NYRB Classics - The First 50 Titles

Difficult, even without some later favourites (I doubt I'll poll the remaining 250-odd). It's Lore and Language of Schoolchildren vs Month in the Country vs Seven Men vs Anatomy of Melancholy for me.

man I've tried so hard to like J.F. Powers.

feel kinda bad voting at all since i've only read a couple of these despite wholeheartedly loving everything about this series. but 'a high wind in jamaica' will never leave my list of 20 favorite books.

o yeah, like I have only read 10 if that, this is def just meant to be a 'shout for your fave'.

So much J R Ackerley. I don't really know anything about him but he seems to be up my alley - liked dogs, auden. Is he any good?

I have heard of none of these

The only two I've read are "My Dog Tulip" and "Sleepless Nights". Both are great so it's a tough call.

Oops, I meant "We Think the World of You" not "My Dog Tulip" (though it's also about a dog).

i get the impression he really, really loved his dog.

Moravia's Contempt vs. Walzer vs. Chekhov

The A of M probably. Never quite got on with that Richard Hughes trilogy when I read him years and years ago, but certainly happy to be schooled. Had Quest for Corvo on my shelf for years, never read it, likewise JL Carr. Wine Dark Sea by Sciascia good. Not doing very well here. Used to dip regularly into the Opie's Lore when I worked in a bookshop, cool book. (their collection of nursery rhymes was a well thumbed fixture on my childhood bookshelves, probably still got it somewhere). Will stick with A of M.

A High Wind In Jamaica was good, from what I remember. Like a nightmarish children's adventure novel.

I liked high wind and morte d'urban, only ones I read

What I've read:

Boredom - Alberto Moravia
Contempt - Alberto Moravia
The Glass Bees - Ernst Jünger
A High Wind in Jamaica - Richard Hughes
The Radiance of the King - Camara Laye
To Each His Own - Leonardo Sciascia
The Unknown Masterpiece - Honoré de Balzac
The Waste Books - Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
The Wine-Dark Sea - Leonardo Sciascia

Going to go for The Unknown Masterpiece - that's such a beautiful story and a great discovery, and well put together w/Gambarra if I recall.

Gotta mention The Radiance of the King as a close second.

The Sciascia and Moravia titles aren't the best things they've done - although the Moravia titles are v good.

Would like to read A of M.

Will start Virgin Soil soon.

Fuuuuuck, too hard to choose.

I mean, of those I've read, I'd say all the following were genuinely great:

Alfred and Guinevere - James Schuyler
Boredom - Alberto Moravia
Contempt - Alberto Moravia
Eustace and Hilda - L.P. Hartley
The Glass Bees - Ernst Jünger
A Handbook on Hanging - Charles Duff
A High Wind in Jamaica - Richard Hughes
Jakob von Gunten - Robert Walser
Lolly Willowes - Sylvia Townsend Warner
A Month in the Country - J.L. Carr
My Dog Tulip - J.R. Ackerley
My Father and Myself - J.R. Ackerley
The Pilgrim Hawk: A Love Story - Glenway Wescott
The Pure and the Impure - Colette
The Quest for Corvo - A. J. A. Symons
Virgin Soil - Ivan Turgenev
We Think the World of You - J.R. Ackerley

I've read:

Alfred and Guinevere - James Schuyler
A High Wind in Jamaica - Richard Hughes
A Month in the Country - J.L. Carr
The Pilgrim Hawk: A Love Story - Glenway Wescott
Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist - Alexander Berkman
The Quest for Corvo - A. J. A. Symons
The Radiance of the King - Camara Laye
Seven Men - Max Beerbohm
To Each His Own - Leonardo Sciascia
We Think the World of You - J.R. Ackerley

A High Wind In Jamaica is probably the objectively best thing there, though Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist is awesome, and I kind of want to vote for Seven Men solely on the basis of 'Enoch Soames' and how thoroughly the title character gets owned.

