What are you currently reading?

[Ken B]

Italo Calvino: Invisible Cities - Heavens, what a beautiful book. Not sure whether it's a novel, poetry, a group of stories, or something else, but the writing is incredibly imaginative. Wish I'd read this decades ago, but there you have it.

[asin]0156453800[/asin]

--Bruce

My problem is the reverse: I read this decades ago, and forget it. I liked it though.

[Mookalafalas]

My problem is the reverse: I read this decades ago, and forget it. I liked it though.

  Me too. I went through a Calvino phase in the mid-80s.  I don't remember anything about this book except the title. 

[Ken B]

  Me too. I went through a Calvino phase in the mid-80s.  I don't remember anything about this book except the title.

I am flirting with reading Boswell's Hebrides. A good idea? (Never read any Boswell or Johnson.)

[Mookalafalas]

I am flirting with reading Boswell's Hebrides. A good idea? (Never read any Boswell or Johnson.)

   Good choice, really.  This was his "test run" for the big bio, but instead of focusing on Johnson's whole life, it is a trip the two of them took in Scotland.  The tone and style are the same, but it is a bit livelier and doesn't have some of the big slow spells that occurred when Boswell was writing about slower periods in Johnson's life and pursuits. 

[Florestan]

Ian McEwan - Sweet Tooth

One of McEwan's finest female characters, Serena Frome--"rhymes with plume," the author tells us in the opening line--is both clever and beautiful, a speed-reading lit geek and a math whiz, a 1970s version of the Harvard MBA types who launch life-changing Internet startups. But in the dark and troubled Cold War days in London, there were few options for bright young women. So when a mysterious lover recruits her for the British intelligence service, MI5, Serena throws herself body and soul into an undercover operation code-named Sweet Tooth. What unfolds is a mystery, a romance, and a dazzling display of literary workmanship.

[stingo]

I have read and loved McEwan's Saturday. Should this ^^^ be the next step?

[Ken B]

   Good choice, really.  This was his "test run" for the big bio, but instead of focusing on Johnson's whole life, it is a trip the two of them took in Scotland.  The tone and style are the same, but it is a bit livelier and doesn't have some of the big slow spells that occurred when Boswell was writing about slower periods in Johnson's life and pursuits.

Thanks.
I have a rec for you Al. The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth. Pastiche 18th C picaresque, screamingly funny for the right sense of humour. Yours seems twisted just right for it. 

[Karl Henning]

Hey! Another fan of The Sot-Weed Factor!

[Mookalafalas]

Thanks.
I have a rec for you Al. The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth. Pastiche 18th C picaresque, screamingly funny for the right sense of humour. Yours seems twisted just right for it. 

thanks, ken, (and Karl ) for the recommendation.  I know the name, and read "Lost in the Funhouse" years ago.  I'll keep an eye out. For funny 18th century, however, the originals are hard to beat--well, Fielding, anyway.  Tom Jones and Joseph Andrews are fantastic, IMHO.  Joseph Andrews is actually a parody of Samuel Richardson's goody-goody weird "Pamela". 

Thread duty: I'm reading this at the moment

[asin]0520043170[/asin]

[Ken B]

thanks, ken, (and Karl ) for the recommendation.  I know the name, and read "Lost in the Funhouse" years ago.  I'll keep an eye out. For funny 18th century, however, the originals are hard to beat--well, Fielding, anyway.  Tom Jones and Joseph Andrews are fantastic, IMHO.  Joseph Andrews is actually a parody of Samuel Richardson's goody-goody weird "Pamela". 

Thread duty: I'm reading this at the moment

[asin]0520043170[/asin]

TJ is my favourite novel in English. I have read quite a lot of that period actually, Smollett, Sterne, Dryden, Pope, etc. plus plays. they order these things much better in France.
SWF is the only Barth I could get through, but it's great.

[Ken B]

Hey! Another fan of The Sot-Weed Factor!

Big time. Alas nothing else by Barth really did it for me.
I had a friend who disliked it because of the Newton section. That section is when I knew I loved it! 

[Florestan]

I have read and loved McEwan's Saturday. Should this ^^^ be the next step?

Frankly, I don't know. I'm not a McEwan expert, besides that I've read only On Chesil Beach, which I also enjoyed.

[stingo]

Frankly, I don't know. I'm not a McEwan expert, besides that I've read only On Chesil Beach, which I also enjoyed.

Fair enough. McEwan seems to be one of those writers whose books are of consistently high quality, so I will just jump in wherever.

[Karl Henning]

TJ is my favourite novel in English.

I love it.  I still remember the time in Charlottesville when I read it first.

[Karl Henning]

Big time. Alas nothing else by Barth really did it for me.

I wasn't crazy about Giles Goat-Boy, and I've not sought out anything other.  I should definitely set to a re-read of the Sot-Weed.

[Ken B]

I wasn't crazy about Giles Goat-Boy, and I've not sought out anything other.  I should definitely set to a re-read of the Sot-Weed.

I gave up on Giles part way through. The one about Scheherazade was readable.
I assume a recommendation of Tristram Shandy would be otiose?
I need to consider rereading Tom Jones ...

[kishnevi]

I gave up on Giles part way through. The one about Scheherazade was readable.
I assume a recommendation of Tristram Shandy would be otiose?
I need to consider rereading Tom Jones ...

Try Amelia instead.
There is also Anne Radcliffe:  I prefer The Italian,  but The Mysteries of Udolpho turns out to be excellent if you make it past the ubersentimental first portion (roughly the first quarter of the novel)

[Ken B]

Try Amelia instead.
There is also Anne Radcliffe:  I prefer The Italian,  but The Mysteries of Udolpho turns out to be excellent if you make it past the ubersentimental first portion (roughly the first quarter of the novel)

I rather liked Udolpho too. I read Amelia, but wasn't wild about it. Of course I may have been hoping for TJ 2 and been disappointed thereby. It was a long time ago.

[HIPster]

Just started:
[asin]0307407969[/asin]

[lisa needs braces]

Will get around to this one in a few years. I'm glad it's out.



I think the last major biography of LvB was the one by Lewis Lockwood, which I thoroughly enjoyed.