days ago and there was something unsettling about it, but couldn't quite engage my brain fully as to what it was (post night shift). Looking at it again now, it reminded me of looking at bleached coral.
Whilst I do have more books than time to read, I can't imagine buying books I have no intention of reading, but each to their own!
I don't know if it has been mentioned yet, but of books with "Snow" in the title, I noticed The Snows of Yesteryear by Gregor Von Rezzori in the New York Review of Books classics, with an introduction by John Banville.
SydneyH wrote: "I don't know if it has been mentioned yet, but of books with "Snow" in the title, I noticed The Snows of Yesteryear by Gregor Von Rezzori in the New York Review of Books classics, with an introduct..."Or how about - August Snow - first in a mystery series set in Detroit.
Bill wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "Most recently I bought Monsters by Barry Windsor-Smith from there for a mate who, it turned out, already had a copy. I'm not sure when, or if, I'll read it."I remember when Bar..."
A lot of Barry's Conan work was good and innovative.
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So, much ado about nothing. Oh well, I got a good anecdote out of the whole experience.
I've been a dormant juror for over a week. I, too, may drop out of the system.
Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."So, much ado about nothing. Oh well, I got a good..."
Now that’s over Lisa, could you ask if there is any progress with our inability to comment on photos yet for it’s been months since we were able to do so. Many thanks.
I tested again just now, wrote a couple of words as a photo comment, posted, they were there, went to another site, came back and my two words had vanished again.
Anne wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "... 'Gatsby' being the only definite let-down - it didn't work, for me ..."We're members of a very small club. I dislike The Great Gatsby too, but most of the worl..."
Yes - and I admit, I'm baffled. Most books ('classics') which I dislike, I can at least understand what others see in it... but not that one.
I forgot to include another one I didn't care for from the list - which would make it roughly 20 likes, 2 not - The World According to Garp by John Irving... which was given away free at the time as part of a promotion. It was readable enough - and indeed, I did read another Irving - but decided that he was a facile, superficial and likely cynical writer. So no more after that.
Fuzzywuzz wrote: "Machenbach wrote: "Nicholas Royle, White Spines: Confessions of a Book CollectorGiven the nature of this book, it’s perhaps fitting that the only book of Royle’s that I’ve previou.
I watched a TV programme about Gibson guitars and a man had spent a lifetime and a fortune collecting them just to hang them on the wall, I found it heartbreaking, it was like seeing the heads of stuffed animals, there were those instruments meant to be played and heard, they needed bringing to life, but as you say each to their own I suppose.
CCCubbon wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."So, much ado about nothing. Oh we..."
Pleased for you Lisa 🙂. More time to spend reading!
AB76 wrote: "
The Fall of Heaven: The Pahlavis and the Final Days of Imperial Iran is a fasacinating and d..."Interesting review... at the time, it did indeed feel as if the Shah, and the West generally, misjudged the situation badly.
I was teaching in France at the time, and taught a large number of young Iranian refugees, whose families had sent them to safety, away from the Ayatollah. One told me he would likely have been sent to his death in the Iran-Iraq war had he not fled; another rode all the way from Tehran to Pakistan on a motor bike to escape. Two of the boys were the most brilliant mathematicians I ever taught, and some of the girls were definitely gifted as well.
Mach, I rather liked John Banville’s Snow , mainly for the language, the story is rather predictable. Like you I am certain that I have read Snow Falling on Cedars but so long ago I cannot remember the tale.Have you ever wondered Mach where all the words and stories that we read and forget go? They must be in there somewhere because when one starts to read one of these forgotten books, bits come drifting back.
Machenbach wrote: "CCCubbon wrote: "First year at grammar school 1949/50 and I was asked to choose a book as a prize and I asked for that book. Didn’t get it but was given Puck of Pook’s Hill instead by Kipling which..."I did not think of it in that way before, Mach, just an old prize. I went and found it upstairs just for you.
https://postimg.cc/Bt60PMCz
https://postimg.cc/s1BLR8m3
I have another from the same period, a spelling prize called Children’s Village. After the war the Pestalozzi village was set up in Switzerland for orphans. The organisation helps low income children with education now but it started with refugee children.
The dictionary and Complete Shakespeare, other prizes, are rather worse for wear now.
Lljones wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Well, definitely a novel pick-up line! Your response?...""No you don't."
I'm back from courthouse now; everyone was sent home after 30 minutes - "No trials today." Submitted ..."
If you want to improve your 'tics and twitches' you should study Klaus Kinski in 'For a few dollars more':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7Awv...
