What are you currently reading?

[LKB]

Long ago I used to devour "classic" books and I recently stumbled one which in my mind was outstanding, "Of Human Bondage," by W. Somerset Maugham. Tried re-reading it and quickly got bogged down. Gave up after about 10% read. I am amazed I had the patience to read this stuff.

Picked up with "The Fraud," by one of my favorite contemporary authors, Zadie Smith.

I've found a fair number of the " classics " to be uninteresting. No reflection on those works really, as the only fiction I've consistently enjoyed has been Sci-Fi, and even that has pretty much fallen by the wayside since 1990 or so ( l now prefer biographies, history and other forms of non-fiction ).

Of the classics that l do enjoy, the most famous is undoubtedly Moby Dick, which l recommend to anyone breathing. 

[DavidW]

Long ago I used to devour "classic" books and I recently stumbled one which in my mind was outstanding, "Of Human Bondage," by W. Somerset Maugham. Tried re-reading it and quickly got bogged down. Gave up after about 10% read. I am amazed I had the patience to read this stuff.

That was required summer reading for me back in high school!

[Spotted Horses]

I've found a fair number of the " classics " to be uninteresting. No reflection on those works really, as the only fiction I've consistently enjoyed has been Sci-Fi, and even that has pretty much fallen by the wayside since 1990 or so ( l now prefer biographies, history and other forms of non-fiction ).

Of the classics that l do enjoy, the most famous is undoubtedly Moby Dick, which l recommend to anyone breathing. 

I haven't given up on "classics," but how much do I want to read about the petty quibbles of provincial English clergy in the 19th century. Maybe it would have taken off, but my patience was expended.

Moby Dick, and Melville in general, is great, but there you need forbearance for all of the detailed descriptions of whaling technology.

[vers la flamme]

Shusaku Endo, The Sea & Poison. A very bleak and gruesome read, much like his much more famous Silence which a bunch of us here on GMG read not too long ago, but very good so far. I picked this up at a Japanese bookstore called Kinokuniya, right next to my school in Midtown Manhattan, belatedly, as it's been quite a while since Dry Brett Kavanaugh recommended this book to me. @DBK if you're reading this, take this as my recommendation to check out that bookstore if you're ever in New York. Cool spot, tons of Japanese lit, translated and otherwise.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Shusaku Endo, The Sea & Poison. A very bleak and gruesome read, much like his much more famous Silence which a bunch of us here on GMG read not too long ago, but very good so far. I picked this up at a Japanese bookstore called Kinokuniya, right next to my school in Midtown Manhattan, belatedly, as it's been quite a while since Dry Brett Kavanaugh recommended this book to me. @DBK if you're reading this, take this as my recommendation to check out that bookstore if you're ever in New York. Cool spot, tons of Japanese lit, translated and otherwise.

Decades ago I frequented Kinokuniya NY and some Japanese restaurants close to the store. I should visit there again. When I was a kid, Endo was popular for his funny and comical essays. After reading these essays I bought Sea and Poison assuming that it would be funny essay too. When I read it, I was shocked by his sharp and accurate depiction of the hypocrisy and conformist tendency in Japanese society.
Endo thinks 1) Japanese people lack ethics 2) because they are not religious/Christian. I agree with 1) but not with 2).

[SimonNZ]

Starting:



The longlist for the Baille Gifford Prize has just been announced, and this year I'm going to see if I can't get through most of them. It includes Katja Hoyer's book on East Germany which I've already done, thanks to a recommendation upthread. Also a big fat work on the 1848 revolutions which has been on my radar, but I want something I can knock off a bit quicker to start.

https://www.thebailliegiffordprize.co.uk/inside-the-covers/news/the-prize-announces-the-2023-longlist

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Anyone here have a suggestion for a book or two on Hawaiian history?

PD

[BWV 1080]

just finished



 remember childhood dinners of the LaChoy Chop Suey / Chow Mein kits, dont think anyone in the US has eaten Chop Suey in 30 years.  Interestingly, Chop Suey was the first big national food fad, beginning in the late 1800s.  By 1900 whites in the midwest were eating in Chinese restaurants.  The author also argues it is an actual Chinese dish, not an American invention (although it was certainly Americanized)

anthropologist E. N. Anderson, a scholar of Chinese food, traces the dish to tsap seui (杂碎, "miscellaneous leftovers"), common in Taishan (Toisan), a county in Guangdong province, the home of many early Chinese immigrants to the United States.[1][2] Hong Kong doctor Li Shu-fan likewise reported that he knew it in Toisan in the 1890s.[3]

