Review of the Day: The Polysyllabic Spree

The Polysyllabic Spree is a collection of 14 essays that Nick Hornby wrote for the Believer magazine. Described on the cover as, “A hilarious and true account of one man’s struggle with the monthly tide is the books he’s bought and the books he’s been meaning to read,” it is the famous person’s version of a book blog.

Hornby is a funny guy, so he brings some levity to a topic that can bring out the pomposity in the best of us. He admits that his lofty intentions often outpace his attention span and his whims divert him from his goals. He admits he forgets most of what he reads. He lauds literature over all other forms of entertainment in one essay, only to recant in the next because he watched a terrific football match. He makes literary criticism jolly.

His consumption includes fiction, biography, science books, and poetry. He incorporates several reviews of the books he read into his essays and writes at length about some of his favorite authors. He salts this hotchpot with commentary about the reader’s life, such as this treat: “I’m not entirely sure why I chose those two in particular, beyond the usual attempts at reinvention that periodically seize one in a bookstore.”

There are two more volumes in this series. With luck, they will be as inspiring and entertaining as this one.

OTHER REVIEWS

Vapour Trails

(If you would like your review listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it)

Favorite Unknown

This week, Booking Through Thursday asks:

Who’s your favorite author that other people are NOT reading? The one you want to evangelize for, the one you would run popularity campaigns for? The author that, so far as you’re concerned, everyone should be reading–but that nobody seems to have heard of. You know, not JK Rowling, not Jane Austen, not Hemingway–everybody’s heard of them. The author that you think should be that famous and can’t understand why they’re not…

Since I tend to enjoy books by Mid-Century authors no one reads anymore (besides J.G. and C.S. at Hotch Pot Cafe, Joy, and a couple of other blogger buddies), I have several I could choose from.  Kingsley Amis springs immediately to mind, or even Helen McInnes. Or how about Frances Parkinson Keyes?

But my first choice is -- and probably always will be unless there is a massive seachange in popular taste -- Anthony Powell.

His Dance to the Music of Time is incredible and provides everything I want in a novel -- evolving characters, complex story, and England between the wars. Although published as 12 separate novels, Dance is usually listed as one "book" on "Must Read" lists like the Modern Library's list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century, so I fidge a little and always make it my "desert island" book. 

Powell wrote several other novels, literary criticism, and four volumes of memoirs. I hope to read all his books. And I definitely plan to re-read Dance, likely more than once.

Opening Sentence of the Day: O Pioneers!

"One January day, thirty years ago, the little town of Hanover, anchored on a windy Nebraska tableland, was trying not to be blown away."

-- O Pioneers! by Willa Cather

That is a terrific opening sentence. And it took me immediately back to my childhood in Waterloo, a little town anchored on a windy Nebraska tableland, where I spent every January trying not to be blown away.

This novel is on the Radcliffe list of Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century -- the rival to the Modern Library's list.  Finishing the Modern Library list inspired me to start this blog. Now I am inspired to get the Radcliffe list finished once and for all.

Teaser Tuesday Trifecta

My teasers have been stacking up, so I have three of them today.

So this last month was, as I believe you people say, a bust.  I had high hopes for it too; it was Christmastime in England, and I was intending to do a little holiday comfort reading -- David Copperfield and a couple of John Bunyan novels, say, while sipping an eggnog and heroically plowing my way through some enormous animal carcass or another.

-- The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby

During the two weeks before the event he would cannibalize an appropriate police uniform and the accompanying accouterments.  He had already, weeks before, got hold of a police badge and the papers of a defunct colleague -- nothing that could withstand intensive scrutiny, but good enough to pass routine inspection while approaching the cordons leading to the Bolshoi Theatre.

-- A Very Private Plot by William F. Buckley, Jr.

Since Balzac's day, of course, Paris has changed. No one is too ambitious, since its populace is now cosseted in the meagre but constant comforts of the socialist state, and the city's glory days are long in the past.

-- The Flaneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris by Edmund White



Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event.

Mailbox Monday

Thanks to power-publicist Mary Bisbee-Beek, two books arrived at my house in time for Mailbox Monday.  Even though these are going straight onto my Guilt List, I am still excited about them.  Mary usually* sends me excellent books.

Eden Springs by Laura Kasischke (a historical mystery kind of thing involving the true story of a creepy religious colony on the shores of Lake Michigan in the early 1900s -- it's all I can do to not read it right this minute)



An American Map: Essays by Anne-Marie Oomen (essays inspired by travels -- so perfect for my mid-winter armchair traveler urges)



I also finally had a minute to run into Second Glance Books to briefly chat with Rachelle, my favorite Portland bookseller and use my Reading Local contest money.  I only had time to browse few the first shelves, but found three books before I even got to the "D" authors:

Nightwood by Djuna Barnes (on the Erica Jong list)

Talking it Over by Julian Barnes (I've never read his books, but Nick Hornby mentioned him favorably in The Polysyllabic Spree)



Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon (I loved the movie and think Chabon is a genius, so predict that this will percolate to the top of my TBR shelf fairly quickly)




*  I say "usually" because, although Mary has sent me several books that I have really, really enjoyed, such as Basil's Dream by Christine Hale (reviewed here) and Good for the Jews by Debra Spark (reviewed here), she is also responsible for The Letter from Death by Lillian Moats (reviewed here), my least favorite book of 2009.