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.
Mal: Well, you were right about this being a bad idea. Zoe: Thanks for sayin', sir.
'Serenity'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
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."
Fred Pete - May 17, 2012 7:25:32 am PDT #18809 of 28333
Ann, that's a ferret.
Atropa - May 17, 2012 8:15:29 am PDT #18810 of 28333
The artist formerly associated with cupcakes.
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.
javachik - May 17, 2012 10:59:48 am PDT #18811 of 28333
Our wings are not tired.
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]
Toddson - May 17, 2012 1:14:40 pm PDT #18812 of 28333
Friends don't let friends read "Atlas Shrugged"
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.
Connie Neil - May 17, 2012 1:18:14 pm PDT #18813 of 28333
brillig
The Bunter crush rules all.
edit: And the Dowager Duchess.
Toddson - May 17, 2012 1:24:25 pm PDT #18814 of 28333
Friends don't let friends read "Atlas Shrugged"
Oh, yes!
Atropa - May 17, 2012 1:40:18 pm PDT #18815 of 28333
The artist formerly associated with cupcakes.
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.
Clovis was named after a Saki character. My dad read "The Open Window" to me when I was ... four? Five? Old enough to read it on my own, but unwilling to give up having a bedtime story read to me.
Ginger - May 17, 2012 4:26:50 pm PDT #18816 of 28333
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda
Get Lord Peter and you get Bunter and the Dowager Duchess. There's no bad there.
I was thinking about Dorothy Sayers when we were talking earlier, and I think it would have been great to have read Sayers at 12, except that I would have started comparing every man to Lord Peter earlier.
Dana - May 17, 2012 4:29:08 pm PDT #18817 of 28333
I'm terrifically busy with my ennui.
So I was just thinking about Agatha Christie and rereading some Perry Mason and mysteries, and in the old stories, people do things like distract the hotel desk clerk and then surreptitiously check the register where people have signed in.
Which is completely irrelevant today, what with computers. What other old standbys of mysteries are useless these days?
Typo Boy - May 17, 2012 4:35:37 pm PDT #18818 of 28333
Calli: My people have a saying. A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken.Avon: Life expectancy among your people must be extremely short.
Hell, even in the left canon there are non bleak choices. Tent of Miracles. Or if that has too much reality, Dona Flora and her two husbands. And Amado has to have enough heft!
Also, talking of magical realism how about the Palm Wine Drinkard! Been a long time since I read it, so don't know if it is depressing - aside from being about a drunk who ends up in the land of the dead. I actually don't remember the details, but remember laughing a lot. Should read it again.