What LoA book are you reading?

DiscussãoLibrary of America Subscribers

Aderi ao LibraryThing para poder publicar.

What LoA book are you reading?

1DeusExLibrus
Editado: Nov 12, 2009, 12:22 am

So, what LoA volume are you reading at the moment? I'm in the middle of HP Lovecraft: Tales

2scott.stricker
Nov 11, 2009, 8:04 am

I'm finishing Cannery Row in #132. I read this a few years ago, but am rereading now because I want to read Sweet Thursday in #170, which is a sequal to Cannery Row. I've really enjoyed the Steinbeck volumes.

3billiejean
Fev 19, 2010, 2:01 am

I am reading Moby-Dick, or The Whale by Herman Melville. I am really enjoying it so far.
--BJ

4Django6924
Fev 19, 2010, 6:53 am

Not the entire volume, but I pulled out Flannery O'Connor last night to reread "A Good Man is Hard to Find." I keep coming back to this every 10 years since I first read it trying to understand why I think it is a masterpiece.

5Texaco
Fev 19, 2010, 9:18 am

I am reading Lafcadio Hearn's Two Years In the French West Indies and am enraptured!!!!

6wildbill
Fev 19, 2010, 10:07 am

I am reading volume one of The Debate on the Constitution. My project for this year is to read the LoA volumes concerning early American history including the volumes of writings by Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton and Paine. Last year I read Empire of Liberty and the author had numerous citations from these volumes as primary sources for this period.

7ptdixon
Fev 19, 2010, 10:35 am

As I mentioned in a different thread, I am a recent subscriber (just got my Steinbeck set on Tuesday) and also own the Lovecraft and Flannery O'Connor volumes which I have frequently been picking up lately. I just started reading The Log from the Sea of Cortez (actually, I am still in its forward "About Ed Ricketts) and am really enjoying it. Revisiting Steinbeck after many years has really been a reawakening for me; I am older now, enough so that I can really appreciate his writing more than I could before. Great stuff.

8DCloyceSmith
Fev 19, 2010, 10:01 pm

I'm partway through two different volumes: I'm finishing up Mark Twain: Historical Romances (I'm a third of the way through Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc), and I've just started Pale Fire in the Nabokov: Novels 1955-1962 volume. In the Nabokov volume, I really enjoyed Pnin.

9euphorb
Fev 20, 2010, 2:12 pm

I just finished Indian Summer in the volume Howells: Novels 1875-1886, which I very much enjoyed. I had earlier read A Modern Instance in the same volume. The volume of early Wilder novels just arrived in this morning's mail, and I am looking forward to reading some of those novels.

10iftbw
Fev 25, 2010, 6:08 pm

I just finished reading "The Spoils of Poynton" in the Henry James Novels volume 1896-1899. Just started "What Maisie Knew," which looks to be more fun, and kind of seems to be James' attempt at a Dickensian "life."

11Django6924
Fev 25, 2010, 10:12 pm

>9 euphorb:

Does the Wilder volume include Heaven's My Destination? I always admired this and The Woman of Andros very highly, and couldn't understand why they are almost forgotten. I've been itching to read The Ides of March and The Cabala, and will probably buy the LOA volume for those alone.

12euphorb
Fev 25, 2010, 10:33 pm

>11 Django6924:

Yes, the volume does include all the ones you mentioned. I'm glad to read of your high opinion of them and am looking forward all the more to reading them. I'll have to put them off for a bit, though, because I started Elmer Gantry from the Sinclair Lewis: Arrowsmith, Elmer Gantry, Dodsworth volume, which I want to have read before seeing a new opera based on that novel next month at the Florentine Opera in Milwaukee.

I'm assuming that Wilder's novel Theophilus North and his Norton Lectures will appear in a second volume of his non-dramatic works, though I haven't seen any announcement by LOA of such a volume -- however, on the page describing publishing subsidies on the LOA website, Wilder is lited among future volumes for which publishing subsidies are still sought, and I believe that page was updated since the volume with the earlier novels and stories appeared, so I take that as a hint that there will be one.

13Texaco
Fev 25, 2010, 10:58 pm

Per the LOA website:

The upcoming volumes for which support is being sought include the writings of John Adams, Jonathan Edwards, Martin Luther King, Jr., Arthur Miller, Clifford Odets, Frederick Law Olmsted, William Prescott, Mark Twain, Thornton Wilder and others. For more information about publication subsidies and a list of additional volumes for which support is needed, please send a letter or e-mail to Karen Duda at:

The Library of America
14 East 60th Street
New York, New York 10022
Phone: (212) 308-3360
Fax: (212) 750-8352
info@loa.org

14DCloyceSmith
Editado: Fev 26, 2010, 2:56 am

>12 euphorb:

You are correct: a third volume of Thornton Wilder is in the works, although it has not yet been scheduled. I don't recall the proposed contents off the top of my head, but I do remember that the volume will include Theophilus North and The Eighth Day. (The latter was one of my favorite novels when I was younger and I keep meaning to reread it to see if I feel the same way now.)

(edited to fix link, per )

15Django6924
Fev 26, 2010, 12:03 am

>14 DCloyceSmith:

Wonderful news!! I was hoping against hope that the LOA would publish The Eighth Day which I received when i was an adolescent as a BOMC selection. It was also one of my favorites (I can still see the blue dust jacket with the yellow sun on it!), but the book disappeared in the 40 odd years since then, and when I have seen it in the used bookshops it is usually pricy (it did win the National Book Award).

My desire to reread it was piqued by a magazine article I read a few months ago (I think in the "Smithsonian") about Wilder writing it while holed up in a genuine cowboy town in Arizona, where after causing some initial bemusement among the locals, he became a regular and accepted fixture at the town's local saloon.

16euphorb
Fev 26, 2010, 12:08 am

The links in the previous two posts lead to a different "The Eighth Day," by John Case. Here's a link to Wilder's The Eighth Day, which has several member reviews.

17LesMiserables
Set 27, 2010, 4:26 am

I am just starting my very first read of my small Library of America collection: The Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck.

18LesMiserables
Set 28, 2010, 3:48 am

> 17 continued.....

I laughed for a long time today as I read about 'Ma' attacking some peddler with a chicken and all was left was the legs.

Up to chapter six and really impressed by Steinbeck: the imagery and narrative combined are really powerful.

19Texaco
Set 28, 2010, 9:31 am

I love it! You make me want to re-re-read Grapes...

I hope you follow the novel up with the film which is equally wonderful...we can discuss this later, but Ma's scenes were especially compelling.

20DCloyceSmith
Set 29, 2010, 12:20 am

I'm flipping back and forth between Chandler: Stories and Early Novels and William James: Writings 1902-1910, and I'm about halfway through each of them.

21LesMiserables
Out 2, 2010, 8:25 am

> 19

Still reading..... they are in CA now and one minute I'm laughing my socks off, the next I'm outraged. Great read so far.....

22Texaco
Out 2, 2010, 10:17 am

LesMis please also read Willa Cather, as she will tell you about the European immigrants who settled in the Midwest (the region the Joads are now currently leaving) during the mid 19th century...Ma and Pa Joad would be their grandchildren.

23Texaco
Out 2, 2010, 10:20 am

The ironic thing about history is that everyone has 'blood on their hands' and the Joads' foreparents would be (at least partly) responsible for the Native American Holocaust...

24Django6924
Out 2, 2010, 11:45 am

>23 Texaco:

I do not accept that way of thinking. To say that a baby is born with "blood on his hands" because of action that happened years before his conception is repugnant--and the sort of mindset that will continue to fuel hatred.

25LesMiserables
Editado: Out 2, 2010, 6:25 pm

> There is no clear cut answer. I was born part of the catholic / protestant divide in Scotland & Ireland: when generation pass it's hard to come up with solutions that are fair ad equitable. People hold grudges, cling to power and hate you just because of what religion your parents were or what culture they came from.

I think though that as we evolve as a society and adopt laws to protect people, animals, environment and redress past and ongoing wrongs, we need to accept that changes have to be made some people won't like them, but on the balance of fairness and equity it needs to be done.

Unfortunately, for me, this won't happen as long as the capitalist monster continues to want feeding. This is touched on many times in the Grapes of Wrath: people want to 'own' land, then more, then more still. But the problem is, it leaves nothing for future generations.

I try to think of it as simply as possible, because that is the harsh reality.
Imagine 10 people owned all the land on earth and imagine only 10 people were on the earth.
Now imagine years later there are 10000 on earth, but they own no land, can't legally get any because they can't afford it.
How did this happen? Well, because they just happened to be born later and that's just tough luck.
Now that's fair?

Now what a capitalist will tell you is: "Well do something about it!" Work your way up. This is a land of opportunity. If a man wants it he can make it." But the reality is, more and more people are becoming poorer and fewer and fewer people are owning more and more of power and wealth.

It basically comes down to exploitation. Once a human being has satisfied his primal needs of security and shelter, there really is no excuse to accumulate gross wealth whilst laws are passed and borders are thrown up to keep the poor, poor.

I'm sure everyone knows that today we still destroy mountains of food in 1st world countries whilst people are starving in 3rd world countries.

26wwj
Out 3, 2010, 8:18 am

25 We also pay huge subsides to a few very well off corporations for growing the food.

While I agree with you, I don't think politics belong in this thread or perhaps this series of threads. A thread on Steinbeck or Grapes yes, but not here.

27Texaco
Out 3, 2010, 10:46 am

26: Sir with all due respect, one cannot discuss Steinbeck or Cather or Twain or Chesnutt, etc., without discussing the politics inherent in their writing.

28ptdixon
Out 3, 2010, 4:00 pm

And that may be true, but this thread is about "whatcha reading", not the underlying politics of the novels. Create a steinbeck thread to talk about those issues (so that those interest can partake, those not interested can avoid) without hijacking this thread.

29Texaco
Out 3, 2010, 4:38 pm

LesMis if you ever get around to reading Willa Cather there is a Tom Outland in The Professor's House who is equally as compelling as Tom Joad from Grapes.

30LesMiserables
Editado: Out 4, 2010, 4:45 am

> 26

I was adding to 23, 24: so perhaps you should direct your post there.

I don't necessarily think we need any policemen on here to tell us what to do and what not to do. The thread doesn't say... "What LoA book are you reading? Please post without talking about the book or any issues it raises." In fact I would say that these forums are exactly made for that reason: to prompt discussion.

Okay I'll start again.

I'm reading the Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. (shhhh) :-)

edited: to add smiley face to give context to my post ;-)

31LesMiserables
Out 4, 2010, 4:54 am

> 29

I'll add that to my wishlist. Thanks for the recommendation.
I finished Grapes of Wrath. I had that feeling afterwards that I don't often get: that feeling that I have read a classic of a classic. The same feeling I got (though each feeling is unique and independent in its own way) when I had finished War & Peace and Les Miserables. I felt Steinbeck had grasped completely the injustice, the cruelty, the fear, the pride, the want, the despair. He managed to convey it with laughter and melancholy in a profound and original way.

I'm moving on now to a non LOA book: I novel I have to read with my year 9 class so.....

32Texaco
Out 4, 2010, 9:27 am

29: LesMis I am thrilled right now, please see below re the Dustbowl of the 1930s and the children (the real Joads) who survived it.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/dustbowl/

33ptdixon
Out 4, 2010, 10:07 am

LesMiserables-
I agree there shouldn't be policemen telling anyone what to do or not to do (though I realize that this is precisely what it appears that I did). However, the political conversations have a nasty way of exploding and otherwise civil individuals can get heated and become rude leading to hurt feelings etc etc (especially with the current election cycle). So, sure you can talk about whatever you wish. However, for some of us it is preferred that the tangental political conversations be taken to a new thread as to not overtake the current topic. With that, I am out regarding this talk.

I am currently poking around a few LOA volumes, but am concentrated on a new novel I just found, The Corrections (ever heard of it?). Joking of course regarding it being new; I purchased it years ago and hadn't gotten to it. I am enjoying it so far, but will need to get back to reading some LOA soon so that I may "keep up" with my subscription...

