Feb. 2006: What are you reading?

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Now that this thread has exceeded 350 postings and it is likewise the start of February, 2006, would it be acceptable to start a new incarnation of the now-traditional "what are you reading" thread, rather than hammer the ILX server and frustrate our dial-up patrons by extending this thread to fantastic length?

It is about that time for a fresh thread.

I have been reading more of On the Road today; I finished the first part of the novel.

― mj (robert blake), Friday, 3 February 2006 02:14 (nineteen years ago)

My non-school reading right now is; Freakonomics and A Box of Matches by Nicholson Baker

― J. Lamphere (WatchMeJumpStart), Friday, 3 February 2006 03:20 (nineteen years ago)

descartes, frege, plato, erich fromm, chandler, david stern, carl schorske. you know - this and that.

the chandler is much funnier than i thought it would be.

― Josh (Josh), Friday, 3 February 2006 03:35 (nineteen years ago)

For school I am reading:
Apocalypse D.H. Lawrence
The Waste Land T.S. Eliot
and a story from the New Yorker International Fiction issue.

― wmlynch (wlynch), Friday, 3 February 2006 03:57 (nineteen years ago)

M31: A Family Romance by Stephen Wright.
Just finished His Dark Materials, thought is was aaammmMMMAAAAzzzing.
The caps is supposed to be sing-song-y.

― Moti Bahat, Friday, 3 February 2006 04:00 (nineteen years ago)

His Dark Materials

That has been tempting me. I'll put it on the pile.

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Friday, 3 February 2006 04:04 (nineteen years ago)

peter shapiro, turn the beat around: the secret history of disco

― joseph (joseph), Friday, 3 February 2006 06:10 (nineteen years ago)

the land where the blues began alan lomax
Cerebus: Church & State dave Sim
Shakey by whatsisname; it's that Neil young bio

― Special Agent Gene Krupa (orion), Friday, 3 February 2006 06:25 (nineteen years ago)

350? Seriously? Usually 1000 is when it is time to start a new thread.

If you are a dial up user, for heavens sake: Click on "Settings" on the bottom of the page, and change your setting to "Only show the last 50 messages" (or whatever it is). There is no reason to torture yourself.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 3 February 2006 07:23 (nineteen years ago)

You might notice that, even with that setting turned on, that all the messages are downloaded to your local computer prior to scrolling down to the unread messages - unless there is another, more secret setting I have not yet discovered.

― Aimless (Aimless), Friday, 3 February 2006 07:27 (nineteen years ago)

No, they are not. The server gives you only the HTML you need. It gives you the question, and then the 50 most recent replies (assuming you have chosen 50), and then jumps you down to the last one you haven't read. If there have been more than 50 replies since the last time you've read, it's true, it will give you all of the ones you haven't read, even if there are 200 of them.

Give the Lizards a little credit, the whole point of implementing the feature was to keep dial-up users from having to download 1000 messages each time they wanted to check a thread!

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 3 February 2006 07:36 (nineteen years ago)

In other news, I'm reading "The Book Of My Life" by Girolamo Cardano, a cranky 16th C. Italian's autobiography. I suppose after I finish it I'll read the other 16th C. Italian autobiography, Benvenuto Cellini's, since I own it and all. That one promises more sex, less cranky ravings, which I'm not sure is what I want.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 3 February 2006 07:38 (nineteen years ago)

still ulysses
still philip k dick

― tom west (thomp), Friday, 3 February 2006 09:30 (nineteen years ago)

Still the Football Man. It's like a piece of period furniture. The North Koreans [at the 1966 World Cup] with 'nonsense rhyme names and slanty eyes'.

"A director of a football club should underwrite any potential bills. £2,000 should cover it."

Last weekend, Chris Kamara called Spurs' Young-Pyo Lee "that Chinese lad"

Perhaps things haven't changed that much. Or perhaps Kamara isn't representative.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 3 February 2006 14:06 (nineteen years ago)

Hey, Tom West, what should I start with as far as Philip k dick goes? What're his best books?

― Moti Bahat, Friday, 3 February 2006 17:25 (nineteen years ago)

And Beth Parker you should start reading His Dark Materials now. It's amazing and you won't regret it. Unless you're a devout Christian. Then you will regret it.

