What are you currently reading?

[Jo498]

Jo - is there anything else by Döblin worth reading?

No idea. It is by a wide margin his most famous book and I have not read anything else by him. He apparently wrote quite a bit besides Berlin Alexanderplatz. I recall one title of a shorter prose anthology (The killing of a buttercup) but I don't remember if I read this or only remember the funny title.

[vers la flamme]

Just finished: The Duel and other stories by Anton Chekhov (a short collection, I read it all over the weekend). Just started: Ivan Turgenev's Fathers and Sons.

Been meaning to get back to the Russians for some time and I'm enjoying everything so far. The Chekhov was amazing. I was only really familiar with his dramas before, but his short stories are just as good. Excellent characters. I've heard him criticized for being too cynical and too morbid, but I didn't find that to be the case.

[Florestan]

Just started: Ivan Turgenev's Fathers and Sons.

You're in for a treat.

The Chekhov was amazing. I was only really familiar with his dramas before, but his short stories are just as good. Excellent characters. I've heard him criticized for being too cynical and too morbid, but I didn't find that to be the case.

Cynical and morbid are the last things that come to my mind about Chekhov. I find him humane and humorous, just as Turgenev.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

The Chekhov was amazing. I was only really familiar with his dramas before, but his short stories are just as good. Excellent characters. I've heard him criticized for being too cynical and too morbid, but I didn't find that to be the case.

To some degrees Chekhov's works present fatalistic and pessimistic views, which I like. In that regard, Thomas Hardy, Katherine Mansfield, and Yasunari Kawabata often remind me of Chekhov. Mansfield was publicly influenced by Chekhov. Her Garden Party and other short stories are terrific.
Btw, Chekhov was a ladys' man.

[AlberichUndHagen]

Halfway through George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss and liking it very much. My favorite characters are Maggie, Mr. Tulliver, Mr. Wakem, Philip Wakem and Mrs. Glegg. For some reason I find Tom Tulliver bit of a boring character. I think Maggie has much more wit in her.

[Florestan]

Finished this:



Lermontov - A Hero of Our Time

Excellent. And some very great insight on music, too.

Meanwhile, Princess Mary had finished her song. Murmurs of praise were to be heard all around. I went up to her after all the other guests, and said something rather carelessly to her on the subject of her voice.

She made a little grimace, pouting her lower lip, and dropped a very sarcastic curtsey.

"That is all the more flattering," she said, "because you have not been listening to me at all; but perhaps you do not like music?"...

"On the contrary, I do... After dinner, especially."

"Grushnitski is right in saying that you have very prosaic tastes... and I see that you like music in a gastronomic respect."

"You are mistaken again: I am by no means an epicure. I have a most wretched digestion. But music after dinner puts one to sleep, and to sleep after dinner is healthful; consequently I like music in a medicinal respect. In the evening, on the contrary, it excites my nerves too much: I become either too melancholy or too gay. Both are fatiguing, where there is no positive reason for being either sorrowful or glad. And, moreover, melancholy in society is ridiculous, and too great gaiety is unbecoming"...

Also, I must confess that I have lost interest in Proust. After all, what do I care about the sentimental tribulations of an aging intellectual dandy in love with a winsome coquette, or about the various snobs and fops who grate on his nerves? 

[ritter]

...
Also, I must confess that I have lost interest in Proust. After all, what do I care about the sentimental tribulations of an aging intellectual dandy in love with a winsome coquette, or about the various snobs and fops who grate on his nerves? 

"No es la miel para la boca del asno" (Sancho Panza in Don Quijote, Part 1, Chapter LII). 

Good evening to you, Andrei.

[Florestan]

"No es la miel para la boca del asno" (Sancho Panza in Don Quijote, Part 1, Chapter LII). 

Equivalent Romanian proverb: Ce știe țăranul ce e șofranul? (literally, What does the peasant know what is saffron?)

Good evening to you, Andrei.

Good evening, Rafael.

[Florestan]

To some degrees Chekhov's works present fatalistic and pessimistic views, which I like. In that regard, Thomas Hardy, Katherine Mansfield, and Yasunari Kawabata often remind me of Chekhov.

Fatalistic and pessimistic views do not preclude a humorous and humane approach, such as Chekhov's and Hardy's*. Haven't read anything by Mansfield or Kawabata.

*I'm currently reading Far from the Madding Crowd and ;pretty much every page gave me at least one chuckle.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Fatalistic and pessimistic views do not preclude a humorous and humane approach, such as Chekhov's and Hardy's*. Haven't read anything by Mansfield or Kawabata.

*I'm currently reading Far from the Madding Crowd and ;pretty much every page gave me at least one chuckle.

Well-said. Their novels are humorous as well. I haven't read Madding Crowd, but I heard that it is a great novel. I will buy an edition in my primary language.  I re-read his short stories this summer and they were wonderful. Thousand Cranes (or Snow Country) by Kawabata is worth reading, imo.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

The Cynic Philosophers: From Diogenes to Julian.

[steve ridgway]

I'm reading The Gallery of Geography by Rev. Thomas Milner, 1889. The original owner wrote his name and house name in it so I was able to find it on a house sales website and see where he probably sat and read it looking out at the forested hills of central Scotland.

[LKB]

Just finished Richard Preston's Crisis in the Red Zone: The Story of the Deadliest Ebola Outbreak in History, and of the Outbreaks to Come.

Quite illuminating, I couldn't help feeling relieved that our current pandemic doesn't involve a filovirus.

LKB

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Just picked up a copy of Louise Glück's "Poems 1962-2012" to read.

PD

[steve ridgway]

Fifty Shades of Grey

[SimonNZ]

Fifty Shades of Grey

Verdict?


TD: Finished:



currently on the go:

[Mandryka]

[steve ridgway]

Verdict?

Half way through Fifty Shades of Grey it's very easy reading, a transparent writing style that conveys the story clearly with no attempt to impress the reader with sophisticated use of language or references. I'm finding it interesting to learn about the different sexual practices and attitudes, what the attraction is, why people might enjoy them, and the general idea that one's preconceptions and conditioning might have made one reject something as unpleasant or disgusting when in fact when one tries it, it might actually turn out to be rather enjoyable. I doubt I'll be adopting either character as a role model but it's making me think about where I agree or disagree with them and what my own position might be.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Schrodinger.

[Florestan]

Schrodinger.

What's his view of it?