I had to teach Of Mice and Men as a home tutor and I wept as I was talking about it. I have a mentally disabled son and the constant need to protect, even to the end, resonated at a very personal level.
A great selection! I was just thinking about Queen of Spades as I'm participating in Simon Haisell's year long read of War&Peace and we just read the chapters where Nikolai is cheated out of a fortune in faro by Dohlokov.
Russian authors and gambling! Think of the literary loss if our current 24-7 gambling had been around in the 19th century.
These are all great suggestions especially Bartleby the Scrivner. There probably isn't anyone writing who hasn't thought of themselves as a bit like Bartleby as a responsible clerk noting down the sometimes empty temporal and transactions of life that suppress one's spirit. You might not agree but I would also also suggest Philip Roth's "Goodbye Columbus" as a textual witness to the ongoing war between men and women where the fixed idea of one's survival gets wound up too intimately with gender. Many of these excellent recommendations discuss games and the game in Goodbye Columbus the game of tennis between a man and a woman. I don't think Roth ever quite fully understood women beyond a fixed genderal stereotype. Roth is not unlike Ted Hughes feeling his genius imperiled when considered alongside the superlative brilliance of any woman. Goodbye Columbus demonstrates how the patriarchal continually harms itself and others through diminished male perception. Both Roth's and Ted Hughes' creative lives were incomplete in their reductive valuation of women as competition or very limited campanion, thereby constantly companion, an always existing potential positive into an undesireable negative. Virginia and Leonard Woolf were spiritual companions in the very best way possible. Thanks so much for this list. It is one of the best I have ever seen.
So many books... But at least these are short. I haven't read any Wharton, Zweig or Pushkin, so I'll likely start with one of those. BTW, which WWII doorstopper are you referring to?
Yes! I stopped reading it a few years ago and haven't picked it up since. However, I am determined to finish it. I was so devastated with the German/Russian collaboration that I had a hard time getting my head around it. William Shirer did a great service in writing about WWII.
That book has helped me confirm stories that I have read. I was deeply disturbed spiritually. It wasn't the writing itself, it was the evil done. Not a good place to be when you're depressed.
I think anyone who is writing a 1200-page history book on the Third Reich would feel a bit burnt out, whatever else is happening in their lives! Thank you for your recommendations. I think the novella is a delightful format, sadly under used.
Very good list, Liza. Agree with you about Wharton. For me the premier female writer. Her novella “Summer” is as brilliant as “Ethan Frome” — highly recommended. Cheekily I’d add Joyce’s “The Dead” to the list, though technically it just falls short of being a novella. What’s a few thousand words between friends when we’re talking about a masterpiece?
A great list - thanks! I have started reading "White Nights" and "Ivan Ilych" is now close to the top of my TBR as well. I've long been a fan of "Bartleby the Scrivener" and I also recommend for its depictions of the various characters in the office and for its just plain entertaining weirdness! Side note, you state "Death in Venice follows Gustav von Aschenbach on his travels to Vienna" - I think you mean another V city, Venice.
I had to teach Of Mice and Men as a home tutor and I wept as I was talking about it. I have a mentally disabled son and the constant need to protect, even to the end, resonated at a very personal level.
A great selection! I was just thinking about Queen of Spades as I'm participating in Simon Haisell's year long read of War&Peace and we just read the chapters where Nikolai is cheated out of a fortune in faro by Dohlokov.
Russian authors and gambling! Think of the literary loss if our current 24-7 gambling had been around in the 19th century.
Haha yes, lots of gambling!
I rather suspect that the anti-capitalist clique is pretty much confined to chronic underperformers.
Thanks for these picks. Haven't read White Nights or Chess Story. Will check those out. The ability to cry at great art is a gift!
These are all great suggestions especially Bartleby the Scrivner. There probably isn't anyone writing who hasn't thought of themselves as a bit like Bartleby as a responsible clerk noting down the sometimes empty temporal and transactions of life that suppress one's spirit. You might not agree but I would also also suggest Philip Roth's "Goodbye Columbus" as a textual witness to the ongoing war between men and women where the fixed idea of one's survival gets wound up too intimately with gender. Many of these excellent recommendations discuss games and the game in Goodbye Columbus the game of tennis between a man and a woman. I don't think Roth ever quite fully understood women beyond a fixed genderal stereotype. Roth is not unlike Ted Hughes feeling his genius imperiled when considered alongside the superlative brilliance of any woman. Goodbye Columbus demonstrates how the patriarchal continually harms itself and others through diminished male perception. Both Roth's and Ted Hughes' creative lives were incomplete in their reductive valuation of women as competition or very limited campanion, thereby constantly companion, an always existing potential positive into an undesireable negative. Virginia and Leonard Woolf were spiritual companions in the very best way possible. Thanks so much for this list. It is one of the best I have ever seen.
So many books... But at least these are short. I haven't read any Wharton, Zweig or Pushkin, so I'll likely start with one of those. BTW, which WWII doorstopper are you referring to?
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
Yes! I stopped reading it a few years ago and haven't picked it up since. However, I am determined to finish it. I was so devastated with the German/Russian collaboration that I had a hard time getting my head around it. William Shirer did a great service in writing about WWII.
That book has helped me confirm stories that I have read. I was deeply disturbed spiritually. It wasn't the writing itself, it was the evil done. Not a good place to be when you're depressed.
thank you Liza! some new ones and some I will now return to (Ethan Frome)!
Reading William Trevor’s duo of novellas “Reading Turgenev and My House in Umbria.
Ooo I love novellas and this feels like a great introduction for people are intimidated by some of those names. I haven't read a few of these! Thanks!
It will have to be "White Nights," since I just read another recommendation of it, and I have it in Russian. Thank you for a great list!
I agree! The best novellas have to be old, however, because no publishers will touch them anymore.
I think anyone who is writing a 1200-page history book on the Third Reich would feel a bit burnt out, whatever else is happening in their lives! Thank you for your recommendations. I think the novella is a delightful format, sadly under used.
Tolstoy's late novella Hadji Murad was a favorite of Harold Bloom's and is great.
Very good list, Liza. Agree with you about Wharton. For me the premier female writer. Her novella “Summer” is as brilliant as “Ethan Frome” — highly recommended. Cheekily I’d add Joyce’s “The Dead” to the list, though technically it just falls short of being a novella. What’s a few thousand words between friends when we’re talking about a masterpiece?
Metamorphosis is actually a kind of uplifting story: Gregors sister transforms as much as Gregor but in a good way!
A great list - thanks! I have started reading "White Nights" and "Ivan Ilych" is now close to the top of my TBR as well. I've long been a fan of "Bartleby the Scrivener" and I also recommend for its depictions of the various characters in the office and for its just plain entertaining weirdness! Side note, you state "Death in Venice follows Gustav von Aschenbach on his travels to Vienna" - I think you mean another V city, Venice.