― Moti Bahat, Friday, 3 February 2006 17:26 (nineteen years ago)

A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold. Which is very quietly pretty and hard to pay attention to (it's nominally a book of essays but really they're more like little ink polaroids of wild Wisconsin combined w/ personal musings) unless I read with complete concentration at which point it slaps me upside the haid with something incredibly beautiful and/or moving. So it's kind of "all or nothing".

― Laurel (Laurel), Friday, 3 February 2006 17:33 (nineteen years ago)

uh moti if you already read SF go with martian time-slip; if not lately i think VALIS is total wow++ but my historical favorite is probably ubik.

― tom west (thomp), Friday, 3 February 2006 17:54 (nineteen years ago)

I have done as Casuistry recommended. It was not exactly hidden and not exactly obvious either. The setting is under Thread Pages / Show Messages and consists of a pull down list where All is the default. This had eluded me in the past.

― Aimless (Aimless), Friday, 3 February 2006 18:05 (nineteen years ago)

Ah, I admit I haven't really looked at the settings page in years. I remembered it as radio buttons. I hope it works out for you!

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 3 February 2006 20:40 (nineteen years ago)

I've been reading the first few chapters of H.G. Wells's The Outline of History - the ones dealing with pre-human history of the earth, geologic time, dinosaurs, evolution, etc. His descriptions of that incredibly ancient time are quite vivid and breathtaking at times - he was a way of communicating scientific concepts in direct and straightforward language that simultaneously preserve a sense of wonder and beauty. I wish there was a book that was written this well that could incorporate the wealth of scientific data that's been discovered since the 1920s, and describe the beginnings of life with this clarity and intelligence.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 3 February 2006 21:25 (nineteen years ago)

Here's the book free online: http://www.bartleby.com/86/

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 3 February 2006 21:26 (nineteen years ago)

ubik by phillip k dick, soon it will be 'the politics of friendship' by jacques derrida. I am hopeful.

― jeffrey (johnson), Friday, 3 February 2006 21:50 (nineteen years ago)

"Tales from Moomin Valley." I love it! I'd never read these books before.

― Mary (Mary), Saturday, 4 February 2006 19:58 (nineteen years ago)

o. nate, do you rate stephen jay gould at all? he's very readable. the mismeasure of man is great fun.

― Special Agent Gene Krupa (orion), Sunday, 5 February 2006 02:14 (nineteen years ago)

Wuthering Heights. I think somebody else on here was reading it recently, which finally inspired me to give it a go.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Monday, 6 February 2006 01:19 (nineteen years ago)

Wuthering Heights. I think somebody else on here was reading it recently, which finally inspired me to give it a go.

Haha! I was the one reading it a couple of weeks ago; I enjoyed it, but I wouldn't recommend reading it with the expectations I had.

I am now currently reading Tom Jones, which is proving to be a hell of a bawdy-good time.

― mj (robert blake), Monday, 6 February 2006 04:17 (nineteen years ago)

I've just read Over Sea Under Stone, The Dark is Rising and Greenwitch. Now I'm reading Bee Season, and liking it. Is it true that the film is crap?

― Archel (Archel), Monday, 6 February 2006 09:41 (nineteen years ago)

Tom Freemantle - The Road to Timbucktoo. Modern travel writing following Mungo Park's route to the source of the river Niger.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 6 February 2006 11:45 (nineteen years ago)

Salman Rushdie

he's diabolical!

― the firefox, Monday, 6 February 2006 14:57 (nineteen years ago)

I read a Rushdie story where he spoke about his love of Tottenham Hostsuprs. It was awful and deserved a fatwa.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 6 February 2006 15:29 (nineteen years ago)

o. nate, do you rate stephen jay gould at all? he's very readable. the mismeasure of man is great fun

It's funny- I was actually trying to think of his name the other day, because I remembered reading some interesting articles by him about evolution in Discover magazine. The name that kept popping into my head was Jared Diamond, but I knew that wasn't him. Thanks for the recommendation - I'll check it out.

― o. nate (onate), Monday, 6 February 2006 15:59 (nineteen years ago)

I've read that too. In this book, the Spurs fans are nasty policemen.

― the bellefox, Monday, 6 February 2006 16:48 (nineteen years ago)

I'm about to start Boswell's Life of Johnson… see you in April?

― remy (x Jeremy), Monday, 6 February 2006 18:33 (nineteen years ago)

This sort of thread is always fun!

I've just started "Gilead", by M. Robinson (I take it as a personal point of honour to read every pulitzer-winning novel).