i wonder how long it would take me to go insane if i were only allowed to read stuff on this imprint

Only one I've even heard of is My Dog Tulip b/c it was a movie. :/

James Morrison and thomp are the yin/yang of this thread

Seriously, if you did only read stuff from NYRB, you would go insane in the most stylish, literary way

I've never been a yin before

http://d.yimg.com/ec/image/v1/release/7332898;encoding=jpg;size=300;fallback=defaultImage

A of M for me (first NYRB I owned, via the internet - I think there's a few NYRB titles in one or two Auckland bookstores now, though), but I hope the Stead picks up a vote from Scott or similar.

Had a soft spot for A of M ever since NYRB released it. I was working in a bookshop at the time - took a punt and ordered thirty at a special discount. Nowhere else in London had it at the time, and they sold like hot cakes. My only genuine moment of triumph in commercial business - I can't sell for toffee. Tried to repeat the success with Benjamin's Arcades Project, the twenty hardback copies of which stood like tombstones in the display area for three whole months before being returned.

that's kind of hilarious

god, i bought both of those as a teenager and have yet to read either. tragic.

I've never heard of A High Wind In Jamaica.

Only one I've read is The Wine-Dark Sea, which was excellent. Didn't vote, though.

I've never heard of A High Wind In Jamaica.

a teenage Martin Amis was in the film of it don't you know.

what about his teeth

Trying to follow that up with some kind of Dr No gag, but I'll just say ha.

if you guys didnt read Robert Walser yet - do it.
the only true competitor to Kafka (and i think he wrote before him)

A lot of great things here (esp. the Opies and Burton, who seems like an early favorite), but have to rep again for Memoirs of My Nervous Illness. Schreber deserved better than what he got from Freud: there's real beauty and ingenuity in his quasi-Manichean delusions, even though they're erupting forcibly and unhappily from the head of a middle-aged judge. Honestly, he might be the closest equivalent to late-period P.K. Dick out there: "Even in the year 1895 I still considered the possibility of my being on Phobos, a satellite of the planet Mars which had once been mentioned by the voices in some other context, and wondered whether the moon, which I sometimes saw in the sky, was not the main planet Mars."

A High Wind In Jamaica- I checked it out of the library today.

Just saw your username, Alfred, and LOLed

Enjoy Jamaica. It's great.

I totes need to read The Unknown Masterpiece

Only heard of one on the list, but a lot of these books seem pretty interesting... there's always hope something interesting and undiscovered is out there. Wish I didn't have so many unread books piled up, I feel obligated to read those first before starting anything new.

The Quest for Corvo is terrific. Certainly preferred it to Hadrian the Seventh which I couldn't get through. Also found Ivy Compton-Burnett completely unreadable.

My Father and Myself is one of the strangest autobiographies I've read. Especially recommended if you're interested in gay literature (a weird, very English kind of gay literature).

Jakob Von Gunten

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Forgot to vote for The Glass Bees

after i quick count i think ive read about 17 of these, which feels like maybe too many. 'the radiance of the king' is probably what i would have voted for

I've only read a few of these, but A High Wind in Jamaica and A Month in the Country are both absolutely brilliant must-reads.

think i forgot to vote.

keep meaning to read A Month in the Country. One of those books that perpetually saw but never pulled off the shelves when I was little. Saw it on the shelves again when I went to my mum's last weekend. had a quick look at the blurb cos of this thread. looks good. prob next thing to read.

It's a beautful book. A perfect example of why so many books are waaaaaaay too long.

Agreed. It would have had my vote, had I remembered to vote. I found a remaindered NYRB copy a couple of years ago, and read it because I thought it would be 'nice' or 'charming' or smthing similar, & it does have some of that English idyll vibe to it, but I found it odder and more moving than that - calm and friendly voice telling you about damaged men, all these worlds that are over.

Agreed about its length too - takes not time to read, does everything it wants.

& Carr is great too more generally, love his county maps and pocket books.