34LesMiserables
Out 4, 2010, 4:11 pm

> 33 No worries.

35DeusExLibrus
Editado: Out 31, 2011, 1:14 pm

Currently in the midst of Theodore Roosevelt: the Rough Riders, an Autobiography. However, that has been set aside for a while in favor of Lovecraft: Tales, Poe: Poetry and Tales, and American Fantastic Tales, which I plan to spend as much of the day and evening reading as possible. Not to say I'll get through it all, but I plan to make as much of a dent as possible! This evening I'll be heading to my parents' house to help with trick r' treaters (answering the door for them that is) and will be toting one or all three along, depending on mood.

36CurrerBell
Nov 1, 2011, 1:17 pm

I'm on a Willa Cather binge right now (also currently reading Hermione Lee's Willa Cather: Double Lives), and I'm just finishing the first LoA volume concluding with One of Ours. To keep the volume clean, though, I've been reading everything on freebie downloads to my Kindle.

I'll probably go next to the third volume (stories, poems, and other writings, mainly critical) and read that directly in the LoA treeware since there really isn't anything that comprehensive for Kindle. Then I'll go to the second volume (the later novels), where the only book I've yet read is Death Comes for the Archbishop and where the novels mainly aren't public domain so aren't available as Kindle freebies.

I just got the two-volume box-set of the Harlem Renaissance Novel, and I'll get to that soon. (The only novel in the collection that I've ever read is Nella Larsen's Quicksand.) I also want to get on to the second volume of Zora Neale Hurston, with the folklore but especially I want to read the autobiography.

37DeusExLibrus
Nov 1, 2011, 1:28 pm

Well, as I should have know, I was, shall we say, overzealous in bringing the Lovecraft and Poe volumes over to my parents' house to read while awaiting trick r' treaters last night. Got through two or three stories in Lovecraft (up to the Call of Cthulhu), and Poe lay forgotten. Ah well, such is life.

38DCloyceSmith
Nov 1, 2011, 8:14 pm

I just finished Melville's "White-Jacket" and I am soon going to start "Moby-Dick" (which I'm looking forward to since I've actually never read it all the way through).

I'm also about half way through the second volume of Eugene O'Neill's plays; I recently finished "Desire Under the Elms," one of the better plays from his middle period, and "Marco Millions," perhaps his worst play from any period.

39Django6924
Nov 1, 2011, 11:39 pm

>38 DCloyceSmith:

Ah, reading Moby-Dick" for the first time! I remember when I read it for the first time in high school, and was alternately elated and exasperated--elated for the dramatic language, and for the amazing amalgam of humor and an awareness of the basic tragedy of existence; exasperated because sometimes the plot seemed to get lost in the welter of cetological details. I plodded through doggedly because I was afraid I might miss something important, but the second time I read it, in graduate school, I knew I could skim over these passages. The third time I read it was 6 years ago, after I had been to see the Charles W. Morgan at Mystic Seaport, and I was struck by how accurate Melville's descriptions of whaling operations and vessels were, and how they preserve a vital piece of American history.

David, do you really think "Marco Millions" is worse than "Strange Interlude"? At least it's funny and shorter.

40Django6924
Nov 1, 2011, 11:47 pm

PS: on the original topic, I just finished West's A Cool Million: The Dismantling of Lemuel Pitkin (the novel) while out of town (being in a hotel while working is great for catching up on reading) and started The Dream Life of Balso Snell which I hope to finish before I get too busy--it's short, a quality that is becoming very important to me these days.

41DCloyceSmith
Nov 2, 2011, 8:59 am

>Django6924

I haven't read "Strange Interlude" yet; there are only five O'Neill plays I haven't yet read (not including the recently re-discovered "Exorcism"), and that one is later in this volume. Thanks for the warning (?).

42DanMat
Nov 3, 2011, 12:21 pm

>40 Django6924:

Cool Million was great and so was Day of the Locust (Miss Lonelyhearts too obviously...). Such a strong volume. Dark, satirical but with an immediacy that's hard to define. I have Balso Snell left myself. I'm sure the LOA would've had a second, equally notable volume if West hadn't run that stop sign in El Centro.

There's a Candide quality to Cool Million which was interesting. The cockfight in Day of the Locust is unbelievable.

43mattsya
Nov 7, 2011, 3:29 pm

I'm in the middle of Philip Roth 1967-1972. When She Was Good and Portnoy's Complaint were both re-reads for me. The first time I read When She Was Good, I remember being unsatisfied with it, thinking it too melodramatic. This time around, I was much more impressed.

I was very surprised by how well Portnoy's Complaint holds up. I read it in college and thought it was hilarious. And now it's still funny and, sort of surprisingly, still vulgar. What I mean is, a lot of times when you go back to controversial things from the fifties and sixties, like, say, Lenny Bruce or The Fugs, it just seems kind of quaint that those things were once considered obscene. It's like when the South Park kids had to read Catcher in the Rye, and they're all excited about reading something controversial but then Stan says to Kyle, "I don't get it, all it does is say 'f***" and 'sh**' a couple times." Portnoy's Complaints still comes across as exceedingly obscene even by South Park standards. (And I mean that in a good way.)

I just started "Our Gang," and I'm finding it sort of tedious. I'm not sure if Roth was intentionally trying to follow up on the success of Portnoy's Complaint with more funny, but this sort of broad political satire really isn't his strength. Or maybe it's just something I'm not interested in.

My next subscription volume is 17th and 18th century poetry. That will be a change for me.

44kcshankd
Nov 9, 2011, 11:36 am

I am in Volume Two of the first administration of James Madison, courtesy of Henry Adams. We are backing into the War of 1812. Reading these detailed Presidential histories (I finished the Jefferson Administration volumes last Jan) gives one a cyclical feel to the endless political debates, over many of the same issues. We are a bickering lot, but of course the alternatives are worse.

45wildbill
Nov 14, 2011, 3:08 pm

The two Henry Adams were some of the first LOA volumes I read. I enjoyed them immensely. There is a separate volume on the War of 1812 with Adams name on it which is simply an excerpt from the Madison history.

46randomengine
Abr 10, 2012, 1:39 pm

I started to read the first volume in the Debate on the Constitution. Early on I got to a point where the greatness of George Washington and his reputation in the American Revolution was mentioned. I bookmarked my place and put the book up and then got out my volume on the American Revolution and began reading that.

I just finished a response to lord Dunmore's Proclamation. It is amazing to me that this response was a very anti-slavery response, that even in this early time period there was a mainstream anti-slavery movement. I am but a novice in American History. I learn so much reading my LoA volumes and I love every moment of it. Once I finish this volume on American Revolution, I may continue on to Debate on the Constitution.

47geneg
Abr 10, 2012, 5:02 pm

In Europe slavery brought nothing to the party. Once Britain lost the American Colonies slavery added very little outside of the Caribbean. In other parts of Europe serfs were in a condition of servitude that might as well have been slavery. In other places the peasantry had no power and worked as they could find it at near slave wages. There were plenty of people in Europe who were willing to take the place of slaves in the fields, in the mines, and in the factories.

Outside of North America and Europe there were smallish groups culturally designated to function economically as slaves, such as the untouchables of India. Most of these societies were not well enough organized to make widespread slavery economically efficient.

Of course, slavery still exists. Considering the God given right for one human being to own another human being I am surprised the Religious Right isn't pressing for a return to slavery and decrying anti-slavery efforts as being part of the liberal War on Christianity.

48Django6924
Abr 10, 2012, 10:59 pm

>46 randomengine:

The Debate on the Constitution volumes are some of my favorite books. Along with The Federalist Papers, reading these volumes told me more about the birth of this country than all the American History course I ever took. It also left me very impressed with the intelligence and foresight of out Founding Fathers (and very depressed at the corresponding lack of these qualities in our leaders today).

49wildbill
Abr 11, 2012, 12:51 pm

I am reading A Princess of Mars. A long way from the Debates on the Constitution. Reading the Debates I was impressed at how the writers hit on issues like the "necessary and proper clause" that are still being argued today.

50geneg
Abr 11, 2012, 12:54 pm

Let us know how A Princess of Mars holds up since you first read it, or what you think of it now. I read it a few months ago and found that unlike most SF from the forties and fifties it held up pretty well as a boy's adventure, which I'm sure is all it was ever meant to be.

51wildbill
Maio 26, 2012, 1:11 pm

A Princess of Mars picked up in the second half. You can read my review on my 50 Book Challenge.

52randomengine
Jan 13, 2014, 6:45 pm

I am currently reading The Guns of August from the Barbara Tuchman volume. I am 219 pages in and simply loving it.

53Django6924
Jan 13, 2014, 8:46 pm

>52 randomengine:

Great book! A favorite of President Kennedy and a major influence on his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

54wildbill
Jan 17, 2014, 11:13 am

I am readingThe Civil War: The Second Year Told By Those Who Lived It. It is a great way to learn history.

55kcshankd
Jan 17, 2014, 4:26 pm

I recently finished Cool School and am finishing up American Pastimes, both outstanding.

56DCloyceSmith
Jan 22, 2014, 1:28 pm

I have been rotating among three collections: Hawthorne, and Melville, and James. I read Melville's Typee last month. (I can see why it was Melville's most popular title during the nineteenth century. Much of it is fascinating and exciting, but parts don't hold up that well and it's a bit long for what it is.)

This past weekend, I finished The Scarlet Letter (for the third time!), and I started James's The American, which I've never before read and which I already love.

57Django6924
Jan 22, 2014, 1:49 pm

I've been sampling James Agee's Film Writing and Selected Journalism. I read a lot of Agee in high school as my favorite teacher was writing his master's thesis on Agee, but there are some of his journalism pieces here I've never read before. A tremendously talented writer--perhaps the most gifted of all mid-century Americans--who never totally fulfilled his potential.

58LesMiserables
Jan 22, 2014, 4:57 pm

I have been dabbling with American Earth. It is a massive, desert island tome. I can hardly think how the Library of America managed to produce it at such inexplicable value.

59Podras
Jan 31, 2014, 3:47 am

I recently finished volume I of Francis Parkman's France and England in North America and am now reading volume II. LOA published in these two massive volumes the entirety of Parkman's seven volume history which begins with France's first "colony," in Florida where they sought to exploit hypothetically vast gold fields (this was before the Spanish arrived and--euphemism alert!--bumped them out) and ending with the French cession of all claims in North America (until Napoleon) at the end of the French and Indian War (aka Seven Year's War). Parkman extensively researched his subject, apparently using a considerable amount of original written source material, and wrote about it with a clarity that makes reading about the period a pleasure, though the loooonng string of bloody confrontations with Indian tribes, especially the Iroquois (or Five Nations), occasionally becomes stressful.

60randomengine
Editado: Jan 31, 2014, 7:06 pm

I sooo want those Parkman volumes. Thanks for writing that up, I found it just getting more excited to read them and I sympathize with the horrible and deplorable actions taken against the First Peoples of this land.

62LesMiserables
Fev 1, 2014, 2:10 am

Not reading in full but dipping in, I couldn't help laugh at Emerson's journal entry of his short traverse of the lower highlands across the Trossachs and the foothills of Ben Lomond. He had what we would describe as an everyday experience in Scotland.

63Podras
Fev 2, 2014, 2:34 pm

>61 LesMiserables: Thank you very much for posting this link. The article referenced contains an excellent review of Parkman's France and England in North America in considerable detail, particularly with regard to Indian relations. Those "horrible and deplorable actions" referred to above (>60 randomengine:) came from both sides. (Yes, I've read Dee Brown's Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee and strongly recommend it.)

A small proportion of the review, though, extracts a few general principals from Parkman, and with support drawn from de Tocqueville's Democracy in America (also published by LOA), uses them for partisan sniping, a discussion of the merits of which belong elsewhere. I do strongly agree, however, that reading about early America, particularly writings from our founding fathers themselves, serves to illuminate an astonishing number of contemporary issues. LOA is providing an extraordinarily valuable service by making them available for today's readers.

