Books!

[tree_and_leaf]

I suppose everyone's seen the Books you can't live without list - I have to say, I'm surprised by some of the choices (I would never have thought that 'To Kill A Mocking Bird' would come so high, not because it isn't a worthy book, but because I hadn't realised it had reached that level of cultural exposure over here). Of course, it appears that the list is quite skewed towards school reading (Lord of the Flies, anyone?)

On the other hand, I feel that anyone who regards 'The Da Vinci Code' as indespensible really, really needs to read some other books, stat.

This makes me wonder - what ten books, oh flist, couldn't you live without?

ETA: My top ten, also in no particular order.
1. Gaudy Night.
2. The Lord of the Rings.
3. Buddenbrooks (Thomas Mann)
4. Die Aula (Hermann Kant). Definitely the most obscure book on my list, it's a Bildungsroman and an apologia for the East German state. The latter aspect doesn't quite work for me - though it's certainly a fascinating insight into another mentality - but it's also an unforgettable portrait of how education changes you, for good or ill, and very funny and evocative to boot.
5. Willehalm (Wolfram von Eschenbach), even if it is unfinished. A story about faith, doubt, intolerance, love, and war, and one which is quite seriously worried about the theology of crusading. Has a fantastic heroine, too.
6. The Divine Comedy (in Sayers' translation, although I do intend to attempt the Italian some time).
7. The Bible, probably in Luther's verion (though in practice, I use the New Jerusalem most often; and obviously the KJV is important to the development of English literature)
8. Barchester Towers.
9. Pride and Prejudice. Yes, I know, predictable...
10. We didn't mean to go to Sea (or almost any other of the Arthur Ransome books)

(Harry Potter probably should be round about 11, as should 'Effi Briest' by Theodore Fontane. That definitely is cheating, thogh)

+++++

In other news, apparently Auden was married to Erika Mann. I feel bad that I haven't heard about it from either side, although I'm assuming it was a marriage of convenience more than anythig else. But still, how did I fail to notice Auden marrying into the Mann clan, who are now definitely the most screwed up family of the literary world - although I suppose the whole thing turned out better than one might have expected.

Comments

[juno-magic.livejournal.com]

Oh, good meme! *steals*

And the Mann clan may have been screwed up, but there's some seriously interesting books to show for it. *g*

[tree_and_leaf]

Oh yes, indeed, which is the main thing in many ways.

"Buddenbrooks" would definitely be in my top ten (which I ought to type up) although that makes me very low-brow for a Germanist, I suspect...

[helflaed.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall hearing about this on a radio programme some time ago. You are absolutely right that it was a marriage of convenience- they had not met before the ceremony, and only married to allow Miss Mann to stay in Britain to avoid Nazi persecution.

[tree_and_leaf]

Good for Wystan, in the circumstances!

[trude.livejournal.com]

There is some info about the Auden/Mann marriage in Andrea Weiss' book about Erika & Klaus M.; Flucht ins Leben. Definitively a marriage of convenience.

[tree_and_leaf]

Thanks for the info.

[sacred-sarcasm.livejournal.com]

To Kill a Mocking Bird's position is probably also due to school reading, I should think. We didn't read it in our school, but I know it's set for GCSE in many places.

(This list isn't in any particular order, just as they come to mind)
1. Gaudy Night, Dorothy L Sayers - this book has probably influenced me more than is strictly healthy.
2. The Book of Common Prayer (the proper one, nothing new and updated and nasty)
3. My collected poems of Auden.
4. The Earthsea Quartet (if I'm allowed to cheat and have a quartet!), Ursula K. LeGuin. I read this in my teens and I still dip into it for 'comfort reading'.
5. The Left Hand of Darkness - also by LeGuin. Absolutely fascinating book.
6. A KJV Bible
7. The Hippopotamus, Stephen Fry. I'd have to have at least one of his books, and this is my current favourite.
8. Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen. I've always preferred this to P&P, for some reason.
9. Any or all of PG Wodehouse's Jeeves books.
10. Something, anything, by Graham Greene (except Travels with my Aunt or any of the short stories), but I'm having difficulty picking just one... probably either The End of the Affair (though I've just re-read that recently, which is probably why it's at the front of my mind!) or A Burnt Out Case or... oh, any of them!

