http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/06/nosplit/sv_classics06.xml
Good books most of them they are, but "the best" invites questions about the criteria used. Besides, it leaves one with the impression that English Literature has a near monopoly on good books, which simply isn't true.
Quote from: Florestan on November 17, 2008, 06:49:44 AM
Good books most of them they are, but "the best" invites questions about the criteria used. Besides, it leaves one with the impression that English Literature has a near monopoly on good books, which simply isn't true.
True.
Just requested The Portrait of A Lady from the library.
We'll see how far I get. ::)
Quote from: mn dave on November 17, 2008, 06:54:35 AM
Just requested The Portrait of A Lady from the library.
We'll see how far I get. ::)
Just across Washington Square? :)
Quote from: Florestan on November 17, 2008, 06:49:44 AM
Good books most of them they are, but "the best" invites questions about the criteria used. Besides, it leaves one with the impression that English Literature has a near monopoly on good books, which simply isn't true.
Why take it so seriously?
1) it's written by a human
2) it's in a newspaper
3) it's an English newspaper (oxymoron?)
4) There's no Platonov ::)
I don't take these lists too seriously. I just think they're fun to ponder and discuss.
Ponder?
heh
Quote from: ezodisy on November 17, 2008, 06:57:57 AM
it's an English newspaper (oxymoron?)
I assure you a Romanian newspaper is no better. :)
I was happy to see Iliad at the top of the list. Best Book Ever.
I'm glad they listed some poetry books. I'm lacking in poetry books. :'(
Quote from: mn dave on November 17, 2008, 07:06:54 AM
I'm glad they listed some poetry books. I'm lacking in poetry books. :'(
The list is seriously lacking American poets: only Eliot is mentioned. No Frost, no Whitman, no Dickinson, no Stevens....no Chuck Bukowski ;D
Sarge
Quote from: Sergeant Rock on November 17, 2008, 07:26:26 AM
The list is seriously lacking American poets: only Eliot is mentioned. No Frost, no Whitman, no Dickinson, no Stevens....no Chuck Bukowski ;D
Sarge
Well, you have to start somewhere. :P
A "perfect library" with no Whitman?!
Quote from: karlhenning on November 17, 2008, 07:37:58 AM
A "perfect library" with no Whitman?!
I guess he's not perfect enough.
No Thomas Mann, no J.M. Coetzee, no William Faulkner, no Günter Grass? Why, one could build a solid library by selecting Nobel laureates from the last 100 years or so who were not selected for inclusion.
It seems that some people need to engage in a little Vergangenheitsbewältigung vis-à-vis the shift away from Britain as the center of the literary world.
No Proust, no Mann, no Musil, no Camus, no Kafka, no Maugham.
No like.
Quote from: Corey on November 17, 2008, 07:44:16 AM
No Proust, no Mann, no Musil, no Camus, no Kafka, no Maugham.
No like.
Yes, but have you read the books they list?
Quote from: PSmith08 on November 17, 2008, 07:43:00 AM
No Thomas Mann, no J.M. Coetzee, no William Faulkner, no Günter Grass? Why, one could build a solid library by selecting Nobel laureates from the last 100 years or so who were not selected for inclusion.
It seems that some people need to engage in a little Vergangenheitsbewältigung vis-à-vis the shift away from Britain as the center of the literary world.
Come on, Coetzee is a good writer but he does not belong between Mann and Faulkner.
Quote from: mn dave on November 17, 2008, 07:45:47 AM
Yes, but have you read the books they list?
A good bit, and own a good bit more. There are a lot I have no interest in reading (
Beloved, Clausewitz, etc). It's not really a bad list, but the omissions are too egregious to call it a "perfect" library — but none of that matters, I just like to complain. :D
Oh, and it looks like Proust was included after all. I wonder how my page search missed that. ???
Nothing belongs between Faulkner and his bottle of bourbon. And certainly not a transparent sense of prose.
Quote from: ezodisy on November 17, 2008, 07:46:57 AM
Come on, Coetzee is a good writer but he does not belong between Mann and Faulkner.
Well, that point's arguable, I suppose (certainly
Waiting or
Life and Times achieves some parity with something like
Tonio Kröger, but Mann and Coetzee were and are doing very different things); my point, though, in name-checking Coetzee was to include a modern author. Also,
Joseph und seine Brüder is considerably more off-putting than
Waiting, though the latter is certainly more coherent than
The Sound and the Fury.
The problem remains: the list is pretty shoddy, at best.
QuoteOn War
Carl von Clausewitz
The first, and probably still foremost, treatise on the art of modern warfare. The Prussian general looked beyond the battlefield to war's place in the broader political context.
Has anyone read this? Sounds like what I'd be interested in. It's listed under "Books that changed the world" (I've read two and a half of that list 8) ).
Quote from: ezodisy on November 17, 2008, 11:39:08 PM
Has anyone read this?
I didn't, but he's the guy who stated that war was the continuation of politics with other means. Unlike today, when it's the other way around.
The typical UK list.
For them Germany has no poets: Heine, Goethe (poems), Trakl, Rilke, Brecht. No philosophers either: Kant, Nietzsche, Engels, Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Popper. No theatre: Kleist, Schiller, Brecht again. No novels: Goethe, Thomas Mann, Hesse. Not mentioning juridic books (Kelsen).
But I understand them. A German list would probably include,regarding British books, Shakespeare. No more.
Quote from: Florestan on November 18, 2008, 12:04:18 AM
I didn't, but he's the guy who stated that war was the continuation of politics with other means. Unlike today, when it's the other way around.
hahaha :)
Quote from: val on November 18, 2008, 12:46:24 AM
The typical UK list.
well there is a reason for that: UK properties are small.
