What are you currently reading?

[Brian]

By the way, here is the rest of "Ishiguro's Top 10 Movies" (at least movies sold by Criterion)
https://www.criterion.com/current/top-10-lists/518-kazuo-ishiguros-top-10

[hopefullytrusting]

Two books by Bataille:

[Papy Oli]

"And then there were none.."

one down for now...

[Brian]

"And then there were none.."

one down for now...

My girlfriend just read that. She kept saying "nobody's died yet" and then she would update. "Ok, the first one died...another one died...up to five now..."

[Papy Oli]

My girlfriend just read that. She kept saying "nobody's died yet" and then she would update. "Ok, the first one died...another one died...up to five now..."

I am two down and the boat hasn't turned up in the morning 

I expect carnage 

[Florestan]

[Papy Oli]

My girlfriend just read that. She kept saying "nobody's died yet" and then she would update. "Ok, the first one died...another one died...up to five now..."

Well that escalated quite quickly 

Now onto a cheerier read:

Cormac McCarthy - The Road

 

[Ganondorf]

I recently finished McCarthy's Cities of The Plain and thus the whole Border Trilogy. What a great (horse)ride! Definitely going to check out Blood Meridian too since I've heard that's his masterpiece.

Also reading Thomas Mann's essays and also Felix Krull.

[Karl Henning]

Witches of Eastwick.
The book is a misogynistic mess in which the women are simply a bitchy trio and the climactic revenge a bloody mess. The film cuts out the misogyny and bitchiness, has Jack Nicholson as the devil-tempter, and plays the revenge sequence for as much farce (and in the end, pity) as it can.

Thanks. I think I may have made a start on reading it, but didn't make much headway. That surprised me, as I had found his short stories very readable. 

[Iota]

Well that escalated quite quickly 

Now onto a cheerier read:

Cormac McCarthy - The Road

 

I got the impression when a Cormac McCarthy discussion was had here a while back that I may be in a minority, but I liked The Road a lot.

[ritter]

Starting Camilo José Cela's La colmena ("The Hive"),considered one of the most important Spanish 20th century novels.



Nobel prize winner Cela published this novel in 1951 (in Argentina, as it was not authorised by the Franco regime's censors in Spain until four years later). It deals with the lives of the Madrid (mainly lower) middle class in the harsh conditions of post-Civil War Spain (it is set in the winter of 1942).

[Florestan]

War and Peace

Just started re-reading it after 30 years.

And these 30 years have completely changed my perspective on both life and this book. 

I have just finished the chapters where Pierre Bezukhov, after having just been initiated into Freemasonry and ordered his estate manager to implement humanitarian reforms in his domains (reforms which Tolstoy himself shows them to be more harmful than beneficial to the muzhiks) lectures Prince Andrei Bolkonsky about universal brotherhood and love, and the Prince explains that he is himself opposed to tyranny and injustice, yet not out of any abstract humanitarianism which he doesn't share or support, but simply out of selfishness. Well, thirty years ago I sided with Pierre hands down; nowadays I think he's just your typically naive, delusional liberal who sincerely believes that everybody is just as enamored of liberty, equality and brotherhood as he is and cannot see, let alone accept, that the very people whom his abstract, intellectual, theoretical humanitarianism purports to benefit see things in a completely different light. The ideas and actions of Pierre, especially when promoted top-down headlong and obstinately, will wreak havoc on the whole society and be met with fierce resistance not least from the very people whom they're supposed to make happy (the tragic history of Joseph I's failed reforms bear witness to that). The selfish, pragmatic, aloof Prince Andrei, who couldn't care less about equality and brotherhood and whose only concern is to live a quiet and dignified life, is much more to my liking now, not least because his philosophy can lead to small but real and effective improvements in the life of his subalterns, whereas Pierre's grand schemes for improving at once the lot of all Russians are at best naive and at worst self-defeating. So thirty years later I stand firmly by my namesake Prince and kiss Pierre good bye: the road to hell is paved with good intentions --- but when one is under 25, this fact is not so obvious.   

[JBS]

And these 30 years have completely changed my perspective on both life and this book. 