[Spotted Horses]

just finished



 remember childhood dinners of the LaChoy Chop Suey / Chow Mein kits, dont think anyone in the US has eaten Chop Suey in 30 years.  Interestingly, Chop Suey was the first big national food fad, beginning in the late 1800s.  By 1900 whites in the midwest were eating in Chinese restaurants.  The author also argues it is an actual Chinese dish, not an American invention (although it was certainly Americanized)

I remember eating that La Choy stuff as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbgiV1jYIrY

[BWV 1080]

I remember eating that La Choy stuff as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbgiV1jYIrY

Wonder what that meat is...



interestingly the company was founded in 1922 by a Korean immigrant named Ilhyeong New that later returned home and started one of the largest chemical companies in the country

[AnotherSpin]

Am very sad to have finished this, best book I've read in a long while. Scathingly self-mocking, clever, funny, refreshingly honest and just so good to read.

Started reading Ben Lerner's book on your lead. I like it a lot so far. Would love to read something else in a similar style. Anything you can recommend? Modern fiction novels.

[San Antone]

I pre-ordered this a month ago and it was delivered overnight:

The Food of Sicily: Recipes from a Sun-Drenched Culinary Crossroads



I learned all I know about Sicilian cooking from my mother and sister (all four of my grandparents were from the same small town in Sicily) - but I've always wanted to know more. 

[Ganondorf]

Reading through Poe's stories. Masque of red death is a wonderful macabre allegorical tale. I have also special fondness for The Fall of the House of Usher, The Gold-Bug, Never Bet the Devil Your Head, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Three Sundays in a Week and A Descent into the Maelström.

Outside of his prose, as much as it may sound cliché to say say it, The Raven is one hell of a poem.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

I pre-ordered this a month ago and it was delivered overnight:

The Food of Sicily: Recipes from a Sun-Drenched Culinary Crossroads



I learned all I know about Sicilian cooking from my mother and sister (all four of my grandparents were from the same small town in Sicily) - but I've always wanted to know more. 

Oh, cool!  How hard is it for you to find a lot of the ingredients in the recipes--either ones that you've been given by your mother and sister?  I suspect that some of the seafood would be hard to get and that you would have to make substitutions.  These days, one can order a lot of items online (or possibly grow in ones garden).  Would love to hear of some of your favorite recipes over in the eating thread. 

PD

[San Antone]

Oh, cool!  How hard is it for you to find a lot of the ingredients in the recipes--either ones that you've been given by your mother and sister?  I suspect that some of the seafood would be hard to get and that you would have to make substitutions.  These days, one can order a lot of items online (or possibly grow in ones garden).  Would love to hear of some of your favorite recipes over in the eating thread. 

PD

For most of my adult life I have had to make substitutions for simple ingredients such as fennel "fenocchio" which my mother used from a plant she'd had for decades.  Last week I made a kind of sauce (we called it gravy) for a holiday "St. Joseph's Day" which called for fenocchio, anchovies, pine nuts, and homemade bread crumbs - added to the tomato base.  I had everything except for the fenocchio, for which I used ground fennel seeds.

My sister is six years older than me, and I'm 71.  So I hope I have many more years of her culinary knowledge.

 

[atardecer]

Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice

An old edition of the book, no pictures of it online that I could find. It is hard cover, a picture of a peacock, a lock and a woman's profile and a price printed on the top right corner of the cover for $1.50

[Iota]

Started reading Ben Lerner's book on your lead. I like it a lot so far. Would love to read something else in a similar style. Anything you can recommend? Modern fiction novels.

None spring to mind that fit the mould of the Lerner really.
A book that explores alienation but in a very different way is 'The Unconsoled' by Kazuo Ishiguro. It's a unique and brilliant book, I've never read anything quite like it, I regularly had to stop and go back a page or two to check that I had just read what I thought I'd read, find that I had, and still be amazed. Really worth reading I think, and due a reread from me.
There are also of course Ben Lerner's two other novels (The Topeka School and 10:04) which I shall certainly be checking out and which both look very promising. Glad you've enjoyed 'Leaving the Atocha Station' so far.

[vers la flamme]

Had to get a copy of Leaving the Atocha Station after reading the interesting discussion here. It was recommended by a Youtuber I follow too. Looking forward to reading it. Re: The Unconsoled, I'm excited to eventually around to that one, too. It's a long book so I'm procrastinating starting it.

[San Antone]

Re-reading for the 4th or 5th time, Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy.



One of my favorite books; and it holds up very well.

[AnotherSpin]

I used to have that. One slim volume of the poem and one big fat volume of his commentary.

Two translations of Eugene Onegin by Nabokov have been published. One is poetic, where Nabokov tried to convey the rhythm and sound of the original, the other is prose, where the meaning is conveyed. Plus extensive commentary.