What are you currently reading?

[Biffo]

Well, I'm glad Fergus to be responsible for you having a nostalgia trip rather than the other way round!


The 39 Steps has an absurd number of coincidences but the plot device of a completely innocent man being pursued by the bad guys and the police is very entertaining. It reminded me of 'North by Northwest' which is itself like a forerunner of a James Bond film.

I bought a collection of Buchan's other books for £2.00. Are they worth reading?

According to Wikipedia Buchan wrote six Richard Hannay adventures. I definitely read two and vaguely remember reading a third (The Three Hostages, possibly) - I also remember there was diminishing returns with The 39 Steps being easily the best. If you have it give Salute to Adventurers a try.

[vandermolen]

According to Wikipedia Buchan wrote six Richard Hannay adventures. I definitely read two and vaguely remember reading a third (The Three Hostages, possibly) - I also remember there was diminishing returns with The 39 Steps being easily the best. If you have it give Salute to Adventurers a try.

Thanks. Will do.

[aligreto]

Well, I'm glad Fergus to be responsible for you having a nostalgia trip rather than the other way round!


The 39 Steps has an absurd number of coincidences but the plot device of a completely innocent man being pursued by the bad guys and the police is very entertaining. It reminded me of 'North by Northwest' which is itself like a forerunner of a James Bond film.

I bought a collection of Buchan's other books for £2.00. Are they worth reading?

The only other Buchan book that I have read is Greenmantle. I would say that they are of their time but probably worth reading if one accepts them for what they are,  a light read.

[SimonNZ]

taking a vacation from the to-read pile with this:



and am thoroughly enjoying it

[AlberichUndHagen]

[SimonNZ]

started:

[Ken B]

Florestan wanted to know what I thought of Grossman's Life and Fate, which I just finished.

I am going to quote a couple Amazon reviews that capture my reaction pretty well between them.

But then there are the myriad characters, most of whom are incompletely drawn. This reader found himself returning time and again to the 18 page list of chief characters to keep track of who is who.

An incredible look, on a very intimate level, at life in Stalin's Russia. This is how World War II looked to individual Russians on a day to day basis. I've seen nothing else like it. Fair warning: it can be hard to keep track of all the characters. Also, this is not a conventional novel with a linear plot. It's more like a series of short stories or vignettes. But everything is tied together in an over-arching structure.

I still, after 35 years, remember some characters in War and Peace. I won't remember many of those in this book, and that puts a ceiling on my affection for it. But I agree with the second comment too.

Goya and Picasso both painted war in Spain. I prefer Goya. I remember faces from Goya, but Guernica is a great painting too.

[Florestan]

Florestan wanted to know what I thought of Grossman's Life and Fate, which I just finished.

I am going to quote a couple Amazon reviews that capture my reaction pretty well between them.

I still, after 35 years, remember some characters in War and Peace. I won't remember many of those in this book, and that puts a ceiling on my affection for it. But I agree with the second comment too.

Goya and Picasso both painted war in Spain. I prefer Goya. I remember faces from Goya, but Guernica is a great painting too.

That's fair enough.

I remember a few characters, especially an old soldier in the besieged Leningrad who asked his newly arrived politruk something like that: I've always wanted to ask some knowledgeable person form the Party, comrade: if we really apply "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs", don't you think that many would be dead drunk at 10 am?

[Ken B]

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
Susanna Clarke

Because Life and Fate wasn't long enough ...

[SimonNZ]

More a straight autobiography and overview of her political work than getting into the mechanics and the nuts and bolts of UN work I was hoping for. Not essential, then, but still happy to have given it my time.

[SimonNZ]

So what's everyone else reading?

currently I'm doing a second read of this:



In my early twenties I read practically every word Orwell wrote, but this, while having much to recommend it was never one of my favorites, unlike Down And Out In Paris And London or the unjustly neglected Keep The Aspidistra Flying. And I'm on the whole confirming that with this second reading. I can't imagine I'll need a third in the future.

[aligreto]

So what's everyone else reading?

currently I'm doing a second read of this:



In my early twenties I read practically every word Orwell wrote, but this, while having much to recommend it was never one of my favorites, unlike Down And Out In Paris And London or the unjustly neglected Keep The Aspidistra Flying. And I'm on the whole confirming that with this second reading. I can't imagine I'll need a third in the future.

I was also an avid reader of Orwell in my early twenties. I wonder how he would read for me after a lifetime of living. You may have persuaded me to revisit him as he had completely disappeared from my radar.

[ritter]

More proustian stuff:

[asin]8804716207[/asin]

Lorenza Foschini enjoyed an international success some years ago with Proust's Overcoat, which dealt with Jacques Guérin's obsessive quest to save all things related to Proust (manuscripts and personal belongings) from dispersion or destruction. In this new (short—169 pages) book, she deals with Proust's and Reynaldo Hahn's romance and later friendship. Very well written, in short chapters that are precisely located and dated (and profusely annotated, with clear indication of the sources of each and every statement made), this is a very enjoyable read. The book (released in September 2019) was immediately translated into French, and I expect an English version will appear soon.

[Mandryka]

Really thought provoking! 

[Florestan]

More proustian stuff:

[asin]8804716207[/asin]

Lorenza Foschini enjoyed an international success some years ago with Proust's Overcoat, which dealt with Jacques Guérin's obsessive quest to save all things related to Proust (manuscripts and personal belongings) from dispersion or destruction. In this new (short—169 pages) book, she deals with Proust's and Reynaldo Hahn's romance and later friendship. Very well written, in short chapters that are precisely located and dated (and profusely annotated, with clear indication of the sources of each and every statement made), this is a very enjoyable read. The book (released in September 2019) was immediately translated into French, and I expect an English version will appear soon.

That looks interesting.

[aligreto]

Shusaku Endo: Silence





I have just finished reading this account of the Japanese suppression and total unacceptance of the attempt by Christian missionaries to introduce Christianity. It is set in the mid seventeenth century and the language [or perhaps the translation] does not give one the dusty feel of an old historic novel. On the contrary, the language is modern, vibrant and alive. I enjoyed it.

[Ken B]

An interesting article on the dismantling of Boeing's corporate culture.

Florestan or any other techie will find it interesting and depressing and probably familiar

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/how-boeing-lost-its-bearings/602188/

[SimonNZ]

a couple of things on the go:



The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh

They Can't Kill Us All: Ferguson, Baltimore, and a New Era in America's Racial Justice Movement

[Mandryka]

Joseph Roulin was a postman, alcoholic, who befriended Van Gough in Arles. We know him through his picture



I'm reading Pierre Michon's short and very dense and challenging essay on Roulin, an imaginative projection made partly on the basis of what little we know of his life, but equally importantly on the basis of the picture Vincent made of him. The book is difficult because it's like a glimpse into a complex, tortured,disillusioned drunken mind -- the glimpse is so deep it's painful.

I love Michon, I don't know if he's been translated. I've read a book by him on Rimbaud, and another on the First French Republic, Les Onze. All really challenging books.

[dissily Mordentroge]

An interesting article on the dismantling of Boeing's corporate culture.

Florestan or any other techie will find it interesting and depressing and probably familiar

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/how-boeing-lost-its-bearings/602188/

Allowing M BA's to take over an industry or a university is a recipe for absurdity couched in incomprehensible pseudo-theory.