If in a more highbrow mood, Kinsky no doubt produces the goods somewhere in Herzog's "Aguirre. Wrath of God", and 'Fitzcarraldo', as well!
Machenbach wrote: "Andy wrote: "MB… unable to reply to your original post for some reason…snow in title, I needed my GR to prompt me.
A 5 star read for me was Moon of the Crusted Snow, which I was ..."
I also read "The Snow Falling on Cedars" some time ago - over-hyped and over-praised, IMO. Mediocre.
I would not waste my time on any cop book by Banville - he has no clue in that genre. Whether his literary output is any better, I have no idea. Suffice it to say that my reading of Christine Falls by 'Benjamin Black' made up my mind to never bother to find out!
Machenbach wrote: "I'm often just left a few years (or even months or weeks) later with quite vague impressions"...Yes, indeed - it's called 'growing old'!
FWIW, I can nearly always remember my 'feeling' about a book -
masterpiece, entertaining, readable, mediocre, OK, could not finish, over-rated, or just plain crap - but unless it's one I've read multiple times, or recently, it's much harder to give reasons.
Ah, well - didn't Nietzsche say: "I would have to be a barrel of memory, to carry my reasons, too, around with me!"
Machenbach wrote: "The one I liked the most, though, was The Cowards. "That sounds interesting, and I've added it to my TBR/Possibles list...
Have you ever seen the outstanding trilogy of films directed by Andrzej Wajda set during roughly that period of Polish history - 'A generation', 'Kanal', and 'Ashes and Diamonds'? Well worth viewing, if not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrzej...
Machenbach wrote: "Kathy Lette was a Picador author. I only know her from her being on TV from time to time, 'though I regularly got her and Ruby Wax confused. I've never read anything of hers but mentally pigeonhole her as a kind of proto-Helen Fielding/Candace Bushnell type on the basis of no basis at all."FWIW, and based on relatively little familiarity with either, I though Wax (USA) was pretty clever and Lette (Aussie) not so much - the nationalities added to clarify which was which... please don't anyone think this is some sort of nationalistic denigration!
As for 'Helen Fielding' and 'Candace Bushnell' - no idea who they are. Definitely 'after my time', as they don't say on 'Pointless'!
Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."So, much ado about nothing. Oh well, I got a good..."
So, no need to practice any Klaus Kinski grimaces yet, then!
My apologies to all for multiple posts - a bit stressed ATM... That'll be it for today.
scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."So, much ado about nothing. Oh we..."
boy could Kinski grimace....the master of grimacing!
scarletnoir wrote: "AB76 wrote: "The Fall of Heaven: The Pahlavis and the Final Days of Imperial Iran is a fasac..."the brutality of the "revolutionary courts" in 1979-81 was quite shocking, hundreds killed with very little legal grounding. It seemed the Ayatollah released a punishing and brutal islamic justice upon his enemies without a second thought
Machenbach wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "@Mach - a quick look at my shelves unearthed a few Picadors - Dispatches by Michael Herr, The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin, and a whole load of Knut Ha..."i think all my Hamsuns are published by Souvenir Press or Green Integer
AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."So, much ado ..."
Not much acting required I think. He basically played himself.
scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "Standing outside the courthouse, waiting for it to open. A man just approached me and said “If I go to trial I want you to be on my jury.”"Well, definitely a novel pick-up line! Y..."
Or the opening line of that book you were always going to write.😁
Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least two years."..."
on a trip to Poland about 16 years ago i read his diaries, or autobiog, it was an insight into the life of a real character...
I am a creature of habit. Each Thursday I take a look at the Washington Post's Book Section (once upon a time - Book World) to see what's new. Today, it's
by William Kotzwinkle (of
fame. Just the title (
) alone is enough to get my attention. And luckily it is on order at the library, and I am first in line!Since I finished my current mystery in the wee hours this morning, I have plucked
from one of my stacks to be opened forthwith. Nothing like a chuckle for a week that hasn't had many so far.
Being memorable in some fashion is probably my fundamental requirement for a book. I’d rather read a memorable bad book than a forgettable pleasant one.
Machenbach wrote: "'though some of the reviews suggest that his skills might not stretch to writing"I don't read many comic books at all any more, so most of the artists are unfamiliar to me unless they’re old enough to have done some work in the “silver age” of my youth.
