The Forgotten Books (3 Viewers)

[steve ignorant]

Some Dostoyevsky book that I only have the second part of
Some Levi-Strauss book, bought with enthusiam 2 years ago as extra study for my Anthropology degree
Adious Hux;ey boook that is shite
Candide by Voltaire
Lots of half read Chomsky books (I know how they end)

Id keep avoiding Descartes and Kant, had to read them for college-awful shite.
Descartes is an eaast-ish read but ultimatley pointless and Kant is waaaaay too anal to be vaguely interesting.
Hegel was interestin though, had a lot of influence on Marx and Bakunin, good read if you know what you are lookin for

 

[JohnnyRaz]

here, what about the books you loved but lent to some cunt, who then left the country etc. These also must come under the catagory of 'forgotten books'

 

[La La]

ugh i hate when people walk off wiht abook you wanted back!
which is why i will NEVER lend anyone this book. it's not being published anymore either but if you can get your hands on it, do. it's a great read.

 

[MDR]

Are there any books you have had forever but never read ?
I have a few that taunt me every time I go to my bookshelf but they never get chosen.

Its time to read these guys I think, they've been neglected too long.
So what will I read first ?

Don Quixote
The Brothers Karamazov
Tender is the Night
The Satanic Verses
American Pastoral - Roth
The Blackwater Lightship - Colm Toibin
Survival in Auschwitz - Levi

Don Quixote is brill, although a little on the long side. Very funny and chock full of insights.

Tender is the night is quite boring, although stylish.

Haven't read any of the others.

 

[Denny Oubidoux]

its always your favorite books you lend to people too, coz you want to share and stuff but the other person wants to keep not share. hate that.

 

[MDR]

I am never loaning out my books again. Such heartache.

 

[La La]

I am never loaning out my books again. Such heartache.

last year i loaned my friend 'a fine balance' by rohinton mistry. i really love that book, but it also holds sentimental value because of the person who gave it to me. i made it clear it was a loan - that i thought he'd love it, but i wanted it back. he gave it to someone else, can't remember who, and i'll probably never see it again. you're right - heartache.

 

[JohnnyRaz]

last year i loaned my friend 'a fine balance' by rohinton mistry. i really love that book, but it also holds sentimental value because of the person who gave it to me. i made it clear it was a loan - that i thought he'd love it, but i wanted it back. he gave it to someone else, can't remember who, and i'll probably never see it again. you're right - heartache.

I had a copy of the grapes of wrath that I bought when I was 17. Not only is it one of my favourite books generally, but the copy I had was all held together with selotape and so forth, well tumbed basically. Anyway lent it to a german hippy, and never saw it again.
moral of the story; a)never trust a hippy
b)never trust a german

 

[IFF]

my brtoher colin gave me "a very british jihad" by paul larkin in christmas 2004 and it's still sitting on my to be read pile

it's then only book on the pile

thnakfully i've jsut ordered more books recently

i would like to read don quixote as the first few days of last years vuelta a espana was based around towns mentioned in it i think. one american cyclist opined in a cycling magazine that he didn't udnerstnad why they had so many days in that region

obviously mr. danielson has never heard of cervantes.

 

[pete]

The Great War For Civilisation is looking at me not reading it right now. It's just too big for the bus.

 

[Denny Oubidoux]

i have a load too. staring down at me right now are :

the gate - Fran[SIZE=-1]çois Bizot (i did start this one twice...)
memoirs of my nervous illness - Daniel Paul Schreber
fury - salman rushdie
the burning tigris: a history of the armenian genocide - peter balakian
the scramble for africa - thomas pakenham
love in the time of cholera - gabriel garcia marquez
phenomenology of perception - maurice merleau-ponty (i may never read this...)
Bertrand russel the ghost of madness 1921 - 1970 - ray monk (not reading this before i read the first volume)
all the pretty horses - cormack mccarthy
hemlock and after - angus wilson
the middle age of mrs eliot - angus wilson
the confessions of a justified sinner - james hogg
the golden apples of the sun - ray bradbury

i didnt realise i had so many books yet to read... i have also a stash of brian aldiss books i got last week which i cant wait to read.
[/SIZE]

Most of these are still waiting to be read. I did read Hemlock and After by Angus Wilson (it was ok, unfortunately it seems that The Old Men At The Zoo is very unrepresentative of his work generally) and Memoirs of my Nervous Illness by Daniel Paul Schreber. Schreber was completely insane and so is his memoir. Im amazed he was able to write a book. I have loads more unread books now. I thought it might be cool to have a thread where we can list books that seem interesting or which we have acquired but which we havent read yet. We might spot something we are dying to read.

I quite like the look of this one because I'm a big fan of Maxwell :

What There Is to Say We Have Said: The Correspondence of Eudora Welty and William Maxwell edited by Suzanne Marrs.

For over fifty years, Eudora Welty and William Maxwell, two of our most admired writers, penned letters to each other. They shared their worries about work and family, literary opinions and scuttlebutt, moments of despair and hilarity. Living half a continent apart, their friendship was nourished and maintained by their correspondence.

 

[Nate Champion]

Stop. I have a few boxes of unread books acquired cheap and impulsively over the years; most of which are now in my parents house. And I can't stop buying either. Despite the ongoing accumulation, I like having a mass because it means I have a ridiculous quantity to choose from and it stops me being too rigid in my reading plan. However, I have got very fussy about reading fiction writers in chronological order.