New Goals & Crazy Ideas

Now that I have my tenure decision, I need to find something to fill all my (theoretical) spare time.* Sure I still have a ton of research to do – must make full professor before my 50th birthday** – but I don’t want to be so damned one-dimensional. I need a new hobby to augment my travels and my photography, so I am reverting back to my favorite childhood activity: reading! Not just reading in my chosen social science discipline, but honest to God, make me sound smarter than you reading.

To this end, I have downloaded the complete list of Time’s 100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. I thought I was well-read until I took a look at the list and realized that I had barely scratched the surface. Yes, having a Ph.D. might impress my friends and family, but it doesn’t mean that I am a well-rounded person. {Sniff}

I’ve put the list below, scratching out the ones I’ve already read. I’ve augmented it with a few other books (see the end) from a couple other Time lists. Who knows how far I’ll actually get with this project, but it does mean that I’m going to have to renew my library card!

Now, I just have to wait for the end of the semester to start my summer project.

Update, May 15, 2009: My English Professor Friend went through this list and X’ed out the books she thought were crappy. I have color-coded those in red, even though I plan on reading everything on the list. She also circled her favorite books, so I color-coded them green. I also marked my favorite books — so far — in pretty, pretty purple. For the record, there are a couple of books that my EPFmarked as crap that I really liked. I put those in purple, just because it’s my list.

The Top 100 List:

• The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow – Purchased 9/4/2009
• All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren ***
• American Pastoral by Philip Roth

Finished May 18, 2009

I read this book because it was on Time’s list of 100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. It is supposed to be a good read; I mean, it did win the Pulitzer Prize. However, I found the first part of the book to be incredibly hard to wade through. I didn’t like Roth’s narrative device; he uses Nathan Zuckerman to establish the background of Swede Levovas one of the popular boys that had marvelous luck. There were times where I was ready just to put the book down and forget about it. It was dense and — to be honest with you — could have been a lot shorter.

That said, I am glad that I stuck with the book because it got better. In fact, I would have really liked this story if Roth had dropped the first part of the book. The tension between Merry and her father was well done; I could really visualize this relationship. It really seems to fit with the tenor of the 1960s. I did have to look up the concept of Jainism (never heard of that religion before).

• An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
• Animal Farm by George Orwell
• Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara – Ordered 5/15/2009
• Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
• The Assistant by Bernard Malamud
• At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O’Brien – Ordered 5/29/2009
• Atonement by Ian McEwan****
• Beloved by Toni Morrison
• The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood – Ordered 5/15/2009
• The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

Finished April 22, 2009

Normally I’m not a fan of crime novels or vintage mysteries (even though I do love noir films), so it’s odd that I would have even read this book. Yet, it was included on Time’s list of 100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present, and my goal is to read every book on the list. I am very happy to report that this book was an entertaining read. Marlowe is very much a man’s man; the women were crazy, especially the two Sternwood girls; and there’s all sorts of slightly corrupt cops, ex-whisky runners, and dodgy businessmen. Granted, I didn’t like Chandler’s references to gay people, but I guess we have to remember that the book was written back in the 1930’s. What amused me most were the analogies: “…and the white carpet that went from wall to wall looked like a fresh fall of snow at Lake Arrowhead.”

• The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood
• Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
• Brideshead Revisit by Evelyn Waugh
• The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder

Finished July 9, 2009

I think I was disappointed in this book because I really like Thorton Wilder’s plays. The best thing I can say about it was that it was short — very, very short. I did, however, like the appendices that were put together by Wilder’s son Tappen. Now, those were interesting. I’m going to try one more Wilder book before I write him off as a novelist.

• Call It Sleep by Henry Roth
• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
• A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
• The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
• The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
• The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon

Finished June 28, 2009

I have to admit that reading some of these books is making me feel fairly unsophisticated. What can I say? I didn’t like this book either. Perhaps I had a preconceived bias against the book. After all, I tried to read Gravity’s Rainbow (a decade ago), but I gave up after about 50 pages. That’s also on this list of books and it’s going to take a lot of willpower to get through that book.

Now, I could reflect upon the plot here, but honestly, SparkNotes does a much better job. Basically, “The Crying of Lot 49 appears to be about cultural chaos and communication as seen through the eyes of a young woman who finds herself in a hallucinogenic world disintegrating around her.”