The last novel I read was B.E. Ellis' "Lunar Park". Not life-affirming but definitely enjoyable. Plus, there is something "nasty" in the way B.E. toys with his public image. A faux-memoir where he confesses vices that might well be real? Nasty, nasty....

― Anonymous Duck (Ohio River Boat), Monday, 6 February 2006 19:53 (nineteen years ago)

Remy, no, you must give updates, I have wanted to read that book for a while now.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 03:28 (nineteen years ago)

just started the New Your Trilogy, i'm late in the Auster game

― J. Lamphere (WatchMeJumpStart), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 06:58 (nineteen years ago)

man I am making spelling mistakes everywhere, YORK

― J. Lamphere (WatchMeJumpStart), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 07:07 (nineteen years ago)

I read some Boswell a couple of years ago, but I didn't get very far because the edition I was reading was cheap and horrible and you couldn't even open the pages very well.

The text didn't seem that hard. Mind you, it wasn't that interesting.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 08:09 (nineteen years ago)

I've just finished 54 by Wu Ming, who in an earlier incarnation as Luther Blissett wrote Q. Both very good. Also recently read the Bob Dylan book Chronicles, which I had no hesitation in putting into the fiction section of my bookshelves when I'd finished it. Not sure what to read next, as I have no more unread books on my shelf so I'll have to go and buy one, which means making a decision.....

― andyjack (andyjack), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 14:34 (nineteen years ago)

I'm still travelling through Western Africa (in my book). The British established the border in Gambia by sailing a gunboat down the river and firing cannonshot to define the line.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 14:41 (nineteen years ago)

I just finished A Million Little Pieces; Alan Alda's memoir Never Have Your Dog Stuffed; TR Pearson's True Cross and Glad News of the Natural World; and now I'm reading Joe Keenan's My Lucky Star

― luna (luna.c), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 23:07 (nineteen years ago)

How is the Alda memoir?

― remy (x Jeremy), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 23:08 (nineteen years ago)

It seemed really incomplete. I'm not sure I can put my finger on why - I suppose I expected a lot more about MASH and the other things he's done, but it's much more about him as a younger man, up to MASH, and not a whole lot afterward (or, at least what there was seemed rushed through). I liked it, but I think I prefer him as an actor.

― luna (luna.c), Tuesday, 7 February 2006 23:20 (nineteen years ago)

The Desert Rose by Larry McMurtry. Dude has written a lot of books! I tend to think of him as the Balzac of the American West.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Wednesday, 8 February 2006 17:41 (nineteen years ago)

Or a more verbose Zane Grey?

― Aimless (Aimless), Wednesday, 8 February 2006 17:58 (nineteen years ago)

You know, I've never read any Zane Grey. I think I'll order Riders of the Purple Sage.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Wednesday, 8 February 2006 18:37 (nineteen years ago)

I have no idea what I'm reading, and it's the worst feeling in the world. I finished the Barnes, read Murakami's short story in the new issue of the New Yorker, and then today at lunch I picked up and read the first few pages of each of the following:

Christos Tsiolkas - Dead Europe (no idea why; I don't have much in common with a gay man in Australia returning to his Greek roots)
James Ellroy - Because The Night (and now I can't get Patti Smith out of my head)
Philip K. Dick - Dr. Futurity (this one seems the most promising...)

But none of them feel right. It's all because Slouching Towards Bethlehem hasn't arrived from the little book shop in Australia yet. Boo to the U.S. Postal Service!

Book limbo sucks.

― zan, Wednesday, 8 February 2006 19:11 (nineteen years ago)

Ouch, book limbo is affecting my grammar: "none of them feels right."

― zan, Wednesday, 8 February 2006 19:16 (nineteen years ago)

Sleeping With Extra-Terrestrials : The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety to counterbalance the xtian apologetics book I'm reading to appease a co-worker. And Tale of Genji still, in 3 translations (more of a project than I anticipated, but has its moments).

― Jaq (Jaq), Wednesday, 8 February 2006 19:28 (nineteen years ago)

Skipping 112 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

I love Teh Connoisseur! Somebody once told me it was based on John Huston.

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:01 (nineteen years ago)

Ken have you read his non/fiction? any other ESC recommendations?

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:15 (nineteen years ago)

I loved Son of the Morning Star.

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:26 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, that one!