64Jan7Smith
Fev 24, 2014, 4:41 pm

Just finished reading both volumes of William Maxwell and was delighted with the writing. Very enjoyable.

65randomengine
Fev 25, 2014, 11:06 am

I have so many hobbies I had to make some time for LoA reading. Monday nights are my LoA nights and I cracked open one of the original volumes I purchased before I got my subscription - the first volume of American Fantastic Tales.

I am an avid fan of fairy tales and horror and that anthology + the Lovecraft volume brought me to the LoA and I have to say I love everything they publish...such great stuff.

Anyway, I continued my journey through the first volume of American Fantastic Tales. I read The Moonstone Mass by Harriet Elizabeth Prescott Spofford. I really enjoyed the surreal quality of the journey the main character takes.

66geneg
Fev 25, 2014, 12:21 pm

Once again, I'm trying to read some recent fiction, specifically The American Trilogy by Philip Roth, particularly American Pastoral. I intend to attempt all three novels before heading back to my comfort zone in 17th-18th century Scotland and The Bride of Lammermoor.

Those of you who know me know that I don't particularly care for modern literature, but I'm always open to trying to develop a taste for it. I don't think, though, this book is going to help. It's well written, filled with emotionally damaged and vulnerable characters. I'm too much of a romantic to dive deeply into the psychology of others'neurosis. I've got my own, why do I want to watch other people's lives fall apart. However, I am but half way. I'll reserve judgment until I'm finished.

67geneg
Mar 19, 2014, 10:52 am

I finished American Pastoral by Philip Roth and just before I finished it I decided to read Uncle Tom's Cabin. I've never read it and I'm not sure I'll be able to finish. So far there is just a smothering tone to the writting. It sounds like it's going to be a story of good white people versus bad white people while the slaves are a prop allowing this white people tragedy to play out. I'm not very far along, fewer than a hundred pages, so we'll see how it goes.

The Roth was well written. I recognized many of the techniques I learned about in my creative writing courses. It was by no means a difficult read, but I just couldn't identify with the characters and their issues. They lived in, and were concerned with issues I don't have any experience with. Oh, well. I still intend to read I Married a Communist and The Human Stain but not without some Scott first.

68mondryle
Mar 19, 2014, 8:59 pm

I passed the halfway point in Whitman's Poetry and Prose after dipping in and out of it for almost a year. It really is a continent, as someone online put it. I was familiar with Whitman's poetry and the 1855 preface but not the prose contained in this part of the volume. It's an extraordinary surprise. Vivid autobiographical writing in short, loosely connected installments.

69wildbill
Mar 20, 2014, 8:07 pm

I am about 150 pages into The Civil War: The Third Year Told By Those Who Lived It. This is a fantastic series. The selections are very informative and have a variety of points of view.

70Podras.
Mar 23, 2014, 5:33 pm

I've just finished William Wells Brown: Clotel & Other Writings and thoroughly enjoyed it. My favorite piece was The American Fugitive in Europe, a travel account of five years spent there while he was still at risk of being kidnapped back into slavery in the U.S. Much of that book consists of interesting travel accounts, sightseeing, and meetings with well-known people, but a small portion gets into the slavery issue. I was especially impressed with an account of a visit to the homes of lower-class English workers in which, in one simple descriptive paragraph without polemics, he demolishes the myth put forth by pro-slavery people that slaves in the U.S. are no worse off than they. For someone who had no classroom education whatever, Brown was a remarkably good and knowledgeable writer.

The opening autobiographical piece in the volume, Narrative of ..., is also contained in LOA's Slave Narratives volume, and a biographical piece contained inThe Black Man, "Ira Aldridge," is included in LOA's Shakespeare in America.

71Podras.
Editado: Abr 25, 2014, 1:49 pm

I've concluded reading LOA's Shakespeare in America: An Anthology from the Revolution to Now and found it to be a very interesting and eclectic mix of pieces about, related to, or inspired by the Immortal Bard in the eyes of Americans. The response by David to a question in the "Forthcoming Titles from the LOA (Winter-Spring 2014)" thread (see > 6) is a superb summary (also on Amazon.com). The range of writings is so varied that it even includes a short short science fiction story by Isaac Asimov, a humorous bagatelle that makes the point that the way Shakespeare is viewed today is very different than how he was viewed in his own time, something that seems to escape the attention of anti-Shakespeareans no matter how often it is pointed out. Normally, the story would not be high on a list of Asimov's writings recommended for LOA publication, but in the context of this volume it is a perfect fit.

A shocking piece was a contemporary news report of what LOA's volume description calls the Astor Place riots. A rivalry between an American Shakespearean actor and a British one eventually became a source of public discontent culminating in an 1849 riot in New York City involving thousands. The National Guard was called out and ended up firing into the crowd, killing 22 and wounding around 30. This is something that should be taught in schools along with the Haymarket riot and the Kent State shootings.

I was a little surprised to see Shapiro include pieces relating to the Shakespearean authorship question given the scholarship he has done on it, but on reflection, that, too, is part of the American response to Shakespeare. A suburb piece by Nathanial Hawthorne gives his impressions of Delia Bacon (no relation to Francis), the woman mostly responsible for starting anti-Shakespeareanism. Pieces by Walt Whitman and Mark Twain show that they were among those questioning Shakespeare's authorship.

An excellent introduction by President Clinton speaks knowledgeably of how previous generations of Americans responded to Shakespeare (e.g. George Washington once left the Constitutional Convention to see a production of The Tempest) and of his personal acquaintance with the Bard. For those inclined to view everything through a political filter, there is nothing whatsoever political about the piece, and the quality of the writing along with the subject matter makes it an ideal lead-in for the anthology.

There seems to be a pattern emerging of LOA publications that focus on American writings about very important people in American culture. Before Shakespeare in America, there was The Lincoln Anthology and The Mark Twain Anthology. David, is this seeming trend going to continue? If you can say, I would love to know who or what to expect next.

72euphorb
Abr 25, 2014, 11:27 am

> 71

I haven't seen the Shakespeare anthology yet, but it's interesting to note a difference between the Shakespeare anthology on the one hand, and the Lincoln and Mark Twain anthologies on the other. In the case of Lincoln and Mark Twain, the volumes include both American and foreign writing about a prominent American (and a substantial number of the selections are by foreign writers), whereas the Shakespeare volume is limited to American responses to a prominent non-American. Because of their focus, the Lincoln and Mark Twain volumes are perhaps the only volumes in LOA (other than Tocqueville) where writers that have no other connection to America are included.

73Podras.
Maio 8, 2014, 2:00 am

Sorry for this being somewhat off topic, but in Shapiro's introduction of Isaac Asimov's piece in Shakespeare in America, he stated that Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare was "mercilessly attacked" by professional scholars. I am looking for such attacks for a better understanding of the basis for their criticism, so far without success. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks.

74geneg
Editado: Ago 22, 2014, 2:56 pm

Over the past couple of months I've been on a reading jag. From the LOA I've read:

American Pastoral by Philip Roth

Uncle Tom's Cabin by H. B. Stowe

The People of the Abyss by J. London

The Iron Heel by J. London

Will You Please Be Quiet, Please by R. Carver

Player Piano by K. Vonnegut

Dark Passage by D. Goodis

I Married A Communist by Philip Roth

Nightfall by D. Goodis

And am just now starting

Cane by Jean Toomer

The two by David Goodis have been more than pleasently surprising. Not my usual fare, but quite good and fun to read. This volume would make terrific reading at the beach.

I was completely blown away by I Married A Communist.

75BINDINGSTHATLAST
Ago 23, 2014, 1:45 am

Just starting the Leatherstocking tales.

76Podras.
Ago 24, 2014, 7:55 pm

I'm currently reading Henry James: Essays, American & English Writers and have just finished his essay on William Charles Macready's Reminiscences, and Selections from his Diaries and Letters. Macready's name sounded strangely familiar but only clicked when James revealed that he was the English Shakespearean actor associated with the Astor Place riots (see >71 Podras.:). It is interesting to find the cross connections that sometimes pop up between LOA volumes.

By the way, James is just as good an essayist as he is at just about anything else he writes.

77wordrubble
Set 2, 2014, 4:18 am

I'm reading the Washington Irving edition that includes his marvelous sketchbook pieces. Irving is such an elegant and thoughtful writer. He's an absolute joy to read.

78Podras.
Out 9, 2014, 12:22 pm

Football: Great Writing About the National Sport. I just read the Jim Murray piece. If LOA ever decides to publish The 50 Funniest American Sports Writers, Jim Murray could be all 50. Laugh out loud funny.

79JackieCarroll
Out 9, 2014, 12:41 pm

I'm reading The 50 Funniest American Writers (According to Andy Borowitz) and I'm loving it. I actually have two books going that I have to finish ASAP so I can't really sit down with it right now, but it's full of short, entertaining tidbits, so I can find time to read one or two every day.

80Podras.
Out 27, 2014, 2:05 pm

I've just finished reading LOA's latest topical multi-author anthology, Art in America and had planned to comment on one thing in particular that I'd noticed, but the Oct. 24, 2014 entry in LOA's Reader's Almanac beat me to it when Jed Perl said, "With Art in America I want to show how the lives of visual artists in this country have been woven together with the lives of novelists, poets, and intellectuals of all stripes." He said it better than I would have, too. :-(

Some of the pieces are written by authors represented by LOA volumes; the main series and/or the American Poets Project. These include James Agee, Tennessee Williams, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore, Jack Kerouac, Susan Sontag, May Swenson, James Baldwin, and John Ashbery.

Some articles are written by authors that don't yet have volumes of their own but IMHO should: Henry Miller, Ralph Ellison, and Truman Capote. I'd be especially interested in Ralph Ellison.

81Podras.
Dez 8, 2014, 5:19 pm

I just began reading H. L. Menckin's The Days Trilogy memoires, am only about 100 pages into it including the notes at the back (they add a lot), and am enjoying it immensely. Thus far, Mencken is writing about his youth in Baltimore in the late 1800's. The style is extremely clear and straight forward, but his choice of topics and treatment of them is enthralling. This is the best book of its kind so far that I can recall ever reading.

82kcshankd
Jan 16, 2015, 12:58 pm

Completed Whitman Poetry and Prose on the bus ride home yesterday. Warning - reading Leaves of Grass may cause you to want to hug random strangers on the bus. So many stories hurtling towards the Park & Ride...

83jckern
Jan 25, 2015, 9:43 pm

I finished Whitman last year; I thought the best part of it was Song of Myself, and his writing about his hospital visits during the Civil War. Overall it was a bit of a slog, though.

Right now I'm dividing between the Emerson essays volume and the Stephen Crane volume. I hadn't even read Red Badge before. Too many of his stories just end with no real resolution, but overall it's a good read.

84CurrerBell
Fev 6, 2015, 6:21 pm

I'm about to start a read/reread of Eugene O'Neill doing a complete cover-to-cover, start-to-finish of the LoA in combination with a reading of the new O'Neill biography, Eugene O'Neill: A Life in Four Acts.

I just not too long ago completed a read/reread of Tennessee Williams doing a complete cover-to-cover, start-to-finish of the LoA combined with John Lahr's new biography (Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh) as well as Tennessee Williams: Collected Stories, The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone, some of the poems, and (still to be completed) Moise and the World of Reason.

I'm also doing a read-along of Stella Adler on America's Master Playwrights: Eugene O'Neill, Thornton Wilder, Clifford Odets, William Saroyan, Tennessee Williams, William Inge, Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, so I'll be moving along to the LoA editions of Thornton Wilder and Arthur Miller in due course.

85CurrerBell
Fev 6, 2015, 6:30 pm

>83 jckern: I finished the Stephen Crane volume not too long ago, in combo with Paul Sorrentino's recent Stephen Crane: A Life of Fire. I think I might actually like The Monster better than The Red Badge of CourageThe Monster's certainly extremely good in any event. Personally, I'm not that crazy about Maggie, which tended to use too much euphemism (unavoidably, given the era). I also found the "Whilomville Stories" quite entertaining. They reminded me of some of Shirley Jackson's "suburban housewife" humor in Life Among the Savages.

