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Favorite books
Vendetagainst:
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned Lord of the Flies yet, I love that book.
Shadows Collide:
I recently read "V" by Thomas Pynchon, which was brilliantly funny and I thought very accessible. Sure, there were many weird sentences and references, by it was all done in an effortless style, and the strange yet relatable characters kept me completely lost in it. Nothing cooler than the girl DL, who performs the Vibrating Palm kung-fu move in a Japanese whorehouse on a man who will become her partner. Also, her invisibility move involves waving her hands in front of a security guard so he becomes distracted. :-)
It does condemn a tyrannical government (in a way) but it also simultaneously criticizes the "hippie"-protest movement for being too stoned out of its mind to achieve any real change. Maybe it was all idealism, with no substance. But, Pynchon also depicts government facilities where protesters are deconstructed, so he may be a bit paranoid.
All i know is it was WAY less dense than I thought it would be.
elcapitan:
Interesting! I enjoyed V, but I found it harder to read than Gravity's Rainbow. There's the same fragmentation of ideas and plotlines but without the overarching (pun intended) thematic quality of GR. I read it after GR, and I was surprised when stacks of the same characters turned up.
What did you think of The Crying Of Lot 49?
Also, I have a copy of Against The Day up on my shelf, but haven't read it yet. Has anyone here?
Uber Ritter:
Most of the stuff I read at College could make this list. But it's kind of heavy on the philosophy and light on literature, so I'll just mention:
The Iliad-I've read a lot of of philosophy, but I still prefer the last book of the Iliad to damn near all of it.
Fear and Trembling by Soren Kierkegaard-Sure, it's religious, but Soren Kierkegaard/Johannes de Silientio is a beautiful writer and storyteller. When you've read Kant, you come to appreciate that all the more.
The Surgeon's Mate by Patrick O'Brian-The best of the Aubrey-Maturin series that I've read, and I'm on like book 19. Sure, Paul Bellamy was cute and all in the movie, but O'Brian's Maturin blows him out of the water as a rather dark and complex hero. Rather than a brilliant surgeon and enthusiastic man of science Maturin is also a spy, disillusioned revolutionary, man of reason/devout catholic and long-frustrated lover of a rather infamous woman. And he's at his best in this book. Much of this novel is like a regency James Bond. Only without the camp.
Philosophical Investigations by Ludwig Wittgenstein--I studied this intensely for around two months for a class, and it hit me like a ton of bricks.
Middlemarch by George Eliot---I didn't know that there were English novels to match the Russians, having fallen in with Dostoevsky young and being disappointed by some American 'classics', until I read this.
Fifth Business by Robertson Davies---Canadian Magical Realism at it's finest? I'm reading the seconds installment of the trilogy, and it is SO good.
Go Down Moses by William Faulkner---Maybe it's because I'm a southerner, but I love this book.
Ordinary Men by Robert Browning---Why did Germans do what they did from '39-'45? The answer is terrifyingly familiar.
RedLion:
--- Quote from: elcapitan on 02 Aug 2008, 21:33 ---Interesting! I enjoyed V, but I found it harder to read than Gravity's Rainbow. There's the same fragmentation of ideas and plotlines but without the overarching (pun intended) thematic quality of GR. I read it after GR, and I was surprised when stacks of the same characters turned up.
What did you think of The Crying Of Lot 49?
Also, I have a copy of Against The Day up on my shelf, but haven't read it yet. Has anyone here?
--- End quote ---
I'm going to jump in here--I think Lot 49 is the weakest of Pynchon's work. Having said that, it's still a fantastic book. Certainly nowhere near the quality of Gravity's Rainbow, V, Against the Day, or Vineland, but good nonetheless.
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