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:46 (nineteen years ago)

Okay, so it was just Invisible Man Syndrome

Dan I had no idea that you were black until you said so in your response to my post, after which I certainly didn't treat you as "invisible". No-one picks up on every preceding post in a discussion like this. You were no more invisible than J.D. or Casuistry or anyone else whose posts I didn't respond to.

― frankiemachine, Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:53 (nineteen years ago)

Ryszard Kapuscinski's Another Day of Life.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Thursday, 23 February 2006 17:57 (nineteen years ago)

I am reading Jane Stevenson's collection of novellas *Several Deceptions*. Very entertaining.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 23 February 2006 18:28 (nineteen years ago)

I've been reading the first few chapters of H.G. Wells's The Outline of History - the ones dealing with pre-human history of the earth, geologic time, dinosaurs, evolution, etc.

I totally lost interest in OoH when it started to be about people.

I'm reading Thomas Perry's Dead Aim, just finished (maybe a week or two back), Gerard Jones Men of Tomorrow: Gangsters, Geeks and the BIrth of the Comic Book, and I promise I'm gonna go back and finish the very enjoyable (but I got distracted by Showcase Presents Jonah Hex) Busted Flush by Brad Smith.

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Thursday, 23 February 2006 18:38 (nineteen years ago)

Evan Connell also wrote a biography of Goya, which my mother liked.
I just started The Darling by Russell Banks, so far so good. His Rule Of The Bone was the last book I read out loud to my kids. They were in their teens, and we'd hunker down on my bed and read it every night. A fabulous reworking of Huck Finn.
None of it turned my boys into readers, though. Sigh.

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Friday, 24 February 2006 00:23 (nineteen years ago)

stanislaw lem's cyberiad, dick's the divine invasion, on by some guy alan or something roberts, i keep thinking alasdair roberts but that's the scots faux-folk singer, lawrence sutin's bio of philip k dick (which is better than e carrere's bio of philip k dick), ulysses still

next possibly those books about the armchair-detective rabbit, and stuff on joyce

― tom west (thomp), Friday, 24 February 2006 01:03 (nineteen years ago)

Tom West, sci-fi fan, have you read the John Varley short story collection "The Persistence of Vision?" Fucking fabulous.

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Friday, 24 February 2006 01:43 (nineteen years ago)

lovebug, I also recommend his books about the age of exploration, A Long Desire and The White Lantern, which I think are now one book The Aztec Treasure House or something like that. Also his long poems made up mostly of what seems to be of (often very old) "found" text, Notes Found In A Bottle On Carmel Beach and Points On A Compass Rose. Later stuff is very difficult to get through- I managed to finish The Alchemist's Journal but not Deus Lo Volt. Interesting experiments, nonetheless, in trying to recreate the alien thought processes of earlier ages.

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Friday, 24 February 2006 03:02 (nineteen years ago)

And you used to be able to find The Collected Stories on the discount tables of Coliseum, St. Marks and any other bookstore you care to name. I haven't finished them, but there is some great stuff in there , including one story called "Lion," which is about a woman who lives up in the mountains confronting a lion in her yard. I must confess I am still a bit puzzled by all the "humorous" stories about the two Frenchmen.

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Friday, 24 February 2006 03:11 (nineteen years ago)

Oh, I didn't see this thread. No mind.

― SRH (Skrik), Friday, 24 February 2006 10:25 (nineteen years ago)

Correct titles:
Notes from a Bottle Found on the Beach at Carmel
Points for a Compass Rose
The Alchymist's Journal
Deus Lo Volt! (w/ exclamation point)

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Friday, 24 February 2006 10:28 (nineteen years ago)

William Burroughs' "Naked Lunch" (my 2nd reading of this, I love it when it flows but frequently find myself tuning out and unable to work out what I'm reading)

I was reading it on the train last night and couldn't stop laughing, got myself some strange looks. I don't remember it being this funny last time.

― Onimo (GerryNemo), Friday, 24 February 2006 11:32 (nineteen years ago)

A straight choice between John Peel's autobio and Zadie Smith's nicely jacketed On Beauty. So, I opted for Moominvalley in November. A Moomin book without Moomins. The silence of the snow-filled valleys reminds me of my childhood in the Essex commuter belt.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 24 February 2006 12:45 (nineteen years ago)

Emil and the Detectives, is that the Netherlands?

Heart of Darkness is narrated by a narrator though. To claim Conrad was a racist is like claiming that Conrad went round saying "by Jove!" all the time.

