Current reading material?

[Lalitree]

you shall know our velocity! by eggers
...
i always thought that dave eggers would really annoy me, but after reading his intro to that best american fiction book, i decided i'd give this one a try.

I liked A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, so I got YSKOV when it came out. I got about halfway through it and just couldn't stay interested, so I finally put it down rather guiltily. Great looking hardcover, though.

[Baconesque]

YSKOV sucks, but Hearbreaking Work is pretty cool.  The only redeeming thing about YSKOV is the additional section by Hand that was in the paperback edition and the Sacrament version of the hardcover.  And that's because it's pretty much a total mindfuck, even though it still doesn't make up for the medicore rest of the book.

[Lalitree]

I just started on A Confederacy of Dunces the other night. I'm excited to read it, a few people have spoken glowingly about it.

[elpollodiablo]

I'm nearly finished with Naomi Klein's No Logo. Fucking incredible stuff, even if it is a bit dated.

[jebreject]

I just started on A Confederacy of Dunces the other night. I'm excited to read it, a few people have spoken glowingly about it.

It's completely ridiculous, in all the best possible ways.

[Emily]

I heard they're making a fucking movie of A Confederacy of Dunces. That should be, uh, interesting.

[jebreject]

Really?  While I was reading it I was thinking of writing a screenplay (because I'm a dork and it's possible that I would get bored enough to do something like that, or at least start it before giving up completely and getting drunk) for it but then decided against it because, well, see parenthetical above.

[max]

Recently read Jonathan Raban's excellent Hunting Mister Heartbreak, and since that traveler's book ends in the Florida Keys I segued into Hiaasen's Skinny Dip.  Now moving on to Raban's Bad Land but was distracted this evening by Daniel Pipes Conspiracy: How the Paranoid Style Flourishes & Where it Comes From.  All the while I've been sampling George Featherling's The Book of Assassins: A Biographical Dictionary from Ancient Times to the Present.

Basically I go to the library with one or two books on mind, browse the new book shelves, and free associate from there.

[SPACERACE]

Yeehaw, just got Carl Hiaasen's "Skinny Dip" back from the abyss of my friends' house, where I'd accidentally left it for too long. I'll continue reading that once I'm done with "Norwegian Wood", which I started last night.

Also, I never liked "A Confederacy of Dunces". It's just too ridiculous for me.

[justinh]

Also, I never liked "A Confederacy of Dunces". It's just too ridiculous for me.

me too.  there's this whole canon of books of this sort that i just can't get into, like confederacy of dunces, the hitchikers's guide to the universe, and most vonnegut.  however, most people seem to be into them and i can't really come up with an objective reason why i don't like them.

[trailofmusic]

I heard they're making a fucking movie of A Confederacy of Dunces. That should be, uh, interesting.

They've been trying to since the late 70s or early 80s.  The most recent attempt is with Will Ferrell as Ignatius, and it got pretty close to becoming a reality but currently lacks financing.

[davy]

the feeling that hitchhiker's guide left me with--and i just finished it for the first time a couple days ago--was of early sci-fi era vonnegut as written by lewis carroll. for about half the book, i was thoroughly entertained, but my enjoyment leveled off quite abruptly around the 3/4 mark.

love me some vonnegut, though. i read every single one of his books--aside from fates worse than death (which i intended to save for a rainy day in my quasi-distant future)--my senior year in highschool, and was so inspired by the experience that i became an english major. more than any other single person, mr. v. is responsible for my quest to live the literary life. in college, of course, i moved on to other things--nicholson baker, michael chabon, denis johnson, and especially vadimir nabokov--but i revisited vonnegut about a year ago and was surprised and delighted to realize how well the material stood up to repeated readings. i thought my overwhelming nostalgia--and college-enhanced mind --would ruin the experience, but on the contrary, i was reading more into his stories--and getting more out of them--than ever before. i finally plucked fates worse than death--an essay collection--from my shelf and it was probably the richest, most rewarding book i read all of last year. regardless of how many years ago it was written, the subject matter (which was largely political) was entirely appropriate to our present-day state of affairs. i truly believe vonnegut is america's greatest living writer...even if he's written his last book.

[John]

Along the same lines as Vonnegut et al - writers who, once you lock into their frequency, you gotta read it all - don't sleep on Richard Brautigan. Hilarious and terribly sad sometimes in the same breath, one of my favorites among the moderns.

[Keith from TTIKTDA]

Currently: Reefer Madness by Eric Schlosser. Weed, Porn, AND Mexicans? Sign me up!

On deck: I'm due for a reread of Alinsky's Rules for Radicals, but I may put that off to read this if my willpower breaks down, or I manage to get off real easy in court tomorrow (I'm looking to get a speeding ticket knocked down).