86CurrerBell
Mar 22, 2015, 9:01 pm

I've got a bit of a project going for myself on American drama, reads and rereads.

Turn of the New Year I finished up the two volumes of Tennessee Williams, in conjunction with John Lahr's Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh, the novels The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone and Moise and the World of Reason, and Tennessee Williams: Collected Stories (introduction by Gore Vidal), along with the Williams chapters in Stella Adler on America's Master Playwrights.

Now I've moved to O'Neill, just finishing the first LoA volume (and I'm reading Robert Dowling's Eugene O'Neill: A Life in Four Acts along with it, and again going to the O'Neill chapters in Stella Adler on America's Master Playwrights).

87Podras.
Jan 4, 2016, 3:23 am

I've just finished Olmsted: Writings on Landscape, Culture & Society by Frederick Law Olmsted. In addition to the eponymous topics, some writings about politics and political corruption associated with his endeavors are included. Especially interesting were anti-slavery articles selected from quite a number he apparently published. During the early part of the Civil War, Olmsted served as the executive secretary of the United States Sanitary Commission. Writings about battles fought in the war are fascinating, but his writings related to his service with the commission show that there are many other aspects about the war to explore, too.

The predominate content of Olmsted's writings earn him a place on my shelves along with John Muir, William Bartram, Aldo Leopold, et. al., though he writes principally about the creation of the aesthetically pleasing rather than natural landscapes.

88jckern
Jan 19, 2016, 8:44 pm

I'm working through the third Melville volume. Pierre was awful; definitely the worst Melville I've read. The short stories were better -- "Bartleby" was delightful. "Benito Cerino" had some uncomfortable dated attitudes but at least was exciting, and Israel Potter was odd.

89LesMiserables
Editado: Jan 19, 2016, 11:08 pm

Nothing at the moment although i'm teaching my seniors Moby Dick later in the year.

90walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:09 pm

Awesome! You are doing super! I have also read Empire of Liberty & it is really good. What do you think of the Debates on the Constitution so far?

91walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:11 pm

I am pleased that you are going through the Historical Romances. What is your impression so far?

92walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:14 pm

I am pleased that you are reading Steinbeck's work. I have the complete set of Steinbeck's work. Although I don't agree with some of his premises, his imaginative interweaving of Jewish theology into some of his work is very good. His East of Eden is impressive.

93walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:21 pm

I have read Poe's Poetry & Tales. Although Charles Brockdon Brown introduced the gothic tales to the public, it failed to draw much interest. Poe's work expanded on the gothic & it is amazing the interest the public had for it. I suppose it was timing but I would suggest that Poe's literary talent was much wider than Brown's.

94walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:25 pm

I have not read Moby Dick though I have read Pierre & Bartleby. For some reason, Melville is a struggle to read though it could be me.

95walterhistory
Jan 21, 2016, 3:32 pm

I have completed Hawthorne's Tales & Sketches. So many of his stories are remarkable in imagination & his use of local history interweaved in those stories. I have read his Scarlet Letter which was my first introduction to Hawthorne. His Young Goodman Brown is downright eerie reading about a man's imagination going wild as he walks through a forest.

96euphorb
Jan 22, 2016, 12:00 am

>92 walterhistory:
walterhistory, it sounds as if your are responding to particular earlier posts in this thread, but it's not clear which ones. You seem to be new to this group, so you may not have gathered that the way people have developed to respond to particular posts is to cite that post by number at the beginning of the new post, preceeded by >, as I have done at the beginning of this post (which responds to your post number 92).

97walterhistory
Jan 22, 2016, 12:33 pm

LOL, I noticed that yesterday so my apologies.

98kcshankd
Jan 23, 2016, 12:53 am

>97 walterhistory: Love the enthusiasm, welcome!

99kcshankd
Jan 23, 2016, 12:54 am

I am 3/4 through Phillip Dick's Four Novels of the 1960s. I am mostly intrigued. Will repost when finished.

100walterhistory
Jan 23, 2016, 5:13 pm

You are most kind, appreciate the compliment :)

101jckern
Editado: Jan 24, 2016, 2:12 pm

>94 walterhistory:
I can understand that; I generally like Melville but I know a lot of people don't like his prose. I've read all of his prose fiction now except for The Confidence Man and Billy Budd, and Pierre is the only work that I found bordered on unreadable. His previous stuff wasn't always exceptional, but even the oft-maligned Mardi I had some pleasure in reading. Pierre was just a tedious, unrewarding slog.

I'm now reading Roughing It (Twain). Certainly a easier read than Melville; I don't always find that Twain's humor has held up to the 21st century but I enjoy his prose in a very different way from someone like Melville.

102walterhistory
Jan 25, 2016, 10:54 am

You are right about Bartleby though, it is one of his better short stories. Some years back I had taken American Lit I class & the prof was obsessed with Melville but even then I still was unimpressed with Melville. Now Twain is a different sort. His ability to use satire in subtle ways makes one anticipate laughs. It is interesting to note that his writings were impacted in later life from the sad period in which he lost his wife & daughter. Mysterious Stranger No. 44 was truly the weirdest at the lowest point of his life. Have you had a chance to read his historical romances yet?

103Podras.
Fev 22, 2016, 8:25 pm

I just finished reading LOA's Wharton: Four Novels of the 1920s. All of them are superb; the kind of writing one expects of her. My favorite is the first novel of the set, The Glimpses of the Moon. A newly married couple with few resources of their own but high ambitions regarding life style rely on wealthy friends to provide their needs, at least for their the first year of marriage. What they weren't prepared for was that "free" sometimes comes with an unexpected price. In terms of personal favorites amongst Wharton's writings, I place this second only to Ethan Frome.

104kcshankd
Mar 23, 2016, 2:26 pm

>99 kcshankd:

Finished with Ubik. The writing is uneven throughout, but Dick's imagination makes the effort worthwhile.

105Dr_Flanders
Mar 23, 2016, 5:48 pm

That is how I feel about Dick in general. Regardless of his shortcomings, I haven't read an LOA book by him that I have regretted, yet. Before the LOA published him, I had read a few novels that were published in the LOA books, so I probably have only read his best regarded work, though.

106novaadage
Maio 1, 2016, 3:28 pm

Just picked up and started re-reading the stories from Kurt Vonnegut: Novels & Stories 1963-1973. His humor and writing is just so wonderful to read. I also picked up Ulysses S. Grant : Memoirs and Selected Letters for $2 bucks from a thrift store. I've been reading from that off and on for awhile.

107jckern
Maio 29, 2016, 2:26 pm

My two recent reads are parts of the first Faulkner volume and the Poe essays and reviews. Poe has some pretty funny reviews of these contemporary authors I've never heard of.

For Faulkner, the best story so far was Light in August. As I Lay Dying was fine, although I don't quite get the supreme accolades it receives. Sanctuary was hard to read, I thought.

108jckern
Jun 21, 2016, 9:53 am

Now I am reading Pylon by Faulkner; I don't like it very much. I feel like it's hard to read for no real purpose, but maybe I'm just not a big Faulkner fan.

What did surprise me is that it had both "fuck" and "cunt" in it; I wondered how it could have been published in 1935 with no controversy. But then I remembered the LoA editions are made from Faulkner's typescripts rather than the published editions, and the cuss words were removed for the printed editions. (Which raises the question of whether that editing strategy is a good one...)

109tomehoarder
Ago 16, 2016, 4:51 pm

I am currently reading the first Parkman volume. Very well-written history. These ought to be better sellers.

110kcshankd
Ago 25, 2016, 3:52 pm

Found a slip-cased set of Reporting World War II on a trip to my hometown used bookstore, started reading volume one last night.

112elenchus
Ago 25, 2016, 4:52 pm

Recently completed a novel of Philip K Dick and one from Ross Macdonald, from each author's first LOA volume, and confirmed these were good choices for me.

113DCloyceSmith
Ago 25, 2016, 9:41 pm

I just recently finished Wright's early works, which were quite good--but (as they should) they depressed the hell out of me.

Now I'm working my way simultaneously through five LOA volumes: Wharton's Novels (just finished The Reef), Nathanael West (almost done), first volume of Parkman's history (recently finished The Jesuits in North America), Welty's stories (just finished Curtain of Green), and the new Le Guin volume (almost done with Malafrena).

I've always been a fan of Le Guin, Welty, and Wharton, and the Parkman is a pleasing discovery. Although West's novels are really not to my taste, I'm actually enjoying much of the unpublished/uncollected material.

--David

114elenchus
Ago 25, 2016, 11:18 pm

>113 DCloyceSmith:

You may have posted your reading in the past, David, but it's the first I've read. It's heartening to know you have a personal as well as a professional connection with these volumes. Happy reading!

115euphorb
Ago 26, 2016, 12:16 am

Henry Adams's Mont St. Michel and Chartres, after having finished his novel, Democracy, a delightful discovery.

116euphorb
Ago 26, 2016, 12:19 am

I'm not sure David has posted his direct reading, as such, before, but his love of this series has long been apparent to me in a number of his posts in various threads in this group. That just makes his contributions and insight that much more valuable.

117Podras.
Ago 26, 2016, 12:14 pm

Almost to the end of the John O'Hara volume and loving it. I knew of him but had never before read anything of his or seen anything made from his works with one exception; an updated version of Pal Joey on stage, Pal Joey '78 starring Lena Horne. From Wikipedia, that version didn't do so well, but from the audience reaction when I saw it, one would think otherwise. It got an extremely enthusiastic standing ovation, and Horne came out to do an encore of Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered.

David, is there any clue that can be shared about when further LOA volumes of O'Hara's works may be published?

118jckern
Ago 27, 2016, 8:20 pm

I agree, Parkman's work is good. I enjoyed the first volume more than the second but it was a fun read.

I'm working on two volumes -- the Leatherstocking Tales (only read Pioneers so far), and Henry James reviews/essays.

119Truett
Ago 31, 2016, 8:06 pm

DCloyce Smith -- like others, I am FASCINATED to know what someone "behind the scenes" thinks of the LOA books and/or writers.
And it's always nice to be reminded that OTHER readers are "working" five or six -- or seven! -- books at a time (so much to read, so little time)!

Been applying more attention to new release novels and nonfiction tomes of late, but...I HAVE been working my way through WAR NO MORE. A _dynamite_ collection of "anti-war" writings.

120DCloyceSmith
Set 3, 2016, 9:11 pm

>114 elenchus: & >116 euphorb: & >119 Truett:
Thanks for the kind words, everyone.

>117 Podras.:
A collection of O'Hara's novels is tentatively scheduled for 2017-18.

121Podras.
Editado: Set 4, 2016, 11:46 am

Thanks David. I'm looking forward to more O'Hara.

Incidentally, I'm now reading Henry James' Autobiographies.

122kcshankd
Set 30, 2016, 11:27 am

Started reading Elmore Leonard with 52 Pickup. Brutal urban fiction, really felt for poor Barbara, Mitchell's wife.

123Dr_Flanders
Out 17, 2016, 4:56 pm

I am also working on the first leonard volume, kcshankd. Having read only a few later Elmore Leonard novels, I was surprised by how dark 52 Pickup is as well.

124kcshankd
Out 18, 2016, 11:50 pm

>123 Dr_Flanders:

I'm working on Swag now. I started reading Leonard because I wanted to get to Rum Punch and Get Shorty, but given the chance I prefer to read authors in chronological order.

125Truett
Out 19, 2016, 6:42 am

Dr_Flanders: don't forget, in an interview Elmore Leonard said he was surprised when the screen version of GET SHORTY turned out to be a comedy. He wrote ALL of his novels in a straight forward -- one might even say "hard-boiled" -- fashion. The comedy elements were -- and are -- there, one just has to approach (or even read) them with a comedic sensibility in order to discover that element.

