Help educate the ignorant!

[Rasputin666]

See, I love books. I read good science fiction, popular science and the like...

But I realized that my main reason for reading is a quest: a quest to find a voice that will resonate with me. Something that I never get with SF or most of the stuff I read (Charles Bukowski came cloese as it gets, but that's it)...
It's hard to find a soul mate in the form of a character or (even better) the author who invented it because I'm weird. I admit to this fact without the slightest pride or joy. Life could have been a hell lot simpler if I was one of the others.

I realized that what is called the Western Canon holds books that stood the test of time and still relevant. Alas, like most of you I was educated in a public education school in my home country, and li. classes thought me to despise anything that is considered "good literature" by the so-called established society.

So what I'm loking for is to re-educate myself... Can you recommand me on any non-fiction books that in your opinion are a great introduction to the "great books"? I don't limit myself to stuff such as Don Quixote etc.- far from it- if it has contemporary stuff too that will be great (like Murakami, though I don't dig him in particular).

I have tried reading "high lit". Enjoyed Borges, and The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov... Borges is like a drawing of escher- for the intellect, while the later is good book, but I found it hard to relate to any of the characters.

I guess that in some way you may say that I'm looking for documentary in a book... Something that's pointless like life itself... Dostoevsky maybe (should read him)...

Do forgive me for my ramblings, forget about what I wrote after the bold paragraph...

I know about "The Western Canon" by Harold Bloom. Any opininos? More suggestions are wellcome, ofcourse.

Thanks.

[Petronius]

Try Nabokov... anything of his most famous works, but I'd suggest Ada or Ardor in particular. It even has tints of sci-fi (by no means relevant, but the action does take place in a different world) and allusions to Borges, plus that it's absolutely beautiful.

I don't know about the canon as academia sees it. The works there are no doubt important in the history of literature, but I hardly found any of these authors to resonate with my modern mind. They read like either children or old men. You'd have to step down in their own world to truly appreciate what they did, and, like myself, you don't seem to find purpose that.

[mayneverhave]

There have been many arguments concerning the canon on these forums. If we can assume, for a moment (as I do), that there exists a loose group of literature of quality that is commonly agreed upon by critics, then its best to look at something like Bloom's book, or another list of the Western canon online. If you take a look at some anthologies (like Norton's Anthology of English literature) you'll find the selections of the editors on who to include and what to include can form a basic/loose canon. Generally there are considered great world literary works that would be included in any canon, and of course there are works that are more specialized to a specific language or region. For example, although I wouldn't include a work like "Dubliners" by James Joyce in a world canon, I would include it in a specifically Irish canon.

I doubt you wanted that kind of explanation however. You'd prefer suggestions.
You mentioned Dostoevsky. That is not at all a bad place to start. Personally I recommend his novel, The Brothers Karamzov, over any of his other work (which you should also look at when you have time). The novel, in its 700+ pages, somehow exists in a state of ambivalence regarding faith and doubt, and the characters which occupy the novel are of various types to satisfy any reader. The novel also does not really require its reader to be well-read (meaning it's very accessible). Once you get some literary knowledge under your belt, you can move on to more difficult movements, like modernism.

Enjoy!

[Tsuyoiko]

But I realized that my main reason for reading is a quest: a quest to find a voice that will resonate with me. Something that I never get with SF or most of the stuff I read

I found this first with Isaac Asimov and later with Dostoevsky.


I guess that in some way you may say that I'm looking for documentary in a book...

Dr Zhivago by Boris Pasternak or A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn would be good choices I think.

[Rasputin666]

Thanks for the recommandations, I will look at all of the books, but I was probably not clear in my request:

see, what I'm looking for is a book about books. A book that will teach me how to read (what stuff to notice, etc.) and what to read... While I'm very doubtfull that I will ever learn to love poetry, or that I'll read Moby Dick for that matter, but I sure can't just let it go...

I also think that classical lit. isn't synonimous with "resonating". Who knows? Maybe I can find what I'm looking in some book by an obscure cult author, but it's hard to know, really. It's like gambling. You pick a book and just hope that it will relate, I guess.

I'm also very fond of lists... The Modern Library list, the Times list, Guardian list etc...

[kelby_lake]

Chekov?

Basically anything Russian.