I can say that I found the whole thing rather tedious – a conspiracy theory that revolves around the U.S. Postal System, really? And all that talk about LSD was a complete turnoff. The names, however, were freaking hysterical. I loved the band named The Paranoids. I’ll admit that the whole affair with Metzger was pretty amusing, especially the bit about the T.V. show he starred in as a child. The book also made me curious enough to read a bit about Pynchon’s life (a recluse, but with guest appearances on The Simpsons!) and I also learned about genre of hysterical realism — so reading it was not a complete waste of time.

• A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell
• The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West
• Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather – Ordered 5/7/2009
• A Death in the Family by James Agee
• The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen
• Deliverance by James Dickey

Finished sometime in October 2009

I kept meaning to write a review of this book, but time got away from me. Having seen the movie, I was not surprised by the book. I enjoyed Dickey’s descriptions of the scenery and, at times, I really enjoyed the story. At least, I enjoyed the first half of the story …

• Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone – Ordered 5/7/2009
• Falconer by John Cheever
• The French Lieutenant’s Woman by John Fowles
• The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing
• Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
• Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
• Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
• The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh
• The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers – Shelved
• The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene
• Herzog by Saul Bellow
• Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
• A House for Mr. Biswas by V.S. Naipaul
• I, Claudius by Robert Graves
• Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
• Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
• Light in August by William Faulkner
• The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
• Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding – Purchased 9/4/2009
• The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
• Loving by Henry Green
• Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis – Purchased 4/27/2009
• The Man Who Loved Children by Christina Stead
• Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
• Money by Martin Amis
• The Moviegoer by Walker Percy — Reading now.
• Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
• Naked Lunch by William Burroughs

Finished June 27, 2009

I have never been so glad to finish a book in my entire life. I don’t know what’s up with the Time editors, but this was absolute trash. It wasn’t the content — the life of a junkie didn’t bother me. What bothered me was the stream of consciousness nature of the book. It made my brain feel like I was stoned, which I guess was the main point of the book. The book was also quite gross. Honestly, some of his statements were just for shock value: “I fart ambrosia and shit pure gold turds!” Really? There’s only one quote in the book that I like — and it’s only when I take it completely out of context: “New Orleans is a dead museum.” Yeah, that would be a great quote to describe the city in the days following Katrina.  The only stuff I actually liked in this book were the auxiliary materials collected in the appendices to the book.

• Native Son by Richard Wright
• Neuromancer by William Gibson

Finished May 23, 2009

I started reading this book because it was included in Time’s Top 100 list. I have to say — if I wasn’t working towards the goal of tackling that Time list, I never would have finished the book. The beginning of the book was rather obnoxious – dense, hard to follow, and quite frankly, a little boring in spots.

By the end of the book, I was glad I had read it. As others have noted, Gibson’s book was the origin of the word “cyperspace.” It was also one of the earliest books in the cyperpunk genre. I’m obviously not that hip; I had to Google the term to find out what it meant. This book also inspired the Matrix movies (it’s just too bad that I liked those movies much more than I liked this book). Plus, after reading the book, I actually did a little more research on the genre and on the writer — only to learn that Gibson wrote two X-Files episodes (“Kill Switch” and “First Person Shooter”).

Would I read this book again, knowing that it was visionary? Probably not. I didn’t like it as much as Snow Crash (#83 on this list). That said, I might read some of Gibson’s other works. Spook Country looks promising.

Final note: I have to admit that I might be a little parochial in my tastes. The fact that Case was a big time junkie really bugged me. A lot. More than it should of.

• Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
• 1984 by George Orwell
• On the Road by Jack Kerouac
• One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
• The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski
• Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
• A Passage to India by E.M. Foster
• Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion

Finished May 12, 2009

I’m reading this book as a part of my summer challenge to tackle all 100 books on Time’s list of Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. So far, this has been my favorite book on that list. After I finished reading it, I started over!

Everyone keeps characterizing this as a difficult book to read, but I enjoyed it much more than Yates’ Revolutionary Road (#80 below). Yes, Maria is rather apathetic, but somehow, I understand that, especially when you keep in mind the time and place of the setting. The whole abortion description was remarkably well-done – so well done that I might use that section the next time I teach my Gender and Politics course.

Disclaimer: Less Than Zero (Bret Easton Ellis) was my all-time favorite novel in high school … and Didion’s minimalist approach is very similar (or perhaps I should say that Ellis’ writing seems similar to Didion’s since she came first).

Note. I plan to read more of Didion’s work.

• Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth
• Possession by A.S. Byatt
• The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
• Rabbit, Run by John Updike
• Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow
• The Recognitions by William Gaddis
• Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett

Finished August 8, 2009

Now, I like crime novels well enough (I really got a kick out of the Raymond Chandler book that was on this list), but I struggled through this one. I’m not sure why. It might be that I had a hard time relating to the characters in the book. It might be the fact that I didn’t like the corruption angle. It might be the fact that I absolutely hated Dinah Brand.

That said, I’m not ready to give up on Hammett’s works. I’ve noticed that I’ve read other books by the authors on Time’s list — other books that I liked way better than the ones selected by the Time editors/writers. When I get a chance, I think I’ll take a stab at reading The Thin Man. Nick and Nora are famous, man! Then, I’ll decide what I think of Hammet as an author.

• Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

Finished April 26, 2009

I picked this book up as a part of my mission to read all of the books on Time’s 100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. At the risk of being jeered, I can say that this really is not my favorite book. Yates is like a poor man’s version of Fitzgerald.

The book jacket characterizes the two main characters are “a bright, beautiful and talented couple.” Yet, as I read the book, neither Frank nor April seemed talented at much of anything. Frank spent most of his time shoving papers around on his desk, arguing with his wife, and – occasionally – smacking her around. April may have been beautiful, but she was incredibly self-interested and rather depressive. They seemed overly smug (oh, we’re so much better than our friends, the Campbells), and while they planned their escape from suburbia, they never managed to pull it off.

I’d tell you how it ends (predictably), but I suspect that would get me all sorts of nasty messages.

The book does its job well in painting a picture of the culture of the 1950s. That said, the beginning was slow and I had a hard time feeling any kind of sympathy for the characters. (Plus, now I won’t have to rent the movie!)

• The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
• Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
• Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

Finished May 11, 2009

As I’ve noted in other reviews, I’m working on reading all of the books included in Time’s 100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. I was really quite surprised to find this book on the list. I mean, most people don’t really consider science fiction to be high literature, if you know what I mean.

I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I got a huge kick out of the comments about BMW drivers. I thought the segregated burbclaves were pretty representative of most gated communities. The franchised churches were hysterical. I felt pity for the Rat Things. And the Metaverse … well, the Metaverse really felt like he was describing Second Life. Given the fact that this book was written in the early 1990s, that’s rather forward thinking.

I, however, have to agree with some of the other reviewers about the last 100 or so pages. The ending wasn’t as richly detailed as the rest of the book.

• The Sot-Weed Factor by John Barth
• The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
• The Sportswriter by Richard Ford
• The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carre

Finished July 12, 2009 

Just when I was thinking about giving up on this list (Naked Lunch? Tropic of Cancer? These are really examples of great literature?), I ran across John le Carre’s The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. Finally, something I could sink my teeth into! The book dates back to 1963, deep into the Cold War. It’s full of twists and turns. I kinda’ figured out the plot (re: Mundt) before I hit the final chapters, but I was not expected the final deaths in the book. I’ll have to check out some of le Carre’s other books.

• The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
• Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
• Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
• Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller

Finished May 7, 2009

This summer vacation, I am working my way through Time’s100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present. I’ll admit that I’ve tried to read Henry Miller before, but I never made it through any of his books. I find them annoying, sexist, and plotless.

Yet, I had a goal, so I read the whole book. The first few pages were obnoxious — really, does he have to use the C-word all the time? — but I eventually became desensitized to the nastiness of it all. In some ways, you could consider this book as a guide to Paris for the starving artist — you learned how he mooched off people, how he found prostitutes, all sorts of handy tips (ha!).

I did mark a few pages withinteresting quotes, such as his analogy of people as lice. And the whole thing about how to masturbate to an apple really reminded me of American Pie.

I don’t think I’ll be reading any more Henry Miller.

• Ubik by Philip K. Dick – On Deck (still)
• Under the Net by Iris Murdoch
• Under the Volcano by Malcom Lowry
• Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
• White Noise by Don DeLillo
• White Teeth by Zadie Smith

Finished August 12, 2009

I read some reader reviews of White Teeth and I can tell you that this is a book that most people either really like or really hate. It’s true that the book is long and that some of the characters are unsympathetic. Yet, life is long and a good chunk of people are that self-absorbed. So, if you’re looking for realism, then White Teeth is the book for you.