126artturnerjr
Out 19, 2016, 10:17 am

127kcshankd
Out 19, 2016, 1:05 pm

>126 artturnerjr:

Fantastic, I am looking forward to it. Also, the notes to this LOA Leonard volume are fantastic. The last five to Swag involve the NHRA, two country singers, Alex Karras and Howard Cosell, and Oui magazine.

128kcshankd
Out 20, 2016, 11:34 pm

Swag was good, have some non-fiction to get through but Unknown Man 89 will be up in a couple of weeks.

129leBleuCheese
Out 27, 2016, 2:09 pm

I'm currently in the middle of one of the essays in the Lectures and Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson (#15). I'm a new subscriber --- haven't even got my first automatic shipment, but I made sure to order this one separate. I'm a big reader of the Transcendentalist movement, and the LOA edition is a beautiful way to experience Emerson's prose!

130kcshankd
Out 27, 2016, 10:30 pm

131LesMiserables
Out 27, 2016, 11:50 pm

Just read through this thread. I'm so overdue reading an LOA volume!

132elenchus
Out 28, 2016, 10:38 am

Never too late to start. I recently received the new Frederick Law Olmstead volume, and I'm itching to crack the spine but October has been ghastly for reading opportunities.

133euphorb
Out 28, 2016, 2:47 pm

I just finished Orsinian Tales by Ursula Le Guin (including the two later stories that were not part of the original collection). I had never read anything by Le Guin before and was very impressed. I very much enjoyed not only the substance of the stories, but also the beautiful writing. I'm looking to reading more of her works.

134kcshankd
Jun 26, 2017, 9:52 pm

Just finished Elmore Leonard's second volume - Freaky Deaky was my favorite but all are excellent.

135elenchus
Jun 27, 2017, 12:08 am

I am trundling my way through the Frederick Law Olmsted volume: trundling because of my extraliterary obligations, and not because of FLO's writing. I am pleased to learn he helped plan one of the first planned communities in the U.S. not 10 miles from my home: Riverside, Illinois. I shall have to make time for a visit sometime.

136Podras.
Jun 27, 2017, 10:28 am

Nearing the end of vol. 1 of John Quincy Adams' diaries. Beyond the most basic facts, I hadn't known much about Adams' career before. It's most impressive, as is his writing ability.

137DCloyceSmith
Editado: Jun 27, 2017, 5:14 pm

I just finished all four novels in Faulkner: Novels 1942-1954. Am I one of the few readers who doesn't think A Fable is all that bad? I know it has its fans (more like a cult), but most of what I'd heard had nearly scared me away from it. It's not a masterpiece like several of his earlier novels--I suspect that none of his books could ever exceed Light in August in my estimation--but I enjoyed nearly every page of it.

Anyway, I've picked up the Francis Parkman volume again, and am currently midway through La Salle and the Discovery of the Great West, which (so far) strikes me as much more trenchant and compelling than its predecessors, particularly if one favors narrative history. (That's not to say I didn't enjoy the first two books--I did--but this one is much harder to put down.)

I'm also in the early chapters of The Princess Casamassima, part of my goal to read all of Henry James's fiction.

--David

138Podras.
Jun 28, 2017, 11:54 am

>137 DCloyceSmith: Absalom, Absalom! is the book of Falkner's that totally sold me on him.

139Podras.
Ago 3, 2017, 10:11 am

I'm currently reading Ursula K. Le Guin's Hainish Novels & Stories, Volume 1. It has been over half a century since I originally read the three short novels at the beginning of the volume (currently working on City of Illusions). After all this time, I'm even more impressed with the quality of Le Guin's early writing than I was when I first encountered her.

140Tolkienfan
Set 12, 2017, 11:46 am

I purchased my first three LOA titles in April of 2016 and just started reading Two Years Before the Mast & Other Voyages by Richard Henry Dana Jr. I am enjoying this title so far and am looking forward to completing it and then moving on to my other titles now that I have time to read.

141elenchus
Set 12, 2017, 1:34 pm

Still working my way through Olmstead, recently added Raymond Chandler's pulp stories from Stories and Early Novels. Probably will pause after completing the stories and move to another book. Rather than commit to reading the entire LOA edition, I like to read a complete section or novel, it allows me to cover more breadth of my TBR pile. It does, however, mean I have many partially read LOA editions on my shelf.

142Dr_Flanders
Set 13, 2017, 12:52 pm

>141 elenchus:

I do the same thing. I bounce back and forth between multiple LOA volumes at any given time, and mix in other books as well. Right now I am working through about 4 different volumes, I think.

143kcshankd
Set 28, 2017, 11:07 pm

Finally finished Rum Punch and I think it may be the first time that the movie (Jackie Brown) ended up being better than the novel. The novel has more sub-plots, but Pam Grier and changing her and Max's relationship to being unrequited is fantastic.

144LesMiserables
Out 8, 2017, 8:56 pm

Started reading Wise Blood from the Flannery O'Connor volume. A couple of chapters in and I'm enjoying it.

I haven't read Flannery O'Connor before, so this is my maiden read.

145elenchus
Out 8, 2017, 9:20 pm

>144 LesMiserables:

I've read only short stories so far, and not many, but I think you're in for a treat. That volume is on my subscription list.

146LesMiserables
Out 10, 2017, 7:03 am

>145 elenchus:

It's very good. I read A good man is hard to find tonight.
Funny and chilling.

147Podras.
Editado: Mar 1, 2018, 6:11 pm

I just finished Reconstruction: Voices from America's First Great Struggle for Racal Equality. Reconstruction was, of course, covered in history classes in school, but that coverage had been pretty superficial. It was an era of turmoil in which the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution were ratified, conflict between Congress and President Johnson led to Johnson's impeachment, the KKK rose to prominence, southerners eventually regained control of their states, and Reconstruction ended with the corrupt bargain struck to resolve the 1876 presidential election. All this was presented with the personal detachment often attending history classes.

This book's contemporaneous writings put readers into the midst of the turmoil. Not only is the story on both sides told with much greater detail and vividness, but it creates a sense of personal immediacy that can be very disturbing at times. Passionate arguments by both sides are presented. Survivors' firsthand accounts of atrocities committed by the KKK and like-minded individuals and organizations are particularly intense. Whites who wanted to support the new constitutional Amendments and the associated democratic principles were murdered along with blacks, and the notion that perpetrators should be brought to justice was totally absent. Rampant terrorism, overt political corruption, and the overturning of democratic processes at the ballot box and elsewhere became open and commonplace. In a very real sense, the hatred and oppression epitomized by the old south was defeated in the Civil War, but in the end, it won the Reconstruction.

After leaving office, President Grant was reported to have made this statement of regret: "I hoped a great deal from the South, but these hopes have been wrecked. I hoped that Northern capital would pour into the South, that Northern influence and Northern energy would soon repair all that war had wasted. But that never came. Northern capitalists saw that they could not go South without leaving self-respect at home, and they remained home. The very terms of the invitations you see in all the Southern papers show that." The South has been what it has been for well over a century, not just because of the Civil War, but for the abject failure of Reconstruction.

LOA deserves praise for much of what they have done, but one of their most noteworthy accomplishments has been their continuing series of volumes preserving contemporaneous writings from assorted eras in American history. This is one of the finest volumes in that series.

148jhicks62
Mar 1, 2018, 12:48 pm

Wow, >147 Podras.:! What a fantastic description! I was on the fence about buying and reading that book, and now I have to. LOA should hire you for their marketing department. You're going to force me to get the Slaves Narratives volume, and the 4 Civil War volumes, as well!

149Podras.
Editado: Mar 1, 2018, 6:03 pm

>148 jhicks62: What can I say? It got me stirred up for good reason. Things are much better close to a century and a half later, but watching the evening news doesn't give me much assurance that those old hatreds are behind us yet.

Yes, I recommend those other volumes you mentioned, too. Anti-Slavery Writings and the two-volume Reporting Civil Rights on the same subject are also worthy.

150jhicks62
Mar 5, 2018, 12:11 pm

>149 Podras.: I truly appreciate a well-written review, since there are only so many books we can read in this lifetime. Thanks, again!

151Dr_Flanders
Abr 12, 2018, 1:05 pm

I just finished the first of the two Hainish volumes by Ursula K. Le Guin. I'd never read Le Guin before starting this collection, but I really enjoyed her writing and the way she approached and explored these worlds she created. I've got the 2nd volume on my shelf waiting to be read, so that might be next.

152Podras.
Nov 4, 2018, 11:13 am

It is a dark and stormy night. A mysterious rider appears, seeking shelter from the rain.

That isn't quite how James Fenimore Cooper begins The Spy in LOA's latest and perhaps final volume of Cooper's works (Cooper: Two Novels of the American Revolution)--for one thing, it's too terse by far--but that is the gist of the beginning. I've just finished reading and enjoying it for the first time. Cooper's writing style resembles that of Sir Walter Scott (I recently read Rob Roy, too), the British romance writer whose fiction Cooper most admired and sought to imitate. Filled with romance and adventure, heroes and villains, he does a good job of it.

Now on to the other novel in the volume, Lionel Lincoln. :-)

153LesMiserables
Jan 7, 2019, 10:41 pm

Just read the Birth Mark in the Hawthorne volume.

154elenchus
Jan 8, 2019, 9:43 am

Recently completed the short stories for "The Lottery" in the Shirley Jackson volume.

155euphorb
Jan 8, 2019, 11:10 am

I'm reading "The Word for World Is Forest" by Ursula Le Guin in the second volume of Hainish novels and stories.

156Podras.
Jan 8, 2019, 12:47 pm

I'm currently reading John Updike's Rabbit, Run.

157Dr_Flanders
Jan 8, 2019, 8:59 pm

I read the The Lottery stories, The Haunting of Hill House and the Hainish Novels last year. I really enjoyed all of it. This year I’m hoping to read the second Steinbeck volume (The Grapes of Wrath) and finish Twain’s Mississippi Writings volume.

158jhicks62
Jan 11, 2019, 1:12 pm

>155 euphorb: I just read that book a couple of months ago myself. It was not what I was expecting, but I still very much enjoyed it! I will reserve further comment until you have finished it.

I'm currently reading Main Street in the Sinclair Lewis volume.

159CurrerBell
Jan 12, 2019, 1:18 am

Rereading The Guns of August in the Barbara Tuchman volume. Read it many many years ago, and it fits in with the WW1 era of the Reading Through Time group's first-quarter 2019. I read the this volume's The Proud Tower a year or two ago.

160kcshankd
Jan 13, 2019, 10:19 pm

Enjoying Into the Blue, the LOA volume on aircraft and space flight.

161kcshankd
Fev 24, 2019, 10:27 pm

Just finished Last Stand at Saber River from the Elmore Leonard Western volume.

It was amazing, Leonard's style and signature tight plot are fully present, but set in the mountains of Arizona at the close of the Civil War instead of gritty Detroit or Florida. Terrific.

162Dr_Flanders
Abr 3, 2019, 6:30 pm

I am working my way through three different LOA volumes right now. I started the Shirley Jackson volume last year, reading The Lottery and The Haunting of Hill House. I enjoyed both of those. I am also roughly halfway through H.P. Lovecraft's volume, which I am much less enthusiastic about. I'd like to finish both in the near future, but instead of doing that this week, I decided to read Moby Dick from the second Herman Melville volume. I've wanted to read Moby Dick for a long time, but I've been intimidated by the things I have heard about it over the years. I fell into the trap of putting it off until a better time when I have less distractions. Well, I would in public schools and Spring Break is here, so I've started a third LOA Volume.

I've been surprised and delighted by Moby Dick. It does feature numerous digressions and asides, but Melville often seems to have something interesting or even profound to say. Sometimes I think it is one of the best novels I have ever read...though I do have about 50 chapters left to go.

I'm relatively youngish and not particularly well versed in the classics, but I am thinking that I might trouble back and start Melville's first volume this year. H. P. Lovecraft might have to wait another season!