[davy]

schlosser's fast food nation has honestly been one of the most influential books of my life. i haven't eaten so much as a french fry from a fastfood restaurant since i read it three years ago. and it gave me that extra nudge i needed to fully accept vegetarianism. haven't turned back.

around the time reefer madness came out, i read somewhere that he was currently researching prisons and prison life. i'd be interested in that.

[sedita]

i'm about halfway through my second trip thru
murakami's after the quake.

it is so amazing.

the short about the fellow who builds bonfires like michaelangelo?
phew.

j.

[jebreject]

They've been trying to since the late 70s or early 80s.  The most recent attempt is with Will Ferrell as Ignatius, and it got pretty close to becoming a reality but currently lacks financing.

I'm sure I'm not alone in being very, very, very against this idea.

[jebreject]

Along the same lines as Vonnegut et al - writers who, once you lock into their frequency, you gotta read it all - don't sleep on Richard Brautigan. Hilarious and terribly sad sometimes in the same breath, one of my favorites among the moderns.

It took a while, but now I'm really digging Trout Fishing in America.  At first I thought it was all a bit too over-the-top, but then I finally "got" it and went back and re-read the bits I didn't like before, and those were great too.

I really liked the "Sea, Sea Rider" chapter about the man in the bookstore:  

"You fought in the Spanish Civil War.  You were a young Communist from Cleveland, Ohio.  She was a painter.  A New York Jew who was sightseeing in the Spanish Civil War as if it were the Mardi Gras in New Orleans being acted out by Greek statues.

"She was drawing a picture of a dead anarchist when you met her.  She asked you to stand beside the anarchist and act as if you had killed him.  You slapped her hard across the face and said something too embarassing for me to repeat.

"You both fell very much in love."

I'm only about forty pages into it right now (haven't had much time for reading these past few days) but I imagine I could sit down with it and finish most of the rest of it.

[Lalitree]

I heard they're making a fucking movie of A Confederacy of Dunces. That should be, uh, interesting.

They've been trying to since the late 70s or early 80s.  The most recent attempt is with Will Ferrell as Ignatius, and it got pretty close to becoming a reality but currently lacks financing.

Yeah, I thought I read that it was back on the shelf.

[trailofmusic]

I heard they're making a fucking movie of A Confederacy of Dunces. That should be, uh, interesting.

They've been trying to since the late 70s or early 80s.  The most recent attempt is with Will Ferrell as Ignatius, and it got pretty close to becoming a reality but currently lacks financing.

Yeah, I thought I read that it was back on the shelf.

I'm sure I'm not alone in being very, very, very against this idea.

I think what they should do is make a biopic of the author John Kennedy Toole (there's a really good bio called Ignatius Rising about him) possibly with small portions of ACoD in it as he writes it/his life parallels

[TheNames]

I just read Gilgamesh, Candide, and Sophocles' Antigone this weekend. A few great short reads. Right now i'm working on Kundera's The Book of Laughter and Forgetting.

I've never read trout fishing but brautigan's definitely one of my favorite poets.

Last i heard David Gordon Green (writer/director of the heartbreaking All the Real Girls) was set to direct Confederacy

[jebreject]

I think what they should do is make a biopic of the author John Kennedy Toole (there's a really good bio called Ignatius Rising about him) possibly with small portions of ACoD in it as he writes it/his life parallels

How much did John Kennedy Toole's life parallel Igantius Rielly's?  I was wondering about that while reading it, and hoping that there weren't too many similarities.  My brother said "man, if they were anything alike it's no wonder he killed himself."

[trailofmusic]

Last i heard David Gordon Green (writer/director of the heartbreaking All the Real Girls) was set to direct Confederacy

that's the one with Ferrell attached.  He's sort of got a metric fuckl*ad of other projects, so it really isn't looking good unless they get somebody else.

[Lalitree]

http://www.nola.com/living/t-p/index.ssf?/base/living-3/1092473940270590.xml

After 23 years of off-again/off-again production turmoil, script rewrites and ownership lawsuits, the making of "A Confederacy of Dunces," so close to fruition this past year is . . . off again.

[william]

"Norwegian Wood",

A Confederacy of Dunces

YSKOV sucks, but Hearbreaking Work is pretty cool

The Stranger

Love all of these books. all of 'em. even YSKOV. especially love that acronym.

  ATTENTION LALITREE OR WHOMSOEVER IT MAY CONCERN! ATTENTION LALITREE OR WHOMSOEVER IT MAY CONCERN!

ahem. this is the longest thread here. i could not begin to keep up with it , and everyone's little posts see, to get lost amidst the discussion. could i put in a tentative request for a new, whole literary forum to be set up? such a request may have already been put in, but i haven't been able to keep up with all the posts. hence the request. would such a forum be logistically possible? how 'bout if i said pretty pretty please  :wink:  [/quote]