[alestar89]

Read Samuel Beckett. Do it! Really. You'll get it. It will blow your mind away. Try his trilogy of novels. It's fantastic!

[Etienne]

Bely - Petersburg
Döblin - Berlin Alexanderplatz
Celine - Travel to the End of the Night
Kafka - Everything
Gombrowicz - Ferdydurke
Camus - The Stranger
Nabokov - Lolita
Gide - The Counterfeiters
Beckett - The Unnamable
Rulfo - Pedro Paramo
Borges - Fictions
Kundera - The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Valery - Mr. Teste
Kanafani - Men in the Sun
Kawabata - Snow Country
Joyce - Dubliners
Proust - In Search of Lost Time
Musil - The Man Without Qualities
Garcia Marquez - One Hundred Years of Solitude
Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby
Sartre - The Nausea

Here are my recommendations, based on your criterias, from the 20th centry.

[jcjp]

There have been many arguments concerning the canon on these forums. If we can assume, for a moment (as I do), that there exists a loose group of literature of quality that is commonly agreed upon by critics, then its best to look at something like Bloom's book, or another list of the Western canon online. If you take a look at some anthologies (like Norton's Anthology of English literature) you'll find the selections of the editors on who to include and what to include can form a basic/loose canon. Generally there are considered great world literary works that would be included in any canon, and of course there are works that are more specialized to a specific language or region. For example, although I wouldn't include a work like "Dubliners" by James Joyce in a world canon, I would include it in a specifically Irish canon.

I doubt you wanted that kind of explanation however. You'd prefer suggestions.
You mentioned Dostoevsky. That is not at all a bad place to start. Personally I recommend his novel, The Brothers Karamzov, over any of his other work (which you should also look at when you have time). The novel, in its 700+ pages, somehow exists in a state of ambivalence regarding faith and doubt, and the characters which occupy the novel are of various types to satisfy any reader. The novel also does not really require its reader to be well-read (meaning it's very accessible). Once you get some literary knowledge under your belt, you can move on to more difficult movements, like modernism.

Enjoy!

I would hesitate to recommend the brothers karamazov first. It needs the perspective of one who has read his other works to accurately judge his moral character. Otherwise he'll end up like the slew of kids at my school: saying 2+2=5 (which is from notes from the underground, note the fallacy of wikipedia) automatically disproves any notion of god.

No, in the Grand Inquisitor his proof is much more extensive and thought-out than any of Ayn Rand's A=A "stuff," yet reading it again I really understand it much better having read some of Dostoevsky's other works. Notably Notes and Crime and Punishment (which I believe it where you should start if you're interested in him).

Also disagree on Etienne recommending Proust: it is NOT meant to be for someone just starting out on their literary adventure. It bored me to death the first time I ever read Swann's Way.

Naturally Petronius took the words out of my mouth: would definitely recommend Lolita by Nabokov (his best, though it isn't absolutely required that you read some of his earlier work). His use of language in general places him squarely within the top 3 (yes, ahead of william shakespeare) of all time in my mind. Reading that novel is such a joy anymore, yet you will have to be.... how do I put this?.... "open" to many literary techniques.

[mayneverhave]

see, what I'm looking for is a book about books. A book that will teach me how to read (what stuff to notice, etc.) and what to read... While I'm very doubtfull that I will ever learn to love poetry, or that I'll read Moby Dick for that matter, but I sure can't just let it go...

Ah. Francine Prose has a book called "Reading like a Writer", where she goes through the different components of prose writing and what to look for as a writer. Her point (one I agree with) is that in order to get the full experience of reading, we have to examine books critically and analytically and consider the different technical aspects of the book - similiar to how you can "watch a film like a director" or "look at a painting like a painter".

I for one don't care much for the book, but that's because I don't particularly need anyone to tell me how to read. But if you're interested in that type of thing, check it out.

[hoo]

Learning to read is for people who read for living. All others can read what they like. So take it easy and don't force yourself to read what you find boring. But of course it's good to read something new. My advise is to start with some really good SF. Good choice is Stanislaw Lem.

[slobone]

So what I'm loking for is to re-educate myself... Can you recommand me on any non-fiction books that in your opinion are a great introduction to the "great books"?

Did you mean to say non-fiction? Cause everything you mention is fiction...