163elenchus
Abr 3, 2019, 8:07 pm

I recall Moby Dick being eminently readable, as well, despite (many times, because of) the many digressions. I don't yet own that LOA volume but I believe it is on my subscription list.

I loved both The Lottery and We Have Always Lived in the Castle from the Jackson volume, still have the "other stories" and Hill House to go.

Lovecraft is uneven, in my experience. Some of his stories are a breeze to read, others not so much; and some, the ideas are more compelling than the story in which they're contained. I also don't see myself reading an entire volume of his stories at once, preferring to dip in and out (especially when called upon by the LT online reading group, DEEP ONES).

164jroger1
Editado: Abr 3, 2019, 9:20 pm

>162 Dr_Flanders:
I read Moby Duck in high school and thought it wonderful, so I decided to read it again when I was about 35. As you know, reading a novel as an adult is a completely different experience from reading it as a teenager, but I still thought it wonderful. So I decided to read it a third time last year (I’m now 74), but this time the digressions got to me and I have only been able to get half-way. I think the problem is that I get impatient now with so many other great books on my reading list. Nevertheless, I still rank it as the greatest American novel of the 19th century and maybe of all time.

165Podras.
Abr 4, 2019, 11:47 am

I've read Moby Dick three times, once out loud to my wife; loved it every time.

If you haven't read Melville's Billy Budd, I recommend it, too.

166Truett
Abr 5, 2019, 6:09 am

Not sure if I mentioned it here, but...has anyone reading it noticed how timely the politics are in the beginning of the book? The war in Afghanistan? The Presidential election that was heavily contended? (paraphrasing, 'cause the book isn't in front of me).

As for "digressions", I always roll my eyes (sorry if you're insulted by that) when someone complains. The best (and sometimes the greatest) writers in history -- alive and dead -- often digress in the midst of a novel. Sometimes because it's part of their storytelling process. But when the writers are firing on all cylinders, it's purposeful. Dickens. Faulkner. Twain. Dostoevsky. LOTS of good (and/or great) writers. One my favorites amongst the living (and great, in my opinion) John Irving.

As for MOBY-DICK, the digressions are definitely purposeful, as is the playful nature of the narrative structure. And I'm always surprised at how many people never mention the humorous bits throughout a good portion of the book (Queequeg is often the reason for this, as is the life of a sailor).

In any case, if you're adamant about fewer disgressions, etc. you could always check out REDBURN or WHITE-JACKET.

Podras: Yes, "Billy Budd", for sure. And "Bartleby the Scriver" will always be a favorite (even the writers of "Archer" felt compelled to use and mention the story).

167geneg
Abr 5, 2019, 10:04 am

I enjoyed Moby Dick much more than I thought I would, but I really enjoyed Israel Potter as well as The Confidence Man.

168jroger1
Abr 5, 2019, 12:10 pm

>166 Truett: “I'm always surprised at how many people never mention the humorous bits throughout a good portion of the book.”

Melville indeed has a wonderful sense of humor, different from Dickens or Twain, but especially evident in “Bartleby,” one of my very favorite stories.

“The best writers in history often digress in the middle of their novels.”

Yes, but most of them shouldn’t. As a rule, novelists should stick to fiction because they are not very good philosophers. The older I get the less patient I am. I read novels to be entertained, but go to the experts when I want history or philosophy.

169elenchus
Abr 5, 2019, 1:07 pm

>162 Dr_Flanders: and following ...

An interesting discussion: Digressions in novels, and how regularly it should feature in novels. For me the digressions often contain the most interesting bits, and perhaps this is because I look for novels to instruct as much as to entertain. Not everyone has to, of course. I find that fiction can illustrate and demonstrate concepts better than they can be defined or discussed, or at least this illustration is as important to my understanding and their forceful presentation as any definition can be.

I can think of several favourite authors who I read (and re-read) more for the digressions than for the central plot:
Patrick O'Brian (in his Aubrey-Maturin novels)
Iain M. Banks (for his Culture novels)
William Gibson
Neal Stephenson

Ideas in action. Novels and fiction generally are great at providing me with them.

170jroger1
Editado: Abr 5, 2019, 2:43 pm

>169 elenchus: “I find that fiction can illustrate and demonstrate concepts better than they can be defined or discussed.”

True, if they are well written and without ulterior motive. But they can also lead us into ideas that are not universally true if the author surreptitiously tries to indoctinate us into his or her pet beliefs. I don’t like to be preached to when all I want is to be entertained. And as for historical fiction - all we need to do is to go to some “based on true events” movie to see the license that is so often taken with the truth.

I’m currently reading a history of American foreign policy. The author, a noted historian, illustrates the concept of isolationism with numerous examples of how it served us well before World War I but not afterward. Most fiction writers would take a narrow slice of history and try to generalize from it, a grave mistake if the reader isn’t alert.

171LesMiserables
Editado: Abr 6, 2019, 7:16 pm

172bsc20
Editado: Abr 6, 2019, 9:12 am

Esta mensagem foi removida pelo seu autor.

173Podras.
Abr 6, 2019, 2:21 pm

I've just finished Cornelius Ryan's The Longest Day and A Bridge Too Far. They are great additions to LOA's series of books of and about American historical writing and experiences. (Forget the movie of The Longest Day; the book is far better and reads like a novel.) Rather than entirely tell the tales of those events (D-Day in Normandy and Operation Market-Garden in The Netherlands) with the brush strokes that historians typically use, Ryan takes a pointillist approach, mostly by meshing the individual experiences of hundreds of the actual participants based on letters he received and face-to-face interviews. The result is a real page turner for both books.

174Dr_Flanders
Abr 6, 2019, 4:00 pm

I appreciate all the conversation and replies about Moby Dick, Melville, Shirley Jackson and H.P. Lovecraft.

>163 elenchus: I'm with you on the digressions within Moby Dick. They really seem to add something to the work and reading them has seemed just as worthwhile as any other part of the novel.

I am looking forward to reading Jackson's We have Always Lived in the Castle soon. I'm not a big horror fiction person, but I thought Hill House and the Lottery were fantastic. Your description of Lovecraft being uneven seems about right, to me anyway. A lot of the stories I have read have a certain sameness to them as well... but I am just starting to get into the Cthulhu stuff, so maybe I'll enjoy that more.

>164 jroger1: I can completely understand feeling impatient with the digressions in Moby Dick, especially on a reread. I'd probably be more annoyed with it now, if I weren't simply enjoying Melville's writing, humor and ideas so much.

>165 Podras.: Buddy, I don't think my wife likes the sound of my voice enough to let me read Moby Dick to her, but that's wonderful that you and your wife were able to share that. After enjoying Moby Dick so much, Billy Budd is definitely on the list.

>166 Truett: I think you are right about digressions. I think how I feel about digressions really just comes down to how well I enjoy the writing or what the author has to say. I love Twain too, and seldom begrudge him a digression. Humor certainly help in both Melville and Twain's case.

175maurice
Abr 9, 2019, 12:12 pm

I've been working my way through, and thoroughly enjoying, the volume of Elmore Leonard westerns. Just finished "Valdez is Coming" last night. I'd love to see LoA do a couple of volumes of westerns by various authors as they've done for some other genres.

176Dr_Flanders
Abr 18, 2019, 9:15 am

>175 maurice: I haven’t gotten to Leonard’s Westerns volume yet. I have read the first volume of his crime novels, and I thought it was good fun.

I’ve seen a few others suggest a multi-author collection of classic western novels, as well, so there certainly seems to be some interest. I’ve not read very many westerns, but if the LOA put something together, I’d probably check it out.

177Podras.
Editado: Abr 18, 2019, 10:43 am

>176 Dr_Flanders: I went through a phase in my teens in which I doted on Zane Grey and went back to him in a minor way a few years ago for nostalgia's sake. He was still enjoyable. I also read and liked Owen Wister's The Virginian. The only other western I've read (except for LOA's Elmore Leonard volume) is the thoroughly adult Ox Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark. Yes; I think there is enough quality material for LOA to do something with. A selection of Zane Grey novels in a few volumes and another volume with multiple authors seems rational.

Added comment: I forgot to say I also read The Mark of Zorro by Johnston McCulley. It's fun reading for a kid, but I don't recommend it for LOA.

178Podras.
Abr 18, 2019, 10:39 am

"I used to thrust papers, things, into my pockets: always had a lot of reading matter about my person somewhere: on ferries, cars, anywhere, I would read, read, read: it's a good habit to get into: have you ever noticed how most people absolutely waste most all their spare time?"

That is one of the many gems in LOA's Walt Whitman Speaks, received in the mail a couple of days ago. The book itself can easily fit in a jacket pocket. :-)

179dachda
Abr 21, 2019, 11:30 pm

I just finished Cornelius Ryan: The Longest Day, A Bridge Too Far. As compelling as when I read them as a teenager.

180LesMiserables
Editado: Abr 22, 2019, 12:43 am

Just read Bierce's Owl Creek Bridge

181Dr_Flanders
Jun 20, 2019, 3:32 pm

>177 Podras.: Sorry that it took me so long to reply! I've been kind of inactive on here for a while. But based on what is being said over in the Future Volumes thread, it looks like we are going to get a volume of Westerns to chew on in the near future. I'll be interested to see what they are able to include in that volume.

I recently finished H. P. Lovecraft's Tales and Shirley Jackson's Novels and Stories. I'm not a big horror story person, but I started both these volumes back around Halloween as it seemed seasonal, and I had very different experiences with each.

I wasn't a huge fan of Lovecraft to be honest. There is no doubt that he has had a big influence on later writers of horror and weird fiction. Having read a number of novels and stories over the years that seem to cite him as an inspiration, such as The Drowned World by J. G. Ballard and some of Jeff VanderMeer's work, I wanted to get a better understanding of what this Lovecraftian thing was all about, and I thought the LOA's volume might be a good way to do that. I enjoyed it to a point, but there was a sameness about a lot of the stories that grated on me over time. I think I'd have enjoyed it more if I'd dipped in for a story or two a year maybe.

I thought the Shirley Jackson volume was fantastic on the other hand. The Lottery and Other Stories was probably my least favorite part of the volume, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. The Haunting of Hill House was great, but I liked We Have Always Lived in the Castle even more. The uncollected and unpublished stories at the end felt well worth reading as well.

The LOA volumes were really my introduction to both these writers, and I count myself a fan of Jackson's now. I'll be seeking out her other novels at some point. I think I have probably had my fill of Lovecraft.

I am now working on Redburn from the middle volume of Herman Melville's LOA fiction editions. I read Moby-Dick earlier this year and loved it. Redburn seems similar, but I find Melville's prose to be so delightful that it doesn't feel stale at all. I might go right on with White-Jacket after I finish Redburn.

182elenchus
Jun 20, 2019, 4:48 pm

I really enjoyed the Jackson volume, as well: I've still got Hill House and the Other Writings to read.

I'm currently reading The Galton Case out of the Ross Macdonald 1950s volume, that will complete the book for me. LOA was my introduction to Macdonald and I'll might purchase more in the series. Certainly I've enjoyed this volume, but there are more LOA noir editions to read.

I consider myself still "underway" in the Olmsted book, but it's been months since I've cracked it. Enjoyable and edifying, but I was interrupted and need to get back into it again. Such a Renaissance man, and seemingly influential on U.S. culture and institutions.

183Truett
Editado: Jun 21, 2019, 8:04 am

Podras 178: Thanks for the insight. I actually got a copy as well, but I haven't cracked it yet (time to do so). Before he passed away, I used to walk 8-10 kms with a beautiful Amstaff/Lab mix. For the most part, the route was familiar to my feet, so I often took a book along, reading as he and I passed through suburbs, along foot paths (instead the occasional wooded areas or partial townships). And because people got familiar with us through our regular habit, when they would get close enough, they would always ask, "how can you read while you are walking?" Though I never answered that way, my first thought was, "How can you NOT?" As Whitman said: every spare moment! :) (I even had a doctor -- a brilliant lady, and the BEST general practitioner I've known -- look at me like I was nuts when I showed her what I had taken with me, in my back pack, to finish rereading whilst in the waiting room: the first, omnibus, volume of THE SANDMAN by Neil Gaiman).

