'Out Of Gas'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
HA.
The thorn in my side on Goodreads finally hit a wall with her "Dan Simmons is popular and some things that are popular are crappy therefore Dan Simmons is crappy" line of reasoning and went straight for "Hitler used to be popular too!"
I WIN.
(Sorry, I know this is of no import to anyone but me, I just felt the need to backchannel a little. Literary seemed the best place to put it.)
... Dan Simmons is popular? The guy who wrote Hyperion? I mean, SF folks know who he is, but I do think it's a stretch to think of him as popular.
(Sorry, I know this is of no import to anyone but me, I just felt the need to backchannel a little. Literary seemed the best place to put it.)
It is of import. And funny. You totally win.
It was funny and you win. . . but she won't ever believe it because that is her weakness.
Jess, thanks for the recs! Press Here looks fantastic, and we actually got the pop-up nursery rhyme book as a Christmas present, though I haven't looked at it yet.
I'm having fun reading a Jeeves & Wooster collection in my spare time these days -- it's just the right level of light & funny and can be put down after 2 or 3 pages without interrupting the flow of the story at all.
Two other great short story masters: Dorothy Parker and Flannery O'Connor. Both of whom I've devoured in quantity, but never for a class and I always kind of wished some teacher had actually assigned them, because they are both just bristling with stuff (both ideas and style) that's great to talk and argue about.
My freshman English professor leaned heavily on Eudora Welty and Flannery O'Connor. I remember them fondly -- a touch of Southern Gothic, but not enough to be inaccessible.
You know who's short stories should be assigned in school? Saki's. Full of wit, snark, style, and all sorts of class issues to discuss.
I am lucky enough to have a taped (a friend taped it from her record back in the mid 1990s for me) copy of Parker reading many of her poems. But the highlight is a complete recording of her reading "Horsie". It's spectacular. And will gut you.
Oh, the glories of the teh interwebs: [link]
A ha this is what Jane taped for me: [link]
ooh ... I had a ollection of Saki's stories when I was young - I remembe loving them. I didn't understand some of them, but I enjoyed the twists.
And for those who like mysteries but don't care of Agatha Christie, there's Dorothy Sayers. For many, the Wimsey crush is inevitable.