I have just finished the chapters where Pierre Bezukhov, after having just been initiated into Freemasonry and ordered his estate manager to implement humanitarian reforms in his domains (reforms which Tolstoy himself shows them to be more harmful than beneficial to the muzhiks) lectures Prince Andrei Bolkonsky about universal brotherhood and love, and the Prince explains that he is himself opposed to tyranny and injustice, yet not out of any abstract humanitarianism which he doesn't share or support, but simply out of selfishness. Well, thirty years ago I sided with Pierre hands down; nowadays I think he's just your typically naive, delusional liberal who sincerely believes that everybody is just as enamored of liberty, equality and brotherhood as he is and cannot see, let alone accept, that the very people whom his abstract, intellectual, theoretical humanitarianism purports to benefit see things in a completely different light. The ideas and actions of Pierre, especially when promoted top-down headlong and obstinately, will wreak havoc on the whole society and be met with fierce resistance not least from the very people whom they're supposed to make happy (the tragic history of Joseph I's failed reforms bear witness to that). The selfish, pragmatic, aloof Prince Andrei, who couldn't care less about equality and brotherhood and whose only concern is to live a quiet and dignified life, is much more to my liking now, not least because his philosophy can lead to small but real and effective improvements in the life of his subalterns, whereas Pierre's grand schemes for improving at once the lot of all Russians are at best naive and at worst self-defeating. So thirty years later I stand firmly by my namesake Prince and kiss Pierre good bye: the road to hell is paved with good intentions --- but when one is under 25, this fact is not so obvious.   

IIRC Tolstoy originally intended to write a novel about the Decembrists, of whom Pierre was to be one.
It's probably meaningful that Pierre is always called by the French and not the Russian version of his name.

[Florestan]

IIRC Tolstoy originally intended to write a novel about the Decembrists, of whom Pierre was to be one.
It's probably meaningful that Pierre is always called by the French and not the Russian version of his name.

IIRC, it's the muzhik Platon Karataev's philosophy that is in line with Tolstoy's own, and it's he who teaches Pierre a lesson or two in this respect. And btw, it's just as meaningful that Plato is the paradigmatic philosopher.

[SimonNZ]

And these 30 years have completely changed my perspective on both life and this book. 

I have just finished the chapters where Pierre Bezukhov, after having just been initiated into Freemasonry and ordered his estate manager to implement humanitarian reforms in his domains (reforms which Tolstoy himself shows them to be more harmful than beneficial to the muzhiks) lectures Prince Andrei Bolkonsky about universal brotherhood and love, and the Prince explains that he is himself opposed to tyranny and injustice, yet not out of any abstract humanitarianism which he doesn't share or support, but simply out of selfishness. Well, thirty years ago I sided with Pierre hands down; nowadays I think he's just your typically naive, delusional liberal who sincerely believes that everybody is just as enamored of liberty, equality and brotherhood as he is and cannot see, let alone accept, that the very people whom his abstract, intellectual, theoretical humanitarianism purports to benefit see things in a completely different light. The ideas and actions of Pierre, especially when promoted top-down headlong and obstinately, will wreak havoc on the whole society and be met with fierce resistance not least from the very people whom they're supposed to make happy (the tragic history of Joseph I's failed reforms bear witness to that). The selfish, pragmatic, aloof Prince Andrei, who couldn't care less about equality and brotherhood and whose only concern is to live a quiet and dignified life, is much more to my liking now, not least because his philosophy can lead to small but real and effective improvements in the life of his subalterns, whereas Pierre's grand schemes for improving at once the lot of all Russians are at best naive and at worst self-defeating. So thirty years later I stand firmly by my namesake Prince and kiss Pierre good bye: the road to hell is paved with good intentions --- but when one is under 25, this fact is not so obvious.   

You can skip just a few pages ahead in your Russian History book to see how the attitude of both you Andreis plays out.


TD: Started:

[Florestan]

You can skip just a few pages ahead in your Russian History book to see how the attitude of both you Andreis plays out.

Pierre would have probably become a Menshevik and Andrei a Kadet. The former would have been purged by Stalin, the latter killed in the Civil War or become a White emigre.

[JBS]

Came across this in the public library.

Veremos como va.

H/T @ritter

[San Antone]

William Faulkner - The Town



The second volume in the Snopes Trilogy.  The Hamlet was written nearly 20 years before the last two books, and there are some stylistic differences.  And although I feel the first book is far superior to the latter two, I always read them together, one after the other, since I wish to give Faulkner his due concerning the larger story arc.

[Mandryka]

William Faulkner - The Town



The second volume in the Snopes Trilogy.  The Hamlet was written nearly 20 years before the last two books, and there is some stylistic differences.  And although I feel the first book is far superior to the latter two, I always read them together, one after the other, since I wish to give Faulkner his due concerning the larger story arc.

I enjoyed Hamlet and Town - Hamlet especially -  but Mansion defeated me. All that prison intrigue. I didn't know there was such a gap between the first and the other two.

[Number Six]

I recently started listening to Watership Down, read by Peter Capaldi.

I don't know if I have ever read the book. Maybe once decades ago. I have seen the film plenty of times, being well scarred by it as a child.

Capaldi is a delight, as expected.