Buff's Stuff

[Ruth]

I didn't hate it, but I wasn't sufficiently taken with it to want to read more magic realism.

[Historybuff93]

Newengland wrote: "Wow, a Hemingway guy who likes Marquez??? I couldn't make 100 pages of One Hundred Years if I tried."

I was surprised too, NE. I haven't really gotten to the really crazy magical realism I've heard about--like a character shrinking or something like that. I have some experience with magical realism--but not like shrinking people--from my reading of Jorge Luis Borges. He is another author (along with Hemingway and Poe, just to name a few) I really enjoy re-reading. Any Borges fans out there?

Btw, NE, what's your opinion on JD Salinger? Lately, I've been reading his novellas Franny and Zooey. I can really see Hemingway's influence on him.

[Ken, Moderator]

I love Salinger, though I've read neither Franny nor Zooey. Loved the Nine Stories and remain a steadfast supporter of the much-maligned (these days) Holden Caulfield (The Catcher in the Rye).

I read Borge's Labyrinths and enjoyed it some years ago. As for magical realism, it holds little mystique for me. In fact, no South American writer has much wowed me so far. I'm still open minded about it and all, I'm just saying....

[Historybuff93]

I have read some of the selections from Nine Stories. There's some great writing in that book--A Perfect Day for Bananafish was excellent. It will be interesting when the date comes (I think it's around fifty years) when Salinger's unpublished work might be published.

Speaking of unpublished work ... What collection Hemingway's short stories do you have? I have a hardcover that's called something like Complete Short Stories of Hemingway. There are some unpublished stories included in the back (inlcuding a very good one about WWII). Pretty interesting stuff. I heard somewhere that after Papa Hemingway's suicide, they went through his desk and found over 2,000 unpublished works.

Happy Thanksgiving!

[Ken, Moderator]

I have In Our Time and also a collection of all the Nick Adams Stories that includes some unpublished ones like "Summer People" and "The Last Good Country."

I've always held that earlier Hemingway is better than later Hemingway -- at least for the most part. The Old Man and the Sea leaves me cold (despite the Gulf Stream).

[Historybuff93]

Ah yes, I forgot that you prefered the early Ernest.

[Sonali]

I liked Hemingway's 'Death in the afternoon'.It took me a while to get used to Marquez's style in'Solitude' but then I've become a fan. Have you read his 'Story of a death foretold'or 'Love in the time of Cholera'?

[Ken, Moderator]

Nope. I now give Marquez a wide berth.

[Historybuff93]

Sonali wrote: "I liked Hemingway's 'Death in the afternoon'.It took me a while to get used to Marquez's style in'Solitude' but then I've become a fan. Have you read his 'Story of a death foretold'or 'Love in the ..."

I haven't read Death in the Afternoon, but I have heard it's good. I haven't read anything by Marquez except One Hundred Years of Solitude. When I started the book, I really like the first chapter, but after that I had a hard time adjusting to some of the illogical and fantastic things Marquez writes.

[Historybuff93]

Hello, everyone! I haven't been posting much lately because I've been quite busy with school (and a few college classes) and writing (plus a play I'm going to enter in the BBC radio play competition).

Has anyone read anything interesting lately?

Last week I started reading Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. It is quite interesting! Lately I've been reading Borges's sonnets, The Scarlet Letter (for school), and the usual large amounts of assorted short stories. Also, I bought a book the other day called The Portable Jung. A good friend had just read some works by Jung and told me they were quite interesting. I haven't started it yet, but just from reading random sections it appears that it shall be a fascinating read.

[Carol]

I am reading The Brothers Karamazov for a nice winter read. I also have Stone's Fall and The Twain Shall Meet as a diversion from BK. Thanks for asking. Your reading list is quite the range.

[Historybuff93]

TBK is a great book to curl up with on a cold winter day and a cup of hot chocolate! I also find that in a long book like TBK or War and Peace that is sometimes nice to have a few other books just for variety.

[Carol]

So I am finding out. The details boggle the mind. I try to comment on about a weeks worth of reading. I think I may need to adjust that into smaller chunks.

[Ken, Moderator]

I'm rereading War and Peace, the new Pevear translation. What's not to love?

[Ruth]

I read an earlier translation twice. What's not to love is that I couldn't make it through the Pevear.

[Carol]

I could only make it through the Pevear translation.

[Jan]

Ruth wrote: "I read an earlier translation twice. What's not to love is that I couldn't make it through the Pevear."
The Karamazov Brothers (as Ignat Avsey calls it in his translation) was recently the subject of a group read in The Reader's Review, so you might enjoy following some of the discussions there. Since that group was suggesting the Pavear translation, I was very tempted to buy it, but test reading a couple of passages, I found the translation 'clunky' compared with the Avsey. Avsey quite rightly points out that a good translation should use the natural word order of the target language. In English we say Marx Brothers etc, so it should have been translated as the Karamazov Brothers in the first place. Reading the Avsey translation, showed it to flow nicely, so I chose that one.