Which he might have done, for all I know.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Friday, 24 February 2006 12:49 (nineteen years ago)

I am reading Roger Penrose's massive tome. It is difficult to carry on the tube.

― Sam (chirombo), Friday, 24 February 2006 13:22 (nineteen years ago)

HOTT.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 24 February 2006 14:52 (nineteen years ago)

if that's the one i found when i searched on amazon i might get it. i ought to get some actual science going now i'm a "sci-fi fan" (ohh...) (tragically i went to a roleplaying group this evening)

i have not heard of that short story collection, beth, but i will get it should i happen to see a copy. i have a run of seven or so early philip k dicks to get round to soon, plus i want to get on to le guin's 'the left hand of darkness' (which i can't believe i haven't read yet) and 'always coming home' (which i can)

― tom west (thomp), Saturday, 25 February 2006 02:15 (nineteen years ago)

Left Hand of Darkness is great, sexy sci-fi.
Persistence of Vision is out of print, but you can get a used copy on Amazon. I gave mine away, otherwise I'd send it to you.
Here! Read the ecstatic testimonials!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0425073009/qid=1140837799/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/104-9677339-7654339?s=books&v=glance&n=283155

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Saturday, 25 February 2006 03:38 (nineteen years ago)

I've just started Walter Van Tilburg Clark's The Ox-Bow Incident - part of a recent splurge on westerns. So far there has been a surprising amount of guys standing around and talking, without much really happening. It's okay.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Saturday, 25 February 2006 23:10 (nineteen years ago)

I read a few stories from Difficult Loves and I've picked up The Princess Bride to read now.

― Navek Rednam (Navek Rednam), Sunday, 26 February 2006 17:55 (nineteen years ago)

Trevor Dann's new book on Nick Drake. Is there anything more to say about such a recluse? Apparently so, although lots of padding and a large type face suggest not that much more. I dug out the albums to play in the background and they're still terrific.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 27 February 2006 10:37 (nineteen years ago)

I finished When Genius Failed, and now I'm reading To The Finland Station (I'm liking the short chapters - makes me feel like I'm reading faster).

― o. nate (onate), Monday, 27 February 2006 15:59 (nineteen years ago)

Finished Idoru (good, but 'meh') going on
Life of Johnson still.

― remy (x Jeremy), Monday, 27 February 2006 17:26 (nineteen years ago)

Ill so spent all weekend reading - finished The Sleeping Father (good), then Louis Theroux's The Call of the Weird (he works better on TV), If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things by Jon MacGregor (excellent, got to somewhere inside me like few books can these days) and Heavy Weather by PG Wodehouse (the ultimate feeling ill book and one of the few actually perfect novels I can think of). About to start The Icarus Girl by Helen Oyeyemi.

― Archel (Archel), Monday, 27 February 2006 17:35 (nineteen years ago)

OK, that's it, my next Wodehouse read will be Heavy Weather (my father gave me all his old Wodehouse paperbacks. I have to admit that I've not gone beyond the Jeeves stuff yet)

I'm reading China Miéville's "The Scar". I've bounced off the opening chapter a couple of times (the whole "Cray-man out huntin' with his octopus" thing! Ugh!) but I've decided to give it a chance now. I did like "Perdido Street Station" after all, and most people seem to find this to be the stronger of the two.
I can sort of understand why people keep comparing him with Mervyn Peake, but I think it's misguiding.

― Øystein (Øystein), Monday, 27 February 2006 18:13 (nineteen years ago)

I finally finished Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, which has a pretty ass-kicking afterword by Delany re: sci-fi and postmodernism, and last night I started Arthur Philip's The Egyptologist. Hope it's good and not just clever.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 27 February 2006 22:01 (nineteen years ago)

I have stopped reading Histories of the Hanged - I think I get the picture. I don't need all the gruesome details.

Now it's Mo-Jo.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 10:03 (nineteen years ago)

I've been trying to read too many books at once and never getting to the end, but I have just finished Kavalier and Clay. I have mixed feelings about it. Very good but could have been so much better.

The comic book illustrator Kavalier is secure in the knowledge that what he does is art; his partner, Clay, is not - he has a keen sense of inferiority from working in an art-form despised by the intelligentsia and a longing to write proper, respectable novels.

I suspect Chabon would like to be Kavalier but he is in fact Clay - too insecure to write the much better novel he could have written if he could have freed himself of some of his more self-consciously literary aspirations.

