Friday, July 10, 2015

That Desert Island Thing

R.T., on Beyond Eastwood, issued a challenge to come up with a six-pack of last reads.  I struggled for a while and came up with six, but I'm unhappy with the list because there are so many others I want to include.  In addition. I didn't include any works that I hadn't already read, or rather completely read.  I'm now almost 3/4 of the way through Anthony Powell's A Dance to the Music of Time, and I've come nowhere near reading all of Frost's poetry, and I still have a few plays by Shakespeare to read. 

So, I'm going to modify R.T.'s .challenge a bit and expanded it to the magic Ten, so popular among all sorts of listings.  This will be my response to the Desert Island Challenge of Last Reads:  Which ten books would you want to be marooned with you on that Desert Island Paradise?


Shakespeare:  complete plays and poems

Proust:  In Search of Lost Time

Anthony Powell:  A Dance to the Music of Time

Frost:  complete poems and plays

Melville:  Moby Dick

Thomas Mann:  The Magic Mountain

Walter van Tilburg Clark: The City of Trembling Leaves

Loren Eiseley:  The Immense Journey

Jane Austen:  Mansfield Park or Persuasion  (a last minute decision)

Lawrence Durrell:  The Alexandria Quartet

George Eliot:  Middlemarch

Miklos Banffy:  The Transylvanian Trilogy
This is something I'm taking a chance on as I haven't read any of the three works.  However, the reviews sound interesting, and my father was born in what is now Transylvania, so I thought I would risk adding this trilogy.  The work is set in pre-WWI Hungary and is the account of two cousins who followed two very different paths.


Those who are less math challenged than I am will have noted that there are twelve works listed here-not ten.  Well, if one starts out with a six-pack, then it's only logical to expand to two six-packs, isn't it?

  I'm now working on a third six-pack, so I'd  better stop here.
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8 comments:

  1. AnonymousJuly 11, 2015 at 5:52 AM

    Bravo! I like your choices. And I applaud your ambitions, especially as they involve a 3rd six-pack.
    However, I have a confession. In one of my dark moments, when my mind was inhabited by trolls and demons, I think I must have deleted my six-pack posting (i.e., I do not find it, and I have only a vague recollection of its former existence, and no recollection of its content); so, I have no idea what I listed. And I am astonished that you remembered the substance of my posting since I -- with my increasingly damaged mind -- had already forgotten all about it. In short, your posting reminds me that my mind is in worse shape than I have been willing to admit. Even now, I am babbling and meandering. Enough!

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    1. FredJuly 11, 2015 at 1:10 PM

      R.T.,

      I created the draft of this immediately after reading your posting, so it really isn't a matter for memory. I find that writing things down immediately helps to fix them in memory and also to provide necessary information when I need it--since I will probably have forgotten it several days later.

      Delete
  2. AnonymousJuly 11, 2015 at 11:39 AM

    I don't think Moby Dick will help much with boat-building. Although, perhaps you wouldn't want to escape the island paradise.

    I wasn't even aware that Frost wrote any plays! For poetry, Frost would be good for me, although I might want to go with Sandburg instead. Or live it up and bring both.

    Aside from possibly Frost, the only one on your list which I might take would be The Alexandria Quartet. I've never read it, but have always heard of it and always mean to read it.

    A couple of mine would be Atlas Shrugged and The Count of Monte Cristo. Nice fat books that are tried and true reads for me.

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    1. FredJuly 11, 2015 at 5:05 PM

      madamevauquer,

      On the other hand, if I should manage to kill a whale, then I shall have just what I need to know to be able to butcher it.

      Actually with that stack, it will be quite a while before I consider something like exiting my Desert Paradise.

      Frost wrote 4? plays, but I doubt if he really ever expected anyone to actually put them on stage. I especially like _A Masque of Reason_ which has four characters: God, Job, Job's wife, and Satan.

      Lawrence Durrell: one of my all-time favorite English writers. _Justine_ was an assigned reading when I was in grad school and I was so taken by it that I eventually read almost everything Durrell has written, many at least twice so far--perhaps three times for the "Alexandria Quartet.".

      Delete
    2. AnonymousJuly 11, 2015 at 6:09 PM

      Thanks, Fred. I'm putting Durrell on my list.

      Delete
    3. FredJuly 11, 2015 at 9:07 PM

      madamevauquer,

      I shall be interested in hearing what you think of Durrell.

      Delete
  3. AnonymousJuly 11, 2015 at 3:55 PM

    Fred, though I have already forgotten my previously posted (and apparently erased) six-pack, I will reconsider preparing and posting a reincarnation of such a list, but I will do so with several conditions: (1) I will limit the list to six books; (2) I will limit the list to books I have wanted to read but have thus far neglected; (3) I will set a deadline [no irony intended] for my reading of those six books. So, stay tuned at Beyond Eastrod for that six-pack, and if I forget to post it soon, please send me a gentle reminder (e.g., "Hey, snap out of it you old fart! Post the damned list!").

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    1. FredJuly 11, 2015 at 5:09 PM

      R. T.,

      Have no fear--I shall be awaiting your list.

      Delete

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