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judagar New user Cary, NC 44 Posts |
The Last of the Mohicans
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landmark Inner circle within a triangle 5194 Posts |
It was fun to re-read this thread. I don't think my opinion has changed much. Lobo mentioned the Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler. Her novel, A Spool of Blue Thread I think is really superb, one of my all-time favorites. But I don't think we'll see the likes of a Steinbeck again--there will be no new Great American Novel because the arena is no longer books.
Edit: (Excluding, of course, the paperback novelization of Easy To Master Card Miracles, Volume 6)
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ed rhodes Inner circle Rhode Island 2885 Posts |
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On Oct 28, 2014, mastermindreader wrote: I prefer Tom Sawyer, myself.
"...and if you're too afraid of goin' astray, you won't go anywhere." - Granny Weatherwax
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S2000magician Inner circle Yorba Linda, CA 3465 Posts |
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On Oct 28, 2014, Dannydoyle wrote: The prejudice I have against The Catcher in the Rye is that it was the book that presumably led Mark David Chapman to murder John Lennon. I realize that that's not the book's fault, nor J. D. Salinger's, but it's what sticks in my mind. |
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gallagher Inner circle 1168 Posts |
It is an interesting Thread.
It amazed me Mark Twain's 'staying power'! ...that's says a lot. I was curious how things were,..some years ago. 1826..The Last of the Mohicans 1850 The Scarlet Letter 1855 Moby Dick ,...Uncle Tom's Cabin 1870 Mark Twain hit the scene. then things got a bit more,....'complex'. Faulkner. Henry Miller. Nabokov. Fitzgerald. I think John Steinbeck had the ease and lightness,..humouress touch, that Mark Twain had. Both, sold the most books. 'Travels with Charlie',..simply great. I'm tossed up between: Charles Bukowski's 'The Post Office'. "It all began as a mistake." ....i find to be the best opening sentence...🙃 and, Arthur Brandon's 'Milo and Roger'. "When I was about eight years old, I swallowed a half dollar." ....now that's a start! I think Arthur Brandon equals Mark Twain's humour, quite often,... in the story. And, it's a 'true' story,.. as is, 'The Post Office'. They dig a little deeper, in me, when planting their seeds. Charles Bukowski. The blackest humour I've ever read. He mixes a sadness, with laughter with, ...a wierd 'let's continue', ...that somehow achieves an optimisum(!). 'The Post Office' has to be read OUTLOUD(!), to work,.. at best, in a group. The social reaction,..in the moment, is as alive and vivid as it was 50 years ago. A very 'human' novel. ...very intense. The love and hate and stress, he relates, in his storys, ...is real. John Steinbeck, Mark Twain,..while 'nice and nett',.. are a bit 'Walt Disney-ish' for me. have a nice day. And,...long live 'the Book'! gallagher |
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critter Inner circle Spokane, WA 2653 Posts |
The Great Gatsby.
"The fool is one who doesn't know what you have just found out."
~Will Rogers |
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Alan M Elite user California 433 Posts |
A Confederacy of Dunces.
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Marlin1894 Special user 559 Posts |
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On Oct 30, 2014, funsway wrote: I agree. And it should be required reading 20 years out of High School. Then again 30 years out. Is it the greatest? Who knows. But it certainly rewards repeated readings. The very end? When the Pequod sinks? And now, concentric circles seized the lone boat itself, and all its crew, and each floating oar, and every lance-pole, and spinning, animate and inanimate, all round and round in one vortex, carried the smallest chip of the Pequod out of sight. But as the last whelmings intermixingly poured themselves over the sunken head of the Indian at the mainmast, leaving a few inches of the erect spar yet visible, together with long streaming yards of the flag, which calmly undulated, with ironical coincidings, over the destroying billows they almost touched; at that instant, a red arm and a hammer hovered backwardly uplifted in the open air, in the act of nailing the flag faster and yet faster to the subsiding spar. A sky-hawk that tauntingly had followed the main-truck downwards from its natural home among the stars, pecking at the flag, and incommoding Tashtego there; this bird now chanced to intercept its broad fluttering wing between the hammer and the wood; and simultaneously feeling that ethereal thrill, the submerged savage beneath, in his death-gasp, kept his hammer frozen there; and so the bird of heaven, with archangelic shrieks, and his imperial beak thrust upwards, and his whole captive form folded in the flag of Ahab, went down with his ship, which, like Satan, would not sink to hell till she had dragged a living part of heaven along with her, and helmeted herself with it. Now small fowls flew screaming over the yet yawning gulf; a sullen white surf beat against its steep sides; then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago. I mean, come on. |
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