184Podras.
Jun 21, 2019, 11:44 am

>181 Dr_Flanders: LOA's mention of a western anthology had me starting up with interest, too.

I agree with you about Lovecraft, though it sounds like I may have enjoyed him more than you did. Some of his work, like The Rats in the Walls, is classic (or at least, frequently anthologized), and Guillermo del Toro very much wants to make a movie based on At the Mountains of Madness. He has a fully developed script. Lovecraft is best taken in small doses, though. Roger Zelazny, a much better writer than Lovecraft IMHO, did a short novel in 1993 that is wonderful; a pastiche on Lovecraft that also features popular characters from gothic literature titled A Night in the Lonesome October. Recommended.

Except for The Lottery which I read long ago for a school assignment (rereading it is still a shock), LOA's Shirley Jackson volume was completely new to me. I fell in love with her, too. I've been waiting impatiently for LOA's promised second volume of her works to appear.

I'm currently reading the first volume of Wendell Berry's Essays. It is relatively slow going for me. He is very thought provoking.

185elenchus
Jun 21, 2019, 11:56 am

>184 Podras.:

I also loved Zelazny's October pastiche. While Lovecraft is represented in the setting, I think it's more a Macguffin than a major factor. Still, good good fun and recommended.

186Podras.
Editado: Ago 30, 2020, 3:09 pm

I just finished reading LOA's America's Women's Suffrage. I knew about the suffrage movement, of course, but had no idea of how many twists and turns it took before the passage of the 19th amendment a century ago this year. The book includes anti-suffragist writings as well as pro. It doesn't stop at the 19th amendment, however. It continues up to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 because the fight for women's equality didn't end with the granting of suffrage. Also, nearly from the beginning, there have been many intersections where the fight for women's suffrage and the fight for black freedom and suffrage intersected and sometimes ran in parallel.

Something else that was new for me was that there were a number of incidents in which women seeking suffrage were physically abused. Some were arrested numerous times, and if as prisoners they went on hunger strikes, they were force fed. The book has one particularly graphic account of the experience of a young black woman whose offence was daring to register to vote. She was fired and her family was thrown off of their sharecropping farm. She was arrested and brutally, brutally beaten because she registered to vote. The year--1962.

Based on contemporary news, there may be material enough for another chapter someday.

187elenchus
Ago 30, 2020, 4:27 pm

Just completed the first novel in the David Goodis volume, Dark Passage. I'm familiar with the film, so it was unavoidable that I compare what I remember of the cinematic treatment with Goodis's original. I'm looking forward to reading more Goodis, but will put the LOA aside for the moment (as is my habit).

188jsg1976
Ago 30, 2020, 5:07 pm

I’m reading the Guns of August, by Barbara Tuchman. Big fan so far.

189Podras.
Nov 21, 2020, 6:35 pm

I'm currently reading LOA's recently released 2nd Shirley Jackson volume and have just finished the third of its four novels, The Bird's Nest. It isn't much of a spoiler to say that it is about a person with a split personality. When approaching the climax of this increasingly intense novel, Jackson's famous (infamous?) short story from the first volume The Lottery came to mind. Don't mistake me. The two stories are very dissimilar. But the thought I had was that The Lottery wasn't a fluke. The same mind that could produce one could deliberately produce the other. The primary difference between the two is that the novel builds to its climax while the ending of the short story takes one by surprise. To me, that surprise ending is also tinged with a bit of guilt for feeling that among the characters in The Lottery, the right person was the "winner". My feeling for Jackson was already high, but my esteem for her writing has gone even higher.

190Truett
Nov 22, 2020, 12:11 pm

Podras: You might want to go back and RE-read those short stories -- and maybe even the NOVELS included in that first volume. First, amongst the group of short stories included in that first volume, "The Lottery" may be the most famous, but isn't, by any means, the MOST bizarre, nor is it the absolute "best" short story she ever wrote (that would be like saying "The Snows of Kilimanjaro", or "A Clean Well-Lighted Place" -- or, take your pick -- was the best short story Hemingway ever wrote). And, for bizarreness, take a closer look at, say, "One Ordinary Day, With Peanuts." How many short story writers in Jackson's day were cobbling up tales about an elderly couple who help maintain the balance (of death; of good vs. evil) in the world? (That story was the springboard for Harlan Ellison's, "The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore"). And there are numerous OTHER such stories in that book. Furthermore, I would've thought that merely _one_ reading of THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE would convince you that "The Lottery" wasn't "a fluke" (though I am puzzled as to why you would think that at all, given Jackson's more than obvious talent -- surely you weren't relying on the ignominious opinion of the over-regarded Bloom for your view of Jackon's depth and breadth of talent as a writer).

By the way: THE SUNDIAL is a corker, too. NOT as much of a showstopper as THE BIRD'S NEST, and definitely NOT as brilliant as THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE or WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE, but...yeah, a dynamite and very dark piece of apocalyptic comedy.

191euphorb
Nov 11, 2021, 3:50 pm

I just finished Stoner by John Williams. I had never read anything by him before, and had not heard of him before this volume was announced by LOA. A truly superb novel that I enjoyed immensely and that truly satisfies LOA's criterion of "excellent writing."

192bsc20
Nov 12, 2021, 10:19 pm

Just finished an Edith Wharton blitz: The Reef, The Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, the last 350 pages of Stories I, and Madame de Treymes. Also, Italian Villas and their Gardens, not LOA of course.

193Podras.
Nov 13, 2021, 11:23 am

>192 bsc20: I vaguely recall LOA saying that they may publish more of Wharton's writings but am not sure if that isn't just my imagination. What did you think of her non-LOA (so far) writings?

194bsc20
Editado: Nov 15, 2021, 5:11 pm

>193 Podras.: Podras: I do think there could be at least one Wharton nonfiction collection in the offing, probably under the rubric of travel writing. Italy was essential to her development as an intellectual--she began writing about it fairly early and published Italian Villas and their Gardens (1904) and Italian Backgrounds (1905) following her first full-length fiction, a historical novel set in seventeenth-century Italy, The Valley of Decision (1902). In terms of Italian Villas, it is a delightfully opinionated guide to classic gardens with illustrations by Maxfield Parrish (she didn't like them because they weren't matched closely enough to her prose). The book is a good example of Italy-based connoisseurship on the part of culturally upwardly mobile Americans of the time. It could be paired with The Decoration of Houses (1898) and miscellaneous nonfiction; with all things Italian, including the novel; or, most likely, as part of a travel volume, which would include Italian Backgrounds, A Motor-Flight through France (1908), and In Morrocco (1920). Then there are Fighting France (1915)--her dispatches from the Great War--and French Ways and Their Meaning (1919). Any way you slice it, that is an intriguing list of nonfiction works (I enjoy travel writing). Decoration, Italian Villas, and French Ways may have the most in common with each other, but I can't imagine that would be a big enough or attractive enough volume. I don't know if she wrote many reviews or essays that could fill out a nonfiction volume; my sense is that she did not but I could be wrong. Letters for sure.

My only issue with the Wharton selections so far is that they did not include the complete short story volumes, which probably would have made the two books too bulky, but nerd that I am, I read all the missing stories for The Greater Inclination (1899); Crucial Instances (1901); The Descent of Man (1904); The Hermit and the Wild Woman (1908); and Tales of Men and Ghosts (1910). Collected Stories 1891-1910 includes probably 70 percent of the material, I would guess. I read the rest via Project Gutenberg as I went. Some of the missing ones were indeed not among the best of her work, but it was also clear that some were left out because of length--she often worked in almost novella-length in her stories.

Besides The Valley of Decision, there are only a few novels that have not been done, and I would guess that LOA is just not all that interested in a complete edition given what they did with the stories. The Fruit of the Tree (1907), Hudson River Bracketed (1929); its companion The Gods Arrive (1932); and the unfinished The Buccanneers (1938) are the remainders of the fiction. But who knows? Maybe they'll do all five, but I don't expect it before a nonfiction volume. More than you asked, but there it is. Cheers.

195bsc20
Editado: Nov 15, 2021, 6:09 pm

>193 Podras.: Looking at those titles again, you could certainly make a case for:

Early Writings:
The Decoration of Houses
The Valley of Decision
Italian Villas and Their Gardens
Italian Backgrounds

Wharton on France:
A Motor-Flight Through France
Fighting France
French Ways and their Meaning
In Morocco

"American" Fiction:
The Fruit of the Tree (New England setting)
Hudson River Bracketed
The Gods Arrive
The Buccaneeers (though set in London)

But I would be surprised if they published all of this. One travel and maybe one fiction; two volumes perhaps. Then again, some of these are brief, so it could happen.

196Podras.
Nov 16, 2021, 11:27 am

>194 bsc20: "More than you asked"

Yes it is, but I'm grateful that you took the trouble to provide all of that information.

197Podras.
Nov 24, 2021, 12:49 am

I just finished reading LOA's American Christmas Stories, edited by Connie Willis.

This short story collection (not one of LOA's main series) is, as the title says, all about Christmas-oriented fiction by American authors. From its title, one might think that it would be a collection rife with saccharine sentiments and clichéd endings, but it isn’t. Some stories fall into that category, though they are too well written to be easily classified that way. Bret Hart’s How Santa Claus Came to Simpson’s Bar is about a group of hard-bitten miners who pool their meager resources—one at serious risk of his life—to bring the spirit of Christmas to an ill boy. Langston HughesOne Christmas Eve presents a very different perspective, one in which the young son of a colored maid for a well-to-do white family in a segregated community learns that a store Santa Claus isn’t there for someone like him. One of my favorites is Collie Willis’ Inn. Filled with a combination of Willis’ trademark humor mixed with stressful situations on the way to a happy but definitely not stereotypical ending, Inn implicitly questions whether Christmas traditions have become meaningless rituals that have parted ways with the so-called spirit of Christmas. Filled with excellent writing, the variety of themes by American authors collected here is surprisingly broad.

198Podras.
Jun 10, 2022, 5:45 pm

A recent promotional e-mail from LOA says this about two of Maxine Hong Kingston’s books, published in LOA's main series volume #355:
"Even as The Woman Warrior and China Men are now acknowledged classics, they continue to elude categorization."
That is saying a mouthful. I just finished reading them, and I totally concur. That isn't a bad thing, however. I recommend both.

199elenchus
Jun 10, 2022, 11:35 pm

I've added the Kingston volume to my subscription list, and while I'm most intrigued by Tripmaster Monkey, comments like that certainly don't undermine my decision.

At the moment, I'm reading Shane from the Westerns collection, which arrived earlier this week.

200D_B_J
Jun 21, 2022, 1:43 pm

Just finished William Maxwell's THEY CAME LIKE SWALLOWS (set in the influenza epidemic of 1918-19) from EARLY NOVELS AND STORIES, and am working my way through the many short stories included in the new Fitzgerald volume.

201clammer
Jul 13, 2022, 8:06 pm

Currently almost finished with the O. Henry volume, and am now starting in with the Westerns collection (still reading Ox Bow Incident; I'm not particularly fond of reading Westerns, having grown up watching films and television no end seems to have spoiled my attention span for them.)

202dachda
Ago 9, 2022, 10:56 pm

My most recent LOA read was Robert Stone: Dog Soldiers, A Flag for Sunrise, Outerbridge Reach. Dog Soldiers was made into a great old Nick Nolte movie "Who'll Stop the Rain".

203Truett
Ago 10, 2022, 8:48 am

dachda -- His first novel -- A HALL OF MIRRORS -- made it to the silverscreen (with a script by Stone) under the title, "WUSA". Doesn't hurt that Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward star in it. If you dig the Stone LOA volume, seek out DAMASCUS GATE and that first novel, too. Although CHILDREN OF LIGHT, BAY OF SOULS and the novella, THE DARK-HAIRED GIRL are worth a read (most especially, the last title), if LOA only does one more Stone volume "Damascus...", "Hall..." and his memoir, PRIME GREEN: REMEMBERING THE SIXTIES, would ideally be the three picks for such a volume.