Now, I’ve been burned by other books on the list — in fact, I’ve struggled through several that didn’t live up to the hype. This one, however, was engaging. Sure, there are parts that are (ummm, how to say this tactfully) extraneous to the plot, but I thought it was a fairly remarkable work for a 24 (25?) year old writer.

The book seems more character driven than plot driven (yes, it does plod along), but there was a richness in the writing that kept me up late reading. In the end, the book is very good at looking at how people struggle to find themselves — a struggle that is probably much worse for individuals who are feeling cross pressured by various cultural values.

It’s pretty damned gritty, but not in a gross, oversexed Henry Miller kind of way.

Oh, and there’s this one part that’s pretty predictable at the end … but I can’t tell you what it was or you’ll be pissed at me for ruining the book.

• Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Time’s Top 10 Graphic Novels: I added the Top 10 Graphic Novels to the list in order to feed a guilty pleasure. While I was never found of comics when I was a kid, I really got into these graphic novels after reading Marjane Satrapi’s two-volume story Persepolis. Well that, and I also started collecting Buffy comic books and the new Minx graphic novels aimed at teen girls.

• Berlin: City of Stones by Jason Lutes
• Blankets by Craig Thompson

Finished May 15, 2009

Amazing. Touching. Beautifully drawn. This is an excellent graphic novel that explores issues of abuse, religion, relationships, and — finally — finding yourself.

• Bone by Jeff Smith
• The Boulevard of Broken Dreams by Kim Deitch
• The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller
• David Boring by Daniel Clowes
• Ed the Happy Clown by Chester Brown
• Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware
• Palomar: The Heartbreak Soup Stories by Gilbert Hernandez
• Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons

Other Graphic Novels: Now, Time did have a top 25 graphic novel list that included a bunch of other books that weren’t on the original list. So, I’ve added them to my project too!

• Buddha by Osamu Tezuka
• A Contract with God by Will Eisner
• Epileptic, Vol. 1 by David B.
• Flood by Erick Drooker

Finished July 16, 2009

Very cool. A graphic novel that’s all graphics and no words. It’s very odd, but the drawing were just gorgeous. I’m actually going to use one of the drawings in this book, along with a part of his interview in a class I am teaching this summer. {American Book Award Winner}

• From Hell by Alan Moore & Eddie Campbell
• The Golem’s Mighty Swing by James Sturm
• Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer by Ben Katchor
• Louis Riel by Chester Brown
• Maus, Vol. I & II by Art Spiegelman
• Nightmare Alley (Spain adaptation)
• One! Hundred! Demons! by Lynda Barry
• Our Cancer Year by Harvey Pekar and Joyce Brabner
• Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
• The R. Crumb Coffee Table Art Book by R. Crumb
• Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco
• Sandman: Season of Mists by Neil Gaiman
• Stuck Rubber Baby by Howard Cruse
• Summer Blonde by Adrian Tomine – ordered July 11, 2009
• Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud

Finished May 26, 2009

This was really quite good. I enjoyed reading it, but I need to give it a second run-through. I’m planning on using some of the concepts in my “Politics, Pundits, and Pop Culture” class this summer when we get to the section on editorial cartoons, comics, and graphic novels (e.g., Maus, Persepolis).

Other Time Recommendations: Recently, Time had a section about gimmick books. Now, I’ve already read some of these books such as Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich. Other books on the list just looked crappy. Thus, I’ve only added the books that looked cool enough that I’d finish them.

• The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner’s Semester at America’s Holiest University by Kevin Roose
• Ten Days in a Mad-House by Nellie Bly
• Newjack by Ted Conover
• Hell’s Angels by Hunter S. Thompson – Purchased  4/18/09

Update: April 22, 2009 — And then there’s the list of other books I want to read by the authors on the lists above. You know how that is – you read one book by a person and the next thing you know, BAM!, you have a whole pile of books by the very same guy/gal. So, I’ll add my additional books as I go along:

• The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler – Added 4/22/09
• Democracy by Joan Didion – Added 5/12/2009
• The Plot Against America by Philip Roth – Added 5/20/09
• I Married a Communist by Philip Roth – Added 5/20/09
• The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett – Added 8/8/09

 

* Yeah, I’m delusional. I’m sure I’ll have so much spare time, given my new administrative duties.

** This is an 11 year window. Surely, I can do this.

*** I grew up in the south and lived in Louisiana. How I avoided this book, I’ll never know!

**** Well, I did see the movie. Does that count?