[tree_and_leaf]

The Book of Common Prayer (the proper one, nothing new and updated and nasty)

Ah, you mean 1549, with the exorcism in the baptism liturgy? *ducks*

[juno-magic.livejournal.com]

Ten is just not enough. I just realized that I have LeGuin not on my list. Nor Silverberg. Or Heinlein. Or some more of my favourite poets. Drat.

Actually, I just wanted to say that "Left Hand of Darkness" is truly great. :)

[tree_and_leaf]

PG Wodehouse is marvellous, though I'm more of a Blandings person myself....

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

Not ranked, but:

1)Kimon Friar, Modern Greek Poetry (I know I can't live without this one because of the lengths I went to in order to replace a previous copy, which included directing my parents to a specific bookshop in Olympia "as they happened to be going to the Pelopennese"); 2)Mary Renault: The Persian Boy
3)Jane Austen: Persuasion
4)Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice
5)Saki: Complete Short Stories
6)New Oxford Book of English Verse (ed Gardner)
7)Tolkein: The Lord of the Rings
8) Lois McMaster Bujold: A Civil Campaign
9) Dorothy L. Sayers: Gaudy Night
10) Kipling: complete short stories if permitted.

[tree_and_leaf]

Interesting choices. I would miss Kipling - I don't see why you shouldn't have the complete short stories.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Oooh, thinking about this (can one count Forest's books as a roman fleuve rather than single items?)

[tree_and_leaf]

I think that's permissible.

I;ve just realised I've deprived myself of Patrick O'Brian. Damn.

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

Of course, if one is allowed to cheat and separate out children's books (the way the New York Times did when they realised that otherwise they were going to have JKR sitting at the top of their best seller list forever there's list two:

1) We didn't mean to go to Sea (Ransome)
2) Missee Lee (Ransome; "she held the Horace as if it were a revolver" "Let them fire on that!" "Better you let me take the tiller now, I think")
3)Cue For Treason (Trease)
4) The Moon of Gomrath (Garner)
5) The Cricket Term (Antonia Forest but would like the entire series as roman fleuve if oursin does, including the two historicals)
6) The Prisoner of Azkaban, JKR
7) The Tombs of Atuan, Le Guin
8)The Silver Chair, CS Lewis
9)The Hills of Varna, Trease
10)The Picts and the Martyrs, Ransome

[tree_and_leaf]

Missee Lee is one of the best characters in children's fiction.

The Silver Chair is my favourite Narnia story too - although I get the impression that this is unusual - people generally seem to pick Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

[bekijane.livejournal.com]

How odd that we should have such simnilar taste in some of the more obscure books: Gaudy Night is one of my favourite books ever, currently sitting face down open page atop my monitor. Arthur Ransome too although I'd probably pick Winter Holiday if forced to choose.

Harry Potter one to three. I can live without the others, and unless the last book is far more heavily influenced by the editor, and less influenced by the fanfic it'll stay just one to three. LOTR is almost a given, but that's a trilogy of four IMO.

Add the complete works of Shakespeare to that and I'm done. I cheated.

[tree_and_leaf]

Winter Holiday is wonderful, too - it was a near run thing.

I think three is probably the best of the HPs, but I'm fond of the latter three as well - although they could have benefited from firmer editing in places (particularly in Goblet, although that's partly structural - given the plot, it's bound to be very episodic).

I am ashamed to admit that I could live without Shakespeare.

[greenwoodside.livejournal.com]

I love eight - both the book and the BBC dramatisation, the latter of which for the transcendent performances of Hawthorne, McEwan and Rickman. One day, I will get my hands on an icon of the Archdeacon on the verge of exploding into one of his rages. In my family, my father and I are both prone to 'doing an Archdeacon'.

As to a list of my own, I feel I could have quite a happy life without any books at all, though not without stories.