204Truett
Ago 10, 2022, 8:54 am

clammer: So...are you saying your TV only played westerns? Or are you saying that of all the things you to "no end" on television only western movies (and TV shows?) made you tired of a particular genre? Personally, I would suspect that you were exposed to spy and crime and police and drama and comedy and even science fiction and fantasy type shows and movies on the TV. And if none of those types of television entertainment turned you off of "mainstream", mysteries or SF & fantasy, it's likely you already didn't dig western literature. So don't go blaming John Ford and Howard Hawks! LOL :)

205clammer
Ago 11, 2022, 3:41 pm

I wrote what I meant.

I'm now reading the Octavia Butler collection.

206bsc20
Ago 13, 2022, 2:34 pm

Edith Wharton, Novellas and Other Writings. Some of her very best work. I especially enjoyed Summer, Old New York, and The Mother’s Recompense, all of which were new to me. A Backward Glance, her autobiography, is next.

207D_B_J
Ago 19, 2022, 2:31 pm

>203 Truett: I do hope they do another Stone volume, and your picks would make a fine one!

208xieouyang
Ago 20, 2022, 7:47 am

I’ve been a subscriber of LoA since it first came out in the early 80s. I was fascinated, and still am, on the variety of authors, its complete coverage of authors’ works, editing,etc.
most recently I’ve read the Fitzgerald Great Gatsby and short stories. Even though I had read many of them already, I read them again to enjoy.
I’ve ordered the other colume of his writings that should be here next week, I hope, as well as a volume of Isaac Bashevis Singer who I’ve always wanted to read.

209elenchus
Editado: Ago 29, 2022, 10:05 am

Reading the Polito-edited Crime Novels of the 1950s, specifically Highsmith's The Talented Mr Ripley. This is a re-read for me, but it's been decades. As is my wont, I'll most likely not read the complete collection, just this novel, and return to the volume after reading other works.

210clammer
Ago 28, 2022, 2:53 pm

Complete Plays 1913-1920 Eugene O'Neill

211Stevil2001
Ago 28, 2022, 3:09 pm

212Podras.
Ago 29, 2022, 10:04 am

Plymouth Colony

213bsc20
Set 22, 2022, 3:26 pm

Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, completing his Autobiographies.

214elenchus
Set 22, 2022, 4:48 pm

>211 Stevil2001:

I recently completed The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, leaving just one novel yet to be read in the LOA edition. Eldritch was probably my least enjoyable PKD read so far and I'll be mulling why as I prepare to write my review.

215Podras.
Set 23, 2022, 10:59 am

>214 elenchus: Whatever one thinks of the content, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a wonderfully crafted title.

216Stevil2001
Set 23, 2022, 11:12 am

>214 elenchus: I liked Eldritch, though not as much as most of the other novels in the Dick LOA editions. I think my least favorite was Dr. Bloodmoney.

217elenchus
Set 23, 2022, 12:39 pm

>215 Podras.:

Agreed! And it's chock-a-block full of interesting ideas, typical of PKD. Somehow it didn't come together for me in the manner I've come to expect of him. Given how prolific he was, sometimes writing multiple novels in one year, I anticipated this would happen eventually.

>216 Stevil2001:

I don't have that LOA edition yet, but certainly plan to get it.

218ironjaw
Set 23, 2022, 12:47 pm

For the last ten years I’ve been thinking about subscribing but since Covid when they stopped international orders, and the uncertainty, I’ve thought about going the Kindle root.

219JacobHolt
Set 23, 2022, 1:31 pm

I finished The Little Sister in the second Raymond Chandler volume a few days ago and thought it was the best Marlowe novel yet. I plan to continue with The Long Goodbye this weekend.

During the recent sale, I purchased the PKD box set. I read The Man in the High Castle in a non-LOA edition not too long ago, so I'll start with The Three Stigmata, probably after I finish the Chandler set. Very interested to see whether it has resonance with The Three Armageddons of Enniscorthy Sweeney (probably my favorite R. A. Lafferty novel) beyond the similar title.

220elenchus
Set 23, 2022, 2:10 pm

>219 JacobHolt:

I would love a Lafferty LOA edition, including short stories. Only read one novel (The Devil Is Dead) and found it to be a tour de force.

I also found The Little Sister to be one of the strongest, but thought The Lady in the Lake actually better. Haven't read the last 3 in that volume, though.

221clammer
Set 30, 2022, 1:56 pm

fs fitzgerald
great gatsby etc

222clammer
Out 28, 2022, 5:16 pm

bruce catton, the trilogy of Army of the Potomac

223bsc20
Out 30, 2022, 3:10 pm

Just completed Reporting Vietnam Part One.

224dachda
Nov 4, 2022, 9:56 pm

>205 clammer: Just finished Bruce Catton's Army of the Potomac Trilogy.

225bsc20
Editado: Nov 19, 2022, 5:53 pm

Just finished Reporting Vietnam, Part Two: American Journalism 1969-1975.

226euphorb
Nov 17, 2022, 9:35 pm

Just finished Ray Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man and was enthralled.

227dachda
Nov 22, 2022, 11:42 pm

In the middle of Stephen Crane: Prose & Poetry.

228Podras.
Nov 23, 2022, 2:28 pm

229vharty
Nov 23, 2022, 2:59 pm

Halfway through Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Finished the Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch two days ago and found it amazing.

230clammer
Dez 17, 2022, 8:04 pm

I'm just finishing up Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s, and I think this two-volume box set (which has Noir of the 1940s as volume I) is a really nice set full of hard-boiled writing.

231cpg
Dez 19, 2022, 4:39 pm

>177 Podras.: "The only other western I've read (except for LOA's Elmore Leonard volume) is the thoroughly adult Ox Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark."

I'm just finishing up reading The Ox-Bow Incident in LOA's 2020 release The Western: Four Classic Novels of the 1940s & 50s. I was required to read The Ox-Bow Incident in freshman English eons ago. I'm glad that the attractiveness of this LOA volume outweighed the negative memory of that mandatory reading. This second reading has hit me like a ton of bricks (in a good way).

232bsc20
Jan 22, 2023, 4:43 pm

With A Modern Instance, I just completed LOA #8, William Dean Howells, Novels 1875-1886.

233clammer
Jan 25, 2023, 7:37 pm

I am nearing the end of _Reporting Civil Rights: Part One_

234clammer
Fev 1, 2023, 2:59 pm

just started Ray Bradbury: The Illustrated Man, The October Country, and Other Stories

235sbnicar
Fev 5, 2023, 10:15 pm

Just finished Last of the Mohicans in the first Leatherstocking Tales volume. I'm reading in story order, not publication order, so I read The Deerslayer a few months ago.

236jroger1
Editado: Fev 5, 2023, 11:30 pm

>235 sbnicar:
An easy way to remember the story order is to read them in alphabetical order starting, as you did, with “The Deerslayer” followed in order by “The Last of the Mohicans,” “The Pathfinder,” “The Pioneers,” and “The Prairie.”

237sbnicar
Fev 13, 2023, 11:22 am

>236 jroger1: Nice to know!

238clammer
Fev 13, 2023, 9:20 pm

HL Mencken collection of "Prejudices (1 through six), a two volume set. Tough reading.

Also just received part two of Civil Rights 1963 - 1973.

between those and the Bradbury it is going to be a lot of reading the next six weeks.

239D_B_J
Fev 15, 2023, 11:39 pm

Humboldt's Gift, from Saul Bellow Novels 1970-1982.

240D_B_J
Fev 15, 2023, 11:40 pm

>5 Texaco: Texaco my grandfather self-published a collection of Hearns' journalism in the late 1970s, when Hearn was very much in obscurity. I'm so happy that LOA put out a volume of his writings and am planning to read it myself at some point.

241withawhy99
Mar 16, 2023, 3:34 pm

I am reading Vol. I of the Hainish novels and stories by Ursula K. Le Guin, as part of a year-long reading project. I'm almost through the third of her first three short novels, City of Illusions. As always I am impressed by her beautiful writing and thoughtful stories. It's terrific that LOA is treating her right.

242clammer
Mar 21, 2023, 11:05 pm

I've started skipping around different tomes lately (instead of sticking to only one at a time); I'm still plowing through H.L. Menken's Prejudices (and the breadth of his knowledge is really astounding; I have to stop and look up so many references that I only get through two or three pages at a time).

For lighter fare, I've taken up Vonnegut's novels again. And the postman brought a new volume yesterday, I haven't unwrapped it yet, but I'm looking forward to starting that soon. AH, here it is: Charles Portis' Collected Works. I am not familiar with Mr. Portis, but I see it has within it a story called True Grit. Well I liked that as a movie (both versions) so I look forward to reading that.

243withawhy99
Maio 30, 2023, 1:54 pm

I just finished The Word for World Is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin. And I read aloud Steinbeck's Travels with Charley to my 16 year old son. That was fun.

244CurrerBell
Maio 30, 2023, 9:15 pm

Raymond Chandler: Stories and Early Novels: Pulp Stories / The Big Sleep / Farewell, My Lovely / The High Window. I've finished all but The High Window, which I just started but should finish tonight or tomorrow. Reading the volume for this month's Reading Through Time Group's topic The Big City - Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.

I obviously won't have time this month to get to
Raymond Chandler: Later Novels and Other Writings: The Lady in the Lake / The Little Sister / The Long Goodbye / Playback / Double Indemnity / Selected Essays and Letters and I'm not that anxious to get to it anyway. Nothing wrong with Chandler, but he's far from being my favorite mystery writer.

245kcshankd
Jun 1, 2023, 11:23 pm

I am finishing Elmore Leonard: Westerns - down to the stories at the end. This is the last bit of the last of the four volumes. I held off as long as I could, trying to savor it.

I also dipped into Rachel Carson: The Sea Trilogy and found The Sea Around US wanting. I didn't care for the anthropomorphism at all. The glossary was well done. Looking ahead, Under the Sea Wind seems more promising.

246Podras.
Jul 27, 2023, 10:52 pm

Just finished Mailer's The Naked and the Dead. I should have read it long ago.

247jmullinix
Ago 3, 2023, 6:25 pm

For late night kid-escape my wife and I have been rewatching Ken Burns’ The Vietnam War recently. Inspired by that I’ve finally begun working through the LOA’s Reporting Vietnam volumes. It’s been quite the pairing of sources - to watch Burns portrayal decades on of events, incidents, and battles and then to go read how many of these were reported first hand.

The recent announcement of the forthcoming Walker Percy volume had me so excited I was moved last week to pull down the LOA’s volume for his fellow Catholic novelist Flannery O’Connor to go through her short stories for the umpteenth time. They never lose their bite or power.

My preorder of the Crime Novels of the 1960s set arrived yesterday and though I’ve read pretty much every novel included in it already I am just chomping at the bit to crack that sucker open and get into Geoffrey O’Brien’s intro, notes, and other extras and then reread the selections by Charles Williams, Dan J. Marlowe, and Richard Stark.

248Podras.
Set 8, 2023, 10:48 am

I'm currently reading Crime Novels: Five Classic Thrillers 1961 - 1964 and am enjoying it immensely.

249clammer
Set 15, 2023, 7:49 pm

>244 CurrerBell: I too am reading this volume. I am not a big fan mysteries or the style of writing but I am slogging through and envisioning each story as a television or movie script. I can only take a few pages at a time but have almost reached the "meat" of the novels. It is a bit of fun to try to picture his characters snarling their lines with a fat cigar in their mouth--particularly the femme fatales.

250Podras.
Out 26, 2023, 2:24 am

I just finished reading John Updike's novel, Gertrude and Claudius (2000). It is a prequel to Shakespeare's Hamlet about the relationship of the two eponymous characters from their early lives up to events at the beginning of the play. Updike is a fine writer, though he is not in Shakespeare's class--nobody is--but I found the novel interesting and recommend it.