What are you currently reading?

[LKB]

Currently finishing up John Toland's The Rising Sun. Hopefully I'll be into something new ( or old ) tomorrow.

Cheers,

LKB

[Ken B]

Currently finishing up John Toland's The Rising Sun. Hopefully I'll be into something new ( or old ) tomorrow.

Cheers,

LKB

Want another Pacific War book? Fire in the Sky by Eric Bergerud. About the air war in the South Pacific.

TD Dead Souls, just starting.

[LKB]

Want another Pacific War book? Fire in the Sky by Eric Bergerud. About the air war in the South Pacific.

TD Dead Souls, just starting.

Thanks Ken B, I'll definitely look into that one.

Cheers,

LKB

[NikF]

The Shape of a City by Julien Gracq.

[asin]1885586396[/asin]

On Monday I've a train journey and this is the book I'll be reading during the increasingly smaller gaps that exist between long and dreamy gazes out of the window.

[Jaakko Keskinen]

Let's see if this is really The Great American Novel.

[Parsifal]

Stone Mattress, by Margaret Atwood

This is a marvelous collection of short stories. The first three are a set of interlocking stories of a group of writers, told at different times from different points of view. The others range from the literary to the macabre. The final tale veers towards Atwood's dystopian style. A pair of residents of an assisted living facility try to survive when their facility is under siege from a populist movement, of sorts.

A really good book.

[Christo]

Finished Buddenbrooks. I enjoyed it greatly, although I liked the beginning and the middle parts more than the ending, the ending got a bit too depressing for my current state of mind (yes, I know that is exactly the point of the novel, decline of a family and all that) although I enjoyed the Wagner references.

Thanks for letting us know! I read it back in 1978, when I was 16; it was my second book in German, after Faust I & II - and I didn't get all the details, but read it with pleasure. Now it's on the agenda - for November - of one of my reading circles. Hope to report back. 

[LKB]

Currently bouncing between Farnham's Freehold by Heinlein, and Chaos by James Gleick.

Cheers,

LKB

[North Star]

Had a 10% off coupon for Bookdepository and no French poetry in the shelf, so I ordered this lot.

     

[ritter]

Had a 10% off coupon for Bookdepository and no French poetry in the shelf, so I ordered this lot.

     

All wonderful, wonderful! A couple of verses by Baudelaire grace my signature on this forum, Verlaine has some stunningly beautiful poems which I know by heart, Mallarmé is challenging (in the best possible way). Perhaps I'm a bit less fond of Rimbaud, I must admit...

Enjoy, Karlo, cher ami.

[North Star]

All wonderful, wonderful! A couple of verses by Baudelaire grace my signature on this forum, Verlaine has some stunningly beautiful poems which I know by heart, Mallarmé is challenging (in the best possible way). Perhaps I'm a bit less fond of Rimbaud, I must admit...

Enjoy, Karlo, cher ami.

Merci beaucoup, Rafael! They're all completely unknown to me really, apart from their vast reputation and influence.

[Spineur]

Merci beaucoup, Rafael! They're all completely unknown to me really, apart from their vast reputation and influence.

Is is unfortunate that there is no translation of the prestigious "La Pléiade" collection which contains real treasures.  André Gide made an anthology of french poetry which contains what most people would consider as the pinnacle of french poetry in a small volume that you can take on a trip with you.  I always do.



The two poets who I treasure that are not represented in this anthology are Jean Cocteau and Jacques Prévert.  They came after Gide.

[North Star]

Is is unfortunate that there is no translation of the prestigious "La Pléiade" collection which contains real treasures.  André Gide made an anthology of french poetry which contains what most people would consider as the pinnacle of french poetry in a small volume that you can take on a trip with you.  I always do.

The two poets who I treasure that are not represented in this anthology are Jean Cocteau and Jacques Prévert.  They came after Gide.

That makes the French poetic tradition sound very compact - but of course the 'greatest hits' that 'most people' know is inevitably that, in any language. And it does indeed sound like a good idea to translate such an anthology.
Thinking even more recent poets, have you read Yves Bonnefoy?

[Spineur]

Thinking even more recent poets, have you read Yves Bonnefoy?

I have and I like a number of his poems.  He has also done what is considered as the best translation of William Shakespeare plays.

[North Star]

I have and I like a number of his poems.  He has also done what is considered as the best translation of William Shakespeare plays.

Very good.

[Jaakko Keskinen]

Re-reading much beloved Herman Melville classic, "Mardi, and a Voyage Thither.

[SimonNZ]

[Christo]

An excellent history of the "hillbilly" music of North Carolina, Virginia and the Piedmont area.  Tells a lot of the settlement and economic history of this region as well as focusing on the musicians and music from the turn of the 20th century to post-WWII country music.

That story sounds really interesting. But is there any music in it, worth hearing? 

[Florestan]

Today, while waiting for my car to be repaired:



Dostoevsky - Humiliated and Insulted

I started and almost finished it. Not among his best novels and a quite implausible main plot imho, but recognizably his style and themes.

[LKB]

Moon Shot, nominally by Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton.

It may not be the best overview of America's race to the moon during the 1960's, but I've found it worthwhile.

Remembering,

LKB