Summer Reading

Oh, and just so that we don't bivouac ourselves in France, can I say that two of my favorite 19th c realists are Henry James and Edith Wharton? I don't know what can touch them.
 
I'm sorry, I should have specified naturalism and evidently melodrama, since you show a taste for critical realism, though I don't understand preferring either James or Wharton (James is wonderful, Wharton is a very nice substitute)to Flaubert. I said that Maupassant would turn Zola's plots into a flat ironic conte. Zola would never construct a Maupassant plot. I don't remember if I've read La Petite Roque. I'll look for it.

I have nothing to say about Balzac, whose great novels are great. Eugenie Grandet is surely one of the greatest short novels of the 19th century. Though as a stylist, I don't see your preference. Hugo is a great melodramatist, and I love melodrama. I don't understand your taste for him. And he's as garrulous as Trollope at times.

Pagnol wrote treatments, not novels. I find the films amusing. He doesn't do anything like what Zola does with narrative voice.
 
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
Hugo is a great melodramatist, and I love melodrama. I don't understand your taste for him. And he's as garrulous as Trollope at times.
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I've never read Hugo's novels.
 
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
Hugo is a great melodramatist, and I love melodrama. I don't understand your taste for him. And he's as garrulous as Trollope at times.
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I've never read Hugo's novels.
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I only like the plays when they are set to Verdi. But even Schiller is better that way. I haven't read much of the poetry.
 
Wow. Every time I hear the word Zola, I think of Cezanne.

Scratch that tho...

The Complete Stories of Truman Capote, sounds good to me...
 
originally posted by Joel Stewart:
Wow. Every time I hear the word Zola, I think of Cezanne.

Scratch that tho...

The Complete Stories of Truman Capote, sounds good to me...
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I've never read l'Oeuvre. Anyone? How does it stand up too the other children of Gervaise novels?
 
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
We seem to be scraping the bottom of the barrel, here, as far as comparisons go. Stendhal was an abominable stylist (maybe they've improved him in translation?).
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Drat, I was just about the recommend The Red and the Black. I think I will anyway.

originally posted by SFJoe:
For the real Fire Island experience, Joe Keenan's "Blue Heaven."
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One of the funniest books ever written which isn't by PG Wodehouse.
 
I've followed up on Maureen's early suggestion, who wrote dead-on: "The World as I Found It" by Bruce Duffy - a fictional telling of the life of Wittgenstein, with a little Bertrand Russell thrown in on the side - alternately silly, intense, philosophical, action-packed, romantic, and thoughtful.

Just about finished, and it is a seriously entertaining book: less intellectual history than a look at life and love among the late Victorians who called themselves intellectuals. A whole lot of summer fun for those of us with pretension (or at least for me!). Highly recommended.
 
He is doing a sequel. I loved "An Equal Music" as well but my favourite remains "From Heaven Lake". Having travelled in and around that region I am astounded at the seamlessness of his writing.
 
originally posted by Yixin:
He is doing a sequel. I loved "An Equal Music" as well but my favourite remains "From Heaven Lake". Having travelled in and around that region I am astounded at the seamlessness of his writing.
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I was rather disappointed with "An Equal Music." I thought that "A Suitable Boy" was an astonishing work of fiction with great emotional depth which just wasn't matched by "An Equal Music." I haven't read "From Heaven Lake," though, so I'll add that to my reading queue.

Mark Lipton
 
I liked "An Equal Music" a lot, but almost anything would have been disappointing after "A Suitable Boy." Those who like the Duffy book about Wittgenstein should really read the Roy Monk biography. But I've said this before I think.
 
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