[tree_and_leaf]

The adaptation of BT is one of the best things the BBC has done, and I think it may be Rickman's best role... (though I'm glad they didn't follow canon and give him red hair - that would have looked a little odd.)

And yes, stories are the main thing.

[prelud.livejournal.com]

The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson
The Complete Poems of Jan Skacel
The Complete Poems of R. M. Rilke
Gallows Songs by Christian Morgenstern
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
Narcissus and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse
Billiards at Half-Past Nine by Heinrich Boll
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco

And there are more, of course, books by Karel Capek (including his translations of French poetry), Ursula K. LeGuin (Tombs of Atuan and Tehanu are the best), Robert Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land - but that`s because of Jubal Harshaw, not Michael), Viktor Frankl, J.D.Salinger (Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction), Nick Hornby (so laugh at me), J.K Rowling, Agatha Christie...

More complete list is here http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?view=benvenuta, but you`ve got to mind the rating. Da Vinci Code is there, too, with half a star. There was no lower rating available.

[tree_and_leaf]

Interesting choices. I didn't consider poetry at all - well, other than mediaeval narrative, which is not the same thing. Rather remiss of me....

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

Am I opening myself up to being pelted with vegetables if I admit that I did not like To Kill a Mockingbird? ::ducks::

To have it sitting on a list *above* Shakespeare seems like sacrilege to me. But that's just me, I suppose.

As far as books I could not live without, I'm honestly not sure. Though I could probably come up with ten and then make puppy eyes and beg for more. In no particular order.

1. Alexandre Dumas - Le comte de Monte-Cristo
2. Complete Works of William Shakespeare
3. Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe
4. Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice
5. Charlotte Brontë - Jane Eyre
6. Guy Gavriel Kay - The Lions of Al-Rassan
7. Frances Hodgson Burnett - A Little Princess
8. Sharon Kay Penman - The Sunne in Splendour
9. Ellen Kushner (and Delia Sherman) - The Riverside books (they do exist in a single volume though I'm not certain if that's the title)
10. Philip Pullman - The Sally Lockhart trilogy (I haven't seen a single-volume set yet, but I'm certain it will appear sooner or later)

...and if I had another space, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

[tree_and_leaf]

I've, um, never actually read TKAM, so it's no skin off my nose.... (and I fear 'worthy' may be all too acurate.)

I haven't read, or even heard of the Penman or the Riverside books. What are they like?

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

You do know that the Dorothy Sayers translation is more difficult than learning Italian, don't you?

[tree_and_leaf]

Really? I never found them particularly bad...

Sammee's Top 10 Books

[sammee42.livejournal.com]

In No Particular Order:
1. The Hobbit.
2. The Lord of the Rings.
3. Mere Christianity.
4. The Bible (KJV)
5. To Kill a Mockingbird. Maybe that's my Americanism shining through, but I've always loved, LOVED this book for many reasons.
6. John Skelton's The Garland of Laurel (does this count as a book?) or his 'Speak, Parrot'
7. Pride and Prejudice.
8. Persuasion.
9. Either 'Lolita' or 'Things Fall Apart' (Chinua Achebe).
10. The Awakening (Kate Chopin).

Re: Sammee's Top 10 Books

[tree_and_leaf]

That's a vaery varied list, despite the two Tolkiens. I have to confess I've never read either 'Lolita' or 'The Awakening' - one of these days, I should fill in the holes in my modern reading....

[sammee42.livejournal.com]

Are you serious about Barchester Towers being one of your favourite books? What did you like about it? I read it for my 19th-Century British Novel course as an undergrad, and I have to admit being very bored. Maybe I would like it more now that I've lived in England and also now that I'm more well read.

[tree_and_leaf]

Of course I'm serious! The dry wit! The characterisation! The affectionate but unsentimental observation! Ecclesiastical skullduggery!

It probably is improved by knowledge of the C of E, though. You might try the BBC adapatation, which has Rickman as a rather unpleasant, ambitious chaplain, and Nigel Hawthorne (Madness of King George, Yes, Minister) as a rather choleric Archdeacon, as well as Geralidine McEwan as the apallingbut indomnitable wife of the Bishop... Has to be seen.