― frankiemachine, Tuesday, 28 February 2006 11:24 (nineteen years ago)

The Nick Drake book is a little desperate at times. This is effectively the second biography in ten years about a person who rarely spoke. At one point the author tells you what number peg Nick hung his coat on at public school. Information too far.

There are still gaps, but judging by the fact that Nick's sister hasn't gone out of her way to help either of the biographers, I guess we'll have to wait for Gabrielle's memoirs.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 11:39 (nineteen years ago)

I tried reading that earlier biography and gave up - it was just SO thin and full of padded out biographese.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 13:16 (nineteen years ago)

He's just not biography material. There are no anecdotes other than, "Nick came round my house, sat down for 14 hours and then left without saying a word."

His songs though, are just sublime.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 13:49 (nineteen years ago)

Who kept track of the coat-peg assignments? I want to read a biography of THAT person!

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 14:46 (nineteen years ago)

When I was in abroad I read "Brilliant Orange - The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football".

Of course, it's more about Dutch culture and society than it is about football, as all such books always are. The football is - if you will - a jumping-off point. Writing a book like this must be fun. I imagine it involves composing Two Big Lists, in this case, one big list of What Dutch People Are Like, and then another about What Dutch Football Is Like. Marry the two up, discard anything that doesn't fit, couple of interviews, Bob's yer uncle.

It's very good, "Brilliant Orange" and does give you (me) things to think about. If I start getting all itchy about cultural generalisations, that's my problem. It's the book's problem, too, but it's a problem only if I'm looking for a textbook rather than a natter.

I read some of it on a double decker train, and I hoped Archel would be pleased.

― Tim (Tim), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 15:06 (nineteen years ago)

1. Ruth Brandon, Surreal Lives (biographical art history, very well punctuated)
2. A biography of Charles Mingus called Myself When I Am Real
3. P.G. Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves!, but it's kind of boring me to death
4. The Best of Myles by Brian O'Nolan/Flann O'Brien/Myles na gCopaleen/whoever the hell he was (again)
5. The Japanese poetry anthology In the Country of Eight Islands (for about the fiftieth time)

― Haikunym (Haikunym), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:03 (nineteen years ago)

P.G. Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves!, but it's kind of boring me to death
Banned!

― Øystein (Øystein), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:14 (nineteen years ago)

haha, I've been reading TONS of Wodehouse but this one isn't really catching me up the way some others have

― Haikunym (Haikunym), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:17 (nineteen years ago)

Just finished Murakami's "after the quake," in anticipation of seeing the play tonight. I'm a pretty big fan of Murakami, but I was pretty dissapointed by this collection. I suspect he is a better novelist than short story writer. I think the play'll be fun though.

― stewart downes (sdownes), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:20 (nineteen years ago)

Super Frog!

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:23 (nineteen years ago)

Ha, I was going to post that Matt has chosen to strike a pose of individuality against the "Drone Mind" of ILB.

― Redd Harvest (Ken L), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:29 (nineteen years ago)

Hm, I am pleased about the train, less so about the football.

― Archel (Archel), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 16:39 (nineteen years ago)

I agree that Murakami's After the Quake is pretty slight. But his other, earlier, short story collection has much better stuff in it.

I'm about halfway through Edger Lee Master's Spoon River Anthology, which I've been wanting to dig into for a few years - since the R. Buckner album that set some of the poems to music. Maybe the formula of so many pieces, each one less than a page, written from the same perspective (dead man or woman looking back on their life from the grave), gets slightly tiresome. But the almost relentless negativity is kind of fun.

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 18:47 (nineteen years ago)

Isn't The Hill the most gorgeous thing ever?

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Tuesday, 28 February 2006 18:50 (nineteen years ago)

Now I'm reading "The Foundation Pit" by Andrey Platonov. I like Andrey Platonov very much, although I don't seem to be able to stop thinking of him as an Audrey.

― Tim (Tim), Wednesday, 1 March 2006 09:37 (nineteen years ago)

Margrave of the Marshes - John Peel. Not far into it, but it's OK. I like the introduction by his kids.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 1 March 2006 10:14 (nineteen years ago)

The Sound and the Fury: Forty Years of Classic Rock Journalism.

£3.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Wednesday, 1 March 2006 10:50 (nineteen years ago)

By the way:

The Oxford Murders - worst book ever! Can't decide whether it is bad enough to be interesting.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Wednesday, 1 March 2006 10:52 (nineteen years ago)

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