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mrdfnle wrote:The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break
by Steven Sherrill
First printing, March 2000

All his other works are scholarly by nature. The college professor at the coffee shop suggested this one. I think I read it in two weeks.
Serious and a good updating of the myth.

I felt this book up in the bookstore for the longest time one day, but I didn't take it home. I guess I owe it. No idea why I didn't buy it, as it was appealing to me. Probably because I already had a stack of 5 or 6 in my hands.

Angus Young wrote:This was a trilogy?

Does he jump over the Snake River in the last book?

There was The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Runaway Ralph, and Ralph S. Mouse. And they were fantastic. Step aside Tolkien. Unfortunately, I believe, there was only ever a TV adaptation of the Mouse and the Motorcycle. It was much better than the Lord of the Rings though- mostly because there wasn't a slight breeze every time the camera pushed in for a close-up.


Jon

19th
Bleak House, Dickens

20th
Of Human Bondage, Maugham

One for the young ladies, one for the young men...

Andrew,

First things that came to my mind for 20th Century were Lolita and Ask The Dust. Also, L. Durrell's The Alexandria Quartet, but you have to read all four, and that could be daunting. Joe Conrad's Victory is also one of my favorites.

I had to think for a while about 19th Century English-language literature. I haven't read that much of it. Mark Twain over Dickens, I guess. Arthur Conan Doyle? Edgar Allen Poe? I don't know.

Good luck!

Superking wrote:Joe Conrad's Victory is also one of my favorites.

I really like this book, too. I'm surprised more people don't talk about it.

Conrad's Heart of Darkness* and Nabokov's Lolita. We've all read both for good reason. Politics, rage, huge interior worlds, moral trespasses, fantastic characters and writing. Excellent for discussions.


*first appeared in 1899. So there you go.

itchy mcgoo wrote:Conrad's Heart of Darkness* and Nabokov's Lolita. We've all read both for good reason. Politics, rage, huge interior worlds, moral trespasses, fantastic characters and writing. Excellent for discussions.


*first appeared in 1899. So there you go.

Yeah, but Conrad's book clearly anticipates modernism, so I'm not sure it's fair to count it as a "nineteenth century novel."

Brett Eugene Ralph wrote:

itchy mcgoo wrote:Conrad's Heart of Darkness* and Nabokov's Lolita. We've all read both for good reason. Politics, rage, huge interior worlds, moral trespasses, fantastic characters and writing. Excellent for discussions.


*first appeared in 1899. So there you go.

Yeah, but Conrad's book clearly anticipates modernism, so I'm not sure it's fair to count it as a "nineteenth century novel."

And how!

Okay then, Uncle Tom's Cabin and Lord of the Flies -or- Tess of the D'Ubervilles and Lolita.

itchy mcgoo wrote:

Brett Eugene Ralph wrote:

itchy mcgoo wrote:Tess of the D'Ubervilles and Lolita.

Sexy!!!

Woyzeck and Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, or Daniel Deronda and The Human Stain. Invidual vs. society, etc.