In my early reading, I got used to the “Marvel method” where a writer and artist would collaborate in coming up with a plot, the artist would then draw the story – being responsible for pacing and sometimes improvising plot details or developments as the story progressed – and the writer would then add dialogue and narrative to the finished panels. Different artists exercised different levels of independence (which led to the bitter arguments about who deserved credit for what), but who drew a story always had a big impact on the resulting narrative.
After that time, comics seem to become a writer’s medium, with books being sold on the basis of being by Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, or Alan Moore, for example. My understanding is that these writers provided pretty detailed scripts that gave the artist less control over the narrative, so that who drew any particular installment had less importance to the effect of the final product.
I still tend to look for books which are drawn and written by the same hand, though one talent usually seems dominant. I’ve liked books by Daniel Clowes and Charles Burns, who seem adept at both elements.
AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again for at least..."Oh, I am sure Kinski was a "real character". His whole life was proof of it. He treated everybody like shit. He sexually abused his daughters Not that anybody ever accused him of the latter (until his daughter Pola spoke out, supported by her sister, over 20 years after his death): he himself somehow boasted about it. Not only in his autobiography. According to Herzog he once said he would probably "get" 20 years in America for what he had done with Pola and Nastassja alone.
However: I do not think he behaved like a piece of shit for 24/24. Only for maybe 14/24.
Ben Okri. The Freedom Artist: I found this book something of a curate's egg, The first few chapters and the end section-particularly the last few paragraphs were a delight.It was the middle that was a bit of a slog, which was a shame but there was not enough plot or character to carry the tale along.
The basic premise was nothing that Huxley, Orwell or indeed Plato before all of them, had not dealt with and Okri made a brave attempt to relate it to the world we find ourselves in now.
It didn't quite come off but kudos for making the attempt.
I have read that this book has been compared to Kafka, I thought that it bore more comparison to an Arthurian grail quest, but perhaps that is just me.
Machenbach wrote: "Fuzzywuzz wrote: "It really is an amazing collection, but my reaction was 'it's so organised, almost clinically so'. Yes, I am stating the obvious. I looked around at my own slapdash, randomly cram..."my bookcases dont have any real method to them, though i tend to stack modern novels apart from the classic ones.
My 20 odd years of reading are taking its toll on available space in my modest 18th century gaff. I reckon in about 3-4 years (if i'm still around), i will need some bespoke bookcases installed and lose somw wallspace. The other option is to do a "stock take" in December 2023 and fillet all the books i dont need to keep but i dont think like that
Holiday by Stanley Middleton(1974), makes me long for a pre-Thatcherite England and to explore it via time travel...I know that the right always are happy to slag off the 1970s as a terrible socialist nightmare but i get the feeling of another England in Middletons subtle ode to failed marriages and North Sea resorts.
Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bother you again..."So you think it not too bad that he sexually abused his daughters and boasted of it….
CCCubbon wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bo..."Itss a similar case to Eric Gill, the sculptor when i realised he had not only molested his daughters but also slept with his dog
Kinski and Gill are both filed under the banner "vile", the separation of the artist from his art is always difficult and i have previously advocated it but in this instance, i should have added a disclaimer to the reference to Kinski being a character!
AB76 wrote: " Holiday by Stanley Middleton(1974), makes me long for a pre-Thatcherite England and to explore it via time travel...I know that the right always are happy to slag off the 1970s as a terrible soc..."
You can't remember those years can you?
CCCubbon wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Georg wrote: "AB76 wrote: "scarletnoir wrote: "Lljones wrote: "It's over, folks. No juries required tomorrow, I've met my obligation, county clerk assures me "we won't bo..."Hm, I am not sure why you got that impression. I rather thought I had unequivocally voiced my opinion: that I think he was a piece of sh*** I would not be tempted to even call a human being.
Bill wrote: "Being memorable in some fashion is probably my fundamental requirement for a book. I’d rather read a memorable bad book than a forgettable pleasant one."
I wonder if you'd say that if you were in a (monthly) book group. Forgettable pleasant books are definitely what I want twelve times a year. I'm fine with bad books if I've selected them myself, but am decidedly grouchy, not to say downright misanthropic, when they're selected by other people.
I wonder if you'd say that if you were in a (monthly) book group. Forgettable pleasant books are definitely what I want twelve times a year. I'm fine with bad books if I've selected them myself, but am decidedly grouchy, not to say downright misanthropic, when they're selected by other people.
I'm just home from work, fed and watered. I went to the computer to find this gem from Mr Fuzzwuzz on the screen :'It is most likely I will die next to a pile of books I was meaning to read', as per Lemony Snicket. What a greeting!
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Thanks MK, I have already read it many moons ago.