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raylan by elmore leonard. read pronto and riding the rap before. casting timothy olyphant as raylan givens in justified really was brilliant.
after that forge of darkness by steve erikson. i plowed through all 12000 pages of the malazan books of the fallen this year and enjoyed the fuck out of them.
 
limonov said:
Bah, Satre is unbearable...the most unoriginal thinker of the 20th century, his works are little more than pop-philosophy interpretations of German Existentialism/phenomenology- Karl Jaspers, Edmund Husserl & Martin Heidegger. And his books all are in desperate need of a good edit (the downside of writing on amphetamines)... I find it facinating that such an inauthentic person can think so much about 'authenticity'. To quote the bible (of all things?!) 'All is vanity'.

I mean no offense, please berate me ;). I just can't abide Sartre...I'm really not a fan of that style of French writing. Give me some Camus or Celine.

Anyway, rereading 'Journey to the End of the Night'- Louis-Ferdinand Celine. He may have been an anti-semite, but he was a damn talented writer.
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Perhaps Sarte's philosophy did suffer from a lack of a certain . . . freshness (perhaps de Beauvoir was more original?). However, to call him just a mouthpiece is to neglect his influence on literature, art, and politics. At the very least, give him props for coining the term existentialism to begin with. And he was more of a student of Kierkegaard than Husserl, regardless of contact with the latter. Shrooms00087, have you tackled Being & Nothingness? Do you still suffer from mauvaise foi? ;)



Journey was the first 'stream-of-conciousness' type that really struck a cord with me. There's parallel's in that and Kerouac's style, so much that it makes me wonder what kind of direct impact it had on writing On the Road (more so than bebop?). It certainly left an impression on Bukowski, who never shuts up about him. I mean, just read Pulp.

Speaking of French writing though, today feels like a Rimbaud day.
 
Max Power said:
Journey was the first 'stream-of-conciousness' type that really struck a cord with me. There's parallel's in that and Kerouac's style, so much that it makes me wonder what kind of direct impact it had on writing On the Road (more so than bebop?). It certainly left an impression on Bukowski, who never shuts up about him. I mean, just read Pulp.
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read les chants de maldoror by comte de lautremaunt and have your mind blown.
 
I'm half-way through The Devils Disciples by Anthony Head (non-fiction). It's the story of Hitler's inner circle, and it's very gripping; it reads more like a novel than a dry academic text. I found the anecdote of Hermann Goering arriving in captivity at Nuremburg laden with suitcases containing the world's entire supply of paracodeine pills utterly priceless. (He also had a sugar bowl full of diamonds he liked to run through his fingers. Pretty gangsta....)
 
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Just discovered a Ukrainian author by the name of Andrey Kurkov. Read 2 of his books: Milkman of the Night and Gardener of Ochakov, and they were both excellent. Dark comedies that carry you along and get you knowing and loving the characters without even realising it. Definitely recommend.
 
Down and out in paris and london by george orwell. before that I read toast by nigel slater. After paris and london I'm reading high society: mind altering drugs in history and culture.
 
re-reading an autobiography of a yogi by paramahamsa yogananda

just finished reading mcluhan's the medium is the massage

and oh my god marshall mcluhan is the stone cold nuts

easily one of the most important authors ever
 
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Reading High Society: mind altering drugs in history and culture by Mike Jay. Got Sea of Poppies and A Tale of Cooks and Conquerers on the ready :)
 
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I've really enjoyed what I've read from Iain Banks thus far. Actually, a few people from Bluelight turned me on to him, I otherwise would never have heard of him. The Wasp Factory and Consider Phlebas were awesome. I also read The Crow Road, but I really can't remember anything besides the granny blowing up in the beginning. I remember enjoying it though.
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one of my favourite authors by a mile. 'walking on glass' is mind-bendingly awesome.

i can also heartily recommend:

the bridge (my #2 fave book of all time)
espedair street
canal dreams
the crow road
complicity
a song of stone

his vision is novel, moving and wonderful.

alasdair
 
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