Norman Geras's Must-Read Pile



A Book for Every Step...


Wendy
One of the pleasures of wandering the web in the last few years has been the discovery of the Weblog of Norman Geras . I relish Norm's irony and perception as he comments  in depth on poiltical and social life in Britain and the world. His posts include observations on literature, music, cricket  - and more or less everything.
It's great that Norm has agreed to share with us his must- read pile. Looking at his pile I nearly entitled this post Promises to Myself. I suppose that's what a Must-Read pile is. It's also, I think, like the centre of a bookish spider's web which ultimately includes every book one has ever read.  

Norman Geras Thanks to Wendy for inviting me to write about what's on my must-read pile right now. I'd better start with the confession that I don't have just a pile, I have a whole shelf. It currently holds some 60 titles. I keep telling myself I can't acquire any more novels till I've cut the number by... ooh, half. But then something catches my eye in a charity shop, or I absolutely must have another book by an author one of whose novels I just finished reading, and so it goes on. Anyway, I won't inflict the whole shelf on you. Here's a representative sample of 10 books that are to be read.

 

Eventide by Kent Haruf

This is a sequel to Plainsong by the same author, a novel I read a couple of weeks ago and liked so much that I have to get to this follow-up soon. It's a bit like Anne Tyler, except set in a small Colorado town rather than in Baltimore. Actually, it's like Tyler only in that it's life going on for ordinary people in different varieties of family, and quietly powerful.

Villette by Charlotte Brontë

This is the last step of a reading project of mine, of which I have several. I've read all of the Brontë novels (Charlotte, Emily and Anne) apart from Villette and I need to complete the set.

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

It's a book I haven't read yet - still! Enough said.

Portrait of the Bride by Betty Miller

I recently read her Farewell Leicester Square and was mighty impressed by it, so resolved to get hold of some of her other titles, most of which are out of print. Lo and behold, visiting my Mom in Israel last month I spotted Portrait of the Bride among her books and she kindly let me take it. In this case I love the physical book even before I've started it. It's a somewhat battered old copy, published by Blue Ribbon Books Inc, New York, in 1936; and it's an ex-library copy, with a cancelled stamp from Norelius Community Library, Idaho. The borrowing slip is still attached to the back endpaper and reveals that the book was borrowed 55 times between September 1941 and January 1991. For what would I want a Kindle?

In A Free State by V.S. Naipaul

I've never read anything by Naipaul and I doubt I would have got to him but for the fact that a friend kindly gave Adèle and me a copy of this one at Christmas, and urged us to try it. So I'll give it a go.

What Maisie Knew by Henry James

Another of my projects - to make my way through the works of 'The Master', which is what he is.

The Best of Everything by Rona Jaffe

I'm told both by women in my family and by women outside it that this is a marvellous book. I just gotta read it.

Eight Months on Ghazzah Street by Hilary Mantel

This one I bought not long after reading Mantel's A Change of Climate. I've enjoyed all of her books that I've read (which don't include the biggies), so it's a safe bet.

Sabbath's Theater by Philip Roth

Yet another of my projects, to do the complete works of Philip Roth. I've got through 21 of them to date, and I'm not about to stop. He's a towering figure in American fiction, Carmen Callil notwithstanding.

The Master Bedroom by Tessa Hadley

I didn't know anything about either the book or its author until a few days ago when we were round at my daughter Jenny's. She said I would like it and encouraged me to take it home. Jenny has a pretty good, if not infallible, idea of the sort of books I like, and the success rate of her recommendations is high.

 

 

Norman Geras  is Professor Emeritus of Government at the University of Manchester. In a long academiccareer, he has contributed substantially to the analysis of the works of Karl Marx particularly in his book Marx and Human Nature and the article 'The Controversy About Marx and Justice', which remains a standard work on the issue.

The Must-Read Pile: Books have their Reasons

Since I was a child, as I wrote in The Romancer, I have obsessed about books, on shelves, in libraries, in bookshops. And like most readers and writers I gather books like a magpie and end up with a sometimes towering must-read pile. My flowery Kindle has added to, not ta not taken away from this habit. Often the pile expresses just who you are and what you are up to in your life. The pile changes, it does not diminish. It is like the granny's apron in the child's story whose pockets are magically filled as they are emptied.

I thought I'd make a list here of the current pile with the reasons why the books are there.

Writing Poems by Peter Sampson.
I am a professional novelist but a very amateur and innocent poet and this book looks business like and practical, not intimidated by or intimidading about the arcane process. I could learn something here. Also I have a poet in my current novel and am trying to get inside her mind.

Delighting the Heart. A Notebook by Women Writers. Susan Sellers Ed  1989
 Found this in a second hand shop. Very  right-on 1980s but with  some essays by good names, including Helene Sixous (Writing as a Second Heart) and Emma Tennant (A Strong Story Telling Impulse) Worth dipping into. Also there are many self-conscious (in a good say...)  poets here. Useful for the current novel.

Writing with a Vengeance. The Countess de Chabrillon's Rise from Prostitution. Carol Mossiman,(2009)
Academic study and analysis examining the life and works of a Nineteenth Century Courtesan, a self- taught novelist and writer. This is for research for a new novel. Should be fun to read and best illustrates the delight of mixing work with play just written about today on Life Twice Tasted. To be read and noted in depth

France The Dark Years 1940-44 Julian Jackson (2001)
Already read and noted but still on the pile - like a safety blanket - to check facts and approaches for the current novel, nearly complete.

Mr Stephenson Regrets David Williams (2012) To read in preparation for interviewing David Willians for The Writing Game in April

Bridge to The Moon Eileen Elgey (2012)
Novel about a boy who has emerged from the care system by a talented and sensitive writer. To read and review for this page.

For the Sake of Silence Michael Cawood Green (2012)
A magisterial novel about silence built around a narrated biography of  Abbot Pfanner the charismatic leader of Trappists in South Africa. this is a highly imagined novel based on immaculate research and deep thinking.I met Michael and his talk of this novel was intriguing so I had to have it.  As a writer I am interested in it to think through the technical leap from fact to fiction. I am well into this book and look forward to finishing it when I will feature it on this page. Going very well so far.

And piled up, waiting for me on my flowery Kindle are:


The Road, by Cormac McCarthy.
To read for the Iconic Book Group

The Chouans  and four other novels  by Honore de Balzac
To read as background for the courtesan novel (see above).

The Sense of and Ending by Julian barnes.
Because my friend Gillian says I should read it. Recommendations by well read friends is the way books go viral.

I know! I know! Looks like the inside of the mind of a raving book obsessive. Well, I suppose that's what this blog is about, isn't it?

Last thought: I wondered if there was anyone out there who would like their own annotated pile shown on this page. If so, let me know.

w