By the way Val:
don't mention the war
This perfect list does not include Don Quixote, Goethe's Faust, Moby Dick, any Dostoevsky, any of the Greek tragedies, any plays of Ibsen, Molière, or even Shakespeare fer chrissake — who's kidding whom?
Quote from: Sforzando on November 18, 2008, 04:06:42 AM
This perfect list does not include Don Quixote, Goethe's Faust, Moby Dick, any Dostoevsky, any of the Greek tragedies, any plays of Ibsen, Molière, or even Shakespeare fer chrissake — who's kidding whom?
Truly, a
sforzando post!
http://www.optimates.us/Greatbooks.htm
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:30:26 AM
http://www.optimates.us/Greatbooks.htm
Decidedly, these lists are a joke!
France without Stendhal, Balzac, Flaubert and Proust...
And
Russia not at all...
Quote from: Florestan on November 18, 2008, 06:36:40 AM
Decidedly, these lists are a joke!
France without Stendhal, Balzac, Flaubert and Proust...
And Russia not at all...
Hm. I'll keep looking...
Just another one-liner for the hell of it.
— Didn't want to be left out! 8)
No Karl left behind
Phew!
Oh, fine.
http://www.listology.com/content_show.cfm/content_id.22845/Books
Oops.
Quote from: mn dave on November 17, 2008, 06:45:06 AM
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/06/nosplit/sv_classics06.xml
Maybe someone else has already said this, but . . . the "BOOKS THAT CHANGED YOUR WORLD" category is piffle to the
nth degree.
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:51:21 AM
http://www.listology.com/content_show.cfm/content_id.22845/Books
Oops.
What, there are 70 books from the 21st century alone that I "must read" before I die? . . .
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:51:21 AM
http://www.listology.com/content_show.cfm/content_id.22845/Books
Where's the Bible?
Ah, I see, they don't have the rubric
Timeless.
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 06:54:06 AM
What, there are 70 books from the 21st century alone that I "must read" before I die? . . .
YES!
Quote from: Florestan on November 18, 2008, 06:55:21 AM
Where's the Bible?
Ah, I see, they don't have the rubric Timeless.
I have the book the list is based on and I'm pretty sure they didn't go there on purpose.
Seven books by Don DeLillo I "must read" before I die? He rates seven items in a list of 1,001? And I speak as one who really likes White Noise.
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:56:28 AM
I have the book the list is based on and I'm pretty sure they didn't go there on purpose.
You do? Have you got
1001 Records You Must Hear Before You Die, too?
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 06:57:30 AM
You do? Have you got 1001 Records You Must Hear Before You Die, too?
NO!
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 06:54:06 AM
What, there are 70 books from the 21st century alone that I "must read" before I die? . . .
Don't feel bad. There are only 13 books from the 1700s or before to read. And (thank God!) none of that boring, difficult Shakespeare.
Quote from: Sforzando on November 18, 2008, 06:58:17 AM
. . . And (thank God!) none of that boring, difficult Shakespeare.
What do you read, my lord?
Words, words, words.
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:58:03 AM
NO!
Well,
1001 Classical Recordings You Must Hear Before You Die,
surely?
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 07:00:59 AM
Well, 1001 Classical Recordings You Must Hear Before You Die, surely?
Is there such a thing?
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 07:01:40 AM
Is there such a thing?
How could you doubt me? (http://www.amazon.com/1001-Classical-Recordings-Must-Before/dp/0789315831/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227024135&sr=1-1)
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ivdModUoL._SL500_AA240_.jpg)
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 07:03:06 AM
How could you doubt me? (http://www.amazon.com/1001-Classical-Recordings-Must-Before/dp/0789315831/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227024135&sr=1-1)
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ivdModUoL._SL500_AA240_.jpg)
Wow! I'm sure we can dig up an online list for that, can't we?
There's even a leather-bound special edition of that puppy.
Quote from: Sforzando on November 18, 2008, 06:58:17 AM
Don't feel bad. There are only 13 books from the 1700s or before to read. And (thank God!) none of that boring, difficult Shakespeare.
Too obvious.
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 06:54:06 AM
What, there are 70 books from the 21st century alone that I "must read" before I die? . . .
Well, look on the bright side: you've got until 1 Jan 2101 to get on that.
Quote from: mn dave on November 18, 2008, 06:58:03 AM
NO!
I misremembered the title, anyway:
1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (http://www.amazon.com/1001-Albums-Must-Hear-Before/dp/0789313715/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227024286&sr=1-1)
(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DDGHXFAYL._SL500_AA240_.jpg)
Quote from: PSmith08 on November 18, 2008, 07:05:41 AM
Well, look on the bright side: you've got until 1 Jan 2101 to get on that.
You've always been a friend,
Patrick . . . .
Quote from: karlhenning on November 18, 2008, 07:06:28 AM
You've always been a friend, Patrick . . . .
I do what I can, friend.
As I said about that list elsewhere some time back, the lesson to take away from that list is that you should read J.M. Coetzee before you die. Add to that, Don DeLillo.
I'd be more interested in a list of books to read after I die. It will be such a long time to kill...
I read only two books these days, being The Bible & Charles Dickens, "Christmas Carols".
So top two...... ;D
http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/topic,9930.0.html
Quote from: Florestan on November 18, 2008, 07:13:51 AM
I'd be more interested in a list of books to read after I die. It will be such a long time to kill...
1. William Topaz McGonagall,
Collected Works: 1877-1902.
The perfect companion for eternity, for, as Abdul Alhazred tells us, "That is not dead which can eternal lie. / And with strange aeons even death may die."