I'm going to post these books for Outposters' who want to adventure:

Novels

Nightwood, Djuna Barnes
The Loser, Thomas Bernhard
Trout Fishing in America, Richard Brautigan*
A Confederate General from Big Sur, Richard Brautigan*
The Autobiography of Red, Anne Carson
The Beauty of the Husband, Anne Carson
Break it Down, Lydia Davis*
End Zone, Don Delillo
The Last Samurai, Helen DeWitt
The Alexandria Quartet, Laurence Durrell
A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary Xiaolu Guo
20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth, Xiaolu Guo
A Visit from The Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan
The Deep North, Fanny Howe (& In Radical Love, 5 novels)
The Castle Franz Kafka ( Mark Harman translation) [no adjectives used in entire book.]
Tristessa, Jack Kerouac
Death in Rome, Wolfgang Koeppen
Eeee Eeeee Eee Tao Lin [soundsdolphin character makes]
Hour of the Star, Clarice Lispector
The Last Novel, David Markson
Vanishing, David Markson
Fisher's Hornpipe, Todd McEwen
Coming Through Slaughter, Michael Ondaatje
Tokyo Year Zero, David Peace
Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon
One DOA on The Way, Mary Robison
Carnival Wolves Peter Rock
Maus, Art Spiegelman
The Palm-Wine Drunkard And His Dead Palm Wine Tapster In Dead's Town, Amos Tutuola


[I will leave the non fiction and movies off for now. This reading list was offered by Les Plesko my instructor. I have read the starred ones]

 

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I've got a good surreal piece of fiction:


The US Tax Code


Chew on that one for awhile.

 

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Interesting list. I have read a few of them:

Trout Fishing in America, Richard Brautigan
End Zone, Don Delillo
The Castle Franz Kafka
20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth, Xiaolu Guo
A Visit from The Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan
Tristessa, Jack Kerouac
Coming Through Slaughter, Michael Ondaatje
Tokyo Year Zero, David Peace
Maus, Art Spiegelman

I was actually surprised that I had read any of them, as I don't read a lot outside of my chosen genres... which don't tend to include many books considered worthy of literary merit.


I just finished Tokyo Year Zero a few weeks ago. Hard to read(for me) but pretty damn awesome. I look forward to reading the rest of the trilogy.

I have not read this one The Palm Wine Drunkard But this one may appeal to Cobane and other horror afficionados. It supposed to be a vat of voodoo.

I have just ordered Kafka's The Castle and The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, which is not on the list above, but is on a non fiction list, I did not list.

Ptilk, he included some, like Maus, because it is one of the first graphic novels. The End Zone , I understand, has an entire football game told through the eyes of a football player. You and I lived through Brautigan times. he was very popular. I enjoyed his work, loading Mercury with a Pitchfork (futz me like fried potatoes on the most glorious hungry morning of my life). I have posted links to Lydia Davis' work. I love that book Break It Down.

Anyway, there might be some new reading mats for you. Ptilk one of them, I forget which one is about a guy who believes he sees Thoreau frozen in the ice and falls and hits his head. This reminds me of your situation.

 

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I read some of Lydia Davis' stories a number of years ago. I was introduced to her by a friend who was a pretty radical feminist and a devotee of Anais Nin and Lawrence Durrell and under her demanding barrage of insistence...I read a bit from all of them.

I remember enjoying Davis' work, but it was overshadowed by the deep beauty of the poetry of Durrell and the erotica of Nin... at that time anyway. Probably more to do with the nature of my friendship than the quality of the writing. I'll check out some more of her work.

I've read just about everything Delillo has ever written, enjoyed about half of that. Brautigan, of course, I've read fairly extensively and greatly enjoyed his poetry when I was younger and still dreamed in color with stereo sound.

Oh, and I left out Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon in my list. I found it incomprehensible when I read it in the 80's. I tried again about 10 years ago, and was able to see some of the greatness in it that so many have claimed it contains....but still it befuddled me much of the time.

Lydia Davis' novel is supposed to be just depressing. It goes from depressing to depressing and I dont really mind depressing. I have only read her short works in Break It Down. I just love them. I know Gravity's Rainbow is a classic in the canon. However, I put it down in the bookstore, every time I pick it up. It is just not appealing to me at this time. I did read Pynchon's latest and enjoyed it. Inherent Vice I'll bet you have a streaks of Benny Profane from his V novel in your stride.

 

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I laughed, but only because I care.

 

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I don't mind depressing either. I rather enjoy it on many levels. Interesting that you mention Benny Profane, as I had a long rambling discussion of "V" not too long ago. The discussion centered on the fact that I have never read the book and my friends insistence that I was Benny Profane In utero and had to read the damn book. We were both a little blitzed and all I really remember is that charge by him and something about being a deacon of the church of vermin. Still haven't read it.

The only books by Pynchon (besides Rainbow) I have read are Mason & Dixon and Crying of lot 49. I don't remember much about the first but found Lot 49 to be about as enjoyable and wonderful a read as possible. Oedipa is one of the most personifying literary characters I have ever encountered.