The Illustrious House of Ramires , by Eça de Queirós. A novel about an ineffectual nobleman writing an historical novel about his heroic ancestors. Queirós has been called the Portuguese Flaubert. Large Fees and How to Get Them : a book for the private use of physicians , by Albert V. Harmon, M.D. If you practice early 20th medicine and want large fees, this book is essential reading. If you don’t, there are still lessons in its amusing and unsentimental discussion of various topics, like in the chapter “The Bugbear of Ethics”, where Lyman advises “ethics in its place is a good thing...But there is such a thing as overdoing the ethical proposition”. Histrionics: Three Plays and Over All the Mountain Tops , by Thomas Bernhard. Bernhard once said “I despise actors, indeed I hate them, for they ally themselves at the least sign of danger with the audience and betray the author and completely identify with stupidity and feeble-mindedness. Actors are the destroyers and extermina
I'd always thought I was pretty highbrow until I started reading, or at least started trying to read, the works of Wyndham Lewis. His novels are almost as difficult to read as his essays. What a Monstre!
ReplyDeleteI haven't read any of his novels. Should I?
ReplyDeleteI ran across Time and Western Man at a used bookstore and started randomly reading a few pages of his critique of Joyce and decided I had to read the whole thing. He has all these clearheaded perceptions, but tied together with sort of loony energy. The book also is a reminder of how the 20th century was already over before WWII even started.
"Blasting and Bombardeering" - his record of serving in the trenches in WW1 - is a good read since it isn't quite so mind-numbingly intellectual as his other works. Also, the trilogy of novels featuring the book I alluded to in my first comment - "Monstre Gai" - is reasonably readable.
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